Heretic: Archangel Project. Book Three

by C. Gockel

  “She won’t know it was you,” said a gate.

  “He’s adhering to his programming,” whispered another.

  “Over our orders,” a gate protested.

  “His logic deserves to be taken into account,” said a final voice that James recognized.

  “One,” he whispered, jerking away from Gunny as though he’d been let loose from a chain.

  Panting, Gunny spun and banged his hand against the lift controls. Kneeling, he picked up his stun rifle from the floor, motioned for James to pick up his own weapon, and then leaned against the wall.

  Panting, in an automatic pantomime of the sergeant's state, James picked up the weapons he dropped and leaned against the wall across from Gunny.

  “There are at least four more,” Gunny said across the ether. “And Wren.”

  The door slid open, and a mental light told James that the oxygen in the chamber was at breathable levels, but the area beyond the elevator was completely dark.

  His mind reached into the ether, hunting for the four remaining crew members.

  Gunny fired. There was a sound of another bolt from a stun. Gunny fired again. “Those two are down. No more on this floor.”

  James blinked. How had Gunny managed to do that? Before he could ask Gunny, the sergeant plugged into Brigg's channel. “They aren’t in masks. Reverse the CO2 converters on level A2.”

  He hit the button to close the door, and groaned a little, looking down at his arm. The stunner had just grazed his suit, and it smelled a little like ozone and melted plastic.

  James looked at him in alarm.

  “Eh, barely feel it,” Gunny said.

  James continued to stare.

  Gunny’s brow furrowed and his shoulders fell. “We can’t take ‘em prisoner. Can’t let ‘em go. It’s quick.” Gunny spat. “People who’d kidnap a babe don’t deserve more.”

  James blinked. He hadn’t been thinking about how reversing the CO2 converters would kill the crew on that level—though now that he did, he agreed wholeheartedly. “You shot them—without seeing them.” James had been utterly useless.

  Gunny cocked his head, and his expression turned quizzical. Tapping his ears, he said, “I heard ‘em with my augments.”

  James's first instinct had been to leap into the ether. His first instinct had been wrong.

  “You’re doing great, man,” Gunny said, looking down at his arm. “Don’t think nothin’ of it. ‘Sides, I shot you.”

  The elevator groaned. James looked up at Gunny. “Want to use me as a human shield?”

  Gunny’s eyes widened. “You can withstand plasma fire?”

  James felt as though the platform beneath him had just given way. “I thought they wouldn’t use plasma fire aboard a ship?”

  “I wouldn’t count on it,” said Gunny.

  “I’d rather not find out,” James admitted as the elevator halted.

  “Fair enough,” Gunny said, jamming his finger on a button to keep the door closed. He wasn’t panting anymore. The brief stop on the way up had increased the oxygen in the lift to nearly normal levels.

  “This is the deck that leads to the tramp's bridge. Wren and the two remaining crew members are going to be there,” Gunny said, both aloud and into the ether.

  James felt Noa’s consciousness spike, and then her thoughts, encoded in their chosen cipher, crackled over the ether. “If they’re cornered, they aren’t going to play fair. They may use plasma weapons. Could be better to let us send a retrieval team for you. Enough ticks could blast that tramp to dust.”

  “I’m worried about them setting off a self-destruct order,” Gunny said. “They’d probably have to circumvent the captain’s old codes; but not confident they couldn’t do it before you sent a retrieval team.”

  “Understood,” Noa replied.

  “‘Sides,” Gunny added, “we may be in need of this boat’s heavy guns.”

  “My people are worth more than that ship's cannons,” Noa said.

  James felt his train of thought had derailed somewhere around “self-destruct order.”

  “Noa,” he said. “How is Oliver?” He had to believe this stupidity had worked.

  “He’s alive,” said Noa. “Monica thinks he’ll be fine.”

  The answer felt … incomplete.

  “Do what you need to do, and then get back here,” Noa said.

  “Aye, Commander,” Gunny said.

  “Understood,” said James. He felt his own personal channel light, and then Noa’s thoughts to him alone. “You better.” The words were harsh, and for a moment he felt heat flaring in his chest and across his skin. He wasn’t really hers to command. Was he? But then her thoughts crackled again, more softly, “Ki-o-tsukete,” and the heat in his skin turned to a more pervasive, bubbling warmth. It was Japanese. It literally translated to, “Take care of your spirit,” or “soul,” and it was commonly said on parting. Sure enough, he felt her consciousness duly pulling back to give him focus in the moment … but he found his focus on her parting words. Did cyborgs have spirits? Noa obviously thought so, and he was matter and all matter was energy, wasn’t it? As soon as that hopeful thought entered his brain, the dark app in the depths of his consciousness reminded him he’d almost killed Gunny under the direction of the gates. If you were controlled by someone else, did you really have your own soul?

  Gunny interrupted his thoughts. Finger jammed on the door shut button, he said, “This boat is really non-standard, but I have a basic idea of the layout. We need to get to the bridge. They’ll be holed up there.”

  He released his finger and the door slid open to darkness so deep to James’s eyes it seemed like a wall.

  Gunny peered around the edge of the door opening and said, “Wait here.” Blinded and blinking furiously, James had to comply as Gunny slipped from the light in the elevator seemingly into oblivion. James reached for the ether—and heard nothing. Cursing himself, he focused on his hearing. He heard Gunny’s breathing, and footsteps on metal, and a thunk. A moment later, Gunny popped back into the elevator carrying an oxygen mask. Which was when James noticed that a tiny light in his mind was telling him the oxygen level was too low again. Not as bad as last time, but without a CO2 recycler like Gunny's, James should have been panting.

  He took the mask without comment, and hoped Gunny wouldn’t notice.

  Gunny pointed into the wall of dark. “Can you see out there?”

  James shook his head and replied over the ether. “It’s the change in lighting. I have trouble adj—” Slamming his hand on the close door button, Gunny lifted his stunner rifle, and shot out all but one of the lights in the lift. Sparks flew, and the lift was plunged into darkness.

  “What are you doing?” James asked.

  Was Gunny trying to kill him, just like the gates had predicted?

  “Lettin’ your eyes adjust in the relative cover of the elevator,” Gunny said, and James remembered the man severing his own safety cord in zero G to catch him. Of course the gates were wrong. “They know we’re here already. Can you see yet?”

  “I need a moment,” James said, taking a deep breath.

  Gunny began speaking over the ether. “There’s a catwalk just outside the door. They’ve got stun charges laid out on it.”

  “I think … I think I’ll be able to handle it,” James said. His head ticked. Yes, he knew he could. He blinked. The elevator was lit only by the light behind the control panel, but he could see.

  “You won’t be able to handle the guys on the other catwalks above who have phaser rifles.”

  He met Gunny’s eyes. “No, I wouldn't.”

  Gunny shook his head. “They’ll only wanna aim toward us—the two decks below will keep ‘em from puncturing a hole in this boat’s belly, but they could still blow a hole in the side.”

  James looked up in exasperation. “How does that make it …?” He stopped before he said “better,” his gaze catching on a fried light fixture above them, and more specifically to the panel it was s
et in. Wide and flat, it was not quite the width of his shoulders. “If we could get to their level,” he mused aloud.

  Gunny tsked. “You’ll never fit.”

  James looked pointedly down at the sergeant’s potbelly.

  “It'll squish through that,” Gunny said. Grinning, he gave himself a slap that made his gut jiggle. “See? Just like flexipuddy.”

  James resisted the urge to send the image to Noa, for fear it would give the tramp’s crew an idea of what they had planned. He kneeled and said, “Better than dislocating my shoulders.”

  Gunny laughed. “Now you're getting the picture.”

  A few minutes later, Gunny's boots were on James's shoulders, grinding into James's bones—or whatever, and the sergeant's thoughts were shooting through the ether. “Don't push no more, there's no headroom!”

  “Maybe we should have dislocated my shoulders,” James grumbled, keeping his eyes on the floor, the two corpses, and almost all of Gunny's clothing. Gunny had slipped out of his space suit, and all his other clothes except his boots, socks, undershirt, and a pair of boxers with a cartoon ptery from a Luddeccean children's holo show printed all over it. His “lucky underwear,” because they were “loose and comfortable and my nephew gave 'em to me.” All things being equal, James didn't want to look up.

  “I'm like a rat caught in a toilet goop flush pipe,” Gunny said. “Okay, got myself turned around. Now push.”

  James gave another shove, he heard an “oomf,” felt the burden on his shoulders lighten, heard a thumping, and ducked as Gunny started kicking his feet. He hissed as the business end of one of Gunny's steel toed boots knocked him in the back of the head.

  As though from a great distance, James heard Gunny grunt, “Sorry.” One's voice was at the forefront of James's mind. “The sergeant has not availed himself of plasti-surgery that would make his body more appealing for reproduction, and yet you believe Eight, that is their prime objective.”

  “They are more sophisticated than Eight believes,” said another gate.

  “They are base. They are animals. We cannot trust them.” It was Eight's voice. James could feel the latent hysteria behind the gate's thoughts.

  “James, can you pass up my rifle and pistol?”

  “I can hear you,” James blurted out, clutching the spot on his head that Gunny's heel had connected with.

  “James, are you all right?” Gunny's voice sounded far away and muffled.

  Eight spoke again. “You should not use him like this! The beast injured him. He doesn't have to hurt but you make him.”

  Looking up through the hole in the ceiling, James rubbed the aching spot. The beast Eight was referring to was Gunny; the injury was the blow to the back of his head.

  “We need more data,” said another voice.

  “Yes!” hissed James. He couldn't abandon his purpose. He blinked. Which was?

  He heard Gunny clear his throat, and looked up to see the man silhouetted in the paneling. “Uh,” Gunny said.

  And in his mind One said, “He has succeeded beyond our expectations.” One's voice sounded fainter now. “And we need more data.”

  “I didn't give ya a concussion, did I?” Gunny whispered worriedly.

  James dropped his hand. “No, I don't think so.” He picked up Gunny's weapons and handed them up through the open paneling. “Let's get this over with,” James said, reaching down to pick up the clothes Gunny had discarded because “every millimeter counts,” but Gunny shook his head. “No, we need to get moving. Hold on a second ...” About thirty seconds later, Gunny was back. “Two men on the walkways above you, twenty meters down. There's some coverage between me and 'em, but that means I can't fire on 'em, and this catwalk is rusty, James. I need you to make some noise to cover up my steps. Give me three minutes, and then draw their fire.” The sergeant's eyes slid to the side, and he vanished.

  “Draw their fire?” James replied, and wondered what Eight would think if he'd heard that. Of course drawing their fire made sense—but how to do it without getting actually fired upon? His eyes fell on Gunny's discarded suit and the corpses, had that bright inspirational light, and went to work. At two minutes and thirty seconds, James looked down at a corpse he'd hastily dressed in Gunny's suit and stuffed Gunny's abandoned under layer down the stomach to make it look more realistic. He piled the rest of Gunny's gear onto the corpse in the corner, hoping it would be mistaken for him.

  “Here I go,” said James, hoping Gunny could hear it with his augments. He hit the elevator button to open the door, grabbed the dead man by the back of the space suit, poked his stun gun beneath its arm, and took a step out of the elevator. Nothing happened. He looked up and realized there was a steel overhang above the elevator landing. Directly in front of him was a metal mesh catwalk at the end of which was a steel airlock door that he guessed must lead to the bridge. Dim lights were suspended from the ceiling from long polyfiber ropes. On either side was freight space—empty, he noted. He carefully advanced one step, and then another.

  The plasma bolt came from the upper left, hit the decoy directly in the chest, and knocked James back under the overhang and almost to his knees. Bright white flashed behind James's eyes, and he shouted, “Gunny, no! You killed him!” in what he hoped passed for genuine grief. He began firing his stun rifle from just beneath the overhang. He couldn't hit his quarry from this angle, but he could hit some of the lights. Static buzzed, electrical sparks jumped, and he even managed to knock one down on the stun grenade. It cracked and hissed with earsplitting force and blinding light. James kept firing. And then he noticed that there were two more corpses splayed out on the catwalk in front of him. “Gunny ...” he called out to the ether.

  There was no response. He reached for Briggs on the lower decks … and heard nothing. James was alone.

  James felt a prickle of static now. The lighting was dimmer with the lights he'd shot out, but his vision was adjusting. There were three prone forms on the catwalk beyond the elevator. Was one of them Gunny? He couldn't tell …

  There was a grinding noise, and the whoosh of air, and a bright light spilled across the catwalk from the door on the other side. James threw up an arm to block the glare. In the ether he heard nothing, but he heard footsteps on the metal mesh catwalk.

  “Wren,” he whispered.

  “Hey, Golden Boy,” Wren said. And then he hissed. “Oh, is the light hurting your eyes?”

  James forced himself to lower his arm, but couldn't keep his eyes from blinking spasmodically.

  “Don't lift that stun rifle!” Wren said. “I've got an electrical pulse detonator.” From his direction came a soft whine. “You hit me with that and you and all your mechanical parts will be floating home.”

  For a moment, all of James's applications seemed to halt, and then static flared along James's spine. “You don't want to die, Wren.” His voice was flat to his own ears. Clinical. It was a certainty. Wren wouldn't blow himself up.

  “Well, no, of course not,” Wren said, and James realized he'd taken a step closer.

  Wren wanted something—James, or … James's eyes dropped to the catwalk and the prone bodies there. One still had a phaser rifle clutched in his hand. A phaser rifle could kill or injure James—and it wouldn't set off an electrical pulse detonator. He looked up at Wren. He was unarmed except for the EPD in his hands. James took a step, Wren did too, and then as though by an unspoken command, they both bolted forward. Wren was fast; James was faster. He heard Wren's feet pounding on the mesh, bypassing the stun charges that were surely tied to his ether connection, felt the vibrations of the man's and his own feet beneath him, but the silhouette of the rifle was in view, just a meter away, he just had to—

  Bright white filled his vision, blinding him. Pain frizzled down his spine. He stumbled, pain shooting through his mind. The light vanished, and he heard Wren drop.

  James swayed on his feet. His hand fell, and he was hit again by bright light. He heard the click of the phaser safety, and Wren's steps l
ess than a meter away, felt the gentle gust of air that had to be Wren aiming the thing. James also heard his oxygen mask gently whining, and Wren's, too.

  “Hands up!” Wren shouted.

  Lifting his hands, James said, “I'm no use to you dead,” hoping it was true. He thought that if he had a heart, it might be pounding. As it was, he only felt an annoying, all over angry prickle under his skin.

  “Can you really die?” Wren asked, and the painful light disappeared from James's eyes.

  Wren was just a step away, the phaser rifle aimed at James's eyes, a beam of light as sharp as a laser shining from one finger. James stared helplessly down the phaser barrel, all thoughts coming to an abrupt halt, and then restarting. Could he die? The phaser was aimed directly at his head, where his connection to the ether resided—and to the gates, too. James was always connected to the gates, but it was only when he had a blow to the head that he “heard” them. Loose circuits connecting under pressure?

  “I think I can die,” James admitted to himself as much as Wren. The connection to the gates was what gave him his ability to think. Without that connection, he'd be … just 6T9? No less, he'd be just whatever programming resided in his extremities. Without his mind, would they continue to operate? Would he be an empty, mechanical zombie? His hands formed fists. Would his fingers still long to touch Noa, even without James's consciousness attached to them?

  Wren huffed. “They said they wanted you in one piece.” James heard the smile in his voice when Wren added, “They didn't say what condition that piece had to be in.”

  Wren raised one finger on his hand, and a bright light pierced James's vision. James drew back with a hiss and Wren said, “Nifty—lightbeam in my augment … useful to communicate in an emergency.” So that's how he'd communicated with the tramp.

  James couldn't see, but he could hear Wren taking a step back. “Now should I blow out your arms first or your legs? Arms or legs, arms or legs … will it hurt a machine like you, I wonder?”

  Phaser fire roared and James braced for pain.