Hostage To The Stars: A Sectors SF Romance (18 page)

“Sounds like a dull life to me,” he said. “No offense. But the AO disappeared a million years ago, as best we can figure. Hardly a current event.”

“The senior professor I work for got a grant to do a big dig out in the Sectors rim and he hired me as the project archivist, which is why I traveled in the first place. Then when my contract ended, I thought I’d see a little of the Sectors before going home to the University. Big mistake.”

Johnny tried to imagine her on Azrigone, which had no known AO sites. He didn’t know if there was any kind of museum. Certainly the cultural offerings of his home world weren’t a topic he’d ever considered before. What would a person with Sara’s background do on his world?

As if reading his mind, she said, “I have—had—enough material now to write a series of books. There are several intriguing theories I want to pursue. Do you think my belongings on the
Star Swan
got forwarded to my parents? I’d hate to lose my notes and materials.” She sighed. “When the pirates took me, I never thought I’d ever have the chance to write another scholarly word.” Sara leaned over and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “I owe you so much—I can’t ever thank you properly.”

“Doing my job,” he said. “Although I’m happy to offer suggestions about ways to reward my efforts.” He gave her an exaggerated wink.

As he’d hoped, Sara laughed. “I bet you are. After all this adventuring, I don’t want to bury myself in the University’s archives and storerooms any more. I can write books anywhere.” Her voice got so quiet Johnny could barely hear her over the engine’s humming. “After almost dying on this wretched planet, I want to really
live
, you know? Not drift through life. Not settle for sloppy seconds.”

“I get it.” He drove a few more miles, having to detour around washed out areas where flash floods must have swept through as a result of last night’s storm. Keeping his eyes on the terrain, concerned how she’d gone silent, he gave into his curiosity and said, “I should probably warn you I’m a trained interrogator.”

Eyebrows raised, she gazed at him. “Meaning?”

Wishing he hadn’t probed into her life before their meeting, he adjusted in the driver’s seat to buy time. “You sound as if there was something else going on, more to your decision not to go back to the University, or at least not right away.” Hoping he hadn’t upset her, he glanced sideways. “Instincts based on all my years in the service. Sorry, it’s none of my business, forget I said anything.”

Sara averted her eyes for a moment. “Old story, doesn’t show me in a good light. Impressionable young grad student fancies herself in love with the famous professor. Working with him at the dig, finding new AO tech, was the thrill of a lifetime and we were doing all this research together, in our own small world. We—we eventually had an affair. But when the time came to pack up the site and return to the university, he told me to take a sabbatical, because he was getting married to a woman waiting at home.”

“What a jerk. Poor deluded girl waiting for him at home.”

“I hadn’t even known he was engaged. The worst part?”

Johnny could imagine. He hoped he never met this dirtbag, because it’d be hard not to kill him for treating Sara so shabbily. “You don’t have to tell me.”

“He said by the time I resumed my job at the University after my year away, we’d be able to pick up where we left off because his wife wouldn’t be suspicious after a year of newlywed bliss.”

Hands clenched on the steering mechanism, Johnny said,” I hope you told him where he could stick his offer.”

Sara’s voice held savage satisfaction. “I did, even if it costs me my job. I don’t want to see that place ever again now anyway. This experience on Farduccir, meeting you, has changed my outlook and what I want out of life.”

Before he could say anything, an alarm sounded. Flicking the tab to silence the buzzer, Johnny steered the ground car into the nearest grove of trees and parked, leaving the engine idling. He scanned the vids, Sara leaning close to do the same. After a few moments he said, “I don’t see anything. Maybe the scanners picked up one or two of the large carrion eating birds. They’ve got a fourteen foot wingspan at maturity and fly in big flocks.”

She eyed him. “Do you actually believe what you just said?”

He shook his head. “Not really, but there isn’t anything on the readouts or visible to the naked eye. We’ll wait another ten minutes and then get going again.”

Sinking into her seat, Sara drummed her fingers on the control panel and bit her lip. “I want us to get off this damn planet in one piece. Is that so much to ask? Can’t the Lords of Space cut us a break?”

“The distort shields are activated. Even if there is a Mawreg robo flying overwatch, they can’t see us.” Johnny tried to be reassuring. “The ground here is rocky so we aren’t leaving tracks. Best thing for us to do is get to that base in the mountains, call for pickup and make our escape.” He set the ground car in motion again and nosed cautiously out from under the trees. No alarms sounded, so he kept driving north, goosing the speed from the previous mark. The old model car hadn’t been maintained, so he hadn’t wanted to push it but now the situation was changed.

He had to stop twice more during the day, the last time sitting in the open while two enemy robos soared overhead in a search pattern, plainly not seeing the shielded groundcar but obviously knowing the quarry had to be in the vicinity.
 

Johnny took a deep breath as the robos moved to the west and soon were out of view. “I have an idea.”

Eyebrows raised, she turned to him. “I’m open to a change in plans. My heart can’t take much more of this sitting duck stuff.” She patted her chest and grinned bravely. “I’m having palpitations.”

“We’re going to reach a point where the car won’t help us any more anyway. We’ll have to climb on foot because I’m not bringing us into the main entrance of the old base. I’m taking a less traveled route.”

“So?”

“How about if we blow the car up?”

“Without us inside,” she said.

Laughing, he said, “Right. We’ll drive a little further north today and close to sunset I’ll unshield gradually, as if the mechanism failed, or maybe I got over confident. We drive like a bat out of hell until the sensors give us the alert that the enemy is on our tail, then I set the car on auto, arm the self-destruct and we bail into the brush. The car detonates in a fireball, the enemy thinks we’re toast, and we sprint to the base. Home free.”

“What is it with you military guys and self-destruct mechanisms?” she asked with a smile. “It’s your answer to everything.”

“Just about.” He shrugged. “It works. Are you in?”

“Sure. I don’t see much in the way of options.”

CHAPTER NINE

Late in the afternoon, Johnny started playing with the distort, to give the impression it was flickering on and off. “Baiting the trap,” he said.

“I’m not too keen on being bait.”

“We’re getting out soon, so be patient a little longer.” As he finished speaking, the alarm blared and they exchanged glances. “Time to go. You got your pack?”

Sara nodded, jaw clenched. “You’ll be right behind, you promise?”

“Absolutely. You go due east, into the canyon and I’ll catch up.” He slowed the car, drove as close as he dared to the tree line they were skirting, and gave Sara the signal. She opened her door and jumped out, rolling a few times before leaping to her feet and racing into the cover provided by the rough terrain.
 

Relieved to see her moving so quickly and therefore probably uninjured from the fall, Johnny set the ground car to accelerate, checked the timer on the self-destruct and bailed out himself. He hid in a rocky outcropping and waited. The two robos flew overhead, accelerating as the ground car became visible, swooping at it, and firing thin rays of energy. When the vehicle detonated with a massive explosion, the robos were caught in the shockwave. One burst into flames and crashed, making its own smaller explosion. The second wobbled a few times and seemed to lose power, landing upside down in a crumpled heap next to the burning wreckage.

Satisfied, Johnny worked his way through the nest of boulders and headed cross country to intercept Sara.
Bought us precious time but I bet they’ll be back.

Six hours later, hunkered down at the entrance to the base, Johnny input his code in a frantic tattoo and swore as nothing happened. Sara pressed close to his side and bit her lip while she scanned the sky behind them. Being tracked by Mawreg robos for the last hour or so had both of them running on adrenaline. Trusting her to have his six, Johnny took a deep breath before entering the code again and this time was rewarded with a green light. The panel slid open enough for one person to pass and he shoved her inside unceremoniously. Right on her heels, he spun to hit the closing mechanism.

She’d tripped and fallen, instinctively throwing her broken hand in front of her body to break the fall, and screamed from pain.

Holstering his blaster, he picked her up as she cradled her broken hand with her good arm, and jogged deeper into the installation. “Sorry. We know how close the bad guys are.”

Head leaning against his chest, she said, “Never apologize to me, remember? We made a deal.”

He shifted her body in his arms for a more secure hold. “Right. Even if the Mawreg or the Chimmer are on the way right now, it’d take them hours to burn or blast their way in. This heavily fortified base is a much tougher nut to crack than the bolt hole. We have time and a couple ways out if required. Alternative sites on base for the extract to happen, especially if the
Penny
sends fighters and a squad of Marines in the dropship to provide covering fire. I’m going to call for the angels now.” He reached the control room and set her in a dusty chair. Squatting to be at eye level, he tucked her hair behind her ears and said, “You doing ok?”

“I’ll be fine. Do what you need to do.” She patted his cheek for a moment.

He straightened and surveyed the panels. Hoping the systems still worked, he activated the comlink and punched in his identifier.

“Good to hear from you again, Sgt. Danver. This is Comtech Anstell on the
Penny
and we’ve been listening for you since we got on station here.” The voice added authentication code causing Johnny to breath deep in relief. He could trust this transmission. “What can we do for you?”

He gave Sara a thumbs up and said, “I need an immediate extract for myself and one injured civilian.”

“No can do, sorry, sergeant. We’re about to rain holy hell on that planet. Countdown has begun. No time to launch a retrieval.”

Sara gasped. Johnny wasn’t surprised. Once he’d reported the presence of Mawreg forces, the planet’s fate was sealed. The Sectors never took a chance on any world where the Mawreg themselves had landed, much less dug in and built installations like the one he’d described. Some Farduccir survivors might have been rescued but he doubted it, since the war lord had apparently signed on to the Mawreg cause. “Understood. Any suggestions?”

“Can you get yourself off the surface? We could swing by and retrieve you later.”

After the entire planet had been destroyed.

“Maybe. Timeline?”

“Classified.” The open comlink hissed for a moment before the comtech gave them a few final, carefully chosen words. “Let’s say you could play one quarter of tisba, if you had an antigrav ball. Good luck, sergeant.
Penelope
out.” The link went dead.

“Only fifteen standard minutes,” Sara said. “Is he serious?”

Heart thumping painfully at the idea of her death, after all this effort to save her, he nodded. “Let’s see what this depot has left. Maybe we’ll luck out and there’s a flier. I can pilot a small ship.”

She held out her good hand and he tugged her from the chair. With her leaning on him, they made quick time into the underground hanger area, which was depressingly empty. One surface flitter and a partially disassembled ground car sat in the midst of spare parts.

“No use. We have to get
off
the planet,” he said. Swearing, he kicked over a stack of spare parts kitted for shipment but never loaded onto a barge. Sara gasped and jumped out of the way of the skittering packages.

“There’s equipment behind the flier,” she said. “Under a tarp. Might it be useful?”

For lack of anything better to do, he walked to the sizable object and pulled the plasta protector back a foot. “Lords of Space,” he said. Excitement mounting, he yanked the covering completely off.

“What is it?” Sara came to stand next to him.

“An escape pod.” A one person escape pod, but he didn’t mention the fact. Feverishly he worked to clear away the boxes and bins surrounding it and blocking the launch track. One handed, Sara helped.

“But aren’t those for escaping from a ship to a planet?” she asked.

“Normally, yes. But Special Forces tries out new gear from time to time and we were testing these pods for situations where one man might be stuck behind enemy lines on a planet and need to escape, where no extraction was possible. Loxton manufactured about a hundred top secret prototypes and we had five here on Farduccir. I did a couple of the test runs. I don’t know what happened to the program—Mike and I were reassigned to a new mission so I filed my report and forgot about it.” He checked the pod sat on a launch mechanism, which it did, and craned his head to check the ceiling for the exit tunnel. He’d have to pray the tunnel was unobstructed to the surface, no time to check anything. He fiddled with the pod’s exterior control panel, eliciting a hum as power flowed through the mechanism. A hatch popped open and a soothing blue glow illuminated the pod’s interior.