Equilibrium of Terror: Part 2

by Eddie R. Hicks

  She moved toward Ella who was still in control of Avearan’s body, although she was under the control of the goddesses. Hannah held onto the augmented psionic body before her and placed her face directly in front of her. “This is so exciting! Don’t you agree?”

  Ella reminded silent and motionless, it was for her own good. The voices of millions ripping into her psionic mind would kill her if it wasn’t for the protection of the goddesses.

  Abyssal Pelican, Rasi orbit, Barnard’s Star System

  The Abyssal Pelican dropped out of sub light speeds minutes after the transport in question headed toward the surface below breaking through the blockade. A blockade that was much smaller than what Jainuzei had imagined as he gazed at.

  “Report,” he said, demanding the bridge crew respond.

  “Two ships broke through the blockade of Rasi,” a Rabuabin officer said. “One of them was the transport we were tracking . . . the other.”

  A hologram of a ship of unknown origin appeared in front of Jainuzei. He watched it closely as he stroked his chin, he couldn’t recognize its design at all. “What is this?”

  “It was a ship we had captured not long ago, a new type of Hashmedai vessel, the Silver Raven,” the officer said. “It entered the system several days ago masquerading as a merchant ship from the Morutrin system.”

  “This must be the ship Jazz came here on . . .” Jainuzei said. As it would provide the perfect explanation as to how he and his partners got here without being shot on sight. How he got here from Earth so fast was another question. Wormholes came to mind, but last time he checked, it was still a new discovery to the order. In any case it was more reading he’d have to do to catch up on if he was going to lead the order to victory.

  “He wasn’t aboard when we took control of it.”

  “Of course not,” Jainuzei said. “I’ve dealt with him.” Jazz should be a frozen body at the foot of the mountains by now. “So you had it in your grasp?” A critical question to Jainuzei, they had it captured not long ago, why is it here potently causing problems?

  “They managed to escape . . .” said Peluei. “I will update you on that incident; you were still on Rasi when it happened.”

  “If I may,” an Aryile psionic said. Jainuzei saw him stand from his station. He had a red gem hanging around his neck like pendant. “The gods . . . they are speaking to me.”

  His last statement caused the entire bridge crew to rise and focus on what he was to reveal. Jainuzei’s heart began to race; he felt the blood in his veins move through quickly. The gods, choosing to speak to a member of this ship, they are either in a lot of trouble or are being praised for all their divine work.

  “What did they say?” Jainuzei asked him.

  “The humans who escaped from the R&D complex must be found and . . .” the psionic stopped, as he raised the gem toward his forehead, probably to receive the last of the gods’ message to him. “Jazz must be brought to Hannah, alive.”

  Jainuzei gritted his flat teeth while he hid the wave of embarrassment that was building in his mind.

  “Did you not kill that human?” Peluei asked.

  Reluctantly, Jainuzei said. “If the gods believe he’s alive then, then, he must be.” I tossed him away, when the gods wanted him brought to Hannah. I must stop failing like this, it is dishonorable, Jainuzei mused, thinking about his failure. He failed to kill Jazz, twice, and he wasn’t supposed to do it in the first place. That’s three counts of failure and dishonor; he didn’t deserve to be leading the order.

  “Weapons Master?” someone called out to him, but he wasn’t sure who it was. He was lost in his deep thoughts and self-loathing.

  He took a deep breath, knowing that he couldn’t change the past only control the present to build a desirable future. The present was that he was their leader, and they were all looking up to him, even now as the crew shifted their eyes away from the psionic and toward him. Jainuzei needed to make a call and he needed to redeem himself from his past errors and create a path where he would not fail again, and not let down the gods who were clearly being lenient on him for what he did.

  “Get me Dargonea . . .” Jainuzei said. “She was in pursuit of the transports that the human subjects fled on before losing contact and withdrawing.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Have every union ship in the system swarm this planet, nothing leaves orbit. The transport, Hashmedai ship, the missing humans and Jazz . . . we have a lot to search for. Let us not disappoint the gods!”

  “Captain,” Jainuzei said to the former captain. “I’ll be in my quarters, you have the bridge.”

  He nodded and said. “I’ll let you know as soon as we’re ready to deploy.”

  Jainuzei made his way toward his quarters via a lengthy elevator ride and corridor walk. He still never got used to the idea of a ship having gravity in every section of it and at times he had to consistently remind himself he was on a ship in space, and not some massive military base. He entered his quarters and felt a wave of cold air hit him. The temperatures were set low, low for an Aryile, comfortable for a human.

  The sliding doors shut behind him as he saw Alisha rest on the couch, still dressed in her lab outfit, musing about the last several hours when he had her brought aboard to escape the outbreak on Rasi. He removed his equipment, replacing it with off duty attire, something warm to keep his body temperature up. Alisha said nothing just held onto her data pad while her fingers slid across its touch screen.

  “I am sorry for all of this,” Jainuzei said to her.

  “It’s not your fault,” she said with little emotion, then sighed. Something on the data pad had her upset. “Knowledge network has gone silent.”

  “The outbreak has consumed the colonized worlds in this system,” he sat with her, hoping his presence would brighten her gloomy mood, “and by the way, I have been made captain of this ship, since Patriarch Dalhakei has gone missing.”

  “This is just . . . too much right now,” she said, tossing the data pad on the floor.

  “I understand. A lot has happened to you over the span of a few days,” he said. “But I assure you; the gods will not let you suffer.” Alisha said nothing more, his words and charming deep voice had little effect. Perhaps she needs some time alone. “I will be meditating,” he said, rising from the couch. “You are more than welcome to join if you please.”

  He retreated to his room where his bed rested below a small window, allowing him to see the spectacle of Rasi and the Radiance fleet in orbit around it. There was a red mat at the foot of his bed where he sat cross-legged, placed his hands at his sides, and shut his eyes. It took him some time to clear his thoughts, for he pondered if Alisha’s response was the punishment the gods handed to him as a result of his actions. He became worried that should the gods not be impressed with his work, that Alisha may become distant and walk out of his life as fast as she walked into it.

  He was growing fond of her intelligence, her beautiful face, her lovely long black hair. She not only embraced his religious believes, but also allowed her mind to be tempered and saw the truth and the path of the Celestial Order much like how he did. He wanted to spend more time with her, to become intimate with her, and see what type of relationship the two of them could forge.

  But first things first. Meditate, clearing his thoughts, so that he can sharpen his mind and body for the battles that await him.

  Snowy tundra, Rasi, Barnard’s Star System

  Jazz and Vaishea slowly trekked through the waist high snow of Rasi as the flurry from the blizzard continued to sprinkle its precipitation contents all over their suits and the surrounding region. Instead of leaving behind footprints, the two left behind huge gashes in the snowy field carved out by their bodies. If Jazz didn’t know any better the blizzard seemed to have intensified, as visibility dropped to almost nonexistence. He could barely see the lights within Vaishea’s helmet amongst the snow and darkness.

  Jazz’s foot tripped over a solid objected burie
d deep below the snow, causing his body to fall over face first into the white cold blanket below him. He heard Vaishea laugh while he struggled to drag his body out from the snow that consumed him. Her hands reached down to dig him out, during which they barely caught a glimpse of what he tripped over the process.

  It was a body.

  The two worked in unison to clear away all the snow, exposing the corpse below them to their helmet’s lights. “The fuck?” Jazz said as he leaned in to get a closer look at what they found.

  The body was wearing an environment suit much like theirs; it was grim reminder to Jazz what might become of them if they didn’t find the Silver Raven. Upon closer inspection he saw that deceased was a woman, a Linl. There were multiple gunshot wounds to her chest and face. Vaishea knelt and started to brush away the snow and ice that covered up the name plate on the suit.

  “What does it say? Jazz asked.

  “Katotea . . .” she said. “Heurol’s missing agent.”

  “Someone wanted her bumped off.”

  “And dumped the body out here where nobody would find it.” Jazz saw Vaishea reach down toward the back part of Katotea’s helmet and removed a cube shaped computer core from it. She held the device toward him. “This should tell us what happened to her before she died.”

  “Let’s keep moving,” he said as she got back to her feet. “I know visibility is shit, but I’m pretty sure the Silver Raven hasn’t backtracked past us.”

  “A ship like that, it could be anywhere on the planet by now, maybe even left orbit.”

  “Yeah but the speeds it was traveling at . . .” he said as the two continued their trek through the deep snow. “It was looking for something in the region . . . or someone.”

  “And who would that someone be?”

  “Yours truly of course. It’s the horse I rode in on, and the one I intend to ride out on.”

  With a perplexed tone of voice she asked him. “What’s a horse?”

  Second class Ranger Ary Vonei’s vision returned to normal as the teleport from the Abyssal Pelican to the surface of Rasi finished. He was fully equipped in combat armor and helmet alongside three other rangers and Dargonea, the psionic that had brought them down. In front of them was the transport that was once in control of the order, but now had left Oyuri ignoring all communications.

  It came to land in the middle of the tundra for reasons unknown. It didn’t try to flee as they fanned out and approached it. There were no signs of life, and the lights from the inside were clearly shut off as seen from the snow-covered windshield. Dargonea teleported away to bring in more ground forces and to check up on the Silver Raven as their next plan of action was to recapture that ship.

  The three rangers finished their circling around the transport with their rifles drawn, shining the light from their flashlights upon the landed ship. Nothing out of the ordinary, and no signs that someone walked away from the craft, though it was hard to tell with all the fresh snowfall, footprints would have been buried up by now. As they got closer, they saw signs that someone was indeed outside for a moment and was tinkering with an exterior access panel, for whatever reason. To make repairs perhaps? The transport did take a bit of damage before landing.

  The doors were forced open and, as expected, darkness welcomed them as their flashlights lit paths that led them inside. Vonei’s HUD reported that the temperatures inside were about the same as outside as well as no breathable air, life-support was offline. The three of them entered the cockpit while Vonei took point. There was an unmoving body in the chair. The three rapidly moved in and surrounded the chair where the body rested, aiming their weapons at it while it’s light highlighted the person. It was the body of a ranger, an order member at that, one that was assigned to the Abyssal Explorer and there was a harpoon bolt through his head. The dried blood on it was several hours old judging by his helmet’s quick scan. This ranger was dead long before the transport left Oyuri, and clearly wasn’t the pilot.

  Gods.

  Someone else was there. The doors of the transport closed, and it wasn’t by their hands.

  The entrance to the cryo chamber opened, and an unknown adversary stormed them with a hail of bullets aimed at them. Vonei and his team quickly took cover and formed a defensive position within the cockpit. Their shields took several hits, but remained strong despite the ambush. Whoever this person was, wasn’t very good with a rifle.

  Vonei raised his rifle to return fire but stopped when he noticed a flashing green light behind him. It was the explosive component to a plasma missile, and there were bullets ripping into it rapidly.

  Then it hit him.

  The attacker wasn’t aiming at them. The target was the explosive. It was a trap. And it worked. The explosion that followed killed two of them instantly, partly vaporizing their lower bodies and utterly destroying half the transport in the process in a furious blast that brightened the skies and the falling snow flakes.

  Vonei, by a miracle, survived the blast, though he felt his life slipping away. His left arm was missing along with his torso and everything that normally would be below it. Air and heat hissed away from the huge opening in his helmet. The cold winds and snow helped take his mind of the deadly pain in his body. From the pillars of smoke and flames, stepped the attacker, the clever and cunning person who shall feel the wrath of the gods for their defiant actions.

  With the last ounce of life left in Vonei’s fading eyesight he managed to see the face of the attacker amongst the darkness. It was Major Chloe Vaughan and as he recalled she found out whom she really was, thus triggering the termination of her along with the Explorer’s crew—

  Two bullets ripped through his head, and his blood and brain spattered across the frozen land below changing color as it froze solid over the course of two minutes.

  A bright emerald green explosion lit up the skies around Jazz and Vaishea. Its source came from something that was located on the ground toward Jazz’s right side. In the aftermath of the blast, Jazz could see signs of fires burning wildly. It was enough for the two to move toward and investigate. Jazz hoped it wasn’t the Silver Raven; otherwise the two of them may as well took of their helmets and let nature finish them off.

  Jazz breathed a sigh of relieve when he saw the object burning in the distance wasn’t the Raven. “What’s this?” he asked.

  “It looks like a union transport, on fire,” Vaishea said as she took a closer look. She was indeed right, it was a transport. Red tracer lights shot through the skies; there was a gun fight in progress.

  “It’s under attack.”

  Silver Raven, skies of Rasi, Barnard’s Star System

  “There!” Destiny said, while aiming her finger toward the faint red aura of flames on the horizon.

  “That was not there when we passed by,” Eupiar said, reviewing sensor logs via a holo screen. “Vel—”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Veloshira said bitterly as she piloted the Silver Raven to its new course. The fires in the snow filed tundra.

  Snowy tundra, Rasi, Barnard’s Star System

  Jazz and Vaishea took advantage of the heavy snowfall, and crawled in the deep snow to avoid detection as they slowly got closer to the burning transport. They were a few rangers shooting at a target and taking cover from the inside the mangled transport. There was a psionic with them but it later vanished, probably going to bring more friends. Jazz and Vaishea needed to act quickly, as soon as they figured out who was friend and who was foe.

  Jazz saw one ranger backtrack as their shields got low. He moved backward so quickly there was no time to warn Vaishea of what was coming toward her, the ranger ended up tripping over her, thus blowing her cover. It didn’t take long for the ranger to realize she was hiding below him, nor did it take long for him to raise his rifle at her. That was all Jazz needed to know these were enemies.

  Jazz made a quick leaping spear tackle, the impact sent the ranger backward and to the ground. Jazz colliding with the ranger provided just enough force to shatte
r what little remained of his shields. Whoever the ranger had been fighting had got a few shots on him prior. Both of their covers were blown, Jazz was busy rolling and wrestling with the ranger, while Vaishea got up from her cover to assess the situation. The brawl Jazz and the ranger engaged in eventually transformed into fist fight as they got to their feet, the rifle was buried in too much snow for either of the two to start looking for.

  Jazz threw the first punch, and regretted it. Slugging the helmet of the ranger was a bad idea, the gloves from his environment suit weren’t exactly heavily armored like his enemy, and the pain that radiated forced Jazz to hold his hand and yelp and curse loud.

  Two gunshots echoed, and the ranger Jazz was fighting dropped dead. The armored person that was taking cover behind the transport did him in, then later the last remaining ranger during the distraction, Jazz and Vaishea created.

  The killer of the two rangers stepped away from the burning transport, looked from side to side, then ran toward Jazz and Vaishea with their rifle aimed at them. Jazz hoped they would at least take the time to thank them, for there was nothing else him and Vaishea could do at this point. Environment suits weren’t exactly the best form of defense versus a magnetic rifle, and reaching for the rifle below his feet in the snow might give the wrong idea, not that he knew exactly where to go to dig it up.