Venus Plains 88

Venus Plains 88

By

Mark Paul Sebar

Smashwords Edition

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Copyright © 2010 All Rights Reserved

Library Of Congress, United States of America

ISBN 978-1-930246-50-8 TXu-001711101

http://www.sebar.com/pub

Table Of Contents

Chapter 01 Beginning Expectations

Chapter 02 Destinations, Friends, A New Home

Chapter 03 Monster On The Loose

Chapter 04 Wild Chase To The Edge

Chapter 05 Quick Escapes

Chapter 06 Tourists And Games

Chapter 07 Survival, Death and Change

Chapter 08 Truths And Consequences

Chapter 09 Causality

Beginning Expectations

It was the great year of April 2267 Venus Plains 88 Life penal colony surface of Venus in the sol solar system. The prisoner glanced around as the long day on Venus hung low in the sky, highlighting a rusty yellow and thick horizon of light and clouds.

The courtyard of the prison appeared deserted as the prisoner took a quick sip of water from a jug. The drops sliding down his parched throat in this shielded hellhole, was something he relished as the seconds ticked away. Nobody had ever escaped from this place as he made his way past the hot atmosphere penalty boxes.

There was a squared area inside a cube shield filled with scorching steam and yellow compression. This was the playfield where they sometimes had a competitive game of ball, but not the type of ball you might think. Oh no, this place was the real atmosphere of Venus contained inside that cubed boundary.

He dare not have pushed through there as he made his way up the balcony of the Warden’s offices.

The information was correct, his friends had lured the warden to other business and the doors swung open, while he entered the warden’s office from the veranda overlooking the prison courtyard. No guards were to be seen anywhere.

He made his way to a corner column and slowly glanced around it. Free and clear, again there was nobody around. On the wardens desk was a GPU, a sort of hand weapon. He grabbed that and hit the coil on its side as it got a high-energy transfer charge in its wire, a sort of high pitched sound.

Now the prisoner was armed and very dangerous. He walked along the corridor hall towards the hanger area of the prison. This seemed too easy to him, as escape was not far away now.

He glanced to the right where upon he spotted two guard droids talking to each other near a desk. Tall, metallic skeletons with armaments and shields, yet their proximity sensors must have been turned off. Was that the work of his mysterious friends he pondered as he slid by, continuing down the corridor to the large hanger facilities?

He found the hanger doors as they swished open making some noise and that is when the guards began to take notice running towards the corridor junction, as he ran towards a Hot Suit walker.

He got to the front of the walker and punched the side entry button while the front hatch slowly swung open. It was a giant vehicle about 15 feet tall and fully mechanized with thick blue shielding around it.

He climbed into the standup cockpit space that only could take a single human and he punched the button to the unit, closing the hatch and activating its blue shielding, as its red light began rotating slowly.

The guards too late, called reinforcements and he powered the shields to full and the walker stood up in full mode. This unit had no armaments, so returning fire was out of the question.

The droid guards amassed and began firing shots of plasma as the prisoner set the coordinates for the walker and navigated it towards an open area that was protected by a large blue translucent shield.

The shots easily bounced off the shields of the walker as it quickly made its way to the larger shield, and then slowly pushed through it.

Warning, high pressure area, auto adjusting to climate change, the computer apprised the prisoner in a gentle female voice.

Suddenly as the walker pushed into 92 times the Earth pressures and 893 degrees of heat at Fahrenheit, the crackling tremendous pressure and steam eating away at the shields of the walker foretold of the sudden harsh dangers he had piloted the vehicle into, upon Venus real surface. Unit degradation to 95 percent. Target attainable through powerboost.

Calculate powerboost and take it from the forward shielding, the Prisoner ordered the walker’s system. There was a sudden noise from a powerup in the system.

Unit powerboost has been adjusted. Target location now attainable in fifteen point four minutes time. Outside the bubble of the prison which was in the background, the walker took a step in slowed motion, one-step at a time. Its shielded foot set down in a lava puddle and gases were released into a hiss of hot cloud and steam. Unit degradation to 93 percent.

Back in the bay, a cyborg name Crotius was getting his gloves on. He was very tall and masculine, half man, half droid with a patch over his left eye and gold thick teeth. His suit was gloss black as was his display formation atop his head and his flowing black cape.

He made his way followed by several guard droids to a large red Hot Suit Walker that was bigger then what the prisoner took and had fierce weaponry protruding off each large arm on the front.

As he approached the vehicle, the front loading ramp slowly dropped down and he stepped up onto it. He turned towards the lead guard droid. Inform the warden I am on my way. It should be an easy kill, he coldly snickered.

Yes sir, the guard droid responded as they all stood back watching, while Crotius got into a center seat, alongside two other empty seats on the unit.

The front latch began to close around him as the unit got up on its two massive feet and a red shielding began to form around it. The lead droid turned to the others. This human has no chance. How much did you guys bet?

Crotius checked the overhead display and holographic switches that hung in front of his visual perspectives, while he could see the edge of the blue prison shield as the walker approached it. Lock on target and calculate time before intercept, Crotius instructed.

Time estimates at kill speed are eight minutes and forty four seconds, came the reply in a deep male voice.

Good…proceed with the pursuit, Crotius instructed. I want maximum short distance angle of interception, and boost seventy five percent power to the legs.

Acknowledged, the computer replied. With that said the prison guard’s unit pushed easily through to the Venusian's atmosphere as steam hissed off its shields. It was a hot yellow world that this faster moving pursuit walker trudged through, meanwhile up ahead the smaller walker unit was within visual of the mining facility near EVE CORONA on Venus.

It was a site to behold, tall structures inside another giant blue domed shield, protected from the harsh pressures, heat and sulfuric acid that could possibly drop from the high clouds overhead.

As the smaller walker made its way along slowly, more steam and hissing pressure had taken its toll on the vehicle.

Inside an alarm started sounding. Law enforcement pursuit vehicle closing. Suddenly a small explosion occurred nearby on the ground. Discharge, auto adjusting rear shielding. Protective occupant measures have been initiated.

Distance to prisoner unit? Crotius demanded while another shot was inaccurately fired.

Distance obtainable, unit speed has dropped to within range. Time to target is now within expectation range of 4 minutes and six seconds at ninety-two percent accuracy. Target within 6 minutes and thirteen seconds at ninety-eight percent accuracy. Increasing shielding against slight pressure variance. Auto adjustments commencing, the deep male voice of his computer system responded.

The prisoner’s hot suit was heating up as the shielding had turned to a red hot glow and steam and heat were easily lagging off of it with the mining facility looming ever more grand in its size. It was so close and yet so far as the prisoner’s walker took it one-step at a time.

Inside there was the slight hissing of the steam and it had gotten hot as he watched from the cockpit through the holographic dials and distance indicator. Another alarm suddenly went off.

Four point eight minutes to suit meltdown, the computer informed him in a perfectly calm voice as sweat ran down his forehead.

It had not yet sunk in what was going on, except his desperation to escape this hellhole and be the first to accomplish what others had never accomplished in its history, nor that of the entire solar system.

If anyone was sent for life to Venus Plains 88, they would serve a lifetime of hell, yet here he was making a run for it, and with each mechanical step of his vehicle, the safety and atmosphere of the blue shielding at the Eve Corona mining facility appeared much more certain.

I know, I know, he replied to the suit’s computer system. How long to the mining station?

Five point six three minutes, she calmly replied. If only he could have been so calm about life and death, but he was not.

At this moment what was running through his head was escape. How was he going to escape the current circumstances that had changed against his very existence and right to live?

Another alarm went on and the prisoner punched a button, now spotting the slowly closing walker vehicle behind him.

He recognized who it was and his eyes opened wide with terror. No, no, no…not him, he said aloud.

Pursuit unit closing in three point two minutes. Apprehension weaponry locked on this unit, she informed.

The walker again stepped over a small lava puddle causing the lava to splash in slow motion around the foot’s shielding, as steam and smoke rose in the high pressure and heat, while the mining facility appeared almost within reach.

Distance to prisoner? Crotius asked.

Range for one hundred percent accuracy lock and fire in two point four minutes, the computer responded as his pursuit vehicle was closing fast with the red hot smaller vehicle just ahead of him.

Shot in the dark, Crotius mumbled. Lock on maximum angled weapons fire. Destroy prisoner. With those words said, the computer began making the necessary calculations.

Acknowledge, the computer responded. Calculations completed in a few moments.

Outside he had closed a wide gap with his faster movement in the tremendous pressures upon the surface, as his walker also stepped in a big lava puddle, sending it up in the air, a bigger splash of magma.

The lava stuck for a moment on the walker’s shielding, and then slowly dripped downward as the hot pursuit continued.

Inside the prisoner’s unit, there was hot steam and humidity as the pressure and outside heat had worn his vehicle down.

He was now in a full sweat and breathing very hot air that dried his mouth almost instantly with every breath, while the safety of the shielding of the mining facility, seemed a stones throw ahead of him.

System suit failure in one point two minutes, she informed. Distance to mining facility now unattainable, she added the grim news while continuing the trudging steps toward the plotted target in slow motion.

No, no, he instructed in a desperate tone. Boost leg support. Cut air cooler system by fifty percent. They were instructions for a near suicide.

Cut in air temp will result in human… she had started to reply.

Do it, he yelled and interrupted. Things suddenly got much hotter in this already boiling suit.

Leg power adjusted. Temperature control failure in nineteen seconds, she calmly replied as though having lost interest, while the vehicle continued towards the target and the hum of the blue shields of the mining facility could now be heard.

Crotius computer informed him. Range achieved, one hundred percent accuracy. Initiating prisoner destruction sequence.

The large guns on each side of his cockpit sent out a spark like plasma that snaked in bouncing directions and then