by Alex Kings
Chapter 23: Docking Cables
Aboard the Dauntless, Lanik considered what the captain had told him. There were no signs the ship was clamped – but if they were clamped and he tried to undock now, it would alert the Shrikes and their allies. They might well attack the ship.
“Lieutenant Dunn,” he said. “What's the mechanism of docking?”
“Six smart-matter cables are hooked into lower ports on the external hull.”
A good method – holding onto the ports was a natural move to keep the ship steady, but if the cables were strong enough, they'd stop the ship from leaving. If he pulled away too hard, he had a good chance of ripping off the entire hull.
“That leaves us one option, then,” he told the CIC staff. “Someone has to disable those cables and detach them by hand.”
*
Fifteen minutes later, Specialist Newman fitted his helmet into place and connected it to the neck of his suit. He ran a systems check, the results displayed on his helmet with all systems returning green. Beside him, Corporal Anscomb did the same.
He heard the comms click in his ears. “Anscomb to Dauntless. We're all ready sir.”
“Dauntless here,” came to reply. “Acknowledged. You have a go.”
Newman walked with Anscomb into the airlock, and heard the inner door swing shut behind them. It was followed by a rush of air which quickly faded. Then nothing but the sound of his own breathing. It was faster than he expected.
The outer door swung open. There was space out there – just the cavernous, distance walls of the Afanc's mouth.
Anscomb went first, stepping out of the airlock, out of the gravity field. Newman saw the pale blue jets of his thrusters as he manoeuvred round the lip of the airlock until at last his boots locked onto the outer hull. The cable linking them went taut.
Newman followed. It felt like stepping over the edge of a cliff at first – gravity, then weightlessness and void. The sensation always came with an edge of panic, until you saw that you actually weren't falling. Newman activated his thrusters as Anscomb had done, turning close to 180 degrees around the lip of the airlock, then manoeuvring down until his boots hit the hull and stayed there.
He was near the aft, looking forward. Below him, the belly of the Dauntless stretched out like a miniature landscape. The six smart-matter cables burrowed into its docking ports. They trailed towards fore, and connected to the docking berth. The lining of the berth connected to the flesh of the Afanc, going on and on until the distance became impossible to judge. A couple of other ships moved about in that giant space. Off in the distance, he could see the mouth, lined with fangs and offering a small window back into the universe.
Newman began to trudge with Anscomb across the hull towards the closest cable. The dull thud of each step echoed through his suit. The cable was close to a metre thick, matte black and featureless. Just inside the hull, where he couldn't see, its tip had formed into a hook to hold the ship steady.
He took out a tool from his belt, pushed its tip against the cable, and activated it – an injection to deactivate, or paralyse, the smart matter. He gave two more injections, spaced evenly around the able, then said through his comms, “Ready.”
Standing on opposite sides of the cable, they gripped it firmly and pulled upwards. With the smart-matter deactivated, the tip of the cable was pliable. It felt like it was made of soft rubber. After a couple of pulls, the cable came free. The docking port closed automatically.
From there, they repeated the task on the next cable, and the next.
Two cables left. Newman was glad it was nearly done. As he gave the cable its final injection, he looked up and out through the Afanc's mouth.
One of the stars went out.
It was just for a moment – then the star was back again. But he was sure he'd seen it.
Anscomb's voice came over the comms: “Is there a problem?”
“Possibly.” Newman changed his comm channel. “Newman to Dauntless. I have something you might want to see.”
“Acknowledged. What is it, Specialist?”
“I just lost a star, less than ten seconds ago.”
A pause from the other end of the channel, then: “We have it. Thanks for the heads-up. Dauntless out.”
Vanishing star. The first time he'd ever seen one, but he knew what it meant: A stealth ship was hiding out there.
There was still the job to do. He gave the cable a third injection, and with Anscomb's help began to pull it free.
Before they'd begun, Anscomb let go. His voice came over the comm: “Get down!” Already he was reaching for his pistol.
Newman didn't need to be asked again. He dropped into a squat. A tiny hole appeared in the surface of the cable.
Without sound, slowed down by the motion of his boots against the hull, everything seemed absurdly relaxed. Newman plodded round the cable as quickly as he could, behind the cover of the cable.
Anscomb was there too, pistol raised, firing. At last Newman was in a position to see the attackers: Three suited figures, flying quickly towards the nose of the ship. From the shape of the suits, the elongated helmets, they were clearly Glaber.
“Anscomb to Dauntless. We're under fire.”
“How close to completion is the task?”
“One cable left.” Anscomb leaned out from behind the cable. His pistol kicked silently.
Newman, as he got behind cover of the cable, fumbled for his pistol. He'd only had basic arms training, and nothing for microgravity combat. In his haste, he dropped his injector tool. At the last moment he caught it floating away, spinning slowly, and grabbed it. He pressed it into the cable.
Something seemed to prod his calf. He glanced down and saw a stringy trail of blood coming out from one side. He must have stepped out too far when he retrieved the tool. The suit had already sealed the section off and given him a calculated dose of local anaesthetic. It warbled about its damage in his ears. A frozen, numb feeling radiated out from the wound.
“Newman's been hit,” said Anscomb, firing again.
“Get out of there,” came the order from the Dauntless.
“The cable?”
“We'll have to risk it. Come inside.”
Newman caught sight of one of the Glaber visible from the side. They'd spread out. He raised his pistol – still feeling oddly calm – and fired at it. The pistol kicked back in his hand, but nothing happened.
“Come on,” said Anscomb, grabbing Newman's shoulder. “We need to go. Deactivate your boots.”
There wasn't enough time to walk back – they'd both be dead before they got halfway.
Newman gave a command to his boots, and a moment later he was floating free from the hull. Together with Anscomb, he turned on his thrusters, pushing them both backwards towards the airlock. As they sailed from behind the cable, the other two Glaber came into view, pistols raised. Anscomb fired back.
A hole appeared in the central Glaber's chest. It continued to sail forward, writhing, Its pistol floated from its hand. Newman fired as best he could at the two remaining Glaber. He wasn't sure if he hit or not, because he and Anscomb were nearly at the airlock. He turned with thrusters.
They were only a couple of metres away! “Brake!” he said over the comms, firing his own thrusters. The airlock raced up towards them. There was no way they could stop in time.
Newman fired his thrusters upwards, pushing him towards the hull. They were still moving as they came upon the airlock, but Newman was able to push himself down a few feet into it, and catch his boot on the lip just before they passed beyond it. This time his leg did hurt – for a second felt like it had been dipped in acid. But it brought them to a halt. With the aid of his thrusters, Newman pulled himself in, and dragged Anscomb in after him. Gravity came back, and he fell to new floor.
“We're in,” he gasped through his comms, swinging the outer door closed and locking it.
As the faint whine of returning air became audible through his suit, he saw the hole through Anscomb's ches
t.
*
“Sir,” said Miller. “We've got a report of armed Glaber coming in through the dock.” A pause as she listened, then, “Our eva team is back inside.”
“Retract the docking tube immediately,” ordered Lanik. “Fermi, reverse thrust, moderate strength. Pull us free.” One cable still attached – they might be able to pull away without tearing the ship apart.
“Yes sir,” said Fermi.
Miller connected to the ship and said, “All hands brace.”
Lanik steadied himself against the command console.
“Thrust in three … two … one.”
The moment Fermi began thrust, there came a creak of straining metal echoing through the bulkheads. It ramped up quickly, becoming a groan, then a squeal. The views on the displays lurched to the side as the ship swung about its attachment point. The sound of screaming metal rose again, then ceased. On the displays, the docking port hurtled backwards.
“We're free, sir,” said Fermi.
On the display, he could see the six cables of the dock where Dauntless had been. A ragged strip of the ship's outer hull, torn away, trailed from one. Beside it, he could make out the three Glaber eva suits. If Agatha was right about ship-level combat being forbidden near the Afanc, they were safe for the moment.
“We've got a report from the eva team,” said Miller. “We've lost Corporal Anscomb. Specialist Newman is being taken to sickbay.”
“Very well,” said Lanik. They weren't out of the woods yet. And the captain still hadn't returned. He realised he was gripping the chromed console edge hard enough to make his knuckles white.
He released it, took a fraction of a second to regain his composure, and ordered, “Estimate the most likely positions of the stealth vessel from Specialist Newman's observation, and conduct a full visual search for any disturbances. Passive sensors only.”
Chapter 24: Soft, Chewy Centre
There were two stasis pods in the chamber, sitting by side-by-side near to a computer terminal. They were cuboids a little over two-metres high, affixed to the floor, with chrome along the edges and a matte-black finish elsewhere. Each had an oval viewing window at about head height. One was patterned with green and blue LEDs indicating status. The other was dark – deactivated and probably empty.
“Yilva, see if you can get any sense out of that terminal,” Hanson ordered, looking through the window of the dark pod to confirm it was empty. It was. He supposed it had held the Blank who had helped ambush them in Mr. Bell's office.
With a faint sense of trepidation, he moved over to the second pod and looked in. This one wasn't empty.
The Blank wasn't human. At least not properly. Its flesh was pale to the point of translucency, like gelatin tinged with pink. It lacked lips, cheeks, teeth and eyelids. It stared forward, sightless, with pale blue eyes. A couple of shiny black wires penetrated the flesh of its neck. It looked almost unfinished.
And yet, at the same time, Hanson could see its shoulders and chest were impressively muscled – but coated with the pale flesh and interrupted by various scars.
He stepped back and pressed his lips together.
Agatha squeezed in front of him and stood on the tips of her toes to get a look through the window. “Huh,” she said. “Weird.”
“Any luck with the terminal?” asked Hanson.
“Nearly there,” said Yilva.
Srak followed Agatha in looking at the blank. He grinned and pointed first to the armour. “Crunchy outer shell – ” Then he pointed to the blank. “ – surrounding a soft, chewy centre.”
“That's a great image,” Hanson told him. “Thanks for that.”
Srak laughed softly.
“I've got some files on the blanks,” Yilva said. She cocked her head. “They're not Ancient technology … none of this is Ancient. It's all from human research. They're clones.”
“I'd hate to be the poor bastard that was cloned from,” said Agatha.
Yilva bounced away from the console and peered through the stasis pod's window. “Oh,” she said softly, then went back to skimming through the console. “No,” she said, after a few seconds. “They're … they're cloned from normal humans, but they're meant to look like that. It's an artefact of the way they're made, I think. Hold on.”
She frowned and gestured at the terminal more got it. “Got it. They're speed-grown in artificial wombs. This guy is something like … five years old.” She looked up. “That's why. They're rush-jobs. That's why they look like that.”
“So this is, what, a mass-produced clone army?”
“I … think so.” Yilva's eyes danced across the screen. “Yes. That's the other thing. They kill parts of the brain during growth. Indoctrinate them. It says here that they're as smart as any human, but lack the will. Absolute loyalty.”
“Does it say to whom?”
Yilva shook her head. “They say humanity, and to their leaders, but there's no detail. That's everything.”
“Still no hint to who's actually making them, then.” Hanson sighed. “And tell me this: If you can work with Ancient technology, you'd already be in a position to shoot down anything you want. Why would you worry about all this clone malarky?
“Maybe they're lonely and want someone to talk to,” Srak suggested.
A loud, metallic bang echoed through the chamber. It came, Hanson realised, from the door. The Glaber had figured out where they'd gone.
“How well is that door locked?” he asked Yilva.
She glanced up from the terminal. “They can't open it from that side,” she said. “I mean, unless they force it open, I guess.”
Another bang came from the door. “I think they intend to,” Hanson said. He considered this for a moment, then said, “Come on, let's move.”
He lead the team to the far side of the room while the Glaber continued to bang on the door.
At the end of the room, the walls were smooth. No joints at all.
Yilva pulled out her tablet and opened up the map. She looked from the bare wall to the map and back again. “There … there's supposed to be a way out here,” she said.
The door – the only door, the way they'd come – banged again.
“Okay,” said Hanson. “Yilva, back to the terminal. Give me something. Anything. Moore, Saito. Look through that equipment, see if there's anything we can use. Agatha, Srak, help them.”
“Yes, sir.”
Hanson scanned the room, considering a strategy. It was defensible, yes – the pods and the equipment were decent cover – but he couldn't see anything after that. With all the Shrikes coming after them, he couldn't see much hope of an escape. They'd be ground down by numbers if nothing else.
His thoughts were disrupted by Agatha's loud laugh.
“Look at this!” she said, lifting something up from one of the equipment boxes.
A spherical object. Hanson recognised it – the weapon the blanks had used.
“Do you think it works?” Agatha said. She pointed it at the empty pod, paused, fiddled with it, then pointed it again. A moment later the top of the pod burst open, showering chunks of its casing and wiring across the floor.
Agatha laughed again. “Cool! I'm definitely keeping this.” She rolled it between her hands.
“Don't tell me you fired that thing without knowing which way it was aimed,” said Hanson.
“No, look, there's an eye here,” Agatha said, showing him the weapon. She was right. A small opening, a couple of millimetres across, was set in the sphere's glassy surface. On the other side, it looked like a circle of tablet smart matter was affixed to the surface.
Hanson saw no buttons. “How did you fire it?”
She pointed at some features on the band. “That's the safety. That's the trigger. I think.” She saw Hanson was still studying the weapon. “Oh, the captain's not jealous because he wants to play with the fancy new gun, is he? You can have a go if you like.”
She handed him the sphere. Hanson ignored the comment and turned it o
ver in his hand, touching it very lightly and pointing it at the floor in case it went off. The surface seemed to be entirely featureless apart from the eye and the band.
“Yilva,” he said, “Is this Ancient technology?”
Yilva took the gun, cradling it in her hands. “I think so. Even the Tethyans don't have something like this.” She frowned.
“Same goes for you, Y.,” said Agatha. “Have a go.”
Yilva glanced at her, then cautiously lifted the weapon at the still-intact bottom half of the empty pod. She pressed the trigger on the band, and the rest of the pod exploded.
She let out a small giggle.
“Fun, ain't it?” said Agatha.
Moore, standing in the background, shook her head and sighed. “This is like looking after children.”
Yilva examined the weapon a bit more, then looked at the pod. “I think it's related to a jump engine. You know the compression and repulsion forced when you go through a jump? Same thing, except with much bigger forces in a smaller volume.”
“It also might come in handy when those lot out there break through,” said Srak.
Hanson nodded. “Not enough, though. It'll help, but it won't be enough. Soon, it'll be all the Shrikes on the Afanc waiting out there to shoot at us.”
Then something occurred to him. “Yilva, does this terminal have a connection?”
“Yeah. Who are we going to contact?”
“I think it's time to fulfil our promise to Mr. Bloodtooth.”
Chapter 25: Call Bloodtooth
For a few seconds none of them said anything. The only sound was the continual banging against the door.
Yilva was the first to speak: “Give Bloodtooth …”
“The messages on your tablet. All the incriminating evidence. And not just Bloodtooth, Give it to Sweetblade too.”
“You want to start a gang war?” said Agatha. She gave an impressed whistle. “Yeah, that could be fun to watch.”
“And maybe it'll keep the Shrikes off our back long enough for us to escape,” said Hanson. “Agatha, help Yilva find some big names we can share this with. Preferably those who'll be pissed enough to start immediately.”
