The guard stormed over and slammed on the bars of her cell. “I don’t want to hear an-another word!” I heard her foot slip, and she hit the cold rock hard. She either stifled more crying or was sucking through her teeth in pain.
“You will eat proper food when you’re do-don—” The guard’s inability to get the last word out only amplified his frustration. He returned to Basaam, grabbed him by the collar, and flung him toward the workstation. “Get to work or-or her bones start b-b-breaking.”
“What a job you have, watching over this sad lot,” I said while Basaam picked himself up and fought his nerves to start working. Every part of him shook. “Picking on women and old men. Can’t imagine what you did to get it.”
“Oh, you don’t re-remember me?” The guard drew himself before my rock-carved prison.
“I’ve beaten thousands of offworlders in my time, kid. Threatened even more. Not one of them didn’t have it coming, though.”
“Well, I remember y-you. The collector who interrogated us after the Piccolo attack. Who left us to d-d-die.”
I placed my face between the bars and glared straight at him. My eyes went wide. “That’s right. You were one of the crew Kale left behind so he could go become the leader of whatever the hell you call yourselves now. Desmond something. Sorry. I usually only remember the pretty ones, like Cora.”
Like all the Ringer survivors Zhaff and I had interrogated after the Piccolo, this one didn’t know a damn thing. Unless they were all lying—and that was relatively impossible with Zhaff around—none of them believed quiet little Kale could hurt a soul, especially not Cora or Desmond. Maybe they were right back then, but Director Sodervall unintentionally provided the cell-based Children of Titan with a leader that could unite them all. A Trass, or at least that was what they had Kale believing.
“Don’t you dare use her name!” Desmond clanged his rifle against the bars.
“What, did you love her too?” I said.
“Never. Cora and Lord Tr-Trass belonged together.”
“I don’t remember you having such nice things to say about him back when I interrogated you. What’d you call him? ‘A weak, Earther-loving scumscrubber.’ To everyone else, he was a ‘nice guy who kept to himself and worked hard.’ Hell, Cora basically professed her love for him. Not you.”
“Lies.”
“Are you sure?” I asked. “I have a good memory when it comes to insults.”
He bit his lip in obvious frustration but said nothing. It was him all right. The loudest of the survivors, cursing and shouting the entire time we held him. Apparently, unlike the others, he wasn’t spaced. I’d have done him first if I were into that sort of thing.
“Doesn’t matter.” I sighed. “Kale had us all fooled, didn’t he?”
“Right until the moment he blew all your Per-Pervenio mates to hell, eh, Earther?” Desmond replied.
I shrugged, then tapped my metal leg. “Got me a new leg out of it.”
“And I got a n-nice show. Earther filth, getting what they deserve.”
“Sodervall did quite a number on you first. Look at you, barely able to walk, stuttering. I don’t remember any of that before we left.”
“He got what he d-d-deserved too.”
“Yeah, he must have had his fun quieting you down. I bet once he shoved you into the airlock, you begged for your life. You probably told him to space Cora first, just so you could have a few seconds longer. Pathetic.”
“Shut up!”
Desmond shoved his weapon through the opening so that the barrel pushed against my forehead. If I could only tempt him to open up and come in, then I’d be in business.
I raised my hands. “Hey, I’m just trying to get the real story.”
“The real story is that you left us with a ma…madman to come here.” My brow furrowed, and Desmond smirked. “You didn’t realize? This is the Children of Titan hideout you f-f-found. I told L-Lord Trass you were the collector. He said to thank you.”
“For what?”
“For getting Pervenio to attack the Quarant-t-t-tine above us.”
Desmond drew his gun back and continued on his way. I slid down the bars onto my ass and poked the band keeping my leg inactive. It sent a slight shock down my finger.
“You damn Ringers,” I grumbled. “When I get out of here—”
“You won’t,” Desmond interrupted as he returned with a metal bowl. He slid it under the bars. Brown gruel dripped over the edges. It looked more like crap than food.
“Eat up, old man,” Desmond said. “This is the sh-sh-shit they fed us on the Piccolo. Suits you.”
“You think this is the worst cell I’ve been in?” I laughed. “By Earth, you all believe you know what it means to fight, but you’re like children throwing a tantrum.”
He didn’t respond. I let the food sit there. At least, until he was back out of sight. Sleep pods fed people intravenously, but they always left me starving for a real meal after. I dug in with my fingers and had to work hard to stuff them under my sanitary mask and get any in my mouth.
The gruel was tasteless with a texture worse than gutter water, but I needed something tangible. I could hear Basaam retching as he, too, forced himself to eat the slop. He sat at his station staring into the cell at Helena and mouthing to her that everything would be all right between every mouthful.
Poor, wealthy bastard. He was probably used to real greens and fresh meat. I, on the other hand, had tasted far fouler in plenty of darker corners of Sol. I can’t even describe the kind of garbage they eat in the sewers beneath New Beijing.
I studied the cavern beyond my cell as I ate. Desmond wasn’t lying about where we were. I could never forget the place where Zhaff and I had stumbled upon the Children of Titan’s hideout, where my daughter served as their doctor, curing the sick and forgotten with stolen meds. I could still hear the gunshots of Zhaff mowing them down while I grabbed Aria and fled instead of turning her in. I could still hear that final gunshot just outside… the one that, for all intents and purposes, ended Zhaff’s life when he attempted to stop us.
A cruel joke from the king of Titan, putting me in the spot where I’d made the mistake that helped spark his whole revolution by shooting Luxarn Pervenio’s son. It didn’t hit me until that moment, but every dead body lost in the rubble of the Darien Quarantine straight above us was partially on me, not only Zhaff. Kale had pulled the trigger, but I put Luxarn’s forces in his crosshair.
I grabbed the bowl of food and flung it at the side of my cell. Helena yelped from the cell over. Then I screamed at the top of my lungs until my throat was sore.
So many mistakes.
Zhaff and I should have never left Cora and the rest of Kale’s crew under Director Sodervall’s supervision. We should have operated more carefully, but I was in such a rush to get paid and make Luxarn proud, I didn’t care. We barreled into this hollow, and the rest was history—bloody, violent history. All I could do now was bust out somehow and end Kale Trass for good so my daughter could be free of his lies.
I gritted my teeth, wrapped my fingers under the electromag dampener on my leg, and pulled. The shock it emitted made all the muscles in my arms contract until I finally backed off.
“You don’t know how to sh-shut up, do you?” Desmond asked, arriving at my cell again.
“Never have,” I panted. “Why don’t you come in here and teach me?”
“I’m n-not stupid.”
“No? I figured that was why Kale assigned you so deep underground where nobody would see you. But it’s not that, is it? No.” I chuckled. “He has you down here because he can’t bear to look at your broken body. That’s it, I bet.”
“Quiet,” Desmond said, seething. His fingers wriggled around the trigger of his rifle.
I almost had him.
“He’d rather look at that scarred witch than you,” I said, “because every time he does, he’s reminded that your skinny Ringer ass survived Sodervall’s racism and Cora didn’t. Am I right?�
��
“Quiet.”
“How are you still so loyal after he treats you like that? If I were you…” I crawled a little closer to the bars. “…I’d be on the first ship to Earth with Kale in a body bag.”
“That’s it. Kale said not to kill you, but he didn’t say anything about breaking your jaw!” Desmond growled. He stomped over to the cell’s controls and began keying in the codes. I slid back along the floor and pawed for a loose rock until I found one about the size of an ear. It would do.
“I’m going to m-make you wish you died here last time, Mudstomper,” Desmond said. The controls buzzed as my cell was unlocked. He didn’t have one foot in before a handful of armed Titanborn soldiers arrived hauling shipping crates to Basaam Venta’s workspace.
“Where do you want these?” one shouted.
Desmond backed away quickly and locked my cell. “You’re lucky he’s m-more important, M-Mudstomper,” he said, his stutter even more pronounced after he came so near to getting in trouble. “When he’s done, all y-your people are gonna s-s-see they can’t win. You’ll starve here, and n-no one will ever remember Malcolm G-G-G—” He couldn’t get the word out, grunting before he marched away.
I dropped the rock and calmly lay back. I had Desmond by the throat, and he didn’t even know it. All we needed were a few minutes alone, and I’d get him to open up again and try to shut me up. Many had tried before.
Maybe my old bones couldn’t even take on a crippled Ringer in powered armor, but collector training had to be good for something. Somehow, I was going to get out of my cell and find my daughter, or I’d die trying like a collector should.
Seven
Kale
The Darien Hall of Ashes was a place I hoped to avoid, but revolution brought me back time and time again. It was where Titanborn went to say goodbye to our deceased loved ones. Essentially, it was a dark, unadorned hall with a series of glassy tubes piercing the exterior wall of the city’s enclosure. Earthers buried their fallen in caskets beneath the ground to be devoured by worms. Even on Mars or asteroids, anywhere, they would decay locked away in boxes.
My people released the ashes of our cremated dead into the stormy skies of Titan. We’d done it that way since the days of Trass’s first settlers, even under the heel of Pervenio Corp. The Hall of Ashes had always been the one segment of the Uppers where we were allowed to roam freely.
Rin held a transparent, spherical container filled with all we could find of Gareth. No ashes spread for him after his body was sucked out into space; only a bit of his blood scraped off the command deck floor. It was the best we could do. More than Cora ever got after Sodervall spaced her like he was emptying a garbage chute.
It hadn’t been long since the ship named after her returned to Darien. I’m not sure how Rin got us out, but we outraced Venta Co. until they gave up. The Cora took so much fire in the escape, she barely stayed together, but we did it. I didn’t bother telling Rin I’d almost been killed by a Cogent retrieving it, but thanks to Malcolm and some quick thinking, we had the key to the next stage in interstellar engine development. Gareth didn’t die for nothing.
Hundreds of Titanborn crammed into the tight confines of the Hall of Ashes. Most of them didn’t know Gareth, but everyone had heard of him and his sacrifice. The silent warrior who fought by my side from day one to take back Titan and all of Saturn’s moons from our oppressors.
“We surrender this soul unto the winds of Titan,” Rin said, regaining my attention. She lifted the orb, flakes of crusted blood tumbling along the smooth inner surface. “May he forever watch over those chosen by Trass.”
Rin glanced back at me. Her armor and sanitary mask were removed so that the gruesome half of her face was on display. Even her burns couldn’t mask her sorrow. She tried to appear strong, but tears welled in the corners of her eyes. Gareth had been with her when an independent Titan was merely a dream. When they were branded a terrorist cell by Pervenio Corp. Before my father died and they sought me out on the Piccolo gas harvester to be their new leader. Before they told me my true heritage as a descendant of Darien Trass.
Rylah rubbed her sister’s shoulders to console her. She was all made up like she was hitting up a Lower’s nightclub, wounds fully healed. Seeing their faces side by side was always strange. Maybe before Rin’s scars, they looked like siblings, but now they couldn’t be more opposite.
“He died protecting you,” my mother said, as if I needed reminding. She stood at my side. “Like he would have wanted.”
“You weren’t there,” I replied.
She clutched my hand, but I didn’t squeeze back. I didn’t want to be consoled.
Rin slowly raised the sphere for all to see “From ice…” She paused to gather herself. The loss of her original Sunfire crew members seemed to be the only thing able to rattle her. Rylah took her arm and helped her keep it up. “…to ashes,” Rin finished.
Everyone in the hall repeated those words. Some solemnly, others with vigor. I barely murmured them. It felt wrong bidding Gareth farewell when he never should have died. Mars wasn’t meant to end in a shootout. No casualties. In and out with our prized scientist in hand and the USF’s rejection driving our cause. And then a Pervenio collector burst through the door seeking out his long-lost daughter, who I’d named our ambassador.
“Kale,” Rylah said. “Kale.”
My gaze snapped toward her. She nodded toward Rin’s hand, which hovered over the controls to eject Gareth’s remains. Trembling. But Rin didn’t strike the key. She was waiting for me.
“Let her,” I said. “They were fighting this war together long before I knew it was happening.”
“It’s not for her,” my mother whispered into my ear. “It’s for them.”
I looked from side to side at all the eager faces regarding me instead of Gareth’s ashes, waiting for me to have the last word. The Earthers called me the self-proclaimed king of Titan, but sometimes I forget that my people believed that even more vehemently.
I stepped forward and laid my hand over Rin’s. “We’ll finish this for him,” I whispered. “Together.”
She nodded. After striking the command, the sphere would be shot out into Titan’s thick atmosphere. Once it flew to a high enough altitude, the change in pressure would cause it to pop like a balloon, sprinkling his blood into the clouds.
I turned to address the crowd.
“Gareth fought for our freedom!” I shouted. “He swore to keep me safe and died keeping that promise. He died for our freedom. From this day forward, we honor all those who have died because of Earth’s greed! Who suffered under their heel and chose not to crumble! We are one Titan. And if they think they can take that from us, then we’ll freeze them all!”
I keyed the command on the control panel so hard it cracked. The sphere was promptly sucked through the dense Darien Enclosure toward a tiny pinpoint of light. I expected the crowd to cheer, but they watched me in silence. The end of my rant could still be heard echoing down the hall, I’d screamed the last words so loudly. My mother wore that deeply concerned expression she always had when I was younger and disappeared at night. If she knew half the things I’d stolen back then to help pay our Pervenio Corp rent, her heart would’ve given out.
As I stood panting, quiet murmurs built by the exit. They rippled across the crowd, some news spreading and stealing the attention of everyone present. I wondered what could possibly be more important than Gareth’s funeral until the whispers reached Rylah’s ear. Her eyelids sprang open.
“You need to follow me, Kale,” she addressed me.
“What is it?” Rin questioned.
“Remember I told you about the Red Wing Massacre? The Earthers, they… You have to see.”
There wasn’t much of a choice. The crowd flowed toward the exit, and we were caught in the tide. Everyone sounded anxious. Terrified. Rin and my other guards fell in close and had to bar people from shoving us.
“Should I send for Aria?” my mother asked.
>
“Yes, where is our young ambassador?” Rylah said.
Aria. The woman I’d named ambassador, who had a father who was a Pervenio Corp collector, and who also happened to be carrying my child. Before we’d left for Mars, all she was to anybody but me was an offworlder with a knack for Earther politics. Being present to see whatever it was Pervenio Corp was up to was part of her job description… but I couldn’t handle any more lies.
“Resting,” I replied. That was half the truth. The radiation and sleep pod meds had taken a toll on Aria’s pregnant body, and she was being treated in the Hayes Memorial Hospital, being monitored to ensure our child was healthy… and until I was sure I could trust her. I hadn’t mustered the courage to talk with her yet.
“She must be exhausted after traveling so far in her condition,” Rylah whispered.
My head whipped around to face her. She wore an impish grin. Somehow, she knew about my baby. I glanced at Rin, who’d clearly heard her, and she shook her head. That meant Aria had told her when even my mother didn’t know yet.
They’d bonded almost instantly after we took over Titan, probably because neither was a full-bred member of the race they were fighting for. And they had history. Rylah had been the one to get in contact with Aria for medical aid when she was still a runner for Venta Co. Rin may have been behind it, but Rylah recruited the doctor.
Had Aria been playing us from the very beginning for Madame Venta? Why?
“Make way for Lord Trass!” Rin bellowed as we entered the Darien Uppers.
The crack of her voice drew my focus back to the crowd. The Uppers remained in disarray, exactly like we’d left them. It didn’t look like anyone was living in the residential towers, but instead, like my people had continued reveling upon the ruins of Earther commerce for the months we were gone.
Rin pushed through the throng so we could see what was on a pair of working viewscreens wrapping the atrium where Darien Trass’s statue stood proudly. Hundreds were gathered within it and around the walkways. The volume was all the way up, but I couldn’t hear anything over the ruckus. Gunshots flared in a sequence repeatedly playing on the screen, my first time witnessing the Red Wing Massacre.
Children of Titan Series: Books 1-4: (A Space Opera Thriller Box Set) Page 89