Prologue
4301.04.21 1929
Celestia
Lance tumbled out of the maintenance hatch gracelessly, making an effort at wiping off the sticky condensation that had built up on his environmental suit during his trek.
Nina plopped out right after him, followed by Tass and Brock.
They were in a section of space at the edge of the galaxy, home to a single Coalition fleet and research facility. Rumours of this place made for popular holovision, but very few ever managed to see it with their own eyes. Getting out here with a conventional starship would have taken over a generation.
His team split up into two groups, separated by chambers full of what were probably sleeping crewmen. They moved swiftly and quietly.
When Lance had first received this contract, he had rejected it immediately. They weren’t beemster killers. But, as the price began to rise, and more information was given regarding this beems’ offspring, his mind had slowly begun to change. This wasn’t just any type of beemster. It was some sort of genetic hybrid, one that their anonymous employer was determined to have destroyed. Death of the actual beems itself was to be avoided if possible, though he wondered what kind of a life a beems could live after taking four shaped charges in the bowels, and losing its child. Perhaps it didn’t wish such a child born. His client had idly mentioned that this was one of the few beems that didn’t end their own lives after the knowledge of the experiment.
The chamber doors seemed to open to them automatically, the beems most likely assuming the pressure points it sensed in its corridors were those of just another maintenance crew. It wouldn’t be able to see them without its drones watching, or so he was told. As tertiary justification, he told himself that the beems probably knew anyways, and that this was just a form of suicide. Everyone would come out a winner in this.
Nina and Brock entered the door a few dozen meters to his right. The two bays at the aft section were separated by a divide thirty meters across and extending the entire vertical diameter of the ship. The offspring would be somewhere between his and Nina’s team, shielded by the thick divide.
Flam, his ship’s navigations officer and self-proclaimed beems expert had told him that beems vital organs were situated near the center line of the ship, in this thick divide. The primary nutrient pumps and main capacitor were here, as well as what constituted their main liver and other life support systems. Other, less important, auxiliary organs were known to grow in hundred meter or so increments, generally filtration organs. The baby would be growing upwards, slowly moving up along the organs as it claimed more space for itself, eventually staking out the area here, ready for birth. A dorsal orifice would open and the baby would come out, in theory. While this divide could be considered ‘thick’, it was far from as resilient as the area around the vital organs. This was their best shot at this apparently mutant beemster’s demise.
This beems’ cargo bay was massive, extending nearly a hundred meters ahead of him. There was a concave semitransparent membrane at the end of the cargo bay. The two blast doors that usually complimented the membranoid seal were retracted at the moment. This was apparently because having them retracted allowed more heat to dissipate and was the most ‘comfortable’ stance for a beems, or so Flam said. The three-tip stern profile the beems were known for was visible from where they were standing. The three massive pincer-like protrusions met at the very aft of the ship several hundred meters beyond him, a noticeable shade of light brown superimposed nearly a kilometre over the metallic faded grey background of the research facility. The center of the three tips would be where the beems’ renowned gravimetric lens would be when it’s sparked. There would be no spark here, though. He noticed three large bumps on each tip. The ship was clipped, most likely because the neural inhibitor was offline. The clip would keep the ship from moving or beeming out its offspring. As he stared, he also noticed the passive pale blue shimmer of an electrostatic field covering the membranoid seal, ensuring the atmosphere was contained in case the vacuum seal was disturbed in some way. For a moment he wondered if the electrostatic field had been there before.
“We’re planting our charges.” Nina reported.
“Let’s make it quick.” Lance ordered, suspicious of the electrostatic membrane. A deployed electrostatic membrane meant kinetic rounds wouldn’t cause depressurizations, which is what he would deploy if he wanted to storm the area with guns blazing and kill some intruders.
Their charges were rigged from Coalition 4400 anti-ship rounds. If primed properly, the shells would propel themselves a few dozen meters before detonating. The idea being that they detonate inside the beemster. Timing was paramount, if a shell went off too early or too late, it risked killing the beems instead, or his men.
“We just noticed an electrostatic field shimmer. Might be a transport inbound.” Nina reported.
“We saw one as well.” Lance whispered. “Cass, can you go around and check it out. Be stealthy.”
“Aye.”
Their ship was the Reaper – an infamous jump-drive equipped stealth ship.
“Set the primer charges for five minutes. That should be enough time for us to backtrack and get out.” Lance ordered.
“We’re ready.” Nina reported, “On your mark.”
“Shit!” Cass crackled.
“What is it?”
“Two troop transports inbound – TROOP TRANSPORTS – they know you’re there.”
Lance looked out past the membranoid wall. The transports were already seconds away from passing through the electrostatic field, big enough to hold an easy hundred soldiers with all their equipment and room to spare. The damn things must have been hiding behind one of the many jagged protrusions in this massive facility.
“Fall back!” Lance yelled over the roar of the thrusters that deafened his team as the ships passed through the electrostatic field and began to land. He braced himself for a moment, expecting the beems to depressurize the cargo bay to try and kill them, but then he remembered that the neural inhibitor was offline. Beems abhorred violent actions.
“You won’t be able to outrun them with those suits.” Tass said with a hint of amusement in his voice. Being a Vorchan, he didn’t need one of those clunky things.
A targeting laser washed over them and Tass instinctively spread his wings, revealing racks of anti-radiation missiles that automatically shot out and rode the transport’s tracking laser back towards it with lethal accuracy, destroying several sensor bulbs and emitters.
As Tass sealed the chamber doors behind him, he saw Nina and Brock do the same. While Brock didn’t have wings, his size allowed him to carry a few missiles of his own in his EV suit.
“I wonder which one of us damaged our transport more.” he said to Tass with a smug sneer.
“Shut up, they’ll chase us down.” Nina panted.
“No they won’t.” Lance said, typing an override into his EV suit’s gauntlet. “I just set a few of the charges to a high yield, thirty seconds. It’ll take out the soldiers pursuing us.”
“You’re a crazy bastard, Lance.” Nina yelled, sprinting down the corridor with Brock following closely behind. Lance followed the hulking masses ahead of him, none of them able to keep a steady speed with the EV suits on. Tass guarded their retreat, pushing himself back along the corridor with his wings. He still had two autocannons trained on the cargo bay doors, but they were nothing compared to the weight of the missiles he had launched earlier.
“You’re crazy, Lance.” Flam yelled from the Reaper, “The explosion will take out the beems, which will take out a good portion of the Deep Grey in the resulting gravimetric implosion. You’re gonna have to find a way into space now. Like right now!”
He pulled himself up into the maintenance hatch they had come from, helping Nina up. Brock and Tass were a few seconds behind them.
The charges detonated.