Hell's Reach (Galactic Liberation Series Book 6)

by B. V. Larson

  Inside—loosely speaking—there were several Living with bear-looking guys in their lower branches, each standing behind a semicircular desk with a jumble of office machinery on it, all of a tech level that most would call obsolete five hundred years ago. No holos, no comlinks, and the few firearms in evidence were cordite-powered slugthrowers—what used to simply be called guns, before that term grew to include blasters, hand-lasers and other modern weapons.

  In front of each desk was a short line of Halfers of various sorts. There were rat-people and humanoids of many shapes, sizes and colors, one insectoid of an unfamiliar type, and two Arattak standing together. Their heads rotated to briefly examine the newcomers, and then they turned away. Four big, heavily armored guards like two-hundred-kilo dinosaurs stood watching, large, short-barreled carbines in their hands.

  Behind this whole assemblage, in the corner, stood a larger Living tree, with several humanoids at more desks, apparently serving it.

  “That’s the boss, I bet,” Loco said.

  “Right. Silaborne. Sort of an ambassador or foreign minister.” She led them to the shortest line in front of one of the outer desks, well away from the Arattak.

  When they reached the front, the bear said, “State your inquiry.”

  “We’re looking for the location of a group of ten to twenty humans—our own specific species—brought to this planet within the last week, probably as Contractors.”

  “Search depth?”

  “Maximum. And confidential.”

  “That will be one hundred forty credits.”

  “Agreed.” Chiara dropped her disk in the reader.

  “That’s a lot just for a search,” Loco muttered.

  “Part of the payoff is for confidentiality,” she replied. “Out here, a thing is worth what you can sell it for and what someone will pay. Remember that.”

  A printer spat out a dozen sheets of glossy hardcopy—considering the climate, probably waterproof, Loco thought. The Living extended delicate branches, stapled the sheets into three separate sets, and passed them to Chiara, along with her credit disk. “Thank you for your commerce. Next!” the bear said.

  “Come on,” Chiara said, stuffing the sheaf into her jacket. “We’re being watched.”

  Loco didn’t see anything—or rather, he saw too much. There was no way to pick out surveillance in this busy, unfamiliar urban park. They walked quickly to the buggy and hopped in. Chiara drove back to ship.

  Inside, in the cabin, she folded away the bed and folded out a table and chairs for four. Raj stood while the three humans and Brock sat.

  Chiara spread out the three sets of hardcopy and handed one to Loco, one to Brock. “Three possible locations. Look these over and tell me whether you think it’s our people.”

  Loco examined his. Map graphics showed where the group was—an island up north. The rest of the printout showed data on the personnel—sex, size, apparent age, names provided if any, declared commercial value and many other statistics. “How many women were aboard the Hercules again?” he asked.

  “Twelve men, six women.”

  “This group has fifteen, with twelve being women.”

  “Mine is eleven men,” Brock said.

  “And mine is ten women.” Chiara glanced around. “Best guess? Most likely?”

  “Brock’s group,” Loco said immediately. “If the Arattak separated them by gender, his might be the eleven Breaker men, because one got killed in the attack. With the other two groups, our women would have to be consolidated with other Contractors and sold here—possible, but less sure.”

  “I agree.”

  Brock nodded, and so did Belinda.

  “Any recognizable names?” Brock asked.

  Chiara grabbed a handtab and read off the Hercules’ manifest. None of the names matched anyone’s groups, but many of those listed didn’t have names, just alphanumeric designations or descriptions like “Laborer D” or “Mechanic 46.”

  “Gimme that,” she said, and took Brock’s packet into the cockpit. She used the ship’s databases to pull up the location of that group, and information on the area. “Hmm.”

  “What?”

  “Just a sec.” She booted up the datalink protocols and worked her way through them, muttering and cursing under her breath. “What a shitty open network. And look at this—we’re getting attacked by low-level malware already.”

  “Can you handle it?”

  She snorted in contempt. “Cassiel’s SAI could probably take over their whole network by herself... if we wanted to risk Mechron vaporizing us for using high tech. No worries on the defensive end, but it’s gonna take me some time to find what we need using software that won’t get us killed. Either that or we go back to the Speaker to Halfers.”

  “Let’s worry about what-ifs when we find them.”

  “Right. So shut up and let me find them.” Chiara worked her way through the network for over an hour.

  During that time, Loco, Raj and Brock stepped out and walked around the ship. It was pleasant outside, and always interesting to look over an alien world—to smell the unfamiliar smells, to examine the subtle differences of a new place. They talked weapons, compared their sidearms and blades, discussed the relative merits of blasters versus more precise guns.

  Loco found himself liking the badgers. They were down-to-earth, professional operators. They were completely unfamiliar with powered armor—not even battlesuits, much less mechsuits—but still, they were thoroughly competent security specialists. They pointed out the creatures watching the spaceport and its activity—one Arattak and two rats for sure, along with the native trees and their bears.

  When Chiara called them back in, they crowded into the cockpit, the only place with multiple displays. These showed diagrams and blurry pictures of some kind of facility, along with a few paragraphs of data. “Okay, good news, bad news. The good news is, I found this likely group here on the main continent. The bad news is, they’re being used by Arattak-controlled rhodium miners in a high mountain range to the south, outside of the Living’s control.” She pointed at a map that pinpointed the location.

  “I thought this was the Living’s planet?” Loco said.

  “Mechron doesn’t care whose it is. The Living claim it, but they don’t thrive above one thousand meters in altitude, so they don’t go up there much. Their security forces are made up of Dreet—the big saurians—who don’t like the cold, so they only go up into the mountains in the summer, and only if there’s a good reason. It’s winter right now, and as long as the mining doesn’t really affect the Living, they don’t worry too much about their sovereignty being violated.”

  “So how do we get our people back?”

  “We’ll buy them.”

  “What? Breakers don’t pay ransom.”

  “They’re Contractors, Loco. We’ll buy their Contracts. That’s the simplest way.”

  Loco folded his arms. “The Arattak are our enemies. They pirated one of our ships. Even if they’d sell our people back to us, we’re not going to let them profit from their crimes. We’ll rescue them, and stomp on anyone who gets in our way.”

  Chiara contemplated a moment. “Okay. Brock, you or Raj ever been to this planet?”

  “No, Captain.”

  “Belinda?”

  “No, Captain,” she replied.

  “So we have no idea where to get extra muscle,” Chiara said.

  “How about asking your rat buddies?” Loco said.

  “They don’t fight unless they’re cornered. Anyone they recommended, I wouldn’t trust. Which limits us to us four.”

  “Five,” Belinda said.

  “You’d be useless in a fight,” Chiara replied.

  “Who said anything about fighting?” She unzipped her tunic, exposing smooth curves. “I can infiltrate. I’ll fake selling my Contract to them if I have to.”

  “Arattak can’t be seduced by human women,” Chiara said. “And they won’t see you as a strong laborer.”

 
; Belinda closed her tunic in disappointment. “But you said there are Arattak-controlled miners... so are the ordinary miners humanoid?”

  Chiara’s eyes unfocused, she was thinking hard. “I don’t have that information, but they might be.”

  Bel grinned smugly. “If they’re mammals, I can distract them with mammaries.” She cracked opened her tunic again, and Loco couldn’t help taking a second glance.

  “What about transport?” Brock asked, eyeing Belinda’s cleavage speculatively. “Even if we neutralize any defenses and get them free, this ship can’t carry eleven more people.”

  “Yes she can, for a short time, if we clear the cabins and don’t go exo-atmo. We can fly right back here in under two hours.”

  Loco looked skeptical. “Then how do we get them off-world?”

  Chiara glared back. “Let’s burn that bridge when we come to it. At least they’ll be free.”

  Loco sighed. “All right.”

  “Okay, then. Let’s hammer out a plan.”

  Chapter 11

  Humbar System, bridge of the SBS Redwolf.

  “Did we already make nice with the Thorians and the Humbar while I was out?” Straker asked Zaxby as he paced, working his new hand, trying to get used to it all over again. “Do the usual thanking and diplomatic backslapping?”

  “Given that Thorians have no backs, rather like we Ruxins, that would be difficult.”

  “Huh—that’s right. Both of your species are symmetrical.”

  “It is one of a few standard biological plans that the Creator seems to like propagating through the galaxy.”

  “Creator? I didn’t know you were religious, Zaxby.”

  “I’m not. As I see no direct evidence for a Creator, I was indulging in human cultural metaphor. Even so, it does seem to be a time when the pendulum of religion is on the upswing. Perhaps you should get ahead of the trend, Derek Straker, and start your own religion. You’re a demigod already to many... Liberator. Remember the Derekites on Terra Nova?”

  Straker snorted derisively.

  Mara sat, checked her board, and swung around in the seat to put her feet up on the edge of the console. “Roentgen says his quarters are adequate.”

  “What do you mean, Roentgen’s quarters?” Straker asked, turning to face her. “He’s aboard?”

  “Yeah, he’s coming along.”

  “Says who?”

  Mara planted her feet on the deck and stood again, hands on hips. “Says me. You wanna fight about it, big brother?”

  “No, but some consultation would be nice, considering I am in charge. Supposedly.”

  Mara strode forward to confront him, her natural presence making her seem much taller than she was. “You were unconscious. Zaxby hasn’t been formally reinstated in the chain of command. I’m the Surgeon General of the Breakers, with Colonel-equivalent rank. I had to make a decision. I made it. You can countermand it, drop him off and have his people pick him up, but you’ll have to explain that to your new best friend. He seems to like you—gods and monsters know why.”

  Straker found himself gazing at his new hand. “This is why. Okay, if he wants to come along, and you can handle the radiation issues... ”

  “We’ll be fine. And frankly, considering what we know about Hell’s Reach, he’s probably going to be really useful. He can survive without a suit in environments that would kill us.”

  “Good point.”

  Zaxby interrupted them. “Liberator? Would you like to comlink Commodore Gray?”

  “No, I’ll wait until I see her in person aboard the Trollheim. What’s with these local names? Trollheim, Hellheim?”

  “Simply Old Norse and Old Germanic linguistic derivations. Heim in this case means ‘home’ or ‘home of.’”

  “Right. But no, tell Gray I’m not ready after my... ordeal. Which is not untrue. I need to do some thinking.”

  By the time Redwolf landed on the Trollheim’s flight deck, Straker had a tentative plan in mind—or at least, a course of action.

  The ever-formal Commodore Ellen Gray piped him aboard with full flagship ceremony. Normally he found the production pointless though he knew it was good for the troops—making them feel honored even as they rendered the honors.

  Today it felt good—like he’d earned it, and maybe he had since today he’d fought a battle, made an alliance, and suffered for the Breakers and for the very cause of freedom in the galaxy.

  Because freedom was never free. In fact, its price was often high, and unappreciated by those who never had to pay. The phrases sounded pompous in his own mind, but they were true.

  He declined the urge to make a speech, though. That would come later, during the inevitable sidespace downtime, shortly before they arrived and entered Hell—Hell’s Reach, anyway.

  “Assemble the staff for a meeting in one hour, if you please, Commodore,” Straker said as they walked toward the dreadnought’s flag quarters. “In the meantime, begin preparations to take Trollheim to the Hellheim nebula. How many skimmers can she carry internally?”

  “Ops-ready, rather than in cargo?” Gray asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Four, max.”

  “Including Redwolf?” Straker asked.

  Gray thought for a moment. “Three, then, without causing major flight-deck issues. She’s not a carrier.”

  “Fine. Bring three skimmers—consult Zaxby on which ones—and Redwolf. Load her up with everything we might need—extra supplies, spare parts and so on.”

  “Speaking of extra supplies, we brought a mechsuit squad and a company of battlesuiters. Plus your own suit, of course.”

  “Good thinking. Gray, you’ll take the rest of the fleet home. You okay with that?”

  “Of course. I understand the situation.”

  “Who’s your flag captain?”

  “Mercedes Salishan.”

  “‘No Mercy’ Mercy Salishan? She ran the weapons testbed ship for the anti-Crystal weapons, right? The Nano-rimo... ”

  “The Nanaimo. Too bad we don’t have her ship, but we got her. She’s the best ship-driver I have.” Gray lifted an eyebrow. “Unless you want Zholin.”

  Straker jerked in surprise. “Our Zholin? Pang Zholin? I thought we’d lost him.”

  “He showed up at Crossroads recently and waited for one of our trading runs. He arrived just after you left. Escaped and defected.”

  “Well, that is good news. Though... has he been vetted for...?”

  “Vetted? We haven’t done any deep testing… I suppose he could be a humanopt fake, or turned by Steel’s people. We could do more—DNA with subquantum variance expression, distinguishing marks, dentals, fingerprints, memories.”

  Straker chewed his cheek for a moment. “Zholin stays with you. Keep an eye on him. Give him responsibility and freedom. That’s the best way to test someone. Assign a Ruxin neuter counterintelligence specialist to monitor everything he does and look for anything out of the ordinary. I’m sorry you’ll miss the action, but you’re the only officer I’d trust with defending Utopia.”

  “Indy could do it without me.”

  “Maybe... but Indy has the heart of a civilian, not a military officer. At the end of the day, I’m not sure she’d give her last full measure of devotion, or make the hard decisions like an organic. That’s what I need most, right now. You’re in command of the fleet... and you’re an admiral as of this moment.”

  “An admiral?” she asked in surprise.

  “You’ve earned it. That also makes it clear you’re ahead of Zaxby in the chain of command, just in case. It’s me, Engels, Loco, then you.”

  “Ah, sir... General Paloco departed shortly after you did, leaving me in command.”

  “Really?” Straker asked.

  “Yes. Apparently he abdicated his membership in the Breakers, as far as Conglomerate law is concerned. He did this all through Indy, without consulting me, before he left with Mayor Jilani aboard her ship.”

  “That sneaky little bastard.”

 
; “Indy said they’d be searching for our people from the criminal underworld end of things. It’s highly irregular.”

  “But not a bad idea. Okay, I guess that means the Breakers—and all the civilians—are in your capable hands, Ellen.”

  Admiral Gray took a deep, pleased breath as they stopped in front of a door. “Thank you, sir. You can count on me. Here’s your quarters. See you in an hour in the main conference room.”

  After Steiner dropped off Straker’s bags, Straker showered, changed and ate before the meeting. His quarters were far less luxurious and ostentatious than those aboard the yacht, but they suited him much better. They had an integrated office, with the dings and marks of other occupants throughout the years, adding to the indefinable, familiar sense of duty aboard a full-fledged warship instead of an armed luxury yacht.

  The meeting was routine, with quick summaries of the recent events, the new alliances, and Straker’s intended courses of action. The review reminded him that there were eleven men missing, but he had no leads on where they ended up, so he turned that problem over to Sinden and her intelligence network.

  In a way it was a relief: he wasn’t required to make a hard decision between going after the men, or Carla and the women. His duty and his desires lined up perfectly on this one.

  As did his fears.

  * * *

  Five days in transit was a hellish time for Straker, his imagination providing some of the worst suggestions possible for the ordeal Carla and the other women must be undergoing. The only consolation for him consisted of thin logic and reason: the Predators must be taking them to the nebula for a purpose, a purpose that meant preserving their captives, he must believe. And, the Predators would also need several days to make the transit, so whatever was happening at the other end, those travel days could be eliminated from his calculations.