Grace scratched her head, then winced at the lump forming on the base of her skull. The machine had knocked her cold, an epic-level throw Grace hadn’t expected. She wouldn’t make the same mistake again. If she hadn’t been unconscious, things might have been different. The shuttle Reiko had used to get away was far smaller than the Tyche. If Grace had been awake, she might have pulled them back, broken airlocks or otherwise. As it was, Saveria was out in the hard black with a psychopathic machine.
Can machines be psychopaths?
It was a curious thought. The motivations of crystal intelligence were foreign to Grace. Even the Ezeroc had minds she could see. The insect race was foreign, oil to her water, but she could still ken something about them. The machines were an enigma. This one? Hope had made it. Gave the gift of a lost life to quicken it. And they’d all paid.
Grace had spent a little time reviewing the cam footage, and sure enough, El had fired first. Not that Grace cared. She trusted El, her sister in battle. The outcome might have altered if El hadn’t fired, but the machine had moved so fast, so quickly, Grace doubted things would have been different if it had been Nate, or Kohl, or Grace herself who found it first. If you discovered a killer robot on your ship, finger triggers were like as not to get itchy.
She probed the lump on her head. You’re relying on gifts from the enemy, and the robot caught you napping, Grace. The Reiko machine was faster and smarter than the others you’ve fought.
“Looks bad,” offered Nate, sliding into the couch next to her. The Tyche’s holo was bright, the ship watching the night around them. Neptune was lost in their wake. Grace was trying to avoid further encounters, keeping the ship away from anything that looked like a transponder or station. Just them, in the hard black, alone.
“This?” Grace touched the lump again. “It’s nothing.”
“Caught you napping, didn’t it?” said Nate.
“It’s not like you did any better,” said Grace.
“Hey,” said Nate. “I got sucker-punched by friendly fire. Wasn’t anything friendly about it, either.”
Grace smiled, shaking her head. “Nothing gets you, does it?”
“Plenty gets me,” said Nate. “Heart almost stopped when you went down.” He fussed with his console. “Still can’t work out why the machine didn’t kill you. Or Kohl. Or El. Or, hell, me. The machines have been after the Empire since they got here.”
“That machine isn’t like the others,” said Grace. “It’s a new thing.”
“Different?”
“But also the same,” she said. “It’s a killer, make no mistake.”
“Or a survivor.” Nate frowned. “Have to wonder what we might do, in the same situation.”
“Ask El,” said Grace.
Nate held up his hands in a don’t-shoot-the-messenger way. “Just imagine, for a second, you wake up in a ship of Ezeroc.”
“I’d kill them all,” said Grace, voice flat.
“Reckon so,” said Nate.
She waited for him to continue, and when he didn’t, she said, “So?”
“I’m just going to leave that one there,” said Nate. He pointed at the holo. “Earth’s orbit is coming up.”
“We’ll miss it,” said Grace. “The shuttle Reiko stole was headed straight for Mercury.”
“Figures,” said Nate. “Whole cluster of metal assholes in that direction.”
“What’s your plan?” said Grace. “My father knows we’re here. I’m sure of it.”
“Reckon so,” said Nate, again. “But he still doesn’t hold all the pieces. He doesn’t know about Reiko. Or Saveria. He knows we were on Pluto, and nothing after that. Hell, he doesn’t even know we’ve got a survivor aboard.”
“Providence?” Grace shook her head. “She won’t be the same.”
“None of us will,” said Nate. “Thing is, Kazuo will flail about. Trying to find our jump signature. He doesn’t know we’ve got an AI transponder. I’m willing to bet he’d not figure on us moving for Mercury. Only the suicidally insane would do that.”
“Sounds like us,” said Grace. She thought for a minute. “He still doesn’t know about the Cantor. He won’t believe we died in the explosion that consumed Chad’s facility on Pluto—”
“Shame.”
“—but he’s likely to think we ran.” She frowned. “Where would the emperor run?”
“Ganymede,” said Nate.
“What’s there?”
“Pirates,” said Nate. He smiled at the window. “Thieves, too.” He glanced at Grace. “I should take you to my home town someday.”
“Sounds idyllic,” said Grace. “What’s the plan for Mercury?”
“Nothing,” said Nate.
“You what?” said Grace.
He turned on his couch, looking right at her. Like he was looking at her soul. “Do you trust me?”
“I … yes. With my life. With my everything.” She frowned. Wait a minute. “What are you up to, Nathan Chevell? You only ask me that when you’re about to do something stupid.”
“It’s not stupid,” said Nate. He keyed his console, charting a course. “Here’s Cunt Reiko’s course.”
“Cunt Reiko?” said Grace.
“Kohl came up with it,” said Nate. “It’s growing on me. Anyway. We’re not going to Ganymede. You can see here,” he pointed to the holo, a jagged line showing the drive signature of the shuttle ahead of them, “the shuttle is trying to do what we’re doing. It’s avoiding detection.”
“Could be avoiding Empire forces,” said Grace.
Nate shook his head. “It’s got an Empire transponder. Nothing to fear. And Reiko looks … real. She looks real, Grace. She could walk aboard any refugee vessel without anyone looking at her sideways.”
“Which means, she doesn’t want to tangle with her fellow constructs,” said Grace.
“Or, only on her own terms,” said Nate. “Which puts her at Mercury, on this raggedy-ass course. And here we are, trying to follow her. I say, fuck it, and punch the drives hard.”
“Are you going to tell me you can see the future again?” said Grace.
“Yes,” said Nate. “Because I can.”
“You’re as reliable as a magic eight ball,” said Grace.
Nate waved his hand side-to-side. “A little more accurate on Tuesdays.”
“Is it Tuesday?”
“No.” Nate nodded at the hard black. “But I can tell you, Mercury is where we need to be.” He glanced at her. “I can also tell you the attack didn’t come from Mercury.”
Grace blinked at him. “Say that again.”
“The attack didn’t come from Mercury,” said Nate. “A whole assload of ships came to Earth. They jumped in, Grace. From out there somewhere.” He shook his head. “No home-team advantage.”
Grace wanted to hit herself. “Why didn’t I see that?”
“Two reasons I can think of,” said Nate. “First is, there’s been a lot going on.”
“Second, I was knocked out?”
“No,” said Nate. “You can’t see the future. Gives me an edge.” He winked.
“Do not wink at me, Nate.” But she felt the confidence/hope from him, and felt an answering grin touch her lips.
Nate grinned right back. “Can’t help myself,” he said. “Now, El tells me we’ll all die if I pilot the Tyche. So, I think it’s up to you.”
“Wasn’t planning on letting you touch the sticks,” said Grace.
“I’m the captain,” said Nate, tone hurt.
“Keep telling yourself that,” she said.
• • •
‘Punching the drives’ was more optimistic than what Nate had in mind. Steady burn, 3Gs in, spin the hull, then 3Gs braking burn, but all in a straight line. Grace had said why not a harder burn and Nate had said because El will hemorrhage and die. Grace had looked down, abashed.
3Gs still put them on Mercury ahead of the shuttle, if it kept jinking its course.
Earth was behind them. Grace pointed the
Tyche’s cams at Venus as they passed, seeing the cracked domes, no sign of human life. The crazy thing was, they’d received no contact. No machine had reached out to check their transponder. It was like they didn’t matter.
That, or they were very, very lucky.
Braking burn to Mercury finished, Grace spun the ship to face the gray planet. Everyone figured Mercury was red, no doubt because it was close to Sol, but no. It was a burnt cinder, the surface baked eternally by the sun’s harsh glare. Grace was ready for the ashen surface, but she wasn’t prepared for the beauty of the solar collectors that reached out like a million fine feathers from the surface.
“Holy shit,” she said.
“It’s something,” agreed Nate. “Been here before. Just to see, you know? Back then, the Guild was present.” He nodded to the Tyche’s flight deck holo, which highlighted a cloud of debris far above Mercury. “There used to be a station.”
“The machines built this?”
“Yeah,” said Nate. “Claimed Mercury as their own. Put up the solar collectors. Not like there’s a shortage of light here.”
Grace nodded. “Makes sense. I read somewhere a day on Mercury is over fourteen hundred hours.”
Nate nodded. “Like a Monday on Earth.”
She laughed. “Just like that.” She hovered a hand over her console. “I figured a LIDAR scan. Look for a place to land.”
Nate shook his head. “No need. Over there.” He pointed to the base of one massive solar collector on the holo. “That one.”
This far out, it looked like a strand of hair, but the Tyche’s camera assured her the base of it was over a klick wide. A klick seemed barely enough to support such a thing, but hell. The planet’s gravity was less than half Earth’s. And it wasn’t like Grace was an Engineer. “How do you know? And don’t say ‘I can see the future.’ That shit is wearing thin.”
“Okay,” said Nate.
She waited. “That’s it?”
“Well,” he said, spreading his hands. “It is what it is.”
“For fuck’s sake,” she said. But Grace pointed the Tyche, readying the ship for landing. There was barely any atmosphere, trace gasses at best. The solar collector was passing into the night side of the planet. Might be over four hundred C now, but in a short time it’d be almost two hundred below. She readied the Tyche’s PDCs, expecting hard contact.
Nate turned them off. “Won’t be needing those.”
“More see-the-future bullshit?” she said.
“No,” said Nate. “Well, yes, but it’s also good sense. We come in, fangs out, and anything there will turn us into ionized gas. Guns in our holsters and they’ll think we’ve got a different purpose than war.”
Grace made a growling sound in her throat. “I don’t like it.”
“Not much about the past week I’ve liked either,” said Nate.
“We’ll die,” she offered.
“Might,” he agreed. “But not today. Pretty sure, anyway.”
“You’re the most annoying man I’ve ever met,” said Grace.
“It’s one of my charms,” he said. “Heads up, though. Don’t crash the ship. Doubt we’ll get a ride off here that can take humans.”
“You want to fly?” she said.
“Yes.”
“It was a rhetorical question,” Grace said. The planet loomed, filling the windscreen as they approached. Everything below them appeared dead, nothing moving. Nothing alive, the voices of living minds absent. The solar collectors were massive, silver things, the bases embedded in the crust of the planet. She brought the ship lower, Endless fields holding them above the surface.
Still nothing. No welcoming party. No missiles. The radio was silent. Nothing painted the hull with coherent light. Total emptiness. Grace wanted to turn the Tyche’s RADAR and LIDAR on. She wanted to know what the ship saw. But Nate was right. No sense in waking up a sleeping dragon. Not until they prepared for the shuttle’s arrival. Whatever that entailed.
The ship settled on the crust. “Perfect landing,” she said.
“Exactly so,” said Nate. “Let’s get Kohl.”
• • •
Grace stood between Kohl and Nate. It felt like they’d shared this positioning so often, it was a deep groove. Comfortable. Kohl’s size and strength. Nate’s confidence and care. Her, in the middle. What are you doing here, Grace? There’s no place on a machine planet for you. She shook her head. Saveria was being brought here. The least she could do was prepare a warm welcome for machine Reiko.
Last check of their ship suit seals complete, she opened the door. The blinding glare of the setting sun was dimmed by her visor, her suit protecting her. The comm net they shared showed interference from the sun. Sol might be a life giver to Earth, but the star was a death dealer to Mercury. Nothing wanted to live here.
Except machines.
As her eyes adjusted to the filtered image provided by her visor, she saw the planet beneath them, dour, rocky, and gray. The solar collector stood, a massive structure that reached into the heavens. Her mind shied at the size. And it was just one. The machines had built so many around their home.
She looked to the planet, taking a step out. Grace’s boots crunched on gravel and rock. It felt like a mountain pass, except nothing green grew. No water. Nothing but death.
“Fuck this place sucks,” said Kohl. “Why we out here, Cap?”
“Reasons,” said Nate, sauntering forward. He looked up at the solar collector. “They built to impress, didn’t they?”
“Reckon,” said Kohl. “Should we blow it up?”
“What? Hell, no,” said Nate. “No, we’re looking for something.”
“What?” said Grace. “Why are we here, Cap?”
“Not sure,” said Nate, his voice distant.
“Great,” said Kohl. He brought his railgun out on its mount, the weapon sliding into his hands. “Let me know who I should shoot.”
“That’s it,” said Nate. “It’s not a ‘what.’ It’s a ‘who.’”
“No one’s alive here,” said Grace. “Everything is dead.”
“Not quite,” said Nate. He bent over, picking something up. He held it out to her. It was a mechanical hand, the kind that came off the machines they’d fought. Metal, shorn at one end.
Kohl leaned closer. “Seems a lot of effort to come here and meet him,” he said. “Where’s the rest of it?”
“Not this one. But where there’s one, there’s more.” Nate tossed the hand aside. “Over … there.” He trudged away, Grace following.
They headed toward the lip of a decline, a hollow in the ground. The far side looked a klick or more away, a shallow depression that might have fancied itself a lake on a different planet. Nate paused on the edge, waiting for them to catch up.
Kohl made it there first. “Well, shit.”
Grace quickened her pace, then slowed as what was in the pit came into view.
Bodies. Hundreds and hundreds of bodies. Her eyes made little sense of it at first, then she picked out the differences. There was a cascade of AI machines, metal frames coated with dust. So many of them. Broken. Damaged. Shells cracked, power cells ruptured. Mass destruction.
A few of the forms Grace made out to be human. Mummified bodies inside ship suits, Guild emblems alongside others wearing Old Empire insignia. Where the bodies weren’t mummified, they were scorched, desiccated, or dust, nothing but the rigor of the suits holding form. The suits had holes, or rents, or were torn asunder.
Nate set off into the pit.
“Nate,” said Grace. She wanted to call him back from so much destruction.
He looked at her. “It’s okay,” he said. “We missed this party.” He turned, stepping carefully as he went down the slope. After a while, he stopped, bending over. “Kohl.”
“Cap?”
“Something heavy here. Needs lifting.”
Kohl shucked his railgun. “I’m so glad I came.” But he trudged after Nate, Grace following, keeping a rearguard.
/> When she reached them, Kohl was already struggling to heft the ‘heavy thing.’ Grace felt shocked at what she saw as the dust sloughed off the body. Gold glinted in the fading light as Kohl and Nate lifted a body. A man made entirely of golden metal. A single, golden warrior, amid this field of so many others.
Grace reached out to touch the figure. A small hole was in its breastplate, no doubt damage underneath. The metal of its body was familiar. As familiar as her face. Grace reached out to touch Nate, her fingers over the suit protecting his augmented arm. “They’re … like you,” she said.
“Yep,” he said. “More fucking Old Empire secrets, hey?”
They made their way back to the Tyche, dragging the remains of a sun warrior with them. A machine made of the same golden metal as Nate’s arm and leg.
CHAPTER TWELVE
HOPE STARED AT the golden man. It was clearly a man, with a bigger chest and tapered waist. She was sure when he woke up, he’d speak with a deep voice, full of milk and honey.
“I say we kill it,” said Kohl. He bent over, looking into the golden man’s face. The golden man was wrapped in the same chains Hope had suspended Reiko 2.0 in. Golden Man’s head lolled to one side, flakes of sand and ash embedded in all the joints. But the gold metal itself looked good as the day it was fabricated. Hope had used her rig to examine the metal, and found the surface coated an array of self-cleaning molecules. Hydrophobic particles nestled alongside ultra-smooth metal. Perfect, just like the day it was made. Just like the cap’s arm.
Its face looked like a mannequin’s, perfect, smooth, human-like. But the eyes were black glass, and a hinge along its jaw suggested it could open its mouth. No soft lips. A beautiful robot, but a robot just the same.
Speaking of the cap, he was here, lounging in Hope’s acceleration couch. Grace sat atop the reactor, legs crossed. El was still back in medbay. Ebony Drake was ‘guarding the airlock,’ which Hope suspected was secret code for kill any death robots. Providence was nestled next to one of the drive cowls, a small personal console in her hands.
Hope had found Providence to be smart, and eager for work that might help her forget she was an orphan. So, Hope had told her Reiko 2.0 had scrambled the ship’s systems. Broken weapons calibration, altered error readouts, the whole thing. Fixing it wasn’t hard, but it was time-consuming, and Hope didn’t have a lot of free time.
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