by J. N. Chaney
As Burner made his way downward, he saw crowds of people gathered around men in station security uniforms. Behind them, on screens that hung down from the spiral’s next level, bold black text was posted over the station’s logo.
All Clear. The Threat Has Passed. Please Resume Your Daily Activities.
- Station Security.
Burner approached one of the crowds and was able to hear the officer giving a completely bullshit excuse to the civilians. “Again, on behalf of the station administration and security, we would like to extend our deepest apologies for any inconvenience the sector closings may have caused. It was just minor electrical trouble that made those sectors temporarily unsafe. The issues have since been resolved and those sectors have reopened. We thank you for your understanding.”
People were asking the officer questions, some of which made it apparent that they didn’t buy the line they were being fed. But the security officer stuck to his story and refused to change it. Burner doubted he’d have any better luck in getting the truth out of him. Not without straps and some dental tools, anyway.
He scanned around and his eyes ended up locking onto a Union officer who was watching the crowds from a secure alcove. The officer had a comm in his hands as he watched for any sign of the crowd’s restlessness.
Burner approached him with the stride of someone in authority. “Jack Burner, Union Intelligence.” He lowered his voice as he got within speaking distance and pulled the officer into his confidence. “Intelligence is requesting an update on the bomb threat. Am I to understand that the bombs have been located and disarmed?”
The officer blinked in surprise and confusion at the sudden question from a man who appeared out of nowhere. Burner could almost see the gears spin in the man’s head. He wasn’t authorized to speak on the matter, but an Intelligence operative would outrank him and compel him to answer. Burner hadn’t provided any form of ID, but he had brought up the bombs, which civilians wouldn’t know about since the official story was about electrical troubles. Burner guessed the man was running a calculation, factoring in potential damage to his career for pissing off an Intelligence operative and the consequences of sharing information that he wasn’t supposed to share.
His pupils contracted when his decision was made. “Ye-yes. We did a complete sweep of the station and located four. All in public places that are usually crowded. A bank, a popular park, an apartment complex, and one of the docks. Terrorists were probably trying to kill as many people as possible.”
Burner kept his posture straight, the position of authority. “And the one at the core?”
The officer shrugged. “We received a tip that the core might be a target, but our sweep didn’t show anything. The guard has been doubled and an order was issued that not even maintenance gets in and out until the all clear is given. It would be impossible for anyone to slip in, much less with a bomb.”
Burner nodded to the officer and continued down the spiraling path. He had confirmed that the bomb hadn’t been planted yet when the sweep occurred, meaning Cypher was likely going to plant it himself. The other bombs were probably decoys. They had succeeded in tricking both the Union officers and the station security that the threat had passed and caused them to lower their guards. The venues the officer had mentioned wouldn’t have caused maximum casualties at all. Not by a long shot.
He still wasn’t sure how Cypher planned to get past all of that security to the core, but that officer had been right about one thing. The terrorists were looking to kill as many people as possible.
He had just underestimated how many that was.
33
Space Station Pharbis, Nimrod Sector, Deadlands
“Sorry, this area is currently off-limits.” The access corridor to the engine maintenance section of the Pharbis was being guarded by a group of five Union soldiers in full uniform and an additional six members of station security. The soldiers took a standard guard formation, two in front to turn back civilians, two flanking either side of the corridor, and one to provide backup. The security officers stood behind them in a less organized cluster. The head Union soldier called for Cypher and his followers to turn back long before they had descended fully into the corridor.
Cypher’s group did not slow. They continued down the path toward the corridor without so much as acknowledging the soldier’s warning.
The soldier put a threatening hand on his holster. “Sirs, we are going to have to ask you again to turn around. This area is off-limits. If you do not comply, we will be forced to take you into custody.”
The terrorists reached the corridor’s level and continued forward. The lead soldier drew his weapon, and the others around him followed his lead. There was a sense of nervousness about them. They had been made aware of the possibility of armed terrorists trying to force their way toward the core. The prospect of getting into a gunfight here hadn’t seemed real until this moment.
The men walking toward them weren’t making any threatening gestures or pulling any weapons, which was the only thing that stopped them from giving into their twitchy trigger fingers and unloading at them. The lead soldier tried one last time. “Last warning. Take one more step and we’ll—”
The rest of what he said was drowned out by the sound of gunfire. The Union soldiers were so focused on the men approaching that they had been completely unprepared for the attack that came from behind. For three seconds the corridor was filled with the resonating sounds of the gun shots that claimed the lives of five Union soldiers, but due to everything being evacuated there was no one around to hear.
One of the security officers came forward, carefully stepping over the body of one of the fallen soldiers. The barrel of his gun was still smoking. “Welcome to the Pharbis, Cypher. Me and the boys have been keeping it warm for you.”
Cypher didn’t spare a second glance for the fallen Union soldiers. If they hadn’t died here, they would have died shortly later in the station’s destruction. They had bound themselves to their fates when they decided to pledge their loyalty to the authoritarian Union regime. “You did well to get you and your men this duty, Blaise. After our recent setbacks, it is good to know someone can still be relied on to get their job done. Is everything set up?”
“It is. Or, it was.” Blaise looked back down the corridor toward engine maintenance. “Some higher-ranking Union officials came through earlier. I think they were with the Constables. Had to let them through. Didn’t want to blow our covers before you arrived. They seemed pretty certain that they were going to find a bomb. They might have located it already.”
Cypher growled and looked back to see Reginald carrying the listless Constable into the corridor. The burden of carrying her had caused him to lag behind the rest of the group. Cypher knew it wasn’t a coincidence that the Constables had beaten them here and knew where to find the bomb. That bitch had given it all away. He would have to be sure to properly thank her when she awoke.
For now though, they had to keep moving. “Maybe we can still beat them there,” he mused. “Otherwise, we’ll need to improvise. Blaise, you and your men cover our back. Burner can’t be that far behind us, and you need to be ready to hold him off if it comes to it.”
Blaise nodded without hesitation. Like the rest of them, he was ready and willing to die for this cause.
They rushed down the corridor and into the maintenance sector. There they realized Blaise’s fear turned out to be justified. A number of Union officials surrounded the reactor and were moving the explosive material out of the core chamber. There were at least twice as many men as Cypher had with him, and they were armed with the latest in Union weaponry. In addition to wearing thick armor to potentially shield them from explosive blasts, it would also serve to protect them from bullets. Even if Cypher’s group managed to get the drop on them, the battle wouldn’t end favorably.
It was time to improvise. Cypher glanced at his field liaison. “Did you set aside some of the explosives as I instructed?”
/> Blaise gestured to a side passage. “There’s a storage area that I cordoned off where I hid the rest of it.”
In his head, Cypher churned through his memorized plans of the station. “There’s another floor that runs underneath the reactor, isn’t there?”
“Yeah, the exterior access.” Blaise pointed down another passage. “If maintenance needs to do work on the outside of the station. There’re some suits and an airlock down there for work on the exterior of this sector.”
Cypher nodded sharply. “We’ll collect the rest of the explosives and head down into the tunnels. We’ll plant them directly under the reactor. If we can cause a breach that opens the reactor up to space, we’ll still get the result we wanted. Oh, and Blaise?”
“Yes, sir?”
“Any Union fool so much as looks in our direction, end them.”
The bodies of the Union soldiers were still warm when Burner arrived. He wasn’t that far behind, then. The fact that the soldiers were shot from behind concerned him. Unless the soldiers all happened to be looking away at the exact moment that Cypher arrived, Cypher must have had inside men on the station already prepared for his arrival.
That was how he intended to access the core.
It would seem Cypher’s plan had one big hole in it, though. Burner stumbled right into the large collection of Union officials gathered outside the core. From behind cover, he observed as explosive material was being moved safely away from the core. Cypher’s plants had indeed managed to set the explosives in the core, but the Union had neutralized them before they could be detonated.
Given how Cypher and his men’s bodies were notably absent, and the lack of evidence of any sign of a battle, it was safe to assume Cypher had chosen a different route when faced with the Union presence here. But Cypher was far too stubborn to just give up. He would be looking for the next best place to plant the explosives.
Burner closed his eyes and forced up memories of the station’s plan from his brief glimpse back at the farmhouse. He remembered an alternate path that had been marked as being of interest to the terrorists. It ran underneath the maintenance sector and the reactor.
The access tunnels. That’s where Cypher would have gone.
Burner considered for a moment calling out the Union officials and trying to enroll them in chasing down the terrorists, but he realized it would cost him too much time. Best case scenario, he convinced them of his story, but it would take them so long to verify who he was that Cypher would blow up the station before they even started after him. Worst case, they’d shoot him on sight and he wouldn’t even live long enough to see the station destroyed.
He decided he’d be heading after Cypher alone. As it had been when he started, so would it end.
ABOARD THE LIBERTY WARD, UNION SHIP, NIMROD SECTOR, UNION SPACE
Cade’s program had worked its magic. Along with Stack’s knowledge of Union systems and protocols, he wound up with complete control of all the ship’s subsystems from his console. He had the weapon systems prepared to go before the Liberty Ward came out of slipspace.
The navigator gave the announcement that the ship was nearing the end of the tunnel, and the helmsman confirmed their arrival once they reached the space near the station.
The captain took his seat at the main console. “Get me the head of station security and whoever’s in charge of our Union boots on the ground.”
While the communications officer did her job, Stack did his. He fired up the weapons system targeting the station.
Even suppressing the weapon notifications to the bridge, he couldn’t hide such a massive power draw for long. A message came over the coms for the captain from engineering. “Sir, was there an order for weapons live? Our main guns are online and getting ready to fire.”
The captain jumped out of his seat. “Absolutely not. Shut it down this instant.”
A pause. “We’re working on it, sir. Our consoles here have been locked out of the weapons systems by an override authority on the bridge. We’re trying to shut down the weapons manually by physically cutting the power to them, but that’s going to take us a minute. Might not be in time to stop it from getting a shot off.”
Stack almost felt sorry for the captain as he scanned the room around him with a face quickly losing its pallor. “From the bridge?”
“It’s got to be the mole,” Stack declared. He knew being too silent in a crisis situation would only make him seem suspicious. He just needed to stall for a few moments. “Someone up here must be abusing their access to take charge of the weapons system.”
Captain Kessek looked to each of the leading officers of the bridge in turn, panic in his eyes. He hadn’t been trained for this. Other threats, yes. But this?
He called down to security. “Security, this is Kessek. I need you to lock out access to the ship's subsystems for all the consoles on the bridge. Then I need you to tell me which console has been connecting to the weapons system.”
Without delay, Stack found his console locked up in front of him and all of his access revoked. It was precisely how he expected an unimaginative officer like Kessek to react. That’s why he had already set the weapons to continue their firing sequence without further input.
The captain learned this a moment later when he saw the weapons were still drawing more power. “Damnit! The only way we are going to shut it down is to figure out which console is running the fire sequence. Security, give me some good news.”
“Just a moment, Captain,” came the response on the comm. “Whoever did this tried to cover their tracks and ran a pretty elaborate masking program. Almost got it stripped, should have an answer for you in a sec.”
Stack could feel himself sweating as he watched the moments count down to the station’s destruction. He avoided looking the captain in the eye, afraid his expression would give away his mix of nerves and excitement. Instead, he pretended to be examining the bridge crew as if trying to find the mole.
Security piped up over the com again. “We got it, Captain. I can’t believe it, but it’s one of the officers’ consoles.”
Twenty seconds till the weapons fire.
“It’s Fells’ console, sir.”
Stack had to feign a look of astonishment as all eyes turned to the pretty young communications officer. Of course, he had known what their search would find. He had set up the program to use Ms. Fells’ console as a dummy in order to mask his own movements. It made him feel a little guilty to do that to the poor woman, but she was the only one of the bridge officers who had close enough family to match with the theory that Stack had put forward earlier.
Fells got up from her seat, her eyes wide, ready to protest her innocence. She didn’t get a single word out before the captain shoved her roughly aside to get at her console. Security returned access to the console to him so he could stop the fire order.
He scrambled at the console.
The weapon fired.
He was too late.
The viewscreen filled with a massive explosion. A high-pitched siren screamed to inform the crew of the dangerous way the ship was shaking from proximity to the blast, though the stabilizers were doing an admirable job of keeping things level and damped inside.
The view screen pixelated and then went white as the ship’s sensors lagged from the flash of the explosion outside. Stack fought his instincts hard. He wanted to throw his arms up in triumph. He clenched his fists discretely instead and focused on his breathing.
Victory!
All the hard work. The risks. The sacrifice. And now finally. Finally…
Kassek slammed his hand on the console in frustration. Ms. Fells was still attempting to stammer something about her innocence, but it wasn’t going to do her any good. Potters and another security officer whisked onto the bridge to take her into custody. They dragged her off to be held until she could be officially interrogated and investigated for her crimes. As she was hauled away, her eyes caught Stack’s for just one moment. In that moment, they w
idened with realization. If only she had figured it out sooner.
“Someone update the Admiral,” the captain ordered to no one in particular. “Tell him the weapons were fired but the perpetrator has been contained.”
He turned his attention back to the viewscreen, waiting for it to reveal how much damage their ship had done.
34
Space Station Pharbis, Nimrod Sector, Deadlands
“We’ll do the video here.” Cypher paced around the mostly empty chamber like a director examining his set. “Put the lights over there and film against that wall. We’ll get more explosives in the shot that way.”
His teams had planted heavy explosives all around the chamber—the ceiling that was directly below the core, the exterior wall that had nothing but space on the other side, and the support pillars that were the chamber’s only natural feature were all primed and ready to be detonated. All that was left now was to create a video to inspire the next generation of freedom fighters.
Cade wasn’t so sure though. He could see from the uneasiness of the others that he wasn’t alone in that feeling.
Despite the beating he had taken the other day, Killington was still the one who felt it his duty to say what the rest of the team were thinking. “We don’t really have time to film a video, boss. Everything is set up. We should be thinking about trying to get clear while there is still time.”
Getting clear sounded good to Cade. The more he thought about the timetables they were working with, the more this was starting to sound like a suicide mission. That wasn’t what he had signed up for.
Cypher glared at Killington. “We’ve been over this. The video is the most important part of all of this. Without it, everything we have done is for nothing.”
