“No,” said Lynch, looking upward. Hanging from the inside mouth of the cave were other spacesuits, some with bones inside, others eerily empty, nooses around their necks and signs nailed to their chests.
CHEATERS
“It’s a warning.”
Sampson whistled again. “Cheaters. Wow. They sure take their gambling serious here on Serendipity. Cheating patrons get the shaft.”
Lynch examined one of the bodies hanging from the cave’s low ceiling. “Patrons were bitten to death by human teeth?”
The signs were unmistakable. And the body inside didn’t look like it was dressed as your run-of-the-mill gambler. It was wearing a lab coat—or rather, what was left of it. “This was a scientist.”
Chapter Thirty-Six
Rogue Planet Serendipity
Surface
Lynch couldn’t spare the time to cut down the bodies, so left them there, leading the troupe deeper into the cave’s mouth, the jagged stalactites above them suddenly a lot more intimidating.
As they walked, Sampson’s helmet mounted flashlight jerked around, casting strange shadows which seemed to grow and shrink with alarming speed. The further they got inside, the more nervous she seemed. Sampson clutched her weapon tightly, eyes darting around inside her armored suit.
Lynch switched channels so that he was just talking to her. “You okay there?” he asked, keeping his head straight so that the others wouldn’t realize they were talking. She might be dumb as a post, but if she had some kind of issue … then it was better that he knew about it so he could handle it.
“Yeah,” she said, a firm tremor in her voice. “I just … I just hate the dark.”
That confused him. “Aren’t you meant to be trained to fight on a space ship?”
“Spaceships are always lit. Even with emergency lighting.”
That was a good point. “If we have a problem … you could watch the entrance.”
“Naw,” she said. “I ain’t going to do that to you. I’ll stick with you till we find whatever it is we’re looking for here, sir.”
“Good to hear.” He switched frequencies back to the group, coming into a conversation about a video of a cat eating spaghetti which had done the rounds a few months ago, and some spirited debate about if the cat was inbred or not.
The away team continued down the tunnel, until they came to a thick, reinforced steel door which had fallen off its hinges, the thick metal frame torn and bent. Whatever tumultuous damage the partially activated future-human weapon had wrought on this rogue world, it had obviously damaged the installation significantly. Just beyond it lay another door, similarly destroyed and open.
“Looks like an airlock,” said Sampson.
“Hope that’s not the only one,” said Lynch, “or everyone in there is dead.” He shone his light further up, revealing an elevator, its doors open. “Think that’s serviceable?”
“Even if it is,” said Sampson, “no way I’m trusting that technology. Shit could be booby trapped. Best cut our way through the floor and rappel down.”
That seemed simple enough. “Do it,” said Lynch.
He expected her to use a blowtorch. Or perhaps explosives. But Sampson, instead, simply pointed the barrel of her massive gun toward the floor and shot out a crude hole—silent and eerily somber in the lack of atmosphere—then casually slung it back over her shoulder. “Done,” she said, reaching to her belt and withdrawing a spool of thick wire. She bolted it to the wall with some kind of advanced nailgun and then, without any further ado, leapt down the hole.
As brave as she was stupid. Lynch hooked his suit onto the wire and followed her down.
The elevator shaft was a crude rectangle into the planet’s surface that descended further down than his light could easily penetrate. “Hope you brought plenty of wire,” he said.
“Heaps,” she said. “Spectre said the main casino was far below the surface. And the earthquake-thing was likely to mess everything up. So, you know, I brought three spares. And I switched out our radio transmitters for lower bandwidth ones optimized for dealing with underground interference, since, you know, big slabs of rock with chunks of iron in them tend to mess with radio waves.”
Apparently Sampson wasn’t all that dumb after all—most of it was probably an act. To fit in with her grunting, scratching, neanderthal Rhino buddies. As Lynch slowly lowered himself into the crudely cut elevator shaft, he reconsidered his opinions on the Rhinos. They weren’t necessarily stupid, just … specialized. That was a charitable way of putting it. They could do one thing and do it well.
That was enough.
Down into the ground they went, with Sampson occasionally changing and extending the wire. As they descended, the temperature climbed, but there was still no sign of atmosphere, until finally they arrived at the bottom.
There the lower airlock lay smashed open too, and beyond that the casino, its light still on and games still active, silently flashed in the dim gloom. Debris littered the floor and gaming tables had been tilted over, machines flattened on the ground, and piles of casino chips lay scattered around like some toddler with anger issues had tossed them in all directions.
“No more bodies,” said Sampson. “That’s … good?”
“I thought we were looking for things,” said Baranov, quietly. “People are the best intel.”
“Actually that’s computers,” said Sampson. “People lie.”
“So can computers,” said Baranov.
Lynch couldn’t help but agree with the sentiment. “People are bastards, but it’s a mistake to trust computers too much.” He slowly crept into the ruined airlock, stepping between the outer and inner doors, but then noticed something remarkable.
The wall to the left hand side of the airlock, normally just an unremarkable steel sheet, had bent and warped from the geological activity. Beyond he could see a corridor, formerly concealed by the otherwise unremarkable sheet. Lynch reached up and tried to pry the metal open, but it wouldn’t budge.
“What’s this?” he asked, curiously.
“Eh,” said Sampson. “Looks like some kind of hidden passageway. I think the earthquake busted it.”
The more Lynch searched the more it seemed to be the case. Normally, the corridor beyond would have been perfectly hidden—it did seem like the warped steel sheet had been some kind of secret door, pre-destruction. The airlock was three-way. “I can’t get it open.”
“Let me,” said Sampson, putting her massive glove on the thing and tearing it out by its hinges.
On the back of the sheet was the symbol of MaxGainz, the steroid company that had caused them a great deal of misery of late. Just seeing it made him feel hot under the collar. “Well, this is just great,” said Lynch, stepping past Sampson into the exposed secret room.
It glowed ominously, a pale green light emanating from row after row of fluid-filled transparent tanks. About half of them had partially decomposed skeletons within, although it looked like the area hadn’t been used in a while, with a thick layer of dust covering everything, even after the earthquake.
“Looks like we found a thing,” said Baranov.
“It’s definitely some kind of thing,” said Lynch, a little edge of bitterness creeping into his voice. “If only we had Modi down here to sort it out.”
“What should we do?” said Sampson.
“Take pictures,” he said. “Lots of photos. Videos. Take a few samples, find any computers or data sticks you can, and then get the hell out of here. We’re running out of time for the climb back. Fifteen minutes, people, no more.”
“Aye aye,” said Sampson, and then she and the other Rhinos went to work.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Rogue Planet Serendipity, Low Orbit
USS Midway
Bridge
Mattis quietly fumed in his command chair, doing his best not to let his frustration show. The incident with Doctor Brooks grated on his nerves.
The Midway was his command. Outside forces m
essing with it, apart from the issue of his pride, would only bring problems. Problems they could ill afford at this point.
Fortunately, Lynch’s voice came through and broke him out of his thoughts. The transmission was heavily garbled, but definitely understandable.
“Commander Lynch to Midway, do you copy?”
Mattis smiled despite himself. “You’re coming through loud and clear, Commander Lynch. What did you find down there?”
“Well first,” said Lynch, “how’s Modi going with the repairs? He’s listening in, right? Lemme tell you, I want that extra week.”
“Oh,” said Mattis, whimsically. “Yeah, I’ve piped this down to engineering. He’s doing okay from early reports. Quite motivated to get that week’s worth of leave, or so I hear. It’s causing him to work extra fast.”
“Well, tell him to shove it up his tailpipe, because believe me, I have cracked this thing wide open. I know why the future-humans were attacking here.” He paused, presumably for dramatic affect, although Mattis could hear a winch whining in the background, so it might have been related to that. “There’s a goddamn MaxGainz facility here. It’s old. Twenty years at least, and abandoned. Just like what that science-nerd guy found. Modi’s little buddy. You know, um, Breeman—Freeman? I want to say, um … Christopher?”
“Bratta,” said Mattis. “Doctor Steve Bratta.” His teeth ground against each other. Steve Bratta had, against Mattis’s best judgement, gone ‘undercover’ on the outlaw world of Chrysalis. There, they had located a human experimentation facility. “Any indications what it’s for?”
Lynch snorted over the line. “It could be anything.” Another pause, broken only by the faint sound of whirring in the background. “You know, this sounds crazy, but my gut is telling me this is important. Something more than just some scientist’s play pen, you know? And some of the scientists, well, they were dead all right. But looks like something tried to bite their heads off. Something … human …-ish.”
Mattis had the same this-is-important feeling. “You say it’s abandoned?”
“If it’s not, they put an awful lot of effort into trying to convince us that it was. I had the Rhinos raid what we could of their computer hardware—” Lynch raised his voice suddenly as though speaking to someone nearby. “Careful with that, it’s fragile!” Then, he seemed to refocus once more. “Look, I got their computers, I got heaps of photos and information, I got what I need to prove it to you, or to anyone else, that that’s what was down here. It was more than just a casino. A lot more.”
“Very good,” said Mattis, “get back here as soon as you can.” And then he closed the link.
“Well,” said Spectre, his voice quite chirpy. “That explains a lot of things.”
“It does?” asked Mattis, curiously.
“Isn’t it obvious?” asked Spectre, as though it truly were the easiest thing in the galaxy to understand. “When the future-humans attacked the first time, they blew up Friendship Station, obviously, because without it they wouldn’t have a way of getting past our defenses without being detected—but they didn’t count on the Midway being there, so they ended up losing the element of surprise regardless. So they took out the facility there. And where did they go after that? Ganymede, of course, to take out the seed bank for humanity. Then, well, straight to Earth to blast our researchers and technological centers to ashes, and then, presumably, a tour of the sector, winding up in Chrysalis to finish the job.”
It all made sense, but something Spectre said leapt out to him in a way that made his whole chest tighten. “There was a MaxGainz human gene research facility on Friendship Station?”
“Of course,” said Spectre, blinking in surprise. “I … thought you would have figured that out by now.”
“News to me,” grumbled Mattis. Just when he thought he knew it all. “Anyway. While we’re waiting for Lynch to come back, we should start tracking that ship.” He touched his radio. “Modi, how are my engines looking?”
“We should have them ready momentarily,” said Modi, pride in his voice. “Although I see that Commander Lynch has not yet returned from his away mission.”
“He’s on his way back now,” said Mattis, perfectly honestly. “I’d say you don’t have more than a few minutes before he does get on board. He’s got a theory—a theory with a lot of evidence to it—but until I have that evidence in my hand, the game is still on.” His tone betrayed the playful nature of his comment. “First one to solve their problem wins, remember.”
“Of course,” said Modi, and without further ado, cut the link.
Well, having engines back would be decidedly pleasant, but having the mystery solved would also be good. The whole thing bugged him. But what didn’t these days? He was turning into a cautious man; a suspicious man.
An old man.
His earpiece did a very strange thing and chirped twice at the same time, two different tones indicating that both Modi and Lynch were trying to talk to him. He opened both channels, patching the two conversations into each other.
“Engines are operational,” said Modi.
Lynch talked over him. “Sir, we’re aboard the shuttle, and—damn it!”
“Sorry Lynch,” said Mattis, grimacing slightly. He had seemed so eager to win. “I’m a man of my world. Modi solved the situation first.” He took a breath. “Okay, Modi, prepare for Z-space translation.”
“That won’t be possible just yet,” said Modi. “I haven’t completed the diagnostics to verify the repairs are working.”
“Then that doesn’t count!” laughed Lynch down the line, with perhaps a little more energy than was strictly necessary, for a game, at least. “You goddamned android; tie a quarter to this competition and throw it away, and you can say you lost two things.” His voice came through, revitalized and charged with a passionate energy. “Sir, our shuttle is burning hell for leather back to the Midway. We will be there as soon as we can.”
Modi’s stammering voice cut over the conversation. “The rules said—”
“The rules,” said Mattis, calmly, “said you had to fix the engines. You can’t be sure that you have yet.”
“There’s a high probability—”
“You,” said Lynch with a laugh, “are a day late and a dollar short. Sorry, Modi, buddy, you gotta do better than that.”
Modi’s tone turned sour. “I will perform the diagnostics, and then I shall report back.”
Mattis nodded even though neither of them could see it. “Right, well, let me know when you have something concrete, both of you. Mattis out.” He craned his neck, looking to his tactical officer. “We can’t wait for Lynch. Have we figured out where that skunk is making for?”
“Not yet,” said the tactical officer, frowning as she consulted her instruments. “There’s a lot of interference in the residual signal. It might be a byproduct of the rogue planet, or possibly the result of battle damage inflicted on the future-human ship’s engines … or maybe something they did deliberately. Either way it’s hard to find their exact heading.”
Spectre coughed politely. “What about an imprecise heading?”
The officer looked to Mattis for confirmation. He nodded.
“Roughly one-one-nine, mark two-zero-zero. Accurate to a degree doesn’t count for much in space, unfortunately.”
Spectre smiled. “It’s near enough.” His face slowly split into a cheeky grin, his British accent intensifying. “Rather than me spoiling it, why don’t you ask Admiral Fischer yourself? She certainly knows.”
He gently bit the inside of his cheek to keep himself from saying what he really felt, maintaining professionalism in the face of … that.
“I will,” said Mattis, straightening his back. “And that’s enough out of you, I think. Spectre, your usefulness to me has expired. Marines, take him to the brig.”
“Arrest me?” Spectre held up his palms innocently. “On what charge?”
Mattis didn’t trust him at all. Spectre presented an unacceptable operational
risk; he was only useful when he was providing information, and his supply of that seemed to have run out if he was sending him to Admiral Fischer. “Pissing off the CO of a US naval vessel.”
Spectre shrugged happily and didn’t resist, holding out his wrists and letting the marines cuff him, then haul him off to the ship’s tiny jail.
Leaving Mattis to wonder why he went so easily.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Rogue Planet Serendipity, Low Orbit
USS Midway
Patricia “Guano” Corrick’s Quarters
Guano threw herself down onto her bed with an angry growl.
“So,” said Doctor Brooks, settling into a chair beside her bed, but not before picking up an armful of clothes and gently pushing them onto the floor. “I’m guessing being a gunner didn’t exactly work out for you, in terms of bringing out your fugue state.”
“Nope,” she said, practically spitting the words. “We flew out there, genuine combat and all. There were pew pews and missiles and an alien ship—but a gunner’s cannons couldn’t penetrate its hull armor, and we were too far behind to catch the missiles. So basically I just turned a whole bunch of perfectly good fuel and ammunition into a nice pretty bill for the US taxpayer. Then we landed. Debriefed. Now I’m here.”
“I can understand your frustration,” said Doctor Brooks, sympathetically. “But at least you got out there.”
“Yeah. Too bad I was garbage.” She angrily punched her pillow. “Damn it! This is pissing me off. I just wanna bring this thing out so you can study it and get it over with, but it just … it just seems like everything around me is working to prevent it from coming out, you know?”
Doctor Brooks was quiet for a moment. “Yes, actually, I do. Wanna hear a story?”
The Last Dawn: Book 3 of The Last War Series Page 16