6

On the second day of our most recent evasion of Vice Admiral Nebs, I met Elise in the training room. The room felt small after such frequent use. We needed to get onto a planet or even a space station to stretch our legs. I was seriously getting cabin fever.

“Is something on your mind?” X-37 asked privately.

“I’m feeling restless. Ready for a mission, any mission. Nothing against the Jellybird, but I’m feeling boxed in,” I said.

“I would’ve thought this would not be a problem for you after so much time in solitary confinement within the Bluesphere Maximum Security Prison,” X-37 said.

“That’s different,” I said

“Of course, Reaper Cain,” X-37 agreed.

I switched into my workout gear. It wasn’t the same as what a civilian would wear, because we also needed to perform tactical drills, then hit the range.

The fabric was tough, breathable, and easy to work with. I was able to sew on pockets to replicate our tactical gear and reinforce places that we destroyed during our hand-to-hand combat training—knees, elbows, and collars mostly. My outfit was dark gray, almost black. Elise had a closet full of these modified uniforms that she’d tailored once I showed her how to do it.

Today, she wore a blue variation to match streaks she had put in her hair. I didn’t have her fashion sense, nor did I care about such things. There wasn’t much I could do about my hard face with its vertical scar traversing one eye. In a crowd, with the right clothing, I could hide my augmentations for a time.

Union wars had scarred a lot of people over the years. My mangled face didn’t draw attention unless someone was looking closely.

“Are you ready?” Elise challenged when we met next to the treadmills and weight machines.

“I’m always ready,” I reminded her.

“Except when it comes to pulling the prank on Tom,” she disagreed as she did some warm-up exercises.

I stretched, trying not to feel old. Age wasn’t a problem; it was the mileage. “I’d completely forgotten about that. You need to be patient. Good pranks can’t be rushed.”

“Whatever,” she said. “You should’ve just let me do it. It would have been hilarious. Maybe I would’ve surprised even you.”

“Doubtful,” I said, thinking she was getting cocky. “Let’s do a run and then work on your strength. After that, I have some surprises.”

“Surprises?” she asked, looking slightly nervous. We’d been training together long enough that she understood my gut-check workouts were always brutal.

“Marksmanship first,” I said, giving her very little instruction at this point. We’d been doing this every day and I expected her to know the drill like the back of her hand, which she did.

She nodded curtly, then went straight to the gun locker. I watched her observe every safety procedure and noted her meticulous attention to detail. She was a teenager, still a kid to me. Her professionalism when we trained like this, however, warmed even the darkest parts of me.

At the same time, I was sad that this was her childhood. She was preparing for war, I thought, but then realized that wasn’t exactly right. She’d been at war since her father put her in Union experiments. 

She’d been at war, but she’d been unarmed and alone. Now she had one Reaper with a bad attitude and some friends to watch her back.

I steered my thoughts away from that topic. It wasn’t a good idea to train angry.

Elise finished checking the handgun then put it on the table with the slide locked back to show me it was empty. I gave her the briefest nod and she continued.

One of the things we’d been working on was our nonverbal communication. Just as I was developing new and improved methods for communicating silently with X-37, I was also doing this with Elise. As much as I resisted, there seemed no way we wouldn’t be working as a team in the future. I needed to stop worrying about ruining her life.

Even if I had an army at my command, Elise and I would be the tip of the spear—because we were the ones the Union really wanted.

I wanted to curse or maybe burn down a cigar or two.

Elise finished with the HDK rifle and tactical gear, laying it all out for my examination. I noticed she had included the stealth cloak.

“Are you sure about the cloak?” I said, watching for her reaction. “It’s difficult to use. You’ll have to go slow so you don’t shoot yourself while trying to make it function.”

“I know, and I know to treat the range like we’re using real bullets,” she said. “But you always tell me training is where we learn. I’d like to try this now rather than in the middle of a real operation when our lives are on the line.”

I let the moment draw out then motioned for her to continue.

“Jelly, can you time this?” she asked. “If I can measure it, I can improve it.”

“I am currently engaged in a difficult computation for Henshaw and Tom. Please ask X-37 if he’s able to do this,” Jelly said.

“That is no problem,” X-37 said. “Anytime you have your earbud in, I can perform many of the functions I do for Reaper Cain, except directly modify your biometrics.”

Elise laughed nervously. “I just need a timer this time, X. Thanks.”

“On my mark,” X-37 said.

“Hold on,” I interjected, pointing at Elise. “Go to the other side of the room and lie down like you’re sleeping. X will give you an alert, and then you can start the clock.”

Elise went to the other side of the training room, sprawled out on her back, and closed her eyes.

“X, give her enough time you can surprise her,” I ordered.

“Of course, Reaper Cain,” X-37 said, then flooded relaxing music through a public address channel that nearly put me to sleep.

A minute or two later, X-37 blared an alert tone through Elise’s earbud. “Alert! Alert! Scenario on!”

Elise sprang to her feet and sprinted to the equipment table. She geared up in the exact order that I had taught her: lightweight body armor, gun belt and tactical vest, and weapons.

Even without X-37 telling me her time as it progressed, I was impressed. She was quick and agile, also benefiting from an unusual amount of confidence for someone her age. She seemed to know she had trained hard and what she could do.

My job was becoming more and more to warn her what she couldn’t do. I’d learned the hard way to respect my own limitations and she needed to learn the same lesson before overconfidence got her killed.

“The drill is weapons transitions, starting with handgun and switching to the HDK,” I said. “Accuracy still matters, so don’t go faster than you can make the shots count.”

Pistol holstered and the HDK firmly attached to its tactical sling, Elise stepped onto the firing lane and waited for the command. There were three possible targets in the simple scenario. X-37 would activate them at random. Some would have holographic bad guys armed with a variety of weapons. Others would be innocent civilians.

Elise hadn’t appreciated my emphasis on target selection until I explained that we worked like the Union. We didn’t want to mow down innocent civilians during a gun battle in a public place.

The first target, an armed man in generic tactical gear, flashed to life. It brought up its weapon to aim at Elise.

She moved faster than the holo. “Threat left!” she shouted, firing three rounds a fraction of a second later. “Threat down,” she reported as the antagonist fell.

I watched with my arms crossed, evaluating her overall performance but also small details like her stance, her grip of the weapons, and how smooth the transitions were when she ran out of ammunition or had a malfunction.

On the range, I would put her up against any well-trained Union soldier, maybe even a spec ops commando. Real life was different. I hoped her new skills would never be tested, but I knew it was inevitable.

As soon as the firearms portion of our session was done, I directed her to disassemble the weapons and leave them on the table to be cleaned later. We went immediately to the treadmills and ran hard for three kilometers.

We hit the weight machines and the modified free weights I’d created from ship parts. She was smiling and enjoying the hard work when I threw in today’s surprise. Between each set, we ran wind sprints on the treadmills.

“I love it!” Elise exclaimed, sweating profusely but smiling like she was racing a hovercraft instead of getting her butt kicked in the gym.

“Bullshit!” I grunted.

Her response was unintelligible, but I thought she was having a blast—which was solid evidence she was nearly as crazy as I was.

An hour later, her expression was less flippant and her trash-talking less frequent. No matter how bad it became, she never complained and I never doubted she would finish the workout.

* * *

I limped away from the harsh training session, trying not to show how banged up I felt. It was nothing I wasn’t used to. Even when I was young, I didn’t stop until I pushed myself about two steps too far.

Maybe Elise was suffering, but she didn’t show it. She was young and had some genetic boosts from her exposure to the Union’s experiments. I’d seen her heal from wounds in a day that should’ve taken her weeks. It only made sense that her workout recovery would be above par.

X-37 did a good job monitoring my biometrics and tweaking things as best as possible. So, I really didn’t have much to complain about.

I took a sonic shower then headed for the observation deck for whiskey and cigar time with Tom. The moment I stepped onto the deck and observed the spectacular three-dimensional view of the uncharted star field, I knew that Tom had also experienced a challenging but fulfilling day.

He loved to learn new skills and tinker with things. The slightly unequal friendship he had with James Henshaw was a big deal to the man. If he resented the ocular engineer’s condescending attitude, he didn’t show it. Tom was probably used to this type of treatment.

I told myself not to worry. If Tom was okay with it, I was okay with it.

Henshaw and I would never be fast friends, but something had changed since our last mission. I discussed what I had observed with X-37 and we conditionally agreed that Henshaw could be trusted. He had turned against the Union as completely as I had and put all of his intellectual and creative energies into developing technology that would help me defeat my enemies.

“You look like you’ve been busy,” Tom said as he handed me a glass of whiskey and a cigar.

I put the glass on a small table next to the chair I preferred for our station time and then nursed the cigar to life. I breathed it in, in no hurry to answer Tom’s observation. We spent a lot of evenings here and our routine was very relaxed.

“We had a gut-check today,” I said.

“Ahh, that makes sense.” Tom paused, stepping back toward his chair but not taking his seat. We were both still standing. “I’m glad I’m not part of that brutishness.”

“What’s on your mind, Tom?” I asked.

He smiled. “I was just thinking about how my training supervisors would’ve never guessed I’d be working on stealth cloak technology with one of the best minds in the Union—formerly in the Union, I guess.”

“Do you think he’s as smart as he acts?” I asked.

“And then some,” Tom said.

“I have something I’ve been meaning to ask you, Tom,” I said.

“Fire away,” he responded easily.

“I’ve told you about the Bold Freedom and how it escaped Dreadmax,” I said.

He nodded and waited for more.

“With your expertise in mechanical engineering, do you think they have a chance of keeping a retrofitted, decades out-of-production freighter running long enough to get them to safety?” I asked.

“That depends on how far they have to travel to reach safety,” Tom said. “I can’t imagine they’ll find any place in the Union, or even the Deadlands, that will accept them. What would be the bounty on thousands of escaped fugitives?”

“I doubt the Union will admit publicly they even exist, but they will have teams to move in and handle their mistake,” I said without telling him exactly what that meant. He understood enough not to ask for details.

“Well, the fact that they were able to build a freighter from parts and leave the system speaks volumes of their ability and dedication,” Tom said. “I’d give them better chances if I was with them.”

“Look at you, Tom, all modest and self-effacing,” I said like I was talking to one of my buddies from basic training. In truth, he was probably the best friend I had or ever would have despite our differences.

“You caught me bragging,” he said, and laughed. “Why don’t we see if Jelly can connect Henshaw and Path to the observation deck. It’s about time we had some guests for whiskey and cigar time.”

I raised an eyebrow, studying Tom but eventually deciding there was no harm in expanding our group on a conditional basis. “I guess we could try it. Can’t hurt. Although I imagine they’ll be having better cigar and whiskeys than we are throwing back.”

Tom laughed, seeming slightly too nervous. “That’s true.”

His behavior intrigued me, but I didn’t feel there was anything malicious behind whatever he was holding back.

A voice came over our general communications channel at about the same time I saw a holographic representation of the Lady Faith’s bridge with Henshaw and Path sitting in oversized chairs. Henshaw was already drinking and smoking. Path sat there with his hands in his lap, seeming peaceful and content as always.

“Nice of you to join us,” I said magnanimously.

“Of course,” Henshaw said. “Maybe next time we can do this in person, and I will share some real cigars with you.”

“Now that’s an excellent idea,” I said as my mind registered a whip cream pie floating between us. It was so out of place that I was having a hard time processing exactly what it was.

“What the hell?” I asked as the pie nailed me in the face. My lightning fast Reaper reflexes allowed me to move my cigar clear of the creamy arc of destruction.

I bounded to my feet and jumped away as I heard Elise and the others laughing hysterically.

“Ha, ha, ha. That’s really fucking funny,” I said, wiping pie from my face.

Elise looked like a disembodied head, with the stealth cloak still shimmering around the rest of her body. She pointed at me. “Now that’s a prank!”

I looked at Tom. “I’m so glad everyone could be here to see this.”

Tom laughed so hard, he nearly spit out the sip of whiskey he had been taking when I confronted him for his part in the joke.

“And you, X, why didn’t you warn me?” I demanded. “Has she been practicing with that cloak without me?”

“Oh yes, Reaper Cain,” X-37 said. “Elise has been practicing with the stealth cloak every day, like you should be doing.”

“Thanks a lot, X. Very nice,” I said.

“Would you like me to instruct you on prank resistance?” X-37 said for everyone to hear.

Elise and the others had a second big laugh.

“That depends on whose side you’re on, X,” I said, then pointed at the others. “You know what goes around comes around, right?”

They continued to laugh, but it seemed a bit more cautious.

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