Mina let out a bark of a laugh. “I wouldn’t let her buy a psi-bow without it.” As she held Rayne closer, her suit’s arm guards opened up, the armor plates splitting, multiplying, and turning into another layer of defensive shielding around our vital cargo.
It was no surprise to me that the only Marine I’d count as close to my equal had read my mind as to the rest of my orders. “Claire, cut through the main line. They look like typical scythe-arms, so you know what to do. Mina, hell, your orders are obvious.”
“No one will lay a claw on Garmin,” Mina said as a declaration-of-fact, as Claire snapped the whip between her hands.
“Oh, you know I know how exactly the right thing to do with this thing.” Her smirk as she engaged forward thrusters spoke more about how she had used that thing during our roll in the hay our first time to Turan.
I launched after her, going for an oldie-but-a-goodie, my all-time favorite melee weapon, my Warhammer. Spitters, especially anti-aircraft breeds, were covered in angled plates that made for good protection from most long-range weapons. Warhammers were invented to split through knight’s armor in the old days and backed by my power armor, and improved by thousands of years of materials science, mine was just as good against bug shells.
Of course, they saw us coming. We were big, shining beacons in the clear skies, after all, but outside the spitter, these poor bastards had to wait for us to get close before they could do anything other than pray for cover, something sparse on the desolate valley they were in. Mina played it safe, keeping her shielded-and-wrapped passenger behind Jill as she played the opening note of our symphony of destruction.
Her first arrow beat us to the Acburian patrol, the telekinetic shot flashing along the way, each flash bringing another arrow into existence along a parallel course. Instead of her volley blotting out the sun, of course, it lit up the sky with purple light.
Well, it was still less ‘noisy’ than an F5 tornado.
A good third of the bugs were run through by that barrage, the rest scattering to minimize the effectiveness of Jill’s continued fire. That was the whole point, of course, disruption of the enemy formation. Claire spiraled right, looking to round up that flank with an onslaught of burning lashes.
Me, well, I was always an up-the-center kind of guy. The few arrows that had struck the spitter had glanced off its plating, just as I knew they would, and the sluggish thing was more focused on the offending gnat biting at it from the sky than the one ready to unleash hell on it from the front.
The spitter only got off one shot, a crackling ball of lightning ripping off from its tail, a peal of thunder accompanying it. Similar to an old-fashioned flak cannon, those bio-electric blasts burst at certain elevations, usually told it in clicky-speak by one of the smarter Acburians handling it. This one was firing on instinct though, so I didn’t even need to look back to know that Jill and Mina easily launched themselves out of the way, flying in perfectly choreographed defensive form.
“You shot at the wrong Marines,” I growled. “Give me afterburners and all reserves to forward shields. Angle for a collision.”
As I pulled back my hammer, ready to knock this bug right out of the ballpark, my favorite lady reported, “Acknowledged, Lieutenant Ryder.”
Shields glowed in front of me as apertures opened all along the back and legs of my suit. The entire thruster suite fired at once, and I went from stupid-fast to ludicrous speed in the blink of an eye.
As Claire burned a path through the remaining scythe-arms and Jill picked off stragglers, my ramming shields plowed into the stinger first, the angled force barrier cracking one of its thick slabs of armor. It was the perfect entry point for my Warhammer, so I took my swing, actuators straining with all the new-found power my Second Battalion suit could channel, thruster ports opening along the arm to add just that much extra pepper to my swing.
The solid chunk of hyper-dense alloy that was the head of my hammer slammed right on point, letting out a sound that could have been mistaken for an explosion. All that weight and force behind it drove the weapon not just through the armor, it plowed through the exoskeleton underneath it, straight to the gooey center that every Acburian shared. I’m not sure if I plowed straight through to the thing’s brain or not, but I do know that I came out through the other side of its truck-sized body, covered in gore and grinning like a madman.
And just like that, it was over. Silence reigned over the valley save for the hum of shields and thrusters.
I wiped black goo off my faceplate as I turned. “So, where was that cave again, Claire?”
14
Of course, because everything had to go FUBAR at once, we were still getting intense interference on coms back to Alliance Hall. At least we had full access to our arsenals again, but without any way to update our status to Della, we could only press on with our initial mission goal. Considering more bugs would come in time during the day, Mina and I agreed that Claire’s initial assessment of going to ground was good to follow now.
Unfortunately, things continued to slide downhill once we go undercover.
“I’m not sure what you’re expecting me to do,” Claire said, looking at me with narrowed eyes and a familiar scowl on her face. Even now, after all, we’d been through and all we’d shared together, she was careful not to come off as too soft or accessible.
I had slept with her, sure. She’d admit that as flippantly as one might admit their condiment preferences at a deli counter. But the other admission she made the night we were together, about having a poster of me on her wall growing up and about looking up to me ever since she was a girl, was likely a secret she’d take to her grave. I could respect that though, at this particular moment, things like respect came well down the list … somewhere way south of ‘staying alive.’
“She’s still unconscious, Claire,” I said, pointing down to Rayne, now freed of my psionic webbing and Mina’s guard. “Isn’t it obvious? I want you to do something about that.”
Here we were again, in familiar and horrific territory. I blinked as the moon of Turan stretched out in front of me; the desolate sand hills, the cavernous caves, and absolute lack of anything colorful or alive. This was the place of nightmares, and after clawing our way out with barely our lives to show for it, we were rewarded with a return trip.
“I’m sure you do,” Claire barked back a response. “I’m just not sure why you’re looking at me to do it.”
“You’re the medic,” I responded, looking at her as though the answer should have been obvious because, well, it should. “This is a medical issue. Isn’t that kind of your forte?”
Claire groaned at me. While our last mission together didn’t leave much room for medical issues, you were sort of either dead, or you weren’t, there was no doubt that something like what was going on with Rayne was squarely in Claire’s wheelhouse. She had been trained for this sort of thing, given a different sort of education than standard infantrymen and women received. She was learned in medicine and the way it reacted to the human body. That was knowledge I needed to use right now, with Rayne stuck in some sort of medically induced slumber.
Unfortunately, Claire disagreed. ”I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” she sneered. “This woman has been sedated. If she was in a coma because of head trauma or even some sort of sickness, I might be able to help. This is synthetic though. This is an intended altered state of being, and because of that, I’m not sure there’s anything I can do.”
“Nothing you can do?” I balked, anger rising in me like one of the several suns in eyeshot throughout Turan’s atmosphere. “How the fuck was she supposed to be woken up in the first place?”
“Ideally, with the stimulants that would shoot into her system the second we landed,” Claire responded before the sentence had even properly left my mouth. “But, given the fact that we crash landed and you pulled her off her medical slab before the meds could be injected into her bloodstream, I’m not quite sure what we can do with her now.”
&
nbsp; I set my jaw. “Sounds like quitter talk.”
Jill, who was keeping watch from several yards away, must have heard me. She snickered as I spoke, shaking her head in amusement.
For her part, Claire didn’t seem nearly as amused. “What it is, is common sense. Without knowing what drugs she was given, randomly injecting her with counteragents is dangerous. Do you want her awake or dead?” She sighed. “So, unless you happen to have the exact medical documentation about Rayne and the proper stimulants on you, I don’t think we’re waking her up anytime soon.”
As a medic, Claire knew very well that I didn’t have any stims on me. In fact, she knew just how against protocol it was for any Marine to have any sort of meds on their person at all outside of trained medics. We might have been able to buy, store, and horde upgrades and new weapons to our heart’s content, but medication was a starship of a different color.
Every grassfed knows that the Alliance doesn’t roll like that when it comes to meds. There have been too many addiction issues over the decades, too many people wasting away because of their habits for the Alliance to even consider an open-door policy on that kind of thing. While guns and knives might come a dime a dozen, you had to prove (either by order of your unit’s medic or physician or by the diagnostic sensors on your suit showing something out of the ordinary) to qualify for medication.
Even when that happens, you were still only given what you absolutely needed and nothing more. Drugs were like gold in our line of work, more precious even that upgrades and weaponry, because you couldn’t earn them. Considering Rayne was a civilian, she wasn’t even in Claire’s purview as the squad’s medic, so proving the proper medical need to the Alliance bureaucrats would be nigh-impossible, even if we could get through to Command. If what Rayne needed was stims, she might as well have stayed on that ship and sank into that good night when it crashed.
“You need to figure it out,” I told Claire simply. It wasn’t much, and it sure as hell wasn’t an answer, but it was the best I could do.
I had my own issues I needed to deal with. I was to take the lead on this mission, and that meant everyone’s life was once again in my hands, as well as the future of the entire war effort. Truth like that didn’t leave much time for anything else. So, I would leave the medical to the medic and regardless of what Claire said, it was a medical issue.
“That’s easy for you to say,” she spat back.
“Easy to say or not, he’s right,” Mina said from behind me.
Claire’s eyes slid past me and rested on her superior officer. While it was true that in the confines of this mission I was in charge, Mina was Claire’s true captain. She had always been there for Claire, always a steady hand present, and willing to do what was necessary to keep Claire safe and to help her grow as a Marine and a woman. I couldn’t compete with that and, luckily, I didn’t have to.
“Mina,” Claire began, a feeble start at a reply that was shut down before it could really begin.
“Your job is your job,” Mina said, silencing her squadmate.
“I don’t have her records, and I don’t know what meds she’s on,” Claire protested, lifting her hands to accentuate her points.
“Those are excuses, Claire, and we don’t deal in excuses,” Mina countered. It didn’t surprise me that Mina and I saw eyes to eye on this issue, but it was still nice to have someone to fight this particular battle for me. “You graduated top of your class, Claire. You have the best mind for meds and the best grasp of the human body I’ve ever seen. I know this is a unique situation, but I’m going to need you to think outside the box here.” She nodded. “Really earn your beans.”
“I hate beans,” Claire submitted weakly.
“We all do,” Mina said. “Now, if you’ll excuse us, Mark and I have to talk about our unique situation.” She cleared her throat. “Figure it out. Get it done.”
Claire looked at Mina, then at me, then back at Mina again. “Yes, ma’am,” she replied, then turned her attention to Rayne, kneeling and starting to examine her.
“Good job,” I said, as Mina and I turned to walk a few paces away for privacy.
“Shaming a Marine into doing her job? It’s not rocket science, Mark. What you did back there was impressive. The reason it was necessary in the first place is what worries me.”
I nodded at Mina. “The bomber.”
“We need to take this seriously.”
“Did I ever give you the impression I wasn’t? In fact, I’m betting we’re having very similar reactions to this, including a few of the same questions.”
“You want to know how he got on the ship in the first place.” Yep, Mina knew that exactly what I was thinking. ”The security in Alliance Hall is top notch,” she continued. “You can barely take a piss in there without the Alliance analyzing it for proteins. Suddenly, people are managing to worm their way in as pilot on what must be the most top-secret mission of the decade? I’m not buying it.”
I wondered if it was the same thought I had. “So, what are you buying?”
“Wars cost a lot of money, Mark,” Mina said, pursing her lips, “but they also bring in a lot of money. When people think the world is a bad day away from ending, they usually don’t think twice about opening up their pocketbooks.”
She was indeed thinking what I was thinking, right down to the motive.
“You think this was an inside job?”
“I think anything is possible, and I think I’ve seen too much in my life to put anything past anyone.” She shook her head. “You’ve got arms dealers, upgrade designers, and resource traders just to name a few. War is big business, and you can’t underestimate what people might do if they get wind that their business might get screwed with. This is a shot to take this war down, once and for all. I don’t think it’s just a coincidence that some son of a bitch ended up piloting the ship we were on.” She tilted her head at me. “Which begs the question of who exactly knew where Rayne would be or what she might be up to.”
“That’s a question we can’t answer right now, but I’m not sure it matters. That guy had a bomb wrapped around himself. That’s an act of fanaticism if I’ve ever seen one. There was no way he was getting off that ship alive, and he knew it. Who the hell would care about money if they weren’t going to be around to spend it?”
“Another question we can’t answer,” Mina lamented.
“Hey!” Claire yelled, beckoning for us to come over to her. “Speaking of answers, I think I have one for Sleeping Beauty here.” She stood up, looking down at Rayne. “I’ve been doing a little research on standard Alliance stasis meds while you guys were talking, and I think I might know a natural remedy that will act in place of the typical antidote.”
“Great,” I answered. We needed Rayne awake. Otherwise, all of this was for nothing. “Let’s get to it.”
“It’s not exactly that easy,” Claire explained.
“What do you mean?” Mina asked.
Clair peered over at me. “Do you remember that time you literally went inside a sandworm, Mark?”
“I do,” I answered uneasily.
“Well, where we have to go to get the remedy is going to make that look like a beach vacation.”
15
“Explain it to me again?” I said, pacing back and forth near Rayne’s still unconscious body. Much like before, night was close to falling on Turan and, with the dark, came the real danger. Only, unlike before, we apparently weren’t going to run from the encroaching danger this time. We were going to wait for it. We were going to stand there and face it down, and Claire was still trying to make me understand why.
“We need its blood, Mark,” she said, tapping her booted foot against the ground restlessly. “Like I said before-”
“It’s not easy to understand, Claire,” Mina cut her off. “Part of your job is to help us understand what’s going on, especially when it’s in a technical specialty we’re not trained for. All that, and Mark is our commanding officer here. So, when he as
ks you to explain it again, you don’t huff, and you don’t cop an attitude. You start from the top, and you calmly and carefully explain it again. Understood?”
“Understood,” Claire said, though I could hear a touch of resentment in her voice. Still, she steadied herself and turned her attention back to me.
“The stimulant that was supposed to wake Rayne from her sleep is made in part from an adrenaline that can be found, among other places, in the bloodstream of certain Acburians. Now, while you two were discussing whatever it was you were discussing, I used my suit to search the intel we received on Turan, which includes bio-scans, to cross-reference species of Acburians with the needed component and species of Acburians that are known to exist on Turan. I came up exactly one species.” She shook her head. “And it’s a doozy.”
I readied myself. The truth was that there weren’t many creatures on this damned moon that weren’t hardcore in one way or another. I had dealt with more of them than I cared to think about, so had Claire, for that matter. If she was being hesitant about describing whatever this thing was, it must have been a hell of a creature. It didn’t matter. Whatever this was, I’d have to fight it. I’d have to face it down as I’d done with everything else on this goddamn moon.
“Tell me,” I said flatly.
“Centi-walkers,” she said, keeping her voice steady and her body completely still.
“My God,” Mina said, her body shuddering at the thought of what Claire had just laid out.
Centi-walkers were a subspecies of ground Acburians that were more than a little frightening. A race recently uncovered by the new, expanded intel network here, they were big and bulky, with elongated heads and musclebound torsos. In most aspects, they were pretty similar to the other ground bugs we’d fought since we were all wet behind the ears rookies. The difference, of course, was that instead of a pair of large scythe arms, these things were studded with a hundred, sharp small arms. Though I had never faced one of them personally, I had heard a few tales of terror where this sort of bug was at center stage.
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