The Empire's Corps: Book 03 - When The Bough Breaks

by Christopher Nuttall

The Marine gazed at him, unblinkingly. “There's no way out of this, Senator,” she said, her voice still utterly inhuman. “You are not going to get the Prince to your starship.”

  How had she known he had a starship? He cursed himself a moment later; the answer was blinding obvious. The shuttle barely had the range to reach Mars – and Mars was almost as unsafe as Earth right now. No, any fool would know that he had a starship waiting ... she’d rattled him, badly. He should have known that right from the start.

  “Maybe,” he said. “But if you press the issue, the Prince is going to wind up dead.”

  “I don’t matter,” Roland said, sharply. “Kill him!”

  Stephen flinched. The Marine didn't move.

  I should have gagged the little bastard, he thought, bitterly. An oversight ... but one that had cost him dearly. How much else had he missed? Maybe he should have held back on purging the military, or offered Devers a seat on the Emergency Committee ... or just concentrated on preparing his client worlds for the day the Empire fell. Instead, he’d tried to take it all ... and lost. And now he was staring at a Marine who could rip him apart with both hands tied behind your back.

  “We can compromise,” he said, trying not to sound as though he were pleading. He hated bargaining, even with his fellow Grand Senators. Bargaining with a Marine gnawed at him ... but there was no choice. “We can drop you and the Prince off somewhere, maybe on Luna Base. Or we can take you to the Slaughterhouse.”

  ***

  Belinda’s tactical analysis programs were almost gone, but she didn't need them to tell that the Grand Senator was being insincere. On a starship he controlled, crewed by his personal lackeys, he would be able to dispose of them. Even a Pathfinder in perfect condition would be vulnerable. Luna Base was a possibility, but the last she’d heard was that chaos was spreading across the moon too. Besides, she did have somewhere to go, if she managed to take control of the shuttle.

  “You’d kill us on your starship,” she said. She ran through her options frantically. The bodyguard holding his gun to Roland’s head was the real problem; as far as she could tell, the Senator was both unarmed and unaugmented. Maybe he had managed to get some military augmentation in the past without Marine Intelligence hearing about it, but he didn't act like it. “And Luna Base may not be safe now.”

  “Of course not,” the Senator retorted. “Your comrades have deserted you.”

  Belinda ignored the taunt. She'd known that the Commandant had abandoned Luna Base from the update she’d picked up in Marine HQ. And she also knew that he was lurking in the system for several more hours. If she could get Roland there ...

  “I have an alternative,” she offered. “Surrender to me and I give you my word, as a Marine Pathfinder, that I will not kill you. I can even have you and your men exiled to Summer Isle, rather than Hellhole or another penal colony. God knows that other losers in the political games have gone there and lived out their lives in relative luxury –“

  “But without power,” the Grand Senator interrupted. “And I am not yet out of cards to play.”

  Belinda signed. She’d seen it before, on a dozen different worlds. The duly-appointed leader, the corporate profit-monger or the revolutionary leader who simply couldn't grasp that it was over. They kept fighting – or, rather, they kept others fighting for them – until their forces were completely obliterated, whereupon they went into exile rather than paying the price for their crimes. Was it really so hard to give up power?

  Your augmentation is a form of power – and it is damaged, Pug’s voice said. Will you tamely accept it being removed from your body, making you merely human, or will you fight to keep what you can?

  “You are wrong,” she said, simply. “There’s no way out of this. Your minion can kill the Prince – I’ll kill him a second later. And then I’ll kill you. There’s no place for you to go any longer.”

  She allowed her voice to lower until it became a growl. “Maybe you can kill the Prince,” she added, “but what will it gain you? Surrender and you will get to keep your life.”

  ***

  Stephen forced himself to think, even though it was so hard. He’d never been physically threatened before; he’d always had a small army of bodyguards protecting him from the very first day of his life. But now the bodyguards were gone – save one, who had to keep Roland at gunpoint. Without the Prince as a hostage, he would die.

  His thoughts kept spinning around. If he accepted her offer, could he trust it? Life on Summer Isle wouldn't be bad ... he’d taken vacations there, back when he’d been a younger man. And she was right; those who lost power games and were exiled got to live out the rest of their lives in peace, provided that they stayed out of politics. He could go there ...

  ... But the Empire was crumbling. How long would Summer Isle remain untouched? There was a detachment of the Imperial Navy stationed there, commanded by a loyalist ... and yet, he’d seen just how many crews were ready to rebel against their appointed superiors. The Summer Isle might not remain safe for long.

  “Maybe,” he said. “But you cannot complete your own mission if the Prince dies.”

  ***

  He was right, of course.

  Belinda felt her head pounding as she stared at him. A stand-off and a hostage-situation, combined. The most likely hostage situation to end in bloodshed and the death of the hostage. And she was on the verge of collapse. Newer warnings, including some she hadn't seen outside of training simulations, were blinking up all the time. Her body was at risk of a catastrophic collapse. If the Senator managed to stretch it out a few more minutes, she was likely to drop dead in front of him. She had to stop him before she crashed to the deck.

  Surely the Senator knew how vulnerable he was ... but he didn't seem to care.

  Roland threw himself to one side. The bodyguard’s gun went off, the bullet missing the Prince and ricocheting off the deck. Belinda threw herself at him as he tried frantically to take aim at her, getting off another shot before she rammed her finger into his eye and right through into the brain. The Senator let out an incoherent howl as Belinda spun around and lunged at him, only dimly aware of the blood dripping from her hands. He put up his hands to try to ward her off, but he might as well have tried to use paper as armour.

  The Commandant would want him alive, if possible, but there was no time for half-measures. She knocked his hands aside and slammed his head into the bulkhead, feeling his skull shatter. A moment later, she felt a stabbing pain in her head and collapsed to the deck herself. The implant that monitored her brainpan seemed to have failed ...

  Get up, Doug ordered. Her former commander’s voice cut through the haze for a few brief seconds. Deal with Roland.

  She pulled herself upright, even though her vision was dimming alarmingly. Roland came towards her, blood dripping from a cut to his face. Belinda reached weakly for the tape they’d used to tie his hands and ripped it free, before she collapsed back to the deck.

  “Listen,” she hissed. She could barely speak. Shaping a single word had suddenly become a near-impossible burden. “Take the pilot, hold him at gunpoint and force him to alter the IFF signal; transmit my name. You should be picked up by the Commandant.”

  “You’re not going to die,” Roland said. There was something desperate in his voice as he pulled at her. He should be leaving her and going to the cockpit, but instead he seemed to have an plan. “I won’t let you die.”

  Belinda smiled at him as she felt the rest of her life draining away. Her implants might be able to save her – they were automatically switching over to preservation mode – but she doubted it. She’d taken too much damage. Her eyes closed ... and yet, somehow, she saw the rest of her team waiting to welcome her. Beyond them, there were others; those who had died on Earth in the final days of the Empire. And Marines she’d known who had died on active service. And her grandparents ...

  And then the universe just faded away.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  The end, when it c
ame, came swiftly.

  Earth’s fall destroyed what remained of the centralised Imperial economy; hundreds of billions of credits simply vanished. The shock thrust billions of people out of work and rendered the Empire’s money worthless overnight. As news spread from world to world, the economy crumbled in its wake. It was followed rapidly by law and order as planetary governments sought independence, or military officers attempted to take power for themselves. To make matters worse, the old grudges that the Empire had suppressed came back into the light and war raged through the newly-independent systems.

  And Earth itself? By the time the fighting in orbit came to an end, so much debris had fallen on the planet that it was rendered completely uninhabitable. Uncounted billions died as the megacities crumbled and fell; millions more starved to death as the planet fell into darkness, the end of technology ensuring that they could no longer feed themselves. By the time the successor states returned to Sol to try to claim Earth for themselves, the entire population was dead.

  We know almost nothing about their final days. Did they die peacefully? Or were the former inhabitants of the megacities hunted down by the Undercity denizens? Did they really resort to cannibalism in the hope it would prolong their lives? We may never know, but one thing is clear.

  They were the Empire’s final victims.

  Am I responsible, in some small part, for this catastrophe? It was my book, the book that destroyed my career and earned me permanent exile from Earth, that Bode used to incite the students, the first step in the Emergency Committee’s plan. And yet all I did was point out truths that were there for all to see, had they bothered to read the writing on the wall. I cannot logically blame myself for the Fall of Earth. Nor can I blame many of those who were alive at the time; they might have helped to speed the end, but the seeds were sown thousands of years ago. In truth, the Empire committed suicide.

  It just took a very long time to die.

  -Professor Leo Caesius, The End of Empire

  Jeremy looked down at the final report from Earth.

  Most of the orbital defences had finally destroyed themselves, bringing the civil war in orbit to an end, but it was too late. Almost all of the orbital infrastructure had been destroyed in the crossfire, leaving hundreds of thousands of pieces of debris to fall on the planet below, while the orbital towers were tottering on the verge of collapse. Earth had been struck so many times that the planet was hidden under clouds of atmospheric dust, blocking out the sunlight. Jeremy doubted that anyone could have survived.

  His wristcom buzzed. “Commandant,” the Captain said, “we are about to cross the Phase Limit.”

  And then there will be no more reports, the Commandant thought, bitterly. But then, he didn't want to hear any more. Avoiding bad news was a bad habit, yet what good would it do to listen to the endless series of disasters sweeping the solar system?

  “Good,” he said. “Take us into FTL as soon as we can go.”

  He scowled down at the datapad, then clicked it off. The Empire was gone ... and yet it would be months before the inhabited galaxy knew it. But Jeremy could not allow himself any delusions. The Empire had been crumbling even before Earth destroyed itself in one final orgy of violence and destruction. Now, once the news reached the rest of the human race, the Empire would simply come apart. And that would be the end.

  The Slaughterhouse would be a target, he suspected. One or more of the successor states would seek to co-opt or destroy the Marines. He’d sent orders to prepare for evacuation as soon as he’d realised that Earth’s collapse had gone too far to be stopped; his Marines should be ready to abandon the world before the news reached the rest of the Empire. Safehouse was unknown to anyone outside the planning team; it should be safe enough, at least long enough for the Marines to regroup and consider their next move. But what would they do without the Empire?

  It had been a badge of honour to be a Terran Marine, right from the start. As the Empire decayed, it had meant more and more to the elite who’d made up the Marines. They’d seen themselves as standing for a greater principle, as being honest and incorruptible when all other institutions were becoming obsessed with form over function. But now the Empire was gone. What were the Marines now?

  Prince Roland had made it out, thanks to Specialist Lawson – but his Empire was gone. His position as Crown Prince was meaningless, even more than it had been before Earth had collapsed into chaos. It was even risky for him to keep his name and title; there would be no shortage of people willing to blame the Prince for the Empire’s collapse. Human nature demanded that they find someone to blame and Roland – the old Roland – would make a convenient scapegoat. The fact that he’d been a puppet, then a fugitive, would completely pass them by.

  “I’m going to record everything,” Colonel Myung-Hee had said. “One day, everyone will need to know what happened at the Fall of Earth.”

  Jeremy couldn't disagree. One of the reasons for the Empire’s slow collapse, according to Professor Caesius, was that the Grand Senate had been allowed to bury historical truths under a mountain of bullshit. He didn't envy Chung’s attempt to catalogue everything that had taken place in the solar system – and he doubted that anyone would ever have the complete picture – but she had to try. Future generations might learn something from the Empire’s end.

  Not that we learned anything from the past, he thought. Why should our successors?

  His wristcom buzzed. “Sir,” Doctor Roslyn said, “we’re ready to begin surgery now.”

  “Understood,” Jeremy said. “Good luck.”

  ***

  Belinda opened her eyes.

  She was lying on a medical bed, staring up at the ceiling. The omnipresent background hum told her that she was on a starship, almost certainly one of the Marine transports fleeing Earth’s system. And yet ... she was confused. She’d known that she was dead.

  Automatically, she ordered her implants to run a status check. There was no response.

  A face came into view. “Specialist Lawson? Can you hear me?”

  Her mouth felt funny and her voice sounded slurred, but she managed to answer. “Yeah ...”

  “Glad to see you back with us,” the face said. “I’m Doctor Roslyn. You took quite a beating, I’m afraid, but it’s all over now.”

  Belinda remembered Roland and shivered. “The ... Prince ...?”

  “Is safe and well,” Doctor Roslyn assured her. “Sleep now. There will be plenty of time to catch up later.”

  She wanted to protest, but he did something to her and she plunged back into blackness. When she next opened her eyes, she was in a different room and two other faces were looking down at her. The Commandant ... and Prince Roland. Both of them looked very relieved to see her.

  “What ... what happened?”

  The Commandant gave Prince Roland a droll look. “Blame the Emperor who designed the shuttle,” he said, finally. “He had a full medical centre installed; Roland dragged your body into the compartment and dumped you into the tube. The automated doctor put you in stasis while the Prince called for help. Once we picked you up, Doctor Roslyn went to work and saved the rest of your life.”

  Belinda nodded. Even that motion was hard.

  “Thank you,” she said, finally.

  “Least I could do,” Prince Roland said, but his face was grim. “Earth is gone.”

  “She doesn't need to know that right now,” Doctor Roslyn said. He scowled at both of Belinda’s visitors. “You’ve seen that she’s alive, now scram. I need to talk to my patient.”

  He watched them both leave the compartment, then turned to look at Belinda.

  “You do know,” he asked, “that you are very lucky to be alive?”

  “Yes,” Belinda said, quietly.

  “Your implants were badly damaged,” the Doctor said. “And you took a beating. Among other things, there was cranial bleeding, the drug-injectors started leaking and you overdosed on the boost. That you managed to keep functioning as long as you did was
nothing short of a miracle.”

  His eyes narrowed. “But there was damage,” he said. “I thought we were going to lose you for several hours before you finally pulled through. The brain damage ... well, we fixed the damage we could fix, but brains are tricky things. You might suffer all kinds of side-effects from that alone. And then we had to replace a number of your implants, just to help your body cleanse itself. In the long term ...?

  “You may feel fine now, but it will be years before you can consider going back on active service,” he added. “My honest advice would be to retire.”

  Belinda stared at him. Her service as a Marine and then a Pathfinder had given her life meaning ... it couldn't be gone. Her father had served out his time; she could do no less, particularly if she could recover.

  She found her voice. “My implants?”

  “We had to remove most of the damaged ones,” Doctor Roslyn said. There was nothing, but sympathy in his eyes. “The neural link, in particular, was contributing to your mental problems. I would be reluctant to install a replacement for several years, at the very least – it would almost certainly make your recovery far more complicated. And the boost and suchlike ...?”

  He shook his head. “Right now, your system couldn't tolerate the boost,” he warned her. “It would kill you. Rest ... and if you want to return to duty, follow my orders and show a little patience.”

  Belinda wanted to argue, but she knew he was right. Besides ...

  She cursed herself for forgetting the obvious question. “Where are we?”

  “Onboard the Chesty Puller, on our way to the Slaughterhouse,” Doctor Roslyn explained. “We’re in Phase Space right now; we shouldn't be in any danger, so you can relax and do as I tell you. Or we can put you back into stasis until we reach our final destination and you can start your recovery then. But my honest advice is still to retire.”

  “To find a house, a husband, have children ...?” Belinda couldn’t help laughing. “Boring!”

  “Then work hard,” the Doctor advised. “But don’t push yourself too hard.”