“Fuck’em,” Fix interrupted.
“What?” Jennings demanded.
“Fuckin’ Gael left us to die on that mine,” Fix said. “Left us to die slow, gasping. That’s worse than throwin’ a man in a steel cage. That’s bloody buryin’ a man alive. No one fuckin’ does that to me. Nae anymore.” Everyone was looking at him surprised. Not only was this one of the longest strings of conversation Fix had ever uttered outside of the medbay, it was also the first time anyone recalled seeing him get a little emotional over anything. Fix was not deterred by their surprise. “Petrova shot the Cap’n twice and her crew shot the Cajun, brained me, and beat up Squawk. I say we go and kill as many of those fuckers as we can. We rain the bloody apocalypse down on their houses. If you want to pick up the girl while we’re fuckin’ doing that, Cap’n, I’ve nae got a problem with that.”
Jennings smiled at Fix and then turned to look to Lafayette. “Mon capitaine, mon capitaine,” he began. “When have I not followed you willingly? There’s no need to apologize. We’re with you.”
“That’s what I just said,” Fix muttered.
“Marquis did it more succinctly,” Jennings countered amiably.
“I trust there’s a plan,” Lafayette said.
“There is,” Jennings replied as he started pacing, feeling the pep pill taking hold of him. “Well, the beginning of a plan anyway. I’m pretty sure I can get us into the TGF carrier, but after that we’re going to have to make it up as we go.”
He explained his plan to them as quickly as he could, while still giving necessary details. Once he was finished, he said, “Thoughts?”
Lafayette coughed. “It will have the virtue of never having been tried, mon capitaine,” he said.
“It’s mental,” Fix responded.
“That’s what I said,” Lafayette agreed.
“Just crazy or just crazy enough to work?” Jennings asked.
Lafayette and Fix glanced at each other. “Hopefully the latter, since we won’t be able to dissuade you of dis anyway,” Lafayette pointed out.
Jennings smiled. “You know me so well,” he said with a sardonic smile. “All right, Fix, you’re on weapons detail. We lost a lot of gear on the asteroid and in Strikeplain, so let me know where we stand ASAP. Lafayette, you and Squawk get me the Tryst’s weapons and communications in that order and anything else after that. Squawk, once phase one of the mission is complete, you’re staying with the ship. Repair anything else you can and try to get that hull breach sealed.”
“Aye, aye,” he said as he jumped up with a series of overly emphasized salutes and then bounded away to head back down to engineering.
“Are you sure that pep pill was safe for Pasquatil?” Jennings asked.
Fix shrugged.
“It’s a great idea in theory to get the ship as fixed as possible,” Lafayette said. “But we don’t have much left in the way of components for repairs. Anything that’s blown out can’t be replaced.”
“Use spit and duct tape,” he responded. “I can’t have a ship with no weapons and no communications.”
“Oui, mon capitaine,” Lafayette muttered.
“Now, I’ll come by to assist you each in turn, so that you can rotate through the mess, get some food, get cleaned up, wound dressings changed, whatever you need,” he said. “Let’s move like we’ve got a purpose.”
4
Several hours later, things aboard the Melody Tryst were not going as well as Captain Jennings would have liked. Their weapon inventory had become a joke. There were no grenades and most of the weapons they did have had no ammunition. They had one repeating plasma rifle with a half-full charge, two pistols with a couple of charges apiece, a sniper rifle with a few rounds and Fix’s crossbow.
Repairs were not particularly fruitful either. Squawk had managed to get the one sublight engine and its coolant tank patched and operational, and Lafayette and Jennings had gone through every bit of shot wiring they had to find enough to be patched together to give them a few shots of plasma cannons and the ability to launch a couple of missiles from one of the left wing launchers before it probably shorted out too. Jennings had something else entirely in mind for the second left wing launcher and it would require no power running to the launcher to achieve, just the missile bay door, which was still functioning. Long-range communications were still completely fried, but they had re-established short-range comms. There was also no use trying to get anything to the right wing weapons since there was a hull breach there. Jennings could only hope that Squawk would be able to get more repairs done while he and the others were searching for Michelle.
Everyone had been given the opportunity to grab some chow, Lafayette going first and making enough for everyone as he was the only one who could make anything edible. Jennings had gone through his rotation last, grabbing a very fast shower, just enough to wash the dried blood off his body and perk himself up a bit. He got dressed in a fresh pair of boxer shorts, khaki cargo pants and an olive green T-shirt, pausing for a moment to apply fresh bandages to his knee and his left side. Once he was dressed, he swallowed a few more of the painkillers that Fix had given him and paused for a moment, resting on his bed, waiting for them to take effect.
“Captain,” Minerva’s voice interrupted him.
“Go ahead,” he replied.
“We are approaching the TGF runabout,” she reported.
“Bloody brilliant,” he whispered under his breath. “Good work, Minerva. Match velocity with the runabout at eleven hundred kilometers. All crew to the bridge.”
“Aye, captain,” the NAI said before relaying his order throughout the intercom system.
Lafayette was already on the bridge when Jennings arrived and slipped into the pilot’s chair. Squawk came bounding in a moment later, followed by Fix, who said something about preparing a medical kit they would almost certainly need during the operation.
“We have matched velocity,” Minerva reported.
“Good,” Jennings said. “As long as we are in a sensor blind spot, they won’t be able to see us until we’re ready to make our move.”
“When will that be?” Lafayette asked.
“Following standard Terran Gael Force practice for arrival at Barnard’s VI, they will need to drop to sublight here,” Jennings said, pointing to a set of co-ordinates he had sent over to Magellan.
“We drop out of light speed at exactly the same time and engage our dust shroud,” he said. “We should be invisible. And the Tryst is faster than that TGF piece of shit. We should be able to overtake them.”
“Should?” Fix echoed.
“Depending on where the carrier is relative to where they were required to drop out of light speed,” Jennings clarified. “And a few other factors.”
“Would you like to know the percentage chance of success?” Minerva asked.
“No,” three voices said at once.
“Just kidding,” she said.
“We really need to talk about your timing,” Jennings muttered.
A light on the Magellan interface began blinking and a countdown began. “Five seconds until the runabout is at the specified co-ordinates,” Lafayette said. “Cutting out FTL engines…now.”
Starlines shrank to stars and the massive gas giant Barnard’s V dominated their view to the left. Barnard’s VI was a smaller planet visible on the right. Immediately, Jennings triggered the last of the rock dust that Lafayette had attached to the hull and the particles, attracted to the small amount of gravity their ship created, surrounded them and followed them even as Jennings activated the sublight engines.
“Do you have a reading on where that carrier is?” Jennings asked.
“Yes,” Fix muttered. “Twelve minutes away,” he said. “Moving to intercept runabout.”
“Damn, everyone’s so impatient these days,” he muttered. “Time to our intercepting the runabout?”
“Five minutes,” Lafayette answered.
“I better go get suited up then,” he said as h
e stood to leave. “Marquis, you have the conn.”
“Bon chance, mon ami,” Lafayette called to him as he headed up the gangplank to the Caf, where his space suit had been placed.
Quickly, he got dressed, attached the plasma pistol to his belt, and Fix’s specially modified crossbow to his back, before climbing into the access hatch for the left wing. Moving as quickly as the bulky suit would allow him, he made it into the wing and said into his comm, “I’m inside the wing, open the missile door.”
The emergency bulkhead separating the wing from the rest of the ship came down, as it always did when a missile tube was going to be opened. Once it had finished locking into place, the missile door opened and Jennings could see space out in front of him. He moved his body into position on top of the missile auto reloader system (all of the remaining missiles in the left wing had been repurposed into the one working launcher) and he prepared himself, grabbing hold of the missile door opening with both hands.
“Two minutes,” came Lafayette’s voice through the comm.
Jennings gritted his teeth as he stared ahead, forgetting one small part of his plan. With all the glittering rock dust that they were using as a shroud, he could not actually see the location of the Grey Vistula where it was being towed behind the TGF runabout. He was about to jump out into space, from a moving location, trying to hit a moving target, and he would not be able to see where he was going until he was clear of the field.
“Forty seconds, mon capitaine,” Lafayette said. “Five seconds to optimal launch. Four. Three. Two. One. Allez!”
Not taking a moment to think about it, knowing that he would not be able to do it if he did, Jennings pushed off with his legs and threw himself forward with his arms. He shot out of the missile door and soared through the rock dust as he left the Melody Tryst behind. As soon as he was clear, he knew that he was going to miss the Grey Vistula. He was going to pass by overtop of it.
“You’re off course, captain,” Minerva’s voice came in over the comm.
“I know, dammit,” he spat.
The Grey Vistula was passing by underneath him now, and Jennings was about to become lost in space. Grabbing the crossbow off of his back, he took aim and fired at the Grey Vistula’s hull, where the arrow stuck and a line of high tensile fiber stretched from the hull to the crossbow’s handle. Fix had fitted the arrow with a magnetic cap, allowing it to lock onto the hull. Pulling hand over hand on the cable, Jennings began dragging himself closer to the ship almost effortlessly in the limited gravity. Once he was in range, he activated his magnetic boots and locked onto the hull.
Thanks to some good aim on Jennings’ part he only had to take a few steps across the hull to arrive at an emergency hatch. Dropping to one knee, he inserted his portable CPU into the flashport, allowing Minerva to override the system and allow him entry. The hatch swung open, and Jennings maneuvered himself inside. Swinging the hatch shut, he felt artificial gravity kick in and his boots hit the floor. A computerized voice, much more robotic sounding than Minerva, announced that the room was re-pressurizing and atmosphere was being restored.
“I’m in, better start getting the ship into position,” Jennings said.
“Oui, mon capitaine,” Lafayette responded.
The computer announced that the airlock had been matched to internal conditions, and the inner airlock door swung open. Jennings stepped through and found himself in a clean, contemporary-looking corridor painted in cream and tope colors that ended in a T-Junction not far ahead. It felt somewhat eerie being inside a completely empty spaceship, especially as it was much larger than the Melody Tryst, but Jennings put that thought to the back of his mind as he raced to the end of the corridor, his magnetic boots thumping loudly on the floor.
Turning left, Jennings made his way down another corridor which terminated in a lift. Pushing the call button, he was met with an elevator a moment later. The elevator was comfortably padded, and Jennings wondered what possible purpose that served. Rather than having floor numbers, a touchscreen computer monitor gave different options including C&C/Officer Quarters, Crew Quarters, Medbay/Cells/Storage, and Bays which Jennings selected. The lift let him out in a room that was eighty feet tall and ran the length of the ship. This ship model was designed to allow for multiple shuttles to dock while still carrying a good amount of cargo. It was ample space for the Melody Tryst to hole up in.
“Marquis, are you in position?” he demanded as he ran over to an enclosed area where all the docking bay controls were.
“Bien sur,” he responded.
“Stand-by one,” Jennings said.
The Melody Tryst had pulled up within a few feet of the Grey Vistula, expanding its shroud cover to the very end of Petrova’s ship. If someone on the runabout specifically looked at the very tail of the Grey Vistula, they might wonder why they couldn’t see it on their sensors, but that was unlikely. Besides, without the shroud cover, the runabout was much more likely to notice the Grey Vistula’s cargo bay doors opening.
Jennings punched in a series of commands, and the bay doors opened. A low powered shield kept the atmosphere in, but was not strong enough to keep the Melody Tryst out as Lafayette navigated her into the cargo bay. The shield captured all the rock dust, but that trick would have been done for once they hit the cargo bay’s artificial gravity anyway, plus it continued to keep the Grey Vistula’s aft shielded until Jennings shut the cargo bay door.
The door closed, and Jennings looked up at the Melody Tryst, sitting in the belly of one of his fiercest rival’s ships. He could not help but allow himself a small smile. The first phase of the mission was going perfectly to plan. That was until he felt the muzzle of a plasma pistol being shoved into his back through his space suit.
“Don’t move,” a female voice said to him.
Chapter 26
1
Selena Beauregard was not altogether unaccustomed to being in tight spaces, literal and figurative. It was a necessary evil in her line of work as security tended to be the most lax around areas where nobody thought another human being could fit. That led to a fair share of ventilation ducts, drainage pipes and exhaust systems in her years as an elimination specialist. There were also dozens of times when she had almost been caught by security, the police or thwarted by her own target, but she had always come through.
This was the first time she had failed so monumentally in her career. First, those lackwit bounty hunters blew her cover at the fraternity party and got the information she needed from Jacq Clemmons, and then they managed to give her the slip after she attacked them in space near Strikeplain. The worst indignity of it all though had been when Anastasia Petrova, who tried to hide her scumbaggery behind an expensive pant suit, had actually managed to capture her and was now holding her in a force field sealed cell.
Once in custody, she had tried a few of the old gambits: trying to seduce a guard and pretending to be ill, but Petrova’s warders were either too well trained or had seen enough movies to know better. Beauregard had tried to find some sort of fault in the security system on the cell, but had put little energy into it as the guards would simply gun her down if she did get out. She even had a few surprises in compartments hidden in her boots that usually helped get her out of prisoner situations, but they had been confiscated. There would be another opportunity, she told herself. She simply had to be ready for it. With that thought comforting her, she fell asleep on the blanket-less bunk in her tiny cell.
When she awoke, it was because there was some strange commotion going on in the hall outside her cell. She heard a lot of shouting and the unmistakable sound of a fist striking flesh. There was a brief moment of weapon’s fire, stun guns from the sound of it, and then the thud of a body hitting the deck and the clattering of a weapon rattling away from someone’s grasp.
Uncertain what to think about this development, she quickly looked around the cell for a place to hide. Something about what was happening did not feel right, and she did not want to be caught in a sm
all cell with some lout about to put a plasma bolt between her eyes. Under the bunk was too obvious and she was still likely to be seen, especially if they actually came into the cell to search. Her eyes next travelled up to the seamless ceiling of the narrow cell and then the open air doorway. At the ceiling above the doorway, there was a foot long slab of steel hanging down which housed the force field emitter.
Smiling slightly to herself, Beauregard jumped off the floor, turned her body horizontally in mid-air and pushed out as far as she could with her feet and hands. Her hands and feet found opposite walls of the cell and she tensed her entire body, locking herself into place like she was merely a plank or shelf extending from one wall to the other. Looking to her right at the cell door, she realized she had not gotten high enough up and began the labor intensive process of shimming herself higher up, trying to go as fast as she could while not losing contact with either wall.
At last, she felt the ceiling touch the small of her back and she started to move to the right, shimmying until she felt the steel force field emitter against her ribs. She held her position, her muscles aching, knowing that she was now invisible to a cursory glance from anyone outside the cell and that she would be able to get the literal drop on anyone who came in.
The stomping of boots reached her ears and she braced herself for an attack.
“Clear!” she heard a voice shout and then another and a third.
“Hold!” a fourth voice demanded. “Force field is on in number six.”
“No prisoner listed in the log,” a voice called from down the hall. Beauregard counted her lucky stars that Petrova’s people were not particularly diligent in the area of paperwork.
111 Souls (Infinite Universe) Page 26
