by M. R. Forbes
"I am scanning," Origin said. "The ship's communications appear to be offline."
Offline? Mitchell's smile drooped a little. "That transport came from the Schism, the ship I was on."
"Are you certain it is the same one?"
It was growing larger ahead of them, still no more than a point of glinting light against a the backdrop of the asteroid belt. "The Tetron fired into the belt, right into the Schism." How could they have gotten away from that? "I don't know where else it could have come from."
"It's the same ship," Singh said.
Mitchell wanted to agree with her. He wanted the Riggers back. His Riggers. If they had to go back to Liberty, he wanted Shank and Cormac and the other grunts on the ground with him.
"Mitchell, nothing escapes a Tetron plasma stream."
"They could have escaped earlier," Singh said. "You were too busy getting us here to see the entire chase."
Singh was right. He didn't know what could have happened. All he knew was that the transport was headed their way. Even so, his early experiences with the enemy were already causing him to question everything. He had seen that they had no qualms about using every edge they could get. They had sent General Cornelius, Millie's father, to confront them here to force the Schism's captain to defy him, knowing full well he was going to wind up dead.
"Still nothing?" he asked as the transport grew closer. It was within a few thousand kilometers, taking a steady, straight path towards them. Soldiers in search of refuge? Or a weapon in disguise?
"No, Mitchell," Origin replied. "How shall I proceed?"
"Mitchell," Singh said.
The rogue Tetron had told him that this was humanity's war. His war. He didn't know how to fight when he couldn't trust anything around him. One leap of faith, and then another, until it was over. It was the only way.
"Bring the Goliath around so that the hangar is facing them," he said.
"If that ship is a Tetron weapon-"
"Do you know that it is? Can you scan it and tell me that it is?"
Origin shook his head. "A fusion bomb has no scannable signature."
"Then bring her around."
"As you say."
Mitchell turned with the rotation of the Goliath, the open view of space outside twisting and re-orienting in the control room. Singh did the same, her face a flat mask. A slight crease in the corner of her eyes was the only indication that she was nervous about the outcome.
"Major Long and his crew are going to love the Riggers," Mitchell said, watching the transport coming in. He sent knocks out through his p-rat. To Millie, to Shank, to Cormac, to Briggs, even to Watson.
There was no reply.
"They aren't answering my knocks," Singh said. She had the same thought he did. "I'm not so sure about this anymore."
"I can still raise the barrier," Origin said.
"No. Either they're with us or we're going to die."
"Mitchell, this war is for all of humanity, not one transport."
"I need people I can trust. I need help." Katherine's voice still echoed in his mind. They couldn't do this alone. "Without it, we're not going to win. Does it matter when we lose, if we still lose?"
The transport vanished from the sight of the cameras that displayed the scene outside the Goliath's thick hull. Mitchell noticed his heart was racing. He had won the first battle. Was he going to lose the second so soon after?
"The transport is entering the hangar," Origin said. "I am receiving a communication from the Valkyrie."
"Major Long can wait a minute. Singh, are you coming?"
"Yes, Mitchell."
Mitchell started towards the lift out of the control room. Origin moved to follow.
"Wait here," Mitchell said. "Get us into hyperspace and bring us close to Liberty, but not too close. I don't want to get blown up as soon as we fall back."
"As you say." Mitchell heard the tone of a knock on his p-rat. "I gained the encryption keys from Corporal Singh's subconscious. If you need me."
Mitchell paused. Was it that easy for the enemy to overcome their best attempt at security? There was so much about the Tetron that they still needed to learn.
They were on their way down when Origin knocked him again.
"The transport has landed. Hangar doors are closing. I have locked down both ships until you arrive."
Some of the hope began to return. At least the transport hadn't exploded.
Yet.
4
Mitchell and Singh made their way back through the dim corridors of the Goliath, careful not to touch any of the branches of dendrites that made up the true form of the Tetron who called itself "Origin." As they walked, Mitchell noticed that the pulsing, liquid metallic limbs were shifting and moving, reorganizing themselves to clear a path for humans to travel through.
"I'm still struggling to make sense of all of this," Singh said. "This ship. The enemy. Origin. I thought I was going to die on the Schism, during some impossible mission or another."
"This mission doesn't sound impossible to you?"
"I don't know. You defeated the enemy ship."
"One ship. You didn't see what I saw on Liberty. The thing I showed you the pictures of is another Tetron. It's already claimed the planet and taken control of anyone there with an implant."
"Do we really have to go back?"
"Yes. You heard what Origin said. We got lucky fighting this one, brute force against brute force. I don't think we're going to get those kind of odds again. We need to know what she knows if we're going to even them out."
"I don't trust it."
"Origin?"
"Yes." She slowed their pace, moving herself closer to him and whispering. "I was in the engine room. The core, its core is there, pulsing lights and thousands of the branches. One of them wrapped around my arm." She shrugged. "That was all it took to control me. It uses charged particles like we use our fingers. Electrical signals that mimicked my nervous system and started sending the wrong commands. I didn't fight back because there was no part of me that even understood something was wrong. Not until it let me go. It has such an innate understanding of humans and how we work. I think it would be trivial for it to deceive us."
"I joined with it," Mitchell said. "To fight the other Tetron. I was part of it. I didn't feel any deceit or any efforts to conceal anything. I don't blame you for not trusting it, in fact, I think it's better if at least one of us doesn't. I can't afford not to. Not now."
"Yes. I understand that. For now."
"Besides, I don't see what there would be to gain from helping us fight one of its own only to betray us later?"
"I don't know. We have no idea what it knows about your past or your past futures. It said it was seeking its creator. Maybe you are supposed to be the one to discover who that is. Or maybe you are the creator?"
"Me? I doubt I'm the creator. I'm a pilot, not a scientist. Maybe it's you?"
"My specialty is mechanical engineering, with secondary training in systems design and analysis, encryption, and security. I've only done rudimentary experimentation with artificial intelligence, certainly nothing like this." She pointed at a group of the dendrites.
"The Tetron originated in a past recursion. When? Where? Did the person who created them know what they were going to become, or were they trying to solve a simpler problem?"
"Like how to help a pilot fly a starfighter?"
Mitchell considered the question. AI wasn't a new thing. Primitive forms pre-dated the Xeno War. "I don't think the creator is the one who came up with the idea of artificial intelligence. More like the one who finally got it thinking completely on its own."
"An iterative leap across the singularity," Singh said.
"What?"
"The singularity. When technological advances allow artificial intelligence to move beyond human control. It was predicted to happen way back in the twenty-first century."
"Why didn't it?"
"I don't know. I'm not a history expert."<
br />
"Neither am I, but now that you mention it, I wonder if XENO-1 had something to do with it."
"Considering Alliance politics, it's obvious that someone is doing their best to prevent it today. Thirty years ago, it seemed as if everything was becoming automated. Now?"
Mitchell glanced at Singh. "You don't look like you were around thirty years ago."
"I'm forty-seven."
"You are not."
"It's the drugs. They're also the reason I was on the Schism. I had a friend. Well, a lover. She was a chemist. She made it, and I sold it through the Undernet."
"Until you got caught." He had known she was on something that had kept her so calm and flat. He didn't know it was the cause of her incarceration with the Riggers.
"Yes. Court-martialed and sent to Millie. The beginning was hard." She paused, her face tensing as a memory washed through her. "Things have gotten better. Watson, on the other hand? I can't believe she kept him around after what he did. I can't believe the military even passed him off to us."
He had proven himself useful so far. How long would the usefulness outweigh the heinousness of his crimes?
"So, there are politicians in the Alliance who are anti-artificial intelligence, and now it turns out there's a good reason for it. Do you think they know something?"
"It isn't just the Alliance. According to Watson, the New Terrans have been pushing back the same way."
"Interesting. What about the Federation?"
"I don't know. We don't have any Federation expatriates on board. I have spent a lot of time thinking about the theory of eternal return since you told us about it. Mitchell, we have no idea how many inception points there have been into each timeline. We have no idea how many instances there are of you, of Origin, of anyone."
It was Mitchell's turn to pause. "What do you mean? M said that once the eternal engine is used, the timeline is locked at that point."
"For the current recursion. Then, the next recursion, a new injection point is available, but the first inception can still occur because it was part of the previous timeline. Think about it, Mitchell."
They walked the rest of the way down to the hangar in silence. Mitchell tried to wrap his mind around the thought. It had always sat at the corner of his mind, percolating as a more general, conceptual idea.
Now it was just making his head hurt.
5
The hatch to the hangar slid open.
Mitchell stood motionless, letting his eyes adjust to the different glow of the tendrils that snaked around the massive expanse of the space. It was easily large enough to house a few squadrons of starfighters and at least three or four jumpships and dropships, and still have space enough for a full contingent of mechs and other heavy machinery.
There was little of that here. Instead, the hangar sat eerily quiet and empty save for Mitchell's modified S-17 starfighter, four Morays, a United Planetary Alliance Navy dropship, and a single small transport. The fighter, transport, and UPA assets were each positioned well away from one another, segregated by Origin. The populated ships were silent and foreboding, a single dendrite stretching to each, climbing their landers and vanishing into the machinery. The Tetron had used them to lock their systems and prevent them from disembarking.
The bridge of the Valkyrie was visible from where he was standing, and he could make out the small figures of her crew from the distance, probably looking back at him. The transport didn't have an outer viewport, utilizing feeds from cameras instead to keep the passengers and crew behind a heavier layer of protection.
Mitchell and Singh crossed the distance from the hatch to the transport, the only sound the echoing of their boots along the metal floor. Mitchell felt his heart beating faster with each step, anxious to either be re-united with his team or blown apart in an ambush.
He wouldn't have to worry about any of this if he were dead.
"Origin, unlock the transport," he said, sending the message to the intelligence.
The Tetron's reply came when the small lights around the transport's hatch lit up.
He tried to knock Millie again. Still no reply. There was nothing to do but hope.
The hatch slid open, a platform extending to the surface of the hangar. Millie was standing right behind it, her clothes torn and filthy, a long gash across her forehead, an assault pistol in her hand, ready to fire.
Mitchell's heart beat faster, making the conversion from trepidation to excitement.
"Riiggg-ahh," he said, his smile spreading wide across his face. Even Singh managed a small gasp of enthusiasm.
Millie's smile was bigger than his own, and it showed how exhausted she was. She handed the pistol off to someone out of view and started down the platform. She made it three steps before stumbling, and Mitchell rushed forward to catch her, grabbing her under the arms and helping her regain her balance. He noticed that her pant leg was torn and bloody.
"Nice work, Captain," Millie said.
"How-"
The others appeared in the opening. Shank, Cormac, Wornak, Hubble, Alice, Watson and thirteen more.
Twenty souls.
Just enough to fill the transport.
"Ares," Shank said, moving down the ramp. He smiled, revealing he had lost a few teeth in the battle. "I wasn't sure about all of this, but I believe you now. I wish I still didn't."
"Me too," Mitchell said.
"Oh man, that was just bloody crazy, you know," Cormac said, limping towards him. Mitchell could see the end of a piece of shrapnel jutting out from his thigh, even if the grunt's embedded meds had stolen the pain of it from him. "Best piece of flying I've ever seen. Hey, Mitch."
"Cormac."
He greeted the others as they came down. None of them were without injury, though Millie's seemed to be the worst. They paused when they reached him, saluting, nodding, or clapping him on the shoulder. Watson took up the rear, his face pale and his entire body shaking with fear. He was here as long as he was useful, and he knew it.
Was he still useful?
"Where are Sao and Briggs?" Mitchell asked, still helping Millie stand.
"They didn't make it. Briggs... she-"
"She saved our asses," Shank said. "So did Sao. He did something with the communications array, faked the lidar signatures or something so the bad guys wouldn't know we had gotten away. Briggs, she got us turned starboard of a big ass rock, close enough to get the transport out behind it. Crazy maneuver. We kept the engines low, just enough to stay in its gravity and hide."
"Why didn't you answer my knocks?" Mitchell said. "I almost didn't let you come aboard."
"The transports comm systems are down, and we turned off our p-rats. We had no idea what happened to you over here, and it was risky to assume our keys weren't compromised. I didn't think you'd consider leaving me out there."
"I thought you were dead, and then this transport shows up. The Tetron have already proven themselves to be good at deception and trickery. As for your p-rats, it's safe to reboot. We will need to change the keys, though. There's an outside chance the enemy has them, and we can't risk it."
"No. We can't. We'll get Watson on it once we're a little more settled."
"Tetron?" Cormac asked.
"Later, Firedog," Mitchell said. "You sent me a message, right before the Tetron fired. You said-"
"I was hoping it would motivate you. It worked."
Did that mean she loved him or not? Mitchell was relieved to not have to confront that right now.
"Tetron?" Cormac asked again.
"I said later, Firedog."
Singh approached Millie. "Captain. I'm happy you made it."
"Thank you, Singh. You too."
"I assume Rain didn't survive?" Millie asked, her eyes searching behind him.
He fought against the pang of sadness that was intruding on him. "No. She saved my life."
"Whoa. Is that a Navy dropship?" Cormac said.
Millie's head swiveled to where he was looking.
"I
t is. All that's left of the battlegroup." He leaned his head down, close to Millie's ear. "I'm so sorry about your father."
"Later," she whispered back.
There was a moment of silence, everyone on the hangar floor pausing as the pressure wave caused by the shift to hyperspace washed over them.
"What the hell?" Shank said.
Millie's eyes narrowed. "Mitch, if you and Singh are down here, who just put the Goliath into hyperspace?"
"I have a lot to tell you. First, we need to get you treated. You and everyone else."
"We didn't have time to grab any med-kits."
"Can you stand?"
"Yes. Why?"
Mitchell pointed to the Valkyrie. "Wait here. I'll go ask our new neighbors to share their medi-bot. I have a feeling they won't say no."
6
The main difference between a dropship and a jumpship was that a jumpship had its own FTL engine. That made it capable of popping in close to a planet, releasing ground assets, and after a short hyperdeath getting the hell back out. Dropships used the space that would have been taken up by the FTL engine to hold a larger contingent of personnel and weaponry, leaving them dependent on carriers or other large craft to carry them to the objective.
Large craft like the Goliath.
Mitchell approached the dropship alone, glancing back every so often to check on the remaining Riggers. They stood or sat on the floor, tired and dirty, watching his lonely trek across the gap Origin had created. The symbolic nature of it wasn't lost on him. He and the Riggers were outcasts, criminals, unwanted for anything but the most suicidal missions.
Like this one.
He needed to get the UPA proper involved in this war, or it was going to be over before it truly began.
"It's never over," he reminded himself.
He glanced to his left, where the four remaining Alliance fighters had been placed by Origin. The pilots had removed their helmets and were watching him with fixed stares, no doubt recognizing him from the streams and trying to figure out why he had been declared dead, when he so clearly wasn't. He didn't acknowledge them, fighting against the pressure of their scrutiny.
