Earth Space Service Space Marines Boxed Set

by James David Victor

  "Never mind," she said, the drugs tugging at the edges of her mind again as she sighed and shook her head, looking away.

  "Don't look away from me!" he shouted at her. His tone was more forceful than she had noticed him use before.

  She turned her head back toward him, but didn't rush about it. He seemed to settle back down the moment her gaze fell on him again. Remaining silent now, she waited to see what he was going to say next. Did he even have a plan? She was beginning to doubt he did. He hadn't planned past getting her here.

  He had heard about the half-Arkana woman being accused of treason and had rushed into action without thinking it through.

  Desperate times called for desperate measures, they said. She thought desperate times didn't have to call for ill-thought measures, but that was an opinion shared by only her of those in this room. She knew she was at a severe disadvantage and should be worried, but she couldn't seem to summon up the energy to be scared of him.

  Her feeling was justified when he stood up and stormed off without another word.

  13

  0805 Hours

  Once he was gone, it was harder to resist the drugs in her system. Shadows gathered at the edges of her vision, and her body began to tingle. She tried to fight it, but knew after a while it was a losing battle ...

  The long path up the gentle slope to the building at the top was paved with white stones, every seam was perfectly straight and there wasn’t a single crack. Perfectly manicured blue-flowered bushes lined either side, but everything was so well-formed she didn't think it could be real. And yet, she knew it was.

  She stood at the end of the path for a long time, staring up at the building ahead.

  It was large, taking up the entire hilltop, though perhaps it was only two stories tall. It was as pure white as the walkway, but with long blue banners hanging down to either side of the massive double-doors made of a glimmering white metal. She knew she had seen it before but struggled to remember where. Four massive columns supported the roof's overhang.

  Taking a deep breath, she looked down at herself and saw the flowing white gown she wore as well as the string of blue stones laying over her collarbone. She reached up and touched the stones gingerly. They were smooth and cool to the touch. Her feet were bare, and she wiggled her dark toes from under the pale hem of her gown.

  She knew what she was supposed to do, but she was scared.

  No, she would not let fear rule her. She moved one foot forward and set it down on the white stones, then the other foot. One by one, she made herself take the steps and close the distance between her and the building. She ascended the three broad steps and then reached the doors, suddenly wondering how one person was supposed to open them.

  This was answered a moment later when the doors were pushed open from the inside, and she saw the white metal gearwork that managed it.

  With a deep breath, she pressed herself past the threshold and down the long blue carpet that led her along the long hallway. She could see a hint of a giant room at the other end, stretching up and open for both stories and gleaming with more white stone. As she reached the end of the hall, she saw where the blue carpet turned from a long runner into a giant circle that covered much of the room's center.

  Around the circular walls, ornate white and blue chairs sat beneath windows of colored but transparent glass. In between the chairs were statues that she didn't take too much time to study.

  Directly across from her, three steps led up to a dais. Upon the dais was ...

  A desk.

  Something in her mind knew this was wrong. However, what else had she expected it to be? A chair. No, a throne. This room felt like it owned a throne, but there were none of those around. It was just a huge white metal desk with a single person behind it. She was too far away to make out any details of the person, other than the features of an Arkana and an aura of power that was unmistakable, even to her.

  She started making her way across the carpet, heading straight for the desk. The person behind it both drew and repelled her, but she kept moving forward.

  As she got closer, she saw two lines of willowy bodies at an angle to the dais but not stepping up onto it. They just stood in that line, perfectly silent and perfectly still. No one seemed to know she was there or acknowledge her presence in any way. That was fine by her because she didn't need to deal with that.

  Drawing closer to the desk, she saw the person behind it was a man. She knew him, but she didn't.

  She reached the bottom of the dais and looked at the lines to either side. Was she not supposed to walk up them? She didn't care. She was going to walk up to the desk and the man behind it.

  Lifting the hem of her gown, she walked up the few steps and moved directly beside the desk. The man was writing something and didn't stop to look at her. So she stood there and looked at him, taking in his familiar yet foreign features.

  "Hello, daughter," he said.

  She started at the sound of his voice. It was low and perhaps pleasant to some, but she didn't want to hear it.

  This was her father?

  "I don't want anything to do with you," she said quietly but fervently.

  "Hmm," he replied, unfazed. "You've made that rather clear. Yet, here you are."

  She frowned. Yes, here she was. But how? And why? It wasn't any sort of conscious directive of hers. It couldn't even be true, could it? It had to be her imagination and what assumptions she had formed about it all.

  With a sigh, she looked at the giant circular room and all the people standing and waiting on this man.

  "Yes," she said. "Here I am. And here I go."

  She turned and started walking back down the dais, wondering why she had come.

  "Come back here," he said, his voice low and level. There was no trace of anger, but it was full of command.

  "No," she said without pausing.

  "Come back here now, daughter," he said again. This time the command was tinged with something else, perhaps anger or perhaps surprise. Emotion was creeping into it, more than he had shown before.

  She did not reply to him and kept walking.

  She did not stop in the circular room, nor on the steps out front, or the walkway. She heard him shout at her one more time through the still open giant double-doors, but she continued to walk. Down the road, between gleaming buildings, and on toward the horizon ahead of her.

  And she kept walking until she'd left the Arkana entirely behind.

  14

  0810 Hours

  Anath was pacing his small room on the Star Chaser.

  This wasn't a ship built to accommodate civilians, so the only available quarters were either for dignitaries—which they weren't about to give him—or spare crew quarters. He got one that was private but very small. It was better than the brig, however, so he certainly wasn't going to complain about it.

  There was something wrong on the ship. No, he knew he wasn't empathic but there was something he could feel. He wasn't sure what it was, but it had him uneasy. He had tried to call his sister, but she was off-ship and he didn't know who else he was comfortable enough with to call on.

  He was considering lying down and trying to make himself go back to sleep when there was a chime at his door.

  Surprised, he jumped up and called, "Enter."

  And he was even more surprised to see the captain walk in. The Arkana just stood there, open-mouthed and blinking. "Sir?"

  Wallace looked...exhausted. There were deep shadows under his eyes and a weary look within them. He waved at Anath. "Sit down," he said. Anath hesitated, but sat back on the edge of his bed while Wallace took up the chair across from him. "I have something I need to tell you."

  "What is it?" Anath asked when the human paused. A pit of worry opened in his stomach.

  "Your sister was arrested last night," the captain began.

  "What?!" Anath exclaimed, jumping back to his feet.

  Wallace waved again, looking ever more tired. Anath didn't sit again
, though. "ESS Intelligence is suspicious there is a leak which resulted in the attack that put us into that nebula. They thought you were too obvious and wanted to question your sister."

  Anath clenched his fists. "She's innocent."

  The captain smiled weakly. "I know she is," he said. "And I'm sure they would have come to the same conclusion, except ..." He sighed. "Someone abducted her from the interrogation room."

  "What?!"

  Captain Wallace stood and put his hands on Anath's shoulders, gently pushing him back to a seat on his bed. "I know this is upsetting," he said. "We are all upset about it too, but we are going to find her."

  "I have to get out there and help look," Anath said almost desperately.

  "You know I can't allow that," the older man replied.

  Now at least Anath understood why the man looked so tired and drawn. The Arkana knew the captain thought well of Anath's sister and relied on her and the thirty-third. Having her taken, and on such baseless charges, was stressful and ridiculous. But this was Anath's sister, and she was missing!

  "Captain, please," Anath said. "She's my sister. I know we haven't been in one another's life for very long, but she is literally all I have in this universe now."

  "I know, son," Wallace said, putting his weathered hand back on Anath's shoulder. "I wish I could say otherwise, but they arrested her within a day of being on the station and without any real proof. Anti-Arkana sentiments are high. We are at war with your people. I think seeing you could cause a riot and make it harder to find her. Her squad is looking for her, and they're Marines. They are smart and stubborn. They care for her too, and if anyone is going to be able to find her, it will be them."

  He knew the captain was right. Anath had seen how her squad felt about her...but it still didn't make him feel any better. She was out there. So he should be out there too, helping to look for her and bring her home. Who knew what was happening?

  "Please believe me that I really do wish I could let you go out there," Wallace went on. "But it's for your safety as much as everyone else's. We don't need you arrested and possibly abducted or murdered."

  That drove it home.

  The Arkana swallowed his pride and pushed his feelings down and nodded. He didn't even feel like he was a soldier anymore. All he could do was sit here and worry. There was a battlefield out on that base, and he was being forced to sit on the sidelines.

  "I do understand, sir," he said with defeat. "But I don't like it."

  "I don't expect you to like it," Wallace said, squeezing his shoulder once before letting it go. "In fact, if you did like it, I might boot you out an airlock." He smiled wryly.

  Anath laughed softly, mirthlessly. "Yes, sir. Thank you for coming to tell me yourself."

  Wallace nodded. "Of course. And I will let you know the moment we find out anything."

  Standing up, the captain left. All of the nervous energy that had been building up in Anath bled out fast, and he dropped his head into his hands with a heavy sigh. The overwhelming feelings of defeat and helplessness made him just as overwhelmingly tired. His mind was racing though, despite the emotional fatigue that weighed him down.

  His sister was somewhere on that base. No one knew where, or who had her, just that she was there … somewhere. And that was assuming the abductor hadn't found some way to get her off the base all together!

  Anath told himself they must have thought of that possibility and blocked it or followed it or something to know one way or the other. Even if the ESS people who lost her, or the whole of the ESS was incompetent, he knew the people of the Star Chaser were not. He had seen them in action enough to know that. He knew his sister was competent, and she was just one of many on the ship who were.

  The captain was right. If anyone was going to find her, it would be them. He knew they wouldn't stop, they would not even sleep, until they found her. And that brought him a little comfort the more he thought about it.

  However, he couldn't help but see the irony of it all. Andy had been able to go on base and Anath couldn't because it was too dangerous for him ...

  15

  0835 Hours

  "Sergeant, do you remember when I said there couldn't be that many spaces on the base where she could be hidden?"

  "Yes, Private."

  "I take it back, sir."

  Roxanna offered the younger woman a faint smile, but Jade knew it didn't make either of them feel any better as they stood and looked over the engineer's shoulder at a schematic of the station. He had been given very basic criteria: big enough for two people, still with atmosphere and gravity, but out of the normal security sensor/surveillance range so this person could get someone in there without setting off alerts.

  The easy part had been the transportation. There was a cart used for the transport of conversion coils. The coils disrupted hover-carts, so those couldn't be used. Thus these carts had wheels, which could have made that mark.

  And yes, there was one missing.

  They had no way to know who had taken it or when because the system that registered that information had been tampered with. It wasn't a very secured system, so tampering would be easy. Wheeled carts were not high priority devices, and no one expected them to get stolen. So that was both a confirmation and a dead end at once.

  "There are storage and crawlspaces around the entire inside of these three decks," the engineer said, pointing at them on the map. "They are not accessible to all personnel of the base, but they are environmentally controlled. They are big enough to fit both people of varying sizes as well as industrial storage."

  "And they are individually compartmentalized," Jade told Roxanna, pointing to other lines on the screen. "Basically, they are all separate rooms, so we can just start at one end and make a big circle to try to see everything."

  "Of course," the Selerid said, rubbing her temple. "Why make it easy?"

  Before she could say anything else, Dan and Anallin walked into the room and came up behind them. Jade sent Dan a small smile, but kept it brief.

  "We scanned every inch of that room. We found some blood, which we confirmed belonged to Lieutenant Fitzwallace. We found some hairs, which we confirmed belonged to Major Dolan. We found some other matter, which we found belongs to a file that's been removed from the system."

  That made Roxanna's brows go up, and Jade swung her gaze between the sergeant and Dan. Someone removed a file?

  "Although there is a slim chance it isn't, it sounds suspiciously like the one who took her is an ESS officer. One who either has the power or has the friends with the power to go into the ESS system and remove it. That's not something just anyone can do," Roxanna said, her tone contemplative.

  "Anyone in the ESS command levels could do it or any council member of the Allied Council," Jade said, also thinking out loud. Being the tech expert for the group, she made it her business to know who could do what. This was probably knowledge beyond what anyone would think she needed, but she figured this proved her right. "Captains of bases, ships, and colonies would have the power to remove from their own system but not ESS overall. So we'd have to check how it was removed—whether from the Eclipse database or the ESS system." She paused and then bit her lip. "A higher level intel officer could probably do it or know how to hack it."

  "Jade, is that something you can do?" Roxanna asked. "Can you see what databases this was removed from?"

  She nodded immediately. "Yes, I can."

  Roxanna turned to the engineer. "What console can she use?" He pointed to one that would access what she needed and Jade set herself up, logging into it and getting right to work as Anallin handed her the scanner so she could connect the two.

  Jade immediately loaded the information, sorting out the records from Dolan and Fitzwallace and focusing on the "unknown," putting that up against the database. It ran through its search and came up with the expected result. However, she wasn't looking for the surface result and dug into the background. There was certain "common" information that someon
e on active ESS duty from an ESS console could access without command permissions, which was what she was aiming to find.

  There was a list of databases where the file was found...or at least where it used to be found. It only took a moment to find what she wanted.

  "It was in broader ESS databases as well and not just the station's," she announced. "Including one where even the name is classified. Only its existence is listed here."

  "Well, that's good and frightening to know," Roxanna declared. "Thank you, Jade. I don't suppose there is anything else you can tell us?"

  Jade shook her head. "There's only so much I can look at without having command authorizations. Major Dolan might have been able to see more ..." She smiled feebly and shrugged. "But more than likely, it needs Commander Shailain or Captain Wallace to access any of the other tracking material."

  The Selerid nodded. "I have to report this to the captain," she said as she stepped away for a little bit of privacy and left the others there.

  "You didn't find anything else in the interrogation room?" Jade asked, biting her lip.

  Dan shook his head with a heavy sigh, his big arms crossed over his chest and his dark brows all but knit into a single line in his frustration. "At least that one thing is something and more than we might have had otherwise. I'm betting she got a good hit in somehow."

  Jade smiled a little. "I'm sure she did." Then she waved at the other console, which the engineer had left. He probably assumed they didn't need him anymore and really, they didn't because Jade was there. She could access and read the schematics just as well as he could. "We have found there's actually quite a few places she could have been stashed. We may have a lot of rooms to go through unless we can figure out a better way to narrow it down."

  "This guy didn't have a lot of time to get her away before Fitzwallace woke up and sounded the alarm," Dan said, "so we start with whatever deck is the closest to the one the interrogation room is on. Whichever sections were closest too."