by HD Smith
“Don’t worry about Wyatt,” I said to her. “If we can prove you’re a House Zar royal, you’ll be safe. My trouble won’t follow you.”
She nodded.
“Are you ready to go?”
She shook her head, then said, “Yes.”
“Your first time in a spaceship?”
“Yes.”
“This is a safe ride, and we can cloak,” I said.
“I didn’t know pleasure cruisers could cloak,” she said.
So she wasn’t completely unfamiliar with spaceships. I’d grown up around them and knew all the tricks. I also had contacts that could build anything.
“It’s a custom model,” I said, which was true, but didn’t cover how advanced my ship really was. It only looked like a Dragon-Fire.
“We are safe, Genevieve,” Susan9 said, coming up front from the back. “It is fitted with lasers and projectile deflectors.”
“So they won’t be able to shoot us out of the sky?” Gen asked.
I shrugged. “They could try, but it’s illegal on Tau.”
“Small mercies,” she muttered.
I initiated the launch sequence.
“ETA for arrival on Old Earth is four hours. Buckle up,” I said.
“10-4,” she said, and sat down to strap in.
Susan9 took the jump seat near the sleeping quarters. The ship was small, but it had provisions for a small family: a couple and one child.
A minute later, we launched. Thirty seconds after that, as we headed toward the space bridge, my building exploded beneath us.
20
Orion Space Bridge, Orion, Wednesday, 14:30 LTZ
Gen
We were two ships back from the Orion gate. The jump through the space bridge on Tau in Liam’s Dragon-Fire pleasure cruiser had been an interesting experience. It was the first time I remembered a jump, though it wasn’t my first jump. I’d always through my first and only jump was from Canis to Tau as an orphan. Of course, now I knew that I’d also made it off Aratus, only to be abandoned on Canis.
I was still a bit pissed at the stunt he’d pulled back on Tau. I understood why he’d done it, but that didn’t change the fact that it had eroded some of my confidence in him and showed me just how little I knew about him. For now, I’d decided to trust Liam. He was still my best chance at proving my identity. I might as well turn myself into House Cortez if I wasn’t willing to take his help.
Dexter and Liam were speaking via a live stream displayed on a panel at the ships controls. We’d narrowly escaped his building with our lives. Someone had set off an explosion so strong that it rattled his ship as we headed toward orbit. Had we been any closer to the blast, we’d be dead.
“Is Wyatt still alive?” Liam asked.
“Not sure,” Dexter said. “I went down to the loading dock before the building exploded, and he wasn’t there. As soon as the explosion hit, I was cut off from security. I’m still trying to get my systems back online. There was a blowback of some sort that shorted out my vid controls.”
“I was wondering why we weren’t getting an overlay,” Liam joked.
Dexter ignored him. “The newsfeeds are covering the explosion as an energy leak.”
“Was anyone else hurt? Were other buildings damaged?”
“As of now, the WLA is calling it a tragic accident that only destroyed your building. They haven’t listed any deaths, which is strange. Their drones should have been able to pick up the remains of Wyatt and his patient—if they were there.”
“How could they have gotten out of the building?” Liam asked.
I jumped into the conversation. “Maybe they didn’t need to.”
“Explain what you mean.” Liam said.
“Wyatt had a lot of wards on his apartment,” I said. “Is it possible those wards protected that part of the building?”
Dexter shook his head. “I don’t see how any ward could protect against the kind of damage I’m seeing on the stream. There are people down there taking vid-snaps and video. The whole building looks like rubble.”
“Someone is sending a message,” Liam said. “We need to figure out who the hell it is.”
“The PKs knew the spider bots were yours,” Dexter said. “Could it be Dalton?”
“He needs my heart; my death alone will mean nothing. That doesn’t mean his lackey, Ace Larson, didn’t take the initiative.”
“You really think Larson blew up the building?” Dexter asked.
“I don’t see why Wyatt would have,” Liam said. “House Cortez needs Gen alive to keep the patent. House Storm is only tangentially involved at this point. I could see Donovan being pissed I sent the PKs after her, but there hasn’t been enough time for that to play out.” Liam looked at me. “Do you have any other enemies?”
I was a little offended by this. “Do you?”
Dexter laughed. “For all we know, it was an energy leak.”
Liam ran his hand through his hair. “Keep an eye on the stream. Someone who knows something will talk.”
“10-4, boss,” Dexter said.
Another ship just completed the portal jump, so we were next in line. The onboard comm system activated.
“Dragon-Fire 1592, do you copy?” the command center on Orion hailed.
“Dragon-Fire 1592 is here,” Liam said. “How can I help you?”
“Your travel voucher indicates you are traveling with two females, is that correct?”
“Affirmative,” Liam said.
I hoped the command center’s questions didn’t mean they were looking for me.
“Your return paperwork does not include the females. Are they remaining on Old Earth for an extended period?”
“Negative, command. I’ll forward you revised documents.”
Dexter swiped in the air at his desk, then he double-tapped the invisible-to-me panel and said, “Sent.”
“I’ve received the updated paperwork,” command central said. “You may proceed. Please be aware that Old Earth is a myst-free zone. Your magic will not work on world.”
“Affirmative,” Liam said, then shut down the comms. “Dexter, are there any warrants for my aliases?”
“Checking now,” Dexter said.
“Check for Genevieve as well,” Liam said.
“What name is on the paperwork?” I asked Liam. “And wouldn’t House Cortez have contacted the police?”
“Not necessarily,” Liam said. “It’s possible they planned to use media awareness first to flush you out of hiding. That way they wouldn’t have a WLA case agent following up.”
“Okay, this is interesting,” Dexter said. “There aren’t any warrants out for your aliases, but Tor-Vargas and Anderson are both showing up on the DS feeds. Someone is claiming Tor-Vargas owned the building that blew up on Tau.”
“Can you figure out who is saying that?” Liam asked.
“It’s everyone now, but what we need is the original post. I’m searching for it.”
“Okay, we’re heading into the portal. I’ll connect again after we’re through.”
“10-4,” Dexter said.
Liam swiped his hand to clear the panel.
“Should I expect anything different this time?” I asked.
“Like what?” Liam asked.
“We’re going to a small portal in the middle of nowhere. Will the jump be the same?”
“I’ve never noticed a difference,” Liam said.
Liam activated a sequence of commands, then removed his hands from the controls. This was exactly what he’d done at the Tau bridge. His ship, like most, was designed to pass through a space bridge unassisted. It wasn’t a matter of skill—or lack of it. His ship was tiny compared to the giant cargo freighters that moved goods between the Known Worlds, and it would be impossible for him to hit the bridge structure unless he was aiming for it deliberately. But the Bridge Command League, which had taken over all operation of space bridges after the incident on Aratus, didn’t want to take any chances. The command sequences a
nd targeting programs that allowed for smooth jumps performed best when automated, which meant everyone used them.
“This bridge takes a bit longer to activate,” Liam said.
“How do you get back to Orion from Old Earth? Does the League run the OE bridge?” I asked.
“No, the Glaser-Freeman Research Station is run by solar energy from the OE Sun. It’s always on. If you go through it, you wind up at the Orion gate, nowhere else. The League tracks all jumps through the Glaser-Freeman and will shoot down anything that comes back through from the Glaser-Freeman that is not on the jump list.”
“So we have to go from the Orion bridge to the Glaser-Freeman, which puts us on their list, so that when we return to this bridge they won’t shoot us out of the sky?”
“Yes,” Liam said. “Orion is the only bridge the League will allow to select the Glaser-Freeman destination.”
“Interesting.”
“It’s a way to control access and eliminate the need to upgrade the defense systems. After Aratus went dark, no other bridge in the KW was weaponized to take down a ship. The OE portal also takes more time to calibrate, which might cause a back-up on portals with higher through put.”
“Why not just protect the OE bridge?
“At one time, the WLA stationed military on board the space station to secure Old Earth. Later, those military personnel were switched to motion-activated PKs. But there wasn’t enough traffic to justify the expense of maintaining the security protocols.”
“Will we stop at the space station?” I asked.
“No, it isn’t allowed. There is nothing onboard except the PKs and they will activate and kill us if we try to board the station.”
“Good to know.”
“Don’t expect JumpNav to work on Old Earth. Your abilities are different from mine, but I’ve never been able to make it work. Lack of myst prevents the spell from being triggered. Also, if you did get it to work, I suspect you’d burn out any reserves you might have and wind up stranded in a location I wouldn’t be able to find.”
That was something I hadn’t thought about. The magic was new to me. I wasn’t used to having the ability, but traveling with a thought had come in handy more than once.
“I’ll do my best to avoid activating any spells. Will we have a way to communicate on the planet?”
I assumed comms and other myst devices wouldn’t work. I had no desire to abandon him and go off on my own, but while exploring the Zar compound we could get separated. A means of communication would be good.
“I’ve found several versions of OE tech that still work. We’ll be stopping at my basecamp and picking up supplies before we head to the Zar facility.”
“Sounds good.”
I rested my head back against the seat, expecting my trip through this bridge to be just as uneventful as the last.
“Are you okay?” Liam asked.
“I’m just thinking about how my life has changed in the last two days and how it will never be the same again. I’ve seen the eyes of my parents. I’ve seen parts of me in another face. It’s just a bit overwhelming.”
Liam smiled. He understood.
“Would you go back to House Vance if you could?”
He shook his head. “I’d prefer my uncle quit trying to kill me. But even if he did, I’d still walk away. My cousin Clara is more suited to the role than me. She’d make a great leader—if they’d let females lead.”
“I’m not sure I’ll have the option of not taking the throne. There are no other House Zar members to transfer the power to.”
“With Aratus gone, you can renounce any claim to Zar or Nyx tech, although I’d consider it a personal favor if you prevented Dalton from getting the Slip Stream patent first.”
Laughing, I said, “What would I do with it?”
“You’d make a deal with Storm Industries, and Oliver would make you so rich you could be anything you wanted to be,” Liam said.
He was serious.
“I’ll think about it,” I said. “What can I expect Old Earth to be like?”
“If we’re lucky, we won’t run into any renegades, tourists, or privateers.”
“There’s more than one type of person that visits Old Earth? Are they all allowed?”
“The privateers are similar to Tor-Vargas. They’re on planet as archeologists, but most have no backing and just enough funds to get there. They have no skills or knowledge, and usually find nothing of value before their credits or supplies run out. The desperate ones become renegades and play in the games. The tourists are elites from the KW who want a chance to see the wilds of Old Earth—without getting hurt. They pay brokers to bring them to Old Earth and show them the sights. They’d be harmless if it weren’t for the staged ambushes.”
“Staged ambushes? What happens?”
“The brokers contract with renegades to put on a show. They hire a Houseless nobody from the KW to be their ‘tourist who doesn’t make it’ during the ambush. The elites go home with a great story to tell, and the brokers book the next tour and find the next sucker.”
“That’s horrible,” I said. “Are the ambushes the games you mentioned?”
“No, those are run by other renegades. They film the games and sell the rights to the networks for pay-per-view events. The unfortunate people in the game are trying to win a million credits. They have to kill to win. None of this is illegal.”
“That’s crazy. Are there no security forces on planet? Where are the PKs or other watchers? Does no one care?”
“There is no legal authority, security force, or military on Old Earth. It’s a wasteland with no rules. We’ll get to my building, suit up, and get to the compound. Once inside, we’ll find what we need and get out. If we see anyone, we’ll abort and come back another day. Okay?”
“Okay,” I agreed.
A sensor on the ship’s console started beeping. The ship had finally made it to the rim, so we were about to glide through the portal.
The ride from Tau to Orion had been smooth. It had happened so fast that I hadn’t had time to absorb the experience. This time I wanted to focus on the event.
I wanted to watch as the ship breached the barrier of the portal and opened a window to the other side. I wanted to catch a glimpse of the moment of time before the seemingly immediate jump happened. Unlike my individual jumps, the portal jumps created no sense of traveling through anything. It was as if you stepped from one place to another in a single motion. The giant alloy circles of the space bridges smoothed the transport experience and made the transition virtually seamless.
I expected the same effortless movement from Orion to Glaser-Freeman Research Station. That wasn’t what happened.
From the moment the ship hit the barrier to the second we were through the gate, my body felt it. It was intense. The push and pull of forces made my soul feel like it might break in two. My head hurt from the tension. The feeling went from a compressed pressure to an almost weightless sensation. The Tau transport had taken seconds; this felt like minutes. I was breathless when we emerged on the other side.
“Gen,” Liam said. “What’s wrong?”
My hands hurt as I released my death grip on the chair arms. It took me a minute to regain my voice. I didn’t know how to put it into words. I conjured the headache spell and let it activate.
“What was that?” I said. “Why was that experience so different?”
“In what way?” Liam asked.
“I felt a strong sense of force as we passed through the wormhole. It wasn’t pleasant.”
Liam activated controls on his display “I’ll scan the systems, but I didn’t sense anything.” He then retrieved a sensor from his medical kit. Handing me the sensor, he said, “Put this on your wrist and relax.”
A loud beeping started, mimicking the rhythm of my heart. There was an extra hiccup sound and the tempo increased.
“Your adrenaline is through the roof,” he said. “Did you feel sick or in danger of passing out?”
“No. It was a back and forth sensation, like I was being compressed then released. At one point I felt weightless. It wasn’t anything like stepping through the void, either. It was hard to focus. Time dragged on. It felt like two or three minutes to get through the portal.”
“I haven’t taken anyone through the jump before. It never occurred to me that someone might experience it differently. Could it be related to the suit?”
I looked down at my dragon scale uniform. I shrugged.
“I don’t think so. It wasn’t a pressure like the suit was squeezing me. It was more mental than that.”
“Okay. I’ll have Dexter do some research. You can’t be the only one who’s had a reaction to the Glaser-Freeman bridge. We’ll figure out if it’s dangerous to go back through, but either way, I don’t recommend we make this a normal destination for you.”
“Agreed,” I said.
I looked back to check on Susan9. Her head was lulling forward. I unclipped from my seat and went to her.
“Susan9, are you okay?” I asked.
She didn’t answer.
“Liam, I think something’s wrong with Susan9.”
Liam brought up a floating panel, switched on several sensors, and passed it to me.
“I’d say check her vitals, but she isn’t human,” Liam said. “See if any of the ship’s sensors can pick up meaningful readings.”
The MHC had been built using tech from House Zar. If it had been constructed to allow someone to live forever, then it had to support space travel, right? She’d not had a negative experience at the Tau bridge.
I flipped through several settings displayed on the floating panel, everything from myst saturation to oxygen levels. Nothing was elevated or reduced. I found an interface that would let me directly connect to the ship’s controls, and because Dexter had loaded Susan9 with the ships schematics and operating manual, she was listed in the inventory of resources.
I sat back down in the chair and linked the two of us together. I searched my data core for an app to monitor Susan9’s vitals. There had to be something. I found an app called MHC Diagnostics. I activated the app, then closed my eyes to focus on the dashboard that opened on my VF.