“Please put your hand on the pedestal,” chimed the female voice. Miranda put her hand out for the pedestal. A solid metal thing that came up to her waist appeared to rise from the middle of the floor. Flat on top, it was circular in the way a cylinder is round on the sides. It stuck out of the floor like a beacon beckoning her to her next stage of life.
“Thank you,” said the female voice. The machine read her handprint, taking in her genetic code to verify the identity. It was a very efficient system for an empire as large as this one.
The lights stopped and Miranda got her hand back. She flexed the fingers to get circulation back in them.
“Miranda Farmer. Recruit First Class. Please have a seat.” Miranda glared at the chairs, trying to choose which of the three fluffy cushioned chairs would spin the least when the elevator rose. She chose the pink one in the middle with the rose pillow.
A pair of lights appeared on either side of the walls. They started at the top and moved down the walls until they disappeared at the bottom. The movement was slow at first. Then it started to gain speed. Miranda felt the giant hand of gravity forcing her down into the soft chair.
She waited for the pressure to lift. Heard the telltale pop in her ears and then the ‘ding’ that indicated her arrival.
She released a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding. Even knowing it was coming didn’t make it easier.
A part of the wall became a door and slid away to reveal another room.
“Miranda Farmer, Recruit First Class. Please exit. Thank you for choosing Riolu Transportation for your booking needs. Have a great day.”
Miranda stood up and walked towards the open door, her legs unsteady underneath her.
“I am a soldier,” she told her legs when they wanted to wobble. They obeyed.
On the other side of the door was a short hallway littered with brightly colored boxes with large holes in weird places. Miranda watched as people darted in and out of the holes, carrying papers and other things with them. An android sat behind the desk closest to Miranda. It beckoned her over.
“Miranda Farmer. Recruit First Class. You have been checked in,” it said in the same sickly-sweet voice that had come out of the walls of the elevator. Miranda grimaced. For wanting to keep her death a secret, the Empire wasn’t doing much about it; shouting her name around so anyone in the lobby could hear it. Then again, Miranda was a common name in the M system, and Farmer was the most common last name in the history of the Empire. Miranda was used to the imperial main frames chosen interface voice. The sweetness might have been unbearably inhuman, but at some point, you accept things.
A man in a gray and yellow suit walked out of the purple cubical to Miranda’s left. His face was kind; older, but nice. He still reminded her of her father with his receding hairline and laugh lines.
“This way, Recruit,” he said. He gestured her into the cubicle.
“You’ve watched the required graduation video and taken your final assessment.” It was not a question, so Miranda didn’t feel a need to answer.
“This is your last step. I’m Ryan Recruiter and it is time for you to choose,” Ryan Recruiter said, shaking her hand. He motioned her to a seat across from his desk. Then he handed her a video screen.
“Look them over and choose.” She took the vidscreen as instructed. Her twelve cycles of bootcamp taught her to act, then ask questions. On it was a list of the recommended military last names.
She sat up straighter in her chair. This was it. Her one chance to change her fate. Much like how colonists had to change their first names to the system they were assigned to, Miranda was being given this once in a lifetime opportunity to change her fate. True, she had to choose from a preselected list of acceptable names, but it was still a choice. She was no longer a Farmer. That life was behind her. Now she would be something of her own making.
“Hilt,” she said after looking down the list for the second time. “I want my new last name to be Hilt.”
“Hilt it is.” Ryan Recruiter filled in the appropriate boxes on the vidscreen.
“And if you could sign here, here and here,” he said. He pointed at a spot. She would sign it. On it went until they scrolled to the end of the document.
“All set.” Confetti popped over her head. It showered her in camo colored flakes and brown curly ribbon.
“Welcome to the Imperial Army, Private Hilt.” Miranda looked up at his balding head and wondered where her crazy adventure would take her next.
About the Author
Celinda Labrousse is a librarian who spends all her extra time writing and telling stories that fly. She hopes you have enjoyed reading it as much or more than she enjoyed writing it. On top of that, she’s a full-time mom, wife, daughter, and night guard for a company that is run by “them that shall not be named.” This is her second book in her Imperial series. If you’re wondering where the book writing comes in, you’ll have to thank the rebels for making this book possible.
If you want to know about the next book, sign up for her email list here (https://dl.bookfunnel.com/dnkgzepc6m). You will get a free digital copy of her novella RUN in English, along with being added to her email list.
Author’s Note
Hi! Thank you for reading Imperial Hilt. It is the second in a series of books about Miranda and her space adventures. Recently it was brought to my attention that I love mysteries. Every one of my favorite books, TV shows, and movies have one thing in common. From Scooby Doo to Doctor Who, they are all types of mysteries.
That’s the great thing about mystery stories. They aren’t stuck in just one genre or type. Sure, there are tropes. You can’t have a good story if you know everything or are given too many hints. Plus, unmaskings, am I right?
So, blending science fiction with a good old whodunit is the heart of this series. I’m calling it Science Fiction Mystery (and no, I didn’t make this up, it’s just not a category on amazon yet).
If it is ever going to be a category, then books like this are going to need a boost. Can you please take two minutes to leave a review? It would mean the world to me and my ability to keep putting out books.
Thanks,
Celinda
Preview: Imperial Assault
(Book 3 in Miranda’s Saga)
Miranda brushed a cobweb off her face for the fifth time that morning. It wasn’t enough that they’d dragged her down into this death trap with its tight spaces and stone carved walls. No, she had to lead the way. Which put her in the prime position of cobweb clearer. And booby trap skipper. She couldn’t forget about the booby traps. The humor of that statement might have passed her by when she was younger, but after years of missions just like this one, Miranda understood the double entendre a little too well.
“Woman leading the blind,” she always teased over the beer they shared when the mission was complete. It was the one time she let her hair down around her team. Given who they were and what they did outside their jobs, it was a wonder she let her hair down at all. She was the uptight matron of Unit 53. The Archives and Ancient Recovery unit. Whereas the resident droid expert, she led the way in ancient Lander translation and discoveries. That was the main reason she was leading.
Okay, Oscar was leading, and he was all smiles about it. If droids could smile. Which Oscar couldn’t, but that didn’t stop him from looking like he was having the time of his life. He beeped and booped his way around dead bodies, sprung traps, trip wires, and fake floors. He was so good at seeing it coming that he was getting a big head about it.
“Beep bop boop,” he sang as he bypassed another trip wire. The path ahead of them was one of the most booby trapped of them all. In their five years of exploration, Miranda had never come across this many self-resetting devices meant to keep non-landers out. It was becoming more tiresome than anything. The walls were overgrown with vines, the pathways a mix of stone and green and traps. If Miranda had thought about it more, she might have thought it beautiful, but as it was all she wanted w
as an exordium slurpy and her own bed back in the little apartment she’d just been upgraded to with her latest promotion. Something about having your own space to go home to made missions like this much longer.
“I know, Oscar; you are saving us all. Thank you so much,” Miranda whined. It wasn’t that she wasn’t grateful. Oscar was a little droid. Which meant that even if he stopped them from falling into a deadly pit of snakes or kept them from being hit by dropping blade swings, he wasn’t tall enough to keep the spider webs at bay. Miranda hated spiders. Ever since the tarantula on Vagus 9 had decided she was its mommy and that they were meant to be together, the thought of any part of a spider touching her became unbearable.
“I get it, Oscar; you don’t need to rub it in,” she said, ducking under yet another row of spent arrows. Miranda never understood why the Landers set up all the traps. Of the deadlier ones, once set off, they did not reset. The darts stuck in the walls. You had to be careful of the blade ones. Those were pressure sensitive and would remain intact until something jammed them, like a rock or some other metal.
The ornate carved heads on the walls were there to disguise the traps. Circles were etched into the tiles on the floor. It was a simple way to add the designs. To hide the deadly nature of the walkways. They’d seen it all before, but not to this scale.
“What are you hiding that you are hiding it this well?” she asked the walls in Droid. The bodies they found in the passageways proved that most were still armed. They were not the first to find this place, but not many others had gotten this far. There hadn’t been a single skeleton in the last day or so of their hike. In a twisted way it gave Miranda hope. It meant that what they were looking for might still be there. Oscar beeped the equivalent of sticking his tongue out at her. If he’d had a tongue to stick.
“I know I look upset,” she whisper yelled at the droid. “I am upset.” It had been five days since they’d seen sunlight. That’s how long they’d been trekking through the abandoned catacombs of the ancient Lander city. At least that’s what the walls had told her. Not that it would take five days to get where they were going. That was the nature of the maze. No, the walls said this was the catacombs of broken minds. Not one filled with dead Landers. Unless you counted the bodies of the robbers and treasure seekers that had come before them. No, these were droid catacombs. Carved out by Landers thousands of years before to honor and put to rest ancient sentient machines that were either too dangerous or too old to be of any use.
That was another reason for all the low-tech traps. Everything here was meant to be separate from robot kind. The walls were carved rock. The traps manned by weights and levers. Scattered throughout it all were caverns, big and small, holding dead bodies of long abandoned tech. It didn’t help that this city of computer bones rested at the heart of one of the deadliest plants in the galaxy. Part of the trap was the living deadly foliage that had consumed the surface of the planet, leaving it a luscious jungle. It was also as uninhabitable as any non-terraformed planet. Even the air was off, the balance between oxygen and nitrogen too high to be breathable for long. Their helmets were working overtime to keep them alive. Even outfitted in her Ironside armor, Miranda felt naked here. Exposed in a way she didn’t quite understand.
“It’s okay, little bird,” Eric said, patting her on the shoulder. Miranda started at the pressure. Her jump was easy to see. She could hear the muffled laughter over the coms. She let them laugh at her. They all needed a way to relieve the pressure this was putting on them.
“We know you love it,” Fox said, winking at her from his position at the rear. At least she took it as a wink. She couldn’t see his face under his helmet, but it tilted in the way that the helmets tilt when they winked.
“I’m the one that loves it,” Adam said. He slipped on the same piece of slick floor Miranda had. Were they all going to follow in her exact footsteps? She mentally hit her hand against her helmet. Of course, they were, that was kind of the point of her leading. One wrong step and flying poisonous darts wrapped in snakes might come flying out of the mouth of the girl on their right. At least the head looked like a girl with curly salt and pepper hair. It could have been a man with a head of coral snakes. The faces were all done the same and they had no bodies to tell anything else apart.
“Whatever it is this time,” Miranda started to say. The path opened into a wide cavern.
“Isn’t worth all this,” Adam finished for her. He waved his hand around the expanse. The walls were twice as tall as they were wide. Shelves of machine parts lay in pieces, shoved into roughly cut alcoves in the cold stone. Adam’s outstretched hand landed on a skeleton pinned to the opposite wall by a pike through its skull.
“Well, there went that count.” Miranda mentally started the clock again.
“Who bet thirty-two hours?” Miranda asked. Fox lifted his hand.
“You had me down for thirty,” he said.
“Doesn’t count,” Adam said.
“You’re just saying that because you had 36 and Eric had 48.”
“I’m still right,” Adam said. “We only round up, not down.” He told the truth. That didn’t mean that Fox had to like it.
Miranda swore she saw Fox’s scowl through the helmet. As much as that wasn’t possible, she could feel it. The mask light flickered. The batteries were running low. Five days in the dark meant they couldn’t recharge.
Oscar beeped a warning.
“Watch your step here,” she said, bringing their attention back to the dangers of the cavern.
“It’s another trap.” Above them loomed a chandelier of spikes. Each wrong tile pressed would bring a crystal falling on their heads.
“You bring our girl to the fanciest places,” Eric said, clapping Miranda on the shoulder. He gave it a squeeze. Electric shock at his touch raced through her tired body. It had always been like that with him. You would think she’d be used to it by now, but no. Every time, she felt that same wave of heat creep up her face. At least this time she didn’t jump.
“Get off.” She shrugged until his hand fell away. She was too tired for this.
“If by fancy you mean decorated in deadly attire, then sure, I can run with that,” Miranda shot back. This wasn’t the first time this trip that they’d made fun of Adam’s need to seek out Lander trinkets, as the court liked to call them. It’s how he got into most of his trouble now that the Emperor had restricted him from field duty. But after five years of searching abandoned planets and Lander burial grounds, Miranda was getting tired. If she hadn’t been the only Droid translator left in the Empire, she might have requested another duty.
“Don’t be too hurt, turtledove,” Eric said, reading the tone in Miranda’s voice. “What the prince wants...”
“The prince gets,” she finished for him. “Way to point out the obvious.” Miranda rolled her eyes. They had come to the cavern’s exit, the crystals still gleaming above their heads. All it would take was one to fall to smush them to smithereens. A passageway led off to the right. A second path lead upstairs. Miranda reached her hand out and felt the wall. The long dashes and dots that framed the new passageway became a message under her touch.
“This way,” she said. She headed up the blackened stairs. Long vines snaked up and down. Some green with life, other brown and rotting. Halfway up Oscar paused.
“Grab the walls!” Miranda screamed. The stairs turned into a slide. Miranda hopped onto the ledge cut into the side of the wall as the stairs cascaded together, forming a slide back to where they’d been before. She dared to look behind her.
Adam was halfway down, barely holding onto Fox’s ankle.
“Hold on!” Eric shouted to Fox. Fox nodded, not willing to move an inch in either direction.
“Don’t let go,” Miranda warned.
“What’s at the end of this?” Adam asked as Eric shimmied down to Fox to get a better hold on Adam. This was not the first booby trap they’d set off on this trek, and it probably wouldn’t be the last.
&n
bsp; “What’s at the end of this?” Adam asked Miranda again. She shook herself out of her fear. It threatened to overwhelm her. She couldn’t imagine how Adam felt.
“Oscar says it’s a pit,” Miranda said.
“What kind of pit?” Adam asked. Eric was in position now.
“He says...” Miranda stopped to listen to the little droid.
“Could be snakes. Or stakes. Or both. Definitely deadly if you let go.” That’s what the Landers had been great at. Creating deadly traps to guard their secrets long after they were dead and gone.
“Miranda,” Eric called, “can you tie me off?” He handed her a link tied to his holo rope. It was a handy suit function, being able to create a hard light holo rope of indeterminate length whenever they needed it.
“Sure.” She linked the chain to her utility belt. “All secure.”
Eric tested his weight. Miranda slipped forward an inch, then she regained her balance.
“Good?”
“Good.” She let go of one of her hand holds to raise up her two fingers, the universal sigh of good to go.
“Okay,” he said. “I’m going to slide down next to you. Miranda, brace us.”
“Braced.” Oscar took that moment to grab onto her.
Eric shimmied down until he was side by side with Adam.
“I’m hooking into you,” Eric told Adam.
“I didn’t know you cared,” Adam said. Miranda couldn’t see his eyes under her helmet, but if she could she probably would have seen Adam batting his lashes at Eric. The two of them were responsible for ninety percent of Miranda’s eye rolls.
“It would be nice if you could hurry,” Fox said. “My footing is giving out.”
“Locked and loaded,” Eric said, slapping the D-ring, creating a chain between him and Adam.
Imperial Hilt (Imperial War Saga Book 2) Page 14