Breach of Duty by Daniel Gibbs & Gary T. Stevens

Author:Daniel Gibbs & Gary T. Stevens
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-01-19T16:00:00+00:00

Once her drives were ready, Shadow Wolf made her final jump back to NW-3-11. She emerged from the wormhole with Miri in the command seat and Piper at the helm. Vidia sat at Piper's usual station, observing the Wolf's sensors.

While Piper put the ship on course back to the Masada redoubt, Henry walked in. Miri stood and moved over to Tia's vacant place, allowing him his seat. "How does it look?" he asked.

"System's as empty as before," Piper noted. "I'm burning us back in."

A few moments passed before Vidia spoke up. "I'm pickin' up an exhaust trace on the sensors."

Henry didn't like the sound of that. "What can you tell me?"

"Looks like one ship, small size. A yacht or personal transport. Or a bigger ship with an exhaust reservoir, I suppose. Their course takes them ta the redoubt."

Henry glanced at Miri. "Any idea who it could be?"

"The knowledge of these outposts is light. And if our contacts are…" She stopped speaking as her attention was drawn by a light and electronic tone from Tia's station. "We've got an incoming message from the redoubt."

"ID?"

"It claims to be from Hale. It's a report from CDF Intelligence Analysis."

"Let me see it." Henry waited for Miri to relay it to his chair's viewer. The viewer popped up, a screen of pure light with text showing on it. It was an official finding for a secret analysis of logs.

Logs from the Solzhenitsyn—and the Laffey.

As Henry looked over the findings, he felt his gut clench. Realization at the betrayal he'd suffered that day became horror at what it meant. "Get us to the redoubt, now," he ordered as he rose from his chair. "Miri, with me!" He drew his charge pistol and rushed for the door.

Miri, somewhat stunned, pulled her sidearm and followed.

Henry checked the galley, weapon drawn, frightening Xu in the process. Tia stared at him with shock when he did the same thing to the rec room. But Henry paid them no heed. He stopped at the infirmary and found Mueller with Snow while Oskar was resting on another bed. They stared at him with shock, but he ignored them, moving astern and scared beyond belief of what he knew, deep down, was happening.

He arrived at the door to Engineering and found it stuck. He tapped at the key to open it, and it didn't. Miri came up, Tia and Mueller and Xu trailing behind, while Henry pulled the panel open and hit the emergency release on the door. The emergency system forced the doors open with a magnetic pull, allowing them entry into Engineering. Miri brought her pistol up as Henry already had his, entering behind him.

They found Samina first. Blood trickled at the back of her head where she was sprawled out, unconscious. Pieter was nearby, an eye going black and similarly motionless against his panel. Sparks crackled and sizzled from the open heart of the ship's Lawrence drive in the middle of the chamber. Henry went to the edge of the opening and pointed his gun down.

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