The Cassini Mission Read online

  I explained to Kane and Kenji about how I had come across a case where a young human male named Devin had become pregnant by a Degan male. Whoever had been monitoring my data must have been responsible for kidnapping the young man. I had heard what they had done to him—the imprisonment and experimentation—and it made me sick.

  “All of this,” I whispered, my voice clogged with emotion. “It’s my fault.”

  I wouldn’t let these bastards get away with this. If I had to face another court-martial, so be it. I would die fighting if I had to.

  “Pregnant?” asked Kane. “Did you say pregnant?”

  Wait a minute. If Devin Drago was Subject H-1, then who the hell was Subject H-2?

  “Uh, guys, I think you better come look at this,” Yates called out.

  Chapter 13

  Reluctantly, I left the computer to follow the rest of the team to Yates, who stood in front of what appeared to be a mini portable cryo-freezer. “I think this is the ‘combined genetic material’ from that file.”

  Inside the cryo-freezer was a clear vial that contained what appeared to be an embryo floating inside a viscous pink fluid.

  Further implications of what was going on were becoming clearer. “This is the ‘sample’ I’m supposed to extract.”

  “Jesus,” Kenji muttered. “These people are sick.”

  “Is it alive?” Kane asked.

  Kenji tapped the controls on the freezer. “Yes. It’s in a suspended sleep.”

  Kane leaned in close and peered into the window. “What were they doing with it?”

  Kenji winced. “They extracted stem cells, injected modified DNA into them and grew biological implants for the sentries.” Kenji rubbed the back of his neck and let out a sigh. “This is part of my research. I never experimented on a living creature.”

  “And neither will they. Not anymore,” I vowed. “I won’t let them.” I stared at the little bundle inside the glass tube. “It needs to be returned to the Degans. They will have to decide what to do with it.”

  “Leave it alone for now. We don’t have time for sightseeing,” Bradley interrupted before turning towards the main lab doors. He placed his hand on the scanner and the doors hissed open as they slid apart. The body of the second security guard fell backwards and landed on the floor with a wet splat.

  His face and most of his head was missing. All that remained was bloody bone and tissue.

  I screamed and dropped my comPad while Yates retched in the corner.

  Seemingly unaffected, Villanova pushed at the corpse with the tip of his boot. “Acid got him, too.”

  Kenji pulled his hand away from his mouth. “Yeah…” Kenji drew the word out slowly before he added, “I’m gonna stay here and look this data over.”

  Kane dipped his chin. “Good.” He turned to the remaining landing party. “Proceed with caution. Villanova, take point.”

  Once everyone got their nerves together, the rest of us followed Villanova into the main lab and the doors automatically closed behind us.

  “Well, here’s the rest of them,” Villanova announced.

  “Oh god,” Yates muttered and coughed.

  The room looked like a massacre scene. There was blood and bodies everywhere.

  I stepped over one of the scientists and made my way to one of the computers. Another scientist was slumped over it and I had to push him out of the way. He left a red smear on the panel as he fell to the ground.

  I reached down and pulled off his lab coat and wiped the computer panel as best as I could. The glass display above came online and I brought up the system’s last event logs. I glanced down at the body at my feet. “This was Director Hilson. He’s the one that gassed the complex. I don’t think he meant to do the whole complex. Just this room.”

  “This is some state of the art shit in here,” Green said as he looked around. “I’ve never seen equipment like this before.”

  “This is where they built those cyborgs,” Yates said, looking at the partially completed cyborg prototypes lying on various workstations lined up around the room like an assembly line.

  “They used the embryo’s genetic material to fuse the biological components,” I muttered to myself. “Bastards.”

  “They’re not operational are they?” Kane asked, motioning to the prototypes.

  “No,” Bradley said as he scanned them.

  “Try to contact the Cassini,” Kane ordered.

  “Yes, sir,” Yates answered gladly.

  An orange blip suddenly appeared on the display in front of me.

  “Look out!” I cried out. “Cyborg!”

  A cyborg stepped out of an alcove in the corner. This one was different. It looked more humanoid than the others. It had human-looking skin and emerald green eyes. A set of pronounced canine teeth jutted out from its lower jaw. You could see a metal structure underneath the patches of skin. It moved differently. Instead of slow robotic movements, it mimicked humanoid movements more closely.

  “What the hell?” Villanova shouted as he lifted his cannon.

  “Get back!” Kane shouted towards me.

  The hybrid cyborg opened its mouth and sprayed a solid stream of liquid at Villanova. He screamed as the acid burned him, straight through his armor and down to his bone. He slumped to the ground dead as the rest of us began firing our weapons.

  Its biological skin and tissue scorched and burned, but it kept moving. I managed to fire off a shot into the side of its head, scorching away flesh and its right eye. In its place, a bright green pulsating light glared back at me. Dodging our weapons, the cyborg bent down and grabbed a phase pistol from the floor, and immediately fired back at me.

  “Shit!” I jumped out of the way just in time and crouched behind a computer console. Kane joined me and pushed me behind him. Green, Bradley and Yates took cover as well.

  Kane leapt up and fired at the hybrid, then crouched back down. “Fuck!” he swore.

  The hybrid hid behind a column, only to step out and shoot. The workstation we used for cover exploded, raining sparks down upon us. Kane covered me with his body.

  While we were under attack, Bradley had managed to scurry across the room to one of the computers. His hands and fingers flew over the controls and the hybrid suddenly disengaged.

  Its posture slumped as if it was asleep on its feet.

  Everyone stared at Bradley as he stood up and walked over to the cyborg. Kane pushed Bradley out of the way and aimed his rifle at the hybrid’s head.

  “No!” Bradley screamed. He grabbed Kane’s arm, trying to pull his weapon aside. “We have to take it back with us.”

  “Fuck that!” Kane jerked his arm out of Bradley’s grasp.

  “Lower your weapon,” Bradley ordered as he raised his pistol at Kane. “We have orders.”

  I stepped forward, trying to take his attention from Kane. “Bradley. Look at this thing. This hybrid cyborg is dangerous. Not to mention illegal! This is why they’re outside of the borders and outside Union Research jurisdiction. It’s built with a combination of Kenji’s, mine, and your research. They bastardized our hard work to create this thing.”

  “We have orders, Aron. Step aside.”

  “This thing killed everyone in this room.” My voice grew louder as I grew angrier. “It is responsible for the deaths of the entire research colony. We have to disassemble it at the very least. They can have its CPU.”

  “No. We have to keep it intact. If you disassemble it, you might damage the bio-connections. Green, take their weapons.”

  “Bradley!”

  “I’m sorry, Aron. If you don’t stand down, I’m under orders to terminate you.”

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Bradley was actually willing to kill me over this?

  Kane growled and stepped in front of me. Green hesitantly stepped forward, but held out his hand. I put my hand on Kane’s arm to keep him back and I turned over my pistol to Green.

  Bradley pointed at Kane and Yates. “You, too. Now.”
<
br />   Kane handed his rifle to Green while glaring at Bradley. “I don’t need this to kill you. And if you touch Aron, I will kill you.”

  Yates gave Green his pistol and crossed his arms across his chest.

  Bradley motioned with his pistol towards the wall. “The three of you go sit down over there.”

  Yates, Kane and I sat down along the wall and watched Bradley tinker with the cyborg.

  “What do you get out of this, Bradley?” I asked. “You got yourself a promotion already, I see. Was it you that hacked into my files?”

  “No, stupid,” he said. “There wasn’t any hacking.”

  I slumped at the realization. “Director Carson gave them my research. And Admiral Bolander gave them Kenji’s.”

  “This is the future, Aron. Don’t you see? We are on the verge of perfecting the next generation of military units.”

  “What’s wrong with the units we’ve got now?” Kane asked with a sneer.

  “You GEMs grow faster than normal, but not fast enough. You’re big and strong, but you’re not what I would call… brainy. No offense. When Earth joined the Union, we got soft. Complacent. We sign treaties when we should be—” Bradley cut his crazy rant off mid-stream. “If you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.”

  I moved closer to Kane and he put his arm around me. “He’s gone batshit crazy,” I murmured.

  “You have a plan, don’t you, sir?” Yates whispered to Kane.

  “Yup. Don’t worry, kid. Both of you are gonna get out of here safely.”

  Kane was staring intently at Bradley. I could see that his mind was moving a mile a minute. Bradley was wrong. Kane was very intelligent. He was stupid to underestimate him and that was going to get him killed.

  Still watching Bradley, Kane muttered under his breath, “He had the security access to initiate a shutdown protocol. He had it all this time.”

  Green whispered something to Bradley, who immediately got pissed off. “We talked about this,” Bradley snapped. “We have orders, and you’re gonna do what you’re told.”

  Green opened his mouth to argue back, but instead he fell, slamming forward onto the ground, flat on his face.

  The hybrid began to rise, letting go of Green’s foot. When it reached its full height, it turned to Bradley and spat a stream of acid at him.

  Bradley managed to move out of the way, but he still got a small droplet on his upper arm. He screeched in pain as he raced to one of the computer panels, cradling his bicep.

  Scrambling to his feet, Green got up and grabbed the hybrid from behind as it advanced on Bradley.

  “Run, Brad!” Green called out to Bradley.

  Taking the opportunity caused by the chaos, Kane crawled forward towards the phase cannon lying next to Villanova’s body.

  As Bradley scrambled to shut down the hybrid cyborg, the hybrid managed to turn around to face Green.

  Green tried to fight it with a series of punches and kicks, but it was as if the hybrid didn’t even register that it been hit. It lunged forward and grabbed Green. Without a moment’s hesitation, it snapped the Marine’s neck and tossed him to the floor as if he was nothing more than a rag doll.

  Kane rose onto his feet. With a loud roar, he aimed a series of blasts at the hybrid’s head. The hybrid turned in reaction, but it was too late. The phase cannon’s particle pulses disintegrated the cyborg’s head and its body slumped to the ground. He leveled a final blast at the cyborg’s chest and it imploded in on itself before exploding in a shower of metal, wires, and organic tissue.

  With the hybrid dispatched, Kane turned his attentions back to Bradley.

  “He was a good man,” Kane said, motioning towards Green’s body. “He died for you. Do you even care?”

  Bradley blinked, not even looking down at the man who gave his life for him. “He was a means to an end.”

  With an audible snarl, Kane tossed the cannon aside and headed straight toward Bradley, his face twisted with rage.

  Bradley gasped as his eyes widened. He scrambled to pick up a phase pistol from the floor. As he turned and aimed the weapon, Kane swung his leg in a roundhouse kick, connecting with Bradley’s head.

  The action caused Bradley to spin nearly 360 degrees on the spot. His body slumped into a heap on the floor, completely unconscious.

  I quickly yanked the pistol from Bradley’s limp hand and aimed it at him while Yates worked to bind Bradley’s hands together with some electronic cabling.

  Reached into the pocket on Bradley’s left leg, I pulled out the data extractor. I slammed the black box onto the computer terminal Bradley had been using and activated the extractor with a button push. The lights on the box began to pulse and its screen lit up, displaying a progress bar and remaining time estimate.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Kane demanded, staring at me with astonishment.

  “I’m finishing up the mission,” I answered.

  Yates added his two cents. “You can’t be serious, Lieutenant.”

  “Don’t worry, this won’t be going to the Admiral or the Director. It’s going to the Union Civilian Council. They need to know what’s going on.”

  Kane smirked. “Heh. You could be court-martialed for this. Again.”

  “If that’s the punishment for doing the right thing, then so be it.”

  The doors swooshed open and everyone simultaneously turned and drew their weapons.

  “Did I miss something?” Kenji asked as he raised his hands in mock surrender and looked around the room. His eyes widened comically at the sight of Bradley lying bound on the floor.

  Kane lowered his rifle. “Nope. Not a thing.”

  Shaking his head in a slow back and forth, Yates tapped one of the computer displays and brought up the communications control.

  “This is Ensign Brian Yates calling the U.S.C. Cassini. Landing party requesting immediate evac. Repeat….”

  Chapter 14

  As soon as Shuttlepod Beta took off will all of the survivors on board, the research center’s self-destruct was activated.

  When the shuttle broke free of the atmosphere, the research lab imploded in a flash of bright light. A mushroom cloud rose in its place. Squeezing my eyes shut, I turned away from the window and rested my head back against the seat. In one hand, I clutched the data extractor and with the other, I cradled the portable cryo-freezer against my chest.

  “What are you going to do with that?” Kane asked. I opened my eyes to see him tipping his head towards the freezer.

  I looked down at the little bundle of cells floating inside. “He’s not mine to do anything with. But I’ll make sure he gets where he belongs if it’s the last thing I do.”

  Once we landed safely aboard the Cassini, we disembarked. Out of the thirteen members of the away team, only five returned: myself, Kane, Ensign Yates, Kenji and Bradley.

  Bradley was awake now. To say that he was unhappy would be an understatement. He had a bruised knot on the side of his head, his hands were tied and Yates had him at gunpoint.

  Bradley jerked his arm, trying to pull away from Yates. “Just wait until we get home. I can’t wait to see you—”

  Kane snapped his head back and narrowed his eyes at Bradley. He was on the verge of losing control, but he held it in tightly. “Shut your sniveling little mouth before I knock your ass out so fucking hard, you won’t need to be put into cryo-sleep.”

  Bradley’s mouth snapped shut. A wise decision.

  “What in the hell happened down there?” Captain Yoruba demanded as he stormed into the shuttle bay. His voice was tight, slightly raised in volume. Though he was angry, he didn’t lose his composure. He looked among all of us, but his gaze finally returned to me. He expected me to answer. Clearly he had already decided any failures on the mission were my fault.

  Ensign Yates had said I could trust the Captain. I knew damn well I wouldn’t be able to pull this off without his help, so I decided to tell him everything.

  Yoruba cut me off mid-story. “If you thi
nk I’m going put my ass in a sling for one of your conspiracy theories, you are sorely deluded. I will not risk the careers of this ship’s crew on the ‘hunch’ of an ex-convict.”

  He motioned for his security officers and they stepped forward.

  “Captain,” Ensign Yates interrupted. “Sir, I beg your pardon, but you didn’t see what they were doing down there.” He swallowed loudly and voice cracked, but he didn’t stop. “It was horrific. These people need to be held accountable.” By the end he was nearly yelling. He took a deep breath and added a respectful, “Sir.”

  “Sir,” Kane added. “I know we had our orders, but you need to listen to Lieutenant Adler.”

  I gave Kane and Yates a quick smile to let them know I appreciated both of them coming to bat for me. “I know you don’t have any reason to believe me, but we need to get this data to the Union Council. I will take full responsibility for what happened here. We just need to get to the council. If you need to look at the data before making your decision….”

  “What is that?” The captain indicated the cryo-freezer in my arms.

  “It’s a hybrid embryo.” I turned the device so that the captain could see the embryo suspended in the pink fluid. “Half human, half Degan.”

  Kenji stepped in. “Sir, they were using its genetic material as a conduit to splice implants into the cyborgs.”

  “Cyborgs? And him?” Yoruba nodded towards Bradley.

  “Commander Brimley was involved in the creation of the cyborgs. He had direct security access to their shutdown protocols.”

  “Which he chose not to use,” Kane added. “Until his own life was threatened. And after those things had already killed my entire unit.”

  Captain Yoruba stared at me for the longest time, his expression completely unreadable. I was prepared to be hauled to the brig, but then Yoruba shocked me.

  “As soon as we come out of cryosleep, we will set course for Sargan, maximum speed. We will deliver your data to the Union Council. Let them decide what to do with you.”

  I nodded and let out a long breath in relief. “Thank you, Captain.”