by M. D. Cooper
Few people were about, mechs or otherwise, mostly because half were sleeping, and the other half were still clearing hulls near Pyra, searching for survivors and rounding up the remaining Nietzscheans.
The emptiness suited Rika just fine. She needed the time to mull over all the things Tanis had told her. It was a lot.
Rika laughed aloud. “ ‘A lot’ doesn’t begin to do it justice.”
Neither had spoken much on the maglev ride to the docks within the I2, nor afterward on the shuttle ride back to the Fury Lance—though Mad Dog had tried to engage Rika in conversation several times.
Niki gave a mental snort.
Rika laughed.
Rika got the impression that Niki had more to say, and was about to prompt her, when the AI spoke up.
Niki sent an image of eyes rolling into Rika’s mind.
Rika couldn’t help but laugh as she imagined Niki curled up next to her intestines, trying to find room for a lamp and table.
I have the strangest thoughts sometimes.
Niki made a strangled sound.
Rika shrugged as she stepped into a lift.
The memory of what Tanis showed her came into Rika’s mind, that she was a mighty rock, a bastion against the storm.
Rika looked around, noting that there was only one person present on the bridge. Garth, the chief warrant officer, was fast asleep, hunched over his console. She was tempted to just leave him there, but then he started to snore. She walked over and shook his shoulder.
“What? Yes! On it!” he shouted, looking around before finally settling his gaze on Rika. “Oh crap, I’m sorry, Captain.”
Rika shook her head as she regarded the man. “How long you been up here?”
Garth stretched. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe all my life? Feels like it, at least. Nietzscheans do not make comfortable bridge chairs.”
Rika winked. “Probably to keep their crews from falling asleep.”
“Well, given how you found me, they suck at that, too,” Garth said as he stretched. “I’m good, Captain. It won’t happen again.”
“Shit, Garth. I just checked the duty logs…you’ve been up here for a hundred hours.”
Garth frowned. “Well, I did hit the head a few times…and I went to the galley down the hall…damn, only twice, I think. No wonder I’m so hungry.”
Rika pointed to the bridge’s rear exit. “Off with you. Get some food and some sack time. You deserve it.”
Garth rose and stretched again. “OK, sorry again, Captain. I shouldn’t have fallen asleep.”
“No judgement here,” Rika said. “You’ve been on point when needed. We’re not NSAIs. We need downtime.”
Garth murmured his thanks one more time as he walked off the bridge.
“Just the two of us,” Rika said as she sat in the command chair. “Maybe we need to get a ship’s AI.”
“Why’s that?” Rika asked.
“AI prison? What’s that like?”
“Which mess?” Rika chuckled. “The Albany System, or the fight with the Nietzscheans?”
“You mean with how the Orion Freedom Alliance operates?” Rika asked as she pulled up the lists of civilian casualties, searching for names, then DNA signatures.
“I didn’t dig into that too much. Some sort of civil war?” Rika asked.
Rika looked up from the list of casualties she had been reviewing. “What do you mean there are two of her?”
“Ahhhh,” Rika breathed. “So that’s why Tanis is out here building the Scipio Alliance. She’s got trouble back home.”
“I don’t know much about them,” Rika replied. “Other than that they’re big. I guess you don’t get to be big without kicking some ass, do you?”
“Do you think Tanis will end up being the leader of the FPA?” Rika mused as she returned to searching through her lists.
Niki answered Rika’s question with a question.
“How am I supposed to know? I’m just the muscle in this operation.”
Rika snorted and leaned back, eyes drifting to the overhead, wondering if it had any answers tucked into the conduits and environmental runs. Nietzscheans really didn’t go for aesthetics—even on their bridges.
“Niki, exactly when have I had time to think about whether or not Tanis does her magic finger touch with everyone?”
Niki snorted a laugh.
“Yeah, well, you’re more likely to have sex than I am.”
Rika laughed at Niki’s impertinence. “You have some sort of plan for my future I don’t know about? What color are you going to paint the nursery? Besides, I doubt Tanis carried her daughter in her own womb. People like this grow babies in medlabs.”
A low whistle escaped Rika’s lips. “I stand corrected. OK, so maybe they can give me a vagina and leave me a mech.” An incongruous thought crossed Rika’s mind, and she barked a laugh. “I guess I’d have to start wearing pants again when I’m not in armor.”
“Good, because I’m probably one of a very small group of twenty-nine-year-old women who has never bought a single article of clothing in my entire life.”
“Dammit, I really liked that jacket. Not that a single purchase ups the confidence quotient, Niki.”
“We’ve had sex,” Rika countered, feeling a flush rise on her cheeks, wishing Niki would drop the subject.
“OK! Stop! You’re making all those up.”
“I suppose if you can imagine it, it’s out there on the nets. I get your point, though.”
A host of memories surged to the surface, recollections of what it was like living on the streets of Tanner City. Memories Rika rarely ever thought of, if she could help it. Some of the things that had happened while living meal to meal back then….
Being wrapped in her armor, unassailable, had always been one of the best parts of being a mech.
Rika opened her mouth to brush Niki off, to tell her she wasn’t worried about intimacy with Chase. But she was. She’d never really had sex—not the way it was supposed to be, at least.
What if Chase….
Even as she let the doubt creep into her mind, it dissipated, replaced by the image Tanis had placed within her. The scared girl from the streets fell away, to be replaced by the confident woman that Tanis saw her as.
The rock, undaunted by the raging storm. The girl was still there, was still the heart, but she wasn’t cowering, wasn’t afraid. She was the iron will and the resolute spirit that drove Rika forward.
“You know what, Niki? I’m not. When I talk to the ISF techs about upgrades, I’ll bring it up. But it may not be something I do until we finish the mission. I don’t want to be distracted.”
Rika groaned and rolled her eyes. “From the way you’ve gone on, I’m not entirely certain you believe that.”
Rika shook her head. “Not yet. Patty brought them to Pyra four weeks ago, then filed for a short leave with the local office. They gave her use of the pinnace to fly to Hudson, but we haven’t been able to get any docking records from their stations yet. I don’t know if Silva and Amy stayed on Pyra, or went with Patty to Hudson.”
Niki didn’t reply, but Rika knew the question that hung in the air: Or if they died somewhere on Pyra?
Rika grit her teeth. “I don’t have weeks, Niki.”
“Yet here I sit,” Rika grunted, gripping her armrest, the plas denting under her fingers.
“Is that what she was doing when we found her?”
Niki gave a throaty chuckle in Rika’s mind.
Rika whistled as she rose from her chair, and gestured to the bridge’s main holodisplay, throwing a three-dimensional image of the Albany System into the forward half of the bridge.
“I’m sure glad she’s on our side.”
Rika stared at the map, nodding absently as she wondered where Patty might have taken the pinnace. That should be easier to find than Silva and Amy. If she could locate it—and hopefully Patty—maybe she could get a lead.
Neither woman nor AI spoke for a minute, and although Rika wondered who Tanis’s powerful enemies could be, she didn’t ask.
Rika sifted through the message queues and found the one Niki had noted, answering it and putting the AI on the bridge’s audible systems.
“Captain Corsia, what can I do for you?” Rika asked once the connection was made.
“It’s good to make your acquaintance, Captain Rika. You’re already a hero to our people.”
Corsia’s voice was strange. Rika would almost describe it as both smooth and edged at the same time. Like one of Tanis’s blades, sliding through water.
Rika wished the ISF personnel would stop treating her like she’d done something miraculous. She’d only found Tanis and carried her to a ship. Anyone could have done it—probably.
“I was just doing what needed to be done at the time. I’m sure you have been in similar situations.”
Corsia chuckled. “Maybe. I’ve had some crazy times in the black with Tanis. But that’s not why I reached out to you. I’ve seen the inquiries you’ve put out, looking for your people.”
Rika’s heart leapt at the thought that Corsia may finally have a lead. “Yes?” she managed to say, not bothering to hide the hope in her voice.
“Don’t get too excited,” Corsia cautioned. “I don’t have strong intel, but I did come across a record of a woman named Patty logging a fli
ght path to Hudson. She was flying a pinnace designated PD-17, which matches your inquiry.”
“How long ago?” Rika asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
“One week before the Nietzscheans jumped in,” Corsia replied. “When the ISF First Fleet entered the system, Captain Rachel sent a small strike force to Hudson. They defeated the Niets there, but there are still at least two battalions of the buggers on the surface. I’ve sent an inquiry to Hudson to see if they have anything further, but it’ll be over an hour until we hear back.”
Rika swallowed and nodded, then remembered that she wasn’t sending visual. “Thank you, Corsia.”
“Of course, Captain Rika. I just wish I had better, more definitive news for you. I know how terrifying it can be, not to know where loved ones are.”
Corsia’s choice of words caught Rika’s attention, she’d never heard an AI use terms like ‘terrifying’ or ‘loved ones’. Granted, her first-hand experience with AIs was almost entirely limited to Niki.
“Do you have any amongst the missing?” Rika asked.
“No my children are all safe. I was thinking of one time when my youngest daughter got lost inside me. Turned out she was trapped in a lift shaft that was under maintenance, and the sensors were disabled. She was down there for half a day before we realized she was missing and then found her.”
Rika’s brow furrowed. “Inside you? How does…oh! You have organic children.”
Corsia’s laugh sounded like ice cracking on a lake. “Yes, Captain. I am married to my chief engineer, and we have both organic and inorganic children.”
“Wow…that’s…”
“Normal for us,” Corsia said, and Rika imagined that if the AI had been on visual, she may have winked. “I’ll keep you apprised of any developments, and pass along word from our forces at Hudson the moment they respond.”
“Thank you, Captain Corsia,” Rika replied as she leant against a console.
“You’re most welcome.”
The connection closed, and Rika let out a shaky breath. “Why do I feel worse, Niki?”
“Thanks. You volunteering to be the new company shrink?”
