“Got any more explosives?” Mason asked.
“I don’t, but we could radio for more.”
“We don’t have time,” Mason explained; “we’ve got to get this done now.” He looked around the office until he saw what he needed in one of the side offices. Judging by the quality of the furniture, it was probably the CO’s or XO’s office.
“This may work,” he said, returning with two flags and their stands. He pulled the flags out of the metal bases and placed the bases next to the safe. “Take this,” he said, handing Jernigan one of the flags. “The flag staffs are metal and may be strong enough to use as levers. If we can just flip the safe once, it’s out the hole. Try to do it gently and not snap your pole.”
The two men slid the poles under the edge of the safe and onto the flag bases. “On three,” Mason said. “One…two…three!”
Both men pulled down on their poles, but the safe didn’t budge. “Okay,” Mason said after a couple of seconds. “Let’s try it again, but make sure you pull at the end of the staff.” He turned to Parker. “You could get your lazy ass over here and give us a hand, too.”
“Want me to go look for another flag?”
“No, just grab the bottom of the safe and lift when I say.”
“But it’s—”
“Just fucking do it, Parker!”
“Sure thing, Top,” Parker said, bending over. “Ready when you are.”
“On three,” Mason said again. “One…two…three!”
The three men strained, and the edge of the safe lifted. One inch. Two.
“Lift! Mason yelled. Six inches. Momentum took over and it started to rise a little easier, but the poles hit the end of their throw. “Switch!” Mason yelled. He dropped his pole and grabbed the bottom of the safe next to Parker. Jernigan joined him as the momentum ceased, leaving the three men holding up one side of the safe with their arms outstretched.
“Lift! Mason yelled. All three men strained, but the edge of the safe didn’t move any higher.
“Can’t hold…much longer,” Jernigan said. “Going to…drop it.”
“No,” Mason said. “One more try. One…two…three!” Once again, the safe didn’t move.
“Can’t…hold…it,” Parker said.
With a loud snap, the floor underneath the other edge gave way. Weakened by the explosion, it couldn’t support the concentrated weight of the safe, and the floor fell away, with the safe going over after it. The three men fell forward toward the hole, and then scrabbled away from the edge. With several loud crashes, the safe fell through the third floor and second floor, before getting kicked into the main part of the hangar away from the offices. With the largest crash yet, the safe hit the hangar floor and buried itself halfway into the ground.
“It doesn’t look like the door came off,” Jernigan observed.
“No, it doesn’t,” Mason replied. “We’re going to need more explosives.”
“But we don’t have any.”
“I know,” Mason said. “I guess I’ll have to call the spiders.”
Aboard the Altar Ship, Blood Drinkers’ Base, Bestald
“Damn,” Corporal Epard said as the slide locked back again. She inserted a magazine. “I’m out of ideas and almost out of ammo. I don’t know how we’re going to get past them, and this is my last mag.”
“Hey, Zzeldar,” Nigel radioed. “We sure could use your help on the ship. How long until you get here?”
“That depends. There is a pack of them at the entryway. Can I use rockets on them?”
“Negative, Zzeldar. This is our ride home, and it’s a long walk if you blow it up.”
“Not being able to use our explosives hampers our ability to move quickly. Still, we should be there fairly soon.”
“Fairly soon ain’t gonna get it,” Shrewlet said.
“That’s okay,” Thunder replied; “I’ve got a plan.”
“Crap,” Shrewlet said. “In the middle of this, you’ve got an idea? Now I’m scared. It’s probably going to get me killed, isn’t it?”
“I hope not,” Thunder replied. “Just let me know when you’re ready.”
“I’m as ready as I’m going to be.”
“Just a sec,” Nigel replied. He fired several times down the hall, and the Altar there jumped back around a corner. “Ready!”
“What the hell do you think you’re going to do?” Shrewlet asked.
“This,” Thunder replied. He pulled a MIB (“Meal In a Box”) out of a cargo pocket. The box was a six inch square and relatively flat. “Here we go!”
The private leaned around the corner and threw it sidearm like a flying disc toward the group of Altar, then he charged around the corner. “Follow me!” Thunder yelled as he ran past Corporal Epard.
A perfect toss, the flying meal packet landed on the ground about three feet in front of the group of aliens and slid into their midst. All five looked at it then dove away in different directions.
Two of the aliens threw themselves to the floor in front of Thunder as he ran down the passageway. He shot both of them in the head, then he killed a third Altar which had gone head-first into the side of the passageway and was lying in a heap, stunned.
Thunder continued on, with Shrewlet and Nigel close behind, but the other two Altar were already recovering, and he had to throw himself to the side as one of the remaining ones fired its laser pistol at him. Shrewlet and Nigel dove to the other side of the corridor as both Altar rose to their feet, already firing.
Shrewlet fired and hit one of them several times before her pistol locked back, out of ammo; Nigel killed the other with a shot through its head.
Both humans got up and Shrewlet ran over to Thunder, who was crawling slowly toward the meal packet. She grabbed the packed and handed to him, and he flipped over onto his back. He’d been hit several times in the chest. His mouth moved but Shrewlet couldn’t hear what he said. He repeated it, then his head fell off to the side and stilled.
Shrewlet rose with a smile, although a tear ran down one side of her face.
“What did he say?” Nigel asked.
Shrewlet handed the meal packet to Nigel. It read, Cheese and Vegetable Omelet. “Thunder said, ‘This shit’s awful. I would have run from it too.’”
Her eyes widened and she grabbed for Thunder’s pistol and came up firing. “Quick,” she said, “Into the bridge! They’re coming from behind us.”
Nigel ran through the open doorway and found that the ship’s ‘bridge’ wasn’t much more than an oversize cockpit, with two pilot consoles and two other consoles in a second row behind them. Two Altar were busy at the controls.
“Don’t move!” Nigel ordered.
The two aliens turned to look, and the copilot on the right reached for a pistol on top of the instrument panel.
“Don’t do it!” Nigel said, sighting down the rifle at the giant ant. The claw stopped two inches shy of the pistol. “Out of the seats.” He motioned with the rifle barrel to show what he wanted, and the aliens rose.
The pilot got out of the seat first, partially blocking Nigel’s view, and the copilot grabbed for the pistol. Unable to get a shot at the copilot, Nigel shot the pilot in the head, and blue blood and chitin exploded throughout the cockpit.
As the pilot’s body fell, the copilot brought the pistol up and Nigel dove to the side, bringing the rifle up as he fell. The alien’s shot missed, passing through the space Nigel had just vacated. Nigel crashed to the deck and fired several times, hitting the copilot in the thorax.
The alien fell backward onto the instrument panel, advancing several of the levers there, and Nigel could hear the sounds of the engines go to full power. Dropping his rifle, he jumped to his feet, stepped forward, and grabbed the alien. Nigel pulled the creature off the instruments as the view outside the canopy shifted. The ship was starting to rise!
Nigel grabbed the levers and pulled them back, too fast, and the ship slammed back to the ground. The ship tilted to the left as it hit out-of-level,
then it slowly righted itself.
Nigel released the breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.
Shrewlet backed into the room, firing Thunder’s pistol out the doorway. “Nice crash,” she noted.
“Hey, we’re down.”
“If you say so, sir.” She stopped firing long enough to spare a glance around the space. “Not much in the way of cover.”
“No,” Nigel said. “About all we’ve got is the chairs.”
“If that’s what we’ve got, then that’s what we’ll use,” the corporal said philosophically. “The hard part’s over.”
“It is?”
“Yeah, we don’t have to advance; all we have to do is hold what we’ve got.”
“Nigel, we are out of time,” the Pendal pilot radioed. “The local government is sending a spill response and containment unit. I cannot dissuade them. It will be here within 10 minutes.”
“Damn. Okay, come on over to the new ship and get up to the cockpit as soon as the Tortantulas clear the way. We’ll leave once everyone’s aboard.”
“Looks like the ants are taking fire from behind,” Shrewlet said, firing over the back of the copilot’s seat. One of the Altar dropped, a laser hole between its eyes. “We may pull this off yet.”
Nigel fired several times at the last couple of aliens facing them, but the shots went over them.
“Careful, sir,” Shrewlet said. “You don’t want to hit our folks on the other side of the ants. Keep your shots low.” She fired and another one fell to the deck.
Nigel aimed at the last ant, but it collapsed before he could pull the trigger. It twitched as Lieutenant Seville stepped over it, and she fired a shot between its eyes with her laser pistol. She looked at the other ants piled up in the corridor and shot each of them again before looking up to see Nigel staring at her. “Just like to make sure,” Mama said with a smile. “I hate ants.”
She strode the rest of the way to the cockpit, with LTJG Minion right behind her. Mama nodded toward the corridor. “We came up with the spiders,” Mama said. “If you two wouldn’t mind vacating our cockpit, sir, we’ll take it from here.”
Hanger Two, Blood Drinkers’ Base, Bestald
“If anyone has some extra explosives,” Mason radioed, “we need some at the hangar ASAP to blow a safe that’s on the hangar bay deck.”
“Blow up a safe?” Zzeldar replied. “We still have plenty of explosives. I will send someone immediately.”
Zzeldar and Breetar were waiting for the humans when they got down to the hangar bay. Zzeldar was already inspecting the safe.
“I thought you were going to send someone?” Mason said.
“And miss out on blowing up a safe?” Zzeldar replied. “Unlikely. All we were doing was shooting at ants, anyway; this is far more fun. Besides, the rest of your troops just got there; they should be able to force an entry into the ship without me.”
“Nigel, we are out of time,” the Pendal pilot radioed. “The local government is sending a spill response and containment unit. I cannot dissuade them. It will be here within 10 minutes.”
“Damn. Okay, come on over to the new ship and get up to the cockpit as soon as the Tortantulas clear the way. We’ll leave once everyone’s aboard.”
“Shit,” Mason said. “We’re out of time. I need you to blow this and blow it now.”
“You have partially buried the door. That will make it difficult, but there are cracks in the metal I can exploit. I have some liquid explosive I’ve been waiting for the right moment to try out.”
“Do what you need to; just do it now.”
“Nothing could be easier,” Zzeldar replied, pulling items from off the harness she wore. “Breetar, you will want to dismount, and all of you will want to clear the area. This will have a substantial blast radius.”
“Typical Tortantula response,” Breetar noted. “When dealing with explosives, there’s no kill like a good overkill.”
Mason looked around the hangar, wondering about its structural stability. “You’re not going to drop the roof, are you?”
“I hope not. That would make it difficult to get whatever’s inside the safe.”
“Exactly. What’s inside is valuable. I don’t want you to destroy it or make it impossible to get to.”
The Tortantula began tapping two of her feet. “I’m not going to do anything while you continue to talk with me. If you would like me to proceed, you should leave the hangar.”
“Okay, folks, clear the area,” Mason said, leading the troops and Breetar outside.
Within 30 seconds, Zzeldar joined them. “Ready?” she asked.
“Do it.”
Zzeldar pushed a button on a box she was holding, and the explosives detonated. Mason could see the hangar’s sides bow out, but the structure remained standing.
The group raced inside to find the door of the safe lying to the side. Smoke still clouded the interior of the safe, but cleared as they approached.
“Fuck,” Private Jernigan said. “That’s a mess. If the drives were in one piece before, they aren’t now.”
“You told me to hurry. I hurried. The door is off, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, the door is off,” Mason said, shaking his head, “but I don’t know what we’ll be able to salvage out of what’s left. Quick, scoop up the remains, and we’ll figure it out once we get to space. We’re out of time.”
The group started for the frigate, but Mason had a thought. “Hey Zzeldar, there is one more thing I need to do, and it’s right up your alley...”
* * * * *
Chapter Twenty-One
Cockpit, Asbaran Ship Annihilation, Bestald
“Everyone’s onboard,” Nigel said. “Let’s get out of here.” The capture of the Altar ship had gone quickly once the rest of the platoon had added its firepower to the Tortantulas. Another two humans were dead, and one of the Tortantulas had been seriously wounded, but they were finally ready to go. The cockpit was still splattered in blue, although the smell of dead Altar was more fruity than unpleasant.
“Strap in,” the pilot said in his harsh whisper; “this may get ugly.”
“Ugly how?” Nigel asked.
“Ugly as in they say, ‘no, you cannot leave’ and start firing weapons at us.”
“Oh. That ugly.”
The pilot advanced the throttles and Nigel hurried to strap in…wearing his helmet this time.
“Departure control, Annihilation is departing for orbit.”
“Negative, Annihilation, return to your point of departure. I do not have a clearance on file for you.”
“Missile systems coming online across the continent below us,” the copilot advised.
“We are unable to return, departure, we don’t have time! We have a bioweapon onboard that is breaking containment.”
“Is this the same weapon that was illegally brought down at the Blood Drinker’s base?”
“Yes, departure, it is. The weapon was damaged in the ship’s crash and containment is failing on it.”
“Missile systems going active,” noted the copilot.
“Do not shoot us!” the pilot transmitted. “The weapon is spore based! If you destroy us, it will seed the entire planet. We will all be destroyed!”
“What are your intentions, Annihilation?”
“We intend to take the weapon through the stargate to an uninhabited planet and dump it into the star there. The spores should be destroyed, but if not, at least they won’t be a harm to us.”
“Missile systems targeting radars have locked onto us,” the copilot announced. Nigel couldn’t tell, for sure, but it sounded like his voice had gone up a couple of notes. If the unflappable copilot was nervous…
“We have containment failure! It’s in the ventilation system! I’ve got crew dying throughout the ship! I’ve got my suit on, but I don’t know how long I’ll last! If I don’t leave now, we will crash back to the planet and release the toxin into the atmosphere. Entropy! My copilot is melting!”
&nb
sp; “Annihilation, your clearance to depart is approved as is passage to the stargate. Can you make it before you run out of air?”
“I’m trying to figure that out now…yes, if I go at full speed and tap into the ship’s emergency system, I should just…just, be able to make it.”
“Hurry, Annihilation, and get to the stargate at your fastest speed. We will clear out all traffic in front of you.”
“Best speed, aye. Direct to stargate, aye. Annihilation, out.”
Cockpit, Asbaran Ship Annihilation, Breaking Orbit
The pilot pushed back from the console with all four hands and took several deep breaths.
“Nice job,” Nigel said. “I didn’t think they would buy it, but you were so convincing you almost had me believing we had bioweapons aboard.”
“We do,” the pilot said without turning around.
“We do what?”
“We do have bioweapons aboard. I saw five unmarked canisters in the hold when I did my preflight inspection of the ship. I assumed it must be something like that; the approach controller’s reaction would seem to confirm their nature.”
Nigel’s eyes opened wide. “What? We’ve got bioweapons onboard, and you never said anything?”
“Until we took off and saw departure’s reaction, we didn’t know for sure,” the copilot interjected.
“But, but, but what if they’d shot us or forced us to return. What if we’d crashed and one of the bioweapons had gone off?”
The Pendal’s shoulders twitched. “Had we crashed,” the pilot said, “all of us would have been dead. The weapons would have had little effect on us. They would only have been dangerous to the Besquith on the planet.”
Nigel slumped back into his seat, relieved to still be alive. After several deep breaths of his own, he had a thought and leaned forward in his seat again.
“It was you, wasn’t it?” Nigel asked quietly.
“What do you mean?” the pilot asked.
“In the strategy meeting, when I didn’t know what to do. Somehow, you told Mason to help me. Didn’t you?”
Asbaran Solutions (The Revelations Cycle Book 2) Page 18