"If there were a shielded compartment, then we'd have a great big blacked out area instead of missing individuals. Are you sure you were able to track all the ships they launched?"
"Absolutely certain. We don't make mistakes up here, Sergeant,"
"Don't get testy, I'm only-"
Foss's whole body jerked as sparks leapt from the side of the command seat. His high pitched scream filled the comms and the bridge as he violently thrashed and writhed. One of his squad mates ran towards him.
"Don't touch him! Stay back!" Steadman shouted.
It was too late. The soldier ran headlong into him with the intention of knocking him free of his contact with the chair, and he succeeded, but in that instant the power coursing through Foss's body carried through to him.
"Check him!"
Rawdon ran forward with his medical scanner, taking a reading on both men at once. "Gone. There's nothing to resuscitate."
Steadman glanced at her command display briefly to confirm her medic's readings.
"Damn, takes a lot of juice to get through our armour," commented Jenkins, one of her more seasoned squad members.
"Retreat. We'll join squad five and head for one of their main computers," Sergeant Steadman said as she began backing towards the main entrance to the bridge.
The doors came to life, slamming shut in a quarter second. Most of her squad jumped.
"Command," She addressed. "There are active systems aboard. Scan and confirm."
Her squad looked to her for directions, glancing around the large darkened bridge nervously with their rifles held up.
"Command!" She glanced at her command screen and saw her wireless link had been severed.
Several gunshots pierced the air, echoing up from the deck beneath them. She whirled to catch sight of what was going on and saw rapid flashes of light from below, heard gunfire that was completely foreign. The foreign weapons made a low pitched, electric snapping sound every time they fired, and their shots came in bursts of twenty or more shots per second. "Move to support squad five!" She ordered, leading the way to the ramps at the side of the bridge that would take them to the lower command centre.
Half way down the ramp something from above caught her eye. She looked up to see the squad mate behind her collapse to the ground and his rifle get snatched away by an invisible hand. She sighted where she estimated the assailant was and was just about to open fire when a hand grabbed the back of her helmet and pulled her down the ramp.
Cameron's rifle went off, the rounds impacted harmlessly against the ceiling. When she reached the bottom of the ramp she tried to get to her feet only to find them kicked out from under her, her rifle was ripped out of her hands and before her eyes appeared a tall man in black armour, his heavy sidearm lowered to point directly at her head. "How much time do we have now that your people are under attack?"
"How much time?" Cameron asked, unsure of the question.
"How much time before they get to safe distance and blast us until we're an empty hull?"
She'd never seen Caran Enterprises do anything like that once boarding teams had been dispatched, but in that instant she realized it was possible, the whole corporation had just been bought out. "I don't know Regent Galactic’s policies."
"What are you? New?" The towering figure asked, cocking his head. "Who are you after?"
Her training came back to her; never reveal operational details. "I'm Cameron Steadman, Boarding Sergeant with Caran Ent-, Regent Galactic. We are executing a sector wide warrant for this ship and several of her crew." she said mechanically.
"Don't shut down on me, God dammit! I can't leave you alive behind me unless you give me something here."
"I'm Cameron Steadman, Boarding Sergeant with Regent Galactic. We are executing a sector wide warrant for this ship and several of her crew."
The dark figure pressed his foot down on her chest plate hard and tipped her helmet up with the toe of his boot.
With a start she realized what he was doing and struggled frantically, grabbing at his leg and squirming under the relentless weight of his heel.
When he pried her helmet up enough to see the under lining of her armour, he fired.
Chapter 17
"We have trouble on the Samson, Jake. We need you at the main cargo hatch," Laura said over the comm.
Ayan heard it; the message was broadcast over the command channel so anyone in charge of a squad or more would have. They were just setting foot on the strange, clay like soil. Most of the soldiers were making their way off the ships to secure the landing area. They were armed to the teeth and many of them donned the extreme environment layer of their armour.
Ayan's white suit started to discolour the instant she set foot on the ground, though she couldn't see much dust. The outer layer of her vacsuit shook imperceptibly every few seconds, returning it to its original colour. Clouds loomed tall and dark in the distance, rolling in over the horizon and obscuring the yellow sun. She only had a moment to glimpse the night side profile of another moon. Its shadowy outline was partially illuminated by some glowing centre of light.
Returning her attention to her more immediate environment, she looked around at the dozens of fighters and other ships that had landed all around the Clever Dream. Armed Triton personnel and deck crew were slowly making their way out of the troop carrier modules that had been installed on most of the Uriel fighters, and from what she could see they had all been overcrowded. Some passengers were so openly relieved, they stretched or sat down on the bare ground and just breathed. "Everyone should seal their vacsuits for now. That’s an order," she relayed over her communicator.
“Jake, something’s up at the main rear hatch of the Samson. Let me through!” She shouted, obviously not at him.
"I'm on my way Laura. Do you know exactly what's going on?" Ayan heard him respond.
“I’m trying to get back there, but there are too many people in the way.”
Ayan ran to the other side of the Clever Dream and saw that there was a gathering at the rear of the Samson, at the bottom of the cargo ramp. "It looks like they're prying at something in a service hatch under the Samson's reactor bay."
Jake burst into a run the moment he set foot on soil. "I'll be right there. Stephanie, I need everyone you can trust from the Clever Dream to back me up."
"Aye sir," Stephanie replied with no shortage of urgency.
Ayan didn't bother to listen to her pass the orders on, but tried to keep up with Jake as he closed the distance between him and the rear loading ramp of the Samson, where people were continuing to gather. The rear hatch was under what the Samson called the maxjack. It was a carefully constructed collection of metal bars, gripper arms, clamps and cutters. At the centre was a heavy plasma torch set on a track that ran around a fortified, extendable airlock above the main cargo ramp. The whole system was wide open, which made the rear of the Samson look as if it had thirty, twisted and curved skeletal fingers, some of which punctured the ground. The growing crowd of over two hundred didn’t seem to notice or care about how damaged some of the system looked from where Ayan was standing.
A few unarmed crew members were starting to disembark from other vessels and the commotion at the rear of the older, battered ship was drawing a lot of attention. At the base of the ramp there was a bright flash. Ayan's head's up display marked it as small arms fire, a particle weapon. There were several more flashes in succession. "What's going on?"
"Someone broke into my credit reserves, they were kept under the Samson's mass reactor," Jake replied over proximity radio. "It's all I have left. Maybe all the ready cash in the fleet."