By Other Means (Defending The Future)

by James Chambers

  “They took him,” Scotch went on, his tone lethal and low as he bent his head close to hers. “They took him, and we have to get him back.”

  His words arrowed past the faint buzzing still in her ears. Her head whipped up and this time Kat snarled.

  If Scotch hadn’t leaned in he would have been safe.

  But he did.

  Instead of continuing to resist his grip, Kat used it to her advantage. She drew back and slammed her forehead into his frontal lobe. He didn’t see it coming. Of course, she wasn’t so pissed that she didn’t pull back a bit at the end. No sense in knocking out the only person she was absolutely certain hadn’t sold out to the pirates.

  “Aw! Fuck!” Scotch swore. “Go’damnit!”

  “You bastard,” she snapped back at him. “You had me thinking he was dead!”

  Med-bay personnel came streaming through the curtain before she and Scotch could truly get into it. They were smart this time; they’d sent in men with some muscle. Not that they needed it. Scotch was more than ready to get out of striking distance.

  “Corporal, you have to leave now.”

  “Oh save it, we both are,” Kat cut in as she swung her legs off of the bed. The hand not bracing her came up and brushed the sore spot forming on her forehead. She fought off a trace of dizziness and ignored the technicians’ protests. The men fell silent, though, as she marched through med-bay, her backside bare in a classic hospital gown that hadn’t changed one wit throughout time. Her lips twitched in a faint smile as she heard the “damn” breathed behind her in what sounded like Scotch’s voice. Not that she cared who else saw—being in the military quickly stripped away any sense of body-consciousness—but Kat snagged a second gown from a nearby pile, shrugging into it like a robe.

  On her way out, she noted only nine members of the 142nd were still in med-bay, other than Scotch and herself. “Where are the rest?” she called back over her shoulder.

  “Those that have recovered were relocated to the crew quarters for now.” Scotch had to raise his voice to be heard. Kat smirked as he caught up with her halfway to the lift. He had her neatly folded uniform under one arm.

  “You know, I could have you up on charges for striking a superior officer.”

  “Ranking, maybe…” she drawled, with hints of her PawPaw’s voice seeping into her tone. Scotch pouted in response and rubbed at the bruise darkening his forehead.

  “Anyway,” Kat went on, “we don’t have time for that bullshit. Sarge is out there somewhere waiting on us.”

  The pout vanished.

  They headed to the barracks in silence. Once they were in the lift, Kat watched closely as the levels changed. Again several decks before the barracks the lights fluxed, and the car slowed. Her eyes narrowed. Reaching out, she depressed the button to stop the lift, and then sent it back two levels. Once it got there she sent it to their original floor once more.

  “What?” Scotch asked over the secure squad band, watching her closely.

  She said nothing, but waited. Again the unit fluxed precisely at the point it had before. Kat resisted the impulse to dart her gaze about the close compartment as she finally responded in the same manner. “The lift did that earlier too. And now it’s done it twice again. As my PawPaw likes to say: once is chance, twice is coincidence…three times is enemy action. Someone wanted to know when company was coming.”

  Scotch grunted and nodded in agreement as the lift stopped at their level.

  When the doors hissed open Kat found herself greeted by security personnel with riot guns poised to fire. She tensed and stopped absolutely still. What she wouldn’t give for her gauss…or at least some fatigues.

  “Scotch?”

  He stepped forward, and the guards slung their weapons and fell back to parade rest. Apparently he had clearance. With a nod at the men, Scotch moved past them into the chamber. Glancing warily at the grinning security detail, Kat followed; as she passed their position, she was glad she’d thought to cover her back. She already felt naked enough without her weapon.

  “You could have warned me,” she hissed once they were well away from the guards.

  Scotch merely put on a suffering look and ran his free hand over his forehead once more.

  “Prick,” she murmured and broke away, heading for the compartment she shared with four other members of the unit.

  The first thing she noticed was her laptop sitting neatly on her footlocker when it should have still been locked inside. She swore and went right for it. Suddenly, Scotch was there, intercepting her before she could lay a hand on the case.

  “I taught you better than that, Private,” he growled.

  She froze instantly, not use to Scotch really pulling rank. He was right, though; her lack of caution was both sloppy and foolish. Good way to get people killed. Good way to end up cubed. “Sorry.”

  “Get dressed,” Scotch ordered, holding out her uniform, and abruptly he left the billet. As soon as the hatch closed she stripped off the double set of gowns and drew the military-issue tee shirt and black fatigues on over her skivvies. She’d sheathed her combat dagger on her hip and was just sliding a ship boot carefully over her pressure bandage when Scotch returned. He carried a cluster of odd items: latex gloves, a pouch of talc, what looked like an industrial hand wipe, and a thick, chunky flashlight. Perched on his head was a set of high-tech protective goggles. She’d forgotten Scotch had some demolitions training. She’d never seen him actually put it into practice, as it wasn’t his primary MOS. He clearly knew his thing, though. Kat watched in fascination as he set the items down in a neat, orderly row, pulled on the gloves, and drew the goggles down over his eyes. He motioned for her to back away.

  First he picked up the powder and sprinkled it over the laptop. The stuff revealed nothing but the unblemished surface of the casing. “Kill the lights,” he ordered, in that non-Scotch tone. Kat complied. When she turned, he had the squat light in his hands and was clicking it through a number of settings, the light altering with each one. Black light. Normal light. Ultraviolet. Supernova, and a few she didn’t even have a made-up name for. It was almost ritualistic, only fast. Click. Trail the light over the laptop in the ceremonial pattern. Trail the beam along the thin gap between the bottom of the unit and the top of the locker. Click. Repeat. “Lights,” he ordered.

  “Sir, yes sir!”

  “No signs of a trip wire or other trigger,” he murmured as he ignored her wiseass attitude and gently ran his hands over the computer in a final check. Clearly confident the unit wasn’t rigged to blow, Scotch motioned her forward. Kat moved closer and watched as he opened the laptop.

  Upon seeing the screen, Kat cursed loud enough that one of the guards opened the hatch and peered in.

  “Corporal?” The man’s tone was tense, and his gaze went from her to Scotch, who had subtly shifted until the guard didn’t have a line of sight on the laptop.

  “Sorry,” Kat answered for him. “Bumped my foot….” Tugging up on her uniform leg she bared the bandage on her left ankle. The guard just stared at her, a long look down to her ankle and up again, less like he doubted her, more like he was remembering the earlier view. She allowed steel to infiltrate her gaze. “Thanks, we’re good.”

  Scotch didn’t need to give her a look for her to know he was annoyed with her. “Thank you, soldier. You can return to your post.” It wasn’t like the guy could argue; Scotch outranked him too. Kat resisted the urge to peer through the hatch to confirm the guard had moved back across the room. “Low profile, Alexander,” Scotch muttered beneath his breath. “Try to remember we like not being noticed right now.”

  She nodded but said nothing as he turned back to the laptop.

  And bit back a curse of his own.

  Her log-in window was open. Typed in the user id field were the words: BRING EVERYTHING. Vague enough, but Kat knew exactly what was being demanded. The bad guys wanted the data, not just the specs on the Rommel—which they presumably now had once they cracked Sarge’s
encrypted copy—but the computer cores as well. There must be data there the pirates didn’t want them to access.

  The message wasn’t all, though. Stuck to the keyboard frame, as if she’d left a note for herself, were a set of navigation coordinates. There was something else visible on the screen, but the log-in window was in the way. Kat hesitated before reaching out to the touchpad, looking to Scotch for permission.

  “Well it’s not like they’re going to sabotage the thing when they want something from us.” Still, before stepping out of her way he tore open the hand wipe and sanitized the keypad and any other part of the computer she might touch. He then pulled off the protective gloves over the soiled hand wipe and dumped it all in the waste basket by the door.

  Kat stepped forward and leaned down to the touchpad. As she typed her code the log-in window closed, and an incoming message alert was visible. Her nerves tingling, Kat clicked it open to reveal an image file of Sarge, unconscious on a beach somewhere, looking like nothing so much as a relaxing tourist. Or he would have, if not for the BDUs and the hint of a bound wrist just visible where his arms crossed behind his head. She rattled a few keys trying to get as much data as possible, but whoever had sent this had some tech savvy because the electronic footprints had been erased.

  “What the hell?” Kat whipped around until she could see Scotch’s face. “How long were we out?”

  “You’ve been out for six hours; we estimate Sarge has been missing for a little longer than that.”

  “Six!” Well, that explained the shake-up call in med-bay. Scotch never was very patient.

  Scotch nodded, concern and exhaustion shading his expression. “You got the lightest dose. Those billeted furthest from the main vent came out of it first. Those closest are mostly still down. One or two went under hard.

  He looked grim. “I was the only one not hit.” Of course, he’d been in med-bay…arguing. “When you entered the barracks the lingering gas triggered the atmospheric sensors in the lift, which hadn’t been tampered with. That alerted Environmental.”

  Something wasn’t right about all of this.

  Okay…something beyond the obvious wasn’t right about all of this.

  Kat’s chest muscles tightened as she processed what Scotch said. She looked back at the photograph, and her nerves jangled uncomfortably as the potential threat became more clear: What if the Rommel’s ranks weren’t the only ones compromised?

  Making sure he was watching Kat moved her fingers over the keyboard. In part she searched her system for malware the pirates may have left behind, but she also used the motions to disguise a few hand signals. Every unit had their own code, a secret way to communicate in the field. She flashed the sign for ‘infiltrator’ and then briefly glanced up to catch the corporal’s eye. Scotch’s grimace deepened. Kat made another slight gesture signifying ‘fake’ and nodded at the image still on her screen. At that one Scotch looked confused.

  “Figures,” Kat muttered aloud. “We’re stuck here breathing in canned air, and Sarge lands on the perfect beach somewhere, working on his tan.”

  It was obvious the moment her meaning came clear to Scotch. He himself had pointed out to her there were no perfect beaches in this sector, and certainly not within a six-hour transit window. Scotch’s left hand moved; ran through his hair, scratching his ear along the way. The message masked: Play along.

  “Someone’s gonna pay.”

  Kat nodded, then pointed at the coordinates; “Any idea where that is?”

  Scotch’s expression was grim. “Not a clue.”

  They didn’t even know if the pirates actually had Sarge, or if this engineered image was completely bogus. Kat swore heatedly as she stripped the note from the housing and shut the system down. “There’s not much chance these navs will take us to him.”

  “Nope. Seriously unlikely.”

  Kat smiled anyway. It was a nasty smile. She could tell just by the feel of it.

  “But I bet we can get someone there to lead the way.”

  Scotch nodded. His eyes looked hard, but his expression was so neutral it was scary. Kat shivered. He reached out and brushed her jaw. Odd for him to do, but she got the message and activated her bonejack.

  “Go on, you,” he said to her. “Now you’re decent, head back to med-bay and check on the rest of the unit. Make sure everyone reports to the crew quarters, Deck Gamma-18,” he instructed her aloud. But over the bonejack he continued, “It’s 0430 hours right now, we deploy no later than 0530. Get those coordinates to Campbell so he can plot a course, then prep the unit for deployment; anyone asks we still have a scheduled live-fire exercise.”

  “What about you?” she asked by the same means, then vocalized for the benefit of the guards and anyone else listening; “Yes, Corporal.”

  Her jaw buzzed as Scotch continued over the ’jack, “I was cleared for entry in here so I could inspect the barracks for any other…surprises and disable them. I best get to that, and see what else I can’t learn about our ‘friends’ at the same time.”

  He grinned as she left and Kat was reminded of her earlier smile.

  “Where’s Dalton?” | “We lost Campbell.”

  Kat and Scotch both spoke over the squad band at the same time. Kat barely felt the ripple along her jaw she was so worked up. She fell silent and waited for Scotch to go on.

  “What?!” Scotch’s tone clearly indicated he wanted to have heard her wrong.

  Kat repeated herself. “We lost Campbell.”

  Silence. “I’ll be right there.”

  Five minutes later Scotch stalked into the common room of the crew quarters. He headed right for her. Even in the midst of battle, she’d never seen a more intense expression on his face.

  Kat’s teeth ground, and she swallowed hard, feeling the ripple of tense muscles all the way to her feet. As he approached, she reached into her pocket and pulled out the contents. By the time he was in front of her, her fingers uncurled to reveal the all-too-familiar sight of a compressed carbon cube; Campbell’s physical remains.

  “Soldier, report.”

  Kat complied, her voice kept flat and neutral only by rigid control. “According to the report registered by the medtech on duty, at 0400 hours Corporal Anthony Campbell succumbed to complications triggered by a delayed reaction to the foreign substance inhaled into his system.”

  By the time she finished reporting her voice acquired a hard edge, and Scotch had gone from white, to deep red, to white again, the expression on his face both uncharacteristic and disturbing. Kat was sure it must be similar to her own.

  “Where. Is. Dalton?” Scotch’s voice vibrated with cold, quiet rage.

  Kat’s breath caught. What had he found in his search? His fingers flickered in the sign she’d used earlier. ‘Infiltrator’.

  Kat’s grip tightened on the cube, and her temper stirred. Betrayal was never easy to take, but when it was someone you’d fought life-and-death beside…It was hard for Kat to keep her expression blank. “Corporal Dalton is unaccounted for.”

  There was only one place Dalton would head: the Teufel. They had to assume she had Sarge, which meant, other than the actual encryption code, she had everything she needed in one tidy package, if she managed to launch before they caught up to her. the Teufel wouldn’t be easy for Dalton to manage if she was on her own—God help them, let her be on her own—but it wasn’t impossible either.

  If that happened Sarge was as good as cubed.

  Apparently, Scotch was of a similar mind.

  He nodded at Campbell’s remains.

  “Keep that safe for now, Kittie,” he said. “Sarge’ll need it in a while.”

  Turning to the assembled unit, his stance and expression was a warning to each and every one of them: disloyalty would be met with extreme prejudice. If there were any other traitors among them, they had to be pissing themselves on the inside.

  Kat immediately nixed that thought. If she started doubting the rest of her teammates, the unit was doomed. Cohesion w
ould be lost and with it their edge. The key was to be alert, not suspicious. She blanked her mind of any misgiving and focused on Scotch.

  “I will not take the place of a damn fine commander when there is anything I can do to put him back in it,” he said. “So grab your weapons and follow me, or get the hell out of my way.”

  Kat, gauss rifle in hand, was in lockstep with him as he went out the hatch heading for the docking bay.

  They didn’t storm the shuttle.

  It would have felt good, but it also would have backed Dalton into a corner. Not that that wasn’t where they wanted her…they just didn’t want her aware she was in it. Instead, they stopped one level above and gathered in a huddle.

  “Diaz, Connor, Danzer, Kopeky…you’re going EVA. I need you to institute a security lockdown of the docking collar and disable the release mechanism. You make our ship a permanent part of the Rommel if you have to, understood?”

  “Acknowledged,” they answered, their tone low and intent, their responses in near-perfect synch.

  Scotch gave them a sharp nod and sent them on their way. Silently the men moved off to do his bidding. He then turned to the rest of the unit, quickly splitting them into four-man squads, each with their own coordinated task.

  “Kat, you’re with me,” he said as he headed back to the lift. “Leave your weapon here.”

  “Yes, Corp…what?!”

  He pivoted and gave her a hard look. “Leave. The weapon. Here. Or do you want Dalton to know we’re on to her?”

  Kat’s grip tightened on her rifle. Her teeth clenched and her neck popped at just the thought of going in not loaded for bear. But he was right. It wasn’t Kat’s only weapon; it was just her most obvious.

  “You’re a pain in my ass,” she ground out. Thrusting the weapon into the hands of a teammate, she accepted his pistol in return, shoving it the waistband of her pants as she stalked after Scotch. “So, let’s hear the plan.”