The Broken Third (Digitesque Book 4)

by Guerric Haché

  “You’ve been out of it for almost eight hours, for one thing.” Baoji was standing over with Kosk, looking at something on the officer’s terminal, both mirrans’ ears flatted. “And something a few klicks from us just blew up the radio spectrum like fucking fireworks.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Elsa pointed to an image on Adrall’s console; it was some kind of wispy, rainbow-hued cloud. “It means something just exploded and we don’t know what it was.”

  “Eight hours? Who -?”

  “Ada Liu. Good morning. My sensors indicate you are now awake.”

  Ada’s eyes shot wide open.

  “ Cherry! ”

  The response came crisp and clean through the terminal’s little speaker. “Your freighter appears to be suffering severe structural damage and computational infection. You’ve mitigated the worst of the damage, but if you like I can connect with the systems and purge the viral infection itself.”

  She pressed her face against the bridge window, looking for her ship out against the dark. She couldn’t see anything - the freighter was headed straight for Chang’e Major, and the vast sphere of clouds and sky filled the entire viewport. “Cherry!”

  “What?” Baoji sounded confused, perhaps doubly so since Cherry was a word in her own language. “Is that your ship? That’s impossible. Nine hour transit? Nowhere on the scan?”

  She was staring at the screen on Adrall’s terminal, but she didn’t see anything else there. “Cherry is - um - Adrall, my ship can fix the AI infection!”

  Elsa’s eyes widened. “Isn’t your ship also an AI?”

  “Yes, but - no, wait!” She spun around wildly, unsure of where to look as she spoke. “Cherry, the AI virus might infect you.”

  “Doubtful.” The response sounded almost amused. “This freighter’s core systems run on quantum computers, which are an entire paradigm of information technology behind my own systems. I am not concerned.”

  “Where the hell are you?”

  There was a brief pause, then a shadow. “Here.”

  Ada spun around to the window. Cherry, all sleek blacks with violently sleek red highlights, was floating just on the other side of the glass, blocking much of their view of the planet. Everyone else on the bridge gaped openly and stumbled back, but Ada laughed and ran up to the glass, pressing her hands and face against it. “Cherry! I’ve missed you so much!”

  This time the voice came through the suit, so familiar, directly into her mind. Thank you. Shall I attempt the override?

  She glanced at Adrall. “I’m going to get my ship to purge the AI. Don’t worry and don’t fuss.” Then she subvocalized. Yes .

  Her heart was racing as the Watersmoke’s controls and lights suddenly flickered. They all started floating, drifting up into microgravity. Then, after what felt like a minute, everything flickered back on again, and the ship appeared to be rotating away from the planet. They weren’t on their feet, but this was a good sign.

  Cherry’s voice broke through the comm, this time speaking in the colonial language with surprising fluency. “The infection was not recent. It has been in the quantum system for years.”

  Adrall was flicking through his terminal with great agitation. “It’s - it’s all clear again. We have full system control, and there’s already a course set to move away from the planet.” He glanced up at Cherry. “What the hell is that thing?”

  “My ship.” She grinned broadly. “My wonderful ship.”

  She turned around to find Baoji gaping at her. “How the hell did your ship get here from Earth , Ada? It just - out of nowhere -”

  Tenrac stammered excitedly. “Captain, captain, the entire ship is being pressurizing. We don’t have enough atmosphere to recover from a second breach, but in a minute we should be able to collect the survivors and tend to injuries.”

  Ada just couldn’t stop staring out the window at those sleek black curves and their brilliant red slashes.

  Then somebody made a horrible, horrible mistake.

  “Captain Hesk!” Senjat Ashur, shouting through the comms. “Whatever you’re doing, cease it immediately. We’re one hour from rendezvous, and the Grand Admiral has ordered you to disregard that traitorous arrest warrant -”

  Ada felt a peculiar thing. For a moment her blood boiled, the pressure building in her veins and, with nowhere to go, threatening to tear her apart from within her veins. Then she realized it did have somewhere to go.

  She spun around and flung herself at the terminal, metal creaking as her hands and her weight strained the colonial machinery. “Hello Senjat. You never should have messed with me.”

  She flung herself through microgravity at the door. Cherry, get to the hangar bay. Ask them to open it for you if you can - it’s polite .

  Yes, Ada .

  “Ada?” Elsa was shouting at her. “Ada, what are you -”

  She turned her awkwardly-welded bridge door into a great ashen hole, diving back down the ship’s newly pressurized spine ladder, shunting herself along far faster than she would have been able to climb. Elsa’s shouting quickly dwindled behind her.

  When she arrived in the hangar she found the airlock sealed, but she could already see Cherry settling into the hangar, over by Baoji’s Peregrine, as the hangar door closed.

  When the airlock opened, she drew in her legs and kicked herself into the vast space of the hangar, drifting forwards towards her ship, thumping awkwardly against the cockpit with her arms wide to give the ship a hug.

  Hello, Ada.

  “You stupid ship.” The glass slid open, she slipped inside the familiar cockpit, and as soon as the cockpit sealed again she found gravity reasserting itself. A small pouch of almonds fell to the ground and scattered. Had she left that there last time? They probably weren’t good to eat.

  She laughed. It didn’t matter anymore when she slipped her fingers into the control groves and was suddenly one with the ship. I’ve missed you so much.

  They spun in the air, watching the the hangar door slide open again, and as soon as Cherry’s geometric intuitions knew there was enough space, they zipped out into nothing.

  She was free .

  Ada whooped as she wrenched the ship into a tight curve, multiple points of awareness flaring in her mind. Senjat and his followers were not far. She swerved around the Watersmoke in a helix, coming to rest opposite the bridge again, and stared down to see her friends and comrades gaping at her. She reached out with her mind, naturally as anything in the world, to send them her voice. “Take care of the crew. I’ll handle Senjat.”

  Elsa’s voice came back to her. “Ada - Ada there are hundreds of people on those ships -”

  She squeezed the transmissions shut. Everybody on those ships had made a choice to follow Senjat Ashur, especially in the face of divisive disputes in the Union. All Ada could do was chuckle, shake her head, and turn towards the Song of Fire and its entourage. She flexed the six fins that spread out on either side of her like they were her own limbs.

  “Cherry, why didn’t you come find me?”

  You commanded me to guard the Elysium crystal, which by the way was never attacked or investigated by anyone. I remained there and never received further transmissions from you. Your suit’s non-emergency transmitter cannot break the ionosphere.

  “Gods.” Baoji had been right about one thing. “I’ve got lots of questions, but right now - what can you tell me about these ships?”

  I’ve been running tactical analyses since entering the system. These ships are technologically equivalent to the fleets of late twenty-second century Earth. They are an order of magnitude less powerful than present-day Earth technology.

  She smiled. “ How much less powerful?”

  The cruiser, for example, is armed with twenty-two laser turrets, eighteen rocket pods, and six railguns. It is protected by a multilayered shell of ablative armor over electric reactive armor, and has numerous laser point defense measures. All of these technologies were discarded by my original de
signers as outdated.

  “So they don’t stand a chance.”

  Unless our strategic objective requires a tactical loss here, I estimate our odds of a successful engagement at 100%.

  Ada laughed. “Just the kind of numbers I like to hear.”

  As she slid through space towards Senjat’s military force, fins spread out and shields passively ready for impact, Ada saw and felt the pickets and interceptors moving into space in front of the cruiser. A defensive formation? Laughable. She sped up, and could almost feel the solar winds whipping past her.

  As she approached the enemy formation some of them suddenly burst with tiny children. She squeezed time to find lines curving through space towards her. At their origins, Cherry filled in the details - explosive EMP rockets with homing devices, designed to disable ships. They were long-ranged, fast, highly explosive, utterly harmless. Ada slipped back into realtime and let the rockets come.

  “Let’s have some fun.”

  What do you mean?

  “The rockets are controlled by machines, right? Computers?”

  Yes.

  “I hear you’re good at computational warfare.”

  Nine rockets were closing fast. Much of that speed was Cherry’s own - she vastly outmatched anything else in the Chang’e system, as far as Ada could tell - but the rockets themselves were also designed for speed. Her eyes followed the lines they were tracing through space in slowtime, her mind twisting Cherry’s fins around, aiming her weapons along those same lines. Six fins meant four spaces. Five rockets had to go. Ada smiled as her mental muscles contracted in bursts of weaponfire, pinpoint zips of hard light squeezed out to intersect five of the rocket paths.

  A transmission buzzed at the back of her mind from the cruiser, and she let it through. An unpleasantly familiar voice buzzed through the fighter’s speakers.

  “Who is this? Where did that ship come from? You’re firing on military hardware, and if you don’t stand down this instant I will open fire with all my -”

  Ada cut him off. “Fuck you, Senjat. You wanted to study me? Find out how to hurt my people? Here’s your only chance to try. Have fun.”

  Hard fragments of light connected with the rockets, one after the other, and she slowed time just to savour the brief bursts of colour. Then she was back in realtime, remaining rockets on their way, fins flexing in space behind her.

  “Cherry, we’re going to grab those rockets.”

  We could destroy them. What is the utility of this plan?

  “Fun! Intimidation.”

  Very well. Fun can yield mental health benefits, and intimidation can be tactically and strategically useful.

  They swerved through space. Lined the rockets up just right. Got them weaving clover and closer to one another. Close enough. She’d need to spin the ship, but that was fine.

  Time slowed.

  It was child's play, as the rockets closed in on her, to shift Cherry slightly sideways and pinch each of the rockets, one by one, between her flexible tail fins. One, two, three… four. All hers.

  Cherry, can you recode them to hunt the ships that fired them?

  Yes, quite easily. It will be done in one-point-three seconds.

  Just enough time to spin the ship around and toss them back in the right direction.

  Cherry pitched forward, slowly rolling in time dilation as Ada watched the lines in her field of vision twist like wet rope. The rockets were bright flares the colour of worry at the corners of her mind, singing rage at first, but suddenly their song changed. So apologetic now, so regretful of ever trying to hurt her.

  They were aimed. They were ready. She heaved forward, tossing the rockets with her fins back towards the very pickets that had fired them. She spun in real-time, steadying at exactly the right moment, feeling the pull of the Song of Fire ahead of her. The rockets, tainted by dark Earth code that turned them against their owners, soared brilliant through the black.

  She swooped out of the way, looking for a better angle. Suddenly something started plinking against her shield.

  The interceptors are firing laser weapons at us.

  Each strike barely registered. Ada laughed. “Fuck them.”

  She swerved sideways, rolling through space, but the lasers were still on her. She spun the ship around in space and blasted great hexagonal sheets of hard light in their direction, glittering blue slices through the void. Distance wouldn’t save them. She saw how they were moving in space, saw the cones of travel their propulsion restricted them to. Pathetic.

  The first rocket connected with the picket it had come from, briefly bursting into light and paralyzing the ship in space. Then the next, ripping a hole into its side, venting atmosphere and knocking the ship out. The third one cracked right into the cockpit of its picket, but the fourth ship managed to shoot its rocket down with a laser. There were still five pickets left.

  The blasts Ada had fired off towards the interceptors burst into a blue hail of electric fragments of light. They tore through the small ships, puncturing a thousand holes in each that sprayed atmosphere and blood and coolant into the void, glittering and frozen.

  She was already within spitting distance of the picket ships.

  Transmission. Senjat Ashur.

  “Ada Liu, what you’re doing is an act of war -”

  “Everybody knows what you did.” Shields up. Active. A hard shell of blue light, twisting, flattening, the point of a knife.

  She dove straight into the nearest picket, shields rippling white under the impact, tearing through the ship’s armor and hull like paper.

  Another transmission. Different voice. Sanako? “Ada! Ada what are you doing?!”

  She felt out. The transmission was from a ship Cherry somehow knew was called the Empress . Good gods, there was a whole second military fleet in the system surrounding that one, with even more and even larger ships. “Sanako? Where are you?”

  “I’m with Admiral Derksen. Zhilik is here, Ada. We want to -”

  They were out of her way. “Good.” She killed all the transmissions. She had better things to do.

  Four picket ships left. The interceptors were drifting through space, dead in the water, and one of them collided with the debris of the picket she had just torn apart, brilliant orange and white fireworks.

  Another picket was in her line of sight, the one in the middle. She peppered it with weaponfire that shredded its armor. This was child's play, and she almost giggled as she dipped towards the nearest picket and jutted out her three starboard fins. They connected with the picket’s small bridge, shearing through the viewport and the crew and the systems, jostling her flight but not dealing any appreciable damage. One left.

  It was firing at Ada, lasers and a few rockets, and she filled the world ahead of her with a violence that swept everything away. Nothing solid got through, and the shrapnel joined her gunfire in slamming into the picket ship’s hull, blasting holes in it and knocking it out.

  Shields up, point of a knife.

  Another transmission came through. She recognized Zhilik’s voice. “Ada, I understand your anger, but -”

  She forced the transmission shut again. He could just be saying what they wanted him to say. She forced the entire communications system to shut down, so she wouldn’t be interrupted again.

  She cut through the last ship like butter and swung Cherry around to face the Song of Fire itself. It was huge, bulky, like some great bloated fish. Fish tasted good. Ada laughed as she dove towards it.

  Suddenly the ship was alight with points of fire, and she realised it was firing rockets at her. Lots and lots of rockets. Helpfully, Cherry counted them. A full salvo of 108 warheads.

  Ada shook her head. “That they even bother.”

  The rockets curved through the firmament towards her as she closed the distance. They were about as maneuverable as garbage in a strong wind. She clipped past the top level of the cruiser’s tower shape, the rockets trying their best to avoid striking the Song itself, but one of them
managed to do it anyway. The explosion felt pleasant to Cherry’s sensors, like a grape popping in her mouth.

  The rest of the rockets pursued her as Cherry’s voice piped up. We could flip and fire on the rockets.

  She felt a predatory grin come over her, rolling her shoulders. “But that’s not as fun! ”

  She dove away from the Song , rockets in pursuit. They arced wide, straightening out far too slowly. She could use this. She spun around in space, her fins twisting to pepper the Song with weak fire as a distraction, letting the rockets slowly curve back around towards the ship itself. A few heavier shots - railguns - struck her shields almost perceptibly, but she didn’t fear them. She dove towards the upper edge of the ship’s flank, spun Cherry around, and dug her fins into the ship’s hull behind her. The Union hull crackled and popped with futile countermeasures that the exotic materials of Cherry’s own hull shrugged off with contempt.

  The rockets were closing in on her and the cruiser, coming in a nice straight line.

  Suddenly the Song of Fire ’s point defenses picked off incoming rockets, those explosions triggering others nearby, Ada’s whole plan collapsing into a cloud of fire and shrapnel headed straight for her. She roared, detaching from the Song and diving down to let the debris scatter across the hull. She dug her fins into the ship as she went, snapping through two laser turrets in the process. Fucking futile. She rolled around under the Song of Fire ’s belly, blasting holes into its underside.

  Out beyond the tip. She was in deep space again, and she swung around after a moment, facing the Song ’s bridge viewport. Shields at 98%. She was fine.

  Optical zoom.

  She could see Senjat’s face, reddish-brown with rage, as he pointed out towards her and shouted.

  Yeah, fuck this guy.

  Shields up.

  Fins out.

  She extended her shield across the shape of the fins, sharpened it in front of her nose. She was a sword of blue, her crossguard six angry claws of hard light. She twisted in space, rolling, aiming straight for the bridge.