by M. D. Cooper
Every soldier under her command was a specialist at the top of their field. Ranks meant little in her squads—there were noncoms running fireteams consisting of lieutenants.
Being a member of Leona’s Spectres transcended rank. It also gave every member their pick of commands when they transferred out—which was rare.
Gage thought that power was in secrets and shadows, and Leona knew that he was right, to an extent, but her job was to shine the light in those shadows where people like Gage hid—with maximum firepower.
Which meant that when Tanis Richards’s mission had run its course, she would be the one to take the woman and her little patrol boat out.
“I assume by your silence that you follow my logic,” Gage said in his typical arch tone. “Best to believe that, when you’re dealing with Commander Richards, you’re dealing with two people, not one.”
Leona nodded, willing to grant Gage that victory. “Any idea who it is? If they’re using her to hunt down whoever was behind the oligarch’s assassination, it must be an AI you know.”
The man snorted and shook his head. “People in my line of work don’t operate in the open. It could be one of a thousand top espionage AIs from whom I haven’t heard a peep in a decade. The TSF is spoiled for choice. However…” Gage placed a finger to his lips, and his gaze grew distant.
“However?” Leona prompted.
“I was just thinking that I must consider the strong likelihood that Tanis Richards has an AI truly paired within her mind. L2 or no. If that is the case, then I’d likely rule out most of Division 99’s top AIs, as I don’t believe they’d take that sort of risk.”
“That sort of opens up the pool,” Leona replied. “It could be anyone.”
Gage’s eyes narrowed, as though he’d come to a conclusion, and he sounded distracted when he replied. “Yes, anyone….”
Leona rolled her eyes at the insufferable man. “Well, you can ponder that all you want, we’re following her ship to Saturn. She’s registered a course that takes her in a slow loop, so we’ll be able to take a shorter path and reach it first.”
“Yeah,” Gage glanced at Leona. “I’m sure that will be a good idea. Especially since your presence at the bar put her on edge, and she didn’t drink the nano.”
“She was never going to fall for that,” Leona replied. “It was ham-fisted.”
“You’d be surprised what people can do when they’re lulled into a false sense of complacency. No matter. Do as you have described, and follow her to Saturn. I’m going ahead to Terra.” Gage rose and took a step toward Leona, pointing a finger at her face. “But no contact. I’ll know, and I won’t be pleased.”
Leona didn’t reply to the man as he turned and walked out of the lounge, though she did think about how much fun it would be to kill him.
In a variety of ways.
DERAILED
STELLAR DATE: 02.20.4085 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Main Docking Ring, Vesta
REGION: Main Asteroid Belt, Terran Hegemony, InnerSol
Harm Ellis was lost in thought as he rode the maglev around Vesta’s docking ring, barely noticing its transitions to the ‘surface’ of the ring, through the asteroid, and back out again.
The route he was taking to meet with the admiral was circuitous to say the least. Especially since ‘Harm Ellis’ had no reason for an unscheduled meeting with the admiral.
Sometimes the layers and layers of subterfuge took their toll on Harm, and he wished that he could just find somewhere warm, comfortable, and worry-free to spend his days.
The problem, however, was that he knew that the job would still be with him—rather, that he’d see the job wherever he went. It was all but impossible not to evaluate every single person he passed, wondering if they were friend, foe, or no one noteworthy at all.
And if they weren’t noteworthy to him, they would be to someone, and who was that? What purpose did they serve, could they be used for nefarious purposes?
It was exhausting.
The maglev stopped at a civilian shopping district, and Harm got off, wandering through the corridors, looking at the shops advertising wares from all over the system.
Though it was easier to buy things over the Link, without ever visiting the stores, there was still a subset of people who enjoyed physically touching items before they made a purchase.
Harm had to admit that he was one of those. There was a value to tactile sensation. So few things were truly real anymore; people’s augmented vision and the ever-present holos added so much light, texture and information to the world around them that they hardly ever saw reality.
Though that was less of an issue on a military installation like Vesta. The TSF expressed a very strong belief in its personnel remaining firmly grounded in reality.
In many stations, the corridors’ bulkheads would be layered in holos, some projected in real-space, some only appearing on a given passerby’s visual overlays, marketing products tailored to them.
Not so on Vesta. If you saw a thing around you, it was a real thing, it had a physical presence. It was reassuring.
For Harm, it took effort to navigate regular civilian establishments. He was constantly working to peel back the layers.
He found that it was possible to learn much about people from how they interacted with the real and virtual worlds that surrounded them.
Tanis, for example, seemed to see through the holos and virtual overlays as though they weren’t even there, while not missing their presence at the same time. She perceived reality in its entirety and the virtual world simultaneously, yet never seemed to confuse the two.
Having studied her brain extensively to ensure she was a suitable subject for Darla’s implantation, he knew that much of it was due to her being an L2. Tanis was fully capable of maintaining multiple streams of thought—almost dividing her consciousness in a fashion that was technically believed to be impossible.
Technically.
He wondered what life was like for her. In some respects he imagined it must be a lot easier because she saw through so many of the things that were crafted to cloud and misdirect people’s thinking.
But she was also aloof and kept herself separate from others—though Darla seemed to be having a positive influence on her. Even more than he’d expected.
She was certainly one to watch. So long as she charted her course through the TSF with care, she’d be an admiral one day. Harm chuckled at the thought. I’ll make sure I have a few favors to cash in when that happens.
He walked into a shop that specialized in coats. Everything from high-tech jackets to ankle-length, armor-plated dusters. He owned a few of their products, so it wasn’t strange for him to peruse their wares.
Of course, that was because he secretly owned the shop and had a hidden room in the back where he could swap covers.
Five minutes later, Randy Drush slipped out of the rear of the shop, making his way through service corridors until he came to the maglev platform that would take him to the TSF HQ sector.
Though Harm’s ‘Randy’ cover was just a dockworker, he had a level of security clearance that allowed him to access Kocsis’s HQ when needed. He didn’t leverage that often, and was well aware that arriving unannounced in this case might ultimately ruin the cover.
Randy’s had a good run, though. Probably time to retire him anyway.
He settled into a seat in the maglev, lost in his thoughts, though still keeping an eye on the other two people in the car. One was a lanky man whose Link ident showed him to be a TSF cook named Norman, and the other was a stocky woman named Poula, a sergeant in the TSF’s military police on Vesta.
The maglev cruised around the ring, eventually passing back into the asteroid proper. At the first stop, both Norman and Poula got out, and no one else boarded.
Harm noted that as being a bit unusual, but it was Vesta’s second shift, a time when there was often a lull in station traffic.
Still, he sat up a bit straighter as the train
took off, suddenly smelling something strange in the air. A second later, the maglev car veered off onto a side track, and the scent grew stronger.
Then the Link cut out.
“Shit!” Harm swore as he rose, an alert that tetrodotoxin was detected lighting up on his HUD. He expelled all the air from his lungs, watching as his defensive mednano began to struggle with the sheer volume of toxin that was entering his body—nano-delivered, he suspected.
The car jerked to a halt, knocking him off his feet just before he reached the door. His limbs began to spasm as he struggled forward, clawing at the deck, even as he could feel his mind’s access to his body shutting down.
Knowing that it was a futile battle, Harm passed a command into his brain’s perimeter defense systems, instructing them to sever all neurological communication with the rest of his body.
A second later, Harm fell to the floor of the maglev, eyes staring vacantly as foam seeped past his lips.
ADMIRAL MIKAYLA
STELLAR DATE: 02.21.4085 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Dublin, Ireland
REGION: Earth, Terran Hegemony, InnerSol
Mikayla grimaced as she exited her aircar and stepped onto the private maglev platform near the suite she’d rented in Dublin. A car pulled up, empty and flagged for her personal use.
Before she boarded, two members of her ubiquitous security team entered and inspected the vehicle. A minute later, one of them appeared in the entrance and gave a single nod.
Her sour expression—which had nothing to do with the rain pouring out of the clouds overhead, or the fact that she had an endless string of meetings with senators lined up later in the day—persisted as she stepped aboard. The frustration she felt came from another piece of news that was unrelated to her official work at Terra: yet another one of her operatives in the Terran Space Force had gone missing.
Missing. No trace. The woman, carefully planted in the 719th Fleet’s procurement department, was just gone.
Division 99 black sites must be filling up fast at this rate…not that my operative in their ranks has been of much help lately.
As annoyed as Mikayla was with the man she had in the TSF’s intelligence division, she didn’t blame him for laying low. Right now, the Mickies were quietly tearing themselves apart trying to find out who had faked Harm’s orders to Colonel Higgs on Vesta and Tanis Richards on Mars.
As unfortunate as it was to have her plant there all but inactive, the division was so internally focused on its witch hunt that it created a silver lining, giving her some latitude in other areas. Not much, but some.
However, if the TSF weeded out all of Mikayla’s agents in their ranks, then that benefit would be greatly diminished. She had half a mind to send orders out telling everyone to go to ground, but that wouldn’t get her the results she wanted.
And if there was one thing her backers wanted, it was results.
After the failure with Admiral Deering, and then the foiled assassination of Oligarch Alden, she needed some wins.
Badly.
Mikayla took a seat, and the six members of her security team took their positions through the car. Once they were settled, the maglev car took off, headed for the Kenyan elevator.
There were faster routes to High Terra, such as the strand that ran down to anchor in the Alps, or even the one in Puerto Rico, but Mikayla wanted some time to think, and the circuitous route her maglev car would have to take as it crossed Europe and then Africa would give her a few extra minutes.
A bit of extra time to plot out what to do in the wake of her recent failures.
What she really wanted to do was take out Tanis Richards. She was certain that was why Division 99 was parading her around OuterSol, having the woman do pointless handoffs in the hopes that someone would strike out at her.
And though Richards had foiled two of Mikayla’s operations thus far, she knew that it was just pure dumb luck on the commander’s part. She had been in the right place at the right time. Add in a bit of random chance, and Commander Richards looked like a hero.
Fool me twice shame on me. Fool me thrice? Not going to happen.
So far as Mikayla was concerned, Tanis Richards could flit about OuterSol for the rest of her life. She wasn’t going to so much as send an operative within a dozen lightseconds of the woman.
Harm Ellis, on the other hand…she was tempted to hire a contractor to deal with that man.
That was the problem she faced all around. If her work was just a matter of knocking off political leaders, she could have killed half a dozen by now. Most were complacent, or their security had flaws that she could easily infiltrate.
Especially with her unique skillset.
But that wasn’t her goal. Her goal was to create a rift between the Terrans and the Jovians. The Plan required it.
She stared out the window of the maglev, as it rose out of the Atlantic and crossed over Normandy before skirting Paris and then curving to the east where it ran along the base of the Alps before dropping back underwater at Monaco.
The maglev car picked up speed as it sped along the floor of the Mediterranean, and she lost herself in thought, considering her options, but still having no clear solutions as the car pulled out of the waters and began to cross the Great African Plains, tall grass waving in the cloudless sky as far as the eye could see.
A dozen options filtered through her mind, from souring trade deals to convincing military leaders to perform overly aggressive war games.
As enjoyable as those were to orchestrate, she needed that elusive win, and a quick win was most easily achieved through death. Mikayla pulled up another list of assets, and her eyes lit on an operation that was ahead of schedule; with a nudge, it could be executed in just a few weeks.
Yes, Saturn is where things will begin. The Jovians will feel this one.
Mount Kenya and the elevator that stretched up into the skies from the plains to the north were just coming into view, when another message filtered through Mikayla’s web of network dead drops.
Harm Ellis had been captured alive and intact.
Mikayla couldn’t resist the urge to clasp her hands together in delight, a tight-lipped smile forming on her lips. If her agent in the division could work quickly, it may even be possible to replace Harm with one of her own people, and no one would be the wiser.
Now that would be a useful advantage.
CONSIDERATIONS
STELLAR DATE: 02.21.4085 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: TSS Kirby Jones, en route to Saturn
REGION: Within Ouranos’s orbit, Jovian Combine, OuterSol
“I noticed that as well,” Tanis replied as she swiped through a holodisplay hovering over her bed, idly sifting through social feeds, searching for a reply from Harm—and thus far coming up empty. “She’s been stationed all over the Scattered Disk. Even did a tour out at the edges of the Oort Cloud a hundred years back.”
“You are the most hyperbolic AI I’ve ever met,” Tanis replied while quirking her lips. “Do you actively work at that, or does it come ‘naturally’ to you.”
“Why would you ‘work’ at something like that?”
Tanis considered Darla’s reasoning. She could see how it was logical—to an extent. However, there were a lot of areas where humans valued accuracy as much as AIs. If Smythe were to employ less accurate but more creative targeting solutions, he’d hear about it.
Loudly.
“OK, I’ll buy that for now—so that we don’t have to dive into another of your philosophical discussions—”
“Nice try, Darla. Let’s stick with Mikayla. Honestly, it’s surprising that she’s still military—especially working in an advisory role to the Scattered Worlds delegation to the Federal Assembly.”
“Well yeah, Alden pretty much said that, what with his belief that she was behind his attempted assassination. What I mean is that if she wanted power, she could have moved into politics, or taken a position in the SWSF’s admiralty at Makemake. From what I see, she was even offered a seat there once or twice.”
“So what sort of long-term planning do you think she’s up to?”
Tanis snorted in surprise, half sitting up. “Say what?”
“Stars, Darla…. Don’t say shit like that.”
“I recall reading about a few. There was that thing that happened back on Alpha Centauri not long after the Sentience Wars ended, right? Where that AI subverted the ring’s network and started taking control of humans.”