Kill Before Dying (Tau Ceti Agenda Book 5) Read online

  “That’s it?” Madira snapped.

  “Yes, human, that is it. The law forbids us to do more at this point. Perhaps if you continue to impress, who knows?” The alien captain’s face seemed to glow slightly brighter for an instant. “General, I wish you good luck.”

  “Thank you, Captain Ghuthlaevex.” The wall instantly zoomed out, flashed dim, and then Moore was looking at the distant UM61 once again.

  “That female is so elusive,” Copernicus said. “Mutual hatred aside, she never can talk straight with me.”

  “The captain was female?” Moore asked. “How do you tell them apart?”

  “Perhaps I forgot to put that in my briefing notes. Family names ending in -vex are female and -ven are male. The females are much larger and are dominant. And by the way her face pulsed and lit up when talking to you, General, I’d say she was somewhat fond of you.”

  “Ha!” Madira couldn’t contain her laughter. “You better not be stepping out on my daughter for a seven-fingered orange-eyed monster!”

  “Not that type of fond,” Copernicus added. “More like you, Sienna, with your cats. Yes, fond in a master and pet sort of way.”

  “Son of a bitch,” Alexander rubbed at the stubble on his chin. “This alien shit is gonna take some getting used to.”

  Chapter 1

  February 19, 2407 AD

  U.S.S. Sienna Madira II Expeditionary Fleet

  Deep Open Space

  691 Light-years from the Sol System

  Monday, 6:30 A.M. Ship Standard Time

  “Up and at ’em! Quit your goldbricking, Marine! It is time to get up!” The ten-centimeter-high holographic image of General Alexander Moore shouted from the light blue sugar-cube-sized holocube projector clock on Deanna’s night table. “Move it, princess! Get your ass up!”

  USMC Major Deanna Moore rolled over onto her side, carefully pulling USN Major Davy Rackman’s hand out from around her breast. She then smacked the alarm button on the cube, and with a grunt and an exhale, rolled out of bed naked onto the floor, catching herself in plank position at the last minute before hitting the cold metal deck plates of her cabin floor. The cold against her hands and toes sent a chill up her body, covering her in goose bumps.

  One, two, three, four, she counted in her head as she completed each military style pushup. Dee forced herself all the way down until her breasts touched the deck plates with each repetition and then she exploded upward using all the muscles in her tight core and strong arms. As her body began to wake each of the pushups became a bit easier.

  Good morning, Dee. Would you like me to count for you? her AIC Bree asked.

  Thanks.

  Seven, eight, nine, ten . . .

  “Dammit, Marine, you couldn’t even take time to put clothes on or turn the lights on or make coffee,” Rackman said through half-open eyes.

  “Didn’t want to wake you. And I’ve told you before the key to flying mecha is in the core muscles. DeathRay always says there’s no such thing as too many pushups and situps.” Dee managed to grunt between breaths. “Besides, aren’t you due back on the Hillenkoetter in thirty?”

  “Shit, that means you woke me up about twenty-five minutes early.” Rackman rolled back over, pulling the cover over his head.

  Deanna put the SEAL out of her mind for a bit and focused on the job at hand—pushing the floor. Back, core, and buttocks tight, breasts all the way down, touch, explode up.

  Thirty-seven, thirty-eight, thirty-nine . . .

  “All hands, all hands,” the bosun’s pipe sounded throughout the ship. “Stand by for a message from the Commanding General.”

  “Does anybody in your family sleep in?”

  “I doubt it. Mom’s probably been up for hours. And Dad, well, I don’t think he’s slept since the Martian Desert Campaigns like two hundred years ago.” Dee grunted.

  “Hell, guess I might as well get up then.” Rackman grunted again. Dee ignored him as he stepped over her and into the little bathroom of the officer’s-sized cabin. He looked back at her and she could tell he was eyeing her nakedness. She liked the fact that the SEAL liked looking at her. It made her feel like a woman, and, well, pretty. She was already glistening with sweat and sex from the night before with Davy—not only was she pretty, but she was also a badass marine mecha jock who would kick anybody’s ass who pissed her off. She knew she looked good. She hoped deep down all the way to her soul that Rackman felt the same way.

  Fifty-six, fifty-seven, fifty-eight . . .

  “Like what you see?” she panted jokingly, holding her body up in plank position a few extra seconds as she turned and smiled at Rackman, her naked breasts firm and pointed at the floor and her legs tight and flexed all the way up. She made a point that her slight sideways turn gave Rackman a full frontal view of her rippled stomach and fighter-pilot muscular attributes.

  She continued to push at the floor after giving him the brief smile. The coldness of the floor was wearing away, and beads of sweat were running down her body and starting to drop from her nose, forming a puddle underneath her.

  “Like what I see? Damn right. What’s not to like, Marine?” Rackman said with a raised eyebrow. Dee could tell that more than his eyebrow was raised and again, that made her feel good. She smiled inwardly as he turned and continued into the bathroom. Dee continued to push the floor. “Chicken shit. You should push the floor with me.”

  “Ha,” Rackman looked down at his obvious excitement. “Not like this. Maybe with you under me?”

  “Didn’t get enough last night?” Dee continued the playful banter through panting for breath. It helped take her mind off the burning in her chest, shoulders, and arms.

  Sixty-seven, sixty-eight . . .

  “Good morning.” Her father’s voice and image projected above the holocube on her nightstand and on the screen on her wall. Almost in an instant the playful mood left the room. Her father had a way of making every situation serious. “We are slightly over nine light-years out from our target star. We are three jumps from the combat zone and as far as we can tell, we are deep within Chiata-controlled space and running silent. From this point in we are at full high alert and will be making last-minute preparations for engaging the Chiata once again.”

  Eighty-three, eighty-four, eighty-five . . .

  “While we have no idea how much resistance we will meet here, we can assume that it will be alien, and if we use our previous engagement as any form of example, their technology will far exceed our own. I’m not going to lie to you because you all volunteered to be here. This could very well be a one-way trip, and anybody wishing to go home should do so now, as our intelligence suggests that QM snap-back teleportation might not function once we reach the target. We have no way of knowing how close to target it will be when the teleportation jamming becomes effective. Therefore, we have no way of knowing how long of a hyperspace jaunt will be needed to reach QMT space again. This could end up being a long trip.”

  “Nobody better fucking snap-back home at this point,” Dee grunted as she dropped to her knees and rose up for a brief second to shake out her arms. Sweat poured down her body as she slowed her breathing and rolled her neck from side to side.

  “What’s that, Marine?” Rackman leaned his head around the bathroom door, toothpaste foam at the corner of his mouth. His eyes widened and she could see he wasn’t looking at her eyes.

  “Just sayin’ that nobody better be flashing out now. Not this damned close. If any of the Archangels bugged out, DeathRay would kick their asses. And if he didn’t . . .” She shook her arms once more and then dropped back to plank position with a big exhale.

  “Oh. Roger that.” Rackman agreed. “I’m sure the Hillenkoetter crew will stay. Hell, most of them are all AIC-controlled clones anyway and I don’t think they have feelings like we do. Hell, I dunno. Maybe they do?”

  “As the morning shift kicks off I want all teams reporting to battle stations and getting battle-rattle-armed and dangerous. Report in to your respective
team leads and prepare to take hell to the Chiata Horde. Stick to our attack plan, and God willing, we’ll come through this, and on the other side of it there will be great rewards. All of you please take one last opportunity to send messages home and assure loved ones we’ll be home soon. It’s time to fight the good fight, now. Good luck. Godspeed. God bless you all.”

  One hundred thirteen, one hundred fourteen . . .

  “The old man likes to keep it short and sweet, doesn’t he?” Rackman stepped out of the bathroom, pulling the shirt of the universal combat uniform, or UCU, as it was more often referred to, down over his head. The hyperdense long-chain molecular material uniform top sucked to his body like paint and then changed to navy colors per his AIC’s direction. He folded the cover and put it in his back trouser pocket.

  “He’s never been one for beating around the bush. Not even when he was a politician.” Dee replied. “You gone?”

  “I’d better snap to or Captain Penzington will be ready to toss me out a goddamned air lock,” he said as he melded his nametag, rank, and insignia patches to his shirt. “Hey, I won’t get to see you again until, well, you know.”

  “Yeah. Keep your helmet on, Navy. You remember what happened to the bridge crew of the Madira last time.” Dee looked at him with concern on her face, but didn’t stop pushing the floor. “Lost too many good people that day. If only they’d been wearing their damned helmets, they’d still be with us.”

  “Hey, you stay on DeathRay’s wing and watch your ass out there. And keep that new shield thing Buckley came up with on all the time.” He looked down at her, and Dee liked the way he looked concerned for her. But at the same time it made her heart twist into knots in her chest. They each had their jobs to do and thinking about Rackman made it both harder and easier at the same time. She figured, or at least hoped, Rackman had similar feelings. Dee paused from pushing the floor and stood in front of him, naked, glistening in sweat, her heart nearly beating out of her chest and breaking at the same time with the thought that they might not get to see each other again. She wasn’t certain if she should be vulnerable or full of bravado. The only thing she knew she was full of was absolute adoration for the SEAL—unadulterated, unfettered, unconditional, unbelievably heart-wrenching adoration. She had to face the facts no matter how much she wanted to ignore them. She was ass over tits in love and there was little she or anyone else could do about it.

  “Don’t worry about me.” She stood on her tiptoes and kissed the tall Navy officer gently on the lips. He leaned down and returned the kiss but kept his distance from her, acting as if he didn’t want to get her sweat on him.

  “No offense, Marine, but you’re pretty damned sweaty and gross and I just got dressed.” He smirked. Dee put her hands on her hips and raised an eyebrow at him. She almost pouted, then almost got angry, and then the marine in her kicked in and she completely understood. Starship bridge crews had a certain air of pomp and circumstance and required formal sharpness they had to portray even in combat situations. She understood, but she didn’t have to like it.

  “It’s okay. We got plenty close last night,” she said, flashing her big half-Martian brown eyes at him. “Just be careful, Davy.”

  Tell him, Dee.

  Shut up.

  I’m just saying, you may not get another chance for a while. Tell him.

  Shut up, Bree.

  Deanna turned about to drop to the floor again but felt a hand grab her by the wrist and pull her around. Davy pulled her into him, wrapped his gigantic Navy SEAL biceps around her and pulled her into a long, slow kiss that she joyfully returned. A surge of excitement rushed over her as he gripped her in his strong hands, and she wrapped herself around him in a long embrace. She could feel his excitement through the UCU pants as well. There was mutual adoration there, she just knew it.

  “Come back safe, Dee. I mean it. I, uh . . .”

  “You too,” she said before he could finish.

  Chicken shit, Bree said in her head.

  Shut up, Bree.

  She kissed him once again and then let him go. The SEAL smiled at her as he tapped his wristband, and her cabin was filled with a flash of light and the sound of frying bacon, and then he was gone. Dee looked around her cabin briefly and noted the sling-forward QMT countdown clock being projected on her wall. The timer showed a jump in fifty-three minutes and twenty-one seconds. “Be safe, SEAL. I love you,” she almost whispered as she dropped to the floor.

  One hundred forty three, one hundred forty four . . .

  Chapter 2

  February 19, 2407 AD

  U.S.S. Sienna Madira II Expeditionary Fleet

  Deep Open Space

  691 Light-years from the Sol System

  Monday, 6:45 A.M. Ship Standard Time

  “You know, in some other life, you might be going off to a day job and I might be headed to take the kids to school.” USN Captain Jack “DeathRay” Boland adjusted his UCU top, bumping into his wife as she brushed her teeth.

  “Why do you get to take the kids to school and I have to work?” USN Captain Nancy Penzington responded as she spit the robotic toothbrush cube into the sink. The little bot shook itself clean under the flowing water from the faucet, then climbed up on the edge of the sink and retracted itself to about half the size of a sugar cube.

  “I just figure you’re the responsible one and all, and that you are more likely to hold down a regular job,” DeathRay replied.

  “Why couldn’t we just be independently wealthy and let the kids have private tutors from home? The two of us could just lay around the pool all day drinking fruity drinks filled with ethanol like they serve on the beach near New Tharsis. Hell, we could even live on the beach at New Tharsis.”

  “Now you’re talking, Captain. What’d’ya say we snap-back there and call all this soldiering shit quits? It’d be the life,” DeathRay kidded. “You heard the General. Now’s our chance.”

  “While I’d love to sit on a beach half naked with you and contemplate how many children we should have and how much fun we’d have making them, I’m not so sure now is the time.” Nancy smiled back at Jack. “Besides, Boland, who’d lead the Archangels boldly into overwhelming numbers of Chiata fighters and who’d command the Hillenkoetter? And somebody has to watch after the Moores. Who would do that if we ain’t here?”

  “Just half naked? Why not all naked? Aw shit, we’d get bored anyway.” Jack grabbed Nancy around the waist from behind and pulled her to him. Then he turned her around and looked into her eyes. “I think I’m right where I want to be right now any damned way.”

  “Shut up and kiss me, idiot. I’ve got to get to the bridge and you’ve got to get back to the Madira,” Nancy told him.

  Commander Joe Buckley Junior, Chief Engineer of the Sienna Madira II, sat across the breakfast table from the armored environment-suit marine he’d been spending most of his free time with for the past year or more. Joe sat leaning on an elbow and playing with the eggs on his plate. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to eat or not. He wasn’t sure he was awake or not. He looked up at Rondi who was already wide-ass awake and in her UCUs. She leaned back in her chair and finished off her coffee.

  “Having a hard time getting going this morning, CHENG?”

  “Yeah. Guess so. You kept me up too late.” Buckley decided he didn’t want the eggs and then realized from the look on Rondi’s face that he’d said something stupid. He backpedaled as quickly as he could. “Not that I’m complaining, mind you. I’d stay up all night with you any time you’d let me.”

  “Ha ha,” Rondi slapped the table. “Good save, CHENG.”

  “Listen, I know you’re an AEM and all and you often go traipsing into thick shit that would make the most courageous of soldiers piss themselves, but . . .” he tactically changed the subject and displayed his concern in one move.

  Nice move, Joe, his AIC told him in his head.

  “But what?” Rondi leaned in closer to him. The little two-person table in the CHENG’s quarters w
as just small enough that she could almost lean nose to nose with him. Joe looked into her eyes and at her face. He’d never spent as much time with a person before as he had with Rondi. The Master Gunnery Sergeant was tough as nails, but from where Joe sat she was soft and vulnerable and squishy in just the right places.

  “But, keep the shield system on and your head down.” He finished. “And, uh, keep it frosty, like you marines like to say.”

  “That’s stay frosty. And, well, you keep your helmet on in engineering in case the ship gets hammered by those zig-zagging blue beams, and no crazy-ass Buckley shit if things go bad down there,” she said. Joe was sure she was talking about the now infamous Buckley maneuver where he had damned near sacrificed himself to save the power systems of the ship during a major battle. He could never live that particular incident down, even though he’d been decorated and promoted for it.

  At the time it had been the only thing Joe could think of to save the ship and it had worked, but he’d fried his body with radiation in the process. He didn’t have any plans to repeat the process. Almost all of his internal organs had to be replaced and the worst of it was the pain from the immunoboost drugs regrowing his testicles. He felt a bit of unease in the pit of his stomach just thinking about it.

  “Well, stay frosty then, and keep your shields up.”

  “I’ll be on an extremely hostile alien fucking planet fighting extremely hostile fucking aliens and breathing God only knows what type of toxic hostile fucking alien air. I’ll keep my fucking shit on tight,” Rondi promised. Joe wasn’t exactly sure when or how the two of them had managed to become a thing. In fact, to him, even though they’d known each other only a few years it seemed like forever. He liked her. She was definitely more than just “boat cute.” She was take-home-to-mom-and-dad cute. That was, if his dad were still alive, but his mom would love to meet her, he was certain. He’d just have to ask her not to be so expressive with the “F-word” in front of his mother. While his mother was plenty old enough and seasoned as a longtime military wife, she would curse Joe for cursing in front of her, very hypocritically, as often as she could manage. Joe just didn’t want to throw rocket fuel on that fire.