Omega Force 3: The Enemy Within (18 page)

Shaking off the disorientation, he slowly made his way towards where Lucky and Kellea were anchored down. He waved his right hand in the air and was relieved to see her wave back; she’d managed to survive the violent descent unscathed thanks to Lucky’s quick and decisive action. She waved for them to follow her and set off towards the aft of the ship, moving along the hull as if she were born in a vacuum. Jason was mildly annoyed at her proficiency; despite his top-rate equipment, he still struggled at the finer points of EVA.

They moved quickly across the rear section of the ship and came around to where the nozzles of the main engines could be seen rising up from the hull (at least from their perspective). The mammoth engines could fit the
Phoenix
inside one of them, but Jason could now see that the hull didn’t actually meet up against the body of the motor. As they closed in on the outermost engine he could clearly see a gap big enough for them to easily fit into. As he suspected, Kellea paused long enough to get her feet anchored on the inside of the gap before disappearing from view. Lucky waved him forward and he also slid into the gap.

In his low-light optical mode he could see the engine was actually suspended by six pylons inside the ship and not anchored to the outer hull itself. He followed Kellea down a maintenance catwalk towards a large, curved hatch near where the plasma conduits connected to the injector housings on the engine. She grabbed a large T-handle on the bulkhead next to the hatch and tried to give it a turn. When it didn’t budge after two attempts, she motioned Jason forward and indicated which way he should turn it. Grabbing a hold and twisting slowly clockwise, he could feel it begin to spin as he commanded the armor to provide incremental assistance until it spun one hundred and eighty degrees and stopped with a solid
thunk.

The hatch had recessed and slid aside slightly, allowing Kellea to get her shoulder in and shove the hatch back all the way. The two members of Omega Force followed her in and Lucky slid the door closed behind them.

“We’re now clear to use short range com,” Jason said. “Hull integrity should be good through this section so no chance of anybody overhearing.”

“Thank you for grabbing me, Lucky,” Kellea said. “I would not have survived otherwise.”

“My pleasure, Captain Colleren,” Lucky said. “I apologize for setting you adrift, Captain,” he said to Jason. “I did not have much time to act.”

“As usual, you did the right thing, Lucky,” Jason assured him. “She’s the
more important of the pair of us and I can survive a bit more of a bump than she can, and good job getting us here. I really didn’t expect this to work.”

“You did not?” Lucky sounded surprised and even a little hurt.

“Well, fifty-fifty,” Jason replied, waving his hand in the air to indicate his indecision. “So, where to?”

“Crisstof’s private quarters,” Kellea said. “We’ll have to—” She stumbled to a stop as the door leading out of the maintenance airlock whisked open on its own. She just stared at it, dumbfounded.

“Is emergency power still active?” Jason asked.

“No,” Kellea said. “If it were, the lights would be on and the airlock would have opened with almost no effort.”

“Speaking of that,” Jason said, “you’ve got a rather glaring security issue on this ship. What’s to stop a boarding party from marching down that same walkway?”

“When main power is on there is a powerful
force field that covers the outer opening; it even keeps the engine bay pressurized with atmosphere,” she said. “The engines need to be isolated from the hull so the vibrations don’t tear the ship apart. Not only that, but if you were to walk in there while the engine was actually running you’d be dead before you made it to the hatch, fried to a crisp in your fancy armor.”

“Thanks for that visual,” Jason said, unslinging a big plasma rifle. “Let’s stay alert. If the door sub-system has power they may have anti-intrusion systems also active.”

“Thank you for reminding me to stay alert during a combat operation, Captain,” Lucky said as he moved off to follow Kellea. Jason could see her shoulders shaking as she at least had the decency not to transmit her laughter.
He’s like a giant, metal Twingo.
He bit down his response and followed after the pair, not completely certain he was enjoying Lucky’s recently emergent sense of humor.

The team moved quickly through the ship, discovering along the way that the power had only been restored to certain doors and not all. Jason was certain that if they went down to Engineering they would see a powerpack spliced into relay junctions so the ConFed
intel guys could move freely through the sections of the ship they thought were pertinent to the investigation. Whoever had designed the
Diligent
, however, was thoughtful enough to provide a mechanical disconnect for each door in an access panel in the bulkhead. Simply open the panel, yank the handle, and then slide the door back into the bulkhead. This was far preferable to having Lucky tear it apart or blast it with a plasma rifle. Though she had to be aware that she would never command the ship again, running through the corridors wantonly damaging everything seemed disrespectful given that Kellea was standing right next to them.

It took a little over forty minutes to reach Crisstof’s quarters since there were no operating lifts and they had to force open most doors. Dalton’s quarters were wrecked. The
intel division had tossed the place looking for anything they could use to incriminate him, and had left it looking like a thermobaric warhead had been detonated inside.

“Oh,” Kellea said sadly as she looked around. She stepped carefully around overturned furniture and smashed display cases. “Some of these were priceless pieces.”

“If they jacked the place up this badly it’s a good bet they didn’t know where the safe was,” Jason said. “Or that it even exists.”

“Oh I can guarantee they didn’t find it,” she said as she moved around the end of Crisstof’s desk. “Bring the power pack.” Lucky helped Jason detach the case he’d been carrying on his back and opened it up. There was an explosive release of gas and the lid flew open as the case spit some of its contents across the room. They floated and bounced off of walls as Jason and Lucky scrambled to retrieve them.

“I didn’t think of that,” Jason admitted. With the
Diligent
likely having no atmosphere, he should have thought to put a pressure relief on the case. He grabbed the power pack as it careened off a padded chair and tossed it over to Kellea. She extended the lead to the unit and plugged it to a thin connector that simply looked like a gap in the paneling of Crisstof’s office.

Once she verified that the unit was supplying power, she moved over to the large window that overlooked the flight deck of the frigate and began tapping on its surface in what appeared to be a random pattern. She stepped back, waited, and was soon rewarded with a holographic interface displayed in the transparent alloy. She stepped forward and entered another sequence of commands. When she was finished the display disappeared and the room was once again plunged into darkness.

Just when Jason was about to comment on the lack of anything happening, an entire section of the bulkhead on the opposite side of the room began to lower into the floor, exposing a tall, shallow safe. He could almost see her smirk though the helmet visor as she walked across the room and began the procedure to open the actual safe itself.

POP!

Apparently the safe was sealed as well as their travel case, as documents and data chips went flying out of the safe when the door blew open. Lucky was able to simultaneously track all projectiles so it was a small task to retrieve everything and load up the same case they’d brought the power pack over in.

“This is an auxiliary flight data recorder,” Kellea said as she disconnected a small cube from a cable within the safe. “This may be useful since it will have a record of all com traffic and ship status leading up to main power failing.”

“So do we think that whatever he wanted us to find is on one of these data chips?” Jason asked.

“That’s all that is in here, so it better be,” Kellea said. “I would say it’s a safe bet that it is. He likely knew the risk we were taking in coming here, so it would have to be something important.”

“Let’s hope so,” Jason said. “Are we ready to leave? We need to be up on the flight deck within the next hour or so for our pickup.”

“We’re finished here,” Kellea said as she closed and secured the case. “Let’s get on the move.”

*****

“What the hell is that?!” Twingo asked
, staring in disbelief at a hulking shape in orbit around the gas giant they were sitting above.

“The computer says it’s a ship, not a space station,” Doc said. “But it’s one of the biggest ships I’ve ever seen. The fact we can detect it visually from here is incredible.”

“We haven’t been here long enough to get a good picture of it, but it does seem like a ship,” Kage said. “It’s the wrong configuration for a station.”

“How so?”
Crusher asked.

“The drive section, although at the center of the ship, is the wrong type for a space station,” Kage explained. “Whatever it is, it’s maneuvering. Orbital platforms have station-keeping propulsion, not massive engines. Luckily we’re not seeing any reaction from it or the defender ships in the area. Either they got in clean or they didn’t make it at all.”

“Nice,” Twingo said to him disgustedly. “Way to jinx them. While we’re discussing it though, why are there only two corvettes patrolling this system? Where are the cruisers?”

“Let’s not go asking for trouble,” Crusher rumbled. “It’s almost time for the pickup. Let’s count our blessings. Without the captain here I’d rather avoid any ship-to-ship combat. No offense, Doc.”

“None taken,” Doc said. “I’m in full agreement with you.”

“We’re within our timeframe,” Kage said. “We can initiate the launch sequence at any time.” Doc stared at the display a moment longer before moving back to the pilot’s seat.

“Get back to your stations,” he said. “We’re launching in five minutes. Kage, prep the sensors and let’s see what we’re dealing with.”

“Copy that.
Active array coming online, waiting to transmit on your command.”

“Stand by,” Doc said. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, trying to calm himself. “Go active, full power.”

“Going active,” Kage confirmed. Tachyon particles flooded the system, breaking the laws of physics as they bounced off every object nearly simultaneously and giving the
Phoenix
a clear view of everything in the area. “Mapping all derelict formations, mapping detection satellites, verifying ship positions. We’re ready to fire.”

“Fire,” Doc said as he squeezed the trigger on the stick.

“All missiles have ignited their engines,” Kage confirmed. “Birds are flying hot and clean. We still have no movement from the defending ships and the behemoth is still flying its normal orbit.”

“Countermeasures to full active,” Doc ordered as he flipped the drive to full output mode. “Let’s go hit the admiral’s ship and grab our people.” He engaged the drive and sent the
Phoenix
streaking towards the small smuggler’s launch that was on the opposite side of the planet from the
Diligent
. “All combat systems active.”

“You’ve got everything,” Kage confirmed. “Fly the indicators to the target, I’ll tell you when to fire. We’re going to overfly it so just pull the trigger when I say. The two corvettes are completely out of position, we’re good to go.”

Doc concentrated on keeping the ship on course as they plummeted towards the formation that contained the smuggler’s scow. The fantastic power of the
Phoenix
allowed her to ignore the influence of the gas giant and fly a direct line to the target. A larger, less powerful ship would be required to respect the planet’s gravity well and pursue the formation around its orbital path.

“Get ready, Doc!”
Kage said. “In three, two, one ... FIRE!” Doc let loose with a full salvo from the forward plasma cannons, the most powerful energy weapon they carried, and barely registered an explosion ahead of them before they were by it and flying down below the orbital plane. “Direct hit!” Kage exclaimed. “New nav data coming your way. All missiles have destroyed their targets and the passive grid is down. Corvettes are mobilizing and heading towards the ship we just destroyed.”

“Go passive!” Doc said. “No more emissions. Let’s hide in the confusion and sneak around to the
Diligent
. What is the big ship doing?”

“Nothing I could detect before shutting down the sensors,” Kage said. “We’ll be coming up on the
Diligent
in thirteen minutes. You’ll have to maneuver onto the flight deck using the optical sensors only.”

“I can handle it,” Doc said, still exhilarated by the action he’d just taken. “Do you think they’ll be there?”

“They’ll be there,” Crusher said confidently.

*****

Damn! I guess it’s started.
Jason’s armor had enough sensor capability to detect the blinding broadcast of the
Phoenix
’s active array suddenly coming online as well as the confusion of the passive detection grid collapsing. The three were now standing on the flight deck of the
Diligent
and were once again observing com silence. No point in coming this far and screwing it all up by someone detecting a radio emission from somewhere it shouldn’t be.