Croma Venture: (The Spiral Wars Book Five)

by Joel Shepherd

  “Can you see an opening?” Timoshene asked Dalray.

  “Perhaps on the far side. It appears to integrate with surrounding infrastructure.”

  “Kino,” Timoshene instructed his third man. “Go and look.”

  Kino climbed quickly to the top of the rib structure, no difficulty in low-G, and made a simple jump onto the top of the smooth ovoid. That produced another audio-spike on Timoshene’s scan, vibrations reaching him through the one-handed grip on his frame and the soles of his boots. He looked behind, shotgun ready in his other hand… and saw something silver flash. Like a reflection, a piece of metal moving and briefly catching the light. In here the only light being generated was by the suits, in diffuse infra-red.

  “I saw something move behind us,” Timoshene said tersely. “Not big, just a flash of light.”

  “Kino, what do you see?” asked Shola.

  “There are several openings,” said Kino, grasping an adjoining support to peer over the edge. “This conveyor system looks sophisticated. I have no expertise in the area, but this does not look old to me. This looks new. And functional. These assembly arms are not decayed at all.”

  On Timoshene’s audio-display, more vibrations, displayed as red dots. There were multiple now, all around them, above and below. Invisible in the maze. “Multiple audio spikes. It looks as though we’re surrounded.”

  “I can see them too,” Dalray agreed.

  “My coms are blank,” said Hiro, with matter-of-fact cool. “If it’s okay with you guys, I’m going to call for human help if I can get through.”

  “Do that,” Timoshene agreed, scanning his own coms in vain for an outside reception. Something was jamming them. “I have no coms either,” he said, now feeling the cool certainty of danger. In the Fortitude phase, his heart would be pounding by now, every muscle aching for a fight. Some Fortitude parren were known to shoot at shadows. There was no danger of that here. “That’s powerful jamming,” he said coolly. “It could be visible to sources outside its immediate effective zone.”

  “Then perhaps the drysine queen might hear it and send help?” Dalray suggested.

  “I’m quite certain she’ll hear it,” Hiro said grimly. “But no, I’m sure she won’t send help.” A pause as they all took that in. “I was worried she might try something like this, but there was no way to stop her. It’s all starting to make sense now. Timoshene, I suggest that we leave, get back to the surface and signal for support. We don’t even need radio — a spotlight would do it.”

  “Yes,” Timoshene said shortly. “We are climbing up.” He followed Kino’s path up the framework, Hiro, Dalray and Shola following. Sure enough, the structures climbed up above, though the ceiling was invisible past thickets of unidentifiable technology in the maze. “Kino, join us above. Kino?”

  There was no reply. Now Timoshene felt that first, icy prickle of fear. All parren felt it, even warriors of the Harmony phase. But here it felt like another of life’s most unavoidable things slipping into place. Fortitude parren were shamed by their fear. Harmony parren embraced and accepted it, and pushed on regardless.

  “Kino!” Timoshene demanded, shotgun pointed out that way, scanning.

  “He’s dead,” Hiro said grimly, leaping up to the next grip and climbing, trying to watch all ways at once — a difficulty inside a civilian EVA helmet. “If we don’t move fast, we will be too.”

  “We do not know he’s dead,” Timoshene retorted, and prepared to leap onto the ovoid fabricator where Kino had been standing.

  “Behind!” Hiro shouted, then the flashing of his pistol’s muzzle as Timoshene spun and fired the shotgun directly into the drone’s metallic face… but the drone ducked mid-air and took the blast on its head carapace. Timoshene leaped as it landed, missing him with a swing of its hyper-vibrating foreleg.

  He landed on the ovoid manufacturing sphere as his suit warned him of more movement left, and leaped again rather than wasting time looking, across empty space and collecting an armful of gantry as something multi-legged zoomed through the space where he’d been. It landed opposite, staring as it tracked him, and for a split-second Timoshene got a good look at it — one armed and old-looking, not especially big and seeming to be made of abandoned old parts. He levelled his shotgun and fired, sending it spinning off-kilter as it scrambled away.

  “They’re old and they have no firearms!” he shouted, scrambling upward and looking for his next leap. “We have a chance, move fast and watch your backs!”

  He jumped for another handhold, the scaffolding of engineering features making a ladder in the low-G, then spared a look back to see Dalray and Shola following with fast grips and leaps of their own… and something hit Shola in mid-leap, a flash of steel and then only pieces of armour amid a red curtain of blood, spinning as they fell slowly to the ground.

  “They don’t need firearms,” Timoshene said grimly, leaping up for his next hold. He abandoned his intended grip as another drone appeared to the side, firing repeated shotgun blasts that detonated just short and shredded the hacksaw’s head and shoulders. It dropped, legs convulsing, and Hiro swung himself onto a new gantry above, firing several shots at something to one side. Then he looked down.

  “Don’t look now but we’ve got the biggest damn hacksaw I ever saw climbing after us!”

  Contrary to that odd human instruction, Timoshene looked. Beneath him, climbing ponderously up the tangle of gantries and supports, was indeed the biggest drone he’d ever seen — it looked like a giant crab, half as big again as Styx in her present body, with great, humming forelegs and multiple utility attachments that were thankfully unoccupied. Timoshene levelled his shotgun at its multi-eyed head and fired, but the big drone held an armoured forearm before its eyes like a man squinting into a sandstorm, and the heavy explosive shells sparked fragments off the blade.

  Timoshene abandoned that useless gesture, leaped one-handed to a new gantry, then up to a new series of holds that presented a promising way toward the ceiling. “Dalray, on me!”

  Dalray remained a level below, blasting fire at several drones that attempted to approach beyond cover and paid for it. But now, having abandoned his climb to fight with the two-handed weapon, he’d sacrificed mobility for a static defence. “Go!” Dalray shouted, still firing. “Someone must stay to provide cover!”

  Timoshene paused, resetting his shotgun to projectile with a flick of his thumb and putting an explosive round into a drone ascending the superstructure fast at Dalray’s rear. “Dalray, climb one-handed, the weapon does not require both hands. A mobile defence is superior…”

  The portion of gantry supporting Dalray abruptly fell, cut from somewhere below by a hacksaw blade. Dalray fell, then disappeared without another sound but the thudding of more shotgun rounds over coms, then static.

  Something small with limbs and small jets zoomed past as Timoshene scrambled across the top of some kind of giant, dome-shaped containment shell and ducked behind attached conduits, looking about as the small flying thing came back. He shot it and it spun from an explosion of silver fragments and fell. Hiro held the dome’s other side, firing but not attempting to climb further.

  A glance up revealed why — several drones now above him, seemingly anticipating this path of escape. Timoshene fired at one, driving it back to cover — their armour was nothing like the strength of drysine combat drones, and these less powerful weapons hurt them, he could see shrapnel holes tearing great fistfuls of damage through limbs and torso. But there were others scrambling into cover up there, hiding in the maze, and a continued climb would bring him straight into their reach.

  He fired the last of his magazine and reloaded quickly from his thigh pouch, having practised that manoeuvre many times in heavy gloves. Movement beside him announced Hiro’s move away from the edge of the containment facility, blasting another drone that tried to follow him. It lurched, legs collapsing, then began a slow slide off the spherical side. That small human magfire pistol was more deadly than it looked
.

  “They’re above us,” Hiro panted, taking a knee as he swivelled to search for other ways out of the maze. “They’ve got flying recon units, no way we could hide.”

  “Can your recon handball escape and send for help?” Timoshene asked. Hiro fired again at a drone that ventured from cover, and sent it scuttling back. From below he could feel continuing heavy vibration — the big crab was still climbing. It would take longer, too large to fit through the smaller gaps in the maze, but it would get here very soon. When it did, smallarms would damage it, but not fatally.

  “Yes, but its thrust is weak against even this gravity,” Hiro answered Timoshene. “I’ve only got one and I need to get it a clear shot — the recon drones will grab it otherwise.”

  “We die here,” said Timoshene. It was obvious, but a human might need some help to grasp it. “I will leave a message on my audio for House Harmony to hear if they retrieve my body. I suggest you do the same.”

  “Yeah, great,” said Hiro. “Hi guys, I’ve been killed by hacksaws. Can you tell?” Something large emerged past an obstructing bundle of unidentified pipes, then the big, clawed legs of the crab-drone, two at a time and placed with ponderous precision on frames and gantries as it crawled toward the top of the containment shell. “Aim for the legs!”

  Hiro fired several shots, and a leg shuddered but did not sever. Timoshene’s first shot blasted ineffectually off its carapace, aiming as close to the head as those protecting claws would allow. A second shot took off a leg, but then Timoshene saw several other drones rushing, and shouted warning. He put a big round through one drone’s head, and it somersaulted as unresponsive legs caught on a gantry and tripped, but two more were coming from the right side…

  One of them half-exploded in a spray of fragments, then another went spinning like a top, legs sheared off. A white missile contrail streaked at the crab drone, and Timoshene’s visor blanked to dark in the subsequent flash, clearing to reveal one entire side of the big drone ripped away as though cleaved by a sword. Timoshene stared up, and saw the unmistakable, dangerous silhouettes of Phoenix marines, some coming through the maze head-first with impatient speed, blazing fire at remaining drones as they fell.

  Hiro let out a triumphant yell, and then an armoured marine was landing before him as marines continued flooding past and around — the fourth Phoenix Company unit, Timoshene saw, the one the humans called ‘Delta’. Timoshene’s coms registered a new channel as the jamming abruptly vanished.

  “Hey Hiro,” the Delta Commander said conversationally — Crozier, her name was. “Didn’t the Major warn you about playing with drones?”

  “Hey LT,” said the human spy. Playing it cool, Timoshene judged. But he could hear the tremor in the younger man’s voice, and was not fooled. “The Major tell you to keep an eye on me?”

  “Something like that. Something about spies and small children always getting into trouble.” The drone Timoshene had shot earlier showed signs of life, trying to get feet under it despite mostly missing a head. Crozier levelled her Koshaim and nonchalantly blew it off its resting place.

  “She loves me,” said Hiro. “I can tell.”

  “So what the hell, huh?” said Crozier, looking around. Then settled on Timoshene, as the parren checked his magazine for remaining rounds. “What did you find?”

  “It is unclear,” Timoshene replied. There was definitely no quaver in his voice. This rescue was good fortune, but another old House Harmony saying said that fortune was harmonious. “Best that you ask your drysine queen. I think she will know.”

  10

  Trace sat in PH-1’s command post with her visor up, the hold at full pressure in the presence of Command Squad and Bravo Platoon. In the seat alongside sat Hiro, also visor-up, checking his big pistol and running internal suit diagnostics off the command post’s screens. He looked relatively calm for a man who had nearly died just now. Not as calm as Timoshene had been, per Crozier’s report. Timoshene had reported back to Gesul on the marines’ com links, eschewing privacy for efficiency, and to the humans it had sounded as though he were discussing the non-existent weather.

  Trace’s com link connected — open channel so everyone could hear. “Hello Major.”

  “Hello Styx. I’m on my way to see you with Hiro and Bravo Platoon. I’m sure you know why.”

  “Yes Major. The three drones have been disarmed and will adopt a non-assertive posture. I look forward to your arrival.”

  “Yes Styx. My marines will not assume an aggressive posture unless threatened. We will be armed, but no weapons will be aimed. I trust that this will be appropriate.”

  “Of course, Major.”

  “ETA fourteen minutes. See you soon.” Trace disconnected. “Lieutenant, you get all that?”

  “Yes Major,” said Lieutenant Alomaim, seated on her other side and observing his own screens. “I think it’s better if you go in alone with Command Squad, you all know her best. Bravo will establish a perimeter, and looking at this activity on scan I think we should keep Heavy Squad on guard at the pads.”

  Trace nodded — scan was showing a lot of parren activity, shuttles zooming to the new zone, marine units in deployment, others probing deeper within despite Trace’s suggestions that it wasn’t a good idea until they knew more. She’d explained the situation to Lisbeth, who was now talking to Gesul about why it wasn’t a good idea. Lisbeth had said that Gesul wanted to know what Styx had to say, to which Trace had replied that he’d know as soon as she did.

  She looked again at Hiro. “You sure you want to come?” she asked him.

  “Sure, why not?” he said nonchalantly. “Don’t need a change of pants, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  Trace smiled, one eye still on her screens. “You sure you’re not going to try and shoot her? It’s the second time she’s either suggested killing you or actually tried to.”

  “No, I’m good,” said Hiro, barely raising an eyebrow. Trace doubted he actually found the suit diagnostic quite as interesting as he made out. “Styx and I have an understanding. I’m just surprised it took her this long.”

  “To try and kill you properly?”

  “To make her first serious powerplay. She plays a long game, patience is her strong suit. But she’s responsible for winning a big chunk of the drysine/deepynine war if she’s as old as we now think she is, and commanders that successful are aways tactically aggressive. Yourself as an example.”

  Trace nodded. “How far do you think it spreads?”

  Hiro shook his head. “Couldn’t assume to know. We’ll have to ask her.”

  “You think she’ll answer?”

  “Depends on how much she thinks her strategic fortunes have changed. Obviously she didn’t get as far as she wanted with this plan or she wouldn’t have killed all of Timoshene’s guys.” Trace detected a faint tremor in his voice. Hiro hadn’t known Timoshene’s men, nor did she suspect he felt particularly close to any parren security on Defiance. But seeing even temporary teammates killed at close range, even teammates you barely knew, was still a hell of a thing.

  “And why’d she do that, do you think?” she asked.

  “That part of the manufacturing facility was operable, while the rest of it was decayed. If they’d shut it down and hidden it, maybe even destroyed some of the evidence they’d been using it, we’d never have seen what they’re up to. Might have bought her another month or two, if no one else picked up the trail.”

  “Phoenix isn’t planning to be around for that long.”

  “And Styx might not be planning to come with us. She was never big on going to croma space, said it was a stupid waste of everything.”

  “From her perspective,” said Trace, “it probably is.” She considered him a moment longer. Very handsome guy, there was no denying it. And a consummate professional in his own, irregular way. “You’d have made a good marine officer.”

  “I disagree, but I’ll take it as a compliment.” He flashed her a sideways smile. “First you sa
ve my life, now compliments. How about dinner?”

  “You’re welcome to have dinner with me on a professional basis any time you like, Hiro,” said Trace. “Make an appointment.” Hiro sighed.

  She hadn’t figured out whether Hiro’s professed interest in her was real or a put-on, nor if the latter, whether it was for the purposes of information-gathering, ego-boosting or simply fun to pass the time. Certainly he liked to live on the edge, and had an unhealthy addiction to adrenaline, in spite of which he’d somehow managed to remain alive through a high operational tempo in one of the galaxy’s more dangerous jobs. Probably it was just that, she thought — he liked to take chances of all varieties, and had precious little fear of consequences. In this case, Trace didn’t especially mind, and wasn’t beyond finding it mildly entertaining.

  PH-1 landed on the control tower’s main pad, and the marines disembarked through the dorsal hatch. Heavy Squad went back to the main airlock to take position by the shuttle, while the rest of Bravo distributed themselves through the tower lower levels alongside Alpha, who were already on duty. Trace took the elevator all the way down with Command Squad, waited at basement level until Lieutenant Alomaim and First Squad joined her down separate elevators, then made her way to the basement engineering facility.

  Trace kept her visor up, bouncing gently along the rows of fabricators and maintenance machines, Hiro further back in the middle of Command Squad while Alomaim and First Squad made a perimeter outside. Here in his maintenance cradle against a wall was Wowser, all weapons pods removed and apparently powered down… though drones never powered down completely, just dozed. Across the room by another wall were Bucket and Peanut, though Peanut seemed more alert, multi-articulated head darting with curiosity.