Task Force (Task Force Series)

by Brad Smith

  God, I hate you. His stomach heaved. The vomit poured out of him into the sink. He clutched the edge of it, clinging for dear life. The sobs racked his body. The hot tears dripped down into the sink.

  Ten minutes later, Marlin lay naked on the deck of his quarters. The tears had dried. The sobs had subsided. He played back the events of the day in his head. Rayner. Maybe he had the right idea. His executive officer had shown initiative and the willingness to push the attack. Certainly, a full commitment of both squadrons would have cost more lives. It would have meant writing more letters to the families back home. More nights second–guessing himself. But maybe that was what the ship needed. Maybe.

  He slowly got up from the deck and, without looking in the mirror, washed his face. Twenty minutes later, he was out of the shower and wearing a crisp uniform. The tie was tight around his neck and his creases were sharp. Marlin arrived on the bridge two minutes later. He tried to ignore the crew’s raised eyebrows.

  “Where’s Rayner?” he asked.

  Haraldi turned around. “Sir, he’s in the briefing room putting together a report for Fleet,” he said.

  Marlin let the non–answer go and reviewed the maps on the viewscreen. It showed the position of the rest of the fleet and their distance to the rally point. Eighteen hours until we arrive. And then what?

  Marlin looked down at the tablet with the list of ships and names that were still in the task force. He fumbled with it and then gave up. “Send out an encrypted blast message to Fleet and let them know we’re falling back. Gretus is gone so the highest ranking officer in the task force takes command of the fleet. Let’s see, that would be —.” He played with the tablet again. Oh dear god. “Me.”

  Chapter Nine

  Lieutenant Haraldi stepped off the bridge and wearily made his way back to his quarters. He approached a “T” junction corridor and caught sight of himself in the reflection of the hallway monitors and screen. I look nearly as bad as I feel. He paused in front of the display and patted down his hair, ran his fingers over his face. Something on the display in front of him blinked red. Data Access Alert. The light blinked once more then turned off. Strange. That should have set off alarms all over the ship.

  He walked down a set of large steps towards the depths of the ship. This isn’t even my job. Passing by his quarters, he paused and then kept going. Five more flights of stairs later, he stood outside the entrance to the ship’s data stores. The lights were on in the room. Shouldn’t be anyone in there.

  Haraldi walked further down the hallway and whistled at a passing security team member. He jogged up to Haraldi. “What’s up, lieutenant? Got a problem?”

  Haraldi shrugged. “I’m not sure, Tripps. But the lights are on in Data Control and Storage and they shouldn’t be. Shall we take a look?”

  Inside the large room, the cooling fans buzzed noisily over the rows and rows of mainframes and servers. The lights on the servers blinked busily on and off. Haraldi could barely hear Tripps answer his questions. Finally, he gave up and they walked silently next to each other. They ducked their heads around the far end of each row of mainframes.

  Haraldi spotted it first.

  The young man in a security uniform stood there in front of the keyboard. Haraldi shot Tripps a look. “Excuse me,” Tripps shouted. The young man kept tying. “I said ‘Excuse me’. Why are you in here? Who’s your direct supervisor? Adams?”

  The young man turned towards them, expressionless. The hairs on Haraldi’s neck stood upright. Tripps pointed to the ID badge on the young man’s chest and waited for him to give it. When he didn’t. Tripps unclipped it himself and studied it. Haraldi could feel his heart pounding.

  Tripps shook his head. “This badge – “ he shouted out.

  Suddenly, the young man kicked him in the stomach. Tripps flew backwards to the deck. Haraldi aimed a punch at the young man’s face. As his fist made contact, the young man’s face parted in half and his clenched hand sailed into empty air. Haraldi pulled back his fist and the young man’s face merged back together in an instant. A drop of silver liquid metal landed on the deck. Haraldi’s eyes went wide. Noridian.

  He turned to Tripps. “Pull the alarm! Get your security team down – !” Before he could finish, Haraldi was lifted up above the young man’s head and flung into a server. The metal and glass crashed under him. Tripps scrambled towards the end of the row of mainframes. The young man collapsed into a spherical form and rolled straight at him. The collision sent Tripps into the wall. Haraldi heard him groan.

  The sphere began to smother Tripps. It melted onto his face in a liquid puddle that filled his mouth and nose. Tripps didn’t struggle. Haraldi picked himself up off the pile of smashed computer parts. Spying Ensing Tripps’ personal weapon on the deck, he picked it up and aimed it at the Noridian. The Karenthium coated rounds impacted on the surface of the Noridian as its liquid metal skin poured down through the body of Ensign Tripps. The entity froze in a matter of seconds.

  Haraldi stood over the frozen Noridian, shaking his head. Too late to save Tripps. A minute later, a five–man security team arrived along with a doctor. “We’re going to have to surgically remove that thing from Tripps,” he said, shaking his head. “What do you want us to do with it after that? Airlock it?”

  Haraldi spent a few minutes talking over his comms set.

  “Put it into a glass suspension cell for now,” he finally said.

  Chapter Ten

  The two men sat awkwardly in the briefing room. Neither of them spoke. Rayner kept his head down, focused on the small viewscreen that hung suspended at the front of the room. On the display blinked the words “Encryption Key Validated”. A second later, Fleet Commander Relnick appeared. Marlin saw how much older he appeared than the last time he had seen him. Old and tired. His eyelids drooped and his jaw hung open. The grey stubble peeked out from around his jaw.

  “Captain Marlin. Commander. As you know, Admiral Gretus is dead. You are hereby ordered to take command of the task force and engage the enemy ship at once,” he said. “No more foot dragging. No more retreats. The inhabitants of the border systems are counting on you.”

  He looked over at Rayner. The younger man leaned forward in his chair and held his clenched fists on top of the table.

  Maybe he’s right. Marlin started to speak. Rayner jumped in.

  “With all due respect, Fleet Commander Relnick, I’m not sure Captain Marlin is best suited for this task,” he said. Rayner stared straight ahead at the screen. Marlin slowly turned towards him. His face turned bright red. His cheeks burned.

  “Commander Rayner, I beg your pardon but —,” Marlin began. He slapped his hand on the table.

  Relnick held up a hand. “State your case, commander. And it better be good.”

  “Sir, ever since we started on this mission, the captain has been dragging his feet. I was ordered to keep the Hellmund delayed as long as possible from its arrival at Verada System. We used the excuse of testing and shakedown runs to keep the ship away from the battle for as long as possible,” he said.

  Marlin stood up. “My decisions were made for the safety of the crew. It turned out to be the right call too. We had an accident and we’re still not clear on the causes!”

  Rayner kept focused on the screen. “During the battle with the enemy ship, Captain Marlin refused to dispatch our second squadron against the enemy ship against orders. Had he obeyed, we could have inflicted much more damage on that Noridian vessel. Perhaps even destroyed it.”

  Marlin said nothing. He stared at Relnick in mute rage and disbelief. Relnick’s bushy eyebrows shot up. “Is that so? Captain Marlin disobeyed orders and refused to press his attack? Go on.”

  Rayner breathed out heavily. “Once we started losing pilots, Captain Marlin lost his nerve and pulled back from the attack. Our second squadron was ready to press forward and hit the ship again. His refusal to do so at a critical time cost us the battle.”

  Relnick was quiet for a moment. He looked
at Captain Marlin. “Captain…is this accurate? If you can defend yourself, I’ll relieve your executive officer of his duties. If not…I’m afraid I’ll have no choice but to declare you as unfit for command. I’m waiting on an answer right now.”

  “I don’t have anything to prove to anyone,” Marlin said. “I made my decision to save lives aboard this ship. I watched what happened at the end of the last war. I’ll be damned if that happens again on my watch! Yes, I kept number two squadron from launching. That is correct!”

  By the time Marlin was finished speaking, he was standing up. His arms were folded in front of him. His crisp uniform was now a mess of rogue lines and creases. His tie hung loose and his hair was a gray mess.

  “Well, in that case, you’ve given me no choice but to find you unfit for command,” Relnick said. “Commander Rayner is hereby given command of the Hellmund and the task force. Do you think you can handle that, commander?”

  Rayner nodded eagerly. “Yes, sir. I’ll pursue this vessel as long as required until either it’s destroyed or the Sixth Fleet is gone.”

  Relnick smiled. “That’s the kind of eagerness we were hoping for back here. In the meantime, Captain Marlin is relieved of his duties,” he said. “Captain Marlin, I don’t care where you go or what you do but you’re ordered to stay off the bridge and let Commander…now Captain Rayner – do his job. You’re not being court martialled or jailed –yet. But I want you to find a project – any project – and keep busy with it. I hope that is clear.”

  Marlin walked out of the room without saying a word. Rayner sat alone for a moment with a broad smile on his face.

  Chapter Eleven

  The Vectura sunk down from the upper atmosphere towards the planet Ordin below. Frida stood in the empty cargo bay, peering down through the port window. At first, there was only a series of colors – blues and greens to mark the distinction between water and land. The rusty heap of a ship creaked and moaned as Nidal went through routine landing procedures. Now Frida could see the cities below. The Vectura descended to the capital city and bucked slightly as it touched down on the landing pad.

  Home. Frida stood up and gathered her gear bag. She shielded her eyes reflexively as the cargo bay dropped down with a thud and the outside light swept over her.

  Nidal stood and stretched beside her, looking out at the dirty walls of the starport and the skyline beyond. “You gonna show me around now, Freed? Two days we got here and I sure as shit don’t wanna waste ‘em moping around this starport.”

  Frida turned to her left and smiled at the frail young woman who stood beside her. “You know, Nidal. I think I might be a little too busy to play tour guide this time around. But I’ll bring back a potful of my mom’s homemade partaneese.” If I ever decide to come back to this ship.

  Nidal patted her on the back and shook Frida’s hand. “Well, in case we don’t catch you in time, it’s been good workin’ with you. You got a steady hand on the mechanical loader.” Without waiting for a goodbye, she walked off into the fringes of the starport.

  Frida sat down on the cargo ramp. She keyed her comms with a tap of her glasses. The HUD materialized in front of her eyes and she watched the timer count upwards as it tried to find her mother’s device in the ether of the capital city. Pick up, mom. Please just pick up.

  The numbers continued ticking upwards. A pit formed in the bottom of her stomach. Frida felt like retching and screaming and curling up in the fetal position all at once. She settled for laying back on the cargo door ramp.

  The ground shuddered beneath her. A chorus of screams and panics. An explosion. Another explosion. Frida sat upright and looked outside the starport walls. A beam fell from the sky, slamming straight down into the city. A skyscraper buckled and crumbled in the distance. Mom. Breathing hard, she fumbled with the buttons on the side of the glasses. “No Connection” the HUD flashed again and again. Another beam fell from the sky. She stood there, mesmerized with her mouth agape and eyes wide open. Nidal sprinted past her up the ramp, slamming her left shoulder into Frida’s right shoulder.

  “Come on, Freed! Let’s get the hell outta here!” she shouted. Before Frida could say anything, Nidal was already sitting in the cockpit. The engines spooled up. Mom.

  The walls of the starport buckled and folded downwards towards the ground. Several of the nearby ships were cut to ribbons by flying steel debris. One of the big transports closest to the Vectura already in the air was cut in two by flying debris and shrapnel. Frida screamed as the cargo ramp started to fold up into the ship. She felt her leg give way underneath her and she rolled inside the ship as it lifted into the air and rotated.

  Mom. The tears flowed freely as the ship built up speed, shuddering violently while the engines screamed in protest. Frida had never heard these sounds from the ship before. The G force punched her stomach as the ship angled upwards and made escape velocity. She closed her eyes and wished it would be over soon. The familiar feeling of weightlessness washed over her suddenly before the artificial gravity kicked in a half–second later. Frida could see outside the portal from where she lay on the deck of the cargo ship.

  The planet grew smaller as the Vectura ascended. Cities that dotted the continent had been replaced by scorch marks on the planet’s surface. She looked for her the capital city but it was a blackened smudge.

  Frida turned her head down and let the whine of the ship’s engines try to drown out the sound of her sobs.

  ***

  Captain Rayner looked at the viewscreen. The ships of the task force stood before him. All the ship’s weapons systems were there ready for him – he only needed to say the words and they would unleash hell. The fighters were launched and the torpedoes armed. But there was nothing in front of them except a single lonely cargo ship, not much larger than one of the big wheeled ground transports back on Earth.

  Rayner bit his lip. “No signs of enemies?” he asked. “Confirm again.”

  The cargo shuttle floated helplessly in the dead of space.

  “Sir, I’ve checked again for enemy presence and found nothing,” Haraldi said. “I did, however, check on the cargo ship. It looks like we have a faint life sign aboard the vessel. No response to our queries, sir.”

  Rayner stood near the front of the bridge. “Reel them in. I want a team of Marines to inspect it.”

  The tractor beam descended from the ship towards the cargo shuttle. The small ship turned slowly, diverting from its current course. A minute later, Rayner had forgotten all about it.

  “Uh…sir, you’d better come quick,” Haraldi said again. “I thought this was just a bug before when I made the initial scan…but looking at it now, I think it’s correct.” The image of Ordin on screen showed the dusty continents dotted with blackened scars where cities once stood. “Ordin appears to be…appears to be totally wiped out.”

  Rayner jogged over to Haraldi’s scanner and looked through it. Noridian bastards. All signs of human civilization on the planet appeared to have been completely wiped out of existence. “Well, at least we know we’re on the trail of that enemy ship,” he said. “If it keeps moving in its current pattern, it should be arriving in the Hayes System soon if it hasn’t already. Let’s get the task force ready for another jump as soon as possible.”

  “Should I task some ships to go look for any other survivors?” Haraldi asked. “I’ve already got a half dozen patrol vessels willing to do it, sir.”

  Rayner shook his head. “We need every ship we’ve got. Any survivors will just have to fend for themselves. We’re already wasting precious time by bringing in that cargo ship.”

  ***

  Make myself useful. Marlin muttered to himself as he rounded the ship’s corridors. A junior crew member jumped back in shock. “Sir!” she yelled. She skittered around him, giving him a wide berth. Marlin shook his head. Can’t go back to my room. That’s the way of the bottle. He rounded another corridor. A young man stopped in his tracks at the sight of him and decided suddenly to go into the
nearest room. If I walk around the decks, I have to deal with this bullshit. He found the wide staircase with the directions down to the ship’s hangar bay. Aha.

  Marlin walked into the huge hangar bay, watching as the cargo ship slowly entered. “Reelin’ her in, are you?” he asked Ensign Bletchley. She stood at the control panel and smiled as she worked the stick. The ship’s name, Vectura, was emblazoned on the side of the ship in dark blue letters. There were no lights on inside. No signs of anyone being on board. The SOS light pattern still pulsed on and off from the ship’s emergency communication system.

  A squad of Marines stood at the side of the hangar bay with their assault rifles unslung. The five men were silent and they shifted their weight. The Vectura touched down.

  The first member of the squad looked behind him. He made a hand signal. The team ran to the door and one of them set a scanner up to it. He pushed a few buttons and the door slowly slid open with a hissing noise. The bleach white gasses vented from inside the ship. One of the men in the squad tossed something inside the door and leaned back with his rifle at the ready. A flurry of hand signals were exchanged between the team members.

  Watching Bletchley’s viewscreen, Marlin saw the visual feed from the surveillance device that had just been thrown inside the ship. Darkness. The camera lens scanned around. An empty cargo bay with a body curled in fetal position near the ramp.

  The squad disappeared inside the ship, their rifles held up, ready to fire. The Marines moved quickly, bringing their rifles to bear all around them. The man in front leveled his weapon at the body on the floor. There was a soft groan. Another squad member approached it from the side and attached a bioscanner to the body’s arm. The other men in the squad entered the cockpit, shouting orders at each other in what sounded like controlled chaos.