Tracer (47 page)

SCIENCE OFFICER GORDEN OLSEN: DECEASED.

CORPORAL KEIRA JENKINS (EXPLOSIVES TECH, FIRST GRADE): DECEASED.

WAITING FOR RESPONSE… WAITING FOR RESPONSE… WAITING FOR RESPONSE…

CAPTAIN CONRAD HARRIS: DECEASED.

This
was the part I disliked most.

Waking
up again was always worse than dying.

I floated inside my simulator-tank – a respirator mask attached to my face – and blinked amniotic fluid from my eyes to read the screen more clearly. The soak stung like a bitch. The words scrolled across a monitor positioned above my tank. Everything was cast a clear, brilliant blue by the liquid filling my simulator.

PURGE CYCLE COMMENCED …

The tank made
a hydraulic hissing, and the fluid began to slough out. It was already cooling.

I was instantly smaller and yet heavier. Breathing was a labour. These lungs didn’t have the capacity of a simulant’s, and I knew that it would take a few minutes to get used to them again. I caught the reflection on the inside of the plasglass cover, and didn’t immediately recognise it as
my
reflection. That was
the face I had been born with, and this was the body I had lived inside for forty years. I was naked, jacked directly into the simulator. Cables were plugged into the base of the device, allowing me to control my simulant out there in the depths of space. My biorhythms, and those of the rest of my squad, appeared on the same monitor.

All alive and accounted for. Everyone made safe transition
.

I had been operating a flesh-and-blood simulation of myself, manufactured from my body tissue. These were called simulants: simulated copies, genetically engineered to be stronger, bigger, faster. Based on the human genome, but accelerated and modified, the sims were the ultimate weapon – more human than human in every sense. Vat-grown, designed for purpose. Now, my simulant was dead.
It
had died
on the
New Haven. I
was alive, safe aboard the
Liberty Point
.

I was a soldier in the Alliance military – more specifically in the Simulant Operations Programme. Technically, the Programme was a special operation conducted by the Army. In truth, this was warfare on such a different level to anything that had come before, that the Programme was something separate from the other branches of the
Alliance military.

I settled on the floor of the tank, unjacking myself from the control cables. The neural-link had been severed when my simulant was killed by the Krell onslaught, but pulling the jack from the back of my neck still sent a brief stab of pain through me. My arms and legs felt baby-weak, ineffectual. Hard to believe that I was going to have to adjust to this all over again. I
didn’t like this body much: the sim had been a much better fit.

Once the fluid had drained, the tank door slid open. I wrenched the respirator mask from my face and tossed it aside, slowly stepping out. I shook fluid from my limbs, shivering. A medic wrapped a heat-preserving aluminium blanket around me. Another reached for the biometric dog-tags from around my neck, scanning them.

“Successful
extraction, Captain,” he said. “Well done.”

My arms and legs ached dully. There were three red abrasions across my chest – stigmatic wounds caused by the Krell assault. Inflamed welts and whip-like abrasions also marked my limbs, reminding me of the punishment my sim had suffered. I probed my chest with numb fingers – almost expecting to find stinger-spines stuck there. My ears still rang with
the shrieks of the dying Krell.

All that had happened was a reality.

Just not a reality for me, at least not physically.

I was in the Simulant Operations Centre of the
Liberty Point
. As far as the eye could see, the chamber was crammed with identical bays – each housing a squad of troopers, operating simulants on missions out in the Quarantine Zone.

Around me, my squad were similarly mounted
in simulator-tanks. Each trooper was undergoing the same disconnection protocol.

“Nice work, people,” I managed. I spoke with the slur of a day-long drunk; like my body wasn’t my own.

I took in my crew. They looked like paler imitations of their simulants, or maybe the simulants looked like improved versions of the squad. They were athletic-bodied but with determined, disciplined physiques rather
than the over-muscled stature of bodybuilders.

They were all dedicated, honed troopers – mentally and physically. But we were not regular soldiers. There were important differences between a sim operator and a hardcopy soldier. Each of us was pocked with data-ports, around the base of the spine, the neck, the forearms, the thighs. Those allowed connection between the simulator and our physical
bodies.

“Let’s get this wrapped up,” Jenkins hollered to the rest of the team. “Out of the tanks, disconnected. Double-time it.”

Although she tried hard not to show it, she looked good. She had a small, trim body; dark hair bobbed for ease inside the simulators. At thirty-odd standard years, Jenkins was a ten-year Army vet and gave no hint of embarrassment at standing naked among a group of
male soldiers. They barely registered her appearance.

“Yes, ma’am,” Kaminski parroted.

“Fuck off, ’Ski. I’m a volunteer just like the rest of you.” Jenkins shook her hair dry. “Save that ‘ma’am’ shit until I get the promotion.”

“Yeah, Kaminski,” Blake said. “How many years are you going to do as a PFC?”

“I’m not listening,” Kaminski said.

He stumbled out of his tank. He ran a hand over his
buzz-cut hair – he was only thirty-two standard years, but he wore it short because he was receding. He’d spent most of his military career as a private: had been busted back to the rank so many times I’d lost count.

Kaminski’s torso was covered in tattoos, from a stylised phoenix to a leering Grim Reaper. Resurrection imagery: death and rebirth, something that only sim operators got to experience.
Across his shoulder blades, the newest addition to this flesh tapestry read FISH FOOD in cursive text. He had acquired that particular marking after a night of hard drinking and a dare from Jenkins, which Kaminski had evidently lost. He grinned inanely, pointing out a phantom injury on his head.

“Hey Jenkins,” he said, “would it kill you to set the charges faster next time? Could’ve saved me
a whole lot of pain from the fish heads.”

“Whatever, ’Ski,” Jenkins said. “At least they went for your head. There’s not much in there you’d miss.”

Martinez laughed. “Corporal’s got your number.”

The sixth member of my team hadn’t taken it so well. Olsen was particularly shaken by the ordeal. The physical and mental disconnection between the simulant and operator wasn’t a pleasant experience,
and he hadn’t been trained for it. That was why they only sent sim operators into the field: not everyone could do this. Olsen’s attachment to our squad had been an expensive experiment. The data-ports on his spine and forearms had only just taken; the flesh around them an angry red, out of place against his flabby white skin.

“You’ll find walking difficult at first,” a medic explained to Olsen.
“The simulant that you have just been operating was considerably larger than you. The difference in eye-level might be disorienting. Try to breathe slowly and deeply. Focus on this light …”

Lieutenant Dyker appeared, consulting a data-slate. He was dressed in khaki fatigues, sleeves rolled up. Dyker was our handler; responsible for directing the op from the
Point
, feeding me intel.

“Welcome
back to Alliance space, Captain Harris,” he said, looking up at me with a worn-out smile. Dyker never looked rested: his face was caught in a perpetual tired crumple. “Barring the sixteen million credits of military hardware that was destroyed in that explosion, I’d say that was a successful op.”

Dyker was referring to the loss of the simulants and the Wildcat APS. The rules of engagement were
fluid, and the sims were expendable. That made them unique in modern military terms, because sims could undertake missions that would be suicide to regular troopers. Even so, our orders were to preserve the simulants if possible – every sim had a significant credit value attached to it.

“What can I say?” I asked, rhetorically. I had time for Dyker; he gave me latitude to do what I needed to in
the field. “The ship was brimming with Krell. They didn’t leave us with much of a choice.”

Dyker shrugged. “No matter.” He threw a thumb in Olsen’s direction. “I don’t think that he will be trying that again.”

“Best leave it to the professionals.”

Dyker nodded. There was something sad in his expression. “I’ll report that back to Command. The op otherwise went well. The ship has been neutralised,
all human cargo taken care of. We have the black box data.” He looked down at his slate. “That makes two hundred and eighteen trips out for you. You really are a stone-cold killer. Do you know what they are calling you down in the District?”

“No idea,” I said, concentrating on towelling myself dry. It was a lie – of course I knew. I might not like it, but I’d heard plenty of operators call me
by the name.

“They’re calling you Lazarus,” Dyker said. “Because you always come back. Whatever happens, you always come back.” He sighed. An absent rub of the back of his neck. “Report to the medical station for psych-eval and a check-up. After that, you’ve earned yourselves seven days of station-leave. Enjoy it.”

“I’ll try to.”