Yeah, I’m going to make a break for it running across the tarmac.
The scan light went green, and the jimmylegs chief accepted custody.
“This way, sir,” he said to Sandy, who was there as a witness, but who did not have any actual custody of Ryck.
The six men walked over to the waiting ramp. The packet was a small ship, about the size of a sloop. It could carry about 15 men comfortably, 20 in a pinch. Although it had bubble space capability, it was generally used within systems. Packets weren’t comfortable, not that Ryck would care, but what they were was heavily armored. Pirates knew they weren’t worth the effort to try and take them.
And criminal gangs know that trying to take one to rescue a prisoner was probably going to fail.
Once in a packet, a prisoner—or items of great wealth that had to go from one place to another—was safe from being taken by others. A packet was like a space-going armored car.
Ryck couldn’t help but look up as he was led to the ramp. If there were any kind of rescue in the works, it would have to be now.
But other than Çağlar, he’d never told anyone where he was going. Bert would know now, of course, as the new commandant. But there wouldn’t have been time to launch anything.
Still, Ryck was a little disappointed as he stepped into the ship. He’d be delivered to the Cube in another hour or three, depending on traffic control, and it would already be June 19 by then. He could conceivably be taken straight to the gallows.
The jimmyleg guards escorted Sandy and Ryck to the main passenger chamber just under the bridge. Limited by the need to be able to travel in atmosphere and gravity as well as space, it was not laid out as well as a space-only ship, but it would do. It was better than what awaited him at the end of the short journey.
“Where’s Mr. Capulto?” Sandy asked.
“Mr. Capulto? He had to, uh, he had to go home for a family emergency,” one of the jimmylegs said.
“I just talked to him a half an hour ago,” Sandy said. “What about Mr. Jones?”
“He took Mr. Caputo. But no problem. We’ve got it,” the jimmylegs said.
Sandy pulled out his Ruger and shot the jimmylegs in the face.
Sandy’s saving me! Ryck thought with a sudden surge of hope.
Ryck quickly stepped in back of Sandy, wondering what the plan was.
“There isn’t any Mr. Jones,” Sandy said, his handgun covering the eight remaining men in the ship.
“Steady there, sir. We’re here to take you to the Cube.”
“Bullshit! I don’t know how you did it, but you’ve taken over the ship, and I’m not going let that happen. The general is going to his execution.”
What? What’s going on?
“General, if you’d just join those men there?” Sandy said, motioning with his Ruger as he pulled out his PA.
Grubbing hell! Ryck thought. I’ve fucked up!
Ryck let himself deflate as he stepped forward to join the others. And just as Sandy spoke into the PA, saying, “We’ve got a situation here,” Ryck sprang into action.
Sandy was a brilliant mind and a sound tactician. He could lead troops into battle, and his bravery was unquestioned. But he was not a dirty street fighter, a warrior who let nothing get in his way.
Ryck was.
Ryck dropped down to the ground as the startled Sandy fired off a string of shots over his head. From down at Sandy’s feet, he sprang back up, knocking the gun hand up and out of the way. His shoulder smashed into Sandy’s chin, sending both men back into the bulkhead. Ryck brought up a knee into Sandy’s gut, rained two vicious elbows into his face, and as Sandy started to fall, Ryck took Sandy’s throat in his hands, and using it as a handle, smashed Sandy’s head with all the force he could muster against the corner of one of the control chairs.
On the third blow, the back of Sandy’s head broke open like a ripe watermelon. Ryck thought he saw the surprise and well, the hurt in Sandy’s eyes as the life fled from his old friend. Or maybe it was relief Ryck saw. He hoped it was.
“Sir, we’ve got activity!” a voice cried out from behind Ryck and he lay Sandy flat on the deck.
“Take her up now!” another voice shouted out. “And get Bertrand ziplocked!”
“Roger!”
A hand grabbed Ryck on the shoulder.
“Sir, if you can get into one of the acceleration seats, it might be getting a little hairy here.”
“What? Oh, sure. What about him?” Ryck asked, pointing back at Sandy’s body.
“We’ll put him in with the rest later, but we’ve got to get in the seats.”
As if on cue, Ryck felt the ship shudder as the engines lit up.
Ryck hurried and sat down, strapping in. Artificial gravity worked fine for most ships, but if the packet was going to be using evasive maneuvers, it was better to be secured while all that was going on.
“Thanks for taking out the brigadier,” one of the men said, sitting down beside Ryck.
“Uh, sure. But I think I’m more in debt to you. Who are you?”
“Lieutenant Colonel Regent Wispon-Franks, Confederation of Free States Army, Exploratores, at your service. I believe you know my boss, Major Titus Pohlmeyer?”
“Yes I do, Colonel. Yes I do. I’ve known the good major, who has been a so-called major, I might add, for the last 18 years at least. And he’s your boss, Colonel?”
“Ah, you know how it is, sir, with the spooks,” the lieutenant colonel said with a smile.
Just then, the ship lurched into the air, overcoming the artificial gravity for a moment. Ryck had to gulp.
Sandy’s body flopped over in the disruption, his hand arm flinging out to land palm up just half-a-meter from Ryck’s foot.
As the ship juked and jived out of Earth’s atmosphere, Sandy’s body was flung back and forth. Ryck stared emotionlessly at the shell of what had once been his friend. Ben’s godfather.
It wasn’t until the little packet broke through into bubble space that the ride smoothed out and Ryck and the rest were able to leave their seats.
“Good job, Jensen,” Lieutenant Colonel Wispon-Franks said. “For a squid, I mean.”
“Someone’s got to watch your ground-pounders, sir,” the sailor said, fist-bumping one of the other men.
“Someone take the Fed general to the aft hold with the others,” the Exploratores team leader ordered a couple of the men.
“I’ll get Sandy,” Ryck told him.
“Do you know him?”
“He was my friend.”
“Oh, sorry about that. Do you want him ziplocked?”
Ryck looked down at Sandy’s lifeless body for a full 20 seconds before replying, “No.”
With one of the soldiers showing him the way, Ryck dragged Sandy to a small storeroom where six other bodies were stored.
The previous crew, I presume?
Four of the bodies were ziplocked. Two were pretty obviously too far gone for any chance of resurrection.
Ryck dropped Sandy’s body on top of a man whose head and part of his chest were gone.
“Sorry, Sandy, but it was your choice. I tried to teach you over and over that to survive, you had to be the meanest son-of-a-bitch in a fight, and you never were that. Now you’re dead, and I’m alive.”
Then it hit him.
I’m alive! I’m mother grubbing, sure as shit alive!
TARAWA
Chapter 33
The shuttle landed at the small Headquarters LZ, and Ryck was off before the engines wound down. Various Marines were waiting, but Ryck ignored them, scanning the group until he saw a certain slightly overweight, somewhat aging woman who was the most beautiful sight in the world. He rushed past Bert and the rest to sweep Hannah up in his arms. A moment later, Esther rammed into them like a rugger, clinging tightly.
“I can’t believe it, Ryck,” Hannah kept saying, running one hand up alongside his face. “I can’t believe it.”
A hand reached across his shoulder as his normally unresponsive son jo
ined the family huddle.
He’d been waiting for this for too long. Upon their escape from Earth and entering bubble space, the Confederation Special Ops team had fled not towards Evolutionary space, not towards Confederation space, but to the Outer Reaches and the Alliance. They’d married up with a New Budapest-flagged freighter in the Void, transferred to that ship, and set the packet on self-destruct. From there, the dead and ziplocked were left in an unmarked lifeboat and sent towards Brotherhood space with the rescue beacon blaring.
With plenty of time to kill as they made their roundabout way to Tarawa, Lieutenant Colonel Wispon-Franks had explained the rescue. His team had been a sleeper cell emplaced within the Federation over seven years prior, on call, so-to-speak, for any needed operation. Four of the team members had jobs at the spaceport as cargo handlers, and the others, including the team leader, worked within the local food service industry. When Major Pohlmeyer activated them, they had swung into action, creating a pretty, well, simple plan. With the packet sitting on the apron, it didn’t take a genius to figure out that it would be the vessel taking Ryck to the Cube. And as the Federation had not yet publicized Ryck’s arrest, no extra security measures had been taken.
The port cargo handlers had been able to insert a worm program that sabotaged the coffee-maker on the packet—which had only the basic anti-virus protection, unlike the nav or power systems—figuring the crew wouldn’t want to sit for who knew how long without the coffee. They were right. An immediate call went out for a tech to fix it, which the team intercepted, and three members of the team had come in under the guise of repairmen. Once inside, it had been quick work to take out the crew, and then for the others to join them. Then all they had to do was wait for the notice from the court that “the package” was on the way and play the part of the real crew.
The plan was too simple to work—except that it had, something for which Ryck would be eternally grateful. And he planned to sit down with the good Major Pohlmeyer, find out how he’d known to swing his team into action, and more importantly, find out exactly what position he had within the Confederation.
And looking over Hannah’s shoulder at the gathered men waiting for him, he’d meet with all of them and get caught up. But that would come later. Right now, he had to reconnect with his family, to celebrate their reunion and grieve Ben’s death.
“Come on, Hannah, let’s go home.”
Chapter 34
“Our target is Hartford,” Ryck told his principal staff.
“Shit, nothing like grabbing for the brass ring!” Sams said.
“Do you have a problem with that, Master Gunnery Sergeant Samuelson?” Ryck snapped, his eyes blazing.
“Oh, no, sir! It’s just that, well Hartford is, well Hartford. That’s their second most important holding, and it’s pretty well defended.”
“So you think it should be hands off? Do any of the rest of you think the same?” Ryck asked, looking around the table.
Only a few Marines met his eyes, and most looked uncomfortable.
“I’m sick and tired of this pattycake we’re playing with them. And the longer we wait, the more the disparity between our relative economic might. If we are at war, then we need to take it to them, pure and simple. Earth as a target? Well, our allies or pseudo-allies are not going to be too supportive of that. So what’s next? Hartford, that’s what.”
“I didn’t mean to disagree, sir,” Sams said. “It’s just that it’ll be a tough nut to crack.”
“Anything worthwhile is. And that’s why I’m tasking you, General Copperwait, to develop the plan that will crack that nut. You’ve got two weeks and all the assets of the Corps, and I mean all of them.”
“Two weeks?” Tomtom asked. “That’s not much time.”
“Well, then, I wouldn’t be wasting any of that time, General.”
“What about lift?”Jorge asked.
“General Nidischii’ is on his way back to the Doughnut as we speak. He’s been tasked with getting us all the lift we need as well as the capital ships needed to hold off the loyalists. For the sake of planning, assume you’ll get the lift.
For the next 45 minutes, various proposals were thrown back and forth. And while Ryck had tasked Tomtom Copperwait with developing the plan, Ryck wanted to make sure his commander’s intent was understood. Ryck and Bert had spent the previous night working out a general operation outline that Ryck thought had a good chance of success, and Ryck didn’t want to stray too far from that concept.
Sams had been right, though, when he said Hartford would be a tough nut to crack. The planet was well defended with ground to air systems, an 800,000-man militia, and according to the latest intel, a brigade of loyalist Marines. Ryck knew that his Marines could take on and defeat the dispersed militia, but they had to get on the planet, all without space-to-ground weapons. The proscription didn’t apply to atmospheric craft, though, according to his staff judge advocate, and Ryck was going to rely on that loophole. If they could get enough Wasps, Ospreys, and Experions into the planets’ atmosphere, they should be able to neutralize enough of the defenses so that most of the landing craft could get through.
Ryck knew that Marines would die—probably in huge numbers. But even if taking Hartford was not a knock-out blow, it should turn the tide of the war. It would be a statement to the rest of humanity, and it would seriously degrade if not cripple the loyalists’ war effort.
Ryck would mourn each and every Marine death later, but that was the price of waging war.
Chapter 35
The Klethos d’relle swung her mace at the Brotherhood gladiator. The gladiator ducked, bringing up his sword to block, but the force of the queen’s swing neutralized the block, dealing a blow to the gladiator’s shoulder.
Ryck grimaced. The mace was a new weapon the Klethos had started to bring to the fights, and in Ryck’s mind, a more effective one. Even if the human gladiator reacted correctly to block it, the power generated by it was just too much.
“His shoulder is shot,” Jorge noted. “This one is over.”
Ryck had to agree, and he was tempted to turn off the feed, but he felt he had to give moral support to the gladiator. He’d never met the Brotherhood fighter, but he’d followed him somewhat over the course of his preparation, as he’d followed all gladiators. It was hard not to with all the press detailing every meal, every training session, every moment of downtime. Ryck was frankly amazed that the public didn’t get detailed reports as to the size and consistency of their shits.
Ishmael Franzoni fought on, but Jorge was right. The fight was over. Within 30 seconds, the queen brought down a tremendous blow that crushed the gladiator’s head. The queen stepped on the prone body, then lifted her head in her victory screech.
“Grubbing hell,” Ryck said succinctly, wondering if Corporal Hailstone might have won the fight.
This was the 25th duel between Klethos and humans since Ryck had won the first fight. Humans had won sixteen of them, the Klethos nine. But the Klethos had won four of the last five, and until the humans adjusted their genmods, it looked like they would be winning more.
What made this duel more significant, at least to the talking heads who covered the fights, was that it was for the Brotherhood planet of Belinda II—one of the two planets settled by the Trinoculars after the Klethos had driven them out of their original holdings. A human gladiator had tried to defend them but failed, and now they’d have to evacuate again and find another home.
“Well, back to the real world,” Ryck said, switching off the holo. “What’s next? Copperwait?”
“No, Tomtom is going through a simulation right now. He’ll be done at 2200 if you want to review the results.”
“He’s been busting his balls, huh? I wasn’t 100% sure about him, but I think he’ll be fine as the force commander.”
Ryck knew that Jorge had wanted to lead the expeditionary force, which would be made up of almost 75% of the total corps strength, but as much as Ryck admired Jorge’s cap
abilities, he hadn’t much combat experience, and he would be more valuable back at headquarters making sure that all the support ran smoothly.
“Yes, it’s going well, better than I expected,” Jorge said. “But now, we’ve got Sergeant Major Ito, Joab Ling, and your good buddy Montero.”
“All three? What is Montero bitching about now?”
“It has to do with the women in recruit training now.”
It had taken Ryck a little longer to put in place the full suffrage he had promised Michiko MacCailín. The Navy had been quicker to get women through recruit training, but with the Marines, the physicality of boot camp had to be examined and adjusted where practical. Which given the “no weaker standards” directive Ryck had issued, meant not much was changed in the long run. The uniform sizes had to be expanded to take into account a greater percentage of smaller recruits, and ergonomic testing of weapons conducted, but in the end, for the first recruit class with women, there were only a very few minor adjustments made.
“OK, let’s get this over with. I want to make a call to Bert to see where we are on the lift.”
Admiral Chandanasiri had been against the plan to attack Hartford from the beginning, but he’d finally relented. He still was dragging his feet, though, with providing the ship-support the Marines needed, and while Bert was doing a bang-up job, Ryck wanted to lend his weight if needed.
Ryck shook hands with the sergeant major and Joab Ling eagerly, and then Montero’s a little less enthusiastically.
“So, everything as Camp Charles going well?” he asked.
“Yes, sir,” Joab said. “We just graduated a class of 958 with a retention rate of 84%. I’ll be sending you the full report later tonight.”
“Eighty-four percent?” Ryck asked incredulously. “With no lowering of the standards?”
“No, sir. Not a bit. As you know, the volunteer rate is skyrocketing. Everyone wants to join, so Manpower can be more selective of who is accepted.”
“Eighty-four percent? That’s amazing. But General Simone here told me you wanted to see me about the women in training?”
Commandant (The United Federation Marine Corps Book 8) Page 20
