Ripper's World: Ripper Fights On

By Peter Salisbury

Ripper Lee, long time veteran of the televised fight circuits survived the viral Blight which wiped out billions of people around the globe. The intention had been to genetically modify humans to eradicate disease and create useful categories of workers who would fit neatly into a global system for generating ever-increasing wealth. Among the modified survivors, there were an unmodified few, like Ripper. Some unmodified survivors found it hard to scratch a living in the new society, others joined the Rebs, and some like Ripper remained fiercely independent. Vanessa Trent, CEO of Viral Benefits Corp, who had ordered the gene-altering virus to be released, sent out android armies to round up the Rebs and deal with anyone who stepped out of line. The Rebs were determined to recruit Ripper and foil Trent's plan of world domination. Ripper went his own way, until he was trapped into assisting the Rebs and was branded a terrorist by Trent. Once again, he was on the run, hounded by airships full of androids. The only two people who he could have relied on were unlikely to be of much help: the lover who had sworn never to see him again, and his spineless agent.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Peter Salisbury
• Release date: Sep 23, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310921506

Peter Salisbury

I am a life-long fan of science fiction, and so when I had an idea for my first story, I wasn't surprised that it was in that genre. The first book took me ten years to complete, but I've got a little quicker since. I am pleased to say that I now have over thirty books published in my name. What next? So far I haven't run short of ideas for new stories, so there are several projects in various stages of completion, and I hope to be publishing the next story before too long, so please subscribe to my alerts. My profile picture is a portrait of the author as a young man, painted by my daughter Charlotte Salisbury who has also contributed to several of my book covers. Professional background In the 1970s I studied Chemistry at university and then spent over thirty years in classrooms across England teaching almost anything but Chemistry, including Photography, Communications Skills, General Science, Computing, and Information and Communications Technology. In the 1990s I spent ten years writing abstracts of chemical patents. This was a most exacting process but very rewarding to be reading about the very latest inventions in the field, and the abstracts were distributed world-wide to research scientists by subscription. Articles of mine have been published in magazines and I have written assignments used for assessing Communications Skills for a major international Examination Board. After retiring early this century I began writing in earnest.

Book preview

Chapter 1: A Quiet Chat

'You actually went out, laid in wait for an armed android, and took it down?' Derek stared at Ripper, trying to read his expression in the dimly lit corner of a public bar. Derek was an independent removals man who used to take Ripper to and from fights before the Blight had wiped out half the world. He had become the closest thing Ripper had to a friend, and he half expected the quick-thinking fighter to crack a smile at any moment.

'That's what I said,' Ripper replied in a serious voice. Each man had an almost full glass of beer in front of him and they were sitting across from each other at a small table. Ripper sipped his drink and waited for Derek's next question. While he savoured the locally brewed beer, he smiled to himself at his latest escapade. What he didn't intend to tell Derek was that he had actually encountered two Tics, the second of which had come unnervingly close to catching him out. Halfway through his inspection of the innards of the first Tic, another had crept up on him, the only sign of its approach being when it had walked over a patch of gravel. Ripper had known what it was even before he turned towards the gangly machine, and he had no doubt that its finger would be resting on the trigger of its stunstick.

'Stand back,' had come the android's sing-song voice.

Ripper rose slowly from his crouched position over the partially disassembled torso of the one he had a few minutes previously dragged into the empty warehouse. He stood poised between the fallen Tic and the one approaching. With his breathing carefully controlled, he waited for his chance.

There was a click and the twin electrodes at the end of the Tic's stunstick crackled with blue fire. 'What are you doing here?'

Ripper's body twitched as if in fear at the sight of the violet discharge. 'I was out for a stroll along the waterfront and heard a noise. When I came in to see what was going on, I saw this Tic lying on the ground and a shadowy figure ran away through a door at the back.'

'This is a crime scene. Do not contaminate the evidence.' The Tic had moved closer, its attention absorbed by the android on the ground.

'You're right. If you look closely, you'll find a clue right here,' Ripper pointed.

The Tic lowered its stunstick and craned forward to focus on the open torso. As it did so, Ripper moved half a step back so as to take the advantage. In the next second he had struck.

'But why on earth would you risk tangling with one of those things?' Derek stared at Ripper uncertain whether to believe him or not.

'Wanted to get a good look at what's inside 'em.'

'But they're dangerous.'

Ripper chuckled and looked around to be certain that no-one else was close enough to be eaves-dropping. 'Not if you get 'em first. You ever been near one?'

'Only the once.' Derek shivered. ' Darn thing stuck me with its stunstick. Not the sort of thing I'd go looking for again.'

'Yeah, this Tic had one,' Ripper grinned, 'didn't do it any good, mind. I dropped it with a single punch. Put a nice dent in its head.'

'What about the body shell, it's metal, isn't it?'

'All plastic,' Ripper chuckled. 'They're nowhere near as well armoured as they look.'

'Plastic...' Derek shook his head. 'I expect it keeps the weight down.'

'Means they use less fuel and makes 'em fast, you've just got to be quicker.'

'I bet. I remember those punches. You put a dent in my dashboard the night before the Blight.'

Derek and Ripper had met for the first time in months only a few minutes before starting on their glasses of beer. They had a lot to catch up on but Ripper's mention of his encounter with the so-called 'peace-keeping' biomimetic androids, or Tics, had taken precedence.

'Ripper, you're really not making all this up, are you?'

'No.'

'And you're talking about today?'

'Couple of hours ago.'

'Where?'

'Old warehouse down by the quay.'

Despite the devastation of the Blight, the coastal town of Steamville had a recovering fishing trade, and a lively import-export trade was flourishing around the docks. Even so, only a few months after the renewed activity, several of the warehouses were still empty, and policed by only the occasional Tic. Ripper went on to describe how after downing the android, he had stepped back into the lee of a doorway and glanced quickly around, his ears straining for the faint sound of any more Tics approaching. The Tics themselves operated almost completely silently, which was one thing that made them dangerous, but inevitably their feet made a small sound on the ground as they moved. By the time he'd counted thirty while holding his breath, he had heard nothing. If there was another nearby, his actions had thus far gone undetected. He stepped quickly out as far as the Tic and dragged it deep into the warehouse. Again he checked the street but he saw nothing moving.

Ripper continued to explain his actions to Derek. His blow had been aimed precisely on the side of the Tic's head, at the tell-tale LED. It no longer flashed, showing that it wasn't communicating with any of its bases. He felt around for a catch to release the shiny black carapace covering the front of the torso. Casting aside the flexible plastic shell, he switched on a keyring flash-light and peered at what was revealed beneath. On the right hand side of the Tic's chest, a short cylinder was wrapped in an insulating jacket and heat rose from an exhaust port in the shoulder above it. There was a red button marked 'Emergency Stop'. Ripper had pressed it and heard a click.

A second later there was a quiet 'pop' of a flame going out and the cylinder creaked as it cooled. By pulling the insulating jacket off the cylinder, Ripper revealed a combustion chamber enclosed by what he guessed was a layer of semiconductor generator units. The fact was evidenced by stiff copper conductors connected to them. The bottom end of the combustion chamber was linked by piping to what Ripper could see from the labels were three separate fuel tanks, one for LPG, one for hydrogen, and one for fuel alcohol. The thick copper wires led to a LiPo storage battery via an electronic circuit control board.

'Lypoh?' Derek said.

'Yeah, I found out they're what's called lithium polymer, LiPo. High density batteries.'

'OK. How do you know all this?'

Ripper grinned. 'Because all the parts were labelled with what they do. For ease of maintenance, I suppose.'

The battery fed several control boards studded with chips and other components which Ripper couldn't identify individually but each board was stamped with 'Right leg', 'Left leg', etc. A bundle of data cables passed up flexible trunking through the neck to the head. Ripper found a clip which allowed him to remove the moulded plastic 'face', a dummy-like mask, again in black plastic. Underneath the faceplate Ripper saw at once the damage he'd done with his fist. Beneath the dent he'd made in the side of the thing's head, a circuit board was cracked.

'Funny how they made 'em look kinda human-shaped,' Derek said.

'I guess they wanted to make the things look more acceptable, like they called 'em Andies to begin with.'

'Til they started killing people.'

'I got a tale to tell on that one,' Ripper said. He glanced around the bar and then added in a low voice, 'I heard it on an indie station the designers wanted to mimic human movements, so they built them with the same joints. Makes 'em easier to weaponise if they can carry a gun the same way we can. Putting the processors and coms in the head has a height advantage and gives the sensitive electronics some separation from the motor control boards. They can be fitted with all sorts of sensors, not just eye cameras and ear mics.'

'Speaking of weapons,' Derek said with a frown deepening across his forehead, 'Did you hear how they strayed out of cell range, went crazy and wiped out whole communities?'

Ripper beckoned Derek to move closer and he spoke in a voice which was almost inaudible, 'I can't say where I got the info, but that whole 'moving out of cell range' thing was used as a cover for another of Trent's plans. Datamass hacked the police databases for 'undesirables' and she then had Tics sent out on missions to systematically root out anyone involved with criminal gangs. Just got rid of them, like that.' For a fleeting moment, Ripper drew a finger across his throat.

The two men drank some beer and sat quietly for a few moments, pondering on how many unexplained disappearances had most likely been as a result a purge ordered by Viral Benefits' CEO, Lorranye Trent. The bar was on the fringe of the docks which provided at least half of the income enjoyed by the rejuvenated Steamville. It had sprung up within two weeks of the Blight, after the Tics had cleared it of bodies. Most of the old housing was bull-dozed but the warehouses along the wharves, and the factories, all deserted, had been left intact, for whatever purpose Trent's plans threw up. New apartment blocks integrated with shopping malls were built using a combination of Tics men and adapted by the Slugger virus.

Low level 'mood music' trickled out of speakers placed at intervals around the bar room shared by Ripper and Derek. The only other sounds were the clinking of glasses and a low buzz of indistinct conversation from a group of sports fans at the other end of the room. The dingy old place looked like it had escaped having a re-fit since the Blight, and so was ideal for a quiet drink.

'OK, now you know what makes the things tick,' Derek smirked at his pun, 'what help is that?'

'Means a sharp blow to the head or bullet through the chest is good enough to stop one in its tracks. The head's the safest; if you hit the LiPo pack in the chest, you'd better be well clear. I gather those things go with quite a bang.'

'Wouldn't do a human much good, either, come to think... What if the one you took to pieces still had an image of you stored in its internal memory chips?'

'Thought of that one. I pulled the boards marked 'memory', gave each chip a good squirt of juice with the end of a stunstick, then dropped them into a water-butt.'

'Hang on, Rip, you just said 'boards' plural. You mean they have more than one memory board, or you're telling me fibs?'

Ripper tried to look sheepish but he couldn't stop a grin lighting up his face. 'You got me on that one. I knocked down two of them.'

'Two? I thought one was crazy but, two, man!'

'Well, it kind of came around poking its nose in, waving its stunstick about, you know how they do.'

'Yeah, and I keep well away.'

'It works better to get in close.'

'Not if there's a whole bunch of 'em.'

'Which is why I was out picking them off one at a time.'

'And what did you do with the stunsticks?'

'Switched 'em both on and dropped 'em in the water-butt, too.' Ripper grinned. 'They made quite a fizz, 'til the power packs shorted out.

Derek laughed loudly, but cut it short, glancing around nervously. 'You never know what side people are on these days.'

'Which makes it all the more important to understand how the enforcers work.' Ripper took a draught from his glass. 'OK, Derek, your turn. What've you been up to since the Blight?'

The elation Derek had felt at meeting his old friend and hearing of his adventure evaporated in a second. 'I lost, 'em, man.'

Ripper knew Derek had been particularly fond of his wife and daughter. He saw Derek's chin quiver and his eyes fill up. It was surprisingly rare for survivors to show much emotion, the genetic modifications caused by Viral Benefits' viruses had seen to that. Ripper had escaped any modification by being so fit from the fight game, and it seemed Derek had, too. He was only slightly heavier set than he had been, although his hair had re-grown where it had been receding. Being a small-time removals man had doubtless kept him fit enough to fend off the genetic manipulations which had altered so many and killed the rest.

'Still got the van, Derek?'

Derek had a far-away expression, but he slowly refocussed his gaze and looked across at Ripper. 'I got me a better one. So many left abandoned...' Another thought then occurred to him. 'I can run you to matches, like before the Blight, if you want.'

'It's not just around town any more. I have to travel away quite a bit. But thanks for the offer. I appreciate it.'

Derek ran the palm of his right hand down from his forehead, over his eyes and nose and down to his chin, as if he was trying to wipe away bad memories. He slowly nodded his head and sighed heavily.

Ripper changed the subject. 'You wouldn't believe the different things I drove around the Wastes in.'

'Which Wastes was that?

'Been at least half across the Great Northern Waste and the Badlands between there and here.'

'I heard they've got more wastes now, like the South Central Waste and the South Coastal Waste. Plenty of Badlands in between.'

'Yup, and the Eastern Waste.'

'How'd you travel?'

'Lot of it by bike.'

'I always had you down as a bike kind of guy, though you never had one before.'

Ripper smiled. 'Not before I could take my pick. Mind you, I was driving a luxury coach at one point when my first bike got stolen. Found a bus-load of stray folks on the road.' Ripper grinned. 'You should see the bike I've got now, though. Almost silent but it goes like a rocket, practically brand new, too.'

'Got papers for it?'

'Sure,' Ripper beamed, 'Found 'em in the shop, filled 'em in myself. Got the official stamp, too.'

'Which you found under the counter by the cash machine.'

'How'd you know where it was?'

'Same place I found mine. Sounds like fun, picking folks up in a bus.'

'It was OK for a few days, but you know me, bit of a loner.' Ripper saw Derek's face fall and he added quickly, 'But I'd like to meet up for a drink, maybe once, twice a week.'

'OK, we'll do that.' Derek's grin returned. 'Like old times, before the Blight.'

'Yeah...' It was Ripper's turn to look subdued. He drank some more beer. 'Been on my own quite a while. There was a girl I was quite keen on but she took off a couple of months back.'

'That's not like you, single man about town.'

Ripper shrugged. 'I guess she got to me more than I thought.'

'Always the way. Still, I bet she'll be back before long.'

Ripper shrugged. 'It's not looking like she will.'

Derek tapped the table with his finger and said with a grin, 'Still, you must have had a few adventures since the Blight hit everywhere.'

'Sure did.'

The two friends spent the rest of the evening talking about old times. After a few more beers, Derek left his shiny new van parked down the road from the bar, and the two of them walked to the end of the street together, before going in different directions.

With the front door locked and armed, Ripper climbed the stairs to his apartment and tuned in to an indie channel. The late night news said that the numbers of the Rebs were being swelled by people who got sick but for some reason didn't get enhanced, and people who escaped infection, like the residents of a town Ripper had visited, where they had evacuated at night before the Tics could grab them all. The townsfolk had left in such a hurry in the middle of the night, that many of the town centre lights had been left on. A spokesman for the Rebs, whose face was hidden, said that a lot more people had escaped infection, or been immune to the virus than Trent wanted anyone to know about.

The camera cut to a silhouetted figure.

'Do you feel like you don't fit in? Got sick but didn't get Trent's enhancement? Join the Rebs.'

Ripper was relieved that he wasn't the only person harbouring a deep distrust of Trent's Viral Benefits programme. VBC and DMI had gained almost total control over all the news networks which broadcast world-wide, the same news items being translated into multiple languages. Originally a fervently indie station, Buzz=news, now wholly owned by media mogul Kargo Santini, began to emulate the mainstream stations. Re-badged as NewsBee, Santini's station thrived because he made himself as ruthless and egocentric as the heads of the channels owned by Lorrayne Trent's Viral Benefits Corp and Datamass. Santini's earlier promises to his viewers that the station would retain its core indie values were quietly abandoned. He was one of the first post-Blight broadcasters to peddle the 'what the public wants, the public gets' methodology and the station's ratings soared. NewsBee's output generated massive ad revenues from their hugely popular talent and fight shows. Santini was completely dedicated to building his media empire so that his wealth would make him impervious to pressure from the dangerous and devious Trent.

The reach of Lorrayne Trent and Kargo Santini's media empires allowed them to provide all broadcasts on a pay-to-view basis only. It had long been known how much profit could be scraped from talent shows and sporting events, and huge sums of money were collected from leagues for different sports. There was no reason to change a well-tried method of wringing money out of a gullible populace. Ripper stuck with the free indie channels, and seeing the way NewsBee had changed only made him more certain that the Rebs were telling the truth.

Chapter 2: Bad News Is Good News

Top For Today, NewsBee's premier talent show, broadcast nightly across the planet in a fierce ratings war with Trent's news channels. Tipped to win and heavily betted on was a young musical combo, The New Boys. While they waited their turn on stage, The New Boys sat hunched around a screen showing one of Ripper's fights on a rival channel. The decor in the call-lounge was loud, very brightly lit and brash. Viewers could not see the cracks and tears in the deeply padded plastic couches, the scratched and ringed tables or the stains in the carpet. They were mapped by the video feed computers and untainted areas grafted in. The Boys clutched their pay-out slips in white knuckled hands, as Ripper and his opponent lunged and dodged. Instead of watching the acts which were their closest rivals on Top For Today, their eyes were glued to the fight. When the floor manager's assistant entered to give them the five minutes to air signal, they shooed him away, rather than tuning their voices for their set.

Each of the five Boys had bet on Ripper's opponent, so the fact that Ripper beat him only moments before their final stage call didn't do them any favours. It was the third week they'd returned to the show having maintained a level of popularity. However, with their hope of the fight winnings dashed, their run faltered.

The New Boys' confidence was further sapped by the absurd outfits they had been given for the show. Their manager had pushed them to go retro: platform boots, enormous flares, metallic sheen and suede effect printed shirts. They overheated in the huge wigs and lacked their previous pace and bounce.

The judges' mood was not good, either. All but one had bet against Ripper and lost, so when it came to the scores, they were less than generous; The New Boys retired with the hope that the on-line audience response would keep them in the running. It was lucky for them that the on-line voters hadn't been as interested in Ripper's match, and they won against the other acts by a hair.

Having been voted through four shows, the Boys were first up for an ad after their encore stint, promoting a dance club. Flashing lights, more garish decor in clashing purples and greens. In a matching set of shiny suits, they put on a better show than they had thirty minutes earlier for the competition.

Next up on NewsBee's evening viewing was a series of news items, 'pumped up' with a background of musik the producer thought appropriate: thrumming drums or sloppy orchestration, depending on the item. It was always the grisliest spots first, so the glamorous news reader, perched incongruously and seductively on her scarlet couch began with a fatal stabbing.

'In the last hour, a young male was attacked outside a supermarket. His assailants were a group of other young males. The dead man's girlfriend tells us her story.' All feeds cut to a cold, grey car park, deserted except for a crowd of news crews and a ring of spectators kept back by a police cordon. A thin and miserable-looking, unenhanced girl shivered against a battered trolley. In her eyes reflected the bright lights of the network cameras. Her T-shirt said 'Slap' over the Viral Benefits logo.

'We wuz mindin' us own and this buncha toe-rags starts pushin' me. The next thing we know, they're helping theirselves out'r our trolley. We'd paid for that stuff an' they were nickin' it.'

'So, your boyfriend tried to stop them?'

'What I said, didn' I? He grabbed one that 'ad 'is 'and in the trolley. They wuz runty little snots, but the one with the red hair got a knife out. No warning. Jumped behind mi man. Stuck it in.' The girl wailed. 'It was 'orrible. All 'is blood was goin' on the floor an' I couldn't do nothin' to stop it.'

'We've heard,' the voluptuous news presenter returned in an unexpectedly strident voice, 'that the assailants were caught on camera. First we'll run the CCTV file of the stabbing actually taking place, then we'll cut to some live shots of a local enforcement squad doing its job,' she crowed with obvious delight. The background thrumming stepping up its beat. It had been a feature of news programmes even before the Blight and something Ripper particularly disliked. The presenter was replaced by the grey scene at the car park before the news crews had arrived. It happened exactly as the girlfriend had described; four teenagers pestering the pair to give up their shopping as they made their way across the car park, followed by attempts to lift goods out of the trolley, then the vicious stabbing.

Four burly enforcers stamped out of a stairwell onto a bleak and wind-swept concrete landing. They were all Sluggers, disciplined to apprehend with maximum force. Six months ago, the Tics would have handled the situation but the networks liked to show real people fighting wherever they could, so the Tics waited out of sight, stunsticks at the ready. The neighbourhood prosecutor had viewed the store CCTV file and pronounced the red-haired youth as the murderer and his friends as accessories. Prisoners were only to be taken if they freely surrendered.

On the landing there was a row of six doors with cracked and peeling paint. Three or four torn, half-emptied waste sacks spilled out their entrails of rotting detritus. The enforcers were clad in dark navy body armour, holding heavy duty stun weapons and steel maiming bars. Judging by the