Andromeda's War (Legion of the Damned Book 3) (26 page)

“Yes,” McKee answered gently. “Who are you?”

A look of profound sadness appeared on the man’s face. “I was captain of the
Victorious
. I am nothing now.” And then he began to cry.

“Suzuki,” Remy said. “The captain of the
Victorious
was named Suzuki.”

“Shoot me,” Suzuki begged. “Please kill me.”

The chief thought that was funny and began to laugh. So his retainers laughed, too. And they were still laughing when Remy shot Oppo in the face.

Chiefs may plan—but the katha decide.

AUTHOR UNKNOWN
A Paguumi folk saying
Standard year unknown

PLANET SAVAS

Remy’s pistol was equipped with a suppressor. So all McKee heard was a soft popping sound as the bullet punched a hole through Oppo’s good eye and blew a hole through the back of his skull. The Paguumi jerked, wobbled, and slumped sideways in his seat. Blood dripped onto the katha hide under his feet.

McKee was still trying to absorb that when Remy turned and shot one of the chief’s bodyguards. The body was still falling as Huzz clubbed another retainer with his shotgun. Three warriors remained. They were bringing their weapons to bear when the drone fired its energy weapon, swiveled, and fired again. The guards positioned next to the back door crumpled. That left the warrior on the other end of Suzuki’s leash. McKee heard a pop and saw a third eye appear between the two the Paguumi already possessed. He went down as if poleaxed. Suzuki continued to rock back and forth and sob. “Well, don’t just stand there,” Remy said, as McKee turned to look at him. “Help drag the bodies into place.”

With McKee’s help, Remy repositioned bodyguards one and two so they were in front of Oppo’s chair. One was armed with a navy pistol, which Remy placed next to his right hand.

In the meantime, Huzz was hard at work making it look as if guards three and four had been moving toward the improvised throne when they were killed. By that time, McKee realized that the whole thing had been planned in advance. With Kambi’s help, Remy had been able to buy Huzz off. Or, more likely, the subchief had goals of his own. Not that it mattered. Oppo was dead either way.

“Okay,” Remy said, as he surveyed the scene. “We’re ready. McKee, tell your people to expect some gunfire and to mill around when they hear it. But they are not, repeat
not
, to shoot anyone. Got it?”

McKee nodded. “Yes, sir.”

“Do it.”

McKee did it. “Okay,” Remy said, “when I give the signal, shoot the assassin in the face. Use your AXE. I want it to look messy.”

McKee looked at him. “What about the warriors by the back door?”

“Chief Huzz will take care of that. Won’t you, Chief?”

Huzz stood over a body. The shotgun produced a distinctive clacking sound as he worked the action.

“You’ve done this sort of thing before,” McKee said accusingly.

Remy’s expression was cold. “What? You thought it was all about wearing green berets? We’re special forces, Lieutenant. We do hard things. The things other people can’t or don’t want to do. Now get ready . . . Fire on my command.”

McKee placed her finger on the trigger, and when Remy said, “Now!” she squeezed it. Half a dozen slugs smashed into the warrior’s face. While that was taking place, Huzz fired his shotgun. The result was instant pandemonium.

More guards entered the hoga through both entrances. Their instincts were to attack the aliens—but Huzz was shouting at them in Paguumi. No, he insisted. The bodyguards were the ones who had attacked Oppo. But thanks to quick thinking on his part, and some help from the Humans, the plot failed.

McKee thought it was a very unlikely scenario and fully expected somebody to call the subchief on it, but no one did. Maybe some members of the tribe were tired of Oppo and wanted Huzz to take over. Or maybe they were truly taken in. In any case, there was a great deal of shouting and gesticulating as the dead bodyguards were towed outside. A crowd gathered, Huzz told the story again, and a cry of outrage went up. Moments later, half the mob ran off to find relatives of the murdered warriors and punish them.

As the hubbub started to die down, McKee heard a gunshot from inside the hoga. She rushed in with her AXE at the ready, but there was no need. A Legion handgun had been left on the ground as part of the staging. And having been left alone, Suzuki had been free to crawl over and make use of it. Now he lay near Oppo’s lifeless body. McKee heard movement and turned to see Remy enter the hab. He looked down at Suzuki. “I feel sorry for him . . . But he made a lot of mistakes. Maybe this is for the best.”

McKee had learned a great deal about her commanding officer during the last hour—and her previously positive opinion of him was beginning to slip. “So you installed a new chief. Now what?”

“Huzz says that Empress Ophelia was captured and given over to the Hudathans in exchange for a thousand-year peace treaty and unfettered access to the wreck. Huzz and most members of the tribe liked that. But when Oppo began to levy a 10-percent tax on the sky metal, his popularity took a dive.”

“Which is why the Paguumis are willing to buy the ridiculous assassination-plot story,” McKee observed.

“Exactly,” Remy agreed. “So I agreed to help Huzz take over in return for his help in rescuing Ophelia from the Hudathans. The ridgeheads have a base north of here.”

“So that’s where we’re headed?”

“Yes,” Remy replied. “The rest of the team will arrive soon. We’ll go after the empress right after we bury Captain Suzuki.”

Remy made it sound so simple. But McKee knew better. She’d done battle with the Hudathans and barely survived. Now she and Avery would be forced to face them again.

—

SAVAS BASE 001

Admiral Nola-Ba was extremely happy. After weeks of waiting, the message had finally arrived. And it was everything he had hoped for. First, a battle group the size of his own had dropped hyper and was orbiting Savas. Second, new orders had arrived. He was to: “Convey Empress Ophelia Ordanus to Hudatha with all possible speed.”

And then? No mention was made of what reception he would receive—but Nola-Ba felt sure that his previous rank would be restored and, depending upon the current state of clan politics, he might receive a medal or two. All of which would be welcome—but nothing compared to the full restoration of his honor.

So it was with a light heart that he made his way up onto the roof. The sun was high, which meant that his skin began to morph from gray to white moments after he stepped outside. The shuttle was waiting, and so was Empress Ordanus. She looked gaunt and wore little more than some filthy rags. But regardless of her appearance, Nola-Ba had to admit that the Human was courageous. Her head was held high, and her back was ramrod straight. “Where are you taking me?” It was said with all the self-assurance that one would expect from a monarch.

“To Hudatha,” Nola-Ba replied. He saw the Human flinch and knew that she knew. Once on Hudatha, there would be no possibility of a rescue. At that point, all she could hope for was some sort of deal. A ransom that would cost her race dearly. “Put her on the shuttle,” he ordered.

Chains rattled as troopers escorted the Human up the ramp. Nola-Ba took one last look at his surroundings. Savas was a shit hole, and it was good to know that he would never set foot on it again. The ramp gave slightly as Nola-Ba made his way up and into the cargo compartment. Ophelia was safely strapped into an oversized acceleration chair—and her eyes were closed as the shuttle’s engines began to spool up. Then the ship was in the air and nosing out over the berm that surrounded the base.

That was the beginning of what would be a two-hour trip up to join the destroyer
Thunder Hand
in orbit. So Nola-Ba took the opportunity to activate his data pad and review the latest draft of his report. The goal was to highlight his accomplishments without being too obvious—and simultaneously minimize the role luck had played in capturing Ophelia.

Time passed, and Nola-Ba was in the process of rewriting paragraph sixty-seven for the umpteenth time, when the pilot’s voice was heard over the intercom. “Sorry to disturb you, Admiral . . . But enemy ships dropped hyper a few minutes ago, and the
Thunder Hand
is breaking orbit to engage them. I was ordered to turn back and land.”

The announcement came as an enormous shock, and Nola-Ba felt a momentary sense of despair. No! This couldn’t be happening. Not now . . . Not when he was so close to leaving. He saw Ophelia’s eyes pop open. Much to his surprise, she’d been able to pick up a smattering of Hudathan during her weeks of imprisonment, and judging from the expression on her face, understood what had been said. “It is a momentary reprieve only,” Nola-Ba told her. “Your ships will be destroyed in short order—then our journey will resume.”

“You’d better hope so,” Ophelia said levelly. “Because if they aren’t, you’ll be the one wearing chains.”

Nola-Ba would never allow himself to be taken alive—but there was no point in saying that. The shuttle was in a steep dive by that time—and Nola-Ba could feel himself coming up out of the seat. Only the harness held him down. “We have a fighter on our tail,” the pilot said grimly. “Stand by for evasive maneuvers.”

The shuttle rolled and began to corkscrew downwards. Nola-Ba had been a pilot in his youth and felt no discomfort. But the Human threw up. Her vomit disintegrated into individual globules that orbited her head like miniature planets. Then, as the planet’s gravity started to take hold, the droplets were sucked down to the deck.

The stench was nauseating, and Nola-Ba struggled to ignore it as the aircraft jinked left and right. “We lost them!” the pilot said jubilantly.

“Good,” Nola-Ba replied. “Return to base. Warn them that we’re coming.”

I will fight,
Nola-Ba told himself.
And I will win.
It was a bold prediction—and he hoped it was true.

—

ABOARD THE HEAVY CRUISER
MARS

Even though Admiral Hiram Nigata was seated on the bridge of the heavy cruiser
Mars
, he was, by virtue of his rank, a man alone. Because it was his responsibility to consider the strategic situation rather than the fate of any one vessel, including the one he was on. The
Mars
was the responsibility of Captain Somlyo and his crew. So Nigata sat and watched the multicolored symbols battle each other in the sphere-shaped holo tank in front of him.

Nigata had been hoping to find the enemy when his squadron of ships entered the Savas system, and his wish had been granted. Except that rather than the single battle group that the diminutive admiral expected to face, there were
two
. The ridgeheads had a combined force of two light cruisers, four destroyers, eight destroyer escorts, and a noncombatant supply ship.

But even though Nigata’s squadron consisted of only one cruiser, two destroyers, three gunboats, and a nearly defenseless transport—he had what might prove to be an equalizer in the form of a seventy-two-year-old carrier named the
Swarm
. Because, assuming that intelligence estimates were correct, the Hudathan ships had only 124 fighters between them. And the
Swarm
was carrying a full complement of 650 twin-engined Tachyon aerospace fighters. Each Tachyon was armed with twin energy cannons, six missiles under each stubby wing, and a pair of “ship killer” torpedoes nestled below their bellies. The heaviest load-out of any ship-launched fighter in the Human or Hudathan inventories.

Still, it was all Nigata could do to keep his face expressionless as three enemy destroyer escorts (DEs) closed in on the gunboat
Iapelus
and attacked her simultaneously. Nigata saw a flash inside the holo sphere as the gunboat and her eighty-six-person crew were reduced to their component atoms. That produced a groan from the bridge crew and a stern admonition from Somlyo.

But a flight of six Tachyons was closing on one of the DEs, and it was only a matter of moments before it was struck by three torpedoes and transformed into a miniature sun. An eye for an eye. A cheer was heard this time, and the captain joined in.

The Hudathans understood the threat presented by the
Swarm
’s fighters, however, and a destroyer was closing in on her. Nigata smiled grimly. The carrier’s skipper was an officer named Constance Povy. And she knew better than to launch all of her fighters at once because if she did, they would run out of fuel at the same time.

So two-thirds of the Tachyons were still aboard the carrier, and minutes before the destroyer could close with the
Swarm
, a hundred fighters shot out to intercept it. They attacked en masse, and the destroyer’s screens flashed incandescent as dozens of missiles and torpedoes exploded against them. The scale of the attack was irresistible, and it was only a matter of moments before the destroyer’s shields failed. Explosions rippled the length of the hull, the ship broke in two, and pinpoints of light appeared as the wreck scattered dozens of escape pods in its wake.

But that was a distraction. The squadron’s mission was to find and rescue Empress Ophelia, assuming she was alive and still on the planet’s surface. To do that, Nigata had to put marines on the ground. Marines plus some armor. A battalion of leathernecks was already dropping down through the atmosphere. But their armor was still on the transport
Hercules
, which was under the protection of a destroyer, a gunboat, and two flights of Tachyons.

Sparks of light flared as an enemy destroyer, a DE, and a couple of dozen fighters zeroed in on the transport. And they had plenty to shoot at. The
Hercules
was far too large to land. That meant she had to send the marine corps’ tanks down in assault boats and shuttles. So hundreds of small craft were swimming around the transport, and they made excellent targets.

Nigata felt his stomach muscles tighten as dozens of tiny lights went dark inside the holo tank. Each represented a ship that wouldn’t reach the surface, supplies lost, and lives ended. Nigata gave an order that sent his second destroyer in to protect the transport, but she was still turning toward the
Hercules
when a bolt of energy struck her. That was followed by another, and
another
, which produced a momentary sun. “The moon!” an excited voice exclaimed. “The bastards have STS cannons on the moon!”

Nigata swore under his breath. The moon. Of course. The Hudathans had been there for a period of time and had the good sense to fortify the moon. His squadron had been fighting for its life from the moment it dropped hyper—so there had been no time in which to check on it.
Still,
Nigata thought to himself,
I should have thought of it . . . I should have . . . Focus,
he told himself.
Think.