"Well, your guess paid off," Henry noted. "So, Antoine Rigault?"
"Yeah. Rigault's a family business, founded out of New Gabon. Former African Union colony, turned down Coalition membership over a century ago when the Union joined up." Felix sighed. "He's a big player too. His grandfather was the family patriarch. His father was the oldest of that generation, but the tradition is for the leadership to go to whoever impresses shareholders across the family the best. Antoine's father didn't impress, so he's determined to get in line. League must be offering him something big."
"And whatever it is, he decided to snatch Tia."
Felix nodded. "Could be personal. Back in the uprising in '47, Antoine was in the field as a corporate security officer. He got shot in the head, lost an eye, and barely survived. So he bears a big grudge. Now he's Director of Security for the Hestian Business Council on top of being Rigault Industries' representative on the HBC."
"If he wields anything like my authority, he is very dangerous," Mavik noted.
"Yeah, I'd say so," Felix remarked. "I apologize if I pushed things further than you liked, Chief, but guys like Saxon aren't going to talk from a beating. You've got to put the fear of God into them. The fear of meeting Him anyway."
"You got results. I will overlook the means, provided you don't repeat them."
With that blessing, Henry and Felix departed. As they walked down the corridor, mindful of being alone, Felix continued. "Rigault's got some heavy backing, Jim. This is going to be a real black op. He'll make trouble if we leave the slightest Coalition link. Fuentes is bending over backward to prevent any appearance of the Coalition not following the treaty. It's the only way to keep Rhodes from breaking the Peace Union and destroying his administration."
"Yeah. So we'll be careful. But we've still got to do this." Henry's expression hardened. "It's Tia's only hope."
14
The day's testing ended, and Tia was returned to her cell. A sparse dinner meal of hard cornbread, a grayish wheat gruel, and a flask of water was left for her, and as a final test of the device, Tia was compelled to eat the meal.
Once Breivik and the others were gone, Tia curled up on her prison cot and shuddered. Even now, she could feel the sensation returning again. The loss of control. Her body acting without her input: walking, lifting, carrying, running. Her mind rendered down to little more than a powerless passenger of her own body.
She felt tears form in her eyes and couldn't stop them from flowing. Terror for the future drove them. A future that looked more and more like she and all of Hestia would be turned into living drones for the megacorps, enslaved forever with the chips planted onto their spines. Their only existence would be labor for their oppressors with no hope of something better.
The League's involvement made the future seem even bleaker. Their entire system was oppressive control, and the neural device on her spine was the ultimate expression of that goal. Breivik's words made that clear, and that even he expected to be implanted made him seem all the more mad in her eyes.
I need to warn people, came the thought. I need to warn the galaxy about these things. Give people a chance to fight back!
The question was how. With this thing in her neck, all they had to do was get to their remote control and she was helpless. They'd march her right back.
The despair came back. She fought against it. No. If I give in, it's over. I have to hold out. Someone will come for me.
She was so absorbed in her thoughts, she almost missed the shadow that settled over her cell's iron bars. She turned on her bed and faced the source of it. The man was formally dressed, indicating he was a government functionary of some sort, and had a bronze complexion with hints of East Asian ancestry. Her eyes settled on his face and anger built in her heart. "Felipe."
Felipe Xiu nodded. A fellow Hestian, descended from Cebuano settler families to Sagittarius, he looked just as healthy as he had the last time they saw each other, at Hotel Ribiera in Lusitania's Acevedo Islands.
Her mind flashed back to that day, when Felipe made clear his allegiance to the League, regardless of their callous betrayal of the Hestian revolutionary movement. "What are you doing here? Did you know about this?" she asked with a frown, pointing to her neck.
"Quite the greeting for an old comrade, Tia," he said softly. The softness was deceptive, as there was a certain bite to his tone, an arrogance she could make out.
"You stopped being my comrade when you embraced those who betrayed us to our oppressors," Tia hissed. "Although I see you've prospered in your treachery. Your League masters have been good to you, haven't they?"
"The Hestian Social Solidarity Party saw fit to put me forth as a candidate for Talisay's seat in the National Assembly," Felipe answered. "I've been honored with the position of party whip, among other positions."
"Does that include being involved with this?!" She turned enough to show the back of her neck. Given what she'd seen of the other test subjects, she knew there would be scarring on her skin from the surgery.
Felipe grinned and nodded. "I have the honor of helping to provide funding for Dr. Breivik's work, yes. It warms my heart that you won't be the first capitalist to be punished in this way for exploiting the working class."
"You bastard," Tia called out. "I'm a worker. I've always been one."
"You're James Henry's assistant manager, helping him to earn profit on the backs of the actual workers on his ship," Felipe retorted. He shook his head. "Just like Linh exploits the dockworkers on Trinidad Station."
"Bullshit!" Tia raged. Her fear for the future was lost in the moment to her anger at Felipe's insults. Her voice seemed to vibrate through the cell. "I'm paid spacer's scale as laid out by the ISU, the same as the rest of our crew, even Henry himself! He's a worker and wouldn't do less! He's even given up personal profit to make sure his crew's paid! And Linh and her people work for the Dockworker's Guild of Trinidad Station, a proper trade union run and operated by workers!"
"Yet here you are, defending capitalists just because they're not openly businesses." Felipe shook his head. "If only the Tia Nguyen who I fought beside could see you now. Or maybe you were always a capitalist at heart?"
"Speak for yourself, traitor," Tia hissed. "You're the one who's become a corporate puppet, dressed up like a company man! All for your League masters!"
"This is a strategic requirement, nothing more," he answered, his nostrils flaring. Her barb had hit home to some degree. "I'm working toward the true liberation of the working class on Hestia and across the galaxy. Once our worlds are brought under the Society, the exploitation of workers will cease. We'll be free."
"We'll all have chips in our necks to make us drones!" Tia protested. "That's the end game of your precious League! Turning workers into slaves!"
"The chips are for the anti-Social only," Felipe retorted. "Capitalists, kulaks, saboteurs. People like you. In time, they'll be unnecessary, once they've been suppressed by the victory of the Revolution."
"How can you be so blind?!" Tia shouted. "The League are the greatest oppressors of workers in the galaxy! I've seen it!"
"They're the only hope to overthrow capitalism we have left! Without the League, the capitalists and theocrats of the Terran Coalition will control our destinies and set back the Revolution for generations to come!" Felipe smacked his hand against the bar. "The only reason you won't accept that is because you've become one of them!"
Tia almost continued the argument, but she stopped herself as her mouth opened. She could see the certainty blazing in his eyes. He was utterly convinced, and nothing would break his belief in the League. Nothing. The only thing she could do was turn her back to him and stop talking.
"It is the only way," he insisted. "The only way. When you finally realize that, maybe I can talk them into removing the chip." After those words, she heard his footfalls on the floor, indicating his departure. She curled back up on her cot, still smoldering at his stubborn defense of the people who betrayed their revolution.
* * *
Tia was not the only person smoldering in Thyssenbourg that night. A short distance away, Antoine Rigault turned off his link and glared at the far window showing the night skyline of the Hestian capital. In his mind, the message from one of his sources on Trinidad Station still echoed.
The team failed. Trapper Saxon is in custody and Linh Khánh is alive.
After all of the success he was enjoying, failure tasted particularly bitter. More so, he wanted Khánh, both as leverage to deal with Nguyen and as an extra test subject.
Do I give this up? There was an appeal there, to just write it off and get back to business. He had Tia Nguyen, and the projects were proceeding well; why rock the boat further with more possible failures?
But he couldn't. His mind kept flashing back to that broken shell of a department store and how close he came to death. All thanks to those women. He wanted his due justice for their attacks once and for all.
His fingers tapped away at his personal computer controls. After several moments, the image of Allan Kepper appeared. The bounty hunter and assassin got straight to the point. "Got that new job?"
"Yes. Head to Trinidad Station, and bring me Linh Khánh."
"Will do." Like that, the assassin cut the call.
Antoine sat back in his chair and considered what he was going to do with Kepper. He'd carefully kept Kepper's presence secret from Aristide and Breivik, given his history with the League, but in time, he had to decide whether to keep him around. It endangered that critical alliance, but on the other hand, he had uses for Kepper that he couldn't use the League for. Uses vital to his future ambitions.
I knew this was a dangerous game when I began it, he reminded himself. But there's few things more dangerous than the steps needed to found an empire...
15
Henry arrived at the meeting place on Trinidad Station, one of the eateries in the Receiving District that marketed itself as providing Khalistani food. He found Felix meeting with a woman in a spacer's jacket of dark green over a plain vest and blouse with trousers. On her belt was a curved dagger in a hilt that he recognized as a kirpan, the ceremonial dagger worn by committed Sikhs.
"Jim." Felix gestured to a third chair for him while the woman looked him over. "This is Kaiya Kaur Chagger of the Majha. She's one of ours."
Meaning she's CDF Intelligence. Henry nodded to her and fought to keep any trace of bitterness from his expression. "Captain Chagger."
"Captain Henry. An honor to meet you." Her English was spoken well, although with a Khalistani accent. "You made skilled use of some missiles I delivered here a few years ago."
Henry knew immediately what she meant. "So you were the source of those Hunters al-Lahim provided us for the attack on Pluto Base."
"Indeed."
Henry glanced toward Felix. "You knew?"
"I suspected. We've got a few people running in Neutral Space, but the Majha's the best candidate for such a run." Felix nodded to Kaiya. "Which is why I called her here. I've already laid out the plan."
"It will work, but I'm not confident it will go smoothly," she said. "And it will burn our ship for certain. At a minimum, we won't be able to take the Majha back to Hestia for other ops. And we may be identified and barred from other ports where the Hestian Business Council's members hold sway. It would negatively impact operations."
"So is that a 'no'?" Henry asked.
She shook her head. "No, simply a point on how much is being sacrificed for this mission. Colonel Rothbard's made it clear how important it is to accomplish anyway. We will do what we can to aid it."
"We start by getting a cargo we know they'd buy on Hestia," Felix said. "It needs to be one to give an excuse to get us planetside, then we find transportation to the security center."
"Food supplies," Henry said. "The HBC keeps Hestia's food supplies balanced on a razor's edge. It maximizes their control over the native populace. And if it's something with a time limit on it, landing it directly will make sense."
"I can arrange for an associated captain to deliver us such a cargo on the way," said Kaiya. "And your ship will be easily hidden in one of our full-sized pods."
"Then that's everything we need for now," Felix said. "Let us know about that food cargo and we'll get prepped for departure here. I'll see to my team. We'll let you know when it's time."
She nodded and walked away.
There was silence between the two men. Henry couldn't look at Felix without the bitter feeling of betrayal coming up within him, knowing he'd had him aboard for nearly four years not as a friend, but a CDF Intel officer on a deep cover operation. "How're things back on Canaan?" he asked.
He noted Felix glanced his way before lowering his eyes. "Lousy. The Peace Union only passes legislation with raw numbers in the Assembly. Then they wheel and deal in the Senate, sometimes successfully if it has enough popular support. Everyone else votes against whatever Fuentes wants, even if it makes sense, although a lot of it I don't like." Felix muttered the last. "There's some scuttlebutt that Fuentes and Rhodes aren't getting along, but he's stuck with her. If she breaks the Peace Union up, he loses his majority in Congress and the anti-peace treaty parties will block everything."
Henry shook his head. "How the hell did it get so bad?"
"People are upset about the treaty, or how it's been reacted to. Defeatists, war-mongers, everyone calls people everything these days. There's no unity, not like we knew." Felix shook his head. "I hear rumors. Some people think there's been psych warfare ops going on, but the proof's not strong."
"I thought I saw some signs of League propaganda in those shipyard attack broadcasts."
Felix grimaced. "Spencer tried to turn Erhart's bad idea into a good one. Instead of a death ride through the League's core systems, we hit their yards and kept them from rebuilding the fleets we've demolished. But the League's been convincing everyone our ships hit civilian shipyards and inflicted mass casualties." Felix shook his head. "Barton's back in CDF Command and they've kicked a lot of people out for being 'anti-peace.' General Ostrovsky's one of the last left, and that's our only good news. Fuentes slashed our budget even more than the fleet. This op? We're making it work on stockpiled resources, not new procurement."
Henry nodded stiffly. "Erhart made things worse, but the war was always going to cause division at some point. The question of keeping the fight up straight to Earth, I mean."
"Erhart was and is a bastard, but he was right about where this is leading us," Felix complained. "The League's taking advantage of this."
"Yeah, they are. Just a question of when and how."
An uneasy silence followed. Neither man seemed to know how to break it. Felix made the attempt eventually, asking, "What happened to Yanik? I could see he's favoring his right arm."
"Kepper got him in the shoulder with an explosive round of some kind," Henry replied. "Oskar figures it'll take a lot of time and surgery to reconstruct the joint. Until then, his right arm's nearly useless."
"Christ," Felix muttered. "We should've hunted the bastard down after Lusitania."
"We were a little busy. Or do you mean your side?"
Felix winced at the heat in Henry's voice. Henry regretted it, but thinking about Felix's true allegiances still hurt tremendously. "Both," Felix answered him.
"We'll get him this time. Rigault's probably going to send him after Linh."
"Will Mavik's people be ready for someone like him?"
"If we leave early enough, it won't matter," answered Henry.
* * *
Samina met Linh just inside the starboard side airlock. A duffel bag was over Linh's right shoulder while her left hand gripped a second, smaller bag. "Hey, Chief," she said brightly, trying to project the good mood she felt despite the circumstances. "Want me to help?"
Linh smiled at her. It was at least genuine, though worry still showed on her face. "It's not your place to carry things for me anymore, Samina. You're an Engineer's Mate now, not a fetch tech."
Samina couldn't help but beam at her words, given they were a reminder of how far she'd come these past few years. "I know, but I didn't know how well you'd recovered from the attack. No harm in helping a shipmate, I mean."
"They hurt my pride more than anything. I told myself I was ready for an attack, but they got me before I could react." Given her familiarity with the Shadow Wolf's internal design, Linh knew where the quarters were and entered the upper deck hall leading to them. "You've got room, right?"
"Yeah."
"Good. I'll get my things set up and get to work on the inertial compensators."
Samina continued following. With the tone of her voice, it wasn't hard to see Linh's distraction. "We'll get her back," she said. "We'll save Tia. I'm sure of it."
"I'm sure we will." Despite her wording, the worry in Linh's voice was still there. It seemed to be consuming all of her attention.
Samina thought of how she might alleviate it, but quickly realized nothing would. Nothing, in fact, could. Linh knew her friend was suffering and that their rescue plans were still something of a long shot.
Nothing Samina said could change that.
* * *
Henry found Miri in the rec room, reading quietly from a digital tablet. He took a seat across from her, getting her attention. "Everything ready?"
"We've got fresh stores and all of our fuel tanks are refilled." Miri set the tablet down. "Whatever happens, we've got the supplies to be in space for a month, at least."
"Good. Also, I thought I'd make it official," he said. "For the time being, I'd like you to be the acting First Mate. Until we get Tia back."
There was no immediate reaction. She seemed to consider what he was saying carefully. "I'm honored," she finally said. "But what about Yanik? He's Second Mate; he should come first."
Breach of Trust: Breach of Faith Book Four Page 12
