The Bounty Hunter: Soldier's Wrath

by Joseph Anderson

  “Her memories are completely erased. Like a formatted data drive,” Natalie attempted to explain to Burke.

  “You can restore files,” he said slowly.

  “Not when the space they allocated has been rewritten,” Cass said, her voice emitting from the sound system in the room. There were a series of speakers, microphones, and cameras in the walls of the ship. She was able to move her presence from room to room, or monitor multiple ones simultaneously if required.

  Burke looked over the tangled mess of wires that he had connected to Lumen’s body. Directed by Cass, he had removed her prosthetic arms and legs and connected her to the ship. Cass had been running tests and diagnostics on Lumen’s mind through her augmentations, bridging her way into the neural link through them. She wasn’t having much success with restoring any of the woman’s higher brain functions. She was having even less success trying to explain what she was doing to him.

  “So, if she wakes up, she won’t be able to remember anything about herself?” he asked.

  “No,” Natalie and Cass said at the time.

  “What do you mean, no? Either her memories are gone or they’re not.”

  “What we’re trying to say,” Cass began.

  “Is that she won’t be able to wake up at all,” Natalie finished. “She’d be like an infant. This isn’t like amnesia, where her personal memories are gone but she’ll still remember how to walk and talk. If Cass finds a way to revive her, everything would be new to her. She would be like a child until she learned everything again.”

  “But you said you could give her memories,” Burke said, remembering his prior conversations with Cass. “Have you tried that?”

  “I don’t know if I should,” Cass replied lowly.

  “I think it’s the right thing to do,” Natalie said. “Her brain should still have the same consciousness. Even if false memories are required to bring her back, it would be a different version of the same person. Like when you dream you’re someone else. You have no recollection of your prior life, but you’re still you. Do you know what I mean?”

  “Yes,” Cass said.

  “No,” Burke said.

  “How did you put up with him for three years on that planet?” Natalie asked, shaking her head.

  Cass laughed. Burke made a face. Natalie leaned in close and kissed him.

  “I’m joking,” she said softly.

  “I know how to create basic memories,” Cass began. “AIs come preprogrammed with certain experiences and knowledge. It’s not something I like to think about, but I can build from there.”

  The conversation quickly progressed from barely out of Burke’s comprehension to most sentences including words he had never heard before. He looked over Lumen instead, frowning at the damaged dermal plates on her stomach. Her skin was fully synthetic, capable of restoring its color after taking damage or even being burned away. There were bullet resistant plates that Burke had fired multiple shots in quick succession before he caused any damage. He wished that their fight had been an avoidable one.

  “You could attempt implanting a memory tonight,” Natalie offered. “I could watch over the process if you want.”

  “I’d like that,” Cass replied. “I’ve been afraid of transferring too much. I don’t know how the hardware will react.”

  “You know, if you’re successful,” Natalie scrunched her mouth up in thought, mulling it over before continuing. “If you can transfer a full memory, you can transfer something more significant.”

  “I’ve already thought of that,” Cass said quickly. “I don’t think it would be right. Like you said, she might have the same consciousness. Would I be killing that by overwriting it?”

  “I’m not sure,” Natalie frowned.

  “What are you talking about?” Burke asked.

  “Oh the look on your face if she did it,” Natalie said, smiling. “Come on, let me show you something you’re interested in. You’ve been patient.”

  He felt lost and was only too happy to follow Natalie out of the room. He felt like something important had just been said that he couldn’t understand. When they climbed the stairs and walked into the armory, he tried to push his confusion aside.

  Natalie stepped into the room until she was standing next to his armor. The battle aegis was nearly worth the same amount as his ship, and his ship had been expensive. The armor had extensive combat capabilities: networking for weapons, close combat blades in the arms, a high jump mechanism, a grappling line, and, most importantly, the capacity to house Cass. The armored suit also provided him protection from most hostile environments, able to provide him with sustenance, oxygen, and hydration, while keeping him sealed off from hazards and enemy projectiles. After owning the aegis for years, he sometimes felt more comfortable while he was wearing it than when he wasn’t.

  “Now,” Natalie began. “I can show you how I managed to take a month off from ACU to visit you.”

  “Oh you brought the things with you?” Cass asked excitedly. Her voice filled the room just like it had the previous one.

  “I had two weeks available for some time away,” Natalie explained. “I was able to justify a full month by making part of this a business trip.”

  “You’re just here to make some money for your job,” Burke teased, shaking his head. “I see how it is.”

  Natalie smirked. She took out her tablet phone from her pocket and held it flat in her hand. She pressed quickly through multiple menus before a holographic projection of Burke’s armor shimmered from the tablet. Cass dimmed the lights in the room so that they could better see the blue outline of the aegis.

  “We’ve made several advancements in kinetic shielding,” Natalie said, weaving her hand around the hologram. Tiny bullets appeared over the projection and collided into the armor. A faint outline surrounded the aegis when each bullet landed, wobbling as it resisted the force of each impact. “Mostly in regards to power consumption. You should have less to worry about with that, Cass.”

  The display changed abruptly. The bullets vanished. The projection honed in on the left arm of the armor and magnified it, so that only the arm continued to float over the device in Natalie’s hand. Two prongs ejected from the wrist portion of the armor, each at a right angle to the hand piece. A line of what first appeared to be lightning snaked along the prongs and then expanded quickly to fill a large circle around the armor’s forearm.

  “Is that a shield?” Burke asked, stepping closer.

  “Oh, you finally got it working!” Cass exclaimed.

  “We barely have it working,” Natalie said modestly. “The blade in the left arm of the armor will have to be removed to accommodate the extra energy stores to power the shield. It will be able to withstand virtually any bullet. It will feel like a solid surface to the touch, but is completely weightless.”

  “I told her that it would be more useful than the second blade,” Cass explained.

  “You knew about these already?” Burke asked.

  “I didn’t know we would get the shield so soon,” Cass said. “But I purchased the upgrades for us. Natalie gets to stay longer. Everyone wins.”

  Burke thought Cass sounded nervous as she spoke. He had been urging her to make more decisions independently of him when their relationship had drastically changed since being stranded on Meidum. Still, he could sense that she was cautious about making too many decisions without him; they were still partners, after all. He saw nothing wrong with her choices. He nodded at the shield.

  “This is good, Cass,” he said.

  “That I get to stay longer?” Natalie asked.

  “That too,” he added.

  “I brought a tracking launcher too,” she said. “I can install that on the left shoulder plate. Cass can operate it. I’m surprised you don’t already have one.”

  “I thought after Lumen and Shaw almost got away from us that we could use it,” Cass said.

  Burke nodded once again. The projection faded away and the room’s lights slow
ly brightened. He stepped forward to his armor, propped up in the middle of the room, all of its pieces locked together like someone was wearing it. He pointed to the shallow cuts that it had sustained during his last job. Natalie frowned at them.

  “Must have been some weapon to cut through this,” she said. “I can fix it while I’m here. For free. Maybe we can work something out.”

  Their eyes locked after she spoke. In that moment, Burke felt at peace with how big of a change it was to have her on the ship. It was only a few months ago that he had been arguing with Cass about limiting the ship’s bedrooms to only his, determined to continue living in exile from the people that had once been in his life. He relished that moment as he looked at Natalie.

  Rylan’s voice came through the same speaker system that Cass used.

  “Captain,” he said. “There’s a call for you. He said it was important. He won’t talk to me.”

  The moment fell away from Burke. He kept a gentle grasp on the calmness he felt as he walked to the front of the ship. Natalie followed behind him. Rylan was seated in front of the ship’s main window. The layered consoles and screens around him made it appear like he was partially sunk into the ship. The main screen was currently blank, showing a transmission currently on hold.

  “Who is it?” Burke asked.

  “I don’t know Captain,” Rylan answered.

  “Call me Jack, please.”

  “Sorry,” the pilot murmured.

  “Put him through.”

  He let out a breath as Rylan entered a command on the ship’s console. Burke wasn’t used to people contacting him directly. He was used to messages through Cass or his personal computer, planning times that worked for the sleep schedules of both locations. The calls he did make, he did so privately in his room. He prepared himself for something bad but, when Geoff’s face appeared on the screen, he was still caught off guard.

  The old man looked awful. He was in a bed in a brightly lit room. Someone had placed a computer or propped up a phone on a table over the bed. Half of Geoff’s head was covered in a plastic wrap, including his left eye, sealing regeneration fluid against his flesh. His right eye was swollen enough that Burke could barely see the color of his iris.

  “Fuck,” he said.

  “Tell your man to set a course for Tali,” Geoff barked. “Fuck it, I’ll tell him. Set the ship for the jump gate to Tali. Now.”

  Injured as he was, his voice was as clear and emotive as ever. Rylan glanced back at Burke. He nodded once and the pilot set to work immediately, angling the ship in the direction of the gate. Their ship, the Brisbane, was currently in the Prime system after picking up Natalie from another jump gate.

  “What happened?” Cass asked, her voice filling the room.

  “Are you moving?” Geoff asked.

  “Yes,” Burke answered.

  The man visibly relaxed in the bed. His right eye softened, revealing that he had been glaring even through the bloated, damaged flesh around his eye. Burke watched as Geoff seemed to be stressed by the simple act of breathing.

  “I just woke up from surgery,” Geoff began. He tried to motion to his shoulder, winced, and lowered his arm. There was a protective layer around his chest, similar to what was stretched over part of his head. The liquid floating around his torso was murky and bloodied. Parts of it looked black. Burke recognized it all too well.

  “You were shot,” he said, more as a statement than a question.

  “Isaac Paxton,” Geoff tensed up as he said the name. His chest heaved upwards and he forced himself to lay back down.

  Burke knew immediately what had happened and where they were going. He felt his fingernails suddenly dig into the palms of his hands. He stared at Geoff through the screen for what felt like a long time. Neither of the men spoke. Burke nearly recoiled away when Natalie set a hand on his shoulder.

  “Are you okay?” she asked.

  Burke moved his head once in a short nod. It was a tiny movement.

  “Kristen’s in the Tali system?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

  “Yes,” Geoff rasped.

  “Paxton didn’t shoot you himself. He sent some of his people?”

  “Yes.”

  “What planet is she on?” Cass asked. “Give me her location and I can look for her while we’re traveling.”

  “Frey,” Geoff said, closing his right eye. “One of the floating cities. Stheno. I’ll send you the address.”

  “Are they ahead of us?” Burke asked.

  “Half a day. Maybe more. I woke up in the hospital before they took me into surgery. Fucking doctors wouldn’t listen to me. They wouldn’t let me call.”

  “What did they want?”

  “They wanted to know if Burke Monrow was alive,” Geoff said. A painful smile spread over his mouth. “I told them you were dead.”

  Rylan’s back abruptly straightened in his chair. Burke felt a buzzing begin to grow around his ears. Natalie looked toward the screen.

  “I don’t think they believed me,” Geoff continued. “I couldn’t hide where Kristen was from them. She’s my daughter. She’s family! I keep her in my fucking contact list for fuck’s sake.”

  The old man cleared his throat, which prompted a long series of coughing fits. More than once he stopped to clutch at his chest. Rylan turned around and looked at Burke, and then at Cass behind him, like he was seeing them for the first time.

  “I think it’s a trap,” Geoff said, after he finally stopped coughing. “They’ll reach Kristen before you but they won’t take her. They want to see if I’ll call you for help. Which I have to, of course, here we fucking are, it’s the only reason they didn’t kill me. Paxton is frightened of you, Burke. He knows you’ll try to stop him from taking my daughter. Maybe then he’ll try to kill you.”

  “He’s scared of me?” Burke repeated.

  “He’s been in hiding since you last saw him,” Geoff said. “He’s terrified. He was nearly shaking when he mentioned your name. This is bad.”

  “Bad?” Burke asked. “It should be a good thing that he’s scared.”

  “Not after all this time,” Natalie interjected. “He’s had years to plan. Years of being scared, planning out of terror that you’ll somehow get ahead of him. He’ll have been meticulous and careful. Fear can be quite the motivator.”

  “Exactly,” Geoff coughed again.

  Burke turned to her. It was his turn to look at someone like he couldn’t recognize them. He could feel Rylan’s stare burning into him the same way he looked at her. The buzzing was growing louder in his ears.

  “Go into the trap,” Geoff closed his eyes again. “Save Kristen. Then kill the motherfucker. I’ll pay you—”

  “You don’t need to,” Burke said. “We’re long passed that.”

  “I’ll send you updates,” Cass said. “When we get to the gate. When we get to Frey.”

  “Thank you.”

  Burke nodded. The screen went blank. He felt something trigger inside of him, changing the moment the screen switched off. The room suddenly felt enormous around him, stretching out and impossibly far away, ready to swoop back in and consume him. Rylan and Natalie were staring at him. He couldn’t speak to Cass with the two of them next to him, not in the way he needed to.

  He felt like he had just been deposited into someone else’s life. A few months ago it was just him and Cass, partners alone on their ship. Now there were too many people looking at him for answers. Natalie’s concern stabbed into him deeply. Rylan was now a potential threat, capable of compromising his entire life. Geoff was desperate; he had never seen the old man look so broken. The thought of Lumen struck him and knocked him further off balance—yet another complication that had entered his life seemingly from nowhere. Worst of all was Cass. She expected him to deal with it and to recover, stabilize and handle things as well she could. Worst of all was his fear that he would disappoint her.

  “I need a minute,” he said lowly.

  “Burke,” Natalie bega
n.

  He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. He felt her hand once again on his shoulder. He shrugged away from her and walked quickly out of the room.

  * * *

  Isaac felt anxious as he stared around his room. The lone cat he owned was on his lap and he stroked her head absentmindedly. The cat, a large tabby named Sunday, sat nicely and purred to his touch. He barely felt it.

  He had paid extravagant amounts of money making sure his time in isolation was a comfortable one. He had been high enough in the ranks of the Torrentus Cartel to justify handling things remotely, through the many proxy agents he had established over the years. He used credits from his own savings, and slaves from his personal stock, to construct the facility ship that he now lived in. The ship was large but he had many needs.

  His personal ship had been built into the larger one. He often moved between his personal rooms in the larger ship—protected by several reinforced doors at its only entrance—and his old vessel. Combined, they felt like a larger home. Much of his furniture was made from non-synthetic materials, an unnecessary luxury that he refused to live without. The rich colors of the wooden desks and cabinets complemented any color he chose for the carpets and walls; most surfaces were alterable, capable of changing at a simple command at the room’s main terminal. The walls and carpets could change from red to brown, or white to gray. The tall picture frames dotted around the room housed display screens that could also change and cycled through multiple paintings each day.

  On his ship, he had access to the vessel’s multimedia centre and recreation rooms. He had access to movies, television, video games, and books as they were released. He had spent many of his days lost in that entertainment, working only when he had to, and justifying it to himself that it helped take his mind off the pathetic life he now led. He didn’t like that he was hiding, but he liked living out in the open, exposed and afraid, even less. After six years in hiding, he took no pleasure in the entertainment he had set up for himself.