by Evan Currie
“Clear the bodies,” the sergeant ordered. “Not much we can do about the blood, but we’ll worry about that when it becomes a problem.”
Rider nodded and gestured to his team as he bent down and grabbed the armor of the man he was standing over, hefting the man’s torso up enough so he could drag him down the corridor.
The sergeant watched the job for a moment, then quickly secured the fallen weapons and followed the team.
One job down, the big one still to go.
► Losing the scout team rarely meant good things, but at least it was a warning that bad things were ahead.
Not that I really needed much warning about that, Leif thought. If it were truly a surprise, I would not have led with the scout troop.
“We lost contact with them about a hundred meters along this corridor,” he said, checking the last time they’d had a signal from the scouts. “So now we have a decision to make. Bull through or try to go around?”
His second stepped up beside him, looking up the empty corridor and then checking the map they had of the ship’s internals.
“Going around will add at least thirty-three percent more time,” the second said quietly. “Probably more.”
“True,” Leif said, considering. “However, if they’re prepared to hold the corridor against us, going straight will cost men and time. In either case, we lose.”
“Not a palatable decision, I admit,” his second said.
“We have an alternative, perhaps,” Leif said as he examined the map.
The Oather design was similar to Imperial cruisers, though the internal layout wasn’t identical. There were nonetheless major consistencies. Both ships were built around a twin core of reactors that warped gravity significantly in the short range of deck to deck. In order to maintain a perpendicular gravity to the deck, the ships had to be constructed in line with the warping of space-time.
The only way to get a straight line was to curve it.
In absolute terms, that meant that while he may not know the layout of the decks in any specific fashion, Leif did know where he was and where he had to be as well as the most direct way to get there.
“Cutting lasers,” he ordered, pointing at a section of deck. “We will go through here.”
“The heat will stress our suit systems in short order, Half Centure,” his second warned.
“We will either be clear of this beast before that’s a factor, or we’ll all be dead. Either way, we are not going to care about the heat,” Leif said. “Leave that to the Oathers to worry about.”
“On your order, Half Centure.” His second saluted, then waved up a fire team and gave them their orders.
“Everyone else, perimeter security.”
► Rider shifted nervously, risking a glance around the corner.
“Something’s wrong,” he said after a moment’s thought.
“You mean the fact that we’re not dodging lasers right about now?” Dow asked. “Doesn’t seem like something to bitch about, Rider.”
“Yeah, that’s the problem alright,” Rider answered easily enough, switching channels on the tactical network. “Hey Sarge, anyone see signs along alternate routes?”
“Negative on that, Rider. Why, you think they’re playing games?” the sergeant said.
“Should have been here by now,” Rider said decisively. “Something’s up.”
“Corporal,” the colonel’s quiet voice cut in, “they’re probably just being cautious. They just lost contact with their recon squad. That likely slowed them down.”
Rider hesitated, not wanting to cross the colonel, but finally elected to just bull ahead. “Ma’am, my gut says they’re up to something that means bad things for us,” he said in a quick spew of words.
The sergeant’s sharp laughter followed instantly. “That’s a given, Corporal. They’re the enemy. You’ll need to be more specific.”
Rider ground his teeth, risking another look down the empty corridor.
Still no sign.
“I can’t,” he admitted finally. “But something isn’t right, ma’am, Sarge. Request to deploy recon.”
The silence on the channel was nearly deafening until finally the colonel came back.
“Corporal, there’s no cover if you get caught out in the open. You’re cooked.”
“Roger, ma’am,” Rider said. “Won’t get caught in the open, ma’am.”
Another pause stretched out before her voice came back.
“Deploy recon.”
“Oorah, ma’am. Recon deploying,” he said over the open channel, nodding to his team. “Let’s go.”
Breaking cover, Rider led the way. He felt an itch running down his spine, not that the feeling really surprised him. Wandering as he was in the open right toward where every bit of intelligence said the enemy was approaching from tended to make his skin crawl. The itch aside, something was bugging Rider. He didn’t think they were approaching.
He didn’t know for sure, but he couldn’t get the thought out of his head, so he was betting his life on a hunch.
His life, and the lives of his team.
With his three squadmates at his back, the armored recon Marine securely planted the butt of his rifle to his shoulder and broke into a loping jog that ate up ground faster. At the junction he stopped, one hand coming off his rifle, fist in the air to signal the rest to follow suit.
He carefully cleared the corner and shook his head when he found no sign of the enemy down the next length of corridor either.
“They pulled a fast one,” he said firmly.
Dow crossed the intersection while he covered the corridor, then took up position on the other side before replying, “What kind of fast one could they pull? We have the routes covered. There weren’t that many to begin with, not with all the damage this heap took in the fight.”
“I don’t know what,” Rider said, “but they’re up to something. Okay, we’re moving on.”
“Hold on, Rider,” Kensey objected. “We’ll lose tactical contact with the rest if we stretch out much farther. The radiation from all the fighting has turned this place into a transmission nightmare.”
Rider hissed, irritated but knowing Kensey was right.
Their suit comms were good, but there were physical constraints to how much range you could get out of a man-portable system. Ideal circumstances would allow spread spectrum transmitters to punch through a lot and reach out respectable distances. While the Priminae vessel was largely designed to be electromagnetically neutral, the squad was in far from ideal circumstances.
The laser radiation from the fighting on board but, more importantly, from the ship-to-ship combat the vessel had endured had left its mark. Lasers powerful enough to burn through combat armor and slice open warships left a longer-lasting mark as heat and other forms of radiation. The squad was also right on top of the vessel’s singularity cores, which were even worse.
“Okay,” he decided. “We’ve got the codes to access the shipboard system. We’ll link to that, as it should be able to get a signal back to the others. It’s hardlined.”
“Assuming it’s not been cut anywhere,” Kensey said in a tone of grudging agreement.
“You sign up to live forever, Kensey?” Rider asked as he used his suit to link into the ship’s communication system.
“Not while you’re leading the charge.”
“Smartass. Okay, I’ve got the ship’s system. What the hell . . .” Rider trailed off.
“What is it?”
Rider ignored his squadmate for the moment, switching tactical channels again. “Colonel, check the status of the ship’s communications relays.”
“What am I looking for, Corporal?” Colonel Conner asked a moment later.
“A relay just ahead went dead, ma’am.”
“There’re a lot of dead relays, Rider,” the sergeant cut in. “What’s your point?”
“No, Sergeant, the corporal may be on to something,” Conner said. “The time stamp is only a few seconds ago. Someone just
cut that relay.”
“Taking down our communications?” the sergeant asked, sounding confused.
“Not effectively, if that’s the idea,” Rider answered. “That one is on their side of the ship. We don’t have anyone on the other side of it, and they should know that—Colonel!”
“I see it,” Conner gritted out. “Another one just went dead.”
“Closer to us?” the sergeant asked, still uncertain.
“No, different deck,” Rider said. “Ma’am, I think they’re—”
“Cutting through the decks,” she finished for him. “You were right, Corporal. They were up to something. We’re redeploying. I’m pulling everyone back. We’ll try and cut them off before they get to the flight deck.”
“I’ll take my team after them,” Rider said.
“Corporal, you won’t have any backup,” Conner warned.
“Recon, ma’am,” he answered simply.
He didn’t need to say anything more, in his opinion.
He could hear the hesitation in the silence that stretched between him and the colonel, but finally she came back.
“Godspeed, Marine.”
“Oorah, ma’am.”
Rider cut the link and simply gestured with two fingers before he brought his rifle back up to his shoulder. His team didn’t miss a beat; they’d been waiting and watching for the signal. As one, they broke position and began running down the corridor.
Marine Force Recon.
Celer, Silens, Mortalis.
Swift, Silent, Deadly.
It was time to live up to the words.
CHAPTER 18
► Commander Heath sat bolt upright in her seat, catching Eric’s attention in his peripheral vision as he was monitoring a laser strike that had come in from the enemy fleet.
“What is it, Commander?” he asked, not looking over.
“We just registered rifle fire on deck thirty-eight,” she said, pushing quickly through a set of menus to access the system deeper.
“What?” Eric looked over now. “Thirty-eight? That’s where the Marines went in looking for the source of a sound, right?”
“Yes sir. I’m getting reports of an injured Marine now.”
“Was he shot?”
“No. He apparently slammed himself into the bulkhead and fired his weapon accidentally.” Heath let out a breath. “No other injuries. The rifle IFF kept it from cutting down the team of Marines that went in with him.”
Eric winced, glad of course that the Identification Friend or Foe system had functioned as intended, but it should never have come to that.
“What the hell happened?” he asked.
“Reports are confused right now, sir. I’m accessing the Marine’s suit recorders.”
Eric glanced at the telemetry plot, determining how much time they had before they were likely to be in a hot battle again, and decided it was enough. “Shoot me the link as soon as you can. I want to see this myself.”
“Yes sir.”
Heath soon sent the link over to his station. Eric quickly queued up the file and played it on his station with the audio turned up. The command station had an isolated audio system that kept most of the sound from leaking out to bother anyone else. He was disappointed when he got through the file.
“What was he hearing?” Eric said. “Obviously something spooked the kid, but none of the systems recorded it?”
Heath shook her head from across the aisle at her own station. “No idea, sir. Other Marines confirm that they heard the sounds they were there to investigate, but none of the recorders got a hint of it.”
“In a hard vacuum, honestly, I’d have been shocked if they had,” Eric said. “Something had to be vibrating the air in their suits directly. Gravity flux, perhaps?”
“We would have picked that up, sir,” Heath said firmly, “and if by some chance it happened and we didn’t pick it up, the suit mics would have. I’m thinking we need to pull our people and examine their suit air, sir.”
“Contaminated suit air? All of them?” Eric asked incredulously. “That’s a stretch.”
“It’s the only thing that makes sense based on what I’m seeing.”
Eric hissed, but finally nodded. “I want a full screen done on that Marine—hell, on all of them. God, we need to pull the damage control teams too. How long until we can purge the suit air from another set and get a new team in?”
“At least twenty minutes, sir.”
“Okay, get it done,” Eric ordered, shaking his head. “If this keeps up, the crew is going to start thinking this ship is haunted, and that’s not going to end well for anyone.”
“Yes sir,” Heath said, not specifying whether she was confirming his order or responding to his statement. Honestly, it didn’t matter as long as she got to work on pulling the damage control teams and the Marines from the affected decks while getting the suit maintenance units to start purging their systems.
Eric returned to the more urgent tasks, but his mind and eyes kept sneaking back to the strange reports coming from the damage control crews.
If I didn’t know any better, I’d . . .
Eric shook that thought from his mind. The last thing he needed to start worrying about now was problems light-years away. There would be a sane explanation.
► “You want us to what?”
Dixon was incensed. First, his ship got big damned holes blown in it, then some joker starts creeping everyone out while he’s trying to fix the ruptures, and now they want him to pull his team in?
“You heard me, Chief. Come in, swap out to a new team. We’re worried that you might have picked up a contaminant in your air.”
“Commander, my air is fine. We’re ten minutes from sealing this deck so we can repressurize,” Dixon insisted. “How long will it take to swap a team? A half hour at least?”
“Closer to an hour, Chief,” the commander said reluctantly.
“An hour? Are you kidding me?” Dixon normally wouldn’t argue with a commander. Making a fool of oneself was an officer’s prerogative, but here she was talking about leaving his ship with a huge gaping wound in her side for an extra hour? No.
“We’re purging the air out of the other team’s suits. We need to confirm that the O2 is pure, Chief.” The commander was sounding irritated.
Good.
“You do that,” Dixon said. “We’re going to finish this job, then we’ll come out and swap for another team. Ten minutes won’t kill us if whatever it is hasn’t already done us in, Commander. We’re on a clock. Let us do our job.”
“Chief, the Marines have been called out. One of them freaked out and hosed down the deck with his rifle.”
“One of them what?!” Dixon damn near blew up, forgetting entirely who he was talking to. “We’re trying to patch my baby here, and you’re telling me one of those idiot leathernecks is putting more holes in it?”
“Chief, take a breath. Your blood pressure and heart rate are going through the roof. If you don’t calm down, I’m sending in a medic team to pull you out by force,” Heath said firmly.
Dixon took a couple of deep breaths, watching his heart rate slow as he forced himself to calm down.
“Better. Yes, the Marines were hallucinating or something and one of them damn near threw himself through a bulkhead to get away from . . . something,” she said when his bio readings had dropped to more normal levels. “That’s why we want your team out of there.”
“Look, my guys are hearing things, but no one is freaking out,” Dixon growled. Much.
“We’d rather it not come to that.”
“We could argue about it for another five minutes, Commander, or you could let us finish, and we’ll be out in fifteen,” Dixon said. “And you’ll be able to pressurize this deck, and then we don’t have to worry about contaminants in the suit air. How’s that sound?”
Heath sighed audibly over the comm channel.
“Chief . . . just get it done,” she snapped, a little stronger than she intended. �
��In the meantime, I’ll be sitting here, trying to decide whether you get a commendation or a dressing-down in your next fit rep.”
Dixon almost laughed over the comm. “Same thing half the time, Commander. We’ll be out of here in fifteen.”
“Just keep an eye on your people, Chief. Anyone freaks out, you all get the hell out of there,” Heath said, “right away and on the double, or I’m coming down there to drag you out. Heath out.”
Dixon flipped from the comm channel over to the team channel, listening in to his damage control team as they worked. Everyone seemed calm, aside from being a little creeped out by the strange noises. He couldn’t fault them on that. He wasn’t all sunshine and roses about the damn sounds himself.
Their vitals were all good, though, well within the expected range for the work they were doing, and better than most had any right to expect. Repairing combat damage in the middle of a fight was dangerous enough; doing so in hard vacuum was enough to get anyone’s blood pumping. But so far, his people were handling the task like it was a walk in the park.
He expected no less of course. They were professionals.
Now if only that damn sobbing would stop!
Or, at least, if his “professionals” would stop occasionally joining in. Embarrassing is what it was.
Dixon sighed and got back to work.
► Doctor Rame had been the medical officer under Eric Weston’s command since the first voyage of the Odyssey, and in that time he’d seen plenty of strange things in his life: the first “alien” ever encountered by humans, truly alien beasties that wanted to eat humans, lots of fighting, and all sorts of new and interesting injuries to treat.
In those years, however, he’d not encountered something quite like this.
“No,” he said with a shake of his head. “I’m telling you, he’s clean. They all are. No hits on the tox panels; everything checks out. You can get whoever you want to look at their suit air, but I’m telling you right now, there’s not going to be anything there besides a very slight CO2 imbalance.”
“That could cause problems, Doc,” the Marine gunnery sergeant said, shooting a glare over at the Marine who was still laid out on the bed.
