The Arks of Andromeda (The Imperium Chronicles Book 1)

by W. H. Mitchell

  "My dear boy!" Augustus said. "I wanted to congratulate you on receiving command of the Gorgon. A damn fine ship."

  "The largest in the fleet," Tagus clarified. "My father was instrumental in securing my commission."

  "He must be very proud of you, eh?"

  "My father's a proud man," Tagus said. "So am I."

  A sly grin curled into the corner of the emperor's lips. "Of course you are, my boy. Of course you are!"

  Chapter Three

  Cameron Hitch watched as a lumbering liftbot carried the final container of pharmaceuticals from the Hotspur to his own ship, the Rattenbury. The robot, weighed down with pistons and hydraulic hoses, waddled like a toddler, eventually stacking the container next to the others. Hitch noted that each box was stamped with the pentagram logo of Warlock Industries.

  The quartermaster of the Hotspur, Jack Calico, presented Hitch with the manifest on a datapad. With his palm print, Cameron signed and acknowledged the cargo was now his responsibility.

  "It's all yours," Calico said.

  "Yeah, so it is," Hitch replied.

  A blockade runner pilot by trade, Cameron Hitch was old enough to have acquired a degree of wisdom, but still young enough to not let that slow him down when doing something stupid was required. He kept his hair short to keep the gray patches around his temples from becoming too obvious. His nose was crooked from a fistfight over a girl—or an unpaid bar tab—he couldn't quite remember which. He wore a dirty flight suit most days, with the top zipped down and a white t-shirt underneath. At his hip, he carried a holstered blaster pistol.

  "Do you understand the arrangements?" Calico asked. "You'll get paid once you reach Aldorus, assuming you get past customs."

  Hitch laughed.

  "They’d have to catch me first," he said.

  Quartermaster Calico returned to the Hotspur, the umbilical bridge between the two ships folding like an accordion behind him. After securing the cargo door, Hitch patted the liftbot and headed for the bridge of the Rattenbury.

  The smuggler's ship was half the size of the Hotspur. At the front, a saucer section hung beneath the main hull. In the back, the fuselage was all engines and thrusters, making the Rattenbury one of the fastest blockade runners in the Imperium.

  Once seated in his command chair, Hitch plotted a course for Aldorus, the capital of the Imperium, and fired the jump drives. The Rattenbury shimmered and then vanished like a magic trick into hyperspace.

  Sitting at his office desk at Warlock Industries headquarters, Oscar Skarlander could almost see the Imperial Palace across the river in the West End. Looking south, he could also see Ashetown, another district of Regalis, the capital city. The three districts of Regalis were a microcosm of the Imperium. The rich to the west and the poor to the south, and in between, the rest of the citizens who made the empire run.

  Skarlander loathed them all.

  His dark eyes stared at a video monitor suspended in an otherwise transparent wall dividing his office. He pulled at his short, brown goatee as a network journalist named Sylvia Flax talked on the screen, the logo for VOX News in the corner.

  "Do robots go to heaven?" Flax asked. Her hair, a bright azure, hung past her shoulders, framing her young but determined face as she spoke. "Tune in for my special report later this week, only on VOX News!”

  Skarlander snapped his fingers and the display blinked out, revealing an android standing behind the clear partition.

  "What is it, Jerry?" Skarlander growled.

  The android was as tall as an average human. Polished, white plastic covered most of its body except at the joints where colored wires were neatly bundled together. His human-shaped face was fixed, unable to convey emotion. Only his eyes and mouth could move freely.

  "The special cargo you wanted me to track has landed at the star port," the android said. "It's currently en route to a warehouse in Ashetown."

  Skarlander waved the robot closer.

  "Any problems?" the human asked.

  "No, sir," Jerry replied. "The insurance company has already paid in full."

  "Good!"

  Skarlander scrutinized the android as he walked around the partition and came to the edge of his desk. The robot was special, he thought. Dyson Yost, from dy cybernetics, had really outdone himself with this one. Jericho, or Jerry as everyone preferred to call him, had a gravitronic brain. Instead of being programmed, he learned like a person did through experience. Normally Skarlander would have chosen an assistant that he could kill without repercussion, but the higher-ups at Warlock wanted to test what an android like this could really do. As long as it didn’t develop morals, Skarlander told them, he'd agree to the experiment.

  The android, Skarlander noted, remained standing by his desk without moving.

  "Is there something else?" he asked.

  "No."

  "Off you go then,” Skarlander said dismissively.

  Jericho left Skarlander's office and stepped into an elevator. The robot held the door as several Warlock employees scrambled in. They spoke amongst themselves while Jericho stood quietly at the back. He listened carefully to their chatter, searching for any social nuances that might prove useful. Biological creatures like humans had decades to learn how to behave, but Jericho only had the basics uploaded into his gravitronic brain before entering polite society. For a while this proved difficult. Gaffes were common for many months. Eventually Jericho began imitating certain individuals in hopes of fitting in. This worked, but left the android feeling strangely detached from the people he was trying to emulate. Jericho knew he couldn't go on pretending to be someone he wasn't.

  The other employees left the elevator as it made stops along the way to the main floor of the headquarters. Warlock HQ, Jericho had learned, was nicknamed the Cauldron. At first, he didn't understand why, other than the word play with the company name. That might have been the end of it, but as he saw more and more of Warlock operations, the true meaning became apparent.

  With Jericho as the sole occupant, the elevator continued below the ground floor, descending through underground parking garages, the basement level, and then subbasement floors. Jericho estimated that, when the doors finally opened, he was nearly five hundred feet below the surface.

  The robot stepped out into a corridor. Fluorescent lights were spaced along the ceiling every fifteen feet, just enough to illuminate the hallway, but not quite enough to avoid the look of a subterranean dungeon. Several metal doors also lined the way, each of which Jericho passed until coming to one in particular. The door was without a label or any other way to differentiate it from any of the other doors, but Jericho knew it well.

  This was his office.

  Once inside, he looked around his little domain. The single room was Jericho's home away from home, or at least it would be if it wasn't, in fact, Jericho's actual home.

  "Computer," he said, "play bebop play list."

  Music began playing as Jericho crossed the room to a couch where he laid down, his feet hanging over the end. Digging his hand behind his head, he listened to the discordant notes of a pianist who died more than a thousand years before.

  He had learned about jazz from archives brought along with the sleeper ships. Jericho studied the files religiously, curious to understand humanity. He stumbled upon the music files quite by accident, but he was immediately drawn to bebop jazz. It lacked the rigid order he was used to, giving him a sense of chaos he found liberating.

  Another song started by another artist long dead. Slowly, Jericho drifted off and fell asleep.

  In Ashetown, the slum district of Regalis, everybody knew Kid Vicious and most of them wanted him dead. In the back office of a warehouse, Kid peered menacingly at a spreadsheet on a computer monitor. When he founded the Griefers Gang, he didn't know it would include this much paperwork.

  Without sleeves, Kid's shirt exposed his bare arms, decorated in ink, mostly of the tribal variety. Wild, orange flames were painted down the length of his jeans, nearly ma
tching the color of his abundant hair flowing around his head.

  A young man in his twenties, wearing a t-shirt with a Chinese dragon print, came up a flight of stairs into the office. Kid glared at him, but was secretly glad he could stop looking at spreadsheets.

  "What the hell do you want?" Kid shouted.

  "The cat from Si-Sawat isn't talking," the young gangster said. "We worked him over real good too."

  "I’ll take a crack at him."

  Kid followed his man down the stairs to the back of the warehouse where a doorway led to a smaller room. Inside, a feline from the Tikarin race hung by his arms, his tan fur matted from blood and other evidence that he had been "worked over good." Seeing Kid enter through the door, the prisoner snarled.

  "Shut up, kitty," Kid said.

  From a bench in the room, Kid took a narrow, black handle. Whipping his hand to one side, the handle expanded into a telescoping baton. Kid swung the weapon, cracking it across the Tikarin's neck. The prisoner recoiled, grimacing.

  "What's Big G got planned, eh?" Kid asked. "When's he moving against me?

  The Si-Sawat crime syndicate didn't typically hire stool pigeons so Kid wasn't surprised when the feline remained silent except for a low groaning deep in his throat.

  "Well, it was worth a shot," Kid said, tossing the baton aside. "Kill him."

  Another henchman, this one wearing a leather jacket and torn jeans, approached Kid as he left the room, closing the door behind him.

  "Boogs is here," he said.

  "What's he got this time?" Kid asked.

  "He just said it's a once in a lifetime opportunity."

  "Yeah, bullshit."

  "He's over by the loading dock."

  Kid headed to the other side of the warehouse, passing stacks of crates, barrels, and every other kind of container imaginable. When he got to the loading dock, Zarro Boogs was standing beside a box nearly twice his size. Kid wondered how he even got it there.

  "Mister Vicious!" Boogs said, waving his arms wildly.

  "This better be good," the gang boss replied.

  Boogs was a bald man in his forties with a long mustache and eyes like droplets of dried motor oil. Most offensive, at least in Kid's eyes, were Boogs' two-toned blue and green shirt and pants covered in a garish diamond pattern like a harlequin. Kid wanted to kill him just for the clothes alone.

  "Of course," Boogs assured him. "Nothing but the best!"

  Grabbing a crowbar that leaned against the crate, Boogs began tugging on the side of the box. Kid thought he could hear something moving inside.

  "You know I don't deal in livestock," Kid reminded him.

  Boogs put his foot up against the crate for better leverage. He gave the crowbar a final tug, dislodging the side, which fell with a crash on the concrete floor. From the dark interior of the box, small creatures, none of them more than two feet tall, came tottering out.

  "I present the perfect gift for children of all ages," Boogs announced. "The Tubby Wubbies!"

  A teddy bear-like creature waddled over to Kid Vicious on stubby, padded legs, looking up at him with black, soulless eyes. "Hi, I'm Mister Giggles!" it said and laughed in a cute, childlike voice.

  Stammering, Kid asked "What the shit is this?"

  "It's a toy; it's a pet," Boogs said. "From MoFoCo, the Tubby Wubbies are genetically engineered toys that live and breathe!"

  More of them emerged from the crate, including a bunny, a raccoon, and a fox wearing a sweater. Those that remained in the box peered out of the darkness, their glass eyes reflecting tiny pinpoints of light.

  "Pick me up! Pick me up!" Mister Giggles pleaded.

  Kid obliged, holding the stuffed bear at arm’s length.

  "I like snuggles," the toy said. "Don't make me cut you."

  "What?" Kid said, not sure if he heard him right.

  At that point, Kid felt a sharp sting in the back of his leg. Looking down, he saw the bunny holding a collapsible baton.

  "Goddammit, that hurt!" he shouted.

  Kid tried stomping on the rabbit, but missed. To his right, one of his men also cried out in pain. Glancing over, Kid saw a stuffed raccoon running by with a switchblade in its paws.

  Still in Kid's hands, Mister Giggles whispered, "I'm going to gut you like a fish."

  Forgetting the bunny, Kid dropkicked the bear against a stack of barrels several feet away. Sitting up, the toy held its paws against his fluffy head.

  The rabbit lashed Kid again with the baton, this time in the shin.

  "I'm going to kill you!" Kid barked just as a blazing beam of energy hit the bunny, setting it alight. The creature screamed, dropping the baton, and ran in a random direction while Kid watched in amazement.

  Another flash and another Tubby Wubby, this time the raccoon, erupted into flames.

  Kid looked where the beams were coming from: a man with a short, brown goatee, holding a disrupter pistol. It was Oscar Skarlander from Warlock, someone he knew all too well.

  Several more well-placed shots sent burning toys scurrying across the warehouse floor until each one dropped, their inner workings melting into slag.

  Skarlander, his weapon down by his side, came forward.

  "Another quality product by MoFoCo," he said dryly.

  "You've seen these before?" Kid asked.

  "Of course," Skarlander replied. "To save money, MoFoCo used a subcontractor to design their little brains. Turns out the toys developed psychopathic tendencies shortly after going to market. They got recalled, but it looks like your vendor friend got ahold of a few."

  "I'm going to murder Boogs," Kid said, waving the smoke away from his face.

  "He ran out during the fight."

  "He can't run forever."

  "Not my problem," Skarlander remarked. "I'm told you have my pharmaceuticals."

  Kid nodded. "Safe and sound, ready for pickup."

  Both men turned as something stirred. On top of the barrels, Mister Giggles got to his feet and raised an arm as far as his chubby limb would allow.

  "Freedom!" he shouted and promptly erupted into fire and smoke, struck by Skarlander's disrupter.

  The Warlock agent turned again to Kid Vicious.

  "Get your shit together," Skarlander said.

  Just outside the Regalis starport, Randall Davidson opened the door to Sparky Joe's Saloon. The sun had just set and the lights of the city were coming to life.

  The bar interior was crowded with people who worked in or around the starport. Mechanics and technicians in overalls soiled with grease and other fluids sat at the tables, their conversations veiled in tobacco smoke. Below a video screen that took up nearly an entire wall, a group of starship pilots, easy to spot in their flight suits, huddled around a pool table. On the screen, a celebrity reporter was talking about Prince Richard's birthday as nobles and the well-to-do mingled in the background on their way into the Imperial Palace. The video then went to a commercial showing a political advertisement:

  RE-ELECT SENATOR JOAN MARSHALL:

  SHE KNOWS WHAT'S BEST FOR YOU!

  Davidson was in his early thirties with short, curly black hair and dark brown skin. He waded through the sea of noise until he reached the counter where a bartenderbot was cleaning glasses. The robot had a torso and a head, both painted in a faded blue. Instead of legs, a stainless steel pole jutted into a track that ran behind the bar.

  "What'll you have, bub?" the robot asked. On its chest, the name tag read Joe.

  Davidson gave a quick glance at the beers listed on the wall behind the bartenderbot. None of them really interested him.

  With his thumb, he motioned to the man sitting to his right. "I'll have whatever he's having."

  The robot gave a shrug and rode the rail down to the other end of the bar.

  "Do I know you, friend?" the stranger said. His hair was short with gray patches around his temples. His nose was crooked.

  "Depends," Davidson said. "Are you Cameron Hitch?"

  "Who's asking?" the smuggl
er replied.

  "I'm told you might be for hire."

  "I might be a lot of things," Hitch said, "if the money's right."

  Davidson smiled. "I need a package delivered to Eudora Prime."

  Hitch cocked his head to one side. "That's on the border. It'll take a while to get there."

  "I understand, but the quicker the better. I hear you have a fast ship."

  "That I do," Hitch nodded. "So, what's the package?"

  Davidson turned in his chair, followed in kind by Hitch. Both men stared at the doorway which stood open. Framed in the entrance, Jericho stood staring back at them.

  "My name's Randall Davidson," Davidson told Hitch. "I work for the Robot Freedom League."

  Chapter Four

  After much deliberation, Otis Radley decided that brown berry was his favorite Spastic Cola flavor. In the East wing of Senator Joan Marshall's mansion, Radley closed the bathroom door, the fan still audible on the other side, and headed back to his post in the command center. Past midnight, he was the only one on security duty, so he was in no hurry. Radley took pleasure in the solitude of his nightly routine.

  Radley twirled the ID badge around his neck by its lanyard as he walked. When he arrived at the command center, he found the door open but thought nothing of it, knowing he often left it open to avoid swiping his ID again. Inside, he sat at a desk chair before a bank of video screens covering the opposing wall. He tapped a few keys on a keyboard and squinted at the scenes each monitor revealed.

  The Marshall mansion replicated the classical Colonial style of early America on Earth, or as close as architects could approximate it from the sleeper ship archives. A circular driveway, paved with crushed gravel, led to the front entrance.

  Scanning the grounds via the monitors, Radley grabbed the neck of a microphone that extended from the top of his desk.

  "Dewey?" he said. "Are you out there?"

  A warble came from the speakers. On one of the screens, a conical robot without arms or legs rolled into view. Its shell was mostly smooth, white plastic except for a single ring of blue, blinking lights around the robot's body. Also, in red, stenciled numbers, a 01 was printed just above the lights.