Mercurial: Ace Evans Book 5 (Ace Evans Series), page 11
“Unknown,” the radar operator said. “But they look similar to Masamoto strike drones.”
“Bring every laser we have to bear,” Loman said, feeling a sheen of sweat popping up on his forehead.
Had he really thought that commanding a warship was the most exciting thing he’d ever done? It seemed absurd to think of being in mortal danger exciting. Not to mention he had over a hundred souls on board the Drachma. The responsibility for all the CDF personnel trusting him to see them through the battle felt heavy. His chest felt tight, and his head was beginning to hurt. He wished he were anywhere but on that ship, even in a board meeting with Lynn Faulk.
“Commander Haley, Titans have launched,” Chief West said, her voice coming in clearly over the bridge speakers. He knew she was in the operations center with the other Controllers. “Drachma’s Alpha Company is standing by to cross over and board the Silent Partner.”
“Very good,” Loman said, trying to sound calm, even though he was far from it.
Drones were the worst. Programable fighting machines that could be launched from one ship to fight another. Other than the financial cost, there was no risk to send a drone. They were the perfect pawns. The computer-controlled drones weren’t afraid. They would charge straight toward an enemy even if the fight was hopeless. And while the Drachma had excellent weapons, her crew was untested. If even one of the drones made it past their defenses, it could wreak havoc on the ship.
“I want Cronus Team standing by to intercept anything that gets through our point defenses,” Haley ordered.
“Roger that, Commander,” Chief West said.
“Drones are almost in range,” the fire control officer announced.
“Fire at will,” Haley said. “Set alert red.”
“Setting alert red,” Lieutenant Jones said.
The light on the bridge changed to red. Loman pulled his seat restraints over his shoulders and crisscrossed the belt straps over his chest before snapping them into the command chair.
“All hands, all hands,” Loman said into the shipwide intercom. “We have drones inbound. Brace for impact.”
On the bridge screens, Loman could see the tiny drones. They were the size of his command chair, but they seemed small on the screen, especially with Lynn Faulk’s massive yacht behind them.
“Sir, there’s a ship leaving the Silent Partner,” the radar operator said.
“Mark it and track,” Loman said. “We’ll deal with it once we’ve taken out the drones.”
Secretly Loman feared they were missing something. The drones could just be a diversion to keep him from seeing the real threat. But his visual scans showed nothing else, and all the executive vice president of security could do was trust his people.
Suddenly bright laser beams shot out from six large cannons on the Drachma’s hull. The angles crossed precisely where the drones were approaching. There were flashes as the small drones exploded. The machines themselves weren’t volatile, but they were loaded with munitions that were. Those that were hit by the lasers erupted in brilliant fire, and many of the other drones were knocked off course by the shockwaves. After a few seconds of intense laser fire, the cannons stopped shooting and Loman stared at the cloud of debris, searching for movement.
“There!” Loman shouted.
A group of about eight drones burst through the debris and raced toward the ship.
“Re-engage!” Loman ordered.
The second wave of fire was smaller. Only two of the cannons could be brought to bear as the drones moved closer to the Drachma. Four drones were hit, but four more escaped.
“Cronus Team is moving in,” Chief West said.
Loman didn’t like her being off the bridge, but he respected her desire to be in the operations center. She was a Controller, and that’s where she felt most comfortable, not riding a console on the bridge. Still, he often relied on nonverbal cues to ensure that his messages were being received.
It only took the push of a few buttons to switch the main display to where Loman could see the two Titan Operators. They flew out from beneath the ship. Their arms were actually the barrels of their weapons. The drones were completely focused on the Drachma and paid no attention to the Titan battle suits. Sly and Ash took them out in short order with short-range missiles.
“Threat neutralized,” Ash said in a calm voice.
There were cheers on the bridge, and Loman understood the relief his officers felt. He felt it too, but he also knew it was dangerous. There were still threats nearby, and if his people got caught off guard because they were celebrating, it could cost them dearly.
“Focus on your stations, people,” Loman said, trying not to sound too harsh. “We’re not out of this yet.”
As if to back up his assertion, the radar operator called out, “The Silent Partner is changing course.”
“Are they running?” Loman asked.
“Negative, sir. They’re moving between us and that shuttle,” the radar operator explained.
“Lynn Faulk must be on it,” Lieutenant Jones said.
“She’s running for the space tunnel,” Loman said. “Can we reach them?”
“Negative,” the helmsman said.
“They’re going too fast,” the navigator added.
“Chief West, can your Titans reach that shuttle?”
There was a slight pause. “Negative, Commander. Unless you want them to follow the shuttle through the space tunnel.”
“No,” Loman said. “Let’s get our asset and lock that ship down.”
He felt anger, his fear completely forgotten. It didn’t make sense. Why had Alex let Faulk leave? He should have shut down her shuttle using his special abilities. Not to mention the fact that he hadn’t intervened with the drones. It wasn’t like him. His anger morphed into fear again. What if Alex didn’t help them because he couldn’t? What if he was dead?
“Comms, do we still have a link to the Silent Partner?”
“Aye, Commander, but there’s been no contact,” the communications officer said.
“It could just be interference,” Jones said.
He was the first officer, and his station was just behind the command chair. Loman wanted to believe the lieutenant, but he knew better. The explosion and debris could cause interference, but Loman knew that if he could, Alex would have acted to help them.
“Track that shuttle,” Loman ordered. “Make sure we know what tunnel they use.”
“Sir, we’re being hailed by Arcadia Orbital Control,” the communications officer said. “They’re ordering us to cease all operations and stand down.”
“Using lasers in a civilized system might be frowned upon,” Lieutenant Jones said.
“I’ll speak to them in a moment,” Loman said. “Once they know what we’re doing, they’ll back down. But first we have to secure that yacht.”
“There’s nothing between us,” the radar operator said. “Just the wreckage from the drones.”
Loman pressed a button on his command chair. “Chief West, send Alpha Company. I want complete control of that yacht.”
“Aye, Commander,” Nyx said. “Alpha Company is moving in.”
“Alright, patch me through to Orbital Control,” Loman said.
He would deal with the local authorities, but his heart and mind were on Alex. What could have happened to the young Operator? He wouldn’t rest until he knew.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Alex heard the emergency door slam into the cart, which slammed into the wall and blocked the door from opening. There was a shout, then the sound of a weapon discharging. Fortunately, Alex had already turned a corner and was out of the line of fire. He was running hard, his heart pounding in his chest. A short corridor led to a stairwell. He raced up the stairs, the ship’s gravity back to full power. He could feel the sweat running from his short hair down his face. His mouth felt incredibly dry and his legs were burning, but he couldn’t stop. He had to get the main doors locked off, and he couldn’t help worrying that Candice had abandoned him.
The top of the stairs led straight to the grand concourse. He was glad the way back hadn’t been as hard to navigate as most of the crew space was. The super yacht was built for the guests, and the crew was left with the spaces that were left over. It was understandable, but it made Alex’s run back to the front of the theater longer than he had hoped. He raced out onto the concourse and back to the front of the theater, fearing he would run headlong into the security team. Instead, he ran into Candice. They collided and she fell with an ooofff!
Alex saw that she had taken a planter on a tall, cylinder base apart and put the metal pipe through the door handles to the theater. She had also managed to push in front of the doors one of the sofas from a nearby lounge area in the middle of the concourse.
“You made it,” she said, looking up.
“Great plan,” Alex said, pulling her to her feet.
The security team was pounding on the door. Alex could tell it wouldn’t hold for long, but there was time for the two of them to get away.
“Let’s move,” he said.
They jogged away from the theater, moving down the concourse back in the direction they had come from. Alex paused just long enough to focus on the bridge control system. From there, the crew could control the entire ship. He had to do more than just cut power here and there. Someone in the bridge was simply turning things right back on.
Alex linked to the security system and locked the theater’s main doors. It was a small action, and he hoped it wouldn’t be seen. Next, he fed power to the circuit breakers and tripped several of them, including the power to the bridge. It wasn’t a perfect solution, but someone would have to find the fuse panel and physically flip each breaker that Alex had tripped.
Candice had been pulling him along. It helped Alex to close his eyes when he was making changes on the ship. He opened his eyes a sliver from time to time to make sure he wouldn’t run into anything, but the concourse was a wide-open space. There were sitting areas and dining facilities in the center, but on either side were wide walkways. Candice had been pulling him down one, trying to get as far from the security team as she could, when Alex heard a weapon discharge.
His eyes snapped open, just as Candice dropped to the floor. There was a large dark mark on her chest. The front of her shirt was burned away, and the flesh underneath was black. Alex took it all in, her prone body, the laser burn, her open, lifeless eyes.
“No!” he shouted.
He dropped to his knees beside her, but there was nothing he could do. The shot had come from in front of him, and when Alex looked up, his fury erupted. Sitting calmly in one of the ornate chairs, with a laser pistol in one hand, was the former medical tech Ernesto Sallizar, who had abducted him from the Currency and taken him aboard the Silent Partner.
“You just couldn’t go along, could you?” he said, shaking his head.
Alex stood up, one hand pulling the fillet knife from the back waistband of his pants.
“Easy,” Ernesto said, pointing the laser pistol at him. “Ms. Faulk may want you alive, but I don’t care. She abandoned us here, so screw her, you know what I mean? It’s every man for himself.”
“You killed her,” Alex said, tears filling his eyes. “Why?”
“She was causing problems,” Ernesto said. “Why don’t you sit down? We need to talk.”
Alex moved to the chair facing Ernesto. He didn’t want to sit and talk with the cold-blooded killer, but he needed to get close enough to use the knife.
“I don’t think I want to talk to you,” Alex said through clenched teeth.
“Typical. You’ve actually bought into the lie that you’re special. How cute.”
“You don’t know anything about me,” Alex said.
“I know that people like you get special treatment. I can’t say why. You’re not smarter than me. You’re not better looking or more talented. You’ve just been in the right place at the right time.”
Alex knew there was some truth to what Ernesto was saying. If he hadn’t been outside the Operator’s Hangar on NP8261 when the colony was attacked, he wouldn’t have had the opportunity to fight the drones, which brought him to VP Haley’s attention. But he also knew that Ernesto was wrong. He did have talents that set him apart. He could do things that other Operators couldn’t do. And he didn’t know what he was waiting for.
With a single thought, he killed the lights to the grand concourse. It wasn’t thrown into complete darkness. There were still lights from the adjoining restaurants and entertainment venues that lined the concourse, and with the transparent roof, the lights from the super yacht added to the starlight which combined to bathe Alex and Ernesto in soft, silvery light. But Alex wasn’t hoping for total darkness. He just needed a momentary diversion. And just as he had hoped, when the lights went out, Ernesto looked up. It was a reflex—the lights in the concourse didn’t shine down from the ceiling, which was transparent, but Ernesto, like most people, was used to the main source of light coming from above them.
He looked up, and Alex made his move. He didn’t dart straight at Ernesto, who was still holding the laser pistol. Instead, he lunged forward at an angle, making sure he moved away from the weapon. Ernesto saw the movement and reacted again just the way Alex had anticipated. He fired the pistol but missed Alex completely, and before he could adjust his aim or move out of the way, Alex drove the fillet knife into his chest.
Ernesto gasped, and for a moment he didn’t move. He sat looking down at the knife handle sticking out of his chest. Alex leaned over and whispered in his ear.
“I guess there are a few things I can do better than you,” Alex said.
He reached over and jerked the gun away from Ernesto. The wounded man didn’t even try to resist. He sat for a moment working his mouth as he tried to speak. Alex thought he looked like a fish. When he finally managed to speak, it was a gurgle.
“You killed me,” he said, bloody bubbles forming in the corners of his mouth.
“It’s no less than you deserve,” Alex replied. “You killed Candice and she never did anything but try to help me.”
Ernesto tried to say something else, but he choked on the blood that was filling his lung and bubbling up his windpipe into this mouth. Alex felt horrible, but it was mostly grief over Candice’s death. It was so completely senseless. There was no reason for it—she wasn’t a threat. All she wanted was to be happy, and her only crime was helping Alex. He didn’t feel bad for killing Ernesto, and he sat beside the wounded man until his head slumped to the side and his final, gurgling breath came bubbling out of his mouth.
Only then did Alex check the gun. The lights came back on, causing Alex to look up. When he did, he saw the security team sprinting down the concourse toward him. Without giving his actions a second’s thought, he moved quickly to the floor and toggled the pistol from kill to stun. Then, taking cover between an overstuffed chair and a thickly cushioned love seat, he began blasting away at the security team.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
“Ash?” Sly asked.
“I think I’ve found a way in,” she replied.
Nyx was monitoring their progress from the operations center on the Drachma. She had taken a station at one of the Controller consoles and was monitoring both Cronus Team and the members of Alpha Company who were once again in their modified Patroller battle suits, making the short journey across space toward the Silent Partner.
“The bubble on top is open,” Ash said. “I see an air lock.”
“Cronus Two,” Nyx said over the tactical com-link. “Move in and confirm.”
Sly was still back with the group of Operators who had been commissioned as Alpha Company. They were using jet packs to control their flight through space.
“Man, that is one big ship,” Sly said. “You could easily fit two or three hundred passengers on that thing.”
“I’m inside the bubble,” Ash said. “The entire roof of this thing is transparent.”
“All the better to see you with, my dear,” Sly joked.
“Looks like there’s a firefight inside,” Ash went on.
Nyx felt her stomach tense. She had no idea who was on board the super yacht. It could be anyone, but she felt certain that Alex was involved. He couldn’t manipulate the huge ship and fight at the same time. She wished for the hundredth time that he was in a Titan battle suit and she was helping him as his Controller.
“Almost there,” Corporal Sansabar said. “Should we make for the entrance on the upper level?”
“Yes,” Nyx said. “But watch out. Make sure your weapons are set for stun. And don’t remove your hard-vacuum suits. We have to assume the entire vessel could be rigged to blow.”
“Cheery thought,” Sly said.
“The air lock is open,” Ash said.
“We’ll be at your position in just a few minutes,” Sand announced.
“Permission to go into the ship,” Ash said.
“Negative, wait for Alpha Team,” Nyx said.
“Chief, that could be Alex fighting in there. If so, he needs our help.”
“I agree,” Nyx said, although it felt like someone were operating on her without anesthesia. “But if you go in now, we lose the advantage of surprise. We need to breach en masse, not one at a time.”
“Roger,” Ash said. “Cronus Two, standing by.”
“I’ve got a visual on you,” Sly replied. “We’ll be at your position in ninety seconds.”
“Let’s just hope that isn’t too late,” Ash said.
Nyx felt the sting of her words. She knew it wasn’t personal. Ash was smart enough to know good tactics from bad. But she felt responsible for not being able to stop the rogue med tech who had abducted Alex from the Currency. No one else blamed her, she had been essentially paralyzed, but Ash wanted desperately to get her friend back. Nyx even felt a twinge of jealousy. She knew that Ash wasn’t in love with Alex, but there were times when she said or did things that made Nyx nervous. No one could relate to Alex the way that Nyx could. As his Controller, she not only spent more time with him but also had deep conversations. In the long stretches of being on watch or long missions, they shared their fears as well as their hopes and dreams. Yet Ash was more like Alex than Nyx was. They were both Operators, with physical acumen that Nyx the computer expert couldn’t match.
