by Rob Buckman
By a circular route it was near dawn before they neared the LZ on a tributary of the main river, and Mike looked for a deep pool, intending to sink the skimmer and go the last mile or so on foot. At last he did, but a lot closer to the LZ than he would have liked. In consolation, the pool was deep, and shaded by the overhanging trees and a lot of pondweed. Even the water wasn’t clear, a rather greenish brown, and would hide the skimmer perfectly. Setting it down at a hover on the bank, they quickly unloaded the things they need. Stripping it of anything that would float. Most of it they could stuff into one of the lockers, and what was left they weighted with some tools and sunk it in the pool. That done, Mike stripped down to his underwear and piloted the skimmer to the middle of the pool. Here he cut the power to the AG and the machine slowly sank. The hot exhaust hissed as the water hit, and a few seconds later water poured into the open cab. As it fell away under him, Mike dived over the side and swam to the bank. Looking back, there was no sign of the skimmer, just a few bubbles popping to the surface. Dressing quickly he shouldered a pack with one of the sleeping bags attached and took off along the compass bearing. By dawn they reached the LZ, and as Mike suspected, the ship wasn’t there. The question was, were they too early or too late?
“Oh no! I thought it would be here.” The Lady Ann pouted.
“Not to worry, Milady, I think we are just a little early. Can’t expect it until nightfall.”
“So, what do we do in the mean time?”
“Find a place to hide for a while and just wait.” She grinned at him, nibbling her lower lips. “Think you can find a tree like the one you did last time?” She asked daringly.
“You little vixen,” he laughed, grabbing her around the waist, “you think you are going to seduce me and while away the afternoon in uncontrolled sex?” His tone was mock serious.
“Oh, I’d never dream of trying to seduce a naval officer from his duty.” She fiddled with the buttons of his borrowed field jacket, looking up at him from under sooty eyelashes as she did.
“Right!” He murmured, not convinced.
“Part of the duty of the leader of this rescue mission is to protect my body,” she murmured, looking up at him, “how can you do that if you can’t see it.” She twined her arms around his neck and kissed him.
“Humm. What would the Admiralty say if it was known that I was derelict in my duty?” Mike muttered between kisses.
“Yes, there is that to consider, it might go on your record, and we wouldn’t want that to happen now would we.”
“Definitely not. I’d never live down the shame.”
“And besides, as the health officer on this trip, you do have to inspect me for lice, or other potentially dangerous alien organisms.”
“That’s true,”
“Um and conduct a very careful and complete inspection,” she paused to kiss him again, “leaving no part of the subject, i.e. me uninspected.”
“Yes indeed, we wouldn’t want you taking something nasty on board the ship with you now would we.”
“Oh no, that would be terrible. Might even be fatal to the rest of the crew.” With a soft groan, Mike broke away and began a quick careful search around the LZ.
It didn’t take long for him to find a similar tree about a hundred yards from the landing zone. There was no way the shuttle could land without him hearing it, so there was no danger there. They had to hide anyway, and rather than sit around looking at each other and just imagine what they might be doing, why not do it and save all the frustration. Putting his pack down, he walked towards it, but as he dropped to his knee, someone started firing at him. The shot missed by a hair, and for that he was thankful as he dived to the ground and slithered under a tree. Shots plowed through the foliage. Whoever was shooting obviously knew about the space inside. Mike didn’t stop, but kept going, scrambling around the trunk and out under the other side. A short dash took him to cover behind a large tree truck that gave him a breather. He pulled his sidearm and returned fire, but from the direction of the shots, they were defiantly closing in on him. He did manage to hit a couple of them as bark chips sprayed him and blaster bolts left smoking holes, sizzling and spitting hot sap. Then a chance shot hit him a glancing blow across his right shoulder; his arm immediately went numb. His sidearm dropped from his hand, and before he could retrieve it with his left hand voice shout out at him. Thankfully, whoever fired the shoot used a stunner instead of a blast rifle.
“Freeze or I’ll kill you!” Cursing, Mike froze. Quickly looking round to locate the source of the voice. As he did, a man stepped out from behind a tree, and Mike instantly recognized him as the man from the camp.
“I told you to kill him you idiot.” A whining voice screamed from behind a large tree.
“I ain’t no killer, your Majesty, you want him dead, you kill him yourself.” The skinny man, the Prince stepped from behind the tree. Looking around before walking towards him. As he did, four black uniformed men came out of concealment followed the Prince.
“So, We meet again,” he snarled, smacking Mike across the face with a short swagger stick, splitting Mike lip.
“Maybe it’s a good thing he didn’t kill you. Now I can have the pleasure of doing it myself.” He struck Mike across the other side of his face with a backhanded blow, and Mike tasted blood. For a moment, the red haze of a berserk fury gripped him, and it was only the prodding of the blaster rifle in his back that held him still.
“Go ahead, dip shit! But I have to tell you…”
“You don’t have anything to tell me, except where the rest of the papers and that cylinder is!”
“Papers… cylinder?” Mike raised his eyebrows in surprise.
“Yes, the one you came all this way to get.”
“I’m haven’t a clue what you're talking about.”
“Yes you do, you worthless colonial reject,” the man spat in his face.
“The ones you stole when you abducted the girl.”
“Oh, the one you were about to whip and rape?”
“Oh, so you do remember,” he snarled, “but yes, I’ll have that pleasure yet, once we find her.” He screamed.
“Don’t bet on it!” A female voice yelled, and a shot hit one of the men black uniformed men standing behind the Prince.
Everyone scattered and dived for cover, Mike included. Scooping up his sidearm with his left hand, he drove his right shoulder into the Princess stomach, wincing with pain as he doubled him over his back with a loud ‘Owfff’. With a grunt, Mike lifted him in a sort of fireman’s carry and pounded towards the source of the shot. Blaster bolts streaked by him, some close but not harmful. Running passed the Lady Ann he slammed the Prince into a tree for good measure and dropped him to the ground beside her.
“That was well timed Milady.”
“Thank you, sir, you are welcome.” She smiled at him, firing again.
“Well, that’s one way to ruin a perfectly good afternoon.” Mike aimed and fired at someone exposed leg, hitting it and bringing a yell of pain. That helped worked off some of his anger.
“Now I’ll never get that inspection!” Ann grumbled, sounding highly pissed.
She worked off some of the anger by shooting at someone else that stood up to fire at them, killing him with a head shot. Not bad shooting for a King’s messenger Mike thought. It was one of the black uniformed men, and he fell back out of sight. Looking around, he tried to work out a way to get them out of the clearing and back into the jungle. At least they have more cover there, and a chance to elude them.
“We’ll have to worry about that later, Milady.” They were in no danger of someone rushing them, not with the Prince as hostage, but the long term the prospect didn’t look good.
Then all hell broke loose as a volley of blaster fire hissed and spat, crisscrossing the clearing with lethal pyrotechnics. An amplified voice boomed out through the trees, ordered them to drop their weapons. The few remaining men did, standing up to put their hands in the air as they came out of cove
r. Ann and Mike ducked down behind their log and looked at one another, not sure if the surrender instruction were aimed at them or not. Mike just shrugged wordlessly at Ann’s raised a bushy eyebrow of inquiry. A quick look over the log brought a sigh of relief as a group of Marines in combat armor walked out from behind a screen of trees, herding the prisoners ahead of them, Sergeant Rice in the lead. He immediately came over to Mike, but didn’t salute, just nod.
“Sorry about the delay in extracting you, Sir, but at first we thought you and the lady were some of the locals dressed like that. Mike nodded in understanding, looking down at himself, then at Lady Ann. It was easy to see why Sergeant Rice would make that mistake.
“Oh, yes. Hadn’t thought about that, but no matter, you are here, that’s what counts,” Mike was grinning from ear to ear, “how did you figure it was me?”
“The sound of your side arm, Sir. Can’t mistake the sound of a service blaster.” Rice chuckled.
“A good point to remember.”
“What shall I do about this lot, Sir?” Rice asked, pointing with his chin at the group of prisoners.
Mike looked around. The man was right; both of the remaining black uniformed men were exactly alike. Height, weight, blond haired, blue eyes, a carbon copy of the other. Mike shivered. There was something unnatural about them, the look in their eyes, like something dead, and the way they stood. Whatever it was, Mike didn’t like it.
“Strip them of their weapons and communication equipment and let them go. We can’t take them with us, except him of course.” He pointed over his should with a thumb.
“Who Sir?” Rice asked, looking to where he was pointing. Mike whipped round, and to his constipation, the Prince was gone.
“Damn! Should have hit the little shit harder!”
“Oh, that was the guy you had over your shoulder, wondered who that was.”
“Prince something or other. I thought I could use him as a hostage and steal his ship.”
“Oh yeah. If that was the Prince, we have his ship, Sir. Found that on the way here to pick you up.” He looked at Mike’s shoulder and called the medic over to have a look at it.
In one way, stun wound wasn’t bad, but the plasma charge did leave a burn on the skin. He wouldn’t really feel anything until the full effect of the stun bolt wore off. Thankfully, it wasn’t a blast rifle. If the energy packet had hit him squarely, he wouldn’t be here talking about it. The shot would have blown him apart with superheated steam, much like the tree. Not exactly a pleasant death, but what death is pleasant. Dead was dead and only the living get to wonder about it.
“You did! That’s wonderful. Maybe we don’t need the Prince after all then.”
“I don’t follow, Sir.”
“His ship has all the current recognition signals.”
“Oh, right.” Just then a Marine came over with one of the local men, and Mike had to smile.
“This man asked to speak to you, Sir, he said he knows you.”
“That’s right, how did you do it?”
“What? Know where you’d be?” The man smiled. “Had me a homing beacon on the skimmer is all. Not the first time it's been stolen.” He chuckled.
“I should have thought of that. So, it was your skimmer then?”
“Yes, but not to worry, I can salvage her, she’s been underwater before.”
“Are you going to be in trouble with his Lordship for not killing me?”
“Nar, not that I’m worried about that little prick. He needs the output from the mines. That means he needs us more than we need him, I’m the boss.”
“Good point, you going to be all right then?”
“Sure, but you could leave me a wee nip of the hard stuff.” He said in a broad Irish brogue.
“Do you have any medicinal Brandy with you, Sanchez?” Mike asked the medic. Seeing him nod. “Good, I need to relieve you of it, for medicinal purposes, of course.”
“Yes, Sir. Of course, Sir.” The medic smiled. He delved into his pack coming up with a full bottle. Mike took it and broke the seal.
“Here’s to you Mr?”
“Murphy, Sir.”
“Really?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Well, here’s to you Mr. Murphy.” He took a long swallow of the potent liquor before handing it to Murphy.
“Here’s to you Mr…?”
“Mike Gray, Ensign and acting Captain.”
“Captain Gray at least, and thanks again.” After taking a long pull on the bottle he capped it and slid it into his pocket.
“You take care, son. I hope to see you again someday, and the lady. Maybe we can sit down and share a bottle once this blasted war, or whatever you want to call it, is over.”
“I hope so Mr. Murphy.”
“Most people call me Paddy,” he held up his hand, “I know, but as I’m the only one around here of direct Irish decent I suppose I have to carry on the tradition.” Mike chuckled, and nodded to the Marine. With a wave and a wink, Murphy went off to join the others.
Once they’d been relieved of their communication equipment they were sent off down the trail. Mike and company took off in the other direction with Sergeant Rice setting a hard pace. An hour later they reached the Prince's ship, finding the two Marines standing guard ready and waiting.
“We have the pilot restrain, Sir.” One reported as he came up, “and it’s good to see you again, skipper.”
“Same here. Let’s get aboard and get out of here as quick as we can.”
Trust a Prince to travel in style, and a bit stupid not to leave a security detail to guard it. The Prince’s ship was a modified version of a standard long-range Military Patrol Craft and could easily take all of them with space to spare. Climbing into the pilot seat Mike brought her to life and lifted off. At this point, he didn’t have to worry about someone querying their flight, as the Prince had probably been hopping about all week.
“Heading for the ship, Sergeant Rice?”
“98 degrees for about ten minutes, Sir.”
“You’d better figure out a way to let them know we’re coming, don’t want them shooting at us.”
“Yes Sir. I mean no. Sir.” He corrected a look of alarm on his face.
“How about the transponder?” A female voice intruded.
“What Milady?” Both men looked round at her.
“Change the transponder code to match that of the shuttle, if you know it, Captain, that way you don’t have to use the radio.”
“That I do Milady.” He had to smile.
The Lady Ann had dropped back into her old manner of speaking, that rather snippy tone he hated. He quickly punched in the transponder code and switched it on to squawk, and a few moments later they got a query back.
“They know we are coming now.”
“Let's just hope the comm tech is sharp enough to notice the code.”
“Jameson was on when we left, and she won’t miss it.” Rice commented from behind his right shoulder. Looking out of the front view port for the LZ, he pointed through the windshield. “There she is, Sir, under that big tree thing, or whatever those bloody things are.”
Mike switched off the transponder and killed power. The ship slowed, and he carefully maneuvered it under the canopy. As before, Conner had parked the shuttle in a clearing under one of the giant trees, and he set it down beside her. He did note the shuttle's remaining point defense laser was trained on him all the way down. A wise precaution under the circumstances. Even when they cracked the hatch, they faced four heavily armed men in battle armor. Taking the pilot with them as a precaution they filed out, and it was only when Sergeant Rice came out and verified that they were not under someone guns that the armored men relaxed.
“Good to see you, Sir.” Conner Blake said, exiting the shuttle and walking over, reaching out to grip Mike’s extended hand.
“Same here, Chief, let’s get aboard and figure out what we are going to do to get the hell out of here.”
“Right, Sir. I
put a perimeter guard out, just in case.”
“Good, I need to get changed and take care of the lady.”
“Aye-aye, Sir.” Taking her by the arm, he led Ann into the ship, and the Captain’s cabin, if it could be called that.
“Wow, I’ve seen bigger dog houses than this.” She muttered, rubbing up against him as he closed the door.
“It's not that small.” He laughed softly.
“No, it's just big enough, but that bed is defiantly way too small.”
“It's only meant to sleep one person Milady.”