Raleigh turned to the wall and opened fire on a small conduit cover just above the floor. It would be a tight squeeze to get through the opening, but the passageway beyond it was more than wide enough for him to move unimpeded into the infirmary. With a savage kick, he dismantled the cover, then set his rifle inside the half-meter square shaft behind it. Ducking his head inside, Raleigh maneuvered and twisted his upper body into the space and brought his legs through easily. He crawled forward and found a small door had closed off the passageway when the blast doors closed. He fired the rifle twice, and the door flew down the passage. Light shone in from an opening in the infirmary ahead on Raleigh’s right. He gave the grating a shove, and it gave way. Raleigh slipped the rifle through and fired blindly into the space. Moving forward and squeezing the trigger gave him the illusion he was moving with covering fire. There was no retaliation. Tirr was likely under cover, which was fine with Raleigh. He came fully through the grate and stood up, bringing the rifle to his hip. The isolation chamber’s internal doors were closed, and Raleigh could immediately see the room was empty. The bassinet-like enclosure where the TriRusk child had been was turned on its side, revealing a tunnel entrance in the floor. They’d escaped. Given the junctions and pathways displayed by the mapping drone, they could be anywhere.
Raleigh pointed his rifle into the tunnel entrance and fired several rounds, but he made no effort to descend into the dust-filled space. The MinSha would have to come up eventually, and the mapping drone would tell them exactly where the exits were. He needed to regain command of the situation and marshal his forces to those exit points. The anger in his veins craved release, but Raleigh turned away from the isolation room and fired several bolts at the doors’ control panel. To his astonishment, the doors slid open. He went through them, stepped over the bodies of the incompetent fools he’d assigned to guard the TriRusk, and sprinted toward the command center. He tapped his headset twice and radioed all his forces. “Let me make this perfectly, fucking clear to all of you. Stupidity will not be tolerated. You will kill everything on this planet that’s not human, or I will kill you myself. Raleigh, out.”
* * * * *
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Weqq
In the Jungle East of the MinSha Compound
“Flyers approaching,” Tara called over the internal laser connection, breaking Jessica’s thoughts about the cockpit of the Mk 8 CASPer and how much the design and lethality had changed since she’d last piloted one, more than five years before. Human innovation never stopped. While the CASPers’ systems had been refined to remove the need for cumbersome haptic suits and had amplified the ability of the human pilot to jump, move, shoot, and communicate, what Tara had done by installing Lucille bordered on cosmic.
“Copy, Tara.” Jessica replied. Moving the CASPer was as easy as walking. The servos and motors showed hardly any delay in responsiveness. With Lucille monitoring the environment and internal systems, Jessica felt less like a pilot and more like a part of the machine. “Incredible.”
Lucille chimed to life. <
“Copy, Lucille.”
<>
“Did Tara ask you to monitor data links? Keep her abreast of intelligence?”
<
“Nice,” Jessica grinned. Maybe there was hope for Tara after all. She could see the bigger picture better than most tactical commanders, and that could serve her well. “Tell me about the flyers, Lucille.”
<
Jessica bit her lower lip. Tirr was moving the MinSha away from the site. “Any life signs?”
<
Working with Lucille again almost made Jessica smile in spite of the actions underway. “Analysis?”
<
Tell me something I don’t already know. Jessica smoothed an errant lock of hair away from her face and adjusted the temperature controls slightly. With her bulky armor packed away in the stowage compartment behind her thighs, her coveralls were hardly thick enough to keep up with the cool air pumping through the cockpit. “How fast can the farthest elements return to base?”
<
I hope that’s enough time.
“Lucille? Can you tap any other data streams? What else is Raleigh attempting?”
<>
“Can you tap the ship’s data stream?” Jessica asked. Her plan fleshed out a little more, and she kept talking. “We need to infiltrate Raleigh’s command network, Lucille. Taking down the jammers and allowing outside comms is one thing, but we need to manipulate what Raleigh’s seeing and reacting to—not to mention that program you’ve found to shut all their CASPers down. We need to broadcast that ASAP.”
<> Lucille paused. <
“Lucille, open up the laser comm with Tara. Let’s bring her into this conversation.”
<
“It’s not her ability, Lucille.” Jessica sucked in a breath and wondered how in the hell she was going to address human values with a non-human intelligence. “She acted in a way I didn’t expect. Did things that compromised her values.”
Lucille was quiet for a moment. <>
Oh, that’s it. Jessica took a breath. Tara wanted salvation in the form of mission success, and had managed to forget what set her apart in the process. There could be some salvation in what Jessica was asking her to do, and in Tara’s apparent willingness to do whatever it took to support her, but proving her innocence to the guild would be problematic at best.
One thing at a time.
The voice was familiar enough that it would normally have sliced through her thoughts like a hot knife through soft butter. Now, though, it made her face screw up in agony.
Please, Dad. Don’t be a traitor. Even though I’m gonna use your program against fellow huma
ns, I don’t want to believe you’ve sold out the entire species, okay?
There was no reply from the mental voices of her childhood. Had there been, it wouldn’t have mattered. The evidence was damning. She had a shitload of it pointing to her father’s company, and what he’d been doing in the galaxy for the last twenty years backed that up. Salvage was a profitable business, especially when the secrets of how an entire species developed their weapons of war were there for the highest bidder.
Jessica shook off the thoughts. There would be a time and a place for investigation. “Lucille, patch Tara through on laser.”
“I’m here, Jessica.” Tara’s voice was level and strong. “What do you have for me?”
Jessica licked her lips and spoke slowly. “We’re going to need to patch Lucille into Raleigh’s network via a direct connection. Has to be from his end, though. We can’t ask for access, or he’ll assume something is off and either flat-out attack us with his ground assets or attempt to shut us down through a combination of electromagnetic interference and direct fire assets before we get close to the compound. We’ve got to get close enough to connect Lucille and not tip him off. You have any suggestions?”
Tara was silent for about twenty seconds. “Lucille, can you amplify INS errors to the point that our data would be unusable?”
<
Jessica nodded as the idea crystallized. “A beacon, right?”
“Not just any beacon, a dedicated navigation beacon. Raleigh has a multifrequency set that can transmit and receive at distances of up to thirty kilometers line of sight. When he turns it on, his flyer re-broadcasts it automatically. We’d have a way to let Lucille isolate the transmission and be able to lock on and infiltrate his system when the direct signal strength peaked.” Tara took a quick breath. “There’s enough caution and warning lights over here that a sudden loss of position and navigation ability is pretty easy to replicate.”
“Can you do the same, Lucille? Without degrading functionality?” Jessica asked.
<
“Do it, Lucille. Reduce whatever system fidelity you have to. Make it convincing.”
<
“Lucille? Make the adjustments necessary, and the second this ruse is up, revert all systems to nominal performance and engage at your discretion.”
<
Jessica smirked. “Did you come up with that callsign, Tara? I like it.”
“Long story, Jessica. Started at the CASPer course during the freefall training phase. I was pretty good at it.”
The comm channel clicked off. Lucille replied, <
Jessica focused on walking the CASPer forward as Lucille’s action timer ticked down. Watching the battle-scarred Mk 5 walking in front of her, she had to admit that Tara Mason was as good as they came. Whether it had simply been bad luck or her fate as a combat leader to have been in the situations she had, her survival resulted from skill more than luck of any type. The freefall phase of the CASPer course had been known to kill students. To pass the entire program of instruction, without a downgrade, was not only historic but impressive for any human being. Watching Tara march resolutely into another situation where things were far more likely to go wrong than right, Jessica idly wondered what she could do to save her friend. There had to be a way.
<
“Copy, Lucille. Tara? Get Raleigh on the horn, and let’s get that connection in place.”
“Roger, Bulldog. Cleared and switching.” Tara clicked off the frequency.
No sooner had the click sounded than Jessica said, “Listening connection, Lucille.”
<
She heard Tara enter the network with a three-note chime. “Boss, Deathangel 25 requesting a beacon. Navigation system is failing. Know you’re hip-deep right now, just need a solid vector to the house. Acknowledge. Over.”
“You said you were less than twenty minutes out? Why the fuck can’t you find your way? Are you lost?”
Jessica rolled her eyes. Raleigh’s disdain was palpable. She could hear the sneer in his voice, and it made her wonder why anyone, especially Tara, would follow him to a bake sale, much less through a combat operation. The rumors of his higher than average awards and payments likely told part of the story, but it didn’t change the reality of his command style. What an asshole.
Tara’s voice came back on the frequency. That she remained calm and level was incredible, given the circumstances. “Boss, Deathangel 25. Merely trying to get back as fast as you said you needed us. We’re beat up pretty bad, Boss, but we can still fight. Need a solid vector home. Over.”
“I don’t have time for this, Mason! If you can’t find your way home on your own, you’re no good to me anyway. How about you walk until your CASPers run out of fuel? Then you can unbutton your cockpits and walk for a while. Maybe you’ll enjoy getting eaten by those jungle birds and—”
“Enough!” Tara screamed into the frequency. Raleigh was silent on the other end, and Tara laid into him with more barrels of vocal ammunition than Jessica thought possible. “Listen to me, asshole. You think you need combat power now? Wait until what hit us overwhelms your compound and your defenses. Wait until they hit the forward elements, too. You’ll be sitting there in that undefended compound without any fire support and a broken ship that can’t haul your nuts out of the fire this time. How about that? Or you can have two CASPers back there to cover your ass and give the company time to refit. Now, turn on a gods-damned beacon!”
“We’ll talk later, Mason. Get your ass back here now.” Raleigh replied. A fresh icon appeared on Jessica’s heads-up display marking the compound’s location.
<
“How far until you can lock on and infiltrate, Lucille?”
<
Jessica sucked in a breath and grinned. “My personal slate.”
<
Sounds like a plan to me.
Tara’s voice returned to their shared frequency. “Not bad. Guess I screwed that up, too. Huh, Lucille?”
<
Jessica nodded. Tara’s remarks about the forward elements coming under attack were an outright lie, unless the TriRusk came out of the cavern or the bird-things sensed and acted upon the threat at hand. Neither seemed probable. Still, Raleigh had to be considering the courses of action and finding himself wanting. Having their primary target unsure of his actions gave them a narrowing window of opportunity. Time was not on their side, because
eventually Raleigh would realize the noose was around his neck and tightening. When he did, he’d lash out with every weapons system he had. If there were nukes on board the Satisfaction, he’d likely try to destroy the entire continent.
“Not bad at all,” Jessica consented. “We can talk about blame later. Let’s get moving.”
“Mike 77 has the lead.” Tara said and stepped off in the Mk 5. Jessica waited for a moment and set an interval of about fifteen meters between them. The imposing, broad shoulders of the CASPer made it impossible to miss, even in the thickening vegetation.
“You good up there?” Moving in a Mk 5 with a haptic suit was quite a bit different from walking in a state-of-the-art Mk 8 like Deathangel 25.
“I’ve got it, Jess.” Tara said. Jessica decided to let it drop. After all, she’d asked Tara to get into a dead man’s haptic suit and walk back into enemy territory as part of a surprise attack. She wouldn’t have come along, if she hadn’t been able to do so. Or, if she didn’t want to clear her name.
“Disengaging direct laser comms,” Jessica called. “Maintaining radio silence on the approach, starting now.”
“Copy all.” Tara replied. “Shut down the lasers, and we’ll keep the faith from here on in.”
Jessica nodded but didn’t reply. The indicator light for laser comms went out. Without a direct data connection, she had no insight into what Tara was doing or going to do. Opportunities for betrayal in the jungle were few and fleeting, but the closer they got to the compound, the more Tara’s options would open up. All it would take was one motion, one radio communication, one lucky shot, and Jessica would be on her own.
That’s not going to happen, Bulldog. Tara’s good people.
Shut up, Dad. She snorted. He’d liked Tara Mason from the first time they met when Tara was recovering from the injuries she’d suffered on Araf. A week later, he’d offered her a job with Intergalactic Haulers, which she’d refused. Being a mercenary was all she claimed to know, and she’d pointedly said she’d do almost anything to have a clean record again. Blindly following Raleigh, though, clearly diverged from that path. If she were to take it all the way and attack a Peacemaker, Tara could trade off that action for years, but she’d never be a reputable mercenary again.
Honor the Threat Page 31
