by Terry Mixon
“I’ve tried to assure that there is no agreement, Master, but if she makes more reasonable overtures he may well agree to her terms. If only to get back at me.”
He made a clucking noise. “You’re too pessimistic. We still have many avenues to disrupt the negotiations. Perhaps it’s time to remove West from power in a more permanent fashion.”
Abigail shook her head, even though he couldn’t see her. “I think it’s far too premature, Master. The council is still more in her camp than out. Her assassination would only make them more mulish. Perhaps the engineered execution of some of the prisoners with the finger of guilt pointing at her? An atrocity would both derail the negotiations and taint her reputation.”
“I wonder if we could merge those ideas,” he said thoughtfully. “Killing some of the Fleet prisoners and then assassinating Olivia West. Those linked events could get everyone looking at Admiral Mertz as the guilty party for her death. That has possibilities.
“Keep a close eye on the negotiations and begin setting up plans to carry out the execution of some prisoners. If the moment seems ripe, we’ll see if we can get the dogs to attack one another. Call me as soon as something important occurs.”
He disconnected without waiting for her response. Abigail scowled at the view outside her window. This was risky. Impetuous. If things went wrong, she’d be the immediate suspect.
Which might be Master Calder’s plan, she admitted. He led the conservative alliance and his family had been in power before the system lord had crushed the planet. As one of only a few surviving members of that clan, he’d want to sit in the coordinator’s chair himself. With the death of Olivia West, he’d see Abigail as an obstacle to his ambitions.
She owed her rise in power to him, but she didn’t owe him her life. She decided she’d take steps to see that certain information about him became public if something unfortunate happened to her. Done properly, he’d find out and understand the message she was sending him. In the end, the real winner was the one left standing.
Chapter Six
The communicator on Olivia’s desk chimed. She answered her assistant’s request with the touch of a key. “Yes?”
“My deepest apologies, Coordinator. Lord Hawthorne is here without an appointment. He’s very insistent about speaking with you.”
“Send him in.”
The titles accorded to the higher orders by birth always made her smile bitterly. They were lords and ladies, just like the AIs that ruled them. Their ruling society had three layers: the Imperial lords who ruled the Empire, the system lords who managed individual solar systems, and the higher orders of humanity.
The machine intelligences always spoke of how they worked hand-in-hand with the human leaders, and the lower orders believed that fiction. Little did they know that even the most powerful humans were just as much slaves as they were.
William Hawthorne was different for a number of reasons. She’d known him for most of her life. He was actually one of her few friends—and her mentor.
The tall man with sandy curls came in and bowed his head. “My deepest apologies for interrupting your busy day, Coordinator. I bring word from my Lady Mother. She commanded me to deliver at once and in person.”
“Then come in and tell me. I can hardly wait.”
He closed the door and gave her a questioning look.
“My security team scanned the room this morning,” she said. “I’ve been here ever since. Speak freely. Did your mother actually have a message for me?”
He smiled. “She did, though that’s not why I’m here. My youngest sister is getting married next month and my Lady Mother would be delighted if you could attend.”
“I’ll check my schedule and let you know, but only because I like your sister more than your mother. She gets on my nerves with all her matchmaking. I’m tempted to tell her about my unrequited love for you just to get her off my back.”
William gave her a semi-panicked look. “Don’t you dare! Not even in jest! She’d never give me a moment’s peace, urging me to divorce Craig and marry you straight away. Oh, the scandal that would cause.”
He sat and gave her a considering look. “I might be persuaded to name my daughter after you, though. She’ll be out of the artificial womb in another two months and we still haven’t agreed on a name. Craig would be honored, I’m sure.”
“As would I. What do you really need?”
“I’ve spoken with the others and taken them the data you provided. Captain Black searched the few Fleet databases we still have and came up empty. No mention of an Admiral Jared Mertz.
“That’s not really surprising, though. Fleet databases are fairly segmented. We only knew the officers and ships assigned to this sector and the surrounding ones. The admiral obviously came from further away. Perhaps even the core worlds.”
Olivia considered what that might mean. “They’ve had a long time to clean up the mess on Harrison’s World. Why wait a decade? To see if there are any rebels still hiding here?”
William smiled. “I’d think you, of all people, would be happy to have the time to consolidate your rule. The orbital strikes mostly destroyed the existing political structure. I’m not sure I’d have expected a resistance leader to end up in charge back then.”
“The irony isn’t lost on me,” she assured him. “We financed the restoration of Invincible and were only weeks away from striking at the system lord.” She said the last with all the bitterness she felt toward their AI masters. They’d taken so much from humanity. And from her personally.
Her fiancé, Fleet Captain Brian Drake, had almost certainly died when the AI realized the humans of Harrison’s World were planning a revolt. His death had almost destroyed her. It probably would have, if she hadn’t been running for her life and helping rescue people from the devastation.
The Lord had struck at them without mercy, killing tens of millions. Then it had crushed their necks under its boot. The slightest hesitation to obey brought wholesale death. It could’ve sent probes down to take control of the implants in their heads, but it hadn’t seemed interested in that level of domination.
Most of the nobles didn’t realize the AI could take direct control of their bodies through their implants. The code in them was perverted. They thought of the lower orders as their slaves, but that was the worst kind of deception. The AIs that had crushed the Terran Empire could make them dance any time they chose to do so.
She knew this because Harrison’s World had a loosely knit community of resistance members. They kept memories of what the Empire had once been alive. Maybe it was closer to a religion. They certainly felt a reverence for what they’d lost that was close to worship.
They’d thought a superdreadnought and a few secrets from the Grant Research Facility would be enough to subdue the AI. They’d been horribly wrong.
It had spies on the ground, though seemingly not in the resistance itself. It had gotten wind of the coup, or at least enough information to believe that humans were a threat to its rule.
Most of her allies on the ruling council would be horrified to know the truth about her. If they even suspected her role in the aborted coup, they’d speedily see her executed.
“Are you even listening to me?” William asked.
She shook herself out of her thoughts and focused. “Sorry. I let my mind wander. What did you say?”
He gave her an exasperated, but resigned look. “I said that we’ve gone over the data we stole from Lady King’s network. Leaving aside her profound incompetence as a negotiator, we’ve analyzed the video she recorded of the initial meeting.
“Admiral Mertz is definitely on a Holyfield class superdreadnought. The same kind of ship as Invincible. The flag bridge layout is unmistakable. With his support ships, he’s too strong a nut to crack, even if we managed to slip some people out to Invincible and finish bringing it online. His trained crew and support vessels would slaughter us. Whatever plan you formulate needs to be subtle.”
S
he nodded. “I’ll give it my best. I told Abigail that I was going up to negotiate in person. I’ll bring back as much data as I can. Is there anything else?”
“One more thing. We looked at the meeting with the Fleet landing party. Something odd came out of it. Look at this.”
He sent her a video snippet through his implants. It showed a woman in powered armor standing up to Abigail’s obnoxious demands. Olivia found herself liking the small woman.
“Okay. What am I missing?”
“The men behind her are in a variant of standard unpowered Fleet Marine armor. So far, so good. Her armor is not standard marine issue, however. Also, even though she never used them, Abigail noted she had implants, so she’s an officer.”
Olivia frowned. “That doesn’t make sense. Only shock troops use armor.”
Imperial shock troops were the Empire’s most deadly ground weapon. The massive suits made them virtually invincible. The people inside them, though, weren’t trusted. Their officers kept them on a very short leash. At the first sign of a problem, their officers would eliminate them. The AIs didn’t want humans to possess that kind of destructive power.
“That’s what Captain Black said. We don’t have any marines in the families now, but we have the basic data. Marine officers use unpowered armor. No exceptions. And look at her size? She’s a tiny little thing. I could scruff her and she’d never land a blow on me. She’s not a marine.”
Bumped out of her comfortable mental space, Olivia took the time to consider the situation and listen to the exchange between the woman and Abigail again.
“She calls them ‘her marines’ right out in the open,” Olivia said. “What about her armor. If it’s not standard issue, perhaps identifying it will give us a clue who we’re dealing with.”
William shook his head. “That only deepens the mystery. The old databases identify it as Marine Raider armor.”
Olivia’s frown deepened. “What’s a Marine Raider? I’ve never heard the term before.”
“According to the records, Marine Raiders were the premier troops of the pre-rebellion Terran Empire. So heavily enhanced they could take out dozens of regular marines all by themselves. Artificial muscles, hardened bones, combat drugs that made them almost immune to pain, and faster than death.
“That armor is lighter than the stuff used by the shock troops, but these commandos could strike out of nowhere and be gone before you knew you were dead. There hasn’t been a Marine Raider in over five centuries. They died trying to stave off the AIs. Or, so we’ve always thought.”
Well, that certainly made for an unexpected surprise. Who was this woman, and what was her role? Had the AIs resurrected the Terran Empire’s deadliest killing machines? Was she a weapon the Imperial lords would use to stab Harrison’s World in the heart?
Her name was Kelsey Bandar, or so she’d said. Olivia looked forward to meeting this exquisitely deadly woman in person.
“Well, now that you’ve ruined my day,” Olivia said, “let’s have a drink. The good stuff. I might not be in a position to enjoy it tomorrow.”
She poured a drink for her friend and for herself. When he was ready, she raised her glass. “To the Emperor. May he rest in peace.”
William finished the ceremonial toast. “And to the Empire. May it rise from the ashes.”
Olivia drank deeply to that. One day they’d restore the Empire or die trying.
* * * * *
Jared awoke when his door chimed. A quick check showed Crown Princess Elise of Pentagar smiling at the pickup. His internal chronometer said he had an hour left before his alarm went off, but he’d cheerfully lose some sleep to see his girlfriend again.
He threw on some clothes and opened the hatch. “Hey! I didn’t expect you for a few more hours.”
She stepped into his arms and kissed him. “I know you have a busy day ahead of you and I wanted some time alone first.”
Her Royal Guard companions remained outside as he closed the hatch.
She hugged him hard. “I’m so happy you made it through that battle. I watched the vids on the trip out. God. If I hadn’t known in advance that you’d made it, I’d have been certain you’d all died. That was insane.”
The battle for this system had been brutal. “We didn’t have a choice. We had to win or suffer the consequences. We lost so many people, particularly the marines.”
“I saw some of that, too. While it won’t make up for the loss, we brought as many Royal Pentagaran Marines as we could pile into the corridors. They’re on Boxer Station. We left our ships there, too. They’ll need some remedial training on your equipment and how you operate, but that should help.”
He nodded. “It does. Not against the planet holding our people, but in case we have to do more fighting in space. We appreciate the help.”
“We’re allies. You’ve given so much to help us. How could we not give everything we could in return? We brought the heaviest ships we had upgraded to use the space-time bridges. We also brought extra crew to transfer to your ships. That should help fill some of the remaining gaps.”
Jared mentally translated space-time bridges to flip points. “I’m going to be in so much trouble when I get back home. Even with Kelsey making it an Imperial order to allow Pentagaran crew on our ships, the Admiralty is going to flip without a ship.”
“Leave tomorrow’s problems for tomorrow,” she advised. “I know you have a very important meeting this morning. Before then, I’d like to do something I’ve never done before.”
He raised an eyebrow. “And what would that be? I thought we’d been pretty…thorough.”
Elise smacked his arm and pulled him down to sit on the couch. “That, too, but not right now. We don’t have time and you are not going to meet a foreign head of state after a roll between the sheets with me. What did Kelsey tell you about what they found?”
“They found what might have been the implant center on the station. Are you wondering what they might be like? I thought we’d discussed that to death. You need to experience them yourself is the best answer I can give.”
She smiled oddly. “I’m ready to start.”
He opened his mouth to say something and stopped. A quick check told him that she had implants.
“I hadn’t heard the implantation center was operational,” he said. “I wish you’d waited. We don’t know this equipment as well as I’d like.”
“Kelsey seemed satisfied,” Elise said. She took his hand in hers. “And if she was going to allow Talbot to do it, how could I miss the opportunity?”
Jared frowned. “Wait. How many people are we talking about?”
Elise gave him a lopsided smile. “She’s already shepherded a few dozen people through the process. Some of my people, her guards, Talbot, Doctor Stone, and some scientists. The second round consisted of mostly my people. She didn’t want to get too far ahead of your approval in getting your crew done.”
He sighed. “Too late.”
“She said you’d say that and begs your forgiveness.”
“I should never have told her it was easier to beg forgiveness than ask permission. I’ve created a monster. If she’d asked, I would’ve said yes, but I certainly wouldn’t have put you in the first group.”
“Then it’s a good thing I didn’t wait. You need people to have implants, you know. The Rebel Fleet officers are implanted. If yours aren’t, that’ll set off alarm bells when your visitors arrive.”
“You’re right. Still, I don’t have enough time to get people to the station, see them through the implant procedure, and then get them back before the negotiating party arrives. Why didn’t she wake me?”
“It was late and she knew what you’d say. She invited certain crew members to come visit Boxer Station. If you approve, they have time for the procedure and the trip here. That’s one of the reasons I dropped in so early.”
Jared needed to have a long talk with Kelsey. It could wait until this situation was resolved, though.
He open
ed a channel to his sister through Invincible’s communications system. It would take minutes for her to respond, so he decided to make this brief.
Kelsey, you’ve officially gotten even. Go ahead with the people you sent for. And, in the future, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t go behind my back where my people are concerned. The chain of command exists for a reason. Come back with the crew. I want you here on Invincible when King comes up. Mertz out.
He returned his attention to Elise. “There. I’ve scolded her and given her the green light. Now, what do we do about you?”
Elise shook her head with a bemused expression. “You stared off into space for just a few seconds. That must’ve been the fastest ass chewing in history.”
“Hardly. You should’ve heard what she said when I got implants and didn’t tell her. So, what can you do?”
Elise seemed to consider his words for a moment and then stood. “Actually, we can talk about that later. You have plenty of time to shower. I’ve missed you and have better things to do than talk.”
That was a plan he could wholeheartedly get behind. Worrying about King could wait.
Chapter Seven
Kelsey stepped out of the cutter. Jared’s bridge crew filed out as soon as she cleared the way. Her security team, Talbot, and Charlie Graves followed them. The cutter crew closed the hatch and decoupled, taking the senior officers from Courageous home.
Jared shook Charlie’s hand. “Looks like we’ll have to start cutting you in on the action.”
Graves grinned. “I’m looking forward to getting back to Courageous and testing these implants. Now that you and the princess aren’t hogging them.”
“I bet. Invincible, please grant everyone present with implants the appropriate access to your systems.”
“Done, Admiral,” the AI said. “Welcome aboard, everyone.”
Jared gestured toward the lift. “Zia, Kelsey, Talbot, Charlie, and Elise. Let’s adjourn to my office. Everyone else, you know where you need to be. Start getting familiar with using your implants.”