by Richard Fox
Aignar swung his gauss cannons away from Stacey toward the new arrival. Nicodemus darted forward and chopped a hand across Aignar’s gun arm. The gauss cannon fired, missing the Ibarran armor and tearing up the floor.
Nicodemus rammed his fingers into Aignar’s helm, crushing the optics and knocking the entire helm back on the neck servos.
Roland tried to get a clear shot with his cannons, but the attacker kept Aignar in the line of fire. Roland yelled in frustration and charged toward his friend.
There was a snap of metal on metal, and a sword slashed through Aignar’s waist, just below the chamber containing his womb. Aignar’s armor fell into two halves. Nicodemus, wielding a Templar sword, chopped off both Aignar’s arms before he even hit the ground and then raised the sword over his head.
“No!” Roland lunged forward as the Ibarran swung down.
Nicodemus stepped forward and delivered his strike to Roland’s gauss cannons. Damage icons flashed across his HUD as the front half of his weapon fell to the ground, neatly severed. Roland ducked to one side to avoid a stab to the helm, and the blade caught his rotary cannons. Nicodemus twisted his sword and the cut barrels fell loose down Roland’s back.
Roland pulled his right hand back into the forearm housing and punched at the other armor’s chest with the spike built into his arm.
Nicodemus twisted aside and the spike managed to scrape the black paint and nothing more. He kneed Roland square in the chest, and the blow ringing through Roland’s womb like the toll of a bell. The impact sent him stumbling back. The Ibarran swung his blade up and leaped at Roland.
Roland unfurled his shield and the strike bit through the shield, stopping inches over his helm. He swapped his spike for his hand and grabbed the hilt on his leg. He activated the sword and stopped around the edge of his shield as it snapped into shape. The tip struck the upper edge of Nicodemus’ breastplate and tore up the front of his helm, destroying one of the optics slits and scarring the metal.
Roland released his shield off his forearm as Nicodemus tried to pull him off-balance. The shield banged across the ground right past Stacey Ibarra, who seemed to have no interest in the battle raging right in front of her.
Nicodemus brought his sword to high guard, the hilt next to his helm. Roland kept his sword pointed at the foe, high and level with his shoulder.
The Ibarran looked hard at the sword in Roland’s grip, then snapped his gaze back to Roland. Roland felt anger emanating off the black knight.
Nicodemus raised his sword just over his head and struck toward Roland’s shoulder. Roland swung his lead foot back and twisted to block. The two blades clashed, and the impact slapping Roland’s blade flush against his body. The Ibarran’s strength was far greater than he’d anticipated.
Nicodemus reversed the grip on his sword and thrust it down, cutting through Roland’s left thigh, demolishing the hydraulics and nicking his knee servo. Damage reports flashed on his HUD and Roland faltered.
The Ibarran kicked the ankle on Roland’s failing leg, knocking it out from under him. Roland fell face-first against the ground, rolled over and swung up a desperate strike. There was a flash of steel and pain burned through his wrist. His armor’s right arm ended just below the elbow.
Nicodemus stomped onto Roland’s shoulder, pinning him to the ground. The Ibarran flipped the sword tip toward the ground, gripped his hilt with both hands, and lifted the pommel just over his helm.
Roland swung his left arm to deflect the blow, but he knew it was useless against the full might of another armor soldier. There, with the instrument of his certain death plunging toward him, he did not feel fear, but calm.
The sword pierced through Roland’s breastplate near the shoulder, emerged out the back, and bit into the floor. The strike missed his womb, and Roland knew that was no accident. Nicodemus wrenched his sword in a circle, destroying machine works in Roland’s back and shoulder.
Psychosomatic pain flared through his body. Pulsating warnings that he was dangerously close to redlining sounded in his ears and around his womb. Roland tripped his fail-safes and all input from his armor ceased. He could still see Nicodemus looming over him, still hear the wrench of failing metal.
Roland touched his shoulder, half-expecting to feel a gaping wound from all the pain he’d felt. He looked at the inside of his womb, wondering if he’d see the Ibarran’s blade when it broke through to end his life.
Nicodemus stepped away, his sword pinning Roland to the ground.
“Aignar? Can you hear me?” Roland sent over the IR.
Intermittent static came over the IR, but no answer.
The Ibarran returned a moment later, holding Roland’s severed arm and the sword. He tossed the hand aside, then grabbed Roland by the back of the helm and shoved the pommel into his face.
“Where did you get this?” Nicodemus asked, barely contained fury in his words. “Did you kill her for it?”
Roland kept trying to raise Aignar.
“Answer me!” Nicodemus punched Roland in the torso, rattling him within the womb.
“They gave it to me,” Roland said, his words barely coming through his damaged speakers. He swallowed a mouthful of amniosis. The naked hatred from the black knight, the damage to his armor, Aignar…all made him feel utterly helpless. “Legionnaires on Oricon…a Major Aiza. He said Morrigan wanted me to have it.”
“She lives?”
“I never saw her. Never spoke to her.”
“No…” Nicodemus shook his head, the one remaining optic eye swaying across Roland like a pendulum. “You stole it. Took it as some war trophy, to prove yourself to the rest of the traitors. I will carve her name into your womb and send you back to them in pieces!”
“Now, now.” Stacey Ibarra leaned over Roland’s helm. Up close, she looked even more alien to Roland. Her frozen features and still eyes fell into the uncanny valley, giving her an eerie quality that sent a chill down his spine.
“Aiza is one of ours,” she said. “The way he fought you,” she said, tapping on Nicodemus’ armor, “I have a little doubt that he could kill one such as Morrigan. Do you think Mars has fallen so far from grace that they’ve taken to scavenging for trophies?”
She pressed a palm against his armor and heat sapped out of his womb. Frost formed against the metal where she touched him.
“Can the other one hear me?” she asked Nicodemus.
The black knight nodded.
“Good, because I only need one to answer my questions. Has Earth changed that much since I’ve been gone?” She cocked her head to one side. “Because out here in the void…things have changed.” She lifted her other hand up. In her palm was a small golden lattice of light. She flexed her fingers slightly, fingertips prodding the lattice until it squeezed into a bright point, then transformed into a crystal that fell into her palm.
Roland shivered inside his womb as the cold grew stronger.
“And they’re going to keep changing,” she said. “They’ll change until we all get what we want. Power. Control. Immortality—though that last one’s tricky. Seems like an incredible thing until it happens to you. Do you know the other immortal?”
She lifted her hand away.
“Could you give her a message for me? Would you do that?” She looked Roland in the eye and gave the side of his helm a pat. “Tell her we immortals should not play games with each other.”
She spun around and looked up at Nicodemus.
“What was that? A prisoner?” she asked. “Why…now there’s an idea. Only need one to deliver the message back to the Keeper. Which one? Which one? Which one? It’s like picking a kitten. I know…” She turned her head back to Roland.
Roland tried to roll over in his womb, forgetting that he was nothing but an observer while his armor was off-line.
“We take this one,” she said, jumping.” She jumped onto his chest and sinking into a deep squat as she looked him over. “Because if he did kill Morrigan…I’ll give him to you and the othe
rs once I’m done with him.”
She clapped her hands twice and looked at Nicodemus.
“I’ll get the others. You rip him out.”
The black knight slapped his hands against Roland’s helm and crushed it into scrap.
****
Gideon watched as a shadow moved through the storm over the artifact dome. Cha’ril’s armor was supine against the metal. A data line connected the two suits.
“That was fast,” Cha’ril said. “The Scipio acknowledged your transmission a few minutes ago.”
“I told you to rest,” Gideon said.
A corvette came through the storm wall and flew farther away. Gideon zoomed in on the hull and saw the ship’s name stenciled on the side: EBAKI.
“That wasn’t one of the ships that came with us…” Cha’ril said.
Gideon looked down the ship’s flight path and saw black armor emerge from a portal not hundreds of yards away. They formed a cordon around an unsuited human. One of the armor dragged a womb from its carry handle.
Metal recovery lines rolled out of the corvette’s hellhole once it came to a stop over the new arrivals.
“It’s the Ibarrans.” Gideon’s anchor popped from his heel. He pressed the diamond-tipped bit against the azure metal and activated the drill. It twisted away, failing to gain purchase. He tried again, but his anchor would not sink.
One of the Ibarran armor pointed its forearm cannons at Gideon, but another slapped the hand down. One of the Ibarrans picked up the woman, then grabbed a recovery line and held tight as it pulled him up and into the ship.
“Is that you, Gideon?” Nicodemus asked over an open channel. He walked a few steps toward the lance commander.
“Traitor!” Gideon cycled shells into his gauss cannon.
“Still an Iron Dragoon, are you? We have one of yours,” Nicodemus said. “The other’s alive. Ibarra, in her grace, will leave the portal open so you can get the other. Stand down or we’ll end you. And your charge still in the artifact will spend weeks in his dead armor waiting for a rescue that will never…ever…find him.”
Gideon half-bent his cannon arm, but didn’t aim it.
“You have the fury, Gideon. See that it doesn’t cost you another lance,” Nicodemus said.
“Leave him!”
As the armor ascended to the corvette slowly. Roland’s womb dangled from its grasp like a weight on a fishing line.
“Earth is weak. We will do what we must,” Nicodemus said.
“I’ll find you, you coward. You Judas! I will find you and make you pay for this.” Gideon pointed across the expanse at the Ibarran armor.
Nicodemus grabbed the last line.
“I look forward to it. Don’t think she will be so merciful the next time we cross paths.”
Gideon charged forward, energy coursing through his rail cannon vanes. He could make an unanchored shot—and die when the recoil crushed his armor or knocked him over the edge and into Oricon Prime’s depths. But destroying that ship would kill Roland, doom Aignar…and Cha’ril was still on the verge of redlining.
He dialed back the charge through his rail cannon and looked away as the ship broke through the shield and vanished into the storm.
His fury was gone, replaced by failure and shame.
Chapter 18
Armsmen snapped to attention as Admiral Lettow stepped into the brig. In a cell closed off by both bars and a force field was Petty Officer Ruiz. She sat on a cot, her wrists and ankles bound to a heavy chain. Her head hung, staring at her hands.
The Ardennes’ chief intelligence officer, Commander Kutcher, stood up from the brig’s control station.
“Get me up to speed,” Lettow said.
“We found her almost by accident,” Kutcher said. “There was some anomalous data in that transmission the Ibarrans sent you. We thought it was just noise from the poor connection, then we found her system ID in the data. Couldn’t recover anything substantive from that first message, which chaps my ass. Took three passes through logs before we saw where she’d logged into the telemetry exchange. From there we found her hack into the Javelin internal comms and her messages to the rest of her sleeper agents. First couple of words are nonsense, then instructions for the artillery strike that took out the first Kesaht ship.”
“What’s she said to you?” Lettow asked.
“Won’t answer questions. She seems disorientated, confused. Might be a counter-interrogation technique. I need to work her over for a few more hours to know for sure.”
“What about the others?”
“They all surrendered after you ordered the fleet to attack.” Kutcher shook his head. “Their cell was perfect. No communication between any of them as far as I can find. No co-located assignments. They’re all isolated on their own ships. I’ll have them brought aboard and start the interrogations. Too many people to keep a cover story straight. I’ll get to the bottom of this, find out who else is working for the Ibarrans.”
“There’s a connection between these sleeper agents,” Lettow said. “One that’s…going to be difficult to accept. Did you open her naissance file?”
“The proccie data?” Kutcher almost whispered. “Why would I…oh no. I can’t open that, sir, takes a flag officer to get through the privacy locks.”
Lettow pressed a palm against a screen.
“Computer. Lift all restrictions on personnel naissance files for myself and Commander Kutcher. Authorization Lettow, Carter J.”
“Warning,” the computer chimed, “unauthorized access to naissance files carries a mandatory twenty-year prison sentence, loss of all pay and benefits, and—”
“I consent.”
“All naissance file access is automatically reported to the Chief of Naval Operations for mandatory review. Decryption sequence initiated,” the computer said.
“I’m an intelligence officer,” Kutcher said. “There aren’t many rules I have to follow. Lie? Cheat? Steal? All acceptable in the greater service of the Terran Union. But there was one rule that was pounded into me and every other secret squirrel type at training: Thou shalt not access proccie data.”
“The Naissance Act was the first major piece of legislation President Garret insisted on after the Ember War,” Lettow said. “Human beings would be human beings; didn’t matter if they were true born or if they came out of a procedural crèche. No distinction in law or treatment.”
“The first, and last, law to pass unanimously if I remember right,” Kutcher said.
The screen blinked green and a box popped up over Ruiz’s file. Lettow pressed his fingertips against the box and the computer flashed a glaringly obvious warning that he’d accessed restricted data.
Lettow looked over Ruiz’ history.
“She’s a proccie, as I feared,” the admiral said. “Came out of the tube…two days before the Ibarras disappeared through the Ceres Crucible. Cross check naissance files with the rest of the sleeper agents, find the link.”
“I’d rather get a slap on the wrists for looking at the data than find a smoking gun. The implications…”
“Aren’t yours to worry about. I’m going to talk to her.” Lettow left Kutcher behind and went to Ruiz’s cell. The force field dissipated with a pop and a whiff of ozone. The cell door unlocked and the admiral stepped inside.
The force field came back on, the inner wall an opaque slate. Ruiz didn’t bother to look up at Lettow.
“Why’d you do it?” he asked.
Ruiz’s head tilted back. Her eyes were soft and unfocused.
“You know what you’ve done? How many lives we lost? What this means for our future with the Kesaht? I just want to know why. What the Ibarrans offered you.”
“I…I had to, sir,” she said quietly.
“You’re not a slave. You made the choice to send instructions to your confederates. How did you think this would end for all of you? You think the Ibarrans care about you? This was a suicide mission. You had to know you’d be caught or killed in the fight you sta
rted.”
“There was no ‘why.’ I just did it. Never bothered to consider what was happening. You don’t think about breathing or your heart beating. Just happens, admiral,” she looked aside for a moment, then sat up. “Admiral. I’m supposed to say something to admirals. It’s hard…like an old memory.”
“You’re not making any sense.”
“I can’t trust you anymore,” Ruiz said, her voice changed to a different accent, as though someone else was speaking through her. “You’ve…let the barbarians come to our walls and you’re about to open the gate. You’re too weak to do what must be done, so I will do it for you. Leave me alone, and I will do what must be done. Win what must be won. Leave me alone. Leave me…alone.” Drool dripped from the corner of her mouth.
“Ruiz, who told you this?”
“She…loves me. She will save us. Ibarra will save us all.” Ruiz’s shoulders began twitching. A seizure spread through her body and she fell to the floor, limbs thrashing.
“Corpsman!” Lettow grabbed Ruiz and forced her onto her side. The seizure subsided, and her whole body went limp. Blood and foamy spittle flowed from her mouth. He felt for a pulse and a final flutter passed through her neck.
The admiral closed her eyes and stood up. He roared and stomped the cot, breaking it off the hinges. He clenched his hands into fists and waited for the anger to subside. A med team burst into the room seconds later.
He stepped around them and stalked back into the brig. The room was deathly silent. Kutcher and a pair of armsmen kept their gaze off the admiral.
Lettow walked up to the intelligence officer, the look on his face conveying his question.
“We swept her for suicide implants,” Kutcher said. “She’s a proccie. Her procedural memory files are in a vault on Hawaii…we go through those and I bet we’ll find more impulses hard-wired into her brain.”
“The others?”
“All proccies. All with a naissance date within a few days of the Ibarras’ disappearance,” Kutcher said. “Takes nine days to make a proccie, and all the tubes were shut down not long after they left. If the sleeper agents are all from the same batch, we can contain them; won’t be too many in the fleet. If they hard wired commands into all the proccies…”
