Tostig was right – a few well aimed proton darts followed up by a marine assault and it would be over in a matter of minutes. There would likely be casualties; there always were. There was the crew of the Artemis to consider – noncombatants for the most part – and it was unlikely that the marine assault force would come through unscathed either, though as soldiers they would all be granted a soldier’s chance. But… if it all went wrong, those colonists would have no chance at all. Could he gamble with eight thousand lives? No, of course he couldn’t. In the end, the decision was simple.
“I can’t gamble with the lives of so many innocents. We must agree to their terms. When they release the hostages – that’s what they are, hostages – we’ll take them on board and make the jump to light speed.”
“Where to?” asked Tostig.
“We’ll jump only as far as the edge of the system. That’s four light hours from here, which means they won’t detect our re-emergence until four hours hence, by which time – hopefully – the Artemis will have completed its mission. Then we come back, review the situation and take it from there. Any questions?”
“Just one,” said Larson, speaking for the first time. “Could someone lend me an EVA suit? Preferably one of the lightweight ones. An extra O2 bottle might also come in handy.”
“For what, exactly?” said Tostig.
“Simple,” said Larson. “You need a plan B and I want my ship back. Before you make the jump I want you to drop me off – as close to the Reaper as you can manage.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“The Reaper will be locked down, but if I’m right there’s a good chance they’ll have left the back door open.”
“The back door?” said Norris. “What back door?”
CHAPTER 20: Whose Side Are You On?
The Artemis
“The Temujin is signaling,” said Angus.
“Armetis, this is Captain Norris. We have considered your proposal and in view of the plight of the colonists on Lyra we reluctantly accept your terms. We await your instructions.”
“About time too,” said Jacks. “Temujin, we are about to launch an escape pod. Please stand by to take the crew of the Artemis on board.”
“Understood,” said Norris.
“Well. Mr. Poulson, your time has finally come. As for the rest of you, Sergeant Fletcher will escort you to the escape pod.”
“I’m not leaving,” said Penny bluntly. “I’m staying right here.”
“Penny, no!” said Chuck, aghast. He was about to argue the point further but Jacks cut him off.
“Why Ensign Parker, how gallant of you,” said Jacks in genuine admiration. “True loyalty! Such a rare quality in this day and age.”
“I shall stay too,” said Savage. “I’m the captain. I should stay.”
“You will not, sir. And you should be ashamed that the ensign beat you to the draw. And for the record, you ceased to be captain the second you surrendered your ship. And now I must insist you make your way to the escape pod. Mr. McBride, surrender your work station to Mr. Poulson and assist your injured crewmate to the pod. You should hurry,” he said looking at his watch. “There is very little time.”
Fletcher prodded Savage with the muzzle of his rifle and pushed him towards the exit.
“I’m sorry,” said Savage as he and James and Angus made their way off the bridge. James wore a grim expression on his face. Angus looked totally forlorn.
“Me too,” murmured Chuck. “You should have gone with them, Pen, you know that,” he said after the others had left.
“It doesn’t work like that, sir. We’re a team, remember?”
Yes, though Chuck. But for how much longer?
* * *
“Are you quite sure about this?” said DCI Burns.
“Positive,” said Larson as one of the Temujin’s technicians helped him into the EVA suit. As requested, the suit was modern, lightweight and flexible. Strapped to his back was a thruster pack which in theory would allow him to perform the most delicate of maneuvers in complete control. Fixed to his chest were the spare oxygen bottle, an emergency beacon, a flashlight and a handgun.
“Easier to find when they are fixed right in front of you,” said the technician. “Apart from that, they tend to get in the way when they’re strapped to your belt – catch on the edge of hatches and that sort of thing.”
“Commander Tostig feels it would be better to send one of his Special Ops troops. Someone expert in infiltration and combat trained,” said Burns.
“He’s probably right, but whoever it was wouldn’t know how to gain entry to the Reaper and there’s no time for me to teach him.”
“And exactly how are you going to get in?”
“The Reaper itself will be locked down, but not the weapons module attached to the underside of the hull. There’s an access hatch at the base of the module that’s used for maintenance. If I can get inside the module it will give me access to another hatch in the keel of the Reaper. With the ship in lock-down that hatch will be sealed so I’ll just have sit tight inside the module until they prepare to get underway – at which point they’ll have to lower the security field. That will be my chance.”
“And then?”
“Absolutely no idea. But it’s my ship, I know the layout and I have one or two tricks up my sleeve. If I can’t come up with anything else I’ll try and get to the engineering compartment, disable the power train and barricade myself in until the cavalry arrives.”
“I can’t help feeling that it will be a lot more difficult than that. Are you sure you don’t want to leave it to Special Ops?”
“Yeah, well there’s another thing. Have you seen the size of those guys? I doubt if any of them would fit through the hatch, especially with one of these suits on.”
“Just so long as you know you have the choice,” said Burns.
“I’ll be fine,” said Larson with more confidence than either of the two men felt.
“Talking of the suit,” said the technician. “Are you OK with the controls? In particular I’m thinking about the propulsion unit.”
“I guess so,” said Larson. “I’ve used this kind of suit before, but mostly just for moving around the outside of the ship.”
“Stick to a few short bursts – the fewer the better. The captain will try and maneuver to within four or five hundred meters of the target. That isn’t far, but in open space will seem a very long way. You’ll need to resist the temptation to reach the target quickly. Any speed you build up on the way will have to be countered by braking as you close in on the destination. The faster you’re going, the harder it will be to slow down in what we like to call an orderly and timely fashion.”
“Understood,” said Larson.
“Message from the bridge,” said the airlock chief. “It’s nearly time.”
The technician pulled a helmet from a rack and lowered it over Larson’s head. He gave the helmet a twist and as it mated with the neck ring a hissing sound told them that Larson was now encased in his own personal universe. “You’ve got two hours air supply within the suit and the spare canister strapped to your chest will give you two more. Make sure you keep an eye on the gauge built into the forearm of the suit. If you need to change over, just twist the lever at the top of the cylinder.”
“Got it.”
“This way, sir,” said the chief, opening the door and waving Larson into the airlock. “Your zero G vacuum awaits.”
* * *
Rarely had three more miserable men shared the same escape pod. As the clamps released and the pod was expelled into space, Lt. Commander Savage held his head in his hands. He was no line officer… a fact tacitly acknowledged but never voiced out loud – though now proven beyond the faintest shadow of a doubt. And in the court martial that would surely follow it would be proven yet again. He doubted if they would actually tear the rank insignia from his epaulettes and drum him out of the service but how could he possibly complain if they did? He felt such
a fraud.
Hunched in the corner, James sat with his hand wrapped around his injured shoulder. The bleeding had stopped but after the initial shock the pain had begun to set in. A sharper pain was nagging at his conscience. Attacking that soldier at the airlock had been as reckless as Jacks had said. He should have bided his time and waited for a better opportunity – and one had indeed presented itself. When they’d been escorted to the escape pod, it had been by just the one privateer – and he would have been keeping a closer eye on Angus, as gentle a giant as you could ever hope to meet, but a giant just the same and a fearsome looking one at that. And that would have been his time. Disarm the privateer – he was confident that he could have managed that – and then creep back up to the bridge when least expected. Job done… well maybe not, but at least they’d have had a fighting chance. But instead, he’d gone off half cocked right at the very start… Idiot!
Perhaps most distraught of all was Angus. Despite his size and strength he’d done nothing… nothing at all, except sit meekly at the work station, eject the warp core and do everything else that he’d been ordered to do. How could he have let everyone down so badly? How could he have been so darned useless?
Savage raised his head from his hands and looked at his two crewmen. They looked just as mortified as he himself felt. He knew that as captain he should offer some words of encouragement but could think of nothing to say apart from the obvious ‘There was nothing you could have done’. The words sounded hollow and empty.
And then the strangest thing happened. Glancing through the porthole he saw in the distance what could only be a man in an EVA suit, floating off in the direction of the Artemis.
How very strange.
* * *
“Primary circuits to standby… tracking scanners online… target overlay engaged…” Chuck carefully went through the final items on the checklist once again. Angus has shown him how to operate the laser during the trials in the Atlas system but this was the first time he’d attempted it by himself. Three times he’d missed a vital step on the checklist – it seemed that every step was vital – the system fail-safes forcing him to go back and correct the error. Finally, with everything in order he looked up at Penny who was seated at the adjacent console.
“Ready?”
“Yes,” she said. “Let’s go to work.”
Chuck thumbed the ‘initiate’ icon and the two of them scrutinized the monitor set in the forward bulkhead. A few agonizing seconds passed before a glowing point of light appeared on the surface of the comet exactly in the center of the target area. As the burn continued the glow became a bubbling cauldron as rock and ice were burned off and ejected into space.
“Power flow optimum,” said Penny, scanning the readouts. “Confinement of the beam is stable.”
“Experiencing some drift,” said Chuck. The sighting reticule had drifted several meters off target, one of the effects of not having the AI to oversee the operation. Some degree of error was acceptable but if they allowed the laser to wander too far, they’d end up drilling a new hole – or holes – in the wrong place, with potentially catastrophic results.
“Compensating manually,” said Chuck. Pulling the reticule back over the target he watched as still more molten debris spewed out to form the beginnings of a tail behind the comet.
Standing behind them, Jacks nodded in appreciation. “Excellent work, Lieutenant! You’ll make a name for yourself yet.”
Ignoring Jacks’ jibe, Penny glanced across at Chuck. “So far, so good,” she said.
“Long way to go yet,” replied Chuck. He’d set the timer at two hours, thirty minutes, by which time the planet Lyra would fill the greater part of the sky. With luck, the comet would skim the outer atmosphere and continue on its way.
The Artemis and its passengers would not be so lucky.
* * *
The EVA technician had been correct – the few hundred meters from the Temujin’s airlock to the Artemis had seemed a very, very long way indeed. As soon as the escape pod containing Lt. Commander Savage, Angus and James had had been launched from the tube, the Temujin had moved in to intercept, Tostig maneuvering the frigate as close to the Artemis as he dared.
At the point of closest proximity, Larson had simply let himself fall from the already open airlock. On doing so, the Temujin turned slowly away, leaving him with the feeling of being marooned in open space. It was disconcerting to say the least, and the temptation to fire a prolonged burst of the suit’s thrusters and rush to safety was almost too strong to resist. Recalling the technician’s advice, he allowed himself a few seconds to gather his senses and then check his bearings before giving a couple of tentative bursts. He was rewarded by a gentle nudge that pushed him almost exactly towards his intended target, a point just to the rear of the command and habitat section in the prow of the Artemis. Once there, all he would need to do was work his way under the hull and the Reaper should be waiting for him on the other side. But he still had a long way to go… and with each passing second his sense of isolation increased.
Don’t look down, the techie had advised him. Best not look up, either. Larson had heard it all before, but why should it be any worse than looking from side to side? It was exactly the same view in every direction, after all. Perhaps the reasons lay in the millions of years of evolution that had taught mankind that it was – on pain of death – better to have something under your feet than nothing. And the vertigo that Larson was beginning to experience was just nature’s way of saying ‘come down from there’.
Another problem was that there was no up or down and without any frame of reference he had no way to judge his speed. Too much velocity would put him into a world of trouble, but being too conservative might be just as hazardous. How about if they decided to power up the engines before he arrived, or worse still, just as he was traversing the engine exhaust nozzles. It would be grim to say the least.
Relax, he told himself. The Artemis was certainly no further away than it had been, and gazing at the midsection he was able to make out some lettering that had previously been indistinct. He was getting there. A minute later he began to identify individual features on the hull and could even see into a lighted area of the ship through one of the portholes. He just hoped that no-one happened to be looking out at the same time.
Exactly three minutes after exiting the Temujin’s airlock, Larson stretched out an arm and grabbed for one of the circular trusses that made up the central spine of the Artemis. He managed to hook an elbow around the truss and jerked to a halt without any need for the thrusters. It wasn’t pretty but it worked. Relieved just to have something to cling on to he allowed himself a short respite, looking back across the void to see the Temujin sitting almost stationary in space. The escape pod was nowhere to be seen. Whatever else it might mean it told him that he probably didn’t have much time. Better get moving.
From his perch half way up the Artemis’s hull he worked his way down towards the underside of the vessel, moving deliberately from handhold to handhold as he went. Traversing the keel he finally began his ascent up the opposite side, thanking providence when he saw the Reaper still sitting there, just above and forward of his position.
Aligning himself as best he could, he engaged his forward thrusters and loosed off a half second burst. Gliding underneath the Reaper’s engine nozzles he passed beneath the sub-light engine bay an on past the hyper-drive compartment. And there, just meters away, was his prize, the maintenance hatch in the center of the weapons module. He gave the reverse thrusters the briefest of caresses and let momentum do the rest. With his speed at a comfortable one meter per second he reached for one of the grab-handles that lay on either side of the hatch. Fingers closed around the bare metal and he clung gratefully on. Almost there.
Holding on with his left hand he flipped open the control panel and punched in the security code, muttering a silent prayer that it hadn’t been changed in his absence. It hadn’t. A small sigh of relief escaped his lips as the
panel lit up and hatch slid smoothly open.
Switching on his helmet lights he squeezed through the hatch and pulled himself up into the compartment above. Directly in front of him was the rotary cannon breech mechanism, the ammunition feed extending up to the magazine above. Sitting to the left and right of the cannon were the two J&P particle beam emitters together with their ancillary equipment. Behind him lay the shield generator and the electronic countermeasures pack. Everything powered down, everything as cold as the vacuum that surrounded him.
He closed the outer hatch, checked his air supply and settled down to wait.
* * *
“Anything on the scanners?”
“No, sir,” said Fletcher. “Our friends on the Temujin seem to be keeping their end of the bargain.”
“And the transport orbiting Lyra?”
“It made the jump into super-space just a few minutes after the frigate.”
“Very good,” said Jacks. “Sergeant Fletcher, Corporal Tully, our work here is finished. I think it’s time we got underway.” He turned to look at Chuck and Penny. “Well, Lieutenant Poulson, it’s time to bid you farewell. Before I go, it is my pleasure to promote you to captain of the Artemis and grant you all the rights and privileges thereto… including the noblest prerogative of every captain – the right to do down with your ship. And after that… medals, commendations… and who knows, perhaps saving a religious order from extinction might even earn you sainthood. At the very least, I image they’ll dedicate a park bench to your honor.”
“As for you, Ensign Parker,” continued Jacks, “I offer you one last chance to save yourself and come with us. You will not be mistreated and I give you my word that you will be released at the earliest opportunity.”
“No thanks. I don’t think the word of a pirate counts for much,” said Penny scornfully. “I’ll stay.”
The Blunt End of Oblivion (The Blunt End Series, Book 2) Page 30