by Mark Wandrey
“Good question,” Murdock said. Vince came out of the kitchen with a six pack of beers and the mercs helped themselves. Besides Dod, Ripper, and Dolan, there was also Tully Roberts, Kelso, Greenstein, Dandridge, and Mika Gruszka. Those eight had been the ones closest to Murdock in his weeks as mayor, and the ones he knew he could count on. The other fourteen were fine, they just didn’t care for one reason or another about what went on. “I was hoping you guys could give me a hand figuring it out.”
“Maybe there’s been a bunch of hot contracts nearby,” Tully suggested.
“Unlikely,” Murdock said with a shake of his head and a sip of beer. “This area isn’t common for large contracts. Damn near quiet. I’ve been active recently, remember? You all know Gliese 1214 is in a resource-poor area of this region.” Heads nodded.
“What about other aliens?” Mika asked. She was the only female on the island. Short and tough looking, if it weren’t for Sheela, Murdock might well have had a go at her. She’d hinted it was a possibility. She’d been a sniper in a covert-ops merc company until a head injury had laid her low. The seizures were rare, but enough to make her retire.
“BBW is only selling Earth-manufactured, human-fit equipment. They could probably customize something. However, the Ctech stuff is both expensive and specifically unsuited to non-human use.” Murdock hauled out his own HP-4 and pointed to the grip. It contained special sensors to ensure only a Human hand could fire it. Of course, the custom one made by BBW was non-standard, as usually the pinkie contact was one of those safeties.
“Quite the mystery,” Greenstein said as he finished off a bowl of stew. The man could eat, there was no doubt about it. Why do pilots always turn into porkers when they quit flying, he wondered?
“I got an idea,” Dandridge suggested, and they all listened.
One after another, either Murdock or someone else suggested an idea. One after another they were all ruled out as improbable or just crazy. As usual when all the mercs were over, Vince sat and listened intently to every word they said. As midnight approached, though, he was yawning and struggling to keep his eyes open. Which was probably why he spoke up.
“Maybe it’s the plot,” he said. All eyes turned on him, and Vince gawked, looking around as if someone else had said it.
“What plot?” Dod demanded.
“Uhm…” Vince stammered, turning red at all the attention.
“It’s my crazy idea,” Murdock said.
“You gonna keep us on pins and needles?” Ripper asked.
“You can’t be on pins and needles,” Mika said, “you ain’t got no fucking legs!”
Ripper looked down at where his legs should be and gasped, reaching with his hands and searching as if they’d just fallen off. Everyone laughed, even Vince. “But seriously,” Ripper said, “you gonna spill it?”
“Tell him,” Vince said, obviously desperate to get the limelight off himself.
“I did a lot of research on the AetherNet after I saw the place. Spent a whole day putting skull sweat into it.”
“Musta hurt something awful,” Mika said and winked at Vince, who guffawed.
“Hardy, har, har,” Murdock mock laughed, then flipped her the bird. “But seriously, I did a lot of reading. You all know the Cavaliers and Asbaran got in deep shit?”
“Asbaran took a swing at the mantises again,” Mika said.
Murdock nodded, not surprised she’d been keeping up. Covert-ops types had to know what was going on. “Yeah, but not until after the bugs kidnapped his sister. Nigel Shirazi came unglued and went full-on Rambo.” Everyone except Dod looked confused. Murdock winked at him, and Dod cackled. “He went crazy in revenge,” Murdock clarified. “While he won, in the end, Asbaran got gutted. You all know about Cartwright’s?” More nods. “I was there when Thaddeus’ son put it back together. I think the whole going-broke thing stinks.
“Well, I found out a huge Izlian fleet took a swing at the Winged Hussars, too. Went after Cromwell and her ship, Pegasus.”
“No shit?” Greenstein asked. “Why do I suspect the gas bags didn’t come out well?”
“You’d be right.”
“Don’t fuck with the Hussars.” Greenstein said, “They’ll win; it’s what they do.”
“She sure did.” Murdock agreed, “They took out a bunch of ships and killed Admiral Omega.” There were whistles around the room. Most of them had learned about Omega in cadre training. Know your enemies, and all that. “Well, afterward, the Hussars disappeared. Nobody has heard a peep from them for weeks.”
“What’s that got to do with this here?” Dod asked.
“It’s not just the Horsemen,” Murdock continued. “Dozens of Human merc companies have left on contracts and never came back. I don’t know the exact number, because we don’t have a merc liaison office here, but I know from the news stories. Usually the press only shits on us, so if it made the news, there must be a lot of it. Ultimately, it looks like someone is out for Human mercs.”
“Who could do that?” Dolan asked.
“Nobody,” Tully agreed.
“No one I can think of,” Murdock agreed. He glanced at Vince, who was yawning again. “Well, time for you to hit the sack.”
“Aw, I’m not tired.”
“Of course not,” Murdock said and got up, “but you’re going to bed anyway.”
Vince looked less than happy as he got up to be led to his room.
“Good night, young merc,” Mika said. Vince beamed at her, and she got a little scowl from Murdock.
“Kid’s going to make quite a merc,” Ripper said after the two were gone. The others nodded.
“He’s a tad scrawny,” Dod noted.
“Murdock’s feeding him up,” Dandridge pointed out.
“You guys need to take it down a notch,” Kelso reminded them, “Murdock wants to let the kid make up his own mind when he’s older.” The others mumbled, and a couple looked chagrined.
“Looks like the kid already made up his mind,” Tully said.
“I knew I wanted to be a merc by the time I was five,” Dolan said. Most of them had similar experiences. “Of course, we all grew up on Earth. Not many mercs grow up on the colonies yet. Not enough years.”
“You assholes,” Murdock said when he came back. “Damn near wound him up again. He’s just a kid; he needs lots of sleep, not endless stories about mercs.”
“Sorry,” Mika offered.
“Yeah,” Murdock said and sat down. He finished her beer then put the bottle on the table, staring at it for a minute. “Something is going on, we all agree?” The others nodded their heads.
“But what can we do about it?” Greenstein asked.
“There are a few things we can do,” Murdock said, then explained his idea.
* * * * *
Chapter Nine
An hour before dawn, four ships fell into the atmosphere of Valais. The vessels trailed streaks of plasma as the atmosphere was heated to many thousands of degrees by the hot drop. Further away, out in space between Valais and the emergence point, the system’s pair of defensive gunboats were now slowly-expanding debris fields. None of the planet’s officials were aware of the incident; the crews hadn’t had enough time to send a warning.
The four dropships split up as soon as they’d slowed enough and entered the lower atmosphere. A crab boat working an early morning string of pots caught sight of a single bright streak of light splitting into four, two one way, another two in a different direction. The crew watched curiously as two of the sparks went westward and were eventually lost to sight behind low storms near Pinnacle Island. The others went south and dropped until they were out of sight.
The operations center at the Atlantis Starport was usually dead unless traffic was expected. A commercial freighter had landed only three days earlier, and none were expected now. Two of the government’s four gunboats were up on patrol, as was standard. While piracy in Gliese 1214 was rare, it had occurred a couple times in the past. While the gunboats wer
en’t warships, they were at least a deterrent. When they failed to check in at the 05:00 watch, a supervisor was summoned from home.
“What’s going on?” the supervisor asked when she walked in. She looked half asleep, and the cup of tea didn’t appear to be helping.
“Buttercup and Tea Kettle aren’t responding,” the technician said. He didn’t look much better; his shift was due to end in just three hours, and the off times were boring beyond belief.
“So what, they’re probably screwing around.”
“Buttercup said they thought a ship came through the emergence point,” the tech said, “and half an hour later, they stopped responding.”
“Have you checked the emergence array?” she asked. A series of sensor satellites, the array used the gravitational eddy zone of the Lagrange point to hold position and monitor for ships.
“The data is coming in garbled,” he said. “It’s like a solar flare.”
“Gliese 1214 is in a quiet cycle,” she reminded him.
“I know, why do you think I called you?”
The supervisor took a sip of her tea and dropped into a chair. She logged into the computer and queried the sensor array. Just like he’d said, the data was coming in clipped and incomplete. Not a single packet was getting through. Wait, she thought, not a single packet?
“Call the crews for Hopscotch and Doppelganger,” she said.
“But they’re not due to fly for three days.”
“Do it,” she ordered, “on my authority.” He shook his head and picked up the phone while she accessed the planet’s orbital defenses. Solar-powered lasers, they stayed in powered-down mode until called upon, so they were hard to spot. Valais only had twenty-three, which allowed for five to cover any single approach vector at a time. All defense satellites in orbit above Atlantis were offline.
“Oh, fuck,” she said, and grabbed the air-raid manual to start the checklist. She was on item five, “call the port director for authorization,” when a trio of air-to-surface missiles hit the control structure and killed everyone inside.
Dawn was coloring the horizon, and the fishing fleet was just coming to life. Fishermen and the businesses that tended them were going to work. All heads turned to the east as sonic booms rolled across the stormy skies. A light rain was falling, so they couldn’t see anything. Since it was in the direction of the starport, nobody gave it a second’s thought.
The explosions thundered across the mostly sleeping town of Atlantis and the docks. This time all work stopped. Sonic booms didn’t sound like that. A new dawn was flashing in the west; the sun was behind them to the east. Had a starship crashed while trying to land? While an uncommon occurrence in the galaxy, it did happen.
The few who’d been around combat narrowed their eyes suspiciously. High-order detonations had a certain ring to them. A few left the docks and headed for the town’s emergency bunkers. Before they went, they warned others. A few listened; many didn’t.
Two YY19 Razor-class dropships circled around from the now-destroyed starport operations center and over the port. They quickly identified all four of the port’s weapons emplacements and destroyed them with a single missile each.
One then set down on the tarmac and began disgorging troops, while the other flew low over the city toward the port.
Any doubt it wasn’t sonic booms or crashing ships was removed by the four missiles that destroyed the defenses. The fishing fleet was in disarray as some crews ran for shore to see to their families, while others frantically tried to put out to sea. The largest ship in the fleet, a 112-meter trawler named Northern Lights, was just getting up to its top speed of eleven knots when the Razor-class dropship swooped over the harbor. Fishermen gawked up as the bulky ship roared overhead, its lift engines roaring to maintain altitude.
It spotted the biggest ship underway, altered course slightly, and opened fire with its two nose-mounted 30mm chain guns. The massive slugs worked the mostly aluminum and fiberglass structure of Northern Lights from bow to stern. Glass shattered, fiberglass splintered, and flesh and bone exploded under the onslaught. One of the rounds punctured the vessel’s 2,000-liter carbon nanobond hydrogen fuel tank, which ruptured. The gas was set off by a broken electrical conduit, and Northern Lights turned into a display to put its namesake to shame.
The dropship made two circular passes over the harbor. As it turned south toward the city center, three-quarters of the fishing fleet was in flames, sinking, or already on the bottom. Most of the rest were damaged. Four hundred were dead, and twice as many injured. Three ships had made it out of the harbor before the attack.
The dropships began circling the city, randomly firing on anything that looked potentially dangerous. One fired a burst into the incomplete nine-story government building. It wasn’t destroyed or brought down, but the damage ensured it wouldn’t be used anytime soon.
The two Razor-class dropships split up as they approached the island chain. One broke off to go further south, while the other maintained a direct course. Its ground-mapping radar picked up the target a few seconds later, right where their coordinates had said it would be. A little atoll with mostly cliffs and a circular, protected bay, which sported sandy beaches. The pilot approved. As the Razor dropped below Mach, he announced ETA as fifteen seconds.
“Locate the prime target,” the commander chittered and bubbled.
“There are twenty-two structures around the bay,” the pilot complained.
“I don’t want to hear your grinding whines,” the commander said and snapped at the pilot, who cringed, “I want you to acquire the target!!”
The pilot knew the target structure had a dock attached. Three of the structures had docks. He ground his mouth parts together and picked one of the rapidly-approaching structures. “I have it,” he said.
“It’s about time,” the commander replied. “Destroy it with missiles.”
“As you order,” the pilot said. He armed the forward missile pods, gave the system targeting information, and clicked on a firing control. A flash of light and a missile raced ahead. The building exploded in a blinding flash, and debris flew high into the air. “Direct hit,” the pilot said.
“Slow to hover over the bay, and engage the rest of the structures with cannon fire.”
“But commander, I’m not positive—”
“You’re not positive what?” the commander asked, menace fillings his words.
“I’m not certain…that is the best course of action.”
“When you have grown to king stature, if you live that long, then you can decide what is best. Until then, you will do what I tell you to do, or I’ll dine on your soft parts! Do you understand?”
“Perfectly,” the pilot said. He relayed the command to the gunners in their weapons turrets on either side of the Razor as he deployed speed brakes and slowed the craft. No longer making enough lift with its flattened hull, the lifting fans roared to life. Across the dark bay, the six powerful hydrogen-burning rocket motors were dazzlingly bright. As were the two 30mm chain guns, which began to rake the beachside buildings with tungsten shells.
The buildings were made of local stone and other light building materials. Under the onslaught of high-velocity penetrators, many of them simply disintegrated. Some of the rounds continued through the structures to take massive chunks from the cliffs behind them. After ten seconds of sustained fire, the gunners stopped firing. Their turrets needed to cycle to fresh magazines.
The pilot noted one of the buildings wrecked by gunfire was collapsing in a most interesting manner. Part of one side was falling away, as if something was lifting it from below. That’s most unusual, the pilot thought, his antenna waving and mouth parts grinding together in his race’s equivalence of a “Hmm.” A second later, a laser lanced out of the structure and punched a half-centimeter hole through the left wing of the dropship.
“Entropy!” the pilot cried out as one of the lift motors was shut down by the computer; its combustion chamber was compromised. T
he dropship slewed to the side violently, and he only just managed to reduce power to the opposite side before the ship did a flip.
“Pilot!” the commander yelled. “What are you doing?”
“We’ve been hit,” the pilot said and began to reverse the pitch. “Laser, at least a megawatt.” Another beam punched through the dropship; this one penetrated just below the cockpit and exited near the center ventral docking port. Judging by the cries of pain from the rear, some of the troopers had just gotten sliced up. A wave of red warning lights came alive on the Razor’s enunciator panel.
“Return fire!”
“I can’t,” the pilot snapped, not worried the commander might pinch his arms off, “it’s taking everything I can to keep us in the air.”
“Gunners, fire!” the commander yelled.
“Ammo hasn’t cycled,” one of the gunners said, “five more seconds.” The commander yelled in impotent rage as the laser punched hole after hole in his dropship. “Get us clear while we rearm,” he said finally.
“Ascent engines!” the pilot called and tilted the ship back to fire its main engines. Unfortunately for them, this only gave the laser gunner a clean belly target. With precise shots, the two remaining motors on the same side were shot out. The pilot screeched in surprise as the dropship yawed and began to fall. He did the only thing he could think of, he slammed the ascent motor throttles to full power.
Wildly out of balance and with numerous systems shot out, the Razor did a half summersault and rocketed perpendicular to the water. The pilot tried to correct, but only succeeded in slamming them into the choppy bay. The Razor bounced once, twice, then it vaulted over the line of smoking, ruined houses, and smashed into the cliff face at 200 kph.
* * * * *
Chapter Ten
When the dropship nosed up and tried to run, Murdock grinned from ear to ear and found his target. An unlit stub of a cigar was in the corner of his mouth, just the way he liked it when dishing out hurt. “Oh, yeah,” he whispered as he stroked the trigger on the crew-served laser, shifted his target, and fired again. With both lift rockets out on one side, the ship was well and truly fucked.