Last Man Out (Poor Man's Fight Book 5)

by Elliott Kay

  “The same source who gave me this,” said Tanner. “The consulate and the Fleet liaison’s office are bought off and kept under surveillance. They can’t be trusted. Qin Kai is only a couple hours out by FTL. We have to get this evidence there right away. I’ve got a line on a way out of here for all of us. We only have to get through inspections.”

  “And how do you suggest we do that?” asked Vandenberg.

  “I kinda figured you had a plan for that after everything you said when we activated the obelisk,” said Tanner.

  “Excuse me?” Vandenberg

  “No, he’s right,” Naomi realized. “You already have a plan for that, don’t you? Like you did for the other obelisk pieces you found on your last expedition.”

  Vandenberg’s face grew red. “Stop talking. Both of you. None of this leaves the room. I have a dozen students here for a field school, and I will not have any of them roped in on some wild conspiracy. We have work to do. Academic work, not espionage.”

  “The expedition needs to stop.” Tanner pointed to the head and the scope now back in the open box. “This isn’t going to end with the attack on the video. It’s going to escalate. We need to get the evidence to Qin Kai. We need to get the class out of here before this place explodes. And we cannot open that door.”

  “We cannot? Are you in charge now, Mr. Malone?”

  “Of course not, but—”

  “Then how else am I to interpret your tone? Is it meant to imply some sort of threat? What will happen if I don’t cooperate?”

  “Wait, what?” Tanner blinked. “I’m not threatening anyone. I’m trying to get you to understand what’s at stake here.”

  “What’s at stake here is the safety and well-being of fourteen of my students and a significant advancement of knowledge about this planet’s history. I will put neither at risk over your hasty judgment over a single artifact and a bit of video from some local guerilla. You’ve spoken before about your counseling issues, Mr. Malone. Perhaps you need to speak with your therapist about your habitual rush to treat everything like some violent crisis. Perhaps you need a crisis to make up for your academic shortcomings.

  “Naomi, we have a dig to continue. Stow these things with the other finds and get your intern straightened out.” With that, he whirled around for the door.

  “Professor!” Naomi called after him, but her mentor didn’t turn back.

  Vandenberg threw open the exit, only to come headlong into one of his students. Gina jerked away from him, taking another step back as she caught his glare. “What is this? Were you eavesdropping?” he demanded.

  “Huh? I came back for a power cell for my—”

  He dismissed her explanation with a grunt and a wave, stomping off into the evening twilight outside. Gina ventured into the research tent, closing the door behind her before looking to the others with wide-eyed surprise.

  Naomi turned to Tanner with much the same expression. “What the hell, Tanner?”

  “I know, right?” he blurted in equal shock. “What fucking academic shortcomings is he talking about?”

  “Tanner. Focus,” Naomi snapped. “I mean why the hell didn’t you say anything to stop him from leaving?”

  “Why didn’t you say anything?”

  “I didn’t think of anything.”

  “Like I was gonna do better? Every shot he threw at me was below the belt and then he walked out,” said Tanner, pointing to the exit. Then he paused. “All of it. Like he’d noticed all those sore spots beforehand. Then he threw it all out at once when he was… when he was cornered.” His eyes drifted to the head of the stone robot and the scope beside it.

  “You’re saying he’s scared?” asked Naomi.

  “Yeah. Of course he’s scared,” Tanner thought out loud. “He’s about to make the discovery of his career. Or he was, until all this hit. Now he feels like it’s all going to be taken away before it happens. Before he can put his name on it.”

  “I’m sorry, what’s going on?” Gina’s gaze turned to the box with the stone head and the rifle scope. “This doesn’t look like anything we dug up here.”

  “It’s not,” said Naomi. “But it’s more alien tech we need to hide. We’ll explain in a minute. Tanner, give him a minute to think this through. His brain will catch up to his mouth and he’ll realize you’re right.”

  “He was thinking it all through,” said Tanner. “A little panicked, but thinking.”

  “Let me talk to him again. Alone,” Naomi added.

  “He sounded pretty angry at you, too,” noted Gina.

  “Only because I brought Tanner on this expedition. He doesn’t like having his authority challenged. Something I’m only learning now ‘cause I’ve never seen it before.”

  “How am I challenging his authority?” asked Tanner. “I’m a freshman. If it wasn’t for people with guns, I’d keep my head down and my mouth shut.”

  “Yeah, but it is people with guns. He doesn’t know how to handle that. Not really. You know the risks he took to get here. Every time there’s a new risk, you’re involved somehow. Even if you’re the one to fix it, he feels like he’s been undermined. Like you said, he’s hitting you below the belt because he’s been thinking about it. And now there’s this. Let me talk him down,” she reiterated, turning for the door.

  “Sounds like a pretty charitable read of his character,” muttered Gina.

  “Oh, I’d rather hit him over the head a few hundred times,” Naomi grumbled back. “It’s less about charity and more about convincing myself empathy is more effective than assault.” She pushed the door open, stepped outside…and stopped with head turned to the sky. “Tanner?”

  He didn’t answer alone. Gina hurried outside with him, following Naomi’s gaze and the noise up above to the sight of two Vanguards sweeping overhead. One made a circuit of the canyon. The other settled into the canyon floor. Its doors opened to release men and women in fatigues and combat gear as soon as it touched down.

  “Oh god damn it,” Tanner grumbled. “We’ve gotta put away the—”

  “I’m on it,” said Gina.

  “Thanks.” He walked out to meet the newcomers. Vandenberg cut off his path, warning him back with an irritated glare.

  “Evening, professor,” greeted Clint Stockton, emerging at the head of the detail. He carried as many guns and grenades as he’d brought on his first visit, only this time he’d added a cocky grin. “We heard you made a big discovery. Thought we’d take a look.”

  “A ‘big discovery’ is a matter of perspective, I’m afraid,” Vandenberg began. “We’re excited to find anything, but in fairness it’s only a ruin carved into the canyon wall. Others have been found across Minos.”

  “Uh-huh. I’ve seen a couple of those old ruins. Can’t say they look much like that one,” said Stockton. He gestured to the great door at the end of the canyon. “Nice job lighting it up.”

  “We have considerably more to do before we know what we’ve found,” Vandenberg tried again. “Your visit may be a bit premature.”

  “Visit? Aw, no. We’re out here to keep you company. Figured Solanke and Garcia can’t give this the sort of security you deserve all on their own. Especially not for such a find.”

  “We don’t know if it’s an important find yet,” the professor maintained, trying to sound friendly. “There’s still more digging to do.”

  “Heh. Well, now you’ve got more manpower. Hear that, boys and girls? Let’s help the professor dig.”

  Chapter Nineteen:

  Reception

  “Though positioned on the border with sometimes hostile aliens, Qin Kai has emerged as a busy world for commerce and development. Defense investments and infrastructure subsidies from the Union Fleet have only encouraged further development by the Lai Wa Corporation in a kind of feedback loop. As always, money tends to follow money.”

  --The Solar Tribune, August 2280

  “It’s almost enough to make you miss the war, isn’t it?”

  “Hm?” T
he question roused Lynette from her slumped posture in the captain’s chair. She lifted her chin from her hand, propped up against the console before her. “Wow. I think I almost dozed off.” She looked over the console, her monitor screens, and the broad display of the bridge canopy. Little had changed since her last look. Phoenix wasn’t even close enough yet to justify a computer-enhanced image of the planet far ahead.

  “I don’t think the captain is supposed to admit to something like that,” said Sanjay.

  “Hey, I promised no secrets and no bullshit when everyone signed on for this ship,” Lynette reminded him. She had to stifle a yawn to get the rest out. “If I have to act flawless all the time, I don’t want to be the boss. And you’re one to talk, Mr. Boots on the Helm.”

  “I won’t tell anyone you’re a slacker if you don’t tell anyone I’m a slob,” he offered. His feet stayed on the console. While Sanjay’s station to the left and forward of her chair offered less room, it was still more spacious and comfortable than any military version. The amenities on Phoenix were a big selling point when she hired him. So was the relaxed environment. Nobody needed formalities.

  “What was that you were saying?” asked Lynette.

  “It’s a long haul from the FTL limit to the destination everywhere we go.” Sanjay waved his hand at the canopy screen. “You cross light-years in hours or days or whatever it takes, but as soon as you get into another system it’s this long drag to an actual planet or station. I’m starting to miss the days when we could make an emergency jump right to the outer orbitals.”

  “You miss feeling your guts clench up from the fear of being torn apart by a gravity well?”

  “Wow. Is that how you felt about it?”

  “For starters.”

  “After the first time, I figured the whole thing about being torn up by transitioning too close to a gravity well was a myth.”

  “Sanjay, you know it isn’t a myth. We saw it happen to other ships.”

  “Yeah, but I figured they screwed it up. So as long as you don’t screw up, you’re good, right? Just gotta get over the fear of doing it the first time,” he shrugged. Lynette stared skeptically until the next thought clicked in his head. “Oh yeah, I guess I was drugged up and delirious for my first time. And not the fun way.”

  “I think I can live with the sublight drag,” said Lynette. “Besides, at least this system isn’t as complex as Archangel or some others. It’s only three planetary orbits between the FTL line and Qin Kai. We’re almost at the buoy line now.”

  “Hell of a buoy line,” noted Sanjay. His eyes drifted to the astrogation display along the side of the canopy screen, where a computerized star chart gave a flat, “overhead” view of Phoenix’s path through the system.

  Buoys and long-range satellites could be found in any inhabited system to monitor space and boost transmission ranges, or simply to mark out legal lines. This system had more than most, particularly considering its population. Only the planet of Qin Kai was settled, along with its orbiting stations, but the spread of buoys and other unmanned craft was as great as that of any system at the Union’s core.

  “We’re out on the edge of human space,” said Lynette. “Nothing wrong with having extra eyes and ears out here. The Union subsidizes all this. Them and Lai Wa.”

  “Which means the Union is subsidizing Lai Wa, right? It’s a corporate world.”

  “Not as strictly as some, but yeah. They terraformed and did all the heavy colonial lifting, and they stuck with it when the borders were settled. If they suck up all the profits of having the Fleet build a hub here, I guess that’s the benefit of being the trailblazers.”

  “Never thought I’d hear you say anything that nice about the corporate overlords.”

  “I don’t have a problem with anyone building a big business or getting rich, Sanjay. I’d like to be rich, too. It’s only a problem when the rich people start being assholes.”

  A beep at their consoles announced a link-up with the system’s communications relays. Shortly after entering the system, Phoenix transmitted a code package to the relay net, announcing their identity and those of its crew and their various subscription services. Personal mail wouldn’t reach them, but mass media continued on for everyone. Travel between star systems only created a new assortment of time delays; news from some star systems would be old, while drawing closer to others eliminated delays.

  Archangel lay near the border of Union space. Qin Kai was even farther out. Lynette expected a greater time delay on the news, but everyone liked to stay connected. She hit the intercom switch. “Hey folks. If anyone’s been waiting, we hit the comm relays. Might be fresh goodies on your holocoms. We’re about forty-five minutes from Qin Kai now.”

  Other updates came through along with the media download. The live connection to the relay net provided a boost to in-system traffic and information. On the canopy screen, Lynette and Sanjay could now see travel lanes and projections, a broader spread of communications from Qin Kai itself, and traffic identifiers.

  Some of those traffic identifiers caught their attention.

  “Whoa,” murmured Sanjay. “What’s Beowulf doing here? And Monaco? Did we miss something?”

  “I don’t know. It’s a Fleet hub, so there’s always hardware, but…” Lynette’s words drifted away. She tapped a button on her personal comms pad. “Veronica, could you come up?”

  “Sure. On my way,” answered her XO.

  Lynette and Sanjay took in the traffic list. A second battleship, the UFS DeRuyter, sat close to the Union Fleet station orbiting the planet. Both DeRuyter and Beowulf had their escorts, but other ships sat docked with the station or hovered nearby, too. Identifiers popped up on the display, marking frigates, destroyers, and other craft from Lai Wa’s corporate fleet, the Solar Alliance navy, Quilombo, and even a NorthStar frigate.

  The Fleet and Lai Wa were natural presences here. The rest still seemed unusual.

  “It can’t be an invasion fleet without any assault carriers,” said Sanjay. “Maybe it’s some sort of conference? Wargames? Nah, why would we get into any wargames with Lai Wa this soon after the actual war?”

  “No, I don’t think it’s that,” Lynette agreed. “Maybe there’s an easy answer? It’s not like they’re hiding from anyone.” She opened up a screen from her personal news media feed. Her compiler program included her preferred outlets and major local services wherever she went. She also had a previewer set to search and select anything with certain keywords of interest, putting those to the front of her personal queue.

  The previewer derailed her intentions right from the start.

  “Oh wow, is somebody being invaded?” asked Veronica over her shoulder. Engrossed as the captain was in her reading, she hadn’t heard the bridge doors open and shut. Her XO stood at her side looking over the canopy displays.

  “That’s what we’re wondering,” said Sanjay. “Look at this, they’ve got Monaco and Dublin out here, and if Beowulf is here then probably St. Catherine is, too. Haven’t seen any other corvettes, but they may be docked.”

  “Hoping to see Joan of Arc out here?”

  “Wouldn’t mind.”

  “Guess that’s fair. I’m guessing it’s some sort of feel-good unity thing? Archangel showing we can play well with others? Maybe a training exercise or a joint patrol?”

  “Pirates,” said Lynette. Her voice came through flatly, with even a touch of annoyance. Her eyes didn’t come off her screen. “They’re looking for pirates.”

  “I guess that makes sense,” Veronica mused.

  “Oh, it makes complete sense,” Lynette grumbled.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Sanjay. Veronica looked to her for the same answer, but Lynette was already bumping the article over to one of Sanjay’s screens. Veronica leaned in to look at Lynette’s.

  The captain sat back in her chair. She knew what would come next.

  “Holy shit,” murmured Veronica.

  Sanjay let out a snort. “This is a good sign
, then.”

  “How is this a good sign?” asked Veronica.

  “There’s only one incident, so they didn’t fuck with him twice, right?” asked Sanjay. “This means he’s on Minos now and everything’s cool.”

  “How is everything cool if they had to fight through pirates to get there?”

  “Remember who we’re talking about? Seriously, he couldn’t get through a semester of school without blowing up his house. You think a field trip is gonna go any better?”

  “He didn’t blow up a house,” Lynette grumbled. “It was an apartment. More of a loft.”

  “Because that’s so much better.”

  “Sanjay,” said Veronica.

  “What? All I’m sayin’ is this shows he made it to Minos okay. Look, the news only came out because the ship made it in, right? And if he’d died that would’ve been the headline. Same if he got himself arrested. Minos is only a couple hours from here, so I’m sure we’d see news if there was news to see. He’s fine. I’m more interested in why the Navy is here.”

  “Like I said, they’re on a joint patrol. They’re looking for pirates.” Lynette banished her media screen. “Turns out Tanner found the pirates for them.”

  “Yeah, well he’s good at that.”

  Sighing, the captain propped her elbows up on her console and buried her face in her hands.

  “Sanjay, could you give us a minute?” asked Veronica. “I’ll take over the helm if we need.”

  “Sure. I could use a break.” With the touch of a few buttons to secure his systems, Sanjay pulled himself out of his chair. He gave Lynette’s shoulder a nudge as he passed. “Don’t worry about it. I’m just givin’ you shit. And him, but he ain’t here to take it.”

  “I know,” Lynette grumbled into her hands.

  “Look, we came out here on a paying gig. We finish this job up and see if we can catch another gig taking us out to Minos. Make sure he’s doing okay. No worries.”

  She dropped her hands away, faintly smiling up at him almost in spite of herself. “Thanks. Go take a break.”