Atlantia Series 1: Survivor (17 page)

‘Don’t they just.’

‘You’re concerned about your brother, Qayin?’

‘He’s a danger to everybody, including himself,’ Hevel replied. ‘The civilians will go insane when they hear of the captain’s so–called plan for the convicts to be brought aboard the Atlantia.’

Dhalere nodded.

‘Yes, they will,’ she said. ‘So perhaps you should not wait for the captain to reveal his plan to them?’

Hevel looked down at her, his rage forgotten and a rueful smile spreading across his lips. ‘When did you become such an agile manipulator? You should have been a politician.’

Dhalere smiled. ‘Better that they hear of the captain’s insanity from their true leader, so that they are better prepared to act against him.’

Hevel felt his heart miss a beat as Dhalere’s hand reached down and gently squeezed his groin.

‘You’re suggesting…’

‘Mutiny,’ Dhalere confirmed. ‘The Word took everything from me and right now I don’t give a damn about much, but I don’t want a bunch of convicted rapists and murderers wandering around this ship. If I’m going to die it’s not going to be at the hands of those bastards.’

Hevel’s mind raced.

‘We would need weapons,’ he said. ‘The captain’s marines would…’

‘Would not shoot civilians,’ Dhalere interrupted in a whisper, her lips brushing his. ‘You could storm the bridge without firing a shot, a bloodless coup. Bra’hiv’s marines serve the colonies, not the captain. There are more than enough civilians willing to stand up and be counted alongside you, Hevel. The only question is whether you’re willing to stand up and lead them.’

Hevel looked into her eyes, her gaze unblinking as she stared up at him with those limpid green pools.

‘Do you think they would follow me?’ he asked, his eyes feeling dry and his heart beating faster in his chest as adrenaline flushed hot through his veins.

Dhalere smiled again.

‘You already have one mutineer on your side,’ she said. ‘Where one follows, so do others. Shall we begin?’

***

‘Are we absolutely sure the inmates are sealed in?’

Andaim’s voice was tinged with tension as he guided the shuttle toward the prison hull, Evelyn watching from a jump seat in the rear of the cockpit. The craft was a simple, wedge–shaped design, capable of carrying four dozen personnel or troops in its hold and of atmospheric flight.

‘All four linking passages have been disconnected and the prisoners are all on lock–down in their cells,’ Bra’hiv confirmed from the co–pilot’s seat. ‘We’ve joined them together into a single longer passage and accessed an emergency hatch further down the hull beyond the reach of the prison population, in case we need to evacuate them in a hurry, but that hatch remains sealed for now.’

‘What about access to the engine rooms?’ Andaim demanded.

‘Stilll sealed from the inside,’ Bra’hiv confirmed. ‘My men will guard that access point while you go in and obtain the fusion core, but without pressure suits no convict can approach you or Alpha Zero Seven anyway.’

‘Her name’s Evelyn,’ Andaim replied.

Bra’hiv looked over his shoulder at her and shrugged. ‘We’ll cover you once the core is extracted, and fly it out for repairs and preparation aboard the Atlantia.’

Evelyn looked at Bra’hiv. ‘Why not just pull the prisoners out first?’

‘Because we can’t risk any chance of them hijacking the mission and gaining access to the Atlantia,’ Andaim explained. ‘This way, if there’s a problem then it’s only us and Bra’hiv’s team that they’ll be able to attack and we can easily use the shuttle to escape.’

Evelyn watched as Andaim guided the shuttle aft alongside the Atlantia’s enormous hull, toward the tangled bulk of the prison behind it. A cloud of spiralling debris tumbled slowly away from the hull’s wake, and far below in the planet’s atmosphere she could see tiny flashes of light as pieces of hull plating and other wreckage burned up.

The shuttle slowed as it entered the debris field and Evelyn looked out of the viewing port beside her at the hull, knowing that inside were at least a hundred dangerous men all hunting for any opportunity to escape their incarceration. With no hostages to bargain with they would attack at the slightest provocation and almost certainly fight to the death in their quest for freedom.

‘The captain could be right,’ she said as the shuttle rounded the prison hull’s silent engines. ‘Cutler and his men could easily be turned to our side, given the right incentive.’

‘They won’t,’ Qayin said from where he was manacled in the rear of the shuttle with several armed marines. ‘They don’t trust him any more than they trust me. It’ll be dog eat dog if they get chance to fight, each man for himself.’

‘Wonderful,’ Andaim said as he turned the shuttle toward a large, jagged black cavity ripped in the hull before them.

‘There,’ Evelyn said and pointed between Andaim’s and Bra’hiv’s shoulders. ‘Out there, see that light?’

From the darkened interior of the hull a flare of distant blue–white light hovered like a lost star trapped among the wreckage, casting a narrow beam of light out into deep space.

‘I see it,’ Andaim said. ‘I don’t want to get the shuttle too close to that thing and besides it’s too small in there. We’ll have to dock out here and get inside. It could blow any moment if our thrusters destabilised it.’

‘Wait,’ Evelyn said, and pointed up into the darkened hull.

There, amid the torn girders and hull braces, a series of thick hull plates were torn outward like a gigantic metal flower, the petals reflecting the sunlight.

‘That’s where the blast happened,’ Andaim realised. ‘That’s where the bomb was.’

‘Yes,’ Evelyn said, ‘and look where it is, right inside where the high–security wing would have been.’

Andaim stared at the damaged hull plating for a moment before he replied.

‘That was a highly restricted area,’ he said. ‘Only a few people would have been able to plant it.’

‘And the captain’s wife was one of them,’ Evelyn said. ‘She could have infected any one of the prisoners or staff.’

Andaim gripped his controls tighter but he did not reply.

‘I’ll get the men ready,’ Bra’hiv said as he unclipped his seat harness, ‘but for what it’s worth, I don’t think it likely that Meyanna Sansin is infected with the Word.’ Bra’hiv turned and strode aft toward his men and Qayin.

Andaim looked over his shoulder at the big convict as he zipped up his environmental suit.

‘I don’t like having Qayin close by,’ he complained. ‘He’s got nobody to protect but himself.’

‘He’s safer when you can keep an eye on him,’ Evelyn pointed out as she pulled the visor of her suit down. ‘Besides, I’m supposed to be a higher risk than he is, right?’

Andaim sealed his visor as he looked at her. ‘Yeah,’ he agreed. ‘But you’re…

‘A woman?’ she finished the sentence before he could.

‘Trustworthy,’ Andaim corrected her.

‘What makes you think that?’

‘Gut instinct.’

Evelyn smiled at him, and then a moment later Andaim hit a button on the control panel and the shuttle’s rear hatch opened. The air rushed from the interior in a gust of ghostly vapour and then the troops unclipped their harnesses and made their way out of the shuttle toward the looming mass of twisted metal and impenetrable darkness.

*

The sanctuary was filled with civilians, flooding back inside after the removal of the mysterious prisoner Alpha Zero Seven. Whispers and rumours gusted across their ranks as Hevel walked with Dhalere into the sanctuary and was immediately greeted by a throng of concerned citizens: mothers herding nervous children, fathers with faces twisted in outrage, lost souls and teenagers who had seen their families wiped out.

All were looking at him, their voices commingled into one outpouring of grief and fear. Hevel called out to them, but the din of their voices drowned him out.

‘Ladies, gentlemen, citizens, please listen to me!’

Hevel clambered up onto a grassy bank, his hands held aloft to catch the eye of people further away. Dhalere waited and watched among the throng as Hevel cried out over the heads of the crowd.

‘I know how you feel!’ he called, and the clamour of voices ceased as they strained to listen to him. ‘I know because I feel the same. The commander of this vessel has lost his mind and is considering placing the rights of convicted criminals above those of honest citizens!’

A wave of righteous outrage soared from among the gathered citizens and Hevel waved them down, appealing with his expression and body language for calm.

‘We cannot overpower them,’ he said. ‘We cannot start a war within a war and jeapodise our very survival at such a crucial moment in the history of our race! But I’m damned sure that we won’t allow Captain Idris Sansin the chance to do that either!’

More shouts, waved hands and eyes ablaze with conviction.

‘We should bring him down!’ shouted one tall, bearded man. ‘We’re not second–class citizens!’

More shouts of encouragement and Hevel looked at the man.

‘Indeed, but would you be willing to place yourself in harm’s way as he does?’

‘I’d give it my best shot!’ the bearded man hollered back. ‘So would we all!’

‘Against the armed soldiers guarding this ship?’ Hevel pressed.

‘Yes, against them all!’

‘Against the command crew who support him?’ Hevel yelled.

‘Yes, against them all!’ shouted more people.

Hevel watched the crowd for a moment. ‘Against the Word?’

The crowd fell silent and the bearded man spoke out. ‘We cannot fight the Word, we’re not strong enough.’

‘That’s right,’ Hevel replied. ‘We’re not. Only a military force could fight back, could make a stand. Not us, and certainly not a rabble of criminals. We cannot take the captain’s place, for we cannot do in his stead what he and his people can. We cannot take this ship by force, for it would be our own downfall. The captain and his crew are not our enemies, for they risk their lives to protect us all every day.’ Hevel let his gaze sweep the watching citizens, now listening in their hundreds.

‘Then what would you have us do?’ asked the bearded man.

Hevel smiled.

‘Walk with me,’ he replied, ‘to the bridge. What cannot be changed by force can be changed by guile and by the will of the people.
We
are the strongest force upon this vessel and our voice will be heard. Who will walk with me?’

The crowd shifted restlessly, citizens looking at each other for support and finding only anxiety and uncertainty.

Then, from the crowd, a woman called out.

‘I will walk with you,’ she said. ‘I will follow the captain, but not into the hands of convicts!’

Hevel looked down at Dhalere, who had infiltrated the crowd as he spoke, as another woman shouted out her support, then another, then men, and from further back into the crowd, and before he knew it Hevel heard the commingled voices of hundreds of citizens shouting their support for him.

Hevel turned and strode down off the bank toward the sanctuary exits, the civilians following him en masse.

*

‘They’re inside.’

Captain Sansin watched as a viewing port displayed an image of the shuttle hanging in space alongside the shattered bulk of the prison hull, its rear ramp lowered.

‘The sooner we get them out of there the better,’ he said. ‘Do we know what the lifespan of that core is?’

‘It’s been jettisoning energy into space for some time sir,’ came the reply from Lael, ‘but it should be good for many months yet. If we can hook it up to a fuelling cable and control it it will prove a valuable weapon.’

Sansin nodded. A fusion weapon was not something that the Word would be able to predict being used as a weapon aboard the Atlantia, especially as they were not used by the military at all. Fusion bombs were far in the history of the colonies, the technology used only for power–generation now. Directed energy weapons were possible but plasma charges were far more stable. Having that core in his hands represented the one opportunity for surprise that the Atlantia had, the one avenue to possible victory that…

‘Sir, we’ve got a problem.’

The captain turned as Jerren called out. ‘What is it?’

‘Councillor Hevel sir, he’s on his way to the bridge.’

‘So?’

‘Sir, the entire ship’s compliment is behind him.’

The captain stood up and whirled to the bridge security team. ‘Seal the hatches, immediately!’

The marines whirled to the doors, but before they could touch them they burst open as Hevel strode onto the bridge, the corridors behind him packed with civilians. Dhalere, his assistant, was by his side. The marines levelled their weapons at the intruders, backing away from them, but none of the armed men opened fire.

‘What the hell is this?!’ Captain Sansin roared, glaring at Hevel.

The councillor walked up onto the bridge and confronted the captain.

‘This,’ he replied, ‘is the will of the people.’

‘The will of the people?’ Sansin echoed. ‘Or the will of one very greedy man?’

‘The prisoners,’ Hevel snapped. ‘They are still confined?’

The captain ground his teeth in his jaw but he did not reply. Hevel turned to the staff manning the bridge, to the marines aiming their weapons at him, and spoke loudly enough for all to hear.

‘We are unarmed,’ he said, ‘and we do not wish to cause any bloodshed. But none of us will stand by and see our safety and security compromised by either the release of convicted and bloodthirsty criminals who have already tortured and killed our own people, or by the incompetent command of a captain who would put the lives of those criminals above the citizens and servants of our race.’

Hevel turned, surveying the bridge.

‘You may shoot us if you wish,’ he said to the marines, ‘but you must shoot us all.’

The marines looked at the captain, who shook his head and gestured for them to lower their weapons.

‘This is a mistake, Hevel,’ he growled.

‘No, captain,’ Hevel snapped in reply. ‘This is a solution.’

Hevel turned and waved Dhalere and several other civilians into the bridge. ‘Take control of the command stations,’ he ordered.