Into the Black: Odyssey One (23 page)

*****

The shuttle slowly lowered itself into the cleared area, its big landing gear shattering the remains of the cleared forest, as the full weight of the twenty meter craft came down. As the heavy craft settled on its gear, a long gang plank slowly lowered, allowing the soldiers inside to quickly step down and assemble at the base of the shuttle.

“Sir, the signal source is three hundred meters, that way,” Master Sergeant Kail growled out, pointing off to the west as he addressed the Major.

“All right. Sargent, detail two men to stay behind and guard the shuttle, the rest of us are moving out to check the source of the distress call,” Brinks ordered firmly, grabbing his pack and dropping its braces into the mounting points, built into his suit.

Kail nodded and waved two of his men over to stand guard at the shuttle’s lowered lift platform, then joined the Major and the rest of his team, as they left the shuttle and headed towards the clearing; they had spotted from the air. Traveling through the remains of the forest wasn’t difficult, in spite the tightly woven embrace of the branches they encountered. A swipe of a machete or, more often, simply their hands would snap the brittle wood into splinters and clear the path for the marching soldiers.

Milla struggled to keep up with the group, but found that the peculiar qualities of the suit they wore were considerable different, when gravity was present. Practically every second step, she found herself stumbling over an upturned root, or stepping into a shallow depression and nearly falling into the man ahead of her. Only the presence of Major Brinks and Corporal Curtis kept her on her feet and moving forward with any reasonable degree of progress. In between falls, she noticed with a certain level of chagrin that the others moved easily and fluidly in their suits apparently using the properties to maintain a steady pace that quickly ate away at the distance between them and their destination. By the time they arrived in the small clearing, Milla was sweating heavily and exhausted from the pace, yet none of the others were breathing more than normal or had even broken a sweat.

Jaime leaned over her, as she doubled up in the clear, helping support her balance as Milla drew deep, ragged breaths, “the first march in these things are always tough. I’ve seen men used to eight hour quick-time marches get worn out in ten minutes of trying to walk in one of these.”

Milla looked up at him in between breaths, “how long does it take to get used to this armor?”

Brinks smiled wryly, glancing back at them over his shoulder. Milla couldn’t see his smile though, as it was hidden behind the shimmer of his armor’s face plate. His words however, came through loud and clear, “oh, usually a soldier figures it out after a three day forced hike through rough terrain. I think we’ll try to spare you that ordeal though.”

“Thank you,” she muttered dryly, along with a word that the translators screwed up. “I do not believe I could take one day of this torture, let alone three.”

Brinks shook his head, his knowing expression wasted on those who couldn’t see it. “You’d figure it out. Once they get the hang of it, most soldiers can maintain a full run for about six hours without rest; the suit makes movement a lot easier, once you learn to stop fighting it.”

Milla just looked at him unbelieving, her body language, even in the suit so obvious that a Lieutenant burst out laughing, while Brinks turned his attention to where Savoy and his men were examining the structure in the center of the clearing.

“I’ve never seen material like this before, Major.” Savoy told him. “It seems to have many of the same properties as the escape pod we found, but it seems to be designed to block signals rather than to be sensor transparent. We can’t read what’s inside.”

By this time, Milla had regained her breath enough to interject a comment, “It’s a survival bunker. The basic design has been in our archives for centuries.” She shook her head, “I did not realize that any were left.”

“Then again,” she considered after a moment, “when the Drasin threat was broadcast, someone on this planet may have copied the schematics out of the database and built this in a rush.”

“So there are people inside?” Major Brinks asked after she had finished.

Milla looked at him with a confused look on her face, “what else would there be?”

Brinks shook his head, he couldn’t decide if these people were hopelessly naive or if Milla was simply a consummate actress. Either way, he had little choice but to play out the hand. “Can you open it?”

Milla shook her head, grimacing. “No, they probably transmitted the frequency code to the other colonies, but without it I can do nothing.”

“Anyway we can talk to the people in there?”

This time Milla paused for a moment before shaking her head grimly, “no, we saw that their communications system was damaged. The only system they have active right now is a secure radio transmitter, no reception capabilities. It is a last resort device, built to gather energy from the decay of an energy element. If it is active, then they have lost all power including, perhaps, life support.”

Grimly, Brinks digested the information and finally nodded to Savoy, “Open it up.”

Savoy nodded and signalled to two of his men, who approached with a larger version of the laser cutters, used to clear the landing area, cradled between them. Approaching the bunker, Savoy took a lightweight hammer and pick from his belt and rapped the hard material three times in succession, paused a moment, before repeating the process. When no response was heard after a two full minutes, he signalled the two men behind him and stepped back.

The big laser cutter took a few moments to charge the capacitors as the two men began the process of slicing through the bunker material. A few minutes later it was apparent that blocking sensors wasn’t the only way this material differed from what Milla’s escape pod had been built of.

Wiping sweat from his brow, one of the cutters, Sergeant Mehn looked up at Savoy, “This is going to take a while, Major. The material is turning to slag and then running into the cut behind the laser and hardening again. The worst thing is that it seems to get harder to cut after each successive cooling.”

Savoy nodded grimly. “All right, we’ll work along and slip laser and heat resistant braces into the cut as we go. Should be easy enough to remove them afterwards.”

The work progressed slowly; as each section was sliced open a third man would slap a brace into the opening, to keep the melted material from filling the hole. Savoy’s team traded off on jobs, as they slowly cut their way through the Bunker, evening out the harsh work among the group. Hours later, the man sized cut was finally completed, and Savoy called to one his men.

“Burke, we’re going to need a special job on this one. Think you can blow that section
out
?”

The short man stepped up and began examining the area, finally turning to Savoy and nodding with a grin. “Yes Sir, with the braces in place, I could blow it inside out if you want.”

Savoy grinned in return and simply motioned the man to go ahead. The rest of the group began evacuating the immediate area, cleaning out the equipment they had brought, as they relocated to a safer area. Milla watched the man called Burke carefully laying explosives, triple checking and meticulously measuring each charge. A half hour later, he finished and headed over to the group, an innocuous device resting in the palm of his hand.

Burke nodded to the man when he arrived, then called out to the rest of the men. “Fire in the hole!”

Milla looked around for a moment, wondering at the sudden movements as everyone ducked their heads. The Corporal Curtis reached up and pulled her down, as well.

“Believe me, Miss, you want to be down here, right now,” she told Milla, as she placed an arm over her helmet and physically held her down.

That statement was punctuated by a loud explosion from the bunker and the sudden showering of rock that pelted down on them. Milla was suddenly glad of the tough armored suit and helmet she wore.

The group slowly stood up and dusted their armor off, admiring the work that Burke had done. The explosives had cut a clean hole in the bunker, blowing most of the debris out and away from anyone inside the squat structure.

The group approached the building cautiously, their weapons held ready. The point men stopped at the makeshift entrance Burke had made, expertly scanning the interior before they stepped inside. Once inside the squat structure they found themselves in an empty room that obviously took up the entire interior of the bunker.

Brinks looked around at the unimpressive room before turning to where Milla had just joined the group. “Well, where are they?”

Milla, looking around the room carefully, responded distractedly. “Under us, the bunker should extend downward one hundred meters. Give me a moment and I should be able to find the control panel.”

Roberts stepped back, allowing Milla to begin examine the room carefully. Finally she smiled and walked over to a blank wall. “Here it is.”

The rest of the people in the room stared at her blankly for a moment until she waved her hand a few inches from the wall, causing a shimmering display of light to appear. The display of light coalesced into a floating control panel that Milla manipulated by brushing her hands along its shimmering surface.

“Projected particle interface,” Milla explained as she entered instructions into the surface. “It’s activated by a three dimensional grid of motion sensors built into the wall.”

The Major just nodded but Savoy stepped up behind her, fascinated by the system. “Are you receiving
tactile
feedback?”

Milla nodded distractedly, tapping another button with an audible click. “Yes…, the particle field allows the computer to exert pressure, so that you know when you’ve activated a control.”

“How does it manage that?” The Major asked a tone of wonder in his voice. “I don’t see any projectors…”

Milla smiled. “No, you wouldn’t. The wall is the projector the same devices that are reading my input also display the interface.”

“Really? But how do you…”

Savoy found himself cut off as Milla entered the last command and the floor began vibrating. In the center of the room a circular seam appeared in the floor and the round section began rising. After it had rose a short distance it stopped, and then it rolled to one side revealing a deep pit beneath it.

“You have got to be kidding me,” one of the soldiers found himself staring down the hole, trying vainly to see the bottom. The best he could do was follow the rungs of a ladder down until even they disappeared from sight.

“Sorry,” Milla said. “It’s the best I can do. Without the power being active, I can’t bring the lift up.”

“It’ll do, Miss Chans. If we can get a power source down there, do you think you can recharge the system?”

She thought it over for a brief moment, “Probably, the system should be a standard reactor.”

“Good. We’ll have to lug the power-packs down there, so let’s get started.”

Chapter 15

Dragging five hundred pound power-packs down a vertical shaft that had apparently been built precisely to spec, at one hundred meters depth wasn’t the easiest job in the world, but after a few hours, Savoy and his tech team had managed it.

Four of them had found themselves standing on the roof of a lift car, waiting as Milla found the access panel and open a hatch in the lift, allowing them to drop though and hand the packs down, one at a time.

Inside the small lift, Savoy looked around, “what’s on the other side of the doors?”

“They open up directly into the shelter. I wouldn’t recommend you ask Mr. Burke to open this door,” Milla’s voice was dry, but some sense of humor managed to make it through the translation algorithms.

“I doubt that will be necessary,” Lt. Savoy told her, chuckling as he looked up at the hatch, “Jackie, would you hand me the pry bar from the tool pack?”

He took the tool as it was offered then sized up the door for a moment before moving.

Taking the pry bar firmly in one hand, Savoy rapped out a pattern on the door, paused for a moment, and then rapped the pattern again. After repeating the pattern several times with no response, he jammed the pry bar into the crack between the doors. The two soldiers, who had squeezed into the lift with them, took up flanking positions on either side as Savoy put his weight into the bar and slowly began to force the doors open.

Sweat was beading on his forehead from the strain of leaning into the bar by the time the door was a quarter of the way open. Sweat that turned cold when an unfamiliar, but unmistakable, barrel of a weapon was pushed up against his visor from the other side of the lift doors. The titanium alloyed bar clanged to the ground, as Savoy slowly raised his hands ahead of him, in an attempt to placate whoever was on the other side of the doors.

Harsh words rang out from the other side of the doors, mostly indistinguishable by their translators except for the word ‘open’. Savoy had little time to reflect on the situation as the lift doors slid smoothly open, exposing him to another person wielding a rifle-type weapon.

“Guys? I got a problem here. Two armed individuals with rifle-type weapons,” Savoy sub vocalized into the induction mic on his jaw.

“Can you recognize what type they are?”

Savoy’s response was impatiently sarcastic, his jaw barely moving as he spoke with the short and guttural sounds of sub-vocal phrases, “for Chris sakes, Hilliard! They’re alien manufactured. For all I know, they’re pea shooters.”

Hilliard’s calm voice came back, “All right, do you see any others with weapons?”

Savoy’s eyes flicked around the dark room beyond the lift, “negative, but there are a lot of people in there.”

There was a long pause, Savoy saw Milla try to move forward out of the corner of his eye and breathed a sigh of relief when the soldier at her side, Jaime, clamped a solid hand down on her shoulder and held her back. The two men he was dealing with weren’t professional soldiers; he could see that in their faces. They were scared kids and that made them a thousand times more dangerous, in this situation.