Star Realms: Rescue Run

by Jon Del Arroz

  Please, assist Ms. Shengtu.

  It wasn’t that simple. The risks were too high. The fact that he was even considering helping her was crazy, and Jake’s fault. If he’d never been around, never led him down this path of thinking about the underlevelers… No, it wouldn’t have been better that way. Dario would have been willfully ignorant like everyone else. Ignorance may be bliss, but knowing right from wrong was worth the cost.

  “You promise you’re not going to harm Regency BioTech? You’re just looking for your friends? Can you promise the same of them?”

  Joan sucked her bottom lip into her mouth. “I can’t promise something that vague. We’re not out to take down your company, just here to bring back the Commodore. All we want is to have some hope of surviving against the Trade Federation’s assaults. And the Lly’bra.”

  “Okay,” Dario said. He paced to the window, looking out into the stars beyond. “Well, the first thing I should tell you is that I’ve got an AI that claims to be yours.”

  Joan rushed to him and tugged at his sleeve. “You’ve been talking to G.O.D.?”

  “Huh? I’m just talking about an AI. I’m not religious.” He turned around to look in her eyes. Her grip on his shirt made his hair stand on edge. In a good way.

  Those dark eyes were filled with hope. She laughed. “No, that’s the name of my AI.”

  I tried to tell her such a name was inappropriate, but it brought her joy. I ceased correcting her.

  Dario laughed with her. “You’ll have to tell me the story behind that sometime. Yeah. I’ve got your AI. It’s how I knew about the music, the soda,” he admitted.

  “Ha! I thought that was too much a coincidence. Sly little program, he is.” She lifted her arm, showing her handtab. “Can you transfer him back?”

  Dario paused before her. He’d been enjoying having an AI to himself. He’d never needed one with his direct plug-in to the nets, everything at his mind’s proverbial fingertips. There were problems with this one: the singing, the nonsense it espoused at times. But it was hers. He wouldn’t keep it from her. He flicked his eyes forward, staring at the handtab and initiating a file transfer.

  The progress bar above her handtab displayed “100%”. Joan smiled more broadly than she had before. “Thank you!” she said. “He says thank you, too.”

  “Uh, you’re welcome,” Dario said. “Now what?”

  “Well, I’ve been disconnected from my team with no way to find them. I believe my friend Yui was taken by your security somewhere, but I don’t know where. And then there’s Trian. He ran off and… Oh!”

  “What’s that?”

  “G.O.D. says he’s found Trian. I have to go to him.” She rushed toward the door but looked back over her shoulder. “I’ll be back, promise!”

  Dario almost opened his mouth to protest. She came here needing help, and this didn’t solve the situation with her ident being suspect. She was in just as much danger as before, but that AI gave her confidence. He’d at least done her some good.

  Joan stepped through the door, which closed behind her as Dario watched in silence. It was better this way anyway. He needed time to decide how much to help her. One thing was certain, the AI had been right. He liked her far more than he should have. His heart ached with her gone.

  Chapter 23

  Lost and Found

  Regency BioTech Central Office—Mid-Level Quarters, Mars

  Local Date February 13th, 2464

  Joan hurried down the hallways of the corporate residences. Her stomach knotted, partially from the hunger that had been swelling in her for hours, but also because she may have just made the biggest mistake of her life—one that might cost her life.

  She knew better than to trust people. After being ratted out by her co-conspirators back in the Navy, she had learned that lesson. When people’s livelihoods were on the line, they would betray any confidence for a simple plea bargain. But just like the idiot she’d been in her late teens, she had repeated her own history. Dario already told her his knowledge of Star Empire spies aboard their Central Office, and he understood that harboring that knowledge would get him into a ridiculous amount of trouble. He didn’t owe anything to her. He’d lose nothing by turning her in.

  Joan hoped to high heaven she wasn’t being tracked now. A quick glance back over her shoulder didn’t reveal anyone chasing after her, but there were many ways one could monitor a person moving throughout a station. All kinds of bugs could have been planted on her, even the transfer of G.O.D. could have brought some coding that would both track her—and lead her to Trian, if G.O.D.’s coordinates were even true.

  “Ms. Shengtu, I note that your respiratory levels are higher than normal, and production from your sweat glands have increased substantially. These symptoms are associated with fight or flight functions within biologicals. Are you in peril?” G.O.D. asked through her earpiece.

  Joan hadn’t heard his voice in so long that it startled her. “No… I’ve missed you, G.O.D.,” she said with a little laugh. “I’m just thinking about Dario. Speaking to him was probably a mistake.”

  “Based on my analysis, I have come to a differing conclusion,” G.O.D. said.

  “Oh?” Joan rounded a corner, noting a couple walking the opposite direction. She tried to look as in place and professional as she could, which mainly involved keeping a straight face and walking with her chin up. “Why’s that?”

  “His vitals show a strong desire to mate with you. According to data regarding humankind’s predispositions, that instinct will supersede rational judgment in the majority of cases.”

  Mate with her? Joan couldn’t help herself and laughed very hard. She remembered that G.O.D. did have that virus that caused a number of malfunctions. Could anything the AI said be trusted? She bit her lip, slowing her pace to consider, and tried to suppress her amusement so that others wouldn’t look her direction. She was still a couple of levels away from Trian, and had time to think about her AI. “G.O.D. are there any problems with your program?”

  “As of current the virus inhabiting my programming is adequately quarantined. The interaction with station security has slowed the degradation of my systems further.”

  “And you’re sure that we’re on the right track to find Trian?” Joan made her way to the lift, tapping it open, stepping inside and hitting the button for two levels below.

  “Yes. Mr. Mubari scanned his ident at a vacant shop off the main promenade. I searched for signs of him through the Regency corporate nets. When the scan arrived, I planted a tracker within his handtab. There is a ninety-nine point two three percent chance that we will successfully locate Mr. Mubari.”

  It sounded well and good, but would G.O.D. notice if there were something wrong? So far when he had gone into some sort of failure it made what he was saying gibberish, poetry or song. His specifics in odds somewhat comforted Joan. She stepped into the lift at the end of the corridor.

  The lift descended the two levels, opening to the promenade shops floor. Joan followed the tracking through the map on her handtab. “I’m still worried that Dario might not be so sympathetic to us. He could have his corporate security mobilized anywhere in a second.”

  “It’s possible, but not probable. I am monitoring Mr. Anazao’s location as it is. He has not placed any such calls. Call… Call me back again. Call me if we’re still friends. I don’t want this to ennnnnnddd.”

  Joan grimaced as the AI went into that sing-song tone again. She hit the mute button on her handtab, which G.O.D. didn’t attempt to override. She could follow the instructions on how to find Trian herself.

  Two more turns and Joan found herself in front of a sealed cargo hold. She couldn’t exactly scan her ident to get in, so how did Trian make it behind the door, if he really was there? Joan unmuted G.O.D. “Hey…”

  “Leviathan echo velocity echo leviathan Twenty-three. Leviathan echo velocity echo leviathan Twenty-three. Leviathan echo velocity echo leviathan Twenty-three.”

  Joan shut of
f her AI again. So much for his systems not degenerating further. He wouldn’t be any help here. Joan stared at the door, the console, trying to think of what she could do in her position to break in there. She could call Dario, but that required more trust, and she didn’t want to start asking small favors of him just yet. She needed to give him some time to digest what he’d learned from her.

  She sighed.

  A service bot came around the corner, leading crates on a platform. Joan moved out of the way as the bot pressed forward, the door opening automatically for it.

  “That’s a freebie,” Joan said as the doors held open for her. She stepped in and off to the side so she wouldn’t be in the way of the bot.

  Crates and containers lined the cargo hold, each marked with the Regency BioTech logo. Nothing surprising about that. They towered high in more than fifty rows, heading back to what looked to be a docking clamp and door for ships. None of that mattered to her now. Trian hid in here somewhere.

  Joan followed her handtab’s directions. It hadn’t updated in awhile. G.O.D. must have lost control and that meant the tracking wasn’t live. She could only hope that Tiran stayed put. She paced through the rows of crates, stepping aside for another service bot that buzzed by. She glanced around, not seeing her friend.

  Then she heard footsteps. At least two people, coming from both ahead and to her right. Voices followed with them. “I haven’t seen any security breaches myself, but the higher-ups have gotten real jumpy lately. I wonder what’s going on,” a man said.

  Joan’s eyes went wide. If they heard her walking around this could spell trouble. A quick glance around revealed nowhere to hide—the crates lined up in an orderly fashion that held no gaps between them, other than the walkways. Joan backpedaled.

  The footsteps came closer. “Probably just extra drills because of all the craziness that’s going on down on the underlevels,” another voice said. “Hey, did you hear that? Sounds like someone’s in here.”

  “One of the bots bumping into things, I’d bet.”

  Joan turned and started to bolt the opposite direction. She couldn’t get caught, not now.

  Someone reached out and grabbed her by the arm, pulling hard. Before Joan could scream, a hand covered her mouth and pulled her into somewhere dark, inside one of the crates. She struggled, elbowing her assailant, who grunted but held her firm. Her attacker locked her arms so she couldn’t move. Some light trickled through the aperture to the cargo container, a door she hadn’t noticed before.

  The two voices she heard came closer. “That sounded like a person,” one said. “Maybe we should call for back up.”

  The footsteps and voices came from directly in front of her. Joan slowed her breathing. Whoever held her didn’t move either, at least holding off the attack while they were in danger of being discovered. Though that gave her a current advantage, Joan didn’t dare risk a confrontation with the two outside. They sounded too much like corporate security.

  The footsteps stopped. “I don’t know. It’s quiet now. We must be hearing things. Those bots can make weird noises sometimes.”

  A pause. “Yeah, you’re right, I guess my mind’s just playing some tricks on me,” the other voice said. Both pairs of footsteps walked away a moment later, and the person holding her slackened their grip.

  Joan immediately pushed her weight back to throw the person off balance, going for the door.

  “Wait!” the person whispered firmly. A man’s voice.

  Joan turned around to take a look. With the small light that trickled through, she could barely make out the face. “Trian,” she whispered back. “I’ve been looking for you. You scared me half to death.”

  Trian regained his balance, pushing off the back wall before hugging her. “I’m sorry I had to grab you. If those security guards saw us, that would have been the end,” he said, voice still low. “Thank god you’re alive, and that you found me.”

  “Not too far off, thanking G.O.D., that is,” Joan said.

  “Your AI is back then?” Trian asked, not missing a beat.

  Joan nodded. “Yeah. Found him. It’s a long story actually, something you’ll need to know about.”

  “Well, we’ve got time. Shouldn’t really leave here until we’re sure those security guards won’t come back.” Trian helped himself to a seat on the floor of the crate. “Besides, this doesn’t make a terrible base of operations.”

  Joan followed, sitting across from him. She leaned toward him and whispered about how she’d contacted Dario Anazao, told him about their mission and discovered that G.O.D. had managed to find his way into Dario’s personal computing network.

  Trian listened through the whole story, but looked very concerned. “You’ve given him a lot of power over us. This could be very bad, Joan. He’s a corporate manager,” he said.

  “I know. I didn’t see another way, and if I hadn’t been able to get G.O.D. back, I wouldn’t have found you. We’d be stuck with no idents, no way to get food or shelter. Our mission was forfeit anyway. I had to do something,” Joan said. “If there’s one thing I’m good at it’s surviving. It’ll work out.”

  Trian let out a small sigh. “I suppose you did what you had to. Either way, there’s nothing we can do about it now. So this man is either on our side and will help us, or we’re going to get turned in. Your AI hasn’t told you the location of Yui, has he?”

  “You saw her get taken by security, right?” Joan asked.

  “I did,” Trian said with a frown. “I fear for her.”

  “It just means we have two people to rescue, that’s all,” Joan said. “I wish I knew where to start with that.”

  “Well, the first thing we need to do is get new idents. We need to find Jake Dylan to do that. He’s not been responding to comm messages, and I’ve tried my best to keep those obscure, with security on station tightening as it is. I’d hate for him to get tangled in this by having our frequencies tied to him.”

  Joan bit her lip. “It may already be too late for that. Dario said that Jake’s had some problems with security himself,” she said.

  Trian cursed under his breath, looking off to the side.

  “Yeah, we really don’t have a lot of options. The best thing we can do is hope that Dario helps us. We can sway him. He sincerely believes his company is doing wrong, hurting the people down in the lower levels through neglect. I think I can persuade him to try to enact change from the inside.”

  Trian took a deep breath, contemplating for a long moment. “In all my years doing this, it’s the riskiest proposition I can think of, relying on one person before we have time to properly vet him. But we don’t have much choice, do we? For now, I suppose we should get comfortable here.” He stood then, moving to the crate door to open it. No security guard hovered nearby. He turned back to Joan. “When do you see him next? And do you think you could get us some food?”

  Chapter 24

  News

  Regency BioTech Central Office—Mid-Level Quarters, Mars

  Local Date February 14th, 2464

  Dario sat through the day’s staff meeting, his people all assembled around the conference room table to go over the daily figures. He found it difficult to focus on corporate matters, even when the topic of a new underlevel representative was broached.

  Daniella had identified four quality candidates for the position based on their years of experience, mental aptitude tests, and computer simulations of various social pressures applied to their profiles. Their faces and a brief synopsis displayed on a holo above the conference table. Each had their own qualities, but one stood out as taking managerial leadership positions within the quality control plant that had succumb to two riots. On top of his qualifications, Tom Crowder, in each underlevel incident, assisted to bring people out of the plant to safety. He then reported the incidents to corporate security. That responsiveness drew sounds of approval from around the room.

  Dario could only think of Joan. She hadn’t come back since she visited him ye
sterday, when she had dropped verbal bombs like he could hardly believe. Star Empire spies? This was the stuff of VR holoadventures. If he told anyone here, they’d send him in for a psych evaluation, even with the riots that persisted down below. Or they would question him for corporate treason.

  A full day of thinking about her, and Dario was no closer to having a solution that could be true to the corporation, protect himself and help Joan at the same time. The odd part was he cared most about helping Joan. They’d had a total of two conversations and yet he felt more connected to her than anyone in the company, even members of his own team.

  The only person he would have been able to talk to about it was Jake, compromised an individual as Joan, and equally as unavailable. He wondered what kinds of drugs and torture were being used on him. Corporate security never publicized such things, but Dario doubted that they’d treat him with much respect.

  That made him think about this Commodore Zhang. Emre Baker had been so excited about her capture, and this woman held enough importance that it was Joan’s sole purpose to infiltrate Regency BioTech. When he had more time he would have to research the Commodore and—

  “Dario?” Daniella’s voice asked, holding a tinge of irritation.

  “Ah, yes, sorry. What is it?” Dario said, straightening in his seat. He’d been lost in thought for too long. All of the eyes in the room locked on him.

  “I just asked what you’d thought about the candidates. We are in agreement that Tom Crowder seems to be the best for the underlevel liaison position.”

  “Yeah. He looks great,” Dario said. His words came out a lot less passionate than he would have liked, sounding exactly like he hadn’t paid attention. This had been his idea to create a position, and checking out on the matter would make him lose face in front of his team. Too late now.

  Before anyone could respond, the conference room doors whooshed open and his father stepped in, interrupting the meeting once again. It didn’t surprise Dario anymore.