The Styx Strikers

by Thor Zollinger

  “Hi yah, sweet cheeks.” Red intoned with a crooked grin. The secretary scrunched her mouth to one side and looked up from her typing. Diana wasn’t very attractive, but she didn’t expect much from men which helped.

  “You’d better go into the conference room now. The Captain’s in a good mood so you’d better not waste it on me and be late.”

  “Ah, it’s never a waste on you.”

  She pointed emphatically at the conference room door. “All right, I’ll go, I’ll go. See yah after?”

  “I’ll still be here.” She stated and pointed again at the conference room door. Rolling her eyes at the receptionist, who grinned and winked at Griffin.

  The four men walked past the front desk and into the conference room. The Captain, XO and the quartermaster were already in the room, along with a few of the other department heads. They were standing and talking around the large table, made up of four regular sized metal tables pushed together into the center of the room. The chairs around the table were simple steel gray government surplus, patched here and there with duct tape like everything else. The walls still had all of the printouts and posters from the lumberyard days taped up, since this was the room the pirates used to meet city visitors in. Some of the lumber from their last job was stacked outside on the tarmac outside to keep up the appearance of an active lumber operation.

  The XO waved his arms in front of the group. “All right you meat heads, sit down! We’re got a lot of details to go over. The Captain has us scheduled for another raid, we’re going after some beef this time around.”

  “All right! Barbeque! $%^&* I haven’t had a good steak in a while.”

  “Shut up Red! And sit down.” The XO walked over by the marker board and flicked it on, bringing up a map showing the feed lot they intended on hitting. “We intend on landing the drop ship over here, out in this field just west of the feed lot. We don’t expect any opposition, just ranch hands with guns, maybe a few ground vehicles. Our intel tells us there aren’t any mechs, but judging from last time we don’t want any surprises.” Both the XO and Red glared at Sneak, but Red managed to keep his tongue silent. “We want you pilots to circle the area this time, make sure it’s all clear before we bring any other assets in closer. Got it?” All four pilots nodded while staring at Sneak, who tried not to make eye contact with anyone but the XO.

  “Knapps, what are we expecting from you this time around?”

  “Well sir, this time we’re goin’ tah black out Port Canaveral, the ranch is too close tah there to the south west. We don’t want no Local Guard alerted. It’s a risk, but should pay off.” Knapps pointed out the locations where they would stage the jamming transmitters and highlighted the area of coverage, pointing out that the jammers would only interrupt radio communications bands and zipPhones.

  “What about the line of sight microwaves and opticals?” the Captain queried with his arms crossed.

  “Snipers, sir. Green Team will be on recon in Port Canaveral. They’ll cut off anythin’ relaying data to the Guard station so’s they won’t know which ah way’s up. No antennas workin’, no comms. With a jammer lobbed ontah the roof too, not even hand helds’l be workin’. We’ll hit ‘em all at once, that way’s there won’t be no warnin’.”

  Captain Razin nodded and thumbed the pen in his right fist. “Skeet, are you guys ready to handle all of that livestock?”

  “Yes sir. We have the storage buildings on the south end set up with fences inside to separate them some. Got to keep them out of sight from the air until shipment. Trucks are ready too. We can handle about four hundred head, which is about half of what the feed lot has listed as inventory. We’ll take what we can transport and leave the rest.”

  “That sounds like a lot of weight. Cargo, have you checked the lift capacity?”

  “Yes sir, that’s only about four hundred fifty tons. Well below the spare cargo capacity of the Salvatore with all our equipment loaded.”

  “Hmm… Let me see, what’s next. XO, are your strike team deployments set up?”

  “Yes sir, as always. Here, let me bring the tactical map up on the board…”

  The pirates went over the rest of the details of the raid, where troops were to be deployed, timing coordination, escape routes, and communications. Captain Rezin was satisfied with the planning, there were only a few loose ends to tie up. All they had to do now was execute the plan.

  Scratching his left ear, the XO pondered for a few minutes on a bothersome itch in the back of his mind, what to do if things start to come unraveled. Should we stand and fight, or bail out and run? He decided they’d better stand and fight, otherwise they’d lose everything they’d worked for up to that point. Hired hands were cheap, but drop ships and mechs were hard to come by. It had taken years to build the equipment up to where they were now. He’d hate to have to start all over again. Oh well, it won’t come to that anyway, he thought as the meeting concluded.

  Jake found some anti-nausea medication in the med kit and handed the bottle to Ariel. Rather than measuring out a spoonful Ariel opened the bottle and took a quick swallow of the thick fluid inside. It had a thick, minty, cola taste to it, not at all unpleasant if you had an upset stomach. Wiping off the opening Ariel put the lid back on and started to hand it back to Jake, but changed her mind and held onto the bottle. She put her head down on the table and curled her arms around her head. “Thanks Jake. I think I’ll just sit here for a while.”

  Jake wandered back down to the displays on the wall in the middle of the wardroom and looked at the alien skull hanging on the wall again. On closer inspection, he noticed tiny metallic dots in a pattern on the forehead area on the frontal plate of the skull. “Huh. I never noticed that before. Somebody should scan this thing in and see what the metal dots are for. First I need to figure out where this thing came from…” Jake turned purposefully and decided to go ahead on his own out in his mech , off down the south tunnel. “I don’t want to wait for the other guys, I want to go now. Ariel, I’m going out in my mech. I want to start exploring the south tunnel. Let them know where I’m at, will you?”

  Ariel groaned from discomfort but answered. “Ok. I’ll tell Bjorn.”

  “Thanks! You should feel better soon. I’ll see you later.” Jake headed out the back way again through the butler’s pantry and through the cafeteria. Turning the corner into the main corridor, he headed down to the pilots briefing room and retrieved the keycard to his mech from the wooden storage box. Re-crossing the corridor Jake entered the top stairwell leading down a half level to the bridge and crossed it to the entrance hatch on his Vulture. Inside the mech Jake powered everything up, retracted the bridge, put on his neuro helmet and stepped the mech out of the repair bay into the main hanger. Jake reached up and pressed the remote to open the hanger doors and started off out of the base.

  Jake turned south and headed off down the main tunnel towards the location of the Y intersection. At the intersection Jake headed south down the river tunnel into virgin territory. The first half a kilometer was fairly easy to navigate, relatively level open ground and very few boulders. The next section of tunnel was much rougher, the ground was uneven, sections of the roof had caved in, and the river started meandering back and forth much more in the tunnel.

  Stopping at a large cave-in, Jake pondered for a minute. “I wonder if I missed something, back there where the tunnel changed and it got rough… Maybe I should backtrack and take a closer look.” Jake turned his Mech around and headed carefully back out through the boulders and fallen rock until he reached the section where the tunnel was mostly cleared and level again. Turning on the extra flood lights on the mech, Jake began examining one of the side walls of the tunnel for anything out of the ordinary. He made it all the way back to the Y-intersection on that side of the tunnel without finding anything.

  “Dang, fifty fifty ninety. If the odds are fifty fifty, ninety percent of the time you guess wrong.” Crossing the tunnel to the far side away
from the exit branch, Jake started working his way down the other side wall. It was more difficult than the side he’d already examined, the river kept getting in the way, making his footing unsure and somewhat treacherous. After stumbling the mech for the umpteenth time Jake reached a section of tunnel where the floor of the tunnel was more level and cleared of boulders for fifty meters or so. Jake stopped and took a long look up and down the side wall and spotted what looked a little like a crack leading back into the rock wall of the tunnel. “My mech won’t fit in there.”

  Jake idled the mech and put it in parking mode, then popped the hatch and climbed down the rung ladder on the exterior of the mech. Jake had a backpack along, which he had loaded up with some snacks and a nice big spotlight last night before he had crashed for the night. Pulling out the spotlight, Jake walked across the uneven ground and around the corner into the large crack in the tunnel wall. “Dang, would you look at that. A pathway.” A few meters in he could see that the crack had been carved out to form a nice man sized passageway wide enough for two people to walk down, and about twice his own height. The passage curved slightly away from the river tunnel until it was headed due east, then continued about fifty meters to end up opening out into a large dimly lit chamber. The rock wall around the opening had been carved into geometric frame for the passageway entrance, with a large compass like star right above the center.

  Holding up his light, Jake could see only a portion of the chamber, but he could see more now than in the entrance tunnel. There was a round oculus at the top of the chamber letting in some light down a long tubular shaft. Smooth pathways had been carved into the rock floor of the cavern, splitting into three pathways a few meters from the doorway. One went straight ahead towards the center of the chamber and the other two curved and followed along the inner walls of the cavern. Jake could see arched door frames carved into the walls of the cavern, unevenly spaced down both walls of the chamber. Jake chose the right pathway and followed it along the right wall of the chamber. His walkway was elevated above the center floor of the cavern as it followed the base of the rock wall. Straining his eyes, Jake could see water glinting in a series of pools towards the center of the cavern. He could see some sort of sculpture made from rock crystal in the center of the largest pool of water, he’d take a closer look at that later.

  Just then, Jake’s radio blasted and squawked and just about startled him out of his own skin. “Planetfaller, this is Moonwalker 2, Come in! Over!”

  “Dang Sven! Don’t do that! Can’t you call me on the radio without yelling at me?” Jake got his breath back and turned the volume down on his radio.

  “Oh. Sorry about that. So, what’cha doin’? Ariel said you were headed off down the south tunnel.”

  “Yah, and guess what? I found a hidden chamber off the main tunnel. It looks really ancient. It’s all carved into the rock of the mountain, and I can see lots of rooms off the main chamber. So far I haven’t found anything in the rooms I’ve looked into, but I only just got started exploring. There are some really cool primitive paintings on the cave walls too.”

  “Wow! That’s rad! Maybe I’d better get in my mech and follow you down there.”

  “Yah, just follow the tunnel until you see my Vulture parked. Don’t forget to bring a light with you, it’s kinda dark in here.”

  “Roger, I’ll be there in a few minutes. Don’t discover anything really good until I get there!”

  “Yah, well you’d better hurry up then.”

  “Can the Ripsaw make it down there? I may have a few passengers with me.”

  “Sure. It’s a pretty clear all the way down to the entrance.”

  “Ok. See you in a few!”

  Jake went back to examining the cave painting next to him. It looked like the doorways on either side had been placed so they wouldn’t mar any of the painting, which looked far older than the precision carved doorways. The painting depicted a pack of Lupes chasing after a herd of Bants in black charcoal and white chalk on the reddish brown rock wall. The Lupes were winded and some had their tongues hanging out, panting as they chased the larger Bants. One Bant had separated from the herd and had turned to face off with the pursuing Lupes with his horns down low. Jake was awestruck by the accuracy of the shapes in the primitive drawings. He could easily tell exactly what was going on and what animals were involved, which lupes were winded, and which ones were dead set on catching the Bant, and he could see the determination in the stance of the Bant. A few of the Bant herd he could see were slowing and starting to turn to face off with the predators. Jake knew he couldn’t have painted anything so inspiring, his sketches looked like stick figures compared to this masterpiece.

  Picture Pack: Ancient Masterpiece

  The next wall down had an equally inspiring drawing. This one depicted a flock of birds much like the parrots of old earth. The birds were wheeling and diving above a stand of trees, while others were posturing in the branches. Jake could almost tell which ones were mated pairs and which ones were the bachelors of the flock, playing on the breezes in an ancient sky. “Wow, that’s so amazing. Wait until the girls see these…” He noticed the painter had signed this one by placing his six fingered hand up against the rock and spattering paint, outlining his clawed hand with the charcoal paint.

  Jake stepped back off the pathway to get a better view of the wall and took a few snapshots with his zipPhone. He wasn’t sure if they’d come out since the chamber was poorly lit, but he wanted to get a few shots to show his parents when he had a chance to write a letter to them later.

  The next chamber had a few carved rock furniture items in it, a large octagonal slab table in the center with rock pedestal based stools arranged around the table, two stools to each face of the octagon. Whatever used the stools were larger than humans, Jake felt small when he hopped up onto one of the stools. A map of Wayfarer was carved into the surface of the gray slate table. Standing on the top of the stool, he could clearly see the shapes of Wayfarer’s continents which had been colored in with white pigments. There were thumb-sized holes here and there in the table surface, though the holes were mostly filled in with dirt. The first hole he located was on the map where the cavern was located. The holes seemed to match up to some of the stars he remembered on the map in the wardroom, he’d have to check on that later. There were more holes in the table than stars on the map. Stepping up onto the table top, Jake took several pictures with his zipPhone.

  “As big as the holes are compared to the scale of the map, it’ll be pretty darn difficult to find any of these facilities. The holes are as big as the entire sector Port Canaveral is in.” Jake grimaced realizing how hard it would have been to find the cavern he was in based on just this map. It gave you a general location, but finding the actual cavern would be next to impossible. You couldn’t even tell from the map whether the location was above or below ground, or even how large it might be. “Needle in a haystack…” he muttered.

  Jake heard noise echoing in from the entrance tunnel, the troops had arrived. Sven came jogging out of the entrance and into the cavern first, followed by the danger twins, then Tarra, Bjorn, with Hai bringing up the rear. Ariel was absent, but Jake already knew why. Jake hopped down off the table and came out of the side room back into the main cavern.

  Everybody headed straight for the aquamarine and quartz crystal sculpture in the center pool. “Wow, check it out!” Sven exclaimed in wonder. “That’s really rad. Do you think it does anything?”

  “Nah. It looks just ornamental.” Bjorn stated flatly. “You can see right through most of it and I can’t see anything inside it, like tubes or wires or anything.” The guys had walked over to the base of the sculpture along a narrow stone slab which rose up in the pond like a sandbar. It looked like the sandbar was intentionally sculpted into the bottom of the pool to allow you to walk up to the crystal sculpture, and continued all the way around just under the surface of the water.

  “You’re just a bunch of cret
ins, no appreciation for real art.” Tarra was disgusted by the lack of interest in the artistic form of the sculpture. “Look how it explodes outwards at the base, with all those little cloudy quartz crystal finials, and how the purple aquamarine crystals draw your eye upwards towards the top. It’s absolutely gorgeous. I’ll bet it came from the geode cave we saw on the flier camera in the tunnel somewhere north of here.”

  “It sure is big.” Hai added in. “I’ll bet it’s almost three meters tall. The main purple crystal is as big around as my head.”

  “How deep is the pool?” Sven asked looking around. “It almost looks deep enough to swim in. The water is pretty cold, though.”

  “Hey, there are fish painted on the bottom. I can see a school of fish like the ones you caught the other day, Sven.” Bjorn was pointing down into the deepest part of the main pool. Bjorn could see a predator fish off to one side of the school, forcing the school of fish into a cardiod shape as they darted away from it in the painting. The light from the oculus sparkled on the crystals and on the surface of the water making it look like the fish were actually moving. The result had Tarra spellbound, her mouth was open in awe as she tried to take in the entire painting on the bottom of the pool. The artist had used the same basic white and blacks of the wall paintings, but had added in strokes of red and blue here and there on the fish. It was clearly painted by a later artist than the wall paintings, but in the same style.

  Jake chimed in as he watched his friends studying the painting in the pool, “Come on guys, there’s a lot more to see than this. We need to explore the rest of the cavern and see what else is in here.”