Last Life (Lifers Book 1)

by Thomas,Michael G.

  Which surprised no one, after all, Estevez wasn’t a citizen of PanAm, nor of Earth. He hailed from Titan, the moon that orbited Saturn. The largest moon, it caused excitement when scientists found it was the sole natural satellite known to have a dense atmosphere. The excitement became euphoria when they discovered a rich treasure trove of minerals. So many resources to exploit, to mine, process, and sell, it made the twentieth century oil fields of the Middle East look like pocket money.

  There was a price. Despite its climate having similarities to that of Earth, including wind and rain, and features like rivers and lakes, other aspects couldn’t be more different; couldn’t be more hostile, including seas of liquid methane and ethane. The temperature was beyond cold, falling to around minus 180 degrees Centigrade. Yet the colonists came, miners, engineers, to brave the terrible conditions to extract Titan’s wealth, and sell it to an eager Solar System.

  Men and women lived a hard existence in the terrible conditions, and a new breed of colonist emerged. Earth had her ingenuity, her adaptation to change, despite the failing economies and dwindling resources. Mars had a superior technology that swept all before it. Titan’s colonists had to become strong to survive. More than strong, they became analogous to the Spartans of ancient times.

  On Titan, strength and military prowess was prized, and weakness despised. They became a planet of soldier engineers. Ran their world with a hard driving military discipline, and the wealth they gouged from their hell planet gave them the resources to purchase a lifestyle even Martians envied.

  The population possessed the kinds of attributes once accredited to such units as the U.S. Navy SEALs, Delta Force, and Marine Force Recon. With access to every technological enhancement money could buy, the Titans became the most powerful and feared colony in the Solar System. Yet they were a long way away. Journey times were awesome, at least two years to Mars, and a little less to Earth, at thirteen thousand million kilometers, depending on current relative positions. The governments of PanAm and the other Earth nations heaved a sigh of relief that they were too far away to present a problem, and ignored them.

  When Estevez appeared out of nowhere to head up Dawson Public, eyebrows were raised. Why had he left his home on Titan, where he formed part of the elite of the system? Abandoned the richest planet of the colonized worlds, to embark on the massively long journey and come to Earth. He was a mystery man, and the best answer anyone could come up with was he carried some kind of baggage. He’d upset some powerful people on his home planet, and had little choice but to flee. Whatever the reason, he was the man in charge.

  He looked powerful, confident, exuding strength and power. Vos felt a sense of relief there weren’t more like this man on Earth. They’d soon be running everything, and it wouldn’t be for the benefit of the ordinary citizen.

  “The military contacted me, and they’re not happy, Sheriff. They say the way you’ve mishandled this whole affair has put them in a bad light. As if you’re alleging the military is conducting some kind of a vendetta, which, of course, they’re not. Is that clear?”

  “Crystal clear, Sir.”

  “It better be. They want this man apprehended by a civilian lawman, not a military cop. This is your case, Vos. He got away on your watch, which means you have to go after him and make the arrest. After that, they’ll take him into their custody.”

  He decided a ration of truth wouldn’t go amiss. “They don’t want to arrest him, Mr. Estevez.”

  “You what?”

  “Sir, they want him dead.”

  The handsome face froze. “I didn’t hear that, Sheriff. You’d better forget you ever had that thought. Dawson Public is looking to make financial savings, and they could start to look in your direction.”

  “Sir, if I could explain…”

  “You can’t explain anything. Vos, you’re close to joining those vagrants you’re always chasing out of Westbank. What is it you call them, Scavs?”

  “Sir…”

  “Shut the hell up. You’ll take a deputy with you and travel with the MPs to Mars. The lighter departs Washington Spaceport in five days to rendezvous with the Cycler. They want this done by the book. Unless you’re not up to the task, in which case they’ll find some people who are tough enough to finish it.”

  “Like the Titans, Sir?”

  Estevez gave him a hard look, and even Vos trembled at the implied power behind that gaze. “What was that you said?”

  “Er, the Titans. They have a reputation for extreme toughness. People say they’re like the old Spartans. You know, live to fight and so on.”

  “You know I came from Titan?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “It’s a long way away, Sheriff. Took me years to arrive here on Earth, and Titan is too far away for them to even consider taking military action on Mars or on Earth, and why would they? There’s more than enough wealth to go around out there, beyond the Rim. It’s impossible, totally impossible, so you can forget you ever heard the name Titan.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Any questions? No? Let me know when it’s done.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  And screw you. Titans think they own the System. But he’s right, and thank Christ they’re too far away to be a problem.

  He’d considered resigning, looking for another job, but he put it out of his head. He’d seen too many men without work. Men like the scavs who lived on the edge of society, always hungry, always hustling for the next meal. He had no choice.

  Five days later they embarked on a passenger lighter. It was the start of the long, uncertain journey to Mars; at the end, this, long days and nights spent gazing into security monitors, or out at the spaceport, searching for the man who’d so far bested them.

  Bowen had jumped at the chance to travel to Mars. Even after months in space, followed by the interminable wait, he was still fascinated and absorbed by his first visit on the planet. Sometimes, Vos wished he’d wipe the smile off his face. Lately, it had started to irritate him.

  “Well? I asked you a question, Sheriff.”

  He realized he’d been woolgathering. “You mentioned something about your people being certain he’d come, General.”

  “Because your cops let him slip through your fingers!”

  So did you, General.

  “You still think he’ll come here, Sir?”

  A scowl darkened his face, and after a few seconds thought, he said, “He’ll come. He has to. But where is he?” He swung around to Guzman. “I want you to rerun the security feed for the past forty-eight hours. Every second, check it all.”

  “Yes, General.” The man seated himself at a console and brought up the first of the recordings.

  Hartmann paced up and down, alternating stares between the viewports and the screens, muttering to himself, over and over. “Where is he? Where the hell is he?”

  * * *

  While Sheriff Harrison Vos was checking out the maintenance personnel, Cage, Romero, and Jackson were still inside the hold of the lighter. The vessel had begun the final descent from the outer atmosphere after detaching from the Cycler, thousands of kilometers in space. The mother ship had continued on its perpetual journey, while they prepared for the landing. They’d used stolen papers to board the lighter and traveled into space to RV with the Cycler. They wouldn’t get away with it Marsside, and they’d have to think of something different. Plan B.

  The hold of the ship was pressurized for the journey from outer space to the landing, but Cage knew they’d normalize when the haulers began the final minutes before opening the seals and airlocks to unload the cargo. A forest of aluminum containers, containing the supplies, minerals, and even luxury goods the wealthy Martians could afford on their inflated salaries. Some had nicknamed the Red Planet, The Golden Planet, with good reason. In the old days on Earth prospectors traveled on horseback, laden with picks and shovels to exploit the latest find. Nowadays, a college diploma in a useful skill was enough to buy them a single ticket to Mars.
It meant a comfortable cabin on a spacious passenger lighter, with every facility to make the journey less disagreeable.

  They’d traveled on a mixed passenger and freight lighter. As the craft detached to begin the long descent to the spaceport, they drifted away from the passenger area and entered the freight hold. It was then he broke the news about the depressurization.

  “We’ll need to wear the crew biosuits for the final part of the journey, so I suggest we get them ready. Make sure we know how they work.”

  She’d raised her eyebrows. “Cage, we have plenty of time.”

  “You saw the sign outside the freight hold. ‘All personnel are required to wear biosuits in this area.’ They'll assume it's a routine safety check. We’ll be part of the crew, going about our tasks. Besides, we need to get used to wearing these biosuits. It’s not just the air pressure on the surface that’s the problem. The average temperate is colder than Antarctica on a bad day, but it can get a lot colder. No suit and you’re dead. A breach in your suit…”

  “Let me guess,” she said coyly, “You’re dead.”

  He’d smiled again but remained deadly serious. He’d seen men and women die on Mars, and even those with small punctures in their suits had died in ways he never wanted to describe. Although the more modern suits were constructed of self-healing fabrics. Small tears they could repair with no problems. Bigger tears…best not to think about it.

  To her surprise she found the lightweight, modern suits easy to wear. The under layer was little different to a wetsuit, and provided the warmth needed on such a cold and uncaring planet. The outer suit was padded at the joints, brightly colored, and fully pressure sealed. For the final day, they wore the suit. When the crew entered the hold, they busied themselves making pointless checks on the lashings that held down the aluminum crates.

  The final descent was nerve-racking for Rose as they hurtled through the thin Martian atmosphere. It was her first experience of a landing, and as they touched the ground with a gentle bump, she held his hand, and kept holding it. The wait seemed to last forever. Until at last the ship started to normalize between the levels and those of the attached umbilical, although the cargo area was something else. It went from being a hospitable, if uncomfortable environment, to one that dropped rapidly in temperature. Noah noticed the pressure and temperature readings began to drop, and slowed his breathing as he waiting. The air hissed out of the cargo hold slowly so that the stores would not be damaged in an explosive blowout.

  “Cage, it feels…strange. I can’t breathe.”

  “Let me look at your biosuit. You need more air. Did you alter the selector?” He inspected the control and touched a contact. A second later, he felt her relax, “You switched from automatic feed to manual. It’s best to leave the suit to control itself. They’re pretty intelligent. Nothing’s going to happen. You’re safe.”

  She touched her helmet to his for the artificial reassurance of proximity. Neither could say the exact moment it happened, but during the months of space travel, they’d discovered one another. If Jackson had any cause to speculate after he left their cabin each night, he was old and wise enough to say nothing. The journey had been for them a time of exploration, a time to unravel their feelings, him to savor her lithe, firm body, and her to make small revelations about him.

  “Your legs. It’s like Rob...” Her voice trailed away, but came back stronger, “Don’t get me wrong. He’s gone, and I accept that. It’s just…I don’t know. You remind me of him.”

  “Is it a problem?”

  “No, no. It’s as if a part of him has come back into my life. Cage, what’s it like on Mars? I guess inside the domes and tunnels it’s not much different to Earth, but in the open, there’s no air. I can’t imagine it.”

  He’d smiled. “It’s nothing like you’ve ever seen. Everything is modern, high tech, and it works. Not like back home. Vehicles run, equipment functions as it should, and everywhere you go there’s a kind of slick efficiency. People live well on Mars, at least, most of ‘em. Although outside, it’s something else.” He thought about the last time he was on Mars, “It’s a killer. I don’t know how the rebels survive.”

  “The rebels?”

  “The so-called outcasts, they call them rebels.…”

  “You were saying…about the rebels?”

  “Yeah, it’s not all the land of milk and honey on Mars. People get sidelined, for different reasons. The Chief Executives who run the place aren’t interested in anyone who doesn’t work.”

  “What about the government?”

  “What government? They say Mars isn’t a world. It’s a business. Run by mega-corporations, and they keep a tight hold on the bottom line.”

  “So how do the rebels manage to survive?”

  “They mostly live in subterranean parts of the early colony, the abandoned mine workings, caves, and tunnels. The first of the cities were built along the base of the canyon, and they’re basic, but well built. Still pressurized, so they can breathe. Those with money move to the top, in the domed cities. Everybody else stays in the dark.”

  “But, how do they get food and water. And air!”

  “They tap into the main conduits, and siphon off air and water. As for food, they steal it, I guess.”

  He winked at her.

  “There are rumors that they raid the hydroponic farms, and they’ve been known to attack and seize the entire cargo of a supply ship.”

  * * *

  Anna Ortiz, the Deputy Commander of the ragbag army that comprised the sole resistance on Mars, swallowed a precious cup of water while she worked to suppress her rage. She was tiny, less than five feet tall, and slim to the point of emaciation. People rarely saw her eat, and they said she survived on a diet of anger and fury. She’d once been pretty, but widowhood had turned her pale face into a hard, cold mask.

  They’d broken through the soil and bedrock after long weeks of hard labor. The rail tunnel lay one meter from where they stood.

  “Where’s Ray? We’ve been planning this for two months, and now we’re ready to break through, he’s not here.”

  “I saw him a couple of hours ago. He said there was something important he had to deal with.”

  Don Cataldi commanded a rebel company. The name ‘company’ was a convenience, an estimate of paper strength that was nothing close to reality. He led twenty fighters, divided into four ‘platoons’ of five. Cataldi was tense, waiting for the order to go. A veteran of countless battles, from the bloody days of the Second and Third Martian Wars, and a senior resistance leader, he couldn’t bring himself to smile. War on Mars was serious business, where a single mistake could result in a terrible, choking death. Cataldi was a big, olive skinned man, with a square, granite face under a bald dome. His roots lay in the Southern part of PanAmerica, in what was once Argentina. A golden future on Mars had crumbled into the bitter reality of life on the run, hunted, and hungry, like it was for all of them.

  “We need him here now,” Anna murmured, “They’re keyed up, ready to go. If they think their leader isn’t with them, they’ll start to wonder. I don’t need that kind of uncertainty. This is a major effort. We either win, or we die.”

  “He’ll be here. You know Ray. He’s…”

  A commotion rippled through the people waiting in the claustrophobic cavern. A moment later, Ray Jamison pushed his way through to the front. “Sorry I’m late. We may have a problem. A rat.”

  The murmurs stopped. Rats were their biggest problem. An operation that took weeks or months of planning would end in disaster when a man or woman passed information to RedCorp security. Instead of returning with food to keep them alive, and guns to expand their fight to stay alive in the hostile environment. Hunger and thirst were a daily experience. Access to air, any air, even foul, unfiltered recycled air a waking nightmare for every man, woman, and child. When one of their own sold them out to the enemy in return for a promise of a box of food, a container of water, or access to an air conduit, people died
. Died in battle of thirst and hunger. Deprived of air and gasping out their last.

  “Who was it?”

  “Sami Kassar.”

  Ortiz winced. “He had access to everything. He was with us from the start. Shit, I thought Sami was okay.”

  “Me, too. We can’t go ahead with this.”

  Ortiz and Cataldi gave him sharp looks. “We don’t have a choice, Ray. You know the way it is.” Cataldi wrenched at a loose rock in anger, tossed it to the ground, and kicked it across the cavern, “We’re desperate. Some of these people haven’t eaten in days.”

  “I know. That’s why we’re gonna do something different.”

  “Different?”

  “Different. This is how we’re gonna do it. They’ll be waiting for us next to Number Eleven Hub. We’ll attack the main rail terminus, under the terminal building.”

  A silence, and Cataldi was shaking his head. “You’re kidding me! That place is like a fortress. Look at what happened to the Andersons. The whole family, desperate and starving, murdered for want of something to eat.”

  He closed his eyes for a few seconds. They’d tapped into the security video feed and seen it happen live. The Anderson family had told no one what they planned, just made a crazed all or nothing attempt on a freighter. The images of the ruined bodies lying on the field had sent a chill through all of them. Jamison had wondered if it was an end run, a suicide run. The family was dead anyway, or as good as. You only die once.

  “This is different. Most of their men will be stationed around Number Eleven. There’ll be a small unit on duty, that’s all. They think this’ll be their chance to wipe us out. While they’re looking one way, we’re going in behind, and we’ll kick their asses.”

  He tried to look confident.

  “They’re cocky bastards, these Martian corporates. Give them some leeway, and they’ll go for it. They think we’re weak and finished.”

  “And some say they ain’t smart,” muttered one of the fighters who remained in the shadows. Cataldi gave him a look that shut him up, for now.