by Joel Dane
I watched the guava spin on her alloy fingertips. “Why don’t you regrow your arm?”
“No reason,” she said. “I just never found the time.”
“She’s a hero,” Aowamo told me.
“Don’t bore the kid with your stories,” she said.
He rubbed the ridges on his chin. “She lost the arm in a cataphract attack. One of them snuck in under the wire of an enclave during a crash. No warning. We fought for hours without the CAVs. The cataphract—” He waited until a sculptural projection washed past us. “You know they spawn paladins, yeah?”
“Sure, I’ve seen the channels,” I told him. “Paladins are like empty suits of armor.”
“Not so empty. Paladins are the bio-forged battlesuits that grunts wore back in the day. We can handle them, but nothing beats a cataphract except a CAV. So we’re protecting this residential tower and the—”
“The cataphract hit me,” Najafi interrupted, “and I haven’t grown the arm back.”
“It sliced her in half,” Aowamo said. “She saved the tower, pretty much single-handed—”
“Single-armed,” one of the other squaddies called.
“—and then a CAV fell from the sky and saved her. The cry pilot died, and that’s why she . . .” Aowamo gestured to her prosthetic. “As a memorial.”
“Oh fuck you,” she said. “I’m not the one who sends my pay to my little sister every week.”
To my surprise, Aowamo showed me a picture of his sister. She was probably five years older than I was, but short and unformed like a little kid. The top of her skull was a sunken pit that was only half-covered with piles of messy black hair. She was a “wizzy”; centuries ago, one of her ancestors used Wix genetic manipulation to give their child exceptional intelligence or health, the ability to function without sleep or—who knows?—an adorable pair of devil horns with a matching tail. Sure enough, Wix worked beautifully for the first generation. Then wizzys appeared: descendants of those genetic pioneers, living the unforeseen consequences.
A tiny fraction of wizzys were born with minor idiosyncrasies: night vision or forked tongues, patches of carapace or eidetic memory. A tiny fraction of that tiny fraction were driven mad by technopathy or fugue states or multidentification.
The vast majority were gene-damaged like his sister.
I never met her or anything. I never heard her name. I never even learned if Sergeant-Affiliate Najafi really refused to regrow her arm as a tribute to the anonymous cry pilot who’d saved her life.
Still, I never forgot the hour I spent in that forgotten sculpture theater, eating guavas and listening to the squad reminisce.
In my memory, though, that hour bleeds directly into another one—maybe days later—when Sayti met me at a balcony overlooking a lively park with fountains and laminated trees.
Sayti and I watched a family having a picnic on a grownstone table, ignoring the peacekeeping moskito drones. Two men and a woman chatted with each other while a toddler marched unsteadily around them, and a third man cleaned a naked baby’s bottom.
“You asked why them,” Sayti said. “Why Tokomak Squad?”
“Yeah.”
“Two reasons. First, because Tokomak Squad killed your mother.”
Her words punched me in the stomach. Najafi took my mother? Aowamo broke down the door and Dustbin fired on her? The others, so easy with a laugh once you knew them . . . they’d shot my mother in that ninth-floor hallway?
“And second,” Sayti said, “I happen to know that they’ll be disposed of in a recymatorium directly beside army headquarters.”
“Disposed of? You mean their bodies?”
“I’m going to weaponize their remains, Maseo. After you lead them into an ambush.”
The next time I saw the squad, I begged them for help. I babbled and wept. I pleaded for them to follow me, frantic and inconsolable. I told them I needed help and led them into a plaza with a directed pulse that they would’ve spotted if they hadn’t been so concerned about me.
The world exploded into a death trap.
Aowamo shielded me with his body, and I still remember the look in Najafi’s dying eyes when she realized what I’d done.
I betrayed them. That’s the debt I’ll always owe. That’s why I can’t sacrifice my squad, not even in training. My mind is willing but my fingers won’t pull the trigger.
Joining the military won’t wipe the slate clean; keeping my squad alive won’t wash the blood from my hands. Nothing will. I know that redemption is just a fairy tale guilty people tell themselves, but maybe even bloody hands can build something new.
CHAPTER 24
Kaytu, Maseo
The reprimand glows on my lens and the system docks my paychecks, but at least I’m good with an Ambo—unlike Ting. She hates firearms. She hates the weight and the noise and the power. She cringes every time she fires: even on full-auto, she misses a three-square target at twenty yards. Misses entirely. Not a scratch.
She’s crap with everything except tech. She scores literally off the charts on her first flowcore test, though . . . and I’m the only one who notices her panic at the results. She’s spliced with terror at the sudden attention she receives.
The next day, TL announces a bug in the scoring algorithm that lowers Ting’s score to merely the top one percent.
In the mess hall that evening, I reopen the covert private window she established weeks earlier and lens her, “You hacked the scoring algorithm to lower your score.”
Ting stiffens over her plate and doesn’t respond.
“If you can change the scores,” I message, “why aren’t you higher ranked?”
There’s a pause. “I’ll raise yours if you want.”
“I’m not blackmailing you, Ting.”
She turns to face me, her amber hair falling around her eyes. Most of the recruits lost ten pounds during training, but she gained five. “Why not?”
There’s no heat in her question, no accusation. Just curiosity. Because we both understand desperation; we both got here through the belly of a CAV.
“I don’t know,” I lens her.
“Because you want to earn this instead of stealing it.”
“You think?”
She watches me from behind the false black pupils of her lenses. “You want to see who you would’ve become if things were different. If you weren’t a child of the refugee camps and the Freeholds.”
Goose bumps rise on my arms in the warm mess hall. Is that what’s driving me? What if it’s not about paying a debt? What if I just want to become the man I would’ve been if nobody had melted down the Big Three AIs? If Vila Vela hadn’t erupted, and Sayti hadn’t turned us into war criminals?
“Maybe,” I lens. “What do you want?”
“To disappear,” she replies, and lowers her head.
I cross the mess hall and sit beside her. “What’re you running from, Ting?”
She keeps her head down.
“The stem?” I lens. “There’s treatment. In the military, there’s treatment.”
After a pause, she messages, “It’s not that.”
“Then what’re you running from?”
“Me,” she says aloud, and closes the window.
She won’t say anything else, and she avoids me for two days—as much as possible, considering we live in the same barracks.
On the third day, she stops avoiding me. Because on the third day, Group Gabrielle vanishes. They’re not in the mess hall, they’re not in the corridors. Jag materializes on the edge of my vision and says that the Gabrielle barracks is now occupied by a new platoon of slippers.
“Shipped out,” M’bari says.
“They’re not finished with basic,” Voorhivey says, looking worried. “They can’t ship them out before they’re even trained.”
Ridehorse glow
ers at him. “Why not?”
“There’s policy. There’s corporate guidelines about this stuff.”
“This is a pilot project,” M’bari says, and glances to Rana.
Rana keeps her head bowed over the strategy simulation she’s running. The arch of her neck is eloquent. She’s good at silence.
“You think they sent Gabrielle to fight lampreys,” Voorhivey tells M’bari, with a break in his voice. “That’s what you think.”
“Maybe they’re on long-term recon,” Basdaq says. “Or got transferred to another base.”
“That’s possible, right, chief?” Voorhivey asks Ridehorse, who is Chief-of-Barracks this week.
“Sure,” she says gloomily. “It’s possible.”
“All things are possible,” Pico says. “Except for—”
“TL’s coming,” Jag murmurs.
“Deck up!” Ridehorse shouts, and we take position at the foot of our bunks.
TL ambles to the center of the barracks. She doesn’t say anything for a full minute. “You’re the most inquisitive flock of fucking magpies.”
Admin speaks from the doorway. “We heard your speculation about Group Gabrielle.”
“Where they are is none of your concern,” TL says, rubbing a scar on her cheek.
“They’re transferred,” Admin says. “Promoted. Because they didn’t sit around gossiping. Confirm.”
A tentative “Confirm” sounds in the barracks.
“Confirm!” Admin repeats.
Half of us shout, “Confirm!”
The other half don’t. Because TL and Admin are lying, so fuck them. Something happened with Group Gabrielle, something they’re not telling us. I know it shouldn’t matter: who cares what they tell a bunch of recruits? But this is Gabrielle we’re talking about. We didn’t like them, we barely knew them. Still, we’d come into this together, and we were connected to them in some unspoken way.
TL must agree, because she changes the subject instead of busting our bones. “Two groups remain. You have a chance to move to the next stage of the pilot program.” Her gaze sweeps us. “Chief Ridehorse?”
“TL!”
“Do you want Group Aleph to advance?”
“Yes, TL!”
“Can we beat Group Bay?”
“Yes, TL!”
She looks at the rest of the group. “Is Chief right?”
“Yes, TL!” we shout. All of us, this time.
“Expect the unexpected,” she says. “A test is coming. You against Group Bay. Confirm.”
“Confirm!”
“If you perform well enough, you’ll graduate to JVLN after basic.”
“JVLN?” Werz asks, before Gazi nudges her quiet.
“Javelin,” Pico says.
“What’s that, TL?” Basdaq asks.
TL takes a breath. “‘A five-corporation joint venture established for risk sharing and resource pooling in the event of low-probability economic, security, and/or existential threats.’”
“Obviously,” Admin says.
A ripple of laughter sounds in the barracks. “What’s it mean?” Calil-Du asks.
“I’m not entirely looped in,” TL admits. “It means a new remort’s crawling out of the wilderness. The lampreys. And whatever they are, they’re worse than cataphracts.”
“But, but what are they?” Voorhivey asks. “I mean, what’s the underlying tech? Did the terrafixing recover them from, y’know, a military platform or an industrial engine or what?”
“My understanding is that that is exactly what the c-suites don’t know. It’s what they want to know. What they need to know. Are lampreys based on a lost SICLE weapon system? On a resource extraction drone or a communication module or some unknown phenomenon?”
“Or an epiphenomenon!” Ting blurts. “Which is like a phenomenon’s phenomenon.”
Admin rubs his face with his palm. “I don’t know why they’re recruiting mutants and newbies for this pilot program, but you’ve got a chance, a small and undeserved chance, to be part of something big. This test is coming. Don’t fuck it up.”
“Kaytu,” TL says.
“TL!” I say.
“With me,” she says, and heads away.
I glance at M’bari. He gives a tiny shrug, and I trot after TL.
She leads me past the Bay barracks and into an empty conference room, where she stops at a projection of a snowy field with a herd of big quadrupeds.
“You know what those are?” she asks.
“Horses?”
“They’re moose.”
“There’s no antlers.”
“They’re female moose,” she says, “and this is where I’m supposed to tell you a heartfelt story about moose, with a clever twist that ties into your personal situation. To open your eyes in a wise satori moment. That’s what I’m supposed to do, Kaytu, but they’re just a bunch of moose and I don’t have a heartfelt story.”
“Okay,” I say.
“You’ve got potential,” she tells me. “You’re no Rana, but you’ve got potential.”
I square my shoulders and watch a knock-kneed moose nuzzle a bush.
“Which you’re wasting,” she continues. “A thirty-day reprimand on your lens is a real failure, Kaytu. It’s a betrayal of your potential.”
“Yes, TL.”
“And your squad, confirm.”
I hesitate. “Confirm.”
“This isn’t the refugee camp where the goal is to keep your friends alive. Do you understand that, recruit?”
“Yes, TL.”
“This is an organization that projects corporate goals using the focused application of force. And the foremost of those goals is standing as a bulwark against the remorts and patriots that threaten the survival of our species. Do you understand that, recruit?”
“Yes, TL.”
“Our value is not measured in the survival of our buddies. If our goal were to protect our squad, we’d encourage them to decruit. Confirm.”
“Confirm,” I say.
“So what’s wrong with you?”
“I guess you’re right about coming from a refugee camp,” I tell her, trying to sound earnest instead of deceitful. “We fight for each other there, not for anything bigger.”
“You don’t mind sacrificing a few squadmates,” she says. “You only choke when the whole squad is on the line.”
“Is that . . . is that right?” I shake my head. “I didn’t realize.”
“You can lie to me, Kaytu, but don’t lie to yourself. I get five or six cry pilots a year. At best they’re like Ting. Salvageable. But you? You never wanted to die, not even when you volunteered. Did you?”
“No, TL.”
“No. I don’t know what your personal backstory is—” She gives a little laugh. “Just like the moose: I don’t have a story for them, I don’t have a story for you. See how I tied that in? Not bad, huh?”
“Smooth, TL.”
“Yeah, and I don’t give a shit about your backstory. A moose is a moose. A soldier’s a soldier. I don’t care where you came from, I only care where you’re going. Is this your life now?”
“Yes, TL,” I say.
“Make that true,” she tells me.
CHAPTER 25
Kaytu, Maseo
chance of completion: 78%
platoon rank: 08 of 27
5323 rating: BBB
After a day of reinforcement training, I’m sent to a solo class in what Admin calls Field Messing: cooking and hydration in the terrafixing. To my surprise I enjoy the class, but my nerves are on edge for two reasons.
First, there’s that reprimand still glowing on my lens.
Second, the entire squad is getting twitchy, waiting for the surprise test against Group Bay.
On my way back to t
he barracks, I pass the vector plasma station and hear rustling. The door is cracked open, even though the vp station is always locked when not in use.
My pulse spikes. This time I know I’ve stumbled onto the test.
I reach for my Ambo—except my Ambo is currently racked and unloaded in my locker. Fine. I slow my breathing. I slow my heartbeat. I clench my fists, then shake the tension from my hands. I’m ready for anything.
When I peek around the door, I see Ting kneeling on a cushioned bench.
Her head is down; her amber hair is a veil around her face.
She’s pushing a gleaming silver barb of stem into the scar in the back of her neck.
Stem tech is bad news. MYRAGE gossip claims that one of the Big Three AIs developed it as a mind-machine interface, compatible with flowcore tech, in the early days after ascension. In theory, a user could control complex computer systems with a thought, stem into the port and be the machine. In practice, the benefits are eclipsed by the side effects: euphoric disassociation and death. Stem cracks open your mind to the ambient waves of signals that wash through cities. You surf the surface of the electronic world, a tiny droplet raised aloft by a tsunami.
As addictive as breathing, and as deadly as not. Before the corpos cracked down, off-market stem flooded the drug markets. It’s harder to get now but no less lethal.
Without thinking, I blank my lens, though I’m too late to stop any surveillance. I’ve just recorded Ting breaking every law of basic training. I’ve just ensured her decruitment, her banishment.
Except without raising her head, Ting says, “Your lens isn’t recording, Mase.”
“They always record.”
“I hacked the room into a loop when I—” She stops for what feels like a long time. “Thank you. For trying.”
I don’t need this, I don’t want this. I don’t owe Ting anything. She’s a junkie with secrets; getting involved with her is dangerous. And there’s no way she hacked the base security, is there?
Still, I hear myself saying, “You and me, Ting. We’re in this together. How many gutter roaches get this far, on any base in any corporation? After months of this shit, we’re still here.” I put a hand on her skinny shoulder. “We even beat the CAVs. What kind of person does that?”
