Ilox Saga 1: Eris Monroe: More Than Human (34 page)

“Not quite, Lluras. You see, I want assurances that this isn’t just an elaborate trick you’re playing on us. So, you’ll be coming along with me and my crew as we find Chol Cuxa and kill him.” The look on the Evene’s face was one of panic.

“That’s…that’s not right! We had a deal!”

“Oh, you’ll get your money…as long as you’ve been honest with me…and gave us the correct data we need to find Chol Cuxa.” Eris smiled at Lluras and put an armored fist over his arm. “Let’s go.”

Lluras was very uncomfortable on the bridge of the Sparta. At some point during the last twenty hours he had been on the ship he had developed an infuriating itch on his back. He couldn’t easily scratch it and it wasn’t going away. He had watched as the ship entered the solar system where Chol Cuxa commanded an outpost filled with Vortex mercenaries. He was wearing little in the way of clothing, but had braided parts of his mane with glittering strands of gold and silver thread. It made his white fur stand out even more – his appearance was striking.

“You’re sure your stealth field makes you completely undetectable?” Lluras asked while scratching his back with his left hand. As a communications expert he didn’t know anything about propulsion technology, but he knew that anything built by sentients could be analyzed and defeated…much as he had penetrated heavily encrypted comm systems over the last year. “I only ask because I know that this particular moon and the installations buried beneath the surface are guarded by some very sophisticated…and lethal…weapons.

“Sparta has never been detected,” answered Kizzara with a smirk on her face. She had been taunting Lluras for the past two hours. Eli and T’sell T’savri were also on the bridge. T’sell had grown tired of the childish games that Kizzara was playing with Lluras.

“It better be, or this is going to be a very sad mission that ends in an expanding sphere of superheated plasma and debris…” Lluras said with a twisted grin.

“Why don’t you leave our
guest
alone, Kizz?” said T’sell. Kizzara grimaced and was about to speak when Eris turned to her.

“Kizz, bring the ship down to the surface of the moon where we discussed earlier. We’ll find a way into the Vortex installation from there. The moment we’re clear, I want Sparta out in space and away just in case we’re captured or killed. Eli, make sure the schematics of the base are available on all of our combat suits.

“They already are…” Eli stated nonchalantly. Eris turned to Lluras with both hands on her hips.

“Everything you told us best be true, Lluras.” Eris said. She was in no mood for levity. It was deadly serious business
she was engaged in and would tolerate no deception.

“Oh, I assure you, I know
exactly
what you’d do to me if you found me to be…lacking…in truthfulness…” Lluras scratched at his back, vainly trying to make the itch go away. He had concluded it must be something he was allergic to in the ship, but he didn’t know what.

“Captain, why don’t I take you down in the
Starlifter
,” offered Kyle. “I can drop you off and then wait around in case something goes wrong.”

“Not this time, Kyle. I want this operation to be as simple as possible, so the fewer elements involved, the less risk there is.” Eris guessed how Kyle felt, but she showed no emotion.

Eris turned to Eli and T’sell and sighed. “You know I wouldn’t ask either of you to risk yourselves in this way if I didn’t have any choice…”

Eli and T’sell looked at each other with a knowing glance. T’sell spoke before Eli.

“We understand, Captain. We’re with you on this.” T’sell felt affection for the human, but shuttered the feeling away. She couldn’t allow emotion to cloud her thinking.

“Very well, let’s get down to the ready room and gear up,” Eris said with finality.

Eris thought about what she, T’sell and Eli would be up against. Confidant that speed and secrecy were paramount to the success of the mission – she knew that the three of them would be able to handle anything the Vortex mercenaries put in their path. Computer and electronic controlled devices would be a momentary hindrance only as Eli Bowman could override anything electronic in less than fifteen seconds. Living, breathing guards would be the hardest barrier, but T’sell’s ability to control the minds of sentients…if only for brief amounts of time, would be a huge factor in their favor. The ready room was close to the airlock.

After she had put her combat gear on and checked her seals, Kyle came over her link.

“Eris…I wanted to wish you luck,” he said. His voice was tender.

“You always do. It must work too, because I’ve come back from every mission intact so far…” Her attempt at humor made him chuckle. “It’s good to hear you laugh. Things have been pretty grim lately.” She looked at his face, searching for something. She didn’t know what, but she was silent for thirty seconds, just soaking in his presence as he said nothing. Kyle broke the stillness.

“I’ll see you when you get back to the Sparta,” he said softly. Kizzara’s voice came over their suit links, “We’re at the drop zone…”

The iris door of the airlock cycled opened and Eris, T’sell and Eli quickly disembarked out of the Sparta and onto the black dust of a dead moon. They had landed in a small crater, roughly half a kilometer in diameter which had jagged edges of volcanic rock along the rim. They began trudging through the soft ground, kicking up trails of black dust that slowly drifted down to the surface in the low gravity. For twenty minutes they moved with a purpose and had cleared the rim of the crater in record time. In the distance was a manufactured complex that appeared to be pre-fabricated and connected to other smaller structures with no obvious function.

“T’sell, can you pick up any sentients in range of your telepathic powers?” Eris asked over her link. The Zari woman immediately responded.

“I sense that there are four individuals in the nearby building - two humans…one male, one female, a K’Tosk male and an Orvod male. I need to be closer, and have a direct line of sight on them in order to read their thoughts,” T’sell said stoically. Eris took out her gauss assault rifle and peered through the magnifying scope. She examined the vista before her and looked for possible ways to enter.

“Eli, have you been able to connect to any data nodes yet?”

“Nope, but I bet there’s one inside that structure. From the information Lluras gave us on the base it looks like one of the anti-ship missile batteries that Vortex installed in the last month. See those smaller structures? I think they hold missiles – a lot of missiles.”

“Okay, keep sharp – both of you… If you detect anything that could give us away…sensors, automated defenses…anything, let me know immediately.” Eris motioned for the team to move out. They kept close to rocky outcroppings to obscure their movements. The information they had paid Lluras to give them showed that the moon was newly acquired by the Vortex mercenary group, and the organization had set up defenses against small attack ships. Chol Cuxa moved around often, never staying in one place for more than two weeks - it lessened the chances of assassination. As the trio moved closer to the building, Eli tensed and stopped moving.

“Eris, there’s a sensor device that is located on the top corner of the building near us. Let me take care of that first…we don’t want them to know we’re here – though I doubt anyone is watching feed from it – no one living anyway.” Eris nodded silently and let him work. After six seconds of silence, Eli spoke again. “Okay, it’s in a looping pattern showing the recordings of the last twenty-four hours. We’re invisible to it now. We can move on.” The map that Lluras had given them showed that this building had an entrance point for a sub-surface tunnel that connected to the main facility on the moon. Unfortunately, they had to enter the building to access the tunnel. There was an airlock that presumably was used to maintain the missile pods and that would be their entry point. They had to get to the main hub in order to gain entrance to Cuxa’s quarters.

“Eli, I want that airlock opened before we get there. Let’s move!”

As the three of them ran at a sprint, they kicked up a large amount of dust. Eris hoped that no one was visually looking outside or they’d be spotted. As she ran, she saw that the airlock door had opened. It was wide open by the time they arrived. If anyone had spotted their mad dash from the rock outcropping, there was no sign.

“T’sell, the first sentient you see…do whatever you do with your mind tricks and Eli and I will take care of the rest.” Eli had fed the plans of the Vortex base into each of their combat suits computers. She had a map projected on her HUD showing her, Eli and T’sell as blue dots moving against a three dimensional layout of the installation. The map showed that the four mercenaries were only a door away down a short corridor. The installation had five levels and dug underground at least fifty meters. From what Eli had gathered it was a highly fortified pleasure palace built for when Chol Cuxa wanted to relax. He had dozens of similar installations scattered throughout the quadrant. She unfastened her gauss pistol from its holster and assumed a one-handed stance as she advanced. She didn’t use her rifle in such close quarters, it slowed her down. As she entered the control room of the four Vortex agents, several things happened at once and time seemed to slow to a crawl.

T’sell took control of the K’Tosk male, who had the weakest mind in the room.
She
pushed
him to attack the nearest sentient who happened to be the human female. He wasn’t wearing any kind of weapon so he launched himself at the woman and slammed her into the metallic floor with a loud thud. As the Orvod mercenary reached for his sidearm, Eris shot him in his left eye and he dropped to the floor, lifeless as a broken doll. He wasn’t wearing a helmet but it was still a risky shot to take. Eli began to
interface
with the local computer system and found a security system monitoring the area. In an instant he created a feedback loop of the last twelve hours - no alarms were going to be blaring from their actions. The last guard instantly made a fatal decision and quickly drew his sidearm but he was panicked and rushed – his eyes wide in disbelief. He fired at the most dangerous opponent, Eris, who dodged with blinding speed as his weapon discharged into a wall behind her, missing by centimeters. She then
clicked
her pistol into Autofire mode with her thumb and shot him three times in the chest. The heavy durasteel armor he was wearing absorbed most of the kinetic force but it was enough to knock him down and momentarily stagger him. Eris strode up to him and put several flechette rounds into his head before he could recover from being stunned.

The K’Tosk mercenary was bashing the Vortex woman’s head against a wall in a mindless rage – she was clearly dead but the mental compulsion was still strong in his mind. T’sell calmly walked up with her
Darisu
held high and cleanly cut his head off. It rolled in a bloody mess across the floor of the room. In a matter of seconds the fight was over, and four Vortex mercenaries lay on the floor dead. Eli’s eyes were glazed over; he was heavily interfacing with something. After a few moments, normal color and clarity returned to his eyes as he brought his gaze to Eris. She was standing next to a security console. As much death as he’d seen, Eli still wasn’t used to the sights and sounds of combat – or the acrid smells of advanced weaponry firing in tightly enclosed spaces. The sight of the pooling blood made his stomach churn. He glanced away. The Vortex group was filled with remorseless killers who had tried to kidnap him and kill his friends. They deserved this – but he still couldn’t take the sight of it. He wasn’t like Eris…or T’sell.

“I think I know where Chol is at. I have complete control over the Vortex network. It looks like Lluras was right, he’s here. This moon base is not that large. At least the installation isn’t… We’re roughly two kilometers from his location. Follow me; I know the fastest route there – we’ll avoid most of the living guards because there are automated defenses in the way I’ll be taking us.”

“What type of automated defenses?” T’sell T’savri asked bluntly. She was morphing her facial features as she spoke. She began to appear as the dead Vortex woman – a petite brunette human. Her armor also visibly changed. After thirty seconds, she had become her exact image. The deception might give them a slight advantage.

“Exactly four heavy MEKS lie in our path,” Eli stated. He seemed overly confident.

“It looks like Chol Cuxa is a cautious bastard,” Eris sounded angry.

“Probably why he has lived as long as he has, with so many enemies,” came T’sell’s measured response. Eris ignored her and spoke to Eli again.

“Are you sure you can handle that many?” Eris said as she arched an eyebrow. “That machine controlling ability of yours does have limits, doesn’t it?” Eli nodded and then smiled at the two women. He seemed sure of himself.

“I have you and T’sell to help if it turns out I can’t…” Eli stopped speaking, turned and headed deeper into the installation. No alarms had sounded. The three made their way further, going down via various passages that Eli prompted them to take. At each turn, they missed running into Vortex personnel. Eris knew that this would not have been possible without the instant Intel that Eli provided, or the way he knew everything that was ahead of them just out of eyesight. As they finally arrived at the lowest level, Eris motioned for them to stop. Using suit comms she relayed her instructions.