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Sol Arbiter Box Set: Books 1-5
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Copyrighted Material
Sol Arbiter Copyright © 2019 by Variant Publications
Book design and layout copyright © 2019 by JN Chaney
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living, dead, or undead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved
No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing.
1st Edition
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Sol Arbiter Box Set
Books 1-5
J.N. Chaney
Jia Shen
Contents
Sol Arbiter
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Epilogue
Intrinsic Immortality
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Epilogue
Digital Chimera
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Epilogue
Memetic Drift
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Epilogue
Nociceptor
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Epilogue
Join the Conversation
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About J.N. Chaney
1
We plummeted in freefall through a rain of sulfuric acid, buffeted by savage winds. Lightning exploded here and there, flashing behind the yellowish clouds. We didn’t feel a thing. In our mechanized drop-suits, we were as cut off from the surrounding environment as if we were still up on the Sol Federation dropship high above Venus. For me and my partner Gabriel Anderson, descending at unnerving speed toward the surface of a hellish planet was just another day at the office.
Less than an hour before the drop, we’d been in the briefing room rubbing the sleep out of our eyes. Or maybe that was just me. Gabe had looked well rested and refreshed with his gray goatee all neatly trimmed and combed. When he saw me stumble in with bleary eyes and unshaven cheeks, he shook his head and sighed. I probably looked like I had barely woken up in time for the meeting, and that was more or less true.
This wasn’t the time to think about that, however. We were about to take the plunge to the surface, and before long we’d have much more immediate concerns than proper decorum.
“Morning, Tycho,” said Gabriel, standing in the briefing room. His expression, as usual, was just slightly mischievous. In the depths of space, day and night had no meaning. Morning was pretty much whenever you rolled yourself out of your bunk.
I smiled a little. “If you say so. Did you get any other details about this assignment? I mean, it’s Venus. When was the last time an inner colony needed Arbiter intervention?”
He shrugged. “I haven’t heard anything yet. It’s probably nothing.”
“They don’t bring us in for nothing,” I reminded him.
The conversation ended abruptly as Commander Urich entered, frowning slightly at my unkempt appearance. Gabriel would most likely hear about it later, and then I’d get a lecture. Circle of life. As the Senior Arbiter in our drop-team, it was his job to make sure I upheld the standards. Nothing I could do about it now, though.
The Commander pointed at the wall and the big board lit up, showing an image of the clouds of Venus just below our ship. It was a sobering picture, that swirling mass of sulfur dioxide and acidic rain above a planet hot enough to melt human flesh. I’d done plenty of these combat missions, but it was hard to believe that I'd be out there, in that, in just a few minutes.
Commander Urich looked directly at us. “Listen up, gentlemen. Insertion will follow directly after this mission briefing. Here’s what we know of the situation.”
Gabriel frowned. “What we know of it, sir? Are you saying we’re limited on data?”
The Commander nodded. “That’s right. Intel is sparse on this one. Mission location is Tower 7, population 520,000, approximately.”
The big board changed, showing an image of the colossal structure that stretched up from the swirling c
louds. It was weirdly beautiful, a twisted spiral of gleaming lights that soared to a sharp peak so high in the sky it was almost terrifying. It made me proud to think that we humans had built something like that. Venus was hell, but we’d made a good home here. A civilization.
Commander Urich continued. “This image is from twelve hours ago. Here’s how it looks right now.”
The board changed again, and Gabriel’s jaw dropped a little. Mine probably did too. The whole tower was dark, like something you’d see in a nightmare—a black mountain, looming silently over a dead planet. It didn’t look like anything had ever lived there, or ever could.
Gabriel shook his head. “What happened?”
Urich’s voice was gruff. “That’s your mission. To find out. That, and to try to get the lights back on before the people inside suffocate. You’ve got 36 hours to get the tower’s systems functioning again, or we’ll have to come back here with a half-million or so body bags. Plus two for you. There’s no extraction here until the mission’s accomplished. Too many lives on the line, too many unknowns.”
This seemed like a situation for an entire regiment, not a team of two men. We would have everything we needed, and our skills and training were the leading edge, but even so. I stuck my hand up like a schoolchild, and Urich frowned.
“Yes, Barrett?”
“Shouldn’t we go in hard, sir? I mean, 520,000 people…”
He shook his head. “You know the protocol. One crisis, one drop-team. There just aren’t enough Arbiters nearby, and with thousands of colonies… you know how it is. There’s no point in bitching about it. You’re all we can spare. Blame budget cuts.”
Ever since the Boson Apertures revolutionized space travel, the Sol Federation had been stretched far too thin. A handful of elite Arbiters were expected to keep seven planets and thousands of colonies from descending into lawless chaos. We were peacekeepers, after all, and our job was to do exactly that. It just wasn’t sustainable, but sticking to the “one crisis, one drop-team” rule in this situation verged on criminal recklessness. Or so it seemed to me.
Gabriel flashed me a look, a warning that said we aren’t the ones who make these decisions, now shut your mouth.
So I shut my mouth, and the Commander went back to the mission briefing. “We do have this recording. The man you’re looking at is Nightwatch Commander August Marcenn, top law enforcement officer for Tower 7.”
The face that appeared on the Board looked almost predatory, like a hungry bird in human form. His hair was white and combed back away from his face. He was dressed impeccably, more like a titan of industry than a chief of police. His eyes were intense, verging on something more than that, something vaguely disturbing.
The recording seemed to have been pulled from Tower 7’s video feed just before the blackout. Looking directly into the camera, Marcenn smiled just slightly. His voice was cultured yet commanding, although his words were close to meaningless.
“Fellow citizens,” he began. “We are still hoping to avoid any unnecessary… ugliness. The intrinsic immortality of the men beyond the machine is too strong to withstand alone. We must go together. All of us. To those who have heeded my instructions: stay in your homes. With your cooperation, the distribution can still complete with some degree of dignity. The lights will be going off soon. Take this opportunity to stay close to your loved ones. Accept what you cannot change. It’s the only way.” His eyes got hard, and he bared his teeth in a grimace. “For those who have not heeded my instructions, my androids will find you. And what will happen then will not be dignified at all!”
The recording ended, freeze-framing on August Marcenn’s grimacing face. He looked even more like a predatory bird, swooping in with beak open.
“What the hell did he just say?” I asked, glancing at Gabriel. “Intrinsic immortality?”
Gabriel shrugged and cocked his brow. “It’s nonsense. He’s gone insane, clearly. The top cop in Tower 7 has lost his mind.”
Commander Urich’s jaw clenched. “You know how I feel about speculation, Anderson. August Marcenn’s mental state is not the issue here. The issue is what he’s doing, and right now we don’t even know what that is. All we can say with any certainty is that he’s become a threat to the colony.” I leaned against the nearby table and let out a long sigh. “Your mission is to secure Tower 7, find out what’s happening, get the lights back on, and bring Marcenn in for questioning. If he resists, you are authorized to use lethal force. Understood?”
Gabriel stood up a little straighter. “Yes, sir!”
I echoed his words, wondering how exactly we were going to secure 300 floors swarming with potential hostiles and panicking civilians. Marcenn had control over a small army of androids, which meant we were walking into a potential warzone. One thing at a time, I reminded myself. One thing at a time.
The Commander turned back to the big board, which was now displaying a detailed schematic. “I’m sending these over to your dataspikes but have a look at them now. You’ll go in where you see the flashing X; there’s an airlock for the mining robots.”
“Mining robots?” I asked.
He nodded. “There are several branching underground mines around the colony. They’re not your concern. The lower levels are all support systems and full of industrial machinery, so you’ll have to make your way up to the inhabited levels above the clouds.”
He filled us in on specifics, including the disheartening numbers of Nightwatch officers and combat androids Marcenn had at his disposal. I tried to focus on the intel, but in my mind, I was preparing for a fight. With over half a million civilians in Tower 7, there was a strong chance that we’d find more than a few casualties, and I sure as hell didn’t plan to be one of them.
I didn’t know August Marcenn, but I did know this much: he had the look of madness in those eyes of his...and I wagered he’d kill every last one of those civilians if he felt the need.
* * *
So there we were, diving straight at the Venusian surface. Our drop-suits were massive, with bulging egg-shaped upper bodies and four mechanized limbs. For as long as we wore them, we’d be all but impervious. Anything that can survive Venus for more than a few minutes had damn well better be.
Gabe’s voice came over the dataspike. “Oh, hell yes! This never gets old!”
“Speak for yourself.” I laughed. “When I’m done with the Arbiters, I will not be nostalgic about this experience!”
“So, why’d you sign up? Come on, Tycho. You love it as much as I do.”
“I just did it for the uniform. The recruiting officer said something about becoming irresistibly seductive.”
“Uh-huh. And how has that worked out for you, buddy?”
“Recruiting officers are lying scum.”
Outside our drop-suits was a world so extreme the most deranged hellfire-and-brimstone preacher of the pre-spaceflight era would have considered it too unbelievable to be included in his sermon. Inside the suits, it was just Tycho Barrett and Gabriel Anderson, teasing each other to pass the time at work.
“I don’t know,” said Gabriel. “I do pretty well. It’s just that the uniform’s not quite enough. You have to look good too.”
I wasn’t willing to buy the idea that he was the handsome one in our little team. I was a lot younger than he was, for one thing. But I had other things to think about. My systems were telling me we were about to break cloud cover.
Down there on Venus, the air was mostly carbon dioxide and the surface temperature hovered around 467 degrees Celsius. Unless I wanted to become an oddly colored stain on some Venusian rock, I needed to make sure I landed safely in an intact drop-suit.
Gabe was on top of it, switching to work mode without missing a beat. “Prepare for bloom.”
“Preparing for bloom,” I repeated.
We dropped down below the clouds, where drag chutes and helium balloons suddenly deployed from behind our suits to slow our descent. The sudden decrease in velocity pulled me up short, and
I grunted from the impact.
Gabe’s voice came in over my dataspike again. “Deploy polymer blades.”