Gunship

by J. J. Snow

  “Yes, ma’am. Did you see their faces?” Chang laughed again then did an impersonation of Reilly—“Where the hell else would I be, Jackson?”—and they cracked up again.

  The wily old knuckle dragger never ceased to amaze her. Reilly had been glad when he decided to become part of her crew. His twenty-eight years of service in the ISUs made him a formidable warrior, and his experience had helped them survive some of the more challenging missions they had faced. Reilly still was learning from him. In the evenings, they talked strategy and tactics. In the mornings, she pushed to keep up with his latest workout routine or avoid collecting fresh bruises in sparring practice. Chang was an invaluable asset, a good friend and mentor. Reilly owed him her life at least a couple times over. Of course, he could say the same of her.

  They both caught their breath and then sobered up. Reilly gathered her thoughts and pointed to the ledgers.

  “These ledgers—I haven’t been able to do a damn thing with them yet. I know they hold the key to whatever was going on with the Welch brothers, maybe even to what is getting ready to happen. I just wish I could break this cipher, but it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before. I’ve tried at least twenty different encryptions, but none of them have even so much as cracked a symbol on it.” She rubbed her eyes.

  Chang pulled a ledger over and flipped it open, turning through the pages absently. Reilly noticed.

  “Something on your mind, Gunny?”

  “We have a new recruit for Sunday’s crucible. She approached Duv tonight at the Iron BAR about the electronics expert slot. She’s well-armed and was confident enough to want to take Ty on in front of a bunch of armed locals, even with us there.” Chang paused, his forehead wrinkled as he thought of how to best tell the Captain. “She didn’t recognize me, but I recognized her. I’m pretty sure she’s working for Zain.”

  Reilly set her coffee mug down. “What are you telling me, Gunny?”

  “She’s a Gaiden, Captain.”

  Reilly stared at him. “What did you say?”

  —————

  “The scores continue to look good, sir. But I did want you to know he is showing some signs of stress due to the advanced pace. To push an operative through two of the holoprograms in a week is a lot. We’ve seen him complete four in three days. I would recommend that you delay the deployment of holoprograms Echo and Foxtrot. His mind needs time to recover.”

  Zain shook his head emphatically. “You know we are on a very tight timeline, Doctor. I have to get him through the first ten before Campbell leaves in order to avoid detection. This way, we are still close enough that we can retrieve him if he suffers a mental break. How serious is it?”

  “The facial tremors are becoming noticeable, and the headaches will also become more acute, perhaps even debilitating without rest and a control program.” The doctor paused. “Perhaps if you implement the control program now, it will help to limit some of the impulses and focus his mental state. Only a two-day break would be necessary, and then you would be able to proceed with the remaining programs. That should limit most of the negative effects.”

  Zain drummed his fingers. Time was everything, and he had so little of it. This boy was going to be the lynchpin in his plan without which everything would fail. If that happened, Welch would be unstoppable. But it would all be for nothing if the kid crashed because he had been pushed too hard.

  “Do it, then. Load a control program for him, and I want scans twice a day for the next two days. As soon as he is stabilized, I need to know so we can recommence the training—am I clear?” Zain looked sternly at the doctor.

  “Yes, sir. I will do everything I can to get the boy’s recovery time down to a minimum. I do understand his importance to your mission. His brain waves are still functioning at a high enough level that I can run the control program now on audible before he enters deep sleep.”

  “Very good, Doctor.” Zain rubbed his face and yawned, feeling stubble along his jaw. He needed to shave, and a shower probably wouldn’t hurt either. He looked back at the doctor. “I know you understand the importance of our work. Without your assistance, our galaxy wouldn’t have a shot in hell right now. Your service is saving lives.”

  The doctor smiled brightly. “Thank you for saying so, sir. I’m just glad that I have the opportunity to make a contribution like this on behalf of my government. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll go see to the boy now.”

  Zain inclined his head as the doctor walked out of the room. The man had no idea how important this operative was to his plans. In fact, nobody except Zain even knew the full plan. And nobody else ever would if it worked.

  —————

  It was turning into a late night, but Welch didn’t mind. So many good things were happening! He opened a second bottle of wine to celebrate as his mainframe came to life again.

  “Mr. Welch,” said a voice.

  Razam turned to face the screen, glass in hand. “Ah, good evening, Mr. Ashati! What a pleasure it is to make your acquaintance! I see you have met my director of operations, Mr. Dobbin. I assume that he has explained everything to you?”

  Seven men stood before him on the screen. All of them were core AOC members, including the current defense minister, Aref Ashati, and the AOC commander-in-chief, Carlisle Bolton.

  “Yes, Mr. Dobbin explained that you will be contacting us from time to time and that we will receive instructions on how we should proceed. We are very honored and excited to be working for you, Mr. Welch. We are very much looking forward to reuniting the galaxy again under a singular central government.”

  Welch smiled contemptuously at the men. They were nothing but puppets now. All of their honor and excitement was a side effect of the new implants Dobbin had fired into the base of their skulls earlier that day at a luncheon. Ridiculously easy, really, to turn these men who believed they were untouchable into his gophers.

  “Very good, Mr. Ashati. Now I have some important information to share with you that you should act upon at once. Dobbin will assist you in carrying out this task, but it must be accomplished within the next week in order to ensure that AOC security is kept intact.”

  “Please, Mr. Welch, we are at your disposal. Whatever you require, we will ensure that it gets done immediately. We are so looking forward to the day when our security concerns have been dealt with so that we can announce you formally and you are finally able to accept the humble position we have offered.”

  Welch grinned broadly. “I, too, cannot wait to join you. I am honored to accept the post of AOC commander-in-chief.”

  Another man leaned forward. “Indeed, Mr. Welch. I only hope that I can uphold the position in the time remaining to your satisfaction. I look forward to the day when I can relinquish my command of the AOC to you.”

  “You are too kind, Mr. Bolton. You have served well as the people’s elected commander, but they will need strong leadership in the days to come as we face very serious threats to our interplanetary government. I am pleased to be able to step into that role. Now, gentlemen, let me inform you of the most recent threat. A new alien biological agent has been released, and some of the colonies have already become infected. In order to best maintain security, it is imperative that we institute an immediate vaccination program for all of our military personnel to protect them against this vector. Dobbin has brought a case of vaccines with him to begin the process. I think we should begin with the ISUs and then move to the main fleet. This must be done immediately.”

  “We understand, Mr. Welch. We will begin at once.” Mr. Bolton stepped back into line.

  “Once you have the ISUs taken care of, contact me again for further instructions. I’ll be in touch.” Welch turned off the screen, smiling to himself, and lay back on the divan once again. Everything was very much going according to his plans.

  —————

  “A Gaiden? You’re sure? I thought they were all dead.” Reilly paced around the common room.

 
; Gaiden were a thing of the past. Reilly remembered hearing about them when she had first joined up, special troops trained to protect senior Quorum members by the Personal Security Directorate. Gaiden were used to carry out assassinations, one-way missions, and other unsavory jobs that the government didn’t acknowledge. They were usually put into training at a very young age under the guise of joining a religious guild which was a front for the official government program. No one knew very much about what went on, except that the trainees learned several different martial arts styles and were usually qualified weapons experts. Some people refused to believe the Gaiden were real, but Reilly knew otherwise. Her work in the ISUs had taken her into some very specialized areas. She had read classified reports that had confirmed their existence and their use in some of the more clandestine programs. She had never gone so deep in as to have to work with one, though.

  Rumors about the Gaiden, however, were plentiful. One popular rumor suggested that the Gaiden were reprogrammed by embedding information directly into their brains. Some spoke of grueling physical and computer training which was used to break and then rebuild the candidates. Biological experimentation with alien DNA, chemical modifications, and nanotechnology were longtime favorites of the Gaiden conspiracy theorists. Another common rumor mentioned the use of miniature hard drives grafted directly onto a Gaiden’s brain. Reilly thought this last one sounded like a load of crap for sure. Anyone with that type of technology would be selling it to the highest bidder, allowing the wealthy to buy and create their own super soldiers. As with all things, the truth lay somewhere in the middle of fact and fiction. More than likely, the Gaiden candidates were chosen for their high IQs, or a maybe a military selection test was used to identify the best recruits. Either way, the Gaiden were bogeymen long gone, lost to history and the fodder for fantasy. When a splinter group had broken away to join the rebellion, the Quorum ordered its remaining loyal Gaiden to hunt down the rebels and take them out. No survivors remained. Or so the scuttlebutt went.

  Of Reilly’s crew, only Chang had ever gone under deep cover and come back out. He didn’t talk about it and they didn’t ask, but Reilly knew if he recognized this girl as a Gaiden, then he had been very deep indeed.

  “Well, I guess I can’t complain about dull moments, though I’m starting to think I sure as hell would like to have a few soon. Does Ty know what she is?” Reilly queried.

  Ty had lost one of his platoons in battle to an extremely adept assassin. He held himself responsible for not catching the traitor before he was able to complete his mission. Since then, the sergeant at arms had worked very hard to be able to read people well and identify any threats long before an attack occurred. Reilly knew if he suspected what the girl really was that he would try to take her out, even if she gave him a direct order not to.

  Chang shook his head. “I’m not sure. He was pretty drunk, but he certainly didn’t take to her. Could have just been stress, or maybe he picked up on it, maybe not. We’ll know on Sunday. Either way, he got lucky. She could have killed him and there wouldn’t have been a damn thing I could’ve done to prevent it. But I don’t think that’s why she’s here.” He frowned again as he re-ran the event over in his mind.

  “Zain wants someone on the inside with us, then. But why? Has he gotten that paranoid that he doesn’t even trust us? Or is the situation more serious than we know and he opted to send her here as extra protection?” Reilly lean on the back of a chair. “If I had known that damn mission on Vervian was going to spawn this shit storm…” Chang opened his mouth then closed it as she narrowed her eyes and stared him down. “I don’t want to hear anything more about bad luck—it’s already done, we’re already here. Now we just need to figure out how to get through it. A damn Gaiden on my ship—unbelievable—I can’t wait to see what’s next.” Reilly walked over to the corner of the wall and punched it once. A small drawer popped open at the bottom of the wall and she lifted out a silver flask, dumping a solid dose into her coffee cup before replacing it and kicking the wall closed again.

  Chang looked at her thoughtfully. “Do not anxiously hope for the future and do not vainly regret what has passed. There is a reason for this. It is like the Commander said, many moving pieces all coming together, but to what end I am not certain. Do we tell the others?”

  Reilly looked down. “She’ll make the cut. Unless we want to tip our hand that we’re on to her, which would put us all at risk, we’ll have to put her in the slot. That means she’ll be privy to all of our comms, what we access on the span, and the classified webs. Unless Seth is good enough to lock her out with a separate compartmentalized comms system for us—I’ll have to talk to him.” Reilly’s head came up, decisively. “We keep this between us for now. But Gunny—I want a backup plan in place. If this is a trick or if Zain has somehow become compromised and she is here to clean house, we have to be ready. Can you get what we need?”

  Chang nodded grimly. “I’ll pick it up first thing tomorrow. Let’s hope she’s not in a house-cleaning mood. For all our sakes.”

  —————

  Saturday went by quickly. Duv and Ty were up early to see their ladies off and get started on their assigned duties before the Captain started to make her rounds. The rest of the supplies, the gear, and the cargo from Vervian came aboard to be stowed while Duv reviewed the recruit list with the Captain and went over the training regimen for the crucible. Of the forty applicants, the Captain agreed with the twenty Duv had listed, including the girl from the Iron BAR. Duv was surprised that the Captain made no remarks about their last-minute addition, instead only nodding and then asking for additional details on the course. Duv outlined the course of fire, the recon test, the force-on-force application, and the individual skill assessments. The Captain listened intently, then signed off on all of it and told Duv to send final timelines to the applicants for the next morning. She walked off towards the bridge, obviously preoccupied. He took note that she was still wearing her sidearm, something that was rare for her to do when she was on, in, or around her own ship. He sent the message out to the applicants’ handhelds with the Sunday report time and location, then wandered out to find Ty.

  Ty was helping Chang and Skeeter move the final supply crates into the hold. The three of them were covered in sweat and dust from working the TORRs all day between the storage facility and the ship to offload the last of the cargo. Duv waved Ty over as Skeeter helped Chang carry some new kitchen supplies up to the common room.

  Ty leaned on a nearby crate to rest, glancing out at the desert landscape around them, then back at Duv. “Yeah? What’s up?”

  “You noticed anything strange about the Captain today? I mean how she’s been acting?” Duv queried.

  Ty wiped his face with a bandana. “Nope, no more than usual since she’s had Zain and Macon breathing down her neck. Not to mention Roen being where her fiancé got shwacked three years ago. If it was me in her shoes, I’d be ready to pop any stranger that walked up right about now.”

  Duv relaxed as he thought about that. “I guess you’re right. There has been a lot going on lately. It makes sense. Her history with this place probably has her pretty well on edge, especially with getting ready to take on some new crew members.”

  Ty pushed another crate over to one side and locked it down to the floor with a couple of magnetic cargo locks. “Yep. That would do it. You know how she hates taking on new crew. I’m surprised she took so fast to Marek, but I think that’s because of him standing up with us at the BAR. She got a good feel for him in a hurry. Any new ones will take some more time. They gotta prove themselves to her first.”

  “Heard that! Hope they’re ready for it—the Captain’s a tough sell. You plan on going into town tonight?” Duv asked, changing the subject as he tossed a loose tac-vest into the appropriate storage locker and closed it up.

  Ty fished a large gun and a tripod out of a box and began to set them up. “Nah. I got to get everything set for the fires course tom
orrow. Marek’s going to help when he gets back from pulling parts from our wreck over on platform eighteen. That’ll take better part of the afternoon, so I figure maybe we get started around sunset. Besides”—he grinned his wicked grin—“Rhonda, the blonde from last night, is swinging by later to see me. She has this thing for guns, so I figure I can show her the setup for the course, maybe go for a little ride on old Maude there and check out the firing range, put some tantalum rounds on target, maybe a little laser fire…”

  Duv stared at him and shook his head. “Um, yeah, sounds very romantic, you two have fun with that.”

  But Ty was already off in his own world, smiling and talking lovingly to the gas-cooled atomizer as he hooked it up to the heavy blaster mounted on the TORR and gently polished off the dust that had dared to settle on its gleaming barrel. “Who’s the sleekest, baddest, most beautiful killing machine in all this solar system? That’s you, baby! Oh yeah, definitely you! Rhonda is going to love you…and then she is going to love me! Uh-huh!”

  “Okay, I’m going to go now and leave you two alone.” Duv gave Ty a funny look and then walked off to get the skills tests ready for the next day. It was no wonder the man had never had a serious long-term relationship. Really, how many women liked ammo and guns?

  —————

  Sunday morning started cold and dark. Of the original twenty invited, only eighteen recruits showed for the crucible. Skeeter climbed up on top of the ship to join Reilly and Duv in watching the recon-and-force-application test. The recruits had four hours to travel fifteen miles through the mountains while wearing fifty pounds of gear, navigate to a preset weapons pickup point, and then return to the ship while eliminating as many of their competitors as possible. The only rule was that there were no rules.

  They were about three hours into the test when Ty returned from completing the final sets on the fires course. He joined them to check out the recruits’ progress. A large digital scope tracked all the individual participants within viewing range, while those obscured by terrain could be tracked on a holo-map with unique symbols that identified them, their current positions, and each one’s pace. So far seven were on the return leg and in hunting mode.