by L S Roebuck
The only person who looked military was an armed Chasm guard at the tube gate who was asking everyone boarding where they were headed. North’s team made for the gate.
North signaled Mateo to walk astride him. He spoke covertly. “We have to make sure we secure a beachhead for Magnus to unload her troops. Once we act, Chasm will know for sure Magnus is attempting to inject a full hostile force. We’ll try to trick them into thinking we are trying to take the hangar bay, and instead cut some holes underneath it, near the tanks and this alleged Underground base, for Magnus to soft seal to.”
“It’s a good plan, commander,” Mateo said.
“I want you, Goldsmith and Advika to board the first car, but take the tube back to the Prime’s insertion point. I’m going to keep my comm channel open to you and scrambled, so pay attention when we make contact with the Underground in case the plans change. These loyalists may be cooperative, or not,” North gave Mateo commands under his breath.
“Ha, just remember your mic is hot if you have to take a whiz,” the Marine joked.
“As soon as you get back, have Rhodes encode and transmit the sitrep to the captain, and then detach and hot rod it back to Magnus and join the main assault force. You let them know what to expect when the board.”
“Sir?”
“Just leave the ordnance with me,” North smiled. “I don’t need the three of you to help me plant the bombs. I’d tell Sparks and Ryder to go with you, but I don’t have time to argue with either of them.”
Mateo causally reached beneath his poncho into his pack and pulled out a small, translucent plastic bag holding three white orbs, small ball-like devices only a few millimeters in diameter. These were the latest in Earth explosive technology.
The bombs had microrecievers built in and cold be detonated by radio signal. A red gash decorated one side of the explosive orbs, which gave access to a manual trigger. In a pinch, a fingernail or other thin tool could start a five second count-down.
“These little things are really lethal?” North asked Mateo.
“Oh yeah, no shrapnel, but nearly 10,000 kilojoules of blast satisfaction. You don’t want to be near this thing when it goes.”
“That’s right,” Sparks said, who pushed herself between the Marines, now just a few meters from the queue and the guard. At any given time, three cars were available to be loaded and released. The first car was full of cargo. A teen closed the door, and it vanished down the Tube. A lone rider was in the second car, and as soon as the first car was gone, the second car sucked away as well. The teens didn’t even wait to fill the third car complete with cargo before sending it on its way.
Within a few seconds, a car appeared, and stopped. The door of the white, egg-shaped transport opened, and North saw it was empty. A second car arrived and opened, and four armored Chasm troopers stepped out. A woman who North thought might be the leader of this group eyed North’s squad with obvious suspicion. Under her poncho, Sparks fingered her pistols, but she knew a shoot-out now would be disastrous for their plan. Then again, if she were caught and identified, she knew she would die painfully after she had been tortured for every bit of information she had. She such an end would be her fate if she were discovered as a Chasm turncoat.
A third car sped into the station, opened, also empty. The group of Chasm troopers moved toward the market.
Sparks whispered to North, “Let me handle this, muscles.”
Sparks walked up to the guard, while the rest of the group stood about two meters away.
“Destination please?” the guard asked, as she adjusted her uniform. “And who are you?”
“You don’t have clearance for that information,” Sparks said.
“Um, yeah, I, um… I think I do, this is my job,” the woman seemed to be considering whether it was worth it or not to hold this unusual group of people attempting to use the Tube. “You know all travel on Tubes is for official business only. If your business isn’t official, you’ll have to walk.”
“We’re in a hurry,” Sparks said. “I’m Chasm. Former triumvirate. I can give you my confirmation code and you can call it in, but my boss is already antsy.” Sparks thumbed out North.
“Wow, he’s your boss,” the young guard said, instinctively messing with her hair as she entertained some impure thoughts. “I want your job. Wait. How can you be former triumvirate?”
“Long story. Anyway, my boss, he is —” Sparks waived the now flush guard close to her head, “a Hawk. Let’s not delay him shall we.”
“I thought Hawks were just a legend?” the guard asked.
“Look at that mass of man. Doesn’t that look like a legend to you?”
North was out of earshot, but saw the guard staring at him, so he flashed his sexy smile and gave a wave.
“I suppose,” the guard said. “Mmmm.”
“Look, let me give you my code and you can call it in. I know that will take time to verify, so let’s get stated. My boss is impatient. He looks good now, but he can be a mean SOB.”
“Well, you seem alright,” the guard said. “But you’re right, I better call—”
“Oh, I forgot to show you these,” Sparks said, and she pulled back her poncho to reveal her thigh holsters. “Pretty sweet right? Now who besides a former Chasm officer would have these beauties. But please go ahead and make the call.”
North looked over and saw Sparks showing off her firearms. The leader of the Chasm trooper foursome also noticed.
“No, you guys are good,” the guard said. “By the way, I’m Kayla. Nice to meet you. Can you give me…” Kayla pointed discreetly at North.
“Sure, Kayla, I’ll get you his contact handle,” Sparks said. “As soon as I am in the Tube car, I’ll send it to your infopad.”
“Thanks,” Kayla shrugged. “It never hurts to try, right? You better get going, don’t want to keep a Hawk waiting.”
“You bet. Thanks, Kayla.”
Sparks turned to the group, and said loudly. “Okay, the guard cleared us. You, you and you,” she pointed to Goldsmith, Mateo and Advika, “into the first Tube car. The rest of you, with me.”
Mateo grabbed North’s shoulder, and muttered quietly, “Godspeed.” The Marines boarded the first car, closed the hatch and it speed off. The third car was half loaded with crates. Ryder tapped North and nodded toward the crates. “I’ve figured out what that is. That’s ship to ship ammo.”
North, Ryder, Meliana and Sparks sat in the second car. As North took his seat, he winked at the guard. She giggled, then suddenly sobered up. The Trooper leader was sprinting back toward the station.
“Stop that car,” she shouted to the guard.
The guard looked confused. North shrugged and pulled the door closed and the tube shot off. Sparks saw the Troopers loading into the third car just as the door from their car sealed closed.
“They are following us,” she announced as the suction sound matched the inertia of sudden propulsion.
“Are you sure that is ammo?” North said to Ryder. A whistling sound could be faintly heard as the car was pushed along.
“Pretty sure,” Ryder said.
“But what would they need ship-to-ship ordnance for? Waypoints were specifically designed not to have external weapons thanks to the peaceniks. The small fleet of armed corvettes was the defensive resources.”
“Utopia,” Sparks said. “It is possible that Chasm developed ship-to-ship ballistic technology.”
“But Magnus’ flack defense system could easily thwart a simple missile attack, so it would be a futile effort,” North reasoned.
“We have a more immediate problem in the car behind us,” Sparks suggested. “We have about three minutes until our tube stop.”
“Time to make something go boom then,” North smiled.
“Oh, I love it when you talk dirty to me,” Sparks said. “Do you have the explosive orbs?”
North produced the explosives pack with three thumbnail sized bombs.
Sparks pulled out one of
her pistols. “Cover your ears and eyes,” she told her fellow passengers. She aimed at the rear of car, between Meliana and Ryder’s head, and pulled the trigger. The bullet hole she created made the tube car wobble as the internal pressure of the car adjusted to match the external pressure.
“The car should be about five meters behind us,” North said. “I’ve got to time this right. Condi, set the fuse for 3 seconds on bomb A and make it hot on my mark.”
The Marine switched seats with Meliana, pulled Bomb A off of the explosives pack and wedged it in the bullet hole. He took the remaining two and gave them to Sparks.
“Hold these. Okay, Condi. Mark,” North said. “Bomb A active,” Condi replied.
North flicked the bomb with his finger, but it didn’t dislodge.
Ryder’s eyes went wide.
North immediately flicked it again, and this time, it vacated the bullet hole, and a second later, detonated.
The explosion rocked the Tube car, but it kept sailing.
Suddenly, another larger explosion filled the Tube. A flash of heat penetrated the car as it was bounced through the tube, careening until it hit the sidewall, and cracking like an egg. The four passengers were tossed hard and clear of the wreckage, onto the tube floor. Smoke filled the tube.
“Ow, mother,” Ryder said. “It feels like my arm is broken. Meliana?”
“I’m okay,” she replied standing up.
North was already up and moving down the tube. “That worked too well.”
“The explosion must have set off the ship-to-ship missiles being carried in that trailing car,” Sparks said. Her hair was being whipped about as the pneumatic pressure system went haywire from likely punctures caused by the explosion.
“Condi, what is the quickest way to the tank access,” North asked.
“There is an emergency hatch twenty meters ahead. Through that hatch, take a left for 50 meters and you should be at tank control,” the VI responded.
“With any luck, the Chasm authorities will think that explosion was just an accident,” Meliana shouted over the wind.
“I doubt we’ll be that lucky,” Ryder said, tossing off her poncho and drawing a gun. The air current caught her poncho and it was soon blown out of sight. “Let’s move while there is chaos. If we can find that hidden base, maybe we can lie low until this heat dies down. Literally.”
North nodded and the remainder of the crew followed suit. If they met resistance now, there was no hiding the squads anti-Chasm intentions.
The in-ear communicator filled North’s head with Mateo’s voice. “Commander, are you guys okay? We’ve lost pressure and we are moving out on foot.”
“Yeah, we had to use one of our toys a little early,” North said. “It was a little too effective. Make all haste to the Prime. Tell the Magnus about potential ship to ship missiles. Probably just a nuisance, but better safe than sorry. And keep this line open.”
“Wilco, Commander,” Mateo radioed his confirmation.
“Do you want me to look at your arm,” Meliana asked Ryder. Ryder winced, but shook her head.
“Let’s move.”
The hatch was easy enough to find, and within a few minutes, the foursome had stepped out of the damaged tube into the maintenance access beneath the hangar. North quickly found the corridor described by Condi and led his team that direction. At the end of the tunnel, a man leaned against the wall, vaping.
North ran up to the man, who smiled when he saw North.
“How are you doing, friend,” said the man, who wore baggie dirty civilian clothes and a beanie cap. He was probably 50, North guessed.
“How do you know we are friends?” North asked.
“Well you don’t look like Chasm,” the man said. “You’re not Chasm are you?”
“You are the lookout?” North asked a second question.
“Yes, sir,” the man said, “Let’s get you inside and you can talk to our Underground leader. I think she’s been waiting for you.”
“How did she know we were coming? And who is she? Did Lind contact her?” Meliana asked.
“Can’t say that I know. Now before I let you in, not Chasm, correct?”
“With security like this, I can’t believe you haven’t already been discovered. The Chasm intelligence here must be really horrible,” Sparks said. “We’re not Chasm.”
The man pushed aside a refuse collection unit, exposing a three-quarters-height door with what looked like an antique numeric keypad.
“This old tech doesn’t interface with wireless protocols,” the man explained. “Makes it much harder to hack.”
After he entered a four-digit code, the man pulled open the door. “You guys go on in. I need to keep here at my post and make sure you weren’t followed.”
North crouched through the door, followed by Meliana, Sparks and Ryder bringing up the rear. The interior of the tank was pitch dark as the door swung closed behind them. North stood, and when he didn’t bump his head, he instructed Condi to provide some ambient light, and the info pad complied.
They were in a small room, with the small door leading out behind them and a larger, full-sized sliding door in front. North stepped toward the door and it automatically opened. Through the door North could see what was obviously the large cavity inside the tank. It was still mostly dark, although he noticed ventilation tubes and power chords connecting to the exterior of the room. On the far side of the room was an elevated platform. On the platform was a large chair, facing away from them and towards at least a dozen red-glowing magnetic resonance screens. If the chair didn’t have casters and a swivel, North would have thought it was some sort of throne. North started to approach the chair, and noticed human activity in the shadows all around them. Smartly dressed men and woman in grey uniforms were reading screens, whispering to each other things North couldn’t make out.
This wasn’t some rag-tag resistance, North thought. This seemed like a highly coordinated logistics operations center. Taking the Marquette from Chasm may be easier than they hoped.
Sparks, a pace behind North, was worried. The air seemed over chilled, and she tried to suppress a shudder. Her instincts drew her hands to her thigh holsters. Meliana walked next to Sparks, and behind them was Ryder, who still had her stun gun drawn.
“Hello?” North said, but the workers seemed to ignore them as they approached the elevated platform and the chair. Someone was clearly sitting in it, and various workers were walking up to that person, whispering in his or her ear, and then walking around to various stations in the tank.
“Hello? I’m Commander North of the–”
“Yes, I know who you are,” a female voice came from the chair. “Second in command on the Magnus. My eyes and ears are nearly omnipresent. Nearly.”
“Are you the person in charge here? Who are you?” North asked. He was just a few meters from the platform now. As if on cue, the lights around the platform brightened significantly. North could see the woman in the chair had precisely-placed silver hair pulled back in a perfect bun. Although he couldn’t see her well through the back of the chair, North judged her to be a relatively petite woman. Sparks heart was beating fast, her eyes peeled wide.
The chair slowly turned, revealing what North could only describe as a frail-looking woman.
“No! It can’t be,” Sparks shouted as she simultaneously drew her guns, aiming them at woman and emptying her clips. The bullets seemed to vaporize before they could reach the woman. Shocked at the unexpected, sudden violence, North tried to process what he just saw. Alien tech? Magic? And while his conscious mind was reeling, his instincts already had his hands moving for his rifle.
Sparks looked at her now empty guns and the woman who seemed to be impervious to bullets.
“How the he—” Sparks started convulsing before she could finish her sentence. North reached an arm out to stabilize her, then looked behind him and saw Ryder with her stun gun drawn. North saw fear like he had never seen before in Sparks eyes, as she fell to th
e floor next to Meliana, who was also convulsing from the effects of a stun gun. Within a blink, both women were unconscious.
North rounded his assault rifle toward Ryder, and was about to put a bullet in Ryder’s leg when the old woman spoke. “Put your gun down, North. Or I will order them to shoot.”
North hesitated and noticed that every single one of the uniformed workers had drawn side arms and they were all pointed at North. He guessed there were at least 30 weapons pointed at him.
Ryder walked up to North, and holstered her gun.
“Now let’s see, how did Sparks do this?” Ryder said as she went to kiss North. She pressed her lips to his. North firmly closed his mouth, as Ryder licked the Marine’s lips with her extended tongue. North slowly turned his head sideways, careful to not make any sudden moves. As Ryder stepped back she took his rifle. “No taste for me? That’s too bad. What can I say? I’m Chasm. I don’t know why Sparks didn’t tell you.”
North was furious. This whole Underground tank story was a trap, probably used to ferret out those who still opposed Chasm. Was Dr. Lind a plant? He wanted to punch Ryder, chivalry be damned, but instead turned slowly back to the old woman, hands raised in clear sight.
“You didn’t answer my question,” North pressed dryly.
“Oh, yes I am most definitely the one in charge,” the old woman said. “My name isn’t important, but most people know me as the Chairman.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The Chairman stood from her chair, and walked toward North. She flicked her head in his direction, and immediately two sharply uniformed Chasm officers, both blonde and burly, seized the Marine, taking his knife, sidearm and pack, before zipping his hands behind his back.
North didn’t take his eyes off of the Chairman, as she walked in a way that almost seemed like she was floating toward the resting bodies of Sparks and Meliana. Her face was almost porcelain, and her deep-set eyes appeared to lack an iris. Instead, they were filled with large inky pupils.
She strode over the bodies toward North, looking down at the fallen through her steps. “The dark one, I do not know her. But Sparks, my heart breaks at her treachery. Was it not Dante who believed the coldest parts of hell were reserved for traitors?”