by Jay Allan
“And get me a line to one of those ships…” He had to know what was going on.
“We have an incoming communique, sir. It appears to be from one of the large vessels.”
“On my line.”
He listened as the transmission played, a wide grin slipping onto his face as he recognized the voice.
“Hello, Augustus…Darius Cain sent a courier. He thought you might need some help. You didn’t forget you’re not alone in this fight, did you?”
“Send a response,” he snapped to the waiting officer. Then he tapped his headset, activating the microphone.
“Roderick Vance, you old dog…God, am I glad to see you. Welcome to Gamma Pavonis, and not a moment too soon!”
Garret watched as the ships of the Martian fleet, fresh and fully-supplied, tore into the spent vessels of the Black Flag.
Victory was no longer an impossible dream. It was there for the taking.
“Let’s go…full thrust forward, and all weapons, fire!
Chapter 26
MFS John Carter
Armstrong Orbit
Gamma Pavonis System
Earthdate: 2321 AD (36 Years After the Fall)
Darius stepped out of the shuttle doors and onto the scarred and battered metal of the landing bay. John Carter and the rest of the Martian fleet had helped turned the tide, and the combined allied forces had shattered the enemy fleet, sending its broken remnants retreating from the system. Whatever compulsion toward fighting to the death the enemy instilled in its rank and file, it appeared clear again that the higher ranks were only too willing to flee when the battle was lost.
The Martian fleet had saved the day, but not without cost, as Darius could clearly see all around him. There was debris strewn everywhere, and more than one area where heavy trusses and large pieces of equipment had crashed to the deck.
“General Cain, welcome to John Carter.” Roderick Vance walked toward Darius, extending his hand. “And to you, General Cain,” he added, as Darius’s father stepped out after his son.
“What can I say, President Vance, except thank you?” Darius nodded, but then he stepped aside, yielding the lead position to his father. Erik Cain and Roderick Vance had been allies decades before Darius had even been born.
“I am just glad your courier reached us in time, General…though, may I suggest we dispense with all the titles and honorifics? It makes me feel old.” Vance, not a man noted for lighthearted amusement, allowed himself a small grin.
Darius just nodded, but Erik Cain took a step forward. He looked for a moment like he was going to offer his hand, but then he just reached out and embraced the Martian dictator. “Roderick, my old friend. It is always good to see you. From what I can glean, you cut it a little close this time, but you made it, and that’s all that matters.”
Vance, usually uncomfortable with such displays, returned Cain’s with enthusiasm. “I wouldn’t have been here at all if your son hadn’t gotten a message through. What’s with you trying to fight this thing alone? We’re in it together, don’t forget.” Vance took a deep breath, and then he continued, a more somber tone in his voice. “And it seems we have come down to it, now, doesn’t it? The final struggle.”
“It does…as it has far too often in the past, Roderick. But we’ll get through this one, as we have all the others, my friend.”
Vance hesitated, looking around, checking to see if anyone else was in earshot. “Not this time, Erik. Not me, at least. But I am here to do all I can to aid you, to secure the future, for Mars, and for the rest of Occupied Space.”
“This is no time for fatalistic premonitions, Roderick. We’ll make it, all of us.”
Vance paused again. “I’m dying, my friend. I have months left, perhaps not even.”
Cain stood, looking stunned. Darius watched, almost as shocked himself. The two Cain’s had seen thousands of men and women die in battle. They had both lost friends. Erik Cain had seen ninety-five percent of Earth’s population perish in the Fall. But somehow listening to a friend say calmly that he was dying proved hardest to accept.
“What? Sarah is down on Armstrong, seeing to transferring the wounded. I’ll send for her and…”
“I’m the dictator of the Martian Republic, Erik. With all due respect to your lovely wife, and one of my absolute favorite people, by the way, don’t you think everything that can be done has been? It’s some sort of accelerated mutation, likely from the bombardment of Mars. There have been a significant number of cases over the years. Specifics vary somewhat from person to person, but mortality is certain.”
The three men were utterly silent, the only sounds coming from the landing bay equipment operating in the distance.
“No one knows,” Vance finally said, “at least no one outside my inner circle. But this will be my last adventure. I might have wished for a chance to spend my final months doing something more constructive than killing, but I am glad, at least, I will get the chance to fight at your side again, Erik. And Sarah and Cate.”
“I don’t know what to say, Roderick.” Cain’s voice was soft, somber.
“There is nothing to say, Erik. You’ve said it all over a lifetime of friendship and faithfulness.” Vance was silent for a moment. “I have brought every ship Mars can put into space, every Martian Marine, every missile, bomb, laser core. Mars will be with you in this fight, until victory. Or until the end.” He looked right at Cain. “But I would ask one thing of you, Erik.”
“Of course, my friend. Anything.”
“I will not return from this campaign, whether we go to victory or to defeat and destruction. I would not spend my last weeks in a hospital bed, too weak to stand, unable to do even the simplest things for myself.”
Darius just stood and watched the two men. He was friendly with Vance, but he knew his father and the Martian strongman went back half a century.
“I understand, Roderick. I think I would make the same choice.”
There was no doubt in Darius’s mind his father would take the same path. No doubt at all. Nor any that he would do the same. The types of lives they’d all led shouldn’t end in helplessness, with faceless attendants spoon-feeding them watered down oatmeal.
“So,” Cain continued, “what can I do for you, Roderick? All you have to do it ask.”
“I want you to take control of Mars.”
Cain stared back, stunned. Darius suspected, whatever his father had thought was coming, that hadn’t been it. “Roderick…”
“Hear me out, Erik. I don’t want you to become Mars’s dictator. I want you to prevent anyone else from doing it. You know I only seized power because there was no choice. I have detested every moment, and I dreamed of the day—a day that will now never come—when I could give up my power, turn Mars back to the Martian people.” His voice grew darker. “But you have seen all I have, the way people are, the lust for power that drives politicians, the carelessness with which citizens treat their freedoms. If I do not make arrangements before I die, if I simply do not return, you know as well as I do, a dozen men and women will struggle for my place. There will be violence, perhaps even civil war…and Martian democracy will be gone forever.” His eyes locked with Cain’s. “I cannot die knowing that what I did, what I had to do, condemned my people to lose their liberty.”
“I will do anything I can, Roderick, but how can I stop Martian politicians from trying to seize power?”
“Kill them.” Vance’s tone was utterly deadpan. “It sounds crazy, Erik, but how many people have we seen die over the last fifty years? Hundreds of thousands of soldiers and spacers? Billions in the Fall, the victims of the Superpowers and their entrenched political classes? There is a choice, now, even as the one we made against the Black Flag. Do we yield to those who would be our masters…or do we stand, fight them, do whatever we must to prevail? Whatever we must…”
“But what if your people resist? Would you have me kill Martians…and lose Marines doing it? Assuming we come away from this battle w
ith enough of us remaining to fight another enemy.”
“No. Too many innocent people have died already. I have a list for you, Erik, the names of those I fear will seek to take control. The dishonest, the corrupt. I would have to kill them eventually if I returned, and in my absence, you must. Mars is defenseless now, every asset of military value stripped away to serve the war effort. And the senior officers I brought here are all trustworthy. They will keep every surviving Martian soldier, every ship far from home until all of this is over. You are famous, Erik, revered on Mars. Unlike an admiral or general, you would be above suspicion. If you eliminate the men and women on my list, you will be able to preside over elections, an outside observer, one utterly above reproach and suspicion.”
He turned toward Darius. “And if you will help us, Darius, the operation will be that much more secure. No one would dare challenge both of you.”
Cain turned and looked at his son. Darius paused for a few seconds, and then he nodded gently. Cain hesitated himself then, for longer than Darius had. Finally, he looked over at Vance and said,” Very well, Roderick. I will do as you ask.”
He took a deep breath. “Assuming we somehow manage to win the fight in front of us now, and any of us get back…”
* * * * *
“Status report?” Elias Cain sat in SS03’s command chair, uncomfortable and keenly aware of his lack of naval experience. His brother had placed him in command of the expedition, with no less of a mandate than to find the mysterious planet Vali and to return with that information. The combined forces of every allied force the Eagles and the Marines could collect were gathering, preparing for a single, desperate attack, an all or nothing bid to destroy the Black Flag, once and for all. And everything rested on Elias, on his keeping the tiny ship hidden, and on the technical brilliance of Thomas Sparks to pull together vague fragments and clues and create the map that would lead the newly-christened Grand Fleet to the final battle.
“The stealth generator is working normally, Colonel. Passive scanners show no indications the enemy is aware of our presence.”
“Very well.” The Black Flag ships were all damaged to varying degrees. It seemed that higher echelon personnel had the option their subordinates lacked, of retreating instead of fighting to pointless deaths. But they’d still fought hard, and Elias suspected bringing news of a defeat back to whatever masters were behind the Black Flag was only slightly preferable to getting blasted to atoms.
SS03 wasn’t a large ship, nor one that could do much fighting if it came to that, but like all his brother’s equipment, it was absolutely at the leading edge of technology, far in advance of most other vessels in the service of the various fleets and navies. Elias had reconciled with Darius, but he had only recently truly come to terms with the amazing scope of what his brother had built. He’d known the Eagles were the best mercenaries, but now he’d come to realize that Darius could have made his own play for total conquest if he’d wished. If the Eagles had kept the worlds they conquered, enslaved them and put them to work expanding their war machine instead of turning them over to clients…the possibilities were astonishing. But Darius had honored every contract he’d ever taken, and he’d turned over pacified world after pacified world to his paymasters, before taking his victorious warriors back to their Nest, the only territory they had ever sought to control.
His brother was a complex man, hard even for him to figure out, but there was one thing he was sure of, one area where the legendary Darius Cain failed utterly. Naming his ships.
Darius had always been grim, with little interest in foolishness or frivolity, but the Eagles’ ships reached a new pinnacle. Elias had thought the whole Eagle One, Two, Three naming scheme for the battleships was lame enough, but when his brother had brought him to the vessel that would take his small team on their desperate mission, he’d prayed to himself that the name he’d seen stenciled on its side had some deeper, hidden meaning that the one that popped into his head.
“Scoutship 3,” Darius had said, matter-of-factly, pointing to the engraved “SS03” on the hull and dashing Elias’s hopes.
So, now, the fate of humanity rested with a small team, crammed onto a tiny but high-tech ship called ‘Scoutship 3.’ That will cause some second glances in the history books…
“Colonel, it looks like they’re heading for the Sigma Fourteen gate.”
Elias looked up abruptly. Sigma Fourteen was far into the outer system, a valueless warp gate leading to a series of two gate systems terminating in a dead end.
Unless…
“Bring us after them,” Elias said. “Slowly, carefully…minimal thrust.” His people had been following the retreating enemy for almost two months, a stretch of mind-numbingly boring duty, punctuated by two terrifying close calls when he’d thought the Black Flag ships had picked up his tiny vessel. But now, his mind was alive, sharp, his eyes fixed hard on the display, as he wondered if they were on the verge of finding what they had come for.
Chapter 27
“The Nest” – Black Eagles Base
Second Moon of Eos, Eta Cassiopeiae VII
Earthdate: 2321 AD (36 Years After the Fall)
“I want to thank you all for coming here.” Darius Cain stood in the front of a sprawling compartment, a space lying somewhere between a large conference room and a modest auditorium. He was clad in his dress uniform, a magnificent bit of opulent tailoring he almost never wore. But he knew his audience, and he understood human responses well enough to realize the grandness of his appearance would only enhance the Eagles’ already extraordinary reputation. That would be important enough when meeting with friends, and even with prospective allies. But the men and women in the room now were more accurately described as enemies, or at least rivals, and with them, it was essential to project strength. If there was one thing he couldn’t show now, it was weakness, or even hesitancy.
Cain had summoned the leaders of all the mercenary companies in Occupied Space, all those, at least, who had not already fallen under the sway of the Black Flag. The fact that they had all accepted his guarantee of safe conduct and come was another testament to the professional regard he enjoyed, and also of the desperate nature of the situation.
The warriors in the room had no love for Cain, nor for his extraordinary soldiers, who had never hesitated to express their feelings of superiority when they met rival companies. But they all shared two things. One was military power. The people in the room commanded thousands of soldiers, and dozens of warships, enough raw strength to make a difference in the coming fight.
The second was independence. The mercenary companies, the condottiere who had dominated warfare in Occupied Space for the past twenty years, did not like to be told what to do. Not even a little bit. They’d been founded by men and women who bristled at control, who’d left worlds and oppressive governments to stake their own claims to a future where no one told them what to think or how to act. And Cain suspected every single one of them had some idea of what life would be like under the Black Flag.
“We’ve had our disputes, many of us. That’s an occupational hazard in our trade. Holding grudges is counterproductive, unprofessional.” Darius spoke loudly, as though he didn’t have a doubt in his mind about what he was saying. In truth, he’d nursed a few grievances himself over the years, including some against people in the room. But it was time to let such things go.
“Many of us have fought against each other, again, an inescapable reality of our profession. But I have brought you all here now on a matter of far greater importance than contracts and grudges. We all face a threat, one that is dire…and one none of us can face alone.” Darius paused for a moment, looking out, trying to get a read on his audience.
“You have all been idle. There are no contracts. Every planetary dispute has ground to a halt, save one that looms over all Occupied Space. I have spoken with some of you before on this, reached out here and there seeking allies. But now, I extend my hand to all of you. The Black Eagles are
the largest of the companies, and every one of them, from the most senior officers to the privates in the line, have sworn themselves to this fight. I now ask each of you to do the same, to urge your own soldiers and spacers to join the battle.”
“That all sounds uplifting and inspiring, but what happens when we’ve destroyed this enemy? Are you our new master then?” The voice was that of Julian Gonsalvo, the commander of the Red Company. Gonsalvo was a first class pain in the ass, and an arrogant fool to boot. Worse, perhaps, the Eagles had beaten his army not once, but twice.
Darius paused for just an instant, taking a firm grip on his temper. Telling Gonsalvo he could have crushed the Reds a third time and made himself Gonsalvo’s master any time he’d wanted to didn’t seem likely to be helpful in the current situation.
“No, Julian…when this is over, we all go back to the way things were. We are facing a threat here, a grave threat perhaps, but nothing more.” That was a lie. Darius had no idea what would happen if they managed to defeat the Black Flag, but he found it difficult to imagine things would just go back to the way they had been. There were hundreds of enemy-subjugated systems, resentments tracing all across Occupied Space, a thousand factors, virtually all of them pushing humanity in a new, unknown direction. But that was tomorrow’s problem. Today’s was getting the whole unruly mob to come together and combine their forces against the enemy.
“Even if we believe that and join you, who would command our forces?”
“I would.” There was no point in being tentative there. Few present, even his bitterest rivals, could believe anyone but Darius Cain should lead the combined forces of the companies. “Your troopers would, of course, be under your direct command, but I would lead the overall force.”
“Must we then worry that you will direct operations to focus casualties on our units and not your own? That you will position the Eagles to benefit from this conflict?”