Into the Black: Odyssey One (41 page)

The damages they were likely to incur while dealing with those four would make the Odyssey a sitting duck for the remaining ships. Those were best case scenarios as well, assuming that the enemy followed patterns of behavior consistent with their last engagement, and that the Odyssey made no mistakes and suffered no interference from Mr. Murphy.

Roberts actually thought that they’d be lucky, if they successfully took on two enemy cruisers at once and forget the added disadvantage of the additional four. Two of the enemy ships attacking from a similar tangent would turn their armor advantage into a joke. The phase shift in the armor would work against one of the lasers, but the second would cut them up like a hot knife through butter.

The problem was that he couldn’t see any way out of the encounter, now.

Certainly, they could turn tail and run, but the thought left a bitter taste in his mouth to even contemplate. Military units were only as good as their traditions, in Roberts’ opinion. The NAC had a short history, but its military traditions went back hundreds of years, just the same.

To begin the NAC Interstellar Armed Forces with the act of abandoning a world to genocide would be setting a precedent of the worst kind. A tacit approval of the act, in implication, even if not in fact. It would be a tradition, not only of dishonor, but of perceived cowardice.

The problem, however, wasn’t in the dying.

Commander Roberts was willing to die, for his own people or for the strangers, because that was what his duty demanded. However, his intellect would not permit his emotion to forget the fact that the Earth knew nothing of their situation and, if they died out here on this day, the Earth could well follow them into the abyss, because they had failed to provide data, vital to the survival of the human… the Terran species.

In the middle of his contemplation, the door behind him whisked open and he saw the people around him stiffen. Roberts shook his mind clear, inclining his head slightly to the left as he nodded, rather than salute.

“Captain.”

*****

“Bring that Carnivore down to three thousand meters,” Lieutenant Savoy ordered as he and his team stood, observing the great wreck they had made of the already wrecked lander.

They were standing about a hundred meters from it now, watching the settling debris through their enhanced HUD’s, as they waited for the information from the Carnivore’s Ground Penetrating Radar to come back.

The signal was fuzzy at first, the initial pass only returning a low resolution scan, but their fears were confirmed as subsequent passes were used to clear up the signal.

The tunnels showed up clearly, long lines extending dozens of meters down and out from the lander, with several branches that extended in all directions like the limbs of an inverted tree.

Or perhaps like the roots of a virulent weed.

Inside the tunnel spaces, some pictures would return places that were blocked in, while others would later show those spaces to be quite clear. The pattern was overlaid quickly scans being taken, even few milliseconds apart, while played back in a real time sequence.

They could almost make out the flailing limbs of the drones as they crawled through the tunnels and continued their digging.

“The computer estimates are coming back now, Boss,” Mehn said softly. “The computer says that there’s a ninety percent probability, that there are over two hundred and eighty of them down there.”

Savoy nodded. “Tell it to keep counting.”

“You’ve got it, Boss.”

Savoy flicked over to another comm channel, accessing into the command. “Well it’s confirmed, Major. We’ve got a nest or something being built, under our feet.”

Major Brinks growled his face grim. “We’ve also got the sky about to fall on us, Lieutenant.”

“Sir?”

“Six more Cruisers are up there, in less than twelve hours we’re going to have to fight or flee,” Brinks told him, his voice grim.

Savoy grimaced, “I can’t say I like the thought of turning tail, Sir.”

“Not our call,” Brinks replied. “In the meantime, we’ve got twelve hours to try and get a handle on the situation. I’m open to suggestions, Lieutenant.”

Savoy frowned, sighed, “We should redirect one or more of the Carnivores back to the Odyssey for rearming. Right now they’re equipped with air to ground missiles, but if we load them up with some Bunker busters, we might have a chance…, maybe at taking the nest out, with minimal risk.”

“Time to rearm?”

“An hour, including flight time,” Savoy responded.

Brinks considered it, nodded. “All right. But we’ll keep our drones where they are and have the Commander detail two more with the appropriate hardware. That’ll save us some time, and let us keep on with our own work.”

“Yes Sir,” Savoy nodded.

“In the meantime, do what you can. Miss Chans is being transported to the local Command Center now. With luck, we might be able to get some coordination with the locals.” Brinks said, glancing over his shoulder. “Their medical facility seems competently run. Makes me wonder why their military is just a fuck up.”

“Sir, I’m not sure if I’d put it that way exactly,” Savoy replied, a little cautiously.

“Are you kidding, Lieutenant?” Brinks snorted “they’re getting their butts handed to them.”

“That’s true, Sir, however it’s not due to a lack of power. Bermont’s little test with that laser rifle proves that.” Savoy shook his head, “and while they’re a little rudimentary by our standards, Sir, they’re probably on par with most conventional forces I’ve seen.”

“I suppose you’ve got a theory for why these Drasin things are kicking ass and taking names, then?”

“Sir, they seem to be two steps ahead of their opposition,” Savoy replied. “Nothing more than that. Power wise, they appear to be at parity with each other… The Drasin simply seem…, I don’t know, more prepared. Like they knew what they were getting into, and packed for the job.”

Brinks nodded reluctantly, but pushed the thought aside. Whatever it was, it didn’t matter at the moment. What did matter was the situation as it stood, so the Major just had to play the cards he was dealt.

No matter how badly the hand sucked.

*****

“Admiral!”

Someone shouted, a tinge of shock and fear in their voice causing Tanner to spin around, just as the doors to the rear of the command pit burst open.

Burst, being the operative word, since the heavy metal doors literally were pulled off their equally heavy hinges, as a hulking figure stepped through, paused and looked around. For a crazy moment, Tanner could have sworn that the figure looked chagrined.

Then she spoke.

“Oops,” a decidedly tiny and feminine voice came from the hulk, sounding embarrassed, as if she had just accidentally jarred someone’s elbow or something equally inane, rather than having just ripped two security doors off their hinges.

“Ithan Chans, I presume?” Tanner asked calmly, his voice causing the guards to pause and lower their weapons, just slightly.

The hulk snapped to a rigid stance and nodded in salute, “Ithan Milla Chans reporting, Admiral.”

“Relax,” he ordered, stepping up out of the pit, to come face to face with the Ithan.

Or, as close to it as he could manage, since the armored suit placed her face plate about two feet over his head. Tanner didn’t flinch though, or alter his expression as he looked up at the faceless features of the armor.

“What can you tell me about the…, Odyssey, Ithan?” He asked simply.

“They belong to the…, to a human world that is not part of the colonies, Sir,” she said told him, obviously correcting herself, as she almost mentioned the mythical ‘others’ again. “Their technology is largely of inferior quality to ours; however they have markedly superior weapon systems and an ingenious though disconcerting trans-light drive.”

The Admiral’s eyebrows went up, “and their intentions?”

“Sir,” the hulking figure seemed to relax a bit, her stance shifting and becoming more pensive. “They rescued me, and the survivors at Port Fuielles, without second considerations. In this system, they were reluctant to engage the Drasin, until it became obvious that the Drasin would continue on to kill the civilians on this world.”

She paused, “they don’t wish to be involved in this war, Admiral. But they…, I don’t think that they can turn their backs on the annihilation of an entire world.”

Tanner grimaced, but nodded. “Are you in contact with them now?”

“Yes Sir.”

“Very well,” Tanner nodded. “Give them my thanks for their aid and ask them what my people can do to help.”

*****

“That’s it?” Brinks blinked.

It couldn’t be that simple.

“What is it?” Milla asked him over the link, her voice as puzzled as the computer translation could manage.

“What can he do to help?” Brinks repeated. “No demands, no posturing, no questions?”

“We have very little time, Major,” Milla reminded him.

This was true, the Major had to admit, but it still seemed insane to him. If nothing else, the Admiral should be talking about how to integrate Brink’s people into his own strategies. Military people didn’t just let some rogue group, pop into their turf and start shooting things up.

Brinks shook it off, chalking it up to a complete alien mentality, and nodded. “Fine. Inform him that we’ll need to start coordinating the sweeps of the city; if we want to be sure that we get them all. We also have a problem where one of the landers apparently crashed.”

*****

“Tunnels?” Tanner asked, eyes narrowing. “Where?”

Milla’s eyes flickered over the map on her suit’s HUD. She looked up to the large display that showed a similar map at the front of the large room. “There.”

Tanner turned to look where she was pointing, “Nero!”

The big man came up from the ground forces control pit, standing almost as tall as Milla in her armor, and looked curiously at her as she stood there. “This must be your missing Ithan?”

“It is…, or so I believe,” Tanner’s lips twisted. “It is difficult to say, of course, as I have yet to see her face.”

Milla’s eyes widened under her helm and she uttered a shocked sounding, “ohh.”

She immediately started fumbling with the controls until she located the ‘shield’ that Brinks had shown her before and activated the control.

“Sorry,” she told them, her faceplate shimmering from a flat, opaque black to a transparent form, backlit by internal lights. “I require the helmet to communicate with the others, however.”

Tanner nodded, and Nero just gazed evenly at her.

“Nero, the Ithan tells me that the Drasin are digging tunnels under the Corinth landing site,” Tanner said stiffly a moment later, remembering what he had called the bigger man up for.

“Corinth?” Nero frowned, “That was a crash. Nothing could have survived.”

“I’m aware of that, however, I believe that we may want to check just the same.”

The big man nodded gruffly. “Agreed. I’ll correct the oversight.”

“I’m certain you will,” Tanner nodded confidently. “However, if what our…, friends are saying is true, we may have a serious situation developing.”

“Agreed,” Nero nodded again.

“Their scans indicate that there are over two hundred Drasin in those tunnels at the moment, Admiral,” Milla said at that point. “They have ordered two assault drones from the Odyssey with weapons they believe might be able to eliminate the Drasin.”

“They act quickly,” Nero intoned, his voice not giving any indication of his opinions of that speed.

“Indeed,” Tanner nodded, “Let us act as quickly.”

“Agreed,” Nero replied, then turned away without another word.

“Now, Ithan,” Tanner said, looking up at Milla evenly, without any hint of discomfort, in having to look so far up to meet her eyes. “I believe that you and I should have a conversation that includes the Captain of the Odyssey?”

Milla nodded at once. “Yes, Admiral.”

Chapter 27

“Captain… Weston, I assume?”

The translation came through clear enough, though the computer seemed to hitch up on the last word and for a moment, Eric could have sworn that it was going to go with the clichéd ‘Doctor Watson, I presume?’ Rather than what he hoped was the more accurate translation.

Weston pushed the trivial thought from his mind and nodded, though he knew that unlike himself, the other man couldn’t see whom he was talking to. “That’s correct. You’re Admiral Tanner?”

“That is correct,” the slim built man nodded, looking out of the screen with every appearance of examining the Auxiliary Bridge, where Weston had taken the transmission.

He wasn’t, of course, seeing the Bridge. Rather, what Admiral Tanner was looking at was Miss Chans’ face, while her suit systems transmitted his image, to Weston. The reverse wasn’t possible, of course, but Eric was able to speak out of the suit speaker system, so that they could hold something that at least remotely resembled a coherent conversation.

The Admiral was an unassuming man, Weston noted, the type that one would probably overlook, if they saw him on the street. His uniform seemed oddly rudimentary, more like work clothes than something any Terran Admiral would wear, but it was spotless and well kept.

His eyes though, there was something about his eyes. Eric couldn’t pin it down, but it was a look he’d seen before.

“Captain,” the Admiral was speaking again, forcing Weston to put the thought from his mind and pay attention. “We all owe you, our thanks for your intervention. I do not believe that my world could ever repay you for what you have done.”

Weston waved a hand, almost irritated by the suggestion. “Nonsense. Gratitude is fine Admiral, but beyond that, it isn’t of any concern to me. We wouldn’t let anyone do what these things were planning to do. They killed two worlds, Admiral. My people wouldn’t let them take a third, not unchallenged.”

“Yes…,” Tanner glanced down, eyes flickering shut briefly. “I was pained to hear of Port Fuielles. Is the system Titualar there with you?”

“She is with her people at the moment Admiral, though they are still sedated,” Weston told him evenly.