by Terry Mixon
A handy canyon provided them with cover against casual sightings. As far as she knew, no one was actively looking for any Fleet personnel or vessels, but that could change at a moment’s notice.
Her team was going over every piece of equipment Marcus had sent. It was sufficient for just about any problem. Each of her people had a suit of Old Empire powered armor. Not the pantywaist kind like the princess wore, but the full up gear.
Nothing short of an anti-ship weapon could hurt them here in the New Terran Empire. But they could deal out pain to anyone else. They had heavy weapons of every kind. Plasma cannon suitable for the armor and flechette rifles of similar size. If they had to strike somewhere, they’d get in.
There were also stunners made to a size appropriate to an armored marine. The Old Empire hadn’t felt the need for anything like that, but Princess Kelsey had made the design and creation of such a weapon a priority so they could stun the living crap out of any unfortunates in their way.
While they checked everything, she manned the officer’s console and the drones slaved to it. Those were even stealthier than the pinnace. She had them crisscrossing the area around the capital looking for Talbot.
Every ten kilometers, they sent a pulse that would activate his retrieval beacon. That would eventually catch someone’s notice, but they’d still be devilishly hard to pinpoint.
All of this helped keep her mind off the fact the admiral and princess were prisoners. Locked away in the Imperial Palace. If she thought about it too long, she became tempted to go get them.
Carl was up in the cockpit. He’d wanted to use a console for something and there was no flight engineer aboard right now. That kept him out of her hair. Let the pilots deal with him.
Having him out of sight also kept her from reconsidering her feelings about him. It was unsettling. He looked like a kid, but he’d put it all on the line to fight for her. That had to count for something. She just wasn’t sure what.
The console pinged for her attention. One of the probes had just detected a marine recovery beacon. Talbot had already activated it.
“Heads up, people! We have a customer! Wrap up your inspections and armor up.”
Carl came scrambling back from the cockpit. “You found him?”
“Sure did. The beacon says he’s alive an in relatively good health. A broken arm, a minor gunshot to the same arm, and a mild concussion. I’m relocating other drones to triangulate the signal and scout the area. Once we’re sure where he is, we’ll check to see if it’s a trap.”
“And if it is?”
She smiled like a shark. “Then we go in even harder. Strap in up front. This is about to get exciting.”
* * * * *
They’d come for Talbot early. A number of armed men and a shock weapon of some kind kept him from getting overly exuberant while he used the bathroom.
Then they’d strapped him back down and taken him to a lab. The medical scanners looked top of the line for the New Terran Empire. Everyone wore old-fashioned medical masks, but he recognized his captor standing off to the side. He made sure to get a better recording of him.
They’d only just begun when his recovery beacon changed status. Someone had responded with a coded pulse. It was intended to reassure an injured marine that CSAR was on the way.
Combat Search and Rescue crews were tough people, armed to the gills to fight off any threat to their patients. Not that he expected it was CSAR coming for him. This facility was going to have a marine combat team on their ass before too long.
One of the scientists frowned. “He has the indicated equipment, and some extras that I can’t identify. How the hell did they get that thing in his brain?”
A woman beside him shrugged. “Done is done. Focus on identifying what you can. Like this node inside his body behind the lungs. It seems to be linked to his nervous system. And…is that a signal? I think it’s broadcasting a signal in a frequency range we don’t use.”
Talbot killed the beacon. He needed to keep his captors in the dark as long as possible.
Their leader came over and looked at the screen. “What kind of transmission?”
The woman shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s gone now.”
He frowned at Talbot. “What was that? Were you signaling someone?”
“Would I still be here if I was? Part of my gear checks for connections to my armor every hour. It’s an automated thing. The range is no more than a hundred yards.”
The man didn’t look as though he were buying that explanation. “Can you estimate the range of the signal you detected, Doctor J?”
“Certainly more than a hundred yards,” the woman said. “Perhaps ten or fifteen kilometers.”
“I hope you’re a better marine than a liar. We’re a long way from anything and our scanners would tell us if anyone was that close. Nevertheless, we need to make it clear to you that sending signals is a very bad idea.”
He reached over to a table of instruments and picked up a laser scalpel. Talbot tensed, but that didn’t help at all when the man cut a long, deep slice into the marine’s arm.
Talbot screamed. He couldn’t help it. It hurt like the devil. He wished he had one of those fancy pharmacology units like Kelsey. One with drugs to deaden the pain. Well, if wishes were horses, he’d be ass deep in horseshit.
“If you behave, I’ll have them regenerate that,” the man said cordially. “If not, I’ll cut off some fingers. We wouldn’t want that, would we?”
Talbot shook his head, his teeth clenched tightly. He had no choice. Hopefully, whoever it was had gotten a good read on him.
* * * * *
Carl watched everything from the flight engineer’s console. The pilots were working on their approach and had no time for him. The marines were armored up and ready to go. All they had to do was locate Talbot.
The probe had lost the major’s signal before they could triangulate a precise location. That didn’t mean there was no data, though. They had almost thirty seconds of recorded transmissions to work with.
The flight engineer’s console wasn’t optimized for data manipulation, but Carl always carried his best tools in his implants. It only took a minute to update the console and start analyzing the data.
Yes, he could see the signal strength changing as the probe moved. Assuming the major was stationary, that should allow him to infer a rough target area since they had a good idea of the direction from which the signals were coming.
He knew Angela was trying to do the same thing, but she was playing against his strengths now. This was science, baby!
Using the known quantity of the beacon’s signal strength, Carl could estimate distance. If Talbot was underground, the signal would be weaker, but he could work with that.
The probe had traveled a good way in those thirty seconds and the signal strength had grown at a steady rate. That made the case for Talbot being stationary even stronger.
Carl brought up a map of the target area. He eliminated the locations that didn’t match the direction of the transmission. Using the strength of the signal and the estimated direction, he put the data through several of his custom algorithms.
That focused him in on a particular stretch of land. Empty forest. Old growth, possibly untouched since the Fall.
He turned the console loose on examining the compiled weather satellite images for the last ten years and it popped back with a possible anomaly. He looked at the autumn images and magnified them.
There. The trees had lost their leaves late in the season and that looked like a building. A very well concealed one.
“I found him, I think,” he said over the com.
“Show me,” Angela said.
“Sending now. There’s a building hidden in the forest at about the right area. I can’t be completely sure he’s there, but it should be enough to send a probe in.”
“Good work. You might just have saved his life. I’m sending a probe in now.”
Carl monitored the probe as it ghos
ted in using only passive scanners. Yes, that was a building and it was occupied. Three, no four guards sat in a pair of concealed blinds that had a great overview of the entire forest around them. There were even more people inside.
“Jackpot,” Angela said. “We go in hard and fast. Let the lookouts scream. We’ll send an override signal once we get inside to reactivate Talbot’s beacon. Then we converge on his location. Stay nonlethal, if possible. I want prisoners.”
A chorus of oorahs came back at her from the marine team.
“Lieutenant Veracruz, pick the best looking ingress route to the target. We’ll drop out the back and call if we need fire support. I’ll designate people to watch the towers. If they look dangerous to you, the support team will take them out.”
“Aye, ma’am. We can start the run at your command. Forty-five seconds to drop zone once we go.”
“Everyone ready? Execute the run, Lieutenant.”
The pinnace banked and accelerated hard. Carl cinched his restraints tighter and loaded Angela’s suit visuals into his implants. This was going to be just like a first person shooter.
* * * * *
The pinnace screamed over the target with no warning. The probes told Angela they’d taken the sentries completely off guard.
The ramp dropped right on the mark and she threw herself out of the pinnace with her team. They’d practiced drops like this in the simulators, but nothing beat the first time going at it for real.
They fell from a height of a hundred meters right toward the trees. She kicked in her suit’s grav unit to slow her fall and dodge the worst of the limbs.
First squad split off to cover the lookouts. The rest of them landed on the roof of the concealed building. A shaped charge opened it and they dropped in, weapons at the ready.
“Imperial Marines,” she said over her external speakers. It made her voice echo from every nook and cranny on the floor. “Lay down your weapons and surrender. Resistance will be met with lethal force.”
The first man she saw ran, but he wasn’t armed. She left him to one of the others. A blue stunner beam took him down.
Two more men ran around the corner and opened fire with automatic weapons. Corporal Riviera made an example of them with his flechette rifle. A swarm of metal darts tore them apart. And the wall behind them.
“That’ll make them duck faster next time,” he said with some satisfaction. “The major’s beacon is online. He’s several levels below us. Stairs or the easy way?”
She pulled a plasma grenade and tossed it down the long hall. Her helmet feed blocked the worst of the light when it detonated. Kelsey was right. It did sound like the end of the world.
They dropped through two levels with that one massive hole. People either ran or surrendered. She detailed a few men to collect prisoners while she led the last group down into the basement.
It was set up as some kind of lab. A number of science types cowered against the wall and Talbot was strapped to a gurney. Blood ran down his arm, but he was conscious.
“The main guy just ran through the door on the far wall,” Talbot said. “He’ll have a car to escape the area.
“Think it’s faster than a marine pinnace?” she asked. “Everyone, lay on the ground and put your hands out. Now.”
She switched to the pinnace frequency. “Jailbird three, Raven Actual. We have the package. There’s a flyer about to leave the building, too. Take him alive. I want to discuss a few things with the gentleman.”
“Copy that, Raven Actual. He just took off. I think I can convince him to land without any trouble.”
She left that to the pilot and freed Talbot. “You sure are a hard man to find. And what kind of sissy lets civilians take him down like that?”
He smiled. “We all have bad days. Is Kelsey okay? The admiral?”
“As far as I know, they’re fine. They’re locked up, though. I’ll fill you in when I feel less worried about a counter attack.”
Angela grabbed him and motioned for two of her men to watch her back. In the powered armor, she had no trouble carrying the burly marine back through the wrecked building.
“Did you have to blow the place up? Nothing they had could possibly scratch your paintjob.”
“Being a marine has a few perks. Blowing shit up is one of them.”
The pinnace was just coming back to the roof as she got there. The ramp was an easy hop from there.
Carl was standing beside a rumpled man who’d been cuffed and strapped to a handy seat. “He didn’t give us any trouble after Lieutenant Riviera offered to land on him.”
“Get more restraints,” she said. “We’ll have a lot more prisoners in a few minutes. I don’t expect we’ll be turning them over to anyone just yet, either.”
“On it.”
The scientist dug more out while she took Talbot to the combat medical area. It didn’t have a regenerator, but it would let her set the broken bone and stop the bleeding. The scanners could also confirm that he had no other injuries that his beacon wasn’t reporting.
“Tell me,” he said.
She popped her helmet and let it swing back behind her. “The heir poisoned the emperor. Then he framed Princess Kelsey and Admiral Mertz. We’re working on figuring out a plan to get them loose.”
“Shit,” Talbot muttered. “This just keeps getting better. We need to get everyone on board and clear out before someone comes looking. I’m sure they called for help.”
Her suit told her the others were making their way back up. They had a few dozen people in custody. Two dead inside and four in the lookout towers. They’d been about to fire something at the pinnace and first squad had taken them out.
“Ten minutes,” she said. “Do an intelligence sweep. Anything we find down there that confirms the heir is behind this might be critical.”
Talbot nodded. “But we scoot the moment we detect someone coming this way. And Angela? Thanks.”
“All part of the service. Let’s get you fixed up before all hell breaks loose.”
* * * * *
Ethan scowled when his com signaled again. Victor. Why did he suspect this was bad news?
It wasn’t a call this time, but a voice message. He played it.
“Highness, they found us.” Somewhere in the background, someone was shooting at something. “I’ll try to get away, but things are looking grim here.”
He stopped the message before it finished. The rest didn’t matter. Once again, Victor had proved to be less than competent. It didn’t matter whether the fool lived or died, so long as he kept his mouth shut doing it.
So, they’d rescued the marine. That hardly mattered when compared to the victory he was about to win.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
They dragged Jared from his cell. It was early morning, by his guess. And perhaps dragged was too strong a word. Politely escorted him with weapons displayed might be more accurate.
His destination was the audience chamber. It held the Imperial Throne. Karl Bandar only used it for traditional times or serious matters. It seemed the new management was more officious. And pompous.
Ethan sat on the ornate Throne with the Scepter on a stand beside him. He didn’t wear the Crown, so the emperor must still be alive.
Jared wondered how long his half-brother would allow that to continue. The heir wasn’t a patient man.
The guards brought Jared up and forced him to his knees when he didn’t go down on his own.
“Have you no respect for the Throne?” Ethan asked with a smirk.
“I’d give my life for it. I simply have no respect for the ass occupying it right now.”
That wiped the expression off Ethan’s face. “You will show me the respect I am due, Bastard. You’re in deep trouble already. Do not make it worse.”
Jared shook his head pityingly. “With you calling the shots, my situation could hardly be any worse.”
“Enough of this. You kneel before me charged with high treason. The attempted murder of your liege. W
ould you care to make a statement before I judge you?”
“Is this how justice works in the Empire now? The trial is you declaring me guilty? What of evidence? What of testimony? What of my representation?”
Ethan smiled. “Why play out the theater where you claim otherwise? You’ve lost. Take your medicine like a man.”
“You told me before I left on the expedition that you’d eliminate me. You tried to poison me with tainted treats and killed Carlo Vega instead. Now your father is dying of the same thing. I’d say my proof is stronger.”
The heir laughed. “Your lies, you mean. Nothing but hearsay. You probably killed the man yourself. In any case, that’s irrelevant. I’m in charge now. My word is law. I hereby find you guilty of the charge of high treason. The sentence is death. Do you have any last words before the sentence is carried out?”
The main entrance to the hall opened and the sound of arguing voices carried to Jared. He looked back and saw Admiral Yeats striding toward them while other officers argued with the guards. A squad of marines in unpowered armor faced down the Imperial Guardsmen at the door.
Ethan rose to his feet. “What’s the meaning of this? I left orders not to be disturbed.”
“Highness,” Yeats said, bowing his head. “I understand you have one of my officers in custody. As the senior Fleet commander, I’m here to speak with him.”
“The time for speaking is over, Admiral. I’ve found him guilty of high treason.”
Yeats smiled politely. “The Charter requires the Senate to try those guilty of treason. The emperor only lays the charge.
“Oh, and that brings me to another issue. The emperor is not allowed to delegate his participation. Since he is ill, you must wait for his recovery or your coronation to bring the charge before the Senate. Highness.”
Rage contorted Ethan’s face. “How dare you lecture me? I am your liege!”
“Not yet, you aren’t, Highness,” Yeats said firmly. “The Charter sets strict limits to your authority. Fleet and the Imperial Senate will not stand idly by while you flout the law. I will speak with Admiral Mertz. Now.”
