Worlds Away (4 page)

7

PRC
Penal Station :

Earth-Sun
Lagrange Three :

During the latter
third of the last century, several observational stations had been put into
orbit in the Lagrange Three point, on the opposite side of the Sun from the
Earth. These stations were designed to forecast sunspots, flares and coronal
ejections, giving advance warning of solar disturbances.

At one time, quite a few of the stations had been populated,
but as it turned out, it was such an unpopular assignment—there was a
psychological effect of never being in a direct line of communication with
Earth, since the Sun interfered with most radio signals—that the world’s
governments had abandoned their efforts there, and only maintained the unmanned
stations. All except one.

That orbital, built by the People’s Republic of China, had
been converted to a penal station for those criminals the government decided
could not be rehabilitated: serial killers, traitors, drug lords, terrorists,
human traffickers, and war criminals. Since the Chinese government had
abolished capital punishment, they decided this was the next-best thing.

There were no guards, and the inmates themselves were
charged with the maintenance and operation of the station as part of their
sentence. Should the convicts fail to organize, it would be their own undoing.

The only contact the penal station had with Earth was the
monthly transport—a military PRC warship—which brought supplies, equipment, and
new prisoners. Sensors all over the outside of the station would broadcast an
EPS alert to the government of China via relay satellites should any
unauthorized vessel approach the station.

This station was where Chow Yin, convicted of nearly every
capital crime in the Chinese justice system, was sentenced to spend the rest of
his days.

Chow Yin wasted no time, and began to plot his escape from
the moment he embarked on the military transport to the penal colony. On Luna
Station, he’d built a criminal empire in a very simple, but effective manner,
and now applied the technique in his current situation.

The first day on the military transport, he sized up the
four other prisoners. There was Tza, a heavily muscled opium smuggler; Huan,
convicted of espionage; Sang, who—if the newsvids could be believed—was a
serial killer who had murdered more than forty women over the past twelve
years; and Sian, a frail young man who had somehow managed to hack into China’s
largest bank, where he’d worked, and embezzle close to a half-billion yuans.

The cargo bay of the transport was magnetically sealed, and
that’s where the five of them would spend the fourteen-day journey to the penal
station. There was no need for guards, since there was no possible way any of
the prisoners could breach the hold’s security system.

Four long tables made from molded plastic were set up along
one wall of the bay, on the opposite side from the six sleeping cots, which
were little more than sheets of canvas wrapped around a plastic frame. Those
were the only furnishings in the area, except for the one lavatory set into the
farthest corner of the hold.

At mealtimes, a dumbwaiter opened in one wall to reveal
trays of food on paper plates. They were not provided with utensils, so the
prisoners were only able to use their fingers to feed themselves.

Even in the low gravity, Chow Yin’s legs were all but
useless. Having spent months on Earth during the trial, his condition had
worsened until the point when he required the constant use of a molded plastic wheelchair.

He expected to become the first and obvious target of one of
the other prisoners, but to his surprise, Sian was the focus of Tza’s first
attempt at extortion.

At the first meal, Chow Yin held back and observed. Sian got
up before anyone else and headed over to the dumbwaiter. Without hesitation, he
grabbed a plate and made his way to the tables.

Tza, instead of going to the dumbwaiter to get his meal,
approached Sian.

“You’re the runt of the litter,” he said. “You don’t need as
much as the rest of us.”

With that, he backhanded Sian, knocking the smaller man to
the ground, and picked up the plate.

“You can have my scraps, if there are any left,” he said in
a snarl, heading to the dumbwaiter and grabbing another plate.

The big drug lord paused a moment, glancing at Chow Yin.
“You got something to say, cripple?”

Shaking his head slowly, Chow Yin remained where he was,
still waiting. Moments later, Sang and Huan decided to split Chow Yin’s plate
before he even approached to get it. Both smirked at him as they divided their
spoils.

Only after Tza, Sang, and Huan had eaten did Chow Yin
approach Sian.

Shaking and looking miserable, the young computer hacker
glanced up at Chow Yin. His eye was already swelling up. “He would have killed
me if I fought back.”

“Of course he would have,” Chow Yin said.

“Next time I’ll be smart like you, and let them go first.”

Shaking his head, Chow Yin said, “No, next time you will go
first again, except you will get a plate for me as well.”

With a look of horror at the thought, Sian said, “That’s
suicide.”

“Trust me,” Chow Yin said, and wheeled himself away to the
farthest table, positioning himself at it as if waiting to be served.

It was several hours later, when the dumbwaiter once again
sounded that a meal was being delivered, that Sian glanced at Chow Yin, who
nodded confidently.

Tza, seeing Sian get up and approach the panel first,
laughed and said to the others, “Do you believe this? Some people never learn.”

Chow Yin, still at the farthest table, waited for Sian to
bring him his meal.

Sian, sweating and shaking in fear, grabbed two plates the
moment the door panel opened, and hurried over to Chow Yin’s table.

Tza guffawed at the action, and slowly stood up. He put his
fist in his hand and cracked his knuckles.

“Watch this,” he said, and lumbered over to Chow Yin and
Sian. He stood over the two, as if deciding which of them to punish first.

Chow Yin pushed his plate a centimeter toward Tza. “We were
foolish to try to take what is rightfully yours,” he said, his words obviously
surprising both Sian and Tza. “Please accept our apologies.”

“Damn right, it’s mine,” Tza said, and reached down to grab
the plate.

Tza’s eyes bulged when Chow Yin casually flicked his hand
out and stabbed the smuggler in the neck with a short shiv, slicing into the carotid
artery.

Both the body and the wheels of Chow Yin’s wheelchair were
made of plastic. For the past few hours, Chow Yin had loosened one plastic axle
a few centimeters, and snapped it off. He had spent the rest of the time
rubbing the shiv against the bottom of the metal table, sharpening the point.

It was obvious Tza could not figure out what had happened. As
the opium smuggler fell to the deck, clutching at his neck and trying to stem
the flow of blood, Chow Yin casually took his plate back and began to eat.

A biosensor detected Tza’s condition, and an alarm sounded.
By the time the soldiers entered the hold to assess the situation, Tza was
dead.

Though the guards did not seem to express any outrage at the
death of a known criminal, they had to follow protocol, and the remaining
prisoners were secured to their cots for the remainder of the trip. From that
point on, they were only released one at a time for meals and biological needs.

The restrictions did not matter to Chow Yin; he’d already
achieved his goal. By the time the military transport arrived at the penal
station, the remaining prisoners had sworn complete allegiance to him.

∞

For the next twelve years, Chow Yin did not simply rule the
cadre of criminals in the penal station. He enforced a strict regimen of
education on them. Doing what the justice system could not, he turned these
criminals into productive soldiers in his burgeoning empire. He found out what
each inmate’s unique talents were, and schooled them on how to use those
abilities more effectively. Whenever a transport came, he would sort through
the newly arriving prisoners and indoctrinate them to his cause.

No matter how much control he had, however, he could not tip
his hand to the outside world. Whenever the military inspectors arrived, they
found what they’d always come to expect: a typical prison environment, the
station maintained to its minimum standards, and the occasional dead body—if
the soldiers reported back that everything was perfect, that would arouse
suspicion.

Though there were grumblings from his subordinates that
their escape was taking too long, Chow Yin knew that any premature action would
result in their recapture. Freeing himself of the penal colony was a secondary
consideration; before he could make any move, he had to be certain that his
escape was permanent. His ultimate goal was not simply freedom; the only way he
could ensure his future was a complete reversal of the game he played on Luna
Station. He would not skulk in the shadows. It was time for him to seize
control of his future, and nothing less than the complete domination of Sol
System would do.

All electronic communications were monitored by the
government satellites throughout the Lagrange Point, so Chow Yin had no way to communicate
with the rest of the solar system. Before he left Earth, he’d managed to send
out a short message to a trusted subordinate through one of his lawyers, but he
had no way of knowing if it was received, or if the man would be successful.

Finally, his patience was rewarded.

When the monthly military transport arrived, the entire
population of the station gathered in front of the docking bay doors, as they
always did.

This time was different. When the ship opened its cargo
doors, instead of prisoners disembarking, seven soldiers marched out onto the
dock and formed a line in front of the gate.

To the inmates’ complete surprise, the pilot of the ship, a
grizzled officer, opened the gate and took a step forward. He stood at
attention in front of Chow Yin and, with a salute, said, “We are at your
service, Emperor Yin.”

“It took you long enough, Mr. Leong.” Chow Yin’s words were
only half-reproachful.

It would have taken Captain Leong years to get himself
assigned to the penal station duty, and to get the military transport staffed
with those who were loyal to the movement.

During the months of his trial, Chow Yin had spent a
considerable amount of time listening to the news. He realized that there were people
from all areas of China who had become disillusioned with the policies that had
turned the PRC from one of the most powerful nations in the world to its
current state as nothing more than a puppet for the Earth Council. The
military, becoming less of a necessity as China slowly moved away from
communism and toward democracy, had particularly suffered in the interim. Many
officers and enlisted, who had dedicated their lives to the defense of the
country they loved, believed it was time to restore the old system of divine leadership.
The Emperors of China had always relied heavily on their military to enforce
their rule.

Before he’d been captured on Luna Station, one of Chow Yin’s
hobbies had been genealogy. He had been able to trace his lineage back to the
Qing, the last imperial dynasty of China two centuries before. With a
legitimate claim through bloodlines, all he had to do was to get a message to
imperialist sympathizers of his incarceration.

Before his exile from Earth, Chow Yin had managed to
convince the imperialists, through Leong—who had never managed to make a rank
higher than captain in the PRC Space Force—that they should set their sights
higher than simply retaking China. With Chow Yin as a figurehead, it was only a
matter of time before the disillusioned officers managed to organize and put
their plan into effect.

Captain Leong said, “My apologies for the delay, Sire.”

“You are here now,” Chow Yin said, then added,
“General
Leong.”

Though the newly promoted general’s expression did not
change, Chow Yin saw that he stood a little straighter.

Chow Yin gestured to the inmates of the penal station. “I’d
like to introduce you to our newest recruits.”

General Leong took a step forward and surveyed the growing crowd
of convicts.

He spoke in a booming voice for all to hear. “We don’t have
much time before the false Chinese government realizes we’ve commandeered their
ship, so I’ll be brief. We need to ensure no one suspects that we have
liberated you from the station. Your cooperation is mandatory.” He made a
gesture, and four of his men came out of the ship, carrying two heavy crates
between them. They set the crates down beside the general and pulled the lid
off.

General Leong continued his speech. “I need everyone to grab
an incendiary canister and bring it to your quarters. Place it in the center of
your cell. They’re connected with a remote, which we will activate once we have
left dock.”

One of the inmates, the serial killer named Sang, spoke up.
“What about our stuff?”

“You must leave all your personal possessions behind.
Inspectors will come. If you’ve packed all your things, they will know the
escape was planned. We want them to investigate all possibilities; this will
delay their efforts.”

Chow Yin cleared his throat and gave the general a furtive
look.

General Leong opened his holoslate and said, “Would the
following prisoners please step forward.” He read off a list of eleven names,
including Sian, the hacker.

As the eleven men separated themselves from the main group,
four more soldiers jogged out of the transport ship, pulse rifles in their
hands, and circled them.

Sang said, “What’s this all about?”

Holding up a hand, General Leong gave the man a conciliatory
nod. “Not to worry. There are some who do not deserve to be part of the new
Empire. We will ensure the purity of our cause.”