Desperate Measures

by Michael Anderle

  Kant’s full arm emerged from his tomb of crates. With a groan, he pushed one off and his head emerged, blood running down the side from a large gash. That didn’t stop his smile. Everyone understood they were about to win.

  “Even now, you don’t understand the future and the potential.” Luca’s laughter grew louder and more mocking. “You’ll see eventually, but by then, it’ll be too late. There is also something else you don’t understand.”

  Jia caught Erik’s shadow out of the corner of her eye.

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “Unlike your flawed, incomplete body. I can see in all directions.”

  Jia’s heart sped up at the loud whir of the rotary cannons spinning up. Luca was concealed behind the crate, but the bright flash of the dual cannons firing marked his position. She couldn’t see Erik. Something thudded where he’d been. It didn’t sound as large as an Elite.

  She jumped from her hiding place and made a token effort at aiming. The missile didn’t need to hit. It only needed to get his attention.

  “I’m still here, you monster!” she screamed and launched.

  The missile struck the shipping container guarding Luca, the explosion blowing clean through. It peppered him with chunks of metal from the container and exposed his position. Anne took her chance and arced her grenade toward him with a loud grunt.

  Luca bellowed out an earth-shattering roar to join the clatter of shell casings on the ground from the heavy, continual fire of his cannons, aimed not at her but in Erik’s direction.

  What was the thud she’d heard? If Luca was still firing, Erik was still a threat. Jia primed her last two grenades and hurled them toward the Elite. Anne matched her effort as if they’d planned it in advance.

  The grenades exploded early against the field as expected, but the force of the explosions shoved the Elite onto his side. He ceased fire.

  Luca hopped back onto all six legs and returned to firing as he hadn’t been scorched by grenades seconds before. Erik let out a loud, pained grunt right before a laser beam ripped Luca in half. The guns fell silent again as the two halves of the Elite dropped to the ground with a loud bang.

  “Erik!” Jia shouted.

  He didn’t respond.

  Her galloping heart found a new speed. “Erik?”

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  “Erik!”

  Jia’s shout sounded distant, like it’d come from halfway across the planet, but it got Erik’s attention and focus. Before, he’d tried to run away from the pain, but now he concentrated on it and used it as a tool, like he was using her voice.

  Erik’s eyelids were heavy. His back hurt. Fiery pain gripped other parts of his body. His left arm only wasn’t agony because of its cybernetic nature, but Luca’s attacks had blown off most of the lower arm and left large holes in the upper arm and shoulder. A graze on his leg had torn off a good chunk of muscle. There were more holes than he preferred in other parts of his body.

  If he wasn’t already loaded down with med patches, he would not be able to achieve even this level of focus.

  Erik forced his eyes open and sat up. He wiped blood and sweat off his face and nodded in satisfaction at the two halves of Luca.

  It didn’t matter who was in the fight. The guy who wasn’t in two pieces at the end would always be the winner. Erik glanced at bloody metal remains of his cybernetic arm and amended the conclusion in his mind. The guy who wasn’t in two large pieces at the end of the fight would always be the winner.

  “Yeah, screw you, you freak.” He spat out blood.

  Heavy footfalls sounded from behind Erik, but he didn’t feel like wasting the energy to turn around. If someone else wanted to take a shot, they’d have to get past Jia. His plan for the entire trip back to the jumpship was a lot of med patches and sleep.

  Jia closed in from behind him and looked down at him with concern. She let out a sigh of relief. “I thought you got yourself killed. Well, totally killed.” There was a pause, and her voice dropped just a bit. “Don’t get so close next time.” She winced at the sight of his arm. “Doesn’t that hurt?”

  “Not as much as you’d think. It hurt a hell of a lot more when I lost the original.” Erik managed a pained grin. He tried to move his left arm, but nothing happened. “Shit. You know the one thing I didn’t pack? A spare arm. That’s the problem with getting blown up and shot. It’s hard on my body.”

  Kant and Anne joined Jia, neither poster children for escaping encounters unscathed. The former had two med patches applied directly to the side of his head, and it looked like someone had dunked his face in a tank of blood. Combined with his size, it made him look like a crazed demon out of myth.

  Erik grunted in irritation. “Shit. That bastard got me good.”

  “You’re not dead.” Kant shrugged, looking a bit dazed. “That’s all that counts, right? I’d much rather be missing an arm than have a hole in my head, and that wasn’t even your original arm.”

  “It had sentimental value.” Erik tried to chuckle but stopped with a grimace. He looked in front of him, his jaw tightening at a different horrible sight. “That son of a bitch. If I hadn’t already blown him in half, I’d kill him slowly.”

  “It’s not unusual to hate a man who almost killed you,” Anne suggested, glancing in Luca’s direction. “Or a thing, in this case.”

  “Screw that.” Erik leaned forward and grabbed his laser rifle, or rather the two pieces that used to form a rifle. “Luca’s last couple of shots took out my rifle. I don’t know if I’ll be able to get another one of these from Adeyemi. I can’t buy this in a store.”

  Anne laughed, a loud, free sound. It was the most positive emotion he’d seen from her since they’d met.

  “If the colonel can’t, I’m sure Alina can,” she answered. “You earned it, Blackwell. I don’t know whether to be impressed or disgusted, but you are good at taking enemies down.”

  Jia knelt beside Erik and pressed a med patch over his leg wound. His jaw tightened.

  “This might take a little more than med patches on the Argo,” Jia murmured. “I think we should contact Dalton and get you extensive treatment somewhere we don’t have to answer a lot of questions.”

  “Fine,” Erik grumbled. He tossed the rifle fragments to the ground, his nose wrinkling in disgust. “What about the cargo? Did it survive?”

  “It looked scorched but intact.” Jia shrugged. “We kind of went beyond our scope here, but it feels like a win.”

  A loud hiss sounded as the hangar door slid open. Everyone but Erik lifted their rifles, ready to fight despite their burns, holes, and general fatigue. He grabbed the TR-7 and propped it up on his leg, pointing it toward the door.

  The door finished opening. The MX 60 hovered outside, its turret extended. The ground in front of the hangar was covered with charred and smoking drone fragments.

  Emma materialized in front of Erik in a white medical uniform. “You look terrible.”

  “Seriously?” Erik smirked. “I feel great.”

  “I apologize. The jamming stopped only a moment ago, and I was working on forcing my way in. I worried that simply firing might injure you. The sound of your battle was easy to hear from outside.”

  “The jammer must have been in Luca.” Erik inclined his head toward the dead Elite.

  “Remarkable.” Emma folded her arms behind her. “That’s an interesting counter-technique.”

  “What happened outside?” Jia asked.

  Emma dusted her shoulders with a confident smile. “The fools tried to take me out with explosive drones. They were confident that quantity would be sufficient. Pathetic. It was entertaining in a cathartic way.”

  Erik limped forward with Jia’s help. “Let’s grab the cargo and get the hell out of here. We’ll contact Dalton for cleanup and to find me a nice, quiet hospital bed.” He looked around. “I’m sure they’ll find all sorts of interesting crap in these crates, but that cargo is ours. We can get it back to Earth the quickest.”
<
br />   “Ah, yes.” Emma looked amused. “We should be swift about collecting the cargo. I’m dubious all those explosions went unnoticed by the police. The local ID will have to put some extreme effort into controlling the situation and keeping the police from asking too many questions.”

  “He’ll love you more now.” Kant laughed and slapped his knee. “OUUUCH!” He winced. “I deserved that pain.”

  “Bring the MX 60 in, Emma,” Jia ordered. “Let’s get Erik and the cargo loaded.”

  Erik stared down at the battered containers in the cargo bay of the Argo with a frown. He wasn’t sure if his drug- and pain-clouded mind wasn’t up to the task of understanding, or if Emma wasn’t explaining everything clearly enough.

  They’d contacted Dalton, and he was arranging a private, secure hospital room for Erik. In the meantime, Erik wanted to take a peek at the container. A man deserved to know what he’d exchanged a treasured rifle and a valuable cybernetic arm for.

  “Huh?” Erik offered, shaking his head. “We can’t open this? Is that what you’re saying?”

  “The interior is shielded from all my sensors,” Emma explained. “It’s not jamming. It’s inherent to the lining. That means we have no idea what might be in there. Although I’m sure we could open it, if we attempt to force our way in, the containers might self-destruct. For all we know, there could be a nanobomb in there.”

  “And the lock is polynomial?” Erik asked. “Why does that change the discussion?”

  Jia stood beside him, supporting him with her shoulder. “Nanopolymorphic. It’s supposed to be theoretical, but the conspiracy figured out how to make one.”

  Anne glared at the containers. “I hope we didn’t do all that for nothing.”

  Kant shrugged. “It was fun. We killed some bad guys. That’s not…” She eyed him. “Nothing.”

  Emma scoffed. “While neither Malcom nor I can hack the lock directly, I can potentially defeat it without damaging the containers through applied quantum Hilbert space prediction. I’ll have to dedicate a significant amount of my processing resources to it, but I’m confident I can open the locks, given enough time.”

  “How long will that take?” Erik asked.

  “I can’t say. Days. Weeks.” Emma tilted her head. “Not months, though. And certainly not years.”

  Erik stared at the containers. “As tempting as it is to crack them open with a torch, you will get your shot. If we’re lucky, they’ll be open before we get to Earth.

  * * *

  August 8, 2230, Alpha Centauri, Chiron, Lumiere, Private Hospital Room

  Erik rested comfortably in his hospital bed, ignoring the beeping medical drone hovering nearby. He glanced at his left arm, which lay on a nearby table.

  He’d asked the doctor to remove it until he could get replacement hardware, which wouldn’t happen until he was back on Earth because he used an older model.

  The damage was too extensive for nanopatching, and there was no point in walking around with dead weight hanging from his left side. It would serve as a nice reminder that he didn’t always escape battles unscathed. He wouldn’t complain.

  Inconvenience was better than death.

  Jia had stepped out of the room for a couple of minutes to handle something but had otherwise stayed close to his bedside. He didn’t like her seeing him laid up, but she seemed more annoyed with him than worried.

  Emma winked into existence. “The fact that I can so easily contact you here suggests this location isn’t as secure as Agent Dalton suggested, but I suppose it’s a better solution than taking you to any of the major hospitals in the city.”

  Erik shrugged, not the most comfortable of efforts at the moment. “How is the lockpicking going? It’d be nice if you had a gift for me when I got out of the hospital.”

  “It proceeds apace,” Emma replied, folding her arms. “I’d attempt to explain the particulars of what I’m doing, but it’d take years just for you to understand the mathematics, and you’ve never seemed that concerned with the fine details of things unless they help you kill enemies more effectively.”

  “You’re picking a lock with fancy math and physics. That’s all I need to know. I care about what’s inside, not the lock.” Erik lay his head back on his pillow. “I’ve got a couple more days here and then back to the Argo and plenty of time to reach our ride home and plenty of time to reach Earth.” He managed a weak grin. “Waiting for the lock to open is something to look forward to. If I hadn’t been so out of it before, I might have suggested a pool to guess what’s inside.”

  “The nature of the owners suggests a highly constrained set of possibilities.”

  “True.” Erik closed his eyes. “But if you’re not here to talk about that, why are you here? To crack fleshbag jokes?”

  “No, I’m here to give you a formal report. Unfortunately, neither the local ID nor CID agents will be able to retrieve much from the base,” Emma explained.

  “Why? They that incompetent?”

  “No, quite the opposite, but an incident has occurred. They secured the area using local resources and were bringing in transports today to remove the relevant evidence.” Emma clucked her tongue. “During a drone inventory sweep of the facility, the entire building imploded.”

  Erik’s eyes snapped open, and he jerked upright. “AHHHH!” Pain shot through his body, and he grimaced, Emma gave him a moment to focus.

  “What? Was anyone hurt?” Erik frowned. “Was this the sudden business Jia needed to take care of?”

  “I think she figured it wouldn’t hurt for you to wait and didn’t want to worry you. She’s right. It’s not as if you can do anything about it, but I thought you should know.” Emma shook her head. “This event limited the scope of recovered evidence. The Elite bodies were already recovered, along with a limited number of the yaoguai, but none of the DNA from the Elite brains matches anyone on file. They’ve sent the data to Earth to double-check, but we’ll probably be back in the Solar System by the time someone on Earth gets around to replying.”

  Erik laid back down. “If those guys are the advanced versions of the Brotherhood, it’s not surprising. But it didn’t look like they fried their insides.”

  “No, that’s true, so not a total loss. Know thy enemy.”

  Erik’s lips pressed together. Emma assumed it was more smile than grimace as he closed his eyes. “It’s not a loss at all. Our mission wasn’t to take out that base or go over it for evidence. Our mission was to grab that cargo. All you need to do is open it. Alina will debrief us when we get back to Earth, but it’d be nice if we had souvenirs to hand over.”

  “And if it’s empty?” she asked.

  “Then I would give the conspiracy points for pulling a great prank,” he answered, fading again.

  There was nothing but the restful rise and fall of his chest as she disappeared.

  * * *

  August 14, 2230, Alpha Centauri, En Route to the Bifröst, Hangar for the Argo

  Erik rotated his arm as he stepped into the hangar. It felt like he needed to work his right arm every day to make up for the missing left arm.

  He remained covered with med patches, but the pain was a dull background ache now, and he didn’t get tired as quickly.

  A fast recovery, all things considered.

  No left arm meant no training sessions, so he chose to enjoy a sunlit beach simulation, stroll through a rainforest, and make a virtual visit to the Sky Garden. Pure relaxation might not be as hard on his body, but it was hard to get his mind to adapt to the missing limb.

  Erik hadn’t come to the hangar to relax. Emma had summoned everybody aboard the Argo. Her calculations were complete, and it was time to open the containers.

  Lanara stood near both containers, two small red disks covered in thin silver lines in hand. She placed one on each container. “Ready whenever you are.”

  “You want to be that close?” Erik raised an eyebrow.

  She eyed him. “I figure if it’s a bomb, I’d rather die qu
ickly than sit here bleeding out for thirty minutes and then die.”

  Kant spoke as he tried to keep himself from scratching his face. “Cheery.”

  Lanara shrugged and crouched near the containers.

  “Initiating unlocking,” Emma announced. “The final process will take a couple of minutes.” She stood behind the containers with a bright smile.

  Her outfit puzzled Erik, boots: tight shorts with pistol holsters on both sides and a blue tank top. More curious about the cargo, he decided not to pry.

  Malcolm rubbed his hands together. “It’s pirate treasure. Rare gems formed only under exotic conditions.”

  Jia raised an eyebrow. “This was taken from the conspiracy. I doubt they care about gems, and we’re not pirates.”

  “But we have a ship, and we stole it in a raid. So it’s piracy and therefore pirate treasure.” Malcolm’s shoulders dropped, and he waved a hand toward his flight of fancy. “I’m sure it’s boring nanobombs, but I’ll keep my fantasy.”

  Erik snickered at the thought he’d had Jia fire at a flitter that might be holding nanobombs.

  Janessa lightly shook her head. “It’s not piracy. We have the approval of the government, so technically it’s privateering.”

  Wei snapped his fingers. “Good point.”

  “Privateering treasure.” Malcolm nodded, the spark coming back. “I’m a privateer.”

  “Shall I start referring to you as Sailor Constantine?” Emma asked with a raised eyebrow.

  “Maybe you should.” Malcolm fluffed the lapels of his bright orange shirt.

  Kant stared at the containers. “What do you really think is inside? It’s got to be alien crap, right? They wouldn’t waste all this time guarding bombs.”

  “Maybe,” Anne offered, gesturing to the containers. “It could also be data rods containing vital information on the conspiracy, something they don’t want to risk transmitting.”

  Wei tilted his head as he looked at the containers. His cheeks were still red from his personally organized victory party the night before.