Transcendent (9781311909442)

by Halstead, Jason

  “You deserve it!” she shouted. “Damn it, Krys, I—I—why did you have to do this?”

  “I didn’t have any other choice.”

  “Yes you did!” she spat. “You had me. I gave you me, or at least I tried to. Is that it? Is there somebody out there? Somebody living like a savage who you prefer?”

  “Shelby, stop,” Krys pleaded. “There’s not anybody else! It’s just—they’re my friends! Why can’t you understand that? I can’t let them die.”

  “Friends,” she snarled. “Friends are acquaintances. People you have something in common with for a little while. Then you move on when circumstances change. Even social contracts don’t require treason!”

  “Treason?” Krys gulped. He’d read the postings and heard the news alerts. Anyone aiding a rebellious activity, either directly or through failing to act, was guilty of it. “So what, you’re going to shoot me because I’m not callous enough to throw my friends away like a piece of fruit that’s gone bad?”

  Shelby stared at him, her chin quivering and her hands trembling. She hugged them across her chest, the muscles beneath her skin cording with the effort she took to control herself. “I’m in line to be promoted to captain soon,” she said. “That would mean a transfer to the starport. If we stopped acting like savages and drew up a social contract, you could have come with me. Except now I can’t let you anywhere near the starport. How do I know you’re not feeding the terrorists information?”

  “What? I’m not a terrorist!” Krys said as he lurched to his feet. A small voice nagged in the back of his head that he’d been prepared to become one. He’d trained with Mig, learning how to fight and planning and preparing for it. He’d even sacrificed himself for his friends and hoped he could find a way to get back to them with information.

  Instead, he’d turned soft. He’d found the lure of steady food, a soft bed, and running water too much to pass up. Having the attention and affection of the highest ranking officer in the colony was a nice perk, too. Krys shook his head and sighed. “I’m not a terrorist,” he said again.

  “You sound disappointed.”

  He shrugged. “Does it matter anymore?”

  “I guess that’s up to you.”

  Krys looked up at her, surprised by her tone. She sounded like she was pleading, not accusing. “We’re so different,” he mumbled.

  She snorted and looked away. Krys followed her eyes to her belt on the table. Being an officer, she only had a couple of attachments for it, one of them being her sidearm. He gasped. Was this it? Was she going to shoot him?

  “Shelby,” he stammered, drawing her attention back to him. “It doesn’t make sense, but I guess I’m more old-fashioned than you are. I believe in friendships and in relationships, not social contracts. What’s holding me back from you? I’m afraid that you won’t feel the same way I do.”

  She stared at him with her lips parted. She clamped them shut and turned away, towards the table. She turned back and stared at him. “What are you doing?” she asked.

  Krys blinked. “Huh?”

  “I’ve been trained to believe in things. Educated and raised to know what’s right and what’s important!”

  “Um, okay.” Krys glanced around and was careful not to look past her towards the entrance with the kitchen and small table. Could he get there first? And if he did, then what? Could he shoot her if he had to? His stomach flipped, answering for him. “I’m not a traitor. I thought I could be when I came here, but you treated me so good and everything worked out for me. So I stayed. Yes, I give my friends clothing and food when I can, but that doesn’t mean I’m trying to change things. I don’t want anyone to get hurt.”

  She stiffened and stared at him. “I have to ask you this, and I need a complete and honest answer from you.”

  Krys nodded. He had nothing left to lose and the fact that she hadn’t shot him yet was a good sign.

  “Are you Krys Evans?”

  Krys laughed at the simple question. “Yes, I am.”

  She nodded. “Good. What about your friends? You said you planned to be a traitor when you came here. Was the plan to perform terrorism?”

  “The plan? There was no plan,” he said. “I gave myself up when I realized I couldn’t get away. I hoped to distract your soldiers so my friends could escape. It worked. Then I figured I’d do what I could to help them from inside for as long as I could when you didn’t have me killed.”

  She frowned. “Help them how?”

  “Originally? Yes, we wanted our old lives back. But I’ve seen enough—I know that’s not possible. Now I just want to keep everybody safe.”

  She nodded.

  “Can I ask you a question?” Krys gambled.

  She stared at him and nodded.

  “Maybe our society considers me an adult but the one I grew up in probably wouldn’t. I know I’m not sure I know what I’m doing when it comes to you, but I have to know something. You got very upset with me. Very. You’ve been talking on and off about social contracts for a while. Does that mean that you, um—do you love me?”

  Shelby’s eyes narrowed as he spoke and then, when he asked his question, she winced. She looked away and wiped her eyes with her hands before turning back to him. “For the smartest man I know, young or not, you can be really stupid sometimes.”

  Krys nodded but felt some of the terror squeezing his heart loosen. “So is that a good stupid or a bad stupid?”

  “Just stupid,” she said. “Do you trust me?”

  “I want to,” Krys answered. He nodded a moment later. “I do, I guess. You’ve never done me wrong or lied to me.”

  “I haven’t done you at all,” she muttered.

  Krys frowned. “What?”

  She shook her head. “If you trust me, then I want to meet your friends. Just you and me. No soldiers. No guns. No trackers. Just us.”

  Krys blew out the breath he’d been holding. “Do I have a choice?”

  “Of course you do.”

  “No, I mean, will I go to jail or be shot if I refuse? You’re not going to let me keep helping them, are you?”

  “Not without—no,” she said, catching herself.

  Krys would have refused anyone else. Shelby wasn’t anyone else, though. She was, well, she was Shelby. She’d bent rules and helped him around others. If she promised him it would just be them, he believed her. “All right. When?”

  “Soon,” she said. “We don’t have much time.”

  “Why not?”

  “The president’s ordered that the rebellion be stopped,” she said. “And he’s sending reinforcements to make sure it happens.”

  “More soldiers?”

  She nodded. “And more.”

  “More? You mean—” Krys trailed off, not quite certain what more there could be.

  “Two armored brigades are in transit,” she said, cutting him off. To drive the point home, she clarified, “Roughly a hundred tanks and twice as many biomechs.”

  Chapter 35

  Palla staggered into a wall of the passage and held herself against it. In between gasps for breath, she wheezed, “This is ridiculous!”

  “You want to tag along with me, you have to pass the BCT physical training,” Lily teased. “Besides, you were getting a belly.”

  Palla’s breath burst out of her mouth indignantly. She looked down at her bare stomach beneath her halter top and ran her hand across it. “I am?”

  Lily raised an eyebrow. “A little bit.”

  Palla pushed off from the wall. She took in a deep breath and let it out. It helped slow her panting a little. “Fine, let’s go.”

  Lily started jogging and glanced back to see Palla struggling to keep up. She slowed down until Palla caught her, and then sped up enough to keep her friend red-faced and gasping. She had to repeat the process three times until they finished two more laps and completed the five-kilometer run.

  Palla collapsed on a bench and leaned forward to gasp for air while sweat dripped off her nose and chin
. Lily sat beside her and offered her a water pod. Palla shook her head and sputtered, “Can’t. Breathe.”

  “This will help,” Lily offered.

  “Might. As. Well. Dump. It. On. Me,” Palla suggested.

  Lily frowned and glanced around. A few other runners had passed them and were heading down the track but it was early enough they were alone. She tipped it over the back of her friend’s neck.

  Palla gasped and then lurched to her feet. She sputtered and shook her head while holding her arms out as water dripped off her hands and through the grate on the floor. “What are you doing?” she shrieked.

  “You said dump it on you.”

  “I didn’t mean it!” Palla whined. She looked down at herself and rolled her eyes. “Great. Wear the white one, you said.”

  Lily followed Palla’s eyes and laughed. Between the sweat and the water, Palla’s top and matching shorts reminded Lily of a bathing suit more than workout clothing. “Come on, you can make it to the showers.” Lily pointed to the women’s locker room door across the hall.

  The sound of feet striking the grating jerked their heads to the left. Someone was running on the track. Palla yelped and ran, not jogged, across the hall and through the door. Lily followed behind, laughing and then drinking from the remaining water in the pod.

  “I’m going to find a way to get you for that,” Palla said when Lily joined her at the lockers.

  “I thought you were serious!”

  Palla snorted.

  “At least you caught your breath.”

  “And almost had a heart attack!”

  “You’re fine,” Lily said. “Now hurry up. You’ve got some basic combat training to get to next.”

  Palla scowled and pulled open her locker door. She opened up the bag for her clothes and then pulled her halter over her head. She turned to Lily, her eyebrows scrunched together. “Hey!”

  Lily was stripping off her shirt and looked up at Palla as she added hers to the bag. “Hey what?”

  “You’re naked!”

  Lily blushed and shrugged it off. “That’s what happens in the showers.”

  “But you’re not freaked out?”

  “I got over that. Kind of had to during my BCT.”

  “And I bet it helps that you finally grew some boobs.”

  Lily rolled her eyes and hoped the added heat in her face didn’t give her away. She finished stowing her dirty laundry and shut the locker door. “You coming?”

  Palla trailed after her into the communal shower room and took up a showerhead on the opposite side of the shower station Lily chose. They pressed their buttons to engage the water stream at nearly the same time.

  “Excited?” Palla asked her after they showered in silence and rinsed the sweat off their bodies.

  “Yes,” Lily admitted.

  “Nervous?”

  “No, just excited,” Lily said. “Hard to believe my first time in a real biomech will be on a deployment.”

  “I meant because of where we’re going.” Palla said.

  Lily frowned and shut her water off. Showering was a lot quicker now that she’d had the sides of her head depilated to keep her interface exposed. The end result was a wide Mohawk that she styled and, when she had a chance to go out with friends, colored. Usually the only friend she went out with was Palla. “Oh. I haven’t thought about that much.”

  “You haven’t? Wow, that’s amazing.”

  Lily shrugged and moved over to one of the drying stations. “When I was a kid, people used to be amazed at that. I almost never worried. I just kept daydreaming about the future.”

  Palla shut her water off and walked over, giving Lily a chance to activate the tornado that whipped around her and sucked the water off her skin. When it finished, she waited for Palla’s spin cycle to finish before heading out of the shower and back to their adjoining lockers.

  “Think it’ll be any different?” Palla asked. “Real biomech versus simulator?”

  “I’m sure,” Lily said as she pulled out her uniform and began to get dressed. “At least that’s what all the instructors keep telling me. The simulator plugs in but it’s just a simulation.”

  “At the risk of sounding silly, I’m looking forward to seeing Venus,” Palla admitted. She smiled at Lily and dropped her eyes. “I mean, all the forests and grass? It’s got to be pretty beautiful, doesn’t it?”

  Lily smiled back. “Depends if we get a station on the light side or the dark side. A Venerian solar cycle is over a hundred Earth days.”

  Palla grimaced. “That’s a lot of darkness!”

  Lily shrugged. “It’s not bad if it’s all you know. Takes some adjusting when the sun sets and rises, but then it’s business as usual.”

  Palla shook her head and sat down to pull on her shoes. “This training is silly. For me, I mean. I’m going to be with the command unit, not out in the field.”

  “Not if my platoon goes out,” Lily said.

  Palla gaped at her before she found her voice. “What?”

  Lily grinned. “If my platoon is sent out, you come with us. You’ll be with the support staff but where I go, you go.”

  “I didn’t know that!”

  “Sorry, I thought you did.”

  “We need to work on our communication. And by we, I mean you,” Palla scolded her. “I barely found out you got promoted to captain because of your performance.”

  Lily blushed and finished dressing. “I wasn’t hiding it. I’m still shocked.”

  “It’s because this mobilization is mostly new cadets being deployed for their first time,” Palla said. “From what I hear, we’re still having a hard time recovering from the war. Most of the human race is our age and just coming into their own.”

  Lily tilted her head and considered Palla’s words. “So why are we being deployed? Shouldn’t we negotiate instead?”

  Palla shrugged. “Not my call. I’m just here to help you out because you’re so special. If I had to guess, I’d say its fear.”

  “Fear?”

  Palla glanced around to make sure the locker room was empty. “Fear that these terrorists find a way to stop the food production on Venus. Without Venus, the human race starts starving in a matter of weeks or months.”

  “Oh.” Lily shrugged the explanation off. “Seems a little extreme, but whatever.”

  Palla nodded. “People with more experience than me or you are calling the shots. We have to trust in their judgment.”

  Lily snapped her fingers. “I just figured it out!”

  Palla’s brow furrowed. “Figured what out?”

  “That you’re stalling so you don’t have to go to BCT class. Come on, mentor. I’ve got to make sure you know how to handle yourself in case we come under fire.”

  Palla’s eyes widened. “Do you think we would?”

  “I guarantee it if you miss Instructor Dexov’s class!”

  Palla laughed and followed Lily out of the shower and down the busier concourse of the habitation ring. All the classrooms, mess halls, and tiny barracks quarters were located in the two large rings that circled the intra-stellar transport. Palla and Lily were on one of ten ships deploying the brigades to Venus.

  Lily was headed home but she’d made herself stop thinking about it that way. Venus was just a potential battlefield she might have to fight for on her way to what she really wanted. Besides, all the people she once cared about were long gone from Venus. The people who were left were the ones who had disrupted her life. Sure, she loved where she was now and what she was doing, but she would never forget how that had come about and who was responsible for it.

  Maybe, if she was lucky, she might even be able to get a little payback.

  Chapter 36

  “I’m putting a lot of trust in you,” Shelby grumbled. “Do you realize that?”

  Krys flashed her a boyish grin. “That’s how love works.”

  Her eyes narrowed as she scowled. “Yeah, well, it feels more like stepping out of an airlock without
a helmet on.”

  He shrugged. “I didn’t say I was experienced, that’s just what I’ve heard and read. Now stop worrying. These are my friends. Yes, Mr. Strain will probably have his gun—sorry, his rifle—but he’ll trust me.”

  Shelby snorted. “All the more reason I should have mine!”

  “This was your idea,” he reminded her.

  She kicked a small rock out of her way as they walked and said, “It seemed a lot safer and smarter back in your residence.”

  Krys chuckled. “Don’t worry, these are good people. Kind people. Angry and bitter, but they aren’t monsters or savages.”

  She sighed but stayed quiet as they walked down the first road towards the irrigation pump. Krys didn’t see anyone yet, but he was sure his friends would be hiding nearby. They made it to the machinery before Krys felt Shelby stiffen beside him. A heartbeat later, he heard someone clear their throat behind him.

  Krys turned and saw Mr. Strain standing with his rifle in his hands, although he held it across his body and pointed at the ground instead of at them. “Mr. Strain!”

  “Krys, what’s this about? And who’s this?”

  “Mr. Strain?” Shelby asked before Krys could respond. “You were a rancher here before, right?”

  Mig’s eyes narrowed. “Krys?”

  “This is Shelby—sorry, First Lieutenant Shelby Riggs. She’s in charge of Sierra-12 now.”

  “Can’t say that I expected this when I got your note,” Mig admitted. He shifted his rifle in his grip and added, “It kind of feels like a trap. Any soldiers hiding over the hill ready to charge in on us?”

  “No, sir!” Krys rushed to say.

  “Mr. Strain, please,” Shelby said. “Krys trusted me enough to tell me about you—I’m asking you to trust me enough to believe I’m not trying to have you captured or killed.”

  “You’re asking a lot,” he growled.

  Krys glanced at his girlfriend, worried about how she’d handle the glowering rancher. He saw that she was standing tall but didn’t look imposing or angry at all. He felt the muscles in his neck loosen up and realized she knew what she was doing. He wasn’t sure he knew, but he’d trust her just like she’d trusted him.