Gun Runner Read online

  Contents

  Prologue

  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

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Epilogue

  Authors’ Note

  GUN

  RUNNER

  LARRY CORREIA

  JOHN D. BROWN

  Gun Runner

  by Larry Correia and John Brown

  THRILLING SCIENCE FICTION ADVENTURE FROM BEST-SELLING AUTHORS LARRY CORREIA AND JOHN BROWN

  The Heart of a Warrior

  Once, Jackson Rook was a war hero. Raised from boyhood to pilot an exosuit mech, he’d fought gallantly for the rebellion against the Collectivists. But that was a long time ago, on a world very far away.

  Now, Jackson Rook is a criminal, a smuggler on board the Multipurpose Supply Vehicle Tar Heel. His latest mission: steal a top-of-the-line mech called the Citadel and deliver it to the far-flung planet Swindle, a world so hostile even the air will kill you. The client: a man known only as the Warlord. Rook has been in the smuggling business long enough to know that it’s best to take the money and not ask questions. But Rook cannot stand by and watch as the Warlord runs roughshod over the citizens of Swindle, the way the Collectivists did on his homeworld. For all his mercenary ways, Rook is not a pirate. And deep within the smuggler, the heart of a warrior still beats.

  BAEN BOOKS by LARRY CORREIA & JOHN D. BROWN

  Gun Runner

  BAEN BOOKS by LARRY CORREIA

  THE MONSTER HUNTER INTERNATIONAL SERIES

  Monster Hunter International

  Monster Hunter Vendetta

  Monster Hunter Alpha

  The Monster Hunters (compilation)

  Monster Hunter Legion

  Monster Hunter Nemesis

  Monster Hunter Siege

  Monster Hunter Bloodlines (forthcoming)

  Monster Hunter Guardian (with Sarah A. Hoyt)

  The Monster Hunter Files (anthology edited with Bryan Thomas Schmidt)

  MONSTER HUNTER MEMOIRS (with John Ringo)

  Monster Hunter Memoirs: Grunge

  Monster Hunter Memoirs: Sinners

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  THE SAGA OF THE FORGOTTEN WARRIOR

  Son of the Black Sword

  House of Assassins

  Destroyer of Worlds

  THE GRIMNOIR CHRONICLES

  Hard Magic

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  DEAD SIX (with Mike Kupari)

  Dead Six

  Swords of Exodus

  Alliance of Shadows

  Invisible Wars (omnibus)

  Target Rich Environment (short story collection)

  Target Rich Environment, Vol. 2 (short story collection)

  Gun Runner

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2021 by Larry Correia and John D. Brown

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.

  A Baen Books Original

  Baen Publishing Enterprises

  P.O. Box 1403

  Riverdale, NY 10471

  www.baen.com

  ISBN: 978-1-9821-2516-5

  eISBN: 978-1-62579-794-0

  Cover art by Dominic Harman

  Interior illustration by Joseph Correia

  First printing, February 2021

  Distributed by Simon & Schuster

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Correia, Larry, author. | Brown, John, 1966– author.

  Title: Gun runner / Larry Correia and John Brown.

  Description: Riverdale, NY : Baen, [2021]

  Identifiers: LCCN 2020048132 | ISBN 9781982125165 (hardcover)

  Subjects: GSAFD: Science fiction.

  Classification: LCC PS3603.O7723 G86 2021 | DDC 813/.6—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020048132

  Pages by Joy Freeman (www.pagesbyjoy.com)

  Printed in the United States of America

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Electronic Version by Baen Books

  www.baen.com

  Prologue

  It was the fall of Gloss.

  As Captain Nicholas Holloway flew closer to the port, he could see hundreds of terrified refugees below, desperately fighting for a spot on a dropship that was only meant to seat twenty. They were pushing and shoving their way up the stairs onto the landing pad. Women and children were clawing at the landing gear, and crying mothers were holding up their babies, begging for a place.

  More Union ships were coming in fast, trying to get as many people out as they could before the Collectivist forces reached the port, but Holloway was a master of logistics, and could tell there was no way they could get them all out in time. The lucky would catch a ride to one of the civilian freighters waiting in orbit. Those left behind would get executed on the spot or tortured and sent to work in the gulag for the rest of their miserable lives. The Collectivist government held no mercy for those who wouldn’t bend the knee. There was no forgiveness for rebels. The Collective were real bastards, which was why Holloway had been happy to run guns to the people who had the guts to stand against them.

  His ship, the MSV Tar Heel, was one of those freighters waiting in orbit. His involvement in this war had begun by smuggling weapons in. His involvement would end by smuggling rebels out. He had promised the Union that he’d cram in as many bodies as they could get up there, and the Tar Heel was one big ship. He would transport those people through the gate and get them to the refugee camp on Amon in the next system. After that, they were on their own. That was a lot of extra mouths to feed for a month. It was an act of charity which would cost him dearly, but the Union had been good customers and he always had a soft spot for the underdog.

  Mankind had colonized thirty worlds since the discovery of gate travel fifty years ago. Some of those worlds turned out better than others. A few were paradises. A few were even worse than war-torn Gloss. Hopefully, the decent people who survived today would be able to make a home for themselves on a different rock, but that was out of his hands.

  Holloway brought the striker in fast and low over the port facility to avoid attracting AA fire from the Collective forces. The last free people of planet Gloss looked up, briefly hopeful that he might be coming to save them, but then he flew by and left them behind. It sucked. He hated it. But the striker was a small craft, and he had to try and rescue a friend first. After that, he could worry about these strangers.

  Ahead of him, the city of Pilling burned.

  Captain Holloway had been an honored guest for a celebration at the rebel
headquarters in Pilling once. It had been a much happier place then. After nearly a decade of unrelenting war, for the very first time the Union of Free Cities was winning and the Collective was on the ropes. Independence was no longer just a dream. The purpose of that celebration had been for their leadership to make a big show of giving awards for valor to their heroes who had turned the tide, to rally the rest of the rebel troops before their next big offensive. Chief among those heroes had been a mech pilot named Jackson Rook. He was just a kid, but Sergeant Jack, as the propagandists had named him, was already a legend to these people. Holloway had been invited to the party because he had been the one who had smuggled in Rook’s mech.

  Then everything had gone sideways.

  Now Pilling lay in ruins, their headquarters was a smoking crater, and the last of the rebels fought house to house, trying to delay the inevitable.

  That party had been only five days ago.

  * * *

  Captain Holloway had really taken a liking to Jackson Rook. It was good to see Union command pinning their highest medal on him. He’d certainly earned it. The feats that boy could wring out of a mech were astounding, stacking Collective bodies from Pilling to Red Valley. Jackson was the most naturally gifted pilot any of them had ever seen, with the bravado to match, but beneath that swagger Holloway could tell he was basically a good kid who’d gotten stuck in a crap situation, doing his best to make things right.

  The award ceremony was brief. The people of Gloss were pragmatic that way, another thing Holloway appreciated about them. Get through the speeches quick and get on to the feast. The colonists on this world had tried to seed the local biosphere with Earth animals, but few of the tasty ones had stuck. The giant lizard wasn’t bad though. If he used his imagination it could almost be mistaken for beef.

  As soon as it was socially appropriate, Jackson escaped the main table with all the generals and politicians and gone out to mingle with the rest of the crowded banquet hall. Of course, as soon as he saw Holloway, he came over to join him. “Captain! You made it.”

  “Good to see you again, Jackson. Congratulations.”

  The kid looked down at all the new ribbons on his uniform and grinned. “We both know this is just to give the recruiters some new vids to work with. The important thing is what new toys have you brought us this trip?”

  And they proceeded to talk shop for the next hour. The kid had no formal education—hell, he’d grown up in a refugee camp—but Jackson was a genius when it came to mech combat. He was a fighter. The Collective had sent their best after him, over and over, and Jackson had sent them all home in a box. Every few months for the last couple of years, the Tar Heel had run the ISF blockade to get more arms to Gloss. Several of those deliveries Holloway had ended up working with Jackson, and each time he’d been impressed. The kid had really grown on him.

  To be honest, Jackson kind of reminded Holloway of himself at that age, except that he had been in the prestigious Earth Force Fleet Academy, and he never had tested with the mental acuity or reflexes necessary to pilot a mech that well, nor was he one of the tiny percentage of human beings born with the genes to accept the brain implants necessary to let a pilot fly by thought. Where man and machine became one, and the results were greater than the sum of its parts.

  Jackson had the instincts, genes, and Gloss had scraped together the black-market upgrades for his brain. Which meant when he was driving something like the Shockwave that Holloway had smuggled here, Jackson Rook became a lightning-fast, all-seeing, battlefield-dominating god of war.

  Someone like that could do really well for himself in Holloway’s line of work. “You’ve got the Collectivists on the run. You might actually win this by winter. Have you given much thought about what you want to do after the war?”

  “A little,” Jackson admitted. “Why? Are you offering me a job?”

  “I am.”

  “Wow…” He seemed a little taken back by that. “Serious? That’s quite the honor.”

  Holloway chuckled. Lifelong groundbounds often had serious delusions about the glamor and excitement of being a spacer, especially a mercenary gun runner. But Holloway had a code he lived by, a good ship, and a better crew, a hundred strong, most of whom were actually worth a damn. So, in the case of the Tar Heel, it was actually a pretty good gig.

  “Of course, I’m serious, son. Once your term is up obviously. Come with us. Travel. See the other worlds.”

  “And smuggle munitions to other people like us who aren’t supposed to have them?” Jackson asked with a nervous grin.

  “Obviously. Most of our business is legit, but that’s just to cover for the part I enjoy most. I hate seeing good folks get pushed around, so I get them the means to protect themselves. My contracts are fair. The pay is good. Every man gets a share.”

  It was obvious Jackson was seriously considering the offer. “I was born here. I’ve never been through a gate.” He sounded a little wistful. Because to someone who’d spent their whole life on one poor colony world, the idea of getting flung across light-years in an instant was rather exciting. Then a look of determination crossed his face. “But I can’t. Gloss is my home. As much as I appreciate it, and I truly do, I have to stick around. They need me, and maybe, when this is all over, we can make Gloss into something nice, something to be proud of. They tried to ruin it. It’s my responsibility to fix it.”

  That was a lot of weight for a teenager’s narrow shoulders, but Holloway could respect the sentiment. “You’re a good man, Jackson Rook. Alright then. Should you change your mind later, my offer stands.”

  “Thank you.” It was obvious the boy was sincere. He stood up to leave. “I’d better go check with my crew chief about how maintenance is going. Tomorrow morning Mech Troop is heading back to the front. We’re going to push those shanks into the sea once and for all.”

  But then Jackson winced and put his fingers to his temple.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Just a headache.” Jackson steadied himself and waved it off. “I’ve been getting this weird feedback to my implant off and on for the last few days. Diagnostics can’t find anything wrong, though.”

  “I’ve got a fantastic new technician back on the Tar Heel. I’m talking an actual specter-level hacker. She’s a miracle worker. Probably way better than anyone in your Union. No offense to your country, but the tech level on this world is downright barbaric. I could have Jane take a look at that for you.”

  Jackson thought it over. “It’s nothing. I’ll be fine. Thanks again, Captain. We couldn’t have done this without you.”

  * * *

  The next day the desperate Collective had activated a technology so vile that its use was considered a war crime by every civilized world.

  The attack was like nothing anyone had ever seen before. Even in Captain Holloway’s considerable experience, he had never heard of slaveware this aggressive. One minute, the elite Free Union Mech Troops had been crushing their enemy. The next, they turned their guns against their surprised allies. It was a slaughter.

  Union Command had gone into a panic. Out of nowhere their best soldiers, armed with their mightiest weapons, had betrayed them. Worse, the mech pilots knew every target vital to the war effort, and went about methodically destroying them, one by one. Units were decapitated. Vital supply dumps obliterated. The rebel army collapsed before the Collective advance.

  By the time anyone figured out what had happened to their pilots, it was too late. This was a new kind of weaponized slaveware, far beyond anyone on Gloss’ capabilities to make. No one knew where the Collective had got it from, or which offworld maniac had been willing to sell their services. The insidious program had crept in through the mechs’ firewalls, invaded the pilots’ minds through their implants, and when the opportunity came, the Collective had flipped the override switch.

  Every linked-in pilot on Gloss had been turned at once. Their wills overridden as they were forced to murder their friends. All of them were lost.
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  Including Jackson Rook.

  The Union had asked for their help. Holloway had Jane analyze the new slaveware’s code. He hadn’t been exaggerating when he had proclaimed her a miracle worker, because Jane was from a world so advanced that its technology bordered on magic. But this was something new, even to her, and she had no easy answer to give the Union. From what she could tell, there was no way to stop the slaveware’s infection remotely. It would require direct access to the pilots to stop it, and good luck doing that when they were riding around wrapped in twenty-ton killing machines. And the Collective would run their new slaves nonstop until they died of exhaustion. The program itself was so overpowering that Jane said that it would require a miracle of willpower for a pilot to pull himself out from under its spell, even temporarily.

  Except then they had intercepted a message from Jackson Rook, begging for someone to kill him.

  * * *

  Holloway deftly flew the striker away from the port, threading it between the crumbling high-rise habitats of Pilling. It was a small craft, fast, and exceedingly maneuverable in atmosphere. Hopefully those traits would be enough to keep him from getting shot down in the next few minutes.

  For the Collectivists, to say, write, or even think their ideology was wrong was a capital offense. In their minds, anti-collectivist words led to actions that hurt others. Words could starve people, murder them, oppress them. Words were like flies, carrying disease. Freedom of speech was not allowed. The costs were too high. So a lot of Free Glossians were about to die. And Holloway wanted to be off this planet before the cleansing started.