Hostage To The Stars: A Sectors SF Romance

by Veronica Scott

  “The distort shields are activated. Even if there is a Mawreg robo flying overwatch, they can’t see us.” Johnny tried to be reassuring. “The ground here is rocky so we aren’t leaving tracks. Best thing for us to do is get to that base in the mountains, call for pickup and make our escape.” He set the ground car in motion again and nosed cautiously out from under the trees. No alarms sounded, so he kept driving north, goosing the speed from the previous mark. The old model car hadn’t been maintained, so he hadn’t wanted to push it but now the situation was changed.

  He had to stop twice more during the day, the last time sitting in the open while two enemy robos soared overhead in a search pattern, plainly not seeing the shielded groundcar but obviously knowing the quarry had to be in the vicinity.

  Johnny took a deep breath as the robos moved to the west and soon were out of view. “I have an idea.”

  Eyebrows raised, she turned to him. “I’m open to a change in plans. My heart can’t take much more of this sitting duck stuff.” She patted her chest and grinned bravely. “I’m having palpitations.”

  “We’re going to reach a point where the car won’t help us any more anyway. We’ll have to climb on foot because I’m not bringing us into the main entrance of the old base. I’m taking a less traveled route.”

  “So?”

  “How about if we blow the car up?”

  “Without us inside,” she said.

  Laughing, he said, “Right. We’ll drive a little further north today and close to sunset I’ll unshield gradually, as if the mechanism failed, or maybe I got over confident. We drive like a bat out of hell until the sensors give us the alert that the enemy is on our tail, then I set the car on auto, arm the self-destruct and we bail into the brush. The car detonates in a fireball, the enemy thinks we’re toast, and we sprint to the base. Home free.”

  “What is it with you military guys and self-destruct mechanisms?” she asked with a smile. “It’s your answer to everything.”

  “Just about.” He shrugged. “It works. Are you in?”

  “Sure. I don’t see much in the way of options.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  Late in the afternoon, Johnny started playing with the distort, to give the impression it was flickering on and off. “Baiting the trap,” he said.

  “I’m not too keen on being bait.”

  “We’re getting out soon, so be patient a little longer.” As he finished speaking, the alarm blared and they exchanged glances. “Time to go. You got your pack?”

  Sara nodded, jaw clenched. “You’ll be right behind, you promise?”

  “Absolutely. You go due east, into the canyon and I’ll catch up.” He slowed the car, drove as close as he dared to the tree line they were skirting, and gave Sara the signal. She opened her door and jumped out, rolling a few times before leaping to her feet and racing into the cover provided by the rough terrain.

  Relieved to see her moving so quickly and therefore probably uninjured from the fall, Johnny set the ground car to accelerate, checked the timer on the self-destruct and bailed out himself. He hid in a rocky outcropping and waited. The two robos flew overhead, accelerating as the ground car became visible, swooping at it, and firing thin rays of energy. When the vehicle detonated with a massive explosion, the robos were caught in the shockwave. One burst into flames and crashed, making its own smaller explosion. The second wobbled a few times and seemed to lose power, landing upside down in a crumpled heap next to the burning wreckage.

  Satisfied, Johnny worked his way through the nest of boulders and headed cross country to intercept Sara. Bought us precious time but I bet they’ll be back.

  Six hours later, hunkered down at the entrance to the base, Johnny input his code in a frantic tattoo and swore as nothing happened. Sara pressed close to his side and bit her lip while she scanned the sky behind them. Being tracked by Mawreg robos for the last hour or so had both of them running on adrenaline. Trusting her to have his six, Johnny took a deep breath before entering the code again and this time was rewarded with a green light. The panel slid open enough for one person to pass and he shoved her inside unceremoniously. Right on her heels, he spun to hit the closing mechanism.

  She’d tripped and fallen, instinctively throwing her broken hand in front of her body to break the fall, and screamed from pain.

  Holstering his blaster, he picked her up as she cradled her broken hand with her good arm, and jogged deeper into the installation. “Sorry. We know how close the bad guys are.”

  Head leaning against his chest, she said, “Never apologize to me, remember? We made a deal.”

  He shifted her body in his arms for a more secure hold. “Right. Even if the Mawreg or the Chimmer are on the way right now, it’d take them hours to burn or blast their way in. This heavily fortified base is a much tougher nut to crack than the bolt hole. We have time and a couple ways out if required. Alternative sites on base for the extract to happen, especially if the Penny sends fighters and a squad of Marines in the dropship to provide covering fire. I’m going to call for the angels now.” He reached the control room and set her in a dusty chair. Squatting to be at eye level, he tucked her hair behind her ears and said, “You doing ok?”

  “I’ll be fine. Do what you need to do.” She patted his cheek for a moment.

  He straightened and surveyed the panels. Hoping the systems still worked, he activated the comlink and punched in his identifier.

  “Good to hear from you again, Sgt. Danver. This is Comtech Anstell on the Penny and we’ve been listening for you since we got on station here.” The voice added authentication code causing Johnny to breath deep in relief. He could trust this transmission. “What can we do for you?”

  He gave Sara a thumbs up and said, “I need an immediate extract for myself and one injured civilian.”

  “No can do, sorry, sergeant. We’re about to rain holy hell on that planet. Countdown has begun. No time to launch a retrieval.”

  Sara gasped. Johnny wasn’t surprised. Once he’d reported the presence of Mawreg forces, the planet’s fate was sealed. The Sectors never took a chance on any world where the Mawreg themselves had landed, much less dug in and built installations like the one he’d described. Some Farduccir survivors might have been rescued but he doubted it, since the war lord had apparently signed on to the Mawreg cause. “Understood. Any suggestions?”

  “Can you get yourself off the surface? We could swing by and retrieve you later.”

  After the entire planet had been destroyed.

  “Maybe. Timeline?”

  “Classified.” The open comlink hissed for a moment before the comtech gave them a few final, carefully chosen words. “Let’s say you could play one quarter of tisba, if you had an antigrav ball. Good luck, sergeant. Penelope out.” The link went dead.

  “Only fifteen standard minutes,” Sara said. “Is he serious?”

  Heart thumping painfully at the idea of her death, after all this effort to save her, he nodded. “Let’s see what this depot has left. Maybe we’ll luck out and there’s a flier. I can pilot a small ship.”

  She held out her good hand and he tugged her from the chair. With her leaning on him, they made quick time into the underground hanger area, which was depressingly empty. One surface flitter and a partially disassembled ground car sat in the midst of spare parts.

  “No use. We have to get off the planet,” he said. Swearing, he kicked over a stack of spare parts kitted for shipment but never loaded onto a barge. Sara gasped and jumped out of the way of the skittering packages.

  “There’s equipment behind the flier,” she said. “Under a tarp. Might it be useful?”

  For lack of anything better to do, he walked to the sizable object and pulled the plasta protector back a foot. “Lords of Space,” he said. Excitement mounting, he yanked the covering completely off.

  “What is it?” Sara came to stand next to him.

  “An escape pod.” A one person escape pod, but he didn’t mention the fact.
Feverishly he worked to clear away the boxes and bins surrounding it and blocking the launch track. One handed, Sara helped.

  “But aren’t those for escaping from a ship to a planet?” she asked.

  “Normally, yes. But Special Forces tries out new gear from time to time and we were testing these pods for situations where one man might be stuck behind enemy lines on a planet and need to escape, where no extraction was possible. Loxton manufactured about a hundred top secret prototypes and we had five here on Farduccir. I did a couple of the test runs. I don’t know what happened to the program—Mike and I were reassigned to a new mission so I filed my report and forgot about it.” He checked the pod sat on a launch mechanism, which it did, and craned his head to check the ceiling for the exit tunnel. He’d have to pray the tunnel was unobstructed to the surface, no time to check anything. He fiddled with the pod’s exterior control panel, eliciting a hum as power flowed through the mechanism. A hatch popped open and a soothing blue glow illuminated the pod’s interior.

  Sara rose on her tiptoes to peer inside. Brow furrowed, she gave him a dubious frown. “Cramped. Tell me this can hold both of us.”

  “Maybe.”

  She retreated, stumbling over gear scattered on the floor. “I’m not going if you aren’t with me, Johnny Danver.”

  The ground shook. Dust rained from the ceiling above. “Barrage is starting,” he said. “It takes time to blow up an entire planet. There’s a chain reaction to establish. But we’ve got to get you out of here.”

  “We both go or no one goes.” Her jaw was clenched.

  He walked to her and gave in to the overpowering temptation to kiss her. Sara twined her arms around his neck and pressed herself to him, returning the caress and deepening it. After a moment, he set her away from him. “My mission was to save you,” he said, voice low. “Let me accomplish my last mission.”

  “No!” Sara wrenched herself out of his arms. “You have to come too. I refuse to leave you behind. This fucking capsule is going to have to save both of us or neither of us. The military always overbuilds, doesn’t it?”

  “Usually,” he had to admit.

  “So it can take a big guy like you and a smaller person like me.”

  The ground shook again and he had to brace her to keep her from falling. “We’re out of time.”

  “Then stop arguing, get in the damn capsule with me and let’s go.”

  He hesitated.

  Sara rested her hand on his cheek. “I know, you want me safe. And I love you for it. But life without you is no life at all. Either I’ll die with you here, or I’ll try the escape pod with you.”

  “I can force you to go for your own good,” he said, picking her up as he reached his decision. “I know the damn pod can take care of one person. Two is dicey.”

  Tears streaming down her cheeks, she begged. “Johnny, please, don’t do this.”

  He strode to the escape pod.

  “When you get to the Penny, don’t mention the cherindor, ok?” he said. “The beast is Shalira’s—Mike’s wife—her secret to keep. When someone actually escapes from the Mawreg, which isn’t often, a lot of the details are fuzzy, so the investigators will believe you if you say you don’t know how you got loose.”

  She clung to him, hands fisted in his shirt, as he attempted to set her inside the capsule. “I won’t leave you. I won’t let you do this, sacrifice yourself for me. We can go together.”

  He kissed her, indulging himself for a long moment, until another, more severe earthquake reminded him of the short time remaining for the planet. Firmly, he deposited her in the pod’s interior seat. Wiping the tears off her cheeks with his thumb, he tried to fill his voice with all the emotion trapped in his heart. “I never thought I’d be blessed enough to find a woman to love. To love me. I need you to live, Sara.”

  She closed her eyes, shaking her head side to side. “Not without you.”

  “I’m done arguing. You have to activate the controls from the inside. If you love me, do this.” He gave her a small shake, not hard, just enough to make her open her eyes. He needed to see her one last time, needed to know she saw him for goodbye.

  Sara stared into his eyes for a moment, her own stormy and tear-filled. Then she nodded and transferred her gaze to the control panel. He told her what to input.

  Nothing happened.

  “Try it again,” he said, clinging to the side of the pod as the ground shook, threatening to take his feet out from underneath him.

  “I did. It won’t work. I guess we’re going to stay here together after all.” She started to climb from the pod.

  “This doesn’t make sense.” He scanned the readouts on the exterior control, which had come to life immediately when he entered his operator code and still glowed green across the board. Racking his brain for the details of the test flights he’d done so long ago, he smacked his forehead in chagrin. “Seven hells, two factor validation.” He helped her exit the pod. “Looks like you get your wish; we’re going together or not at all. I’ll get in and you’re going to have to crawl in on top of me. It’ll be cramped.” He pulled himself over the lip of the hatch and reclined, reaching for her. “Hurry!”

  She managed to get inside, curling herself by his side in the tiny space, which wouldn’t have been possible if the designers hadn’t allocated enough room for a soldier in full combat uniform and his bulky gear. Padding closed in firmly on all side, pressing their bodies together, making her heartbeat accelerate and her chest tighten. She listened to his steady heartbeat under her ear and tried to calm herself. His fingers flying, Johnny activated the interior controls and the hatch slammed shut with enough force to rock the capsule on its stand.

  “Why does it work for you and not me?” she asked, as the pod elevated and rose.

  “Some Special Forces gear requires our operator code and our DNA. I didn’t even think about that when I first touched it but back in the day when we were doing the test runs, the controls were set with fail safes so no one took it for an unauthorized joy ride.” He hugged her as best he could. “We’ll be going into cryo sleep in a minute or two and stay under until the Penny retrieves us. I hope the coolant is viable after all these years.”

  She screamed as the pod lurched and clanged against the tunnel wall before resuming its upward journey, accelerating as it ascended.

  “Getting hot,” Johnny said. “I think the planetary chain reaction is pretty near to end point.”

  “Do we have time to get far enough away?”

  “The pod has hyperdrive short jump capability, if we can get high enough off the planet. The AI is making the decisions now.” He ran his fingers through her hair in a gentle caress. “I love you, lady.” The words were hard to make out, mumbled.

  She tried to form the only possible response but her throat and lips were numb. She realized movement was impossible, both from the acceleration and the accumulating effects of the cryo sleep inhalant. Dying in Johnny’s arms wasn’t what she’d hoped for when they started this escape, but if her life ended high in the atmosphere of Farduccir, at least she’d be with the person who meant more to her than anyone else ever had.

  The first thing Johnny saw when the escape pod opened and the cryo coolant dissipated was Mike’s face as he peered over the shoulders of the techs working to free him and Sara. He coughed. “Damn, the whole point of this was to keep you out of uniform, cousin.”

  Mike laughed, relief plain in the lines of his face. “Yeah, well then the whole point became rescuing your sorry ass from the pirates and the Mawreg.”

  Sara groaned and tried to sit up. One of the techs grabbed her.

  “Careful, she has a broken hand,” Johnny said as the men lifted her from the pod.

  Mike reached in to assist him in making his own way out of the pod’s embrace. “Who would have guessed this flaky piece of old tech would come in handy someday? We were pretty skeptical during the test program, remember?”

  Johnny patted the pod’s side as he slid
to the deck. “Life saver all right.”

  “Is this lady the famous Sara Bridges?” Mike asked.

  Although woozy and disheveled, Sara broke free from the medic to come to Johnny. Hand on his shoulder as he leaned heavily on Mike, peering into his face, she said, “Are you all right?”

  “Head hurts.” He eyed her up and down, eyes narrowed. “And you?”

  “I’m fine, or will be once the doctors fix my hand. And scan for any Mawreg implants.” She focused on the man supporting him. She thought she observed a faint family resemblance. “Are you Mike?” she asked.

  He gave her a salute. “Major Mike Varone, at your service.”

  “I heard a lot about you,” she said.

  “I suspect not all good from the tone.” He laughed. “What have you been telling her about me, cousin?”

  “Nothin’ but the truth, I swear. Well possibly the edited truth.” Johnny chuckled.

  “Listen, he needs help. When we were in the Mawreg lab, he took in or absorbed a whole bunch of their data,” she said, ignoring their teasing byplay. “Some kind of memory implant he’s got?”

  Mike gave Johnny a sharp glance. “We’re straying into classified territory here on an open deck.”

  Sara stepped closer to Mike, attitude pugnacious, jaw jutting. “I made him tell me. He couldn’t stop himself from taking in data once he began. I-I had to hit him to get him to disconnect.”

  Johnny grinned and rubbed his chin. “She packs a punch all right.”

  She glared at him and turned to Mike. “The point is, he needs to download or debrief. He hasn’t been entirely himself since it happened. Please, can you get that arranged, the sooner the better?”

  Johnny knew Mike understood his situation completely. But she was selling herself short —she had an important piece of data to share as well. Shaking a finger at her, he said, “This lady has a complete schematic of the Mawreg base memorized.”