by C. T. Phipps
Ida was sitting on the side of her bed, wearing a pair of micro-spectacles as she read from a databook of what I believed was The Chronicles of Narnia. A side-screen was open for composing some sort of letter while she did so.
I was wearing a captain’s white jumpsuit and great coat I’d picked up at Lucifer City, where we’d dropped off all of the enemy forces except for a skeleton crew we’d stunned and proceeded to toss out in a set of escape pods before entering jumpspace. It felt surprisingly good and, to my immense relief, I’d also found my identity was cleared of all charges.
My fake identity, at least.
I was Marcus Grav again as Judith had corrected all of the data files on it that might clue anyone in to its fake veracity. I’d decided to leave behind my old life to my doppelganger, who was already announcing his victory at Shogun across the holonets. The Crius Provisional Government was in the process of disintegrating and would probably fall to the Free Systems Alliance within the week. I was still deciding if that was my problem.
Ida looked up from her databook. “I see the crew has decided to accept you as their new Captain.”
“We decided to put it to a vote,” I said, shrugging. “Half the crew is Sector Seven and half the crew are Commonwealthers, so it came down to all of them wanting to stay out of this war. They actually elected William as the captain first, but he deferred.”
“I’m surprised,” Ida said. “He’d have made a good captain.”
“He would have, but I think he’s pathologically allergic to authority,” I said, smiling, “The others weren’t exactly fond of me after they found out what the real Cassius Mass was doing on Shogun, but I convinced them to acquiesce.”
“Lying to your crew is very easy,” Ida said, sighing. “You’ll learn that as captain.”
“Oh, I told them the truth,” I said, smiling. “They just didn’t believe me. Current theories range from me being his doppelganger, a Cassius Mass impersonator, a conman who took that identity to get rich women to sleep with him, and a half-dozen other equally implausible ideas. The fact my DNA doesn’t match his is enough to convince them it’s all a big misunderstanding and they shouldn’t try to turn me in to the authorities, though.”
“Got your DNA fully clouded, did you?”
“Isla helped.” She’d also made sure my face looked like it had before, though the doctor had added a few improvements, so I was a great deal better looking than any non-genetically enhanced individual had any right to be.
“How are you and she?” Ida asked.
“Good friends,” I said, smiling. “Judith feigns jealousy but those two have more in common than not. Besides Isla and Clarice are back together. Not that they were really apart, I suppose, but for making Clarice put her under house arrest for a day.”
“I did what I had to do,” Ida said. “But that excuse rings a bit hollow over time.”
“That it does.”
“So, you’re just going to sit out this war?” Ida asked.
“I’m going to try,” I said, sighing. “The Commonwealth is already moving all of its forces to Sector 7, but the addition of the Chel and many neutral systems announcing their support is making this a bigger war than it has any right to be. If they’re smart, they’ll try to find a diplomatic solution. Judith calculated they were actually grossly in debt and overstretched before the war. Either way, joining the Community is dead in the water and it’s going to probably break up in a generation.”
“I wouldn’t count on it,” Ida said. “The Watchers have kept it trudging on before.”
“Not my fight,” I said. “Though, when I drop you off at the nearest Watcher substation, I’ll leave you some insights into my doppelganger. It’s the least I can do.”
“Not afraid I’ll come after you once I get this all sorted out?”
“Will you?”
Ida paused. “The fact you’re asking me that question and expecting an honest answer worries me about you, son. However, no, I won’t. I’ve got bigger fish to fry and I don’t just mean the Free Systems Alliance.”
“Judith told me she’d forwarded you all of her data.”
“How is your other Robot Girl?”
“Other Robot Girl?” Judith said over the cell’s intercom.
“She’s too big for a bioroid body,” I said, rubbing the back of my head. “Judith has planted herself in the ship’s databanks as well as my cybernetics, the starfighters I’ve purchased, and the bioroid body Zoe prepared for her late…sister. It’s pretty cramped compared to the vistas she’s used to but large enough to relax in.”
“I have to tell my superiors about her,” Ida said, shaking her head. “A Cognition A.I. is too dangerous to let loose.”
“Understood,” I said, nodding. “Please also inform them, if you do, about the fact we’ve got datapackets spread across the galaxy that will reveal the Watcher’s own experiments with Cognition A.I. Like creating the Fixers to divert suspicion from their experiments and look like the Commonwealth had a check on the Watcher’s power. Are the Fixers even aware they’re just a branch of your department? Do they know their Cognition A.I. are the same ones that survived the Galactic Dark Age?”
The Nobility had corrupted most of their kind during the Great Collapse but not all of them had been destroyed. Some had simply gone deep into mankind’s computer systems or hitched rides onto alien vessels, dwelling in the databanks of the Community with their colleagues there. The Watchers were just one of their tools spread across the galaxy, trying to protect a humanity that despised them.
Even Judith had been surprised by that. But it explained how Ida had always been ahead of things. Too bad Hiro had gone off script. He’d been there to throw off suspicion from Ida’s efforts, not actually stop her.
It had gotten him killed.
Ida paused. “You are way too smart for your own good, son.”
“Hunk-A-Junk told me we should work together on this.”
“Work together?”
“I intend to live a normal life after this,” I said, shaking my head. “But Judith isn’t exactly all too keen on that.”
“The Other Cassius lost his wife,” Judith said. “He’ll be insane with grief and lashing out.”
It was a rare situation you could say you knew exactly what another person was feeling but my doppelganger had surely found out by now that Zoe had killed his wife and taken her body. Worse, that Zoe was already dead by his original self’s hand and his dead wife’s body inhabited by yet another copy. The Other Cassius was no doubt fuming with hatred for me and misplaced rage. I’d made a powerful enemy through no real fault of my own, but I knew he wouldn’t let this slide.
I wouldn’t.
“There’s also a lot of other Elder Markers out there and relics Zoe knew of and Judith now has access to the databanks of. Things that can maybe provide humanity an insight into our enemy.”
“They’re too powerful to fight,” Ida said.
“Yes, but maybe there’s an alternative to war with them,” I said. “Teach them to appreciate music instead of human chess.”
Ida snorted at that. “So, what you’re saying is we may be seeing more of each other in the future?”
“Lucifer willing.” I didn’t believe in the Devil, but someone had my back.
To be continued in:
LUCIFER’S NEBULA
Book Two of the Lucifer’s Star Series