Star Marque Rising

by Shami Stovall

  “Capital Station has over a million inhabitants,” I said, almost stunned into silence, but my heart and mind knew I didn't have time to flounder.

  “Scum. The worst of the worst, and more than 70% defects.”

  Capital Station had more criminals and cutthroats than any place I knew, but did that mean their lives were forfeit?

  “The Star Marque,” I said, grasping at the details, trying to make sense of it. “What about the Star Marque?”

  “What about it?”

  “You'll just leave? It's stuck in Dock One!”

  Sirens. Sirens. Sirens.

  The screeching kept my pulse high and my blood hot. I stepped close to Endellion, and she waited a few steps up from the bottom, her expression unchanging.

  “The Star Marque has served its purpose,” she said.

  “What about the people onboard?” I yelled loud enough to grate my throat, but it was still not as loud as the sirens.

  “I have you and Sawyer. The rest are leeches. They've always been leeches, suckling at my success, attaching themselves to me because their own ambitions and dreams amount to nothing. They want my power, and they want my determination, but they're not willing to pay the prices I pay for it.”

  “This? This is the price? Have you lost your mind?”

  “I told you,” she said with finality. “The results are all that matters. Felseven, the admiral, all their supporting governors—they'll all be dead. Every last one of them.”

  “But what about…”

  “They've yet to send their reports, and now it won't matter. Once we leave, they'll be corpses, my history buried with them, and without Felseven's vote or his supporters, my victory is guaranteed. I win, Clevon. Always. You're only as good as the obstacle that stands in your way to success. And I'm better than Felseven and all his scheming.”

  Millions of deaths? Her own crew killed? Was there no price she wouldn't pay for success?

  I guessed not. I should have known. She'd made it clear from day one she refused to be stopped. Why had I ever thought Felseven and his goons had a chance? But this? The lack of remorse? It was too much. Too damn costly. Too fucking insane.

  I shook my head. “We'll find another way. There has to be some other plan we can attempt, some other scheme that doesn't require this.”

  “Don't get soft on me, Clevon,” she said as she walked off the last step. “There won't be any evidence after the dust settles. Capital Station was old, after all. A malfunction isn't outside the realm of possibility. Now let's go. We need to break clear of the station and return to Vectin-14.”

  “We should save the Star Marque, at the very least.”

  “There's no way to save them.”

  The floor rumbled, and the artificial gravity shifted and distorted. The room tilted—or it seemed like it tilted—and both Endellion and I had to stand at a slant to prevent ourselves from falling.

  “Stop this,” I commanded. “Change the course back.”

  “It's impossible. I've finalized the command.”

  “Fuck you! I know you can change it. Do it!”

  Sirens. More sirens.

  “This is the only way,” Endellion whispered, her voice almost drowned out by the blaring warnings. “Don't pretend you care about the nameless filth on Capital Station or the superhumans who would have us in prison.”

  She went to step around me, but I posted my arm and prevented her from walking any farther. The room tilted again by another ten degrees, creating a harsh slant toward the far wall. Endellion and I kept our ground, our balance supreme.

  “The Star Marque,” I said. “I won't leave without it.”

  “Then you'll die with it.”

  We stared at each other. Her icy statement was a promise.

  I realized then, maybe too late, that this was what it came down to. The result, the ultimate goal, was all she wanted, and anything that had to be destroyed to achieve success… so be it. Endellion's eyes, her posture, her aura—they screamed desperation and determination. She would let me die to win. Fuck—she would kill me to win. But in her world—the one where I protected the Star Marque, and she didn't—I was dead and she was a planet governor.

  The results spoke for themselves.

  Endellion must have understood I had processed the information, because she offered me a tight smile. “Come, Clevon. You know this is for the best. Could you imagine me handing out hundreds of planetside estates once I became governor? I'd be accused of favoritism and corruption, and it would've been a dark mark on my political career. In a way, this is serendipity. The perfect end to a good run.”

  When she went to walk around me, I lifted my rifle and buried the barrel in her gut. She tensed and stared at me, both shock and rage clear on her face.

  “If you're only as good as the obstacle standing in your way,” I said, “then you're no better than me. Turn around and fix this, or we're both dying right here.”

  Endellion took a moment, her eyes narrowing, sweat coating her pristine skin.

  The crimson lighting. My trigger finger itching to fire. My heart pounding hard enough to deafen the sounds of the siren. Her deep breathing.

  One of us was going to kill the other.

  The station tilted again, the jolt of movement providing the opportunity Endellion wanted. She turned as I pulled the trigger, and I fired the plasma bolt into the grate stairway, burning a hole through the thin steel. She lifted her rifle, but I grabbed the end of it and thrust it upward. The tremor knocked us both sideways. We fell toward the wall—our new floor—but that didn't stop our fighting.

  I landed hard on my back, but I ripped the rifle from Endellion's grasp. She answered in kind, striking my dominant shoulder with her metal knuckles, bruising flesh and cracking bone. She went to punch again—no doubt to dislocate something—but I rolled away and jumped to my feet. When I went to fire, she kicked at the rifle, catching my hand and knocking the weapon from my grasp.

  Endellion swung with her right, but I recognized her dirty tactics. Instead of backing away and getting my forehead cut open, I lunged forward and tackled her to the ground. She jabbed my side, smashing my kidney and wrenching a shout out of me. Anger and bloodlust masked the pain within a fraction of a second.

  She wanted to hinder me, like she had in our sparring match when blood dripped into my eyes. But this wouldn't be a drawn-out fight. I would make sure of that.

  I pulled my knife and slashed down. I wanted to open her throat to ensure she died, but Endellion kicked upward, causing us to both tumble across the jagged surfaces of the ancient computer terminals. Bits of steel from the machines pierced my clothes and skin. My knife connected with Endellion's face during the scuffle, and the blade sank to the bone. She threw me off—her strength in a league of its own—and I crashed into a sharp edge of equipment, a terrible flash of agony ripping through my spine.

  Endellion stood and staggered away, the station's shaking hindering her movement. She brought a hand to the slash that ran from her forehead down to her chin, just over her left eye, so wide open that it exposed bone and muscle and wept blood like a red waterfall. Her exposed eye socket had chips missing from where the blade had hit hard. Probably one of the few places she had bone left.

  I got to my feet, knife still in hand.

  The red lights flickered in and out until they died, blanketing the room in impenetrable darkness. Awash in the space-like void, I attempted to get my bearings, but Endellion punched me hard in the side. For a moment, I could do was scream—I knew she had shattered an organ.

  She grabbed my neck with her vise grip, and my imagination filled in the blanks. She planned to rip my throat out.

  I slashed wide, hoping to hit her in the face a second time, and Endellion jumped back to avoid me. I knew she would. Stumbling blindly, I kept my blade up.

  Endellion dashed away from me, despite the constant shaking of the floor. The scraping of metal against metal told me she had picked something up.

  Her
rifle.

  I threw myself to the side, reconstructing the environment in my mind's eye with what little I could remember of the room. Endellion could see in the dark thanks to her ampullae of Lorenzini. I concentrated, my breathing loud, but the harsh clang of metal was distinct and easy to detect over all other sounds. When the station tilted again, I ascertained Endellion's location, as well as loose objects colliding with stationary ones. I jumped from one position of cover to another—or, at least, what I hoped was cover—and narrowly avoided a bright flash of plasma as Endellion opened fire.

  She could sense me, but her aim wasn't what it would have been if she could have seen me.

  My side refused to straighten. I hobbled, hunched over my crippled kidney, and groped around in the darkness. Endellion fired four times, her bolts slicing through steel and lighting up the area in short bursts. During the last two shots, we spotted each other. But I also spotted my rifle.

  Endellion fired again, catching my right calf and burning half of it clean from my body. I hit the floor and rolled with the next tilt of the station until I reached my weapon. Once armed, I turned the rifle upward and fired in her general direction, forcing her to take cover.

  I wanted to keep fighting—to finish it—but Endellion ran back toward the starfighters.

  My heart stopped, and I couldn't breathe.

  “Sawyer,” I said, strained, jabbing my fingers onto my PAD. “Sawyer! Help me stop this!”

  She didn't answer. I slammed my hand on the floor and forced myself to stand. I had to make it back to the starfighter. If Endellion and Sawyer wouldn't help me, I would use my last fucking breath to make sure Endellion paid for what she had done.

  I would gun her down with her own fighter.

  I half-ran, half-stumbled forward, Endellion's boots echoing throughout the main computer terminal. I fired in her direction, hoping to catch her, but all I managed to do was slow her down. She took careful steps and jumped behind objects while I jogged to catch up.

  Although the room was half-upside-down, Endellion slammed her hand on the computer terminal for the access dock. The door opened, and she ran inside. Seconds behind, I froze at the door and waited, keeping myself on the other side of the wall and out of sight. After another tremor, I heard a starfighter hatch open—Endellion had been waiting to shoot me if I entered too hastily—but the moment she climbed into her fighter, I ran to mine.

  The cockpit opened, and I lunged inside.

  “Sawyer,” I shouted. “I need your help!”

  “Sawyer,” Endellion said over the comms. “Disable Clevon's fighter.”

  The following second took a lifetime. I held my breath, my heart on the verge of exploding, my body protesting, and my mind soaked in so much hate I was ready to incinerate the whole fucking place to ash.

  Who would Sawyer answer to?

  My screens powered down.

  “Sawyer!” I yelled, my throat already raw from the force of my shouting. “Sawyer! She's going to destroy the Star Marque! She's killing them!”

  No. No, this couldn't be happening. Sawyer wouldn't do that. She wouldn't kill everyone on the Star Marque for Endellion.

  I grabbed the side-sticks of my starfighter and jerked them around. Nothing responded. I yanked and thrusted, straining the steel they were made of, certain I could rip them clean from the fighter if I applied full force. Not even the cockpit hatch would open anymore.

  I punched the side of the starfighter. The rumbling became constant, shaking every bit of machinery around me. I slammed my fist into the wall a second time until I felt a bone break, and blood exploded from my knuckles.

  “Sawyer,” I said, my teeth gritted so tight I tasted the copper from my split tongue and slashed cheeks.

  She didn't answer.

  I pulled my hand back, shaking. I had a fast mind. I could put everything together. I knew Endellion had left already, leaving me alone on the failing station, trapped in an area with no hope of escape.

  I was already dead.

  “Sawyer,” I said again, unable to think of anything else to add.

  She'd made her decision. I always knew. Sawyer followed Endellion no matter what. I was a fool to think she would stray from Endellion's commands.

  “Sawyer.”

  I couldn't help it. Pain entered my thoughts and my body. I closed my eyes.

  “Sawyer,” I muttered, an edge of pleading in my voice. “Please. I'm begging you. You have to see this is insane. I want to save the Star Marque. I can't do it alone.”

  But I was alone.

  Sawyer said nothing. She might not even have been listening.

  Swallowed by the blackness of my cockpit, I leaned back, taking in the details of my future coffin. I had failed. As a person, as a man, as a vice-captain. I cared about the Star Marque and her crew, but I was too weak and incompetent to save them. I was the loser Endellion talked about in her speeches, the man incapable of protecting the few things in life he valued more than his own.

  I hadn't cried since I was a child—when I'd cut my palm open on a shredded can top—but now silent tears streamed down my face.

  All the shortcuts, all the dealings, all the cheating—it was in that moment I wished I hadn't done any of it. I wished I was with the others on the Star Marque, developing something greater than myself. Maybe Lysander had been right. Maybe I should've focused on the whole. Then I wouldn't have been in such a situation. I would have people I could count on. People I could genuinely count on. Lysander wouldn't have left me to my death. Noah wouldn't have. Quinn and Lee wouldn't have, either.

  “Sawyer,” I said, my breathing shallow but steady. “If you're going to do me like this—if you're going to kill me—at least whisper those sweet nothings you promised.”

  She didn't say anything.

  I smiled to myself, caught up in pleasant memories. “Spending time with you, it was what I looked forward to. Every day, after training. Me, you, Blub. C'mon, Sawyer. One more round. For old time's sake.”

  Silence was my only answer. It stung more than heated words or denial.

  This was it.

  “Demarco,” Sawyer said.

  I caught my breath and snapped my eyes open. “Sawyer?”

  “If you go after Endellion, I'll do it again.”

  My screens pulsed back to life, and I sat up straight as the starfighter fitted around me. Anticipation filled me with renewed energy. I jerked the controls and flew through the undocking procedure. Once free from the access hatch, I stared at my screen, taking note of the two green dots.

  One for Sawyer. One for Endellion.

  I wiped the blood and tears from my face, ready for a second chance at life.

  The urge to fire off a hyperweapon in Endellion's direction consumed my thoughts, even though it was a long shot and I knew it would miss. Endellion had to pay for her crimes. But that had to wait. What could be done about the station? What could I do to change the situation?

  When I backed far enough away from the station, I could see it entering the exosphere layer of Glavis-4's atmosphere. Red-and-yellow waves of heat washed off the white surface of the space station, lighting up space with its destructive brilliance. The Star Marque remained in Dock One, but how could I save them?

  What should I do? Kill Endellion or head back to Capital Station?

  I chose the Star Marque. I headed for the plummeting space station, aware I could be destroyed in the process, but I wouldn't let them die without a fight.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  FIRES OF A FALLING STAR

  I punched my starfighter forward and rushed to the station.

  “Demarco,” Sawyer said over the comms. “You can't. The debris and burnup will destroy you.”

  “I don't care,” I said through clenched teeth, the pressure from the mounting G-force messing with my already-injured body.

  “It's too late.”

  “Help me or leave with Endellion. I don't have time for distractions.”

  I flew my st
arfighter straight for Dock One. My screens flashed with warnings. The heat, the particles from the breaking station, the gravitational pull—everything could kill me. But flying close enough wouldn't help anything. I needed to do something. Maybe I could land in the dock and force the attachments off the Star Marque. Maybe I could find another starship that wasn't immobilized. Anything. I had to try.

  “Demarco.”

  I didn't answer. I wasn't lying when I said I didn't have time for her. Sawyer could go—my anger rested with Endellion, even if Sawyer had complied with her—but I couldn't deal with her situation while wrapping my thoughts around the plummeting problem before me.

  “Demarco… I've come to help.”

  When I entered the exosphere, my starfighter shook, rattling my teeth against each other. “Sawyer. Can I blast them free?”

  I had two hyperweapons. The bolts could vaporize metal. Could I use them to free the Star Marque from the constraints of the dock? It would be the fastest way to free them, but I couldn't do the calculations. I had no idea what would need to be destroyed.

  Her green dot flew back toward me, heading for the edge of Dock One.

  “I've highlighted the target shots for you,” she said. “If you break that section of the dock and I land back on the Star Marque, I can get it out into space. Felseven's hold is no longer operational.”

  “Do it.”

  The coordinates on my screen showed the points Sawyer believed would destroy the dock. I accelerated into the atmosphere, the starship tremoring with such force. It was a struggle to keep my hands on the side-sticks. Bits of Capital Station's outer walls broke away, creating a duralumin trail that caught the light of the Galvis star. I dodged the fragments, my movements precise and my eyes unblinking.

  Turn. Twist. Two-degree tilt.

  The slightest of changes made a world of difference. I processed the information with unwavering attention, knowing full well that a single shard of metal could pierce the hull of my starfighter and kill me in an instant. Hundreds of obstacles filled my screen, almost hindering the path of my target, and sweat streamed down my face.