by Rick Partlow
“Are you Bree?’ the kid asked with a hint of a British accent.
She looked him up and down before answering. He was dressed in clothes conservative and nondescript enough to be a deliberate choice, like camouflage, but also highly practical and durable. She eyed his light jacket for a moment, then pushed a button on her ‘link and saw the readout from her security sensors displayed on her corneal implant. He was carrying a handgun in a holster inside his waistband. Not totally unusual here, but it did indicate just what sort of customer he was.
“Yeah,” she grunted finally, tossing a stray lock of orange hair out of her face. “What do you want?”
“I need to get something on the net,” he told her, sounding a bit like he had rehearsed the words. “I want it on all the crowdsourced news sites and I want it big enough and public enough that the corporates can’t squash it and the private news nets can’t ignore it.”
“I can get it on the net,” Bree said with a shrug. “I can’t promise if it’ll be ignored…that all depends on how significant it is.”
The kid chuckled softly, fingering a dataspike. “I think it’s significant enough,” he said quietly. “I need it to break at a precise time…it’s on the spike. You won’t be able to access it until that time.”
Bree cocked an eyebrow. That seemed…ominous, somehow.
“You expecting something big to happen?” she wondered. There had been all those terrorist attacks lately, the ones that had succeeded and the ones that hadn’t. This guy could work for those people… She had to ask herself if she cared. That wasn’t her world anyway.
“Something big is always happening,” he replied cryptically and she thought she detected a little bitterness in his words. “People just don’t know about it. I think it’s time to change that.”
“The price is the same for momentous things and petty concerns,” Bree told him, trying to re-inject some healthy cynicism into the conversation. “And I don’t take Republic dollars…nothing that can be traced. It’s either a thousand in Trade-Notes or five hundred in Corporate Scrip.” She shrugged diffidently. “Unless you have anything interesting to barter.”
“I have Trade-Notes,” he told her, tapping a code into his ‘link, then touching it to her payment kiosk with the lack of concern of a man spending someone else’s money.
That was when she decided that she knew what he was and into which pigeonhole he fit. She felt a surge of fear in her gut and wondered if this was some sort of sting… No, that didn’t make any sense. She was one of thousands of black market netdivers; and, all ego aside, there was nothing special about her. There was no way they would bother to run a sting someplace this dangerous just to grab her. She relaxed slightly, hoping she hadn’t shown her fear in her expression.
She held out a hand and he dropped the spike into it. The plastic felt sharp and menacing as her fingers closed around it.
“It’s self-erasing,” he told her, eyeing her suspiciously. “It’ll only load once, so don’t screw around with it until you’re ready to upload.”
“Don’t try to tell me my job, spook,” she snapped, glaring at him. “I’ve stayed in business down here for twenty years. I’ll get your propaganda on the net just like you want.”
She saw a flash of alarm in his eyes for just a moment and she wondered if she’d pushed it too far. But then he smiled, an almost relieved smile.
“Sorry,” he said. “But take my advice: you might want to watch it after you upload it.”
“No one down here gives a shit about what you Straights do to each other,” she muttered scornfully.
“Maybe not,” he admitted, “but a wise man once said, ‘Just because you don’t take an interest in politics doesn't mean politics won't take an interest in you.’ You might want to keep that in mind.”
He turned and pushed aside the curtain. Two lean, menacing-looking strangers also dressed in anonymous, practical clothes waited for him there; and, as the curtain slowly bounced back into place, she could see them walking with him towards the market’s exit.
She shook her head, looking back to the dataspike still in her palm. She considered for just a heartbeat destroying the thing and forgetting she ever saw it, but she rejected that almost immediately. They’d found her once; she was pretty sure they could find her again.
* * *
“That’s it,” Admiral Minishimi said, watching the moon grow larger in the ship’s viewscreen projection. “That’s as far as they’ll let us go.” She turned to her navigator. “All stop, drive to station keeping.”
“Station keeping, aye ma’am,” he acknowledged. The Farragut had already decelerated to just a few kilometers per second, so they only felt the last quarter gravity of thrust as a slight pressure into their acceleration couches.
Minishimi turned to the video pickup and McKay could see the pain in her eyes, even as she kept it out of her voice. “We’ll be dropping our Eysselink field in one minute, Jason,” she said. “Then you’ll be clear to launch.” Her mouth twisted in a frown. “I don’t trust that bastard Fox, so we won’t be leaving our field down for more than thirty seconds.”
“Don’t trust anyone, Joyce,” he told her from his seat in the cockpit of the assault lander. “I don’t know what’s going on planetside, but I do know that you and the rest of the task force are the only thing keeping Philip Ayrock from having his way. He won’t rest till he takes you out somehow. You know what that means from past experience.”
He hadn’t wanted to come right out on an open channel and say that he was sure there were traitors among the crew, but he could see in her eyes that she’d understood his reference. Back during the last war with the Protectorate, she’d nearly been killed when her XO had turned out to be a Protectorate plant, either brainwashed into cooperation or replaced with a duplicate.
Although knowing what he knew now, come to think of it, he hadn’t been so much a Protectorate plant as one of Misha’s creations. He wondered again just how much of what that neurotic alien computer said that he could believe.
“If there’s any way we can support you,” Minishimi told him, “we will.” He started to open his mouth and she interrupted him. “And don’t bother to give me any nonsense about how it’s vital this ship survives: it’s vital you survive, or Ayrock wouldn’t be trying so hard to get you killed. We’ll be out here, watching.”
“Thanks, Joyce,” he said, not bothering to argue with her. They both knew that if any of their ships dropped field long enough to fire a weapon, the Lunar Defense Base would destroy them in seconds. “McKay out.”
He broke the connection, then twisted around to look back at the rows of armored figures strapped in behind him. About half wore Marine pattern gear, while the others were in Special Operations battle rattle. The main difference was that the Marine body armor was camouflaged in grey, black and brown while the special ops gear was currently grey but had the more expensive chameleon circuits that would blend it in with any background. They both used the same weapons although the special ops versions were suppressed. The real differences were inside the armor: he knew he could trust Vinnie’s teams to do the right thing.
“All right, listen up everyone,” he said into his helmet’s pickup, using the general channel. “We launch in thirty seconds. You’ve all been briefed and you all have the Op Order in your ‘links. We’re fairly certain from the satellite surveillance that Yuri is going to attempt to launch an old ICBM from one of the silos with the nanovirus as the payload. The overwhelming goal of this mission, beyond taking out Yuri, beyond surviving is to make sure that missile does not launch.” He paused, letting that sink in. “You’re all aware of the special munitions we’ve brought along,” he continued. He glanced past them where a pair of large backpacks were strapped in with the other gear. “You know what that means for us if we need to use it.”
“We’re all volunteers, General,” Captain Muniz reminded him, almost a rebuke. McKay smiled thinly.
“Yes, Captain,” he replied, “and I’m
not questioning the bravery of each of you in the face of death. I know each of you would give his life to prevent the nanovirus from being deployed. But would you give your buddy’s life?” He looked over them, wishing he could see their eyes through the helmets. “Because that’s a hell of a lot harder. If you’re the one with your hand on the control for one of those nukes, and that missile’s about to launch, you need to be able to push that button.”
“Semper fi, General!” The words came from Gunny Kennedy, but it was echoed by many others, followed by a chorus of “Ooo-rah!” from the Marine contingent.
The Special Operations teams just sat quietly. They were older on average and most of them had actually seen combat, while the Marines had not. Like McKay, they’d seen friends die. They were professionals, the best at what they did, and they’d do their jobs well, dying if need be; they didn’t need to psych themselves up for it anymore.
“Fucking jar-heads,” Tom Crossman muttered on their private frequency.
“Drive field is down,” the lander’s pilot announced. “Launching now.”
Loud bangs sounded as the lander’s maneuvering thrusters kicked the vehicle out of the Farragut’s hangar bay, then again as it angled towards the transfer course that would take it from cislunar space to Earth orbit.
“Main engine ignition in three seconds,” the pilot droned. “Two…one…ignition.”
The aerospacecraft shook and a roar filled the cabin as the drive ignited, pushing McKay back into his acceleration couch.
“Here we go,” Vinnie said on the private command channel. “Hoping that a sociopathic narcissist lets us live long enough to stop a psychopathic nationalist from killing a city.”
“You wish you’d stayed in the Marines, Vinnie?” McKay asked him, half serious.
There was a pause before the other man answered.
“No, I don’t think so, sir,” he finally said. “We’ve travelled farther than anyone else ever has. We’ve been part of really big, history-changing events. That’s why I joined the military to begin with, you know? But…”
“What?” McKay prompted.
“It’s Tom, sir,” Vinnie admitted. “It doesn’t feel right that he’s on this.”
McKay looked back over at Tom, where he sat with the rest of his team, motionless in Buddha-like calm. He was an ever-present force of nature and McKay couldn’t imagine the unit without him.
“Other men and women on this operation have families,” he reminded Vinnie, trying to be fair.
“Yeah, but they’re not Tom,” Vinnie said sullenly. “Yeah, I know,” he admitted, “that’s unprofessional of me, but… We’ve been together since day one, sir. He’s paid his dues. He deserves to make it out of this alive.”
No, it wasn’t professional, McKay thought, and it wasn’t fair. But luckily, he had a job that needed to be done and he got to choose who did it.
“Don’t worry, Vinnie,” McKay assured him. “I’ve got something else in mind for Tom. And I’m hoping it gets more than just him out of this alive.”
“What?” He could hear the frown in the tone of Vinnie’s voice. “I mean, sir? Why didn’t you mention this before?”
“Because there is no way that Ayrock doesn’t have spies on the Farragut,” McKay told him. “And I want him to believe that we’re just a bunch of meek little lambs going quietly to be sacrificed.”
“I should have known you’d have something up your sleeve, sir,” Vinnie said, chuckling with appreciation.
“He has Shannon, Vinnie,” McKay stated, feeling a cold jolt of anger through his gut. He’d been angry for days…there were times he couldn’t remember being anything but angry. “There’s no way I’m going to let anything happen to her. Someone has to survive this; someone has to be there for her. You’re going with the teams to the missile silo. I’m going with the Marines to the command bunker. If I don’t make it, you have to promise me you’ll get her out.”
“You know I will, sir,” Vinnie replied instantly.
McKay was grateful Vinnie hadn’t insisted that they were all going to make it through this alive. They both knew it wasn’t true.
Chapter Thirty Nine
“The lander from the Farragut is entering Earth orbit, Mr. President,” Admiral Di Ndinge announced---unnecessarily, Ayrock thought, given that they were all quite able to see the shuttle’s track on the Situation Room’s large holographic display. “Are you sure you don’t want our defenses to intercept it?”
Jameson glanced at Ayrock with confusion in his eyes, his face slack and his skin grey. The man had gone to hell in the last few days, since Ayrock had been forced to fully activate the conditioning he’d put in place so long ago. Before, just a whispered word had been enough; but since the fiasco with Shannon Stark, Jameson had become aggressive and resistant to suggestion and Ayrock had to use the control word. Under its influence, the President was sluggish and compliant and people were beginning to notice. Ayrock nodded to Jameson, who then turned back to the Admiral.
“No,” he said, his voice muted and hesitant. “Let them land.”
“I don’t understand this, sir,” Di Ndinge said, frustration in his voice as he looked between Jameson and Ayrock suspiciously. “If General McKay is being charged with murder and treason, why are we letting him undertake this mission?”
“McKay is a loose cannon,” Ayrock said, deciding he’d have to answer the question since Jameson was probably incapable of putting two thoughts together on his own. “He’s got no respect for civilian authority or the democratic process and he’s gone off the reservation…” He shrugged. “But Yuri is a bigger threat at this point. The man is insane and he has weapons of mass destruction that he’s already used on civilians; it would be irresponsible of us not to use our best assets to take him out.”
“Then why aren’t we going in with overwhelming force?” Di Ndinge demanded. “If we know Yuri is sitting there, why don’t we just take the site out from orbit?”
“Yuri might have an escape route,” Ayrock said, beginning to get annoyed with the Admiral. Divungi Di Ndinge was a whip-thin, sharp-featured officer from Gabon in the African Confederation; and he was usually a toady that kissed Greg Jameson’s ass, but he was getting nosy. “We don’t know how much of the nanovirus he has or if there’s any already out there, planted ahead of time or left with his confederates. We need boots on the ground to grab Yuri or his people to question.”
It was bullshit, but it was plausible bullshit.
“Then why not send more people?” the Admiral wanted to know. “Why just one shuttle? The task force has a battalion of Marines and another of Colonial Guard troops.”
“Because we don’t trust him!” Ayrock fairly yelled, pushing himself up from his seat next to Jameson and standing almost nose-to-nose with the Fleet officer. “He’s already disobeyed direct orders from the President and killed General Kage! If we let him come in force, what’s to stop him from attempting a coup?”
“Sir,” Di Ndinge turned to the President, not even addressing Ayrock, “do you actually believe that General McKay would attempt a military coup? Whatever the man is, he’s always been loyal to the Republic.”
Jameson stared blankly at the Admiral for a moment, then slowly and awkwardly said: “Just let them land and keep monitoring the situation.”
“Yes sir, Mr. President,” Di Ndinge said between clenched teeth. He glared at Ayrock. “I’ll be in Operations, then, if you need me.”
The Admiral stalked through the door and Ayrock watched it slide shut behind him before he let out a vociferous curse. Things were unravelling too fast. He was so close to ridding himself of the last possible obstacles and now Jameson has a meltdown?
What he really needed was a session alone with the President to reinforce the conditioning. Ten years was too long not to expect a few threads to fray at the edges. But that wasn’t possible: people like Di Ndinge would be watching far too closely for him to arrange that. He would just have to manage the way things were
.
At least he had Stark well in hand. Her people were still out there; but without her leadership, they wouldn’t be able to accomplish much.
* * *
“We’re at 10,000 meters,” the lander’s pilot announced, his words echoing through the cabin and in everyone’s helmet speakers. “Twenty minutes to target.”
“Tom,” McKay said on their private channel. “You’re a go.”
“Roger that, sir,” Tom Crossman replied, unbuckling from his acceleration couch. He turned to one of the corporals from his team. “Andersen, you’re with me.”
Tom worked quickly, pulling on his equipment and checking Corporal Andersen’s at the same time, but he took a moment to switch to McKay’s private channel.
“I don’t like running out on you, sir,” he told the General, his voice tight with barely suppressed anger. He knew McKay had picked him for this assignment because he had a family…but he wasn’t angry with the General. He was angry because he was lying. He was glad he’d been selected, and he hated himself for it.
“This needs to be done if any of us are going to get out of this alive, Tom,” McKay told him. There was a pause and Tom knew that the other man was smiling, even if he couldn’t see him. “Your kids need a father,” he said quietly. “And Shannon’s going to need your help.”
“Yes, sir,” was all Tom trusted himself to say in reply. He gave Andersen’s chute one last check, then slapped the man on the shoulder. “We’re ready.”
“Prepare to deploy jumpers,” McKay instructed the pilot. “We’ve got to do this right on the edge of our descent turn, to avoid detection.”
“Aye, sir,” the officer said crisply, but Tom knew the man was thinking, “I know how to do my job.” And he did, but even if the pilot knew what he was doing and had the orders down, you had to make sure everyone that might have to take over for him in an emergency heard them as well. “Depressurization in ten seconds. All hands strapped in and seals tight.”