“You’re asking me? I’ve only known him for thirty minutes.” Damion rolled his eyes. “Go ahead and block it for a day. After that, let them have it back. Got that, Juni? You’ll only have twenty-four Earth hours to snoop.”
“Sure, a day of no one watching me take a piss. For some reason that makes me feel a bit better. On the other hand, you’re asking me to be your mole, O high-and-mighty Alpha Fighter.”
“As you command.” 47 turned around and opened the console, and he pulled out a cord and attached it to the port at his wrist. He closed his eyes and went silent as he worked.
“What’s he doing?” Juni whispered again, his blue eyes trained on 47 in a manner that led Damion to believe his friend expected the Core to spring into song and dance.
“I don’t know,” Damion hissed back. “And why are you whispering?”
“I deduce that the Beta pilot thinks that I cannot hear him if he speaks in a lower tone,” 47 replied, right before he went rigid.
The wires around his fingers turned red hot before fading back to their normal multicolor casings. 47 pulled his fingers from the wires and hid his hand behind his back as he turned toward Damion.
“92’s video access has been disconnected for twenty-four hours, along with his access to any other communication links.”
“Ah.” Juni stared in amazement at 47.
“Why don’t Cores have names?” Damion asked 47 suddenly. It had been a constant question on his mind ever since he first learned about Cores. They were never referred to with names, only numbers.
47 had been looking at the floor, but at Damion’s question, he looked up at him, careful to avoid eye contact with Juni. “Cores are not given names. We are assigned a number sequence according to when we were conceived or found viable within genetic testing, the date we were retrieved by the Creators, and the day we are given over to the programmers. Names create emotion and familiarity, which we do not require.”
“But that’s three numbers, and you have two,” Juni pointed out with a bit of a smirk.
Damion wondered for a moment if his friend really had placed in the upper 5 percent in the IQ testing, as he had boasted while they were still in boot camp.
“A few of us were placed in the unknown factor for the date of conception and therefore only have two numbers with which we are branded. It assists with telling Cores apart.”
“You have a brand?” Damion raised an eyebrow. “Thought that was just talk.”
“You are supposed to think many of the truths are merely rumors,” 47 replied with another birdlike tilt of his head, once again showing the stark bruises that dappled his neck. “But that one is a truth. We are branded with our numbers and have chips surgically implanted in our brains before we are put in the sensory deprivation tanks as infants.”
“Wow,” Juni breathed out.
“On that note,” Damion said, “I’m going to my new bunk. I need to brush up on the protocols so I don’t look like an idiot tomorrow.”
He knew he should be happier with the answers 47 had given him, yet everything he didn’t know and now had to learn astounded him. 47’s answers brought new questions to the table.
47 turned and pushed the button for the door to open, following Damion out of the room with his gaze cast down and his hands still behind his back.
“You better not forget about me!” Juni yelled out the door after them.
“You’re like a bad venereal disease, buddy. Nobody can forget that.”
“Screw you, Hawk!”
Once they had entered the elevator again and the door closed, 47 finally looked up. “Did I say something inappropriate?”
“No, not really.” Damion shook his head. “It’s just very real, very soon.”
“I do not understand,” 47 replied as they exited the elevator once again.
“All right.” Damion tried to think of a way to explain it to someone who couldn’t fathom emotions like a normal person, but more like a child, or idiot savant. “Just think of your one ambition, your one dream suddenly coming true, but you’re not ready for it. So when it happens, you feel like you’re treading space wake.”
“I have no ambitions, nor do I dream.” The look on 47’s face let Damion know he truly believed this statement, but Damion wondered if it were the truth. Obviously 47 had ambition, or he wouldn’t have waited for the one Fighter he construed as the best. “This must simply be one of the things that a Core is not meant to understand.”
Damion shrugged. “I suppose it is just to improve your performance,” he said as he entered his new, larger, living quarters, not attempting to explain any more. “I wonder where I get my new uniforms.”
“They are in the left side of the closet,” 47 informed him before answering his first question, once again standing by the door. “Yes, it is. It is felt that Cores should not have any emotions, attachments, or anything that will impede their connection to communications and the Zodiac’s control systems. We integrate with the systems of the Zodiacs and the Zeus to research and find ways to improve the ships. The Cores who are with the Fighters are given clearance to walk around the Zeus with or without our Fighters. We follow orders without question from those who have the clearance to give them to us. Primarily our chosen Fighter. Precedence given to those that enhanced us—the Creators—and the Commander.”
Damion wasn’t sure what to do with a slave. Really, that is what he thought of the situation. He had heard of wealthier Earth-and Lunar-born having maids, servants, and the occasional personal Cores, and there were Cores on Venus and other pleasure colonies that were used strictly for sex. Those were rumors. The books the Academy had given them at flight school glossed over Cores and their functions, stating they were primarily for support systems and were to be approached only by Alpha Fighters or the Creators. Damion had the idea from rumors and Academy books that the Cores were modified humans with the ability to access the system. A chosen servitude. However, this was very different. “I really don’t need you to do anything,” he said because he felt the Core waiting for him. “I need to read my assignment log to see when to report.”
Core 47
47 MOVED farther into the quarters and went to the closet embedded into the wall. It was on the right side, near his capsule, next to the bathroom door. He waved his hand and the action opened the left side of the closet that contained his Fighter’s uniforms. There were eight of them in total—one for every day of the week, including one for the day the others would be sanitized. 47 had the same number of uniforms, but his had to be specially dealt with since they had more holes for port entries than any other Core’s.
47 had not been boasting when he said he was the best. He had altered himself, installing more ports in his skin to better access the ship’s system. The more ports he had, the quicker he would be able to access information as well as transmit into Ares.
47 turned, indicating the uniforms before going into the bathroom and closing the door. There he ran water into the sink to wash his hands. Looking at his fingers, he dispassionately noted the angry, blistering lines of burns like tangled wires that crisscrossed the fingers and the top of his hands. The fight through the communications systems against the other Core had been more difficult than 47 had estimated, but he wouldn’t make that mistake again in the future. He was better than the other Cores and would continue to be so by increasing his own abilities. He took a moment to wash the burns on his hands before he spread antibiotic on the livid wounds. After he was done, he pulled out a pair of cotton gloves from the pocket on the leg of his suit and pulled them on before turning off the water with his elbow. Then he walked out of the bathroom to see what his Fighter was doing.
Damion
DAMION SAT at the desk, looking through his new schedule. He thought the Core was acting strange, but he didn’t know what a Core acting normal looked like. He should be scared that this Core was still going to eject him out of the ship during their first run together as he had done with all his other Fi
ghters, but Damion couldn’t worry about that and focused instead on learning what he needed to. Death could come at any time for any person, so dwelling on it was pointless.
Damion looked over his shoulder and saw the Core merely standing in the bathroom doorway, waiting for orders. The Core had never had his own Fighter before, aside from those the Creators had ordered him paired with, and he hadn’t obeyed them because they had not been his chosen.
How a Core should behave for their chosen Fighter was programed into 47. Damion felt the Core would live up to the programming.
After a good ten minutes of being creeped out by the silent Core, he finally asked, “Why are you just standing there?”
“You have not ordered me to do anything else,” the Core stated in his matter-of-fact way.
“Don’t you have things you want to do?” Damion asked.
It was definitely going to take a day or two for Damion to get used to this. Possibly longer. Or never.
The Core was silent for a moment. “If you do not have any orders for me, I could jack in to the capsule and finish my last modifications for the Ares.”
“All right.” Damion nodded. “Go ahead and do that, then. I’m just going to read these for a while before heading to bed. Um, you sleep in that capsule too, don’t you?”
“Yes, that is correct. Resting in the capsule keeps Cores connected with the ship and the monitoring systems. What the Creators wish to know about Cores, they find out when we are sleeping. Anything they perceive as needing repair within our neural cortex is also done while we are jacked into the system.”
“Tell me a bit about the Creators.” Damion had heard the term but was unsure what and who these men and women were or did—aside from manage Cores.
“They are a group of high-clearance scientists. They oversee all Core production, integration, experimentation, and assign each Core to their specific specialty.”
“And your specialty is Zodiacs?” Damion asked.
“Correct. I was given the assignment to produce a workable Zodiac with advanced weaponry and defense systems. I was also given permission for unconventional experimentations on the Zodiac and myself.”
Damion raised an eyebrow and wondered if the freedom the Creators programmed into the Core was the reason he was capable of breaking rules. “Having free rein to experiment isn’t the norm for Cores that are assigned Zodiacs?”
“Not to the extent of, as you call it, the freedom that I am permitted.”
The Core moved to the metal capsule and sat on the edge, lifting his legs over to the inside of the sparsely padded white device. There he paused for a few moments before speaking. “May I ask a question?”
“Sure,” Damion answered, hearing the surprise in his voice.
“I apologize for my boldness, but I wish to understand. Why did you ask me if I had a name? I perceived that it was common knowledge that Cores were not given what is called a traditional name.”
The Core’s back was to Damion, but still in a rigid, perfect posture, allowing the cables to connect to his spinal ports through automatic biometric tuning. Damion could see the numerous holes in his suit along his spine where jacks would enter the ports under his skin. He could also faintly see port access bumps behind each ear, and when he looked carefully, one at the base of the Core’s skull. The how or why so many ports were desired by the Core was a question Damion wouldn’t pose to him at this moment.
“Most stories about how Cores are made are just that—stories. Really no one talks about how or where they get people to become Cores,” Damion said and almost wished he could see the Core’s face. “I didn’t know if you had a name before becoming one and really—” He hesitated before speaking the truth. “—I feel a bit uncomfortable calling another human being by a number even if I know Cores are not raised normally.”
“Uncomfortable? I do not know what that is. No one else has ever asked me that question, which is why I am trying to understand. As for how Cores are produced, more than 90 percent are altered from infancy, and 10 percent are above two years of age. The origin of our bodies is not disclosed.” The Core finally turned, twisting around so that his glacier-colored eyes could meet Damion’s. “If you have more questions, I will answer them.”
“I figured you would.” Damion had a feeling his new Core—and slave—was programmed to be more than only helpful. “I’ll have more, I promise, and you’ll be able to tell me all the answers.” He paused, his gaze moving to the floor as something sparked in his mind. “Wait, I just thought of one. How old are you?”
The Core tilted his head, the shadows of the room hiding his bruises. “If my calculations are correct, I am twenty-four years, ten months, and twenty-three days of age. My date of birth is not exactly known, so my calculations may be incorrect by a few days.”
“I think twenty-four is close enough. What month?” Damion didn’t really care, but hell, knowledge was power, or so they had told him growing up. Of course, his father also told him that drinking before work helped the day go faster and with less aggravation.
“Approximately the middle of the second week in November,” the Core replied, looking slightly perplexed as to why it was relevant.
Damion nodded. “Can you make sure I’m up by 0600?”
“Affirmative,” he answered from the capsule.
Damion went back to reading his manual for a while at the desk before carrying it to his much softer, bigger bed for the night.
Core 47
47 WAITED until Damion lay down and made sure that his Fighter was distracted by his reading before 47 activated the plug-in. He gasped softly, forcing his body still as the input jacks slid through his skin and into the ports beneath the regenerative layer. Jacking in to access the Zeus’s system wasn’t a pleasant feeling, particularly the five ports in his skull and the ones down his spine. But the aftereffect was what made it worth it. He let out a quiet sigh and closed his eyes, saying hello to the only friend he had ever known.
The ship itself.
A FEW hours later, 47 noticed Damion had finally fallen into a deep REM sleep. He released all the jacks but one from his ports, separating himself from his capsule except for the line still in his left wrist. He walked the short distance from his pod to Damion’s bed and gazed down at his Fighter.
47 knew he was incapable of feeling, yet he couldn’t deny the strong urge to complete the bond that would bind him and Damion as Core and Zodiac Alpha Fighter. He sat down on the edge of the bed with utmost vigilance to make certain he did not disturb his Fighter’s rest. He reached up with both hands and touched the very tips of his fingers to Damion’s temples.
The mild electrical current from the cable in his wrist traveled into Damion’s body, and 47’s fingertips received the current back into his own. 47’s mind ignited from his Alpha Fighter’s electrical patterns. A web of blue-and-white energy surged suddenly from Damion’s mind. 47 gasped and his back straightened as he assimilated the biophysical patterns and fed the information needed back into their Zodiac ship. He began to feel changes in his physical response to the bonding. Respiratory and heart rate increased, as well as an unfamiliar hunger to retain connection to Damion’s bio patterns indefinitely.
47 decided to end the connection before subsequent problems arose from the enormous electrical feedback.
Damion’s eyes opened after 47 released his head. Damion had goose bumps all over his arms and up his neck. It was a fascinating reaction—as was the obvious erection tenting the sheets.
Damion
“WHAT WERE you doing? Trying to electrocute me?” Damion asked in a bewildered tone as he slid away from 47 and closer to the wall, needing to put distance between them. He frowned as he saw the cord plugged into one of the strange ports—this one in the back of 47’s hand. The same hand that had been touching Damion’s head.
“I believed it would be more relaxing for you if the bonding process happened while you were asleep, since many Fighters find the reaction to the process una
cceptable.”
“Bonding? Huh? Wait, what does bonding mean? The material I read on Cores didn’t explain other than it helps us pilot. What did you do to my body?” Damion sat up and pulled the sheet up to his hips to hide his erection.
“I assure you, I did nothing that would cause you harm. Your body’s reaction to the bonding process is not unusual,” 47 stated calmly, placing his hands on his knees. “I apologize if I alarmed you, but I needed to expedite the bonding process so that we are better prepared when you pilot the Ares Zodiac for the first time. As for what the bonding is, I will attempt to explain as clearly as possible if you wish for me to continue.”
“I’m not sure I want to know, but it would be nice to be sure you’re keeping to your word of not killing me.”
“I cannot lie to you, Fighter Hawk. Breaking my word would be akin to lying, so therefore I am unable to make a promise to you that I could not keep.”
“Don’t do anything like that while I’m unconscious ever again.” Damion lay back down with his gaze fixed on 47 in suspicion.
“I will not need to,” 47 replied. “I apologize for causing you discomfort. Completing the bonding process was necessary. It was pivotal that I become educated in the electrical signals that you emit. By doing so I can better serve and protect you. I will be able to adjust the Zodiac as you fly so it can anticipate your reactions, as well as monitor your biorhythm to assess how much stress you are under during battle.”
“They should give a class on you guys,” Damion grumbled, turning on his side so his back was to the wall.
47 shook his head. “A class would not be beneficial as only 3 percent of the colonial population would ever be in knowledgeable contact with a Core. The Creators deem our existence should be kept as quiet as possible.”
“What about Beta pilots?” Damion countered. He wished someone had prepared him better for having a Core.
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