“I’ll keep that in mind, but you should keep in mind that I’ve been around the galaxy. I know a thing or two about life. Besides, you’re not the only one who’ll be busy for a few weeks.” Erik tapped his PNIU and a data window appeared. His eyes darted back and forth as he read. “Lots of little cases. I kind of thought after my week off that I would come back to a lot more action, but we solved the only big thing last week in one day.” He looked at her. “Maybe we should do a patrol of the Shadow Zone between looking into some of this other stuff?”
Jia raised an eyebrow. “Just because we’re on the task force, it doesn’t mean wandering around at random will accomplish anything. I think we should concentrate on clearing what we have.”
“I’m not saying we shouldn’t, but maybe Alicia’s got something new for us. We need to maintain a presence down there.”
She could almost imagine him as a young boy, pleading to go out and play in the forest.
“One would think after everything that happened in Florida, you would want to focus on calmer things for a while, even if they aren’t as impressive.”
Erik grunted. “I suppose I’m just aching for a little action.”
Jia stared at her partner. “There was a murder last week. We solved it quickly. That wasn’t an insignificant incident.”
“But the uniformed officers caught the guy on site, and we had a camera feed.” Erik shrugged. “They didn’t even need a detective for that. He was ready to plead before we even interviewed him.” He eyed her. “That’s not really us doing anything as detectives.”
“Halloween’s coming up. Maybe you’ll get your wish. You read the memo, didn’t you? Pretty much every cop in the city is going to be on duty that night.” Jia gestured grandly with her arms. “Crowd sizes are projected to be twenty percent larger than last year.”
Erik looked hopeful. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been anywhere that cared about Halloween.” He cracked his knuckles. “It’ll be a nice change. I imagine like everything in Neo SoCal, they take it to the next level.”
“They do, but keep in mind, we’re just helping with crowd control.” Jia laughed. “That means no TR-7, and you should really look into getting a stun pistol.” She pointed to her two holsters in turn. “It’s not like you can’t carry both weapons at the same time. I’ve been convinced of the utility of a non-stun pistol, but you seem to deny the opposite.”
“I’ll leave the stunning to you. I haven’t shot anyone who didn’t have it coming.” Erik narrowed his eyes, fixing them on Jia. He didn’t say anything.
Jia shifted in her seat, uncomfortable. “What?”
“So, it sounded like you were saying you weren’t going out with that guy again anytime soon.”
Jia thought for a moment before she realized who he was talking about. “You mean Corbin?”
Erik nodded. “Yeah. Him. Down-to-Earth Businessman Corbin.”
“No. I haven’t decided what to do about him, even before considering work. Why?”
Erik pointed to his holster. “You did well in Florida, but that doesn’t mean you couldn’t use a little more training. How about you accompany me to the tac training center? Just like a quick thirty-minute session. No one’s at risk, so you can train like you mean it.”
Jia thought it over, looking for reasons to object, and couldn’t find any. “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to get some training in a more dynamic environment than the range. Even the best VR equipment can only go so far.”
Jia tried to not regret her decision as leaves from a low-hanging simulated branch slapped her face as she ran through the forest.
She gripped her rifle tightly. Sweat covered her and she slowed to a jog, wondering if her mind was making up the smell she had to be exuding. “I think Emma overdid it a little.”
Bright flames filled the dense forest behind them and smoke floated up. Heat caressed Jia’s face, but it didn’t feel right. Not hot enough. There were limits to the simulation.
She’d coughed when she’d inhaled the smoke and worried about the implications of breathing in so many nanites.
The intake waiver claimed the little robots would be exhaled without harm, but the fine print required her to sign away all rights to sue the company for any direct or indirect injury caused by the training environment.
Erik grinned and glanced over his shoulder at the burning mess in the distance. “No point in making training easy. If you practice using a harder scenario, it leads to normal fights becoming more effortless.”
Jia eyed him. “I doubt we’ll be bombarded by dozens of explosive drones during our next case.”
Erik snickered and shook his head. “Someone shot missiles at us how long ago? Those are a lot more dangerous than a few explosive drones.”
“Yes, just two missiles. But I’ll admit there were a lot of terrorists.” Jia took a deep breath, shocked that she had to debate the level of explosive ordnance that might be used against her.
Her life had become so dangerous and complicated in such a short time.
She took a moment to wipe the sweat off her face. “Everything else is fake here, but the effort is real. I can see why you value this type of training.”
“We used a mix of this kind of thing, pure VR, with practical real-world training when I was in the Army,” Erik explained. “Obviously, when you’re out on the frontier, you don’t have these kinds of resources, but they are great when you’re minting a new soldier back on Earth. We’re close to finished. As I mentioned, I had Emma prepare a short-duration scenario.”
Jia’s heart pounded from their earlier run and the attacks. She took a few deep breaths before swapping out her magazine. “How are we going to take down the target with so many drones around? We don’t have the mobility, and all it takes is one direct hit for us to be done.”
“Easy. We’re going to give them an easy target. I’m going to draw their attention, and you’ll take down the target.”
“Emma won’t fall for that,” Jia replied.
Erik shook his head. “She’s not controlling the simulation. She just programmed it.”
The AI snickered through both PNIUs. “It’d be pointless to develop a simulation that would always result in your defeat, although it would be trivial, considering my genius and general capabilities. I’m trying to offer valuable training scenarios customized to your relative ability levels and drawing on your past experience. Please note that doesn’t mean that all strategies that work in one scenario will work in another. I know you value your ever-so-important human intuition, but I’m not a normal AI.”
Jia nodded at a wide building with an open hangar about fifty meters from the edge of the forest. An open field separated the trees from the hangar.
A single-seat white atmo-limited fighter was parked inside, several missiles attached under the body and backswept wings. Her gaze dropped to the disc-shaped magnetic explosive clipped to her belt.
Erik carried a similar device.
They needed to destroy the fighter to complete the scenario, and the winning parameters noted that “a significant amount of damage was required.”
Just shooting up the fighter wouldn’t work, the idea being it would be too easy to repair in a real-world scenario. That seemed to define the modern world. Advanced technology couldn’t save everything and everyone, but short of massive damage or death, most things and people were salvageable.
“Okay, the drones I’ll buy, but this target?” Jia pointed to the fighter. “I doubt we’ll have to blow up any fighters as cops. Those terrorists had flitters, and you can bring down flitters without explosives.”
“Here’s hoping we won’t have to deal with fighters or even exoskeletons,” Erik replied merrily. “But I’m not convinced.” His smile disappeared. “And keep in mind, if you’re helping me with my personal investigation, it could lead to something heavier than you’d expect.”
Jia furrowed her brow in concern and leaned toward him to whisper, “What someone can get away wi
th at an automated mine on a far frontier moon and what they can get away with on Earth are two separate situations. I doubt we’ll have to deal with a fighter.”
“You’re assuming this ends on Earth.” Erik crept forward, fallen branches crunching under his boots. “I’m assuming it just starts here. For all I know, I’ll be crashing a boarding pod into a destroyer.”
Jia cleared her throat. “Fine. Let’s go blow up a fake fighter. That way we’ll be prepared to take down a destroyer.” She looked around to make sure nothing was sneaking up. “The sad part is, all of that sounds reasonable when you say it.”
“Glad you believe in me.”
“I believe enough.” Jia nodded at the hangar. “What’s the plan?”
“You wait until I’ve got most of the drones after me,” Erik suggested. “Stay in the forest until then. You’re fast. You can clear the field and set the explosive before they can peel back and get you, especially if you head deeper into the hangar and hide in a back room.”
“I’m glad you believe in me, too.”
Erik grinned. “It’s good to have people you trust watching your back.”
Both detectives continued forward until they arrived at the edge of the forest.
As had been the case since the beginning of the scenario, there wasn’t a single soldier in sight. Thick swarms of drones circled overhead, their normally quiet hums melding into an unsettling symphony. Each carried a modest but effective explosive.
“Time to see how fast I can run,” Erik muttered, pushing his boot toe deeper into the ground. “You ready?”
Jia nodded.
“Three, two, one.” Erik burst out of the forest and opened fire. Two drones fell immediately, but he didn’t move toward the hangar. Instead, he concentrated on spraying bullets at the drones and running along the tree line, cackling as if he could unsettle the simulated machines.
The swarm of drones swirled in the air before diving toward Erik. He darted back into the forest, and several drones exploded when they hit the ground or an unfortunate tree.
Even if they lacked the full force of non-VR explosions, the bright flashes, collapsing trees, and cloud of dirt looked all too real. Jia’s heart rate kicked up after finally having slowed from the previous attack.
Jia took a deep breath and sprinted toward the fighter. It wasn’t that far away, but neither were the drones near the back of the swarm that broke away and headed toward her. Others continued their sacrificial dive-bombing of Erik, but his quick movements in and out of the forest saved him from any direct hits. The last couple of drones leveled out before their final attack as if they were adapting to his movement pattern.
It wouldn’t be long before they finished their deadly mission.
They could win. Jia just had to do her part. Her lungs burned and her legs ached as she pushed into the hangar and past the nose of the fighter. She dropped her rifle and yanked the explosive charge off her belt. She lifted it and frowned.
“Something’s wrong,” she wheezed between ragged breaths. “The power indicator’s off.” She pressed the activator, but the timer didn’t appear. “Oh, come on.”
“That’s what battle is: one long string of people cursing and saying, ‘Oh, come on,’” Erik offered with a laugh. “Haven’t you ever heard that no plan survives contact—” Another explosion sounded. “Fake dirt tastes nasty. Sorry, survives contact with the enemy?”
Emma laughed, her tone mocking. “I probably shouldn’t give you a hint, but I will only point out that you’ve already encountered enemies in the real world who were able to jam devices or had access to EMPs. Not all explosives are hardened against that sort of thing, and if you’re thinking you can just shoot it to set it off, all that would accomplish is making a mess. It’s simulated properly, and requires a certain level of energy to activate. I suppose it would go off if it was caught in another explosion, but if you had that, you wouldn’t need another explosive, now, would you?”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Jia scrubbed a hand over her face. Even if it was a simulation, she didn’t like losing, especially not when Emma was being so smug.
Half the forest now burned, the smoke rising into the sky. The illusion was maintained well enough that Jia couldn’t clearly distinguish the roof. Four drones hovered near the front of the hangar, not descending.
Jia stared at them. Why weren’t they moving?
Another explosion rocked the forest.
Erik hissed. “I’m out. The system’s got me immobile, and it’s covering me with sensors. It’s funny. I look at myself, and I see nothing but a blurry outline.”
“It seems your sacrifice was in vain,” Emma mocked. “I’ll speak of your bravery at your funeral.”
There was no way Jia could let the AI win after that speech.
“The scenario parameters are just that we have to blow up the fighter, right?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Erik replied. “The backstory being it’s the air support that’s going to take out our advancing unit.”
“I did think the context was important,” Emma explained. “Training without context is pointless. All the leading training authorities say so.”
A feral grin took over Jia’s face as she stared down the drones. “But the parameters don’t say anything about the attacking side having to survive.”
“No, I suppose not.” Emma snorted. “But what good is a victory where you lose all your forces? That’s not even Pyrrhic. It’s just pathetic.”
“Nope,” Erik suggested. “Your background scenario makes it clear. If this were a real situation, we would need to protect our unit. Sometimes the few have to sacrifice for the many to win the battle and the war. You got an idea, Jia?” He sounded enthusiastic.
“Yes, I do.” Jia shook out her hands. “I don’t know if it’ll work, but I might as well try.” She grabbed the explosive from the ground and tossed it a few meters from her current position, then took several deep breaths and rushed forward. The drones immediately dropped altitude. She held her position, waiting as the small robotic craft zoomed toward her. When they had closed to within a few meters, she spun and leapt off the ground, looking over her shoulder.
Two of the drones stopped immediately, hovering in place, but another two continued in her direction. One smashed into the ground, exploding near where she had dropped her charge, and a secondary explosion ripped from the ground. Jia careened through the air as if pushed by an invisible hand but didn’t feel the burn she would have expected in a real blast.
She couldn’t move. Thin silver lines surrounded her body, both to protect her and enforce her status as a corpse. Her impact was soft, but the bright light of the secondary explosion forced her to close her eyes.
A moment later, when Jia opened them, the hangar was gone. Only the empty tactical simulation room remained. The silver floor rippled a few times. She pushed up, unharmed, and able to move freely.
Erik jogged from the other side of the room with a big, stupid grin on his face. “Good job.”
“But she was right,” Emma observed. “You’re both dead.”
“Hey, but we saved the unit.” Erik patted his shoulder and winced. “Got a little more banged up than the safeties usually allow, but I’ll live.”
“Interesting,” Emma murmured. “I wouldn’t have thought both of you would be willing to die, but then again, it’s only simulated death, so it proves nothing.”
“Hey,” Erik began. “If you train seriously, when the time comes, you’ll act seriously.”
Jia grimaced. “I’m not planning to blow myself up anytime soon.”
Erik shrugged. “But the fact that you could even think about doing it means you might be able to in the future if you needed to. For now, though, how about us ghosts go get a beer?”
Chapter Forty
October 30, 2228, Neo Southern California Metroplex, Police Enforcement Zone 122 Station, Break Room
Erik resisted a smirk as he stepped into the break room and spotted Ja
red Thompson.
Of all the goals that concerned him on a daily basis, making friends was far down the list. Sure, having a good relationship with the other detectives would help cut down on tensions, but the other detectives couldn’t seem to grasp that Erik wasn’t going to abandon Jia.
Untangling the tight web of laziness, corruption, and self-serving crap that defined the NSCPD might take years, as the members of the old guard slowly quit or were fired.
People like Captain Ragnar and the new incoming chief would handle that. Erik would focus on his partner, solving cases, and avenging his unit.
Jared sipped a cup of coffee, a sour look on his face. These days, he wore the expression so often it was like he’d been genetically engineered to only make that face. Erik considered pointing that out to him, but that would cross the line into needless antagonizing.
“Hey, Thompson,” Erik offered instead. He headed toward the coffee machine with his own cup. “Ready for Halloween? It doesn’t sound like it’s going to be that bad, based on those last reports. No credible serious threats in a place like this. It’s almost a miracle.”
“Miracle? What miracle?” Jared growled. “Ragnar’s been working us like dogs these last two weeks, and mandatory overtime is just another way of doing that. I don’t care if he got the orders from on high. He should have kept things lighter in the run up to Halloween.”
Erik began to fill his cup, the rich aroma tickling his nostrils. “What did you expect him to do? It’s not like the captain gets to set a crime quota. Things got quiet for a little bit and we got lucky, but they’re heating up again now. We’re lucky that the cases are mostly easy to handle. Not always exciting, I’ll grant you, but we’re the cops. We handle crime.”
“You’re sounding more and more like Lin.”
Erik chuckled. He wasn’t going to throw the first verbal punch, but Jared had made it so he didn’t need to. “And that’s supposed to be an insult? Try harder, Thompson.”
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