Theocracy: Book 1.

by Doug Dandridge

  Patrick shook his head as he followed the two up the hall and to the stairs leading to the lower section of the Monastery, and from there to the vault.

  * * *

  “We have lost contact with the men in the upper Monastery, sir,” said the com tech, giving the Colonel a worried look.

  Chung chewed his lip as he glared at the man, relishing the nervousness that helped to alleviate some of his own. In his military he had life and death control over all of the men under him, meaning he didn’t need a reason to execute a subordinate. So the man had to be nervous reporting bad news to him, with all the shoot the messenger attitude that infected the military. Chung didn’t have that immediate worry. Only the head of the Theocracy Intelligence Agency and the Theocrats had that kind of power over him. And none of them were within scores of light hours of him.

  “Do you have contact with Captain Harkness?” he asked, thinking of the agent he had stationed near the vault, just for the possibility of such an occurrence.

  “Yes sir,” said another tech, looking up from his board, a look of relief on his face as he glanced at his partner. “The Captain said he heard fighting above, but he is ready to deal with whatever comes down to him.”

  “I want that Monk alive,” said Chung, glancing over to the chair where Sean O’Hara sat staring into space. “Tell the Captain he can do what he needs to do with the Republican agents. But the native is to be alive when we get there.”

  “Yes, sir,” said the com tech, nodding and turning back to his board, relief written in his body language.

  Chung swiveled his chair back toward the front, watching the ocean rolling beneath the vessel. “How long till we get there?” he asked the Commander at the same time as he accessed the computer for the information. The readout said four minutes and twenty-three seconds.

  “Four minutes and twenty-two seconds,” said the Commander.

  “I know that, you idiot,” growled Chung, and the officer looked away. Chung smiled for a moment. It always felt good to be the big dog, and this mission made him the biggest dog in this system, even if that moron of an Admiral wouldn’t acknowledge that.

  * * *

  Captain Harold Harkness, officer in the Theocracy Marines, waiting in anticipation for the Republican agents to come to him. He felt confident in his ability to handle them. Hell, two tons of armor would make anyone feel confident, even it the Pubies were coming down with full body armor themselves.

  He made sure all the weapons were ready, for the dozenth time, like the professional he was. And he smiled in anticipation of the death he was about to distribute, like the psychopath he was. He thought for a second about his targets. The Colonel wanted the native alive. Well, maybe that would happen, and maybe it wouldn’t. When the Captain got into the middle of a killing he was not too particular about who fell to his arms.

  * * *

  Alyssa had to admit to herself that the surroundings would have been comfortable and spacious, if there hadn’t been someone here waiting to kill her. She didn’t believe for a moment that the ones they had killed upstairs were the only Theocrats in the building. Or even the deadliest. They had only been standard Theocracy Marine Corps grunts. If it had been her, she would have left something much more capable to guard this vital point. And she thought Chung would do at least as she would, if not more.

  The stairs led down through more than a standard story, and she thought of how thick the floor must have been. It would still open up like an aluminum can under assault with modern weapons, but in this gunpowder age it would be nigh impregnable to hits from balls or mortars.

  The temperature dropped as they continued down, and the air became filled with moisture. Alyssa sent Shadow ahead to scope out the way, and the beast moved from dark space to dark space on silent feet, living up to his name.

  The cat heard it just before they did, but not by much. It was hard to cover up the metallic sound of something massive moving toward them. Alyssa readied herself after shooting a cautious glance toward Derrick, then motioned for the Monk to not move. She looked through Shadow’s eyes, the cat having backed into a hole in the wall where most of his body was hidden, only his head sticking out. She hoped it was a robot of some sort, since all of that ilk were somewhat stupid, lacking in human initiative. When she saw that form her hope sank to the bottom of the ocean outside this structure. She could tell by the configuration of the combat mech that it was manned, looming a full three meters in the hallway, head almost scraping the high ceiling.

  “Come out little mice, where I can see you,” boomed the voice of the marine over the loudspeaker system. “Don’t make me tear this place apart.”

  “What do you want to do?” asked Derrick, looking over at Alyssa while he nervously shifted his rifle.

  “We have more trouble than we can handle coming up our ass in an unknown but probably short period of time,” said Alyssa, looking back the way they had come. “In front of us is both our objective and the lesser of two evils. So we go forward.”

  “Go forward,” said Derrick, checking the load on his rifle. “I was afraid you were going to say that.”

  “Come on, little mice,” said the voice ahead in the language of the Theocracy, which both Derrick and Alyssa spoke.

  Alyssa saw that Patrick was confused by the speech, and reminded herself to have a download for that language place in his implants. If we get back, she thought, preparing herself to move forward. She looked once more through Shadow’s eyes and saw what they were facing, then wished she hadn’t taken the look. It was intimidating, to say the least. It looked like death, to say the most.

  That was always the most difficult part of any combat operation, moving yourself into a situation that might result in death or serious bodily harm. Alyssa had done this many times, and it still scared the crap out of her each and every time. But she had learned how to do it despite her brain screaming that she was a crazy bitch for even contemplating such an action. So she checked her weapon and sent the signal through her com link to Derrick.

  Both agents moved as one. Alyssa slid across to the right wall while Derrick took the left. Both weapons were firing as soon as came into sight of the hall, Derrick’s rifle tracking from left to center, hers from right to the same midpoint of the hallway. And all of their rounds bounced completely off the combat mecha that dominated the end of that hallway.

  It fired back, both arms containing heavy caliber weapons that sent rounds out at high velocity. Alyssa ducked under the first rounds sent her way, while Derrick caught one in his right leg that blasted through the suit and out the other side. He fell to the floor, screaming and sending grenades at the mecha that exploded off its armor with no effect. Alyssa grabbed his good leg from around the corner and jerked him back, just before a stream of rounds tore through the space he had occupied.

  “You OK?” she said the Derrick, looking at the ruin of his thigh. The bleeding had stopped as the suit had closed up the wound, and she knew the nanites would be working to control the internal bleeding. There was a good chance they would succeed before the man bled out, but she still wanted to get him in a tank as soon as she could.

  “Hurts like hell,” said the former marine with a grimace, then his face went into that expression one gets when painkillers kick in. “I guess I’m pretty useless right now.”

  “Just check our six while I deal with this thing,” she said, listening as the mecha strode toward them.

  “Let me,” said the Monk, his sword out of its sheath, shield on his arm.

  Alyssa started to say no, but the look on the Monk’s face stopped her. There was no fear there. None whatsoever, just a look of calm, like he had no concern for his own life. If he dies, we’re sunk, she thought, but another thread was going through her mind. There is no fucking way I can take that mecha. Not without some heavier weapons. And that damned magic sword just might do the job.

  “Ok,” she said, nodding at him. “Be very careful. He can take you out in an instant if he g
ets a good shot at you.”

  The Monk nodded his head, then his eyes went into that intense state that she associated with battle readiness. She nodded her head as she watched him move. Then he was around the corner and all hell cut loose.

  * * *

  Patrick entered Fae state just before asking Alyssa if he could handle the trouble. He felt some unease at going up against something that had given them so much trouble. The knowledge of how he had handled the hostile strangers just moments ago gave him some confidence that he could handle this as well. In Fae state he thought out his options from what he knew, without second guessing or worrying about what might happen.

  He knew that his shield was as important to the task at hand as the sword. He crouched down and kept as much of his body behind the shield as possible, his head from the eyes up the only visible portions of his upper body. He still felt a little unbalanced, and part of his mind put in a mental note to work on reestablishing his connection with his physical form. At this moment he didn’t have time for any of that, and knew he must do the best he could.

  All calm flew from his mind as he rounded the corner and saw the huge shape bearing down on him. At first he thought it was some kind of demon out of mythology. His mind referenced the Maurids he had seen earlier. He had thought they were demons as well, and had found out differently. His mind then went to the prospect that this was some kind of machine. Until he saw the human face behind the translucent mask of the giant, and realized that this was a man in a monster suit. But more than that.

  And then the thing started firing away with weapons on both arms. Patrick dropped his head below the shield just before rounds cracked by overhead. He realized that this thing was a dead shot, and anything he exposed would get blown off. He hunched over into a more extreme crouch, the bottom of the shield touching the floor. Just as the rim of the shield touched rounds sparked off the floor and hit the lower area.

  “We’ll see what you do when I pull that shield out of your hands,” boomed an amplified voice. “Then I’ll give it to the Colonel as a gift, to match his sword.”

  Colonel and sword both brought horrible images to the fore. Colonel had to mean the big man that had stood over him while he was dying. And if that man had an ancient sword, he was doubly dangerous.

  Bullets continued to beat a rhythm on the shield, which again absorbed most of the force. Patrick knew he needed to do something other than cowering under cover, or the mechanical giant would indeed pull his shield away from him, then blast him with its weapons. Something bright reflected off a near wall, and white hot stone ran like water. It hit the shield and the monk waited for the hellish thing to burn through. But the shield didn’t even heat up on his side.

  “Damn that blasted artifact,” said the man in the mecha. “We’ll just see how you do without.”

  A giant hand grabbed the upper edge of the shield, and Patrick knew the next move would be to jerk it out of his grasp, something he was sure he wouldn’t be able to resist. But he had been ready for the move that to his Fae enhanced brain looked like the clumsy grasp of a stumbling child.

  Patrick ran his sword blade around the edge of the shield. It slid easily, and he had learned early on that sword would not cut the shield that was made of the same material as it. The edge swept through the mechanical fingers like so much air. The fingers fell from the shield to hit the floor with a ringing sound, while the remainder of the hand pulled back with no purchase.

  “Son of a bitch,” howled the metal giant. The hand came back in and slammed against the shield. The actual blow was muted by the material of the device, but Patrick was still shoved backward by the massive strength of the mecha. He hoped the giant would try to grab his shield again, and he could render the other hand useless. But the man controlling it wouldn’t make that move, and Patrick thought of his next.

  The beam weapon came back on, hitting the floor and eating a hole that grew toward the Monk. He moved the shield slightly to make sure its very bottom was in the way. The beam moved up onto the shield, then overhead to strike the far wall, then into the ceiling. Patrick looked up and move aside just in time to avoid a splash of molten rock that fell onto his position. He could feel the heat as it passed, and knew that if it hit him he would be in serious trouble.

  Got to close this out, thought the Monk, watching the internal clock that was now in his head tick down. They had about two minutes to get to whatever it was they had come for. Maybe less. And the damned thing was still flinging around whatever that invisible beam was that ate through stone.

  Patrick flung the shield out, striking one of the arms of the mecha. This left the right side of his body open, but gave him as target the left side of the mechanical monster. In a flash his sword went out, to slice into the wrist of the creature. He cursed under his breath as he saw where the strike went. He had intended to hit further up the arm, where he hoped it would cut into the flesh of the rider. But his body still was not reacting as it should. At the moment he wanted his old body back. Slighter, not as powerful, but fully knitted to his mind.

  The man he was fighting swung his other arm at Patrick. Patrick got his sword back up just in time, and the arm swept through the blade, this time at the location he had intended. The end of the mechanical arm fell to the floor, but this time blood spurted from the stump and the section that hit the floor also produced a pool of blood. The man screamed out, his voice booming over the corridor.

  Patrick spun in place and thrust the sword behind him, into the high chest area of the mecha. The scream turned to a gasp, then a gurgle, then silence. Patrick turned to look back and saw the machine standing there in stillness. The face behind the translucent mask was open eyed, open mouthed, and stilled in death.

  “Come on,” he yelled to the others, pulling his sword free and giving it a moment to rid itself of the blood that was on its first foot of length. The blood slid off, leaving the blade perfectly clean as always, and Patrick slid the weapon back into its special sheath.

  “Damn if you didn’t take care of that big fuck,” said Alyssa as she came around the corner. Shadow came out of the hole he had sheltered in and ran his body first between Patrick’s legs, then Alyssa’s. “We need to get going,” she continued, moving around the immobile mecha.

  “Where’s Derrick?”

  “He’s watching the rear,” said Alyssa with a frown. “He insisted. We’ll round him up as soon as we know what we have down here.”

  Patrick didn’t like leaving the man alone, despite not having a great liking for him. He had not always been friendly with his battle partners, but they were still partners, and normally he would stay with them no matter what.

  “Let’s go,” said Alyssa in a loud voice.

  “Get moving, Monk,” came the voice of Derrick from around the corner. “The sooner you get it the sooner we can get out of here.”

  Patrick nodded his head and followed the woman down the hall, toward the vault he knew so well. She started running and he followed, increasing his pace. They turned another corner and there was the opening to the vault.

  “How did you open this thing in the first place?” she asked, running a hand over the two meter thick door that was retracted into the wall.

  “I put my hand in the place that glowed,” he said, touching the door material as well. It was like no substance in the world, that door. The closest thing to it was the metal of the artifacts that were stored within, though not quite of their quality. Patrick had seen a monk patriarch cut into the metal of the door with one of the artifact knives. The knife had gone through solid stone like it was clay. The material of the door had resisted like hard wood. It could be cut, but not easily.

  Alyssa walked into the vault and to the far wall. She studied the wall for a moment, then motioned to a flat spot. “Move your hand over this spot.”

  Patrick nodded and did as she said.

  Nothing happened, and the woman cursed under her breath. “This has to be the place,” she said, stari
ng at the flat area.

  “Oh,” said Patrick, holding his hand in place. “It didn’t start glowing instantly at the entrance to this vault either. I had to hold it a moment.” And then the spot glowed, a soft white that illuminated the entire room. “And I put my hand on it,” he finished, placing his palm against the glowing area.

  The glow increased in brilliance and with a grinding noise the adjacent section of wall moved in about a meter, then slid to the side. Dust and grit that had accumulated into a solid mass through time scraped off and hit the floor, leaving a thick line on the stone surface.

  Ahead the tunnel, about three meters in width, slanted down. There were glowing lights on the ceiling showing the way for about fifty meters. The tunnel beyond that was cloaked in darkness.

  Alyssa stepped into the tunnel and started checking the walls. “Come here, Monk,” she said, looking back at Patrick.

  Patrick walked to her side and she pointed to the wall. “Put your hand near the wall, but don’t touch it.”

  Patrick complied and the wall glowed in the manner of the other panels.

  “It’s as I thought,” said the woman with a smile. She looked back across the vault, her face turning to an expression of worry. “We need to get Derrick here and then seal up this tunnel. Let’s go.”

  Patrick followed her out of the vault at a run, still not completely sure what was going on. But it was turning into an adventure, and life definitely wasn’t boring.

  Chapter Eleven

  Colonel Nathan Chung gripped the arms of his acceleration chair hard enough to break wood or normal household plastic, which made it a good thing that the members were not made of either of those substances.

  “We’ve lost contact with the Captain,” said one of the com techs, a nervous look on his face.

  “Of course we have,” said Chung in a growl. “They sent their very best, and that idiot couldn’t handle that level of competition. Probably that damned Suarez woman.” He growled again low in his throat. Why can’t they keep their damned women at home, in the bed or kitchen, like any sensible culture. No, they have to loose them on the Universe. And this one is so damned competent.