The Prisoner of Eldaron: Crimson Worlds Successors II (25 page)

“Acknowledged.” He flipped the com to the unitwide frequency. “It’s time,” he said, as he pulled the clear hood up and over his face, attaching it to the connectors along the neck of the survival suit. “Full life support gear, everyone.” He could almost feel the collective groan. The survival suits were incredibly uncomfortable, especially with the hoods drawn. But he didn’t care. Uncomfortable was better than dead. A lot better.

“Okay, let’s go…” He took one last look to confirm everyone had their gear in place. Then he put his hand just over the switch to open the hatch. He paused for an instant and turned back toward his people.

“And remember, get me a prisoner!”

*  *  *  *  *

Yulich stared down at the weapon in his hand, a small sub-machinegun. There were guns in the locker with greater hitting power, but
Black Viper’s
captain was after mobility. The corridors and passageways snaking their way through his ship’s lower levels were narrow and crisscrossed with conduits and structural elements. Better to carry something small than to try and navigate down there with a heavy assault rifle.

He stood around the corner from the spot where the enemy’s shuttle had attached itself to
Black Viper
. He knew every centimeter of his ship, and he figured his people would have a good vantage point here.

He could hear the creaking sounds as the enemy shuttle attached to his ship’s hull. It didn’t sound like a normal breaching tube, which made sense, because he hadn’t expected an Atlantian Patrol ship to carry any assault shuttles. He hadn’t been able to confirm what exactly was out there. The shot that had taken his lasers offline had blown his whole scanner suite to charred rubble as well. The reactor was still running, at about thirty percent output at least, but otherwise,
Black Viper
was a wreck. She’d served him for ten years, through more raids than he could easily recount, but that was all over now. His ship was doomed.

And us with her…

There was nothing left to do but make the invaders pay for every centimeter of her broken hull. And he intended to do just that…at least as much as he and ten survivors could do before they were wiped out. He guessed a few more of his people were still alive, trapped behind jammed bulkheads or too badly wounded to move. Lars Treven was among those Yulich knew was dead. He’d seen his first mate cut in two by a collapsing girder while they were still on
Black Viper’s
stricken bridge. The two had served together for a long time, and Treven was one of the few men Yulich had called friend. He hadn’t dealt with the grief yet. He’d pushed it back, refused to let it work its way into the forefront of his mind. And the way things looked, he’d never have to face it. He was likely to join his friend, and very soon.

“Alright, you men, listen and listen good. These bastards could have blown us out of space if they wanted to, but they’re boarding instead. We’ve got something they need, and that means this isn’t over yet.” That was all for show, to work his few remaining fighters into a frenzy. If Ivan Yulich knew one thing for certain it was that this battle was all but over. There was nothing left but to go down fighting…and deny his ship to the enemy.

“We hit them hard as they’re coming out, but then we fall back down the main corridor toward engineering, fighting all the way.”

And then, when it’s really over, I’ll end it. Black Viper is mine and nobody else’s, and I’ll be damned if I’ll let them have her
.

He heard a loud clang, and an instant later a door blew out into the corridor…and armed men poured out. They paused for an instant, getting their bearings and locating the defenders before shooting. But by then Yulich’s crew had opened up, raking the corridor with deadly fire.

He saw one of the invaders drop…then another. One of the stricken men lay in the middle of the corridor unmoving. The other was pulled back into the compartment by his retreating comrades.

A loud cheer rose from Yulich’s crew, and he could see out of the corners of his eyes as they pumped their arms into the arm.

Let them go
, he thought.
Anything to keep their morale up a little longer…

But he knew things would get tougher. He was still thinking that when half a dozen small spheres came bouncing down the corridor.

“Grenades!” one of his men shouted, and then the hallway erupted in blast of smoke and flame.

Chapter 18

Marine Headquarters

Planet Armstrong, Gamma Pavonis III

Earthdate: 2319 AD (34 Years After the Fall)

Catherine Gilson stood next to her office’s outside wall, a single stretch of floor-to-ceiling hyper polycarbonate, offer a sweeping view of the parade grounds twenty meters below. She was watching the recruits run by, organized by platoon, each with its drill sergeant close behind, driving the exhausted trainees forward. They looked a little ragged, but that was to be expected. The new class was only a week into their two-year basic training regimen, a staggeringly difficult program that saw fewer than thirty percent of participants graduate. Most of the rest dropped out, taking the option for a free return trip back to whatever world they had come from. But not all the attrition would come from the quitters. A fair number would die trying to get through the program, she knew. Marine training was designed to produce the best possible fighters, whatever that took…and that sometimes meant putting men and women in dangerous situations. The armor instruction on Armstrong’s moon was particularly dangerous, and there were always fatalities among the second year men and women when they arrived at Jax Base to learn how to move around a frigid near-vacuum in a twenty ton suit of nuclear-powered armor.

Gilson’s mind flashed back, years before…to Camp Puller on Earth, where she had endured the torments of the Marine training program. Back then it had been six years, something she couldn’t imagine now, and it had been heavy in remedial education, with dozens of classes designed to bring its often illiterate trainees up to high standards of educational achievement. The Corps had recruited mostly from Earth’s horrific slums back then, offering a way out of the misery for those who had what it took to become Marines.

Gilson’s strategies had been somewhat similar, opening the door to a Marine career to all citizens of former Alliance worlds, many of which had fallen on hard times after the Fall…and had suffered again during the Second Incursion. They weren’t the hellholes Earth’s Cog-peasants had endured, but a few of them were close. A career in the Marines meant a chance at an education, and to be part of an organization with a storied history and high standards of excellence. But the Corps demanded much in return, far more than most could give.

That pitch had lost some of its appeal with the growth of the mercenary companies. They too offered an escape from poor worlds and dismal lives. And they held out the promise of riches, the profits of a life spent at war for gain. Gilson liked to imagine the allure of the Marines would appeal more to those she really wanted to recruit…but then she remembered herself the day she’d gotten off the train at Camp Puller, young, angry, there only because the alternative was so much worse.

How would I have responded to a recruiter for the Wildcats or the Lightnings? Not to mention the famous Black Eagles? Am I just lying to myself if I say I would have walked through the gates of Puller? Turned down enlistment bonuses and promises of riches to be won?

She put the thought out of her mind, mostly because she suspected she wouldn’t like the answer. Besides, despite the competition, the Marines hadn’t had too much trouble filling their meager quotas. The Corps she led was the slimmest shadow of what it had been at its peak, and it had survived only because she, and a band of old officers like her, had refused to let it die. And service with the Corps carried one benefit the mercenary companies couldn’t match—Armstrong citizenship upon retirement, a chance to live on a prosperous world that enjoyed a wide array of constitutionally-protected freedoms. And, however much the Corps had shrunk, it still held much of its reputation…and Armstrong was a peaceful world as a result, a place few would even contemplate attacking.

She turned and walked back toward her desk. The Corps was indeed smaller than it had been, but its Commandant’s workload seemed as deep as ever. She had pages of reports to go through, as many of them dealing with Armstrong’s civil government as with the Corps itself. The planet had been a small, unimportant colony when the Marines moved their operations there after the colonial rebellions. The Corps had been vastly larger then, and it had virtually taken over the entire planet. Later, it fought one of the great battles in its history there, when thousands of Marines struggled under Erik Cain defending it from the Shadow Legions. From that moment on, Armstrong belonged to the Corps, in every way that mattered.

Gilson was effectively Armstrong’s head of state as well as the Corps’ senior officer, though it was a bit more complicated than that. There was a civilian Assembly as well, and a Speaker who presided over that body. In theory, the two branches shared equal power, and they had to agree on all major decisions. In practice, the Assembly, half of its members Marine and naval veterans, did whatever Gilson wanted, rubberstamping anything she sent their way. Armstrong was the Marines’ planet, through and through, most of its industry dependent on the Corps’ technology, which Gilson had freely licensed to promote economic growth. Armstrong’s industrial output was exported to a hundred other worlds, and even the purest civilians couldn’t argue with the way the planet had been governed.

Gilson sat down at her desk, making another effort to focus on her work. But she still couldn’t concentrate. She read a sentence, maybe two…and then her mind wandered back to the same subject. Finally, she slapped her hand down on the desk in frustration.

Why would she leave without speaking to me? It’s not like her. What could have made her behave so impulsively?

Sarah Cain was one of Gilson’s few true friends, a veteran with a service record almost as long as the Commandant’s. They saw each other frequently, had a regular weekly lunch together. Sarah was the Corps’ unofficial second-in-command, one of the very few remaining veterans who had seen service in all four of mankind’s wars of the last sixty years. The two had known each other for all that time, and they had served together on many campaigns.

But something was wrong now. Gilson knew Sarah had gotten a mysterious visitor…and that she had disappeared immediately after. But that was all she knew. And that had her very worried.

Gilson’s first reaction had been to fear some sort of abduction…but then she realized that simply wasn’t possible. No one could have gotten into the Marine hospital with enough force to subdue her and all those around her. Sarah was a surgeon, but she was also a Marine, and that meant she would never yield without one hell of a fight. Even if someone had managed to subdue her without raising a general alarm, they could never have escaped unnoticed. Or gotten offworld. Any unauthorized vessel lifting off would have been detected and intercepted. Armstrong space was well-defended. The small remnant of the fleet had come under the Corps’ control when Augustus Garret had finally retired and gone back to his family’s home on Terra Nova. It was a small armada, but one perfectly capable of observing every ship leaving or approaching Armstrong orbit.

Some private vessels had left over the past few days, but nothing out of the ordinary. Unless Sarah had commandeered one of them. But why would she want to slip away? What could have come up that would cause her to leave, keeping her reason a secret? It didn’t make any sense. But Gilson couldn’t stop herself from trying to figure it out.

Where did you go, old friend? And why?

*  *  *  *  *

“Thank you for seeing me without an appointment, General.”

“It is my pleasure, Admiral Campbell. It has been a long time…since just after the Second Incursion if I remember correctly.” Gilson gestured toward two small chairs sitting in front of the window wall.

Campbell nodded, waiting for Gilson to sit before he did. “Yes, your memory is impeccable.” His voice became somber. “I believe it was at Erik Cain’s memorial service.”

“Yes…could that have really been more than fifteen years ago?” She shook her head slowly. In some ways it seemed so distant…yet in others like yesterday.

“I’m afraid so, General. I must say, I am gratified to see the Corps still intact. I shudder to think of where mankind would be if your people hadn’t been there during the Shadow War…and again when the Second Incursion struck.”

“Yes, we’ve managed to survive, though it was very tentative for a while. But things are better now, quite a bit better. Our technology has fueled a bit of an economic revolution on Armstrong, and our finances are actually quite stable. Indeed, I have been considering activating a third regiment if things continue to go so well.” She paused. “Though that’s not for public consumption yet.”

“That is of course good news, General,” Campbell replied with a smile. “Which I will certainly treat with the utmost discretion. And from what I hear, your use of the Corps’ military technology to spur civilian industry has been extraordinarily successful. I’m told the standard of living on Armstrong is the envy of Occupied Space.”

Gilson returned Campbell’s smile. “Well, considering how many trillions of credits the Alliance spent developing that tech…not to mention what we retrieved from damaged First Imperium gear, it’s no wonder we’ve seen a decent return. At least some of it can be used for productive purposes as well as destruction.”

The two sat quietly for a few seconds before Gilson spoke again. “So, not that I’m not happy to see you, but I imagine you came for a reason beyond reminiscing about old battles?”

Campbell nodded. “Yes, I’m afraid I did.” He paused, looking uncomfortable for a few seconds. “Before I begin, may I ask where General Cain is? I have come to speak with her as well as you, but I was unable to contact her at the hospital.”