There was a muffled cheer, then men and women began switching off their monitors and comgear as they filed toward the door.
Vogel stepped up beside Griffith. "Warrant, I will want a special escort and a hovercraft for myself, at once."
"Yessir, we'll take care of you. You'll come with the rest of us. I don't have the men for a special..."
"I expect my orders to be obeyed. Mister!" Vogel then pointed out a group of troopers standing awkwardly by the door, TK assault rifles in their hands. Their faces were grease-smeared and hollow-eyed beneath their large, plastic-visored battle helmets. "Those five. They'll do."
"They're with me, my Lord. They'll protect all of us on the way to the Vehicle Bay."
"Now listen here..."
The Gunther machine pistol came up, small and wicked-looking in Griffith's blood-streaked paw. "My Lord, SHUT THE HELL UP! And get in line with the rest of them! MOVE!"
The party passed into the corridor, the uneven echoes of their running feet filling the passageway with sound. The hallway took several turns past now abandoned and debris-strewn rooms, twisted down stairs to the Bay level two floors below, and angled across toward the Vehicle Bay. Grayson stayed by Griffith's side in the rear of the column, with the five young troopers. Vogel, he saw, was with Riviera and Ari up near the head of the group, but scowling at his offended dignity.
That'll mean trouble for Griff, Grayson thought. Trouble for all of us. His mind spun back to the explosion that had taken his father. How and why had it happened? The thought of his father's BattleMech lying in a twisted ruin out on the spaceport apron, tomb for whatever remained of Durant Carlyle's body, tore at Grayson's mind. He suddenly began remembering odd little moments. His father presenting him with apprenticeship orders when he was ten and the surge of still-remembered pride. His father's ashen face at his mother's funeral just before they'd come to Trellwan five years ago. His father discussing Grayson's education schedule with Ari and Griff in the officer's lounge here in the Castle just after they'd arrived.
Durant Carlyle had been a permanent, unchanging fixture in Grayson's life. Though always busy with the never-ending business of outfitting, supplying, and leading a House Steiner BattleMech Lance, the smile and the steady warmth in those eyes had always been there for his son.
Now they were no more. Grayson had taken them for granted, and their loss tore a wound so deep and so telling that he could not yet feel it. He could only repeat inwardly, numbly, "Dad..."
The Vehicle Bay was crowded with men, women, and children waiting to board the HVTs, transport hovercraft capable of carrying 25 or 30 people at a time. The plenum chamber fans were already turning, filling the room with the high, warbling hum of many engines.
A sergeant saluted Griffith as they entered the room "We've set scouts out down the road. It appears clear."
"IR and motion scans?"
"All clear, Weapons Master."
"Good. Maybe they didn't expect to be this successful. The road to the port may not be covered yet But I want the convoy covered by every HVWC we have." The weapons carriers were already moving, small hovercraft mounting missile launchers or beam weapons and carrying five or six soldiers each. The keening of hovercraft engines rose in pitch, and the first machines skimmed off their heavy rubber skirts and drifted through the open doors into the cold darkness outside.
Vogel was there. He seemed to have lost some of his bluster, but not his scowl. "I've had enough of this foolishness, Weapons Master. I want a hovercraft, a pilot, and a guard. And I want them now."
Griffith waved him aside with the machine pistol, then called out "Brookes!" Sergeant Brookes! Are you ready to move?"
A harried, red-haired man looked up from his humming scout It was a tiny hovercraft, a four-seater. A pair of soldiers were wrestling a lightweight laser onto an aftdeck pintle mount "Yeah, Griff! Any time!"
"Take Master Carlyle with you."
The realization that Griffith was sending him on ahead cut through Grayson's numbness. "Griff, no! I..."
"Go on, lad. I'll catch up with you later. Quickly now!"
Grayson didn't hear Griffith's answer. The Weapons Master had turned away from him and was facing Vogel, speaking quietly. Vogel's face was turning red.
"C'mon, Master Carlyle. Old Hattie here’ll have us back t' the shuttle at light speed. Here. You'll be wanting these." He handed Grayson a hooded, cold weather jacket and goggles. The scout had an open well deck, and a high-speed run would be dangerously cold in this weather.
The sharp crack of an ear-stunning detonation smacked across the Vehicle Bay, and smoke boiled from the door across the room. Grayson whirled, wide-eyed. Vogel was lying on his face, with Griffith crouched above him. The five soldiers were fanning out toward the smoking door.
Just then, several black-clad figures burst through the smoke, spewing the savage white bursts of automatic weapons fire. Griffith was on one knee now, the Gunther balanced in a classic one-hand brace right out of the BattleMech Manual. He fired in short, precise bursts, centering each burst on an attacker's chest
More attackers swarmed though the door. Grayson realized with dull shock that each wore a heavy mask, the goggles insect-like in the Bay's dim red lighting. They plunged into the Bay in headlong dives that brought them rolling up to one shoulder, subguns chattering in sharp, short bursts before the milling crowd of Techs and staff personnel could respond. Grayson saw Riviera sagging back against the skirt of an idling hovercraft, tiny scarlet explosions blossoming across his torso from right thigh to left shoulder.
One of the soldiers beside the Weapons Master pitched back, his face a streaming mask of red. Two more crumpled where they stood, and the two survivors turned and ran for the nearest hovercraft
"Griff!" Grayson screamed. His fingers were on a handhold on the hoverscout's side. "Come on!"
"Let's go, son!" Brooke laid a hand on Grayson's shoulder, urgency in his voice. "We've got to leave!"
Grayson shook free of the hand and dashed back toward Griffith. As long as he had known his father, he had also know Kai Griffith, with whom he had probably spent more time from day to day.
"Grayson! Come back!" Sergeant Brooke was close behind. Grayson dodged in front of a hover transport that was just rising from the ferrocrete, its skirts rattling in the overpressure of screaming fans. Air whipped Grayson's pants against his legs, and the keening fans drowned out the rattle of small arms fire from across the Bay. Black figures continued to pour from the passageway door.
Grayson spotted a TK rifle lying on the ferrocrete, close by the outflung hand of the soldier who had been carrying it, Grayson had never fired one in combat, but he'd practiced with them often enough on the firing range under Griffs sharp eye and tongue. He checked the seating of the 80-round magazine in its slot in the stock behind the trigger hand grip, checked that the safety was off, leveled the barrel at the oncoming black figures, and squeezed the trigger.
TKs fire caseless, 3 mm slivers of soft metal and high-velocity explosives that balloon on impact into miniature, tissue-destroying suns. Almost noiseless, almost recoiless, and on full auto, it hacked through the enemy ranks like an HP laser through soft tin. Grayson hosed the weapon's flare across the attackers, saw them pilch back into the yawning doorway or forward into untidy heaps on the ferrocrete.
His finger slipped from the trigger, and the gun snapped upright Added now to the bewildered, conflicting emotions Grayson was feeling was the realization that he had just killed for the first time.
Griffith turned and seemed to see Grayson for the first time. "No, son! Go ..."
As he spoke, a stream of bullets caught the bald Weapons Master in his side and from behind, lifting him, spinning him around, and slapping him onto the pavement in a sprawl of arms and legs.
"Griff!" Grayson screamed.
There was a soft, plopping sound, and clouds of white smoke geysered from exploding gas grenades. Grayson tasted the numbing tang of paralytic gas in his throat, choked on th
e acrid fumes. The next thing he knew, he was lying on the ferrocrete deck of the Vehicle Bay, his muscles locked in a rigor that could not be broken. He could scarcely see now, though the departing whine of the hovercraft convoy was audible. Around him, he heard the coughs and hoarse yells coming from people in the hovercraft that had not made it away in time, as masked troopers swarmed aboard and cuffed gasping prisoners into submission. Then Grayson saw nothing more.
* * * *
He decided later that he must have lost consciousness. When he opened his eyes, the air was clearer, and he could move again. The muscles in his legs and arms trembled uncontrollably, though, and Grayson felt so weak he could scarcely lift his head from the pavement.
Black uniforms moved among the few remaining hovercraft, herding small parties of prisoners toward the door to the main passageway. Cold air was pouring in from the open Bay doors, and as he gulped it down, Grayson's mind and vision cleared, and the muscle spasms eased. He pulled himself upright.
Kai Griffith was nearby, propped against a grounded hovercraft. The Weapons Tech appeared to be alive, though his uniform was drenched with blood and his skin paler than that of a native Trell. His chest was moving in a short, jerky rhythm, his breathing shallow and rapid. It took a moment for the realization to sink in. Griff was alive!
He also became aware of one of the attackers in particular, a tall man all in black, his face masked by a metal sensor mask. Grayson did not need to see the silver starburst at his throat to know this was the warleader of the enemy assault force. The man was attended by a small band of sneak-suited soldiers, and he seemed to be interrogating the ragged handful of prisoners. A pair of attackers hauled one prisoner to his feet, thrusting him before the warleader.
When the man said, "I am Viscount Olin Vogel," Grayson started. The prisoner was dirty, dishevelled, and unrecognizable. His hands were tied behind him, and he was not wearing a cloak or other finery. "I am a Commonwealth representative, and as such, expect to be ransomed. I'm sure my principals will be able to make a generous offer for my exchange."
The warleader paused, as if considering, though it was impossible to read expression through his blank sensor mask. It was common practice for important prisoners to be ransomed. The custom was lucrative and prevented the out-of-hand slaughter of captured nobles or wealthy businessmen.
"I have been in close communication with your king," Vogel continued. "He will be delighted to see me. In fact..."
The warleader drew a machine pistol from the holster slung low on his hip, held it to Vogel's chest, and pulled the trigger. There was a ragged burst, and the man snapped backward in a spray of blood. Through ringing ears, Grayson heard the thud of the body and a last, strangled sound from Vogel. The man's feet scraped aimlessly at the pavement for a moment, then jerked and were still.
The sight of the casually murdered Vogel froze Grayson as effectively as had the paralytic gas. Why had the warleader done that? Vogel would have been worth millions to this pirate...
A hand grasped his forearm, hauling him up off the pavement, setting him on unsteady feet. Grayson stared into the smooth metal of the warleader's mask.
"That's the Captain's kid," someone said. Grayson's eyes shifted. It was the astech speaking — Stefan was his name. Grayson recognized him despite the grotesque mask the man wore. He'd seen him about the Castle after the latest batch of astech recruits had arrived from Sarghad.
So, this was the betrayer, the traitor. An astech, one of the workers inside the Castle, had opened the Repair Bay gates and let the attackers in. And they would be in league with the 'Mechs that had inexplicably descended from the freighter DropShip. All of it had been part of some monstrous plot to take the Castle, destroy Carlyle's Commandos, and kill his father.
The warleader's machine pistol was coming up, and Grayson thought that now they were going to murder him as well. His foot lashed back, crumpling the kneecap of the man holding him and breaking his captor's grip. Then he lashed out again, striking for the warleader's face. The shock as his opponent blocked the kick with a down-stabbing first nearly knocked Grayson from his feet. He whirled and lunged close inside the man's reach, using his hands to smash and grab at the helmet's blank visor.
His opponent yelled as connections broke free with a soft, sucking sound, and the faceplate hinged up and back from the chin and came away in Grayson's hand. The inner surface of that plate was lined with receptors and a high-tech enhancer that projected images directly onto the wearer's retinas. For an instant, Grayson saw an angry, black-bearded face, whose features were vaguely-familiar and whose eyes seemed to promise sudden death.
A blow to Grayson's chest sent him staggering back against the ruined console, where the warleader held him with the muzzle of his pistol held steady and level one meter from Grayson's left eye. "Singh! You animal!"
The shout had come from Grayson's right. Grayson turned, saw horror and anger and a death's-edge determination burned into Griffith's face five meters away. The Weapons Master was supporting himself on one blood-smeared arm, was holding a small automatic pistol in the other.
The warleader's gun fired first, three quick shots that split Griffith's straining face and opened new rivers of blood from the Weapons Master's throat and gaping mouth.
Grayson screamed mindlessly and threw himself forward. The warleader swung back to cover him, the machine pistol centimeters from his head. Grayson lurched to the right as the weapon struck him with a hammerblow of thunder and white pain. His body hit the floor an instant later.
5
Grayson was aware of sound before he felt the pain. There was a low and steady roaring in his ears, like surf against a rocky coast, but with a steady, rhythmic pulse that was maddening until he recognized it as the beat of his own heart. Somehow, though, the pain had lost its knife's edge. He hurt, but not as much. Not as much as what? He struggled with the idea, a vague sense of passing time, of horror and wrenching loss, but could not remember.
The pain receded somewhat. Encouraged, Grayson opened his eyes. He winced at the sudden glare, but managed to get them open and carefully survey his surroundings. He did not recognize the room. Bare plaster walls with chipped patches high up by the wood-beamed ceiling were close around his bed. A table, a clothes chest, chairs, and a mirror completed the list of furnishings. A narrow window let him see a patch of orange sky beyond dust motes dancing in a shaft of bloody light.
Light. It must be... daylight! The long night was over!
He sat up suddenly, then sagged back onto the bed, hands clasping his dizzy, pain-wraeked head. His head was wrapped in bandages, he found. Someone had carefully tended what was obviously a fairly serious head wound.
A door opened somewhere behind him, and Grayson sensed someone enter the room. "So, awake at last! I thought I heard you yell."
Grayson didn't remember yelling, but decided anything was possible with his head feeling as it did. He turned slightly, and focused on the speaker.
The man was a young Trell, somewhat shorter than Grayson's lanky stature, and stockier, with wide, stubby-fingered hands that were stained with grease. He had the pale skin of a native Trell, which looked even paler next to the unruly black hair and deep, dark eyes. He wore a casual, knee-length tunic, white except for a triangular shoulder panel that caught the red light in shifting patterns of warm color.
Grayson's eyes went back to the Trell's face. Recognition clicked somewhere behind the ache in his skull. "I know you! Ah... Claydon, isn't it? Right! Senior Astech Claydon. You were on Riviera's team!"
Claydon inclined his head with a wry smile. "At your service, Lord, though I can hardly admit to the title anymore. That's not exactly healthy now."
"Not... what? Why?"
Claydon jerked a thumb over his shoulder toward the window. "It's not safe to admit to being one of the offworlders' pets. Not any longer."
Grayson wrestled with that concept for a while, then let it go. He decided to concentrate on more immediate questions.
"Where am I?"
"My father's house, of course. I brought you here after the attack."
"Your... father?"
"Yes. Berenir is his name. He's a merchant. He's done business with you folks. Doesn't share the local prejudice against you offworlders. He's the one who got a doctor to come in and tend your wound."
Grayson touched his bandaged head. "Then I have you and your father to thank for saving me."
Claydon grimaced. "You'll be able to show your thanks by getting well and out of this house and away from here. If the neighbors knew we had YOU here.
"What makes me so unpopular all of a sudden?"
"All of a sudden? What have you been using for eyes, Lord?"
Grayson ignored the bitterness in Claydon's voice. "Is it because of the Pact?"
"You ought to know that most Trells think Captain Carlyle was betraying them to Oberon. When word of the Pact got out, offworlders stopped being welcome around here."
Claydon's casual mention of Durant Carlyle brought tears to Grayson's eyes. Memories flooded back unbidden, memories of the battle with running, black-clad figures in the smoke-filled Vehicle Bay, of the horror of that instant as an enemy Marauder painted with the slit-eyed emblem descended toward his father's 'Mech.
Emotions clamored within him, a mix of grief, shock, and loss. "My father is dead," he mumbled.
"I know. I think they all know... now."
"It wasn't his idea... the Pact, I mean."
Claydon shrugged. "It's all the same. He was the leader up there in the Castle. The people looked to him, and when word came that we were being given over to those filthy bandits..."
"Who told you about that, anyway?"
Claydon shrugged again, and said nothing. Grayson couldn't tell if he didn't know or wasn't telling.
Betrayal. And more betrayal. There had been enemies among the Castle workers, that much was certain. Grayson remembered the astech Stefan standing at the black-garbed warleader's side, pointing him out to the enemy. Perhaps Stefan had been the one who had leaked word of the Trellwan Pact to the people of Sarghad. Grayson remembered now that the first anti-Commonwealth student riots had begun shortly after the last batch of astech recruits had arrived at the Castle, and Stefan had been among them. Grayson had been one of those assigned to guide them through their physicals and indoctrination lectures.
Decision at Thunder Rift Page 4