The Butcher of Anderson Station Read Online Free PDF Page B

it. I’ve got enough bad press without slaughtering the hero of Anderson Station.”
    “And otherwise?”
    Dawes sat back on his haunches and closed the blade with one hand.
    “I don’t waste resources, Colonel. If you want to die, it will do that girl and her father absolutely no good. If you want to make it up to her and all the people like her, I could use your expertise. You’re a rare resource. You’ve got knowledge and training, and as the man who is famous throughout the whole system for killing Belters, you’re in a position to be our strongest advocate. All it means is walking away from everything you know and love. The life you built for yourself. The admiration of everyone who looks up to you. All the things you’d have lost anyway.”
    “This was a recruitment, then.”
    Dawes stood up, sliding the knife into his pocket. His smile reached his eyes this time.
    “You tell me,” Dawes said. Then, to the woman, “ Recanos ai postar. Asi geendig .”
    “ Aiis ,” she said, shouldering the rifle like a professional.
    The pair walked out together, leaving Fred on the deck, massaging the agony out of his legs as the feeling started to return.

Also by James S. A. Corey
T HE E XPANSE
    Leviathan Wakes
    Caliban’s War

If you enjoyed THE BUTCHER OF ANDERSON STATION ,
look out for
LEVIATHAN WAKES
    B OOK 1 OF THE T HE E XPANSE
by James S. A. Corey
Prologue: Julie
     
    T he Scopuli had been taken eight days ago, and Julie Mao was finally ready to be shot.
    It had taken all eight days trapped in a storage locker for her to get to that point. For the first two she’d remained motionless, sure that the armored men who’d put her there had been serious. For the first hours, the ship she’d been taken aboard wasn’t under thrust, so she floated in the locker, using gentle touches to keep herself from bumping into the walls or the atmosphere suit she shared the space with. When the ship began to move, thrust giving her weight, she’d stood silently until her legs cramped, then sat down slowly into a fetal position. She’d peed in her jumpsuit, not caring about the warm itchy wetness, or the smell, worrying only that she might slip and fall in the wet spot it left on the floor. She couldn’t make noise. They’d shoot her.
    On the third day, thirst had forced her into action. The noise of the ship was all around her. The faint subsonic rumble of the reactor and drive. The constant hiss and thud of hydraulics and steel bolts as the pressure doors between decks opened and closed. The clump of heavy boots walking on metal decking. She waited until all the noise she could hear sounded distant, then pulled the environment suit off its hooks and onto the locker floor. Listening for any approaching sound, she slowly disassembled the suit and took out the water supply. It was old and stale; the suit obviously hadn’t been used or serviced in ages. But she hadn’t had a sip in days, and the warm loamy water in the suit’s reservoir bag was the best thing she had ever tasted. She had to work hard not to gulp it down and make herself vomit.
    When the urge to urinate returned, she pulled the catheter bag out of the suit and relieved herself into it. She sat on the floor, now cushioned by the padded suit and almost comfortable, and wondered who her captors were—​Coalition Navy, pirates, something worse. Sometimes she slept.
     
    * * *
     
    On day four, isolation, hunger, boredom, and the diminishing number of places to store her piss finally pushed her to make contact with them. She’d heard muffled cries of pain. Somewhere nearby, her shipmates were being beaten or tortured. If she got the attention of the kidnappers, maybe they would just take her to the others. That was okay. Beatings, she could handle. It seemed like a small price to pay if it meant seeing people again.
    The locker sat beside the inner airlock door. During flight, that usually wasn’t a high-traffic area, though she didn’t know anything