⊶ Prologue ⊷

The tarmac of the LEO pad shimmers under the floodlights of the lift facility. Before I arrived, I watched the weather on screen. I knew exactly what I was arriving in. Knowing doesn’t make it easier. A late evening rain had followed what would’ve been a relentless summer day. Combined with the residual heat off the engines and drive systems, the humidity makes my clothing stick. I lift my hair into a short ponytail, trying to get some kind of relief.

It doesn’t matter that the sun has been down for eight hours; the thick air across the facility makes breathing almost unbearable. If I wasn’t expecting an emergency cargo drop, I’d just keep the hatch buttoned up. But I am expecting a drop and the hatch is down.

Maybe it isn’t so bad…. I watch in fascination as goat trucks and robotic shunters in the distance are pulled upward into distorted specters of themselves. This isn’t a view you get in space. I’m glad I get earthside as often as I do.

I run a hand over the interior of the metal fuselage. I like flying this old bird; it holds memories for me. I met my husband in this cargo hold, not more than three feet from where I’m standing now. I catch myself wondering if my daughter will join the service when she’s old enough. Maybe then Sophia could come with me, back to Earth, to finally see what I’ve been trying to describe to her since she was little.

An unmarked van curves tightly past my LEO’s low-slung tail fins and reverses up to the cargo ramp, the rear doors opening before the vehicle brake lights come on.

My free hand drops from the fuselage to land on my sidearm, and I press myself instinctively into cover behind part of the airframe. After recognizing the three men who exit the vehicle, I relax.

The men wrangle a long shipping can out of the van and hustle it up the loading ramp.

I let them pass and then duck down, looking under the twin fins on either side of my craft, checking the tarmac for any sign of pursuit.

“I get that we’re in a hurry, Corporal,” I say as I straighten and turn to watch the men securing the sealed module to the floor brackets of my cargo area. “But the mission briefing I received was a little light on specifics. It was of the ‘Go here, get this box’ variety….”

“If command didn’t see fit to inform you of specifics,” a deep voice gravels from inside the van, “then you were excluded for a reason.”

Following the voice into the dark interior, I find its owner and promptly draw myself up, restraining the urge to salute. “Sorry, sir.”

The lieutenant colonel climbs out and moves past me, joining the shipping canister.

“Once she’s properly stowed and we’re airborne, I’ll be checking the contents. This craft has an advanced medical system? I spec’d one for this mission.” He doesn’t bother to hide his expression of mild disdain.

“Yes, sir. A new protocol was issued a few months ago. We’re now required to conceal all gear that may be above the civilian level of technology. This LEO might be an older model, sir, but I can assure you it has what you need.”

He grunts his response, “Good enough.”

I watch two of the men deplane. The van leaves as quickly as it arrived. Something about it all sends a chill down my spine.

The last man, the corporal, lingers uneasily near the center bulkhead.

“All secured, sir,” he says.

“Captain, button us up,” the lieutenant colonel says, his eyes flicking across the distant buildings. “Get us into the air.”

I punch the button to close the cargo ramp. “Sir, are we expecting trouble?” The idea of some kind of pursuit from an intercept vehicle makes me nervous. I love this LEO, but I know it isn’t nimble, armed, or well-armored.

“If we delay, there might be,” the lieutenant colonel says. “We’ve captured a foreign operative inside our perimeter. She’s currently in suspension at a level two setting.”

I stiffen and look at the cargo can. There’s a woman in there, drugged and troded into insensibility.

At my moment of hesitation, he says, “She’s a valuable asset. We have orders to bring her back for an in-depth interrogation. We are also running full containment. Anything happens to compromise our return to the platform, we are to close the loop.”

This is definitely not the normal transport run I volunteered for.

“That order comes from the top, Captain.” He meets my eyes, studying me for disapproval. “Let’s be careful, let’s be quick, and let’s be professional.”

That’s as close to ‘shut the hell up, and do your job’ as I’ve heard in a long time. I make my way forward along the narrow cargo hold.

“The medical gear?” he queries.

I point to the hidden floor compartment he’ll need. “Right there, sir.”

Moving into the cockpit, I visually check some of the pre-lift settings.

As I’m strapping into the command seat, the corporal joins me and quietly closes and dogs the bulkhead door. He drops into a second-row seat and straps in.

The young man looks gray, and his hands shake as he fumbles with the buckle.

“You going to be all right, Corporal?”

“Yeah. This is my first closed loop.” He looks nervously around at the control area covered in switches and controls. “Do you think we’re going to be okay?”

“I don’t see why not. This lift pad is as tight for security as any. As long as the cargo is clean, scanned for possible tracers, and no one’s physically after us…” I leave out the idea of the woman’s sponsors being invested enough to have a satellite watching her movements.

Lights blink, demanding my attention. They draw me back to my immediate task.

I’m glad I’m in this bird. As older LEOs go, this one is great. I’ve been its primary pilot for the better part of a decade. I remember flying it before it was retrofitted with an automated copilot. It’s been in some hard knocks with me at the controls, but together we’ve always pulled through.

The ACP runs its scans, does the calculations, forwards them for my approval, and waits for me to approve communications with the tower. The transmission is a quick signal burst, and the reply is a fraction of a second later.

“Colonel, please ensure you, your gear, and the cargo are secured.” I speak clearly into the pickup. “We are taxiing now.”

“Understood.”

The corporal blows out a breath as the scenery outside the thick windows begins to pan by. “It’s so quiet. Not like a regular transport.”

“Electric drive motors in the nose wheel,” I say, keeping myself on oversight, watching, just in case the system fails and needs immediate human control. “Once we maghook for take-off and launch, the SABRE drives will run as basic jet engines until we climb high enough to switch to scramjet. When we get closer to our lift window, we’ll reconfigure the drives again for a full rocket burn to get us into orbit.”

I flip the take-off sequence ‘on’ when the launch window light turns green.

The ACP announces, “Craft is aligned and steering locked. Runway magnetic hook: locked.”

A buzzer sounds through the cabin. “Launch.”

The LEO is thrown powerfully down the runway and into the air, climbing at a steep incline. Then comes the initial surge as the SABREs cut in.

A minute later, a second buzzer sounds. “Accelerating to hypersonic speeds. Active bypass: normal. Climbing to operational altitude.”

The endless expanse above, the crescent of white clouds, and the piercing shades of blue below, the view outside never gets old.

After a moment, the voice of the automated copilot sounds again, “Final altitude approaching. Lift altitude achieved. Holding steady. Boost window opening, trajectory confirmed via satnav. Final window to orbit calculated. Confirmed… Locked… Ready to initiate orbital insertion.”

I look at the numbers scrolling past on a side screen. I confirm the drive efficiencies for the ACP. Automated actuators close the air intakes. The ACP indicates that the turbo-compressors are shut down. The fuel source switches over in preparation for the final push into orbit.

Opening a mic channel, I say, “Colonel, we’re in position for final boost to insertion.”

A quiet chime sounds, and the LEO vibrates as the ACP ignites the burners. Thrust pushes me into my seat. Two and a half Gs make my limbs leaden.

I pull up a dual cam display. One shows the twin aerospikes on the tailfins, the other shows a projection of the targeted lift window, its distance ahead of us, and our current speed.

Lights pulse and flicker: all normal. The countdown clock to my lift window starts to scroll down.

A thud against the cabin door is the first indication of trouble.

“What the hell was that?” the corporal asks, panic filling his voice.

It happens twice more. I don’t have a lot of time to react; the rocket thrust from the engines is hitting full burn.

I flip on a rear cabin cam and pan it around. I speak into the open channel, “Colonel?”

The cargo pod is open, empty. Medical gear is strewn across the deck. The lieutenant colonel is slammed against the closed ramp, a fist-sized hole ripped through his clothes; bloody entrails have been wrenched out and span the length of the cargo hold. He feebly claws at them, trying to push them back into his belly. Only a shocked and vague understanding fills his expression.

There’s blood everywhere.

The corporal watching over my shoulder whispers, “Holy fuck.”

A naked woman snarls at the cam. Reaching up, she wrenches it from the wall. If the extra gravity isn’t slowing her down…

“Dropping the security bars.” I toggle a remote. The bars hammer into place electronically.

The corporal unbuckles and lurches through the weight of Gs to the barred and dogged hatch as the handle starts to spin. He raises his heavy pistol.

The woman on the other side yanks on the door, but it stays sealed.

“What can she access from back there?” he asks.

“If she’s smart…” I turn to look at him. His face is filled with worry that I can’t abate with my reply. “Enough to be a problem.”

I think about my daughter.

Sophia would be coming out of class right now, joking with her friends.

I have to make it home; I booked time in the big VR chamber for tonight. Sophia was so excited to be going to a VR beach.

…anything happens to compromise our return…. The lieutenant colonel’s words roll around my mind.

I turn to the corporal. “Who the fuck is she? What do you know about her?”

The countdown to lift is past zero. I only have a fifteen-second emergency abort opportunity.

“Some kind of cybered-up crazy supersoldier. She supposedly killed a bunch of our operatives all over the world, gutted them by hand. The lieutenant colonel was tracking her for a few months, and we followed her to Manila. She sucked up a lot of resources just finding her, more to bring her in. They want her in suspension so they can do a brain hack.”

I slam my palm into the pilot override.

The rockets disengage.

“I’m canceling the lift window until we get a handle on this. I have to descend, shed some speed. Then I can open vents into the hold.”

“Why descend? Can’t we just open the pod to vacuum when we’re up there?”

“There’d be nothing left to brain hack if she’s freeze-dried.” I shake my head. “We have to chill her without killing her.”

“The medical tube will have air. Won’t that be enough to keep her mobile?” His tone is unsure.

“Yeah, it does. On a high-end recycler, too. But do you have any idea how cold it’ll be back there inside a few minutes?”

“And then what?” He fidgets. The not knowing what the woman is doing in the hold is eating at both of us.

“We freeze her to slow her down, and then you shoot her.” I’m checking fuel levels for a second run and burn. There’s enough, but only just.

“What about our orders?” he asks. “We have a set arrival time.”

“Are you suddenly in a hurry to close the loop, Corporal?” I bark at him. “We freeze her out, and you take her down. Empty whatever you’re packing into her guts. Even if she dies, we shove her into the medical pod. It’ll hold her like that the rest of the way. Medics on the platform will sort her out for a brain hack.” I start fielding automated information requests about the sudden shift in flight plan and trajectory. I mutter, “We’ll be doing everyone on the platform a favor.”

The intakes reopen, and the drives are fired up again. The steady, reassuring vibration has a calming effect. The illusion is destroyed by hard thuds on the hatch that slow to a long silence.

I report an unsecured cargo incident, forward a fake manifest showing safe cargo, no toxins or hazardous goods aboard, and send a message indicating our crew is securing the freight and that we would be requesting a new lift window momentarily. The external comm system quiets.

As we wait, the corporal asks, “How cold is it back there?”

“It’ll chill to minus sixty, and I have the evacuation fans running on high. It’ll take about ten minutes for approval on our next lift window.” I eye the view of the ocean and the clouds rotating beneath us. “Whatever we do, it has to happen before then. I don’t know about you, but I’m inclined to let her sit back there for a few minutes.”

We’ll be a little late to the platform, but we could still make it.

“All right, Corporal. The vents are closed, the fans are off. Pressurizing the hold. It’s going to be fucking cold back there. Get close enough to her that you don’t miss.”

“Right,” he mutters, “Don’t miss.”

“Removing the security bars.” Magnetics pull the steel sheathed composite bars aside. “Go get her.”

“Like a rat in a bucket,” he says.

He opens the hatch, and the blast of cold air that rolls forward has me sucking my breath.

“She took out all the lights back here,” the corporal calls from behind me. “Goddamn, what a fucking mess.”

“Just find her, Corporal.” I busily reset a request for a new lift window.

The grunt, the gunfire, and the sudden warning lights sprinkled across my panel send my heart rate soaring. The warning lights are followed by a wheezing scream that rises in pitch and is quickly cut off.

I know the corporal didn’t close the hatch behind him… I know there’s no way I can unbuckle, reach it, and pull it closed. A newer craft would have an automated door, closeable with a touch of a button on the console.

The old bird and I have finally let each other down.

I pull my pistol and, with my other hand, reach under the control screen to the concealed lever. The one that would close the loop. I hear wet slapping footfalls rushing forward out of the darkness.

As the sun rises over the horizon, I think of my daughter and wonder if she’ll ever make it planetside to see it for herself. Would she ever marry, ever have children of her own?

A cold, blood-soaked hand clamps around my throat. A hard hammer-like blow on my forearm breaks bones and sends my weapon tumbling. My mind locks on the pain.

I pull the lever.

Through the portholes, I see the shifting curve of the planet beneath me and the Californian Islands passing by.

“Land this craft,” the woman snarls through frostbitten lips. The corporal’s pistol gleams in her hand as it rises into my view. A palmscreen implant glows around the weapon’s grips.

“No,” I gasp. It’s all I can manage.

Acidic gas washes its way along vents, compromising metals, searing skin, muscle, sinew, and bone. Sealed tubes hidden in the hull and filled with voraciously programmed nanites burst open. The disassembler swarm begins to follow its programming, digesting the LEO craft from the inside even as it flies.

Fuel to the engines is dumped as the craft descends in a slow graceful arc.

The ACP reconfigures the flaps and locates a remote area of the Atlantic for the wreckage to impact; the tiny bots would destroy whatever was left and then they, in turn, would be swallowed by the sea.

As the shuttle streaks past the arid landscape below, it registers an encrypted covert beacon and sends out an emergency protocol code. Following its embedded subroutines, it makes one final flight adjustment.

The LEO twists free of its original trajectory … and falls toward the dust.

*****

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