One by one, “Angel” autonomous rescue craft separated from the Nightwing and began to cooperatively map the inside of the cruiser’s landing bay looking for anything that didn’t match the most up-to-date schematics they had for the vessel, aside from the occasional discarded tool. They were large spherical pods that looked rather formidable from a combat standpoint. On each “side” were two agile metal arms with reconfigurable tool mounts at their ends. The standard configuration was for a hand-like mechanism useful for opening doors and lifting human-sized people out of bad places.
All four of their life-sciences sensor banks went into continuous operation, sifting and examining every molecule around them for any evidence of life aboard aside from the crew of the Nightwing. One of them activated its on-board lights. The landing bay was bathed in antiseptic white for a few moments. Then the lights went out again and the floating craft continued towards the forward section of the bay. Their orders were clear: Find injured or disabled humans and transport them to a central triage for evaluation and further care.
Deployment bays silently opened on opposite sides of the corvette’s hull at deck level, bathing the interior surfaces in warm golden light. From each emerged four power-suited and armed crew members following one of the ship’s look-bots. Each were nearly featureless black vehicles about the size of a shopping cart which looked for all the work like enormous polished black ladybugs. The look-bots activated their ground lamps so the deck was illuminated in all directions for the benefit of their human compatriots. Then each activated and configured their proximity sensors. The corvette’s crew members, Angels and look-bots were tied in to the same data network as the vessel itself, so if one found something, all of them would get a near instant view of it and a fix on its location. The bottom line in any Nightwing-led search was pretty similar: If there was someone lost aboard this ship, they wouldn’t stay that way for long.
“Last man out,” Doverly said quietly. “We have seven minutes to power up and have this ship underway.”
“Affirmative, landing party. Standing by to liftoff,” Ensign Sara Graham replied. Triple-S registered the buildup of power in the corvette’s engines and the human members of the SAR team subconsciously picked up the pace a bit getting to the hatches that would give them access to the rest of the ship. By now all four of the Angels had found their way into other sections of the vessel and were patiently looking in every open space for survivors. Once Doverly’s crew had departed the landing bay, Ensign Graham increased power to the ship’s counter-grav and skillfully backed it out of the landing bay. Once it reached a distance of a few dozen yards from the cruiser’s hull, it faded from view once again and set a course for Point Shadow.
Doverly and her search party had proceeded only five yards into the Saratoga’s landing bay loadlane when all of their commlinks lit up with a silent message from Angel Four. It had apparently found a survivor and was requesting assistance. The commander hurried across the landing bay again with her team moving alongside, looking in every possible direction for threats.
They rounded a corner into the corridor leading to base deck auxiliary engineering and saw light up ahead. The Angel had activated its lamps and had the entire corridor bathed in a soothing gold-white light. On the floor in front of it face down was what appeared to be a Saratoga crew member wearing the uniform of a junior lieutenant. Doverly holstered her weapon and knelt beside the young man. The doctor rapidly ascertained he was alive and apparently had no visible injuries. She gently rolled him on to his back. Many of the landing party members gasped and all of them recoiled at the pale skin of the Saratoga officer. His ghoulish face remained motionless.
Suddenly the officer awakened, his iris-less white eyes staring at the ceiling. A piercing scream filled the corridor.
Thirty-Three
The sight of two decorated Skywatch officers sitting at a large circular card table under a single light bulb hanging from the forward hull of a heavy paladin mech would have been strange enough by itself. The rag-tag group of locals sitting at the same table and participating in the hastily organized poker game only made the scene that much more unusual.
The mech was configured for trans-orbital flight. It was perched on ground mounts and had its ventral bay ramp extended. On either wing were formidable-looking heavy kinetic assault cannon, each roughly the size of a railroad tanker car. Old-time piano-heavy rock music thumped from inside.
It was roughly an hour until dusk, but the Sinisish primary and atmosphere never disappointed when it came to all-afternoon sunsets. The fiery orange sky and the wispy stretched clouds cast soothing shadows across the dusty ground. There wasn’t a hint of wind, little humidity and the cool evening temperature was almost artificial in its perfection. It wasn’t hard to see why the out-of-the-way frontier planet was so popular as a drop-in spot for just about anyone trying to get from Core space to one of the edge worlds or back again. Passers-by walked slowly along the lightly-marked path a few yards from the mech’s nose guns. Any that lingered too long were encouraged to keep moving by a frown from the marine officer.
Moo had parked the paladin just outside the bazaar, taking care to avoid getting too close to the livestock pens. The constant noise and aroma from the animal cages tended to moderate the festive mood of a hard day’s wind-down time. The enormous Argent crest and the Highlander tartan-style unit colors emblazoned beside the oversized and stylized Jack of Clubs on the paladin’s starboard hull gleamed in the late-day sun.
Captain Hunter had his sandaled feet propped up on a solar-activated steam-powered drink cooler, which contained the evening’s supply of ales, beer, snacks and ice. He wore his Argent C.O. ball cap down over his eyes to hide the fact he was half in the bag for the night. He was also hiding his dwindling supply of checks behind three empty beer bottles and concentrating far too hard on his lack of decent cards. He wore a black and silver Skywatch Maltan Firing Range Instructor t-shirt and a hastily assembled necklace made out of bottle caps and a leather shoelace.
Moo sat across from his captain. He was hunched over the table with his prodigious arms balanced on his elbows. He used all his fingers to hold up his cards. His surface warfare unit and mech driver tatoos were prominent along his forearms and shoulders. He wore an olive-green Argent Second Marines tank and fatigues to go with his meticulously laced combat boots. Moo figured the outfit would keep the nine-inch combat knife sheathed on his belt from looking out of place. The colonel didn’t look all that impressed with his own hand, but he could at least take comfort in the fact he wasn’t running out of checks as fast as Hunter apparently was.
To Moo’s left was a strange looking humanoid creature with skin roughly the color of melted chocolate working on finishing its fourth bowl of peanuts with one six-fingered hand and holding up its cards with the other. The constant rustling and crunching sounds were potentially annoying, but there was nobody at the table with the energy to say anything about it.
Across from peanut-chomper was a bloated gray-skinned creature that looked like a cross between an elephant and an inflatable dinosaur. It was remarkable for its apparent ability to balance its bulbous weight on a relatively small metal barrel and for the fact it seemed to have the most checks at the table, at least for now. On the opposite side of the captain was a tanned and toned barefoot young woman wearing a tourquoise two-piece bathing suit, a seashell necklace and a straw-colored sombrero. She had long sandy-colored hair and had her checks parked behind a hollowed-out pineapple filled with rum and equipped with a pink and lavender colored swirly straw.
“I’ve got a hand like a foot,” Hunter mumbled.
“Tell me about it,” Moo replied.
“I hired Cerylia.”
“Sure we should be talking about sensitive matters right about now, skipper?”
“Why not? None of these yahoos understands a word we’re saying. We could be planning to kill and eat all three of them–” Hunter tossed another bag of peanuts to the six-fingered creature. �
��See? He’ll be reaching for another handful of cashews while we open the steak sauce.”
The young woman called Moo’s bet.
“Fold.” The colonel tossed his cards into the pot. “So what’s the plan?”
“I’ve been thinking quite a bit about that between cervezas,” Hunter said, shifting his cards around in an attempt to make his hand look better. It didn’t work. “I’m tempted to pick up the phone and call in some of my markers. If what L’Orleans says is true, that freighter column is probably going to be carrying a hell of a lot more contraband than just Atwell’s playbook.”
The six-fingered chocolate peanut-chomper raised.
“What the hell? You’ve seen half the hand!” Hunter said with a sour expression. He threw a cheese puff at the creature, who ducked and added another check to the raise. “Call,” Hunter sneered as he threw good money after bad. The little creature squinted as it smiled wide. The girl took a sip of her drink. The elephant creature frowned, trying to decide whether it should call or not. Hunter had attempted to explain betting order to them several times, but gave up when it became clear the only way to get his point across was to spell it out in semaphores. He couldn’t even do that sober, so he just let them bet whenever.
“They’ll keelhaul the lot of us if we get caught,” Moo said as he opened another bottle of his private label. Hunter had made several attempts to add the colonel’s preferred adult beverage to his own list of favorites, but he couldn’t get past the fact it reminded him of root beer mixed with syrup. Lucas, on the other hand, couldn’t live without it. He was especially impressed by the fact the fanciful bottles were made in the shape of standing grizzly bears and each held one-third of a gallon of deep amber ale.
“Well, you know me. I’m not going to be the rulebook guy. We had a guy like that at the Academy when I was doing survival training.” Hunter finished his beer. Moo tossed him the opener and Jason cracked a fresh one. “His fiancee got it in her head one 48-hour liberty she was going to teach us all how to play some new board game. We got about halfway through a session before I had to break out the hard stuff because we couldn’t go two moves without rule boy treating us to a reading from the sacred book of no-nos.”
“I’m surprised we even have rules for this kind of thing. Who can quote chapter and verse about hiring pirates to attack civilian freight convoys?”
“It depends.”
“Doesn’t it always?” Moo sighed. The elephant creature called and the girl picked up the deck to deal everyone their draw cards. Hunter discarded two. Everyone else discarded one. Hunter settled back in his hammock-like rattan chair and exhaled a long groan. By now he was far more interested in his beer than the unimpressive cards he had just been dealt.
“I could say I’m investigating the admiral’s death. IAC would challenge on comitatus grounds and say it’s a civilian matter. I could counter by asserting ‘under fire’ jurisdiction and put it back in Skywatch’s court.”
“No wonder all the good little students want to work for the Judge Advocate General Corps. They get paid to argue all day and still never say anything definite.”
“I spent money on these cards because of that little peanut disposal over there,” Hunter growled as he bet the table minimum and put a lime in his beer. “But I think the stronger claim would be my own bootlegger hunt.”
Moo took a drink. “And how does that work?”
“Well, there’s no civilian jurisdiction over deep space piracy. That’s been in the navy wheelhouse since the ancient windjammers and the empires of sail. I can’t hang the bastards like they could, but a ship’s captain can arrest and convene a before-the-mast court-martial. That one even bypasses the council. I can invoke the authority of the president himself under the action regs if I have to.”
Moo put his feet up on an empty ammo box. “All we have to do is catch them in the act.”
“I just wish my command prerogatives included better hands.” The peanut-chomper called Hunter’s bet while the girl dipped into a small bowl of candies and popped one in her mouth.
“We need to make a piracy case stick against Atwell.”
“He abducted at least one Skywatch crew and attempted to commandeer the Dunkerque. Annora can make a solid case he is at least an accomplice to the murder of a flag officer. I’ll take the kick in the pants for the autopsy and keep it off Hearts’ jacket.”
“Hughes went rogue though. Just like Atwell. Was he really a Skywatch flag officer when he died?”
“Well, I’m no lawyer, but until Hughes is discharged or busted down in rank, he’s still an admiral. Pumping him full of happy juice and making him think he’s been eaten by a space bug is bad enough, but if he overdoses, that’s on the guy whose idea it was to begin with, and all the roads on that map lead to Colonel Atwell. They can throw sand in the air, but I’ve got the forensics and my Chief Medical Officer prepared to testify.”
“How does this keep us out of the brig when Skywatch Command finds out we’ve teamed up with the Condor Pirates?” Moo asked. The elephant creature called the bet. The crunching and munching of peanuts continued. By now the horizon was burnt orange mixed with purple and black. A few stars were beginning to fade into view.
“The theory of the bigger fish,” Hunter replied after taking a swig. “Technically, Cerylia isn’t guilty of anything.”
“For now.”
Hunter nodded. “For now. The last charges she was up on were dropped because the merchant captain bailed on the case before testifying. Those guys need to haul freight. They don’t get paid to sit and talk all day like JAG does.”
“She boarded the Dunkerque and threatened to take her a prize.”
“She overreached. I talked her down.”
“You persuaded her with a fortune in triluminum claims.”
“After Mumph gave the owners bad detonators and caved in their access. Those mines had been abandoned for two months by the time Cerylia got there. Just because she had the tools to get to the ore doesn’t make her the bad guy.”
“Interesting legal theory, but it won’t fly back in that room full of complaining old women we call the admiralty.”
“Without her squadron, we could have easily had a much more serious loss of life at X-Ray Tango. There’s credible evidence she rescued Hatch and his team. With a little complimentary language and some soft-shoe, I can portray her as a hero.”
“That’s going to be one hell of a dance, skipper.”
“Well, this time, I’m going to hire her and her crews before we make our move. We’ll intercept the column and board the lead freighter for inspection. When we find what we’re looking for, we’ll seize it as evidence in my investigation and impound all the ships and their cargo. When their captain gives Atwell up, we’ll let him on his way.”
The peanut-chomper called, leaving the girl as the last bettor.
“And how does Captain L’Orleans fit into this?”
“She flies a privateer’s flag. I’ll simply attach her to my squadron so her ships are legally Skywatch for the duration of the mission. We’ll beef them up with some borrowed surplus weapons I snagged on the way over here. I’ll seize the column’s Q-ship and part it out to cover Cerylia’s fee.”
“Just take the ship? Just like that? Won’t the freight line complain?”
“Civilians can’t operate vessels with fixed armaments on commercial shipping lanes, even if there’s a threat. Depending on how sharp the point on the spear is, I’ll have pretty wide latitude to make the decision myself.”
The girl called the bet. Hunter didn’t even bother showing his busted ten-high flush.
“You can do that?” Moo asked as he accepted a handful of candies from the girl.
“I can do anything.” Hunter finished his beer and tossed the bottle into the recycler. “I’m a battleship captain.” Then he opened another.
Thirty-Four
“I thought for sure this would be when she got her promotion.”
Tom Huggin
s was still trying to get over what had been done to the ship he had invested so much time becoming familiar with. Before him was Fury’s brand new Force Combat Information Center, which the entire task force had already taken to calling the “flag bridge.”
“I’d trade my leaves if it would get her eagles,” Sabrina Mallory replied. She was still getting used to being saluted so much, and it went without saying she wasn’t all that happy about being forced into her black and silver class A uniform. She did have to admit her new gold LCDR rank insignia looked especially classy in place of her old lieutenant’s bars. The command star above her new braids was also new and more than a little noticeable. “We were just doing our job during the Station 19 engagement. I don’t see what all the fuss was about.”
“Well, they’re going to have to promote Jayce next time.”
“Why is that?” Mallory asked.
“We can only polish those silver leaves so much before they get too pointed. Walking around with weapons that sharp is against regs,” Huggins said in a resigned tone as he gazed up at the new computer-controlled light banks.
Mallory rolled her eyes and smiled.
“You saved a lot of lives getting Fury back in action as fast as you did,” Huggins replied. “Civilian promotion committees love to pin medals on newly promoted officers, especially bronze stars. That one almost always earns you a new rank. Makes for a good uplifting story to tell the taxpayers.”
“This is beyond belief,” Mallory said reverently, looking up at the new viewscreens covering most of the bulkheads, each displaying the stylized Pegasus logo of Fury’s task force.
“Look on the bright side. If we hadn’t been hit by that frigate, we never would have ended up in spacedock, and there wouldn’t have been a reason to build us new toys! I’m just glad the armor held and we didn’t end up with casualties. New armor was first on the upgrade list.” Huggins said as he walked around the liquid crystal reactive display in the center of the spacious new command center. Sensor, weapons, electronic warfare and fleet control stations were arranged around the outer edge of the room, leaving plenty of floor space for supervising officers. The center of the new deck was raised on polished aluminum steps and equipped with a new conn station consisting of a high-backed shock couch, twin sideconn displays and a fold-away control console complete with its own LCR forward display for the force commander.
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