Seeker of Moons (Cassidy's Command Book 1)

by Geoff Workman

  “Seven Moons,” echoed around the table.

  Kyle enjoyed the meal, especially the beer which was sweeter than he remembered, he would have liked more but understood more would not be good on the eve of a fight. Everyone seemed a bit melancholy as they sat chatting and after a while started to drift back to their quarters. Last on the bridge were Esther and Kyle, the former gazing into the large front viewing monitor. He came up beside her and said softly, “What are you looking at?”

  “Just look at the stars Kyle, they are so beautiful and tonight may be the last time we see them.”

  “Don’t say that Esther, we will do a good job tomorrow, we will be able to celebrate and get out of here just like I promised you.”

  “I know, it’s just sometimes it all seems a bit too much and I am not sure I would have got through this far without Ivan Freeman and of course you as well.”

  “No Esther, it is down to you and I guess as it is your bridge watch I had better leave you to it but in case we don’t speak, Good Luck tomorrow.” He desperately wanted to hug her but knew it was likely to end badly.

  He was just turning away when she made a grab for the collar of his fatigues and spun him around even though he was taller than her. The next thing Kyle knew, Esther had moved in to kiss him with one long and passionate embrace. When they finished, she pulled away and he noticed that there were tears in her eyes but her manner suggested that it was as far as she would take it.

  “OK Trooper, I am in dereliction of duty and need to get back on watch, you need to get some rest, see you and the others tomorrow.”

  Chapter 4

  The War Begins

  Kyle half hoped for a knock on the door from Bambi but it did not come, he drifted in and out of sleep.

  He was dreaming of the Offenders Institute at Willow and the fights he had gotten into there through use of his big mouth, when he had not learned to keep it under control. At the outset he got beaten up pretty badly, but he learned and took advice from other inmates. The day he won his first fist fight was the turning point, he had his food tokens stolen by one of the scrotes from ‘B’ wing, a known bully and thug. Kyle was just getting the tokens out to pay for his meal when the scrote just snatched them straight out of his hand and stood there laughing.

  “You gotta problem boy?” challenged the scrote, who was attracting a crowd in the refectory by his shouting and showing off.

  Kyle was thinking to himself, use your brain not your anger, he put his food tray down and with one swift movement picked up an empty one from the carousel, without stopping he brought it around in an arc, slashing the scrote across the windpipe with its rough edge. Although he was shocked by the ferocity of the attack, a scratch on his throat would not finish him. This young lad needed a lesson, he took one step forward but was met by a huge uppercut to his overgrown stomach, followed by another and another. Rocking already, he did not even see the upward punch to his jaw and with a crack of bone and teeth, fell backwards when trying to get back on his feet he collapsed in a heap.

  The warders came running having heard the disturbance but no one had seen anything, the scrote was lying on the floor and needed taking to the infirmary. Sticking to the prisoners code on informing he said that somebody hit him from behind but didn’t see who.

  It wasn’t the last fight Kyle had had in jail but from then on he earned respect from the inmates and also had the confidence to fight his corner when it was necessary.

  It was time to get up according to the alarm on the communicator unit, which then illuminated to show a picture of Esther in her full armour with visor back so that her face could be seen. “Time to shake a leg Getaway, the last training session begins in Hangar 2 in thirty minutes, so if you want breakfast you had better get moving. Good Luck Kyle, I mean Getaway.”

  “Good Luck yourself Esther, I mean Sub, see you later!”

  He suited up, tested the suit systems, all were fully charged or fully functional, he examined his Dominator rifle, it too was charged and a quick inspection showed it ready for use. He thought he should test its ability to link to the suit so flicked down the visor and checked the red rifle icon was there, which it was, as were the sub menus. All OK, so it’s off to war then.

  There was only Bambi waiting at the Hanger and as they both had visors up they looked into each other’s eyes, “I thought I might see you last night Bambi,” said Kyle.

  “I thought about it but I think we need all our energy today and besides I wanted to do some thinking.”

  “Anything you want to tell me about?”

  “No, well at least not just yet.”

  “That’s OK, just remember I will be around if you need me” and he tapped her arm with his armoured fist.

  She had no time to answer, “Here come the others,” warned Bambi and in strode Freeman, flanked by Buzz and Shiner.

  “It seems that all of you skipped breakfast, don’t worry it’s normal before a battle. Our latest area scan shows that our visitors are four hours away, which means we have around an hour and three quarters to practice, then we need to hide in the blacked out room where you found Pixie and I.”

  “What about Pixie and the Sub?” asked Bambi.

  “To some extent they need to act as bait because the pirates will know that the ships systems have been repaired and it may give us a slight edge if they think that they only have two people to deal with.”

  The next hour or so went very quickly as they practised standing and shooting, running and shooting and rolling and shooting. Single shots, sustained bursts and the manual function all were tried with varying degrees of success.

  An alarm on Freeman’s visor display indicated that training was over and they packed their gear to head off to the hiding place. Once there, they could see that some tidying up had taken place since their last visit and the viewing screens in the room replicated images from the bridge cams.

  Freeman confided, “This is the worst part team, the waiting, I want to run through our battle plan, gather round” and the others sat down, visors up listening intently.

  First up, keep an eye on the charge status of your armour and the carbine, there is a charge point in the room and you should be able to top up your equipment while we are in here.

  There will be a point when we have visual contact with the enemy and I want us to be ready for them. The pirates have three possible air locks they could use, ‘Delta’, ‘Echo’ or ‘Gamma’ and we will know which one before we leave this room. Each is accessed by a single personnel door and a vehicle wide drop down door, this means we have to prepare to meet the boarders from both access points.

  The single doors will be covered by Buzz on the left and myself on the right, the drop down door will be secured by Bambi left, Shiner right and Getaway at the centre. Any questions so far?”

  Kyle had been listening intently, especially as he seemed to have the most dangerous holding position, his question concerned the flexibility of the plan if the pirates only used one of the doors.

  “A good question Getaway and indeed it would be our dream scenario, as the team from the unused door will push through into the air lock and fire along the queue waiting to use the other door.”

  With no other questions Freeman carried on, “Do not fire until you get the signal from me on your helmet comms. Right now, visit your visor display and make sure that automatic sustained burst is selected on weapons link, keep your safety catch on but disengage immediately on arrival at your firing position.”

  Bambi put her hand up, “Excuse me sir, what do we do if any of them surrender?”

  “That’s tough to answer, you saw the training vid and they can keep fighting even after they have supposedly surrendered, but if safe to do so force them to the ground and deprive them of weapons, then we will take it from there.”

  Buzz broke in, “Perish the thought, but what about our casualties?”

  “If you are hit, stay down, try to activate the medikit built into the armour by accessin
g your visor menu and wait for help. There is an ER room on board staffed by Hu-mechys and although shut down at the moment it will start up as soon as their door is opened.”

  Suddenly the comms unit in the room burst into life and Esther’s face appeared on screen. “This is it team, an unidentified ship is making an approach run towards us. We have conducted a lifescan of the ship and there are indications of a compliment of between thirty and forty occupants.”

  Freeman whistled at the news, “We were expecting between twenty and thirty, OK thanks Sub, can you tell which air-lock yet?”

  “Sorry Secom, I will get back to you as soon as there is an update but you will pick them up on screen any minute.”

  As Esther had indicated a dark silhouette began to materialise on the view screens, banking around towards the air locks of the Seven Moons. As it grew closer Freeman informed the group that the visitors were using one of their own Tenders, which had been stolen in the original raid.

  Esther came on-line again, “It’s Gamma lock, repeat Gamma lock, go to it and Good Luck everybody.”

  “We’ll see you later,” said Freeman as brightly as he could.

  Freeman held his fist in the centre of the group and all the others held a fist against it, “For us and the Moons,” he shouted. “For us and the Moons,” echoed the others.

  Secom took the lead, dropped his visor, slung his ‘Dominator’ across his chest and strode with power out of the room. He led the group at a canter to ‘Gamma’ air lock where they took their allotted positions and waited.

  Kyle checked his gun for probably the fourth time, safety off and auto linking on, come on, come on let’s get this over.

  The air-lock warning light came on in the outside corridor and all doors were solidly locked to prevent accidental entry. There was a discernible rumble from behind the wall, indicating the arrival of a heavy vehicle and after what seemed an eternity the door locks shot back and the safe to go light came on above the door.

  Each of the defenders stole a glimpse at the screen in the corridor, which monitored the air lock and already the Tender was spewing its occupants out.

  Whether they had confidence in their numbers or whether they just didn’t understand military protocol, they sauntered in groups towards the larger door behind which hid Kyle, Bambi and Shiner.

  Somebody on the other side must have pressed the open button and it gradually started to rise. Kyle dropped to his knees so that he could fire early and Bambi and Shiner copied him. Still no word from Freeman and Kyle could now see the legs and feet of the boarders, the door continued to rise, then the urgent voice came into his helmet, “Go, Go, Go.”

  Kyle knew he had to be first, he fought back the lump in his throat and released a steady stream of electrified plasma from his Dominator towards the centre of the group who were trying to come through the door. The shouts and screams from those at the front would have been terrible to hear, if he could have heard them. He kept his finger on the trigger and more electric blue streams shot out from his rifle, he could see the green and yellow streams coming from Bambi and Shiner’s guns, also finding their targets in the packed throng.

  The sprawl of attackers began to back off and started to spread out from the disorganised column, but more worryingly some were now returning fire, the doorway made a good aiming point for them and already a couple of projectile shots had pinged off his armour.

  Time to move thought Kyle and spoke into his helmet mic, “Bambi, Shiner time to move out, on me fifty yards right and keep firing as you go.”

  They ran, they rolled, and they fired and as they moved into the large air lock, their armour subtly changed now being a grey silver colour to blend with the background. Streams of colourful bright sizzling plasma tried to track them down and projectile shots bounced off the walls behind them, but whereas the pirates were having difficulty locating their targets, the computer controlled shots from the Dominator carbines found target after target, resulting in splintered armour or burning flesh. In the short window that they were stationary they were able to direct a withering fire into the centre of the pirate group, but the ones who were breaking away on the left and right flanks were starting to find their range and accuracy.

  Kyle and both his team mates had taken hits of varying degrees though none had broken the surface of their armour as yet, but he realised that multiple hits in the same area could prove fatal. There was still half the invading force fighting, but where were Freeman and Buzz?

  The answer arrived quickly and deadly, instead of rushing the air lock all guns blazing, the pair by the small door had crept in on the left hand side whilst everyone else was distracted by the existing fire fight. Once they drew level with the main action Freeman opened up on the rear of the left hand flank and dropped the breakaway group of five with his first burst. On the right flank Buzz took down another four or five, who died before they knew they were under attack.

  The remaining centre group were now facing a firestorm of well-directed plasma, seeking out any movement and the return fire finally started to diminish as the remaining ten or eleven pirates had to try and fight on two fronts.

  One of the main problems the Seven Moon defenders were now encountering was that there were so many bodies on the ground, surviving pirates were able to shelter behind them so the rifle’s auto sensors were having difficulties framing a clean target.

  Recognising the problem Kyle instructed Bambi to cease fire and move twenty five yards to the left and ten in on the centre and for Shiner to do the same on the right. “OK guys when you are in position switch back to manual and try to snipe the remaining pirates, aim for the source of their plasma flashes or anything that moves.”

  This initially worked very well as the first two pirates who tried a shot died in agony a second after, from return fire. At the rear of the circle Freeman and Buzz were having a similar success using the same tactic.

  Somewhere in the middle of the smoking, twitching mess of bodies, the scanners showed that there were still another five hostiles out there. These were the smart ones, they understood that by firing back they attracted death so they just stayed still on the ground.

  Freeman came over the helmet speaker, “Keep alert, this may not work but I want to give it a go.”

  “Pirate scum, you are surrounded by a superior military force, drop your weapons, raise your hands, step forward and surrender.”

  A gruff voice answered, “You are going to be in so much trouble when our Boss finds out about this, Darko will have you all roasted alive, why don’t you surrender to us and we will be kind and let you go for a walk outside.”

  As the chat was going on there was a sudden movement and three pirates got up from the group of bodies, raced for the large open door and straight at Bambi, who was in their path. Kyle managed to drop the second of the runners and Bambi the first but the third one who was wearing a full set of armour ran straight into her at full speed knocking her over. The pirate raised his projectile weapon and was just about to let Bambi have it at point blank range when Kyle crashed into him at full speed. There was an audible crunch as they came together before they both rolled over and over, dropping their guns in the process.

  As both protagonists struggled to their feet they faced each other about ten feet apart and Kyle noted the glint of steel in the pirates hand, it was a boning knife, sharp and deadly and if it found a joint in his armour he was in serious trouble.

  There were a few seconds to spare before the attack came, Kyle used it to search his visor menus for anything that could help, quickly opening the power distribution menus he switched max power from legs to arms and locked the setting to one hundred and fifty percent.

  The pirate moved forward sensing an easy kill, he was not aware of the strength of Kyle’s armour, or its other abilities.

  “You gonna get hurt Troopy, I’m going to cut your heart right out and eat it in front of you.” The knifeman made a series of lunges, which Kyle avoided and he then decided to
turn the tables. As the next lunge came in, he simply grabbed the knife in his armoured gauntlet and with the extra power flowing through his upper limbs he was able to yank the knife out of the pirates despairing grip. “Troopy, what are you? You cannot be human,” and the blank facemask only heightened the impression of facing a dispassionate killer.

  The following events Kyle would probably remember for the rest of his life with great remorse. He dropped the knife on the floor and strode towards the now unarmed pirate, who tried to land a large forehand at Kyle’s head but again all he did was swot the blow away. He then reached forward very quickly, grabbing the pirate by the throat and squeezed with an iron grip, by lifting his adversary off the floor with his super strength it wasn’t long before a lifeless corpse was dropped to the ground.

  The elation of self-preservation was not all Kyle felt, he felt good, he felt invincible but he didn’t like how he felt. It soon passed and a dark feeling of sorrow for killing a man in such a way took over and he sat on the ground with his head in his hands, sobbing.

  “Getaway, Kyle, Kyle are you ok?” An increasingly desperate Bambi shouted into her helmet mic as she shook the limp form of her team mate. The voice gradually got through and starting to pull himself together, he began to get back to his feet. “Sorry Bambs I wasn’t in a good place just then. What’s our situation?”

  “The good news is, the attackers have to all intents and purposes been neutralized but the bad news is we have taken casualties.”

  This made Kyle feel a lot less sorry for himself and he demanded to know who the casualties were. Bambi lead him to Shiner who was propped up against a wall, his visor was up and his face indicated he was in some pain though heavily medicated. Bambi picked up their stricken friend’s arm and a number of black burn marks indicated plasma hits on the forearm, with one of the burn marks having a double ring indicating a hit in the same place twice.