The Dead Ship: Episode Three (Firehawk Squadron Book 3) by Jonathan Schlosser

Author:Jonathan Schlosser [Schlosser, Jonathan]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub, mobi
Published: 2017-06-23T04:00:00+00:00

6

The squadron ran out of a dark and dusty landing bay in the basement of the pyramid. One hundred meters square on each side and a third as high, steel girders and concrete blocks and lights and wires strung and flickering across the ceiling. A cluster of tables they'd thrown up against one wall where they ate and sat and cursed at each other. A square tapped off for sparing with their padded gloves or no gloves if they both agreed to it, old blood on the floor where it'd dried.

Colson stepped out of the elevator where it opened directly into the room. On the far side two large overhead doors in the wall that led into the room with the Firehawk, the only ship they had so far. The same bay where Praetus had taken them. A long chute leading out to the surface where the ship rose on a belt and then launched from an exterior pad. A long and pointless way to launch a fighter, he thought, but it kept it safe and hidden and it wasn't as if they were getting assault alerts and launching in a hurry against a wing of sevs.

Not yet.

Shy'lkn was sitting on top of one of the tables, looking at her comm and eating something. Probably a ration bar. Next to her was Lana Kalliensky, whose short, slight frame made everyone wonder how she'd ever gotten into the military until she took them in the ring and beat them into a bloody pulp. She was from Ranx, a military colony world, where both of her parents had been commandos for the Empire since before the War of Teeth, and they'd taught her more about hand-to-hand combat than Colson thought he'd ever know.

She also hated the name Lana with an utter passion and so everyone just called her Kallie. And if they didn't, she took them into the ring and beat the shit out of them and then they called her Kallie.

Shy'lkn saw him come in and pushed herself up off the table, jumping lightly down to the concrete and walking over. She threw him a half-assed salute, just barely brushing her temple below her bristled scalp, and he returned it.

“You want to see it?” she said.

“So you have something?”

“Of course I have something.”

“Care to tell me?”

“Our glorious leader hates the suspense,” she said, rolling her eyes and walking toward the wall across from the tables, where they'd set up a haphazard bank of computers. “It's surveillance tape. Nothing huge, just local hub stuff. But there's one bit you're going to want to see.”

“How much do you have?”

“In total?”

“Sure.”

She shook her head again, distain in every motion. “Three years, two months and sixteen days. Navy apparently doesn't rewrite this stuff often.”

“You watched three years' worth of tape.”

“Not a chance.” She sat down in front of the computer and the screen noticed her and flipped on as he pulled a chair around backward next to her and sat with his arms folded over the back.

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