by Lucas Bale
‘This is war,’ Skoryk said. ‘No campaign of sabotage is without risk. If we fail in our operation, far more will die. You know that. There is no way people can be evacuated from the Core before the annexation begins unless we make the Magistratus think not only that there are more than just the two of us, but that we are not going to stop. They must believe that they cannot ignore us. And we must make citizens put pressure on the Quorum. They must fear us.’
Weaver had lost, and he knew it. ‘Can we derail a conveyance?’
Skoryk nodded. He turned one of the charts over and began to sketch on the back of it. As he drew, Weaver saw a conveyance take shape. ‘If we place charges in two places—here and here,’ he indicated the transit system at the bottom of the conveyance, near the front, ‘then it will derail relatively safely. Small charges only; very little explosive is needed. There will be enough noise and energy discharge from the explosions, and the resulting derailment, to cause fear and confusion. The front of the conveyance, where the engine housing is located, will be torn apart, but there are no passengers in that section. People will be hurt when it derails, yes, but we can’t avoid that. None will be killed.’
‘Small charges.’
‘Yes.’
‘At a single point. Disruption only.’
Skoryk glared at him. ‘Why are you concerned about citizens suddenly?’ he demanded. ‘Your kind haven’t exactly displayed much affection for them in the past. Why now?’
‘I could ask you why you’re you’re so keen to kill them,’ Weaver said. ‘But citizens are not your people, are they? They made their choice, and they chose the Republic. That’s what makes you hate them.’
‘I don’t hate them. I don’t have any opinion of them. We need the Consul because we need technology to make the new colonies work. That’s why I’m here. To protect my own people, and to make sure the star carriers transporting that technology get out of here.’
Skoryk stood and rolled his shoulders. He closed his eyes as he did, flexed his hands into fists, and relaxed them again. When he stopped, he looked again at Weaver. ‘What I don’t get,’ he said, ‘is why you’re here.’
‘As I said before, my reasons are my own.’
Skoryk smiled. ‘So, will they come for us soon then?’ Skoryk watched Weaver’s expression closely, searching his face as he had done in the shantytowns on Jieshou. But there are no men outside with guns this time, Skoryk. You don’t have the support you need to kill me. I think you know that.
‘You still think I betrayed you on Jieshou?’
‘I think you’ll betray us here. It’s hard-wired into you.’
‘I’m done talking about this. When do we carry out the attack?’
Skoryk paused before answering, still watching him. Then he glanced down at the sketch. ‘Tomorrow. In the evening, as people are heading to their refectories before the curfew. Nightfall will make the fear more real. Make it easier for us to disappear.’
‘We meet back here afterwards.’
‘Yes. It may take a while, of course, to ensure there is no surveillance. But we meet back here.’
Dusk made the pale blue light fluorescing on the tavara and galleries above him, and on the edges of the walkways around him, seem harsh and cold. The air was cool and clear, and there had been no rain for several days. The last rain, in fact, had come the day of the gunship bomb.
Skoryk had been right, of course—the walkways were crowded with citizens returning to their domiciles or heading to refectories in order to take evening khana. Across the conduit tracks, in the pale haze spilling from a long strip-light, a patrol of Peacekeepers appeared from a narrow passageway between two low storage bunkers. They walked slowly, heavy rifles carried across their chests. The light fell on their armoured suits and disappeared, as though it had been sucked in and consumed. Citizens parted as they swept along the walkway, shrinking away from the black apparitions, palpable fear and tension radiating from their postures.
The Peacekeepers stopped in front of two citizens, surrounding them. One Peacekeeper faced away from the rest of the patrol, weapon held slightly higher. He scanned the walkway and the Conduit, but no one watched. The citizenry continued on their own paths, quietly desperate to appear unconcerned and uninterested. Yet Weaver saw stolen glances towards the Peacekeepers, often accompanied by a shuddering relief. Relief that it isn’t them, but fear that it might be next time.
One of the Peacekeepers was in the process of interrogating the terrified citizens, looming over them like some dark shadow. Weaver watched the two citizens shake their heads vigorously, then back away. Two more Peacekeepers advanced forward and seized them roughly; the first began to search them. All the while, the sentry continued his surveillance of the walkway, seemingly oblivious to what occurred behind him.
One of the citizens began to struggle. Slight movements initially—tiny pushes against the rough and invasive searching of his clothing. It continued until his companion noticed it and said something. Above the clamour of the passing citizenry, Weaver couldn’t hear what it was; but the Peacekeeper searching him had noticed it too. He stopped and backed away. Glancing to the rest of the squad, he gave instructions that Weaver could not hear.
A scream came from the companion—a woman, Weaver could see now. She was dragged to one side. The man—perhaps her husband, perhaps only a work colleague, but certainly a friend—realised his error. He shook his head, remonstrating, expressing regret. The Peacekeeper who held him pressed him against the wall and kicked his knees from under him. The first brought his weapon up and directed it toward the man who was now kneeling in front of him.
The woman continued to scream.
The citizenry no longer walked. Instead they watched, horror etched on their faces. Horror mixed with hate.
The man was paralysed with fear now. Weaver had seen it before. No matter what the Peacekeeper said to him, the man would be unable to comply. His reaction would be seen as resistance. And there could be only one result.
Weaver was walking before he realised it. Across the Conduit tracks and towards them. The pack slipping from his shoulders; the pack within which anyone searching would find explosives. The pistol was heavy now, tucked into his waistband, pressing against the small of his back. Digging into the skin.
What are you doing?
He knelt and dropped the pack on the walkway, beneath a bench. He slid the pistol beneath it. He couldn’t tell if anyone saw him do it. Didn’t have time to worry about that.
Then he crossed over the Conduit.
The sentry saw him coming and raised his weapon. Weaver could hear the conversation now; the barked commands of the Peacekeeper to the man kneeling in front of him. An emotionless, dead voice, issuing orders the man was incapable of following. This is not your concern. You are placing the entire operation at risk. For what?
‘Stay where you are, citizen.’ The Peacekeeper’s weapon was aimed at Weaver’s face. It was steady and sure.
‘He’s terrified,’ Weaver said. He slowed, but continued walking.
‘This is not your concern.’
‘If you kill him, this whole place will erupt.’ The cameras would be on him now. Searching his face. Seeking out his implant. Why be so foolish? For the sake of one man?
‘This is not your concern.’
Weaver held out his hands. ‘Let me help him. You want to search him. Let me help you do that.’
‘I will give you one more opportunity to leave the area.’
‘Everyone is watching. There will be a riot. Do you think that is what the Quorum needs at a time like this?’
The Peacekeeper paused. Weaver thought he might even be considering it.
Another Peacekeeper turned his attention to Weaver now, weapon raised. ‘Why are you getting involved?’ he said.
‘There’s no need for bloodshed. No need to inflame the situation further.’
‘Who are you?’
‘My name is Farrel. I work in a warehouse in the canton
. I was just about to present myself for khana.’
A soft whine cut through the air. A conveyance was approaching.
‘I suggest you go there now.’
‘What are you going to do with him?’ Weaver asked. Why are you doing this? What do you care about him?
‘He will be coming with us.’ The whine was accompanied by trembling beneath his feet. Not far now. It’s coming. Is Skoryk watching this?
‘He was foolish,’ Weaver said. ‘But he’s not a criminal.’
‘He resisted.’
Weaver could feel the gentle breeze kick up as the conveyance approached. Much louder now; a familiar noise that now grated on him. ‘He was scared. We all are.’
‘He resisted.’
The wind picked up as the conveyance swept past, slowing to allow passengers to begin the process of boarding. Weaver glanced at it, more than eighty metres away, then back to the Peacekeeper. Too far away, he thought. I’m too far from it to do anything now.
Time seemed to drag; to tick past so slowly he could see each second evaporate in front of him. Then something caught the Peacekeeper’s attention behind Weaver and to his right, towards the conveyance. The weapon drifted away from Weaver’s face, following the Peacekeeper’s gaze. It was as though the Peacekeeper couldn’t really process what he was seeing, faced suddenly with the direct and obvious potential threat from Weaver, and then from another, more uncertain threat.
Weaver turned slowly. Far too slowly. Much too late.
He was so close to the first explosion that the sound and the pressure wave reached him at almost precisely the same moment. The force of the pressure kicked into him from somewhere behind him and beyond his right side—intense and overwhelming. It punched him into the curve of the trench where the tracks for the conveyance ran.
He spun as he fell, landing heavily on his shoulder. Ligaments tore, but there was no pain. The pressure rang in his ears, so he only felt, rather than heard, the second explosion. Much bigger than the first—longer somehow. The pressure wave from it surged over him, and then was sucked back into the vacuum created by the detonation. The only thing that protected him from the second, much bigger explosion was the trench into which he had been thrown. A second explosion, he thought. But my pack is under the bench…
He tried to understand, but a wave of dizziness and nausea swept over him. He tried to pick himself up, but stumbled and fell. Gunships, his mind shouted to him. Gunships will be coming. You will be on camera feeds. They will be looking for you.
Cameras would have recorded him placing the pack under the bench, then approaching the Peacekeepers. They would be coming for him. They would assume he was a distraction for the placement of the bombs. He needed to get his pack; the explosives, the pack itself, all of it would contain forensic leads. Avenues that might feasibly take the Seneshal to those who had provided the matériel.
He hauled himself up and over the edge of the tracks onto the walkway. But where his pack had been, there was now only the chaos of a wrecked bench, surrounded by shattered bodies of the dead.
His pack. The first explosion—it had been his pack. But how? It had not been armed.
He saw it then—a hard slap in his face. Despite the wearying dizziness and nausea, he understood. Skoryk could not have placed both sets of explosives and armed them. He simply didn’t have time. The explosions had been too close together for that. No, there was only one other explanation: the explosives in his pack had been rigged. A timer? No, some sort of remote detonator. Skoryk had not intended Weaver’s pack for the Conduit—his own, much larger explosive was enough for that.
Skoryk had intended the explosive in the pack to kill the person wearing it.
Him.
For a moment, it was all Weaver could do to stare at the citizens lying on the ground by the warped frame of the bench. In jagged movements, he forced himself to look away and at the Conduit.
The explosion had torn a ragged hole in the lead conveyance, as though some unstoppable creature had burst from inside it, opening up the alloy and plexi-resin frame like some infernal starburst. The direction of the explosion was obvious to him, even in his half-delirious state. It had torn up the walkway and continued into the lobby of a nearby tavara. In its wake, it had left a bedlam of bloodied, charred shapes that might once have been human.
Through his damaged ears, he dimly heard the gunships coming, and he felt the tremor of their approach through his feet and in the smoke-filled air. He looked once more at the dead and dying, then ran.
C H A P T E R 46
JORDI WATCHED them chain Shepherd to oiled bolts they had screwed into the steel walls of the hold. They all wore thick, heavy vests beneath their long coats, and carried short rifles and pistols as though they knew how to use them. The tang of their sweat hung in the thin air. One of them, the one they all turned to for instructions, stared up at the cameras as they set the chains. It had taken a while for the pieces to fall into place, and for Jordi to realise why. Now he understood.
‘Put the others in the sleeping quarters,’ the man said to the others. ‘Keep the three of them separate and seal the doors.’
Another of them, the youngest, and a weasel boy not much older than Jordi himself, seized him by the arm, his grip tight and his mouth pinched in disgust. Jordi pulled away, feeling the urge to fight welling inside him.
They treated the preacher more cautiously, he saw. Four of them, all with rifles out and aimed at him. Yet there was no fear on the preacher’s face. He acquiesced without complaint, watching each of them through hooded eyes, seemingly calm.
‘Why am I down here?’ Shepherd said as he glanced around the hold of his ship. Jordi wondered if Shepherd was trying to find some way to escape, but he could not see how he could possibly break free of the chains without the key that was now in the man’s coat.
‘Skoryk said he wanted you in here,’ the man replied calmly. ‘In front of the cameras. So here you are.’
Yes, now Jordi understood. He had overheard Shepherd and the preacher speaking in the passage outside Soteria’s medical bay after they had escaped from Herse. He hadn’t understood back then what meaning their words carried, but the smuggler had spoken as though Soteria had made decisions for him back in the mountains. His tone had suggested shock, even fear. Much later, as Jordi had lain concealed in the hidden compartments in the hold, he had heard Shepherd talking to himself—and he had understood. Shepherd was talking to her—the ship. As though he knew she could hear him.
They want him down here, Jordi thought, because she needs to see him. She needs to know they have him. They don’t know what she might do.
Natasha glanced towards Shepherd as they were led away, and the smuggler tried to convince her by his expression that everything would be okay—a half smile and a slow nod that looked just like the one Jordi’s father had given him before they ran through the cold in the forest. Jordi didn’t know why he had looked at her that way, why he’d thought she needed or wanted it. But he’d done it.
Yet Shepherd had refused to look at him. The smuggler blamed him—he’d made no secret of it. Jordi had allowed himself to be caught, and then he had been used to trap Natasha. Their only advantage had been taken from them because Jordi had been careless. He had hidden, of course, but they had found him easily. Two of them, both armed. One was the weasel boy, who had followed his elder’s commands without question. As they dragged him out, he had thrown Jordi a look of disgust, then disappeared into the shadows of the ship.
The other, the man, had forced Jordi forward. Quietly, the man’s hot breath wet against Jordi’s ear, the cold metal of his pistol pressed against Jordi’s neck, they had made their way to the bridge. Jordi had done nothing—he had succumbed to fear. He had not struggled against the man’s vice-like grip, nor had he tried to make a run for it. He had let the man take him and use him.
And now, with Shepherd chained to a wall in the hold, and armed men and women taking the ship, Jordi was suddenly overwh
elmed with guilt. He felt a sharp tightening across his chest; sweat broke out across his face. If I hadn’t come, we wouldn’t be here, he thought. There would have been no guns, and they couldn’t have used me to steal the ship.
But he’d come because he’d felt compelled to. He had stowed away on the freighter because staying on the strange planet, in that camp with the rest of the survivors from his village, had felt like a betrayal. As though he had survived only because Ishmael had given his own life in trade for Jordi’s. Ishmael had fought for what he believed in—had even lied to his brother in order to do so—and Jordi had been the beneficiary of that sacrifice. With his every waking thought seared by the memory of his brother’s frozen, tortured body hanging from a stake driven into the snow… how could he just sit there and do nothing?
It might have been reckless to stow away—and he understood Shepherd’s frustration—but the smuggler’s anger had served only to stoke anew the fire already growing inside him. Jordi had fought to liberate this ship from the Peacekeepers on Herse just as bitterly as the smuggler and the preacher. He had swept away his fear and risked his own life for them. So even if he understood the smuggler’s anger, he could not accept the blame that came with it—in fact, he fiercely resented it. It made him feel wretched, like the worst of the vermin that lurked in the forest surrounding what had once been his home, and he was aggrieved by that feeling.
Even now, as afraid as he was, and as they led him in a line with the preacher and Natasha, a gun hovering over each of them, he still believed he had done the right thing. Even as the weasel boy took pleasure in punching him in the back with the butt of his rifle, he was certain in that belief. And so he walked, even though in truth his legs could hardly carry him. When the boy told him to stop, he did, and the men pushed each of them into separate sleeping quarters.
Jordi turned and hammered his fists on the door as it closed, engulfed by intense, claustrophobic emotion. The room tightened around him, the steel walls closing in on him. He pressed his wet cheeks against the cold metal and felt his body shake. But it wasn’t just fear filling him now. There came, too, in that moment, the touch of an emotion so unusual and tangled he couldn’t say what it was. A bedlam of anger, frustration, and bitterness. It circled his fear and consumed it.