I turned to look at the ship in utter amazement one more time. Wondering what ancient race had made such a thing that could hard crash itself into a world and survive.
I whispered something. I think I was muttering that I didn’t want the Monarch to say what she’d been saying all along. If she said You gotta believe in something, Sergeant Orion… Well, then… Boom. I do her right here and let the captain decide what to do with me on the other side of it. I was cool with the judgment.
But she didn’t do that.
“The primary ship was destroyed during reentry and the crash,” she said. “What you are seeing is… the lifeboat. This is how the ship crashed. Much of the larger ship exploded across the desert up there and created the crust fractures after her primary pulse shields overloaded and softened the landing by creating the continental crater to brake for impact. They were still going too fast and so the main superstructure detonated to save the lifeboat. We theorize some kind of superweapon fired and created the tube down into the core at the last second, allowing the lifeboat to enter with maximum armor, using something we think is called a ‘Repulse Ram’ and of course braking engines in full reverse. Farther down, the entire front end of the ship is smashed. The crew there were killed instantly. We’ve only been down that far externally and with drones. The damage is very bad there. Most of the technology is unrecoverable from those sections. But most of the ship beyond the bow survived.”
“That’s not possible,” said Punch. “That ship is bigger than a damned Ultra Battle Spire. The original ship would have to be… huge. Enormous. Gigantic even. Ain’t nothing like that ever been built in the galaxy, lady.”
“This ship isn’t from this galaxy. Not in its current form.” She came out of her trance and looked at the rest of us. Her eyes landing on me. Then the captain. “But…”
She looked at me again. Like maybe she’d said something she hadn’t meant to. And now she wanted to take it all back.
“We’re running out of time,” she said. “They’ll be directing more guards to react to us. We’ve got to cross now and enter the ship. We’ll be safer in there.”
“Safer from who?” asked Choker.
The captain, still cradling the shotgun, turned toward the Seeker. His voice was cold as the grave. Monarch or no Monarch.
“My sergeant has questions. I think you should answer them, ma’am.”
The Monarch must’ve sensed we’d all kill her right there. The company thinks as one. We may fight and gamble and play tricks on each other as much as we do on any enemy. But when the captain has made it clear he’s not happy with someone, well then, the company isn’t happy with that particular someone.
“Okay,” she said. Taking her hands off her wicked high-speed little machine gun. It dangled by the two-point sling. I was waiting for her to pop one of her dangerous grenades and do something freaky to us. Stun us. Gas us. Make us disappear to the ninth dimension. Heck, maybe she’d just turn into bats and fly away. Things felt tense and uneasy. Dark. Dangerous even. “But let’s get an advance team across the gap, Captain. We’ll be safer in there. I’ll explain as we go.”
“Safer from who?” mumbled Choker again.
“The apes,” she answered softly. “They’ll be back. In greater numbers next time. They’re the guardians of the wreck.”
The captain waited, staring at her. Not liking the deal. But knowing she was still our employer. I could see him thinking there are some deals you just don’t make. Shouldn’t make. Deals with the devil. And him thinking we’d made just that.
I didn’t think it. Didn’t need to. I knew it. Knew the kind of deal we’d made. Later I’d tell myself we had no choice. That we’d had to make the deal as the Ultras started their first pass. That we’d had no other real option.
But that’s a cop-out. You’ve always got choices. Some are just easier than others.
“I assume we’re using the cables to swing across,” said the captain. Allowing the bargain. Allowing the story of our tragedy to progress.
She nodded.
The Old Man turned to me. His eyes as hard as those nails in that cold coffin grave.
“Sergeant Orion, get a team across and secure a breach point.”
Chapter Forty-Two
The company worked mountaineering skills whenever we had a chance. We’d found combat climbing skills came in handy when you didn’t want to fight fair. And as a rule, our SOP was all about never actually fighting fair.
Fighting fair is for amateurs. Plus, we didn’t have the manpower, guns, and best tech to do so. Sometimes I was glad we didn’t. It made us work harder knowing we were lacking. If we’d had those things, maybe we would have gotten lazy. Then where would we have been?
The galaxy is filled with the graves of dead mercenaries who got lazy. But there are also graves for the pros who have to do it the hard way. I have to be honest about that because it’s best to. I’ve found that graveyards are sometimes the least discriminatory places you’ll ever go.
Death is the great equalizer. That’s for sure. Right, Orion? So get it on.
I slammed into the alien ship’s cold hull after following Punch and Jacks across on the first vines. Her voice was in my ear. In all of our comms. She was telling us what she knew. Why we were here. What was so important about this wreck. The whole show. The ticket to the ride if we were willing to buy it. And take it.
We’d established an entry point on the alien hull and selected vines that would take us roughly near that spot we’d selected, as she lectured us about exactly how weird the galaxy could get.
Now we were
