by PP Corcoran
“You have something to add, Colonel?” The governor’s tone was menacingly low. Reynolds ignored the politician’s implied threat.
“Governor,” she began in a strong, steady voice. “Brigadier Singh and his militia may put up a spirited defense. However, in my professional opinion, if the K’Tai forces that we face are even a quarter of the size of those reported by Admiral Alderman, then we cannot hope to stop them…”
“That’s complete BS, Governor!” spluttered Singh angrily. “Our air defenses may not be state of the art, but I assure you they are good enough to deal with a few troop transports.”
Reynolds was struggling to suppress her growing frustration “If it was only a few transports then I would agree, but it’s not. It’s going to be hundreds of transports, thousands of soldiers, supported by aero fighters and able to call on fire support from ships in low orbit.” Reynolds’ eyes held those of the governor.
“The militia might fight, sir. But they will lose, and your city and the people in it will pay the price.”
The governor looked from the impeccably dressed colonel, the very picture of what a professional military officer should be, to Brigadier Singh in his crumpled, faded uniform. Vandenberg opened his mouth to speak; however, his office doors burst open to admit his visibly pale assistant, who began to speak without waiting for permission, the words tumbling out.
“Governor. The… the navy… they’re gone… all of them!”
Angrily Vandenberg rounded on him. “I know they’re gone, you idiot!”
“No sir, you don’t understand! The ships Admiral Alderman left in orbit… Port Control reports that they powered up their drives and are making a run for the edge of the system.”
“Cowards! Filthy cowards!” Singh’s face was incandescent with rage. “Running in the face of the enemy. I’d hang the lot of them.”
Reynolds held her tongue as the brigadier vented his anger. She may have not been a naval officer, but even she could see that a couple of light cruisers and a handful of destroyers attempting to make a stand against the massed fire of the K’Tai fleet was a futile gesture. For the first time, her mask of professionalism slipped as emotion found its way into her voice.
“Governor, without naval support the K’Tai have complete control of the low orbits. They will be able to pinpoint your air defenses and strong points and destroy them without their ground troops even having to engage you.” Governor Vandenberg was leaning heavily on his desk, his head bowed. Reynolds prayed that he was listening to her. Taking a breath, she pressed on. “Governor. It is my recommendation that you order the militia to stand down. Declare Gemini an open city. If you don’t, the K’Tai will massacre Brigadier Singh’s men and kill an awful lot of civilians in the process. I’ll take my battalion into the hills and fight a guerrilla war until Eighth Fleet get their act in gear and kick the K’Tai off the planet.”
The silence in the office stretched interminably before the sound of heavy weapons fire penetrated the room. The governor raised his head and his eyes asked a silent question of Singh, who nodded slowly as he spoke.
“The militia have engaged the enemy.”
Vandenberg’s eyes shifted to regard Reynolds’ pleading face. Whatever his decision now, the fate of the militia was already sealed.
“Colonel, get your men to the hills and… good luck.”
Reynolds’ hand came up in salute before she spun and ran for the door, activating her wrist comm as she went. The double beep of the secure link being established to her battalion headquarters had barely finished before she was shouting her orders down the link.
“Execute Plan Shadow immediately! Repeat. Plan Shadow.” Reynolds cut the link without waiting for a reply as she ran through the corridors of the governor’s mansion, weaving through smartly dressed civilians going about their business like this was just another ordinary day, completely unprepared for the tsunami that was about to descend on them. Out of the front entrance, Reynolds took the steps three at a time, vaulting the single decorative chain-link barrier and sprinting for her waiting flitter, the engine already whining as her driver brought up the power. Reynolds had barely made it into her seat before the flitter was powering out of the parking lot and heading for her headquarters at the edge of town. Instinctively her eyes scanned the clear sky, searching for the incoming K’Tai transports as, with complete disregard for who could see, she began stripping out of her dress blues and rummaged through the duffel on the back seat of the flitter until she produced well-worn but serviceable combat gear. Her eyes never stopped searching the sky above as she dressed by instinct. Her body armor sealed and she was reaching for her helmet as, off to the west, she caught sight of bright blue and red flashes of coherent light rising skyward as the air defense batteries engaged the incoming enemy craft at maximum range. Almost immediately there was what could only be described as a barrage of vertical lightning as the enemy fleet responded. Where there had once stood an air defense battery and its militia crew, there was now only twisted, smoking carnage. All Reynolds could do was save as many of her people as she could.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Entering Orbit
H HOUR
DOWNTOWN GEMINI CITY
All over the city the sirens begin their ear-piercing wail. There had been raids on the system before, privateers hijacking the heavily laden merchantmen, but with the arrival of the League Border Patrol the frequency of the raids had reduced to a trickle. This, though, was something different.
It had been years since any privateer had had the audacity to make a physical attack on the planetary surface. Agate may not have been one of the overpopulated Core Worlds, may have had nowhere near the numbers living on it that even the sector capital had, but she did have a small standing defense force, maybe only a few thousand strong with a dribble of militia to back them up, but to get to the surface you would have to get past a squadron of cruisers and a handful of corvettes and destroyers. Any force capable of that was more than a group of ragtag privateers!
Dave’s suspicions were confirmed in the most ominous of ways as the office windows shook as they were battered by the reverberations of sonic booms.
Dave froze in place for a moment as the sight of lumbering troop transports, escorted by more nimble bat-winged aero fighters, filled the sky. Their design was unmistakable. The K’Tai had come to Agate.
From the sparse defenses came the sight of rising blue and red turbo laser fire, clawing into the air, searching out the transports. No sooner had the defenses began to speak than the bat-wing fighters swarmed over them, pulverizing the weapon emplacements and their crews.
The first of the transports touched down at the edge of the normally serene park that the Henderson Shipping building overlooked, the air filling with the high-pitched whining of anti grav engines. Ramps dropped down and released a flood of heavily armed soldiers completely covered in dull black body armor. With efficient movements, the black specters set up a defensive perimeter. These boys were not ordinary K’Tai marines or infantry; it looked like the K’Tai had brought in their best for this operation. At the entrance to the park, closest to the descending transports, was a stationary police flitter. Its bright colors and flashing lights drew an immediate and deadly reaction from the soldiers. Before the hapless police officers had a chance to react, the flitter was struck by a deluge of pulse rifle fire. The bright flashes of the rounds struck the vehicle’s skin before they passed easily through the thin metallic skin of the flitter, cutting the officers down where they sat. The rifle fire continued until the flitter’s hydrogen-filled fuel tank was hit and the vehicle exploded. The noise momentarily drowned out that of the landing transports. A ball of smoke and flame rose high into the air as the glass window in front of Dave rattled slightly in its frame from the concussion of the explosion, the flitter now a fiery funeral pyre for the dead officers.
Reacting out of sheer muscle reflex long before his conscious mind could catch up, Dave bolted out of his office a
nd ran straight into crowds of panicked office workers flooding into the corridor as they rushed to the civil defense shelter in the lower basement of the office block. Dave forced his arms out in front of him like the bow of a ship and, without a perceptible slowing of his pace, pushed his way through the human sea as he made his way to the offices of Kyle Henderson.
Pushing the door to the outer office open, Kyle’s terrified secretary confronted Dave. The secretary sat stock-still at his desk with eyes as large as saucers as he drank in the view from the floor to ceiling windows of yet more transports landing in the park and disgorging their cargo of soldiers.
Dave stepped between him and the window, but John continued to sit transfixed, as if Dave was not there, traumatized by what was happening.
“John, where is Kyle?” Dave demanded.
A loud crack filled the room as Dave brought his hand down sharply on the desk. As if slapped across the face, John jumped in his seat, his head snapped up to look straight into Dave’s face with naked terror in his eyes.
“Where’s Kyle?” Dave repeated in a more softly-spoken tone.
“In…in…in his office… What’s happening, Mr. Carter? What…what should I do?”
Dave reached over and put a reassuring hand on the man’s shoulder. “Head down to the shelter, John. I’m sure everything will be fine. You’ll be perfectly safe down there.” The lie burned in his throat. Anyone showing the K’Tai the slightest sign of resistance was classified as a combatant and treated as such, while the remainder could expect to be sold into slavery to serve the various noble houses after time in a re-education camp. Eventually, the lucky few might be considered for release from the bonds of servitude, at which time they would be entitled to a secondary status within the Imperium. However, no matter how hard they worked or contributed to K’Tai society, they could never expect to reach equal status with a purebred K’Tai. That was how K’Tai society had operated for thousands of years, and it wasn’t likely to change any time soon.
Rising unsteadily from his chair, John headed trance-like for the outer door and the corridor beyond. “OK, Mr. Carter, I’ll do that. Please tell Mr. Henderson that I will finish up those draft reports for him after lunch,” he mumbled as he left.
Dave was already moving for the inner office. Going through the door at a trot, he barely caught sight of something heavy swinging for his head. Ducking, he bent forward and let his momentum carry him into a forward roll, which took him clear into the center of the luxurious and spacious office of the local manager of Henderson Shipping. Completing the roll, Dave ended in a fighting crouch, facing the way he had entered.
Kyle Henderson struggled to get the heavy brass lampshade, now firmly embedded in the wall by the door frame, free: a lampshade which would have done some serious damage if it had contacted Dave’s skull.
“Easy there, Kyle, it’s me, Dave.”
Releasing his hold on the improvised weapon, Kyle slumped against the wall, his hands dropping to his knees as he tried to control his adrenalin-fueled breathing.
“Shit, Dave, I thought you were one of them. Sorry.”
Standing up straight again, Dave walked over to the window overlooking the park. Damn. The black-clad soldiers were already beginning to move clear of the park and the sound of more rifle fire reached him from down the block. Whoever these guys were, they had some serious hardware and were not afraid to use it. Screaming from directly below caused Dave to press his face hard against the glass so he could look down to the entrance of the building. He could make out the crumpled figure of one of the building’s security guards lying prostrate on the ground. A small group of employees who had obviously been intent on escaping from the building were being pushed off to one side by soldiers, who made a great show of keeping their rifles trained on the unarmed civilians. More to act as doormen and guides than anything else, the small number of security guards employed within the building did not even carry weapons. However, the pool of blood that was slowly surrounding the prone guard told Dave one thing. If these guys perceived you as a threat of any kind, then they would shoot first and ask questions later. For a second, he allowed himself to think of Sue and the kids. Were they safe? Were soldiers landing at the mines as well? Dave’s logical mind interrupted. The only reason you would have for invading Agate was to get the Redlazore, and the source of the Redlazore was the mines, so it would be only good planning to secure the mines as part of the initial assault and where were Sue and the kids? Only at a Redlazore mine!
Dave spared one more look out the window at the soldiers before his gaze shifted to the sky, now thick with incoming transports. Spinning away from the window, he strode to an impressively large polished oak bookcase which adorned the far wall of the office. Reaching the bookcase, he pulled his shirt sleeve up and ran the inside of his right forearm along the bookcase’s edge while Kyle looked on in confusion. That confusion only deepened as with a soft click, the entire bookcase began to move away from the seemingly solid wall to reveal a metal door set into the very fabric of the wall. The bookcase came to a halt and the metal door slid to one side. Behind the door was a narrow elevator big enough to squeeze in two people.
Kyle looked on in complete bewilderment as Dave got into the elevator. Seeing the look on Kyle’s face, Dave gave him a toothy grin. “Let’s go, kid, it’s time to leave.”
Kyle joined Dave in the cramped interior. There were no visible controls, but as soon as Kyle was inside, Dave ran his forearm alongside the door, which immediately closed.
“Biometric lock,” said Dave before Kyle could ask. With a lurch, the elevator moved. Seconds later the door opened again and Kyle stared into complete darkness. Dave stepped out and automatic overhead lighting came on. By the way Dave had confidently stepped from the elevator, Kyle was sure he could have found his way around the small room the lights revealed easily in the pitch black. The room, more of a large closet, thought Kyle, had bare, grey permacrete walls. No pretense at hiding the rough walls. No beds or chairs. No amenities. Whoever had built it had not wasted time or energy in comfort. Well, that rules out a safe room, thought Kyle.
Dave was wasting no time. Striding up to a dull metal locker which popped open as he reached it, he began stripping off his clothes. Without slowing his actions, he addressed Kyle. “Your locker is over there. Now get a hustle on, we’ve got a lot of ground to cover, and by the way the K’Tai are moving, we’ll be lucky to avoid running into them.”
Automatically Kyle obeyed Dave, his locker popped open just like Dave’s had, and inside he found a silvery bloused jacket and matching pants. Sitting at the bottom of the locker were a set of sturdy boots. Stripping his expensively tailored suit off, Kyle looked around for somewhere to hang it. Dave reached over and lifted it off him before unceremoniously dumping it in a pile on the dusty floor.
“You’ll not be needing that again, Kyle. Now hurry up.”
Still confused by what was going on, but realizing that Dave was not in the mood to take questions, Kyle dressed in haste. The material of the jacket and pants felt strange against his skin, somehow warm and silky smooth, which was at odds with the exterior which felt rough. As Kyle sealed his new clothing, there was an odd sensation as the clothing adjusted to fit him perfectly. Dave was already dressed and moving to the next set of lockers along while Kyle slipped on his boots. Again, the strange sensation as he sealed them and they adjusted to fit him perfectly. Looking up, his breath caught in his throat at the sight of Dave shrugging into body armor. OK, this was too much.
“Dave, just what the hell is going on? If these guys are just pirates raiding the city, why don’t we just hunker down here and wait for the militia to deal with them?”
With a soft hiss, the body armor molded to Dave’s upper torso. Dave spun to face Kyle. “Kid, here it is in the short version. Those are not pirates, those are K’Tai soldiers, and they’re not tourists. My guess is they’re here for the Redlazore, and that means they’re here to stay. We need to get the hel
l out of Dodge before we find ourselves trapped in this city. Now, I promised your granddad that I would keep you safe, and that is exactly what I am going to do. To do that I need you to follow my orders like your life depends on it. And make no mistake Kyle… it most surely does. Your clothing is made of smart weave, it’ll keep you warm, it’ll keep you cool and more importantly it will hide you from most types of sensor. Now get over here and I’ll talk you through the rest of your gear.”
Dave reached into the locker and pulled out another set of body armor, which he put over Kyle’s head. As the armor met at the sides it let out a hiss and sealed closed. “This is state of the art armor, it’ll stop a pulse rifle round at ten meters, the manufacturers claim five but I wouldn’t want to put that to the test. It also has attachment points for spare magazines and the like.” Dave next handed Kyle a set of clear-lensed glasses. “Smart glass with embedded night and thermal vision. Comes with an integrated secure communications system so we can talk to each other without the locals eavesdropping.” Kyle put on the glasses and immediately a scrolling list of commands and system checks appeared in the left lens as the smart glass adapted itself to Kyle’s personal biometrics.
“The glasses constantly monitor your pupil movement. To select something from the menu, just focus on the drop-down list, then the item you want. The glasses will do the rest.”
From the locker Dave produced an evil-looking, stubby rifle which he pushed into Kyle’s hands. “Right, kid, pay attention. This is a CAR 56 assault rifle. 100 round clip of guided multi-purpose rounds. The clip is ejected and fitted like so.” Dave brushed his thumb to a stud above and behind the clip, which obediently fell away from the rifle into Dave’s waiting hand before he rammed it back into place, giving it a little wiggle to ensure that it was seated correctly. “Charge button is here and that also allows you to select single shot, three round burst or full auto. Got it?” asked Dave.
