331 Far Future Ch. 41 – And in Every Port they owe Their Soul... to the Company Store... (1/2)

The Shield Wall of the current mining district rose in front of me.

Duracrete pillars were embedded into a trench a thousand feet into the underlying rock. Immune to corrosion, only the most mindless battering over years and decades could drive a hole into them, allowing the hungry wurms outside access to the endless tunnels and pits of the mining area beyond.

It had a shield over top it to keep out the alkaline winds and monitor the air quality, although the mines weren't quite at the spawling size of the mega-city it fed ceaselessly. The mines meandered over several thousand square miles, and when an area was worked out, the tailings for another area filled it in, and the shield wall was moved out into another direction. The wurms would flood energetically into the new zone, and more than a few would be pulped by Thunder Bombs laying in wait down below to thin their numbers, providing ready meals for wurmlings coming in later.

The great double monorails and their ceaseless loads of rendered mountains were heading in and out almost constantly, but I was approaching along the ground. They still needed some sort of ground access to explore the area, and I made my way across the sandy ground, barely stirring up a trail, my Disk gliding along behind me with my spoils.

The doors I was heading for were located conveniently beneath the monorail, since that was the easiest overland access. I brought up my Band, still perfectly functional despite corrosive dust and more corrosive wurm-guts thanks to my Vajra, and I established Node contact, quickly flitting through the numerous channels to Wall Security. A bored man's face popped up in my Virtual File.

”Hello? What's a Termite contacting us for?” the bored man on duty asked.

”Oh, I'm outside your land access under the rail. Could you open the postern for me? If not, I'll just climb the wall, but it would be nice if you could turn off the point defenses for a minute or three while I do?”

”You're outside-?” he trailed off, then got a look on my broadcast location. ”Emperor! What happened? You're... you're on the sand lake!”

”Skating across it, actually. The wurms can't see me, I'm not in ground contact. So, about that door?”

”I'll alert them you are coming! Is there a vehicle coming? Do you need a rescue team?” He sounded amazed.

”Oh, no, everything's perfectly fine. You can check with Sergeant Shek at Janus South Access 4, I set out by myself yesterday on foot. Nobody else along.”

”You... ran here?” The man, one Corporal Ahfung, was in disbelief. ”Across the sands?”

”Skated here, across the sands. Took a couple rests, did some sightseeing... you know, the usual. Sorry for the delay. I heard you had a wurm problem inside the walls, so I was sent over to take care of it.”

”I... see.” Clearly that side of things wasn't that unusual. ”I've cleared you for entry down there, Exterminator Rantha.” See, no longer a Termite.

”Thanks! I should be there in about two minutes.”

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I skated up to the huge doors, big enough to admit a major-ass landcrawler, and inside the smaller door cut into the larger one. This was black durasteel, had some E-iridium mixed in with it, even tougher and stronger than normal durasteel, capable of defying the cutting power of adamant, although it didn't have that same power itself.

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The smaller door was more like a garage, which could be quickly filled in by sliding a plug of metal there in the event of attack. As I closed in, cameras in shielded mountings on the side naturally caught sight of me, and lifted it slowly up to let me in.

I coasted past the two-foot-thick door, the force screen snapping over me, and came slowly to a halt about ten paces beyond. The men in suits waiting there had tubes in hand, presumably for spraying me off from the corrosive dusts outside.

I waved at them. ”No need for the spray, boys. I've got no dust accumulation whatsoever on either myself or my Disk here.” I flicked the air, and the humming force-screen over the contents shimmered up at the impact.

They were staring at my Disk, kind of gaping at it, but the hardass in charge said, ”Protocol says that we-”

”-are to clean incoming personnel and equipment to remove stray particles and dust from them in order to eliminate random corrosion of equipment, et al,” I waved my hand. ”I have no such things to eliminate, therefore if you start spraying me down, it's because you are an asshole, and I'm going to punish you for it.”

There was a tiny lilt in my voice. The hardass looked at me, looked at the stuff on my Disk, and slowly decided that not getting on my bad side was a good thing. ”Uh, understood.” I was standing there with my arms and waist bare, as well as my calves and half my feet, as well as my face. Not even any breathing equipment from the abusive mix of gases called an atmosphere out there... with temperatures that spiked to 80 degrees C at noonish, and plummeted to -50 at night.

Which meant I was resistant to some serious rads, heat, and cold, as well as corrosion.

”So, where's my liaison for the wurm contract?” I put a holo up. ”Supervisor Choken?” His image and ID rose up in front of me.