The Bad Company Read online

  What is it with these guys that they don’t have any internal security? Kae thought. Just like on the tank, none of the weapons faced inboard. The final solution protocol. If the computers are destroyed, they need to have a safe place while their weapons scorch the remaining life from the planet.

  Kae appreciated the vulnerability, while hating the reason it was created.

  “Flashing red,” Kelly reported.

  “Same here,” Praeter said. One by one, they reported their limitations. Kaeden was close, but still energized.

  The power supply remained on the drop ship hovering at a safe altitude directly over the compound.

  “Finish it!” Kae called and started to jog in a circle around the compound, killing the automated weapons as he passed, while the others saw their systems drop in power until they shut everything off to save enough in case of an emergency. They had learned that running to redline could have dangerous consequences.

  When Kae was finished, the Crenellian emplacements were interlocking smoking ruins. Kae stood tall, holding his railgun over his head as he cheered, to himself.

  One step closer to finishing it all, if the colonel was right about this headquarters being the lynchpin of the operation.

  ***

  The battle was brief before both silence and darkness returned. “ALL CLEAR!” Kaeden shared using his suit’s speakers cranked to maximum. Shortly after that, Queen belted out We Are the Champions.

  “Is this where we run like hell?” Char asked as she stood and dusted herself off. She smiled at her husband, before making like she was going to sprint ahead.

  “No plan survives first contact,” Terry replied, brushing himself off. “I think we shall take a more dignified approach.” He strolled ahead two steps to avoid Dokken relieving himself. Terry looked back, took one more step, and then started to run.

  Char bolted after him. Dokken trotted, with his head held high. Getting there first wasn’t one of his priorities. He wanted the humans to finish this because his thoughts kept drifting back to the War Axe, where his arch enemy had free run of the ship.

  ***

  Marcie was happy and pissed at the same time. All of the worm-crawling she did to cover a grand total of fifty yards. Her hair was soaked with sweat and matted to her head because of the helmet.

  The weretigers bounded past her along with the Pricolici and the four warriors as they ran toward the area illuminated by the armored suit lights.

  She wiped her head on her sleeve and ran after them, hurrying to catch up. They were the first ones to arrive after the mechs had cleared everything out.

  The weretigers sniffed at the destroyed equipment and circled as if confused. Christina turned her head back and forth as if almost hearing something but not quite.

  Marcie found Kaeden as he finished ordering the drop ship to land at the edge of the compound. He looked down at his wife and held out an armored hand. She took it, but wanted him out of the suit.

  “No can do,” he whispered to her. “I’m the only one with any power. We need to fix that issue, by the way, when we do our hot wash.”

  A hot wash, the after-action review that they’d conduct as soon as possible after the operation finished.

  “Maybe we can get Ted to work on it,” Marcie offered, disappointed that Kae would stay suited up.

  The drop ship settled into position. Cory, see what you can do for Fleeter? She’s hurt badly, Kae told his sister using the comm chip.

  The werewolves were next to arrive, then Terry and Char with the platoon. Dokken trotted up ahead of Ramses, Cory, and Auburn, who turned to intercept the drop ship as the ramp started to lower. Cory rushed inside.

  Terry and Char walked around the compound, looking at the destroyed weaponry. “The limitation of stationary defenses,” Terry said. “Someone is always going to have better firepower, or they’ll just bypass your stuff.”

  “The Crenellians are advanced when it comes to the technology of warfare, but not when it comes to the tactics,” Kaeden offered from his armored suit, seeing the platoon arrive carrying nine of the aliens. They were put down where they stood, mildly interested in the destruction around them.

  Praeter and Duncan slowly pounded past as they headed for the drop ship in order to access the power supply. Gomez and Kelly were close behind. Capples stayed in low power mode, waiting his turn.

  Char used her senses to find the door. Kaeden made quick work of removing the dirt from around it. Dokken sniffed at it as the Were pack circled. Christina was near the front. Terry signaled for her to follow him. Kae grabbed the handle with one hand and counted down with the other.. When he reached zero, he yanked.

  And didn’t move. He braced himself and pulled again.

  “This one’s a little more robust than the outpost door, it appears,” Marcie said.

  “Thermite!” Terry called and held his hand out.

  No one slapped a thermite grenade into it. He turned in a slow circle. “AUBURN!” Terry yelled.

  Auburn emerged from the shuttle and jogged to where Terry was standing. “I need a thermite grenade.”

  “We didn’t bring any,” Auburn replied, holding his hands up to calm TH. “When we did the initial planning to come down here, we were supposed to be fighting the populace of Tissikinnon Four, which is a barely industrialized society. We never intended on fighting the advanced systems that the Crenellians have because they never told us that’s what we were up against.”

  Terry pursed his lips and whistled. “Fair enough,” Terry replied before turning to face the others. “Options!”

  “Rocket,” Kae said. “I have one left and it’s not doing any good hanging off my back.”

  “Grenades,” someone called out.

  “Those will just bounce off,” Kae answered.

  “Explosives,” another shouted. “Sorry, these are for excavation work.”

  “Sounds like your rocket, Kae. I’ll hold the JDS as a last resort because we want to minimize damage inside the complex,” Terry said, stroking his chin in thought. “Clear the area to one hundred meters.”

  People and Were alike scrambled for cover. The platoon picked up the Crenellians and carried them to safety.

  Terry and Char headed for the drop ship. Marcie was already there, holding Fleeter’s hand.

  Cory was covered with a blanket as she slept in the jump seats. Char touched her daughter’s head, lovingly smoothing her hair over her wolf ear. Besides the silver streak of hair that framed one side of her face, Cory’s gift from her mother had been wolf ears. Cory was not a werewolf, which made her ears even more of an anomaly.

  Terry watched his wife and daughter, while also finding himself looking longingly at the jump seat bed. He had slept there a number of times and found it as comfortable as a hammock. He couldn’t blame her for sleeping, not after she expended her energy healing the injured warrior.

  The leg was growing back, being reassembled at the nano level.

  Fleeter was asleep too, as her body shepherded all of its energy toward the damage.

  “She’ll be fine,” Ramses said from the other side of a dead mech suit.

  “That’s good news, thank you,” Terry said, feeling tired as the body bag with Cantor’s remains propped in a corner weighed on him. Terry stared at it before shaking himself free.

  He looked longingly at the mech suits, but with four people trying to recharge at once, there was no time to bring those two systems up to speed.

  He wasn’t going to get his shot driving the mech. Not that day and not for a while.

  “FIRE IN THE HOLE!” Kae called the standard Force de Guerre warning from near the drop ship. The rocket whooshed away. There was a ten-second delay as the weapon raced upward before turning and attacking its target from directly above. The rocket hit with a fantastic scream, exploding to send a shockwave in all directions. The ship bucked once before settling back down.

  Kae ran to the hatch. “It’s not looking good,” he said. Terry sighed as he
took Char’s hand and together, they walked off the ship.

  ***

  Joseph shined a flashlight. The tunnel was as dark as a Stygian night. Even his Vampiric senses could discern nothing in the blackness. He could feel Bundin close by.

  I see a doorway, Bundin said, maintaining a monologue for Joseph’s benefit. Joseph couldn’t talk back unless he was in physical contact, but the Podder knew that the group followed because of his exceptional hearing. He and Joseph agreed that he’d keep talking and Joseph would keep listening.

  Petricia hung onto Joseph’s shirttail while Jones and the other warriors kept their railguns aimed to the sides.

  There are none from the local Pod around. This tunnel appears to have been used recently, but I cannot tell you where they have gone.

  Up short slopes, down slope around corners, through fallen rocks, and still they kept going. Progress was slow and Bundin’s idea of ‘nearby’ seemed far different from Joseph’s.

  The rocket explosions and impacts of the mechs directly overhead shook the tunnel. Joseph knew they were close to the complex, close to the underground facility. They stopped briefly to cover their heads as small rocks and dust filled the air around them.

  One more turn of the tunnel and Bundin appeared, blue in the muted white light. The eyes on his stalk blinked rapidly when the bright beam washed over him.

  “Sorry about that,” Joseph apologized.

  The tunnel was not much wider than the Podder. Joseph worked his way past first, followed closely by Petricia. Two warriors stayed behind and two moved in front of Bundin where the tunnel continued into the distance, disappearing around a corner after twenty meters.

  Joseph looked at the door, trying to discern how to open it. There was no handle, no lock, no hinges, and no access pad of any sort. It was a blank door, little more than a metal wall in the middle of a rock tunnel.

  Petricia leaned back against the Podder’s shell and crossed her arms as she tried to relax. She found the confines of the tunnel pressing in with her only relief coming when she focused on Joseph and what he was doing. She stared at him as he meticulously searched the door and the area around it.

  Jones tiptoed to the corner and looked around it. He couldn’t see anything. He listened intently, but heard nothing. He stayed where he was, railgun aimed into the darkness.

  Joseph used his small knife to pry into the gaps, but could find no purchase. The door refused to budge.

  “If you told me that this was not a door, I would believe you,” he said to Petricia as he joined her in leaning against Bundin’s shell.

  A single blast shook the door. More dust drifted through the air.

  Joseph rotated his railgun from his back and aimed at the door. “Take cover, boys,” he told them. Bundin backed up and Petricia stood behind him. Jones and the second warrior disappeared around the bend in the tunnel ahead.

  Joseph fired at the sides, but the hypervelocity darts didn’t penetrate. He only needed to fire twice to learn that shattering projectiles within a closed space was a bad idea.

  The metal is only as strong as the rock within which it is set, Bundin thought.

  “Fire in the hole,” Joseph said as he aimed a second time, but this time at the rock to the side of the doorway.

  The cracks boomed within the tunnel, echoing into the distance. The dust danced with each new shot. But the rock was giving way. Chips were flying from around the casement. When it was all exposed, Joseph stopped firing. He let go of his rifle, and the combat sling let it flop to his side. He jammed his fingers into the gap he’d created and found the other side of the door frame. He dug his fingers in and pulled until he could brace his feet on the wall and then with all his Vampiric strength, he ripped the casement out and the doorway fell to the tunnel floor.

  Beyond, he saw a well-lit space that appeared to be a luxury bathroom.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  The War Axe

  “Captain San Marino, how are you?” Auburn’s dark skin glistened with the odd lighting inside the drop ship.

  “I’m fine, and would love to catch up, but I expect this isn’t a social call,” Micky replied.

  “Colonel Walton asked me to contact you and let you know that we’re working to get inside the Crenellian headquarters. If there’s a problem and they launched their weapons against the planet, we’re going to need a pick up. Can you be here in four hours?”

  Micky’s face dropped. “I cannot. We’ve been slowing down, but we are still heading away from Tissikinnon Four. I thought we might have another day before we needed to start the process to return to the planet. Do we know if the orbital defenses have been neutralized?”

  “Not by us they haven’t, not yet anyway,” Auburn replied.

  “I have to get us turned around and heading that way. Smedley will provide an update as soon as we have it. Tell Terry that we’re on our way at the best possible speed.”

  “Will do, Skipper,” Auburn said, using Terry’s name for the captain.

  Micky liked it, continuing to look at the screen long after Auburn had signed off.

  “Helm, turn us around right freaking now. They need us on Tissikinnon Four.”

  Clifton gave the thumbs up over his shoulder as he started entering commands. “Changing the heading now.”

  Micky didn’t feel anything as the ship turned to face the planet as it continued on a trajectory away from the planet. In space, aerodynamics were mostly irrelevant. The ship was flying backwards, but that ability solved the problem of how to reverse a space drive.

  Don’t. Turn the ship and always accelerate in one direction.

  “If you could inform the crew to strap in, Captain, I’d appreciate it. They’re going to feel a little bump…”

  Poddern

  Terry, Char, and Kaeden inspected the damage to the door leading underground. The surface was scorched and chipped, but when Kae leveraged the strength of his powered armor against the door, it wouldn’t budge.

  “Doesn’t that suck a whole bunch,” Char said.

  Terry looked at the hatch and pulled his Jean Dukes Special. He flipped it over to eleven with his thumb. “It goes to eleven,” he said in a low voice.

  “Embrace the suck, Dad!” Kae called.

  “But not yet,” Terry replied and put his weapon away. “Once the mechs are recharged, you think four of them pulling together might get this thing open?”

  “Won’t know until we try.” Kae looked disappointed.

  “Can’t do it.” Terry gripped his son’s armored hand. “Not yet anyway. If we kill them and their equipment, then we condemn the planet. Let’s not be in a hurry to do that.”

  “Has anyone heard from Joseph lately?” Char asked.

  ***

  Joseph and Petricia looked inside. It appeared to be an empty bathroom. Jones appeared beside them.

  “Let us go in first,” Jones suggested.

  “As you wish.” Joseph stepped aside. Jones and the second warrior rushed in, jumping to the sides and covering each other with the bounding overwatch technique. Joseph and Petricia walked in. Joseph reached out with his telepathic mind.

  “A dozen Crenellians in the room beyond,” Joseph whispered, raising his railgun and making sure that Petricia stayed behind him.

  Bundin worked his way through the opening and stopped within the bathroom. He looked from one fixture to the next. None of it made any sense to him. Jones and Einar stood at the door that led out of the bathroom, counting down on their fingers. At zero, Einar yanked the door open and Jones ran through.

  “DOWN ON THE FLOOR!” Jones yelled. Joseph waved Einar through in front of him. The warrior ran past Jones to occupy a flanking position overlooking the Crenellians seated before two long banks of computers.

  The room was large at twenty meters per side. There were two rows of computers, more systems than aliens. None of the Crenellians had moved.

  Joseph walked in, touching Jones gently on the arm as he walked by. “My name is Jo
seph and I’m with the Bad Company. Your president hired us to end this war and we intend to do just that, but we need your help to do that.”

  Petricia walked up behind Joseph and waited.

  “That looks like the tunnel out,” Joseph pointed. “Would you mind terribly opening the door for our friends and fellows?”

  Petricia walked past the Crenellians. Some watched her, others seemed indifferent, but when the Podder came into view, their attention snapped to the alien with the blue shell and stalk-head.

  Jones and Einar eyed the small humanoids warily as Petricia continued up the tunnel. She knew there was fresh air on the other side and that hastened her steps. She’d had enough of being underground.

  The door was more like a hatch, massive in construction but angled to keep people out. She cycled the unlock mechanism and tapped a lever that led to a counterweight. It dropped and the door cranked open. As it popped, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She smelled sulfur and explosive, but it was still outside air.

  When she opened her eyes, she found railgun barrels pointed at her, one from a mech, and pistols from both Terry Henry and Char.

  “It’s Petricia,” she said weakly.

  “At ease!” Terry called. “You can’t imagine how much grief you just saved us.”

  Petricia nodded and started to climb the stairs out as the door was over her head. Terry was climbing in and ran into her. She pointed outside. Terry stepped back.

  “Tunnels not your speed?” he asked.

  “Not in the least,” she said with a half-smile. Char helped her out and she looked back.

  “We’ll tell Joseph,” Terry said. Being underground wasn’t natural. He thought a vampire would take to it better, but Petricia had always been different. “Kae, get Auburn in here with our comm gear. I want Smedley knee-deep in this shit in five, and where are the rest of my Crooners? Get them in here, too!”

  ***

  Terry climbed down the stairs and strode down the tunnel. Char was right beside him as they walked into the Crenellian planetary command center.