by Scott Baron
Yep.
“While I’m sure we would all love to entertain your idea, Vince, their planet is far too fortified to approach for such an attack,” Sid pointed out.
Right over his head, Daisy silently laughed to herself.
“So there’s some good news and some bad news,” Daisy continued. “The bad news is the planet is heavily fortified and surrounded by a sizable force orbiting it. You can see the battle stations, cruisers, and that ring of what appear to be satellites of some sort. All of which provide them an ample defense.”
“And the good news?” Mrazich asked with a sigh.
“They’re far away. I mean really far away. That message warning them about our forces that the loyalists sent? It won’t reach them for years.”
“True,” Zed agreed, “but even so, when supplies stop coming back home they’ll come looking. We’ve already taken their fleet from them, but it appears they have many ships, and likely possess ample capacity to easily construct more. We have to stop them before they send a new fleet out. With the battle for Taangaar at hand, we really cannot afford to fight on yet another front.”
“But it would take them years to even learn of our actions,” Sid posited.
“Yes, but what if they managed to capture one of our ships, as we’ve done to theirs? We have to realize that is a possibility, however unlikely. And if so, what if that ship then used our superior tech and warped to their homeworld and warned them of our pending attack? No, we must move swiftly and decisively, while the element of surprise is still ours.”
“That’s asking a lot from our people, Zed,” Celeste said.
“I know it is. But it’s the only way to be sure.”
“Zed’s right,” Mrazich agreed. “We need to hit them hard, and we need to hit them fast. Everyone, coordinate with your Chithiid liaisons and their teams. We will begin the next phase of the mission to Taangaar straightaway.”
Daisy settled into her quarters, quite ready for a much-needed power nap, but first she needed to reach out to Maarl. She knew his men were eager to move forward after their victory against the Ra’az fleet. The question was whether they’d succeed on their home turf.
“Morale is exceptionally high, Daisy. My people are very motivated. There is an excitement among them I have not seen for a very long time,” he said over the video screen.
“I am glad to hear that, Maarl, and yes, the success of our fleet assault has provided a much-needed boost to everyone’s spirits. But how comes the placement of your men?”
“There are many thousand on the ground, spread at key locations, as well as dozens of ships hidden within the Ra’az fleet. There are also nearly a hundred additional craft waiting nearby, just outside of scanning range,” he informed her.
“That is excellent news, my friend. But I worry we may be premature and in need of further seeding the forces on the ground. While tens of thousands of men are a large amount, it is not much in this case, given the billions of people populating the planet.”
Maarl smiled broadly into his monitor.
“Your point is well taken, Daisy, but those men are not only there to fight. No. They were also inserted amongst our people to give hope. To start the rebellion organically from within. Our rebels will provide weapons and support, but those oppressed under the Ra’az and their loyalist servants will rise up in a great, angry mass. When that happens, numerically, they should crush the Ra’az once the battle stations in orbit are no longer a threat.”
“And that is where our teams come in.”
“Yes. Mark my words, Daisy. If you eliminate the threat of retaliation from above, my people will be more than capable of handling the invaders below.”
“I will relay the message to the commanders. The fleet is preparing for attack and should be ready to launch within hours. From then, we shall rely on not only our skill, but also on luck.”
“And I wish the best of luck to you, Daisy.”
“As I wish it for you, my friend.”
Chapter Eighteen
Daisy saw Vince coming down the corridor an hour later as she was on her way to see Commander Mrazich for a last-minute strategy pow-wow and update about their Chithiid allies. He had a slightly jittery vibe going, she noticed, which wasn’t his usual thing at all.
“What’s with Vince?” Sarah asked. “The poor guy looks all kinds of shaken up.”
I don’t know. He does seem a bit more fidgety than usual, but then again, it’s pretty normal to be nervous before you’re about to be thrust smack into the middle of a massive war.
“Yeah, but this feels like something else.”
Maybe I’ll grill him later, if the opportunity arises. For now, I’m just gonna let him do his thing.
“Hey, babe,” she said, planting a kiss on him when their paths finally crossed. “You good?”
“Yeah, all good,” he said. “You off on a mission?”
“If by mission you mean going to a meeting with Mrazich and Harkaway to update them on Maarl’s people’s status, then yes.”
“But you’re not launching yet, right?”
“No, not for a bit.”
“Okay, then. Well, I’ll let you get to it, but give me a shout when you’re done.”
“Will do,” Daisy replied warmly, planting another kiss on his eager lips before heading off to her meeting.
Well, whatever’s bugging him, at least it’s not me.
“You’ve got other stuff to worry about, anyway,” Sarah commented as Daisy stepped into the command center.
“Captain. Commander. Everything good?” she asked the two men.
“Copacetic, Daisy,” Harkaway answered. “Thanks for asking.”
“So, I spoke with Maarl,” she said, not wasting any time getting to the heart of the matter. “He said he’s confident in the men he has on the surface’s ability to raise an insurrection, and he is hopeful those posing as loyalists we have managed to insert into the battle stations will be able to disable the weapons systems aimed at the planet. But we’ll still need to do all we can to take out the orbiting battle stations as quickly as possible. Without those removed from the equation, there’s just too much of a chance they’ll find a way to fix them and rain down death on a sizable percentage of the Chithiid population at the first sign of trouble.”
“We’ve been thinking about that,” Commander Mrazich said. “While we’ll be doing all we can to knock out the Ra’az comms links between their ships and the surface, what we’ll also need is a distraction. Something to confuse the enemy and misdirect them.”
“And Mal has just the idea,” Harkaway added. “She’s said she will be able to warm up the remote drones and load them all into one of the captured freighters to bring them along on the mission. That way they can participate without needing a warp drive installed on each of them, and that’s a good thing, seeing as we don’t have any extras. Anyway, she’s also pretty sure she can have them transmit a scrambling signal. It won’t cover that large an area, but it’ll be something.”
“Seems like a solid plan, given our resources,” Daisy agreed. “And disrupting their comms will be a key part in all of this. We’ve seen it before, they won’t hesitate to kill their Chithiid servants if they think they’ve turned on them. But if their comms are cut off, they won’t know what’s happening on the surface. As a hive race, they need a consensus to act. If we play this right, for all intents and purposes, it should just look like a space-borne attack and nothing more.”
“Okay, then. Have Maarl’s men standing by to insert into the pre-designated facilities. I’m having the fleet prep to launch in four hours,” Mrazich said. “Be ready.”
“You know we will be,” she replied with a cocky grin.
Daisy found Vince loitering around the mess hall, pacing back and forth, talking to himself.
“Hey,” she called out, walking toward him.
“Hey,” he replied, smiling nervously at her.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “I mean, you k
now I try not to be that nagging girlfriend always asking what you’re thinking, but I’m kinda worried about you. You’ve been acting a little strange. Is everything all right?”
“Yeah, everything’s fine,” he replied, shifting his weight from foot to foot.
He looked around the room. Amazingly, it was nearly empty. The usual stampede of visitors from the fleet were busy prepping for the upcoming mission.
“Well,” he said, his hand digging in his pocket, “we’re about to go to war. Again. And things are going to get really crazy soon, and I’m worried if I don’t do this now, I may never get another chance.”
“What are you talking about, Vin––”
In one smooth motion, Vince dropped to one knee as he took a small pouch from his pocket. He reached inside and pulled out a small piece of coal, mounted in a bezel and hanging by a thin chain.
“Daisy, I know you don’t like artificially made things, and nowadays diamonds are grown easier than lettuce and are a dime a dozen, but this is a piece of genuine, nature-made Earth coal. An unfinished diamond, if you will.”
“An unfinished diamond?” she asked with a casual laugh that belied her racing pulse.
“Yeah. I just didn’t have the time to squeeze it into a diamond yet.”
“Vince, I don’t know what––”
“Daisy, will you marry me?”
“Hooooooly shit,” Sarah blurted inside Daisy’s head.
She grabbed him by the face and pulled him to his feet, latching onto his lips with a passionate kiss.
“So, should I take that as a yes?” he asked when she finally came up for air.
“Yes! Yes, yes, yes!” she answered, happy tears streaking her face as she took the lump of coal and slid the chain over her head. “It’s lovely, babe.”
“I’m glad you like it,” he said. “It was either that, or something that goes boom. Like a phased plasma rifle in the forty-watt range.”
“You know me so well,” she said, happy adrenaline flooding her veins.
“You have to tell him, Daze. It can’t wait any longer.”
I know, Sarah. Hang on to your bootstraps, it’s going to be a wild ride.
“So, Vince. There’s something that I’ve been meaning to tell you but just haven’t really had the right moment present itself,” she began.
“You’re not going to tell me you’ve been cheating on me with a cyborg, are you?”
“Hush, I’m trying to be serious, here.”
“Sorry. Shutting up.”
“So, the thing is, you know how I had that incident with my neuro-stim back aboard the Váli?”
“Yeah.”
“And you know how it kinda planted a whole mess of stuff in my head?”
“Obviously.”
“Well, there’s a little more to it than that.”
She paused, though not for dramatic effect.
I can’t believe I’m actually doing this.
“So do it and get it over with, Daze!”
I’m trying. Leave me alone!
“Ugh, typical. Pussying out when you––”
“Sarah was copied into my head,” Daisy blurted out.
She went silent as she studied Vince’s face for a reaction. To her surprise, he wasn’t freaking out. At least, not yet.
“I’m sorry, did you say you copied Sarah’s personnel files into your head?”
“No. I copied Sarah into my head. The neuro-stim re-partitioned my brain and stuck her in there.”
“That shouldn’t be possible,” he said, confused.
“No, it shouldn’t, except for one little detail none of us knew at that time. Sarah wasn’t just another grown human. She was my sister, grown from the same egg, no less. We shared a similar enough genetic structure that the neuro-stim somehow overrode its normal safeties and downloaded her entire consciousness into my head.”
“So you’re saying Sarah lives in your head?”
“Now you’re getting it.”
“And she’s been there since the accident aboard the Váli?”
“Yeah. All of her memories, her whole life. All that made up Sarah had been backed up with Mal’s neuro-stims. After she died, she wasn’t really gone long at all. She was with us pretty much the whole time, only riding shotgun inside my head.”
“But Sarah’s alive, Daisy.”
“Yeah, that’s the thing. That Sarah was saved by me and this Sarah. It’s that whole time travel paradox mind-fuck thing all over again. But basically, the important thing is, Sarah lives in my head.”
Vince finally showed the look of shock she was waiting for.
“So, she’s seen everything?” he asked.
“Of course that’s the first place he goes with this Earth-shattering revelation,” Sarah griped.
“She’s seen some of it,” Daisy admitted. “She can pull back if she wants. Turn off from seeing stuff when I need privacy.”
“But she’s there? Like, right now, she’s inside your head, hearing everything I’m saying?”
“Pretty much, yep. She’s my handy stenographer, paying attention to everything that goes on around me. She even catches stuff I would otherwise miss sometimes. It’s a good partnership, though it was a little freaky at first, if I’m totally honest about it.”
“Uh, hi, Sarah,” Vince said, giving a little wave.
“Tell him I say hi back. And sorry I walked in on him that time in the shower.”
“She says hi. And also she’s sorry she walked in on you in the shower that one time.”
“Holy shit, it is Sarah!” he gasped. “I hope I didn’t say anything bad about her,” he said, suddenly self-conscious.
“Don’t worry, Vince. If you did, I’m sure she’d have badgered me to give you hell about it.”
It was then that Daisy noticed a figure standing not ten feet away from them, his jaw hanging open in shock.
“Oh, shit. Finn. Hey. Uh, how long have you been standing there?” Daisy asked, trying to play it off.
He was having none of that.
“She heard everything?” he finally said, a fierce blush spreading across his face, and just as the flesh-and-blood Sarah walked in through the mess hall doors.
“Hey, guys, what’s up?” she asked, innocently.
Finn looked at Daisy, then turned and focused briefly on Sarah, his face flushing an even deeper red before he raced out the door.
Sarah turned to her friends, perplexed.
“What was that all about?”
Chapter Nineteen
“Jesus, Daisy. You could have warned me!” Sarah shouted, thoroughly pissed.
“I had to tell Vince. He had just proposed to me, for fuck’s sake.”
“Fine, you do what you’ve got to do, but why the hell did you do it in front of Finn?”
“Well, we were in the moment. He had just dropped to one knee and popped the question. It took me by surprise, okay? And when I got around to telling Vince about the Sarah in my head, well, I didn’t really notice him standing there.”
“Yeah, Daisy, you freaked him out. Nice going, dumbass.”
“Hey, it’s not my fault the guy has a thing for you.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Oh, please,” Daisy snarked at her sister. “Don’t give me that.”
“Yeah. You know what,” Sarah chimed in.
“I really don’t. What the hell did you hear that got him so freaked out?”
“No. Not this time. You want to understand this thing properly, then you need to truly know for yourself.”
“Are you fucking kidding me? Now, of all times, we’re back to this? We’re about to go to war, Sarah. I doubt it’s the best time to be singing Kumbaya and sharing memories.”
“That’s precisely why it’s the right time,” Sarah shot back. “You say you want to know what set him off. Well, if that’s really true, then you should be willing to share memories. You heard Freya. She said the first time will only last a month or so before fading. So yo
u even get a money-back guarantee. What more do you want?”
“She’s got a point, Sis,” Daisy agreed. “I mean, you two share like ninety-nine percent of the same memories as it is. Adding in the stuff from when your timelines split should take, what, maybe two hours, tops? Is that about right, Freya?”
“Closer to one hour, if I push it,” she replied. “And Sarah was right. It should only last about three or four weeks this first time, give or take.”
Sarah wanted to say something rude, but she forced herself to bite her tongue. Finn was upset, and not your run-of-the-mill upset, and it appeared the only way she’d truly know what the story was would be by agreeing to share memories with her incorporeal self.
It wasn’t an easy decision, but it was one she finally arrived at with no further badgering by either her sister or her other self.
“Fine, I’ll do it.”
“Really? Excellent!” Sarah gushed.
“But only if you promise to keep what we share to yourself until we have a chance to talk.”
“Okay. Promise,” Sarah agreed.
I wonder what she’s on about, Daisy mused. Of course, now you’ve sworn not to tell me anyway, so I guess I’ll just have to wait to find out.
“This is going to be amazing. I’ll finally have new memories, just as if I had a body again.”
“Yeah, yeah. It’s a two-way street, so spare me the overly chipper attitude, okay?”
“Hey, I’m part of this too, you know,” Daisy reminded her. “Sarah lives inside my head, so I’ve got to go through with this just like the two of you.”
“Fine. Can we just get this over with already?”
“The neuro-stim unit is all set up,” Freya informed her. “All you two need to do is come aboard, plop down in your seats, slip the bands on your heads, and let me do the rest.”
“Okay, then, let’s do this.”
The pair made their way to the hangar, rushing straight to Freya’s stealthy craft. Finn was nowhere to be seen en route. Sarah supposed she should be grateful for that.
“Ready,” Daisy said as she settled into her seat. “You ready, Sis?”
“Yeah,” Sarah grumbled.
