Spoils of War

by Terry Mixon

  Fei’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “Are you telling me that they killed children?”

  “Isn’t it my turn to ask a question?”

  “If you’ll humor me, I’ll let you ask two for each one I take out of turn. I need to understand what you’re telling me before I can move on.”

  One Twenty-Four shrugged. “Yes. Of the two hundred children that started in the crèche in my cycle, we were down to one hundred and twenty-one when this happened. Keeper told us that perhaps only seventy would live to see the end of our training. Those that are culled are immediately killed, though we never had to watch.”

  The woman’s calm expression remained frozen, but One Twenty-Four could see rage burning in her eyes. Fei remained still for a few moments and then stood, turning her back to One Twenty-Four and staring at the wall. Her shoulders seemed tight, and her hand rested on her weapon.

  “Are you going to kill me now?” One Twenty-Four asked, her voice a little unsteady despite her resolve to accept whatever came with a brave face.

  The woman turned slowly back toward her, taking her hand off her weapon. She crouched down in front of One Twenty-Four and took her trembling hands into her own.

  “No, Little One,” she said softly. “I will never allow anyone to hurt you. You have my word on that.”

  “I don’t know what that means, but Grace said that I shouldn’t give my word—whatever word that is—unless I mean to do what I say. That it was important.”

  “She’s right. It’s a promise, not a specific word, and one should always keep their promises. No one on this ship will hurt you. If they were to try, I’d hurt them first, and I’m very good at hurting people that deserve it.

  “I’m sorry that you grew up in a place where such horror was acceptable. The Empire isn’t like that, and hearing that you had to suffer under that kind of dystopian nightmare makes me want to find this Keeper and introduce her to my fist. Many, many times.”

  The idea of someone striking Keeper was so strange that One Twenty-Four couldn’t wrap her mind around it. “She’s very strong, and she knows how to fight. She started teaching us how to fight one another. That’s how I broke Thirty-One’s nose and turned our rivalry into something more. That’s why Thirty-One threw me into the darkness and why Keeper sent the guards to kill me.”

  Fei took a deep breath and resumed her seat, her hands in her lap. “Are all the children in the crèche physically the same? Is that why you use numbers?”

  “We’re all grown from the same template, so we’re exactly the same. The only way we could tell one of us from another was via our wristbands. Except for Thirty-One. Her nose was different after I hit her. I’m not sure why, but that made me happy. Keeper is what we will grow into.”

  The woman shook her head. “I can assure you that you won’t grow into a monster like that. Grace will make sure of that, and we marines will help her. You can’t see that what was done to you is wrong because you don’t have the proper frame of reference yet, but you will one day. Then you’ll be as pissed off as I am.”

  “Pissed off? You use such strange words. By the way, you speak the language of the crèche much better than Grace. She’s… hard to understand.”

  Fei chuckled. “That’s the language used in the Singularity. It’s simply called ‘the tongue.’ We all know it, to a degree, and she just needs to practice. Perhaps you can help her, and we can teach you to speak Standard, the language used in the Empire.”

  One Twenty-Four felt herself smile. “I didn’t know it had a name. Thank you for telling me. I like learning new things. A lot of the lessons in the crèche were about subjects that I didn’t like. That’s why Keeper warned me that I had to stop daydreaming, or I’d be culled. What happens if I don’t like something now?”

  “Then we’ll talk about it. Not everything one must do is fun, but if you know why you need to learn it, that makes it easier. You’re young, so you don’t have to worry about that for a while yet.

  “I know I owe you some questions, but I want to ask a few more. Were you born with those marks on your face? And what do they mean?”

  “That’s two questions, but since they’re related, I’ll allow it,” One Twenty-Four said with a smile, using the woman’s words against her. She didn’t know why, but she liked Fei and felt safe around her.

  “I only got my caste tattoos a few months ago. They hurt so bad, but we couldn’t move, or they’d go on wrong. We lost six of my line sibs that day. It was just before Keeper gave us the shots to activate our sexual organs, though I’m still not sure which ones they are. We needed them to grow breasts and mature.”

  Fei smiled slightly. “I have some knowledge of sexual organs, so I can probably give you a basic rundown. Why did you need shots?”

  “Because members of the ruling caste are designed to be sterile. I don’t know why we needed something to start producing the hormones needed to make us develop, but we did. Our brains, mostly, but Keeper said that we would also one day be able to use our bodies to make men in the other lines more amenable to doing what we wanted. That came later, and she was going to train us on how to do it.”

  Once again, anger flashed in the woman’s eyes. “That sounds a little too… hands-on for my taste. We also have sexual education, but it’s more of an intellectual exercise. We leave our kids to explore the specifics with people of their choice when they’re ready.”

  Just then, One Twenty-Four’s stomach rumbled.

  “Are you hungry?” Fei asked. “I can have something brought in, and we can eat while we talk.”

  One Twenty-Four nodded. “It’s been a long time since I ate. I’d like that.”

  “Then that’s what we’ll do,” Fei declared as she rose to her feet and walked over to the hatch. She opened it, revealing a woman on the other side in the same kind of coveralls.

  “Jane, could you head down to the mess and grab something for the two of us?”

  The woman looked at One Twenty-Four, her expression blank. “Sure. Anything in particular?”

  “Whatever they have handy. Thanks.”

  One Twenty-Four knew instinctively that the second woman didn’t like her. Perhaps she even hated her. Her sense of safety evaporated.

  Fei closed the hatch and started back toward One Twenty-Four but came to an abrupt halt. “What’s wrong?”

  “That woman. She hates me. I can see it in how she looked at me.”

  Fei considered her for a moment and then pulled her chair over beside One Twenty-Four. “It’s complicated. She doesn’t hate you, specifically, but she lost a friend when we rescued you. Anne Marie Scott was her name, and she died when those guards came after you.”

  “How?”

  “The details aren’t important,” Fei said. “What matters is that she gave her life to save her friends and you.”

  “Me?” One Twenty-Four blinked in surprise. “Why would she die for a stranger? An enemy.”

  “Because she was an Imperial Marine, and we don’t let people kill children. Grace had you in her arms and allowed someone to shoot her in the back to keep you from harm. It’s who we are and what we do.

  “Jane understands that, but she lost a close friend. It’s going to take her a while to get over that. She doesn’t hate you, but she wants to hurt the ones that killed her friend. She wants that very badly, and so do I. Those people are not you, so you don’t need to fear us.”

  “Grace… what? I still don’t understand.”

  “Maybe one day, you will. All you need to know right now is that we’re going to keep you safe. Grace is going to talk with you in more detail soon. Right now, she’s making sure that we get out of the Singularity alive.”

  One Twenty-Four had never been more confused in her life. Why would enemies do that for her?

  After a few moments, she simply shrugged. It would either become clear in time, or it wouldn’t. For right now, she’d just accept what Fei said. Grace was doing what she could for her, for her own reasons, and she’d explai
n why when she was ready.

  For now, One Twenty-Four would eat with Fei and find out more about her captors. She really wanted to know more about the Imperial Marines and why they did what they did. She owed them a debt, it seemed. Only time would tell if she could ever repay it.

  18

  “Have you lost your ever-loving mind?” Kyle demanded from across the wardroom table. Anders, seated beside him, didn’t look much happier.

  Grace had just told them everything that had happened during the mission, the final straw being her claiming the girl as her booty.

  She’d expected the executive officer’s explosion. In fact, he’d only be the first of many. And, conceivably, one of the milder cases.

  What she didn’t know how to predict was Anders’s response. As their captain, he was going to set the tone for the rest of the Fleet personnel. If she had to fight with anyone about this, it was going to be him.

  And that was a fight she had to win if she wanted to secure the girl’s place as a person in Imperial society. Not as something that could be destroyed at someone else’s whim.

  That seemed counterintuitive, since she was claiming that One Twenty-Four was property, but she had to make sure the spooks didn’t disappear the girl first. Then she could set up for the fight ahead of her.

  Grace didn’t directly answer Kyle’s outburst, instead focusing her attention on Anders. She raised one eyebrow, prompting him for a response.

  The man grimaced slightly. “I understand why you’re doing this, but I have to question if you’ve considered all the implications. Imperial Intelligence is going to want that girl in their custody. They’re going to want to drain her dry of every bit of information they can get.

  “She’s a member of the ruling caste of the Singularity. Even as a child, she has to know some juicy secrets. And then there are the negative repercussions to having her. It took everything I had to keep Kayden out of this meeting. The man is frothing at the mouth about how dangerous the girl is.

  “And you know what? He’s right. If the Singularity knew that we had her in our possession, they’d send everything they have after us. Even the border of the Empire probably wouldn’t protect us.”

  Grace shrugged. “If they knew where we were right now, they’d send everything they had after us anyway. We just blew up one of their transshipment centers, or at least we were going to before they blew it up themselves. By the way, does that still count? Inquiring minds want to know.”

  Anders sighed and rubbed his eyes. “Our actions prompted them to blow it up, and we’d already booby-trapped their fusion plant, so I’d say yes. Our mission was a complete and utter win, beyond our wildest dreams of success, since we pulled this girl out of there.

  “But I have to agree with Kyle. Making her your booty is going to open up a world of hurt for you personally. You’re going to come under immense pressure to backtrack. Hell, they’ll probably just take the girl anyway. I can’t stress how much this could harm your career.”

  “They’ll get her over my dead body,” Grace said flatly. “From what I can see, she was raised in some kind of dystopian hellhole. Na sent me a brief update via one of the guards, using her implants so that the girl couldn’t overhear.

  “Fei is the most even-tempered, levelheaded NCO that I’ve ever served with, and she’s so pissed off right now that she wants to break things and kill people. I’ve never heard her drop an F-bomb until today. She’s frothing.

  “And to be clear, I want to get information from the girl, too. I just want to be a damned human being while I do it. She’s terrified that the Empire will dissect her. That we’re going to butcher her to find out how she was made. Do you really think that someone in Imperial Intelligence won’t be tempted?”

  Neither Anders or Kyle said a word, confirming her guess about their opinion of the spooks. Imperial Intelligence was good at what they did, but no one could call their methods clean.

  “The way that this was explained to me, not even the emperor can gainsay what I’ve chosen to seize,” Grace said when they offered nothing more. “Imperial law states that a genetically engineered being is property. I’ve verified that. The doctor is running some tests, but Kayden has already confirmed that the ruling caste is made up of twelve lines of what amounts to designed beings. Genies.

  “Even though that law is undoubtedly meant to be a poke in the eye for the Singularity, it means that—technically—she’s property. And, as any good lawyer will tell you, technicalities are the very soul of the law.

  “So, who’s going to tell the emperor that his edict doesn’t carry any weight? Is it going to be you, Kyle? Are you going to tell the emperor that you can flout his word?”

  The man looked like he wanted to bang his head on the table. He settled for pulling at his long red hair.

  “I want to,” the man finally admitted. “Do you realize what you’re doing? That girl isn’t a human being. They cooked her up in a lab somewhere. That means that there are other people exactly like her running around. How can you see a copy as a person?”

  “How can you not?” Grace put her hands on her hips and, even though she was sitting, she hoped it carried her defiance across to the man. “Are you really going to get into nature versus nurture with me? Just because someone designed her genes doesn’t preclude her from being human. For God’s sake, she’s a twelve-year-old child.

  “The people that left the Empire to form the Singularity were just as human as you and I. From what Kayden says, their base caste still is. I’ll bet you any amount of money that that girl is fully human once you get down to the genetic level.

  “I have no idea what all they’ve tweaked, other than perhaps clean out recessive genes and modify certain attributes, but they didn’t change very much, because she’s still human. It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out. We have eyes, don’t we?”

  She said the words, but some doubt crept into her mind as she unconsciously rubbed her wrist. The girl had been strong. Maybe even stronger than Grace. That had to be intentional. What other tweaks were they going to find before this was all over?

  “I honestly don’t know what to think,” Anders said with a shake of his head. “I’m going to have to think long and hard about this before I decide how I feel. What I do know is that it’s not a decision I have any control over.

  “Imperial law says the girl is property. The emperor said you can seize whatever property you want. Right or wrong, you’re the girl’s owner, and you’re responsible for her. I can’t change that.

  “But is that really who you are? Are you the kind of person that owns another human being, even for altruistic reasons? Can you live with that?”

  It was Grace’s turn to sigh and shrug. “She needs someone to watch out for her. I’m not her owner, I’m her guardian, and that’s how I’m going to look at this. I thought I was going to go back into the Imperial Marines when we got home, but now I’m really wondering. I didn’t plan for this, so I don’t know how things will play out.

  “What I am sure of is that there are going to be plenty of people that feel just like Kyle does. Or worse. Maybe even on this ship.”

  She stared at the executive officer. “Tell me honestly, do you hate the girl? Do you blame her for what the Singularity has done?”

  The other man opened his mouth to say something but then stopped and closed it again. After taking a deep breath, he shrugged.

  “I sort of do, but even I get how stupid that sounds. Does that mean I want to hurt her? Hell, no, but I’m still not a fan of your decision. She needs to go to Imperial Intelligence for debriefing, and then they can decide what needs to be done about her.

  “With you keeping her, what kind of life does that mean for her? Your career is over. Even if there were no reprisals against you personally—which I certainly wouldn’t count on—do you dare take your eyes off her? If you go on a mission, what happens without you around to protect her?”

  Grace deflated a little. “I don’t know. My
mother could help, but I have no idea how she’s going to feel about this either. I don’t want to stop being a marine, but I probably don’t have much choice. I hope we had a good haul, because I might be living in an armed compound somewhere in the woods on some backwater world.”

  Anders snorted. “No worries there. I haven’t had time to more than skim what Kayden grabbed, but there’s a lot of rare elements used in flip drive construction. He also got some finished drives, which are even more valuable. Your share is going to keep you sitting pretty for as long as you like.”

  He drummed his fingers against the tabletop. “You’re right about some people hating that girl with all their hearts and souls. Some of them might even be on board Bright Passage right now. It’s probably a good thing that you’ve got your marines guarding her.

  “But how sure are you that your own people aren’t going to take out the loss of your marine on that girl? The people chasing her were the ones that killed Scott. They’re hurting and mad. In their place, I’d be considering some payback.”

  Grace shook her head. “Na is watching the girl, and I trust her judgment. She won’t put people on that duty that would be a threat to the girl. At this point, she’s as much an advocate for the girl as I am. That’ll work for now.

  “We’ve got a few weeks until we get out of the Singularity. All this could be moot, since we might be dead before we get back to the Empire, so let’s not borrow trouble. I’m sure that we’re going to have plenty enough of it when we get back home.”

  Anders chuckled darkly. “You are, anyway. So, if you don’t go back into Imperial service, what will you do?”

  Grace shrugged. “I honestly have no idea. This was never on my scanners. I had my future all mapped out, and now this girl has changed everything. You might end up being right. Imperial Intelligence might take her away, no matter what the emperor says. Or the emperor might change his mind.