Defying Mars (Saving Mars Series-2)

by Cidney Swanson

  “Ah,” said Harpreet. “And you were innocent.”

  Kazuko nodded. “But they needed to blame someone. From what I’ve heard here, the Chancellor does not respond well to scenarios concluding without blame and punishment being assigned.”

  Harpreet nodded. “It is a common failing of the dictatorial.”

  “I’m lucky to be alive, really,” said Kazuko. “And luckier to have escaped interrogation with the Chancellor’s office. Security just threw me in here after asking a few questions about how it was possible for my system to have been hacked.”

  “There is a mercy, certainly, in the discovery that we—or our life’s work—might be less significant than we had believed,” said Harpreet.

  Kazuko laughed softly. “I suppose so. If I’d worked anywhere that really mattered to the government, I’d be dead.”

  “Indeed,” replied Harpreet. “My friend, you have never asked how I came to be here.”

  Kazuko flushed. “It felt like bad manners to ask you.”

  “You are here today as a result of crimes committed by me,” said Harpreet. “Should I find myself someday able, I shall procure your freedom. In the meantime, I crave your forgiveness.”

  Kazuko sat still for several minutes, digesting the news. Then she looked at Harpreet’s soft eyes and murmured, “You’ve been the truest friend I’ve known. There’s nothing to forgive.”

  Not everyone shared Kazuko’s qualms about manners, but few ever thought to ask why Harpreet had been imprisoned. Harpreet was not surprised. She knew from long observation that most people were more interested in talking about themselves than listening to others.

  So she gathered and listened, sorted and waited.

  9

  LOOKS LIKE DIRT

  The weeks following Pavel’s new alliance with Ethan and Brian Wallace were challenging ones. Pavel had never faced considerations as basic as “Where will we sleep?” or “Where does food come from?” It had come as a shock to Pavel to learn that he was financially destitute. He had credits aplenty, but he had no safe means by which to access them if he wanted to remain hidden.

  Ethan, of course, had no credits in his acquired body. Brian Wallace, however, was a very wealthy man, who had laid careful plans to be certain he was never cut off from his credits.

  Unfortunately, Brian’s wealth could not buy the three shelter from among his former acquaintances. After a few hours, or a night at most, former friends confessed their reluctance to act in a way that would set them at odds with Brian’s cousin, the head of Clan Wallace.

  “I’m sorry, truly, but I can’t risk her disfavor,” ran the responses time after time.

  “I’m fine living on the ship,” Pavel declared, stoic.

  “Aye, lad, but he’s not,” replied Brian, indicating Ethan.

  “I will adapt,” said Ethan in a flat voice that little suggested how difficult it might be.

  And so the three lived on their stolen ship, using Brian Wallace’s credits and planning for Ethan’s attempt to complete his mission.

  Something of a breakthrough for Ethan’s mental health came one morning when Pavel woke to the sound of a monotone humming.

  “Eth?” murmured Pavel.

  No response.

  “Ethan?”

  Ethan broke off humming and, after a long minute’s struggle, spoke. “I am finding confinement difficult,” he confessed.

  From the rear of the ship, Elsa whined above Brian’s snores.

  “You and the dog, both,” said Pavel. “Listen man, I’m sorry.” He reached back to release the lock upon Elsa’s crate. “This is no life for either of you.” Pavel ruffled Elsa’s fur, but the dog darted to Ethan, licking his hands, his chin.

  “Elsa,” murmured Ethan. Pavel had successfully reattached muscle, ligament, tendon, and bone in Ethan’s injured limb such that he now had the use of both arms. Ethan dug his two hands deep into Elsa’s coat. Her tail thumped noisily upon the ground.

  “The dog relaxes you,” Pavel said to Ethan. His years at the hospital had made him a keen observer of physiology.

  Ethan’s brows drew close. “Yes,” he replied. “I believe you are correct.”

  From that day, Pavel began monitoring Ethan’s wellbeing, offering frequent prescriptions of “Elsa-time” to his Marsian friend.

  Brian noted the improvement in Ethan’s mental health with a woeful pronouncement. “Me credits come in handy,” Brian said, “But it’s clear enough the real reason ye tolerate me is because of me dog. Ah, well. That’s good enough for me, I suppose.”

  “We’re both exiles, man,” said Pavel, smiling sympathetically. It was a turning point in their relationship.

  Pavel’s friendship with Wallace was cemented a few days later, following a disagreement over what sort of escape vehicle they ought to use for their upcoming mission to the satellite facility.

  “My aunt’s ship is a worthless piece of junk,” declared Pavel. “It’s time we buy something with some real muscle.”

  “‘We,’ indeed,” muttered Wallace.

  “Muscle?” asked Ethan.

  “Figure of speech,” replied Pavel and Brian in unison. They’d grown accustomed to Ethan’s confusion over non-concrete descriptions.

  “We want something that can outrun security,” continued Pavel, growing animated. “Something with some actual power under the hood.”

  “There’s no need to outrun security with an untraceable ship,” argued Brian Wallace.

  Ethan disagreed. “The need for speed could become more paramount in an escape situation,” he said.

  “Exactly,” said Pavel, grinning broadly. “If they can’t catch you, it doesn’t matter if they can trace you or not.”

  “That is incorrect,” said Ethan.

  “Come on, Ethan. Whose side are you on?” asked Pavel.

  “Figure of speech,” murmured Wallace.

  Pavel rolled his eyes. “Look. All I’m saying is this ship is slow. And now, when we’re planning to break into a secure facility, is the kind of situation where speed could be important.”

  In the end, Wallace allowed himself to be persuaded when a ship was found which had the ability to jam tracking technologies.

  “And ye’re certain it has to be this one, lad?” asked Brian Wallace, looking at the sleek, reflective silver of Pavel’s choice—a Hercules-class flyer.

  “It’s got seven times the power of Lucca’s old dust-sucker,” said Pavel. His grin ran ear-to-ear as he dumped the specifications of the new vehicle on Wallace and Ethan. “Just look at her! She beat out the Novum Oddysseum by seventeen minutes in last year’s Singapore Classic. Now, that is a ship, my friends.”

  “Aye, lad,” sighed Brian Wallace. “It’s a ship that says, ‘Notice me, if ye please.’ I don’t care for it.”

  “C’mon, Wallace,” said Pavel. “You don’t think the Chancellor’s ship says, ‘Notice me’?”

  Ethan was staring at both of them with a puzzled look. “Figures of speech?” he asked.

  The pair nodded in response.

  “Sorry, man,” said Pavel.

  “Conversations with the two of you are most educational,” replied Ethan. “Brian Wallace, the racing ship is approximately twenty percent less likely to gather notice than the Chancellor’s luxury vehicle.”

  “Ye don’t say?” asked Brian, surprised.

  And so the trio flew away in a newer, faster, and very much shinier Hercules-class craft that afternoon, Pavel whooping at the helm as he put the ship through her paces.

  “Thanks, man,” said Pavel to Brian Wallace, grinning broadly.

  “You’re entirely welcome, lad,” replied Wallace.

  The two argued less after that. In fact, after attracting stares and whistles at their next stop, Pavel allowed Wallace to persuade him of the need for something less visually appealing and consented to having the ship painted a dull shade of brown.

  “It looks like dirt,” Pavel said sadly when they’d completed the transformation.r />
  “Aye,” said Wallace, snorting with laughter. “So it does. Dirt. That’s something we two can agree on.”

  Meanwhile, Wallace’s many connections with the underground world of activities deemed criminal by Lucca Brezhnaya’s government proved to have their uses. The Scot was not able to obtain direct assistance from Clan Wallace to break into the satellite facility. But through means indirect, the party of Brian, Pavel, and Ethan were finally equipped with scan passes, codes, and intelligence about security within the building, which appeared to have been down-graded to video-surveillance and one security guard only, if reports were to be believed.

  The evening of their planned mission arrived. Ethan estimated that he needed ninety minutes to finish the work of redirecting the control of the satellites to MCC. Pavel suggested they arrive between four-thirty and five in the morning, a time night-shift guards favored for drinking the strong black Budapesti coffee known as kávé.

  “Zussman—our butler—worked security when he was a twobody,” said Pavel. “He swore by that four-thirty cup of coffee to get you through ‘til the shift ended.”

  This led to another disagreement between Brian and Pavel as Pavel steered the craft toward Budapest.

  “Lad, we don’t want security distracted,” said Brian Wallace. “We want them unconscious.”

  “That is not an acceptable first option,” replied Pavel.

  Ethan stepped between the two, figuratively, suggesting that Pavel was well-informed to know what sort of drug might render someone unconscious with the least amount of damage to the individual’s person.

  Wallace shrugged his agreement. “It’s more humane than striking them a blow to the brains, I’ll grant ye.”

  Ethan, who had been researching medicinal methods of knocking someone out, made several suggestions and Pavel grudgingly approved one of them. He didn’t like the idea of harming someone who could have been Zussman.

  “You are a healer,” said Ethan. “It would be morally reprehensible in you to be eager to cause harm.”

  Pavel looked at his long fingers arrayed upon the nav-panel. He had been a healer. Now he didn’t know what he was.

  He brought the ship to a halt just one street over from the satellite facility.

  Quietly, they gathered the few supplies they required. Then the two walking and the one hovering made their way in a silence broken only by the sound, overhead, of large cruisers carrying commuters to or from work. The air was fresh with the nutmeg-scent of something like fossil fuels or perhaps paint thinner. Pavel, who had been hoping to smell kávé, was disappointed. At the corner of a neighboring building, Ethan stopped to wait, leaving him closest to the ship and safety, while the other two proceeded ahead of him.

  Ethan had manufactured earpieces similar to those he and Jessamyn had once worn, so that the three could stay in communication with one another.

  When Brian Wallace and Pavel reached the narrow food-service entrance in back, it became Wallace’s turn to stay behind while Pavel scouted out the building. Pavel proceeded cautiously around a darkened corner toward the room Ethan would need to access. Having seen no one yet made Pavel nervous rather than confident, but he gave the signal for Ethan to cross the empty lot and enter the building. Wallace remained to stand guard at the entrance.

  Vaguely, Pavel wondered if Ethan would feel afraid approaching the place where he’d been captured by Red Squadron Forces. A slow minute ticked past and then Pavel heard the hum of Ethan’s hoverchair.

  Shizer, he thought. He hadn’t counted on the noise of Ethan’s mode of transport. The slight whine was a result of a modification Pavel had made to boost power to the chair. Wallace had laughed at what Pavel had done, calling it overkill. Pavel didn’t see how giving a hoverchair the ability to outpace most hoverbikes was a mistake. He’d have wanted it if he were reliant upon a chair to get around.

  But the whining sound didn’t give them away; the place seemed abandoned. Ethan appeared and immediately set to work upon a flat panel lining the entire wall of the small room. Pavel consulted a chronometer and then left Ethan so as to stand guard in the hall. The building was eerily silent.

  But after some twenty minutes had passed, the quiet hum was joined by the sound of Brian Wallace’s voice in Pavel’s earpiece.

  “We’ve got company, lads,” whispered Wallace.

  “Shizer!” Pavel muttered, already dashing back to Ethan.

  “Visitors! We’ve got to go—now!” whispered Pavel. “This way!”

  But Ethan was gliding in a different direction. “Follow me,” Ethan said to Pavel. “I have memorized the floor plans.”

  Pavel nodded.

  “Grab the back of my chair,” Ethan called softly.

  A moment later when Ethan put the hoverchair through its paces, careening madly around corners and down corridors, Pavel understood the genius of having him ride behind. It was faster and quieter than running.

  Beyond one open door, Pavel thought he saw a flash of red armor and his heart began to beat wildly.

  We should be to Wallace by now, he thought worriedly.

  And then abruptly they were back to Wallace. Who was pinned against the wall by an officer in red.

  10

  BUNCH OF BLAMED FOOLS

  The sun had risen hours ago and glided now along its summer-arc, warming Mars’s northern hemisphere to just above freezing. Jessamyn stood outside her home awaiting the arrival of her transport. Her time with her parents had left her frustrated, and she kicked at small rocks along the front of their home. When this failed to settle her, she began to pick them up and throw them as far as she could, gazing with envy at the freedom with which the rocks sailed away.

  A small hopcraft arrived within half an hour and Jess repeated the unsatisfying experience of not being the pilot inside one of the Secretary’s transports.

  Upon arriving at MCC, frustrated and disgruntled, she slipped out of her walk-out suit and was immediately ushered into the private office of Mars’s CEO.

  “Good morning, Pilot Jaarda,” said Mei Lo, smiling.

  “Madam Secretary,” said Jess, nodding in deference, trying to shed the frown that had taken up residence upon her face.

  “I’m behind schedule as usual,” said Mei Lo. “Some things never change.” A swift shake of her head. “I need to discuss a pressing matter with you.” The Secretary rose and crossed to a small window set to overlook the Marsian desert. “In spite of your brother’s efforts, we do not have control of the satellite array.”

  Jess frowned. “My parents told me everyone is saying the lasers can’t hurt us anymore.”

  “Yes. We had a fine time decoding your brother’s message, I can tell you.” She pressed her lips together. “Unfortunately, that information was leaked to all of Mars Colonial and has now become a banner behind which many rally.”

  “I heard about the faction who want to reopen trade with Earth,” said Jessamyn.

  “You would have, with Lillian and Geoffrey for parents. They’ve been a great support.” Mei Lo sighed softly. “But merely turning off the targeting lasers solves very little and has created new problems for MCC.”

  “I’m happy to tell everyone the truth about Terrans,” said Jessamyn. “The way I see it, we just need to educate the citizens of Mars Colonial as to the true nature of Terrans and that will do two things. It’ll change everyone’s mind about trade relations and convince anyone who needs convincing that we owe it to the Mars Raiders to bring them home.”

  “Jessamyn, Jessamyn,” said Mei Lo, sighing. “If only things were that straightforward.”

  “It’s very simple, Ma’am,” said Jessamyn, gathering steam. “You’re right that I didn’t tell you everything about my encounters on Earth. But I’m willing to lay it all out in front of you. And when I do, it will be plain as day that we do not want to establish relations with any member of the Terran government.”

  “You don’t have to convince me,” said the Secretary. “What you don’t understand i
s that you won’t be able to convince those who are pro-trade.”

  Jess scowled. “You’re right I don’t understand. But it’s pretty basic: Terrans are cruel and selfish and wasteful. What’s so hard about explaining that to people?”

  Mei Lo rose and stood before the small window behind her desk. “I can’t send you back,” she said at last.

  Jessamyn spluttered, attempting to begin a new argument.

  “No—” Mei Lo held up a hand. “I cannot send you back now. If we are very careful and considered in our actions for the next twenty-three months, it may be possible to send a rescue party the next time Earth draws near.”

  Jess felt her skin grow suddenly cold. “If I don’t go now, I think my brother will die,” she said softly. “He won’t make it a full annum. I just know it.”

  The Secretary shook her head. “If I were to send a ship now, without making allowances for trade, the public outrage would grow beyond what I can contain. My government would fall. I’m doing everything in my power to prevent that, Jess, because if this government goes down, the one that rises in its place will be committed to changes to the Marsian way of life that will destroy us.”

  When she finished, the two remained silent, the room echoing with the Secretary’s words.

  “I don’t understand,” said Jess at last.

  “I know,” said Mei Lo. “There are days I don’t understand either.”

  Jessamyn sat still for a moment, gazing at the opaque-glass door sealing off Mei Lo’s office. Shadows passed by in ones and twos. “Do the people who say they want us to trade with Earth really mean it? They’re not just, I don’t know, flirting with the idea?”

  “They believe and argue with passion that it is in Mars’s best interest to re-open trade,” replied the Secretary.

  Jess didn’t know what to say. She only knew she would never, ever, want to be in a position to bargain with Lucca Brezhnaya or her government.

  Mei Lo sighed softly. “I’ve managed to keep peace by promising to carefully examine the possibility of sending a negotiations team in an annum. That’s what this has come to: delay as my best option. My government has maintained that the Galleon cannot fly again so soon after her recent voyages. I never thought I’d say this, but there is a mercy in our having only one space-worthy craft.”