Ghost of a Machine

by Cynthia Sax

  He grunted. He didn’t remove them.

  She smiled. He must like them. “We look like a team.” She swung her legs, her feet dangling above the floor tiles.

  “Are a—”

  Ghost’s body stiffened.

  Lethe straightened. “What is it?” She looked at the main viewscreen, saw nothing to warrant his alarm. The image was of open space. They neared Deneb 9 but the planet couldn’t yet be spotted.

  “Cyborgs rebel.” He tapped on the control panel embedded in the console. “Code.” A seemingly never-ending number scrolled across the viewscreen. “Broadcast or blow up.” He activated it on their system.

  “As the captain, I authorize that broadcast.” She slanted her gaze at him. Broadcast or blow up didn’t give them much of a choice but she remained in charge. She made that decision.

  His eyes glowed.

  He was a domineering cyborg. She shook her head. “We should inform the commander.”

  “K models. Two.” He leaned back in their chair. “Informed.”

  The commander’s two males would have informed her. “Captain Rhea—”

  “Merchant ship. Cyborgs not attack.” Ghost eased that concern.

  She couldn’t contact the Rebel Headquarters about the code. It might fall into the hands of the spy. “Where do they need our warship?”

  “They?”

  “The cyborgs. How are we helping them to escape from the Humanoid Alliance?” The commander said the Rebels had an alliance with the cyborgs.

  Even if they hadn’t one. Lethe looked down at Ghost’s large hands. These were his brethren and some of them had risked their lifespans to save him, to save her.

  She would do the same to help them.

  “Not mission.” Ghost rested his chin on the top of her head. “Earth Minor. Mission.”

  “We have a warship.” She pointed out. “They need our help.”

  “Have warship how?”

  How had they obtained the warship? He had killed every being on board. “Oh.” The other cyborgs would do the same thing. “The armada that passed us will soon belong to the cyborgs, won’t it?”

  They would control all of those gorgeous ships, the most current vessels in the Humanoid Alliance fleet.

  Ghost grunted.

  “Then we can help the Rebels.” Lethe decided.

  “No.” He insisted on denying her any role in the rebellion. “No cyborgs. Small fight.”

  “There will be fewer warriors for the Rebels to fight on the ground.” Cyborgs were used for that part of the invasion. She had escaped Mercury Minor before they’d been employed. “The Humanoid Alliance will still have ships in the air. They’re bombing Deneb 9 as we speak.”

  He didn’t say anything.

  “The Humanoid Alliance won’t win the war without the cyborgs. They’ll know that and they won’t be gracious losers. They will bomb the planet to dust before they retreat, purely to be vindictive.” She thought of the beings on that planet, the girls with fourteen solar cycles of living, on their own, with no beverage, no way of leaving the planet. “We have to help the locals, Ghost.”

  “No fighting.”

  She turned to look at him. His jaw was set. His lips were flat. He wouldn’t allow them to enter the battle against the Humanoid Alliance.

  That was okay. She preferred to rescue beings. “We have this big empty ship. We could fill it with beings, save lives.”

  His body immediately tensed. Her cyborg didn’t like being around others. “Not safe.”

  He was right. It wouldn’t be safe for those beings. One of them would touch her and he’d rip their arms off. Then the others would panic and he’d kill them all.

  Lethe considered the situation. “We’ll lock them in the chambers until we land on the next inhabitable planet.”

  “Shot down before land on Deneb 9.”

  “No one will shoot us down before we land.” She tried to sound certain about that and failed. They could be shot down. That was a possibility. “The Humanoid Alliance will think we’re one of their warships.” Battles were chaotic. They wouldn’t keep track of all their vessels.

  “Rebels?” He lifted one of his eyebrows.

  The rebels were a bigger concern. They would think the warship belonged to the Humanoid Alliance also and would target them. “You’ll find somewhere safe for us to land.”

  His lips twisted but he didn’t reject that solution.

  That gave Lethe hope. “Once the Rebels see me, they’ll know I’m one of them.” There were no female captains in the Humanoid Alliance forces. “We can do this.”

  “No.”

  He was being unreasonable. She gazed at him. “Ghost—”

  “No risk.” He slapped his right palm on the console, his flesh ringing against the metal. “Must protect.”

  “Someone risked his lifespan for me.” That captain had used her body in return for his favor but he had risked everything to save her. “If it was me on that planet—”

  He moved his hand to the control panel. Her image appeared on the main viewscreeen.

  “That could be me in that merchant ship, Ghost.” Her voice filled the bridge. “Wouldn’t you want someone to save me?”

  Blast it. “I might have used that same argument previously,” she admitted.

  He replayed the footage.

  “Okay. Okay. I did use that same argument.” And her stubborn cyborg wouldn’t allow her to utilize it again. “Ghost—”

  “No.” He shook his head, his shaggy hair falling over one of his eyes.

  She reached up, pushed it back.

  He froze, his gaze fixing on her face.

  She had all of his attention and that was a heady feeling. “I need to do this.” Lethe softened her voice. “I told you about that mother with her baby. She wanted that last spot on the ship, the spot I took. Every rest cycle, I see her eyes, the pleading in them and then the disappointment. Maybe if we save as many beings as we can, that guilt will disappear.”

  He looked away from her.

  Silence stretched.

  “Know guilt,” he admitted.

  The images of a vast array humans and humanoids, ranging from newborn to ancient, flashed quickly on the main viewscreen.

  They were all female and all appallingly appeared to be dead.

  “Ours. Failed. See always.”

  There were so many of them. Lethe’s heart clenched. When the new images were all finally shown, the first image reappeared, an endless loop of pain, a reminder of the lifespans he had lost, the beings he felt responsible for not saving, his failures.

  Cyborgs didn’t sleep. When Ghost referred to ‘always,’ he didn’t mean he saw them during his rest cycle. He meant he always saw them.

  That would drive any human insane.

  It had broken her cyborg.

  “Ghost.” She petted his neck, not knowing what to say, how to comfort him.

  He stopped the images. His gaze returned to hers. “You die, Mine. I kill until I die.”

  If she died during this rescue attempt, he would start killing and he wouldn’t stop until someone stopped him. Lethe trembled. Manufactured for battle, he was difficult to kill. An entire warship had tried to end his life and had failed.

  He was warning her that the carnage would be even greater.

  She lifted her hands to her cyborg’s handsome face. “I won’t die.” She could protect herself and wouldn’t allow him to fail in his task. “We have an A Class Warship. I’m a great captain. It will take mere moments to fill the chambers with survivors. And then we’ll leave.”

  “No.” He remained obstinate about this. “Allowed risk once. Not again.”

  He had allowed her to risk her lifespan once? Lethe decided to ignore that and focus on the true issue. “This will be the last time.”

  Ghost looked at her with disbelief.

  “If you agree to this, I will part ways with the Rebels. I will go with you to Earth Minor and leave the fighting behind me.” It was never a
bout the fighting for her. She wanted to save beings.

  “No battles? No rescues?”

  She grimaced. Not responding to a distress call would be difficult for her but she would do that. For him. “No more battles. No more rescues.”

  He gazed at her.

  She gazed back.

  Moments passed.

  “One hundred beings,” he relented. “Touch you. Kill all.”

  “Deal!” She wrapped her arms around her male, hugging him.

  The ship could hold more than one hundred beings and she would have to make the no-touching rule understood but one hundred was better than none.

  And it was more than one, the one life that had been saved solar cycles ago—hers. Lethe’s debt to the universe would be paid. “Thank you.” She bounced against him.

  Ghost grunted.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Ghost had fought thousands of battles. Being the ultimate warriors, cyborgs were designed for combat, manufactured for the sole purpose of ending lifespans. Killing the enemy gave him great satisfaction.

  That satisfaction was clouded by other emotions. During battle, he would feel anger at the Humanoid Alliance for their dishonorable actions, rage that they were the masters he had to serve. He would experience guilt and devastation over not being able to protect the females he sensed belonged to his brethren.

  He had never felt fear.

  Not until now.

  The thought of risking his female’s lifespan yet again, terrified him.

  Ghost donned his irritatingly tight flight suit, yearning for the body armor he’d once worn. He refastened the boots his female found for him. She called them a gift, and that was why he tolerated the footwear.

  His little female dressed also, covering her agonizingly fragile human form with a thin layer of useless fabric. His lips twisted. That wouldn’t protect her against a gentle breeze.

  Protecting her was his mission, his top priority.

  She refastened her boots and sat in their captain’s chair. Alone. They had to focus.

  Ghost stood beside her and scanned Deneb 9 for activity. The fighting encompassed the entire planet, flares of heat signatures on the surface denoting activity.

  “Landing sites.” He circled the three locations with the least activity. All of them had too much fighting for his liking.

  “One of the moons is near this site.” She indicated her choice on the main viewscreen. “I can use it to conceal part of our approach.”

  “Humanoid Alliance attacks. We retreat,” he warned. They couldn’t defend themselves against the Humanoid Alliance in the air and the Rebels on the ground.

  “Agreed.” His female nodded. “They won’t attack us. This is a Humanoid Alliance warship, one of their top vessels. Unless they hail us, and they wouldn’t do that in the middle of a battle, they won’t know we’re not one of them.”

  He didn’t share her confidence. “Plotting course.”

  “Take us close to the moon.”

  They worked together, planning the descent. He plotted it. His little female, having more flying hours and the space battle experience he lacked, tweaked it to her satisfaction.

  Ghost changed the destination to Deneb 9. “Authorize.” He gave her one last opportunity to change her mind.

  “Authorization granted.” His stubborn human was determined to save the strangers.

  And he would assist her. He changed their course, steering the warship toward the planet.

  They passed the moon. Its image dominated the main viewscreen, the gray crater-strewn surface devoid of life.

  “Mercury Minor only had one moon.” His female’s voice was soft. “It wasn’t shining the planet rotation of the invasion. That might have been why no one detected the ships until it was too late.”

  They wouldn’t have that advantage this planet rotation. There was no darkness to conceal their approach. The sun shone on their landing site.

  The airspace around the planet was crowded. Humanoid Alliance warships flew in and out of battle stations. A couple of ragged Rebel ships darted forward. Their brave but foolish captains fired missiles and retreated.

  A merchant ship heading to open space from the planet exploded, decimated by the Humanoid Alliance. Ghost gritted his teeth.

  “They’re not allowing anyone to leave the planet.” His female said what he was thinking.

  He grunted. She didn’t need a reply.

  That realization would have frightened another captain. His stubborn female looked more determined. “We’re their only hope.”

  The transmission noise from the surface was filled with frantic distress calls. The cyborgs, when they retreated, had taken any ships they could find. The Rebel vessels stationed on the planet had been the most accessible.

  That had reduced the Rebels’ already small fleet, giving the survivors no means to escape Deneb 9. They were being pounded with missiles, annihilated more and more with each passing moment.

  A squadron of Humanoid Alliance warships flew toward Deneb 9. “We’re joining them.” His female accelerated to catch up with the squadron. Then she adjusted the warship’s speed to keep pace.

  Every time they changed course, she did also. The delay between their movements and hers was mere heartbeats.

  She was fast for a human. Ghost’s lips curled upward. And she could fly.

  The communications system beeped. One of the warships was hailing them.

  “Ignore that.” She broke pattern, headed toward their designated landing spot.

  Missiles from the ground arced around them. The floor below Ghost’s booted feet slanted to the left and right as his female avoided the bombardment.

  One missile connected. The warship shuddered, the shields holding. He stepped closer to his female.

  “Damage report?” she asked.

  “No damage.” He rotated the guns, pointed them toward the ground, fired missiles back at the Rebels. The warship jerked with each round.

  “Stop shooting at them,” she ordered. “We’re on the same side.”

  “Shooting at us.” He didn’t listen to her, continued firing. “Protect you.”

  “They can’t get past our shields.”

  “Now.” As they neared the landing site, the missiles from the ground lessened. “Land. Shields lower.” They couldn’t land with the shields up.

  “Which is why we’re landing here.”

  The ground attack abruptly stopped. The sky was devoid of missiles and the silence was eerie. He didn’t trust the sudden peacefulness.

  “Do not land.” He scanned the area. “Beings on ground.”

  “Don’t shoot them, cyborg,” she yelled. “Those are survivors, the beings we’re seeking to save.”

  He hesitated. “Threats.”

  “If they were threats, they would be shooting at us.”

  Her logic was sound but, during his long lifespan, he’d seen humans act in illogical ways. “Trap. Clear the space.”

  “Ghost.” Her voice grew even louder. “Those aren’t cyborgs. Those are humanoids. They’re scared and exhausted and fighting for their lifespans. They aren’t setting traps for anyone.”

  “Mine.”

  “If they shoot us, you can shoot them,” she relented.

  That was a deal Ghost could accept. He lifted his hands from the control panel. One or two missiles shouldn’t compromise the warship’s structural integrity.

  But he would add a layer of protection. He scooped his female out of her seat.

  She yelped. “Stop it.” She batted his arms. “I’m flying our warship.”

  He claimed her chair, set her on his lap and wrapped his arms around her. “Fly now.” She could fly her warship while seated on him.

  “You’ll distract me.” She hunched over the control panel.

  Ghost hunched over her, not allowing any space between them.

  His female huffed. She guided the warship downward. According to his lifeform scans, the beings directly below them moved. There was
no other activity.

  “Lowering shields,” he announced, bracing for possible impact.

  Nothing happened.

  “See.” Her tone was smug. “There isn’t anything to worry—”

  Missiles shot upward, from all directions. Alarms sounded. The main viewscreen flashed red.

  “Shit.” His female cussed, swerving the warship left and right, frantically trying to avoid the bombardment.

  Ghost assisted her but he knew the task was doomed.

  The Rebels had cleverly coordinated the attack, waited until their shields were lowered, until they were too close to the ground to escape the missiles.

  The warship would be hit, the shields would collapse, and they would crash.

  He folded his body over his female, creating a protective cage around her with his arms and legs, hoping that would be enough to save her life.

  The boom temporarily shorted his auditory system. The panels peeled off walls. The main viewscreen shattered. A support beam fell, crashed against the console to their right. The warship bucked, thrown upward, to the right, to the left.

  His female screamed and clung to him.

  The warship dropped. The free fall pulled them toward the ceiling. His female’s skull cracked against his chin. Ghost absorbed that pain, tightened his grip on her, hooked his feet around the base of the chair. It took all of his strength to remain seated.

  The warship connected with the ground. Only Ghost’s arms prevented his female from slamming into the console. Her breath rushed from her parted lips. He dug the heels of his boots into the floor tiles, the impact denting the squares.

  Metal screeched. The support beam shot forward, piercing a hole through the main viewscreen. Pieces of the ceiling fell. The live circuits dangling above their heads snapped and popped. The stench of spilled fuel aggravated Ghost’s nostrils.

  Before the warship stopped, he was out of his seat, his female slung over his shoulder. He ran toward the exterior doors. The vessel was a huge immobile target. The rebels would ensure there were no parts left to salvage.

  He dodged fallen debris, kicked through doors, using his new boots as battering rams. There was no need to break down the exterior door. The warship had split into two, the entire right side missing.

  He slid his female lower against his chest, ducked under a panel, and sprinted across the torn ground. A missile whistled above them.