Vanguard Rising: A Space Opera Adventure

by A. C. Hadfield

  “I’m sorry, Irena,” Bella said. “But we’ve got to move. Hold on.”

  Before she could say anything, the tether pulled taut and grabbed her with a violent yank as the Goat’s thrusters burst to life and blinded her with white and yellow light. She screamed and wrapped her arms around the tight tether.

  The shuttle distanced itself away from the station and then, using its aux thrusters, altered its trajectory to go up and over the overhang created by the topmost torus. She glanced back. The SMF ship had reversed out of its current position, presumably to get a new angle on the shuttle. Her heart pounded inside her chest and sweat dripped from every pore as Bella maneuvered the shuttle in small intricate movements, trying to get as much infrastructure between them and their attacker as possible.

  Irena’s body became increasingly heavy under the thrust. Her bones ached, and she couldn’t help but cry out as the slim barrier between panic and calm split wide open. “Damn it, Bella, this is insane. What are you doing? I’m going to die out here.”

  “You’ll be fine. Just don’t let go of the tether… we’ll be cutting thrust very soon. Get ready for a hard landing inside the airlock.”

  Despite the advice and warning, it wasn’t enough.

  Bella brought the shuttle closer to the station until they were hovering beneath a dense section of infrastructure made up of angular supporting joists and beam cross sections, effectively providing a three-sided box in which the Goat hovered.

  The reverse thrusters cut in, slowing their movements to a crawl. The change in direction pulled hard on the tether yet again, flinging Irena at great speed toward the open airlock at the rear of the shuttle. Bashir and Greta stood there with their arms open, but they must have realized Irena’s entry was too fast. They dived out of the way. Irena, unable to slow her momentum, flew into the airlock. She curled into a ball and brought her feet up as she hit the bulkhead with a thud.

  The hit sent a flash of pain up her legs and into her chest, and then she was bouncing back out toward space. A pair of hands grabbed her by the arm while another pulled on the tether, preventing her from escaping back out of the airlock.

  “You’re safe,” Greta said. “You’re all good. Just take a few breaths. We’ll get you settled. You did great.”

  “I feel like I’m going to die.” Irena’s body wasn’t used to all this. The worst aspect being that she’d fouled her undergarments, which she refused to announce.

  “How is everything back there?” Bella asked.

  This time it was Bashir who spoke, a slight tremble to his voice indicating he had found the experience traumatic, which gave Irena at least some comfort to know it wasn’t just her. “Irena’s in safely. I think we’re all good. Shaken up, but okay.”

  “Well, ladies and gentlemen, don’t get too comfortable. We’re moving again; we need to get Harlan from airlock G4. At least we’ve lost those crazy fools for the time being.”

  When Irena finally got her breath back, she asked, “Once we get Harlan, how are we going to get away from the Wickham?”

  “Let’s face one impossible task at a time. We’ll figure something out. Now hold on to your butts. It’s going to get bumpy again.”

  31

  Cursing his lack of cardio training, Harlan finally arrived at the G4 airlock. He leaned over and rested his hands on his knees. He sucked in deep breaths and waited for the dizziness to ease before gathering the energy to check the suit pods.

  He approached the first one and thought about Irena, considered sending her or Bella a message, but didn’t want to interrupt in case she was currently in transit from the station to the Goat. He just hoped she made it okay. The last look she had shared with him before he’d run off stayed with him. Although she hadn’t said as much, the fear in her eyes was obvious.

  No need to panic now. Get moving.

  Wasting no more time, he pulled the door to the first suit container open. To his relief, it was there. He wheeled it out and prepared to suit up when he noticed something wrong: the coupling seals between the suit and the helmet were smashed. The high-tensile alloy showed signs of stress, as though something had warped their shape. He couldn’t get the two parts to fit correctly.

  His first thought was sabotage, but looking at the damage, it was entirely possible that when it was last used, the wearer had suffered some kind of collision.

  Didn’t explain why they would have put the suit back in, though, unless they were trying to cover up the accident. Entirely plausible given the constraints the engineers were under if no abbots were available for a time-sensitive repair.

  Pod two, however, confirmed Harlan’s initial fear. This suit had a clear slash through its torso section. The jagged rend made it impossible to consider using.

  Pod three: the same, this time the arm and leg seals were split.

  And finally, number four. Harlan closed his eyes as he opened the door and reached inside, all the while whispering an affirmation to himself that it would be okay, that this suit would have survived the sabotage and be in perfect working order…

  But no.

  It too was damaged beyond repair.

  Harlan kicked the door shut, sending a clang of metal on metal to echo out into the abandoned level. He swore loudly and kicked at the useless pods once more.

  Why couldn’t anything just go to plan for once?

  A loud thud boomed out to his side, making his ears ring. Pod three splintered metal in all directions. A dark jagged-edged hole appeared in its side. A second thud slammed home a few centimeters to Harlan’s left. He felt the rush of air by the side of his head.

  His upgraded adrenal glands kicked in, sharpening his senses. Then came his trained instincts: he dove across the width of the storage area, taking cover between pods one and two. And finally, his brain became available for rational action. First, he considered the threat: they were using a non-automatic, high-powered rifle with armor-piercing rounds. The suit pods were made especially strong to withstand trans-vacuum relocation.

  Given the trajectory of the shots, the shooter had coverage over the entire entrance to this three-meter-wide corridor.

  A tiny kill box all for Harlan.

  He couldn’t risk running out; he’d be gunned down in seconds.

  To make matters worse, he noticed a couple of dragonfly drones—DFDs—approaching his position. This made him think that these weren’t the actions of a rogue abbot. The drones were known tech from Station Six, which all along had been a common factor going back to his first discovery of the spider on Asimovia. He reached out to them using his near-field network adaptor, but the network wasn’t visible. That wouldn’t stop him, however.

  — Milo, run a scan on discrete networks. I need to take out those DFDs so my attacker loses his extra eyes.

  A few moments ticked by before the peripheral responded.

  — Negative. No networks found.

  — Come on, they’re right there, two dragonflies communicating with each other and a host. Get with it, Milo. This isn’t the time for screwing up.

  — I repeat. No networks found. Incoming message.

  Harlan dared to sneak a look at his wrist communicator and saw a message scroll along the screen from Bella. Irena had boarded the Goat, but the SMF was tailing them, and he ought to make himself ready immediately, as they didn’t have much time.

  Another shot smashed into the suit container directly in front of him. He jolted away so his back was against the second pod. The bullet smashed around inside the one in front, no doubt damaging the suit further. A few more shots like that, and he’d be completely exposed. He resisted crawling out to get behind the second pod: that was just what the shooter was waiting for.

  This wasn’t an all-out assault.

  It was a calculated hunt.

  The two dragonflies hovered above, just out of reach, and then flew around all the pods, presumably scanning the area and sending the information back to the hunter.

  Whoever it was would know the
weak points, ricochet angles, and Harlan’s physical state.

  He tried once more with his peripheral.

  — Milo, it’s massively important you figure this shit out and get me that network.

  — I’m sorry, Harlan, but there’s nothing I can do.

  — Screw you, then, buddy.

  Harlan’s anger flared. He turned his peripheral off using the slider switch at the base of his cranium. He pulled his rifle over his shoulder, checked the round in the chamber, and switched off the safety. Uncapping the front scope lens, he pulled out the articulated limb, feeding it around the corner of the suit pod.

  The video feed from the flexible camera showed up in a holographic display above his wrist communicator.

  He swept it across the entrance of the kill box until the gun’s AI found what he was looking for: a hunched figure towards the rear of an atrium that opened out just beyond the short hallway he was currently in.

  His target was no more than a hundred meters away.

  The DFDs buzzed closer, making him flinch.

  Harlan tried to swat one away, but the self-correcting collision detection system prevented him from striking lucky.

  A fourth gunshot reverberated round the atrium, and another dense thud smashed into the lens of his rifle, knocking the gun from his hands and smashing the targeting system to pieces. It appeared his enemy was using the DFDs for target correction as well.

  Spending too much time in this area would get Harlan killed, he knew that for sure, but as far as he could tell, he had only two options: get into the airlock, or try to run for cover directly in front of his attacker.

  The latter was what the bastard wanted. The former was equally dangerous because of the time required to get up, move, and then activate the opening procedure of the airlock door. If it was pressurized that’d take even longer.

  And all the while those damned DFDs would be feeding back information.

  First things first: deal with the drones. If Milo couldn’t help, Harlan had an idea. Gylfie had said he would stay behind and be their eyes and ears on Atlas while they headed to Earth. Well, that plan would have to be brought forward.

  Harlan called Gylfie on his communicator even as another shot rang out, this time smashing into the remains of his rifle, shattering apart the gun’s stock, leaving him weaponless other than the two confusion grenades he had taken off the Marine outside Hugo’s place. He’d never be able to throw them far enough for them to be effective, though.

  A few seconds later, Gylfie’s voice sounded in Harlan’s ears. “What’s up, you guys get into trouble already?”

  “That was quick. Almost as if you were expecting my call.”

  “I was. I’ve been tracking the SMF. Things are getting serious around here. What’s happening with you?”

  The sixth shot slammed into the pod, smashing a hole all the way through it.

  Harlan jerked back, pushing himself as far into the corner as possible so his attacker couldn’t hit him through the newly created access point.

  “I’m being pinned down and shot at by someone with a high-powered rifle. I don’t have long. I need a favor. This bastard’s got a couple of DFDs buzzing around me, and I can’t find their network. Can you do it?”

  “Drones, you say… I’ll try. Ping me your exact location.”

  Harlan did just that and lowered himself below the hole in the suit pod. As he did so, one of the dragonflies buzzed down low. He instinctively kicked out at it—and only barely missed having his foot blown off as another shot fired through the hole and slammed into the side of the opposite pod. He mentally noted this was the seventh round.

  “You need to hurry, Gylfie. I don’t know how much ammo this shooter has, but at this rate, I’ll have no cover at all.”

  “I found you. I can see you from the security cameras—and your attacker.”

  “Who the hell is shooting at me?”

  “Damn it. I never liked this asshole. Sending you a picture now.”

  A portrait flashed up on his wrist display: it was Alex Aurier. That old bastard. Harlan swore aloud. A renewed anger swelled inside him. Now that he knew who was attacking him, the fear ebbed away to be replaced with furious vengeance.

  “Gylfie, what’s the lag on the feed?”

  “A couple of milliseconds. It’s a fast connection. What do you need?”

  “While you work on taking down the dragonflies, I need you to zoom in on Aurier and redirect the video feed to my display. Let’s see how he fares when the odds are evened up.”

  “Okay, patching the relay now, and I’ll work on finding the DFDs’ network.”

  Harlan watched the feed on his wrist display as Gylfie zoomed in on Aurier. He looked closely at the weapon and recognized it as an illegal Janzai WeaponTech Custom Special with nine rounds to a magazine. Janzai was thought to have gone out of business years ago when the SMF had sourced their weapons from a different manufacturer, but it appeared they had either gone underground or Aurier had sourced a refurbished unit.

  A plan formulated in Harlan’s mind.

  He yelled out, “Hey, Aurier, you old scumbag. I know it’s you. I can smell you all the way back here.” And then he made himself as low as possible as an eighth round slammed into the pod behind him. His heart pounded, and he took a couple of breaths when he saw how close it was: just a few millimeters.

  However, Aurier had done what Harlan wanted.

  He just had one more round to go before reloading.

  “I found the network,” Gylfie said over the comm link. “What do you want me to do with them?”

  “Send them flying into Aurier’s face. I want to disrupt his concentration.”

  “Sending the command now.”

  The two dragonflies darted away from Harlan, making him smile. He watched the two black dots disappear off into the distance. From the video feed, he saw Aurier swat at one of them before bringing his eye back to the Janzai’s scope.

  Harlan brought a foot up to the hole in the pod in front of him, but kept moving it upward.

  Aurier fired, but the DFDs had messed with his aim, and the shot went flying into the ceiling, clouding Harlan in dust and debris, but this was the break he wanted.

  He hopped to his feet, took a deep breath, and sprinted down the atrium toward Aurier, all the while hoping he hadn’t miscounted or misremembered the Janzai’s capacity.

  He got about halfway when he saw Aurier fumble around for another magazine.

  The old man looked up from his position behind a half-meter-tall wall, his eyes widening as he tried to reload the heavy Janzai. The weapon shook, and Aurier’s attention went from the weapon to Harlan.

  The two DFDs buzzed around Aurier, but to give him credit, he ignored them and stuck to his task, even as they flew into his grimacing face. His cheeks were red and sweat stuck his thinning white hair to his scalp. His lips curled with a smirk.

  Aurier raised the rifle.

  Harlan pumped his legs as hard as he could and, when he got close enough, jumped with everything he had left, shouting as he flew through the air, fists balled, knees raised to his chest.

  Aurier’s eyes went wide. He pulled the trigger.

  The Janzai recoiled.

  The bullet went harmlessly low.

  Aurier’s mouth fell open as he realized what was about to happen.

  With his feet first, Harlan landed on the older man’s chest, knocking him back. The Janzai clattered to the ground. Aurier tried to push himself free, but physically wasn’t a match for a furious, adrenaline-fueled Harlan Rubik, who pummeled a right and then a left hook into Aurier’s face, crunching nose cartilage and loosening teeth.

  Unable to break out of the rage, Harlan rained down blows until Alex Aurier’s body went limp and his face was nothing more than a bloodied mess of meat and bone.

  Exhausted from the attack, Harlan rolled off Aurier and slumped to the ground.

  Aurier’s chest rose and fell slowly. A wheezing noise came from the man’s
ruined nose. Harlan regained his feet, took the Janzai, and threw it over his shoulder with the attached strap. He stood up and staggered over to the wall where he rested to catch his breath.

  Gylfie’s image appeared on his communicator. “Nice work, Harlan. Been a while since I’ve seen you move that fast.”

  “My body is letting me know that it’s been a while, too. Running is just awful.”

  “Sure, but it beats being shot to pieces.”

  “I can’t argue with that. Thanks for the help, boss. You saved my ass.”

  “Anytime. If you’re okay finishing up, I need to divert my attention elsewhere. Looks like the SMF is closing in on my hideaway.”

  “Do you have another place to go?”

  “Always, Harlan. It’ll take a millennium for anyone to find me on this station. Good luck.”

  With that, the comm channel went quiet, but only for a brief second.

  Bella’s panicked face appeared on his screen. “Damn you, Harlan, I’ve been trying to contact you for ages. What the hell’s going on? You said you’d be a few minutes. We’ve got the SMF on our asses and we need to go. Where the hell are you?”

  “I ran into some resistance here, but it’s taken care of. I’ll be at the airlock shortly. Hang tight.”

  She continued to rant at him, but he shut the connection down, eager to finish up with Aurier, who groaned and attempted to sit up, but could only lift his head. He spat a wad of blood and teeth from his mouth and regarded Harlan with a grimace.

  With a wet rattle to his words, the old man said, “Too much of a pussy to finish the job?”

  The insult flew over Harlan’s head as freely as an ill-aimed shot. “I want you to pay, so I’ll let the SMF deal with you. When I expose Vanguard, you’ll be one of the first to face justice. I assume you’ve been a Vanguard member since you first joined the runners with Hugo all those decades ago?”

  Aurier just laughed. “You have no idea, Harlan. You always were the lost little boy, weren’t you? Even your best friend in the orphanage clued into things way before you.”