Authors: Kevin J. Anderson
TASIA TAMBLYN
F
inding Robb Brindle alive brought Tasia the greatest joy she could have imagined. She just wished it wasn’t in a place like this—trapped in a prison bubble beneath the clouds of a gas giant, surrounded by inhuman enemies. The bowels of Hell would have been an apt description.
Still . . . Robb was alive!
Tears streamed down her grimy face. For just a moment, her joy pushed back the waves of anger, fear, and confusion. One thing at a time. She embraced the young man who had been her fellow soldier, her lover, and her friend. They hugged without words, their muscles trembling, breaths hitching. Finally Tasia wrinkled her nose. “Shizz, you stink.”
Robb’s grin was awkward, as if he hadn’t had much chance to practice it in a long time. “You know how long it’s been since I’ve had a shower? This isn’t exactly a Relleker resort. I saw images of Relleker once, but I never actually went there . . .” His voice trailed off. Tasia couldn’t imagine how he had retained any hold on sanity, just sitting here with no conceivable hope of escaping.
Talk about being under pressure,
she thought. Looking at his disheveled form, she knew Robb had fared much better than she would have.
He indicated the chamber and his six equally ragged companions. “How long has it been, anyway? With all the Klikiss robots lumbering around out there, you’d think at least one of them would have a clock or calendar display!”
Tasia mentally calculated, shocked at how long it had been since she’d last seen him. “Almost two years.”
Hearing this, several of the prisoners groaned. Robb swallowed hard and lifted his chin with forced optimism. “Well, it did seem like forever. No wonder we all look like shit.”
Tasia ran her fingers through her regulation-short hair. “Looks like I’ll have plenty of time to get used to it.”
When she and her loyal Listener compy EA were taken from the hijacked rammers, sealed in a small prison bubble, and dropped into the colored gases of Qronha 3, she was certain she would be killed. Only after Tasia had seen the hydrogue citysphere—a fever-dream conglomeration of odd geometric shapes—had she begun to grasp the extent of the alien civilization. How many such cities lurked within the Spiral Arm’s gas giants? How many had the Hansa incinerated with their Klikiss Torches, whether intentionally or by accident? No wonder the drogues were foaming at their liquid-metal mouths.
Klikiss robots had accompanied Tasia and her compy through oddly permeable walls into the hydrogue city. “Where are they taking us, EA?”
“I do not know, Tasia Tamblyn. But if we are making new memories to fill my datacore, then this is an experience I will never forget.”
“Was that an attempt at humor? That sounds like my old EA.”
Next, they’d been brought into this strange zoo chamber to join seven other hostages. Apparently, the hydrogues—or the Klikiss robots—had been taking “experimental subjects” for some time now.
Recognizing Robb despite his tattered clothes and long tangled hair, Tasia remembered the day he’d gone into the hydrogue-infested depths. His last transmission had been, “It’s beautiful, beautiful—” He must have seen a hydrogue citysphere.
Now she asked, “Why did they take us prisoner, Brindle? What do they mean to do with us?”
“Kill us all,” said one of the most miserable captives, whose name was Smith Keffa. “Damned Klikiss robots! Damned drogues!”
All the humans were gaunt, their eyes sunken. They had lived here without proper care, without hope. Everybody had a story, and she was disheartened to hear their hair-raising tales. Her fellow captives had nothing better to do than talk about themselves, and it seemed Tasia’s arrival was a welcome break in their endless terrifying monotony. Crestfallen, she learned that none of the other dunsel commanders from the rammers had been taken hostage. As far as she knew, she was the only one still alive. Maybe EA had had something to do with the robots sparing Tasia’s life. . . .
“They keep bringing new prisoners, but there used to be more of us,” Robb said. “One died trying to escape. Others were taken away and killed in awful experiments.”
“The drogues and the Klikiss robots made us watch!” Keffa held up his hands and arms, displaying horrific scars from long-healed gouges in his skin, but he did not explain what had been done to him. Some of the prisoners groaned, others huddled, staring sightlessly as if they were already dead.
Robb hunkered down next to Tasia and slipped his arm around her. Deep sadness etched his handsome face; all the boyish charm had been sapped away by his endless ordeal. “I can’t say how sorry I am to have you here, Tasia.”
She nudged him with her elbow, still marveling to see him regardless of their circumstances. “Right. I missed you too, Brindle.”
He reached into his grimy pocket and withdrew a brown and crumbly tangle of thin leaves. “I still have the worldtree frond that green priest gave me before I climbed into the encounter chamber over Osquivel.” He rolled it in his fingers, but the plant material was dry and dead. “It didn’t do me much good. Sometimes, I hold it as if I’m a green priest and I send imaginary letters in my mind to you and my parents . . .”
Tasia saw the withered leaves and recalled when Rossia, the limping green priest with wide eyes, had reverently given the frond to Robb as if it were a talisman. “I don’t think drogues like worldtrees much.”
“No. But in a weird sort of way, I think this little twig has kept me sane. I’ve been thinking about you a lot. Good memories are about the only things that keep us going here.” Robb shook his head. “But this nightmare isn’t one of the things I wanted to share. Not with you—not even with my worst enemy.”
Leaning against him, she grunted. “Not even Patrick Fitzpatrick III?”
He gave a rusty-sounding chuckle. “Whatever happened to him, anyway? Is he still a jerk?”
“He’s dead.” She described what had happened at the battle of Osquivel after Robb’s encounter vessel disappeared into the planet. “Fitzpatrick was killed, and so were a lot of other good soldiers.”
There was so much to tell him, so many things that had occurred since his disappearance. Unfortunately, she would have more than enough time to bring her companions up to date. First, she told them about the new rammers, how they’d been deployed swiftly to Qronha 3, and how she had been captured by the turncoat robots.
EA piped up: “The renegade programming was embedded in the Soldier compies from the beginning. The Klikiss robots simply activated it.”
Now one of the black robots loomed in front of the translucent wall. Tasia glared at the beetlelike machine as it pushed its way through. Smith Keffa cringed from the robot. Obviously trying to look brave for Tasia’s benefit, Robb said, “I don’t think it’s here to play checkers with the prisoners.”
The robot spoke, as if for no other reason than to taunt them. “A Manta cruiser has arrived above Qronha 3. We have instructed the Soldier compies on board to take over. We are also activating the programming system-wide.”
“What do you mean, system-wide?” Robb asked.
“All Soldier compies, all across the Spiral Arm.”
Tasia reacted with automatic outrage. “Humans have never done anything to Klikiss robots. What the hell do you intend to do?”
“Exterminate you all.”
Tasia put her hands on her hips, not caring how ridiculous she looked in front of the looming black machine. “That figures. The EDF declares war on the Roamer clans, and now Klikiss robots are trying to wipe out humans. Shizz! Can’t anybody figure out the right enemy these days?”
“We know our enemies.”
Having delivered its ominous message, the Klikiss robot departed.
PATRICK FITZPATRICK III
O
n the open deck of his grandmother’s Colorado mansion, Patrick Fitzpatrick sat alone and stared at the mountains. He had turned off the environment screen so he could smell the biting, fresh air. The cold was the least of his problems. Snow etched the jagged tops of the majestic peaks, and the sky was an utterly transparent blue, so different from the claustrophobic habitats where he and his fellow EDF soldiers had been held by the Roamers.
If he’d been back in the Osquivel shipyards, Patrick and his EDF comrades would have been hard at work processing metal, assembling ships, doing something productive. Right now, more than anything else, he wondered where Zhett Kellum was, what she was doing. Maybe she was burning him in effigy. . . .
He’d been back home for three days now, a “war hero” with little to do except make public appearances, smile and wave. Some of the other refugees were media darlings—particularly feisty Shelia Andez, who made no secret of her resentment toward the Roamers. Because that fit so nicely with the Hansa’s position, Shelia got as many bookings and honoraria as she wanted.
The public grumbled that clan Kellum had not seen fit to turn over the brave soldiers immediately after rescuing them. The public didn’t know what they were talking about, and the Hansa kept it that way. He found it offensive; worse, a year ago he would have believed the ridiculous propaganda.
His grandmother stepped out onto the deck. Though he faced the opposite direction, he could sense she was there, and that she must be scowling in disapproval. The former Hansa Chairman had looked over his shoulder all his life while his parents went off on innocuous diplomatic assignments designed to keep them away from anything important. Fitzpatrick didn’t acknowledge her.
“Just sitting out in the cold again? Another day down the drain?” As a power broker, Maureen never wasted time on unnecessary small talk; she watched the clock, charged every minute of her time to one account or other.
“Does it bother you that I’ve got things to think about, Grandmother? Or would you prefer I joined some politically correct volunteer organization?” Intentionally, he blew out a white breath; it reminded him of the vented atmosphere from broken-open pressure domes when Kiro Yamane’s reprogrammed Soldier compies had gone on a rampage—the extravagant diversion that gave Patrick his chance to escape.
“You don’t look like you’re enjoying your furlough, Patrick. I pulled strings to get you plenty of time off, along with full media attention. Your comrades seem to be reveling in their freedom, going to parties, vacationing, exercising. Why don’t you visit some of the friends who were rescued with you?”
“They weren’t my friends, Grandmother. Just fellow prisoners.”
“Well, I invited them to your reception tomorrow, so I hope you’re ready to be sociable. Every day, you just sit here and stare at the snow.”
“Maybe that’s what I need right now.” He still didn’t look at her. “I didn’t ask for a reception.”
Maureen put a hand on his shoulder, but she was only imitating a gesture of comfort that she had seen other people make. “There, there. It’s really the best thing after what you’ve been through.” She had raised him, shaped him, tried to mold him into a perfect Fitzpatrick heir. In doing so, she had unwittingly taught him to recognize her manipulations. Patrick could either pretend to cooperate, or he could find some way to short-circuit her intentions.
He gave a sour laugh. “A lot of people have been through a lot of things.” At last he glanced at her and was immediately reminded of her nickname. With her stern face, sharp nose, and narrow chin, the “Battleaxe” did resemble a heavy-bladed weapon.
Seeing that she couldn’t melt him with her charm, Maureen crossed thin arms over her chest, but was too controlled to let herself shiver in the cold. “I also wanted to give you a report. There’s been news. The EDF dispatched investigation ships to Osquivel even before we got home. They wanted to inspect Roamer operations in the rings, salvage anything, gather information.”
“And they didn’t find anything, did they?”
“The place was entirely abandoned. EDF search teams discovered a few remnants of the shipyards, but either everything was destroyed by the Soldier compies, or else the Roamers scuttled the facilities themselves. Typical. Whenever their furtive little operations are exposed, they scurry away like cockroaches.” When she smiled, her thin lips became completely colorless. Patrick had never noticed that before.
“What did you expect them to do? They exchanged the hydrogue derelict for their freedom—that was the deal—but they knew they weren’t safe. Why doesn’t the Hansa just leave them alone?”
She clucked her tongue. “Patrick, you are certainly obsessed with the Roamers! May I remind you that they hardly gave up the derelict voluntarily. In fact, they had the thing in their possession for some time without ever mentioning it, even though our Hansa scientists could certainly have done a far superior job of analysis than their own primitive engineers did.”
Patrick huddled deeper in his chair and focused on the distant peaks, his stomach as cold as a glacier. Roamers were exceptionally good at hiding. When the first EDF expedition came hunting hydrogues at Osquivel, Del Kellum had managed to cover up his huge shipyard operations. Patrick wondered how he would ever find the Roamers now, and Zhett, if they
really
wanted to hide.
His time with the dark-haired beauty had changed him, against his will. Now he no longer fit in with his blueblood family. “Grandmother, I want you to do something for me. Make whatever excuses you need to make—I don’t really care. I’m going to resign from the EDF.”
She looked startled, but her expression was a reflection of surprise, not disappointment. “Of course, Patrick. The family never intended for you to have a lengthy military career. We can transition you into a corporate position, or even an ambassadorship, if you prefer.”
“Not that. Too many others are letting themselves become propaganda puppets for a cause we know is false. So, I’m going to speak out, and some of the other refugees are bound to join me. What the Hansa is doing to the Roamers is completely unfair.”
That surprised her. “You can’t be serious! You know what the clans have done, what they
are
.”
He tucked his chin into the collar of his jacket. He had been just as prejudiced himself when he first joined the EDF. He’d been merciless to the Roamer recruit Tasia Tamblyn, treating her like dung—but she had gotten the best of him more than once. He was good at picking fights.
“I know more than that, Grandmother. All their accusations are true, regardless of what you choose to believe. The clans have perfectly legitimate reasons for cutting us off. We deserve it.”
Now truly shocked, Maureen looked as if her mind was already spinning through possibilities, assessing and discarding ways to mitigate this disaster. “That’s ridiculous and rash, Patrick. Come inside, and I’ll make you some tea.”
“Grandmother, you never make your own tea. And stop patronizing me.”
“No need to jump to conclusions. You can’t possibly understand all the reasons behind—”
“Of course I understand.” He finally stood up. “I was
there
. I caused it myself. I was with General Lanyan when we encountered a Roamer vessel filled with ekti. We seized it, stole the stardrive fuel, and then blew the ship out of space. Never gave the captain a chance.
I
pushed the button myself.
I
fired the jazers that disintegrated a Roamer ship.”
He was gratified to see her stunned into silence. “Later, when somebody found the wreckage, the Roamers knew the EDF was to blame. That was why they broke off all trade with us. That’s what started this whole mess.”