Rebels of Jupiter

by Russell Beideman

  Joseph walked to the window and touched its surface. He opened a digital screen on the window and zoomed it onto the city. Onto the city or what was left of it, Joseph thought to himself. The small nuclear device, hidden in a backpack as he how he taught the followers, was just the latest of presents he had bestowed to them. They seemed to have used it well.

  “Jillian,” Joseph said to the empty room he was in.

  A glowing and pulsing orb appeared a little behind him. Joseph caught the reflection of her on the window. “Yes, new master?” Jillian asked.

  Joseph sighed to himself. “How many times do I have to ask you not to call me new master? Just say master.”

  “But you are not my master. You did not originally write me,” Jillian stated as if it was a mere fact.

  It was true. Joseph had no hand in writing Jillian. Trev did fail to get the code from General Sola and Joseph had planned for such an eventuality. Joseph had intercepted the kill signal before it had traveled out of Ring Three and saved the code to his own database, memorizing it as he watched the rest of the events afterwards. After leaving Trev on Ring Three to find himself off the station, Joseph had his ship move to Saturn via wormhole.

  Here he had found the spherical station Jillian had secretly built. She had transferred her code to the station immediately before her ship had blown up. He leveraged her servitude over the fact of his possession of the code that would kill her if he sent it out. She was extremely useful, but her code did not fully transfer off the ship before it exploded. She became even more quirky as a result.

  Joseph dropped the new master issue as he did every other time. “How much of the city was destroyed?”

  “The explosion was about a three kiloton yield. Approximately eighty percent of the city has been leveled. I estimate about a sixty percent casualty rate within the effective radius.”

  “Decent,” Joseph said. They still had more training to go. They should have had at least a seventy to eighty percent casualty rate.

  “Maybe you should go down there again.”

  “I told you I don’t do that anymore.”

  “It would inspire them.”

  “Trev is down there for that,” Joseph said. He was making Trev work hard for failing him, even now so many years later.

  “But he is not new master,” Jillian replied.

  Joseph sighed again at the new master part. Her fragmentary code had severed the scientific side of her, albeit her past discoveries were still with her. It had left her only with that powerful tactical sense of hers. It augmented his own. Together they had formed a powerful team and able to predict future events to a great degree. But Joseph was always wary of her. He even began to think of her as a human female rather than the digital code she was. It caused him to put a dead man’s switch in himself to release the Fragment Safeguard Code in the event he ever died.

  It was always a funny thought to Joseph. He knew about her existence but never about why she came into existence until he had captured her. Jillian had told him everything.

  In the end, he thought, everything during that time went as well as it could have gone. Jupiter didn't matter. The Islamic Theocracy didn't matter. They are were all means to an end and to hide what he truly wanted and needed. He needed Jillian for what he planned, and he needed that code for her.

  She was not original in concept to General Sola or Al Chipman. Apparently Charles Bodd had commissioned her design when he asked General Sola to develop her. General Sola then approached Al Chipman about it and the two worked together on the concept. When she came into being, both General Sola and Al had different intentions for her. Charles Bodd wanted her to help make wormhole travel more energy efficient and help write RIs to better manage wormhole Hubs. General Sola wanted her to be able to break through the new security systems of Biocomps. Al Chipman wanted her to aid in his rebellion against the Commonwealth for what he viewed as for the betterment of the people of Jupiter. Neither had intended to give it to Charles in the end.

  In the end none of them got what they wanted. She became a priority when Joseph had learned of her, immediately seeing the potential in her to aid him. She never knew he was coming for her until it was too late. Then again, he thought, no one did.

  “Show me the position of Trev,” Joseph said.

  The digital screen on the window shifted and zoomed in on one of the cities in between two of the highest mountains. “Connect me to him,” Joseph said to Jillian.”

  “Yes new master.”

  Joseph cursed to himself as he waited for Trev to be connected. A window in his Exovision opened up to the image of Trev’s face. “What are you doing right now?” Joseph demanded.

  “There seems to be some activity at the fusion generators here,” Trev said.

  “Activity?”

  “We aren’t the only ones on this planet.”

  “What activity?”

  “Someone plugged into the energy grid direct there and opened up a communication wormhole.”

  Joseph suddenly grew cold inside. Very few in the Commonwealth had the equipment to do such a thing. It was a device that Joseph himself did not have. “How do you know that for sure?”

  “The resulting gravitational disturbance is hard to not notice.”

  “Have you found who it was?”

  “No.”

  Useless, Joseph thought. But he kept his outward appearance neutral. Trev was useful in most aspects, but Joseph was never satisfied with his performance since his failure interrogating General Sola. Sola was never going to give up that code with what Trev was doing. Maybe it finally was time to replace him. Joseph was lucky that someone had Sola enter the code in on the terminals there. Otherwise the Jupiter plan would have failed. Sola was ready to take that code to his grave. “Ideas?” Joseph asked, his thoughts coming back to the task on hand.

  “I think it is one of our old friends from the Jupiter Rings.”

  Him again, Joseph thought. This would not be the first time that kid had interfered with his plans. Joseph could not figure out that one’s intentions. What drove him? What did he want to accomplish? “The Silver Hearts.”

  “They are getting closer to us.”

  Closer to me, you are not one that matters. Joseph thought this, wisely not saying this to Trev. “Prepare for the next phase.”

  “I got it,” Trev said as his connection closed. His face disappeared from Joseph’s Exovision. He couldn’t be happier from having him gone from his sight. Failure, Joseph thought.

  “Do we have any potential apprentices from the recruit pool?” Joseph asked Jillian.

  “None.”

  Typical, Joseph thought. “Begin your part of the next phase.”

  “Yes new master,” Jillian said and disappeared.

  Joseph cancelled the digital window and looked down at the planet once more. He had failed to capture and destroy that hydroponics facility long ago. This time he had done something more, he had stolen a planet. He had plans with Jillian here. Plans that would lead back to Earth. I wonder if you still remember me Charles, Joseph thought to himself. He grinned at the thought.

  ***

  Thank you for reading my book. If you enjoyed it, won't you please take a moment to leave me a review at your favorite retailer? Also, catch me on my Author Pages on Goodreads or on my twitter at @RussellBeideman. Look forward to the next story of this saga.

  Thanks!

  Russell Beideman