“Not really,” Callie said. “We stole ours off an alien ship.”

  Wilfred cocked his head. “Did you? We’ve tried that. We’ve gotten our hands on a few scourge-ships over the years, but we could never make much use of their bridge generators. They’d open a wormhole, but it only went to one destination out in the middle of nowhere, still light years from help or habitation, and we always had to come back here eventually, or starve.”

  “There’s a sort of invisible fence around this system,” Ashok said. “The scourge-ships have generators that only allow them to travel from here to the fence line and back again. Ours is… not so limited, but even so, we had a hard time getting here – there are countermeasures to prevent incursions. The Exalted really don’t want visitors.”

  “There go my hopes of the cavalry arriving in the form of ten thousand warships converging from all directions,” Wilfred said. “But… can you get my people out of here?”

  “That’s sort of why I wanted to know about troop strength,” Callie said. “If we cram our ship full, I mean standing room, and we throw out everything non-essential that takes up space, to really maximize things… we could fit maybe a hundred people? We’re talking about a ship that’s meant for a crew of half a dozen.”

  Wilfred said hmm. “How fast can you do round trips?”

  “The bridge generator takes about eight hours to recharge,” Ashok said. “Each way. So we could take a load, wait eight hours, come back, wait eight hours, head back, wait eight hours… we could move couple hundred people a day.”

  “I’m guessing there are more than a couple hundred people who’d like to leave this system,” Callie said.

  Wilfred nodded. “There were six hundred thousand colonists on Vanaheim when the Exalted invaded, and almost a hundred thousand on Niflheim. The initial fighting, and the plagues the Exalted used on the rebels, killed tens of thousands of us, and these days the Exalted have strict population controls for the humans they’ve imprisoned… but I’d guess we’re talking about roughly that many humans in the system still, most of them prisoners in facilities or on work farms.”

  “So that’s seven thousand trips,” Ashok said. “At sixteen hours per round trip. We could get everybody back to human-controlled space in, oh, call it thirteen years.”

  “We could get a bigger transport vessel,” Callie said. “Plug our bridge generator into that instead. We could cram a thousand people on instead of a hundred. But even so… it’s not practical. Plus most of those people are basically in prison camps, I assume, so we can’t just pick them up and take them to safety.”

  “Yes. The majority of the population is slave labor, toiling on the farms of Vanaheim to keep the population fed or in Exalted factories to produce whatever they need. The unluckiest people are plucked from a life of forced labor and used for medical experiments.”

  “Evacuation isn’t viable at scale, then,” Callie said. “If you have sick people, young people, vulnerable people, we can see about getting them to safety. But for the rest… we’re just going to have to liberate the whole system, I guess.”

  Wilfred laughed. “Great idea. Wish we’d thought of it. Did you have a plan?”

  “Blowing stuff up, mainly,” Callie said, and Elena had to grin.

  CHAPTER 17

  “Blowing things up. That’s the kind of innovative thinking we need here on Niflheim.” Wilfred rolled his eyes. “The Exalted have a literal fleet of warships. If we venture out into orbit, we tend to get obliterated.”

  “They had a fleet of warships,” Ashok said. “We destroyed every vessel in the shipyard at Scourge Station.”

  Wilfred gaped. “I… we… I’m going to have to check on that, and get confirmation…”

  “Of course. Trust, but verify, just like it says in the Bible,” Ashok said.

  “I think that line’s from Chaucer,” Callie said. “What Ashok says is true, Wilfred, but let’s table it for now. Even if you’re still worried about their scourge-ships – and I’ll admit we didn’t destroy them all, just most – we’ve got a pretty nice ship of our own up there, one designed for hunting down pirates and fugitives, with stealth technology and that aforementioned bridge generator.”

  Wilfred nodded. “We can use that, absolutely, we welcome your help, but I just want you to understand the magnitude of what we’re facing here. It’s no small thing to overthrow the Exalted, even if you have crippled their fleet. Even one scourge-ship is an engine of mass-destruction, and they have drones, guards, weapons, science, space stations that are flying fortresses… fighting the Exalted is a big job.”

  “I never do anything small. We have another advantage, too. You know about AI?”

  He frowned. “Artificial intelligence? Sure… there are some expert systems in the mining facilities here, we use them to calculate resource allocations–”

  Callie shook her head. “I’m talking about true AI. Conscious machines, sapient beings in their own right. It’s a little something we perfected back in the civilized systems while you’ve all been sealed up here. We’ve got an AI on our ship. His name is Shall, and he’s our trump card. He can seize control of the Exalted computer systems, override their security, and cover his tracks along the way. He’s how we destroyed their fleet. We’re up against a technocratic regime, right? But right now, we’re the ones with the best technology in the system. Pick a target, some place you’ve wanted to break into or smash apart but couldn’t crack on your own, and we’ll help you get in. Call it a proof of concept, to show we can do what we promised, and then we’ll move on from there.”

  “No pressure,” Shall murmured in her earpiece.

  She could tell Wilfred was excited, and trying not to show it. “If this is true… let me talk to the other generals.” He gestured at the blank screens. “You can wait outside.”

  Callie and the others obligingly moved out into the corridor, and Wilfred shut the door. Callie could have listened in, of course – the revolution’s technology was primitive even compared to the Exalted’s – but they were playing nice, and she had a pretty good idea what he’d say anyway: something like, ‘Our prayers have been answered, but don’t get your hopes up.’

  “Do you think they’ll go for it?” Elena asked, leaning against the wall, looking tired but ferocious, and, as always in Callie’s eyes, fetching.

  “I think they’re pinned down on a dirty rock and they’ve been eating kicks in the teeth for dinner for generations, so they’ll wobble between hope and fearful caution, and come up with some stupid compromise, and we’ll make it work anyway. I wish there was a delicate way for me to just assume command of their resistance. Generals.” She shook her head. “Do you think there’s any chance they have anybody with actual military experience in the bunch? They’re probably inventing guerilla tactics from first principles. I don’t claim to be some great military genius, but at least I’ve had practical training in the security services, and I’ve got a decent grounding in theory. Plus, Shall’s crammed full of tactical and strategic information, so I’ve got good advisors, too.”

  “A coup is probably not the best way to demonstrate our helpfulness,” Elena said.

  “It’s admirably direct though,” Ashok said.

  One of the women who’d taken Metcalf away came into the corridor and asked if they wanted anything to eat or drink, so they sat at a dented table in another room and ate fungal paste and sipped more of that strong mineral-smelling water, waiting to get the word.

  Wilfred came in, smiling. “It was a close vote, but we’ve agreed to do a test run.”

  “Glad to know you had to argue so hard to let us risk our lives to help you,” Callie said, and Elena kicked her under the table. She sighed. “Sorry. It’s been a long… interval since I last had any sleep. What’s the target?”

  “There are twelve major Exalted facilities, each one under the control of a high-ranking director, most of them Exalted, but with a few chimera collaborators. You brought us one of those directors, the Butcher, and apparently disabled the facility, too. We’d like to take out another one – a research station in orbit around Vanaheim.”

  “Consider it exploded,” Callie said.

  Wilfred shook his head. “There are thousands of prisoners on board, so no explosions, please. You said your AI can help you seize control. Your crew’s job will be to infiltrate the station and take over its security. Then my people will bring a stolen transport ship to rescue the prisoners, along with enough supplies from the station’s stores to feed them, and you’ll cover our escape. After that, you can explode the station.”

  “This is pretty ambitious, for a proof of concept,” Callie said.

  “Does that mean you can’t do it?”

  “No, that means I like the way you think,” she replied.

  “I wouldn’t mind having a couple more local backups,” Shall complained. “You can’t imagine the existential fear of having only one full copy of my consciousness in this system. If the White Raven gets destroyed, I’m dead here. The war drone is all well and good, but it’s just my core consciousness, with limited access to memories and really pitiful processing power.”

  Callie checked her weapons. “Shall. That’s every human’s whole experience for our entire lives. I don’t even have a copy of myself back on Glauketas the way you do. If you’re really worried, why don’t you copy yourself to the computers in the mining facility?”

  “Why don’t you copy yourself onto a squirrel?” he said. “The infrastructure here is ancient. The Exalted shipyard station was primitive, too, and where it wasn’t too primitive, it was too alien.”

  “Then I, too, regret that you have just one life to give for the resistance. Or a life and a half, counting the war drone. Self-preservation is good motivation, anyway. Mortal fear keeps you sharp.” She clambered on top of the war drone and clipped herself in. Callie was well-rested – they’d all caught up on sleep while the resistance got their part of the plan in order – and she was eager to strike a blow against the Exalted. Having a deep personal dislike for the creatures who ran this system made this whole process very satisfying.

  Everyone had a part to play. Elena was with the resistance, ready to assist their meager medical team with any rescued prisoners who needed help. Drake and Janice and Lantern were staying on the White Raven, stealthed and watchful, ready to offer support as needed. Lantern could have been useful elsewhere, but the humans had some pretty deeply ingrained anti-alien bias. Ashok was in Lantern’s blister-ship – doubtless crammed rather uncomfortably into the small space – with Kaustikos clinging to the outside, both of them ready to do their own parts in the infiltration. She didn’t trust Kaustikos in any objective sense, but he knew she’d destroy him if he misbehaved, and she did trust his instincts for self-preservation.

  “We’re within range,” Janice said.

  “Bombs away,” Callie said. The cargo bay doors opened and Shall’s war drone dropped from the ship’s belly. The White Raven rapidly receded above them as Shall arrowed toward their target. The orb of Vanaheim hung beneath them, a blue and green world of staggering Earthlike beauty, floating between them and the system’s sun.

  “There’s the station,” Shall said. Callie’s head-up display lit up, outlining the dark shape in glowing lines of light. The station was a standard Liar configuration: a central hub with seven radiating arms, each intersected by concentric rings. As they drew closer, the shapes of three scourge-ships lit up in her helmet, and with those in place to provide scale, Callie got a sense of the station’s staggering size: it was a city in the sky, not much smaller than Scourge Station had been.

  “How are Ashok and the asshole probe doing?” They weren’t in direct communication – they didn’t want to risk their comms being overheard – but Shall’s sensors were mighty and he outlined the distant blister-ship in light as well, so Callie could watch it approach the station from the other side.

  “They look to be on track,” Shall said. The station grew and grew, filling the screen. “There’s our insertion point.” A red circle appeared on her view of the central hub. “Based on our scans, it should get us close to control systems and access tunnels.” Shall matched velocity with the station – changing speed and direction as gradually as possible, in deference to Callie’s comparatively fragile form being whipped around on his back. They’d programmed approaches intended to evade the sensors of the scourge-ships, but, even so, a shiver crawled up Callie’s spine as they moved toward the station’s central hub. A blast from one of those ships would turn her into vapor.

  Fortunately, Shall’s careful approach worked as intended, and he clamped himself magnetically to the station’s hub. His cutting torches went to work, and Callie clung tensely to his back while sparks flashed silently around her. Shall removed a section of the hull, revealing a wide crawlspace beyond, busy with pipes and cabling. Shall clambered into the hole with her, then pulled the cut-out section after him and welded it back into place. There was no atmosphere here, or artificial gravity, so Shall used his magnetic clamps to make his way along the tower, pausing occasionally to examine cables and junction boxes until he found one he liked: “This should work.”

  He opened a panel and extended delicate manipulators, patching himself into the station. “Let’s see what we’ve got… okay. I’m in. I’ve got control of their comms and station security. There are… wow, sixty of those hunter-drones crawling around. I can control their exoskeletons from here, but there are also a dozen autonomous security guards, basically supervisors, and I can’t do much about those except give them bad information.”

  “Where are the prisoners?”

  “Where aren’t they? There are dormitories, and labs, and shifts of prisoners eating in a cafeteria – they’re spread all over. We pretty much have to take over the whole station if we’re going to get them out.”

  “Can you disable the prisoner collars?”

  “Mmmm… no. Which is a problem. Taking those off requires personal authorization from the director. There’s no point rescuing these people at all if the Exalted can kill them all remotely.”

  “The resistance can remove collars, Wilfred said.”

  “One or two or ten, sure, but thousands? It would take weeks, and I doubt the Exalted would wait that long before pressing the ‘kill all’ button.”

  “All right. Is the director on station?”

  “The director is… in, yes, in her office at the top of the hub.”

  Wilfred had filled Callie in about the director, a human named Kerneghan. The resistance had a particular hatred for the humans who’d chosen to collaborate with the Exalted – even greater than their hatred for the Exalted themselves. “That’s where I’m going, then. Where’s my point of entry?”

  “Straight up. I’ll tell you when you reach the access tunnel.”

  Callie launched herself in the microgravity, sailing up through the dark tangle of wires and pipes, reaching out occasionally for handholds to propel herself further. After ascending hundreds of meters, Shall said, “Look for a hatch on your left… there.”

  The access panel was square and sized for Liars, but she could fit through. She yanked the lever, opened the hatch, and squirmed into a cramped little airlock. With much twisting and swearing she got the hatch behind her closed, which unlocked the other airlock door that led into the station proper. She squirmed out, grunting when the artificial gravity hit and sent her tumbling to the floor. She was glad Ashok wasn’t there to see.

  Callie got her feet under her and looked around. The room was dark, dirty, and full of tools and bits of busted equipment, like maintenance areas all over. She prodded a broken hunter-drone exoskeleton with her boot, satisfied herself that it wasn’t going to leap up and attack her, and engaged her suit’s active camouflage. “Is the corridor clear?”

  “It is, but there are two guards outside the director’s office. They’re being extra-cautious, I guess, since Metcalf got abducted. I don’t know what you should expect inside the office, either – no cameras in there. Rank has its privileges and everything.”

  “Challenge mode, then. Guess there’s no chance of kiting the guards away?”

  “If I send them orders to go anywhere else, they’re going to check with the director before they do, probably.”

  “Any nearby hunter-drones we can turn against them?”

  “Not on this level. I think they’re mostly used for herding prisoners, and you’re on the executive level now. I can retask a few to your location, but it will take a little while for them to arrive, and it might attract notice.”

  “I’ll just have to go through the guards, then.” Callie eased open the maintenance closet door and stepped into the hallway. The executive level was nice, paneled in what looked like real wood, with soft overhead light, and living vines growing along the ceiling, sprouting little white flowers. The carpet under her feet was dark, thick, and deep pile. Collaborating with the Exalted had its perks, clearly.

  Callie crept along the hallway, following the map Shall helpfully provided in her helmet display, turning first right and then left, passing closed doors that held conference rooms, and the executive dining room. At the end of the last corridor, maybe twenty meters away, stood an ornately carved wooden door, with a tall pane of frosted glass on either side. The door was flanked by two Liar guards wearing some kind of black mesh body armor. They were bigger than most Liars, the size of short adult humans rather than toddler, and their main tentacles were as big around as her thighs. These specimens had probably been altered in surgical suites to be more physically powerful and intimidating, or maybe even tweaked in their incubators. With that armor, her tasers weren’t likely to work, and if she got within grappling distance, they’d overpower her with all those extra limbs. She needed to do this from a distance, and fast –