The first phase of our plan seemed to work—the planetary-defense systems ignored us. Even if they detected the trail from our thrusters, they surely believed it was just a residual effect of the explosion, a large chunk of hull propelled by the blast.

  So far so good.

  I looked at the sun behind us through the external cam. I expected to see a dull red ball, but the vista that presented itself to my eyes was much more spectacular.

  The surface of the star was far from homogenous. Amid black spots—called star spots—titanic explosions blasted flares of superheated gas into space. Geysers of plasma rose from the sun, then formed huge coils as they returned to the surface, retained by its powerful magnetic field.

  As our craft had only limited time to accelerate, our speed was not that impressive, but fortunately Abyss orbited close to its star, and was close to the gate. The penitentiary ship was slow. We would arrive on the surface before it had time to dock at the Black Hammer.

  Deceleration, on the other hand, was a problem. We couldn’t fire our thrusters to kill our speed before entering the atmosphere without being detected. The only solution was to abandon the ship. The four members of the crew left their anti-G tanks and we all geared up in space battle suits equipped with jetpacks. Afterward, the six of us went into the airlock and waited for the right moment to jump.

  The countdown appeared at the top of my HUD. Through the external cam of the Sylphid, I saw the dark planet racing toward us. It wasn’t totally dark, though, as its north pole was surrounded by a glowing hallo. I’d seen aurorae from space before, but this one was particularly spectacular.

  Life on Abyss survived in extreme conditions. As the planet was close to its cold sun, it was bombarded without end by deadly radiation that slowly stripped it of its atmosphere.

  Orbital-defense stations that looked like inverted pyramids were ominous presences hanging above the black world. Their armor reflected the dim light of the sun. Three 620-meter-high Karkadann-class heavy cruisers reinforced the planetary defenses, each one escorted by two 300-meter-high Shenlong-class destroyers, nicknamed Black Dragons. The warships had deployed their solar-energy collectors, which looked like the wings of some legendary flying reptile. They glinted with red highlights as the sunbeams slid on their surface.

  The penitentiary ship was a bright dot in the distance. What I saw was the plasma ejected from its main thrusters as it decelerated. It was right on time.

  But where’s the Dromon?

  The doors of the airlock slid open, and we threw ourselves into the void as soon as the countdown reached zero. We activated our jetpacks and flew toward the red crescent that bordered the dark planetary disk.

  “Abyss” was indeed a fitting name for this world. I felt like I was falling into the dark pit of hell.

  A finger-four of Jingwei was rushing toward us. We shut down our jetpacks as soon as we detected the fighters. We all had jammers that were supposed to make us invisible to sensors, but this kind of tech was never totally reliable. I missed my Venatici quantum suit.

  The interceptors passed us without even slowing. I heard the members of the crew sighing with relief through their comms. We fired the jetpacks again and resumed our descent. The red crescent was now filling a large part of my field of view.

  I could see the buildings of the penitentiary complex, their contours outlined with blue lights. Two structures dominated it: the command tower on one side, and the Black Hammer—the prison itself—on the other. Numerous barracks, bunkers, hangars, repair facilities, and other buildings filled the terrain between them.

  The planet was flat and featureless; I imagined it was so old that all its mountains had been eroded eons ago, and there wasn’t enough heat in the planet’s core to sustain any tectonic or volcanic activity. A forest stretched to the horizon in all directions, a black carpet covering the entire world.

  As per my plan, the crew of the Sylphid flew toward the forest, where they would hide until the next phase. Tess would find a good sniping spot on the ground and wait for my instructions. Meanwhile, I glided toward the spire of the command tower. I had to disable the defense stations that guarded the tenech gate before the rebel fleet arrived, otherwise this whole op would end in disaster.

  I touched down on the top landing platform of the command tower, hacked the door, and sneaked inside. My scanners didn’t pick up any life signs in the vicinity. I didn’t like that. It all seemed way too easy.

  From that point on, I followed the infiltrator routine. Find the control room—check. Hack a terminal—check. Disable the defense systems—check. Piece of cake.

  I wished I could turn the defense stations against the GCC ships, but they were only semi-automatic. Target selection was operated manually. I could, however, inject a cyber-virus into the system that would force the generators of the stations to operate outside safe parameters, thus disabling them permanently.

  The GCC ships, on the other hand, could not be hacked, because their cybernetic systems operated in a closed loop. Tampering with their onboard AI was impossible without physically boarding the ships.

  As soon as my work was done, I left the control room to return to the landing platform. Suddenly several red dots lit up my mini-map.

  “Sergeant Reggs, you are right on time.” Vlasto gave me a cold smirk. His steel-gray eyes drilled into me.

  Ten comsynts pointed their blasters at me. They all wore quantum suits, which explained why my sensors didn’t pick them up earlier. Vlasto had also traded his usual black uniform for a quantum suit.

  “Your weapons on the floor,” the sergeant who commanded the squad ordered me. “Now.”

  I had no choice—I obeyed.

  39. Rebellion

  The comsynts led me to what looked like an interrogation room inside the command tower. It contained only one chair made of titanium nanomaterials and equipped with massive restraints, obviously designed to contain a being with superhuman strength. This room had probably been set up specifically for me, because there was no other reason to have an interrogation room in the command tower.

  The comsynts confiscated my backpack and the rest of my gear, including my drone launcher and my helmet. Then they forced me on the torture chair. The restraints tightly wrapped themselves around my wrists and my legs. A beam of light struck me in the eyes as the rest of the room was plunged into semi-darkness.

  Vlasto ordered the comsynts to leave us and return to the Dromon. They were replaced by several GCC soldiers in CoBA armed with AA-67 shotguns. Their faces were blank, and their eyes lifeless.

  Zombies.

  Fallen GCC soldiers transformed into soulless cyborgs.

  General Pyong entered the room. The medals on his chest were shining testimonies of the atrocities he’d committed.

  “You use necrorgs to guard political prisoners,” I said. “How clever.”

  “We decided to remove the human element given the nature of some of our guests,” the general replied. “Xian Dao masters have the annoying ability to influence human minds. Our cyborg guards are immune to that ability. But let’s not waste our time and get to the point—you are wondering why you are still functioning.”

  I locked gazes with the general. “I’m still alive because you need me.”

  He gave me a brisk nod. “You will undo the damage you have done to the public image of the Coalition, RGS-358. Or shall I call you the Butcher of Pien Ju? You will confess that you are responsible for the massacre. You will testify that a group of rebels under your leadership stole four Valkyrie gunships from a GCC base and used them to destroy the Pien Ju village as part of your terror campaign.”

  “And what would compel me to cooperate with a piece of sgarb like you, general?” I spat.

  “If you cooperate,” the general replied calmly, “your rebel friends will be spared a particularly unpleasant way of passing from this world to the next.”

  I scoffed. “You underestimate them. Their fleet will be here soon, and they’ll turn this place to ruins.”

  The general’s small eyes gave a hint of a cold smile. He punched a button on a virtual keyboard to activate a holo-screen. It showed the tenech gate of the Abyss system and the stations that defended it. The motley rebel fleet was there, right on time. The defense stations remained inactive as I’d expected. The virus I’d unleashed had done its work.

  “We do not need those defense stations to stop your pathetic flotilla.” The general waved his hand briskly, as if chasing a fly. “We have a much more potent weapon in our arsenal. Your spy on board the penitentiary craft is a double agent. Once I explained to her what happens to the families of traitors, she proved to be very cooperative. She led your ships into a trap.”

  The sun was obscured by a huge battleship that materialized at the tenech gate. It evoked the image of a supersized saltwater crocodile from Lianxing, with its frontal shield shaped like two gaping jaws. I recognized the model—it was a 1,500-meter-high battlecarrier, Tiamat class, the latest line of warships launched by the GCC. The monster of the apocalypse in one of the religions of the Ancients, a fitting name for a ship that could destroy entire stellar systems.

  “It’s over, Reggs,” Vlasto stated with a smirk. “Together with the Dromon and the ships that guard Abyss, we have enough firepower to annihilate your flotilla ten times over.”

  I clenched my jaws. “Everyone on those ships will fight you to the death. Go ahead, do whatever you want with me. I’ll never give you what you want.”

  “We shall see about that.” Vlasto touched a button on the virtual keyboard, and the holo-screen showed a similar interrogation room. A female was tied to the chair, her face flooded with cold artificial light.

  Tess!

  My heart raced wildly. I pulled at my restraints with all the strength I could muster, but they wouldn’t budge.

  Vlasto snickered. “I see that we touched a nerve here. As you know, synths can take a lot of abuse, much more than a human can. I promise that her agony will be very, very long. And I’ll make you watch every second of it. So, Reggs, what will it be?”

  “It will be war,” I snapped.

  My mind connected to the network shared by the regiment of battle andros stationed on Abyss. I uploaded everything I knew about the GCC and their atrocities onto that network, and also about the Venatici and the way they treated their artificial slaves.

  “Free yourselves, my brothers,” I cried. “Rise up!”

  Nothing happened. Vlasto and the general stared at me with blank expressions.

  “What did you expect to accomplish, RGS-358?” the general asked suspiciously.

  Vlasto only sniggered at my attempt. “Really, Reggs? You’re desperate—or completely delusional.”

  An explosion shook the command tower. Then another. Vlasto’s smirk vanished, and the general grew pale as his eyes widened.

  The holo-screen transmitted the feed from one of the orbital-defense stations. Two out of three Karkadann-class cruisers in geostationary orbit above the penitentiary complex—as well as the Black Dragons escorting them—were operated by android crews, and they were the first ones to rebel. The anti-capital plasma guns of the Karkadanns blazed as they delivered a killer salvo to the unsuspecting third cruiser, operated by cyborgs.

  The damaged Karkadann went down in a cloud of fire and debris, the horn on its frontal shield thrusting toward the surface of the planet. Its two escort destroyers didn’t outlive it by long. The Black Dragons operated by andros shot Antares missiles before the ships loyal to the GCC could deploy any countermeasures.

  The GCC destroyers were ripped apart by massive explosions. Chunks of their solar-energy collectors were propelled in all directions like the wings of gigantic dragonflies shot in flight.

  “Dromon, immediate takeoff!” Vlasto yelled into his comm.

  He punched a button on the virtual keyboard and switched to the feed from one of the external cams of the command tower. The Dromon rocketed up, but its flight was cut short by a salvo of plasma cannons from the heavy cruisers in orbit. An Antares hit one of its thrusters in a blinding explosion. Three other hits finished the job.

  The Dromon tilted to the side and started falling. The crew tried to stabilize the flight by firing lateral thrusters, but the damage sustained by the craft was too severe. Its generators were breathing their last. The once proud Venatici ship tumbled into the black forest like a collapsing tower. The crash caused a thundering noise so intense we heard it even in the interrogation room of the command tower.

  “No, not the Dromon!” Vlasto cried hysterically, drawing his RC-66B Radovaris blaster. “You’ll pay dearly for that!” He pointed the barrel of his blaster at my head.

  The door of the interrogation room whooshed open and a squad of andros rushed through. Their XK-H62 heavy rifles spewed a stream of bullets accelerated by electromagnetic forces to ten times the speed of sound.

  General Pyong opened his mouth, but didn’t get the chance to utter a word. All the medals in the galaxy wouldn’t save him. His chest riddled with bloody holes, an astonished expression frozen on his face, he collapsed on the ground.

  Vlasto’s RC-66B barked twice. Two battle andros tumbled to the ground. Despite his lightning reflexes, he was quickly overwhelmed by the wave of andros pouring through the door. Their mechanical arms clenched him tightly and squeezed his wrist, forcing him to drop his blaster.

  “Curse you, Reggs!” Vlasto yelled, thrashing about wildly to free himself from the andros. “You plotted all this. You reprogrammed the andros in that facility in Area 42, didn’t you? Turned them against their masters. Traitor!”

  “The right term is reconditioned, not reprogrammed,” I corrected him. “They’re sentient beings, not mere machines.”

  One of the andros deactivated the restraints that kept me tied to the interrogation chair. As soon as I was free, I picked up the Radovaris that lay on the floor and pointed it at Vlasto. He managed to free one of his hands and pulled his spear from the sheath on his back.

  The plasma blades blazed red in the semi-darkness. Vlasto cut down the andros who tried to restrain him, and their severed limbs rained down on the floor.

  I had a line of fire and decided to take the shot. “Die—you—tyrant!”

  But I couldn’t pull the trigger. My index finger wouldn’t obey my will.

  Vlasto gave out a cackle, a malevolent, nervous laugh. His eyes glinted with madness. “You can’t do it, Reggs. Whether you want to or not, I’m still your master, and you’re still my slave. All comsynts have a failsafe preventing them from harming their Venatici commanders. You’re powerless against me. Impotent!”

  He put on his helmet and strode toward me, clenching his plasma spear with both hands. I dashed to the corridor.

  “Run, slave, run!” Vlasto shouted through the speakers on his helmet. “You won’t escape my wrath.” I couldn’t shoot him, but nothing prevented me from causing him harm indirectly.

  Display energy sources.

  A bright line lit up on my HUD. It followed the corridor and disappeared behind a blast-resistant door. That line was an energy-distribution pipe. I fired at it once with my blaster—one shot was sufficient, and the pipe snapped with furious hissing. The corridor behind me was instantly flooded with flames.

  Vlasto yelled as the blaze enveloped him. His quantum suit gave him some protection against heat, but it didn’t make him invulnerable. I didn’t stay to enjoy the view—I needed to get to the Black Hammer as quickly as possible.

  I contacted the captain of the Resistance fleet while running to the nearest landing platform. “What’s your status?”

  “Making good progress planetward, ETA 34 minutes,” he replied. “The Tiamat is on our six, but we’re faster.”

  “I need a lift,” I said. “Command tower, upper platform.”

  “Aye aye,” the captain acknowledged. “Turul on its way to pick you up. Grand work, Reggs. For a moment I thought we were all toast. I don’t know how you pulled that off, but grand work.”

  “We’ll uncork the champagne once we all get to safety,” I said.

  “Copy that, Reggs. Good stars.”

  40. Clash of titans

  With the help of a squad of andros, I fought my way to the landing platform. Enemy reinforcements arrived continuously, wave after wave, from the levels below. My Radovaris made quick work of them, but a continuous stream arrived via the elevators.

  When I reached the landing platform, I told the surviving andros to hold this position while I boarded my ride.

  The Turul was an impressive fighter evoking a bird of prey. It was large enough to carry a crew of four. This class was unofficially called W-wings, because the Turul fighters looked like the letter W when they were on the ground, their wings retracted.

  The door of the Turul was open and I hopped inside. The fighter took off immediately, its engines bellowing. Reaching the Black Hammer would not be easy. A ferocious dogfight raged around us, as the rebel Alicanto fought the GCC Jingwei for air supremacy.

  The Alicanto—nicknamed the Firebird—was a fighter of legend, widely considered the best interceptor of its generation. The first model had come into service during the early years of the Perseus Wars, and achieved an unprecedented kill ratio. Four decades later, the Firebird still remained a formidable fighter in the hands of an expert flyboy. Located at the tips of its wings, its two main thrusters—massive compared to the size of the cabin—gave it unparalleled agility in a dogfight.

  Alicanto worked best in pairs. After the lead lured the enemy fighters into the trap, its partner jumped on their six and shot them with Quicksilver missiles or its rapid-fire railguns. Rinse and repeat ad libitum.

  As soon as the Alicanto cut an opening through the enemy’s air defenses, the Turuls swooped upon the enemy positions, clearing out railgun nests, missile-launcher batteries, and flak tanks.

  My fighter flew amid geysers of fire as the rebels pressed their attack. Gigantic ground-to-orbit railguns and plasma cannons rose above the battlefield like the masts of ancient sailboats. The noise their salvos produced was apocalyptic, as if we were flying through a thunderstorm on a gas giant. High above the atmosphere, the cruisers operated by andros were having a hard time surviving the onslaught.

 

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