Stand or Fall (The Omega War Book 4) Read online

  Bastards.

  “What do you need me to do?”

  “You’re Human, Jessica. We need you to confirm the battle damage personally. I know this will not be easy, but I also know you have seen enough battlefields to retain your composure and determine the responsible party. We’ve quarantined the entire planet, which really wasn’t difficult. New Persia isn’t high on the list of planets any species wants, except for Humans.”

  Jessica’s stomach twisted into a knot. The moisture in her mouth and throat evaporated, leaving her unable to speak for a long moment. Five thousand Humans were dead. They were mostly women and children and by the laws of warfare on Earth two centuries earlier, they would have been protected from such an attack. The regulations of the Galactic Union did not specify any being as a non-combatant. All species were fair game; she’d learned that from her own near assassination. The loss of five thousand defenseless Humans would hardly faze most of the species in the Union, but to Jessica the fault lay squarely on the Mercenary Guild and their pursuit of the Four Horsemen.

  Nigel Shirazi and his company weren’t without blame. To loot a maintenance depot of every weapon and soldier capable of defending the settlement was a gross miscalculation. He’d likely figured the MinSha would not return after he destroyed their ships.

  “Besides Nigel Shirazi, you mean?”

  Dreel nodded, impressed. “Certainly, his actions were rash, and he did not anticipate reciprocity from the MinSha against women and children, which is curiously naïve for a Human mercenary commander. Your orders are simple, Jessica. Get to New Persia, assess the damage to the settlement, and trace the culprits. If they are Drehnayl’s forces, report to the Peacemaker Guild at once for further instructions.”

  Jessica blinked. “You seem sure this is the work of Lieutenant General Chinayl and the Mercenary Guild.”

  “That’s part of what we have to confirm. If Drehnayl’s forces are behind this atrocity, that is a tie to Chinayl. They’ve ordered MinSha mercenary forces to engage in genocide on the planet, Jessica. While not expressly forbidden by the Union laws, they are clearly approaching Human colonies in the Rim Territories with prejudice. Every species has a right to colonize the galaxy, and unless the Humans did something threatening to the MinSha, there is no reason for their forces to wipe out a settlement in this manner.”

  “Save for terrorism.” Jessica frowned. From her years of schooling, the word left a sour taste in her mouth. “They want Earth to cower at their feet, so they attack the far-out colonies that likely can’t defend themselves and use those losses to stoke fear. Gods, what bullshit.”

  Dreel nodded. “I am inclined to agree, Lieutenant.”

  “So, I’m taking a team?”

  Dreel shook his head. “No. You’re going alone.”

  “What?” Jessica flinched. “You just said the Mercenary Guild has a price on my head! Why would you send me on my own without even a strike team?”

  “We have reason to believe they won’t attack you directly.”

  “Directly?” Jessica shook her head hard enough for her neck to pop. “Oh, hell no! You want me to be bait, sir.”

  “I never said that, Jessica.” Dreel sighed. “Master Rsach believes the Mercenary Guild may try to intercept you. If that happens, he has probable cause to confront them at Luna. Your being Human is the only reason Peepo and her litter-mates want you dead. If they act now, with your rank and position, they risk a tribunal, if not direct confrontation. As you’re probably aware, mercenaries and tribunals do not make a good match. Things will get messy.”

  “If I’m dead, that won’t matter,” Jessica fumed. She bit back any further comment because it wouldn’t serve any purpose. Sending her on her own was a significant risk, but she’d likely have a vessel and a flight crew—they would be capable of protecting her to a certain extent. She also had Lucille and her wits. The near-AI program was much more than a virtual assistant, especially when a situation turned bad. Lucille had her back. If their quarantine efforts had been enough to confuse potential enemies, then her mission could succeed, and she could return to Dryod Four before prying eyes figured things out. After giving it some thought, she realized leaving on her own, without support, bordered on delusional, but sometimes the best tactical moves deftly walked the line between brilliance and stupidity. “Fine. I’ll take the mission. It beats sitting in quarantine for three more weeks.”

  Dreel nodded. “You’ll have an Excalibur-class scout vessel and enough supplies and ammunition for sixty days of operations. The vessel has a crew of four, including pilots and gunners. You should have everything you need at your disposal. Assess the damage and, if possible, prove Drehnayl and her forces are behind this attack. Do so, and our guild has some much needed leverage to stop Peepo’s war.”

  * * *

  With her go-right-now bags slung over her shoulders and a weapons case containing a laser rifle in her hand, Jessica moved through the subterranean passages of the Peacemaker barracks to the main flight hangar. As promised, the hangar was empty save for Lieutenant Pt-Dah and Dreel. Behind them, three sleek Excalibur-class scout vessels hummed gently. All the other craft were quiet, and the usual complement of maintenance workers and ship captains were nowhere to be seen. The craft represented a final shell game.

  Jessica walked around the rear entry ramp of a Peacemaker Guild standard transport, likely the one Dreel arrived on, and into the soft circle of light. Dreel nodded solemnly at her and Pt-Dah twitched a series of its limbs in succession much like a wave. She’d never seen the Lieutenant do such a thing and wondered if it was something done for equals.

  “Lieutenant Francis,” Dreel said. “Your steed awaits.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Jessica couldn’t help but smile. The giant Besquith intelligence officer had been her favorite instructor and, over time, had been her biggest cheerleader. “Let’s hope this little ruse works.”

  Dreel chuckled. “It will work, Jessica. Provided, of course, we do everything exactly as rehearsed.”

  Jessica’s breath caught in her chest. Dreel’s familiar words dredged up a memory she’d almost forgotten from the academy. In one of Dreel’s more boring lectures, he prattled on about the need for rehearsals in operations to the point that one student, an Oogar named Arkus, had gone berserk. He’d charged the mighty Besquith, and they’d wrestled for a moment before collapsing in laughter in front of the shocked student body. Dreel had stood, opened his brawny arms to the class and told them anything rehearsed to the point of exhaustion was staged and devoid of authenticity and initiative. Remaining flexible and, more importantly, ready were the hallmarks of being a Peacemaker.

  Jessica set her bags carefully on the deck and checked her position to both Dreel and Lieutenant Pt-Dah on instinct. She was much closer to Pt-Dah, and something about her garrison commander’s fidgeting set her on edge. As she bent down to set the weapons case on the floor, the Jeha rippled forward with a shriek. Hand on the knife in her left boot, Jessica came up quickly to meet the attack, only to see Dreel step forward and swipe a mighty claw across the Jeha’s face, then slam his other fist repeatedly into the squealing, yellow, pus-filled jaws of the barrack’s commander. The beating took thirty seconds, and as soon as Dreel finished knocking the Jeha unconscious, the lights in the hangar came on, and two lumbering Lumari Peacemakers collected the former commander on a stretcher and ran for the medical bay. Dreel wiped his claws on his combat vest and looked at her.

  “I’m glad you remembered your training, Jessica. Your posture made it easy to defend you against Pt-Dah’s poorly-executed attack.”

  “Pt-Dah was the true leak?” Jessica asked as the tumblers clicked together in her mind. “Hak-Chet’s report said the leak had been silenced a few weeks earlier, but that was part of the plan, wasn’t it?”

  “Oldest trick in the book, Lieutenant. Getting a much bigger fish with a little more bait, or something to that effect,” Dreel grinned. “Undoubtedly, he was ordered to kill you. I’ve ensur
ed otherwise. Now, he also won’t be able to tell his benefactors which ship you boarded. They know our plan to exfiltrate you, but Pt-Dah did not know your destination.”

  Jessica nodded and knelt to sheath her knife. Eyes on Dreel, she recognized his plan was much more complicated than she’d assumed. “You’re not putting me on any of those vessels, are you? And no support team either?”

  “You’ll have two flight crews. Pendals, by the way. My personal pilots,” Dreel said. “And you’ll take a Besquith-built thrust core mounted with my yacht and a few other ships. It’s a little bigger than a scout vessel and better appointed. It will carry some diplomatic cargo and could give you some anonymity. But that’s not all.”

  “It’s diplomatically protected and registered to the Besquith Consulate, not just the Peacemaker Guild. It’s the perfect cover.” Jessica wanted to slap her forehead. “I should’ve thought of that.”

  “You are a fine addition to the Peacemaker Guild, Lieutenant Francis. In time, you will be as conniving as the best alphas. But, time is wasting, as your kind says. Your appointment at the gate is in four hours, and it will take three and half to get there. Get aboard the Malae and have safe travels.” The Besquith extended a massive hand to shake in the Human manner.

  Jessica reached out and took his hand in both of hers. “Thank you, Dreel.”

  “Find the bastards behind New Persia, Jessica. Do it before they strike again, because your entire planet is watching. They need hope.”

  * * * * *

  Chapter Three

  Memphis

  Earth

  All Jackson Rains really wanted was a good, last drink…or three. He wandered Memphis for the better part of three days searching for just the right place to have a farewell-to-Earth drink. Much of that wandering had been more drunken stupor than actual searching, but it hadn’t mattered much to him. Fresh from the Peacemaker Academy at Kleve, he’d taken off his freshly-minted platinum shield, slipped it into a pocket, and headed home to Earth for leave. There hadn’t been anyone to see. Family wasn’t an issue. His parents had left him in the Tucson Interplanetary Aerodrome as a child, and he’d never known them. Bounced from orphanages to foster homes, he’d never stayed in one place longer than a year, through no fault of his own. Most of the families with the ability to support foster children were mercenary families. When the breadwinners died on mission, and the steady stream of credits became a trickle, those left behind searched for another mercenary. Each new marriage saw foster kids returned to the system. Taking in a fostered child would give a mercenary family on Earth a nice credit bonus, but with the high mortality rate, kids like Rains found themselves moving almost constantly. When he turned 16 and completed his initial VOWS, offers from higher tier mercenary companies showered down on him, but Rains wasn’t interested.

  Saving nearly every credit he’d been able to earn or steal through his high school years, Rains graduated from the Foster Academy for Mercenary Children and hitchhiked from Arizona to Florida to catch an orbital shuttle. From Armstrong Station, he’d bartered his way onto a freighter bound for Kleve. He’d walked up to the gates of the Peacemaker Academy and asked to be considered. It took six interviews and three different iterations of the physically- and mentally-demanding VOWS tests before the cadre took him into the school, sat him down in a cold, dim conference room, and left him shivering for two hours, before an older Sidar with a funny smile sauntered into the room, noisily slid a chair from the table, and sat down across from him.

  “Who are you, and why are you here?” The Sidar rested his short arms on the table and clasped his clawed hands in front of him. A few sprigs of white hair caught the only light in the room. He leaned forward, his black eyes gleaming, and whispered. “Who are you really, Jackson Rains?”

  Rains stared at the older alien, said nothing, then felt like a fool when hot tears pooled in his eyes and rushed down his cheeks. “I don’t know.”

  The Sidar smiled and nodded. “My name is Selector Hak-Chet, Jackson. You are precisely the Human I’ve been looking for. Welcome to the Peacemaker Academy.”

  Jessica Francis and Nikki Sinclair got all the press and attention. Jessica more so than Nikki, but they were the first two Humans to successfully complete the academy. Human attention span only lasted so long. As Hak-Chet had put it bluntly, “Who was the third Human to walk on Luna?”

  Rains hadn’t known, and the point was clear. He was just another Human Peacemaker, and that made him vitally different. He could travel anywhere in the galaxy, and only a few would recognize him—his fellow Peacemakers. Beyond them, he was invisible, exactly as Hak-Chet wanted, but the Selector never bothered to share his plan.

  So, Rains had gone absent without leave, figuring that if Hak-Chet really wanted to tell him the plan, he’d send someone along to collect him. It had been five days, twelve hours, and thirty-six minutes since he was due back at the Peacemaker Consulate on Luna for duty. The first day, he’d cowered in a hotel room, thinking Lumari and Oogar Peacemakers were going to burst through the door at any moment. He started drinking on the second day and didn’t remember much of the next three, when he decided it was time to go back and face the consequences.

  A shady-looking bar fronted by gaudy, neon green signage beckoned in the early morning fog. Murphy’s would be a perfect place to drown his final goodbyes to Earth. Even if the Peacemakers didn’t throw him in prison and discharge him for desertion, war was coming. General Peepo and her fleet hovered over Earth like vultures, patiently waiting for their prey to acquiesce to death before pouncing on the carrion. Being a Peacemaker should have given Jackson confidence, but he merely wanted to return to Luna and apologize to the only thing he’d ever considered family—the Peacemaker Guild.

  He finished a Jameson, neat, for a little hair of the dog and liquid courage, and he had been just about ready to leave the bar when a cute brunette walked in with three scruffy guys. The way they surrounded her made Rains wonder if she was some sort of celebrity, but she hung on the arm of one of them, a burly guy with a mohawk and a neon green leather jacket.

  Talk about shit that doesn’t make sense.

  The foursome found their way to the other end of the bar and took over a corner. The girl caught his eye and smiled. It was a gorgeous smile on a face that was not traffic stopping, but pretty. Rains ordered another Jameson and smiled in return. The girl blushed slightly and looked away. Mohawk, however, saw the entire exchange. He slipped off his worn leather jacket, revealing a black, sleeveless t-shirt emblazoned with the name of a godawful 1980s metal band, and had stomped Rains’ way. Mohawk arrived at the exact instant the robot bartender set the new whiskey down. Aware of the larger man’s presence, and acutely aware of his unwashed smell, Rains reached out for the glass only to have Mohawk knock it away.

  “Aww,” Jackson groaned. “That’s Jameson Reserve, man. Rare and expensive.”

  “Tough shit, asshole.” Mohawk grabbed Rains’ leather flight jacket by the left shoulder and yanked. Rains slid from the stool, stepped backward, and quickly got his feet under him. Instead of looking ready to fight, Jackson let his arms hang down from his shoulders. He shuffled back a step and plaintively raised his hands.

  “What’s your problem, man? I don’t want any trouble,” Rains said. Mohawk’s buddies, one with a long, ratty beard, and the other wearing sunglasses despite being inside the dark, dingy bar, appeared at Mohawk’s sides.

  “Yeah? You lookin’ at my girl’s gonna get your ass in trouble, boy.” Mohawk shifted his weight. Rains knew he was right-handed, and the first punch he threw would be a haymaker. If Mohawk managed to be faster than he looked, it would be a difficult fight. The anger rising in Rains’ brain, however, would makes things immeasurably worse.

  Rains forced a chuckle. Nothing else insulted him like being called, “boy.” Controlling his emotions with a quick inhale-inhale-exhale Peacemaker technique, Rains felt a detached calmness descend over him. He wiped the smile from his face with the back of hi
s dark-skinned hand. Why does it always have to be racist motherfuckers?

  “Look,” Rains said. “I’ll buy you and your entourage a round, okay? I don’t want any trouble.”

  “My what?” Mohawk looked perplexed. “How ‘bout you speak English, boy?”

  That’s twice. Rains sighed. And he’s a dumb motherfucker to boot.

  “You and your friends. I’ll buy you all a round, we can sit down, and as soon as I finish my drink, I’ll be on my—”

  Mohawk’s right hand came up in a ham-sized fist, but Rains was already moving. The punch lashed through the air where his face had been a hundred milliseconds before. Without anything to stop the momentum, Mohawk’s weight shifted toward his left foot and Rains stepped forward, brought up his fist, and drove it into Mohawk’s right eye with every bit of strength he had. Mohawk went down in a heap, and, before he hit the floor, Rains bounced to the left and drove a knee into Beard’s crotch. When the big man crumpled over in pain, Rains drove an elbow into the back of his neck.

  Two down.

  Sunglasses, though, appeared to have his shit together. In his right hand was a switchblade knife Rains hadn’t heard open. Sunglasses acted like he’d had some bladed weapon training, as his knees were bent and his posture indicated he was ready for movement in any direction. But, Sunglasses kept inching forward waving the blade back in forth in front of his face.

  “Here I come, boy,” Sunglasses said in a hoarse whisper. His accent was distinctly Mississippian, coarse and under-enunciated. He inched forward, and Rains shifted his weight to his right foot, slightly behind.

  One more step, buddy.

  Sunglasses moved forward, and Rains relaxed into a kick that brought the sole of his left boot into Sunglasses’ face with a crunch. He went down across the other two, all three unconscious. Rains turned to the bartender and motioned for another round. The rest of the patrons in the bar gaped at him but said nothing. A fresh whiskey appeared, and he looked at the girl. Her wide eyes gazed at the three men on the floor, then back up at him. It was obvious she thought the three of them should have wiped the floor with him.