The Dig

[Semir Gerkhan]

2-6-834 AS

Planet Pygar, in the middle of the wasteland.

---

PSI Agent Luke Garcia

---

García heard the explosion and jumped like a spring from the bench where he was sitting in the back of the transport, next to the artifact. The PSI agent heard a noise like rocks falling outside and felt pieces of something hitting the roof of the transport. Right after, a second explosion sounded from the front area of ​​the vehicle. As gunshots and screams rang out, the team grabbed their rifles and moved toward the front of the vehicle along the connecting corridor as fast as they could, only to see the cockpit metal door slam shut. Two of the militiamen hiding behind corners opened automatic fire on it, causing several of their bullets to ricochet in all directions.

Luke quickly moved to the side and took cover as best he could behind the corner. "Cease fire!!" He screamed above the noise. "Cease the damn fire!!" The militiamen stopped shooting and looked at him, hesitant. "The door and compartment are made of metal! The bullets bounce, they don't go through them!"

After a few seconds of uncertainty, the Militia young sergeant in command began to shout orders to his men, urging them to bring tools to open the door, while some of them ran to look for them towards the loading area. At that moment everyone noticed how the transport suddenly slowed down and finally stopped. The attackers must have taken over the controls, and had stopped it. Garcia didn't know what was happening, but he had enough information to know that it wasn't a coincidence. Someone was attacking them, and he was sure that he had to do with the artifact. It had to be assumed that the transport's pilots were dead or disabled, and that the attackers controlled the vehicle's driving capacity. Now, they were stranded in the middle of the desert.

Luke left his men covering the position, and back out to the loading area again with the militiamen, to check the relic status. He didn't even have to get there to start hearing that buzz. He approached the relic, and he could hear it better. Something had changed. Until then it had been a slow, almost inaudible vibration, although it could be felt in the body in an unpleasant way. Now, however, it had raised his frequency, and he could be heard clearly. The agent looked at that blasphemous object with hatred. He could almost hear an echo of cruel laughter in the background of that buzz, and he felt as if the artifact was mocking him. Garcia grimaced, and headed decisively towards the front of the transport.

"Mackintosh, Wells, Yang, with me!" He barked, gesturing to his subordinates, who abandoned their cover positions. The four of them returned to the loading area dodging several militiamen who were heading towards the cockpit door with blowtorches and crowbars, and Luke pointed to the relic. "This thing is doing something it didn't do before. Do you hear that noise?" The agents nodded. "I don't know what it is, but it can't be anything good. I want you to put the explosive charges back in."

Mackintosh looked at him with some doubt. "Boss... Orders are to take it to Central."

Luke looked at him with an exasperated expression. "I know the orders, I myself transmitted them to you. But the artifact may be activating, and you already know what it's capable of doing. Do you want to end up like one of those poor bastards in the field hospital? No? Well, then start now!"

The relic continued to buzz strangely, while Garcia's men worked to place the explosive charges on it. It was a rather annoying sound, which could be heard clearly despite the noise of the transport's engines idling, and the knocks of the militiamen who continued trying to access the cockpit. García kept an impassive face, enduring the disgusting sensations that the waves of the artifact produced in him, while the latest events were passing through his head at full speed.

------

Luke had been worried about safety during the trip shortly since after the incident at the hospital, when they found Arthur. When leaving there and returning to the Citadel he had been informed that the artifact wouldn't be able to transport as immediately as he would have liked. From the first moment he had realized that the relic was pretty heavy, but it turned out to be much heavier than expected. The Administrator's men needed two whole days to extract it from its pedestal and lift it to the settlement. They burned up to four gravitatory forklifts in the process, and one of the workers was nearly crushed to death. According to what Garcia had known from one of the technicians that Voncloud had taken to the Doldrums, that inexplicable weight must have been related to the material it was made of. It was something unknown, obviously alien, and the measuring instruments gave readings of a level of density that was scientifically impossible, according to the current knowledge.

Luke had seen Voncloud's troops try to contain the civilians inside the limits of the settlement, but he knew it was impossible. Sooner or later someone would get out of there through one of the many minor galleries in the cave system and start talking outside. And so it had been, given that on the second day of their stay, more people had begun to arrive from other parts of the planet, attracted by the news of the discovery. The agent was desperate, since he was aware that speed ​​in transporting the artifact was essential to preserving the secret. The longer the relic stood there, with so many people swarming around, there would be numerous information leaks. No one really knew how many ramifications the heretical cult could have in Pygar, and wouldn't be very complicated for potential attackers to imagine the possible routes that the convoy would follow, when it departed. However, since he couldn't do anything about it, so he focused on preparing to do his job.

Garcia had consulted with Voncloud and Blaine and then had studied carefully the route on his holographic map. Soon he realized that the convoy would have to surface at some points, because the Doldrums were remote caves that did not connect to Pygar's main cave systems. Therefore, they would enter and exit the underground up to three times before they could reach the path that would take them directly to Central below the surface. It was a danger, but there was no choice if the relic was to be carried by land means. The possibility of transporting it by air had been considered, but the onset of storms and their strenght couldn't be predicted, at least not precisely, making too risky any long subatmospheric flight. It was one of Pygar's main problems. At any instant the weather could change from only difficult to completely lethal, and piloting a ship through a storm of grade 6 or higher was simply suicide.

Once the artifact was finally extracted from the Citadel, it had been loaded onto the gigantic tracked ground transport that Voncloud had brought for this purpose, through its roof using a crane. It was an hybrid monster built using the hull of an old Dromedary-class freighter as a base, and expanding the rest of the vehicle by welding sheet metal around it. Its twelve engines had the necessary power as to move its enormous mass with the heavy relic in the cargo hold, but however, this time they hadn't departed immediately either. Radars reported the formation of a powerful grade 7 electromagnetic storm over Doldrums, and that level of meteorological violence had caused the departure to be delayed even further. It was true that the large transport, the three off-road trucks, and the four escort APCs that formed the convoy were armored and prepared to survive even grade 9 storms on the surface, but it would have been useless to leave in those conditions. They wouldn't have advanced even one kilometer per hour, with the serious risk of suffering a mechanical breakdown, and in a situation of zero visibility. Additionally, the electronic devices of the vehicles tended to malfunctioning or simply not work under these conditions, so they wouldn't even have been able to guide themselves correctly. Thus, another day of waiting had passed, until the epicenter of the storm had moved and they had been able to leave the settlement.

The first two surfacings had been quite chaotic due to the electromagnetic storm that, although it had decreased, had continued hitting during the first hours of the trip. The convoy had trudged across the wasteland for several kilometers, wrapped in sand and buffeted by gusts of wind. The geolocation instruments were suffering from interference, visibility was difficult and communications had been almost interrupted until they reached the entrance to the next section of underground caves. In both cases, the eight vehicles that made up the convoy scattered during their journey acros the surface. The first time, when they went back underground, the pilots realized that they had lost visual contact with two of the escort APCs. The second time, one of the trucks wasn't able to gather with them.

However the orders were to continue forward at all costs, and Militia High Command refused to allow the transport to stop and wait. Therefore they had continued their journey through the caves, until they had begun to ascend to emerge outside for the last time. A pleasant surprise showed up on the radars, when they realized that the storm had finally subsided almost completely. As the convoy approached the exit to the outside, García heard the pilots on the radio reporting that the area was in relative calm, and visibility was almost total. Only a few less than 60 kilometers per hour gusts of sandy wind were crossing the wasteland, clouding the landscape. The comments in the communications were optimistic, since they could now advance with much greater speed, without having to face the fury of the weather. The enormous transport was already approaching the end of the cave and then... Then the explosions were heard.

------

"The explosive charges are mounted and armed, boss." Luke snapped out of his thoughts and looked at Yang, who was waiting with his hand outstretched, offering him the detonator. "What are we going to do now?"

Garcia took the detonator and secured it inside his vest, while he hesitated. "Nothing at the moment... let's wait for events to unfold. But I swear to Deux that I'll blow up this aberration before it transforms us all into murderous zombies." He gestured with his hand to indicate to follow him. "Now let's see what's happening."

They advanced again to the front of the transport, where two of the militiamen were trying to open the door with a crowbar, after having softened some parts with a blowtorch. The other ten were stationed, with weapons ready. The four agents joined them.

The commanding sergeant was talking into his transmitter, presumably to one of the remaining escort APCs. "Fennec, this is Camel-1, what the hell is happening out there?"

A nervous voice was heard with a creak on the speaker. "Fennec-2 here, Camel-1, we're under attack! There have been two explosions, and part of the cave entrance has collapsed right behind you! We've lost contact with the rest of the convoy! Access to the cave system has been completely blocked. We're about 700 meters from the entrance, and I can't see anyone else. They don't respond to the radio either." There was a moment of doubt in the voice. "They were probably trapped inside, or... buried under rocks."

The young Militia sergeant seemed to be going through the worst moment of his life. He ran his hand across the forehead to wipe away the cold sweat. "Fennec-2, we're detained against our will, a hostile force has taken the cockpit and we don't have access to the vehicle controls. Can you see anything from your position?"

"Negative, Camel-1. We're positioned in front of you. I see the cockpit... the windshield is broken in several places. But I can't see the inside, is too high."

A sharp knock from the cockpit door indicated that the militiamen had been successful in their efforts. The sliding leaf opened about twenty centimeters and the two soldiers that were there tried to move to the sides as quickly as they could. Several blaster fire came out from the other side, hitting one of the men in the chest. The militiaman was protected with a ballistic plate vest, but the shots went through him cleanly leaving two huge burning holes, and collapsed without uttering a single moan. The other soldier threw himself to the ground to save the life.

"Take cover!" The sergeant crouched down, aiming his pistol, and shoot several times on the door's gap, until empty his magazine.

The other soldier who had been trying to access the cockpit took advantage of the moment when the sergeant fired to crawl closer, hook his crowbar on the leaf, and pull it open completely. The cockpit was completely exposed, and the ten militiamen that were ready opened automatic fire with their carbines, ravaging the interior of the room. Garcia took advantage of the hurricane of bullets to advance with Wells and Ellis to the side of the door.

As Ellis dragged the fallen militiaman out of the fire zone, Luke pulled out a flash grenade and tossed it inside. The blinding blast illuminated the hallway briefly, and Garcia and Wells stormed the cockpit, one on each side. Luke stepped over the corpses of two militiamen lying in the doorway and saw a fleeting movement behind one of the driver chairs. He fired against it and the hostile took cover behind as much as he could, trying to crawl away, shooting without aiming from under the seats and behind the bodies of the dead drivers. Garcia had to move out of the shooting angle to avoid being hit and Wells used that moment to flank the enemy by the other side of drivers' chairs.

"Don't move you bastard!" Wells shouted as he aimed at the crouching man's head.

The guy stood still for a moment, as if weighing his options. He seemed to be breathing hard and smiled defiantly behind the glass of his mask. He uttered a broken whisper. "For... Malta." Then he turned like a flash and raised his blaster pistol. Both men fired at the same time. The shot grazed Wells' shoulder, causing a burn, and two bullets from the agent's rifle hit the hostile's head. The man fell backwards, limp.

García approached the corpse and kicked the fallen weapon away, while he looked around, searching more threats, but the cockpit was clear. He screamed loudly towards the door so that it could be heard from the hallway. "Clear!"

Wells examined his wound with a gesture of pain. Fortunately it was a very shallow wound, and practically had cauterized itself. Then turned to his commander. "For Malta, boss?" Wells crouched down to look at the deceased man closely. "Does this guy work for Outcasts?" He made a gesture of admiration. "Had a lot of balls, attacking the convoy alone."

The hostile was a guy dressed in a ragged, sand-colored tunic, like the one they had seen many of the settlers in the Doldrums settlement wear. His hands and what was left of his face were eroded and burned by the sun and sand. He must have spent a long time on the surface, without protection, and García wondered how the hell had managed to climb into the transport cockpit. He opened the dead man's tunic to see what he was wearing underneath, revealing an advanced black ultralight combat suit with iridium alloy plates incorporated. Wells whistled, with surprise. This was cutting-edge equipment, well out of reach of most people. It wasn't sold on the common market, you only found it if you knew exactly where to look... or if you worked in the faction that made it.

Luke's face paled when recognizing the respiratory mask and type of clothing. Looked at his subordinate. "This guy doesn't work for the Outcasts, Wells, he's an Outcast. An elite operative, I think, given what he's wearing."

Wells stood up and waved through the broken windshield at the Militia APC placed in front and below of them. Then checked the control panel, that was full of the sand that was entering through the holes in the glass. The screens were out or broken, and appeared burned, probably damaged by the blaster hits that were visible. He tried to type something on the console, and received a spark. The agent cursed. "Motherf...! Well, he will be an Outcast, but he's also a damn bastard. The panel is completly destroyed, he probably shot it several times before we entered." He shook his head. "I'm afraid we're pinned here, boss. This thing isn't going anywhere."

The rest of the PSI team and some militiamen entered the cockpit. Garcia turned to the sergeant, pointing the corpse. "Listen to me, you've to radio to Marshall Blaine immediately. Tell him that we've been attacked by an Outcast operative and we're immobilized. We need reinforcements immediately."

The sergeant raised his hands, shaking his head with a nervous smile. "Wow, wow, calm down, tough guy, you are not in charge. You're here as additional protection, and only because Administrator Voncloud has allowed it. But I give the orders here." He shrugged, agitated. "We still don't know what happened and why we were attacked, and I'm not going to make hasty decisions."

Luke huffed in exasperation. That man was overwhelmed by the situation and still in denial. Undoubtedly he was afraid to inform his superiors that a single attacker had killed several of his men, disabled the transport vehicle and isolated it from the rest of the convoy. The agent tapped his forehead with a finger several times and drilled the NCO with his gaze. "Oh come on, sergeant, think with your head a little! The cult consumed Cardamine, and we found quite a few supplies of that orange shit in the Citadel. We've no idea how they got it, but... Don't you really think it's a tremendous coincidence that we found Cardamine and now we're attacked by an Outcast operative? Don't you think it's likely that the Outcast knew about the existence of the relic and now are trying to recover it?"

The NCO looked at the fallen hostile for a few seconds, tightening his lips. "Well, he's pretty dead, the threat has been neutralized. The cave entrance has collapsed and isolated us from the rest of the convoy, yes, but they're just some stones, it's a problem that we can solve. In fact, they're probably already working on the other side to remove the rockfall." He waved an arm in the direction of the cave system they had emerged from. "There are technicians in the other trucks, with spare parts for this vehicle. When they meet with us will fix the control panel. There is no need to alarm the Marshall, our current forces can protect the transport until it can get underway again."

Luke showed a scornful expression. "For Deux's sake, do you really think that man acted alone? The Outcasts love their own life more than anything in this universe, and do you think this one came here alone to commit suicide attacking a transport with about twenty armed men inside, and escorted by APCs? No sergeant, there's something else here. We're not safe."

The sergeant seemed to struggle with himself, but finally gave up and clicked his tongue angrily. "Damn it!" He sighed. "Okay, okay, I'll try to inform the Marshall right now, and ask that send us more men. The weather is quite calm, there should be no problems with the comms." He looked at the ground, shaking his head. "Damn... I can't believe this has to happen just the first time I..." The man stopped talking and stayed still while a distant rumor began to be heard.

Everyone present remained silent. Indeed, a constant, growing noise, like an oscillating roar, was beginning to be heard. Garcia saw how the militiamen began to look at each other, with worried expressions, while some approached the windshield to look outside. Luke do the same, trying to see something among the thin clouds of sand that fluttered in suspension, although deep down he already suspected where the sound was coming from. That was sounding like the nozzles of a ship roaring at full power, in subatmospheric flight, trying to slow down. And it was getting louder and louder.

The sergeant's transmitter crackled again and the voice of the APC commander was heard. "Fennec-2 here! We detect a ship in the scanner approaching from the northwest at full speed! It doesn't have an activated transponder! From the size I would say it's a frigate!"

Wells pointed to an area of the almost clear ​​sky in front of them. "Over there! Here they come!"

Garcia looked towards the place and saw a black dot, which was getting bigger by the second. If it was a frigate, it was clear that they were coming for the artifact, and he could bet his right hand that an Outcast assault team would be inside. He turned to the sergeant, who seemed in shock and indecisive. "We're going to be assaulted within a few minutes. Try to inform the Marshall, but we're alone, no reinforcement will arrive in time. I recommend that you take defensive positions in the transport with your men, and entrench yourself. My team and I will go down to fight the hostiles on the ground."

The NCO looked at him for a second or two, and then nodded, regaining his composure. "Okay, but take under your command the militiamen who are in the APC to support you." Luke gave a slight nod of thanks, and left the cockpit.

------

The tactical team went to the cargo elevator and opened it, putting on their helmets and checking weapons for the last time. They descended on the lifting platform through the belly of the vehicle to the sandy ground, between the tracked wheels. Luke didn't like having to face these unknown troops in the open field, but he knew had no choice. The sergeant and the rest of militiamen would defend themselves better by shooting from the elevated and somewhat covered area of ​​the cockpit, but the transport couldn't be protected at all angles from the inside. If they only defended the Dromedary from there, assailants would take advantage of the dead angles and wolud surround it. They would attack from several sides at the same time using explosives and that would be the end. It was absolutely necessary for someone to be on the ground, to keep the attackers at a distance.

The PSI agents emerged from beneath the transport, as the sound of the ship's engines increased, and advanced towards the APC, whose rear ramp was already opening. Eight militiamen ran towards the tactical team, meeting them halfway.

Garcia addressed them. "Hi, boys." He pointed towards the ship, which was already beginning to be seen with some clarity. "We're going to deal with a frigate that is coming for the artifact that we've orders to guard. The frigate can wipe out all of us easily with its cannons, so we'll have to bet our lives that they won't want to take the risk of destroying the relic." He pointed his thumb back. "Therefore, we'll take positions among the tracks of the transport, and we'll pray very hard that we haven't made a complete mistake." Luke took another look at the ship that continued to approach, and started toward the transport, gesturing to follow him. "If Deux is with us and they simply don't ravage us with cannon fire, they will have to deploy the assault team that I imagine they have inside the ship. We'll wait for them covered, and we'll not let them surround us. I warn you, those bastards are Outcasts, and they will be wearing some of the best military equipment that exists on Sirius. If you can, shoot them in the head, it will probably the most vulnerable part of them."

The eight militiamen and the six agents positioned themselves at different angles, scattered between the tracked wheels of the large transport, and then ordered the APC to position itself in the same way as close as possible. Luke took aim with his rifle's holographic scope and widened the magnification to observe the approaching ship. They were a few kilometers away and flying very low, and he could finally make out what it was about. It was a ZC-410 Peregrine-class frigate. Garcia knew that model, the Pontifical Guard had one that was used as an armored transport. It was armed with six standard gunboat cannons and two heavy ones, so it sure enough had capacity to kill them all.

The frigate was already very close, and in some seconds they would be within gun range. Luke glanced over the soldiers under his command that he could see, and used the communicator on his helmet. "Everybody ready?" He received thirteen affirmative responses. He then moved from his position to take a look towards the APC. It had gone backwards to place itself closer to the transport, but not close enough. Garcia cursed, and called them. "Fennec-2, this is Camel-20! You're too far from the transport, you've to get closer! In your current position you...!"

The frigate opened fire with two of its standard cannons and the noise drowned out the rest of Luke's words. The ship had fired from the limit of its effective range, and the first impacts of the plasma projectiles hit just a few meters from the APC. Garcia saw how the armored vehicle accelerated at full speed, but to the right, away from the transport, and in turn opened fire on the ship with its mounted gatling gun. Luke watched as the Peregrine made an evasive maneuver to dodge the burst, and returned fire this time with all its standard cannons. The APC was hit three times on the side and exploded violently, sending pieces of burning metal in all directions. Some of them beat the large transport, ricocheting, and reached the tracks, causing the soldiers to have to hide.

The frigate passed at full speed above them, thundering at them with the roar of its engines, and Garcia could see how the trail of two missiles left the top of the transport and pursued the ship. Some of the militiamen sheltered in the cockpit had fired portable surface-to-air missile launchers in the hope of shooting it down, although it soon became clear that it would not work. One of the cannons fired and destroyed one of the two projectiles, and the other hit the frigate, activating its shields. The ship shook sharply due to the shock wave, but didn't fall, and curved in its flight to face the transport again, this time from the side.

The cannons opened fire briefly again, this time aimed at the cockpit. It was hit squarely by three precise shots that caused some explosions, while the frigate flew over the transport at full speed again. The soldiers covered behind the tracked wheels could hear a long, terrible crunch, like the cry of a large wounded animal, and saw how the entire cockpit fell from above to the sandy ground, completely detached from the body of the enormous vehicle. The sand raised by the impact showered them all.

Garcia heard Ellis' concerned voice through the helmet's earpiece. "Shit boss! They're going to massacre us from the air! This is not working!"

"Damn, Ellis!" Luke responded desperately. "Hold your positions and don't let anyone leave the coverage!"

Garcia was beginning to doubt the success of his plan, but he also knew that there was nothing more to do. They couldn't compete in firepower with the frigate, and they had nowhere to run either. His hope lay in that it seemed that the ship's attacks had been intended to be precise, so he expected that they would still want to recover the artifact intact. He watched as the ship made another turn to face the transport again and headed towards it at full speed. However, it slowed down until it was standing on top of the remains of the APC, and descended to a height of about nine meters, remaining motionless. The cargo hatch on its belly opened and ten dark figures fell out.

The Outcast assault operatives used the flaming remains of the armored vehicle as cover, and opened fire on them with blaster rifles. Luke inmediatly ordered his men and militiamen to regroup in the tracks poiting that direction and defend. He saw how two of the militiamen were hit almost instantly as they moved to change position, and fell dead, their ballistic vests completely ignored by the plasma projectiles.

"Choose the targets carefully, boys! Don't make burst fire, conserve ammunition!"

Garcia was firing, trying to reach the attackers taking cover, but they were at a distance of about 400 meters, which made it very difficult to have a clear target, and the smoke and flames of the destroyed APC obscured vision. However, the Outcast did not seem to be affected by that smoke, because their projectiles hit very close and forced the soldiers to hide from time to time to avoid being hit. However, Garcia knew that if they could hold the position and not let the Outcasts get closer, they would be in a stalemate, which would benefit them. If the Militia sergeant had managed to contact Marshal Blaine, it was very possible that he would try to send reinforcements by air, which would arrive at some point. The problem was not to run out of ammunition before that happened.

The frigate was still suspended in the air doing nothing, right above the assault team it had deployed. Suddenly its cannons moved and opened fire again, launching a wave of projectiles towards the space of ground that separated both groups of contenders, impacting only a few meters of the transport. The successive plasma blasts raised a large cloud of sand and dust that completely obscured the vision of the defenders, who stopped shooting and took cover to protect themselves. Garcia felt several blaster rifle shots impact the area of ​​the track where he had been a few seconds ago. He couldn't see anything through the cloud of sand, he didn't even see his own men, and yet the Outcasts' shots were almost as accurate as they had been before. His helmet had a thermal vision mode, although in broad daylight it was useless, but it was likely that the Outcasts had a more advanced model that could be used in all types of lighting conditions. The shooting intensified and Luke replaced his magazine again as he thought that the frigate hadn't tried to hit them with its cannons, but had deliberately fired at the ground. Therefore, those shots were only intended to do what they had done: blind them while the assault team advanced in the open field.

A blurred figure emerged from the dust cloud about 4 meters away just as he moved to look outside, and shot him. He threw himself on the ground, returning the fire in a burst towards his opponent's head, and felt an intense burning pain in his side. The Outcast fell limp onto the sand, with the visor of his helmet destroyed.

Garcia screamed into his transmitter. "They're here, fall back behind the tracks...!!"

Several shots, screams and bursts of gunfire were heard around them. Gritting his teeth to overcome the terrible pain of his wound, Luke staggered off the ground and moved out of the tracks, trying to locate and flank the attackers, but he was unable to see anything half a meter away. He tripped over the corpse of a militiaman and fell to the ground again, which saved his life because a blaster burst came out of the dust cloud in front of him and pierced the air right where he had been. Garcia rolled over and emptied his magazine at the approximate origin of the shots. He then pulled out his pistol, while on the other side of the tracks someone could be heard screaming in panic. He saw nothing, but the enemy didn't respond, so he assumed that he had caught up with him. He got up again and advanced, until he found the body of his attacker. Next to him was Dominguez, dead, with a large burned hole in his chest, along with other three fallen militiamen.

Luke leaned against the right track of the transport, dizzy with pain, while the noise of fighting was decreasing around him. He looked at his wound, realizing that it was very serious. It had been a graze, otherwise he would have been dead by now, but the plasma had completely dissolved the section of the vest where it had hit, and had disintegrated flesh, skin and bone. He wouldn't bleed to death, since everything was cauterized, but he had no idea what internal damage he might have. He had to sit down, leaning on the track, because his legs couldn't support him. Yes, without a doubt he had internal damage, and he was dying, because it was going very fast. He took the last syringe of painkiller from the first aid kit in his vest, and injected it into his leg. That wouldn't save him at all, but at least it would make the pain decrease for a while.

"Garcia here..." He tried to weakly talk into the transmitter "Situation.. what is... the situation...."

He received no response. Garcia knew that everything was lost. He sighed and took off his helmet, which rolled on the sand. He had done everything he could, and it still hadn't been enough, but he knew that no one could ask him for more. He knew that he had followed the orders and had done his duty to the end. If today he had to die, could do peacefully, because Deux would receive him with open arms. There was only one thing left to do. He wouldn't allow that blasphemous aberration to fall into the hands of the Outcasts.

Luke took out the detonator of the explosive charges from his vest and began to crawl along the ground, using the last strength he had left, moving as far away from the transport as he could. He knew that he had very little chance of surviving, and death didn't scare him, but he preferred to be as far as possible when everything exploded. After all, as His Holiness often used to say, Deux helps those who help themselves. When he felt that he couldn't advance even one more meter, he simply rolled over, lying on his back on the sand.

The agent raised the detonator, and whispered. "Deux Vult."" Then he pressed the button and passed out.

------

Garcia opened his eyes when a boot shook him violently. The pain in his wounded side hit hard again, making him grit his teeth as uttered a muffled moan. The light from the white dwarf was blinding him, and he had to squint to regain some vision. Standing in front of him were two silhouettes, which he could recognize as two of the Outcast operatives. One was pointing his rifle at him.

"This bastard is still alive." He said, behind the tinted visor of his helmet. "May I kill him?"

The other looked at the wounded agent for a few seconds, as considering it, and then made a gesture of disinterest. "Leave him, they're all dead except this one. He's a soldier of that church, let his god decide whether to save him or not." He tapped his partner on the shoulder and pointed behind him. "We're leaving now, we've nothing else to do here."

The two Outcasts walked away while Garcia looked at them with a glazed look. The pain of his wound intensified, and he was so weak that he almost couldn't move. He cursed the Outcasts for waking him up. All dead... that's what that guy had said. Ellis, Yang, Mackintosh, Wells and Dominguez. Good agents, good believers. No doubt by now they would be with Deux, and they must be looking at him now from the Lord's Own Eyes. He would soon join them, probably... He blinked several times to try to stop seeing blurry and then saw the destroyed transport.

The large vehicle was open like a gigantic flower. The explosion of the charges had burst it from the inside out, sending pieces everywhere, and it had been so violent that even one of the immense tracks had come loose. There were still some fires and a lot of smoke coming out of it. Garcia smiled. He had achieved it, he had blown up that impious thing, that disgusting alien device that corrupted people's souls. He hadn't been able to fulfill his mission, but at least... the artifact couldn't do any more damage.

Luke noticed that the Outcast frigate was positioned right above the remains of the large transport. Its cargo hold was open, and it looked like a clamp attached to a thick chain was being lowered into the transport from there. The agent paled as the chain came back up, holding the relic. It was... intact... pristine. It didn't even have signs of having received an explosion or fire, and still reflected that violet luminescence that caused him so much concern. He could hear it buzzing over the noise of the ship's engines, that sound that made him nauseous, and that was always heard above any other, despite how loud it was. Luke felt again as if the relic was looking down on him and laughing at his helplessness. Finally, the artifact stepped into it and the hatch closed, and the feeling dissipated.

The frigate began to move to the side and then descended to land. Luke leaned over his side so he could continue watching, and he could see the members of the Outcast team approaching the frigate. He counted six, accompanied by five repulsor stretchers, each containing a body bag. Everyone boarded the ship, and it immediately took off, moving away into the sky.

Luke stayed lying there, in shock, watching as the frigate became smaller and smaller. When he couldn't see it anymore, he blinked rapidly, and felt through his vest, until found his portable communication device. He managed to focus his gaze enough to find a contact.

"Your... Eminence..." He said with a thin voice when the line opened to the other side. "We've... a serious... problem."