The False Admiral (26 page)

“ANYTHING else?”

Deilani shook her head. “That's it. And, sir . . .”

Sir, eh? “Save it.” I got to my feet. “No time. Let's get to it.”

Salmagard returned my pouch. I attached it to my hip and straightened.

“The bay doors are opening,” Deilani reported, handing the reader back to Nils, who clutched it weakly to his chest. “You'll need at least a couple of charges to guarantee it,” she said to me. “It's a lot of rock. It won't be easy to clear.”

“I know how to break things,” I replied absently. I looked at the flare launcher in my hands. “Be careful,” I said to the girls, then left the satellite. They were on their own now.

In the cramped lift, I leaned against the wall, forcing my eyes
to focus on the flare launcher. I broke it open and tried to load a flare, but it slipped from my fingers, clattering to the floor. I knew better than to bend down for it. I took out another flare, and very carefully loaded it.

The doors opened, and I snapped the launcher shut.

The corridor hadn't changed. There was still a hole in the bay hatch, doing its best to depressurize the corridor. I activated my helmet and knelt to look through, bracing myself against the pull. I saw a few xenos, but none were nearby. My field of view wasn't good; there could have been some that were very close, but I couldn't confirm that without a combat scanner like Salmagard's.

I opened the hatch, dodged through the wreckage, and staggered toward the nearest skiff. Nothing dropped on me from above. With luck I could be halfway across the bay before they even noticed I was back.

We were certainly leaving this ship in a sorry state. There were vehicles smashed into everything, overturned, destroyed, flattened . . . carcasses everywhere.

What a mess.

This felt familiar. I was alone and at the end of my rope. Even if I got my way, someone wasn't going to like it. In this case, that would be the locals. This was no way to open relations between two species.

I powered up a skiff and took off. A smaller xeno dropped from the ceiling, but I avoided it. I needed a survey flyer, and there was only one left that was undamaged.

I could hear Salmagard and Deilani on the com. If they got into trouble, I wouldn't be able to help them. If they needed advice,
I wasn't in any state to give it. I barely had enough focus to keep the skiff level. I didn't need the distraction. I turned off the com and throttled up.

The xenos were closing fast. I leaped off the skiff, hit the control for the ramp, and got back on the skiff, narrowly avoiding the claws of a specimen so large it wouldn't have been able to fit into the colony ship's corridors. It must have come in through the open doors.

Through those doors, I could see the black walls of the valley, and the seething green mist.

I'd be out there soon enough.

I made a wide turn, almost reaching the wall of the bay, then changed direction sharply, heading back for the flyer. I took the skiff up the ramp and dove free as it crashed into the bulkhead, then rolled to my feet and pulled the hatch release. A large xeno had managed to latch on. I shot it squarely in what I hoped was its face with the flare gun, and it dropped free without a sound.

The ramp closed. They'd be all over the flyer, and I couldn't count on them being as patient with me as they'd been with Salmagard at the controls. I had to move quickly; for Salmagard it hadn't mattered, because she hadn't needed her flyer to fly. I did. I couldn't let them damage it.

I picked myself up and flipped on the cabin lights, powering up the flyer. I accessed the computer and checked the onboard inventory. Sure enough, there was a set of high-yield charges with the other survey gear.

I lifted off immediately, hovering over the deck. The backwash from my liftoff took care of whatever xenos were nearby, and wrecked the remaining vehicles. Purely from the feel of the flyer, I could tell that I had some passengers, but as long as I could move, I didn't care.

I took the flyer toward the open bay doors. These flyers were intended to taxi out onto the flight ramp, where they could take off safely. In here, my thrusters were wreaking havoc on the bay, blasting away the remaining equipment and xenos, and tearing up the deck and bulkheads. I couldn't hear the Klaxons from inside the cockpit, but I could see the warning lights on the walls giving their all.

I was past worrying about property damage. I hit the thrusters, and the flyer rose. I kept it slow and easy.

Once I was clear of the colony ship, I gained altitude more quickly, watching the survey screens. I needed to see the situation from above before I made my move.

I set the flyer to circle the ship from about two hundred meters, and dragged myself into the other seat to better concentrate on the screens.

There was an enormous amount of rubble on the hull. The wall of the valley had just collapsed on it. Blasting gone wrong? Seismic activity? It could've been anything—but it seemed as if it was related to the mysterious formation that Deilani had noticed.

I could see it clearly from here, but I still didn't have any idea what it was, or if it might affect what I was about to try to do. If it was substantially sturdier than the rest of this mineral, that could be an issue.

I thought about running a geological scan, but decided against it. There wasn't time, I didn't feel up to it, and the readings would be unreliable anyway. I could
see
what had to go away to get the rubble off the launch silo. All I had to do was blow it up. I'd just use more explosives to make up the difference. I gazed at the thing as I circled, hoping that would be enough.

It couldn't be a natural formation. It didn't look like anything
else on this planet, not even the spires. Were locals going to come pouring out when I blasted a hole in it? Probably. Something about it reminded me of Old Earth insects and their hives.

There was the bridge—I could see the big executive viewports. That was the highest point on the ship. I couldn't just land the flyer anywhere, because it would draw xenos. I had to distance myself from it once I touched down.

I would use the flyer itself to draw attention away from me while I got down to business.

I went back to the equipment lockers to get my survey charges.

To cover distance, the only friend I had left was gravity. I could use the curvature of the hull to get down there fast. It was getting back into the ship that would be difficult if the xenos noticed me. I didn't know how to go undetected because I didn't know what senses these locals were using. Apart from a weakness to heat, I didn't even know which ones they
had
.

I couldn't account for all the variables. Actually, I couldn't account for any of them, and I was wasting time worrying about it. I set the flyer down, not very gently, but at least no one heard it. There can be perks to no atmosphere as long as you have a functioning EV suit. My helmet hummed into place when I activated it, and I disembarked.

I didn't waste time looking around to see if I had company. If they were onto me, there was nothing I could do about it.

The domed hull of the colony ship was so vast that it was like standing on a miniature planet. I jogged to the lip of the deck and dropped down, sliding down the hull for a rough landing in the rubble below. I could see movement in it: xenos only centimeters across. They were small, but for all I knew, their corrosive properties
were no less potent than those of their larger counterparts. I had to avoid touching them, or I'd risk compromising my suit.

Up close the unusual formation was even larger than I'd realized. The surface was rough and pitted, but at a glance, it looked as if it had more in common with the xenos than the spires.

Whatever it was, I had no doubt I could blast it, but it was still awe-inspiring. If these creatures had built it . . . No, there were plenty of unintelligent life-forms able to show a remarkable grasp of structural engineering. It didn't mean anything.

But what about the spires?

A spasm of pain almost brought me to my knees, reminding me that I didn't have a lot of time before my withdrawal put me out of commission. I didn't know if I was going into shock, or a coma, or if my heart would just stop. I struggled to stay on my feet; falling down with all these little ones around was a bad idea, and getting up wasn't getting any easier.

I was in the rubble now, jumping from rock to rock as I approached the formation.

I ducked between two mineral shards that formed a sort of cave entrance, trying to find my way down. The lower I set the charges, the better the result would be.

Here was the planet at its most oppressive. The mineral walls soaked up my light, and there was virtually no ambient light from the surface. It would have been treacherous going for me even at my best. As I crept through the dark, trying not to slip on the sharp, crumbling rocks, I wondered if any Ganraen surveyors had come underground this way, investigating this formation.

And how many of them had made it back? Maybe that was what had touched things off.

I dropped onto a ledge and knelt, keeping very still. The cavity ahead had too many improbable angles. My light couldn't show much, but it looked to me like the walls were covered in xenos. The things were clinging to it, jagged, spiny legs jutting out and overlapping, creating a lacework of black limbs. My skin crawled. The silent world of my EV helmet only made it worse. Sweat stung my eyes, and I could feel blood thudding in my ears.

I pulled three charges off the belt, linked them together, set the timer, and threw it in.

I couldn't go any deeper and hope to get back to the surface alive. This was the best I could do.

I worried that even that small weight, just five kilograms, might knock something loose and bring down the locals on me. But if they noticed my intrusion, they didn't react. Maybe they were sleeping.

I turned and started to climb back toward the faint starlight above. That hadn't been so bad. I felt too weak to be climbing, but the thought of staying just made my skin crawl.

I clambered back onto the hull, putting some cling in my glove for extra purchase. Now I had to figure out how to get back inside. A look around showed me I was clear for the moment. I could see dark shapes crawling on the flyer. There was no hope of flying back in. I'd have to find an airlock.

Moving slowly, less with stealth in mind than my rapidly failing strength, I slid down the hull toward the nearest exterior walkway, but I immediately had to put a charge in my glove to stop myself. Massive legs emerged from the mist below me.

I was looking at a xeno over ten meters across. It mounted the
hull and began to climb toward me. I scrambled up and away, but even with its leisurely stride, in my present state I was outpaced.

I took my hand away from the deck and faced the thing.

“You know the Empress only negotiates one way, right?” I took out another charge and thumbed five seconds into the timer. These surveying explosives weren't meant to be used as grenades, but I'd never been picky about these things. I tossed it.

There was, of course, no sound. I raised my arms to shield my faceplate. Pieces of the behemoth were flying away, their arcs made lazy by the mild gravity.

I groaned, picked myself up and shuffled along the walkway. There was another xeno on the side of the ship. It wasn't as large as the one I'd just dealt with, but it was still huge. It didn't seem to have a problem with me. Or maybe it had seen what I'd just done to its friend. Either way, it kept its distance.

I struggled down a ladder, across a set of handholds, then made a controlled descent to the same airlock the trainees and I had used to enter the ship in the first place. I'd come full circle without realizing it.

Inside, I deactivated my helmet and broke into a pitiful jog. That had gone well. Much better than expected. I still had a lot of ground to cover.

I took the strength I had left and tried to turn it into speed. I made it into a lift, and up, then down to the blue-level corridor, past the junction. Which way to the silo? There was no time for a guide path. These Ganraen decks were all alike. It wasn't far now.

I ran headlong into Deilani, who came out of a maintenance hatch so fast that the impact threw me against the opposite wall.
She was clutching some kind of cylinder to her chest, and for a moment looked like she might drop it. Her eyes widened in panic, but she held on, sagging against the opposite wall.

“Is that it?” I gasped. “Where's the private?”

Deilani shook her head. “She was—she tried to buy time.” Her face was oddly blank.

I just stared at her. “Are you
kidding me
?” She opened her mouth, but I cut her off with a look. She flinched and backed away.

“The charges are set,” I said. “Go get ready.” She shouted something after me, but I wasn't listening, and there was an odd ringing in my ears that didn't bode well.

I ducked through the maintenance hatch and got moving. The air was flowing, so the area was breached. Deilani must have left a hatch open to the compromised part of the ship. All the better; it could guide me.

I followed the air, activating my helmet and pulling out the flare gun as I set my EV suit to home in on Salmagard's.

There was something wrong with the signal. I couldn't find her.

I stumbled through the hatch, and there was no light beyond. The ship wasn't going to waste power on sections of the ship no one was supposed to see. I turned on my suit's lights, and didn't look at my O
2
gauge. With the flare gun raised, I moved as fast as I could down the narrow passage. I reactivated my com.

“Private? Private, come in.”

Nothing.

There had to be a way to track her down. They had used this corridor to get to the fuel, and the fuel was highly unstable. It had to be kept at a low temperature. Not lower than the temperature on the surface of the planet, but there would be some kind of
temperature-control apparatus for wherever the stuff was stored . . . and that would need power, whether this part of the ship was sealed or not.