“Of course,” Giles said. “We’ll keep her safe and bring her home soon.”
“Cool. Thanks for letting us know, Giles. All the best juju with your mission!”
“Thanks, Brock,” Giles responded. “You too.”
The line disconnected. Pieter looked up from his screens. “What was that?”
“Giles.” Brock chuckled. “Apparently, Anne slipped out on The Scamp Princess with him.” Brock shook his head. “That girl… I gotta go tell Mollz.”
Pieter’s eyes were back on his screens. “Aight,” he muttered absently.
Brock wandered into the lounge. The atmosphere was still pretty tense and quiet as a library. Jack was napping. Joel was playing video games on his wrist holo.
Molly was sitting near the front, looking out of the window.
He approached her gently, as if approaching a wild horse that might bolt at a sudden movement.
“Hey,” he said quietly.
Molly’s head turned, and her eyes locked on to his. “Hey, Brock. How’s it going?”
“It’s going good. Pieter’s doing a great job up there. We’re making progress.”
“Good.” She forced a smile.
“I’ve just taken a call from Giles, though,” he added, his face a little more serious. He felt Molly’s defenses go up as she braced herself.
“What did he say?”
Joel wandered over to hear the conversation. He stopped a row of seats back and leaned his arms over on the back of one as he listened. Brock glanced at him before he continued. “Everything is okay. It turns out that Anne was missing, but she’s shown up on Giles’s ship.”
Molly took a second to react. “You’re kidding?”
Brock pressed his lips together and shook his head once. “That was what I said.”
Joel scoffed. “Son of a—” His shock turned to half a laugh, which turned to a cough.
Brock bobbed his head, trying to keep his face straight.
“How?” Molly asked.
Brock took a breath to compose himself and then slowly exhaled. “It sounds like we have a bigger security issue, to be honest.”
Molly cocked her head questioningly.
“Seems our teenager with woo woo superpowers is able to fuzz out her image on the base cameras.”
Joel was still chuckling and coping with his shock. “You know, I bet if she can get past those, she can probably get past any cameras.”
Molly bobbed her head. “I’m thinking keeping tabs on her is going to be much harder than we first thought.” She glanced at Joel. “Kinda like bottling lightning.”
Joel raised his eyebrows. “I’d say.”
Molly frowned and looked back to Brock. “Okay, well, we’ll have to figure out a way around this, or a way to make her stay put and keep her safe—”
“And we need to figure out who is after her,” Joel interjected.
“Right,” Molly agreed quickly. “But in the meantime, if Giles is keeping an eye on her, then we can only hope for the best.”
“Right, cool,” Brock agreed, starting to leave. “He said he would. And if he can, of course, he will. I’ll have a chat with Emma and see what we can do about modifying the cameras or something.” He shook his head, his eyes betraying his amazement. “I still can’t believe it.”
Molly shook her head in sympathy. “I know, right? Kids!”
Joel chuckled and patted Molly on her shoulder as he also turned to go. “I hear it’s different when they’re your own, though.”
“Ha!” Molly snorted. “You can’t just hand them back when they’re your own. I have trouble remembering to feed a cat, remember?”
Brock chuckled as he disappeared out of the door. Joel headed back to his seat, leaving Molly still shaking her head.
Shit.
What’s up, Oz?
That’s my fault. I should have been on to her.
There’s no way—
How I could have known? Yes, there was. I totally should have known. And from the sounds of it, Paige figured it out. How did Paige figure it out, and I didn’t catch it?
Hey, listen to me. You were working on the task at hand: finding Sean. There was no way any of us could have predicted what Anne would be capable of. Or what she might do. Remember, we barely know her yet.
Well, I’ve obviously been compiling my own heuristic of her.
And how’s that going?
Well, no clear guidelines. Nothing of any significance anyway. She barely talks to anyone. She doesn’t reveal things about herself. She spends a lot of time out of the way of the cameras in her room. There are a few data points but no patterns to tell us anything.
Yeah. I think when we get back, we need to put some effort into correcting that.
Okay. I’ll make it my priority.
Oz. Stop. You’re fretting. She’s safe right now. With Giles. You didn’t screw up.
Well, why do I feel like I did?
Erm, maybe because you’re a perfectionist?
I’m not. That’s a wholly human quality.
Oh, and feelings aren’t? Tendencies aren’t? Humor isn’t?
Okay. Touché.
Good. Now stop beating yourself up and get back to helping Pieter figure out where we need to be and whose ass we need to kick!
Yes, ma’am.
Molly sniggered quietly and leaned her head back and closed her eyes. She could always count on her team and best friend to make her feel better, no matter what was going on.
Chapter 4
Paige’s office, safe house, Gaitune-67
The office was relatively quiet. Since the debacle with Anne stealing away, it was just Paige and Maya on the base now.
And Bourne.
But Bourne didn’t really count, Paige mused to herself in the silence. He mostly kept to himself, churning away on the redundant processing power that sat within the confines of the base firewall.
It was a good opportunity to catch up on some work. Paige had hunkered down in her office, mocha machine keeping her adequately caffeinated to deal with the load.
She looked at the time. She hadn’t moved for two hours and hadn’t been outside or in any kind of simulated daylight since she got up. Then, she realized she hadn’t showered since yesterday, either.
She pushed back in her chair, sighing. She still had a heap of stuff to do. But she needed a break.
Just then, her desk holo pinged. It was a comm from an address she didn’t recognize. It looked official. She scooted her chair closer to the holoscreen to read it. It was about the university.
Her decision to take a break forgotten, she poked her finger into the hologram and opened the message. Her tired eyes darted left and right, assimilating the information.
Her stomach lurched.
She sat back, her mind reeling from the information. She should call Molly.
But Molly was probably out of range now.
ADAM.
Nope. ADAM was out of range.
ArchAngel? Well, she is obviously the next best thing, but she wasn’t interested in university problems.
Her mind flicked to Garret. He’d warned her months ago that something like this might be coming. She’d dismissed it. And him. Things hadn’t ended well, and his warning had only served to show her how much she didn’t trust him.
She wiped her face with her hands.
If in doubt, do nothing, she told herself.
She’d go shower. And then talk to Maya about it. It wasn’t within Maya’s official remit to get involved in university stuff, but still, she was a good friend. And had a good head on her shoulders. They’d figure it out together.
She scooted her chair back again and hit save on the message so she could find it easily from her wrist holo later. Then she got up and left the office, flicking the mocha machine off as she went.
Aboard The Empress
Brock arrived back in the cockpit to find Crash perched o
n the navigation console, his eyes glazed over and looking at the floor.
“You’ll never guess what’s happened,” Brock announced as he strode in and collapsed into his console chair. “Woo woo voodoo teenager strikes again!”
Crash looked up. “Who? Anne?”
“Yeah.”
“Why? What’s she done now?”
“Oh, you know,” Brock explained mock-casually, “only gone and bypassed the entire base technology and snuck away on The Scamp Princess with Giles.”
“No way!” Crash exclaimed, his expression verging on surprised.
“Way.”
“Oh, man. That’s… intense. How did Oz take it?”
Brock shrugged. “Dunno. I only spoke to Molly.”
Pieter looked up. “From what I can tell, he’s not taking it well. His processing has slowed down by fifty percent since you headed out there to tell her.”
Crash sniggered. “Well, well, well. AIs suffer from pride.”
Brock grinned. “Appears so. But seriously, this could be a problem. If she’s deliberately doing it to hide herself, that’s one thing. I mean, we don’t think she wants to screw us over. But what about if she’s doing it accidentally, and it leaves us vulnerable?”
Crash had folded his arms and was stroking his chin with his fingers on one hand. “You have a point. And to take this one step further, what else is she compromising?”
Brock sighed and swiveled a console chair around to sit on. “Who knows? I mean, one problem at a time, but when we get back, we’re going to have our hands full trying to woo woo-proof the base.”
Crash closed his eyes. “Crap. You’re right.”
Brock spun round and started punching keys in the holos at the console. “I’m gonna see if Emma and I can get a jump on anything that might help while you guys are finding out where we need to be.” He spun back to address Pieter. “Lemme know if you need me on anything else, though. I’m right here, yeah?”
Pieter stopped typing to respond. “Sure thing. Thanks, man.”
“Any time, broooooooo…” he called, turning his music on via his holo for his audio implant.
Crash sighed and slumped down in his pilot’s chair, wishing he could just fly.
Paige’s quarters, Safehouse, Gaitune-67
Paige stepped out of the shower and wrapped herself in the self-drying towel. Then she grabbed a second one and wrapped her hair in it.
She padded out to the bedroom and set about moisturizing and dressing.
“Paige?” It was a computerized voice over the comm system.
Paige froze, confused. Oz was away. And it didn’t seem like Oz. A second later, she realized it was Bourne.
“Bourne. Hi. What’s up?” She clutched her towel around her tighter.
“I was checking incoming messages and noticed you weren’t at your desk to receive yours at the moment.”
“Yes…” she said slowly, still bamboozled why Bourne was monitoring messages or needed to tell her about it.
“Well, there was one that seemed out of place. So, I figured it might be important. It’s about your company.”
“Oh, is that right?”
“Seems someone wants to buy it.”
Paige paused again, deodorant only under one arm. “I see.”
“Do you want me to send it through to your holo?”
“Yes, please.” She finished putting her deodorant on and hurriedly pulled on her underwear and sweats.
“Bourne?” she asked, feeling a little less vulnerable now she was dressed.
“Yes, Paige?”
“How come you’re monitoring messages?”
“I was bored with the archives. I wanted a break. And it seemed like a sensible thing to do since you guys aren’t monitoring anything at the moment. Good job, too. Else you would have experienced a time lag in your communications about this important message.”
Paige raised an eyebrow comically. She didn’t know whether to chuckle or be annoyed at him. “Okay. Thanks so much, Bourne. But you really don’t need to worry about monitoring our communications. Most of it isn’t time sensitive, and we have protocols in place for when it is.”
“Oh, okay then,” he responded flatly.
The intercom went quiet. Paige sensed she was alone again. For the first time in her years in the safe house, she was glad there weren’t cameras in the quarters. That would have just been… creepy.
She headed back into the bathroom where she had left her wrist holo on the vanity counter. She strapped it back on and opened her messages. Bourne was right. There was a new one. From another sender she didn’t recognize.
Her heart started racing. She prodded the message in the hologram and opened it up. Again, she scanned it. This time, instead of a sinking feeling, she felt anxious and perhaps a little excited.
Her eyes scanned down.
“Fuck me,” she muttered to herself. “That is a lot of zeros.” She whistled out through her teeth. “Pheeeew!”
Her brain stopped processing properly. She knew she needed to dry her hair and style it, plus a host of other things in her routine, but all she could think about was talking to Maya.
She hit her implant. “Maya? Are you there?”
A moment later, Maya responded. “Yeah, what’s up?”
“Someone has just offered me a truckload of money to buy my company. I need a yoll-arita and some girl time.”
“Sounds good to me. I’m just finishing up at the gym. Gimme twenty minutes to get showered, and I’ll meet you in the kitchen.”
“Okay, you’re on!” Paige tapped her implant and the call disconnected. She carefully sat back down on the bed, allowing the new reality to sink in.
Bates Residence, Spire, Estaria
The Sark had gone down hours ago. All being well, Philip’s wife would be home shortly. She’d messaged him as she was leaving the office. Accounting for traffic, he knew it would be less than three minutes. Plenty of time to make the call.
“Yes, she’s here. No problem. You can give the boys a night off. I’m taking her on a trip off-world, so she won’t need protection. Great. Thanks, Jack. You have a good night, too.”
Philip hung up the call on the secure holo console in the living room.
That took care of the security detail. Now, he just needed to make sure that everything else went smoothly.
He waited in the living room patiently. He’d done this a million times before, albeit never to his wife.
The front door opened. He heard her high heels click against the polished floorboards in the hallway. He heard her place her things down on the floor. Her heard her take her atmos jacket off and then pick up her things and head into the—
“Hello, dear.” He smiled congenially.
“Hello, Philip. How was your day?” She looked frazzled. This might screw up his plan.
“Oh, can’t complain,” he said brightly. “Fancy heading out for dinner tonight?”
She cocked her head and smiled. “Err, yeah. Sure. That would be… lovely.”
“Good.” Philip grinned, getting up. “How about we leave in say, ten minutes?”
“Okay, fine. Let me just head upstairs for a few.”
“Okay, dear, no need to change,” he added. “We’ll go somewhere fairly casual, if that suits you?”
“Yes, fine,” she said, her mood clearly lifted by the prospect of a break from the old routine. She trotted up the stairs, leaving her shoes at the bottom so she could move more easily.
Philip hummed to himself, monitoring his own heartbeat in his chest. He was indeed nervous. The chances of getting this wrong were always high. Which, of course, meant that things had the potential to get messy. Which was the last thing he wanted in his own home. But then… orders were orders.
He continued to hum as he prepared the things he needed. He ambled over to the kitchen and opened up the main drawer, pulling out some cable ties. He very deliberately placed t
hem down on the counter, next to the plant so it wasn’t obvious they were there. Then he moved to another drawer by the oven and pulled out the auto-syringe that he’d prepared earlier that afternoon. All he needed was to get it onto a vein, and the machine would do the rest.
He placed it into his pants pocket and then ambled back to the living room. He heard her moving around upstairs. After a few moments, she seemed to be coming back down. He waited for her to nearly reach the bottom before he started moving back toward the hallway door. She was hurrying, putting in earrings and then rummaging in her bag at the bottom of the stairs.
“I can’t find my lipstick,” she muttered.
“Take your time, dear,” he cooed, leaning against the doorframe, watching her carefully like a cat watched a canary in a cage. Cool. Confident. He waited, as if just waiting for the perfect note in the music, fully aware of when it was going to come.
Carol moved from the bag and started heading toward him and into the open-plan living area. As she walked past him, in one swift movement, he put his arm out to stop her moving and with the other, jabbed the syringe to her neck.
For a second, she called out as if pleasantly surprised by his advance. Her face quickly turned to one of horror as she felt the jabbing pain in her neck. She turned, looking at him with utter betrayal, unable to move or do anything about what had just happened.
And then she slumped in his arms. He caught her and laid her down gently. Then he reached for the cable ties and started binding her wrists and ankles.
Kitchen, Safehouse, Gaitune-67
Maya was already in the kitchen by the time Paige emerged from her rushed beauty routine. Maya hadn’t bothered to dry her hair. Being full-blood Estarian, she didn’t have the problems Paige had with it going frizzy if she didn’t dry it after a shower.
“Yoll-aritas are up in three minutes. I’ve got some snacks in the oven.”
Paige grinned. “You’re an ascended one, you are!”
Maya turned over her shoulder. “I know. I just need to put in a petition with the Ancestors to recognize that!”
Paige chuckled and sat down at the table, still cooling off from the shower. “You know, it’s kinda neat to remember my Estarian roots.”
The Ascension Myth Box Set Page 175