Atlantia Series 3: Aggressor (21 page)

‘My daughter,’ she replied. ‘They’re holding her and my father, Stefan.’

‘I think we saw Erin in the throne room,’ Evelyn replied. ‘She’s unharmed.’

‘For now,’ the woman replied wearily.

‘What’s your name?’ Teera asked.

‘Ishira,’ came the exhausted reply, ‘captain of the merchant vessel
Valiant
.’

‘How did you end up here?’

‘We were fleeing,’ Ishira replied. ‘We were searching for supplies when we got jumped by a Veng’en cruiser. We fled across the system and managed to evade them, but then we got captured by some damned pirate and…’

‘Whoa, back up a moment,’ Evelyn cut her off. ‘You saw a Veng’en cruiser?’

Ishira nodded as she drank a little more from the canteen. ‘Came out of nowhere. We’d only just arrived in the system, and I guess the flare star’s output was screwing up our warning receivers and radar. They opened fire but we out-ran them.’

Evelyn sat back on her haunches thoughtfully.

‘We were following a Veng’en cruiser,’ she said. ‘Sensors said it dropped out of super-luminal close to the Chiron system.’

‘Could be the same one,’ Teera acknowledged. ‘But why start messing about hitting merchant ships? They were on their way home, right?’

‘You don’t know where the cruiser went?’ Evelyn asked Ishira.

‘No,’ Ishira replied. ‘We were getting closer to the parent star when they just vanished, turned back for some reason.’

Teera and Evelyn exchanged a glance.

‘Maybe they saw the pirates coming?’ Teera ventured.

‘Veng’en wouldn’t run just like that,’ Evelyn said. ‘If they were chasing one human vessel and others turned up they’d have considered it a bonus. Something else must have happened to them.’

Ishira looked up at them both as she began to recover her senses.

‘What then hell were you doing following a Veng’en cruiser? Who are you?’ Then she saw Evelyn’s shoulder insignia and the patches on her flight suit. ‘Atlantia?! You’re Colonial?’

‘Atlantia’s in orbit right now,’ Evelyn confirmed.

Ishira apparently found a fresh surge of energy as she scrambled to her feet.

‘Then get them the hell down here!’

‘A bit tricky,’ Teera replied. ‘We’re hostages here and Salim Phaeon has a large force at his disposal. Carpet-bombing the compound with so many innocent lives at stake isn’t an option.’

‘Nor is leaving us here!’

‘Nobody’s leaving anybody,’ Evelyn assured her. ‘But our captain isn’t going to make a move against Salim until he’s sure that he can do so without endangering too many lives.’

‘Human shield,’ Ishira uttered in disgust. ‘Salim is a pig and a coward.’

‘Our sentiments exactly,’ Teera grinned. ‘Which is why we’ll do everything we can to disrupt things from our end.’

‘Great,’ Ishira said as she put her hands on her hips. ‘Where do we start?’

‘By putting these robes on,’ Evelyn replied.

Ishira’s jubilant expression folded in upon itself. ‘You want us to do
what
?’

‘Put the robes on,’ Evelyn replied as she picked up one of the flowing gowns. ‘We can’t do much good sitting down here in a cell.’

Ishira stared at the gowns, mortified. ‘I just went through hell to avoid wearing those damned things.’

‘Then you’re an idiot,’ Evelyn snapped back. ‘Best chance we have to get out of here is to not be locked in these cells. Your daughter is up there right now. You think you’re doing her any favours by getting yourself killed down here?’

Ishira fumed in silence as Evelyn tried to work out which way round the gowns went on.

‘This isn’t exactly my sort of thing,’ Teera said as she unzipped her flight suit. ‘And we can’t conceal weapons in them.’

‘We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,’ Evelyn said as she glanced at Ishira. ‘You said your father was here too?’

‘Working on the Arcadia, I think,’ Ishira replied. ‘We got separated when we arrived.’

Evelyn thought for a moment and then she looked at Teera.

‘If the Arcadia was captured recently, it’s unlikely that Salim’s people could have completely hacked her systems and computers.’

‘Doesn’t matter much, does it?’ Teera asked. ‘There’s no way we can get a team down here to check, and a Marine assault is out of the question.’

‘We might not have to,’ Evelyn said as she slipped out of her flight suit and draped the slender robe over her shoulders. ‘We might be able to use the Boarding Protocol.’

‘The what?’ Teera asked.

‘All Colonial capital ships share the same computer codes and contain hidden overrides that are designed to allow remote control from a sister vessel.’

‘You mean Atlantia could take control of Arcadia?’ Ishira asked.

Teera stared at Evelyn and grasped her own head with one hand.

‘Of course,’ she replied. ‘I remember something of that from the training. The codes were designed so that if a ship was successfully boarded by attackers, the rest of the fleet could both contain and control them, turning the attack into a capture.’

Evelyn’s and Teera’s military training had been compressed into six months instead of three years, and much of the detail had been missed in order to bring them to combat-ready status, but pilot chatter and building experience meant that many of those missed details were steadily being filled in. Both Mikhain and Captain Sansin had occasionally spoken of the Boarding Protocol, which had only been used once during a battle between a Colonial scout vessel,
Patriot,
and a Veng’en cruiser, code-named
Rage,
during a confrontation a decade previously.

Ambushed during a routine patrol on the Icari Line, the Patriot had been hopelessly out-matched by the much larger and more powerful Rage. Choosing to flee, Patriot’s captain had elected to head not for Etheran space but instead for the nearest Colonial outpost. The faster Patriot could have made it to the outpost ahead of Rage, but her captain was unwilling to risk the lives of the outpost’s personnel should the Veng’en push their attack further. Instead, he undertook an ingenious deception.

Nearing the outpost, he sent an alert signal ahead and then deliberately weakened his own aft shields, allowing the Veng’en cruiser to achieve a hit on the smaller vessel. Feigning crippling damage, the Patriot slowed and the Veng’en cruiser both caught and boarded her. The Veng’en boarders reached the bridge, only to find it abandoned. Calling their own crew aboard their ship for assistance, they were surprised to receive no reply.

The Patriot’s captain and crew had counter-boarded the Veng’en cruiser, now short of armed personnel, and successfully took the bridge. Moments later, the Colonial outpost took control of the Patriot and sealed her, trapping the boarders inside. In the space of an admittedly tense hour, the Patriot’s captain took his crew from certain defeat to complete victory with barely a shot fired, an event that had gone down in Colonial history and earned the captain his promotion to admiral.

‘The problem is,’ Teera pointed out, ‘we don’t know if anybody is aware on Atlantia that there’s a Colonial frigate down here.’

‘They will,’ Evelyn replied. ‘That’s our job. As long as Salim or his people are talking to Atlantia, we need to be there to try and send a signal to let them know what’s down here. As soon as they figure it out they might be able to take control of Arcadia and shut her defence systems down, then launch an assault to liberate us.’ Evelyn looked at Ishira. ‘All of us.’

Ishira looked at Evelyn for a long moment and then she stooped and picked up one of the robes.

‘This had better be worth it,’ she uttered.

Evelyn looked down at herself and tried to ignore the cold flushes washing through her body, provoked by more than just the cold. It could not be long before the withdrawal fevers that she had heard about began, horrific pangs of agony that wracked the sufferer’s body for days or even weeks on end.

The robes were of a creamy-white satin fabric, two lengths over her shoulders that reached down to a clasp at her waist, and two more lengths that extended almost to the ground. Her mid-riff was bare, far more skin showing that was covered, and the tiny shoes that came with the robes were thin-soled and not good for running or fighting of any kind.

‘We’re not going to be able to thump our way out of here,’ she warned Teera and Ishira. ‘We’ll need our wits for this, understood?’

Her two companions nodded, and they waited together for the Ogrin to return.

***

Qayin strode through the ship toward the holding cells, a hundred thoughts skimming around through his mind like flashes of awareness in an immense darkness.

The farmer in the sick-bay was still unconscious and unable to communicate with Doctor Sansin, a state of affairs that Qayin would very much like to become permanent. But security was high around the patient’s bed, with little chance of Qayin making his way inside without being observed. Likewise, there were now three Devlamine dealers in custody, and only the threat of violence against their families forcing them to maintain their silence. Qayin knew that his threat could only hold for so long before the men folded. He needed a way out and off Atlantia, the sooner the better.

On Chiron IV an entire armada of pirate vessels were commanded by a man whose exploits out beyond the Icari Line were almost legendary. Qayin did not like what he had heard about the man, but then he did not like what he had heard about most pirates, or even drug dealers for that matter. There were no such things as friends in Qayin’s business, only accquaintances who gained or lost favour through their ability to supply or pay for goods. Nothing much else mattered, really, and that was the kind of lifestyle that Qayin yearned for once again.

The complexities of proper relationships frustrated him at the best of times. The constant sacrifices, both large and small, to maintain the trust of people who thought of themselves as friends was a drain on Qayin’s patience that he could ill afford. Stuck aboard Atlantia Five as a high-security convict for two years and another two aboard Atlantia herself as a Marine had driven him almost insane. Now, liberation was at hand, a chance to break free from the stifling coils of Colonial life that no longer existed anywhere else in the cosmos anyway. Every order, ever command and every duty strained the limits of his endurance, but not for much longer.

Qayin entered the cells, the two Marines guarding them stepping aside as they recognised him. Both were former convicts and servants of Bravo Company but, to themselves, servants of Qayin. Loyal men, who knew how to fight and who had expressed a desire to leave the Atlantia as the first reasonable opportunity. Qayin nodded discreetly at them as he strode into the cells and down to where a lone man was sitting on a bench staring at the deck.

Qayin knew a little about Taron Forge, not least of all that he was the estranged son of the celebrated Admiral Tyraeus Forge, a man as famous as Salim Phaeon for entirely opposing reasons. A valiant commander with many courageous battle actions to his name, lost now to the Legion.

Taron looked up at Qayin without interest at first, but then he spotted Qayin’s bioluminescent tattoos and a sparkle of curiosity twinkled in his expression.

‘The Mark of Qayin,’ he murmured.

‘Pleased to meet you,’ Qayin replied.

Taron stood and looked the Marine up and down. ‘Last person I’d have thought would stoop to becoming a Colonial foot soldier. What happened?’

‘Cicrumstances,’ Qayin replied. ‘Better to be free up there than locked away down here.’

‘That depends on what you call “free”,’ Taron pointed out. ‘You here to escort me to more comfortable surroundings?’

‘No,’ Qayin said. ‘I’m here to make you an offer.’ Taron’s eyebrow lifted and he glanced over Qayin’s shoulder. The big Marine turned and saw a petite but somehow dangerous looking woman with exotic features watching him in silence from the opposite cell. ‘Both of you,’ Qayin added.

‘What kind of offer would that be?’ Taron asked. ‘Working for the Man?’

Qayin shook his head, his gold and blue locks shimmering and his glowing tattoos sparkling as though with mischief.

‘Working for yourself,’ he replied, ‘through me.’

Taron eyed the Marine thoughtfully. ‘Just the kind of thing Sansin would pull as some sort of loyalty test, I presume. See if I can be trusted?’

Qayin stepped closer to the bars.

‘See the guards by the block entrance?’ Taron glanced to his left, and when Qayin was sure he was looking at the Marines he spoke again. ‘They’re my men, not Sansin’s or anybody elses. Half of Bravo Company is waiting for my word to pull the hell off this damned ship and get back to business.’

Taron watched the two Marines for a long beat and then looked back at Qayin.

‘What’s your trade?’

‘Devlamine, but I’ll shift whatever turns a profit.’

‘User?’

‘Seller,’ Qayin grinned, ‘supply and demand is all I’m interested in.’

‘Where’s your market?’

‘Chiron IV. Salim already knows the drugs are aboard Atlantia, and the captain is searching for them as we speak. He won’t find them yet because they’re well enough hidden, but the wider the search goes the sooner they’ll be found. Captain plans to exchange the entire stash for Salim’s hostages. I disagree. Best place for them is with the customer, don’t you think?’

‘Where is your supply?’ Taron demanded.

‘Safe, below decks,’ Qayin assured him.

Taron glanced at Yo’Ki before he spoke. ‘What’s your price?’

‘Salim’s reckoned to have a lot of ships down there, a lot of merchandise he’s picked up since the apocalypse. We trade for transport and supplies, and make sure we hold back the crystals that are the Devlamine source. Keep Salim dependent on us for supply.’

‘The small matter of getting the Devlamine down there?’

‘Leave that to me,’ Qayin replied. ‘I can get you both out of here with the Devlamine, and back to Chiron.’

‘And I take it that your Marines will be coming along?’

‘If not now, then imminently. Captain will be forced at some point to launch an assault, and we’ll be there. A small matter to switch sides once we’re on the ground.’