Escape Velocity Read online

  Praise for the works of Jason M. Hough

  Zero World

  “A science fiction [novel that] smashes The Bourne Identity together with The End of Eternity to create a thrilling action rampage that confirms [Jason] Hough as an important new voice in genre fiction.”

  —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

  “An enjoyable read…expect minor whiplash from the frenetic pace.”

  —Entertainment Weekly

  “Hough has combined all the ingredients of a first-rate sci-fi thriller.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “One hell of an entertaining read. Hough continues to deliver white-knuckle books anchored by unusual and fascinating characters. Zero World is a giant cup of pure badassery that secures his place among the finest sci-fi action writers today.”

  —Kevin Hearne, New York Times bestselling author of The Iron Druid Chronicles

  “A high-octane blend of science fiction and mystery, Zero World is a thrill ride that shoots you out of a cannon and doesn’t let up until the very last page.”

  —Wesley Chu, author of the Tao series

  “Warning: Do not pick up this book if there is anything else you need to do. There is no safe place to rest inside these pages, no lag in the full-throttle action, no moment when you will think, ‘Okay, this is a good spot to take a break.’ Once you realize how much you don’t know—about this world, these characters, this inexplicable mission—the only way out is forward.”

  —Brian Staveley, author of The Emperor’s Blades

  The Darwin Elevator

  “A hell of a fun book.”

  —James S. A. Corey, New York Times bestselling author of Abaddon’s Gate

  “[Jason M.] Hough’s first novel combines the rapid-fire action and memorable characters associated with Joss Whedon’s short-lived Firefly TV series with the accessibility and scientific acumen of [James S. A.] Corey’s ‘Expanse’ series.”

  —Library Journal (starred review)

  “Claustrophobic, intense, and satisfying…I couldn’t put this book down. The Darwin Elevator depicts a terrifying world, suspends it from a delicate thread, and forces you to read with held breath as you anticipate the inevitable fall.”

  —Hugh Howey, New York Times bestselling author of Wool

  “Newcomer Hough displays a talent for imaginative plotting and realistic dialogue, and the brisk pacing and cliffhanger ending will keep readers enthralled and eagerly awaiting the next installment.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Jason M. Hough does a great job with this huge story, which unfolds with just the right balance of high adventure, espionage, humor, and emotional truth….As soon as you finish, you’ll want more.”

  —Analog

  “A debut novel unlike any other…This is something special. Something iconic. The Darwin Elevator is full of majesty and wonder, mystery and mayhem, colorful characters and insidious schemes.”

  —SF Signal

  “Fun, action-packed and entertaining…a sure contender for science fiction debut of the year!”

  —Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist

  “A thrilling story right from the first page…This book plugs straight into the fight-or-flight part of your brain.”

  —Ted Kosmatka, author of The Games

  “If you enjoy high adventure with a kick-ass crew, I suggest you take Hough’s Darwin Elevator for a ride.”

  —Warren Hammond, author of KOP Killer

  Escape Velocity is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2017 by Jason Hough

  Excerpt from Zero World by Jason M. Hough copyright © 2015 by Jason Hough

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States by Del Rey, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

  DEL REY and the HOUSE colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

  ISBN 9780553391343

  Ebook ISBN 9780553391336

  randomhousebooks.com

  Cover illustration: © Larry Rostant

  v4.1

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  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Epigraph

  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

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Del Rey Books by Jason M. Hough

  About the Author

  Excerpt from Zero World

  In a far-off place, under the most extreme of circumstances, he did what he thought best. For all of us.

  —a gravestone in Nightcliff, Australia, A.D. 3911

  You seem to forget how utterly alone we were out there. There was no time to plan, no way to even communicate. Can we do this later? I need some time. I need a chance to mourn our dead.

  —Dr. Tania Sharma, interrogation transcript, 26.AUG.3911

  Location Unknown

  HE LAY AT the bottom of a deep hole, in a puddle of filthy water that sizzled as bits of molten metal dripped down from the destruction above.

  Skyler Luiken remained motionless for a time, just staring up at the column his arrival had carved. He remembered nothing of the actual crash. Couldn’t even remember when exactly he’d lost consciousness, or why. Medically induced, probably. Another gift from Eve. Her last? He called out for her. “Eve?”

  No response came. But then she’d said he’d be on his own, hadn’t she?

  He took a long, shuddering breath and allowed all the sources of his frayed nerves to worm through his mind. He was a thousand light-years from Earth. Alone. His friends were scattered across the gigantic, planet-spanning apparatus of the Scipios, their exact locations and conditions unknown. All of them had been thrown toward the massive collection of alien space stations in the final explosion of Eve, their host. Eve, the only ally they had, the only one who knew what the hell was really going on here. Now gone. Holy fuck, she’s really gone. The AI had sacrificed herself. Expelled him and the others on precisely calculated trajectories an instant before her destruction in a last-ditch effort to give each of them a chance to accomplish the task at hand.

  He found little comfort in that.

  Skyler let his breath out, and with it banished the enormity of his task to the edges of his mind. Too much to grapple with, and he wasn’t about to lie here and wallow in overwhelmed shock. He’d deal with his immediate predicament now, and damn the rest of it. He had to survive, take stock, find safety. Find his friends.

  “Hello?” he called. “Can anyone read me?”

  A terrible silence stretched. He fiddled with the comm menu rendered on the inside of his visor. All channels were already on, but it showed no links to anyone else. He bumped the system to maximum broadcast strength.

  “This is Skyler. I’m…I’ve no idea where I am. I’m alive. Obviously. I can’t hear any of you, but if you can read me…”

  What? W
hat to tell them?

  “Just stay put,” he settled on, no better option coming to mind. “I’ll report my location once I know where the hell I am, and wait for you all to join me. Keep trying to communicate. We might just be out of range.”

  Now what? he wondered.

  The answer seemed obvious. He had to scavenge.

  Now that, that, Skyler could wrap his mind around. He glanced around the pool of fluid and debris in the basin of the pit his arrival had created. The pod had burrowed through some kind of multilevel structure. A space station, no doubt. How deep had he gone? Skyler glanced up. The air above, thick with steam and smoke and a fine particulate like snow or ash, obscured the entry wound, but he figured the hole must have been patched by some automated process or else all that crap in the air would have been sucked out into space. Still, what he could see was at least a hundred meters of the shredded remains of a multilevel structure, as if his little craft had dug its way down through a twenty-story building. There were floors every five meters or so, each sprouting mangled pipes and conduits of unknown purpose, though given that most either leaked fluid or rained sparks, it didn’t take much imagination to guess. The cavities in between these, though, were truly unknown. In truth it didn’t look much different from a cross section of any Earth-based structure.

  He shifted his focus to the remains of his escape pod. It lay around him like a cracked egg, with bits of the foamy orange cushion that had surrounded him during the brief flight now melting away into the soup of knee-deep viscous fluids rapidly filling the space around him. He jumped off his toes, just enough to test the gravity without rocketing himself up into the haze above, and judged it to be about three-quarters of Earth normal. What had Eve said about the gravity on Carthage? Pretty damn close to that, if his memory served. So he must be at a pretty low altitude.

  As the last of the cushioning melted away, Skyler saw some gray containers floating amid the wreckage. He picked one up and examined it, puzzled at first. It was Builder gear, definitely, but its purpose eluded him. He was about to toss it aside when he realized his suit was telling him the answer. In the bottom corner of his field of view, a display on his visor indicated that this was repair paste for his armored suit. He grinned despite himself and picked another. Ammunition, in the form of six pellets that could be inserted into the right or left shoulder of his suit, powering the beam weapons embedded just above his wrists. Skyler’s grin widened. Eve may have sacrificed herself, abandoning him and the others to take on an entire sieged planet by themselves, but at least she’d not left them completely naked and defenseless.

  Another case held “nutrients.” He almost gagged. This would be the rather nasty food Eve had manufactured for them and never quite gotten around to improving. Skyler decided not to look a gift horse in the mouth, as his stomach growled its desire to be filled with the gritty, overly sweet fare. Last, a self-replenishing container for water, filled by pulling moisture out of the very air around him. This he attached immediately to the receptacle on his lower back and then willed the suit to extend the small tube toward his mouth. He heard the thin whir as the little straw extended, and he drank greedily, ignoring the slightly metallic taste. It was cool and wet and somehow grounded him, putting an almost whiskeylike glow of confidence in his gut. He repeated the process with the food, choking a few gulps down.

  Skyler tried the comm again. “Anyone out there? This is Skyler. I’m alive, but I’ve no idea where the hell I am or what to do. Reply if you can hear me.”

  No response came. The suit’s status indicators still showed no connection to anyone else, nor any Builder equivalent of a network at all. He ground his teeth at that, but decided not to spend any more time worrying about it for now. Maybe it was broken, or maybe the others were simply out of range. He left the comm switched on, and set a recurring timer to remind him every ten minutes to try it again.

  Finally, he checked himself for injuries. Bruised and battered, but otherwise he felt good. His suit still had integrity, too.

  Fed and hydrated, Skyler turned his focus toward his overall goal.

  The enormity of which still boggled his mind, but considered in the simplest terms—that he was here to free the world of Carthage from the Scipios—he figured his first task should be to gather intelligence. How did the Scipios hold this world? What were their society and security structure like? Was his crew truly alone here, or could he perhaps rouse some kind of rebellion from within the metaphorical prison walls? The mental image of a worldwide prison riot was almost enough to make him laugh.

  A burst of fire erupted into the cavity just a few meters above him, then quickly receded into a small gas-fueled flame like a welder’s torch left on. The sound of it somehow woke Skyler’s sense of hearing, and he began to listen as much as see. The dripping water, the slosh of his legs in the now-thigh-deep pool, and something else, too. A new sound, rhythmic, that stuttered even as it rose and fell through sweeps of extreme pitch changes. The noise came from all around him. Instinctively, Skyler sloshed over to one side of the pit, pressing himself against a wall made of charred debris, as the volume grew.

  Multicolored light tore through the mists above. Beams of violet and yellow. Skyler knew next to nothing about life beyond Earth, but every fiber of his being came to the simple conclusion instantly: security response. He was an intruder here, an infection, and the cavalry had arrived to deal with him.

  He raised his weaponized arm and waited, forcing even breaths through his clenched teeth. The one thing he could not afford was a shoot-out. Whatever the population of Scipios here was, it was bound to be far higher than he had ammunition for. No, a subtler approach was the only real option if he was to have any hope of reaching the surface, much less accomplishing what he’d come here to do.

  The flashing lights above were joined by others, and then a shadow appeared in the rising steam. The curling white murk spread and swirled around the edges of a teardrop-shaped object maybe two meters tall, with four metallic and heavily segmented tentacles moving in a carefully controlled dance as it lowered itself deeper into the pit.

  The sight of it barely registered, for it was what Skyler saw beyond this alien that almost overwhelmed his mind. A brief glimpse through the thick haze, but that was enough.

  A night sky, half-obscured by clouds.

  He didn’t need to get to the surface. He was already there. The realization left him reeling as his assumptions shattered like glass.

  Skyler did his best to keep still, tucked in shadow under a curled bit of torn fibrous metal his arrival had peeled from the floor just above. The creature above him bore an obvious resemblance to the Scipio Swarm that had destroyed the Chameleon, though it had fewer tentacles and a more streamlined body of much thinner profile. Made for atmospheric use, perhaps, its existence closer to a support apparatus, rather than the swarmers who lived out their lives in that lonely vigil at the edges of this solar system. Those had been dirty things, rugged and scarred. This was sleek in comparison, with a gleaming white skin or hull that looked almost like porcelain on its top half, covering the lower black and gray areas like a tortoise shell.

  With a slight bob the Scipio came to a stop. Its four limbs stretched straight outward to where they grasped whatever support they could find with four-fingered mechanical hands. Much more elegant than the spike-tipped monstrosities their space-faring brethren favored, perhaps because to impale every surface they traversed here would be to damage their own home.

  For a time it simply hung there, suspended, crying its odd lilting alarm. Skyler remained motionless, too, ready to unleash hell if noticed, happy to remain hidden if possible.

  Another shadow appeared as a second Scipio lowered itself into the deep pit. It came to rest a few meters above the first. This one was slightly larger, and had markings along its side, like a bar code made of skewed and curved lines. Abruptly the shrill alarm stopped as the pair of robotic machines or vehicles—Skyler couldn’t be quite sure which—settl
ed into position. He stared at those lines, the markings on the side of the recent arrival. They seemed to shimmer, then warp under his gaze. A trick of the light, perhaps, or just his rattled senses, but before he could puzzle it out the situation changed.

  A section of the larger one’s belly suddenly extended downward, revealing an array of tubes and connective gear. A turret, his brain warned, and he shifted his aim toward it. Before he could shoot, though, the swivel-mounted cannon revealed its purpose. It swung with precision to one side and burped out a white cloud of foam. The material slapped wetly against one of the small fires licking out from a severed pipe on the wall of destruction. The blaze vanished under the thick goop, smothered instantly. Another quick swivel, another blast from the fire extinguisher. Skyler watched, mildly fascinated, as the machine or vehicle systematically doused each open flame. An alien firefighter, he thought. When those closest to Skyler, in the basin of his crash-pit, were out, the thing began to climb smoothly back up toward the top. Every meter or so its cannon would cough out more white mucus. Another flame would vanish.

  He shifted focus back to the first Scipio to have arrived, the smaller one. It hadn’t moved since its big brother had shown up, and as of yet had not revealed its purpose here.

  Skyler cursed himself. With everything else going on he hadn’t bothered to check his air levels, and if the air here was breathable. He scanned the information splayed across the corners of his visor, the system tracking his eye movements and thought patterns as a means of navigating the interface. He fumbled his way through the menus until he found what he needed: atmospheric analysis. A quick review told him the only thing he really needed to know: breathable to a human. There were indicators for the various gases present and in what quantity, but that meant little to him. Oxygen was the only one listed in orange, the rest green. Nothing red, so he’d count his blessings and worry about the side effects later.