Ascendant

by Jack Campbell

  “Who died while serving with Squall,” Leigh Camagan said.

  Rob couldn’t help smiling at her. Three years had passed, but Camagan still remembered the names of those who had died in the battles then. His smile faded as he wondered if there would be so many dead in future battles that no one could recall all the names.

  “I’m sure the council will approve,” Camagan told Mele. “Go ahead. Take care of the star system while I’m gone, you two.”

  “How soon are you leaving?” Rob asked.

  “As quickly as possible. I want to be on my way before any word of what’s going on might be able to leak to our opponents.”

  “You’ll be heading for Kosatka first?”

  “Yes. It’s along the way to almost every other place and the closest possible source of help for us.”

  “Do you think Kosatka will have anything to spare for us?” Mele asked. “They must have heard about what happened at Jatayu by now, but we haven’t heard anything.”

  “I think,” Leigh Camagan said, “that Kosatka and Glenlyon are both facing dangers that demand all we can manage. But even if we can’t do anything else for each other, standing back-to-back together might help both star systems with the knowledge that we’re not alone in our fight. And maybe seeing Kosatka and Glenlyon working together to defend each other will inspire others to come to our aid. I’m hoping that the pressure on us means that Kosatka is facing less trouble at the moment.”

  Rob saw Mele shake her head.

  “If Scatha and its pals are smart,” Mele said, “and they’ve been way too smart lately, they’ll know we can’t do much after losing Claymore. They might decide to hit Kosatka harder while we’re unable to do anything.”

  “That makes way too much sense,” Rob said, glancing toward the other council members as an idea came to him. “Leigh, this might be the time to do something that could be either really smart or really stupid. I’ll need council approval to do it, but it might help ensure you make it through to Kosatka. And if Kosatka is under more pressure, it might help them, too.”

  “I’m in,” Mele announced. “You had me at really smart or really stupid.”

  “Let’s see if we can get President Chisholm to sign off on whatever your idea is, Rob,” Leigh Camagan said. “For me, I trust your instincts. And Kosatka may need our help as badly as we need them.”

  * * *

  • • •

  Of the three cities so far constructed on Kosatka, Ani remained a shiny ghost town and battlefield, Drava had about two-thirds of its buildings occupied and the atmosphere of a place under siege, and the capital and original city Lodz was full of people, bustling with everyday life and commerce, only additional security checkpoints here and there hinting at the problems so far mostly kept far enough away to allow a feel of normality.

  The intelligence offices occupied several rooms in a boxy structure once intended for record-keeping. Design features meant to keep out anything that might damage files also worked to keep in classified information. Those who came to Kosatka hadn’t been eager to establish a formal means of spying on others, having seen too much of that sort of thing on Old Earth. Now that the need for that was as obvious as the fighting around Ani, Kosatka was still reluctant to create a permanent institution. So instead of a formal organization, the intelligence offices had been grouped under what someone had thought was the innocuous name Section Eight.

  “Why does saying Section Eight always make you smile?” provisional intelligence chief Loren Yeresh asked Carmen Ochoa.

  “It’s just an old joke from Earth,” Carmen told him. “One of the largest militaries there also used the term. What is it you need?”

  “One of our remote pickups in a rebel-held area intercepted this,” Loren told her, bringing up an image on his display. Instead of words, stylized symbols appeared. “I assume it’s a message, but it looks more like pictograms than words. None of our gear can make sense of it. Can you?”

  She felt a shock of recognition that brought a lot of unpleasant memories with it. “Yes. This is an old gang code,” Carmen said. “The Tharks. They control a lot of territory around Tharsis on Mars.”

  “Our enemies are still hiring Reds, then,” Loren said.

  “A lot of people will do almost anything to get off Mars,” Carmen reminded her superior officer. “These Reds are being paid to get to go somewhere else. We could recruit our own,” she added, not able to remember how many times she had made that recommendation.

  And once again Loren Yeresh shook his head. “Carmen, no one trusts them. I agree that’s stupid when we’ve got you as an example, but people don’t look at you and see a Red.”

  “Maybe they should. We need fighters.”

  “I’ll pass your recommendation up the chain again. What’s the message say?”

  “I don’t know all the code,” Carmen said, tapping a semicircular symbol with a short vertical line drawn inside. “That’s a cent. It can mean one or one hundred. And this next one . . . that’s like the beggar code symbol for full so I think it means the cent stands for one hundred. The mark is usually used for money but . . .”

  “That next symbol looks like a gun. This is about an arms shipment?”

  “No,” Carmen said. “The gun represents a person. A man or a woman who is a gang fighter. That’s how a lot of things are done on Mars. People are only worth what they can do or what their work is so they get represented by symbols showing whatever that is.”

  “Really?” Loren asked, studying the symbols. “What sort of symbol represented you on Mars?”

  “None of your damned business.” Carmen took a deep breath. “So, one hundred men and women, fighters. This here, that large, tall triangle with smaller triangles attached to the bottom on either side, represents a spaceship. But it’s got a heavy line under it, so the ship is landed, which means a spaceport.”

  “What’s the horse mean?” Loren asked.

  It did look like a horse, the stick figure drawn with the legs straight up and down as if the animal were standing stock-still. Carmen didn’t have to guess what that meant. “It means a trick. Like a Trojan Horse. That’s where it comes from.”

  The pieces lined up in her head. “This says they’re going to hit our main spaceport with a sneak attack.”

  Loren stared at her. “Are you sure?”

  “That’s what it looks like! Maybe some shipment along the rail line into the spaceport, maybe inside some trucks.”

  She waited as Loren Yeresh called up schedules, flipping rapidly through screens on his pad. “Because of the sabotage to the rail line from Drava, there aren’t any freight trains due in today. But there’s also the mass transit line that goes past the spaceport and has a stop there. I’ll notify the security office—”

  “Wait.” Carmen pointed to another symbol she had recognized. “See that? A circle with short lines radiating out from it? That’s a crater.”

  “A crater? How does that—”

  “A crater represents a threat from above, because something falls and makes a crater. Maybe the threat is someone high-ranking who’s out for you, or maybe it’s a physical threat, like a bomb or an aerospace craft. But it means something dangerous coming from above.”

  “Coming from above. At the spaceport.” Loren flipped through more screens. “There are the usual shuttle runs between here and the orbital facility. I’ll notify security up there.” He paused, thinking. “Trojan Horse. That literally was a big, fake horse, right? So nobody would expect it to hold people.” Loren checked his pad again. “There are also a couple of cargo drops due in. One hundred people. Size . . . size . . . yeah, cargo containers that size could carry that many, and there’s nothing unusual about cargo containers being pressurized to protect the contents. One of the drops is today.”

  “What freighter is dropping it?” Carmen asked as she tapped her pad to call u
p the data. “The Terrance Griep. Supposedly out of Brahma. Arrived here via the jump point from Kappa. Why would a freighter from Brahma have come here from Kappa?” Kappa was a red dwarf, smaller and dimmer and cooler than stars like Kosatka, with a bevy of cold, lifeless worlds circling it. With far better worlds available elsewhere, no one had settled at Kappa, but a few months ago Apulu had claimed ownership of it. Since there was no one with the means and the desire to dispute that claim, it hadn’t yet been challenged.

  Loren leaned over her shoulder to look. “He could have come to Kappa from Catalan. That’s what he reported as his last stop.”

  “He also could have come from Hesta,” Carmen pointed out.

  Her boss pulled up more data. “Shark is handling patrol duties while Piranha is getting some repair work done. The Terrance Griep showed up while Shark was running down another freighter that had jumped in from Jatayu.”

  “That was convenient.”

  “Yeah. It kept Shark from doing any physical search of the Griep before the freighter reached this world. Maybe this job is making me paranoid, but right now I really wish I knew exactly what was in that cargo container that is due to drop in about an hour.”

  “I think we already know what’s in it,” Carmen said.

  He hesitated. “If we’re wrong . . . hell, I’ll call in an alert,” Loren decided. “That’s what we’re here for, right?”

  “Supposedly. Look, we only learned of this because I was working here and I’m a Red,” Carmen said. “We need to hire more. There are good people trapped on the hellhole called Mars. Give them an option to escape Mars and help ourselves at the same time.”

  Loren Yeresh paused long enough to nod to her, his expression serious. “I promise you that I will make that case in the strongest possible terms. You get to the main spaceport fast. I want you there when that drop comes down. Try to get us some live prisoners. The more proof we can get that these ‘rebels’ are being recruited by other star systems, the better our chances of getting help against them.”

  “I’m on my way.” Carmen jumped up and ran out, pausing only to grab her rifle as she went.

  It felt odd to hop into an automated public transit vehicle en route to a fight, but it was the quickest way to get there. The other passengers gave wary looks to Carmen, in her camos and resting the butt of her rifle on the floor of the vehicle. The main city still hadn’t seen much violence from the “rebels,” so Carmen seemed out of place.

  By the time she reached the spaceport the scheduled cargo drop was only fifteen minutes away. Carmen saw soldiers and public security officers streaming toward the port as she dialed in access to the spaceport’s official system to identify the drop pad the cargo would land at.

  “Pad Six,” a security officer called out as she raced by. Carmen joined her, another security officer dropping in alongside. Both carried sidearms in addition to the nonlethal shockers that used to be the sole armament of public security officers.

  Carmen spotted a low shed that offered an overlook of Pad Six and veered off toward it as a squad of militia volunteers added their numbers to those of the public security officers. Hauling herself up on top of the shed, which proved to be a cover for equipment monitoring the cargo pads, Carmen lay down on the roof before looking upward.

  There it was, a spark of light against the blue sky as thrusters fired to slow the descent of the cargo lifter and the container nestled under it.

  Her comm beeped. “All personnel in the vicinity of the spaceport, switch to command frequency two.”

  Carmen made the switch as another announcement boomed across the spaceport’s public announcing system. “All non–security personnel clear the spaceport immediately. Evacuate toward the terminal and out onto the plaza, then wait for instructions. Mass transit, road, and rail access to the spaceport has been temporarily suspended. Repeat, all non–security personnel must leave the spaceport immediately and gather on the plaza outside the entrance to the main terminal.”

  A lot of people were being inconvenienced, Carmen thought. If she’d made a mistake in interpreting that Thark gang code, those people were going to very unhappy with her.

  She readied herself, staying prone as she loaded her rifle and sighted toward the pad, making sure the scope was set to start recording data and automatically relaying it back to where Loren Yeresh waited to forward the information to whoever needed it.

  Another order came over the command circuit, the speaker sounding breathless with either excitement or worry. “All personnel hold fire until order is given. Repeat, do not shoot until order is given.”

  The cargo lifter came down in a flurry of dust devils, dropping nearly vertically on final to Pad Six. The last stage of the descent was slow, coming in gently. The cargo container, ten meters long, six meters wide, and three meters high, bore no external sign of being anything other than a routine drop.

  It must be uncomfortable for those packed closely together inside, Carmen realized. But for a Red, brought up in the harsh living conditions that made Mars misery for all but the elite, it would be just one more thing to endure.

  She really, really hoped none of the men and women inside that cargo container was anyone she had known back on Mars.

  Maybe she was wrong. Maybe it would be the next drop. Or maybe she’d misread that gang code.

  The lifter grounded.

  Automated loading equipment began rolling toward the cargo container, the usual human supervisor nowhere to be seen. Would that tip off the possible occupants of the container?

  The pressure seals popped, and the front of the cargo container dropped, not in the usual deliberate manner but in a sudden fall.

  “Fire!” came across the command circuit.

  Carmen’s sights were on a man carrying a rifle who was in the front rank of those dashing out of the cargo container. He wore lightweight armor, the sort of thing more suited to police patrols than combat action.

  She centered her sights on the man’s chest and fired, deliberately avoiding looking at the man’s face.

  A barrage of fire erupted from a dozen points facing the cargo container, riddling the front ranks of the raiders. The falling bodies in front tripped up and hindered those behind, slowing them and making them easier targets for the defenders.

  Carmen fired again, her scope recording the action. She could see the attackers shouting as they tried to get out of the container, struggling amid their fallen comrades blocking the way, screaming as they were hit, falling and bleeding.

  She had to look away as the defenders’ fire continued to rake the front of the container.

  Cease fire. Please. Cease fire. They’ve been stopped. We’re slaughtering them.

  Realizing that she had to act, Carmen punched her comm. “Request cease-fire! I need prisoners! Live prisoners!”

  Did her message jar someone out of a frenzy of killing? “Cease fire!” the command came.

  How many were left? Carmen saw a dozen men and women stumbling out of the cargo container, their empty hands held up. Some of those lying in heaps near the front of the container were probably still alive. But at least half were surely dead.

  “Thanks, Carmen,” Yeresh said over her comm. “Great job. They could have done a lot of damage and killed a lot of people hitting the spaceport by surprise like that. Thanks to you, they never had a chance.”

  She looked at the bodies lying in front of the cargo container. “Yeah. Great job.” Carmen dropped down off the shed and began walking toward the prisoners, her rifle held across her body. The prisoners were on their knees now, arms raised, nervous soldiers and public safety officers holding weapons still aimed at them.

  Carmen paused to look at the tattoos on the arm of one of the male prisoners. “Tharks,” she confirmed. “This one’s a jed, a high-ranking member of the gang. Keep him separate.”

  The prisoners watched her, t
heir eyes still stunned from the disaster that had befallen their planned attack. “Hey,” one woman called out to Carmen. “You Hellas? ValMar? We deal.”

  Carmen shook her head. “Not Hellas or ValMar. If you talk, we’ll deal. No talk, no deal.”

  “Wherefrom?”

  “Shandakar.”

  “Shanda?” The survivors exchanged glances in which distress warred with the shock at the slaughter of their comrades.

  “What’s their problem?” a security officer asked Carmen.

  “Shandakar is where the wimps on Mars supposedly come from,” Carmen said. “They’re embarrassed at losing to a Shanda.”

  “Reds are crazy,” the officer said. “Except for you.”

  “No, I’m crazy, too,” Carmen said. “Let’s get all of these prisoners in restraints. I don’t want to lose any more.”

  “What about the freighter that dropped them? They must have known about this. There’s no way these people were hidden in that container all the way from Catalan.”

  “I doubt that freighter ever went to Catalan,” Carmen said. “We’ll see what his navigation files say when Shark intercepts him.”

  * * *

  • • •

  High above the planet, the destroyer Shark swooped down toward her prey, looking very much like her namesake on the prowl in the waters of the far-distant world of Earth. Shark had originally been built by the Old Colony of Franklin, using the same plans as those for the Founders Class destroyers of Earth Fleet, and spent over a decade as the Bonhomme Richard. Two and a half years ago, after being declared surplus, Franklin had sold her to Kosatka, which hadn’t been sure who that guy Richard had been and decided that Shark made a better name. She wasn’t the newest warship in space by any measure, but out here Shark was still a force to be reckoned with.

  Especially when Shark’s target was a lumbering, boxy merchant freighter.

  “Merchant ship Terrance Griep, your ship off-loaded a cargo container full of enemy combatants. Stand by to receive a boarding party,” Shark’s commanding officer Commander Pyotr Derian broadcast. Trying to keep ships from smuggling combatants and weaponry down to the surface wasn’t the most exciting job for a warship, but it beat boring holes through endless space while hoping for something interesting to happen. He turned his head to speak to the operations watch stander on the bridge. “Initiate final intercept maneuver.”