Titan's Fury: A Science Fiction Thriller (Children of Titan Book 4)

by Rhett C. Bruno

  “Quiet,” Desmond said, seething. His fingers wriggled around the trigger of his rifle.

  I almost had him.

  “He’d rather look at that scarred witch than you,” I said, “because every time he does, he’s reminded that your skinny Ringer ass survived Sodervall’s racism and Cora didn’t. Am I right?”

  “Quiet.”

  “How are you still so loyal after he treats you like that? If I were you…” I crawled a little closer to the bars. “…I’d be on the first ship to Earth with Kale in a body bag.”

  “That’s it. Kale said not to kill you, but he didn’t say anything about breaking your jaw!” Desmond growled. He stomped over to the cell’s controls and began keying in the codes. I slid back along the floor and pawed for a loose rock until I found one about the size of an ear. It would do.

  “I’m going to m-make you wish you died here last time, Mudstomper,” Desmond said. The controls buzzed as my cell was unlocked. He didn’t have one foot in before a handful of armed Titanborn soldiers arrived hauling shipping crates to Basaam Venta’s workspace.

  “Where do you want these?” one shouted.

  Desmond backed away quickly and locked my cell. “You’re lucky he’s m-more important, M-Mudstomper,” he said, his stutter even more pronounced after he came so near to getting in trouble. “When he’s done, all y-your people are gonna s-s-see they can’t win. You’ll starve here, and n-no one will ever remember Malcolm G-G-G—” He couldn’t get the word out, grunting before he marched away.

  I dropped the rock and calmly lay back. I had Desmond by the throat, and he didn’t even know it. All we needed were a few minutes alone, and I’d get him to open up again and try to shut me up. Many had tried before.

  Maybe my old bones couldn’t even take on a crippled Ringer in powered armor, but collector training had to be good for something. Somehow, I was going to get out of my cell and find my daughter, or I’d die trying like a collector should.

  Seven

  Kale

  The Darien Hall of Ashes was a place I hoped to avoid, but revolution brought me back time and time again. It was where Titanborn went to say goodbye to our deceased loved ones. Essentially, it was a dark, unadorned hall with a series of glassy tubes piercing the exterior wall of the city’s enclosure. Earthers buried their fallen in caskets beneath the ground to be devoured by worms. Even on Mars or asteroids, anywhere, they would decay locked away in boxes.

  My people released the ashes of our cremated dead into the stormy skies of Titan. We’d done it that way since the days of Trass’s first settlers, even under the heel of Pervenio Corp. The Hall of Ashes had always been the one segment of the Uppers where we were allowed to roam freely.

  Rin held a transparent, spherical container filled with all we could find of Gareth. No ashes spread for him after his body was sucked out into space; only a bit of his blood scraped off the command deck floor. It was the best we could do. More than Cora ever got after Sodervall spaced her like he was emptying a garbage chute.

  It hadn’t been long since the ship named after her returned to Darien. I’m not sure how Rin got us out, but we outraced Venta Co. until they gave up. The Cora took so much fire in the escape, she barely stayed together, but we did it. I didn’t bother telling Rin I’d almost been killed by a Cogent retrieving it, but thanks to Malcolm and some quick thinking, we had the key to the next stage in interstellar engine development. Gareth didn’t die for nothing.

  Hundreds of Titanborn crammed into the tight confines of the Hall of Ashes. Most of them didn’t know Gareth, but everyone had heard of him and his sacrifice. The silent warrior who fought by my side from day one to take back Titan and all of Saturn’s moons from our oppressors.

  “We surrender this soul unto the winds of Titan,” Rin said, regaining my attention. She lifted the orb, flakes of crusted blood tumbling along the smooth inner surface. “May he forever watch over those chosen by Trass.”

  Rin glanced back at me. Her armor and sanitary mask were removed so that the gruesome half of her face was on display. Even her burns couldn’t mask her sorrow. She tried to appear strong, but tears welled in the corners of her eyes. Gareth had been with her when an independent Titan was merely a dream. When they were branded a terrorist cell by Pervenio Corp. Before my father died and they sought me out on the Piccolo gas harvester to be their new leader. Before they told me my true heritage as a descendant of Darien Trass.

  Rylah rubbed her sister’s shoulders to console her. She was all made up like she was hitting up a Lower’s nightclub, wounds fully healed. Seeing their faces side by side was always strange. Maybe before Rin’s scars, they looked like siblings, but now they couldn’t be more opposite.

  “He died protecting you,” my mother said, as if I needed reminding. She stood at my side. “Like he would have wanted.”

  “You weren’t there,” I replied.

  She clutched my hand, but I didn’t squeeze back. I didn’t want to be consoled.

  Rin slowly raised the sphere for all to see “From ice…” She paused to gather herself. The loss of her original Sunfire crew members seemed to be the only thing able to rattle her. Rylah took her arm and helped her keep it up. “…to ashes,” Rin finished.

  Everyone in the hall repeated those words. Some solemnly, others with vigor. I barely murmured them. It felt wrong bidding Gareth farewell when he never should have died. Mars wasn’t meant to end in a shootout. No casualties. In and out with our prized scientist in hand and the USF’s rejection driving our cause. And then a Pervenio collector burst through the door seeking out his long-lost daughter, who I’d named our ambassador.

  “Kale,” Rylah said. “Kale.”

  My gaze snapped toward her. She nodded toward Rin’s hand, which hovered over the controls to eject Gareth’s remains. Trembling. But Rin didn’t strike the key. She was waiting for me.

  “Let her,” I said. “They were fighting this war together long before I knew it was happening.”

  “It’s not for her,” my mother whispered into my ear. “It’s for them.”

  I looked from side to side at all the eager faces regarding me instead of Gareth’s ashes, waiting for me to have the last word. The Earthers called me the self-proclaimed king of Titan, but sometimes I forget that my people believed that even more vehemently.

  I stepped forward and laid my hand over Rin’s. “We’ll finish this for him,” I whispered. “Together.”

  She nodded. After striking the command, the sphere would be shot out into Titan’s thick atmosphere. Once it flew to a high enough altitude, the change in pressure would cause it to pop like a balloon, sprinkling his blood into the clouds.

  I turned to address the crowd.

  “Gareth fought for our freedom!” I shouted. “He swore to keep me safe and died keeping that promise. He died for our freedom. From this day forward, we honor all those who have died because of Earth’s greed! Who suffered under their heel and chose not to crumble! We are one Titan. And if they think they can take that from us, then we’ll freeze them all!”

  I keyed the command on the control panel so hard it cracked. The sphere was promptly sucked through the dense Darien Enclosure toward a tiny pinpoint of light. I expected the crowd to cheer, but they watched me in silence. The end of my rant could still be heard echoing down the hall, I’d screamed the last words so loudly. My mother wore that deeply concerned expression she always had when I was younger and disappeared at night. If she knew half the things I’d stolen back then to help pay our Pervenio Corp rent, her heart would’ve given out.

  As I stood panting, quiet murmurs built by the exit. They rippled across the crowd, some news spreading and stealing the attention of everyone present. I wondered what could possibly be more important than Gareth’s funeral until the whispers reached Rylah’s ear. Her eyelids sprang open.

  “You need to follow me, Kale,” she addressed me.

  “What is it?” Rin questioned.

  “Remember I told you about
the Red Wing Massacre? The Earthers, they… You have to see.”

  There wasn’t much of a choice. The crowd flowed toward the exit, and we were caught in the tide. Everyone sounded anxious. Terrified. Rin and my other guards fell in close and had to bar people from shoving us.

  “Should I send for Aria?” my mother asked.

  “Yes, where is our young ambassador?” Rylah said.

  Aria. The woman I’d named ambassador, who had a father who was a Pervenio Corp collector, and who also happened to be carrying my child. Before we’d left for Mars, all she was to anybody but me was an offworlder with a knack for Earther politics. Being present to see whatever it was Pervenio Corp was up to was part of her job description… but I couldn’t handle any more lies.

  “Resting,” I replied. That was half the truth. The radiation and sleep pod meds had taken a toll on Aria’s pregnant body, and she was being treated in the Hayes Memorial Hospital, being monitored to ensure our child was healthy… and until I was sure I could trust her. I hadn’t mustered the courage to talk with her yet.

  “She must be exhausted after traveling so far in her condition,” Rylah whispered.

  My head whipped around to face her. She wore an impish grin. Somehow, she knew about my baby. I glanced at Rin, who’d clearly heard her, and she shook her head. That meant Aria had told her when even my mother didn’t know yet.

  They’d bonded almost instantly after we took over Titan, probably because neither was a full-bred member of the race they were fighting for. And they had history. Rylah had been the one to get in contact with Aria for medical aid when she was still a runner for Venta Co. Rin may have been behind it, but Rylah recruited the doctor.

  Had Aria been playing us from the very beginning for Madame Venta? Why?

  “Make way for Lord Trass!” Rin bellowed as we entered the Darien Uppers.

  The crack of her voice drew my focus back to the crowd. The Uppers remained in disarray, exactly like we’d left them. It didn’t look like anyone was living in the residential towers, but instead, like my people had continued reveling upon the ruins of Earther commerce for the months we were gone.

  Rin pushed through the throng so we could see what was on a pair of working viewscreens wrapping the atrium where Darien Trass’s statue stood proudly. Hundreds were gathered within it and around the walkways. The volume was all the way up, but I couldn’t hear anything over the ruckus. Gunshots flared in a sequence repeatedly playing on the screen, my first time witnessing the Red Wing Massacre.

  “Quiet!” I screamed.

  A hush fell upon the Uppers as if all the air had gone out of the room. The Titanborn in front of me noticed I was there, parted, and allowed me to approach the screens. It was a newsfeed being broadcast from Earth on every single one of their channels.

  “This footage, never before shown, is graphic,” a reporter said. “We are releasing it to the public now only after the recent Solnet leaks were unable to be controlled. I repeat: this footage is not suitable for children.”

  Someone wearing Titanborn armor stood within a conference room of some sort, even though we’d never sent any of our people to do this. Stars shone brightly through a viewport at his back. Men and women in formal attire and with the Red Wing Company logo on their lapels stared in horror, some of them lying on the ground bleeding. Chairman Galora, the woman who had helped us escape Mars, was the closest to the imposter, and a Pervenio Director was beside her.

  The imposter waved his or her gun at members of the Red Wing board. Then he or she stomped around the room like a lunatic, smacking his or her own helmet. He or she grabbed the Pervenio Director by the neck, threw him, and proclaimed, “From ice to ashes!” His or her pulse-rifle then aimed toward the viewport, and he or she fired until it shattered. Every person in the conference room was yanked out into space before the feed went to static.

  I’d read about what happened back aboard the Cora, but seeing it was another story entirely. More influential Earthers taken out of our way was never a bad thing, but without Red Wing Company, we wouldn’t have escaped Mars.

  “Kale, was this you?” I heard my mother whisper in my ear. She might as well have been shouting, the room went so quiet. The parallels to what Rin did aboard the Piccolo were clear enough that I wasn’t surprised she asked.

  I shook my head.

  “We are sorry you had to see that,” the reporter said, clearly rattled. “It is now coming through that this horrible tragedy was perpetrated by this man, Gareth Hale, proving, without doubt, it was indeed an act of terror perpetrated by the Children of Titan. A former gas harvester from Ziona, Titan, Gareth was thought to have died in the Sunfire incident more than three years ago. Clearly, that is not the case.”

  A picture of none other than Gareth popped up on screen. It felt like someone had tied a belt around my heart and squeezed it, seeing him. The Red Wing board used a ship that orbited Mars. I wasn’t sure if Gareth had the time to get from New Beijing to it and back without me knowing, but there was no doubt the picture was of him from a mug-shot before he wound up on the Sunfire. Back when he still had his tongue.

  “Titan has continued to deny comment on this malicious attack. Rumblings out of the USF Assembly indicate that they believe this was a direct reaction to the recent news of a formal merger between Venta Co. and Pervenio Corp, but one thing is for sure, Kale Trass’ visit to Mars was not without ulterior motives. New reports out of Europa indicate that the Kale’s personal ship was also spotted assaulting Martelle Station, where Venta Chief Engineer Basaam Venta was captured and taken into Titan’s custody, joining thousands of other captives from their illegal seizure of the Ring.

  “We went live to Jumara Venta shortly after showing her this footage to get her reaction to these shocking developments.”

  The screen transitioned to grainier footage, where Madame Venta’s officers were busy pushing through a mob of reporters. They were on Martelle Station, cleaning up Malcolm’s mess while she lied about where we took Basaam because, to a corporation like Venta Co., taking a man’s life was worth a lot less than his valuable tech being compromised.

  “Madame Venta!” a news reporter shouted. “Madame Venta! Do you have any comment on the attack on Basaam Venta and its supposed connection to the Red Wing Massacre?” One of her men pushed the camera away, but the reporter was persistent. He weaseled his way right into her face and repeated the question.

  “Any comment?” she snapped finally. “It’s time we stop taking these Ringer rebels lightly! The USF has spent the last month looking into an incident here at this very spaceport where my children were slaughtered by Kale Trass. I proposed a solution to the USF then in the form of an armed defensive fleet, and they denied me. Then he has Red Wing Company destroyed so handily, their assets are being sold off to the highest bidder. Still, the USF ignored me. Now he’s stolen my friend and colleague Basaam off Martelle Station. This cannot go on.

  “Do you think I’m partnering with Luxarn Pervenio to benefit my company? I’m done waiting for them to bicker over the methods of our expansion and ignore our safety in the present. It is time we take control of this situation before Kale targets another boardroom full of innocents or stuffs more people into cells. PerVenta Corp is in the process of buying all assets of Red Wing, and together, we will develop a militarized force to take back the Ring at all costs. We will not allow them to use the lives of captives to bully us any longer. If the USF has anything to say about it, they can try to stop us. It’s time for Kale Trass’s bloody reign to come to an end.”

  The feed cut back to the production studio and a few reporters seated at a table. “Harsh words,” one of them said. “Luxarn Pervenio echoed her statements in a written statement just last month. We reached out to the USF Assembly for comment, but up to this point, there has been no response. This is John Standard of SolWide News Net. We’ll be back after this short break.”

  The screen transitioned to a shiny vessel flying through the upper atmosphere of
Jupiter. “Have you ever dreamed of sailing over the eye of Jupiter?” a soothing matronly voice asked. “Zeus Luxury Cruise Lines invites you—”

  The rest of the out-of-place Earther ad was cut off by the Uppers erupting in applause for the elimination of a powerful Earther corporation. They chanted Gareth’s name and proclaimed death to Madame Venta and Luxarn Pervenio’s Fleet.

  I grabbed Rin’s arm, pulled her into an abandoned shop, and slammed the door. Rylah and my mother followed shortly after, struggling to squeeze through my people as they once again turned the Uppers into their own personal nightclub.

  “I swear, this wasn’t me,” Rin said before anybody could ask. “And whoever it was, that wasn’t Gareth in that suit. He’s taller, and he was with me.”

  “And what about kidnapping an engineer off Martelle Station?” my mother questioned, her glower boring into my soul.

  “He’s crucial to our cause, Katrina. We had to improvise.”

  “Stop it, you two,” Rylah said.

  “Do you think any of our people could have been capable of pulling that off?” Rin shook her head. “Rylah, maybe someone took a ship and snuck away to Mars?”

  “I could pull dispatch logs, but I doubt it. Red Wing’s headquarters is a cruiser; it isn’t easy to break into, let alone find in orbit.”

  “And now, Venta and Pervenio are joining forces to buy them out,” I said. “Did you know about the merger?”

  “I keep the newsfeeds on all day, and it’s the first I’m hearing about it.”

  “Am I only one realizing who benefits from slaughtering the only Earther company that has ever helped us?” Rin remarked.

  “You think they were behind it?” my mother said. “That’s low, even for them.”

  “Would you have said that while you were wasting away in quarantine?” Rin asked. My mother sank back, her eyes glazing over.

  “Rin,” I said sternly.