Edge of War (The Eternal Frontier Book 2) Read online

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The cacophonous sound of something slamming against metal pierced Tag’s ears. He blinked, slowly making sense of the world as the ringing continued. Each high-pitched rattle sent knives through his ears and into his brain, twisting the pain inside his skull until he felt ready to explode. At first, when his pupils focused on the silver metal above his head, he thought something was wrong with the Argo. The cloying scent of the Forest of Light rocked him back to his senses. He pushed himself to his feet, almost losing his balance. His hand shot out and found the smooth coolness of a metal wall, his head pounding as he gazed around him.

  Sofia stood. “Skipper, you okay?”

  “Alive,” Tag managed.

  She ran to his side and helped him as he teetered forward. His memories of everything that had just happened hit him at once, from arriving in the Forest to the bash that had sent him reeling into unconsciousness. Another wave of vertigo rolled over him, and he leaned on Sofia for support.

  The marines were clustered around what looked to be a doorway to their makeshift prison cell. Bull continued drumming his fist on the wall, and Lonestar hurled epithets and curses at the clear polyglass door. Gorenado sat near the entrance, his eyes closed as if he was meditating, and G and Sumo paced around Bull. Beyond them stood Coren.

  “Can you quiet down with that racket?” the Mechanic said.

  Bull twisted to face him, his face no less flushed than usual. “This is your fault, xeno.” He jabbed his finger into Coren’s chest.

  Coren made no indication he was alarmed or at all frightened by the marine’s posturing. “I didn’t know it would end up like this, that they wouldn’t believe me when we got here. But that hardly matters.” Coren indicated the polyglass door with a wave of his hand. “No matter how much you yell, they won’t hear you. This is sealed with acoustic barriers. Mechanic technology.”

  “I don’t give a flying rat’s ass what you or the gods might say,” Bull said, using the choice phrase so common at makeshift station bars full of gutfire and other home-brewed alcohol. “I’m not stopping until they answer my questions.”

  “The least you can do is be considerate of your captain,” Coren said with a sigh. He gestured at Tag.

  Tag curled his fingers through his hair, gripping at his scalp as if that would disperse the lingering headache pulsating through his brain.

  Bull appeared no less angry, but he stopped punching the cell’s wall. “Captain, I hope to the gods new and old that you’ve got a way out of this mess.”

  Tag wanted to make a smart remark. He wanted to say he had the key to this place sitting in his pocket. No big deal. Like he was supposed to have all the answers or something. But he didn’t. That wasn’t what he should say, whether or not his agonized brain was telling him Bull deserved it.

  “Give me a minute,” he said instead.

  Bull didn’t like that. And when he didn’t, neither did his marines. A fire burned in Bull’s eyes that spread to the others, radiating in furious glares, all except G. Tag could understand their frustration. They had endured a surprise assault on the Montenegro, had helped start the rebuilding process, and then were sent away on what must seem to them like a wild goose chase. Now, before they had even started any real mission, they were prisoners of the alien species they were supposed to be helping, betrayed by their captain’s trust.

  “Look,” Tag said. “If you want out of here, hear me out. If you won’t do it out of respect, I’ll damn well order you to.” He glanced at Bull. He hated continually pulling rank like this. It wasn’t how a leader truly earned respect, but he didn’t have time for relationship building: they were in prison. Mission number one was getting out. “I know I’m just a CMO turned captain and this isn’t what you signed up for, but you’ve got to listen to me on this one.”

  “After all,” Sofia added, “can’t get much worse than being stuck in prison.”

  “Not helpful,” Tag said.

  “Fine,” Bull said. “You got us in here, you get us out. This is your rodeo now.”

  Lonestar smiled at the comment. “If it’s a rodeo, count me in.”

  Gorenado huffed in agreement, and G looked as eager as a puppy to please its family. Sumo leaned against a wall, her sinewy arms across her chest.

  “The Mechanics are nothing if not practical and logical,” Tag said.

  “He’s got that right,” Sofia said. “They place about as much importance in pure emotion as a navigational AI system on a warship does.”

  “Exactly,” Tag continued, “so we have to appeal to their—” He stopped then looked around the cell. A sickening feeling stormed through him, settling in his gut. “Speaking of AI, where’s Alpha?”

  “The xenos took her away,” G said. “Said they wanted to check her out.”

  Alpha had started as an experiment, having once been nothing more than a dish of cells growing in a cell incubator. Tag had nurtured life and sentience out of those cells, and in the short time since her virtual birth, she had saved his life numerous times against the Drone-Mechs. All notions of formulating and executing a plan to appeal to the Mechanics suddenly seemed inadequate and far too slow.

  “What are they doing to her?” he asked.

  “Don’t know,” Sumo said. “For some reason, they didn’t care to explain.”

  “I don’t think they planned on hurting her,” Coren said, as if he could read Tag’s thoughts. “I think they were just curious. You know, as much as I hate to admit it, Alpha is a work of technological prowess. I’m sure they could hardly believe a human created her.”

  Tag wanted to take pride in that reluctant admission of Coren’s, but all he could think about was the Mechanics taking Alpha apart in some kind of mechanical vivisection to study how she worked. “They can’t treat her like a machine. Not now. She’s fully sentient.”

  Pushing aside Bull, Tag started to bang on the polyglass door, their previous conversation forgotten, overwhelmed by thoughts of Alpha’s torture. The tremors resonating through his bones made the headache worse, and the noise didn’t help either. He ignored the hammering sensation on his brain as he watched a pair of Mechanics strolling by.

  “What did you do to Alpha?” he yelled, knowing full well what Coren had said earlier. But he had to try. He couldn’t just let them tear Alpha apart. Not like this. Gods, no. “Don’t hurt her!”

  Then, to his surprise, the door opened.

  Tag’s heart leapt, and he waited to be escorted out, waited for the guns to be drawn or maybe for the pulsefire to fly.

  None of that happened. Instead, Bracken stood before him, alone and no longer wearing her power armor.

  “I was wrong,” she said simply. No apology. No explanation.

  Her velvety fur waved under the caress of a soft wind curling between them. It carried the distant beat of the drum the Forinths used to keep the ice gods out of the Forest. The sound should have made Tag’s head pound all the more furiously, but instead, it brought him only relief. He was out of the prison cell, facing Bracken. A strange expression traced itself across her face. Her thin lips were slightly downturned, and her golden eyes glowed a little less brightly than before.

  “Wrong about what?” Tag said. He heard the footsteps of the others as they cautiously approached the exit, and he took a step out the door. His boots sank into the wet earth and foliage.

  “Your people.” She eyed the marines. “Or more accurately, you.”

  “No shit,” Tag said. He took another step toward her, his fingers clenching into fists. She didn’t flinch. “What did you do to Alpha?”

  “She’s fine,” Bracken said, “and she’s what saved you.”

  ***

  When Tag neared the shelter Bracken was leading him to, he saw Alpha seated inside on a table with a gaggle of Mechanics surrounding her. Several of them peered into an open panel on her chest. Tag’s heart climbed into his throat, and he broke away from Bracken, his feet pounding through the vegetation. The fluorescent pla
nts and trees blurred by until Alpha turned his way. She lifted a hand in an awkward but distinctly human “hello.” Her mouth contorted into the best simulation of a smile she could muster.

  “Captain!” she said. The ease in her tone slowed Tag, but his heart still raced as he approached her.

  The Mechanics around her backed away upon his arrival, and Tag studied the open panels, revealing the work he had put into integrating her life-support units with the M3 droid chassis.

  “What’s going on?” Tag said. He heard Bracken’s light footsteps as she caught up to them.

  A shorter, younger-looking Mechanic stepped forward. “We were just examining the electroneural connections you created to serve as the biosynthetic conduits with her external control systems.”

  “Why?” Tag asked, not hiding the suspicion in his demand.

  “The technical aspects of this machine are quite a bit more advanced than I suspected from a human of your rank and talent.”

  Tag ignored the derisive words. The insult wasn’t what worried him. “You do realize she’s more than a machine, right? She’s sentient. You have to respect that.”

  The Mechanic stepped back, his brow twitching slightly as if nonplussed.

  Bracken scoffed. “I fear it is much too difficult for my people, talented as they may be, to see your invention as anything but a machine. Biological components or not.”

  “I find satisfaction in knowing you appreciate Captain Brewer’s work,” Alpha said, “but I must agree with him that I do not appreciate being referred to as a machine.”

  The young Mechanic backed away from Alpha, glancing among Tag, Alpha, and Bracken like a lost tourist trying to figure out which corridor of the space station to take. “I suppose I regret my choice of words. I will have to think about the ramifications of biological organisms within machines.”

  “Yeah, you do that,” Tag said.

  Alpha closed her chest panel, muffling the humming and clicking of her internal workings by her outer chassis. “I didn’t mean to cause a conflict.”

  “Not your fault,” Tag said. “But did they hurt you?”

  “No, Captain. I was merely showing them how you accomplished the task of bringing me to life.”

  “You actually consented to that?”

  “Of course,” Alpha said. “But only after I convinced them you and the others weren’t here to initiate any type of nanite enslavement protocols.”

  Tag turned to Bracken.

  She regarded him for a moment before speaking. “The good thing about her being part computer is that the data don’t lie.”

  “Although I am quite capable of lying organically,” Alpha said proudly, “she is correct that my internal data storage is quite difficult to alter without leaving behind significant markers of such alteration.”

  “You breached her internal memory then,” Tag said.

  The realization of what that meant hit him with enough force to make his pounding headache worse. Not only had the Mechanics found access to everything Alpha had experienced firsthand, but they would also have had the opportunity to delve into the trove of the Argo’s databases. Every vid and audio feed, every bit of experimental data and security, every conversation he might have shared between crew members, for better or worse, could have been accessed through Alpha’s connection with the ship’s main AI and computer systems. He wanted to interrogate Bracken, to find out what else she knew about them in this breach of privacy. He felt almost naked in front of them now. No more secrets. Nothing he could hide from them.

  Bracken didn’t seem the least bit bothered by what they had done. “We did believe her internal memory,” she repeated. Then, to quell any shadow of a doubt he might have about her indiscretion into their data-sifting, she said, “The theories you and Sofia shared certainly align with our own suspicions that your species is somehow responsible.”

  “But the SRE isn’t?” Tag asked hopefully.

  “I have not put it past your current governing body or any of your rebellious colonies,” Bracken said, “but I can say with a fair amount of confidence that you and your crew are acting in our best interest and not that of the Drone-masters responsible for the enslavement of our people.”

  “You’re damn right,” Tag said. “Why not let my crew go, and then maybe we can get to work?”

  “Yes,” Bracken said. She gestured to the younger Mechanic, and he jogged out of the shelter toward the prison cell. “It’s clear that the first order of business is getting the Stalwart in working order. But after that, what exactly did you have planned, Captain Brewer?

  CHAPTER NINE

  Construction on the Stalwart had been underway for a couple of weeks now with no interruption by ice gods or Drone-Mechs. The routine of managing repairs and doing research on the nanites and Drone-Mechs, while strenuous, was a welcome reprieve from being stuck on a cramped spaceship traveling the stars and constantly watching for a surprise attack. Scanning his terminal, Tag was seated at a table in the improvised home Sofia had lived in over the past five years of her residency on Eta-Five.

  The open windows of Sofia’s home let in the otherworldly warble of alien birds and insect-like species, and each breath Tag took was another reminder of the strange planet he was on. The thickness of the humidity and the scent of the damp soil reminded him vaguely of the wet earth and fog of the early mornings when his father used to drive him from Old Houston to the Gulf of Mexico. They would wake up before the break of dawn, take a passenger pod from their 127th-floor apartment in the midtown skyrisers, and fly down the coast until they reached the protected coastlines where water lapped the sliver of a beach. The call of gulls had rung out through the humid air, piercing the gray smog above them, and ten-year-old Tag would follow his father past the blinking holoscreens advertising VR simulations ranging from intense combat to sensual experiences, skirting their way to a fishing spot on the Preserves, the largest faux-nature franchises operating in the SRE. Supposed “fresh” air was pumped into the bubbles where they fished surrounded by holoscreens that gave them the illusion of being on a secluded dock on the bay. And though the visual and auditory effects were almost convincing, the artificial fresh air scents had never convinced Tag.

  “It smells like Grandma’s perfume mixed with sugar and seaweed,” Tag had said.

  His father had laughed, almost letting his fishing reel fall into the saltwater. “Who knows? Maybe that’s what it actually smelled like before.”

  “Then I don’t want to breathe fresh air,” Tag had said.

  But now, far from the overpopulated planet filled with humans and their industry and outside the ships and space stations with recycled and filtered atmosphere, he welcomed fresh air. He was even more thrilled that it smelled nothing like the “fresh air” from the Preserves.

  Tag took another deep breath, and Sofia apparently noticed.

  “That’s what I loved about this place,” she said. “After growing up on Paragonia during the terraforming efforts, stuck in the tunnels and domes all day, I couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to take a clean breath of air.”

  Her brown eyes focused on a point only she could see as if she were caught in a trance.

  Alpha looked up from a terminal she was working on. “Captain Brewer, do you think it’s possible we can install scent receptors on my chassis? I would like to experience this scent as well.”

  “Be careful what you wish for,” Sofia said, “because you’ll regret it after a freeze-dried-bean night on the Argo.”

  “Is that due to the human proclivity for gaseous discharge?”

  “Farts,” Tag said. “We call them farts.”

  Sofia burst out laughing while Alpha nodded as though she were a student being taught an important lesson. Tag couldn’t help the grin cutting across his face. But when Coren showed up at the door, his short fur in disarray, the humor vanished as quickly as a Forinth changing colors.

  “Is it done?” Tag asked. The dark reminder of the mission before them f
ell over him like an ominous shadow, eliminating the momentary reprieve any immature jokes had provided.

  “The Stalwart’s reactors are all in working order again,” Coren said. “It will fly now. If we took it to space, the cargo decks, half of engineering, and some of the crew quarters would be unusable.”

  “Understood. As much as I like Eta-Five, fourteen days here is enough. It’s about time we carry on,” Tag said. “Any chance we can take off early and use some of the Argo’s repair bots to help expedite things on route?”

  “Maybe,” Coren said. “But by the time we reprogrammed the bots to work on our ships and retrofitted them to accommodate the alloys of a Mechanic ship, our own bots and engineers would be finished. It’s best we stay the course to ensure optimal repairs.”

  “Still don’t trust human tech to help with the job?”

  “In a manner of speaking, no,” Coren said. Tag thought he detected the hint of a good-natured grin twitching at the corner of the Mechanic’s thin lips. Maybe hanging around with humans was wearing off on Coren. “But I do appreciate the offer.”

  “Good to hear,” Tag said. He stood from his seat on a tree trunk serving as a stool. “I’m going to go check on our friends with the guns. Alpha, if you could keep searching for any way to deactivate the nanites without killing their hosts, that would be greatly appreciated.”

  “Happy to oblige, Captain,” Alpha said, still hunched over her terminal. Tag had no idea whether it was in the realm of possibility for Alpha to find any such solution, but at least it kept her busy. She seemed to appreciate having something, anything, to keep her mind active.

  “I’ll be meeting with the Forinths,” Sofia said. “Want to let them know we’re a few days from takeoff. I’m sure they’ll be relieved when all these crazy aliens are out of their hair.”

  “I thought Forinths didn’t have hair,” Alpha said.

  “Human phrase,” Tag replied.