by Marko Kloos
“That would utterly break my heart,” Sergeant Fallon says in a low voice, and I nod solemnly.
“Can we expect backup if things go to shit, sir?” Lieutenant Wolfe asks.
Major Masoud shakes his head.
“We’ll be a long way from anyone else. The transition alone takes over twenty-four hours. I can’t imagine a tactical situation where we’d have time to send for help and wait for a task force to make it through. We will be on our own, and we’ll only have what we bring along.”
“Another day at the office for SOCOM,” Captain Hart says. He looks like the briefing details are boring him a little. I’m sure that’s an impression he wants to cultivate among us junior ranks from lesser branches.
“Any more questions?” Major Masoud asks.
Some of the other people in the room have a few. I listen and make mental notes as Major Masoud answers inquiries about logistics and rules of engagement. Sergeant Fallon watches me as I make notes on the scuffed screen of my battered little PDP.
“What are your thoughts?” I ask her.
“My thoughts,” she repeats and scratches the back of her head. “My thoughts are that I am way out of my element any which way I turn out here. But I will tell you this. I know staff officers, and I know bullshit when it comes out of their mouths.”
I look up and make sure Major Masoud didn’t overhear this statement, but he’s in the middle of answering a question, and the people in the chairs in front of us are having their own low-volume conversation.
“Which part was bullshit?” I ask.
“Can’t quite put my finger on it,” she says. “But if he has told us half of what’s in those holds and what he plans to do with it, I’ll eat a drop ship with a big side of noodles.”
When the questions from the group cease, Major Masoud wipes the information on the screen behind him and resets the display to the holographic image of the ship’s logo.
“This concludes the initial mission briefing. We will have a post-transition briefing once we have assessed the situation in the target system. In the meantime, prepare for combat transition. All personnel will be in battle armor prior to Alcubierre. All unit heads, report readiness to me by 1400. Dismissed.”
We get out of our chairs and file out of the briefing room. On the way out, I rejoin Halley, who is at the tail end of her group of drop ship pilots.
“What do you think?” I ask her.
“Deep-space recon with experimental hardware,” she says. “Going into a system that’s further away from Earth than anywhere we’ve ever been. No backup, and a ship full of SOCOM toys and SOCOM troops.” She drops her voice a little. “Right now I can’t decide whether to be scared out of my mind or piss myself with excitement. Probably a little of both.”
Behind us, Sergeant Fallon rasps out an amused little cough.
CHAPTER 17
“All hands, combat stations. I repeat: all hands, combat stations. Alcubierre transition in t-minus thirty.”
After the most tedious Alcubierre trip I’ve ever had to suffer through, Task Force Rogue transitions into the Leonidas system like a pair of thieves slipping into a dark alleyway. We pop back into normal space at slow speed and under full EMCON. I’m in Portsmouth’s ops center, along with Dmitry and most of the other officers except for the pilots, who are strapped into the seats of their respective drop ships and attack boats in the hangar modules.
“Transition complete. Give me a passive sensor sweep,” Portsmouth’s skipper orders. He’s a lieutenant colonel named Boateng, a tall black man with a graying regulation haircut and a close-cropped beard. The holographic display in the middle of the room pops into life silently. The blue lozenge-shaped icon in the dead center is labeled AOE-1 PORTSMOUTH. Right next to it, so close at the current magnification scale that the icons almost seem to be touching, is the blue lozenge representing FFG-480 BERLIN, where Lieutenant Colonel Renner is undoubtedly running her own sensor sweep of the neighborhood.
We wait as the sensor arrays on Portsmouth search the area for traces of activity—optical, infrared, gamma radiation, radio waves. With every sensor sweep, I expect a cluster of nearby threats to pop up on the holotable any second—a welcoming committee of advanced frigates, or a space control cruiser, or a nuclear minefield surrounding the Alcubierre transition point. A few minutes later, however, the plot is still blank except for Portsmouth and Berlin.
“Neighborhood is clear, sir,” the tactical officer says. “No activity out to at least ten thousand klicks.”
“Keep scanning,” Lieutenant Colonel Boateng orders. “Contact Berlin on low-power near-field comms and request data link.”
“Aye, sir.”
A few moments later, the holotable updates and the scan range increases as the data link goes active and Berlin adds the feed from her superior sensor suite to the tactical situation display.
“Astrogation, let’s have a fix, please.”
Five minutes pass, then ten, without anyone springing a trap on us. The holographic orb of the tactical display remains blank except for our own two ships. Finally, Portsmouth’s skipper is satisfied that the transition point is safe for now.
“Berlin reports fuel reserves at eleven percent, sir. That’s with the emergency fuel.”
“Let’s clear the neighborhood and find a good spot to commence refueling ops,” Lieutenant Colonel Boateng says. “Another two hours in Alcubierre, and they would have run dry. I guess we found out how far a frigate can go on full deuterium stores.”
“Astrogation fix is in,” the astrogation officer says. “We are in the Leonidas system, two hundred million klicks from the parent star and just outside the debris disk.”
“1MC line,” the skipper orders, and picks up the handset.
“1MC open, sir.”
“Attention, all hands,” Lieutenant Colonel Boateng announces. “Welcome to the Leonidas system. We are still alive, and will remain so for the immediate future. Helmets off, but keep ’em close. Replenishment personnel, stand by for transfer operations.”
Next to the skipper, Major Masoud releases the seals for his own helmet and pulls it off his head, and I do likewise.
“Berlin Actual on near-field, sir,” the comms officer announces.
“On speaker,” the skipper orders.
“Aye, sir. Go ahead.”
“Looks like they didn’t set a tripwire,” Lieutenant Colonel Boateng says.
“As far as we know,” Lieutenant Colonel Renner replies. She sounds a little tired. “Let’s hope they’re not doing any long-range surveillance of the node. I’d hate to see a task force popping up on Tactical in a few hours.”
“Or worse, a flight of standoff nukes,” Portsmouth’s skipper says.
“My tanks are almost dry. I want to come alongside for a refuel ASAP. If we need to clear the neighborhood at high speed, I want to have full stores.”
“Affirmative. I propose we find a cozy nook somewhere on this side of the debris disk and give you a refill,” Lieutenant Colonel Boateng says.
“In the meantime, I’m launching the recon drones for a full sector scan,” Lieutenant Colonel Renner says. “I want to get a good picture of what’s out here before we move around too much and run face-first into a battle group.”
“Or a Lanky seed ship,” Lieutenant Colonel Boateng says, and my stomach does a little somersault at the thought.
Looking around in Portsmouth’s ops center, I am keenly aware that we are in hostile space in a ship that isn’t really a warship. Portsmouth lacks armor and weapons, except for a CIWS system to intercept incoming missiles. The ops center has no weapons officer station, and there are no SI troops guarding the door. Berlin is old and tired, but she’s a proper combat unit, and all things considered, I find myself wishing they had berthed my platoon on Berlin instead. If missiles and rail gun rounds start flying out here, this ship won’t be half as survivable as the frigate that’s keeping pace with us on our port side, no matter how many state-of-the-art drop shi
ps Portsmouth has tucked away in her mission pods.
Three uncomfortable hours later, we are slowly and silently coasting further into the Leonidas system, and Berlin is once again docked alongside Portsmouth for replenishment. The supply ship Burlington topped off the tanks on both Portsmouth and Berlin right before our transition, to make sure we got into the system with the maximum amount of reactor juice on board, but the twenty-four-hour Alcubierre run has taken its toll on Berlin’s fuel reserves. The tactical sphere above the holotable in Berlin’s ops center is expanding gradually as the recon drones from Berlin move away from our little task group, but so far, all they survey is empty space.
“Stand down from combat stations,” Lieutenant Colonel Boateng finally orders. The XO picks up the 1MC handset and makes the general announcement, and I can practically hear the chorus of relieved sighs all over the ship.
“Have your troops get out of armor for now and grab some showers and chow,” Major Masoud tells us. “But expect trouble to show up on short notice. This system shouldn’t be this quiet.”
“What’s the word from upstairs?” Sergeant Fallon asks when I walk back into the platoon pod.
“Dressed up for nothing, luckily,” I reply. “Everyone in their squad berths?”
“Armored and ready for go-time.”
“Let them ditch the hardshell and assemble on the quarterdeck, please.”
“Copy that.” Sergeant Fallon pops the release latches on her own armor on the way to the back of the pod.
Three minutes later, thirty-nine troopers are lined up in front of me on the quarterdeck and looking at me expectantly. I find that I’m still not used to this kind of attention, but the three tours I spent as a drill instructor supervisor at least gave me a lot of practice in addressing full platoons.
“As you’ve heard, we’re in the Leonidas system,” I say. “You are now officially the furthest-deployed Spaceborne Infantry troops in NAC history. Nobody’s ever been out this far except for the people we’re trying to track down.”
There’s some muted cheering, but most of the troops look apprehensive instead of excited, which is exactly how I would feel in their spot.
“We are in clear space for now, but that can change in a hurry. The recon drones are probing ahead, and we may have to jump back to alert status in very short order. We’ll step down just a little for now. Chow break, one squad at a time. Keep your armor close.”
Sergeant Fallon takes over to sort out the chow schedule, and I walk back to my own quarters to get rid of my armor. The battle armor is climate-controlled, but the environmental controls don’t kick in until the suit is fully sealed, and we’ve been riding out combat stations for the last few hours with our visors raised and the suit envos off, to save battery power for emergency use. The hardshell doesn’t breathe, and when I unfasten the armor modules and drop them on the floor in front of my bunk, the ballistic liner underneath is moist with sweat on the inside. When I peel it off, I can feel the warm air release that had been trapped between my body and the liner for hours now.
Having a private shower is an almost unimaginable luxury. I’ve had my own berths before, but never one that included a wet cell, even if it’s just a tiny little clamshell capsule. I clean the accumulated sweat from hours of standing around in armor, and conclude that being an officer does have a few decent perks after all.
Thirty minutes later, we are back in the briefing room on Portsmouth for the post-transition briefing. Freshly showered, and without the constant dull ache of the Alcubierre field pulling on my bones, I feel much more comfortable.
“They are here,” Major Masoud announces. “Wherever they are hiding, they are keeping very tight EMCON, but we know that they have set up refuge in this system.”
He brings up a tactical display on the holoscreen behind him. It’s a chart of the system, a distant yellow star and five planets in elliptical orbits around it. We are between the third and fourth star of the system, near the large debris disk that bisects the system on the ecliptic plane.
“As you can see, Leonidas has five planets. Only two of them are suitable for habitation, and three are gas planets. But all of the planets in this system have terraformable moons. Leonidas a has three, Leonidas b has two, and Leonidas c has seven. Leonidas d and e have one moon each. That means we have two planets and fourteen moons to scout for human activity, all without being discovered ourselves.”
I look over to Halley, who shakes her head slightly. We all know the logistics involved in scouting that many celestial bodies properly, and if we start flipping over rocks on every moon in this system, we’ll be busy for months.
“There’s no radio traffic out there, at least nothing loud enough to reach us out here. But our recon drones did sniff out something interesting in our neighborhood. A single source of occasional transmissions, right . . . here.”
Major Masoud rotates the map and zooms in to a section of it, not too far from where we transitioned into the system.
“There’s an asteroid field right here, half a million klicks off our current trajectory. And something in that field sent out a one-second encrypted burst transmission not too long after we arrived.”
He marks the location on the holographic map and zooms the map back out so the icons for Berlin and Portsmouth are back in the scale.
“We redirected two of the drones to make a closer pass. Visuals indicate it’s either a relay station or an observation outpost. They’re making directional transmissions every time the asteroid they’re on makes a full rotation and the station faces toward the interior of the system. It’s a low-power tight beam, really hard to pick up, but one of the drones caught it.”
Major Masoud opens another display square on the hologram behind him and flicks a grainy video feed onto it. It’s a maximum-magnification shot from a recon drone’s camera system—the craggy surface of an asteroid, and a clearly man-made structure protruding from it. It’s a low-slung cross-shaped structure, a central pod with four spokes projecting from it that connect to smaller pods on the ends of each spoke.
“That,” he says, “is where we’ll get the intel we need to save us having to comb through the system moon by moon.”
“Sir, they’ll see us coming and send for help,” Lieutenant Dorian interjects. “With all due respect, should we be advertising our presence in the system this early?”
“They’ll see Berlin coming,” Major Masoud replies. “They’ll certainly see Portsmouth coming, black paint or not.” He smiles sharply and nods at the corner of the briefing room where the drop ship pilots are sitting in a row together.
“But they won’t see a single Blackfly coming from the dark side of the asteroid they’re on.”
A general buzz of excitement goes through the briefing room. I look over to the pilots, and Halley and her fellow drop ship jocks are exchanging glances, undoubtedly already trying to figure out how to beat each other to the pilot seat for that particular run.
“Small installation like that, we can secure it with two SEAL teams, maybe three,” Captain Hart says. He sounds confident to the point of slight boredom, and I decide on the spot that I’ll probably never get around to liking him. But then Major Masoud shakes his head, and I see with some satisfaction that the captain’s little smirk disappears from the corners of his mouth.
“It’s an unarmed station. It may even be an automated relay. Either way, it’s a tiny outpost, and it doesn’t support more than a tech or two, if they have it staffed at all. The SI can take this one.”
He looks over to me.
“Lieutenant Grayson, I want you to get two squads from your platoon together and report mission readiness by 1730. One squad on the ground, one in reserve in case things go to shit. No point taking the entire platoon. You won’t be able to fit them all into that tiny little station anyway. You’ll be taking along one of the Fleet Neural Networks people to get the intel off the station once the place is secured.”
“Aye, sir,” I say, trying to hide
my surprise. I would have bet on Major Masoud picking someone from his pet SEAL platoon for a mission like this. The SI are trained for this sort of assault, of course, but this sort of cloak-and-dagger stuff is right in the center of the SEALs’ competencies. But I know better than to answer in any other way than the affirmative.
Major Masoud turns his attention to the pilot section.
“I want First Platoon’s drop ship warmed up and ready for skids-up at 1800. We are going to nudge Portsmouth’s course to match the asteroid’s rotation so you can launch and approach from the station’s blind spot. Berlin will provide overwatch from a distance. Any questions?”
“I’m not sure I’m comfortable with the amount of premission recon,” Halley says from the flight section. “Feels like we are rushing in.”
“We have to rush in, Captain,” Major Masoud replies. “For all we know, that outpost spotted us when we came out of Alcubierre. We need to assume they already know we are here. We need to grab what we need and go.”
“Understood,” Halley says, but I know her facial expressions, and I can tell she’s still not entirely happy with the situation.
“Let’s get to it,” Major Masoud says. “I want to be gone from this neighborhood before the big kids show up to give us a bloody nose.”
“Squad leaders, to me,” I call out when I get back to the platoon pod. My NCOs obey and come across the quarterdeck to where I’m standing.
“Gear up two squads,” I say, and look at the candidates: Philbrick, Wilsey, and Welch. I make my decision in a heartbeat.
“Gunny, suit up. You’re going in. Sergeant Wilsey, your squad will be backup. The rest can stay out of armor and stand by.”
Gunny Philbrick and Sergeant Wilsey both nod and walk back to the squad berths, this time with urgency in their steps.
“Am I coming?” Sergeant Fallon asks.
“I’d just as soon have you here and keep Sergeant Welch and Third Squad occupied. Do a CQB drill on the range. Have them go running on the concourse. Get their blood flowing a little.”