“Ah, Julia,” Ash interjected with a laugh. “I think Mei was inferring that Sergi was feeding oxygen to his other head.”
There was a pause as Julia switched mental gears, and he chuckled when she groaned.
“Well, damn. I missed the real meaning of the conversation again,” she muttered.
“That’s okay, Julia. It’s just all that heavy breathing that gets to Mei,” Sergi teased.
As if on cue, he heard Mei’s exasperated hiss. “I believe your brain is definitely suffering from hypoxia, Sergi. I know men like to let their balls breathe, but really!” Mei retorted.
The sounds of Julia, Josh, and Ash’s muffled laughter made him grin. He knew which buttons to push to get a predictable reaction out of his impossibly easy to ruffle counterpart. His smile faded as the depth of his deception hit him. This small group had become more than comrades on a mission to do the impossible – they had become a family.
“Sergi, how much longer do you need?” Josh asked from near the entrance, breaking into his train of thought.
“This should complete the final connection. Whether these things have a built-in power supply that is still working is another matter. I’ve gone through this one, and it looks like it’s linked to the one before it and the next one, but I never found an actual power source,” Sergi replied, inserting the circuit board into the empty slot.
“We’ll deal with that when we get to it,” Josh instructed.
“Roger that,” Sergi replied, carefully adjusting the panel and feeling it click into place.
He pulled himself to the side. All the damaged panels that he could see had been repaired. Whether Earth materials and alien technology were compatible was another question, but the preliminary testing in the lab had shown a closed circuit. There was one more thing to do and that was to reconnect the line cable that he had noticed as he was entering. He wasn’t sure how he had missed it during his space walks.
He turned slightly and in the glow of the lights they’d brought he could see Josh watching him intently. Returning his focus to the cable, he pulled the end around and aligned it with the port. He blinked when a flash of red light illuminated the interior of the gateway.
“What the…?! Sergi, we need to get out of here,” Josh warned.
“Just a minute,” Sergi responded.
He twisted and pulled his body upward to a long bar where he had strapped one of his tool bags. His fingers fumbled with the clip when the gateway shuddered, then roughly vibrated. A soft curse escaped him when his thickly gloved hands slipped off the clip.
“Leave them. We need to get out of here now,” Josh ordered.
Sergi felt Josh tug on his foot. At the same time, he realized that the bag of tools, along with himself and Josh, were beginning to move. It took him a moment to comprehend that it was the walls that were beginning to spin, not them.
He twisted and nodded to Josh. With a wave of his hand, he motioned for Josh to go through the opening first since he was closer. Reaching down, he used the railing to follow Josh down to the gap in the outer wall. Josh braced his feet on a long crossbar and kicked off. A moment later, Sergi did the same and followed Josh through the gaping hole in the side of the gateway, his hand moved to unhook his tether to the mechanism. His hand stilled when he looked down the long line of circular gates and saw the other sections lighting up. He reached out and grabbed Josh’s arm.
“Josh, look!” Sergi exclaimed, lifting his arm toward the lights.
He heard the alarmed communications of his team, but he was more focused on what could only be described as a miracle. Each of the six gateways was coming online. The long rows of cables connecting them began to glow. Sergi watched in fascination as each gate slowly began to spin – and open. It took a moment to register in his brain that Josh was urgently ordering him to use his jet pack. When it did, he realized that they were in extreme danger.
“Hurry up, Sergi. We need to get back to the Gliese,” Josh said.
Struggling to unhook the tether, he grunted when the clasp refused to release. “I won’t argue with you on that,” Sergi muttered before he heard Josh’s repeated urgent warning in his headset.
Sergi released a long string of curses in his native Russian when he was jerked backwards away from Josh. His fingers slipped from the clasp as he spun violently. Fighting to twist around so he could grab the tether, he clenched his jaw when the line was jerked out of his hand.
“I can’t get the tether undone,” Sergi growled in frustration.
He looked in the direction he had last seen Josh. The other man was leaning forward, his determined expression visible behind the glass of his helmet.
“Hold on, I’m coming,” Josh replied.
Sergi released a nervous chuckle. “I don’t think I’ll be going anywhere. Though, I would appreciate it if you could hurry,” he reflected, seeing the other gateways beginning to spin even more rapidly.
Sergi’s breath caught in his throat when Josh struggled to grab him and missed. The tension on the tether was increasing and he knew he was seconds away from death. If Josh didn’t leave him, they would both be dead, and the mission would be in dire jeopardy. He reached out and gripped Josh’s shoulders when the other man was finally able to grab him.
Ash’s tense warning sounded in their headphones. “Josh, you need to get a move on,” Ash stated.
“I am,” Josh replied.
Sergi shook his head. He kept his gaze on Josh as they both rotated at an increasingly dizzying speed.
“Josh… Commander, leave me,” Sergi ordered in a quiet tone.
Josh ignored him and continued to work on the metal clasp. Sergi gritted his teeth and prepared to forcibly push Josh away when the tether finally broke free. Josh cursed before he warned Sergei to ‘Brace for impact’.
Sergi grunted when his back hit the spinning ring of the gateway, and his momentum sent him spiraling toward the glowing cable. For a moment he wondered if being crushed to death or electrocuted would be better. Unable to stop his trajectory, all he could do was hope that a second miracle would occur, and he would just be cast out into space.
He knew his luck had run out the moment he connected with the cable. The powerful surge of electricity flashed through his suit. For a brief second, he stiffened and thought his heart would explode, but it just stuttered and stopped. A brilliant flash of white light shot through his mind. He wondered if he had been given a glimpse of heaven to add to his misery.
Sergi wasn’t a religious man, but if there really were only two afterlife options – heaven or hell – he could see why a supreme being might give him a glimpse of what he could never have. It would make his eternity in hell all the more bitter. That was his last thought before his mind shut down.
Chapter One
One Earth week later:
The alarms pulled Sergi back to consciousness, and he was suddenly aware of a steady downpour, making the world outside the pod look distorted and dismal. He looked at the digital readings. Oxygen was dangerously low. The system was showing a leak in one of the tanks. He lifted his head, and noticed the small portable tank with a mask attached. He read the oxygen level.
Thirty percent….
He had less than five percent in the capsule and thirty percent on the portable tank. He laid his head back and stared through the glass covering. At least the capsule didn’t completely feel like a casket – if only for the moment.
Above him, Sergi could see the remains of the parachute that would have deployed once the capsule broke through the atmosphere. It was tangled in a large tree.
Four things registered in his brain. First, he hurt like hell, so that confirmed he was alive. Second, he was no longer on the Gliese 581. Third, wherever in the hell he had landed, there had to be some type of atmosphere if there was rain and trees – preferably the kind that wouldn’t melt the flesh off of his bones. The last was the one that concerned him the most. He wondered if any of the others had made it out alive.
&nb
sp; Sergi grabbed the mask, held it up to his face, and slammed his palm against the emergency release lever. Nothing happened.
“Open, dammit,” Sergi ordered in Russian, violently working the lever again.
“Warning, current oxygen levels are critical. The system diagnostic has detected a leak in the main oxygen tank. Please replace the tank,” the computer voice stated.
“You think I don’t know that my oxygen is almost depleted? If you would open this casket, I would gladly remove myself,” Sergi growled in profanity laced Russian.
He clenched his jaw in determination. Grabbing the release handle, he pulled on it again. This time, the very noticeable click of the lock releasing swept through the interior of the pod. With his free hand, he pushed against the hatch until he had enough room to sit up.
He shivered in the icy rain as he cautiously looked around. At least the parachute gave him a small measure of protection from the downpour. Barren trees surrounded him. The area was desolate: there was no life – and no other escape pods to be seen. He slowly pulled the mask away from his face, and gingerly took a deep breath. A slight cough escaped him as the swirling mist swept through his nose and down his throat. The air felt heavy, but he could breathe.
He dropped the mask to the side. His gloved hands gripped the side of the capsule and he rolled over the edge. A silent curse filtered through his brain when his booted feet sank into the dark gray mud.
“This feels like home,” he muttered under his breath, taking in the freezing rain, thick fog, disgusting mud, and dreary landscape.
Unsure of where he was or how he had gotten there, his first focus was on getting out of the bulky spacesuit and into something that he could move in. He bent over, parted the fabric of the headrest, and withdrew the military-grade NRS-2 Scouting knife that he had stored in the foam cushion.
Sergi used the knife to gut the interior of the capsule. He had been very careful to modify the interior after it had been stored aboard the Gliese 581. He pulled out camouflage clothing, weapons, the portable oxygen tank that came standard with each pod, and a survival pack with a limited number of rations, medical supplies, and the essentials for the most dangerous covert operation.
Sliding the blade along the edge of the fabric of the bedding, he retrieved his SR-1 9mm pistol along with several clips. He did the same along the bottom, removing the parts for the VSK-94 Special Purpose Silent Sniper rifle. The rifle was perfect for Urban Warfare if he needed to strike without being seen. While he had never expected to need any of the items he had stored in the capsule, his training and experience had drilled into him the necessity to be prepared for any event – including a trip into space.
Within minutes, he had stripped himself of the bulky spacesuit and dressed to blend in with the environment around him. He quickly packed everything into the camouflaged grey and tan backpack, remembering at the last minute to remove the video camera that was recording his every move, and slid the straps over his shoulders. He tucked the pistol into the waistband of his pants against his lower back, making sure he could easily reach it.
He reached up and closed the lid of the capsule, then turned to face the gloomy forest. He had no map of the area or knowledge of his environment, which meant that, for now, he had to classify everything as hostile.
Sergi held the rifle ready as he left the shelter of the parachute and moved into the freezing downpour. His hat protected his head from the cold rain while the high-tech goggles gave him the ability to search for any heat signatures. He moved like a wraith through the woods, searching for evidence that he wasn’t alone.
La’Rue Gant flipped up the visor of her welding helmet, looked at the circuit panel for a moment, then took off the helmet and turned toward the storage unit. In the background, loud music played. While it might not be the smartest thing in the world to do at the moment, La’Rue had never really cared what anyone else thought. She lived by one rule – hers.
“Which isn’t such a bad idea, La’Rue darling,” she muttered to herself, “considering you are on a planet of assassins. Why not go to a place where the residents would love to slit your throat just for the fun of watching you bleed out? But, hey, it might be more profitable for them to hand me over to Bog. My face is probably plastered on every screen in the galaxy. Fuck Slate and his fucking thirty thousand credits owed.”
She wouldn’t be in this mess if she had listened to her head instead of her gut. Yeah, it was way messed up and should have been the other way around. Her gut was what had kept her alive this long, but this time she swore her internal warning system was fried.
“You just had to listen in on a secure transmission. You should have ignored it, La’Rue. People who cross the Legion end up dead. If anyone knows that, it should be you. Then, being the really smart person that you are, you decide you need to follow one of the signals that they were talking about – to Turbinta! Who the hell lands their escape pod on a planet full of assassins? I’ll tell you who, the same kind of dumbass who lands their freighter and burns up their front shields in the process, that’s who,” she muttered.
For the past two years she had been monitoring both the rebel groups and the Legion. Lifting a hand, she wiped her nose on her long sleeve. Even with the environmental system working, she could still feel the chill in the air.
“The rebels have to be on to something this time,” she said as she replaced the helmet and welder in the storage unit. She paused with her hand on a wrench and glanced at the circuit panel, a frown creasing her brow. “They have to be, otherwise why would the Legion be going crazy? Andronikos’s prize Commander wouldn’t have come here himself if he wasn’t worried.”
La’Rue shook her head and moved back to the circuit board, wrench in hand. She replaced the panel and tightened the bolts. Twirling the wrench in her hand, her lips twisted as she looked around the small but nimble freighter. It was the last of her heritage, a gift from her father. Sure, it hadn’t worked when he’d given it to her, but it did now thanks to years of hard work, more daring cargo runs than she would admit, and a few high-stakes wins at the gaming tables.
Unfortunately, she might have pissed off a few of her lenders when she had turned out to be a little savvier than they’d been expecting and had actually paid them off with her winnings. Her goal was to never have to borrow credits again, and one way to do that was to earn a lot – by cashing in on what the Legion wanted. If she could find even one of the strange pods the Legion was talking about, she could live off the reward for a couple of years. She could ditch the lower end freighter runs, upgrade the Star Runner, and kiss Slate and his band of despicable, thieving pirates goodbye once and for all.
Her eyes darkened with anger and determination. She wasn’t about to lose her only way of making a living because Slate had decided to put up her ship as collateral for his bad decisions. She had argued that the debt wasn’t hers, but unfortunately, Bog didn’t want to listen. Slate had used her thumb imprint to guarantee the loan.
She grumbled to herself as she stowed the wrench in the storage unit, then strode through the freighter, ducking her head under a low hanging conduit. HL-9 followed her. She turned at the end of the corridor and bent to open a hatch. Pulling it back, she waited for the ladder to rise before she slid down. HL-9 gripped the ladder with four of his legs on each side, and slid down behind her.
“I don’t know when I’ll be back, H. However long it takes, I guess. You have the position of the signal, right?” La’Rue asked. She glanced at the eight-legged bot before she turned and pulled open a storage compartment. “Where is the long barrel? Argh, I bet Slate took it. I have only two of the short barrels left and one of them doesn’t work,” she groaned, letting her head fall back to stare up at the ceiling in frustration.
La’Rue ground her teeth together before she looked down and made a face at HL-9. Slate had a lot to answer for and she planned on making sure that he did – if she survived this crazy quest of hers.
Opening the second cabi
net, she pulled out the holster and the blaster that had belonged to her dad. Pursing her lips together, she swung the holster belt around her waist and tightened it. She pulled out the broken blaster and tossed it to the service bot.
“See if you can fix this while I’m gone,” she said as she turned and pulled out a waterproof slicker and cap. “Let’s hope I don’t run into anyone. One lousy blaster meant for shooting field rodents isn’t going to do me much good against a well-trained assassin.”
La’Rue pulled on the slicker, sealing it over her black pants and shirt. Her matching black boots went almost to her knees and would protect her feet. Tucking the loose strands of her red hair into the cap, she pulled the padded strap tight under her chin. She grabbed the goggles and a stun rod last.
“I look like I’m ready to go out to harvest fields instead of hunting for a mysterious pod on a planet full of assassins. I swear if a Turbintan sees me dressed like this, they’ll die from laughter,” La’Rue grumbled to her only companion. “Don’t let anything happen to my freighter, H.”
The small bot flashed its multiple eyes at her to let her know that it understood her order. La’Rue released a long, loud sigh before she stepped into the circle on the floor and reached up to press the green button on the control panel attached to one of the support brackets. Within seconds, the platform she was standing on descended under the freighter.
La’Rue jumped off the round platform and landed on the soggy ground, wincing at the splat sound. She pressed the remote on her wrist cuff, scanning the area as she pulled her goggles down. There was nothing out there – she hoped.
“H, show me the best path to the signal,” La’Rue softly ordered.
The display inside her goggles flickered, and a second later a map appeared. Gripping the stun rod in her hand, La’Rue left the safety of her freighter and headed out into the pounding rain on a mission to find one of the mysterious pods the Legion was so interested in locating.