The Thin Blue Line (The Empire's Corps Book 9) (v5.1) (39 page)

She isn't as cynical as the kids here
, she thought. Children were taught to fear and suspect everyone, either through government-sponsored teaching or simple observation. It didn't take long for kids to realise that the government and their teachers didn't really give a damn about them either.
And she isn't as tainted
.

The streets seemed more crowded as she drove towards the spaceport. She clicked on the radio at Helen’s request and logged into a news station, which was babbling on and on about the conference and what it might mean for Terra Nova. The Governor hadn't said anything else, publically, but his Talking Heads were talking up a storm. If the conference failed, if all their hopes fell through, there would almost certainly be outrage on the planet’s surface. It was easy to imagine the riots growing out of hand and tearing through whatever remained of the planet’s infrastructure. And then Terra Nova would die.

She glanced at Helen, sitting in her seat. “Are you glad to be going back to space?”

“Yes,” Helen said. “But will my parents be there?”

“I don’t know,” Belinda said. “I wish I did.”

The thought made her wince. She’d read the file. Helen’s parents hadn't been seen since their ship left orbit and headed out beyond the Phase Limit. It was possible they’d return, if they thought their daughter was a hostage, but it was also possible that they would assume the worst and never return. Or that they were already dead. If the unknown plotters had killed several people on Terra Nova to cover their tracks, why not a pair of Traders?

But if they killed her parents
, she thought,
why did they leave Helen alive
?

She had nothing good to say about the death-worshippers. But even she had to admit they weren't given to assaulting women or children. Sex, after all, was just another pointless act in their doctrine. Why try to seek pleasure when there was none to be had? Helen could have been killed, perhaps poisoned, and had her body dumped somewhere it would never be found. Instead, they’d kept her. Maybe she had been a hostage after all ...

And there’s no point in keeping a hostage if there’s no one who would be affected by her death
, Doug said, at the back of her mind.
Her parents must still be alive
.

I know
, Belinda thought back.
But where
?

Accordingly, as respect for the law collapsed, chaos threatened to overwhelm large parts of the Core Worlds. The law-keepers were no longer familiar, the law-keepers were, in their own way, threats to the general population. Indeed, there was no justice left in the Empire.

- Professor Leo Caesius.
The Decline of Law and Order and the Rise of Anarchy.

Island One, Glen considered, was beautiful.

The design actually predated space travel, according to the files. It was a giant wheel, spinning slowly against the inky darkness of space, with an entire ecosystem inside the wheel itself. The complex at the centre of the wheel – the hub – was a small industrial base in its own right, geared to keeping the rest of the habitat functional. As they flew closer, they could see greenery inside the wheel, as well as blue lakes of water. Glen couldn't help feeling a stab of envy for the men, women and children who lived in the wheel.

Belinda put her head next to his. “We already know their security is lax,” she said. “We’re already within missile range. They should have challenged us by now.”

Glen winced. She was right. Space combat wasn't his forte, but he knew a laser head warhead could be detonated and inflict colossal damage on the space habitat from considerably further away. Island One was heavily armoured, true, yet it didn’t have the defences of a battlestation or the mobility of a starship. It was very much a sitting duck if the shit hit the fan.

He gritted his teeth, then waited as the shuttlecraft flew over the wheel and into the hub. The artificial gravity field took hold of the shuttle, making it rock slightly, as it touched down in the shuttlebay. Moments later, a docking tube appeared from the side of the bay and advanced on the shuttle, linking to the hatch. The shuttlebay itself, Glen noted, was never actually pressurised. He wasn't sure if it was a security precaution or merely a quirk of the unusual design. Island One had been built in the days before artificial gravity had been commonplace and it showed.

The hatch opened with a click, allowing them to leave the shuttle and walk through into the arrival lounge. Glen would have been impressed if he’d been a visiting tourist, he decided, for there was luxury everywhere. But there was very little actual security. Their bags weren't searched, their bodies weren't scanned ... there wasn't even a physical search. And, given Belinda’s nature, the failure to check the newcomers could prove fatal.

He looked up as a man emerged from a wooden door – a
wooden
door – on the far side of the lounge. Glen had to resist the temptation to roll his eyes like a rude schoolgirl; the man wore a uniform that made him look alarmingly like a raspberry, while even the best tailoring couldn't hide the fact he was developing a paunch. His face had been engineered to show confidence and reliability, which would have been more impressive if it hadn't been so clear that it
was
engineering. The nasty part of Glen’s mind wondered what he’d looked like beforehand, the remainder wondered just how easy it would be to slip an entire shuttlecraft of illicit goods past Island One’s security. He didn't like the answer.

“Marshal Cheal,” the newcomer said. “I’m Luke Doyenne, the Head of Security ...”

Glen eyed him, sharply. “And why are you not doing your job?”

Doyenne blinked at him. “I am doing my job ...”

Glen lunged forward, catching Doyenne’s neck in his hand. The Head of Security gasped, but did nothing. If he was augmented in some way, he wasn’t able or willing to use it to break free of Glen’s grip. Indeed, he didn't
feel
as if he was used to physical fighting. Glen had seen similar problems among private security officers on the planet’s surface. They were never truly tested and so lost condition quickly, leaving them in deep trouble when all hell broke loose. Several had died during the first set of riots on Terra Nova.

“You are not doing your job,” Glen snarled, feeling the frustrations of the past week bubbling up within him. “You let us, a group of strangers, land a shuttlecraft in your station without vetting us before we landed. You let us bring weapons onto the station before checking our identities. You didn't check the equipment we brought on the shuttle – a single nuke could have taken out the entire habitat, killing the people you are pledged to defend. You even came to greet us in person rather than sending a minion. We could have taken the hub by now because of your carelessness.”

“But ... but you’re Marshals,” Doyenne protested. “You’re ...”

“You didn't
know
we were Marshals,” Glen snapped. He let go of Doyenne and watched, with bitter contempt, as the man rubbed his throat. “You are going to be hosting a conference featuring the most powerful men and women in the galaxy or their designated representatives – and if one of them so much as breaks a nail, it could mean war. Your security is
shit
!”

“We’re not supposed to be intrusive,” Doyenne said. “And we did have your IDs ...”

“Shuttles can be hijacked,” Glen pointed out. “IDs can be copied or faked. You didn't
know
who we were and it could easily have gotten everyone killed.”

And you missed Belinda too
, he added, in the privacy of his own mind. It wasn't something he wanted to point out. Having an ace up his sleeve might come in handy, if the shit really did hit the fan. Besides, she needed to remain undercover until the end of the conference.

“Now,” he said, after a moment to let Doyenne recover, “you can show us to our quarters. I will expect a full briefing on Island One’s security and current situation in one hour, after which I will take command of the station. You will serve as my second-in-command, but your main duties will consist of working with the various bodyguards to come to a mutually-acceptable agreement on what is considered acceptable. I believe you have done such operations before?”

“I have,” Doyenne said. “But these aren't normal security officers.”

“I know,” Glen said. “I hope your diplomatic skills are up to it.”

He smiled at Doyenne. “You’ll need some time to recover,” he added, darkly. “You’d better find someone else to give us the tour.”

“Of course,” Doyenne said. His voice sounded harsh, although Glen knew he hadn't inflicted any real damage. “Stacy will show you to your apartments, then assist you in unloading your shuttle.”

Glen rolled his eyes as Stacy stepped into the room. She was young, barely older than nineteen, with long blonde hair and a shapely body her maid’s uniform was designed to show off to watching eyes. Glen privately supposed that if he had enough money to hire servants, he might well dress them as maids too, just to enjoy the view. But then, Stacy probably made more money than he did, as well as living on Island One. He didn't know many people who
wouldn't
put up with a humiliating uniform in exchange for being isolated from the chaos on the planet below.

Stacy bowed low, exposing her breasts, then straightened up with a smile. “If you’ll come with me,” she said, “I’ll take you to the transit tubes.”

Glen followed her, carefully keeping his eyes away from her dangerously short skirt. It was designed to distract as well as entice, he suspected, based on rumours about the lives of people so wealthy they didn't have to give a damn about the Empire’s laws. None of Island One’s permanent residents would ever see the inside of a courtroom, no matter what they’d done. It galled him to know that there were people even the Marshals could never touch, but he was used to it by now. There was no point in wasting time grumbling about the untouchables.

Besides, they’re all up on Island One
, he thought.
They won’t be causing trouble down on the planet
.

He pushed the thought aside as they reached the transit tubes. Island One was large enough to require public transport, although the transit pods seemed surprisingly luxurious for vehicles that would only be used for a few minutes at most. Stacy started to play tour guide, outlining the vehicle’s functions, but Glen tuned her out. It didn't matter to him how the pods functioned, merely how they could be secured. The pod hummed as soon as the doors hissed closed and started to move. There was almost no sense of acceleration at all.

“Pretty good compensators,” Belinda commented, from beside him. “And fast too.”

Glen nodded as they broke through into the transparent tube. For a moment, his head swum as he tried to grasp the fact that they seemed to be racing
upwards
towards the ground. It was so confusing that he had to look away, but neither Belinda nor Helen seemed to be bothered by the view. The pod must be rotating within the tube, he decided, as they entered the giant wheel and the view vanished again. There was a faint quiver, then the pod’s doors hissed open again. He hadn't even felt the pod slow to a halt.

“There are twelve spokes in all,” Stacy said, as they walked out of the pod. “Each one houses a transit station you can use to get back to the hub, if necessary. There are additional stations scattered around the wheel and under each of the mansions, but they’re not linked to the hub, so you have to change at one of the spokes. It was deemed safer for the children if the systems were separate.”

“Clever,” Glen said, dryly.

Stacy’s expression didn't change as she led them out of a door and into the midst of a forest. Glen stared, utterly charmed. There were trees everywhere, surrounded by flowers and grass; in the distance, he could hear the sound of birds and insects buzzing through the trees. A motion caught his eye and he reached for his pistol, before realising that it was a giant red butterfly. He hadn't seen one outside the zoo in his entire life. They were long since extinct on Earth.

“This is fantastic,” Marshal Sitka Singh said. “I ...”

“It does have that effect on people,” Stacy said, as she led them towards a grassy path. She pointed to a large tree with red and green fruit hanging from the branches. “I should tell you that you can eat just about all of the fruit – and anything else, if you have an enhanced digestive system. If you don’t, pick the fruit and check it against the datanet. That should tell you what is safe to eat.”

“You actually eat food grown in the wild?” Marshal Gerry Alongshore asked. He’d grown up on Earth. “Really?”

“The habitat is designed to be completely safe,” Stacy assured him. “Anything dangerous was simply not permitted to enter the biosphere. There aren't even any plants or animals here from other worlds, apart from Earth.”

Belinda leaned forward. “No dangerous animals?”

“None at all,” Stacy said. “Most of the animals we introduced to the habitat are small and harmless. The only dangerous critters allowed here are guard dogs, which aren't really part of the biosphere. It’s perfectly safe.”

“Good,” Glen said.

He couldn't help being torn between feeling impressed and a strange kind of contempt as they walked over a stone bridge – there were so many fish in the stream that it seemed to be teeming with life – and up to the shores of a silver lake. There were a dozen small huts, resting on stilts, with wooden staircases leading down into the water. He saw a large fish – a dolphin, if he identified it correctly – break the water, then vanish back under the waves. It seemed alarmingly safe and tranquil.

“These are your quarters,” Stacy said. She seemed unaware of their astonishment as she led them over the bridge to the huts. “Each of them has access to the datanet, food distribution network and everything else you might need. If you want to swim, you can just undress and walk down the stairs into the water. There’s small boats and toys in the furthest hut ...”

Glen cleared his throat. “We’re not here for a holiday,” he said, although he knew that part of him would be very tempted to simply relax. Maybe Doyenne had an excuse for his lax attitude after all. If the landscape hadn't curved slightly, it would be alarmingly easy to forget that they were on a space habitat. “We have work to do.”