by T. G. Ayer
Nerishka and Dresden shared a long look before Nerishka replied. “That’s because it does, and it’s my job to make sure it doesn’t get into the wrong hands.”
“Who do you work for?” Judith asked, shaking her head in credulously.
“If I told you…” Nerishka let the words hang.
Kelem clapped his hands, a broad grin spreading across his face. “You know what this means?”
“What?” Judith shot back.
“We get to use the explosives!”
KABLOOEY
STELLAR DATE: 10.18.8948 (Adjusted Gregorian)
LOCATION: Yazata Asteroid
REGION: Ayra System (Independent)
The team stood at the entrance to the gate room—which took another hour to find—staring at the remains of a twenty-meter jump gate laid on the floor in a grid. From what Nerishka could see, half the gate was missing, and all the mirrors were cracked.
Kelem snorted. “I win. You guys better pay up.”
Nerishka stared around at them. “Seriously?”
“What?” Kelem shrugged, attempting innocent and failing. “Dresden was in on it too.”
Nerishka turned to glare at Dresden, but he too looked unapologetic. She gave a weary sigh and shook her head, then focused back on the gate remains.
“Get as much footage as you can. And grab a few samples. We need to document this, so we cover our asses.”
“You mean we’re not going to blow this thing up, get the hell out, and then pretend we know nothing?” asked Judith drily as she drifted along the length of the room, collecting a few of the smaller pieces of the gate and depositing them inside a bag.
“Yeah. We’re doing that. But when my boss asks for my report, she’ll prefer something more than ‘I saw it, trust me’.”
“So weird to think of you as having a boss,” Judith mumbled as the team began taking vids and samples, carefully avoiding some of the more radioactive segments.
As Nerishka studied the remains of the gate—which was bigger than she had expected, one thing became clear.
“I don’t think we have enough explosives to blow this thing.”
“No?” Kelem asked. “We can probably crush five levels with what we have.”
“Still might not be enough,” Nerishka said. “What you see here survived a negative energy explosion.”
Judith waved at the team from the corner of the room, pointing at an antimatter bottle. “It’s half full. Think it will do the trick?”
Judith and Dresden moved the ten-milligram antimatter bottle into the middle of the gate’s remains where Kelem affixed the explosives to its exterior.
“Think this will crack it?” Kelem asked as he set the final explosive where Lyra directed. “These bottles are made to be really durable.”
“That’s a relief. Because, if it works, this kaboom is gonna crack Yazata in half,” Kelem said.
Lyra replied.
To Nerishka, Lyra asked,
Nerishka chuckled.
As they ascended the lift shaft once more, Dresden glanced over at her.
Nerishka was well aware that. The comment had come completely devoid of emotion.
Then he said,
Lyra cut into their conversation,
She met Dresden’s eyes which bore an expression she couldn’t define. He shook his head before joining Judith in mocking Kelem over the near loss of his man bits and the possible need for an ablative codpiece.
Minutes later, they were aboard the ship, Raz easing the freighter out of the asteroid, drifting away as though they were nothing more than a piece of debris.
Lyra announced as the team sat in the rear observation deck, watching Yazata grow smaller behind them.
“They pick us up?” Dresden asked.
“You’re getting funny, Lyra,” Kelem said with a smile.
Nerishka spotted the ASF ships a moment before Lyra dropped markers on the holodisplay. “They’re closing with Yazata, they must not have spotted us departing.”
“Raz is good at what he does,” Dresden nodded in satisfaction. “I didn’t pick him for his looks.”
Nerishka met Judith’s eyes, both making an effort to hold in their laughter. They’d previously agreed that Raz’s good looks would have been reason enough to have him on board, rad piloting skills aside.
“I heard that,” Raz shot back over the ship’s comms.
“You listening in on us?” Judith asked with a laugh.
“Gets lonely up here. You don’t call, you don’t send vids—oh shit.”
Lyra spoke up.
“Blow the charges,” Nerishka ordered. “We need a distraction.”
“My girl can take it,” Raz called back. “You said it was around five hundred gigajoules-worth, right?”
“That’ll barely crack that rock,” Raz said. “But the EMP and debris will shield us from those ships nicely.”
“Lyra, do it,” Nerishka ordered.
The team turned their attention to the holodisplay where one of the ASF ships was
moving into the docking shaft while the other was turning to boost toward the Teshub.
“He might be far enough away that he won’t lose sight of us,” Dresden said softly, a moment before a blinding light burst from Yazata, followed by a shockwave that bowled the Teshub over, sending the freighter spinning through space.
“Holy shit! Dampeners holding…mostly!” Raz called out as the team gripped their chairs as the ship rattled and shook around them.
Then the wave passed and the holodisplay updated, showing a view of Yazata, now split in two, chunks of the asteroid streaking through space around them.
“What the burning stars…” Kelem whispered. “I thought that antimatter bottle was half empty…. Can five milligrams of antimatter smash a thousand-kilometer rock?”
“There must have been some other antimatter stored nearby,” Nerishka said. “A lot of antimatter. Damn…if Azag didn’t know someone’s on his tail before, he’s sure going to know we’re coming now.”
NEW TARGET
STELLAR DATE: 10.19.8948 (Adjusted Gregorian)
LOCATION: Teshub, near Yazata Asteroid
REGION: Ayra System (Independent)
Raz let the Teshub drift for a day before slipping into a common shipping lane and activating a new transponder that identified the vessel as the Icarna.
Ayra’s inner asteroid belt was a disaster, and when the local space traffic control queried Raz on his undocumented course, he just bluffed a lie about his course being redirected by Ayran Search and Rescue teams after the Yazata explosion.
A lie the STC thankfully bought and didn’t cross-check.
“We’ve got two days to Ishtar Station, folks,” Dresden advised as the crew finished up a meal. “Make sure you’ve studied the station’s layout. Given how we haven’t managed to do anything not involving mass destruction in the past few days, I think we can all assume there are going to be some fireworks.”
“Blowing stuff up is fun,” Kelem said with a grin as he placed his dishes in the washer. “I mean…why else be a merc?”
“He makes a good point,” Judith said, shaking her head. “But since a few hundred million people live on Ishtar Station, let’s not blow the place up. That one would weigh on my conscience a bit.”
After a few more minutes’ conversation, Judith and Kelem left to ‘study’ which Nerishka suspected was to play a game of Snark with a holo of Ishtar somewhere nearby.
Once they were gone Nerishka turned to Dresden, a frown lowering her brow. “I think it would be best if they stayed out of the next part of the mission. You too.”
“Really?” Dresden turned to look at Nerishka. “You think after everything they’ve invested so far that they’d be happy to wash their hands and head off without seeing this through?”
Nerishka shrugged. “Maybe we need to make it clear to them that they have the option? We’re not sure what we’ll be walking into. A smaller team could move around with less chance of detection.”
Dresden grunted. “I’ll tell them if it makes you happy, but I can guarantee they’ll say they are staying. And we will risk offending them.”
Nerishka shrugged again and shifted her gaze away from his. “They need to know they have the option. To be honest, if I had any say, I’d drop you all back on Nimrud and head off myself to see this through. Less risk to you and the team that way.
Dresden shook his head and scowled at Nerishka for a few long seconds. Then he walked off without a word, passing her an audible feed as he entered the lounge where Judith and Kelem were dealing cards.
“Just one thing, team. The next part of this mission could merely be an in and out. Maybe even a one-person job to make it most efficient. You don’t have to go to Ishtar Station.”
“Are you going?” asked Judith, her tone hard.
“That’s beside the point.”
“It isn’t.”
“What if I told you I wasn’t going,” asked Dresden, his tone equally hard.
Judith snorted. “Then I’d ask if the Queen of Death is going too.”
“You know she’s going.”
“Then that answers your question. She goes, we go.”
Nerishka stiffened at the redhead’s resolve.
Nerishka didn’t answer. She shifted to stare out of the window at an asteroid the ship was passing, watching as it grew ever smaller and disappeared into the blackness. This was a lot more than going off book. She was about to take out the top military leader of an independent system.
If I’d found the head of their government to be behind the pico research, I would have had to do the same thing. Jump gates are just as dangerous. The director will understand.
Even so, doing it without authorization would have consequences. Jeriah would see to that. And Nerishka didn’t need to take anyone else down with her.
Then she stiffened. What about Lyra? What repercussions would there be for the AI who helped Nerishka execute her unsanctioned kill?
Lyra cut into Nerishka’s thoughts, startling her.
Nerishka snorted.
Nerishka laughed.
Lyra sighed.
Nerishka grunted.
Nerishka took a deep breath and rolled her shoulders.
She’d wanted to be alone, had needed it all this time.
So why did she suddenly feel so bereft?
ISHTAR
STELLAR DATE: 10.21.8948 (Adjusted Gregorian)
LOCATION: Teshub, near approaching Ishtar Station
REGION: Ayra System (Independent)
Nerishka watched Ishtar Station grow larger as Raz brought the Teshub in to dock on one of its outer rings. She’d spent so much time studying it over the last day that she felt as though she’d already visited the place.
The station was a massive structure, consisting of dozens of rings situated around a five-hundred-kilometer-long asteroid that had been hollowed out, and spun fast enough to provide just over 0.7g on its inner surface.
Within that asteroid lay the capitol buildings of the Ayra System and many of the major economic powers.
All of which meant that Ishtar was a place that took its security very seriously.
