Operation Chimera (2 page)

Her eyes narrowed. “My son shouldn’t be getting eighty-twos.”

Michael shook his head, laughing. “It’s not a school test, eighty-two targets out of a hundred hit while flying upside down between asteroids at 7,000 meters per second. Not as easy as it sounds… Guess I got lucky.”

“Can we stop talking about you trying to get yourself killed?” She leaned on the desk, and then began a conversation about casual everyday things as though her son was not about to go off on a dangerous mission. A bevy of questions from her students followed, about what it was like to be a fighter pilot.

Lieutenant Junior Grade Emma Loring stumbled through the chaos. Both hands clutched the strap of a duffel that weighed as much as she did, threatening to drag her to the ground if she let down her guard for even a moment. Squinting into the icy wind, she wandered along the edge of the throng of officers, enlisted, and civilians.

She never saw the attack coming.

Sarah, her little sister, hit her with force more akin to a ten-ton asteroid than a ten-year-old girl. Emma went over backwards, the duffel pulling her down like a turtle on its back. Small fingers clutched the fabric of her uniform, wadding it into fists that shook her as the girl fell on top of her.

“Please, Emma, don’t go,” she wailed. “Mum’s gone off last month; I don’t want you to leave me alone.”

Emma let go of the strap and sat up, wrapping her arms around her trembling sibling. “Hey now, Sprite, buck up. This is a very important thing I’m doing. If it goes right, we could end the war.”

Sarah sniffled, wiping her tears. “I don’t want you to end the war. I want someone else to do it, someone who’s not my sis.” She paused, frowning at Emma’s not-quite shoulder length bob. “Why did you cut it?”

“Regs. Had to.” Emma pulled at the ends, feeling somber. “That was two years ago when I went in.”

“I didn’t notice on the TG.” Sarah pouted, twisting ink-black strands through her fingers.

“Those screens are so titchy, no wonder.” Emma ran her fingers through her sister’s long, straight hair.

The girl pouted. “Guess I don’t look like a smaller you anymore. Mum’s been gone three months now; I’ve no one to play with.”

Her father stepped into her peripheral vision wearing a proud grin. Behind him, two security men panned dark visors over the crowd. Sarah narrowed her eyes at them.

“Your guard dogs don’t even trust the military?” Emma held her sister tight, patting her on the back as she looked up at her father. “It’s as if they’re expecting someone to have a pop at you.”

“Well, you know how they are. Government security and all that. It’s miserable at home. Whenever I go out, one of them is with me.” Her father pinched the bridge of his nose. “I can’t have a decent conversation with anyone, they’re afraid of
them.
”

“Take me with you?” pleaded Sarah. “I don’t want to go back to London.”

“I can’t. They don’t let sprogs on board.” Emma winked.

As the girl ran back to her father, begging him to use his influence to keep her sister home, Emma disengaged herself from her duffel’s strap and stood up.

“Give ‘er a ‘and with that bag, would you, Jeff? She can barely lift it.”

The hulking dark suit took a step closer.

“I’ve got it, Dad.” Emma hefted it back into place. The impact knocked her forward. “I don’t need to be coddled; it’ll only get me teased.”

Sarah, still clinging to her father, spun her head to stare. A curtain of black settled around her hips. Emma missed having hair that long. The look on the little porcelain face sent a few cracks racing through her resolve. She let the duffel slide to the ground and hugged her father and sister at the same time. After several minutes of silence, he shifted in an awkward twist toward the door. They exchanged glances; Emma knew he needed to go, some business with his office as Senator for District Fourteen, but he resigned himself to stay longer for Sarah’s benefit.

Closer to the flight deck, Lieutenant Junior Grade Aaron Vorys swaggered past those either already finished with their calls or who had no family come to see them off. He smiled at any who looked at him as if he and he alone would be the reason this mission succeeded. Confident in his stride, his white uniform did not even make the usual swooshing noise as he moved.

A blonde woman in a plain white uniform with a red cross on each shoulder gave him a head to toe glance. He changed course, sidling up alongside her.

“Is this your first cruise?” he asked, hoping the glint off his teeth was not too blinding.

She folded her arms, glanced at the rank on his collar, and flicked at her own pins: a field of black with three diagonal lines. Corpsman, enlisted. “Sorry, cowboy. I’m just here to make sure none of you flyboys leave their breakfast on the flight deck. I’m not here to fraternize.”

He cringed, feigning pain. “We’re not out there yet; you still have a few minutes to get to know me.”

The woman let her arms drape limp, shaking her head and turning away. “I don’t think so, sir.” She seemed less than enthusiastic about calling him ‘sir.’ “I sincerely doubt you’ll find a girl that loves you as much as you do.”

“Looks like your reputation precedes you, Vorys,” said a man just behind him.

Aaron glared at the pillar of averageness smirking at him, recognizing the source of the voice. He checked the Velcro on his own suit, pinching across the collarbones from left to right and then along a diagonal back to his hip.

“Your uniform fits just fine. It must be the narcissism wafting off of you,” quipped Liam, his one blue and one green eye caught the light with a gleam.

Neither could speak for a few seconds over the din of a cargo-mover roaring overhead, hauling several one-ton containers. The train-like arrangement of tug and boxes replaced the cold wind with a warm downrush. The deafening sound of its thrusters cut out the instant it breached the energy wall.

Aaron frowned at Liam. “I don’t know why you’re so pleased with yourself, Tell. You’d think if they made you in a vat they’d have at least made you perfect.” His voice reverberated quite a bit louder than he intended, occupying the silent aftermath of everyone shutting up in the wake of the tug.

Lieutenant JG Liam “Tell” Dalton was a replicant. There was no point being either ashamed of or proud of something beyond his control. “They wanted to keep us grounded in reality, keep us normal. They couldn’t go making us all look like Ken Dolls now could they? That would throw off the balance of nature or something.” He tapped his chin, and waved a hand at Aaron. “Besides, there’s plenty of puffed up asses to go around without manufacturing more.” He brushed at his hair, more yellow than Aaron’s sandy-brown, perfectly sculptured coif.

“She doesn’t know what she’s walking away from.”

Liam gave up on his false preening. “Oh, I’m pretty sure she does. So, umm, no family to see you off then?”

“They, uhh, couldn’t get away.”

“Oh, that’s right. Your mother got that post on Persephone 3. Administrator?”

“Colony Coordinator,” said Aaron, his nose rising a degree higher.

Eyebrows climbed. “Impressive, running the whole place. That’s a lot of pressure.”

“It’s a”―Aaron’s gaze slid off of Liam as he leaned to his right―” Liam, you ever see that before?” He pointed with a head motion.

Standing in one of the entrance doors, a non-human gazed around as if the shuttle bay were the single largest artificial structure he had ever seen. A touch shy of seven feet tall, his skin was coal black, his body had the general shape of a humanoid save for legs with double-jointed knees. Like a cat, he stood on the tips of elongated feet. The bone that would best approximate a human’s ankle was almost eighteen inches off the ground, leaving his weight balanced on three toes. The quartermaster had accommodated him as best as possible in regards to uniform, though boots in that shape were a bit too far removed from ordinary to be readily available.

The stranger moved into the room; ebon shimmers over his head had the appearance of either hairs or quills, it would be difficult to tell without touching. He turned his attention toward Aaron and Liam, attracted to the familiarity of their unit patches. With grace surprising for his size, he moved as if floating. Aaron leaned back as the newcomer’s oversized eyes, deep, royal blue ovals bespeckled with thousands of spheres formed of darkening shades, blinked in from the sides. Two ridges ran down the center of his face on either side of his nose, giving the impression of thick black leather grafted on to an otherwise human head. Teeth like onyx chips glinted from pale white gums as he smiled.

“Lieutenant,” he said, nodding at Aaron before nodding to Liam. “Lieutenant.”

The voice, silken and deep, did not come in time with the motion of his lips; another sound, faint and comprised of hisses, pops, and throat noises hovered just at the edge of hearing. Small blue lights at the ends of a metallic torc around his neck flickered in time with the speech. Both men shot a glance at the rank pin on the stranger’s sleeve as he extended a hand with three fingers and a thumb. Lieutenant JG, just like them.

“My apologies, Terrans. Is vertical oscillation of the grasping digits not an acceptable greeting salutation among your kind? Also, if this device”―he tapped the small sphere at one end of the torc―“commits an offensive or embarrassing error of translation, please pay it no mind.”

Aaron returned the gesture. “Handshake works for us, but if you run into anyone higher rank you should salute them.”

“Oh, yes. Ridge of the hand to the brow. I remember.” He saluted them. “I am Zavex, of Talnur.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Liam offered a subtle bow. “Damn those Draxx.”

Zavex drew in a sharp breath, the blues in his eyes darkened. A sizzling hiss emanated from him, something the device did not bother to translate. “It comes with great cost that the Talnurians have agreed to support the Terran Alliance.”

Aaron offered a grim nod. “I heard about that. Orbital station collided with the planet. Just like the Draxx to attack an unknown civilization.”

“We were more than they expected. The albedo of Talnur is low, and we have gone many generations without notice. We do not, however, overestimate our capability. Siding with Terrans became a necessity rather than choice.”

“That doesn’t sound like you’re very loyal.” Aaron winked at a passing female Ensign. She giggled.

Zavex pondered for a moment before emitting a slow series of sounds; seconds later, the translator chimed in. “I meant to say that the Terrans offered us the opportunity not to be destroyed. It was, forgive my weak human idiom… not much choice.”

“Don’t mind him.” Liam patted Zavex on the arm. “He’s an ass to everyone.”

Aaron picked a crumb out of his eye with a certain finger.

“So, you look a bit on the young side, what are you, about twenty?” Liam ignored the gesture.

Zavex found that amusing. “Talnurians age at an equivalent rate of one human year for every 2.73 Earth years that pass. I am, in your time, approximately fifty-two years of age. However, among my people, I am considered a young adult. In your terms, I would be nineteen.”

“Fancy that,” said Aaron.

“I don’t imagine either of you would know if they have managed to find a flight suit with proper boots?” Zavex flexed his toes.

Aaron and Liam looked at each other, then cracked up.