Christopher Nuttall - Democracy's Might

The internal security systems must have failed completely, she thought. Or perhaps they’d been subverted long ago .

She felt her weapon grow warm in her hand and shuddered. Plasma weapons had a nasty tendency to overheat and then explode with stunning force. But there was nothing else to use… and besides, it might just be cleaner to die in an explosion than what she would undergo if the Blackshirts took her into custody again. She’d barely survived one interrogation. She knew she was unlikely to survive a second.

“Keep firing,” Wachter said, quietly. “We’ll hold them back as long as we can.”

Sidney led the way out of the shuttle and into the enemy superdreadnaught, his suit’s systems already trying to access the ship’s internal security processors. Unsurprisingly, they didn’t respond; someone had either locked the systems or simply destroyed them. It didn’t matter, he decided, as his HUD showed the shortest path to the CIC. They had to get there before it was too late.

No one tried to block their path as they smashed their way through two sealed airlocks, not until they reached Officer Country. Four Blackshirts stood there, firing at a group of Imperial Navy Marines who seemed to be trying to counterattack. For a moment, the situation was so surreal that Sidney almost started laughing, before the Sergeant pushed his way forward and spoke briefly to the Imperial Navy Marines. The Marines fell back a moment later, allowing the other Marines to advance forward.

The Sergeant barked orders. Sidney launched a grenade towards the enemy position, then joined the charge as the grenade exploded, knocking the Blackshirts out of their post. The Marines smashed through them and charged up the corridor, ignoring the handful of bullets that pinged off their armour. Sidney guessed that the Blackshirts had had to organise their mutiny on the fly. They hadn’t bothered to find weapons capable of burning through powered combat armour.

They crashed into the Blackshirts attacking the CIC and opened fire. There were no survivors.

Penny let out a sigh of relief as she carefully lowered her weapon to the deck, then stood upright, careful to keep her hands in view. The rebels might take her prisoner, but they wouldn’t treat her as badly as the Blackshirts would have done… assuming, of course, they didn’t know what had happened to their missing personnel, the ones who had become POWs. But even if they did decide to retaliate by butchering prisoners, it wouldn’t be as bad as being tortured first…

The rebel Marines were surprisingly gentle. One of them frisked her — she couldn’t help cringing away from his armoured hands, knowing that one mistake would break bones — and then cuffed her, before leaving her to sit on the deck. They were a little tougher with the other officers, then the crewmen who had hidden in the office. Penny found herself staring down at the deck, wondering what would happen now. The rebels had offered their prisoners choices in the past, but would they do that now?

It was nearly forty minutes before she was helped to her feet, then pushed gently towards the hatch. Outside, it looked like a warzone. Blackshirts, Marines and ordinary crewmen had fought savagely, often leaving their bodies on the blackened and scorched deck. Penny knew that the damage was mostly cosmetic, unlike some of the damage inflicted by enemy missiles, but she couldn’t help feeling bitter. They’d worked so hard to get General Clive up to marginally acceptable standards, during the flight from Earth, and now the ship had been damaged again.

In the shuttlebay, she wasn’t surprised when Wachter and herself were separated. There was a brief conversation between two of the rebel Marines, then they were helped into a shuttlecraft and firmly strapped down. The shuttle took off moments later, heading back into space. Penny tried to see if there was still fighting going on, but the naked eye revealed nothing. By now, surely the Blackshirts would have lost control of the fortresses…

She shook her head. One way or the other, it was no longer her concern.

A rebel officer met them as they were helped off the shuttle. “For the moment, we’ve assigned you guest quarters,” he said, “if you will give us your parole. If not…”

He left the statement unfinished, but Penny could guess. If they refused to agree not to cause harm to the rebels while they were on the ship, there were more unpleasant places they could be held. The brig, for example, or a refitted cargo hold. It certainly wouldn’t be very comfortable, even if the rebels didn’t go out of their way to make it unpleasant.

“We will give your our parole,” Wachter said. “And thank you.”

Penny said nothing as they were escorted through the ship’s corridors to a small cabin, probably once used by one of Stacy Roosevelt’s allies. It was large enough to house them both comfortably, even though it had clearly been stripped of anything valuable or dangerous. The rebel cut her hands free, warned them that Marines would be posted outside the door, then shoved them both into the room. Penny rubbed at her wrists as the hatch slammed closed, leaving them alone.

“Get some rest,” Wachter ordered. “I’ll have the sofa.”

“Yes, sir,” Penny said. God alone knew what the rebels would want with them. They’d better catch up on their sleep while they could. “And sir…”

Wachter tapped his lips, silently indicating that they were probably being observed.

After a moment, Penny nodded and walked into the bedroom, leaving him alone.

It took longer than Colin had expected to secure Morrison, even though the Blackshirts had clearly lost whatever cohesion they’d had after the Imperial Intelligence structure had been overrun. In the end, however, the stations had been secured, the superdreadnaughts had been evacuated and the remaining starships had been moved to a safe distance. Given enough time, according to the engineers, they could all be pressed back into service. But not soon enough, they’d added, to make a real difference.

“We might need to jump out again, once the orbital fortifications are secure,” Colin commented to his XO. “They’ll certainly try to recover Morrison.”

The XO smiled. “With what?”

Colin had to admit he had a point. The Imperial Navy had concentrated its forces at Earth, Morrison and Terra Nova. Now, one of those fleets had been shattered and the other two were tied down. And they were close enough together that one of them could probably be lured out of place, with a little effort.

“True,” he agreed. He looked up at the display for a long moment. “Do we have an updated repair estimate?”

“Four days,” the XO said. They’d only taken minimal damage from the battle, thankfully. “And then we can resume the offensive.”

Colin nodded. By any standards, it had been the most one-sided battle since the end of the First Interstellar War — and yet the same trick wouldn’t work twice. Earth’s defenders would know to expect their point defence systems to be jammed and prime their systems to overcome it. Earth would be a far harder nut to crack.

“Good,” he said. “Once we return to the RV point, I want you to bring our two aristocratic guests back onboard. I want a few words with them.”

“Yes, sir,” the XO said.

“And have all of the prisoners moved to the planet’s surface,” Colin added. “We can’t afford to trust them, not now.”

He scowled. It had become clear, very quickly, that some of the rebel POWs had been abused. The files had been destroyed, though, and no one who had personal knowledge of the abuse victims had been captured. But Colin suspected that anyone who hadn’t been held on Morrison itself had been shipped back to Earth.