The Crypt: Shakedown: (A Military Sci-Fi Novel), page 33
She felt it, ever so light, barely there at all—a tapping at the base of her skull. Anne recognized it as an echo of her former self reacting to this unexpected insult. Nothing more, nothing less. She controlled it, then let it go.
Anne Lafferty controlled her emotions; emotions did not control Anne Lafferty.
“Maybe we could tow it,” Kerkhoffs said. “Drag it through transdim with us?”
All eyes turned to Hasik. He looked pale, as might be expected of someone who’d been minutes from death only a few hours earlier. Artificial blood had him back on his feet, although Hammersmith had given him a crutch and told him to avoid putting pressure on the wounded leg.
“Towing won’t work,” he said. “We’ve run experiments. In every one, the thing we towed was lost. Lost as in never to be seen again.”
Cooley gestured to the wardroom bulkheads, the ceiling. “We’re inside a superstructure that’s attached to the hull. How can that make it through but something towed cannot?”
So, there were limits to Cooley’s knowledge of the Keeling. That was something, at least.
“The ship generates a near-field effect, but only for things in direct contact with the hull,” Hasik said. “If we secure the hauler to the hull, that might work.”
“Might work?” Cooley shook his head. “I’m not authorizing that. Ditch the crawlers, get my hauler in your landing bay, and let’s skedaddle.”
An expensive option, considering crawlers cost around thirty million each. Compared to potentially losing the war, though, it was a pittance.
“We need them,” Lindros said. “The Ishlangu rendezvous is in unclaimed space. If we run into trouble, we need the combat flexibility the Ochtheras provide.”
“Fuck flexibility,” Cooley said. “You want the Ochtheras? Then strap them to the hull.”
Lincoln glanced at Sung. “Will the hauler fit in the pouch?”
“If I break down the maintenance racks, yeah,” Sung said. “It’ll take about ninety minutes.”
“You have forty-five,” Lincoln said. “We dive in sixty. Grab anyone you need. Kerkhoffs, assist him. Store the rack parts anywhere you can, but make sure they’re labeled. When the hauler is off our hands, I want them reassembled ASAP. Go.”
Sung and Kerkhoffs hurried out of the wardroom.
Lincoln again faced Cooley. “Do we need to take the hauler apart to get your intel?”
“Not if the crawler tech crew assists me,” he said. “We take the embedded bits out one at a time, and she’ll fly just fine. At the rendezvous, I might even set her on autopilot and send her in a random direction. Let those Cloister bastards chase their tail for a while. Look, Captain, I can get my end of the job done in twenty-four hours, easy—as long as no one goes crazy and starts smashing things. I’ve been told that’s an issue on this boat.”
Cooley knew about the hallucinations. He didn’t hold all the cards, but he held more than Anne did.
“Lindros, get the crawlers out of the pouch,” Lincoln said. “Hasik, figure out how to secure them to the hull so they survive transdim. If the crawlers aren’t secured in forty minutes, we’re leaving them behind. Go.”
Hasik hurriedly hobbled out. Lindros followed, leaving Anne alone with the captain and Cooley.
Anne had to admit, Lincoln made decisions fast and she did not vacillate. She was a captain for a reason.
“Colonel,” Lincoln said, “I strongly suggest you read Major Lafferty in on your intel. You know a thing or two about Keeling, but there’s a big difference between being briefed on it and being here. Bad things happen in transdim. If something happens to you, consider what would be lost if you don’t make it back to report.”
An understanding smile crinkled Cooley’s friendly eyes.
“That’s good counsel, Captain,” he said. “I’ll share what I can.”
That seemed to satisfy Lincoln. She stood.
“Then I’ll leave you to it,” she said. “Colonel, I’m doing everything in my power to accommodate your mission. I hope it’s worth the risk.”
She left the wardroom.
Anne sat silently.
Cooley puffed on his cigar, making her wait a few moments before speaking.
“Look at you,” he said. “You’ve come a long way since we first met.”
“Thank you, sir. I completed some demanding missions.”
“I bet you did.” He rolled his cigar between finger and thumb. “How old are you?”
“I’m twenty-six.”
“Twenty-six, and already a major.” He nodded to himself. “Helluva career track you’re on. And you’re the intel chief on a classified vessel? Pretty big assignment.” He took a puff, let out another smoke ring. “Did your daddy arrange it for you, you little shit?”
The tapping hit so hard her vision blurred. The itch, the urge, it blossomed, exploded, filled every bit of her brain.
“Major Lafferty, I asked you a question.”
Anne focused on her breathing. She wouldn’t let this man yank her thoughts around and destroy all the work she’d put in.
“I earned this position, Colonel.”
“I’m sure you did. I’ll share what I can about my mission, Major, but first, I’m awful hungry. Go tell the galley to whip me up something.” He pointed his cigar at the coffee urn. “And have them brew me a fresh pot. That’s not too demanding of a task for you, I hope.”
Being spoken to like that? She was a major. She was the intel chief on this ship.
“Yes, sir,” she said. “I’ll get right on it.”
Anne stepped out of the wardroom. She could have used the wardroom comm to call the galley, but she needed to get away from that smoke. Get away from Cooley.
She hadn’t felt like this since…
…since Eden.
But she was better now.
She could control it. She could make the tapping go away, make the itch subside.
She was better now.
She was better.
52
“Hey, Bennett,” Beaver shouted. “The stuff that goes on in this ship… would you say it’s the craziest stuff you’ve seen outside of combat?”
The card game came to a stop. Beaver, Abs, and Shamdi looked at John, as if he might say, no, not at all—I’ve been on ships that make mass hallucinations, fratricide, and jumping into other fucking dimensions look like going down to your local for a pint.
“Yeah, Beaver,” John said. “I’d say this is the craziest stuff I’ve seen outside of combat. Queen of hearts.”
John tossed his card. It rose up, spinning slightly, and hovered there, started flapping like a piece of frying bacon.
Nothing crazy about this place. Nope, not at all.
“Hope you’ve got better aim with your rifle.” Abshire pantomimed picking up a card off Muttonhead Mafi’s midriff and putting it atop the five of hearts resting on Mafi’s sternum. “Because you suck at throwing cards.”
John stared at his hovering, sizzling card. “So you’re telling me the queen of hearts is not floating in mid-air?”
Now it even smelled like bacon.
Shamdi tapped the stack of cards on Mafi’s chest. “Yours is right on top, Geezer. You can’t see it?”
And just like that, the sizzling card—which smelled delicious—was gone. John’s card had actually landed on Mafi’s midriff. Abshire had moved it.
Beaver put down the ace of spades. “Got you nailed, Bennett!”
Holy hell was the kid bad at this game.
Mafi started to lurch against the canvas restraints holding him tight to the bunk. Shamdi put a hand on Mafi’s chest—more to keep the cards from shifting than to comfort the man.
“Hey, Mafi,” Shamdi said, “you looking for your watch, buddy?”
“That cumstain took my watch. He took my—”
“He gave it back,” Abshire said. “Your watch is in your locker, next to your toothbrush. We checked on it, ol’ buddy ol’ pal.”
Mafi stopped struggling.
“Thanks,” he said, then returned to his status as a non-moving substitute table.
Shamdi played the four of hearts.
Abshire played the nine of hearts. “Wow, Beaver, good thing you took that trick with the most-powerful card in the game, amiright?”
“Scream, aim, and fire, motherfucker.” Beaver gathered up the cards. “That’s how this dog hunts.”
Somewhere in Raider Land, a man let out a long, haunting moan. John wondered what the man had seen. Then John remembered he didn’t want to know. Not one bit.
Abshire stared off in the direction of that moan.
“Why’d they do this to us, Bennett?” he asked. “I volunteered, you know? I didn’t get drafted. I worked hard in boot. I wanted to serve the Union. I didn’t do anything wrong, yet I wind up in the Crypt. Do they know what this place does to us? Do they even care?”
They was the common pronoun for the Admiralty. The people who pulled the strings and sent sailors and Raiders to die. The people who’d filled this ship of nightmares with the guilty and the innocent alike.
“I don’t know, Abs,” John said. “I just go where they tell me to go.”
John hadn’t known exactly what he was getting into, but he knew he was signing up for a lethal deployment option. Several Raiders on their first-ever deployment had done no such thing. Abshire hadn’t chosen this. Neither had Sui Jun, who was still in the infirmary, still repeating the last two words anyone said to her and saying nothing more. Neither had Delaker Oneida, whose Raider career was over almost as soon as it began. Neither had Fred Abeen, Beaver, Bishop, Chennault, or Ochthera engineer-gunner Silja Lehtonen—they were all fresh out of boot, and as far as John could tell, had done nothing worthy of being entombed.
“We’re here because we’re fucking awesome,” Beaver said. “That’s why.”
Abshire shrugged, tried to play off his emotions. He changed the subject.
“Seems like everyone is handling transdim better on the return trip,” he said. “Forty-four hours in and only a couple of small fights so far.”
“And a whale’s penis,” Shamdi said.
“And a whale’s penis,” Abs agreed. “But this ain’t nothing compared to that trip in. It’s like people are getting used to it, you know?”
That was one way to look at things. Almost half the platoon was restrained, either by choice or because Lindros ordered it before he stripped down and ran laps around Raider Land until he himself was restrained by Sands and PXO Winter.
Winter’s troubles on the dive in had, so far, not manifested on the return trip. She was fine. She’d tried to get John to slip away somewhere to screw, because she wanted to know what it was like to fuck while in transdim. John avoided her. No way did he want to do that. He’d just hallucinated playing-card bacon—what if, in the middle of a good bonk, Winter turned into the rat-shrimp-thing, or a giant trout, or some other mad shit like that?
Sorry, ma’am, I don’t fuck fish.
“Neither do I,” Abs said. “Not that there’s anything wrong with it.”
John looked at him. “Did I say the part about fish-fucking out loud?”
“You did,” Abs said.
The men looked at the cards remaining in their hands. Beaver took the trick, so it was his lead. He was in no hurry. The point of the game was to pass the time, so no one really cared.
“It’s quiet,” Shamdi said.
Abshire nodded. “Like Christmas Eve, you know? That kind of quiet. With all the snow.”
“I fucking love Christmas,” Beaver shouted. “Maybe when we surface, we’ll get presents. I fucking love presents.”
The skin of Mafi’s face turned crimson. Blood-smeared horns burst through his temples, cracking bone, spilling wet-red on his pillow. The big man lifted his head. Blazing orange eyes stared out at John.
“You know you won’t get presents tomorrow,” Mafi said. “You know all these kids are going to die screaming for their mommies. They’ll beg you to save them and you won’t. Because you can’t. You never could. You know they’re going to piss themselves, shit themselves. That they’ll—”
John winced—Shamdi had punched him in the shoulder.
“What was that for?”
“Play your card,” Shamdi said
John looked at Mafi’s chest. On it lay a five of spades, topped by a ten of spades, topped by a jack of spades.
“Maybe I should have saved my ace,” Beaver said.
“S’matter?” Shamdi waved his fingers in front of John’s face. “You seeing something weird again?”
Devil-Mafi smiled wide. A too-thin, too-long tongue slid out of his mouth and into his left nostril. It wormed around in there, struggling to get deeper before sliding back into Mafi’s mouth.
“Nope,” John said. “I don’t see nothing at all.”
Devil-Mafi became Table-Mafi. All was back to normal. But what Devil-Mafi had said…
Goosebumps ran along John’s arms.
“Game over,” he said. “Everyone in their rack. We need all the rest we can get.”
Beaver laughed, shook his head. “The dangerous part of the mission’s over, Bennett. We’re home free. Don’t quit now, I’m winning.”
Beaver was, in fact, not winning.
“I’m out, too,” Shamdi said. “I’m supposed to go chat with Bethany before we surface.”
Beaver and Abs busied themselves cleaning up the cards. They didn’t say anything, but neither did they hide their lascivious grins.
“Fuck you guys,” Shamdi said. “Fuckin’ pervs.”
Beaver and Abshire started laughing. Abs made a gesture of locking his mouth and throwing away the key.
“We didn’t say nothing,” Beaver shouted. “Nothing at all.”
Shamdi glared at them.
The fire team—as well as the rest of the platoon—had learned that making any suggestive or humorous comments about a certain xeno department ensign would not end well for anyone. Tough Guy Shamdi had a soft spot for her. He didn’t take kindly to anything he perceived as an insult.
“In your bunks.” John glanced at the brass clock-timer on the bulkhead. “We’re four hours out from realspace. Not you, Sham—go do your thing, but don’t stay too long. Tomorrow… tomorrow might not go as smooth as we hope.”
Shamdi stared back. “Bad feeling?”
John nodded.
“I hear you,” Shamdi said. “I won’t be long.”
If Shamdi didn’t feel the danger himself, he recognized someone who did. It was a bond that unblooded Abshire and Beaver couldn’t understand. Not yet, anyway.
Shamdi left the berth.
John climbed into his bunk. He closed his eyes, praying he would see no more insane stuff. When he opened them, a rat-shrimp-thing stared down at him through the now-translucent copper ceiling.
“Not tonight, Margaret,” John said. “I’ve got a headache.”
And with that, John Bennett rolled over and went to sleep.
53
Susannah had never been a drug-head. She’d always looked down her nose at those types. Always judged them. But if what drug-heads experienced was a teeny tiny fraction of what she saw while in-dim? Then maybe she’d been missing out all along.
She dusted off the crate where Nitzan would sit, even though she’d dusted it off three times already. The little motes that kicked up flashed in the light.
So many pretty colors.
She’d seen rainbow snakes slithering around two or three times during the two-day dive out from the Purist Nation, but they weren’t quite as frightening as they’d been at first. They were actually kind of cute.
The colors and the snakes were interesting, but what Susannah really wanted was the silent room with the light. That, and the voice. The voice.
High One himself, talking to her. Did he speak in riddles? Maybe. If so, Susannah figuring out those riddles was all part of His plan. High One had everything planned out, timed to the last nanosecond. He gave you experiences to make you stronger. He showed you lessons if your eyes were open to learning, to believing. He helped you through your troubled moments, all to get you to one particular point where you had to make a choice.
If you chose correctly—and you kept passing His tests—you might someday be by his side in body and soul.
Was Nitzan Shamdi a test? Susannah thought so. He was a good man. A Purist. He was interested in her. Very interested. Was Shamdi a test to see if Susannah had truly given up her past ways?
Maybe. Probably. If so, she was failing that test.
She liked Nitzan. She really did. But she wasn’t attracted to him. Not in that way. No matter how many times she tried to talk herself into it, she just wasn’t.
Maybe things were about to change. Only a few hours left before entering realspace to rendezvous with the Ishlangu and head back to Union territory.
Maybe Nitzan would walk into the storage room. Maybe Susannah would close the sphincter, so no one could see in. Maybe Nitzan would look wonderful and sexy in a way he hadn’t yet. Maybe Susannah would hallucinate, and Nitzan would be full of beautiful colors, or maybe he’d look like… like…
…like Melanie.
Susannah slapped herself, hard. She did it again, even harder.
Her face stung. Her hand stung.
That was wrong. Wrong. She wasn’t going back to those ways. She wasn’t. When Nitzan walked in, she was going to rip his clothes off and have at him. She would—
Someone stepped into the compartment, but it wasn’t Nitzan Shamdi.
“I saw your meathead boyfriend on his way here,” Anne Lafferty said. “I told him to go fuck around somewhere else.”
She looked almost like a different person. Her wide eyes danced with glee.
“Ensign Darkwater, I think it’s time you and I had a little chat.”
Lafferty reached out and stroked the sphincter’s smooth surface—it sealed shut, trapping Susannah inside with her.
54
What a slobbering mess. Not like Olivia. Olivia had been stronger. Darkwater wasn’t like Olivia, or like…
