Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Leave us a Review

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  PRAISE FOR JOHN SHIRLEY

  “John Shirley’s acerbic humor is a perfect match for his sense of doom and adventure. One of his best. Buckle in!”

  —Greg Bear, author of Blood Music and The Unfinished Land

  “One of our best and most singular writers. A powerhouse of ideas and imagery.”

  —William Gibson, author of Agency and Neuromancer

  ALSO BY JOHN SHIRLEY

  Stormland

  City Come A-Walkin’

  The A Song Called Youth Trilogy: Eclipse

  Eclipse Penumbra

  Eclipse Corona

  Black Butterflies: A Flock on the Dark Side

  The Feverish Stars

  ALSO BY JOHN SHIRLEY AND AVAILABLE FROM TITAN BOOKS

  Bioshock: Rapture

  LEAVE US A REVIEW

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  SUBORBITAL 7

  Print edition ISBN: 9781803363820

  E-book edition ISBN: 9781803363837

  Published by Titan Books

  A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd

  144 Southwark St, London SE1 0UP

  www.titanbooks.com

  First edition: June 2023

  2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  Copyright © 2023 by Alcon Publishing LLC. All Rights Reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

  To all the US Army Rangers; those fallen,

  and those still fighting

  PROLOGUE

  GENEVA, SWITZERLAND

  Professor Frederic Dupon strolled beside the Rhone River on a cool night in May. He was walking home from the neuronics lab, and watching the moon rippling on the water. Thoughts of frontal lobe stimuli scans gave way to wondering if he could get his pretty neighbor Hilda to come out and gaze at the moon with him. Didn’t full moons have some sort of romantic effect?

  He had never subjected the claim to a scientific test.

  Dupon heard a soft motor noise, caught a peripheral glimpse of something slinking up closer, long and specter-white. He turned, frowning, and saw an ivory van pacing him, its windows impenetrably black.

  His mouth went dry and he hurried on, walking faster. The electric van kept pace. It was almost silent. The only other sounds were the lapping of the waves against the retaining wall and the distant rumble of a jet.

  Dupon stopped, to see if the vehicle would pass him.

  It did.

  And then it suddenly nosed into the curb, blocking his way.

  The professor froze, remembering a smartband call from Hans Quorgasse.

  “Dupon,” the EuroIntel operative had said, “your work has attracted interest in the East. You will need additional security.”

  “What do you know of my work?” Dupon asked in irritation. “It is classified!”

  “I know about the spaceflight applications. We’re sending some people to support Kessid security.”

  Dupon relaxed. The van must contain the men from EuroIntel. As much as he loathed such skullduggery, at that moment it seemed reassuring.

  The back of the van opened, and a drone emerged, about the width of a bicycle’s handlebars. It hovered, running a scanning laser over him.

  “Professor Dupon?” a filtered voice said. Before he could respond, however, another voice emanated from the drone.

  “It’s him you idiot,” the second voice said. “Just do it.”

  A screech of tires caused Dupon to jump. A second vehicle pulled up — a long black car. Two men clambered out and drew sidearms. One was Quorgasse, from EuroIntel. The other flashed a badge.

  “Professor, get in!” he barked.

  Before Dupon could react, quick coughing sounds came from within the van, accompanied by a stuttering of muzzle flashes. The two newcomers sprawled backward as their skulls shattered with a precision that became a bloody mess on the hood of the car. Their lifeless bodies crumpled to the ground.

  That did it. Dupon turned to run. He heard the hum of the drones following.

  Something hissed, and he felt a stinging on the back of his neck.

  Tranquilizer darts… fired by drone…

  He kept moving—another three steps, and then his legs turned to rubber. He lurched face-forward to the sidewalk.

  When he hit the concrete, he thought, dreamily: This is what it feels like to shatter my nose…

  ONE

  ARMSTRONG, ARIZONA, UNITED STATES

  FIFTY MILES FROM PHOENIX

  Art Burkett drove the Chevy Hydro all too slowly through the Cactus Flats suburb of Armstrong. He’d have driven much faster if it wasn’t a Saturday afternoon. The streets were bubbling with kids.

  Boys raced on electric skateboards and scooters. Two girls played drone-ball in the middle of the street, one throwing the ball, the other directing a drone to catch it. For a distracted moment Burkett thought he saw an orbcraft soaring above, but then he spotted a smiling dad showing his son how to operate the flying model of a spaceplane.

  Maybe get Nate one of those…

  His house was part of this development—anyway, it used to be his house, before Ashley insisted on the separation. Technically he was still the co-owner, but it didn’t feel that way. The first lieutenant lived on the Army base now—SubOrbital Base Three, a good eighteen miles away from the housing project they’d lived in for four years. Rangers quarters for officers weren’t bad, but they weren’t home.

  These were big houses, all from the same developer, with some variation to break up the architectural monotony. Burkett thought the minor differences so predictable they were just as monotonous, but the development had been built fourteen years ago, in 2027, and its inhabitants had given it character. People painted the houses distinctively, put up quaint little lawn sculptures, seasonal flags, their own choices in foliage—trees, rose bushes, small palms, and desert plants in Spanish-style pots.

  The tract mostly housed military families or locals whose businesses catered to the armed forces. There was USAF Sergeant Carlson, in jeans and T-shirt, working in his driveway on a classic muscle car from the 1970s. Carlson glanced up from beneath the hood of the Trans Am and waved at him, and Burkett waved back. He and Carlson had both served in the Second Venezuelan War, and Carlson had flown the heli for Burkett’s team, dropping them over a coca plantation with two other squadrons of the 75th Airborne Rangers.

  Burkett tried to steer his mind away from that memory, but he seemed to see again the pink-gray dawn light outlining glider chutes, attracting heavy fire from the cartel-funded nationalists camped at the plantation. “Slim” Mersener and Gabrielle Velasquez, shot to pieces on both sides of him before they even hit the ground. Gore, blossoming in the sky.

  Feldman’s armor protected him some—he only lost an eye, and a lot of the feeling in the right side of his body…

  Don’t think about that. There’s the house.

  My house, and not my house, he thought bitterly, pulling up in front. Ashley didn’t want him pulling into the driveway. Said it blocked her little Hydro II, but it was more than that, or so Burkett suspected. It was symbolic.

  “You don’t get a place in my parking space, Art, until you change your mind.”

  Stepping out of the car, Burkett walked up the driveway. He felt a buzzing in his shirt pocket, and grimaced. This was his day off, he was fresh in his civvies, ready for miniature golf with his son. So naturally…

  Stopping at the f
ront porch, he took out the phone—aware that Ashley was watching him through the front window—and read the text.

  PER USSPACECOM, IC2, 1LABURKETT: R-INTEL ORDERS:

  RETURN TO OPS 3 WITHOUT DELAY, SADDLE UP FOR QRF

  BRIEFING & DEP PER. GEN. CARNEY, USAR

  “Dep.” Deployment.

  They were going up.

  “QRF” for Quick Response Force, a loose usage of the term considering their style. Another time Burkett would have welcomed these orders. The team had been kept on tenterhooks for weeks, prodded by hints about a deep-insert covert op in Eastern Europe. He’d been feeling that inner keenness, that welcome tension, since the first briefing, and was more than ready for the mission.

  But not today.

  “Well, what’s the word?” Ashley asked. She stood on the other side of the screen door, arms crossed, gazing calmly at him with her crystal-blue eyes. She was trying to keep her expression neutral, but Burkett thought he saw sadness in the set of her mouth. Or was that anger?

  “Deployment.” Burkett sighed. “Report immediately.”

  She snorted. “Really?”

  “Yeah, Ashley,” Burkett said. “Really.”

  Crisply attractive, slim, long-legged, and tanned, Ashley was five-nine to his six-two, wearing shorts and a peach-colored blouse. Her silky blond hair was short on the sides now, with a ruffled spikiness on top. He missed the long blond hair that had fallen past her shoulders. That style had said “relaxed.” This new one was fashionable and pretty but off-putting—at least to Burkett.

  Message received, Ashley.

  Now she had a Māori-style tattoo as well, resembling a bracelet around her right wrist. The skin still slightly red and puffy around the ink. He decided not to ask her about the tat. Burkett reached out and opened the screen door. The text wasn’t classified so he showed it to her. She glanced at it and gave a quick nod.

  “The Army has unerringly shitty timing,” she said. “As usual.”

  “Dad!” It was Nate, coming up behind his mom. Eight years old, he had her slimness, her blond hair, and blue eyes, but he had the faint makings of the craggy planes of Burkett’s face. Looking around his mother, the boy looked worried, glancing questioningly at Ashley as she continued to block Art’s way at the door.

  “Hey, Private First-Class Nate Burkett,” Art said, forcing a smile. “What’s up?”

  “Gettin’ ready to go.”

  Burkett gave his son a rueful look. “Afraid something’s come up.” His heart sank as he said it. He handed Nate the phone. The boy peered at the message.

  “Saddle up?” the boy said. “Now?”

  “Yep,” Burkett replied, “and you know how it is with the Army. When they say jump, I gotta jump. It’s in my contract.”

  “A fifteen-year-old recruitment contract,” Ashley said dryly. “That has to be renewed next year.”

  There it was—the thorn in their marriage. He wanted to re-up. She didn’t. Ashley thought he was crazy not to take a civilian job, one that had been on offer for months now, at triple his current salary. Security consultancy, no risk. Nobody shooting at him.

  “You should’ve been a captain years ago,” she continued. “A silver star, two bronze stars, five purple hearts, more combat leadership than…”

  Never shouting, laying it out coolly. An assistant prosecutor for seven years, she had all the arguments down. Ashley taught a law class at Armstrong Community College, and wanted to go for a full professorship somewhere, but didn’t feel as if she could do it with Burkett gone so much. Not when there was a damned good possibility he wouldn’t come back from one of these deployments.

  Nate poked around on Burkett’s phone, looking a little sullen. Burkett gently took it back.

  “You know how it will be when you get to the base, Arthur,” Ashley said. “They’re just going to make you wait. Why don’t you and Nate—”

  “No, Ashley,” he said. “Last time I pulled that they sent a drone to find me. The S-7 is always fueled and ready.”

  “What you gonna have to do on this mission, Dad?” Nate asked, squinting up at him with his head tilted, his mouth squiggled like he was trying not to cry. Burkett went down on one knee and hugged him. The boy put his head on Burkett’s shoulder.

  He felt a twisting feeling of shame at letting his son down.

  Get a grip, he told himself.

  “Nate, it’s a combat deployment,” he said. “That’s all I can tell you, except that I’m going to be super, crazy, way-way careful, and the people I’m going with are going to watch my back. They’re the best, son.” He leaned back to look into Nate’s eyes. “Listen, the instant I’m back, I’m going to apply for special furlough and we’re gonna do a lot together…” Mentally adding, if your mom allows it. “But right now, I’ve got to go. Rangers always stand ready.”

  Burkett gently drew away from the boy, stood up, and stuck out a fist. Lower lip quivering, Nate dutifully fist-bumped him back. Swallowing the lump in his throat, Burkett turned to Ashley.

  “We’ll talk when I get back.”

  “Yes,” she said, crossing her arms. “We will.”

  “What are the odds of a hug, Ash?”

  Her eyes glinted at the edge of tears. Suddenly she reached out, hugged Burkett—once, and quickly—her arms taut on his shoulders. She never said it aloud, but he knew what she was feeling.

  This time is it. This will be the one.

  Oddly enough, he hoped it was the real reason for the separation. That would mean she still loved him. Ashley pretended it was about money and her career, but she had knowingly married a Ranger. He figured she was afraid he’d leave her a widow and Nate fatherless.

  But what if he was wrong? What if there was some other reason? Something he didn’t know about.

  She drew back and took Nate’s hand.

  “Come on, Nate. Me, you, and Jerry’ll go to the PCS picnic. There’s some fun stuff set up.”

  “Jerry?” Burkett said. “You and Jerry have plans?” He kept his voice level.

  She rolled her eyes. “Police Community Services picnic, Art. I told you about it a week ago. We’re doing the face-painting booth for the kids.”

  Jerry. Sheriff’s Deputy Gerald Baker. A vet and an old friend, but one who often let his eyes linger on Ashley. Maybe, Burkett thought, it really is time to leave the Rangers.

  But not yet.

  “Right,” he said. “The picnic.” Burkett took a deep breath, winked at his son, gave Ashley all the smile he could manage, and walked back to the car, feeling like he’d just slung a hundred-pound rucksack on his back. As he pulled out and drove slowly away from the house, he passed a familiar black SUV.

  Jerry didn’t look his way.

  Growling to himself, Burkett wove through the obstacle course of children and families and out to the desert highway.

  Now he pressed down on the accelerator.

  SubOrbital 7 was waiting to take him, his captain, and a squad of men into orbit for a black-op insert. In less than three hours he might be in a battlefield on the other side of the Earth.

  Burkett pushed the car to eighty-five, driving down the long straight highway that split the desert. To either side, cacti were effulgent with thick yellow blooms, almost glowing in the bright sun, and in the distance red-stone outcroppings rose with a curious wind-carved grace. Sometimes Burkett savored the view, but now he focused on the necessary mental acrobatics. Changed his inner center of gravity, turning to fully face the mission.

  Closer to the base, his inward shift was almost complete. Through the gate, past the checkpoint. By the time he had changed into his ACU—Army Combat Uniform, complete with the Rangers tab—he was mission-ready. It was something a Ranger learned. Especially an officer bound for combat.

  “You’ve got to be more ready than the non-coms and the enlisted men,” Major Corliss had told him, when he first got his first platoon. “Because you’re going to lead those men right into the Valley of the Shadow of Death.”

  TWO

  SUBORB BASE THREE

  ARIZONA

  Burkett put on his tan beret—something he wore for briefings, not combat—and reported to what Captain Randall Mayweather liked to call the “ready room,” though the term originated with aircraft carrier pilots.