The Cagliostro Chronicles II: Conflagration (31 page)

She walked up t
o him and stared up at his face. “I regret to tell you, Captain Johnson, there has been a change of plans.”

“What kind of change?” Mark
rumbled menacingly.

“I am sorry. T
ruly I am, Captain. But I must do what is best for my children which live upon myself, my world.”

“Chakix…” Mark growled menacingly.

The brush about them split apart as Agalum troops surrounded everyone in the small clearing. All their weapons were aimed directly at the
Cagliostro
’s crew.

“I once again apologize
, Captain, but the Agalum invaders left me no choice.”

“Be quiet
, Chakix,” an Agalum officer commanded. He pushed past her and aimed his gun directly at Mark. “Kill all the others. This one is going to spend the rest of his short life on our home world, telling us all of his savage and crude world’s secrets.”

Mark locked eyes with the Agalum who faced him. The purple skinned ‘lettuce head’ stared down the barrel of his gun toward Mark. “You will witness the deaths of your people, then you will come with us to our base where your very long, very painful interrogation will commence.”

Mark smiled. It was a slow, deliberate thing, starting at the corners of his mouth and working its way up his face
, while his head dipped lower. “I don’t think so.”

The air around the small clearing seemed to shimmer
for an instant. The Agalum and the natives spun in surprise. Even Chakix was taken aback. Surrounding the clearing were at least fifty of the
Cagliostro
’s crew wearing heavy battle suits. They had weapons aimed directly at the Agalum soldiers, the natives, and Chakix herself.

“H-how?”
Chakix stammered.

The heavy suited crew began to disarm the Agalum and restrain the natives as well.

“What, Chakix? Did you really think I could make close fitting camouflage suits like we’re wearing, but not be able to add that property to my heavy battle suits as well?” Mark continued to smile. “But to answer your first question, very easily, actually. You overrate your position here, Chakix. Now maybe you could make the ground swallow us all up if you wanted to, but I kind of doubt that will happen because your children would get killed or injured in the fracas as well. As to how I knew you were going to try to double cross us, well let’s just say I knew what to look for from you. We had your vessel on board the
Cagliostro
long enough that we were able to study you, surreptitiously of course and discern when you were making contact with your world or larger body or whatever the planet really is to you.”

“You studied me?
” Chakix almost bellowed in humiliation. “As if I was some base creature?”

“Oh it gets better, Princess. We were ready for you in every way shape and form. When you sent your signal to the planet, looking for this Agalum son of a bitch,” Mark jerked his thumb at the officer who stared numbly at him, “Red knew immediately and informed me of it on the command deck. You were standing right there, trying to be oh so slick. Letting your Agalum cronies know we were coming back and where we would meet you. Red and I had a code worked out. He called me ‘Captain’. Red never calls me ‘Captain’. The
Cagliostro
is just not that kind of ship. We’re corporate, not military. But anyway, that was the code word we worked out. You sent that signal that the Agalum knew how to process, and we all knew the game was on. End of story. See, Chakix, we really did not trust you, no matter how long we had you aboard the ship. You proved that caution was the right way to go where you were concerned.”

“Now what?” the Agalum officer asked.

“Now you shut up and stay put,” Red ordered. “No talking, no moving. Sit on the ground, don’t say a word. Unlike you Agalum animals, we won’t treat you disrespectfully unless you force us to. As of now you’re all prisoners of war.”

“That includes you too
, Princess.” Mark nodded toward Chakix.

“I am a prisoner?
Upon myself? My own world? I think not.” She began to turn to run, but Ariel stepped forward and punched her in the mouth. Chakix dropped like a bag of stones, clutching her bleeding mouth, her eyes wide in abject shock.

One of the heavy
suit wearing crew placed a blocking helmet back on her head, but on her true body this time.

Again shock registered upon her face.

“What? Did you think I only had one of those helmets? I can manufacture as many as I need in the
Cagliostro
’
s
fabrication facilities. The one we used in the other dimension was only the first version prototype. This one is version ten. Yeah, we’ve been updating it since you came aboard,” Mark confirmed. “You’re not going anywhere unless we let you.”

“Now what?
” Eddie asked.

“Now we take that base
,” Mark replied.

“Good
,” Red interrupted. “There’s twenty men up there in camouflaged heavy suits awaiting your word,
Captain
,” he added with the faintest of grins.

“Okay, these bastards are all disarmed?” Mark inquired.

“Yes all of them,” Red replied.

“Communication devices too?”

“Yes absolutely.”

“Good. Leave twenty men to guard them, including her
.” Mark pointed at Chakix. “The rest of us are going to take that base.”

***

Twenty minutes later, the entire camouflaged phalanx stood fifty yards outside the mouth of the Agalum base.

‘We’re ready, Mark
.’
Red announced through the telepathic link supplied by Ariel.

‘Okay people, as they used to say,
it’s go time.’

The heavy suited troops moved off silently toward the side of the false volcano
, while the stealth suited contingent waited at the edge of the forest.

Telepathically Mark apprised everyone gathered
with him of the their next move.
‘Red will move the heavy suited troops to the hangar exit we discovered in subsequent scans of this base the camouflaged probe did. When they begin the attack we hope at least that all of their attention will be drawn over there, allowing us to enter through this hangar deck entrance. We should be able to slip in unnoticed. These stealth suits are silent in every way, as well as undetectable, at least through every method I know of. They are faster than the heavy assault suits and as I said already, silent.’

‘When do we move in?’
Eddie asked.

‘We’ll know as soon as we see the signal.’

‘I kinda wish Red was with us and not leading that other assault,’
Eddie commented.

Dan chuckled,
‘What’s the matter, squirt? Afraid? Don’t worry about it, I’ll protect ya.’

‘G
et outta here, you freak,’
Eddie snapped back.
‘I just don’t like us going into a battle without everyone here. It doesn’t feel right for us to be split up.’

‘That’s the way it’s got to be for now, Eddie.’
Mark replied.
‘Just relax, we should be going-’

‘Mark, look
at the entrance,’
Dan interrupted.

The entire crew stared where Dan indicated
, and saw the Agalum guards running toward the back of the hangar and the exit at the opposite end.

‘Time to go, move it,
’
Mark ordered.

Mark, Dan, Ariel, Eddie,
and Dr. Troiano along with the two security people, Dorn and Crosby, moved silently and invisibly toward the hangar doors. Surreptitiously they all entered the base. There were only a handful of Agalum troops left guarding the entrance and the group of seven slipped past undetected.

‘This
is so not in my job description,’
Dr. Troiano telepathically muttered.

‘Sorry
, Ann. For today it is,’
Mark replied.

‘Stay
near me, Ann, I’ll watch out for ya,’
Dan offered.

She
smiled within her stealth suit,
‘Thanks, Danny, you’re a gentleman.’

‘Y
eah but don’t let it get around,’
he replied with a smirk.

They continued to move deeper into the dark complex. It was lit with low level lighting throughout
.

‘Look a
t the engineerin’ in this place,’
Dan mentally exclaimed.

‘I agree
, Dan. This is something amazing. Once we get it under our control we can explore it at our leisure. Right now is not the time.’

‘You got it
, Boss,’
Dan replied tersely.

‘Mark,
’
Ariel called.
‘I’m sensing something else headed our way. It looks like a large group of troops are coming right toward us from where we entered. There must have been a passageway we missed. They’re going to run right over us if we don’t get out of this hangar area. They’re heading toward the back and the rest of the crew outside.’

‘Can you contact Red?’

‘I’ll try, but I’m going to have to shut down with the rest of you to do it, to concentrate my accuracy and mental strength.’

‘Just
do it. Let me know what happened afterward.’

Ariel nodded and closed her eyes. In the dim yellow glow of the goggles they
all wore her hazy image seemed to waver while she concentrated her efforts. Mark stopped a moment and watched her intently even though he knew the squad of Agalum were closing from the rear on them all.

He saw something he had never seen before. Somehow the goggles that allowed them
to see one another when camouflaged also allowed him to see her telepathic ability. Her head glowed a brighter yellow, followed by a spike of energy reaching out toward the back of the hangar area, where Red and his men were.

“Amazing
,” he whispered.

The others turned and looked at him quizzically,
then first Dan, followed by Eddie realized what he was looking at. Ann Troiano was the last to see what was happening.

Mark looked behind him and saw the squad of Agalum foot soldiers
getting closer. Quickly he shook Ariel’s arm, breaking her concentration.

She looked up
, saw what was happening, and quickly reconnected with them all.
‘I see them coming. Where can we go?’

Mark looked at his sleeve and an image formed on it. Not a stand-up holographic image like it would on his regular tech suit, but rather one on the sleeve itself
, which remained invisible to those without the special goggles he had designed.

‘This way.
Dorn, Crosby, take point,’
he telepathically said.

Everyone followed quietly, the two security personnel at the forefront.

‘Left turn in twenty feet,’
Mark ordered.

Dorn first, and then Crosby
stepped around the corner. Crosby almost immediately stuck her head back around and beckoned everyone to follow her and Dorn.

The remaining five people stepped around and flattened against the back wall of the corridor
.

Heavy boots began to thud along the
hangar deck and an instant later a large contingent of Agalum appeared, passing right by the camouflaged and veritably invisible crew.

Everyone stood silently, not even bothering to breath
e. Soon the large group of Agalum had passed them all by noisily.

‘What now?
Dorn asked of Mark.

‘We head to the base commander’s office and take him prisoner. He tells his people to stand down
, and we win.’

‘What if he won’
t?’
Crosby asked.

‘Then we make him. I have no issue with that, do you
, Crosby?’

‘None whatsoever,
Sir,’
came her terse reply.

Mark nodded.
‘Good, let’s move out.’

Dorn and Crosby took point once again, followed by Dan and Eddie. They continued down the same corridor they had stepped into, when the sound of stomping fe
et came toward them from around the next bend in the corridor.

‘Uh-oh,’
Ariel mentally cried.
‘They’re coming right toward us.’

‘There’s nowhere to go,
’
Eddie commented.

‘Tell me some
thin’ I don’t know, short stuff,’
Dan grumbled.
‘Doc, stay behind me,’
he said as an afterthought,
‘Cause all hell’s about ta break loose.’