Punisher 618

The stars wavered faintly in the black of space, the only tell-tale sign of a cloaked ship dropping out of warp. A small port on the underside of the stealth ship opened and a thin blade of yellow light momentarily stabbed out as a tiny figure shot into space.
His breathing was even and measured as his eyes scanned the readouts on the inside of his visor. In the distance, a giant asteroid hung in the void, slowly rotating. His target. A soft female voice spoke, coming seemingly from within his skull.

“Sensor readings complete. Distance to target twenty seven thousand kilometres. ETA ten minutes. All systems functioning within normal parameters”. The readout winked out, leaving a faint cross-hair and range finder in its place, counting down the clicks. Onwards, Punisher 618 sped towards his destination.

As he drew nearer to the asteroid he noticed the usual surge of adrenaline during a mission was absent. He should be feeling nervous, excited, tense. But all he felt was a calculated calmness. It must be the limbic inhibitor, he thought to himself. He had been awoken from deep hibernation less than six hours ago. His liaison officer had informed him that several modifications had been made to his already super-human physiology while he slept. The limbic inhibitor was one of them. Its purpose was to nullify feelings of fear, panic and uncertainty during combat, whilst intensifying rage and aggression. He had thought to himself - aint technology wonderful?

Punisher 618 was now much closer to his target, the asteroid looming in the distance. Faint lights were now seen dotting the rocky surface and he could pick out the blue radiance of the patrol ship’s engine ports as they circled the perimeter.
The asteroid was an old mining base, abandoned for over a hundred years until the Synthos had appropriated it. During the soldier’s long hibernation, an army of Synthetic Life Forms colloquially known as the Synthos had been created as the work-horses of the colonies. Devoid of free will or the ability to reproduce they had toiled in servitude to humanity. Six months ago, a colony of Synthos had suddenly gone rogue, a mutation had occurred in their compulsion genes and they had become self aware and self-determining. Then shortly after the uprising began, they had acquired the ability to procreate at an exponential level.

With the armed and naval forces stretched thin across the colonies in an effort to suppress the growing Syntho menace, command had ordered the activation of the Punishers. They were an elite fighting squad of cybernetically enhanced super-soldiers capable of handling almost any threat on planet or in space.
This asteroid was supposedly the Syntho’s main research centre, recently discovered by naval intelligence. Punisher 618’s mission was to infiltrate the base, discover the means by which they had gained their independence and how they were reproducing, and secure the command centre until reinforcements arrived.

A proximity alert sounded inside his skull. He was rapidly approaching his destination. His trajectory had been perfect. From the crushing twenty five gee launch to a service hatch on the outside of the rock he had managed to bypass the formidable defences and reach the base undetected. The low power state of his battle suit had allowed this, however once he was inside it would be very hard to hide his two point two meter frame from the station’s security forces. To that end, the suit was armed to the teeth and capable of taking on the station’s internal defences single-handedly. It would have to be. There would be no support until he had secured the command centre.

Small retrorockets on his boot soles fired, slowing his approach. His powered gauntlet reached the handle of the outer hatch and he swung his legs down onto the rock. He pointed an armoured forefinger and it interfaced with the control panel, bypassing the hatch mechanism. Slowly it swung outwards and he pulled himself head first into the service tunnel, going hand over hand down the ladder against the steady centrifugal tug of the asteroid.

He would have to work fast now. The opening of the hatch would present as a security breach on the station’s grid. Without checking his momentum he reached the inner hatch and punched it clean off its hinges and into the dark passage beyond. The soldier glided through the open hatch, immediately planting his feet either side of the service tunnel entrance and standing up against the spin of the asteroid. He crouched into a combat stance as the metallic sound of boots approached from further down the dim passageway. His entrance had obviously been detected. Speed was now imperative. A helmet appeared around the corner of the Punisher’s hiding place and with lightning speed his fist came up, a gleaming bayonet shot from his wrist guard and its powered blade punched through visor, brainpan and helmet. He lifted his arm and the guard’s feet rose from the deck twitching momentarily. Then the blade retracted and the body slumped to the floor.

Aint technology wonderful, he thought.

A computer terminal glowed faintly at the end of the passageway. The soldier sprinted towards it and his forefinger again interfaced with the terminal. A schematic of the station appeared in his vision. Curious, he thought. There did not appear to be a research lab on the station. The fastest route to the command centre, located in the core of the asteroid, ran through the habitat ring and the agricentre. The armoury was situated on the other side of the station. If he was quick enough he could reach the command centre before the main security force could reach him.

He sprinted at an unnatural speed down the passage way and into a wide avenue tunnelled from the rock. At its end a metallic door slid open, revealing a full squad of armoured humanoids sprinting towards him, guns at the ready. As they opened fire on the towering soldier, Punisher 618’s arms came up and forearm mounted auto-cannons erupted into a lethal storm of destruction as thousands of high-velocity explosive rounds tore the humanoids into bloody shreds of flesh and composite body-armour. The soldier continued his sprint through the carnage, through the door and turned into a sharp bend in the avenue. His mind had exploded into a titanic but cold rage. He came upon another squad of security guards and he obliterated them as well, suddenly realising that he was laughing. Gore splattered, he continued his mad, cackling, headlong rush into the agricentre. He met with rows of crops being gently watered by overhead irrigation pipes. His sprint carried him through the fields as powered boots crushed the green plants beneath them.

Without warning an enormous mechanical arm rose from the crop row ahead of him. The soldier attempted to skid to a halt but his momentum carried him forward into the huge robotic fist swinging towards him, catapulting him across the field and into the wall of the agricentre with an echoing metallic clang. His HUD flickered briefly as he crashed to the soil and then he was on his feet again, facing the giant mechanoid. A harvester by the look of it, the first real resistance he had met. Punisher 618 mentally activated his shoulder blade launchers and twin tubes swung from his back and over the armoured pauldrons of his shoulders. His targeting system locked on to the mech and dozens of miniature rockets fired from the launchers, swarming towards the robot. The Punisher was again sprinting towards the exit before the rockets impacted on the lumbering mech with bright orange explosions that sent shockwaves outwards in a spherical ripple, flattening the crops and hurling fiery pieces of mech in a concentric ring across the field.

Aint technology wonderful?

The giant soldier plunged into the next tunnel working towards the asteroid core and suddenly emerged into a wide boulevard lined with housing blocks interspersed with smaller streets. He slowed his charge. There were shops and markets, small parks and fountains all crowded with people. All staring open mouthed at him.

No, not people, his brain told him. Synthos. They are not people, they are constructs. A nearby woman in a plain dress stood transfixed in terror, a cowering child sheltered beneath each arm. His confusion and shock began to rapidly dissipate and once again he felt the red, gleeful rage take hold. No! His higher self screamed at him. These are living, breathing people. Civilians, families! “DESTROY THEM, THEY’RE ONLY ROBOTS!!” his aggressive base self told him. He railed against the impulse for several seconds and then heard a faint bell-tone within his skull.
“Compulsion override activated” came a distance voice from within his mind. Suddenly his arms rose again and unleashed a torrent of destruction down the boulevard. A wave of death washed the Synthos into oblivion, their screams drowned by the sounds of the horrendous weaponry.

NO!! His higher self screamed silently. This is wrong! Stop, stop now! But he was laughing, enraged, striding down the avenues mowing the terrified fleeing Synthos down. It was over in minutes. The buildings were collapsing and burning and blood ran in bright crimson rivulets down the gutters. Smouldering chunks of charred flesh lined the streets. Numbly he began his sprint into a side road leading to the main tunnel towards the core, propelled by a sense of urgency his higher consciousness neither felt nor understood.

Gravity lessened now as he moved deeper into the station and the centrifugal spin of the asteroid lessened. He was now obliged to spring in bounds down the tunnel, stabilising himself with his hands on the rocky walls and ceiling. Finally he reached the main door to the command centre. Alarm klaxons were now blaring and warning lights flashed atop the circular reinforced door. The Punisher grasped a circular charge from his armoured thigh and flung it onto the centre of the door. With just a thought he detonated it and the door exploded inwards in a green fireball, throwing those inside like ragdolls against the walls, floors and ceiling of the centre and hurling molten chunks of door in every direction. The Syntho officers and security forces still standing were quickly dispatched by the Punisher’s powered bayonet, the soldier not wanting to further damage the sensitive electronics of the command centre. Then it was finished. There had been no further resistance.

The blind rage seething through Punisher 618’s brain began to subside, and horror began to surface. He had slaughtered the entire station with in twenty minutes of infiltration. Men and women and children. Synthos, he corrected. He strode to the main terminal and interfaced with his forefinger. Data began to stream into his cortex, immediately processing. There was not a shred of research on Syntho technology or evolution. This had been a peaceful colony. He had an urge to vomit, but the sensation quickly subsided along with the shame, grief and disgust. An unnatural calm came over him and the voice of reason in his higher consciousness became a whisper.
He opened a channel to the stealth ship.
“Punisher 618 reporting,” he spoke in a dull drone into the helmet’s comport.
“Go ahead 618,” came the voice of his liaison officer.
“The command centre is secure sir. I am uploading their data files now. There was no evidence of research, nor any data suggesting it on the station.”
“Very well,” replied the officer. “There was a good chance that would be the case. You’ve accomplished your secondary objective efficiently though.”
“They were civilians, sir. Women and children.”
“They were Synthos soldier. Constructs gone haywire. You decommissioned them. And your limbic inhibitor worked perfectly, got the job done. Stand by and await further orders, 618. Command out.”
A tiny voice spoke deep within Punisher 618’s consciousness.

Aint technology wonderful?