Mars Descent (Cladespace Book 2)

by Corey Ostman

  Wragg touched her shoulder.

  “They can’t get too far.” His voice was soft and calm. “Takes over an hour to reach the rim in any direction. Remember the accident—Gusev overrides all transport speed close to the base.”

  “Will they have something that can intercept the Scout?” she asked.

  “Easily,” the captain said, punctuating the optimistic word with a sarcastic grunt. “But we’ll need to convince them. That won’t be easy.”

  “Corruption?”

  Wragg smiled and shook his head.

  “No, not corruption. Worse than that.”

  “Luddites?”

  “Bureaucrats.”

  The mover circled the base of Gusev Spire, then decelerated and parked.

  They sprinted into the spire. It was crowded, unlike the tunnels of her morning walk. Grace panned across the large, open interior of blue and green. Hundreds of people? No, thousands. She broadcasted her protector credentials, but nobody seemed to notice. Few Gusev citizens wore ptendas, she realized.

  Grace turned to Wragg. “Where to now?”

  Wragg scanned the area.

  “They’ve moved things around,” he said. “Look for the security sign.”

  Grace surveyed the walls, but there were no signs. She opened her ptenda’s map and a section of the spire lit up.

  “Deeper in,” she said, pointing.

  They passed a bronze statue of a six-wheeled robot. The plaque read: Spirit, 26 Tula 209.

  They moved forward in the crowd. Grace checked Tim’s link circuit. Still active! Why hadn’t Raj contacted her? Why hadn’t Tim? She squashed the ball of tension in her gut as a bead of sweat ran down her forehead. She wiped it with her sleeve.

  There was a queue beneath a large sign marked SECURITY. Grace counted six ahead. She ground her teeth. Back home, a protector wouldn’t have waited in line. People would have moved out of the way.

  “This step is fairly efficient,” Wragg said. “It won’t take long.”

  Grace turned a skeptical eye toward the line. She remembered her first time waiting to enter Port Casper. It had seemed like an endless dance of credentials. Utterly alien to cloisterfolk.

  Hurry, she thought. Now!

  “Our cruiser has been stolen,” said Wragg, when they got to the desk ten minutes later. Grace noted his voice was matter-of-fact, though the content of the message was not.

  The young clerk put down his drink and stretched his fingers across the display surface, barely looking up. No eye contact.

  “Designation and number,” he said.

  “Mauritius class, mark two. Registered at Elysium Planitia as Charlie-two-three-nine-nine,” Wragg said.

  Grace looked back at Richard. He stood still, though she noticed his fingers tapping nervously at his side. She reached over and placed a hand on his shoulder. He smiled feebly, but she noticed his fingers continued their dance. It was taking all his effort to remain calm.

  “Your standing?” the clerk continued.

  “Captain,” Wragg said.

  The clerk worked the panel. Grace saw the blue glow as a transmission reached out to Wragg’s ptenda, requesting identity confirmation. The captain responded, and the clerk continued.

  “Last known location?”

  “West. Port Nine,” Wragg said. “Local time eleven twenty-five.”

  The clerk sighed. “Well, I’ll forward this to rim patrol. With no robots, they are busy this time of day. They probably won’t make time for a research vessel.”

  Grace felt Richard quake. Enough. She moved forward, grabbed the clerk’s wrist, and pushed his scrawny hand to the desk.

  “Look. A little girl is on that ship. Not to mention my two best friends and the crew.” She steadied her voice and emphasized each word. “You’re going to help us and you’re going to do it now.”

  The clerk stammered a squeak when a voice boomed from behind.

  “Wragg? Don’t tell me you’ve misplaced another ship!”

  Grace turned to see a giant. The man was in motion, headed straight for Wragg. Easily two meters tall. Bald. Massive limbs. Dress gold uniform of a security officer. A fruit salad of high-ranking medals. She saw the flash of a nametag: T. JAMESON.

  The two men embraced. For a second, Grace could have sworn Wragg was lifted from the ground. Probably just an illusion.

  “This is no misplacement, Jameson,” Wragg said. “Our ship—the Scout—has been commandeered. His child is aboard.” The captain nodded toward Richard. “And a man wanted in connection with murder. It could be a hostage situation.”

  Jameson looked at Richard. There was military discipline in his gaze, but there was compassion, too.

  “You’re in the wrong line, folks,” he said. “Follow me.”

  Grace heard the clerk stammer ‘next’ as they followed Jameson, cutting through the crowd toward a lift bank.

  The lift tube on the far left blinked a red deactivated warning, but Jameson made straight for it. He placed a hand on the panel, the lift powered up, and the door slid open.

  “Small perk,” he said as they filed in. “Down.”

  The lift started to move. Grace raised her eyebrows at Wragg, who smiled back at her.

  “Jackson! Telemetry on the Scout. We’ll need an intercept,” barked Jameson to his ptenda.

  There was no audible reply. Grace wondered if Jameson wore a dermal.

  Five levels went by before the door opened into a large natural cavern. Two rows of cruisers stretched before them. A woman rushed up to meet them, her medals clanking on her chest.

  “Status, Jackson?” Jameson said.

  “I’ve got the Bonneville powered up,” Jackson said. “Third on your right, sir.”

  “Any contact?” Jameson asked.

  “Yes, sir. Short, though.”

  “What was it, Captain?”

  “‘Help’, sir. That was all. Came from the bridge station— data only, no voice.”

  “Yvette,” Richard whispered.

  Following Jameson’s lead, they ducked their heads and entered the cruiser, its ion engines already lit in a shimmering mirage of heat. Grace helped Richard aboard, glad to see the determination on his face. The hatch folded shut behind them.

  Jameson plopped down next to Jackson. Wragg, Richard, and Grace sat in three of the four seats directly behind the admiral and captain. Grace checked her ptenda for messages. Nothing. She keyed an update to Raj and Tim anyway.

  The cruiser spun out of its berth and turned toward the airlock.

  “Just like old times, Wragg,” Jameson said.

  “Yes. Except I’m not pointing a p-wave at you.”

  “Touché, though I miss even that, oddly enough.” He turned to Jackson. “Let me know when we’re set, Jackson.”

  Grace looked up from her ptenda. She remembered Wragg’s story about the mutiny. So these two went way back, she thought. And the admiral was apparently stupid enough to follow a crazy captain. It didn’t look like there were any hard feelings between the men now.

  The ship came to a stop inside the airlock. Its nose angled up. Grace looked at the displays. Ten degrees. Twenty. Thirty.

  Captain Wragg turned to Richard and Grace.

  “You might want to hold on.”

  Richard was already gripping his armrests. Grace secured herself and watched as the airlock doors opened, together, to the right and left.

  “In one, Admiral.”

  The scene shifted as she slammed into the seatback. Consciousness was no longer fluid. She saw snapshots of reality.

  The orange sky.

  Narrow fingers of burnt umber clouds far above.

  How fast were they going?

  Captain Jackson’s voice brought her back to continuity.

  “Intercept in three minutes,” she said.

  Chapter 20

  “Get off!”

  Quint’s voice was a bellow tinged with the high frequencies of panic. Tim noted the flush response on his face: the pain must be excr
uciating. Quint spun Tim around in an effort to shake him off, but Tim had no muscles to tire. He remained clamped to Quint’s leg.

  Anna and Yvette weren’t moving. Come on, Tim thought. He jerked Quint’s leg harder. It unbalanced him, and Quint fell against a console. The clatter of a dropped phasewave. At that, Yvette and Anna shot past them and off the bridge.

  First goal achieved. Tim listened for their footsteps on the ladder, but then something else distracted him: some kind of communication from Mazz. The robot was using the ship to alert him of…what? Tim began to shuffle his attention. Then Grace pinged him, and he realized she had done so several times.

  Quint grabbed Tim’s torso and yanked.

  “Off!” Quint screamed.

  Quiet, Tim thought. I’m trying to listen.

  He calculated the three highest energy frequencies and applied a notch filter to modify incoming audio.

  At once Quint’s screams disappeared.

  Now to listen for the footfall. Yes—they were down the ladder safely. Tim Trouncer released his grip and raced out the door. He couldn’t shake the memory of chicken marsala, and realized it had felt pleasurable to sink his mechanical jaws into Quint’s ankle.

  Tim snapped his wandering memories away. He needed to deal with the distracting inputs before his second goal was at paw.

  • • •

  Quint sat down hard on the bridge floor, stunned with pain. He didn’t understand why the ghastly robot toy had stopped biting. One second the PodPooch was firmly attached, and the next it had flashed away, along with the women. Were they controlling it?

  He tried to get up. The pain didn’t subside. It worried him. The hooded aposti had been very clear when Quint started gene therapy: avoid any injury. Quint remembered joking about cuts and bruises, but the man had frowned and shook his head.

  He knew he didn’t have much time before the pain would make him pass out. Quint pulled himself over to the aft bridge locker and searched for a medbind. He pulled open one drawer and searched amid a clatter of tools. Nothing. A second drawer had three medbinds. He grabbed one.

  Quint turned around, peeling away the protective sleeve from the medbind and slapping it on his leg. He waited to feel relief. Nothing yet.

  Quint scooted over to Nutter. He was still unconscious, his face purpling where the ceiling grate hit him. Quint dragged the grate off.

  “Hey, Nutter! Wake up!”

  Nothing, even when Quint shook him. That could have been me on the deck, he thought. If I hadn’t been in Archdale’s cabin getting my ptenda.

  His thoughts were interrupted by a beeping at the console. Quint raised himself with his arms. It was the tactical display. A ship was closing with the Scout. Quint tapped for credentials, then whistled under his breath. Gusev Central Command. The old man must have had more connections than he’d thought.

  An urgent message began to scroll across all displays: POWER DOWN AND COME TO FULL STOP.

  Quint snorted. Like hell I will. He called up the ship’s comm map and tapped on the engine room.

  Link established, Quint prepared an escape squirt. It would take ten minutes to power up. He looked down at his leg: his calf and ankle throbbed, but the pain was finally easing. He tested his weight on it, and nearly fell over. Damn. He’d have to drag his leg behind him.

  • • •

  Grace watched as Jameson manipulated the tactical display. She saw curt messages streaming in from Central Command. The last flashing message showed that the admiral had been granted complete leeway. Grace nodded approvingly.

  “Jackson, charge the cannon,” Jameson said.

  “No! My daughter is aboard. You can’t—”

  “Relax, Mr. Archdale,” Jameson said. “We know the ship has friendlies. We’re not going to fire on her. But Jackson may have to raise our voice.”

  Richard groaned and strained forward in his seat. Grace knew what he was thinking: if a shot were fired, would Quint do something desperate? Had he already done something? Grace swallowed and laid a hand on Marty.

  “Still signaling them to stand down, Jackson?” Jameson asked.

  “Yes sir. We’re tied into the Scout. They hear us.”

  “Bring us alongside. Match velocity and heading.”

  “Yes, sir,” Jackson said. She changed course, pulling in next to the Scout and cutting most of the throttle. The g-force lessened considerably.

  Jameson turned around in his seat. “Wragg, is your bird armed?”

  “No, sir,” Wragg said.

  “Good,” Jameson said, and turned back to Jackson. “Give ‘er a nudge.”

  Grace gripped the chair’s arms as Jackson brought their cruiser against the Scout’s flank. The charged fields surrounding both ships crackled and complained.

  “No worries,” Wragg murmured to Grace. “Only the boundary layers collided. They’ll try to avoid damage to either ship.”

  Jameson was frowning at the Scout. “Try again, Jackson. This time, speak a little louder.”

  This bump was more substantial. The fields pushed against the hulls of both cruisers. An abrupt, deafening squeal set Grace’s teeth on edge. She wondered what it sounded like on the Scout.

  “Still nothing, sir,” Jackson said.

  “Brief weapons burst. Target one kilometer ahead, directly in that ship’s path.”

  “Reticle aligned, sir.”

  The rarified Martian atmosphere glowed as energy pulsed from the ship’s cannon. A shimmering sphere impacted ahead, and a plume of red dust rose into the air. The Scout passed through it, exciting minor vortices as the sand reacted to the cruiser’s presence.

  “Damn,” Jameson said. “No reaction. Is that ship’s pilot running blind?”

  “His name’s Quint Brown,” Grace said. “A kid. We picked him up at Elysium Planitia—he was trying to avoid the draft.”

  “Your kid,” Jameson said, “has either abandoned the bridge or is one cool customer.”

  Wragg put his hand on Grace’s arm and leaned forward in his seat.

  “Admiral? Captain? Use your engines. Bring the Scout to a stop.”

  Jameson nodded. “Let’s give him a moment to respond, first.”

  “How can we stop it?” Grace asked Wragg. “This ship’s tiny compared to the Scout.”

  “This little craft can make up in velocity what the Scout has in mass,” Wragg said. “The engines are powerful enough. We can make the Scout stop.”

  “Then what?” Grace asked. “Quint could stop the ship, and then maneuver away moments later.”

  “No,” said Wragg, shaking his head. “The Scout’s engines would drop offline. He wouldn’t be able to entertain a cold restart. Not immediately.”

  “But will your bird take the load?” Jameson asked. He looked from Wragg to Richard. “We might cause a hull breach.”

  Blood drained from Richard’s face, but he nodded.

  “Do what you must.”

  “Very well.” Jameson turned to Jackson. “Captain, let’s see what you’ve got.”

  “Sir,” Jackson said in acknowledgment. She was already accelerating, pulling above and ahead of the Scout. She pushed forward on the yoke, and a loud crack erupted aft and below as the interceptor’s hull slammed against the top of the cruiser below.

  “We’re sliding, sir,” Jackson said, her jaw clenched. “I’ll push a little harder. Something is bound to stop moving and bite.”

  Grace felt the little ship shudder and a loud squeal came through the deck beneath her feet.

  “That doesn’t sound—” Richard began.

  “I’m taking her down. Adjusting maneuvering thrusters—now!” Jackson said. The interceptor decreased altitude. A groan reverberated throughout the small craft.

  Grace’s mind raced ahead. The Scout was going to be stopped soon, and she needed to get aboard. She pulled out Marty and remembered Wragg’s concern about firing a weapon in the engine room. But the engine will be stopped, she thought. She thumbed Marty’s controls and set the weapon
for dual-fire.

  Chapter 21

  Quint let gravity pull him down the ladder. He used his mechflesh hand to slow his descent before he hit the deck. Though he was gentle, his leg still spiked with pain when he put weight on it.

  The ship groaned and complained like his body, both under stress. Quint had expected this. He knew Central Command might force the ship to stop, but he hadn’t expected them to intercept so quickly. He looked down at his wrist. He still had time, and he had the ptenda back. His escape squirt would be ready. Not a clean escape, but an escape all the same.

  Quint made his way along the lower deck, the ship vibrating beneath him. One shudder nearly threw him off his feet. Soon, now, the Scout would stop. But he’d be gone.

  Quint leaned against the wall, catching his breath. Should he release the worm now? If he released the worm, it would shred the nav infodocs aboard and Archdale would never be able to find his precious Essex. But would the worm affect the squirt? Should he wait until he left the ship?

  Quint entered engineering. The sound of the engines comforted him. He was close now. So close.

  He unholstered his phasewave in case the tin man caused trouble, then continued aft, rounding the corner past the starboard drive. The ship squealed and lunged as the engines strained against the breaking force. The squirts were lined up a few meters away. Once he was inside and nav enabled, he could leave his parting gift.

  Quint made his way forward, looking around. Where was that filthy robot?

  Squirt 5 was waist level, winking green. He checked its vitals. Damn. The computer hadn’t fueled it yet. He began the fueling sequence, then tucked his phasewave into his belt and uncoupled the squirt’s nav from the Scout’s computers. He spun the wheel of the hatch.

  “Please raise your arms, sir,” Mazz said. “And step away from the squirt.”

  Aha. There it was.

  “Can’t,” Quint said. He lifted his left arm and stepped backwards, turning his head. Mazz stood three meters away. The robot held something in its right hand. It looked less like a weapon and more like a box. Still, the robot brandished it as if it were a weapon.