I peered up as we approached the table and saw at least a dozen white-armored soldiers watching from a carved-out balcony a level above. The outline of their suits’ fabricated wings were tucked under their arms, and I could just make out the symbol on their chest plates—the same orange circle that the attackers, both on the gas harvester and in hangar twenty, wore. The Children of Titan.
“What are they doing?” I asked.
“They are watching over my instructor,” the boy responded. He pointed to the person in the hazard helmet at the other end of the hollow.
My gaze fell back down on what I assumed was the Doctor. Other than the helmet, whoever it was also wore a winged suit of armor that was stained with blood. A Ringer lay on the brightly lit table nearby with a sanitary mask on. The young man’s shirt was off, and he had a pale, chiseled body similar to those of the marble statues in Mr. Pervenio’s office. He stared at me with intense loathing while the Doctor stitched up a fresh wound in his shoulder. I pegged him to be the one flying Ringer from outside who’d survived.
The Doctor’s head turned to face me. “He came!” a distorted voice exclaimed, almost triumphantly. I couldn’t see a face through the tinted visor. The Doctor snipped the end of a stitch and hurried around the table. “I mean, I knew that he would, but…”
The Doctor reached up and pulled off the helmet. Long, curly auburn hair came bouncing out, revealing that she was a woman. Then I saw her face—slim and freckled, but not quite white or long enough to belong to a Ringer. My heart began to race. She was older, but it wasn’t a face I could ever forget. It belonged to my daughter.
“Thank you, Jordan. Go and tend to the patients,” Aria said to the young assistant, who bowed before rolling the gurney with the woman on it over to an open medical station on the wall. She then turned back to me and said, “Hello, Dad.”
It had to be a bad dream. I figured I’d dozed off on the shuttle down to Titan and had been dreaming ever since. But as I removed my own helmet, hoping to wake up, there was no denying it.
“Aria,” I whispered. Words froze in my throat. My pistol very nearly slipped out of my hands. I reached out to make sure she was real, my gloved fingers grazing her pink cheek.
“He’s grown, hasn’t he?” she said. She no longer had the gentle soprano voice I recalled.
“I…” I turned back toward the boy and realized why he’d seemed familiar. He was Elios Sevari’s son. The one I’d orphaned then never bothered to learn the name of.
“Aria, what are you doing here?” I asked.
“Everything I can, since nobody else will,” she answered sternly.
“Where’s the other collector?” the Ringer on the table snarled at me through his mask.
I peered down at him, startled by hearing someone else speak. All my focus had been on Aria. “My partner is waiting outside, just like you asked for,” I said.
“I’m surprised to see you were willing to take on a new one,” Aria said, suppressing a grin.
“So was I.” In my peripherals, I couldn’t help but notice the shadow of one of the Children of Titan operatives skulking around on the level above us. Never throughout the many years she was gone from me had I imagined her in a more dangerous place.
“Dammit, Aria, you shouldn’t be here,” I said.
“Neither should you,” she countered.
I bit my lip, then sighed. “Would you mind telling your friends to lower their guns at least?”
“You killed my brothers,” the injured Ringer growled. He sat up and slammed his fist against the medical table. “By Trass, you’re lucky you’re still alive!” The movement caused him to wince in pain. Aria placed her hands on his shoulder and helped lay him back down.
“Quiet, Nash!” she snapped at him. “After the stunt on Earth, Mr. Pervenio will keep sending more and more collectors until there are none of us left. If your former leader had detonated the bomb away from civilians where he was supposed to, then none of this would have happened. At least this is one collector I can reason with.”
Nash muttered something under his breath before relaxing his head. He continued to hold his heated gaze fixed on me, however.
“I would love to work beyond the sights of guns, but in the end, we aren’t Titanborn,” Aria said to me. “It is their right to remain wary of me after all of this, no matter how much I help.” She spread her arms, gesturing to the rows of gurneys filling the room. I couldn’t help but notice how she’d used the term Titanborn freely.
“All of what?” I tried to get a good read on the workstation beside her table. Everything appeared to be medical equipment except for two familiar containers lying against a cabinet with the red-and-black logo of Pervenio Corporation stamped on the side. They looked just like the ones in hangar twenty and apparently had recently arrived since they were still closed. I approached them, finding it strange that nobody attempted to stop me from looking.
“Don’t play games with me, Dad,” she snapped, following close behind me. “Do you really think that after fifty years, Pervenio Corp couldn’t help bring an end to places like this? Right now, we’re buried a few dozen meters below the ‘official’ Darien quarantine, where sick people like this have no chance at receiving help because it costs a lifetime’s salary to get the care they require. I bring the ones deemed ‘too unfit to survive’ here and care for them as best as I can. Many don’t make it. Do you really think germs slip through decontamination only by accident? So long as Ringers fear being sent to places like this, Pervenio Corp will own the Ring.”
“I never really thought about it.” That was the truth. Like I’ve said countless times, I was never one to ask questions if the pay was right. As far as I was concerned, Pervenio Corp did what it had to do to secure a place in Sol and maybe one day, beyond. At least, that was how I’d gone about my life up until seeing Aria standing amid a terror cell and countless dying Ringers.
I leaned down and popped the lid off one of the containers, hoping with all my heart that it was merely a coincidence and she wasn’t the smuggler I’d been hired to detain. There were no firearms, explosives, or any other dangerous technologies inside. All it held were filled vials and syringes, bottles, and small data pads with the Pervenio logo printed on them—everything a provisional medical center might need to start mass-producing cures. I quickly opened the other container only to find more of the same.
“Immunizations. Vaccines. Simple cures,” she said. “Pervenio Corp has already discovered almost every disease that plagues the people of the Ring… or rediscovered to be precise. And while they are willing to waste billions commissioning Arks that may never reach their destinations, they keep all the medicine that isn’t already paid for locked up on Earth to keep demand high. I’ve been working with the Children of Titan to get our hands on as much as we can.”
“And Venta Co,” I added.
She hesitated for a moment before nodding. “Yes,” she said. “And them. They’re helping me for the wrong reasons, but I took the best option I had. You taught me that.”
I turned and gazed straight into her pretty green eyes. They looked like mine had when I was young and full of vigor, only she spoke words that an Earther never would. Sometimes I forgot she was an offworlder, but she was, through and through. I’d made her that way by never settling down. She was no longer the little girl who marveled at the Arks of the Departure.
“So that’s where you disappeared to?” I asked. “You could’ve said something. I could’ve—”
“Done what?” she interrupted, a harsh edge to her tone. “Do you know what I had to go through to convince Venta to get involved? And still, Madame Venta only did it to hurt your employers. I’ve spent more than a year trying to get Titanborn out of quarantine zones all over Titan, and even still, I’m watched with rifles. That’s how little these people trust anyone from beyond this moon. But can a real doctor let so many suffer and do nothing? Can she, Dad?”
I pictured the dead and dying Ringers out
side in the refectory, recollecting how it felt like I was strolling through a graveyard. Even those in the quarantine above. They were enclosed deep under the orange moon’s icy surface where nobody would ever see them, so that immigrants from Earth could arrive and continue to replace them with ease. None of the ads on Earth saying THE FIGHT TO ENSURE OUR SURVIVAL IS IN YOUR HANDS ever made mention of quarantines or furnaces.
“I don’t know, Aria,” I said. “But this isn’t your fight.”
“It is now,” she replied.
I turned around to see the glinting armor and armed rifles of the Children of Titan fighters on the level above. I took a deep breath. “So what happens next?”
“Leave the supplies here for Jordan to continue administering. I’ve taught him enough. Pretend you never found it and take me in instead. I’ll lead Pervenio to all the wrong places, and by the time they find out the truth, my friends here will be long gone.”
I looked to the ground. “Aria, I can’t…”
She grabbed me by the wrists and pulled me close. “I know what will happen.”
I doubted she really did. They would stuff her in one of Pervenio station’s famous cells. My standing with Pervenio wouldn’t help either. In fact, I’d probably get thrown in with her and accused of conspiracy if her being my daughter came out. When she had nothing left to tell them, she’d be left there for life—or, worse, spaced with the trash for what she’d done. The suicidal ways of the Children of Titan had certainly rubbed off on her.
“You don’t understand,” I said. “I won’t be able to lie. My partner—”
Right as the words left my lips, a chorus of gunfire rang out from the upper level of the hollow. I lunged forward, grabbed Aria, and pulled her back behind the workstation and containers for cover. That was when I noticed that none of the shots were aimed at me.
A muddle of screams and bullets ricocheting off rock greeted my ears. I peered over the workstation to figure out what was happening. I should’ve known immediately. On the balcony, shadows danced among bright flashes, and though I couldn’t see him, I knew Zhaff was one of them. Apparently, his plan didn’t involve waiting for me to discuss terms.
“Zhaff!” I screamed.
“Well done, Malcolm. These terrorists are in clear violation of fifteen Pervenio colonial regulations. The penalty for armed resistance is death. Secure the Doctor.” Zhaff yelled at a relatively loud volume for him. It was precisely enough for his voice to project to me while retaining its usual evenness, as if he weren’t currently taking on a cohort of Children of Titan operatives all by himself. He wasn’t even breathing heavily. They didn’t stand a chance.
“From ice to ashes!” one of the terrorists roared, his voice quickly trailing off into gurgles as a bullet shredded his throat.
I turned to see Aria, her eyes wide as they had been on that roof back on Earth. Her lips trembled, though whether it was with fear or sorrow, I wasn’t completely sure. She’d seen enough gunfights as a child for me to imagine it was the latter.
For the first time in my life, I wasn’t sure that I could follow through in completing a mission. It had always been so easy for me. Close my eyes, follow orders, and follow the credits that came along with doing so. I glared at the medical containers and then back at her. I must’ve repeated the motion at least four times before coming to a decision. I threw on my helmet, yanked Aria to her feet, and pulled her out from behind our cover. There was no time to second-guess.
“Put on your helmet and grab the containers!” I yelled to her. They might’ve been heavy on Earth, but on Titan, they were no more difficult to carry than two infants.
She nodded and did as I asked. I drew my pistol and stood. A bullet whizzed by me, somehow missing.
“I’ll kill you!” the injured Ringer named Nash howled. Sometime during the fray, he’d rolled off the medical table to use it for cover. He had a rifle aimed at me from the ground and opened fire. I jumped out of the way just in time before getting off a shot of my own that struck him in the center of his chest, causing him to drop his gun instantly.
“No!” she gasped.
“Let’s go!” I yelled, pulling on her arm.
She pulled back. “There’s a better way!”
Bullets hissed by our heads, crackling against the floor around us as some of the rebels on the balcony who were still battling Zhaff noticed us and shifted their aim. “The Doctor flees!” one of them shouted from above. “Traitor.”
“No, I’m not!” Aria shouted. “I—”
I was done listening. I grabbed Aria and ran as fast as I could with her in tow.
Shards of rock flew up all around us, but Zhaff carved through our enemies above with the artistry of a master painter and kept us from being hit.
“Get Katrina Drayton into the tunnels!” Aria shouted to Jordan Sevari as we passed. He was huddled under the gurney along with the middle-aged Ringer they’d been testing, terrified. It all made sense. Kale Drayton, the one thought responsible for the Piccolo attack, had his mom sprung from the quarantine right above us and into the healing arms of my daughter.
Aria was in too deep. I had to get her out, for both our sakes.
Somehow, we made it through to the first hollow unscathed. The many sick Ringers conscious enough to hear what was happening were either trembling or sobbing. Two Children of Titan operatives lay on the floor, their throats cut open by a sharp fragment of rock. Zhaff’s handiwork no doubt.
“What was that?” Aria asked. She was struggling to catch her breath the same as I was. Pure adrenaline drove me.
“My partner!” I lugged her into the exit tunnel and keyed the airlock. Luckily, it wasn’t locked from the inside. Once the sequence was complete, and the outer hatch was open, I shoved her through. Only then was I finally able to slow down.
“Turn on your oxygen,” I panted.
She stopped and looked down at the containers in her grasp. “No! I won’t let you return it all. We worked too hard.”
I grabbed her by the helmet and switched her oxygen on myself. “Don’t make me regret this.”
She stared at me blankly for a few seconds. “Regret what?”
I remained quiet and nudged her along. It took me until the end of the long tunnel to completely gather my breath. Once there, I poked my head and my gun through the hologram-camouflaged exit to make sure the coast was clear. My eyes had to adjust to the brightness, and after they did, only Titan’s murky sky was visible. The brewing storm couldn’t be more than ten minutes out and appeared to be growing even more ferocious.
“Do you have anywhere to hide?” I asked. I couldn’t believe the words coming out of my mouth. Thirty years and I’d only ever failed a handful of missions, let alone committed treason. But sometimes missions go off the rails and there isn’t time to think things through. You have to react, improvise, and worry about the consequences later.
Aria appeared as astonished as I was. “What? I… Yes. The Children have plenty of sanctuaries buried under the ice.”
“Can you fly your suit like they do?” She nodded.
“Good.” I motioned for her to drop the containers. “You’re going to have to shoot me now to slow them down.”
“Dad, I…”
I handed her my pistol and took a few long steps back. “Aim right here,” I said, pointing at my thigh. “Right in the meaty part. I’ll tell my partner you escaped. I’ll make a foolish attempt at lying to a Cogent.” I couldn’t help but picture that day back on the rooftop when I’d taught her to shoot for the first time. When things were simple.
She gawked at the weapon as if it were a foreign object. She was so busy trying to help people that I guess handling firearms was a skill she’d forgotten about. It was good to know that at least one of us still had a fully operational heart.
“If I puncture your suit, you’ll freeze,” she said.
I smiled. “My partner won’t be long. I’ll crawl back inside.”
She examined the gun, and as she did
, someone struck her in the back of the helmet, knocking her down. The pistol flew out of her hands and skidded across the sand. My heart raced even faster. This time, Zhaff didn’t hesitate when I was about to be shot. Exactly like I’d asked him not to back on Earth.
“The interior has been secured, Malcolm,” he said. “The child and a few survivors escaped into a tunnel and blew the entry, but the stolen supplies are accounted for thanks to you.” His eye-lens angled toward Aria. “You couldn’t handle one of them?” I could see his scarred, exposed eyebrow lifting behind his visor, as if he was making a joke. Any other time, I would’ve been proud to see him making progress as a normal human.
Zhaff bent down and pulled Aria’s arms together behind her back. The blow had stunned her so badly that she was on her knees whispering something indiscernible. She didn’t put up much of a fight.
I approached them cautiously.
“I sent a message while I was inside,” Zhaff continued. “An airship should be dispatched soon to retrieve us once we are a safe distance from the quarantine so that we don’t cause any unrest with the locals.”
“Zhaff.” The toe of my boot hit something hard. My pistol, lying innocently in the sand. “She’s not going to hurt anyone.”
“Not directly anymore. Pervenio will have many questions for her, however.” He gripped her wrists and then looked up at me with his glowing yellow eye-lens. I thought I could see the corners of his thin lips curling into the early stages of a smile. “I will leave the fact that she disarmed you out of my report, if that is what concerns you.”
“I’d appreciate it.”
I swallowed hard, bent over, and slowly wrapped my fingers around the handle of my pistol so that he wouldn’t notice. My heart beat so hard that it felt like it was going to burst through my rib cage.
I’d spent years of my life hoping I was still human enough to feel such an elevated level of apprehension again, but as it finally happened, I wished I never had. Zhaff was growing on me, but he would never defy orders. I knew that better than most. Until that moment, it was the one thing we had in common. The one thing I’d always respected. Difficult as he was, he was honestly the closest thing I’d had to a friend in far too long. I was no longer ashamed to call him my partner.
Children of Titan Series: Books 1-4: (A Space Opera Thriller Box Set) Page 23
