Boots thumped, and then Rafe was on his back, staring at Jan, who was staring down at him with a frown that might convey genuine concern. Maybe. Rafe couldn’t be sure.
“She, uh ...” Rafe waved one bloody hand in Kast’s general direction. “She was gonna shoot you, mate.”
Jan knelt beside Rafe. “Thanks.”
“You heard me yelling about the detonator, right?”
“Yes,” Jan said. “We knew Esparza likely had a remote detonator hidden somewhere. I planned to follow him to wherever he’d hidden it, then take it from him once he produced it. Hence, why I’m here.”
“Oh,” Rafe said.
“Still, I appreciate the thought.”
“Sure,” Rafe said, and he felt better for a moment until he realized his chest still hurt. “Sorry.”
Jan glanced past Rafe and Kast, then back. “For?”
“I sold you to the Supremacy. I put you in prison.”
“You just saved my life, Rafe.”
“Right, that’s why I jumped on her.” Jan wasn’t listening. “I sold you out. I thought I could break you out later, but I was stupid and selfish. I can’t ever make up for that.”
Jan held his gaze. “Not all plans go as we expect.”
“I know you can’t forgive me, but please—”
“Rafe.” Jan took Rafe’s hand in his own. “I forgive you.”
Rafe blinked. He was dreaming. “What?”
“I forgive you, Rafe.”
Rafe smiled. He really smiled, for the first time in what felt like years. He’d done the unforgivable, then and now, but Jan had stopped it. Jan had saved him, again, and Star’s Landing, apparently. Or maybe they both had. Rafe wanted to think he had helped some, just a little.
“I lied to you about Cliffside, too,” Rafe whispered. “I wasn’t deleting data.”
“It doesn’t matter now.”
“It was a job for Esparza. He asked me to retrieve files that the Patriots of Ceto had hidden there, the location of some mini-nukes they managed to steal from the Supremacy.”
Jan pursed his lips. “That does make sense.”
“There’s more though, mate. I found multiple nukes.”
“The Truthers have them?”
“No,” Rafe said, before another cough racked his body. “They said they needed them for research, but I figured, you only need one for research. Right?”
“So you lied to them.”
“Yeah.” Rafe coughed. “But we still need to get those nukes somewhere safe.” He coughed again. “They’re buried in ...”
His throat seized up. Everything tasted salty. Someone very heavy was standing on his chest, and it was growing increasingly difficult to breathe.
“The maglev tunnel,” Rafe whispered. “Beneath the Sledge.”
Jan squeezed Rafe’s hand. “I’ll take care of it.”
“Just don’t ... go yet?”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
There was nothing more to say. Rafe really was going to die down here, and he hadn’t prepared for that. He didn’t want that.
But at least he’d die holding hands with his best friend.
17: Pardon
“Well,” Lieutenant Jeffrey Coffman said, as he watched his loyal CSD soldiers picking through the mess of rubble, collapsed piping, and bodies between them and a concealed but possibly active mini-nuke, “this is a fucking mess.”
Captain Varik’s Vindicators stood nearby, out of the way. Coffman hated seeing the Supremacy down here, but they had been authorized by Senator Lozano. Why Lozano thought she had the ability to authorize a foreign military operation in Star’s Landing was anyone’s guess, but Lozano would not have that authority after President Mendoza demanded her resignation.
“It could have been much worse,” Elena Ryke said. She stood beside him now, and Coffman caught the barest of shrugs. “It was magnificent how our combined fire cut through that Truther army. I applaud you for having the wherewithal to shoot first.”
“We didn’t,” Coffman said. “We thought you did.”
“No employee of mine would pull the trigger until I had expressly authorized it.”
“It wasn’t the Supremacy,” Coffman said.
“Then it is odd, isn’t it, that shortly after all three of us were lured here, under the pretense of securing Jan Sabato, someone shot the Truthers with whom we were attempting to negotiate. They, of course, immediately shot back, ensuring a firefight erupted. With two foolish acts, all our joined forces were united against a single target.”
Coffman felt the uneasy feeling in his stomach turn into a hard rock. “That was convenient, wasn’t it.”
“Was the mini-nuke Sabato mentioned another ruse?”
“No, it’s there.” Coffman had gotten confirmation from his scout drones as soon as he sent them to fly over the wreckage. “Contained, but leaking radiation. If it had gone off ...”
“So it would seem,” Ryke declared, “that we just saved Star’s Landing, thousands of innocent people, and Armistice Day. It would seem we are all heroes.”
“It would seem that way,” Coffman agreed.
“Oh, do cheer up.” Ryke clapped him on the back. “You’ll certainly be promoted after this.” Ryke looked past him, at the Supremacy forces. “Are you sure I cannot murder them?”
“Yes, I’m sure.” Coffman scowled at her. “You’re lucky I haven’t arrested you and your mercenaries as it is.”
“For what?” Ryke asked lightly. “Taking a walk?”
Behind them, someone cleared her throat. Coffman glanced back to find one of Ryke’s bodyguards, a woman in tight black body armor with a long dark ponytail, standing at attention.
“Yes?” Ryke said as she turned. “What is it, Sasha?”
“Ma’am.” Sasha swallowed. “Our guest has wandered off.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Coffman caught one moment of truly vicious rage. Then it was gone, replaced with Ryke’s predatory smile. “I see. I expected something like this.”
“Problem?” Coffman asked.
“An internal matter,” Ryke said, casually waving the matter aside. “Nothing you need concern yourself with.”
“Then why are you still here?”
Ryke laughed, patted his arm, and stepped away. “I’ll leave you to your diplomacy, Lieutenant. I do hope you have a pleasant day.” She turned to Sasha. “Shall we?”
Coffman kept one eye on Ryke as she and her ponytailed bodyguard strode off. Judging from the phrase “wandered off,” it seemed one of Ryke’s prisoners had somehow escaped her iron clutches. Normally, Coffman would consider following up on that, but he had bigger concerns at the moment.
Like a platoon of Supremacy Vindicators who shouldn’t even be on the planet. Like an active mini-nuke buried in a bunch of sewage plant rubble. Also, a slippery thief who’d apparently played everyone here for fools.
“The Supremacy captain is coming your way now, Lieutenant,” one of Coffman’s aides said over their private channel. “He seems pleased about something.”
“Great,” Coffman growled. “Maybe I can get him out of here without causing an interplanetary incident.”
Coffman waited as a tall Advanced man in a black uniform strode over. He had hard eyes and a trimmed black goatee. His name was Captain Karus Varik, and though Coffman had never met him, rumors suggested he was a self-righteous dick.
“Lieutenant,” Varik said, “I’m here to inform you we will be leaving Star’s Landing. We have what we came for.”
Coffman nodded. “And what’s that?”
“Classified government information stolen by a local thief. That information has been recovered.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” Coffman really wasn’t. “You do understand there will be further inquiries about this.”
“We had full clearance from your government officials to launch this operation,” Varik said, with a dickish shrug. “If your diplomatic office authorized our joint operation in error, you sh
ould really take that up with them, shouldn’t you?”
Coffman was certainly going to do that. “How soon will you be off planet?”
“As soon as we return to our shuttles.”
“Great. I’ll make sure no one shoots you on your way out.”
“Thank you.” Varik stroked his goatee. “There is one other matter. A body we’d like to take home with us.”
“Whose?” Coffman asked. The Supremacy didn’t seem to be missing a single Vindicator.
“An agent of our government who was, unfortunately, another victim of your Truthers.” Varik shrugged. “He was authorized to be here. I can forward you his diplomatic visa if you like.”
“I’d like that,” Coffman said.
The information came immediately, and Coffman hid all but the slightest of scowls. So Security Chief Bharat Dhillon had gotten himself captured by Esparza’s forces, then burned alive. Coffman remembered the man from their brief confrontation in the Sledge. Dhillon, too, had been hunting Jan Sabato.
Funny how it all came back to Jan Sabato.
“I’m assuming you have no objection?” Varik said.
“No. He’s one of yours. Take care of him.”
“We will.” Varik inclined his head. “Good day.”
Varik spun and marched off. Coffman didn’t watch him go. He hated coincidences, and there were about thirty of them piled up down here in the rubble. He’d just been played by the man who murdered four of his officers, and that stung.
Coffman stood, thinking and brooding, until another transmission came in. “Lieutenant! We’ve got him! Esparza!”
Coffman straightened. “Alive?”
“Yes, sir. He’s still a bit groggy from the stunner, but we have him in custody.”
“Anyone with him?” Coffman asked. Even he hadn’t expected to net the most wanted Truther on the planet alive.
“Just a body, sir,” the soldier said. “DNA was inconclusive, but he was probably a Truther.”
“Bring Esparza in, soldier.”
“Yes, sir.”
Coffman actually smiled. Putting Graham Esparza on trial could be very beneficial to President Mendoza’s efforts to keep peace with the Advanced on Phorcys. That, plus securing Esparza’s rogue mini-nuke, likely would get Coffman promoted.
Not that promotions, or the vastly increased salary that came with them, were why he did this. Still, those were nice.
“Excuse me, Lieutenant,” a calm male voice said from behind him. “Might I have a moment of your time?”
Coffman spun and pulled his pistol in less time than it took to breathe. He found Jan Sabato — or at least, a man who very much looked to be Jan Sabato — standing behind him, hands raised.
“So it’s actually you this time?” Coffman asked.
“You can poke me, if you like.”
Coffman didn’t lower his pistol. “I don’t get this. Any of it. Did you want us to find the mini-nuke?”
Sabato offered a mild nod. “Unfortunately, I could not reveal my true purpose without tipping off Esparza. You have a few security leaks.”
“And how did you get the Supremacy down here? How did you know Senator Lozano would authorize it?”
“Lozano has very good reason to want someone not with Ceto’s government to retrieve the data disc Captain Varik and his soldiers have now retrieved. As do Senators Beil, Yu, Callahan, and Parrish.”
“Really,” Coffman said.
“Also, you should do a thorough background check on any CSD soldiers who’ve ever served under General Melton or his aides. You may find their loyalties somewhat ... complicated.”
Coffman knew General Melton, and he’d personally never liked the man, but these were outrageous claims. “You’re seriously accusing five Ceto senators and a decorated general of working with the Truthers.”
“Not just working with them. Financing them.”
“And you have proof?”
“I do. I will provide you with indisputable proof implicating your traitorous senators in the plot you’ve just foiled, to bomb Star’s Landing, as well as other useful revelations, providing you agree to arrest me.”
Coffman lowered his pistol. “All right, you’ve lost me.”
“Once I’m in CSD custody, both watchful elements within the Supremacy and those within our own criminal underworld will stop hunting me. Everyone will be confident justice has been served.”
“You’re serious.”
“Quite so. I will, of course, escape a few months after you take me into custody. My escape will never be reported. Official records will assure everyone I remain in prison.”
Coffman scoffed. “You’re dreaming.”
“Am I?” Sabato asked. “And what if, in addition to the generous bounty I have already offered, my aid in capturing Esparza alive, and the tip that saved Star’s Landing, I were also to throw in the location of two unclaimed mini-nukes?”
Coffman blinked. “You have mini-nukes?”
“Well, not on me,” Sabato said. “But I can provide the location of two unsecured warheads, as well as everything else I have just offered, in exchange for the simple consideration I have just requested.”
“I arrest you,” Coffman said. “And then let you go.”
“After a few months. Unofficially.”
“You killed my men,” Coffman growled.
“Ah,” Sabato said, with a gracious nod. “That was, as you must know, a case of mistaken identity.”
“How’s that?”
“Your men attacked us while driving an unmarked APC, working in concert with a group of Truthers who were attempting to kill us. Your men did not identify themselves as CSD. Their deaths came only after they attempted to murder us first.”
Coffman hated how much sense that made. He had been having trouble explaining what his men were doing in the middle of the Prospector District, without orders, in an unmarked APC that CSD records insisted had been destroyed. What Sabato had just said confirmed his worst suspicions.
There were dirty cops, working for the Truthers, and the CSD was lousy with them. They’d have to vet literally everyone from top to bottom, again. Still, perhaps the Truther cause would fade without Esparza’s leadership and the backing of the Ceto senators who’d apparently financed it. If any of that was true.
“Lieutenant?” Sabato asked, smiling. “Do we have a deal?”
Coffman took one cleansing breath. All of this was obviously bullshit. But if it wasn’t ...
“You know everything has to go through the president.”
“I very much look forward to meeting him.”
Coffman felt his mouth open before he consciously closed it. This was the most arrogant man on the planet. “All right. I’m placing you under arrest.”
“Thank you, Lieutenant.”
“I assume the big woman who told me you were down here is one of yours?”
Jan frowned. “Who?”
“The big blonde.” Coffman focused. “Polina Rostov.”
“I have no idea who you’re talking about.”
“Right.” Coffman rolled his eyes. “Of course you don’t.”
Jan turned, placed both hands together behind his back, and offered them. “Please be gentle.”
Even as Coffman slapped his cuffs on his wanted fugitive, it still bugged him that none of this was his idea.
Bharat had long wondered what the reunion between Fatima Blaize and the man foolish enough to believe she’d betray him would involve. From the fact that Fatima now stood, fists raised, across from Jan, it seemed that reunion involved violence. At this point, this didn’t surprise Bharat at all.
“Oh, come now,” Fatima said. “I’m not letting you off with a kick to the shins. You actually thought I’d sell you to the Supremacy. You believed that, of me, for five years!”
“Fine,” Jan agreed. “One punch, no bracing.”
“Acceptable. Where do you want it?”
“You choose.”
“Are you forgetting y
ou got shot two days ago? I want to hurt you, not kill you. Now where can you take a punch?”
Jan looked around the darkened interior of Bharat’s brand-new HUe for help, evidently found none, and shrugged. “Well, all right, I suppose you could punch me in the g—”
Anything else Jan might have said was driven out by Fatima’s expertly placed blow below his sternum. Jan coughed, collapsed, and rolled around a little. Above him, Emiko politely applauded. Bharat found it only appropriate to join in.
“Right then.” Fatima brushed off her hands. “That’s that.”
Jan coughed from the ground. “Sorry,” he wheezed.
“Nice of you not to go for the balls,” Emiko said.
“Please.” Fatima brushed back her platinum-blond curls. “I have standards.” She reached down to help Jan up. “Apology accepted.”
Jan swallowed hard and took her hand. “Thank you.”
“This does not, of course, mean you don’t still owe me.” Fatima helped an unsteady Jan to his feet. “I did spend five years saving you from prison. For now, I have news!”
Bharat followed Fatima, Jan, and Emiko out of his new HUe into a clear Ceto afternoon. The cloudy blue ball of Phorcys glistened in the clear green sky. The air was cool with a slight breeze. It was, for all intents and purposes, a perfect day, which Bharat hadn’t expected given this was, you know, Ceto.
Nadia, the wife Bharat adored, stood outside, resplendent in a light blue sarong and sandals. One eyebrow raised in what was probably bemusement. “Are you all done hitting each other?”
“For the moment.” Fatima gestured for Nadia to sit before taking a chair for herself. “Also, I just received confirmation from my source on Phorcys. Tarack’s people raised the boat and recovered the bodies.”
Jan settled in the fold-out seat across from Fatima, wincing as he rummaged through the icebox for a beer. He raised it. “A toast, my friends, to the Dhillons. A family lost too soon.”
Bharat raised his own beer, along with Jan, Fatima, Emiko, and Nadia, who brushed dark hair from her face.
“I will say,” Nadia added, “I never expected to toast my own demise. Have I thanked you recently?”
“No need.” Fatima smiled at her. “I’m simply glad you’re no longer under the watchful eye of a psychopath.”
Supremacy's Outlaw: A Space Opera Thriller Series (Insurgency Saga Book 3) Page 26