Ep.#4 - Freedom's Dawn (The Frontiers Saga), page 16
The guard turned his head to look back as he noticed the sound of footfalls. In a split second he saw two armed men advancing toward him. His eyes widened as he tried to bring his gun around, but he was too late. A flurry of energy blasts struck him in the face and chest, knocking him backwards into the bridge.
Andre heard a woman's scream followed by the sound of at least two male voices shouting as he ran down the hallway toward the bridge. Not three seconds later he was stepping gingerly over the dead guard’s smoking body. Andre sensed a man moving to his left and went into a roll as he landed. He came up firing, striking the moving man in the shoulder.
The second agent came in right behind him, but stopped and crouched, using the dead guard for cover as he sized up the situation. There was a terrified blond woman on the far side whose hands were already up in the air. There was another equally terrified woman in a uniform to his left. Her hands were also up, as were the hands of the young man standing next to her.
“Nobody moves!” the second agent ordered as he slowly rose from his crouched stance. He glanced to his right. “I’ve got another room to my right.”
Captain de Winter came in next, holding his miniature energy pistol. “Check it out,” he ordered.
The second agent backed away toward the entrance to the captain’s ready room at the back of the bridge, making room for the two nervous noblemen to join the party from the corridor.
“Is that a gun?” Josh asked, trying not to laugh at the captain’s tiny pistol.
Captain de Winter did not take kindly to the crack and immediately fired his weapon, narrowly missing Josh’s leg and striking the back of the navigator’s chair.
“Whoa!” Josh yelled.
De Winter looked at his weapon, then back at Josh. “Yes, I suppose it is a gun.”
“It was a joke!” Josh defended. “I was kidding!”
“Please refrain from shooting people, Captain,” Andre advised as he rose from the floor. “One of them might be the pilot.”
“Yeah!” Josh agreed. “Don’t shoot the pilot!” he declared, pointing at himself. “That’s me, the pilot.”
De Winter looked disappointed. “You got to shoot someone.”
“Pilot’s don’t usually guard the entrance,” Andre said as he reached down and grabbed the close-quarters automatic weapon from the dead guard, “with a gun.”
De Winter ignored the sergeant as he strolled into the middle of the room, looking around the bridge. “Not much to look at,” he commented, “very… functional.” He looked at his two officers, still standing just inside the entrance, waiting for something to do. He gestured for them to take up positions, a look of complete dissatisfaction on his face. "Get him over there with the others," the captain ordered the fumbling noblemen, gesturing toward the wounded comm-officer laying on the floor, holding his injured shoulder.
“You,” Andre said, pointing to Josh, “which console is your tactical station?”
Josh pointed hesitantly toward the tactical station not more than a meter in front of the sergeant.
“Josh,” Kaylah scolded under her breath.
Andre stepped up onto the center command platform and sat down at the tactical station directly behind the captain’s chair. He spent several seconds examining the console.
“Is there a problem, Sergeant?” de Winter asked.
“It’s in Angla, I think.”
“You don’t speak Angla?”
“I am Takaran,” he growled. “We don’t need to speak Angla.”
De Winter moved over behind him and looked at the console. After a few moments spent looking over the controls, he spoke. “This one operates the hangar bay doors.”
* * *
Vladimir reached the end of the central corridor and started up the main ramp that led up one deck and emptied into the main circular corridor that encircled the Aurora’s hangar bay. Although there were still weeks, maybe months, worth of work to be done before the ship would be in decent shape again, he welcomed this little break. After he ensured that Cameron was safely in the hands of the Corinairan doctors, he would visit his quarters, take a quick shower, and change into clean clothes. On the way back, he thought he might even get something to eat. Although most of their meals still involved hefty servings of molo, when combined with some of the emergency meal kits that had been scavenged from the forward escape pods, it made for a pretty decent meal.
He was a little worried about Nathan and the others still stuck on the surface below, especially with the reports he had received from Naralena about riots in the streets of Aitkenna. The multilingual Volonese woman—who had been stranded on board as a result of their hasty departure from the Haven system—was working in their newly formed signals intelligence office and had turned into quite an asset.
Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do to help his friends at the moment. He had sent Loki to retrieve their shuttle, and after that, all he could do was wait for Nathan to call in to be picked up. Besides, Jessica was with him on the surface, and if anyone could protect him, it was her.
Vladimir stopped halfway up the starboard ramp leading up to the main deck as he heard strange sounds. Some sort of energy discharge, and several of them. It was faint, but very reminiscent of the weapons used by the troops that had attack them on Tug’s farm back on Haven. Next, he heard two faint thuds. He instinctively crouched down low, his mind racing. He had no weapon, and the armory was on the other side of the noises. That’s when he heard a voice. It was in a language he didn’t understand. However, he was sure of two things: they weren’t friendlies, and they were headed his way.
“The doors,” the agent guarding the medevac cockpit announced. “They’re opening. Prepare to take off.” he ordered the pilot. He turned and yelled down the short corridor that led from the cockpit to the cargo area. “They made it! They took the bridge!” Cheers erupted from the back of the shuttle.
After he had dropped the jamming pod into the hangar bay, the agent ordered the pilot to depart the Aurora and head for the Yamaro. With its engines already spun up, the shuttle was able to immediately begin its roll out into the transfer airlock. Wasting no time, the pilot eased the shuttle forward, sliding just under the inner doors as they rose. As he rolled to a stop, the doors began to close behind him. In a few more minutes, the transfer bay would be depressurized and the outer doors would open. Then he would begin the second phase of the worst mission of his career.
Allet and Deliza were busy reconfiguring the routing nodes to redirect all signals between the bridge and engineering to their new transmission path.
Vladimir came running into the middle of engineering, causing Deliza to jump, a small squeal erupting from her mouth. “Everyone! We’ve been boarded!" he announced. "Go now! Get out! Get out! They will be here any moment!”
Two crewmen that were working on repairing one of the damaged consoles immediately dropped their tools. “Where do we go?”
“Anywhere!” Vladimir instructed. “Go down one deck, try to circle back and reach the armory.”
“I don’t even know where the armory is!” one of them said.
“We’re civilian technicians, remember?” said the other.
Vladimir rolled his eyes. “Then just hide! Go!”
Allet looked confused, until Deliza excitedly translated. He grabbed her and pushed her toward the other exit, yelling orders at her in his language.
Deliza ran to the other exit across the room, stopping at the doorway and turning around. “What are you doing?” she called to Vladimir.
“Where is my gun belt?” he cried. “I left it in here!” Jessica had ordered all fleet personnel to carry a side arm ever since they were first boarded back in the Taroa system, but Vladimir had taken his off while climbing around in the service tunnels. Now he cursed himself for not putting it back on.
Deliza looked quickly around the room but saw nothing except loose tools and equipment. She looked toward Vladimir and Allet who were both frantically searching for a weapon of any kind.
“Look in there!” Vladimir shouted at Deliza, pointing to the room behind her.
Deliza spun around and frantically searched the room. Finally, she spotted the gun belt draped over the edge of a seat at one of the systems monitoring consoles. “I found it,” she yelled as she ran toward it.
Allet had already taken up a position to the left of the hatchway holding a large piece of damaged metal pipe. It wasn’t a weapon, but it was better than nothing. Unable to find anything suitable, Vladimir took a position on the other side of the hatchway. He looked at Allet holding the pipe across the hatchway from him. “Go low,” he whispered, motioning with his hands. “I’ll go high.”
A moment later, the first member of the boarding party entered the room. He came in at a slow walk, crouched low. He immediately turned toward Allet to his right, not because he saw him but rather because that was the direction he was supposed to check. Allet was already crouched low, expecting to swing his pipe at the attackers knees, but the attacker’s already crouched stance required a different tactic. Allet swung the pipe upwards, striking the enemy hard under his chin, driving his head up and back and sending his weapon flying out of his hands. Allet immediately dove toward the loose gun that had landed deeper in the room.
The second boarder came in right behind the first one, but went left instead of right. Vladimir lunged into, letting out a groan as he and the enemy agent went tumbling over. They wrestled for a few seconds, but Vladimir was quickly able get behind the man. His old infantry training kicked in, and in a quick motion he yanked the enemy agent’s chin around, snapping his neck.
The third boarder was right behind the first two, and immediately opened fire through the hatchway, spraying the room with red bolts of energy that instantly burnt holes in any organic matter and ricocheted off the bulkheads, decks, and overheads.
Allet dove for cover behind the nearest console as the energy blasts danced around the room, the enemy weapon still in his hands. Vladimir managed to roll, pulling the body of the man whose neck he had just snapped over on top of him. The dead man’s body armor absorbed the energy blasts, preventing them from reaching Vladimir.
Gunshots rang out in rapid succession. At least a dozen or more sounded, ricocheting off of everything. Everything except the enemy that had been standing in the hatchway spraying the room with energy blasts. His armor was designed to dissipate energy, not stop solid projectiles, and the three rounds that struck him blew right through his torso, killing him instantly and dropping him where he stood.
The sound of weapons fire, both energy and projectile having stopped, Vladimir pushed the dead man’s body off to one side and peeked in the direction that the gunfire had come from. There stood Deliza, smoking pistol in hand and shaking with fear, her eyes wide.
The respite was short lived, and the room was immediately lit up with energy weapons fire once more as a fourth man opened fire from behind the corpse lying in the hatchway. This time, the red bolts were flying in both directions.
Deliza screamed, dropping the gun and running back into the other room.
“Vlad!” Allet cried as he returned fire from his position behind the console.
Vladimir looked and saw that Allet was trying to cover his retreat. He quickly scrambled on hands and knees across the floor toward Allet’s position, staying low enough to avoid being hit by Allet’s return fire.
Vladimir made it behind the console with Allet just as several energy bolts struck the wall directly behind him. For the moment, he was safe.
“Thank you my friend,” he panted, staring at Allet in disbelief. This quiet man who had spent his every waking moment working to repair and sometimes even upgrade this ship, was now risking his very life to defend them, and without a moment’s hesitation.
Allet continued returning fire, pressing the trigger as quickly as he could. He muttered something to Vladimir in his own language. He repeated himself several times, finally gesturing with his head toward the same doorway that Deliza had been standing in moments ago. Vladimir got the hint.
He jumped up and ran toward the other door as Allet continued returning weapons fire in rapid fashion, diving through the doorway and onto the floor in the next room.
Deliza screamed as he came tumbling into the room. Vladimir quickly got to his feet.
“Where is the gun?” he asked frantically.
“I dropped it!”
“Where?”
Deliza pointed back toward the other room where the firefight still raged.
“What?”
“I’m sorry! It was loud!” she cried.
Vladimir grabbed her and held her, trying to comfort her.
“Did I kill him?” she sobbed.
“Yes, yes. You did. I am very proud,” he told her, looking around the room.
“What?”
“Go,” he told her, pointing, “into the service tunnel.”
“What? Why?”
“Go now!” He pushed her hard toward the tunnel entrance, nearly knocking her over. “GO!”
Deliza stumbled over to the tunnel and quickly climbed up inside, scrambling to get deeper.
Vladimir quickly moved back over to the doorway, keeping himself out of the line of sight of the attacker at the main entrance to engineering. He could see Allet holding his ground from behind the main console, firing red energy bolts as fast as he could.
“Allet!” Vladimir called.
Allet looked to his right and spotted Vladimir standing in the next room, but the Russian’s hands were empty. Allet saw the gun that Deliza had dropped to the left of the door, the slide still back and the chamber empty.
Another enemy soldier appeared at the hatchway and joined his cohort in spraying the room with energy bolts. Allet had little choice but to run. He made a mad dash for the doorway toward Vladimir, firing his weapon the entire time. He only made it three steps before one of the red beams struck him in the left leg, knocking both his legs out from under him. He went down hard, bouncing once off the floor.
Vladimir watched in horror. It seemed like everything was moving in slow motion as he watched the Karuzari’s body bounce a few centimeters up from the floor. His body fell back down just as another energy beam struck him in the top of his head, causing the right half to explode outward, sending pieces of bone, blood, and brains spraying up and outward into the air.
“ALLET!” Vladimir yelled, but there was no movement.
The weapons fire continued for what seemed like an eternity to Vladimir as he stood there staring. In actuality it was only seconds. As soon as the enemy realized they had killed the only threat, they began to slowly move forward.
Vladimir caught a glimpse of one of the enemy’s gun muzzles and reacted instantly. He ran across the room and climbed into the tunnel entrance, scurrying after Deliza. “Quickly,” he called ahead to her in a hushed shout. “We must get to the next junction quickly.”
Deliza crawled through the tunnel as quickly as she could. Her knees were bleeding from the textured non-slip surface. The rough surface had already torn through the thin tights she had been wearing under her skirt. Her hands were holding up much better, partly due to the amount of work she had done around her father’s molo farm back on Haven.
“Quickly. Quickly. Quickly,” Vladimir called from behind.
“I’m moving as fast as I can,” she defended as she scurried along.
The tunnel was rapidly becoming darker as she moved farther along. Finally, Deliza reached the first tunnel junction. It led off the main tunnel to the left, going downward at a sharp angle. Afraid to go down the steep drop headfirst, she managed to turn around in the cramped tunnel and go in feet first.
Deliza slid down the four meter long tunnel before she reached the level portion at the bottom. It was darker here, with only the slightest bit of light spilling down from the main tunnel now. It was even dustier here than it had been in the main tunnel. She coughed as the dust she had disturbed during her landing swirled about her.
“Lookout!” Vladimir warned as he came sliding down the tunnel headfirst. He slammed into her right shoulder, pushing her further into the level portion of the dark tunnel below and kicking up even more dust. She moved to her left, as this tunnel was both wider and taller than the first one.
“Forgive me,” Vladimir apologized as he rolled onto his back and struggled to right himself. “Oh, my head. I think it hit your shoulder.”
“Yeah, I’m sure of it,” she said as she rubbed her painful shoulder. “Why didn’t you turn around and come down feet first?”
“I am not as small as you.”
A voice called from the distance. Vladimir became silent. “Ssh.”
Another voice responded to the first, this one slightly louder. Vladimir could not understand their language, but he did recognize it. They were speaking Takaran; he was sure of it.
Vladimir looked at Deliza. He could barely make out her face in the darkness, but from what little he could see he could tell she was petrified. “What did he say?” he asked in a barely audible whisper.
Before she could translate for him, the more distant voice spoke again. It was a little louder now, as if the speaker had joined his comrade in the second room where the service tunnel entrance was located.
The closer of the two men spoke again, only this time he was quite loud, as if he were in the main tunnel itself. Vladimir’s hope began to vanish. He had no idea where this tunnel led, and without lighting, they would never be able to navigate the tunnel system, not in the dark. If they came into the tunnels after them, they were doomed.
