by Cain Hopwood
There were advantages to this approach though. To a casual observer, it would have looked as if he’d just stretched back on his cot and taken a nap. In fact, he’d just finished a virtual conference with his staff. It was the first time he’d used the full immersion mode of the new implants to mediate such a meeting. He’d waited until all his staff were settling in for the evening before bringing them in. The meeting’s audio and visuals were hidden away in an encrypted sub channel, that was masked by the unit’s usual data traffic. So the fact they were meeting at all, would have been hard to determine.
And, with the audio and visuals being fed directly into each participants auditory and optic nerves, only a bonafide mind reader would have been able to eavesdrop. Frankly, if the Ka-Li could read their minds, then it didn’t matter what precautions they took.
The purpose of the extraordinary meeting had been to instruct his staff on what to do if they encountered another rogue Chonai Ka-Li. The colonel knew full well who and what the Chonai were. He’d spent a lot of time quizzing their translators on Galactic history.
Colonel Whitfield considered himself lucky that it was Moss who encountered the first of these Chonai. Had it been Gritz, the Chonai would probably be in a body bag now, or under guard at the camp. Either would have been fine as far as their hosts were concerned. But it would have unequivocally made an enemy of the Chonai.
Moss though, had taken a more cautious approach. Knowing Moss’s background in Brazil, this wasn’t a surprise. Before he’d made lieutenant, Moss had spent two tours in the nano-phage affected western badlands. He’d spent a lot of time working with the locals there, and the golden rule there was, tread softly.
There was no question that Colonel Whitfield would report the incident to Katona. In fact Moss’s Chonai had seemed to expect it. The question the colonel had was, was this a genuine encounter with a Chonai stowaway, or had it been engineered by Katona?
If it was the colonel in Katona’s place, he would want to see how an untested unit reacted to an off the books scenario. They were bound to encounter unexpected situations over the next few months on Marbel. Whether humans typically responded aggressively, defensively or cautiously would be useful information to Katona.
Having Moss’s squad followed by a supposedly rogue Ka-Li, made for a good test. The question in the colonel’s mind was, was it one? It occurred to him that the other purpose this encounter could be, was a test of loyalty. Surely Katona would be wondering how loyal and honorable humans were. Honor was something that Colonel Whitfield knew was a cornerstone of Galactic civilization. It might even be the one thing that enabled the far flung society of disparate races and worlds to co-exist.
The thing that rankled the colonel most about this whole deployment was his lack of options, and the complete absence of an exit strategy. But, once he and his unit had proved themselves trustworthy and useful, then like any valuable asset it would be harder to simply discard them. At the moment the colonel felt like a lowly pawn in a complex game.
He browsed through Moss’s report again. He paid particular attention to the rogue Chonai’s words, trying to tease out any additional meaning or intent. Moss had demonstrated power over the Chonai, but chose not to exercise it. He’d let the rogue Ka-Li go, and that had, intentionally or not, allowed them to part as equals. This was very important in relations between Ka-Li.
The colonel took out the com-pod he used to get in contact with their hosts. He rolled the small round disk around between his fingers like a coin. It had a clip on the back, designed to be attached to one of the straps on a Ka-Li harness.
He thumbed the control nub. “This is Colonel Whitfield. One of my patrols encountered what seems to be a Chonai stowaway on your starship. Such an encounter was outside the orders of the patrol, so my men spoke briefly to the creature, and let it go.”
“A Chonai remnant you say?”
“That is correct.”
“Are your men sure it was a Chonai remnant?”
“Absolutely, it said as much itself.”
“Well, it’s possible, I have heard rumors that there are still some lurking in some of the less used holds and chambers in the starship. It’s more a matter for the centarch than Katona, but I will pass the information on.”
The colonel slipped the com-pod back into his pack, and lay back on his cot. He closed Moss’s report. Within the next twelve hours they’d be arriving at the Marbel system. Then the process of packing up camp and redeploying to the planet would begin.
The starship would be away for some months delivering supplies, but by the time it returned, the centarch expected Katona and him to have made progress.
They had a lot of work to do, and not much time to do it in.
— 23 —
Jon hefted the supply crate with a grunt and placed it on top of the others. With two clicks its locking tabs engaged, and it was secured in place.
“That’s the last one. Transport six is full,” he said.
He gave the hold a quick once over. The row of drop seats were up — ready for use — and the rest of the cargo space was packed to the hilt with crates.
Happy that the transports he’d been assigned to pack were ready to go, he trotted down the loading ramp.
Skip was waiting at the bottom, glistening with sweat. “Lieutenant, that has to be a record.”
Jon checked the countdown he had running in his heads-up. “You could be right Skip, three hours forty seven minutes.”
“That is a record. Our best time for breaking camp is four hours three minutes.”
“I don’t think everything is loaded yet,” said Jon. “But, there’s still seventeen minutes to go. Come on.”
They tried to break into a trot, though it was more of a shuffle, and headed for what used to be the camp’s assembly area. It was almost empty. There were only a few crates still scattered about, and the rest of the unit were working feverishly to get everything stowed and secure aboard the remaining transports.
Earlier — at six a.m. — the colonel had issued orders to break camp. They had been, as usual, curt.
“Break camp. Be ready to move by twelve hundred. Pack five days of field rations each. I’m timing you. This is not a drill.”
Within seconds, Jon and the other lieutenants had their men up and moving. Before even a minute had passed, the camp was boiling with activity as shelters were collapsed, structures dismantled, and crates filled with the odds and ends of camp life.
The operations manual listed the time for a complete bug out of a fully operational field camp, as eight hours. In Jon’s experience, the longer they were on site, the closer they approached that time. The regimental record was a few minutes over four hours. And, while they’d definitely break that today, Jon wasn’t sure if this camp counted.
For a start the unit was undersized, barely a full company. And, not everything had been packed into the transports; there were still crates, locked together in palletized blocks, that would be moved later by the Galactics.
But whatever the outcome, there would be plenty of arguments in the regimental mess about whether it qualified as a record beating effort. Assuming that is, they ever made it back to Earth in the first place.
Jon and Skip trotted wearily up to where the rest of Jon’s squad had assembled. Murdoch was sitting cross legged; his pack was on the ground in front of him, his precious Barrett atop it, out of the sand. The rest were standing around looking like they’d just run a marathon.
“Everyone got a full kit?” Jon asked.
Once he’d received the required number of nods, yeps and sirs he confirmed completion of the colonel’s order. His squad were ready to move out.
Like Jon’s squad, the others were just finishing up. Only Lepok’s medical transport was still loading. Packing up the unit’s clinic always took longer; even hardened military medical gear had to be packed with some care.
He hunted around looking for the medical transport to see if she needed any additional hands
. Three of Gritz’s heavies were already helping her out, and they looked just about done so Jon slumped to the ground next to Murdoch.
A few minutes later, Lepok and Gritz locked down the last of the medical supplies, and jogged over to join the rest of the company.
The colonel was waiting, standing on the lowered loading ramp of transport one. “Good job people. A shade under four hours, could be a new regimental record. Now, as I said in the order, this is not a drill. We are bugging out at twelve.”
He took a look around. “Everyone has to be in their assigned drop seats in the transports at eleven forty five. Sometime after twelve, this chamber will lose gravity when the starship jumps to the Marbel system. That’s why everything has to be locked and loaded. Including each of you.
“As soon as the jump is complete and gravity is restored, sit tight. We’re to be collected and returned to the Aquina, which will take us straight down to Marbel.”
The colonel made eye contact with each of his lieutenants, including Jon, then continued. “The next forty eight hours will be busy. Try to get some rest before we leave. I’ll brief the officers in detail now. If you’ve got questions, they’ll answer them after.”
Jon shouldered his pack and made his way through the crowd to the colonel’s transport. He looked across the low scrubby dunes; it wasn’t a pleasant environment by any stretch of the imagination, but it was familiar, and he wondered when, or even if, they’d see it again.
Part Three
Marbel:
Stetlak annexed system
— 24 —
Jon woke, shook a dusting of snow off his fatigues and crawled over to the edge of the hide. He gave a small nod to Murdoch, and the sniper lifted the edge of the fabric. Jon propped the small gap open, leaving just enough space so they could both see their target in the valley below.
“Sleep well lieutenant?”
“Not bad, considering the cold.”
Murdoch sniffed. “It is that. But still, I’m preferring it out here to back at camp.”
“Same,” Jon said.
Jon, Murdoch and Skip had been huddled, shivering in the hide for three days waiting for the weather to clear. The ski in, during a howling blizzard while navigating inertially, had been interesting to say the least. But it had been necessary; the storm erased all evidence of the journey. They’d set up the hide on the lee side of a wind drift. From his experience backcountry skiing, Jon knew that particular placement would shelter them from the worst of the gale. It also ensured that the domed roof of the hide would be quickly covered by snow, protecting them from overhead thermal imaging.
What he couldn’t tell when they’d set up, was whether the spot had a suitable view of the valley below.
The storm had eventually blown itself out. Daylight had brought sunshine. And the small cluster of buildings below the hide stirred with life.
“I’ll tell you what,” Murdoch said. “These Marbelites are not as ugly as the Ka-Li. Not by a long shot.”
Jon peered through his spotting scope. “But they look a hell of a lot meaner. Well, tougher anyway.”
“Have to be, to live in this place.”
“Spent more time in worse,” Jon said.
A few Marbelites had emerged and were diligently clearing doorways and windows of snow. Others were making sure that transports and flyers were ready to move at a moment’s notice.
The Marbelites looked more or less like large squat polar bears, though with three fingered hands instead of paws. Covered with dense white fur they didn’t need clothing, even in Marbel’s sub zero temperatures. Like the Ka-Li, the only thing they wore was a belt and harness, for carrying tools and weapons.
Through his scope, Jon followed one individual. It was smaller, maybe a juvenile, and only wearing a belt, not a full harness. The creature was studiously clearing the snow from one flyer. It wasn’t alone in its task; the other three flyers were also being cleared.
“Going somewhere do you think?” muttered Jon.
Murdoch took his time answering, scanning each of the flyers with his own scope. “Maybe,” he said. “Or maybe they’re just making sure they’re ready to go at a moment’s notice. Either way, it seems like a lot of air transport for such a small place.”
“Good point.” Jon flicked through the mission brief. “None of the earlier satellite imagery shows over two flyers.”
“With any luck we won’t have to wait too long.”
Their intel was that a regional clan meeting was due to occur here during the next few days. The clans had been stirring up a lot of trouble recently. The story coming down from the centarch, was that there was a new leader emerging, and the regional chiefs were jockeying for positions on his war council. At least, that is what Shaiken’s spies and informants were saying.
The colonel, not a big fan of spies and informants, had decided to get his information first hand. He’d persuaded Admiral Katona to let them run a recon mission; the blizzard had given them the opportunity to get in undetected.
It would be the first test of the human soldiers, their equipment and methods. Every time the Ka-Li had tried something similar, it had failed. The best theory was that the Marbelites had built sensors for clima-fields, without which the cold blooded Ka-Li couldn’t survive the harsh Marbel environment. Each time the Galactics had tried something similar, the Marbelites had scattered to the four winds long before a strike team could approach.
Feasting, fighting, and family cemented the complex web of Marbelite clan alliances. But this particular meet up was unusual. It was only small, three chiefs. But, two of the three were sworn enemies. So it was going to be tense.
“Do you think they’ve already had their little pow wow?” Murdoch said.
“I don’t think so, there’s only four flyers down there. This might be the advance guard. Or, maybe only one of the chiefs has arrived, and the rest were blocked by the storm.”
Murdoch absently scratched an eye. “Y’know lieutenant, our brief is just to observe right.”
“Yes.”
“Wouldn’t it be useful to be able to hear what they’re talking about down there?”
Jon didn’t take his eyes from his scope. “Our orders are just to observe. Specifically, when and how they react to the raid Katona has planned. The Galactics haven’t been able to work out whether they have a spy, or some kind of early warning system.”
“True sir, but isn’t listening part of observing. From here we can only see when they start running around like lunatics. With a few of Skip’s audio motes, or a couple of micros, we’d have a better idea of what’s going on down there before things start going crazy.”
“And how are we going to emplace them? Are you going to ghost down and scatter them around?”
Murdoch cocked his head. “No, this isn’t my kind of country. But a sparrow could.”
Jon considered the idea. Skip’s regular obs-drones — colloquially called sparrows — were small, about the size of a hummingbird. Fortunately, they could carry the housefly sized micros.
“How far are the buildings?” he asked Murdoch.
“One point two clicks.”
“That’s only just inside the micro drone’s operating radius,” Jon said. “And, that’s with good weather. We’ll need to stage them off a regular drone.”
Both men looked down into the valley.
“The drone could use that outcrop as cover,” Murdoch suggested, pointing to a few small rocks at the edge of the landing field where the flyers were being cleaned down.
Jon nodded. “Skip, prep a sparrow. We’ll need to get it to high ground to relay comms to the colonel anyway. Also, load it with two micros, it’s going to be taking a small side trip.”
It only took Skip a couple of minutes to prep the drone and get it airborne. He flew it low and wide of the buildings. Then he approached, using the rocks as cover, ensuring that anyone in or around the buildings wouldn’t be able to observe the tiny device. The obs-drone was small, and whil
e it wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow in the Brazilian jungle, it most certainly wasn’t a native of Marbel.
It hovered briefly near the rock, released two micro drones, and shot off back the way it came.
“All yours lieutenant,” Skip said. “I’ll park this somewhere high, so we can get a good comms link back to base.”
Jon took control of one of the fly sized drones, bringing it down to ground level before directing it toward the nearest flyer. He hadn’t been flying for more than a few seconds, before Murdoch interrupted.
“Sir, can I make a suggestion?”
“Sure,” he said, but kept the drone heading toward the flyer.
“I wouldn’t use a low level approach.”
Jon stopped the tiny drone and looked across at the sniper. Murdoch hadn’t moved his own micro, it was still clinging to the rock near where it had been dropped. He was just looking out of the hide, intently observing the Marbelites moving around below.
“Do you have another suggestion?”
“Yes, go high. Stay on the sunny side of the buildings.”
“Won’t that make the drone easier to spot?”
“Yes. But only if they look up.”
Jon blinked; where was this coming from? But then he thought of Murdoch’s uncanny ability to move undetected. “Why won’t they look up?”
“They don’t, they only look at the ground. And off into the middle distance. It’s probably habit, or evolutionary.”
Jon nodded, and directed the micro drone to rise. He waited until it was twenty meters up, then moved over the field.
“That one,” said Murdoch in a distracted tone. He’d indicated one of the smaller Marbelites, who’d finished its cleaning job and looked to be heading back in. “Wait until the others have their back’s turned.”
Jon selected a spot on the Marbelite’s harness, tagging it. He didn’t want the drone to alight on its fur, the creature would feel that for sure. Jon waited patiently, each second bringing the Marbelite closer to the building. Then, just before it was about to enter, Jon swooped down and attached the drone to the Marbelite’s back.
