Tech World (Undying Mercenaries Series) (3 page)

-3-

There are a few funny things that people have to understand about revival machines and how they operate in order to understand what happened later that same hot Friday in Georgia. Our bodies are only backed up occasionally, starting with the day you’re recruited. When you’re brought back to life, you usually came back as you were on the day your cells were copied—at least physically.

There are exceptions to this however. If you needed corrective surgery of some kind or if you improved your physique with exercise and training, you might back up your body’s cellular scans afterward to ensure you returned to life later in the best possible condition.

The mind of a Legionnaire is recorded separately. It’s done with incremental backups, transcribing only the changes to our neural nets. This process is done far more regularly so that we can remember our training and life events. Usually, our tappers do the job of transcription. If they’re within range of a transceiver relay unit, they’ll upload the data concerning our neural networks quite often, every minute or so. That’s how we can recall the circumstances of our own deaths.

The only living witness to the debacle that had occurred in my little shack was Tech Specialist Natasha Elkin. She knew me, and I thought sometimes she might even love me a little. Whatever her t
rue feelings were, she covered for me that morning.

Natasha
was a tech and a good one. She hacked all three of the dead Hegemony pricks’ tappers, dumping their last uploads. The exact circumstances of their deaths were therefore recorded in her mind and restored in mine, but the Hegemony pukes had forgotten the dramatic finish. They knew they’d come to my place. They knew they’d pushed their way in and argued. But they had no idea how they’d died, or who had been at fault.

When an alien machine in downtown Atlanta gave birth to me once again, there was already a Hegemony squad waiting on site to arrest me. Fortunately, I wasn’t taken by surprise. Stumbling and naked, I had just long enough to read a private message from Natasha on my tapper before they hauled me away to a holding cell.

“Stay cool, stay dumb, no memories,”
her message read.

I swiped my numb fingers over the text, and the words erased themselves, lost in the mysteries of the net. I allowed myself a small smile.

Playing dumb comes easily to me—some say it’s my only natural skill. The Hegemony MPs held me, and they grilled me, but they eventually gave up.

As far as they could determine, I didn’t remember a damned thing. At least, no more than the other three dead men did. Only Natasha’s story of three amateur-hour MPs pawing her and abusing her boyfriend was left behind to fill in the gaps. The memory loss was blamed on bad net service in the region—a believable enough excuse. Even I could te
stify to that much of the cover-story.

By the end of a very long day, I had a uniform issued to me and I was told Natasha had driven up from Waycross to pick me up. There were mumbled curses from the Hegemony people at the Atlanta Station as I was discharged from custody. I accepted their irritable behavior magnanimously and left in high spirits.

Natasha and I left the building as soon as we could get away. But at the exit door—which was powered, barred, and crisscrossed with wired glass—we were met by three familiar faces. I drew myself up and stiffened, but they held their hands high, palms out, in an apologetic gesture.

“Look, McGill…” began the skinny, balding Specialist. For the first time, I noticed his name was Turner. I hadn’t bothered to read his name badge while he was assaulting me in my home.

“Look,” he repeated, “I’m—we’re all here to say we’re sorry. For what that’s worth. We don’t know what went wrong at your place. But I think we can all agree that we’ve paid a price for it—whatever happened.”

I stood stoc
k-still, enjoying their discomfit for several seconds.

“I can accept your apology, Turner,” I said finally. I turned to Natasha. “As to pressing charges, only Natasha here knows what really happened to her. She was assaulted as I understand it.”

Natasha locked eyes with me for a second then turned to the three men in question. She drew in a breath and spoke. “I hope you gentlemen understand we’re
all
legionnaires. We shouldn’t let our petty rivalries pull us apart. We all serve the same world in the end.”

“Yes, ma’am,” said the fat guy eagerly. “We’re really sorry for…for anything we did.”

“You paid a horrid price,” she said, looking at each of them with pity in her eyes. “You all died screaming. Turner, you even shit yourself at the end.”

Turner’s eyes narrowed making him look even less pleasant than usual. The other two fidgeted with their hats.

“Under the circumstances, I won’t press charges,” Natasha said finally.

They were all visibly relieved.

“Thank you, ma’am,” fat boy said. “And for the record, I don’t understand how this all could have gotten so out of—”

Natasha put up a hand, and they stopped talking instantly. “Try to control yourselves in the future,” she advised, and we pressed past them.

I held my laughter until we reached her car. Natasha started up the car with a thrum and we glided through the city. My belly hurt I laughed so hard. I finally noticed she wasn’t in as good of a mood as I was.

“Hey,” I said, looking around. “Shouldn’t we hit
the auto-road? It’s a faster way out of town.”

“We aren’t leaving town,” she told me. “Official orders have come in—orders from Varus. You and I are to report to the local Chapter House.”

“Great.”

I tapped at my tapper, and my amusement died completely. Whoever had ordered my arrest had given up on having the local Hogs do it. They’d contacted my superiors this time. I was indeed ordered to report immediately to the Atlanta Chapter House.

For each of Earth’s Legions, there were both Mustering Halls and Chapter Houses dirt-side. The rest of our organization existed up in space, usually in the form of a large ship that served to transport troops to their assigned worlds.

Mustering Halls were big buildings constructed in the largest cities, usually one Hall per Sector. They handled recruitment and operated as ready-stations for off-world missions. The major difference between a Mustering Hall and a Chapter House was in scale and scope. Chapter Houses were local sales outlets—a few veterans were posted there performing local recruitment for a single legion. The Mustering Halls were much bigger and were shared facilities used by all the legions.

I’d only been to the Atlanta Chapter House twice. Once was when I’d been thinking about joining up. The second time was to file my change of address info when I’d moved to Waycross. It was a dingy little place, and I wasn’t looking forward to my third visit.

My legion’s Chapter House wasn’t much to look at. From the outside, it could have been a shoe store or one of those places that sells secondhand electronic goods from off-world. There was a row of similar Chapter Houses repping various legions. There were about fifteen in all that recruited locally and served the retired membership. Apparently a lot of my brothers
and sisters came from the southern states, and this office functioned as a hub for them.

Natasha and I had suited up by the time we arrived. Smart clothing is great that way. You can dress in your car if you want to
. All you have to do is wrap the cloth over yourself and wriggle a bit to let it worm its way around your butt and behind your back.

“What’s our story?” Natasha asked me as she parked.

I eyed her worriedly. I felt confident I could bullshit my way past anything that was asked of us, but Natasha was a straight-shooter. She’d done all right against the Hogs as she didn’t respect them, but with real Legion Varus people I knew it would be different for her. She liked telling the truth and doing as she was told when legit authority was involved. She’d helped me out back home and taken things way out on a limb. But I didn’t trust her here. She’d crack under real pressure from one of our direct commanders.

“Uh…story?” I asked. “We’ve already got it down. Some goons came to the door, there was a struggle when they didn’t identify themselves, and things went badly. Don’t change even the slightest detail.”

She looked worried, and she put a hand on the car door. The panel recognized her touch, flashed a colored light and the lock clicked open.

“Hey,” I said, reaching over and giving her a kiss on the cheek. “Don’t worry. We’ll be fine.”

“You murdered three men who someone sent to arrest you, James,” she said with a tight look on her face.

“Yeah, well…they deserved it.”

“I agree, but what if Graves is in that building? What if he’s a little smarter than that Hog team? He’ll
know
what happened. He knows us. He knows
you
.”

“Graves won’t give a shit if I got into it with a few Hogs.”

Natasha sighed and rolled her eyes at me briefly. I got that sort of response often, especially from women.

She climbed out, adjusted her uniform so it fit properly, and straightened her spine. I did the same, placing my beret on my head and tilting it at an appropriate angle. The smart uniforms worked to transform themselves into a crisp arrangement by crawling over our bodies.

I led the way to the door, pushed it open, and stepped inside. At the front desk I got my first surprise. I recognized the man who sat there. He was a rat-faced guy with close-cropped hair that glistened with additives. His name was Winslade and he was Primus Turov’s chief weasel.

Winslade had his feet on the desk. I looked at him, and he smiled back with sharp white teeth.

“Hey McGill,” he said. “Nice of you to show up. You’re wanted in back.”

He directed me with a casual stabbing of his thumb over his shoulder.

“Adjunct Winslade?” I asked. “What’s going on, sir?”

“You’ll find out. There’s only one closed door in the back. Go see who’s waiting inside.”

Winslade gave me a shitty grin. I passed him by, walking as coolly as possible. I wanted to maintain a solid front for Natasha’s sake. She’d been rattled the minute we arrived in the parking lot, and there wasn’t any point in giving her a weak vibe now.

As we passed his desk, Winslade’s skinny arm shot out blocking Natasha’s path. I felt like cracking him one, but I had to let it go.

“Not you, sweetie,” he said. “You can wait out here and keep me company.”

Walking to the door, I pushed it open and stepped inside. In the dim interior I met none other than Primus
Galina Turov herself.

I should have expected this after seeing Adjunct Winslade out front, but somehow I hadn’t figured it out. The Primus
never
came down to the sticks. She was a rare enough sight at the Mustering Hall up in Newark—but down here at the Chapter House? No way.

She took in my surprise with relish. I don
’t mean she was happy to see me, not by a long shot. Her joy was derived from my obvious dismay.

“Six months of leave and you’ve already forgotten how to salute?” Turov asked.

I jumped to attention and gave her a crisp salute. She didn’t deserve it, but rules were rules.

Turov and I had never seen eye to eye. She was a small, shapely woman who was older than she looked and a whole lot meaner. She’d been born a rule-stickler while I’d been born a rule-breaker. I figured we were destined never to get along.

She made a point of toying with her tablet before addressing me. I stood there, staring at the wall behind her head, waiting.

Finally, she set the tablet aside and leaned back in her chair.

“I suppose you’re wondering why I’ve ordered you to come here. Correct?”

“No sir,” I said.

A frown flickered over her features. She paused, but finally had to ask. “You
expected
to find me here?”

“No sir. I meant that I’m wondering who sent those three Hogs—excuse me, Hegemony officials—to my door this morning.”

“Ah, that,” she said, nodding. “I sent them.”

For the first time since I’d entered the tiny, dim-lit office, I met her eyes directly. She’d gotten my full attention.

“Hegemony troops? On the eve of a critical vote concerning our independence? Can I ask
why
, sir?”

Turov smiled and steepled her fingers. Her nails were blood red, but cut short. “Because you are who you are, James. I was depending on that. Thank you for the assist. Now, if you would kindly get the hell out of my office and onto the lifter waiting at the Atlanta Spaceport, we can all move on with our lives.”

I was confused. I’d expected a good reaming at the very least. But here she was, all smiles. Why had she bothered to come down here in the first place? Just to gloat about something? It seemed like she thought she’d won some kind of victory, but I was baffled as to what the prize was.

Then the implications of her new orders sank in.

“Sir?” I asked in confusion. “Did you say there’s a lifter at the spaceport?”

“Yes. Get on it. Legion Varus is mustering out—immediately.”