Ghost Black

by Matthew S. Cox

  “I… no idea you were in that apartment. They could’ve killed you.” His unfocused gaze found her. “I never knew.”

  Risa attempted a casual shrug. “Hey, I almost killed Kree with a bomb. Guess nearly killing our daughters runs in the family.” Three seconds of giggling melted into crying.

  He pulled her into his lap. Hannah gave them space, and returned to the desk by the infirmary entrance. Risa thought back to the look he’d given her the first night she felt safe enough to sleep on the cot he’d gotten for her rather than crawl into the vents to hide. It hadn’t registered much with her then, but now, it made her feel like clinging to him and hoping Daddy made the bad things stop.

  A few minutes later, she calmed down enough to risk speaking. “I’m sorry, Dad.”

  Garrison reached up and pulled her head against his chest. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “Dad? I… I can’t do this anymore.”

  “Do what?” He let his hand slide from her head to her shoulder so she could look at him.

  “This.” She waved an arm at the wall. “I want out. This damn war ate my childhood. It ate my body… and my soul. Every time I set off a device, I’m a wreck for days. I can’t do it anymore.”

  “Done.”

  She blinked. “That easy? Not going to try and talk the superweapon into staying?”

  “It never really did sit well with me, watching you go out there.” He chuckled. “I kept seeing you as that little girl I found in the square, thinking that’s who they’d sent into danger. You won’t get an argument from me if it keeps you safe.”

  I can’t tell him about Bliss. He’d kill me. “I know I never saw eye to eye with General Maris, but he’s right. He’s the reason Shiro’s team is after us.”

  “What?” Garrison glanced around, and repeated his question in a whisper. “What are you talking about? Maris is involved?”

  “Not directly.” She stared down at her hands. “Maris kept refusing orders to run false flag operations on UCF targets. Someone high up the food chain said the MLF ‘grew legs,’ and wants it back under complete control. Maris knows it’s foolish to try fighting two wars when both sides are a thousand times bigger than you. We can’t take on the UCF and the ACC at the same time. Technically, we’re part of the UCF military intelligence command, right? Maris didn’t want to strike our own citizens.”

  Garrison sighed. “I’ll reach out to some old contacts. In the meantime, it’s no longer your problem to worry about. Take Kree topside and try to find that life we all took away from you.”

  Risa picked at her belt, staring down. “I don’t know… Kree deserves a real mom, not some Cat-6 wired-up terrorist.”

  “No!” yelled a tiny voice. Kree zoomed in from a shadowed teal curtain by the infirmary entrance, tears already in full bloom. “You said you wouldn’t go away!” She glared at Risa, bottom lip shaking. “I thought you wanted me.”

  “Oh, Kree.” Heaviness settled over Risa’s heart. She slid from Garrison’s lap to her knees, and wrapped her arms around the girl. “I do.” It’s probably stupid, but I do. “I’m just scared something’s going to happen to me. I’ve made a lot of people very angry. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “But… but…” Kree looked at her, wide-eyed. “You have speeware! No one can hurt you.”

  Risa squeezed her, and peered up at Garrison.

  He ruffled the child’s hair. “You care more about that kid than all of Mars and her people.

  “Garrison―Dad…” That’s going to take some getting used to. “Not fair.”

  Garrison smiled. “That’s not what I mean. I wasn’t criticizing you. A mother should put her child first.”

  Risa cringed, arms clamped around Kree, bracing for a shouted declaration of non-mommy-dom, but the child remained quiet. After another minute of no protest, Risa looked up at Garrison. He seemed pale, perhaps even older than she’d thought him to look minutes ago. She tried to force the idea of what her bomb might have done out of her mind.

  “Dad… I know exactly how you feel.”

  5

  Death Row Pardon

  Flat on her old bed, Risa stared up at the wall full of plasfilm posters at her right. Roughly one-third depicted the six preteen members of a boy-band named ‘Fifteen Minutes,’ which despite the name being intentionally ironic, turned out to really be an apt description of how long their fame lasted. Her twelve-year-old self couldn’t get their music out of her head. I bet it was all computer generated. The centerpiece of her display, an eleven-by-fourteen-inch sheet of plasfilm, bore the likeness of Alexis Santiago. When the image was taken, the woman had been twenty-one. Tanned, blonde, and strutting around in nothing but a few patches of yellow fabric clinging to her skin in a creative interpretation of a bikini.

  Risa smiled at the memory of Garrison’s face when she’d asked for that swimsuit. She’d figured he’d give her a hard time over the two-thousand-credit cost of a ‘garment’ using nanofilament hooks to stick to the skin, but hadn’t been prepared for his reaction. Now it made sense, though he hadn’t known for sure. Did he suspect? Then again, even an adoptive father would’ve nearly passed out at a tween wanting a bathing suit like that.

  The mere act of lying in her old bed made her feel sixteen again. Risa closed her eyes and tried to dream about her life before she’d ever killed anyone, before so much metal wound up seared into her bones. Quiet chirps emanated from a holographic jigsaw puzzle on the floor beyond the end of her bed. Kree had fallen in love with the puffy cartoon rabbit and become absorbed in seconds. Tiny hands shimmered wherever she ‘grasped’ the floating pieces and twisted them into place in midair.

  Garrison had given her that puzzle less than a month after finding her. Nine-year-old Risa hadn’t much bothered with it. She’d only wanted to hide. I probably hurt his feelings.

  “This is hard.” Kree whined.

  Risa sat up. Thin bands of static appeared at the edges of the holographic pieces, making the swarm of them dizzying to look at. A patch about the size of a dinner plate floated a few inches away from Kree’s face; though their shapes fit, the images didn’t belong together.

  “You should start with the corners.” Risa scooted to the foot end of the bed and sat on the edge.

  Kree, kneeling by the emitter, looked back and up at Risa for a few seconds before frowning at the huge cloud of pieces. “I can’t find them.”

  There’s another reason I gave up on this one. Risa slid to the floor behind her. “You check that side, I’ll check this side. Find the corners or any pieces with a flat edge.”

  “Okay.” Kree slapped at the assembled patch, ‘breaking’ the virtual puzzle pieces apart. They flew like fireflies back into the cluster.

  Minutes later, Risa had a collection of nine edge pieces.

  Kree leapt to her feet, ‘holding’ a two-inch slice of hologram dark blue on one side and grassy on the other. “Got a corner!”

  Risa smiled. “You found one before I could.”

  “You gotta find one now.” Kree reached up and ‘put’ the piece into play. The orientation of the illustrated grass meant it had to be the lower left corner.

  Over the next twenty or so minutes, the swarm surrendered the remaining three corner pieces. Risa claimed the second, and spotted the other two―but let Kree find them ‘first.’ Another fifteen minutes later, Garrison walked in wearing a weary countenance.

  He glanced in her direction, and a smile brightened his features. After standing there watching them for a little while, he crept to his desk without a word. Kree had a run on the right vertical border, placing twenty-two pieces in a blitz. She stood on tiptoe, reaching for the last piece but still falling short. A moment later, she looked about ready to burst into tears until she honed in on a battered chair across the room.

  Risa stalled her with a hand on the shoulder. “It’s not a physical board. It’s light.” She winked, ‘grabbed’ the entire puzzle, and pulled it down. Fourteen inches of holographic carto
on rabbit went into the floor. “You can move it around.”

  Kree tried to repeat the gesture of dragging the whole puzzle around. It took her a moment, but she eventually found the proper hand shape to trigger the computer in the projector. More amused by the ability to reorient the puzzle than continue working on it, she proceeded to swing it back and forth and spin it.

  Garrison chuckled under his breath.

  Risa leaned to her left to peer around the end of the hospital barrier that separated her ‘bedroom’ from the office. “Thanks.”

  He raised an eyebrow.

  “For giving me that,” she whispered.

  “Risa… I got that for you almost sixteen years ago.”

  She looked down. Shadows whirled around small fragments of rock as the puzzle continued spinning. “I know. I never did really say thanks. I’m sorry if it made you feel―”

  “It’s fine.” He smiled. “You’d been through hell. I didn’t take it personally.”

  They spent a few minutes in silence, save for the whirring desk fan, watching Kree amuse herself moving the hologram around.

  “Bad news?” asked Risa.

  Kree appeared to tire of playing ‘spin the puzzle,’ and resumed her hunt for border pieces.

  He rocked back in his chair. “I wouldn’t call it bad, but Maris isn’t exactly thrilled by your change of status to inactive.”

  “I can’t say I’m surprised.” Risa patted Kree on the head, whispering, “Need a minute to talk adult stuff.”

  Risa stood and walked to the desk. Kree’s fear faded when she realized Risa wasn’t leaving the room, and she resumed sifting among floating jigsaw tiles. Garrison hadn’t bothered unlocking his terminals, and peered over a password prompt at her as she crossed in front of him.

  “Of course, you know there’s going to be some repercussions.” He tapped his fingers on chair arms.

  Risa leaned on the corner at his left, one ass cheek on the desk, one boot on the ground. “Figured I’d have to give up my spot on the Row.”

  “Probably.” He chuckled. “Maris wanted you to train up your replacement, but I put the brakes on it. I’ll deal with that. I’ve got a feeling it’ll be a little while before we need another device planted.”

  “There’s a political shitstorm brewing. Everett didn’t say much about it, only that he thinks the director of military intelligence is going to be an issue.” Risa traced a clean squiggle in the dust on the desk. “If he wants me off the Row right away as some kind of middle-finger gesture, mind if I crash here when I’m ‘in for the night?’”

  He nodded. “It’s still your bed. And now you’ve stopped listening to that atrocious electronic garbage, you’re welcome to stay as long as you want.”

  She stared down. “It’s going to be awkward enough being here and off the roster. I have no idea how much longer the Front is even going to be around. Something bad is coming, and I don’t want Kree to have a front row seat like I did.”

  Garrison leaned his elbows on the desk and cradled his head. “They assured me you would be extracted from the site prior to engagement. They were not supposed to initiate unless you were confirmed clear. I had no idea you were still in there when I gave the go-ahead.”

  “Raziel.” She sighed. “He took out the ‘kidnapper’ with a PubTran. Da―Andriy came straight to my bedroom and stuffed me in the vents, like he’d been given instructions.”

  Garrison rubbed his temples. “Why? Why would he do that?”

  “He’s an AI, Dad. It’s like playing chess against a computer that’s forty moves ahead of you with a thousand variations of each game played to the end depending on how you react. Best guess, he wanted me to grow up pissed off at the UCF military so I’d be willing to fight both sides.”

  “You’re saying”―Garrison looked up―“Raziel is part of this dirty op too?”

  She shook her head. “No. He really wants both sides driven from Mars. Most of our people are either born UCF and have a natural loyalty to the government they’ve known their entire life, or they’re defected ACC who view the UCF as paradise by comparison. He wanted me pissed off and ready to lash out at either side.”

  “Target of opportunity.” Garrison ran one hand over his head and groaned.

  “Yeah, something like that.” Risa folded her hands in her lap. “I used to believe he was a real angel from Heaven, who chose me to do his work on Mars. Now that I think back, it does sound crazy. He tricked me out of my innocence. I am not going to let this war do the same to Kree. I’m not going to do the same to someone else’s kid.”

  “As long as humankind has war, people who fight in it will die.”

  She swished her dangling foot back and forth. “I’m not a soldier. I was an angry kid with an immortality complex and too much augmentation. I can’t even say how many of the people my bombs killed were soldiers.”

  “Those scientists were weaponizing nanobots for use against civilian targets.” Garrison’s expression hardened. “They’re worse than soldiers. You didn’t kill people, you stepped on roaches.”

  “I guess.” She picked at her fingers.

  “If you learned the ACC was planning an attack that would kill innocents, would you stop it? Would you feel guilt over anyone you had to kill to prevent someone from hurting Kree?”

  “Two free shots on goal, Dad. Cheapshot penalty.”

  Garrison smirked. “This isn’t Gee-ball, Risa.”

  She lifted her head to make eye contact. “You said you were okay with me getting out. Now you sound like you’re trying to change my mind.”

  He took her hand. “No. I am completely at ease with you staying safe. What I’m trying to do is make sure you understand why we asked you to do those things. I’d kill as many enemy troops as it took to keep you or any innocent citizen safe. I’d do whatever it took, and I wouldn’t lose four seconds of sleep over it.”

  “You’re a soldier.” She smiled. “Deep down inside, I’m a plays-with-dolls sorta girl. In another world, I’d probably scream at the sight of bugs.”

  Garrison laughed. “Now that, I can’t even picture.”

  “I want to give Kree the life I never got. School, a real apartment… not living like rats in a catacomb. Maybe you can get out too, Gran’pa.”

  He grumbled, glanced away, and keyed in his password to unlock the terminal screens. “There’s no ‘out’ for me, Risa. I can’t give up on it yet. I’m in way too deep. If this business with Everett goes south, I’ll do everything I can to shield you, but there’s no pulling my ass out of the fire by my own bootstraps. Besides, I’m still more than a little pissed off at Command for costing me Serena.”

  She pushed off the desk and stood at his side, hands on his shoulder. “I’m sorry. Maybe she was tired of pretending to love Andriy and rushed things along? What if she lied to him to make her move to turn him too soon because she wanted to get back to you?”

  He let off a sad chuckle. “Wishful thinking, but thanks. What do you think Andriy would’ve done if he agreed to defect, and as soon as he’s in our hands, she forgets he exists? If he doesn’t have an immediate meltdown, his loyalties shift back home and we think he’s ours. It’s dangerous and foolish, and the Serena I know wouldn’t have taken a risk like that.”

  Risa leaned to the right. “You knew the Front was―”

  “A cover story for C-Branch? Yeah. I wasn’t about to start a coup over it; I needed this.” He gestured with both hands at everything.

  “This?” She stretched up to check on Kree, who continued to paw at the maelstrom of flying puzzle pieces.

  “A degree of separation from the sons of bitches who think sitting behind a desk with stars on their shoulders makes them heroes. The solitude, the dark, and being ‘in the shit’ again. At my age, straight-up field work was off the table. This is at least close.”

  “You still want the UCF off Mars?” She smiled at Kree and sank down from her toes to stand flat.

  He grinned. “They’ve proved to be some
what poor policymakers. Arden was a damned mess.”

  “I caught a ride on a millipede driven by a synthetic; he had some interesting opinions on that.” She fussed with his olive-drab shirt, plucking lint clusters. “He said it didn’t matter what we did, because humans would always organize into some manner of government. If we did manage to win our ideal victory, something new would form, and it might be worse.”

  “Sounds like one o’ them ‘free-thinker’ types.”

  Risa smiled at his overdone redneck voice. “He had a point. He also mentioned how few people there really are on Mars. We should be worried more about surviving as a species than who’s pulling the strings.”

  He threw his hands up in a mock gesture of frustration. “Wanting to go on the inactive list, talkin’ all kinds of politics… Next thing I know, you’ll be lookin’ to go to university or something.”

  She offered a ‘who knows’ shrug. “Maybe. I’ll need to have some skills beyond killing people to get by.”

  Garrison swiveled the chair to face her, brushing a finger over his lips in contemplation. “What happened to all that ‘the UCF is a fascist police state that needs to be burned out like the malignant tumor it is’ rhetoric?”

  Did I really say that? She cringed. Yeah. I probably did. “I thought the military had killed my father… killed one of their own men for objecting to political ideals. I didn’t know…”

  He stood, placed his hands on her shoulders, and pulled her close until their foreheads touched. “I don’t have words for how relieved I am that my hot-headed little girl didn’t get herself killed.”

  Risa considered pointing out how he’d had every chance to stop her from accepting General Maris’s offer of cyberware, but decided against it and managed a weak smile. “Me too, but the storm’s still overhead.”

  “So, what now?” He sighed.

  “Now…” Risa walked back to Kree. “I have a puzzle to solve.”