Maelstrom Strand Read online

  Aircraft and aerospacecraft died and fell tumbling towards the city below. Fires already burned and pillars of smoke rose to merge with a black pall hovering over the heart of Argos, over the area he knew marked the spaceport…and the palace. He’d never seen destruction or war on this scale, not in a career with more combat time than almost any mech-jock in any conventional unit, never seen a whole planet ripping itself apart. And he’d certainly never expected the first place he’d experience all-out war to be Sparta. His home.

  They’d arrived through the jump-gate only hours before and he’d suspected something was amiss almost immediately. They hadn’t been hailed, hadn’t been challenged, hadn’t received so much as a friendly hello from orbital traffic control, and their messages to the home fleet ships in cislunar parking orbit had sailed out into the black unanswered. Lyta had been the first to get suspicious, and it had spread like a plague on a virgin field. They’d been running on the decoy fusion engine affixed to the rear of the ship for the sake of maskirovka, its fuel and boost capacity limited, mostly there just to provide a fusion signature so casual observers wouldn’t wonder why a ship was moving at a tenth lightspeed without any noticeable means of propulsion. Once Logan had embraced the paranoia, he’d told Kammy to secure the decoy engine and burn for Sparta on the stardrive at maximum boost.

  The command might as well have flipped a switch. The moment they’d surged forward at an effective acceleration of nearly fifty gravities, the four heavy cruisers had abandoned their LaGrangian point posts and headed out to meet them at maximum sustainable boost. Which was not nearly as fast as the Shakak, but also didn’t have to be because they were heading right into the teeth of the fleet.

  “Hey boss,” Tara Gerard, the Shakak’s tactical officer had reported, her tone unusually reserved, her characteristic bloodthirstiness seemingly reined in since they’d been dealing with Logan’s homeworld. “I’m picking up what looks like a battle on the surface, just between your capital at Argos and the military base at Laconia.” She’d squinted at the readouts for a moment and looked back at him again. “Some fighting going on in the air, too, but no orbital weapons used yet.” She’d shrugged. “Don’t know why.”

  “I think it’s pretty obvious why,” Lyta had said, her voice and expression as flat and final as a judge handing down a death sentence. “Whoever’s behind this couldn’t recruit anyone in a high enough position at the Orbital Defense Command to take over the defense grid, so they took it out, instead.”

  “Can you take on that many ships?” Logan had asked Kamehameha-Nui Johansen, pointing at the threat icons on the forward display screens.

  “Mithra knows, boss,” the big man had admitted. “One at a time, sure, but…” He’d eyed Logan with discomfort on his rounded, homely face. “Are we sure they’re all bad guys? What if some of them are just being dragged along into this shit?”

  “We’re all being dragged into this shit, Kammy,” Lyta had answered for him. “They’re probably counting on us not wanting to fire on our own.”

  “We have to go help dad and Terrin,” Logan had decided. He touched a button on his ‘link to hook himself into the ship’s public address system. “All shuttle pilots, all mech pilots, all Rangers, gear up and report to the drop-ships.” He’d turned to Katy. “We’re going in and you’re going to watch our backs. Don’t get killed.”

  She’d kissed him, brief but fierce and headed out of the bridge without a word. He hadn’t hesitated. He knew what his father would say.

  “Kammy, take us in. If anything gets in our way, warn it off, then shoot it down. Whoever’s behind this is going to find out why staging a coup against a Brannigan is a bad fucking idea.”

  He hoped things were going well for the Shakak, because everything looked pretty horrible down in the soup.

  “Katy!” he yelled her name, not caring about professionalism or radio discipline, not even sure if his signal could pierce the web of EM jamming. “How are we looking?”

  “You’re looking fine,” she said, her voice low and steady, as if she were half-asleep. He knew what the tone meant. Combat pilots didn’t yell or curse or sound uptight when the real bullets started flying. They shut down their emotions and ran on instinct, not letting their fear or anger interfere with the instincts of flying. “I personally have had better days,” she went on, “but I’m not exactly the only target up here, so I think I’ll be okay, barring Murphy’s intervention.”

  He tried to access the feed from her bird and the second assault shuttle, but the interference from the ECM was too much. The air practically crackled with it. The world tilted crazily, throwing him against his restraints and the view from the drop-ship’s external cams swung with it, showing sun and blue sky and mountains all rushing into one, stomach-churning kaleidoscope of colors. Something erupted into a gout of flaming debris only a few hundred meters away and their attitude gradually levelled out.

  “Thanks, Commander,” Lt. Lambeti radioed, relief strong in his voice.

  “Get them safe to the ground, Tony,” Katy replied.

  “We have a transmission coming in,” Lambeti said with all the subtle coolness of a puppy finding a bone. He was a young officer and still not quite up to the cool detachment of Kathren Margolis. “It’s for you, Colonel Conner! It’s from the Guardian!”

  “I see it, Lieutenant.”

  He’d kept his voice calm, but inside Logan felt the weight of a planet slipping off his shoulders. His father was alive…they were in time. Logan tapped a control on the base of the mech’s steering yoke and a still picture of his father popped up beside the audio-only message. There wasn’t enough bandwidth available through the jamming to get an image.

  “Logan, are you there?” Jaimie Brannigan asked, his bellicose voice strong enough to cut through the static and interference. “Do you read?”

  “Read you five by five, sir,” he replied. “We’re on our way down right now. Coming in over Argos right now, heading for the palace.”

  “No!” his father exclaimed, surprising him. “Forget the palace. The Guardian’s Own is still fighting there, but they’re up against the entire Home Guard, or at least mech pilots enough to fill all the armor the Home Guard had. I think they brought in outsiders for this. Starkad is behind it, that’s for damn sure. They have two squadrons of assault shuttles supporting them and it’s a lost cause. We have to go get Terrin at the research facility in the Bloodmarks and get him and that data secured.”

  “Roger that, sir,” he said. “We’ll divert and meet you there.”

  “Be careful, son, but hurry your ass up. They have drop-ships and assault shuttles on the way and I don’t want to have to fight them all by myself.”

  “We’ll take care of it, Dad.” He grinned, despite everything. “We’re Wholesale Slaughter. That’s what we do.”

  4

  Terrin opened the safe with trembling hands and pulled out the lead-lined case, the scuffs and scratches on its surface as familiar as the touch of Franny’s fingers.

  “You still have it?” Jaimie Brannigan asked from behind him, a hint of disbelief in his voice along with what Terrin thought might be a touch of outrage at the security risk. “I’d have thought you’d erased the data crystals after you read them into the systems here.”

  “I was going to,” he said, not bothering to shut the door to the safe—there was nothing else in there to secure. “I should have,” he admitted. “But we went through so much to get this out of Terminus and keep it away from Starkad, I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of it.”

  “It’s just as well,” Jaimie Brannigan allowed, wiping sweat from his brow with the back of his sleeve. It was cool in the office, but his father had been sweating since he rushed off the ramp of the drop-ship. “Saves us the time of copying everything.”

  “Sir,” Dr. Kovalev said, clearing his throat. He’d followed them into the office along with Franny and it was a close competition as to which of them looked the most worried. “I have the techn
icians working on purging the databases here, but…”

  “This isn’t the only facility with the data,” Terrin finished for him, closing his eyes for a moment and letting out a sigh at the realization. “We had to farm some of the work out to a few universities.”

  “It’s scattered,” Kovalev explained, hands working as if he were molding the explanation out of the air. “No one of them has all of it, but it’s all there and it’s only a matter of time before someone pieces it together.”

  “Plus, there’s the Imperial weapons we shipped out from Terminus before Starkad got it,” Franny pointed out. “They’re at a couple of different weapons manufacturers’ research and development labs off-planet.”

  “Nothing to be done about it now,” Jaimie declared, though Terrin could see the concern in the man’s face.

  Well, there’s a lot to be concerned about.

  “Come on,” he motioned to Terrin, “we need to get you and the data on the drop-ship and out of here before the enemy arrives.”

  “Who’s behind this, Dad?” Terrin asked, knowing he was wasting time, but needing to know.

  “Starkad at third and last,” Jaimie told him, a door-slamming certainty in his tone. “As for who they set up to be their figurehead here…” He shook his head. “Unfortunately, it could be one of a dozen. My grandfather’s old advisors told me I should have anyone even suspected of being involved with his assassination put to death twenty years ago, but I didn’t do it because I knew Maggie wouldn’t have approved.”

  Terrin tried to picture his mother, Maggie Conner, but the only image that came was of her with a rifle in her hands, heading off to face the traitors coming to try to kill her children.

  “No, she wouldn’t have,” he agreed, voice breaking on the last word.

  A muscle in Jaimie’s cheek quivered, as close to his father would ever come to crying. He grabbed Terrin by the shoulder and pulled him into a hug, surprising him.

  “Your mother would have been so proud of you, Terrin. I’m proud of you. You’ve accomplished more than anyone had a right to hope.”

  Terrin returned the hug, his throat clenching at the rare compliment from his father…and then he stiffened and pulled away, realizing what it could mean.

  “We’re getting out of this, Dad,” he insisted.

  “You will,” Jaimie told him. “You and Francesca get on that drop-ship and head up to the Shakak.” He turned to Kovalev. “Once you wipe the databases, get your people on the jet out there and take them as far as your fuel holds out, far away from the population centers. No military bases, no universities.”

  “Yes, sir,” the professor said, nodding firmly. “I’ll see to it.”

  “What about you?” Terrin asked his father.

  “I’m going out to my mech and give you the chance to get away from here,” Jaimie said. “It’s a Guardian’s duty to defend his people…”

  “Lord Guardian!” The voice was small and tinny, coming over the external speaker of Jaimie Brannigan’s ‘link. His father hated using an earbud; he’d always said it made him seem like some madman talking to himself. But distant thought it was, Terrin recognized the voice as belonging to Donnell Anders. “Enemy forces incoming!”

  Terrin swayed and nearly lost his balance as the explosion rocked the entire building, a rolling crack of thunder punctuated by the crash of furniture and equipment and screams from the main section of the lab outside the office.

  “What the hell…” Terrin coughed the words out as he caught himself against the desk, saw his father helping Franny to her feet. The opaque, smoke-dark polymer of the office walls were cracked and splintered, and the door had swung open, admitting a haze of pale smoke.

  “The drop-ship, sir!” Anders said over the ‘link. “They got the drop-ship! Mecha inbound!”

  Jaimie Brannigan seemed preternaturally calm as he pulled the ‘link off his belt and held it beside his mouth.

  “Hold them, Donnell. I’m coming out.” He eyed each of them, his gaze lingering on his son. “Logan’s on his way. I’ll do the best I can to buy you time till he gets here.” He shoved the door open, checking outside in the corridor before he hesitated and threw a final command over his shoulder. “If there’re any guns to be had, I suggest you arm yourselves. Don’t let those data crystals be taken.”

  “I love you, Dad,” Terrin tried to say, but his father was already gone.

  Logan Conner charged down the ramp of the drop-ship and straight into hell.

  He’d visited the research facility before, when Terrin had first arrived; and he’d been struck by the beauty of the place, the isolation of the little transverse valley sliced out of the mountains by the narrow stream running down from the glaciers. Now, the narrow valley seemed more like a smelting furnace, barely able to contain the flaring, sparking, molten madness within its borders.

  The sight through his Sentinel’s canopy was a kinetic light show impossible to separate into its coherent parts, so he ignored it and let the picture from the threat display filter through to his thoughts. Distinct packets of data moved in blue or red triangles, neatly separated into friend and foe, mecha, infantry, and aircraft.

  That picture was clearer, but no less intimidating. Jaimie Brannigan and Donnell Anders had cobbled together a company from Mithra alone knew where, probably mech-jocks who’d happened to be in the palace during the attack. It was strike-mecha heavy with the Sentinels both his father and General Anders piloted, three bulbous, ugly Nomads and a pair of Scorpions at the heart, lighter assault mecha and a couple of Arbalests crowding close on the edges. They’d arrayed themselves in an offset line running from the furiously burning wreckage of what he assumed had been their drop-ship nearly all the way over to a three-meter drop off down into the creek bed. Not quite all the way though, there was a hundred-meter gap between the last of them, a broad-shouldered Valiant, and the terrain limiter.

  Facing them from nearly two kilometers away down the length of the valley, partially obscured by scattered clumps of pines and aspens, was nearly a full battalion, still pouring out of half a dozen drop-ships, one or two still settling down on heavy landing gear. Fifty mecha, not yet deployed into formation but already spraying missiles and lasers across the distance between the two forces.

  Poor fire discipline. Probably hard for traitors to train together and establish leadership authority.

  “Fourth Platoon, fill the gap,” he ordered, trusting Captain Gerald Paskowski to understand his intent. Paskowski’s strike mecha would be ideal to seal up the hole in the line, heavily armed and armored and able to soak up a lot of damage without going down.

  “Roger that, sir.” Paskowski’s tone was all business, as if this was just another operation and not the end of the world.

  “Arbalest Platoon, standard launch diamond two hundred meters behind the line and concentrate on the enemy’s front ranks.”

  Captain Mandy Ford was still leading her fire support mecha off the second drop-ship, five blue icons he automatically translated into the hunched-over, top-heavy missile carriers, useless in a short-range fight against enemy armor but good as a stand-off weapon. She didn’t respond, which was a breach of protocol but then, they were all pretty rattled, even if some were trying not to show it. He could see her moving into the formation he’d ordered, which was all he cared about.

  “Val, you, Hernandez and Prevatt take your platoons around the left flank of the formation and stack up, get ready to jet over for a flanking attack on my command.”

  He’d been plodding along in his own mech as he spoke, walking just fast enough to avoid standing in one spot for too long, heading for the center of the line where twin Sentinels waited.

  “Glad you could make it, son,” Jaimie Brannigan’s face appeared in the communications display, more haggard and drawn than Logan remembered, looking unnatural and wrong somehow squeezed into a helmet. “Terrin’s inside, you need to…”

  “Lyta’s taking a platoon in there now, sir,” he said.
“Katy and her wingman are trying to keep the other side’s assault shuttles out of the fight, but that means we won’t have any air support. What we do have…” Logan grinned fiercely as wave after wave of missiles began streaking out from behind them, arcing over their lines. “…is artillery.”

  The Arbalests wouldn’t have the luxury of a reload train out here, but they carried enough of a load to keep the barrage up for nearly a solid minute. A rolling chain of explosions tore divots in the valley floor, gouts of flame and dirt and, here and there, plasma from a ruptured fusion reactor rising into the air, chased upward by mushroom clouds. By the time their tubes shot dry, the entire far end of the valley was aflame, fire licking at centuries-old trees and spreading across the tall grass despite a few pockets of stubborn snow still cowering in the shadows, unwilling to melt away. White smoke billowed off the burning trees and grass and joined the darker haze from flaming metal, where enemy machines had fallen. Men died inside them, the unlucky who hadn’t perished in the explosions that had crippled their mecha now consumed by the flames.

  It was a bad way to go. Logan hoped when his time came, the end would be quick.

  He couldn’t see a damn thing through the smoke, not on optical, infrared or thermal, and Katy was far too busy above them to bother her for a report. He hoped against knowledge and experience that the missiles had taken the fight out of them, that they would head back to their drop-ships and be satisfied with the capital and the palace. He knew it was a fantasy before he saw the first of the black silhouettes striding through the white smoke, their march purposeful and vindictive, seeking vengeance for their fallen comrades. They might not be better trained or better led, but General Constantine liked to say that quantity had a quality all its own. And there were still a lot of them.

  “For all my sins, I do penance, I repent.” The words were murmured, barely audible, and it took Logan a moment to realize it was his father saying them. They were from the Baj, the Zoroastrian prayer of thanks and purification. It was said at meals and before trials.