Chapter 1: Dangle

Boyd secured his cloak as he pushed through the bustling crowd of colonists and traders, each step of his scuffed boots kicking up a small cloud of dust from the arid ground. He was surrounded by market stalls selling scrap metal and shrink-wrapped rations, the colorful tarps that had been strung up as makeshift awnings protecting their owners from the harsh glare of the system’s sun. The street – if it could be described as such – was sandwiched between two rows of prefab buildings that had been erected to form a rudimentary settlement. Their formerly pristine, white facades had been stained by airborne sand and weathering, but they remained bright enough to reflect the sunlight in a way that he found decidedly unpleasant. They were industrial in their appearance, all function and little form, deployed on extensible stilts that resembled the outriggers of a crane. Comms antennae and exposed air conditioning units jutted from their walls, patched with electrical tape and clumsy repairs in places, the insulated cables that linked the structures to the colony’s power grid snaking their way along the ground between them. There was nothing but desert and scrubland beyond, the planet’s hardy flora clinging to life wherever it could in the inhospitable environment.

The locals were clad in obscuring shawls and protective visors, their bodies wrapped in flowing garments that shielded them from the ever-present dust. It made for a very impersonal crowd – all the better to disappear in. Boyd was wearing a duster made from brown leather that was scored by faded scratches, his shoulders wrapped in a ragged cape with a cowl that cast his features into shadow. The passers-by would be none the wiser of the Navy-issued handgun that he carried on his hip, nor of the environment suit that he wore beneath his disguise, its moisture recyclers helping to stave off the oppressive heat.

Hades was a UN colony on the outskirts of human space, a recent effort by corporate conglomerates back on Earth to expand their operations. It was populated almost exclusively by miners seeking a paycheck and outlaws fleeing the authorities on their homeworlds. The corporations needed able bodies for their colonization efforts – people to man their equipment and extract the resources that funded their ventures. It was common to see lawbreakers sign up to escape punishment. From debtors to murderers, the colony ships would take anyone who showed up and signed the waivers. It was a widely-known secret that the companies were fully aware of who they were hiring, but plausible deniability let them dodge fines and sanctions, and background checks were kept to a legally required minimum. Hit a pedestrian while drunk driving? Not to worry – just sign your life away to a mining concern, and you’ll disappear forever. Nobody who had better options would ever agree to relocate to a place like this...

Even among the outlying worlds, Hades was an exception. The fledgling colony had quickly become a haven for hardened criminals and organized gangs, its mobsters and pirates eventually gaining enough of a foothold to draw the attention of the authorities. The straw that had broken the camel’s back had been a pirate raid against a UNN jump freighter carrying weapons for the planetary defense forces stationed on the colony. The PDF were weekend warriors, for the most part, poorly trained and usually even more poorly equipped. Still, with the planet so far from UNN supply lines, they were the first and last line of defense in the event of an attack. It was their job to hold out until a fully-fledged fleet could arrive to do the heavy lifting, which could potentially take months. The vessel had been hit shortly after exiting superlight at the edge of the system, the pirates taking advantage of the brief period of disorientation that followed a jump to board the freighter with a skiff, quickly overwhelming its skeleton crew. They had made off with its cargo of heavy weapons, no doubt to be sold off on the black market and shipped all over Coalition space.

The criminals would have known that they couldn’t steal the freighter itself – it would be practically impossible to hide or sell off a vessel of that class, as monumentally large and expensive to operate as they were. The sheer audacity of the raid demonstrated that there had been a shift in attitude on Hades, however. The situation here had changed, and the Admiralty had tasked Agent Boyd with finding out why. It was an operation months in the making. After spending weeks undercover posing as a corporate hiree, he had boarded a colony ship on Ganymede, the lax recruitment standards making it a trivial affair to blend in with the usual rabble of desperate job-seekers and flighty criminals. Once on Hades, he had laid low, eventually making contact with an informant who was willing to sell him information on the local criminal enterprises. His price wasn’t credits, but a pardon for any crimes committed and a ticket back to Earth. Boyd was authorized to make such deals, and so had agreed to the man’s terms.

His contact had claimed to be a gang member who had become disgruntled with life on Hades. He refused to communicate via unencrypted channels and had demanded a face-to-face meeting at a local tavern, the public setting going some way to ensure that this wasn’t some elaborate mob honey pot. Boyd was no less wary – this could just as easily be a trap intended to draw out UNN spies – but he felt confident with the comforting weight of his XMH on his hip.

As he weaved through the throngs, he spotted a few children milling about, sticking close to their parents or playing beside the market stalls. They were the real victims – families who had taken advantage of corporate incentives to make a go at a new life on the frontier. As bad as Hades was, the overpopulated domes of Martian cities and the subterranean tunnels of Jovian colonies were hardly brimming with opportunity, and the promise of open skies with a breathable atmosphere was often all that it took to convince the uninformed to relocate. Rather than finding opportunity here, they had found themselves at the mercy of a criminal empire, and had likely been given little choice but to keep their heads down and cooperate.

The higher-ups that funded these ventures didn’t give a damn as long as the ore kept flowing and the colony turned a profit. With nobody to hold them accountable so far from populated space, the corporate entities formed a kind of symbiotic relationship with the local criminal organizations, and it was in the interest of both parties to ignore the other. Everything might have continued to run smoothly, flying under the UNN’s radar, if someone hadn’t taken things a step too far. Now, the eyes of the Navy were firmly fixed on Hades.

Boyd spied the tavern in the distance – another ugly, boxy prefab standing on a set of outriggers that lifted it off the ground. The structure had been expanded by joining several of the modular buildings together. There was a neon sign hanging above its entrance, so caked in dust and grime that it was hard to tell if it was even turned on. He could see an array of solar panels on the roof that would presumably supply the structure with supplemental power, along with a satellite receiver, its bowl now full of sand.

As he climbed the short flight of creaking, metal steps that led to the entrance, the automatic door opened to let him pass. He noted that it didn’t quite slide flush with its frame, suggesting that there were probably grains of sand jamming the mechanism. He stepped into the dingy interior as the door struggled to close behind him, and he reached up to lower his hood, his features still obscured behind a pair of protective goggles and a respirator that covered his mouth and nose. His dark hair was matted with sweat, and he wiped his brow with the sleeve of his duster, finding that the gesture served only to glue more sand to his damp skin.

The tavern was relatively empty. It was cramped and poorly lit, clouds of tobacco smoke swirling around the solitary ceiling fan that turned lazily overhead. There were only a dozen tables scattered about the main prefab, and only a handful of them were occupied, the establishment’s patrons glancing up at him suspiciously as he made his way towards the bar that lined the far wall. They were dressed much the same as the people he had encountered out on the street, clad in thick coats and shawls, their faces hidden behind masks and hoods – anything to protect themselves from the windblown sand and the relentless sunlight that beat down on the planet. Any one of these people could be his contact – even the bartender couldn’t be ruled out. How would they make themselves known to him?

The man standing behind the bar glanced up at Boyd as he approached, the agent sinking into one of the padded stools, leaning his gloved hands on the faux-wood counter. None of the furnishings were made from real wood – it was all polymer and metal, as genuine timber was a luxury on planets where it couldn’t be sourced locally.

“Barkeep,” he rasped through his respirator. “Got liqueur?”

“Got scrip?” the man replied, crossing his tattooed arms impatiently.

“Aye,” he said, reaching into one of the pockets of his duster. He dropped a handful of plastic coins on the counter with a clatter. Credits were worthless out here. The employees were paid in vouchers – small, plastic tokens that could only be redeemed at company-owned stores. It was wage slavery of a sort. You work in the mines, then you get paid in a currency that can only be paid back to your employer. The excuse given to justify the practice was that commercial entities weren’t often willing to ship their goods so far out to service such a small population, and that the company was only doing what was necessary to secure essential supplies for its employees. That didn’t really hold up to scrutiny, especially when one took into account that much of the equipment used by the colonists was leased from the same company, ensuring that they remained in debt. Such practices only seemed to grow more brazen the further the colonies were from commercial shipping lanes. The joker who ordered the hit on that freighter was about to cost a whole lot of people a whole lot of scratch.

The bartender lifted one of the tokens suspiciously, producing a handheld scanner and running the little disk beneath its sensor, checking for the laser-etched code that was used to prevent forgery. There was a beep of confirmation, and though he seemed satisfied, he was no less suspicious of the newcomer.

“I have rum, tequila, vodka, gin...”

“Gin,” Boyd crackled, his respirator masking his voice with a hidden modulator. The bartender selected a bottle from one of the shelves, then poured him a glass of colorless liquid, setting it down on the countertop in front of him. Boyd extended a built-in straw from his mask with the press of a button, then took a draw, the drink burning on its way down. It wasn’t exactly top-shelf stuff...

He felt vulnerable here with his back to the room, but he had to keep up appearances until the informant revealed himself. There were always new workers being shipped in, so it wouldn’t be unusual to see unfamiliar faces, even in a hole in the wall like this.

Damn it, didn’t they have a jukebox? Some music would help ease the tension, and it would mask the noise of the incessant coughing and the hissing of respirators. The bartender wasn’t very chatty, ignoring Boyd as he washed glasses with a filthy rag, leaving him to sip at his gin in silence. Boyd’s goggles were tinted to protect him from the harsh sunlight, allowing him to turn his head and observe the patrons without being too obvious, scanning his eyes over the hunched figures as they drank or played card games at their tables. Nobody seemed all that interested in him, which was a good sign. The shifts in the mines were over, and these people were likely exhausted after a hard day’s work. He wondered briefly how many of them were criminals, who among them was fleeing alimony payments, and who might have murdered their spouse or skipped their probation hearing. Every person one met in these colonies was under suspicion. The man working the stall beside yours could be a murderer who had posted bail and then boarded a colony ship under a false name – there was no way to know.

He was interrupted as a stranger sat down heavily on the stool to his left, making the old leather creak. It was a portly man, wearing only a pair of faded work jeans and a stained tank top, his lack of protective gear suggesting that he had been in the tavern for a while. Maybe he was an employee? Boyd watched as the man fidgeted nervously, shifting his weight in the seat, drumming his fingers on the bar. The guy looked like he was about to crawl out of his skin. This must be his contact...

“Are you here to meet someone?” the man asked, making a poor attempt to sound casual.

“I believe we spoke on the phone,” Boyd replied, his distorted voice hissing through his mask. “As you requested, I have come to buy the item in person.”

The portly stranger exhaled a quiet sigh of relief, relaxing somewhat as he leaned some of his weight on the bar. Boyd took the opportunity to get a better look at him. His hairy arms were covered in tattoos, some of which probably denoted gang affiliations, and his thick fingers were covered in callouses that hinted at a life of hard labor. This man had been on Hades for a long time.

“Yeah, I have what you’re looking for in the back,” he continued with a gesture over his shoulder. “You want to come inspect it?”

“Lead the way,” Boyd replied.

Not a bad idea – there would be less chance of them being overheard in a back room. Boyd spared a glance at the bartender, concerned that he might be listening in, but he was conspicuously disinterested. Even shady backroom deals and conspiratorial whispering might not arouse a lot of suspicion in a place like this. Contraband and stolen goods likely changed hands on a regular basis, and it was nothing out of the ordinary. The people of Hades would have learned to keep to themselves and mind their own business pretty quickly.

The agent finished his drink, then rose from his stool, following his contact to a door on the left side of the room. Another sliding panel opened to grant them access, and they stepped into one of the prefabs that had been joined to the main building, the door sealing shut behind them with a hiss. It was being used as a storeroom – the walls were piled high with crates, and shelves filled with bottles reached from floor to ceiling. The informant checked the room hurriedly, then squeezed past Boyd to lock the door, entering a numerical code into a touch panel that was embedded in its frame.

“Okay, I think we’re alone,” the man said as he wiped his brow with the back of his hand. He took a seat on a nearby crate, the container sagging a little under his weight. “You never know who might be listening in,” he continued, his wild eyes darting to the agent’s inscrutable goggles. “The Syndicate controls this colony – they have eyes and ears everywhere. Not here, though. I made sure of it.”

“You told me that you had information to sell,” Boyd said, cutting straight to the point.

“Yes, yes,” the man grumbled with an impatient wave of his hand. “First, I need you to prove that you are who you say you are. I need to know that this isn’t some kinda rat trap before I give you anything.”

“Very well,” Boyd replied. He began to unbutton his leather duster, the man flinching away as he reached beneath it, expecting him to draw a weapon. Instead, he produced a leather wallet, holding it up to the informant.

“What’s this supposed to be?” he demanded, squinting incredulously as he leaned closer to inspect it. “There’s no badge there – nothing.”

Boyd slipped off one of his gloves and pressed his fingertip against a hidden scanner in the back of the wallet. A holographic badge flared to life, the insignia of the United Nations Naval Intelligence branch clearly visible, along with his name and rank. It lit up his contact’s surprised face in the dingy room, then fizzled out, the man taking a moment to collect himself.

“Okay, okay,” he stammered as he began to wring his hands. “Fuck me, you’re UNNI? I didn’t realize things had gotten bad enough to get you guys involved. You’ll keep your word, right?” he added. “You’ll protect me if I squeal?”

“I’m authorized to make deals on behalf of the agency,” Boyd replied, stowing his wallet back inside his duster. “But, you have to give me actionable intel first. Tell me everything you know about the hit on the freighter. I want names, and I want to know where those weapons ended up.”

“Okay, yeah,” the man said as he hopped off the crate. He was pacing now, visibly agitated. “They have people in flight control – it’s not hard for them to get their hands on jump schedules and shipping manifests. They had weeks to plan the hit.”

“What about the local authorities?” Boyd asked.

“Shithole like this barely has enough wardens to police low orbit,” the man scoffed. “It wasn’t hard to make sure no patrol ships would be sniffing around the exit point. They hit the freighter before her drive was even cold. Came away with three Cupcake SAMs – deployable surface-to-air missile launchers packing EMP warheads, perfect for taking out low-flying spacecraft. The Navy uses them to defend their bases. Other shit, too, I heard. Crates of surplus XMRs, forty-mill launchers, enough slugs to choke a Krell. They were en route to the PDF, those fucking useless militiamen, but the Syndicate got there first. Never seen anything like it before,” he added with a shake of his head. “Nobody has ever hit a UNN jump freighter – nobody’s ever had the balls. The Syndicate does.”

“What is this Syndicate?” Boyd asked. “Who’s running the show?”

“You’ll protect me, right?” the informant asked hurriedly. “You’ll vouch for me? I want it on record that I had no choice but to cooperate,” he continued as he spread his arms in exasperation. “I’m not a bad guy, but nothing happens on Hades without their say. They control everything. The nail that sticks out gets hammered down, as the saying goes. If you don’t fall into line, they’ll put one in the back of your head and dump your body down a mine shaft.”

The man was rambling, obviously terrified by the prospect of reprisals. Boyd had to calm him down and get him back on track before he had a goddamned coronary.

“This is all being recorded,” Boyd said, trying to reassure him. “The UNN is bound by any deals that I make. Just tell me everything that you know, and I’ll see to it that you disappear. We’ll put you in the witness protection program – give you a whole new identity – and you’ll be on the first boat back to Earth. You’ll be out of reach and impossible to find – you have my word.”

The man wiped his mouth on his fuzzy forearm, taking a moment to compose himself before continuing.

“The Syndicate is everyone. There are pirates, smugglers, mobsters, separatists – all united under the same banner. It’s easier that way. They’re not competing against each other, and they outnumber whatever two-bit local cops aren’t already on the payroll. The corp doesn’t give a fuck as long as operations keep running smoothly. The Navy wasn’t supposed to care about what happens out here either. Naval Intelligence ... Jesus Christ,” he muttered as he lay his head in his hands. “They brought the Ninnies down on our heads.”

Boyd ignored the derogatory nickname, pressing the man for more details.

“Try to focus. So, this Syndicate snatched the weapon shipment? I need to get that hardware back. They can’t have had time to move the goods off-world yet, not when they’re so hot, so how are they planning to fence them? Do you know if they have any buyers lined up?”

“No, you’re missing the big picture,” the informant replied with a bitter chuckle. “Thought you Ninnies were supposed to be smart? The Syndicate wants control over the colony, completely. They want to drive the pencil pushers out and claim Hades as sovereign territory. Billions of credits worth of resources get extracted from this dust bowl every year, and the Syndicate wants control over that wealth. If they can direct the cash flow, then they’ll become more than just petty criminals. They’d have the resources to stake their claim, and to defend it, from both corporate security and the UNN if need be. All of the infrastructure they need is already here.”

“Why would they try to take over the planet?” Boyd asked, his brow furrowing behind his goggles. “Why piss off the corp? Why rock the boat? All the intel we have suggests that the criminal organizations on Hades have an unspoken truce with the corp – one that benefits them both. What changed?”

“They want the whole pie, not just whatever slice the suits are willing to give up to keep the peace. This colony is remote enough and poorly defended enough to give them a shot. Not everyone living here is a criminal, of course. There are plenty of families here, people who came to Hades for work, for a shot at a new life. The Syndicate is telling them that the UNN can’t protect them, and that they’re the only ones who can. In a way, they’ve already proven it. The Navy can’t even keep their own freighters safe out here. They’re banking on you not responding, banking that you won’t divert fleets from the war effort to put down an insurrection on some shitty backwater nobody gives a fuck about.”

“If nobody gave a fuck, I wouldn’t be here sweating my balls off,” Boyd grumbled. “It’s a full-blown insurrection, then? The situation is worse than I thought – much worse. If that’s all you have to tell me, then I need to get this intel off-world as quickly as possible. The UNN needs to be warned.”

“Yeah, absolutely,” the man replied with a nod. “You know everything I know. You got a ship in orbit, anything like that? Anyone to back you up? I’m not a big player – I can’t get a message out without some gangster or suit picking up on it.”

“No, I went undercover on one of the colony ships,” Boyd replied. His hand slowly wandered inside his duster, reaching for the sidearm on his hip. “But why would you need to know that?”

The informant’s demeanor changed abruptly. Gone was the anxious, pacing man, his darting eyes now fixed confidently on Boyd.

“Thank you, Agent Boyd. That was all we needed to know.”

Boyd pulled his handgun from its holster with practiced speed, but too late, he heard the sound of the door panel sliding open behind him. Something hit him in the back of the head, and his world went dark.

Boyd awoke to darkness. His mask and goggles had been removed, and he could feel coarse fabric brushing against his face as he struggled to turn his head. There was a throbbing pain in his temples, like someone was driving an ice pick into his skull, and he could taste blood on his tongue. When he tried to move his hands, he found that they were bound behind his back, a metal chair creaking beneath him. He wasn’t dead, then. At least, not yet...

The burlap sack was unceremoniously torn from his head, the light blinding him, Boyd blinking to clear his vision as the dark shapes that surrounded him slowly came into focus. He found himself in a spacious building with a high ceiling – some kind of warehouse, maybe – filled with rows of shelves that were packed with nondescript crates and containers. He was tied to a folding chair in the middle of a concrete floor, surrounded by five men. Three of them were wearing full-faced helmets with opaque visors – the same kind worn by Marines. Military surplus, maybe? Their uniforms identified them as members of the colony’s PDF, and they were all holding XMRs, likely the same rifles stolen from the freighter. The magnetic coils on their barrels made them easy to identify.

One of the remaining men was immediately recognizable as his would-be informant, producing a butterfly knife from his pocket, playing with it as he began to circle the chair. Boyd turned his head to follow him, the rest of the group looking on in silence. The last stranger was standing a few feet further away, his hands buried in his pockets. He was an older man, and he was smartly dressed, sporting a tailored suit in a shade of slate grey that matched the streaks in his thinning hair. He wore a pair of expensive loafers, and there was a glint of gold on his cufflinks. This was a mob boss if Boyd had ever seen one – his rap sheet might as well have been tattooed on his forehead. He scrutinized Boyd with a pair of cold, blue eyes, as sharp as razors despite the crow’s feet at their corners. His calm, commanding demeanor made him far more threatening than the fool swinging the knife around.

“I gotta be honest, boss,” the informant began as he circled back into view. “When you said you wanted to bait a Ninnie to Hades and take him alive, I thought you’d lost the plot, but here we are.” He stopped in front of Boyd, then brought the tip of the blade close to his face, seeming annoyed when he didn’t flinch away. “We have our Ninnie, along with enough hardware to take out an entire landing force of UNN dropships. If they park a carrier in orbit, they won’t be able to get a single boot on the ground.”

“You kept me alive,” Boyd groaned, his headache still lingering. “Why? What do you want with a UNNI agent?”

The informant stepped aside, giving him a view of the man in the suit. He had produced a fat cigar from his pocket and was shielding a lighter as he lit it, taking a few quick puffs to get it going. He exhaled a cloud of smoke, then cleared his throat, his voice a gruff baritone as he began to speak.

“As my colleague has already alluded to, Mister Boyd, I brought you here for a purpose. Cooperate, and no further harm will befall you. Everything that you have been told so far is true. I represent the Syndicate, and we aim to take control of Hades.”

“You can’t steal an entire planet,” Boyd replied incredulously. “It’s impossible. You’d have to be very poorly informed to think that you could pull it off.”

“I think you’ll soon come to realize that you are the one who is poorly informed, Agent,” the man replied as he took another leisurely puff from his cigar. “Ironic, considering that HUMINT is your organization’s specialty. I’d have something to say about the UN wasting tax credits, but issues like taxation aren’t going to be a concern of ours for much longer.”

“If you really try this – if you try to take control of Hades and cut the colony off from the rest of human space – you’re going to have a lot more than one carrier breathing down your neck,” Boyd spat.

The man took a few steps closer to the chair, exhaling a cloud of acrid smoke in his direction, Boyd fighting the urge to cough.

“You don’t get where I am today by being risk-averse, Mister Boyd,” he continued as he tapped his cigar to dislodge a small shower of ash. “How’s that little war of yours going, Agent? Things aren’t looking too good, I hear. The fleet is spread thin all across the frontier, without enough ships or men to protect every colony, and a Bug fleet could drop out of superlight almost anywhere. That’s why the weapon shipment was coming in to begin with – because in the event of an invasion, you’d have to rely on our good friends in the PDF to hold the line until the boys in blue could arrive to save the day,” he said with a gesture to his armed goons. “It doesn’t instill a great deal of confidence.”

“Do you realize how many people you’d be putting in danger by diverting resources from the war effort for this nonsense?” Boyd demanded.

“I don’t think you can spare a fleet,” the boss continued, ignoring his question. “Ask yourself – what’s a higher priority for the Admiralty? Helping some corrupt corp maintain control over a backwater like Hades with less than a million inhabitants, or denying the Bugs a foothold in human space? The Navy can’t be everywhere at once, and the choice is an obvious one.”

He became stern suddenly, his weathered features wrinkling into a frown.

“You know as well as I do, Ninnie, that the UNN would expend more resources maintaining their tenuous hold over uninhabited wastelands like Kruger III or Chara II than they would defending this strategically insignificant colony. I am not a dishonest man,” he continued, bringing the cigar to his lips again. “The reasons my colleagues and I want control over this planet are purely selfish and monetary in nature, but when I say that the Navy won’t protect the people of Hades, I tell no lie. The Syndicate, on the other hand, defends its assets. The colonists are an asset to us, and we will defend them against any and all threats. The Bugs, the corp, the Navy – it doesn’t matter. Our price might be economic domination over the planet, sure, but that control is already exerted by ExoCorp and its subsidiaries. The locals won’t even notice the change in management.”

The man leaned down to eye level with Boyd, taking another long drag from his cigar.

“What do the people of Hades have to lose by cooperating with us? The protection of a UNN fleet that wouldn’t arrive for weeks if they called for help? The employ of a corporation that cares even less about their welfare than smugglers and pirates? Nobody is being hustled or coerced here,” he added, spreading his arms. “We merely offered the people of Hades a choice, and most of them have already made it.”