by S. A. Tholin
"Not dead," Osten said. "A ghost all the same."
"I've seen your records. You had a fine career once."
"If that's what you want to call it. Just a pilot, me, hauling equipment from world to world. Not a hero like you, and thank fuck for that. Might never have left if that had been the case. Might still be killing for the Primaterre. Might still be dying for the Primaterre, a little more every day. But you wouldn't understand. Too young." Osten pressed the gun hard against Lucklaw's forehead, forcing his head back against the tacky leather of the seat. "Too young to die, but here we are."
"Nobody's forcing your hand. Not now and not then."
"You think I had a choice back then? Quitting the service?" Osten shook his head. "Can't do that once it has you. Can't do it once battle becomes instinct and adrenaline fuel. Get out early enough and maybe there's a chance. But for people like me? I knew I was done for when I stopped dreaming and when even the nightmares wouldn't come. As though I wasn't even human anymore; just a machine made for war. Switch on, switch off."
"Machines don't commit mutiny."
"It wasn't mutiny. Not exactly. We were on our way to Hypatia, watching the streams from the planet surface when Calley, our navigator, suddenly said: what the hell is it all for, anyway? And you know what - nobody on the crew had a good answer."
"To ensure the future of humanity -"
"Yeah, yeah, but what does that mean? It's a big universe, kid. What difference does it make to you or me how people live their lives a thousand light-years away? What difference does it make if one planet out of infinite worlds is ruined? We could all have stayed at home and would never have noticed the difference." Osten flexed his fingers around the Morrigan, caressing the trigger. "You're in exo-work, so you must know what it's like. Too much time too far from Protectorate space and the mind starts to wander. Starts to lose focus."
As though it was no longer receiving a signal. As though it was no longer being nudged.
"Tell me," Lucklaw asked, his curiosity getting the better of his judgement, "do you love the Primaterre?"
"Strange question." Osten shook his head. "No, but that's not a bad analogy. It was as though the whole crew fell out of love with the Primaterre. All the warm, fuzzy feelings gone, in an instant. And not everybody handles a break-up well. Some of the crew said they didn't care, said we had a job to do and pay checks to collect. They had to die, of course, but more crew lost their nerve then. Said they might be deserters, but not murderers."
"So you killed them too," Lucklaw said, thinking of how his own team had reacted when released from their priming. Similar dynamics, similar emotions.
"It was my damn ship. You better believe I put my foot down but good."
"And you destroyed the Amalthea to cover up your crimes."
"That came later. Much later. We already had our phoenix brands by then. There were few of us left then and fewer still now - I heard you killed Nystrom."
"He died a traitor's death."
Osten gave him a look of pity. "So young, and already so hardened. You don't look a day older than eighteen; fresh out of boot camp and this is where they sent you. A damn injustice, if you ask me."
That's what he had thought too. But it's not fair! he'd cried to his mother. No matter how serious she looked in her admiral's dress uniform, no matter how stern her tone, she was still his mother. His mum, who'd never missed a birthday and had read bedtime stories to him during cease-fires, always finishing the chapter, even if her quarters were full of smoke and sirens whined in the background. Admiral Lucklaw might transfer an untested corporal to a banneret company, but surely Mum wouldn't?
Except she had. And when he'd called her up to complain, she'd disconnected, making but it's not fair the last words he'd ever said to her. The last words he'd ever say if Osten pulled the trigger.
"But you're not wrong about Nystrom. He deserved what he got. See, contacting RebEarth was only supposed to be about money. Sell the Amalthea's cargo and make a nice profit, enough to set us up for life - or the afterlife, as it were." Osten chuckled humourlessly. "I was thinking of going somewhere cold. Some place with seasons, where trees lose their leaves and winters are dark sky and white snow. That might be nice, I thought; a nice change from sand and sunburn."
Lucklaw did his best to look interested, but could only manage to half-listen. Comms were down and he was disconnected from the world, but he still had some tools at his disposal. His sensors worked fine, and though they couldn't see Captain Osten or his fancy suit, perhaps that very blindness could be of use. If he looked very hard at what he couldn't see, he might find what was keeping his systems on lockdown.
"The deal went through fine, but then Nystrom started getting chatty with the RebEarthers. Drinks were poured, and the next morning I woke up with a damn feather tattooed on my face. Not just me, either, the entire crew, and Nystrom was grinning like an idiot. Said thinking about retiring had made him want to shoot himself. Said that he needed war, and what better enemy than our old masters?"
"You joined RebEarth by accident?" That was almost funny, and explained why Osten still wore Primaterre armour, and why his ship had the curving lines of a Primaterre barque. The man hadn't let go, because he'd never wanted to be where he was in the first place.
"Hush," said Osten and silver washed over his eyes. The man was looking elsewhere and as he did, an umbilical cord of darkness shifted between him and Lucklaw. It bound them together, denser than disconnection and fat with siphoned power. It was a cloaked data link, choking his connection to the world. Breaking it looked impossible and probing it inadvisable, but perhaps he could creep along it, using it as a bridge into Osten's systems.
"Your friends have finished with mine." Osten moved behind the chair, wrapping one arm around Lucklaw's neck. "They'll come here soon. I take it one of them is your commander - unless Scarsdale got his wish?"
"Scarsdale's dead." It was hard to speak and maintain concentration. He was glad that Osten had moved, because he could feel blood welling from his nostrils. This data link - more Tower tech, no doubt - was like nothing he'd ever seen and the strain inevitable. Before this was done, he'd look like Somerset had when she'd turned.
Osten responded to the news with a scornful scoff. "Bloody fool. Him and Lockwood both. I told them the Eshi suits would only make them bigger targets, but they couldn't resist. Trying to compensate for something, I imagine. That's what us boys in Transpo always said about cataphracts, anyway; the bigger the suit, the smaller the..." He trailed off. "Well, never mind. Wouldn't want to get on your commander's bad side. Don't know if he's the joking kind."
"You want to talk to the commander?"
"That's why I told Scarsdale to bring him to the Cephalopod. If I can get him to hear me out, if I can get him to listen, maybe he can help me escape this nightmare. If anyone could, it'd be a banneret commander. Will he listen? Will you be enough leverage to stay their hands?"
"If you drop the ban, I'll apprise them of the situation. The commander's a reasonable man; he'll hear you out."
"Nice try. I can tell you're a clever boy. The suit I'm wearing, I barely understand half of what's going on. I bet you'd do a better job. Bet you'd be as clever as any towerman. Tell you what, you help me out and I'll give you this suit and all my other Tower toys."
"Help you out how?" He'd scaled the link and was brushing against Osten's systems, careful not to interfere with the man's suit. Against its defences, his hacking tools were no more useful than a peashooter against an Ereshkigal suit - but, what was it Rhys had said? Your target is the man inside the armour. And he could see that man now, the glimmering web of augments and scripted functions. All he had to do was find the right target.
"We set an ambush. I might have hurt one of your teammates." Osten's cheeks moistened with tears. "They may not be in the best of moods when they get here. You need to tell them to stand down, to listen. I can help. I can give you intel on RebEarth. I can give you the Cephalopod. That's why I built her."
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br /> "To replace the Amalthea. You want to buy your way back home?" Lucklaw shook his head slightly. "You know better."
"It needn't be the Protectorate. Any world where RebEarth can't find me will do. They claim to be monsters of the Primaterre's making, but they were always monsters. The Primaterre is just the excuse by which they live, the scapegoat to blame their own failures on. The shadows are watching, and I can endure the chaos no longer. Anywhere but here, I beg of you. Even if that means Primaterre prison - even if it means execution - all I ask is to live long enough to regain purity."
"Purity is a lie."
"What?" Osten's concentration wobbled just enough for Lucklaw to slip into his system's electro-biological processes.
"It's indoctrination, Osten, subliminal conditioning received by our primers. We're made to be pure, and we're made to love the Primaterre. Something you did on the Amalthea, or somewhere you went, must've blocked the signal. It felt like falling out of love because that's exactly what happened - only, the love was never true. The love was a lie, whispered over and over again."
"I don't believe it."
But his hand trembled, and he lowered the Morrigan. Such was the nature of the Primaterre lie: once revealed, the truth couldn't be denied. When Cassimer had told the team, Lucklaw had felt as though he'd been sleep-walking all his life, only for the sun to force him to blink awake and see the world for what it was.
"You were set free, Osten, and look at what you did with that freedom. Your first thought was personal profit, and then fear made you bow at the feet of another master. You chose chaos over order, destruction over creation. You claim to want to leave RebEarth, but you are RebEarth. Too weak to shoulder duty, too cowardly to honour home and tradition. The truth is, the Primaterre raised you up. You had a meritorious life, but you never deserved it. Poor, pathetic fool."
"Shut up."
"Oh, but it's not me you need to fear. Don't you hear them, Osten? Don't you see them in the shadows? At long last, they have come for you."
Visual augment hacking was strictly illegal, but in certain crowds, strictly illegal simply meant don't be stupid about it. The hallucination pack Lucklaw slipped into Osten's augments wasn't ideal. He'd designed it a long time ago, to mess with opponents in online games, and the imagery was juvenile; scary witches, killer clowns and creepy silhouettes. But with a few adjustments of the brightness-levels, perhaps it'd look frightening enough to a man who no longer loved the Primaterre, but feared demons all the same.
Osten whipped his head towards the bridge's most shadowy corner and made a choked, whining sound. Reflexively, he raised the Morrigan.
Lucklaw grabbed for the gun. He seized Osten's wrist with his other hand and squeezed as hard as he could, and found to his surprise that his basic muscle augments were more than enough to crush bone.
The Morrigan was his. So heavy, so comfortable in his hand. He looked up at Osten and saw the black ink feather on his cheek and the red-rimmed eyes of a man who wanted only to go home. And then he pulled the trigger.
Because Osten had been wrong and Admiral Lucklaw right; it was fair. He was Corporal Aubrey Lucklaw of Scathach Banneret Company, and he was exactly where he belonged. He'd seen the truth of the world and the truth of himself, and he'd learned from his commander to do what was necessary.
Osten lay twitching on the floor. Lucklaw bent over him with a sense of detachment that might eventually turn to remorse. But Osten had fallen out of love with the Primaterre, and if he was brought back a prisoner, it was possible that someone would notice. If they did, it was also possible that they'd look into the soldiers who'd brought Osten in, and what would they find? There was no way of telling. If whoever was behind the priming had access to tech like the Tower mind-worm, no secret could be kept.
Osten's suit was intact. Lucklaw connected, initiating a full wipe of its systems. As Osten had said, in the hands of someone who knew how to use it, it'd be incredibly powerful - but as Tower had rejected him, he rejected it. He knew who he was and who he wanted to be, and he slid the Morrigan into his hip-holster.
He moved Osten's body to a corner and wiped down the instrument board. The viewport was covered in chunks, but it wasn't as though he was going to fly by eye. His systems reengaged, he asserted control over the Cephalopod and spoke over her comms:
"Attention Cephalopod. This is your new captain speaking. This ship will be departing in ten minutes. If you would prefer to be on board when that happens, proceed to Airlock Five. Kneel, unarmed, with your hands behind your heads, and you will be escorted to a safe holding area. Thank you for your cooperation."
Twenty minutes later, Hopewell and Florey returned, having recovered Rhys from the shuttle. They set the unconscious medic down and turned to examine the dead captain.
"He give you any trouble?" Florey sat in the co-pilot's seat, flicking a fragment of bone from its armrest.
"No, sir."
"Take it he was the captain then. Can't really tell if he looked Keplan anymore. You use his own gun on him?" Hopewell leaned over Lucklaw's seat, eyeing the Morrigan with rather too much interest.
"He was. Said he hated beaches." Lucklaw buttoned the strap on his holster.
"We're moving away from Cato." Florey leaned forward to stare at the instrument panel. "Where are you taking the ship, Corporal?"
"The Cascade, sir, as per the commander's orders." Yeah, that's right, he wanted to gloat; I know something you don't.
"Our orders were to seize this ship and transmit a message to Bastion. You don't need to go to the Cascade for that."
"I was given further orders. We're to enter the Cascade and set timed charges. If the Andromache attempts to leave the system, we're to arm the charges before folding back into Protectorate space. The corruption cannot be allowed to spread."
"What about the commander? If we blow the Cascade..." Hopewell, horrified, trailed off.
"The commander is prepared to do what's necessary." And so am I, he thought, and the heft of the Morrigan on his hip helped boost his confidence.
56. Cassimer
He fell through darkness tiger-striped with neon, and the building screamed around him. Metal crumpled like tissue-paper under collapsing rock and glass, and water sprayed from burst pipes. He landed hard, crashing through the ceiling of the elevator cage and had only a moment to push the pain aside.
The lights went out in a shower of electricity. Dust cascaded from above, drowning him, sucking around his knees and rising to his hip. Fire roared from a corridor two floors up, briefly illuminating the elevator shaft. The silver fortress's upper storeys crumpled and tore under a barrage of black glass boulders.
Cassimer rolled to the side, pushed himself to his feet and kicked open the elevator gate. Slower than usual; almost too slow, only narrowly avoiding the rockfall. His damaged spine augment had cracked open, and a power cell had been compromised. Smoke and toxic fumes wreathed his suit, leaking from inch-wide breaches.
Had to keep moving. He ran, sweeping his Morrigan's light over the surroundings. A warehouse, half original building and half carved from glass, its far end opening up into the spiral hangar where the Andromache glowed bright.
On the gantries, locals were still prying cryo chambers open. A few sleepers came out alive, staggering and clutching their chests. Long lines of would-be passengers snaked across the gangways connecting to the open airlocks of the Andromache.
Cassimer stepped into the light and all eyes turned to him.
"Kill him!" came a shout, but none of the locals obeyed. Some dropped their weapons; one or two leapt from the gantry to plummet to the engine-scorched ground. Then one decided to run for an airlock, and when the others saw him, more followed, and soon the gantries and gangways were a roiling riot of pushing and shoving. The red had lost control.
When Cassimer approached the nearest gangway, the airlocks hissed shut and the Andromache's force field flared. No matter; the ship couldn't take off with the force field active.
&
nbsp; Cassimer scanned the crowd, ignoring the fleeing locals. There; a well-fed man who could only be from the Ever Onward. An easy shot, and up and down the bridge, other possessed vessels screamed as one. They'd felt it. They'd all felt it. Not an army of demons, then, but one single entity in control of thousands. A single entity who felt every pain, every death. Good. As soon as the Morrigan's echo died down, Cassimer raised his voice over the din and panic.
"Open the airlock, Elkhart."
No response. As expected. He found another target; took it, and then exchanged the Morrigan for his knife.
The locals melted away around him as he crossed the creaking gangway. Already overburdened, it bowed underneath his weight. A middle-aged man, fashionably tanned, leaned over the railing and looked towards the fiery inferno below with dread.
Cassimer grabbed him by the hair, put his knife's blade against the man's throat, but Earth have mercy, this was a civilian, unarmed and innocent. Corrupted, perhaps - but he didn't know that for certain. All he had was Elkhart's story, and Elkhart was a liar.
"Please," said the man. "What's happening? Where are we?"
We're in a lichen demon's secret lair, and I'm about to kill you because I believe you to be possessed. A notion so absurd that he lowered his knife. He couldn't kill this man. Couldn't kill these people. They were from the Ever Onward, and they deserved better than -
- searing pain jolted his shoulder. His sensors reported a small-calibre bullet lodged below his left collarbone. It had passed through his shoulder cleanly, hit the inside of his armour and ricocheted back into tissue, bouncing and fragmenting.
He turned, heart pounding as medical augments released emergency stores of first aid. A woman stood behind him, gun in her hands. She'd pressed it to one of the breaches in his suit and fired - brave, and braver still not to run. He wrenched the gun from her and drove his blade towards her, inches away from killing when she smiled and said: "Six nights I spent in Nexus. Six nights all alone."
Her voice was hoarse where Joy's was bright, but the light Kirkclair accent, and how quickly she leapt from word to word, made him stay his hand.
