Never Surrender (The Empire's Corps Book 10)

by Christopher Nuttall

  Stewart opened the hatch, then dropped inside; Jasmine followed him, into a small observation tube. If she was right, if Wolfbane had stuck with the Empire’s designs, there should be an access port further down the corridor. The remainder of the group brought up the rear as they advanced, trying to look like a team of workers. Thankfully, most workers would still be wearing their emergency suits until it was definitely clear. They passed two other groups of workers, one wearing complete spacesuits, as they slipped into the access port. A small terminal sat there, with a single operative. Stewart knocked her out before she could even turn and see the men filing into her compartment.

  “Get the hacker pack set up,” she ordered. The Trade Federation representatives had told her it should crack most non-military computers, but there was no way to know what advancements Wolfbane had made. “See what we can get out of the computers.”

  Stewart nodded, slotted the hacker pack into the computer and then went to work. Jasmine waited, forcing herself to remain calm, until he looked up. “I can't get much out of the system,” he said, “but the armoury is right where we thought it was. It shouldn't be hard to upload a manifest into the system.”

  Jasmine looked at him. “Do it,” she ordered. She frowned as the diagram popped up in front of them. It looked as though it was better defended than she’d expected. “Teams One, Two and Three will go there. Teams Four and Five will carry out their planned orders.”

  She waited for Stewart to finish, then led the way out of the compartment. There was a shuttlebay just down the bottom of the compartment, crammed with worker bees. Stealing them would be easy, she was sure. And then ...

  Get into the armoury, she thought. And then see how much damage we can do.

  “They’re not part of the main computer network,” Stewart reported, as they inspected the worker bees. “But I can link them into the laser beam.”

  Jasmine smiled. “See what Gary can make of them,” she ordered. She led Team One into one of the worker bees, then started the engines. “And hope the shit doesn't hit the fan.”

  ***

  “You know, you can sit down and wait,” Lieutenant Julian Chan pointed out. “You won’t be at risk, whatever happens.”

  Gary shook his head. He’d been pacing up and down the freighter’s bridge until he’d practically worn lines in the deck plating, simply because he’d been unable to force himself to wait calmly. Back on Earth, he would have eaten something to distract himself from the butterflies in his stomach, but here he didn't dare. Even the thought of kissing Kailee was too distracting. All he could do was wait and hope he didn't fuck up when the time came.

  There was a beep from his console. “The link is up and running,” he said, practically throwing himself into the chair. “And I have a message.”

  He blinked as he read it, quickly. Jasmine wanted him to try to hack the deeper levels of the shipyard’s network, but she also wanted him to prepare to take control of the worker bees and direct them at enemy targets. Gary flinched - how was he supposed to handle two separate tasks at once - and then got to work. The worker bees themselves were easy to subvert; they were designed to be operated remotely, if necessary, and there was almost no protection on their computers at all. Indeed, the only real problem was handling so many at once.

  But it was the computer network that posed the real problem. Gary had hacked networks before, on Earth, but he’d never explored a military-grade system. He’d always been too afraid of meeting people even more violent than Barry or Moe. Now, he had no choice, but to try to break the system. Some of his hacking tools worked; others, it seemed, were next to useless. The system was actively designed to make hacking almost impossible.

  “I can't get in without a password,” he said, finally. In his experience, there was always one idiot who used ‘PASSWORD’ as his password, but linking the idiot to his ID within the system would be the real pain. A school computer would allow unlimited attempts to enter a password - he smirked at how easy it had been to crack some of the systems - yet some of the gaming companies had been smart enough to break the link after three failed tries. “And they would probably notice if I tried to guess.”

  Kailee frowned. “How does that work?”

  “They have a locked compartment inside their house,” Gary admitted. “I need to know where it is to find it and I need the key to get inside. Right now, I can see the firewall blocking access, but I need both an ID and a password to get in.”

  He cursed under his breath. There were ways to force entry, but he had a feeling they would merely trigger alerts. The system he was touching, however lightly, felt more alert than anything he’d previously encountered. One wrong move would be disastrous.

  A message blinked up in front of him. “Keep in touch with the bees, but do nothing else,” Jasmine sent. “Deploy them when the time comes.”

  “We wait,” Gary said. “Again.”

  ***

  Jasmine held her breath as they slipped closer to the armoury, a single brooding structure near the centre of the shipyard. Weapons pods surrounded it, ready for installation; it didn't take much imagination to see them pouring fire towards Commonwealth targets. She frowned inwardly as she saw the missiles themselves - it always astonished her just how large they actually were - then pushed the thought aside. The warheads on the tips were the truly important points.

  “Docking in five minutes,” Stewart said. “They’ve accepted our manifest - our manifesto.”

  “A weak joke,” Jasmine said, dryly. “But liveable.”

  She smiled, thinly. They were inside the security wall now; anyone who saw their manifest would assume that someone else had already cleared them to enter the shipyard. But there were places on military bases, even Castle Rock, where access was denied without a proper ID card and clearance from one’s superiors. Surely, the armoury would be one of those places.

  “They seem to have cleared the wreckage of the boat nicely,” Stewart commented. “You wouldn't know that anything had happened over there.”

  “No,” Jasmine agreed. She glanced at her watch. Night-time on Wolfbane ... Watson, assuming that everything had gone to plan, would be moving into position now. She needed to be in place on the armoury before it was too late. Diversion or no diversion, she was sure alert levels would be raised all over the system once the shit hit the fan. “Check the link with Gary, then take us in.”

  “Link solid,” Stewart said. There was a dull thud as the worker bee connected to the armoury’s airlock. “We’re in.”

  Jasmine nodded and rose to her feet as the airlock hissed open. She stepped through the hatch, followed by Stewart, as the inner airlock opened too. Inside, a bemused-looking functionary was staring at his datapad, clearly wondering where the newcomers had actually come from. Clearly, they might have had a valid flight manifest, but not any actual work authorisation codes.

  “We’re here to check the records,” Jasmine said, as she opened her helmet. “I need access to your terminals.”

  The functionary blinked. “I don’t have a record of you in the files,” he said. “I ...”

  He broke off as Jasmine grabbed him by the throat. The spacesuit had no enhancements to give her the strength of ten men, but it felt thoroughly unpleasant. Jasmine smelled urine as she hefted him up in the air, then held him in front of her face.

  “I need your ID card and your passwords,” she said, sharply. “Now!”

  The man stared at her. “I ...”

  Jasmine nodded to Stewart, who produced a sharp knife from his suit. “Cut him,” she ordered. “Make it painful ...”

  “My card is in my pocket,” the man whimpered. “My code is C-O-C-K-S-S-U-C-K-S!”

  “Really?” Jasmine asked, doubtfully. “That’s your access code?”

  “Yes,” the man said, desperately. “I wanted something no one would ever guess!”

  “I dare say you succeeded,” Jasmine said. The advice she’d been given in the Marine Corps had been to use random le
tters and numbers, but she’d also been told never to rely on any system that was connected to the planetary datanet. Gary would hardly be the first young man to hack for fun and games; hell, he probably wasn't even in the top 100. “If this doesn't work, we will hurt you.”

  She keyed the code into the hacker pack, then turned it over to Gary. “Now, some more questions,” she said. “How many people are on this platform?”

  ***

  “The code works,” Gary said, as he dipped into the platform’s computer. The laser link wasn't perfect, but better than some of the systems he’d seen on Earth. “I can't get into all of the sections ... hang on.”

  He smirked as he went to work. Most systems had an inherent flaw, one they never quite seemed to be able to lose. They assumed that someone with access, even limited access, had at least some right to access the entire system, simply because they were already on the interior of the firewall. It was actually easier to start with a low-ranking peon’s code and then work one’s way up to the most secure parts of the network.

  “Ok,” he said. “I’ve downloaded most of the codes, but I can't find any actual trigger codes.”

  “Shit,” Jasmine said. “They’re not stored on the network?”

  “Not as far as I can tell,” Gary said. “You can launch the missiles, but you can't arm them.”

  ***

  “Understood,” Jasmine said.

  She cursed under her breath. She’d been expecting something to go wrong, but she hadn't quite expected this. In hindsight, perhaps she should have expected it; the missiles could be launched, in the event of a disaster, but not actually armed. A nuke that slammed into something without being armed wouldn’t make anything like as big a bang.

  “We’ll target the missiles on the facilities,” she said, as her people spread through the installation. “Even unarmed, they will do a great deal of damage.”

  She led the way into the command core and stunned everyone, including the CO. It was unlikely his codes would be any help. Instead, she sat down in front of the console and accessed the emergency launch system. For once, the Empire’s insistence on standardising everything would actually come in handy. The missile pods waiting outside, prepped for being installed into starships, were identical to the ones that could be bolted to hulls or left in orbit for additional firepower. And they could flush their missiles if necessary.

  “The other teams are in place,” Stewart said. “And Gary has the worker bees ready to go.”

  Jasmine took a breath, then programmed in the firing sequence. The missiles refused to lock on to anything without the arming codes, so she merely pointed them on courses that would intersect their targets. If nothing else, the combination of immobile targets and imprecise targeting would make it harder for any countermeasures to do their work. And then she hesitated ...

  “Carl should be in place,” she said. She glanced at her wristcom, then frowned. “But there’s no way to know.”

  “I think they’re supposed to check in every hour,” Stewart countered. “The last thing we want is a security alert here, now ...”

  Jasmine nodded, then smiled in relief as an alert popped up on front of her. “He’s done it,” she said. She tapped a switch, then smirked. “Firing missiles ... now!”

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  The Empire didn't care. The people making the decisions, the Grand Senate, were completely disconnected from the situation on the ground. They simply didn't care about either the risk to their servants - or the misery they were inflicting on countless occupied worlds.

  - Professor Leo Caesius. The Empire and its Prisoners of War.

  Wolfbane City, Wolfbane, Year 5 (PE)

  Private Jonathan Williams couldn't help feeling uncomfortable as he stood at his post, just outside the Governor’s Mansion. It was a cold night and he was grimly aware that it wouldn’t be over for hours. He was stuck outside, watching the deserted streets, while his superiors partied inside the mansion, enjoying themselves while he froze halfway to death. It wasn't something he wanted to think about, but he had no choice. He could hear the tinkling of the music from his guardpost on the edge of the complex, making it hard to keep his ears open for problems. It was a persistent distraction.

  “Betty should be free when we get off this weekend,” Private Hobbes offered. “We can go have some fun with her after this.”

  Jonathan shook his head. The only advantage to being on the Governor’s personal security detail was a brothel, right next to the barracks, and he wasn't sure it made up for the difficulties of the job. Hundreds of high-ranking men and women - and the ass-kissers attached to their bodies who could only be removed through surgical intervention - passed him every day, each and every one of them grumbling over the inconvenience of having to be scanned, searched and then cleared against the master list of permitted guests. It was his duty to check them before they entered, yet he knew a single word from one of them could end his career. The guards wore no nametags merely to make identification difficult, if not impossible. It was the only way to do their job.

  “I prefer Sharon myself,” he said. “She’s kinder.”

  He ignored Hobbes’s rude sound of disbelief. Sharon might be fatter than Betty, but she was far more welcoming - or at least better at faking it. Betty might be hot enough to pass for a porn star, yet it was clear she hated men with a white-hot passion. Jonathan had no idea why a woman who hated men would work in a brothel, but it was hard to blame her for her feelings. None of the troops were very considerate lovers. Besides, there was always a shorter line outside Sharon’s door.

  “I think you’re mad,” Hobbes said. “I ...”

  He broke off as a fancy car came into view, gleaming black under the streetlights as it slowed to a halt outside the guardpost. The windows were tinted, but he had the impression there was only one man in the car; a moment later, the door opened, revealing a stocky man wearing a very ill-fitting suit. He must be important, Jonathan reasoned, as the man stumbled towards him. The mixture of awful dressing and drinking while driving - he could smell whiskey splashed on the man’s suit - meant a very important person indeed. No one else would dare show up to the Governor’s party in such a state.

  Must be one of his senior officers, he thought, as he walked closer. Someone important enough not to give a damn.

  “I need your ID,” he said. “And your name ...”

  “Don’t have it,” the man slurred. He sounded drunk enough to wind up on the ground any second, probably wondering just what had hit him. It was a minor miracle he’d managed to drive without crashing or hitting anyone, although the onboard computer had probably handled most of the driving for him. “Need to go see the Governor ...”

  Jonathan winced. A man who could not be allowed admittance, but also a man important enough to have both of them sent to an asteroid mining station or a garrison on a rebellious world ... if they weren't summarily exiled to a penal colony. The man's suit alone cost more than Jonathan could expect to make in his entire career, yet he could not allow him to pass through the guardpost. He was damned whatever he did ...

  There was a whine cutting through the air. Jonathan looked up, just in time to see an aircar flashing overhead and heading right towards the mansion. A brilliant flash of light blasted the aircar out of the air as the plasma cannons engaged automatically, then swung around, searching for new targets, as a whole line of aircars appeared out of nowhere. One by one, they died, sending pieces of white-hot-metal flying everywhere. Jonathan cursed, then grabbed the newcomer and dragged him bodily into the guardhouse. With a little bit of luck, he could spin it into a heroic rescue that would save both of their careers. Another aircar exploded, almost directly overhead, as they plunged into the armoured post. He heard the sound of debris bouncing off the roof as he closed the door, firmly.

  “The complex is being sealed,” Hobbes said. “Our friend will have to stay with us ...”

  The newcomer moved like greased lightning. Hobbes bent over, then
collapsed to the floor, hitting the ground like a sack of potatoes. Jonathan had barely a second to realise that the newcomer had killed his friend before a second fist slammed right into his throat. There was a moment of absolute pain, then nothing at all.

  ***

  Carl Watson allowed himself a moment of pleasure as the two guards died, then pushed it aside as he stripped the first man's uniform and pulled it over the expensive suit he’d stolen from a nearby store. It had served its purpose, getting him close enough to the guards to take them all out when the diversion began; now, he needed another disguise to get close to the Governor. The aircars would, he suspected, provide enough inducement to keep the Governor inside, protected by the emplaced defences. They wouldn't be expecting a single man on the ground to be the real threat. Besides, even if they did, the helmet he’d stolen would make it impossible for them to separate him from the remainder of the soldiers.