by Ryan Krauter
“Velk is by a table in the middle. Two at the door on each side, the other against the right wall as you enter, Halley.”
Loren reached into his goodie bag and pulled out his SSK. If he was going to get into a firefight, or possibly worse, he was going to do it using a Confederation weapon, not a Priman one. He took the Priman gun from his belt holster and put it in the bag, just in case he needed it for disguise later.
“Halley, you’ll go first,” Roxis ordered. “Go out of your room, turn right, and go left around the corner at the end of the corridor. Go through the first door on your left. “Loren, I’ll send you a couple seconds later to meet up just as she’s getting to the door. You go five doors down to the right of your room. Go through that fifth door, and you’ll end up following Halley and Web in. Hang on a minute, two guards on patrol, you’ll be clear in a bit.”
Loren hated the waiting. It gave him more time to think about all the ways this could go wrong. He’d rather just get on with it.
“Halley, get ready to go on my mark.” Loren held his breath as he listened to Roxis, who had turned out to be a surprisingly capable mission controller. “Go.”
Loren tensed, felt a trickle of sweat run annoyingly down his forehead.
“XO, go.”
Loren swung out of the doorway and headed down the hall towards the interrogation room. He could see Halley rounding the corner and moving towards him, SSK held ahead of her at eye level in a two handed stance. She was completely in the zone, feet gliding across the floor as she kept one eye down the sights of her gun and the other on her target. Web was two steps behind at the same pace, SSK at high guard so he wasn’t sweeping her with his barrel in the close confines of the hallway.
He picked up the pace so he would arrive on Web’s heels, and the action started. Halley burst through the door with Web right behind. She went left, Web went right, and Loren covered the middle.
Halley landed a vicious strike to the throat of the Priman by her, Web cracked his in the temple with the butt of his SSK, and Loren walked right up to the third guard with his SSK pointed right at his face. The guard was caught for a split second between surprise, fear, and concern for Velk, and his hesitation cost him as Halley charged up and dealt him a blow that rendered him unconscious.
Web was on top of Velk, but the former Commander wasn’t going to go down without a fight. He was large for a Priman, and despite Loren’s guess of middle age or better, the man was in top physical form. He attempted a measured jab at Web, who dodged out of the way and then set his feet, ready for a fight. Halley appeared to his rear, and he slid back across the floor in a low stance to close the gap with her so he could lash out with a closed fist at where her jaw had been a second earlier. Only her accelerated reflexes kept her from losing teeth. Loren, not the physical fighter the other two were, still saw his chance, and attempted a roundhouse kick to the Priman’s gut. Velk used a two handed block on Loren, but that gave Web the chance to get in close and land several blows to Velk’s head and kidneys. Halley followed up with a kidney shot from behind, then kicked him in the back of the knee, taking him off balance and partially collapsing his stance. A second later, Web and Halley had him on the ground, though it took both of them pummeling him into submission so they could place their cuffs on him.
Loren took the chance to burst through the connecting door into the interrogation room where the Talaran captain, Lazaf, sat bound to his chair. He had been mildly roughed up, but was none the worse for wear. He looked half asleep. It seemed likely, as an effective interrogation technique often relied on the disorientation that came with sleep deprivation.
It took him a few seconds to realize Loren was in the room. He shook his head, a disbelieving look on his face. “XO?” he asked in surprise, though an air of understandable suspicion hung over him.
“Aren’t you happy to see me, Captain Lazaf?” Loren asked with a quick smirk. “Can’t say too much right now, but we were in the neighborhood when we saw you were here. Care to leave with us?”
“Hell, I can go see the Primans any time,” he replied gratefully. “Let’s get out of here.”
Loren got out a small knife and snapped the blade into place. He cut Lazaf’s bindings on one wrist, then handed him the knife so he could finish. “I’ll be in the next room with our prize.” Loren quickly dashed through the doorway and back to help Halley and Web.
He arrived to see Velk in cuffs, standing tall and as proud as his newly bruised face would allow. He strode up to the Priman and addressed him.
“Representative Velk, nice to meet you.”
Velk looked at him, a hint of surprise in his eyes.
“And who are you, invader of our territory? Confederation, Talaran?”
“Actually,” Loren said lightly, “you do know this is Enkarran territory? Funny you accuse us of invading, while you occupy a conquered system.”
“We needed a place to live. The Enkarrans would have been properly compensated once our position was secure, but this galaxy is ours to do with as we see fit.”
Loren was about to go on, but Halley grabbed his shoulder. “We don’t have time for a debate right now,” she told Loren. “Chat him up on the ship, but for now, we need to go.”
It was at that moment Lazaf walked through the door, shedding the last of his restraints and dropping them on the floor. He looked at Velk, and a wicked grin grew on his face. “Not so fun when the positions are reversed, are they?”
“We are adversaries,” Velk stated simply. “We live the roles we are placed in. Our role is to show you how an entire galaxy can be brought to order, if only you’d accept your place in it.”
“And our role is to tell you to stuff it,” replied Web.
“How eloquent,” replied Velk, deadpan.
“I felt honesty was better than a polished delivery,” added Web.
“Alright,” said Halley. “Playtime’s over.” She tapped her Priman earbud and waited for Roxis to reply. “Ensign, we have both items. Lead us out of here.”
Loren heard the voice of Ensign Roxis on his earbud. “Standby. There’s another guard detail in the hallway.” There was a moment of silence, and then they heard his voice again, this time with a little more urgency. “Um, it looks like something’s going on,” he said suddenly. “I see increased guard activity, and some of the checkpoints are either closed or have details posted on them. Also,” he stopped suddenly. “Damn! They cut me out of the network. I can’t tell if they know about us, or if this is just a lockdown procedure, but it looks like there was some sort of silent alarm. Did anybody do anything in there?”
All eyes turned to Velk. Halley grabbed his uniform by the chest and roughly pushed him against the wall. She gave him a pat-down, finding a small device strapped to his wrist. She removed it and examined the screen.
“Some sort of personal alarm,” she muttered as she looked more closely. “Looks like he didn’t have time to hit the panic button, but his circuit was open long enough to trigger some sort of response.”
She stared daggers at Velk, who stared back defiantly.
“You would expect me to do nothing to resist your efforts?”
“Oh, I’d be disappointed if you didn’t,” replied Halley, impressed in a perverse way that he had managed to do it while fighting all three of them a minute ago. “It just complicates things.”
“A lot,” they heard Roxis interject over the comms. “I still have my floorplans and I can see you as long as your comms are active, but I can’t see the status of anything else. We’re flying blind, as you pilots say.”
“Best guess; which way do we start?” asked Halley.
“Leave the room, go left to the end of the corridor, then take it right and I’ll give you more info there. That’s taking you through some maintenance spaces. It looked like they were moving troops to cover the hangars…” his voice trailed off as he realized the implication of what he’d just said. “What if they head to our ship? Do I start shooting, hide, someth
ing else?”
“Hide,” Halley replied. “If you cause problems, they could take you out without much risk to themselves. Let them think everyone’s inside the base. If you have to hide, make sure you tell us first.”
“You’ll be the first to know,” Roxis stated confidently.
Chapter 13
They walked down the corridor at the same fast pace Halley had kept up on the way into the interrogation room. She led, with Web behind, then Velk with Captain Lazaf in charge of him. Loren brought up the rear.
The first corner went easily; soon after that after that it became less easy. With the voice of Roxis in their ears, they followed his instructions and made their way through the base. Since their path was different than it had been on the way in, Loren was rapidly losing any idea of where they were. Suddenly, they rounded a corner and saw two Priman troops manning a cross corridor halfway down the hall. Halley and Web each dropped one with quick double taps, not slowing their pace in the least. Velk tried, but got a vicious jab in the back from Lazaf for his efforts.
The next turn led to the same results- Halley and Web took down two more. They reached another cross corridor, and Halley prompted Roxis for directions.
“Left is quicker but goes through narrow corridors like you’re in, right takes longer but goes through larger spaces. Your choice.”
At that moment, a door opened and four Primans dashed out of the doorway, weapons blazing. All the Confeds ducked into whatever spaces they could find as blaster bolts popped and scarred the walls around them.
“Looks like we go right!” yelled Halley over the commotion. “Loren, you go first; we’ll go in that order and Web and I will bring up the rear.”
In no position to argue, Loren nodded and dove across the hall into the alcove which held the door Roxis had directed them to. He slapped the wall plate and the door swooshed open, revealing a large storage area. It looked to be two stories high, with rows of tall metal shelves loaded down with various parts, boxes, crates, and machine components in various states of repair. The good news was that it was deserted.
“Clear!” Loren yelled through the open doorway, and he raced fifteen or twenty feet to the end of the aisle to get a better look at potential routes.
Lazaf came through, pulling Velk by the rear of his uniform, followed by Web and finally Halley. The SAR woman stayed at the door, peering around the doorframe just enough to trigger off bursts of shots from her SSK at the pursuing Priman troops.
“Roxis!” Loren yelled as he tapped his earbud. “What now?”
“Head all the way across the room, away from the wall you entered. There’s the main hangar where you planted the explosives, then a maintenance area with exterior access, a galley area and then a hall right to where the ship is parked.”
“Yeah, no problem,” Loren said sarcastically.
Web came trotting up to Loren’s position and waited for a briefing. He knew Loren well enough to know that the XO had something planned.
“Ok Web, we’ll start by stacking up on that far wall,” he pointed in the direction Roxis had told him to go. “From there, it’s practically the next room over.”
“That bad, huh?” Web said, then took off at a jog for the wall.
“Get ready to move!” they heard Halley yell, and Loren obliged by pointing Captain Lazaf towards Web’s moving figure. Lazaf had been saddled with riding herd over Velk, a job he took in stride and seemed to enjoy, as evidenced by the jab he gave Velk to get him moving.
Halley ducked into the room, letting the door close behind her. She then smashed the wall plate with the butt of her SSK.
“I hope Roxis had a plan,” she said as she slammed a new magazine of armor piercing rounds home into the pistol. “I couldn’t hear anything over the gunfire.”
“We go that way,” Loren briefed, “through three areas and then to the ship.”
They quick-timed it over to the wall and stacked up on each side as Loren had ordered Web. Web and Halley took point, and on cue, opened the door and stormed through into the hangar. Loren immediately heard gunfire. He had no idea how big the place was, since he hadn’t been the one to plant the explosive charge in there, but he couldn’t spare the time to wonder about that as he ran through the doorway and covered the middle sector.
To his left, Halley had downed a pair of soldiers, while Web had let one unarmed mechanic run away. He looked at Loren, who had a clear sector, and simply said, “What? Not like he was shooting at us. Besides, they already know we’re here.”
“No arguments, Web, you’re doing great,” was all Loren could manage. He did see someone pop up in his field of view finally. It was one of several doors along the far wall of the hangar, and it opened to reveal a pair of armed guards. They saw him and raised their rifles, and Loren caught one with a single aimed shot before the other could fire his way. At this range, he wasn’t going to acquire again in time to be effective, and with ammo a big concern, he elected to simply duck behind cover and let the Priman take his shot. The man was silenced by a blast from Web’s SSK a second later.
Loren took a second to examine the hangar bay in detail. There were three doors along the far wall where they needed to get to. “Roxis,” Loren commanded over the comms, “there are three doors ahead. Which one do we take?”
“Far right,” was the prompt reply.
“Follow me,” Halley said, and started walking quickly but smoothly for the indicated door, SSK outstretched, elbows slightly bent in her preferred two handed grip. Everyone followed obediently. As they approached the door, Halley stepped through and immediately double-tapped an unseen victim down the corridor. She proceeded a few steps and was in the maintenance area. It was a large space, as big as the hangar itself, and lined with benches where equipment was in various states of assembly. Storage shelves lined the interior walls, and there was an airlock on the exterior wall, which featured several large banks of viewports. It was well lit and offered cover that they’d need as they made their way to the other side.
The others followed, piling into the room and closing the door behind them. Following Halley’s lead, Loren smashed the wall plate with the butt of his SSK the same way she’d done earlier.
“Problem,” Halley said simply as she looked around. “We have an exterior access point on the left wall they can use to get to us. Hell, they could open it and vent this compartment to space if they’re smart. There’s another door halfway down the right side wall where they can gain access. We need to get across this room ASAP.”
“No arguments from me,” Loren said, and started walking to the far wall. He’d only taken five or six steps when all hell broke loose. The door on the right wall Halley had warned them about opened, and a half dozen troops poured in. They must not have been expecting to find the Confeds, because they stopped short when they saw Loren standing alone in the middle of the room. He aimed and fired three times, knocking down two and winging one, before he was forced to dive to the floor under withering fire from their assault rifles. The volume of fire that the bigger weapons could put out gave the Primans a huge advantage.
Web lunged forward, trying to get as close to Loren as possible so that there wouldn’t be a large gap in the Confed’s lines. Velk took the opportunity and gave Lazaf an elbow in the gut, then turned and made to run. This brought him face to face with Halley, and she was already swinging. She landed an open handed palm strike to his nose, breaking it and sending blood gushing down his face as he crumpled to the floor.
“And let that be a lesson to you,” Web yelled over the increasingly deafening gunfire. Halley gave him a quick smile, then made sure Lazaf was alright before moving to the end of their line to anchor it.
“Roxis,” Loren said for his earbud. “Detonate the hangar bay. We’re through into the maintenance space, and they’re behind us in the bay.”
“You sure, Commander?” Roxis hesitated. “I don’t know if their bulkheads will contain the explosion.”
“Torch it, or w
e’re humped anyway!”
“Fire in the hole!” was what Loren heard by way of reply, followed by a muffled whump from the direction of the hangar bay behind them. The base shook, and the lights flickered. Loren hoped that was the end of the troops behind them.
He renewed his efforts to crawl forward towards the door that lead to their salvation, and indirectly that of everyone on Toral. That alone would have been enough to make him face an army of Primans. Bits of shrapnel and debris flew through the air; sometimes hot pieces of metal landed on his neck and hands as he crawled through the rows of worktables. He took the occasional potshot over the tabletop to encourage the Primans to not move too much. As he looked behind him, he saw the rest of his team dragging themselves across the ground to follow his lead.
He had switched to energy rounds now that they were in a space where a stray armor-piercer could potentially poke a hole in the exterior wall or viewport and kill them all. He noticed the Primans had done the same, even as their numbers increased. He counted an even dozen now, and was starting to get very nervous. Finally, they were close enough to the door to feel freedom. Halley rolled over and took the lead, standing up in the small alcove that the door was built into. She hit the switch that should have opened it, but nothing happened. She hit it again, this time with more force, but nothing happened.
“Roxis,” Loren yelled over the din. “I think our door to the galley is locked out.”
He heard Roxis cursing softly as he worked frantically at the computer in the ship. The fact that he was still there operating was the one bright moment in the last few minutes; the Primans hadn’t gone searching the docked Keeper ships, so at least they could call on Roxis for some support.
“I think I can bypass. It might take a minute.”
“No rush, but we’ll all be dead or captured by then.”
“Right.”
Loren steeled himself for the time he’d have to buy Roxis. If he needed a minute, Loren would get him one. He scooted to the end of the table they were hiding behind, checked the charge in his blaster’s energy pack, leaned around the corner, and opened fire until the Priman counterfire drove him back. Web then popped his head up from close to Halley’s position and sent a few more blasts downrange. Nobody was scoring hits anymore, but they had to spend the ammo to keep the Primans in check so they didn’t rush their position.