Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
I slip from Raven One’s cockpit into the cool darkness of Valis’ industrial outskirts, my pulse pounding so fiercely I’m surprised the mercenaries inside the arms cache can’t hear it. The warehouse looms before me, an unremarkable slab of corrugated metal crouching against a row of disused factories. It’s past midnight, the sky murky with smog that dims even the sharp glow of Valis’ overhead lights.
Tabitha hums in my helmet. “David, confirm heat suppression is active,” she states with a teasing note as if trying to lighten the gloom.
I whisper back, “Confirmed. Check the readout.”
“Don’t you trust me?” she retorts. She’s been my constant anchor, my partner in every sense but flesh and blood, and her voice reliably masks my nerves. “You might be a scrawny pilot, but your mech’s heat signature is still big enough to show up like a beacon if you forget that suppression toggle.”
I snort humorlessly. “You’ve saved me from bigger fiascos. A little infiltration is child’s play, right?”
“Right.” She brightens. “You better not blow us all up.”
I swallow an uneasy lump.Carefully, I step forward, mindful of the cracked pavement. The hush of the industrial zone is so complete that the slightest clatter might give away my arrival. Focus.
True to Patch’s intel, the arms cache is guarded by a local merc group known for terrorizing outlying settlements. Explosive weapons, ballistic warheads, racks of pulse rifles. Everything inside that building is contraband.
A small fraction of it would buy me a fortune on the black market, but I’m not here to keep the loot. My contract is to discreetly destroy it and gather any data that might expose the supply chain.
The “Talon” name is my call sign on the job, and apparently, the pay is good enough to justify the risk. One infiltration, timed charges, a dash of stolen intel, and vanish. Patch bribed local security to reroute their patrols, so I’m free of meddling from official forces, at least for a brief window.
I slip between two shabby cargo trucks on the far side of the fence. Raven One stands behind me, crouched in a shadowed nook, silent and watchful. She’s eight feet of raw agility, but even that’s too large to sneak inside this warehouse unseen. The infiltration is on me. Time to work. My heart thrums, and Tabitha senses it.
“You sure about this plan, soldier?” she asks, half-laughing. “One pilot, minimal backup. Or were you hoping for a big fireworks display? If so, I wholeheartedly endorse it.”
I exhale, bracing myself. “Let’s keep the fireworks to a minimum until we pull the intel from that server.”
Behind the fence, a pair of sentry drones circle on stubby repulsors, scanning the perimeter with bright-white beams. My visor shows Tabitha’s threat map overlay. Two circles drifting near the front entrance, plus a half-dozen mercenary foot patrols deeper in.
I wait, letting them move to the left, then flick a silent command to Tabitha. She pings an electromagnetic short-circuit hack like a viper striking in the dark. The drone’s bright beam fizzles, then the device goes dark and crashes into a pile of scrap.
Tabitha cackles in my ear. “Nothing like a quick kill.”
I remain stooped, moving swiftly along the fence to an auxiliary door. The keypad is old, rusted around the edges, half-corroded from years of neglect. Amateurs. I unspool a small data spike from my belt, letting Tabitha do the heavy lifting while I keep watch. Sparks, who had a hand in rigging this, teased me earlier that it’d only work if the keypad wasn’t wired to detonate. Here’s hoping it’s not.
The lock yields with a faint beep. Inside, dim industrial lighting reveals steel racks piled with crates. The stale air smells of old metal with a faint tang of chemicals.
I flatten myself against a column of cargo, each crate labeled with stenciled warnings about ballistic warheads, pulse rifle batteries, or rocket thruster igniters. Jackpot. I can practically feel the pulses of illicit energy behind the metal lids. No wonder some shady client wants this place wiped out. My contract is to ensure these mercs can’t keep terrorizing remote colonies.
Tabitha nudges me. “Two mercenaries near the center aisle,” she murmurs, overlaying orange silhouettes on my HUD. I see them trudging along with bored expressions, likely clueless that I’ve slipped in behind them.
“Noted,” I whisper. “Vanguard AI showing a no-go path on the right?”
She hums. “They’ve got a partial laser tripwire over there, old-fashioned but lethal. Circle left, watch the open walkway.”
I do as told, shifting from crate to crate. My boots barely scrape the ground. The hush gnaws at my nerves, every sense on high alert. I circle deeper into the warehouse. The center, ringed with overhead lamps, is loaded with heavier ordnance in massive metal containers. If my charges work as intended, the entire facility will turn into a lovely orange burst for every black-market satellite overhead.
I creep along a stacked shelf. One guard ambles near me, maybe fifteen feet away, but his eyes are on his datapad, not the crates. Good. Quiet as I can, I slip behind a forklift and freeze, my heart pounding as he glances in my direction. My breath locks in my throat. After an agonizing beat, he steps away, muttering curses about the graveyard shift. I release a silent breath.
“Smooth. Keep it up,” Tabitha urges.
The plan calls for four timed charges placed around the building to create an expanding chain reaction. I stash the first explosive on the underside of a crate stacked with ballistic warheads, adjusting the timer’s readout with a flick of my gloved fingers. Ten minutes. That should be enough time to get out with the data.
The second charge, I magnetize to a structural beam near the center, ensuring the roof collapses from the inside out. For the third, I anchor it on a rack of pulse rifle batteries. My watch says only a few minutes have passed. Plenty of time for the final bomb, plus the data snag.
“Tabitha, the server location?” I ask under my breath, sliding behind a panel that might house power couplings.
She’s quiet as she scans local signals. “Northwest corner, top floor. Their encryption is minimal, definitely older hardware. Lucky for us, I’m excellent at older hardware.” She adds cheekily, “You might want to ask me to dinner after this.”
I grin wryly. “We’ll see if I survive. Then, maybe I’ll treat you to some battery acid and a candlelit fuse box.”
Her laugh sparks warmth in my chest. No matter how tense operations get, I’m never alone. I slip forward, drifting up a metal staircase that clings to the warehouse’s inner wall. The clang of each step is enough to spike my blood pressure, but no alarm rings out. So far, so good. When I reach the top, I spot a dusty corridor lined with office doors. Only one door glows from within, a flickering screen visible through a small window.
Bingo.
I glance around, verifying no guards lurk, then press my ear to the door. I hear the faint beeps of a console on the other side. Carefully, I tap the handle. Locked, obviously. I pop the data spike again. Sparks’ programming is running smoothly tonight because the lock unseals with a timid click .
Inside, an outdated security console flickers on a sagging desk. This must be the nerve center for the warehouse, decorated with cheap furniture and reams of old shipping logs. I close the door behind me, exhaling my tension in shallow bursts. Let’s move fast.
I jam my portable terminal into a side port. Through my visor, Tabitha’s code streams in bright lines, manhandling the old firewall. She mumbles strings of nonsense, weaving them into the system’s architecture. I watch, my nerves on edge. The longer we linger, the higher the chance of discovery.
“Cracking the data now,” Tabitha mutters. “They store everything in old-school archives. This might take me a minute. Don’t get shot, please.”
I chuckle, scanning the corridor for movement. Seconds crawl. The portable terminal whirs. My gut clenches. Any second, a guard could wander in.
Then, the door handle rattles. My stomach plunges.
I duck beside a dented filing cabinet and fish out my sidearm, a small handheld that fires stun rounds. The door creaks open. A merc steps inside, wearing half-rusted armor. He stands there scanning the room. He must see the blinking console or the tether to my terminal because he stiffens, snarling, “Who…”
I slam a stun round into the back of his helmet before he can finish. The merc jerks once, hitting the floor with a dull thud.
Tabitha sighs in relief. “Nicely done. Though part of me wants to see these jerks learn some manners.”
I edge over, confirm he’s out cold, then drag him toward a desk. “We’ll settle for blowing up their stash.” My voice shakes from the jolt of adrenaline. “How’s that data?”
“Almost done. Keep an eye on that corridor, or the meltdown fiasco will pale compared to a shootout if we get pinned.”
I exhale, glancing at the motionless guard. Mid-lift, I decide I don’t want him to burn up in the imminent explosion. Call me soft. I hoist him under the arms, half-drag him out the door, down one flight of stairs, and shove him behind a big forklift. He’ll have a headache when he wakes up, but at least he won’t be incinerated. Heart hammering, I dash back up. This brief detour ate precious time.
Tabitha chirps in my ear. “Got the data. It’s full of coded references to some big operation. We might have a lead on who bankrolls these creeps.”
“Great.” I unplug the portable terminal and coil it away. “We have everything. Time to set the last charge and bail.”
I slip from the office, step over a half-cracked crate, and nearly trip over a tangle of wires. The warehouse thrums with the noise of old ventilation fans, but no guards are visible. We got lucky. The final bomb needs to go on that side of the building, far enough from the other charges that it triggers a second wave of blasts. My lungs burn from tension as much as from exertion.
Tabitha breaks the silence. “Four and a half minutes left, David. Let’s not dawdle.”
“Right.” I hustle to the southwest corner, picking a massive steel container labeled WARHEAD PRIMERS. Perfect. I magnet the charge, set the timer, and watch the digits glow menacingly. Four minutes to get out. Alarms remain silent, but the tightness in my chest tells me we’re on a razor’s edge.
I weave between crates and dimly lit aisles, edging toward an emergency exit on the far side. The building’s half-lowered shutters reveal a sliver of the night sky. Everything’s going so smoothly that it sends a prickle up my spine, like the calm before a storm. My boots scuff, stirring up dust, but no patrol leaps out.
We’re nearly there when Tabitha’s warning pings. “Incoming guard on the right, moving at a trot. He might’ve realized something’s off.”
I duck behind a thick support beam. My visor reads a single hostile. The footsteps grow louder, echoing off the concrete floor. He passes close. Too close.
My hand tightens around the sidearm. The faint click of a safety catch draws a surge of panic, but the guard keeps going, apparently more worried about the silent drone or the front entrance. I stifle a relieved exhale. He never realizes I’m crouched behind him.
As soon as the coast is clear, I sprint to the exit. Night air hits my face, fresh compared to the musty interior. I break into a run across the overgrown lot. Raven One stands hidden near an old shipping container, practically looking bored. A cluster of trees lines the perimeter. Perfect cover.
“For once, we’re ahead of schedule,” Tabitha informs me brightly as I clamber onto the mech’s open harness. “Ready for fireworks?”
“Now or never.” I fire up the thrusters enough to slip beyond the chain-link fence. My HUD warns me the bombs will blow in under two minutes.
I dart across the shadowy yard, Raven One’s servos purring. The fence rattles as we slip through a gap. I lurch into a small stand of dead trees, the moon’s sickly glow flickering through the branches.
Then, it happens. A violent roar erupts behind me, orange flames licking the sky. The ground shudders. My stomach knots as an enormous fireball engulfs the building’s roof. A split second later, the second wave of charges detonates, obliterating entire swaths of shelves. The metallic shriek is almost deafening. The building’s walls buckle inwards, a thunderous collapse that sends sparks and shrapnel spinning overhead.
I gape, half in horror, half in triumph. Damn. We did it. The facility bursts in a brilliant cascade, fueling a mushrooming column of smoke and debris that must be visible for miles. If any low-level mercs survived, they’re sure to remember “Talon” paying them a visit.
Tabitha whistles. “I’d comment on the artistry of a good explosion, but I’m more interested in hauling ass out of here. Let’s go.”
I blink away the glare, nodding to myself. “Right. We vanish.”
No sirens fill the air. Patch’s bribe must have worked, meaning local security is off chasing fabricated leads. I angle Raven One around a twisted ramp that formerly served as a loading dock, then slip away into the industrial zone’s labyrinth of junk heaps. I keep my thrusters low to avoid drawing attention or lighting up any sensors.
Tabitha monitors the audio channels, spitting false signals to cover our tracks. The radio chatter is chaotic, mercenaries screaming about an unknown pilot, the crackle of shifting debris.
I exhale as the silhouettes of the main factories fade behind us. Job’s done. Another swath of illicit arms is dust. The local underworld’s got a new rumor—a scrawny pilot called Talon who vanished into the night after leveling an arms cache. Maybe the reputation will net me more contracts. Or more enemies. Probably both.
Then, my comm crackles with a private link. It’s Patch’s frequency. “David,” he greets. “Heard a real big boom from here. You still alive?”
“Barely.” Relief seeps into my tone. “We’re headed back now.”
He chuckles. “Kid, I had faith in you. Let’s meet at the usual bay to settle up, yeah?”
Like clockwork, my stomach rumbles at the thought of finishing an op with real food. “Roger that. Let’s move.”
Tabitha keeps me company as I navigate the outskirts, occasionally scanning for hidden patrols. My mind races with the data we snagged. This might lead to something bigger. For now, the only priority is regrouping with Patch, collecting my payment, and maybe having a laugh about not dying in a swirling inferno.
We set a course for Patch’s yard on the far side of Valis’ industrial ring. I keep Raven One at a moderate pace. Usually, these long, silent rides give me too much time to brood, but tonight, adrenaline still thrums in my veins. Tabitha occasionally jokes about the guard I stunned or the drone we crashed. “I hope that guard wakes up in time to avoid the firefighters,” she muses.
“Eh, I moved him far enough.” I wince slightly. “I’m not heartless. Just…efficient.”
Her laughter puts me at ease. “You’re practically a saint.”
Eventually, I spot the sprawling mess of rusted crane arms, shipping containers, and half-shredded hull plating of Patch’s yard. Sparks waits by the entrance, arms folded, jacket zipped tight against the cool breeze. She’s wearing practical cargo pants and heavy boots, a rare smile on her face as she sees Raven One approach.
I power down the mech inside the gates. The cockpit hisses as it opens. I hop free, kneeling to stretch my stiff muscles. Sparks ambles over, glancing at the faint black soot on my armor plating. “Look at you.” Amusement laces her voice, tinged with concern. “I can smell the smoke from here.”
“I bet.” I exhale a breath that feels too heavy for my lungs. “Facility’s gone. Timed charges worked like a charm.” Then, I add, “Thanks for that data spike. Couldn’t have done it without you.”
She shrugs, placing her hands on her hips. “Sure. I like building things that ruin other people’s days.” Her face softens, and she glances around. “You’re not hurt, right?”
My chest tightens. “I’m all right.”
Before she can reply, Patch joins us. He’s swinging a beat-up cooler in one hand, the smell of cheap beer wafting from inside. “Got a little celebration in mind.” He grins. “You made short work of those bastards, kid. Good job.”
He hands me a can of some off-brand brew, then extends one to Sparks. Tabitha, of course, can’t taste a thing. I murmur, “Here’s to you, T,” under my breath. She hums an amused thanks in my earpiece.
I pop the can, scrunching my nose at the pungent chemical tang. Patch never invests in top-shelf beverages. Sparks sips hers and scowls. “Ugh.” She takes another gulp anyway.
Patch rummages in his jacket, retrieves a small credit chip, and tosses it at me. “Your share from the contractor, like we agreed. Enough to keep your hangar lights on for a while, plus some extra for the next wild mission you dream up.”
I catch the chip and flick a glance at the readout. It’s a decent pile of credits. Enough to buy more mech upgrades or pay off some debts. My shoulders sag with relief. “Much appreciated.”
He turns to Sparks with a theatrical flourish. “And for your assistance, Ms. Alvarez. I believe we negotiated a standard fee plus a one-percent cut if the job went smoothly?” He waggles another smaller chip. “Here’s that one percent.”
Her eyes widen. “Never thought I’d literally own a slice of a merc gig.”
I clink my can against hers. “Congratulations on becoming part of the business.”
Sparks almost smiles, that subtle half-grin. “Guess so,” she murmurs. Then she lifts her can. “To not blowing ourselves to bits.” We laugh, tension unraveling under the moonlit scrapyard.
Tabitha picks that moment to speak up through our private neural link. I gotta say, this mission was almost too smooth. Maybe you’re getting good, David.
I snort. You’re half the reason we’re still alive, I think back. Thank you.
Out loud, I address our ragtag circle. “We’ll never speak kindly of this beer,” I announce, hoisting the can. The synthetic, near-sour taste is about as tolerable as the factory stench. “But at least it’s something. Could be worse.”
Patch roars with laughter, leaning against a rusted crate. “Kid, real beer’s for fancy folk. Cheap swill is good enough, so long as it’s cold.”
Sparks quirks an eyebrow. “Is it even cold? Tastes like lukewarm regret.”
I grin, venturing another sip. It’s awful, but sometimes that’s exactly what a night like this needs. We pass bantering comments about the unbelievably sloppy security, about the half-lucky guard who got stunned but not blown to smithereens, about the data that might reveal the bigger fish running weapons contraband across Valis. None of us dwell on it too long. We’ll sort it out soon.
Somewhere overhead, a siren keens in the distance. The local enforcers finally responding to the raging inferno I left behind. They’re probably too late to salvage anything. I sip the beer again, ignoring the bitter aftertaste.
Sparks sets her half-empty can on a crate, pulling her jacket tighter. “Think I’ll crash soon,” she mutters. “Can’t believe we pulled that off so cleanly.”
Patch pats her shoulder in a fatherly way. “You earned the rest. I’ll see if I can scrounge a better brew next time we celebrate.” Then, he looks at me, crossing his arms. “Kid…er, I mean, Talon, any final words? Because the rumor mill’s about to spread your name.”
I stand straighter, releasing a wobbly breath. Knowing mercenaries might already be whispering about the single pilot who torched an arms depot stirs an odd flicker of pride. I wanted recognition, right?
I clear my throat. “Maybe it’ll net more customers. Or bigger threats.” I shrug. “Let them come.”
Patch grins. “Attaboy.” He stows the remaining beer in his cooler. “Sleep well. I’ll wire the rest of your cut over the next day or two.”
Sparks ambles away, offering a faint wave that I return. Patch lumbers in another direction, humming a contented tune, leaving me alone with Raven One’s silent silhouette. My muscles ache, my head throbs from adrenaline, and the stale aftertaste of discount beer coats my tongue. Still, I’m oddly at peace.
Tabitha breaks my reverie. “So, proud of yourself?”
I smirk. I guess I am. “We did well, T. Let’s call it a night.”
I power down Raven One’s systems for transport back to the hangar. As I gather my gear, the distant glow of the destroyed warehouse flickers on the horizon. My new alias, Talon, will spread on the lips of spooked mercenaries by dawn. A page is turning in my story. If the underworld wants to test me, I’ll answer. With Tabitha and my crew at my side, I’m no longer the scrawny reject. I’m the pilot who destroyed a small army’s worth of weaponry in a single night.
I hoist my pack. Tonight, at least, we’ve left another dusty chunk of Valis safer. That’s enough reason for me to keep moving. There will be bigger fights, larger challenges, but for now, we can celebrate the success. I slip across Patch’s yard, my mech in tow. The flickering overhead lamp dims behind me.
Tomorrow’s new problems can wait. Tonight, I’ve earned a moment’s rest alongside a dusty can of the worst beer in Valis and a victory nobody can deny.