by C H Gideon
Samuels’ expression was flat, like the icy landscape before them, and for a long moment, she sat in silence before deactivating the recording drone. “Thank you, Captain Xi,” she said neutrally before exiting the cabin.
The next few hours passed by in relative silence as the column rolled toward a nearly-vertical mountain looming fifteen kilometers above the ice-field around it.
“Alpha Site secured, Colonel,” Captain Xi reported precisely on schedule. “The facility is ready for the infantry.”
“Copy that, Elvira,” Jenkins acknowledged. “Sergeant Major Trapper, you’re ‘go’ to secure the facility.”
“Roger,” replied the grizzled Tim Trapper Sr., whose no-nonsense approach stood in stark contrast with his son’s more relaxed style. “Moving in.”
Roy’s tactical plotter showed a stream of icons emerging from the APCs—advanced personnel carriers—which bore Trapper’s PDF troopers, all of whom had come from Terra Han. The Terran Armor Corps had only a handful of active infantrymen, most of whom were near-retirement and too high-ranking to warrant deployment as Pounders. So Sergeant Major Tim Trapper, Sr. was one of the few long-serving Armor Corps infantrymen present on Shiva’s Wrath, with the rest of the veterans working to train an entire regiment of fresh recruits back at Armor Corps HQ on Terra Americana. But most of the recruits, like these PDF troopers, would come from Terra Han for a variety of reasons.
Uniquely in the Terran Republic, Terra Han was an Earth-class world. Its gravity was only six percent above Earth norm; its atmospheric content was nearly identical save for CO2 levels of 4,000ppm, which was four times Earth’s pre-FTL levels in the mid-twenty-first century; and, most important of all, it featured an axial tilt and mean temperatures that supported icy polar caps and Earth-like seasonal changes on much of its surface. Combined with its population of one billion humans, five times that of the second-most-populous colony, Terra Americana, this made Terra Han prime recruiting ground for the rebuilding Armor Corps.
Sergeant Major Trapper directed his people into the mouth of the subterranean facility, which bored straight into the side of the towering mountain. Without the forces of tectonic instability, erosion from weather, or tides lapping against the base of the rocky prominence, the mountain had stood unmolested for hundreds of millions of years. The sea of ice stretching out in all directions was less uniform near the base of the mountain, but Durgan Industrial Enterprises (DIE) had cleared several approach paths using a combination of careful orbital strikes and heavy equipment several decades earlier.
Two minutes after deploying from the APCs, Trapper reported, “Main facility secure, Colonel Jenkins. All internal monitoring systems read five-by-five. I’m sending four platoons to investigate the mining tunnels.”
“Good work, Tim,” Jenkins acknowledged. “Arrange a detail to finish securing the rest of the facility and rejoin the column once you’re satisfied. We need to secure the other three facilities.”
“Roger, sir,” Trapper acknowledged, and to Jenkins’ surprise, the venerable warrior emerged from Alpha Site’s massive, iron-walled cave mouth four minutes later at the head of half the troopers he had led inside. “My people will conduct visual inspections to confirm the site’s integrity, after which they’ll reinforce the entry point.” Trapper’s people filed into the APCs, with the sergeant major’s boots the last off the ground. As soon as he regained his APC, he reported, “Ready to roll, Colonel.”
“1st Battalion,” Jenkins called over the command channel, “proceed to the Beta Site.”
Three hours later, the Beta Site and Charlie Site had been secured, and the column had nearly reached the Delta Site.
But before they arrived, Roy’s tactical board lit up like a Christmas tree. “Multiple contacts, Colonel,” Styles remarked, and Jenkins leaned over the technician’s shoulder to get a better look at the confused stream of data. “I’m reading Jemmin forces surrounding the facility,” Styles reported tightly.
Jenkins set his jaw. “1st Battalion, hold position.”
The column came to a halt a few seconds later, during which time Styles worked to parse the data feeds, “They must have been using some kind of stealth systems, Colonel. It looks like they intentionally deactivated them as we approached.”
Jenkins saw no fewer than eight vehicles, each at least twice the size of Roy, arrayed in front of the Delta Site’s cave-mouth entrance. Each of these four facilities was a fully-automated, deep-mining operation funded by DIE. They extracted ultra-rare minerals, which were remotely-transported twice-a-year off the surface and collected by DIE transports for return to the Terran Republic.
“What are the Jemmin doing down a DIE mine shaft?” Jenkins wondered aloud.
“Can’t be for the minerals,” Styles mused. “Word is they’ve already mastered deep-core mining of all but the largest gas giants. Running remote operations like this one are inefficient by comparison.”
“And the other three sites’ cargoes are just sitting there,” Jenkins agreed, “waiting to be collected.”
“There’s either something other than minerals being extracted down there,” Styles suggested, “or the Jemmin are here for something from the facility itself…but what would they need with our relatively primitive tech?”
Jenkins grimaced. “Things look like they’re about to get interesting.”
Styles’ board lit up again. “I’m receiving an incoming transmission from the Jemmin, Colonel.”
“Let’s hear it.”
3
Keeping the Peace
“Greetings, human paramilitary forces,” greeted the Jemmin’s auto-translated voice, which somehow seemed even colder and less…well, human, than the Azure Spire’s commanding officer during their brief jaunt through the Nexus System. “This location is under quarantine by the authority of the Illumination League Peacekeeping Force. Do not encroach while we secure the area in accordance with ILPF protocol.”
Jenkins turned to Styles. “Get General Akinouye on the line. I don’t like the sound of this.”
“The Bonhoeffer’s currently repositioning, sir,” Styles replied promptly. “I haven’t been able to establish a real-time secure P2P for about eleven minutes.”
Jenkins bit his lip irritably before gesturing for Styles to put him on with the Jemmin. “This is Colonel Lee Jenkins, commanding officer of the Terran Armor Corps forces currently deployed on this world. We are here under lawful writ in accordance with both Terran Republic sovereignty and pursuant to Sol’s colonial recognition of the Terran colonies. We are thereby permitted to transit within Solar space, to conduct exploratory operations while doing so, as well as to extract and utilize essential resources from any territory which the Illumination League recognizes as under human domain. Acknowledge.”
“Your transmission is acknowledged, Colonel Jenkins,” the Jemmin replied, and something about its tone and cadence set Jenkins on edge. He doubted that effect was unintentional on the Jemmin’s part. “We are here under the authority of the Illumination League Peacekeeping Directive, which subordinates parochial concerns whenever conflict arises with the sub-directives of member nations. Do not encroach until we have secured this facility and returned to our mobile command center, at which time you may carry out whatever lawful operations you see fit. Acknowledge your compliance with this directive.”
Jenkins gritted his teeth in anger. They were here to meet representatives of a hitherto-unknown alien species, and that meeting was supposed to be facilitated by the Vorr—who the Jemmin had just shown the door after a short-lived exchange of fire that had killed at least three warships.
For all he knew, the Jemmin had the alien representative cornered in Delta Site.
But he had no options. The only potential moves left to him required General Akinouye’s support, and the general was currently unavailable due to the unstable situation unfolding in orbit.
“Transmission acknowledged,” Jenkins replied bitterly.
“Acknowledge your comp
liance with the previously-transmitted directive,” the Jemmin repeated forcefully.
Before Jenkins could reply, the P2P light flickered to life, signaling he had just re-established contact with the Bonhoeffer. “Stand by, Jemmin Peacekeepers,” he said and quickly switched over to General Akinouye’s direct line. “General?”
“I’m here, Colonel,” Akinouye replied. “We don’t have much time, though. The shooting has stopped, and the Vorr are withdrawing to the gate, but the Jemmin are trying to push us off overwatch. It’s taking some fancy flying just to keep us from bumping into the bastards.”
“Sir,” Jenkins urged, “I need you to invoke Terran sovereign military authority in dealing with the peacekeepers here. We’ve secured three of the four DIE facilities, but Jemmin peacekeepers occupy the fourth and they’ve assumed a hostile posture.”
“Shoot me the details,” Akinouye commanded, and Styles did precisely that while listening in on the conversation. A minute passed as the general silently examined the data. “I’ll do what I can, Colonel, but our efforts up here haven’t been very successful. I wouldn’t expect them to budge a centimeter until they’ve had their way with that facility…and we didn’t come here to start a shooting war with the Jemmin. Is that clear?”
Jenkins was disappointed, but kept it from his voice as he replied, “Crystal, sir.”
“Put me through to the Jemmin commander on the ground,” Akinouye ordered, and soon he was piped directly through to the ILPF commander.
“Good work on those cans, Podsednik,” congratulated Chief Rimmer. “I’m glad you fought to get assigned to my drop-deck. The Corps needs more people like you.”
“Thank you, Chief,” Podsy acknowledged, having never been good with compliments. Or formal military interactions, for that matter.
He had found a home with Jenkins’ battalion, which was filled with misfits and ne’er-do-wells like himself who liked to stretch the bounds of military discipline to the breaking point. Up here on the Bonhoeffer, the culture was a lot colder and less fluid. He would have to do something about that since it would be his home for at least the next six months as he fought to get up-to-speed with his prosthetics in what little downtime was available to him.
“Chief,” Podsy ventured, “my people are heading back to their racks, but I was hoping you’d help me out with something.”
“You’re not tired?” Rimmer quirked a brow in both amusement and challenge.
“Of course I am, sir,” Podsy replied with a weary, lopsided grin, “but I want to make sure we stay as far ahead of the curve as possible. The Vorr didn’t come down here for no reason, and the Jemmin didn’t open fire on them because they thought it would be fun. They were fighting over something, and I’m guessing it’s going to be well below the icy crust of Shiva’s Wrath. I’d like your permission to use your sensor feed access so I can scour the surface for signs of whatever it was they’re looking for down there.”
“You can’t use your own access?”
“I could, but your access includes streams unavailable to me,” Podsy explained. “We know Vorr technology isn’t all that dissimilar to our own, but Jemmin gear works on entirely different systems. I can track Vorr activity on my access codes, but not Jemmin, and,” he added pointedly, “I can’t redirect any active scanners on my authority. But you can with yours.”
Rimmer nodded slowly before moving to a nearby virtual interface panel. “Get comfortable, because I’m only authorizing you to use this terminal. And no active scanning of the Jemmin vehicles, only broad sweeps of their locations like would be normal for routine overwatch protocols. Understood?”
“Perfectly,” Podsy said enthusiastically. “Thank you, Chief.”
“Keep it to two hours max,” Rimmer added firmly. “Then hit your rack and get ready for your next shift.”
“Yes, sir.”
After Rimmer had gone, Podsy delved into the Bonhoeffer’s sensor feeds and quickly found several key points of interest he honed in on to further investigate. His attention lingered for a few moments on the tense standoff between Jemmin forces and 1st Battalion at the Delta Site, but he forced himself to move on.
“Stay focused, Podsy,” he muttered as he pored over sensor feeds and prepared for his first active-scan sweep of the formerly-Vorr-controlled base camp.
A camp which was now filled with Jemmin “peacekeepers.”
“Human paramilitary forces,” the Jemmin Peacekeeper declared as the ILPF vehicles lifted several meters off the ground, using their peculiar hover technology—which Jenkins had been assured was not anti-gravity, though it certainly appeared to be—and flew back in the direction of the now-Jemmin-occupied Vorr base camp, “we have secured the facility and are withdrawing as previously indicated. In accordance with the Illumination League’s directives, you are now legally permitted to enter the facility for whatever purpose you wish to pursue.”
“Acknowledged, Peacekeepers,” Jenkins said flatly. Even General Akinouye’s work over the last hour had yielded zero tangible results, and with each passing minute, Jenkins grew increasingly convinced that the Jemmin had taken something important from Delta Site. He switched to Trapper’s private channel. “Sergeant Major, the Jemmin have withdrawn, but something doesn’t smell right. I’m moving 2nd Company up to secure Delta’s mouth, and I want you to lead an APC as far down the tunnel as it goes before deploying your people. I’ll take a team of technicians to inspect the facility’s control center.”
“Negative, Colonel,” Trapper replied firmly. “You await my go-ahead before disembarking the command vehicle. Armor Corps protocol says I put boots into every room before you do.”
Jenkins nodded irritably. “Understood, but I want you leading the team down whichever tunnel looks to have gotten the most use by the Jemmin in the last few hours. And, Sergeant Major, if you find anything of interest, I want you to treat it like a crime scene and await my arrival.”
A meaningful pause. “Understood, Colonel.”
“Deploy at your discretion, Tim.”
A few minutes later, with 2nd Company’s mechs arranged in a reinforcing formation outside Delta’s cave-mouth, Trapper’s troops streamed out of the APCs just like they had three times before. Except while sixty troopers streamed into the mouth, leap-frogging with long-practiced rhythm as they worked their way into the potentially dangerous opening, the APC bearing Trapper himself remained silent.
Four minutes later, Trapper’s APC leapt forward and he reported, “The control center is secure, Colonel. We’re moving down the tunnel.”
“Copy that, Sergeant Major.” Jenkins nodded. “Chaps, take Roy to the cave-mouth. Styles, you’re with me.”
“Yes, sir,” they acknowledged in rapid succession.
With just six minutes left in the two-hour window Rimmer gave him, Podsy worked frantically to run down every last byte of data the Bonhoeffer’s sensors could gather. Thus far he had revealed no fewer than fifteen distinct, artificial holes in the icy crust of Shiva’s Wrath. They were spread out over a rough circle with a radius of eight hundred kilometers, and the Jemmin had occupied three of those holes with vehicles.
Each of the five-meter-wide holes had a dedicated fusion reactor pumping out enough heat to keep the water in the shafts from freezing by circulating reactor coolant down several kilometers of pipe. Sort of an inverse geothermal power system, to Podsy’s mind. The tops of the shafts were covered with heavy-duty, special-alloy water-locks that prevented the water below from spewing upward like hydro-volcanoes. Each lock was a few meters thick, which meant it would be difficult to send anything large down them.
It was obvious to Podsy that the Vorr had come here to conduct some kind of exploratory mission, probably with the goal of recovering something specific from the ocean beneath the icy shell of Shiva’s Wrath.
But the problem was that he still didn’t know what they were there for. Or, perhaps more importantly, which of the shafts represented the best hope of finding it.
“Time’s up, Podsednik,” Rimmer declared as he came to stand beside Podsy’s wheelchair. “Head to your rack.”
“Chief,” Podsy pleaded, “I need a few more minutes. I’m running an EM scan of the subsurface ocean, which won’t be finished for another eight minutes. If I’m right, the Vorr didn’t have time to recover all of their equipment from down there, which is why the Jemmin forced the issue by exchanging fire. It’s why they keep trying to push us off overwatch,” he continued, mindful of the irritated look coming over Rimmer’s face. “I think there’s something down there they don’t want anyone to know about, least of all the Vorr but not us either.”
Rimmer looked like he wanted to argue, but somewhat surprisingly, he pulled up a chair and sat down. “Why not hand this off to sensors?”
“Frankly?”
“Frankly,” Rimmer agreed.
“I don’t know the Bonhoeffer’s crew yet,” Podsy admitted. “The people down there are like family to me. Well…some of ‘em, anyways,” he amended with a snort. “Could you lay your head on a pillow not knowing if your family was in good hands?”
“You think you’re better than Armor Corps veterans?” Rimmer challenged, taking some measure of offense at Podsy’s suggestion.
“No, sir,” Podsy said seriously, “but when I see crew chiefs like Batista wandering off for mid-shift naps…it doesn’t instill the highest degree of confidence in the rest of the system. No disrespect intended.”
Rimmer eyed him for a few tense moments before sighing. “None taken. You work with what you’ve got, and right now, Batista’s what I’ve got. But I’ve also got you,” he continued pointedly, “and it’s obvious you’re going to go far in this branch. I need you to remember your duties though, Chief,” he said seriously. “You wanted to be a crew chief on my deck, which means that your duty to my deck comes first. If you can’t do that, you need to tell me right now so I can adjust my system.”