Mecha Rogue

by Brett Patton

  But when Matt tried to imagine a future with her, his vision blurred. Things wouldn’t resolve. There always seemed to be something between them. First Cadet Kyle Peterov. Then Rayder.

  No excuses now, he told himself.

  “I’m sorry,” Matt told her. “It’s just that—”

  “It’s just that you’re an asshole,” Michelle said, with real heat. She didn’t turn around.

  Matt felt a red-hot stab of anger, and he clenched his fists. He had to grit his teeth to keep from biting off a sharp comment. More Mesh hangover. It tweaked your emotions. Had to keep that in mind.

  Soto went to the window to look down with Michelle. He held a small snifter of some golden liquid he’d gotten from the bar. Matt’s gorge rose. How could he drink now?

  But Soto was always like that. Soto didn’t waver. Soto was tough, gristly, made of muscle and determination. Even in his forties, he was a pinnacle of fitness. Washboard abs showed even under his Mecha Corps uniform. Bulging biceps strained the limit of the fabric. Matt could see Michelle easily going for someone like him, even though he was twice their age.

  Would that happen? On Eridani? They were supposed to be going to some Mecha Corps retreat overlooking Newhome Basin. And if not Soto, what about the other Corps who were undoubtedly there?

  Always something in the way.

  Matt sighed and looked down at the swelling city. It was late in the afternoon, and shadows stretched long from Newhome’s concentric rings of brilliant chrome-glass and white-stone buildings. The Capitol Plaza was a hilly green park at the very center of Newhome, ringed by wide canals and dotted with neoclassical buildings housing the Universal Union Congress, its High Court, the Union’s most important monuments, and the Prime Residence. It looked far too perfect and regular to be real.

  Sudden vertigo made Matt sway, but he forced himself to stay there and look down.

  “You’re right,” he told Michelle.

  Michelle said nothing. Her expression, visible in the reflection from the window, remained set and hard. After a time, though, her lips twitched into a smile.

  “Yes,” she said. “I am.”

  The trio watched the rest of the way in silence as the space elevator hurtled down toward Newhome.

  * * *

  A whisper-quiet electric shuttle took the Corps to a resort that sprawled atop a hill overlooking Newhome. In the gathering twilight, the city was a vision in porcelain white and green glass, towers soaring gracefully as they approached spires soaring nearly a kilometer high. At one edge of the city, Atlantis, Eridani’s largest ocean, fed canals that snaked through the outermost concentric rings of Newhome, glowing a pale teal from artificial light. Small personal watercraft and larger yachts peppered the canals, lit with pinpricks of brilliant white light. Low, purple-tinted clouds stood in banks off the edge of the shoreline, as if politely waiting for nightfall to move in. Above the clouds, the first stars had begun to speckle the sky, and two of Eridani’s five moons were visible as tiny crescents.

  “It’s beautiful,” Michelle said.

  The resort itself was a collection of low, post-and-beam buildings of raw native wood and glass. A single stone slab outside read MECHA CORPS 1: SHANGRI-LA.

  “Not subtle, are they?” Soto asked, nodding at the sign.

  It’s not a heroes’ reward, Matt told himself. It’s a bribe. Forget your questions, here in the lap of luxury. Do your job, and you can live like this for a time. They technically had an entire week off. Matt had no idea what he would do.

  Inside, graceful, sculpted furniture and abstract art were the order of the day. The lobby looked out over carefully pruned grounds of Eridani’s native, spiky, purple-tinged foliage, with a lighted turquoise pool the size of a small lake, dim-lit gazebos perfect for a romantic tryst, and an open-air bar at the edge of the hill overlooking Newhome.

  On the grounds, figures moved here and there, dressed in comfortable, casual clothes. But the way they moved—the furtiveness, the caution—told Matt they were Mecha Corps like themselves, or high-ranking Union military.

  An otherworldly beautiful receptionist greeted the trio and called a pair of friends to show them to their rooms. Matt looked disappointedly as Michelle and Soto were escorted away down separate wood-paneled halls, and he was directed down yet another. He’d hoped to have a room closer to hers.

  At his door, Matt’s host pressed a wood-and-aluminum access card into his hand, and invited him to call her personal number there for anything. She was a slim, blond-haired woman with sky-blue eyes, attractive in a mathematically perfect way. Matt was too tired to play to her act. All he wanted to do was sleep. He thanked her absently, and she gave him an understanding smile in return.

  His room was huge, at least a hundred square meters in size. On one side, a wall of glass framed Newhome like a photo. Another wall of pale wood unfolded into a full bar, and an inset wallscreen showed neutral scenes of Eridani nature. The bed was so large that eight people could comfortably sleep in it, and the bathroom alone was larger than any quarters Matt had ever been assigned.

  “Definitely a bribe,” he said to himself. But at the moment, it didn’t matter. The bed was perfect, like falling into a cloud.

  * * *

  Matt woke the next day to his Perfect Record. His father’s gift, and his curse—the ability to seamlessly recall every single moment of his life.

  In his memory, Matt was grappling with Rayder on Jotunheim, the lost planet of the HuMax. Rayder held Matt’s Mecha in an agonizing grip, dangling Matt over the edge of a chasm cut into the planet’s burning core. “Who made the HuMax?” Rayder asked, his violet and yellow eyes burning with superhuman passion. “None other than your precious Union.”

  The Union hiding evidence of HuMax survival was one thing, but the Union creating HuMax? He couldn’t believe it. The Union was formed as a response to HuMax aggression. The Union had saved humanity. Everyone knew that.

  Just a trick to save himself, Matt thought. And it still didn’t work. In his moment of triumph, Rayder had let his guard down. Matt Merged with Rayder’s Mecha and toppled his adversary over the edge, ending the Corsair’s dreams of Union domination. And avenging his father’s death.

  The memory should have been a happy one, but Matt sat up in the too-soft bed, shaking with angst. All that time chasing Rayder, intent on ending his life. That had given him clarity and purpose. Rayder’s death had cast his whole future into disarray.

  It was nearly noon by the time Matt made it to Pleasure Dome Restaurant. It was raised one story above Mecha Corps’ Shangri-La, with a panoramic view from the gray-green sea to the broad, undeveloped valleys to the west of Newhome. Fluffy cirrus clouds cut broad swaths in the deep blue sky, making the whole scene look like an overly retouched image.

  Around him, couples and small groups sat at tables and talked in low, polite tones. Matt was terrified. This was the kind of place he’d only read about. Where you had to have manners. Where there were protocols and pleasantries. He had no idea how to behave. He’d never been to a place like this before.

  He picked up a leather-bound book and scanned a menu printed on real paper. He didn’t know what most of the dishes were. What the hell was a club Reuben? Or steak Tataki? The brief descriptions below the menu items were flowery and vague. Coming from Union Insta-Pak rations and “what we got is what you eat” in his refugee days, it was overwhelming.

  The pounding in his skull swelled to a new crescendo. Matt gripped his head, willing the Mesh hangover a swift exit. He didn’t belong here.

  A waitress came to take his order. Another pretty girl. This one less otherworldly, with close-cropped black hair and a single silver earring, in Eridani’s sunburst crest.

  “Coming down off Mecha high?” she asked, giving Matt a friendly smile. They were probably paid to be friendly, Matt thought.

 
“Mesh hangover,” he said.

  “Is that what they call it now?” she asked. “We have some local herbal tonics that help ease the pain.”

  “You’re a Mecha pilot?”

  The woman’s eyes skittered away. “No.”

  Then how would you know if they worked? Matt wondered. But he didn’t need to bite her head off. She was just doing her job. He let her talk him into an evil-tasting glass of bile-colored liquid, and sat sipping the awful stuff. He looked in vain for Michelle and Soto, but they never entered the lounge.

  What he did see were other people, looking at him. At several tables, heads nodded in his direction, making their companions take quick glances at him. Some of them were assessing. Some of them were scared.

  Matt caught fragments of conversation: “Mecha star.” “Big shot.” “Show-off.” They were talking about him. Despite the Union and the Corps’ careful communications, word had gotten out about him—the first Demonrider.

  After lunch, Matt made himself explore the resort. It was beautiful, in that parklike way that overly designed spaces have. It reminded him a little of Aurora, the planet where he had gone to school.

  Matt ignored yelled invitations to join a half dozen others in the lake-sized pool, and walked quickly past the bar, where only the most hard-core drinkers sat in the middle of the day.

  Inside, he found an arcade, filled with virtualities. They used simplified versions of the Mecha interface suits and viewmasks. Matt ignored the whispers of the people around him as he connected into one called Mecha Corps: Final Adventure.

  Matt burst out laughing. It was just another rescue-the-ambassador scenario, running through the maze of a Union city to battle Corsairs armed with conventional weapons. There was no Mesh high. Nor was there a single challenge. He’d done more intense exercises at training camp. It couldn’t even compare to his time on Keller—

  Fighting those weird Corsair Mecha.

  The thought still unsettled him. Corsairs weren’t supposed to have Mecha. No other interstellar governmental organization besides the Union had biomechanical Mecha. Everyone knew that.

  Matt stripped out of the game suit and went back outside to the pool, nursing his gut-twisting unease. No matter what the Union said, Corsairs had Mecha now. Mecha such as he’d never seen, with a weapon he’d never experienced. Were they a result of Rayder’s capturing Hellions less than a year ago? Could they have cracked the code so fast, when even Union labs couldn’t unravel Dr. Salvatore Roth’s technological secrets?

  Matt shook his head. It seemed as though his life was nothing but questions. And it was clear the Union wanted him here at the resort so he wouldn’t have any desire to ask them.

  * * *

  The next few days were like walking through a dream. Matt’s Mesh hangover slowly abated, but the need to get back into the Demon grew. He found himself sketching little stick-figure Demons on the napkin fabric in the Pleasure Dome Lounge.

  Some days he met Michelle and Soto for breakfast; some days he didn’t. Even through their Mesh hangover, they both had that intent, serious Mecha Corps look. They didn’t doubt they were doing what was right and good. Even after Jotunheim and the Union cover-up, even after Keller and all the unresolved questions.

  Shangri-La offered a whole range of Newhome tours, via land, air, or sea. Matt went with Michelle and Soto to the Capitol Plaza, hoping to recapture that sense of awe he’d felt when he first arrived on Earth and saw the ruins of Cape Canaveral.

  Capitol Plaza was impressive. Ringed by towering skyscrapers and placid canals, it was more like a park than a plaza. Roman pillars fronted the grand entrance of the Congress Hall, above which was inscribed the Union motto: IN UNITY, ADVANCEMENT. IN DISCORD, DECAY.

  But the neoclassical buildings, massive monuments, and parklike grounds didn’t impress Matt. Even the festive crowds of tourists, clutching Union starburst flags, didn’t change his mood.

  The only thing that stirred his feelings was a massive, dull black slab of vitreous stone, as big as a football field. Set away from the other buildings among rolling hills of carefully cultivated Earth bluegrass and poplars, the slab was deeply scarred by fusion exhaust. On its side was a number: 100.

  Platform 100. Built to mark the landing place of the first shuttle from Earth, carried here inside the first Displacement Drive asteroid ship. Launches from Platform 99 on Earth were what built the asteroid ship and started the Expansion.

  At Platform 100, Michelle stopped and stared for a long time, her smiling face turning somber.

  “What’s the matter?” Matt asked her.

  Michelle shook her head. “Just thinking about how far we’ve come.”

  Matt nodded. Michelle was from Earth. This had special meaning for her. He remained silent and let her look. Maybe she was thinking of her parents, forever bound in their Earth jobs.

  Back at the resort that evening, Matt found Michelle sitting alone in the Shangri-La open-air bar, at a little table overlooking Newhome Valley. She looked wistfully out at the valley as an untouched glass of white wine sat in front of her. From this angle, the thin ribbon of the space elevator sliced a neat diagonal into the darkening sky. The passenger module was visible as a tiny pinprick of light, far up the ribbon.

  “Waiting for someone?” Matt asked.

  Michelle jumped, then turned and shook her head. Her eyes seemed to look through him, at something very far away. “No. Just . . . passing the time.”

  “Waiting to go back?”

  A sigh. “Just enjoying my time here, right now. You should try it sometime.”

  You’re enjoying it because this is all part of Mecha Corps, Matt thought. The reward for good corpspersons who don’t ask too many questions.

  But, for once, he was able to push that thought aside. It was okay. Michelle was all-in. She’d always been all-in. It’s what she was.

  “Have you thought about . . . are you going to be Mecha Corps the rest of your life?” Matt asked, finally.

  Michelle looked out across the city for a long time before responding, “Probably. But for the moment, it’s nice not to have to work so hard for a while. Don’t you get tired of working sometimes?”

  No, Matt thought. But was that true? Not really. He was living his life at a dead run. He didn’t have time to think about what he was doing.

  I don’t want to think about what I’m doing. There are already enough questions.

  “I don’t know,” he told her, finally.

  Michelle focused on him. Her blue eyes were still and clear, fixed on his own. She was waiting for something. Waiting for him.

  “Would you like to have dinner with me?” Matt asked.

  Michelle’s eyes widened. “Are you asking me out? On a date?”

  Was that what he was doing? Since Mecha Training Camp, to the hidden Mecha Base and through all their experience together in the Corps, their lives had been too breakneck to even think of dating. But now—

  “Yes. I am.”

  Michelle stood up, smiling, and offered Matt her arm. “I thought you’d never ask.”

  Matt took her arm. This was it. His chance.

  Michelle grinned up at him. For one moment, the world was perfect. “It’s just too bad we have to eat that—well, whatever that stuff is they’re feeding us at the Pleasure Dome.”

  Matt nodded. It was supposed to be haute cuisine, but he’d never developed a taste for it. Not as a refugee.

  There had to be other places to eat. The Newhome tour shuttle had passed through a number of little townships on the way up to the resort. They had to have restaurants.

  “Who said we have to?” he asked her, explaining his idea.

  “I don’t think we’re supposed to leave,” Michelle said.

  “We just did, this morning.”

  “I mean, besid
es the tours.”

  “You took out the universe’s greatest supervillain, but you’ll follow the rules now?” Matt teased.

  Michelle laughed. “You’re right.”

  “Come on,” he said, offering his hand. She took it and let him lead her through the grounds, out the gate, and down the smooth concrete roads to the nearest cluster of houses and apartments. It turned out to be a small village, with a main street, a market, a little touristy art gallery, a bar, and a single restaurant named From the Earth.

  Matt and Michelle shared a grin at the name and went in. As promised, the place featured a whole slew of old-Earth-type foods, heavy on the hamburgers and fries. Soon the two were diving happily into old-fashioned plastic baskets of grease-soaked food, under the bemused gaze of the owner of the place.

  “Much better!” Michelle said. “I was wondering who I’d have to kill to get a burger in the Corps.”

  Matt nodded. Even he knew what hamburger was, though the refugee ship version was made from vat-grown meat. The Corps was heavy on Insta-Paks and gloppy stuff that wouldn’t fly away in zero g.

  “This is fun,” he said.

  “You’re finally enjoying yourself?” Michelle asked, her eyes glittering in the low light of the restaurant.

  “It’s good being here. With you.”

  Michelle beamed, magnifying her beauty tenfold. Matt smiled back at her, feeling, just for a moment, as if he belonged. Maybe there was a future with her. With Mecha Corps or not.

  “We should do this every night,” he told her.

  Michelle nodded. “Yes!” Then her expression darkened, and she added, “Not tomorrow.”

  “Why?”

  Silence for a long time. Then: “I’m seeing Kyle.”

  Anger flared red-hot in Matt. Kyle Peterov. The Eridani senator’s son and former Mecha pilot. The guy who’d stolen Michelle away from him. The guy who’d tried to kill him, in the grip of Mesh rage. Of course he’d be here on Eridani. Probably working in a comfortable job Daddy had arranged for him.