Sleeping.
Jack looked down at the recesses and saw the dark figures within. Next to the recesses, in the clusters of tentacles, he saw the outline of a Chitin soldier’s suit—the large, black, smooth shell of the Chitin soldier.
Jack aimed his pulse pistol. Reyes held her hand over the top of the weapon and pushed it down. She shook her head slowly and pointed up.
Jack guessed what she meant, and he agreed. It was time to leave.
Jack sent the team ahead of him and followed to the exit above. He glanced briefly over his shoulder as he entered the exit chamber. Reyes tugged at a tentacle and the panel closed under their feet.
And as the liquid drained away, leaving them in a vacuum, Jack knew they had completed the first step of their mission to destroy the Chitin surveillance network. He hoped the next step would go as smoothly. The top panel of the exit chamber slid aside and Jack sent his team out into the void of space and back to the Scorpio.
13
“I can’t believe they were in there the whole time,” Torent said as he climbed out of his suit.
“They were there, but they weren’t,” Reyes said.
“That’s a bit too cryptic for me,” Torent said. He looked at Jack, “Can you translate?”
“Not really,” Jack said. He took the sample cartridge from his meat suit that contained the dense fluid that filled the Chitin facility. “Care to elaborate?” he said to Reyes.
“I think they were asleep, but a long sleep, more like hibernation. They are probably dormant until they need to perform some task.”
“Like what?” Jack asked. He tossed his meat suit on the equipment drone to be taken away for post-operation testing and refit.
“Well,” Reyes said uncertainly, “if it’s a monitoring facility, I guess they have to relay communications or coordinate surveillance operations. I don’t know for sure, but I am sure that our presence didn’t alert them or they would have woken up.”
“What if they were just waiting for us to leave?” Osho said, pulling a jacket over her cold skin.
“I’ll go and report to Commander Griff and make sure that captain knows to keep a close eye on that facility. Maybe we just got lucky this time.”
“Oh, well,” Torent said. “There goes all our luck. We never get lucky twice. Don’t take me on the next mission, sir.” He walked past Jack and gave him cheeky smile.
“Good work out there, team,” Jack said. “I think you all deserve to accompany me again next time.”
“Remind me not to do so well next time,” Torent said.
“You couldn’t do badly if you tried,” Jack called after him. “Take the next watch off, guys,” Jack said. “You earned the rest.”
But Jack didn’t have time for a rest. He had to brief his commanding officer. He had to brief the captain. He had to deliver the sample to the lab and check if it would interfere with their weapons. He had a report to write. Jack would spend the rest of the watch in meetings and briefings. It would be some time before he got to rest.
Jack was starting to wonder if there were any benefits to rank. So far, it seemed like work, work, and more work. And when the work was done, there was the same threat and danger and risk as every other fleet Marine had to endure. It clearly took a special kind of Marine to make it in command. Jack wondered what people had seen in him that made them think he had the necessary ability for all this responsibility.
Reyes came over and stood next to him. She was wearing a loose Marine utility jacket.
“You want to walk me back to maintenance? Grab a coffee?” She reached out and touched Jack’s hand.
Jack felt a flush of heat as he blushed. He looked at Reyes’s big, dark eyes. “Later,” he said. “I’ve got work to do. You did great over there.” Jack moved away. “I’ve got to tell the captain to keep a close watch on that facility. Don’t want all our stealthy creeping about to come to nothing.”
Reyes walked with Jack to the junction where they would part.
“I’ll see you soon,” she said.
Jack hoped he would. As soon as she was out of sight, he ran toward the command deck.
Captain Pretorius was in his chair on the command deck. The image of the Chitin facility on the holostage was shrinking slowly as the Scorpio moved toward the next target.
Commander Griff stepped away from the holostage and turned to the captain.
“Are we concerned about those unconscious Chits, Captain?”
Reading the report on his armrest holostage, Pretorius rubbed his chin and looked up to Commander Griff. “I am more concerned about conscious ones, Commander. Forge reported that the demolition charge was deployed out of sight.”
Griff walked over to the captain and lowered his voice. “Can we trust his judgment?”
Pretorius thought for a moment. “Forge is fresh, that’s true, but the kid has got what it takes. I’ve no doubt about his abilities, and so far, his tactical judgment has been spot on. He saved your ass, Commander.”
Griff nodded. If Jack Forge hadn’t been on hand at the Battle of Drydock, Griff could have been killed along with so many others. “He has performed well on the battlefield, but this was a very different operation.”
Pretorius fixed Griff with a fierce look. “It was a Marine operation, Commander. You had the authority. If you weren’t satisfied with Forge’s suitability for the job, you shouldn’t have given it to him.”
Griff nodded again. He had picked Jack for the task knowing that the new commander was a strong and competent leader who had gone toe to toe with the Chits on several occasions. Forge was smart and perceptive. He had always displayed excellent judgment. Griff knew there was no one better for the job of sneaking aboard a previously unknown Chitin craft.
“But what about the young woman he took with him?” Griff asked, as much to himself as the captain. “She’s not a Marine.”
“She has had her encounters with the Chits. More than any of these new recruits you’ve received recently.” Pretorius stepped down from his chair. He could sense Griff was concerned about the overall operation.
“What if the next facility is filled with Chitin soldiers?” Griff looked at the holoimage of the receding facility.
“Then your Marines will handle it.” Pretorius stepped over to the holostage and tapped the control panel on the side. The display changed to show the Scorpio. Pretorius shrank the Scorpio down so it was just a point of light. A label hovered over it, showing the ship’s speed and heading. Away on the other side of the holostage was another point of light, identified by its label as the second Chitin surveillance facility target.
Griff joined Pretorius at the holostage. “I’ll send Commander Forge again, Captain. He is the right man for the job.”
Pretorius nodded. “I’ve seen a lot of Marines on my ship in my time, Commander. I’ve seen company commanders and battalion majors come and go. They’ve all had the authority of rank, they have almost always been dedicated, they have occasionally been brave, and they have all been trained to it, but Jack Forge has come up from the ranks and he’s come up quick. He hasn’t been trained, because he didn’t need to be. He has authority in him. He wears it like his own skin. He’s comfortable with it. He has confidence in it. The people around him trust him with it. You can’t train that. You can’t teach that.”
Griff nodded. “He’s a good Marine.”
“And if this operation goes wrong,” Pretorius said, walking back to his chair, “it won’t be because of what one Marine commander did or didn’t do. It’ll be a combination of factors, maybe an error in the initial plan from Fleet Command and Control, maybe because the enemy simply won’t let us destroy their network. All we can do is take it one step at a time and remain confident in our people.”
Griff nodded. “He brought back that sample of fluid. That was good thinking.”
“Yeah,” Pretorius agreed. “The same chemical composition as a liquid layer of their home planet. That one sample has taught us a lot about the
enemy.”
“Another reason for us to succeed, Captain. We need to get that information back to Fleet Command.”
“Another good reason to succeed,” Pretorius agreed. “We already have so many.”
14
Jack stood in the small corridor leading to the engine control room. Squad Leader Sam Torent stood at his side. A number of Marines were positioning large composite beams across the corridor, while the maintenance chief fused one end to the bulkhead with a molecular welder.
“That’s it,” Jack said. “The barricade is there to slow them down. The pulse rifles will stop them.”
“And a Marine, with a lot of courage,” Torent added.
“Sir, yes, sir,” the Marine replacements shouted in unison. Jack remembered his first time aboard the Scorpio and how regimented everything had been.
“One sir will be sufficient, Marines,” Jack said.
Sam Torent turned and spoke quietly. “Are you sure we shouldn’t just block up the corridor, sir?”
“We need to be able to move about the ship. I don’t want to cut off one part of the ship from the rest. We might need to send support.”
Torent nodded. Maintenance Chief Slim walked over to Jack. “That’s the last piece here. Where do you want me next?”
Jack walked over to the beams that crossed the corridor. He placed his foot on one of the beams and pressed hard. The composite beam was fixed, rigid. Jack nodded. He stepped through the gaps to the other side of the barricade.
“Sam, have some cover placed here.” Jack pointed at the deck on either side of the corridor. “Something that’ll take a plasma spear at close range.”
Torent nodded. “A composite plate should do it.”
Slim stuck his head through the beams that crossed the corridor and looked at the spot. “I can weld a couple of plates in, no problem, but I am running low on plate. How many Marines are you going to post here, Jack?”
Jack looked through to Torent and then over to the fresh-faced replacements, all eager and nervous. “As many as we can spare,” Jack said. He patted Torent on the shoulder. “Keep them working at it, Sam. I’m going to maintenance to review our progress.”
Numbers were all important and Jack knew he didn’t have them. The barricades were working well and a handful of Marines could hold off an army of Chitin soldiers, but only for so long. If just one of the defensive points failed, the whole ship would be lost.
Any one of the systems could be turned against the Scorpio. The fusion reactor in the engine room could be set to fly the Scorpio apart. Or the Chits could deactivate the engines and bring the Scorpio to a dead stop, making the ship a sitting target for the Chitin fighter craft.
The corridors leading to the gun batteries were important too. If the guns stopped firing during an attack, the Scorpio would be defenseless. The Kraken fighter craft could move in and rain a furious wave of fire on the Scorpio, or more of the Hydras could move in, attach themselves to the hull, and deliver more soldiers to the fight inside the ship, creating a runaway invasion that would be difficult to halt.
Life support systems were particularly vulnerable, so Jack was dedicating a large portion of his available force to protect them. If the Chits interrupted life support, the fight would be over. The Marines could fight on for days sustained by their meat suit support systems, but the Scorpio’s crew didn’t have such equipment available to them. Without a crew or command officers, the Scorpio was dead in the void.
The command deck was the next most vital area. Jack had to protect the captain and his command crew. Without the control center, the engines would have no guidance, the weapons no target. Life support kept everyone alive, but the command deck kept them in the fight.
Jack walked into the maintenance hangar, so preoccupied with his planning that he had just found his way there without thinking about where he was going. He had once found it difficult to find, hidden away in its temporary location in an abandoned hangar. That temporary location now had a look of permanence about it.
The hangar was empty. Slim and Reyes were both out on jobs, building the barricades at various points throughout the ship. Jack poured himself a coffee and accessed a holomap of the ship.
The barricades were looking strong. Jack checked their positions on the holomap. The ship was in good shape. There were still some additional structures to be put in place, though, mostly along the four main corridors that ran the length of the ship. Jack didn’t want to give the Chits an easy route through the Scorpio. He wanted to drive them to the barricades, to the Marine squads and their pulse rifles.
Jack saw a location in a minor corridor that should have been barricaded. Jack wanted to check that the work had started. He pointed at the holomap and accessed the internal surveillance feed for that location. The live image showed a few Marines sitting around on top of a pile of materials that should be used for the barricade. It looked as if the Marines had done their job of moving the materials into position and were now waiting for Slim or Reyes to arrive and fuse them into position.
Jack flicked through the surveillance images of the various barricades. The work was progressing well. Jack was sure the Marines would put up a fierce resistance should the Chitins attempt to board. He hoped it wouldn’t come to that.
Next, he looked at the green flickering lines that mapped out the Scorpio’s many corridors and decks. Once he had been limited to a few locations, but now he had seen almost every inch of the ship. It was big, but having spent so long on board, he had walked every corridor and set foot on every deck.
There was one area he hadn’t seen before. Thankfully, he had never been sent to the brig. But there was one occupant there now that Jack was sure should be there. In fact, Jack felt it would be better if he was just flushed out an airlock or dispatched by a burst of pulse rifle fire. Former Commander Finch was being held in a cell.
Jack found the brig easily. He tapped the location on the holomap and accessed the surveillance feed. Jack saw a row of empty cells and then he saw Finch. Jack felt a sudden shot of panic when he saw his ex-commander. The man should have been dead. There was no doubt that he had been corrupted by the Chitins, if not converted in some way in to one of them. It was dangerous to keep him alive and on the ship.
Finch was sitting on the edge of his bunk in an otherwise empty cell. The walls of the cell were solid composite. The front was a made up of a series of vertical composite bars that ran from the deck plate to the overhead plate. Jack could see he was secured, but he was still dangerous. If it had been up to Jack, the former commander would be dead. After talking to Bill Harts moments before he had thrown himself out into the empty void, being dead was probably preferable to being controlled by the Chitins.
In front of the bars, a Marine in ship-side utility dress stood guard. Jack recognized the Marine guard as one who had been posted to guard Reyes when she had been secured in the med bay. He was armed only with his polished baton.
Jack guessed Agent Visser had made sure the guard wasn’t armed with a pulse rifle or pulse pistol. The mounted electron bayonets would slice through the composite bars easily enough. If Finch were to get hold of the guard’s weapon, he would be free in moments, and if Finch was loose on the Scorpio, there was no telling what chaos he would create.
The guard walked back and forth in front of Finch’s cell. Jack remembered the Marine, he was cocksure and a bit dumb. He wasn’t a bad Marine, just not a great one, and he clearly enjoyed being Finch’s jailer.
Jack began to get nervous as he saw how the guard twirled his baton. If it fell, it could get into Finch’s hands, but Finch wouldn’t be able to affect an escape with a timber baton.
The Marine guard stood in front of Finch’s cell for a moment and turned to face Finch before walking on. Finch sat on his bunk, feet together, hands at his side.
The guard turned and walked back the way he’d come, pacing out his little patrol, possible only to beat the boredom.
Jack’s heart leapt to his
mouth as he saw Finch stand. The guard turned at the end of his little patrol and walked back. Finch stepped forward, his mouth opening wide. He stepped up to the bars as the guard came along again.
Jack leaned forwards toward the surveillance image and saw the black cloud swirling inside Finch’s mouth, a cloud made of fine tendrils that began to reach out in twisting threads. And just as the guard stepped alongside the bars, he obscured Finch from the surveillance feed.
The guard stopped and turned to Finch.
Jack pushed himself away from the workbench and ran. He ran toward the brig. Finch had to be stopped. It might already be too late to save the Marine, but Jack might still save the Scorpio.
The brig was controlled by a security system and a detention drone. The Marine was the only human guard. The brig area was behind a transparent composite door that remained firmly shut to anyone without authorization. Jack gave his security clearance and the door opened. Inside, Jack walked past the empty cells until he saw the Marine guard. The guard stepped toward Jack, baton at his side.
“Commander, the detainee wasn’t expecting visitors.” The guard had a vacant look in his eye.
Looking past the Marine, Jack caught glimpse of Finch, his head tipped sideways. Finch’s lips moved and the guard spoke.
“But you can come and see him if you want.”
Jack stopped as the guard took another step forward. The guard had been alone with Finch for too long and Jack was suddenly very concerned that Finch was spreading some kind of Chitin mind control.
Jack backed away from the guard, suddenly feeling very nervous about being trapped with Finch and a guard who seemed to have been infected by whatever had taken Bill Harts’ mind.
“Detainee?” Jack said. “I think I’ve taken the wrong turn.” Jack backed toward the door. It opened and he backed out. The guard watched Jack leave and then walked back to the front of Finch’s cell.
Jack needed to speak to Visser. He needed to speak to her now.
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