by Brett Patton
Michelle watched them go. She blew out a big breath, as if in great sadness. Matt put a hand on her shoulder. “He’ll be back.”
Michelle shrugged off Matt’s hand. “Don’t say that,” she said.
“Don’t say what?”
“ ‘He’ll be back.’ You don’t know that.”
“I’m sorry,” Matt said.
Michelle shook her head, shoulders slumping. “Just don’t say stupid things. You don’t know what’s going to happen. You don’t even know what’s going to happen to us.”
“Join the illustrious Mecha Auxiliaries,” Jahl said, chuckling.
“Or continue your training as Hellion pilots,” Peal added. “After all, Colonel Cruz says the past is the future!”
Matt nodded, but neither of those options had any appeal. He couldn’t imagine being Mecha Auxiliary, even in Intelligence, like Jahl. He’d never have a chance to find that Corsair. It would be a comfortable, dead-end life, just like being an analyst for a terraforming corporation.
As for working in a Hellion after piloting a Demon, that would be like marrying the best friend of the woman you loved.
“ It ain’t over till it’s over,” Soto said in a rich, voice-over tone. “And I don’t see any fat ladies singing yet.”
“What are you talking about?” Matt asked.
Michelle snorted. “More old Earth sayings.”
“They’re not just sayings,” Soto said. “It’s not over. It’s a pause. Wait till the other pilots fail, and then Roth will give us another shot.”
“You think so?” Michelle asked, crossing her arms.
“Anything can happen.” But Soto looked away.
The next week, Michelle went back into the Hellions. Not as full Mecha Corps, like they’d offered, but into advanced training for Merge. Matt watched in the Hellion docks as she worked with the Corps on Merging with Flight Packs first. Her first few tries resulted only in half-finished Merges, with shining antimatter jets gleaming below the incomplete dark-Mercury hide of the Hellion. She tumbled out of the cockpit, exhausted, to watch as a more experienced Corps person got in to complete the Merge—in mocking irony, it happened to be Sanjiv. The Hellion seemed to be sneering at them as Sanjiv completed the Merge.
Eventually, Michelle mastered the art of Merging with the Flight Pack, but she got hung up again when it was time to Merge the Hellions themselves. Now Sanjiv and Pelletier were both apologetic.
“It takes years to learn this,” they said.
“Not for him,” Michelle said, nodding at Matt. “He did it back on Earth, a couple weeks into cadet training.”
“Oh yeah. Funny,” Pelletier said. Sanjiv laughed too.
On the dock later alone with Matt, she asked, “Why don’t you try it?”
“I’m not ready,” Matt said. And that was true. But he’d have to make his decision soon. Cruz had given them a week’s leave to recover and choose their course. They could go on to Hellion piloting or stay in the Auxiliaries.
Neither of which worked for Matt. He tried to see Dr. Roth and plead his case, but Roth seemed to be avoiding him. So he spent his time camped out in front of Yve’s office or watching Michelle or sitting and poking at a slate in the Decompression Lounge, looking for a lever to use on Roth.
But Roth was like the HuMax. All the histories read the same. They started a decade ago, when Roth’s Advanced Mechaforms had revolutionized Mecha technology. Before that, Roth’s CV included a short stint at a conventional mechanical Mecha manufacturer a dozen years before he founded Advanced Mechaforms. His bio noted only “independent research” during those years. There was speculation he had gone to the Taikong during that time, due to some travel records that took him to the edge of the Union. But swapping allegiances between the different IGOs was insane; it was rumored that the Taikong implanted you with track-and-kill devices using FTL technology, and defecting from the Aliancia might involve you in a duel to the death, if you ever met another citizen of that realm.
Roth’s technology was equally shrouded in mystery. The only thing accessible to Matt was an assessment of biometal versus composite armor, confirming the dramatic superiority of biomechanical technology. The only thing interesting was a small notation after tests involving a Nuclear Annihilator (Enhanced Output). A sidebar noted: Biometallic mass damaged beyond regenerative capability; refer to Appendix C for analysis of resulting new form.
But Appendix C was classified, so Matt was left with his own speculation about what new form the Mecha may have become.
Eventually, Matt caught Yve in the lounge. Yve was sitting at his customary upside-down table, without even a drink bulb in front of him. As if he were waiting for Matt.
“Hey,” Yve said, as Matt came up to him.
“Are you avoiding me?”
Yve shook his head. “Usually a more subtle approach is best. Like ‘Hello, stranger.’ ”
“Have you?”
“If I were, I wouldn’t be here now,” Yve said, running a hand through his hair.
“I have to talk to Roth.”
“So you talk to me?” Yve smiled.
“You’re the oversight, aren’t you? Maybe you can talk some sense into him.” But Matt knew Yve was right. He was just looking for someone, anyone, to talk to.
Yve let the silence stretch out. “Are you going to go for the Hellion corps?”
Matt clenched his fists. That was the real question, wasn’t it? That’s what he had to decide. And if he got right down to it, why wouldn’t he? He’d be able to hunt down his father’s murderer just as well in a Hellion as in a Demon.
If Matt could ever figure out how to hunt him down at all. Officially, the Union never had any presence on Prospect, so all the records were locked away. Matt remembered more about Prospect than any screen could tell him, and he still didn’t have enough to go on. Just the Corsair insignia and that memory of the Corsair leader with HuMax eyes.
“I’ve got my own location problem,” Matt said.
Yve’s eyes widened fractionally. “In regard to what?”
Matt shook his head. Yve wouldn’t help him if he knew about his insane quest. He probably wouldn’t understand it. He’d say something like, Why are you wasting your life on a ghost?
“Would you take the Hellion offer?” Matt asked.
Yve frowned. “I’ve talked to Dr. Roth. About you. I’ve reviewed your records. And I know Roth wants to find a way to, ah, use you.”
“What does that mean?” Matt asked.
Yve shook his head. “I’m not entirely sure. Perhaps a Demon that’s designed to be leader controlled, rather than shared-Merge controlled. Maybe something else. I know he has more ideas on the drawing board.”
More ideas on the drawing board. Matt leaned forward, licking his lips. A shade of that old Mesh compulsion rose in his mind: Yes. More. Back in. Cockpit.
Yve’s slate shrilled. He flipped it open and looked at it. All expression disappeared off his face.
“I have to go,” Yve said.
“What’s the matter?” Matt asked.
Yve’s hand convulsed on the slate, snapping it closed. His eyes stared off into the distance. He looked like a dead man.
“Yve?”
Yve kicked off the table and shot for the exit. Matt thought about following, but before he could move, his thoughts were interrupted by Peal and Jahl. They rocketed into the lounge at what must have been thirty kilometers an hour, to make a hard landing on the stainless-steel wall. They flipped up to where Matt was sitting on the roof and caught themselves, breathless, on the edge of the table.
“You have to see this,” Jahl said.
“Everyone has to see this,” Peal added.
“Yes. You’re right. Coupling to the lounge’s wall screen.”
Shouts of “Hey!” and “What happened!” came from the patrons as the bar’s wall screens flickered and went black, showing only a single crimson insignia in the center. The insignia was similar to the Corsair’s thousand-daggers sta
ndard, with one significant difference: in this design, a single, large center dagger was orbited by a hundred smaller blades.
“. . . stand by,” the wall screen’s speakers boomed. “Please stand by. Please stand by . . .”
“I didn’t mean we had to show everyone,” Peal said.
“This transmission is happening on every world in the Universal Union,” Jahl said. “Simulcast across the FTL network and transmitted by local satellites. They’re just waiting for enough people to pay attention.”
“They?” Matt asked.
“Corsairs,” Jahl said.
“Rayder,” Peal added. “He’s stepping out from the shadows.”
Matt’s stomach flipped over. No wonder Yve had retreated at full speed. But what were they planning? Matt used his slate to send a message to Michelle’s access card. COME UP TO DECOMP NOW.
COMING, she sent back.
The transmission’s chanting stopped. The screen cut to a grainy, bit-rotted FTL image of a man dressed in a uniform bearing the a version of the Corsair insignia with a single dagger. He stood in what looked like a simple, spare office with windows that looked out over a dark city beyond. His hair was dark, almost blue-black. His face was angular and intense, as if carved from a block of granite by an inspired sculptor. And his eyes—
One was violet and one was gold.
“I am Rayder,” the man said.
Matt rocked back with the force of recognition. His body burned, as if immersed in a sun. A storm of insane rage built in him. But through the storm, one thought screamed:
Rayder is the Corsair who killed my father!
He hadn’t been chasing a ghost. The man was real. The HuMax were real. The greatest evil alive was the man he’d sworn to kill.
All of his success—in life, in school, in the Mecha—it was all suddenly meaningless. He was a fool, lazy and confused, letting Ash’s death consume him, letting Kyle’s antics enrage him, letting Michelle distract him with the possibility of love. He should have never wavered from his childhood purpose for an instant.
On-screen, Rayder smiled at the camera. It was the smile of a snake, a grin without a shred of humor. “I address you today first to make a simple demonstration.”
The screen changed to show a battle diagram. A Union Displacement Drive battleship, the UUS Atlas, floated over a green planet tagged CANTARA.
A new Displacement Drive ship appeared, this one tagged RAYDER 1. A second Displacement Drive ship popped into the frame, tagged RAYDER 2. Dozens of battleships swarmed toward the UUS Atlas. Shards of the UUS Atlas flew off into space, and a haze of fighters converged on the Union ship.
Stats began scrolling from the Atlas. Damage reports. Defenses mobilized. Time to charge the Displacement Drive. Deployment of internal troops. And, perhaps most important:
FIGHTER DOCK COMPROMISED
MECHA DOCK COMPROMISED
NAVIGATION COMPROMISED
The screen changed again as everyone in the Decompression Lounge watched breathlessly. Matt was aware that other cadets and Auxiliaries had flowed into the bar to watch the show, but that was unimportant. His brain resonated with only one thought: Rayder killed my father.
The Union’s most wanted is my boogeyman.
Now surveillance video showed a Mecha dock. A dozen Hellions stood, bolted down to metal mesh. Raw stone rose above the Mecha. A large control tower extended out of the stone. The glass walls of the control tower had shattered, and a woman hung impaled on the shards. The external air lock was open, showing glimpses of fighters and plasma explosions.
Three space-suited figures shot across the screen toward the Hellions. Tags identified them: CAPT. KYLE PETEROV, LT. PAULA VORJOY, and LT. BENE ROSSBARD.
“Kyle,” Michelle called out, echoing the screen in utter surprise. Matt looked up. She’d come to hang by his side.
Kyle reached his Hellion as a heavy cargo ship roared in through the air lock, thrusters full on in heavy braking. The interior of the cavern briefly lit as bright as day. Kyle held tight to the edge of the Hellion’s cockpit as he was battered by the ship’s exhaust. His two companions went tumbling out of the frame.
Space-suited troops poured out of the cargo ship. Some headed through the control tower, deeper into the ship. Some went to the main air lock.
And one group went toward the Hellions. Led by a single man, they moved with calm purpose, as if their actions had been scripted. They wore Rayder’s single-dagger version of the Corsair insignia.
As Kyle pulled himself into the Mecha’s cockpit, the Corsair in the lead raised a pistol and shot. The round hit Kyle in the upper arm. Air and blood fountained in a pink jet out of Kyle’s interface suit. Kyle sagged, barely maintaining his grip on the Mecha cockpit. He dragged himself in. Another bullet glanced off the Hellion next to him.
The screen changed to show a cockpit view of Kyle. His face was white and his eyes were bloodshot as he slapped a patch on his suit. The hissing stopped and he pulled in great breaths, whooping through the microphones.
As the cockpit closed, Kyle strapped himself in and brought his hands up to his helmet, ready to remove it and plug into the Mecha’s neural networks. He mouthed something as the cockpit folded up.
Something stopped the cockpit from closing. Kyle cursed and struggled with his straps. A hand reached down toward Kyle. The screen suddenly went dark.
The screen changed viewpoint again. The Corsairs had lodged a scaffoldlike device between the sections of the Mecha’s cockpit, holding two of its pieces open. The lead Corsair scrambled into the cockpit.
The screen went back to Rayder, who spread his arms to his audience, as if embracing them. “You see our power now. We can take any Union warship. We can smash any Union planet, as we had our revenge on Geos. We now even hold your Mecha technology.”
The camera panned to focus on Rayder as he paced. “But that is what I’ve had to do to level the field. Your Union would never seriously consider what I propose, if it wasn’t for the threat of the same violence they hold over every Corsair.”
“Subliminal influencing technology detected,” Jahl said. “Filtering signal.”
“My offer is simple: it is time for the Union to choose a new Prime. I enter my candidacy, provided that all votes from all Union worlds, frontier and core, are counted alike.”
“Elect me Prime, or die in fire,” Soto ground out, coming up to join the group.
“Elect me Prime. I will move the Union forward. And in time, I will show you what the Union hides in its labs. I will reveal how the Union has been lying to you all these years.”
Rayder continued. “Has it chafed you that the Union hides its greatest advancements in secure labs? Have you wondered if there is something more than longevity treatments and pervasive computing? There is.”
Rayder stopped to gesture outside at the city beyond his window. The camera’s focus changed to look out over it. When it snapped into focus, Matt gasped.
Carbon-darkened spires reached for the sky. Ruined buildings slumped together, like drunks holding each other for support. The stubs of elevated walkways projected from the buildings, arching over broad avenues that glittered with frost. Some structures spilled green-tinted light out onto the streets. Some were sheared off to reveal complex crystalline machinery. Huge squares hosted the fallen remains of monumental architecture. One was nearly intact. It showed a man and a woman looking up toward the stars, their gazes intent and piercing, even in ruin.
“10,956,” Matt said in sudden realization.
“What?” Michelle asked.
“That photo. My Perfect Record. My dad.” Matt spat. The ideas were too big. His father had shown him that image. He’d seen that sculpture and that city.
Did that mean his father had been there? To the world where Rayder was broadcasting from?
It made sense. There had been times when Dad was away on Displacement Drive ships for weeks at a time, while Matt stayed behind on Prospect. Was one of those trips to Rayder’s world,
where he’d taken that image?
“10,956,” Matt breathed. He remembered that one clear as day. A perfect match for the scene outside Rayder’s window.
Was the location of that world what his dad was trying to hide from Rayder all those years ago? Or had Rayder already been there—and he’d attacked his dad on Prospect as retribution?
Either way, it all fit together.
All he had to do was remember what his father was working on. Then he’d have the answer he needed—and the answer to the Union’s location problem.
Matt searched his memories, letting his Perfect Record take him back to those far-off times. Tears streamed down his cheeks as he had a picnic with his dad on the hot surface of Prospect, during one of the times the near-constant wind died down. As he watched a video of Geos and Eridani, but not the Geos and Eridani he knew. These planets had rings. Spindly and thread-thin, they arced across the night. Something they’d lost in the HuMax war, his dad told him. They’d lost a lot of things.
He remembered the last time his father came back from his Displacement Drive jaunts. He’d been tired, withdrawn. Fighting with the Union, he said. Fighting with himself. But then it’d been Matt’s birthday, and there’d been cake, and Matt hadn’t thought about it anymore.
Matt searched the days after that last trip, remembering whirling star charts on the screens at night, seeing anew how his father had handled those gleaming HuMax artifacts with a thoughtful expression, as if he knew how precious and dangerous the objects were that were now in his possession.
But the star charts were of known worlds, not of uncharted planets with shattered cities. And his dad had spent most of his time in the sealed lab. Matt wasn’t allowed in there. Nobody was allowed in there. Dad had hidden too much.
Try as he might, Matt couldn’t put together the location of Rayder’s home world.
But if the data could be recovered from the lab on Prospect . . . if there was any chance, however small . . .
Matt tore himself out of the seat and rocketed at the exit. He had to find Yve. And this time, he wouldn’t take no for an answer.
