Rikas Marauders
Page 82
At present, Hudson was on the far side of Howe, over 5 AU distant. Rika pulled up the inventory of long-range pinnaces aboard the Nietzschean ships under her command. She’d need a fast ship to get there in less than a week, one with some solid defenses as well—there were still a lot of only ‘mostly dead’ hulls out there. Many could still muster the energy to fire a beam her way.
“And they should keep running S&R,” Rika replied. “It’s just as likely that Silva and Amy are here, rather than at Hudson. But Patty is probably out there, and we don’t leave ours behind.”
“Well, then,” a voice came from the bridge entrance. “You’re going to need some company, I expect.”
Rika turned to see Chase approaching, still wearing his armor, helmet tucked beneath his left arm, a tired smile on his lips.
“I thought you were storming Nietzschean hulls with Second Platoon,” Rika asked as she walked toward him, embracing when they met.
“I blew an actuator in my left leg. Had to come back to swap it out. Ship’s log showed you onboard…so here I am. You really thinking about flying to Hudson?”
“I don’t know,” Rika shrugged. “Maybe? I’ll wait for the response from the ISF force out there. Would be silly to fly halfway there only to find that Patty ended up going somewhere else.”
“Well, I doubt you’d make it halfway before you got the message.” Chase chuckled. “Not unless they took a really long time to respond.”
Rika nodded. “Yes, I was exaggerating. It’s a normal thing to do, you know.”
“Oooh…punchy. When was the last time you ate?”
“Ummmm…I had a cup of coffee at Tanis’s cabin on the lake. Before that…yesterday?”
“Cabin on the lake? Is that code for something?”
Rika laughed. “Stars…no, truth is stranger than fiction. Admiral Tanis Richards lives in a cabin on a lake inside one of the I2’s rotating cylinders.”
“Wow…I knew they were hab cylinders, but that’s still surreal.” Chase took Rika’s left hand in his right. “C’mon. Let’s stuff you full of carbs, charge up your batts, and see if you need any joints lubed. You’ll feel right as rain.”
Rika snorted. “You’re such a charmer, Chase.”
“Me?” he asked as he led her off the bridge. “I doubt it. But I did follow you across space and join the Marauders just to find you. That’s still gotta have earned me some points.”
“All used up now,” Rika winked at him. “But you’ve done a few things since then—namely not getting killed while we were in Armens’ clouds, and every other time too, I suppose.”
“Got it,” Chase said with a grin. “Not dying keeps me in your good graces. You have no idea how lucky you are, Rika. Not dying is something I’m also very keen on.”
“It’s why we make such a great couple,” she replied.
HUDSON
STELLAR DATE: 09.02.8949 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Lance Pinnace 09
REGION: Hudson, Albany System, Thebes, Septhian Alliance
Rika looked at the blue and white orb of Hudson as it slowly grew before them, both colors glinting as the world rotated in Howe’s light.
“A place with a nearly full planetary winter.” Chase shook his head. “Sounds like my idea of hell.”
“Yeah, but they have great summers from what I hear…warmer than Pyra’s.”
Chase glanced at Rika from his seat next to her in the cockpit. “Rika, we’ve only had terrible experiences on Pyra. It’s hell, too.”
“Not so,” Rika shook her head. “Pyra is where I met Team Basilisk, didn’t assassinate the president, and was reunited with you. I also saved Tanis there. Pyra’s got a lot of good memories…even if the place is trashed now.”
Chase gestured to the ruins of one of Hudson’s orbital habitats, once home to more than sixty million people. “Hudson’s not doing much better.”
“Fucking Niets,” Rika muttered. “It’s like they get some sort of special glee from destruction.”
“Incoming message from the local ISF detachment,” Chase said and put it up on the cockpit’s holodisplay.
A young man appeared before them.
“Captain Rika, I’m Major Harl. We were advised that you were coming, but I’m not entirely certain what you hope to find here on Hudson. The humanitarian crisis we’re facing is worse than the one on Pyra.”
“Really, Major Harl?” Rika asked as she shared a puzzled look with Chase. “Why’s that?”
“Power, Captain Rika. The Niets took out almost all of the ground-side power generation facilities when they buggered off. They wiped out the space-to-surface energy beaming systems, too. Most of Hudson has been without power for two weeks now. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but this world has a legitimately serious winter.
“Add to that the fact that half the stations in orbit blew pods when they came under attack, and those people landed all over the surface; we’re doing what we can just to keep three billion people from freezing to death.”
“The planet’s tropics don’t look frozen,” Chase commented, gesturing at the world before them.
“Yeah, I’ve noticed,” Major Harl grunted. “You have a dogsled handy? One that can ferry a million people down to the tropics?”
Rika pursed her lips and swallowed. She’d come to Hudson expecting to search for Patty, but now that seemed incredibly selfish, given the suffering occurring on the world below.
“Our ship is at your disposal, Major Harl. How can we help?”
Harl’s expression lightened, though only a touch. “That means a lot, Captain Rika. I’ve got a group in the mountains that I can’t get to. Some of the Niets dirtside have taken them hostage, making all sorts of wild demands. Right now we’re in triage mode, saving as many as fast as we can. We’d expend too many resources on that mission when we can save lives elsewhere…however, if you’d like to take a crack at them….”
“Major Harl,” Rika’s lips pulled back in a predatory smile. “You had me at ‘Niets’.”
“I thought that might do it,” Harl replied. “I’d heard you mechs have a special dislike for the bastards…something about them making you like that?”
Rika shook her head. “No, our people made us like this to kill Niets.”
“Shit…really? That’s…uh, nevermind. I’m sending you the coordinates and all the data we have. Keep me apprised.”
The comm system registered a data burst, and then the connection went dead.
“Cheerful fellow,” Chase muttered. “You sure about this, Rika? We could spend a month down there rescuing people, but, from what you said, Tanis is going to send us all on our own special mission before long.”
Rika sighed, nodding slowly. “I know, but I can’t go on my own personal crusade while people are freezing to death around us. We’ll keep our eyes and ears peeled. We know that Patty docked on a station here, and there are no records of her leaving before the Niets showed up, which means she’s still around somewhere.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Chase replied as he rose. “Patty’s tough as nails. Proved that more than once.”
“Where you going?” Rika asked him, as Niki programmed a flight path that would take them down to the coordinates Major Harl had provided.
“Armor,” Chase said as he stretched, his tight shipsuit sliding across his muscled back. “Shipsuits are nice and comfy, but not much protection against the elements, or a Nietzschean beam rifle.”
“That’s why you’re my kind of guy.”
Chase leant over and kissed Rika on the top of her head before walking out of the cockpit. She watched him go, a happy smile on her lips.
Niki snorted.
“What? Who?” Rika asked aloud, her voice raised more than she intended.
Rika growled. “Not funny, Niki.”
“Do you need a nap, Niki? You seem surly.”
Rika watched the snow-covered surface of Hudson fill more and more of the forward view as they entered a polar course, passing over most of the debris that had gathered on the equatorial plane, considering Niki’s words.
“Well, I’m not biting it down there. Take more than the cold and a few Niets to take Rika down.”
“At least I’m not neurotic.”
* * * * *
The location Major Harl had provided was deep within a rugged mountain range just north of the planet’s fiftieth parallel. It was over five thousand kilometers from climes where temperatures rose above freezing, and was currently blanketed by a blizzard of epic proportions.
Even with its grav systems on max, the pinnace was buffeted by the winds, lurching through the skies as Niki brought it down toward their target, staying as far from the craggy peaks as she could.
“How is it that flying through a gas giant didn’t shove us around this much?” Rika asked, as the ship bucked again, straining her harness as she lurched to the left.
Rika would have commented on Niki’s attitude, but the shuttle slewed to the side, stopped, rolled, and then dropped a hundred meters in a heartbeat.
“Did you do that on purpose?” Rika asked, her tone guarded.
He only shrugged in response, but she could see by the way he was gripping his armrests that he was more than a little nervous.
She gave a meaningful glance to his armrest, and he lifted his hand to see that the plas was twisted.
The pinnace shook again and slewed to the side, and then the vibrations stopped.
“Can we talk again?” Rika asked cautiously.
“We’ll do our best,” Chase said, drawing in a deep breath and leaning his head back. “You didn’t get us killed, so I guess we owe you.”
“Last ping from the ISF said the storm is going to carry on for another twelve hours at least,” Rika said. “That’ll give us enough time to get in, scope the place out, and then kill all the Niets before it lets up. Then we get the hostages rounded up and head on out of there.”
Chase glanced behind them, down the pinnace’s single corridor. “They estimated thirty people down here. Think we can fit that many in the pinnace?”
“Worst case, we make two trips.”
“I hate making multiple trips. Maybe some of them can ride on the hull.”
Rika cast Chase a hard look, only to see him grinning at her. “You’ve recovered from your bout of nerves quickly, I see.”
“I never doubted Niki for a second.”
“OK, fine.” Chase’s eyes grew wide. “We came within three meters of a cliff face! That was nuts, and I’m totally within my rights to be freaked out by it.”
“I seem to remember you being rather tense as well, Niki,” Rika added.
Rika and Chase glanced at one another before speaking in unison, parroting Niki’s prior utterance. “Suuuuuuure.”
The AI didn’t respond as she set the pinnace down on a ledge in a narrow canyon that the winds had swept clear of snow. It was fifteen meters above the floor of the canyon, but the ship’s sensors showed that there was another forty meters of snow below, much of it only loosely packed.
“Stars, that’s like my worst nightmare,” Rika said as she peered over the edge of the ledge. “I’d sink right to the bottom.”
“Rika, come put this on.” Chase stood at the bottom of the ramp, holding a white EV suit. He was already wearing one, his JE-84 slung over his right shoulder.
“Why?” Rika asked. “We won’t get cold; our armor can handle space, for stars’ sakes.”
“Have you ever fought in snow?” Chase asked as Rika approached.
“Umm…no, I guess not.”
“Well, you’re going to hate it. It gets everywhere. You may think your armor will keep you warm, but ice is going to get in all the nooks and crannies and bind things up where you least expect it.”
“You forget,” Rika said as her body disappeared from view. “I got the swanky flow armor upgrade. I’m coated in a non-stick surface.”
Chase snorted and gestured to her body. Rika looked down to see snow melting against her invisible form and running down her legs, freezing around her feet.
“Damn…that could be problematic.” She pulled her feet free of the ice forming around her and walked up the ramp, stomping her feet to knock the ice free. “I hate snow already.”
Chase tossed her the EV suit. “You haven’t seen anything yet.”
Five minutes later, with a-grav packs strapped to their thighs, they reached the canyon floor and began the slow five-kilometer hike to where the Niets were holding the hostages.
Every two hundred meters, Rika pounded a comm relay into the canyon wall, so that when the time came, Niki would be able to initiate a remote piloting routine and bring the pinnace to them.
The relays were rated for a longer distance, but she wasn’t going to take any chances, given the intensity of the storm.
While they walked, she reviewed their target. It was something called a ‘ski lodge’, nestled at the base of a series of mountain peaks that formed a near-complete bowl around it. From what she understood, people went to the tops of the mountains, strapped various things to their feet, and then slid down the slopes.
Why can’t they just planetdive like normal people?
The lodge itself consisted of several outbuildings for equipment and supplies, and one central structure that served as a hotel. The hotel contained a pool, several gathering areas, two restaurants, and rooms for two thousand visitors.
Luckily, the information the ISF had from before the Niets arrived showed that only a dozen guests had been at the lodge, in addition to the off-season staff.
Rika couldn’t imagine why the lodge had more than zero guests if the weather frequently got like this in the stormy season.
<’Trigger Ridge Resort’,> Chase read as they
passed a sign anchored on the side of the canyon wall.
<’Trigger’, or ‘Resort’?> Rika asked.
Chase laughed.
Rika groused.
Rika assumed that they’d normally be greeted by an amazing view of towering peaks with the lodge nestled at their base, and crazy locals sliding down the slopes with boards strapped to their feet.
Granted, Rika considered, most of the people doing that weigh a fraction of what I do. Maybe it’s not so nuts when you come in at less than seventy kilos.
Despite the vision in Rika’s mind, what they could actually see was little more than a white blur. Even with passive sensors—running active would be like telling the enemy to shoot them—they could barely make out the next ten meters.
Now that they were past the canyon’s confines, Rika didn’t want to give off any EM. With a hand signal to Chase, they moved out across the snowy expanse.
Hudson’s atmosphere was thick, and even up in the mountains, trees could reach twenty to thirty meters in height. Before long, it was clear they were moving up the central road by the shadowy shapes on either side of them.
It felt like they walked forever in silence, with only the howling wind to keep them company as they worked their way toward the lodge. Rika had decided that their sweep would start with the large equipment shed where the snow vehicles were stored. They’d disable them to prevent any Niets from escaping.