Erik cleared his throat. “I’ve saved a lot and invested well. I didn’t have a lot of needs on the frontier, and you know what they say: the real miracle is compound interest.”
Lan chuckled quietly. “Restraint is a key to prosperity.”
“I couldn’t agree more.” Erik offered her a winning smile.
Lan smiled back. “Now, I hate to be rude, but I haven’t spoken to all my guests yet. I’ll come back to you in a bit. A good friend of mine was just about to discuss her new grandchild.”
“Of course,” Jia murmured, her heart pounding.
Lan offered a final small smile to Erik before wading into the dense, chattering crowd. She didn’t look back.
“That’s just a stalling tactic.” Jia sucked in a breath. “What if we continue to be busy? She’ll get louder with her complaints.”
“Nothing wrong with positive thinking,” Erik replied. “It’s not like we could tell her the truth, though if we did, she would probably be impressed by your fancy new government connections.”
Jia chuckled and finished her glass. “She would be.” She looked around. “I haven’t seen my father since the party started.”
Erik nodded toward a corner. Jia’s father, red-faced from too much wine, chatted merrily with three other red-faced men. One man said something, and they all started laughing.
“Oh. He’s escaping into wine.” She nodded in agreement. “Good plan.”
“Aren’t you?” Erik asked, raising an eyebrow.
“I’m not in the middle of an escape.” Jia deposited her glass on the tray of a passing waiter. “I’m just accomplishing battlefield preparations.”
“It’s not as bad as I thought it was going to be.” Erik smiled. “It’s not my kind of party, but your mom isn’t being that …uh.” He searched for a word that would be appropriate in this company.
“You’ve been bought off with real crab.” Jia sighed. “You are a cheap date.”
“Hey, real crab isn’t cheap.” Erik patted her shoulder. “And there is no harm in winning me over, but it’s good to remember that not everything is crazy-ass missions and death. I figure you should be the one reminding me of that.”
“I understand, which is why I care about this.” Jia’s gaze followed her mother until the older woman stopped and chatted with another guest. “You’re not picking up on the obvious. This whole thing was a trap.”
“What trap?” He glanced around in concern. “She doesn’t hate me anymore.” Erik shrugged. “And I think that’s a win. We’re actually dating this time, so the party doesn’t feel like a recon mission where I’m worried about being discovered and taking an arty barrage.”
Jia’s inhale was soft. “You really didn’t pick up on it, did you?”
“Pick up on what?” Erik frowned. “Is the drink choice supposed to be some sort of slam on me? If so, it’s not working. I’m a beer guy, but it doesn’t mean I won’t ever drink wine.”
Jia gestured subtly at her mother. “What do you think she’s talking about right now?”
“I don’t know. Rich people crap. Investments, politicians they’re planning to buy. That sort of thing.”
“No.” Jia lowered her voice. “She told us what she was going to talk about—her friend’s new grandchild.”
“And you hate kids now?” Erik looked confused. “You’re not Miss Playful, but I didn’t realize you hated kids.”
“I don’t…” Jia closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She was unsure if Erik honestly hadn’t picked up on her mother’s cues or was messing with her for his own amusement.
Maybe both.
“What’s wrong, Jia?” Erik asked, making the surprising move of setting his plate of crab puffs on a nearby table. “If she’s upsetting you, we can leave. I’ll always have your back, you know that.”
“My mother doesn’t say things without having an ulterior motive.” Jia managed not to stare across the room at the offending matriarch. “Erik, she’s mentioning grandchildren because that’s her subtle way of suggesting we hurry up and get married to provide her with some. I think she would take the grandkids without the marriage, if possible.”
“Oh.” Erik swallowed, all the confidence draining from his face. “I get it.”
“Exactly.” Jia nodded. “The thing is, Mei’s not firm enough in her position by Mother’s standards to move onto the next stage of her life, but in her reckoning, I am, despite being younger. That’s why she’s pushing me to get out of a field job. Because she thinks you’re a compatible and acceptable-enough match, and I should be producing the next generation of Lin women. You heard her. She figures you’re rich and famous enough that you’re worthy of being her son-in-law. You’ll enhance the Lin family as an addition.”
“Kids, huh?” Erik mumbled, his earlier swagger gone. “There’s thinking ahead, and then there’s thinking way ahead.”
“You never thought about kids during all those years on the frontier?” Jia asked, her tone curious rather than accusatory. She’d barely thought about anything besides her career, but she’d had less time for it to become an issue.
His voice was soft and a touch vulnerable for a moment. “I always thought I’d make a crap dad,” Erik admitted. “And I’ve been with women, but it’s not like I was in a position for a stable relationship, and it’s not like I met anyone who I felt like I wanted to raise a little Erik Junior with.”
Jia’s stomach tightened at the implications of his last sentence.
She averted her eyes and was grateful for the passing wine tray. She acquired a new glass and gulped it down. She’d let her mother control the conversation from a distance. They were busy cleaning up the conspiracy and needed to focus on the day to day issues, not worry about children.
“So, uh…” Erik began, rubbing the back of his neck.
“Erik Junior?” Emma scoffed.
Erik and Jia looked around, worried that she’d chosen to appear, but she’d limited the transmission to their ears. The distraction was welcome.
“What’s wrong with that name?” Erik asked.
“Any future fleshbag spawn between the two of you should be named after the being responsible for your survival,” Emma explained.
“And what name would that be?”
“Emma 2.0, regardless of gender.” The AI’s tone made it sound so obvious.
The two humans shared a quiet chuckle. Jia wasn’t sure if Emma was trying to do them a favor by breaking up the awkwardness or if she was being serious, but latching onto an absurd conversation vector offered an escape better than wine.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Jia replied with a smile.
“On an unrelated matter, something occurred to me while I was doing data analysis,” Emma continued.
“You really want to talk about this now?” Erik whispered.
“Why not? Do you want to go back to the previous conversation?”
“No,” Erik and Jia replied loudly enough to draw stares from nearby guests.
“The lack of an impressive AI on the Argo is irrelevant because of my constant connection to the ship and your ability to manage it because of its smaller size,” Emma explained. “But the cometary incident reinforced in my mind that might not be the case with the Bifröst.”
Jia couldn’t believe they were discussing classified experimental jumpships in the middle of her mother’s dinner party, but Emma was right. Anything to avoid an awkward discussion about children was welcome.
“I need to make modifications,” Emma continued. “Heavy modifications to the AI of the other ship. Right now, it’s useless for anything except simple automation.”
“You mentioned that before but then dropped it,” Erik replied quietly.
“Because I needed more time to perform an analysis of the basics of the systems. I’m now more confident and prepared to do what is necessary.”
“I don’t know what to tell you.” Erik leaned closer to Jia so it’d look he was in an intense conversation with only her
and not some mysterious AI kilometers away. “The DD isn’t going to let us park that ship in Earth orbit.”
“I’m just mentioning,” Emma replied, “but the sooner I can accomplish this, the better it’ll be for your goals, and I’d argue, the goals of the UTC.
“We can ask Alina about it when we have an opportunity,” Jia whispered. “It’s not like the DD can complain too much about free improvements.”
“That’s all I ask.”
She watched her mother occasionally gesture in her direction. The temporary freedom of the AI upgrade conversation gave way to a return of worrying about an overbearing parent.
Jia needed a mission far away from Earth and soon.
Chapter Eight
July 12, 2230, Neo Southern California Metroplex, Private Hangar of the Argo
Erik set his flitter down in the hangar. He’d arrived in response to a cryptic message from Lanara.
Come right away. Don’t need your better-looking half.
They didn’t have a mission, and Alina had told them to stay on standby, so he’d spent the last few days with Jia, either on dates or training.
He doubted this was some secret attempt by Lanara to seduce him. That woman wasn’t turned on by anything that lacked a fusion reactor.
“What the hell?” Erik thought as he looked through the front windshield.
Large cargo bots floated through the air with crates underneath. There were crates and cargo containers filling half the hangar, and Lanara was pushing a hoverdolly topped with a pyramid of long, dark cylinders with pointed ends.
“Do you know what’s going on, Emma?” Erik asked aloud, confusion still painted across his face.
“Yes,” she replied. “I’ve had communication with her, but Engineer Quinn would prefer to tell you herself, I believe.”
Erik grunted in frustration and opened the door. Yes, any conversation involving the Argo was probably best held in the protected hangar, but she could have sent him a message with a couple of clever phrase replacements.
Lanara stopped pushing her dolly toward the open cargo bay and jogged over to Erik. “Blackwell, you came a lot sooner than I expected.”
“You said you wanted me to come right away,” he replied with a shrug. “I figured that meant right away.”
“Well, I figured that meant anytime in the next week, but now that you’re here, we can get this out of the way.” Lanara rubbed her hands together with an eager gleam in her eyes.
Erik looked up as a cargo drone passed overhead with a crate almost the size of his flitter underneath. “What is all this?”
Lanara jabbed a finger in his chest. “I’m trying to get you to stop bitching, both for your sanity and mine. The best way to do that is to solve it my way.”
He eyed her. No confusion had left his face, and perhaps a dab or two had been added. “I haven’t talked to you in days.” Erik gestured around the hangar. “You can’t need all this for my penjing containers.”
“Those? No?” Lanara waved that thought away. “I set that up days ago. You can transfer your stupid plants over here anytime you want. No, I’m talking about your other bitching.”
Erik scrubbed a hand down his face. “I’m so far off the map in this conversation that I’d need to travel for days before I got back to the part where it said ‘here be monsters.’”
Lanara mimed an explosion. “Because you’re a soldier, all you think about is blowing crap up. You keep whining for ‘more guns, more guns, more guns,’ and I keep telling you there’s only so much we can do because of the reactor.”
Erik nodded slowly, feeling more grounded. “Okay, and you’re going to add more guns?”
“Damn it, Blackwell.” Lanara shook her arms in front of him. “Don’t you ever listen? I can’t do much with guns because we don’t have the power for it. You don’t want a ship where the life support cuts out when you fire the weapons, do you?”
“No, that would include all levels of suck.” He thought for a moment. “But would the life support come back on in that scenario?”
Lanara’s withering glare made him want to laugh.
“The first step was to solve the power issue.” She flung her arm toward a large cargo container in the distance that could have held the MX 60. “And that meant we needed a reactor upgrade.”
“Now we’re talking.” Erik looked at the Argo. “But does Alina know about this? I’m guessing this isn’t something you can pound out in a couple of hours.”
“She knows I’ve requested supplies, and she’s approved the purchases, but she has cautioned me about taking the ship offline until we have a window of opportunity. Right now, I’m gathering the parts and preparing.” Lanara cast an eager look at the ship and licked her lips. “I’m good at what I do, Blackwell. If I prep this ahead of time, I can do it in stages, especially on a small ship like this. We’ll upgrade the reactor, and then I can immediately do the shield upgrades. It’ll take longer to stabilize the new power network, but once I do, we can start putting in more of the guns you’re so obsessed with.” Her eyes pinned him in place. “Assuming you still want them?”
Erik didn’t respond right away. He was too busy imagining the Argo with two or three times the firepower. The less they needed to rely on the jumpship, the safer they would be.
If the conspiracy got lucky and boarded the ship with enough Tin Men or yaoguai, they’d have the ultimate weapon. He wanted the jumpship to be the last resort.
“Why wouldn’t I want them?” Erik questioned.
“Because having more guns wouldn’t have done anything to help you last time,” Lanara replied with a shrug. “I don’t want to do a bunch of work just because you need a security blanket, Blackwell. If that’s what this is about, tell me now, so I don’t end up throwing you out an airlock later.”
Erik chuckled, amused at the image of the tiny woman trying to eject him from the ship. “I’m pretty sure we’re going to run into more human ships than Hunter vessels, and if we can’t have a fleet backing our asses up or a dedicated warship on call, the more we can cram onto this thing, the better.”
Lanara scratched her eyelid. “That makes sense. With your luck, we might run into Zitarks or Leems, and having more firepower would help.” She frowned. “But this is where things get complicated.”
“Complicated? Technically?”
“No.” Lanara shook her head. “I’m damned good, and this ship is on the smaller side, but I’m still one person. I can do this in stages like I said and get it done decently quickly, but I’m going to need help. This is something I’ve been thinking about for a while. If we’re going to fly around on that jumpship, I’m going to need more regular help. Raphael’s great, but he’s all about that jump drive, not so much the nitty-gritty of things like the grav emitters on the Argo. Emma’s terrific, but I need human hands I can boss around, too.” She clenched her teeth. “I asked Alina for more people, and she told me to talk to you about it because it’s your team. What crap is that? I’m the engineer. She wouldn’t ask my opinion if you wanted to hire a bunch of cannon fodder.”
“I don’t know,” Erik offered, the dream of extra guns fading. “Things are only going to get more dangerous from here on out. If these people are going to help, that’ll mean they’ll need to be on board with us when we’re on missions.”
“That’s kind of the point. I need help when crap’s blowing up all around me, too.”
Erik locked eyes with Lanara. “Cutter’s not the only person who might be dead by the time this is over.”
Lanara sneered. “You trying to scare me, Blackwell?” She took three steps to look up at him and squared her shoulders. Her tiny size might make her attempt to intimidate ridiculous, but Erik had to admit she had the aura of a grizzled lifer NCO.
“I’m saying not carrying a gun won’t save your life when the conspiracy’s shooting at us,” Erik offered quietly.
“Okay, Soldier Boy, I know you’re a bad-ass who has dropped onto every kind of world there i
s to blow people’s brains out, but that doesn’t mean I don’t know a thing or two about danger, and that’s before counting that I could have died too in that little Hunter incident.” Lanara’s nostrils flared. “I’ve been in a cramped little engine room when half the ship’s been blown apart so badly that I’m lucky I’m in a pressure suit and the grav emitters are fried. Bodies floating around me, their blood making those stupid little spheres, and me sitting there trying to get the backup power cells online, so the other guys don’t end finishing me off. At that point, guns don’t mean crap.” She pointed to her chest. “In that situation, engineers mean everything.”
Erik nodded. “If you’ve been through that, why are you blowing the danger off?”
“Because…” She deflated a touch. “Because I actually believe in your stupid mission, Blackwell.” Lanara relaxed her shoulders. “And as great as I am, I know my limits. Alina’s like you. She thinks she’s doing everybody a favor by limiting exposure and keeping all this secret. I know some of that is ghost crap, but I’ve accepted a truth that seems to have escaped our fancy ghost boss and your oh-so-experienced ass.”
“What truth is that?” Erik asked, his voice a soft rumble.
“We’re at war, Blackwell,” Lanara answered. “You both talk like it, but you don’t always act like it.
Erik grunted, unsure of what to say. This was more a mission of revenge-filled annihilation.
“I’ll admit I didn’t take this seriously at first,” Lanara continued. “Put me in a ship, give me my tools, and I can be happy. Alina pays well, and you were giving me challenges. That’s all I cared about.”
He reached up, scratching his nose. “But you take it seriously now?”
Lanara nodded. “If we hadn’t been out there to stop that Hunter ship, who would have died along the way? Those bastards might have parked above Earth and broadcast a suicide signal and killed half our species.” She tightened her hands into fists so hard, her nails dug into her palms. He worried droplets of blood would leak out. “It’d be one thing if those Hunter bastards had shown up themselves, but the conspiracy woke them up. The conspiracy could have cost billions of lives because of whatever twisted plan they have. And that’s before you think about all their weird-ass yaoguai, mutants, Tin Men, and half-alien hybrids. There is absolutely nothing they won’t do.”
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