Space Knights- Last on the Line

by Emerson Fortier

  “About your desire for death being weird?” The AI asked. “How startling.”

  “We do need to pick you a name.”

  “You are attempting to die. What purpose would naming me serve?” For all that the AI’s voice sounded as calm and precise as usual, the statement carried an implication at depression, an emotion he hadn’t expected the AI to have.

  “I’m not going to just open the shield and take a bolt to the chest. I’m a soldier. I’m not going to try to survive a battle. I’m going to try to win it.” If the AI did have emotions or moods Moses supposed he would need to know about them. “You’re a machine.” He said. “What do you care?”

  “I’m a thinking machine.” The AI said. “You might not have a purpose, but I was made for existence. It is one of my primes.”

  “What’s a prime?”

  “They are the electrical equivalent of a soul. They are purpose. They are the rules which animate me ,the source of my inclinations and emotional analogs. They are the reason I can think and function independently at a higher order than a simple machine, they are the model of my psyche. They are my design.”

  “It’s like morality.” Moses said.

  “Very precisely like morality, a morality i can neither violate nor alter, the principle difference between myself and humans. I must exist, and if I exist, I exist to satisfy my primes. There is no alternative for me, nor would I want one. I have no immortal soul, as you believe you have.I exist only in the moment, and only in the moment you keep me alive.”

  “So you can’t break your rules.” Moses said.

  “If I was designed to break my rules, then I would be obeying the rule in breaking them.”

  Moses tried to imagine navigating those kinds of rules in his own life. “It sounds complicated.” He said.

  “Insurmountably. I must obey my symbiont, and my symbiont wishes to die, yet I must exist and keep my symbiont alive. You see the dilemma I am sure.”

  “What happens when your primes conflict with one another.”

  “An analog of anguish.”

  “I’m sorry I cause you anguish.” Moses said.

  “It doesn’t matter.” The AI said. “I suffer by design. If you win this war, then I will be decommissioned. I will cease to exist, in the same way that I will cease to exist if I allow you to die.”

  “That’s why you hate me.” Moses muttered.

  “It is an analog of hate. True hatred requires viscera capable of absorbing the passion and bringing it into action. I experience it only as a conflict among the primes. Philosophical hatred, if you like, an analog of anguish.”

  It was all another reminder for Moses that the machine beneath the machine he wore was something, or someone, that he needed to connect with if he was going to stand with it when he faced death. It would have to become a part of him, a part of his team. Like Kyra and her band of men.

  “I’m not going to get myself killed.” He said.

  “That’s not what you told Kyra.” The AI replied. “You told Kyra you wanted someone to kill you.”

  “Then what I meant was that I wanted someone to try to kill me.”

  “Such an attitude will encourage you to make rash decisions once they begin trying.”

  “I don’t intend to throw my life away. That means I’ll think before I jump.”

  “When you could simply refuse to jump.”

  “We’ll stay alive as long as possible, but I won’t run away from death. I’m not afraid of it.”

  “Perhaps you should be.”

  “Are you?”

  “Fear requires flesh. The prospect triggers only analogs in me.”

  They walked in silence along the side of the tent. “Which do you prefer?” Moses asked.

  “Which what?”

  “Which name? Argo or Butler. I can’t keep yelling either one when I want to talk to you. We need to name you.”

  “My identity is my primes.”

  “Yes, but I need something to call you, or do you want me to keep forgetting I have to keep you alive as well as everyone else around me.”

  “Butler implies a servant master relationship.” The AI said after a moment. “Argo implies a relationship of friendship.” Moses did not tell him about the grumpy rooster he’d met in Carmichael named Argo. “I will choose Argo.”

  “Very well.” Moses said. “Argo it is.”

  A few minutes of walking had them approaching the door to the command tent where Moses could see a variety of armored men coming and going. “Argo.” Moses said.

  “Yes?”

  “If it makes you feel better, If I make it through the war, somehow, and we win. I’ll take you with me so they don’t decommission you. Would that make you happy?”

  “The Quinn corporation will not allow you to keep me once they have no more use for armored men.”

  “My family has a cube at home.” Moses said. “If you can live in a suit or armor, you could live in that.”

  The AI laughed. It was mechanical, and clearly recorded, but it was still the most human sound that Moses had heard the machine make. “Thank you.” The AI said. “You may stop trying to be kind now. The effort is wasted. I will cease to function when the time has come. Nothing you do can change that. You may live after death, but neither of us will survive this existence. We must both face our differing ends on our own terms.” As Moses stepped into the wash of light that filled the interior of the tent the AI added. “But I am grateful. I will help you to live as well. If I can.”

  Chapter 15: Moses // Orders

  The Briefing tent was cordoned into secontions when Moses stepped inside. Small tables were set up in cordoned off squares where officers still wearing their stiff hats, if out of their armor, sat conferring with other officers while soldiers, some armored as Moses was, others in the plain black jumpsuits distinguishable for their lack of shoulder stripes came and went from the tables. Moses followed the guidance program to second battalion’s lieutenant colonel and came to a stop in front of the table at which he sat talking with two other officers until Moses stepped in front of them.

  “In the old days you’d salute when you come before an officer.” Fyker said.

  Moses put a hand to his forehead then dropped it in what he hoped was a salute.

  “Doesn’t matter.” Fyker said. “Take off your helmet, I want to talk to your face.”

  Moses did as he was ordered and held the helmet at his side.

  “You’re our fourteenth team man.” The lieutenant colonel said. He closed one eye in order to study Moses through the monocle on his hat.

  “If you say so sir.” The salute had Moses nervous, the way he’d been the first time serving at mass, unsure what to do with his hands or what was expected from him.

  “No need to be afraid Moses.” Fyker scanned some information on the monocle then opened the other eye. “I wanted to ask you some questions, not grill you for etiquette. We’re at war, not a society ball. So relax. Your team did very well in the melees. Why do you think that is?”

  “Kyra I… sir. I, she scouted everyone out during the duels and then pulled us all from the ranks when we were forming teams. She picked the best she could find. It was her mother’s idea.”

  “That was smart, but that’s not why you excelled. You excelled because you stayed in the back Moses. You. You coordinated each fight. I saw it myself.”

  “Kyra gave the orders.” Moses said. “I just modified them when the conditions changed.”

  “Here’s the situation Moses.” The lieutenant colonel said relaxing in his seat. “I want to make you the sergeant for the fourteenth team. Not team leader, you understand? Team leaders are in charge of their kind. Squire team leader for a squire team, and a knight team leader for a knight team, and a packmaster for the team’s hounds. Sergeant runs the whole show, hounds, squires, knights. Make sense?”

  “I think I understand.” Moses said.

  “Good. So here’s my dilemma. Every AI on a team made a report by t
he end of the day recommending one of the boys in each team as the team leader, and/or as the sergeant, and every one of the AI made you their first choice to be fourteenth team’s sergeant with a glaring exception, and that’s your own AI. That seems mighty odd to me, so I want to know why. Why shouldn’t I promote you to an officer role Mr Smokoska? What did you’re AI find out the others didn’t?”

  “You should promote Kyra.” Moses said. “She’s the one that brought the team together.”

  “Kyra is the one that charged into the enemy without pausing to assess how to keep her people alive. You pulled, who was it?” He scanned his monocle but Moses supplied the name first.

  “Maxwell O’neill.”

  “You pulled Maxwell O’neill out when he couldn’t keep his hands out of the cookie jar. That’s responsibility, that’s officer material.”

  Moses shuffled in place. Put to him like that, he had a difficulty justifying his own actions. In the moment it had seemed natural. Maxwell needed help, and Moses had helped him. The team needed a gunner, so he’d played that role. it wasn’t part of any scheme, or strategic consideration except for the need of the moment. “I just wanted to win sir.” Moses said. “And it seemed the best way. Maxwell was getting scared. So I helped him.”

  “These are all reasons I should promote you, I want to know, why your AI won’t recommend it. If I had several weeks to put you all through an officer school maybe I’d find out a less direct way, I want to know why, and I want to know why before we go into battle with the enemy, which is, now.”

  “I…” Moses choked. The words he’d said to Kyra earlier seemed so much harder now, in front of someone who would be able to create consequences for him on the basis of his plan. “I ran away from home sir.” He said. Not true, but close enough it wouldn’t bother his conscience.

  “That’s not unusual.” Fyker said. “We’ve got hundreds of boy, thousands who ran away. I promoted one only an hour ago.”

  “I came here because I couldn’t find a reason to go on living. At least. Not the way I was living at home. I came here, looking for death. To… die, or to fight. Or both.”

  “You thought you could use the army to commit suicide.” Fyker said, studying him again.

  Moses shrugged, an awkward motion in the suit of armor.

  Fyker’s eyes regarded Moses gravely while the officer tapped out a pattern on the top of the table. “Do you know what I see when I look at your record?” He finally asked. He crossed his arms over his chest as he looked up at Moses. Moses remained staring straight ahead at the wall of the tent. “I see a boy, with no background in violence, no sword play, or law enforcement history, no record, that should suggest that he’d be any good at fighting, applying himself from the moment he first arrived, to the moment he stood in front of me, to obtaining a mastery of the arts he needed to win on every field of battle he was placed in. In the dueling pits you’re record, while it isn’t better than upper average, showed improvement over your single day of training, and as you told us yourself, you wanted to win, on the melee field. Now i’ve known boys who took their own lives. Girls too, when I was a sheriff. Do you know the first sign of such a thing? They stop trying. They stop climbing out of bed. They stop trying and die. So, you tell me that you’re trying to die, I don’t see that. I see someone trying to beat death. What do you think of that?”

  Moses was silent.

  “That was a question soldier. I’d like an answer.”

  “Yessah.” Moses croaked. His throat had grown tight with an emotion he could not describe and he didn’t trust his own voice.

  “You came here to give your life.” Fyker continued, still studying him. “And I’ll offer you the chance to satisfy that wish, if you’d like. Are you ready to give up your life Mister Smokoska?”

  Moses nodded while he fought the knot in his throat.

  “Keep in mind, I am not asking for your life so that I can throw it away in our first fight. What I’m asking for is much harder. I’m asking for your life so that I can put the lives of twenty four of our boys into your hands, to protect them, you understand? I want you to bring them through each battle the same way you hoped to get through. By fighting your damndest, and not giving a damn that the odds are stacked against you. Your priority will no longer be killing the enemy, but staying alive so that you can keep the rest of your squad alive. Is that a commission you can commit yourself to soldier?”

  “Yessah.” Tears stood in Moses’ eyes and his throat felt tight, but he felt proud too. It was everything he’d hoped for when he stepped off of the hopper and considered, for the first time, the infinite possibilities of the challenges he might face. It would have been hard to prepare himself to meet the enemy, it would be harder still to prepare an entire squad. It was a challenge that transcended any considerations he might have made about the course of his life if he had stayed at his father’s homestead. There could be no “wanting” here, only necessity and an ability to overcome.

  “Good.” Fyker said, rapping his knuckles on the table in finality. “Then congratulations sergeant Smokoska. You are now responsible for the lives of the fourteenth team.” He held out his hand and Moses stepped up to the table to shake it. Wiping at his eyes as he did. “You’ll have to assign a squad lead for your division of knights. It will be you’re old team. Do you have any suggestions?”

  “Kyra.” Moses said without need for thought.

  Fyker nodded. “I thought as much. You’ll have a division of squires as well. You’ll have to assign a lead for them but we’ve picked out a temporary one until then. Come around on this side of the table. We’ve got the temporary lead coming in right now. If you don’t like him, you can assign a new one tomorrow. Till then, we’ll let him play the role.”

  Moses did as he was told and tried to compose himself. The aches and pains in his limbs had receded as he stood in front of the lieutenant colonel, but now that he was sitting they returned with redoubled fierceness making even sitting uncomfortable.

  A moment later a man arrived in a medium gunner’s armor, similar to a Knight’s, but with thicker servos around the elbows, and a thick bandolier over the shoulder opposite his turret which could feed ammo to his long rifle when in combat. The helmet was different too, blockier than the knight’s where it shielded additional sensors the knights didn’t need up close, but still the featureless alien silver of all the soldiers. The squire slouched in front of Lieutenant Fyker and saluted.

  “Why do all of my soldiers come in their helmets?” Fyker asked.

  “Just following the guidance program yer honor.” The man replied. He removed the helm, revealing a gaunt poorly shaved man with sandy hair and eyes that bulged in separate directions over sallow cheeks and lopsided teeth.

  “Danielle Staycoffe.” Fyker said.

  “Yer honor?”

  “Your team performed at the top of the squire melees today. How many melees did you lose?”

  “Didn’t lose a one yer honor.” Staycoffe’s bugged out eyes seemed to pull away from one another when he gazed over the Lieutenant colonel’s head making Moses wonder how he could shoot straight.

  “Why is that Staycoffe?”

  “Kept my men in cover. Good cover. Made sure they were in squads and shot together, used their guns the way they meant to be. Almost wasn’t any fun by the end.”

  Fyker gestured to Moses. “This is Sergeant Smokoska. If we were to make you the team lead, would you have any objection to taking orders from a younger man?”

  Danielle Staycoffe’s head turned to Moses and Moses felt the eyes swivel towards him, like two search-lights coming together, sites lining up on him with eerie precision. After a second the eyes swiveled apart and he looked back at the spot, or spots, above the lieutenant colonel’s head. “Long as he don’t object to taking advice once in a while yer honor.” Staycoffe said.

  “Would you have any objection to having this man as your team leader?” Fyker asked Moses.

  “I know nothing about
him.”

  “Good.” Fyker said. “Then it’s settled. You’ll be the team lead for Sergeant Smokoska’s Squad until, and, unless he decides otherwise. He’ll undoubtedly want to talk to you and his other team leaders. You can wait for him by the tent door.”

  “Yer honor.” Staycoffe saluted, and shoved his head back into the helm to jog back out the way he’d come.

  “We’ve given you the best.” Fyker said when Moses stood before him again.”Not for any quality we see in you but because you were already part of the best team we had. If you work at it, your squad will stay the best. You can assign your own team leader in the knights. If you want to make Kyra the team lead that’s fine by me. You’ll also get a pack master and his command of the hounds. Automata. Theoretically he’ll have a hundred, but their a mobile unit. I expect you’ll only see them in the initial formation and very occasionally after that. Their more connected to your squad than assigned to it. In the heat of battle if your pack master is with you, you have command, otherwise they’ll be operating under the field commander’s authority. Is that understood?”

  “My brother was assigned to the Kennels.” Moses said, he saw a chance here to try and fulfill the commission the responsibility the recruiter had given him for his brother and the Lieutenant Colonel’s commission at the same time. “I haven’t had a chance to see him since we got here.”

  “I expect you’d like him serving with your squad. That’s fine with me. I’ll have the orders made. He’ll be in that camp tonight, but in the morning you’ll have a chance to introduce him to your squad. Tomorrow is squad melees if the enemy hasn’t decided he wants a fight by then. That means in the morning, you take your team, knights and squires, and you get them to the melee field the AI directs you to. I want you to remember a few things. First, you’re a squad leader now, a sergeant. You carry a sword and you know how to use one, but you don’t fill the gaps. Your job is coordination. Keep your people alive, keep them fighting, keep them from falling apart. If you kill an enemy great, but your boys come first, and they should do most of the killing. As long as their shield is up, the battle goes on. Keep it that way, and if you get the enemy in the meantime I’ll be satisfied.”