by Alex Kings
After scrolling through a few pages, she nodded. “Thank you, Commander. You'd best return to your ship now. With any luck, all this will be sorted soon.” She edged back around the shuttle to the front of the bay and, at the door, turned back to him and saluted. “Safe journey.” The door closed behind her.
Lanik got back into the shuttle and closed the door. That was it, then. He'd just tricked an SIS operative.
The air in the bay hissed and lights flicked off before the door opened. Lanik eased the shuttle out and took it back to the Dauntless.
Chapter 29: Gang War
Hanson and his team came up the tunnel in a crouched run – or in Srak and Yilva's case, scrambling along with their bellies close to the floor.
He thought about that piece of shrapnel he'd picked up. A six-digit number followed by the letters IO. An Alliance manufacturing code. The pod – or part of it, at least, had been made in Alliance space. If his memory hadn't deserted him, on the colony world of Iona. He tried to think what he'd learned about Iona in the academy of afterwards: Small, recently colonised, unimportant strategically and economically.
Up ahead, the sounds of fighting grew closer, louder, fiercer. Bursts of gunfire and laser shots, grenade explosions, screams and growls.
“Yilva?” he asked, without slowing.
“This is it! This is definitely the only way unless we want to backtrack for an hour.”
Hanson sighed and shook his head.
The tunnel opened up into a small room with a set of doors on the far side. That was where the fighting was coming from.
Was it better to wait, or push forward?
“Get to the sides,” said Hanson, hitting the panel. That did nothing, so Srak stepped forward, grabbed one half of the door, and forced it open.
The sounds of carnage doubled in volume. Hanson waited a few seconds before glancing out.
On the far side of the door, another of the Afanc's giant internal spaces opened up before them. Overlooking it was another large platform. It was connected by walkways to other platforms further in the distance. A transport pod nearby had been pulled from its rail and sat, torn open, on the ground. Behind the smouldering and chewed-up remains of shops and stalls, various groups took shelter. As Hanson watched, a team of armoured Varanids made a rush for some Glaber positions opposite; humans and a few Petaurs provided suppressive fire. Sweetblade, presumably. Other than that, it was impossible to make out sides in the battle.
“Christ,” said Hanson under his breath.
Srak seemed to have heard him. “Biggest gangs on the Afanc,” he said, leaving the comment hanging.
“Yilva?”
“Keep to the wall,” Yilva said. “There's a club. We can go through that.”
“I hope this doesn't turn out to be a dead end,” said Hanson.
“It is,” said Yilva. “But we can break through the wall at the back.”
Hanson glanced out once more. Sweetblade's little assault had succeeded, and the Shrikes had been pushed back. Some Albascene were coming in from the other side.
“Get ready,” said Hanson. “Move on my mark. Three … two … one … go!”
They rushed out, still keeping to a crouch. To shield them, Srak put himself between the team and the rest of the battle as best he could. Hanson scanned the scene back and forth, looking for any potential hostiles from any of the gangs. They seemed too occupied with their own troubles, but –
To his left, a Glaber hiding behind a damaged shuttle saw them, nudged at his companion, and pointed. The two of them raised their guns a moment later. Then their chests exploded.
Agatha laughed. “Awesome! I will never get bored of that.” She a laughed again.
“That's what you said about the rocket launcher I got you,” growled Srak. “And look what happened there.”
“Here!” yelped Yilva. “Stop! Here.”
They were at the club's facade. The doors had been torn away and were lying, spattered with bullet holes, a few metres inside. Above, a sign in elegant Varanid calligraphy hung from one end. The red-carpeted corridor inside had managed to escape any major damage.
Hanson waved his team through inside the club as a troop of Glaber began a counter-assault. He ducked inside just as gunfire tore up the adjacent wall.
The main floor of the club, at the end of the corridor, was dimly lit by small wall fixtures. A chandelier had come away from the domed ceiling and fallen to the floor. Its sapphiroid decorations were intact.
Here, the sound of fighting outside was muffled. There had been a fight here before it moved on – a dead Varanid lay slumped among overturned tables to the left, the victim of some absurdly high-caliber cannon. A small flame flickered on a stage to the right.
“All the way to the back,” whispered Yilva.
Hanson led his team across, silently, skimming his aim across every overturned table, across the bar, the barriers of a staircase to the upper level, in case someone were hiding behind them.
At the rear of the room, there was another door, which led to a second dance floor flanked by tables and a bar on one side, private booths and some sort of tub on the other.
Glass or sapphiroid clinked behind the bar. Hanson swung his weapon in that direction. Nothing moved. He waited for several seconds, signalling at Moore and Srak to spread out to either side, then announced in a loud voice, “Come out! We won't hurt you.”
A Petaur rose up from behind the bar, hands raised and the skin flaps under them taut.
“I very much doubt that!” said Vance.
Chapter 30: Fulfilling a Promise
Vance's laugh was a husk, drained of all joy, but still he seemed to cling to it. “Oh, Captain Hanson,” he said. “What a pleasant surprise. Why here, of all the places? Why did you come through here?” His tail swung back and forth in irritation.
“We didn't have much choice,” Hanson said. “On account of being shot at and all.”
Vance's attempt at a laugh collapsed into the same Petaur growl Hanson had heard from Yilva. “You saw what he did, Red? Srak? Haha – to our home?”
“I never much liked this place,” said Srak.
“Out there! To the Afanc!” hissed Vance.
Srak growled. It sounded like a distant earthquake. In one quick motion he bounded forward to the bar, grabbed Vance's head in one massive hand, and lifted out from behind the bar. “For a guy who laughs so fucking much,” he said, “you have the humour of a brick.”
“Sir,” said Moore, “I know this is really touching reunion between criminals who hate each other, but we should get a move on.”
“Agreed,” said Hanson. He glared at Vance. “You, clear off. Srak, put him down.”
“Wait!” said Vance. “I … you have those special navy ethics, don't you? Take me with you! I know things. I can help.”
“Oh, really?” said Hanson. “Like what?”
“Get me on your ship and I'll tell you! Everything you want to know.”
Hanson put his fingers to the bridge of his nose and sighed. “I think you're bullshitting us.”
“Me? Haha, yes, I know – you're smart aren't you? I know why you'd think that, Captain. Red – sorry, Agatha here – has probably told you all about me. A bit shrewd, that's me. Why do you think I was on Mr. Bell's side back then? But no, I'm not lying, really. Think about it – I'm one of his top guys. I –”
Srak gave Agatha a look and cocked his head. She shrugged. A fraction of a second later there was a gentle crack. Vance's chatter stopped. His head, still gripped by Srak's massive hand, was turned at an odd angle.
Srak dropped the limp body.
“Oh … ” whispered Yilva. Her tail lay limp on the floor.
Agatha prodded Vance with her boot. “I won't miss him,” she said.
Hanson glared at them. “Why did you kill him? There was no reason to kill him.”
“What, he's your friend now?” said Agatha.
“Fulfilling a promise,” said Srak. He growled. “Typical mi
litary. Happy to start a war to get what you want, but worries about killing someone who deserves it.”
Hanson stared at them both. Mercenaries, of course; not subordinates. He didn't expect rigid discipline, but this was too far.
But there was a time and place for that – and it wasn't in the middle of hostile territory.
“Yilva,” he said gruffly, pointing to the back wall. “Is that the way?”
“Uh …” Yilva looked a little intimated by his tone. “Oh, yeah, that's it.”
“Agatha, make us a door. The rest of you take cover in case we find resistance.”
Agatha said nothing. She just waited till everyone else was behind cover, then raised the Ancient weapon. The wall seemed to bloom open with a shriek of torn metal, leaving shredded fragments curling away from a hole in the centre. It looked like the bulkhead had been a little more than two feet thick.
The chamber on the other side was empty, silent. Hanson led them through. As they crossed the platform, he activated his comms. “Hanson to Dauntless.”
There seemed to be a longer pause than usual before a response came through. “Lanik here. What's the situation, sir?”
“We ran into a few more difficulties, but we should be okay now. Prepare for extraction. I want you to send the shuttle to the following co-ordinates.” He sent the co-ordinates of the closest docking region. “We should be there in ten minutes.”
“Understood. I'll send the shuttle out now. Lanik out.”
They headed across the platform and through a tunnel to another chamber. There had been fighting here too – dead Glaber and ruptured, empty Albascene suits were strewn amongst the wreckage.
Finally, they passed from that chamber to another open platform that looked out on an inner space that was open at one side. Evidently this place had been used as a docking bay for small vessels. Lines engraved on the platform marked landing space. Most of the shuttles had been taken, and those that remained had been damaged by the fighting.
As Hanson watched, one of the Dauntless's shuttles came in through the small opening at the far side of the chamber, engines flaring, and flew over to the platform.
It settled on the space near the closest edge and extended its gull-wing doors. Hanson, still checking the space around them for hostile, waves his team in, then followed himself.
“All ready, sir?” said the officer at the controls. Hanson recognised him as Ensign Toboso.
It was crowded with the entire team there – Hanson, Moore and Saito on one side, Yilva and Agatha on the other, with Srak, who was too big to fit on either bench, sprawled down the middle.
“Ready,” Hanson told him.
Toboso went back to the controls. The doors closed with a click, and a moment later the shuttle was in the air, heading away from the platform.
Hanson watched the platform retreat through the window. At least, he thought, he hadn't needed to fight through a crowd of Glaber on the final leg. The extraction itself had been relatively easy. Unlike the rest of the mission.
He pulled out the small plaque from the stasis pod. At least they had some idea where to look next: Iona. Perhaps he should drop the mercenaries off before then.
The shuttle flew out of the small hole, and at last they were clear of the Afanc. It spread out behind them, a vast and irregular fibrous landscape that became a tiny portion of an impossibly large tentacle, bathed in dim red light and kilometre-long shadows.
Up ahead, through the window, he caught sight of the Dauntless. It looked almost like a scale model. Except he could see on the underside a long hole where the outer hull had been gouged out. Damaged, yes, and a ship he'd only known for a few weeks, but in that moment it felt like home.
“We're getting a hail, sir,” said Toboso.
“Put it though.”
Just as Toboso began to do so, a sensor alarm warbled. Proximity alert – and out the side window Hanson saw a ship appear, slate coloured and the shape of a streamlined arrowhead. It was hard to tell how close it was – but nearly as close as the Dauntless, at least.
The voice that came over the comms was not Lanik's: “This is Operative Serafin of the SIS. Decelerate to a relative stop and turn off your engines.”
So much for an easy extraction.
“Bloody hell,” said Hanson.
Chapter 31: Jump
“Sir,” said Dunn, “We have lidar contact. Very close.”
Lanik studied the screen showing a new blip, then the visual. The Black Cat had dropped its stealth. And the shuttle was decelerating.
This wasn't part of the plan.
“Hail the Black Cat,” Lanik ordered.
Dunn tapped at his console. “No response,” he said.
The shuttle came to a full halt relative to the Dauntless and the Afanc a little less than five seconds later.
“We … we now have a response from the Black Cat.”
“Connect us,” said Lanik.
Operative Serafin appeared on one of the screens above the command console.
“What are you doing?” Lanik asked.
“I'm sorry, Commander,” said Serafin softly. “I know his seems like a betrayal of your trust, but I can't risk allowing Hanson and the rest of team on board the Dauntless. That would give him too much room to find the upper hand. And I know how good he is at that. So this is how we're going to do things: The shuttle with stay by the Black Cat's outer hull and jump with me. You will follow. If anything goes wrong, I destroy the shuttle first. Even if that turns the whole Afanc against me. Understood?”
Lanik's jaw tensed. “Why the lie?” he said.
Serafin looked back at him silently, but eventually her face softened. “Mission priority,” she said. “Datachip comes first. Then ending your mission. Doing so without casualties comes third. I'm sorry, Lanik.” She cut the connection.
Lanik felt the lieutenants glance up at him. They'd known the mission was over, but not in detail the plan he'd made with Serafin.
A thought came to him, unbidden. A decision he never thought he'd make now seemed obvious.
“Fermi,” he said. “With maximum acceleration and assuming we head for the shuttle, how quickly can we get between it and the Black Cat?”
“About five and a half seconds, sir. We can shave about a second off that it we head for the line between the two ships and turn sharply once we're blocking them, to stay between the two. But that would be pushing it.”
“Then we push it,” said Lanik. “At the same time I want you to prepare for a blind jump.”
“Sir?” said Fermi. He glanced round at Lanik, clearly surprised by the order.
“Yes,” said Lanik. “Do some preliminary calculations if you need to, but so long as we don't end up inside the star, I'll be happy. Start now.”
Three things left.
“Miller, send out an order to evacuate all personnel from the aft section of the ship, and from all decks adjacent to the outer hull. I expect we'll take a beating here.”
“Yes, sir.”
Two things.
“Dunn, hail the shuttle with a tight beam laser. Make sure no-one's listening in.”
“Yes, sir.”
Immediately after, Hanson's voice came over the speakers: “What's going on, Lanik?”
“I don't have the time to explain sir,” said Lanik. “Just know that when we fly at you, you need try and get in our path, then run away.”
“Run away … ?”
“Yes, sir. Towards the Afanc. Don't worry. We can get you out of there, but this is the only way.”
A pause. Then, “Understood. Good luck, XO.”
“Thank you, sir. Lanik out.”
One thing left.
“Now,” said Lanik, “record an audio message from my console and prepare to send it to the Black Cat with urgent priority.” When the recording began, he said, “Operative Serafin, on the datachip I gave you, compare page 1 with page 101. This should prove it is a forgery. The real chip is still aboard the Dauntless.”
/> When Lanik had finished the recording, he frowned slightly.
“Fermi, how are those jump calculations progressing?”
“We've got a solution, sir,” said Fermi. “We've got an uncertainty in destination of between zero point seven and four light years in any direction.”
That was it then. Everything was set up. “You all know by now that we're going to do something difficult and risky,” he said to the CIC officers. “This isn't time for a long speech. I trust each and every one of you will do your job and make this work. That is all. Now, let's get to it.”
He took one more look around the CIC. Possibly his last, if things didn't work out. Then he said, “Dunn, transmit the recorded message now.” He ran through the sequence of events in his head, timing them as best he could: The Black Cat receiving the message, Serafin seeing the hail, opening it, beginning to read …
“Fermi, full burn now.”
Fermi's fingers danced across the controls, and the Dauntless's engines roared into life. Lanik could feel the ghost of acceleration. One of the screens warned about bulkhead compressions stresses exceeding safe levels.
Four seconds. They seemed to pass with agonising slowness. This was the dangerous part. He was relying on Serafin being too distracted checking the datachip, being unsure of whether he might destroy it, to react quickly enough.
Two seconds.
One.
The CIC rattled. Part of the outer hull burst into superheated plasma under the Black Cat's lasers. A fraction of a second later, all the bulkheads whined again as the ship turned.
The shuttle was safe.
The Dauntless continued to accelerate towards the shuttle, towards the immense surface of the Afanc ahead of it. The shuttle's engines flared into life, running in the same direction – but its acceleration was tiny compared to that of the Dauntless.
“Beginning jump prep,” said Fermi.
As the shields dropped, the Black Cat fired another volley. A high-pitched screeched echoed through the ship as the unprotected hull boiled away. A longer groan followed as something – Lanik didn't know what – buckled and collapsed.