There was only one man in New Kowloon who had known about the meeting with their informant. Just as there was only one man who had access to Solomon’s rooms for long enough to plant that device.
There was only one man in New Kowloon that Solomon trusted.
Had trusted.
And that was Matty Sozer, looking up at Solomon with the eyes of a youth, staring at him from a harvester window.
Solomon lowered the pistol as his chest started to swell with fury. How could Matty have done this to him? Why? How long had his best friend been working against him?
“I’ll ask you one more time, Matty: why?”
14
Not a War, an Upgrade
Back on the metal floor of the strange Ru’at city, Solomon was gasping for air as he felt his heart race.
“Matty!” he whispered, shaking his head to cast aside the strange memories or visions or whatever those experiences had been.
“Proxima…” he heard the imprimatur beside him mutter, and when he looked over to her, he saw that she too appeared disoriented and confused, just as he was. “I was… It was like… It was like I was in a dream…” Mariad Rhossily rubbed her eyes and looked at her shaking hands as if to prove that this really was real.
The other citizens of the colony were groaning and wobbling back to their feet—all apart from the cyborgs, of course, who had stayed exactly where they were. As Solomon did the same, offering his hand to help the older Ambassador Ochrie to her feet, he saw that it looked as though every human here had had some sort of deeply moving experience. It was startling to see so much emotion from the people who, just moments before, had been as silent as the cyborgs themselves. Solomon could see tears and a few weary, tragic smiles, as well as quite a few more deeply troubled frowns.
“Ambassador?” the imprimatur breathed in a low voice. “Did you…”
Ochrie was the one in their little group who appeared the least emotional. Instead of tears or laughter, her mouth was a flat line. “Did I what? Have some recurring dream about my dead daughter? The answer would be yes. And it doesn’t mean anything.”
“You have a daughter?” Solomon said in surprise. Somehow, he had imagined that the austere woman would have been married to her job. “Had, I mean… I’m sorry…” he stammered as he saw Ochrie’s eyes widen for a fraction of a moment, and then her frown deepened instead.
“Her death was a long time ago, and I fail to see what relevance it has to our predicament here,” she snapped.
“Of course it has relevance,” Tavin broke into their muttered conversation. “You have been given a gift of knowledge by the Ru’at. Just as we all have.”
“And what could you possibly have experienced, Mr. Tavin? Seeing that you were grown in a test-tube?” The ambassador had her hackles up, Solomon realized.
“Oh, I had a life. Or this body had a life.” Tavin flickered his eyes to Solomon. “What about you, Lieutenant Cready? Care to share with the group?”
“No,” Solomon said tersely, and instead changed the subject. “What was that? A drug pumped through the air?”
“That, Lieutenant, was the Ru’at,” Tavin said mysteriously. “That is why so many of the Chosen of Mars converted to following their new masters.”
“You’re not making any sense, Tavin!” the ambassador hissed. The crowds around them had thinned somewhat, and by now, the vestiges of the emotional experience were starting to drain from their expressions, as the human citizens once again went about their daily business. The sudden return of the silence felt as comforting as a hospital bed.
“The Ru’at are a strange species,” Tavin declared. “And when us poor humans come into contact with them, they can trigger…memories in us. You see, you Confederates are thinking of this encounter with the Ru’at in entirely the wrong terms. You use terms like invasion or war when really, you should be seeing the Ru’at as our allies, as these people here do. What we are talking about is an upgrade.”
“Allies!? Upgrade!?” Rhossily turned on the man, stalking forward and Solomon thought that she would probably hit him straight across his smirking face if one of the cyborgs hadn’t stepped forward to extend an arm and halt the irate woman.
“The Ru’at didn’t look like our allies when they bombarded Proxima!” the woman said vehemently to the taller man.
“I never said that they were peaceful, Imprimatur,” Tavin said. “But the Ru’at did send us the Message, which allowed us to create all of this amazing technology, and that promises to unlock the secret of faster-than-light travel as well!” The clone looked pleased. “The Ru’at have been studying humanity for a long, long time, and they have sent their gifts to us as an offer to help us evolve. To become more like them!”
“It sounds like you’ve drunk the Kool-Aid, Tavin,” Solomon growled, using a long-dead expression.
“Ask these people around us!” Tavin spread out his long-fingered hands. “Do any of them look unhappy? Are their lives still one of crushing misery and long hours of dangerous work? Can you really not tell me, Lieutenant Cready, that the Ru’at haven’t made their lives better?”
Solomon forced himself to consider the question as he looked around them. The thoroughfare was once again filling with the converted citizens of the colony. These new arrivals also walked in silence, calmly, but Solomon wasn’t sure that he would have described them as happy. He watched as those nearest to him went to wait their turn at the cubicles on the inner side of the wall, before stepping inside and being handed something by the shrouded figure.
“Food. Water. Medicine. Duties. Advice. Tools,” Tavin announced, indicating the booths around them. “Everything that a human might need or want, they can have it for free.”
“How very utopian,” Solomon sneered.
“I ask you again, Lieutenant: do these people look unhappy to you? Would life not be better if we let the Ru’at guide humanity? They are already an interstellar race. Think of the knowledge and the opportunities that they can offer us!” Tavin ended gloriously.
“What do I think?” Solomon squinted. “I think that a lot of people died on Proxima, and just a few miles above our heads, fighting these Ru’at.”
“If the Marine Corps wasn’t so stubborn…” Tavin began, before Solomon cut him off.
“And it also seems to me, Tavin,” Solomon said in a louder voice, hoping that some of these new ‘Ru’at citizens’ had the wits left to listen to him, “that giving away free food and triggering painful memories is a great way to brainwash and control a civilization you want to conquer!”
15
Battle Plan
“Stand down! Stand down!” Dark silhouettes were piling through the open airlock, and they were bulky, humanoid but taller than the average human, and much, much wider.
And they’re shouting in English, Jezzy registered as she and The Last Call’s station administrator barely reached the opening to the service elevator.
“What?”
“Lieutenant Wen!” a voice was shouting, and Jezzy turned to see the first dark shape walk out of the glare of their assembled suit lights.
It was General Asquew.
“General!” Jezzy felt her knees go weak as relief flushed through her. The Second Rapid Response Fleet is here. They might have a fighting chance.
The General of the Rapid Response Fleet was a tall and imposing woman even before she put her power armor on, and with the added metal-sheathed combat boots, the battle-harness, and the metal cowl and sculpted helmet, she looked more like a Valkyrie or some sort of living warrior goddess than she did a human. The impression was further aided by the broadsword that she had strapped to her hip, and the heavy machine pistol she held in one hand.
“Lieutenant Wen. We detected the destruction of the Oregon as soon as we jumped in. What happened? Where’s Colonel Faraday?” Asquew asked as lines and lines of Marines swept into the hold around her.
“Ugh. Excuse me,” Fatima said in muffled tones from behind her breathing mask, �
��but if you’re not the Ru’at or the cyborgs, can we stop my station becoming a poisonous deathtrap now?” She nodded up to where the silvered pipe that Jezzy had shot was still spewing carbon dioxide.
“Frack. Sorry. I didn’t realize who it was. You said yourself that the station didn’t recognize their ship ID,” Jezzy said, looking around for a way to stem the poisonous clouds.
“It’s Hausman,” Asquew spat, her voice loud and clear through her suit’s speakers. “He’s revoked all of our command codes. The entire Rapid Response Fleet are now considered to be enemy combatants!”
“What!?” Jezzy shook her head. This was all too much for her. It was like Asquew was speaking a foreign language. “General Hausman of the Near-Earth Fleet?” she repeated. There were only two generals in the entirety of the Marine Corps, and between them, they coordinated all the Marine units, including her Outcasts as well as every ship from one end of the Confederacy to the other. But, seeing as humanity was in danger of spreading itself pretty thin between all of the various colonies, stations, and deep-field station-ships, it was decided that one military commander would be responsible for the protection of Earth, the Moon, and the near stations—Hausman—and the other would be responsible for everything else—Asquew.
“Earth has been nuked,” Asquew said.
“What!?” Jezzy burst out.
Behind her, the station administrator had apparently given up on the idea of getting the woman responsible to fix her station, so instead, she was already at a unit on the base of the pipe, heaving on a large metal wheel and slowing the flow of dangerous gases to a standstill.
“Is that going to be a problem, Administrator Ahmadi?” Asquew asked the woman, not missing anything in her usual eagle-like command style.
“No, General. I’ve rerouted the gases into the secondary system. Just so long as we can vent this room and repair the pipe, we’ll be able to keep The Last Call habitable.” Fatima threw a very dark look at Jezzy.
“I’m sorry…” the combat specialist murmured. She was sorry for a lot of things. She was sorry that she couldn’t have saved the Colonel Faraday. Just like she was sorry that she couldn’t save the steady-hearted Karamov.
“You did what you thought you had to do, Marine. No one will judge you for that,” Asquew said, already turning back to Fatima. “Don’t vent the room. My Marines can fight in this environment. And we never know what advantage that might give us against our enemy.” Her attention turned to the back of the hold. “Those elevators will become a secondary airlock system. Just so long as the bulkhead doors are closed, we’ll be able to bring people in here in survival masks and not risk the rest of the station.” She nodded and turned to the Marines who were busy dragging heavy cargo boxes into the hold. Each of them wore their own suits of power armor, whose air filters would deal perfectly with the poisonous gases in the room.
As Jezzy watched, the Marines set up lines of cargo boxes, before flipping the top ones open to reveal weapons, armor, and more weapons. As Jezzy watched, she saw a team of two Marines pulling out a heavy repeater cannon, carrying it between them as a third Marine fired heavy bolts through the thing’s base and into the floor. When they were finished, it was pointing straight at the airlock door they had come through.
“I want one in front of every airlock.” Asquew said. “And I want medical teams to the survivors. We’re taking them out of here.”
“General, sir?” Fatima was saying, wiping the sweat from her brow from her own work diverting the carbon dioxide. “But I don’t think that my people will want to go. I gave them the same choice, and those that stayed, well, this is their home.”
Jezzy saw that General Asquew about to say something, but then she just nodded perfunctorily as she turned back to her quartermaster. “Then see that the survivors are suitably armed.”
“Excuse me, Marine?” One of the general’s Marines approached Wen, a data-screen in one hand. As the military personnel around them rushed and hurried, Jezzy was taken to one side to be offered a new suit of power armor.
“Seeing as this one is, uh…” The young Marine frowned at the state of Jezzy’s suit.
“I had to jump-start it,” Jezzy said distractedly, her mind repeating the phrase, Earth has been nuked. Earth has been nuked.
It was a complicated procedure getting out of her suit—particularly because she had effectively welded a part of it to her own foot—and the dangerous atmosphere inside the hold made it all the more difficult.
“Holy frack…” the young Marine said when she saw the state of Jezzy’s foot. “The stimulants must be the only thing that’s keeping you standing up!” A quick calculating look, and the Marine was calling out to Asquew.
“Sir! General, sir! Request to set up immediate field hospital at first safe breathable location to our current!”
Asquew nodded. “Granted. Keep it far enough back so that when the fighting spills over, we’re not having to spend time rescuing your patients.”
“Sir! Yes, sir!” The Marine nodded to her team of medical specialists, and they started for the nearest elevator.
“There’s a works canteen a floor below us. It’s big, got water, and away from the main station avenues.” Fatima sighed dramatically. “I’ll take you there.”
“Sounds perfect. Medical Team Blue? With me!” the specialist called out, and they were moving.
As Jezzy hopped and hobbled with the group of field medics, her mind was still racing. They nuked Earth. Solomon was heading for Earth.
And then, the worst thought of all: Solomon must be dead.
“Hausman did it? But…why?” Jezzy looked up at the form of her general standing over her. Jezzy was in what the medical specialist referred to as an ‘FTB’ or Field Treatment Bay, more colloquially as ‘Anywhere There Aren’t Bullets Flying at You.’
In short, it was one of the metal canteen tables with a sheet laid over it and a cluster of medical equipment. The medical team had already commandeered the room and set up several such FTBs, empty at the moment but awaiting the imminent arrival of the injured.
“One of the generals nuked New York,” Jezzy heard Fatima repeating Asquew’s words from the other side of her treatment bay. Jezzy herself was hooked up to monitors and extra injectors while the medics worked on her foot, which meant anaesthetizing it to the point that she couldn’t even remember she had a foot, and then prying away the metal from her burnt and frost-bitten flesh before using dermal patches of quick-growing cellular tissue—loaded with stem cells—to rebuild it.
“Will she walk?” Asquew asked the medic at Jezzy’s side.
Wow. Great bedside manner, sir, Jezzy thought.
“Oh, sure. She’ll be stiff and might have lost some movement, but there’s nothing structurally wrong down here,” the woman said, and Jezzy couldn’t work out if that was a reassuringly pragmatic attitude or deeply depressing.
“How long?” Asquew asked, looking behind the screen at the surgical operation the medic was currently performing. Jezzy watched the older woman’s face for any signs of a reaction. There was none.
“Well, I’d advise twenty-one days at least until full movement is attempted…” the medic started to say.
“Unacceptable. I need Lieutenant Wen ready to fly,” Asquew said.
You do? Again, Jezzy felt that curious doubling of feelings as she was at once flattered by the general’s faith in her as well as traumatized that things were clearly that bad.
Solomon’s gone… she couldn’t stop herself from thinking.
Fly where?
“Well, seeing as we’re probably all going to die out here anyway…” The medic was a woman who apparently didn’t care who she was talking to. Jezzy thought it must be one of the few benefits of having seen all your fellow soldiers, Marines, and superior officers in varying states of agony. “Just so long as Lieutenant Wen stays dosed up on her stimulants and painkillers, her new suit will have a complete restock and I’ll add something extra into the mix, then she won
’t feel the pain.”
“But can I fight?” Jezzy said. Solomon might be dead, but that doesn’t mean I want to lie down and let his death be for nothing!
She earned a small nod of appreciation from the general, and that was all.
“Well, I wouldn’t go around doing leaping roundhouse kicks at those metal meatheads, but yes, you’ll be able to fight,” the medic said, before leaning around the screen to catch Jezzy’s eye. “But, as a medical professional, I am obligated to tell you that if you don’t take as much weight off this foot as possible, then you’re healing time will probably double or even triple to forty-two, sixty-three days…”
“If we’re still alive in sixty-three days, I won’t care if there’s still a foot attached to the end of my leg at all!” Jezzy said and meant it.
“Good,” the general said. “As soon as the medic is finished, you and your Outcasts are going back to Mars.”
What!? Jezzy thought.
16
The Judgement
“Step forward, Ambassador Ochrie,” Tavin said seriously.
They stood in front of the large booth-cubicles in the rear wall of the thoroughfare, with the line of Tavin’s cyborgs behind them.
There was something different about these cubicles, however, Solomon saw. These three stood apart from the others and had higher, peaked archway openings with small container walls built out around them to provide a more private opening.
I haven’t seen any of the Martians here using these ones, Solomon thought. His mind checked the surroundings for any modes of escape.
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