Risen From Ashes Read online

  But that paled compared to the anger burning through her now. Losing Lucinda Ortega mere months before this mission had come close to breaking her. Ortega had been her best friend, her former XO and her sister in every way but blood. Knowing her death, and the deaths of others under Ortega’s command, could have been prevented only made the loss worse. But Ash had been able to do something about what happened. She’d helped expose the incompetency and indifference in Ortega’s chain-of-command and those responsible would never again endanger another Marine. Then she’d been able to help defeat the enemy forces responsible for her friend’s death. She been able to act and that helped with her grief.

  She finished her whiskey and climbed to her feet. As she moved to stand before the screen, her fingers tightened their grip on the glass. What she wouldn’t give to have Fonteneau’s neck in her grasp. Damn him!

  She lifted her glass to her lips and frowned to find it empty. For a moment, she considered pouring herself a second drink.

  Angel, you’ve had enough.

  A sob caught in her chest. She knew it wasn’t him. Talbot was dead, along with the other Marines in the shuttle. But she heard him just the same. Just as she’d heard him every time she started feeling sorry for herself or started thinking about ways to get to Fonteneau.

  “Damn it, Loco, why? Why did you have to play the hero?”

  Tears stung her eyes. He’d been one of the few constants in her life as a Marine. They served together on the Heinlein her first mission out of the Academy. He’d had her back then and later, when they once again served together. When she and the others had been brought up on charges, he’d been one of those fighting to prove her innocence. On that fateful day she’d been given a pardon, he’d been the one to return her dog tags to her. Since that day, they’d served together. He’d been friend and mentor, brother and fellow Marine. Now he was gone and there wasn’t a damned thing she could do about it.

  Quit feeling sorry for yourself, Angel. This isn’t the sort of Marine you are, and you know it. Now get a grip. Your command deserves your best.

  She could almost see him standing in front of her, expression serious, eyes worried. He’d kept her from doing anything foolish after Tarsus. Now his memory was trying to do the same thing.

  God, she needed him now.

  No, what she needed was a night where she slept without the ghosts of all those she’d lost, especially him, haunting her. Maybe then she’d be able to think straight.

  Besides, Talbot wasn’t there. He wasn’t speaking to her. That was her subconscious playing tricks on her again. Talbot, along with the others in the shuttle with him, were dead. There was nothing left of them, no bodies, not personal effects except for what they left in their quarters, to return to their loved ones. Those brave men and women had sacrificed themselves to save the flagship and everyone onboard. She needed to push through her grief and do them proud.

  But that could wait until tomorrow. She hadn’t allowed herself to grieve after Arterus. She hadn’t given voice to her anger, much less done anything about it, after her pardon. Since that day, she seemed to move from one potential catastrophe to another. She hadn’t had time to catch her breath, much less mourn her losses. If holding it together a little longer meant drinking when she was off-duty, well, she wouldn’t be the first commanding officer to do so.

  Nor would she be the last.

  With one last look at Fonteneau’s image, she turned away from the screen. Instead of pouring herself another drink, she put away her glass. It might not have been Talbot, but the memory of him had been right. She owed it to her Marines to hold it together until reinforcements arrived. She owed it to her dead not to let the governor and those like him beat her and lessen their sacrifices.

  “All right, Loco. I’ll shape up.” She hoped. “But I am going to make every damned one of those bastards responsible for what happened to you and your team, to Lucinda, and to our people on Arterus pay.”

  And heaven help anyone who stood in her way.

  How had it gone so wrong?

  Charles Edward Fonteneau dropped onto the edge of the narrow bunk in the cell he’d occupied since that bitch Shaw and her Marines took him into custody. Despair filled him. He didn’t deserve this. He’d done nothing wrong. He’d done what any system governor with a loyalty to his people would do. He’d tried to protect them from even more harm at the hands of the Callusians.

  Damn Shaw and damn the Fuerconese!

  He lay back and covered his eyes with his arm. He knew they watched him, looking for any sign of weakness they could use against him. To hell with them. He wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of breaking him. He’d continue protecting his system, no matter what the cost.

  That was the crux of it all. It was what he’d use to fight these ridiculous charges against him. He’d done his duty. He’d already lost one planet in the system to the Callusians. No one, not his intelligence people and not Fuercon and the rest of their so-called allies, had anticipated the use of the biotoxin. That failure cost thousands upon thousands of people their lives and Shennong was interdicted for who knew how long as a result.

  He’d tried explaining it to the intelligence officer who interrogated him every day. Every single day. But the man wasn’t interested in what he called “excuses”.

  “Tell me again. Why try to hack the defense platforms when the Callusians returned to the system?” Captain Julian Galloway asked the previous day.

  Just as he’d asked every other day. The phrasing might be different, but the import of the question was always the same. Just as his answer was.

  “It was the only way to keep my system safe.”

  Why wouldn’t they believe him?

  Perhaps they didn’t care. After all, it wasn’t Fuercon or any of its allied planets facing the threat of the biotoxin. He knew what the Callusians were capable of. Navarch Dadd made it clear he wouldn’t hesitate to use the biotoxin against the capital planet. His duty as system governor was to prevent another massacre from happening. If that meant sacrificing the Fuerconese taskforce, he would.

  And he’d do it again.

  Now he was the one in custody and not the cowards in the government who refused to do more than wait for the taskforce to come save them. He’d done what he could to prevent millions more of his people from dying. What were a few thousand deaths compared to millions?

  “What would you have done had you known about the precautions Admiral Collins put in place to protect the system?” Galloway asked during the last interrogation session.

  There had been no answer. Fonteneau knew better than to say “exactly what I did” or words to that effect. Had he known, he would have revealed it to the Callusians. Unfortunately, the last thing he’d expected was for the Fuerconese to keep him in the dark. They’d not only locked him out of the system’s defense platforms, but they’d installed other platforms he hadn’t known about. The moment he saw those secondary platforms go online, he’d panicked. He knew Dadd would carry through with his threat to destroy the system and he was helpless to prevent it.

  Unless he found a way to subvert the taskforce’s precautions.

  Goddammit! He’d done everything for the sake of his people. Why couldn’t they understand that?

  “On your feet, Fonteneau!”

  His stomach pitched and he swallowed hard. With no option but to comply, he sat up and then stood. As he did, the color drained from his face. Two armed and armored Marines stood at the hatch to his cell. Each day, they appeared like clockwork to escort him to the interview room for the next interrogation session. Not once had they said anything more than what was required to move him from point A to point B. Today would be no different, so he made no attempt to engage them.

  A short time later, he sat at the table in the center of the interrogation room. His right wrist was secured to the table. Not that he had anywhere to go if he were able to get free from the room.

  Get free! What a laugh! The door was secured. Two Mar
ines, armed Marines, stood guard. And he was on a fucking spaceship. Where the hell could he run?

  And what more did they think he could tell them?

  The hatch slid open and he blinked in surprise. For the first time since his capture, Captain Galloway wasn’t alone. A Marine, a non-com if he correctly identified the insignia on the man’s light armor, entered just behind the intel officer. Something about the Marine’s expression sent a chill of fear down Fonteneau’s spine. Had they decided their hands-off approach to interrogation was no longer working and the Marine was there to extract the information in a more direct manner? What if they’d decided he was no longer of any use to them?

  Oh, God, was this it?

  “Charles Edward Fonteneau, this is Sergeant Michael Shaw, Fuerconese Marine Corps. Sergeant, you had something to tell the prisoner?” Captain Galloway said from the other side of the table.

  Shaw stepped forward until he stood next to Galloway. His dark eyes flashed, his expression hard, he nodded once.

  “Charles Edward Fonteneau, I have been tasked with informing you that you will be transferred to the custody of Fuercon’s Naval Intelligence Agency upon our arrival in the home system. There you will be formally charged with crimes against Fuercon and her allies. You will be brought to trial. If you are convicted, you will serve out your term at a penal colony under Fuercon’s control. Once your term has ended, you will be returned to Savitar VI to face any charges they wish to file against you.

  “Much as it pains me because your actions cost the lives of a number of good men and women, I have also been tasked with giving you one last chance to cooperate.” Shaw’s expression left no doubt that he’d much rather shove him out an airlock than deal with him. “Failure to do so will be taken as bad faith on your part and will noted during your trial. Cooperation will be considered to help mitigate your crimes.”

  Shaw leaned across the table in his direction. Fonteneau swallowed hard and pulled back as far as he could. Fear licked at the edges of his control as the Marine’s gaze bored into him.

  “Personally, I want you to refuse. I want Captain Galloway to look the other direction so I can escort you to our Marine CO for a little chat. You are responsible for the deaths of your people on Shennong because you failed to insure adequate defenses for the system. You are directly responsible for the deaths of every member of Taskforce Liberator who sacrificed themselves to save your system. Far as I’m concerned, you’re nothing more than a fucking traitor to Savitar VI and an enemy combatant to Fuercon and her allies. So please, refuse to cooperate and give me a reason to deal with you in a very permanent manner. It will give me great pleasure to save my homeworld the expense and trouble of trying you.”

  Bile rose in Fonteneau’s throat and he swallowed against it. When he looked to Galloway, hoping the captain would call Shaw off, he moaned softly. The intel officer, instead of ordering the Marine to back down, appeared to be studying something on his datapad. There would be no help from that quarter.

  “Y-you can’t.”

  “I can and I will.” Shaw straightened and one gloved hand fisted at his side. “Either answer the captain’s questions or come with me.”

  Left unsaid was “please come with me.”

  “What do you want to know?”

  Fonteneau dropped his head into his hands, sinking into despair. This was a nightmare he’d never wake up from. All he could do was try to stay alive long enough for his government to negotiate his return. Those still in power surely worried about what he might say about them. To save their own skins, they’d get him back from the Fuerconese. They had to. All he had to do was stay alive long enough for it to happen.

  “See, Sergeant. I told you he’d be reasonable.” Galloway sat up and turned his attention to the prisoner. “Let’s start at the beginning. When was the first time the Callusians contacted you?”

  3

  Taskforce Liberator

  On approach to Fuercon

  Admiral Richard Collins finished reviewing the latest report from Captain Galloway and leaned back. Under most circumstances, he wouldn’t have approved the use of intimidation against a prisoner. At least not one like Fonteneau. But these weren’t normal circumstances. The man withheld information that cost an untold number of lives on Shennong and on the system’s ships and defense platforms. And that was before he considered his own losses.

  And near losses.

  Some of those losses weren’t from physical injuries. One in particular concerned the admiral. He’d done his best to give her time, understanding the depth of her grief. He’d even seen some improvement, at least when she was on duty. But it wasn’t enough. Not when the taskforce was only a day out from Fuercon. The last thing she needed, and the last thing he wanted, was for those not on the mission to see how deeply she’d been impacted by their losses. It was exactly the sort of ammunition her detractors would use against her.

  Not that he blamed her. Hell, if he was honest with himself, he carried the same guilt Ashlyn did over the deaths of Talbot and the others on the shuttle with him. He also carried the deaths of every Marine and every sailor—he smiled at the ancient word—under his command. Their faces, like the faces of all those who’d died under his command over the years, would haunt him. However, he learned long ago he couldn’t let their deaths impact the way he performed his duties. That would be a disservice to those still living and a betrayal to the memory of the dead.

  Not that it helped in the dark of night.

  It was a lesson he knew Ashlyn learned early in her career. But that was before the events of the last five years. Her own beloved Corps, at least certain members of it, had betrayed her and her command. She’d lost people on Arterus. The survivors had been sentenced to the penal colony on Tarsus with her where they’d had to fight for survival until President Harper pardoned her and began the search for those behind what happened. She hadn’t truly recovered from that before a new set of losses hit. First was Colonel Paul Pawlak, the Devil Dogs’ former CO and Ash’s friend. Only a few months later, Lucinda Ortega, her former XO and sister in every way but blood, died in battle. Now Talbot. The Master Guns had been friend, mentor and, since her pardon, often her anchor, keeping her from doing anything foolish. It was no wonder the young woman was reeling.

  Even so, Ash managed to maintain while on duty. She might be closed down emotionally, but so were her Marines. They suffered the loss of their comrades as much as she did. More than that, they knew all she’d been through the last five years. Now they formed a protective buffer between her and anyone or anything that might set her off.

  Collins shook his head, a slight smile touching his lips. He had no doubt they would storm the brig and give her a few minutes with Fonteneau if they weren’t convinced she’d kick their butts for doing so. Ash might be hurting, but she was still their CO and she wouldn’t let them do anything to jeopardize their careers or their freedom. She stood for them just as they did for her.

  But the time had come, like it or not, for him to step in and knock some sense into her. Unfortunately, he wasn’t sure how.

  Five minutes later, Collins stopped outside Ashlyn’s quarters. As he did, Sgt. Michael Shaw snapped to attention where he stood in front of the door.

  “I need a few minutes of the colonel’s time, Sergeant.”

  “Begging the Admiral’s pardon, sir, but Colonel Shaw left instructions that she not be disturbed.”

  “I understand, Sergeant, but this is important.” When Shaw remained where he was, Collins sighed. He understood, but he did not have time for this. “Sgt. Shaw, I’m not here to bust your sister’s chops. But I am not going to let her destroy her career and possibly get herself sent back to the penal colony because she’s hurting. Hell, son, in her place, I’d be doing everything I could to get to that bastard Fonteneau.”

  He waited, watching as Shaw considered what he said.

  “Sergeant, we are less than a day out of Fuercon. Do you have any idea what your sister’s detra
ctors will do if they find out how badly Talbot’s death rocked her?”

  Shaw swallowed hard and nodded once, his expression hard. Good. With the young man on his side, Collins had a chance of breaking through to Ash. At least he hoped so.

  “You remind her of that when she comes for my head, sir.” Shaw turned and entered a code on the touchpad next to the door. “Admiral Collins, ma’am,” he announced before stepping aside so Collins could enter.

  Collins stepped inside and waited as the hatch slid shut behind him. Ash stood across the room, staring at the viewscreen at the space beyond the ship’s confines. Her shoulders slumped and a glass with what he assumed to be whiskey hung from one hand. Instead of turning, she lifted the glass and drained it. Then she straightened and squared her shoulders before turning.

  “Admiral.”.

  Collins forced himself not to react. The Ashlyn Shaw standing before him bore a remarkable resemblance to the one he’d seen in a cell back on Fuercon mere days after she’d been brought back from the Tarsus penal colony. Her eyes were dead, her expression blank. She was an officer in pain, wishing she’d been on the shuttle with her people when they died.

  While most of the taskforce’s personnel looked forward to returning home, he saw the opposite in Ash. Returning home meant having to face not only her CO and the Commandant of the Marine Corps but also the families of the fallen. He knew she expected them to blame her for what happened. Worse, she accepted that blame. Somehow, he needed to push past that and get her to accept many more were coming home than would have if it weren’t for her actions and those of her Marines.

  “May we sit?” One corner of his mouth lifted in a smile as she started in surprise. Whatever she’d expected him to say, that hadn’t been it. Good. If he could keep her off-balance, he had a chance to get through to her. He hoped.