by Wayne Watson
“Take him alive- the fool has given us the perfect hostage. You damned fool Jamieson- what do a bunch of stupid dirtyfoot colonists matter to you?”
The crew all rose, drawing knives and short swords and started to cautiously advance. Wayne made no move to draw his blade, simply saying, “Alright, the hard way it is.”
Then an image flashed through his mind. An old memory- two happy, smiling children and their mother. The last time he saw them alive before they were killed by the likes of these pirates. Scum who had no regard for the consequences of their actions. He thought of the children and staff of the Mission that were sure to have died in the raid.
The old rage flared in an instant and Wayne turned from a scientific, calculating fighter into a raging and deadly elemental force. His intentions of disabling and capturing the crew were momentarily forgotten- he had one thought- hurt them. Time appeared to slow for him, as his synapses sped up five-fold. The others in the room moved like they were stuck in treacle.
A 600mm length of 30mm OD duralloy pipe doesn't appear to be much of a weapon, but in Wayne's hands it was as deadly as any sword. With his augmented strength and speed, the pipe became a grey blur, flashing across the control room and burying itself deep in a crewman's chest. Drawing a short 'Hawksbeak' knife, he pounced on the closest crewman, seizing his knife arm while tearing his chest open by plunging in the short, heavy blade and dragging it down, slicing through ribs. He used the body as a shield to fend off his other assailants, until he had torn the chest open with a half-dozen raking gouges.
The hapless crewman dead, Wayne flung his body at another crewman, knocking him down. He then pounced on another, repeating this performance. On the third crewman, his knife stuck in a kevlar breastplate. Enraged, he threw his victim across the control room, leaving him in an unconscious and dying heap, after slamming into a wall.
Ignoring the battle between Jamieson and his crew, Jacques had gone wide and was charging in fast, his short sword aimed at Wayne's exposed right flank. As his blade was about to make contact, a terrible crushing pain flashed up his arm, as a hand like a vice grabbed it and squeezed with inhuman strength. Then he was hauled around and used as a flail, knocking down two of the remaining three crewmen, the force of this dislocating the captain's arm at the shoulder and breaking the radius and ulna. Wayne seized the last crewman and tore out his throat with his teeth. A killing punch to the temple ended the crewman’s agony and as suddenly as it had come on, the white-hot rage left him. He then set about securing the living with plasticuffs and treating their more serious injuries- they were not about to get off easy by dying.
Jacques painfully propped himself up against a console. "You bastard! What the hell are you?"
"A very bad son-of-a-bitch. I thought everyone knew that."
"How..."
"This place has always been a rendezvous point for pirates. I happened by and found the Crows you were going to meet up with. I put them in a shuttle, moved them off with the tractor and they got downright talkative as they got close to that singularity. They really believe it is Hell's Mouth, by the way. I gave them the opportunity to find out. Now I'm sick of talking to you and I hear my marines."
Wayne stepped over and covered Jacques mouth with a strip of duct tape.
The marine boarding party entered the control room to find their Captain watching over several semi-conscious crewmen as he quietly smoked a cigar. “You need a medic Sir?” asked the senior marine, concerned at his blood-soaked appearance.
“No Corporal, I'm good- but those three need medevac and there are two in engineering with busted heads that might be alive still.”
“OK Sir, I'll take care of it- you need anything?”
“Just a shower, looking at your face.”
Wayne stood up and kicked one of the bodies. “Get a work party up here and police this mess up- double bonus for clearing my mess- carry on Corporal.”
The marines jumped to attention and cleared a path for Wayne to leave the bridge.
“You heard the skipper- volunteers- you, you and you- get this bridge squared away,” barked the Corporal. He had seen the Wolf in action before, but this was the first time the newer members had seen the aftermath of their commanding officer in action.
***
Captain Jacques awoke unable to move- nor could he feel anything- nothing.
“Finally awake, dickhead,” snarled senior ship's surgeon, Lt Lillian Williams. “I wanted to say goodnight before I closed the pod. You are going to have a nice rest on the way back to Yalumba. We have you all wired and tubed, so there is no need to get up. It's not to long a trip for us, even dragging your clapped out shitcan, but you may be getting a little lonesome by and by because I'm not putting you to sleep. Never mind- when we let you out there are some folks really keen to have a long chat with you.
Give my regards to Colonel Linda Hamilton- an old friend of mine who works for Navy Intelligence. We went to medical school together- after we left the Cockatoo River Mission. She will be the one unpicking your brain bit by bit- so goodnight asshole.” One of the surviving crew members, fearing spacing, had become downright loquacious and had revealed the reason they were fleeing. She slammed the lid shut and a med tech wheeled the pod away to secure storage. She could get no information on the fate of her family and had a long three weeks in subspace before she would find out.
The only reason the captives were still alive was that she knew that she could do nothing that would result in more misery than a forensic mind-picking...
***
Cockatoo River Incident Memorial- Five years later.
Wayne and Jenny strolled slowly towards the Mission, making the most of a few minutes of privacy.
"It is true that time helps," said Jenny. "But I don't think the pain will ever go away. I thought it would be just another mission and I would leave it all behind- like we have all done before."
"That was no ordinary Time Corp mission. The Corp has not had a lot of success with such deep insertions. Actually, you are the first successful one."
"The other all failed? How many have there been?"
"About twenty. No other operator has survived with their mind intact- they all went native and thought their past lives were a delusion. It's been 600 years since the last attempt- good agents are too valuable to risk. You had a unique profile that indicated you had a good chance. In any case, I backed up your mind-state to pre-transfer. That technology wasn't around last time they tried."
"No shit. So how does the mission stand now?"
"We just have the end-game to play. That is about ten years away. Until then, we are free to our own devices."
"Learning how to be better soldiers for the Empire."
"Exactly so, although we are actually learning all this good stuff for ourselves."
"Something I never lose sight of- now let's get back in character. The girls of the mission have intentions on stuffing us like a Christmas Goose- then Doc Williams will be pouring the local brandy into us. I don't think I told you- she resigned from 'Fury' just after you left for the academy and has been running the Mission clinic."
"Sounds a lot better than yet another civic banquet. I had heard that Doc was there- the girls kept in touch, even if it was just a message twice a year. It's going to be good to catch up for a few days."
***
The Mission was mostly unchanged from when Jenny had left over five years ago. The differences were subtle, yet clear to a military mind. Discrete sensor arrays watched the countryside and the bell tower was now topped by an antipersonnel maser, fashioned to look like a weather vane. Trees and shrubs had been cleared or trimmed to give clear lines of sight near the buildings and the gates were now more than decorative.
This was not a case of locking the stable door after the horse had bolted. This was a weather change throughout the outer worlds of the Empire. A realization that not only the new and under-resourced colonies were vulnerable to predators. News travels slowly through
an interstellar civilization, but five years after the incident, the whole Empire of Man was now more vigilant, better prepared and stood ready.
Now they knew that they could not let the vast distances of space be their shield against evil. They were slowly accepting the fact that they would soon have to go forth from their comfortable existence and root out the evil that was the Great Hegemony of Worlds. This cult of death-worshipers should have remained on old earth, but for weak men standing by and allowing evil to take place- it was now amongst the stars and growing stronger.
The wheels of the Empire turned slowly, but ground finely. When the home worlds were secure, they would be able to set forth on the Great Crusade.
***
In the hour before dawn, Wayne stood alone at the memorial gate, staring silently at the markers for the dead. While he knew that the actions he had planned had saved many from a wretched existence, he was painfully aware that he could easily have prevented all of the deaths here.
Like all commanders, he now, more than ever, felt the weight of carrying out his orders knowing that he had to sacrifice others to meet a larger goal. And like all commanders from the dawn of time, he knew that he alone had to bear that burden…
Other books by this author (in order):
Meddlers in Time
Meddlers in Time- Out of the frying pan, into the fire
