by Kal Spriggs
I jumped to the next platform. Another entrant saw me coming and swung at me, but I dove into him, slamming the full weight of my suit into him. As his helmet rocked back off the surface of the platform, I kicked his limp form off into the void.
After that, the other Flight's entrants started getting out of my way. Some of them started going after my people, too, but the first one I saw doing that, I rushed behind him, caught him by the helmet, and slammed him face first into a column hard enough that he bounced backward off the ledge.
They left the rest of Jade Flight alone after that. In fact, they started getting out of our way. Neither did the drill instructors intervene. I wasn't sure if they wanted us brawling like this or if they merely didn't care. They probably find it amusing, Shadow whispered.
Now and again another entrant wouldn't move out of my way fast enough and I'd grab them and chuck them. A few struggled, but I was angry, tired, and to be honest, it felt good to be working out some of my frustrations. A couple of them brawled with me, slamming blows into me or trying to grapple, but those ones went for sophisticated moves that they'd learned in martial arts. The Kavacha Mark V didn't have joints built like a human. There might be holds that worked, but the ones they tried and the blows they made just rang off the armored carapace, no worse than the other impacts I’d received along the way. Picking them up and throwing them or slamming them bodily into hard surfaces pretty much put an end to most struggles.
Twice more I fell on my first lap of the course. But this time, my fellow entrants from my flight were helping me. Both times they caught me. Some of them were even marking potential targets on my circuit of destruction.
Things were going pretty well as we shuffled around to the start of the course, just about right on the one-hour mark.
Of course, at that point, many of the people I'd been beating on were waiting for us. At least four of them rushed me on the first section of track. They weren't even trying to run the course, I realized, they'd just decided to gang up on me as I came in.
As they ran at me, though, I just gave a whoop, amplified over my suit's speakers, and dove in at them. One of them had gotten ahead of the others and I drove my shoulder into him. I heard an audible crunch as my armor struck his and then the pair of us ran into the next set of armor behind him. I lifted up, bringing them both up on my shoulders. Once they lost contact with the ground, they were pretty much mine. Leverage, I thought with a grin, even as they pounded on my shoulders and back. I didn't try to throw them, instead I turned and slammed them backwards into the wall of the Tangun’s Steps. Once. Twice. The third time, they went limp. The two others who'd come at me were being beat on by the rest of my flight. I saw Jonna pick up one of them by the foot, swing him around, and chuck him out towards the center.
“Nice move,” I told her as she fell in next to me on my jog.
“We aren't supposed to use our exosuits to brawl,” she noted.
“Not over food, no, but if they're all still running the course when it's time for us to get chow, well, that would just be a shame, wouldn't it,” I panted. Keeping Vars' accent going through all this was becoming second nature.
“Maybe you aren't so bad after all, Vars,” she said it loud enough for the others in our flight to hear. As other flights cleared a path for us, I figured I should count this one as a win, too.
***
“Entrant Vars, over here!” A voice snapped at me.
We'd been doing physical training out of our suits. I was sweat-stained and tired, but I jogged over to the drill instructor. “Sir?”
“This way,” he snapped. He led me off at a brisk walk and I fell in behind him. A moment later he paused outside a door. “In there, entrant.”
I stepped inside. It was fairly dark, with just a single spotlight centered over a chair and table, a figure seated on the far side.
Institor Mikhail Dyer sat opposite me. He was sipping at a cup of tea. He gestured at me to sit. I couldn't help a look around, half expecting someone to be behind me.
“No need for that, Vars,” Institor Dyer smirked. “I assure you, if I were having you executed, I would do it much more simply... and you wouldn't see it coming.” He set his tea cup down and sat back, crossing his arms in his midnight-black uniform. With the single light gleaming off his pale skin and white-blond hair, he looked almost like a disembodied head.
“You're a bit of a conundrum, Vars. Your initial review, well... let’s just say you weren't exactly leader material. Your profile suggested you were nothing more than a thug. A clever thug, but a thug. Then there are your moves with your father and House Mantis. That was a bit of finesse no one really suspected. That moved you in track to be... well, something more competitive. An agent, perhaps, maybe even a future with...” He lifted his hands, “Well, maybe even Imperial Intelligence.”
“The missing factor for that was loyalty,” he went on. “We need to know where you stand.”
He's wired into some pretty sophisticated lie detector equipment, Shadow whispered to me.
I figured, I replied. I took a breath, “How can I prove my loyalty?”
“You know, that's the hard part,” Dyer admitted. “I told you to monitor your flight for loyalty to the Empire and the Emperor. What do you have for me?”
I swallowed nervously, “I haven't had much time to talk with them.”
“None at all, I suspect, else things have changed in the years since I've been here,” Institor Dyer smirked. “But talk is cheap. I'm talking about impressions. You will have noticed things at this point. Certain people will stand out.” He sipped at his tea.
“Princess Kiyu?” I asked. He arched an eyebrow at me and I went on. “She knows what she's doing, she's confident.”
“And?” Institor Dyer asked.
“She's watching everyone and everything,” I told him.
“She is, which is understandable, she's of the Imperial Family. They watch everything, things like succession can be so very... risky to them, you know.” Institor Dyer clicked his tongue in disapproval. “Certain people would be rather happier if we could have someone in place to watch her more closely.”
“Sir?” I asked, not sure what he meant.
“I want you to become her friend, Vars. You already worked with her once. You have a common bond.”
“I shot the man she subverted and she thinks I'm pirate scum,” I told him.
“Well, we all have our burdens to bear,” Institor Dyer told me. “Win her confidence. Become her friend. Tell me everything she tells you.”
I swallowed, “I'll try, sir.”
“Good,” he nodded. “Entrant Hayden, what do you know of her?”
I shrugged, “She handles her armor well, she's not as good at shooting,” I told him, sticking to technical things so he wouldn't pick up on me lying. “She helped me on the course earlier today.”
“Don't trust that,” Institor Dyer leaned forward. “Entrant Hayden is very, very dangerous. I would advise you to stay away from her, Vars. Monitor her. Listen to everything she says, but do not trust a thing she tells you or any actions she takes.”
“Understood, sir,” I answered. Great, Imperial Intelligence has it out of Jonna, that’s not good.
Looks like your girlfriend is in trouble, Shadow whispered in the back of my mind.
She’s not my… never mind. I couldn’t afford to argue with her, not right now.
Institor Dyer stared at me for a long moment. I felt sweat begin to beat my forehead. Did he suspect that I wasn’t who I appeared to be? Did he suspect I knew Jonna better than I had reason to?
He waved his hand, “Dismissed, Vars.”
***
I returned to Jade Flight just as the others were finishing up their physical training and I fell in at the back of the group as we headed to the showers. There were no separate stalls, no privacy, and I kept my eyes up and out of focus as the Flight stripped.
There were ten shower heads, so we alternated, three per shower head,
soaping up, rinsing, and stepping back to let someone else under the chill water.
“You're playing a dangerous game, Armstrong,” a soft voice spoke from next to me.
I glanced over, catching the green eyes of Kiyu only ten centimeters away. She does know who I am. I didn't dare respond, though, I knew they monitored everything.
“They can't hear in the showers, and there's issues with monitors in here, anyway, too much water and motion,” she murmured, stepping in under the shower head. For just a moment, my eyes flickered down her body. Her very well-muscled, but still very feminine body.
Take a picture, bro, it'll last longer, Shadow whispered in my ear.
I was thankful for the cold water as I soaped and stepped under the shower head for my turn. As I stepped back out, I told her, “Imperial Intelligence wants me to be your friend.”
“Of course,” she answered. “They watch my family more closely than they search for traitors.” We repeated the bathing routine. We were almost out of time, though.
“What should I do?” I asked.
“Report to him, but I wouldn't report this conversation. He will have half our flight trying to be my friend, trying to watch me. The other half will be watching her,” she nodded her head in the direction of Jonna, who had just gone under the shower.
I couldn't help looking over at her, and again, my eyes flicked down her body.
Come on, you creeper, Shadow snickered. Although she's been darting looks at you when you go under, so fair's fair, I suppose...
She... what? Shadow's words threw me off enough that I missed the opportunity to respond to Princess Kiyu.
“Be aware, your actions today will have consequences. The other flights will target you from now on,” she said it calmly. “You've also targeted my brother's favorite, which means that even if he wasn't going to be after you before, he will now.”
“Favorite?” I felt like I was missing a lot, not being able to look at her as she talked.
“Initiates are allowed to sponsor one entrant,” she told me. “Prince Ladon sponsored entrant Jerral, the big brute you keep mixing it up with. Every time you beat him, you make the Prince look bad.”
Oh, great. On that thought, the water cut out and we all moved out, toweling off and moving to our bunks. I kept having to avert my eyes. Now that I'd started looking, I was finding it hard not to do more of that. I went over to the sinks and started shaving. Jonna came up next to me. “You stupid fos, you're going to get yourself caught,” she hissed at me as she leaned over the sink next to me.
“What?” I whispered back as I brushed.
“Averting your eyes. No one else has noticed, not yet, but we're all in prime physical condition and we're naked. Do they not appreciate beauty back where you're from?” She finished up, “you don't need to ogle everyone, but if you don't look at the girls, the boys, or some of both, someone is going to ask questions.”
My eyes went to her, standing there naked with a towel thrown over her shoulder. “Uh, it's not proper.”
“It's fine, it's expected, just don't think it means anything,” she told me. She straightened up and turned away, “Oh, and stay away from the Princess, she's trouble,” she hissed at me, before she smacked me on the backside as she turned, “Good moves out there on Tangun’s Steps, Vars.”
I jumped and someone in the group gave a whoop of laughter. I couldn’t think of an appropriate response and went back to shaving.
I felt like I had more problems than I’d had before. As I watched Jonna saunter away in the mirror, though, I couldn’t help a goofy smile.
***
“Cover left,” Jonna snapped. My highlighted the area on my Kavacha Mark V’s heads up display and I swung my training TBA-2, or TBA-T into position as we swept past the open doorway. This was our first run through the shoot house, a long stretch of connecting rooms and corridors.
Richardson had told us that we’d be facing holographic targets for our first run. I wasn’t entirely certain I believed him.
“Target, ninety degrees!” Osmund called out and I heard him open up, firing his TBA-T. I kept my own weapon leveled on my sector, half out of discipline, and half as I had to translate what he meant in my head. On Century, we used the twelve-hour clock positions for reference. Ninety degrees, though, meant off to the right of our direction of travel. Which meant behind me. If I were a suspicious person, I’d say it would be perfect to hit us from the opposite side…
Even as I thought that, two forms appeared in the doorway I’d been covering and I opened up with my TBA-T. I squeezed off three rounds into the center of mass of both hostiles, “Contact, two-seventy degrees.” I hoped that was right. “Two targets engaged.”
Both targets had vanished. Either they’d been holographic targets or the physical targets or people had dropped back. I kept my attention on that doorway as we continued moving.
We came to the end of the corridor and Jonna paused just short of the doorway. “Breach,” she snapped and we bounded forward. We hadn’t rehearsed that enough, though and Osmund and I clipped one another coming through the doorway. It wasn’t enough for either of us to fall, but it knocked us both off balance.
I saw this was a larger room, sprawling and with numerous catwalks and bits of cover. I also saw numerous moving figures and realized that we were in a shooting gallery… and we were the targets.
Simulated gunfire erupted around us at the same instant. Flashes erupted from my side and I engaged, even as I felt a painful jolt in my leg and alerts flashed in my helmet.
I downed one target, switched to the next and fired, just as I took another hit, this one on my torso. This time the jolt ran through my chest and for a moment, I couldn’t breathe as the muscles in my chest clenched up. That’s not good.
I heard more gunfire from my side and behind me, but I continued to cover my side as I moved forward, seeking cover or at least concealment.
I moved into shelter behind a pile of crates, but the gunfire didn’t let up. It was constant and almost all around me and I felt another jolt travel up my arm as it took a hit. Alarms flashed on my heads up display. My armor on my leg had locked up and I switched my TBA-T over to my left hand as the armor seized up on my right.
I twisted around the cover, opening up on several of the enemies on the flank. Two of them vanished, but several more forms dashed into nearby cover and returned fire. I took another one down, but then something hit the center of my visor and my world went white.
There was nothing but pain. Stabbing agony between my ears. I was screaming, I realized. It didn’t matter. I couldn’t scream hard enough for the jabbing, stabbing all-consuming pain that drove into my forehead and back out.
It went on and on, my world narrowing down until there was nothing else and then, finally, mercifully, my body couldn’t take any more and I collapsed into unconsciousness.
***
Chapter 7: I Lost My Mind
I felt the needle enter my neck. Before I consciously realized it, I was sitting upright, my hand lashing out in a punch.
The blow laid out the medic who’d just injected me. I was shouting. Screaming in pain and sheer response. I caught the motion of people around me and I lashed out instinctively, driven into rage and anger. The pain, the overwhelming pain, that had hit me before was gone, but just the echo of it still washed out every scrap of thought. I punched and kicked, I bit, I screamed. Hands grabbed at me, trying to hold me down, but it felt like it was children trying to hold me. I drove an elbow into one of them and thought I felt bone break. I clawed at a pair of familiar eyes, I bit down at a hand in reach.
“Hold him, hold him, damn you!” A voice shouted.
“He’s gone mad!” Someone shouted, almost in my face. I slammed my forehead into that face and the speaker reeled back. The others around me piled on, though and I couldn’t move. All I could do was scream in incoherent rage.
“Cortical electrode shorted in his helmet,” the first voice snapped, “he’s lucky
the injection restarted his heart, but his brain took a lethal jolt, enough to fry him.”
“Is he…” I thought I recognized Jonna’s voice, but all I could do was scream at her.
“The injection restarted his heart, the quick heal might reset his brain. But he’s going to be like this for the next few hours, if he gets better at all. If we hit him with cold quick heal, he probably wouldn’t wake up.”
“Blood of the Dragon,” a voice muttered. “He’s insane. We can’t hold him like this.”
A familiar face appeared in my vision. I recognized her, but I couldn’t think of her name. “It’s going to be okay,” she told me, her voice soft. I screamed at her in response.
The next few hours were indescribably horrible. I screamed myself hoarse and then screamed more. Everything was gone. I had no words. I had no mental connections. I didn’t know my name. I didn’t understand anything. All I had was the rage, anger and fear. Whatever they put in me, no matter how tired I felt, I couldn’t even close my eyes. Worse, I could feel, it was like I had nothing but that. I knew there was something wrong with me. I felt horror. Everything, every bit of who I was, was gone.
Hours passed. I had no sense of time. Twice they forced water down my throat and I choked and gasped and then screamed some more.
The only thing that kept me sane. The only thing that stopped my sanity from crumbling entirely, was the soft, familiar voice speaking to me. I couldn’t understand the words, not then. I knew the tone, though, the calm, patient, familiar voice that kept me from teetering over the edge. And then, sometime, after what felt like months or years, I found a word. “Jiden,” I gasped. And with that name, it felt as if my brain came alive with connections. The voice whispering to me was my sister. Or a copy of her, anyway. And I had my name, again. I was William Alexander Armstrong.
“What, what did he say?” A face appeared over me.
Yes, my sister whispered to me. But they can’t know about me, about us. The why came back to me, everything coming in a rush that made my head spin.
