Xander

by Vivienne Savage

  Davis plucked the fallen gun from the floor before they proceeded into the basement laboratory. Its expansive floor spread for several yards in either direction, filled with sleek, silver, waist-high towers. The impeccable server room housed at least a dozen machines.

  “What the hell… Whoa! Whoa!” A man in a white lab coat threw up his arms and stumbled back from a wide desk near the entrance.

  “Down on the floor,” Thandie ordered, training her gun on the man.

  Creswell holstered his weapon and moved to the impressive computer banks. The touch panels lit up beneath his hands. “Ask him for his password.”

  “You heard the man.” Thandie finished patting down the technician, securing his wrists behind his back. “What’s your login?”

  “I don’t have one, I swear.”

  “You work here and you don’t have codes?”

  “Look, I don’t have the access codes. I’m just a junior technician. I come down every hour to check the temps.”

  “Creswell, see if you can get in the system. Matthews, get this egghead out of here.”

  “I’ll take him up with the others.” The doctor grabbed the technician up from the floor and pushed him toward the door. He went without any resistance.

  “This is gonna take a few,” Creswell called over from the terminal.

  “Do what you can. I don’t want to be here any longer than we need to be,” Viljoen said. “The rest of you, secure—”

  “Jemison to all teams. We have a situation.” The commodore’s voice came over the comm line with intermittent static.

  “What’s going on, sir?” Viljoen asked.

  “Kaiden is going crazy. They activated some sort of programming, and he hauled ass out of Medical. He knocked Jem offline, hell if I know how, and shorted out our engines. Everything is going to shit but it’s worse than anything DuPrie did to us. It’s like… we’re under a cyberattack,” Gareth filled them in. “I’m trying to regain control of the Jemison.”

  Viljoen swore. “Damnit, Creswell, we need to be in that system.”

  “Almost… Got it!” Creswell shouted. “Holy shit. Gareth, you are under cyberattack. I’m in their system now, but the only code originating from here isn’t attacking the ship. My best guess? He’s hacking Jem by thought.”

  “But there’s gotta be something controlling him,” Gareth argued. “We need to find the control signal and sever it. He’s going to vent the entire ship if you don’t do something! Our sedatives aren’t working. Hart and Vargas shot him with over a thousand CCs of the good shit.”

  Viljoen paced the room anxiously. For the first time since her arrival to the Jemison, Thandie saw fear in his eyes.

  “Okay… Download in progress. Hot damn, that’s a lot of info!” Creswell exclaimed.

  “I’m looking through your video link now, Creswell. These are 250 zettabyte servers,” Gareth said. “Standard for cyberware corps. It’ll take you fifteen minutes to nab that much data on your equipment. We don’t have that kind of time.”

  “Abandon your work on retaking the Jemison and join me in this system. If we work together to sever the signal to your brother, the rest will fall in place.”

  Three tense minutes passed, the two hackers growing increasingly desperate. Creswell’s fingers flew over holographic displays and several lines of glowing green and yellow data glittered in the air.

  “No good, Lockhart. Signal is rerouting.”

  “I’m on it. Shit. It moved again.”

  Thandie’s palms grew damp as she listened to the back and forth between the techies. Hacking and computer software were beyond her knowledge, but she understood the stakes if they failed. Her friends, her crewmates—everyone aboard the Jemison was in danger. Including Xander. The thought tore her up inside.

  “I can’t get anywhere close to the command signal,” Creswell called over, sweat soaking his blonde hair. No matter what he tried, the screen flashed red. “It’s beyond the scope of my ability.”

  “If you can’t shut it down, we won’t have any choice but to kill him.” Commodore Bishop’s grim voice took over the line. Killing Kaiden was the very last thing that any of them wanted.

  Gareth became very quiet. At first, it seemed he had left the communications line entirely. “Pull the power. It’s a long shot, but it’s the only thing left that may work. Knocking out the facility’s power will kill the interlink with the satellite. If there’s someone there controlling my brother, they may lose access for a brief period while reconnecting to the next signal relay.”

  “Over here.” Leaping up, Creswell moved to a large power generator on the opposite wall. With Abernathy’s help, they managed to open the front paneling and began work on the inner lining.

  “What if there’s a backup?” Viljoen asked into the line.

  “Let’s hope there isn’t,” Xander replied. The sound of his voice, strong and even, flooded Thandie with relief.

  “Last connection and… got it. Right, let’s see what we have here.” Creswell pulled the shielding panel off. The inner core glowed with pristine white light. Thandie turned her face aside and squinted. “Damn it all! That’s a Valkyrie conduit.” Creswell threw the panel aside in frustration. “I don’t know how to deactivate one of these without causing some serious damage, lads. We’ll be better off blowin’ the entire building. It’ll save the Jemison but lose everything here.”

  “We need that data for our fellow marine,” Thandie said.

  Commodore Bishop growled. “There isn’t enough time to evacuate the lot of you from the facility, Creswell. Find another way to do it. Lockhart, can you walk him through a safe method for powering down the… whatever the hell he called it. We’re on borrowed time. Kaiden depressurized the cargo bay.”

  “It’s a Valkyrie conduit. They’re overpriced cubes of white matter,” Gareth said. “They become unstable energy when disrupted. The only safe method for powering it down is to hit the deactivation switch. It’s going to take half an hour to go cold. Minimum.”

  Thirty minutes they no longer had at their disposal. Twenty-five minutes after the Jemison depressurized and its 447 inhabitants became cold corpses.

  “I’m sorry, Gareth.”

  A single gunshot echoed over the line. The report of a hand cannon silenced the communication link of all chatter.

  Viljoen sighed, dropping his head. “Shit.”

  “Oh no.” Fairchild’s hands flew over her mouth. Davis moved over and squeezed her shoulder.

  Like everyone else in the room, Thandie waited in strained silence, willing the sick sense of dread to go away. They were too late and now a good man was dead. A man who counted on them all.

  “Shit! He’s not down.” The communications link became filled with panicked shouts and cries of warning from Xander and Gareth.

  Three successive shots followed. Hart screamed for Ethan to run.

  “Take it down, now!” Gareth yelled. The comm line died to static.

  Viljoen took aim at the power panel with his gun.

  “Are you feckin’ crazy?” O’Malley yelled. “You shoot that and you blow us all up!”

  “My family is up there!” Abernathy exclaimed. “I can’t… we need to do what we can. I’ve got a little boy up there, and he’s only four. Four bleedin’ years old. I’ll die before I let anything happen to those people.”

  “He’s right. We have to get that power source out somehow,” Viljoen argued. “We knew what we were getting into when we came down here, and the way I see it, none of you have a better idea.”

  “That’s true,” Davis agreed. “It’s us or the ship. We have civilians. Our fellow service members have their families on the Jemison on our residential deck. It has to be us.”

  Two options loomed before them, losing the ship or giving their own lives. To Thandie, the solution seemed simple. “Commander, tell him I’m sorry. Tell him I love him. So much.”

  “Tell who—Kruger, what are you doing?” Viljoen tried to snag her by the wri
st but Thandie’s cybernetic arm was stronger, allowing her to jerk from his hold. She didn’t stop to think or reevaluate her plan.

  Thandie plunged her right hand into the open power box and closed her fingers around the miniature star. White heat encompassed her fist, but her mechanical strength dislodged the power source from its setting. The optimistic side of her expected to feel no pain, believing it would scorch through the synthetic nerve endings too quickly for her to feel it.

  She was wrong.

  Her fist combusted and the fire spread, a flash of lightning traveling her synthetic skin and melting the metal skeleton beneath. The remains of her hand resembled an aged candle left in the sun. The acrid odor of cooking flesh and hair filled her nostrils.

  It was a hundred times worse than the accident that mangled her flesh and blood arm years ago. An inhuman shriek tore from Thandie’s throat, but her uncooperative bionic limb refused to release the conduit.

  Somewhere to her right, a marine screamed, “Do something! Get it off her!”

  It sounded like Elizabeth, but she couldn’t be sure, unable to hear much over the sound of her own agonized wailing.

  “No! Get away from her,” Creswell shouted. “Everyone down, now!”

  The disrupted Valkyrie conduit pulsed, dimming and flashing multiple times. It stuck fast to Thandie’s disfigured hand and white exploded before her eyes.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Gareth dropped into the chair beside Xander’s workstation. “Need to talk?”

  Xander shook his head. “I’m fine, mate. Keep your concern for your brother, where it belongs.”

  “You’re also my friend. The funny thing about concern is that it can focus on many different things, aye? Are you worried about Kruger?”

  Chuckling quietly, Xander nodded. “A bit. It feels silly to worry when your brother requires 100% of my attention, and yet, here I am, thoroughly distracted.”

  “I wouldn’t want you working on my brother if you were an unfeeling asshole. You’re an amazing doctor because you’ve got your heart and you feel,” Gareth said gently.

  “Enough about me. How are you holding up?”

  Gareth gazed at his twin through the observation panel. “It’s… weird. Since he returned, I can sense things more clearly. It’s not how I felt during our childhood, but… It’s like he’s almost here again.”

  “He’s in there. Nisrine is certain of it, so you aren’t alone, and you’re not imagining it. We’re going to free him from their control and punish everyone responsible for this.”

  Gareth nodded. “And Kruger is going to come away from this safely, too. You love her, you know. I can feel it whenever the two of you move beside one another. It’s like an arrow straight into my senses. I used to envy you.”

  “Gareth…”

  “You have a good thing here. You know… I thought I’d never want another woman after Tara pulled her bullshit. Used to think that little tart was as good as it gets. Our child dies and she mourns Rosie by sleeping around. Didn’t think I’d ever move on. Maybe that’s why the only dating I’ve done happens to be with an anonymous avatar in an online videogame.”

  “I’ve seen you with Flidais. Perhaps you’re not together in person, but whatever you have is real,” Xander cut in.

  “Maybe. Maybe I’m using it as a crutch to avoid taking my life forward. Who could say for sure? I don’t even know her real name. She could be married, for all I know.”

  “Have you tried asking?”

  “No.” Gareth chuckled and rubbed his neck. “My big brother… he’d be laughing at me right this moment. Asking why I’m so afraid. When Rosie died, he burned all of his leave time to get me on my feet again. Had been saving it, but he used it for me. Didn’t think twice about it. Doesn’t matter what I needed, he was always there for me. All my life.” Gareth rubbed his face.

  Xander passed him a nearby tissue box. “Sounds like a good brother.”

  “The best.”

  “I’ve got a pair of trays for the two of you from the officer’s galley,” Kathleen called from the doorway. “Come sit with me and eat. It’s lonely out here,” she claimed, infusing a hint of light-hearted warmth to her voice.

  “Come on. Let’s get some food into you before you pass out. You’ll be no good to him when I have him awake if you’re passed out in the next cot, mate.”

  Gareth resisted at first, but with Xander’s insistence, he left his seat. The human brain required food as fuel to thrive, and as a psychic, Gareth needed a larger quantity than most others. Missing a meal could be the difference between a crippling migraine that landed him in his bunk for a couple of days and staying coherent to help his twin.

  Both men settled at the medical station’s counter alongside Kathleen. To Xander’s left, a floating monitor detailed Kaiden’s vitals, assuring he was stable. Two identical trays awaited them, some sort of creamy casserole with a heavy serving of noodles, two palm-sized meatballs, steamed veggies, and slices of cheesecake.

  Xander picked at his plate, but Gareth shoveled his meal down like he was creating a new galactic record. “Feel better?” Xander asked, shoving his cheesecake over after watching Gareth scrape the remaining crumbs of his together.

  Gareth laughed quietly and dipped his head. “A little, yeah. It’s just… I can’t lose him again. I want to tell Mum we found him and that he’s gonna be all right.”

  “We’re going to do everything we—”

  The translucent glass holographically presenting Kaiden’s vitals lit up like a holiday display, casting hues of green, red, and yellow from its surface. The numbers changed to indicate his racing heart rhythm and rising blood pressure.

  Xander pushed his tray aside and dragged the terminal display closer.

  “What’s happening?” Gareth demanded.

  By appearances alone, Kaiden seemed normal and no different than any other man in his early thirties. He rested peacefully with his eyes closed, but his chest barely moved.

  “I don’t know. Everything is within normal limits here. Let’s have a look then,” Xander muttered, glancing through the observation window.

  Kaiden bolted to a sitting position and climbed out of the bed, crashing equipment to the floor. Lines snagged and tore from his body, sending a trickle of blood down his medical gown.

  “Oh shit!” Gareth stared through the glass. “What the hell’s he doing?”

  “Jem!” Kathleen cried. “Seal Observation Room One.”

  The magnetic locks activated and secured Kaiden in the room, but then he beat the door with both fists until he dented the metal.

  “Kaiden, stop.” Gareth attempted to reason with his brother over the intercom. “You’re safe now on the Jemison, just like I promised.”

  Another loud bang on the door was the only reply. Kaiden’s stony features never changed.

  “I don’t think he hears you,” Xander said in a low voice. “Look at him.”

  Kaiden struck the door again, but the barrier held and kept him contained.

  They released collective sighs of relief. “Thank God,” Kathleen said.

  Kaiden crossed to the observation window and thrust his fist against the glass, his unnerving stare sending chills down Xander’s spine.

  “Oh shit.” If Xander could shatter unbreakable glass, what could a souped-up cyborg do?

  The second punch splintered the thick pane’s interior layer, creating a network of fine cracks spread out across the buckling glass.

  “Jem, evacuate Medical!” Xander’s cry sent up the alarm. “Send additional security personnel to Medical!”

  The window shattered with the third punch.

  “No one here wants to hurt you.” Xander raised his hands up, palms out, and placed himself between his patient and the door. They had to keep him from leaving the medical wing.

  Kaiden grabbed the doctor and swung him around, launching him halfway across the room and into Kathleen, who crumpled beneath his weight with a startled cry.


  “Are you okay?” Xander asked in a groaned breath. Pain registered, sending twinges of agony across his back, but he didn’t have the time to acknowledge it and mope on the floor. Fire spread throughout his shoulder and pulsed down his arm. It had to be dislocated.

  “I’m fine. But what the hell! I thought you said he was turned off.”

  “He was. Get the tranq gun. Quick!” Needing both arms at full working capacity, he gritted his teeth against the pain then wrenched his arm into the socket again.

  Kathleen slammed a case on the desk and unsnapped it to reveal their stash dedicated to hostile patients. He loaded a cartridge into a gun while she did the same. For a noncombatant, her aim was good; the dart sank into the meaty portion of Kaiden’s posterior where he lacked metal augmentation.

  “Nice shot,” Xander commented. His dart nailed the cyborg in the throat.

  Nothing happened.

  “Bridge to Medical. What the hell is going on down there?” Ethan’s voice cut through over the comm system.

  “Kaiden Lockhart awakened from his hibernation. He’s no longer responding to sedatives,” Kathleen reported back.

  “Security is on the way and so am I.”

  “Copy that, sir. We’ll follow his movements.” Kathleen grabbed two field kits and followed Xander out into the hall. Kaiden strode with purposeful steps ahead of them, making his way unhindered through the ship’s corridors.

  “Shit, he’s getting in the lift.” Gareth shoved a hand through his hair. “Jem, can you hold him in there?”

  “Negative, Chief Lockhart. He has overridden my lockout commands. Destination: Engineering Deck. I have issued evacuation protocols.”

  “He can cause all sorts of trouble down there.” Gareth muttered.

  “Jem, can you slow the lift down?” Kathleen asked. The A.I. provided no response.

  Gareth swore.

  “What? What now?” Xander asked.

  “I don’t know what the fuck just happened, but he deactivated her somehow.”

  A thousand scenarios floated around in Xander’s head, none of them good.

  They took the lift down to Engineering and stepped out in time to witness the end of Kaidan’s brutal assault on a five-man security team. Four guards groaned from the floor. The last man flew over the cyborg’s shoulder, slammed mercilessly to the hard deck with a technique that wrenched his shoulder from the socket and snapped the bone. His shock baton rolled uselessly away from his limp fingers.