The doctors and adept continued to wait while she explored. Tapperhaven had remained posted by the door, and Kurj stood leaning against a nearby wall, his arms crossed, his metallic coloring a vivid contrast to the white Luminex. The sleeves of his pullover strained his large biceps.
“It’s odd.” Soz braced her palms on her knees. “I don’t feel a thing. The sockets aren’t even sore.” She surveyed her arm, trying to find a seam where the doctors had inserted the tubes they used to thread the biomech into her body. The placement didn’t have to be exact; the picotech braided into the threads had enough intelligence to make them weave into Soz’s neural system. “If I hadn’t known you all had operated on me, I couldn’t tell now.”
Relief washed across Irzon’s face. “Good.”
Her response startled Soz. Usually J-Force officers were more reserved about showing emotion, not because they didn’t feel it but because they learned fast to guard their moods when they spent the majority of their time with other empaths. Irzon’s reaction made sense, though. It had to be excruciating to do such work on the Imperator’s heir. If anything happened to Soz, the doctors would lose their jobs, possibly even their freedom. They all knew Kurj was listening, watching, analyzing.
Loriez was studying the holos of her body floating above his console in the headrest of the table.
“How does it look?” Soz asked.
He glanced up at her. “You’re a healthy young woman, Your Highness.” Kurj’s voice rumbled. “She is Cadet Valdoria here.”
Red tinged Loriez’s cheeks. “Yes, sir.”
Any reminder of her differences here made Soz twitch. Somehow she had to find a balance between being one of Kurj’s heirs and being like the other cadets. If Kurj hadn’t spoken, she might have done so herself, but that could have caused problems. Given her less than stellar subtlety, she might have ended up with more demerits, and she already had too many of the blasted marks on her record.
Rajindia gave the impression of calm efficiency, but Soz could feel her underlying strain. None of it showed, though, when she spoke. “We can finish activating the system now, Cadet Valdoria.”
Soz sat up straighter. “I’m ready.”
Loriez pressed more commands into the console, and the blue rod edging the biomech table flared in brightness. Soz waited, striving for patience, but nothing happened. After a moment, she gave Irzon and Rajindia a quizzical look.
“You can finish it yourself,” Rajindia said.
Neither the adept nor the doctors offered any more guidance. Soz closed her eyes and concentrated, settling her thoughts as her instructors had trained her to do in the biomech class she was no longer taking. Perhaps testing out of it early hadn’t been such a good idea, after all.
She thought: Node?
Nothing.
Soz let her consciousness float. She wished she had Shannon’s ability to submerge into a trance. Thinking of him made her tense, which had never happened before. She let the memories of home slip away and just drifted.
Still nothing.
Perhaps she hadn’t directed the thought enough. She focused her mind and concentrated harder. Node, activate. It startled her how strong the thought sounded in her own mind, as if it were enhanced. Still no response, though.
Her agitation surged. She pushed it down, but the more she became concerned about being concerned, the more it disrupted her concentration. It was like saying, Don’t think of huge pink fungi. Of course then she could think of nothing but pink glop.
Node, she thought. I would appreciate it if you would answer me.
Please specify the question you wish answered. The thought came into her mind, firm, strong, oddly warm, reassuring in its competence.
Soz sat up with a jerk. “Whoa!”
“Cadet Valdoria?” Rajindia asked. Irzon and Loriez were watching her intently. An uncharacteristic furrow showed between Kurj’s eyebrow. Soz grinned at them all.
Here is a question, she thought to the node. Do you have any properties that distinguish you from any other node created by ISC?
Your question is rather general. It sounded calm. Pleasant. Efficient. Did you have anything specific in mind?
This is ultra, Soz thought, this time just to herself, without the focus she used for the node. Then she added, Something that would prove I’m talking to you.
“Cadet Valdoria?” Irzon asked, her dark eyes alert. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, fine.” Soz had no idea how her face looked while she “conversed” with her node. Probably she needed better control of her expressions. She didn’t want to go blank or make odd faces. Maybe that was why Kurj so often looked impassive; he had developed that control to a high art.
The node thought, My history parallels that of other nodes constructed by the J-Force biomech technicians. However, I do have more memory than other nodes.
Why more memory? Soz asked.
Your brain has extra capacity. Scientific images of neural structures formed in her mind, along with various stats.
Ultra, Soz thought. To Rajindia, she said, “My node has extra memory because your tests said my brain can handle it. You think I have inherited some of the genes that give holographic memories to the women called Memories on Lyshriol.”
Rajindia inclined her head in acknowledgment. “Your node told you this?”
“You bet.”
Irzon smiled. “Congratulations, Cadet Valdoria. You’re now a Jagernaut.”
“Hardly.” Kurj spoke from his post by the wall, his deep voice rumbling like a growl. “She’s a first-year cadet.”
Soz bit back her urge to point out that her classes and new biomech web qualified her as a junior. She was too pleased with the node to be annoyed at him right now. Besides, she could end up with more demerits.
Know who he is? she asked her node.
Which “he”? According to your sensors, I this room contains two human males.
Hey. It could detect the people in the room. She could hardly wait to explore all these new abilities. Their interaction was going so fast, barely a second had passed according to the fuzzy display it was creating in her mind. To Kurj she said, “Yes, sir,” in response to his comment about her rank.
“We can begin your training with the biomech web after you’ve rested.” He pushed away from the wall and walked toward her, lowering his arms.
“Yes, sir.” She sent her node another question: What Can you tell me about the larger man in this room? She pushed her thoughts even faster, curious to see how much she could learn in the few seconds it took for Kurj to walk to the table where she sat.
Data flooded her mind: Identity: 99.8 percent probability he is Kurj Skolia, Imperator. Weight: 130 kilograms. Height: 2.13 meters. Chronological age: undetermined from physical attributes but given as 52 standard years in history files. Apparent physical age: 38 standard years.
And so it went, ever faster. Kurj was moving in slow motion now, taking each step through invisible molasses. Soz winced and pressed her fingertips against her temples. The node was flooding her with data, everything from his blood type to estimates of the chemical composition of his hair.
Pain stabbed through Soz’s head. “Ah!” She pressed the heels of her hands against her temples. Stop! You′re going too fast.
“C-a-a-a-d-e-e-t V-a-a-a-l-l-d-o-o-r-r-r-i-a-a-a.” Irzon’s voice echoed so slowly that Soz wondered if someone had recorded it and was playing it at a delayed rate. She groaned and doubled over, her hands clenched around her head.
Accelerated mode off, her node thought.
The pain receded in Soz’s temples. Someone put a hand on her shoulder and someone else pressed a medical tape against her arm.
“—happened to her?” Kurj was demanding.
“Her blood pressure and heart rate spiked,” Loriez said.
“She started to have a seizure. Too many of her neurons were firing at once.” Then he said, “Gods above! Her impulse rate increased for a fraction of a second.”
&
nbsp; Rajindia spoke. “Cadet Valdoria, can you hear me?”
Soz sat up slowly. Afterimages floated in front of her eyes as if she had looked at a bright light. Irzon was monitoring her with a gold metallic strip she had laid on Soz’s left forearm. The tiny holos that glittered above it showed data and images of Soz’s brain. Rajindia stood with her hand on Soz’s shoulder. Kurj was over by Loriez, dividing his attention between Soz and the holos above Loriez’s screen.
“I’m all right.” Soz lowered her hands.
“What happened?” Kurj asked.
“Apparently I put the node in accelerated mode.”
“You’ll learn how to control the modes,” Rajindia said.
Loriez looked up at Soz. “According to these scans, you tried to change the speed that neural impulses travel in your brain.”
Kurj frowned at him. “Is that possible?” He didn’t even hide his worried look. Today he was showing a whole plethora of moods that Soz had never seen from him before.
“I wouldn’t have thought so,” Loriez said. “Certainly not like this. But she did it.”
“Is it dangerous?” Kurj asked.
“If it had gone on much longer, it probably could have caused brain damage.”
“I can learn to control it,” Soz said quickly. She didn’t want them turning off her biomech. It exhilarated her, despite the headache. She needed to know what it could do, how far she could push it. A whole new universe of possibility awaited her.
“And if you can’t control it?” Kurj asked. “Neural impulses are the transfer of chemicals across cell membranes. How could you speed that up?”
“I don’t know,” Soz admitted. “Maybe something about the extra memory in my node.”
Rajindia spoke to Kurj. “We can study the effect to see if it can be handled or eliminated.”
He considered her for a moment. Then he spoke firmly to Soz. “You will stay here, under Rajindia’s supervision, until we ascertain how and why this happened.”
Soz had no objection. If she stayed here, working with the doctors, she would learn to use her web faster. “Yes, sir.”
“I mean it, Soz,” Kurj said. “Don’t push this one. You’re risking a lot more than demerits. You could damage your brain. Then where would you be?”
It was a sobering thought. “I’ll be careful.”
“Good.” He smiled slightly. “Remember that when you feel tempted to push this web of yours.”
Soz flushed. Kurj knew her too well. “Yes, sir.” Then she thought, Node?
Attending.
She strove to keep her thought process at a normal speed. Why did your accelerated mode make chemical changes in my brain cells?
I haven’t completed my investigation, it answered. However, my initial analysis suggests the effect is due to the unusually extensive neural structures in your brain. Many now also include bioelectrodes that can fire according to commands from you or me. When they began to discharge in accelerated mode, it caused some sort of resonance process.
Soz looked from Kurj to Rajindia. “Do I have more neural structures than most psions?”
“Everyone in your family does,” Rajindia said.
“Did Althor have any problems like this?” she asked.
“None,” Kurj said. “Why?”
“I asked my node what happened.” Soz described its response.
Rajindia rubbed her chin. “Imperator Skolia, I’d like to jack her into our training system.”
Kurj looked less than thrilled. “It’s too soon. She just activated her system. We don’t know why it’s malfunctioning.”
“It’s not malfunctioning.” Soz jumped in, eager for the training. “It’s working even better than we expected, better than I’m trained to handle. I need to learn.”
His inner lids came down in opaque gold shields. “Do you make it a practice to contradict your commanding officers, Cadet Valdoria?”
Heat spread in Soz’s face. Damn. “Sir! No, sir!”
Kurj spoke into the comm on his massive wrist gauntlet, and Soz winced as he registered another demerit on her record. At this rate, she would spend the rest of her time at DMA cleaning mucked-up droids and spamoozala.
Loriez had continued to pore over Soz’s stats while Rajindia watched Soz with unsettling intensity, as if she would see into the workings of her bio-enhanced brain. Irzon set her holotape on the cart and picked up a pressure-pulse ring. Although Loriez’s console could read Soz’s vital signs, the ring provided more accurate data. Soz held still while Irzon clipped it around her arm.
While the doctors worked, Kurj spoke to Rajindia. “Which training system do you want her to try?”
Soz glanced up with a start. She had expected him to deny her permission to work on the training systems. Her pulse surged, evoking a discreet beep from Loriez’s console. She wanted to jump in with suggestions for her training, but she managed to restrain herself. Kurj might be giving her demerits, but he was still listening to what she had to say. If she pushed any harder, that would change.
“I’d like to try the debriefer,” Rajindia said. “It will make it possible for her node to interact with our systems here. We can ask it questions directly and record its responses.”
Kurj nodded, the elbow of one braced on the forearm of the other so he could rest his chin on his fist while he thought. Soz recognized his mannerisms; he was probably going to agree with Rajindia. Well, good. She had always known Kurj was intelligent.
“Very well.” Kurj lowered his arms. “But control the speed of the questions. Keep it all in normal time mode.”
“We’ll make certain of that,” Rajindia said.
He nodded to them. “After she’s had a chance to rest, you can proceed.”
She was ready now! Soz started to protest, but Kurj raised his eyebrows at her, so she closed her mouth.
Her brother actually smiled, his teeth a startling flash of white in his metallic face. It made him look decades younger. “Rest, Soz. Gather your strength. Your node isn’t going anywhere without you.”
Good gods. That sounded like a joke. From Kurj. “Yes, sir.”
To Irzon, he said, “Keep a good watch on her legs and her sight.”
The doctor nodded. “We’ve had extra monitors on both since she awoke and described her symptoms.”
So they had heard Kurj tell her about her father. She stared down at her hands, which were folded in her lap.
“Soz.” Kurj’s voice was a low rumble.
She looked at him. “Yes, sir?”
He spoke with uncharacteristic gentleness. “I will let you know as soon as I have more news about him.”
“Thank you, sir.” For now, she would learn her biomech system and learn it well, just as she would master her other enhancements when she received them, as she would ace her classes, meld her mind with an EI, and learn to fly a Jag, until she became the most versatile, hardest, fastest Jagernaut in the J-Forces.
Then she would kill the Aristos who had hurt her father.
19
Windward
As commander of the Ascendant battle cruiser, Corey Majda was the highest authority in the orbital defense system that guarded Lyshriol. Now, however, Majda had come down to the planet. She sat with Roca, Denric, and several ISC officers at a long table of blue glasswood. It stretched down the length of the dining hall in Castle Windward, the Valdoria retreat high in the Backbone Mountains. Rafters of green glasswood braced the high ceiling, and glasswood mosaics patterned the walls in mountain scenes. A fire roared in the giant hearth at the end of the hall, its flames taking on the color of its glasswood logs, blue, green, and gold.
Roca missed her other children. She wanted to draw them near during this time of grief, but they were taking care of matters in Dalvador while she stayed up here. The twins, Del-Kurj and Chaniece, were eldest now that both Eldrin and Althor had gone offworld. They would tend the house and look after the youngest children, Aniece and Kelric. They were also seeing to their father’s dutie
s, with help from Vyrl and Lily. Eldri considered himself a singer and farmer only, but Roca understood what he didn’t acknowledge, that in his own unassuming way, he led the people of the plains. In his absence, his children would carry on for him.
Despite the importance of those tasks, they weren’t the true reason the children stayed in Dalvador. Their father refused to see anyone, especially those he loved. His insistence that ISC bring him here instead of to their starships hadn’t surprised Roca. Windward had always been his retreat, a place he preferred far more than the alien environment of ships in space. ISC had destroyed a substantial portion of Windward shortly after Roca’s marriage to Eldri, when they came to “rescue” her. Although they had rebuilt it to match the old castle exactly, Roca knew Eldri felt it was no longer the same. But he preferred a rebuilt castle to a battle cruiser in orbit, and ISC assured her they could care for him just as well here.
Roca looked around at the ISC doctors arrayed on both sides of the table. In their crisp green or blue uniforms, they seemed so out of place beneath the glasswood rafters and columns. They were taller than Lyshrioli men and women, more angular, darker in their hair and eyes, a sharp contrast the rustic, stained-glass hall.
“Surely you can do something for him.” Roca spoke to Jase Heathland, the senior doctor of the team here.
“We can rebuild his legs,” Jase said. “But they will be more biomech than natural. He will have to relearn their use, not only how to walk, but how to think about walking. The way they receive signals from his brain will no longer be the same.” He rubbed his chin, frowning as he thought, his narrow face tanned from his time walking in the plains under the Lyshrioli suns, an unusual effect since most Skolians protected their skin. Jase tended to prefer what he called a “natural” state, which was one reason Eldri could relate to him. The Bard avoided most ISC personnel, but he actually liked Jase.
Schism: Part One of Triad (Saga of the Skolian Empire) Page 27
