Zhaff slowly stalked forward. The board members nearest to him flinched, a few stifled tears. Rich men and women—the kind who attended Phobos Academy.
“What do you want from us?” Director Ulnor asked.
“All who partner with…” Zhaff paused. His helmet obscured his face and distorted his voice—the same way it did the Ringers when they raided the Piccolo—but the next words were difficult to get out. He’d been prepped by Luxarn, but lying never came easily to Zhaff. The truth was so much simpler.
“Pervenio Corp is our enemy,” Zhaff finished.
“Just stay away from us!” a Red Wing official yelled.
“Take what you want!” screamed another.
Zhaff slowly spun around. He caught another guard approaching from the hall on his thermals and shot the man’s foot as he edged against the entry. He fell forward into the opening, and another bullet ensured he would never breathe again.
More cries filled the room.
“Whoever you are, Ringer, you won’t get away with this!” Luxarn growled. For a moment, Zhaff wasn’t sure if it was through the com-link built into his reconstructed ear or the service bot until a few of the board members voiced their agreement.
Zhaff turned back to face Luxarn in the bot’s live feed. He stared into the weary face of his father, noticing wrinkles that he’d never had before. Blemishes caused by the stress of Zhaff’s failures. Luxarn looked directly at Director Ulnor for some reason.
“Go on,” Luxarn said. The lips on the screen didn’t move, indicating the voice was in Zhaff’s com-link. “I promised a gift to you, Zhaff. Look into the eyes of Director Ulnor and see.”
Zhaff did as requested. Fear racked the director’s face. Zhaff’s eye lens zoomed in and out, poring over his every feature, and that was when he saw. The bully who’d beaten him all those years ago sat directly in front of him. For a moment Zhaff’s eye-lens lost focus, and he saw that haggard old man in his place, then it centered.
It was him. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t noticed earlier.
“I’ve been waiting a long time for this, Zhaff,” Luxarn said. “You don’t ever have to be afraid. Him, Kale Trass—all those who ever put us down—will pay. So, go on. You survived Titan for a reason, I know it.”
Zhaff slowly approached the director, memories of that day filling his mind. The world melted away, and he found himself crossing the icy surface of Titan. He heard the bully’s friends laugh at him; heard that old man whisper about family and understanding…
“Get out!” Zhaff roared. He gripped the massive conference table hewn from the very rock of Mars and flipped it with the mere flick of his wrist. The board members on the other side were smashed against the wall. “Just get out!”
Those board members who weren’t incapacitated by the table stood to bolt for the door, but Zhaff whipped around and shot the one in the lead. “Not you!” he said. The respiratory aid built into his throat rattled as his breathing hastened and it was pushed to its limits. All the frightened voices of the Red Wing board blurred.
“This is what happens to those who steal from our Ring!” Zhaff said, still trying to recite his lines. Not to fail.
“Us steal?” Director Ulnor said. His voice broke through the madness and Zhaff focused. He could hear his own face crunching again as a younger version of the man beat down on him. Without logic. Without reason.
“Why did you do it!” Zhaff shouted. He seized Ulnor by the throat and pulled him close. He imagined freezing air whipping all around them, Titanian sand stinging his skin like a thousand tiny knives. His eye-lens focused in and out, but he saw himself lying on Titan with his partner Malcolm beside him, both bleeding out after the bang of two gunshots.
“Family,” Malcolm whispered, voice faint and quavering.
“Why!” Zhaff lifted Ulnor and slammed him against the floor.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” the director wheezed.
Zhaff’s vision refocused and he saw Ulnor, then the board of Red Wing directors, frozen by terror. Everything was being captured by Luxarn’s service bot, and he had only one final line to recite.
Focus, Zhaff told himself. Sometimes there is no logic, only chaos.
“Finish it, Zhaff,” Luxarn said sternly into his ear.
“From ice to ashes,” Zhaff said out loud. All the eyes of those before him went wide. They’d seen this act before.
Zhaff aimed his pulse-rifle at the translucency above, then unloaded his magazine into one segment. The fused silica glass was strong enough to withstand the barrage without shattering, but Zhaff looked down again at the director. Now he stood above him, only he didn’t see Ulnor. Again, he saw a gray beard, worn eyes—he saw Malcolm Graves.
He couldn’t explain why, but without thinking twice, he screamed at the top of his lungs, grabbed the director, and flung him with all his might into the compromised glass. It blew open, the explosive decompression tearing the hole wider, twisting structural members and sucking every member of the Red Wing board, along with Director Ulnor, out with it.
Zhaff joined them as well, only his armor was designed to withstand such forces. Nano-fiber wings beneath the arms helped him ride the gush of air. In a few seconds, he floated across space, looking down upon the breached ship and the glowing red of Mars beneath it.
When he looked back up, Titan, blood, and Malcolm Graves filled his view. “Family... I hope you understand, Zhaff,” his old partner said softly.
Zhaff refocused his vision, and through the field of glass and debris, saw a small Venta Co. ship zooming toward him.
“I’m proud of you, my son,” Luxarn said through his com-link. “A worthy sacrifice has been made in our quest to secure the safe propagation of human life. Now we take back what was stolen from us.”
My son. Luxarn had never referred to him like that before, only ever Zhaff. So much had changed while he was under. Zhaff hated change.
One
Kale Trass
After I lost Cora, I never thought I could feel again, but as I floated alone aboard the ship named in her honor, staring at Gareth’s body, it all came rushing back. He was my friend. Believed in me in ways even Rin couldn’t. Only it was then I realized I didn’t even know his last name.
War changes everything. It makes friends into strangers, men into monsters. They said it plagued Earth back before the Meteorite—that Darien Trass would have been wise to leave, impending apocalypse or not. All I knew was I’d be saying goodbye to more than Gareth before our war was through. At least all those years watching our brothers and sisters, fathers and mothers be sent off to Quarantine never to be released were good practice.
“Are you feeling any better, Kale?” Rin asked, pulling herself along the hallway at my back.
“Fine,” I said. I clenched my jaw and exhaled. My stomach remained uneasy, and my muscles ached all over. Though, apparently, that was to be expected after roughly a month in a sleep pod.
“Those Earther anti-rads pack a punch.”
I drew myself closer to Gareth and took one of his limp hands. His skin was cold as the surface of Titan. All that time learning how to communicate with him, now I’d never need to read his hands again.
“Don’t let the collector get in your head,” Rin said.
“We should have paid attention,” I said.
“We were too busy dealing with traitorous ambassadors and Earthers.” She joined me at Gareth’s side and lay her hand over ours. “He died how he would have wanted to. Keeping you safe.”
I swallowed then nodded. “I won’t let it be for nothing. Is the collector almost ready?”
“He’s stabilizing,” Rin said. “Kale, I’m still not sure this is the best idea. I know you want to make a statement on M-day, but they’re Earthers. They believe every day belongs to them. We can delay.”
“Delay plans so more people can die like him? Basaam’s prototype can end our war.”
“We don’t know that.”
�
��Now you don’t believe?” I asked.
“That’s not what I’m saying.”
“Then you agree? We won’t have another chance like this to retrieve it. All the Earther corps are reeling. I checked the feeds before you woke up—”
“You opened coms this close to Jupiter?” she interrupted, her features darkening.
“Only for a second.”
Rin took me by the shoulders and stared straight into my eyes. I didn’t need to fight my impulses anymore to keep my gaze from trailing off toward the gruesome half of her face or the hole in her cheek through which I could see the shine of her tongue. It felt strange to remember I hadn’t even known her for a half a year. Everything before the day she’d pulled me off the Piccolo felt like a blur. Every day since, an eternity.
“Do you realize how dangerous that is?” she said.
I brushed her away. “Something happened, Rin. Red Wing stock is plummeting over something called The Massacre. Pervenio Corp and Venta Co. are in open talks about a merger. What we did in that hangar is changing everything. Earthers have never been so close to a battle since before the Meteorite.”
Rin looked like she wanted to say something then bit her lip and exhaled. “We targeted Basaam on Mars because we knew he’d be easier to take there. Even with all our planning, things went sideways. Now we’re going to put things in the hands of an Earther?”
“You’re always talking about reading and reacting,” I said. “Letting the Earthers extend too far. M-day is coming. You say we can delay, but symbols are everything, right? It’s what helped us take back the Ring. It’s what I am.”
“You’re more than that now,” Rin replied.
“Am I?” I pushed past her back out into the hallway and made my way through the Cora’s innards. She kept pace with me.
“Maybe you’re right, and the collector can get this done, but maybe you’re wrong, and they’re waiting for this,” she said. “They had Aria for hours. Who knows what she told them.”
“She didn’t know anything about Basaam.”
“And we didn’t know she was the daughter of a Pervenio Collector. She could have overheard us any time.”
I turned my attention to the circular room lined with sleeping pods. Two of my men stood beside Malcolm’s, prepping him to be woken up. Aria lay in another, dreamless. I knew that was the case now after my first spell using one. There were no grand adventures of the mind or nightmares once put under—there was nothing.
“What if she isn’t lying, Rin?” I said.
“Then she would have told us from the start,” Rin said.
“Even if her father really was out of the game?”
“You saw that man. Did he look retired, charging in with a handful of Cogents? Nobody but Venta and Red Wing were supposed to know which hangar we were in. Face it, Kale, there’s too much about her past we don’t know not to be careful.”
“And how much do I know about your past?”
“That’s not—Look, I know you care about her, and I know now what she’s carrying in her belly. But she accomplished what we needed her to in getting that meeting with the Assembly. I’m not saying we need to kill her, but she can’t be around us anymore. It’s too risky.”
My fists clenched as I thought back to the last night Aria and I spent together on Mars. The way she looked at me after we were finished in bed, like in that moment, nothing else in the world mattered. I wasn’t sure how anybody could fake something like that, and then I remembered that I was doing it. Faking a smile right back at her.
“I’ll decide what to do with Aria,” I said. “You worry about getting Malcolm to help us. Gareth deserves for us to pull this off.”
“Now that’s something we both agree on.” Rin turned and approached Malcolm’s sleep pod. “All right, start waking him.” My men did as she asked, and the lid popped open with a snap hiss.
Rin turned back to me. “I’m just worried he’s too unpredictable,” she said. “He could try to run or warn someone once he’s alone.”
“He won’t,” I replied.
“You don’t know that, Kale.”
“Yes, I do. Malcolm won’t risk what might happen to Aria if he doesn’t obey your every command.”
“Or he’s a good liar, like his daughter, and doesn’t give a shit about her. He’s an Earther, after all.”
“He could’ve killed me, Rin. After Gareth died, he could have ended all of this. He stayed because he thinks Aria needs saving from me.”
“What is it about this woman?” Rin rolled her eyes and hunched over Malcolm’s sleep pod as stimulating chems raced through the tubes connected to him. “Fine, but let me handle the threats. If we’re going to get him nervous, it’s going to have to look real.”
I moved to my aunt’s side, then peered over at Aria, the woman who, apparently, I barely knew. The woman carrying my child, who’d been a shoulder to lie on during this war when my entire world felt like it was caving in.
“Just don’t actually hurt her,” I said.
“I won’t,” Rin answered.
Malcolm’s eyes snapped open. He gasped for air just before Rin tore him out of his sleep pod without bothering to carefully remove any intravenous feeder tubes first. We wore our full suits of powered armor since the mag-boots made traversing the Cora simpler while under zero-g. Rin lifted Malcolm’s weightless body. He coughed and hacked as he came to his senses.
Rin slammed him against a blank wall, where two of our men restrained his arms and legs so he wouldn’t float away. I could see his lips twitch as he attempted to speak, but now I knew what it was like to wake up after so long. The disorientation lasted longer than the sickness.
His cheeks went green, and before we could do anything, he vomited. To his credit, he must have fought back most of the bile, as only a bit snuck out. Rin quickly removed a sanitary mask from her belt, wrenched his head back, and strapped it to his face tighter than necessary. Only then did she take a step back.
We watched as he searched from side to side like a newborn finding the world again. His bleary eyes blinked a few times, and it took around a minute for them to focus on me. A chill ran through me. It’d felt like only an hour since what he said to me before we went under, blaming me for Cora’s fate and so much more. I knew he was just trying to get under my skin, but hearing another Earther talk about her like she was merely a name made me want to scream.
“There you are,” Rin said. She planted a finger in the center of Malcolm’s forehead and pushed. “I never thought you’d wake up. How does it feel to be the one wearing the mask now?”
Malcolm licked his lips then spat. “Tastes like shit,” he rasped. “Any chance of getting a new one of these?”
“You’re lucky we don’t let you drown in your own filth, Earther.”
“I can see why you all hated them.”
“You don’t see anything,” I said, stepping forward. I was supposed to let Rin handle him, but I couldn’t help myself. The chems from being under had drained entirely out of my system by now, and all I could feel was my rage toward him.
“Ah, the boy king decides to speak for himself,” Malcolm said.
“He speaks for all of us!” Rin snapped. The back of her hand smacked Malcolm across the face, hopefully hard enough to wipe away the indignant grin I knew he was wearing under his mask.
“But he lets a woman strike for him?” Malcolm said.
“We aren’t as backward as your kind.”
“Oh yeah? Which one of these pods do you have my daughter stuffed into, huh?” Hearing him bring her up caused me to look at her pod, and his gaze followed mine. “This is your last chance, kid,” he said. “Let us out of here. Don’t put another death on your conscience like Cora’s.”
Rin peered back at me upon learning for the first time that this collector had been there during Cora’s interrogation. If she didn’t think I could handle a snake like him before, now she’d be sure of it. Collectors were infamous for being able to work their
prey. They found weaknesses, used their gut, and exploited them, whereas Cogents saw lies and extrapolated information to form high-stakes percentages which informed their actions.
“Your daughter is safe. For now,” I replied, desperate to show Rin I could handle myself. “That all depends on you.”
“If you hurt her,” Malcolm snarled. “Boy, you don’t even know pain.”
“Relax. Aria is of no use to us dead. You, on the other hand… that’s an entirely different story.”
“Let me go, and you’ll see how useful I can be.”
“I plan on it. You’re going to help us with an issue. We took someone on Mars, but without his research, he’s of no use to me either.”
Malcolm chuckled then coughed a few times. “Yeah, I know. Basaam Venta. If you really think I’m going to help you, you’re crazier than I thought.”
“I told you, you’re my collector now. It’s not up to you.”
“And it’s like Aria told you: I’m retired. You may as well put me down now.”
“Don’t tempt us,” Rin snarled.
“Believe me, we thought about it, but you’re different than the other Earthers,” I said. “You chose family—real, blood family—over your mission.”
“Is that why you think I let you live? I just didn’t feel like dying along with you and missing out on enjoying retirement.”
I took a step toward Aria’s sleep pod. He didn’t allow his expression to reveal anything, but his gaze momentarily flitted her way. “I don’t believe you,” I said.
“You people never do.”
Rin’s hand shot forward and wrapped around his throat. “We want to end this war sooner than later, Collector, and you can help us do it. Everyone wins.”
“You expect me to believe that?” he asked.
“I expect nothing from you besides your obedience.”
Titan's Fury: A Science Fiction Thriller (Children of Titan Book 4) Page 2