Vigilante Series 2: Nebula Vigilante

by T. Jackson King

  And yet, his choice to become a cyborg was imperfect.

  Even in his dreams, caring memories returned to haunt Matt. The memory of his dead childhood. The memory of his dead pet. The memory of his dead love Helen. Along with memories of implacable aliens doing unmentionable things to helpless people all across the galaxy. Like rude strangers, the dream memories accosted him. But there was only one of him and billions of needy people. What could he—

  “Matt?”

  A strange image invaded his dream universe. An image of fiery clouds, lightning, and resonant song that both uplifted and frightened him. An image—

  He blinked, coming to awareness in normal human mode. Not in ocean-time, thank goodness. Matt opened his eyes, saw the pale blue ceiling of his stateroom, and looked left to the voice he had heard. To his new love, Eliana Antigone Themistocles. She’d taken the time to brush out her waist-long black hair, apply rose-colored lipstick to pale white lips and change into a green Vietnamese cheongsam style dress. He half-smiled at the woman he hoped would not leave him, would not be lost like all the people he had previously cared for.

  “How long since I passed out?

  Eliana’s concerned expression eased. She leaned forward to touch his left arm as it lay atop a silken sheet. “Three hours. I told Mata Hari to go ahead and head for Zeta Serpentis. We passed the heliopause an hour ago and are now in Translation space-time. Do you hurt, Matt?”

  She cared for him. In truth, she loved him, as she had told her brother Ioannis the Despot of the human colony on Halcyon when she had refused to return to the patriarchal control of her brother, their younger brother Konstantinos and scheming relatives. It had surprised and pleased him when she chose being with him over working as a “tame” Molecular Geneticist for the Greek humans and the native Derindl hominids whose world was occupied by Mother Trees that existed in symbiosis with the Derindl. He had so little experience of true loving, of companionship by choice. He gave her a happy smile.

  “Nope. Feeling very good, really. Guess I needed the rest and recuperation,” he said, mentally querying his nanocube databytes to confirm their analysis matched his. Being used to internal “systems analysis” was a part of being a cyborg. As was seeing in infrared, ultraviolet, gamma rays and even radio waves when he activated the nanoware in his contact lenses. “You? Did Mata Hari help you get me here?”

  “Yes, she was really—”

  “Matthew.” A human-size holosphere took form to the side of Eliana, near the foot of their bed platform. Mata Hari herself took form in it, but not dressed in her Victorian lace spy dress. Instead, she appeared as a black-skinned, nearly nude Barbarian Queen. She lifted a hand to languidly finger a necklace of giant white pearls, with a central black pearl as large as a knuckle. “What about me?” she said softly. “I arranged for the floater sled to waft you down the Spine hallway to your oh-so-private stateroom. Which of course is criss-crossed by my lightbeam sensors array.”

  Eliana flinched at the sudden appearance of low power red laser beams crossing all parts of his stateroom, including a few dozen that touched Matt’s bare chest, arms and head. He just sighed.

  “Jealous, my lady? Yes, I love Eliana. And I also . . . cherish you, dearest one.” Mata Hari raised one eyebrow. “But you already know my organic condition thanks to your continuous monitoring of me, whether here onboard ship or in Suit outside ship. Thanks to your tachyonic comlink and senses, we are never apart. Right?”

  Mata Hari the Barbarian Queen crossed arms under her full breasts and went “Hmmph! You take me for granted.”

  Eliana bit her lip to avoid laughing. Matt gave thanks that his AI partner was a rapid learner of emotionality. And of how a naked woman could distract almost any man from asking pointed questions.

  “There’s a problem. Or several problems. What are they, dear partner?” he queried Mata Hari.

  With a snap of her long fingers Mata Hari changed her holo image to the Victorian spy look, now fully clothed and appearing a trifle impatient.

  “Zeta Serpentis lies just 75 light years from Earth’s Sol and at a diagonal vector from where we were at the F3V star,” Mata Hari said. “That means another ten hours of Alcubierre Translation time before we materialize. I need further guidance on simple matters and on complex ones.”

  Matt reached up to squeeze Eliana’s warm hand, pulled himself into sitting, then nodded to his other partner. “What simple matters?”

  Mata Hari’s black eyes focused on his. “Do we materialize at the F2V white star’s heliopause boundary, which will alert every starship and Port facility outfitted with a gravity wave detector? Or do we materialize closer in, close enough to rattle some coffee cups in that casino dome on Omega?” She smiled at him, knowing he would appreciate her command of human vernacular speech. “Or do we try another approach?”

  Matt recalled his arrival at Omega as the personal Guard to a gaggle of methane-breathing tentacles. There had been seventeen freighters and private staryachts in orbit, with frequent shuttle traffic down to the Port arrival facility that sat like a small tent next to the three kilometer wide geodesic dome that housed all the lifeforms working, playing and hoping for more riches at the galaxy’s premier gambling establishment. While there was an Anarchate commercial office sitting beside the Tachyon Pylon that gave everyone easy access to interstellar fund transfers and mercantile demands, there had not been any Anarchate battleglobe in orbit or on station elsewhere in the six planet system.

  “We arrive at the heliopause just like normal traffic, we emit a counterfeit ID beacon, we adopt the common main tube starship with two pontoon outrigger tubes configuration, and pretend to be the private yacht of a human optoelectronics manufacturer,” he said thoughtfully. “You can pick some name and image from your Library of current geopolitical Big Names, right?”

  “I can,” Mata Hari said, fingering her white pearl necklace. “And I can make the camouflage changes you suggest. Second simple question. Your organic partner Eliana—do I fabricate a combat suit for her? If she accompanies you downplanet, she will need better protection than a skintight vacsuit, a machete and a low power laser gun.”

  Good point. “Yes, fabricate a basic combat suit for her, with the usual adaptive optics crystal coatings, an ablative layer and standard ceramic armor underneath. No need for a combat exoskeleton. But I do think you should outfit her helmet with a tachyon comlink that automatically connects with you and me, and a waist belt of nanoDefense shells with ultrasonic viber. And yeah, give her a cutdown Magnum sidearm—once she has taken lessons from you at our shipboard target range. That okay with you, Eliana?”

  The spare, fine-boned and sculptured face of his albino lover nodded slowly, looking from him to Mata Hari and back to him. She brushed at her ebony black hair. “Matt, I’ve never killed anyone in my life. Will I have to kill if I travel with you?”

  “Not if I can help it,” he said sincerely. “But the Anarchate is a dangerous galaxy. Anyone who . . . looks defenseless will draw tech scavengers and genome harvesters. Being combat suited and carrying a decent sidearm will protect you simply by being present on your bodyform. Understand?”

  “Understood, Matthew my love.” She smiled at him and squeezed his hand. Then she leaned over and kissed his cheek. It was such a simple sign of affection that he nearly cried.

  Instead, he looked at the holo of Mata Hari. “Those are the simple matters. What is complex?”

  His AI partner, the product of an alien civilization hundreds of thousands of years old, gave him a passable human-style smile. “What do we do when we arrive in orbit about Omega?”

  Matt eyed Eliana, seeing identical curiosity in her jade green eyes.

  “Vengeance,” he said. “For Helen Sayinga Trinh and thousands of other bond-slaves who work for the casino.” He paused, recalling the indignation of her casino Owners who did not wish to lose their natural gravity baccarat dealer when they were asked the buyout price for her contract. The reply of two million platinum St
andards was given by a bear-like alien with a sly smile. They had escaped in an outbound freighter two days later, during her morning sleep time.

  Eliana blinked, understanding immediately. Mata Hari tilted her amber-skinned, aquiline head to one side. “Vengeance for what purpose, Matthew?”

  “To deliver a lesson to the Anarchate that owning people through bond slavery is wrong. That selling cloneslaves is utterly obscene. And that some people will fight against it. I hope to create a galaxy-wide tachlink rumor mill of poor people trying to guess what might this dangerous Matt Dragoneaux do next?” He paused, thinking deeper about how to asymmetrically conduct a war campaign against a galaxy-wide entity. “And to cause the Anarchate to dispatch Nova battleglobes to similar large commercial and industrial star systems around the galaxy, thus reducing their ability to mass a naval fleet for action against our fleet.”

  Mata Hari blinked even as Eliana murmured “What fleet of ours?”

  He grinned, then swung his legs off the bed platform and headed for the suite’s door to the Spine hallway, naked as the day he was born. “We will have a fleet. Eventually. Maybe even before we arrive in the Small Magellanic Cloud.” He stopped and looked back at the puzzled expressions of both Eliana and Mata Hari. “Coming my dear? And both of you should understand that just because billions of sapients comply with the way things are now, does not mean they will always accept the status quo. Peaceful most people are, even when oppressed. But if they see someone, anyone, successfully challenging the authorities, why, for humans at least, that is an incitement to rebellion.”

  Eliana joined him as they walked the hallway heading for the commissary room that lay between his suite and the Bridge. Food they both needed. Combat training Eliana needed. And skull-to-skull scheming he needed to do with Mata Hari, to fine tune the elements of his intention to teach the Omega people-owners and the Anarchate a lesson about the danger of owning thinking people. Who knows, maybe some of the self-aware AIs that ran most things behind the scenes would be interested in insurrection. Stranger things had happened in human and alien history.

  Matt smiled, internally and externally. At last, a Vigilante job worth the doing!

  They took the Omega Port’s shuttle down to the Arrival Hall that lay just outside the casino dome, leaving Mata Hari to continue the pretense of being an super-yacht owned by a weird biped who had too many Standards to spend and too much arrogance to stay home. There were many like Howard Demitri Trimestes on Omega, the super-rich of at least 30 species, based on the vid spy-cams of the casino that Mata Hari had tapped into using her superior mind, and sloppy programming of the central gaming computer. It had no self-awareness, unlike the Port AI that needed sentience in order to multi-task with thinking organics. And, Matt suspected, the casino Owners very likely did not want a mouthy AI questioning them on why so many gambling games were rigged against payouts, unless they were minor amounts to be given in front of an audience.

  Eliana, dressed in a yellow combat suit adorned with the Running Wolf motif of his own suit, had pushed back her helmet now that they were in the decent oxy-nitro air of the Arrival Hall. She looked at the bustle of a hundred or more sapients either arriving or departing to their orbital transport. Then she hugged his arm to her side. Matt, wearing Suit with his helmet faceplate clear to anyone’s view, glanced at her.

  “Yes?”

  “You are . . . this Howard person. But my real name was given by Mata Hari to the Port AI. Why Matt? Won’t someone here have heard about me and you and Halcyon?”

  He guided them toward the tall hallway that led to the casino dome, noticing just two Anarchate Guardians dressed in green military uniforms who sat behind a distant computable, partly in the shadows, doing their best not to disturb the rich aliens who expected perfect security with no sign of disturbance, dirt, beggars or loud military types who did not know the aliens were their natural betters. At everything. The casino Owners clearly did not want to give the impression that anything could “go wrong” on Omega, so they kept the Anarchate security presence restricted to the Arrival Hall and to their pylon office where incoming and outgoing tachyon messages could be monitored for security lapses and emergencies.

  “You have not done covert work before, Eliana, so I thought it best for you to use your real name. While Sigma Puppis and Zeta Serpentis are in the same part of Orion Arm, the destruction of a Nova-class battleglobe by an unknown starship is not something the Anarchate is likely to share with anyone outside of Combat Command. The Intelligence AI knew of us, of course. But elsewhere on the galactic tachnet that links worlds and galactic arms via Tachyon Pylons, the news that refers to Halcyon is likely to be commercial, how the Halicene Conglomerate screwed up a contract and was ordered by the Anarchate to depart Sigma Puppis system.” He considered further her question as they joined three dozen aliens of various legs, tentacles, morphoforms and loudness as they all headed for the brightly illuminated entrance to the casino dome. “So unless you chat up a Halicene merchant, it is unlikely anyone will even know you come from Sigma Puppis, let alone had a hand in pissing off Commander Chai, who became shipwrecked on Autarch Dreedle’s home world. Okay?”

  Eliana smiled, nodded, and her walk became more confident, the movement suggestive of the very smart molecular geneticist that she was. Good!

  Their entry into the open space of the casino dome was anticlimactic. A few clouds floated high overhead, indicative of the ambient moisture level in the giant dome and the desire of its Owners to imitate a natural habitat. Nearby ponds, fountains and winding garden pathways broke up the space between the blocks, domes and pyramid shapes of multiple gambling sites, restaurants, pleasure halls, stores with high value trinkets for sale to the super-rich of this half of home galaxy, and the blue uniforms of people who served as bondGuides for any question asked by any visitor. The concept of Servant class was long established in the Anarchate and so, despite the immense datafiles of suit-worn minicomps, many visiting aliens preferred an organic source to answer their questions about the casino. Of course there were holo maps near the main entrance and at major intersections, but the casino Owners had long ago aimed to create a luxury zone where living people of all species served as Servants at the beck and call of any visitor. With all visitors being verified as having billion Standard or better resources, the casino could afford to hire bondServants who both knew their place, and who hoped for giant tips if they . . . served properly the appetites of the alien super-rich. The place had disgusted Matt when he arrived as a Protector for a methane-breathing gaggle of tentacles. Now, having seen life in the Anarchate from the Flesh Markets of Alkalurops to this resort where everything could be bought, he was again reminded of the vengeance he sought by coming to Zeta Serpentis.

  “Mata Hari,” he called over Suit’s tachlink, knowing that Eliana would also hear. “Have your Nanoshell remotes infiltrated all parts of the casino dome and the pylon box of the Anarchate Guardians?”

  “Yes, Matthew,” his AI partner said from orbit. “It was a simple matter to camouflage a Defense sled as an automated optoelectronics package for use by the dome’s Repair facility. Your purpose?”

  Matt pulled lightly on Eliana’s arm so that they walked down a lightly occupied garden pathway, with a high shrub wall on the left and a small pond with alien dragonflies flitting over the blue waters as some kind of alien fish stealthily hunted the flies when they got too close to the water’s surface. When a fish tongue shot up to ensnare a dragonfly, he activated Suit’s faceplate holo to orient himself to the building placements, purposes and location of one site that he blinked into red dot importance. With a twig of his alpha brain rhythms to alert Suit to head that way, Matt cleared the holo so he could see the path ahead, but activated the left and right panels of faceplate to show energy emissions and spy beams on the left, while weapons blisters and mobile personal arms showed on the right. Just because the Owners desired a peaceful appearance did not mean every super-rich alien came here with peaceful intentio
ns. He spoke to both his partners.

  “Eliana, be ready to lower your suit helmet when I give the word,” he said, wondering how long it would take the casino’s crowd control gas to fill the vast dome—something he would not allow. “Mata Hari, what is the exact count of organic lifeforms in and near the dome, the number of bondServants in employment, the number of species represented by all lifeforms, any lifeform that is not oxy-nitro based, the number of starships in orbit, and how many serious combat suits like mine are present anywhere on Omega?”

  “Moment,” she said. “There are 6,114 organic sapients on Omega, all of them located within three kilometers of your location. Of that number, 1,048 are bondServants belonging to fourteen different species. The rest are visitors.” She paused. “Human components of the total working lifeforms are 152 bondServants, while two casino Owners and two super-rich humans are also present. Total species on Omega are 31, with four of them being methane or chlorine breathers.” A second briefer pause happened. “There are 23 starships in orbit, most of them recent arrivals, from yachts to supply freighters. As for combat suits that could pose a threat, there are two Guardian combat types based in the Guardian box next to the Tachyon Pylon. Total enforcement personnel among the 6,114 sapients are 44, counting the Guardians in suits, at the Arrival Hall and in the barracks that you are heading for.”

  “Matt, are we going into battle?” Eliana asked, a tone of concern in her voice.

  “Not if I can help it,” he said. “But I had us arrive in person, versus by Remote, for several reasons. One, for you to see this place that I plan to destroy in four hours.” She gasped. “Second, to locate the Guardians barracks and freeze its doors so no Guardian can exit when Mata Hari arrives overhead to recover us. And third . . . I wanted to physically see the place and Owners who once treated my dead lover Helen as if she were simply property, bond property that would jump here and serve there upon their orders.” He grimaced inside Suit’s helmet, noticing and storing the locations of the few ultrasonic crowd control blisters and the numerous gas emitters for putting the super-rich into a quiet sleep while some emergency was resolved. He turned to face Eliana, his faceplate clear, even as a cyborg part of him noted they had arrived just meters from the main entrance to the Guardian barracks.