The Adventures of Connor Jakes: Masks (The War for Terra Book 1) Read online

  The Adventures

  Of

  Connor Jakes

  Volume 1

  Masks

  By

  James R. Prosser, Jr.

  The Adventures of Connor Jakes

  Copyright: James R. Prosser, Jr.

  First Published: August 17, 2014

  Cover Illustration by: James R. Prosser, Jr

  Publisher: James Prosser

  This book is entirely a work of fiction created by the author. Any resemblance to any person or character, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  The right of James R. Prosser Jr, to be identified as author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system, copied in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise transmitted without written permission from the publisher. You must not circulate this book in any form.

  For Doc, Renny, Long Tom, Johnny, Ham and Monk Especially to Lester.

  Thank you.

  &

  I should probably thank my wife again.

  Inspiration is only part of the equation. The rest is the wind at your back and she is mine.

  Other books in the Resolute Saga include:

  Resolute Command

  Resolute Stand

  Resolute Uprising

  Resolute Victory

  And the soon to be released:

  Resolute Alliance

  Although you don’t have to read these books to enjoy this one, it may help to understand some of the background of the character.

  For those who came in late …

  Six years ago, the Terran Confederacy was crushed by an invasion from the Ch’Tauk Empire. The human race was either killed or rounded up and sold throughout the galaxy as slaves. The few who escaped were scattered and alone.

  Three years later, a refugee ship and a lone fighter pilot rescued a prison ship escaping Ch’Tauk aggression. The prisoners told of a station filled with human refugees, scientists who were captured and being used to build new weapons for the invaders. A rescue mission was mounted and the prisoners freed. Among them was the engineer Melaina Petros, the amphibious Karisien Tuxor and a captured pirate named Connor Jakes.

  Following clues left by mysterious battleship, the passengers found the carrier, Baal commanded by the mad Admiral Hathaway. He told of a secret fleet and a runaway battleship that could bring about a reversal of fortune for the humans. The battleship Resolute was found but at the cost of the crew of the carrier. The fighter pilot, Lee Pearce, was given command of the battleship and tasked with finding the remaining scraps of humanity.

  The former pirate with a mysterious background became instrumental one year later in a battle to save the planet Karisia. In the process, a traitor to the Confederacy was discovered. Erik Heyerdahl had been aiding the Ch’Tauk in creating new weapons to use against his own kind. Jakes and the engineer Melaina Petros became involved romantically even as he was forced to sacrifice himself to save the alien race. A new species was found living under the care of the Karisiens, the Engineers: a lost race of trans-dimensional beings that had accidentally created the Ch’Tauk and were now forced to fight on the side of humanity.

  Over the next year, the battleship Resolute, aided by Jakes and his crew of Corsairs, scoured the galaxy, looking for the ragged remains of the human race as well as Pearce’s fiancée, Alice Bennett, presumed dead in the space above Karisia. During this time, a former computer programmer and civilian named Banu Rao began to rise to power, slowly gathering his own cadre of scientists and engineers to design a new type of ship which would destroy the Ch’Tauk invaders once and for all. In the end, Admiral Ronald Chang sent a scout force to Earth to begin the uprising against the Ch’Tauk.

  In a final push towards the Ch’Tauk, the battleship Resolute was sent on a mission to find Banu Rao and his warship. The Engineers made their influence known and wagered the future of both races on the outcome of a single battle. Forces on Earth began to retake the planet even as the Resolute and Jakes’ ship, the Sweet Liberty fought their way to the Ch’Tauk home world. During the final battle, the Engineers stopped the fighting; controlling all of the technology and beings they had created. Resolute was forced to destroy Banu Rao and his ship before he could commit genocide.

  Earth was free but the struggle to return humanity to their home was still being fought in a dangerous universe by the most unlikely heroes…

  Table of Contents

  Overture

  Terpsichore Station

  Book 1

  Old Black Magic

  1

  Sweet Liberty

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  Entr’acte

  Book 2

  Paper Moon

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  Entr’acte

  Book 3

  Live Till I Die

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  Finale

  Overture

  “When the war ended, so did the story of a lot of folks. Jakes’ story was just beginning.”

  Alfredo Ortiz

  The Stars, My Heart

  Terpsichore Station

  During the War

  Connor Jakes slid sideways on boots slicked by artificial mud. His head was pounding and he could feel the pulse of blood in his ears. As his body slid into the metal wall of the station corridor, he swore to several different hells. Picking himself off the floor and launching into a headlong run down the hall, he could still feel the pressure of the beast behind him. His lungs burned from the stench of the creature, scraped more raw with each breath.

  A screech echoed from the corridor he had just left. The thick walls of the station trembled from the power. Jakes raised his hands to his ears again to shield himself from the noise, stumbled again and landed hard on his elbows. Even at the distance from the turn, the sound was nearly deafening. He pushed himself up with a grimace and tried to get to his feet. Another roar flattened him to the ground and forced his hands over his ears.

  “Shut the hell up!” he roared in response to the creature, not expecting it to listen. “I’m tryin’ to think!”

  Jakes looked around as the roar began to abate. He was at a cross corridor again, with doors on either end, the long hall extending another hundred meters before it turned to the right. He looked back to the crossroad and tried to figure out his location. He hadn’t been on the station long enough to have memorized all the routes to the hangars, but felt he must be close. Choosing a side, Jakes pressed against the floor and took to his feet. His boots were still slick but kept their grip even as his head swam from the blood rush.

  The hallway was short and the door marked with alien glyphs. He felt for the pad near the door. The station had not been built by humans and the pad reflected the width of an alien appendage. He pressed hard but the door refused to activate. Sliding over to get a better look, Jakes saw a series of crosses in an octagonal pattern on the pad. He pressed the crosses randomly, but the door again refused to cooperate. He felt the st
ation shudder as another blast of sound raced down the corridor behind him. Cursing, he patted his hand along the deep pockets of his black trousers. Not finding what he was searching for, he reached around to the other side while covering one ear with his other hand. A sharp intake of breath was lost in the sound as he found the small device in his pocket, a thin, flat disc. He squeezed it and a shaft of purplish light shone forth.

  The crosses glowed in an uneven pattern. Some were brighter than others and had splotchy stains, visible only from the light of the disc. Jakes examined the splotches carefully before putting the disc back in his pocket. The shrieking had finally stopped and he could concentrate again. There was a faint sound like rustling fabric from far behind him. A shiver of fear ran down his back as he reached up and tapped a sequence out on the crosses. There was no response from the door. He tapped again, changing the sequence slightly. Again, the door stayed shut.

  “Come on you piece of… ”

  His words were swallowed in another bellow from behind him. He pressed out a third sequence and was rewarded by a puff of air from the door. He leapt through the opening and pressed his hand to the pad on the inside. This time, the door responded immediately, closing and sealing him off from the corridor. The abrupt quiet left him feeling strangely empty. The room lights flickered on and he surveyed his surroundings.

  The room was large but stuffed to the ceiling with crates and metal tubes. As the ringing in his ears began to recede, he shook his head to clear his brain. He stepped along the edge of the wall, feeling a slight tremor from beyond, but still not hearing anything. There was a path through the crates, and Jakes walked further into the storage bay, not hearing his own boots on the metal deck. An idea began to form and he increased his pace. If the storage bay was insulated for sound, it might have an airlock.

  The crates seemed to be standard maintenance components, as well as some non-biological chemical packs. He couldn’t see anything useful in the first few boxes and moved further to the back of the room. There was a nagging voice in his mind he could not quite hear. The screeching from the station corridor was still upsetting his thinking. He stepped around a large stack of thin boxes and saw the most beautiful thing he could remember, besides Melaina Petros.

  The loader suit was gray and stained with oil and dirt from countless jobs in the hold. It stood on its own in the corner with a small port plugged into a wall socket. Despite being on Terpsichore, the suit was meant for something human-sized with two arms and two legs. A thin layer of dust lay on its shoulders and exposed kneepads. Whoever had parked it here had not used it in a long time. Connor prayed the servos in the joints had not frozen up from inactivity. He pulled the rounded helmet from the suit and pressed the small activator. Diodes lit up around the facemask. A small heads-up grew in size, showing diagnostics for the suit.

  “Hot damn!” Jakes muttered as he set the helmet down and began to unstrap the suit from the wall. He pulled the legs over his trousers and fastened the belt harness. The upper torso was heavy and clumsy to put on alone, but Jakes had worn one before. The gloves shrank around his hands as he pressed the switches. He had to stomp the feet a few times before the servos kicked in. The mechanical assistance for the arms and legs made it easier to move the suit.

  As Jakes reached for the helmet, he heard the voice again. This time he realized it wasn’t inside his head. It was coming from the comm system of the suit. He pulled the helmet down and locked it into place.

  “…Resolute calling any personnel on board Terpsichore station. Please respond. We are sending a boarding party to the number three dome airlock. Repeating message. This is the battleship Resolute calling any…”

  The voice was smooth and cultured and Jakes thought he recognized it. If Resolute was orbiting the station he might have a chance to make it off in one piece. He used the tracking system in the suit to try to signal out. He had ordered the Corsairs to move away and hide until he called them, a decision he regretted the first time he saw one of the creatures howling.

  The transceiver array in the helmet showed it was receiving, but not able to transmit. Connor swore as it meant he would need to go to them rather than have them come to him. Moving through the corridors with roaring monsters did not seem to be a great idea but it was the only one he had.

  There was a thunderous sound from the other side of the room, a pounding on the door increasing in frequency and strength. Jakes froze and glanced around the storage bay, desperately seeking anything that could help him if the beast managed to open the door. The fact of the noise made him understand it had already battered away the outer layer of metal. He shut down the incoming comm and activated the noise-cancelling feature of the loader. Spotting a panel, Jakes stepped over to the farthest wall. The controls sprang to life under his glove, but he could not read the alien script.

  “Well, that figures,” Jakes said, slapping the wall.

  The sound of tearing metal intruded past the noise-cancelling software. Jakes spun around, the suit causing him to over-extend the movement and fall to one knee. Jakes looked towards the entrance. White light was streaming in from the corridor, creating shadows against the yellowish glow of the bay’s lights. The door had been breached and Jakes felt the cold trickle of fear down his back.

  Pushing off from the floor, Connor felt his feet leave the deck. The suit’s servos caused him to jump nearly three meters from where he had been. He landed hard and went down to his knee again. The crate he landed on was marked for portable energy packs. He pressed a panel on the crate and the lid slid open. Reaching inside, he pulled out one of the portable batteries. Given a chance, he might be able to rig up a short range transmission. If nothing else, he could send out a repeater signal to Resolute that might attract attention.

  “Well, alright then,” Jakes said to himself, a smile crossing his lips. He shoved the pack into one of the wide pockets on the suit and zipped it up.

  The suit’s power assist had been meant to aid in lifting heavy crates and withstand extreme pressures. Without a load, the servos were giving him added strength and power. He wished it gave him agility to go with it, but he’d take whatever he could get. Leaping away from the deck, Jakes jumped to the top of a stack of crates. He could see the shadow of his pursuer moving among the boxes. He felt pressure on his chest and heard a keening sound coming through the mask. The creature was wailing again, and Jakes thanked whatever fate guided him for the noise-cancelling system.

  He leapt from one crate to the other, carefully avoiding a direct line of sight to the beast. As he approached the door, the pressure on his chest increased. He looked around but still saw no sight of the creature. He hopped to the deck near the entrance and pressed himself against the nearest crate. The creature had already moved further into the maze of crates, giving Jakes a clear path to the door. After a few calming breaths, Connor stepped towards the mangled wreckage of the door.

  The sound penetrated the armored shell of the loader suit, pushing Jakes back into a stack of crates. The second creature stepped into the frame of the door and howled. Jakes shook his head and stared. The new arrival was larger than the first and packed more power. Jakes steeled himself for another attack as the creature stepped over the slag of the door. It raised its head high and pulled heavily on the air in the room.

  Jakes moved, he pushed off the crate behind him and began to run. As the beast lowered its head for another blast, Connor lowered his own head and jumped. The servos carried him a meter from the deck and under the beast’s head, nearly flying across the floor. He curled over and tumbled. He could feel the heat of the melted metal against his back as he rolled between the creature’s legs and into the corridor. Losing control, Jakes slammed into the far wall of the corridor. Looking back, he saw the beast bend fully forward, looking at him from between its own legs. It had lost the sonic blast in a puff of surprise at his maneuver, but he couldn’t rely on that forever.

  He turned quickly and started back down the hall. His heads-u
p showed him the local area map of the station. As he turned the corner back into the hallway he had left before, he heard the vibrations of another blast of sound. Gaining his bearings, he ran back the way he came. The servos in the suit had begun to smell strange and he could feel the sweat against his skin.

  All he wanted was for Resolute to take him away from this place; that, and to have Melaina waiting with a cup of strong coffee. And maybe a hot shower…

  Book 1

  Old Black Magic

  1

  “As soon as he was on Earth, he left. I don’t think Jakes liked us much. Come to think of it, the feeling was mutual.”

  Lee Pearce

  Unpublished Interview Notes

  Sweet Liberty

  After the War

  Of all the foods spread into the galaxy by humans, none had become more ubiquitous than the russet potato. Hardy enough for most soils, the starchy tuber had been modified over the years to be drought and disease resistant and to have a meatier flesh. As humans mixed with other races, the russet potato and its descendants had become a popular dish on many worlds. After the invasion of Earth, the potato became a staple food for the remaining human population scattered across the galaxy. Since most deep space vessels needed to feed their crew with whatever hydroponic rig they possessed, the potato became comfort food for the masses.

  Melaina Petros held seven degrees in subjects ranging from quantum energy transfer physics to M-space mechanical design. She had pursued the development of new engine designs and power regulation systems for starship design. In her years of academia, she could not ever remember stepping into a garden to collect her own food. As she gathered potatoes for her evening meal, she smiled to herself at the simplicity of the garden.

  Quantum mechanics determined the subatomic structure of the universe. It sought to quantify forces that altered their own structure as soon as they were examined. The constantly shifting nature of M-space and the energies required to move a ship into it were her world. The straight rows of potatoes, kale, mushrooms and fruit were orderly and predictable. She had once felt lost among growing things. Now she felt the need to tend the plants that kept her new family alive.