by Jay Allan
Of course, they’d need the breathing gear anyway, since any action would likely take place underwater. Even if there were imperial facilities down there, he had no idea how they’d fared over the years. Once habitable corridors and chambers could have flooded centuries before, or ancient air pumps and life support units could have failed. In any event, his people would debark with full underwater survival suits.
“Two kilometers to sea level. Scanners still detecting intermittent drive trails. The AI has calculated a course with sixty-four percent probability.” Antoinette Bissel sat next to him at the controls. She was another agent, just like him, but she had actual naval experience, three years serving as the political officer on a heavy cruiser. It didn’t make her a battle-tested admiral, but it did give her a surer hand with the controls, and with the scanner array.
Caron nodded. That was good, getting the choice narrowed down to a clear favorite, but sixty-four percent wasn’t enough. “Push the scanner power levels up, Antoinette, just a touch past specifications.” Union equipment was no match for the Confederation’s, at least not in terms of durability. Union ships rarely dared to try to match their enemies’ sometimes reckless tactics in redlining reactors and weapons. But he only needed a little more, just another few seconds of data. If the trend continued the way it was going, he’d know with a reasonable likelihood where the last ships to come to Aquellus had come.
As those vessels had disappeared without a trace, he had mixed feelings about following their courses so effectively. But if failure was dangerous in the Union, outright cowardice was manifestly fatal. If he broke off and ran, he doubted he’d get back to Montmirail to face any kind of trial. Boucher would more than likely blast his landing craft out of the sky…and write off any innocents trapped onboard as collateral damage.
So, forward…chasing after the ghosts. Just stay focused, and make sure you don’t become a ghost yourself…
* * *
“You’ve got some stuff down here I didn’t expect to find. These old converted freighters usually barely run, but half of this looks almost military grade.” Righter’s voice blared through the comm, and Andi smiled. Pegasus was a special ship, in more ways than one. Captain Lorillard had begun the process of upgrading the vessel, and Andi had continued it with such zeal that she constantly found herself almost out of cash for the amounts she poured into the ship. Pegasus was tougher than any outsider would expect, and she was a lot faster. And her weapons suite was an order of magnitude above the single light laser turret most free traders carried.
And that doesn’t even take the torpedoes into account…
She knew the weapons Durango gave her were powerful, and she hoped she didn’t have to use them. That was both because she didn’t want to run into an enemy tough enough to warrant it…and because she was far from sure Barret could effective target with weapons he basically had to drop out of the cargo bay.
“Now you know why we needed a good engineer, Lex. Take a close look around down there, because we’re counting on you to be at one hundred percent if we get in the shit…and you’re stuck on here with us, so you’ll want to be at your very best. If Pegasus doesn’t get back, none of us get back.” It was blunt, but nothing save the hard truth.
“That’s a fact, Captain.” Righter’s voice was different, lighter than it had been. Andi understood, at least to a point. Righter hadn’t become the skilled engineer Durango said he was without being deeply interested in the subject matter. Yarra had always spent hours down in engineering, even when she wasn’t needed there, and it looked like her temporary replacement was cut from the same cloth.
“Let me know if you need help down there.” Andi had almost sent someone down to watch Righter. He was almost a stranger, after all, and trust came slowly to Andi, and with great difficulty…if it came at all. But she needed Righter, and every instinct she had on people management told her he needed to feel like part of the crew if he was going to do his best. And fight off his demons. That was in all their interests, since every one of their lives could depend on getting a damaged system back online a few seconds quicker.
“Will do, Captain.”
Andi cut the line, and she turned and looked over at Barret. She knew what her comrade was going to say before he even got the first word out.
“Don’t say it, Barret. I know…but we need him. With Yarra in the hospital on Samis and you stuck up here at gunnery in a fight, a simple overload could end up being fatal. We need someone in engineering, someone who knows what he is doing. I didn’t choose to trust Righter. I don’t have any choice but to trust him…not if we’re going to have a go at this mission.” And we don’t have a choice about that, not a real one.
Barret just nodded, a grudging and wordless acknowledgement that Andi was right. A few seconds later, he said, “Approaching the transit point, Andi. AI calculates insertion in seventeen minutes, forty seconds.”
“Maintain course and velocity.” She stared at the display, and her hands tightened on the armrests of her chair. She was edgy, more than she usually was. At first, she’d written it off to everything that had happened on Dannith, on worries about how she was going to clean up that mess. But then she realized she wasn’t just concerned about trouble on the mission. She expected it. Bad trouble.
Sector Nine…
Andi detested the Union intelligence operation with righteous zeal. But she also feared it, something far more difficult for her to face and to accept. She’d changed her ship’s name to lay low, to escape Sector Nine’s wrath for what she’d done the last time they’d tangled. She’d bought a new beacon, a highly illegal act that had only been possible with Durango’s assistance. She’d told herself such precautions were smart, tactically correct. But in moments of true self-reflection, she’d admitted to herself that fear had been at play at least as much as any other motivation.
Now, they’re out there. Maybe on their way now. Maybe even there already, waiting for us…
She swallowed hard, pushing back against the cold feeling trying to spread through her body. Keep it together, Andi…don’t lose your shit now.
“I want evasive routines queued up before transit, Barret.”
“Andi? You think someone’s waiting for us just past the point?”
“I don’t think anything, but we’re not taking any chances. We’re going to be ready for whatever is there. If its nothing, what do we lose? A few minutes of data upload?” Andi had run into hostile ships in the Badlands before, but she had a feeling they were heading into the deadliest battle they’d ever fought. She knew very well her people just might lose, that her ship might be overwhelmed.
But they weren’t going to die because she was unprepared. Pegasus and her crew wouldn’t pay the ultimate price because their captain was too young, too inexperienced. Like she knew some outside her tightly knit group had whispered.
No way…
“And I want the forward lasers ready to power up as soon as we emerge.”
“Yes, Andi.” She could tell she was unnerving Barret a little, but there was something more, something that helped prop up her courage.
She could see his faith in her, his absolute commitment to follow her orders, to trust her completely. To trust her with his life.
She couldn’t fail him, nor any of the others.
She wouldn’t. Whatever it took.
Chapter Eleven
Sector Nine Stealth Ship Phantasia
In Geosynchronous Orbit
Planet Aquellus, Olystra III
Year 302 AC
“Commander, we’re receiving a pulse from the scanner buoys positioned at transit point three.”
Boucher’s head snapped around. She’d taken great care to cover for every contingency, but she hadn’t really expected anyone to show up, at least not so soon. She cursed to herself under her breath. She’d just sent the first expedition down to the surface. She’d lost contact when they’d descended into the watery depths, past the extra range the surface b
uoys had provided, but that had been expected. It was a waiting game, and she wouldn’t start to worry about them for at least eight or ten hours.
But if we’ve got visitors…
Her best chance to catch a signal from the landing party was to remain in geosynchronous orbit, directly above their submersion point. But if she had to deal with another ship, orbit was the last place she wanted to be.
“All scanner input on my screen.” She stared for a few seconds as the data scrolled down the display. There had been something, almost certainly, but there wasn’t enough of a reading to identify what had transited. It could as easily have been a chunk of rock or an icy comet that had come through by chance.
“Launch a spread of probes, Drusus. If there’s something out there—I mean something manmade—I want to know exactly what we’re facing.”
“Yes, Commander.” The bridge was almost silent save for the clicking of the aide’s keyboard. Then, Phantasia shook four times in rapid succession, as the long-range probes blasted out and accelerated toward the outer system.
“Probes away,” Drusus added, somewhat needlessly.
Boucher sat silently for a minute, perhaps two or three. It would be at least an hour before the probes got far enough out to send back any meaningful data, longer even for their comm signals to reach Phantasia. She hoped the scans would prove the buoys had issued a false alarm, that she and her people would remain unmolested long enough to complete their mission. Whatever imperial defenses remained operational were more than enough to worry about…the last thing she needed was some Confed ship full of greedy prospectors. She could destroy any ship likely to come to Aquellus, she was sure enough of that. But any fight would draw her away from the planet, and leave the landing party unsupported.
“Drusus, team number two is to prepare for launch at once.” She hadn’t intended to send more of her people down, not until she’d heard from the first group…or become sufficiently concerned at the lack of communications to assume something was wrong. But if she ended up having to pull Phantasia away from Aquellus to engage an approaching ship, the second team was the only backup her vanguard would have for hours.
“Yes, Commander. Flight deck confirms launch prep initiated on landing sled number two.” A few seconds later: “Agent Moreau also acknowledges. Estimate time to full launch readiness, fourteen minutes.”
Boucher turned and almost snapped out a reply. Fourteen minutes wasn’t the kind of response time she wanted, but she pulled back on her angry response. Her people were on edge, and it made sense to pick her battles. It would be hours before any ship—if there even was a ship out there—could come close enough to Aquellus to compel Phantasia to engage. That meant fourteen minutes, even an hour and fourteen minutes, would serve her current needs well enough.
She leaned back in her chair, trying to ignore the growing intensity of her headache. She tried to tell herself it was nothing, most likely some kind of natural phenomenon. The absence of any further contact data supported that conclusion. But her gut resisted the call to relax, and something she couldn’t quite pinpoint was telling her there was a danger out there.
Whatever it was, she would make sure of one thing. She would be ready for it.
* * *
“Andi, we just picked up…something. It was very quick, a short energy burst, but it was definitely there. Almost like…”
Andi swung around abruptly, her eyes boring into Barret’s back as her comrade hunched over his workstation. She could see the tension in his neck and shoulders, and she realized instantly he was concerned. She’d learned to trust Barret’s old navy instincts, and she saw no reason to change that practice just then. “Like what?”
“Like some kind of comm burst. I couldn’t get a fix. Honestly, we didn’t get enough of a reading even to be sure I’m not hallucinating. But it just reminded me of…” He paused for a second or two. “…of an exercise we did when I was posted on Renown.” He reached out, his hands moving in a blur over his controls. Then: “Andi, you may think I’m crazy, but I think there’s a scanner buoy out there. I know it doesn’t make any sense, but…”
“No, it makes perfect sense.” Andi was generally suspicious, usually verging fairly close to paranoid…but that didn’t mean her concerns weren’t right more often than they were wrong. “Cut all power…engines, reactor, scanners, everything. Go down to minimums for life support.”
“Yes, Andi.” Barret flipped a series of controls, and Pegasus lurched once as its thrust cut out. An instant later, the dampeners dropped as well, and Andi felt the familiar sensation of weightlessness. She reached out almost instinctively and snapped her harness into place.
“Activate the port side positioning jets…we’ve got to change our vector, at least as much as we can without sending up a flare to anyone who’s watching.”
“Andi…I’m not sure that was a scanner buoy. I’m not even sure I think it was. It could have been any one of a number of things.”
“Like what?” Andi had the advantage, of course. She knew Sector Nine was in play, that they were a far greater danger than she’d let on to her crew. Barret’s passing suspicion had become her operative assumption that Union forces were already at Aquellus.
And now they know we’re here, too…
Maybe, maybe not. If we run silent, sneak up on the planet, maybe they’ll figure an asteroid came through the point.
Pegasus’s vector was good, close to the approach course toward the planet. That was a lucky break. She’d have to use the positioning jets, but the compressed gas nozzles were hard to detect at long range, even for sensitive scanning suites.
They’re also weak. You’re going to have to navigate this one perfectly if you want to get to Aquellus.
She knew one thing for sure. She’d have to fire up the main thrusters to decelerate, and when she did that, Pegasus would pop up on every scanner screen anywhere near the planet. Then it would be a dead run for the one place her ship had a chance to hide.
Deep in Aquellus’s oceans.
She sucked in a ragged breath. She’d known the mission was a dangerous one. Durango hadn’t even tried to lie about that. But the fact that Sector Nine had gotten there first drastically escalated the risk level. Andi had always had a strange sort of confidence, a belief she could get through anything, a positive outlook that somehow existed alongside her pessimism and suspicion.
If there’s a Sector Nine ship here, it’s probably in orbit.
She needed a way to draw that vessel out, away from the planet. She had to open the way, to give Pegasus time to slip past and make a run for the ocean.
She unhooked her harness and stood up, holding onto the armrest to steady herself in the zero g environment. “You’ve got the con, Barret. I’ve got an idea…and I need to have a chat with our new engineer about making it a reality.”
* * *
Still nothing.
Boucher sat, almost stone still, her eyes fixed, as they had been for hours, on the scanning display. She was looking for something, anything, that suggested some kind of ship had transited into the system. But there had been nothing at all.
It was frustrating. If the scanners picked up a vessel, or even some readings that suggested one was out there, that would be definitive. But she couldn’t prove a negative. There would be no solid report that there was nothing out there. The chance of a potentially hostile ship lurking in the system declined with every passing minute, every flash report from the probes showing nothing but clear space.
Just what a skilled captain lurking out there would want.
Phantasia was a large and powerful ship by the standards of the craft that typically prowled the Badlands, but Boucher was well aware of the dangers of being caught unaware, regardless of armament. If she returned to orbit, if the ship was attacked from a superior position, while her people were focused on operations down on the planet…anything was possible. Even defeat at the hands of an inferior enemy.
She couldn’t divert
her attention fully to the two landing parties she’d launched, not until she was sure whatever had caused the initial alarm had been a natural phenomenon.
There was an irony to it. The more time that passed without any contact, the likelier it was her ship was still alone in the system. But if that turned out to be wrong, it also meant whoever was in a vessel out there was extremely competent, a dangerous adversary, regardless of Phantasia’s greater resources.
“I want all scanners to remain at full power. The ship will hold position sixty thousand kilometers from Aquellus orbit.”
“Commander, we won’t be able to receive any transmissions from the landing parties unless we return to orbit.” Drusus rarely questioned her orders, but she understood that she must seem paranoid to her subordinate, almost obsessed with the idea of a phantom ship out there. The odds of a real threat were dropping steadily, in every calculation…everywhere except in her gut.
Part of her could feel something out there. She knew it was ridiculous, and she scolded herself for harboring such considerations.
But she wasn’t ready to reenter orbit. Not yet.
“I understand that, Drusus. Maintain position and scanner power.”
If there was something out there, she damned well was going to find it.
* * *
“Do you think you can manage it? We’ve got a decent supply of spare parts, but you’ll still have to figure out how to make it work. And we don’t have much time.” Andi stood over a long cylindrical shape in the cargo hold, gripping one of the zero grav handholds and looking at Lex Righter. She realized she was speaking softly, almost a whisper, a pointless affectation. Pegasus was on silent running, of course, but that had nothing to do with actual sound.
