Suicide Mission: Unity War Book 2

by C. G. Michaels

  “I found our pistols,” Garner said, “and a few grenades. A bit of rope. But that’s it. You?”

  “Packs an’ knives. Here.” He tossed a pack and a sheathed knife to Garner. “What’d they do with our MREs?”

  “Maybe they fed them to some prisoners. Looks like we’ll be going hungry for a while.”

  Fault didn’t like the sound of that. His belly already hurt, he was so hungry, and his throat was parched—the aliens hadn’t bothered to feed or water him the whole time he’d been here. He was beginning to wonder what the regular prisoners existed on.

  Garner must have noticed his expression, because he said, “I know. But it can’t be helped. We don’t have time to search for the food stores right now; we’ve got to get out of here before they notice we’re missing.”

  “Yeah, okay.” He snatched a couple of the grenades from Garner and fastened them to his belt. “Let’s go.”

  But when they stepped out the door, they found the guard standing on wobbly legs. He was facing the other way, but he couldn’t miss Jaden, who stood on guard only a few meters away.

  Fault drew his knife just as the guard shouted for help. He wrapped an arm around the alien’s chest and slit its throat, causing a gush of blood to burble over his sleeve, and the Snapper’s shout died with it—but too late. Its voice, though weak, had alerted others, and they were already headed in this direction, smallish figures in the distance, coming rapidly closer.

  Garner stuck his thumb and middle finger between his teeth and whistled sharply, alerting both Jaden and An, who met them as they made a path towards the barbed wire fence and the rock formation that lay about a mile to the east of the farm. They headed for the gate, which opened up onto a dirt and gravel road, and which was guarded by a sole Turtle, who saw them coming and raised its rifle to its shoulder. Expecting this, the team had already drawn their pistols, and Jaden struck the alien in the middle of its broad chest, creating a blistering, blackening hole. An blasted the gate controls, and the gate popped open, allowing them to slip through to the road, which they left shortly, in favor of wilder country and the collection of rocks. Despite their injuries, they kept up a strong pace the whole way, outdistancing the slower Snappers, who they already had a lead on. By the time they reached the outcrop, Fault could no longer see their pursuers, but he had no illusions they wouldn’t be far behind for long, and with a truck and plenty of weapons.

  The four of them fanned out automatically, giving themselves the best opportunity for locating adequate shelter—and a proper hiding place. The rocks stuck up and lay low at turns, hiding behind each other, and they had all sorts of crevasses and cracks that might be large enough to hide at least one person. And now that their boots no longer had sand beneath them, the team’s footprints were well concealed.

  “Over here,” Garner said, and the rest of them followed his lead. Ducking behind a bigger outcropping was a shy-looking cave, nearly invisible in the dark.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  On the alien planet

  Caves, Garner knew, maintained a consistent temperature level throughout the year, being much cooler in the summer months than their surroundings, and warmer in the winter; this cave proved no exception. Night had fallen, leaving the desert cool, almost cold. The cave warmed them a little, bringing a small comfort to their tired bodies.

  They could see the human slave farm from the cave opening: lights shone from the cell block, illuminating the farm and a bit of the surrounding area. To make sure they themselves wouldn’t be seen by Snapper guards, they moved back into the cave, searching for a spot out of the view of binoculars and agreeable enough to hole up in for a short while.

  The cave rested on the top of a tall hill, and the mouth sloped down away from the crest of that hill. When they moved deeper in, they also went further down; in this way, they were able to keep the opening of the cave in sight while remaining out of view themselves. Very little light came in this far, and that light was only starlight and moonlight; so they used An’s flashlight when they had to, though they did this as sparingly as possible, to preserve the batteries.

  When they’d had a bite to eat and some water—which they’d have to find more of soon—they brought each other up to speed on what they’d all discovered during their time apart.

  “There are other farms,” An said. “I’ve seen two with alien slaves.”

  “Nice to know they treat their own people as badly as they do us,” Jaden said dryly.

  An shook his head. “Not just Snapper slaves. Other aliens.”

  “Shit, you mean there’s something else out there?” asked Fault.

  “Not just one something, several. I lost count of how many different types I saw. I guess the Turtles have made a living out of conquering other races.”

  “Shit.”

  “Bastards.” Jaden wore a dark expression. Her nose and mouth had bruised and swollen where the alien guard had struck her with its boot. Garner wanted to kick them all in the nuts. If they had nuts.

  “Where are these farms, the ones with the alien slaves?” Jaden asked now.

  “One’s about five miles from here, due north,” An said. “The other one abuts the human slave farm. It’s right behind it.”

  “Well, damn,” Fault said. “Why don’t we just go over there, capture one of the Snapper slaves, an’ interrogate it? We could find out all sortsa shit.”

  “Yeah, because sneaking in and out of a slave compound is so easy,” Jaden said.

  “I got you guys out,” An said. “I bet I could do it again.”

  Jaden made to protest again, but Garner spoke first. “One of the biggest advantages the aliens have over us is information. An, are you sure you can do this?”

  “I’m a Star Force pilot, aren’t I? Hoo-yah, as the Marines would say.”

  “We need a battle cry,” Fault said.

  “What we need is some common sense in this conversation,” Jaden said. “How do you expect to kidnap a Snapper by yourself, even if it is a slave? What if it fights back? What if the guards see you? What if—?”

  “He won’t be by himself,” Garner said. “Fault will go with him. They’ll have guns, grenades, and knives. You and I will go to the hangar I saw on the way to the slave compound. We’ll find our ships and figure out a way to steal them back so we can get back to Colonial space. Once we have the ships, we can get out of here.”

  “What about her?”

  Garner didn’t have to ask who the her in Jaden’s question was. “I don’t know where Ilana is,” he said, and felt miserable admitting it. “For all I know she’s on the other side of the planet, or on a different planet altogether. It was a mistake to come here unprepared. I should’ve let Captain Stephenson handle it. Fault was right: it’s because of me you’re all here. You’re paying for my mistake.”

  “Garner,” Jaden said hesitantly, “Ilana might be here. There was another Galapagos survivor in the slave compound. He told me he’d seen Ilana on the farm, but that they took her away somewhere.”

  Garner’s throat had gone dry. “Where?”

  “I don’t know. He didn’t know. To another cell block on this continent, he thought, but that could be anywhere.”

  Something sank inside him. To know she was here—somewhere—but to not know where . . . that was torture. He knew now that they would hurt her, as they hurt all their prisoners; and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to stop it.

  Jaden put a hand on his arm. “The Colonies won’t stand for this. They’ll come to free the prisoners, and Ilana will be one of them. You’ve done what you can for her. Now we have to get back and report what we’ve seen.

  “Fault and An can find a Turtle slave and question it, maybe find out more about Ilana or the other Galapagos survivors. We’ll get the ships back.

  “We’ll find her. Someone will find her.”

  He wanted—he needed—to believe it. But he couldn’t bring himself to go to the effort.

  “I suggest we go at f
irst light,” An said. “It’ll still be cool at that hour, and none of us has had much sleep. I’m about to collapse.”

  They all agreed readily to this. Garner volunteered to act as lookout; he couldn’t even think about sleep right now.

  “Wake me when you get tired,” An said. “We’ll all take turns.”

  Garner nodded agreement and moved to the cave opening. He had a Beretta and his knife.

  He tried to blend into the rock; the mouth of the cave lay behind him, so he thought he would look like just another shadow, but it didn’t hurt to take precautions. He had An’s night vision goggles on; they turned everything green, including the stars. The sounds of the desert night came to him, more prevalent than they had been a few miles from here, where he had first found water. There he had heard mostly silence, and the occasional call of a night bird. Now all manner of strange sounds came to him: hoarse, simian-like cries; the song of a bird, lonely and desolate; and the howl of some kind of mammal. None of it sounded friendly, and none of it sounded like home.

  He felt exposed despite the darkness, standing there with the desert before him and the open cave at his back. He longed for the security of a warship, or, barring that, at least a house or building. He saw shadows. They moved, either because of the growing breeze, or because they were more than shadows. One large shape in particular he had his eye on, because it looked close and seemed darker than the rest.

  Then the shadow gave a call that chilled his spine. Garner sighted it, hoping to get off a clean shot, but the shape melded into the darkness before he could pull the trigger. It spooked him; he kept glancing around for signs of further activity, thinking that at any moment it would appear again. He couldn’t stop thinking about the weird call it had given.

  He had just started to relax again when the shape materialized out of the shadows next to him, lurching in his direction and giving that eerie call again. Roughly the size of a brown bear, the animal had short, coarse, light-colored fur and powerful, muscular limbs. It had a long muzzle filled with sharp teeth, and long, curved, razor-sharp claws that would be good for digging as well as hunting. It had oddly opaque eyes, black in the night vision goggles. Its pointed ears were large, the better to disperse the desert heat. The creature had gigantic, curving horns and a face plate on its forehead—bone, Garner thought.

  He had just enough time to take all this in before the thing swung at him. On instinct, he dodged the blow, but went stumbling backwards into the cave. He was about to shout out a warning to the others, but he heard them stirring already, heading in his direction, alerted by the nearness of the beast’s cry.

  The creature advanced. Garner fired off a shot, but the animal knocked his hand aside, ruining the shot. Pain jolted up his elbow and arm, and the gun went skittering across the cave floor.

  “Garner, get out of the way!” Jaden’s voice. She and the others had their pistols out, but couldn’t get a clear shot.

  Fuck. The only other weapon Garner had on him was his knife, and this creature’s hide looked too thick for a knife to penetrate very easily. Garner continued to retreat, and now his boot struck something—a rock, a stalagmite—and he went down on his backside.

  His error had a positive effect: Jaden could take the shot. The laser struck the creature in the shoulder, and it rose up on its hind legs and gave a terrific howl, more anger than pain. From Garner’s position on the cave floor the animal looked enormous. Its mouth opened wide, revealing the sharp, deadly teeth.

  “Dammit,” Jaden said, “I can’t see! An, turn on your flashlight, for God’s sake!”

  The light came instantly on, and sought out the creature. This seemed to further enrage it, and it pushed past Garner to get to the others. An shot and missed. Jaden shot again, but hastily; she hit the beast in the face plate, and the laser didn’t fully penetrate the creature’s skull. Instead it left a simmering black dent.

  Garner got up and picked up the rock he’d tripped on, and threw it at the animal. It didn’t even earn the creature’s notice.

  The creature knocked Jaden down, and once more a gun went flying. The beam of An’s flashlight went wild as he searched for the lost pistols, but Garner was far more interested in Jaden. The beast had straddled her, preparing to maul her with its massive horns; but it had set its paws too wide, allowing her plenty of wiggle room. She slid underneath it, away from the reach of the curving horns or the creature’s gaping maw.

  The animal growled in frustration, lifting its head to see who else it could release its anger on. That was when Fault pounded the creature hard on the nose with his metal fist. The beast gave a kind of injured snort, then got off of Jaden and made its way out of the cave.

  “I found the guns!” An, who had gone off into the depths of the cave in search of the pistols, now saw that the creature had gone. “Damn, what happened?”

  Fault helped Jaden up. She rubbed her shoulder where the creature had hit her, wincing.

  “You okay?” Garner asked.

  She nodded. “Bruises, that’s all.” She looked to Fault. “Thanks.”

  He gave a curt nod. But Garner didn’t miss the satisfaction in his eyes.

  “Everybody relatively intact?” An asked. “Garner?”

  “I’m fine.” He took the gun. “Keep the flashlight handy.”

  “Hey, I can take over for you.”

  “I’m fine.” Garner resumed his post. He looked for the creature, but it had gone; all that remained were tracks.

  Hours passed. During that time, Garner took note of a number of alien patrols sweeping the immediate area in search of the escaped prisoners. None of the patrols came their way, however, and so the rest of the night went by without incident.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  On the alien planet

  Fault accepted the binoculars An handed him, and surveyed the alien farm from where he and An lay, their bodies covered with scrub to camouflage them if any Snappers happened to glance their way. Odd-looking beings bent their backs in the glaring sun to gather ripening, baseball-sized red vegetables—or maybe they were fruits—off the vine, the same sort of thing the human slaves were doing on the other side of the fence. Fault was struck by the variety of the aliens present; he saw red furred ones, humanoids that bore either fanciful skin patterns or intricate tattoos, orange-colored lizard-like creatures, and more. He was fascinated by both their diversity and by the fact that humans shared the universe with so many different life forms, yet had remained totally ignorant of any of them until the Snappers had invaded their skies. Were they all as vicious, as ruthless, as the Snappers, or would some of these creatures one day befriend Earth and her Colonies?

  He forced himself to stop gawking and take in the details of the camp. “Looks like it’s set up the same way as the human slave camp,” he said.

  “Yeah. We’ll dig under the fence again, over there—That’ll get us closer to the prisoners.”

  Fault nodded. They’d have to watch out for guards, of course, but the Snappers maintained a regular patrol, each of them walking a specific area—there were times when a particular group of prisoners was left temporarily unguarded. So if he and An could slip in during one of those intervals, they might be able to snatch someone.

  “I guess it goes without saying that we’ll take one of the Snappers,” An said. “Seeing as we don’t know what language any of the rest of them speaks.”

  “Right.” He hadn’t thought of that, actually; he’d been too busy thinking how amazing it would be to talk to one of these other species, see what they knew about the Turtles and why they were at odds with each other, or if they were as clueless as the humans.

  He and An worked their way down to the barbed wire fence, in a place where none of the guards patrolled and from which they could easily get to a captive. Fault belly-crawled along the edge of the fence, looking for a weak spot. It didn’t take too long to find a spot where the ground dipped down slightly beneath the fence, and he used his knife to dig out the little bit of w
eeds that were growing there, then scraped enough layers of dirt away so that he and An could wriggle under.

  Which they did, each of them holding up the lowest strand of barbed wire as the other squirmed underneath, to make sure it didn’t catch on their clothes. It was a tight fit—Fault hadn’t given them any room to spare—and Fault’s ribs and back complained the whole time, but they made it through and crouched on the other side of the fence in the scrub to peer out at the slaves and their captors.

  Fault had watched the guards long enough to know when they patrolled and when they briefly left an area, and the minute he saw the nearest guard leave his post, he and An began crawling through the rows of vegetable vines towards the Snapper prisoner they’d selected as their target.

  When they popped up beside the slave, one of the red-furred aliens produced a startled sort of sound, but the Snapper said nothing, allowing itself to be led—at knife-point—through the vines, under the fence, and into the surrounding wood. From this vantage point, they could see the farm, but only in snatches unless they pushed aside some of the thick greenery shielding them. They were also far enough away from either of the camps that no one would overhear them, even if they spoke in normal tones, which, for the most part, they didn’t, preferring to err on the side of caution.

  Fault kept hold of one of the alien’s reedy arms and brandished his knife at it, encouraging cooperation. “What’s goin’ on here?” he asked. “What is this place?”

  Apparently being forced into hard labor by its own species had loosened the captive’s tongue, because it spoke freely: “We are prisoners here,” it said in its own blurry-sounding language. “Slaves to the Overlords, who conquer all.”

  “ ‘Overlords?’ Who are they?”

  “We don’t have time for that,” An said. He had the Snapper by its other arm, pinning it behind its broad back.