by Jamie Sawyer
“We understand,” it finally responded.
“They’re here already!” Feng said.
The side wall of Medical was transparent, allowing a view of the Fe’s main corridor, and that was now filled with hulking figures. Troopers in vacuum-rated battle-armour, black and shiny, with full-face helmets and flight-rigs mounted on their backs. They were accompanied by an army of semi-autonomous breaching spiders, each as big as my head. The mechanical swarm spilled across the walls and deck: clutching every surface for purchase.
One breached the hatch to Medical, and detonated. The door instantly gave way. Red-hot debris was thrown across the chamber.
Lopez started firing. It wasn’t much by way of resistance, but the closest Directorate trooper took a hit to the chest. In heavy armour, the trooper shrugged off the impact, flipped a grenade through the hole in the hatch.
“Fire in the hold!”
The stun grenade detonated. Light and white noise filled the room.
I rolled left, hit the deck as fast as I could, but only managed to take the edge off the explosion. Images were plastered across the insides of my eyelids.
Another spider-bot went off, creating a larger hole.
Medical descended into chaos. The Directorate filled the space with their armoured mass. Armed with heavy shock rifles, these guys weren’t here to kill us. No, they had come to capture. They executed their mission with crisp precision, working as one, as though they were a single hive-mind. These, I knew, were Directorate Special Forces. The squad had probably been born together, the product of Chino-Korean advanced genetic engineering. They would not stop, would not pause, until their objective was complete. What chance did we stand?
Lopez was screaming, one of the spider-bots clambering over her, pinning her to the deck. Feng was lashing out with arms and legs, slamming into armoured bodies. Novak slashed with a makeshift knife, the blade useless against the boarders’ hard-suits. The Directorate had already taken Zero, a single trooper dragging her unconscious from Medical.
Through a red haze I watched each of them go down.
My squad. My people. Jenkins’ Jackals.
Other soldiers had already surrounded P’s tank.
“Remember what I said, P!” I shouted.
There was something in the alien’s eyes. Some spark of understanding: our minds in synch. Did Pariah represent a cure for the virus currently spreading through the Maelstrom? If it did, then it couldn’t be allowed to fall into Directorate hands. We exchanged that knowing without words.
The nearest hostile waded through bodies, red-eyed goggles glaring down at me. The chest-plate of the trooper’s armour was filled with insignia—the Directorate badge, Uni-Kor’s flag, and a Taijitu symbol. Words were scrawled across the armour plating in Standard, scruffy like a child’s handwriting: SIM-KILLER.
“Fuck you!” I screamed.
I grasped for the lead trooper’s helmet, pulled at the sealed face-mask segment. It came free with a hiss of escaping atmosphere. I was stunned to see a face that I recognised staring back at me.
“Feng?”
No, not quite Feng. This version was different. If Feng was Mark I, this bastard was Mark X: older, battle-scarred, world worn. Surely this soldier’s selection for this mission couldn’t have been deliberate, but the effect on me was immediately disarming.
One side of the soldier’s face was covered by an intricate fire tattoo, and it came alive as his lip lifted in a snarl. He slammed the stock of his shock rifle directly into my head. It connected with my temple, and pain exploded in my skull.
Another soldier appeared at his shoulder, face-mask removed as well. A third version of Feng, except this soldier’s face was covered with an intricate snowflake tattoo.
Fire and Ice. Twins.
I stumbled backwards. Carmine’s photo fell from my hands, and I scrambled for it. Pariah had finally come awake, was violently thrashing its limbs against the inside of the capsule. Too little, too late. Around me, the Jackals were being restrained by the boarding party.
“Targets acquired,” Ice said in American-Standard. His electronic voice sounded so flat, so empty: at odds with the cold fury behind the face-mask. He nodded. “Objective is secure. We have them.”
Meanwhile, Fire just kept hitting me and hitting me. Until, eventually, it all went black.
And just like that, it was over.
CHAPTER TWO
THE BODY REMEMBERS
Six days later
A lamp, fierce as a spotlight, shone down on me. So bright that it was very nearly blinding, rendering everything else in the room in harsh, black outline. There was little option but to look straight at it though, because two metal stanchions on either side of my skull held my head in position.
“Is she awake?” came the curt male voice.
I tried to make out the speaker, but got nothing more than a silhouette.
“Yes,” was the response. “Her vital signs have stabilised.”
“Good.”
“She is fascinating, Honoured Commander. Truly fascinating.”
That was shadow number two. Sounded female, breathy. Excited?
I stirred from the table. It was stainless steel, freezing cold against the skin of my back. The clamps had just enough give that if I tilted my head, I could see my own body: the mounds of my breasts, the perfectly immaculate flesh of my limbs. They won’t stay that way for long, I thought.
More relevant than that, I also caught a glimpse of my surroundings. My eyes adjusted quickly, and I saw that the rest of the room was unkempt, worn out. There was medical equipment stacked in the corners, tiled walls that had collected a lifetime of grime, stained and splotched by viscera, mired by blood and dirt. Generally unsanitary. Not the sort of place you’d want to be naked in, for sure.
A torture chamber. That was what this place was.
The sense of vulnerability was unbearable. I tried to move some more, and found that I was spread-eagled, like a butterfly ready for dissection. I wriggled, really fought against the field holding me in place, but it was pointless. Breathing was hard enough. I was on a gravity-plate, and the field it emitted was strong as any physical bond.
I’m screwed, I concluded. Totally and utterly screwed.
While I’d like to think that I wouldn’t have ended up in this position except with consent, that wasn’t the case. I couldn’t muster the energy for a quip on that. There was nothing funny about this, not at all.
“Can she hear me?”
“I think so,” the female answered.
“Respond, Prisoner.”
“Perhaps she requires some motivation.”
The figures moved around the edge of the table, dipping in and out of clarity. One carried a probe of some sort, its tip lighting with a bright spark. That promised pain on a level that I really didn’t want to think about.
“I’m awake,” I managed. On the G-plate, talking was difficult, but not impossible. “I’m fucking awake, all right.”
“Good,” the male answered. “That’s very good.”
Small, short, with Asian features. Unified Korean.
Kwan. His name was Commander Kwan Ryong-ho. I recognised him from the transmission to the Santa Fe. Now that my eyes were adjusting to the light, I was beginning to make out the details of my captors. Kwan was past middle age, but with the edges taken off: the effects of a partial rejuvenation-regime showing in the lines around his eyes, in the new hair growth that struggled to take root on his pale pate.
“Welcome to my world,” Kwan said. The words were spoken in precise, fluent Standard. Kwan’s high cheekbones were etched with blue light, subdermal circuitry that looked almost cosmetic but allowed him to make head-to-head comms. “You are my prisoner.”
He lingered a distance from the arc cast by the lamp, with his hands clasped behind his back. He was always moving, his body always fidgeting, radiating impatience. He wore the black uniform of an Asiatic Directorate officer, with service-regulation trousers
topped by a tunic that was buttoned to his neck. A physique that, while not fat, was not that of a soldier either. He was shorter than me, I’d guess, and physically didn’t look like much of a threat. But if Zero’s assessment of the man was even partly accurate, his physical prowess wasn’t the issue …
“My colleague is Surgeon-Major Tang Li-na,” Kwan said. The second figure, the female, gave a slight bow of her head. “The Surgeon understands your kind, and will be conducting this interrogation.”
“It will be my pleasure, Honoured Commander.”
Kwan continued, “You will answer my questions, Prisoner. Is that understood?”
I had no choice but to lie there, but that didn’t mean I had to like it. “Fuck you,” I replied.
“She has spirit, this one,” said the Surgeon.
Her face was brilliantly lit as she positioned herself over me, and I could see her more clearly as well. Surgeon-Major Tang wore a surgical mask, tight over a defined chin, and was younger than Kwan, although I couldn’t say by how much. She pushed a shock of bright blonde hair—striking against her similarly Asian features—from her forehead, where an ocular medi-viewer was fixed. The multi-lensed apparatus clicked and whirred as she focused it on my body.
“We are of the Asiatic Directorate,” Tang said, “and you are in the star system Joseon-696, on the planet Jiog. This is a sovereign colony of Unified Korea.” She paused. “Under Council Directive 988, we have permission—indeed, we have a duty—to investigate any potential threat to the national security. Be aware, Prisoner, that the Honoured Commander has authority to execute any and all who trespass into Directorate territory.”
Although I already knew this, Tang seemed to take great pride in informing me of it. She was a patriot through and through, this one. I knew that I wasn’t getting out of this alive, no matter what these people said.
“We will start at the beginning,” Tang said. “Why were you sent here?”
“I’m not telling you a Gaia-damned thing,” I answered.
“What is your mission?” Kwan said.
Now there was a question. The European Confederation vessel Hannover had been our mission objective. We had been sent into the Maelstrom, into the Gyre, to recover the starship, or at least to search for survivors. There had been none, but we’d secured the Hannover’s black box. All well and good, except that the box and all of its data had been stolen …
Kwan asked, “Were you sent here to kill me?”
When I didn’t answer, Tang said, “Her silence speaks for itself.”
“It is exactly as I thought,” Kwan said. He wore distrust like a cloak. “The Alliance would love to finish the Directorate once and for all. I am an easy target.”
Tang nodded enthusiastically, very much taken with that idea. “Yes, Honoured Commander. She is an assassin. Her ship was filled with military technology.”
“Make no mistake, Prisoner,” Kwan said, ignoring Tang. “I will get answers. We have access to your ship’s mainframe. It will take time, of course, but eventually we will discover your mission.”
Then you don’t need me, I thought.
Kwan preempted that conclusion and said, “But things will be easier for you, Prisoner, if you talk. Who sent you here? Was it the Senator?”
That could only be Senator Lopez: the father of Private Gabriella Lopez. His political aspirations, to become Secretary General of the Alliance, appeared to be a constant no matter where in the universe we travelled.
“We already know that his daughter was among your squad,” Tang added.
I knew that it had been too much to ask for that fact to go unnoticed by the Directorate. Although I tried to hide it, Kwan must’ve seen the reaction that the Surgeon’s comment stirred in me.
“We have pored over your ship,” Kwan said. “Have no doubt that every scrap of intelligence has been secured, and will be analysed accordingly. Her callsign is ‘Senator.’ Why is that?”
Lopez was an unexpected prize haul for the Directorate. She would be a bartering chip to be used against the Alliance, against a rising political star. I didn’t like Senator Lopez much, that was for sure, but the fact that the Directorate now had his daughter in their custody was a major blow to the Alliance.
I ground my teeth and looked up at the ceiling.
“I suppose that it would be a badge of honour for him to claim the head of Commander Kwan Ryong-ho for the Alliance,” Tang suggested. “It would shatter the Directorate for good.”
“Which is exactly why you will not be getting free,” Kwan said, glancing down at his fingernails. “I take it that she is drugged?”
Tang gave a small shrug. “Yes. It is difficult to be precise, given her condition, but it should be enough to keep her under control.”
“You continue to impress, Honoured Surgeon,” Kwan muttered.
“I am grateful for your praise.”
Tang wore a medical smock that had started as white, but was striped with red and brown stains: worn more proudly than the various Asiatic Directorate emblems of service that adorned her lapel.
“Get a fucking room,” I growled.
“So you will speak?” Kwan replied. “Then we will begin,” he continued, eager to hurry this along. “Why are you here? If you have not been sent here to assassinate me, then what is your mission?”
“My name is Keira Jenkins,” I said by rote. “My rank is lieutenant. I am serving with the Alliance Army Simulant Operations Programme. My serial number is 967253.”
“What is your mission?” Kwan repeated. “Why are you in Directorate space?”
In the process of searching for the Hannover, we had discovered that the Krell had been infected with a plague. The contagion was spreading through the Maelstrom like wildfire, and many Collectives had already become infected. We had agreed to help the Krell search for a cure, and I had made contact with a navigator-form: a higher-function fish head, capable of speaking for the whole shoal. That AD hoc alliance had been shattered when the Black Spiral attacked the Krell ark-ship. I’d seen the Spiral’s leader, codename Warlord, deploy some sort of capsule, and I suspected that the Spiral were responsible for spreading the virus.
“Are you an infiltrator?” Tang asked. “Perhaps sent here to find state secrets? To steal information for your masters back in the Core Systems?”
Commander Kwan tried a different approach. “Your comrades have already spoken,” he insisted. “But I want to hear this from you, the mission commander. Think of this as an opportunity. Should you speak, you have my word that things will be easier for your subordinates.”
“My name is Keira Jenkins …” I replied.
At the edge of my vision, I could just make out two more figures, standing at what I assumed was the hatch to the torture chamber. Both were armed with AUG-30 PDWs—personal defence weapons—crossed over their enormous chests. These were the twins: Fire and Ice. Their presence was ghostly, slightly otherworldly, and their bug-eyed goggles reflected the light back at me. A battered medical drone also watched on at a safe distance, recording the proceedings for broadcast on the Directorate’s only remaining government news channels. Footage like this was pure gold for the propaganda effort.
“My rank is lieutenant. I am serving with the Alliance Army Simulant Operations Programme …”
Tang loitered at the head of the table. Her own ocular headset flashed and flickered, recording and analysing everything that I did and said.
“Should I make her speak for you, Honoured Commander?” Tang enquired. Her Standard was stilted, overly formal, but her eyes were dark wells. The aura of excitement that prickled about her was very nearly pheromonal. “I can, through the application of certain drugs, encourage compliance …”
“Not yet,” Kwan said. “She will break. She knows that this is best for her.” His authority reasserted, Kwan began again. “I am giving you one more chance. Let us start with your capture. Tell me the story of when you first arrived at my facility. How we found your ship drifting in spa
ce.”
“Controlled space,” Tang added. “Sovereign space.”
“Directorate space,” Kwan concluded, with a nod.
I focused on the light overhead. “My rank is lieutenant.”
“There were five simulators on your ship,” Kwan said, voice a quiet growl. “And yet we have recovered only four operators. We know your callsigns, your operator’s credentials. We know that the fifth tank was used by a soldier called Daneb Riggs.”
Kwan’s eyes narrowed. He had hit on a nerve, and he knew it. I fought to control the unconscious reaction to the line of interrogation, but it wasn’t easy. Tang’s medi-viewer ticked and beeped as it registered my shifting bio-rhythms.
“Where is the fifth soldier?” Kwan asked. “Was he killed?”
“Or has he already infiltrated our facility?” Tang suggested.
I had no loyalty to Riggs, not anymore. He had betrayed me, betrayed all of us … Kwan and Tang stood, waiting for my account.
But of course, I told them nothing. I wouldn’t give the Directorate the satisfaction of confirming even a single detail. I retreated to my safe place.
“My name is Keira Jenkins. My rank is lieutenant. I am serving with the Alliance Army Simulant Operations Programme. My serial number is 967253.”
Commander Kwan let out a sigh. I got the distinct impression that he was someone who expected to get what he wanted on the first request. In that case, he and I weren’t going to become friends anytime soon.
“Please, give up this pathetic charade,” Kwan said. He sighed again, showing his exasperation. “As an Alliance Army operative, you are an enemy of the state. An enemy of the Asiatic Directorate.”
What Directorate? I wanted to scream back. You guys are supposed to be gone. The Directorate is finished.
Tang nodded profusely. “We know who you are. Former member of the Lazarus Legion. You served under the terrorist known as Lieutenant Colonel Conrad Harris.”