Frost gazed at us with a confused look as we both smiled. “What? What did I do?”
I spoke. “We are going to steal a Durian command ship, and you are going to fly it back here for us.”
Frost shrugged. “OK, if you say so, Sir. Just keep in mind that I have no idea of exactly how to do that.”
I replied, “York and I will be there to help make it happen.”
I turned and yelled out, “Colonel! We have one more thing to ask of you. Pick one of those command ships and give me York, Frost, and four more BGS Marines, and we will have that ship waiting by the time the rest of the team boards her.”
The Colonel looked at the diagram. “Take this one on the end. We will change up to accommodate that.”
The Colonel removed his helmet, smacked me once again hard on the back, and then spit a wad of Omega root juice onto my torso.
I looked down. “Colonel! What the…”
The Colonel smiled. “You don’t have a leg to spit on, Grange. I just had to make do.”
I shook my head in disgust as Frost and York laughed. I then smiled myself as I thought about the easy cleanup that the BGS suit offered. I blinked out long enough for the root juice to fall to the floor, where it joined the growing ooze of disgust on the rest of the floor around the Colonel’s desk.
I blinked back in with a completely clean BGS. “Ta-da!”
York shook her head. “My lord, Mr. Grange. You crack me up with how you can so easily entertain yourself.”
I looked down at my clean suit and then back at York. “What? I thought that was a pretty good trick!”
Over the next eight hours, our offensive force was secretly moved into place at Tackor. I and the other BGS Marines floated unseen just above the Nevil base. The Colonel’s Marines then rose from their hiding places among the ruins of Tackor and began their sprint, moving quickly across the four kilometers that separated the two conquered cities.
The Durians at Nevil had the minimum of security forces on patrol. For each of the fifteen transports that sat fully loaded at the base, we sent a pair of BGS Marines aboard to open their bay doors. The Colonel’s Marines followed after, boarding the vessels and creating extreme chaos and mayhem as they cut loose on the yet-to-be-armed troops that waited inside.
I followed York into the farthest Durian command ship. Our first encounter was with a handful of technicians that were gathered around a piece of equipment in one of the cargo bays. Five tungsten rounds soon had the five techs’ remains scattered across the bay deck and a far wall.
As York charged forward, I held up to look at the device the techs were working on. Frost yelled back for me to move forward. I turned and powered ahead to catch back up. As York moved up and down the halls, it was once again the job of Frost, me, and two other BGS Marines to clean the decks. With each shot, we were careful to not damage any of the ship’s internals that might be required for using the vessel as a transport back to our lines.
York rounded a corner and dispatched three Durian Helgrons before they had a chance to react to a Human Marine who had blinked in just beside them. I cleared a set of administrators from a room to the left while Frost did her worst to five crewmen on the right as they slept in their bunks.
York powered down the hall, cutting through the corner of the next wall and coming out behind two Helgrons that were positioning themselves for a fight. With a blink in and then out, the two Helgrons fell to the deck with fist-sized holes in their chests. As with our previous shipboard ventures, the rest of the team had a hard time keeping up with York’s momentum.
As Frost opened a door and blasted two Durian doctors, she yelled out, “Mr. Grange! Get in here!”
I entered the room to see the remains of the doctors splattered across the right wall. As I turned towards the rest of the room, my eyes locked on the five Marines that lay outstretched on tables. They were still alive as the Durians performed experiments on them.
I spoke. “I just lost the last bit of humanitarian-type feelings that I held for the Durians. You want to think every species has at least a few redeeming qualities. Now, I don’t think I would care if I found them.”
Frost replied, “I’ll let the Colonel know we have wounded incoming.”
We left Major Howell with the wounded Marines and got back to the work of clearing the ship. The major had initially joined the Marines as a corpsman. After passing the officer’s exam, he had moved on to other duties. That initial training was the best attention we could offer our wounded during the fight.
On the fourth deck of seven, the alarm on the ship finally sounded. Blaster and laser fire came down the hallways as we moved forward. The active skins on our suits performed exactly as they were designed to do. The energy bolts from the weapons were absorbed by the outer layer of the suit and passed around to the other side, where they exited and proceeded along their way.
Word came from the Colonel over the comm. “Grange, eight of the fifteen transport targets have been neutralized; the next seven are just getting under way. What’s your progress there?”
I replied, “We have two decks to clear, Colonel. As usual, York is running away from us on a rampage. And we found five of our Marines here, Colonel. Still alive. Looks like the Durians were conducting experiments on them.”
The Colonel was silent for a moment. “I hope you are doling out some justice for that, Grange.”
I replied, “You can bet we will, Colonel. If you need a motivator to pass back to your men, you might want to pass that info along. War is a dirty enough business on its own without one having to worry about being experimented on.”
Frost spoke. “Sir, not to diminish what they were doing in here, but weren’t we doing the same with the Milgari at one point?”
I thought back to the experiments George had conducted in his attempt to find a vaccine to counteract the Torrian drug that had been used on the otherwise docile Milgari.
I replied to Frost, “We were at least attempting to find what made them so belligerent. As it turned out, we found a cure. But, I get what you are saying, Frost. It’s a very fine line between having to conduct experiments and wanting to. I’ll have to keep that thought in mind going forward.”
We moved back out into the hallway and continued to clear the decks up to the top level as we approached the bridge. The Helgrons gave it their best effort, but we were unmatched in our equipment. The hallway was cleared as York stepped onto the bridge. Twelve seconds later, the eight officers that manned the bridge posts were dead.
I spoke to Frost. “Let’s see if we can fly this thing, Frost. The nav computer is over here, according to our intel.”
Frost stopped and spoke. “Sir, tell me if I am wrong, but a flashing red light is usually a bad indicator.”
I looked around the bridge to see a red light flashing on each of the operator consoles as well as on a central panel up over our heads.
I spoke. “Crap! They set off the self-destruct!”
York spoke. “We have forty-eight seconds to evac, Sir.”
I replied, “OK, let’s go get our wounded and get them out of here!”
I raised the Colonel on the comm. “Problem, Colonel. Looks like they got the self-destruct set before we could stop them. We are going to evac the five wounded and move on to the next command ship.”
The Colonel replied, “Change of plans, Grange! Get those men off there; we will have a Wren waiting to pick them up. I’ll let my troops know to save that last transport if they want a ride home. The other Durian command ships are in the process of lifting off.”
We flew straight through the walls and floors to reach the wounded warriors on deck five. The wounded were lifted by the five BGS Marines and flown down the halls as fast as we could. The Marine I had over my shoulder wheezed and coughed as I carried him with one arm wrapped around his midsection as my other arm powered us down the hall. Our active skins had been turned off. It was the only way we could carry the wounded with us.
As I d
ropped down onto the next deck, I took a glancing hit by an ion bolt as it exploded off a nearby wall. My chest burned with a fire I had never before felt as the gel inside the suit heated from the explosion. I dropped down hard to my stumps and fired off a tungsten round, obliterating the Durian crewman that we had missed during our sweep.
York quickly passed me in a full run with her wounded Marine over her shoulder. “Get a move on, Mr. Grange! That timer is ticking!”
I powered up my BHD and once again began moving down the hall, with Frost and the others close behind. As we exited the Durian ship, a Wren was waiting at the ready. We hustled the wounded Marines aboard, and the rear hatch was closed. As the Wren lifted off, the self-destruct timer on the Durian command ship ticked down to zero. A huge explosion followed, bringing the Wren’s active skin to 85 percent as we pulled away.
The Colonel came over the comm. “Grange, we managed to take control of the last transport. It should be lifting off just behind you. Just bring our boys home.”
As we landed in the quad, we were met by a team of medics in white biohazard gear.
York rolled her eyes. “I know what that means.”
I replied as I raised my face shield, “What? What’s the problem?”
York shook her head. “We are quarantined until that crew determines that we are clean. The Durians could have been planting pathogens on these Marines in an effort to send them back to start an epidemic. Kind of the opposite of the viral warfare we saw used on the Milgari. Even if it only took out 5 percent of a city’s populace, it would be considered a big win.”
As I looked up at my visor, I took note of a flashing yellow alert. I pulled down on the face shield to check the issue.
I grumbled, which made York ask a question. “What are you seeing, Sir?”
I replied, “I have a flashing yellow indicator that reads ‘Biohazard.’ And to go along with that, my chest is burning right now. I don’t think the pain meds in this suit are working anymore.”
York looked. “You have some burns that need looking at there, Sir. That biohazard might just be from that. Wait, an indicator just went off on my HUD. Mine says ‘External threat.’”
York blinked out and then blinked back in a few seconds later in a different spot. “Yep, indicator is gone.”
York reached out and touched an area on my shoulder where I had been carrying the wounded Marine. The external threat indicator once again lit up on her HUD.
York spoke. “Yep, looks like you are infected with whatever it was they were playing with, Sir. Frost, Major, Sergeant, blink out and then step out of the Wren.”
Five seconds later, the rest of my team reappeared in the quad just outside of the ship. The white suits ran sniffers over their exteriors for several minutes before returning to the hold of the Wren to tend to the wounded.
The officer leading the biohazard team spoke. “The rest of you are clean. You may go. This one and the other wounded are now in quarantine until we determine what this is.”
I raised my hand. “Got any pain meds with you? My chest is burning, and I could seriously use some relief.”
The officer reached up and raised my face shield. Before I could ask what he was doing, he had a pen-like device pressed against the skin just above my upper lip. I winced as a shot was administered.
I spoke. “What was that? You gave me a shot in the face?”
The officer chuckled. “Sorry, Sir. We need clean skin, and I am not familiar with the suit you have on. You face was available, so I took the shot. Blood flow is good there; you should be feeling the effects shortly.”
I blinked my eyes and rocked backwards as the meds kicked in full. “Whoa. That was, like, almost instantaneous. And… I can’t feel my chest at all anymore. Thanks, Doc!”
Six stretchers soon appeared. I and the wounded were gently lifted onto them just before I passed out. When I awoke, a full day had passed. The Colonel was standing behind a glass wall with a grin on his face.
I groggily spoke. “What are you grinning for, Colonel?”
The Colonel shook his head. “Docs say you should be dead, Grange. Those wounded Marines you brought back died within an hour. The Durians must have just infected them. Anyway, the docs say you have a bug that is about as nasty as any they have ever seen. They are baffled by how your blood is fighting it off. You have something different going on that is holding back that virus from completely kicking your ass. My guess is that DNA shot you took back on Molov. Docs think you have some sort of super-DNA in you now.”
I looked down at my burned but rapidly healing chest. “Well, at least the burns don’t look so bad.”
The Colonel laughed. “The docs had you all zipped up in a BGS suit all night. They just pulled you out about a half hour ago. It seems that suit accelerates the healing process as well as feeding and medicating you. They are swapping out the gel and the filter pack to see if that will speed things up.”
I looked up at the Colonel. “So, how did our operation go yesterday?”
The Colonel replied, “It went very well is how it went. We have four Colossun mega-transports parked just outside our walls with half a million androids trapped in their containers.”
I attempted to sit up as much as I could. “Are we going to blow the ships or what?”
The Colonel grinned. “We isolated their comms so they can’t get orders, and I have a couple techs that were working with Dr. Touchstone who are in the process of reprogramming them. Then we plan on sending them back with a single android piloting each ship.”
I asked, “And this reprogramming—I suppose it is going to do something for us?”
The Colonel again grinned. “Yes it is. About fifteen minutes after they are activated, they are going to turn on their makers. I am expecting a battlefield full of nothing but chaos. It might even delay their use of any androids until they figure out what we did.”
I nodded in approval. “Sounds like you are going to exploit this fully, Colonel. Has anyone said how long I will be in here?”
The Colonel’s grin turned to a serious expression. “You have a battle ahead of you, Grange. Docs won’t be releasing you until you are dead or they are sure that virus has been eradicated. We won’t know either of those things until they have happened. Just sit back and heal up, Grange. We can put up a decent fight for a while without you.”
I gave the Colonel a half wave as I flopped back onto my pillow. I was exhausted.
Chapter 22
The next two days were spent in the infirmary. The Durians had stopped their assaults to assess the security around their landing port at Nevil. Several attempts were made to retake the captured mega-transports that sat just outside our walls, each without success.
At the end of the second day, I woke when a medical tech opened the sealed door and entered my room. “Mr. Grange, looks like you beat this thing. The doctors are still scratching their heads over how you are even alive. And those burns on your chest, those should have taken a month or two to heal, but you will be back to 100 percent in about a week. The docs think it’s that BGS suit. I’ve been studying that thing, and I have to say I think what has happened here is beyond what that suit will do.”
I replied, “So, what’s next?”
The tech looked at me. “What’s next is you are free to go. They want to see you in a week to check on those burns, but as of right now, you can go back to the fight if you want. Your blood work shows absolutely no sign of that virus. And the docs took a couple pints of your blood to work with on creating a vaccine for the rest of us.”
As I began to get up, I noticed the two new legs that were attached to my lower torso. “What am I supposed to do with these? I don’t have time to train them.”
The tech laughed. “Doc George came by with those while you were out. He said they have a 60 percent usage algorithm built into them, so you are not starting from scratch. He says in two days of normal use, you should be at 90 percent.”
I tried to stand on the l
egs and found them to be wobbly, but usable. “Thanks for the help, Corporal. Do I have a helmet around here? And where did I get this full suit?”
The corporal replied, “In the locker over there in the corner. The suit we had to take back from another Marine. He wasn’t happy, but he didn’t complain much either.”
I retrieved the helmet and made my way to the Colonel’s office. “Colonel, what do we have on the books for today?”
The Colonel looked up and replied, “I have a team loading our program onto those androids out there. As a kicker, we added some code that we took from the Duke. It’s a long shot, but with a little luck we can spread our worm through parts of their network.”
I gestured towards the Colonel’s console. “What city is next up on the defense block?”
The Colonel brought up a map. “Parliot is the next logical target. They have their force in position. We aren’t sure why they haven’t attacked. The Durians are not ones for indecision.”
I spoke as I looked over the map. “Any word from outside? From Frig or Ashley?”
The Colonel shook his head. “Not a peep. The only external comm we have had has been the Duke trying to pester everyone for information on you. As far as he knows, that Durian virus took you out.”
I replied, “Yeah, he has a way to track every one of us. For some reason, he seems to have lost that ability with me.”
The Colonel leaned back in his chair. “Maybe it’s that DNA update you had. The doctors are still baffled that you are alive. Every lab sample they had of blood from anyone else saw that virus spread quickly. They even tried it on samples from the Milgari, Dakar, and Prassi, and even a Bulgar sample we had. That virus blossomed in every one. Your blood fights back and actually does what you would hope it would do by isolating cells that are infected, and then eradicating them.”
I crossed my arms in thought. “Hmm. I hadn’t really considered the DNA aspect as what might have knocked the Duke off my trail. Since the lab already has blood samples from me, have them look for anything that would somehow allow us to be tracked that doesn’t show in my blood. I’m guessing it might be a big help to our cause if the Duke no longer knows where each of us is.”
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