“Where does it lead?”
“It comes out on a rocky ledge that overlooks the administration buildings and more importantly, the mine’s landing strip.”
Tarina looked up but could only see darkness. “How long of a climb is it?”
“It takes about ten minutes. Just stay close behind me and climb where I climb and you’ll be okay.”
Tarina nodded and began to climb up the wooden rungs. She might as well have been blindfolded as she could barely see more than a meter in front of her. Dirt and dust trickled down into Tarina’s eyes from above as Angela led the way up. She stopped for a couple of seconds to rub the dirt from her eyes before continuing the climb. Less than a month ago, she could have made the ascent without breaking a sweat. Now, however, after the abuses her body had taken, she had to force herself to keep going. It actually took twice the time Angela had said it would to make it to the top of the shaft.
Angela reached down and helped her friend climb the last few rungs before letting her catch her breath. “We don’t have a lot of time to waste up here. We still have to climb down and make it back to our bunks before the guards get back.”
Tarina took a deep breath and nodded.
Angela turned off her flashlight, reached above her head, and pushed the top cover aside. Light from outside flooded inside. She tapped Tarina on the head and whispered, “Stand up.”
Tarina stood. The fresh night air felt warm and refreshing. It reminded her of having a shower with Michael after having made love.
“Look over there,” Angela said, pointing toward a brightly lit landing port. “That’s where the Inspector General will land. Unless they’ve changed how they do business, the shuttle will be moved to a bunker dug into the side of the mountain. His inspections usually last two to three days. We’ll steal it on the first night he’s here and make our run for it.”
“How do we get there from here?”
“There’s an old path that leads down to the far side of the landing strip. From there we can use a dry riverbed to mask our movement to the shuttle. I’m sure that we can make it the whole way there without being seen.”
Tarina raised an eyebrow. “How can you be sure that it is an unobserved approach?”
“Because the guard towers are all facing the mine’s entrance. They don’t expect anyone to be moving around behind them. Their arrogance is their weakness.”
Tarina couldn’t fault her logic. “Do you have any homemade weapons? I doubt that they’ll let us simply walk onto a Kurgan shuttlecraft and hijack it without trying to stop us.”
“Watch your head,” said Angela as she bent down and pulled the cover back over the shaft.
Tarina got below and switched her light back on. She was surprised to see the small stash of supplies and equipment that Angela had acquired. There was a set of NVGs, a couple bottles of water, a few rations packs, and most surprisingly a Kurgan pistol with a full clip. Her father’s voice echoed in her mind . . . if it looks too good to be true, then it’s too good to be true. “Angela, how did you get all this stuff?”
“We can talk about that later. We have to get going or we’re going to get caught.”
“No, now!” said Tarina, grabbing a hold of Angela’s arm.
“I did things I’m not proud of. There, are you happy now?”
The bitterness in her voice told Tarina that she had asked the right question, just the wrong way. “I’m sorry, Angela, but I had to know.”
“Can we go now?”
“Yes, of course. Lead on.”
Tarina felt sorry for making Angela confess her sins, but with her and Wendy’s lives on the line, she wanted the truth no matter how unpleasant it may be to learn or admit. At the bottom, Angela made sure the way was clear before sliding out into the tunnel, closely followed by Tarina. They moved like a pair of cats hugging the shadows for cover all the way back to their cavern.
“Thanks for trusting in Wendy and me,” whispered Tarina, trying to make up for her earlier remarks.
“Who says I trust you? You’re a means to an end. I need you and you need me; that’s all there is to this arrangement. Don’t confuse what has happened between us with friendship.” With that, Angela turned her back on Tarina and made her way to her bunk.
Tarina shook her head and climbed into her bed. She kicked off her clogs, pulled up her blanket to the shoulders, and tried to make herself as comfortable as she could. Something nagged her tired mind. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but she knew she would eventually, just not tonight. In a matter of hours, they would be woken up for another day’s toil in the mines. Within seconds, fatigue washed over her and she was fast asleep.
Chapter 18
With a loud crash, Colonel Wright flung his helmet to the hangar bay floor, cracking open the glass face plate. “Just what the hell are you telling me?” He could barely hold back his brewing temper.
“Sir, things aren’t working as they should. One of your satellites only lasted one hour and three minutes before failing,” explained a red-faced technician. “The other cuts in and out. I’m sorry; I don’t understand what could have gone wrong. Both of the satellites were tested and double checked before being loaded onto your ships.”
Wright ground his teeth as he looked over at the other flight crew as they got down from their vessel. Forty-eight wasted hours flashed through his mind.
“Sir, these things happen from time to time when new technology is rushed into operation without sufficient testing,” said a senior technician.
Wright yelled aloud. He lashed out with his right foot sending an empty container flying against the wall.
“Colonel, something is better than nothing,” Eskola said, trying to get her boss to calm down. “Perhaps it’s a small glitch that the computer techs can fix from here?”
Wright clenched his fists. He knew it wasn’t the technicians’ fault. He took a couple of deep breaths to calm himself down. He looked over at the senior tech. “Petty Officer, do you have any more satellites onboard?”
The man shook his head. “No, sir. There was insufficient time before we left to acquire a spare.”
“This is a bloody nightmare. Can we get two more satellites brought to us? Surely there have to be more back with the fleet.”
“That’s not going to happen, sir,” said Lieutenant DeCarlo, the ship’s captain, as she joined the conversation.
Wright turned and saw the slender young officer standing there holding his shattered helmet in her hand. “Why can’t we, Lieutenant? We’re already in Kurgan space. It wouldn’t be too difficult for anther transport to bring us two new satellites.”
DeCarlo handed Wright his helmet. “Sir, while you were gone, a couple of things came up that changed everything.”
“Like?”
“First off, we have detected a Kurgan listening station barely ten light-years from us. As we are running under strict comms silence, I don’t think they have detected us. However, the longer we spend in Kurgan space, the greater the possibility that they will find us and vector fighters to our location.”
“And the second thing?”
“The only other transport ship configured like mine in the Sixth Fleet for a deep space jump has just appeared off our port bow. It looks like they are preparing to launch a vessel. If I did not know any better, I would suspect that a ground reconnaissance team will be heading for Klatt in the next five minutes.”
Wright shook his head. “Jesus, if the other satellite craps out while they are in flight, they’ll have nothing to help guide them in when they arrive over the planet.”
“That is a distinct possibility, sir. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to ensure that everything is as it should be on the bridge. I suggest that you and your people make themselves as comfortable as possible as we will be jumping back to the fleet as soon as my executive officer’s calculations are verified by the navigational computer. It’s going to take us the better part of a day flying at maximum speed to reach the neare
st friendly vessels.” DeCarlo saluted Wright, turned, and left the hangar.
“This is how disasters begin,” said Wright. “The entire mission hinges on those satellites; without them, anyone heading to Klatt will be flying in blind.”
Eskola said, “Sir, I suggest that we both climb out of our survival suits. I don’t know about you, but I smell awful. After a shower, we can grab something to eat and try to brainstorm the problem. There may be an easy fix that we can’t see right now.”
Wright nodded. He turned and handed off his helmet to one of this ship’s technicians. Another issue was already being played out in his mind. As far as he knew, the Kurgan listening station had never factored into any of Captain Killam’s planning. It was one thing for small transport ships to hide among the clutter of an asteroid field—a task force was another. If his mission to deploy the satellites over Klatt had not worked out as planned, perhaps he could do something about the Kurgan post to help the fleet. In seconds, Wright’s mind started to process the new problem and come up with a surefire way to overcome it. Time was not on his side. Separated from his staff, he would have to come up with a solution all by himself. Tired or not, he relished the chance to pay back the Kurgans for all the suffering they had put his people through.
Chapter 19
“Okay, we’re going to come out of our jump in the next five minutes,” said Parata to Sheridan. “The feed coming from the only working satellite in orbit has crapped out again. We know where you want to land, but without the live feed from the satellites there are no guarantees that we can put you down precisely where you want to go.”
“What’s the margin of error?” asked Sheridan.
“Give or take five hundred meters.”
“That doesn’t sound so bad. What’s the problem?”
“Michael, your landing site is at the bottom of a canyon. Right now, there is a sandstorm covering the land for hundreds of kilometers around the mine. I’ve never seen one like it. It’s a monster of a storm. It reaches up almost five kilometers into the sky. I’d hate to come out of the jump and fly into the side of a mountain or crash into a canyon wall. What I’m getting at is that you have two choices. You can change your landing site or carry on as planned. I’m only the pilot. It’s your mission and your call. So what will it be?”
Sheridan looked over his shoulder at his friend. “Master Sergeant, your thoughts?”
“Go for it,” replied Cole. There was a fierce look of determination in his eyes. “Sir, a lot of people are counting on us. We don’t have the time to abort the jump and wait out the storm.”
Sheridan thought exactly the same way, he just needed to hear it from Cole. He looked back at Parata. “If anyone can land us safely in the middle of a storm, with or without satellite guidance, it’s you. Carry on, Captain.”
“Okay then. Strap yourselves in. It’s going to be one hell of a bumpy ride,” said Parata as he reached behind his shoulder, pulling down his harness to buckle himself in.
Sheridan and Cole headed back to the shuttle’s crew compartment.
“Hurry up and stow your gear, we’re about to fly through the belly of a dragon,” said Cole to the other Marines who rushed to lock away all of their loose equipment.
Sheridan sat down and hurried to secure his six-piece harness before their ship came out of its jump inside Klatt’s atmosphere. He put a headset on so he could hear what was happening in the cockpit. With one last quick check of his watch, he saw that they had less than thirty seconds before he found out if he had made the right decision or not. Sheridan took a couple of seconds to look around the cabin at his teammates’ faces. Some were scared, some tense, while a pair of the younger Marines seemed excited. The butterflies in his stomach told him that he was not made of stone. It was okay to be worried. He knew that the day he no longer feared death was the day he would start to make bad decisions. He reached into a pocket, took hold of his mouth guard, and popped it just as the shuttlecraft ended its long jump.
The light in the back of the shuttle turned from white to red. Automatically the artificial gravity switched off and the body harnesses tightened to keep everyone in place.
“Hang on!” hollered Cole as Klatt’s gravity took hold of the shuttlecraft and pulled it toward its surface. The sudden jolt shook loose anything not properly stowed away. An assault rifle flew from its rack and smashed into the face of one of the Marines, breaking his nose. Blood streamed down the stunned man’s face. Until the pilots managed to get the vessels’ sublight engines running, the ship fell like a rock.
A second later the lights flashed on and off in the back of the shuttle. In his headset, Sheridan heard Parata swear. He had to fight the urge to ask what was going on while the two men up front struggled to keep their craft from crashing into the ground. The last thing they needed was a passenger asking a lot of annoying questions.
Without warning the ship banked over hard to the right. Sheridan groaned as he felt the gravity pull against his body. Again the lights flickered. It was obvious that something was wrong.
“Jesus, sir. What the hell is going on?” yelled out Cole.
Sheridan shook his head just before the shuttle righted itself and then turned over on its left side. The lights went out, plummeting the back of the shuttle into darkness. A woman’s voice cried out in fear. Sheridan couldn’t take it anymore. He reached up and pressed his headset mic. “What’s going on up there? We’re being tossed around like ragdolls back here.”
“We’ve lost the starboard engine and most of the avionics,” replied Parata, his voice tense. “They failed the second we came out of our jump. Without the guidance and terrain awareness warning systems, we’re well and truly flying blind in this storm. We can’t see more than a few meters in front of the ship.”
Sheridan bit his lip. “Can you climb out of the storm?”
The ship began to shake up and down as if being buffeted in the back of a bucking bronco.
“No! We don’t have enough power left in the one engine still running. Hell, we’ll be lucky if it doesn’t seize up before we land.”
“Okay, do what you can.” Right away, Sheridan regretted his choice of words. Of course, they were already doing their best.
“Well?” said Cole, yelling to be heard over the turbulence.
“We may have made the wrong call on this one. We’re flying blind.”
“Bloody hell,” said Cole.
For close to thirty seconds, the shuttle rocked so hard that Sheridan thought it was going to fly apart. When it seemed to find a pocket of calm air, the craft righted itself and stopped shaking. Sheridan allowed himself a moment to relax.
In the cockpit, the pilots never saw the jagged peak of a rocky hill obscured by the swirling sand until it was too late. With a loud crash of metal tearing apart, the portside wing of the shuttle was torn right off. In the blink of an eye, the craft began to plummet to the ground. It had fallen less than two hundred meters when the shuttle hit another rocky outcropping, tearing open a large jagged gash in the side. In the back, dust and sand rushed inside.
In the pitch-blackness, Sheridan heard voices calling out in fear and pain. His hands gripped his harness as tight as he could. His heart jackhammered away in his chest. He closed his eyes and prayed that their ordeal would soon end.
Seconds later, with a crunch of buckling metal, the nose of the shuttle hit the hard ground sending the vessel cartwheeling through the air. It went end over end three times before coming to a halt against a tall stone spire. The sudden stop threw Sheridan’s head flying back onto the headrest of his seat, knocking him out.
The haze in his mind slowly began to fade. For a few seconds, all Sheridan could hear in his ears was the pounding of his own heart. Gradually, it was replaced by the wailing sound of the wind rushing inside the stricken craft. Right away he knew that something wasn’t right. His chest felt as if it were being crushed. He opened his eyes, reached into a pocket, and pulled out a small flashlight. He turned it on an
d saw that he was hanging upside down. The shuttle had come to rest on its roof. The crew compartment was a mess of broken seats and twisted metal. A quick glance told him that he had lost at least three of his team. Their bloodied and broken bodies were strewn in the wreckage.
“Here, let me help you down,” said Cole.
Sheridan swung his light over and saw his friend standing there with a deep gash on his forehead. His face was covered with dust and blood. “You okay?” Sheridan asked.
“Yeah. This is nothing. Looks worse than it is.”
Sheridan unbuckled his harness and fell down into Cole’s arms. He placed his feet down and felt something soft under his boots.
“Don’t look down,” warned Cole. “Half of Mister Skylar is at your feet. The other half is still strapped into his seat.”
“How long was I out?”
“I dunno. Four, maybe five minutes.”
Sheridan shone his flashlight around. “Did Miss Toscano make it?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t had a chance to take a good look around.”
“I’m over here,” called out Toscano.
“Where?” said Sheridan, trying to see where the voice was coming from.
“I’m still in my chair. I think I’m trapped under the weapons rack. From here, I can see your flashlight beam.”
Cole and Sheridan carefully made their way to where the weapons had been stored.
“You’re right next to me,” said Toscano. “I can see your boots.”
Sheridan bent down and shone his light under the long metal rack. He smiled when he saw First Lieutenant Toscano wave back at him. “Hold on, we’ll get you out of there.”
“Let me help,” said Sergeant Urban as he bent down with Cole and lifted the metal frame up. Sheridan reached over, unbuckled Toscano’s harness before grabbing a hold of her closest arm and pulling her free.
“Thanks,” said Toscano as she brushed the sand from her face.
“Are you hurt?” asked Sheridan.
“No, sir. Apart from a few bruises and being scared out of my mind, I think I’m okay.”
Trident Fury (The Kurgan War Book 3) Page 11