Mindscape: Book 2 of the New Frontiers Series Read online

  “We haven’t?”

  “We secured the inside, but we forgot to check the outer hull. Get someone to go fetch the captain for me, but make sure he stays sedated; then get someone else to extract the ship’s data core for transfer to the Adamantine.”

  “Yes, sir,” Ram replied and got on the comms. When he was done, he asked, “You really think they’re planning to scuttle the ship?”

  Alexander shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  “So why not pull the trigger already?” Mouth added. “Boom goes the weasel, and the Adamantine with it. We’re still close enough for the shrapnel to take us out.”

  “The Adamantine might not be their target,” Alexander replied. “They could do maximum damage by waiting for us to pull into one of Earth’s shipyards for repairs.”

  “Hell of a long time to wait while you’re freezing your ‘nads off in space,” Chesty commented.

  Alexander’s comm crackled. “Admiral, we’ve found multiple enemy contacts clinging to the hull.”

  “Where?”

  “Amidships.”

  “Did they spot us?”

  “With the naked eye? Not likely, sir. You want our pilots to scrape them off?”

  Alexander’s mind raced through options. “No, too risky. We’re sure to miss a few like that, and it just takes one to trigger a bomb. Send me their location. We’ll take care of it.”

  “Aye, sir. Transmitting now.”

  Alexander summoned a hologram of the enemy position so Ram and the others could see. He checked for nearby airlocks and highlighted four, one on each side of the enemy forces.

  “They are sneaky bastards,” Mouth said. “There’s at least fifty of them crawling out there!”

  “Fifty-seven,” Alexander corrected.

  “I guess Captain Vrokovich was telling the truth. His missing men are all floating out in space,” Sergeant Ram said.

  “It’s going to be hard to take out that many people without them triggering whatever bomb they’ve rigged up out there,” Ram said.

  Alexander nodded. “I agree. We need to wait until Captain Vrokovich and the dreadnought’s data core are safely away before we risk an attack. How’s that coming along, Sergeant?”

  “The Martian is suited up and on his way,” Ram said. “We’ll have to send a shuttle for him, though.”

  Alexander mentally grimaced. They’d sent back the shuttles that had carried the marines to the Crimson Warrior to prevent the Adamantine from crushing them when it docked. “No time. Load him into an escape pod with the ship’s data core and a few marines to keep him out of trouble. We’ll launch them into space and pick them up later.”

  Ram nodded.

  “Meanwhile, get our squads into position at those four airlocks.” Alexander pointed to the highlighted areas of the hologram.

  Ram nodded. “Let’s go, Shadows!”

  “Oorah!”

  They set off at a run once more, heading for the nearest of the four airlocks Alexander had selected. As they ran, Alexander’s mind turned to the approaching Solarian destroyers. They were losing valuable time keeping pace with a derelict ship when they should have been burning back to Earth at top speed. He hoped for all of their sakes that the engagement didn’t last long.

  Chapter 16

  Alexander looked up. Countless stars floated in an endless black sea. The Crimson Warrior’s hull stretched out a full kilometer to the horizon, shining a dull gray in the distant light of the sun. Invisible shapes crouched low against the hull, their silhouettes highlighted green by sensors. Their holographic cloaks were engaged, bending light around their VSM drones until only a ghostly shadow remained.

  “The rabbit is in the hole,” Sergeant Ram reported. Captain Vrokovich and the data core were safely away. “All teams move out, and watch your fire around those warheads.”

  The latest drone recon from the Adamantine showed what looked like several nuclear warheads clamped to the dreadnought’s hull. Alexander knew that shooting an enemy warhead wasn’t a good way to trigger it without the accompanying rocket fuel to ignite an explosion, but better safe than sorry.

  The squads crept along the hull, moving up behind cover to keep the enemy from spotting them with whatever limited sensors they had at their disposal. Alexander’s own sensors showed fifty-seven red enemy blips dead ahead, spread out all over a large section of the hull. Around them was a circle of green blips, gradually tightening like a noose—six squads of twelve marines moving in on the enemy from all sides. They each had exactly one target, with some of them sharing the harder-to-reach targets. One well-aimed bullet from each of the marines and the threat would be over.

  “Halt,” Ram called out.

  The noose stopped tightening.

  “Shadow Twelve, get us a visual.”

  Alexander watched as a green silhouette crept up and poked his head around the molten remains of an enemy laser cannon. A holofeed appeared on Alexander’s HUD, showing what Shadow Twelve saw.

  Dozens of Solarians lay prone on the hull, hugging the ship with magnetic clamps. Most of them were lying under some type of cover and shooting them all simultaneously before anyone could trigger a bomb was going to be impossible.

  “It’s not pretty, Sarge,” Shadow Twelve said.

  “Assholes rarely are,” Mouth added.

  “All units, line up your targets and fire on my command,” Ram replied.

  Shadow Squad moved up and poked their weapon barrels out around the ruined weapon emplacement. Alexander went down on one knee for added stability and aimed both his 50 caliber cannons at his target.

  “Ready… and—what the hell?” Ram roared.

  Before he could say ‘fire!’ a flash of bright yellow light illuminated their location. The sergeant’s holographic cloak flickered and failed, revealing his drone—headless, its neck glowing molten orange.

  “It’s a trap!” Ram said.

  Alexander ducked and rolled away just as another flash of dazzling yellow light hit the hull where he’d been standing a split second ago.

  The marines returned fire with the simulated thunder of .50 caliber cannons. Enemy crew in maroon combat suits burst up from their prone positions and ran for better cover. Some of them turned, firing backward with their sidearms as they went, only to explode in bloody clouds of explosive decompression as .50 caliber rounds ripped them open and exposed their guts to space.

  Alexander crouched down between a comm dish and a ridge of heat vents and used his HUD to skip between visual replays from different angles to watch as marines were cut down in dazzling flashes of light. Those lasers were lethal. They’d already lost almost twenty drones, but the enemy crew wasn’t carrying anything bigger than a pistol, and laser pistols were far too small to take out a VSM with one shot. Alexander slowed a few of the replays down until he could judge the angles of incidence and reflection of enemy laser fire. The angles were too steep.

  “Shit,” Alexander muttered, realization dawning.

  “Heads up! They’ve got drones firing on us from space!” someone announced, figuring it out, too.

  Alexander activated his comms and contacted Lieutenant Stone.

  “We need air support!” Alexander said, absently noting the irony of asking for air support in space.

  “I see it,” Stone said.

  Red lasers joined the yellow ones flashing through space, and fiery explosions bloomed close overhead. Shrapnel rained down, plinking off the hull with simulated noise. Alexander caught a flash of maroon-colored fabric in his peripheral vision and turned to see an enemy officer come sliding into cover beside him.

  A shiny black faceplate turned his way, and the man’s pistol swung into line. Thunk. Alexander felt a quasi-painful jolt as the bullet hit his armor. Then he fired back. His target exploded and blood sprayed everything in sight with a wet splattering sound. He looked away in disgust. Now he remembered why he hadn’t joined the marines.

  “Drones neutralized,” Stone reported.

&
nbsp; Alexander rolled out of cover, tracking his next target. The next nearest enemy officer had his hands raised, and he was waving for attention.

  “Hold fire!” someone ordered. The accompanying text identified him as Goblin One. “Incoming enemy comms.”

  Alexander heard a female voice with a distinct Martian accent crackle in his ears. “If you fire one more shot, I will destroy this ship and all of your expensive little tin soldiers with it!”

  Alexander took another step toward her. “Admiral de Leon here,” he replied.

  The woman turned to him, her expression impossible to read through her shiny black faceplate. “The Lion of Liberty. When they gave you that nickname, they clearly forgot what lions are. They’re blood-thirsty predators. Just like you.” She spread her hands to indicate her dead crewmates, their feet still pinned to the hull with magnetic boots, their bodies motionless, frozen with their guts hanging out like gory mannequins in a house of horrors. “If you had any honor at all, you’d give your Peace Prize back after today.”

  “I was just following orders, ma’am. Like you were when you rigged your bombs.”

  “You must not be a fan of history. ‘I was just following orders’ ceased to be a reasonable defense in World War II. That was more than nine hundred years ago.”

  “Let’s cut the bullshit. You made a threat; I assume you have a corresponding demand to make?”

  “I do. Leave this ship and go back to Earth where you belong or I will blow it up and no one will get it.”

  “You’d kill your own crew?”

  “Rather than let them be captured by Terrans? Yes. They’ll go back to their real lives when they die.”

  “You’re a Simulist,” Alexander said, as if that explained everything. “Now I understand your suicidal impulses. What if you’re wrong and this is it?”

  “Either way I won’t regret it.”

  “Because you’ll be dead and incapable of reflecting on your stupidity. Trade your immortal life for an empty void of existential gibberish. Sounds like a fair exchange to me,” Alexander said. “You must have a lot of faith in said gibberish.”

  “And you an utter lack of it. You can argue with my beliefs all you like, Admiral, but it will do nothing to weaken my resolve.”

  “Then let’s try this. Your captain is safely away aboard the Adamantine along with the Crimson Warrior’s data core. All you’ll deprive us of is a few prisoners and a derelict dreadnought.”

  The woman facing off with him regarded him in silence for a couple of seconds. “Even if that’s true, we still win,” she decided.

  “No, you don’t, and here’s why. I’ve already checked your ship’s logs, and it’s clear to me that you couldn’t have launched the missiles that hit Earth and the Moon, but by destroying your ship and killing your crew, you’ll make it look like you had something to hide. It will seem like the Solarians really were involved even though there’s no proof.”

  Silence answered that argument.

  “We still have a chance to prevent this war,” Alexander went on.

  “Do we? You assume that Terrans are reasonable people. There are only three options here, Admiral: one, aliens attacked you, which seems doubtful; two, we attacked you, which I know to be false; and three, your own government attacked itself and now they are framing us so they will have an excuse to go to war.”

  It was Alexander’s turn for silence. That hadn’t occurred to him. Would the Alliance really do something that terrible? How many millions had died in the attacks? And their already bankrupt government was having to shell out trillions of Sols in emergency relief funds.

  Alexander shook his head. “That’s absurd. The Alliance is dirt poor and you’re suggesting we plotted to burn down our own house. How stupid do you think we are?”

  “Then you’re in favor of the alien invasion theory.”

  “It doesn’t matter what I’m in favor of. If you’re right and your government had nothing to do with what happened, then the truth will eventually come out. But in order for that to happen, we need witnesses like you to still be alive. The Alliance is a democracy, and if we can prove that our government killed millions of its own people, any war that gets started now will end in the fires of anarchy back on Earth. Stand down, ma’am. You’re more use to your people alive than dead.”

  Silence answered that last request as the enemy officer considered his arguments. “I may have misjudged you,” she said at last. “All right. We’ll do it your way.”

  “Thank you.” Alexander watched as marines moved up cautiously to take her and the remainder of the Crimson Warrior’s crew into custody.

  Alexander contacted McAdams while he waited. “Any updates from Fleet Command?”

  “Our orders stand, sir. They’re sending reinforcements to meet us halfway and head off those Solarian destroyers.”

  “Who’s going to reach us first?”

  “Depends who pushes their ships harder, and what kind of Gs we can pull while we’re towing the Crimson Warrior.”

  “That’s not the answer I was hoping for, Commander.”

  “It’s the only one I’ve got, sir. We’ll do our best to keep them out of range. Maybe you’ll be able to talk them out of attacking us.”

  “Hah!” Alexander scoffed. “Very funny.”

  “No, I mean it. The way you talked that Solarian woman down was genius. I particularly liked the way you made fun of her for being a Simulist when you’re one yourself.”

  “I didn’t think it wise to let her dwell on the idea that the universe as we know it could be one big mindscape. And I never said I was a Simulist—just that what they believe is plausible.”

  “Well, I don’t care what that woman says—you definitely deserve your Peace Prize.”

  Alexander grunted. “Doesn’t feel that way, but thank you.” Alexander looked up at the stars, trying to decide which one of them might be Earth. “Do you think she was right?”

  “Weren’t you listening? I just said—”

  “No, not about me—about the Alliance attacking itself.”

  “Your analysis was on point, sir,” McAdams replied with an audible frown. “We can’t afford to attack ourselves.”

  “True, but there might be more to it than that. It wouldn’t be the first time a government conspiracy bit us in the ass, Commander.”

  “Operation Alice was different. The conspiracy was to attack the Confederates, not ourselves. Besides, what could we possibly gain from a war with the Solarians?”

  “I don’t know, Commander. What I do know is I don’t want to get blindsided again. At the risk of contradicting what I said to you in the Officer’s Lounge earlier, I really hope the Solarians are to blame.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “Because with the alternatives being aliens and friendly fire, the Solarians look tame by comparison.”

  “Aye, sir. That they do. Are you coming back to the bridge now?”

  “Not yet. I want to see the prisoners to their G-tanks and make sure they’re all safely sedated first. Soon as that’s done we can dock the Adamantine and get back to Earth.”

  “Hurry, sir. Every minute we spend drifting out here is another minute that those destroyers have to get to us before our reinforcements do.”

  Alexander gave a mental grimace. “Don’t remind me. See you soon, Commander. De Leon out.”

  Chapter 17

  Dorian Gray stood on the sidewalk outside Mindsoft Tower looking up at the hazy white curtain drawn across the sky, wondering how much of that haze was from old world pollution and how much of it was clouds—maybe even clouds that had formed in the wake of the recent Gulf impact.

  Bringing his gaze back down to Earth, he sighed and folded his arms. Peripherally, he noted his bodyguard bots scanning the area.

  “Professor Arias… I don’t have all day.”

  “One moment, please, Mr. Gray… I’m sure it won’t be much longer.” The professor flashed a hesitant smile from where he stood on the
curb with a new bot prototype. The bot looked like one of the service industry models—humanoid with a pleasant, holographic human face, and soft, human-looking skin. It even wore clothes: a black sports jacket over a plain white T and blue jeans, topped off with a black bowler hat to make him—it—look like something that had stepped out of a time machine.

  The professor looked up and down the pristine blacktop with wide, bloodshot eyes. His team stood off at a distance, hands in their white lab coats, shuffling their feet nervously. Arias looked every bit the part of a mad scientist—complete with overgrown, unruly brown hair, and augmented reality glasses, which he preferred to lenses for some unimaginable reason.

  Phoenix had hired him because he was one of the world’s foremost experts in artificial intelligence. Now she’d asked him to attend this demonstration of a new AI that Arias promised would soon replace all the others.

  Dorian tapped his foot and checked the time in the top right corner of his lenses. “We’ll schedule another demonstration when you’re better prepared, professor,” Dorian said.

  “Wait! There!” Arias pointed across the street to a dark alleyway. His bot turned to look. So did Dorian.

  Something was moving between the garbage dumpsters. Something small. A stray dog, Dorian realized. It looked like one part Jack Russel and two parts shaggy street mutt. The dog was scrounging for food in the garbage. Professor Arias snapped his fingers at one of his team members. The man hurried forward, producing a roasted chicken leg from his lab coat. He handed it to the bot.

  Dorian’s nose wrinkled. How long did he have that in there?

  The professor turned to the bot and said, “I’m hungry, Ben. Could I have that chicken, please?”

  The robot regarded the professor with an apologetic smile on its holographic face. “I’m sorry, Father. Someone else needs it more than you.” With that, the robot set out across the street toward the dog, whistling and calling to the stray in a pleasant voice, servos whirring as it went.

  The dog looked up from the garbage and cocked its head, studying the bot’s approach as if to decide whether it should stay or flee. Then a stiff breeze blew in and the dog lifted its snout, obviously catching a whiff of the chicken. It wagged its tail once, but did not approach. As the bot drew near, the dog crouched low and growled. Ben stopped in the middle of the street and carefully peeled the meat off the chicken bone, scattering the bits on the ground. Placing the bone in its jeans pocket, the bot got down on its haunches and beckoned to the animal once more.