Terminal Alliance

by Jim C. Hines

  Kumar cleared his throat. “Sir, wouldn’t Alliance Intelligence techs be better equipped for this?”

  “Yes.” Mops waited while Grom crawled out of the ship behind her. “But Command intends to let the rest of the crew die.”

  Monroe’s right hand twitched. “Sir?”

  “I spoke with Admiral Pachelbel. Command believes containment is our top priority, and every infected human is a potential threat to the EMC and our entire species.”

  “Well . . . she’s not exactly wrong,” said Kumar.

  Wolf spat. “If this shit is such a threat, shouldn’t they try to study it? Figure out a cure?”

  “Mentioning Krakau venom spooked her.” Mops thought back to the conversation. “That’s when she changed the plan from sending an escort to having us run a preprogrammed A-ring jump back to Earth.”

  “Risky,” said Monroe. “None of us are trained for that. It would be safer to stick with the escort, and would only take a few more hours. They could send a team to pilot us back home. We know enough now to protect them from exposure.”

  “Unless they’re not worried about exposure,” said Wolf. “This could be a cover-up. A conspiracy to make sure nobody else finds out about Krakau venom. If that’s the case, they’ll probably kill us as soon as we get back.”

  “Is unfounded paranoia a sign of feral reversion?” asked Grom.

  Wolf whirled. “This is founded paranoia, dammit!”

  “There’s a simpler explanation,” said Kumar. “When a dog turns rabid, you shoot it.”

  “What’s a dog?” asked Grom.

  The admiral’s phrasing echoed in Mops’ mind. Put down.

  “They can still examine the crew after they’re dead,” Kumar continued. “It would be safer, since you don’t have to worry about them struggling or escaping. Let’s be honest. To most of the galaxy, humans are little more than animals.”

  “Well, most of the galaxy can kiss my ass,” muttered Wolf.

  “That’s enough.” Mops hammered a fist against the fighter’s hull, cutting off further discussion. “We’re not an intel team, but we’re the only hope this crew has.”

  “Maybe we don’t need Intelligence,” muttered Kumar, picking up one of the Prodryan helmets. Mops jabbed a warning finger at Grom before they could comment. “I need a vacuum snake, at least three meters long.”

  “Wolf, there should be a five-meter snake in the bay supply closet,” said Mops. “What are you thinking, Kumar?”

  “Prodryans are carnivores. They eat about once a day, swallowing their prey whole, then hock up pellets of anything they can’t digest.” He held out the helmet. “This attachment here with the low-pressure valve would be right in front of the mouth. What’s a spacesuit without built-in plumbing, right?”

  Grom scooted away from Kumar. “You want to go spelunking for Prodryan mouth-shit?”

  “If we examine what they were eating, maybe it will help us figure out where they were before they attacked the Pufferfish.” Kumar tossed the helmet aside. “The pellets are cleaner than human or Glacidae excrement, and depending on how it’s processed and stored in the fighter—”

  “I don’t need the details,” Grom interrupted.

  Wolf returned, hauling a coiled tube of segmented metal. She pressed a button on one end, and the tube unrolled to its full five-meter length. She passed the end to Kumar, who climbed into the fighter.

  A few moments later, the tube seemed to come to life, segments squeezing together and pushing apart like a worm. Its diameter expanded to three centimeters, then contracted again. With each surge, it crawled deeper into the Prodryan plumbing system.

  “Want a snake’s-eye view?” offered Doc. “I can hook you up to the camera, show you what the inside of a Prodryan mouth-toilet pipe looks like.”

  “I’m good, thank you.”

  “Chewing through the first valve,” Kumar called out. It didn’t take long before the snake was moving again. The ripples in the protruding end grew stronger, and a chunk of shredded metal and plastic popped out of the back and onto the floor. The remains of a second valve followed less than a minute later. “Here we go.”

  The snake’s movements slowed, becoming almost gentle. A short time later, it began depositing a series of dark green spherical clods on the bay floor.

  Kumar scooted backward out of the fighter, careful to avoid dislodging the snake. He yanked on his gloves and crouched beside the closest dirtlike clump. “Looks like Prodryans use the same vacuum-tech as most species to dry and sterilize their waste.” He crushed the clump in his hand, letting the granules fall between his fingers. “The water gets reclaimed and circulated back to the crew.”

  “You know you’re spreading Prodryan shit all over the deck,” Wolf pointed out.

  “Technically, it’s Prodryan regurgitate.” He grabbed another clump. “See how this one is bigger and lumpier than the others? I didn’t see anywhere on the ship to store live food, so they’re probably eating some form of prepared nutrients while on board. Smooth and bland, without much waste material. But this chunk’s irregular.”

  He dug carefully into the material, revealing what looked like bits of bone and blackened scales, along with a small, curved beak. “They didn’t eat this on the ship. This was from wherever they last docked.”

  “Where was that?” asked Mops.

  Kumar’s triumphant expression faded. “I’m not sure.”

  “Give me a closer look at that beak.”

  Mops pulled on a glove and took the beak, bringing it close to her monocle.

  “Turn it so I can see the underside.”

  While the top of the beak was black, the underside was lined with a series of curved white ridges, like sharp ribs running the length of the beak.

  “Humans call it a balloon lizard. Four of those curved beak pieces come together like flower petals. It can swallow prey up to twice its own size. They’re from Cuixique, but Quetzalus colonists have successfully bred it to survive on several other settlements.”

  “It’s a Quetzalus lizard,” Mops said.

  “I’m surprised eating that didn’t kill them.” Kumar was trying to fit two small bones together, as if he wanted to rebuild the lizard. “Humans can eat pretty much anything, regardless of its biological basis, and the most we’ll get is a stomachache and a nasty trip to the head. But for most species, eating an animal from another world means a quick, painful death.”

  “A good chef can tailor meals to other species,” Wolf said quietly. “Your body might not get any nutrition from it, but they’ll neutralize any toxins and make sure it can pass through your system without . . . complications.”

  The way Wolf was avoiding eye contact . . . “Dammit, Wolf,” said Mops, matching her soft tone. “How long have you—”

  “A couple of times, when we were between jobs.” Wolf shrugged one shoulder. “It was me and a handful of guys from infantry. Nobody lost control or went feral or anything like that.”

  “It’s not unheard of,” said Monroe. “Some of the troops think eating gives them an edge. Brings out the aggression in battle. Depending on what they eat, the most vicious side effect is heartburn and gas.”

  “The regs against eating are decades old,” added Wolf, apparently encouraged by Monroe’s comments. “Can you name one instance of someone going feral just because they had an unauthorized snack?”

  Grom reared back, legs twitching furiously at Wolf. “You threatened to eat me. You were serious?”

  Wolf raised her hands. “I have much higher standards for what goes in my mouth.”

  Grom bristled more.

  “Cool it, both of you,” said Mops.

  “Do you want to chew me out, or do you want to figure out where these Prodryans came from?” Wolf snapped, regaining a bit of her usual defiance.

  “You’re right.” Before Wolf
could gloat, Mops pierced her with a glare. “The chewing out can come later.” She turned her attention back to the clumps on the floor. “We’re looking for someplace that gets enough interspecies traffic to have specialized chefs on the payroll. That eliminates most colony worlds. It has to be somewhere the Prodryans could go without people asking too many questions. Doc, give me a list of all known locations that meet those criteria.”

  Doc brought up a list of about a dozen space stations and settlements.

  Wolf picked up another clod. She crushed it in one gloved hand, and used her fingers to tug out a length of tattered black string. A clump of something shiny and best left unidentified stuck to one end. “Coacalos Station.”

  “Are you sure?” asked Mops, checking the list. Coacalos Station was the third name Doc had provided.

  “They use strings like this to muzzle anything served live. The strings are color-coded to show which species can eat it without dying. Black for Prodryans. Red for Nusurans. Blue for Glacidae, and so on.”

  “Do we report this to Command?” asked Monroe.

  Nobody spoke. It wasn’t a question of whether the Alliance had people who could do a better job digging up the Prodryans’ secrets. They absolutely could. The fried mem crystal in the fighter proved that point.

  “Not yet,” Mops said quietly.

  Grom fidgeted. “We were ordered to return to Earth.”

  “I know.” Nobody said the word “treason,” but Mops suspected they were all thinking it. Most of them, at least. Kumar was busy sweeping up the dusty remnants of Prodryan waste pellets and only appeared to be half-listening to the conversation.

  She considered offering them the chance to back out, something like, “Anyone who doesn’t want to be court-martialed or worse, speak up now.” But sometimes noble sentiments had to give way to practicality, and she was shorthanded already. “We’re going to Coacalos Station.”

  Kumar glanced up. “How? We still don’t know how to fly the Pufferfish.”

  Mops checked the timer on her monocle. “You’ve got several hours left to master those navigation tutorials. Finish up here, and let’s get to work.”

  This is my firearm.1 There are many like it (because they’re mass-produced to precise standards at the Lunar Armaments Manufacturing Facility), but this one is mine.2

  My firearm is an extension of my body. (My firearm is not, however, a metaphorical extension of my genitalia.) Without me, it is useless. Without it, I am incomplete.

  I will shoot swiftly. I will shoot true. I will shoot the enemy before they shoot me. If that fails, I will shoot the enemy after they shoot me. But before is preferable.

  I will respect my firearm and treat it with the same care I would my own flesh. I will learn its strengths and limitations. I will learn to operate it to its fullest capacity. I will follow cleaning and maintenance protocols to the letter.

  I will not use my firearm to clear fuel line jams.3

  What counts in life is not the stripe on my holster, but my accuracy in battle. I will honor my firearm, my training, my crew, my species, and my Corps.

  —EMC Firearms Oath, based on Earth Rifleman’s Creed, by General William H. Rupertus

  —

  Firearms are property of the Earth Mercenary Corps.

  See note #1.

  See incident report #6142L, “Destruction of EMCS Army Ant: Lessons Learned.”

  “HOW MANY IS THAT?” Mops asked as she secured Private Carrie Fisher into an acceleration pod. Fisher was another smoothie, less than two weeks out of basic training after being reborn at the Siberian Medical Facility. She was a good kid, with enough energy and enthusiasm for three people, and deserved better.

  “One hundred twenty-two,” said Doc.

  Leaving roughly seventy unconscious humans to find and drag into the acceleration chambers, Mops grabbed her now-empty maglev stretcher and checked her monocle to see who was next.

  The sedative had worked just as Command had promised. Another hour or so, and they’d have the whole crew strapped in. She checked her oxygen and suit integrity as she returned to the target range to collect two more napping infantry troops. “Kumar, any progress?”

  “I’ve gotten through 4.5 percent of the A-ring tutorial without killing everyone.”

  Mops swallowed her first three responses. “Technically, that qualifies as progress. Keep at it.”

  “At this rate, it will be a minimum of two-point-eight days before Kumar successfully completes his first simulated jump.”

  “I know.” She checked the status of the rest of her team. Wolf and Monroe were on decks C and F, respectively, gathering more ferals. Grom was on the bridge with Kumar, trying to dig through the ship’s logs to find any other information on Krakau venom. “What if we hired someone for navigation? We could put out a call to the colonies, or maybe ask one of the Nusurans from that freighter, assuming they’re still hanging around the system.”

  “Aside from violating eight security regulations, the differences between a Nusuran freighter and an EMCS cruiser are too great. It would be like expecting a Glacidae to be able to pilot a shuttle based on their ability to ride a snow-serpent.”

  “We’ve got an incoming signal from Command for you, sir.”

  “Thanks, Grom.” Mops checked her timer. “They’re twenty minutes early. Send an acknowledgment and relay the message to me.”

  “I’ll try. Wolf left some notes on the communications console, but her handwriting is atrocious. Stand by.”

  Two minutes later, her monocle changed to a visual of Admiral Pachelbel. Mops cleared her throat. “Grom...?”

  After another minute, the message restarted, this time with sound. Pachelbel offered a brief greeting and reminded Mops once again about the danger of their situation, and the importance of following orders. The rest was a data dump Doc identified as the emergency override instructions for navigation.

  “You’ll have to load and authorize it. Once you do, the ship should take us straight back to Earth.”

  “How long will the jump take?”

  “Eleven light-years? It looks like they’ve got us flying pretty close to top speed, so I’d say just under a half hour.”

  Thirty minutes until Pachelbel and the rest of Command would expect to see the Pufferfish’s decel signature flare in Earth’s system. They could probably stall another hour or so, saying they were getting the rest of the crew into their acceleration pods. That meant ninety minutes to figure out how to fly this thing.

  She paused. “Doc, how well can you read that nav program?”

  “I don’t know the navigation controls enough to understand what it all means, but I can read the code. It’s significantly clearer and more straightforward than trying to read Human.”

  Mops allowed herself a small smile. “Grom, I have a new assignment for you and Doc.”

  The bridge acceleration chamber was designed for Krakau. The acceleration pods were cramped, designed to fill with viscous, honey-colored fluid. A set of syringes injected a mild blood thickener, providing additional protection to Krakau brain tissue.

  Mops had taken one look and ordered her team down to the pods at Battle Hub One. The bridge pods could probably be reconfigured for humans, but she had neither the time nor the technical knowledge to do it.

  Wolf and Monroe were already secured in their pods, while Kumar and Grom hunched over the backup navigation console.

  “You’re sure this will get us to Coacalos?” It was the fourth time Wolf had asked the question.

  “Nothing is certain until it’s done,” answered Grom, also for the fourth time. With Doc’s help, they’d copied and reprogrammed a new emergency navigation override program, this one targeting the edge of Alliance space.

  “Yeah, well, you crash us into a star, and I’m gonna eat your face,” grumbled Wolf.

  “Not
ed.” Grom flicked their hind legs in Wolf’s direction, a sign of annoyance. “I don’t believe you understand the complexity of this operation. Navigating these distances is like standing on the surface of your Earth and using a pistol to hit a target the size of your eyeball on the moon. We’ve run more than twenty simulations, only one of which resulted in catastrophic failure.”

  “What kind of failure?” demanded Wolf.

  “We emerged a thousand kilometers deep in the star. I’ve adjusted the parameters, and the rest have been within acceptable ranges. Though the damage to the Pufferfish adds an element of chance that’s impossible to fully predict.”

  Mops settled into her own pod and began rereading the information Doc had pulled up on Coacalos Station. The station resembled a giant volcano spinning through space, orbitally leashed to a hypergiant star roughly a hundred and fifty times the mass of Earth’s sun.

  That much mass would affect their A-ring jump, so Grom had plotted a conservative course that would likely put them several days’ journey from the station. Not ideal, but better than getting sucked into the star or looped into tight orbit and shredded by slingshot forces.

  Thick black leaves covered the station’s exterior. They acted as solar collectors, with roots stretching more than a kilometer through the rock walls to the station interior. The Quetzalus who owned and ran the station tapped the plants as their primary source of power.

  The station was independent of both the Quetzalus home world of Cuixique and the Krakau Alliance. The Coacalos family was part of a minority who’d broken with their clan and objected to joining the Alliance. They’d originally intended to form an independent colony, but after years of ugly legal battles, the Quetzalus High Court and the Alliance Judicial Council had proclaimed that any such colony or space station would fall under Alliance jurisdiction.

  Which was why Coacalos Station was, legally speaking, a spaceship: an enormous, self-sustaining spaceship parked in a wide stellar orbit. A spaceship large enough to welcome other ships and their crews, provide living space for trade and recreation, and to do pretty much anything an official space station might do. But it could travel from one system to another under its own power, and that—technically—made it a spaceship. That legal technicality gave the Coacalos family absolute command over their “ship” and everything that went on there.