by Rick Partlow
“Hold your fire!” A male voice called out loudly. “We’re friendlies!”
Ari’s eyes narrowed, then widened as the doors slid all the way open. The elevator was occupied by three men in Intelligence-pattern stealth armor, one of them laid out on a gurney and being tended to by a fourth: a short, frumpy woman with a doughy face that grew paler as she stared at the rifle barrels pointed her way.
“Put your hands on your head,” Ari snapped as he cautiously approached the four of them. “Don’t move.”
“I’m Reynolds,” the closest of the men insisted as he raised his arms, his voice tinny over the helmet’s external speakers, “Fleet Intelligence Special Operations.” He motioned at the other armored man, who had a blood-stained smart bandage on his leg and was struggling to remain standing with his arms over his head. “That’s Von Paleske…we were with Colonel Stark’s raid team.”
“Get out of the elevator and on the ground,” Ari ordered, motioning with his carbine, “all three of you.”
“That’s Tom Crossman,” Roza said tightly, gesturing to the figure on the gurney. Ari let his vision, which had been scanning back and forth between the two armored figures and the civilian, focus on the body on the medical bed and he cursed softly as he recognized the unconscious man.
Dammit, he thought, we don’t have time for this.
“Take off your helmets,” he told the two men as they began to step out of the elevator. Reynolds did immediately, pulling off the full-face helm and dropping it on the ground. Ari had never met the man, but he recognized the young NCO’s face from files he’d viewed. Von Paleske took a moment longer, having to lean against the elevator doorway to wrestle off the helmet.
Ari gave the man a once over, then nodded to Roza. “They’re who they say they are.” He turned back to the two men, pulling off his own helmet
“Captain Shamir, thank God…” Von Paleske sighed. He’d met the young man before, though briefly, during the spin-up of the last few weeks.
“Let’s not be thanking anyone just yet,” Ari muttered. “Who’s she?” He nodded towards the civilian. “And what the hell went down here?”
“I’m Dr. Maggie Cochrane,” the woman stammered. “I work for Mr. Riordan…”
“She was in charge of keeping Antonov healthy,” Reynolds interjected. “Captain, I was covering the rear entrance and Von Paleske came back to my position after he got shot…we couldn’t contact anyone except the lander because we were too far underground.”
“Stop wasting time, dammit!” Ari nearly jumped at the hoarse, labored voice that came from the gurney. Tom Crossman pushed himself into a seated position, waving aside Dr. Cochrane’s objections.
He looked, Ari reflected, like hell: His armor had been cut off and his utility fatigues were torn and coated with blood all along the right side of his body. Smart bandages were stuck to his right thigh and hip, his right arm and the right side of his neck; and an IV in his left arm was attached to a pump and reservoir on the gurney, feeding his veins a blood substitute. His face was ghostly pale and his hair was matted with sweat, but his eyes were alert.
“Captain,” he said, taking a breath and wincing as it hurt his neck, “Antonov was waiting for us…it was a trap. The place was full of biomechs…”
Ari inadvertently glanced around in alarm. “Where are they now?”
Crossman shook his head impatiently. “They’re down in the holding area…”
“They’re just standing there,” Reynolds interrupted, “not moving, like they’re waiting for orders. They didn’t even move when me and Von Paleske finally went in.”
“They haven’t moved since Antonov left,” Crossman snarled, giving the lower ranking noncom a glare that made him shut up. “Captain, the room where Antonov was being held was rigged with stunners. Everyone else is dead, but the Russian psycho captured Major…I mean Colonel Stark.” Even under the circumstances, Tom’s face had a hint of a smirk at the promotion. “They thought I was out, and I let ‘em think so, but I was awake for all of it. He had me in there…he told her that he’d let Fourcade cut me up unless she submitted to it.”
“To what?” Ari demanded impatiently, feeling a pit opening up in his guts.
“A hypnoprobe,” Crossman replied grimly. “Sir…he has her brainwashed. He used her to get in the lander and escape. He promised her that he’d leave me behind and let the Doc here fix me up if she didn’t fight him and make it take longer.” There was agony on Crossman’s face that wasn’t just from the pain of his wounds. “You’ve got to track them down, because God knows what he’s going to do to her when he doesn’t need her anymore…”
Ari swallowed hard, looking back and forth between Tom and Roza.
“Holy shit,” he blurted, eyes wide. “I just realized, I have no idea who to call.”
“I think perhaps,” Roza said slowly and quietly, “I do.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
“Mr. President,” Captain Di Ndinge called, “we have a report from Fleet Headquarters!”
Daniel O’Keefe stepped across the crowded, chaotic, makeshift ready room that had been set up in an antechamber off the Senate floor, pushing aside staffers, both military and political, making his way to the small tactical readout that had been hooked up to a terminal in a corner of the chamber. Divungi Di Ndinge was a slender, gracefully-featured officer from Gabon in the African Confederation and he was normally a reserved and soft-spoken gentleman, but at the moment he seemed almost giddy.
“What’s happening out there, Captain?” O’Keefe asked the man, who was part of Admiral Patel’s senior staff.
“A cislunar patrol craft received a transmission from the Bradley,” the Captain told him. “It was fairly low power---the ship is in pretty bad shape. But according to their report, they managed to destroy both enemy craft.”
“Thank God,” O’Keefe sighed in relief, leaning heavily against the back of the officer’s chair. There was a smattering of applause and relieved exclamations around the room as the word spread. He even heard someone softly sobbing. “You said they took damage…how many casualties?”
“There are a few serious injuries---bad burns and shrapnel wounds in engineering mostly, but just one fatality, Mr. President: Captain Perez, the ship’s commanding officer. He apparently somehow broke his neck during the intercept maneuver with the first enemy vessel. The report wasn’t clear on how it happened.”
“My God,” O’Keefe murmured, shaking his head sadly. “The man died saving our lives, Captain. I’ll make sure his sacrifice isn’t forgotten. For now…do we have any ships that can get help to the Bradley?”
“Yes, sir, there’s an antimatter freighter that was on the way from the Mercury production facility out to Fleet Headquarters. I’ll have them divert to the Bradley and aid her in repairs.”
“Excellent, Captain. Keep me informed of their status, please. And let me know if any of the other cruisers return from outsystem.” They’d ordered a recall weeks ago, but when the fastest interstellar message went at the same speed as the ship carrying it, there was no way to know when the half dozen interstellar warships on routine patrols would make it back. He turned to Zhakarova. “Spread the word that the threat is over and sound the all-clear to the people who went to the shelters.”
“Yes, sir,” she acknowledged before hurrying out of the room.
The President stepped over to the small workstation where Marine General Rietveld was hunched over a communications display, speaking in hushed tones to someone wearing a flight helmet.
“Any word from Colonel Stark?” O’Keefe asked him.
“Nothing yet, sir,” the tall, shaven headed officer reported, coming to his feet. “I have Captain Shamir’s pilot on the line, but the last report he heard was a few minutes ago when Shamir and the others entered the bunker.”
“Can’t we track where her lander went?” O’Keefe demanded, exasperation in his voice. “I mean, we do have satellite coverage, don’t we?”
“
Yes, sir, Mr. President,” the General assured him. “It’s going to take a while…we’ve been concentrating on the threat from the Protectorate ships…now that we know they’ve been destroyed, we can run a tracking procedure on Colonel Stark.”
“Make it happen, General,” O’Keefe told him, clapping a hand on the big man’s shoulder. “I want to know where that lander went and what happened to Colonel Stark.” And Antonov, he thought but didn’t say. No one else needed to know that yet.
“Sir.” O’Keefe looked up to see an aide handing him a plate with a sandwich and sliced carrots. He opened his mouth to say he wasn’t hungry when his stomach reminded him he’d skipped lunch and was, in fact, starving.
“Thanks, son,” he said with a nod, taking the plate and grabbing a bite as he leaned against a wall, suddenly feeling the nervous energy of the last few hours running out of him.
I’ll have to see that Lt. Franks gets a medal for this, he thought, his mind beginning to wander with exhaustion. Can’t promote him though…that’s up to Stark, or McKay when he gets back. I’ll just let them know that I approve of any promotion they want to give him.
“Mr. President?”
O’Keefe’s eyes snapped up and he saw Svetlana Zakharova half-in the door of the room, looking a bit frazzled. “Yes, Svetlana?” He set his plate down on one of the few bare spots he could find, noticing out of the corner of his eye that it was wobbling and threatening to fall before one of his aides grabbed it with fortuitous timing.
“Sir,” Zakharova went on breathlessly, “it’s Colonel Stark…she’s back. She just landed and wants to meet you privately in your office.”
“I’m damn glad she’s back.” O’Keefe admitted, shaking his head. “It’s a madhouse here and I still don’t have a clear idea of what’s going on. Get my security detail…I’m heading there now.”
He took a moment to check in with the military officers and make sure they kept him informed of any new developments, then he followed his security team through the secure exit to his flitter. As a Senator, he’d often used a groundcar to get around Capital City, an old-fashioned affectation he’d clung to from his boyhood in rural Alberta, but a President couldn’t get away with such eccentricities. He was conveyed in a special, armored flitter, always accompanied by another flitter full of Security and usually a combat lander of Marines.
O’Keefe settled into his seat in the flitter as a Security agent took the seat next to him and Zakharova fell into the one across from him, eyes glued to her tablet.
“Public confidence has gone down 43 percent since the announcement and the attack, sir,” she told him. “The people are close to panicking, sir…there are reports that thousands of people are still in the shelters in a half dozen different cities. You need to address the public very soon.”
“And I will, Svetlana,” he assured her drily, “once I actually know what to tell them.”
Zakharova paused with a retort on her lips, raising a hand to her ear bud reflexively. “Yes, transfer it to my ‘link,” she spoke quietly to the caller, then she looked back to O’Keefe. “Sir,” she announced, “you have an urgent call coming in from General Kage. He says he needs to talk to you immediately.”
“Put it over the cabin speakers,” he told her.
“Sir,” she said hesitantly, a scowl passing over her face, “he says this is very confidential, for your ears only.”
“Oh for Christ’s sake,” O’Keefe hissed in frustration. He pulled the ear bud from his ‘link and put it in place. “Put him through,” he told her, nodding. “Let’s see if he has a good excuse for missing my speech…”
* * *
Shannon Stark strode through the halls of the Republic Presidential Office Building with the casual familiarity of a regular visitor, even her sweat-soaked utility fatigues and holstered sidearm hardly drawing a second glance on a day when a Protectorate attack had narrowly been averted. The offices were a mass of confused activity as personnel trickled in from the shelters and others audited newscasts or tried to press their contacts in the Fleet to find out just what the hell had happened.
Shannon moved through the chaos purposefully, eyes fixed straight ahead as she approached the President’s private offices. There were the normal pair of Security agents stationed in the reception area, arrayed on either side of the entrance, but none of the President’s aides or secretaries were at the pair of workstations in the outer office.
“Colonel Stark,” the senior of the Security agents said respectfully. “The President is expecting you.”
She nodded and stepped towards the door, but the guard held up a hand, an almost-embarrassed look on his face. “Sorry, ma’am, but regulations…you need to check your sidearm before entering the President’s office.”
Shannon hesitated a moment, coolly assessing the beefy, professional-looking man, his right hand resting casually on the stock of a submachine gun strapped around his chest, then she smiled thinly and pulled the 10mm from the holster high on her right hip and handed it butt-first to the agent. He grinned sheepishly as he accepted it, pulling open a drawer at one of the work stations and locking it inside.
“I’ll have it for you when you come out, ma’am,” he assured her.
The door slid aside and Shannon stepped into the President’s private office. It was a well-appointed room with tasteful art on the walls and a collection of antique hardbound books on mahogany shelves, with a polished oak desk as its centerpiece. It was as nostalgic and old-fashioned as the man behind the desk…though at the moment, he looked less old-fashioned than simply old.
He looked up and smiled wanly as Shannon entered, but he didn’t rise, seemingly too exhausted to get up. “It’s good to see you, Shannon,” he said, sounding utterly drained. “I was beginning to worry.”
Shannon stepped over to the desk, absently running a finger over the antique fountain pen in a sterling silver holder displayed there. “Well, Mr. President,” she allowed with a shrug, “there were reasons for worry. Things didn’t go well.” She took the pen from the holder, turning it back and forth in her fingers, examining the classic lines of the obsolete device.
O’Keefe’s eyes flickered to the pen, then back to her. “So, Antonov wasn’t there?” he guessed.
“Oh, no, sir,” she told him, “he was there all right. Along with about a hundred biomech troopers, armed and armored. They knew we were coming, and they were ready for us.” Her eyes were cold and deadly as they locked on his. “They’re all dead, Mr. President. Except for a couple I left to guard our back before we went in, they’re all dead. And I had to leave them there.” Her fist tightened on the pen, gripping it so tightly it creaked in her grasp. “I had to leave Tom Crossman there to die.”
“Tom Crossman is not dead, Colonel Stark,” a voice said from behind her. Shannon spun around, her face screwing up in shock that bordered on rage, raising the fountain pen instinctively, like a weapon.
Shannon knew there were at least two concealed entrances to the President’s office. She had to guess that General Kage had been concealed behind one of them when she entered, because now he was standing directly in front of her, his eyes dark pools of impassive calm in the harsh and craggy terrain of his weathered features. His right hand rose to meet her left wrist, holding it and the fountain pen immobile in a grip of iron, while his other hand pointed a stunner at her at hip level.
“Please drop the pen and relax before I am forced to incapacitate you,” he said in a cool, level voice. “Your friend Sergeant Crossman is alive, and being taken to a hospital by Ari Shamir and my agent Roza Kovach. They also picked up your two other men, Reynolds and Von Paleske…and one other, a woman, was still alive from the raiding force, she is receiving treatment.”
“Crossman told us how Antonov forced you to submit to the hypnoprobe, Shannon,” O’Keefe said. He was standing now, having taken a few steps back from the desk, and had his hands up in an almost pleading gesture, a helpless, plaintive tone to his voice. “We can help you
through this.”
Shannon hesitated for a moment, then with a dismissive flick of her fingers tossed the fountain pen towards Kage’s chest. His attention faltered for just a moment, but it was enough: with speed born from years of constant practice, she snatched the stunner from his hand and put the barrel against his nose.
The General’s eyes widened slightly and the only sound in the room was President O’Keefe’s sharp intake of breath. Shannon pulled her wrist free of Kage’s grip and stepped back from him, then sniffed and tossed the stunner on the floor.
“Get real, General,” she told him, shaking her head, her fists on her hips. “If I were brainwashed, you’d be dead and so would the President.”
“But…” O’Keefe stuttered, his back against the wall of the office. “But Captain Shamir said…”
“Mr. President, you’ve known me for six years now,” she said, her glare boring into him. “Have you ever known me to be careless?” She looked to Kage. “I’ve known for weeks that the enemy was using hypnoprobes to control their agents. One of the first things I did was to visit the Fleet psych-med wing and receive counter-conditioning. I’m sure you did the same thing once Agent Kovach informed you that you’d been brainwashed during that voyage on the Patton.”
“Yes I did,” General Kage admitted, nonplused. “But if you were not hypnoprobed then why did you allow Antonov to…” Realization dawned in his dark eyes and he smiled, an unusual expression for him. “Ah, I understand…you are tracking him.”
“But why didn’t you tell us?” O’Keefe stepped away from the wall, approaching the two of them tentatively. “Why didn’t you tell Captain Shamir?”
Shannon fell tiredly into a chair beside the desk, closing her eyes and taking a breath. “Because frankly, Mr. President, Antonov has been two steps ahead of us this whole time and I don’t trust our lines of communications. I had to make sure he believed I was doing exactly what he told me to do so he wouldn’t deviate from his plans.” Her mouth twitched and her tone grew hard and bitter. “So I didn’t get all those men and women killed for nothing.”
