Heretics (Stars Edge: Nel Bently Book 4)

by V. S. Holmes

  FIFTEEN

  “Oi, Bently!” A loud voice and louder knock rattled the cabin door. She dragged herself from the glowing screen, shutting down her research on sonic weapons with a pang of regret. With Lin’s credentials and a few deep dives into what Phil had sent her, she felt close to actually understanding a bit more about their invisible antagonist.

  She slipped to the door before another knock could wake the tangle of limbs and hair that were the sleeping Lin. Fumbling her smile into place, she stepped into the hall and shut the door behind her.

  Andy leaned on the opposite wall of the hall, dressed in a strange combination of electrosuit and field clothes.

  “Hey. Lin’s asleep. What’s up?”

  “We’re wanted outside.” She shifted. “Sorry for cutting your date short last night, by the way. Never know how a contact is gonna go down, especially with IDH faffing about again.”

  Nel shrugged. “I get that there’s a lot of tension between IDH and everyone down here. Weird being caught in the middle. Everything go alright for you?”

  “Good enough, considering. Freelance work isn’t ever easy. Anyway, we’re doing recon on something in headquarters and they want archaeology eyes.”

  Excitement sparked through her as she checked the time. “I thought the mission wasn’t until noon. And you’re not an archaeologist.”

  “I guess they want field staff to head in and get shit squared for the eggheads to do their research. Electrosuit and pack required though, alright?”

  “Be there in five,” Nel affirmed before stepping back into their room. She dressed in darkness, momentarily saddened that she could now pull an electrosuit on without sight. She managed to find her pack and feel for her tools without knocking anything over. Pulling the coverlet over Lin’s sprawled limbs, she dropped a kiss on the sleeping woman’s head and crept from the room.

  Andy had waited in the corridor and fell into a jog beside her. The rest of the mission underlings were arrayed about the tunnel platform in various stages of donning chem masks and protective gear. Nel eyed the equipment with distaste. “I thought we left these with space travel.”

  “Makes me glad I’ve never broken atmo,” Andy lamented with a chuckle.

  “Attention, everyone.” Harris’s voice cut through the low chatter. Fidgeting and preparations stilled. Like the others, he wore an electrosuit bolstered with a fully equipped vest. “I appreciate your readiness this morning. I realize this is a bit last minute, but during our preparations for our mission this afternoon, we discovered some concerning developments. This base has a series of chambers that, since the initial attack in Qena, have been sealed. The shutdown of this base was triggered by the CPO of Odyssey of Earth, Philos, though we aren’t certain if that is what initiated the planet-wide blackout.”

  Kestral raised his hand. “Isn’t this consistent with the information from our initial briefing?”

  “Indeed. However, several of our current field team do not have access to that information.” Harris’s eyes lingered on Nel. Did he know she had found a way around that hurdle? Did he care? “Additionally, upon arrival here, we discovered that, despite orders to keep these chambers sealed until our arrival, there was unauthorized access a week ago. Until we examine the security history and access codes, we can’t be certain this wasn’t a second attempt at an attack, hence the precautions. Therefore, please take this seriously. We’ve already had a casualty and our transport morgue has limited space.” He patted the chem mask hooked at the side of his belt. “We’ll leave chem masks off unless needed to avoid the use of audio-coms. Understood?”

  Murmurs of ascent echoed from the limestone walls of the platform.

  “Move out in T-5.”

  She double-checked her headphones were settled properly. Already her headache dimmed at the soft bloom of noise-canceling static.

  Unauthorized access. If Nel knew one thing about IDH, it was how proprietary they were about their information and spaces. So someone who had clearance level but not permission? That thought did nothing for her tenuous trust of the organization.

  She glanced back to see Andy checking the safety on her pistol. Her mask hung about her neck. She might have been born on Earth, but she sure knew her way around an IDH uniform. Maybe that’s part of the job, becoming someone else. “Bent, might wanna arm up.” The low voice cut through the static of apprehension in Nel’s mind.

  Nel scowled. “I’m not a gun person.”

  “This isn’t about politics—”

  “You don’t want me in there, twitchy, with a deadly weapon I really don’t know how to use.” Nel softened the refusal with a smile. It was inappropriate, in hindsight, but she didn’t really care. Everything about her being there seemed inappropriate. “Dirt-o-mancer should do just fine. It’s not like I’m the first sweep.”

  Andy shrugged in a suit-yourself fashion and fell into line with the rest of the team. They headed up the stairs Nel had taken the other day, cutting left into a broad hall. Several open doorways led off to what looked like libraries and low-tech research stations. The double doors at the end of the hall, however, were barred with a massive bank-vault lock.

  Teera crouched at the access module embedded in the stone, electronic lockpick propped on one knee while she fiddled with the dials.

  Harris stood over her, dark eyes watching the flickering screen with interest. After a few false tries, she glanced up with a victorious grin.

  The gears whirred and Kestral cranked the lever to the left. A pop sounded, muffled through the headphones. A second later air roiled from the room, mixing like oil and water with the air of the tunnel.

  “Masks!” Kestral boomed.

  Nel ducked her head, smothering her mouth and nose in the crook of her elbow. As she scrambled to press the mask onto her face, a voice cut through.

  “False alarm! Just pressurized. Some residual compounds…” He trailed off, collecting samples as he went, frown almost comical under the distortion of the mask’s clear face. “Should be done in a moment.”

  Nel tightened her mask’s straps regardless, noting that no one else risked removing their PPE either. The point guard team entered, flashlight beams making ghosts of the swirling air.

  A minute later they were waved in. Nel eyed the shadowed doorway, unwilling to touch anything but the sweaty wood of her trowel’s handle. Her stomach was tight. Edging in behind Andy and the glinting barrel of her 941, Nel caught sight of dozens of computer screens. Tidy workspaces encircled a central desk. Dust coated almost every surface, save for the deep drag marks across the floor. Her muffled steps led her around the side, wrist held out so her comm’s camera could catch anything her eyes didn’t.

  After a full sweep an alert popped up on her mask’s shield:

  SWITCH FROM AUDIO COMM. REMOVE MASK. ALL CLEAR.

  With a hammering heart, she pulled the mask off, letting it dangle like Andy’s just under her chin. Under the must, the room smelled of hospital antiseptic and engine grease.

  “Fan out,” Harris commanded. “I want everything recorded first, don’t move anything. Teera, can you access the computers safely?”

  “Yessiree,” she chimed, moving to the main panel in the center of the computer bank. “Once I’m in, want me to bring her online?”

  Her. Nel turned. In the dim light, she almost missed the small cylindrical shape in the center of the room, currently shrouded in black cloth. Her stomach tightened. She followed the boot prints on the floor. She had assumed there were several, but on closer inspection they were identical. One very busy set.

  “This shit looks like some alien lab,” Andy observed, nudging a few of the wires with her boot. “Funny, that’s almost the most likely option these days.”

  Nel barked a laugh, staring at the dim room. She edged toward the main console. It was dusty, but the metal was new, gleaming under what she imagined was about two years’ worth of dust.

  “I’m into the main bas
e computer,” Teera called over the susurrating footfalls. “Switching from emergency backup to main power. Bringing auxiliary systems online…security systems…” Colorful coding flickered over the large screen of the tech’s comm, mirroring the flickering across her pale eyes. “Hang tight everyone, bringing lights up.”

  A click, a buzz, and then light swelled, scattering shadows to the corners.

  “ALEXANDRIA BASE POWER: ONLINE. INTER-BASE COMMUNICATION SYSTEM: ONLINE. BASE DEFENSE: ARMED. BASE COMPUTER: OFFLINE.”

  Harris bent over Teera’s display with a frown. “Everything still working?”

  “She didn’t come online with everything else, but I think that’s due to the firewalls.” She shifted, glancing up at the central bank. “Gonna try raising her out of stasis and connecting via hardline, instead of the main access—”

  “Do your best not to blow us to kingdom come,” Harris suggested.

  “Will do, sir.” A series of keystrokes later and the ground shuddered. A mechanical iris in the center of the empty console ground opened. A gleaming, fluid-filled tank rose from its confinement. Nel’s chest constricted as it shuddered to a halt. Stunned silence filled the room.

  The tank, scratched, half-filled, and spider-webbed with cracks, was empty.

  “Teera—”

  “I don’t know, sir,” she hissed, flingers flying, eyes darting from her ocular screens to the looming empty tank where Alexandria’s senti-comp should be. “Getting security feeds now…”

  “Weird place for an aquarium,” Andy noted, peering at the covered cylinder.

  Nel fixed her with a glare. Andy was fun, but her blasé attitude was beginning to grate. “More like the personification of the uncanny valley. Next time you get a chance, Google ‘senti-comp.’”

  “Someone stole their CPU?”

  “CPO,” Harris intoned, the tension around his mouth stating that he, too, would rather the questions wait. “Central Processing Operative. Alexandria, like all our largest bases or ships, was run by a sentient computer.”

  Andy’s face eased into a delighted grin. “So, like powering my Gameboy off a potato. Bitchin’.”

  Nel just stared at her. “No ew? No creeps?”

  “I don’t know, seems like the inverse of wetware to me. There’s been a lot of tech integrations in the last few years. Maybe I’m just a bit more inured to it.”

  Nel’s attention was fixed on the pervasive cloy of mildew, underscoring the distinct tang of plastic and circuits. Biology and circuitry, humanity’s zenith or its nadir. Snarled cables within the tank were coated with biofilm and what she really hoped wasn’t tissue. It wasn’t theft. It was kidnapping.

  Static crackled and everyone ducked; Nel’s hands clapped over her noise-cancellation in panic.

  “Got the security feed up.” Teera rocked back on her heels, neck craned to view the grainy footage on the largest screen. The halls were deserted, save for occasional patrols. Seemingly the same handful of guards were on duty much of the time. “I don’t understand—who steals a senti-comp? I always see people searching for them on the dark web but to actually—”

  “Unauthorized access occurred on the seventh. Roughly two weeks ago,” Harris interrupted.

  Wordlessly the tech fast-forwarded to the date in question. A routine security sweep, then a new figure jogged up the stairs from the train tunnel.

  Harris leaned forward. The others pressed closer, all pretense of searching the room dropped in their shared dread. An electrosuit glinted under loosely wrapped dark fabric. Light bounced off angled reflectors over their face. Whoever it was walked with purpose, either certain there were no guards or able to handle any they encountered. Judging by the graceful stride and heavy gauntlet, Nel determined it was probably the latter. They carried a blocky pack, the size of a large camping cooler.

  After a second's delay at the vault entrance, the door opened, and the person slipped in. Gloved hands flew across the same access point where Teera now crouched, and the tank rose from its holding chamber.

  Alexandria’s senti-comp was female. Whoever broke into the chamber seemed to attempt to wake her, returning to the access point again and again, movements increasingly frustrated. Finally, their fist came down on the glass itself. Fluid sloshed, but otherwise, the head remained still, unconscious.

  The kidnapper crouched by their pack then, ripping it open to show a dark, square container. Next, a heavy pipe shattered the thick acrylic of the tank. Liquid dribbled across the floor, and the figure ripped their gloves off, reaching bare-handed into the primordial technical fluid. Even on the grainy monochrome footage, Nel saw the drifting hair and waxy, waterlogged skin. A few tugs removed the wires and tubes, hastily replaced by other sets attached to the pack at their feet. Then she was tucked inside, and the lid sealed.

  “Ripped her right out of the wall while she was sleeping.”

  “Can we get a face from that?” Harris asked.

  “Not with the recog-blocking mask.” Teera shook her head, pale face tight. “But I have affirmative credentials.” Before she could pull the record from the computer’s history onto the main screen, a voice cut through the dread.

  “Don’t.” Lin stood in the doorway, electrosuit tight across her heaving chest. Her gloved hands were clenched tightly. Nel stumbled over the wires to get to her but stopped short at the fury in the woman’s dark eyes.

  “Letnan—” Harris began, but Lin’s low voice silenced him.

  “It’s my brother. Alexandria’s senti-comp was stolen by Komodor Muda Dar Nalawangsa.”

  SIXTEEN

  Nel couldn’t tear her eyes away from Lin. The woman she followed across the stars fractured before her eyes, pieces clattering across her betrayer’s footprints on the dusty floor. Nel’s mind spun with morbid curiosity: how did it feel to be ripped from consciousness? Hauled from your second womb? A different question burned in Lin’s fragile eyes, filled with venom.

  “Dr. Bently,” Harris murmured. “Please take Letnan Nalawangsa back to the train. I’ll meet you in my office in half an hour.

  Lin’s voice was a snarl. “With all due respect—”

  “It’s an order, Letnan.”

  Before an argument exploded in the dusty air, Nel grabbed Lin’s hand, palm pressing to the heated circle of her glove. When dark eyes met hers, she tugged gently. “C’mon, love. You don’t need to see this.”

  Lin followed, but once they were clear of the vault and down to the solitude of the platform, Nel realized it wasn’t passively. Lin ripped her hand free once they reached the solitude of their cabin and paced from the door to the bed and back, raking a shaking hand through her hair. Every line of her trembling body was taught with fear. “This is a fucking nightmare.”

  Nel let her pace. Usually she was gone before anything big ever happened. Before any feelings got too large. Gritting her teeth, she rooted herself to the ground. Lin watched Nel’s life crumble a dozen times in the past few years. Nel might not know what to do, but she knew she wanted to be here. “Are you sure it’s him? I know you want evidence he’s okay—”

  Lin spun on her, face a rictus of despair. “You think I need a face to recognize my brother! I know his walk, his shoulders, his damn temper tantrums when things don’t go well!”

  Nel’s gut clenched. She had recognized Mikey, too, despite the blood and bruises and rigor mortis. “No. I trust you. I’m sorry. I can’t even begin to think of why he would—”

  “There’s a thousand reasons, but I can’t think of why he, of all people, would do this. If he needed a senti-comp you’d think he’d use his ship’s.” Lin rubbed her eyes, miraculously dry. Sometimes tears weren’t enough. “Promise for Tomorrow was powered by Phil, before he took over Odyssey. The Promise has been running with a rudimentary AI system. They’re fine, but finicky for a ship that size, especially when trying to cross star systems. I worried it could have caused a trajectory malfunction, and that’s why…” Her words dissolve
d into a snarl.

  “Would he kidnap someone just to have a more powerful ship?” Nel frowned. She knew so little of her girlfriend’s temperamental brother, save for the ambition they shared and his distaste for Nel. And his distrust of IDH. “And why her, when he knows we need her?”

  Lin’s jaw tightened and she strode again from wall to door. Nel smelled ozone, ears muffled in anticipation of a blast. Her chest ached, looking at what this mission had turned Lin into—intensity heightened to paranoia, lean grace turned to angles and edges.

  She tugged the bottle she had taken from the space station out of their tiny closet and offered it to Lin. Ignoring her, the Letnan raked a hand through her hand, wheeling about and starting back toward the heater. “Talk to me a minute?”

  “It’s just everything, alright?” she snapped back. “Nothing’s okay, and hasn’t been, and it won’t be for a while and I’m just trying to cling to each hour at a time.”

  “I’m here,” Nel offered. Her untrained empathy was clumsy at best, but sincere. “You just gotta ask. You’re always so knowledgeable, confident. I can’t begin to think about how to actually meet your needs. Aside from—”

  “What I don’t need is another sex joke! I’m more than just a lay, alright? Right now, I need a human, not a vibrator.”

  This was a familiar conversation to Nel, but never from this side. It’s not comfortable. “I’m sorry. Really. I’m not great at this stuff. But I’m here.”

  “Maybe if you spent your days listening to people instead of screwing our mission up, you’d have learned by now!” Lin snapped. “You think it’s easy working my ass off trying to save your planet when you spend your days staring at maps you don’t have clearance for and making moon eyes at your beer or whatever new and interesting woman hopped aboard that day?”

  “Whoa.” Nel raised her hands in protest. As much as she wanted to debunk the bit about Andy, she knew it was better to ignore that accusation. “I’m trying to help! In the only way I can, since I’m left to twiddle my thumbs. And you should want to save Earth because it's worth saving, not because it’s mine. Or was Dar right?”