Kevin: Don’t worry about the money for a while, I’m doing fine. Have you heard of the Freelancers and Hunters Guild? They charge a 100 credit membership, but as a member, you could get access to their job boards. I understand that a lot of the jobs they offer pay better than any you could get outside the Guild.
Gordon: Thanks, I’ll check it out, 100 credits is a lot of money, but… Oh, times up, I have to go, I’ll talk to you later…
After training that night Kevin only had time for a shower, and then to bed, it seemed that time for play would have to wait until the pirates were taken care of, he thought as he snuggled up to Samantha’s warm back and went to sleep.
***
Friday after work, Drake was still waiting to hear from Apapetux. There had been no word, and he was getting increasingly nervous with the waiting.
Once again he felt he was getting into a situation where he didn’t have a clear idea what he was supposed to do, or what part he might play. With the crew of the destroyer and the Aggressive Solutions team both working to capture the rest of the gang, he felt like extra baggage that was just going along to make up the weight…
It was because of this sense that he was on an indefinite hold, that he found himself walking around Balsdif’s Open Arms and Armor after work, as the weapons and armor dealers were closing up for the day.
From what he’d been told so far, the pirates may be using some sort of shared location as a base. He tried to imagine what the base might be like. Could they be on a planet, space station or asteroid?
He didn’t think people would just leave a space station lying around, but this was a game, right? So anything could be going on.
As Drake was thinking about how he would be of use, he saw a shop that sold explosives. The shop was due to close soon, but it brought to mind the book he’d been studying just a few days ago. And he wondered if they had anything he might find useful on this next mission.
He looked around the shop. He examined the mines, explosives and grenade options they had for sell. The display cases assured the customer that these were for display only and not live. The prices for most of the items would deplete what little funds he had, and then he saw a glass box near the front labeled ‘specials.'
Drake decided to look in this glass display case. There were a few items, but one caught his attention. It looked kind of like a gray cord with thin tape like wings and ran around a spool like a wire. The book he read briefly covered something called detonating tape. It could be used as a rope to go around something you wanted to blow up from all sides, or the plastic coating could be removed, and the tape stuck to something like a door, to blow a hole in it. He could see a lot of ways to use something like this.
Drake asked the sales agent about the tape.
“This? We just got it in from… it’s an odd lot, being only twelve meters long instead of the usual eighteen-meter spool. The nice thing about this type of explosive is it’s impossible to set off without an electric charge or an extremely high heat, and it can be cut to suit any size of job. It’s high yield explosive tape, and as an odd lot, it is marked down to 995 credits. It comes with three igniters that can be set off with their built-in timers or by a remote signal. The remote detonator is sold separately, though.”
The agent put the plastic like explosives in a nice plastic like bag for Drake, after the funds were transferred.
Drake felt a little happier about not being prepared now.
He returned to the Guild Hall and put the explosive tape in the green backpack he bought the second time he had to buy clothes…
Since he was still waiting for the call, he decided to log out of Omnia. He would have Samantha wait for the call for him while he got some training in.
***
That Friday night Drake practiced blowing stuff up with explosive tape, in his training room.
On Saturday morning Drake asked Samantha if there had been any growth in his stats since he last checked on Wednesday.
“Yes, you have had some growth, but it’s only been a few days. So, I hope you’re not disappointed,” said Samantha. For a second Drake almost thought she was taking his slow stat growth as a personal failure. Not for the first time, he felt that this one way mind reading thing she could do wasn’t fair. When she sounded like this, he wished he could read her better.
Samantha brought up a blue screen for Kevin to examine:
Name: Horatio Drake
Race: Human
Hit Points: 170
Combat Level: 1.6
Strength: 1.7 (max 3.5)
Charisma: 1.9 (max 3.5)
Agility: 1.6 (max 3.6)
Intelligence: 2.1 (max 3.7)
Dexterity: 1.4 (max 3.5)
Wisdom: 1.3 (max 3.5)
Constitution: 1.7 (max 3.5)
Memory: 2.3 (max 3.7)
Maximum values are based on personal genetics.
After viewing his stats, he gave Samantha a hug and said; “Thanks for your help Samantha. I’m not really disappointed; we’ve discussed how my job and everything that has been going on has limited my time to train. So I know it’s not your fault.”
He then gave her a kiss on the forehead.
“Well, we have so little time to train, let’s make the most of it,” said Drake
He didn’t receive the message he’d been expecting until late in the morning on Saturday.
He was thinking about lunch when Samantha alerted him to the message in Omnia.
He asked if she had something quick he could eat and she handed him a meal bar and a bottle of water, which he quickly ate while walking into the Omnia game room.
Chapter 23 – Losing It
Waking up in the game, he had Samantha bring up the message. Apparently, Samantha had kept Aggressive solutions advised of his location. So he had a message telling him to be ready with his gear at the front entrance to the Guild Hall in three minutes. To be fair, it had been five minutes when the message was sent.
Drake hurried to get suited up in his armor, put on his gun belt, sling his carbine and his backpack with the explosives.
Ready.
He was two minutes late getting out the front door, which Drake thought was good. But he seemed the only one.
“Hey,” he said. “I couldn’t just sit waiting fully armed and armored for two days straight. So what’s the plan?” He asked Lorna Fei and Tredido waiting in the ground car.
“We will be taking the XR2 that we captured from the pirates; the Navy will be sending two Marine fire teams with us. The plan is, that just as we hit the ground, the destroyer should be dropping out of hyperspace and launching two shuttles which will each carry two more fire teams,” said Lorna.
“Since the XR2 has that nice back loading bay, we will get the heavies to open the party with.” added Tredido.
“Heavies?”
“The Marines in heavy mechanized armor, you know, almost two and a half meters tall and weighing more than a car? Those heavies.” continued Tredido.
“The destroyer only has 2 two heavy weapons teams as support for their two squads. That’s 25 total marines with two sergeants and a single second lieutenant, which is all the Marines a destroyer normally carries,” said Lorna.
“The scout we sent in only reported what looked like three pirate type ships and two ships that looked like either captures or people they’re trading with. Still, we should have numbers and surprise on our side.” Lorna continued.
“Sidonia has been going through the ship records, nice to get them by surprise and intact by the way. And she has put together a program to imitate the voices of the previous crew. Based on those records, so we should get landed and pour out of the back of the XR2 before they know there is an attack.” This last part from Lorna seemed to sound like she was trying to convince herself that it would work.
Drake was going to try to figure out what he should do if plan A didn’t work.
“So, what type of base do the pirates have?” asked Drake.
/> “Almost nothing, they set down on a planet outside the normal territory of the Imperium. There is no town or infrastructure. It looks like a random meeting place, in a large clearing. There are some trees, but they’re hundreds of yards away, based on the signs, it looks like they burned back any vegetation around the base. We aren’t sure if that’s normal, or a reaction to the local wildlife. The guess is that they change locations every few weeks to prevent this sort of thing from happening.” said Lorna.
By this point, we were arriving at the spaceport. This was the first time Drake took a clear look at the XR2 from the outside. The other day he was knocked out going in, and too tired and focused on getting some rest leaving, to take a look.
The XR2 was a lot more bulky, almost square, with little effort put toward efficient movement through the air. In that way, it was more a space vessel and less a multi-purpose ship like the one that was now Drake’s. The XR2 was slower too, but it had much more firepower and a thicker hull. Drake decided that the trade worked well for both sides, and he wouldn’t want to try to run a beast like this ship alone anyway.
Drake climbed into the open back hatch where there were Marines waiting in combat suits, with their own faceplates open.
Once Drake, Lorna, and Tredido were aboard, the ship lifted for space. Drake made his way to the familiar saloon, rather than wait with the Marines.
Drake could listen from the saloon to what was happening on the ships small bridge.
Once the ship was in hyper, Apapetux came back and joined him. It was unlikely anything would disturb the ship for the next 8 hours while it was in hyperspace. The ship could, fortunately, reach the upper hyper-bands that usually only military ships were equipped to reach. Otherwise, they could have been a day reaching the enemy base.
After Apapetux had told Drake how long the trip would take, Drake asked; “So should I take a nap here or is that spare cabin still available?”
“We will all be trying to get some sleep before we land. The marines are lucky that way, I understand that their suits are comfortable enough to sleep in, they even have a ‘sleep mode’ that will automatically attempt to keep themupright, should anything happen, like a small car hitting one.” Apapetux said with a grin.
Drake wondered ‘Does he think that mechanized armor is funny or something?’
“So, yeah the cabin on the lower deck toward the rear is not assigned. Feel free to use one of the bunks, but expect a wake up about a half an hour out, to go over last minute details.”
With that Drake felt like he was dismissed, so he said good night and headed down to the cabin. To get into the bottom bunk, he had to take the armor back off, but he kept his belt with his blaster pistol and Vibro-knife next to himself and tried to get some sleep.
It was not easy to fall asleep since his internal clock insisted it was noon, but he finally relaxed enough to fall asleep using the meditation skills he learned.
***
Drake was startled awake hours later by the sound of someone knocking on the metal hatch to the cabin.
It took Drake a couple seconds to remember where he was. He figured that it was time for the final meeting before they hit the base.
Drake made his way to the saloon, but not seeing a group, continued on to the ships galley-mess area. There he found the Aggressive Solutions group with two of their marine complement, drinking hot beverages that filled the room with an odor that was like a cross between coffee and carob.
“So, what are you drinking?” asked Drake.
This got him some odd looks.
“Hey, I’m from a primitive world. Since the freighter crash, I have been learning a lot, but I haven’t run into this drink before.” Drake defended his ignorance.
“But whatever it is, if it has a bit of something to help me wake up, I’ll take it.”
“It’s called Carf. Here have a cup, it’ll help you wake up,” said Lorna
Drake was served a cup, and it tasted worse than unsweetened carob or coffee. It was like someone bred the drink for its bitterness. But he went ahead and drank half the cup.
After choking down half the drink, he took a look at the holo-display on the table. It appeared to display a picture from orbit of five starships.
“This is the picture our scout took of the pirate camp.” Said the Marine with four slash marks on his sleeve, and being the more senior of the pair had Drake guessing that he was the sergeant, and the man with three slashes was the corporal.
It was the little things like these rank marking that reminded Drake that he was not dealing with earth symbology. And big things like the ship that reminded him this was a game. As Drake thought of this, he couldn’t keep a small grin from forming on his face, even amid all the tension
“We believe this ship,” he continued, by pointing to an oddly shaped ship, which looked like a strange egg with a handle on one end. “is the modified Nelta 34 Light Freighter that was involved in the destruction of the Fyffes Swiftstar. These two ships have the markings of two other pirate groups that have been reported out in this region. These last two ships are more of a puzzle. These ships appear to be cargo ships of some kind. They might be ships the pirates have taken, or they are trading stolen goods.”
“The plan for us is the same regardless of their guilt, we are to secure the landing area, and keep the ships from lifting. So we will either have to board or disable the ships. Fortunately, you already took out the only thing they have close to a real warship. In fact, they are all small freighter types of ships.”
“The ships include the Nelta 34, an EGL-260, a ZT-400, a Zoklis, and an LT-610. All considered light freighters of different models and makes, but they all have some sort of weapon, either added on or by design for defense.”
He pointed to a section of the clearing near the ships and said; “This is where we will land, with the cargo bay door pointing toward the freighters. When we land, move out quick, we don’t want to be one big target waiting to be shot.”
“It’s the first three ships I mentioned that we are certain are pirates. So the plan is for your team to take on the Nelta 34, while we attempt to either board or disable the rest. Any questions?” asked the sergeant.
Drake asked, “If one gets off the ground, are we supposed to try to go after it, or leave it to the Fulster.”
“Leave it, just focus on capturing the Nelta. Once you’ve secured that ship, then you can see if anyone needs your help. Each group will have the same orders unless something changes. Focus on your job first, call me if you need help.” said the sergeant.
After looking around to see if there were any more questions, he said; “Good, so how long until we break out of hyper?”
Apapetux said, “We have about ten minutes to go, then about fifteen until we land. So, everyone, be in the cargo bay in twenty minutes ready to go… except for the two minding the ship.” He glanced at Lorna and Sidonia.
Drake took that to mean the three men were going to take the freighter, while the engineer and psionic specialist guarded the ship.
Drake went back to wait out the twenty minutes in the saloon.
After some time Apapetux and Tredido join him.
Apapetux asked, “Are you ready? Lorna could go if you wanted to stay with the ship.” He grinned.
“No, I’m ready,” said Drake. He knew the Dwarf was just needling him since Lorna was going to have to fly the ship.
They headed down a level and then to the rear of the ship, to stand behind the waiting Marines.
About three minutes from the expected landing Lorna’s voice came over the ships speaker. “The pirates are not buying the cover. Brace yourselves, we’re heading down fast. There are only three birds in the nest, and they look eager to fly.”
Drake couldn’t find anything to grab, so he braced himself against a corner of the cargo hold. He was glad there was no cargo in the hold to fall on anyone as the ship started to buck.
Then a little over a minute later there was a feeling of impac
t, and the cargo doors fell open. When Drake saw the cargo door open so quickly he thought that someone had overridden the door, since opening like that could smash someone flat. Just before the door impacted, it seemed to slow just a little. Drake suspected that Sid was controlling the door.
The marines all manage to stay on their feet, and they scrambled out of the ship. With two of the freighters missing, the spare marines were redirected to new targets. Three marines went for the ZT-400 and three toward the LT-610. The other two went ahead of us to secure the ramp leading into the Nelta 34.
Drake’s focus closed in on taking the Nelta, he’d trained on boarding this type of ship in his training room, so he felt a measure of confidence.
Drake exited the XR2 bay at a run, behind the marines… Good cover. There were still people scrambling to get aboard the three freighters, but the Marines were shooting at any carrying a weapon.
The Marines ahead of Drake jumped up on the closing boarding ramp and started shooting at what looked like hydraulics designed to lift the cargo hatch. One of the hydraulics caught fire, and the hatch fell back to the ground with a loud bang, just in front of Drake who had been getting ready to try to jump up on the elevated hatch.
Drake only paused for a second before entering the cargo area of the ship. When Drake practice boarding this ship, he thought the layout to be odd. The ships bridge and the crew quarters were separated by the cargo bay, with engineering connecting to the cargo bay and crew space. This meant that as the marines in their bulky armor preceded Drake; they controlled most of the ship in that instant. They just had to lock down engineering, the crew quarters and the bridge. The last should be the hardest since it could only be accessed down a corridor.
With the Marines dominating the cargo bay, Drake made his way to the engineering access. There was no lock, so he stood to one side of the hatch, and palmed the pad to open the door. Shots were fired out. One of the marines noticed and came over to the door. Drake imagined that he didn’t worry too much about hand blaster fire. But the marine still stepped behind a crate that lined up with the door. The shots were aimed for the marine this time, and he returned fire. After a just a couple shots he stopped shooting and signaled to Drake.
Omnia Online (Omnia Online Series Book 1) Page 19