Spinward Fringe Broadcast 0: Origins

by Randolph Lalonde

  I ran to the edge and saw him fall into the water below. His suit would protect him from the two hundred meter fall and the near frozen water. “Minh, get the shuttle in the air and track our arm consoles. We'll need a pick up.” I shouted into my communicator. “Start with Oz.”

  I turned to Jason and Doctor Lang. The doctor's headpiece was already up and sealed. “I'm right behind you. Someone's got to treat that big idiot.”

  “That's insane, there's no way!” Jason said, walking carefully up to the edge.

  “It's that or you get left behind. You bet there are sentinels on their way here right now.”

  He looked over the edge again and I could see he was starting to panic. “There's got to be another way.”

  I looked at Doctor Lang for a moment and she took one quick step towards Jason. She slapped something on his cheek. Before he knew what was going on he fell to the floor unconscious. “That'll work,” I said with a shrug.

  We sealed his headpiece then picked him up and tossed him out the window. I sympathized with him, and found myself trying to think another way, any other way before watching the Doctor take a run at the window and leap out. I followed her as I heard the door open behind me.

  Chapter 4

  Falling

  I remember thinking that there had to be a way to incorporate an anti gravity unit into the suits, or at least a parachute as I watched the water quickly approach. Then I hit, and the black blue of the water enveloped me. The front of my suit inflated and I was drawn back up to the surface.

  Minh had already brought the shuttle down from the landing platform and was dipping the loading ramp at the front into the water, making it easy for the security team to fish Oz out. He was completely limp, and the Doctor was right behind him, pulling Jason with her.

  I was the last on the shuttle. “Back to the ship!” I shouted into my communicator. The hatch shut behind me and I moved over to where Doctor Lang was releasing Oz's headpiece. As soon as the seal came undone a gush of blood rushed out. She carefully but quickly pulled the hood off and the extent of his injuries became plain. He had been shot in the lower half of the face and passed out sometime before or after he hit the water. The suit must have started medicating him as soon as it detected injuries. One of the security officers brought the larger medical kit from the shuttle and Doctor Lang immediately got to work.

  She cleared his airway and applied a few micro patches to deliver more medication on his neck then did some work inside the wound. I couldn't make out what she was doing clearly, but I stood near just in case she needed assistance. She didn't. Her hands were practiced, she was quick, and her work was done in two minutes. She took off her hood and looked at me. “There's nothing else we can do until he's on the ship, but he's stable. He was shot twice in the chest as well but his suit wasn't punctured. At worst he suffered some bruising. I'm amazed he got us out. Help me get him into a stasis tube.”

  I was just starting to pick him up when I heard the cockpit door slide open. “Jonas! Who do we start shooting at?” Minh-Chu yelled over his shoulder.

  Carrie took over for me, gently picking up Oz's feet. “No shooting! Don't shoot anyone!” I yelled as I ran past the crewmembers who had accompanied us planet-side. Everyone made it back. I dropped myself into the cockpit tactical seat and looked out the view port.

  From our position in orbit I could see Vindyne ships had engaged in combat with the depleted Gai-Ian fleet and more combatants were still arriving.

  “I'll bet that half the defence fleet or more are still around Gai-Ian Nine and there's an offensive just large enough to keep them occupied there. Vindyne got past their inner system defences.” I brought up the tactical display and Alice patched into the computer. “Captain, planetary communications chatter is filled with reports of explosions in key areas before the arrival of the Vindyne fleet. They're trying to put out the fires and get things under control, but there is a lot of chaos.” Alice reported in a sad tone.

  “How many explosions, can you get a number?”

  “Over seventy from what I've overheard.”

  I sat back and thought for a moment, doing some mental math. “That's just about how many cannons they'd need on the surface to defend the entire planet.”

  “None of the cannons have been directly affected.”

  “They wouldn't have to be if bombs were destroying control centers just like the one in the northern port. Vindyne should have control of the orbital space soon. It's time to leave.” I looked at the tactical display and saw three Vindyne Marauder corvettes, nearly two hundred meters long each and heavily armed. “We really have to get out of here.”

  I started turning towards the communications and information systems station but Jason ran into the cockpit and sat in the seat first. “On it Captain. Oz is squared away,” he started working the communications controls and hailing the First Light.

  At the same time I checked for her profile at my station.

  “No ship. She's just not there or her communications and transponder are out,” Jason said urgently. “Could Vindyne have gotten to her?”

  “No, if the First Light had been destroyed there would be dozens of emergency beacons. Maybe she's on the other side of the planet.” I said as I frantically scanned the entire region.

  Minh started evasive manoeuvres as the corvettes were about to enter firing range, their engines were far more powerful and they were catching up fast. “No ship?” He cried out as he forced the boarding craft into a spiralling dive towards a distant moon. “No cover, no friends, fighting everywhere and corvettes catching up. There can't be no ship!”

  I was still scanning for the ship when Alice's voice emitted from my command unit. “There is no wreckage from the First Light, and there is no evidence of the ship in range. I'm sorry Jonas.”

  I sat back in my seat and watched the small holographic screen hovering over the flat panels built into the tactical station as the three Vindyne Marauder Corvettes came closer and closer. Their beam weapons would cut the boarding shuttle to pieces in seconds.

  “Message coming in sir. The Vindyne are ordering our surrender. We have thirty seconds to cut the engines and secure any weapons,” Jason reported.

  “It's our only option. Signal our surrender. Minh, straighten us out and cut our engines.”

  He did what he was asked then locked the controls and released the swivel on his pilot's chair so he could turn to face me. “Should we expect any help from our friends on Concordia?”

  “Well, the civilian government loves us, but the military aren't big fans.”

  “What did you say down there?”

  “It's more what I didn't say. We were about to leave without making anything worse, but then there was an explosion in the market place. They tried to put us under arrest so Oz found us an escape route.”

  The lead Corvette class ship, a narrow vessel with gunnery ports along the top and bottom, closed in and locked us to her hull with docking clamps. “Please turn off all non-critical systems and stand by for transport to the nearest carrier,” came the announcement from the communications systems as the docking clamp's data link jacked into our craft.

  “Well, I suppose it's better to be imprisoned by the winning side.” Jason said quietly as he watched the other two corvettes turn back towards the battle. I shut down the tactical station while everyone turned off the other posts. The shuttle was suddenly far too quiet and even though the lighting hadn't changed, it seemed darker.

  “Well, this is probably the last chance we'll get to see what was in that crate the Governor had delivered,” I said as I got up and walked into the main cabin. It was a meter and a half tall and two meters per side. I undid the clasps on one end and the container opened. He had honoured his promise and more. There were samples of shield, weaponry and biomass technology from what I could tell at a glance. “It's as though he didn't know what we'd want from him exactly, but he was prepared to give us what it was on a seconds notice,” Doctor Lang sai
d.

  “He knew the military were about to take over the negotiations, I suppose this was his way of getting the last word in,” I agreed.

  “Oh no, don't tell me he did what I think he did,” Doctor Lang said, shaking her head. “That power cell is just the right size for a hover chair.”

  “Well, there's nothing wrong with them giving us anti gravity technology samples, they might be more advanced there as well.”

  Doctor Lang moved a few things out of the crate and pulled a handle. A tray slid out with Elise laying on top of her flattened out hover chair, which provided a softer surface than the bare stasis unit. She looked like she was sound asleep.

  “Oh no.”

  Doctor Lang checked the young woman's vital signs with her medical unit and nodded to herself. “She's in dry chemical stasis. Judging from the container and her state, she could stay this way for weeks or longer.” She checked the controls to the container. “This chamber is made to operate for months. He used the best. It even has its own inertial dampeners.”

  “What will Vindyne do with her?” I found myself asking quietly.

  “I don't know,” she turned to one of the security officers. “Get the medical supplies from the shuttle. If I'm right, this could work to Elise's advantage.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, her system has been tricked into sinking into a protective coma, so there's no way to wake her. If I'm right, the drug synthesis kit should be able to generate the first and second phases of her treatment, and with her already out, I can accelerate it so when she wakes up she should have increased motor control and a lot of the nerve damage will be repaired. What she'll do with that I don't know, but it's better than her waking up the way she was before. Maybe she could help herself a little.”

  “Good consolation to being taken captive,” Jason, who helped the security officer with the emergency surgery kit, said from behind. “If she's as smart as I think she is, maybe she'll be our Trojan horse.”

  “I hope not. The last thing I want her to do is get herself into more trouble trying to help us.” I replied.

  “Well, either way, this might be my last chance to honour my promise to her,” Doctor Lang said, taking a small materializer and the synthesizer from the surgical kit. She set right to work programming the right combination of drugs into the machines and I took that opportunity to see how things looked from the cockpit.

  I immediately wished that I hadn't. We were well behind the Vindyne's front line, and the largest ship I had ever seen loomed ahead. Even though we were a few thousand kilometres away from it, the vessel was imposing. It was the largest space faring vessel I'd ever seen second to Freeground.

  It was a massive, thin half circle, the size of a medium space station. Long rods extended from the front and rear and engines. The engines were easily half a kilometre across, indicating incredible interior mass. One large docking bay was yawning open. Five corvettes were emerging shoulder to shoulder. We were just minutes away from docking.

  I looked to my right and saw that the fighting over the planet had stopped. There were no more flashes, just dozens of ships entering orbit, specks and small seemingly random shapes against the back lighting of the great big blue and green world.

  “Think we could bribe our way out of this?” Minh asked quietly.

  “Not with their superiors looking on from that invasion platform behind them.”

  “Do you have a plan?”

  “Surrender, then talk our way out.”

  “Sounds like a good plan, mostly because your talking has been so very effective.”

  “Do you have any better ideas?”

  Minh sat quietly for a moment before answering, “It'll come to me.”

  “Tell me when it does.”

  I casually tapped a preset sequence of buttons on my command console. To anyone looking on it looked like I was checking my messages. That couldn't be further than the truth. Alice was whispering in my ear a second later. “Thank you Jonas, I won't let you down.”

  Doctor Lang came into the cockpit a moment later. “It turned out a little better than expected. I was able to set the drugs to release into her system in stages. There were a few subdermal inserts in the kit that will release the second and third stages of the treatment into her system when it's time. She'll wake up a little earlier, but that's the only risk other than some mild shaking after a couple of days.”

  “How long until she wakes up?”

  “About two days. After that she'll be fine for a day or so. I just hope the shaking phase doesn't frighten her too much. It's a side effect of the regeneration process.”

  “We can't hide her. I don't know what they'll do to the ship or that container. Will Vindyne be able to detect the drugs in her system?”

  “They will, but there won't be anything they can do about it. At the worst they'll keep her in stasis, I hope.”

  “You and me both. I don't know what I'll do if anything happens to her.”

  “I know. I hope I can stay with her.”

  “So do I. It's important that we don't get separated, but I suspect that's the first thing they'll do. I'm just glad we're all trained to handle it.”

  As we came within a kilometre of the docking bay, the Marauder released the clamps and began accelerating away. I could hear Minh curse under his breath as one of the clamps scratched lengthwise across the hull.

  We were caught by some kind of magnetic tow or gravity field which began drawing us into the landing bay. It consisted of several levels that overlapped each other with elevation pads and sections cut away so many small ships could be docked, moved, serviced, and dismantled or sold. The efficient use of space was impressive, almost impressive enough to distract me from the fact that we were absolutely helpless.

  The bump of turbulence indicated that there was a shift in gravity, and the people working without helmets or sealed suits indicated that there was a reliable contained atmosphere. I found myself looking at the ships littering the multiple levels of the bay. Many of them had minor battle damage, while others were in perfect repair.

  “They capture a lot more than the All-Con Fleet did, that's for sure. I'd love a chance to take a look around. There's an Arcyn Starskipper, right there,” Minh's copilot said, pointing to a sleek black gunship. I remembered seeing notices about that model, warning everyone in Freeground Operations that it was one of the fastest lightspeed ships in her class, with room for a crew of twelve and a small cargo. It had a predatory look and sleek design. A true mercenary ship that very few mercenaries could dream of buying, yet too flashy for common military use. “I've never met anyone who could afford to buy the armed model. I'd give my restaurant for one.” Minh said, sitting up in his seat. “Whoever owns that one must be pretty pissed at being captured.”

  “Are the ship's computers clear of any sensitive information, Minh?”

  “Yup. All that's left are the logs starting when we landed on Concordia. Not very interesting stuff.”

  “Good.”

  “Think we'll make it out of this Jonas?” he asked quietly.

  “Any corporate machine that big has got to have a few cracks in it. If anyone can find them, it's this crew. I'm just glad Ayan got the ship out of here. We couldn't have been much help and it's likely both sides would have fired on the First Light.”

  “Cloaking devices. We should all have cloaking devices,” Minh said, crossing his arms and looking out the cockpit. “And bigger guns.”

  Our ship was reoriented, and by our trajectory I could tell it wouldn't be long before we were down on the deck. I turned to the rest of the crew. “Okay, they're going to board us in a few minutes. We have to disarm ourselves. Stow any weapons that you have on you where they're safely out of the way and out of sight. That crate is going to stay open; just close the stasis section so Elise doesn't get knocked around while we're touching down. Erase all data on any recording devices you have, we don't want to give them anything we don't have to. They're going
to ask questions. Speak when spoken to and answer them. Don't lie, don't try to escape, don't fight them.”

  “What if they ask about Freeground?” asked Carrie as she deposited her sidearm in an overhead storage compartment.

  “Focus on as many unimportant details as you can. Tell them whatever you have to so you can prevent harm to yourself and your crewmates. The Admiralty may disagree, but I’m not going to order you to keep a secret that won’t do Freeground any harm if it’s uncovered. It's that simple. We'll try not to get separated but that's exactly what they'll do. I'll try to keep us together and get us free. Keep in mind that we've seen no sign of the First Light so she's still out there. We have no idea what kind of plan they have in mind, so we'd better not screw it up by doing something dangerous or stupid. As of now our mission out here is to do one thing and one thing only: survive.”

  When we landed everyone was gathered at the front of the main cabin facing the forward boarding ramp. All our suits were sealed. As I opened the hatch my headpiece display indicated that there was a breathable atmosphere, but we remained covered up regardless. I put one hand up and held the other forward, presenting a data chip containing a full manifest and ship log for the last day.

  The soldiers rushed in four at a time, all in navy blue and black armour. They carried double-barrelled rifles the like of which I had never seen. One barrel looked like it was for energy, the other seemed to fire large projectiles that must have been four centimetres across.

  After a dozen soldiers had taken up positions in front of us, rifles at the ready, one soldier strode leisurely up the ramp. He stopped inches in front of me, then looked me up and down. “You are the Captain?” he asked.

  “I am. Here is our manifest. We have one injured and one in our care. I take all responsibility for any criminal activity that--”

  “Take off your mask,” he ordered.

  I hesitated for a moment then retracted my headpiece. Without a word he stepped back and shot me full in the face. There was a flash of light and excruciating pain. Every cell in my body seemed to be writhing in its own private hell before I passed out.