Democracy's Right

Chapter Ten

“You do realise,” Anderson pointed out, “that this isn’t the most secure of places?”

Colin nodded. After supervising the transfer of the Annual Fleet’s cargo to Daria’s transports — most of the original transport crews had volunteered to join the rebels, rather than go back to the Empire and explain what had happened to the cargo — he’d taken the Shadow Fleet on a long trip out to the Rim, where they’d halted at a hidden facility belonging to the Freebooter’s League. Colin himself, however, had taken Shadow and travelled to Sanctuary, an asteroid habitat along the Rim. It was a black colony orbiting a dull red star — hence unknown to the Empire — but it was surprisingly populated.

But then, perhaps it wasn’t such a surprise. The Empire’s expansion had driven the independent colonies out ahead of it, past the Rim. Millions of humans lived in hidden colonies, some working with others to try to build a civilisation, others hidden away so well that not even their fellows knew that they were there. Colin remembered reading a report of a hidden colony of survivalists on a world the Empire had settled, only stumbling over the colony by accident. The Rim might be dark and cold, at least according to the Empire’s propaganda, yet it teemed with life.

Daria had promised that she would put the word out along the Rim, once the Shadow Fleet became a fleet in truth. Since Colin had arrived, he’d spent time chatting to everyone who was interested, including representatives from other hidden colonies and settlements, some of whom were tired of hiding. He hadn’t realised just how many starships there were along the Rim, all of whom were completely off the books as far as the Empire was concerned, or how much trade there was between the Rim and the colonies at the very edge of the Empire. The massive Family-owned shipping lines might not call at the black colonies, but other starships did, their crews colluding with independent colonies to keep them alive. Some of them, Daria had admitted, were pirates, although the line between good and evil blurred along the Rim. If pirates brought life-saving supplies to hidden colonies — or even poor legal colonies — no one was going to question where it had come from. Besides, sticking it to the Empire was a tradition along the Rim.

Even so, not everyone was willing to commit to joining him. It wasn’t too surprising. The Imperial Navy’s usual way of dealing with a newly-discovered black colony was to demand surrender and transport the population elsewhere, if they didn’t just launch a missile at it and destroy it in nuclear fire. Colin suspected that even if the rebels won, even if they defeated the towering monolith that blighted so many lives, few of the hidden colonies would declare themselves. The habit of hiding was too ingrained by now.

“I know,” Colin agreed. It was quite possible that Imperial Intelligence had its own agents on the asteroid; that they knew about Sanctuary and had simply chosen to leave it alone and try to use it to find other colonies. Anderson’s warning was well-taken. He’d also talked Colin out of returning the freighter crews at once, pointing out that the longer the Empire remained uncertain of what had happened to the Annual Fleet, the fewer precautions they would take. “I don’t think that we have a choice.”

Shadow was lurking outside, the most powerful ship in the system, and he had a full company of Marines covering his back. Even so, he knew that he was dangerously exposed… and he loved it. For the first time in years, he truly felt alive, something he knew that was shared by most of his crew. His crew reassignments — promoting officers and men to their level of competence — seemed to work better than the Empire’s haphazard approach to promotion. They might have been assured of certain death if the Empire ever caught them, yet they didn’t seem to care. The Empire had created a system that bred resentment and hatred on a massive scale. All it had needed was someone to stand up and throw the shackles off.

He looked up as Daria entered the compartment. “I brought three people who wanted to meet you in person,” she said. She looked back outside. “Come on in.”

Colin lifted an eyebrow, which rapidly became a smile as he saw the first person entering the compartment. The man was a legend. The second was a woman he didn’t recognise at first, but the third had to be a Geek, if only because of the biomechanical implants inserted into his body. Colin almost felt sick as he considered the warped and mutilated flesh. The Empire banned implants, outside the Thousand Families, the Marines and certain special cases, but the Geeks delighted in flouting that law. The man he was looking at was more machine than human being. The Geeks, according to rumour, could link into computers and control them directly. Colin could believe it.

“Admiral Walker,” Daria said, with a hint of formality. Her face seemed more composed than normal. “Please allow me to introduce Captain Jason Cordova, Hester Hyman and Salgak.”

Colin found himself coming to his feet, for Captain Cordova was a legend. Everyone in the Imperial Navy knew the story, even though Public Information had been trying for years to rewrite it, or even just to convince the crewmen to forget about Cordova. Hell, the man had inspired Colin himself. Twelve years ago, just before Colin and Admiral Percival had their fateful meeting, Captain Cordova had found himself ordered to scorch a planet that had been unable to pay its taxes. The Empire didn’t tolerate planets that refused to pay and didn’t accept excuses. Cordova had refused the order and, when other starships had arrived to arrest him, had taken his starship and loyal crew out beyond the Rim. Since then, he had been a lurking presence on the border, even though he hadn’t been able to do more than irritate the Empire. His ship, the Random Numbers, was only a heavy cruiser.

Cordova took Colin’s hand, shaking it firmly. Perhaps it was just a trace of hero-worship, but he seemed somehow larger than life, with a long golden beard, a massive bright smile and a uniform that seemed to come from a bygone age. In some ways, he seemed too good to be true, leaving Colin feeling a twinge of jealousy. Cordova could probably have talked Stacy Roosevelt into surrendering without ever needing to board her ships; hell, his mere presence would probably have caused Admiral Percival to wet himself. Colin reminded himself that he’d taken nine superdreadnaughts and, in an afternoon, inflicted more damage than Cordova, in all his years, had ever done. The man might have been a legend, but he was still only a man.

Hester Hyman was, in her own way, just as much of a legend as Cordova. She looked middle-aged, her face bearing the scars of a botched rejuvenation treatment. Her long dark hair was streaked with grey and she held herself as if the only thing keeping her on her feet was her own force of will. She looked unremarkable, even to Colin, until he saw her eyes. They told the full story. This was a woman who had seen terrible things.

Colin knew her story, or at least the legend. Hester Hyman had been a housewife on an isolated colony world that had the misfortune to be governed by one of the worst governors in the Empire. Hester had been picked up one day, taken to the Governor’s Mansion, and raped, along with many other girls from the colony. Hester had been thrown out afterwards and the governor had forgotten about her, a grave mistake. She had gone back to her family, rallied her support and led an uprising against the Empire. The Blackshirts had put it down eventually, but by then the Governor and most of his cronies had died in the fighting. Hester had been captured and sentenced to life on a penal colony, yet somehow she’d broken free, led her fellow prisoners to take over the penal ship and escaped out to the Rim. Since then, she had been another thorn in the Empire’s side. The price on her head was second to none.

And, compared to two living legends, the Geek was almost unremarkable.

“You did extremely well,” Hester said, once they were all seated. Colin had poured them all a glass of wine from Stacy Roosevelt’s private stock. It would have cost a Captain a year’s salary to purchase even a single bottle of Old Scotch, yet Stacy had nine bottles in her cabin. “The Empire will not soon forget what you did.”

“Thank you,” Colin said. Hester’s voice had surprised him. It was harsh, almost atonal, a chilling reminder of what the Empire had done to her when they had her in their clutches. She had once been pretty, perhaps beautiful. Now… her face was scarred and her body seemed to be in constant pain. “It’s only the beginning.”

“It will require time to assimilate the materials that you have brought us,” Salgak stated. The Geek leader — or representative, seeing the Geeks used a democratic system to make decisions — spoke with a harsh, buzzing voice. At some point in the past, he’d removed his vocal chords and replaced it with a mechanical speaker. Colin wondered — he had no intention of asking — if the Geek had also replaced his genitals. There were some questions he really didn’t want to know if they had an answer. “We can produce certain materials for your ships at once; more advanced ships will take time, at least six months.”

Colin smiled inwardly. Not even the Thousand Families could keep something the size of the Empire in technological stasis, no matter how much they might wish to try. Even so, they were determined to limit technological advancement as much as possible, fearful of the consequences if something were to be developed that would change or undermine the economic base of the Empire. The scientists in the Empire either worked for the Thousand Families or they found themselves transferred to planets so primitive that they thought that a time machine meant a watch — or they ran off to the Rim and joined the Geeks. Or, if they were focused on the biological sciences, they joined the Nerds.

The Empire disliked all of the revolutionary groups, of course, but it reserved a special hatred for the Geeks. They feared that the Geeks would one day produce a weapon that could make the entire Imperial Navy obsolete overnight, or that they would succeed in hacking into Imperial Navy starships and trigger their self-destructs. Indeed, all the cut-outs built into Imperial Navy computer systems were designed to prevent an outside force from hacking in, something Colin found rather reassuring. The thought of Admiral Percival being able to blow up his ships simply by transmitting a command code to their systems wasn’t a pleasant thought at all.

And perhaps the Empire had good reason to worry. There was far more industrial talent and resources along the Rim than anyone, even Imperial Intelligence, had guessed. Combined with the materials he’d hijacked from the Annual Fleet, the Rim could become a real threat to the Empire. It would take time, however, and he had to ensure that the Empire remained off-balance. If his calculations were accurate, Admiral Percival would know about what had happened at Jackson’s Folly by now.

“We have the time,” Colin assured him. The Empire might have the force of a sledgehammer, but it needed a target — and locating the hidden shipyards would be almost impossible. Daria had told him that the Geeks kept most of their facilities hidden away from everyone, even her. “And, once we are ready, we can go on the offensive.”

“We have been discussing the issue,” Hester said. “I represent a union of underground groups that is interested in taking part in your war. We do, however, have two concerns. The first one is simple. What will replace the Empire after you win?”

Colin hesitated. If the truth were told, he hadn’t considered the question properly — and he had only focused on the Imperial Navy. He knew that the Empire needed some heavy reform, yet some would want that reform to go further than others. The Empire’s only real justification for its existence was that it united the human race — after the disunity prior to the First Interstellar War had nearly seen the human race exterminated — and breaking the Empire up would be disastrous. Yet… others would disagree. They would see the Empire’s very existence as evil and demand that it be broken up, leading — inevitably — to humanity fighting wars between the successor states. And then there were the aliens… very few humans would want to grant them freedom, not after centuries of propaganda about how the aliens would destroy the human race, given half a chance.

“I believe that it would be better to destroy the Empire first and then worry about the aftermath,” he said, finally. “I could promise you the universe, yet I might not be able to keep that promise.”

Hester’s lips twitched. It took Colin a second to realise that it was a smile… and that she couldn’t smile properly. The Empire had taken that from her, along with everything else. He did wonder why she didn’t employ a body-shaper to repair the damage, but he had to admit that it made a hell of a message. She bore her scars proudly.

“That says well of you,” Hester said. “We have too many factions here who would want promises before the war had even begun, let alone been won, and refuse to play unless they got what they wanted.”

“Thank you,” Colin said. He smiled inwardly at her reaction. “And what was the second concern?”

Hester reached out and tapped the terminal on the desk, inserting a datachip into the system and displaying a star chart in front of them. “We have been waging our own war against the Empire for years, before you decided to join us,” she said. Colin felt a twinge of guilt. Hester had been fighting the good fight for over forty years, while Colin had been an infant, and then Admiral Percival’s client. It had taken a shocking personal betrayal for him to realise just what the Empire truly was, not a concern for the humans caught under its iron heel. “Many of our number have been captured and sentenced to Garstang. We want them liberated from the Empire.”

Colin followed her pointing finger. Garstang was the Empire’s latest penal world, a barely-habitable world on the edge of Sector 117. The convicts — including their families — were loaded into single-shot capsules, given a small amount of supplies and shot down to the planet’s surface. Some penal worlds managed to form civilisations and tame their worlds, allowing the Empire to take them over and incorporate them into the Empire; others remained hellish worlds, ruled by warlords and criminals. The Empire didn’t care. There was no shortage of rebels, criminals and undesirables to tame the penal worlds — or die trying.

He had to admit that it made an excellent first target. The penal worlds were defended, but they rarely had starships assigned to their defence, choosing instead to rely on orbital weapons platforms. The Imperial Navy crewmen assigned to the planets were hardly the best in the service — some of them had a habit of recovering convict women from the surface and taking them into orbit, where they were forced to service the crew — and a single superdreadnaught could probably blow right through the defences without suffering any damage.

“Tell me something,” he said, looking at Cordova. A heavy cruiser could have coped with the defences of a penal world, if not easily. “Why didn’t you go after them yourself?”

“We couldn’t get a fleet of transports together,” Cordova admitted. Behind him, Daria nodded. “There was no way of getting the convicts off the world before reinforcements arrived from the nearest system.”

Colin nodded. The penal worlds would have a picket ship floating out nearby, drives and weapons stepped down — rendering it invisible to passive sensors. As soon as his fleet arrived, that ship would power up and flicker out, racing to the nearest world with an Imperial Navy squadron. If he went there with his full fleet, however, that picket would have to race to Camelot to summon reinforcements, and that would take at least three days. The most pessimistic estimate Colin could come up with was that they would have at least a week before they faced a force capable of destroying the Shadow Fleet. A week would be long enough to pick up quite a few people from the planet’s surface. They would just have to be careful that they didn’t take any real criminals with the rebels.

“Very well,” he said, finally. It would be an easy mission and it would blacken the Empire’s eye. It would also be a propaganda blow against the Empire’s penal system. “We will make that world our first target. I trust that you can provide transport ships for personnel lift?”

“Easily,” Daria said. She grinned. “I tell them that they’re going to be escorted by nine superdreadnaughts and they will be delighted to come along and join the fun.”

Colin grinned back. “And then we can start the real work,” he added. A plan was already unfolding in his mind. It would be risky, but if they could pull it off, the rewards would be worthwhile. He looked up at the Geek. “Can you modify a pair of bulk freighters for me?”

“Of course,” Salgak said. The Geek’s great head — so heavy that it had to be held in place with extra support — turned from side to side. His mechanical eye tracked Colin’s face. “What would you like us to do with them?”

Colin told him.