“Shit,” he cursed as the number of aircraft registered on his sweep. They were of course stealthed to the best of their tech’s ability. But not good enough to escape his when he actually looked for them. He counted about eighty aircraft within a two hundred kilometer radius of his area along a two hundred degree arch. From that he estimated that the Nations must have deployed over two hundred aircraft, which was probably an underestimate. He didn’t see how or why they had taken that many atmospheric craft with them on their ships, though he had to admit each could carry a couple of squadrons stowed away without too much trouble. But they were liable to cause him trouble unless he did something drastic. With that thought he was back at his tank, contacting the bots that had flown to him from the pyramid, getting them ready for the next phase of the operation.
* * *
The small robot scanned the skies as it used it scramjet propulsion to move through the air. Its sensors picked up the target it had been programmed to seek, and the robot increased speed and changed course until it was coming up behind the Nation fighter. The robot was giving off very little heat with its advanced engines, and its five centimeter length and stealth construction gave back no return to the less advanced sensor tech of the enemy aircraft.
The robot maneuvered in close and came to a soft landing on the skin of the aircraft, its legs bonding with the alloy they sat upon. A small laser bored into the hull, then a proboscis extended into the hole. With a jet of air the package was delivered, and soon microbots were swarming through the inside of the aircraft, heading for their targets, where they delivered their nanobot cargos. The delivery robot dissolved its attachments to the hull and fell off, dropping the kilometers back to the ground. Meanwhile the nanobots went to work, first making more of their kind, then attacking the systems of the aircraft.
* * *
Watcher sat in his tank, leaning out of the top hatch, while his suit HUD kept him apprised of what was going on. The river stretched ahead, his vehicles back from it fifty meters into the foliage. He could see a gleam of sunlight on water here and there through the growth. The timer on the HUD counted down, until it hit zero, the moment the nanites were supposed to work their magic.
* * *
Senior Pilot Skyler Kane looked out of his canopy on the red and orange tinted world below. It’s beautiful, he thought, a lush growth like nothing they had at home, where population had just about overrun resources. He had also seen some flying creatures that seemed almost too big to take wing, then remembered that the oxygen level out there was much higher than on his homeworld, again thanks to all that vegetation. He had been flying too fast for the flyers to do more than get a quick look at him, and even if he had been going low and slow they would have been insane to have tackled anything as big as his fighter.
The river glinted below in the sunlight as he banked his fighter into a turn. His eyes scanned the length of the waterway at the same time as his sensors reported nothing unusual. He straightened the fighter out and cruised at three thousand meters over the water, heading for his next checkpoint.
The flashing red lights on his instrument panel were the first indication that something was wrong. The engines dying with a rattle was the next. The pilot tried to call up his onboard computer to get an idea of what the malfunction was, but the AI did not respond to his queries.
“What the fuck,” he cried as the nose of the aircraft started to tilt down. He pulled hard at his stick, which had seemed to go dead in his hand. The fly by wire system must be out, he thought, struggling to pull the aircraft up and into a glide by shear strength. But no matter how hard he pulled, the stick would not come back. The nose of the aircraft soon pointed straight down, and the plane was in a dive from which he would not be able pull her out of.
Normally the computer would be yelling at him to pull up, but it was completely missing in action. The altimeter went through a thousand meters of distance at an alarming rate, and Kane made a snap decision. With the pull of a lever the canopy blew off. A second later the seat blew out of the aircraft, then separated from the pilot. A moment later the parachute opened and the pilot was swinging beneath the shroud lines, the river below. He pulled on the lines and started his move away from the center of the water, aiming for the shallows. That jungle was said to be deadly, and he didn’t want his introduction to it to be a drop while banging against the trunks of large trees. He was also pretty sure that the river would hold things he didn’t want to meet, but he liked his odds in the shallows better than in the orange and red canopy below.
As he watched another fighter slapped nose first into the river and disappeared from sight. Kane said a prayer to the God he worshipped as he saw that the canopy was still intact on that aircraft, meaning the pilot had ridden it into the drink. Nothing surfaced, and Kane said another prayer, before turning his attention to the water coming up below.
He splashed down into that water, about twenty meters from the shore. His suit kept him dry, but was also trying to pull him under. Kane hit the chute release and unburdened himself of the waterlogged equipment, then hit the buoyancy control and inflated his vest. He looked toward the shore, making sure that his survival pack was attached to his suit. A bubbling noise caught his attention, and he turned outward to see something big disturbing the water, the pattern moving toward his position. He turned and started toward the shore as fast as he could swim. It was not a race he would win.
* * *
“What the hell,” said the tech in a loud voice.
Admiral Miklas Gerasi turned to the sound of the voice, wondering what was going wrong this time. “What do you have, Ensign?” he asked, getting up from his chair and walking with quick steps toward the officer’s station.
“We lost contact with all of our aircraft over the large river valley,” said the young officer, looking at the Admiral with bewildered eyes. “Then they all started to drop from the sky.”
“At the same time?” asked the Admiral, his own eyes widening.
“As close to it as to make no difference, sir,” said the officer, looking back at his screen and pushing tabs on his touch-board.
“Any idea what happened?”
“I don’t have a clue, sir,” said the young man, shrugging his shoulders. “We have no indication of EMP or light amp, no vids of missiles. They just went off the air, and then they fell.”
“The Abomination did something,” said one of the other officers. “That’s the only explanation.”
“And he had to have a reason for knocking down the aircraft in that sector,” said Gerasi, looking over at a larger screen that was showing the river valley. “Like he wants to cross that river without us seeing him. Can we bring that river under fire?”
“If we could see him,” said the Tactical Officer, nodding his head. “But I would bet my life he will be hard to find.”
“But we can look,” yelled the Admiral, looking from Tactical to Sensory Officer.
Suddenly the screen looking over the river valley erupted with static. The river was still visible, but the picture was so degraded there was little chance of seeing a trio of stealthed objects crossing that water. The Admiral cursed and threw his hands in the air, wondering why his God had tasked him so.
The Admiral looked over at another officer, a Lt. Commander in charge of flight operations. “Get every plane you can over that valley, right now.” He turned to his Marine Liaison Officer. “Do we have any boats you could put on that river?”
“There are none in the area,” said the officer after a moment’s thought. “We could probably get some there within a half an hour. But I don’t think he will still be there.”
“Are there any other rivers in his path where they might be of some use? asked the Admiral, walking over to the main viewer, which was now showing a map of the region in question in lieu of the useless live feed. “What about this one here,” he said, his finger pointing to one about a hundred and fifty kilometers from the river the Abomination had to be crossing
at this moment.
“It’s not as big as the other one,” said the Flight Operations Officer. “Only two hundred meters across on average.”
“Still a chance to stop him,” shouted the Admiral, glaring at the officer, then looking over at the Marine Liaison. “Get some damned patrol boats on that river right away. We might be able to stop him, with a little luck.” And luck was not something we’ve had a great run on, thought the Admiral, shaking his head. “Just get those boats there, and reaction teams in transports.” You may be a devil, he thought of the bald, wide browed creature that haunted the nightmares of his people. But we have God on our side. And who can stand against us, when God is for us.
* * *
Watcher scanned the river for a moment from the edge, still back from the foliage. A large crocodilian type of creature, in the ten ton range, was gulping down one of the pilots who had landed in the water on the other side of the broad river. He felt a little bit of guilt at having dropped the man to his death into the belly of a predator, and so many of his fellows to an end in crashing airplanes. When he was Vengeance he had been responsible for so many deaths, in the trillions. Even though he knew he had not really been responsible for those killings he still felt guilty. And now, even when he had to kill, he regretted the necessity. But he also knew he had to get to Pandora before it was too late, if it wasn’t already, and these men were in his way.
Watcher dropped down into the tank, the hatch closing behind him. With a thought the tank crashed out of the last ten meters of jungle and slid down the bank of the river, the other two spreading out to either side. They entered the river and went under, their weight sinking them to the bottom, from which they rolled along several centimeters above the mud on their antigrav lifters. Something big bumped the tank Watcher was riding in, followed by several other bumps, and the super being viewed the huge crocodilians knocking their bodies against the unknown objects rolling along the bottom of their turf.
This went on for some minutes, and the tanks were almost all the way across when the crocodilians gave up. The tanks rolled up the slope and broke the water while Watcher kept a close watch on any aircraft that might be entering the valley. With no sign of the enemy the tanks rose out of the river and into the jungle beyond.
Watcher checked his map and decided to angle north, and take advantage of a natural pass that pierced the mountains while retaining plenty of cover. He checked the time in his head and cursed himself once again. It was not something he could help. He needed to get to his woman, but being destroyed along the way would not help either of them. Patience, he thought, trying to relax back into his commander’s chair. He smiled an evil smile, the long dead spirit of Vengeance manifesting within him for a moment. When the time came he would do what he had to do, and maybe even enjoy it in the moment.
Chapter Sixteen
Never take counsel of your fears. Stonewall Jackson
Pandora had never felt such pain in her life. Even the induction field that Vengeance had used on her had not caused this much agony. She knew that was theoretically impossible. There should have been no greater pain than direct induction of pain nerves. But there had to be a psychological component to seeing the actual physical damage to your own body. Pandora knew she could be repaired, but still, seeing her breasts burned to stubs and one of her hands crippled by the loss of two fingers, not to mention all the cuts and burns all over her body, were almost more than she could take. And laying in her own urine and feces made her feel degraded like nothing she had ever been through, like she was a helpless child dependent on others to clean her, and these others had no interest in that.
Dear Jesus, she thought as she watched the Inquisitor pick up another instrument from the nearby table; give me the strength to resist. She was not sure why she was praying to the Savior she had rejected so many years ago (or was that so many tens of thousands of years), the Savior her father had preached. She still wasn’t sure she believed in him. Maybe it was the comfort of tradition, or the belief that nothing else could save her now. Not her God, or science, or her lover the superman.
“All you have to do is give us the code,” said the Inquisitor, holding up the heat probe where she could see it. The tip was glowing with a white heat that she could feel from a half meter away. “Just transmit the code through the computer link we have established with your mind, and we will be done here.”
The link you think you have established, thought Pandi, wanting to smile and gloat at the man, to show him a sign that she was triumphant here, and knowing that to do so would spoil her plan. But she had the connection through her own implants, not through the nanites they had injected into her brain, the ones her own system had devoured and then mimicked.
“You can go to hell, you shit head,” she said, spitting out the last words to keep herself from crying.
“Very well,” said the man, moving to where he could look at her genitalia, to the opening of her vagina. He put a hand on that delicate flesh, rubbing a finger over her clitoris, gently, like he was trying to pleasure her. He looked up at her with a leering smile, then brought the heat probe into line and pushed it into her opening.
The extreme pain shot up Pandora’s nerves before she could react. She tried to clamp down with nanite nerve blocks, also realizing that to show less than great pain would tip her torturers off. But even cutting thirty percent off the pain transmission was not enough. Her bladder and bowels loosened again, and snot clogged her nose while her muscles arched. The smell of burning skin reached beyond the mucous that clogged her olfactory apparatus, sending waves of nausea rolling through her as she recognized that it was her own tender flesh that had been melted away by the heat. Please stop, she thought, while her mind sent the signal that opened the defenses of the station and its subsidiary works without her consent, her subconscious doing for her what she would not allow herself to do consciously. And then blackness folded over her, unconsciousness taking hold.
* * *
“We have the code, my Lord,” called the Chief Inquisitor over the com link. “The computer is verifying it as we speak.”
“And we will only know for sure when we have tried it out,” said the Admiral, looking at a view of the pyramid on the main viewer.
“What shall I do with the interogee?’ asked the Inquisitor, a smile on his face.
“Continue the questioning,” said the Admiral, grimacing as he looked at the body of the woman on the transmission. “Get everything you can out of her. But do not do anything that will end her until we make sure this code will open the doors we want opened.”
The Inquisitor nodded his head on the repeater screen, then it went blank.
So the woman out of time really has run out of time, thought the Admiral. To have come from tens of thousands of years in the past, from the time before the ancestors left the system, before the homeworld was destroyed. To have rejected the God of her fathers, only to fall to those who worship the same God, as he would have wanted to be worshipped. The Admiral shook his head as he walked over to the Com Officer’s station.
“We have the pyramid on the screen, Admiral,” said the Lieutenant, looking at the ancient object centered in the viewer.
“Send the signal, and let’s see what happens,” said the Admiral, grasping the back of the officer’s seat with his hand.
The Com Officer nodded and pushed the lit tabs of the touch display. “It’s on its way,” said the man, the tension displayed in the set of his eyes.
Who can blame him, thought the Admiral, his own hands tensing on the back of the chair. This could be the wipe them all out signal.
“Something’s happening,” said the tech, staring at the screen.
The Admiral watched as the view zoomed in to an area of the pyramid that was clear of the vines and lianas that draped the rest of the structure. Something was appearing there. Something that looked like a shadow against the sun dappled surface of the structure. It grew, and it took a moment for the Admiral to realize wh
at it was. “The door is opening,” he whispered while watching the entrance to the pyramid revealed. For generations his own people had tried to open the pyramids on the worlds they occupied, with no success. And here one was opening, and with it a possible link to the Donut.
“Get me Commodore Tisher,” ordered the Admiral, looking over at another com tech. Eight more ships had arrived from home. The Nation of Humanity was risking all on this venture, putting all of their starships in the Supersystem. Home was protected by less capable interplanetary vessels and orbital fortresses. It was a roll of the dice, but one Gerasi approved of.
“Admiral,” came the voice of the younger officer as his face appeared on the viewer.
“Tisher,” said Gerasi, walking over to look at the man eye to eye on the viewer. “I want all of your marines at that pyramid as soon as possible, along with as many naval techs as you can spare.”
“I saw the thing opening,” said the now wide eyed flag officer. “What are my men to do?”
“We have an opportunity to take the Donut,” said the Admiral, pointing at the pyramid on the other viewer. “Get your men down there, and tell them to jump through whatever open wormhole they find. If there is more than one, then send recon parties through them all, but the primary target is that station. Understood?”
“The Donut,” stammered the man, his face paling. “Do we dare send an invasion force there? What about the Abomination?”
To Well And Back (The Deep Dark Well) Page 17