Destroyer (Expansion Wars Trilogy, Book 3) Read online

  "I assume the block you were taking to the cargo hold contains the something we were coming to the Pontiac to meet, sir?" Chambliss said as Jackson settled back into his seat.

  "It is the thing," Jackson corrected him. "It's a relic from the Phage War, a piece of equipment our Vruahn allies gave us to help with the war effort. The processing unit inside the damn thing somehow evolved once it was cut off from the Vruahn network … it's emerged as a fully sentient AI, the first of its kind."

  "Holy shit," Chambliss whispered.

  "I'm using a loophole in the regs to tell you all this," Jackson said. "The existence of this machine is a highly classified, closely controlled secret. Your position as second in command of the ship it's sitting on means that you now have need-to-know along with the necessary clearance level."

  "If it's such a closely guarded secret, how the hell did a rogue alien ship commander find out about it, much less exactly where it was, sir?" Chambliss asked.

  "I think we both know what the obvious answer to that is, Commander," Jackson said. "And the implications aren't pleasant."

  "Could someone really be a traitor to their own species?" Chambliss asked after a moment. "Espionage is one thing between nation states, but what could you possibly hope to gain? If the Darshik could have won this war it would have meant either the eradication or subjugation of humanity. Hell, they technically surrendered and we're still fighting."

  Jackson didn’t have an answer for his XO's question. If the Phage had communicated and given someone the opportunity to save their own skin, would the same thing have happened then? He'd always thought the one bright spot out of that war had been humanity realizing they weren't alone and banding together against a common threat as they never had before. Perhaps that was temporary; perhaps it never actually existed. What was certain to Jackson at this point, however, was that the Darshik were getting information from a human source and it was a source with a high level of access to Terran military secrets.

  "Nav, plot a course to the DeLonges jump point by way of Arcadia Prime so that we can retrieve our two shuttles and crews," he said. "OPS, inform Engineering that we'll be transitioning out of the Arcadia System within the next … thirty-two hours."

  "Course plotted and locked in, Captain."

  "Helm, come onto new course … all ahead flank."

  "Engines ahead flank, aye."

  Pike walked casually through the entrance of the Royal Clipper, an expensive hotel in the Britannia District and the place he'd watched Vice Chairman Akio Tanaka enter along with his impressive security entourage. Counting his blessings that he was still wearing Aston Lynch's expensive suit, he assumed a practiced air of pure arrogance and brushed past the doorman without a word. As he walked by, he noticed a man loitering near the edge of the building that, to a trained agent, stood out like a sore thumb. Pike ignored him and saw that the man didn't take any special notice of him as he ascended the steps.

  The Royal Clipper was pure old world. The exquisite woodwork that adorned the lobby looked to be actual wood and not the synthetic facsimile that most builders used. The art on the walls looked like it had come from England, the one on Earth, and most of the staff could be heard speaking in that clipped Britannic accent.

  Vice Chairman Tanaka's security staff didn't pay Pike a bit of attention as he walked by, his mannerisms of a mid-level bureaucrat so practiced he was virtually invisible. He walked slowly into the bar area and took a seat, pretending to be absorbed by what was on his comlink as he waited for the bartender.

  "Sir, I'm afraid this is—." The bartender didn't get any further before Pike, anticipating that the Royal Clipper catered only to government types, had his ident card exposed in its leather wallet and slid it across the bar.

  "Whiskey … neat," Pike said without looking up.

  "At once, sir."

  Aston Lynch was still listed as an official aide to the President of the United Terran Federation. For a place like the Royal Clipper that tried to provide an atmosphere where government officials could relax and spend money without worrying about media or civilians, Mr. Lynch was exactly the type of clientele they liked. He was just low enough on the food chain that he'd be more apt to spend big trying to impress his betters.

  Pike watched out of his peripheral vision as Vice Chairman Tanaka was escorted to the elevators. The team was good. Three men went in first, probably to secure the target floor, while one remained near him. The other two were posted up a few meters away where they could continue to scan the room for threats. They would go up after the other four had Mr. Tanaka secure in his suite. There was no way Pike could easily slip by them without making a huge, loud mess and he doubted his boss would appreciate him freelancing within the capital over a hunch.

  "Your drink, sir," the bartender said, placing an exquisitely cut crystal glass in front of him with a whiskey that smelled fairly cheap despite the price they were about to charge for it. He just grunted and pressed his thumb on the proffered tile to authorize a tab started in his name.

  As he nursed his drink, he watched the man he'd noticed earlier walk into the hotel lobby, still looking wildly out of place. It wasn't his clothes, the way he walked, or anything as obvious as that, but there was something about him that alerted Pike this was a dangerous man. He wandered around the lobby for a few minutes before the elevator doors opened up and two of Tanaka's security people walked out and approached him. There was a brief but intense conversation and a subtle scan from a handheld device one of guards produced. The newcomer was pointing at the elevator and arguing quietly with the security team, the leader of which was shaking his head and gesturing vaguely behind him. After a tense moment the newcomer looked around and seemed to remember where he was. He reached out and palmed something the guard had offered, nodded curtly, and walked out of the hotel.

  "One more," Pike waved at his empty glass.

  "Waiting on someone?" the bartender asked when he brought the second drink back.

  "Not particularly," Pike answered, thinking fast. "I'm making arrangements for a dignitary that's in town for the next two days." He put particular emphasis on the word arrangements.

  "Oh? Any sort of special arrangements you're thinking of?" The bartender was now extremely interested in what Pike had to say. His credentials and story were exactly what someone in the position to offer unique local services wanted to hear.

  "My responsibility is to an executive officer from a certain high-powered corporation that I think we can leave nameless," Pike said, deciding to use his knowledge of Tanaka staying at the Royal Clipper to his advantage. "His appetites aren't necessarily too exotic, but discretion is of the utmost importance."

  "I understand completely." The bartender nodded. "I might know of a little-used service entrance that can only be opened with a key card and security code. From there you can access the service elevators that go directly to the suites on the top ten floors."

  "That's encouraging," Pike said, feigning thoughtfulness as he kept an eye on the lobby. "How much would it take, hypothetically, to jog your memory?"

  "Five thousand notes. Has to be hard currency," he answered immediately, letting Pike know this was a regular scam he had going. "Ten thousand if you would need me to—hypothetically—secure services for your client as well."

  "No need," Pike said, reaching into his jacket pocket. He discreetly peeled off ten five-hundred-note bills and slid them under his rocks glass. At first Pike thought that the bartender might be some amateur as he'd barely checked to see if he might be law enforcement, but then he remembered where he was. The capital police wouldn't try to bust a Tsuyo executive for solicitation no matter the circumstances. They may threaten to in order to wet their own beak, but nobody would be looking at the inside of a holding cell and everybody in this town knew it.

  "Wait here," the bartender said, sliding the glass off the bar so the untraceable cash dropped into his waiting hand without making a show of it in front of the few patrons in there. A min
ute later, he came back with two access cards.

  "The one with the blue stripe is for the service elevator; the access code you'll also need is on the back. The plain black one is to open the outer door; the location and code is written on the back of that one as well. The codes all rotate every twelve hours so you have another … three and a quarter before they change again. No refunds if you miss your window."

  "You've made my life much easier this evening, my friend," Pike said, laying down another grand on the bar.

  "Just doing my patriotic duty," the bartender smirked. Pike winked at him and left the bar. Like most public places in New Sierra City, the Royal Clipper was loaded with the latest security tech like scanners that could detect even the most carefully hidden weapons or explosives. It was true that there was a sort of laxness that was inevitable in any seat of power, but the little side-venture the staff of the hotel had going probably wouldn't ever result in a high-profile assassination or something equally unpleasant. If Pike had walked in as a civilian and tried to proposition the bartender in the same way, he'd have likely been grabbed in the lobby and taken to a security room where he would have been vigorously interrogated until local law enforcement arrived.

  He walked out of the hotel and back into the humid night air, flagged down his waiting car, and sped away. There was a calculated risk in taking his eyes off the objective, but nabbing the guy that was talking with Tanaka's security pros in the lobby was out of the question, at least out in the open like that. It was fifty-fifty odds that he was there to meet with the Vice Chairman, but couldn't be seen publicly doing so.

  It was a gamble since the thing the man was handed might have been the entirety of the exchange, but Pike’s instincts told him that there was more to it than a simple handoff. That could be done anywhere. He hoped that the exit he'd rented from the entrepreneurial bartender was also one that others among the staff offered up to others for the right price. He knew his credentials listing him as an aide to the President had allowed him the access he needed, he just hoped Tanaka's position had the same sway.

  By the time he took the car around three blocks and back up to the ramp that led down to the below-street delivery and service entrances, he assumed that his quarry had either already made his way inside or wasn't using the same door to gain entry at all. He also thought about what he'd do if it turned out this new player belonged to the CIS … it would make things a bit awkward at the next office party if he assaulted him.

  "Well, no shit," he muttered after climbing out of the car. Standing near the door that the bartender had sold him was one of Tanaka's guards. That might not mean anything, as he could be there as part of their standard procedures when guarding a VIP, but it was promising. He reached back into the passenger compartment and opened his gear bag, selecting three items before commanding the car to randomly loop around the area, coming by his current location every twenty-five minutes.

  He pulled out one of the devices, a handheld com scanner, and began running through the frequencies to see if his friend down by the door was wearing a two-way radio. He was and it was encrypted so he put in his earpiece and set the device to trying to break the encryption. The gadget was the latest and greatest from CIS's toy box, but Tanaka was an executive at the company that made all of their equipment. It stood to reason that his would be better than the stuff Pike had access to.

  After fifteen minutes he gave up. As he'd assumed, the encryption the security team was using was simply too good for the small handheld unit to crack. "Gotta do this the hard way I guess," he muttered, pulling out the black door access card and displaying it prominently as he walked down the ramp.

  "Stop right there," the guard said. "This is a restricted—"

  "Yeah … that's what this is for." Pike waved the card at him. "Get out of my way, idiot." The guard's eyes narrowed dangerously, but he stepped aside and watched closely as Pike placed the card against the reader and punched in the code he'd memorized.

  The door released with a pop/hiss and swung open. Pike gave the guard one more disgusted look before moving inside and letting the door close behind him. Once inside, he found his way to an employee breakroom where he traded out his expensive suit jacket for a white jacket worn by the food prep staff. He also swiped an employee access badge that had been carelessly left on the table and stepped from the room, stashing his jacket on a top shelf near the door he'd come in.

  "New here?" a voice said from behind him. He turned and saw a pretty young woman in a black server's outfit walking towards him.

  "I am," Pike said with a chuckle. "Still trying to get my bearings. My shift doesn't start for a bit. I'm Michael."

  "Aleen," she said with a bright smile. "Hope to see you around, Michael."

  "This isn't going to work," Pike said to himself once she was gone. Instead of loitering near the crew break area he went the way the bartender had described towards the service elevators. Now that he was in, he only had another two hours and forty-five minutes before he needed to be gone. Hopefully he'd catch sight of his target before then.

  Just as he was deciding whether to try and locate the suite Tanaka was in and head there or set an ambush up outside after taking out the single security goon, his target walked around the corner and almost collided with him. This time the man's eyes lit up with recognition, seeing past Pike's mismatched disguise to the agent beneath.

  Without hesitation, he lashed out with a forward kick that Pike barely deflected before launching off his right foot and trying to land a hit of his own. The two separated and looked at each other warily, each now a bit more cautious.

  "CIS? Fleet Intelligence?" the man asked.

  "Line cook," Pike deadpanned. "It's my first day."

  The man gave a tight grin before taking one more step back and reaching into his pocket. Pike couldn't get to his weapon in time beneath the long white jacket he was wearing, so instead he yanked the shelving unit to his left, planting his foot near the base to ensure it toppled instead of slid. The wheeled rack had been holding clean dishes that looked to be queued up for the evening service, and when it went ceramic plates and real glasses were flung to the floor. His opponent seemed to freeze for a split second, unsure whether to continue pulling his weapon, dodge the falling dishes, or put his arm up to protect himself.

  His hesitation was his undoing as the force of the shelves hitting him caused him to stumble, trip on the broken plates and glasses, and fall with his hand still in his pocket. Pike moved in and drove his fist right into the man's throat, disabling him as his eyes bulged and he made strange bubbling noises. The racket three hundred crashing plates had made was tremendous and Pike knew he only had seconds before someone came running to see what the hell happened.

  He grabbed the man by a handful of jacket and dragged him back down towards the breakroom, sliding him into a restroom and locking the door. It was a surprisingly long time later before someone began screaming about the mess he'd left. The man was beginning to come out of shock so Pike reached in his pocket and pulled out a cylindrical advice, pushing it against the man's neck and pressing one of the buttons. There was a soft hiss and a moment later he was breathing slowly, now in a deep sleep.

  "Now let's see who you are," Pike said, rummaging through the man's pockets.

  There was an assortment of equipment that proved the man was an intelligence operative, but it wasn't anything Pike had seen the CIS issue. There were some obvious forgeries that identified him as a Tsuyo Corporation attaché but nothing that told Pike who he was working for or why he was meeting with the Tsuyo vice chairman.

  Knowing he was on the clock, Pike began a more thorough search and, after another minute, found something sewn into the liner of the jacket. He cut it out and examined the thin ceramic wafer in the dim light of the restroom's single-light fixture. He'd seen one before; it was a passive-burst tracker that allowed an operative to be discreetly monitored by an orbiting ship or satellite. It didn't actively transmit on its own, but it woul
d "chirp" a coded response when queried. It was also only used by the Eastern Star Alliance.

  Now that he knew the man on the floor was ESA it made things a bit more complicated for both his immediate situation and what he was going to report to his boss. Not wanting to waste any more time than he had, he pushed the cylindrical device to the man's neck again and pressed a different button. Before he'd even positioned the man on the toilet after sliding his pants down he could feel his heart fluttering. By the time he was straightening his own jacket out in the mirror, the man was dead.

  He briefly entertained the idea of grabbing the Tsuyo executive in the suite above and taking him to a CIS safehouse, but quickly dismissed it. Killing an ESA operative while catching him in the heart of the capital was one thing; kidnapping one of Tsuyo's highest-ranking board members was quite another. If he was even slightly off in his reasoning they'd never find enough of him to send home to bury. He would have to make a quick escape before his dead friend was noticed missing and Tanaka's security got involved. He also needed to get this information back to his controller and, possibly, his contacts in Starfleet.

  15

  "You have something for me?"

  "I do, Captain," the Cube said in its usual measured intonation that, for some reason, infuriated Jackson at times.

  The Nemesis had transitioned into the DeLonges System sixteen hours prior and had so far been ignored by CENTCOM. There had been no news from the other ships in the system of another Darshik attack, but that didn't mean one hadn't happened. The Specter was now hitting high-profile Terran targets seemingly at will. Without specific orders, Jackson was at a bit of a loss as to what he should do. His ship still had plenty of fuel and provisions to mount a hunting expedition, but he needed both approval and whatever intelligence the CIS had managed to cobble together from all the engagements.