Denver Corp. Stock began
trading at an all time low
in the wake of a failed
resolution by the board to
withdraw from the war.
Embattled CEO Nicholas
Denver has vowed to turn
his company around by
the end of the year.
Camp - Lex Talionis - Krasnïer - Gorean Territory
~~*~~
Katz sat on a twisted and bent swivel chair he had scavenged from one of the side rooms, turning idly from side to side as he locked his eyes on a patch of scorched metal, his mind a thousand light years away as he battled the inner demons that were set to plunge him over the edge of an abyss of emotions.
"What is it?" Kyr asked him standing in a patch of sunlight cast by a ragged hole in the hull high above them. His heavy eyes looked resigned as he leaned against the buckled wall watching his friend.
Katz slowly dragged his eyes from the spot on the wall, his shoulders setting imperiously as he forced the emotions from his face. A cold mask slamming down as he bristled.
"Why does something have to be wrong?" he asked, his tone sharp.
Kyr darted a look behind him to where Rikard and Galadriel were sitting out of earshot, and Tagria continued to slumber. He rolled his shoulders in the Kardiac flight jacket that Katz had insisted he put on the night before to keep him warm.
"I was concerned," Kyr replied. "I know that expression on your face, only one other man wears it…"
"Don't compare me to Darien again," Katz's voice held a knife's edge of warning.
Kyr shook his head, his thick hair flopping from side to side as he did so, his eyes sad. "Don't loose yourself, we're alive, we're okay… you're doing okay…"
"I don't need a pep talk," Katz snapped, rubbing his temple. "Just because we're sleeping together, that doesn't give you an excuse to pick about everything. I'm tired, I have a headache… nothing to do with where we are and what's going on, okay?"
"Caffeine withdrawal," Kyr said. "Pressure behind the eyes, and a sluggishness to your thinking, oh and of course the temperamental mood swings. Add to that the fact that you are starting to get dehydrated." Kyr walked over to the chair and knelt down beside Katz. "And, for the record, yes we're sleeping together. And yes that does give me the right to worry about you. So quit your bitching at me, you seduced me, deal with the consequences of it for a change."
"A moffie domestic," Rikard sneered standing watching them. "How utterly pointless," he fixed a withering stare on Kyr. "You were built to be better than this…"
"I wasn't built, thank you," Kyr said adjusting the leather jacket and turning to face Rikard. "I was born, there hasn't been a Kaynin built in one of your labs for generations. We're a species, with all the flaws that being alive brings. And if we're flawed, that means you are flawed too, you made us and forgot a few things…"
"And who are you to correct me?" Rikard asked, his eyes smouldering.
"I'm a doctor…" Kyr began.
Rikard laughed, a short bark that caused Tagria to flinch as she jumped awake, curling up defensively as her sharp claws flexed to look around her for an attack.
Rikard folded his arms, "you're a Doctor? A finger painter stands next to Picasso and says 'look I'm a painter too.'" Rikard shook his head, "my children are growing up…"
"Leave them alone," Galadriel reprimanded as she joined them, pulling on her jacket and tying her hair back. "Rikard," her voice held a note of warning.
Katz smirked, "now who's domesticated?"
Rikard bristled, opening his mouth to speak and then shaking his head. "We have to continue to climb, the escape pods should be a couple of hundred meters above us. Once we reach it, we will need tools."
"Where are we going to find tools?" Katz asked, looking at the devastation about him.
"That way," Rikard gestured. "The ship is vertical in the ground, so we are right beside the machine shops, there are plenty of tools there. If you run along the ship, we can parallel climb to the escape pods and meet there."
Kyr looked at Katz, "I'll go with you."
Katz nodded, checking his pulse pistol as he looked over at Galadriel, "will you be all right alone?"
"I somehow doubt Rikard will let anything happen to me," she said staring directly at the archfiend.
Rikard's smile was wolfish as he nodded, "naturally Milady, you are always safe with me, nê?"
Galadriel's exotic eyes flashed in the dim light, "says who it's me who has to worry?" She walked to the ladder like railing, scaling it upwards as she continued her climb through the body of the wreck, far above her the morning light spilled in from the shattered aft section of the ship, shedding a golden light on her as she ascended.
Tagria pounced from her coiled position, swinging her way through the wreckage as she slipped in a lizard-like fashion up the walls, pressing her body low, and flattening her feathers protectively quickly passing the Kardiac Lieutenant as she swept upwards.
Rikard watched them, as he looked again at Kyr standing with Katz, "remember something; you are a work of art, don't let grubby rooineck hands soil your canvas," he glared at Katz before he put his foot on the rung of the railing, following Galadriel's ascent upwards.
"Man I hate him," Katz said with an exasperated sigh.
"He just enjoys pushing your buttons," Kyr reassured resting a hand on Katz's shoulder. "You are in charge here, we're all looking to you, and so he has to pull you down what ever way he can. It gives him an illusion of control… I don't know what would happen to his bravado if he realized he's just as screwed as the rest of us."
Katz stood, "we need to get moving. They're counting on us."
The young pilot swung around the railing-ladder, using it to get him around, moving 'down' through the decks, chewing his lip as he considered the two-meter jump that separated the deck they were on from the one 'below'.
Ordinarily navigation on a starship was an easy affair, but they had never been designed for the orientation the crash had left the Lex Talionis in. A simple two meter gap from the floor to the ceiling meant a dangerous jump across a chasm nearly a quarter of a mile deep, with dangerously ragged debris below waiting to shatter bodies on impact.
The 'chasm' had been the berth where Lex had been constructing his Propylon Jump Ship, the better part of four hundred meters high, running the length of the ship, with cranes and construction equipment protruding from the walls, the whole area had been super heated from the orbital burn, meaning that much of the equipment was brittle or melted. And somehow they were expected to negotiate their way to the machine shops.
"This is going to be impossible," Katz stated looking at the ten deck-jumps they would be facing.
Kyr ran a tongue down his incisor as he considered the problem as well. "Maybe we could find some cabling from somewhere?"
"Swing over?" Katz asked looking towards the nearest crane, charred and blackened and hanging precariously from its mounting. "I don't think they are in any condition to support our weight. Maybe we could try one of the elevators?"
Kyr nodded as he crossed the bulkhead they had been using as a platform to sleep on, dropping into the elevator bank, looking at the reinforced blast doors that had double latched to seal the elevators against the crash.
"Maybe we should call Galadriel back with that plasma torch?" Kyr suggested as Katz leaned down to see what Kyr was looking at.
"We could try to shoot the lock?" Katz offered, patting his pulse pistol.
"Sub-sonic rounds," Kyr reminded. "They're designed not to puncture ship hulls in space, the ball bearings would just disintegrate on impact. Maybe if we had a PKD we could smash it open kinetically…"
"Or…" Katz said, looking back behind him getting a wild look in his eyes. "We could use another way to 'kinetically' smash it open."
"Does this involve a particularly squishy death, in which my mother won't be able to recognize my body?" Kyr sighed looking at Katz's eyes. "It does, doesn't it?"
Katz ducked back through the deck, returning a few minutes later with a large cargo hook attached to a fat partially fused cable. He leaned down to slide the hook through the double latch looping it around the cable to secure it.
"Technically what you're doing isn't kinetic…" Kyr commented.
"I never studied physics, what do I care?" Katz responded returning to the chasm and looking up at the teetering crane.
Kyr joined him and shook his head, "Katz… this ship isn't stable, you could collapse this entire section… not to mention kill us all…"
"You worry too much," Katz answered, testing the cable and listening to the groaning protest of the cranes weakened mountings. "Besides we don't have much choice."
"We have plenty of choices," Kyr answered. "One of them is to not do this…"
"True, but where's the adventure in that?" Katz responded drawing his gun. "You should get out of the way, find some cover."
Kyr sighed as he scrambled to the far side of the 'platform' as he crawled into an open maintenance panel, pulling his hands over his ears as he squeezed his eyes shut.
Katz swung around the railing using the deck floor as cover as he sighted in the pulse pistol, squeezing the trigger.
The shot rang out, breaking the silence in the derelict warship, the round impacting the mounting with a whinging sound as it disintegrated. The crane heaved, the sound of metal straining against a break as the whole assembly shifted.
"Ag, what the hell was that?" Rikard's voice echoed from high above.
Katz's TAC began to trill for attention. Katz rolled his eyes as he shifted his aim and fired again.
The crane shifted again, this time the metal splintered, and the yellow construction machinery broke free of its upper mounting, swinging around with a squeal of metal straining past its breaking point. The last mounting pulling free as the whole machine crashed its way downwards, smashing through the platform they had been sleeping on, they cable snaking after it as it pulled taunt. A sharp snapping as the crane reached the end of the cable, crashing into wreckage far below with the force of a wrecking ball.
The whole warship shifted, as far above loose debris began to rain down, metal girders from the superstructure tore free. They smashed downwards crashing like dominos through upper deck sections, spinning as they cascaded in an avalanche of metal and wreckage, hammering towards the ground.
Bridge - Lex Talionis - Krasnïer - Gorean Territory
~~*~~
The Headless Mech's head upon the table before him suddenly snapped its eyes open. As the ship teetered, the crashing sounds of the superstructure collapsing caused him to send a signal to his body, the mech dropping his tools, securing the crystal shard in one hand as his other hand picked up the head and braced himself.
Higher in the wreck - Lex Talionis - Krasnïer - Gorean Territory
~~*~~
Rikard swore as he jumped for Galadriel, shielding her with his body, screwing his eyes tight against the noise as he fought to concentrate, trying to stop the debris that rained down upon them.
A piece of metal the size of a car bounced down the chasm, spinning towards him as he reached out with his mind to catch it. Gritting his teeth as he tried to wrestle it away from them. His head spinning as more debris came down, the railing beneath him creaked and groaned under their weight as he felt it begin to give.
Another piece of debris smashed off of the first, ricocheting off of the larger as it flew like shrapnel to impale in the small of his back, the pain lancing through his mind and shattering his concentration as he felt himself falling, the larger piece of metal, suddenly in freefall as well, plummeted after him.
Below - Lex Talionis - Krasnïer - Gorean Territory
~~*~~
Katz pressed himself back tight into the corner where the deck met a bulkhead, watching the hail of debris flowing past him, smashing into the supporting superstructure beneath them. The more debris fell, the more the wreck moved, the whole structure shifting to the right as it began to list.
He vaguely heard above the din a man's scream, opening his eyes as he saw a black blur falling down the chasm, a cascade of wreckage following behind it. Pulling himself upright he fought to the edge as the debris storm began to subside, trying to see who had fallen.
He ducked back as another girder smashed its way past him, ringing as it spun end over end towards the depths of the darkness.
HMS T'zaht - Krasnïean System - Gorean Territory
~~*~~
Chuck stood by the observation window, a pair of field binoculars, borrowed from the Marines, against his eyes as he swept the darkness. The digitally enhanced optics scanned the darkness, tracking the fast moving object that was sweeping through the darkness towards the crippled Imperial ship.
"You know, I thought signing up on this ship would be an adventure," He remarked to no one in particular. "Now I know that adventure actually means, sheer and utter panic, combined with pant-soiling good fun…"
He lowered the binoculars, "think if we called and offered to settle this over a beer, he'd listen?"
"I doubt it, sir." Petty Officer Wheeler commented from underneath the dismantled helm station, his hands moving quickly to replace burnt out circuit boards and restore flight control to the disabled warship.
The broad-eyed kid had stripped down to his undershirt, biting his tounge as he fiddled with a stubborn screw that just didn't want to come free. He looked as if he belonged in school, not serving aboard an Imperial Frigate, but given the state of the war, everyone that could serve, did. Irregardless of their age.
Chuck felt old.
"See the universe, then blow it up," Technical Specialist Hartley said with a dry grin from where he toiled to feed power to the defensive systems. "I didn't sign up when the first draft came through, joined the Excalibur during the Pirate-Baron round-up. About two-years ago now, and you know something?" he wrenched out a blown fuse, nimbly replacing it with a new one. "It's always like this, guns, guts and brown underpants."
Chuck raised the binoculars again, "our friend is banking," he said, sounding relieved. "Methodical bastard, following a standard search pattern… least we know he hasn't spotted us."
"Still," Hartley replied moving on to the next blown console. "He's going to catch up to us soon. And I can't give you weapons anytime soon, sir." He took off his Excalibur baseball cap and mopped the sweat from his brow. "Though I should be able to get you shields in about twenty minutes."
Wheeler sat up from beneath the helm, "I joined the Excalibur just before the Gorean Occupation," he pulled himself to his feet and tried the console, smiling when it lit up. "My brother was on the Anger of Hades, said I should try it out. Didn't expect to end up a glorified shuttle pilot."
"He flies dropships," Hartley explained. "Nice for some, I guess."
"I parked dropships," Wheeler corrected. "flight deck ape mainly." He began to run a diagnostic as he spun to the engineering console and checked the power distribution grid, "but with the shortage of pilots rated on the UDS-902K, they needed me to fly Super-Six-One for Captain Hansen… so here I am… and my underpants are nice and clean, thank you Hartley."
"You're sixteen," Hartley said flipping open another panel. "You're barely out of nappies…"
Wheeler glared from beneath the brim of his own cap, ignoring the jibe on his age from a kid only two years older than he was.
Chuck looked at both of them, his fingers drumming on the binoculars, wondering why war was a game for the young. It was his job to keep them alive, and considering how close they actually were to death, he wasn't sure how he was going to do it.
"Bluff it…" Chuck murmured lifting the binoculars. "Lex's drones are intelligent, right?"
"We think so," Hartley said joining Chuck at the observation window. "It's displaying intelligent behaviour."
"What would it take to make it think we're fully operational?" Chuck asked.
"Prayer?" Hartley offered.
"No, no," Chuck muttered thoughtfully. "We need lights, all the running lights. The engines on full… and shields. It is unlikely that thing has anything more than visual sensors and LADAR, if we go after it, then it is going to pee itself…"
"Sir?" Hartley asked, glancing over at Wheeler.
"Quad rail cannons, an assortment of missile banks and pin-point defences. Not to mention a rather lethal CIWS…" Chuck mused.
"The CIWS's are offline," Hartley reminded, "our rail cannons can't track something that small, and we're fresh out of missiles."
"Yep, but I am willing to bet he doesn't know that. He thinks were up shit creek without a paddle, following the Imperial playbook when it comes to hunt-kill operations. If we suddenly change the play and go on the offensive, he is going to switch from Predator to prey. And run as fast as he can, find somewhere to hide while he calculates his options."
"We have a couple of portable generators on board, I can rig them into the running lights…" Hartley looked over at Wheeler and shrugged.
Wheeler grinned, "we're going snipe hunting…"
"What the hell is a snipe?" Chuck asked lifting his binoculars again.
"Right now?" Hartley said, "our little friend out there."
Bridge - Lex Talionis - Krasnïer - Gorean Territory
~~*~~
The headless mech lifted its head, reattaching the modular unit to its mounting. Securing the assembly with its own nano-repair system. Straightening up as the holographic system flickered to life, replacing the flat optical plate with a visage of rage.
Spinning the crystal baton through his fingers he slapped it under his arm, a dark expression shadowing the pale complexion of Kardiac's face. They had attempted to kill him, he was the last iteration of Lex Talionis's higher reasoning.
He searched for the Jump ship, but the limits of the mech's transmitter wouldn't allow him FTL communications. All he could find was the PIM and the last of his drones, running search and destroy orders, looking for the Imperial vessel that was hiding, wounded, in the outer system.
Standing, perfectly balanced on a console, the assassin mech ran through the limitations of his programming. He didn't contain the code he needed to reinstate the Lex Talionis's master program, the only hope lay in the transfer of the primary code to the Jump Ship.
It was almost funny that a machine had no choice but to rely upon faith, but the visage he wore was strangely appropriate to that absurdity. His only options were to exact revenge, and that meant dealing with Rikard and his accomplices.
In order to successfully defeat Rikard the 'rings' would need to be activated and a careful assassination plan developed to exploit them. Even a GN as enhanced as Rikard was, was vulnerable once they were active, and if the report from the PIM was correct, then Rikard was somewhere at the bottom of the primary shaft, buried beneath tonnes of debris.
It was only a matter of time, though, until the powerful being freed himself. That left the task of eliminating Rikard's companions to the three iterations.
He accessed a computer record, designating each of them appropriately 'Covenant, Sword, and the Arm of the Lord.'
Covenant nodded his satisfaction, caressing the baton, before swinging it up to tap his chin thoughtfully. He issued recall orders to the Drone he had designated the arm because of its immense reach, calling the Drone to assist the sword in its hunt. While Covenant himself set off, bounding from console to console as he began a climb of his own towards the ring chamber and the auxiliary power generator that could power it.
HMS T'zaht - Krasnïean System - Gorean Territory
~~*~~
"What the hell?" Chuck commented, swinging the field glasses as he tracked the Drone breaking off its search to accelerate to cruise speeds and head back to the planet.
"I have sensors," Killborne reported as the real-time RADAR and LADAR scopes went active, detailing the same information Chuck had observed with his own eyes.
"Whoa," Wheeler commented. "Someone just got recall orders…"
"Recall orders?" Chuck said crossing to the sensor station, resolving in on the planet. "From where? We all saw the Lex Talionis crash."
"Maybe it survived the crash," Wheeler offered.
"If it survived, then that means that Captain Katz might have survived the crash as well." Chuck patted Wheeler's shoulder and gestured to the helm, "We need to get back to the planet, quick as we can."