Renegade (54 page)

Ahead, a bright flash, then some terse chatter from PH-1 that Lisbeth missed. Another flash, then the terrifying sight of silver streaks shooting high away from Crondike at scary speed, arcing into the black and starry sky. Magfire, aimed upward from the surface at something flying over. Another bright flash, and another line of fire, hosing the sky. Closer now, Lisbeth saw pieces rising from the explosion, tumbling over and over. Then the deadly arrowhead-shape of an assault-shuttle, low and fast across the ice, turning belly-out and thrusters flaming as it came around for another pass. Then the buildings were rushing up, and it was their turn.

“Brace for manoeuvres!” Lisbeth thought to say… and then suffered the anti-climax of ongoing silence as Tif dropped even lower, buildings zooming past left and right, then an abrupt right bank and a big roaring kick in the pants as she dodged an upcoming obstruction. A connecting skyway forced them to climb, and Tif rolled straight upside down and roared thrust again. For a heart-stopping moment Lisbeth thought they were going to power straight into the ground, but Tif flipped them again and nudged more power to flatten them out barely thirty meters from the surface, then edged the thrusters forward and slowed them with a roaring burn that slammed Lisbeth painfully forward against her straps.

Around another low, pressurised structure, skidding and turning left while slowing… and suddenly before them was a shuttle, barely half their size and ugly-industrial, but clearly armed and rotating their way with bursts of attitude thrust to acquire them. Tif dropped the right side and hit full thrust, powering them sideways and around as the enemy shuttle fired and missed, then looped them upside down again as she rolled for opposite thrust and came around behind it… a bright flash, and Lisbeth saw the shuttle explode. Then a streak on scan as PH-1 came by.

“Nice move AT-7, I got him. Proceed to target and keep your eyes peeled, these bastards are tricky.”
Lisbeth tried to process that people had just died back there, but couldn’t. She was too pleased it hadn’t been her to care.

A slide across some open ice, then big steel passages like great pipelines on the icy surface, three of them culminating on a central, low domed hub. Scan read that as Wellhead Seven, and sure enough, the fourth side with no tunnel attachment had a hard steel landing pad alongside, with an extension arm waiting for them. And most incredible of all, the light above the extension arm was flashing, meaning someone was waiting for them. Someone friendly, Lisbeth hoped. Though given their payload, it wasn’t her who needed to worry about that.

Tif somehow came out of the move directly on course, angled them straight to the pad then kicked forward thrust hard and dropped them near-motionless onto the pad. Skid wheels brought them straight to the extension arm, and then it was reaching above the cockpit toward the dorsal hatch — a big, worn and dirty thing that looked like it could handle four marines abreast in full armour.

“We’re down!” she shouted for everyone’s benefit, and Lieutenant Zhi in particular. “The extension arm is coming, dismount, dismount!” Suddenly she was gasping, as though she’d suddenly remembered to breathe, and could hear Zhi and his men speaking in short, fast grabs down back as they clattered and moved. And then her breathing tightened once more as she realised how exposed they were here, sitting on a pad atop a blank expanse of ice, with enemy shuttles around playing hide and seek with PH-1 and looking to kill them both.

I
f she survived
, Trace was certain this would be the last time she operated in light armour. She leaped across a yawning gap between gantries, across the blaze of burning generators below, smoke choking her lungs and accumulating below the domed overhead where the air filters were no longer clearing it. And hit the opposing railing just as the latest grenade exploded behind her, and something smacked her back armour and thudded her leg with a hideous pain.

But the leg still worked, and she swung herself over, rolled low through an exposed patch as fire smacked the steel around her, then slithered the last bit on her belly beneath a red-hot pipe that hissed and steamed. Her move exposed the four who’d been trying to flank between the big east-side slurry processors — two saw her and fired, but she took more time and snapped one’s head back, then the others dove and covered. Another grenade, predictably, and she rolled off the gantry and held on beneath it, using the walkway as a shield. It exploded too far away — throws under fire in low-G were hard to judge, nothing dropped where you’d intended, but still she had about six shrapnel injuries and was losing blood, though not enough yet to slow her.

She dropped to the floor and pressed to a steel side amongst the tangled machinery, there was shooting to her left where Kono’s section were still fighting, less to the right where Walker’s section had once been, but had now fallen back with only one left and fighting. Movement as an attacker tried to get a shot at her from the right, then was slammed into pipes and slid as someone else shot him. The attackers had them surrounded in the steel maze, but were having trouble closing the deal, as every time they squeezed, several of them died. Hurt and exhausted, marines kept fighting, point blank, outgunned and hopeless, they didn’t care. Just hold position and make the attackers leave their cover if they wanted to win.

Suddenly Kono was peering at her past gantry supports, bloodied as she was but alert. Trace held up three fingers, indicating the slurry processors… then snapped her rifle up straight at Kono. Kono ducked and she shot the man who’d appeared behind him. Something exploded, Kono lost his rifle, then tackled the next man at him before he could fire. Trace leapt behind a pipe as two more fired on her point blank, hitting only steel… and at the first pause she put her pistol over the edge for more accurate close range fire and knocked one off his feet. The other covered, and tried to shoot Kono as he wrestled, then a grenade hit the wall next to Trace, and she leaped on the shooter as his gun came back to her.

She swung around the support pylon he used for cover, converted her grip into a headlock and unleashed full power to slam him over backward. His buddy who she’d knocked down was getting back up — she broke his friend’s neck, then flattened as the grenade exploded and blew the other off his feet. Kono threw off his wrestling opponent, got on top and punched him until his skull broke open. Trace grabbed a grenade off some webbing, pulled and threw it at the slurry processors, then tossed two more to Kono.

Boom! as the grenade she’d thrown exploded, but no screams — those guys had gone. “They just committed a section to this charge,” she said hoarsely to Kono. “They’re exposed now — we take some grenades and see who we can flank. You ready?”

Kono nodded grimly, one eye swollen closed, an arm dangling, but determined. “Let’s do it.”

Suddenly a crash above the echoing racket of rifle fire, then her ears popped badly. “Airlock!” she yelled, yawning hard behind her oxygen mask. “Crash entry!”

Wind was rushing, then warning yells, followed by the unmistakable whine and howl of a chain gun spitting devastation. Past the tangle, Trace glimpsed some armoured figures bounding away at high speed… then the hail of bullets hit and sent them kicking and spinning through the air. She crawled past the latest corpses and peered through a visible gap between machinery, and saw the big, armoured figures of Echo Platoon Heavy Squad, stomping in with big armoured rigs braced for extra loadout, chain guns and rapid cannon blazing.

“Echo Platoon this is the Major!” she shouted. “Flank and flank hard! Get around the walls and watch for surprises! Soak those tunnels!”

Corporal Barry complied, Echo heavy commander splitting his two sections and sending four each way around the walls — they must have come in with local radio silence, Trace thought, so the enemy didn’t know they were here. No atmosphere outside meant the shuttle’s approach was silent, and Chief Stanton in the pad airlock must have let them in. And here behind them, she saw, was the rest of Echo Platoon, in full armour and moving fast. Any surviving special forces soldier who saw that coming would be wise to run.

Trace got up and limped to where she thought Kono’s section might be scattered. On a high walkway she found Kumar, bloody hand now accompanied by a bloody side and torn face, but alive and until recently, fighting. She gave him a hand-up whether he wanted one or not. “Move Private, we’re leaving! Sergeant Kono, make sure you get Romki! He was taking care of Singer last I saw him!” As gunfire and explosions rapidly retreated around the wellhead dome. Marine Heavy Squads were scary enough against full armour — against light armour, and with low gravity allowing maximum loadout, they were carnage.

Suddenly there were marines jumping gantries alongside her, and someone took Kumar off her hands, then simply picked him up and jumped with him, powered armour making that comfortable even in full gravity. She ignored the offered help and jumped from a gantry down to the floor — there were marines everywhere, she guessed Echo had brought two regular squads plus the heavies, one squad staying behind to make room.

“We are thirteen in the room!” she told the room as she hopped one legged for the airlock. “Twelve marines including myself, plus Mr Romki who has been helping us!” And added on coms, “Hiro! Hiro, where are you? We’re leaving!”

“Major your leg,” said the marine alongside, hovering anxiously. “Let me take a look at…”

“Not now.” She waited by the big, scarred steel doors of the airlock, two marines plus Chief Stanton working to equalise pressure — with a connection to AT-7 at the other end, they should be able to open both airlock doors now without major decompression… but old beat-up airlocks like this one weren’t always obliging. The doors opened and she waited alongside as they came back — a number of her marines limp as they were carried, but she couldn’t look too hard, there were too many troops still moving, counter-attack or violent decompression still not impossible, and her job now was to make sure no one got left behind.

Kono waited with her as finally everyone started pouring back in. “Giddy,” she told him. “Get.”

“After you,” said Kono.

“Get!” she shouted, and he went. She went to Chief Stanton by the airlock panel. “Sky will fall on your head if you stay here,” she told him. “We’ve room if you want to come.”

“I got friends here,” he said grimly. “Friends who need to hear this. Do your cause more good that way.”

Trace nodded and slapped his arm. “Hiro!” she tried again on coms.

“Hi Major,” said Hiro right alongside her, and she nearly jumped. “You’re hurt, you should get in.” He wore a miner’s jumpsuit, helmet and breather mask, no doubt how he’d been sneaking around. But how the hell…?

“Major go!” yelled Lieutenant Zhi as he and the last of Heavy Squad came running for the airlock, and Trace went, stubbornness serving no further purpose. Hiro tried to take her arm down the ugly, pressurised tube beyond, and she shook him off, one leg was all she needed in this gravity.

Then the floor seal to the dorsal airlock, only big enough for one fully armoured marine at a time and taking great discipline and practice to get everyone out of it in a deployable hurry. She hopped and sailed down it, shaking off more assistance at the bottom to get down to her command chair in the main hold beneath the dorsal level. She locked in, slammed the restraint bar down and heard a crash from above as the airlock arm disengaged. Again her ears popped, AT-7’s life support pumping in the extra air she’d lost in the docking. A thunder of engines, and they were lifting.

Opposite her in the restraints, Private Van, head lolling, his neck torn by shrapnel. Marines had put bandages on it, but the blood was no longer pumping. One kept his head still as they powered and swung through manoeuvres. All looked morose. Van’s eyes saw nothing.

“T-Bone?” called Trace. She knew he was gone, but she couldn’t help herself. He’d been with her for three years, having joined Command Squad about the same time as Erik had arrived on
Phoenix
. He liked loud music and funny movies, and wanted to make apple cider once the war was over, a product for which he insisted the market was drastically underserved. She’d even broken her strict no-alcohol rule for a small sip, just to learn what he was talking about. He’d been so pleased that she’d do that for him. “T-Bone. Oh no my friend. Oh no.”

With nothing left to do, and no commands left to give, she was blinded most of the way up by tears.

W
ith
UFS Mercury
chasing them
, it took two jumps clear of Heuron to be sure they weren’t being followed. There, drifting mid-system at an unsettled dwarf binary romantically named AG-41, Erik finally unhooked himself from the command chair after a half-hour’s systems review.

Exhausted didn’t begin to describe it, and he limped down the main corridor with utter unconcern for crew threats, and headed for the medical bays. Even now, two marines posted to guard the bridge accompanied him, but the only crew they encountered down the corridor were exhausted themselves.

In Medbay Three, Erik found a most expected sight — Major Trace Thakur in singlet and shorts, holding a crutch while standing on one leg, various bandages wrapped around her while a corpsman treated her standing up and pleaded with her to at least take a seat. But Trace was talking to her wounded, and until she’d made her rounds, rest and shrapnel holes alike would have to wait. She turned to look at Erik, her hair flattened by her helmet, marks about her eyes and cheeks where glasses and breather mask had dug into her face. Looking at her now, Erik understood truly for perhaps the first time why she was like she was. Anything less would crumble, mentally if not physically. Even most toughened combat veterans couldn’t do it, not like she did. And for this, her marines loved her — she was rare like diamond, and nearly as hard.

Erik pulled his pistol in full view of everyone, and with some theatricality checked the magazine, then handed it to her. “I hear you told Staff Sergeant Kono that you’d shoot me if I came to get you.” He gestured for her to do it. “So go ahead.”

Trace nearly smiled. She pocketed the pistol, and hugged him hard. Erik hugged her back, though carefully. “Captain didn’t pick you because you’re a Debogande,” she said against his shoulder. “He picked you because you’re a fucking freak. I’m not sure even he could have pulled that off.”

“He could,” Erik said confidently. “I’d actually discussed it with him — full power with a captive warship. He said it was possible, with
Phoenix
, though he’d never had to do it. Without that discussion, I’d never have tried it.”

Trace pulled back and looked at him with those deep, dark eyes. “Knowing it’s possible, and actually doing it, are two different things. Our friend kuhsi’s a gun too. You hear stories about kuhsi reflexes but Hausler says her one evasive move on approach was beyond computation, navcomp review won’t classify it as evasive because the software won’t accept her reaction time.”

Erik nodded. “I’m sorry about your guys. Van, Walker and Singer.” It was the first time he’d dared to give condolences. It was the first time he’d been sure they’d be welcome. “Carponi too. He was hit right in front of me. I carried him, but…”

Trace looked down at his blood-stained jacket and pants. She smiled tightly, and patted his cheek. “You did good, Erik.”

“He was protecting me.”

“It’s what we do,” said Trace. “We try to protect each other. But bullets are dangerous. It doesn’t always work. And we lost Toguchi.”

“Right in front of me again.”

“And just as well or you’d never have gotten PH-4 back. See, both times? You were right where you were supposed to be. First to carry Carponi, and second to save PH-4 and Alpha First Squad. Not bad karma at all. Good karma. Something’s going right with you.” Erik frowned at her. “What, you’re surprised a Kulina believes in karma?”

“No, it’s just that the karma you believe in’s a bitch.”

“Karma is a bitch,” Trace agreed. “But if she was a bitch all the time, nothing would work. Speaking of bitches, Dale’s over there, he’s okay. You go there, we’ll work our way around.”

She was inviting him to talk to her wounded marines, as though they’d actually be pleased to see him. A little while ago, Erik would have been pleased. Now he was realising, as he’d probably never realised before, that it really wasn’t all about him.

“What would happen if I ordered you to get off your feet?” he suggested.

“Very little,” said Trace, and swung on her crutch to the bedside of Private Arime, who’d been shot through the arm and shoulder, and now lay half-asleep amidst tangled fluid tubes and monitors, but struggling to stay awake to talk to the Major.

“Hey LT,” said Erik, sitting on Dale’s bedside. The big marine’s head was wrapped so he could only see out of one eye. “How’s the head?”

Dale clasped his hand with a crooked smile. “Few days in bed, Doc says. You finally got sick of me enough to knock me out.”

“If you hadn’t buckled me in I would have knocked myself out and crashed the shuttle. I’m sorry about Carponi.”

“Yeah.” Quietly. “Yeah, me too. Toguchi too. Too many good people, LC.”

“Far too many.” He looked Dale firmly in his one visible eye. “And it’s not over yet.”

T
wo jumps later
, and they were at Gogi. Yet another red dwarf, duller than usual with several huge gas giants in close orbit leading to frequent partial-eclipses along its equatorial plane. But Gogi’s outer system was glorious for fortune-seeking free rangers, here beyond the official administrative zone of human or sard administered space. There were ice chunks aplenty, and rare metalloids in compact, near-sun rings that would have made rock and atmosphere worlds uninhabitable from constant strikes, but co-existed fine with mining settlements and stations against whom impacts remained statistically improbable.

Phoenix
came in slowly from zenith, selecting the asteroid base of Leechi for approach. Leechi was a Barabo base, in that barabo were the dominant species aboard. But barabo were such anarchic administrators that few systems in their ‘possession’ were ever strictly considered to be ‘theirs’. They’d not had their possessions taken from them by virtue of their location out beyond the established rim of Spiral civilisation, and because until recently, they’d enjoyed the protection of the tavalai. But now that protection was faded if not yet gone entirely. Barabo territories rimmed up against sard space as well, and listening to com traffic upon their arrival, and not yet aware of
Phoenix
’s presence, Erik was not surprised to hear a quiet tension in communications.

“Never thought I’d find myself out here,” Lisbeth murmured by Erik’s chair, with a firm grasp of a chair arm, and gazing on the forward scan. A chaos of rocks and small bases and little ships, interspersed with a few larger ones. No warships that they could see. With this many rocks, that meant little. Systems like Gogi were places where those who did not wish to be found came to hide.

“Leechi’s got repair facilities,” said Erik. “Big enough for us, I think.”

“What if they refuse?” Lisbeth asked.

“Would you refuse?” Erik asked with a faint smile. “Looking at us?”

“So what… we’re going to go around the outer rim territories intimidating everyone into helping us?” A few curious glances their way from the other bridge crew.

“Well first,” said Erik, “it’s not the ‘outer rim’, that’s just what humans call any place beyond where we’re most interested. Technically it’s neutral space that would actually be barabo space if the barabo actually had the balls and firepower to ever claim anything.”

“Now that the tavalai are pulling back,” Kaspowitz added, “it’ll probably end up sard space.”

“Oh I think Fleet will have a thing or two to say about that,” Erik added. “More likely it’ll end up human space. But not for a while. And secondly, ‘we’ are not going to go around doing anything. ‘You’ are going home to Mother as soon as we can find a reliable transport.”

“Many of those out here?” Shahaim asked cautiously, looking up from the transponder transmissions she was scrolling through.

“Given what Mother will pay them when they deliver the cargo at the other end,” said Erik. “Probably quite a few.”

“Yeah, I know,” Lisbeth said calmly. Erik was almost surprised. “If you’re going to survive out here for a while, you’ll need Mother’s help. Someone’s going to have to get back to her and tell her what’s going on. Probably should be me.”

The click of bridge-guards standing to attention told Erik that Trace had entered the bridge. It didn’t warrant a vocal announcement because up here, technically she wasn’t that important. Erik glanced, and saw her walking on light exo-legs, secured tight about her waist and keeping the weight off her bad leg. Otherwise she wore the usual black marine casuals, that gave no outward sign of other injuries.

“What does the Doc think of you moving around?” Erik asked her.

“Didn’t ask,” said Trace, taking a hold of his chair on the other side. “Do they know we’re here yet?”

“About half an hour ago,” said Erik. “They went very quiet.” No one out this way would have heard of events on Heuron or Homeworld yet. But a human combat carrier out this far from primary human concerns, on its own with no support, was odd indeed. Particularly
this
combat carrier, which was known the length and depth of Spiral space. A lot of folk up to things that Fleet might disapprove of would suddenly be very nervous. “Who’s on standby, with you and Dale sidelined?” With an edge to his question, just in case Trace hadn’t yet realised that she
was
sidelined.

“Crozier,” said Trace. “She’s still pissed she didn’t get a capture on
Adventurer.
”

“Tell her that if she wants to take pointless risks to pad her personal resume, she should join the chah'nas. At the very least we’ll need port security on Leechi, it’s not very big so one platoon should do it.”

“So do we know who’s staying and going yet?” Trace asked.

“You’d know better than me,” Erik retorted. “I know a couple I’m booting off personally.”

“Seriously?” Kaspowitz asked. “You’re not going to punish a bunch of mutinous wannabe assassins?”

“Not this time. Conflicted loyalties after what happened can be expected. Sides were not fully declared because we didn’t know what the sides were. Besides, getting abandoned out here without funds could be punishment enough. If anyone tries it
after
we’ve given them a chance to get off, it’ll be the airlock for them.”

“So how many
will
get off?” asked Lisbeth.

“From what I hear, I think about fifteen percent of spacer crew. No more.”

“And marines?”

“None,” said Trace. Erik gave her a sideways look. Trace shrugged. “I think a lot of us now take this fight more personally than the war. We know a lot of the corps will support us when they hear. That’s real trouble for Fleet Command. Can’t dull that impression by jumping ship now.”

“We’re hell short of crew as it is,” Shahaim muttered. “Another fifteen percent will put us down to a skeleton crew.”

“Can you survive out here?” Lisbeth asked quietly.

“Sure,” said Erik. “Piece of cake.”

“Sard will try and kill us,” said Trace.

“Tavalai remnants still hiding out here will try and kill us,” Kaspowitz added.

“Pirates and privateers after the price Fleet will put on our heads will try and kill us,” Shahaim added.

“And Fleet themselves will try and kill us,” Geish said dourly.

“Like I said,” said Erik. “Piece of cake. Besides, we’re not out here to just survive. Humanity needs a safe zone where those who don’t like the growing polarisation can come to talk it out. This is as good a spot as any.”

“I think you’re thinking too big,” Trace said calmly. “That may follow eventually, but for now, let’s set small, achievable goals. Like put Supreme Commander Chankow’s nuts in a vice, and squeeze. It may be that in gathering all the people who don’t like him together, you’ll achieve some kind of peace process as well. Hating Chankow, Anjo and company might be the only big thing that Spacers and Worlders all have in common.”

“Mother will help,” said Lisbeth. “I know she will. I know she doesn’t like Chankow.”

“Mother is a businesswoman,” Erik disagreed. “First and foremost. She employs several million people. She takes their welfare very seriously. Don’t expect too much from her Lis, and don’t push too hard when you get back.

“She’ll help,” Lisbeth repeated confidently. “You’ll see.”

Erik found that train of thought opened up whole new avenues of fear. Family Debogande was powerful, but that power was nothing compared to Fleet. If push came to shove, Debogande Inc needed Fleet a lot more than Fleet needed Debogande Inc. Ultimately Fleet had all the guns, and could make its own rules.

“Is Leechi very pretty?” Lisbeth asked, gazing at the forward scan.

“I doubt it,” said Erik. “Barabo mining station, they’re not the tidiest people.”

“Sell you some good weed though,” Kaspowitz volunteered. Erik gave him a stern look.

“I’d like to buy a few things,” Lisbeth said wistfully. “Before I go home.”

“A new spaceship wouldn’t count?” Trace suggested.

“Oh shush,” Lisbeth retorted. “
I’m
not that rich, it’s the family.”

“I’m sure I don’t see the distinction.”

“Envy,” Erik cautioned his marine commander, holding up a warning finger in her face. Amused, Trace swatted it.

“Besides, I’m sure they don’t take human currency out here,” said Lisbeth. And blinked. “Gosh, how are you going to
pay
for anything?”

“Charge the aliens money to come and stare at Kaspo,” said Shahaim. Nav made a rude gesture at her.

“We’ll think of something,” said Erik. “You can go shopping Lis. It’ll be a nice vacation stop for you, strolling down a barabo mining station market, just you and Delta Platoon and a thousand weed-chewing barabo miners.”

Lisbeth smiled at him. “That actually sounds like fun. You forget, I wanted to join Fleet, but Mother wouldn’t let me. I’m finally here.”

“No I remember,” Erik said tiredly, examining a new incoming jump track that appeared on scan. “You’re living the dream, Lis.”

“We’re all living the dream,” Kaspowitz echoed. It had been the kind of thing they’d said in the war, echoing the corny Fleet recruitment ads, full of cheerful, brave and patriotic young people off to do their duty in the great adventure. “The Major especially. She’s not cut out for peacetime.”