Deathstalker 04 - Deathstalker Honor

to fight anymore. There were shortages of everything needed to fight a war, the ships and weapons that ought to have stopped the invaders having been used up when Humanity fought itself. Shub and the Hadenmen and the insects had chosen their moment well. But Humanity fought on, and thanked God that at least the alien Recreated hadn’t made an appearance yet.
    Because there was no one left to watch the Darkvoid.
    The people called out for their heroes, the great warriors of the rebellion, but most were dead, or nowhere to be found. And the four greatest, the four survivors of the Madness Maze, had been sent off on distant, vital missions from which they might not return.
    The army of the rogue AIs of Shub came to the planet Loki, world of eternal storms, and were invited in by human traitors. Ghost Warriors strode unfeeling through the howling winds of Loki, side by side with the human turncoats. Outer settlements fell quickly, and the central city of Vidar, overseer of the extensive mining operations, sent out a desperate call for help. There were no ships available, but it was a valuable planet, so Parliament did the next best thing, and sent them Jack Random and Ruby Journey.
    The Defiance dropped out of hyperspace over Loki, hung around just long enough to drop a heavily armored pinnace, and then it was gone again, needed urgently elsewhere. The pinnace, wrapped in four times the usual amount of protective armor, dropped like a stone into the violently swirling atmosphere of Loki. Inside, the two living legends and their accompanying marine crew clung desperately to every handhold they could find, their crash webbing swinging them crazily back and forth. There were warning lights flashing all over the place, and everything not actually nailed down flew about the cramped cabin like so much shrapnel. The crew of a half dozen marines hunched their heads down into their shoulders, and did their best to hang on to their last meal. Random did his best to look stoic and experienced, while Ruby swung happily back and forth in her webbing, whooping loudly with glee at every new drop and lurch. “Now, this is what I call a ride!” she yelled over the din of the storm and the pinnace’s straining engines. “You’d have to pay good money for a ride like this back in Golgotha’s theme parks!”
    “Can’t you do anything to settle this ship down?” Random yelled to the pilot at the front of the cabin.
    The floor dropped out from under his feet again, and he clung grimly to a nearby stanchion with both hands. “I have been in crashing elevators that were less uncomfortable than this!” “Spoilsport!” said Ruby loudly. “You’re getting old, Random!” “Shut the hell up and let me concentrate!” the pilot shouted back,
    entirely unmoved. “The gyros are useless in weather systems like this; the conditions are changing too suddenly for the computers to cope. The best we can do for now is drop like a brick and hope conditions improve as we get nearer the surface. Though I wouldn’t put money on it. If you don’t like the way I fly, there are parachutes under your seats. Of course, the storm lightning will fry you the minute you open the outer hatch, but that’s your problem. Thank you for flying with us, and for God’s sake try to get some of it in the sick bags.” “Let the man do his job,” said the massive Sergeant to Random’s left.
    He was a thirty-year man with a trim, muscular form and an impressive number of combat drops to his credit. Half the Sergeant’s face was covered with a spiderweb tattoo, and golden skulls and crossbones hung from both ears. His name tab said MILLER. “He’s made this drop twice before, which is twice more than anyone else has. He knows what he’s doing.”
    “I’m glad someone does,” said Ruby, from the webbing on Random’s right. “I mean, normally people who express an interest in visiting Loki of their own free will are immediately grabbed and locked up in a rubber room under industrial-strength sedatives, before they hurt themselves. Loki is the only planet in the Empire with worse weather than Mistworld. They only got colonists to come here by bribing them with massive land grants and more credit than they could spend in a lifetime. If the Empire needed an enema, this world is where they’d stick—“ “We had to come,” said Random. “We’re needed.”
    “I was quite happy back on Golgotha,” said Ruby. “Living in a civilized city where the