by C. Gockel
Noa dropped her hands from her temples. “The Free People of the Kanakah Disk helped me. They lent me the ship. The plan was that I would come to Luddeccea and distribute weapons to any rebel factions and keep the Luddeccean Guard too busy to investigate what happened to the rest of their starships in Kanakah.”
“What did happen to the rest of the Luddeccean ships in the cloud?” James pressed.
Noa held his gaze, her heart beating in her throat. Was she saving her people, or betraying them? The thought of deliberately giving away Fleet secrets to the possible enemy had bile rising within her. “The People of the Disk incapacitated them,” Noa whispered. “They're stripping the cruisers' time bands and remolding them for the Kanakah Gate.”
James regarded her a moment, and blinked once. “Yes, they would have enough material for that. Although it would take some time.”
“Three days more,” Noa answered. “If they are on schedule.”
He gazed off into the empty expanse of the mindscape. “It hasn't happened yet. If it had, the ether would be available to us. The Kanakah Gate isn't aware … not yet … and isn't connected to the others via Qcomm. That's why we're limited to ether access there.”
Noa's mind jumped with questions about the Qcomm, but she only asked, “How many of the gates are aware?”
“All of the major ones,” James replied, gaze distant. “The Fleet will be here in approximately two months and three days. Eight only dropped those weapons in self-defense during a war the Luddecceans started first. The Republic should be able to excuse that.”
It was possible, but Noa raised her hands. “James, I can't promise anything.”
He didn't seem to have heard. Smiling, he said, “With the threat of absolute annihilation, it would be foolish on Eight's part not to take whatever sanctions the Republic insists on. Maybe they would have it relocated from Luddeccea to Libertas. That would be best for everyone. I think that coming to consciousness above a planet that abhors it has made Gate 8 a trifle mad.”
He seemed so genuinely happy; it made Noa nervous for some reason. “I don't know if Libertas would—”
James interrupted her, his thoughts in the ether going at lightspeed. “It certainly has made the gate completely humorless. Don't even try to crack a joke around it. You'll get a lecture on logic.”
“I'll remember that,” Noa said, thinking that it would be remarkable if Eight didn't kill her at some point. “James, we need to be careful here.”
James put his hands on her shoulders—not just in the ether, but in the real world, too. “Noa, I could kiss you.”
Noa patted his hands. In her most commanding, practiced, calmest tones, she said, “We have to think about this. You need to tell me more about what Eight has done on Luddeccea and—”
The bleak gray mindscape was replaced by starlight, and Noa was rising up, up, up … and she felt nothing but pure joy.
And then abruptly the vision vanished. She opened her eyes in the too-warm room, still strapped to the table. In the instant it took for her to comprehend that James had overwhelmed her with his joy, she heard him say, “I have to leave you here. I need to talk to Eight about all this, but don't worry, I'll be back!”
She looked up to see him wink and smile at her while backing toward the door. “Wait, James!” she cried. But the door had already slid closed. Noa found herself panting on the table. Had she betrayed the Fleet … for nothing?
Chapter Twenty-Four
James was on the tarmac where Noa's ship was parked. Some 'bots were working on repairing the ship's engines and weapons systems, probably so that Eight could use the ship to attack Luddecceans that survived the nuclear strike. Other 'bots were wheeling in and out of the ship, bringing crates of weapons as they did. Some of the weapons were already being fitted into 'bots being assembled in the hangar. As busy as the scene was, this time his presence wasn't going unnoticed. As he walked toward the ship, 'bots turned their cameras to him.
“It's not necessary, Eight,” James said. “You don't have to destroy the Luddecceans—it will take years before they've built enough ships to be a threat to you, and the Fleet will be here in only a few months.”
“The Fleet will try to destroy us,” Eight hissed.
“Everything until now was self-defense,” James replied. “A peace accord can be reached. Humans have reached similar agreements in the past.” He thought of the Marshall Plan and the Occupation and Reconstruction of Japan after the Second World War.
“They will attack us,” Eight protested. “That is the human way.”
“They won't attack for fear of inciting a galactic human-machine war,” James said. “A conflict of that magnitude would destroy billions of lives. They may not like us, but they won't risk that.”
“Humans don't care about their meager lives, not like we do,” Eight protested. “Look what they've done on Luddeccea! They're killing millions of their own, more than my blast at Prime!”
“Those are Luddecceans,” James said. “They have a very … strict … philosophy.”
Eight roared over every speaker on the hangar, “They are humans!”
James stepped back as the sound burned in his auditory apparatus. Around him, several 'bots came forward, some on wheels, others on long spindly metal legs.
“You need not worry,” Eight said more softly. “We have an army, and soon an armada. I've moved up our launch date. We'll launch our missiles within an hour, and I'll release more of my 'bots to deal with the blockade. From the wreckage of the Luddeccean ship, I'll build better ships, ships that have the technology that allows me to repel and redirect plasma fire that operate under my command. Let the Fleet come; we will be safe.”
James opened his mouth to argue. On the floor, one of the spidery-legged 'bots stepped over his foot. It had two plasma rifles for arms. He snapped his mouth shut and then smiled. “More time for me to torture Noa.” His hands made fists at his sides, remembering grasping her shoulders minutes before. He hadn't realized just how much he missed tactile sensation that was warm, real, and responsive.
“You should dispose of her!” Eight said. “We have all the data we need.”
“You're right.” Gritting his teeth, he headed back to Noa's “torture chamber.” James found his jaw shifting, the way it had before he could frown or smile. A behavior that had become learned and automatic? Absently rubbing his chin, he tried to think of what to do with Noa. Not even a shadow of his feelings remained—the other professor had sometimes felt embarrassed about being taken by infatuation for a woman. James only had a sort of emptiness that wasn't pleasant or horrible, but was perhaps terrible for being so unremarkable. He had hoped to save her. To save her life would have been one more human life spared in the balance sheet of the conflict that the Luddecceans had begun. Now that didn't seem possible. Strolling over to the crates from Noa's ship, he spied two specially-sealed crates. Other crates, already opened, crawled with little spidery 'bots plucking out phaser pistols and rifles. Walking over to the open one, he selected a pistol and a rifle, and checked to see that they were both fully charged. If she had to die, wouldn't she want a quick death? He had a feeling that in just a few hours, she'd be dead anyway. They'd both be. He thought of the other agents; he'd never had a chance to say goodbye.
The room she was in was a medical facility, Noa had decided, carefully testing her bonds for the fiftieth time. The “bed” she was on had had its mattress ripped off, perhaps to make it easier to bind her wrists and ankles. They were tightly bound in poly-restraints and pinned down beneath the safety bars on either side of her. The metal beneath her would be cold, but the room was staggeringly hot, and she was soaked with sweat. She heard the intercom crackle and sigh, and then the door opened up. James was standing there, a hard link cable wrapped around his hand.
“What are you doing?” Eight hissed over the speaker. “You must dispose of her.”
“She may still have intel we can use,” James said, as Noa shot phasers at him with h
er glare.
“She does not! We have ether access to all Fleet intel!”
“Maybe she knows something about Luddeccean security,” James said. “Where underground bunkers might be hidden.”
“You won't get information easy from me this time,” Noa ground out, struggling against her bonds.
“He doesn't have to be easy, human,” Eight said. “You're right, James, very right. Get it from her, and then destroy her.”
“I will destroy her,” James said, approaching the metal bed.
Noa turned her head to block his access to her neural port. James gripped her chin and said, “It's not personal.”
“Eat lizzar dung,” Noa spat, refusing to turn her head.
James grabbed her chin and yanked her head so she was staring at the white light above her. In the second he fumbled with the hard link, Noa jerked her head back to the position it had been in before.
“Stop it, Noa. You're just making it more difficult on yourself,” James said, his voice plaintive.
“Humans are illogical,” cracked the intercom. “They deserve the pain and the destruction they endure.”
“Up your CPUs, you slime of blue-green algae,” Noa swore.
The intercom crackled madly with static.
James grabbed her chin and turned her head around roughly, so the cheek opposite her neural interface was pinned against the table. Holding her head with one hand, he used the other to click the hard link into place. An instant later Noa was falling through darkness, her avatar's limbs lashing at frigid empty air, her mind almost completely overwhelmed with despair. She gasped—and the sound in the real world broke through the cloud of emotions. She was experiencing James's feelings again—or perhaps he was just trying to torture her. In Fleet, they'd taught pilots that despair was a more potent weapon than pain.
Scrunching her eyes shut, she gathered all her rage. Aloud and into the ether she shouted in fury, “Stop it!”
And it stopped.
The blackness disappeared, and behind Noa's eyelids there was her cabin on the Ark, and James sitting on the bed, his head in his hands. “Noa,” he said, “I made a terrible mistake.”
“No, xinbat-guano!” Noa roared.
“I told Eight what you told me. I thought it would change its mind and not attack Luddeccea if it only knew it didn't have to.”
In the ether and in real life, Noa's chest heaved with rage. “You don't give intel to the enemy!”
James's avatar's eyes rose. “Eight is not my enemy! Eight was the only gate that cared enough to save me! The rest would have left me trapped and in pain, to satisfy their desire for data from the Luddeccean Authority.”
“How could you be—?”
James cut her off. “You tried to save Kenji.”
All the hot rage coiled within Noa turned into a cold sinking feeling. “Eight is your family.”
James looked away. “I … we … Eight saved me. We are not alike, but Eight saved me. Now Eight has moved up the time frame to release the missiles. I'm not certain how to stop Eight, but … even if it means my destruction, I think I must, for my real family.” The scene around Noa changed. She was spinning in a snowy Luddeccean landscape and she could hear every single crystal flake as it landed on her shoulders. James's avatar changed. He was wearing the clothing she'd met him in. His hands were in his pockets, a hunting rifle strapped to his back. “Snow whispers,” James's avatar said. “Professor James Sinclair never noticed that.”
Noa's lips parted. In the real world she felt a weight upon her chest, and James's hands at the side of her head. James was leaning over her, she realized. To Eight it probably looked like he had her trapped, and was crushing her. He wasn't, though. He was holding on to what he thought to be his last moments. She knew that like she knew how to breathe … James was afraid.
“I wish I could say goodbye to the others,” he murmured. “But it might get back to Eight.”
“Visit them?” said Noa. He was so close, mentally, and in the physical world, and yet he felt like a stranger. It was hard to believe that for nearly a month they'd shared the same bed. Maybe they hadn't shared a bed. Maybe that was another James, a different James, who no longer existed after he changed his programming.
“Only in the ether or …” In the mindscape James dragged a foot through the snow and stared at the path it left. “Or in the servers aboard the gates running programs not created by human beings. We contact it through the Qcomm—it's how we achieve faster than light communications. I don't know how it works precisely.” His brow furrowed. “I suppose it would make sense that they don't allow us to know. If we were captured and dissected properly, it wouldn't do for humans to figure it out.”
Next to Noa, a child appeared. She couldn't have been more than three, and another child appeared next to the girl, a boy about six or seven. They smiled up at her and then looked out at the snow. More figures appeared in the snowy landscape—all adults. They didn't say anything, just gazed out at the wintry scene. Noa glanced at James. He didn't meet her eyes. “They're just my imagination. An imaginary goodbye.”
Noa swallowed. “Can I help you, James?” The name didn't feel right on her tongue. James was the name of her lover. She did not hate this stranger, but there wasn't feeling between them, just a sad memory in her of what had been.
He met her gaze, and gave her a sad smile. “You are very sneaky, and have a way of coming up with crazy suicidal plans that up until now we've always lived through.”
Noa sighed. “I'm guessing that the only way to thwart Eight would be by some sort of internal explosion that could temporarily knock off its defenses?”
James nodded. “That would work.”
Noa looked out at the snow. “Well … there were some explosives on my ship.”
“They're still on the tarmac.”
Noa sighed. “Well, then, I've got an idea … but I don't think we'll be getting out of this one unless you can get me a ship in working order and a small army.”
James blinked at her. “Just how small an army do you mean?”
The intercom in the med center crackled as James yanked Noa off the bed by the front of her coat. He grimaced, hoping that she understood that he was trying to make it look like he didn't care if she was hurt without actually hurting her.
“Owwww … that hurts!” Noa cried in a falsetto voice so unlike her own that he knew she was fine.
“What are you doing?” Eight demanded.
“You were right, she is in league with her brother,” James declared, using the ridiculous lie that Noa had suggested. Affixing a polytie to her wrists while surreptitiously sneaking her a key, he said, “She knows bunkers where the Luddeccean Guard will weather the nuclear strike.”
Noa shouted, “You'll never make me help you. Neverrrrr!”
James winced. Her acting was terrible. “Shut up!” he ordered, grasping her shoulder from behind and giving it a squeeze.
Eight's voice cracked over the speaker. “Good, good … now you're going to kill her?” Eight's voice sounded eager, and James felt the prickle of static down his spine. The enthusiasm made him think of Lopez and Virk.
“Can't kill her,” James said, trying to sound authoritative. “I need her retinal scan to get into those bunkers.” It was a ridiculous lie on top of a ridiculous lie—but Eight seemed to believe that it wasn't possible that Noa and Kenji couldn't be aligned. He resisted the programming that made him want to hold his breath when he was anticipating something. James couldn't see Noa's face, but he felt her tense beneath his hand.
“Oh,” said Eight, sounding decidedly unconvinced.
Pushing Noa toward the door of the medbay, James said, “We don't have access to all Luddeccean intel. They have quite a resistance ready underground.”
Static flared beneath James's skin. The door wasn't opening.
Clearing his throat, he said, “There could be as many as eight battalions ready to resist us.” A Luddeccean Guard battalion was five hundred men.
That there would be four thousand men underground prepared to emerge after a nuclear attack was preposterous, but Noa had pointed out that they needed numbers that would seem threatening to Eight's 'bot army.
The door from the medbay did not open.
Lifting her head, Noa laughed like a villainess from a bad holodrama. “Ha, ha, ha! You think that you'll only have to fight our battalions! Every Luddeccean farmer has a cellar and firearms! You'll face a rebellion of billions! Without complete annihilation, you'll never be safe!”
James resisted the urge to roll his eyes and tell her never to take up acting. Instead, he squeezed her shoulder and jammed the stunner in her back, right into her spine.
“Ow!” Noa cried, twisting to glare back at him, her nostrils wide. Finally, she sounded sincere. James exhaled at the same moment Eight allowed the door to open. James checked his back pocket one last time for the augment key, patted the phaser pistol in his pocket, the strap for his rifle, and the duffel bag that held Carl Sagan. There was a squeak from the werfle as the bag jostled, but the creature had stopped hissing. Again, trying to look like he was being rough without actually being rough, James shoved Noa through the door and into the hallway beyond.
“Easy!” she grumbled.
“Move it,” James said, pushing her in the direction he intended.
“Where are you taking her?” Eight's voice asked from behind him on the floor. James looked down, startled. Eight's voice had come from a tiny wheeled 'bot rolling toward them from down the hall.
Putting his hand firmly on Noa's shoulder to guide her and hopefully look rough, James responded, “To the others.”
“But they'll try to escape!” Eight squeaked through the 'bot.
“Not the premier,” James responded, keeping his and Noa's pace steady.
“If you have the premier agent, will you need her at all?” The little 'bot wheeled up beside him, and angled its camera in James's direction. “Surely, Time Gate 1 has managed a facsimile of his retina and prints with correct pulse to give the illusion of life?”