“We can’t go on,” Monica said. “Oh God, what are we going to do?”
The light got stronger. Brighter. He couldn’t see the dust motes anymore from the shine of the light.
“Monica?” Bull said. “Look, I’m sorry, but I kind of got to go now, okay? You folks just do your best. Hold it together in there, all right? And hey, if it all works out?”
“Yes?”
“Tell Fred Johnson he fucking owes me one.”
He dropped the connection, unplugged his hand terminal. He took a grenade in each hand, his thumbs on the release bars. A head poked up through the hatch, then back down fast. When no one shot at it, the head came back more slowly. Bull smiled and nodded at it, welcoming. The opaque cowling went clear, and he saw Casimir staring at him. Bull grinned. Well, that was a pleasure, at least. A little treat on the way out.
“Hey,” Bull said, even though the man couldn’t hear him. “Hold this for me.”
He tossed the two grenades, and watched the man’s expression as he understood what they were.
Chapter Forty-Nine: Anna
Anna returned to consciousness floating in a tangled knot with Okju the camera operator, two office chairs, and a potted ficus plant. Someone was setting off firecrackers in long strings. Someone else was shouting. Anna’s vision was blurry, and she blinked and shook her head to clear it. Which turned out to be a mistake, as shaking her head sent a spike of pain up her spine that nearly knocked her unconscious again.
“What?” she tried to say, but it came out as a slushy “bluh” sound.
“Christ, Red, I thought you were cooked there,” a familiar voice replied. Rough but friendly. Amos. “I hated to think I broke my promise.”
Anna opened her eyes again, careful not to move her head. She was floating in the center of what had been the studio space. Okju floated next to her, her foot tucked into Anna’s armpit. Anna extricated her legs from the two office chairs they were twisted up in, and pushed the ficus away from her face.
More firecrackers went off in long, staccato bursts. It took Anna’s muddled brain a few seconds to realize the sound was gunfire. Across the room, Amos was leaning against the wall next to the front door, taking a magazine out of his gun and replacing it with the smooth motion of long practice. On the other side of the door one of the UN soldiers they’d picked up was firing at someone outside. Answering gunfire blew chunks of molded fiberglass out of the back wall just a few meters from where Anna floated.
“If you aren’t dead,” Amos said, then paused to lean around the corner and fire off a short burst. “Then you’ll probably want to get out of the middle of the room.”
“Okju,” Anna said, tugging on the woman’s arm. “Wake up. We need to move.”
Okju’s arm flopped bonelessly when she pulled it, and the woman started slowly rotating in the air. Anna saw that her head was tilted at an acute angle to her shoulders, and her face was slack and her eyes stared at nothing. Anna recoiled involuntarily, the lizard living at the base of her spine telling her to get away from the dead person as quickly as possible. She yelped and pushed against Okju’s body with her feet, sending it and herself floating away in opposite directions. When she hit the wall she grabbed on to an LED sconce and held on with all her strength. The pain in her neck and head was a constant percussive throb.
The sounds of gunfire didn’t stop. Amos and his small, mixed band of defenders were firing out through every opening in the office space, several of which had been cut as gun ports.
They were under attack. Ashford had sent his people to stop them. Anna’s memories of the last few moments came back in a rush. The terrible screeching sound, being hurled sideways at the wall.
Ashford must have shut down the drum to stop them so that his gunmen could finish them off. But if Okju had been killed as a result of the sudden stoppage, then that same effect would have been repeated dozens, maybe hundreds of times throughout the makeshift community on the Behemoth. Ashford was willing to kill them all to get his own way. Anna felt a growing rage, and was glad that no one had thought to give her a gun.
“Are we still broadcasting?” she yelled at Amos over the gunfire.
“Dunno, Red. Monica’s in the radio room.”
Anna pulled herself across the wall to the closet where they’d placed their broadcasting gear. The door was ajar, and she could see Monica floating inside, checking the equipment. The space wasn’t large enough for both of them, so Anna just pushed the door open a little farther and said, “Are we still broadcasting? Can we get back on the air?”
Monica gave a humorless laugh but didn’t turn around. “I thought you were dead.”
“No, but Okju is. I think she broke her neck. I’ll take the camera if you need me to. Where’s Clip?”
“Clip was helping Amos, and he was shot in the hip. He’s bleeding out in a side office. Tilly is helping him.”
Anna pushed her way into the small room and put a hand on Monica’s shoulder. “We have to get back on the air. We have to keep up the broadcast or this is all for nothing. Tell me what to do.”
Monica laughed again, then turned around and swatted Anna’s hand off of her arm. “What do you think is happening here? Ashford has men outside trying to break in and kill us. Bull and his people have lost the engine room, and Juarez says Bull’s been killed. Who knows how many people he—”
Anna planted her feet against the doorjamb, grabbed Monica by the shoulders, and slammed the reporter up against the wall. “Does the broadcasting equipment still work?” She was amazed at how steady her voice sounded.
“It got banged around some, but—”
“Does. It. Work.”
“Yes,” Monica said. It came out as a frightened squeak.
“Get me on the channel the assault team was using, and give me a headset,” Anna said, then let go of Monica’s shoulders. Monica did as she asked, moving quickly and only occasionally giving her a frightened look. I’ve become frightening, Anna thought. Tasting the idea, and finding it less unpleasant than she’d expect. These were frightening times.
“Fuck!” Amos yelled from the other room. When Anna looked out, she saw one of the young Martian officers floating in the middle of the room spraying small globes of red blood into the air around him. Her friend Chris launched across the room by pushing off with his one good leg and grabbed the injured man with his one arm, then pulled him into cover.
“We’re running out of time,” Anna said to Monica. “Work faster.”
Monica’s reply was to hand her a headset with a microphone.
“Hello? This is Anna Volovodov at Radio Free Slow Zone. Is anyone left on this channel?”
Someone replied, but they were impossible to hear over the nearby gunfire. Anna turned the volume up to the maximum and said, “Repeat that, please.”
“We’re here,” James Holden said at deafening levels.
“How many are left, and what’s the situation?”
“Well,” Holden said, then paused and grunted as though exerting himself for several seconds. He sounded out of breath when he continued. “We’re holed up in the port elevator shaft just outside the command deck airlock. There are three of us at this position. Bull and the remaining marines are fighting the counterassault team at a position further down the shaft. I have no idea how that’s going. We’ve run out of room to retreat, so unless someone decides to open the hatch and let us onto the bridge, we’re sort of out of options.”
The last part of his sentence was almost drowned out by a massive wave of incoming gunfire in her office. Amos and his group were hunkered down, leaning against the reinforced armor they’d attached to the walls. The reports of the shots and the sound of bullets hitting metal was deafening. When the fire lessened, a pair of men in Behemoth security armor rushed the room, spraying automatic weapons fire as they came. Two of Amos’ team were hit, and more globes of red flew into the air. Amos grabbed the second man through the door and yanked him up off his magnetic hold to the floo
r, then threw him at his partner. They tumbled off across the room together and then Amos fired a long burst from his weapon into both as they spun. The air was filled with so many floating red orbs of various sizes that it became difficult to see. The rest of Amos’ team opened fire, and whatever attack Ashford’s people had launched was apparently driven back, as no more soldiers charged through the door.
“Is there anything we can do?” Anna yelled at Holden.
“Sounds to me like you’re in some shit there yourself, Preacher,” Holden replied. His voice was weary. Sad. “Unless you’ve got the bridge access controls nearby, I’d say you should concentrate on your own problems.”
More fire came through the offices, but it was sporadic. Amos had driven off their big attack, and now they were taking petulant potshots. Monica was staring at her, waiting for her to issue another order. Somehow, she’d become the person in charge.
“Set me to broadcast on the Radio Free Slow Zone feed,” Anna said. In the end, talking was all she had to offer. Monica nodded at her and pointed a small camera at her face.
“This is Anna Volovodov broadcasting from the offices of Radio Free Slow Zone to anyone on the Behemoth that’s still listening. We’ve failed to hold engineering, so our plan to shut down the reactor and get everyone back home is failing as well. We have people trapped in the external elevator shaft, and they can’t get onto the bridge.
“So, please, if anyone listening to this can help, we need you. Everyone on this flotilla needs you. The people dying right outside your door need you. Most of all, the people we left behind on Earth and Mars and the Belt need you. If the captain does what he’s planning, if he fires the laser at the Ring, everyone back home will die too. Please, if you can hear me, help us.”
She stopped, and Monica put down the camera.
“Think that will work?” Monica asked.
Anna was about to say no when the wall comm panel buzzed at her. A voice said, “How do you know that?” A young voice, female, sad. Clarissa. “What you said about destroying Earth if we attack the Ring, how do you know that?”
“Clarissa,” Anna said. “Where are you?”
“I’m here, on the bridge. I’m in the security station. I was watching your broadcast.”
“Can you open the door and let our people in?”
“Yes.”
“Will you do that?”
“How,” Clarissa repeated, her tone not changing at all, “do you know what you said?”
A man generally regarded as the instigator of two solar system–wide wars got all this information from a protomolecule-created ghost that no one else can see. It wasn’t a particularly compelling argument.
“James Holden got it while he was on the station.”
“So he told you that this would happen,” Clarissa said, her tone doubtful.
“Yes.”
“So how do you know?”
“I don’t, Claire,” Anna said, appropriating Tilly’s pet name to try and create a connection. “I don’t know. But Holden believes it’s true, and the consequences if he’s right are too extreme to risk. So I’m taking it on faith.”
There was a long moment of silence. Then a male voice said, “Clarissa, who are you talking to in here?”
It took Anna a moment to recognize it as Hector Cortez. She’d known he was on the bridge with Ashford, but somehow the reminder that he’d sided with the men who killed Bull was too much. She had to restrain herself from cursing at him.
“Anna wants me to open the elevator airlock and let the other side into the bridge. She wants me to help stop Ashford from destroying the Ring. She says it will kill everyone on Earth if we do.”
“Don’t listen to her,” Cortez said. “She’s just afraid.”
“Afraid?” Anna yelled. “Do you hear those sounds, Hector? That’s gunfire. Bullets are flying by even as we speak. You’re locked away safe and snug on the command deck planning to destroy something you don’t understand, while I am risking gunshot wounds to stop you. Who’s afraid here?”
“You’re afraid to make the necessary sacrifices to protect the people we’ve left behind. You’re only thinking of yourself,” he yelled back. Anna heard the sound of a door closing in the background. Someone had shut the door to the security station to keep the argument from being overheard. If it was Clarissa, that was a good sign.
“Clarissa,” Anna said, keeping her voice as calm as she could with the ongoing sounds of a gunfight behind her. “Claire, the people waiting outside the airlock door are going to be killed if you don’t open it. They are trapped there. People are coming to kill them.”
“Don’t change the subject,” Cortez started.
“It’s Holden and Naomi out there,” Anna continued, ignoring him. “And Bull is there too. Ashford will have them all killed.”
“They wouldn’t be in danger if they hadn’t attacked Ashford’s rightful command,” Cortez said.
“That’s three people who all made the choice to give you a second chance,” Anna said. “Bull chose to protect you from the UN fleet’s vengeance when he had no reason to. When I asked her to, Naomi forgave you for almost killing her. Holden agreed not to hurt you, in spite of the many provocations you gave him.”
“Those people are criminals—” Cortez tried to say over the top of her, but she kept her voice level and continued.
“These people, the people who forgive, who try to help others. The people who give their lives to save strangers, they’re on the other side of that door, dying. I don’t have to take that on faith. That’s fact. That’s happening right now.”
Anna paused, waiting for any sign Clarissa was listening. There was none. Even Cortez had stopped speaking. The comm station hissed faintly, the only sign it was still on.
“Those are the people I’m asking you to help,” Anna said. “The person I’m asking you to betray is a man who kills innocent people for expedience’s sake. Forget Earth, and the Ring, and everything else you’d have to take on faith. Ask yourself this: Do you want to let Ashford kill Holden and Naomi? No faith. Just that simple question, Claire. Can you let them die? What choice did they make when the same question was asked of them about you?”
Anna knew she was rambling. Knew she was repeating herself. But she had to force herself to stop speaking anyway. She wasn’t used to trying to save a person’s soul without being able to see them, to measure the effect her words were having by their reaction. She kept trying to fill that empty space with more talking.
“I don’t like the idea of those people being killed any more than you do,” Cortez said. He sounded sad, but committed to his position. “But there is the necessity for sacrifice. To sacrifice is literally to be made sacred.”
“Seriously?” Anna gave a humorless laugh. “We’re going to do dueling etymology?”
“What we are facing here is more than humanity is ready for,” Cortez said.
“You don’t get to decide that, Hank,” Anna said, stabbing at the radio as if it were the man. “Think about the people you’re killing. Look at who you’re working with, and tell me that in clear conscience you know you’re doing the right thing.”
“Argument by association?” Cortez said. “Really? God’s tools have always been flawed. We are a fallen people, but that we have the strength of will to do what we must, even in the face of mortal punishment, is what makes us moral beings. And you of all people—”
The feed went silent for a moment.
“Cortez?” Anna said. But when Cortez’s voice came, he wasn’t speaking to her.
“Clarissa, what are you doing?”
Clarissa sounded calm, almost half asleep. “I opened the doors.”
Chapter Fifty: Holden
Naomi had taken an access panel off the wall next to the command deck airlock. She’d crawled halfway inside, and only her belly and legs were visible. Holden had planted his mag boots next to the airlock’s outer door and was awaiting instructions from her. Occasionally she’d ask him to t
ry opening the door again, but every attempt so far had failed. Corin floated next to him, watching down the elevator shaft through her gunsights. They’d seen a quick flash of light down there a few minutes back that had set the bulkheads to vibrating. Something violent and explosive had happened.
Holden, having now moved on to his second last stand of the day, had come to view the whole thing with a weary sense of humor. As far as places to die went, the small platform between the elevator shaft and the airlock was about as good as any other. It was a niche in the wall of the shaft about ten feet on a side. The floor, ceiling, and bulkheads were all the same ceramic steel of the ship’s outer hull. The back wall was the airlock door. The front was empty space where the elevator would normally sit. At the very least, when Ashford’s people came swarming up the shaft at them, the floor of the niche would offer some cover.
Naomi scooted sideways a bit and kicked one leg. Holden could hear her over the radio as she grunted with the effort of grabbing something just out of reach.
“Gotcha,” she said in triumph. “Okay, try it now!”
Holden hit the button to open the outer airlock doors. Nothing happened.
“Are you trying it?” Naomi asked.
He hit the button two more times. “Yeah. Nothing.”
“Dammit. I could’ve sworn…”
Corin shifted enough to give him a sardonic look, but said nothing.
The truth was, Holden was out of emotional gas. He’d gone through his existential moment of truth back when he thought he was making a last stand at the elevator to buy Naomi time. Then he’d been given a reprieve when the attackers chose another path, but Naomi had been put in the firing line, which was actually worse. And then she’d shown up a few minutes ago saying Bull had sent her on ahead to get the door open while he acted as rearguard.
Every plan they’d made had failed spectacularly, with more casualties piling up at every step. And now they were at yet another last stand, with a locked door behind them and Ashford’s goons ahead of them and nowhere to go. It should have been terrifying, but at this point Holden just felt sleepy.
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