Marathon the complete se.., p.1
Marathon: The Complete Series (Books 1-9) (Complete Series Box Sets), page 1
part #1 of Marathon Series
MARATHON: THE COMPLETE SERIES
BOOKS 1-9
DANIEL YOUNG
CONTENTS
Enter If You Dare…
Bad Cargo
Foreword
I. Welcome to the Fringe
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
II. A Job is a Job
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
III. Once More, With Feeling
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Epilogue
Hidden World
I. Snake Pit
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
II. One Last Job
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Trapped
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Lost Star
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
War Dead
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Captive
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Lost
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Finished
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Envoy
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Afterword
Also by Daniel Young
ENTER IF YOU DARE…
A starship captain faced with an impossible choice.
An amnesiac awoken on an alien world.
A timecop lost in a constantly-changing history.
These stories and many more await inside the page of Portal, a short story collection from the mind of Daniel Young. Six distinct worlds with their own strange rules, pitfalls, and challenges.
Nothing is as it seems...
Enter the Portal if you dare!
BAD CARGO
FOREWORD
The Marathon series is an homage to a certain type of golden age space opera. Thrilling stories in which hard science isn't a concern and the planets of distant star systems are easily accessible, habitable, and full of alien races and strange creatures. Retro technology sits right alongside playful new inventions.
In other words, this is old-fashioned adventure sci-fi. I hope you have as much fun reading it as I did writing it!
—Daniel Young
PART 1
WELCOME TO THE FRINGE
1
Adam Eckhart traced his rifle sight over a line of concrete bunkers on the horizon. They hugged the dusty desert ground and blended into the grey landscape. Eckhart could barely see them, even through his field glasses.
“Bing and I will skip around the compound to the right. We’ll hide in those dunes behind the main entrance. Dallas, you and Alice wait here. When you see my signal, you’ll assault the entrance and draw the suckers out front. Then Bing and I will come in from behind.”
“How can you tell which is the front entrance?” Bing asked as he bobbed his many-eyed head above the hill where the Marathon crew hid. “There must be fifty buildings over there.”
Alice made a croaking sound behind her gas mask. Her sightless eye sockets never left their target. “They don’t bother to guard the other forty-nine entrances, do they? That one with the glass front is where they’re hiding the target.”
Dallas Eldridge did not rise above the hill. He turned his helmet toward the dirt blocking him from the compound. He didn’t have eyes, either. He didn’t need them.
His helmet made that telltale whirring noise when he scanned the area through the hill itself. “The glass is armored … and they’ve planted mines all over the ground in front of the compound. If you want to get behind them, you’d better cut a wide circle.”
“How many are inside?”
Dallas swiveled his head back and forth. The joints in his mechanical neck made a metallic buzz. His whole prosthetic body made the same noise whenever he moved. His crewmates had long ago gotten used to that sound, and Eckhart no longer really noticed it.
A segment of Dallas’ reinforced Crionium helmet slid aside, and a periscopic sight rose from inside. A bunch of circuitry gleamed inside the cavity.
Some part of Dallas’ original brain still lived in the body, but Eckhart couldn’t see anything organic in there. Dallas’ body had been completely replaced by prosthetics, except for that one tiny nucleus of brain that never saw the light of day.
The periscope extended just far enough to see over the hilltop, swiveling from right to left. “Most of the compound is empty. All the troops are in the main building. They’re downstairs, surrounding the vault.”
“That settles it,” Alice rasped through her mask. “We’re going in through the front door.”
Eckhart shouldered his rifle. “Wait until Bing and I get into position.”
“The vault is solid Kesmite,” Dallas reported. “How do you plan to get through that?”
“I’ll answer that question when I get into the compound. Come on, Bing.”
Eckhart half-crouched, half-crabwalked away from their hiding place, but he didn’t go the way he’d originally planned. He didn’t want to step on any mines.
Bing followed him, slithering on six tentacle-like legs. His other two held twin rifles, and he carried a backpack full of Halfanite charges just in case.
Bing kept casting backward glances toward Dallas and Alice. They disappeared behind the first swell when Eckhart and Bing got twenty paces away.
Eckhart crawled a long way out of his way. He paused at strategic spots to peek out and make sure he was well out of range of any mines.
“Are you sure this two-pronged approach is the best?” Bing murmured in his ear. “What if the freaks catch on that we’re trying to flank them? We won’t be able to drive off that many if they turn on us.”
“That’s where you come in, pal.” Eckhart paused again. “This is it. Let’s set up camp here.”
He laid his rifle aside and pulled off Bing’s backpack. Bing took a glance of his own toward the compound. “Only ten of ‘em back here.”
“I’m telling you this is our best chance to get inside; now stop dithering. Hand over the Halfanite.”
“You said you were going to wait until Dallas distracted them from the front.”
“I am.” Eckhart pulled out a block of Halfanite and a handful of primers. “Get ready to make a big mess. You’re good at that.”
Eckhart shot Bing a grin, grasped his rifle, and stood up. He was still far enough away that the armed guards behind the compound couldn’t see him. The grey jumpsuit over his flight uniform camouflaged him perfectly.
The guards followed the same pattern of patrolling the compound. They crossed each other’s paths to change positions; then they turned outward to scan the surrounding countryside.
They searched for anyone sneaking up on the compound, but of course they didn’t see anything. They must have been keeping watch on this stretch of desert for so long that they no longer expected to see anyone.
Then they turned, crossed each other’s paths again, and reversed the pattern. They studied the compound itself, the sky, and the hills on either side while they walked. That left at least a minute and a half when they weren’t facing outward to search the desert they already believed was empty.
No one from the nearby town came out this far. None of the ordinary citizens would dare to approach the Jackal Clan’s headquarters. The alien crime gang had everyone on Oskz well trained.
Eckhart timed his movement so none of the guards were looking toward him. He straightened up, flipped his rifle sideways, and used the shiny metal housing to reflect the sun toward the compound. He repeated the maneuver until the guards resumed their places and turned outward. He ducked down just in time.
“Do you really think that will work?” Bing asked.
“Dallas can see us even if it doesn’t. Any second now...”
A ground-shaking explosion finished his sentence for him. Eckhart and Bing both scrambled onto their knees to look out at the compound. A billowing cloud of flame erupted from its other side.
Eckhart swept his field glasses to his eyes, and Bing gasped. Dallas rose over the opposite hill, and his giant mechanical body sent a thrill of fear through Eckhart’s chest. He hoped he never had to face Dallas on the other end of a gun.
Dallas stomped down the hill, and two enormous assault guns pivoted out of slots in both his arms. Shouts and frightened yells punctuated the din the minute he made his appearance. The guards protecting the back of the compound raced away to help their friends defend the compound.
He stalked ever nearer, and the sun reflected off his armored body. He deliberately stamped on a mine, and the thing detonated under his massive foot.
The echoing boom startled the guards, and they all opened fire. Their shots deflected off Dallas’ armor, and he cut loose with his own weapons.
Waves of Datrium plasma billowed from the gun ports on his arms. It swept the lead from the enemy guns before him and cleared a path.
Screams and terrified orders drifted on the wind to Eckhart’s ears. He slung his rifle over his shoulder and grabbed Bing’s backpack. “Get ready!”
The minute he spoke, Alice vaulted out from behind the hill. She shouldered her rifle, but she didn’t follow Dallas.
She cut sideways at a blinding run. She loped along stooped, over and her two-toed feet gripped the sand with unerring accuracy. Her bald, skeletal head swiveled back and forth, while her empty eye sockets scanned the area in front of the compound.
The Bion race might not have eyes, but their sightless sockets possessed more photoreceptors than Earthling eyes. The Bion’s enhanced sensory organs could detect almost as much as Dallas’ prosthetics.
She crossed the dunes to the end of the line of Jackal Clan guards. Dallas’ massive presence distracted them so much they either didn’t notice Alice, or they mistook her for something too insignificant to bother about.
She stopped running level with their line, turned toward the compound, and started walking. She traced her rifle sight back and forth across the sand and fired once, twice, a dozen times.
Every shot set off a mine. They erupted in an ever-expanding carpet of explosions to clear her path to the entrance.
That got the guards’ attention, but when they tried to counter her attack, Dallas doubled down on his own assault. The guards had to wheel back and forth between one attacker and the other.
“Now!” Eckhart hopped to his feet and took off at a dead run, but Bing overtook him in a second.
The Yakit hybrid loped past Eckhart and reached the now-deserted compound first. Bing crouched against the concrete wall. “Do we get to make a mess now?”
Eckhart ripped open the backpack. “Go to town, buddy.”
2
Bing let out one of his chirpy laughs and snatched five blocks of Halfanite at once. His many arms could work a lot faster, and Eckhart envied his friend at times like this.
Bing worked fast, fitting the primers into the blocks. “Where do you want to plant these?”
“Dallas said the goods are downstairs. Plant them along the lower edge of the wall there.”
Eckhart smacked his first block against the concrete right above the sand. Bing planted his own block right next to Eckhart’s, but when Bing prepared to attach more of them, Eckhart stopped him. “That’s enough. We don’t want to blow the whole building.”
“We don’t?” Bing laughed again. “You’re letting me down, man.”
Eckhart pulled his friend away. “Stand clear.”
He punched the timer, and he and Bing ducked behind the nearest corner. The next building protected them from the blast, but when it went off, another ear-splitting detonation from out of sight drowned out the noise.
