by Anna Carven
Electric Heart
Anna Carven
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Also by Anna Carven
Copyright © 2017 by Anna Carven
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Created with Vellum
Chapter One
Riana fidgeted in the hard metal chair, trying to relax. The stark white walls were closing in on her, and the blinking red light staring down at her from the ceiling was giving her the creeps.
It was small enough to be unobtrusive, but just large enough to be noticed.
We’re watching you.
They wanted her to know it. It was a deliberate tactic, and it was classic Federation. On Earth, she was always plagued with the feeling that someone was watching her, that she was being followed, that every single little piece of her life was being dissected and served up to the greedy information-hungry gods of the Network.
It hadn’t been like that on Fortuna Tau. The mining station had been so remote and inescapable that nobody had bothered with surveillance.
But even though the Federation sought to know all, there were still ways to hide one’s deepest, darkest secrets. If they knew who and what she really was, she would probably never see the light of day again.
“Case file number 10357X, you have failed to submit your progress report.” The bland, robotic female voice droned out of a holoscreen at the end of the table, a little too loud for comfort. A generic grey AI ‘face’ stared back at her, its gaze flat and emotionless. Riana cringed. “Failure to submit by the nominated deadline is a Grade B offense. Forty demerit points have been deducted from your MQ.”
“Forty points?” She stared at the blinking light in alarm. That seemed a terribly harsh penalty for something as minor as failing to submit a progress report. “But I didn’t even know I was supposed to file a report. I didn’t get the notification.” When the hell had that requirement popped up, anyway? She’d only just arrived back on Earth after the most harrowing experience of her life, and she was still trying to adjust to the change of pace. Checking in with the Board of Corrections had been the last thing on her mind.
After almost a year in space, Earth felt strange and unfamiliar to her, especially after she’d spent most of last week on a doomed cargo freighter feeling absolutely terrified.
Of horrible insect-aliens called Xargek.
Of explosions and gas leaks.
Of Kordolians.
Riana shuddered. The ruthless warriors were the stuff of nightmares, and their Universal reputation as merciless conquerors did them no favors. She still didn’t quite understand what they were doing in the Ninth Sector, but whatever their mission, it couldn’t be good for Humankind. Their appearance had sent shockwaves through the Human population on Earth.
“The penalty stands, 10357X. It is not open to appeal.” The AI’s voice was hard and inflexible. As usual, they’d stuck her in a small, suffocating processing room and left her to talk with a machine.
It was standard Federation procedure.
“I thought I’d worked off all my demerits,” she protested, frustration creeping into her voice. That was the main reason she’d joined the Offender Enlistment Program in the first place. After being found guilty of several minor charges of information piracy, it had been a chance to reduce her penalty and increase her Morality Quotient.
Surprising herself, she’d passed all of their rigorous psychological and physical screening tests.
The Offender Enlistment Program was a novel idea, and some of the more conservative senators and citizens were very vocal in their opposition to it. After all, who would trust a convicted citizen with a borderline MQ? But the Federation was struggling with overcrowded correction centers and a dire shortage of Human peacekeepers, and it had been increasingly difficult to find volunteers who were crazy enough to sign up for duty on an isolated asteroid mining station in High Earth Orbit.
So that was how Riana, a nonstandard offender with one petty crime to her name, had enlisted for duty on Fortuna Tau as a probationary peacekeeper.
See the Galaxy, they’d said. Challenge yourself, they’d said. It’ll be the adventure of a lifetime.
Ha. Talk about a way to glorify community service.
She’d been fed the usual recruitment propaganda. But instead of the promised ‘adventure’, she’d encountered a living nightmare of giant flesh-eating insectoid aliens and ebony-clad killers with coldfire eyes and very sharp swords.
Kordolians.
A chill ran through her. What was Sergeant Arin thinking, hooking up with one of them? Riana feared her friend had fallen victim to some weird sort of Stockholm Syndrome.
Even worse, Arin now expected Riana to somehow use her infotech skills to help solve a conspiracy. Someone was behind the catastrophic explosion on Fortuna Tau, and Arin and the Kordolians wanted blood.
Riana wanted nothing to do with it.
Not with what she’d discovered so far.
Not with Corrections keeping tabs on her.
Not with the Kordolians thirsting for revenge. According to them, revenge was a blood right, whatever that meant. They seemed to take it all very seriously.
“10357X, you are thirty-six hours, seventeen minutes and forty five seconds short of the required service duration. You have failed to complete the twelve months of service stipulated in your reform contract. No further reduction of demerits will be considered.”
“Are you kidding me?” Riana groaned in disbelief. “I’m only a day-and-a-half short of the required twelve months. You’re going to cancel it just like that?” Something wasn’t right. After hacking a damn top-secret military server, escaping a doomed superfreighter, and returning to Earth, she hadn’t even heard a peep from the infotech court, but Corrections were all over her ass.
“You have failed to complete the requirements. No further reduction of demerits will be considered.”
“I want to speak with a case worker,” she demanded, anger making her voice rise. “Someone Human.” A mild feeling of panic coursed through her. The processing room was warm and stuffy
, and there were no windows. Her heart fluttered, her palms felt sticky, and her breathing had become rapid and shallow.
Riana willed the feeling away. She couldn’t give in to some stupid irrational sense of panic. She couldn’t let anxiety win. Not here. Not now.
The AI’s emotionless voice snapped her out of her rising panic. “Current waiting time for a face-to-face appointment is four weeks, three days, two hours, thirty-seven minutes. Under Federation law, you may apply for an appointment through your Citizen Access Account.”
Typical AI. The machine’s processing capability only went so far. Flexible logic wasn’t part of its makeup.
Riana knew it all too well. She’d once programmed similar AI operating systems. They were designed to be inflexible for a reason. Efficiency over individuals. That was the rule.
Lateral thinking could get a man or woman dismissed.
“Surely I can get some sort of credit for the time I’ve served,” she protested, even though she knew the AI couldn’t process her request. She had a sneaking suspicion the Federation had some sort of vested interest in keeping her under endless surveillance.
“No further reduction of demerits will be considered,” the AI repeated for the third time, its dull eyes looking straight through Riana. The inanity of it all made her want to scream. “You are to complete a further twelve months of micro-surveillance. You are permitted to reside and travel within the common zones, however you will be fitted with a replacement monitoring chip and restricted from manipulating data on any Network-capable devices. Your bio-sig will be logged at all times. Do you understand, 10357X?”
“Yes,” Riana said weakly. It was impossible to argue when one’s opponent was an inflexible robot. Besides, there was a lot the Federation didn’t know, and considering what she’d actually gotten away with in the past, having to serve a further twelve months under micro-surveillance was nothing.
All she had to do was stay away from any Network-capable devices. Datapads, virtua-links, manual computers; they were all off-limits as far as she was concerned.
“Shit,” Riana growled, feeling trapped.
The doors slid open, revealing a medic wearing standard Federation greys. Her face was concealed behind a white sanitation mask, leaving only her hazel eyes visible. She regarded Riana with a bored, dismissive glance. A bot-cart containing medical equipment trailed behind her, its transparent drawers revealing various instruments. An imposing armed guard followed her into the room. Suddenly, the small, windowless space felt very small.
“Temperament evaluation data tells me you’re not going to fight this,” the medic said lazily. She touched the side of the bot-cart and a drawer slid open. “But you probably know what’ll happen if you do.”
“I’m not going to fight you,” Riana sighed. After all, what could she do? In space, she’d been given a provisional rank. She’d had responsibilities. She’d been treated as an equal by her colleagues.
On Earth, she was nothing, just another petty offender in the eyes of society.
Riana held out her arm, looking away as the medic slipped on a pair of gloves and readied the autoinjector.
“This is going to hurt a little.”
“I know. I’ve had one of these before.” She winced in anticipation as the cold metal of the autoinjector was pressed against the inside of her upper arm. There was a soft click, followed by a sharp sting as the monitoring chip slid beneath her skin.
“You’re tagged now,” the medic said coldly, as if Riana were some sort of animal. “I have to inform you that under Section 39B of the Monitoring Act, any attempt to remove or tamper with the device—surgically or otherwise—is an offense and will attract a ten-year minimum sentence. Tampering will activate a sedation node and an alert will be sent to the relevant authorities. Do you understand, 10357X?”
“Yeah.” Riana stared at the tiny red mark on her skin as the sharp pain in her arm subsided. There was no blood, no raised area to indicate where the implant had settled, no lump in her arm. There was just a minuscule red dot. It didn’t even hurt anymore.
Twelve months under micro-surveillance. Twelve months of acting like a model citizen. Twelve months away from the Networks. She’d have to stay away from her beloved Darkweb, she’d need to keep out of the Underground, and above all, she had to stay out of trouble.
More importantly, she absolutely had to stay away from anything remotely Kordolian. Whatever Arin was trying to rope her into, she didn’t want a bar of it.
Just stay out of trouble.
Really, how hard could that be?
Chapter Two
Kail sat on the stone ledge, staring out at the barren landscape below. Endless rolling dunes stretched out before him, polished by the light of Earth’s sole moon.
This landscape was so different to the flat ice-plains of his home planet. Here, it was dry and arid and infuriatingly hot.
He hated warm planets, but at least Earth’s surface temperature fluctuated with the rising and setting of its infernal sun.
The sun had slipped below the horizon now, granting the welcome relief of darkness, or as the Humans called it, night.
The wind howled in the distance as Kail watched two armed Humans traversing the sandy plains, moving between a row of stationary armor-vehicles. Even with night falling around them, he could see them clearly. His vision was acute enough that he could make out the tension in their faces and the stiffness in their shoulders.
The Humans had set up a makeshift perimeter around the site, stationing their primitive looking machinery amidst the undulating dunes. They had insisted on observing the First Division as the Kordolian warriors hunted the deadly Xargek invaders. The insectoid aliens had disappeared into a complex of abandoned stone structures, and if they were allowed to breed unchecked, it would spell disaster for Earth, Sector Nine, and eventually, the Nine Galaxies.
It had taken the stupid Earth authorities an unbelievably long time to understand the seriousness of their predicament, but they’d eventually seen sense.
So after much hesitation and uncertainty on the Human side, Kail and his brothers-in-arms had finally been granted permission to enter Earth.
To do what they did best. To hunt.
Granted permission. What a ridiculous notion. Kail snorted softly as he caught sight of another figure in the distance. This was undoubtedly one of his people; the speed and stealth with which the dark figure moved wasn’t something a Human could pull off.
The warrior passed insolently close to the Humans, but they didn’t detect his presence until he appeared right in front of them. They reacted by raising their guns. The warrior, Rykal —he was close enough now that Kail recognized him—offered them a hard-edged smile, his teeth flashing white in the darkness. He raised his hands in what was supposed to be a placating gesture as he engaged the Humans in conversation.
Of course Rykal would try and talk to the Humans. Unlike Kail, he seemed to tolerate the soft-skinned aliens and their foolishness to the extent that he’d even taken a Human mate.
Kail shook his head in disbelief.
Even Ugly Eyes Kalan had succumbed to the temptation, claiming a small, dark-haired female.
Madness.
Kail didn’t want anything to do with Humans. He just wanted to kill Xargek and get off this sweltering hell-hole of a planet as quickly as possible.
More Kordolians emerged from the shadows, moving silently across the dunes towards the ancient stone complex. Kail stood, stretching his stiff legs. Sentry duty was a pain-in-the-ass, but Kail’s daytime shift was coming to an end now that the sun had disappeared over the horizon. His replacements were about to arrive.
“Take your rest now, brother.” A deep voice cut through the wind. Kail let out a soft grunt, acknowledging the newcomer, but he didn’t turn around. He was still on guard, so he kept his attention focused on the landscape below.
“Have you located the nest?” he asked softly as Kalan came to stand beside him, emerging from the narrow
tunnel. They were of a comparable height, and they were both broad of shoulder and heavily muscled. Of all the First Division warriors, Kalan was best matched to him in terms of size and strength. As sparring partners, they were well balanced.
“Nah,” Kalan replied, a note of dissatisfaction in his voice. The big warrior was edgy. “The Xargek are like us. They don’t like the dry heat or the light. Strange that they landed here of all places, but you can never fucking predict what they’re going to do. My guess is that they’ll probably burrow down into the sand during the day and hide like the rest of us.”
Kail felt Kalan’s unrest, because he was the same. He yearned for a real fight, and whenever he encountered a decent opponent, the blood in his veins sang with battle-lust.
The instinct to hunt, fight, and kill was part of their nature, and it couldn’t be suppressed.
“I’ll take over now, brother,” Kalan said quietly, clapping Kail on the shoulder. Kail inclined his head, listening to the faint howl of the wind. His hand dropped to the hilt of his sword as he wordlessly turned back towards the tunnel, leaving Kalan to his task.
Even amongst the stoic members of the First Division, Kail was considered reticent. He usually preferred to let his blades to the talking.
He’d probably been like that in his past life as a temanjin, but his memories of that time were gone. Only his ritual scars remained, forever marking him as an outsider.
Another sound reached his ears. A faint, familiar scraping noise mingled with the wind, sending a thrill of anticipation through him. After enduring the infernal blazing sun all day, watching and waiting, he just wanted to kill something.
Behind him, Kalan moved, reacting to the sound. Kail held up a hand. “I’ll deal with it,” he said gruffly, heading for the tunnel.
Kalan acknowledged him with a soft grunt, not bothering to follow. Kail worked alone. The others knew that.
The smell of dust and ancient decay assaulted his nose as he followed the narrow passage. It sloped downwards, leading him past thick walls constructed from giant blocks of stone. The deeper he went, the thinner and more stale the air became.
