L Modesitt - Empress of Eternity

The keeper in red had already headed back toward Helkyria. She stopped just to the right of the first spec-op techs. The Bridge is almost in position.

"Spec-ops!" called Helkyria. "Stand by for insertion!"

Duhyle fumbled in his waistpak for the stiktite, easing out a strip and holding it and the mistletoe in one hand. With the other, he levered out the cylindrical grenade from the topmost strap holder on the right side of his makeshift harness. Then he pressed the sprig against the stiktite and wrapped the strip across the surface of the grenade, before carefully slipping it back into the strap holder.

"Spec-ops…stand by!" ordered Symra.

There was no feeling of movement or anything else, yet when the south door to the station opened, what Duhyle saw over the heads of the fast-moving spec-ops techs was a brilliant rainbow of light, so bright that it hurt his eyes…and beyond that a wall of blackish brown metal.

Two massive and red-bearded Aesyr stood on the narrow metal platform before an open hatch, their mouths agape. The techs surged forward, and both Aesyr fell. In moments, the techs were inside the hatch, and Valakyr and the first of the security troopers were pouring onto the platform and through the hatch.

Duhyle moved across the chamber to a position near the open door. There he waited until several groups had left the station, then jumped in front of another threesome and hurled himself through the opening. Landing on the hard metal platform deck sent a shock up through his boots, almost as if the Aesyr ship carried one sort of charge and the station another. He staggered, then righted himself and followed the troopers into the passageway beyond the hatch, its dark brown metal bulkheads two yards apart. The overhead was also metallic, a smooth silvery cream that emitted a cool and indirect light.

He?d taken only three steps before something like a jagged lightning bolt flared down the metal passageway, striking some of the techs and missing others, crackling and leaving the acrid odor of seared flesh, fabric, and equipment.

Duhyle started to catch a falling trooper, then let her slide past him to the deck as he realized that the charcoaled face held no life. He swallowed and followed two troopers who were dodging toward a ship?s ladder up to the next level.

"Boarders on the bridge! All marines midships! Second deck house level!" The announcement reverberated off the metal bulkheads with such volume that it almost deafened Duhyle as he followed the pair of troopers toward the ladder.

More of the lightning-fire flared down the ladder toward a trooper at the bottom. He lifted a small shield, and the electroplasma flared harmlessly around him.

Duhyle flattened himself against the bulkhead to let another three troopers rush past him, then followed them closely. All four of them stopped short of the area at the foot of the ladder.

While the trooper at the bottom of the ladder continued to deflect electroplasma bolts, the force of the bolts froze him in place. No one else would have been able to climb the metal stairs in the face of that barrage, either.

"Marines midships! Midships on the double!"

The announcement reminded Duhyle that they didn?t have much time to reach the deck above, especially with Aesyr marines swarming toward them from all over the enormous vessel. He eased out one of his grenades and made his way past the troopers near the open space at the base of the ladder. He stopped just short of where the electroplasma bolts could reach him.

There he pressed the detonator, then waited a slight moment before taking a quick two steps. He leaned forward and flung the grenade underhanded and up the ladder-before jumping back before another electroblast streamed downward.

The explosion of the grenade was thunderous within the metal-enclosed space, but when the trooper with the shield started to move up the ladder, another jagged plasma bolt flared downward, forcing him back.

Duhyle pulled another grenade from his chest harness, waited for the next plasma bolt, then pressed the detonator, jumped forward, and flung the second grenade. This time, the return bolt passed close enough to his arm that he could feel the heat and power.

But…no more bolts followed the second explosion, and a wave of troopers flowed up the ladder. Duhyle was more than glad to let them. He followed after a good squad?s worth of troopers had scrambled up the metal stairs to the bridge level.

Once up the ladder he followed the cross passageway toward the center of the ship, keeping low to avoid the occasional and intermittent projectiles and electroplasma bolts that ricocheted off the dark metal walls or the well-lit overhead.

Ahead of him, the midships passageway intersected a fore-and-aft passageway, predictably enough, in the middle of the superstructure. Several troopers hung back from the fore-and-aft passage, even while snapping fire around the corner because of the fire coming from the direction of the bridge.

Why hadn?t the Aesyr closed the hatch to the bridge? They?d had enough time. Or was there something preventing them?

Duhyle pulled out another grenade as he moved forward, pressing aside several troopers and stepping over one who had fallen. As he neared the corner, he dropped to his knees, then took a quick look toward the bridge, then jerked his head back. The passageway was strewn with bodies, but one of the dead or immobile Vanir troopers had jammed something in the hatch, and the Aesyr were struggling to remove it, and several bodies that blocked the hatchway as well.

Taking another grenade, Duhyle tabbed the detonator and then leaned forward and hurled it toward the hatch, ducking back and reaching for another grenade from the harness.

The first grenade bounced down the passageway and stopped short of the hatch, caught on something, before it exploded.

Immediately after the explosion, Duhyle let go of a second grenade, hurling it toward the opening in the hatchway. His aim was off, and the cylinder ricocheted to a halt just short of the hatch. Duhyle dropped back around the corner and readied a third grenade as the second exploded.

Beside him, Valakyr grabbed one of the small shields from a trooper, clearly waiting for Duhyle to throw his next grenade.

Duhyle did, and as soon as the explosion echoed down the passageway, Valakyr sprang clear, ordering "Forward!" as she sprinted the ten yards or so toward the hatch.

Troopers surged after her.

Duhyle let them. The Hammer control section had to be aft, and he looked to his right, down the fore-and-aft center passageway. Bolts of force flared from an open hatchway some fifteen yards away, dropping a trooper.

Duhyle didn?t move. There was something odd…wrong. The trooper had bounced away from the hatchway-before being struck. The forcebolt had held a reddish shade. Duhyle had never seen that before…ever, and he?d seen every kind of weapon used by the spec-ops and security forces.

He watched the aft hatchway more intently. Another trooper fired a stunner bolt at it, and the energy angled away from the open hatch as if reflected.

Symra drew up beside Duhyle, gesturing toward the open hatchway. "That?s where Baeldura is."

"I thought so." Duhyle glanced at Symra. "Where?s the commander?" He couldn?t bear to use her name, not when he feared what the subcaptain might well say.

"She?s still on the lower deck. Part of her leg got torn up some by their flechettes, and we can?t get her up here. She said to tell you she?ll be fine, but that it won?t matter if we don?t stop Baeldura. She?s on a portable comm with Baeldura."

Duhyle understood that the "we" mostly likely meant him. He just nodded, then eased around the corner into the fore-and-aft passageway and flattened himself against the metallic bulkhead. Whoever was firing from inside the compartment couldn?t quite hit the space right next to either bulkhead.