The Deadly Pact Read online

  “Of course, Captain.” Tirikitirik snapped his fingers twice and nodded. “You should have the information you requested now.”

  Kri looked at Taylor who nodded. Kri said, “Thank you. Who must I ask for permission to cross through your space? We were unaware that this region was inhabited by anyone other than the interstellar Alliance.”

  “The Alliance? Pah!” Tirikitirik was once again the braggart as he continued. “Cringing fools. They fear to lift a finger against anyone. They stay well clear of our borders. Where in our space do you need to go?”

  Taylor had been working on the star chart and had an answer ready. She put the chart on Kri’s command console. Kri looked at the displayed information and said, “I am headed to a system called Yimughi with several stops along the way to refuel my ship’s engines.”

  Yimughi? It is not far, but there is little of interest there. An old base was there once, long ago, I think and a large gas giant but not much else.” Tirikitirik shook his head and said, “Well, if you wish to go there, you must speak to Keltupelek. He is a man of influence. His word will carry you that far and much farther in Etyrni space. Follow me to the largest moon of the fifth planet. We will land at the settlement.” The screen switched to the external view, showing the Laughing Jijik turning away and moving towards the indicated moon.

  “Form up with the Laughing Jijik. How long until we reach this settlement?”

  “At current acceleration, roughly fifty hours, sir,” Taylor said. “I have the settlement on sensors. It looks large enough to have roughly seventy to a hundred thousand people.”

  Dowd stepped up to Kri and said, “Sir, I suggest you talk to the Marines if you plan to actually land on that moon.

  Kri nodded and said, “Good thinking. You have the bridge, Mister Dowd.

  The walk to the Marines quarters was short. They had separate berthing and mess facilities, along with a dedicated gym that was specialized for their needs. Kri stepped off of the lift near the gym and flagged down a passing Sergeant. “Excuse me, do you know where Colonel Santi is at?”

  The sergeant said, “Yes, sir. He’s on the mess decks.”

  Kri nodded and said, “Thanks.” He walked off to the galley and found the Marine commanding officer. “Colonel Santi, I have to make a landing on a potentially hostile moon in a few hours. I plan to bring some of your marines with me for security. Who do you have that might make a good candidate?”

  Santi said, “Sir, any of my Marines are excellent choices for security. Follow me to the gym, please.” They strolled onto the gym. “I’m sure you’re aware, but we have two squads of marine special forces. One of the things they specialize in is hand to hand combat along with all of the associated ranged weaponry all other Marines train with. I’ve had the pleasure of watching them train from time to time. I suggest you take at least a pair of them with you on any trip off of the ship.”

  Kri grinned eagerly. “Sounds like an interesting diversion, Colonel.” The gym was filled with marines wearing athletic clothing. Many of them were practicing hand to hand combat. When they saw the oncoming naval officers, they snapped to attention.

  Kri gave them a friendly wave and said, “Carry on, thank you.”

  Kri and Santi moved across the gym and stepped up behind a cluster of marines watching as a pair of Marines stood facing each other on a large, round mat. At first glance, the pair seemed a wild mismatch. One was male, the other female. The man was tall, over two meters with long, densely muscled arms and broad shoulders. The woman, while not short was thin, almost tiny in proportion. Both were wearing outfits that allowed physical contact with the practice knives they held to be scored.

  The pair saluted each other formally with their knives and then leaped into action. The speed with which blows went back and forth was dizzying. Kri watched as sweat started to pour off of the faces of both opponents. He looked on as both worked blow against counter blow. Neither landed a blow for the first minute, then the first two. The practice knives smacked against each other repeatedly and forearm blocked forearm without the knives ever touching the practice outfits. With a suddenness that was almost faster than Kri could see, the woman scored a large red streak across the man’s chest. The scoreboard showed only a single hit over the entire match. A lethal blow signified the immediate end of the bout.

  She grinned and wiped sweat from her eyes before embracing her opponent. “You almost got me, Willy. If you’d reached just a touch further, it would have gone the other way.”

  “I know, Natty, I know.” The tall man shook his head and clapped her on the shoulder.

  Santi stepped forward and said, “Captain, allow me to introduce Sergeant William Ghergen and Corporal Nastacia Scya. They are part of our special forces detachment and the two best hand to hand fighters I have ever seen. Corporal Scya was on the Marine team before she shipped out with us.”

  Both Marines stood to attention. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, sir,” Ghergen said.

  “And you, Sergeant, Corporal,” Kri said. “I may be leaving the ship soon and entering a potentially hostile environment. We still don’t know a lot about the rules, but we have a briefing scheduled for the day after tomorrow at oh-five hundred. I want both of you there. You will provide physical security for any team leaving the ship. I’ll have orders cut for your lieutenant detaching you for the duty today. Any questions?”

  Both Marines said, “No, sir.

  “Excellent. I’ll see you both day after tomorrow, then.” Kri motioned Santi to follow him out of the gym. Once the two officers were well down the passageway from the gym, Kri said, “Thank you for demonstrating to me just how capable they were before instantly assigning them to my security detachment.”

  Santi nodded again and said, Yes, sir. We’re ready to assist in anything you need us for.”

  Chapter 7

  Gorgon drifted like a ghost through Xalcek space. The trip there had been without incident, and the point to point drive had functioned flawlessly. The Xalcek system was almost unchanged from the sensor logs taken from Saber before it had been returned to the Alliance. The only major change was a large structure on the edge of the system. It was a huge roughly circular structure roughly ten kilometers across with an open center and a series of industrial looking pods arrayed around it. Upon arrival, Patho had ordered an investigation of the object.

  Patho worked the sensor system, collecting passive scans and energy readings from the enormous structure. It had a gantry like construction, mostly scaffolding and structural pieces. The large pods arranged around the perimeter housed power generation and complex machinery. Without active scans or hands on analysis, their function couldn’t be determined. Sighing, Patho turned to the other officer on Gorgon’s bridge and said, “Lieutenant Guiles, what do you think of this thing?” Patho gestured at the gigantic gantry displayed on the main plot.

  “Well, sir, I have mixed analyses from our passive sensors. Nothing conclusive. If we can’t find out, we’ll have to board it and take a closer look.” Guiles shrugged and turned his attention back to his console.

  “Move in closer to one of the pods. The construction makes me think we might be able to access some of their data or control runs out on an EVA. With luck, we’ll be able to figure out what this thing is.”

  “Aye, sir. Plotting a course.” Guiles worked at his console for a moment before saying, “I’ve plotted a course to this pod on the top left of the array as we’re looking at it.” A yellow box highlighted one of the pods. “It’s the largest of the pods.”

  Patho sighed. Without active sensors, it was impossible to determine whether or not there were any people on the station, but Patho wasn’t willing to bet against it. “use caution on approach, so we aren’t spotted.”

  “Aye, sir,” Guiles said.

  Patho watched as the young officer skillfully brought Gorgon to a distance of two hundred meters from the chosen pod. “Well done, Guiles. Let Major Aves know I’m taking him on an EVA in thirty minut
es. While I prepare, make a visual inspection and forward anything interesting to my data node. Once we’re locked on the pod, move Gorgon out of visual range. I’ll signal you to come back in to pick us up. Commander Hilleman is in command until I return.”

  “Aye, sir,” Guiles said.

  Patho headed to the ready room and met up with Aves, who had just arrived. Aves had pulled his combat armor out of his locker and was running it through the diagnostic and maintenance routine before putting it on over his EVA suit.

  “Mister Aves, how are things going today,” Patho asked as he pulled out his EVA suit. The EVA suits were skin tight, with a flexible outer layer that held pressure against the skin and carried an on board thermal control system and air supply. Combat power armor was designed to go over the EVA suit and provided heavy protection and greatly enhanced strength to the wearer. The combat armor also added significant endurance as it carried a redundant air and power supply. Patho stripped to his briefs and pulled the EVA suit on over his body. Once the suit was in place, he sealed the neck and pressed the vacuum pump that pulled the suit in close against his body.

  The suit sucked in uncomfortably against his skin, and Patho bent and flexed several times to get it into a comfortable position. He then stepped onto the power armor boots and pulled the front of the chassis up to his waist before sliding his arms into the armored sleeves. The armor sealed up, and Patho flexed his arms and legs again to get everything settled into place.

  “I hope we don’t need to use all this armor,” Aves said. “Not without more of my unit at least.” The Gorgon was crewed by sixteen Navy personnel and eight marines, led by the newly promoted Major Aves.

  “We shouldn’t. This is a recon trip only. We’re not even entering the pod unless it proves to be uninhabited.”

  Aves grinned and said, “I’ll bring my pry bar, sir.”

  Patho chuckled and said, “Good thinking.”

  Aves lifted the long metal bar and strapped it to his pack before pulling the pack on over his armor. He gave Patho a wink and then settled his helmet on the heavy collar of his EVA suit. Patho pulled an electronic analysis kit from his locker and clapped Aves on the shoulder. The pair headed to the forward airlock and opened the inner door.

  Patho tapped the intercom and said, “Aves and I are leaving the ship. I’ll make a single directional ping from my comm to have you come back in visual range.”

  “Aye, sir,” Guiles’ disembodied voice said from the intercom.

  Patho locked his helmet in place and touched the control to cycle the airlock. Once the outer door was open, Patho and Aves pushed off from Gorgon and drifted towards the Alliance station. They made a few small corrections with their suit jets and touched against the pod. Patho turned and faced Aves and made a hand gesture for him to follow. Aves acknowledged and fell in behind him. Patho worked his way carefully along the structure until he saw what looked like a bundle of cables. Patho pulled the analyzer from his belt and attached it to a strut supporting the cables.

  The analyzer started sucking information from the cable run and gave Patho directions to attach the more sensitive probes. After ten minutes of careful work, the analyzer indicated it had accessed a number of data storage locations. The small device showed several progress bars, and Patho waited patiently while it completed its automated task. Patho ran the signal analyzer across the cable bundle several more times, but there were no new systems for him to access.

  Patho repeated the process with Three more cable bundles around the pod before he turned to Aves, who had been watching his back while he worked. Patho pulled the direct comm link cable and plugged it into Aves’ suit.

  “Have you seen anything while I was using the data sniffer?”

  “I did take the opportunity to peek into some of the windows. Mostly engineering spaces but one was a berthing area with what looked like mostly Xalcek Alliance troops inside. They didn’t see me, of course. The room was pretty small, so I don’t think there are a lot of troops on board. Perhaps a maintenance team?”

  “Perhaps. I’ll signal Gorgon to return so we can reboard and look at the information we’ve gathered so far.” Patho said. He watched the area where Gorgon was supposed to be for a few minutes until the ship came into view.

  “There it is, sir,” Aves said and pointed at the ship looming out of the inky black of open space.

  “I see it.” Patho unplugged the comm line and pushed off towards Gorgon.

  Once Patho and Aves had gotten changed back into their underway uniforms, they met up with Guiles and Hilleman in Gorgon’s tiny wardroom to review the data. Patho and his officers waited while the computer chewed on the information retrieved from the Alliance network on the station. After a few minutes, the computer beeped, indicating the automated data correlation was complete.

  Patho put the information up on the screen and leaned forward, cupping his chin in his hand while he considered what was displayed.

  After a few seconds, Hilleman let out a low whistle. “The Alliance must have stuffed this thing with every computer they could lay their hands on. Look at all those data paths.”

  Patho nodded. “It’s going to take a long time for our computer to map out the functions. Despite that, I think we can safely presume that the gantry was part of the Alliance plan to send the second crab fleet to Lashmere.”

  Guiles said, “I think so, sir. Look at those massive focusing coils all around the structure. Clearly, the system was made to manipulate space-time. With the kind of power generation it has, it might be enough to form a jump ring large enough to send the fleet, but the mass is the real problem. They must have found a way to take that out of the equation.”

  Hilleman said, “I find it somewhat disturbing that the Alliance has learned to make jump rings. That assumes, of course, that this is actually what the structure does.”

  “We know they got good scans of our system from Thun, the scout who first came to our system,” Patho said. “In any event, we can’t say for certain what it does until the computer finishes its analysis. Let’s concentrate on the Xalcek military headquarters. Have we located it?”

  Hilleman tapped a control pad built into the small wardroom table. The screen changed to show the planet Xalcek. The screen zoomed in to show an installation on the surface. “Their military headquarters is located here at this large base. They have a strong security perimeter and ground patrols throughout the base.”

  “Can we hover over the base and drop us in from a safe height,” Guiles asked.

  “No. There is a large population center around the base, and they have significant lighting. We’d be noticed easily by anyone who just happened to glance up while dropping an infiltration team off. You’ll have to be dropped outside of the settlement.”

  Patho interjected and said, “We don’t resemble any of the Alliance races closely enough to pass for any of them. We’re way too tall to be Xalcek, and our profile is nothing like any of the others.” Patho paused for a moment before continuing. He rubbed his chin thoughtfully while the other three officers waited expectantly. “The trick will be getting from our drop off point into the base without being seen at all.”

  Guiles said, “It’s even more complex than that. Spectral analysis indicates the atmosphere will be slightly toxic. You’ll have to bring a supply of oxygen to supplement the planetary atmosphere.”

  “We’ll need to modify our armor to carry the oxygen. Making an infiltration in a full environmental suit would be pretty much impossible,” Hilleman said.

  Guiles sighed. “Sir, I’m not sure if we can use our armor to make the infiltration. It’s bulky and very heavy. We have the new designs that research was working on before we left but there wasn’t time to build them. Perhaps we could complete their work and build some more appropriate armor for the mission.”

  Patho grinned broadly at the idea. “I do love the idea of new toys. Let’s take a look at the designs we have on hand.”

  “Yes, sir.” Guiles tapped out
a command on his datapad. The monitor came to life and displayed a schematic of a new type of power armor. The design was sleek and appeared much more close fitting than the design currently in common use. “The material is a densified carbon and ceramic composite. The material should be highly resistant to both energy weapons and projectiles.”

  Hilleman said, “This looks like a complete design to me. What was Naval Research still working on when we left?”

  “The broad strokes are complete. They were finalizing internal sensors and weapons,” Guiles said. He tapped at his datapad again. The monitor updated to show three different designs. “These were originally suggested by Marli Simmons, just after the battle with the crabs. The first is a system that maximizes the combination of two technologies we currently possess. The first being powered combat armor and the second is the newly introduced stealth materials and systems.

  “The second system is a main line combat unit. It trades a large portion of the stealth features of the first for much higher survivability and additional internal weaponry.” The screen updated and highlighted built in arm mounted energy cannons. “The armor still maintains exceptional mobility and hand to hand combat ability.”

  Patho nodded at the presentation. “What of the third design?”

  Guiles updated the display. “The third unit is a heavy infantry design. There is an extended power source in a large backpack and a mounted plasma cannon. The armor is thicker and heavier than the standard infantry model. The targeting computer is upgraded as well to use the cannon to maximum effect.” The image highlighted the weapon, standing almost a meter above the shoulder of the armor design.

  “Impressive,” Patho said. “So, the designs are largely complete, barring only final details?”

  Guiles nodded. “Yes, sir. We can finalize the design for our current needs and fabricate them in the maintenance bay easily enough.”

  “Very good,” Patho said. “Mister Hilleman, do you have any input before we proceed?”