Other than Rug, all the Quatro remained with the shuttles. They were too big to fit inside the cockpits, but they were perfectly capable of crouching just outside them with energy weapons trained on the Darkstream pilots, who’d been informed that any wrong moves would result in their summary deaths.
Andy’s back there, too. Andy, whose infection was festering. I won’t let you die. Not when we’re this close.
By using the leapfrogging technique, they were able to move safely and fairly swiftly. Before long, Tessa’s squad spotted Rug surrounded by five of Darkstream’s new MIMAS mechs. The HUD colored Rug in yellow, and a second after that, Tessa patched through a visual feed as well.
But Lisa wanted to see her friend with her own eyes. She ordered her squad to proceed with caution as she slowly advanced herself.
One of the mech’s heads turned toward her as she approached, seeming to see her coming. Underneath the patina of battle damage each mech bore, they all had differing designs. This one had yellow swirls covering its face and body.
“You’re Lisa Sato,” the mech said in a feminine voice, which sounded like it belonged to someone Lisa’s age.
“I am,” Lisa said. “Who are you?”
“Seaman Apprentice Ash Sweeney. But that’s not your concern right now. What’s of much greater concern is why you’ve entered Ingress without permission from the Darkstream garrison, accompanied by this Quatro with whom you appear to be allied.”
“We skipped customs because we thought we could prevent that Quatro mech from killing more people. Also, we have someone in our party in dire need of medical attention.” Lisa cleared her throat, struggling to meet the giant robot’s gaze. She was certain the mech’s visage had been designed to appear both menacing and impersonal at the same time. “As for my Quatro friend, whose name is Rug, she saved my life, along with forty-one of her brethren. Those same Quatro helped us to retake Habitat 2 from criminals. Most of the ones who helped us are now dead, but those that remain have accompanied us here.”
“Yes, they accompanied you inside shuttles you hijacked from our mutual employer,” Sweeney said, her voice cold. “Tell me: did these Quatro also help you kill Commander Laudano and his soldiers? There’s a warrant out for your arrest, Lisa Sato.”
Lisa had no answer for that. How could she make this metal-clad company loyalist understand the necessity of defeating Laudano?
Lisa almost laughed at herself. Company loyalist. She’s no different than I was, mere days ago. “Commander Laudano conspired with Quentin Cooper—the leader of a criminal gang called Daybreak—to consign the residents of Habitat 2 to slavery.”
Now, it was the mech pilot’s turn to fall silent, and the mech itself remained perfectly still. Near her, one of the other mechs twitched, which Lisa interpreted as shock at the specter she’d just raised.
But do they accept it as truth? She knew it couldn’t possibly be that easy. Nevertheless, we must try.
Without warning, a larger, darker mech charged out of a side alley, tackling Rug with a jagged shoulder and sending the massive alien flying to crash into a nearby office building.
“No!” Lisa cried, sprinting forward to place herself between Rug and the strange mech, who she recognized from the system net vids of the recent battle. She raised her palms toward it.
“Get out of my way,” a deep voice boomed as the mech’s arms became massive cannons, inside which energy began to collect and coalesce. That voice, while recognizable as human, was stripped of everything connected to humanity.
Its owner has endured incredible torment. That, Lisa knew straight away.
“I will not,” she said, proud that her voice shook only slightly.
“Gabriel Roach,” Tessa called, her own voice totally firm. “Is that you inside that bucket?”
Slowly, the alien mech turned to face Tessa, not lowering its energy cannons by a centimeter. “Tessa Notaras,” it growled, working through the words as though they were mouthfuls of taffy. “You dare return here?”
“Only for great need.”
“I told you never to return. Because of the evil you helped perpetrate. Have you come back to do more evil?”
“I’ve come to help finally correct it.” Tessa stepped toward the mech, looking much more resolute than Lisa thought she herself could have managed. “You want to talk evil, Roach? Let’s talk about our employer, who you’ve continued to work for.”
“I don’t work for them anymore.”
Raising her eyebrows, Tessa said, “That must be a very recent development, then. Because for seventeen years, you remained in the employ of the beast who ordered me to perpetrate the very evil you banished me for. I was blind to that hypocrisy, then—blinded by guilt. But since leaving for Alex, I’ve had a long time to think about what happened between us. Darkstream is profit-mad, and its main vehicle for profit is an expanding campaign of exploitation and terror. It’s always been that way, and recently it’s gotten much worse. They’ve already enslaved the population of Habitat 2. Next, they’ll certainly do the same to everyone on Alex. But it all started here, didn’t it? With their genocide of the Quatro, who we both know aren’t the demons they tricked everyone into thinking they were. Not even close.”
“A Quatro killed the only woman I ever loved,” Roach said, and for the first time, Tessa was visibly taken aback.
So Lisa spoke up, addressing Roach. “The Quatro you just attacked, Rug, is certain her brethren were provoked into war.”
The alien mech shook its head. “Even if I accepted that, I would never work with someone as duplicitous as you, Tessa. The news that you helped murder Commander Laudano and his soldiers only makes me more sure about you.”
Tessa spat on the pavement, then turned her glare on Roach once more. “Your interpretation of everything is incredibly convenient for you, Roach. Why am I not surprised?” She leveled a finger at the alien mech’s head, which involved angling her arm at quite an incline. “You obviously don’t intend to help us in any way. But I know there’s a voice inside of you, telling you that there’s something wrong with the way you see things, and something very right about how I’ve explained them. So, tell me: is that voice loud enough for you to understand you must let us leave this city? Or will you attempt to apprehend us in spite of it?”
A long moment passed, with Roach and Tessa locked in a silent combat of will.
At last, Roach said, “Get out of my sight. If I see you again, I’ll kill you.”
Tessa looked at Lisa, subvocalizing: “Let’s get back to the shuttles. I don’t know how long this offer will last.”
Nodding, Lisa got on the militia-wide. “Let’s move, everyone. Back to the shuttles, double-time.”
Chapter 6
Good and Evil
With the alien mech safely neutralized, contained, and onboard the Javelin, Bronson was driving his crew hard to complete preparations for their departure from the Belt as soon as possible.
Nothing was expected of Jake, however. Bronson had permitted him to pay his father a short visit aboard the Whale, to say goodbye.
Evidently, the visit could have been longer.
Right now, Jake was sitting in the Starlight Lounge with absolutely nothing to do, and had been for a while.
He still remembered the day Bronson had first brought him here. Before then, he’d never been anywhere outside the Belt. His main concern had been making enough money for Sue Anne to get the treatment she needed—well, that was still his main concern, actually. But back then, his life had been confined to the Whale and the endless series of comets they’d developed for homesteaders eager to put as much distance as possible between themselves and civilization.
The idea that the inner Steele System constituted “civilization” would have seemed odd to anyone from the Milky Way—Jake knew that. This entire system was basically the frontier, perhaps in the truest sense of the word since ancient Europeans had first colonized North America.
But to Jake, the inner system did
mean civilization, with its cities, its space station, and its ever-expanding industrial base.
And since walking into the Starlight Lounge to be wowed by Bronson’s promises of mech combat, glory, and riches, he’d seen that civilization for himself.
Despite it all, he missed the Belt. He missed Hub; the closest thing the Belt had to a city, and also the place Jake was from. Perhaps most of all, he missed life out here with his father, hopping from comet to comet, wishing for something else, without ever realizing he already had everything he needed.
I was so naive.
He’d been convinced, that the Ixa could arrive at any time, to finish off the remnants of humanity—or maybe one of the species would show up from the systems that surrounded Steele, which did show signs of occupation by intelligent life. Jake had believed he needed to join the Darkstream military, to use what he’d learned from lucid to navigate training, and to rack up combat experience. To become mighty, so that when aliens did attack, he could act like some big hero.
He’d believed that everything would always be simple, that he would always consider himself good and his enemies evil.
But as he sat here with his hands wrapped around a cup of cold tea, it wasn’t like that at all. He felt empty, with nothing but the blood on his hands and the indoctrination Darkstream’s training had left him with.
The handful of crewmembers that were inside the lounge kept their distance from Jake. He could tell they considered him an “other”—a mech pilot, who’d been given a shiny new toy, and who’d recently done battle with a fearsome alien robot.
If he were to guess, he’d say the crews’ feelings toward him entailed a mixture of fear and resentment. The way Bronson lavished praise and privilege on him didn’t help. Possibly, that was an innocent impulse on the captain’s behalf, though Jake doubted it. Nothing was ever innocent with Bronson. More likely, he did it to keep Jake apart from the crew.
Divide and conquer. That was the secret Darkstream mantra, he’d come to realize.
He decided to browse the system net, to see whether he could find any news about the situation on Eresos.
Scrolling through one of his social feeds, amidst the posts about everyday life, he saw a smattering of rumors that Quatro in mechs of their own were approaching Ingress. Because of the signal delay, that news would be several hours old, and it would be some time before he’d find out how Ash and the others had truly fared.
That killed him—the not knowing.
Idly, he refreshed his feed, and the post that appeared at the top caused him to bolt up from his chair, eyes riveted on the rectangle in the upper right of his HUD, which displayed the social feed.
A few of the crewmembers glanced toward him before returning to their drinks, but Jake ignored them, rereading the post:
“Attention to anyone near Hub: we are under attack. Strange robots have infiltrated our comets and have begun attacking us. We’ve contacted Darkstream but haven’t heard back. If you’re reading this and are able to help, please, please come.”
Willing the social feed to dissolve, Jake tore out of the Starlight Lounge and sprinted toward Bronson’s office, which was just a short distance down the corridor. He pounded on the hatch while sending Bronson IM after IM.
Finally, the hatch opened to reveal Bronson, whose eyes were underscored with black patches. “Price. What can I do for you?”
“Hub is under attack.”
Bronson inclined his head. “I’ve heard. It’s unfortunate, but sadly we can’t alter our itinerary.”
“Our itinerary? People are dying!”
“I’m afraid it’s out of the question, Price. We need all hands on deck back on Eresos. The situation there has gone completely to pot.”
Jake squinted at Bronson, unsure whether the captain had gone mad or he had. “To pot…?” He shook his head to clear it. “My family is in Hub, sir!”
Shoulders rising slightly before falling again, Bronson said softly: “This is what it means to be a soldier, son.”
“I see,” Jake said, and suddenly, he felt totally at peace. Something had fallen into place, and with it, everything had begun to make a lot more sense. Amazingly, the captain’s words had soothed many of his woes, and they’d done that by simplifying things for him. He knew exactly what he had to do.
“Are you going to be all right, son?”
“I’m going to be fine, sir,” Jake said.
“Okay, then. Well, if you ever need to talk, we have a fine doctor aboard.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good man.” Bronson cleared his throat. “Dismissed, Price.”
But as the captain was saying the words, Jake was already turning to leave.
Chapter 7
Sucker Punch
It’s beautiful.
Lisa had heard a lot of old-timers say that Eresos came nowhere near the custom-tailored planets of human space back in the Milky Way, and certainly it would have paled beside the natural beauty of Old Earth, though no one alive had ever seen that, outside of ancient photos.
Lisa didn’t care what people said, anyway. For someone who had lived most of her life in the Belt, and then the rest of it on barren Alex, Eresos seemed downright lush—even with its leafless trees, its mildew smell, and the sweeping Barrens she’d heard about but hadn’t seen yet.
Of course, Hub does give it a run for its money. Like the terraformed planets back in the Milky Way, Hub had also been carefully designed and cultivated to please the eye, using plants cloned from heritage seeds that had been salvaged from humanity’s homeworld.
But Eresos was…natural. Natural, which was supposed to be the reason for Old Earth’s striking beauty. She’d read once that humans had evolved to find the landscapes of Earth’s savannas appealing, with their winding water sources; their open plains that had enabled ancient humans to run down prey; and their scattered copses, perfect for hiding from predators…
“Tessa,” she said, and the older woman’s gaze drifted toward her slowly, as though she’d been expecting to be addressed.
“Yes, Lisa?”
“The man inside the alien mech—Roach. What did he mean when he mentioned the ‘evil’ you helped to bring about? Why did he call you duplicitous?”
For a long time, Tessa returned her stare in silence.
Next to Lisa, Andy’s shallow breathing was ragged though steady, and the two Quatro on the floor—Rug, and one who’d chosen the name Nail—seemed to take little interest in their conversation, though Lisa had a hunch that Rug, who she knew best, was in fact listening.
When Tessa’s reply came, it was subvocalized. “Let’s meet in lucid.”
Lisa nodded, maintaining eye contact while she slipped out a sedative and ingested it. In the crash seat across from hers, Tessa did the same.
The dream soon enveloped Lisa, and she found herself in the lobby which she’d set her implant to put her in by default. She accepted Tessa’s invitation when it came.
An instant later, she found herself walking along a mountain pass, with Tessa beside her. They stood in the middle of a landscape filled with mountains that stretched from horizon to horizon. As beautiful as the mountains were in height and breadth, that was not their most striking feature: rainbows seemed to cover each mountain. Some mountains only bore two colors in alternating lines, and others had more. Lisa spotted one that had at least five distinct hues.
Most of the colors were various shades of red and brown, though she also saw yellow, white, blue, gray, and black.
“Did you…make this?” Lisa said, her voice hitching as her breath caught in her throat.
“No,” Tessa said. “This was the Zhangye Danxia region, in ancient China. I don’t know what it looks like now, after the Degradation, but someone captured its likeness in virtual reality for all time, and now we get to visit it.”
“How did you come to learn of it?”
“I read about it in a book.”
Lisa nodded. Of course. Tessa reads about everythin
g in a book.
Suddenly, she turned toward her friend as she felt a scowl tighten her mouth and brow. “Wait. I know what you’re doing, Tessa Notaras.”
Tessa was ahead of her on the trail, and now she stopped walking in order to turn toward Lisa, eyebrows raised, her face the very picture of innocence.
But Lisa wasn’t fooled.
“You want me awestruck and lightheaded, don’t you? I can taste how realistically the dream has rendered this mountain air. This is the state of mind you want me in as you tell me what Roach was talking about. It must have been quite bad, if that’s the case.”
For a few moments more, Tessa maintained her veneer of purity and surprise. Then, she dropped the act. “I should never have taught you as much as I have,” she muttered.
“Enough stalling,” Lisa said. “Enough tricks. Tell me what he was talking about.”
Shoulders rising and falling more quickly, now, Tessa said, “Yes. Okay. Do you remember all those times you asked me what, exactly, Darkstream had done to make me mistrust them so?”
“Yes…”
“And do you remember how I’d always refuse to tell you?”
“You said that you would, someday.”
“Today is that day. And the reason I couldn’t tell you before what the awful thing Darkstream did was because I helped them do it.”
Lisa crossed her arms. “Go on.”
With a long sigh, Tessa continued: “Captain Bronson—Commander Bronson, back then—was in command of the first missions to Eresos, the stated aim of which was to secure a new home for humanity. Unfortunately, Eresos already had someone living on it.”
“The Quatro,” Lisa said.
“Yes. One of them attacked us, or at least, it seemed to. I now think that attack was provoked by Mario Laudano. Either way, it wasn’t enough to rile the troops like Bronson wanted them riled. So he enlisted me to help him create the fiction that the Quatro control the Amblers, and that they’d ordered one of them to attack us, killing some of our soldiers. It was only by chance that the Ambler attacked, of course, but I helped Bronson make the others think the Quatro ordered it.”
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