Warp Wraith, page 28
A cacophony of commlink chatter erupted as the lead shuttle swept in for the nearest of the Citadel’s landing pads—one of the larger ones, atop the roof of the lower tier below the main tower. From the communiques, it sounded like the Troopers were attempting to contact anyone in control in the complex. They were getting no responses.
Vondrak folded his arms around himself and squeezed till it hurt.
A blaster bolt lashed out from the smoke as the lead shuttle swept in for its landing and glanced off its armored flank. The Shock Troopers hardly flinched. And no second shot followed. But once the landing gears of their vessel hit the tarmac, they were boiling from the ship with undisguised haste.
The lead Trooper reached the exit hatch from the pad to find it sealed. Trying the controls triggered no response. Waving to his comrades, the others settled around him while a Trooper with different markings on his armor stepped forward, shouldered his rifle, and produced an equipment kit. The mortal applied several wired leads to the controls and worked his kit frantically.
“Lord-Director Roaul,” the voice of the lead Trooper crackled. “This is Palace Strike One. Are you receiving us?” Silence answered him. “Citadel Control? Anyone, are you receiving us?”
Lights on the code-breaker Trooper’s kit blinked in a pattern matched by the hatch control panel. The door cracked and slid back, allowing smoke to billow out.
The Troopers plunged into that.
A ping interrupted the transmission. Vondrak winced and slapped the holoprojector control. “What is it?”
“Lord-Admiral Sestus, Sire,” the orderly on the other end replied.
Some of the tension coiled unbearably in Vondrak’s guts released. “Go ahead.” He touched another control, killing the feed from the Citadel strike teams, and waited while a cursor blinked impotently at him from the air.
Light motes moved together from the air into a vision of Sestus on the bridge of his flagship. Distance and signal degradation gave the imagery a graininess. But not all the rough edges were from that; a hint of haze hung in the air around Sestus. It looked like his ship had suffered damage.
“What the hell is taking you so long?” Vondrak spat.
Sestus flashed a hint of fang before visibly restraining himself. “We’re less than seven hours out. These rustics been harassing us part of the way.” He clenched a fist before him. “We just sent a push back the way it came with losses.”
“You’ve had a few yourself,” Vondrak said with snideness he couldn’t help.
Sestus glanced around at his bridge before snorting and glowering through the hologram. “Not as many as you, I believe.”
Vondrak hid a flinch. He couldn’t be sure the other vampire referred to Mabuse, but it was possible Sesuts’ vampiric senses were acute enough that he’d noted the loss. Or it could just be more games. Vondrak had never known his peer to be particularly telepathic. He shook his head impatiently. “It’s not a contest, Sestus. It’s survival.” He stepped closer to the hologram. “What’s more, I’ve confirmed the identity of the Wraith. It is Malik Vigil.”
Sestus’ pretty-boy brows beetled together. “You know this how?”
“Watch.”
Vondrak touched another control and waited as the tachyon burst transmission went out, crossing the distance between Circe and the ships speeding to relieve it. After a pause, a bluey light lit up Sestus’ features. His brows knotted further and his nostrils flared as he watched the replay of Mabuse’s last fight. After a few seconds, the light on his face dimmed and he looked back at the holographic camera.
“Hardly conclusive.”
A grunt of shock and fury escaped Vondrak’s chest. “Did you actually pay attention? It’s him! It has to be!”
“You almost seem to want it to be,” Sestus jibed.
“This isn’t just an invasion,” Vondrak insisted, shaking his fist in the air before him. “He’s here to expose us. He’s here to blow open the whole Theocracy!”
Sestus folded his arms and pursed his lips, a hint of consideration wrinkling his face. “Have you told Ruthven?”
“I’ve sent this footage via tachyon burst. There’s been no response, as of yet.”
“Malik...” Sestus mused. “Duke Luther’s favorite pet.” The vampire’s features tightened. “He escaped your clutches, Vondrak.”
“He escaped the Dark Science Division,” Vondrak retorted. “I have little control over that cult of degenerates!” He was shaking now, with fury and with the panic of seeing the debacle of the last thirty-six hours in its entirety. “And now, it seems, they’ve lost control of their own Citadel!”
“Oh my,” Sestus chortled, “you do have your problems.”
“They’re our problems, my Brother in Blood,” Vondrak hissed back. “They’re all our problems.” He had both his fist up before him, trembling. “I warned Ruthven, all those years ago. Eradicating the Sacred Band was risky enough. But taking some of them prisoner, experimenting on them...”
“As Duke Enoch ordered,” Sestus noted warningly.
“I didn’t want to be between the factions!” Vondrak shrieked. “I didn’t want to have anything to do with any of this. There will be no safe place between Enoch and Luther if this gets out!”
“It’s not getting out,” Sestus snapped and the bite of his reproach echoed off the walls of the sanctum. His eyes flared with hot, deadly Flux. “Just hold your ground.”
Vondrak lowered his hands, took a long breath that, in all reality, he didn’t need. But the habits of mortality lingered—just like the instincts of fear. “I will.”
“And hold yourself together.” The other vampire looked down his nose imperiously through the hologram. “We will be over Circe soon and I will pound Malik’s pitiful, little uprising into radioactive glass.”
HARDCASES CLUSTERED around Edie at the southern edge of Reyes, where the hoverbikes had been massed like a herd of durasteel horses. She’d set up a small holopad projector and the others had to crowd in tightly. The air stank of their sweat and, in a few cases, hastily-bandaged wounds.
“The Citadel’s here,” she said, straining her voice over the yowl of anti-gravity motors. She pointed at the hologram. “We come in from here.”
The image showed a map and a blinking line that ran to where the Magvars petered out into foothills, then shot south, winding behind a southerly spur of hills. The path—obvious as the strike teams’ course—dipped into a low gorge that angled to the northeast of the pulsing red icon of the Citadel, before come up out of it, rising over a low peak to erupt on the fortress’ right flank.
Moff whistled. “That’s a long ride, and then to come out of that, right into a fight against that thing.”
“The Wraith says it’s been out of power since the first strikes,” Edie replied.
“There’ll still be a garrison.” Moff glanced around at the other Hardcases. “And whatever the hell is down in that hole.”
“The garrison’s our problem,” Edie told him in a sharp voice she hoped quell the hint of resistance she heard in his. “The rest is his.”
“What exactly does he want to pull out of there, Sundown?” asked one of the other Hardcases—a burly-built woman with bare, muscled arms she knew as Coda.
What, indeed? Edie considered her response. “Political prisoners is the simplest way I can explain it.”
“We’re risking our necks to spring a few dissidents?”
Edie locked gazes with Coda. “He says it will change the complexion of the war.”
“I’d rather do that here,” Moff said with a snort, and thumbed over his shoulder at Reyes and the Pass, “behind these nice fortifications. And the word is the Aleister legions are moving north.” He folded his hands over his blaster, slung muzzle-down with the butt at his shoulder. “What kind of sense does it make to deplete our defenses here, with that in mind?”
“The Wraith is calling the shots, Moff.”
The little man scowled. “I thought this was an alliance.”
Edie glared at him in silence, willing him to shut up in front of the others. The Hardcases watching the silent exchange shifted on their feet and exchanged furtive glances. Edie’s skin itched with their attention, and the knowledge that the longer this confrontation dragged out—the longer Moff made an ass of himself—the more doubt it sowed amongst her people. And they sure as hell couldn’t afford that.
Finally, thankfully, Moff backed down, looking down at the ground and then finding something to fidget at with his weapon.
“Vasilache,” Edie spoke up and quickly found the big Cadre Leader among her audience, “see to preparing our positions here. You’ve got the heavy weapons the Wraith brought. Word is, Vier isn’t far now. He’ll reinforce you.”
The perpetually-filthy man grinned through his stains. “When the legions arrive, they’ll get a nasty surprise.”
“I’m more worried about the surprises waiting for us,” Moff muttered.
Edie’s blood boiled for an instant as she whirled on the little man. “I called for volunteers,” she snapped. “You don’t have to go.”
Again, tense silence gripped the meeting.
This time, Moff smirked and looked away from her glower instantly. “No way, Sundown. Someone’s got to watch your back around all these new friends of ours.”
“I appreciate that,” Edie said, though her tone didn’t match her words. She took the opportunity to look around at all the Hardcases, try to meet as many gazes as she could, note as many names. They were a ragged damned bunch, but her heart suddenly swelled within her to see them, the group she’d brought together, held together, risen to lead. “I appreciate you all,” she told them.
Smiles and clenched fists and rumbles of appreciation answered.
The moment past, she knelt at the holopad and keyed a changed in the display. It zoomed in on the Citadel. “Now, this is the layout.”
The fortress featured a great central spire that rose up from the mountains like a terrible, black obelisk. Supporting this, tiers of lower buildings formed its foundation, these studded with battlements and topped with landing pads. Heavy weapons platforms blinked. Garages and entrances at the base did, too.
“Detailed schematic,” Coda grunted uneasily. “More of the Wraith’s handiwork?”
“He says it may be a little dated,” Edie replied, sharing that unease. She hadn’t asked him how he’d gotten it. In fact, she’d stopped asking questions, altogether. “We’ll be coming out of this gorge, here.” She pointed to the northeast of the tower. “Supposedly, this is the least-defended side. The Scorpiods go in first and cripple the heavy weapons.” She moved her finger over the installation. “We follow and take these battlements here and here and form a perimeter. The Wraith’s strike teams will force an entry.”
The Citadel schematic cross-sectioned to show various different levels of the structure. The main tower had a central shaft running through its heart, down into the bedrock of the mountain beneath it. What looked like foundries surrounded the core. The interior was twisting passages and a mazework of offices, cells, and chambers hazily labeled as “laboratories”. Edie shivered unconsciously upon noting those.
“And after that?” Moff asked.
“We secure the main level and wait for the Wraith to bring out his people,” she replied.
“We’re sure they’re people?” Moff shrugged and let out a chortle that was joined by some of the others. “I mean...he keeps some pretty rare company.”
“I’m not sure of anything other than this will help win the war.”
“He says,” Moff grumbled.
“I say,” she snapped. Moff pressed no further. She looked over at Vasilache. “What do we have?”
“Forty bikes,” the big man answered. “We side-lined any of the ones that looked questionable. Pretty much the entirety of the mounted company, though.”
“Double-up,” she told the others, looking around. “Triple-up, where you have to. And bundle-up. It’s going to be a long, hard, cold ride. And we’ll be going right into the fight. Any questions?”
The Hardcases answered with grim quiet and clenched jaws. Even Moff refrained from another quip.
“Alright. We go in twenty!”
The Hardcases broke up to see to their bikes. Engines squealed as they were tested. Rumbled conversation filled the gaps between revs. Determination powered their movements. Fear was there, too. But they trusted the job. They trusted the Wraith.
Edie swallowed back bile, thinking on that last part as she checked her blaster rifle in its side holster on her hover bike. She circled the vehicle once, eyeing anti-grav pads and chassis and handle bar controls. Her eyes drifted across the field outside the south of Reyes, to where the Scorpiods had set down. The Wraith’s people were coming and going from a quartet of them, while more swarmed about a fifth that had been partially opened-up for repairs.
She didn’t see any sign of him. But, then again, she was seeing him over and over again in her mind, in her past. It took work to suppress a shudder.
Moff lingered close, checking his own gear and clearly intending to ride along as her number-two.
“You’ve got a lot to say,” she said to the man bitterly.
He snorted quietly. “There was plenty I wasn’t saying.”
“I know. And I appreciate that.” She reached out for his arm. “But watch it with the opinions.”
He yanked free of her grip. “I can’t believe you’re alright with this!”
She grabbed at him again. “Who says I’m alright with it?” She gave him a shake. “Who says I’m alright with anything that’s happening? But we bet everything on this!”
“On the Wraith.”
“That’s right.” She released and gestured towards the parked Scorpiods. “And if it’s all a lie, we are screwed, anyway. So, I’m choosing to see it through.” She worked her jaw as she held his gaze. “How about you?”
“Not letting you go on into that, alone, with only that Wraith’s word,” he replied without hesitation.
And that actually meant more in that moment than she was really willing to admit. Because relying solely on that dark presence in her mind—that killer that she now knew had stalked her nightmares for nearly a decade—was the loneliest feeling she could imagine.
“Then saddle up.”
“CONTACTS, COMMANDER!”
Callisto jerked up out of his seat on the Vengeful’s auxiliary bridge and lurched to the holoprojector. A long-range sensor scan was already up, showing the four ships of his half of the Revenant fleet, speeding out from Circe for the rendezvous point. At the far edge of the scan’s range, blue icons winked into being. A pointer slid over one of these and a lesser hologram popped out, identifying the ship.
“It’s Brula!” Callisto nearly sagged over the projector. “Thank the Flux!”
“Inbound transmission,” the commlink orderly told him from her station halfway around the circle of the chamber.
“Put it through,” Callisto replied. “And tie the other captains in, as well.” He waited while the icons of Brula’s blocking force sped across the display. A globular hologram blipped into being before this, showed Venture smiling. More materialized, from the other ships’ captains. Finally, a larger one superimposed over the others, revealed Brula’s narrow, scarred face. “Captain, it’s good to see you!”
“I’d say it’s good to see you, Dee,” Brula replied, “but I’ve heard about Everild. Any change?”
Callisto frowned. “Nothing.”
“Well,” she said, “I’m afraid I’m not bringing a lot of good news. The bloodsuckers are right on our asses. We had put some distance between us and them. But they kicked in a high-g antimatter burn. And their Orloks are nipping at our tails.” She smiled grimly. “When we reach you, we’ll be coming in hot and with company.”
“We’ll reach you at this point, current speeds,” Venture spoke up. A halo formed on the scanner displayed and winked. “Maybe another seventy minutes.” He paused and cleared his throat. “You’re the senior, now, Brula. What’s the plan?”
The woman chewed her lower lip for a moment, was probably viewing the long-range readings from her own end. “Ambush,” she said at last. “The bloodsuckers have all their fighters out, hounding us. Their capital ships will be uncovered. How many Slayers do you have left?”
“Fifteen, if I’m back in the cockpit,” Callisto replied—a little too fast, his desire getting ahead of his duty, and sending a few winces through the auxiliary bridge team.
“Damn,” Brula breathed. But she gave herself a shake. “It’s enough. Get ‘em all in space and trailing the main group. Then power down and coast.” She typed something noisily and the star map acquired extra notations and lines—transmitted from her end. “Here,” she went on, “right here’s your spot.”
Callisto stared at the diagram. The dotted line of the expected axis of the Theocracy’s advance took them between widely-dispersed debris fields, the leftovers of some ancient astronomical disaster that may have once been a small moon of Circe’s. Brula’s notations left finger-drawn scrawls at points in the fields. Powered-down and drifting amidst the dust and scattered rock, a Slayer would be nearly invisible.
“You’ll wait while we draw them after us and into the heavies,” Brula said. More hand-drawn scribblings appeared, crude arrowheads that converged on the axis. “Once they’re engaged, your Slayers will whip around on their tails.”
“That’ll be leaving us uncovered,” Venture pointed out, his expression partially-hidden by his mustache, but the crow’s feet tightening at his eyes betraying tension.
“We’re bringing what we’ve got left,” Brula answered.
Callisto eyed the pitiful dusting of Slayers that remained. Less than a full squadron. Kylie’s people had taken a pounding.
