“Might as well lob a giant hunk of metal at the cruiser,” Talon scoffed. “They’re worthless in a fight.”
“He’s right, ADIM,” Cassius agreed. “They aren’t like you, remember?”
ADIM twisted his head toward Cassius. His rotating red eyes came to a complete and utter halt. “Not yet.”
5
Chapter Five—Adim
“What could possibly be so urgent that you summoned me out of a meeting of the clans?” Zaimur asked Cassius.
After some days of travel, they were all back on Ceres Prime, on the command deck of the White Hand, which was docked within a private hangar.
“Even with Yara pledging her support, there’s some resistance to allowing this Tribunal push,” Zaimur went on.
“I’m certain you’ll be able to convince them,” Cassius replied.
“What is it, then?” The exuberant demeanor ADIM had watched Zaimur display throughout the journey back from Eureka had been supplanted by exhaustion. There were no servants on his arms. He was alone, hours of discussions between the clans to determine the course of a war that could no longer be avoided painting dark circles around his eyes.
“ADIM, tell him,” Cassius said.
ADIM stepped forward. “This unit has located the prototype gravitum weapon used to split open Kalliope aboard the Ascendant,” he said, spinning the story Cassius had instructed him to. “Against the will of the rest of the council, Tribune Benjar Vakari seeks to use it to bring this war to a swift end and avoid Tribunal losses like those at Eureka.”
Cassius said that the attack on the Ascendant would provide an excuse for them having the gravitum bombs; plus Elisha could support the fact that they had nothing to do with Kalliope. Additionally, it was a chance to cripple Benjar’s flagship.
Yet ADIM wasn’t sure if his creator was more interested in those strategic benefits, or in helping the former executor Sage Volus. Cassius’ heart rate accelerated when he was around her, just as it did when he watched the last recording of his deceased human son.
Sage was not a member of his biological family, so ADIM didn’t understand why. He had to trust in the wisdom of his creator, but they were placing their faith in too many other people. Too many unpredictable variables. Too much potential for chaos.
Zaimur’s face drained of its color as he looked to Cassius for verification. “You said the battle would infuriate him, not turn him into you,” he spat.
“He’s been blinded by greed,” Cassius said. “Ignoring the tenets of his own faith, and because he was right about me, the others won’t deny him.”
“I’ve seen the remnants of Kalliope, Cassius. If he set one of those bombs off here, he could—”
“He won’t have a chance to. Thanks to ADIM’s reconnaissance during the battle, we have the opening we’ve been waiting for. I’m proposing to you that we send ADIM alongside a strike force to commandeer the weapon.”
Zaimur bit his lip. “What happened to staying put?”
“Not a single one of your men needs to be involved. ADIM, what would you need to infiltrate the Ascendant?”
“Five hundred operational androids,” ADIM answered, just as they had rehearsed.
“Androids?” Zaimur’s brow furrowed. “Maybe your people thought they were more dangerous than they really were during the Reclaimer War, Cassius, but they’re no good in a fight.”
“Not in their present configuration. However, this unit will take control of them and improve their performance. They will serve as a distraction while this unit retrieves the prototype weapons that will be utilized to hold Earth hostage.”
Zaimur paced across the White Hand’s command deck and plopped down on the captain’s chair as if he owned the ship. Cassius’ face contorted. ADIM strode forward to forcefully remove the Ceresian, but Cassius held out an arm to stop him.
“If ADIM can infiltrate a New Earth cruiser only with that, why doesn’t he just kill the bastard?” Zaimur asked, admiring his own nails. “Kill all the Tribunes while he’s at it?”
Cassius positioned himself in front of Zaimur. “Because others would rise in their place. The only way to truly cripple the Tribune is to shake the faith of its loyal populace. People who have never known starvation or thirst. Who’ve been provided for and told what to do their entire lives.”
Zaimur stood. “I won’t be able to keep Yara in the dark about this. You may not want her to know about you, but this goes against the entire strategy I sold her on. She isn’t eager to sacrifice so many. Neither am I.”
“Tell her exactly what we’re after, then. We’ll show her one of your best agents accompanying the androids on this mission and pretend that’s all there is. You know what she’d do if she found out I was still alive.”
“She’d rip this asteroid apart.” Zaimur nodded slowly as he gnawed on the inside of his cheek. “I’ll have to find someone up to the task.”
“Focus on the clans. I’ll take care of that.” Cassius grinned. “I have someone perfect in mind.”
“Good. Keep me updated.” He turned to ADIM. “I’ll have my men seize five hundred androids under Morastus ownership and bring them to you.”
“This unit would prefer to accompany them,” ADIM said. “Each android must be thoroughly evaluated.”
Zaimur scanned ADIM from head to toe. “Fine. Just try to be discreet. And please don’t hurt anybody. Ceresians love their bots.”
“They’ll love to keep their world more,” Cassius said.
* * *
For hours, ADIM roamed the Ceres Buckle. He wore the guise of a Morastus enforcer, half a dozen of Zaimur’s most trusted operatives alongside him. He even wielded a pulse-rifle for the first time. He didn’t need it, but it helped him look the part.
Ceresians were everywhere. More humans up close at a single time than ADIM had ever witnessed before. They scurried about with a frantic energy that reminded ADIM of the crews of the Tribunal freighters he’d raided. Mercenaries, merchants, civilians—everyone seemed prepared to fight. It wasn’t a good time to seize their feeble android assistants, but the Creator’s will required it. Together, with ADIM, they could be strong.
ADIM stopped as they passed by a repair shop carved into the rocky wall. Beneath an overhang fashioned out of bolted-together scraps of metal, a collection of deactivated androids hung on a rack. A soot-covered mechanic fused the joints on one of their legs with a blowtorch. He was repairing the model, but not improving it. Keeping them chugging along.
It made ADIM’s circuits run hot seeing such wasted potential. He got that from Cassius. From seeing how Cassius had advanced these rudimentary designs into ADIM’s prototypes. Humanity’s insistence on maintaining the status quo confounded him. All things should be optimized.
ADIM pointed to the bots on the rack. His followers nodded and approached the mechanic with him. “Sir, the Morastus Clan requires your bots,” one of them said. ADIM recognized him from when Zaimur had pretended to shoot Cassius in the head for all of Ceres to see.
The mechanic turned around slowly and lifted a faceguard. His leathery skin was browned from grime. “Sorry, fellas, they ain’t for sale,” he said. “I’m fixing them up for their owners.”
“They’re needed for the war effort. The owners will be compensated for their donation.”
“You’ll have to take that up with them.”
ADIM stepped forward quietly and spread his fingers over the head of one of the inactive androids. With a surge of energy, he brought its pale, white eye-lenses flickering to life. He then infiltrated its memory core, digging through code and diagnostics logs. As he suspected, the android was in fine physical condition, a worthy frame through which to extend his being.
“Hey!” the mechanic barked. “Hands off! I don’t care who you—” He froze as he grabbed ADIM’s wrist and his fingers passed through the holographic camouflage to wrap around a colder metallic limb. ADIM removed the hand and flung the man against the wall of the shop.
“Th
ese six are worthy,” ADIM said, disguising his voice.
“You son of a bitch!” the mechanic groaned. He jumped to his feet and charged, but ADIM raised his pulse-rifle so that the barrel poked him in the gut. He raised his arms, eyes bright with fear.
The Morastus agent who’d spoken seized him and yanked him away. “I suggest you listen to him.”
The mechanic shook him off. “You damn Morastus pigs. Think you can do whatever you want just because there’s a war. Don’t I pay enough just to work here?”
ADIM stopped as he was about to assume control of another android. He twisted his head one hundred and eighty degrees to face the disgruntled mechanic. It would’ve been easier to remove any of those who opposed their actions, but Zaimur had requested discretion and Cassius didn’t disagree.
ADIM considered options to make this apprehension go smoother, and settled on one of his new skills—lying.
“If we do not take these units,” he said, “here will cease to exist. The Tribune comes.”
The words hushed the mechanic, and one by one ADIM took control of the other androids. They would all serve their purpose, save for one, where he discovered a faulty memory core. The potential error it could cause in his growing network was unacceptable.
The mechanic watched in confusion as ADIM detached the selected androids from the rack, and they began to walk away in a single-file line under his remote control. Ceresian androids didn’t need pilots, but they weren’t autonomous beings. They pursued tasks based on basic programming and rigorous response to issued coding.
ADIM didn’t have to say a word to operate them. In less than a minute they were all his. Their eyes were his. Their bodies were his. All their recorded memories were his.
ADIM’s experience with Zargo Morastus’ personal android had taught him much. He could control five as if they’d always been a part of him. He could watch with his main body as they disappeared into the crowd, making their way back to the Morastus compound, all while seeing through their eyes.
Soon, he would control five hundred. Nothing would escape his sight.
6
Chapter Six—Talon
Talon stood within the private Morastus crypt, buried deep beneath their compound on Ceres. Every occupied asteroid in the belt had them. Ceres itself bore thousands in its rocky mantle. They were where the remains of all Ceresians were buried after they died—one with the asteroids that bore them.
Better than being spaced. After all these hundreds of years and wars, there’d be enough bodies floating amidst the asteroids to form a belt of their own.
Talon knew he would have a spot in one of his own crypts soon enough. Right where he belonged, not in some cryo-cell on a solar-ark. But not before he found his daughter.
A Morastus enforcer kept a wary eye on him as he kneeled before an occupied slot in the wall. A bust of Zargo Morastus, a likeness from before the blue death ravaged his aging body, was carved into the rock face. His personal android’s head lay before it, along with a collection of other tributes and holo-torches that would never extinguish.
“Hello, old friend,” Talon whispered.
“Let’s hurry it up,” the enforcer grunted, tapping Talon on the shoulder with a rifle. “Boss doesn’t want you out here too long.”
Talon glanced back, seeing the face of a young man in the same line of work that Talon had been. A man who didn’t yet know what it meant to care about something beyond himself.
Who didn’t know that before Elisha, Talon was nothing. Not even real.
He sighed. He’d been stuck on Cassius’ ship for two weeks and was beginning to feel restless. It was the first time he had been permitted to leave, and it had taken appealing to his guards’ sense of admiration for their former leader to get there.
Sage and Tarsis were to be held on the White hand until the android, ADIM, was ready, unable to use any comms systems to ensure that nobody leaked the fact of Cassius’ survival.
Talon wondered which wrong turn in his life had led him to be dependent on the Butcher of Lutetia. Somehow, it seemed inevitable though. Zargo’s own son had thrown his lot in with Cassius Vale, after all.
“I don’t trust any of them, sir,” Talon said. “Sage, Cassius, your son. I wish you were still in charge. I wish…”
Talon chewed on his lip to keep it from trembling. He meant it all. They’d drifted apart after Talon left his direct employ, as was to be expected, but Zargo never had to let him out. People in that deep with the Morastus rarely got out. They knew too much. But Zargo had given him that. A chance to have a safe, peaceful life with his daughter. It didn’t work out in the end, but all the same. That was the stuff of fathers.
“At least I got to see you one last time before you were set free,” Talon said, placing his hand over the bust’s face and noticing the bright blue veins splaying under his pale flesh. “Goodbye, sir. I can never repay you for letting me take care of my girl. If you are here, or anywhere watching, try to keep me alive until I can save her, so it was worth it. Hell, keep us all alive.”
“Time’s up.”
An arm barred Talon’s throat and ripped him upright. He thrashed, kicking his feet as he was dragged backward, over the body of the Morastus enforcer who’d been watching over him. He struggled to talk. Struggled to breathe. Darkness closed in around his vision.
Then, as his muscles grew too exhausted to keep resisting, his attacker’s grip relented and allowed some air to pass through his windpipe. The barrel of a pulse-pistol pressed against the center of Talon’s back.
“What is Zaimur Morastus planning?” a woman asked, leaning over Talon’s shoulder just enough for him to see her face.
She looked grimy. Pale. At first, he thought it was Sage after a swim through a gutter. She had auburn hair—at least it looked like it, it was tough to tell in the dim crypts—though her hair wasn’t curly. Her features were also much sharper and she was noticeably younger. Barely twenty.
They could be distant cousins, maybe, but aren’t all Tribunals?
Her collar, however, looked like it belonged to a weller, the people working the water treatment plans down in Ceres’ subterranean ocean. But she had a grip like an arena fighter, not a poor Ceresian from down where low gravity made inhabitants grow stringy and weak.
“Who… are you?” Talon strained to say.
“What is Zaimur Morastus planning?” the woman asked. There was something about her accent Talon couldn’t place. Something decidedly not Ceresian. Something he hadn’t noticed when he believed Sage was one of them.
“I don’t know Zaimur Morastus.”
“How does he plan to attack the Tribune?”
“What’s the Tribune?” Talon said. He rocked his body back to break free. The woman clenched him tighter, dragging him back through the room until they were lost in the shadows of an older zone where nobody bothered to pay for upkeep on the holo-plaques.
“We know you’re working with him. We know who you were. Who you are now. Tell us, and you can live the remainder of your cursed life in luxury on New Terrene.”
“I’m a miner.” As Talon responded, his brain worked through all the possibilities. Was this someone working for a rival clan, wanting to steal glory? Until he realized the only one that made sense. An executor had him.
“An executor working the wells?” he said. “Learn anything good down there, a pretty girl like you?”
The woman’s face gave subtle tell of her surprise before it reverted to a level of seriousness only a Tribunal was capable of.
“I am not the traitor Sage Volus,” she said. “Tell me everything you know, and your daughter will not be harmed.”
“You won’t touch her,” Talon growled, making another futile attempt to break free.
“That isn’t up to me.”
“Liar!”
She tightened her grip until he couldn’t breathe again. “You Ceresian filth, burying your dead down here as if this lifeless rock could substitute for Earth. It makes me
sick. Disgusted.”
“Then go home,” Talon snarled.
“I am a knight in the darkness. I cannot.” She allowed him to breathe again, then spun him around and pushed him against the wall. Her pistol nestled under his chin, and from this angle he saw now how little like Sage she was. There was no softness. No flexibility in creed. Just black and white.
“I’ve risked everything contacting you, but His Eminence must be satisfied,” she said, low and menacing. “Tell me everything you know, and you and your daughter can live out your days on New Terrene. Far more than a heretic like you deserves.”
“Quite an offer,” Talon spat.
“It’s not an offer. Deny it, and your reward shall be pain like you can’t believe. Until you beg the Spirit of the Earth for mercy. We will make your daughter watch.”
Talon’s eyes darted from side to side. He was alone in the crypts, and across the room, the hatch had been closed. Probably locked. This was an executor, so sloppiness was out of the question. She had him dead to rights.
The gun stabbed into the soft flesh below his neck. “Talk,” she demanded, her glare boring through him. Her eyes were dark, unlike Sage’s, like obsidian.
Talon froze. Beyond the fact that he still needed to catch up on oxygen, he couldn’t help but consider her offer. A way to avoid a suicide mission and spend all his limited time with Elisha. What loyalty did he have to Zaimur Morastus anyway? Or Cassius Vale. Or Sage Volus.
He could arrange for Tarsis to come along maybe, do right by the Vergent. But why care about anyone else? Ceres was in a losing war anyway. It wouldn’t be long before this very hollow became a temple to the Tribune’s Spirit. What was the point in resisting? Only Elisha mattered.
Bang. Bang. Bang. Their heads whipped toward the exit. Unclear faces peered through the viewport up top, Morastus mercs or others, locked out. Talon could just barely hear their muffled voices demanding them to open.
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