Star Crusades Nexus: The Second Trilogy Read online

  There wasn’t a second’s hesitation on Khan’s face, and just like a hundred times before, he was following Spartan and expecting to run into trouble at any moment. They were past the bomber and heading toward an open area to the rear where four oval doors were fitted. Each was large enough for a Biomech machine to move through, and one had been left open. They drifted toward the door, reaching the railings that ran around the frame. Spartan pulled himself to the right, but Khan landed by accident directly in the middle. He should have moved but just stood there, gazing at the object on the other side of the open door.

  “Khan, get back!” muttered Spartan, but his friend was captivated.

  Spartan glanced over his left shoulder at the bomber. There was no sign of the Biomech or its machine siblings, only the aged spacecraft and the cavernous hangar. He noticed the markings from the days of the Confederacy, and for the briefest moment felt a pang of nostalgia for those days. There had been no Alliance, no Biomech war machines, and no alien races back then. The walls of the hangar were fitted out with scores of racks and mounts from which hung a variety of tools from simple hand tools to complex and unrecognizable heavy devices. A sound from near the bomber drew his attention. As he watched, a pair of humanoid shapes moved around the craft.

  Dammit!

  “Khan, with me!”

  There was no time for contemplation or thinking. He pulled at the rails and swung inside the doorway and into the next section. Khan needed no encouragement, and both slipped inside just as the two figures emerged from the side of the bomber. Spartan observed them carefully and was surprised when the two forms stopped near the front of the craft and began speaking to each other. Both wore spacesuits but of a totally alien form of manufacture. They were about the same height as Spartan but more slender in build.

  “Who are they? More Biomechs?” asked Khan bitterly.

  Spartan detected an odd tone in his friend’s voice, and when he looked at him could see the interest he had in these creatures.

  Why is he so upset? Is it because he feels an attachment to them if they’re synthetic as well?

  Spartan shook his head.

  “No, I don’t think so. Look at them; don’t they remind you of somebody?”

  Khan’s lip curled slightly as the realization dawned on him.

  “T’Kari?”

  Spartan nodded.

  “Yeah, the suits are different, but they move the same, and listen to them speak.”

  The one to the left was busy chatting away, and although it was impossible to understand what they were saying, it was quickly obvious they were speaking the language of the T’Kari, or at the very least a dialect of theirs.

  “Do you remember any of their language?”

  Khan almost laughed at the question, and Spartan nodded apologetically.

  “Yeah, well, it was worth a shot. These must be captured T’Kari. You remember what the others said?”

  Khan barely moved his head in silent acknowledgement. Spartan looked back at the two, almost feeling sympathy for them.

  “They were taken from their homes in Biomech attacks and forced to serve the machines. They must be holding hostages.”

  The large Biomech emerged from the shattered side of the bomber and pulled at the metal framing to extract itself from inside. It caught on part of the metal as it moved, and several chunks tore and split before it was out and attaching itself to the floor. The body language of the two potential T’Kari transformed in an instant. They stood up straight and watched the machine. It moved close to them and swung one of its arms at the nearest. It struck with a low-pitched thud, and the alien was sent spinning about in the weightless environment before striking the wall. Spartan shook his head and reached out to hold Khan back.

  “No, we can’t…not yet,” he said as quietly as he could.

  The Biomech machine stopped and looked straight at him. Spartan felt his heart drop but kept completely still. Khan did the same, and it looked like it might have worked. It was nonsense, of course; the Biomechs would certainly have access to finely tuned sensors. After all, even the Alliance Vanguard Marines had access to that level of equipment, and the Biomechs were centuries ahead in most regards when it came to science and engineering.

  “What about that?” asked Khan.

  Until now Spartan hadn’t even looked inside. He looked behind him for a brief moment, gazing at the hundreds of cylindrical shapes fitted like shelves in a warehouse. At first it took him back to the T’Kari Raider they had been on where the enemy had been transporting clones to his own worlds. But this was different, and he was shocked to see the layout was almost identical to the ones he had seen back at the start of the Uprising. He had been on board a ship where the foul Biomech creatures had been created. These cylinders looked exactly the same as those used in the harvesting sites; a place where living prisoners were mulched down and used to create new and terrible monsters. He looked back to Khan, and he could see a change, one that he hadn’t seen for months.

  “I can’t, not anymore,” Khan said.

  He leaned out of the doorway, pried a bar from the wall mount, and then kicked at the wall and toward the Biomech. He bared his teeth at the thing as he moved silently to it. Spartan watched him go and was instantly reminded of the bond between them. Khan, after all, was related to the Biomechs and all their plans. By all accounts the final stage of manufacture. It seemed they had first started by cloning key individuals, such as the human leader Typhon, to help spread dissent through the Confederacy while doing the same with dozens of other races. Then came the foul creatures, those that left cities as burning pyres, and the very last stage was the completely artificial, synthetically manufactured monsters that included him. At the same time, these machines had managed to encourage every race to side with them from the Zealots of the Confederacy to the T’Kari Raiders in New Charon. It was a long and complicated link, and one that Khan was less than happy about. The warrior spun about. He hurtled toward the machine with shouts of anger bellowing from his lungs. Spartan didn’t hesitate and pulled around to the left to find a tool.

  Come on! Find something, anything!

  The sound of hand-to-hand combat had already started as Khan smashed his own improvised weapon against the armored housing of the machine. It had turned its four arms against his friend, and Spartan couldn’t imagine he would last long against such speed and savagery. The machines would always have the edge in this kind of encounter.

  “Khan!” he cried out in a mixture of fear and anger.

  There were small items that he didn’t recognize, but on one unit was a series of metal splinters for fabrication work. They were studded, and he could only assume they were for bracing heavy equipment. It didn’t matter; he needed something substantial to swing. He grabbed the largest and rested the weightless bulk on his shoulder like a club. For a second, he looked like a battered and wounded version of the ancient Herakles, the famous human hero. He looked at the fight and then tensed his muscle against the doorframe like a spring.

  “I’m coming!”

  He pushed back to compress his legs, flinging himself off and back toward the bomber and the direction they had come in from. As he flew at the machine, a series of sparks flashed off the Biomech. Spartan cried out in surprise as Khan tore off one of its arms. He cast it aside like a piece of garbage and swung behind it to carry on striking. Then Spartan was in range and drifting to the right of the Biomech. It seemed to have completely forgotten about him, but as he tried to stab at it with his metal club, one of the arms twisted about and blocked it.

  “It’s like that, is it?” he snapped and grabbed at the arm.

  Rather than trying to avoid the powerful limb, he used it to drag himself closer to the thing. It flailed with one of the engineering arms, and a serrated edge slashed Spartan’s leg. It was a quick attack, but the cut was deep and nearly ten centimeters along his flesh. He winced and then jammed the metal splinter into the machine’s neck joint.

  �
�You might be a machine, but I know what’s inside you!” he shouted.

  The metal splinter was shaped like a large wedge and pushed down the side of the head and into the torso. There were flashes around its body, and the lights in its armored helm went black. Both grabbed at the floor and the bomber, as the machine halted like some dormant statue. The magseals on its feet still stayed active, so it remained upright but to all intents and purposes, dead.

  “Good timing,” Khan spluttered.

  Spartan tried to smile, but the blobs of blood from his wound were drifting away. He felt a little sick and would have tipped over if it hadn’t been for the lack of gravity. Khan pulled himself to his friend and looked down at the wound.

  “I did all the work, and you still got cut,” he laughed.

  Neither of them had noticed the two T’Kari that had been watching the fight unfold. In their bloodlust, they had concentrated on tearing the machine apart. The T’Kari had vanished from their thoughts, but now both waited in silence and with firearms raised and pointing directly at their surprise guests. One chattered excitedly to the other before tapping something on its suit. The helmet opened up to show a face they both recognized. It was that of a female T’Kari. She bowed slightly and lowered her rifle.

  “Uh, what’s going on?” asked Spartan.

  “How the hell would I know?” muttered Khan, doing his best to nod.

  More noise came from the right, and all four turned to see one of the eight-legged machines coming into the hangar. It moved with a horrific gait unlike any other machine or creature. Spartan lunged at the T’Kari and lost his footing. As he drifted in the air, he pulled the weapon from the T’Kari and took aim. The weapon was unfamiliar to him but was equipped with a rudimentary iron sight and trigger. He squeezed the trigger, and a blue discharge blasted out at the machine. It tore a hole through the metal but did nothing to stop it.

  “Not once you fool, kill it!” growled Khan.

  Spartan was spinning now, and he rotated completely around before he could fire again. This time he held down the trigger until the weapon stopped firing. It must have loosed nearly thirty rounds. It was more than enough to leave the eight-legged machine a lump of molten ruin that floated past them in the hangar.

  “Okay, Spartan, I’ve had enough of this place. What now?” Khan asked, pulling his friend back to the floor.

  Spartan looked to the T’Kari and tried to hand the weapon back, but the one refused and instead pulled out a small pistol from a leg holster. The other alien with its visor still closed, pointed to the doorway next to the massive room full of cylinders. It said something quickly, yet with a stern tone that was obvious even in an alien language. Spartan listened intently, as he had spent a considerable amount of time with their people. He recognized just one of the words. It was their word for exit, and he had seen it written in their own peculiar script at T’Kari research sites and on ships.

  “So, they know a way out,” he said both to himself and to Khan.

  His friend seemed to positively shake with excitement at this news.

  “All right, let’s do this!”

  CHAPTER SIX

  Spartan was punished again and again after the Great Uprising, even though he was one of many heroes to have lived through it. Unable to climb through the stifling structure of the Marine Corps, he forged his own path with the infamous APS Corporation. This high-tech private security company was torn apart by controversy, however, and once more he was cast aside. Many had forgotten his name when he vanished aboard a T’Kari Raider, one of the many ships forced to serve the Biomechs. Few expected to see him return, and even fewer could imagine the change they would find when he did.

  The Rise of Spartan

  Jack looked out of the tiny armored window on the side of the Hammerhead. None of the other marines could see it, but his forehead was covered in a fine sheen of cold sweat. He took in a series of harsh breaths and tried to slow his pulse, but it wasn’t working. He could see the flashing indicator icons on the overlay inside his armored helmet, but it did even less to help him calm down. An image of the battle with the Animosh returned, one where most of his friends lay dead around him. It was the thought of Hunn, the Champion of Hyperion lying in a growing pool of black blood that returned time and time again.

  “Hold on!” shouted a marine.

  The craft shook and buffeted as they hit the warm air above the urban sprawl of Helios. It was enough to snap him out of his thoughts and put his mind back on the mission. He tapped the release button, and the visor opened to let in the cool conditioned air of the spacecraft. He reached inside; his armored hand tried to wipe away the sweat, but with the glove it was difficult. He cursed and closed the visor before anybody could see his face.

  Get it together, idiot!

  He looked back at the tiny window, remembering the last time he was in this position. It had been inside the damaged hull of ANS Conqueror as she had made her way through the atmosphere. It ended in a violent emergency landing, followed by hours of hiding and fighting. This time was different though; at least he tried to tell himself that. Now they were heading down by choice, and it made him feel strangely distant to his comrades. He could see the swirling light brown clouds in the skies, as well as layer after layer of roads, rail systems, and tall buildings. It was how he had imagined Terra Nova would be until he actually went there many years earlier.

  “Jack, you ready?” Wictred asked.

  Jack said nothing but lifted his thumb in the universal gesture. Wictred seemed satisfied with that, looking about the craft at the other marines as they sat and waited. All of them wore their latest issue dark gray PDS Alpha armor and black tiger strike camouflage pattern. The gear had been introduced prior to the Helios Expedition and was a minor upgrade to the old version of the armor that had been used in the Corps for decades. It was designed to provide protection against the environment, as well as moderate enemy fire. It fitted close to the skin. Contrary to most people’s thoughts, the suit wasn’t designed to turn each marine into a tank, more it had been created to allow them to operate in any environments within a fully sealed suit. The visors on their helmets were a smoked black color, and the reinforced gorget section at the top of the chest covered the neck and chin; this was the most obvious visual change to the equipment.

  “Remember the briefing. Our job is to secure the officials and to get them back to the birds. We go in fast and get the job done.”

  The marines replied back on the affirmative, and Wictred nodded slowly. Unlike the other marines, he could never have fitted inside standard marine issue gear. Instead, Wictred wore the heavily modified armor produced back on Prometheus and based on specifications laid out by the Alliance military, with the assistance of engineers on Hyperion. The color scheme was identical to the PDS Alpha armor that Jack wore, but it more closely resembled a non-powered version of the exo-skeletal armor used by the massive Vanguards. For a second, Jack actually thought he was looking at one of those pieces of equipment, but the finish was completely different. The slab plating and rougher finish marked it out as a functional object, like everything Wictred’s people used. It was the first time Jack had seen Wictred wear it, and it looked much more aggressive than he’d expected.

  “What do you think of the JAS gear?” called out one of the marines.

  Jack heard the man’s voice and glanced at Wictred to hear his response. The armor’s name was a simple one, and he was pretty sure he’d heard it described as a Jötnar Assault Suit, as opposed to the Personal Defense Suits used by everybody else. At least that was what he’d heard in the barracks.

  “It’s tight, not how I would have designed it,” he said smartly.

  Two more of the marines looked at Wictred as he flexed his muscles. There was no fancy powerplant or hydraulics. Everything that moved was done purely through the strength of its wearer. He looked directly at Jack and lifted up both fists as if boxing. It gave Jack a perfect view of the serrated blades on the arms.
r />   “I like the weapons and armor though. It’s a start, and it is a good match for the Vanguard gear.”

  Jack looked at the arms of the armor and noticed the obvious changes that had been made for the Jötnar. Their propensity for violent close ranged combat had meant the removal of anything designed for ranged combat. The limb joints were stronger, with multiple serrated edges on the arms all the way to the elbows. He imagined this type of new armor would make them even deadlier killing machines. It wasn’t surprising they were being mated up with the Vanguards to create heavy units. Jack looked at the rest of the marines in the Hammerhead and was still surprised at how small they were compared to the enlarged bulk of Wictred. He shook his head, doing his best to hide a laugh.

  This is not going to do anything for Wictred’s ego!

  “Don’t forget the rules of engagement, Corporal,” he called out to his friend.

  Wictred frowned at this, and to others it might have looked as if it was more of a rebuke. Jack knew differently. This was Wictred being annoyed that he wouldn’t be easily able to use his new toys, at least not until they were in serious danger. Wictred protected his face with the left paw and struck a mock punch with the right.

  “If any of them get too close, I’ll have to introduce them to my friend here.”

  It was a modest distraction, but as he looked at Wictred, the thoughts of the Helion synthetics that had been far from his mind were now back and in full form. They had been much like Wictred, though more slight and closer to Jack’s height than his friend. He wondered how many were still on the planet and then banged his helmet hard against the bulkhead.

  What the hell are you doing? Sort it out, now!

  It was the continuous buffeting of the spacecraft that had brought him back to reality, and he was actually thankful for it. The memories of what had been were impacting him, and he needed to focus. Jack looked back to the window and spotted another of the Hammerheads moving in formation. The craft was smaller than the spacecraft normally used for this kind of mission, and it was part of the great change that had swept through the Alliance military. The days of all operations commencing with a massed landing craft assault were long gone. With better vehicles, weapons, and armor, the marines of the Alliance could make use of a host of new vehicles, from the small but fast Hammerheads to the eight-wheel Bulldog armored personnel carriers to launch lightning attacks ahead of the larger landing vehicles.