Anomaly on Cerka Read online

  “Really?” Alma’s rifle lowered a centimeter. “We did break into a VDF facility,” the woman reminded her.

  “Well, mostly friendly, then. I’ll still have to turn you over to the CPS after.”

  “Like fuck that’s happening.”

  Jessica called out.

  the AI asked.

 

  The AI giggled.

 

 

  Jessica sighed, knowing Trevor would be annoyed with her.

  Trevor grunted.

 

 

 

  Trevor laughed.

  Jessica chuckled aloud.

 

 

  “If you don’t move your ass in the next three seconds, I’m gonna—”

  Alma’s shriek cut off as Jessica reached out and placed her hand on the end of her railgun.

  “You need to relax, Captain,” she said, releasing a passel of nano onto the weapon. “Or shoot. Pick.”

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” Alma sputtered.

  “It’s like this,” Jessica said, glancing at the other three crew members who had entered the cargo bay while she’d been speaking to Trevor. “You’re not really a significant threat to me. I also want to get intel from you, so I’m not killing you. I need to find out if my friend is on your ship. Actually, let’s start at the end there. Is my friend on your ship?”

  “Your friend? The redhead?”

  “Yeah, she’s a witch. I think red hair is their calling card.”

  Alma cocked her head. “For real?”

  “No, I have no idea if all witches have red hair.”

  “Fuck,” the captain shook her head and yanked her railgun out of Jessica’s grasp. “I think you’re crazy. Boys, grab her and toss her in the hole before I get a worse headache.”

  Two of the crew advanced on Jessica, seizing her arms and pulling them back.

  Splaying her hands, she reached out and grabbed onto the first things she met. One was a hip, and the other was a man’s junk. A hundred thousand joules of energy flowed into each, and amidst a pair of blood curdling shrieks, the hands grasping her arms let go.

  Around her, the rest of the ship’s crew backed off, though Alma’s jaw tightened.

  The woman knew she had to show her crew that she was still in control of the situation, but Jessica was too valuable a prize to simply kill. With a look of forced resolve, she pursed her lips and lowered her railgun, aiming at Jessica’s leg.

  “You’re gonna regret that,” she informed her reluctant prisoner.

  Her finger pressed the firing stud, but nothing happened.

  “Oh shit,” someone said.

  Jessica strode forward, snatched the rifle from Alma, and grabbed the woman by the hair.

  “OK, lady. I’m starting to get annoyed. You’re going to tell me everything you know.”

  * * * * *

  Fifteen minutes later, Trevor walked onto the bridge, a laugh bursting from his throat as he saw Jessica lounging on the captain’s chair, legs hanging over one arm while her head rested on the other.

  “This your new ship?” he asked, looking around.

  “Stars no!” Jessica snorted. “Did you catch a whiff of the smell in the passageway out there? What makes that sort of stench, anyway?”

  Her husband shook his head. “I really don’t want to know. Smelled like hydraulic grease and dead skunk.”

  “Guh…there’s a terrible visual.”

  “So, where’s the crew?” he asked, turning as Jessica nodded to his left.

  All nine members of Alma’s crew were lined up along the far side of the bridge, foreheads on the deck, hands cuffed behind their backs.

  “Damn, that looks uncomfortable,” Trevor muttered. “Reminds me of that one time we all went on a team-building event with Cheeky.”

  “Trevor! We all swore never to speak of that again.”

  “I didn’t speak of, it, I spoke of being reminded of it.”

  “Same difference.”

  He shrugged. “Well, did you learn anything from them?”

  Jessica swung her legs over the edge of the chair and stood, stretching languidly. “Damn, that was uncomfortable.”

  “Then why were you doing it?”

  “To get a laugh out of you when you came in,” she replied.

  The mountain of a man shook his head, a deep rumble sounding in his chest. “I suppose it worked, then. You do love to make a scene.”

  “Set a scene, Trevor. ‘Make a scene’ sounds like I throw hissy fits or something.”

  “I know.”

  Jessica laughed and turned to the crew. “OK, so Amanda’s not on board—hopefully Iris finds her soon. Once I determined that, I got them to tell me what they saw in the weapons depot. Was definitely our evil warlock guy—”

  “Magus, Jess, he’s called a Magus.”

  “Sure,” she nodded. “But how often do we call people what they want?”

  “Ummm…pretty much most of the time.”

  “Spoilsport.” She shot her husband a mock glare before continuing, “I guess he was doing some sort of hoodoo voodoo on the proton tank. Probing it with magic—which scared them off.”

  “That probably explains why you didn’t see any tampering on the tanks.”

  “Right,” Jessica nodded. “Also confirms that they’re here looking for the mind-control tech that the VDF was using on their brain cases.”

  “So is there any of that left?” he asked. “Other than in the crates that went boom down on the lower ring.”

  “Not that I know of,” she replied. “But I want to go visit General Hera just to be sure.”

  “Once we deal with this,” Trevor said, then held up a hand. “No, don’t you dare take the Sexy and leave me with this lot. No, no, no.”

  “Pleeeaase, the smell is killing me.”

  “Fine.” He kissed her forehead. “But you owe me. Big time.”

  Jessica gave him a winning smile. “Anything.”

  “You’re going to play the next four games of snark with a four-card handicap.”

  “Shit,” she muttered. “You drive a hard bargain.”

  * * * * *

  Iris asked.

  The other AI checked her multimode railgun and the electron beam on her right arm.

 

 

  Iris stared down the long corridor that led into an old waste reclamation plant.

 

  Jinx asked.

  Iris laughed aloud.

  The pair of AIs began to advance down the corridor, a nano
cloud flushed out ahead of them, searching for any sensors—not that they’d be likely to pick up the two stealthed figures.

  Jinx asked as they approached the sealed doors at the end of the passage.

  Iris replied.

 

  Iris asked as she reached the door and placed a breach kit on the panel.

 

  Iris said in a more serious tone.

 

  A moment later, the doors slid open, and both AIs quickly advanced to take cover behind a large tank. Just as they hunkered down and began surveying the space, a rocket flew out and slammed into the deck a few meters behind them.

  Iris got her drones out, and as they rose into the air, she picked up dozens of enemies. From the energy signatures, they were all armed to the teeth.

 

 

  Iris signaled for the other AI to move to the far end of the tank while she sent out more drones to get a better view of their surroundings.

 

 

  Iris replied.

 

 

  UNLEASHED

  STELLAR DATE: 05.11.8948 (Adjusted Years)

  LOCATION: Unknown location, Cerka Station

  REGION: Mullens, Virginis System, LoS Space

  Consciousness eased its way back into Amanda’s mind as she slowly became aware of her surroundings. She was laid on her back on a stiff feeling mattress.

  With her eyes still closed and only feeling half awake, she tried to adjust her position to one that was a little more comfortable, but found she couldn’t move.

  Or, more accurately, her arms and legs couldn’t move.

  Amanda stopped trying to shift her position, and thought back to the last thing she remembered. A sinking feeling settled in her gut. She was wide awake now, her adrenaline beginning to pump, but she kept her eyes closed and her breathing calm.

  Summoning her Magic she instinctually pulled on the Essentia she’d stored in her body, rather than on the ambient Essentia in the world around her, and noticed it flowed through her much easier.

  She mentally smiled to herself.

  Of course. That was the issue. Essentia didn’t flow as easily here as it did back home. That would account for the strain she’d felt when she’d attempted to use more powerful Magic, but it only really became obvious as she siphoned the Essentia she stored inside herself and compared the flow.

  She was relieved; this was something she could work around. She just needed to make a minor change to what she would normally do, and she’d be able to use her Magic unfettered.

  She set her mind to begin multitasking, splitting it into more than a dozen separate minds linked to form a hive, with several of them constantly pulling Essentia into herself to store it like a battery. It was a simple thing to do and seemed to—at least so far—negate the issues she had been experiencing with her Magic use in this universe.

  She conjured a second set of senses and placed them just above her prone body. Light flooded her mind as she looked around at the room through this Magical vision.

  Her surroundings were small and dirty, made of grimy metal bulkheads, grated flooring, and bright white lights set into the ceiling.

  She was laid out on some kind of medical bed that encased her lower arms and legs in sturdy looking clamps with blinking lights on them. Sensors were attached to her head and body, which she noticed was currently naked. Her boots and suit were laid off to one side on a chair.

  There were several robotic arms attached to the bed, hanging in the air above her, each one ending in fine needles that looked ready to slide into her.

  The only other person in the room sat with his back to her, checking over what looked like more attachments for the robotic arms. To the man’s left, a little closer to Amanda, was some kind of terminal, with a display that appeared to show her vitals.

  The wires attached to my head and chest must feed into that machine.

  “You can pretend you’re asleep as much as you’d like, miss, but you can’t fool us.”

  Amanda opened her eyes. “Apparently not,” she replied.

  The man turned to look at her.

  He was young and surprisingly handsome, which threw Amanda for a moment. She’d expected some kind of monster.

  She raised an eyebrow. “Hi there. I don’t normally get naked on the first date, you’ll have to forgive me,” she said.

  The man smiled. “Sorry about that, just making things a little easier to work with. Also, we’re going to need to take a look at that bodysuit of yours. It’s got some curious properties that might be of interest to certain people.”

  “You could have just asked,” Amanda replied.

  The man smiled in a condescending manner. “Nice try. Now, speaking of tech, I have quite a bit of work to do on you,” he said as a light on the console flashed.

  With a whir of motors, the bed tilted up. She was propped in a more upright position, although not quite vertical.

  “Me?” Amanda asked, choosing to play along. She wanted to see what these guys—whoever they were—wanted.

  “But of course. You must be harboring some seriously advanced tech in that cute body of yours, miss. We saw you using some powerful personal shielding and stealth tech, and yet, our scans say you’re a true-blue, all natural, vanilla human. So here we are.

  “I’m going to dig around inside you and pull out whatever this advanced tech is. Might go for a pretty penny. Or maybe we can use it ourselves…. Can’t be too careful, with all these AIs getting ideas above their station, you know.”

  “Is that right?”

  Amanda used her Magic and dove into the man’s mind, working carefully so as not to make him aware of her presence. She looked into the truth of what he was saying, only to be confronted with some incredibly grizzly memories of other people he’d worked over.

  “I won’t lie,” he continued. “This is going to hurt. Quite a lot, actually. Should be fun though, yes?”

  “Well,” she replied nonchalantly, “as much as this sounds like a laugh a minute, I really am going to have to take a raincheck. I have other priorities right now, things to see and people to do, you know?”

  “Cute,” the man replied, as a light flickered on the console and the robot arms swung to life.

  Amanda smiled and concentrated. With a snap of air, she Ported across the room, appearing right behind him.

  “Wha—” the man exclaimed.

  Amanda reached out and grabbed him, pulling him backward and throwing him against the wall with a thud. Stepping up to him, she caught him by the neck and squeezed.

  “You know, that really wasn’t a nice thing you were going to do to me.”

  The man gagged and clawed at her fingers in panic.

  “The CPS are really going to want to speak to you, I think,” she added, and slammed his head against the wall, knocking him out.

  He dropped to the floor in a heap and lay still.

  “Nighy-night.”

  With a last smile at the unconscious man, Amanda moved over to the chair holding her clothing. With another quick
working of her will, her clothing snapped onto her body.

  “That’s better,” she said to herself as she turned toward the door just as it slid open with a hiss.

  On the other side, several armored men toting impressively large rifles opened fire on her. Rail-fired pellets streamed toward her, while a beam of light slashed across her body, burning into her Aegis, but not passing through it, leaving her unharmed.

  “Boys,” she scolded, shaking her head. “Is that any way to treat a guest?”

  With a thought and a threatening step forward, she raised her hands, sending Magical lightning laced with Essentia and kinetic energy lashing out with a blinding flash and an ear-splitting boom.

  Electronics fried, internal liquids violently evaporated, and the entire group was flung backward, as arcs of residual electricity snapped and popped around the metal room. Some of the men in the group had died instantly, but a couple of them moaned in agony as they clung to life.

  Walking forward, Amanda spotted a corridor leading off from the room. She looked down it to see a man with a gun looking at her with an expression of horror. He blinked, and then turned and ran.

  “No you don’t,” she muttered, and reached out, grabbing him telekinetically.

  The man flew back into the room in a second. She held him above the ground with a magical grip on his neck, while he clawed at the invisible and insubstantial hand that gripped him, making it hard for him to breathe.

  “Don’t mind me, just need to check something,” Amanda told him, and reached into the man’s mind, hunting for anything that might hint at working with the Reavers—seeing things he couldn’t explain, or any sign of Magic being used on him—but she found nothing.

  What she did find were memories of some terrible actions that he and his fellow gang members had taken part in. Some of the images turned Amanda’s stomach, and many of the victims had been entirely innocent.

  She pulled out of his mind and looked up at him. “You disgust me.”

  “Who…who are you?”

  “Judgment,” Amanda said, and slammed his head into the overhead, knocking him out. “The CPS is going to have a field day with you lot.”