by Jason Letts
“What am I looking at? Should we still land?” Rion gasped.
“I’m not seeing anyone else in the area. Whoever did this is long gone,” Bailor said.
They’d come this far and Rion couldn’t bring himself to suggest that they turn around.
“Heath,” he whispered, fearing the worst.
The ship came down in the same spot they had landed before, except the landing gear was still badly damaged and the impact nearly threw them all on the floor. Rion raced to the hatch and yanked it open. He could immediately tell the air was different. Less pure. The smell that something had been burning made his stomach turn.
Swinging down to the ground, he raced for the farm house. Lena and Bailor were right behind him, all of them running to keep the dread and agony at bay. Something was on the ground in front of the porch, where the robo dog still kept a disinterested watch. The clothes, the hair, the shape were all unmistakable.
Rion spilled onto the ground next to Heath’s body, rolling him over to find a bloody wound in his chest. They’d shot him once and left him.
“Heath!” Rion called, but he’d never get any more answers from the old man. He began looking around for clues. “Who did this? The Marshall Force? The Alliance?”
The burning smell came from damage to the house, but all of the flames had snuffed themselves out. The structure still stood and didn’t appear to be in danger of falling over. They looked over the wreckage to try to find a sign, but it wasn’t until Rion wandered off into the fields that he discovered the truth.
“Look at the marks from the landing gear,” he said. “These are Alliance fighters, Skybird class. The house probably took one shot from the cannon after they’d gone in to get Heath.”
That turned out to be the last easy answer they’d get about what happened.
“Are we responsible for this? Did the Alliance find a way to tap into the ship and realize we’d come here?” Bailor asked.
Rion didn’t want to know what it would do to him if the answer had been yes. But as they surveyed the wreckage and the sad scene, it didn’t seem likely.
“You’d done so many checks and they had possession of the ship for so little time. Besides, the way we left things with Hobart makes me think he wasn’t going to come after us more than he had to, certainly not to lengths like these.”
“Maybe they just found him,” Lena said. “Maybe they traced the ship to here from something they dug up before we were even flying it.”
They were reasonable possibilities. Someone in the Alliance with knowledge of shipbuilders might’ve recognized some part of Heath’s handiwork in the Assailing Face and came after him about it. His residence here wasn’t exactly a secret since he met people regularly.
“I wonder if they interrogated Heath at all and got any information from him about us,” Rion said, surprised that he was able to think about their welfare so quickly considering Heath’s dreadful end.
“As best he knew we were angling to manipulate the Marshall Force. Now that’s over and done with. Heath never had an inkling when we’d be setting our sights on the chancellor,” Bailor said.
They spent more time investigating the area to see what else they could find. Most of the crops had been untouched. The Alliance officers who had come never seemed to have found Heath’s hidden bunker under the barn, which would allow them to replenish their stock of ammunition. After they buried Heath, the worst part of it was the feeling of distress from being there that settled in the pits of their stomachs.
“Should we try to find somewhere else for you to hide out?” Rion asked Bailor’s parents when they were back hanging around the ship. “What if someone comes back? Being here could still be dangerous.”
Sandor and Liss Pu looked at each other and communicated with a series of nonverbal cues. When they turned back to Rion, their minds were made up.
“We don’t think anybody’s coming back here. And besides, it’s not like we have great places to hide arranged all over the solar system. We’ll wait here until we can meet up with Francis,” Liss said. As daunting as the situation was, she exuded calmness.
“Bailor, you could stay with them here and let Lena and I go after the chancellor,” he suggested, the thought having just struck him. “There doesn’t need to be a chance that you could lose each other again.”
His partner in crime since he was five-years-old shook his head and grinned as if Rion would never understand.
“I’m going to see this through to the end. That way we all make it back in one piece. You need me on board and I won’t hear another word about it,” he said.
“The power of your friendship will overwhelm all enemies, or some such nonsense,” Lena said, throwing her arms around them in a mock hug.
There was more to do before they left that took another day to complete. That included restocking the ship of weapons and food. Bailor spent his time working on his transmitter to make sure it had enough range to reach them no matter where they were. When he handed over the device to Lena, she almost flipped it on before Bailor could grab her hands.
“Be careful with that. I’ve rigged it so it sends a special distress signal not just to us but to all of the planetary regents and the Vestige. Getting to the chancellor isn’t enough. We need to expose him and prove beyond a shadow of a doubt he’s gone, otherwise no one will believe it.”
“Good thinking,” Rion said. “What we need to do is make a statement. Both him and his vision of an oppressively controlled Alliance regime need to be put in the past.”
The last piece of the puzzle was sorting out the timing of the barges.
“It looks like the barge makes deliveries to the chancellor about once a week. If we leave tonight, that’ll give us enough time to get to Earth for the next one,” Bailor said.
“Then the waiting begins,” Rion said, taking a deep breath. He knew once the ship left ground he wouldn’t be able to stop until it was all over.
They spent a few hours helping Bailor’s parents get accommodated for their stay and had a salad of whatever looked ripe in the gardens. Soon they were checking their equipment and preparing for takeoff. The focused look on Lena’s face made it seem like the grim journey had already begun for her. The Brain Candy injector never left her grasp. Rion, on the other hand, felt like the real moment of reckoning with the chancellor was still in a foggy future he might never reach. The anger and resentment he carried could’ve powered the ship.
The Pu’s stood on the ground not far from where Heath did the last time the Assailing Face departed from this rock. Through the window, they could see Liss waving and Sandor shaking a fist to urge them on.
It was all happening so fast, and it seemed like they were leaving sight of Heath’s rock only moments later. The trip to Earth and the plan to locate and confront Chancellor Yetrue were underway, and Rion attempted to hold onto the buzzing feeling in his gut that their opportunity was sitting right in front of them.
The ship’s formation and novel heat signature made them comfortable with traveling along the most direct route possible. Nobody gave them any notice, not even some Alliance ships going about their business. Rion couldn’t help but look at them and wonder if they were the ones that had killed Heath and blown a hole in his home.
Getting to Earth was uneventful, but Bailor explained that successfully dropping Lena off was going to take some finesse.
“For one, all of the agra-centers have systems in place detecting any objects coming at them from space. We’ll need to travel along the ground for some distance to reach our destination and then continuing on that far again on the way out before returning to space. Unlike their growing techniques, their security on the ground is relatively low-tech and limited to the odd patrol jeep cruising the fields. We should be able to pick those up on our scanners, keep the engine quiet, and avoid tipping them off under the cover of darkness.”
For all the dangers, Rion was a little jealous of Lena. He’d never set foot on Earth in his lif
e and wouldn’t be able to now even though the planet was coming into view. Bailor had mapped out their flight path perfectly, giving the appearance they were shooting for a spaceport in the lower half of North America before veering north for about fifteen-hundred kilometers along one of the shuttle lanes.
“What if anybody gives us grief about flying along the ground?” Rion asked.
Bailor exhaled and shook his head.
“We ignore them and keep going. The ship will stop for only about a minute before moving on. If anyone decides to come after us, we’ll still have a good chance at outrunning them.”
They reached the planet’s surface and began cruising at an altitude safely above all of the buildings. Billions and billions of people lived below, and all of their lives would change if the mission turned out to be a success.
As much as Rion was concerned about unexpected snags, his thoughts kept drifting to the girl who was about to stick her neck out the farthest to complete their mission. He wanted to say something sweet to her, or hold hands again, but her face appeared to be made of stone and her eyes were cold, dark space.
“Stay alive,” he told her as she finished suiting up and throwing on her pack with Bailor’s device in it.
“If you insist,” she said, her eyes lingering on him before she turned to stow the regent’s knife and the injector at her sides.
“We’re getting close,” Bailor called from back in the cockpit. Rion could feel the ship slowing down. Lena pulled her gloves on last and went to the hatch door, yanking it open. Immediately a blast of air gushed into the ship. Rion could see over the edge to the fields whipping by below. They were maybe three meters above the ground.
It all had to work. It had to, Rion thought over and over.
He could see the plants below more easily now that they were slowing to a halt. Other than the rushing air and the hum of the engine, everything was silent. They’d gotten her to the drop off without any interference.
“Go!” Bailor called out as Lena leaned over the edge and prepared to jump. She extended one leg and vanished into the darkness. By the time Rion got to the opening to pull the hatch closed, she’d disappeared among the tall stalks. It was a good thing he believed in her so much, because this next part was all on her.
After the hatch closed, they picked up speed and exited the planet according to plan.
It felt weird being on the ship without Lena. There was no one between him and Bailor to take up the most room, no one to make ridiculous comments or push them toward doing the craziest thing imaginable.
With Earth in the rearview mirror, the frantic pace of things subsided and they sat through a leisurely trip to Mercury, which they decided would be the most logical place to wait for Lena’s signal. Its relatively central location in the solar system meant they’d have the shortest possible trip to make when the time came to go.
Half a day had passed when they made it to Mercury, and Rion was already eyeing the section of the console where the alert would appear. It wasn’t long before Bailor caught him.
“We’ve got a long time to wait,” he said.
“I know,” Rion said.
“She’s going to be fine,” he said.
“I know.”
Rion wondered if they’d felt this kind of tension when he’d gone off to get aboard the Vestige. Lena wasn’t the type to worry and would’ve moved on if anything happened, but he knew Bailor would’ve been uneasy about it. Rion was sure he’d feel the same if Bailor was out there and exposed. Friends like him didn’t come along often in life, and putting them at risk had a great personal cost.
It reminded Rion how happy he was that Bailor had found his parents again.
Mercury was the most industrialized planet in the solar system, home to countless power plants, refineries, shipyards, and factories. One of its most identifiable features were massive solar arrays hundreds of kilometers long that bookended the planet out in space as it orbited around the sun. Most of the ships that came here were connected to one of the companies and hauling materials to be used in the manufacturing, but they weren’t the only ones ostensibly sightseeing. Here and there out at a generous orbit were small stations serving as tourist docks.
The Assailing Face kept to itself as it passed time roaming about the area.
“You know what we could do that would be cool,” Rion said. “We could attempt to scout out the internment camp that Reznik broke out of.”
“That’s a great idea,” Bailor said, brightening up. “It was one of the thermal plants near the equator that they used to make fuel cells. From what I read in Reznik’s logs, they rounded up hundreds of thousands of people from Earth to work in places like this. Many of them were criminals or addicts, but anybody on the fringes of society was likely to get picked up and shipped off. Some were convinced with promises of a payout after a few years. Others were taken without a word. Almost all of them died, because the plants were hastily constructed and extremely unsafe.”
“Geez,” Rion winced. “Are any of them still in operation?”
“Some are, but the practice of bringing people in was outlawed right around the same time new technology automated the work enough so that they didn’t need people anyway. If I’m remembering right, Reznik’s plant had a number of abandoned structures. She spent nights building her own ship. When it was ready to go, she rigged up explosives in some of the fuel storage units and let it blow as she took off. I don’t think any repairs were done.”
They approached the planet’s surface and passed over the site of the plant, where they caught a glimpse of some of the buildings that were still standing. Even if a bubble had been in operation, Rion imagined it was a soul-sucking place to work. Gravilinx might’ve gotten a few tips from here.
Their tour didn’t last long before they resumed wandering about the area without much purpose. A day passed and then two, but there was still no signal from Lena. Rion and Bailor played games and talked about old times and the stupid things they used to do on Mars. They finally availed themselves of one of the tourist docks and slept generously.
The waiting continued into a fourth day when they decided to take a closer look at the solar arrays. Departing from the dock, they cruised at a lethargic pace that spoke to their marginal interest in the destination. Both of them were getting antsy about receiving the signal from Lena, and Bailor had to convince himself multiple times that he’d correctly programmed the transmitter.
On the way, they noticed a ship traveling in the same direction from a ways behind.
“Looks like we’re not the only ones dropping by the arrays,” Rion said before pulling his attention back to the view through the windshield. From their current perspective, the arrays made it look like the sun was wearing sunglasses.
“Let’s slow down so we can capture some pictures. It’ll be something I can tell my parents about,” Bailor said.
Rion didn’t mind, but they noticed the ship behind them started to decelerate as well. It began to register that out of the large area the arrays took up, it was a little strange that it would be going to the same nondistinct point they were.
“I think we’re being followed,” Rion said, more surprised than worried. “We’d better pick up the pace just to be on the safe side.”
The ship behind them followed suit and then some, gaining ground on them at a modest rate.
“Let’s take a look at who we’ve got here,” Bailor said, leaning over the console and working with the scanners. It wasn’t long until he’d produced some images of the ship. “Does this look familiar to you?”
Rion peered at the images of a ship with a configuration unlike anything he’d seen before. It looked a little like the letter “M” except that the top was perfectly horizontal.
“Reminds me of somebody with arms out and fists down because of those prongs,” Rion said. “None of the big manufacturers make a ship like this. Come to think of it, you can share these pictures with your parents at least.”
&nb
sp; “Do you think it’s armed?” Bailor asked as the decreased distance produced a clearer image.
“These bulges at the bottom of the prongs, the tubes in the middle and on top. I’d say definitely, as a matter of fact. If I had to guess I’d say we were getting run down by a pirate,” he said.
“I suppose we’d better take care of that so we can get back to what we were doing,” Bailor said.
Rion settled into the center seat where he could more easily pilot the ship. He veered right to confirm that they were being followed and the pursuing ship matched them by every degree. Rion brought the ship’s speed up higher and waited to see what the pirate would do while he contemplated measures to prove they weren’t worth the effort.
They didn’t have to wait long for a sign that the pirate meant business, a pair of seekers and a slight change in course.
“He’s trying to pin us against the arrays. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is a regular routine he pulls, but he’s going to get more than he bargained for. I’ll ready the decoys and let the tracers knock the wind out of him,” Rion said, hands on the controls.
The seekers streamed toward them, raring for impact, but Rion launched the decoys like he’d done it a hundred times. The explosion behind left them unscathed, and through the cloud of debris came a volley of tracer fire peppering the enemy vessel. Rion expected the ship to turn tail, mostly debilitated, but it kept coming. Bailor did a double-take at the scanners.
“It took virtually no damage at all. In fact, it covered its cannons with revolving panels or something to protect them,” he said.
Rion grumbled, wondering why this fly wouldn’t hurry up and buzz away. The urge hit Rion to swing around and unload on them, and that’s what he’d have to do if this didn’t get resolved soon.
