Titanborn

by Rhett C. Bruno

  “What has it been, three, four years since I saw you in person?”

  “Something like that. I can’t believe they still have an old man like you in command here.”

  “Only until they find someone better,” he joked. The smile he was wearing faded when Zhaff appeared beside him.

  “I can relate. This is the partner you assigned me.” I gestured toward the Cogent with both hands. “Zhaff. Fresh out of the Cogent Initiative.”

  Zhaff stepped forward with perfect posture and saluted. “Sir.”

  I could tell by the director’s darkening features that he hadn’t actually met a Cogent before. He saluted back halfheartedly before putting his arm around my shoulder. He turned me around and walked me as far away as we could get in the room. It was relieving to know that even he felt uncomfortable around Zhaff.

  “A little young, don’t you think?” Director Sodervall whispered into my ear. “Even for one of them.”

  I glanced back over my shoulder at Zhaff, who stood quietly in place with his eye-lens tracking us. I remembered how I’d noticed the same thing when we first met. His tall body moved with inhuman fluidity and precision, as if he were gliding effortlessly across a paper-thin sheet of ice with no fear of falling through. That was probably what made his age seem so bizarre. That or his taciturn face, which never showed any perceptible emotion.

  I shrugged. “I figured you knew. Better to start them young I guess.”

  “So I hear,” Director Sodervall replied.

  “Look, sir, about what happened on Earth, I—”

  He shook his head and looked me straight in the eyes. “Forget it. We had no idea what we were up against at the time, but now we do. Focus on the job at hand.” He turned back around so that we were again facing Zhaff, though he continued to address only me directly. “You two need to build up your strength and plan your next move. You’ll have access to all our shipping records, and whatever else you may need. I wish I could offer more help, but I don’t have many officers or collectors to spare these days. They’re all on assignment here.”

  “I was wondering why they really sent us here all the way from Earth, especially after what happened. I’ve done business on Titan before, though. I should still recognize a few faces down there who may be able to help.”

  “Good. Ever since M-day we’ve been putting down protests and riots daily. Even after Luxarn announced that he was planning to petition the USF Assembly for all offworlders, including native Ringers, to be permitted to take part in the Departure Lottery. These damn Ringers are never pleased. If it were up to me, we’d send every single one of them off on an Ark-Ship toward some star and be done with it. Bastards were so eager to abandon Earth back in the day after all.”

  “I’m sure Luxarn has considered it,” I jested. The director shot me a glare that made me worry he was a little too comfortable with that idea. I couldn’t stand offworlder affairs any more than anyone, but without them I’d need to find a new line of work. “So I’m guessing you’re expecting us to experience some trouble down on Titan when we go?” I asked, deciding to change the subject.

  “Trouble? That’s a gentle term for it. We extinguish new strains of dissidents here constantly, but there’s a new group that won’t go away. They call themselves the Children of Titan. Wear all white and paint orange circles on their chests like they’re part of some ancient tribe. Hell, a month ago they raided a terraforming research plant down on Titan. Blew the thing to pieces. Who knows why.”

  “They think Titan is their world,” I responded, my conversation with the Ringer on Earth popping into my mind. “They don’t want to change it.”

  “Indeed,” he said, seeming rather disturbed by the notion.

  “Any idea who’s leading them?”

  “Not a clue, but they seem to have great appeal among the locals, and with so many down there turning a blind eye they have an uncanny knack for getting their operatives around our surveillance measures. We’d sweep all the colonies on Titan ourselves, but Luxarn wants us to keep our involvement relatively quiet so we don’t rouse any more Ringers to their cause. If we march down into the lower wards in force, we may soon have a real revolution on our hands.”

  “Thank God for that. Keeps us employed.” I nudged Zhaff, but he didn’t seem to get the joke. He’d been paying close attention to everything the director was saying.

  “Always looking on the bright side, Graves. You just worry about trying to find these smugglers. Mr. Pervenio has placed great importance on their apprehension.”

  I opened my mouth to respond, but as I did a Pervenio officer came running into the room. He was out of breath. “Sir!” he said, saluting. “There’s been an incident.”

  Director Sodervall waved him over listlessly, as if he was tired of hearing those words. When the officer whispered something into his ear his eyes went wide with horror.

  “Right now?” he questioned.

  All the officer could manage was a nervous nod.

  “I’ll be there immediately.” He turned to me. “Your workout will have to wait. Follow me.”

  I glanced up at Zhaff. As always he didn’t appear perplexed, but the fact that he was also silent was enough for me to know that he, too, was unsure what was going on. I shrugged, and we followed the director and his guards out of the room.

  Chapter 12

  A tram carried us through the core of the moon and to the bustling security headquarters at the other end of the station. It made the one in New London look antiquated. The screens were larger and many were holographic panes able to be touched and manipulated—the newest in telecommunications technology. There were also, of course, floor-embedded viewports, which currently displayed a stunning vista of Saturn’s Rings.

  “This way, sir.” The officer led us into Director Sodervall’s private office. It was a sizable space, filled with all manner of clutter. It was evident that he was a very busy man with responsibilities extending well beyond keeping tabs on me. No wonder he didn’t have time to bother with the Cogent Initiative.

  The director keyed some commands into the console built into his desk, and then a large, holographic screen was projected in front of his viewport. He returned to my side to watch what was about to be displayed on it. Zhaff was behind us, and I could feel his warm breath on my neck as he leaned in close.

  “What’s going on?” I asked the director.

  “Just watch,” he replied evenly.

  He set the recording to play. The feed was grainy, but I could distinguish what appeared to be some manner of soldier in heavy white armor standing in front of an air lock. An orange circle was inscribed over his chest plate, and his visor was tinted enough to make it impossible to discern his face. The camera trembled a bit, which meant that there was likely someone on the other end holding it.

  “The Children of Titan?” I questioned. Director Sodervall nodded with austerity.

  Inside the air lock there were at least a dozen Earthers banging on the glass of a circular porthole and screaming. A similar number of pale, long-faced Ringers were lined up in seats set on either side of the rebel soldier. They were watching, though they didn’t look like they approved of what was happening. Their eyes bulged with dread, and even though most of their mouths were covered by sanitary masks I could tell by the way they drooped that many of their jaws were hanging open.

  “We are descendants of those chosen by Trass—Titanborn,” a voice deepened by some sort of distortion device said. It was coming from the soldier at the air lock. “We tire of being owned; of rotting in your q-zones as you suck our home dry. Retribution is coming. This is what happens to those who steal from our Ring. From ice to ashes.”

  Without warning, the armored soldier at the air lock pressed a button on its control panel and sentenced every Earther inside to death. The outer seal came open and in seconds the winds of Saturn reached in to yank them all out. Then the video went to static.

  “That happened an hour ago on an old gas harves
ter named the Piccolo,” Director Sodervall said irritably. “Somehow they’ve been able to broadcast that video all over this station.”

  The Ringer on Earth flashed through my mind, aiming my own pistol straight at me. I swallowed and shook away the memory. The director didn’t appear to notice.

  Zhaff pulled out his hand-terminal and held it in front of us. In only a few seconds he’d been able to pull up the video on Solnet himself, as if testing whether or not the director’s intelligence was correct. Disseminating something like that across the highly guarded Pervenio servers was no easy task. It meant that these Children of Titan were as talented as they were bold and unpredictable.

  “Do you have any idea where that ship currently is?” Zhaff asked before I could.

  Without answering, Director Sodervall opened the door to his office and looked out on security headquarters. The panicked glare of every officer was fixated on him. “I want everyone searching for the location of the Piccolo. Now!” he bellowed. The officers immediately lowered their heads and hammered away at their keyboards.

  “You should also analyze the broadcast to discover how they were able to disseminate it on such a broad scale,” Zhaff said.

  “I know that, Cogent!” the director snapped. “My engineers have been on that for the last hour. We don’t know how, but it originated on that harvester.”

  Without hesitating, Zhaff walked over to the director’s personal computer and began typing into it. The sight came close to making me laugh, but I was able to hold it back in light of the current circumstances. The director didn’t say anything, but he seemed to be more in shock than he’d been watching the recording.

  Zhaff’s eye-lens darted from side to side, incredible amounts of text scrolling across the reflection in the yellow glass. After half a minute he stopped and looked up. “That is impossible,” he stated. “According to your records the Piccolo is far too dated to have a communications system capable of accomplishing this on its own. It appears that the recording was somehow transmitted from the ship directly to this station, where your secure channels were used in order to post it publicly.”

  “How do you know all that?” the director questioned. He stormed over to see what Zhaff was looking at. I couldn’t help but let a smile break onto my face despite the circumstances. It was nice to see Zhaff’s abilities thrust into the face of somebody beside myself. Now Director Sodervall knew exactly what he’d signed me up for.

  “He tends to surprise you,” I said.

  “That recording is now available on all local Solnet channels,” Zhaff continued. “There will be no stopping it from being dispersed throughout the entirety of Sol unless everybody in the system disables their active devices.”

  “Skelly bastards!” Director Sodervall barked. “Mr. Pervenio is going to have my head for this. Can you trace how they were able to do it?”

  Zhaff keyed a few more commands and scrolled through more information so quickly that Sodervall’s eyes looked tired just from trying to keep up. “Not from here. I would need to see what was done on that ship.”

  “Then we’ll have to get you onto it,” Director Sodervall decided.

  “Also not possible,” Zhaff said. “We are presently tasked with locating the smugglers behind the bombing on Earth. We must focus on our own assignment.”

  “I hate to disagree with you, Zhaff, but he’s right,” I said. “The Ringer I encountered on Earth used those same phrases before he killed himself: Titanborn; From ice to ashes. Call it a hunch, but I have a feeling the same people are behind both attacks.”

  Zhaff’s eye-lens fixed itself on me. “Why did you not inform me about this earlier?”

  I shrugged. “I didn’t think it was important. Offworlders and their expressions. I didn’t even know the Children of Titan existed until today.”

  “They’re the right kind of bastards to be willing to bomb Earth on M-day, all right,” Director Sodervall added. “This could be another distraction to hide what they’re really after.”

  “My thoughts exactly. Now, we have a ship full of Ringers who saw what happened up close if they’re still there. One of them might know something. It’s our only lead, Zhaff. How many transport ships are arriving on the Ring within the next week?”

  Zhaff bent down and searched through the director’s computer again. “Seventy-three,” he specified.

  “And the smugglers could be on any of them, assuming they’re even coming here. I say we follow this lead right now.” I turned my gaze toward the director. “If thirty years as a collector has taught me anything, it’s not to believe in coincidences.”

  “Sir,” an officer outside hollered. “We have a read on the Piccolo’s location. She’s emerging from the upper atmosphere of Saturn now, drifting on a slow course directly for this station. We’re getting intermittent messages from the surviving crew that the invaders have disappeared and that they’re bringing the Piccolo back on their own accord.”

  “Well, it looks like you both won’t have much choice,” the director said. “They’re coming right to you.”

  “They are lying,” Zhaff decided. “That vessel has an ion-engine and cannot be allowed to reach this station.” His tone wasn’t any more authoritative than normal, but there was something about it that earned even the director’s complete attention. A sense of urgency perhaps. “According to you the Children of Titan are renowned for utilizing violent, unpredictable measures. Lend us a ship and we will intercept it.”

  “I agree with Zhaff.” I hated to say it out loud, but he was right. If both this attack and the one on Earth were connected, then the Children of Titan had used a bombing to divert our eyes from their true intentions. It was impossible to say what else they were willing to do.

  The director exhaled and nodded slowly. “I’ll prepare a strike team straightaway.”

  “Don’t worry, sir, you know I’ve put down plenty of violent offworlders before,” I said evenly. “We’ll figure this out.”

  “I want to trust that, Malcolm, but let’s try to keep this as clean as possible this time. We don’t want another Undina situation.”

  I knew from the moment I saw him that he wasn’t going to let our conversation end without dredging up my recent failures in some way. I feigned a grin and bowed my head. “With Zhaff at my side? Never.”

  “For your sake, I hope not. Good luck, Graves.” He patted me on the back before turning toward Zhaff, a distrusting glare plastered on his wrinkled face. “You, too,” he muttered. Zhaff saluted him, but Director Sodervall walked away toward his hectic officers without paying any attention.

  Chapter 13

  A small transport vessel flew me, Zhaff, and a group of three Pervenio officers toward the location of the Piccolo. All I could see through the cockpit’s viewport was the starless black mass of Saturn as we headed straight for its dark side. Occasionally tiny fragments of rock zipped by the cockpit’s viewport, illuminated by the steady stream of light emitted from the ship’s forward spotlights. Our path was taking us across the topside of the planet’s inward Rings, where they were at least relatively small and mostly ice. Still, the entire ship rattled every time one of them banged against the hull.

  “Three minutes out!” the pilot shouted back into the holding bay. I could see a red blip nearing our position on his control console. There were no other visible ships anywhere in sight through the viewport. We were past all the ice haulers, and every working gas harvester operated within Saturn’s roiling atmosphere. Between the innermost Ring and the planet itself it was completely dead space.

  “What happened on Undina?” Zhaff asked suddenly, breaking the silence. Nobody but the pilot had uttered a word since we left the station.

  “What?” I asked, not sure if I was more surprised by the apparent randomness of the question or that he didn’t already know.

  “The mining colony of Undina. Director Sodervall told you to avoid a similar situation.”

  “I thought you reviewed my entire file?
”

  “I did,” Zhaff clarified. “I studied the records of numerous eligible collectors to be paired with before I arrived on Earth, Malcolm. You were one of them.”

  Of course he had. He’d been thorough as always. A part of me wished he’d overlooked my name and saved me his presence, though that probably would’ve meant that Director Sodervall wouldn’t have given me the New London bomber assignment. I’m not sure if I would’ve survived two weeks of vacation if he hadn’t. I probably would’ve drunk myself into the bottom of a sewer out of boredom.

  “I’m flattered,” I said. “And Undina wasn’t on it?”

  “It was,” Zhaff replied. “Based on the available report, the insurgents were disposed of successfully. Why would Director Sodervall want us to avoid that?”

  “It was a joke. Forget about it.”

  “You’re lying.”

  I sighed. I knew he wasn’t going to drop it. “They were disposed of successfully,” I said. “Just not as cleanly as the director would’ve liked. I didn’t pull my trigger fast enough and a lot of workers died because of it. Don’t worry; I won’t be making that same mistake again. If these offworlders want to keep treating Sol like their playground, then I’m done trying to play nice.”

  “One minute!” the pilot updated us.

  “One day most of our species will be what you consider offworlders, Malcolm,” Zhaff said. “Even the life you helped create was conceived offworld. It is our job to ensure the welfare of human expansion, no matter who commits the crimes that threaten it.”

  I wasn’t sure what to say. I’d met many young collectors who claimed to feel the same way: that they did their work for more than a bounty. After a few years on the job, seeing the shit we see, there wasn’t one of them who didn’t forget about all that. When Zhaff said it, however, I knew it wasn’t just something he told himself to feel better. He didn’t even care about getting paid. There was nothing, no horror he could see, that would ever change his mind. I could respect that level of stubbornness.