Fortress Purgatory (Helltroopers Book 2) Read online

  Fortress Purgatory

  (Helltroopers Book 2)

  By Isaac Stone

  Contributions from Timothy Mayer

  Copyright 2017 by Isaac Stone

  CANTO: Introduction

  In the early 1300’s a man named Dante Alighieri crafted his masterwork, in the form of a narrative poem Divine Comedy, detailing an exhaustive journey through the Inferno, Purgatory, and Heavenly realms. The Helltroopers trilogy is a scifi remix of this mighty work, and follows a squad of space marines and a mysterious android as they take the harrowing journey through those reimagined realms. The novels remain faithful to Dante’s work, and so be warned that they do not follow the typical narrative structure one might expect from an average story, but instead adhere to the structure of the original Divine Comedy.

  Strap on your power armor and get ready to fight like hell.

  1

  The gunship Thelema approached Fortress Purgatory from the lower part of its orbit for maximum stealth. Even traveling at crushing speeds, it took the small craft weeks to reach its target. Ash was in no mood to engage the old fortress in a firefight, especially without his nuke. Besides, he really didn’t know what was on the surface. For all he knew, the former military base could hold plasma cannons and modal rounders. The last thing he needed was to have the entire crew vaporized by some discharge they didn’t expect.

  Everyone was quiet as the ship moved into range over the horizon of the planet. Mercury was very hot at this point, enough to cook a steak and themselves too. With no atmosphere, they wouldn’t last very long outside the ship if attacked. Even the environmental suits wouldn’t survive very long out there. The heat would cook the life support systems in seconds.

  “We’re coming up on Purgatory,” Makulah told him as the large man’s hands gently played with the controls to the gunship. “We’ll see it just over those crater lines in a few minutes.” His eyes were fixed to the screen in front of him while everyone else had their eyes on the digital 3D image of the planet. It appeared in the middle of the control module.

  “They have to know someone is coming eventually,” Ash commented. “Especially with Haddo on the loose, and with Inferno gone they know we mean business.”

  The big money they expected to get for finding Simon Haddo would only be paid by the EAC Corporation if they brought him back to their corporate offices alive. Haddo had information the corporation was willing to pay a lot to get. So much that when Ash requested a ‘refit’ budget for his team and the gunship after the nightmare events on Inferno the request was approved so quickly he regretted not asking for more. If this mission worked out and they were paid what was owed, it would be the largest sum a group of bounty hunters had received in known history, though it wasn’t like anyone was going to broadcast that. This was as black ops as a mission could get. The reward was enough to make them chase Haddo across the solar system after he gave them the slip from Inferno in the asteroid belt. Haddo was wanted for crimes against humanity, but this still didn’t justify the colossal sum EAC was willing to shell out. He had to have something that shattered paradigms to make it worthwhile. Besides, after the horrors they found on Inferno, that corporation didn’t appear to be much better than Haddo, and it was clear that at lease some of the higher powers inside the EAC were villains of the worst sort.

  Ash, who commanded the Team Omega Security Company, held one victim dear to him. Because of her Ash had his own reasons for bringing Haddo to the corporate office. Ones that would allow him to get the money and extract his revenge against it. After what they’d done to his long lost love, Ash was ready to march into the core of the sun if it gave him access to EAC’s inner cabal. He still suspected that the girl had been selected explicitly because of her relationship to Ash, but that was almost too terrible a detail to contemplate. Still, considering the detail files Barbara Ann had on every member of Team Omega, it was clear that they were players on a stage, the trick was to survive long enough to get paid for the performance.

  The trip to Mercury was uneventful, and that was a blessing. Haddo already enjoyed a head start. His ship wasn’t even in range when they broke into the final level of Inferno and found his cryptic painting of the word Purgatorio. It puzzled Ash how Haddo managed to get out of detectable range so quick. However, they were in the asteroid belt at the time and there were plenty of places he could hide. Somehow, Haddo concealed his own private ship from them on the other side of the asteroid that was hollowed out to build Infinity, now known as “Inferno”, Station to get away from them. If Haddo could do that, the man was capable of much more. Not to mention having the capacity and the skills to move through the levels of the nightmare station without disrupting the denizens of the levels themselves. Team Omega had made the journey too of course, but they’d had to fight their way to the bottom of hell.

  Their current destination was the old military base on Mercury, known as “Purgatory” from the Catholic place that separated hell from heaven. The fortress was between both, as it was located on the inner planet nearest to the sun. It was built decades ago for a war that no longer had any significance. There was plenty of military hardware left over from battles that never took place to blast them out of the sky. Before he decided to leave Inferno and follow Haddo, Ash let Royce know where he was headed. The executive signed off on his action and transmitted him all information his branch of EAC had on the old base.

  It was taken over by another branch of the EAC Corporation years ago because the fortress lay abandoned for years. The government responsible was glad to dump the place for a tidy sum. The military planned to remove all the ordinances that were still near the surface. They hadn’t managed to do the last bit, but the weapons were supposed to be locked away. Ash wasn’t willing to bet his life on it.

  EAC used the fortress to manufacture and test the power packs they marketed in place of batteries all over the system. They were vague on what process was used, but it made sense that the most powerful and wealthy mega-corp in the system would be tight lipped about the greatest invention since starship drives. The corporation didn’t want Team Omega to get near their experimental production facilities, at least officially. The corporation seemed to feel their own security force in place would be able to limit the damage Haddo, who was now being treated like some kind of high value spook, might do to their facility. The diagrams sent to Team Omega were marked “Off Limits!” on many of the levels. The old base held quite a few workers and researchers.

  The team spent most of the trip relaxing and in preparation for the hunt on Mercury. There were plenty of repairs to make and things to research. The loss of Ester, who was close to everyone in their group, was hard on them all. This left Kris as the only woman on the gunship, which created more problems. She was the only female and that could make things weird. Then there was the android they rescued from a dead pirate ship, Barbara Ann. She was created to be beautiful and pleasing to the eye, though all aboard knew she was more deadly than she appeared, a pleasure model that could defeat battle droids. Barbara Ann, an enigma wrapped inside a riddle to everyone, in spite of all the help she’d provided descended through the levels of Inferno Station.

  Ash was certain that Haddo would find his way into the fortress unannounced. It was not like the man to let anyone know he planned to use their facility to conceal himself. Haddo had left Inferno soon before they discovered he was gone. The man seemed to have many ways to get from point A to B.

  All of Team Omega was strapped into their acceleration chairs. Since Ash had no idea what would happen as they approached the old base, it made sense to lock everyone down. The worst thing to happen would be to float around the comma
nd module if the gunship had to execute a complicated maneuver. People could turn into red smears very quick in such a fashion.

  “He’s down there,” Barbara Ann, normally quiet, spoke. “Simon Haddo has entered the fortress. You will find him in this place.” She still wore the same green gown they’d found on her when she made the transfer from one ship to the other in the void of space.

  “Haven’t heard much from you,” Ash commented as he turned back to look at Barbara Ann’s green eyes. “Why the sudden change?” Her fiery red hair floated around her head in a crimson globe.

  “It was some news I felt you needed,” she told him. Barbara Ann could blow hot and cold. Right now, she was in her cold phase.

  “I expect we’ll find more of those codes you need to unlock your memory,” Jack Lantern called out. He sat in front of her and remembered the way she would suddenly have revelations during their trip through Inferno.

  “No,” she informed him. “That won’t be an issue. The last code I found unlocked them all. Nothing is hidden from me.” Ash glanced back at her and noted she still was barefoot, a little strange, but she’d walked that way through several walls of fire and didn’t get even the slightest burn. She was made special, that was for sure, and was probably worth more than the gunship Thelema itself, ordinance included.

  “Are you telling us you know everything about this place we’re headed?” Pete Costa challenged her. He was off to the side of her and had to turn his neck around to speak to the android. Weeks in transit and he’d still never warmed to her.

  “I can tell you what I know,” she told him. “I have a complete lay-out of the fortress in my head. I don’t know what it might resemble currently, as my information was from the last year it was in use as a military base. I do know the size and amount of weapons left near the surface when it was abandoned.” She closed her eyes, the only way she could concentrate.

  “Why didn’t you tell us?” Theo demanded. He was the team intelligence officer; this was some information he needed.

  “Because you didn’t ask,” she responded.

  The silence in the module was thick.

  “Transmission on the way,” Char, the AI inside the ship’s cybernetics, called out from a speaker. “We’re receiving it from EAC. You want me to put it up in the center of the module?”

  “Send it to the middle of the room,” Ash instructed. Was it a coincidence the transmission appeared the very moment Barbara Ann made her announcement?

  “On the way,” Char confirmed.

  A cloud about four feet in circumference began to form in the middle of the command module where everyone could see it. The cloud slowly took form until it condensed into a head. In seconds, the head turned into the shape of the one that belonged to Royce, Ash’s corporate contact at EAC, the man that upped the reward when they had doubts about what they were doing inside the station. As far as Ash was concerned, the Royce was the face of EAC, or at least the faction within the corporation looking to eliminate and cover up what the other, more sinister cabal had been up to.

  “Good to see everyone,” the head informed them. “I’m sorry for your loss of a valued team member; I realize everyone in your team is very close. I hope the additional compensation will lessen the grief of her departure.”

  Oh, you will in ways that can’t be imagined, Ash thought to himself.

  “So what’s the reason for the call, Royce?” Ash asked the head.

  “Haddo is inside the fortress,” Royce informed him. “You were correct; it was where he planned to go. Some of us had our doubts about the wisdom of traveling to Mercury, but you seemed to have called that one correctly.”

  “Do you have any more news?” Ash snapped at the head. “Like where he is and who he’s with? It would be helpful if we were supposed to hunt him down. I’m not thrilled about the prospect of another trip through one your corporate torture dungeons.”

  “Can’t help you there,” Royce told him. “I am only now making headway in using executive authority to cut through all the red tape surrounding Fortress Purgatory. We have some security logs of Haddo’s arrival, just scraps my team was able to extract before we were locked out. Simon claimed he was an ore prospector with some engine trouble. Over-powered the surface guards and made his way into the fortress. You can see from the diagram the enormous size of Purgatory. Haddo could be anywhere inside that place. Considering the events on the orbital before you destroyed it, expect resistance and do not assume any form of help from EAC staffers. Its become something of a cold war in the board room these days, someone wants to help Haddo as much as we want to bring him down.”

  “Thanks, Royce,” Ash responded. “We’ll do our best to get him back. Just have the money we agreed to ready when we haul his ass back to you.”

  “It’s all waiting for you,” Royce promised and the head faded into the air.

  “Transmission broken,” Char announced.

  “Well, that was almost useless,” Kris observed from her acceleration chair. “We know he’s there. But we don’t know where to find him. Not much of an improvement over the last time.”

  “Did you expect them to tell us anything?” Theo asked the crew. “They’d just as soon we get killed on the way down and then not have to pay us.” He shook his black curls.

  “If we get killed on the way down,” Jack asked him, “what good would it do them? They wouldn’t have Haddo or what he knows.”

  “Because we’d have either found Haddo or opened up a path,” Theo explained. “With us dead, their people can grab him. It’s simple, we do the dirty work and they claim the credit for capturing the most hated man in the system. They get what they want and end up looking good for taking him out. Makes covering up these weird ass facilities a little easier.” He leaned back and groaned.

  “Target coming up!” Makulah announced. He looked at the screen with resolution and made the final adjustments in front of him.

  Now they could see it. The old base was an outcropping over the rim of a crater. Without atmosphere, Mercury was subject to frequent meteor strikes. Even with its own liquid core and magnetic field, the small planet was the target of meteors from the billions of years it had existed. The planet was barren and had great temperature extremes, but its proximity to the sun and very lack of atmospheric interference made it ideal for solar power. The government who built the military base inside the crater picked the location well. There was plenty of frozen water in the crater. Located toward the planet’s North Pole, the temperatures were low enough to provide some comfort for anyone who needed to leave the protective underground installation to visit the surface.

  The exterior part of Fortress Purgatory extended slightly from the surface. It was concealed by a rock outcropping and some rubble that was piled on top of it. Ash never could understand why it was here in the first place. All he could figure out was that someone wanted to claim Mercury for their own and this was the result. There were no human settlements nearby and no reason for a fleet of attack ships to defend a barren planet. Someone had grand ideas, but they went bust against the practical realities of maintaining a military base so far from civilization.

  “Take her down slow,” Ash advised Makulah. “Those missile batteries off to the side don’t appear to be armed, but we don’t know for sure. All it would take would be one button push. Then we’d be erased.” He watched the landing field grow larger on the screen.

  “Nothing powered up on the surface,” Makulah observed. “I see some navigational beacons operating, but its dead down there. A few transport shuttles for the cargo ships who visit, but that’s it. They don’t appear to be doing anything. Let me see if I can get a signal from the flight controllers.” He made a few corrections to his front.

  “Nope,” Makulah commented. “Not a thing down there. You hear anything Char?”

  “Just background chatter below the surface,” the AI told him. “Odd when you consider this is an EAC installation and we are transmitting the flight codes Royce
provided us in order to pass the security screen. I would expect them to be waiting for us and ready for the inspection the codes would tell them to expect from us. Where is the ship Haddo used? All the ones on the surface are local.”

  “Guess I’ll wing it,” Makulah grinned as he brought his hands around the consol. “Everybody sit tight, more gravity coming up than we had the last time, but I can do this.”

  2

  Thelema landed with a dull thud.

  Everyone in the command module felt a shudder as it touched down to the surface. There were a series of bounces as the ship settled into place, which let them know they were on Mercury at long last. As planned, everyone was suited up in armor during the final approach. Had the ship been blasted apart by some antique counter-measure, environmental suits wouldn’t do them any good. On the other hand, he wanted everyone ready to leave and enter the fortress once they were docked.

  “Good morning ladies and gentlemen,” Makulah joked, “this is your friendly pilot. Welcome to the Fortress Purgatory. Temperature is a chilly minus one hundred and forty degrees Fahrenheit. The sun is high in the sky and wind isn’t blowing at all because we have no atmosphere.” Everyone groaned and unsnapped the harnesses on their acceleration chairs.

  It took Char fifteen minutes to bring a gantry over to the gunship. Once again, no one was there to greet them at the terminal. The place should have had one or two people on duty at all times to check for any incoming ore ships or cargo containers. But nobody was anywhere near the control room inside the terminal. Char was able to figure out the codes and attach the gantry to the gunship. By the time everyone had checked and re-checked their weapons and armor, the seals of the gantry to the Thelema were complete.

  “Take it easy,” Ash advised everyone as they walked the short distance from the ship to the terminal. “We don’t know what is going on the other side. First sign of trouble we’re guns up.” Although they were licensed across the system as a security and collections company, Ash didn’t want to frighten anyone on the other side that might be surprised by the sudden landing.