by Wilson Harp
Eclipse
By Wilson Harp
Copyright © 2013 by Wilson Harp
All Rights Reserved
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Christina Ackerman
Steve & Michelle Dorland
Ray Drew
Ruby Franklin
Bootie & Dennis Frantz
Dorothy Heck
Leeta R. Linville
Linda Rowe
Ike Stokes
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 1
“Keep an eye on the right flank. I saw two head through that door,” said Lieutenant Colonel Zbigniew ‘K-man’ Kiskaliski.
Sergeant Johnson nodded as he motioned two of his men to cover the location.
“The main hallway splits about fifteen meters after that turn. The arsenal is down the right, and the command center is to the left,” said Sergeant Lippor.
“Johnson, take four to secure the arsenal. Swanson, you and your squad are with me. Hendricks, hold back with Travis and Bennett and be ready to assist where needed. Let’s move,” said K-man.
“Colonel, we have a strong energy reading near the command center,” said Lippor as he followed his commander down the hallway. While the other marines were focused on raid, Lippor was responsible for the device wore on his back.
The command and control center on the Berlin was feeding updated scanner information directly to the heads-up-display on his visor. He was able to feed instant updates to Lieutenant Colonel Kiskaliski and the other officers.
“Force field?” asked K-man.
“Stronger, maybe an inertial field,” said Lippor.
“Marines, possible inertial ahead. Don’t fire until we are through,” said K-man.
The forward marine motioned that the main corridor was clear after the turn. K-man and his men advanced in a quick and well-ordered pace.
“Colonel, we have secured level two, have eight captured and took two casualties,” Captain Watts reported.
“How bad?” asked K-man.
“They should pull through—med team is inbound.”
“Level three now secure, Colonel,” said Captain Golding. “No casualties, five captured.”
“Good report. We have level one almost secure. Berlin, this is Kiskaliski, send down the sweepers and the techs.”
“Roger, Colonel. Launching crews now.”
Two marines had reached the split in the corridor.
“Way is clear,” one of them reported.
K-man and his team moved forward and slowly advanced to the door leading to the command center. One of the marines touched the panel that opened the door. Instead of the bright blue shine of an inertial field, there was a pulsing red light filling the doorway.
“Mosar shield. Must have come on when they went to lockdown,” muttered Collins.
“Sir, there is a spike in energy, they are setting to blow,” said Lippor.
K-man swore under his breath. They only had about two minutes to secure the room and stop the self-destruct command.
“Greenaway, with me. Marines forward,” he ordered as he ran through the field.
Several lasers hit his body armor as he dove for cover along the left wall. He heard the firing of his marines as they came in behind him. Warmth from where the armor absorbed the shots made him glad, once again, that Earth’s engineers had made the breakthrough that allowed full body armor to be built.
He pulled himself to his knees and focused his rifle on the movement at the other side of the room. One of the Otina guards was behind an overturned table. His head was barely visible above his weapon. Barely was all K-man needed.
His shot ended the threat to his men from that angle. A quick turn of his head showed three more Otina firing on the Marines still coming through the door. Two of the aliens never saw their killer, but the third swung his blast rifle toward K-man as he fired. The Earth forces were still trying to fix the display on the helmet so that the Marines could see the lasers that the Otina used, but K-Man had seen enough of them fired to know that the shot had gone wide to his left.
“Colonel! Sir!” A frantic yell came from the doorway. K-man scanned around the room once more and then turned to the doorway.
“Greenaway, stop that self-destruct order. Harris, Porter, help me with Swanson,” he ordered.
Captain Swanson was the newest member of the team. He was lying still on the floor just inside the doorway.
Greenaway moved past the others toward the main control console. His job was the most important. If he didn’t stop the self-destruct, over forty marines would be dead in less than a minute.
K-man started looking for any injury on the fallen marine. “Swanson, can you hear me? Talk to me,” K-man said.
There was no response from the man.
“I got nothing, Colonel,” said Porter as he felt along the back of Swanson.
“Nothing I can see, either,” said K-man. “Greenaway, report.”
“Just a second, Colonel. There. Self-destruct is clear,” Greenaway said. K-man had initially argued against taking the young computer expert with his team, but Admiral Salazar had insisted that all forces dealing with the Otina take a computer tech with them on any ground assault. It had taken three bases that had self-destructed before Salazar had made it mandatory. Greenaway had saved K-man’s team four times in six months by disabling self-destruct orders.
“Med team is incoming, sir,” said Lippor.
“Good. Hold on Swanson, we are going to get you out of this,” said K-man.
“Sir, we have three in the back data room. They are techs and have surrendered,” one of the marines reported.
“Hendricks, get in there and secure the prisoners. Johnson, report.”
“We got ‘em, sir. No casualties, no captures.”
The medical team turned the corner and was waved over to the downed marine.
“What happened,” asked one of the medics.
“Not sure,” answered Porter. “Captain Swanson was just in front of me and as soon as he cleared the door he just dropped to the ground.”
“He’s gone into full arrest, we need to get him back on the ship,” said the other medic.
K-man motioned for his marines to help the medics get Captain Swanson evacuated to the Berlin.
He watched as they took his fallen man out. He hated losing any man—it ate at him. Swanson was a veteran of the Iltia war, and a highly decorated one at that.
“Sir, we have some good data here. The techs will need to see this right away,” said Greenaway.
“Excellent, Lieutenant,” said K-man. “What kind of data?”
“Some medical information and a series of what looks like dates and times.”
K-man nodded. Most of the locations they found that had medical facilities had some captives that were being experimented on. Those found in the Earth system had exclusively been humans, but recently a few Hed
ali were found as well. Dozens of Otina bases were found each month in the inner asteroid belt in the earth system, and it was likely there were thousands in the Kuiper belt in the furthest reaches of the system.
“Let’s get the tech team down here, and let the sweepers get to work,” said K-man as he motioned his team out.
K-man stepped back through the glowing red field that filled the doorway.
“Greenaway,” he said. “See if you can get this field off.”
“Yes, sir,” said Greenaway. “It’s just a mosar field, though.”
“I know. I just don’t like coincidences.”
The hallways were filling with the technical teams who would download as much data as they could recover from the Otina computers. The sweepers were bringing in their gear as K-man left the breach point of the Otina base. They would use their sophisticated equipment to analyze and check every inch of the base in hopes that a new technology or piece of equipment could be found.
K-man stepped up into the Platte and looked at his assembled men.
“Everyone check in,” he said. The heads-up-display in his helmet showed all but Swanson with a green light.
“Major, we are all aboard,” he said as he hit the switch that closed the door to the landing craft.
He took his helmet off and rolled his head around to work out the kinks. Most of the younger marines didn’t make a show of it, but he knew they all felt the tightness. The old dogs, like him, were too tough to care what others thought and openly stretched and twisted.
“What happened to Swanson, sir?” asked Porter.
“I’m not sure, didn’t see any injury. But the medics were concerned,” he said. “They have him on the Tiber and I saw it heading to the Berlin before I boarded.”
The Platte lifted off as the marines headed back into the ready room. It would take about ten minutes to dock on the Berlin, and K-man had plenty to keep him busy. He called his officers together and had them break down what had happened, how any injuries had occurred and if they had any suggestions on improving training for the next raid.
By the time he had heard their impromptu reports, the Platte had docked with the Berlin and his men were disembarking.
His communicator beeped, and he put the earpiece in his ear.
“Colonel Kiskaliski, please report to med bay four,” came the message.
“Roger, on my way,” he said.
He considered dropping off his gear in his room, but was anxious to hear Swanson’s condition, so he walked toward the medical facilities.
“Captain Gagne, we are aboard. Do you have the next coordinates?” K-man said on the command channel.
“Good to hear, Colonel. We got our next coordinates just after you launched. I’ll let you tell your marines, but Admiral Salazar has ordered us back to Ellison and then a two month liberty on Earth. When the tech and sweepers get back, we will be on our way.”
K-man smiled. It had been over three months since they had been on Earth and over a month since they had liberty on the Ellison station around Jupiter. This would be welcome news and help morale.
“Great news, Captain. I’m heading to med bay four now. It will be a few minutes until I can file my docking report.”
“Everything okay?”
“With me, yes. Captain Swanson collapsed during the raid and the med team evac’d him to the Berlin. They asked me to go down there, so something is up.”
“Good luck, Colonel.”
“Thanks, Kiskaliski out.”
K-man turned into the medical facilities and made his way over to station four. There he saw several men in hazmat suits inside the sealed station.
“What’s going on, Doctor?” he asked as he approached.
“I have no idea, Colonel,” said Doctor Preston. “But you need to see this.”
K-man stepped closer to one of the windows looking into the medical station. He saw Swanson, or what he thought was Swanson, on the bed. His combat armor had been pulled open, but a pool of various liquids and amorphous piles of organic material were all he could see.
K-man stepped back and looked at Doctor Preston. The Doctor’s face was pale and drawn.
“What happened, Doc?” asked K-man.
“The only way I can describe it is that he fell apart. Some of the muscle and bone structure is intact, but most of his body is liquefied. The sealed suit is the only thing that kept him from being a pile of goo where he fell.”
“That’s one of my men, Doc,” said K-man. “Have some respect.”
“I’m sorry, Colonel, but I don’t have any words to explain or describe what happened. I have never seen anything like this before. Could it have been a new weapon?”
“I don’t think so, but let’s find out what the sweepers pick up. Is there any alien substance in there?”
“Not that we can tell. I sent hazmat in and they are testing for anything out of the ordinary. I’m going to have to quarantine the ship until we get the results.”
“Yeah, I suppose you will. Let me know if you find anything else.”
“Will do, Colonel. Is there anything you can tell me? What was happening when he collapsed?”
“Nothing, we were going into the command center, he was in the middle of the pack, as it were, and he just collapsed.”
“Very odd.”
“He had just gone through a mosar field. They had, for some reason, turned on a mosar field when they locked themselves in the command center.”
“Did everyone go through the field?”
“Yes, twelve of us.”
“Did anyone else have any problems?”
“No, none that I am aware of.”
“Colonel, I would like to have all of the men who were in that room come down for a complete physical. Yourself included.”
“Will do, Doc. I’ll have everyone who was on that level come down.”
K-man left the medical bay and headed to his quarters. The mosar field couldn’t have affected Swanson, so it must have been something else that the Otina had developed. The idea that a weapon could be developed that could do that to a man made him shudder. Especially when it left no visible mark.
In an hour, he had showered, put on his uniform, and made his way up to the bridge.
“Skipper, are we ready?” he asked as he approached Captain Gagne.
“The Anthony just warped in to get the scooters. She should be back for us in an hour,” said Gagne. “Sweeper report is coming in now.”
K-man slipped around a console and pulled up his report sheet. The sweepers report was still uploading.
“How is Swanson?” asked Gagne.
“We lost him,” said K-man.
“Hard to lose anyone. He was at Do’yar’on, you know?”
“I didn’t know that,” said K-man. “He never brought it up.”
“Should have been in his file,” said Gagne.
“Probably is, I just never read every folder as thoroughly as I should,” admitted K-man.
“A man of action not words. I get that. I hate all the paperwork myself.”
“No excuse, I should have known.”
“Would it have changed today?”
“No. But who knows what tidbits of knowledge can save a life. I guess I need to pull the files and go through them carefully.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself, Colonel. You have twenty officers serving under you and over two hundred marines. You can’t know each file intimately.”
“I suppose you are right, but if he was at Do’yar’on then I should have known that.”
“Sweeper report is ready. What are you looking for in there?” asked Gagne.
“Anything that would explain why Swanson bought it. A new weapon… technology… something.”
“What happened?”
“Something caused him to melt, or liquefy, in his suit. Was real nasty. Won’t be able to send anything back to Karen that she will recognize.”
“Dear Lord.”
“Yeah, not what I
want to think about either, but if the Otina have a new weapon, I hope our sweepers found it. Doc is going to quarantine us until we are sure that there is nothing to worry about.”
“Just got a message from medical. Preston says no need for quarantine, nothing found with Swanson.”
“That’s good. Still going to have the rest of my team checked out.”
“Sir,” said Lippor as he approached the men. “You might want to see this.”
He handed K-man a display pad, a visual scan was paused. K-man touched the play button and the scan moved forward.
“What is this?” Gagne asked as he looked over K-man’s shoulder.
“It’s an Otina security scan. We look at these regularly to analyze how they move in defense of their bases,” said K-man.
“What are the red speckles on those?”
“Mosar. Those are the Otina,” said K-man. “Those hollow looking images are the humans. We show up on their scans because of the metal in our equipment, but our bodies are hard to pick up with their equipment. We have thought about trying to use that to infiltrate their bases.”
“So is that an Otina?” asked Gagne, pointing to a figure moving on the scan. The figure had only a few specks of red, not near as many as the others.”
K-man froze. “No, that isn’t.”
“What is it then?” asked Gagne.
“That’s Captain Swanson,” said Lippor.
The two officers watched as the figure with a few red specks moved with the other marines. When the door to the command center opened, they saw the marines charge in. The figure of Swanson hit the door and collapsed, the red specks disappearing.
“I need to make a secure line call, Captain,” said K-Man.
“Use my ready room, Colonel.”
“Lippor, who else has seen this?”
“Greenaway, a couple of the techs, and us. That’s all.”
“Gather everyone who has seen this and bring them to the Captain’s ready room. This is absolutely not to be seen by anyone else. Pull the file down from the reports and get this information locked down.”
Lippor saluted and hurried from the bridge. K-man and Gagne moved toward the Captain’s ready room.
“What do you think it is, Colonel? An alien imitated Swanson? Could he have been a shape-shifter like a Pelod?”