Renegade

by Joel Shepherd

  They touched, feather light, and rolled to where pad workers were unhurriedly extending a docking arm to touch the dorsal port. “Thank you for flying Phoenix Air,” said Hausler. “I know I can speak for all of my crew when I say that it has been an absolute contractual obligation to fly you here today, and I look forward to setting my ass on fire with you all again in the near future.”

  “Jeez, can these pad guys work any slower?” his co-pilot wondered. “Are they getting paid by the hour or what?”

  “Nice job guys,” Trace told them. “Do me a favour and stay with the ship. Get some gas and stay alert.”

  “What, you mean we don’t get to go and take in the stunning attractions of Crondike? ‘Cause it looks like a peach.”

  When the access arm made a seal they climbed the dorsal hatch, then walked at a low crouch along the dingy, fluro-lit tube until they reached Embarkment. It was utilitarian like mining settlements everywhere, some pad workers operating the arm and peering out portholes, talking on coms. Beyond were offices, where bored workers paid little attention to comings and goings.

  At the base of the steps from the tube stood an impatient woman in a working jumpsuit, red customs tabs on her shoulders. Beyond her, about twenty civvies with recording devices, and a few with notepads. About half were kids. Trace very rarely suffered outbursts of any kind, but she had to repress a bad word beneath her breath. It looked like a fanclub.

  “Hello Staff Sergeant,” said the customs woman to Kono as he lead the way. “Are you in charge here? I just need all your IDs for the log, if you wouldn’t mind… thanks.” As Kono flashed his on the reader. “Thank you Staff Sergeant Kono, thank you Private Kumar, thank you Private Arime.” As they checked through one at a time. “Thank you Major…” and the customs lady’s eyes bugged a little. “Major Thakur! Thank you very much!”

  Gasps from the gathered fan club, who clustered not too close, recording devices activated and angling for a shot of Trace’s face as she passed. “Major Thakur!” called a couple of the kids. “Major Thakur!” As though hoping she’d wave and smile. If Trace resented anything about her Liberty Star, it was the celebrity that went with it. War was not a game show, and she absolutely refused to go along with this lunacy on any level.

  And yet, in this situation, her celebrity could be an enormous help, eventually. Marines weren’t the only ones who would doubt Fleet’s story about the Captain and the LC, with her standing against it. It also made her an enormous inconvenience for Fleet. Surely they’d like that inconvenience removed at the earliest. But doing it in public would be problematic for them.

  “Thank you Mr Toshi,” said the customs lady as Hiro passed through, and Trace waited with the gathering group forming a ring to keep the fan club at bay. A couple of the kids jumped to see more clearly — in the one-fifth-G they sailed nearly up to the ceiling. A couple of her marines smiled. Trace did not. She beckoned Hiro to walk at her side, and they skipped lightly down the wide-spaced stairs, letting gravity sail them gently down.

  “Nice inconspicuous entrance?” Hiro ventured.

  “Manifest and flightplan security on mining bases is shit,” said Trace. “All the civvies hack it, see who’s coming in. Famous ships get a crowd.”

  Hiro nodded. “Lucky they didn’t know it was actually you — we’d have a hundred here. All these kids shouldn’t be in low G.”

  “Local holiday,” said Trace. “They’re down from the heavy station to see family.” Because Spacer kids had to spend a medically-mandated 96 percent of their time in full gravity. Anything down to 90 percent could be fixed, medically, but it was risky and expensive. Less than 90 percent and kids got brittle bones, malformed heart and organs, all kinds of nastiness. Every Spacer kid wore a ‘heavy tab’ somewhere that wouldn’t come off, often a ring or bracelet, that recorded gravity levels at every moment and alerted someone if they weren’t getting enough. Station kids loved to mess around in the hub when parents and guardians weren’t looking, and often got much less G than adults thought they were getting. Twenty-percent-G here on Faustino wasn’t technically any healthier than zero-G for kids over long periods, and bases like Crondike were usually child-free. Station rims on the other hand were often crowded with boarding schools, where parents from bases like this one would send their kids for medical and educational purposes equally.

  The main walk through arrivals had a tall ceiling and some shops along one wall. Regular portholes overlooked pads to the right — spacesuited workers and runabout vehicles, various inspectors and machinery operators. Along the walk, passengers, crews, a lot of pads personnel, a few security. It always looked comical to the unaccustomed, because everyone skipped instead of walking — it was the far faster form of movement, with long, easy bounces along the corridor. Accidental collisions were common, as you couldn’t change direction in mid-air if you saw you’d made a mistake. Carrying sharp objects in the transit halls was strictly prohibited.

  “Who is Mr Toshi?” Trace asked Hiro as they bounced. The customs lady had read that name off his ID when he’d checked in.

  “Debogande Inc employee,” said Hiro, moving as well in micro-G as any well-travelled marine. “Performance Inspector, I made him up. He’s a pretty nifty guy though, gets lots of places, high security clearance.”

  “I can imagine. You’d like to get a few places in here?”

  Hiro nodded. “Crondike security aren’t much worry, but Fleet have got others for emergency contingencies. Be nice to check it out while you’re finding Mr Romki.”

  “Absolutely,” Trace agreed. “Do your thing, just keep in touch.” Hiro nodded, then skipped easily left and bounced off a wall down an adjoining corridor like a guy who’d spent quite a bit of time in this gravity. A well-travelled man indeed.

  “You trust him?” Kono asked, taking Hiro’s place at her side.

  “Not yet. But the Debogande family has a habit of making all their inner circle feel like part of the family. It’s not just a paycheque for guys like him, it’s personal. I’m pretty sure he’d take a bullet for Lisbeth.”

  “Lisbeth’s not here,” Kono said dourly.

  “We’ll see,” said Trace.

  * * *

  Erik walked with Lieutenant Dale and Alpha First Squad along a perimeter path of Blue Sector Park. The park was at the top of the Hoffen rim, and the high ceiling thirty meters above was a line of segmented, transparent panels presenting a spectacular upward view of the enormous hub and axle, huge support arms stretching away from the rim for kilometres. The park itself was central residential green space, long and rectangular, filled with plants and centred upon a series of winding ornamental lakes and a stream. The gardens were beautiful, in stark, natural relief to the grey steel of surrounding walls… though here the steel was broken by large windows overlooking at various levels, where expensive apartments looked onto the pretty view.

  Ahead Erik spied the hotel he’d seen on schematic plans. Dale spied it also. “So long as we’re not paying,” he said. “And I doubt Fleet credit will take us at the moment.”

  “My treat,” Erik said drily.

  “What if they’ve blocked your account?”

  “They don’t know all my accounts.” Even Fleet officers were allowed some secrets from Fleet Command. Most couldn’t keep those secrets, if someone as high up as Erik’s enemies were determined to discover them, but Erik’s financials were Debogande Incorporated private accounts. Any bank that wanted to keep doing business with Debogande Inc would think twice about closing them, no matter who was asking.

  They weren’t headed back to Phoenix because Erik was concerned that while they waited for Trace, Phoenix was a sitting duck at hub dock. She couldn’t go anywhere — vastly outnumbered she’d be out-positioned and out-gunned anywhere in the system, except at a full sprint for jump, which they couldn’t do until Trace had finished her mission. If he returned to Phoenix now, Erik feared that she’d just become too tempting a target for someone who decided to just wear the nasty p
ublicity, and kill two birds with one stone. But if hitting Phoenix left LC Debogande still loose on station, it was less tempting. Better to spread out for now, and hope that multiple assassinations was more than Fleet was prepared to wear, locked in a battle of public appearance as they were.

  Private Lemar saw the running girl first, sprinting from a hallway adjoining the park and hurdling a flower bed. “Ware right! Runner, two o’clock.” She was coming straight for them, short blonde hair, slim, not especially fast or graceful, but plenty scared. Then came the cops, four grey uniformed with light armour, another two plain clothes, guns and tasers out. All the marines took a knee on the grass, rifles aimed without needing to be told… and Erik recalled to do the same before Dale planted him face down.

  One cop aimed a taser, while a plainclothes aimed a pistol, yelling at her to stop. She was just ten meters away when Dale sprang up and advanced on both her and the cops, rifle aimed and yelling. “Put it down! Put it down or I will fire on you! Put it down now!” Then other marines were joining in, and civvies in the near vicinity were running, freezing or falling for cover as some had been taught.

  The cops backed up fast, and Erik caught the girl as she stopped and gasped. Evidently she had been heading for them, not just passing through.

  “Whoa whoa whoa!” yelled one plainclothes, both hands in the air. “Chill, just chill! That’s a suspect, we just want our suspect! Look, all guns are away, just cool it marines!”

  “You do not point loaded firearms at the backs of running civilians!” Dale yelled back, his own weapon still aimed with deadly precision. “And you sure as hell don’t do it with armed marines in the line of fire!”

  “Right, okay!” the plainclothes agreed. “Lower the rifle, please! We just want our suspect, that’s all.”

  Erik looked at the gasping girl — she was maybe Lisbeth’s age, maybe a bit older. Pretty but for the bloody nose and swelling eye. “Lieutenant Commander Debogande!” she gasped desperately. “Don’t… I have to speak to you! They know! They know your Captain’s dead, they all know!”

  “Who knows?”

  “I can’t say!” She stared at him with meaningful intensity. A civilian, in jeans, blouse and boots… too well dressed to be some street thug, and clearly white collar, not some blue collar dock grunt or engineering tech. Who would the cops want so badly they’d point guns at her while she was running away? “Phoenix! Phoenix is in danger!”

  “Lieutenant!” he told Dale. “We’re taking her. Fleet privilege, ship security comes first.”

  “Fleet privilege buddy,” Dale snarled at the cops. “Take a hike!”

  “That’s seriously not a good move,” the plainclothes retorted.

  “Arguing with Phoenix marines is seriously not a good move,” Dale corrected. “We matter, you don’t. Fuck off.” The cops didn’t seem to take it well. Where cops got the notion that Fleet marines were arrogant, Erik had no idea.

  His Debogande Inc account was certainly still working at the hotel lobby. The fact that the local banks owed maybe ten percent of their net capitalisation to Debogande Inc-related business probably had something to do with it. The desk manager’s eyes widened to see his ID-linked account appear on the screen. Erik told him to skip the description of room services and specials — he’d stayed at such places before, and could fill in his marines.

  In the big elevator riding up, Private Ricardo thought to check the blonde girl’s handbag with apologies, as the girl held a cloth one of them had found to her nose. In the handbag, a taser… recently used, Ricardo thought, as she sniffed the discharger. Powerful enough to do some proper damage, not just stun.

  “Seriously boys,” Ricardo told them all exasperatedly. “It takes the girl to check the handbag? ‘Cause this one’s cute and pretty and couldn’t possibly hurt you?” Ricardo had a crewcut, tattoos and a granite jaw. The look of displeasure suited her entirely.

  “She was the LC’s catch,” said Dale. “Good job LC.”

  “What part of ‘personal protection for officers on station’ do you find hard to understand?” Erik said sharply. “Like what part of ‘don’t let one of our alien prisoners shoot another of our alien prisoners’ don’t you understand? Or ‘don’t let mutinous crew try to kill the LC?’” The marines in the elevator shifted uncomfortably. “I love my Phoenix marines, but you guys whine about non-standard duty worse than little girls forced to eat their vegetables.” He took the taser off Ricardo and shoved it on Dale. “You take it. Try not to shoot yourself in the ass.”

  The silence that followed was oddly respectful. In truth he probably should have thought to check the girl’s handbag in case she was armed… but as Private Ricardo had pointed out, the girl was slim and pretty, and scared and bloodied, and it hadn’t occurred to him. But ultimately it was the marines’ responsibility to correct for his oversights — they were the urban combat specialists, not him, and they were trained to expect judgement failures from less-trained spacers. If marines had a flaw, it was that they were trained to blow shit up, and disdained other duties as less important. He’d been wanting to point it out to them for a while now, but hadn’t dared. Dale’s jibe had seemed the perfect time… plus he was getting genuinely sick of it. But instead of resenting it, a few of the marines in the elevator were now almost smiling, like a sparring partner who’d just been caught with a good right hook, and appreciated it.

  “You use that taser recently?” Dale asked the girl. She nodded. “On who?”

  “Cop,” she said, muffled by the cloth.

  “He still alive?”

  “She. Don’t know.”

  Exasperation and rolled eyes from the marines. “Now we know why they were chasing her,” someone remarked.

  The girl pointed to her face. “She hit me first!” Indignantly. “Asking for it.”

  The elevator arrived at the high floor, and Gunnery Sergeant Forrest led them off with a cautious glance left and right, rifle ready. “Straight on,” Erik instructed with a glance at wall signs, and they walked down the hotel hallway. “What’s your name?” he asked the girl.

  “Ivette. I’m from Apilai, I work for an insurance company, Allied Heuron. They’re a Spacer company, I’m a Worlder. I got told yesterday I could stay if I changed to Spacer citizenship… so I’d have to give up property rights on Apilai, inheritance. I’d have to live up here half the year forever. Keep my money up here. No thanks.”

  Sergeant Forrest arrived at big double doors at the end of the hall, and looked at the keycard Erik had given him. “This the one?”

  “Yep,” said Erik. “Go in.” Forrest opened the doors, onto a huge presidential suite, the far wall entirely glass, overlooking the park they’d just left, and the amazing upward view of the Hoffen Station hub. Marines whistled, staring around as they entered.

  “Standard room for you LC?” one asked.

  “You bet,” said Erik. “Five adjoining bedrooms, three bathrooms, should do for all of us. View of the park in case anyone comes at us from there, you guys can check the rest of the layout for yourselves. Lieutenant Dale, security status is yours.”

  “Aye sir,” said Dale, and went to do that. Erik escorted Ivette to the bathroom while she washed up in the sink. Her nose didn’t appear broken, and her lip was cut. Her nose wouldn’t stop bleeding, which seemed a first for her, so Erik wetted some tissue and put it firmly up her nostril.

  “Thank you,” she managed, still shaking a little from recent adrenaline. “I… I came to find you. I heard you were here, and I…” She looked uncertain how much more to say. Erik could guess. To know he was here, and where to find him, suggested eyes on the inside. Spies. People watching.

  “Heuron Dawn,” he said. Her eyes evaded him. “I’m not the police. I’m concerned for the safety of my ship. You said they think Captain Pantillo’s actually dead?” Still playing along, just in case.

  “They’re sure of it. I don’t know how they know.” She looked at him questioningly. Erik said nothing. “He was going
to run for office, you know. For Heuron, in Spacer Congress. Everyone thought he had the votes, when you put together Spacers and expat Worlders. They’re saying that’s why Fleet killed him, and why they’re kicking all the expat Worlders out.” Staring at him cautiously. No doubt she’d also heard what Fleet were saying, on Homeworld at least. That he’d killed Captain Pantillo. It was in her eyes, that fear. Erik was not accustomed to anyone being frightened of him. Tavalai maybe, but not humans. And he’d spent so much time lately around tough women with no physical fear of him at all, that he’d almost forgotten how he might appear to a young, slim civilian girl who now found herself very vulnerable in a strange hotel room with the big male commander of the legendary UFS Phoenix. And his heavily armed marine contingent.

  “What are they going to do?” Erik asked her. “If the Captain was their saviour, what will they do now?”

  She stared at him for a moment. “You should run,” she said suddenly. “It’s going to get nasty. Everyone here remembers Phoenix, Phoenix was one of the liberators of Heuron. We want you to get out, now.”

  “I can’t leave Heuron, my marine commander is on Faustino doing important business.” He felt his blood beginning to run cold, a chill prickling the hairs on the back of his neck.

  “Then pick her up and leave!”

  “Why? What’s about to happen?”

  Ivette took a deep breath. “I can’t say. But it’s about to become very unsafe for Fleet ships at Hoffen. Trust me. If you stay here, you won’t be spared.”