《Weapons Don't Have Names》 Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Planet Hephaestus. Orbit. The ship was dying. Its systems failed one after another, devoured by a virus sent by the pursuers. Lights flickered and went out. Only blinking red emergency lights on ship''s bulkheads broke up the darkness. Life support went next; quiet whispering of the AC systems became a terrifying silence. A moment later, a nerve-shredding howl of the emergency alarm blared all over the ship. The pilots managed a miracle - they sent the dying ship into the planet''s atmosphere. Now all they had to do was keep the ship from spinning uncontrollably, so people could leave the doomed vessel somewhat safely. The hull shook violently, as if it were riding pell-mell over broken ground. Emergency partitions closed with loud bangs, and ship''s compartments started filling with the most horrifying smell one can experience in space - that of burning plastic. "Engine fire starboard!" second pilot reported. Co-pilot just nodded silently, his attention on ship''s controls. "Eight-five!" he called out. Replicant soldier RS-355085 snapped to attention, raising his helmet-enclosed head. "Ensure passenger safety," the pilot ordered. "Put them in a pod and eject. Meet you planetside." "What about you, sir?" The soldier fingered the clasps uncertainly, hesitant to leave the commander behind. "We''ll follow. Execute." "Sir!" The replicant undid the safety harness and left the bridge, holding onto the bulkhead for balance. Both pilots couldn''t help but feel relieved. The artificial soldier, always calm and completely devoid of fear, caused a strange subconscious revulsion in humans. The replicant himself, although struggling to maintain balance on the heaving deck, managed to reach the hatch leading to the living quarters. "Blaze, get up." he addressed his companion, who was still strapped into a cradle. Replicants were considered property and therefore were only assigned serial numbers, but unbeknownst to their creators and handlers, they had their secret names, only used when alone or in secure comm channels. "Sarge?" the second replicant lifted his head. "We have orders to evacuate the passengers." The sergeant caught a momentary pause in the ship''s lurching and covered the distance between himself and the other soldier in one swift movement. "My pleasure," Blaze laughed. "I am, after all, the favorite of all the ladies in this sector" Sergeant grimaced, displeased; Blaze''s penchant for running his mouth for no reason was annoying at times. "These are the first ladies we ever met," he reminded cruelly. "Let''s go pack them into a pod." "What about the Major and the Captain?" Blaze unbuckled the harness and got up, holding onto the headrest. "They are following." Sergeant slapped the door sensor lock. Blaze followed, trying to adjust to the rocking and struggling not to slam into sergeant''s back. As soon as the hatch opened, the passengers turned to face the entrance; their faces were identical, as if they were replicants themselves. They seemed to be doing fine; strapped into cradles securely, the young women handled the turbulence without any injuries.Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator. "Ma''am." Distorted by the helmet''s speaker system, sergeant''s voice was absolutely calm. The replicant could have been watching a sunset, not standing on a deck of a crashing ship. "Follow us, ma''am. We are leaving the ship." Sergeant began to undo the safety harness on the passenger closest to him. A glance at her shoes made him frown. Civilian style stilettos would only be good for acquiring compound fractures at this point. "My apologies, ma''am." He yanked the shoes off the girl''s feet, breaking the flimsy straps in a single pull. After repeating the same with the other passenger, the replicant returned to working on the harnesses. It was not an easy process - he had to balance on the lurching deck, hold onto the cradle railing with one hand and work with the other. That done, he waited for a moment of stillness in the turbulence, lifted the passenger from the cradle and held her close. Blaze stood by for support, holding onto the bulkhead, and stared at the women curiously. He tried to find out what their role in the mission was, just to be reminded by the sergeant that they, simple grunts, don''t have access to classified information. "Blaze, take her." said sergeant''s voice in his headset. Chimbick shifted his hold to the passenger''s arm. "Ma''am, RS-355090 will steady you." "Come to me, ma''am!" Blaze exclaimed clownishly, offering his hand to the young woman. "Shut up, Blaze." Sergeant replied for her. The girl grasped Blaze''s hand frantically and made a wobbly step, trying to maintain her balance on the heaving deck. Blaze carefully wrapped an arm around the girl''s waist to keep her from falling and started walking towards the escape pod hatch. Sergeant freed the other passenger and held her the same way. "Don''t be afraid, ma''am. I won''t let you fall." "Captain was right, " Blaze''s voice proclaimed in the headset. "We should have taken a Consortium ship." Sergeant blocked the vocoder so that no sound escaped the helmet and replied: "Then we would have been detected on Tiamat." "And it''s so much better now?" Blaze chuckled. The reply was the familiar "Shut up, Blaze." Sergeant cut the vocoder and concentrated on transporting his charge to the pod. The hatch presented a bit of a conundrum - a five foot tall round opening with a tall coaming could endanger the passengers as they came through. Sergeant had to stand with his back against the wall and hold both women while Blaze dove into the hatch and extended a helping hand. Loading completed, the replicants buckled both passengers into cradles, sat down themselves and then Blaze hit the launch button. Pyrobolts fired with a sharp crack, a moment of acceleration and the pod stabilized, heading for the planet. Thrusters activated to slow down the descent. The second pod streaked by and the replicants let out a sigh of relief - the operatives were safe. In confirmation, sergeant''s comm crackled to life. "Eight-five, how are the passengers?" the major asked. "Condition normal, sir." the replicant answered after a brief glance at the pale women. "Slightly nervous." "Alright. Meet you on the surface." Left with nothing else to do, sergeant studied the mysterious passengers furtively. The only time replicants saw women was in educational films and on missions, so they were ignorant of common standards of human beauty. But he thought the young women were pretty - slender, fit, skin tanned to a golden hue. The replicant was especially amazed by their long blond hair, reaching below the waist. That and fingernails covered in decorative patterns. They were so long it would be impossible to clench a fist for a blow; sergeant failed to imagine a task that would require such a modification. Bright and highly impractical clothing was completely unlike the drab uniforms he was used to. The passengers were dressed identically, just like the replicants, and it made their similarity even more obvious. Sergeant began to think that they may be a part of some secret detachment. Perhaps a custom replicant model for special missions? But the fear in their eyes cast doubt on this hypothesis. Maybe they were allowed to retain basic emotional responses for better integration with the civilians... Had the major felt the need to explain the status and importance of the passengers they took onboard on Tiamat, this guessing game would have been unnecessary. But the major decided that no additional information was required to complete the mission. Blaze''s snickering interrupted this train of thought. "Hey Sarge. Don''t tell me you didn''t enjoy that." "Enjoy what?" Sergeant was genuinely confused. "Hugging a girl."Blaze explained. Sergeant opened his mouth to tell the squaddie off, but then closed it and contemplated the question. Did he really enjoy that? To his annoyance, he realized that he didn''t pay any attention to the sensation, concentrating too hard on their mission to evacuate the passengers from the doomed ship. "Shut up, Blaze." he grunted in lieu of an answer. Blaze snorted, but shut up. There was no need for the sergeant to patch into Blaze''s helmet''s tac block to know that his brother was staring at the women. But since the replicants had no immediate orders at this point, he decided not to interfere and instead stared out of the viewport. Chapter 2 Planet Hephaestus. Badlands. Those who ever landed in an escape pod usually carried this experience with them for the rest of their lives. "I hate landings like this." Blaze piped in once the roar of landing thrusters subsided. Immediately, he heard the all-too-familiar "Shut up, Blaze." Sergeant untangled himself from the cradle and checked on the passengers. Condition normal. The girls looked shaken, but weren''t injured. The replicant grinned and tried to hail the commander, but there was no answer. His smile faded. Sergeant frowned and hailed again, to no avail. "Weather is crap," Blaze piped in again, watching large raindrops bombarding the front viewport. Noting that the passengers'' clothing was incompatible with the weather conditions, sergeant walked to the hatch. "Blaze, stay here." he ordered over comm. "I''m going to see the major, he''s not answering the comm. Probably interference due to rain." "Strange," Blaze replied as he called up a map on his tacblock. "I''m reading his pod clearly." "So I''ll check." Sergeant opened the hatch and jumped out, just to sink ankle-deep into reddish brown mud. Ignoring the rain drumming on his visor and armor, the replicant looked around for the officers'' pod. It was less than a hundred yards away and he walked over, struggling to lift his feet from the muddy ground. Every step was an uphill fight: the ground sucked at his feet like some unknown carnivore, and clumps of dirt stuck to his boots seemed to weigh hundreds of pounds each. Finally reaching the pod, sergeant activated the comm link again. "Major, sir, this is RS-355-085. I''m by the pod, Sir." No answer. Sergeant waited five seconds or so, then pressed the lock key and entered the pod. The operatives were dead, one didn''t need a degree in medicine to see that. Sometime during the landing, the pod clipped a rock outcropping, and a piece of stone broke off, decapitating both officers. Now it was stuck in a bulkhead. Replicant stared at the bodies for a moment, then left the pod and locked the hatch. Commanding officers'' death meant that now the sergeant was in command. And the last order they received must be completed. At any cost. "Well?" Blaze asked curiously as soon as sergeant returned. "Dead, both of them." Sergeant didn''t need more than a couple of words to explain the situation. "Clipped a cliff on landing and were decapitated." "What are we going do?" Sergeant shrugged. "Deliver the passengers to Eldorado." It suddenly dawned on him that their conversation must look like a pantomime to an outside observer. He turned to the women and activated the vocoder again. "Ma''am, both major and captain are deceased. I am now in command of the operation. I am Sergeant RS-355085, and this," he pointed to Blaze, "Is RS-355090. Please remain calm and do not panic." He fell silent, trying to find suitable words, but for some reason, nothing came to mind. Talking to civilians was not one of replicant''s skills, and the standard set of commands for emergency measures in areas affected by natural and man-made disasters didn''t seem suitable for this particular situation. Actions proscribed during mass riot suppression... even less so. It seemed unlikely that the women would appreciate something like the "On the ground, face down, hands behind your head" command, especially accompanied by liberal use of obscene expressions, as recommended by instruction manual. After some thinking, the sergeant decided to continue in a different key. "We are in hostile territory - planet Hephaestus. Therefore, I request that you do not initiate contact with local population and stay close to us, ma''am." Despite his misgivings, there was no panic among the civilians. After the successful landing the passengers composed themselves quickly and now looked bewildered rather than scared. Upon hearing the news of the officers'' deaths, the twins exchanged a silent look and just listened to the replicant''s speech quietly and attentively. "What are you going to do next?" asked one of them. The replicants couldn''t help but be stricken by the melodiousness of her voice. Until now, the only female voice they ever heard - not counting the terrified screams during riot suppression - was the tactical block. And that was a pale imitation of the real thing. Sergeant realized that he was just standing there agape and waiting for more. Closing his mouth, he glanced around, embarrassed, as if anyone could see his face through the helmet''s opaque visor. Finally convinced that nobody noticed anything, he answered the question, trying to sound emotionless like before. "Complete the mission and deliver you to Eldorado, ma''am." Both soldiers checked weapons and gear, their smooth practiced motions akin to those of battle mechs - similarly identical, faceless and determined. Inspection complete, the sergeant opened the hatch to emergency equipment compartment and produced a stack of bright yellow protective coveralls. "Make your selection, ma''am." He held the packets out to the girls. "Don''t you think we''ll be too noticeable in this?" one of the twins asked matter-of-factly. "Also, you are bound to make the locals nervous with your armor." That didn''t stop them from studying the labels, though. They chose and unpacked the coveralls, but now studied them as if seeing such equipment for the first time. "Ma''am." Noticing their trouble, sergeant took one of the outfits and showed how to unfasten it. "What do you mean by noticeable?" "You said it yourself that locals are hostile," the other girl joined the conversation. "And you don''t have your own ship anymore. So the logical thing to do would be to change into something less conspicuous, buy tickets to Eldorado and just fly there." The sergeant nodded, showing that he considered her argument, and continued with the explanation. "Ma''am, Hephaestus is controlled by the Foundation Union. There''s no communication with Eldorado, so we will capture a transmitter, send a signal and wait for help." "What if there is no help?" one of the girls predicted gloomily, as she fought the fastenings on her dress. "Who cares about us enough to get us off a hostile world? It''s a better bet to get out of here on our own. There must be communication with some neutral planets, no?" "Ma''am?" the sergeant was genuinely surprised. He was in the exact situation he''s been prepared for all his life: in the enemy territory, deep behind the lines, where one should hide and sneak attack the enemy. The young woman''s words contradicted the replicant''s entire world view. He couldn''t comprehend the idea that one could simply go and buy a ticket to Eldorado. "If there is no help, ma''am", he continued, " We will capture a ship with a pilot." "Awesome." the young woman summarized quite mirthlessly. The twins either forgot to introduce themselves, or didn''t think it was necessary. The other passenger suggested an alternative plan. "Let''s split up. "We''ll fly like normal tourists, changing flights, and you can wait for help, capture ships and do whatever you want. "And once we get to Eldorado, we''ll see whose route was fastest and easiest. Okay?" "No ma''am." The sarcasm was completely lost on the sergeant. "Your plan is not acceptable. Please finish changing your garments, we are leaving. We need to move as far as possible before nightfall." "What about the officers?" Blaze inquired. "I''ll take care of that." The sergeant climbed out into the rain again. A couple of minutes later he was fitting a plasma grenade onto the pod. That done, he was just about to set the timer and tripwire mode, but had a sudden stroke of genius - to take the officers'' dog tags and return them to the HQ back home. In addition to being a corporate ID, each of these dog tags was also the crowning achievement of nano science - a multifunctional computer with enormous capabilities.This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. The replicant detached the dog tags from the bodies, carefully packed them away into his backpack and turned to leave, but then his eyes caught sight of a bag the commanding officer carried on his belt. Deciding that in their situation it would be unwise to waste resources, sergeant took the bag and inspected its contents. It turned out to be full of coins - Union marks they started minting just before the war. Sergeant tsked and moved to put the useless item back, then decided that he might get reprimanded for losing a large sum of government issued money, so he added it to the backpack as well. With that, he left the improvised tomb and set the grenade to tripwire mode. "Ready?" he asked as he entered "their" pod again. "You could say that." Replicants'' new wards sounded gloomy. Survival coveralls were made of thin microcapillary fabric and protected the wearer from extreme temperatures, moisture and pressure, which would ensure survival even in a less hospitable environment than Hephaestus'' mud and rain. Even though the coveralls were a bit big on the girls, microclimate systems were working well, so one could call the passengers'' new gear satisfactory. Certainly more so than their civilian outfits, given the present conditions. However, they didn''t seem to think so, judging by their muffled, but expressive comments regarding the new clothes. The replicants only understood about half of the words, but caught the general feel of displeasure. "Do you have a map?" one of the girls asked as she inspected a light helmet doubtfully. "Are there towns or well-traveled highways around here?" "Yes, ma''am." the sergeant nodded. The young woman''s reply surprised him again. "That''s where we must go." He didn''t expect to hear a well thought out and reasonable suggestion from the passenger; the replicants were taught that once in a critical situation, all civilians turned into helpless creatures prone to panic and requiring constant care and control. However, RS-355-085 observed no panic. Instead, the passengers showed initiative and offered reasonable ideas. If they were, indeed, with the Intelligence Service, then their ideas should be at the very least heard. The replicants had no idea what to do in a peaceful city and how to behave in order to avoid too much attention. But the young women seemed perfectly convinced that they could blend into a crowd of civilians. The sergeant also began to think that such an infiltration would be successful. Looking harmless and attractive would confuse any civilian. The replicant himself, however, was leaning towards an idea that he was accompanying Consortium agents. One argument for this theory was their complete obliviousness to nudity. During classes the instructors mentioned the multitudes of various taboos and voluntary limitations civilians accepted; public nudity was one of them. The young women, however, changed their clothing in front of the replicants without hesitation. Besides, Consortium wouldn''t put in all this effort to extricate them from hostile territory for no reason. RS-355085 picked up a notepad and downloaded a local map from his helmet tac block. "Here, ma''am." he said, showing the notepad to the young woman. "Eighty kilometers south of here there''s a town, Stratos city". "I told you they were from Intelligence." Blaze seemed to have come to the same conclusion as the sergeant. "And the road... " Ignoring his brother, the sergeant continued. "This is the closest one, leads to a mine. Approximately fifteen kilometers from here, ma''am." The girls exchanged glances once again. If they had opaque helmets on, the sergeant would have thought they were communicating with each other, but he could see the women''s faces and their lips didn''t move. Still, he could have sworn the twins could understand each other. Some cutting edge implants, similar to what the replicants themselves had? "So how about we get transportation?" suggested the girl holding the notepad. "What for, ma''am?" the sergeant asked confusedly. "It''s not difficult to capture a vehicle, but it will attract attention and make it easier for the hostiles to detect us." He offered the young woman a small box. "Comm links, ma''am. Tune them to our frequency. Time to go." He waved at his squad mate and went outside into the torrential rain. After a moment''s hesitation, the twins put helmets on and followed. One of them made several uncertain steps over the mud and stretched out her arm, catching the downpour with a gloved hand. Then she took off the helmet and looked up at the sky, happily despite the rain that made her squint. The replicants watched her, dumbfounded, trying to guess if this behavior was typical for humans. For them, this was the first time under real rain. The space station where their lives began ten and a half years ago had no atmospheric events, for obvious reasons. And in the stony wastelands of Hel, where the first battle of this war was fought, no rain was expected in the next couple hundred years. The sergeant felt an urge to take his helmet off as well and find out what it was like to stand in the rain. But the training ingrained into his entire being forbade such silliness. All the dangers possible on an unfamiliar planet, from unbreathable atmosphere to a number of viruses and bacteria capable of ending those who disregard safety precautions in mere hours, were instinctively expected by every replicant. Armor is your second skin. Symbol of safety. Your own world, even with an illusion of solitude. * * * The other girl distracted the replicant from his thoughts. She fumbled with the comm link for a moment, then walked over to the soldiers and asked a bizarre question: "How do you set these up?" "Ma''am?" the sergeant was genuinely surprised again. Deciding that she might have been inexperienced in working with that particular model, he took the comm from her hand and quickly tuned it to the required frequency. "Now put the earbud in, ma''am, and the mic..." he turned back her coveralls collar and carefully pasted the mic strip onto her neck. "...goes here, ma''am." Having completed the process, he walked several steps away and activated his own comm. "Ma''am, this is RS-355-085. Can you hear me okay?" "Perfectly well," a woman''s voice sounded in the ear bud. "Can you do the same for Rie?" she nodded towards her sister, still motionless under the rain. The young woman was so absorbed in watching the deluge that she didn''t even notice the approaching replicant. "Ma''am." he called out to her. "Allow me to assist you with your comm link." "Huh?" the girl called Rie looked at the replicant distractedly. "Yes, of course." Resignedly, she allowed him to put the set on her, and then, with a regretful sigh, put the helmet back on. "What if I want to turn it off?" she asked over the comm link. "Just take off the mic or take out the earbud, ma''am." Sergeant approached his squad mate and the two engaged in a quick conversation only they could hear. "Let''s move," the sergeant finally ordered. "To the road, I hope?" A woman''s voice inquired in the headphones. The girls fell in behind the soldiers and followed somewhat clumsily, slipping in the mud. "We made quite an entrance, so they''ll be looking for us," the young woman continued, "But with a car we can get as far away as possible from the pod much faster. Then we can abandon the car, and there they are chasing the wind." The sergeant thought it over. Theoretically, if it were just he and Blaze, they could cover quite a distance just running by the time any search party appeared, but in the present situation... He looked back at the girls slipping and sliding in the muck, sighed and reluctantly agreed. "Yes, I agree with you ma''am. Set for the highway." * * * The replicants set a fast pace, trying to get as far away as possible from the landing site. Looking at how swiftly they could move even loaded with backpacks, it was hard to believe they were creatures of flesh and blood. "We will arrive shortly, ma''am." the sergeant informed the young women during a short stop in a rocky crevice. Despite all doubts, the new companions held their own during the forced march. The sergeant made a mental note: the young women''s physical fitness was in compliance with the regulations adopted by several enforcement agencies within the Consortium. "Five more kilometers and we will reach our destination." he said aloud. "Are you hungry?" "We''ll eat once we get a car." One of the girls replied. She was perched on a large rock. The other, called Rie, silently waved them off and began scraping the sticky mud off her shoes with a piece of stone. "By the way, how do you plan to stop a ride?" she asked. "A ride, ma''am?" Blaze sounded bewildered. "Transportation." Rie explained without interrupting her task. "We will destroy the crew, ma''am." the sergeant replied; Blaze nodded and patted his carbine lightly. "Civilian cars are not armored, and therefore, this will not be problematic." Reactive ammo used by the Consortium could effectively take out lightly armored targets as well, but the replicant decided not to talk about that. The girls exchanged a look again. "Maybe we shouldn''t leave a trail of bodies?" Rie offered a novel suggestion. "We will hide the corpses." The sergeant was slightly offended by the idea that he could make such an error as leaving witnesses behind or not hiding corpses. Replicants were taught to cover their tracks from a very early age. Long before they would begin practicing on "dummies" - criminals whose personalities were erased. "Alright, you''ll hide the bodies." The girl agreed. "But there will be a search for missing people, and it''s really not that hard to track a missing citizen''s car route. Our route, that is." "We cannot leave witnesses," the replicant said stubbornly. "We can cover one crime with another," The other girl, assigned the name of "Not Rie" by the replicants for now, joined the discussion. "Do you have a paralyzer?" "Yes, ma''am." the sergeant took a black rectangle out of his pouch and opened it with a click, extending a pistol grip. He didn''t consider paralyzers to be particularly useful; a low powered energy weapon only capable of stunning an unprotected live target for a short time. Even a car window would be an impenetrable barrier for one of these. "Then it''s simple." Not Rie continued. "You hide, we take our helmets off, walk to the road and stop a car. Then we shoot the driver with a paralyzer, take everything valuable so it looks like a robbery, and leave." The sergeant thought it over. It seemed like a reasonable suggestion. To his embarrassment, his own knowledge of criminal activities was very vague. The young woman''s expertise was quite impressive. The replicant came to a conclusion that the protected subjects were, after all, Consortium Security agents. "What''s the probability of success?" he inquired. "A hundred percent," Rie laughed. "What can possibly go wrong?" The sergeant gave her a doubtful look, but remained silent. He wasn''t quite so sure - the tried and true method with witness elimination was, in his opinion, much more reliable. "Let''s do that." He finally made a decision and handed the paralyzer over to the young woman. "Great," she replied happily and took the weapon. "Just one small thing left to do." Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Planet Hephaestus. Badlands. The rain never stopped. The only thing that changed was its intensity - from a slight drizzle to a solid wall of water. By the time the group reached the road, the rain let up a bit, and visibility improved enough to allow passing drivers to notice the girls standing by the roadside. "Time for you to hide," Rie reminded the replicants and headed for the wide strip of the highway that slashed across an endless ocean of mud. Her sister followed behind. She took the helmet off as she walked and hid the paralyzer inside it. The replicants nodded in unison and activated phototropic stealth mode, dissolving into rocks that crowded the highway. Looking back, the girls could see no sign of two armed people. The highway between Stratos city and the mines was rather busy. Unfortunately, most of the traffic consisted of robotic trucks carrying ore from the mines to smelters. About a quarter of an hour passed before a red sports car stopped for the sisters and the driver called out to them. "Hey tourists! Are you going to the city? Get in, I''ll give you a ride." Sergeant tensed. "Get ready," he ordered. The twins got into the car - perhaps to make sure they could shoot the driver point blank. The doors closed and... And then the car sped away. "Happy trails!" a very pleasant voice said over comm link.This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Next, there was a muffled rustling - it would seem the girl was peeling the mic off her neck. Then, her sister''s cheerful voice, followed by the same noise. "Got talked into playing some war game with friends. It''s fun for the first couple of hours, but then you''re just tired. Slogging through mud all day, who decided that was entertainment?.." The rest of the conversation was cut off by two characteristic clicks indicating that comms were turned off. The link was dead. "Did you understand this, sarge?" dumbfounded Blaze asked as he watched two green dots on the tac block moving towards the city. "I think so, yeah..." the sergeant said slowly, feeling every hair on the back of his neck stand on end. "It appears you were right, brother - they really are spies. Not ours though, but enemy spies, do you understand now? And I, defective moron, let them go. Ugh.." He banged his helmet against a rock in despair, then slammed a fist into the mud for good measure. "What are we to do now?" Blaze started rising carefully. "Find and capture," sergeant declared gloomily. "We were ordered to deliver them to Eldorado at any cost; it''s our duty to complete this mission. Let''s go." He got up, hoisted the duffel bag onto his back and adjusted the straps for the march. "Chimbick, don''t blame yourself." This was the first time Blaze called his brother by name today. "It''s not your fault. "The commanders didn''t see fit to inform us about their status. "And now there''s nobody to brief us." "Brother," Chimbick put his hand on Blaze''s shoulder. "They didn''t know how to use our gear, did you notice that? I should have realized!" He sighed and pointed. "Let''s move. "The crash site will be found soon." Silently, the replicants disappeared into deepening twilight. *** Half an hour later, a helicopter landed fifteen kilometers away from the road, next to the abandoned pods. Landing compartment hatch opened wide and several militiamen led by a man dressed in customs officers'' uniform rushed down the ramp. "Check the pods," the officer ordered. Two three-man teams split from the main group and ran to the escape pods. The rest spread out in a circle to create a defense perimeter. The first group reached the pod and opened the hatch. Next, an explosion thundered. Chapter 4 Planet Hephaestus. Stratos City. The trip to Stratos City was almost luxurious; the replicants settled comfortably in the back of a truck loaded with empty CO2 scrubber boxes. They got into the truck bed by jumping off a convenient cliff overhanging a sharp turn in the road. All drivers - both living and robotic - would slow down here to avoid flying into oncoming traffic. When the truck started braking on a straight stretch of the road, Chimbick peered out carefully. "Oh hell," he whispered. "Checkpoint." Blaze leapt up and readied his carbine. The sergeant raised his hand in a calming gesture. "Don''t. Only if they see us." There turned out to be no reason to worry though - the soldiers didn''t even leave the sentry box. One of them waved at the driver to pass and continued talking to his squad mate. To add insult to injury, those sad excuses for warriors just leaned their weapons against a wall causally. "Idiots," Blaze summarized the situation. The sergeant snorted. "No, brother, these aren''t idiots. These are our passes into town. Follow me." He vaulted over the side before the truck had a chance to speed up. Blaze jumped after him, stumbling forward a bit under the weight of his duffel bag. "Are we taking them?" he asked. "Yes." The replicants moved off the road and began discussing the plan of attack. First they decided to hide the backpacks salvaged from the pod. Chimbick took only the agents'' dog tags and the money bag, realizing that now these coins could make the mission easier. The hardest part would be figuring out the nuances of civilian life. Backpacks hidden and stash booby trapped, the replicants activated the phototropic camo that turned them into a barely noticeable shimmer. * * * Sentries Quigley and Novak were enjoying life as much as it was possible while enlisted in Hephaesian Defense Force. The two friends ended up at a remote two-man station, a true gravy train as far as service went. All they had to do was sometimes walk into the road and check semis coming from the mines. Even if any inspectors decided to stick their noses in their business, usually some buddy on duty at the HQ would have time enough to warn them of the enemy approach, so both soldiers were relaxing like there''s no tomorrow. The table was graced with a bottle of imported rum, a rarity in wartime, and a plate with some simple snacks. As an added pleasant bonus, Novak''s collar was concealing a packet with "angel dust".The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. After a couple of shots, the buddies relaxed and moved on to stimulating conversation. "I ain''t slow, right?" Quigley was relaying a tale of his latest conquest. "So she starts complaining about her husband, like, he''s an asshole, doesn''t love me, doesn''t pay attention, looks at me like I''m furniture... I''m like, thinking here, oh, you''re gonna put out, honey. So I says, come to daddy, right, get my hands under her shirt... She''s like..." What she was like forever remained a mystery, since Quigley''s speech was cut short by an abrupt opening of the door, as if it were kicked with a boot. Sentries leapt up, expecting to see a surprise inspection, but all they could detect was a wall of rain. Then a faint shimmering entered the door. The feckless warriors'' brains, clouded with booze, were struggling to solve this phenomenon, and that moment of hesitation cost both their lives. With a crack of broken vertebrae, both militiamen fell to the floor. "Just like "dummies", one of the shimmers snorted disdainfully and turned into an armor-clad replicant. "Shut up, Blaze," the other shimmer was grouchy. The sergeant turned off the stealth mode and rolled one of the corpses over. "Move it," he hurried Blaze along and began unfastening a bullet proof vest on what used to be Quigley just a moment ago. Blaze looked around, found a light switch and the room was plunged into darkness. That didn''t, however, affect the replicants in their night vision helmets. Uniforms were the reason why they decided to attack the hostiles unarmed, since otherwise an eleven millimeter rocket round would create a laundry problem for Blaze and Chimbick. "Too big," Blaze noted with some consternation. Local brick-red camo and light bullet proof vest looked baggy on a wiry replicant. At least the helmet and goggles fit. Boots were the only part of replicants'' own gear that they kept on. Their very noticeable Consortium armor and helmets were packed into an empty MRE crate. "It will do." Chimbick waved Blaze off and continued fiddling with the looted harness. Blaze remained sulkily silent. The sergeant understood and shared his mood - compared to the cutting edge Consortium gear, Hephaestian equipment looked rather lame. Replicant battle armor included a body suit made from ballistic fiber, with muscle augmentation cables running along the limbs. The body suit would protect from aggressive environments, vacuum, shrapnel and some types of gun ammo. Composite armor fit over the body suit. A helmet, made from the same composite, was outfitted with a multitude of sensors and a tactical computer for automated battle command and control. It provided a 360 view, watched the tactical situation on the battlefield, monitored the solder himself and controlled a built-in doctor module. The cherry on top was the phototropic camo feature that literally turned the wearer invisible. This crowning jewel of technology was perfect at what it did and thus turned the replicants into deadliest and most dangerous soldiers in this part of the universe. But now they had to trade this thing of beauty for the pathetic Hephaestian militia gear. The replicants booby-trapped the corpses, grabbed the MRE box and ran for the light patrol vehicle assigned to the post in case some miscreants needed to be chased. Chimbick jumped into the gunner''s seat and Blaze took the driver''s spot. The LPV rolled on towards the city. Chapter 5 Planet Hephaestus. Badlands. Lieutenant Nave Graham of the recently formed Hephaestus Counterintelligence Service was a bit anxious: this was his first case as a lead and like every rookie ever, he was afraid he would fail. "A plasma grenade, was it?" He inquired of a sapper busy with examining what was left of the escape pod. "Uh-huh," the man replied gruffly. "A primitive trap; they just set it to tripwire mode and when the soldier opened the hatch, it tripped." He nodded towards the other pod, hidden beyond a veil of rain, where his colleague was puttering about. "Crude, but effective," the sapper said, tossing a melted chunk of metal that used to be part of the pod''s hull. "The explosion set off the remaining fuel in pod''s tanks. Enough to blow the pod and everyone around it to smithereens." "The deceased was a moron." Nave grimaced as he watched the customs officer''s body packed into a bag. "Shouldn''t have just barged in blind like that... Any ideas who could have done that?" "I can''t tell for sure," the sapper replied, "But I suspect whoever did it, had special training. Military likes traps like this. Terrorists and other criminals aren''t above them, either, historically." "Got it loud and clear," Graham said, even though nothing was clear at all. Quite the contrary, the suspect list just expanded significantly to include a wide spectrum of all kinds of professions - from corporate armies, mercenaries and slave traders to run of the mill smugglers trying to cover their tracks. "Ready," reported the other sapper. "Pod two is clear, you can inspect it." Graham nodded, even though the other man couldn''t see him. Struggling to pull his feet out of viscous sticky mud, the detective trudged to the pod. Two militiamen stood by the open hatch, holding their automatic rifles most menacingly. They scanned the surroundings warily, as if suspecting that the pod''s owners would come back for their property. Nave threw back his raincoat''s hood, scraped the mud off his shoes, pulled foot covers on and climbed into the pod, where the sapper was still working on something. Lieutenant''s attention was immediately drawn to two shapeless piles of clothing on the floor. "Interesting, isn''t it?" the sapper inquired phlegmatically. "Uh-huh," lieutenant agreed as he carefully unraveled the closest pile, which turned out to be a woman''s dress. Nave looked it over and, for whatever reason, sniffed. It smelled faintly of perfume. The smell seemed like a man''s cologne to Nave. Puzzled, he grunted, folded the dress and put it into an evidence bag. "So what happened here?" he asked the sapper. As an answer, he was shown a Consortium-made plasma grenade. "Trip wire mode." the sapper explained. "Just like in the other pod." Nave said thoughtfully. He heard business like voices behind his back and then his crime scene experts climbed inside. The pod became very crowded. Nave got out to give his team a chance to search every inch of the pod''s interior for clues. A smallest thing could lead them to the mysterious survivors of the ship that disintegrated in the atmosphere. Lieutenant headed for the investigative team''s van where a couple of techs were messing about with smashed electronics. "I think you might find this interesting," one of them said as soon as the lieutenant climbed into the van, leaving puddles everywhere.The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Without waiting for an answer, the tech swiveled his monitor around and started explaining: "This from the customer officer''s tac block. He got the footage just a fraction of a second before the explosion, from the militiaman''s body cam. You know, the one that opened the door. Curious, don''t you think?" Nave nodded silently as he stared at the image. Two male corpses with their heads caved in were strapped into cradles. Somebody really didn''t want these bodies to end up with Hephaestus law enforcement. Curious... Noting all this, the lieutenant moved to the comms officer''s compartment and called Counterintelligence HQ. "Get me the boss," he asked the officer on duty. Three hours later Nave was sitting in his office and carefully studying the collected materials. It was all very curious... Two unknown persons changed into orange survival suits and moved in an unknown direction. Discovered hair samples showed that the unknown persons were in fact women of childbearing age, chemically blond. Most notably, the samples belonged to creatures practically identical genetically, which suggested replicants. Nave didn''t know much about those - artificially bred creatures with altered human DNA. He''s never heard of female replicants, but that didn''t necessarily mean the greedy corporations hadn''t mass produced several product lines for their army. This theory was supported by the fact that the genome showed some unfamiliar mutations. It could mean either artificially created beings or one of Union races, with the same degree of probability. Recon drones didn''t find any suspicious movement within a fifty kilometer radius, which led Graham to a conclusion that the unknown persons took the shortest route to the highway and found transportation there. Junior officers were checking reports of stolen vehicles or missing drivers in the area. It wasn''t out of the realm of possibility that am accomplice with a car was waiting for these unknown persons in a previously agreed upon spot. That particular theory was not provable though: constant electrical interference in the atmosphere, caused by rain and thunderstorms, and thick cloud cover made orbital surveillance impossible. Nave sent two junior officers to comb CCTV footage from Stratos City municipal security systems for a pair fitting the description. But were there just two unknowns? Judging by the data from the surviving pod''s on board computer, life support systems load was twice the norm for two women of middle height. Even considering nervous stress and rapid breathing, it would still mean these women had twice the lung capacity of a normal human. So the only reasonable explanation was that there were at least two more people in the pod, but those left no trace other than the entry in a computer log. Graham reread the report from the expert team, then studied data from space defense system and finally, for the fifth time in the last three hours, checked his inbox. It finally paid off. There was a message from Tiamat; a Bison class freighter, tail number 1560/4510, was attacked in orbit by a Union patrol. The ship managed to shake its pursuers despite being infected by a virus, change its recognition codes and jump through the Gate to Hephaestus system. Graham poured more coffee, displayed the new data on his monitor and busied himself with reading the case file from Tiamat office. The more he read, the more he felt serious trouble approaching. Tiamat Counterintelligence picked up a relay chasing a Consortium agent spying in Ferrum system. He managed to evade the arrest team by blasting through the perimeter and hid in the capital. Not for long though, since in about an hour his body was found in a private room at one of the fancier night clubs. The still warm trail led the agents to Bison freighter, but again, it managed to slip away. And now pieces of it, along with pilots'' bodies, surfaced on Hephaestus. Once again, Nave pored over all the available data while the computer searched for all known materials on Consortium Security Service operations. A phone call interrupted him. "Sir," the duty officer reported, "A checkpoint was destroyed on highway E-11" Nave glanced at the map, grabbed his hat and sprinted from the office. *************************************************************************** The rest of the book is now available for pre-order on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited, release date is February 14th. Also, for the Luddite in your life, there will be a paperback edition. Unfortunately, I can only leave 10% of the book on free platforms, so chapters have been removed.
Book Two is finished, and if this one does well, we can pay our translator to get the sequel to you. Thank you all for reading and reviewing. Your interest is what gives us strength to keep writing. Here''s the link to Amazon We are live! Yes, we are live on Amazon! Kindle, Kindle Unlimited and paperback, all set and waiting for you. What better way to entertain your date on Valentine''s day? Or forget that you don''t have a date, if that''s the case. Or spend the evening if you don''t care about Valentine''s day. Either way, click the link above. And a little teaser, appropriate for V-day ***** "Now I understand the lack of logic in the characters'' actions in that play we saw, ma''am." "Yes?" Angela rested her head on Chimbick''s shoulder, making his heart race at triple speed. "What helped you understand?" "You." Chimbick replied simply.This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. "Did I help you understand that you are a hero in a fairy tale, too?" She asked, looking up into his eyes. Chimbick opened his mouth to say no, but stopped to think. Why not? Every fairy tale began with some sort of a disaster or need. That he had in spades. Then the characters would go through some ordeals, meet other creatures and change in the process. Did he change? Replicant glanced at the girl next to him and smiled. He certainly did. And then, in the end, the hero would do something extraordinary and reach his goal as a completely different person. A better version of himself. "No, ma''am." He said finally. Words stuck in his throat, but he forced them out, suppressing the cowardly urge to present wishes as reality. "A hero would have let you and your sister go, ma''am." He managed to say. Surprisingly, Angela didn''t leave and didn''t take her hand away. She just watched him with those bottomless gray eyes. "You''re still in the middle of your journey, that''s all."