The Battle for the Solar System (Complete Trilogy)

by Sweeney, Stephen

  Gang associations, however, were too much like hard work. There were too many risks involved. The boarding of the vessel within Confederation space had been one of his biggest jobs in recent years, working alongside an ad hoc group of others he had met in a dingy bar some time ago. He’d soon discovered that they were useless, little more than chancers, with some of them even succeeding in getting themselves killed before boarding the ship. And even when they managed to get on the ship, some of them were wild, uncoordinated and ineffective, as if getting into a firefight was a game to them. Let’s all get shot to bits, won’t that be hilarious! He’d decided to cut his losses there and then, putting a round into the back of the heads of his former comrades, before rigging up a series of booby traps and fleeing with what he could.

  That hadn’t been a venture he’d enjoyed, not something he was used to. He often preferred to focus on the things that were easiest to carry and dispose of, mostly stealing to order. The trades were quick, for the most part effortless, and low-key. I’ve got X and I’ll sell it to you for Y; cheaper than most other places. What did they care that it was stolen? Starports were his greatest outlet, travellers and entrepreneurs being his best customers.

  Today, however, Arlos had been a waste of time.

  He started toward the docking port where he had left his ship, intending to now head for the nearest jumpgate and depart the system for greener and more lucrative pastures. Although, for some reason he was having difficulty making headway deeper into Imperial space. The navigation buoys were oddly reluctant to provide him with the necessary data. That was very puzzling. There was a war on, sure, but that usually didn’t affect traffic as much as this. Never mind; he’d just have to dig through the ship’s databanks and see if the previous owner, from whom he had so violently separated it, could be of any more help.

  Glancing over his shoulder, he noticed that his pursuer had also risen and was once again tailing him; though this time not nearly as subtly as before. It wasn’t the first time he’d been followed when he was trading, but judging from the way the woman had kept her distance and her profile low, she wasn’t one of the usual suspects. At first, he had thought her to be in the same line of work as himself. Some found it easier to let others do all the hard work and then pounce on them in the middle of a transaction, relieving them of their hard-earned goods. Bloody parasites! He hated them!

  But this woman was far too cautious for that. He had dismissed the possibility that she was a bounty hunter, chasing the reward money for either his head or something he had stolen from the wrong person. If she had been, then the pursuit probably wouldn’t have been such a drawn-out affair; more noisy, violent and over very quickly. No, this was a new one to him and he could make few assumptions. One thing he knew he could be very certain of, however, was that the woman had decided it was time to come out of hiding and was about to move in for the kill.

  *

  Clare Barber swept between the groups of people on the floor around her. She watched her step as she did so, though she didn’t take her eyes off her target, who now walked with a greater purpose than just the desire to sell his haul and leave.

  He still had the card, though. She’d heard him enquire a couple of times in the past hour as to whether anyone would be interested in buying information. They weren’t, of course. These people only wanted to get away.

  It seemed to her that her target was either too ignorant or too arrogant to appreciate the terrible fate that had befallen the imperium, and so it had come as little surprise to her that he was having difficulties in offloading his stock here. She thought it likely that he had, up until recently, only operated in Confederate and Independent star systems, now returning to Imperial space after attracting too much attention and needing to disappear for a while. If that was the case, she mused, then he wasn’t having much luck escaping unwanted attention here, either.

  The man abruptly stopped walking and Barber, anticipating his next move, calmly reached into her jacket and removed a pistol from within. Her finger clicked the safety off.

  The man turned around, his eyes meeting hers for the first time. The scowl he now wore told her that he wasn’t happy at being followed. Many scars covered his face, some burn marks, all permanent reminders of the cost of his chosen lifestyle. His eyes seemed to tell terrible stories of all those he had butchered whilst in pursuit of that path. He presented a look that Barber thought would’ve had many hastily reaching for their valuables, rather than incur the pain and violence that was promised. Barber, however, was immune. She had seen many more terrible things.

  The man sighed audibly before speaking. “” The words he spoke were those of an Imperial dialect, his voice calm and smooth, his eyes still locked on her.

  Barber didn’t react. He was playing with her, trying to throw her into a false sense of security, pretending that he wasn’t as dangerous and threatening as his looks might suggest, giving her the chance to walk away.

  “You have something that belongs to me,” she said, “and I want it back.” The man might have addressed her in an Imperial dialect, but Barber was certain that he would understand everything she said to him. The pistol she gripped emerged from between the folds of her blanket and she pointed it casually at his chest. “Hand over the data card. Nothing else, just the card. And do it slowly.” Her other hand slipped the blanket from her shoulders, letting it fall to the floor behind her. She became aware that people nearby had started shifting. They were shuffling backward, clamouring to stand and escape the scene that was unfolding about them.

  The man sneered, watching the people gathering up their belongings and trying to get loved ones to move out of the immediate area. He then looked back at Barber, seemingly quite amused.

  “I’m serious,” Barber warned. “I won’t ask you again.” She could’ve shot him hours ago, but it wouldn’t do her any good if the man had left the card somewhere other than about his person. She had also considered the danger of a defensive knee-jerk reaction from one of the people assembled close by, who could panic at the sound of gunfire and pull a weapon on her herself.

  The raider’s eyes widened, but his sneer remained. “Well, if you want it so badly, why don’t you just come over here and take it?” he replied, reverting his dialect.

  Barber ignored the invitation, holding her ground. Though she had her pistol to hand, she wasn’t about to approach and frisk the man. Her experience with people such as this raider had taught her that they could be slippery characters, unpredictable and desperate. And either very cunning or very stupid. It mattered little to her which of those two he might be, as either way he would most likely be very dangerous. She would remain where she was.

  “All I want is the card,” she repeated. “Drop it on the floor and then step away.” She straightened her arm, making a point of training the gun on the man’s head, emphasising her point. The raider’s sneer disappeared, his face becoming serious. He reached into the long coat he wore, his hand fumbling around in an inside pocket.

  Steady, girl. Barber tensed, anticipating the glint of a firearm and the need to react. A moment later, the raider’s hand reappeared and threw something at her feet. She expected the almost inaudible clatter of plastic as the card hit the floor. The noise that came, however, was far louder and clunkier, and punctuated by a metallic clasping sound. The gasps and sudden cries about her confirmed her worries, and she took her eyes off the man for just a moment to see a tiny, flat octagonal device resting just a few feet in front of her. A red light winked on and off on the top of its dark grey surface, steadily growing faster and faster.

  It was a mini-mine … and it was about to explode!

  Barber darted back, trying to keep an eye on the man as the device went off, flames and smoke obscuring her vision. Through the haze she sighted him, sprinting between the packs of people crowded together on the floor. Ignoring the screams of t
error around her, Barber began a much more urgent pursuit of her target. She’d have to kill him now. There was no hope of bringing him down carefully and interrogating him. That opportunity had been lost.

  The man was fast, darting between groups and huddles, and hopping over bags. Even so, Barber had few problems keeping up. She kept a tight grip on her pistol as she ran, stopping every now and again to loose off a shot, none of which found their mark. The long coat her target wore flapped around as he zig-zagged, ducked and leapt about, concealing his form and making it harder to land a hit.

  She soon had him cornered, the exit he had been making for unexpectedly sealed. She had seen to that when she had followed him into the port, intending on minimising possible escape routes. She saw him hammering at the door release button next to the exit, and levelled her gun at his torso as he tried in vain to prise the door open where it met the wall, his fingers struggling to find anything to latch onto.

  Just as she squeezed the trigger, the raider ducked along the side of the adjoining wall, and the shot that had been intended for his heart slammed instead into his left shoulder. She quickly squeezed off another round, but with the man once more ducking and diving, the shot missed altogether, ripping through his coat and ricochetting off the wall behind him. The third squeeze clicked on an empty chamber.

  “Bitch! I’ll kill you!” the man cried out in a mixture of pain and anger, his right hand clasped around his bleeding shoulder. He then swung around and Barber finally caught a glimpse of the man’s own weapon. It looked like a laser pistol. She ducked down as he made to fire.

  The raider appeared to be left-handed, or at least held the weapon with his left, and with his shoulder wounded, his aim was far from true. The first shot cleanly missed its intended target, as well as everything else, the thin red beam striking the floor behind Barber, letting off sparks and leaving a scorch mark at the point of impact. The second and third shots were partly more successful at finding targets, though once again neither were Barber. The first felled an old man, hitting him square in the forehead. The beam passed straight through his skull, leaving a small hole in the front and back of his head, before striking the ground behind. The second caught a mother in the hand as she reached across to grab her daughter, the little girl screaming in horror as three severed fingers fell neatly into her lap.

  The fourth pull of the trigger resulted in nothing, and nor did the subsequent ones. Barber noted the blinking light on the side of the gun at the same time as the raider. Out of ammo. The man cast about for a brief moment, seeming to consider his options, before coming to a swift conclusion and racing away.

  Barber broke into a sprint to catch up with her target, who had resumed darting and skipping over people. He wasn’t heading in any particular direction, but zig-zagging once more. She saw him fumbling around in his coat and assumed he was trying to buy himself some time as he searched for an energy capsule to recharge his laser pistol. With the huge scatterings of people and baggage, coupled with his urgent need to reload his gun, Barber was certain it wouldn’t be long before he met his undoing.

  She found that the raider didn’t disappoint.

  As the man leaped over a bag, his foot became snagged, caught within an exposed, upturned strap. The sudden and unexpected additional weight caused him to topple forward, and he crashed to the ground. His pistol, along with the energy capsule that he had only just managed to pull from his coat, clattered and skidded along the floor ahead of him, far out of reach. She saw him start thrashing his foot around in a vain attempt to free himself, seemingly not willing to take his eyes off where his gun and ammunition had gone. The struggling did him no good and Barber took the opportunity to reload her own pistol, ejecting the spent clip and shoving another one in its place. She was quick, but even with her speed she saw that the raider was already working on a solution to his own problem.

  The man’s hands flew towards the straps that were curled around his ankle, and with a flick of his wrist, what looked like a knife shot into his hand. It must’ve been a specially concealed weapon, built into the sleeve of his coat. The blade was apparently exceptionally well-maintained, as with little more than a few slashes he had managed to cut away the straps and was once again free.

  Barber pounced, descending on him as he stood, pulling the trigger of her pistol at point-blank range. The man grunted as the bullet hit him square in the chest, a dark red circle appearing an instant later as blood began pouring from the wound. If the raider had felt any shock or pain at that moment, then he pushed past it quickly, responding by driving his knife deep into Barber’s chest. Barber cried out as she felt the blade slicing into her. It was sharp. Very sharp.

  “Yeah? See how you like it, bitch!” the man spat.

  She attempted to pull away and fire again, but even before she had time to act the man gripped her tight about the shoulder, withdrew the knife and plunged it twice more into her. It was as if all his injuries had been forgotten and he was now being fuelled by nothing but pure, unadulterated rage.

  Just as he prepared to strike for a fourth time, Barber managed to push beyond her own pain and pull back on the pistol’s trigger as many times as she could. There was a series of bangs, followed soon after by several clicks as she emptied the remainder of her clip into her opponent’s stomach. She looked at the man as he struggled to breathe, unable to draw air into his lungs. He held fast to his knife, even as his eyes began to roll back. He then sagged, his grip on her loosening as he fell to the floor. It was over. It was done.

  Barber could feel her own legs beginning to give way and she fought to control herself. Focus, Clare, focus! Find the damn card! NOW! She set about rummaging through the dead man’s clothes, praying that he had the data card with him, rather than having left it in his craft. In her current state, she wouldn’t even be able to make it to the docking ports, let alone break into his ship. She coughed as she continued her hasty search, tasting blood in her mouth and seeing it splatter over the man’s body as it ran down her chin.

  Relief washed over her as her fingers encountered a thin piece of plastic in one of his many pockets, which, once removed, revealed itself to be just what she had been looking for – a tiny, thin blue card, bearing the Confederation insignia. He had taken little care of it – it was slightly scratched, and covered in lint, crumbs and other pieces of shrapnel that inhabited the pocket she’d found it in. Still, she had it.

  Now she had to …

  Her head began to feel light and she sat down on the floor with a heavy thump, using one hand to prop herself up and keep from tipping over completely. She couldn’t pilot a Dart like this. Hell, she couldn’t even walk like this. There was now only one thing she could do to ensure the card made it back to its rightful owners. Reaching into her jacket, she removed a packet containing a tiny capsule and a small bottle of liquid. Breaking open the packet, she placed the data card into the capsule and sealed it tight. She coughed some more, feeling the blood filling her mouth again, the taste of copper and iron with it. She spat it from her mouth, as well as the rest that wanted to follow.

  It took her some time and considerable effort to achieve what she had planned for the card, but eventually she succeeded. Drawing heavy, ragged breaths, but confident that the plans were now in a safe place, she lay back. She was going to die. With what remained of her strength, she fumbled out the spent clip from her pistol and pushed in a fresh one. Not that it would do her much good now; it was more of an automatic reflex than anything else. She found her breath coming shorter with each passing moment. The raider’s knife must’ve punctured a lung.

  Congratulations, Clare, she thought to herself, you finally made it out of the service.

  She noticed that some of the more inquisitive witnesses to the scene were inching forward to investigate the man and woman who now lay in a pool of blood together, following their very violent encounter. She met another woman’s eyes and saw them filled with pity.

  “I hope you’re luckier than I
was,” Barber whispered.

  But in her heart she doubted that. There was a good chance that she was the lucky one here. Running wouldn’t save these people any more than fighting would. They were only prolonging the inevitable. Eventually they wouldn’t be able to run any further, although she couldn’t blame them for trying. And when the Pandoran army caught up with them, that would be it. Prisoners would not be taken, lives would not be spared.

  Her vision soon became cloudy and she closed her eyes, letting the darkness take her.

  XXII

  — An Uncomfortable Revelation —

  Over time, the grey form of Arlos loomed steadily larger as the ATAFs hurtled towards it, hidden from all but the most diligent of observers beneath the veil of the starfighters’ cloaking field. Owing to the direction of their approach, the starport was hidden behind the far side of Arlos, and as he rounded the planet Dodds expected to see a flurry of activity all around their destination.

  The sight that greeted him couldn’t have been further from it. The starport lay quiet, appearing to be all but abandoned. The normal glow of lights and other illuminations that would’ve welcomed travellers were absent, the port’s lifelessness echoing much of the rest of the star system. For some reason, Dodds couldn’t shake the feeling that the port wished to convey the impression that it had been out of use for quite some time, its previous residents having upped and left many years ago.

  First Cardinal and now this. It was the second time in almost as many days that his destination had presented him with a cold and dead demeanour. It was a theme that was beginning to become all too common. The only indication that the port wasn’t quite as lifeless as it would have one believe was the presence of a solitary cargo vessel, resting nearby. Though it too was shrouded in darkness.