Another war. Another raid. Another loot. Forerunners were crazy, but they got interesting stuff at their disposal. In particular, one pile of niodes got my attention. There was something strange on those. I bet technicians would have liked to study those, but for some reason I did keep them. I think that I did it mainly because one can always use some more niodes.
But I didn't use them. Not all anyway. Those that I did keep, was interesting gate address on them... or niode matrix as it should be called. And no, I didn't figure that out by myself. I got help, quite by accident. For some reason or another, I did meet fellow called Drake Novum something. Weird fellow, with lots of even stranger ideas.
Anyways, he did take an interest in those niodes as soon he saw them. Then he spent days in my apartment just poking them with weird looking devices. Every day or two, some delivery guy came and left something on my doorsteps. Always there were more weird devices. Or data chips. Even books or maps. Weird stuff... Specially when he needed my blood sample and did send it somewhere with that delivery guy.
I didn't mind, it was refreshing to be able observe something totally different than weapon drills or something similar. You know, not soldier stuff.
So, when he announced that he figured it out, I was kinda disappointed. But on the other hand, we got something new to do. Exploration trip. Secret exploration trip. With all sneaking that I could muster, we took my mechs, equipped them with stuff needed for the long trip. Gates can be really nasty sometimes. If we are really unlucky, we could end spending months at thein other end before we can return home. And if we told anyone where to look for us, it wouldn't be secret any more.
For a nerd type, Drake was awfully familiar with mechs? Didn't think much about it, I really don't spend time with civilians, so I really don't know what they normally can or can not do. Specially weird ones like this fellow.
But that helped a lot, we get on the road little faster. And a training trip is more believable if there is someone to practice with.
Gate to one training area, short trip to remote gate and thru another gate. Little longer march and another gate. Yep, paranoid spy stuff, but there could be loot to find. And reputation to lose, if we were wrong. So, after dozen or so gates, I was pretty sure that we were safe. Our goal was some unknown gate, which Drake found accidentally on some of those maps he studied in my place.
Gates that are in caves are really rare, I haven't even heard one like that, and we soldiers have traveled thru lots of gates, and talked about our trips. That gate alone could be worth of this trip, one can get a pretty good pile of niodes if you find a useful gate.
How awfully detailed that map was, it guided us directly where we wanted to go. We did find fair-sized tunnel, that opened in the huge cave after we marched short while in it. The warrior in me did speculate, how useful cave like this could be. There were spaces to hide scores of mechs, and if there really is a gate inside here, this could be the stronghold to dream about. Easy to defend, with unstoppable escape route. Pirates would love this place.
Multiple energy sources, all around us. Targeting warnings went wild, they were armed and we were targets. Unknown gate my ass, of course someone would use a sweet place like this. And defend it. My reflexes are speedy enough, so my weapons were hot and I was targeting before I was halfway with that thought ... Except that I wasn't...
No targeting signal? No weapons response? No nothing? And now not even movement... But no enemy fire neither? Yep, I am slow sometimes, and no thinker by all means, but this was a trap. Drake!
He had me good. He came to me because of the rumor of niodes. Didn't erase me because there was chance of some future use of me, and I did provide him a nice hiding place. Something like, a vacation he did describe it as. And this was his hideout. Or something like that. Clone depot sounded really odd? Around us were his troops. Bodyguards for our trip. Or my funeral.
And my mechs. They were wired. Drake could shut down them at any time... or release if needed. Last days of his "study" was to let his guys to do this little preparation. So, there I was, to be in the future a really wealthy person, judging form all this interest, or a really dead loser. Not much choice to make. Bad or worse, I was neck deep in this, and I managed to make them to believe me. Or at least Drake pretended to believe me.
Expedition group turned out to be more like little invading army. First I did think that those were to guard me. Didn't go down that road for long, that idiot wouldn't survive as long as I had, so there should be something potentially nasty awaiting us. And I have no usable weapons. This started to look like a not so good idea, but still it was little better than having to die right now.
So off we go, thru to the last gate.
(maybe to be continued...)
Submitted by By Kalevi Karvinen#863817