Freedom's Fire Box Set: The Complete Military Space Opera Series (Books 1-6)

by Bobby Adair

  Spitz shakes his head slowly before settling his gaze on me again. “I can see your father in you. You look a lot like him.”

  I sigh and look around the room to emphasize my boredom with the charade. “Can we get to the point of all this?”

  “Your father didn’t die in a mine in the mountains.” Spitz straightens himself up in his chair. “I was on the project responsible for the design of the rockets that took your father and thousands of brave men just like him to the moon. I met Sergeant Kane during a training session for his unit. I was one of the experts called in to brief the men on the assault vehicle’s capabilities. As unlikely as it was, we became friends, and after I returned to California, he and I kept in touch. We met a handful of times during his training, mostly after I was assigned to supervise the vehicle preparation at the secret launch site at the molybdenum mine where you believe your father died. He even invited me down to Denver once to have dinner with him and his wife, your mother. Of course, because of the secrecy around the project, I had to lie to her and tell her I worked at the mine with your father.”

  “You met my mother,” I scoff. “This just gets better.”

  Spitz puts a hand out in front of his belly. “You were in there. She said you couldn’t sit still, you were too anxious to come out.”

  That stops me cold. My mother told me dozens of times when I was a kid how anxious I was to always get on to the next thing. She said I was that way when she was pregnant, eager to get out, always squirming, never letting her get a full night’s sleep.

  “Dark brown hair.” Spitz snips a pair of fingers over his ears. “She liked to wear it short. Boyish, but pretty on her. She had the most striking blue eyes, and a smile that would melt your heart.”

  I’m dumbstruck. How can he know so much about me, about my mother?

  “Your father didn’t work in that mine,” Spitz tells me with confidence. “Despite what the apocryphal stories of our moon assault tell us, not all of the ships were destroyed on the way. Your father’s assault craft was one of the few to touch down on the lunar surface.” Spitz’s face turns sad. The emotion leaks through. “They didn’t succeed in destroying the Gray ship, but they fought humanity’s first battle on another world, our first war with an alien species. Your father died a hero, Dylan Kane. You should know that.”

  Reeling from the story, feeling like it could be true, wanting it to be true, I ask, “What do you want from me?”

  “This ship of yours,” says Spitz, “what do you call her, the Rusty Turd?”

  Frustration!

  Either Spitz and Gustafson are being truthful, or they are ridiculously good at interrogating rubes like me. “The name is a joke. The ship is a royal piece of shit, but it is effective.”

  “I know.”

  Gustafson laughs, but this time it seems she’s laughing at Spitz.

  He turns to her and puts a hand on her wrist and pats. “I know. I know now.” He looks at me. “You rammed those Trog cruisers in what the MSS is calling the Arizona Massacre?”

  “Fuck the MSS.”

  “You took out three?”

  I nod, and figure, why not fluff my cap with all my feathers? “Two more out in the asteroid belt, though I wasn’t onboard for one, and with the other, we destroyed it without using the ship.”

  Spitz and Gustafson exchange a surprised look. They didn’t know that.

  I wonder if I’ve just been tricked into giving away something they were seeking.

  “Five?” Spitz is shaking his head. “Incredible.”

  It’s time to squeeze them for a real answer before their faux admiration wears off. “Why am I here? What is going on?”

  Both turn somber.

  Best to be direct, I guess. “We killed two of your pilots in that dogfight today.” Then I figure I better throw in the truth of the matter—the violence was their fault. “After you fired your guided missiles, came close to destroying my ship, and then sent those fighters after us.”

  “Good people, those two who were killed.” Spitz glances at Gustafson again. “Nobody’s happy about what happened. I guess all I can say is we’re at war. We should be thankful no more were killed. It’s a good thing you surrendered when you did.”

  “All is forgiven?” I don’t believe it.

  Gustafson is looking back at her d-pad again and doesn’t look up when she says, “Probably not the right choice of words.”

  “No,” agrees Spitz. “Still, there’ll be no repercussions if that’s what worries you.”

  I raise my hands and wave at the interrogation room. “What is this then? Why am I here talking to you two about nothing important?”

  Spitz looks disappointed.

  Maybe that choice of words wasn’t the best, either.

  Gustafson reads something else off her d-pad, turns a pair of hard eyes at me and says, “We’re asking you to join us.”

  Chapter 26

  Join?

  I sit up straight in my chair. It’s time to take a real interest in the conversation. “You understand my apprehension here. First, you attack my ship. You capture my crew. You separate us and march me into the bowels of a massive military base buried in a mountain, a place so secret we only stumbled upon it accidentally. You’re obviously human. You possess military tech the likes of which I didn’t know existed, and there don’t seem to be any Grays or Trogs around. Is this the Free Army headquarters?”

  Gustafson and Spitz both laugh, and Gustafson tells me, “Good heavens, no.”

  “Who are you then?”

  “We don’t have an official name,” explains Spitz. “I suppose we’re just humanity.”

  “A better descriptor,” suggests Gustafson, “might be ‘humanity’s hope.’”

  “Who’s in charge?” I ask, looking at Spitz. “You?” I turn to Gustafson. “You?”

  Both shake their heads.

  Spitz says, “Secretary General Kimura is our elected leader.”

  “Secretary General?” I ask. “The UN, when there still was one, had a Secretary General. Is this the UN?”

  Spitz shrugs. “Is that a bad thing?”

  It’s my turn to shrug. “I don’t understand any of this. Is this a UN operation?”

  “No.” Spitz waves his hands at the walls. “Originally, this was a mining colony. Back then it was a tiny fraction of today’s size. As for the people here, well, you already know that Dr. Gustafson and I were JPL scientists.”

  The longer I listen, the more certain I am that Gustafson is hiding the most important information about who she is, but I don’t say that.

  Spitz says, “In the years after the siege, when we saw how the Grays were looting our planet and turning us into an uneducated slave species, we organized into a movement.”

  “A revolutionary movement?” I ask, “Like the Free Army but not the Free Army?”

  “No, our goal wasn’t to fight the Grays,” says Spitz, “not unless we could stumble upon a technological breakthrough that would give us such an advantage over them we could win without sacrificing most human lives to do it. That’s our long-term goal, I suppose, to free all of humanity.” Spitz shakes his head as though the years in pursuit of that goal have worn him out. “We focus our efforts on exploring other star systems far from here where we can start anew.”

  “Most of our research and manufacturing efforts,” adds Gustafson, “are spent on designing and building ships to find these places and to take us there.”

  “Not those big Gray cruisers,” I figure.

  Spitz answers with a shake of his head. “Ships that size would be impossible to hide from the Grays. The last thing we want is to alert them to our presence here or to give away the location of the system we’re fleeing to.”

  “The system we’re fleeing to?” I quote. “Are you saying you found a planet where we can live, and you’re actively colonizing it?”

  Both Spitz and Gustafson nod like they’ve just given me the be
st birthday gift ever.

  Can this be true?

  “Where?” I ask.

  Spitz turns deadly serious. “The galaxy is an immense place. Telling you we have a colony in another star system isn’t giving you any information that will endanger us. If you were MSS, for instance, that bit of information by itself is nearly useless. It’s the location that makes it valuable.”

  “You think I’m MSS?”

  “We’re careful,” says Gustafson.

  I can understand that. “So the big plan is?”

  “We reestablish humanity somewhere else,” answers Gustafson. “Stay quiet. Keep our heads low until we know who’s in the neighborhood, until we can defend ourselves from the local bullies.”

  “And eventually come back here and rescue our people,” finishes Spitz.

  “And all the while,” I conclude, “the rest of humanity, at least the ones who survive this war, will live as slaves to either our Grays or the Trogs’ Grays. For what, years? Decades? Centuries?” I’m turning judgmental, but I make no attempt to rein it in. “By running away, how many billions do you condemn?”

  “By staying,” Gustafson calmly argues, “all of humanity is condemned to bondage forever, or it all dies in a war so terrible nothing survives. Tell me, saving some and rebuilding elsewhere, is that better or worse?”

  “We’re not unanimous on this point,” Spitz tells me. “However, our policy, our priority, is to colonize.”

  “Why do want me?” I ask.

  “Maybe the equation has changed,” says Spitz.

  Chapter 27

  Gustafson glares at Spitz. “That’s his opinion. It’s not shared widely here.”

  Shaking his head, Spitz cuts in, “Many of us—”

  “A minority,” Gustafson emphasizes.

  “—believe we can help earth despite our primary mission. I believe a man like you, using your ship as the weapon it can be, can rally earth’s people to win the war against the Trogs and then defeat the Grays in a revolution.”

  Me? A hero?

  I laugh.

  Gustafson chortles. “Dr. Spitz, one unexpectedly successful weapons system may be good for destroying Trog cruisers, however, the main problem remains. The Grays and the North Koreans control the railgun emplacements on the moon, and they command the remaining battle stations orbiting the earth. All of those guns can be turned on earth in case of revolt. No revolution stands a chance. We’ve had this discussion a million times. Unless you find a way to neutralize those orbital gun platforms and by some magic of simultaneity take out everything on the moon, no revolution can succeed. It can’t even start. Nobody wants to throw their lives away on nothing.”

  “They’ll do it for hope.” Spitz smiles. He’s a dreamer. “If people have someone to believe in, if they have victory to believe in, they’ll turn on their masters. Despite the fact the Grays control the North Koreans and the North Koreans are in command of every significant military installation, most of the SDF soldiers—manning those guns, maintaining the bases, repairing the equipment, marching their drills, wearing orange spacesuits—are not North Koreans. They’re people just like Mr. Kane here, and they hate that they’ve been made into slaves. They’ll take up arms against their masters. That’s the natural human response to slavery.”

  Both Gustafson and I are left momentarily wordless in the afterglow of Spitz’s lofty appraisal of humanity.

  I find my voice first. “You seem to know a whole lot about what goes on back on earth, being out here for three decades.”

  “Well not three decades, yet,” corrects Spitz. “But yes, we do know a lot of what goes on. We keep in touch, you might say.”

  “Then you’re aware of what the propaganda videos are saying about me,” I tell him, glancing at Gustafson to gauge her reaction as well. “The Arizona Massacre? The MSS claims I’m a spy for the Trogs. Hell, they’re blaming every loss in the war on me.”

  Spitz laughs. “Utterly ridiculous.”

  “People believe that shit,” I argue.

  “Some do,” he agrees. “Some don’t. Most, who knows? They stopped listening to the lies so long ago they don’t care. They just apathetically go about their business, trying to keep their children fed.”

  “Not the Free Army,” I tell him. “The ones who don’t believe I’m a Trog spy think I’m an SDF double-agent because I didn’t murder Lieutenant Holt when I had the chance.”

  “You have to know that doesn’t make any sense at all,” says Spitz. “It’s not logically consistent.”

  “It doesn’t have to be.” I sigh loudly. “People don’t make decisions with their heads. They make them in their hearts, and then apply constructed rationale later. You people have PhDs. You should know this kind of stuff.”

  “You underestimate yourself,” Spitz tells me, “and you underestimate everyone else. People are better than you think they are.”

  I shake my head.

  “If you didn’t agree with me, why’d you put on an orange suit in the first place? Why’d you join the SDF? Why’d you destroy five Trog cruisers at great personal risk, when retreating to a safe orbit over Pyongyang would have been the easiest path to take, the safest?”

  I don’t know how to respond.

  “Don’t listen to any of that,” says Gustafson. “You have your answer already. What’s the point of rejoining the Free Army if half of them hate you and the other half suspect the stories might be true? Our military isn’t what it should be. We develop weapons, yet we’ve never built the kind of army or navy we should have. All of our manpower has been dedicated to building colony ships and transports. Our people, when they can, take the opportunity to settle our new homes.”

  New homes? More than one?

  I don’t comment on the slip of the tongue.

  “We need good military people,” continues Gustafson. “Convince your crew to go out with the next colony ship. You’ll take your ship along, of course.”

  My bitterness over the attack bubbles up. “My damaged ship that can’t make light speed?”

  Gustafson waves a hand. “It’s being repaired right now. Better than before.”

  “It’ll perform as it was designed,” says Spitz, “Not as it was shoddily built.”

  “Out on a colony world,” says Gustafson, “humanity has a chance. Go there, fight if it becomes necessary, if we encounter a hostile race. At least out there, we have a chance. Here, in this system, you’re wasting your life.”

  Chapter 28

  Call it intuition.

  Call it something like me spending too much time with Phil and picking up a smidgen of his talent by osmosis.

  All I know for sure is something’s not right. “Here’s my whole problem.” I rudely wag a finger at Gustafson. “She’s a liar.” I glare at Spitz. “You’re telling me stories with too many holes.”

  Spitz seems surprised, Gustafson hesitates before she feigns offense, and any doubts I have about her honesty disappear.

  I tell Spitz, “She’s a bug-head.”

  Gustafson pretends disinterest.

  Now that the words are out on the table and nobody denies them, their veracity stretches into full-blown truth. “I think she’s an early implant, but at her age, it was probably implanted when she was around thirty, maybe thirty-five. She’s had a long time to assimilate, and she’s put a lot of practice into hiding it. People like me,” I tap a finger against my temple, “especially people like Phil, we were practically born with bugs in our heads. They’re as much a part of us as hands and eyes. This clumsy shit Gustafson is doing might fool you, Spitz, but it doesn’t fool me.”

  “Fool me?” Spitz chuckles. “I know what she is.”

  “I’m enhanced,” Gustafson corrects.

  I’m thrown off balance. I was all ready to grill Gustafson. I didn’t expect such a quick confession.

  Nodding, like a happy teacher, Gustafson says, “I received an implant early on, right after the Gra
ys took control of earth. Yes, I’ve gone to great lengths to learn how to hide it from people like you. It’s necessary for my job. And as you’ve likely guessed, I’m no engineer. I do hold a PhD in psychology. Before the siege, I worked for the FBI, helping them understand terrorist psyches so we could better fight them. After the siege, I was given a choice to leave the FBI or accept an implant so I could assist them in tracking down domestic insurgents as the department slowly morphed into an MSS tool. I took the bug, but I didn’t stay on.”

  “Obviously,” chuckles Spitz.

  “Here on Iapetus,” she explains, “I’m in charge of what you might think of as the CIA and FBI rolled into one. Part of my agency’s responsibilities are vetting the people we recruit from earth to either work here or to become colonists. I don’t think I’m standing too tall on my laurels to tell you we do a good job of ferreting out liars, spies, and potential saboteurs. We have a system that works well. We’ve had no major failures in the twenty-something years I’ve been in this role.”

  Gustafson leans across the table. Her voice carries a hint of a threat. “One thing I’ve learned is that bug-heads can be hard cases to crack.” She leans back and looks at me with what I think is admiration. “You, in particular, Mr. Kane, are a challenge.” She touches her head for emphasis. “You’ve built a psychological wall we can’t penetrate. You could be hiding anything.”

  “That’s what we’ve been doing here?” It’s not a question, just a preface to an accusation. I look at the wall behind which I sense the presence of people sitting in chairs eyeing computer monitors. “You have three bug-heads over there trying to root around in my mind while you’re in here distracting me with your bullshit.”

  “Yes,” she admits, “that’s right. They’ve been analyzing you the whole time we’ve been talking.”

  “And you have, too,” I tell her, “While I talk to Dr. Friendly here and he prods me for responses about my parents, you’ve been getting updates on your d-pad all along.”