by Claudia Gray
“As far as that pilot knows, no mech would either—at least not in a situation like this. There are no other mech captains of their own ships, none who live as free traders and would be in a position to have that conversation at all.” Abel smiles—briefly, and not broadly, but it’s the first he’s managed since Noemi was injured. “Therefore, the pilot interpreted my response as that of a human. A pedantic, annoying human. The kind he would want to stop talking to as soon as possible.”
Virginia laughs. “You’re something else, Abel.”
He’s familiar with the colloquial phrase. It’s complimentary in the vaguest possible way. But he can’t help thinking of it literally. I am “something else.” Neither wholly mech nor wholly human. I am unique in the galaxy. I am alone.
Soon, Noemi will be unique, too. But he intends to make sure she never feels alone.
Moving back to the ops station, Virginia studies the readings from Kismet in more depth; her eyes widen as she takes in the Damocles ships again. She rubs her arms, the kind of self-soothing gesture intelligent humans often use to filter out other stimuli while they concentrate. “This is mass military action. The Battle of Genesis set Earth off, didn’t it? When we beat them, they realized they had a real fight on their hands.”
“I think the stimulus came before the battle,” Abel says. “I believe it began the moment Noemi spoke to the worlds.”
Abel possesses eidetic memory. He perfectly recalls all the information and sensations he perceives, forever. As a student of cybernetics, among other sciences, Virginia knows this about him.
Yet she insists on replaying Noemi’s message anyway, “to check.” It’s an emotional response, not a logical one, but he indulges it. He’s found that attempts to make humans act rationally are often futile.
“The truth about the Cobweb plague—both on Genesis and throughout the galaxy at large—has been kept from you.” Noemi’s voice echoes within the Persephone bridge. The audio recording is of the highest quality, and yet Abel could never be deceived by it. There is an emptiness there, a hollowness, that betrays Noemi’s absence. This is an echo, no more.
“Another Gate in Earth’s solar system—a secret Gate, one that leads to the planet Haven, a habitable world that’s been kept secret, too.… Find that Gate, and you’ll know Earth’s been lying to you. Find Haven, and you’ll know why Earth created Cobweb in the first place.”
Virginia shuts off Noemi’s recorded voice. “There’s nothing about the other colony worlds of the Loop,” she says. “Absolutely zero about Kismet. So why is Earth patrolling this place almost as hard as Genesis, i.e., the world Earth’s actually at war with?”
“Think about what Noemi said. ‘Find that Gate.’ Almost no one else in the galaxy knows the location of the Haven Gate. Therefore Vagabonds and other travelers must be flooding every system.”
Slowly Virginia nods. “While they’re looking in the wrong places, they’re getting frustrated. Which means they might combine forces. Make alliances. Figure out how to stand up against Earth. And maybe Kismet made trouble first.”
“Exactly. There may be unrest on the other colony worlds of the Loop as well. That’s why we broadcast the message to all the planets—in hopes some would rise up and join our alliance. It appears our plan was even more effective than we’d projected.” For entire planets to rise against Earth—even planets as relatively pampered and privileged as Kismet—the levels of anger out there on the Loop must be incendiary. “Unfortunately, Earth had an effective counterstrategy of their own.”
Shaking her head, Virginia mutters, “How are we supposed to counter that?”
“I cannot say.”
Large-scale military strategy is beyond his purpose. With Noemi Vidal by his side, Abel can fight for Genesis and all the other colony planets. He can take up arms against Earth. With Noemi unconscious, endangered, suspended between life and death? He can only fight for her.
The military vessels aren’t interested in one small ship flying to the Cray Gate, headed out of the Kismet system. So the Persephone makes good time and passes through without incident.
Virginia brings up the image of Cray on the viewscreen; its red-orange surface turns everything on the bridge faintly crimson. This world is not being patrolled like Kismet. Apparently Cray’s privileged scientists have so far remained loyal to Earth.
(At the outskirts of the system, scans pick up a few Vagabond vessels searching for the Haven Gate, in vain. But they’re far away from Cray itself, not a factor for either Earth or Abel to consider.)
“Nobody down there knows what I’ve done,” Virginia murmurs. “I mean, Ludwig and Fon and the other Razers know about you and about Noemi and about the Cobweb plague—”
It was Virginia’s Razer friends who realized the new, even deadlier form of the Cobweb virus had to have been engineered in the underground labs of Cray. That virus had been used as a bioweapon against Genesis, one that would’ve won the war for Earth—if Ludwig and Fon hadn’t stolen the genetic information that allowed a cure to be developed. Abel wonders whether the elders of Genesis would express even a fraction of the gratitude the Razers deserve, or write them off as products of a corrupt system. Probably humans would have better luck.
“I helped put together Genesis’s war fleet with the Vagabonds. I took part in battle,” Virginia continues. “Well. I mean, mostly I watched the battle, but I played a big part in getting thousands of ships there! Nobody on Cray would ever believe it.”
“Let’s hope not,” Abel says.
“Exactly. Someday I’m going back—someday soon—and I’d rather not do it as a war criminal, you know? Which I guess is technically what I am. But not after we overthrow Earth. Then I get to be a hero of the revolution.” She grins with pride. “That has a nice ring to it, huh? ‘Hero of the revolution.’”
“Certainly it’s better than ‘war criminal,’” Abel says as he inputs a course to the Stronghold Gate.
Virginia’s smile dims when she looks down at her console. “We’re running the mag engines way beneath capacity. I get that we can’t overload again yet, but we could move faster than this.”
“That might attract more attention from the military, which I’d prefer to avoid. Besides, Noemi is stable in cryosleep. As long as this ship is safe, she is, too. Therefore my first responsibility is to protect the ship.” Abel rises from his chair. “My second responsibility is to my friends, which is why I need you to return to Cray immediately.”
She blinks at him, as though unable to process his words. “But you’re headed to Haven! You’ve got to try to steal all this stuff from Gillian Shearer, or else you’re going to get yourself killed—”
“There’s a reasonably high probability of that. It’s a risk I’m willing to take, for Noemi. But I’m not willing to put you at risk, too.”
Virginia doesn’t budge. “It’s my choice to make.”
“No. This is my ship. I decide who travels with it. And I won’t be carrying you any farther than Cray.”
She lifts her chin, using every centimeter of height she has over him. “How do you intend to make me leave? Throw me out an air lock?”
“Unnecessary—and, as exposure to deep space would be fatal to humans, counterproductive to my goal of protecting you. I would instead render you unconscious and put you aboard an orbital scanner I retrofitted as an emergency escape pod three months ago. By removing the sensory equipment and installing emergency air packs, I’ve made it capable of sustaining human life for approximately fifty-five hours. You could make it to Cray within”—Abel updates his calculations based on their current position—“nine point three hours. The nutrient bars and water supply inside will keep you nourished. I apologize for the primitive zero-G waste-processing unit, but I understand most humans get used to the vacuum effect, eventually.”
“You’d knock me out? You would, wouldn’t you?” Virginia’s face flushes, and she balls her hands into fists. Is she going to try to knock him out first? Abel hopes sh
e doesn’t break her fingers in the process. Instead, she sputters, “You’re about to shoot me into space, you—you—overgrown toaster!”
“Not if you’ll take your corsair and leave freely. I’d greatly prefer that option. I suspect you would, too. The vacuum effect of a primitive waste-processing unit has been known to cause chafing on—”
“I get it, I get it.” She slumps in defeat. “I know your specs as well as anybody, Abel. I’d have to be an idiot to try to fight you. If you keep acting like a big, heroic, self-sacrificing doofus, I’ll leave the ship like you asked—but you won’t think about it?”
“I’ve already run the calculation of your probable death on Haven six thousand four hundred and seventy-five times. No scenario offers you better than a thirty-two percent chance of survival.”
A long pause follows. Virginia finally says, “No decimal points?”
“That one came out even.”
“Come on. My chances have to be better than that.”
“For most human passengers, they would be. However, you would insist on attempting to rescue me, Noemi, or both. These attempts would no doubt be intelligent but also doomed. Therefore your survival chances are very low. Regardless, I can’t accept those odds, and you shouldn’t either.”
“You know me too well.” She sighs. “Don’t guess you’re going to tell me the odds of your survival.”
“No.” They’re much worse than Virginia’s, but he has to do this. She doesn’t. “Where we’re going, you can’t follow. Virginia, I hope we meet again, but if we don’t, thank you for teaching me what friendship can be.”
Her brown eyes well with tears. “Damn it, Abel, you’re making me cry.”
“Better here than in zero-G.”
She makes a sound that is somehow both a sob and a laugh. He takes her arm and begins guiding her back down to the docking bay, and her corsair, and escape. No doubt she’ll protest her expulsion at least one more time, but Abel now feels 88.21 percent certain he’ll be able to make her leave, and is ready to administer unconsciousness via an injection if not. Either way, Virginia’s headed to Cray.
Maybe he won’t be able to restore Noemi’s life. Maybe he’ll lose his own. Virginia’s the only one he knows he can save.
4
TWENTY-ONE HOURS AFTER VIRGINIA’S RELUCTANT DEPARTURE, the Persephone reaches the Haven Gate.
To Abel’s relief, the gate remains relatively unguarded so far. The few patrol vessels in the area are easily eluded, and he slips through undetected.
Earth is still trying to hide the Gate, he muses. Noemi’s message made the entire galaxy aware of Haven’s existence. Literal millions of people will be searching for the Gate Earth tried so hard to keep secret. Putting a full military guard around it would only draw attention to the area, making its discovery more likely.
Despite this attempt at concealment, Abel predicts the Gate will be found, and soon. Haven provides one of the few potential homes in the galaxy. It is nearly as large and as potentially fertile as Genesis. Humans can survive there, provided they’ve either survived the Cobweb plague—a disease designed to bioengineer humans for this very environment—or undergone a treatment protocol with a weakened form of the virus. Given the disastrous spread of Cobweb, millions if not billions of people are prepared for this new world.
More than that, they’re desperate. Earth’s climate has been unhealthy for generations and will soon no longer support human life. If the billions of people about to be displaced thought they might find a home on Genesis after winning the Liberty War, Earth’s defeat in the last battle will have convinced them otherwise.
Other ships will follow, Abel thinks. Haven won’t stay hidden much longer.
Flying into its frosty atmosphere, Abel again notes the pale cloudless sky, which is scalloped with the silvery crescents of some of the planet’s fifteen moons. Forests of dark-blue conifers stand out against the endless blanket of snow. The only animal life he observes comes in the form of swirling clouds of marsupial bats. He’s deduced that many other animals live here—these forms of plant life require insect fertilization, at minimum—but the ship’s sensors don’t pick them up in the immediate area.
What they do pick up is the Winter Castle.
It shines like a palace of crystal on the horizon. The structure is less a single building, more an enclosed town. Abel only observed it from a distance before, but now that the Persephone is drawing closer, he can fully appreciate both its beauty and its genius. Most human observers would think the tall, prismatic spires were merely lovely, but Abel recognizes the glitter of solar micro-panels. They must generate a tremendous amount of power, more than enough for the few hundred people who live there now. The passengers on the crashed Osiris hadn’t made it as far as the Winter Castle when he was last here approximately two weeks earlier, but he detects flickers of light within windows, the distant hum of energy. The survivors have made that trek and are settling into their new home.
As he zooms in closer, he can detect greenery inside—arboretums and hydroponic gardens have been built. The plant life will both purify the atmosphere and provide fresh, healthy food. Only one set of doors is visible, but he spots many small hatches that could release mechs or ships to gather anything needed and bring it back to those inside.
It is a work of brilliance. Abel recognizes it as he would his own fingerprint. Both he and the Winter Castle can only have been designed by the same person: Burton Mansfield.
He glances toward the shadow on the horizon that marks the wreckage of the Osiris. That ship brought these settlers here, with Mansfield aboard—and with Noemi as Mansfield’s prisoner. It, too, was a kind of artwork, beautiful and brilliant at once.
Now it is charred metal and broken tile. It is the grave for Mansfield’s body.
Abel wonders if he, too, is about to be used up, burnt up. Whether he will become just the marker for a soul that used to exist.
He lands his ship in a small cavern approximately two kilometers from the Winter Castle. Purple crystals glint dully from the Persephone’s landing lights as he settles it down. A scan of the surrounding geology suggests these crystals are amethysts, but this interests Abel less than the fact that sensors would have difficulty penetrating the cave walls and finding the Persephone. He’s hidden his ship as well as he possibly can.
Of course he’ll have to lead others here eventually. But by the time he returns, a bargain will have been struck. Noemi will be safe. The cavern must protect her until then.
He hesitates at the door, tempted to turn back and look at Noemi one more time. But he doesn’t. It would be entirely irrational, and for the next few hours, he may do better listening to his machine programming rather than his human soul.
At his belt, he attaches a personal force field—the sort of thing normally worn with an exosuit for protection from exposure to deep space. His color vision tints gray—a natural side effect of the field. Such things are virtually never used without exosuits, because their energies would disrupt human brain waves. Abel’s skull is made of stronger stuff. The field is nearly invisible, betrayed only by a faint golden glow along his skin.
Shielded only by this and his hyperwarm parka, Abel sets out toward the Winter Castle.
Gillian Shearer is almost certainly a person in authority among the humans currently living on Haven, he reasons as he trudges through the thick snow. Most likely she is the principal authority—
His thought stops. His movement stops.
Pain arcs through every millimeter of his body, so shocking that he almost can’t process it. He topples sideways into the snow, utterly stiff. Most humans would be knocked unconscious, but Abel stays awake. Barely.
A stun weapon, he thinks, insofar as he can think. Force fields don’t provide complete protection from those. Someone or, more likely, something is patrolling the area, and little time remains for him to escape.
He tries moving his hand. It twitches, nothing more. Still, it’s a start. He’s encou
raged for the 18.11 seconds before he hears footsteps crunching in the snow.
When the Charlie mech leans over him, blaster in hand, Abel tries to speak but can’t yet. All his hopes of bargaining with Gillian—of making his surrender mean something—are at risk. He can’t do anything as the mech grasps Abel’s arm in its hand.
Then the Charlie stumbles to the side. Just a step—no more—and immediately it appears to recover itself. The strangeness of seeing a clumsy mech would, at any other time, excite Abel’s curiosity. Now he simply lies there as the Charlie lifts its wrist to its face and begins speaking into the small comm strapped to his glove: “The model sought by Dr. Shearer has been identified and apprehended.”
Abel had hoped to negotiate as a free man. He must prepare to do so as a prisoner.
He is transported to Shearer’s lab in an enormous white sack. This is unfortunate for two reasons. First, it gives him very little chance to work out the inner schematics of the Winter Castle.
Second, it’s completely undignified. The second reason is far less important than the first, but he’s keenly aware of it as he’s dumped out on the floor of a room that’s entirely, pristinely white.
“At last,” says Gillian Shearer. “Model One A.”
Abel manages to prop himself up and look at her. She’s shorter than the average human female, but she radiates authority. Confidence. Power. Her brilliant red hair and blue eyes stand out sharply in this white-on-white laboratory, including the coverall she wears. Gillian is ready to get to work.
He knew her as a little girl. She had seemed to love him in those days. That time seems longer ago than it was.
Then she surprises him. “You came back to Haven of your own free will. You had no logical reason to do that, and multiple reasons not to. Did Directive One finally kick in?”
Gillian, just like her father, can’t fully accept that Abel’s core programming no longer controls him. He says, “No. I have a proposition to make.”
