Taggart (Heroes of the League Book 2)

by Jo Carey

  Turning to the far side of the table, Sarge pointed to a petite human female and introduced her as," LCpl Renata Stigl, handle: Wren." She looked at Ciara as her eyes went black.

  "Sister," she said as they snapped back to normal.

  "Sister," Ciara said in reply, her eyes also going black.

  "Damn, two of you in one squad," Tenga said, "I might as well stay home and finish my knitting." His accent was singsong, like a cross between Polynesian and Australian, if he was from Earth, that is. Wren cuffed him for good measure.

  Continuing, the Sarge pointed to an older woman. "This is our sniper, Pfc. Penelope Disme, handle: Nickel. She can split a corn kernel in half at one thousand yards with a fifty cal."

  "Milady, why Nickle?" John asked.

  "Oh, my, how proper. It's cuz my last name is pronounced 'dime' with the 's' silent, so Penny 'Nickel' Dime. Something about coming from old money. These jokers are nothing if not creative."

  "And this is our resident hacker, Pfc. Randolph Mercer, handle: Relay."

  "Why Relay?" Ciara asked.

  "Cuz, ma'am, the old computer systems used to run on big, mechanical relays. Would make a helluva racket when they were running."

  "Just like when he's sleeping," Nickel said as she punched him in the arm. He smiled and dropped his head, embarrassed at all the fuss.

  "Listen up," Sarge said. "The Director is going to tell us what the hell is going on, aren't you Director?"

  "First, about our newest member, Keelan," she said as she pointed to the Erdexi. "He's here to make sure that lab on the planet remains secure. Be aware that as of a thousand centuries ago, his race and the marauders were not on good terms. He is also coming along to find anything aboard the big ship that the hijackers removed from the planet-side facility. Remember, we do not know how a member of that ship's crew may react to an Erdexi, if at all. Keelan, would you like to add anything?"

  "No, Director, you seem to have covered it all. Thank you."

  John brought up images from Kessar on the holotable as Ciara returned to the original subject of her briefing: The ship itself. First was one of the ships in orbit around Kessar. She filled them in on the events of the last several hours. John brought up pictures of the small ships around the Marauder.

  Sarge squinted down at the hologram and asked, "Any idea how many Rebirthers we're talking about?"

  "We count fourteen small ships including the one attached to the hull. I estimate over a hundred hijackers and twenty-six manning the thirteen ships."

  "What about the Marauders on board?" Rostock asked.

  John took down the ships and replaced them with a sequence showing a reconstruction of Nebulon fighting a Marauder Unit one-on-one when she and her team were on Rhanna. Everyone looked at Nickle.

  "What? Yeah, I'm Tralaskan, but not Tyen. My Tyen genes are staying put, thank you very much."

  "We know of thirteen Tyens on Tralaska and the fourteenth, Dr. Blyst, is on Earth at last report. None have been reported on this ship," Ciara said.

  "Ma'am, are they as tough as they say?" Relay asked.

  "Yes, perhaps tougher."

  Murmurs of amazement passed through the crowd as they looked once more at Nickel."

  "Stop it. Jeez." Nickel said, embarrassed.

  Taking back control of the briefing, Ciara said, "We just don't know what's on board that ship. There could be units, there could be controls, or there could be something unknown. What we do know is this: This action by the Rebirthers could be construed as an act of aggression, or worse yet, an act of war by the Marauders, so the Rebirthers are now considered enemies of the League. If you see a Rebirther mixing it up with something unknown, shoot the Rebirther and apologize to the unknown. Anyone have a problem with those rules of engagement?"

  She looked around the room and saw no disagreement.

  "Good. Captain, how are we going to get on board?" Ciara asked Capt. Mosk.

  "The probesat keeping watch on things is equipped with a stealth generator, so Command sent it on a mission to survey the ship," Letta said as she brought up a close up of the belly of the Marauder ship. "They found a ventral hatch just forward of the engineering section. We'll attach there and have Relay jack our way in. Once you're safely aboard, we'll disconnect and head out and wait for our backup."

  "Director," Solange said as she got a cup of coffee. "What about communicating with the Marauder crew?"

  "Just like the Cuutoh's communications system," Ciara answered, "we're carrying universal translators programmed with every known League language including Erdexi and Goranthi. Hopefully the Marauders speak something the translator can work with. If not, we'll have to resort to pointing and pictures."

  "One final item,” Captain Mosk said. “Protector will arrive six hours after us. Their orders are to rendezvous with the Cuutoh and hang outside the moon's debris field and assist. We are to try to avoid conflict unless absolutely necessary."

  "Captain, ETA?" Sarge asked.

  "Two Hours at present speed."

  "Okay, listen up. You know the drill. Inspection in ninety. We go in hot, we go in ready, and we go in silent."

  "Oorah!" they replied loudly as they went off to prepare.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Arriska and Tobath ran down the corridors, trying to escape the creatures that had taken the ship. For the first time in their lives, the two felt alone.

  "Down here," she said in gasps. Between fear and exertion, both were out of breath.

  They ran into a storeroom and locked the door behind them. "We should be safe in here," she gasped as she looked for water.

  Tobath, always the better searcher, ran up with water and ration bars. Arriska drank, keeping the bar for later. "What were those things?" she asked between gulps of water.

  "Don't know. They must have been waiting for us, but how did they know where we would emerge from other-space?”

  "That's a question we must save for later. Now we must find weapons and figure out how to retake the ship.”

  They were young, typical members of the Martok ruling race. Both fair skinned, tall, with large expressive eyes. Being a female, Arriska had small vestigial wings on her back while Tobath's male back was bare. They both had fine white hair.

  "Could those creatures be Erdexi?" Tobath asked.

  "I don't know. Laeren says the Erdexi are dead. We need to see them to figure out who they are." she answered as she sat on a crate.

  "I heard the shuttle bay door open as we ran. I think they brought something on board.”

  "What and for what purpose, I wonder?"

  "We need to get eyes on the hijackers, but how?" Arriska said as she looked around the room. She stopped when she saw a data terminal outlet on one of the walls, near the floor. The Arriska was a flexible-use ship which meant that all rooms--including heads, storerooms, and closets--came with water lines, waste lines, power, light, ventilation and data. She had an idea, so she turned to Tobath and found him standing behind her holding a portable field terminal with data and power cable at the ready.

  "Thank you," she said as her heart swelled with pride in her future mate. He thought of everything.

  She plugged the cables into their sockets and set the terminal to secure connection before applying power. Though not impossible it would take anyone a significant amount of time to trace this terminal. She logged in under a maintenance worker ID to safeguard her true identity and accessed systems across the ship, the first being the Shuttle Bay video feed. The screen shimmered as an image formed. In the center of the deck was a small ship--maybe big enough for four people--sitting, surrounded by equipment and packing crates. Accessing the ship's interior at several points were strange beings the likes of which they had never before seen.

  "What are they?" Tobath asked as Arriska zoomed in on one of them. They could see facial hair, external ears, and colored eyes.

  "I don't know. Computer, identify species on screen, this terminal."

  "Working," the femin
ine voice said. "Species unknown."

  "Identify ship attached to hull."

  "Working... Unknown design."

  "Scan all video feeds. Identify and display," she said, taking a long shot.

  "Working..." The screen shimmered as the feed changed. An image formed as they watched. "Erdexi, based on ancient record search. Location: Main Bridge."

  "How many?"

  "One."

  "How many ship-wide."

  "One individual."

  She switched back to the ship in the bay. "Computer, ID ship, this terminal."

  "Working... Design unknown. Design components suggest either remote- or neuro-controlled. Warning. Warning. Warning."

  Worried now by the warning signal, Arriska said, "Proceed."

  "Scans indicate that the devices being loaded are chemical weapons. Extreme caution recommended."

  "Type of weapon?"

  "Nerve agents. Warning. Activity detection. Trace beginning."

  "Emergency shutdown,” she said. The terminal went black while she pulled out the two cables for good measure.

  "Think they found us?" Tobath asked as he listened at the door while placing himself in harm's way to protect her. She smiled at the thought.

  "No, not enough time. We need weapons."

  They searched the room and were about to give up hope when Tobath tripped over a locker hidden under a tarp. "This is marked 'Dyddack's Personal Property'," he said as he reached down and snapped the lock off with his hand. Martok males had incredible arm strength. "Isn't she your cousin?"

  "Second cousin and not in line for the throne, but things change," Arriska said as she looked inside the box. To their amazement they found pistols and dueling mini-rapiers.

  "Damn, she must have been preparing to call for a duel," he said as he reached in and grabbed a gun and rapier which he handed to Arriska.

  "I wonder who with?" she replied, disgusted with her family and all the political intrigue. Dyddack had to know that Tobath would have stepped in and slit her throat if she dared challenge Arriska, so she was aiming at a lower rung on the advancement ladder.

  "Not you," he said. She knew he would die for her in an instant.

  They checked their new weapons before strapping them on around their waists.

  "Tobath, I have a bad feeling about this. These people aren't pirates, nor are they kidnappers. They've got something planned. We have to retake the ship and stop them."

  "But how? They outnumber the two of us by at least fifty to one."

  "First, we have to disable the Arriska's drive. We then have to eject that ship in the bay and send it into the planet. Kessar is dead and a little more nerve gas can't make it any more dead. Last, we have to free the rest of our people and overwhelm our captors."

  "We can disable the engines and kill power from the engine room by initiating a self-test. Each system has its own self-test protocol separate from the rest of the ship, so we can kill power and lights while leaving life support in place.”

  "How long?"

  "Four, maybe five hours."

  "Excellent. Let's hope the hijackers can't see in the dark,

  The two of them policed the storeroom, so no trace of them remained. Tobath opened the door and checked the corridor. Seeing it was clear, he signaled Arriska, and the two of them left the storeroom and headed to Engineering.

  They arrived a short time later and found two guards standing one on each side of the door.

  "How do we get past them?" Arriska asked as she looked at the guards in amazement. This was the first time she saw their attacker's species in the flesh and she found them both fascinating and repulsive. "Damn, they're hairy," she said.

  "I'm betting they're mammalian," he said as he pulled a scanner from his pocket and aimed it at them. "High body temperature, and they perspire. I'm reading iron-based blood, so not a Martok offshoot," he commented. The Martok had copper-based blood chemistry and a lower body temp maintained by rapid breathing. "I suggest we stun them and drag them inside the room with us. We'll deal with them when we're finished." He took his gun from its holster and set it to a light stun while adjusting its frequency to match a mammal's nervous system. He showed it to Arriska, who copied the settings to her weapon.

  They aimed at the two beings. "Fire," he whispered as he pulled the trigger.

  The two guards dropped like a pair of percha fruit after a frost.

  Arriska and Tobath ran up to the door where Tobath scanned the interior of the room. Seeing it was clear, he palmed the door open and they dragged the unconscious guards inside, sealing the door behind them.

  "Engineering is unmanned, run by the main computer. The hijackers haven't made it in here yet," he said as he ran up to a control board and locked out the cameras.

  "How do you know all of this?"

  "I'm not sure you want to know. I'm not what I claim to be."

  "Tell me," she demanded.

  "My father is an engineer, not High Born. I hacked the system to get into the school."

  "Why this deception? You risk death if you’re caught!"

  "It's a long story. I figured that I would die a happy man if I got to just meet you once. Call me a hopeless romantic. Anyway, I don't buy into all this high-born stuff. You, milady, are the real deal. The rest of the students aboard this ship are a waste of precious air."

  Arriska stared at him in total shock. One minute he was her precious Tobath, but now he was someone else. She didn't know what to think.

  "Arriska! Snap out of it. Look, you can have me beheaded when things get back to normal, but I need you to focus. I need that headstrong, in-charge, princess back, okay?"

  She looked at him and felt things that a princess should not feel about her betrothed. All she could do was nod.

  "Great. Now we're cooking on a lit stove," he said as he grabbed a pair of keys from a rack and handed her one.

  "Okay, watch what I do," he said as he inserted his key into a slot on the control console. "Take your key and insert it into the slot over there on the console marked with the numeral two."

  She walked over and inserted the key as he instructed. "Now what?" she asked as she found herself unable to stop looking at him.

  "I'll count to five. When I hit three, turn the key to your right," he said as he demonstrated in the air above the console, "when I hit five, turn it to the left." Again, he demonstrated in the air. "Got it?"

  "Yes," she said with a smile.

  "Excellent, milady. Now, one... Two... Three... Turn... Four... Five... Turn." The console lit up as covers retracted revealing controls and indicators. He pressed a button on one of the consoles which activated a computer interface. Arriska watched in awe as the room came alive. "Won't they notice?"

  "No. There's a flaw in the design which masks-out access to the system when the interface is activated. Everything is normal as far as the bridge is concerned. Now, you need to voice-order the computer to go into drive and power self-test."

  "Computer, recognize Arriska," she said.

  "Arriska, Princess of the Realm, recognized."

  "Initiate self-test, drive and power."

  "Self-test initiated. Systems back on line in T minus five hours. Have a nice day."

  The lights in the room went out, replaced by the dim glow of emergency lighting. The covers replaced themselves as the consoles went black. Tobath grabbed the keys and put them in his pocket. He walked over to Arriska and gave her a peck on the forehead. "You are so much more than your peers. None of them hold a candle to you. Come on,” he said as he scanned the passageway. Seeing it was clear, he opened the door, and they dragged the guards out into the corridor and propped them against the wall next to the door. "They'll never know we were here," he said as they ran down the corridor and back to the storeroom.

  Once inside he found himself pushed up against the wall with Arriska kissing him with passion, too much passion for someone of her standing or age. He pushed her away just enough to breath and speak.

 
; "Arriska, stop. We can't do this, not now."

  "Why? Why stop?"

  "Oh, your mother didn't give you the talk, did she?" he said as he worried about his own safety.

  "What talk?"

  "Sex."

  "I know all about sex," she said.

  "Even the part about Royal females killing the male after mating?"

  She stumbled backwards and fell over a crate. He caught her and sat her down on a makeshift seat.

  "That's a legend, a myth."

  "Your mother was very explicit in her description of what would happen when you and I were betrothed. She said it was a royal secret and her concern for my safety seemed to be genuine.

  Calming down, Arriska asked, "What are we going to do now?"

  "I was planning to free the others, retake the Arriska, and destroy that ship in the bay. I would love it if you could find the time to give me a hand."

  She hugged him. "I'm tired," she said.

  "I can imagine." He propped her up and got blankets, which he made into a makeshift bed and pillow. "Here, lie down and take a nap. We've just stirred a nest of ricka rats, and we should give them time to calm down. I'll wake you," he said, but she was already snoring. He covered her and sat on the floor next to her, watching her sleep as he planned their next moves.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Tobath awoke with a start. Next to him Arriska still slept, her breathing regular and mercifully silent after a bought of snoring that could wake the dead. Taking care not to wake her, he stood up and looked around, his night vision allowing him to see in the dim emergency light. He saw nothing, so he started to sit back down thinking it was just a dream when he heard a noise. He stopped and listened. It happened again, a scratching at the door. Someone was attempting to enter the room. He knelt, pulling his weapon with one hand and his scanner with the other. He scanned the hallway and observed eight warm bodies all but one with the wrong blood. The other was Erdexi.

  "Dammit," he whispered as he gently shook the Princess. When he saw her waking he placed a single finger gently on her lips, signaling her to be silent. He showed her the scanner and mouthed the word "hide."