Déjà vu all over again, he thought. The ring was just too large for his peace of mind. They couldn’t isolate the enemy-held sectors completely and they couldn’t destroy the entire structure. The debris falling on the planet below would make the Endor Holocaust look like a child’s tea party. And if we don’t get them out, who knows what will happen?
He glanced up as he heard something above him, a second before a trio of small aliens dropped out of a hatch. They lashed out with makeshift weapons, trying to hurt or kill a human before they were gunned down. Martin didn’t hesitate. He shot them down before they could hurt anyone, then kept pushing down the corridor. The little aliens were servitors ... he wondered, darkly, why they hadn’t simply joined the rebel forces. Surely, they would have been welcome. Or maybe they’d never realised it was a possibility. There was enough horror being openly broadcast over the airwaves for any surviving enemy forces and their collaborators to have grave doubts about their chances if they surrendered.
“We have reinforcements on the way,” Butler said. “Rebel troops.”
“Surprise, surprise,” Martin muttered. He would have preferred human troops. “Are they armed and ready?”
“They say they’re armed and ready,” Butler said. “And they’re coming.”
Martin nodded, then glanced into a large room. A handful of bodies lay on the ground. He frowned, wondering how they’d died. They didn’t look to have been shot, or caught in one of the explosions ... it took him a moment to realise they’d poisoned themselves. They were older children, or young adults ... his gorge rose as it dawned on him they’d killed themselves, or had been killed, to keep themselves from falling into rebel hands. He swallowed hard to keep from throwing up, feeling disturbed in a manner he found almost impossible to articulate. The slaughter just kept growing worse.
He put it out of his mind as he forced himself on, searching room after room for the enemy. The compartments were empty, hardly any movement in the tubes or shafts that kept the complex alive. The enemy must be retreating, falling back in hopes of surviving just for a few minutes longer ... he let himself wonder if they were already dead, if they had all killed themselves, but he didn’t believe it. Surely, they wouldn’t all have killed themselves. He thought he tasted despair as he kept inching forwards. What would he have done, if the barbarians were at the gates? Would he have shot Yolanda, and any kids they might have had, to save them from being raped or worse? Or ...
A movement caught his eye. A humanoid shape stood in the darkness, peering at him. He tensed, bringing his rifle to bear on the alien. It took a step forward, into the light. A Tokomak, naked save for a belt. Martin wasn’t reassured. The Tokomak had been messing around with implanted weapons while humans were still bashing each other’s heads in with rocks. The alien could be enhanced to the point where it - he, judging by the genitals - would be a fair match for the entire platoon. It was impossible to be sure. He felt his finger tighten on the trigger. One false move and the alien would be blasted to pieces.
“Halt,” he barked.
The alien raised his hands, palm outwards. “We wish to surrender and throw ourselves on your protection,” he said. The voice was raspy, oddly unnerving. “Please, will you protect us?”
“Come out with your hands up, leaving all your weapons behind,” Martin ordered. His mouth was suddenly dry. The vast majority of the ring’s population wanted the Tokomak dead. All the Tokomak dead. He swore, inwardly, as the aliens appeared. There were kids amongst them, kids who looked to be in their first decade. It was never easy to be sure with aliens, but ... he gritted his teeth. It wasn’t going to be easy to get them to a POW camp without trouble. “This way.”
He studied them as they inched forwards. Up close, they looked surprisingly human as long as they didn’t move. It seemed almost a betrayal when they did move, their too-long arms and legs jerking in ways only a contortionist could match. They appeared so close to humanity that he found it hard to even look at them, as if he could be tricked into believing them human if he didn’t take care. It was hard to be sure, again, but he thought they looked terrified. He didn’t blame them. Mobs were stupid and dangerous. They’d tear the prisoners limb from limb if they got a chance.
Butler nudged him. “You sure about this, sir?”
“Yes,” Martin said, curtly. “It has to be done.”
He detailed two men to inspect the alien positions, and try to determine if there were any more inside, then motioned for the aliens to keep moving. If they were lucky ... he keyed his throatmike, reporting on the prisoners and asking the rebel command to clear a path to the FOB. There were already a handful of prisoners in the base, aliens who’d been stunned or managed to surrender before it was too late. Martin told himself, firmly, that the POWs could speak to hold-outs, reassuring them that it was safe to surrender. But, in truth, he wasn’t sure that was actually true.
His heart started to pound as they made their way along the main corridor. It was massive by human standards, easily the size of an interstate, but he still felt confined. The ring was really too big. He would have preferred something smaller, something more ... personal. The ring was an impressive piece of work ... his thoughts slammed to a halt as he saw the mob, looming in the distance. He heard a cry of dismay from behind him and bit his lip. It wasn’t going to look good, if they had to open fire on the mob to save the prisoners. And yet, he wasn’t going to send them to be killed either.
A rebel leader, marked by a red armband, strode forward. “Thank you for capturing these people for us,” he said. “You can hand them over now.”
“We’re going to take them back to the FOB, where they will be treated as prisoners,” Martin said. He kept his voice calm. Mobs could scent fear. “You can take your team to secure the rear.”
The leader looked worried. Martin winced, inwardly. The great problem with rebel cells - with any sort of insurgency, really - was that the chain of command was nothing more than fiction. A leader who lost face would often lose control, once his position was damaged beyond repair. His people might turn on him, or worse. Martin kicked himself, silently, for forgetting the lessons of the streets. He’d grown too used to law and order, to a clear chain of command ...
“We want them,” the leader said. “Justice!”
“Justice,” the mob echoed. “Justice!”
“There will be justice,” Martin said. “But they have to have fair trials.”
“Give them to us,” the leader ordered. “Now.”
Martin leaned forward, lowering his voice. “We promised we would protect them, if they surrendered. We meant it. If you try to take them by force, we’ll open fire. Your people will be killed. And afterwards, when the fleet arrives, there will be no help for your planet and it will be your fault. Take your people and go.”
The words hung on the air, just for a second. Martin tensed. The marines would kill hundreds of people, if it came down to a fight, but ... in the end, they would be overwhelmed and killed themselves. God alone knew what would happen when word reached the higher leadership - and Piece - on Tokomak One. They’d be unable to decide between punishing whatever remained of the mob, to please their human allies, or letting the mob go unpunished to please their population. It wouldn’t be an easy choice ...
“Fine,” the leader said. “But there will be justice!”
He turned and walked away, speaking to his people as he led them around the marines and further into the ring. They hissed and spat at the prisoners, but nothing worse. Martin breathed a sigh of relief as they resumed their march, hoping and praying they’d reach the FOB before something else happened. Sweat trickled down his back. He’d fled one set of rough streets to build a career for himself in the marines. He didn’t want to die on another set of streets.
The FOB was a large complex that had been a school, before it had been taken over by the provisional government and placed in the care of their most reliable troops. Martin handed the prisoners over to the guards, with cl
ear instructions for their care and dire threats of what would happen if they were mistreated in any way. He hoped they’d listen, now that they were building a new world for themselves. The desire for revenge ran deep, but so did the desire for something new ...
You’re thinking like a Solarian, he reminded himself. You should be thinking like an Earther.
His intercom chimed. “Captain,” Piece said. “We need to talk.”
“I suppose we do,” Martin said. He motioned for Butler to take command. “You can teleport me, can’t you?”
He closed his eyes, a moment before the teleport field gripped him. The tingle ran up and down his body, seemingly timeless even though he knew it was a bare second or two. There were no shortage of horror stories about ghosts in the matter stream, of entities that existed in the never-never land of teleport space ... stories that wouldn’t go away, no matter how extensively they were debunked. He opened his eyes and breathed a sigh of relief as he looked around Tokomak One. Relaying the teleport signal through a pair of booster stations was always a risk. It wouldn’t be taken if things weren’t urgent.
“They’re planning to rename the station something else,” Piece said. He stood by the control pad, watching Martin with grim eyes. “Freedom One, perhaps.”
“I think the name’s already taken,” Martin said. He didn’t try to hide his irritation. “Why did you recall me so quickly?”
Piece met his eyes. “The rebel commanders have already lodged complaints about you taking prisoners,” he said. “Did you have to ...?”
“Yes.” Martin looked back at him, refusing to even think about backing down. “I’m not going to preside over a slaughter. Sir.”
“Our allies want to take control of the ring,” Piece pointed out. “They say ...”
“It will be a great deal easier to take control, without the enemy kicking and screaming and ruining as much as possible before they get rounded up and killed, if the Tokomak think they can surrender,” Martin countered. “If they think they’ll be killed anyway, sir, why in the umpteen billion names of God would they surrender? They might as well do what they can to hurt us before we wipe them out.”
“I understand your point,” Piece said. “But ...”
“Understand this,” Martin said. “I will not be responsible, directly or indirectly, for a slaughter. If enemy combatants surrender to me, they will be treated in line with official procedures for handling POWs and their dependents. We will treat them well as long as they behave themselves.”
Piece cocked an eyebrow. “Do you understand just how many slaughters you kicked off when you captured Tokomak One?”
Martin felt the urge to slam his fist into the deep-cover agent’s face. “Yes. I do. I also know we had to take the station. And yes, I know there were slaughters. I do have blood on my hands. But I won’t slaughter helpless prisoners, sir. Is that understood?”
“I’ve communicated as much to our allies,” Piece said. “They may insist on securing the remainder of the ring themselves.”
“And much joy I wish them of it,” Martin said. The ring was staggeringly huge. It would take years for the entire structure to be searched from top to bottom. “Now, was there a reason you called me beyond chewing my ass about prisoners?”
Piece shrugged. “You’ll be pleased to know the latest raid was turned back,” he said, as he led the way out the chamber and down the corridor. “The gravity point defenders aren’t interested in doing more than sniping at us.”
“For the moment,” Martin said. He’d seen the LinkShip’s report. An alien fleet - an unimaginably huge alien fleet - was bearing down on the Twins. Admiral Teller was on his way, if the last update they’d received was accurate, but he might not get to the Twins first. “What happens when their fleet arrives?”
“We get our asses kicked,” Piece said. “There’s no way we can stand off even a fraction of that fleet.”
Martin nodded, curtly, as they entered the command centre. A dozen aliens sat at consoles, working frantically to get the defences on line and build up a datanet before the Tokomak arrived to knock it down again. They’d taken control of the fixed defences, but they had very little mobile firepower. A handful of freighters, crammed with missiles, would delay the Tokomak for a few seconds before they were blown away. The gunboats would pose a tougher threat, but the Tokomak could afford to simply ignore them and concentrate on the orbital defences. They’d know the gunboats wouldn’t pose a long-term threat.
Unless they decide Admiral Teller is a more important target, he told himself. They might just let us live long enough to delay them for a minute, if they concentrate on Admiral Teller.
“So,” he said. “Is there any update from the Admiral?”
“None.” Piece indicated the screen. “Our best-case estimate is that he gets here first, whereupon he can make a stand on the gravity point. Our worst-case is that he gets here too late, after the aliens have had a chance to deploy themselves. That’s pretty much guaranteed disaster.”
“For us,” Martin said. “They might move their fleet too close to the gravity point.”
“They’ve got enough point defence that it probably won’t matter,” Piece said. “And, in any case, they’re not likely to repeat their old mistakes. They’ll keep the fleet at a distance and smash Admiral Teller’s ships, one by one, as they try to make transit. It may not be a complete disaster, but ...”
“It will be,” Martin predicted. He knew Admiral Stuart was doing something, but ... it didn’t matter. They had to hold the Twins or everything they’d done would be for nothing. “Can we not find a way to weaken them?”
“So far, no.” Piece tapped the display. Large clusters of red icons orbited the gravity points. “They can’t get to us, right now, but we can’t get to them either. But once they get reinforcements, all those calculations will go out the airlock.”
Martin nodded. “I know the score.”
“I know,” Piece echoed. “We see no way to change it.”
“And there’s no point in trying to talk to them,” Martin said. The Tokomak hadn’t answered any of their hails, even the ones offering to organise a local truce until the war was over. “Or have the rebel leaders changed their calculations?”
“They can’t.” Piece shrugged. “If they surrender, they’ll be slaughtered. They knew it before the uprising began.”
Martin glanced at the console, wondering - not for the first time - if Piece really cared. An uprising on the Twins, particularly one that took out the planetary infrastructure and the trained workforce, would help humanity even if the Tokomak fought their way back into the system and regained control. It would make a certain kind of sense to let the Tokomak and rebels fight it out, while humanity waited for the right moment to push through the gravity point. He rebelled, instinctively, against the logic ... but he understood it. God, he understood it. He just thought it was revolting.
In more senses than one, he thought. What happens to the galaxy if the rebel forces are gravely weakened?
“Then we should start making plans for the coming battle,” he said. It went against the grain to just wait to be attacked, even though he knew there were times when there was no other way to proceed. “We do have all those missiles stockpiled, don’t we?”
“Not enough,” Piece said. A set of red icons appeared on the display. Urgent commands echoed around the compartment as the operators struggled to deal with the new threat. “I’m afraid we’re dependent on Admiral Teller. If he doesn’t get here soon, we’re screwed.”
Chapter Thirty-One
“Admiral,” Yolanda said. “We’ll drop out of FTL in twenty seconds.”
“Understood,” Hoshiko said. The fleet was already at red alert, just in case the Tokomak had had enough warning to set up a gravity net and yank them out of FTL ahead of time. “Be ready to engage if necessary ...”
She silently counted down the last few seconds, bracing herself as the fleet shuddered back into normal space. They�
�d used the tethers to convince the locals that only a relative handful of ships were bearing down on Crux, but there was no way to be sure the defenders would fall for it. The Tokomak had used the trick themselves, time and time again. She leaned forward as the display rapidly updated, revealing a system frantically scrambling to defend itself. Crux had an immense industrial base, with enough natural resources to keep a spacefaring civilisation going for hundreds of thousands of years. The only downside, as far as the Tokomak were concerned, was that it lacked a gravity point. They’d surveyed the system extensively, according to the files, but found none. It had to have been a disappointment.
Her lips quirked as the fleet shook itself down, heading straight towards the shipyards. Crux was important to the Tokomak, both as an industrial centre and as the first system they’d settled after they’d invented the stardrive. The massive settlements on the system’s planets were completely dominated by the Tokomak, with only a relative handful of other races ... according to the census. There was a permanent underclass of undocumented workers, the files stated, but they simply didn’t have any legal rights. If they stayed quiet, they were ignored; if they caused trouble, they were summarily shot or deported. Hoshiko was fairly sure there wouldn’t be any revolutions or insurgencies here. Crux just didn’t have the population to make them practical.
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