by Troy Osgood
Harrow didn’t want to follow my plan but couldn’t think of anything else. It wasn’t her ego making her hesitate. She would never let her ego get in the way of keeping her men alive or completing the mission. I knew this because I never did. She hesitated because she didn’t like the idea of the unknown.
“Inside,” she said into the comms.
I led the way inside, moving quickly towards the back wall in the right corner. I ran my hands over the smooth metal where wall met wall. I tapped on it, hearing the noise. It sounded solid.
The others followed me in and I could hear our side returning fire. Now that we were inside, we only had to defend the one opening. Glancing back I saw Fortin and Sweet in the airlock, one on each side, firing down the corridors.
“Well,” Harrow asked eyeing the wall.
“Need a torch,” I said tracing an outline of a door on the wall.
“Look around,” Harrow ordered, thinking there had to be something in the room we could use. She had pretty quickly figured out my plan.
“Doesn’t Sweet have a breacher in his bag of tricks?”
Harrow cursed, annoyed at not thinking of it herself.
“Sweet!,” she yelled.
Gilbert switched positions. The big man ran over to us, saw the wall and reached behind his back. He pulled out a small device that I recognized. It was a newer model of the one I had on board the Nomad’s Wind. Of course it was legal for Sweet to have it. Not legal for me to have it. Which is why I never told anyone I was in possession of a breacher. Or any of the other equipment I had borrowed when I left the 2Es.
Harrow and I moved aside. He placed the device against the wall. I heard the hum as Sweet traced a large square. He placed the device in the middle of the square and hit a button. It stayed in place. Taking a small controller in hand, we all stepped back. He hit the button, lines of energy coming out of the bottom of the device, sliding along the surface of the wall and outlining the square that Sweet had traced. The lines of energy sparked and snapped, crackling against the wall. Hitting another button, smoke started rising up from the metal as the lines of energy started cutting through the wall. The energy lines were bright, the smoke thick. Within seconds the section of wall fell to the ground.
It landed with a loud crash.
We were immediately through the wall. Harrow led. I followed.
The new room was an office. A Tiat equivalent of one. There was a piece of furniture that looked like a desk, another that was probably a chair, and some weird abstract sculpture that I think was supposed to be shelves. There was also a door to the hallway.
This was good news for us. We had chosen the right corridor to go down. The other must have led to the barracks which was not what we wanted.
And the most important part was that it wasn’t flying open with Tiat swarming into the room. They hadn’t heard the giant section of wall falling.
Good for us, bad for them.
With Gilbert and Fortin back in the lab providing covering and distracting fire, the rest of us gathered at the office door. Harrow started ransacking the desk thing and the shelf art. Carleton leaned against the door with Sweet and Treuto ready to burst out. I was to follow them. They would go right, I’d go left. Not what Harrow had told me to do but technically I wasn’t part of her team.
Carleton hit the pad and the door slid open. Sweet stepped out into the hallway, body looking right towards the corner. He went flying, a body coming in from the left quickly and suddenly. We all heard the impact against the wall.
The Tiat are tall, the shortest is seven feet, and skinny but they are super dense and strong. Hitting one is like hitting a wall. Being hit by one hurts a lot. I’ve done both and regretted it everytime. Sweet had just been body tackled by a Tiat and slammed into the wall. Even a big guy like him was going to be hurting from that.
I stepped out to help but immediately had to start firing down the corridor. The Tiat had turned at the noise. They were now trapped between me, and Carleton who swung out into the corridor, and Fortin on the other end. We couldn’t help Sweet who was under the Tiat and unable to move.
Luckily Treuto was there.
The Europan stepped into the hall, covering the distance in just a couple steps, and reached down. He grabbed the Tiat by the collar, lifting the heavy alien as if he weighed nothing. I knew Europans were strong, but not this strong. The Tiat reached behind and punched at Treuto, the Europan staggering under the blows, but holding up as there was no real strength behind them because of the angle. A human would have gotten broken bones but Europans seemed to be as tough as Tiat. I heard the sound of Treuto’s climbing claws unsteathing followed by them slamming into the Tiat’s back. There was a scream that turned to a gurgle. The Tiat spit blue blood and sagged, Treuto letting him drop to the ground.
Humans were no match physically for Tiat. If we got into hand to hand with them, we’d lose, every time. Even if we somehow managed to kill them, we’d be a battered and bloody mess. It appeared that Europans were a match.
Between Carleton and myself, along with Fortin now backed up by I presumed Harrow on the other side, we made short work of the Tiat caught between us. Once they fell, I expected to see the others come barreling down the corridor with Tiat in pursuit. Instead they came through the office space.
With a loud explosion behind them.
The building shook and could hear pieces of it falling. A dust cloud came down the corridor.
“That’ll hold them for a bit,” Fortin said with a chuckle.
“Unless that corridor loops,” Gilbert mentioned. “Then we’ll be seeing them again.”
“Let’s go,” Harrow said stuffing some items she’d taken from the office into the pack attached to her vest. “You good,” she asked Sweet who was being helped up by Treuto.
He gave a thumbs up. His helmet wasn’t cracked, which was good, but it looked like a rib or two might have been. At least he was walking. He was a big boy, only Treuto would have been able to carry him.
We started down the corridor, Gilbert on rear guard just in case the Tiat had breachers of their own. None of us mentioned that we’d just blown up our way out of here.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The other rooms were more of the same. Offices. Small labs. Not what we wanted. Or at least not that we could find wanted.
Or read what we wanted.
It was all in Tiat and none of us could read it. Fortin could read some but nothing related to what we were seeing. I had a few words but mostly they were curses. The Tiat equivalent of ‘Your Mother’. I also knew some Tiat ship commands and notations from the time I had to fly a Tiat ship out of this asteroid belt. Nothing that helped us now.
We had no idea what we were looking for either so we just grabbed all that we could, hoping that 2E Intel could make something out of it. There was plenty of signage, but again all in Tiat.
They speak a very short language. Sharp consonants, very little in the way of vowels. It’s very direct. Short and to the point. The Tiat had no time to waste on unnecessary words. They had no time to waste on entertainment either. Not a fun people.
The corridor continued and turned just like it did on the other side. This confirmed what we had been worried about, that it was a continuous loop around the building with rooms on the inside and outside. A pretty basic layout but one that worked against us as it allowed the Tiat to come at us again from the other side.
This time when they started shooting at us, just as we had gotten down the new corridor about twenty feet and found cover in doors on either side of the corridor, we only had to worry about them shooting at us from one direction.
For now anyways. No doubt they were working their way through the debris barrier or using their own breachers to pass through the walls. Sooner or later they would flank us again.
There was also the part about the 2E bombers that were incoming.
I didn’t bother to ask Harrow for an update on the countdown. I really didn’t want to know.
Fortin and Carleton were just ahead, the furthest out, in a doorway on the right side. Myself and Gilbert were on the left side, the first of just three doors on that side. Harrow, Sweet and Treuto were in a right side door, closest to the corner.
Letting Gilbert provide the fire I looked around the room.
It wasn’t an office.
Not as big as the lab with the five bodies, which was an examination and testing room, this one was still a decent size. Judging by the equipment, this had to be a research or development room. If there were viruses being generated in this facility, this room was where they were created. I had no names for the equipment or any idea what exactly they did. It was more what they looked like.
I’d seen enough vids to know what an evil scientist’s machines looked like.
Working my way around the room I searched everywhere, or as much as I could when doing it quickly. I pulled open drawers and cabinets, tossed stuff off counters. I had no real idea what I was looking for but hoped I would know it when I found it.
I wasn’t really worried about accidentally exposing myself to anything. I was wearing a pretty high end environmental suit. I should be safe as long as nothing tore the suit or smashed the helmet. Should being the word. I didn’t want to take the risk but I was here and we needed to know what the Tiat had developed.
That examination room scared me.
Disease was the scariest thing in the galaxy. It could wipe out entire civilizations and then spread to others. With so many varied beings in the galaxy, what was specific for one species inevitably would affect many others. Maybe not in the same way, but there would be consequences.
Quarantines were strictly enforced and one of those rare things that seemed to bring everyone together.
The last time a planet had come under a world and species wide plague, that system had been blockaded by pretty much everyone. There had been Tiat ships next to Terran vessels. No one was allowed in or out. The planet died, the entire population destroyed.
It had then been bombed with geothermal explosives. Everything had been burned which hopefully included the virus.
There were survivors of the species, those that had been off planet, but they were few and far between. The Bintu were a fairly peaceful race, had to be when there was no homeplanet and just a collection of ships orbiting a dead planet. They were in the process of building a giant space station to house what remained of their population with the hope that someday their planet would be livable again. They’d been building the station for a decade.
No way in hell would I allow that to happen to Earth and our people.
And not just Terrans. Apparently the Dyer, Thesans, Engyn and Serit were also at risk.
The Tiat scientists could be super geniuses but there was no way that a virus or viruses designed to attack five different and such varied species wouldn’t adapt and kill or harm others.
Or maybe that was what they wanted?
Wipe out their five greatest enemies and decimate the rest of the galaxy while they remained safe and secure in their isolated little empire? The Tiat had stopped expanding into the known galaxy over fifty or more years ago. They solidified their hold on what they already had and just sat back, enjoying life as the largest empire in the galaxy. When we started exploring the unknown systems, they started doing so as well.
A whole new direction for them to expand into.
Was that the plan? Take out their biggest threats, weaken the rest of the galaxy and look towards the unknown and eventually come back and take over what was left of the known systems? Rule it all someday?
Biochemical weapons were the worst. I mean war sucks and physical weapons do their fair share of destruction but nothing on par with biochemical attacks.
We needed to know how far along the Tiat were. For all we knew they had started this program during the Third Galactic War and they were nearing completion of the virus. Or it was only a year or so old and they weren’t far along. Or there were another twenty facilities like this scattered around.
I doubted that part. This was probably the only one.
Developing viruses was dangerous work. Asteroids were really the only truly safe space to do it. If there was an accident it would be isolated on the rock and not contaminate anywhere else. The asteroid could be destroyed and the virus could be attempted again.
I came up empty. The room was clean. Nothing that looked to be research notes, materials or even a computer. There were plenty of places that looked like input for a wired computer, but those did me no good without the system itself.
Walking back to the door, I stood in a way so I could look down the corridor at the door behind me without exposing myself to the Tiat. I could see Sweet at the door firing down the corridor with Treuto and Harrow just inside the doorway. I held up my hands, showing them empty. She did the same.
“Carleton,” Harrow’s voice came over the comms. “Anything?”
“Nada boss,” he replied.
There were only a couple more rooms down this corridor and sooner or later we’d start hitting the barracks and break room, along with whatever other creature comfort rooms there were here. I doubted there would be a game room or entertainment center like there would be in a Terran facility but never know.
What it meant was that we had to get to the other rooms and check them out.
That meant advancing down the corridor with the Tiat firing on us.
There was really only one way to do it in this situation.
“Lancer, take over for Gilbert,” Harrow ordered.
Gilbert was crouching down, weapons held against the door jamb to keep it steady, and continuously firing down the corridor. Hearing Harrow, he started standing up well firing. I crouched down and maneuvered myself in line with him, holding my rifle. Looking down the blaster’s barrel, I was the room and then the door jamb and finally the corridor.
Long and straight, made of the gray metal, with a couple doors on it. Nothing remarkable except for the four lines of fire coming our way. It was all I could do to not fall backwards, every instinct telling me to take cover. But I had to stay here and return fire.
Once I was firing, Gilbert stepped back and out of the way. I slid forward and hugged the jamb. I could see Fortin ahead and on the right.
“Gilbert and Carleton,” Harrow said, everyone knowing what she wanted. “Sweet and myself. Treuto is pick-up. On my go.”
I continued firing down the corridor. I did controlled bursts. Three at the bottom where wall met corridor, three in the middle and three at the top where I thought a Tiat’s head would be. I didn’t hit anything but hoped my fire would keep them buttoned up. Just ahead and across Fortin was doing the same. We waited for Harrow’s command.
“Go,” she ordered.
We increased our fire, no longer aimed or controlled bursts, but a steady stream up and down the wall and the corridor. Gilbert stepped out into the corridor, standing up, and starting firing down the corridor. Up ahead, Carleton did the same. We waited for return fire from the Tiat but none came, Fortin and I had done a good job of keeping them hiding.
Gilbert started walking and as soon as he was past me, I stopped firing. I stood up and waited. He was a couple feet ahead when Sweet passed me, weapon raised and ready to fire. Coming even with Fortin, Gilbert adjusted his walk as Carleton stepped out next to him. Fortin stopped firing and stood up, waiting.
With Sweet and Harrow passed, I stepped out into the hall and raised my weapon. Sweet was directly ahead of me and I could feel Treuto behind. If any of us fell, the others would continue and Treuto would grab the fallen.
They passed Fortin and he stepped out, waiting until I was even with him to start walking.
“Drop,” Harrow ordered.
Carleton and Gilbert continued firing and then abruptly stopped. They dropped to the ground in a crouched position weapons still raised. As soon as they were below the weapons barrels, Sweet and Harrow opened fire. They kept advancing as Gilbert and
Carleton moved to the side. They stayed crouched, firing until Sweet and Harrow were past. They waited until Fortin and I passed by then stood up and starting following us. I could feel Gilbert’s weapon pointed at the back of my head.
“Drop,” Harrow ordered after walking ten or so feet down the corridor and she and Sweet did so.
My firing was a second or two behind Fortin as I had to wait longer for Sweet to get out of the way. He was a tall guy, much taller than Harrow.
I kept the barrage up as I walked. Not the easiest thing to do.
“Drop.”
Stopping firing, at the same time lowering my body, I could hear and feel the plasma blasts from Gilbert only inches from my head. Crouching down, weapon raised, I shifted to the side as Gilbert and Carleton walked by.
This was a risky maneuver. It required precision and timing, all members to be synced up. If one faltered, it gave the other side an opening. The idea was to keep a continuous barrage of fire down the corridor, keep the Tiat pinned down. The reason for the switching was to keep everyone fresh, give the lead a quick break.
It may have seemed like the hardest part, when the first team stepped out into the corridor and started walking but it really wasn’t. It was the riskiest, that was for sure. If the timing wasn’t right or the enemy was daring, they could take out one of the first pair and the whole thing would be over. That was the riskiest. The hardest was keeping up the constant fire well walking and ducking. Dropping and maintaining your balance, then sliding to the side, well keeping synced with the guy next to you. Yeah, that’s the hardest.
Harrow was showing a ton of faith in me. Only teams that had been together a while would attempt it. I was an unknown quantity. No way was I going to let her or the team down.
Sweet and Harrow walked by us, weapons raised and ready. I stood up, Fortin next to me, raised my weapon and followed. Treuto was behind us. The Europan had his large blaster hanging over his shoulder on a sling. Wouldn’t take much to flip it around into ready position.