by Jason Winn
Michael George, a long-haired freshman congressman from Virginia, spoke up. “Just send the Blue Shirts to find the Pettys and shoot them all. I mean, do we really need to waste what few tax dollars we have on investigating these jackasses?”
The room simmered with giggles and a few gasps.
“Mr. George,” growled Senator Kim, “you may be new to the House, but I assure you we still mean to uphold the Constitution.”
Cougar leaned forward, intrigued at the breech in decorum and civility. This George had balls. That’s what the country needed right now.
“I’m serious,” George shot back. “They didn’t give one shit about the law. They lied. They cheated—setting up like, what, several hundred partnerships with the multinationals? They built prison camps and authorized civilian murder squads. They turned the Pentagon into their church headquarters. They started an illegal war that we’ll be paying reparations on for the next century, and you’re gonna to tell me that we need to spend billions of dollars and probably two years investigating them? Please. I could list a hundred better uses for that money. Their crimes were documented in broad daylight. This kind of pussyfooting is what got us the Petty family in the first place. The public is screaming for their heads. Why not give the people what they want?”
“Because, Mr. George,” said Bell, “this country owes the citizens, all their citizens, the right to due process.”
“If your moral compass is so broken that you can’t see that I’m right,” said George, his eyes boring into Bell’s, “then you’ve no business in this new government.”
Senator Kim glared at George, then said, “The honorable Mr. George may consider himself barred from this hearing for the day. When you remember your manners and your place, you may return.”
Representative George stood and stabbed a finger at the men and women around the table. “Y’all mark my words, if you let them defend themselves in court, the judges they packed into the system will let them go and the zealots that supported them will be running to their side. It will be civil war. Once you get rid of them, then you can go back to enforcing the law.”
With that, the young congressman left the room, slamming the door behind him.
Cougar wanted to jump out of his chair and applaud the young firebrand. Here was a man who understood the war for the country was still raging. The cancer of the Values Party needed to be cut out with a knife, or a gun.
Axel could barely make out the words coming from Silva’s mouth through the blinding pain. Naked confusion swirled with primitive terror. Bloody chunks of his bark-like flesh lay in his lap and on the floor. Agonizing waves rolled up and down his body. Breaths came in gulps as sweat poured from cold flesh. The plasma flames on the Heinz hadn’t been this bad.
A thick hand slapped the side of his face. Vision blurring in and out, Axel tried to find Silva’s face. A moment later the blurs subsided and Silva was so close, their noses were almost touching.
Axel spat and lunged to bite Silva’s nose.
Silva snapped his head back and wiped his cheek.
For a moment the pain dulled to a barely tolerable level and Axel started to shiver from the cold. He would not break, he told himself over and over. His muscles began to tremble with the blood loss. The room went black and Axel felt his essence drain from his body.
This is it, he thought. Death will be like draining a sink, your life spilling out of you.
In that moment, Axel thought of all his children, now free of their disappointing father. Their mothers, no longer having to worry if he would show up unannounced, with some attempt to buy their forgiveness under his arm—a late birthday present or a wad of wrinkled paper money. No one would remember the old soldier, fading away in this chair.
The last drop of Axel Nash circled the drain, about to fall into the oblivion.
Time stopped.
Axel awoke with the feeling of a lightning bolt shooting through his head, to the base of his spine. The pain shot back up to unbearable levels. His heart slammed in his chest so hard it might explode. And flashes in his vision kept rhythm with his stampeding pulse.
Silva came into his vision, which was crystal clear, now. He held up a tube with a needle at one end. “Combat-stim,” he said. “Can’t have you passing out, Nash.”
Axel began to hyperventilate, his lungs trying to keep up with his thunderous heart rate. He was alive. This was the same sensation of relief and terror he’d felt in the Japanese hospital after the Heinz. He didn’t want to look down at the mangled remains of his chest, yet he was still alive.
“I’ve got a million of these things,” said Silva. “I can keep you up for days or weeks, if that’s how you want to play this. But I think you might be motivated by something else.”
Rage replaced terror as Axel decided there was no way he was going to die in this room. Only a bullet to the head would end him. He was going to kill this man. He was staring at the embodiment of Russian evil from the Solar War. Killing Silva would be retribution for Jessup, Rider, Ramirez, Olson, and Burzynski.
Axel spat blood and growled, “That how the bear trains their dogs?”
“What was that?” asked Silva. He squinted and cupped his ear.
Axel gasped for a breath. “I said, that how the bear trains its little dogs?”
“You won’t upset me with your insults, Yankee. Yes, I’m not Russian by birth, but I was raised by them, learned what it takes to survive in harsh conditions. That’s why your pitiful country failed to conquer the core plants. You’re all too soft. Although, I must admit, you’re the toughest one I’ve seen yet. Too bad.” He picked up a pistol. “Tough men are hard to find these days. Shame you’re running errands for the French. And don’t worry, even though you won’t talk, I’m sure those kids in the next room will.”
He aimed the pistol at Axel.
The room went dark. The ambient hum of the ship stopped. Axel slouched forward, thinking he’d passed out again.
There was a flash and an ear-splitting pop as Silva’s pistol went off. Axel felt the whiz and scorching pain of a bullet grazing the top of his head.
There was shouting.
Axel’s hearing returned. Muffled sound became clear.
“Power!” Silva shouted.
“Hold on,” someone called from far away.
Jean-Baptiste and Ravel were shouting in another room.
Slapping of skin. The muffled sound of bones breaking. A man roared in pain. Metal clattered on metal. Dead weight hit the deck. Axel felt the impact through his feet. His pain was muted now, as if his brain was exhausted from the signals and merely said, Message received. We’re dying. What’s the point of sending pain signals?
A flashlight cut through the darkness. Axel jerked his head back as if the light were a luminescent club about to smash into his body. The beam went vertical and Devon’s face emerged from the pitch black.
“Untie me,” whispered Axel.
Devon found the knife used to flay Axel’s chest and cut his hands and legs free. “Oh my God. What did he do to you?”
Axel tried to get up and fell back in the chair. “Isn’t it obvious?” The room tilted and spun violently.
She looked him up and down. “I don’t even know where to start. How can I help?”
Axel’s head was a fog of coherent thoughts that slipped away every time he tried to grab one.
“Where’s the stim?” he managed. Every syllable radiated pain through his chest.
“What’s that?”
Axel spotted the one Silva used, lying on the floor. “Syringe.”
“You want this?” She kneeled down and grabbed the spent tube.
“No. Go find the others. He said he had a bunch.”
Devon placed the flashlight in Axel’s lap, pointed toward the door, and scurried out.
Axel’s eyes drifted across all over. He expected to see Silva laying in a heap on the floor, but the room was empty. He squinted and saw a faint blood trail leading into the corridor. He strained his ears
and he could swear he could hear a faint dragging sound down the hall. But he could also be imagining that. Devon must have used the dark to take him out.
“Guess you didn’t have implants, Rusky.” His voice sounded as if he was drunk.
The air was so cold. He looked down to see a curtain of blood and exposed muscle, where his temporary skin used to be. His right arm seemed to be glued to his side, instinctively holding his chest together. He was too weak to scream. Tears streamed down his cheeks.
Devon returned, carrying a box of combat-stims.
“Where is he?” asked Axel.
Devon surveyed the room, before turning back to Axel. “I don’t see him.”
“Shit,” Axel hissed.
“And there’s someone on the bridge.”
He needed an weapon in his hand—anything. “What’s he doing?”
“He’s hunched over a console. I don’t think you would be afraid of him.” She pulled a syringe out of the box. “Here.”
Axel took it with his left hand, raised it above his head and stabbed his thigh. He felt the piston inside slam the needle home, into his skin. A half-second later his head cleared, like wind blowing away a pile of leaves. He felt a rush of strength in his legs. But he wasn’t sure if he could stand, yet.
“Another.” His voice sounded a little more like his own.
“You sure?”
Axel just waved his hand, lacking the strength to put up a fight.
Devon frowned and handed him another. The needle plunged into his other thigh. The energy to bend tungsten shot through his entire body and the pain in his chest abated. Axel reached out and Devon helped him to his feet.
Emergency lighting overhead flickered on, and a red glow filled the room.
“What happened to the ship?” Axel asked. This wasn’t part of his plan.
“I rebooted it.”
“Huh?”
“Well, it’s basically a big computer. I found a way in through the defense AI. There’s a security flaw they never patched, so I exploited it and got control of the central router. I sent the maintenance reboot command and…here we are. That released the door locks and I came to find you.”
“Are the kids okay?”
“I think so. They’re tied up in crew cabins.”
“Good enough. We’ve got to find Silva. He’s probably hiding in a corner somewhere. Maybe we can lock him in until my friend gets here.”
“Who’s that?”
“Just go find Silva. And be careful. Take his gun and hand me the knife. I’m going to check the bridge.”
Devon pulled Axel to his feet. His legs felt strong enough to walk. That would do for now. He gripped the bloody knife in his right hand. With his left, he grabbed the rest of the combat-stims from the box.
“Meet me back on the bridge,” he said and staggered into the corridor.
Axel found the bridge. Red light bathed a large circular room filled with consoles. Monitors lined the walls. Lines of code flew across every screen as the ship ran through its start-up sequences. Heavy breathing came from the far side of the room. Axel saw a chunky man with a bad comb-over frantically slapping away at a console. He wore a respirator mask attached to a canister on his belt. A man in a Chinese captain’s uniform lay still on the floor. Blood covered his chest and face.
Axel was about to shout over to the fat man, when suddenly the frigate slammed to one side, followed by muffled ‘bang’ and the eerie bending of hull metal. The grav field temporarily wobbled, sending Axel sailing into a bridge console. The fat man shrieked and flew out of his chair. Impact alarms wailed and several control stations flashed with red and yellow lights.
Axel seethed in pain as he forced his battered body back upright. His head was spinning from a combination of the combat-stims and blood loss. The gravity returned and he stood up on shaky legs. A fresh blood stain covered the keyboard and monitor he slammed into.
The fat man grunted as he pulled himself up and hunched over his computer. He didn’t even notice Axel standing a few meters away, fixated on some warning on his screen.
“Hey,” shouted Axel.
The man flinched and looked over to him. Seeing Axel, his face became a mask of horror at the snarled mess of ripped flesh and exposed muscle that stood behind him. Clouds of mist flared in his mask.
“What’s your name?”
“Ch…Chang.”
“Chang, what was that?” asked Axel. He couldn’t take any more surprises. His heart was likely to seize up and explode from all the combat-stim juice coursing through his veins.
The man kept staring, unable to take his eyes off the monster before him.
Axel snapped his fingers. “Hello, Chang. What was that?”
Chang looked back at his console. “I think it’s a warship. They’ve hit our engines.”
“Put it on screen,” said Axel, pointing to the main bridge monitor with his bloody knife.
Chang got up from his chair and hobbled over to the coms console. A second later, the monitor came to life showing a battle cruiser, flanked by three frigates and a squadron of heavy fighters. All of the ships were green and gold, the signature color of the Dragon Armada. Axel staggered over to the captain’s chair and fell into it. Seeing the Chinese warships signaled the end of all of this. Either his friend Kim got the message and this was the cavalry, or these folks were with Silva’s coup attempt, in which case Axel, Devon, and the kids were about to live out their lives in pain amplifier cells.
What if Kim is with these clowns? In his haste to get help, Axel hadn’t even considered that. No. She wasn’t a traitor. But then, Axel hadn’t spoken to Lieutenant Kim in almost ten years. Hope faded as he wondered if she’d even received his message.
You’re fucking kidding yourself, Nash.
But it was the only card he had to play, hoping that information on one of the coup’s operating cells would be bait enough for her to send a shock team to come rescue him. And that maybe she would, in return, just let him and his charges go back to Earth.
“Devon!” Axel shouted over his shoulder. “Devon, you okay?”
There was no answer. Axel went to stand up, but his legs wouldn’t cooperate. The combat-stims had worn off. With a heavy head, he looked down at his left hand to see he only had three stims left. He popped the caps of two of them and stabbed his thigh. Once more, lightning shot through his body and he was able to stand up. He put the other tube in his pocket, next to the frog’s tongue.
As he turned to head down the corridor connecting the bridge to the rest of the ship, he caught a glimpse of a main monitor. A troop transport disembarked from the battle cruiser.
Gunshots rang out from the bowels of the ship.
The red light of the ship’s corridors created an infinite number of dark crevasses for someone to hide. Axel shuffled through the ship, a ship he was completely unfamiliar with. He’d been on hundreds of boarding parties during the Solar War, but he’d been properly equipped for those. Now he was jacked on enough combat-stims to kill a man and only armed with a kitchen knife. Somewhere in the belly of this ship roamed a madman. Silva assumedly knew the schematics of every deck, bulkhead, and compartment…including the armory. This was a warship after all. But the signage on the walls was little help; it was all in Chinese.
Heavy footsteps, interspersed with gunfire, echoed off the metal walls.
After a few turns, Axel found the crew cabins. Bullet holes smoked from several doors. He checked them. They were locked from the inside. He prayed Devon was right about Ravel and Jean-Baptiste being safe inside. Information monitors flickered to life as the ship continued its startup sequence. One this size could take several hours to come back online.
He pressed on as a bitter foam brewed in his mouth. His body was starting to process the combat-stim overdose. He maybe had ten minutes before he passed out and his heart exploded. He spat red liquid from his mouth. In the emergency lighting, he couldn’t tell if it was blood or saliva. And it didn’t matter.
>
“Devon!” he shouted again.
Silence stretched for an eternity, broken by occasional metal groans from the ship’s hull. Axel hoped that right now repair gel coagulated over the hull fractures. However, the wounds to the ship might be too severe for the emergency repair systems to heal, even if they were online.
Silva’s voice boomed through the corridors. “Axel, we still have business to settle.”
Axel didn’t answer. Silva was clearly deranged at this point, giving away his position. Silence would be Axel’s ally. He crept down a stairwell into the shuttle bay. He could hear the latches of weapons creates being thrown open, a magazine being slapped into place, the bolt of an assault rifle being pulled back.
This was his chance. Silva was busy loading a weapon. Axel rounded the shuttle that brought him here from the Zulu Dancer. Silva stood hunched over a case of grenades, stuffing them into his tactical vest. He was muttering something to himself about busting open doors.
Axel reached into his pocket and pulled out the frog’s tongue. In the other hand he switched to a hammer grip with the knife—point up, edge away from his body. He would wrap his left arm around Silva’s head and drive the blade into his jugular. It wouldn’t matter how many combat-stims the man had in him, he’d bleed out in seconds.
Axel crept to within inches of Silva’s back. He lunged, wrapping his arm around the man’s head. But before he could bring the knife to bear, Silva’s right arm shot up, blocking the fatal blow. His arm felt like iron. With a fluid motion he jerked and flung Axel backward, into the shuttle, knocking the wind out of him. He slid to the floor, consumed with pain. The room began to spin. The knife flew out of his hand.
Silva spun around, roaring and spraying bullets in all directions. Several rounds cut through the shuttle. And if Axel was standing, he would have been raked with gunfire across his belly. Instead, another round grazed his head.
Half a dozen syringes jutted from Silva’s torso. Blood sheeted from wounds in his head and a broken nose. One eye was swollen shut. Whatever Devon did to him must have almost killed him.
