“Who are you and why were you running away from the Sky View Lodge? Is this a local matter, or are you involved in something else?” the agent asked as he held his ground just out of the warrior’s reach. What the agent didn’t see, however, was that Jason had snagged a fallen soldier’s weapons and was standing just around the corner. He lowered himself to the ground and used his toes to push forward until he was just near the edge.
“Answer me!” the agent said sharply. Jason selected the stun setting and pushed the last few inches he needed before rolling over to his left and lining the agent up in his sights. The agent heard him and also brought his weapon to bear, his set to kill. He also fired the first shot, a wildly-aimed blast that went wide. Jason heard Crusher bellow in pain and squeezed his own shot off, taking the agent full in the face.
The agent didn’t convulse or flop about like some did when hit with a stunner. He just crumpled like a toy after someone flipped the switch off. Jason rose quickly and fired two more stun bolts into the now-stirring troops before moving to check on Crusher, expecting the worst.
“Where are you hit?” he asked, unable to see any visible wounds. Wordlessly, Crusher held up one of his “dreadlocks”, which in reality were highly sensitive sensory organs that could detect minute pressure changes and allow his kind to have a full sphere of awareness when in battle. The one in his friend’s hand had a singed end that still had a faint wisp of smoke curling off of it.
“It doesn’t look that bad,” Jason commented He’d seen Crusher suffer far more grievous injuries without as much as a whimper. He was now making a face like he’d just slammed his tongue in an airlock hatch, however.
“Let me shoot you in the most sensitive part of your body with his gun,” Crusher said, actually reaching for the agent’s weapon. This made Jason tighten up and squeeze his knees together involuntarily.
“No need for hostility,” he said quickly. “So what should we do about him,” he asked, gesturing towards the agent. “The troopers won’t remember shit, and probably didn’t know anything anyway, but this guy seemed to be after us specifically.”
“Kill him?” Crusher asked.
“I’d rather not,” Jason said. “Not because I have any particular affinity for ConFed agents, but when you kill one, fifty more seem to join the hunt for you. Remember that thing Doc was saying about multiple stunners being able to erase recent memory? Something about overloading the temporal cortex in most sentient species?” Crusher just gave him a strange look.
“You actually pay attention when he’s blathering on about that shit?”
“Not usually. But for some reason this stuck,” Jason said. “I think he said there was also an equally good chance it could totally blank both the memory and voluntary body functions.”
“Damn,” Crusher said. “You’d probably be doing him a favor just to kill him.”
“Well, at least this way he has better odds,” Jason said and fired two stun bolts into the agent’s head at a distance of less than five meters. The agent’s legs flailed around wildly for a moment and then he went still, the rising and falling of his chest telling them that at least his autonomic nervous system had survived the ordeal.
“We’d better get moving,” Crusher said as he policed the area for any physical evidence they might have inadvertently left. “I’m sure Lucky got Captain Colleren back to the ship already.”
“Let’s move,” Jason agreed and tossed the weapon back over near where the original owner still lay. The pair walked casually back out of the alleyway and turned back onto their original course that would lead them out of the city via one of the service roads and not the main streets, which were surely blocked off by now.
*****
Jason let out an explosive sigh of relief when his boots hit the ramp of the Phoenix. Even if they were discovered now, the odds were much more in his favor behind the controls of the powerful gunship. As he’d requested from Kage, the engines were running and emitting a low, steady hum as the ship sat primed for flight. He closed the ramp and the rear pressure doors and ran to the bridge with Crusher right behind him.
The rest of his crew, and Kellea, were already strapped in and ready. Four anxious faces looked at him as he climbed into the pilot’s seat. “Talk to me,” he said as he began verifying his ship’s status.
“We’re being asked to clear out,” Kage said. “The ConFed ships in orbit want to land some assault boats and need the landing area empty.”
“You’re shitting me?” Jason asked, elated. “So we just fly off, simple as that?”
“You wish,” Kage snorted. “We’re being diverted to the main spaceport outside of the capital for a search by ConFed Intelligence before we’re cleared to depart the planet. Our required flight plan just came through.”
“Hmm,” Jason said. “Still … at least we’ll be airborne. This is still more desirable than trying to tear out of here without clearance. I assume we’re still pinging as the Lark?”
“You assume correct,” Kage said. “We just got our clearance to lift off. Actually we were told, more or less, to get the hell out of the way.” Jason looked and confirmed his navigational data before feeding power to the drive and lifting the Phoenix smoothly off the landing pad. He retracted the gear and swung around for a gentle, sweeping climb into the holding pattern where they would stay until directed to fly on to the capital.
Jason looked over at Kellea as he accelerated the ship along their new flight path. The starship captain looked a bit shell shocked, extremely dirty, but none the worse for wear otherwise. In the mad dash to get to her, he hadn’t had a lot of time to reflect on what he might find out when he was finally able to debrief her. Seeing the Diligent spinning in space with heavy battle damage wasn’t something he’d ever expected.
“Captain! You’ll want to see this,” Doc broke him out of his reverie. “News broadcast from Camderan media sources.” Jason looked at the clock and saw he had a few hours to kill before they made any real decision on what their next course of action would be.
“Put it up,” he said. Doc turned and fed the video to the projection system that turned the front canopy into an enormous display.
“Confederation Agents attempted to apprehend the first officer from the warship, Diligent, that had been intercepted days ago. The ship is said to have been involved in the recent violent protests across the planet. The officer, whose name is officially being withheld at this time, was killed during the attempted arrest. The captain of that vessel, Kellea Colleren, is still at large …” The video cut to a scene outside of what appeared to be block housing in a northern part of the planet. A sheet was covering a body on the sidewalk. The bright orange hair of Commander Bostco could be seen as the wind rippled the thin cover.
“Oh!” Kellea choked back a sob.
“Kill the feed, Doc,” Jason said quietly. He was completely enraged. Bostco had been his friend and he had no doubt the ConFed hadn’t tried to arrest him, but had assassinated the easygoing officer in cold blood. Bostco was no warrior, and he wouldn’t have put up a fight when confronted by an armed party.
“Arrest my ass,” Crusher growled, giving voice to what everyone else was thinking. “What are we going to do, Captain?”
“We can’t help him now,” Jason said, the feeling of impotence in the face of such an obvious injustice fueling his rage. “First we get Captain Colleren off this planet safely, and then we start trying to piece together what the hell is going on.”
“These guys are playing for keeps right now,” Twingo said softly. His eyes were wet, but his voice was steady. “We can’t risk taking this ship into the capital. We might not get out and they’ll tear her apart if they even suspect we have anything to do with this.”
“Agreed,” Jason said. “This damn planet is completely blanketed … what options do we have for getting out of here? Preferably without having to fight our way out through a ConFed blockade.”
“Running the data now,” Kage said. “I’ll
have to slice into the planet’s orbital control system to get current positions of all the ConFed warships buzzing around up there.”
“Just get it done.”
*****
They were getting close to the stretch of the flight where they would have to make their move. The Phoenix was pushing up the coast towards the more populated capital region and was about to get into a stretch of nearly-deserted swampland.
“Figure anything out?” Jason asked.
“No,” Kage answered, frowning. “We have good cloud cover at around thirty thousand feet, and the air traffic sensors don’t have very good coverage here, but the ConFed fleet has a stranglehold on this planet. Even if the Camderan flight controllers miss us, it’s doubtful the ships in orbit will.”
“We could try a ‘Drunken Twingo’,” Doc suggested. “The sensor coverage may be sparse enough to get away, and the distraction may move the picket ships out of formation.”
“It’s as good an idea as any,” Kage agreed. “We’ll need to execute it in the next five minutes for it to be effective.”
“Drunken Twingo?” Kellea asked.
“I’m formally requesting that this maneuver be renamed,” Twingo said irritably.
“Noted. Denied,” Jason said. “Doc, get ready with the countermeasures. Kage, arm two thermobaric warheads … high-yield.” Jason took control of the ship from the computer and prepared for the maneuver as soon Kage gave him the word.
“In three … two … one …“ Kage reached over and opened a channel on the com panel. “This is micro-freighter Lark declaring an in-flight emergency! We’ve lost main power and cannot maintain altitude! We’re losing stability control! Our position is …” He trailed off and then killed the channel. At the same instant, Jason pulled the throttle back and pushed the nose over while kicking the left rudder pedal. The Phoenix wallowed a moment in the air before listing to her port side and falling through the clouds in an apparently uncontrolled tumble.
The ship rolled over twice and shuddered as Jason allowed her to fall naturally through the sky a bit longer. When they passed through fifteen thousand feet, he pushed the throttle back up and powered out of the stall. He pointed the nose at an open stretch of heavily wooded swamp and held that course for a few more seconds.
“Now!” Kage barked.
Jason squeezed the trigger twice and sent two missiles streaking out of the weapons bay towards the ground. The instant the first missile detonated, Kage killed their transponder and Doc engaged the ship’s countermeasures suite to hide them from the sensors of both the ground control system and the orbiting ships. He slammed the throttle forward and sent the ship streaking over the impact site just as the second missile hit. The shock wave of the powerful warhead slammed into the belly of the ship, but caused minimal damage as the Phoenix shot away from the scene at high subsonic speed.
“Talk to me,” Jason said as he concentrated on his control inputs. The Phoenix was hugging the terrain and skimming over the treetops at a scant twenty meters. The computer was doing most of the work by keeping their altitude constant; he just had to make sure he didn’t fly into any obstacles.
“They’ve been trying to raise us on the com,” Kage said. “One of the ConFed cruisers confirmed the explosion under the clouds. They’re arguing now about who is going to dispatch a recovery team.”
“Glad it wasn’t a real emergency while they get into a jurisdictional pissing match,” Jason muttered. He was thankful for the delay, however, since the longer they argued, the longer he had to put some distance between them and the fake crash site. Their ruse wouldn’t even fool a cursory flyover since there was no debris and the damage was completely inconsistent with a ship impacting the ground. “Just keep me up on what those ships in orbit are doing,” he said.
It was another seven tense minutes of screaming along at ground level when Kage had an update. “The ConFed fleet commander is sending down two landers to inspect the crash. So are the Camderans. Two of the picket ships are moving out of their holding orbits to come in closer and use their sensors to scan the ground.”
“Is it big enough for us to slip through?” Jason asked.
“Slip is probably the wrong word, but we’ll be able to get up past the ships before they can try to pursue. I’ll let you know once they’ve repositioned and the landers are on their way down,” Kage answered.
Another five minutes crept by while Kage tried his best to gauge the ConFed’s position by listening over the com. “We’ve got a window. You’ll have to be in slip-space the instant we come up through the holding orbit though.”
“Slip-drive charging. Ten seconds until it’s online,” Twingo said, anticipating Jason’s next order.
“I’m feeding the most current nav data to you now, Captain,” Kage continued. “You’ll have to let her do the flying, I don’t think I can update your display fast enough to guarantee we won’t slam into one of the cargo ships up there.”
“No argument here,” Jason said and prepared to turn primary flight control back over to the Phoenix’s computer.
“Here we go,” Kage said tensely. “It’s going to be close ... Engage now!” Jason switched over off manual flight and immediately the Phoenix pitched her nose up and the drive slammed to full power. Despite the compensators, they were still pressed back into their seats as the gunship shot up out of the clouds in a pure vertical climb.
Jason clenched up as the sky turned black and he could see they were heading straight towards a formation of gigantic civilian freighters loafing in a parking orbit. The Phoenix angled her flight path slightly to cross the path of a slow-flying cargo hauler right in front of its prow. They were through the formation almost the same instant Jason’s brain even recognized it was there. If he’d been flying manually there would have been no chance for them to avoid the larger ships.
“Slip-drive primed,” Twingo reported.
“Engaging,” Jason said, but when he went to hit the control that would send them streaking out of the system a hard impact jarred the ship and the slip-drive’s “READY” indicator winked out. They were still in real-space and the ConFed was moving to intercept.
“We’re hit!” Doc called out. “Plasma burst from the near cruiser.”
“Port emitter is depolarized!” Twingo shouted. “The drive is resetting! Try not to take any more hits.” Without another word he leapt from his seat and ran off the bridge towards Engineering.
“Countermeasures OFF!” Jason barked. “Full combat mode! Give me everything!” Kage and Doc worked in unison to switch from sneaking around mode to kick some ass mode. The bridge lights dimmed to a muted red and he could feel the power course through the ship as the shields and weapons came online.
The cruiser tried another shot to disable them but it splashed harmlessly against the shields as the Phoenix clawed her way up out of Camderan-2’s gravity well. Jason nudged the nose towards the irregularly-shaped moon that was slightly off the starboard side and kept the hammer down. He wanted to put some distance and obstacles between him and the ConFed fleet to give Twingo a chance to get the slip-drive back online.
“They’re moving to cut us off,” Doc said. “One of the destroyers in high-orbit is breaking away on a direct intercept course.” Jason looked down at his tactical display and saw the big red icon lumbering out of orbit towards them. It was picking up speed quickly, however, as its captain was pushing hard to get into weapons range and bracket them between it and the ships pursuing. “Looks like they’re also launching fighters.”
“Oh fuck me,” Jason ground out. “Can’t anything ever just be easy?” He angled back to port and adjusted his pitch to allow the Phoenix to gain a little more precious distance between them and their tormentors. “Is the nav computer keeping our slip vector updated?”
“Yes,” Kage said, his hands flying over his own panels. He was actively jamming and working other sorts of tech voodoo to confuse the inbound fighters. Jason sucked in a breath and let it out slowly as h
e let his neural implant fully integrate him into the ship. There was the usual split second of vertigo before he could “see” through the sensors and feel the Phoenix as if she were an extension of his own body.
He picked out the closest of the interceptors bearing down on them and prioritized them to the targeting system. He didn’t want to fire on a ConFed ship as that carried some serious ramifications, but he wanted to be captured even less.
Just when it seemed he would have no choice but open fire on at least three ConFed fighters, a new alert flashed in front of him via his neural link.
“Slip-Drive Ready.”
The message flashed in his field of vision twice before fading away. Jason looked down to confirm the slip-drive’s status on his indicators and then slapped the control to his right. His neural link was abruptly terminated and the Phoenix shuddered as she transitioned to slip-space.
“Set up our dummy jumps,” Jason said, blinking and shaking his head to clear the cobwebs caused by his link being cut so quickly. Normally he would ease himself out of the link. He knew he was in for one hell of a headache for the next few hours.
“Program set up and executed,” Kage confirmed. “We’re firing tachyon bursts at the first one to mask our vector if they’ve managed to track us.”
“That was a little closer than usual,” Twingo said as he walked back up on the bridge. “Glad the first shot was only meant to disable the drive. They could have turned us into a vapor cloud with the shields lowered like that.”
“Yeah,” Jason agreed. “Good job getting the slip-drive back.”
“I’d love to take credit for it but I more or less stood down there while it sorted itself out. Good job not getting us killed,” Twingo said as he slouched into his seat.
“It was hit or miss for a little bit there,” Jason said with a humorless laugh.
Omega Force 3: The Enemy Within Page 7