Guerilla (24 page)

“I haven't heard of anything like this.” Sage affixed the button to his shoulder the same way Jahup, Kiwanuka, and Noojin had done.

“I was not always a Terran Army soldier. I helped my mother with a lot of the design work she did on sec systems. She tells me I am a most apt pupil.”

“Glad to hear it.” Sage opened his pack and took out the cloak to disguise his armor again. “Now let's go find that weapons cache.” He started toward the starport buildings and pulled up the map of the storage units. The one they were looking for was on the north end.

 

TWENTY-­NINE

Cheapdock

North of Makaum Sprawl

6152 Akej (Phrenorian Prime)

Z
hoh watched the countdown taking place on the locking mechanism and remained calm. There was time. There had to be time. He couldn't get this close to achieving his goal of exposing General Rangha's unacceptable greed and watch that chance slip away.

“Enter the code again,” he told Mato.

Without pause, Mato did as he was told. He was a warrior and he would obey. All of the other warriors stood with Zhoh. They were spyrl. Nothing would break that. They would only retreat when Zhoh gave the command.

When Mato finished, the countdown continued.

Cursing Rangha's treachery even in this, Zhoh prepared to give the command to save his warriors. Then another idea struck him. Rangha was not that clever. He had secrets, but they would be simple secrets. He was not a tactician. Rangha was a pampered pet of the Empire.

“Enter the code backwards, Mato.” Zhoh couldn't back down from the challenge. He wouldn't walk away and have nothing to show for his efforts.

Mato didn't question the command, didn't mention that they were almost out of time, and his lesser hand was steady as he tapped the code sequence into the keypad.

With only four ticks left on the counter, the symbols stopped, winked, and faded from sight.

Ettor had told the truth, but he had withheld a fraction of it. Zhoh's estimation of the being rose, but only slightly.

Along the storage bay, the light beams winked out.

“Allow me to check for further surprises.” Mato scooped up his bag and walked through the storage bay.

Impatiently, Zhoh watched and waited as minutes passed. Presently, Mato returned and slung his bag over his shoulder.

“Everything is clear,” Mato said.

Zhoh stationed two of his warriors at the entrance and walked deeper into the storage bay. He surveyed the weapons stacked on shelves and racks around him. Rangha had amassed a variety of ordnance.

“Captain.” Yuen, one of the more seasoned warriors among them, lifted a Vesokan plasma launcher.

The weapon was thick and heavy and took at least four appendages to wield. The Vesokan possessed transmutable bodies contained within shells and could manifest as many limbs as they needed.

Despite their lack of definite shape, they had a propensity to mimic those around them. Some of them had psi abilities that allowed them access to the memories of those they consumed. Offworlders who made planetfall at Vesoka didn't live to regret that landing. As a result, the Vesokans learned quickly and took to the stars and to war.

The Phrenorian Empire had battled the Vesokans to a standstill, then drew lines that separated them from the other galaxies and the Gates. If the Vesokans reproduced more quickly, they might have stood a chance against the Empire. The Terran Alliance had quarantined the Vesokan system even before the Phrenorians had to beat them back.

“Yes, Lieutenant?”

“This weapon came from Tianyse.”

That caught Zhoh's attention. Tianyse was one of the outer worlds of the Empire and had suffered tremendously when the war with the Vesokans started. Ten years ago, nearly every Phrenorian on that planet had been killed before the Empire even knew the Vesokans were a threat. Zhoh had been part of the offensive that had beaten the invaders back at great cost, but the glory had been worth it.

“How do you know?” Zhoh asked.

“This is a seventh gen iteration of the weapon, sir.” Yuen was a heavy weapons expert. “The only place we saw these was Tianyse.”

Zhoh didn't ask if Yuen was certain of that. The warrior knew his weapons.

“General Rangha was also on Tianyse,” Yuen said.

“Not during the fighting,” Zhoh said. He'd interfaced with every combat general on Tianyse. Several of the successful campaigns had been ones he had designed.

“No. General Rangha was there afterward. During cleanup.”

Basking in the glory the Empire gave him as a blooded hero
. Zhoh barely restrained a curse.

“I was assigned to the cleanup effort,” Yuen continued. “We catalogued weapons like these. As I said, that was the only planet where we encountered them.” He replaced the plasma cannon on a rack with at least twenty others. “These other weapons, they're all from campaigns we've fought in, sir.”

Evidently Rangha had been building his inventory over the years, so his treachery had been going on far longer than Zhoh would have imagined.

“Make a list of the weapons, Lieutenant,” Zhoh ordered. “We'll match them up against other campaigns the general was involved in.”

“Yes sir.”

“And take vid.”

“Yes sir.”

Zhoh was torn between emotions as he walked through the aisles of weapons. He was angry that Rangha had gotten away with so much, and he was enthusiastic about finding so much corruption the general was responsible for. The presence of the storage bay filled with weapons was leverage, but he wasn't certain if it was enough. Bloodline heroes were fiercely protected by the Empire. None of them had ever been toppled.

That thought gave Zhoh pause, but he pushed past it. Simply accepting the lot he had been regulated to on Makaum was intolerable. He would have his victory and his life as a warrior returned to him, or he would die trying.

He was more warrior, more of a champion, than Rangha would ever be.

“Captain,” Mato called from the back of the storage bay. “I have something you should see.”

Zhoh walked back to where Mato stood in front of a climate-­controlling unit. He'd attached a PAD to the unit.

“What?”

“I have discovered who has access to this storage bay.”

“Through a climate controller?”

Mato's pheromones gushed and in a cloud of sweetness. “Climate controllers are programmed through the starport mainframes,
triarr
. I overlaid an
orrach
virus I've designed into the system.”

An
orrach
was a small, vicious aquatic predator on Phrenoria that laid its eggs within the eggs of other creatures. The embryos matured quickly in their egg-­within-­an-­egg, ate the other unborn creature, and hatched with poison lethal enough to bring down a full-­grown
ighttas
, one of the thirty-­meter-­long bottom feeders that scavenged the Phrenorian oceans. They were more deadly as young than they were as adults.

“The virus looks like code that the Green Dragon Corp uses,” Mato went on, “but it gathers in the mainframes and gives me access.”

“What do you have?”

“As we knew from Ettor, Rangha's personal
jolaf,
Captain Achsul Oretas, has been visiting the storage bay, but there is also a Terran woman who has come here as well.”

“Who?” Zhoh peered at Mato's PAD.

“Her name is Ellen Hodgkins.”

“Who is she?”

“I'll have to do more research on her, but what I see here is that she's registered with the
Hooded Vorol.
” Mato flipped through the PAD. “That's a small, transitory starship that doubles as a space station. A traveling casino that offers sex and drugs.”

“A smuggler.” Zhoh understood at once. Such ships set up in orbit to make a profit sometimes for weeks or months, fleeced everyone they could, then headed for brighter waters.

“Yes.”

“What would Rangha want with a Terran?”

“He could use her as a go-­between to sell to Terrans and other races onplanet.” Mato checked through a few more screens. “Hodgkins has a history of criminal behavior and was previously an employee of DawnStar Corp.”

“How long ago?”

“She was released from DawnStar weeks ago by Velesko Kos.”

Zhoh considered that. “Kos was operating DawnStar's illegal drug factories. Was Hodgkins affiliated with Kos before arriving at Makaum?”

Mato flicked through screens of data. “Yes. She worked with Kos in the Awver system as a strikebreaker. Apparently there are still bounties on Kos and Hodgkins and several of their collaborators in that system.”

“Rangha mentioned Kos when I talked with him this morning.” Zhoh's angered deepened as he remembered the conversation he'd had with the general at the hidden base, and he wondered if any of the weapons that were supposed to be there were now here in this storage bay. “He all but accused me of favoring the Terran sergeant, Sage, by standing with him against Kos.”

“Perhaps the agreement with Hodgkins was begun with Kos.”

“It's possible. I want to speak to that female.”

“Getting access to the
Hooded Vorol
will be difficult. We can't force our way aboard, and they do not favor Phrenorians with any kindness.”

“There must be a way to get to her.”

“Captain,” one of the warriors called from the front of the storage bay. “A sec team is headed our way.”

Zhoh looked at Mato.

“It wasn't anything I did here.” Mato unplugged his PAD. “I would have known if I'd tripped any alarms.”

“Get outside. We've got all the information we need for the moment.” Zhoh strode to the front of the bay. “Lock this place down.”

The Green Dragon sec team arrived at the storage bay as the door closed. The officer in charge was young and crisp, new to authority and proud of his position. He looked at Zhoh and his warriors.

“I am Lieutenant Fu and I am in charge of security. Who is Captain Achsul Oretas?” the young lieutenant asked.

Zhoh squashed the impulse to split the man with his
patimong
.

“I am,” Mato said, following the plans they'd made before they'd entered the starport. “Is there a problem?”

“Your identification seems flawed.”

“There must be some mistake.”

“There is no mistake.”

“I have access to the storage bay,” Mato argued. “Only myself and Ms. Hodgkins have the codes.”

Fu hesitated for a moment. “Please come to my office. We can get affairs straightened away there.”

Zhoh rubbed the fingers of his left lesser hand, letting Mato know that following the lieutenant's suggestion would be fine for the moment.

“Of course, Lieutenant.” Mato gestured with one of his primaries, getting close enough to Fu to make the young man step back just a little. “After you.”

Zhoh followed Mato and the other warriors trailed after them. The Green Dragon sec men surrounded the group but did not act threatening. Zhoh felt no fear, trusting that his warriors could easily dispatch the sec men if the need arose. Until then, he would see if Mato's skills could smooth over the temporary setback. It would be better if the Hodgkins female had no warning they had knowledge of the weapons.

 

THIRTY

Outside Cheapdock

North of Makaum Sprawl

0306 Hours Zulu Time

S
age held his position in the shadows beside the last row of storage bays. Out on the starport, one of the loaded shuttles launched, speeding down the runway for a short distance before leaping adroitly into the night sky and sailing over the trees. Only a little farther on, it arced sharply upward, kicked in the thrusters, and headed for the starry space. The thunder of the engines rolled over the starport.

“In place, Top,” Kiwanuka called. She'd climbed to the top of the building and lay on the roof to provide cover fire if necessary.

Sage checked her vid and swept the aisle between the rows of storage bays. No one was in the narrow alley between.

“Pingasa,” Sage said, “you're with me. The rest of you grab cover and wait.”

Pingasa joined Sage and they stepped out of the shadows. The cloaks covered the armor for the most part, and evidently Pingasa's button chips were doing their job because no alarms sounded.

Sage scanned the storage bay numbers, looking for the one where Vekaby's companions had said they'd taken delivery of the weapons.

“Bannyad locks,” Pingasa said.

“That doesn't mean anything to me,” Sage told him.

“Expensive locks. Hard to break.”

“Is that going to be a problem?”

“No, but I'm going to make it look easy and I want you to know it's not and that you should be impressed. Very impressed.” Pingasa knelt in front of the unit and dug into his chest pouch.

Sage stood guard with his hand on his Roley underneath the cloak. The spidersilk material shifted slightly as a gentle wind gusted. Sage breathed the thick air through the slight crack he'd left open in his faceshield. The humidity had risen and it smelled like rain. It was getting on toward one of Makaum's rainy seasons.

Lightning flickered across the sky, and rolling thunder followed shortly after. Sage's faceshield told him that the temperature was starting to drop, which could mean storms, but he already knew that because he felt the cooler air cycling inside his helmet.

An alarm suddenly screamed.

Pingasa stood and grabbed his bag. “That wasn't me, I swear. I barely touched that thing.”

Grabbing the corporal's arm, Sage pulled the man into motion back toward the jungle. “Move!”

6198 Akej (Phrenorian Prime)

Zhoh stood under guard in the sec office as the lieutenant watched the computer clerk sift through the starport's files. Cheapdock did a lot of business, and there was a massive amount of files. Some of them, probably like the storage bay where the weapons were kept, were not accessible to every Green Dragon officer.

The sec office was large, filled with sec screens that watched over the starport. A big map at one end of the room showed the locations of the sec guards and accompanying drones. Zhoh's warriors stood in a group under the watchful eyes of the guards.

The lieutenant was growing impatient with his lackey's inability to sort out the problem with the identification Mato had presented at the gate.

The being at the computer station shook his head. “There is a problem, Lieutenant Fu, but I cannot isolate it.”

“Perhaps there is not a problem,” Mato said. “Perhaps the problem lies in your software.” He acted calm, but he put a note of rising irritation in his voice. “I cannot be held here for long. I have responsibilities. If I am not back to my unit soon, I will be missed.”

“That is not my problem,” Lieutenant Fu said, raising his voice as well. “The security of this spaceport is my responsibility.”

So far, Zhoh held himself in check. They had not been relieved of their weapons, merely detained.

The security alarm shrilled to life out on the starport.

Lieutenant Fu watched as one of the screens at the front of the room shifted over to another location. In the shadows in front of the storage bay where Rangha kept his illicit goods, two cloaked shadows pulled back and ran.

Lights tore away the night, chasing the two fleeing figures and Zhoh noticed the armored boots of the Terran Army.

Energized by the security breach, Lieutenant Fu glared at Mato. “Those men tried to break into your unit! When I brought you in here, I put that unit on immediate lockdown! Why are those ­people out there?”

“I don't know,” Mato replied.

Cursing, Fu turned to his guards. “Lock these ­people down! I am going to find out what is going on!”

Zhoh knew that was not going to happen. He unfolded immediately, drew his
patimong
, and cleaved the lieutenant from crown to jaw with one blow. Blood and brain matter flecked the screens and the computer officer.

Even as Zhoh unlimbered his Kimer pistol, his warriors exploded into action. Particle beams, lasers, and solid rounds filled the air. The Green Dragon sec men fell in pieces.

Mato crushed one guard's face and skull with his primary and shot another with his particle beam weapon, vaporizing a large hole through his chest.

Zhoh only had time to kill one more guard, who managed to wound Lieutenant Yuen in one of his lesser arms, before the fight was over.

The alarm continued to shrill and the comm on the computer called for attention. One of the warriors had shot the computer operator in the back. His clothing and his flesh smoldered and set off a smaller smoke alarm.

“Which way?” Mato asked.

“To the storage bay,” Zhoh replied.

Doubtless, Mato knew that many sec guards would be closing in on that area, but he asked no questions, simply led the way out of the security office.

0306 Hours Zulu Time

Sage knew they couldn't outrun the sec lights even with the assists from the hardsuits. His mind raced, trying to figure out their best exfil route.

“Top, I'm sending air support and ground support your way,” Halladay said. “Blue Jay Twelve and Fourteen are two minutes away.”

“That would be a waste of time, sir, and a diplomatic nightmare. We don't have any authority here. This starport is Green Dragon territory.”

“They're running drugs and guns out of that place,” Halladay said.

“Can you prove that? Or are renters simply abusing their storage privileges?” Sage followed Pingasa around the corner of the nearest building as two Green Dragon sec guards opened fire.

Bullets chewed holes in the plascrete wall and a laser burned a meter-­wide swath from the corner, leaving slag running down to the ground.

Watching Kiwanuka's overlay on his faceshield, Sage saw both sec guards go down to her armor-­piercing rounds. Chunks of armor blew out from their chests, showing where the bullets had gone. Sage knew that the Green Dragon Industrial Trade was a purely criminal corp, so he didn't sweat the body count. Those men wouldn't have hesitated to kill his ­people.

He hated the fact that he hadn't been able to uncover the secrets in the storage bay. There probably wouldn't be another chance.

“Top!” Culpepper called. “We've got incoming!”

Glancing back at the corporal's position, Sage spotted three powersuits headed their way in long, loping strides, cutting off their retreat.

“Time to come down, Kiwanuka,” Sage said. “We've got to find a new exit strategy. Corporal Culpepper, close it up. Noojin, Jahup, in with the group.”

The three joined Sage just as Kiwanuka dropped to the ground a meter away. The lead powersuit fired a short-­range missile that struck the rooftop where Kiwanuka had been. Plascrete shattered and a ten-­meter section of the wall toppled free to land on the ground nearby.

“Move!” Sage shouted, and led the way back down the aisle between the rows of storage bays.

Figures swept around a building fifty meters in front of Sage and ran toward him and his team. He pulled the Roley up and prepared to fire, then got slammed to the ground as another short-­range missile hammered the ground behind them.

A crater opened up and threw a landslide of plascrete rubble and dirt at them, covering the whole area in a haze. Knocked from his feet, Sage skidded for several meters and watched as the approaching group got blown from their feet in a near miss as well.

Rolling to a prone position, Sage pulled the Roley to his shoulder and took aim at the man in front of him. Before he squeezed the trigger, he recognized Captain Zhoh GhiCemid seventeen meters away.

“Wait!” Zhoh had his rifle pointed at Sage's head.

“Hold your fire,” Sage told his ­people.

“Those are Phrenorians,” Culpepper argued.

“We're not fighting Phrenorians on Makaum,” Sage said.
Yet.
His aim never wavered. He opened his faceshield. “You know who I am.”

“I do,” Zhoh replied. “When I saw Terran Army armor, I expected it to be no other being.”

The powersuits came nearer. Kiwanuka turned around and fired at one of them, putting armor-­piercing rounds through the pilot's head and shoulders. The powersuit lost coordination and fell, taking down the one following closely behind it. The third one sidestepped his companions and laid down a barrage of fire that filled the air with bullets and explosives.

Choked by the roiling dust, Sage coughed and closed his faceshield again, letting the hardsuit filter out the impurities.

Two of Zhoh's warriors opened fire on the powersuit. Hammered by bullets, the pilot retreated. He paused only long enough to help the other survivor to his feet.

“I suggest we work together,” Zhoh said. “Our chances of getting out of this will be better.”

Behind him, three of his warriors laid down suppressive fire to hold the Green Dragon bashhounds at the other end of the aisle at bay. But holding a position wasn't going to work for any of them and Sage knew it.

“Agreed. We work together to get out of this,” Sage answered over the team comm so his ­people would know what was going on.

Culpepper opened a private channel. “You've got to be kidding, Top! You can't trust Sting-­Tails!”

“How well do you think we're going to do fighting them
and
the Green Dragons?” Sage spotted a nearby aisle that headed to the jungle to the north, behind the last row of storage bays.

Culpepper cursed.

“We go north.” Sage pointed at the aisle so there would be no mistake. “We head into the jungle and try to fight our way back to the river.”

Zhoh clambered to his feet as well and saluted Sage with his sword. “Fight well, Sergeant.”

“You too,” Sage responded. He waved to Noojin and Jahup. “See if you can find us a way out of here.”

The two Makaum recruits dashed ahead. At least two rounds slapped into Jahup, partially turning him around, but he didn't appear injured as he sped up to catch Noojin.

Sage and Zhoh followed the two and Kiwanuka hung back so she could cover the Phrenorian captain. As they emerged at the other end of the aisle thirty meters behind Noojin and Jahup, Sage took up a position at the aisle, knowing the bashhounds would overtake them and trap them out in the open. He readied his weapons.

“What are you doing?” Kiwanuka asked.

“Buying time,” Sage replied. “If they catch us out in the open without fallback positions, they'll cut us to pieces.”

“I'll stay.”

“No, Sergeant, you won't. I'm depending on your sniping ability to give me time to reach you. Now go.”

Kiwanuka went and the rest of the soldiers followed her. Culpepper protested almost inaudibly, but he knew Sage was right. As he passed, he slipped Sage two claymores.

Sage shoved the claymores into the ground just inside the aisle and activated them. He shortened the Roley's stock so he could maneuver it more easily in close quarters. Then he waited and hoped he could buy his ­people—­and himself—­enough time to get out of the death trap they'd stepped into. He watched the end of the aisle as shadows from the approaching bashhounds filled it.

6217 Akej (Phrenorian Prime)

“What is the sergeant doing?” Zhoh watched the human as he ran back toward the storage bays, surprised at how Sage stopped at the end of the aisle they had just come through.

“A foolish thing,” Mato replied. “He's going to get himself killed.”

Zhoh stopped, remembering how the sergeant had stood up alone to Velesko Kos and his guards in the nightclub in Makaum, calling Kos a murderer to his face. That had been impressive, worthy of a warrior, worthy of glory.

“Come on,
triarr
.”

Zhoh took a fresh grip on his
patimong
and turned back to join Sage. “Go, Mato. That is an order. Get the warriors set up so they may defend the sergeant's retreat and mine when the time comes. Work with the Terrans.”

“You're going to get yourself killed.” Mato's pheromones smelled like metal, indicating his apprehension.

Excitement filled Zhoh as he thought of the coming battle. It would be glorious. He should have considered the tactic of slowing down their pursuit himself. His respect for the sergeant grew. “I have no intentions of dying today. Go.”