by M. D. Cooper
In front of Tanis, part of the shimmersuit flickered, turning black, and then red around the area the wand had struck. From the height, and bits of exposed teeth, it was safe to say it was Kris’s jaw.
“Bet you wish you’d surrendered now.” Tanis reached out and ripped the lightwand free.
The woman staggered back, but didn’t make a sound. She must have pain suppressors.
Wordlessly, Kris pulled two thin blades from what Tanis guessed were her forearms. With most of the shimmersuit still functional, they appeared to float in midair.
The blades began a deadly dance and Tanis blocked with her pulse rifle, narrowly avoiding losing an arm in the first flurry of blows. The man was still cursing as he bent over the nuke, trying to do battle with Angela’s nano—though it was likely his AI was doing most of the fighting.
Tanis blocked an overhand blow from Kris and followed up by driving the butt of her weapon into the woman’s chest. Kris fell back and the shimmersuit failed, reverting to a glossy black.
“So much for your unfair advantage.” Tanis pointed the pulse rifle at the woman’s head. “Now drop the blades and put your hands behind your head.”
The woman snorted, a sound that didn’t work well with part of her face sliced open, and raised her right hand. As a static shield sprung out of her forearm Angela fed an intercepted Link communication to Tanis:
Tanis dashed over to the man and held one rifle on him, while firing several shots in Kris’s direction with the other.
“I’m going to have to ask you to step away from the nuke, Mister.”
He didn’t even look up, frantically working the manual interface, using every possible edge to stay ahead of Angela.
“Fine, have it your way,” Tanis muttered before smashing a fist into his face. The blow forced him to his knees and Angela signaled approval.
At the far end of the engineering bay two men stepped through the hatch and leveled large caliber slug throwers at Tanis.
Kris helped Trent to his feet and they backed out of the engineering bay as the hail of bullets pinned Tanis down.
“It was nice meeting you.” The man called out. “You may have disrupted our little event today, but I’ll make sure you get a front row seat for the encore.”
The pair slipped past the two heavy weaponers, who turned and followed them out. Overwhelming silence filled the bay.
Tanis stood and looked at the damage caused to the Steel Dawn III’s engine bay. “Why do I get the feeling this was the easy part?”
CHAPTER 2
STELLAR DATE: 3227162 / 07.28.4123 (Adjusted Gregorian)
LOCATION: Mars Outer Shipyards (MOS)
REGION: Mars Protectorate, Sol Space Federation
“Well, I can see you get right to work.”
Tanis looked up from her cup of coffee to see two men entering the sector chief’s office where she was finishing up her report with Chief Ian. She spotted four stars on the collar of the man who had spoken and rose before snapping off a salute. “Thank you, sir.”
He returned the salute. “I’m Admiral Sanderson and this is Captain Andrews of the Intrepid.”
“Impressive work, Major Richards,” the captain said.
“Thank you, sir,” Tanis replied. “It was a pretty easy decision. Stop them, or get blown up.”
“I’m sure there was more to it than that.” Captain Andrews gave her a warm smile. The admiral was smiling too, but it was more of a grim, got-a-job-to-do sort of smile. He cast an unreadable look at Captain Andrews as they both sat.
Tanis took a moment to examine the two men as they all got comfortable. Each was older than her; a quick records check showed Admiral Sanderson as having just passed his three-hundred and fiftieth birthday. She already knew of Captain Andrews; he was an old spacer, born over a thousand years earlier. Much of his life had been spent in stasis making the run between Sol and Alpha Centauri. Because he was recently returned from an interstellar journey, none of the images of him were recent and she was somewhat surprised to see visible aging.
Angela commented.
“I didn’t expect you two to come down here.” Chief Ian of MSF pulled Tanis out of her private conversation as he addressed the captain and admiral. “Though I can’t say I’m surprised either.”
“Someone tries to detonate a nuke three klicks from where my girl’s tied up, you’d better expect I’d come down here.” Captain Andrews’ expression brooked no argument.
“Will Stevens be joining us?” Admiral Sanderson asked.
Tanis looked up the reference and found that Stevens was the MOS stationmaster. Her TSF security clearances brought up additional data pertaining to several complaints the stationmaster had filed against the Intrepid for incoming shipments causing disruptions on the station.
Tanis suddenly realized she hadn’t checked on Patty or Eric. Emergency Response Status would have ID’d the dead, so Tanis accessed their net. The list scrolled over her HUD and she felt her heart drop as their names slid past. She made a note. There should be a memorial for the dead, and she would contact their relatives.
She returned her attention to the conversation around her to hear Chief Ian explaining the stationmaster’s whereabouts. Apparently he was down on Mars for a meeting with the Marsian government.
“And getting a strip torn off him, no doubt.” Captain Andrews glowered. “It’s what he gets for letting a god damn nuke get smuggled onto his station.”
“Now Captain, we don’t know that nuke didn’t come in
on the Steel Dawn III,” Chief Ian countered.
“If I may...” Tanis waited for a nod from Admiral Sanderson before continuing. “There were no abnormal emissions on our trip from Earth to indicate the nuke was with us during transit. It could have been stowed behind some sort of shielding on the ship, but frankly I don’t know where that could be. Every shielded location is heavily monitored. Also, on my way out I saw scuff marks on the bulkheads that indicated the nuke came from the dock.”
“Still, you can’t be sure.” The chief’s jaw was set at a stubborn angle.
“She’s right.” A man with commander’s bars stood in the doorway. “Sir.” He addressed Admiral Sanderson. “You asked me to keep you advised of what we found. It turns out the device was brought on board MOS a week ago on a small transport. It was stored in a nearby holding facility until today when it was moved to this sector as it was marked for the Dawn’s return trip to Earth.”
“Thank you, Commander,” Sanderson said. “Will you join us? This is Major Richards; she will be heading up your security unit going forward.”
Tanis kept surprise from showing on her face. She looked the commander up and saw he was Joseph Evans, a TSF pilot added to the colony roster several months ago. Initially his duties consisted of piloting assembly craft, but according to the records several acts of sabotage resulted in his transfer to ship’s security. As the ranking TSF officer the admiral placed him in command. Knowing that a flyboy ran security gave Tanis new insight into why her interview had seemed so perfunctory. These folks were desperate and apparently needed someone with her skills.
The knowledge raised more questions. Why didn’t an operation like this have the cream of the crop available to run security, and why hadn’t she heard of sabotage on a GSS ship?
“Yes, sir.” Commander Evans nodded to the admiral, and gave Tanis a long look as he sat down. It was either a look of guarded relief, or territorial disgruntlement.
“We’re damn lucky you were on that ship, Major,” Captain Andrews said. “My report indicates that the blast would have taken out over ten percent of the shipyard, and while it wouldn’t have completely destroyed the Intrepid, it certainly would have set the launch date back. Way back.”
“That’s not something we can tolerate,” Sanderson growled. “That damn Dakota down at the MIS is beating its milestones every month. If we have many more setbacks we’re going to have to prove ourselves to get the colony assignment.”
Tanis knew the Dakota was proceeding well, but she hadn’t realized it stood a real chance of moving up its completion date. Looking up the data Tanis realized if the other GSS ship maintained its accelerated timetable and the Intrepid kept slipping, New Eden’s assignment would be referred to an advisory board and could be assigned to the other ship.
“It’s getting bad. Those radicals are getting bolder every week,” Chief Ian said.
Tanis shook her head. “Those were no radicals on that ship; they were too well armed and equipped. I expect that will be confirmed when they are interrogated, sirs.”
“Are you sure?” The admiral’s eyes narrowed. “All of our information points towards this being the work of small cells of anti-colonization groups.”
“As certain as I can be at this point,” Tanis replied. “They were far too well equipped, as I said. Consider that they took the dockside; then the ship. Within minutes they disabled the AI were hauling a nuke on board. They would have detonated it too if Angela hadn’t already had the training on disabling devices of that design. All of this was accomplished in a matter of minutes.
“I’ve worked against anti-colonist, anti-expansion groups before. They are determined, but they aren’t that well set up. The folks we were up against had serious credit and decent talent behind them.”
“If you say so.” The admiral shrugged. “If the evidence bears that out you will report it to me. In your capacity as head of the Intrepid’s security, I will be your commanding officer; however, since you are a colonist and are on Captain Andrew’s boat, you will also be under his direction.”
Ignoring his ship being referred to as a boat, Captain Andrews spoke to Tanis. “Did you notice anything else of interest?”
“Well, for starters, that nuke was military grade, and their nano was up to spec as well. Angela had considerable difficulty handling them and disabling the weapon. Also, their personal armaments were military grade.”
“I wasn’t made aware of that,” the admiral interrupted.
Tanis looked at Commander Evans. She didn’t want to show him up in front of the admiral and captain, but pussyfooting around really wasn’t an option. “TSF doesn’t use them, but they’re a recent spec for Jovian and Scattered World space forces. One of the operatives, a woman named Kris, also had one of the best shimmersuits I’ve ever seen. It incorporated sound-cancelling emitters Angela had to take out before we could even hear her move.”
Commander Evans whistled, and the captain nodded in agreement. “That does sound like better stuff than you’d expect some radicals to have.”
Admiral Sanderson shook his head. “Let’s hope not. I prefer radicals; they’re not nearly as messy. If what you say is true, this could be coming from a government or a major corporation.” He leaned forward, looking at each person in turn. “I don’t have to tell you that it is imperative we keep the media from this. If they start posting stories about the Intrepid being under attack by unknown, well-funded terrorists, we’ll have the folks down on the Dakota all over the GSS for preliminary hearings.”
His gaze lingered on the chief for more than a moment and Tanis glanced up to see the man fidgeting.
“Yes, sir,” he said. Tanis was impressed with how the admiral’s cold gaze could elicit compliance even from people outside his chain of command. Or in the chief’s case, not even in the same military.
“I’ve caught wind of some issues with the schedule and security. How many breaches have there been?” Tanis asked.
Captain Andrews laughed. “This one’s not afraid to ask questions.”
Admiral Sanderson sighed as he leaned back in his chair. “I know. It’s both the best and worst part of being an MICI officer.”
Captain Andrews answered. “There have been several dozen. None like today, but cumulatively they are affecting the schedule. I think we’ve beaten that horse to death, so I won’t belabor the point. You know what’s at stake.”
“I understand, sir,” Tanis said.
“Good. Commander Evans will brief you on his progress on the Dawn so far and then show you to the Intrepid. You’ve got a lot to catch up on and I want security very tight tomorrow night at the ball,” Admiral Sanderson instructed.
“Ball?” Tanis shot the admiral a querying look.
Captain Andrews gave another rich, warm laugh. Tanis wondered if she was the butt of some joke, but his smile appeared genuine and she found herself liking the man despite his odd choice of hair color.
“Joseph will fill you in on that—I’m sure he’ll be overjoyed at not having to oversee the event.” Captain Andrews smiled. “You’ll find that despite our tight schedule we are still required to hobnob with all the deep wallets that keep this sort of thing afloat.”
Sanderson didn’t let a lip twitch. He rose, as did Tanis and Commander Evans. He snapped off a salute which they both returned and left the chief’s office. Captain Andrews stood after the admiral left and clasped Commander Evans on the shoulder before he followed the admiral into the hall.
Chief Ian breathed a deep sigh once they left the room.
“If my report is satisfactory…” Tanis said to the chief.
He didn’t even glance at it as he nodded and waved them out of his office. Once in the corridor outside his office, Commander Evans chuckled. “He’s got a stash of vodka in his desk he likes to dip into at times like this; it's far more important than your report.”
Tanis’s brow furrowed. “Pe
ople are smuggling nukes onto his station and he’s getting sloshed? No wonder folks can slip anything under his nose.”
The commander shot her a glance. “Hey, there are still a lot of hardworking people doing their best to keep things safe. Keep in mind that the security team on the Intrepid is a mix of GSS, TSF, MOS security, MSF and ship’s security. We have to step carefully.” He paused and took a deep breath. “Sir.”
Tanis calmed herself and gave Commander Evans an understanding look. “Those are a lot of toes you’re dancing around. I see why you may have to tread lightly. But I don’t have to like it, and frankly, I may not bother with it.”
The commander’s eyes darted momentarily and Tanis was fairly certain he was viewing information on his HUD. Even though moving the eyes was not necessary to focus on any part of a data overlay, most people couldn’t help the reflex. It was a handy tell.
“I suppose that’s your MO; run in full burn and sort things out later. Let those under you pay the price.” As he spoke, Commander Evans’ body language had changed. Previously he had been alert and slightly defensive, now he appeared guarded, his arms were crossed and his eyes were dark.
“Have my file up, do you?” Tanis’s expression was grave. “I won’t deny I’ve earned a lot of my reputation for being straightforward, but I suspect you are referring to one incident in particular.”
“It does tend to stand out.” He nodded slowly.
“I’m not going to justify it; I don’t need to explain my actions to you.” While Tanis didn’t need to justify herself to a junior officer she did need to have this man’s support and assistance. “But I will tell you this. Were the VA of that event ever to be released, and I think it should be, people wouldn’t be calling it the ‘Toro Massacre’ anymore.” And I’d have my respect and proper rank back, Tanis added to herself.
