Lost Valor

by Kal Spriggs

  I looked north, hearing a dull roar as some kind of ship took off. The flare of engines flickered through the rain, but I couldn’t see the ship itself. I could feel the rumble in the rooftop through the soles of my feet.

  I looked down at my dirty feet. My shoes from Century had finally fallen apart. I felt a strange ache as I considered that. They hadn’t been particularly good shoes… but they’d been the last thing I’d had from home. Besides, walking around on the filthy, cold, and wet concrete barefoot made me feel even more miserable.

  All at once, I just couldn’t be here anymore. I thought about the abandoned spire that Jonna had pointed out. I needed to see the space port, I needed to see the sky, I needed out. I turned north and started walking.

  ***

  It wasn’t too hard to slip through Crooked Dagger territory. I kept my head down, kept the hat I’d stolen low on my face, and walked with a purpose. Finding my way up the sides of the spire was the harder part. Jonna and I had come in from the other side. I didn’t want to circle around to the other side, not and waste the remaining daylight. Eventually I found an area where a rusty ladder hung down just low enough for me to reach. From there I began climbing up, finding sections here or there where I could climb up to the next area. Now and then there came a roar of engines and a flare of light as ships took off, at least one or two every few minutes, sometimes a series of four or five vessels all at the same time.

  It took me a while. A couple times I had to stop, because there just wasn’t any way to continue the way I’d gone. Then I had to turn around, go back the way I’d come, and find a new way upwards. As I went on, I came closer and closer to the sullen gray underbelly of the clouds. I paused, noticing that I’d circled around towards the front of the abandoned spire. I was very high at that point, about the same height as when Jonna and I had come here.

  In fact…. I looked down, recognizing a ledge off to the side. It only took me a few minutes to work my way down there, though I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to get back up the way I’d come. I was back where we’d been before and I walked over to the edge, where I paused and took a seat, dangling my feet over the edge of a long drop. The rain was still coming down. It was still cold and miserable. I picked out the forms of ships, the big hulls of merchant vessels, the sleek forms of military ships. There were cargo and passenger shuttles too. There were hundreds of ships, far more ships than I could easily count, more than Century probably saw in a month. Since the largest space-faring ships rarely entered the atmosphere, I wondered how the orbital station of Drakkus looked in comparison. If there was this much traffic on the ground… How quaint and pitiful Century must seem to them.

  I dismissed that thought. I didn’t care what these people thought of my planet. I didn’t care what they thought of me. I wanted to go home. I hated this place, these people. Even Jonna, who I’d thought had been my friend…

  “I figured you’d come here, eventually,” a soft voice spoke from behind me.

  I started in surprise and for a moment, I was worried I’d actually fall forward and down, but a strong hand caught my shoulder and pulled me back. “Careful there.”

  I looked back, meeting Jonna’s intense blue eyes. “Well, then,” she smirked at me, “I see you still need a minder.”

  “Right,” I glowered at her sourly. I wanted to shake her hand off my shoulder, but I was pathetically grateful for the human contact. The civets didn’t count and in some ways, Ted was worse than them.

  I looked around, then put two and two together. “You’ve been waiting for me?”

  “I come up here anyway, from time to time,” She let go of my shoulder and then took a seat next to me, dangling her feet above the void. “Not a terrible view, today.” She shot me a look, “But yeah, I was hoping to catch you.”

  “Why?” I asked, honestly curious. “I mean, you threw me out of the Ragabonds, told me I was as good as dead if I ever came back.”

  She sighed, “You and Ted together weren’t a good fit. You’re too strong-willed, too opinionated, too worried about doing the right thing. And Ted just didn’t fit in, anyway. I told you that already. Nothing personal, Will. Just as Francis would have killed you if you’d joined the Crooked Daggers.”

  “Wait, what?” I asked.

  She rolled her eyes. “I forget I have to explain everything with you.” She took a deep breath, clearly choosing her next words with care. “Down here in the gangs, life is cheap, and status is everything. I told you that military service earns your immediate family a place over there, right?” She waved off at the invisible Heart, still hidden behind the clouds and rain. I nodded in reply, not sure what that mattered. I noted that there was a storm coming in, heavy rain and the flashes of lightning beginning to blot out parts of the spaceport, coming closer.

  “Well,” she went on, “it doesn’t go for their families. Not unless they join the military, anyway. So it comes down to how much they love their kids.” Her face went hard. “Because if they don’t sign up, then their kids are shipped here.”

  “Is that what happened with your parents?” I asked, thinking of what Simon had let slip.

  “Mine?” She looked at me in surprise. “No, my father was an officer, which is why…” she trailed off. “Which is none of your business. Anyway, as I was saying, the kids end up here in state-run foster houses that dump you on the street as soon as you’re old enough if you’re lucky or sell you into slavery if you aren’t. Where they grow up scraping by, joining gangs or living in the street until they’re old enough to sign up… or they join one of the Pirate Houses.” She jerked a thumb over her shoulder, back at the Barrens. “That’s why there’s so many kids. Most of them aren’t orphans, they’re the lost, the abandoned. They’re the kids whose parents didn’t love them enough to risk themselves, so the Empire took them away and put them here.”

  “That’s horrible,” I said.

  “Yeah, it’s not a system without flaws,” Jonna muttered. “Anyway, the Houses, they use that to their advantage. You get a lot of kids here who know they were abandoned. That makes them bitter. Growing up on the streets makes them violent. The Houses recruit from the strongest, most capable, most violent. Francis, he runs the Crooked Daggers the way he does so that he can get recruited. House Pyros has already talked to him, had him do some jobs for them. I give it another year or so before they bring him in along with his most trusted people, then the Crooked Daggers will fall apart and another street gang will take over their territory. It’s a recruiting technique.” A flash of lightning lit her face and the rumble of thunder was close enough behind that I shivered.

  “Huh,” I said. I shot her a look, “Is that why you kicked me out?”

  “Hardly,” she rolled her eyes. “The Ragabonds don’t operate like other gangs. I take in a lot more of the helpless types, like Ted. I know people, people who help me slip kids offworld, out to someplace they can live a more normal life.” Her expression turned hard, “Or at least, I did. Things sort of fell apart not long before you showed up, otherwise you and Ted would be offworld already. I was hoping to reestablish those connections, but it didn’t work out.” She gave me a tight smile, “I’m not going to be running the Ragabonds much longer. Simon’s not the sort to run it in the traditional fashion, but he’s not going to be doing charity, either. I was half-hoping that you’d cut the dead weight and come back.”

  “I’m not abandoning my friend,” I told her.

  “Not smart,” she shrugged, “but I can understand. But that kind of sentiment is dangerous here.” Her gaze locked on that distant city.

  “Why are you here?” I asked impulsively, the question eating at me. “You just said your father was an officer, doesn’t that mean you could have a pretty good life out there?” I waved at the city beyond the spaceport, finding it difficult to imagine anything worth coming to live off scraps in the Barrens.

  “I didn’t have a choice,” Jonna shot me a look. “My father… well, he had a bit of sentiment too,
I guess.” She stared at me as she said that, as if wondering if I understood. “He found something, learned something. Something so dangerous that powerful people had him killed.”

  I stared at her, not sure if I believed her or not. I didn’t see why she’d lie to me about it, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t. I’d trusted her before and she’d thrown me out on the streets.

  “Look, I’m just biding my time until I can make my move, make it so they can’t kill me too,” Jonna sighed. “I don’t even know why I bother telling you.” The rain had started to flow more heavily and I saw her pull her patchwork cloak tighter around her.

  “Maybe because you’re lonely and you need someone you can trust?” I asked.

  She glared at me, “You’re remarkably perceptive, sometimes. I guess even a broken clock is right twice a day.”

  I blinked at her, not really sure what she meant. Any clock I’d ever seen, when it was broken, the display didn’t work. How could no time at all be right?

  Jonna sighed again. “Anyway, I wanted to check in on you, see if you were doing alright. Any luck on getting money to get offworld?”

  “No,” I told her, feeling miserable to admit that out loud. “We’re losing money, slowly. Not pulling enough in to feed us and maintain our savings.”

  She gave me a nod, “Well, tell you what. I’ve talked with Simon. He’s going to run the gang, after I leave. He’ll need a front man. If you shake Ted, you can probably work something out with Simon.”

  “I won’t. And… wait, you’re leaving that soon?” The thought shocked me. I felt like the world had shifted under me. Why did everything move so fast?

  “As soon as I can put together the final details,” she nodded. “I’m going back to the Heart, I’m going to finish what my father started.”

  “How?” I asked.

  She shot me a calculating look. For just a moment, something dark flashed in her eyes. The lightning flashed again, the bright flash illuminating her face for just a second, making every angle of her face hard and sharp. It was there and gone so fast I wasn’t sure I’d really seen it… but I felt cold certainty that she’d just considered whether or not she could trust me, and then whether or not to push me off the ledge to my death.

  “Probably best for me not to give you the details,” she said after a moment. “But I’m going to follow in my father’s footsteps. He was an officer, so I’m going to be one too. I’m going to the Drakkus Imperial Military Institute. They have to accept my application, with who my father was. I just have to pass the medical exam and…” her face went bleak, “well, I finally have a way to do that.”

  “Were you sick?” I asked in surprise. I was half tempted to tell her about my plans to go to the Century Military Academy, when I got home. If I got home.

  She lifted up her cloak and then the hem of her shirt, showing a bit of her midriff. There was a scar there, I saw. A bullet wound, I realized. It was similar to one that Jiden had on her arm. “Caught me in the liver,” she told me. “Should have killed me. Would have killed me, but friends of my dad’s got me to Athan. Who put an artificial liver in me. But the Institute won’t take someone with an artificial liver, especially not one of dubious origins. So I’ve been waiting for a donor. Athan got me a message, he expects one in the next few days.”

  “Really?” I asked in surprise, “he gets donors? I wouldn’t have thought…” I trailed off as she gave me a level look. “Oh… a ‘donor.’” I grimaced a bit. Someone was going to die, someone whose liver should be a match for Jonna’s missing one. “Is that… I mean, are you good with….”

  “I’m not exactly thrilled about it, but most of Athan’s ‘donors’ are people who the Houses want to make disappear. They’re normally high-ranking members of the Pirate Houses or their advisors and senior staff. Athan just makes the bodies… go away, and pays them for it in the process.”

  I shuddered. I didn’t think I could live with myself if I knew that someone had been murdered for me to survive. Still it wasn’t my business. Not really.

  I thought of Kiyu, who’d been the only one besides Jonna to be kind to me in the slightest. She was going to the Imperial Military Institute, too. I wondered if they’d encounter one another. I wondered what these two, very different, young women would think of one another. For that matter, I thought of Vars and his stamped and sealed certificate. I should probably warn her about him. “Well,” I began, “if you’re going to the Imperial Military Institute, there’s a couple people I’ve encountered that you might run into…”

  She held up a hand, “Trust me, Will, the less of your former associates I know about, the less of your trouble I bring with me, the better. I don’t know, and I don’t want to know. I’m leaving all this behind, but I’m taking on something much bigger than this, than all of this,” she waved a hand around us. “It killed my dad, Will.”

  I ground my teeth, “This killed my entire family, Jonna.”

  She shot me a look, “I’m not trying to make light of what you’ve been through, but…”

  “Whatever,” I growled. Lightning flashed again and this time, the spire trembled and the thunder was a sharp crack as it struck somewhere up above us. I pushed myself to my feet. “I need to go find something to steal to try and make ends meet. Good luck with your glorious future, Jonna.” I stalked off angry and tired and feeling used. The rain came down in a solid curtain and within a few steps, I couldn’t see her anymore.

  ***

  Chapter 18: Back To The Beginning

  Finding my way down from the spire was easier than I’d expected. I just followed the easiest, shortest path, dropping down from ledge to ledge until I reached the street level. The heavy rain continued to pour down, like God above had upended some enormous bucket. The spaceport was tantalizingly close, but the long line outside the gates, even in this storm, and the Red Badges and their scanners showed that it wasn’t just distance that separated me from my goals. I looked over at the line for enlisting in Drakkus’s military. A hundred or more men and women were gathered there, some looked my age or even younger. They stood silently in the rain, heads bowed as it beat down on them, a chill downpour that leached all the color and joy out of the world. Could I do that? Would it be any worse than eking out an existence here on the Barrens?

  What if they send me to kill some rebels or back an invasion of a colony? What then, eh smart guy? I tried to reject that thought, but it kept coming back. If I enlisted as an escape, I’d have no out. I’d be bound for ten years… unless I tried to jump ship or something. Then I’d be on the run, again, only they’d probably put all my data in the system, they’d hunt for me wherever I went… maybe even back to Century.

  I turned away, ducking my head and pulling my hat down against the rising wind and rain. Lightning flashed again and again, most of it seeming to strike the spire above me, the ground trembling and the bright flashes followed momentarily by cracks of thunder.

  The streets normally had small rivulets and puddles. Now they were turning into streams and even rivers. As I walked away from the spaceport, I soon found myself almost wading through storm water, sloshing along, soaked to the skin. Now and then the wind would gust and drive heavy rain right into my face.

  I headed more or less south, but I lost track of landmarks quickly enough. The water was getting deeper and the rain showed no signs of stopping, so I started looking for someplace to shelter. I didn’t dare wander into the service tunnels. Water must be pouring into those. I hoped the Ragabonds’ lair wasn’t flooding even now. The rain was just ridiculous at this point.

  I didn’t recognize the street, but looking around, I had the strangest feeling I’d been there before. In fact… I turned off the street, wading through an alleyway until I came to a spot. There was a low doorway for utility access or something on a shed, the door missing, but the shed was low enough that I was able to jump and catch hold of the edge of the shed’s roof. From there I was able to climb up onto a section of pipe and follow tha
t higher, getting up onto the flat top of the building and pausing there for a moment to try and get my bearings. As lightning flared and struck only fifty meters away, followed instantly by a sharp crack of thunder, I realized that maybe going higher wasn’t the best idea. All the hair stood up on my neck and I jumped down to a balcony below me. The wind gusted, almost blowing me off and my hands scrabbled for purchase. There was a hollow frame where a door had been and I caught hold, teetering for a second as lightning and thunder erupted on the rooftop above, dazzling my eyes and making my ears ring. This is utterly insane. I pulled myself through the opening, into a dark room. I could hear the rain beating down on the rooftop above me, a dull rumble that almost seemed like a living thing. Thunder roared again, vibrating the entire building.

  I crawled on my hands and knees, almost like an animal at this point, half driven mad by the noise and chaos of the storm. In another flash of lightning, I saw the outlines of a stairwell and I crawled down, trying to get away from the noise outside. The stairwell was black, the strong smell of soot and burned chemicals thick in my nostrils. I came to a door, a metal hatch, I felt with my fingers. I couldn’t find a handle. In fact, as my fingers felt around the edges of the door, I realized that the metal hatch was welded shut. For a moment, I started to feel genuine fear, feeling trapped, until I reminded myself that I was safe from the storm. The stairs had brought me at least another floor below the attic area. I could go back upstairs easily enough, once the storm had passed. I was safe. Even the rumble of thunder was muted, here.

  In fact, as I listened, I realized that I could just make out a pair of voices in discussion. My eyes, adjusting to the dimness, made out a slit of light, where heat or damage had twisted the metal door and left a thin gap between the frame and the door itself. Just enough to let in some light… and to let me look out.