Titan (Old Ironsides Book 2)

by Dean Crawford

  Arkon Stone’s jaw clenched as he forged ahead and spoke to his guards.

  Nathan grabbed Xavier’s arm, Allen also placing one arm protectively across the former officer’s shoulders as they hurried along.

  ‘C’mon pal, we’re not out of this yet.’

  Nathan walked quickly in pursuit of the warden’s guards, who were jogging along the corridors toward the prison’s main landing bay. Even as they approached, moving through security gates as the guards locked them down behind them, Nathan could hear the shouts and jeers coming from the gantries running along the top of the adjoining blocks.

  ‘Ain’t nowhere to run, sticks!’ a con yelled from the gantry to cackles of delight. ‘We’s gonna watch y’all burn from up here!’

  Nathan rushed out into the landing bay with Allen and Reed, the main doors sealed behind them by the warden’s men, and looked up to see the inmates crowding the gantries. The steel–mesh fences were more than strong enough to hold them back, the current running through them an equally effective deterrent, but that didn’t stop them from tossing buckets of latrine water out into the bay. Detritus from the block tumbled and spiralled down into the bay, but Nathan could tell by the tones of many of the countless cries coming from the depths of the blocks beyond that many of the men inside were afraid.

  ‘Has every block fallen?’ he asked the warden.

  ‘All but one,’ the warden replied. ‘Volt must have coordinated with the other prisoners, we don’t know how. What’s worse is that with all communications channels down we can’t communicate with the fleet. We’ve sent an emergency distress beacon signal but as far as we know, nobody knows what’s happening in here.’

  ‘Perfect,’ Nathan uttered. ‘Any other gems you want to share with us?’

  ‘The water supply is low, and the atmospheric scrubbers rely on the same power sources as the security system.’

  ‘So if the inmates don’t get us first we’ll either starve, dehydrate or asphyxiate,’ Allen said.

  ‘That’s about the sum of it,’ Stone replied.

  Even as Nathan considered this, a series of alarms sounded from somewhere inside the prison and he heard the clatter of plasma fire as flashes of blue–white light flickered from down the corridor they had just emerged from.

  ‘Volt’s crew is out,’ he said with a clairvoyant flash, ‘and they’re armed.’

  Fire alarms began breaking out all over the prison, and Nathan looked up as a cheer went up from the gantries high above them and prisoners there ran out of sight, no doubt flocking toward the security gates that were opening all across the blocks.

  ‘How long do they have?’ Allen asked the warden as he checked the magazine in his rifle.

  ‘No more than a few minutes,’ came the grim reply. ‘It’s gonna get bloody in there.’

  The cries and hoots of joy transformed slowly into the roars and howls of conflict and pain as the prisoners fought for their right to escape the blocks even as Nathan caught a glimpse of the unmistakable light from flickering flames somewhere inside the darkened blocks.

  ‘We need to blockade the sally port!’ he shouted at the warden.

  ‘No point,’ the warden shook his head. ‘If they’re armed they’ll break through in no time but the gates will hold them up for a while.’

  Xavier gestured to the rifles. ‘Why not just shoot them through the gates? They’re trapped in there, it’ll be like shootin’ rats in a barrel.’

  Arkon Stone peered at Xavier. ‘And to think you’re innocent of murder.’

  Xavier didn’t take it personally. ‘It’s not about murder warden, it’s about survival. If we don’t start shooting them all, as soon as they get through those gates the ones loyal to Volt will sure as hell kill us!’

  Nathan looked at the warden, as surprised at the big man’s compassion for the inmates as he was by his own conviction that Xavier was right.

  ‘He’s right, they’ll spare nobody once they get out of there. Volt will use us as hostages if we’re lucky or just gun us down on sight if we’re not. There’s nothing we can do right now except hold them back as long as we can before we have no choice but to open fire.’

  ‘Volt will use a human shield,’ Stone countered. ‘His crew will put the fish out in front.’

  ‘Nobody said this was gonna be easy,’ Allen replied. ‘Nobody in a prison is entirely innocent.’

  ‘Except your friend Reed here, right?’ Stone challenged.

  Allen did not reply, but Nathan intervened.

  ‘We need to get the block that’s still secured to open up and let us in.’

  Stone stared at him. ‘You want to break in to the prison?’

  ‘Zak and his crew want out,’ Nathan shrugged. ‘If we’re not in their way and they can’t get to us, everybody wins and nobody else dies among your men. It’s not perfect but it’s the best of a bad situation. Do you think you can get the cons on the safe block to open up?’

  ‘They’re convicts, Ironside,’ Stone growled, ‘even if they could get into the watch tower and open the sally port they’re more likely to settle in against the gantries and watch us all gunned down.’

  ‘Then we have no choice,’ Nathan replied. ‘We wait for Volt’s crew to come through, and human shield or not, we open fire.’

  The warden sighed heavily, weighed down by the knowledge that his men could only open fire on the prisoners if he himself ordered them to do so. What criminal charges might be bought by the justice system planet–side in the aftermath of the riot was anybody’s guess, but Nathan didn’t envy the warden the decision.

  Finally, the big man gestured to his men.

  ‘Defensive positions,’ he bellowed. ‘Warning shots only, but if they break through gate three….’

  The warden did not finish his sentence and the security detail nodded once, curtly. Nathan realized that they understood the impossible situation their boss was in, and without a word they silently complied with the unspoken command. He realized that he had grossly underestimated both the warden’s intelligence, his moral standing and the loyalty of his men and been as duped as Zak Volt had been: Warden Stone was a good man, as were his team.

  The security guards rushed to man their posts, but Nathan could already see that the flashes of plasma fire were coming closer, the gates inside the main entrance sealed only by manual locks now that the power to the security systems had been breached. Once again it was only a matter of time before the prisoners reached them, and this time there truly was nowhere to go, for beyond the two sets of bay doors was nothing but the brutal vacuum of space.

  ***

  XXXI

  CSS Titan

  ‘All bulkheads sealed immediately!’

  Marshall’s voice boomed over the warship’s communications channel as red flashing lights flickered throughout the vessel. Lieutenant Foxx watched as one by one the sick bay’s doors slammed shut, solid metal covering the more normal hard–light doors, sealing them inside the unit.

  ‘I want decontamination units deployed across the ship,’ Marshall added, ‘we’ll provide a genetic analysis of any materials that need to be confined or destroyed. Stand by for further orders!’

  The admiral paced like a caged animal inside the sick bay as Schmidt watched him.

  ‘This is not a life form that can easily be contained, captain,’ he pointed out. ‘We need to understand it further.’

  ‘Then get on with understanding it,’ Marshall snapped. ‘I want a way of destroying it discovered as soon as possible.’

  ‘That’s not what I was thinking.’

  ‘You saw the footage of what that thing did to those two Ayleeans!’ Marshall shot back at the doctor. ‘‘You said it yourself: it may not care about us, may consider us irrelevant to it, an obstacle to be overcome. Unless you want us to roll over and die I suggest you get to work.’

  ‘Such an endeavour is not the work of minutes, captain,’ Schmidt argued. ‘‘It may take months to understand how this creature communicates w
ith…’

  ‘You’ve got an hour!’ Marshall roared. ‘Figure out how to blast it to hell!’

  ‘To what end?’ Schmidt asked. ‘To let them know how we feel about any species that wanders into our space? That we’ll blow them to hell without first thinking?’

  Marshall jabbed a finger at Schmidt’s chest. ‘If this were a computer virus, would you be so certain about risking further infection to discover how it worked, doctor?’

  ‘That’s precisely what I did do, captain,’ he replied quietly. ‘It’s how I became a Holosap, remember? The Falling infected me over two hundred years ago when I was studying it.’

  Marshall ground his teeth in his jaw as he spat his response.

  ‘All the more reason to find a defense, before we all end up as semi–opaque light bulbs.’

  Schmidt smiled, not rising to the captain’s bait and remaining silent. It was Vasquez who broke the uncomfortable silence.

  ‘We need to communicate with it.’

  Foxx looked at him. ‘We need to what now?’

  ‘You said it yourselves, this thing impersonated an Ayleean and it talked,’ Vasquez said. ‘Either it learned an entire language real fast or it’s been here longer than we think. Either way, why not just ask it what the hell it wants?’

  Schmidt smiled, and one hand reached out to clap Vasquez on the shoulder even though he could not possibly make contact.

  ‘Thank you, young man. It would appear that the police force produces a more robust mind than the fleet.’

  ‘He used to be a Marine,’ Marshall pointed out with a smug smile.

  ‘Then he’s certainly moved forward in the world, has he not?’ Schmidt chortled back as he gestured to the exits. ‘Captain, if you will? There is little point in us huddling in here when the proximal cause of this infection is in the very next room and may well already be moving freely across the ship. Maintain the lockdown on all other sections until we have had the chance to face and perhaps communicate with this entity directly.’

  Marshall sighed and reluctantly relayed the order to the bridge, and one of the sick bay’s solid doors hissed open to reveal the corridor that led to the quarantine unit. Schmidt led the way, walking this time instead of flickering out and reemerging next door.

  ‘You realize that we’re about to communicate for the first time with an extra–terrestrial species, a truly historic moment,’ Schmidt said to the admiral. ‘You should be proud to witness it.’

  Marshall walked with his hands shoved into his pockets and a scowl on his face. ‘I’ll be proud if it gets the hell off my ship and chats from a distance. It’s not protocol to invade another vessel.’

  ‘I doubt that they would have a care in the world for our protocols.’

  They walked into the quarantine unit and Foxx immediately froze in position along with everybody else as they saw the figure standing silently within the cubicle, watching them with eyes that seemed somehow hollow, without a soul.

  She felt a superstitious awe creep like insects beneath her skin as she and the admiral advanced cautiously into the unit with Schmidt and Vasquez.

  ‘Fascinating,’ the doctor said.

  The figure was human, female and a little taller than Foxx, with long blonde hair that fell to the small of her back and green eyes. Her skin was impossibly perfect, her hair immaculate, not a single one out of place in an image that was as unreal as it was real, unnerving in its impossibility. Her hands were clasped before her, a faint smile touching her features, and to Foxx she looked somehow familiar.

  ‘Hello,’ Schmidt said as he approached the quarantine cubicle.

  ‘Hello.’

  The voice was light, gentle, placid. Foxx looked the woman up and down, the white gown she was dressed in flowing like a liquid cloud down her perfectly symmetrical body. Her gaze was unnervingly steady and Foxx noted that she did not blink, those green eyes identical to each other, unnaturally perfect.

  ‘Why are you here?’ Schmidt asked. ‘How do you know our language?’

  The woman smiled. ‘We have heard your language for many centuries, Doctor Schmidt.’

  Foxx gasped as the doctor hesitated before replying.

  ‘How did you know my name?’

  ‘I can hear,’ the woman replied. ‘I’ve been listening for some time.’

  Marshall stepped forward. ‘You’re outside of the quarantine unit,’ he said.

  ‘No,’ the woman replied. ‘I am all here, but I can see enough to know what’s been said.’

  ‘You can read lips,’ Schmidt said.

  ‘If I choose to.’

  Foxx eased closer to the unit, observing closely her somehow rigid expression, as though she were mimicking an image rather than a fully animated person, and the woman turned that unsettling gaze upon her.

  ‘You have questions.’

  It was a statement, utterly confident, totally understanding, as though the being had somehow read Foxx’s mind, and suddenly she recognized the face of the woman, or at least part of it.

  ‘It’s not human,’ she said out loud, ‘it can’t be reasoned with. That’s the Mona Lisa smile.’

  Marshall peered at the woman’s face, and then Vasquez spotted something.

  ‘And those eyes, they’re from Director General Coburn,’ he gasped.

  Marshall suddenly seemed to see through the deception even as Schmidt spoke.

  ‘It’s generating a form that appears both familiar and unthreatening,’ he said, ‘attempting to either lull us into a false sense of security or to avoid provoking fear in us.’

  Marshall’s jaw tensed as he realized the deception. ‘Show us as you truly are or this conversation is over.’

  Foxx watched as the woman’s immaculate appearance suddenly began to fade, as though her white clothing was now dirty and her skin ageing, her calm expression twisting slightly with what might have been something approaching anger. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because if your first proper appearance to us is a mixture of deception and deceit it doesn’t naturally make me want to trust you,’ Marshall shot back. ‘I can have this quarantine unit transported to a launch bay, ejected into space and blasted from existence within five minutes. I take it that even a life form as advanced as your own still wishes to live?’

  ‘We have no knowledge of our original form,’ came the reply, ‘for we were cloned for millennia.’

  Schmidt glanced at Marshall. ‘Cloning technology has been available to humanity for centuries, but these creatures may have possessed it for millennia, and notice how she refers to herself as we. Who knows what they could have cooked up out there?’

  Marshall nodded as he observed the woman.

  ‘Why did you attack the Ayleean’s vessel?’

  ‘We had travelled far, and needed fuel.’

  ‘From their fusion cores?’ Vasquez asked, curious now.

  ‘From everything,’ came the reply. ‘All matter has its uses.’

  ‘You killed the entire crew,’ Marshall pointed out.

  ‘All fuel has its uses.’

  Foxx heard that reply and her skin crept with a sudden chill as she realized that this being, this entity had no concept of what it had done. It did not understand that in taking the lives of other beings it caused pain: to it, they were simply the next meal.

  ‘We will require more fuel,’ the woman said.

  ‘Then take it from planets,’ Schmidt suggested, ‘not other beings.’

  ‘Planetary gases are not complex, they are insufficient. Free us now or we will be forced to consume your vessel also.’

  ‘You would have done so anyway, had we not seen you coming,’ Marshall pointed out. ‘Why should we believe that you won’t attack us now?’

  ‘It is not for us to say,’ came the reply. ‘You must release us.’

  ‘I can’t do that,’ Marshall said.

  There was no hesitation: the woman’s form collapsed downward like falling smoke and vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

  ‘Where
’d it go?’ Vasqeuz asked.

  ‘It’s still in there,’ Marshall said. ‘Shape shifting freak or not, it can’t get out and it can’t call for help.’

  As Foxx watched, suddenly she felt a vibration coming from inside the quarantine cubicle. She took an involuntary step back as Marshall glanced at the Marine guard.

  ‘Increase the holding power to maximum and shield against all vibrations.’

  The Marine complied and the vibration vanished, but now Foxx could see the metalwork of one of the gurneys beginning to glow as a red haze blossomed into view within the cubicle, billowing outward, filling the cubicle as though the interior were aflame.

  ‘What’s it doing?’ Foxx asked.

  Schmidt edged closer to the cubicle as though he were about to walk inside, but then he hesitated for a moment as though he were realizing something. Then, he whirled to the captain.

  ‘Put the shields up, admiral! Prepare for battle!’

  ‘Why?’ Marshall shrugged. ‘It’s trapped.’

  ‘It’s not trying to escape! It wanted you to seal it in! It’s generating heat, and heat is light, and light has a spectra. It’s signalling the rest of itself and sending a distress signal!’

  As if one cue a low, mournful alarm sounded through the ship and the XO’s voice crackled into the admiral’s communicator.

  ‘Captain on the bridge, all arms!’

  ***

  XXXII

  ‘Pull all of the fighters back and charge all cannons!’

  Marshall’s voice boomed across the bridge as he marched onto the command platform and saw the main display screen showing the alien vessel moving across the star fields. Although none of its running lights or anti–collision beacons were switched on Foxx could see the hull was aglow with light, the vessel’s propulsion system flaring blue–white as the ship began to turn toward Titan.

  ‘They’re coming for us,’ Olsen said, ‘I’ve got weapons of some kind charging, high–energy electrical impulses across her hull on both sides, can’t tell what she’s carrying though.’

  ‘It could be a form of weapon we’ve never encountered before,’ Schmidt said as he materialized alongside them on the bridge. ‘We should keep our distance.’