Michael Anderle - [Heretic of the Federation 03]

by Time to Fear (epub)

  “That way.”

  John groaned. “I hate stairs.”

  She took the lead. “Me, too,” she told him but didn’t slow her pace.

  By the time they caught up with her, she had the door open and had used the connection to close and lock the bulkheads leading into the section.

  “I was too busy downloading data to take care of this before,” she told them and highlighted the locked doors across the base.

  “Can they override it?” John asked, and she frowned.

  “Yes, until I fry the controls,” she told him, “and I don’t want to do that yet except maybe here, here…and here.”

  The schematics flared to reflect what she’d done, and Amaratne groaned. “That’ll make it hard.”

  Ivy punched his shoulder. “Shuttle. Remember?”

  He rolled his eyes. “I only hope you’re right.”

  Ted shook his head and covered his eyes with the blade of his hand.

  “We really need to make she and Ka never get to meet…”

  “Ka?” Remy asked, and Roma tuned in.

  “It’s a long story, but she’s in the files. You can look her up later. In fact,” he added, “you can look all the Hooligans up later. They’re part of Stephanie’s regular crew and as important to her as her team.”

  “That’s not hard,” Roma retorted. “All her people are important to her.”

  Ted raised his eyebrows. “So you have done your homework.”

  “Of course. I don’t get to sit around and devise evil trips down memory lane,” she replied tartly.

  “Are you calling this evil?” Ted asked and indicated the scenario where the three infiltrators had reached the bottom of the stairs and now peered into the corridor.

  “I told you there was something wrong with those Dreth,” Ivy whispered as the first dark, spindly form turned towards her. “Oops. Me and my big—”

  She stopped as John brushed past her and launched twin sets of lightning from his palms.

  The Telorans retaliated but not with magic. They had blasters too.

  It took her a moment to realize the significance.

  “Not all of them have magic!” she exclaimed, retrieved a grenade, and pitched it into the middle of them.

  “I’d forgotten that,” Amaratne admitted and stopped on John’s other side so they flanked him. “Let’s hope the hostages are okay.”

  Ted turned to Remy. “Is it time?”

  The AI checked the scenario recording. “Almost. Let them know to expect a new team member.”

  Ted’s voice cut through the comms.

  “Be alert for a new team member,” he announced, and the three maintained their fire.

  Roma frowned. “But Todd didn’t have a new team member…”

  “Todd had eight team members,” Ted reminded her, “and I want to get Remy out from under your feet.”

  “By integrating him into John’s team?”

  “Exactly.”

  She grinned. “This I have to see.”

  Her brother gave her a wary look.

  “Why do I get the feeling this will hurt?”

  “Remember Vishlog and Ivy?”

  “But she’s past that now, isn’t she?” Remy asked, concerned.

  Roma sounded far too happy as she replied, “You’d better hope so.”

  Ted shook his head. “When you’re ready, Remy. This is what I want you to do.”

  Given what he’d heard of the infiltrator’s plans, the suggestion made perfect sense, and Remy began to prepare.

  In the scenario, John fried a third Teloran while Ivy shot a fourth. Amaratne eliminated the last two.

  “I told you they weren’t Dreth,” the girl said and unlocked the door. She also passed the footage from the security cams to both their HUDs. “Do you think our new teammate is in there?”

  John shrugged. “Well, we won’t know until they reveal themselves.”

  He glanced at Amaratne. “Ted didn’t give you any clues, did he?”

  The admiral shook his head and studied the faces he saw in the HUD. “No, but any of these folk would be a great addition. I recognize several from our specialist teams. I can understand why Ops kept the result of this little effort under wraps.”

  They moved into the cell after he had rifled through the Teloran’s robes to find two cube-shaped devices. He tossed one to John.

  “Cuff keys,” he told him. “Some of them look hurt.”

  “I’ve got that, too,” John told him and glanced at Ivy. “Keep watch?”

  She nodded and followed them in, closed the door, and tapped the relevant cams. “Will do.”

  The corridors remained quiet as John and Amaratne moved among the prisoners. At first, they both unlocked the cuffs until the young mage found the first man who needed saving.

  “Keep going,” he instructed as the admiral crouched beside him. “Get them loose. I’ll see what I can do about getting them mobile and making sure they survive.”

  One of the men closest rasped a chuckle. “What makes you think we want to survive. We know what’s coming.”

  “Trust me,” John told him, “the Witch is coming too, and nothing will stand against her.”

  The man stilled. “Tell me it’s true.”

  “I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t,” he replied and pointed to the wall closest to the door. “Wait over there. We’ll get you to a shuttle.”

  It didn’t take them long to free the rest of the prisoners or for John to get them onto their feet. He was covered in a sheen of sweat by the end of it.

  “Are you okay?” Amaratne asked, and the young Talent nodded.

  “I merely need to pull some more energy from the outside. I’ll be fine.”

  The older man lowered his voice. “Any sign of them?”

  John shook his head. “If they’re here, they haven’t shown themselves yet.”

  He shrugged. “I guess you can’t blame them. Maybe when we get them to the shuttle—”

  “Let’s hope we don’t need them before then,” John replied and signaled for them to move out. “Ivy, do you want to take point?”

  The girl opened the door. “Shuttle?”

  “Shuttle,” he confirmed. “You can try to hack the comms from there.”

  The prisoners watched them, their faces wary, but they didn’t argue.

  “Where are the pirates?” one of them asked after they’d walked past several junctions with no sign of their former captors.

  “I locked them in their rooms,” Ivy responded, “and then shorted the controls.”

  “All of them?”

  “Except for the ones we killed,” John added and the conversation ended.

  They passed the bodies of the welcoming committee in the corridor. No one had come to clear them, and Ivy wondered how much time had elapsed.

  The HUD showed a scant thirty minutes.

  “It feels so much longer than that,” she muttered as they crossed the landing pad and shepherded their charges into the shuttle.

  “Who’s flying this?” one asked, and Ivy looked at John. He pointed at the cockpit, and she opened the door reluctantly and ignored the same voice that asked, “Can she fly?”

  There was no one in the cockpit and her heart sank. “It looks like we remoted in.”

  The newly rescued hostages froze. “Are you saying none of you can fly?”

  Here it comes, Ivy thought. Our new teammate will reveal themselves.

  The silence dragged on and no one stepped forward.

  “Can any of you?” she asked and saw them exchange disbelieving glances.

  “We will never get out of here,” one groaned.

  “And you know what they did to the last one who tried to escape.”

  A collective moan went up from the group.

  “We have reinforcements coming,” Amaratne told them, “and the ones we didn’t shoot are locked down.”

  “How long for?”

  “As long as I can hold them,” Ivy reassured them
as the hangar’s pressurization alarm sounded. She turned, slid into the co-pilot’s seat, and hooked her tablet into the shuttle’s control console.

  The admiral slapped a hand on the door controls to seal the shuttle hatch.

  “We have power,” the girl reported.

  “Well, at least they followed some procedure,” Amaratne responded. “See if you can find the sensors and patch them through to the HUDs.”

  “Gotcha.” She frowned at the controls but found the necessary settings easily enough.

  The sight of a dropship coming in wasn’t exactly comforting.

  “Reinforcements?” she asked, but the admiral shook his head.

  “Wrong markings—and they won’t launch until we’ve secured the communications array.”

  One of the prisoners snickered. “Good luck with that.”

  “Do you care to share?” John asked and his eyes flared gold.

  The man stared at him and licked his lips nervously. “Only that they have a Teloran guarding it, is all.” He lowered his voice. “A mage.”

  “We know,” John replied. “We’ve seen him.”

  “Seen him and survived?” the prisoner asked disbelievingly.

  John nodded. “He’s securing the center. We left him to it while we scraped their data systems and pulled you guys out.”

  “If he’s not locked down, it would have been better if you’d left us,” one of the others told him morosely.

  “Don’t bet on it,” the young mage snapped and looked at Amaratne. “Any ideas?”

  “Yeah,” the admiral said and opened the cargo area. A mini-turret sat on either side of the space. “I’m gonna make sure they land in pieces."

  “Can you do that?” he asked as the older man slid into one of the turret operator’s seats.

  “I might not be able to fly this,” Amaratne declared, “and I might not have been in one for a while, but I still know how to use the guns.”

  “Just don’t bring it down on top of us,” John told him and snickered.

  “That’s where you come in. I hope you have enough juice.”

  He was still laughing as he pivoted the shuttle’s turret and fired at the incoming dropship. John glanced at Ivy, but she was too busy trying to hack the comms controls from the shuttle’s systems.

  “Did you know there’s another array out there?” she asked as the man opened fire but didn’t stop what she was doing. A moment later, she made a sound of sheer frustration. “Ugh! The shuttle can’t patch through.” She slid out of her seat and headed to the hatch. “We’re gonna have to make it to the comms center if we want to take it. I’m sorry, guys.”

  “Yes!” Amaratne shouted and made the hostages flinch.

  John’s eyes widened, and he thrust both hands toward the rear of the shuttle. The sight of debris raining around them and the other shuttle careening past to pound into the end of the hangar bay before it exploded made most of the prisoners shake their heads.

  “Now you’ve done it,” one said as everything froze.

  SCENARIO FAILED! flashed in large red letters across the inside of their HUDs.

  “What?” they chorused. “How come?”

  Ted brought the burning dropship into focus, and Amaratne groaned. “New teammate?” he asked, and Ivy giggled.

  “What?” she asked, still snickering. “It wasn’t me this time.”

  The admiral rolled his eyes. “And thank you, Ivy.”

  Before she could reply, Ted spoke over the comms. “I’ll restart the scenario from when the alert sounds.”

  When Ivy sent the alert through to their helmets, they decided to wait and see who it was despite the protests from their rescues.

  “For all you know, it could be more pirates!” one exclaimed.

  “True,” Amaratne agreed. “John, are you ready?”

  The boy nodded. “I can shield us if we need to, but I agree with the admiral. Let’s see who it is.”

  Remy brought the dropship down alongside the shuttle and stepped out of the cockpit before the hangar had started to close.

  “More incoming!” Ivy warned as the hangar stayed open.

  “You get the hangar closed,” Amaratne told her and adjusted the focus in his HUD. “I can shoot those already through.”

  “Just don’t put a hole in the hangar roof.”

  “And what happens if they shoot back?” one of the prisoners asked and his voice rose in alarm.

  “I happen,” John told him.

  They regarded him with some doubt but nothing happened. Amaratne missed one craft and caused the other to veer wildly away while he winged a third one.

  “Well, they know we’re here now,” a prisoner whined.

  “And it doesn’t matter,” Ivy told them as the hangar doors closed and the pressure alarms died. “We can get out of here now.”

  “Where to?”

  She stopped in the cockpit doorway and pointed out the opening hatch of the dropship. “Into that,” she told them.

  “But how do you know they’re friendly?”

  John let electricity arc over his fingertips. “It doesn’t matter if they are or not. They know how to fly and they won’t want to die.”

  That appealed to them and they agreed.

  “We’d better make it quick,” Ivy warned as one of the alerts she’d set activated. “The pirates have breached the first bulkhead.”

  “Gotcha.” The young mage stepped alongside her as she headed to the closest exit from the hangar. Amaratne jogged to catch up with them, and the prisoners wheeled to follow.

  “I thought the communications array was my job?” he asked.

  “Yes, but you’ll need me for the mage,” John told him.

  “And me for the doors.”

  “What about us?” the closest prisoner demanded.

  The three teammates looked at each other.

  “Let’s get you into the dropship,” Ivy told him and led them over to where the vessel’s rear hatch had opened and an entry ramp descended.

  A tall figure with dark hair trotted down it as she approached.

  “Step right up,” it called. “Remy’s Emergency Extraction Service has arrived.”

  “Remy?” She almost stopped in surprise, but the AI jogged past her. “Close the hatch as soon as you’re aboard. Nothing will break through.”

  “But—”

  “Trust me,” he told her, and she sighed and led the prisoners aboard. He had a point. Someone had to look after these people. She merely didn’t want it to be her.

  There was no time to argue, though, so she signaled the hostages to follow her and closed the hatch after them.

  “Make yourselves comfortable,” she told them and jogged to the cockpit.

  She’d almost reached it when a narrow hand snaked out and grasped her arm.

  “How comfortable do you want me to be?” a sibilant voice asked, and she drew her blaster and emptied it into the speaker’s chest.

  At point-blank range, the rounds tore through the alien’s body, shredded his spine, and sprayed one wall of the dropship with blood. His hand slipped from her arm and his body sagged as she backed away with her blaster up to cover the rest of the prisoners.

  “Don’t any of you move,” she ordered, her gaze fixed on their shocked faces as she maneuvered into the cockpit and locked the hatch.

  “I heard shots.” John’s worried voice came over the HUD as her hands began to shake.

  “There was…one of them was a Teloran,” Ivy told him.

  “We’re on our way back. Are you okay?”

  “No! I mean, yes, I’m okay. No, don’t come back. Get the mission done.”

  “Are you secure?”

  She checked the footage from the rear compartment. The prisoners had seated themselves as far from the Teloran corpse as they could get. Now and then, one of them would give the cockpit hatch a worried glance.

  None of them made any effort to follow her and she breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Yeah.
I’m in the cockpit and it looks like there was only one. The others are sitting and they haven’t tried to get in. Get the comms. I’ll get the doors.” She drew a shaky breath and steadied her voice. “Are you ready?”

  “If you’re sure…” John still sounded like he wanted to return.

  “Don’t make me come out there,” she warned and was relieved when Amaratne interjected.

  “If she says she’s fine, she’s fine, but we need to hurry.”

  They all looked at the counter and Ivy gasped. “Hurry. Go straight and then left. It’ll take you around most of the living quarters but trust me, trying to go direct would take longer.”

  On the feed from the security cams, she was glad to see them break into a jog. Amaratne turned to Remy.

  “You wouldn’t happen to be a communication specialist, would you?”

  The AI laughed. “I could be, but I believe you are more familiar with the quirks of this particular system than I am.”

  “So what can you do?” the man asked as a small explosion shook the corridor and half a dozen Dreth broke through.

  Remy chuckled and drew a blaster with each hand. The next few seconds showed very clearly what he could do, and Ivy breathed a sigh of relief.

  John might make it through this yet.

  “You’ve cleared that section,” she told them when the firefight died down. “You might as well take a short-cut straight through.”

  “How many Dreth?” John asked.

  “This section? None,” she confirmed, “but you’ll find one very nasty Teloran, an autocannon, a Meligornian, and two Dreth pirates when you get there.”

  “It sounds like fun,” Remy commented and sounded far too happy at the prospect.

  “Just don’t mix nMU with eMU,” she reminded John, and he groaned as the three of them broke into a jog.

  “As if I could ever forget.”

  They reached the bulkhead outside the comms center in record time and Ivy kept the door closed.

  “Can’t you get the autocannon?” John asked.

  She froze. “Let me see…” Seconds later, the answer became clear. “It’s a closed circuit,” she told them. “I’m useless here.”

  “You’re doing more than enough,” Amaratne assured her. “We couldn’t have made it this far this fast without you on overwatch…and your part is done.”