Stepping Up (31 page)

“Seems like a little overkill to make you my personal
assistant, especially considering I have one of those also.  So you are now the
Deputy Operations Officer and my personal bodyguard.  You’re to back up Aria
should she become damaged or incapacitated in some way.  So plug into the
library and learn everything you need to do in order to do that.”

“At once, Ma’am.”

So go the rest of the days in Transit.  Since I probably
have less than six weeks before I will probably be leading the ship into
combat, I spend a lot of time learning how to do that.  Until I run out of time
to study. 
Night Searcher
has fallen out of Transit. “Captain,” Aria
calls from the Bridge, “we are approaching a planet.  Could you come to the
Bridge, please?”

“On my way.” I use my perCom to read what the scanners
reveal on my way to the Bridge.  It isn’t much.  The giant mass of Lacus IV
looms on the forward screen. It is a Class D planet (huge but not larger than
Goliath).  Our guess was correct; the cruiser is achieving orbit over the
planet. “Report.”

“The cruiser is assuming orbit. We cannot get power readings
of any type from inside it. However, we should not be misled. That ship
probably has screens of advanced types. We are forty-five minutes from orbit.
Aside from four mining tugs that typically are robotic units, we detect no
ships in orbit.”

“Scan the planet.  Perhaps we can deduce their points of
interest.  Hail the cruiser.  We can try this diplomacy crap one last time.”

“Scanning. It is a Class D planet, approximately
forty-thousand miles in diameter. It has a very dense atmosphere, 32% water;
the rest of the data will be in shortly.  If they are receiving our hails,
they—”

The voice of Azazeel booms from every speaker grille on the
Bridge: “Do not interfere with my will. If you do, you will be destroyed.”

Rangee pipes up. “Target cruiser is assuming a very low
orbit trajectory. It must be doing something that requires a certain altitude.”

I’m going to bet that Azazeel can hear us.  “I have no wish
to interfere with your will.  You told me if I gave you the disk, you would
release the girl.  I have a mission that I cannot complete without her.  I gave
you the disk, but you kept the girl.  Please release her to us.  I don’t know
this planet, or this sector.  What you do with them has no bearing on us
whatsoever.  Return the girl to us, and we will be on our way.”

I look at Aria. “Ponder this: If we were to launch missiles
at that cruiser for point or proximity detonation, could we jostle their
particular altitude significantly?  I’m just wondering for right now.”

Azazeel is speaking again: “Away with you, toad. I do as I
wish. I have bandied words with you far longer than I have with any human
scum.”

Aria has an answer for me. “It is hard to say. But the hull
seems to be a higher tech level of bonded, super dense material.  Our scanners
are unable to penetrate it.  There is insufficient data to determine what
effect—if any—our missiles would have on it.”

“Captain! The cruiser is deploying drones! Our ballistic
computers are tracking approximately forty trajectories. They are moving into
low orbits around the planet. Those vectors look like final approaches. 
Confirmed, they are moving to the surface.”

“Aria, get the department heads and primary staff in the
conference room.  I need input. We’ll start in ten minutes.”  I go to my
office.  I don’t know why, but I feel compelled to have that Amulet with me.  I
slip it over my head and put it inside my flight suit.  It and the chain are
oddly warm, almost comforting. 

I walk into the conference room and begin before sitting. 
“Take your seats, please.  Here’s the situation: My predecessor stated that it
was of the utmost importance that we escort Gwendolyn to Atlas and the Academy
of the Ancients.  He stated, and I quote, ‘crew and ship are expendable.’ 
However, if the ship is lost, I’m curious as to how the mission is to be
accomplished.  Although the decision is mine, I want to assure you that my
reasons are neither strictly personal nor obsessive.  At this time, we know
nothing about the vessel, other than what I saw inside it. Likewise, we know
little about the planet although our probes continue gathering data.  I believe
that our direction is clear. We should assault that ship and rescue Gwen.  Is
there any discussion?”  There’s no outright dissension.  Although, when I
mentioned Prowse’s policy, I heard a few curses hurled towards his memory.

Athena speaks: “I suggest a team penetrate the ship and
steal the girl. I do not recommend attacking the vessel by means of firepower.”

“I disagree,” Rangee counters. “We should nuke the piss out
of that thing.”

Aria puts her opinion on the table, “But that would entail
significant risk to the child.”

“Ginny, I mean ‘Chief Berry,’ how about an ion blast or a
meson shower? Can you rig up some manner of electromagnetic pulse to scramble
them up?”  She starts making notes on a pad.  To the group I say:  “Although I
concur with your sentiments, I consider neither this crew nor this ship
expendable.  Like the XO noted, they are in a very low parking orbit.  We will
have to board the ship in order to locate and retrieve Gwen.  We can’t destroy
it.  If she dies, our mission fails.  Troop Commander, I’m sorry, ‘Chief
Sergeant,’ get some of those bloodthirsty killers armed up and armored up—you
have an hour.  Aria, do we have any ships that can provide support to the entry
team? Fighters or such?  Doc, you made some photographs of Gwen when you examined
her. Please distribute copies to the Troopers.  XO, find where those probes
they launched set down, and zap them with a laser as firing solutions are
acquired.  Prepare a missile attack on the cruiser, we may not be able to
destroy them, but I’ll bet we can distract them long enough to make other
things work.  Ginny, can you fiddle with the nuke warheads to maximize the
EMP?  What effect do you predict from the meson shower or the ion blast? The
clock starts now:  Missiles to launch in fifty minutes, entry team is five
minutes behind them.”

Rangee nods and begins tapping commands out on his perCom.

Ginny responds first: “Either mesons or ions should affect
their sensors or targeting computers. I recommend the meson shower.”

“Make it happen.  Can you meet my timeline?”  She looks at a
chronometer, nods and starts to rise, then looks at me.  “Go.” I say. She
leaves.

“I strongly recommend you let Athena lead the Troopers. If
we are truly dealing with a psionic here, she won’t be affected.” Aria has such
a way of pointing out the best solutions.

“Excellent idea.  Athena, draw whichever weapons you have a
proclivity for.  You will lead the boarding team.”  She and the Troop Commander
nod.

When we break up from the conference room, I go back to my
apartment.  Bethany is dusting. “I’m going to relax and try to meditate for a
moment.  If something bad starts happening to me, alert Aria or Athena, then do
what you can to take this amulet off of me.”

“Yes, Captain.”

I sit back in the Captain’s throne chair.  No wonder
Prowse liked it.  I take off my boots and stretch the kinks from my feet and
toes.  I do what I can to get comfortable with the amulet around my neck, take
a deep breath, close my eyes and think “Gwen, where are you? Can you hear me?”

“I am with Lunia.”

I feel my body dissipate, and reality as I know it slips
from me. When my eyes open, I’m in a huge room. It is roughly four-hundred
meters by ten, with a twelve-foot ceiling. I am on a ship that is not mine. 
Fortunately, I am in the clothes I was in, and the amulet is still around my
neck. I slowly understand that I am in a gigantic TMOD chamber. I’m standing in
the aisle. There are double-stacked TMOD units on either side of the room.
There are at least four hundred in a line on each side.  And of course, the
floor is hard and cold.  My boots are still in my stateroom on
Night
Searcher
.

“Hi, Mommy.” Her voice is coming from nowhere, but
everywhere.  “I missed you.  Do I have to come home now?”

Oh, this is so not good!
I hope Aria and Rangee
figure out they should continue the attack in my absence. I have nothing better
to do, so I look at the TMODs.  Every one that I can see is occupied. There are
humanoids the size of mountain gorillas in
all
the berths. I imagine
they are what Neanderthal man may have looked like.  All appear to be male,
have beards, and easily weigh four hundred pounds each.

I think, “Gwen? Where are you? Can you hear me?”  I pull my
perCom from my pocket. 
Good thing I have a habit of sticking it there
.
“
Night Searcher
, this is
Night Searcher
Actual.  Do you read me?”

“
Night Searcher
Actual, this is
Night Searcher
.
State your location, please.”

“Irrelevant.  Continue attack plan.  I authenticate:  Gorb,
Shownya, Chocolate.”

I hear a brief buzz of discussion on the other end then a
decisive “Affirmative, Captain.  Changes are locked out. 
Night Searcher
out.”

“Mommy, I can hear you, but I don’t know where you are. I am
in Lunia’s room playing with her dolls.”

“How did you get to Lunia’s room?”  I’d give a year’s wages
for a light machine gun, or a pistol. Even a heavy club.  But I see no weapons
lying about, nor anything I can use effectively as a weapon.

I see iris valves on either end of this room. Since I’ve no
idea which direction is which, I approach the door closest to me. The iris
valve opens as I approach. It’s an engine room. There are what look to be
Maneuver drives present and running...
big
Maneuver drives.

“Oh, that’s easy,” I hear Gwen say.  “1211 Danfellows Ferry.
Hers is the big yellow house.”

That brings me up short. “You’re not on a ship? Are you
sure?” I back away from the iris valve and walk to the other one.  I look in
every TMOD I pass. All contain men, no females, child or otherwise.  But I am
confident she is on this ship. It makes no objective sense, but I feel it. 
They couldn’t have dropped out of Transit to jettison her somewhere. Surely
they don’t have teleportation technology.

“Mommy is being silly. You know I am at Auntie Lunia’s; you
brought me here. She works in a cyborg factory.”

“Is Lunia at work now?”

“Of course she is at work.  She works every day.  She works
very hard, too.  Like you.”

“Do you see her every day?”

“Every day, before and after work. She is taking care of me
until you come to get me.  Do we have to go now? I am having a lot of fun
playing with the dolls.”

“I know you enjoy playing with the dolls, sweetie, but can
you tell me specifically what you are doing with them?  They may look sturdy,
but I bet they break easily.  You aren’t hurting them are you? You wouldn’t
want to do that, you’re a good girl.”

“What?? I never hurt people!!! Why did you say that?!?”

I was afraid of that.  She equates the dolls with people.
 
The ship rocks violently. The gravitational stabilizers go offline for half a
minute. I float upward slowly until I can grab a piece of wall and hold on.
Gravity restores. My head feels like someone hit me with a crowbar.  It’s like
she yelled inside my head.

“Calm down, sweetie.  I know you would never want to hurt
people.  But people who make cyborgs sometimes don’t care like you and I do. 
I’ve heard about cyborg makers.  Some of them are bad people that like to hurt
others.  They enjoy it.  I know if you were doing that and didn’t know it, you
would get very sad. Has Lunia shown you that you can take dolls apart and put
them back together differently?”

I open the other iris valve. It opens onto a huge control
room, probably for the TMODs. I eyeball it to be about twenty meters wide,
forty deep. There are two attendants about fifteen feet away, sitting in swivel
chairs at a control station. They have not turned in my direction.  Yet.

I step back, trying to get out of sight or at least close
the door.  And I kick a small wrench, which clangs down the companionway.
This
is also very not good. Am I the only engineer who insists on a clean work area?

The attendants look at me in disbelief, like they aren’t
sure I’m really there. One of them runs for the door, and the other shouts what
can only mean ‘intruder alert’ into a microphone.

Well I suppose there’s nothing for it but hand-to-hand. 
Although, I’d prefer to bring a gun to a fistfight any day.

The one heading for the door makes it out. The other is so
shaken that one hammer fist strike to the back of the head takes him right
out.  His momentum pushes his head into the microphone, the wound starts
bleeding terribly, and he falls to the deck, unconscious. There is a device on
his belt with a lot of buttons on it. I see a diagram on the wall of the
control room. Schematics are the true universal language.  I can discern the
purpose of about half of the writing.  This appears to be a troop ship,
probably for a massive planetary invasion.  One in a fleet of…could that mean
200?

I remove the device from the tech’s belt.  I don’t know what
it is, but I have a feeling my situation is not hampered by having it.  Unless
it has a locater beacon in it.  I take his boots, too.  I need to reestablish
contact with Gwen.  I turn on my ‘mommy’s mad’ voice.  I say aloud, “You listen
to me, young lady! If you have hurt those dolls you are going to be in big
trouble, do you understand me?”  It’s time to test my theory.  Sadly, his feet
are much larger than mine, but I take his boots anyway.  Blisters I can deal
with, not being able to move quickly and surely is a much bigger issue.

I take one of the elevators up to the next deck, which leads
to a huge supply room. There are hundreds of crates of all sizes.

After a bit of looking around, I see some crates marked with
an unknown language and what I think are warning signs. Upon further
examination, I realize that they are laser carbines.  They’re a little
primitive; but that’s what they are.  I help myself to one and hope I’m sharp
enough to figure out how to turn the stupid thing on. I find the power stud and
stick another power magazine in a cargo pouch on my thigh, then make my way
forward, pausing at the entrance to the other TMOD room.

“Gwendolyn! Don’t you make me tell you a second time! You
answer me right this second! I want you to stop playing with those dolls right
now!”

The ship rumbles, the lights flicker.

“Whoever you are, stop yelling at me!” she screams between
my ears.   Apparently I’m not the only competitor for her attention.

The ship rocks as if buffeted by an asteroid.  The lights
and pathway indicators flicker. Then the room goes pitch black. The only
visible light now is the faint glow of an indicator of my carbine.

“When you tell me you’ve stopped playing with the dolls,
I’ll stop yelling at you! And what do you mean ‘whoever you are?’ You know very
well who I am!” All of the doors I try are locked.  But I can’t tell if they
are barred from the other side or just because the power is out. Gwen doesn’t
reply to me. The ship continues rocking.  I go back to the TMOD room, through
the drive room, and to the other TMOD bay. I make my way to the stern control
room.  In the other TMOD bay there are tubes full of similar humanoids.

The iris valve to the stern control room is locked.

I can ‘hear’ Gwen, but she’s not talking to me:  “But she
wasn’t in the toy box, I can’t play with her.  That’s your rule, not mine.”
There’s a pause.  “She says that what I’m doing hurts people.” Another pause 
“No, I will not take her arms off,
No!
Ouch! That hurts!
Oowwwww!
”

I hear Athena, broken and staticky on my perCom: “I don’t
know where the Captain is...we are looking...” the rest of her message
dissolves in static.

The tech’s handheld unit! I forgot I had it!
When I
pull the handheld out and hold it close to the valve, a button lights up. I
press it and the valve opens.

“Gwen, I’m looking for you, baby.  We miss you back on
Night
Searcher
. I’m going to take you home.  Hang on for me. Can you make any of
these doors between us open for me?”

I try to call Athena on my perCom: “If you can hear me, I’m
in the TMOD area. I have a feeling it is on the lowest deck.”

I get no reply from Gwen.

Athena:  “medical room...can’t rea...”

“I love you, Peanut.” I say to Gwen.  “I’m not leaving here
without you!”

I hear Athena, but I don’t think she’s talking to me: “I’m
making my way aft. The Captain is sure Gwen is aboard somewhere.”

“Mommy, I can’t leave now. Auntie Lunia says we are in
trouble. You and me.  She’s really mad.”

Three laser shots come through the valve as I open it.  One
catches me in the thigh. Good thing the laser magazine is in the pocket on the
other
side. I’m in pain, but I’m still in the fight.  It makes me stagger a bit to
the side, which as things turned out is a good thing, as it gets me out of the
firing line.

There are two explosions in that room. Grenades. The
explosions are followed by the familiar sound of Sherri’s voice. “Sonia! Are
you in here somewhere?”

Praise the Gods the cavalry is here.  Now for a fight on
the other front.
“Gwen, there’s a fire in the kitchen! Do you smell the
smoke?  We have to leave! Guide me to you! I’ll get you out of here!” In a much
louder voice I yell “Sherri! I’m here!” To Gwen I shout, “If the kitchen burns
up, we won’t have cookies!!” The ship rocks from side to side and gravity goes
off line completely.

I start to float. Sherri catches my foot.  “Hey, baby—I mean
Captain—here, put this on.”  She hands me an APE suit. “Is that a laser burn?
Here, come closer to me.” She pushes her helmet visor up. “The displays and
scanners are nice, but I need the Mark I eyeball right now.”  I see the welcome
sight of five suits of the new armor behind her.

It would probably be a comical sight, seeing me float
sideways in the air and Sherri treating my wound with an injector and a
QuickPatch dressing. In a few short minutes I am in my APE suit—except for one
thigh—and ready to go. Sherri pulls out an inertial tracking device. A handy
little gizmo—once a ‘starting place’ is defined, you can run, jump, fly,
whatever, and the gizmo will guide the operator back to the starting place. 
She shows me the “companions” display.  “Here’s where we are.” Sherri points to
the Control Room, “Here’s where Athena’s team is.” She points to an area above
and forward of us.

“Gwen,” I say into empty space, “did I tell you about the
cookies my mom used to bake? It’s a secret recipe passed down in my family for
years.  I don’t have anyone to pass it to. I want that to be you.  I was
looking forward to you helping me with a batch tomorrow, but I need to get you
out of here first.  Has my friend, Athena, found you? Sherri has found me, but
we still don’t know where you are.  You remember Sherri? From
Night Searcher
?
From home?”

“Cookies are so nice, I want to help,” Gwen says. “What? Who
is a cockroach?? No, no,
nooooo!
”

 “Ow!” I yell at Sherri as she dabs burn ointment on my
wound. “That stings!  Okay, thanks.” She puts the QuickPatch in place then
turns her face up to mine.  “Stop grinning like that.” I take a few seconds to
tell her what I know about the storage rooms and the drive rooms. 

 “I think they have plugged Gwen’s consciousness into this
thing.” I explain to Sherri. “Long story short, I think this ship is a cyborg
factory, and they have her doing some of the vivisection work.  They have punished
her for not hurting me.  I guess it’s me anyway.” I point to the passageway
running along the right, “Is this the way you came? By the way, if we get out
of this, I may have to take you up on those ‘tongue and groove’ carpentry
lessons you’re so interested in giving me.”

“I’m happy to be your instructor, but that will have to
wait.” Her grin disappears. “No, we came off the elevator. Let’s get to where
Athena is. This way.”

The ship’s intercom comes over very loud and very clear: “Self-destruct
sequence in two minutes…one minute fifty five…one minute fifty…”

The team moves quickly and furiously towards the elevator.
The point man shouts in horror as he identifies at least sixty cyborgs heading
our way. His warning is his last act.  He should have been moving.  He falls in
a hail of weapons fire. 
Night Searcher
troopers take a knee and start
sending ordnance towards the enemy.  Sherri should have closed her helmet
visor.  The accelerator round tears into her cheek. The round proceeds through
her skull and bounces around on the inside of her helmet.  It penetrates her
cranium again and again.  Her head is ground to nothing in seconds. The
grenades make the cyborgs explode like sacks of rotten fruit. Sherri’s lifeless
body falls to the deck.  I doubt she even felt the round that killed her.