Terminus (Fringe Worlds #1) (14 page)

“Unfortunately, our confederates are far from being the only vendors on the planet,” Dr. Chantrey said. “We have reason to believe the Vacra have agreed to buy what they need from others as well, and will do business with whoever obtains the goods first.”

“In other words, parking ourselves outside someone’s storefront isn’t necessarily the best plan,” Adames said.

“So we comb the desert until we find them,” Loyola remarked. “Or until our allies tell us they’ve made contact.”

“In essence, yes,” Browing said. “Any further questions?”

There were a few seconds of silence, and then Maker spoke up. “Just one,” he said. “If this whole planet is full of lowlifes like you said, how do we know that we can trust our so-called allies?”

“We don’t,” Dr. Chantrey said, without missing a beat.

Chapter 17

Maker’s squad was essentially packed up, with all their gear on the dropship, when Diviana approached him with her idea.

“No way,” Maker said, frowning in distaste when she finished speaking. “It’s completely out of the question.”

“Think about it,” Diviana said. “We’re suffering from an almost complete lack of intel. We’re going to need to know more if we want to pull this thing off with any hope of success.”

They were standing just inside the doorway of the dropship, which was magnetically clamped to the floor of the bay. Maker, who would be piloting, had been making a final inspection when Diviana had come in. Outside their vessel, the landing bay was the site of frenzied activity as various ships – including Browing’s personal yacht – prepared to depart for the surface.

“Maybe that’s true,” Maker said, “but what you’re suggesting is an unnecessary risk.”

“What’s an unnecessary risk?” Adames asked, appearing from the cockpit area.

“Diviana here wants to go off on her own,” Maker replied. “She thinks our cover story sucks and wants to deviate from the plan.”

Adames nodded, soaking this in. The current game plan called for them to pretend to be a group of scientists – oceanologists, xenologists, etc. – trying to answer numerous questions about Terminus: whether the planet had ever been home to intelligent life, whether the desert had once actually been an ocean, and so on. It wasn’t the greatest ruse, but one that would be easy enough to pull off considering the short notice they were given for the entire mission.

“It’s not a plan,” Diviana countered. “It’s a pretext – a fabrication to keep anyone from giving us a good hard look. In the meantime, we’re supposed to stumble around two million miles of desert and hope we get lucky? That won’t work. We need quality info in order to come up with anything close to a plan.”

“And she thinks she can get it for us,” Maker said. “By going solo.”

Adames gave her an appraising glance. “Can you?”

“Of course!” Diviana said dismissively. “It’s what I was trained to do. Why put me on the team if you didn’t plan to let me do my job?”

“Because I have a different job for you!” Maker grumbled irritably.

His statement seemed to take both Adames and Diviana by surprise, but he didn’t give them a chance to respond.

“You know what? I don’t care,” Maker said harshly. “Go on – get yourself killed if that’s what you want.”

His tone was grim, but Diviana barely seemed to notice. Instead, she seemed to be fighting a smile. “You mean it?” she asked almost gleefully. “I can go?”

“Be my guest,” Maker said. “And one other thing…I think I
am
going to give you a call sign. From now on, for all coded communications, you’re Athena.”

Diviana blinked. “Athena?” she repeated somewhat timidly.

“She’s an ancient goddess of wisdom and courage,” Adames said. “She sprang fully grown, as well as clothed and armored, from the head of her father, Zeus, the king of the gods.”

“I know who Athena is,” Diviana retorted sharply. “She’s also the goddess of warfare and strategy.” She turned her attention back to Maker. “So, is branding me ‘Athena’ your way of saying there’s some merit to my plan?”

“No,” Maker answered. “I’m calling you that because – much as your namesake did to Zeus – you’re giving me a headache. Now get out of here before I change my mind.”

Diviana once again fought to keep a grin off her face, then saluted and left.

“She’s right, you know,” Adames commented. “Without more info, we’re going to be stumbling around in the dark here. If she’s experienced in gathering intel, letting her do it is the right decision. You know that, Gant.”

Maker was unconvinced. “Maybe, but knowing it won’t make me feel any better if she has to make the trip back home in a casket.”

“I’m sure it won’t come to that,” Adames said. “Anyway, I’m pretty much done with those, uh,
upgrades
you wanted, although some of the stuff Wayne drew up will have to wait until we’re on the surface. I’ve got to be honest, though, Gant. I trust you with my life, man, but what are we doing here? I mean, some of these integrations and configurations you’ve had me do are things I’ve never seen before. I don’t even know what all this crap is supposed to do, and it makes me nervous, to put it mildly.”

“Good,” said Maker, who had spent a great deal of his own time making modifications to their ship with the materials Adames had obtained. “I’d be worried if it didn’t.”

******************************************

The trip down to the planet in the dropship was mostly without incident. As Browing had said, a large passenger ship, the
Celestial Crown
, had arrived at Terminus roughly around the same time as the
Mantis
. With the surface seeing a steady stream of weary travelers via the
Crown
’s three shuttles, a
s well as cargo vessels and freight transports, it was very easy for one more ship to head planet-side without drawing a lot of attention.

Diviana, of course, wasn’t with them, having made other arrangements for getting down to Terminus. When questioned about her absence by others in the squad, Maker had merely replied that she’d been given a last-minute, sidebar mission.

“We expect to hear from her at regular intervals, though,” he’d lied as they were making final preparations to depart the
Mantis
. In truth, all he’d been able to wring from Diviana with respect to future communications was that she’d contact them when she knew something.

As they descended to the planet, the subject of Diviana came up again – this time in a half-sensible argument from Wayne about how their absent teammate had been given a call sign (meaning that two members of the unit now had them) – and he still deserved one. Maker let Adames handle the reply and instead focused on piloting the dropship and focusing on what lay ahead.

Browing had provided them with official papers to prove up their claim of being a scientific expedition (should anyone care to ask). As Diviana had noted, it wasn’t a great cover, but it would provide a plausible reason for their presence, as well as explain why they were zipping all over the place, sticking their noses in every corner of the desert.

It took about an hour to reach the area they had settled on as base camp – a region of desert far enough out that no one was likely to stumble across them accidentally, but close enough to the outpost where the Vacra had been seen that they could reach it within a reasonable time. The dropship itself served as their command center; in addition, they set up several atmospheric tents to serve as storage, a mobile hospital, and other functions.

They had set down late in the morning, and the rest of the day got swallowed setting everything up. The atmosphere wasn’t one-hundred-percent compatible with human life – you could breathe it, but after a while toxins would start building up in your system – so they wore noseplugs. (There were also drugs you could take that would serve the same purpose, but they were known to have nasty side effects.) The only person who didn’t require help with breathing was Fierce, whose genetic modifications included an advanced respiratory system – and Erlen, who stayed in the dropship while the others worked.

When everything was done, Maker called for a halt and the entire group gathered together for a celebratory drink of water. Everyone was dripping with sweat except the Augman, who would probably be just as comfortable standing in a blast furnace. They were sitting around a foldaway table under a large frame tent, which was one of the few open-air structures they had set up. It was then that Maker noticed that Loyola was missing. In fact, he quickly realized he hadn’t seen her in hours.

“She took off a while back,” Fierce replied when Maker put the question to the group. “Said she needed to do some recon.”

“And no one thought to tell me?” Maker grumbled angrily. “We can’t just have people taking off whenever they like!”

“According to our briefing, it’s what she’s supposed to do,” Fierce responded. “Scout out the area we establish as our base and confirm the previous report that it’s clear.”

“Yeah,” Maker said, “but it would be a nice gesture if she let her commanding officer know
when
she was doing it – or wait for the order!” His hand automatically went up towards his ear, intending to tap the comm unit he was wearing and activate it. At the last second he stopped, then looked at Wayne, who was also responsible for communications.

“We’re good,” Wayne said, practically reading his mind. “All communications are secure. But, uh…”

Maker arched an eyebrow as Wayne trailed off. “But what, Marine?”

“You need to refer to her as ‘Scope,’ sir,” Wayne said sheepishly.

“We already have coded designations for this assignment,” Maker said, not quite understanding. “We’ve got Baker, Doughboy–”

“I know,” Wayne said. “But on the way down here in the dropship, the rest of us decided we’d rather have our own individual call signs. You were busy piloting, so you probably didn’t notice.”

“Call signs,” Maker intoned, almost mockingly.

“Yeah,” Wayne replied enthusiastically. “Loyola is going to be Scope. I’m going to be Tinker. And Snick is going to be Buddha.”

“Unbelievable,” Maker muttered, almost to himself. He tapped the comm piece in his ear, bringing it online. “Scope, this is the Baker,” he said distinctively. “Come in.”

The response from Loyola was nigh-immediate. “This is Scope, sir.”

“Scope, please convey your locus.”

“I’m about three hundred yards south of your location,” came the reply.

Maker moved away from the table and looked in the direction indicated; he saw no sign of Loyola, only wave after wave of windswept desert dunes. Even after employing a pair of field glasses, he couldn’t pinpoint her location.

“Scope, please repeat,” Maker said. “Did you say three hundred yards south of our location?”

“Affirmative.”

“I can’t get a make on your position,” Maker said, scanning as far as the horizon. He glanced back at the others with him; the fact that they were all staring south indicated that they were listening in via their own comms, but none of them seemed to have eyes on Loyola either.

“Again, I can’t get a make on your position,” Maker repeated

“Isn’t that the point?” Loyola’s voice heckled through the comm. There was a sound of snickering behind him, but Maker ignored it.

“Her camouflage is excellent,” Snick said softly.

“If her marksmanship is as good,” Adames commented over the airwaves, “we might just have ourselves a winner.”

“Would you like a demonstration?” Loyola asked. “Take a look at the pole at the southeast corner of the tent you’re standing under.”

The five men looked at the tent pole indicated. It was white, roughly eight feet tall, and about a quarter-inch in diameter. A moment later, a beam of laser light sheared the pole about one foot from where it joined the tent. The tent itself leaned precipitously to one side, but did not fall. It was, without question, a world-class shot.

Before anyone could comment, another beam came along and took another foot off the remaining length of pole still sticking out of the sand. Three more shots followed in rapid succession, each cutting another foot off the tent pole. Wayne let out a long, low whistle that conveyed the sentiment of everyone present: Loyola’s marksmanship wasn’t just impressive. It was on a scale few of them had ever seen.

Maker quickly looked in the direction that the shots had come from. He still couldn’t make out where Loyola was holed up.

“Permission to carry on with recon, sir?” Loyola asked.

“Permission granted,” Maker said. “One more thing – you owe the Marines a new tent pole.”