by J. F. Holmes
The shuttle bucked as it sliced through the atmosphere. Smythe-Zumwalt hated this part of space flight. He’d taken the anti-nausea drugs before boarding the craft, but they weren’t doing the job. He’d been tempted to go aboard the large orbiting station that was the waypoint for most people trying to reach the surface. Most ships didn’t carry their own atmospheric shuttles, and the ones on the station-to-surface route had been designed expressly for that purpose. They were piloted by people who were cognizant of the difficulties of flying through this particular atmosphere. But the UN shuttle was armed, and it had all the special equipment he might need. The equipment to make people talk, to want to talk with all their hearts, to convince the citizen they were telling the truth.
“There’s still time to turn around and go back,” said Humphreys, looking back over his seat.
The man had irons on his hands and legs. Even if he got away from his guards, extremely unlikely, he wouldn’t go far, nor would he go fast.
“Why don’t I have a mask?” were the next words out of the prisoner’s mouth.
The citizen looked down at the light mask hanging from a strap around his neck. The atmosphere of Mars was decades from being truly breathable. It had almost enough oxygen, way too much carbon dioxide, and it was still lacking in the inert gases that made up most of the atmosphere of living worlds. Seventy percent of the atmosphere was the nitrogen that had been brought from the belt in Type C rocks. And it had over ten percent carbon dioxide.
“You’ll be given a mask when we want you to have one,” said the citizen with a smile. “We’ll see how far you can run while sucking in a load of CO2.”
The man glared at him for a moment, then turned away. The shuttled bucked a couple more times, while the flare of plasma coming off the heat shield obscured any view from the small passenger windows. Then everything smoothed out as the shuttle shed velocity and became an aircraft.
“We’re getting a signal from the unit we’re supposed to meet, sir,” came a call over the intercom.
“Put them on.”
The screen to the front of the chair back lit and the image of a woman in the uniform of the United Nations Police appeared. “Citizen Smythe-Zumwalt. I’m Captain Felicia Montgomery. I have my company mounted and ready to support you.”
“Very good, Captain. The target is the village of Jakarta, and the Gold Rush Mining Company.”
The eyes of the woman widened, then narrowed. “What are they up to that interests Earth?”
There were a lot of commercial interests on the planet, some barely getting by. Four million people, some living in the few cities, and two hundred thousand in Lowell itself. Most worked in agriculture, tending to the bioengineered plants that were turning Mars into a living world. The Gold Rush Mining Company had been established to take advantage of a type of rock, ten kilometers in diameter, that had fallen on the already dead world hundreds of thousands of years before. Buried in the ground and covered by ages of windblown dust, the area was a treasure trove of metals like platinum, gold, and silver. The company was obscenely rich, and had aggressively staked their claim before any of the traditional oligarchs could get to it. Which had caused a lot of friction, and cases were still being heard in courts on Earth and Mars.
Fortunately for them, the riches of the asteroid belt were actually easier to exploit. The metals they mined in the gravity well were still valuable on the developing Mars, and cheaper to deliver than bringing them in from the belt and dropping them from space. That was an Earth market.
“I guess a good thing can’t last forever?” the citizen asked Humphreys, taking a step up the aisle and falling into the seat next to him.
“What are you talking about?” asked the man, his eyes narrowing.
“All the money you got out of that crashed asteroid. I guess it helped finance your little scheme. You know, the one to bioengineer viable plants and seeds.”
“I’m not sure what you’re talking about,” said Humphreys, shaking his head, “but the mine has just about played out.”
“Good thing we found out about your operation when we did, then.” Smythe-Zumwalt looked down at his hand comm, looking at a text that was coming across. “Good. Our agent in Lowell reports that your daughters were seen in the village as of yesterday. I doubt they’ve left the planet in that time. And if we don’t get you to talk?” The citizen shrugged his shoulders. “I’m betting we find other people there who don’t have your fortitude. If we put them through the same things we put you through, I’m sure we’ll find out what we want to know.”
Humphreys continued to glare at him, and Smythe-Zumwalt knew he’d hit a nerve.
“You can make it easier on them by telling us what we want to know. We’ll still arrest them, and they’re looking at jail time, but not the pain you’ve already gone through. Not your wife, and especially your little girls.”
Humphreys looked away, turning his head to look out the window at the end of the row. Something moved out there, and the citizen leaned over to get a look at a pair of helicopters that had joined up with the now slowly cruising shuttle. They looked very much like the helicopters that cruised the skies of Earth. The engines were of a different design, filtering out CO2 and compressing oxygen so they could work. Each had machine guns and rocket pods on the side, pointing forward. Each had a crew of four, and carried eight troopers. The citizen knew there were a dozen of the craft, carrying ninety-six troopers. There was a trio of dedicated gunships along for support, but the citizen didn’t think they would be necessary. Of course, it never hurt to have too much firepower, but too little could lead to disaster.
Humphreys spun in his seat, bringing his manacled hands around and striking Smythe-Zumwalt in the chest. He had obviously been trying for the head, but the chains linking hands to feet didn’t allow that much reach. Smythe-Zumwalt grunted in pain as the hard fists of the man hit his chest, then fell back out of his seat onto the floor of the aisle. Humphreys surged to his feet, only to be met by the stun baton in the hands of one of the guards.
“Don’t hurt him,” yelled the citizen from the floor as the guard reared back with the baton to strike the prisoner.
The citizen stumbled to his feet and glared down at the prisoner. “You’re not going to get us to kill you. Oh, no.” He leaned down to look into Humphreys’ eyes as two guards held him down, one in the seat inward on the row from him, the other from behind. “I want to see your eyes when we have your little girls in our hands. Ever hear a child scream in pain? Well, of course you have.”
“You’re all bastards!” hissed the prisoner.
“Yes, we are. But what happens to those children is in your hands. Tell us what we want, and all we need to do is foster them out to proper, patriotic families.”
Humphreys closed his eyes and took some deep breaths. When he opened his eyes, there was no defeat in them. “You’ll never get your hands on them. Enjoy your little victory now, but you will lose.”
***
The first missiles came up from an area of the Martian forest ten kilometers outside the village, along the path the copters and the shuttle were on. Warning alarms went off on all the aircraft as their automated defense systems took over. Gatling guns flashed, sending out streams of explosive rounds as the barrels tracked the incoming missiles with radar guidance. Three were picked off before they got into range to make an attack, blasting out their fury in empty air. One came close enough to explode near a target, sending shrapnel through the hull of the troop carrier. The helicopter pitched over, smoke pouring from the engine intakes as the pilot fought to keep his bird in the air.
The gunships banked away, heading for the firing areas pinpointed by the trails of smoke from their launch. Missile pods spoke, chain guns buzzed, and the area where the missiles had come from exploded in a mass of splinters, trees falling, burning, to the ground in the slow motion of low gravity.
“I think we got them, sir,” came the call over the citizen’s earbud. “They...”
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br /> A couple of missiles, probably from shoulder-fired weapons, came streaking up from directly below, hitting one of the slowly moving gunships outside the arc of any of its defensive weapons. Smythe-Zumwalt looked out the window in time to see the rotor of the gunship go flying off, the body dropping into the forest.
“You want us to go down there and comb the forest for them, sir?” asked the police captain over the comm.
The gunship was down and burning, and there were hundreds of kilometers of forest in each direction, with the exception of the village and mine ahead. Mons Olympus towered in the distance, trees running up its slope, doing their part to convert the planet into a world fit for animal life.
“Get us to the damned village,” he ordered, gritting his teeth in anger that anyone could strike at his people. “They damned sure know we’re coming. We need to get to them and hit them hard.”
The citizen looked over at the prisoner, who was looking back with a slight smile on his face. His people are trained, thought the citizen. By us. And they know our habits and tactics. This was starting to look like it might not be as easy a job as the citizen had thought. But we’re the government. We can’t let them get away with defying us. That way would lead to more people revolting, until there were enough of them that the UN couldn’t handle them all. Yes, they could still starve them out, but that would just lead to more planets trying to buy into the genetic engineering project of the rebels.
The shuttle kept to a low cruise, letting the copters surround her. There was one more missile attack on the way, but this time they hadn’t been in the proper setup, the angle was bad, and the defensive systems swatted them out of the air before they could come close. The gunships stayed back, unwilling to run into another ambush, and responded by firing their own rockets at the launch sites.
“We’re killing your people, you know,” said Smythe-Zumwalt to Humphreys.
“They know how to take care of themselves,” said the man with an evil smile. “In fact, they might not be where you think.”
“I want you to send one gunship and a quartet of troop carriers directly to the mine,” said the citizen over the comm. “Don’t try to take the mine. Just sit outside and make sure whomever is in there doesn’t get away.”
“Roger,” said the captain in agreement. “I’m thinking we should set the rest of the carriers down in a circle around the village, so we can prevent the subjects from escaping into the forest.”
The citizen thought about that for a moment. With modern masks, which did little more than filter out the CO2, they could last out there indefinitely. And there was no telling what kinds of supplies they might have stashed in shelters out there in the forest. While the trees didn’t grow as thickly as they had in old Earth forests, there were still an awful lot of them, covering an area of hundreds of thousands of square kilometers. They might be able to track them using infrared, since they would be the only animals in those woods, but then again, against people who knew what they were doing, they might not.
“Very well. We’ll go with your plan.”
“Thinking of spreading them out?” asked Humphreys. “That might work. Or it might let my people take them down in detail.”
“Shut the fuck up,” growled the citizen. He felt his anger was rising. The damned traitorous rebel was playing him. Well, we’ll see how well you play that game when we have some people important to you in our hands.
“The streets are empty, sir,” came the call from the police captain. “I’m circling over them now, and there’s no sign of life.”
They can’t hope to get several hundred people away, now can they? thought the citizen, looking over at Humphreys. Not at this short notice.
“We might just blockade this village. Let everyone here starve to death. Or at least get hungry enough they come out of hiding. That forest might be a good hiding place, but I’m betting there’s nothing to eat in it. Once your supplies are gone, so are your people.”
“Not everyone in the village is with us,” said Humphreys, a troubled look on his face. “You would kill the innocent with the guilty?”
“To find the rest of you and stop your conspiracy against the lawful government? Of course I would. And who’s to say who’s guilty or who’s innocent? Me, that’s who.”
“And you wonder why people hate you so.”
“I wonder nothing about that. I just know it’s my job to keep you people under control, and there’s only one way to do that, short of nuking the hell out of every rebellious enclave in human space.”
Humphreys flinched slightly at the word ‘nuking’, and the citizen wondered if there might be some useful information there. Probably not. Most people didn’t like the idea of nukes, weapons that could be sent at them from space, giving them no chance to fight back.
The whine of the engines changed, the shuttle switching to VTOL and coming down for a landing. Smythe-Zumwalt looked out the window and saw they were setting down in a large open area on the edge of the village. The craft thumped, the jacks taking up the recoil, then lifting the ship slightly.
“We’re here. Bring our boy along, and make sure he has a mask.”
The citizen pulled his body armor vest over his uniform, then adjusted his own mask up over his face, checked his sidearm, and walked to the main hatch. He could tell he wasn’t on Earth. There was more gravity than there had been aboard the ship, but much less than he’d grown up with. No wonder the people born here are so damned skinny, he thought. Maybe not as thin as those on Luna, but you could definitely tell those transplanted here from the native born. Humphreys had obviously been raised on a heavy-gravity world, his great rolling muscles a sign of growing up on greater than Earth gee.
The village looked much like one would on Earth, in places where there were still such habitations. Many were constructed of stained wood, though appearances could be deceiving. Under that wood was extruded plastic, and the doors, made of the same substance, formed an airtight seal, as did the windows. The object was to keep CO2 out, so the people could live comfortably in their houses. A leak could prove deadly, as too much CO2 shut down the oxygen/carbon dioxide exchange in the lungs, and could lead to a quick, though painless, death. There were several rolling wagons in front of houses, though none of the vehicles used to pull them. Plants were everywhere, in flower beds, in hanging baskets, drinking in the enriched (to them) air, and helping in the conversion.
“His house is the third on the left,” said Vandermeer, looking down at a hand comp, his rasping breath coming through the mask.
“Then let’s open it up.”
The door was locked, and the plastic inner lining was proof against anyone kicking it in. The lock mechanism wasn’t proof against a high-caliber slug, and a couple of well-aimed shots had it open. The inner door of the airlock was also locked, though in its case it was attached to a mechanism that only allowed one door to open at a time, while CO2 was removed before it could get into the house. It took a battering ram to take this one down, since there was no observable lock to shoot. A couple of swings and it was open.
“In you go,” growled Vandermeer, pushing Humphreys forward to follow the leaders.
The citizen looked around the house, a small living room at the entrance, open kitchen at the back. Two doors let off to one side, he was guessing to bedrooms with baths. The house had a lived-in look, comfortable furniture, and kitchenware hanging from racks. There was a water bowl and feeder in one corner. The citizen shook his head. People still wanted animals, cats being the most common, since they didn’t have to leave the house to eliminate. He wondered where the kitty was now. If it had gone into hiding, it wasn’t going to come out, as the house was already filled with CO2.
“Too bad about the cat. Your daughters’?”
“They wouldn’t have left it behind,” said his prisoner. “We had a carrier.”
“Check the bedrooms,” Smythe-Zumwalt ordered his men, then turned back to Humphreys. “So the question now is, where did the
y go? I’m betting the mine.”
“And I’m betting you don’t want to go there.”
“But first we’ll search all these other dwellings. I’d hate to miss out on a family reunion just because we weren’t thorough enough.”
All the dwellings were empty, the village completely deserted. The citizen set some people with deep radar equipment to look for underground chambers or tunnels. They found some basements, a couple of tunnels linking them. And then exactly what he was looking for.
“I think this must lead to the mine,” said Vandermeer, looking at the radar scan that showed the tunnel running straight and true for five kilometers before curving to the right. “It gave them a way to get to the mine without showing themselves.”
“Okay. We’ll leave a couple of squads of Captain Montgomery’s people here in case someone’s in hiding. We’ll take their copters so the rebels might think everyone has left. Maybe we’ll get lucky, and some of them will wander back in, thinking it’s all clear.”
“And how many are we going with?” asked Vandermeer.
“All of our people, and two squads of Captain Montgomery’s. That’ll give us twenty-eight troopers. That should be enough to handle anything we’re likely to meet. The squads we leave here can come to our rescue if things go south.”
“Then let’s get going,” said Vandermeer. “You three people watch the prisoner. I wouldn’t want him getting any ideas about trying to get away if we find any cross tunnels.”
***
There were cross tunnels, and some chambers opening up to the side. Some power equipment, drills and rock saws, were lying untended in one, while bunks and cabinets of food lay behind an airlock in another.
In one chamber, they found what looked like a hand comp on a table, and one of the troopers reached over to retrieve it.
“Don’t,” yelled Vandermeer, the only thing he could get out of his mouth before the trooper picked up the device. It immediately converted into a ball of fire as the C10 within went off, the motion-activated trigger detonating. It took the man’s armored arm off in a spray of blood, sending a wave of tungsten darts off at all angles. Two troopers were hit by the darts, one through his mask, upward and into the skull. The other through her torso body armor. The one with the dart in his brain was dead before he hit the floor, and the one with the hole in her chest struggled to stay up while blood spurted from the hole, the sign of an arterial puncture. The man who’d lost his arm fell against the wall of the chamber, screaming, a high-pitched sound that rattled the others.