The Expendable Few: A Spinward Fringe Novel

by Randolph Lalonde

  The hatch slid open. Captain McPatrick and a short intelligence officer with pin-prick eyes entered. “Ensign Remmy Sands, I’m not surprised you fell short,” the Fleet Intelligence operative said. “Call me Shannon. I am here to bring you back down to basics. You don’t have the luxury of failing, especially now.”

  Remmy didn’t bother standing or offering her any sign of respect. If she hadn’t come in speaking like she was a dissatisfied slave owner he would have stood at attention, but she was immediately the most irritating thing he’d ever seen.

  Shannon went on, looking straight through him with those beady eyes. “I’m calling bullshit on all the details of Clark Patterson’s death and everything that follows. I also don’t believe your team spent next to no time discussing politics or complaining about your place in the Sunspire’s mission while you were still aboard. I smell an editor in this report, Ensign, and if we had time I’d charge you with tampering.”

  “The whole report is taken from his neural recorder. The one you guys implanted and didn’t tell him about,” Remmy barely concealed his irritation. “How could I modify a recording taken by tech I don’t understand? Hell, not even Marcelles could figure out how to reprogram it without killing him. Want more details? Then get to the morgue and scan his corpse,” Remmy spat.

  “The events of his death aren’t as important as what I suspect was omitted from the record,” Shannon insisted. “What about political discussions? You can’t tell me that you spent weeks between missions without talking about Parliament in detail, or complaining about your situation.”

  “Patterson wasn’t a very political guy,” Remmy said. “And you speak about him with respect. He died because of something your people did to him. He was in the service all the way.”

  Shannon snickered. “He died because of tampering which Doctor Anderson should take responsibility for. He knew Doctor Marcelles wouldn’t leave Patterson wired, so he sent your team to get him fixed. We knew it, so we let it happen just to see if Marcelles could do it. He may have failed, but there’s evidence that Marcelles has technology we want.”

  “Yeah, and I just delivered it,” Remmy said. “You want to kill frameworks almost as fast as you can kill anyone? There’s the step-by-step on how it’s done.”

  “The Intelligence Oversight staff and I are positive that whatever you’ve given us is only the beginning, especially if Marcelles has become an issyrian-human-framework hybrid. We’ve never seen anything like that before, never even simulated it,” Shannon replied. “That kind of advance can’t be ignored.”

  “So you want him more than ever,” Remmy said half to himself. He expected something like that to happen, but hoped it wouldn’t. The last thing he wanted was some new team following him back to Uumen.

  “We’re sending Lieutenant Samuel Davi with you this time. He and three of his team will go along, monitor your progress and take over if they see it is necessary. If you fail, your contract will be terminated and you will be on your own. You may leave, Ensign Sands.”

  “Oh, please, oh please drop my leash and let me go into the wild,” Remmy said with an impish grin. “On a world where humans get free meals, board and good pay. That would be just terrible.”

  “We’ll have your citizenship revoked,” Shannon said slowly. “I doubt you can come up with one hundred thousand credits for a new one before one of their machines gets to you.”

  Remmy’s mood turned sour. “You people have no sense of humour.”

  “Get us Marcelles,” Shannon said. “Then I’ll show you my pleasant side.”

  Doctor Anderson watched Remmy retreat from the room. It was like watching himself, only a few people alive knew him when he was that young, when he had a wandering, active mind and a sense of humour that he used to hide behind. Don Quixote would have been proud of the youth Carl Anderson was, and disappointed with the man of productive schemes and hard focus that Doctor Anderson became. Remmy brought memories of his first stint in Intelligence back, and wondered if Remmy survive to meet his own Jessica Rice.

  There were noticeable differences between Doctor Anderson and Remmy, however. Remmy faced greater challenges at a younger age and rebelled in grand fashion. He also saw the politics in the Intelligence community for what they were: a constant power struggle. People like Remmy Sands got caught in the middle, often crushed underfoot. That brought his thoughts back to Commander Patterson and his fate. “Doctor Marcelles can’t resist an interesting patient. That’s why I sent Commander Patterson’s team to him.”

  “Wasteful,” Captain McPatrick said. “If he finished a couple more missions I would have started giving him time on the bridge. Out of all the rejects and malcontents we’ve taken in for this tour he was one of the few I could see myself endorsing for re-entry into Fleet proper.”

  “Which would have led to you flipping the switch, turning off the suppressor Fleet installed and setting his grief loose on him,” Doctor Anderson said. “He would have never gone back after facing the death of his sister.”

  “It would have been done gradually,” Shannon said. “Especially since the grief therapy was slipping. The neural latticework was the only way to stabilize his personality, to get him in shape for our needs.”

  Doctor Anderson looked to Captain McPatrick. His expression was stony, he didn’t like forced conditioning, cybernetic or not. He believed a soldier should be able to stand on their own, think on their own and manage themselves. Old school, the kind of thinking Doctor Anderson didn’t always like, but found easy to understand and respect. Shannon was from the new school of Intelligence. “So, if I start improvising are you going to slip nanobots into my food? Have a latticework built in my brain so you can pull my strings?”

  “Your failure would be costly, but your mission on this ship isn’t so important that I couldn’t turn it around myself. I’d just present my report to Parliament as another failed New Liberal initiative.”

  “And let all the work I’m trying to do to connect Freeground with the galaxy go to waste,” Doctor Anderson said with a sigh. He leaned back in his chair, sparing a glance at Captain McPatrick.

  “Don’t look at him,” Shannon said. “He’s under Fleet Intelligence oversight just like you. The return from retirement is conditional for you both.”

  “So you’ve reminded us more than once,” Doctor Anderson said. “So, other than hijacking my operations on Uumen and restricting me from going down there myself, what special instructions do you have for me today?”

  “Nothing else. I just wanted to make sure Ensign Remmy Sands was given all the right details.” Shannon turned on her heel as if she were a statue on a turntable and left.

  Captain McPatrick was about to follow when Doctor Anderson cleared his throat. “Doctor?” He asked, stopping.

  Doctor Anderson waited for the hatch to slide closed behind Shannon before saying; “starting to understand how your nephew felt when he was commanding the Sunspire yet?” Doctor Anderson said. “Oversight wrapped around one leg dragging you down?”

  “Doesn’t mean I’m going to break away from the fleet and abandon Freeground,” he replied in a low growl.

  “Give it another month. No one can carry an Oversight officer on their back forever.”

  Chapter 16 - Longshadow VII

  “I hate dome cities,” Coral said, looking up at the expansive transparent metal and support beam dome above. The dark surface of Longshadow VII filled the airless sky beyond the dome. Small clusters of light marked cities on the surface, a stark contrast to the pitch black sections where there were pits large enough to see clearly from their distant orbit.

  “Why? Is it the thought of getting sucked into space if one of those panels break loose, or is your claustrophobia acting up again? No, wait, you’re getting the spins whenever you look up because all you see is the surface of Longshadow Seven and your brain keeps telling you that you should be falling, or that you’re upside down,” Kipley offered.

  “They call that vertigo,
” Judge added.

  “Don’t help,” Coral said. “Either of you.”

  “If we could have taken our C&C units with us this trip, you’d be medicated by now,” Kipley said. “Can’t believe a chick like you is letting a case of the spins get her all out of joint. I thought you were rough-and-tumble tough.”

  “Never sleep again, Kipley,” Coral growled.

  “Why? What’s she gonna do?”

  “You might wake up on the wrong side of an airlock,” Judge replied with a too-wide grin.

  Longshadow VII’s third moon was the settling place for the builders of Longshadow prison. This was where they retired to when the dark planet below was ready to open its doors. The moon base, called Preacher’s Landing, served as an observation and supervision site for the prison planet.

  The blood on the walls had been washed away by her new owners. The holocaust virus struck long before Davi and his team arrived. An entire Order of Eden battle group orbited the moon, never far from the city-base.

  What was more important about those ships was the people they brought. Tens of thousands, enough for the Order of Eden military to take control of the ghost city Preacher’s Landing had become. Everyone in Davi’s five person team was uneasy except for Judge, his second in command. A gust of air struck them in the face as an airlock door opened to admit them onto a larger, tube enclosed street.

  “Welcome to Preacher’s Landing,” said an android with human features. His skin was flexible, probably well synthesized to feel human, only it had a sickly grey sheen. “You are the four hundredth and twentieth group of travellers to stop here since the Order of Eden liberated the station, congratulations. Do you have any questions?”

  Davi breathed an inward sigh of relief, glad that their fake Order of Eden identification cleared the android’s scans. “Where is the Bloated Barfly?” He asked.

  “That establishment is adjacent to the main Port, not far from the terminal you just came from. If you take sub-car road thirty three and announce your destination you will be taken directly there.”

  “Thank you,” Davi said. He started for the side door beside the android that read: SUBTERRANEAN ROAD 33

  “Since you are one of the first groups to visit here since new ownership, you can receive fifty percent off all accommodations,” the android rambled with an inviting smile.

  “Thank you,” Judge said as he passed by.

  “Ask me how! Did you know that the Longshadow system has many tourist attractions? Try a shuttle safari, where you can see the dragon dogs of Longshadow Seven and how mines operated in ancient times, all in one day!”

  Judge looked directly at the android and said; “Thank you,” with a note of finality that brought the machine’s promotional rambling to an end.

  The lower streets were carved from dense, rust coloured stone. Lightweight hover vehicles swept past trundling wheeled transports. The heavy load bearing tires made a deep hum as they rolled down the hard road. Yellow lights shed only enough illumination for someone to safely see by. The rest of the light came from old signage advertising for shops along the row, most of which were still empty. Their owners were dead, or had escaped and those broken store fronts looked like cavernous wounds, hollow and dark.

  “Looks like we missed the fire sale,” Jack Kipley said. He was a whip thin man, who was constantly checking every corner.

  “A little respect,” retorted Miir Coral. “Most of the shop owners were murdered when the virus made AI’s go berserk. This is a tomb as much as it is a street.” She wasn’t what one would expect a covert marine to look like, with golden hair and a figure born out of fashionable genetic manipulation. She was conceived during the fad to have petite, shapely daughters. Fortunately, her small size served her well in her job. More often than not she was the one who was able to venture where no one else could fit.

  “Sorry,” Kipley said. “Did you know someone here or something?”

  To Davi’s relief, Coral didn’t reply. Extending that conversation with someone as impossibly dense as Private Kipley was pointless. He was one head trauma away from being declared brain dead, but an incredible fighter. “There’s the Bloated Barfly,” Davi said as he saw a holographic image of a robust bottom shifting on an almost too-small barstool hovering in front of one of the few lit shop windows.

  “Looks like a prime night spot,” Stanley Foster said. He was the other half of the genetically altered duo in Davi’s group. He was conceived around the same time as Coral, and it was fashionable then to have tall, square jawed male children. He was fully a head taller than Davi, who was of average height, and very happy his parents didn’t care about offspring fashion.

  “We’re not going inside to meet someone special. This is a kidnapping, remember?” Davi replied.

  “What?” Kipley replied. “Seriously? We sneak in through a huge hole in the Order’s security, walk right past I don’t know how many port patrol guys on the way here without any trouble, and now we don’t even get to sit down for a drink? I mean, if we’re not going to see some real action this trip, we may as well get glossed, they must have a serious selection in there, with the Order stocking the place.”

  “We got in so easily because of the guy we’re retrieving,” Judge whispered. “Where do you think our Order of Eden idents have been coming from?”

  “Oh, so this is the guy,” Kipley said.

  A crowd of technicians in filthy yellow and brown jumpsuits emerged from the bar ahead.

  “Did you even bother reviewing the mission brief?” Coral asked in a harsh whisper.

  “Enough to know where we were going and how long I have to watch your backs for,” Kipley said. “Don’t need to know much more.”

  “I’ll never get used to the idea of you being a member of Intelligence when the word could never describe anything you do or say,” Coral said.

  “Quiet,” Judge told them as the technicians came within earshot.

  Davi made eye contact with one disheveled woman with half slumbering eyes. She looked like she had been drinking something other than alcohol, something that was probably concocted in a laboratory. He didn’t see a hint of suspicion in her eyes, only the evidence of a temporary paradise of altered perception. If everyone in the pub was half as intoxicated as she was, the mission would go off without a hitch. “Judge, you go ahead and check the place.”

  “Aye, be back in a minute,” Judge replied.

  Before they ran into anyone else, they were through the side door of a burned out shop on the row. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dark. When they finally did, he took a look around. There had been some looting, but not nearly as much destruction as he expected. “Law took control here fast,” he muttered as he pinched the edge of a silky blouse hanging off a display.

  “It’s like the owner closed up shop and pickers just took his cash and the more valuable jewelry,” Coral said. “I knew things were bad out here, but I never wanted to see this myself. You look at how much work went into this shop and know someone, maybe a whole family cared about it, they worked here day in, day out. Now they’ve been killed, or pressed into service in the mines, and it’s just…” she sighed, taking the dark interior in. “Empty.”

  “At least it’s not New Vickers,” Kipley said. “If this were a shop there, you’d find the shopkeeper and a few customers smeared across the walls. Now that was an eye opener. Almost like seeing Pandem like the First Light guys did.”

  “At least there was still fighting when they got to Pandem,” Foster said. “New Vickers was just a never ending slaughterhouse. Androids rounding up leftover humans so they could get loaded into slave transports.”

  “Or so they could give them a hundred K and join the Eden side,” Kipley added. “Never seen anything more messed up than someone giving a ‘bot a bunch of coins, getting a hot meal and turning slave driver all in one hour. Totally fucked up.”

  Davi remembered watching that, and somehow it didn’t surprise him. It should have, he shou
ld have had more faith in people, but when one of the prisoners paid his way into the Order of Eden from the marching line and turned on his fellow captives within the hour, it just made him want to leave. They watched that processing station, where androids and robots infected with the holocaust virus stripped starving humans, de-loused them, met their minimum survival needs with salvaged food and medical supplies then marched them into cargo containers.

  Davi and his men didn’t do anything about it. They were there to gather intelligence, not be seen or caught fighting a hopeless battle. Otherwise he would have wrecked the whole installation himself.

  They accomplished their mission before leaving. The TRF Peter had dropped several transit shuttles, probably looking for supplies, or offloading dissidents but the ship itself was long gone. What happened to the people aboard their shuttles was a mystery. They were missing, most likely dead or taken into custody. Two of the three shuttles had already been cut up into scrap, the third was clamped to the landing platform, it’s doors hanging open and systems running as if it were expecting the owners to return any moment.

  Davi was snapped back to the present as Judge returned. “Our target is sitting next to the door with a cyborg. There are about a dozen more people inside, only three we have to worry about - they’re hard shell.”

  Hard shells - it’s what they’d started calling the Order of Eden soldiers who wore heavier armour plating. Their metallic dark green armour made them look like they beat up a giant cockroach and stole it’s carapace. “What about the bar?”

  “Automated dispensers, no android servers either,” Judge replied.

  “Okay, this is almost too easy,” Coral said.

  “Want to hear the punch line?” Judge asked. “There’s a door at the back leading upstairs - though an empty dance floor into the main port.”

  “You’re shitting me,” Kipley said. “Straight retreat to home free? It’s like this guy wants to get taken.”

  “Maybe,” Davi said to himself. “How did you know his buddy was a cyborg?”