“ We have already been informed of the situation through E.D. F command, you intend to physically land a ship the size of the Liberty next to the institute?” She asked incredulously.
“ Or as close as we can get,” Michael finished for her.
The woman consulted something out of view for a few seconds.
“ There’s a park near to the facility that you might be able to land in. It’s called Stromoika park, I’ll arrange for the area to be cordoned off immediately.”
“ Thanks,” Michael replied, “Liberty out.”
“ Well here goes,” Kinraid said.
Vargev gave the commander a look of silent distain; he must be a newbie to come out with something like that.
“ Everyone hold onto something, this is going to be rough,” Michael said.
That enticing sapphire blue planet, with gentle wisps of white cloud that was the Earth loomed large, the bright azure glow of its atmosphere was clearly visible as the Liberty began its entry.
The outer hull began to heat up rapidly, and the ship started to shudder, at first gently then increasing in violence as the winds in the upper atmosphere increased.
Michael preyed that the ship would make it through entry, she had taken a heck of a lot of damage, and it would be touch and go.
The Liberties hull trailed fire and smoke as it punched ever deeper into Earths atmosphere. The shuddering became almost unbearable; conduits exploded and crewmen were thrown across the floor. Small fires began to break out amongst the damaged circuitry, the fire suppression system was knocked offline again. Outside the ship it looked like a travelling inferno, parts of damaged hull plating were torn completely off the ship due to the immense pressure.
Even the huge form of Dalvosh was struggling against the unrelenting violence of punching deeper and deeper into the Earth’s atmosphere.
The shuddering had finally stopped, smoke still hung thick across the command centre, and the crew immediately went to work putting out the myriad of small fires. At length, the environmental systems came back online and started clearing the smoke.
Michael wiped the sweat lining his brow, “We made it!” Elated, a wide grin played across his face. It was all he could do to stop himself punching the air in delight, damn I love this ship, he thought.
The holoviewer cleared, showing the white blanket of cloud cover below them, the ship continued to descend trailing smoke and pieces of damaged hull plating from its incredibly hot outer hull.
“ Status?” Michael asked as the rest of the command crew picked themselves up from the violence of entry.
“ We’ve got severe damage to the outer hull; multiple hull fractures. Integrity is at eighteen percent and holding, minor injuries reported.”
“ Well at least we made it through,” Michael said with genuine relief.
The Liberty quickly punched through the cloud cover, and flew over the landmass that was mainland Europe.
They descended quickly, and soon they could see the mountain ranges between them and the outskirts of Prague itself.
Lathiel silently approached the form of the man checking through the transports inventory, he had his back to him, consulting a handheld scanner. Before the poor soul even had a chance to react, the assassin grabbed his head, wrenched it backwards and savagely sliced the mans throat. The man staggered, coughing and spluttering on his own blood, Lathiel thought the man was making too much noise in his death throes so he rammed the mans head against a large shipping container next to him, instantly knocking him unconsciousness.
Carefully, he dragged the man’s body behind some other containers and activated his crodes gland again, pain ravaged the assasins body once more as he gradually took over the form of the inventory man, within seconds the transformation was complete.
The impostor searched through the bloodied, lifeless body, took the man’s I.D. card and wiped any trace of spattered blood from the card and his knife on the dead man’s coveralls. Silently, he left the ships hold.
As he made his escape down the ramp of the transport, out across the landing pad and towards the main building a small dark ship could just be seen overhead, trailing smoke. Its matt black hull and wedge shaped design resembled one of his own Krenaran ships, it seemed to be heading for the centre of Prague. However, its main weapon and torpedo launchers were completely different, deep indents in the sides of its hull gave off a bright electric blue light.
Lathiel recognised the ship as the Liberty, they must know of the plan, he thought, muttering a Krenaran curse; his job had just gotten that little bit more difficult.
12. A final reckoning
Lathiel made his way calmly, yet quickly through the ten storey terminal building down the main elevator and out onto the busy roads outside.
He noticed a line of elaborately painted vehicles across the road. They all had signs above them with just one word, taxi, he wasn’t sure what that meant, yet he needed to secure some form of transport so headed towards them anyway.
The driver looked at him quizzically, as the assassin was dressed in the inventory man’s dirty coveralls, “do you have a destination.”
“ The institute of quantum mechanics,” Lathiel replied with a smile, trying to act as naturally as he could.
“ That’s only a few minutes drive from here, hop in,” the driver said.
Lathiel did so, and soon the unknowing driver was shepherding the assassin to his target.
The tall buildings of Prague whipped past like a blur as the battered form of the Liberty descended gradually towards its landing spot in the heart of Stromoika park.
“ Deploy landing legs,” Michael asked.
“ Landing legs down,” Eldathar replied.
Michael had hoped against hope that the landing legs were operational, otherwise the ship would slam front first straight into the park. Thank god for small mercies, he thought as the Liberty gently came in to land.
They could now see the wide open park, and the huge security cordon which had been hurriedly placed around it. The roads surrounding around the park had been blocked off and traffic had been steadily piling up, already the whole city looked largely gridlocked. The park itself was quickly cleared of any pedestrians, however a large crowd had gathered outside
its confines to catch a glimpse of the landing of the most famous, or some would say infamous ship in the E.D.F.
The Liberty slowed almost to a standstill, then gently lowered itself onto its landing legs. It was a tight squeeze, the ship very nearly took up the entire length of the park. With a hiss of vented gas, the ship settled onto its legs and slowly began to power down.
“ Eldathar, Dalvosh, Vargev, Kinraid, you’re with me, we don’t have much time.”
Logameier came onto the bridge at the same time, “you might need these.” He handed three Solarian scanners, one each to Michael, Vargev, and Kinraid. “They have been re-configured to be readable by humans.”
“ Logameier, you are in command until we get back,” Michael said.
Lieutenant Johnson Logameier nodded his understanding, “good luck.”
Vargev touched his wrist comm. “Commandoes, green light has been given, form up with us outside the Liberty.”
The squad of E.D. F commandoes the Liberty had been carrying on its journey were ready. Vargev had briefed them earlier; they were nervous, this was not exactly the kind of mission commandoes were trained for. Nevertheless, Nikolai needed their raw skill and instinct for this most dangerous of foes.
The taxi had managed to make it to the rear of the institute, the driver turned in his seat to face him. “That’s as close as I can get you, they have set up some sort of road block up ahead.”
As the driver turned back to check his meter, Lathiel quickly took out one of his knives and rammed it straight through the drivers seat, impaling the taxi driver in the process. He slumped forward onto the steering wheel.