Conflict: The Expansion Series Book 3

by Devon C. Ford

  “It’s sterile,” he bragged before taking a sip and making a theatrical sigh of satisfaction, “and I do love the taste of my own brand… ahhhh,” The recruits tried hard not to pull faces or fall about laughing, at least those who weren’t still stunned by the tool he’d used to fill the module – young Leslie Brandt being one of them – and they lined up to take enforced turns to sip the recycled urine of their training master, much to his great delight. After a tentative sip of the end product, the squad was converted.

  “What the hell is that?” Payne gasped as she fell back from the muddy bank and landed on her back.

  “What?” Brandt asked, torn from her reverie by the panic in the other woman’s voice.

  “Something moved. Something… big.”

  Brandt reached for her weapon as she spoke. “Get back, slowly…”, but before she could say anything else the water erupted as a muscled tail the length of a full-grown man whipped back and forth to propel something shaped like a crocodile fast up the bank out of the water. And directly at Payne, who was flailing about in the mud. Brandt’s gun rose, her finger already on the trigger before she had fully aimed, and her thumb cranking the safety spectrum all the way to maximum. Rapid fire tore the heavy air, shredding holes through the open maw of the animal which seemed as wide as the ramp of a dropship, but it kept coming. Brandt walked her shots towards the back of the open mouth, seeing a glimpse of more teeth than a hundred crocs should possess, until her rounds found something in control of the body.

  The mouth slammed shut with a percussive clap, the long jaws falling lifelessly into the mud and sinking between Payne’s legs only a hand’s breadth away from her armored crotch. Only rapid breathing filled the channel before she erupted with shock at her lucky escape.

  “What the shit!” she cried, scrabbling backwards to her feet and snatching up the full water purification module. Forgetting herself, she threw her body into Brandt’s arms and shook violently. “Did you see it?” She babbled. “It… it…” She stopped, lost for words as the adrenaline removed her vocabulary.

  “I saw it,” Brandt answered, their armor plates clanging against one another as she held on tightly to the younger woman.

  “It nearly got me!” Payne said waveringly, as she fought back the flood of adrenaline-induced tears and the shock of having survived a primeval threat to her life. A rumbling growl, like the rolling thunder of a sudden storm, filled the air ominously. Both women turned to look at the animal they thought to be dead as its one yellow eye locked its focus directly on them, coiled its massive tail again, and launched itself forwards off the muddy bank.

  Brandt, watching in slow-motion as she tried to turn and fling Payne out of the way of the opening jaws, saw a blossom of purple against the forehead of the monster as daylight showed behind it in a blink of an eye. It slammed down to the mud again, knocking both of them aside with its second death, and both lay still, breathing hard as a cool voice reached them over the channel.

  “Overwatch is clear,” Zero said as though nothing of note had just happened. Brandt shoved the enormous dead weight of the animal’s lifeless lower jaw from her armored leg and stood She looked at the dead creature before following the line of sight back towards the outpost. Through the smallest gap in the foliage, about the size of a dinner plate, she saw Zero lower his rifle. Even though his visor was down, she could have sworn she’d seen him smirk.

  ~

  The Hammer appeared on the sensor feed of the Vengeance a split second after the active display screen registered a dull flash as an unlit patch of space darkened. The hull of the ship, undamaged and intact courtesy of their overpowered shields, blocked out the light of distant stars to create a kind of negative space effect.

  “Captain, Hammer reports no damage. She took a rail cannon strike from the surface, but their sensors show that the gun position has been destroyed by return fire.”

  “Good,” Halstead said hurriedly, “did they pick up the distress beacon?” A pause as the information was relayed via the data link established between the frigates.

  “Negative,” the comm officer replied, “Captain Hayes recommends a jump back to the fleet.”

  “Agreed,” Halstead answered, “plot the jump, send coordinates to the Hammer and do it.”

  The two frigates appeared almost simultaneously on the screens of the fleet, having jumped inside the defensive screen of gun barges undocked from the Indomitable. Both sent out ‘all clear’ hails on the fleet-wide ship channel to indicate that they weren’t fleeing anything close behind them and didn’t require immediate assistance. In unison, the captains of both frigates handed over control of their bridges to senior crew and went to their quarters, where a joint comm link was established, and they waited for the admiral to join them. They didn’t discuss what they had just been through, as neither had the patience to repeat themselves.

  “Captains,” Dassiova said as he activated his own screen and sat down, leaning forwards in eager anticipation of their news.

  “Sir,” Halstead said in a clipped, efficient tone, “emergency beacon detected on the moon of the habitable planet near the largest star of the twin suns,” she said. She anticipated the next questions as her brief report continued. “No details of their disposition or location on the surface, but we have to assume enemy hostility, given the events.”

  “By ‘events’ I presume you mean the reason for the Hammer’s shields climbing back up from sixty percent?” Dassiova asked, glancing up to look at the right side of his screen where Hayes’ face was remaining neutral.

  “Yes, Sir,” he said in a flat tone, “what appears to be, or should I say have been, an orbital rail cannon emplacement on the surface registered an energy spike. We detected it, evaded the shell, and returned fire with an energy weapon salvo to destroy the gun.” His report was clipped, efficient, and he knew as well as Dassiova did that he was leaving out a lot more information than he had included.

  “Only one shot?” the admiral enquired in a tone of contemplation. “Only one gun battery?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “So, one shot took you down to sixty percent shields, and you’re calling that a one hundred percent win, instead of dumb luck you’re still in one piece? Captain… come on…”

  Hayes relaxed his face a little, defeated by the lull of the admiral’s fatherly tone. “It took us to fifty percent,” he admitted, “and the shot was only a glancing blow to the forward shields – a plumb hit would’ve been a helluva lot worse.”

  “And no other guns detected?” Dassiova asked.

  “None, Sir, I can only assume their recharge time was too long or they had some kind of malfunction. Either way, we were lucky. Our sweeps didn’t detect the gun until the energy signature flashed up, otherwise we’d have been on the other side of the planet.”

  Dassiova’s face turned to the other side of the screen. “And the distress beacon,” he said, “any indication at all about the Tanto?”

  “No, Sir, and we didn’t pick up anything on the frequency of the ship other than the emergency blast.”

  “Dammit,” Dassiova cursed quietly to himself. “Unfortunately, with what we have heading for us, I can’t spare you two to go back there just yet, and I’m sure as hell not going to leave more of our crews there without jump capabilities and a lot more firepower.” He paused, sighed, and dropped his head slightly as he thought ahead to the call he would have to make to Torres, who was stranded on the Anvil waiting for his ship to be fixed after it took a beating. He was glad the Ichi wasn’t fit to sail right then, because he was damned sure what he would do if he was in the young captain’s shoes.

  Sucking in another breath and lifting his steely gaze, he looked at the screen again. “Dock with the Cortez and resupply. I need you two fully stocked and ready to roll out in twelve hours; there’s a storm coming, and we all have work to do. Get some rest and be ready.” Turning off the connection, Dassiova leaned back and rubbed his face. Massey appeared inside his quarters
but the question of how she got in didn’t even compute in his exhausted mind. He didn’t wait for her question, simply gave her the information before she asked.

  “Planetary defense cannons, an armada heading our way and our recon ship still out of action,” he said somberly. “Add to that, our missing people are alive, and I can’t spare the manpower to go get them until we’ve dealt with the goddamned Va’alen.”

  “That’s not the sum of your problems,” she said without humor, “the algorithm missed a subspace transmission an hour ago. Somehow it embedded itself alongside a ship-to-ship comm and I only found it on a routine review.” Dassiova groaned out loud, wanting the galaxy to stop spinning for just a few hours so he could catch his breath.

  “Where from?” he asked her. “Could you trace the source?”

  “Oddly yes, this time,” Massey said with a small smile, “it came from the Anvil.” He stared at her, daring her to make the same implied accusation as before. She did.

  “You know, Sir,’ she said with mock melodrama, “I could’ve sworn the Ichi is docked there right now…”

  ~

  “Yes, Admiral,” Torres replied woodenly, “and no, Sir, I understand…” He kept his face intentionally devoid of information until the fleet commander dismissed him and the screen went black. Torres dropped his shoulders and relaxed his expression; the visual equivalent of no longer using his telephone voice. Behind the screen, hidden from the admiral’s view and fighting to keep her breathing undetectable in the cramped quarters onboard the fleet’s forge ship, Amare Eze let out a breath and fired questions at him as though she hadn’t just heard the same conversation.

  “Are they all alive? Is the Tanto able to fly? Are th…”

  “You realize I know as much as you do, right?” he asked her to bring her back to her senses. She stopped talking and rose from where she was hiding behind the data terminal to walk over the only small section of floor not taken up by the bed, the console desk or the tall locker. Torres saw how the emergency lighting in the dark cabin caught the muscled lines of her body as she moved without shame. Equally without shame, he leaned back and watched her pull on underwear, doing that curious thing with her thumbs as she nestled the waistband onto her hips just right, and added the flight suit which she intentionally left unzipped to expose cleavage and betray that she had known all along he was watching her.

  “So, what are you going to do?” she asked simply.

  “Get our ship fixed and go get them, obviously.”

  She said nothing, just leaned over and kissed him before she shuffled to the door and opened it to peer into the tight corridor. The coast must have been clear, because she slipped out to return to her own cabin. Torres stretched, groaned, and launched himself from the small bed. He had to do the same curious shuffle maneuver to get to the bathroom cubicle which was designed with as much comfort as the rest of the cabin. He turned on the shower, chiding himself for his ingratitude. He knew that one deck down, where the enlisted crew of the Ichi were berthed, there were four seaman per cabin this size and still only one bathroom.

  The temporary accommodation aboard the Anvil wasn’t designed for comfort, it was designed to safely house the full crews of any ship in the fleet requiring essential or emergency maintenance and rebuilding. Their ship, battered and venting atmosphere from half a dozen hull breaches, was still suspended by the big repulser docks in a hangar where she was being worked on day and night to bring her back to readiness. She was not a warship, not by any standards, considering the size and sheer destructive capabilities of the two frigates or the eight small gun barges ordinarily docked to the carrier flagship, but she still packed a punch, despite her forte being stealth reconnaissance. Torres’ mind wandered briefly, imagining what it would be like to command a much larger instrument of war. He shook that thought away, recalling how lucky he was to still be in command of the ship he had, and focused instead on trying to figure out how he could get himself excused from fleet duties to rescue his people.

  Chapter Nineteen –Unnamed Moon Surface

  Aq D’marath, a warrior who was only capable of bravery when the person he was challenging was separated from him by either distance or by other warriors who were braver then he was, had been in a state of near constant panic since the two ships had arrived bearing a transport pod for a Hive Lord. He could not answer why the hundred ships ordered there by the Supreme Commander had not arrived, having known nothing of any such instructions.

  He had shown his dominance when the human ships appeared in orbit, and he was ready to accept the praise of his entourage, as well as that of the Hive Lord, when all hell broke loose in his reinforced command center.

  “Aq, the human ship has returned fire on our rail gun,” a female Va’alen shouted from her position at the sensor array controls, “one has jumped away…”

  “Impossible,” D’marath snarled, glancing nervously into the shadows at the rear of the room where the Hive Lord hung motionless in the air, “our shot should have destroyed them easily. They were weak and could not have survived a…”

  “Perhaps,” interrupted Fal K’rath, the ranking Va’alen of the small escort dedicated to the Hive Lord’s personal safety. Although a rank below the Aq, his presence and casual air of dominance threatened D’marath, who recognized a warrior far more capable than he could ever hope to be.

  “Perhaps what?” D’marath asked dangerously, risking a challenge by a warrior who seemed unfazed by the common knowledge that the young commander was well connected. He had seen a rapid reduction in the respect shown to him since the humans had destroyed their gateway device and cut them off from the rest of the alliance, and he knew that was because those disrespectful warriors believed they would not gain the safety of their home systems again.

  “Perhaps,” K’rath said unwaveringly, “the humans are more dangerous now than they were before. Perhaps their previous encounters with the mighty Va’alen have taught them how to fight.” Murmurs of agreement rippled around the room as other warriors growled their support of the Fal. Aq D’marath glanced around him for his own support, suddenly afraid of a challenge, and when he saw none, he tried to answer politically.

  “Our Supreme Commander,” he whined, “tells us how the humans will be driven from this system. He says…”

  “Have you encountered any humans, Aq D’marath?” K’rath asked, giving a bow of respect to soften the overt challenge in his words. The disrespect in his voice was palpable, but as he accompanied the words with a gesture of supplication, any challenge would be made to appear unjustified.

  “No, I… I have not yet had the honor of killing a human in battle.”

  “We fought with them,” K’rath said as he spread the arms on his left side out to encompass his mate and the pair crewing the other two ships of the escort. “They have new weapons we did not see when we fought them the last time, and their ships do not break like they did before. I believe they have learned from our previous battles.” D’marath knew that the junior officer had fought the humans before and escaped with the few remnants of an attacking force that had proved to be too few in number to beat the invaders, who had been reinforced just in time to drive their swarms of ships away. They had blamed the arrival of more warships for that defeat, and the supreme commander had accepted that reason for their loss and retreat, but instead of punishing them, he had rewarded K’rath with a reputational promotion, by placing him in command of a Hive Lord’s personal guard. Aq D’marath glanced over the shoulder of the warrior flaunting his disrespect of him at the Hive Lord, who levitated in silence, its head shrouded. But the presence of its mind at the back of their brains itched them like an infecting prion. The Hive Lord didn’t speak, they never had to as they silently commanded the Va’alen around them to speak for them.

  K’rath shook, his back arching slightly as though overcome by a sudden cramp before he fixed the Aq with a direct look and spoke in a voice not his own.

  “And why has your gun positi
on not responded? Did you even check to see if the enemy barrage was effective?”

  “Our shields should have absorbed anything the humans could have fired at us,” D’marath answered peevishly, realizing too late that the Hive Lord was addressing him directly. He bowed his head slightly after speaking. “I will send a detachment there now t…”

  “No,” K’rath’s voice boomed in the confined space, “you will lead a detachment there now. Go.”

  D’marath, defeated, left and signaled for his entourage to follow. K’rath shuddered as the Hive Lord pushed into his brain.

  Why did you speak your own words as though they came from me? it asked, the words hissing into his brain with no sound.

  He needs to learn to show respect around you, Lord, K’rath thought in answer as he too bowed in respect. He blames others for failing at tasks he himself is too weak and incompetent to undertake. No replying thought arrived in his mind, and he didn’t know if the Hive Lord was contemplating a response or was simply satisfied with its escort’s style.

  “What air transport do we have? K’rath asked the remaining Va’alen in the command center, as he stood tall once more.

  “We have many ships, Fal,” a female said with her head bowed, “but flight is not safe on the surface because of the ion storms and the wildlife.” K’rath snorted his derision.

  “You are all as weak as your Aq,” he snarled, before turning to the Hive Lord to kneel and speak out loud for the benefit of the others. “Lord, I beg your permission to search the planet for the humans shot down before we arrived here.”

  Silence hung in the room before all of them shuddered with the intrusion into their minds by the hovering Lord.