Pledge Allegiance (9 page)

D
espite her warning
regarding the landing, Baltimore managed to set the shuttle down as light as a feather on a road just outside of the city. The road had been ripped up and was now nothing more than a line of rubble leading through the trees to the ruined city. All of the buildings had been razed to the ground. It was impossible to know exactly when the destruction had occurred but it was obvious that nobody had lived here for a long time. The jungle was beginning to reclaim the ruins. Vines had spread over the rubble like green veins and a tall orange-colored grass was growing in places between the fallen buildings.

“Looks eerie,” I said to Baltimore.

She nodded. “Let’s go and take a closer look.”

We unstrapped our safety belts and went into the rear section of the shuttle. The ramp was already descending. Hart and his team were positioned by the opening, crouched in firing stances, blaster rifles braced against their shoulders. The ramps descended to the rubble, revealing dense jungle on either side of the road but nothing more.

We exited the shuttle and Baltimore pressed a button on a remote to raise the ramp and secure the craft. She put the remote in her pocket and said, “Vess, Morrow, are you receiving?”

Vess’s voice came into my ear through a hiss of static but I could still make out his words. “We’re receiving you just fine and we have clear video feed from your cameras.”

Baltimore looked at me. “Where do you suggest we search first, Captain? The jungle or the city?”

“Let’s try the city,” I said. “It seems the most obvious place for survivors to make a shelter.”

We scrambled over the rubble that had once been a road and made our way into the city, or what was left of it. There were some walls still standing but other than that, the entire area was nothing more than a heap of broken rocks.

“Hart, do you have the scanner?” I asked Hart who was scouting ahead.

“Yes, Captain.” He took it from his belt pack and held it in front of him, pointing it left and then swinging it to the right. The box emitted a steady tone. “No life forms detected,” Hart said.

“Okay, let’s move on and check it again in a few minutes.” I clambered over a pile of rocks that had once been a building, my eyes searching the ruins ahead for some sign of life, even though the scanner had said there was none. Maybe the survivors had avoided the city and made their shelter in the jungle. If so, there would be thousands of miles to cover, and we could never hope to do that on foot.

“Captain, I see something,” Sumiko said, pointing at a building that was partially standing. “A soldier.”

I raised my weapon along with everyone else. Sumiko advanced toward the building, crossbow in hand, moving as swiftly and silently as a cat. When she reached the doorway of the building, she stepped through it and disappeared for a moment. Then she reappeared and said, “They are Imperium soldiers. They are dead.”

I went over there and glanced inside the building. The two Imperium soldiers were wearing their battle suits—metal exoskeletons with an internal power generator that served as armor and increased the soldier’s mobility and strength— but had removed their helmets. Both men had clearly been dead a long time, their skin stretched tight over their skulls, their eyes gone.

One soldier had the name Higgs stenciled on his breastplate. Beneath the name, the armor had been destroyed by a blaster rifle, judging by the scorched hole that went through the steel and into the man’s body.

The other’s armor said his name was Davis. His suit was unmarked but when I looked closer at his body, I could see how he’d died. I looked at the others and said, “He slit his own wrists with his combat knife.” The knife lay on the ground a couple of inches from his hand. Both wrists had been cut open from the middle of the forearm to the base of the thumb. Davis had made sure he was going to bleed out quickly.

I crouched down and asked one of Hart’s men to help me roll the body onto its side so the breastplate pointed at the wall. The battle armor was heavy but we managed to pull and push the body into position after a couple of minutes of effort.

I opened a panel on the side of the torso and pressed the button that would play back the suit’s autolog. In the same way a ship recorded information to a log, the battle suits recorded audio and video automatically.

As well as being stored in the suit’s own memory, the data was constantly streamed over a secure network to higher-ranked officers in the chain of command. It enabled the Imperium to know exactly how a battle had been won or lost, how soldiers had died, and what mistakes were made. It was also useful when a soldier went AWOL or was captured, as it meant he could be found by tracing his stream.

I flicked the switch that would project the playback from a tiny lens that was built into the breastplate.

On the wall, an image appeared, showing the room in which we were standing. A voice said, “I’d rather die than become one of them.” I rewound the data a little and the image showed fighting in the ruined streets. The camera swung around violently and the noise of blaster shots filled the air. Then Davis shouted, “Higgs!” and moved forward to his companion, who was lying on the ground with a hole blasted in his breastplate. “Hang in there, buddy,” Davis said, grabbing Higgs beneath his arms and dragging him into the building we were in now.

The image shifted slightly as Davis sat down on the ground. Higgs was lying in the position he was in now, clearly dead. Davis’s voice sounded weak and frightened when he said, “This battle doesn’t make any sense. We’re fighting each other when we should be fighting the common enemy. Some of our men have been brainwashed or something, I don’t know. They went to explore the area to the east of the city and now they’re fighting on the side of the Horde. This shouldn’t be happening. We’re supposed to be on the same side.”

He paused and then said, “My best friend Sam Higgs is dead. He was shot by one of our own. At least he died fighting for the human race. At least he didn’t become one of the Horde.” He fumbled with something on his belt and held up the knife. “I can’t let what happened to the others happen to me. I’d rather die than become one of them.” Then he began cutting his wrists.

I turned off the log.

“He sacrificed himself rather than fight for the Horde,” Sumiko said softly. “He died a hero.”

“He did,” I said.

“He mentioned that the soldiers who became part of the Horde went to explore an area east of the city,” Baltimore said. “Morrow, did you manage to get a map of the area?”

In my ear, Morrow said, “Yeah, I got a rough map. I’m sending it down to your nav device now.”

Baltimore took a small tablet from her belt and turned it on. It showed an aerial map of the jungle, the city, the mountains, and the rivers. She moved her finger east from the city then stopped. “What’s this square building in the clearing to the east?”

“Hold on,” Morrow said, “I’ll try to intensify the image on our screen. Looks like it could be a temple or some kind of place of worship. It’s a tall building roughly pyramid-shaped and I can see a wide set of steps on one side.”

“Let’s check it out,” I said.

We moved east through the jungle and an hour later we left the ruined city behind and were approaching the area that the map showed as a clearing with a temple. Noises came to us through the trees; sounds of men talking and a chorus of angry hissing that must have come from snakes or lizard-like creatures.

We remained at the edge of the jungle and stayed low, hidden by dense ferns and thick vines as we gazed at the scene in front of us.

The temple was at least two hundred feet high and looked old, its stones overgrown with moss and vines. A wide set of stone steps led up to a platform where a man stood in front of a dark doorway. He must have been at least ten feet tall. He was bald and muscular and wore only a loincloth and leather straps that were crisscrossed over his massive chest. In one hand, he held a long, thick whip of braided leather. Even from this distance, I could see that his face was cruel and that he had a black triangle painted on his forehead. Within the triangle was an eye, also painted in black.

His gaze was settled on the scene below him as Imperium soldiers led a line of lizard-creatures to a temple door at ground level. The lizard-men walked on two legs and wore simple armor but they were unarmed and chained. They hissed at their captors as the Imperium soldiers herded them toward the door with electric prods and energy lances.

The man at the top of the steps grinned as he watched the prisoners being forced into the temple.

“What do you think happens in there?” Sumiko whispered.

“That must be where they’re being brainwashed, mind-jacked, or whatever happens to turn them into the Horde,” I said.

“We should leave here,” Baltimore said. “The survivors aren’t here.”

We quietly retraced our steps away from the temple. When we reached the city an hour later, I was wondering what our next move would be and how we could possibly search the entire jungle for the survivors, when I heard voices ahead, among the ruined buildings. I motioned to the others to stay quiet and crept up to a pile of rubble that offered concealment. I peered over the top and saw five Imperium soldiers on the street in front of us.

They appeared to be searching for someone, entering buildings with guns drawn before moving on to check other places where someone might be hiding. Their heightened state of alertness, evidenced by rapid head movements and the way they trod warily, told me that their prey was somewhere close by.

There was a sudden movement as a young man broke from the one of the buildings and made a run for it. The soldiers turned to face him and leveled their weapons.

“Go, go, go!” I whispered to my team.

Sumiko and Baltimore were the quickest in our group. They fired their weapons before the rest of us had a chance to take aim.

Sumiko’s crossbow bolt pierced a soldier’s helmet and the man dropped down, dead, before he even knew he’d been shot.

Baltimore fired her blaster pistol and sent a second soldier to the ground, a smoking hole in his helmet.

I took one down myself, hitting him squarely in the chest, the blast sending him reeling backward.

The remaining two soldiers returned fire, running for cover among the rubble. I ducked behind the rocks and the energy bolts from their blasters sailed harmlessly overhead.

Hart’s men went into action, taking up firing positions and blasting at the Imperium soldiers. “Enemy down, Captain,” Hart said.

“Proceed with caution,” I warned, “There might be more of them. We need to find that young man who ran from that building. I’m sure he was wearing a flight crew jumpsuit. It was dirty as hell but I think I recognized the ISS
Oregon
patch on the arm.”

We advanced to the street where the dead soldiers lay. Hart took out the scanner and it made an oscillating sound when he pointed it at various buildings. “Three life forms, Captain,” he said.

“Survivors of the
Oregon
,” I called out. “I’m Captain Shaun Blake. I’m here to take you home.”

Nothing. No reply and no movement in the dead city.

“Georgia Vess,” I called, “your father is waiting on our ship. We’re here to rescue you.”

A head appeared in a doorway, peeking out at me. “It is you,” a female voice said. “Michael, Dan, it’s Captain Blake.” She stepped out onto the street and came toward us. She wore a dirty flight suit with the same ISS
Oregon
patch I’d seen on the young man earlier, the same patch I’d worn when I was captain of that doomed ship. Her features were plain but seemed to radiate an inner strength. Her long hair was curly and sat around her head like a dark halo.

Vess’s voice was almost deafening in my ear. “Georgia! It’s Georgia!”

I winced, noticing Baltimore do the same.

“Are you all right?” Georgia asked.

“Yeah, I just have your father shouting in my ear.”

The young man who’d made a run for it appeared from a building farther along the street, along with a second man who was older and shorter. Both wore beards and looked thin beneath their flight suits.

Georgia said, “Ensigns Michael Fletcher and Dan Blythe, Captain.”

I nodded to the two men. “Are there any other survivors?”

“There were two more of us, Captain,” Georgia said, “but they were captured and taken to the Overseer.”

“The Overseer?”

“At the temple. The Overseer oversees the turning of prisoners into members of the Horde.”

“Yeah, I think I saw that guy,” I told her.

“He has some sort of mind control power of his own. The prisoners are turned using a machine inside the temple but the Overseer can get into people’s heads and make them do things. The two other survivors who were captured…he made them fight to the death while he and his soldiers watched. Then he made the victor take his own life. We all saw it. We were hiding in the jungle, watching. There was nothing we could do.”

“Captain, you need to return to the ship,” Vess said in my ear. “Our mission here is complete.”

He was right about needing to get the survivors on board the
Finch
but I disagreed about our mission being over. How could we leave Savarea while that Horde factory was still in operation?

“Let’s go,” I said to everyone. “We need to get back to the
Finch
.” I led the way toward the road where the shuttle waited.

When we were on board and lifting off from the planet’s surface, I looked east to where the temple stood. It was obviously an important part of the Outsiders’ mission to subjugate all the other races in the galaxy, including human beings. They might not have many of these Horde-making factories, so dealing a blow to this one could be a major milestone in the war.

There was no way I could fly the
Finch
out of her orbit around Savarea until the machine inside that temple was destroyed.

Whatever it took.

T
wo hours later
, I was in Conference Room One with Vess, Morrow, Baltimore, Hart, and Sumiko. Vess had spent some time with his daughter and she was now sleeping in her quarters, finally able to sleep somewhere safe. Fletcher and Blythe were doing the same.

“Captain,” Vess asked me, “do you have any suggestions regarding where we should go next? We need to avoid the Imperium and I’m afraid there probably aren’t too many places where that can happen.”

“We aren’t done here yet,” I said.

He looked confused. “Of course we are. The survivors have been rescued. My daughter is safe.”

“There’s a machine on that planet that’s turning innocent beings into soldiers for the Horde. We can’t just leave here and forget about something like that.”

“Are you suggesting we fly down there and blow them away using the
Finch’s
weapons?”

“No,” I said, “there’s a race of lizard-men down there, prisoners of the Overseer. If we blew the temple away using the
Finch’s
firepower, we’d probably kill them all. They don’t deserve that.”

Vess frowned in confusion. “So you’re suggesting a stealth mission? You want to sneak into the temple and destroy the machine under the enemy’s nose?”

I shook my head. “No, I’m suggesting an all-out assault.”

“But without using the
Finch
, that would be suicide. I saw that place through your camera. They have much more firepower than we do. And more soldiers.”

“We have something that could balance the odds in our favor,” I said. “We have
Doragon
.”

Sumiko pumped her fist in the air. “Yay,
Doragon
!”

Vess looked at Sumiko and then back at me, confused. “What is
Doragon
?”

“It’s the tank in the landing bay. If we use the tank and some of our soldiers to keep the Imperium forces busy outside the temple, a second team could get inside and take out the machine.”

He looked doubtful. Now that his daughter had been rescued, he wasn’t hiding his doubts beneath a veneer of optimism. The time for that was past. Now, he was weighing up our chances of survival if we assaulted the temple.

He shrugged. “You saved my daughter and I can never repay that. And you are the Captain, after all, so the final decision is yours.”

I looked at the expectant faces around the table. “Prepare to assault the temple. Hart, can you drive the tank?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Baltimore will take a team of your men and attack the Imperium soldiers outside the temple. You’ll be using the tank to support them. Sumiko and I will slip into the temple with two of your men and find that machine. We’ll use grenades to destroy it.” I looked at Vess. “I assume we have grenades on board.”

He nodded. “Of course. In the armory.”

“Excellent,” I said.

Morrow spoke up. “There’s just one thing I need to remind you all of. Everson will have sent his men after us. He knows exactly where we are and he’s headed this way. We don’t have much time to pull off this mission and then get the hell out of here.”

“Then let’s get started,” I said.