Bone Rider

Published by

Dreamspinner Press

5032 Capital Circle SW
Suite 2, PMB# 279
Tallahassee, FL 32305-7886

USA

http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of author imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Bone Rider

© 2013 J. Fally.

Cover Art

© 2013 Daniela Barisone.

Cover content is for illustrative purposes only and any person depicted on the cover is a model.

All rights reserved. This book is licensed to the original purchaser only. Duplication or distribution via any means is illegal and a violation of international copyright law, subject to criminal prosecution and upon conviction, fines, and/or imprisonment. Any eBook format cannot be legally loaned or given to others. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact Dreamspinner Press, 5032 Capital Circle SW, Suite 2, PMB# 279, Tallahassee, FL 32305-7886, USA, or http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/.

ISBN: 978-1-62798-211-5

Digital ISBN: 978-1-62798-210-8

Printed in the United States of America

First Edition

October 2013

Little Dragon

This is for you.

You make me proud.

You help me fly.

T
HE
fuckers were going to kill him. He knew it. He’d known it since the results had come in and he’d compared his top performances to those of his brothers. Not good enough. Not
dedicated
enough. Well, they had him there. Honestly, there were pieces of his partner he wouldn’t have touched with a ten-foot pole, much less his own private parts. Which, since as an intelligent battle armor and weapons system, he was supposed to bond completely with his host, might be construed as a flaw. Maybe. Possibly.

He studied the charts again. The results didn’t get any better from staring at them, though, and his worry ratcheted up another notch. Damn it. He should’ve just bitten the bullet and completed the bonding, allowed himself to synch with his host’s personality as well as his body. Trouble was, as it turned out, he not only had considerable intimacy issues, there was also a lot of him and not quite enough of his host. The result was that he was neither willing to mesh with his host’s mind nor able to perfectly settle under his skin. Six experimental armors, six unique artificial beings, and of course one of them had to be too big, too slow, had to have too much sense of self. There was always one. In this particular case, it happened to be System Six, the last one out of the lab. The one intended for the most highly decorated host, the war hero turned voluntary test subject. Rik. He of the yucky innards and the slimy subconscious.

System Six had been as eager to join with his host as the other systems, but that had been before he’d been poured down Rik’s throat and discovered he did not want to spend his life tied to someone who didn’t fit him in size and personality. He wanted out. Oh, did he want out. Too bad that “out” translated to “killed.” Destroyed by his creators or his own traitorous body. Battle armors were symbiotic by design; they couldn’t survive on their own. It was why they’d been dubbed “bone riders” by their designers. Lab humor. He hated it. Fact remained that without bones—or rather a host body—to ride, System Six would shut down bit by bit and eventually disintegrate. Hence the faking.

“… extremely high, but if you compare them to the other units, the scores are substandard.”

You try to run with the pack with your legs hobbled
, System Six thought resentfully, shoving his stolen copy of the report charts back into place. He inched closer to the doorway, keeping his host’s body pressed against the wall and unaware of the goings-on around him. As far as Rik was concerned, they were in their bunk, sleeping. Rik was probably dreaming about fornication again. System Six was too busy eavesdropping on their commanding officers to check… and, frankly, too disgusted. Slimy, scummy, gross subconscious. Gah.
Keep sleeping, Rik. Not your life they’re discussing
.

“Could be they simply need more time to adjust.”

That was Mir, second-in-command of the Widowmaker and System Six’s new favorite person. Yes, more time would be good. Maybe he could bring himself to bond with Rik after all, given more time. Or figure out a way to jump hosts without getting himself killed, if it turned out they really were as incompatible as System Six suspected. There had to be a way to make this work. He didn’t want to die. Be dismantled. Didn’t matter what they called it. The result was the same: no more System Six. He didn’t understand how the other systems could be so calm about the threat of extermination. But then, they were hooked in completely, what little consciousness they’d had dissolved in their host’s. Safe in oblivion, happy in absolute amalgamation. Not that they’d started out with a lot of individuality. Honestly, sometimes System Six couldn’t help but wonder if maybe he was the only one of them who was truly sentient.

“No. Look at the readings. The fucking armor is too big. Way too big. The idea was to use the extra material for additional plating under heavy fire, but that can’t work. Too much matter and not enough room. See?” There was a short pause while the officers stared at whatever Kom had pointed out. “In the long run, it’s going to squash Rik’s organs and kill him.”

System Six didn’t bother poking Rik’s head around the corner to check which part of the test protocols was being pointed out. He didn’t like where this conversation was going. His performance hadn’t been all that great back at base, but the discrepancy between him and the others had been attributed to the general differences between the systems. This had been their first long-distance training session, the crunch test. Obviously, he’d failed. Worse, they’d noticed the space issues. This was so, so bad. They were going to kill him, pull him out like a bad tooth and kill him.

“The others are doing fine, though,” Mir noted, perusing the results. “Much better than any kind of external body armor we’ve tested. I’m thinking Ler was right. Smart systems are the way to go.”

“They are impressive,” Kom admitted a little grudgingly. He was old-school military and had never made a secret out of the fact that he didn’t much like the idea of soldiers invaded and joined with intelligent weapons. Too much potential for disaster, he’d argued on the way out to the training grounds. You don’t fuck with individuals like that.

System Six agreed with him, though their perspective differed somewhat.

Mir chuckled. “Five out of six is pretty impressive too.”

Meaning one of them was going to be destroyed when they were back on base, and System Six had no doubts as to which one of them was going to end up as so much scrap metal. His host’s heart rate spiked in reaction to his agitation. Rik’s mind stirred, but System Six slapped it down before it could struggle to full awareness. The last thing System Six needed was his creep of a host interfering with what he had to do. There was no way he was going to let them ship him back and hold still while they tore him from this body and pulled him apart. They’d created him; that didn’t give them the right to undo him.

Time. He needed time. They were traveling through space at high speed, much too fast for System Six to come up with a feasible plan before they reached their destination. What he needed was a break. He had to stop the damn ship, or at least slow them down some. All right. Engine room. Find the control station, get into the system, hack the override, and hit the brakes.

How hard could it be?

I
T
WAS
supposed to be a routine training exercise and missile test in a fenced-in, rarely used area of military property west of San Antonio. Heat, brush, and the occasional run-in with a disgruntled rattler. Sweating rookie soldiers testing new types of ammunition and camouflage, sweating officers dutifully jotting down the results. Nothing fancy or unusual, except maybe the abnormally high percentage of FNGs
{1}
, but so far, nobody had been hit by friendly fire, so Captain Mark Brennan, in command of the exercise, figured they were doing all right. Mostly it was business as usual, right until the bright blue Texas sky turned red above their heads as a glowing, burning missile came screaming from the heavens and pulverized a hill not even five klicks from base camp.

The force of the impact made the ground shake. Brennan lost his footing and ended up flat on his face, as did most of his men. Equipment tumbled, an expensive new radar system got smashed to bits by a crate that bounced like a damn rubber ball, and the newly erected tents collapsed with the clank of toppling metal poles and the sigh of slumping fabric. Some of the soldiers yelled in surprise, at least one of them in pain.

Brennan shook his head to clear it a little and spat out a wad of dirt and blood. He must’ve bitten his lip when he’d hit the ground, but his teeth were all accounted for, so he merely wiped the back of his hand across his mouth and got back up with a grunt. His men were staggering to their feet around him, looking dazed and just as wobbly as their commanding officer. Some of them were talking, or maybe shouting, but he couldn’t hear them over the din in his head, the roar of his own heartbeat, the ringing in his ears; he could only see their lips move. Brennan’s vision was wonky as well, choppy and grainy, overlaid by the persistent flares and black spots caused by looking into too much brightness. He hoped his eyes hadn’t been damaged, or maybe his brain, because he could’ve sworn he’d spotted a glimpse of red-hot metal a second before the flaming
something
that had fallen from the sky met the ground. It had looked like a big, blazing shape that had defied the laws of physics by spinning along its lateral axis and slowing down before touchdown. He was reasonably sure that wasn’t how a meteorite was supposed to look or behave, and as soon as his ears stopped ringing and he could see again without miniature suns obscuring his vision, Brennan was going to call this shit in and ask permission to check out the site.

He started toward the radio station, weaving a bit on unsteady legs. His equilibrium was shot to hell, but the high-pitched whistling in his ears had already climbed down several decibels and he picked his way through the broken equipment slowly, blinking impatiently and checking on his men as he went. What a mess. Either some soon-to-be discharged asshole had forgotten to relay information about missile tests in the area, he thought, or they were dealing with a UXO, as in
unexploded ordnance
. Brennan hoped it was the former, because if it wasn’t, then someone somewhere (terrorists? North Korea? Iran? Plenty of enemies to pick from; it could’ve been anybody) had just declared war on the United States.

The thing was that missiles rarely traveled alone. This one might’ve been a dud, but if it had been part of an attack, then there must’ve been others, better aimed and fully active. Maybe this had been meant for Houston, though that meant it must’ve gone completely off course. How many cities had been targeted? How many destroyed? What about Washington DC? Was it even still standing? Had the president been there? Brennan thought he should know, but he didn’t, off-balance in every sense of the word as he was, so he shook it off and focused on the situation at hand. First things first. Secure the camp and contact command. Speculation was useless at this point.

Brennan stopped by a hunched-over private to make sure the man wasn’t seriously injured. No blood, though, just miserable heaving and the early stages of an impressive goose egg. The kid was probably concussed. He called for the medics, one hand on the soldier’s back to make sure he didn’t topple over, and glanced around, assessing the damage now that his sight was almost back to normal. It wasn’t as bad as it had looked at first glance. The jeeps were still standing, as were the heavy weapons and ammo crates. The tents had toppled and equipment was strewn about, but the actual destruction looked to be minimal. He still wasn’t hearing right, but his eyesight was mostly back to par and he felt steadier on his feet. Barking orders came naturally; he handed over the still-retching private into the medics’ care and started to sort out the confusion around him. By his estimate, he could move his troops within the hour; faster, if necessary.