Tartarus gate a space op.., p.1
Tartarus Gate: A Space Opera Series (The Collapse Book 1), page 1
TARTARUS GATE
©2021 MATTHEW P. GILBERT
This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Any reproduction or unauthorized use of the material or artwork contained herein is prohibited without the express written permission of the authors.
Print and eBook formatting, and cover design by Steve Beaulieu. Artwork provided by Phillip Dannels.
Published by Aethon Books LLC. 2019
All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved.
Contents
ALSO IN THE SERIES
Prologue: The Unsung
1. Any Given Tuesday
2. Martial Law
3. The Other Invaders
4. The Hard Way
5. Trojan Horse
6. Unleash Hell
7. Best Laid Plans
8. Standoff
9. Stowaway
10. Bluff Called
11. I’ll Show You Games!
12. The Man Behind the Curtain
13. Imperial Standoff Procedures
14. The Great Escape
15. Worst Case
16. Target Secured
17. Snake
18. Ragnarök
19. Armistice
20. Destinations
Thank you for reading Tartarus Gate
ALSO IN THE SERIES
ALSO IN THE SERIES
TARTARUS GATE
SHERIDAN STATION
ZION RISING
Prologue: The Unsung
Captain David Bauer staggered against the bulkhead, tore off his helmet, and let it drop to the deck. It bounced and rolled away like a severed head as he struck sweat from his eyes with the back of his arm. Black, jagged lines across his vision made it difficult to check the charge on his M87 rifle, but he was fairly certain it would kill a few more of those…things. Bauer offered a silent prayer to any gods that might be listening that his vision would clear in time to die fighting if it came to that.
Screams of shipmates and the crackle of blaster fire echoed down the gleaming, white passageway. Bauer’s every instinct demanded he turn and fight—stand with them—but his mission demanded otherwise.
His body, however, also had demands. Breath bursting from his lungs in ragged gasps, he swept his slowly clearing vision back and forth. There was no telling where they would come from.
Gradually, his vision cleared, and his spirit surged at what he saw. He was much closer to his goal than he had imagined. The airlock and the Jaeger beyond were less than a hundred yards ahead.
Bauer left his helmet behind and stumbled toward his destination, still gasping from exertion, but heartened now that the end was in sight.
The passageway stretched ahead of him, a long, curving transteel section that allowed passengers to view traffic to and from the Bismarck. He could see the Jaeger’s gleaming hull just ahead, securely docked at the airlock. Beyond her, the hellish red glow of hyperspace burned, a trackless void of billowing clouds and constant lightning flashes.
Bauer averted his gaze and pressed forward, struggling against nausea. He didn’t fully understand the science, but he knew gazing at the unfiltered light and eddies of hyperspace had strange effects on humans, inspiring odd emotions of dread and disorientation. Typically, the transteel gangway would have been polarized when jumping from normal space, but nothing was certain in battle. Someone had forgotten or died before they’d had the chance to flip the switch, or the equipment had simply failed, damaged in an attack. Bauer forced his stomach to settle and focused on his goal: the airlock, and beyond that, the Jaeger, one of the Bismarck’s few remaining small ships, and her fastest.
Bauer looked back, taking one last look at the ship that had been home for the last year. The Bismarck herself was dying, and so was her crew. Likely, the Jaeger and her team would join them in eternity soon enough.
But not before striking a final blow at the Devil.
A burbling, squealing hiss from ahead sent a chill through Bauer, reminding him that few plans survived contact with the enemy. He spun and brought his M87 to bear, ready for anything, and yet, even knowing what he did, nothing could really prepare him for what he saw.
A hellish, impossible mixture of conflicting biology was clawing its way through a hatch in the main deck, blotting out both the Jaeger and the twisting nether of hyperspace like a black hole, limned in crimson, devouring light and life. Blood and ooze dripped from its skinless form, muscle, tooth, and bone shifting and reshaping even as Bauer gaped in horror. A menagerie of limbs—some insectoid, some human, some barely more than tentacles—tore at the deck, scrabbling in the gathering pools of putrescence as the beast lumbered up and out, tentacles flagellating about its body as if in anticipation. The air filled with a trilling hum like song of cicadas as it approached, and a ragged, toothy maw suddenly split its mottled flesh as it surged forward.
Despite his training and combat experience, for a moment Bauer froze. He had seen them before, but not this one. Somehow, they knew the right forms not just to shred bodies, but souls as well. Every man died screaming, ripped apart and devoured by his own, personal monster. Every abomination was a unique snowflake, custom-tailored to shatter a man’s mind.
The small passageway suddenly filled with brilliant light as another of the fleet’s capital ships flared in a cataclysmic explosion, backlighting the abomination, reducing it to a mere shadow against the light of a small sun. The shockwave was enough to overcome the Bismarck’s inertial dampeners and sent Bauer to his knees. The creature roared in surprise and slipped back into the hatch slightly as Bauer found his will again and fired.
The M87 hurled plasma bolt after bolt at the glistening bulk. The corridor filled with the scent of burned meat as the beast wailed in agony and retreated from the energy blasts.
Bauer, head on a swivel, edged past the hatch and toward the airlock, blasting at the hole in the deck as hands, tentacles, and claws reached up in threes and fours to grasp at the rim. He kept firing one-handed as he worked the controls to the airlock and slipped inside.
The outer door had a porthole, made of transteel, as was everything transparent aboard the fleets. As soon as he sealed the portal, Bauer could see the bulk of the creature surge from the hatch outside and slam against the door, even as more of it continued to flow upward from below. Eyes rolled and teeth snapped as it stared back at him, hatred and wrongness rolling from it like heat on the desert horizon.
Bauer heard the external keyboard being worked and fired on the interior control panel. The close quarters blast singed his exposed skin and burned half of his close-cropped hair to stubble, but he was fairly certain the airlock was not opening ever again. Anyone who hadn’t already made the rally point would go down with the Bismarck, a tragedy to be certain, but his mission was directly from the Emperor, his orders clear: “Fail, and humanity fails with you.”
Any sacrifice was authorized.
The creature wailed and battered against the now inoperable airlock, its limbs twisting into great, bony battering rams as Bauer entered the Jaeger. The ship’s computer announced, “Condition Zebra breach, main entry hatch,” a single time as he sealed the door again.
The titanic blows shook the Jaeger for a moment as the monster pounded against the barrier, roaring in fury, then subsided. The silence was even more unnerving.
Bauer felt his heart skip a beat at what he saw through the inner airlock port. On the Bismarck side, something thin and white had pierced the seal around the edge of the door. Spikes of bone infiltrated and grew, and the door groaned at the strain.
My God, it’s going to get through.
The Jaeger was already in GQ, klaxon blaring, her interior lit by the dim red glow of battle lanterns. Bauer charged through the main compartment toward the cockpit. Three terrified crewmen, Beck, Meyer, and Stearns, offered half-hearted salutes as he passed. Bauer was pleased to see they were already strapped in and ready for a rough ride. There should have been three more, including Admiral Zellner, but it was what it was. Bauer shook his head at the loss, but there would be time to grieve later. For now, it was enough to know what crew he had left wouldn’t be smeared across the interior compartments in the high-G burn he was about to order.
“Captain!” A strangled cry of joy and disbelief came from their pilot, Tim Schroeder, as Bauer fairly leapt into the cockpit.
“Condition Zebra breach, cockpit door,” the computer announced, falling silent as the door slid back into place on its own.
“Get this ship underway, Lieutenant! Now!”
Schroeder, sitting in the pilot’s chair, spun and stabbed at his controls, shouting into his headset mic, “All hands, brace for impact! Underway in five!”
Bauer grabbed one of the many handholds that existed for precisely this situation and looked back at the airlock through the cockpit’s transteel front section. His heart sank at the sight of splintering bone infiltrating and expanding around the outer d oor like high speed ice. The hinges bulged, and warning lights flashed inside the airlock, announcing that it was no longer sealed.
“Four!”
The inner door gave way, collapsing as the beast literally grew its way in. The bulk of the creature surged into the tiny airlock, flesh, teeth, claws, and wild, staring, alien eyes, like red icing compressing into a piping bag, ready to deliver the final writing on the wall.
“Three!”
“Hit it!” Bauer cried. “That’s an order!”
Schroeder was a disciplined officer. He didn’t question. He followed his order and slammed a palm against the bright red emergency disconnect button, triggering the explosive charges designed for exigent separation.
The Jaeger lurched as if it had taken fire. Bauer was heartened to see, along with spinning shrapnel, the formless creature twisting and boiling in the vacuum, arms and tentacles flailing.
“Fuck you,” he whispered under his breath. “Die!” Though he had his doubts. There was no way of knowing if hyperspace was a lethal environment for the creature. The only sure ways he had personally seen were flame and lightning, and why not? Those had always been the weapons of gods.
“Go! Ahead flank, now!”
Schroeder boggled at this. “Yeah, no!” he shouted, shaking his head as he reached for the throttle. “I can’t work with you plastered all over the bulkhead.” Bauer staggered toward his chair as Schroeder goosed the maneuvering jets and spun the Jaeger about, pointing the main drive at the shattered airlock, and switched the viewscreen to rear. “Or this goddamned noise.” He hit a switch to silence the klaxon. “We have a point of unfinished business, too.”
Bauer cracked his head against a first aid kit on the bulkhead but managed to tumble into his seat and begin strapping into his five-point. He smiled, seeing exactly what Schroeder intended.
“Point one thrust,” Schroeder announced and raised his middle finger to the screen as he throttled up. The whine of the engines rose to a dull roar. Bauer watched in satisfaction as the creature twisted in the plasma of their exhaust, disintegrating in silence as they catapulted away from the Bismarck. Even at one tenth, it was a lot like being fired from a gun.
“You sure about that flank speed order, sir?” Schroeder asked.
Bauer looked out at the miasma of hyperspace, watching the remains of the dying fleet, some ships burning, others cold and dark, adrift. Another explosion lit the red haze of hyperspace, a small, short-lived sun bursting into life. In the glare, he saw the battlecruiser, and felt his guts churn in horror.
The Danzig, the Bismarck’s sister ship, lay still and dark in the abyss, but she sprang to life even as he caught sight of her, engines firing, maneuvering thrusters slowly rotating her ponderous bulk. Even at nearly three miles long, she was still somehow sleek and beautiful, deadly and perfectly formed for her purpose. With the imminent death of the Bismarck, she would be the last of the Emperor’s planet killers.
Only, as far as Bauer knew, the Danzig had died hours ago. What lay before him was not an ally, but a reanimated corpse, the Emperor’s own turned against her former brethren by the dark power of an implacable enemy.
Bauer pointed at the monstrous ship of war. “Ahead flank! We have to reach the gate well ahead of the Danzig!”
Schroeder looked at the approaching ship and back at Bauer. “We could use the help, couldn’t we, Cap?”
Bauer shook his head. “Danzig is dead, overrun. They broadcast their scuttle codes an hour ago and ten thousand miles away. There are no humans left alive on that ship.”
Schroeder’s face drained of blood as he flipped the monitors back to forward view. They showed only the endless, swirling void of hyperspace, but ahead somewhere, ten thousand miles or so, was the jumpgate to the Tartarus system.
He paused a moment and looked at Bauer, giving him a chance to prepare. “Ahead flank, aye, sir.”
If point one was like being fired from a gun, flank speed was akin to being smashed by the hammer of Thor himself. Schroeder had cybernetic implants to compensate for the G’s. Bauer had always intended to have some installed himself, but he had just never found the time. It was easy enough to take the drugs when needed.
Until it wasn’t.
Bauer’s vision narrowed to pinpoints and then to nothing. Darkness followed, crushing and irresistible.
Bauer returned slowly to consciousness and the sound of shrieking alarms and blaster fire. “Condition Zebra breach, cockpit door” the ship’s computer announced, over and over.
“Cap!” Schroeder was screaming. “Oh my God, Cap, wake up!”
Galvanized, Bauer found the will to hit the adrenaline injectors on his armor. Strength rushed into him, and he tore frantically at his restraints, struggling to take stock of his situation while he got himself loose.
The cockpit door was open and repeatedly trying to close again. A bloody corpse, its face difficult to identify in the dim red light, drifted in zero G near the overhead, blocking the door from closing. Schroeder continued firing at something on the other side as Bauer noticed the half-formed claw sprouting from the corpse’s back.
My God, it’s onboard.
“Stay the fuck back, Stearns!” Shroeder shouted. “I’m warning you!” A moment later, he fired, and someone on the other side screamed in agony. “Shut the goddamned door, Dave!” Schroeder screamed. “Get it out of the fucking way!”
Bauer rose without thinking and launched toward the overhead harder than he had intended. He hit the bulkhead above the cabin door hard and found himself face to face with a twisted mockery of a man, the burned flesh still smoking. As he reached a hand to push the abomination back into the main compartment, the top of its head split into a giant maw, like a demonic Venus flytrap. The head surged forward, detaching itself from the body, the attached neck stretching and undulating like a snake, propelling it toward him.
Bauer shrieked in horror, but he managed to control himself enough to push the rest of the corpse away. It sailed slowly through and the cockpit door sighed closed. In the main compartment, Beck, looking all too human, rushed forward and hammered a fist against the door, screaming, “No! Don’t leave us in here with it!”
“It’s fucking in here!” Schroeder wailed and snapped off a wild shot at the wriggling, gnashing snake beast as it drifted across the cabin. The plasma bolt missed, blasting a hole in the back of Bauer’s chair and penetrating one of the kick panels below the control console. Sparks showered across the floor, and the air filled with the acrid smell of burning electronics.
If I hadn’t woke up when I did….
“Jesus, Lord, help us!” the pilot screamed.
Bauer, too, made a silent plea to any gods in shouting distance. We just need a few minutes.
A huge pustule formed on the creature’s side with amazing speed and burst with a loud report. Vile fluid spewed forth in a rain of tiny droplets, a makeshift rocket it used to hurl itself at Schroeder.
From somewhere behind the blasted kick panel came a hiss of rushing air, followed by an explosion. It was small, but it caught the skittering beast full in the side, scorching it almost beyond recognition. The charred remains flew past Schroeder and slammed against a bulkhead, then stuck there with a sickening squelch.
Schroeder stared at the corpse a moment in shock, then peered inside the hole he had made in the console. “Huh. Emergency oxy bottle popped. Hope we don’t need it.”
Bauer watched in grim resolve as bits of liquid dripped from the still-smoking corpse. A small rivulet twisted and slithered like mercury across the floor and beneath a control panel. “We won’t.”
He shook his head in wonder at their singular bit of good fortune. Perhaps the gods were with them in their darkest hour. Now he owed those gods his very best effort to finish their mission.
