Escape (Jack Forge, Lost Marine Book 3) Read online

  The spacetime turbulence suddenly died away, now little more than a rumble that could have been overlooked under normal circumstances.

  The image over the holostage was clear now. It showed the two ships, blown off course by the gamma ray burst and spacetime turbulence. They were converging and resuming their course to the rendezvous coordinates. The burst stream had thrown them almost a lightyear off course.

  Jack opened a channel to Captain Morton.

  “How are your people, Captain?” Jack said.

  “We’ve got a lot of frightened civilians over here, Major. They thought we were under attack by the Devex again. Fortunately, there’s only a few minor injuries. Nothing we can’t handle. Looking forward to getting back to the fleet. We’re a bit off course, but we shouldn’t be delayed by too long. How are your people?”

  “One serious case here, Captain. I’ll need access to your best medical facilities. I’ll bring him myself once we back in formation.”

  Morton shook his head slightly. It was barely noticeable, but Jack could tell Morton was not happy.

  “A problem, Captain?” Jack said.

  “I’d be happier with you in command of the frigate. I know you have a skeleton crew as it is, and if the Devex attack...” Morton trailed off.

  “If the Devex attack, one frigate is not going to hold them off. Our best hope is to reconnect with the fleet as soon as possible.”

  “Yes,” Morton agreed, “and we should be back with the fleet very soon. I’ll send over any medical supplies you need for your injured man. That should be sufficient until you can get him to a fleet medical facility.”

  “I don’t know if Commander Torent will survive that long without the best medical care we are able to provide. Your med-bay, med drones, and doctors are far better than a stack of med-packs.” Jack took a breath. “Permission to come aboard, Captain.”

  Morton fidgeted in his seat. Jack could read his hesitance.

  “Is there a problem, Captain?”

  “I have a surveillance link with your ship, Major. I’ve seen what happened to Commander Torent. I don’t know if he should be allowed over here.” Captain Morton leaned in closer to his holostage. “What is happening to his arm, Major?”

  Jack leaned closer to his holostage. Although the two ships were still hundreds of thousands of kilometers apart, Jack and Morton were nose-to-nose.

  “You are spying on a military craft?” Jack said. “We are under constant threat of attack and you are spying on my ship. That might be considered a treasonous act, Captain.”

  “Take it up with Fleet Intelligence when we get back to the fleet. If they order me to take Commander Torent then I will. But until then...”

  Jack had heard enough and spoke over Morton, cutting him off mid-sentence.

  “Prepare to receive me and Commander Torent at the airlock nearest to your best medical facility. You had better open when I knock, Captain. We’ve been friendly until now. Let’s not fall out.”

  Morton stiffened. “I’ll take the patient, Major, but my records will show that I did so against my express concerns for the safety of my passengers.”

  “Noted,” Jack said. He deactivated the call. Stepping down from the command chair, he walked over to Commander Bale.

  “Mr. Bale, find out how Captain Morton is spying on us and stop him.”

  Bale nodded, but before he could reply, Jack had marched off the deck.

  Jack hauled two tactical suits up to the bunk where Sam was still mercifully asleep, and he began to dress Sam in the suit. His right arm was fully formed from the Mech tissue now, though it appeared to be completely lifeless. Jack slid the suit over the arm, trying to avoid touching it himself. With Sam fully suited, helmet in place, Jack climbed into his own suit.

  The tactical suits were the fastest means of traveling between the two ships. Jack used his command codes to take control of Sam’s suit, set his gravity field to zero level, and carried his weightless body toward the lower airlock, down the steps to the lower deck, and down to the lower airlock.

  Drifting out into space was always exhilarating. Jack had never traversed the void for recreational purposes, though. It was usually in response to some hostile action. He wasn’t going out because of an attack this time, but it was still dire.

  During the Mechs’ first encounter with Sam Torent, they had linked to his mechanical endcap, a black composite band around his severed upper arm that housed the dark composite tendrils that linked Sam’s neural systems to his cybernetic arm, a junction between hardware and human. The Mechs had probed it briefly during their final encounter.

  Jack remembered the attack. At the time, it had appeared the Mechs were merely interested in the device. Soon after, when the black composite tendrils had grown and taken on the Mech’s gray color, Jack realized that Sam had been infected somehow. The violent energy of the gamma ray burst had simply activated it and pushed it into a phase of sudden, aggressive growth.

  He was used to making difficult choices. As a Marine, he had been told what to do, but as an officer it had been his responsibility to make life and death choices, to give orders, and to live with the consequences. Jack had decided the best course of action now was to take Sam to the medical facilities on the civilian transport. Jack hated not knowing what was going to happen to his friend, but he had to trust he was making the right choice.

  The civilian transport filled Jack’s view. He was drifting slowly toward an opening in the massive hull, the city-sized craft dominating Jack’s view. Behind him was the frigate, a powerful warship in its own right but nothing like the size of the civilian transport. Jack risked a glance back at the frigate. It was receding fast, a glinting speck lost in the sea of the endless void.

  A message came over Jack’s tactical suit helmet communicator. Jack opened the channel. The voice of Bale sounded clear and close. Jack looked back at the distant frigate.

  “Yes, go ahead, Mr. Bale,” Jack said.

  “Major, I’ve redeployed the sensor drones to their maximum range. I’m detecting something moving in on our position.”

  “Can you be more specific?” Jack asked.

  “It could be a sensor shadow. It might be that the gamma ray burst has thrown my sensor calibration right out, but…”

  “What is it, Commander?” Jack pressed, but in his gut, he knew.

  “A number of objects approaching at speed. They’ll be on top of us in under an hour.”

  Jack looked at the airlock racing closer. He adjusted his suit’s gravity field and reached out to the hull. His grav field connected with the transport’s hull and he drew Sam and himself slowly and carefully toward the opening, maneuvering them both safely inside.

  “Keep a close eye on those objects and inform me when you have a clear signal. Copy?”

  “I’ve just received a fresh data stream from the drone net, Major. Sensor reading is conclusive.” Bale’s voice was muted, afraid. “It is a Devex warship.”

  Jack looked up at the frigate above him as the civilian transport’s outer airlock door closed.

  “Get the frigate ready for combat, Mr. Bale. Stand by for my orders.”

  3

  As the pressure in the airlock increased with a high-pitched whine, Jack moved to the inner door. He jabbed at the release panel until the door finally slid open. A crewman was waiting inside.

  Jack walked Sam out of the airlock and over to the crewman.

  “Take him to the med-bay. Make sure he gets there safely.” Jack fixed the crewman with a hard stare. The crewman nodded emphatically and hooked Sam’s left arm over his shoulder, walking him along the curving white corridor.

  “I need to get back to my ship,” Jack said and stepped back inside the airlock. He sealed the inner door behind him. Walking across the airlock, Jack looked out through the small porthole in the outer hatch. The frigate was falling behind and slipping from view.

  “Commander Bale. You are not holding position. Report,” Jack said into his suit’s c
ommunicator.

  Bale’s voice was angry and flustered. “The transport is pulling away. She must have spotted the Devex and she’s running. We can’t keep up. The frigate is at breaking point. I’ll burn out the main reactor if I push any harder.”

  Jack watched as the frigate slipped further behind, out of Jack’s limited view. He considered briefly contacting Captain Morton and telling him to slow down, to maintain the formation, but he realized he did not have authority over Morton’s ship, and what’s more, the captain was clearly running for his life. Jack would never be able to convince the captain while fear was in charge.

  “Commander Bale,” Jack said as he turned away from the outer airlock hatch. “Get out of danger. Run. Hide. Just don’t get caught. Get back to the fleet if you can. I’ll remain on the transport.”

  “But, Major,” Bale said, “the transport can’t outrun the Devex ships. The transport will surely be captured. We can’t prevent it, but if you leave now, I can collect you from space.”

  “Negative, Commander,” Jack said. He sealed the inner airlock behind him. “Sam needs medical attention. He has to stay here. I’ll remain on board and organize the defense over here. Get clear. Stay safe. The frigate is yours, Commander Bale. Forge out.”

  Jack ran along the corridor and caught up with the crewman carrying Sam.

  “Hurry it up there, Crewman,” Jack said. “There is a Devex ship approaching fast and it will be on us in no time. We will need Commander Torent up on his feet if we hope to survive an attack.”

  The medical bay was almost as large as the main deck on the frigate. It was long and divided by clear composite partitions. A short, human-shaped drone with a white composite shell and friendly synthetic face came down the central aisle and looked up at Jack.

  “Bring the patient this way,” the medical drone said in a friendly voice and then turned to lead the way.

  A second medical drone joined them at the bunk, and the drones began to remove Sam’s tactical suit and deposit it carefully on a nearby unit. Once undressed, a series of straps deployed across the bunk to hold Sam in place. One long probe from a drone was slid into Sam’s ear, another in his mouth. A probe pierced Sam’s arm and drew blood.

  Jack watched the medical drones perform the swift procedure. One of the drones removed the med-pack from Sam’s neck.

  Sam woke immediately, his eyes wide and frantic. He began jerking and thrashing about, constrained by the straps across his body.

  “It’s okay, Sam,” Jack said, touching Sam’s shoulder.

  Sam turned and stared as Jack. His eyes were dull and gray, yet they burned with an intensity that Jack had seldom seen in him.

  Then the straps snapped. Sam reached out to Jack with his Mech right arm, perfectly formed from the gray tissue. The fingers gripped Jack around the throat. A drone reached for Sam’s right arm, to restrain him and free Jack from the crushing grip.

  Sam’s forearm seemed to unravel, and a series of fine gray strands erupted from the surface. They reached out and wrapped themselves around the drone’s arm. The drone lost power, the synthetic face going limp and even more lifeless. Then the strands threaded into the drone.

  Jack grabbed Sam’s Mech wrist. He managed to speak. “Sam. It’s me. It’s Jack.”

  The threads were whipping out of Sam’s arm and enveloping the drone’s arm. The second drone scuttled back. A containment wall came crashing down around the small bay containing Jack, Sam, and the disabled medical drone.

  “Sam,” Jack pleaded again.

  Sam looked from Jack to the drone. The threads pulled out of the drone and merged seamlessly back into Sam’s Mech arm. They left the medical drone unpowered, its head lolling to one side. Then Sam turned his fierce gaze on Jack. The fine threads spun out from the wrist and headed toward Jack’s face. Jack felt the tips of the threads skate over his skin, touching his eyes, inside his nostrils. They were cold and hard, even though they were fine as a strand of spider web.

  Jack pulled and loosened Sam’s grip enough to speak without impediment.

  “Commander Torent,” Jack shouted. “Stand down, Marine. That is an order.”

  The hand around Jack’s throat slackened. Jack pulled it away and gasped for breath. Sam’s arm hovered just within reach, the pair contained in the isolation bay.

  “Stand down, Marine,” Jack said as he massaged his throat. “Do you copy?”

  Sam spoke. He sounded confused.

  “Jack? Jack? Where are we?”

  “I said do you copy, Marine? Answer the question.”

  “Yes, sir,” Sam said. “Stand down, sir. Copy that.”

  Sam looked around, confused. Jack leaned against the composite wall.

  “At ease, Sam,” Jack said, eying his old friend with a hint of fear.

  “What happened?” Sam held his gray arm up and studied it, clenching and unclenching his new gray, Mech fist, turning the wrist, bending the elbow. Fear and wonder on his face. “What’s this?” He looked at Jack with fear and anxiety. “What happened? What’s going on?”

  Jack didn’t know where to begin, and then he heard the beat of boots in the med-bay. Jack turned to see Marine Squad Leader Hawke and a small squad of militia running in. Hawke slowed as he spotted Jack.

  The containment walls of clear composite were tough and reached from deck to ceiling, but Jack could hear Hawke’s voice through them.

  “Major Forge?” he said in surprise and confusion. “There are reports of an attack in the medical bay.”

  Jack nodded toward Sam, sitting up on the medical bunk, studying his new right arm.

  “Commander Torent had a bad reaction to his…” Jack hesitated. “His new cybernetic arm. He hasn’t had one for a while.”

  Hawke pointed at the medical drone, deactivated and slumped against the containment wall on the far side of the med bunk.

  Jack glanced over his shoulder. The drone had been deactivated by the gray threads from Sam’s arm. Jack looked at Sam. He appeared calm, if a little confused, and was still studying his arm.

  Jack turned back to Hawke. “Guess some of the equipment is not at its best,” Jack said with a shrug. He tapped on the composite with his knuckles. “What do we have to do to get this removed, Hawke?”

  Hawke looked uneasy. He didn’t want to disobey a superior officer, and one who he held so much respect and admiration for, but he also didn’t want to release Sam, a man who had just destroyed a medical drone.

  Jack read the young Marine. He guessed the reason for his hesitation. A sharp order might snap him out of his indecision, Jack thought, but he decided to try a different, softer approach.

  “He’s okay,” Jack said, nodding to Sam. “I can vouch for him and I will guarantee his conduct. Now do you want to remove this containment so we can deal with the real problem?”

  Hawke nodded. He contacted the command deck and spoke to the security officer there.

  “You can release the containment shell in the med-bay. It’s Major Forge. It’s just a misunderstanding.”

  The walls retracted, drawn back up into the ceiling. The deactivated med drone fell over as the composite wall was removed.

  Stepping toward Hawke, Jack opened a channel to the captain on the command deck.

  “This is Forge. How long do we have?”

  Captain Morton sounded flustered. He was a civilian captain, not used to combat situations. He was doing his best, but Jack could hear the tension in his voice.

  “The Devex are closing fast, Major. We don’t have long.”

  Jack gestured at Hawke and told him to wait. He walked over to Sam, still sitting up on the side of the bunk.

  “And the frigate?” Jack asked Morton.

  “The frigate has disappeared from our sensors. I think it has been destroyed. We are defenseless.”

  Jack guessed Bale had followed his orders and had switched to silent running so the little frigate could remain hidden from the Devex.

  “We’re not quite as defenseless as y
ou think, Captain.” Jack looked at Hawke, the young squad leader, with a knowing smile. “We have some experienced Marines on board. Permission to join you on your command deck, Captain?” Jack said.

  “Whatever you think is best. We are relying on you now, Major. You are the only thing standing between us and the Devex. Morton out.”

  Jack slapped Sam hard on the shoulder.

  “Sam,” Jack said firmly.

  Sam looked away from his arm to Jack and then back to his arm again.

  “Commander Torent,” Jack said more firmly. “Get up. Suit up and fall in. Do you copy?”

  Sam looked at Jack in a daze.

  “I said, do you copy, Marine?”

  Sam seemed to wake from his reverie. “Yes. I heard you, Jack. Get up.” He looked at his arm again. The gray hand and fingers moved as naturally as a human arm.

  “I gave you an order,” Jack shouted.

  Sam was off the bunk. He stood before Jack at attention. “Yes, sir. Suit up and fall in, sir. Yes, sir.”

  Jack nodded, then patted Sam on the shoulder. “Hurry, Sam,” he said more softly. “We don’t have much time.”

  4

  The command deck was a buzz of activity, and Jack could feel the tension coming from all the command deck officers. Captain Morton was in front of the central holostage looking at an image of the pursuing Devex warship.

  The warship sat in the center of a squadron of a dozen Devex Raiders. The massive warship dominated the holoimage. Captain Morton stared at it, transfixed.

  Jack walked over to the holostage and stood next to the captain.

  “How long before they get here?” Jack asked casually.

  Morton’s head dropped for a moment. He picked it up and looked at Jack. He shook his head slightly and then looked back at the image. The huge black slab of a Devex warship with the sleek raiders like tiny flies around a huge beast was an ominous sight. Jack and Morton both knew what it meant.