Hostage To The Stars: A Sectors SF Romance (3 page)

Kidnap and ransom insurance as a routine way of doing business? Damn, this Sector was really screwed up.

“We believe the target of the grab was Miss Immer.” The briefing officer swung to the projected holo of the woman. Johnny watched the Sector Governor, who winced and buried his head in his hands for a moment. Interesting. “As you know, Ms. Immer is a key member of the staff of the Sector Fifty Five agricultural agency.”

He pondered the victim, memorizing her face. Her perfectly coiffed hair, impeccable makeup, gemstone earrings and expensive dress in the agency ID file didn’t shout “farmer” to him. Being a rancher, if a bureaucrat like her came to him to discuss crop rotation or breeding stock, he’d have a more than healthy dose of skepticism. She’d have to demonstrate a lot of expertise in the field to get his respect.

“Ransom negotiations have been underway but the kidnappers are demanding an excessive amount, as well as other considerations, and we anticipate the talks are going to break down.”

For a farm agency employee?
Johnny considered her again and watched the governor, whose eyes were glistening. Oh no, this was a personal issue all the way. He wondered if well-known Mrs. Governor Gurgins was as distressed about the fate of a minor bureaucrat.

Now the briefing officer hesitated, giving his superior officer a glance. “Additionally, Ms. Immer has a medical condition which could be life threatening if she’s unable to receive proper treatment. Therefore we’re going in now, to extract her.”

“Sectors Command was unable to reassign a team of Special Forces operators to handle the job–”

Johnny heard the subtext loud and clear. The Sectors authorities were aware this was all bullshit, Ms. Immer was the governor’s mistress and probably had no life threatening disease but the detail made a handy pretext for taking action, rather than waiting for the standard ransom procedure to play out. The governor apparently couldn’t bear to go through the K&R process, panicked and yanked everyone’s chain to get her rescued. Which could get her killed, especially as these eight boy scouts seated at the table were regular troops, not Special Forces. Johnny bet the pirates knew damn well who they had in their prison and how valuable she could be. And he’d been assigned as window dressing, to show the Sectors cared. When of course the politicos didn’t give a rat’s ass over the fate of one low ranking clerk, but couldn’t afford to ignore a rising young governor ascending in the Sectors power structure, who wanted his pretty mistress rescued. Johnny slouched lower in his chair. He hated these political missions.

“Sergeant Johnny Danver, who had extensive experience on Farduccir during the original engagement with the Mawreg, has been assigned by the Sectors to our task force as a consultant. He’s a highly decorated veteran of more classified missions than we have time to talk about.”

Johnny raised one hand in a casual wave as all eyes in the room turned to him for a moment. “Happy to help.” This was either going to be a piece of cake as promised, and he’d be on his way home in a couple of weeks or it was going to be the most screwed up job he’d ever been on and he’d never see Azrigone again. He’d bet heavily on the latter outcome. At least it was him and not Mike, since his cousin had a new wife and a baby on the way.

The briefing ended and the officers and the governor departed. As soon as the door closed, Captain Scortun took the floor and the atmosphere lightened. The soldiers kicked back in their chairs. “I don’t have to tell you how important this is to the Governor,” he said, sitting casually on the end of the conference table. “We get his lady home in one piece and he’ll be all kinds of grateful. This could be our most important mission to date, gentlemen.”
 

He brought up a holo of a building. Johnny gave the screen his full attention. “Ms. Immer is being held here, in a wing of the warlord’s own palace, if I can use the term so loosely. Pretty much a large house in the middle of a compound. Umarri’s aware she’s got more than usual value, so she wasn’t put into the prison or sent to another camp. The neutral party negotiating team has been allowed to meet with her and give her the meds she needs.” He winked. “We’re going to be dropped here after dark.” He indicated a point in the low foothills, probably two hours away from the palace compound. “We’ll reach the target at midnight, cut our way into the rear of the estate, break into the wing of the palace, grab Ms. Immer and be on our way. The pickup point is here.” He indicated another spot in the foothills to the east.

“How many guards?” Johnny asked. “What level of armaments are they carrying?”

Captain Scortun gave him an odd look but answered readily. “Fifty men patrol the palace compound but only ten in the area we’re concerned with at any given time. The pirate ground operation is on the lean side.” He keyed the readout to display winking red dots. “Intel says these are the patrol routes. We’ll have a window of time to get in and out. Armament? The locals undoubtedly broke into the stockpiles the Sectors left behind when we withdrew, although anything valuable was supposed to be destroyed or rendered inactive. Any gear the inhabitants swiped is fifteen years old.”

“Fifty to nine isn’t great odds.”

“These are poorly trained thugs,” the corporal seated next to Scortun scoffed. “Who herd sheep when not playing soldier for the warlord.”

“You can choose to believe that,” Johnny said, giving the scoffer a stare. “The mountain people are fierce warriors, disciplined, tough.”

“Ok, right. Noted.” Scortun gave a few more operational details as his men asked sporadic questions. “Briefing concluded, men, we’ll be leaving the Station in six hours.”

“Aren’t we going to outline alternate scenarios?” Johnny asked.

“Not sure I catch your drift, sergeant. We go in as I discussed, we grab Ms. Immer, we exit.” Scortun raised one eyebrow.

“What if the route in is heavily guarded? What if there’s been construction since those holos were created? What if she’s been moved to another cell? Are you aware in this season northern Farduccir is subject to violent storms? Flash floods? What if we’re cut off from the designated exfil point – where’s the backup?” He couldn’t believe the officer in charge wasn’t going to run at least a few what ifs. In Special Forces, teams spent hours ahead of the mission working out the job from every conceivable angle and a few batshit crazy, inconceivable possibilities. Operators had to be prepared for all eventualities because as soon as the boots hit the deck, plans were subject to change. The Lords of Space loved to laugh at the plans humans made.

“Stand down, sergeant,” Scortun said. “We get you’re an ex Special Forces op. Retired, right?”

Johnny nodded, although taking note of the vaguely contemptuous tone the captain gave the word ‘retired’. “Honorably discharged.”

“Sorry Command dragged you into the game for this. No need to prove anything to us. Stay out of our way, take orders, come along for the ride. My men and I have done this kind of job before.”

Slouching in his chair, Johnny raised his eyebrows. “On a world like Farduccir?”

“Simulated.” Jaw clenched, eyes narrowed, Scortun’s attitude was pugnacious. “And several hostage situations on various worlds in our Sectors. We’re the go-to strike team in Fifty Five.”

My sympathies to the citizens of that Sector.
“Just tryin’ to help.”

“We don’t need your help, except as an extra gun maybe. I repeat, stand down, sergeant.”

“Yes, sir.” Johnny thought Scortun was lucky he’d come along for this ride, not Mike, who would have pulled rank on this clown, handed him his ass and run a proper operation. Maybe there’d been another reason why Sectors Command had wanted Mike, to instill discipline into this disaster in the making. Resolving to watch his own six because for damn sure he didn’t trust these jokers to do the job properly, Johnny studied the holo of the pirate compound and surrounding territory and identified his own alternate methods of getting in and out.

The casual attitude of the Sector 55 team continued to irk him as he geared up, had an excellent meal and later filed into the fast little dropship with his new, unfriendly comrades. Merely because the pirates weren’t used to having anyone attempt to extract their hostages didn’t mean they weren’t going to be prepared for the eventuality. These pirates did kidnap and ransom for a living. He sat at ease in his assigned place and tried not to feel like a grunt ground pounder, which is all the Sector 55 guys seemed to want from him. He’d keep his eyes open. His after action report was going to be a scorcher. The local command would probably bury it in the center of a black hole, but he’d be sending it unofficially to a few trusted old friends in the Special Forces command structure as well.
 

This was bullshit and the waste of a very expensive Sectors’ Tier One operator.
 

Him.
 

CHAPTER THREE

The pilot of the shuttle dropped them high in the atmosphere over Farduccir and the nine men descended in individual descent mode, forming into a squad on the designated small plateau in the forbidding foothills. Johnny at the rear, the soldiers marched in the direction of the pirate stronghold. Sure enough, about an hour into the hike, a storm struck. Fortunately for his companions, he’d marked a small cave formation in his study of the terrain and led them to shelter there, before a flash flood came along to wipe them out.
 

The soldiers lounged around the cave, barely able to see each other in the gloom, and groused.
 

“Tell me again why we had to come in to rescue this woman now?” said the corporal. He glared at the sheeting cold rain outside.

“Word is the governor’s wife is bidding against him in the ransom negotiation,” the captain replied. “Might have even arranged the grab in the first place.”

The idea made sense to Johnny; given everything else he’d heard and seen so far in Sector Fifty Five. If the general civilian populace of this area had any idea what went on at the highest levels, they’d be amazed. The galaxy-wide war against the Mawreg and their client races occupied so much of the time and attention of the overarching Sectors government, small problems like corrupt politicians and pockets of inefficiency didn’t matter. Not if the Mawreg were held at bay. Just his luck to be caught in the local mess.

Eventually the storm cleared and the flash flood in the canyon subsided and the squad was able to move. The captain set a fast pace now, as he was running over an hour behind on the timetable.
 

The team reached the town where the warlord had his palace and slunk through the underbrush to the rear of the compound as planned. The corporal sent a small drone aloft to fly overwatch. The building matched the holo in the briefing, maybe a bit more rundown but certainly no improvements. Johnny timed the guards and observed the gaps in coverage. These guys were pretty slipshod, overconfident and more interested in staying out of the periodic rain showers. Hardly the proud warriors he’d interacted with during his previous deployment to Farduccir. Two of the Sector 55 soldiers cut a hole in the fence and remained behind to provide cover while the rest of the squad slipped inside, moving smoothly to the rear of the building, using every ounce of cover.

So far, so good.

The corporal breached the door and the team slipped inside, ascending the flight of stairs in a well-practiced maneuver. Bringing up the rear, Johnny was minimally impressed. Easy enough to do when no one was shooting at you.

The corridor on the top floor was empty. The soldiers prowled door to door, scanning each room, all empty. One was an office and the others were bedrooms.
 

“Pay dirt,” whispered the soldier with the scanner when he reached the last door. “One woman alone in here.”

“Which might not be Ms. Immer,” the captain reminded them. “Go in with caution.”

But when the corporal sprung the old fashioned wooden door open, the hostage they sought snored in the large bed. She woke with a scream.

“We’re here to rescue you, ma’am. Governor Gurgins sent us,” the captain said, covering the floor to the bed in two steps, hand at his lips in a shushing motion. “No time to get dressed, we’re out of here.”

“But my clothes—” She clutched the sheet with one hand and gestured at her thin nightgown with the other. “I can’t go like this.”

“Use the blanket for a wrap and move,” Johnny said, earning himself a scowl from the captain. “Shoes?”

“We’ll carry her.” The captain motioned the biggest soldier forward. Slinging his weapon, the man picked her up as if she weighed nothing and slung her over his shoulder.

Johnny providing cover, the team moved into the corridor, closing her door behind them. As he reached the stairs, sounds of movement drifted up from below. He raised a clenched fist and the squad stopped. “Someone’s coming,” he whispered. He tried the office door next to him, which was unlocked. The group slipped inside. Johnny took the position at the door, which he kept open a crack. Judging by the utilitarian garments, the intruder was a servant, and passed by without stopping.

“What about Sara Bridges?” Ms. Immer whispered. “Aren’t you going to get her too?”

Captain Scortun leaned closer. “Who?”

“The other woman taken off the
Star Swan
with me.”

“We're here for you, ma’am. No intel on anyone else.” Scortun’s answer was crisp and disinterested.