The Deadly Pact

by Michael Freeport

  “No, sir. I think a specialized set or armor to aid in infiltration is just the ticket.”

  “Good. Mister Guiles, prepare two suits of the stealth armor. One for myself and one for Mister Aves,” Patho said.

  “Yes, sir. I’ll put the parameters into the computer. Once I have an estimate on manufacturing time, I’ll let you know.”

  “Excellent. We’ll plan our landing once we have the armor worked out. Let’s get to our duties, everyone.”

  It took two days of simulations and work until Guiles and Aves declared the new armor design to be ready. Patho met them at the maintenance bay to watch the small nanite manufacturing unit put the armor together. The trio of officers watched with interest as the maintenance bay slid open, giving them their first good look at the new armor.

  The first set was sized for Aves. It was pitch black and very slim compared to standard issue power armor. Aves reached in and with Guiles’ help, they muscled the armor out onto a stand.

  “It’s heavier than it looks,” Aves said after they’d gotten it secured. He rubbed it curiously with his hand. “This material reflects virtually no light. It also absorbs most sensor frequencies, and those it doesn’t absorb will have extremely weak returns. The built in power supply is enough to run a medium weight field rifle and the standard life support and comms pack. It won’t stand up to the kind of abuse the standard infantry model will, but it has better mobility and is designed to operate silently.”

  Aves pulled the armor open and climbed into it after running a startup maintenance check. The armor sealed up around the marine and ran through its startup routine. Aves stepped off of the armor stand and flexed the joints to get it fully settled.

  “It feels really light and maneuverable once you’ve got it on and settled properly,” Aves said over his external speaker. He dropped into a fighting stance and went through a warm-up set of moves “This thing moves really well.”

  “It looks good, Mister Aves. Let’s get another suit built and test them out.”

  The small plant hummed for about twenty minutes before opening again to reveal a second suit; this time sized for Patho. With Aves’ help, they hoisted it onto the now empty armor rack. Patho climbed into it and stepped down to the deck, facing Aves.

  Aves said, “Looks good, sir.” He took a step back and dropped into a fighting stance. “Want to give it a quick spar to work out the kinks?”

  “Sure,” Patho said. He stepped back and raised his arms, ready to defend himself.

  Aves didn’t waste time on niceties. He charged Patho immediately, heavy feet pounding on the deck like thunder. Patho tried to stop the charge by bringing his arms down on the marine’s shoulders, but Aves was already twisting aside. He caught Patho by the arm and deftly tossed Patho over his extended leg, causing Patho to land heavily on his side.

  Sensing more than seeing Aves approach, Patho swept his legs to the side, tripping Aves and giving Patho room to regain his feet. Aves was already moving back towards Patho from a crouching position as Patho turned to face him. The two grappled for a moment before Patho said, “Good enough, Mister Aves. These suits are great for hand to hand combat. Let’s head over to the small boat bay and test out their stealth systems. The pinnace sensor suite should be enough to see what emissions we aren’t fully hiding.”

  “Agreed, sir.” Aves trooped through the door and headed to the aft boat bay. He sealed his suit up and then cycled through the airlock. Patho walked into the Pinnace and warmed up the sensor suite.

  Patho keyed his suit comms and said, “Okay, Mister Aves, start by moving back and forth in front of the pinnace.”

  “Aye, sir,” Aves responded. He moved across the boat bay, and while Patho could see him, as far as the pinnace sensors were concerned, there was nothing there.

  They ran through a series of exercises, using increasing amounts of power. The only thing the pinnace even noticed was when Aves fired his rifle at full power through the open bay door. Based on the sensor readings from the pinnace, the design was a resounding success. The armor was ready.

  Patho and Aves met up with Hilleman on the bridge. Patho said, “Now that we know the exact capabilities of the armor, we can determine our route and how we plan to get into the base itself. Mister Hilleman, what have you got for us?”

  Hilleman had been busy over the previous two days as well, using passive sensors to get detailed scans and to lay out movement patterns of the base personnel. “I suggest we make a drop off two hours after local nightfall. The locals tend to go to bed pretty early. Base patrols change overnight to a more random pattern, but we’ve programmed times of high likelihood that you will have clear spots to move through.” Hilleman shook his head before continuing. “I wish we had more time to spend watching their movement patterns, but I know we need to get back to Lashmere as soon as possible with the intel we’re after.”

  Patho nodded and said, “Our timetable needs to be as short as we can make it. Good information from the Alliance will help us with the crabs and in rescuing our missing people.” Patho said, his voice firm. “Our priorities are to get information on the crabs first and the Alliance second.” Patho tapped his wrist comp, checking the time. “We have seven hours before we make planetfall. Get some sleep. I need everyone rested and on their toes. If there are any questions?” Seeing there were none, Patho dismissed the officers and turned in.

  Gorgon drifted slowly through the planetary atmosphere of Xalcek. The ship was in maximum stealth mode as it made the approach to the drop off point. Patho and Aves stood quietly, waiting in the aft boat bay to disembark once they received the signal. The ground was visible through the windows as they waited. Finally, the light blinked on in their helmets and the doors opened. They were still about ten meters above the ground, the Gorgon was hovering just above the surface and had backed up to a small hill, giving them as short a drop as possible. Once they had jumped and landed on the hill, they activated their own stealth systems and moved quickly towards the waypoint that marked their route through the town surrounding the Alliance base.

  Patho marveled at how similar the town seemed to a human one. Rows of houses arranged along streets, even if the streets were blue rather than the gray of his home planet. The architecture was also a bit odd, but the squat, blocky structures were clearly homes of the people living in the town. No lights shone through windows, and there was no movement they could detect on their passive suit sensors. After more than an hour of careful movement, they came in sight of the base perimeter. A thick concrete wall surrounded it, with a walkway along the top. That walkway was patrolled in random patterns and had guard towers at regular intervals.

  Patho and Aves approached cautiously from behind a row of houses. The wall towered over them, standing ten meters high. Their passive sensors marked the location of passing patrols by the sound of their footsteps on the walkway above. Once the built-in computers from their armor had mapped out the routes all of the patrollers were taking, they pulled their rifles from the sheaths on their backs. They aimed grapnel lines and fired. The action was eerily silent.

  The two men were hoisted by their lines up the wall and climbed carefully up onto the walkway. After seeing they were undetected, they quickly retrieved their grapple lines. They looked both ways and gave each other a nod and then moved quickly to a stairwell that led down to the ground inside the wall.

  Patho motioned for them to halt while he consulted the map. Passive scans had shown several buildings that had readings consistent with computer mainframes. They crept around outlying buildings until they reached the closest of the marked structures. Aves cupped his hands and gave Patho a leg up to look into a row of narrow windows. Inside, he saw rows of mounted electronic equipment. He wasn’t sure if it was the computer he was looking for, but it was worth a closer look. Patho hopped down and motioned to Aves that they were going to enter the building. The two officers moved silently around the building until they saw a door.

  The door was set in
a heavy metal frame and was locked with an electrical keypad with twelve odd symbols on it. Aves pulled an electronic device from his belt and inserted a thin metal probe into the keypad. The probe fed the data pathways back to the tiny screen. Aves manipulated the tool for a few seconds while Patho watched the perimeter.

  A Gol slithered around the corner, wearing the Alliance uniform. Patho brought his rifle up smoothly and shot the Gol in its chest. The weapon was intended to be silent, but it made a bit of noise. To make matters worse, the Gol collapsed, dropping the truncheon it was carrying with a racket that seemed explosive compared to the silence of the night up to that point.

  Aves dropped the electronic lock pick and brought his rifle up, scanning the area for any alert to the sudden noise. After a couple of minutes without any additional activity, Aves finished picking the lock, and they dragged the unconscious Gol into the building. Patho advanced through the building. The room they’d entered was a small reception area that had a large double door on the far side. Patho took out his data scanning tool and checked for signals around the door. It didn’t appear to be alarmed that he could tell.

  He motioned Aves, and they stood on either side of the door with weapons ready before he pushed the door open. The room beyond was the one they’d seen from the windows. Patho moved swiftly to one of the racks of equipment. He pulled the automated data probe from his belt and attached it to the front of the equipment.

  The probe scanned the alien machine for a moment before prompting Patho to move the probe to a different location. Several moves later, the tool had started mapping out the data pathways. He glanced over his shoulder and saw Aves back to him as the marine carefully watched the room.

  Patho returned his attention to the data infiltration tool and waited patiently while it worked its way through the Alliance computer network. The progress bars moved very slowly. To Patho, it seemed obvious the built-in algorithms were struggling with the alien network. He turned to Aves, tapped his shoulder, and pointed at the device. Aves glanced at the tool and then shrugged.

  Patho tried to wait patiently, but time passed slowly. He checked the time repeatedly and tried to figure out how long the data retrieval would take. His attention returned to the tool when it flashed to gain his attention. The screen showed an alert indicating failure to retrieve data.

  Patho cursed softly and then put the data probe back in its pouch. He gestured to Aves that they were leaving the building. The Gol was still out cold in the front room as they passed. The map of the base led them to another building. This one was larger and did not have windows. Patho and Aves circled the building and found there was also no door. The pair deployed their grapnels once again and got onto the roof of the building. There was a roof access hatch that was alarmed. Aves worked around the safeguard and then lifted the door open slowly as Patho aimed his rifle into the pitch black opening.

  Patho switched to infrared and was able to make out the building interior. There was a floor three meters below the roof. He carefully lowered himself into the room before dropping gently to the floor. Aves followed close behind. They moved through a series of small rooms that were arranged like offices and administrative areas. Patho’s infrared scans showed a large group of heat sources below him. After a few minutes of searching, they found a stairwell going down.

  Ten minutes of wandering through the ground floor later, they found a second stairwell that descended into a single open room filled with quietly humming computers. Patho turned and grinned silently at Aves. Moving quickly, he worked with his data probe for a few minutes, and this time, the built-in download algorithms started streaming data into the on board memory quickly.

  As the progress bars filled, Patho kept watch with Aves. Patho heard a noise above them, probably on the floor above and the lights in the building came on. The area was flooded with visible light. Patho quickly switched back to normal vision and nodded at Aves. He snatched the data reader without checking on its progress. Whatever they had at this point was all they were likely to get. Someone had obviously entered the building. Looking around, Aves pointed at a door set in the far wall. It was heavily built and looked like a bank vault. Patho nodded and went to the door. There was a complex biometric and password lock system. Aves worked on the lock while Patho watched the stairs. The door began to swing open, and Patho was about to give Aves a thumbs up when several uniformed Alliance military personnel came through the door into the room.

  Patho fell back and started unloading stun shots into the group. Aves joined him a split second later. The Alliance troops were clearly unprepared to face incoming fire, and they all went down within ten seconds. Patho motioned for Aves to follow him into the heavy door.

  They made it another fifty meters before coming to a T intersection that had stairs going up if they continued straight. Patho checked his armor computer. According to dead reckoning, they were under another building that had been classified as a barracks or residential structure. To the left was a security structure and to the right was another building that had been marked as a possible data center. Patho motioned right, and Aves preceded him down the hallway in a low stance that made him appear to scuttle along the ground. Patho followed close behind, frequently looking behind to check for anyone following.

  Patho’s pulse was pounding. Not knowing for sure where they were going and anticipating possible hostile contact at any moment was giving his adrenaline glands a real workout.

  Ahead, the corridor turned left, and Aves flowed around it smoothly while Patho came up behind him. Aves was knocked back into him by someone he hadn’t seen yet. The two officers went down in a heap, and he felt Aves struggling to right himself while lying on top of him. Patho heard a single cough of Aves’ rifle and then the marine was helping him to his feet. He pointed at a uniformed Xalcek who was now lying on the ground, stunned. Patho gave Aves a nod and motioned for him to continue. They were approaching a building right on the perimeter of the base. It was marked as a possible administrative building with a low probability of having anything useful.

  They ascended into the building after bypassing another security door. The ground floor was open and had a variety of desks of varying size and shape, apparently to accommodate the various races of the Alliance. Aves led the way to a door that led outside into a narrow clearing between several buildings. Once Aves had cleared the immediate area, Patho followed him outside. Aves motioned to the wall, and Patho nodded. The sky was beginning to lighten as dawn approached.

  When they had reached the base of the wall, they moved along it until they found a stairwell. As they ascended, a blaring klaxon sounded. Lights came on all over the base, and people started streaming out of several buildings. Patho and Aves crouched low on the stairwell and hurried to the top. They heard shouting, and several beings started running towards them along the top of the wall.

  Aves and Patho put their rifles into rapid fire and started stunning everyone they saw atop the wall. Aves attached a small charge to the stairs and tapped the detonator as he ran away. It was a small charge, barely enough to destroy the top several stairs, but it would give them some breathing room. Unfortunately, the sound would also pinpoint their location.

  They fixed ropes to the top of the wall and quickly rappelled down the outside of the base wall. Patho led the way towards the houses that surrounded the base. Patho was just starting to think they would make it to cover there when he was flung from his feet by a tremendous force. As he tumbled, he saw Aves cartwheeling through the air near him.

  The ground came up at him with a suddenness that was bone-jarring. Patho rolled onto his back, trying to reorient himself when he saw a large force of Alliance troops moving his way. He snatched the data mining device from his belt and hit the emergency transmit button. This would transmit the stored data on an encrypted carrier and then destroy the device itself. He sat up and brought his rifle around only to see a trio of Gols clubbing at Aves with heavy truncheons. They appeared to be inflicting a sho
ck each time they hit.

  Patho rapid-fire stunned the Gols and then, still sitting unloaded into the approaching formation of Alliance troops. Several of them went down, but most of them separated widely and approached him from different directions. He was starting to get to his feet with something hit him in the back, and he was knocked flat. Most of his armor circuitry started to fail almost immediately. His armor joints froze up a few seconds later, and he was rolled onto his back.

  His helmet was forced open and then pulled from his head by a Xalcek who was none too gentle about the task. Two Gols stood above him with long, wicked looking rifles trained on his head. He did his best to look as harmless as possible.

  Another Xalcek walked towards him and stood, looking down. “Greetings. I am Commander Ktenu. Welcome to Xalcek.”

  Chapter 8

  The Alliance headquarters was in an uproar since the two humans had invaded and stolen a huge amount of sensitive data. Commander Ktenu, the leader of the Alliance military, moved briskly to a meeting with the other commanders and Alliance observers. The passageways echoed his footsteps as he hurried to the meeting with his fellow commanders.

  Ornate doors opened at his approach, and Ktenu saw the other commanders already seated at the central table, surrounded by affiliate members of the Alliance and civilian observers to the military council. A buzz of conversation stopped at his appearance.

  Ktenu stepped inside and seated himself at the center of the half circle table which was traditional for meetings of Alliance leaders. He looked left and right, regarding his fellow leaders of the Alliance military. “Commanders, I greet you. I understand we have captured intruders in our base?”

  Hu-Ji, the Gol Commander, said, “It is true, Commander. Two humans broke into our secure computer system and stole a large amount of data. They were able to transmit the data before being captured.”

  Ktenu nodded and said, “Where is their ship? Has it been captured yet?”