The Messenger Box Set: Books 1-6

by J. N. Chaney

  Dash looked for the Slipwing and the Snow Leopard. He found the former darting around the edges of the battle, snapping out pulse-cannon shots and taking down missiles, but otherwise staying back. You’re a smart girl, Amy, Dash thought, noting that she’d also committed all of the drones to the fight and those now raced in, pumping fire into the missile platform. The Snow Leopard, though—

  Dash found her limping along, having taken at least a couple of direct missile hits. Gritting his teeth against the worst, he said, “Benzel, what’s your status?”

  He unclenched his jaw when Benzel answered. “Our status?” He laughed. “Like a bouncer after a crew of deep-spacers just got shore leave in his bar. In other words, beaten to shit, but still on our feet.”

  “Can you still execute the plan?”

  “Sure. And though it pains me to have to admit it, now would be a good time.”

  “Go for it, then,” Dash said.

  “Will do, out.”

  The Snow Leopard immediately began to turn about, setting a course away from the battle. Dash watched her limp off, a long plume of vapor trailing behind her. She’d not been meant to hang around in the fight, anyway—her job was to deploy scrambler mines to knock anything the Verity tried to send into unSpace back in-system.

  Dash turned his attention to the Swift. Like Dash, Leira had taken a pause, hanging behind an asteroid about a thousand kilometers away.

  “Leira, I think Wei-Ping and Amy have those Verity ships under control. Let’s go take out that damned missile platform.”

  “Well, as it happens, I was just going to suggest that. Tybalt tells me that one of its missile banks has gone quiet, either out of ordnance, or because of damage. Either way, it’s got a blind spot.”

  Dash watched the data as it came up on the heads-up. Sure enough, a roughly forty-degree arc had opened in the platform’s field of fire. “Sentinel, you and Tybalt plot a course among these rocks that gets us as close as we can to the platform in that dead zone.”

  A series of short, arcing trajectories appeared, bounding from point to point within the debris field. “This is the shortest, most efficient path. I have highlighted the portions of it that entail the greatest risk because of exposure to laser shots from the platform.”

  Dash nodded. There were three gaps they’d have to watch out for. “Leira, you ready?”

  “Anytime.”

  “Let’s go.”

  Dash fired up the Archetype’s drive and started along the first track, the Swift falling in behind him.

  Dash glanced at the Swift, which was lurking behind a massive chunk of rock even bigger than the one shielding him. Petawatts of laser energy lit space around them; the far side of these rocks had no doubt been turned to glowing slag.

  “They’ve got that damned laser pointed right at us,” Leira said. “I don’t know, Dash, we might just have to shoot that missile platform into submission.”

  He frowned. She might be right. They’d mainly managed to avoid the laser shots as they picked their careful way through the debris field; the Archetype had a seized left foot actuator from one blast Dash hadn’t quite been able to dodge, and the Swift had been scoured across its left torso by another. But he wanted to take the platform more or less intact, if he could. He wanted to destroy the Verity, yes—but he wanted to understand them even more.

  So he could more effectively and thoroughly destroy them.

  “Wei-Ping, what’s your status?”

  “We backed off like you told us to,” she replied, and took cover behind the gas giant. “These ships are doing a damned good job of repairing themselves now, too. Have to admit, watching these structural members knitting themselves back together is pretty amazing—and creepy as hell.”

  “Yeah, took me a while to get used to it, too. Just remember it’s nanotech, not spooky magic.”

  “There’s a difference?”

  Dash smiled. “Honestly, I’m not sure. How’s the Stalwart doing?”

  “She can keep up, but her AI says she’s out of the fight until she gets back to the Forge for heavy repairs.”

  The Stalwart was the Silent Fleet ship Dash had seen pulling back from the battle earlier. They’d been fortunate, actually; all six of the Verity missile frigates had been pummeled into wreckage, with the Stalwart their only serious casualty. The Snow Leopard had been hit badly, too, but she’d never been meant to stay in the battle for long anyway.

  “Amy, how about you?” Dash asked.

  “I’m way out here, Dash, near the edge of the system. At this range, those crazy big lasers are barely enough to roast our asses.”

  Dash saw that the Slipwing had, indeed, retreated well away from the missile platform. It worried him a little; she was a long way from help, especially if something nasty translated into the system nearby. The chances of that were small, of course, but still something to consider.

  Dash gave a nod as his thoughts ran their course. “Okay, here’s the plan, everyone. The last of our drones are still engaging the platform, which will keep it busy for another”—he glanced at the tactical situation—“well, not very long. Probably just a few more minutes. But we’ve found a blind spot where it’s not able to launch missiles anymore, either out of ammo, or the launch system is down, whatever. So, in five minutes, Wei-Ping, you and Amy start another attack run. You want to draw as much fire as you can, but don’t worry about staying to fight—just pull back and protect yourselves. That should be enough of a diversion for Leira and I to make a run of our own, get in really close, as long as we can avoid the worst of those damned lasers.”

  “Dash,” Sentinel put in. “If I may—you are thinking in a surprisingly narrow way, given your history of innovation.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Do you not remember your tactics in your final clash with Clan Shirna, when the Slipwing was trapped and falling into a gas giant’s atmosphere?”

  Dash did. It was when he’d finally come face-to-face with Nathis, the Clan Shirna leader, aboard his flagship. He’d used one of the Unseen devices called a Lens, meant to collapse and detonate stars, to cause an implosion.

  “I’m not sure what you’re suggesting here,” Dash said. “I don’t think we brought a Lens with us.”

  “That is not the innovation I am referring to. I am talking about the method you used to close on Nathis’s ship, avoiding almost all of its fire as you did.”

  Dash frowned; there’d been so many battles, they’d all started to blur together.

  No, wait.

  He looked at the big rock that was hiding him from the laser with its shadow. When he’d wanted to get close to Nathis’s ship, he pushed a similar rock ahead of him, using it as a shield.

  “Crap. Right, I’d forgotten about that. Leira, change of plans. Find a rock big enough to cover the Swift, but small enough to push. We’ll run in like that. As long as the rocks are big enough to block the laser long enough for us to get close.”

  “Got it,” Leira said, waiting for a lull in the incoming laser fire to throw the Swift at a smaller rock nearby. Dash did likewise, selecting one that seemed the right size and shape.

  “Leira, you ready?” he asked.

  “Ready.”

  “Wei-Ping, Amy, go.”

  “On our way,” Wei-Ping replied. Amy just let out a whoop.

  Dash planted the Archetype’s hands against the rock and applied power, spooling up the drive. He actually pushed on an angle, offsetting the rock’s lateral movement relative to the missile platform. Glancing at Leira, he saw that the far side of her rock glowed as though lit by dazzling sunlight. The laser beamed away at them, rapidly cycling back and forth between him and Leira, searing the rocky debris. Leira’s soon glowed yellow-white, blobs of liquified stone sputtering off into space.

  Slowly, the mech-rock pairs gained speed. On the heads-up, Dash saw that Wei-Ping and Amy had started their runs, the Herald leading the Silent Fleet’s attack, the Slipwing zipping among them, all of them boring in
at the platform. More salvoes of missiles were sent to greet them, provoking a spectacular fusillade of dark-lance and pulse-cannon shots.

  A massive chunk spalled off the rock Dash was pushing, slamming the Archetype with a heavy thud, then spinning away, trailing blobs of glowing magma. He pulled his attention away from the battle and back to the immediate threat. More pieces broke off the rock, the searing laser energy starting to not just melt it, but fracture it from thermal stress.

  “I hope this rock lasts long enough—”

  The rock split in two, one half tumbling aside. A blast of laser radiance caught the Archetype full-on before Dash could lunge aside. Vaporized armor sputtered off into the void; Dash yelped at the transmission of damaging sensations he felt through the Meld. His shielding held. Barely.

  The laser abruptly went dark.

  A few seconds later, something flashed past close by. Dash recognized the Slipwing at the same time he heard Amy say, “Take that, you doll-faced bastards!”

  “Amy has destroyed the laser,” Sentinel said. “The only threat during the remaining approach is the platform’s point defense systems.”

  Dash hadn’t even noticed Amy doing what amounted to a strafing run across the missile platform, but he could follow her trajectory back, seeing that she had.

  “Leira, your cousin is crazy,” he said. “And apparently, she hates dolls.”

  “No one sane likes dolls. Now, tell me that’s something you wouldn’t have done.”

  “That’s different,” Dash said.

  “How?”

  “Dash, you will collide with the missile platform in thirty seconds,” Sentinel said.

  Dash powered up the Archetype’s drive, swept around the still-glowing rock, and started for the looming platform. “Leira, let’s finish this, shall we?”

  “Right behind you.”

  She went low, racing under the platform and pumping nova-cannon shots into its underside. Dash went high, over the top of the station, to its far side. Behind him, the two chunks of rock slammed into it, rocking the station hard. The point defense systems, which had been desperately trying to track the two mechs, poured their fire into empty space.

  Dash took advantage of the moment to zoom in close to the station. “Sentinel, is that new weapon ready to deploy?’

  “It is.”

  “Perfect,” Dash said, slamming the Archetype’s fist into the platform’s hull. It smashed partway through; Dash held it there and activated the new weapon, the one Custodian had said would be quick and easy to install on the mech. An incapacitating agent poured out of a nozzle on the Archetype’s wrist.

  “The perfect boarding weapon,” he said, watching on the heads-up as the internal volume of the platform filled with the gas. “It’s not really fair, but I like it anyway.”

  “Damn right it’s not fair,” Leira said. Dash could hear the wicked smile in her voice. “How long will it take?”

  “The station is yours,” Tybalt answered. “You have several hours before the Verity awaken, if they do at all.”

  “I’m not going to cry if a few of these bastards don’t make it. Leira, once again—shall we?” Dash said.

  “Let’s.”

  16

  Dash peered around the corner of a twisted hull plate, residual damage to the station where Leira had struck it with the Swift’s nova-cannon. It offered the easiest access to the station’s interior, but there remained a problem—obviously, the portions of the platform flooded by the incapacitating gas were only airtight as long they weren’t opened to space. For that reason, the Archetype had to remain where it was, its hand embedded into the platform’s hull; even then, the atmosphere was leaking out, and that section would soon be depressurized. If they couldn’t find a functioning airlock, they might end up venting the entire missile platform just trying to access it.

  Which would be too bad for the Verity—at least those who hadn’t managed to get into vac suits, anyway.

  Dash pulled himself around the twisted hull plate. “Leira, watch out for that corner there when you come this way. That might cut a vac suit, which would suck.”

  “Got it.”

  Dash found himself in a compartment that must have been comms, or some sort of control anyway, based on the number of terminals, consoles, and displays, all now battered and dark. The bodies of two Verity hung in the middle, surrounded by slushy blobs of what passed for their blood. Dash checked them in thermal imaging and saw they were still warm, but much cooler than Kizdin had been, so that presumably meant they were, indeed, dead. Vacuum was a good insulator, though, so it would take some time for the bodies to radiate away the rest of their heat.

  “I’m a terrible person,” Leira said.

  “How come?”

  Leira touched one of the bodies, sending it drifting aside. “Because I’m thinking about what happened when I tore open that ship—what we found. And I’m hoping these assholes suffered when I shot this compartment open.”

  “That doesn’t make you terrible,” Dash said, moving to a sealed blast door. “It just makes you human.” He glanced back. “And if it makes you feel any better, I was thinking the same thing.”

  He turned back to the blast door and peered at the console beside it. Fortunately, the Verity hadn’t lost all their human roots; they still used common labels and symbols for controls, albeit styled in a strange way. “Yup, according to this, this is a functioning airlock, and it’s pressurized on the other side. If we can get this open, we should be able to get inside without venting the whole place.”

  “Well, go ahead, then,” Leira said, pushing away the other body. “Because, have to admit, as angry as these bastards make me, having them hovering near me dead like this isn’t helping my mood any.”

  Dash gave her a thumbs up and studied the controls. It took him a moment to work them out, but he was finally able to depressurize the lock and open the blast door. He led Leira inside, closed the door, and hit the repressurize control. A faint whisper became a rush of air, which died as Dash felt his suit dimple in, no longer inflated against vacuum.

  He looked at Leira, raised his pulse-gun, and touched the door control.

  The inner blast door slid open.

  As soon as it did, the station shuddered. Dash cursed, his immediate thought being that the platform’s structure had been compromised so badly by battle damage that this door had actually been keeping at least this part of it from collapsing. But the platform just went silent again.

  “Dash,” Sentinel said. “Two projectiles were just launched from this platform in opposite directions, perpendicular to the plane of the system’s ecliptic.”

  “Missiles?”

  “Projectiles,” Tybalt said. “They are quite dissimilar to the missiles that were fired from this station during the battle, so it would be an unwarranted extrapolation.”

  “Got it,” Dash said. “What are their targets?”

  “There are no clear targets for either,” Sentinel said.

  Dash looked at Leira. “Not missiles. What else leaves a ship or space station quickly after it’s been badly damaged?”

  At the same time, they both said, “Escape pods.”

  “Maybe,” she replied. “Tybalt, could they be getting ready to translate out of the system? Traveling away from the ecliptic is the shortest route to a translation point, after all.”

  “That is entirely possible,” Tybalt replied. “If you wish, we can engage the projectiles and stop them.”

  “No, I have a better idea,” Dash said. “Sentinel, put me through to Benzel.”

  A moment passed, then Benzel’s voice came on the comm. “Dash, Sentinel says you wanted—”

  “Yeah, can’t really stand around conversing here,” Dash said, peeking out of the airlock. In the dim glow of what must be emergency lighting, he saw a prone figure, a Verity, lying on the deck a few meters away. “Look, two somethings just flew away from this missile platform in an awful damn hurry, and they look like they’re about
to translate. They might be escape pods. Are any of the scrambler mines you laid in range of them?”

  A moment passed. “Yeah, Sentinel and Tybalt have repeated the data to us. Looks like at least one of them is, for about another minute, anyway. You want to stop it?”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  “On it.”

  Dash peered out into the passageway again. The smoke fuming the air seemed a little thicker. He glanced back at Leira. “Let’s go, before this place bursts into flames or something.”

  Dash started forward. Following him, Leira said, “Tybalt, what are your scans telling you about the stability of the reactors aboard this thing?”

  “All of the reactors have done an emergency shutdown. I can only detect auxiliary power in use, drawn from fission batteries.

  “That said, there is still a considerable amount of ordnance aboard,” Sentinel put in. “The Verity could have the means of initiating a self-destruct function.”

  Dash paused, looked down at the Verity, and nudged it with his foot. It didn’t stir. In thermal, it still seemed warm enough to be alive.

  “So let’s hope we knocked them all out before any of them could initiate anything,” he said, raising the pulse-gun and proceeding along the passageway. And let’s hope that none of them were wearing suits, or were in sealed compartments, or there’s no automated failsafe, or the whole thing doesn’t just blow apart anyway…

  The bridge was still intact, giving some hope that they could retrieve useful data—especially if the Verity had been incapacitated before wiping anything. Both Sentinel and Tybalt had asked him and Leira to retrieve data modules or other storage devices as a priority, but—

  “Gone,” Leira said, pointing at an empty port on a console. “Their data cores are gone.”