The Empire's Corps: Book 04 - Semper Fi

by Christopher Nuttall

  The Admiral is not going to be pleased, he thought, grimly. If nothing else, enough conscripts had died to make it impossible to conceal their deaths. It wouldn't be long before more young men – and women – started trying to dodge the draft. They couldn't all hide, but it would be nightmarish rounding them all up. We might even suffer a manpower shortage.

  There was a cough from the pilot. “Do you want to rappel down there, sir?”

  Ivan shook his head. He’d clambered down lines into battle before, but he had a feeling that there was no point in trying to inspect what remained of the convoy. Instead, a ground team would have to be sent to strip the vehicles of anything useful before the insurgents returned, whatever the risks. The alternative was simply to fire missiles into the vehicles himself.

  “No,” he said, finally. Besides, the enemy could be lying in wait, hoping to bag a helicopter. Intelligence was sure that they had few HVMs, if any, but Ivan knew better than to take anything Intelligence said for granted. “Take us back to the garrison. There will be plenty more work for us to do.”

  We’ll find the bastards who did this to you, he silently promised the dead men below as the helicopter rose up into the air. And when we do, we will make them pay.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Naturally, this led to the democratic triumph of the majority. Democrats honoured this as a victory. But the democracy could and did demand anything. And politicians scrambled to win power by giving the people who elected them what(ever) they wanted. The fact that this did long-term damage to the Empire passed unnoticed.

  -Professor Leo Caesius, Authority, Power and the Post-Imperial Era

  It hadn't been a good day.

  Helen Patterson held her son’s hand as she walked home, already rehearsing what she was going to say to her husband as soon as he returned from the office. Their son had discovered just what their father did for a living ... and he hadn't hesitated to use it to force his teacher into letting him get away with everything. If the headmaster hadn't been made of sterner stuff, Helen and her husband would have remained blissfully unaware of what the little monster was doing. Instead, there had been an uncomfortable interview with the headmaster, leaving her with the dull awareness that she’d raised a corrupt child.

  She scowled at her son, who was rubbing his bottom while glaring tearfully at her. Helen had never smacked him before, but after she’d seen his teacher crying because she’d thought that she was going to be hauled off to prison – or worse – Helen had lost her temper and spanked Sirius right in front of both of them. God knew how the brat would respond to that, she thought, silently promising herself that she would keep a closer eye on him in future. She had no idea where the sadistic streak he’d shown had come from either. Helen wasn't sadistic and her husband, for all of his faults, wasn't sadistic either. He had never raised his voice to her, let alone struck his wife or son.

  Helen ran her free hand through her long blonde hair. She’d thought she was a lucky woman – and she was, compared to some of the others she knew who moved in the same social circles. How could she have made such a mess of raising her son?

  “I hate you,” Sirius said, bitterly. “You’re going to be sorry.”

  “And you, young man, had better improve your manners or you will go over my knee again,” Helen snapped, tartly. It had been a mistake to allow Sirius to realise how powerful his father actually was, even if he wasn't really aware of the details. Helen knew just enough to keep her from sleeping properly, some nights. “Your father will not be pleased.”

  She nodded to a pair of patrolling guardsmen as they turned into their street. Sirius had wanted a garden, back when he’d had true friends to play with, and Helen had convinced her husband that it would be a good idea. The house was larger than the one they’d shared on Trafalgar – she was a social queen on Corinthian, when she wanted to be – but it was also isolated. She couldn't help mixed feelings about her husband’s position; it made her socially powerful, yet it isolated her. No one trusted her completely – and why should they?

  “Dad will not be happy with you,” Sirius said. “You hurt me.”

  Helen rounded on him and he flinched away, trying to pull his hand out of hers. She felt a moment of bitter regret, wondering if she had done the right thing. But she’d raised a monster and she had to do whatever it took to heal him before it was too late. Too many of the people she’d met who worked with her husband were complete monsters. And her husband’s boss was the worst monster of all.

  There was a van parked outside their house, she noticed, as they reached the gate. She gave it an odd look, wondering what it was doing there, then ignored it as she fumbled with the security sensor on the gate. A moment later, the van door opened and four masked men emerged. Helen had no time to scream before they grabbed her and Sirius, pressing clothes to their mouths. Her legs buckled as the universe started to blur ... and faded away into darkness.

  ***

  “They got them,” Blake reported, softly. His tone dripped disapproval. “Both wife and son. They don’t think they were followed.”

  Jasmine nodded. She’d been surprised that Helen Patterson wasn't escorted at all times; it had taken several days of surveillance to confirm that there weren't any security officers following her. It had puzzled Jasmine until she’d realised that very few people seemed to know what Johan Patterson actually did. Most people just considered him a senior civil servant, someone who had effortlessly shifted his allegiance from the Empire to Admiral Singh. Hardly the sort of person who demanded attention from the resistance.

  No shortage of civil servants, she thought, ruefully. The Empire could have populated entire planets with the multitude of civil servants on Earth alone, let alone the Core Worlds. Kill one and a thousand will take his place.

  “Let's hope not,” she said, grimly. This was far more risky than anything else they’d done. If someone realised that Helen Patterson was missing, along with her son, they were going to start a proper search. And perhaps offer a reward that might tempt others into betraying the underground. Wolf might remain cooperative, but Jasmine knew better than to trust his subordinates. “And Patterson himself.”

  “Remains at the office,” Blake said. “I think he’s working late tonight.”

  They’d timed the kidnapping so it took place simultaneously with Sergeant Harris’s offensive in the countryside. The series of attacks, she hoped, would not only keep Admiral Singh occupied on Corinthian, but distract her from the true angle of attack. But if someone happened to notice ... Jasmine shook her head, irritated. If she had allowed the possibility of failure to convince her not to try something, she would never have bothered to live.

  She settled back to wait, quietly monitoring the planetary datanet for news and information. There was little true news, which would have bothered her if she hadn't known just how heavily censored the datanet actually was. The attacks in the countryside would never be mentioned until Admiral Singh had decided how to present them to the population in the cities. Jasmine had a feeling that the Admiral would call them a deliberate attempt to starve the civilian population, something that might just turn the urban inhabitants against the farmers. Avalon’s council had done something similar, back during the Cracker Insurgency.

  It was near midnight by the time they received a buzz from the monitoring team, reporting that Patterson was on his way home. Jasmine scowled – being caught after curfew would force them to fight their way out or surrender to the guardsmen in the hope they could break out later, no matter what paperwork they carried – but readied herself as best as she could. They had to convince Patterson to see reason before he contacted the security forces and ordered a search ...

  She slipped out of the vehicle as Patterson’s car arrived outside his house and the man climbed out. Jasmine hadn't been impressed when she’d seen his photograph; he was a grey man, wearing a grey suit. He might not have taken any sadistic pleasure in what he did, but he was so completely detached from the
realities of his job that he could order anything with nary a qualm. She would almost have preferred a sadist. At least they could be relied upon to let their vile tastes interfere with their work.

  Keeping to the shadows, she slipped up to the wall and scrambled over it as quietly as she could. Patterson was walking up the path to the main door, pushing his hand against the security scanner; Jasmine watched carefully as he entered the house, then ran up to the door herself. The lock was an old one, easy to pick with a simple multitool. She was mildly surprised that he hadn't arranged for his house to have a more modern security system. Unless his boss hadn't wanted him to have one ...

  “Helen?” Patterson’s voice called, from inside the building. “Where are you?”

  Jasmine opened the door, pistol in hand. Patterson swung around to face her, staring in disbelief. Jasmine had tried her best to act like a young girl from Corinthian, walking in a slovenly manner that would have earned her punishment duties at the Slaughterhouse, but Patterson might well know enough to see through the pretence. No one knew what he’d been on Trafalgar – he was definitely not a native of Corinthian - and if he’d been Imperial Intelligence he might well have had dealings with Marines.

  “Don’t move,” she said, flicking on the laser sight. She didn't need it, but the beam – half-visible in the darkness – was hellishly intimidating. “Your wife and son are safe, as long as you cooperate.”

  Patterson’s mouth fell open. “Who ... who are you?”

  Jasmine felt a moment of pity. Patterson genuinely cared for his wife and child. The pirates didn't care for anyone, but themselves; Avalon’s old councillors had been too busy competing for power to care about their families. And if anyone on Han had loved their families, they had been too wrapped up in hatred and rage to show it. But Patterson cared.

  And yet, she knew what he did for a living. How could he look his child in the eye when he came home?

  How could I do it, if I had children? She asked herself, sourly. After everything I’ve done, it might be for the best that I will never have children.

  “We want your cooperation,” Jasmine said, ignoring the question and putting her doubts aside. There was no time for self-pity, particularly when it was effectively whining. “If you work with us, your wife and child will remain unharmed. If you refuse, you will never see them again.”

  She forced as much cold hatred into her voice as she could, trying to convince him of her sincerity. Even with the Commonwealth at stake, she wasn't going to kill the little boy – but she would send him to a farm, with enough memory-altering drugs to ensure that his previous life became a half-forgotten dream. But was that any better than simply killing him outright?

  And what would she do with the wife?

  Patterson studied her for a long moment. “You must know that this will get you nowhere,” he said, sharply. “Don't you know what I do for a living?”

  “Of course,” Jasmine said, sardonically. “Why do you think you were targeted?”

  She stepped forward, into the light. “We have eyes and ears everywhere,” she said, warningly. “If you breathe a word of this, to anyone, you will receive your wife’s head in the mail. You don’t want to know what we’ll do to your son. Maybe” – she allowed her voice to darken – “it will be like the torments your people have handed out to your enemies.

  “We watch your channels, you know,” she added, fighting down the urge to be sick. “I was particularly impressed by the execution when the killers sliced a little girl into tiny pieces, right in front of her parents. Such a sickening sight, wouldn't you agree? Or doesn't it bother you to watch a young girl die?”

  She stared into his eyes as threateningly as she could. “We could do that to your son,” she concluded. “You know just what some people can do.”

  Patterson swayed on his feet. Like others, he’d probably thought that his work could stay in the office; perhaps he'd bought his house to maintain a healthy separation between the suffering he oversaw and his family. But now he had to realise that what his superiors had meted out to Admiral Singh’s enemies could be meted out to his family in turn. The nightmare had finally come home.

  Years ago, Jasmine had heard a lecture from a Marine Corps psychologist, who’d talked about how easily the values of human society could be pushed aside, if someone approached the issue in just the right way. Everyone could be manipulated, or broken, if the right levers were pushed. If someone believed – genuinely believed – that the person they were torturing was subhuman, they would happily commit all sorts of atrocities on their victim and then go home and eat a perfectly normal meal with their families.

  Or they might want to please their superiors. Or they talked themselves into doing it ... claiming that the ends justified the means. But once you crossed that line, no matter how strongly you tried to talk yourself out of it, it was always easier to cross it a second time.

  It had grown worse, the psychologist had added. Few people could really form close relationships and connections to large groups of people. It was why the Marine Corps used hundred-men companies as the building blocks of larger units – and even that, he'd claimed, was pushing it. At some point, the numbers became so unimaginably large that even the most empathic human couldn't really grasp that the numbers were real people.

  “During the Unity Wars, Bloody Kane the Executioner was responsible for depopulating seventeen worlds through orbital bombardment, with a death toll of over fifty billion lives,” the psychologist had said. “And yet his subordinates had said he was a kind and gentle man. Perhaps the figures were just too large for him to truly understand.”

  Patterson broke the silence. “What do you want me to do?”

  “For the moment, we want you to make excuses for your child and wife,” Jasmine said. He had to compromise himself still further before he could be useful. “You will contact the school tomorrow and tell them that you’re moving your son to a different school. Your wife’s friends are to be told that she is ill – or that she has had to do something that will take her out of the city. You will, of course, make sure that the surveillance monitors don’t pick up anything that might ... worry someone.”

  Patterson hesitated, then nodded. “Of course not,” he said. His voice turned calculating. “I will, of course, require proof that they are still alive.”

  “It will be provided,” Jasmine assured him. “I’ll have them write a few notes to you.”

  “I have money,” Patterson said, quickly. “I can pay ...”

  “We need you in position to help us,” Jasmine said. She made a slip that had been carefully calculated. “We want to move goods in and out of the city and you can help us do that.”

  Patterson relaxed, so subtly that most people would have missed it. Smuggling was big business – and it made sense that a criminal gang would want to have someone in Internal Security in their pocket. He could cooperate without fearing that he was betraying the Admiral ... criminal gangs flourished under her regime. So many people wanted things the Admiral wasn't willing to let them have.

  “I will be in touch,” Jasmine said, lowering the pistol. She doubted that Patterson would try to jump her, but she kept her attention focused on him anyway. “And I strongly suggest that you don't do anything to alert your superiors. They will not be happy with you.”

  She smiled as she saw that sink into his face. It had probably never crossed his mind that he might find himself in an interrogation chamber, strapped to the table as Horn interrogated him, breaking bones and pulling out teeth whenever he thought that Patterson was holding something back. Jasmine had wondered, at first, why the locals didn't seem to use truth drugs. It had taken her a while to realise that a mind like Horn’s preferred causing pain and suffering, even when there was an easier way to get answers out of an unwilling donor.

  “And sleep well,” she added, nastily. “You don't want to go into work tomorrow looking like you have something to hide.”

  Patterson blanched.

/>   Jasmine nodded politely to him and slipped out of the door, moving through the shadows to the wall and scrambling over it, dropping down onto the street. There was no sign of any foot patrol, thankfully, but she stayed in the shadows until she reached the van and climbed inside. Sleeping in the vehicle would be uncomfortable, yet a moving van would be bound to attract attention. Besides, she’d slept in Raptors with a full platoon of Marines and that had been worse.

  Blake nodded to her as she pulled the door closed. “Success?”

  “Success,” Jasmine said. She wanted a shower, but she knew that no matter how often she showered she would never wipe the stain off her soul. God alone knew what Colonel Stalker would say. “He’s going to cooperate.”

  She let out a breath she hadn't realised she’d been holding. A fanatic – or someone who had been conditioned – wouldn't have hesitated to scream for help, even if it meant their family being brutally tortured to death. Patterson had known that there was nothing preventing insurgents or criminals from killing his family; the insurgents might well take a little revenge for everything Admiral Singh had done by killing Patterson’s wife and child. It would be pointless, Jasmine knew, but it would also be human.

  “Good,” Blake said, gruffly.

  Jasmine lay down on the floor, shifting until she found something reasonably comfortable. Blake definitely didn't sound happy – and how could she blame him? Jasmine was walking the thin line between legal actions and illegal acts of war, actions that every Marine had a duty to stop – with lethal force, if necessary. Offhand, she couldn't remember how many Marines had been shot down by their fellow Marines, even though she’d studied the cases at the Slaughterhouse. Only a handful, if she recalled correctly, but some of them had been truly shocking.