Merkiaari Wars: 03 - Operation Oracle (43 page)

Eric wiped the blood from the knife on his thigh staring at the couple. The girl was still astride her partner, slumped forward with her head on his chest. The pale curve of her back was beautiful in the light; her expression... was it wonder? Pleasure? Eric’s face remained a mask, but his hand shook as he sheathed the knife. Already the scene was burned into his viper memory, ready to haunt him in the years to come. He didn’t look away, but made himself remember the feel of the knife entering the girl’s neck between her C1 and C2 vertebrae as his training dictated. Made himself hear her cry of pleasure again and again just as he ended her life. At least this way his nightmares would be true remembrances... and deserved.

He turned away.

Sensors reported no hostiles near as he ran through the ship as if alone on a derelict. Been there, done that, he thought. This feeling was similar, but not the same. The ship was alive with mechanical sounds and well lit. Air moved through the ducts, sounds from behind closed hatches, and even distant crashes came to him as vibrations through the structure of the ship as crew unloaded cargo. None of that had been present last time. The ship had been utterly dead, as had everyone aboard except him. Bumbling around in the dark, he hadn’t enjoyed the experience. He’d been lucky to find an operational escape pod that time.

Lucky. Right.

Some would call him a Jonah for how many times he had been present and the only survivor when missions went wrong. Then again, all the veterans were guilty of being survivors when circumstances had whittled the regiment down to a nub.

He entered environmental and went straight for the service way he needed. It was the last one. Sensors reported the vats and equipment unattended as he had hoped. The gardens aboard ship looked after themselves mostly. He hadn’t expected to encounter anyone, but then, he hadn’t expected to find two people having sex in the auxiliary control room either. He climbed into the service way and locked the hatch behind him.

He followed his map taking the turns fast as he came to them, and climbing when he had to. He was approaching the bridge now, and sensors showed a lot of activity. The bridge was fully manned just as engineering had been. Not really a surprise anymore. He had already guessed the crew was oversized. They probably doubled as boarding parties for jacking ships and stations. He paused at the final hatch and watched things using sensors. The hatch he crouched beside was in a bad location for his purposes.
Dasher
class ships used the U-shaped bridge that military ships used. It was a logical layout. The captain’s command station was positioned centrally so that he could oversee operations, and the elevators leading to the rest of the ship were behind him between the legs of the U. All that was fine, but it meant the hatch he was about to use was in full view of everyone on the bridge, directly beneath the main viewscreen. There was nothing to be done about it, and he prepared himself for a fight.

He lay his rifle aside and drew his pistol. The pistol was a little faster to aim in extremis, and he expected this fight to be extreme. There were six hostiles to neutralise, and he needed to do it before they raised the alarm. Also, he needed the bridge intact. He couldn’t emerge spraying fire in all directions. He would have to rely upon Snapshot for targeting.

Vipers were programmed with perfect recall in an effort to make them better killers by making target acquisition at a glance instant and perfect. The routines in his programming were complicated and numerous. Together they were called Snapshot and could not be turned off. The moment he emerged, he should be able to acquire all six targets, but he couldn’t kill them all with one shot. There would be time for them to respond. They might try to run, or hide, or fight back, and he wasn’t wearing armour. The risk of return fire was part of the job and he didn’t let it concern him. The one thing he feared was the alarm being raised, and if he was seriously unlucky, they might lock him out of the controls.

Computer: Melee mode.

The world seemed to slow as the hatch slid aside. It didn’t of course. He had sped up. He pushed himself out of the hatch already turning toward the comm shack. He had chosen it as his first priority to prevent word of his attack leaving the ship. His pistol swung toward the crewman even as he straightened to full height. His targeting reticule found the man’s head and spun. It only had time to pulse once before his finger twitched. A three round burst splashed blood and brains over the bulkhead but did no damage to the ship. He had set his pistol to 50% power, more than enough even at much higher ranges than this.

He glared around the bridge acquiring targets as cries of shock erupted. Men and women dove for cover or went for their weapons. His reticule picked them all out storing their positions, and he began servicing targets. He fired at the captain, or the officer currently in charge of the deck. He was sitting in the captain’s chair at least. Before the man completed rising Eric’s three rounds took him in the upper chest blasting him back into the couch.

Impact!

Eric staggered as damage assessments flickered onto his display. Right side over the ribs. He reprioritised his targeting to take out the gunner. It was the damage control officer, and he had a pistol out. Before Eric could take him out, another round punched into him. Left shoulder this time, minimal damage but plenty of blood soaked his uniform and trickled down his arm. He dove aside, rolled to his feet, and killed his attacker with two trigger pulls. The helmsman reached for a control. Eric killed him, but the hand landed and alarms wailed.

Goddamnit!

The last man dove into the elevator but died before the doors closed. Eric turned examining the bodies. A groan from one man, another trigger pull, and it was over. The alarm continued wailing.

Computer: combat mode.

The world sped up to normal and data flooded his display, some flashing for attention. Priorities. IMS, absent his input, swung into action and began making repairs. He ignored it all reaching to drag the dead helmsman off his consol. He shut off the alarm, and headed for the elevator. He needed to block it. He didn’t want to permanently disable or damage it.

The simplest answer occurred to him and he dragged the body halfway back onto the bridge so that the doors couldn’t close. That done he headed for the comm shack to call Gina in.

* * *

Alpha site, Landing, Kushiel

“Gina,” Eric said giving her a start. “I’ve taken the bridge. I’m using the ship’s comm shack so don’t try to respond. You haven’t got the range. I need you to saddle up and help with the assault. There were a lot more raiders than I thought. I’m estimating forty plus and at least half of them are outside. I need you to take care of business out there while I deal with those in the ship. Coordinates follow...”

She started in surprise. Coordinates meant the ship was grounded. She hurriedly collected the ammo she had brought to the OP with her, and headed back to tell Liz of the change in plans.

“...Penleigh out.”

Gina didn’t bother entering the coordinates into her wristcomp. Her processor had the data, and with a coded thought she added the location to the map of Kushiel they had been gradually compiling. The location surprised her, though she didn’t know why it should when she thought about it. The raiders were here to steal. Why shouldn’t they do that in the capital? The ship was on the ground within the city itself. She was going to visit Haverington again it seemed.

She headed for the shuttle and called Liz via helmet comm. “Liz, we have a change in plans. Eric needs my help.”

“Is he okay?”

“Seemed to be. He says there are more raiders than he thought. He needs me to go to him.”

“Go. We’ll be fine.”

She bit her lip. “I’m sorry to leave you uncovered this way.”

“Just be careful. Eric wouldn’t ask for help if he didn’t badly need it. I know him. He must be greatly outnumbered.”

Liz was right. Gina didn’t know him as well or as long as Liz, but she knew him well enough to know he didn’t panic. That he had taken the bridge and called her before clearing the rest of the ship spoke volumes.

“I’ll be careful. Keep everyone out of sight and listen on comm for me. I’ll be as quick as I can. Fuentez out.”

Gina quickly boarded the shuttle and went through her pre-flight checks already thinking ahead to the fight. She didn’t know what she would find in Haverington. She knew the raiders had armed shuttles and their ship on the ground. Worst case scenario would have those shuttles in the air patrolling the area. That would be bad. Not only would she have to land and hike into the city from a long way out, but she would have to deal with possible air attack. Ideally the shuttles would be on the ground and the raiders too busy with their pilfering to launch quickly. She suspected the truth would be somewhere in between. Either way, she needed to choose her landing site carefully.

She flew the shuttle to Haverington with her eyes glued to her shuttle’s sensors. She didn’t fear being detected by the raiders on the ground, and with Eric in control of their ship’s bridge, she was safe from that too, but the shuttles were another matter. They would have the same or similar range to her cargo shuttle, but being smaller they would be faster and more manoeuvrable. She had no intention of fighting in the air and hugged the terrain to minimise detection.

She landed in the outskirts of the city.

She would have loved to use her APC not only to drive closer, but also in battle. The twin barrelled pulser on the roof could have done serious damage to any target especially those shuttles, but she couldn’t drive and fire the weapon. APCs typically carried a minimum of three crew—driver, gunner, and navigator/comm specialist—plus the platoon of vipers it carried as cargo. On her own, all she would succeed in doing was provide the enemy with a nice mobile target to practice on.

She disembarked from the shuttle carrying her rifle and pack. Her pack was stuffed with extra ammo including grenades, and her rifle was fully loaded. As was her custom, she had chosen to load her grenade launcher with all HE rounds. The P100 could take a maximum of ten. She had loaded it to capacity and had enough loose extras to load it fully twice more. She strongly doubted she would need so much firepower, but it was better to have too much than not enough.

She slogged through the snow carrying the pack in her left hand, and her rifle slung across her chest. She couldn’t wear the pack on her back as designed because her PLSS was there. She kept her right hand free for her pistol. It was holstered over her environmental suit, and it felt wrong, but there was no choice if she wanted to use it. When she needed to fight, she would discard her glove for access to her weapon’s bus, and wondered if perhaps there might be a way to design a glove that would allow the connection while maintaining suit integrity. The gloves she sometimes used in combat had an open window in the right palm, but that wouldn’t work with her suit.

Hmmm.

With sensors at max trawling for hostiles and their emissions, she spent her time imagining a suit mod that would work. If she came up with an answer, she would submit it to General Burgton with her report. He was always looking for ways to improve the regiment and its gear.

The snow was deep in places. It forced her to keep to the centre of the streets. That wasn’t where she instinctively wanted to be, especially when the sun was up and the sky clear. The weather was fine, the day a balmy -25° and should the enemy be looking her way she would stand out like a beacon. She wanted to hug the buildings for cover but couldn’t. Snow drifts had mounded high and deep there. She jogged up the middle, but was ready to take cover.

Her sensors reported in when she came within range and TacNet updated itself. She found a side street with less snow built up, and used it to take a break. She crouched behind the crumbling wall of a fallen building, brought TacNet up on her display and interrogated sensors. She drilled down into the data, and began making notes on the map to make it easy to recall information at a glance. She really did love TacNet, and knew her old friends in the marines would be envious.

It was obvious right away that Eric had been discovered. A large group of hostiles marked in red now on her map were attempting to gain entry to the ship. He must have locked it down and sealed the cargo bays and airlocks. Another group, smaller but still numerous, was doing something in one of the buildings. Salvage operations maybe? Were they that confident of regaining the ship? It confused her because if she had been them, she would have had all hands attacking Eric. Maybe they felt the crew inside could deal with him. Good luck with that! Eric was a lethal SOB, all vipers were, but they probably didn’t know what he was. She watched both groups for a minute or so, noting a few strays wandering between the groups. She had no idea what they were meant to be doing, but she was glad to see both shuttles grounded and seemingly of no immediate interest to anyone. The strays were going to be a problem, she realised. Not because they were inherently more dangerous, but because they had bugger all to do and might notice her arrival. Still, there weren’t many of them. She could probably avoid detection as long as she watched them and took measures to evade them.

“Eric? I’m in position,” Gina said over viper comm. “I’m ready to get the party started.”