She kept her eyes on their attackers as she heard him pull one of the attached lines out of the wall and hook it securely around his waist. She heard scraping as he began shoving the cargo to one side, exposing the ship’s side door. If she got low enough, she could open the door, and he could shove the containers out, one by one. Twenty seconds, tops. Maybe less.
“Two minutes,” she told him. “Stay behind those containers, dammit. Keep covered.”
But before she could steer them lower, the alarm came again. “We are being targeted,” the shuttle repeated calmly. On the tactical display, she could see the small lights moving toward them from three directions this time. Too many, and far too fast.
“Hang on, Arin!” she shouted, and took the controls back to manual. One of the shots would miss, she could see; the other two seemed to be homing in on them. Different firing systems, then; their attackers were neither experienced nor properly prepared. Which doesn’t mean their strategy won’t work. She watched the faster shot get closer and closer to them, and as it closed in, she rolled them abruptly to one side. She heard the containers shift, and the missile swept past them.
But the second detonated not thirty meters from their undercarriage, and they were suddenly pitched forward, nose toward the ground, the ship’s engines groaning as they attempted to compensate. “Arin!” she shouted.
“I’m okay!” he shouted back. “Elena, just get—”
They hit the ground nose-first, the front window slamming into the dirt, obscuring her visibility entirely. The harness kept her from dropping onto the ceiling as they skidded upside down through the frozen dust, far faster than they should have; the engines were whining, trying to soften the landing, and she thought they had been damaged. In an instant, though, the engines no longer mattered: they slammed against something she couldn’t see, she jerked roughly against her harness, and the engines shut down.
“Arin?” she said, unbuckling herself, her feet dropping onto the ship’s ceiling. “You still hooked in?”
There was silence, and everything in her went cold.
“Arin!” She rushed toward the containers. Where they had been carefully lined up on the floor they were now tossed about the ceiling like huge squares of confetti, on top of each other and in corners, a few broken open, seeds scattered. She saw the safety cable behind one of them and grabbed it, pulling; it resisted. She shoved at the container covering it; the heaviest of them was ninety kilos in this gravity. If she braced herself against the wall she should be able to shift it. Squeezing between the container and the wall, she positioned her feet and set her shoulders, then took a deep breath and shoved. The container slid reluctantly away from her, and fell off to the left.
Arin was crumpled against the wall, unmoving.
She rushed to him, careful not to shift him. She could see his chest rising and falling rapidly, and she felt a glimmer of relief. Where was the damn med scanner on this ship? Under a pile of containers, she realized; she would have to rely on her rusty field training. Pressing her gloved fingers against the thin fabric of his suit hood, she took the pulse in his throat; a little fast, but steady enough. She cleared the debris away from him, trying not to move him, unsure of where he had been hit and how hard. His nose was bleeding; it was clearly broken. As she was running her hands carefully along his arm, he stirred and groaned.
“Sit still,” she told him sharply.
“What,” he said.
“We’ve crashed,” she told him. “You got hit with a container. Be still; I don’t know how badly you’re hurt.”
He opened his eyes; both pupils, she noted, were even. His concussion couldn’t be too bad. “Why’d they shoot at us?” he asked, coherently enough.
“Because they don’t want us here.”
He looked confused. “We’re bringing them food.”
“We’re interfering in local politics.”
“Don’t they need us?”
Now was not the time for a lesson. “Lie still, Arin. I’m going to see who I can contact.”
She made her way back to the front of the ship and managed to pull up a rudimentary console. No comms at all, but the environmental controls were still on: air, temperature. They could breathe, at least.
Unfortunately, they couldn’t shoot, and she cursed. If she’d been running this mission off of Galileo, she would have been carrying a sidearm. There would have been half a dozen pulse rifles in the cargo hold, just in case. Fucking freighters.
They were lying here, upside down in the dirt, and they were helpless.
Chapter 6
“You don’t have to come, sir,” Greg had told Herrod. “I’m guessing there’s going to be more shouting and denials than discussion this time.”
Herrod had given him a familiar look of mild amusement. “Shouting and denials require diplomacy, too, Captain,” he had pointed out. “And while I may not be able to throw my weight around anymore”—here he gestured at Greg’s assembled security detail, eight armed soldiers of considerable size—“I can still sling a pulse rifle if the situation calls for it.”
Greg had the distinct impression Herrod was having fun.
In the end he had settled for a single platoon with two senior soldiers: Bristol and Darrow, both of whom he knew well, both of whom knew how to be unobtrusive when they needed to be. “With any luck,” he told the platoon, “this is a false alarm, and you’ll all be nothing more than pomp and circumstance. But keep your eyes open, and stay on your toes.”
He could have taken a pilot, or at least a cabin crew, but Greg was fond of flying, and as the ship’s captain he rarely got a chance to do it. Herrod had the good sense to settle himself in Sparrow’s passenger cabin instead of sitting copilot, so Greg had the space to himself. Sparrow was an easy shuttle to fly, smooth and responsive, and Greg almost never engaged the autopilot, even when it would have freed him up to do something else. He could watch the stars, see the moon advance through the front window, while keeping an eye on surface scans and nudging their direction now and then.
Almost as relaxing as running. He smiled.
Oarig had denied any plans to intercept the food drop. “Why would we interfere with a commercial shipment?” he asked, and Greg had no rational answer. He hadn’t pointed out that few of Oarig’s actions since his precipitous installation had made commercial sense. If Oarig was preparing some sort of ambush, it spoke of inexperience. The Admiralty had no intelligence on Oarig, but Greg was guessing, based on his appearance, that if he was more than twenty it was not by much. Not enough time to learn real politics, no matter how young he had started.
In contrast, Villipova, the governor of Smolensk, was a grim-faced woman of fifty-four, used to occasional violence, but reasonably skilled at dealing with corporations and trade. Greg had dealt with her under less stressful circumstances, and had found her unfailingly practical, if not prone to overtures of friendliness. During their negotiations she had seemed tired and irritable, and had struggled with letting Oarig speak his mind. She clearly thought the Baikul governor was foolishly inflexible, and much of Greg’s challenge had been getting her to listen long enough to understand the areas where Oarig was open to compromise.
When he had briefed Commander Broadmoor on the tactical situation, he had told her to expect both domes to be coordinating attacks on each other. “This attack may just be the start,” he’d said. “Keep the troop shuttles on deck, and your people ready to go. And if you detect anything more radioactive than a thorium mine—you alert me instantly, understood?”
Greg had no doubt Oarig would revel in Central sending infantry to Smolensk, but he doubted the governor would sit silent when Baikul received the same treatment. Greg’s orders to Emily Broadmoor had been clear: she was to deploy the others if—and only if—she thought a show of firepower was the only way to prevent the colony from blowing itself up.
They were still ten minutes out from the dome when Commander Broadmoor commed him. “Sir,” she told him, “we’re s
howing some activity on the surface. Pulse rifles, and what looks like a wreck.”
Here we go, he thought. “Any distress calls?”
“Hang on . . .” She was silent for a moment, then: “There’s a beacon, sir. It’s a cargo ship off of Budapest.”
Greg hit Sparrow’s comm. “Savosky?”
“This is Yuri Gorelik. Captain Foster, is that you?”
Savosky had not yet returned, then. “We’re getting a beacon from one of your shuttles down here. Looks like they got caught in some surface fighting. Are you in touch with them?”
“No, Captain, we’re not.” Gorelik sounded concerned. “Captain Savosky is on his way back right now. Shaw was supposed to be making the cargo drop.”
“On her own?” The question came out before Greg realized what he was asking. Of course Elena would have managed a way to do it on her own.
But that wasn’t what was worrying Gorelik. “She was supposed to be alone,” he said. “But it seems we’re missing our other mechanic. Arin Goldjani. Captain Foster—” There was a pause. “He’s nineteen. Not experienced. He was meant to stay here for this mission. We think he stowed away.”
He was also, Greg knew, Yuri and Bear’s adopted son. “Are you getting anything from them at all?”
“Just the beacon, as you are.”
Shit. “The colonists must have a local jammer,” he said. The alternative—that the crew could not respond—was unthinkable. “Your cargo ships don’t carry weapons, do they?”
“No, Captain.” Gorelik’s voice was grim. “They do not.”
Greg was changing course even as he commed Jessica. “Commander, get in touch with Oarig and tell him if he’s got anything to do with shooting at fucking civilian freight ships trying to bring his own people fucking food, this is no longer going to be a neutral negotiation.”
Jessica got the point quickly. “Is it Elena?”
“Of course it’s Elena. And apparently some green kid who followed her down.”
Jessica swore concisely. “On it, sir.”
Admiral Herrod appeared at his elbow. “Problem, Captain?”
“We need to divert, sir,” Greg said. “Someone shot down a cargo carrier. They’ve put up a distress beacon, but Budapest can’t contact them.”
He waited for Herrod to lodge a protest, or at the very least grant permission; but it seemed Herrod had grown accustomed to his retirement. “What’s our strategy?”
“Our strategy,” Greg said, loudly enough for the others to hear, “is to clear the comm signal, get to the civilian vessel, and avoid deadly force as much as we can. Which means we threaten the hell out of them and get them to stand down long enough for us to get our people out. Darrow, Bristol?”
“Sir,” they said simultaneously.
“You perceive a credible threat that you can’t disarm, you defend, understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
He kept Sparrow on a clean vector and watched for the shuttle’s telemetry: it seemed to have some power, and he held out hope Elena was all right. After several minutes, the wreck appeared on the horizon, and as they grew closer, he saw enough to feel relief. The shuttle, intact but flat on its back, was surrounded by massive cargo bins: the food the colony so sorely needed. Without weapons—why the fuck do freighters drop in war zones without weapons?—she had defended her ship with the only leverage she had: the cargo they were trying to steal.
“Sparrow, what’s in the area?”
“Four hundred and sixty-two people,” Sparrow said calmly.
“Moving?”
“Yes.”
“In the same direction?”
“No.”
“Put them up on tactical.”
They were clumped in two groups, relatively even in number, and they were moving toward each other. Typical Yakutsk: domes so interested in choking each other off that they missed all of their common ground. He would have left them to their futile devices, but Elena’s downed shuttle was right in between them.
He swore again, and tried comms. “This is Sparrow calling the shuttle off of Budapest.” Pick the fuck up.
“The other shuttle is not receiving comms,” Sparrow told him.
“Can they send?”
“No.”
“Are we close enough to break a comms jam?”
“No.”
“How long until we reach her?”
“One minute seventeen seconds.”
Eternity. Shit. “Are any of those people targeting the shuttle?”
“Insufficient information to determine target.”
“Is the shuttle in the line of fire?”
“Yes.”
“How likely are they to light up?”
“Direct impact at a range of less than two hundred meters will result in ninety-four percent likelihood of an incendiary event.”
Damn, damn, damn. What he wouldn’t give to just open up on both groups of colonists. He recognized it as frustration, but he found himself long over the impulse to rescue people who would shoot at those sent to help.
“What are they firing?” he asked the shuttle. It was remotely possible they were using something old, something that might be vulnerable to a generated EMP or even a radio jam.
“Plasma P7 rifles,” Sparrow said.
“How many?”
“Five hundred and forty units. Two hundred and twelve with the group south of the shuttle, the rest with the group north of the shuttle.”
More guns than people. Never a good equation. “Sparrow, keep an eye on Budapest’s shuttle. If any of those rifles locks on her, fire on the shooter. Understood?”
“Understood.”
If Sparrow shot a colonist, it would be an act of war. It might also come far too late to save Elena and Arin Goldjani.
But Greg would sleep better.
Behind him, all nine of his passengers were pulling on env suits. Herrod returned again, and said, “I can pilot, Captain.”
Greg met Herrod’s eyes through the clear fabric hood of his suit. Serious, military, entirely straightforward. He nodded, and stood. Herrod slipped into his seat.
“The comms jam is broken,” Sparrow said as they approached.
Greg tied into the colonists’ comms. “Drop your weapons!” he shouted. “This is Captain Greg Foster of the CCSS Galileo. That shuttle you’re targeting contains people in need of medical help. According to the Armed Conflict Act of 2976—”
One of the colonists pointed his P7 upward and took a shot at Sparrow.
They were high enough that the shot did nothing but scar the shuttle’s hull, but the message was clear. Before Greg could shout an order, Herrod was keying in a command, and Sparrow laid down a line of shots ten meters before each group of colonists. Greg saw them stop, saw some of them throw up their arms before their faces, saw a few turn and run. You guys are the brains of the outfit, he thought at the fleeing people. Herrod dropped Sparrow to the ground in front of the others.
“Stand the fuck down, all of you,” Greg shouted over the comm, “or we’ll shoot straight next time!”
They did not, he observed, drop their guns, but they stopped advancing and avoided pointing anything at his ship. He stood, grabbing one of the large shoulder cannons from the back of the ship, and slung it next to his ear. “Sparrow, keep us covered,” he told the shuttle, and opened the door.
The colonists watched him, wary, as his platoon filed out of the door, Greg among them. “Anybody fires,” he told them, “the ship will take you out.”
“That’s illegal,” someone called resentfully.
“Your next of kin is welcome to sue.” The platoon, weapons raised, gave him cover as he backed around Sparrow’s nose until he was completely sheltered by the shuttle’s hull.
He turned to the others. “Keep them back,” he said, then slung the cannon over his shoulder and ran toward the wreck of Budapest’s shuttle. “Elena?”
“I’m here,” she commed back. “We need to get Arin out of here.”
> We need to get both of you out of here, you damn fool.
He covered the last ten meters to the shuttle’s open doorway, and squeezed in between the upended shipping containers.
And there was Elena, hanging on to a handle on the wall, hovering over a battered-looking civilian who had to be Arin Goldjani. Goldjani was young indeed: rangy, all knees and elbows, a patch of hair shadowing the brown skin of his jaw. The kid was conscious, and his color wasn’t bad, but his nose was clearly broken; through the hood of his suit Greg could see most of his face was covered in blood.
Elena herself . . . well, he had seen her look better. Her env suit was covered in dust and grime, and through the clear hood, he could see long strands of hair hanging in her eyes. He squinted and looked closer; he thought some of her hair was blue instead of her natural dark brown. If she was pleased or surprised to see him, she did not let on. Her expression, beyond concerned, was singularly irate.
“Can you get us out?” she asked him.
“Are you abandoning this bird?” he asked.
She looked as if she hadn’t considered the question, and he realized she must be very worried about the kid. “I think we have to for now,” she said. “Maybe we can come back for it later.”
“I don’t think so,” he told her. “I think as soon as we get out of here, they’re going to throw themselves at each other.”
“But we brought food.” This came from Goldjani, and he seemed genuinely confused. “More than enough. What do they need to fight for?”
“I don’t think need comes into it at this point,” Greg told him, but he kept his voice gentle. There were some truths about humanity that were never easy to learn, even when they were laid out before your eyes. “Let’s get you out of here, and take you somewhere that has a doctor.”
“It’ll have to be Galileo,” Elena told him.
She looked at him, saying nothing else, and he realized what she was telling him: the kid’s injuries were beyond the limits of simple first aid. Worse than he looks. Whatever she had seen on the shuttle’s small med scanner had spooked her. Budapest may have had a full-service med kit, but she thought Goldjani needed a surgeon. “You ever been on a Corps starship, Goldjani?” Greg asked him.
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