Machine World (Undying Mercenaries Book 4)

by B. V. Larson

  Maybe he knew what his fate would be, too.

  When Randy finally lay still on the deck, I used the key on his tapper, and I erased him. Not just his life, but all record that he’d ever existed. Maybe his mamma had a few baby pictures saved somewhere back on Earth, but that was about it.

  The only people who would remember him were those who knew him personally and could attest that he’d once drawn breath. As far as all the computers in the galaxy were concerned, he’d never been alive at all.

  When I was done, I looked at the key...such power. I’d never permed a man before, and it felt strange.

  I tried not to think about it afterward—but of course, I did.

  Why’d I do it? Because such a man didn’t deserve to live.

  What right did I have to perm another human being? I don’t know. What right did he have to kill seven versions of me in a row?

  Like I said, I tried not to think about it...

  But I did.

  The detention people were understandably upset when they got to the torture chamber and found both their star tormentors dead on the deck.

  They found me sitting on the steel chair, looking down at the bodies thoughtfully.

  “Drop the weapon, Veteran.”

  I did so. Then I held up my hands. On my forearm was a live feed, displaying Turov’s face.

  “Let Veteran McGill go,” she ordered.

  “Are you under some kind of duress, sir?”

  “No. He has acted under my authority. He is to be escorted to my office immediately. But don’t listen to anything else he says.”

  The guards weren’t happy, but they did as she ordered. They muttered and complained all the way back up to Gold Deck.

  Centurion Belter made an appearance along the way, and she almost crashed the whole party. She was raving mad, half-naked, and she had a lot of grease and dirt on her. She must have had a hard time getting out of that locked data closet.

  “Sorry sir,” I said when faced with her shouts and curses.

  When the guards explained I was under Turov’s protection, she took her sidearm and left me, snarling about traitors and bastards. Since I felt I was neither, I didn’t feel the sting of her barbs.

  It occurred to me as we reached Gold Deck that Turov might very well have me shot when I got there. But those were the breaks. I’d done what I wanted to do. I’d made my bargain with the devil, and I was going to keep my end of it, no matter how it turned out.

  When I got there, she saw I was unarmed and so she waved my escort back outside into the passages. Her office door closed behind me, and we were alone.

  I stood at attention as she walked around me, staring up curiously. She stopped when she got around to face me again, and she shook her head.

  “You’re a wonder, James McGill.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  She held out her hand. “Give it to me.”

  I put the Galactic key into her small palm. She made it disappear like a magician palming a gold coin. One second it was there and the next it wasn’t.

  Then she surprised me by putting her pistol on her desk.

  “James, I’m sorry,” she said.

  Of all the things Galina Turov might have said to me, this was probably the last one I was expecting. I glanced down, looking into her face for an instant. Our eyes met, and she honestly looked troubled.

  “I reviewed the vid files while you were gone,” she said. “I didn’t know. I swear it. And I don’t want you to blame all of Solstice, either. My orders were to extract the truth. They were overzealous in their efforts.”

  “You could say that.”

  She stared at me thoughtfully for a second. “What happened on the Nairb ship? Give me the truth.”

  I told her. I told her everything. About Claver, the Nairb death chamber, the squid missile pod—even the chocolate bar. She listened, shaking her head from time to time and making sounds of disbelief.

  “All right,” she said when I finished. “I’m going to trust you on this one. What’s done is done, anyway. If the Nairbs don’t buy that the cephalopods destroyed their ship, executing you won’t have any effect on their condemnation of Earth. Your charges are dismissed.”

  “Thank you, sir,” I said.

  “Why did you need the key for simple revenge?” she asked. “You had a pistol—that would have been enough for the McGill I know.”

  I thought about my answer. She didn’t know that I’d erased that guy, Randy. He just wasn’t there anymore in the computer systems, and anyone who’s ever looked for a ghost can tell you they’re not easy to find. You don’t even notice when they’re not around anymore.

  “What would you have had me do,” I asked her, “if it had been you in that chair for seven lives?

  “Seven...?” she asked, shocked. “I didn’t know...”

  I took three steps toward her. She backed up one pace and put her hand on the desk near her pistol, but she didn’t pick it up.

  I touched her shoulder. I don’t know why, really. We’d been close once. Maybe that was it. Touching her just felt right.

  She didn’t even seem to notice. She was looking into my eyes, not at my hands.

  “Galina,” I said, “we’ve been through it, you and I. Life, death—love and despair. This is one more of those moments, that’s all.”

  “But what did you do?”

  “People think I do whatever I want, but it’s not true. I did what I had to do.”

  She finally caught on then. “You erased them?” Her eyes were big. “That’s why you needed the key. Killing those two wasn’t enough?”

  “For one man it was—but not for the other.”

  She nodded as if she understood. Maybe she did understand, I’m not sure.

  She looked so young, but she wasn’t a kid. She’d seen a lot in her lifetime, just as I had.

  “I’ll cover it up,” she said. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Thanks,” I said, “but I’ll never forget this day.”

  She gave me a little kiss. It was a strangely gentle gesture, coming from her. I took my hand off her after that and left. She didn’t try to stop me. She didn’t say anything at all. It was hard to know what she was thinking.

  I didn’t ask because I didn’t care. I’d had a long, hard day, and it was finally done.

  -41-

  Imperator Turov’s idea of “covering up” was a little different than mine. She didn’t erase records or stage a hearing to clear my name. She just dropped the charges and ordered everyone involved to shut the hell up.

  It was effective on a surface level, I had to give her that. The legion officials stopped trying to arrest me, and I was restored to my previous rank and position in Winslade’s cavalry cohort. I don’t think Winslade was too happy about that, but he didn’t say anything. He had to be wondering what kind of strange power I had over Turov.

  No one said much to me at all, in fact. But they did stare, and a few of them sneered. They talked—oh yeah, they talked—but only behind my back.

  Carlos was an exception to that rule. He didn’t just sneer and whisper, he came right out and bitched about what had happened.

  “Another sleazy con job,” he said. “Or should I say, blow job?”

  “What?” I asked, jolted out of my thoughts. I was running down the pilot’s checklist on my dragon. It was all shined up and ready for the parade ground. Not fighting a battle for a week had allowed us to repair and polish our deadly machines.

  Carlos and I were standing in the mechanic’s bay under the bellies of our respective vehicles. Originally, I’d placed his dragon in a pod at the far end of the bay, but that hadn’t worked out. Sure, he’d been less annoying to me, but he’d irritated everyone else. Without me to shut his mouth, his naturally charismatic personality had driven the rest of my squad nuts. Consequently, I’d moved him right up next to me, so I could keep an eye on him.

  “You heard me,” he said. “Turov still has a thing for you. It’s obvious an
d undeniable. If any of the rest of us had pulled shit like that, we’d have been permed instantly. Well, maybe not instantly. They might have tortured us for a while first.”

  At the mention of torture, I bared my teeth. I could still feel Randy’s hot needle in my back. Anne had sprayed several layers of fresh cells over the puncture wounds, but they still ached and stung, especially when I stretched in the morning.

  “You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” I told him. “And you should stop talking before I stop you myself.”

  For some reason, he got the message this time. He fell quiet, although he was still muttering to himself about how unfair the universe was. He opened the leg actuators on his vehicle to make some tension adjustments, and I left the bay.

  I had a headache, a backache and I was pissed off. I went to see Anne, who looked me over doubtfully.

  “I think you have an internal infection,” she said. “How did this happen, James? Did you report these injuries?”

  “Sort of.”

  “What does that mean? Are they from training, or working in the bays or what?”

  Hesitating, I thought about my answer before I spoke. Finally, I shook my head. “The injuries were deliberate,” I said. “Courtesy of Legion Solstice.”

  Anne was alarmed and angry about that. “You should report them. This goes beyond hazing and bar-fighting. This is abuse.”

  She applied salves to my skin and gave me a hefty shot of antibiotics deep in my abdomen. The shot made me a little sick, and the long needle reminded me of Randy again.

  She put a hand on my forehead then read the results that lit up her tapper. “Slight fever. Blood toxins are up. Are you sleeping?”

  “Sometimes.”

  She kept prodding me and checking me over. At last, I’d had enough of it, and I gently took her hands in mine.

  “Let’s go on a date,” I said.

  She looked into my eyes, still worried. “What happened to you? This could be serious—you didn’t have a bad revive again, did you?”

  That made me laugh. “I had several of them, in fact. And I don’t want to take another trip through the revival machines, if that’s what you’re suggesting. I just need some cheering up and some time to heal.”

  “I don’t know,” she said, looking down at her hands, which were still wrapped up inside mine.

  “What? Why not? You promised me another date a while back, remember?”

  She nodded, but she still didn’t look at me.

  “This is the best shot we’re going to get,” I said. “Things are pretty quiet right now. Everyone’s been revived, even the tribunes. If we get into another fight, we’ll be separated again. If we fly back home—well, we might not see each other until the next campaign.”

  Anne pulled her hands out of my grip and sighed. “I know. All right. I’m on break in an hour. Meet me then.”

  Her words gave me the first smile of my day. I had something to look forward to. Even better, it looked like the general dislike and mistrust I’d been faced with everywhere I went didn’t extend all the way to Anne. I was glad about that.

  I made some plans and special arrangements, and by the time I met her coming out of Blue Deck’s main hatch, I had a picnic basket on my arm.

  She looked at it and smiled. “What have you got?”

  It was a long list, and there were even a few special items like pickled quail eggs and a bottle of real wine.

  “Where did you get all this stuff?” she asked.

  “I pulled a few strings.”

  She gave me an odd look. “With Turov?”

  My mouth opened then closed again. I was stumped. Did everyone believe I was some kind of boy-toy for the brass?

  “No, with the quartermaster. He owed me one. What kind of rumors have you been listening to?”

  We walked together toward Green Deck as we talked. I was annoyed, but I tried to keep my voice light and unconcerned. Even I knew that yelling at your date in the first five minutes wasn’t a wise man’s opening move.

  We came to the entrance, which was an overgrown arch of leafy vines. It had always looked strange as the vines were in stark contrast to the steel walls of the ship.

  We passed inside before she reached out and touched my arm with gentle fingers.

  “I’m not being fair to you,” she said. “We should cancel this.”

  “What? These quail eggs aren’t going to eat themselves!”

  “I know. I appreciate all the effort you’ve gone to, really I do. But I don’t know if I can go through with this today.”

  “Aw, come on,” I said. “Let’s talk it out. First off, no, I didn’t screw Turov to get out of being permed.”

  Her eyes were on mine now. She didn’t say anything, but I knew I had her full and undivided attention.

  “Secondly,” I continued, “I didn’t kill the Nairb ship and doom us all.”

  “You didn’t?”

  “Well—hold on,” I said. “Okay, I did destroy their ship. But that’s been fixed. The Galactics believe it was the squids that did it.”

  “How did you manage that?” she asked suspiciously.

  I gave her the general story, leaving out many of the details. In my version, I was more of a secret agent sent to remove an obstacle than a crazy convict who managed to kill his executioners first.

  “So,” she said, “that’s why you’re still breathing? Because Earth won’t be blamed?”

  “That’s right. We’re in the clear.”

  Now, you have to understand that I didn’t know any such thing. Not yet. The Nairbs were dead, and as far as anyone could tell, they hadn’t reported the details of their fate. The radioactive evidence trail had been effectively planted too, pointing a guilty finger at the squids. But the investigation hadn’t come yet, and hadn’t made any conclusions.

  To my way of thinking, I wasn’t lying—but I was embellishing and extrapolating. The results I described weren’t certain, but they were likely and preplanned. When I was finished, I watched Anne to see how my words had been received.

  She still looked wary, like a cat that just won’t come in the door because it suspects you’re going to grab it the second it does. She was right, but I kept on smiling and waiting like I didn’t have a care in the world.

  Finally, she stepped closer and took my hand again. I sighed and we found a spot to eat. Together, we shared a few hours of happiness on Green Deck. No one bothered us, and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

  -42-

  The only thing I hadn’t gotten out of Anne the night before was a promise of more romantic encounters. She’d enjoyed herself, we both had, but she’d stopped short of making a commitment.

  In the morning, as I booted people out of their bunks and sent them reeling to the showers and breakfast, I was thinking of her. How was I going to entice her this time? I’d spent a lot of credits and good will getting that picnic together on Green Deck, but a man couldn’t pull that stunt every day. For one thing, I’d be broke before the week was out.

  Fate had other plans for me in any case. Klaxons wailed, and we were called to battle stations at about nine in the morning. My team was busy doing calisthenics in our module, and we didn’t even have our dragons handy to jump into.

  “You know what that noise means!” I shouted. “Move your butts, people. Everyone get down to the dragon bay. We’re not getting caught with our pants down this time!”

  I knew things were bad when red arrows appeared on the deck, leading toward the lifters. I contacted Leeson immediately for directions.

  “McGill, the legion infantry is doing a hot-drop. Get your dragons to the lifters, pronto!”

  “Will do, sir,” I said, waving to my squad who were pounding along behind me at a run. “What are we up against?”

  “Unknown ships have entered the system, and they’re heading for us. We’re deploying Legion Varus on the titanium mountain, with Winslade’s cohort to back them up. That’s all I know for now. You have you
r orders, Leeson out.”

  How many ships? That’s what I wanted to know, but he was off the channel before I could ask.

  I relayed the information to my squad, and Sargon contacted me privately afterward.

  “So Solstice is going to stay in space?” he asked.

  “That part didn’t get past you, huh?”

  “No, Vet. The way I see it, Turov clearly has a plan—and for once it makes a little bit of sense to me. She wants to protect her sole prize on the planet surface and at the same time hold a reserve force in space she can drop anywhere in response to an enemy attack. Our legions are only useful on the ground, so we can take it as something of a compliment that she’s chosen Varus to be deployed first.”

  “That’s one way to look at it,” I admitted. “We’ll find out what we’re facing in due course, I’m sure. I’ll keep you informed, specialist.”

  “I know you will. You’re not as smooth at this job as Harris was, not yet, but I like your style, Vet.”

  “Thank you, Sargon.”

  We disconnected, and I had to smile. Sargon was one of the few men in the unit who hadn’t doubted me, not even when I was accused of blowing up an Imperial ship and possibly causing the eventual demise of Earth. He and I understood each other. Sometimes, a man had to do what a man had to do.

  We were busy after that, plugging our bodies into our dragons at the same time we were decoupling them from the ship. They came to life as we moved inside them. After having piloted one of these fine machines for months now, it felt like a second skin. When I moved my arm, my dragon’s long steel appendage moved. I felt like a giant made of fine metals—and that’s pretty much what I was.

  Clanking down passages toward the lifters, we made good time. There were arrows to follow on the deck, but we knew the way by now.

  The ship was venting and yellow flashers were spiraling around everywhere. It was enough to give a man a headache. The crew was scrambling just as much as the troops were. I knew what that meant, they were getting ready for some fast maneuvering. This might well be a space battle rather than a ground battle. If that turned out to be the case, my cohort might well be the lucky ones. Anyone up here could be caught and destroyed, helpless in their dragons.