Chapter 12
Lieutenant Mark Havelock
She’d left the city. She’d left the planet. She’d goddamn left Cluster.
I didn’t want to believe it; the Anna Carter I knew wouldn’t be able to navigate her way to the shops, let alone circumvent the security systems of a Cluster city to escape.
It stunned me, yet it didn’t stun them.
Maybe it had something to do with whatever medical tests they’d forced us to do on her. Maybe it didn’t. Christ, I didn’t know what was going on.
I bent over the controls of my cruiser, studying the navigation readings. After several minutes my back was so stiff, it felt like every muscle had been turned into steel.
With a crack, I straightened up, seeing my frown reflected in one of the shiny panels to my left.
I focused on it.
Gain her trust, they kept telling me, gain her goddamn trust.
That was meant to be easy, was it?
I couldn’t even find her.
Maybe I didn’t know as much about this situation as I wanted, but I had to keep hold of one fact: I knew why I was doing this.
I knew why I was doing this.
Every sacrifice, every freaking sacrifice was toward one goal.
I couldn’t forget that.
So I bent over the control panel again.
Even if I somehow found Anna, I now wasn’t that confident I’d be able to catch her. The entire security division of Cluster had let her escape. I was confident of my abilities, sure, but I wasn’t that confident.
I brought up a sweaty hand and pressed it over my chin, letting a finger drag down my cheek until I dug the nail into my jawline.
I was starting to realize I needed more help. Not from friends, but from enemies turned allies.
Them.
Pressing that same sweaty hand into my forehead and letting my thumb shut my eyes closed, I sucked a breath through my teeth.
I would have to call them, wouldn’t I?
As much as I hated to admit it, they may be able to help me.
Swearing and slamming my hand down on the console, though not too close to the critical navigational controls that I could damage them, I shoved myself back in my seat and let out an angry grunt.
Once it finished echoing through the small confines of my cockpit, I pushed my left hand forward and let it dart over the communication controls.
Seconds later I had them on the line.
“You are calling us,” they stated the obvious.
“I need help,” I reluctantly admitted.
“You must capture her, regain her trust, and deliver her to us. If you do not, we will not uphold our end of the bargain.”
I knew that. For the love of god, I knew that. They didn’t have to keep repeating the obvious.
I swallowed my anger. “She escaped from Cluster. I have no idea how. She stole a ship according to security reports, but nobody’s been able to track her.”
There was a long pause. “We will manufacture you medicine.”
“Sorry?” I had no idea what they were talking about. “I’m fine; I don’t need any medicine.”
“Not for you. For her. It will…” there was a substantial pause where I could hear them breathing, whatever they were, “subdue the effects of the ability.”
“Ability?” I knew cute little Annie Carter was at the center of this. I knew she was betrothed to Illuminate Hart. I knew she was the key to unlocking the future we all so desperately needed. But did I really know why?
No.
They did. Or at least they thought they did.
“You do not need to know any more information. All you need to do is deliver the medicine.”
“… Alright,” I managed as I pushed myself as far back in my seat as I could go, my tense back pushing hard against the yielding fabric of the backrest.
I brought my hand up and pressed my thumb and fingers over my eyes.
“Specifications of medicine delivered. We have also calculated the most likely location of her ship. It is critical you deliver the medicine before you approach.”
“Okay,” I grunted.
“Diffuse airborne deployment is suggested. Manufacture the medicine in sufficient quantities and bombard her location with it.”
“Won’t that be risky? Can she overdose on it?” I shouldn’t have been questioning them, but I was.
“Risk negligible. Follow orders. The likely location has now been sent to your vessel. Find Annie Carter, regain her trust, and deliver her to us. If you cannot regain her trust, simply deliver her.”
“Yes,” I answered.
The audio feed cut out without so much as a goodbye. Then again, they weren’t much for politeness.
For a few seconds, I didn’t do anything. I sat there, glassy eyed as I stared at the viewscreen.
When my mind started to question what I was doing, I reminded it that what I was doing was saving the universe. Maybe in the movies you could avert disaster without spilling blood, but this was the real world.
With that thought playing through my mind, I steeled myself, hardened my jaw, and leaned forward, hands darting over the navigational panel.
I quickly accessed the coordinates they’d sent me. It wasn’t that far away and was within long-range scanners. I scanned the coordinates, and sure enough, I picked up a ship.
While my scanners identified it as nothing more than a simple freighter hauling engine parts, the information they’d given me assured me it was likely Annie.
So I punched the coordinates into navigation and told the computer to follow.
With a sigh that barely made it out of my tight, constricted throat, I pushed up and walked toward the back of the ship. There was an extremely sophisticated matter reconstructor lodged into the wall. A gift from a friend.
I plugged in the specifications they’d sent me and sat back as it began to synthesize them.
“Computer, what medication will this synthesize?”
“Medication not in the known database,” the computer replied.
“Then predict what the effects of the medication will be.”
“… Substance unknown, prediction impossible.”
My brow crumpled. “What do you mean prediction impossible? And what do you mean it’s an unknown substance?”
“Substance unknown, prediction impossible. Lieutenant Mark Havelock does not need to know what the medicine will do,” the computer suddenly said, mimicking the tone and speech pattern of them.
The skin along the back of my neck prickled, and I stiffened.
“All Mark Havelock has to do is to deliver it and secure Anna Carter.”
I stood there. I breathed. I nodded.
After several beeps, a large vial of a blood-red liquid materialized in the synthesizer.
I left it there and returned to the navigation seat.
As I waited for my sophisticated vessel to catch up to Annie, I had plenty of time to think. But, wisely, I stopped myself from doing it.
Think, and I might start questioning what I was doing. So instead I sat there, rested my hands on the panel, and locked my gaze somewhere on the wall above the viewscreen.
Space darted past outside, just a swathe of dark penetrated by blasts of bright starlight.
…
Captain Fargo
She was gone.
Miranda had left the planet. Don’t ask me how she’d done it. Don’t ask any of the technicians or esteemed scientists how she’d done it. Nobody knew.
But she wasn’t here.
She’d stolen a prototype ship and escaped.
I sat in my office staring at the wall. The wall didn’t hold the solutions I was seeking, but at least it didn’t judge me either.
I kept telling myself I should have seen this coming. That after one look into Miranda’s eyes, I should have realized she was some incredible criminal with the hacking abilities of the universe’s greatest AIs all meshed into one seemingly human mind.
Despite everything she’d done, my mind kept going back to one point.
You couldn’t fake a betrothal.
No mistakes were ever made with them.
It was one of the most secure practices in the universe.
So even though I couldn’t be sure of her name or where she’d come from or what she was, I knew Miranda was betrothed.
And that was my clue.
Maybe all I had to do was figure out who she was betrothed to, and I would crack this mystery open.
But how would I do that?
She claimed that she’d given her betrothal papers to Lieutenant Mark Havelock, and he was long gone.
Believe it or not, despite how serious this situation was, I would not be able to walk into the Contracts Office and demand information on her betrothal either. It would blow apart the tradition. Only the two involved in a betrothal contract could access information on it. I would need a special order, not from the president of the Foundation, but from the entire Senate and every member of it to break the tradition. And they wouldn’t do that.
Nor, in fact, would the Illuminates let them.
The Illuminates guarded the betrothal tradition almost as closely as they guarded the universe against the Gap.
Plus, even if I could somehow get a Senate order to access Miranda’s betrothal, I wouldn’t be able to find it.
Somehow, some goddamn how, we didn’t have enough information to access her identity. She’d done something when she’d hacked into the maintenance tower. She’d scrambled what information we had on her; there wasn’t even any footage left.
Even the Contracts Office no longer had records on who had come to see them one week ago when Miranda had picked up her contract.
It was incredible to even comprehend that something like this was possible in the modern universe. There were meant to be so many checks and balances to prevent security breaches on this level.
It was incomprehensible and yet it was happening.
And it was happening on my watch.
I crossed my arms further in front of my chest until it felt like I was trying to crush my lungs.
Every technician and science officer who wasn’t looking into the security breach in the city was trying to figure out where she’d gone.
I doubted they’d be able to find her.
It was as if Miranda knew exactly how we were going to look for her before we did.
Which meant she had to know the intricate security operations of the Foundation Forces extremely well. Another reason to cast doubt on the premise she was a newfound one.
But if she wasn’t a newfound one, who the hell was she and where had she come from?
“Sir,” a voice suddenly echoed out from the com panel by my wall.
I shivered, suddenly pulled from my reverie, and swiveled toward the door. “Come in.”
The security officer practically charged into the room, and it was a surprise she didn’t leave skid marks with her shoes. “We found Mark Havelock.”
I looked up, breath stuck in my chest. “Where?”
The security officer’s brow twitched.
“Where?” I questioned again quickly.
“He’s dead.”
“Sorry?” My voice shook in surprise.
“He died three years ago.”
I was stunned. But I had a job to do. “What do you mean? I saw Lieutenant Mark Havelock a little over a week ago.”
The security officer took a much-needed breath. “Mark Havelock was killed at one of the Newfound Institutes on Earth three years ago,” she stuttered, barely capable of believing what she was saying.
My mouth jutted wide open. “So who the hell are we dealing with now?”
“Mark Havelock,” she answered.
I trusted my offices – every single one of them. They were all good people, and I knew I could always rely on them.
They didn’t play games.
So even though this sounded like a game, I didn’t snap. “What’s going on here?”
“He’s a graft,” her voice shook.
My jaw slowly opened, my breath wheezing from my mouth. “A graft? How… how did you find that out?”
“Sir,” if she looked uncomfortable before, now she looked as if she wanted to crawl out of her skin.
My eyebrows crumpled so far over my eyes I could barely see out of them. “What?”
“It was an anonymous tip-off.”
“And it’s been confirmed?”
“Yes. They sent us a bunch of information, including bio scans and data files. It’s stuff that’s been meticulously deleted from the Newfound Institute’s records. But once we had the information, our technicians ran a forensic audit and confirmed the information is definitely what was deleted from the newfound databases.”
I brought a hand up, unashamed of the slight tremble, and rested my palm flat against my chest, my crooked fingers barely capable of straightening. “So you’re telling me that the Newfound Institute at some point knew that Mark Havelock was a graft?”
She nodded.
I swore. I wasn’t usually one to swear. I was controlled, I was trained, and I knew my position and the dignity and respect it afforded me.
But that didn’t stop the expletive from cracking through my lips.
This was huge.
This implicated the Newfound Institute and God knows how many other people.
“Do we have any idea where this anonymous tip-off came from?”
I knew the answer well before she shook her head.
I brought both hands up and locked them over my forehead, letting them drag slowly down my face, indenting against my cheeks and nose and mouth as if I was trying to drag my face off my skull.
“Maybe it’s somebody who used to work for the Institute? Maybe somebody who knew Havelock was a graft, but their conscience caught up to them and they couldn’t hold that secret any longer.”
“Maybe,” I conceded in a weak tone. “Or maybe they appreciated that right now we need this information.”
She shot me a confused look. “You think somebody out there is on our side?”
I didn’t answer.
I couldn’t answer.
It was time to stop thinking and to start finding out.
Patting a hand down my face one final time I let my arm drop, and I strode toward the door. “Keep me updated. And show me that information on Mark Havelock. If I’ve had a graft traipsing around Cluster, I want to know just how much damage he’s done.”
“Yes, sir.”
I strode out of my office. Though my stride was determined, determination wouldn’t be enough.
The complexities in this game had just doubled.
And the stakes of this game – the universe.