“They weren’t ready for us, but they are now!” Rin shouted. “Get the men out to retrieve him now.”
I nodded and pulled myself off my seat. Blood rushed to my head, and it took me a moment to see straight. “Nice flying,” I rasped. I grabbed the ceiling and went to launch my weightless body down the hall, but Rin clutched my arm first.
“You stay on the ship,” she said. “Kale.”
I bit my lip in frustration then nodded again before continuing on my way. I couldn’t help but glance at Aria in her pod as I entered the next room, completely oblivious to the game of life and death we’d sent her father into. For a moment, I wondered if not wanting her to lose the only family she had was why I’d come up with this insane plan, but I quickly buried the thought. We didn’t have time for doubts.
“You three with me,” I addressed the three Titanborn who we’d bothered waking. One was graying, and judging by the breaks in his nose, had seen more than his share of fights. The others were as young as me, including the blonde who’d let me try steak for the first time, who might have been even younger.
We zipped down the halls using the ceiling bars, then clicked on our mag-boots outside the cargo hold.
“Helmets on,” I said.
The blonde one tapped my shoulder, then immediately reeled his hand back. The young man looked mortified. “Lord Trass, I… What are we doing?”
I took a moment to gather myself, forgetting we didn’t have time to plan this operation. “The collector is out there with vital intel. We have to retrieve him.” A bang sounded, and the Cora rocked hard to the side, throwing us against the wall. “Fast! Helmets on. From ice to ashes.”
“From ice to ashes!” they echoed as they followed my commands. I signaled the outer door of the cargo hold to open and followed them into the airlock hall. It sealed, and the space depressurized before the outer hatch opened.
The men charged forward, and I went to follow them before Rin’s words echoed in my ears. I stopped. I’d been reckless with my life up until Mars, but watching the life drain from Gareth’s eyes had changed something. I knew because I never would have listened to Rin about staying out of things before. It always felt like we were an eternity from making a real difference, but now, thanks to Gareth’s sacrifice, we had a real shot.
If I died, it could all unravel. I might not have asked for that responsibility—or wanted it—but to our people, I was the face of their legend, and to the Earthers, I was the face of the enemy. I knew that now.
“Basaam’s office is the furthest down the main hall, space side,” I said into my helmet coms.
I watched my men hop across the breach and into the lab. A set of bundled, sparking conduits hung in the center of lofty room, as if something had been ripped from them out into space. What remained of catwalks were twisted, and monitoring stations all around had been blown open. The low g of Europa’s upper atmosphere allowed my men to leap up to the second floor at the back. One remained posted at the corner, and the others delved deeper into the offices.
I fought every piece of me not to jump out and help when I saw the flash of gunfire around the bend. Soon after, my men emerged. One carried Malcolm’s unconscious body over his shoulder. They were down to the lower floor before a bullet slashed through one of their helmets and the man toppled over.
A black figure pulled himself around a nearby corner, battling the pressure change. His fingertips dug into the wall so hard it bent beneath them, and in the other hand, he gripped a pulse pistol. I’d barely had time to move before I saw the yellow glint of his eye-lens. He fired again, and the Titanborn holding Malcolm went down hard.
I whipped around the corner of the cargo hold, grabbed a pulse-rifle off the wall, and let loose. The Cogent fell back around the corner as my hail of bullets sprayed the wall. The one remaining Titanborn grabbed Malcolm and sprinted for the Cora.
“Station PDCs are online,” Rin spoke into my ear. “We don’t have long.”
My magazine clicked empty as the Titanborn leaped across the breach with Malcolm. The Cogent re-appeared and lined up his shot. The muzzle flashed, and the Cora dipped slightly to avoid anti-air fire, causing the Titanborn and Malcolm to slam into the ceiling of the cargo hold.
“Go!” I yelled. Just as the word left my lips, the Cogent’s last shot pierced my helmet. I flew back against the wall, my skull slamming hard. My ears rang, and my vision went blurry.
“Lord Trass!” I heard, but the words were distant. “Lord Trass, are you all right!” The young blonde Titanborn who’d survived tore off my helmet and turned my head from side to side to check for wounds. Then he tilted the helmet. My vision cleared for me to see that the shot had hit the side of my visor and somehow missed my face.
“Grab him!” I groaned, pointing toward Malcolm.
I went to stand, but either my legs were wobbly or Rin turned the Cora sharply because I stumbled and had to catch myself on the wall. I couldn’t focus enough to figure out which. The cargo hold doors were closed.
I staggered toward the airlock, and when I got inside, the Cora spun, and I bounced off the walls like a ball.
“Hold on back there!” Rin shouted. “All station defenses are online. I’m taking us through the Ark Ship frame, then we can outrun them at a full burn.”
The ship heaved me to the side, then threw me forward. The sole remaining Titanborn scampered to try and help me while also holding on to unconscious Malcolm, who didn’t have the luxury of an armored suit.
“Fighter has a lock, hold—”
Another blast made my ringing ears go completely silent. A rush of air dragged me and the others out into the hallway. Our bodies struck a blast door that fell shut and kept the rest of the ship pressurized. My face pressed against a porthole in the center, allowing me to see the result of the Cora being clipped by a missile.
Silvery fragments of the medical bay flew across space, Gareth’s body somewhere amongst them. They were lost amongst pieces of the Venta Co. Ark Ship’s construction frame, battered by the Cora and the fighters chasing us. Cora shot down a few more missiles with PDCs, and the distance grew between us and the chasing ships.
The remaining Titanborn grabbed me and screamed something. Rin was over the ship-wide coms doing the same. I couldn’t hear any of them. All I did was search the blackness for a body that would never be turned to ashes and loosed upon the skies of Titan. The body of my protector, Gareth, my friend… lost forever.
Six
Malcolm
“Kale!” I screamed. “Let me out of here, you son of a bitch!” I scratched at the sanitary mask pulled across my mouth, but it was no use. I’d woken with it on, and this one was made from the same nearly indestructible nano-fabric the wings on Ringer armor were made of. A maglock on the back ensured I couldn’t untie it.
We were underground somewhere beneath the surface of Titan. I could tell by the chill. There was enough methane on Titan alone to keep their settlements balmy, but the Ringers preferred things icy. The last thing I remembered was being pulled off Martelle Station, then I woke from my sleep pod and was dragged to wherever here was. I didn’t even get to see Aria first.
I dragged my artificial leg across the floor. The Ringers now had a band wrapping it, which emitted some sort of electromagnetic current. It didn’t hurt, but it jammed the signal so my nervous system couldn’t communicate with the limb, leaving it as little more than a deadweight crutch.
I shook the bars holding me in my rock-carved cell. “I swear, when I get out of here, I’m going to wring your neck. Kale! Rin!”
“Shut up, Mudstomper!” someone said and kicked my cell. “He’s trying to work.” The speaker, a Ringer guard, hobbled by, pulse rifle in hand. One of his legs was twisted beyond mending, and his left hand twitched involuntarily. “W-why aren’t y-you working?” the guard addressed someone else, a stutter on full display. He looked at Basaam Venta, who stood in the center of the cavernous space beyond my cell. A tall array of viewscreens curved in
front of the Venta scientist. Random pieces of tech were strewn about, mostly mechanisms I couldn’t name.
“I need certain materials,” Basaam said. His approach to the guard was drawn short when chains snapped him back, binding him to his new workspace, where I imagined he was prepping to build the prototype engine I’d stolen the plans for. I felt an unusual pang of guilt before remembering that if I’d failed, the Ringers wouldn’t have any use for him. Knowing them, that was a death sentence.
“Lord Trass says t-to tell-tell me everything you need,” the guard said.
“Help for starters. How do you expect me to work with these on my wrists? Under these conditions? I’ll be working with volatile gases. On Europa, I had an entire staff, trained engineers, hermetically sealed laboratories—”
“We’re not on Eur-Europa.”
“That’s for damn sure,” I remarked. Their attention immediately fell upon me. I shrugged my shoulders. “Pretend I’m not here.”
“You have to tell Mr. Trass that these are not suitable conditions,” Basaam said. “I’ll build him what he wants, but if we’re not careful, I’ll turn this place into a crater.”
“He already did that once,” the guard said. “Lord Tra-Trass says you must work here. No…nobody can know.”
“Then, by Earth, send me some skilled laborers. People that have been around an impulse drive at the very least. You have captives; find out which ones have training in nuclear engineering or shipbuilding at the very least. And some food. I can’t think straight when I haven’t had solid food in over a month!”
The guard slammed him in the gut with the butt of his rifle. Basaam was lucky the man was a cripple. Even so, with a powered suit of armor on, the blow was enough to send him to his knees. Basaam’s glasses fell, and he had to crawl and grope along the floor like a beggar to find them. He tried to mask his sniveling, but the cavern was vast and empty. No sound could be hidden.
“Leave him alone!” the woman in the cell beside mine cried out. She’d been sobbing ever since we were brought down, and though neither she nor Basaam seemed to have any interest in talking to me, I’d had imaginary money on the fact that she was Kale’s leverage against him.
“Helena, don’t,” Basaam wheezed.
“Please, you have to let us out of here,” Helena said.
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 n
ever 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.”
Titan's Fury: A Science Fiction Thriller (Children of Titan Book 4) Page 9
