[/b][/u]
Red eyes gleaming menacingly, the spider-like Dagan slashed downward with its front two legs—just in time to see them cleaved off by the blade of Akasha’s double saber. The Darker reared back and screeched in agony, leaving itself wide open to her follow-up attack. It quickly found itself tumbling backward as the boot of her Neighbor Quartz armor connected with the underside of its carapace. The mangled Darker bowled over a pair of insectoid Krahdas and came to an abrupt halt when its body slammed into the cave wall five meters away.
Whirling around, Akasha felt her Fighter training kick in as a trio of Dagans leapt down at her from a rocky ledge nearby. Her glowing sapphire blade danced and spun, weaving a figure-eight pattern through the air as it bisected two of the incoming Darkers. The third Dagan nimbly slipped past her defenses and collided with her right shoulder, spinning her around. Akasha instinctively jerked backwards as it hurled itself at her again, then blinked in surprise as a burst of photon bullets peppered the creature from close range. It fell to the ground, twitched twice, then lay still.
Behind her, Kira grinned. It was one of those ‘you-owe-me-one’ kind of grins. Akasha sighed. She’d lost count of who owed who more at the moment.
The girl’s good with a gun, she had to admit of her pint-sized friend.
Kira blew on the still-smoking barrels of her twin machineguns, more for dramatic effect than anything else. “So,” she said casually, ignoring the horde of Darkers closing in from all sides, “we’ve known each other about a month now, right?”
“About that, yeah.”
“And we’re friends now, right?”
“Nah, I’m just using you for extra meal tickets,” Akasha deadpanned as she hacked through an over-eager Krahda, then burst out laughing. “Yeah, of course we’re friends. If it weren’t for you I probably wouldn’t even be here right now. I was ready to give up playing soldier until you came along… ready to give up a lot of things. Why do you ask?”
“It’s just, I realize I don’t know that much about you. What’s your story, anyway? I don’t think I ever asked.”
Akasha grimaced, not sure how to answer. “It’s sort of complicated…”
Just then their radio ear pieces crackled with static and a stern, humorless female voice spoke up. “Trainee Akasha, Trainee Vorholtz, this is ARKS Control. You are in the middle of an important combat mission on Amduscia surrounded by enemy contacts. Please focus on the task at hand.”
[/b][/u]
“Relax, Control, we’ve got this.” Kira rolled her eyes and shook her head dismissively, idly blasting a Dahgash between the eyes mere moments before it could take a bite out of her arm. The fish-like Darker groaned and careened away, flying straight into a river of searing molten lava. It plunged in face-first and disintegrated almost instantly.
The immediate danger past, Kira focused her attention back on Akasha. “Anyway, your story. Before you tell me, let me guess: You grew up in a happy, well-adjusted home with two loving—yet gigantic—Newman parents and not a care in the world. You decided to join the ARKS out of sheer boredom because your life was so great and wonderful that you just couldn’t stand it anymore. Am I right?”
“Not exactly,” the Newearl replied. “More like I woke up in a lab a few months back with no memory of who I really am.”
“…For real?”
“Yeah.”
“Whoa, that’s deep.”
Their radios crackled a second time. “ARKS Control to Trainee Akasha and Trainee Vorholtz. Are you taking this operation seriously?”
“Oh yeah,
totally,” Kira answered without a hint of seriousness in her voice. “We are
so serious right now it’s not even funny.”
“
So serious,” echoed Akasha, winking mischievously at Kira as she said it. Her double saber twirled through the air like an oversized boomerang, cleaving a Dagan in half before lodging itself in the bulbous backside of a passing Breeahda, which let loose an agonized shriek before spiraling into the ground. Akasha had only been aiming at the Dagan; the Breeahda was an unexpected but welcome bonus kill.
“I don’t get it, then.” Kira dodged a fierce claw swipe by a swooping El Ahda as she jammed a new magazine into one of her machineguns. “If you don’t remember your past, why are you here?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, why are you here in the ARKS? What’s your goal?”
“My goal? I… I guess I never really thought about it. The Captain—I mean Captain Colton—wanted me to join. Gave me some speech about how it would be good for me or something. Beyond that, I just—I want to know who I am, where I came from. Do I have any parents? Are they out there, looking for me right now? It's driving me crazy, not knowing even the most basic things about myself.”
Kira converged dual streams of photon bullets on the El Ahda as it looped around for another pass. Her weapons roared furiously, shell casings were expelled with reckless abandon, and the volcanic cavern lit up like the epicenter of a great lightning storm, until at last the beast on the receiving end was no more. “So you really don't know anything at all?”
“I... might have a brother. I met him in the lab after I woke up, right before the ARKS found me. Said his name was Shankar.”
“Hmm... Did he
tell you he was your brother?”
“Well, no, but he looked so much like me! If you saw us together you'd swear we were twins. He even had the same face tattoo I do!” Akasha easily hopped over a pair of Krahdas charging in her direction.
“How big was he? Like, as tall as you?”
“Yeah, about the same height, maybe even a little taller. Why?”
“Well—and I realize this might sound a little obvious—there aren't many people as tall as you are,
especially not Newmans. In fact, I can count the number of super tall Newmans I've met on one hand, because—oh wait—it's just you. So based on your description, I'd say that, yeah, there's a pretty good chance you two are related.”
“I don’t know what happened to him. I wonder where he is now and what he’s doing…”
Another burst of static. “Trainees, this is Control again. Please keep personal chatter to a minimum.”
Akasha didn’t even bother replying to the controller this time, casually continuing her conversation with Kira. “So what about you? Why’d you decide to exterminate evil bug monsters for a living?”
“Ah… well, I… I dunno…”
“C’mon, I told you my story—what little there was to tell. The least you can do is tell me yours.”
Kira sighed in resignation. She supposed it was her own fault for bringing up the topic in the first place. And maybe, deep down, she’d wanted to confide in her new friend. “Alright, fine, I guess that’s only fair. If you
must know, I’m here because my sister isn’t.”
“That sounds rather ominous. What happened?”
“She’s just… gone, okay? She disappeared and no one knows what happened to her. The police couldn’t find her. Her teammates hadn’t heard anything. We searched high and low but nothing turned up, not a single clue. It’s like she vanished into thin air.”
Akasha pirouetted on the ball of her left foot, her long ponytail twirling around her body as she swung her double saber around in a high arc. The photon blade passed through the last two remaining Dagans, severing their limbs and ending their lives in an instant. “Your sister was an ARKS soldier too?”
“Yeah, she joined a couple years before I did. More for financial reasons than anything else, I think.”
The woman from ARKS Control spoke to them again, this time barely concealing the irritation in her voice. “Trainee Akasha, Trainee Vorholtz, do you read me? Please copy.”
“My dad, his heath isn’t so good,” Kira explained, ignoring the controller. “He’s got a ton of medical bills. Fara was helping him out with the meseta she got from client orders. After she disappeared he couldn’t pay his bills anymore, and he’s too sick to work, so…”
“So you stepped up.”
“Something like that, yeah. I figured I could earn some meseta to help my dad and maybe find out what happened to my sister at the same time. I was planning on joining the ARKS anyway, this just sorta sped up the process.”
ARKS Control interrupted them again. Her voice was strained, her tone seething. “I know you can hear me, trainees. It would be wise for you to listen—“
Akasha switched her radio off, finally ending the controller’s ceaseless nagging. “Thanks for telling me your story, Kira. It sounds like you’ve got—
whoa!”
[/b][/u]
She rolled out of the way just in time to avoid the crimson energy beam slicing across the rocky ground. The Kartargot that fired it trundled forward on its stubby legs, snarling angrily at the two ARKS trainees. It extended its two fin-like ears, preparing to release another deadly blast—this time in Kira’s direction. With no time to utter a warning, Akasha tackled her friend to the ground, once again narrowly escaping the creature’s deadly onslaught.
Lying on her back, her face buried beneath two soft mounds, Kira groaned. “Not that I don’t appreciate the assist, but you’re… kinda smothering me here…”
In her frantic scramble to save Kira, Akasha had landed directly on top of her. Her chest, fortunately or unfortunately, was situated directly over the girl’s head. Raising herself up, she offered Kira a helping hand. “Uh, sorry about that.”
The pair hardly had time to recover before the Darker came at them again, charging up a third energy beam.
“Kira, blind it!” Akasha shouted as she rushed the Kartargot head-on.
“Roger!” Kira replied, blasting it in the face with everything her weapons could muster.
The creature roared as it stumbled wildly about. No longer able to aim properly, its beam went wide and scorched a hole in the wall of the cavern. By that point Akasha was already upon it, using its flat-topped rear end as a springboard as she leapt towards the back of its neck. A single piercing strike ripped through the Kartargot’s bulbous red core—its only weak spot—and with that, the Darker was no more.
Akasha and Kira stood panting as they surveyed the scene around them. The Kartargot had been their final opponent, which meant their mission was now complete. At last they could claim victory.
With the battle over, so too was the exercise. The craggy volcanic outcroppings, blistering lava streams, and mutilated throngs of Darker carcasses abruptly vanished, replaced by the featureless gray walls of the VR training chamber. The only remaining occupants, either alive or dead, were Kira and Akasha. They weren’t really on Amduscia; they never had been.
“Whew.” Akasha exhaled deeply, dropping to a cross-legged position on the floor. The parts of her skin not covered by armor glistened with beads of sweat. “That was some workout.”
“Better than hitting the gym,” Kira agreed.
A musical tone signaled the official completion of the exercise. On the wall of the chamber, projected by one of the holographic emitters, the results were categorically tallied and displayed. Below that, the final score was given: ‘S’, the highest possible grade.
“Congratulations trainees, you’ve cleared today’s combat exercise,” Control announced through the loudspeaker. She sounded unenthusiastic, to say the least. “These scores place you within the top four percent of your class. However, your personal conduct was… somewhat less than professional.”
“We passed the simulation, didn’t we?” Akasha countered.
“Admirably.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
Control didn’t have an answer to that one.
* * * * * * * * *
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COLONY SHIP 02, UR: COUNCILOR LANE’S OFFICE
The designers had done a first-rate job, he had to admit. Even this close, Lee couldn’t tell she wasn’t the real Councilor Tamara Lane. That mole on her left cheek and the miniscule crow’s feet creeping up around her eyes added a nice touch of realism, an attention to detail that made the crucial difference between a passable imitation and a true replica.
The
real Tamara Lane was long dead, of course—gunned down with the rest of the Ur Executive Council in a massacre he himself had ordained. Lee’s people had replaced the whole lot of them with CAST doppelgangers and no one had been the wiser. As far as coups went, it couldn’t have gone any smoother. The bodies were disposed of, the loose ends tied up. Now here he was, sitting in the Councilor’s chair with his feet up on the desk while she sat across from him in the seat normally reserved for visitors. It was alright, she didn’t mind. She’d been built to serve him, after all. They all had.
This Tamara, this doppelganger, was as close to the real thing as anyone could get, right down to her fingerprints. With her metal frame she wouldn’t get past a security scanner—but then again, members of the UEC were rarely subjected to such indignities. The important thing was that she could play the part, and in that aspect she excelled. She excelled so well that her own husband hadn’t noticed a difference during these past few months. Wouldn’t he be surprised to learn that her loyalties belonged to another man?
Her personality, along with those of the other doppelgangers, had been meticulously crafted by a team of expert designers. They’d incorporated every available piece of public data on the councilors into a complex set of algorithms, creating what they claimed was a near-perfect recreation of the originals. Nothing was ever perfect, Lee believed, but these twelve replicas were certainly close enough for his purposes.
The only thing left now was the issue of governance. The Executive Council managed all governmental affairs aboard the colony ship, no small feat. Lee couldn’t care less about the people of
Ur, but the UEC had to at least keep up the appearance of a normal functioning body, otherwise he’d have a whole new set of problems on his hands. Fortunately the doppelgangers were more than up to the task. Not only could they imitate their namesakes’ personalities, they were also crammed with as much knowledge of the political landscape and current social issues as possible.
They might even do a better job governing than their flesh and blood counterparts, Lee thought wryly, smiling inwardly at the irony.
“Shall I go ahead and submit that client order to the ARKS?” asked the Tamara replica, pulling Lee from his musings.
“No, hold off on that for now. An experienced card player knows when to stay his hand, and the time isn’t yet ripe. I have another task for you now. Here, come take a look at this.”
Tamara stood up and rounded the desk, stopping next to Lee. He adjusted the angle of the display monitor on the desk so she could read the data more easily. “Financial projections over the next several months? Unless I’m reading this wrong, it looks like you want to overhaul the allocation of public funds.”
“Specifically, I need you to double
Ur’s financial contributions to the
Terra Nova project.”
Terra Nova: It was being hailed as Oracle’s bright future, a super-massive space station outfitted with the latest anti-Darker shielding technology. Currently being built in an undisclosed location somewhere deep within the core regions, it had been under construction for the past ten cycles. Every colony ship in the fleet, including
Ur, was required to allocate a certain portion of its funding to the ongoing project.
“We need to set an example,” Lee continued. “When we do, the other ships are bound to take notice. They won’t want to appear… uncharitable, especially not before the living arrangements have been finalized. And so they will follow us.”
Tamara nodded in understanding. “They’ll assume we’re trying to curry favor with the planning committee, but in the end they’ll be forced to match our contributions or face the wrath of their own citizens. It doesn’t matter whether or not the added contributions have any tangible effect. You’re counting on the
perceived effect those actions will cause—jealousy and fear. The jealousy of their citizens at the prospect of losing the best housing opportunities to
Ur, and their councilors’ fear of the backlash prompted by that jealousy.”
“Precisely.
Terra Nova… our grand new home, free of the Darker threat, is poised to become the preeminent piece of real estate on the market. The entire Oracle fleet has a stake in this, which is why the other colony ships will react exactly as we expect them to, like puppets on strings. In that respect they’re as easy to maneuver as the Darkers. In some ways even more so.”
“How very
devious of you,” Tamara nearly purred, then added soberly, “But the UEC can’t approve something like that unilaterally, I’ll need to go through the treasury department.”
“Which you happen to be the chair of, as I recall.”
“I can pull strings but I can’t perform miracles. It’s not going to be an easy fight.”
“I never said it would be, but I need it done. Can I count on you?”
“You can always count on me,” she replied warmly, resting a well-manicured hand on the inside of Lee’s thigh. Her supple fingers delicately traced the length of his pant seam, slowly sliding up his leg as she continued, “Don’t worry, you’ll get your funding. You know I’ll do whatever it takes to—“
“Stop.” Lee forcefully grabbed Tamara’s wrist, halting her advance.
“I-I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I shouldn’t have done that. I just wanted to please you—“
“Let me make something clear. I need your help to further my goals, but don’t confuse me
needing you here with me
wanting you here. You’re a tool to me, nothing more. Under that synthetic flesh you’re merely a pile of circuits and gears, an appliance built to serve a specific purpose. A tool in a pretty package is still just a tool, and I have no interest in tools. I only care that they serve their purpose.”
“It won’t happen again... sir.”
“See that it doesn’t.”
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Both Lee and the councilor turned their attention to the far side of the chamber as the door slid open with an audible
hiss. Standing in the doorway was a tan-skinned, middle-aged man, his muscular frame slightly ill-fitting in the formal business attire he wore. The gray streaks lining his neatly-combed hair had the effect of making him appear distinguished rather than merely old. It was a look that conveyed both his strength and his many years of experience, first as a retired ARKS veteran and later as a respected member of the UEC. Of course, looks can sometimes be deceiving, especially since he happened to be another CAST doppelganger.
The man with Tristam Renault’s face raised an innocuous eyebrow. “Am I interrupting?”
“No,” Lee answered brusquely, releasing his grip on Tamara’s hand. “Come in. What have you got?”
Renault smirked as he stepped into the room. “Nearly everything, as far as we can tell. There were a few heavily protected files—which we’ll eventually crack—and a couple bad sectors—which we can repair. Everything else, all of
Ur’s data marked ‘top secret,’ is right here on this disk.”
He held up the disk in his hand, passing it across the desk to Lee.
Such a small thing, marveled Lee, sliding it into the computer terminal.
In the right hands it could topple an empire. In mine, it can create one.
“Let’s see what we have…” Lee perused the list of computer files, skimming past the unimportant ones. “…Hmm, the Heart of Gaea; interesting but inconsequential… Luphan Ayatane; I’ll come back to his file later… Well now, what do we have here? Project Typhon… Project leader: Dr. Naya Kestren… Project status: Suspended…”
“Typhon? Isn’t that the project you—“
“Yes,” Lee replied, cutting Renault off. “Ah, here we go, I’ve found what I’m looking for: the Fifth Fleet Massacre. Are you familiar with the details?”
Renault stroked the beard stubble on his chin. “The publicly available knowledge, yes. My namesake—that is, the original Tristam Renault—called it one of the great tragedies of our era. The entire Fifth Fleet was wiped out in a single day by a surprise Darker attack. Six colony ships, three dozen heavy cruisers, and several hundred support craft were literally ripped apart from the inside out. The statistics are quite sobering, though I imagine you could paint a more detailed picture than the record books.”
“Indeed. Let me tell you a story, a story you won’t find in the body of ‘publicly available knowledge.’ During the height of the Darker attack aboard
Orpheus, a small ARKS strike team infiltrated the Command tower and downloaded a program into the central computer. The program was designed with two purposes in mind: first, it was to activate the ship’s self-destruct countdown, and second, it was to relay as much data about the ship’s status as possible. Its condition, power output, and spatial coordinates were all transmitted in a comm pulse that eventually made its way back to
Ur. The contents of the transmission were kept secret, known only to the ARKS top brass and the UEC. And with good reason! You see, the data contained a troubling but undeniable truth:
Orpheus survived. It wasn’t destroyed by the Darkers, as is commonly believed, but was captured as a spoil of war. And here is where it gets more interesting. Because the colony ship survived, the program is still running, and once every standard day it sends out another pulse.”
“You’re saying…”
“I’m saying exactly what you think I’m saying. The ARKS and the UEC have known
Orpheus’s status and location all along. And the file containing that data is right here, updated daily for our convenience.”
Tamara folded her arms across her chest. “If that’s true, why sit on it for so long? Why hasn’t the fleet launched an attack against
Orpheus already? Surely they realize the danger it represents.”
“Why, indeed?” Lee fixed her with a penetrating gaze. Unfortunately, its effect was lost behind his dark sunglasses. “The answer is simple, my dear. They didn’t attack because they
couldn’t, not without destroying what’s on board: Project Typhon, quite possibly the instrument to winning this long war. A Pandora’s box that, in the proper hands, has the potential to finish off the Darkers once and for all.”
“And whose hands are the
proper hands? Yours?” Tamara asked, her lips pursed together in a tight smile.
“Typhon is already as good as mine, I merely need the key to unlock it. Of course, I have…
other plans for Typhon. Winning the war is one thing; winning the war and turning a profit is even better. If I can eliminate my enemies at the same time, well, that would be best of all.”
TO BE CONTINUED
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