The Eternity War: Dominion
Page 24
“Give it a rest, Feng,” Lopez suggested. “We’re making first contact with an alien race, and you’re worried about your girlfriend—”
“Hold,” I said. “I see movement ahead.”
Several tunnels branched from the main chamber. There were jagged shadows inside each tunnel-mouth. Things lurked there, unwilling to reveal themselves. I swallowed back apprehension. Here goes.
“We’ve come a long way to find you,” I said. “Can you show yourselves?”
The shadows quivered.
The floor gently inclined downwards, towards a pit in the centre of the cavern. Liquid ran in the grooves of the floor, through the channels etched into the deck, and a pool had formed in front of me. I cautiously approached it, watching as the surface shifted and rippled.
“Show yourselves!” I said, louder still.
This time, I got a reaction.
“Holy Gaia and Christo…” Lopez murmured.
The Jackals held firm, but I defensively put up a hand to my face. Droplets of liquid showered me, hit the walls of the chamber.
The Aeon rose from its cryo-pool.
The xeno was maybe three metres tall, although the creature’s hunched posture suggested an even greater height if it stood upright. Centipede-like, with several pairs of limbs running along a slender body that was encased in a brilliant white exo-suit, made of a crystalline-metallic compound that reminded me of the pylons on the surface. The suit was wired into the pool, although as I watched, some of the bio-cabling withdrew and slithered away. The Aeon’s head poked from the collar, and what skin was visible was pale white, almost translucent. A collection of tubes ran between the creature’s mouth and the torso unit. Whisker-like proboscises shivered over its wrinkled head, as though tasting the air.
None of the details really made sense, and I couldn’t seem to focus on the xeno’s features. Everything about it was fuzzy, like it didn’t want to be seen.
The Aeon ponderously advanced out of the pool. Its upper limbs unfolded, clicking and whirling, and the alien towered over me. Three pairs of unfocused black eyes sprouted from a nearly arachnid face, in stark contrast to the frozen white of the xeno’s flesh. Those eyes blinked, out of conjunction, and scanned me blindly.
Despite its size, the creature didn’t look like much of a fighter. On the contrary, my military instinct had already identified a dozen weak points in the exo-suit’s joints, and the noise the creature made as it took a step from the pool suggested it was struggling to even breathe. A tide of smaller crystal spiders crept from the cryo-pool. No bigger than my hand, some of the scuttling things tended to their master’s suit, while others formed a defensive line between us and the alien.
it boomed.
The creature spoke in my head. I flinched at the sudden mental intrusion. Beside me, the Jackals did the same, and I knew that we were all receiving the same message.
From other pools around the room, other Aeon rose. Perhaps a dozen of the xenos, almost indistinguishable from the first. An army of Scuttlers appeared in support, seeping from the tunnel mouths.
said the Aeon.
Every time it spoke, its voice was different in some way, and other speech patterns followed its words. Sometimes the whisper of rubbing spider legs, other times the distant cry of whale song. Were those other alien languages? That was my best guess. The effect was discomfiting.
“Ah, hi,” I said. “My name is Lieutenant Keira Jenkins. You’ve just scanned my memory, and brought up the worst bits. I’m an emissary from the Alliance. I suppose you know that already.”
The atmosphere around the lead alien’s body seemed to vibrate and shimmer, rearrange at the Aeon’s will. The creature was angry.
“We’ve come a long way to find you,” I said. “Tell me your name; your designation. That’s the least you can do, after the whole mind-scan thing.”
I shook my head, trying to dispel some of the voices.
“Can you speak to me one at a time?” I said. “We are not a Collective.”
There was a minute pause before a response came. Were the many minds communicating, I wondered?
“I have come here with my squad, my people. Jenkins’ Jackals.”
“That is us,” said Novak.
A ripple of voices spread through the chamber, as though the concept of war disturbed the whole Enclave.
“The Krell are in great peril. They are being ravaged by a virus, which has been unleashed on the Maelstrom.”
As one, all of the Aeon shivered, and their Scuttler army did the same.
The walls around me shifted to show star fields, planets, the great stellar abyss at the edge of the Milky Way.
Worlds ignited around us. I involuntarily flinched as planets were burnt to a cinder by Aeon ships. Watched as stars were sent supernova by the arcane technologies of the Aeon.
“This is what we need,” I said. “Your weapons, your ships. Please, help us.”
The words didn’t really matter, because I knew that the Aeon was accessing my mind, reading my thought-patterns. But what were we to something so advanced, so beyond the limits of our capabilities? There was a gulf in our communication.
“You’re frightened of dying?” I queried.
Now I saw dozens of other ships, of different designs and patterns, flowing through the Maelstrom. Some were organic, obviously the result of advanced bio-engineering. Others were machined. Opposing fleets met, and battle was joined. The Dominion against the Pantheon.
“Unless we stop it, an enemy faction will bring the war to the Maelstrom,” I said. “They will see this whole sector of space—this galaxy—consumed by the Machines. Your crypt—or whatever this place is—will be destroyed.”
The images around me shifted, then darkened. Disappeared.
A hum started to build up around the chamber. The atmosphere oscillated, molecules agitating. Slowly, the Aeon began to retreat back into their cryo-pools.
“You can’t let this happen,” I insisted. “You aren’t above this, Torex Var Tor!”
“What the hell does that even mean?” Lopez yelled.
To my left, Novak dropped. Just like that.
To my right, Lopez did the same.
I stared at Feng. There was panic in his eyes.
“What’s happening?” he managed, as he too collapsed.
The neural-link is being cut, I thought.
Then I pitched forward into the water, too.
I made extraction.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
YOUR WAR
I was back on the Valkyrie, in my tank, in the Simulant Operations Centre. Rapidly, I collected my thoughts and decided what had happened. I’d made extraction; from the frozen atmosphere of Carcosa, into the warm liquid that filled my simulator-tank. But there had been no emergency recall, no warning, nothing that justified immediate extraction.
As I processed those thoughts, a figure came into view outside my tank. Braced a hand on the tank’s outer canopy, on the handle that would activate the simulator’s emergency release.
“You promised me a fast death, Jenkins,” said a voice, piped into the bead in my ear. “It’s a shame that I can’t do the same for you.”
Lockdown! I ordered. Do not release tank canopy. Until my data-ports were disconnected, I still had limited thought-connection with the simulator, and I used that to initiate the command.
CONFIRMED, said the tank.
“Is all anyone ever ask for,” said another voice, heavily accented, but with a mocking tone.
“It’s all that she’s ever wanted, I think.”
Wearing his prison overall, a laconic smile plastered over his face, Riggs stood outside my tank. He must’ve seen my expression—which I couldn’t hide—and the grin grew. Both hands on the release handle, ready to drag me out of the simulator.
There were other voices in my head, too.
“… on ship! Repeat, vessel is comprom—”
“Defend the CIC!”
Think. Think fast.
Sims. Vault. Storage. Zero prepared them for deployment—
I reached for the control panel on the interior of the simulator. The system was designed so that an operator could make immediate transition, could operate the tank from inside without a handler or technical support.
“Jackals!” I yelled, into the respirator clasped over my face. It had a built-in communicator, and unless something had gone drastically wrong—or more drastically wrong—I’d be in instant comms with the rest of the squad. “Riggs is free!”
“Ah, no, no,” said Riggs. He pressed his forehead against the canopy so that I could see him better. He had a communicator at his neck, allowing him to speak with me. “Don’t do that.”
One sleeve of his overall was pulled back, and I saw the bright splash of blood from the data-port on his arm. I couldn’t make out anything behind or around Riggs. Couldn’t see what had happened to the rest of the squad, or to Zero. Or Dr Saito, or Captain Heinrich, or Commander Dieter… Someone would surely realise what was happening.
“It won’t do you any—” Riggs started.
But his words were lost to me, as I slammed my palm into the EMERGENCY TRANSITION button, and the control panel lit.
I made transition and left the SOC.
In the instant that it took to make the jump into the waiting simulant, a deluge of thoughts flowed through my mind.
How did Riggs get free?
The answer came in flashes, in the split-second it took me to make transition into the new simulant.
“Have you scanned him for covert tech, Zero?”
“The only metal in him is his data-ports.”
Riggs in his cell: scratching his ports.
Riggs had something in the connections. That was why he kept scratching them, and that was why they looked infected.
Next question: is Riggs working alone, or is there another traitor on the Valkyrie?
I was in the storage vault. Detecting movement in the bay, an overhead glow-globe flickered on, dowsing the compartment in bright light. Racked bodies lined the walls—copies of the Jackals and Phoenix Squad, all ready for immediate deployment, just as we had left them. That was good; I didn’t need to waste any time with breaking out of a cryogenic capsule. Zero was true to her word—she’d decanted our entire supply of simulants, and every available sim was armed and armoured. The combat-suit was attached to a charging station, plugged into the bulkhead. My helmet was already locked, almost as though Zero had predicted we’d find ourselves in this mess. The face-plate HUD flashed with WELCOME, OPERATOR: LIEUTENANT KEIRA JENKINS—DISCONNECT POWER SUPPLY TO—
Boot all systems, immediately, I ordered.
PROCEED.
I snapped an arm free of the charging station, and the cables disconnected. I had a matter of seconds before Riggs dragged my ass out of the tank, and I lost connection with my sim. I registered that none of the Jackals’ skins were moving, which probably meant they hadn’t reacted as fast as me, or that Riggs had somehow incapacitated them.
Got to act now.
I had to get to Medical, and stop Riggs. Not just stop him: kill him. If that made me an assassin or a bloodthirsty bitch, I had to be honest with myself. Nothing short of obliterating Riggs was going to stop this.
I hit the ground at a pace, legs cycling. Each footfall thundered through the deck, and my M125 plasma rifle was in my hands. Zero had equipped each of the suits with a full combat loadout; another very serendipitous move. I reached the exit hatch. Slammed a fist into the release control. The door slipped open…
The hostile on the other side wore a full survival suit, including a respirator mask and goggles. The suit was covered with iconography: tight white script that was obviously supposed to be a reproduction of Shard machine-text. Gender, age and other personal details unclear to me, the tango looked a little surprised at my sudden appearance. Maybe they hadn’t expected me to make transition so quickly. He or she brought up a machine-pistol, finger squeezed on the firing stud.
Well, I’m a girl full of surprises.
The muzzle of my plasma rifle was in the tango’s face before he or she had even drawn a bead. My sim-senses, augmented by the combat-suit, were superior to those of the untrained fanatic in every way. I blasted the piece of shit into the great beyond. The body collapsed backwards, and I charged on through into the corridor on the other side.
Go! Go!
I stole a glance at my bio-scanner. It was running on passive mode, results imposed onto the upper corner of my HUD. What I saw was almost enough to make me stop dead in my tracks. Bio-signs crawled all over the ship. Moving above and below me. Far more signals than there had been surviving crew, which could only mean one thing…
A siren cut the air, wailing mournfully in protest.
“This ship is experiencing a boarding event…” said the AI. “All hands, prepare to repel invaders.”
There was a deep groan through the Valkyrie’s frame. Metal on metal: one ship’s hull grinding against another. That was possible, and consistent with a hostile boarding action. An enemy ship, locked on one of our external airlocks? The Ghost Maker was one big sensor-blind, and we hadn’t detected the wrecks in orbit around Carcosa until the last moment. Perhaps that had aided the attackers’ approach on the Valkyrie. Commander Dieter and Captain Heinrich wouldn’t have seen them coming until it was too late…
I ran into another Spiral agent. This tango was dressed differently to the first. He wore a tactical harness over a suit of space armour; nothing so advanced as a combat-suit, but military-issue equipment. The target was also devoid of any of the usual Spiral markings, which struck me as odd. No time to question that further. This bastard managed to loose a volley from his assault rifle as I hurtled around the corner.
My null-shield reacted, ablating the kinetic energy, but not quite fast enough. Gunfire bounced off my right shoulder-plate, producing a startling report in th
e closed corridor. I snarled, charged onwards.
This tango held his ground. Kept shooting.
A spherical energy shield popped into existence around the hostile. He was using a null-shield generator, like that incorporated into my suit. Another piece of restricted military tech.
“I don’t have time for—” I started.
A hail of heavy gunfire came from the direction in which I’d just come.
Medical alerts flooded my HUD. Of course, I didn’t really need to see those to understand that I’d been ghosted. The rounds punched through my null-shield, then my combat-suit, and finally my simulant.
The shooter didn’t take any chances. From behind me, the roar of the heavy cannon—a weapon most definitely not designed for use in a pressurised environment like a starship—continued. My simulant collapsed, faltered, and then toppled to the deck.
Fifteen seconds after I’d made transition into the new sim, I extracted.
Back to the SOC.
Riggs was joined by more shapes outside the tank. Black armoured bodies, watery outlines visible through the simulator’s conducting fluid. Hostiles flooded the SOC.
Riggs came in and out of focus. With each shift, a ringing impact shook the simulator.
“As I was saying, Keira,” Riggs said, “it won’t do you any good.”
Another impact. The head of a power wrench became visible as it made contact with the protective canopy. Riggs swung it underarm, like a baseball bat, with all the force he could muster.
“This is over now, for good.”
Another impact. The wrench’s powered element sparked, sending energy discharge across the canopy. That was made of armourglass, and wouldn’t yield willingly.
“It’s time you gave up.”
But yield it would, eventually. A small fracture had already breached the glass.
DAMAGE DETECTED, protested the tank. INITIATE SIMULATOR EVACUATION?
Do not evacuate tank! I answered.
“The Aeon won’t help. There’s no point in fighting any more.”
I keyed the EMERGENCY TRANSITION button, echoing the same order in my head, and left the SOC just as Riggs landed another blow on the tank.
New eyes opened, and I yanked my arms free from the charging station. This skin was in exactly the same condition as the last: ready for immediate activation.