“Not until you tell me exactly what’s going on,” I replied. “Last time Kale let me out, I found myself gunning down an innocent old man.”
“I know.”
“So you know that when I hear you’re in charge of what’s going on back there, I’m hesitant to trust you. Given our history.”
She groaned in frustration. “Do you want to know why I’m in charge? His aunt, Rin, is my half-sister.”
“The one with the…” I ran my fingers over half of my face.
“Can’t miss her.”
“Are you—”
“A Trass?” she finished before I could. “No. I just get all the baggage without any of the name.”
“If she tells you I flirted with her, I was just trying to piss her off.”
She rolled her eyes. “They wanted my help back before this movement was anything. The pay was good, so I figured why not? I threw her a bone here and there using my broker network, and the next thing I know, Pervenio is gone. Credits worthless. So she sold me on a vision for a new Titan for all of us, but this? Killing protestors to save a minute? This isn’t it. It’s the same as it was under Pervenio, only with different people spreading the lies.”
“I told Kale something like that.” She wasn’t amused. “You really were with them the whole time? Was I always just a mark then? Even back when we met?”
“You were after my information. I was after yours.”
“C’mon, Ry. It seemed like you were after more than that.”
“It was always Aria, Malcolm. The moment you introduced me to that girl in your hotel room, it was like looking in a mirror. I cared for you, I swear I did, but I loved her. I love her now. The only reason I attacked you that day in the Foundry was to protect her because I knew what happened between you two. Twice after that, I nearly had you taken out, but you and your damn Cogent partner were too stubborn, and reached her until she found out it was you and decided to give her bastard father a chance.”
My heart stopped. I’d spent a lot of time wondering how my daughter could wind up working with rebels and terrorists. “It was you who brought her here, wasn’t it?”
“Rin—”
“Don’t lie to me.”
She swallowed hard. “The Children of Titan needed somebody inside of Venta Co. with the connections to steal medicine on Earth because there weren’t enough credits in producing it here. We kept in contact after you and I…” Her words trailed off.
“Stopped,” I finished for her.
“She hated working for Madame Venta. I thought I was helping her.”
“By getting her wrapped up with terrorists?” I said. “That wasn’t your damn place. You’re not her mother!”
“And you were any better?” She grabbed my face and leaned in close. Her breath was intoxicating. Her eyes dreamy. Hazel, but with so many shades of yellow sprinkled in, it was like watching the sunrise over Earth’s ocean. It was enough to startle me into silence.
“We both failed her, Mal,” she whispered. “We drove her into the grasp of a monster, but it’s not too late to help her.”
“So that’s what this is? We’re breaking her out?” I transferred all my weight to my artificial leg and pushed off to get to my feet. “Why didn’t you just say so?”
“I don’t know why you keep thinking she needs your help. She’s already out, Malcolm. Waiting in Kale’s ship to run, but she wouldn’t leave without you. Trass knows why.”
“Did you tell her I was a waste of time?”
“Too many times.” Rylah flashed a grin.
I don’t care what she said, what we had was real. The way we felt about Aria only made it more so.
“Where do we go?” I asked.
She directed me toward a narrow tunnel with two empty suits of winged Ringer armor lying on tables outside. My chest tightened at the sight of them, and I got dizzy. Rylah didn’t notice.
“We fly,” she said. “Put it on. I tried to find the shortest Titanborn I could, but it’ll still barely fit you.” She glanced back and saw me leaning on a column, struggling for air. “Oh, c’mon, Malcolm. It’s easy.”
I grunted an incomprehensible response. It wasn’t the Ringer suits or the idea of flying through Titan’s atmosphere like a bird. It was the tunnel we were about to exit. At the end of it, on the surface, was where I’d gunned down Zhaff.
Rylah must have noticed that I looked like I saw a ghost because she rushed back to my side and lent her support.
“Mal, I know what happened here, but you need to be strong,” she said. “Aria needs us now one last time. Kale is… broken. He’s allowed my sister to twist his view of the world so far, there’s no turning back for them now. Aria still has time to get out before her hands are too bloody to lift.”
I stared down the tunnel, which seemed to grow longer and longer. I could remember running down it to save Aria as clear as day. Me thinking we were smooth sailing until Zhaff found me forsaking our Pervenio contract to bring the Children of Titan doctor to justice.
“Malcolm.” Rylah gave my cheek a light slap. “You have to focus.”
I shook my head out. “All right,” I said. “For Aria.”
Thirteen
Kale
“Why did you bring me here?” Rin asked as she approached. We were half-exposed to Titan’s surface, so she was fully armored and wearing her helmet.
We stood within the entry lobby of what remained of the Darien Quarantine I’d destroyed, where Ringers used to wait for hours under constant watch before visiting with their sick relatives. Toppled columns filled the hall, walls blasted open. Pervenio logos all over were scratched away and vandalized.
“They say the fallout cleared,” I said. “That it’s safe to be here now.”
“You’re not thinking of rebuilding it?”
“Never.” I knelt and scraped away a bit of dust over the shadow of a man that permanently stained the floor after nuclear fire bleached everything around him. “There aren’t even ashes.”
“It serves them right, storming in here like animals.”
I walked through what little was left of a large decontamination chamber. A web of pink lasers and warm air would have once brushed across my body after I’d been forced to strip down. The tingle that model had given my skin became second nature. I’d spent most of my life passing through the things. Between the Earther-run Uppers and the Lowers, at every dock, every time I visited a Q-zone—eventually, Pervenio Corp had them everywhere to try and keep the number of quarantined Ringers at an affordable minimum. Before we took over, the medicine we needed was produced only on Earth. I knew only a handful of Titanborn who could pay for the stuff until Aria, my father, and the Children of Titan stole their formulas and vials from a hospital on Earth.
I stopped as we entered the visiting area, deeper within the complex. Here, the top of the plateau within which the quarantine was carved had been completely blown open. Wind howled as it raced through, blowing grains of sand that would have been like tiny knives without our suits on. Thunder boomed overhead from a gathering storm, and out of the corner of my eyes, I saw the guards escorting us flinch.
“I still don’t understand why you wanted to come here,” Rin said.
“Sometimes it’s nice to be reminded where we came from,” I replied.
“You’re in good spirits,” she said. “How’s the baby? I apologize, I haven’t been around in some time.”
“Healthy. Aria thinks he may be born a few days after M-day if everything goes right. That means he’ll only ever know the new world we make.”
“Good. And Aria?”
“Since when do you care?” I said, but not angrily.
“She’s done everything we’ve asked since we returned, even I can’t deny that. And what you said about her reaction after you told her the truth about Orson Fring, I never thought she’d be the only one to understand necessity.”
“She’s been fighting for anyone to give a damn about her much longer than I have.”
“Sometimes, it’s worth the search,” she said.
“You’re right ninety-nine percent of the time, but I’m glad you were wrong about her.”
“Me too,” Rin agreed.
I continued until there was nowhere else to go. A crater of rock, plasticrete, and twisted metal greeted me, where the Piccolo had impacted. Somewhere amongst the rubble were pieces of that ship upon which my entire life had changed. Even further down, beneath many dozens of meters of rock, was the hidden hollow where Basaam neared completion of his engine.
“Do you think Hayes is trapped down there someplace?” I asked.
“No,” Rin said. “He’s with the ashes now, watching over us. Kale.” She lay her hand on my shoulder. “I have a lot I need to tell you. Look.”
She drew her hand terminal and held it up for me to see. She’d been busy making rounds of our most essential stations around the Ring. We still hadn’t located the Cogent who’d come so near to killing Aria and me, so I couldn’t join her. Rylah oversaw the construction efforts both on Phoebe and with Basaam, while my mother focused on righting the current food shortage. I’d even gotten her to visit me for dinner a few times, furious as she still was over Orson.
A year ago, I never would have imagined sitting around a table with my mother and the mother of my future child, but I never would have imagined a Titan without Pervenio Corp either. I knew she’d come around eventually, especially with Aria on my side. Now that we were being honest, I’d come to find we had even more in common than I thought… both pushed to do things we never wanted to, for the sake of the greater good.
“Kale, are you paying attention?” Rin asked.
“Sorry, I’m just… it’s nice to finally be out of Darien,” I said.
“I’m sure. That Cogent, whoever he really is, has proven difficult to track.”
“If only we had fresh air to breathe here.” I sighed, barely paying attention to her. “One day maybe. Aria had an idea about converting this crater into a terraced hydro-farm. Reconstruct the enclosure, let it be known for something good and not all the death.”
“She’s impressed me with some ideas lately, but that one might not be enough. Now, would you look at this.”
Rin brought her hand terminal closer to my face so I had no choice but to watch. She set a recording to play of her recent visit to the Pervenio Station Detention Center, a place I’d never want to visit again even if I could. The hundreds of cells lining the walls and facing out into the infinite depths of space with a wall of sanity-killing glass were crammed with Earthers. There was barely enough space for all of them.
A few guards fed the captives with only one bowl of slop per two or three of them. I could see the gauntness of what were naturally chubby Earther cheeks. The pinkish hue of their skin grew more sallow by the day, and many of their eyes were permanently bloodshot from crying.
Rin switched to the next feed so I could see food being slid into one cell through a slot in the wall. The six people inside crowded it like savages, pushing and shoving each other to get as much as possible. Reduced to animals like so many of my people were as they withered away to bones from treatable illnesses for no good reason in the very place where I stood.
“None of us planned to hold them here for so long,” Rin said. “Without any trading arrangements outside the Ring, we can no longer afford to feed both them and our people.”
“Are you suggesting we make a deal with Earth?” I asked.
“Never. But Earth is coming with their fleet, hostages or not. They’re not of any use to us anymore, so maybe it’s time to finally use them.”
“Like we used Orson?”
“I didn’t say that,” she said.
“But we’d have to waste ships to do anything else.”
“That’s why I rushed back here.” She switched to an Earther newsfeed on Solnet called Europa’s Lens. “Watch.”
A finely manicured male reporter was on screen, with perfect, thick hair and wearing makeup so none of his wrinkles would show. He stood overlooking a busy hangar outside Martelle Station, with dozens of ships in the midst of lifting off. The corporate logos of Pervenio Corp, Venta Co., or Red Wing Company were printed on every hull.
“This is the scene on Europa Station,” the reporter said. “For weeks now, a record number of vessels have been armed and dispatched to resolve the tense situation on Titan. Madame Venta, who has elected to personally lead the campaign, had this to say: ‘Together, Luxarn Pervenio and I will right the wrong of this savage rebellion against reason. We will liberate the Ring from radicals, doing everything within our power to save the captives there, and we will ensure that it will again be a haven of commerce and safety for the citizens of the USF.’”
“Our New London correspondent futilely attempted to reach the Voice of the Assembly, Talos Gaveren, about reports that this outward act of aggression remains unsanctioned by the USF,” the reporter said. The feed cut to a recording of the bald old man. Talos shoved whoever was behind the camera away without comment before being quickly escorted away down the crowded New London streets.
“It’s clear that this is an unprecedented situation in the post-Meteorite era,” the reporter said. “All we can do now is hope that our brothers and sisters trapped on Titan as part of ongoing negotiations will finally be returned home, unharmed. Perhaps this display of strength will convince Kale Trass to see reason, or perhaps it will inspire them to show their true colors. Tune in for our coverage of the Crisis on Titan here, twenty-four/seven.”
“That’s only a fraction of their fleet, and it’s already completed,” Rin said. “What we saw at Martelle Station barely scratches the surface. They’ve obviously been planning for this solution much longer than anyone thought.”
“Are you surprised?” I asked.
“Only that they didn’t come sooner.”
“The USF may want all their people back unharmed, so the idea of settling far from Earth still sounds like opportunity, but Saturn’s gas and Titan’s fully autonomous colonies are worth far more than human lives. Expansion at all costs.”
“The mudstompers will never stop being greedy,” Rin said.
“And everyone wonders why we couldn’t cave to Orson Fring.”
“It’s proven to be the right move, Kale. I know how hard you took it. Production has doubled since he passed, but we still won’t have enough ships thanks to the delays. Even if every Titanborn in the Ring starts building, we won’t be able to stand against them now that they’re all together.”
I stopped and surveyed the quarantine’s ruins. Just like how this place kept us at bay, all the slowly starving Earthers filling the cells on Pervenio Station were the only thing keeping Earth from bombing Darien, and the rest of Titan, in the first place. They were our shield, at least until Madame Venta and Luxarn took charge and decided to test our resolve. And if they were coming anyway, we were stretching our resources thin for nothing.
Whether they lived or died, the fates of our countless Earther and offworld captives were suddenly irrelevant. I ran my hand along a faded Pervenio logo outside of a nonexistent door; the same I’d seen throughout my whole life emblazoned on every ship or container holding the hand-me-down piece of tech a Ringer from the Lowers could afford.
“Kale,” Rin pressed. “This isn’t time to daydream. We can’t threaten Earth’s people with a second apocalypse if there’s no Titan left to defend. Basaam is wasting his time when he might hold secrets to new weapons that can help us fight back.”
“People,” I said, my eyes going wide as an idea popped into my head.
“What?”
“Let’s give Madame Venta back all of their people alive and unharmed,” I said.
“I know things have been pleasant for you lately, locked away on Darien with your girlfriend, but they’re our main leverage. Think, Kale.”
“I am. The Earthers are boxed up like shiny new hand terminals already, ready to be shipped all over the Ring. Casualties d
uring the heat of battle Madame Venta and Luxarn will talk their way out of, but if we make the captives visible for all of Sol to see—”
“We give them no choice but to pick them up,” Rin finished for me. “Otherwise, we’re the merciful ones. Hard to fight when their ships are as full of innocent refugees as Pervenio Station.”
“Exactly. We can reconfigure every prison cell to launch intact, thousands of them. It should buy us enough time to get Basaam’s drives as close to Earth as possible and force them to surrender.”
Rin reached to her ear to switch on her com-link. Just then, an urgent message came through for both of us on our emergency line from the head of security at the Darien docks.
“Lord Trass,” the man said fretfully. “There’s been alert of unauthorized entry to the Cora. The dockhand says it’s just an error, but there are also reports that the Pervenio collector you’re holding was escorted out of his cell by Rylah, yet hasn’t passed any checkpoints in some time.”
I looked to Rin, my fingertips pressing into my palms. Just when things were starting to look up.
“Graves,” she growled.
Fourteen
Malcolm
Rylah and I stood at the end of the tunnel far beneath the Darien Quarantine, her hand resting on the controls for the hatch that would expose us. My powered Ringer armor was so loose, I felt like a kid back on Earth in my clan-family hand-me-downs. I raised my arms. Wings sewed from nano-fiber tensile fabric stretched from hip to forearm. It seemed insane that a human being could fly just by flapping these on Titan, but I’d seen the Ringers do it before. The moon’s atmosphere was thick as syrup.
“Wait,” I said over our coms, desperate to buy time so my nerves could catch up. “What about my gun?”
“Rin keeps it on her every second,” Rylah replied. “Looks like you’re finally going to have to let the old girl go. Now, are you ready?”
I know she wasn’t asking about the gun, but I pictured the last time I held it, forced to blow away a man whose only crime was not wanting a war. It seemed fitting that my pistol’s final kill would be an old-timer like me who didn’t quite understand the world he’d aged into.
Children of Titan Series: Books 1-4: (A Space Opera Thriller Box Set) Page 97