Alliance (Jack Forge, Lost Marine Book 5)

by James David Victor

  The squeaks and whistles of the distorted communication transmission made Jack feel even more tired. The nebula was distorting the signal and made it unclear, but the message was not misunderstood. Jack’s tac boat had been detected, but it was not clear what it was. The Blades were here to take a closer look and destroy the craft if it was hostile.

  Jack responded.

  “This is Tac Boat Scorpio Nine. Transmitting ident codes now.”

  Jack boosted the signal and directed it at the lead Blade.

  “Ident confirmed. Welcome back, Major Forge.”

  The Blades maneuvered into formation on either side of Jack. They were small by comparison, like a pair of racecars next to a tank, but they were highly maneuverable and extremely deadly. The nose-mounted laser assembly and flank hail cannon were as powerful as anything the fleet had in its arsenal. The Blades could fight off any small craft that evaded a destroyer’s heavy weapons, and they could close with an enemy’s largest ships fast and deliver a crippling blow. They were called the Blades because they could slice through a defense and cut an enemy to ribbons, softening them up for the knockdown blow from the destroyers and their supporting flotillas.

  Jack relaxed as the clouds of nebula enveloped him. It felt like a thick blanket covering him, taking him into a soft bed where he could relax.

  Sleep.

  Jack slapped his leg to stave off the drowsiness that crept up on him like an assassin.

  The fleet hiding in the dense nebula was revealed on the holostage as Jack drew closer. The massive shape of the carrier Scepter was the first ship Jack saw. The carrier was bigger than any of the warships in the fleet. It was the main landing base for the Blade fighter wing. The carrier was so massive, it had landing bays and a maintenance sections capable of landing a frigate class vessel or up to three corvettes.

  Moving in formation with the Blades along the length of the massive carrier, Jack next saw an even larger ship, one of the dozens of city-sized civilian transport ships. These massive ships were unarmed and extremely vulnerable. They relied on and owed their safety to the Scepter and its attendant warships.

  As Jack moved past the Scepter, he saw his target up ahead. Emerging from the dust and gas was the Scorpio. Although smaller than the carrier, the Scorpio was one of the remaining destroyers and was itself a huge ship. With a formidable arsenal of laser assemblies and hail cannon batteries, the destroyer class was the fleet’s primary heavy hitter. It was heavily armored with durable hull composite augmented by hull integrity fields. The destroyers had small landing bays designed to house the thirty-six tac boats for its Marine battalion.

  The Scorpio Battalion was Jack’s. He had been a part of it from his first posting as a Marine recruit all the way through to his current position as the ranking Marine officer of the Scorpio battalion. The battalion had shrunk greatly from its original three companies, each of twelve squads, and the tac boats were reduced even more to only a few functional craft.

  The outer hangar door was open for Jack, so he moved in and contacted the Scorpio’s command deck for permission to land. Commander Chou, the Scorpio’s second-in-command, acknowledged Jack’s safe return and allocated him a landing spot in the hangar.

  “Put her down gentle, sir,” the lead Blade said to Jack over his communicator.

  “Thank you,” Jack said. “Good flying with you. Go the Blades.”

  Jack maneuvered inside the hangar, the outer doors sliding shut behind him. He touched down with the slightest of jolts and began to isolate the tac boat’s reactor to commence shutdown. He worked on autopilot, his hands moving across the flight console, deactivating the subsystems in order. He realized he was not concentrating and made the conscious effort to focus on each minor operation of the shutdown procedure. The last thing the fleet wanted was a tac boat running free or a residual energy flare inside the hangar deck, a possible outcome of an incomplete or incorrect shut down.

  Jack double-checked his work, pointing at each subsystem and speaking the result to himself to ensure he had completed the job correctly, then he climbed out of the seat, gathered the few items he had brought aboard, and walked to the boarding ramp.

  The tac boat ramp dropped with a thud. The deck was busy with boats being prepped for scouting missions and some undergoing maintenance. At the far end of the hangar, Jack saw a Blade receiving some attention from a maintenance crew. The Blade was one of the Orphan group, the Blades that had been left homeless after the destruction of their carrier. These Orphan Blades now set down on any available deck in the fleet. The Scepter had crammed in as many as possible, as each remaining destroyer had their allocation. The rest of the Orphans were using the outer hulls of the frigates as makeshift landing pads.

  The pilot of the Blade was sitting on the hangar deck, his back against the front landing strut of his ship. He had his arms folded and his ankles crossed. His head was down, and he was snoring loudly. The maintenance team moved as quietly as possibly, allowing the pilot to catch a few well-earned moments of sleep.

  Jack left the hangar deck as a tac boat lifted off noisily, and he noticed the sleeping pilot appeared undisturbed.

  Jack walked out into the familiar corridors of the Scorpio.

  The Scorpio was busy, crew walking here and there, all focused on some task. There was a pair of Marines standing guard at one internal hatchway in full tactical suits with their pulse rifles slung on their shoulders, and they saluted Jack as he came near. He returned the salute and stepped through the hatch, making his way toward the command deck at the forward section of the destroyer.

  All life was here. People working, eating, sleeping. The Scorpio was operating with a full crew compliment. All fleet ships had recruited suitable personnel from the civilian population aboard the massive civilian craft. Those here were glad to be, and the captain of the ship, Pretorius, was glad to have them. All were former fleet personnel, or former civilian fleet personnel, or at least had some technical experience that made them suitable for their new role.

  The Fleet Marine Service, however, was not fully manned. The training facility set up on one of the civilian transports was not producing the best quality Marines. Jack recalled his introduction to Marine life. He’d been pressed into service, he’d been Tasered, flogged, half-starved, and then almost killed during an attack on the training base. He remembered it now in a sudden flood of memory. He particularly remembered being forced into a fistfight with a fellow recruit, a thuggish criminal who had since become a firm friend of Jack’s.

  Stepping past another pair of Marine guards and onto the command deck, Jack felt the heightened tension. The fleet was hiding and in constant danger of being discovered. Their hiding spot had bought them some time to make what repairs they could, but there was still not enough time or resources.

  Jack stepped over to the holostage at the center of the command deck. Captain Pretorius was looking at a holofile on a small hand-held holostage, flicking through the information and cross-checking with the data on the main holostage, which showed a 3D image of the Scorpio—a line image showing all decks, corridors, vital systems, and subsystems. The ship was in full diagnostic and repair mode. Most of the subsystems were highlighted in yellow or red, and some were blacked out completely to show they were currently offline.

  Pretorius handed the small holostage over to his second-in-command.

  “Tell whoever we have in charge down there that the seals need to be reset manually. I don’t care what they did in the civilian fleet. I’m not leaving this nebula just to have my starboard thrusters fall away into space.”

  Commander Chou nodded, took the tablet, and walked off quickly.

  Pretorius looked up briefly.

  “Jack, my boy. You look awful.”

  “Thank you, sir.” He looked at the image on the main holostage. “The Scorpio doesn’t look so good either.”

  “I’ve got systems failures across the board. I’ve got a team over from the Canis helping reset the main drive manif
old. I’ve got half my gunnery crew training the other half how to service a hail cannon. And…” Pretorius looked up. “And we’re getting there…slowly. Did you find anything out there?”

  “Maybe,” Jack said. He looked at the holoimage and the section where his quarters were. “I might have found a narrow channel out of here. But the chance is slipping away. The Skalidions are advancing all along the boundary. I’ve transmitted the data to the Scepter. It’s all with the admiral’s staff now.”

  Pretorius took a holofile from a deck officer as it was handed to him. “We’ll be ready to move the moment the admiral gives the order. Why don’t you go get some sack time, Jack. You’ll be no good to me if you collapse from exhaustion.”

  Jack nodded. “Yes, sir. Thank you. But I was going to look in on Commander Torent first.”

  Pretorius placed the holofile down and looked at Jack.

  “I should have told you already. I know he’s your friend. He’s with Fleet Intelligence. The alien tech division.”

  Jack felt a wave of anger wash over him. Sam had given enough. Why couldn’t they just leave him alone?

  “Alien tech division?” Jack asked. “They created a division just to torment Sam? Where are they?”

  Pretorius looked at Jack with a cheeky grin. “Agent Reyes has him. Agent Sarah Reyes.”

  Jack felt his breath catch in his chest. The sound of the name was like a symphony.

  Sarah Reyes.

  He had not seen her since... It had been too long.

  “Where are they?” Jack said.

  Pretorius zoomed in on the holoimage of the Scorpio and highlighted a maintenance workshop.

  “They are in there.”

  Jack pushed off the holostage. “Thank you, sir,” Jack said and moved off.

  “Say hello and then get some sleep. That is an order, Major.”

  Jack shouted back that he would, but he didn’t feel tired at all. He was excited.

  Sarah Reyes. She was here.

  The maintenance workshop was guarded by two Fleet Intelligence enforcers in their black tactical suits. They stopped Jack at the entrance.

  “No one can enter.” One of the enforcers moved his pulse rifle and blocked Jack’s path.

  “I’m here to see Agent Reyes,” Jack said. The sound of her name was wonderful, but the title of ‘agent’ was strange. Jack had only ever had a bad time at the hands of the Fleet Intelligence agents. He hoped Sarah would be pleased to see him.

  “Jack?”

  Jack heard his name from behind the workshop door. Then the sounds of running feet and his name called out again, louder, excited.

  “Jack? Is that Jack Forge?”

  The door was yanked open, and there stood Sarah Reyes—her bright eyes smiling at Jack, and her thick, dark hair bouncing around her perfect features. Her high collar black Fleet Intelligence uniform was decorated with a single silver pip on her chest.

  “Sarah,” Jack said. He wanted to say so much more.

  Pushing her way past the enforcers and reaching for Jack, Sarah smiled. “It’s good to see you!” She dragged Jack toward her, through the door, and into the workshop.

  Jack let the door close behind him. He let Sarah throw her arms around his neck and kiss his cheek. It felt good to be close to her again. He squinted into the darkness a single pool of light up ahead showed Sam, sitting up on a bench. He was shirtless and cradling his right arm by the wrist. His Mech arm.

  Sarah took Jack by the hand and led him across to Sam.

  “It is so good to see you, Jack. Sam’s been telling me everything.”

  “Oh, good,” Jack said. “Pity you couldn’t get it from a reliable source.”

  “Krav you, Jack,” Sam said. He jumped off the bench and leaned back against it. “You look terrible.”

  Sarah wrapped an arm around Jack’s waist and walked him forward.

  “Don’t mind Sam,” she said. “He’s just grumpy because I’m making him work.”

  “What kind of work?” Jack said. He looked at Sam. His old friend was smiling. He still cradled his Mech arm, but he appeared to be fine. The last time intelligence agents had their hands on him, they had performed an investigation into his alien arm that was nothing short of torture. Now he looked fine.

  Jack looked to Sarah Reyes. The uniform looked good on her, but it still held too many bad memories for Jack. He couldn’t trust the intelligence agency. They never seemed to have his interests at heart.

  “We have been trying to discover the range of abilities Sam’s new arm has. It’s fascinating. The most interesting thing I’ve ever worked on.”

  Sarah was a genius engineer, and she had managed to learn the secrets of alien tech before. She had some kind of innate ability to understand the strange and unknown.

  Sam grabbed his shirt off a nearby bench. Sarah stopped him and grabbed his Mech arm. She tossed the shirt back to the workbench and tugged Sam’s arm toward Jack. Sam protested for a moment but let Sarah continue.

  “It is amazing. Look,” Sarah said, pointing at the upper arm. “The doctors fitted an endcap, a place for Sam’s old cybernetic arm to attach and connect to his nervous system. The Mechs injected their Mech tissue at that point and look!” Sarah tugged again. “It’s gone. It’s been transformed into Mech tissue. I can’t detect any sign of the endcap interface.”

  Jack looked at Sam’s arm. It merged seamlessly into the lower arm and hand that was clearly composed of the dark strands of Mech tissue, forming a human-shaped arm and hand.

  Jack looked at Sam. He was worried about the arm.

  “You okay?”

  Sam nodded. “It feels great.”

  “Show him,” Sarah said. She let go of Sam’s arm.

  Sam grinned at Jack. He looked around the workshop and spotted his shirt on the workbench.

  Sam held out his hand toward the shirt. Jack watched and saw the fingers begin to unravel, fine threads of Mech tissue unwinding so the hand was gone, replaced by the fine dark strand.

  Jack had seen this before when Sam interfaced with the Devex technology. But then something new happened. The threads began to stretch forward.

  Sam grunted with effort.

  “Concentrate,” Sarah said calmly, soothingly.

  Jack watched as Sam’s arm unraveled and reached for the shirt. The fine threads gripped the shirt and began to draw back, bringing the shirt with it.

  Sam grunted in pain and effort.

  “Don’t overdo it, Sam,” Sarah said. She placed a hand on his bare shoulder.

  Jack stared for a moment at Sarah’s hand, touching Sam’s bare skin. He wanted that touch. Then he looked to the shirt and saw Sam drawing it toward him. Then the hand began to reform, and finally, with Sam gasping for breath and on the point of exhaustion, he held the shirt in his fully-formed, human-shaped hand. He looked at Jack. Beads of sweat lined his forehead.

  Sarah squealed in delight and clapped excitedly, then she patted Sam on the back.

  “That was amazing, Sam. The best yet. Well done.”

  Sam nodded. he began to pull his shirt on and then his knees gave way.

  Jack was there in an instant, acting entirely on instinct. He grabbed Sam and stopped him from falling.

  “Easy there, Sam,” Jack said.

  “I think…” Sam panted. “I might have—” He paused. “—gone a bit too far.”

  Sarah helped Sam put his shirt on and leaned him against the bench. “I think we’ll apply a med-pack and let you get some rest,” Sarah said.

  Sam climbed up onto the bench and laid down. He was asleep in a moment.

  “Is he okay?” Jack asked.

  Sarah placed a med-pack on Sam’s forehead and looked at the display.

  “He’s exhausted,” she said, reading the diagnosis. “Sleep and something good to eat and he’ll be right as rain.” She turned to Jack. “You look tired too.”

  Jack nodded. “I just had to come and see you.”

  Sarah smiled. “It’s good to see you
too, Jack. I never thought I’d see you again. When you were left behind...”

  Jack placed a hand on her waist. “It’s okay.”

  “I had to leave,” Sarah said, looking down. “I had no choice.”

  “It’s okay,” Jack said again. “We all did our duty. Speaking of duty, you’re not working maintenance anymore.” Jack looked her black agent’s uniform up and down.

  “I was sworn into the intelligence agency. I have a brief to reverse engineer any alien tech.”

  Sarah stepped closer to Jack.

  “Like Sam’s arm?” Jack asked, taking a step closer.

  “I have a broad jurisdiction. I’m pretty independent. I can work on whatever takes my fancy.” She stepped closer.

  Jack could feel her body heat. He could smell her hair.

  “We should swap notes,” Jack said. “I’ve seen some crazy alien tech recently.”

  Sarah reached up and placed her hand on Jack’s shoulder. He looked down into her shining eyes.

  Then Sam jerked in his sleep, crying out in pain. His arm unraveled and threads erupted outward.

  Sarah turned to Sam and adjusted the med-pack on his forehead. Sam fell quiet again, but his arm remained a frayed mess of Mech fibers.

  Sarah turned to Jack, a little concerned.

  “I should get back to work,” she said, pointing at Sam. “The arm does strange things when he’s asleep. I need to monitor it all.”

  Jack nodded.

  “And you could use some sleep too,” Sarah said. “I have broad agent powers and can order you to bed,” she said with a half-smile.

  Jack nodded. “I should sleep. I’ll be back on duty at the top of the next watch.”

  “I’ll see you soon,” Sarah said. “I hear a bunch of former ball professionals are putting on an exhibition match of 360 switch ball in one of the civ arenas. Take me?”

  Jack nodded. He felt his passion for Sarah grow. Then he felt his eyelids droop and tiredness come over him.

  “Sure. I’d love to take you,” Jack said. He stepped away, reluctant to leave Sarah but eager to lie down and sleep.