The serum didn’t work as well as the USSF had hoped. In most cases, he still had to give it time to work, and there was some damage it just couldn’t fix.

  He didn’t know how that compared to Caleb Card and his Relyeh symbiote. He knew Card could heal faster than normal. Maybe faster than a clone. But the Intellect Skin he wore tended to keep him from taking damage that would require a quick fix—a position Hayden couldn’t help but envy. He had two fake arms and a fake eye; scars across his face, chest and back; and a hole in his leg. He wouldn’t mind trading places with Card, just for a little while.

  “Card, you copy?” Hayden asked. He had hobbled along the passage for nearly five minutes, the first junction coming into view ahead.

  “Roger,” Caleb replied. “You’re almost out of range.”

  “The path is clear coming my way, you might want to start trailing.”

  “Roger. On my way.”

  “You know where the control is?”

  “Affirmative. I marked the spot on my tactical when you touched it.”

  “Pozz.”

  Hayden didn’t need to slow. His pace was already less than optimal, his cadence uneven. He made it to the junction and paused, eyeing the plaque that offered directions. He couldn’t read it, the characters only slightly familiar. Was that Chinese? If so, this was either an Earth generation ship or a perfect replica. Would Vyte go through that much trouble to fool them?

  “Looks like everything’s written in Chinese,” Hayden said.

  “This could be the Ziyou or the Taoyi,” Caleb replied. “Those are the two Chinese ships I know about.”

  Assuming the layout was the same, Hayden didn’t need the plaque to know where to go. “Pozz. I’m heading left toward the lifts and the bridge. There’s bound to be security up that way. Watch out for targets and stay close.”

  “Roger,” Caleb said. “I’m a secure distance behind you.”

  Hayden turned left, heading toward the starboard side of the vessel. He closed on another junction, pausing when he heard voices.

  “Did you hear about General Haeri?” a woman said nearby, approaching down the adjacent passage.

  “No,” a man replied. “I mean, not since yesterday. I still can’t believe what happened to Chair LaMont.”

  “The Judicus Department has a warrant out for the general’s arrest. He’s wanted for questioning in connection with the assassination.”

  Hayden froze. What? He started backing up. General Haeri was wanted for murder? How the hell could that be?

  He knew how.

  “I don’t believe that bullshit,” the man said. “Haeri is the most loyal Centurion on the planet. He has more medals than I have brains.”

  “That isn’t hard.”

  “Shut up. You know what I mean. He had no reason to kill LaMont. I bet it was the Trust.”

  “The Trust isn’t real.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  The two people were getting closer to the junction. Hayden continued backing away, unsure he still wanted to be taken into custody. If Vyte had already gotten to Haeri, he and Caleb wouldn’t stand much of a chance once they were in the open.

  “Hold on, I’m getting an emergency update,” the man said.

  “Me too,” the woman replied.

  “Sheriff, what’s going on?” Caleb asked, noticing Hayden’s retreat.

  “It’s Haeri,” Hayden whispered. “He’s in trouble, which means we’re in trouble.”

  “Shit,” Caleb said. He paused for a few seconds. “Sheriff, we have to stick to the plan.”

  “Haeri can’t send for me, or come to bail me out once I’m in custody,” Hayden replied.

  “Understood. But you aren’t going to get very far in a bloody duster and combat armor without an ID. The basic plan is sound. We need to follow through.”

  Hayden clenched his teeth. Caleb was right. He couldn’t move around Proxima like this, and there was no time to figure anything else out. He stopped backing up, recovering and starting toward the junction again.

  “This is so messed up,” the woman said. “Why would Haeri try to come all the way out here?”

  The two people were almost at the junction. Hayden picked up the pace, rushing to meet them.

  “Beats me,” the man replied. “The Ziyou is like a pimple on Proxima’s ass, and I don’t think anyone in Praeton even remembers we’re out here. You heard the orders. Report anything out of the ordinary.”

  “Like anything even slightly exciting ever happens here.”

  “You don’t call the increased personnel reassignments exciting?”

  “Not until I’m one of the personnel who gets reassigned, no.”

  The two people made it to the junction a few steps ahead of Hayden. He saw them seconds before they saw him—a pair of guards in light ballistic bodysuits and helmets beneath dark navy utilities. MP patches on the sleeves of their shirts.

  “Excuse me,” Hayden said, slipping the microspear out of sight before getting their attention.

  They turned to look at him, freezing momentarily at the sight before reaching for their sidearms.

  “What the hell?” the woman said.

  “Put your hands where I can see them,” the man ordered, getting his gun out and pointing it at Hayden. “Nice and slow.”

  Hayden raised his hands as best he could. “The augment’s damaged. I can’t bring this one up any higher.”

  “Where did you come from?” the woman asked, pointing her weapon at him too. “How did you get here?”

  “It’s a long story,” Hayden replied. “One thing I can guarantee. Things are going to get exciting real soon.”

  8

  Caleb

  Don’t lose them.

  Caleb silently told Ishek to be quiet. He had plenty of experience tailing targets and wasn’t about to lose anyone.

  This isn’t Earth, Caleb.

  Maybe not, but the rules don’t change. And it was still a human society, without strange Escher-like webs and alternating gravity fields to navigate like he’d had to do back on Essex.

  But we don’t belong here.

  Technically, he did belong. According to Rico, as a former Space Force Marine he had full citizenship rights on the planet, though he would have to find some way to claim those rights. Even if he did, he would need to find a way to convince the Council not to stick him in a distant dome away from the main population. While legal loopholes meant he could stay, the Council wouldn’t risk letting him reveal the truth about the nature of Proxima’s relationship with Earth. There was also no chance they would let him say anything about the universe-spanning race of hostile aliens actively working to subdue them.

  Caleb kept one eye on the passage ahead and the other on the situation map overlayed against the front of the Skin’s cowl. He had been close enough to see the two MPs’ interaction with Sheriff Duke, amused by the way Hayden had surprised them without even really trying. A short exchange, and then they had confiscated his gun and bullets, though they had failed to identify or take the Axon microspear. They had tried to restrain his hands, but the augments— especially with the damage to one of them—made that challenging, so they abandoned the option, choosing to walk behind him with guns out instead.

  That approach worked out in Caleb’s favor, giving him a chance to sneak up behind them and scan them with the Skin, adding their appearances to his cache of projections. He was projecting the male MP now, just in case anyone happened to see him walking through the corridors. His connection with Hayden’s glasses gave him advanced warning of anyone who had already passed the Centurion he was projecting. It allowed him time to either change the projection or hide. If he passed anyone else, he could scan himself an altogether different disguise from the man he was following.

  But so far he hadn’t passed anyone else.

  Walking through the corridors now and seeing the worn steel plaques at the intersections, offering directions through the massive starship eased his mind. He had been more concerned about this being another trick or trap than Hayden was, probably because he was more experienced with both the Axon and Relyeh, especially in the way they handled the so-called lesser intelligent races. In a sense, it was as if their technology had made them too powerful and too destructive, to the extent they leaned toward espionage so as not to ruin the resources they hoped to gain.

  Not that the Axon really wanted anything out of humankind. They weren’t generally enemies. Not in the sense the Relyeh were. But their idea of self-preservation meant sacrificing the lesser races for their continued survival.

  If humans were in the same position they would do the same thing.

  Caleb couldn’t argue with Ishek about that. He had to settle for accepting this wasn’t a trap, at least not in the traditional sense. Maybe Vyte didn’t care that he and Hayden had made it to Proxima. Maybe the Axon believed they were already too late to stop whatever it had planned.

  And maybe it’s right.

  Caleb couldn’t argue that, either. They didn’t know what they didn’t know. They had to work with what they did know. Right now, that meant tailing the MPs who had taken Hayden. He knew from the similar layout of the Deliverance they were bringing him to one of the outer hatches, and from there likely to whatever construction connected the old starship to the newer settlement. He had heard the MP call the Ziyou a pimple on the ass of the planet, which indicated wherever the starship had landed wasn’t especially popular, which was both good and bad.

  Good because it gave Caleb and Hayden a chance to find their legs here without too much noise coming at them at once. Bad because they were separated from the greater whole, and from General Haeri. If someone was concerned that the general might be on his way to the Ziyou, it was most likely because whoever was calling the shots knew about the portal, about Vyte and about the potential for them to cross the great divide. Hanson had no doubt tried to send a message to Vyte through the Collective before his death. If the Axon-Relyeh hybrid had succeeded, the news would have arrived almost around the same time he and Sheriff Duke had.

  Which meant the enemy forces on Proxima already knew who Hayden was and that he was in custody, even if the MPs who had him had no idea what was happening. They would follow their orders as directed. But their SO might be getting those orders from a khoron-infected CO, or even an Axon Intellect projecting that CO. Would the enemy try to bring Hayden to them or simply try to get rid of him? And did they have any idea he had come through the portal?

  They didn’t go through the Collective at least. For as tired as Ishek was, the Advocate could still block off their connection and keep them hidden. The enemy would have to guess whether or not Hayden had come alone, and they would have to adjust their strategy to the possibility that he hadn’t. That crack in their understanding was Caleb and Hayden’s opportunity. It was up to them to use it to the best of their advantage.

  You’re losing them.

  Caleb glanced at the map being generated by the networked systems as they moved through the ship. The MPs had passed through the outer hatch, the heavy blast door cutting the signal strength of their network to ten percent. It was a higher degradation than he had expected.

  But it wasn’t zero. While the map itself was slow to respond, he still had Hayden as a green mark on the tactical and the two MPs as orange. Two more orange marks appeared ten meters away from Hayden, apparently waiting for the prisoner to arrive.

  Caleb used his eyes to navigate the Skin’s interface, the language presented in Inahri and translated in his mind by Ishek so he could understand them. Max had altered the Skin to allow almost complete parity with the Advanced Tactical Combat System embedded in the Centurion combat armor, including the video stream functionality. He accessed it now, getting a grainy view of the world through the cameras in Hayden’s glasses. Hanging from the Sheriff’s neck, the glasses only provided him a glimpse of the ground, but it was the best he could do until he went through the outer hatch—which wasn’t a possibility before the area was clear.

  The image stuttered, shifting focus a bit to allow Caleb a view of the lower half of the newcomers as they approached, and he heard the choppy audio when they spoke.

  “Thank you, Corporal,” one of them said. “We’ll take him from here.”

  “Of course, Judicus,” the male MP said. “Who is he?”

  “Someone who doesn’t belong here,” the Judicus replied.

  The view from the feed shifted as the Judicus took the glasses and studied them. Caleb got a quick but good look at the man’s face. Chiseled and serious. Blue eyes and brown hair. It was a shame he couldn’t use the Collective to determine if the man was infected.

  “Interesting,” the man said, staring directly into the camera. He smirked slightly and then winked.

  The feed went dark, the network connection suddenly dropped.

  We lost them.

  9

  Nathan

  “We need to find that chopper,” Nathan said, staring at the image. “Right now.”

  “Affirmation,” Max replied. “I estimate five to thirty minutes before the transfer of the device can be completed.”

  “Five minutes?” Isaac exclaimed. “General, we have no shot finding the helicopter and getting to it in the next five minutes.”

  “No, but we might be able to within thirty,” Nathan replied. “Abort the landing and take us back up.”

  “What about the Relyeh ships?” he asked.

  “They’re two minutes from touching down. I don’t think they’ll give chase.”

  “Roger.”

  Isaac worked the controls, the Parabellum beginning to accelerate and ascend again. Nathan kept a watchful eye on the enemy ships just in case one or more decided to chase them after all.

  “Ike, I don’t suppose you know what kind of range a helicopter like that has?” Nathan asked.

  “Actually, General, I do,” Isaac replied. “That’s a Bell UH-1 Iroquois. A classic. Not too many of them around in my time, but a few, and I’ve always had an interest in military history. If I remember right, the range is something like three hundred miles. Translated to kilometers, about five hundred, give or take.”

  “Close enough to work with,” Nathan said. “Max, you have access to the ship’s computer, right?”

  “Pozz.”

  “Scan the logs for our first touchdown on the west coast, get the location, and then estimate the distance from Sanisco to here, if you can.”

  “Approximately one hundred kilometers,” Max replied less than a second later.

  “That means the max range is four hundred klicks from that location,” Nathan said. “Can you put a radius on the map?”

  The image of the Rangers taking the interlink from Krake vanished, replaced with the dropship’s map of the area. A light blue circle appeared over part of it, centered over the location of the Wheat. Most of the western side of the circle was over the ocean, likely eliminating it from contention. The northern side was also out since it passed so close to Seattle. Not only would they have picked up the chopper on their sensors if it had flown anywhere near the city, but it didn’t make sense to send it in the same direction Krake was already traveling.

  The south was less likely for the same reason. The paths of the chopper and the dropship might have crossed—an outcome the enemy probably preferred to avoid. That left a wedge to the east about four hundred klicks long and one hundred kilometers wide. Still a large area, but they had one more criterion to add into the search radius.

  Nathan brought up the map on the command chair’s terminal, eliminating some of the blue overlay. He left the wedge wider to the north and south than his original estimate, just in case. Then he pulled the enemy ships they had captured on sensors to the map.

  Only two of them fell within the slice he had created.

  “Max, what do you think?” Nathan asked.

  “Affirmation. Agreement. Excellent work, General. The interlink will be loaded onto one of those ships.”

  “But which one?” Isaac asked.

  “Unknown,” Max replied.

  “We might as well flip a coin,” Isaac said.

  “I would if I had one,” Nathan replied. He was happy with himself for narrowing their options, but the success was a double-edged sword. What if they made the wrong choice and attacked the wrong target? “Fifty-fifty odds were pretty good, but he didn’t want to leave such an important decision to chance. Ike, what’s the ETA to the closer mark?”

  “Eight minutes,” Isaac replied. “The further ship is eighteen.”

  “Max, is there any way to identify the interlink or the chopper from above, assuming infrared is out.”

  “Shape recognition,” Max replied. “If the vehicle remains in the open. Your software isn’t programmed to identify such old equipment, but I can change that. Hahaha. Haha.”

  “Do it,” Nathan said.

  “Compliance.” Max hesitated a few seconds. “Completion. We’ll need to pass low over the locations to make a positive identification.”

  “We need to go in low regardless. We’ll duck in toward tango alpha. Ike, slow us enough that we can make a landing if we spot the chopper. If you don’t see it, hit the thrusters and hop to tango beta. If the helicopter isn’t there, we’ll have to take our chances.”

  “Roger, General,” Isaac replied, already adjusting the heading and velocity of the dropship. “Assuming we make it to either target in time. They could be gone before we get there.”

  “Which is why we’re hedging our bets as much as possible,” Nathan said. “It’s the best we can do.” He released his harness and pushed it over his head, getting to his feet. “Ike, you have the bridge. Max, with me.”

  “Yes, sir,” Isaac replied.

  “Hesitation,” Max said. “Ike, it’s advisable to expect defensive fire. Remain cautious and alert.”

  “Will do,” Isaac said. “Thanks, Max.”

  “Pozz. Hahaha. Haha.”