Marvin wanted his promised parts, naturally. I decided it was time to have a long overdue conversation with him.

  “What happened to med-tech Ning, Marvin?” I asked.

  “I do not know,” he said.

  “Her nametag was found in microbial soup in Sandra’s medical pod. You said you needed more protein to finish her repairs. Did you use Ning for that purpose?”

  Both Marvin’s functional eyes were on me, and the third one with the cracked lens joined them. “Jolly Rodger was destroyed. Ning may have been destroyed with it.”

  Was that evasion, I wondered, or just Marvin’s usual literal-mindedness? It did seem like he was still answering my first question while avoiding my second. “So, I’m going to assume you did use her proteins to repair Sandra,” I said. “That is an unacceptable practice—”

  “She asked you to do this, didn’t she?” Marvin asked.

  “She? You mean Sandra?”

  “Yes.”

  I looked at him, startled. Was that anger I sensed in him? I didn’t think he was capable of that emotion.

  “Asked me to do what?” I asked.

  “To cheat. To change the parameters of our arrangement at the final moment.”

  “No, she didn’t ask for that,” I said. “She doesn’t even know about our arrangement.”

  One of the cameras tilted closer. “She wants to disassemble me, you know.”

  I shook my head bemusedly. What was I supposed to do with Marvin? He could be telling the truth. Ning might have easily been lost in the mad scramble to evacuate Jolly Rodger. The nametag could be easily explained as well. Perhaps Ning was working on Sandra when the ship was hit. Maybe she was injured and fell into the medical pod, to be consumed by the microbes.

  “Let’s talk about Sandra then,” I said. “She’s not like everyone else who went through the microbial baths. She is stronger, faster, and has gained better senses. Why is that?”

  “Superior base-materials, longer period of exposure, and superior workmanship.”

  “Superior base-materials—meaning Ning.”

  “The closer the match and the fresher the base-materials—” he began.

  “Yeah, I got it,” I said. “I don’t understand what you mean about superior workmanship, however.”

  “Microbial generations are very short. They mutate and learn at a highly accelerated rate. Those that worked on her had already worked on two other humans.”

  “Ah,” I said, nodding. “The dirty motor oil stuff. Those microbes were experts after having worked on Kwon and Carlson? You think they learned that fast?”

  “Yes.”

  “But I still don’t know why she came out so differently than the others.”

  “I would surmise they performed experiments, taking their own initiative.”

  I looked at him harshly. “I would find that more likely if they were ordered to do so,” I said.

  Marvin’s cameras studied me, but made no comment. “Is this interview at an end?” he asked finally.

  “I suppose it is.”

  “Have you found my actions and responses satisfactory?”

  I knew he was asking for me to uphold my part of the bargain, but I wanted to know more while I had him in a compliant mood.

  “Did you kill Ning, Marvin?” I asked him.

  “No,” he said. “But I might have put her body into the medical pod to be repaired. And she might have been used by the microbials as raw materials. Accidentally.”

  “You might have?”

  “Yes—if such an admission does not negatively influence your decision to fulfill your commitments.”

  I snorted and shook my head, staring at him. Marvin quietly awaited my decision. I wasn’t completely sure what had happened between Ning, Marvin and Sandra. If Marvin’s story was the truth, it explained a lot. I tended to believe he had taken unsavory action, but that he was not a murderer. He was more of a mad scientist.

  In the end, I decided to help him. I guess after he had saved the lives of several of my crewmembers, it was hard to say ‘no’. A promise was a promise. Even if it was made to a robot…at least, that was the way I saw it.

  “Okay Marvin,” I said. “I promised. We’ll build you some new parts as soon as I heal up. But you can’t continue to experiment upon humans the way you do with machines.”

  “Agreed,” he said. “How will we proceed?”

  “Come back in three days,” I told him. “I need to recuperate.”

  The days passed quickly, and before I knew it I was working out with barrels of nanites at the base where we still kept most of our factories. I set Marvin’s brainbox up in the heart of a Nano ship that looked eerily like Alamo. As I built his new body, I had to wonder if I was making some kind of far-reaching error. I hoped not.

  I hooked up the manipulator arm and gave him a single engine. There was no repair unit onboard—no factory he could use to duplicate his mind or other parts. There was no armament, either. He had power, sensors, an engine and an arm. That was it.

  How much trouble could he get into with that?

  The End

  What follows is the beginning of Book #4, CONQUEST

  To purchase the entirety of the fourth book in the series, search for CONQUEST on your eBook Seller's website, or go to BVLarson.com

  CONQUEST

  (Star Force Series #4)

  by

  B. V. Larson

  -1-

  I woke up around midday under a flapping tarp. I was in a lean-to, something Sandra and I had put together on the southern shore of Andros Island. The tarp was orange vinyl, and one hundred percent free of nanites. Sandra had insisted we leave all alien technology behind. I found our shelter’s ruffling sounds, caused by the endless ocean winds, to be peaceful rather than annoying.

  Groaning aloud, I raised myself onto one elbow. Blearily, I surveyed the white sandy beach and the clear blue waters of the Caribbean beyond. Sandra and I had chosen this secluded spot for our brief vacation in part because none of the laser turrets that ringed the island were visible from here. You had to walk out into the surf and look east or west to see them. I had tried it and inevitably, they’d spotted me almost as quickly as I had spotted them. The nearest turrets were around a thousand yards away, but they’d swung around and studied me intently. Was I harmless, or an enemy to be burned down without compunction? It was an odd feeling to be judged by your own software. Each time they allowed me to live another day I was left aware of that moment of indecision in their alien minds.

  Today was a sad day, as it was the end of our brief three-day vacation on the beach. I had stolen this time as it was. We marines had come home to Earth at last, but we were far from safe. If anything, our doom could be seen with perfect clarity as it advanced upon us.

  I had spent six days in the hospital after we’d returned to Earth. For six long days my internal nanites had itched and tickled inside my body, repairing my bones, skin, organs and tissues. I’d spent those days worrying. I now understood how doomed men of the past must have felt while they awaited the inexorable approach of their final defeats.

  Napoleon during his last three days at Waterloo, King Leonidas at Thermopylae…Hitler, squatting in his bunker—which one was I? Was I playing the part of the hero making his last stand, or the delusional villain on the verge of taking down all he had ever held dear with him? I wasn’t entirely sure.

  I hadn’t started the original war with the Macros, no matter what the less flattering commentators said. The most insulting of the fake online vids showed me shaking hands with hundred foot tall metal monsters before they demolished buildings full of screaming kindergarteners. I wondered at the amount of effort these video pranksters had gone to in order to cast me as a demon in battle armor. I wanted to give them each a beam rifle, a gallon of silver nanites and a pet Macro of their own to play with. Let them try to make peace with the machines while I complained about their choices.

  The vids angered me because I hadn’t started the war—but I most certainly had rekindled it, that I could not deny. The criticism that hurts the worst should always be listened to, I told myself, because it was closest to the truth.

  I’d left the hospital a week before any doctor approved the decision. Six days I’d lain there, reading budget reports and talking to people who were nervous in my presence. It was as if they thought they might catch something deceptively deadly. I was sick of my sick-bed and tired of my visitors. The parade seemed infinite: celebrity well-wishers who turned a simple handshake into an interview. Politicians who came for private meetings, but brought cameramen in tow. Military people wanting to debrief me until my brain felt drained of useful thought. I knew I had to get moving again, so I did.

  Every day since I’d left the hospital had been something like today. First I’d shaken myself awake, causing a wave of fresh pain in my healing ribs. Then I’d sucked in that pain, reveling in it. How many times had I told my marines that pain was a good thing? As long as you felt it, you had unassailable proof that you were still alive.

  Sandra had led me down here, to this vacation spot, soon after I’d marched out of the hospital. Today, when she returned from combing the beach for interesting shells, she met me at the lean-to. We kissed and smiled at one another.

  “It’s over,” I said. “We have to go back.”

  “Yes, I feel it too,” she said. “We’ve been here too long. I’m not able to enjoy it any longer. I can’t stop thinking about what’s going on back at the base.”

  Without any argument, we packed a waiting crawler vehicle and drove it northward through the crashing waves, back to Fort Pierre and Star Force headquarters.

  As we drove over wet sand with waves licking at our tires, I kept thinking about the Macros, wondering if I should have done something differently. What was done was done, I told myself sternly. If I’d started a new war, then it was time to win it, not cry about it. Now was not the time to dwell on the mistakes of the past, but instead to press onward. I had to fix what I could and cheat to cover the rest until things went my way.

  Sandra and I held hands, but we hardly spoke on the journey back to base. We were both lost in our own thoughts. As we drew closer to home, our thoughts and expressions became grimmer.

  We reached the base without incident. Before I entered the gates, however, I contacted Major Barrera and Kwon. Kwon had retreated back to the NCO rank of First Sergeant, where he felt more at home, but he was still my right-hand man. Sandra already knew my plans. No one argued with me. They all knew what had to be done.

  I reflected as I crossed the base to Fleet’s grandiose new headquarters building that I’d built Star Force almost from the sand up. In many ways, the entirety of Andros Island bore the mark of my hand. Strung along every beach was an army of robotic turrets, aiming their laser projectors at every passerby. When I was on base, I could see them beyond the concrete walls, tracking every gull, swimmer and passing aircraft. They classified, identified and passed judgment upon everything that crept within their range. I watched a company of my marines exercise between two of them, oblivious to the fact the turrets watched them and contemplated an instant incineration for any man who might trip a neural chain and become designated as hostile. How trusting they were of my software.

  Crow had left his stamp upon this organization and this land as well. He’d done very little Nano design work, and he rarely worked on new weapons systems to combat the Macros. But he had lovingly shaped his own sprawling quarters and his office was reportedly huge. I had yet to set foot inside his new building since my return. The visit was long overdue.

  I walked into Fleet headquarters at one p. m. on a Thursday afternoon. In my hand, I had a folder stuffed with budget reports. I didn’t like what was printed on that blizzard of paper.

  Mysteriously, Fleet’s building had grown to be four stories tall in my absence. It was the largest building on base now, except for the hospital itself. The place hummed with staffers. Most of the staffers were clerks working on computers in their cubicles. I walked through rows of them, keeping my expression as blank as possible, but I imagined I was scowling somewhat. It was hard not to. Crow had stinted himself nothing. I could only imagine the bloated budget he rode herd upon, sucked out of every nation on Earth.

  Crow held court in a palatial office on the fourth floor. There was plenty of room left over up there for his army of clerks. I noted as I walked down the center aisle that the clerks on the fourth floor were different. They were almost all female. Most of the women were startlingly attractive, and the majority were Asians.

  There were guards here and there, armed with normal rifles rather than beamers. That was a new base regulation Crow had instituted, beamers were forbidden while in the presence of civilians who had no protection against blindness and radiation. I didn’t approve of the rule, as regular ballistic weaponry wasn’t particularly effective against Macros—or even our own marines.

  I could tell right off these base troops were poorly disciplined. They hadn’t been trained as shock-troops by veterans like First Sergeant Kwon. Most sat with their butts on the corner of a desk and relentlessly flirted with the half-interested clerks. The rest smoked near the windows while tapping at their smartphones.

  By the time I reached Crow’s door, I had been confronted by a half-dozen panicked staffers. There were a thousand reasons I couldn’t take another step. I ignored them all. I’d long ago learned that the key to bypassing bureaucrats was to maintain momentum and never stop walking. Eventually, these fluttering minions gave up on stalling me and switched to whispering warnings into their phones instead.

  I reached for Crow’s office door, which was a good twelve feet tall and built of fine island mahogany. The golden latches twisted before I could touch them, and the stately doors swung open to reveal a sumptuous interior. There was orange carpet underfoot, thick and soft. Fan blades shaped like palm fronds spun overhead. A massive desk built of rosewood filled the center of the room.

  There, standing in the middle of it all, was Crow himself. His blue eyes were open wide, as were his grinning lips. He had a sunburn and his reddened face made the whiteness of his big square teeth all the more noticeable.

  “Come on in, Colonel!” he greeted me, waving me forward with a sweep of his arm. “I hadn’t expected you would be done with your holiday so soon, but I’m glad you’re back.”

  I nodded, accepting his lie, and walked into the office. A few women with long dark hair and navy-blue business skirts swarmed quietly at the threshold behind me. Their eyes darted and they whispered to one another in hushed excitement. Crow shooed them back and closed the massive doors in their faces.

  I stood with my hands on my hips, admiring his office. “Nice flat you’ve got yourself here, Jack,” I said.

  His face puckered just for a second, then smoothed back into a smile. I knew he didn’t like it when I ignored his title of Admiral, but I didn’t care.

  “Glad you could drop by. You should build yourself a better building. I know a few architects. Everyone swears they’re the best in the hemisphere.”

  “I noticed,” I said, “and that brings me to the reason I’ve come.”

  I tossed a sheath of paper on his huge desk. The desk was so big the folder looked like a snowflake on a football field.

  Crow picked through the printouts, frowning at them. “Spreadsheets?”

  “Yes, budgets. Fleet is sucking up all the accounts. I don’t know how that got started, but it’s going to stop today.”

  Crow worked his mouth for a second, but nothing came out. Then he got his bearings again. I figured he was out of practice at the art of dealing with me. For months, everyone around here had been his frightened yes-man.

  “I’ll see what I can do about that, Kyle,” he said. “I’m sure we can come to some arrangement. Possibly, a bump up is in order for the Marines. Your side of the house took a beating out there. You’ll need to rebuild.”

  I nodded slowly, staring at him. He bent over the papers, took out a pencil and made some adjustments. The pencil scratched briefly.

  “Yes…I’ll cancel the officer’s private stadium. That’s a morale-building project, you know. Plenty of my mates will be disappointed, but we have to keep our priorities in order.”

  I shook my head slowly. “Fifty-fifty,” I said.

  He blinked at me, and cocked his head to one side. “I don’t quite follow you there—”

  “Oh yeah, you do. Fleet gets half of all incoming funds and the Marines get the other half. That’s it. End of story.”

  Crow flashed then, as I knew he would eventually. The man had a temper, and I was surprised he’d managed to keep it under wraps for this long.

  He sprang at me. It was sudden, almost thoughtless. His eyes were bulging in his head like boiled eggs. He didn’t punch me, he extended a single finger and poked me with it. My chest muscles tightened, but that only made my ribs hurt more. I whipped up my hand, grabbed his wrist and twisted. He went down on his face.

  He bounced back up. I stood there, staring at him. My eyes were slits and my mouth was a tight line. His nose was bleeding, probably from hitting that gaudy orange carpet with excessive force. I was bleeding too, from the hole his finger had punched into my chest muscles.

  I crossed my arms. He took a deep breath and crossed his. He laughed suddenly.

  “Same old shit between us,” he said. “Two alpha dogs, only one pack.”

  “Right,” I said, “but you’re all done humping my leg.”

  Crow nodded. “Okay mate. You win. Seventy-thirty. I’ll write it up today. There will be a lot of damage, a lot of good projects cancelled, but Fleet will survive.”

  “Fifty-fifty or we go for it right here,” I said.

  He took a step toward me and I thought he was going to punch me this time. I wasn’t really in good enough shape for a brawl. My bones weren’t completely reattached in places. But I was ready for it anyway.