by R. K. Thorne
Between her and Mo, they had exceptional aim, and the second group of pirates or whoever they were went down without any further fight. But the damage had been done.
The hospital looked like all hell had broken loose. Ellen’s heart sank. How had these assholes gotten word that a new shipment was coming in? Had the only thing protecting this hospital been its poverty?
She groaned inwardly as she leapt out of the flyer. A man in a doctor’s white coat, two Teredarks, and six Ursas in similar white coats were emerging from the hospital, headed toward the rubble.
The Teredark stopped, bent its head slightly in her direction, then clicked some at the man. The Ursas were shaking their furry heads. The man clicked back once or twice in the pale human imitation of Teredark native. The Teredark—who seemed to be the leader—made a dismissive gesture in Ellen’s direction and slithered toward the rocks.
The man approached her, his face pained but not with hurt or sympathy. More like anger. “He says to you people to leave from this place. Your medicine is not worth the cost.”
“They’re free,” Ellen grunted, even though she knew what he meant.
“No. They are not.” Pressing his lips together and raising his chin, the man turned and followed the others toward the rubble.
“Jenny, Kael, do you read? We’ve cleared out the artillery, and—”
She stopped short when Kael appeared, leaning heavily on Jenny with one arm around her and the other around Merith. Something about the sight made her blood run cold.
“We read you, Commander,” Kael said. “Thanks for the pest control.”
“Yeah, Xi patched us in on Mo’s cam,” Jenny said.
“That was kicking,” Kael agreed.
“She is a master,” Ellen said, relief easing into her veins. It was really just one bit of bad damage to the knee and thigh of the armor. Nothing an armor case and a lot of skin glue couldn’t fix, from the look of it.
“Pretty sure he meant you, Commander. Mo’s too efficient. We never get in in time to see her come to the rescue.”
Ellen didn’t know what to say to that. She slapped the crate behind her instead. “Get the pirate in the flyer and then you two help me unload this stuff. They said they want us out of here.”
“Really?” Jenny grunted.
“In not so many words.”
“I will insist again that I am not nor was I ever a pirate,” Kael grumbled as they let go of him next to the flyer. He thunked down without much ceremony and a clank loud enough to make several Ursas flinch.
“You’ve only got one leg right now, don’t you?” Ellen shot back, smiling to herself.
Jenny snickered. “I’m all out of wooden pegs, so I guess I’ll just have to heal him.”
Kael slammed the lid shut on his armor case. The nanos and the case went to work on their repairs with a little hum and a whirr. They’d have a little more work to do than normal this time. He ran his fingers over the cool, shining, gray steel shell for just a moment. Two months in, not having to pull out his repair kit after every single mission still felt like a massive luxury.
He rose and limped over to the desk. His desk, although he was still getting used to the idea. All this space after a decade of life hot bunking in Theroki filth… well, it was one of many things that was taking some getting used to. Also the easy accessibility of skin glue, nanos, and a brace that would have him healed up before the day was over.
Cabin 6A looked largely unchanged from two months before. The vid screen on the wall held a changing montage of nature videos that Dr. Taylor had said would help with stabilizing some of his biochemical processes. The new chip no longer messed with him directly, and Dremer had declared his prefrontal cortex “mostly fine” and “perfectly adequate,” whatever that meant. Eventually, his body would get the message, but it would take time and practice as his brain had had years of training in letting acid build and build in his veins. Metaphorically speaking. And, of course, the nature videos couldn’t hurt. Unless they drove him crazy. But unlike Taylor’s meditation exercises, the bird-filled forest and the wind over the sand dunes actually did make him feel better.
Right now, a small tropical waterfall trickled over shining black stones. That, combined with the exertion of the hospital delivery mission, left him with a calm, mellow buzz. His team had had plenty of cleanup work to do, scaring away bandits near the hospital before Ellen and Zhia ever got there.
The holodisplay on the desk patiently pulsed amber with a message from Doug. He tapped the base, and the holo sprang to life.
About time. The final details of his new identity danced before him. He read it over quickly. Still born on Faros IV, in a similar but different region; that seemed smart. His new persona hadn’t ever been a Theroki though. He’d worked security on the water farms prevalent in the Ramadd region for two decades before taking to the stars. A simple life, now with a little more adventure.
Guess he had better read up on water farms.
His eyes flicked over the new name Doug had assigned, and he chuckled. He sent a quick reply back. Kael… Asidian? Very creative, Doug.
Doug must have been working at the same time, wherever he was, because it was barely five minutes before he replied. What? I like the sound of it. Unless you have a better suggestion… ?
Kael shook his head. He did not. That was why he’d been glad to let Doug pick. That didn’t mean he wasn’t going to tease the man over it. He answered one more time before shutting down the holo screen. Not everyone can have a name as versatile and impressive as Douglas Oliver Simmons. It’ll do.
He hit the shower and retired to his room with water, a stolen meat-stuffed pita, and a handful of dried figs, waving off an invitation to join Nova and Fern at the mess table. It wasn’t really stolen, of course, but it still sort of felt that way. Taylor had said to give it time.
The meat and figs were insanely delicious. While he’d only run into the gifted Amaya actually cooking one time, he’d been sure to thank her profusely and wasn’t surprised to find she’d hailed from Faros VII. Picked up as part of the same passenger program that had drawn him in.
He hadn’t run into her beyond that one time. She was somewhat reclusive, cooking in large batches at odd hours, but then again so was he. Being part of the crew hadn’t drawn him out much more over the last few weeks than it had when he’d been trying to keep his Theroki head low and out of trouble. He wasn’t entirely sure why he was keeping to himself. Perhaps it was the same reason—this was a good gig, and he didn’t need trouble. Maybe old habits died hard. Maybe he was just too tired; they worked hard.
Maybe it was Ellen.
He wasn’t avoiding her exactly. But he might have more interaction with Simmons than half the crew, although he and Nova had—cautiously and with Zhia’s somewhat absent supervision—taken to sparring regularly at least three times a week. One way to get over someone trying to kill you was to fight them again, he supposed. And again and again. And every fight where he didn’t utterly lose it reinforced for him that things had really changed. They were really different. There was no oath programming, no bloodlust. None artificially manufactured by a microchip, anyway.
He had really done it. Escaped.
Hard to believe, but they’d done the impossible.
One thing hadn’t changed though. Ellen was still his commanding officer, and nothing more.
He alternated between spending the day trying to accept that and plotting wild ways to change her mind. He regretted both sorts of days.
He didn’t act on any of it. He’d made his thoughts on the matter known. She could come to him if she changed her mind.
She hadn’t.
And it hurt like hell. He’d been right to think that working with her would be torture. But all in all, he came out ahead. Pain, but also purpose. He owed them every freedom he had. The least he could do was carry a rifle and obey orders. While he got paid for it, no less.
Finishing his dinner, he flopped down on the bunk and
watched the wall display shift from prairie grass waving in the wind to a sunset over the ocean. He sucked in a big breath and exhaled it out slowly. That one was his favorite.
He wasn’t happy. But this was as close as he’d maybe ever been.
After a while, he started to feel that itch of being watched. He’d shut his eyes, listening to the waves and thinking. Without looking up at the maintenance crawl space above him, he smiled.
“Isa. Cut it out. Don’t you have something better to do?”
“But you’re so relaxed,” she said shamelessly from the ceiling—her observation superhighway. They were all creatures in a human zoo for her to study. He wasn’t clear on exactly how many of them knew it. “It’s so calming, even when it hurts.”
She knew of his struggles to come to terms with everything, of course. He hadn’t much tried to hide them, and Ellen was too often in his thoughts to conceal anything anyway. “Humans are complicated, kiddo. But you can get calm watching these too. Just try it.”
“I don’t feel calm. I feel bored. And antsy. I tried.”
“Ah. Maybe you should try meditation then.”
She snickered. Every time he tried meditation, he ended up throwing something. Once he’d hit one of Xi’s cleaning bots, and Xi had made him repair it even though he knew she could do it herself. Faster.
“That was funny,” Isa agreed. “You didn’t have to repair it.”
“If you are speaking of the damage to my robots,” Xi put in, “the work was easy for Kael. There’s no need to worry on his behalf.”
His turn to snicker. “I think Xi just wanted the company.”
“I have the constant company of the whole crew,” Xi said placidly. “I do not need to manufacture tasks to interact with humans. And the two of you should be preparing for your sleep cycles. Especially you, Ms. Isa.”
“Don’t tell her, Xi—just one more minute.” Isa shifted in the tiny metal tube above his cabin. “Her” being Bri, her mother, of course.
“Sixty seconds, and no more.”
They all lapsed into silence. Hmm. Perhaps he didn’t need to leave his cabin to have a conversation or two.
“If it wasn’t for the company, then why’d you make me do it?” he asked.
“I believe you would call it… a challenge.”
“A challenge?”
“A challenge to myself. I wanted to see if you would do it if I prodded. I won two credits from Nova.”
He snorted. Well, he had. Mission accomplished, Xi. “You bet on me? Don’t spend that all in one place, lady.” He had long ago given up resisting anthropomorphizing her.
“I have not done so. Since I have no corporeal needs, I cannot decide what to spend it on. And indeed I am not a human entity or citizen of any country, nor do I have a bank account to hold the credits. One of my robots is holding the hard currency for me while I decide.”
“I’m sure you’ll figure it out.” Or start asking him for suggestions. He had better get thinking. Was there anything you could buy with only two credits?
“Sixty seconds have elapsed.”
“Good night, Kael,” Isa said placidly. The sound of her shifting away up the crawl space was almost imperceptible.
“Good night, Isa. Good night, Xi.”
Xi lowered the lights and dimmed the wall display, and he shut his eyes.
Before Ellen had even finished stowing her armor, Simmons’s face popped up on the holodisplay above her desk, and he’d launched into the details. His mug was emblazoned with a cartoon cat wearing a grass skirt today, and he shrugged as he took a sip of coffee. “Anyway, it’s not as bad as it sounds. Should be nice and easy. Not filled with—whatever it was you encountered on those last few missions. Aliens? Mutants? The white spider tentacle monsters.”
She, too, shrugged from her spot kneeling on the floor as she checked that her shoulder pauldron was fitted correctly into its repair case. They hadn’t gotten adequate samples to figure out what the monsters were. Far from her only regret from those missions.
“Well, anyway. I doubt they’re on Capital.” He adjusted his wire-rimmed glasses.
“Is that a promise?” She hammered the bicep piece home harder than she needed to. The suit could do this all automatically, but she preferred reviewing each piece herself.
“Uh… no. But from an after-action perspective, you have to admit the telepaths were a big problem.”
She pursed her lips as she moved to check the top femoral plate. “True. So. What can we do about it? Train Isa to fight them? She’s too young, Doug.”
“I found something better. Although we should consider training Isa too.”
She stopped and leveled a glare at him. “She’s fourteen.”
He held up his palms. “For her own protection! You really think ferrying her around the galaxy into active war zones is conducive to her safety? What if one of those things had somehow followed you back to the ship? You wouldn’t have been the only one at risk, I think.”
“I’m not a telepath.”
“Tell that to the monster-aliens. I saw the recordings.”
Good thing he couldn’t see inside her head too. She just pressed her lips together and focused on the shin plate. But he was right. Those creatures had talked to her, and Isa would be safer with training. Finding someone to teach her while they spun around the galaxy would be nigh on impossible, though.
Doug’s spoon tinkled in his mug as he stirred. “So this ties right back to the mission. A friend of a friend on Capital is doing some cutting-edge research into telepathic blocking. But she’s run into some kind of personal issues. I don’t know the details, but we all think she’d be a good candidate to bring into a cell, particularly on your ship. Obviously she’s a she, so nothing to worry about there. And if we can help her with whatever her predicament is, we’ll do some good too.” He grinned and rubbed his hands together in front of his face.
She lifted an eyebrow. “You don’t know what her problem is?”
“No. She’s afraid to discuss it. Although I’d guess it has to do with getting access to her research.”
“And all we have to do is get her to give up her whole life and join us on an unknown, anonymous spaceship, huh? That should be easy.” She narrowed her eyes at him.
He grinned behind another sip of coffee, the spoon still in the cat mug poking him in the cheek. “Especially with your natural charisma.”
She snorted. “Does she know anything about the Foundation?”
“Yes! So you have that going for you. She’s working in a facility we fund. So you can bring her tools and equipment along, no need to replace it or really upset her work.”
“Aside from taking it off planet and into space? And dragging it all over hell and back? I doubt that will be… calming.”
“Well, with what I know of her work, she can do it anywhere. But you’ll have to see what she thinks of the idea.”
“All right. Don’t forget, I still need that intel officer too.”
“I know, I’m working on it.”
“Are we planning to take everyone on your little voyage into city life?” Ugh. She always felt so out of place on these inner worlds. Few of them were like where she’d grown up in the SHR. Many of the worlds in the Pacific Alliance Systems had maintained cultural identities connected to their mother nations on Earth, the Saeloun Hanguk Region included although the Union influence had been strong in the last few decades. But very few inner worlds bore any resemblance at all to the cultures that had founded them.
Even fewer resembled the insides of battleships. And that was the real problem, wasn’t it? Her home planet was a montage of Union ships and military bases.
Doug’s shrug brought her back to the present moment. “Look over the rest of the mission details and see what you think. We’re going to need people that are good, in armor but also without. You may not be able to wear armor everywhere you’ll need to go to convince this woman.”
“And what part of Capital are we tou
ching down on?”
“Appellate 481. To Josana’s great luck. Your target’s name is Dr. Chayana Persad.”
Ellen took a deep breath, surveying her armor. She almost wished she weren’t done stowing it away. She much preferred that to facing down Simmons at the moment—or the next topic she needed to bring up.
She was too tired for this.
But she steeled herself to keep going anyway. “What about Arakovic? Did you find anything in the lab files?” For the better part of two months, Simmons had been digging through the data they’d stolen from Vala’s lab connection after rescuing Kael.
“Yes—and no. We were logged in past one layer of security, so we got some information for free, but there’s a lot more security levels further down. Tough stuff. I’ve cracked some but not all. But I did find that she had a formal connection to the Enhancer labs we hit.”
“Formal? You mean, she didn’t just infiltrate them?”
“Nope. She’s not their enemy. She’s their client.”
“Their client?” Ellen thumped the armor case shut and snapped its tabs. “I didn’t think the Enhancers took on clients.”
“They don’t like to advertise it. And they’re very selective. They only offer their services to like-minded souls. We think it may be a means of recruiting new scientists, if they can convert them fully to their ideology. Beyond that, the Union and the Puritans are both putting the squeeze on the Enhancers pretty heavily. Someone’s gotta bankroll their creepy experiments.” He grinned and shrugged boyishly. “Especially with a piece of prized research vanished into the ether. That can’t be helping matters.”
Ellen scowled, thinking of the fetus now floating in an orb of green goo in their lab downstairs. The Enhancers’ empress, now in Foundation hands.
Audacity’s hands.
“She’s not research. She’s a person. Or she’s going to be a person. I think.”
He nodded solemnly. “Which is why it’s good that we’ve got her and not them. I also hope to find more about… what she is, for lack of a better phrase, in their files.”