Legacy of Vale: A Space Opera Series (The Circuit Saga Book 2) Page 4

  “I’m just messing with you, Ceresian.” Tarsis chuckled weakly until he started coughing. He looked even worse than he had aboard the Amerigo. His veins were a brighter shade of blue, and his unbelievably pale face was growing gaunter by the night.

  The mechanical exo-suit wrapping the entire back side of his body made it difficult to tell exactly how thin his limbs were, but it was clear he wouldn’t be able to walk well without it, if at all. He wiped his mouth and sat up, his still-damaged suit whining throughout the entire motion.

  “You just need to relax,” Tarsis continued. “There’s a whole Circuit worth of ships out there that’ll be trying to find out what happened to the Amerigo. One of them is bound to run into us.”

  “Hopefully. Otherwise we went from one inescapable ship to another. I keep thinking maybe we should’ve stayed on the larger one.”

  “If it weren’t for you, I would have.”

  You will live on this ship, and you will die on this ship, Talon remembered, a chill running up his spine. That was the creed Tarsis had dedicated his life to, and one Talon himself had willingly dishonored.

  “Tarsis,” he began, swallowing the lump in his throat, “I’m sorrier than you could possibly imagine. It was wrong of me to ask this of you.”

  “Relax,” Tarsis said. He placed his metal-braced hand on Talon’s leg and patted it a few times. “I didn’t have much time either way. Better to help someone in need of it than to die for my own foolish honor.”

  “Yeah…” Something about Tarsis’ words cut through him like a hot round from a pulse-rifle. Before he knew it, an admission sat on the tip of his tongue that he hadn’t allowed himself to utter since the day his fate was decided.

  “I’m not ready to die…” he said weakly.

  Tarsis’ eyes shifted around uncomfortably. Clearly, he wasn’t used to being in the position of the consoler. A lengthy spell of coughing gave him some time to come up with a response.

  “Neither was I,” he said. “Nor should anybody else out there be. I’ve become resigned to it, but it took them strapping me into this suit to finally stop fighting the truth. I’m too close now to curse my fate and deny it. I’m ready to join the Spirit of the Earth. But you’ve got fight in you still, and you’ve got to keep fighting until there’s none left.”

  Talon’s brow furrowed. There was no such thing amongst Ceresians. No god. No afterlife. They lived for the moment and the credits that came with it. He’d always imagined that when he died, it would be like someone erasing a digital file.

  “I didn’t peg you for a Tribunal,” he said.

  “I’m Vergent, born and raised!” Tarsis pounded his chest.

  That didn’t surprise Talon. They filled out most of the arks thanks to their dated tech. The people who lived out beyond Saturn’s orbit where civilization was few and far between, known as the Verge. Pirates. Scavengers. Survivors.

  “What do you care for their Spirit, then?” Talon asked.

  “Used to work a smuggling ring in and out of Europa,” Tarsis said. “I picked up a few things there, but I don’t really know the prayers. Heck, I’m not sure if I really even believe in their Spirit, but I’d like to hope there’s something waiting for me after this all ends. Why else endure so much?”

  Talon shrugged. “I never really thought about it.”

  “Until you found out about all of this?” Tarsis gestured to his exo-suit. A sly grin formed behind his thick graying beard. “Trust me, I know.” He leaned his head back and made himself as comfortable as he could possibly get in the tight confines of the pod.

  “So what is it that had you wanting off that ship so badly?” he asked. “A woman? Revenge?”

  Talon froze as, for a moment, Sage’s face flashed in front of him. He’d tried not to think about her at all after her betrayal, but just that split second was enough to leave a foul taste in his mouth. He quickly forced her out of his mind. Whatever his feelings for her might have been, it didn’t matter. She’d gotten his friends killed. Instead, he focused on Elisha’s smiling face.

  “A little bit of both, actually,” he admitted.

  Tarsis sat up, his suit screeching as he used his arms to push up. “You have my attention.”

  “Oh, now you want to talk?”

  “Don’t be rude. There wasn’t much time for me to chase women aboard the Amerigo, and the ones who were there were too close to death to bother dealing with a man like me.”

  “Yeah, well, unfortunately for you, the only girl I’m concerned with is a little young. My daughter, Elisha. She’ll be turning seven soon.”

  “Ahhh. She’s your Spirit of the Earth, then?”

  “I don’t know about that, but she’s everything worth living for.”

  “And dying for,” Tarsis said. “So there’s something for you after you’re gone. You’ll always be with her—a part of her. The Tribunal faith isn’t as strange as it may seem if you think about it like that.”

  Hearing Tarsis’ wisdom only made Talon’s desire to get back to her even stronger. He turned his gaze back out through the viewport and into the blackness. Not even space will stop me, he thought.

  “I guess you’re right,” he said out loud.

  “So that’s what all this is about, then. Getting back to her?” Tarsis slumped back in his seat.

  “Exactly…” The word trailed off as Talon noticed something moving in the distance. Speeding through the star-speckled, black canvas was a tiny blue light that didn’t seem to fit with the others. He pressed his face up against the viewport.

  “What do you see?” Tarsis asked, accompanied by the whine of his suit.

  “I think it’s a ship!” Talon could begin to see the distortion of an ion-drive trail stretching across space. Whatever it was, it was moving fast.

  “Move over,” Tarsis grunted. Talon shifted as much to his side as was possible within the pod. They wound up squeezed together by the viewport like two missiles on a rack. “By the Ancients, it is!”

  “Maybe our luck hasn’t run out yet?” Talon nudged Tarsis in his side.

  “Nothing about our lives is lucky, but it seems something out there wants you to get where you’re going. I’ll be damned if I’m going to stand in its way.”

  “Let’s hope it’s not Tribunal,” Talon said.

  “At this point, who the hell cares?”

  There was a sparkle in Tarsis’ eyes, one that said that no matter how close he was to dying, he didn’t want to go out rotting in some cramped escape pod. That he craved some purpose like he’d had on the ark. Talon couldn’t help but agree.

  5

  Chapter Five—Sage

  Sage remained on the medical bed in the White Hand. She’d awoken when restraints popped up to wrap her torso and hold her tightly against the surface.

  At first, she feared the worst, but the ship’s computer quickly informed her that it was just bracing her in advance of landing. After everything she’d recently learned about Cassius, she couldn’t be sure.

  Memories continued to beset her, like her childhood in New Terrene, where she’d struggled without a family for so much of her life until she found purpose as a soldier of the Tribune. Or the first time she’d prayed to the Earth Spirit on her own.

  Everything felt so distant, as if she were watching a video of another girl’s life through a holoscreen. But the more memories that came through, the more the individual ones came into focus. The past she’d chosen to forget was being reconstructed piece by piece.

  It had her head throbbing, though admittedly not as badly as when she’d first woken. She wondered if she was just getting used to it. All she knew was that whenever she turned her neck the wrong way, it caused the fresh scar on the back of it to burn like wildfire.

  Suddenly, the pull of g-forces made her stomach jump. The White Hand was turning hard, likely preparing itself for landing wherever it was headed. The restraints kept her body from sliding off the bed, so for that she was thankful.

  It didn’t take long afterwards to feel the soft vibrations of a proper touchdown along her back. In her experience, only executor-level training could allow a pilot to bring a ship down so gently. Sometimes, she forgot that Cassius had been through the same gauntlet.

  Her restraints slid off promptly, freeing her to stretch her weary limbs. Then the ship’s engines powered off with a whine. They had been operating so smoothly that she hadn’t even noticed the soft hum they produced until it was absent.

  When footsteps echoed from the corridor outside the medical bay, Sage closed her eyes and positioned herself on the bed so that it would seem like she was sleeping. Her reinvigorated nerves were able to hold the flood of memories at bay, allowing her to use breathing techniques to slow her pulse.

  She couldn’t risk the ship’s computer using the holoscreen monitoring her to see right through her ruse. It seemed more advanced than those aboard typical Tribunal vessels.

  “Gaia, how is she?” Cassius asked as he entered the room.

  “Stable. She has been in and out of sleep,” the computer responded.

  It even had a name. The notion that she could somehow remind Cassius of his former loyalties dwindled when she heard that. In the Tribune, that was a punishable offense in its own right.

  “Good,” Cassius replied. “It’s time we got her up and walking.”

  Sage felt his hand graze along the edge of the bed. There was a slight pull on the flesh around the wrist of her human hand as he fiddled with the needle in her veins before pulling it out. She was surprised that she could feel the minor sting that accompanied it. Dulling minor pains was at least one side effect of the implant that she would miss.

  When he was done with that, Cassius removed all the other apparatuses sticking out of her. Focus, Sage, she
thought to herself every time he got close. You will not lose faith amongst the faithless. Focus!

  As he moved around to the other side of the bed, her eyes snapped open. She swung with her artificial arm, catching Cassius in the side of the head with just enough force to knock him out and do no more damage. She made sure of that.

  Cassius had done the service of unplugging her from all the machinery, so there was nothing holding her down. She hopped up to her feet, adrenaline helping her ignore how atrophied her legs were.

  She took a step toward the doorway, then glanced back over her shoulder at Cassius. He was on the ground with one limp arm still raised and draped over the bed. A trickle of blood ran down his cheek, but he was breathing fine. She knew what she should do. She knew what she would’ve done if that bomber had never shown up on New Terrene all those months ago.

  I am a knight in the darkness, a vessel of their wisdom. Her vows jumped to the forefront of her foggy mind. I am the silent hand of the Tribune…

  No, I won’t.

  She was through getting involved in the feud between Cassius and the Tribune. She’d known the moment she couldn’t pull the trigger on Titan that it was time to go back to what she did best.

  The renewed memories of Caleb were only serving to make her soft spot for Cassius even more apparent, no matter what he’d done. She simply wanted to forget everything that had happened since she’d left New Terrene. To return there and guard its people. Be the executor of Mars.

  Once she was out of the lab, she glanced both ways down the corridor. She’d been on the White Hand before, but it was under similarly murky circumstances. The layout remained a mystery to her. Down at the end, in one direction, she looked through the same viewport as earlier. The solar-ark was directly adjacent to them now, just a portion of its massive glittering sail visible.

  Wherever they were, she couldn’t risk just moseying out of the cargo hold, but she had to move quickly before Cassius woke up. If this place is secret enough for Cassius to bring the solar-ark, then the stolen freighters might be here also. I’m sure he won’t miss just one.

  Sage started to jog, gaining more confidence in her legs with every slap of her bare feet. It took a wrong turn down toward the engine room and a complete U-turn for her to locate the corridor leading to the cargo bay. As it neared, she slowed down and sidled silently along the wall. There was no telling what might be waiting in there.

  She quickly found there to be nothing. Not even a crate being transported. The exit ramp was lowered. She hurried to the corner and peered out.

  The White Hand was docked in a massive hangar, so long that it put the one on board the Ascendant to shame. The solar-ark took up most of it, fitting perfectly, as if the hangar had been constructed to house it.

  Six smaller ships were lined up in a row beside the White Hand in a lower, offshoot hangar at the back. They appeared to have upgraded armor compared to normal Tribunal freighters, but they were the right size and shape.

  She stayed low as she rushed out of the White Hand and toward the lowered ramp of the nearest freighter. As she sprinted inside, she heard a muffled bang. A bullet glanced off her artificial shoulder. The force of the shot sent her careening onto the ship. The shots that followed peppered the wall right where she had been.

  Scrambling back to her feet, she continued running, shocked that Cassius would actually shoot at her. A few empty storage containers were lying around, and she flung them to block the ramp. Then she made her way through the tight corridors.

  Unlike the White Hand, she could traverse a Tribunal freighter blindfolded. The inside was relatively unchanged. The command deck didn’t take long to reach.

  She stepped in, and as soon as she did, the memory of when she’d raided the Tribunal freighter with Talon accosted her. A sudden feeling of vertigo seized her limbs, causing her to slip and stumbled over a lip in the grated floor.

  She could hear the gunshot that took Vellish’s life echoing again and again in her head. See his face right in front of her, his synthetic nose drenched in sweat from his brow, and his hateful gaze fixed on her before she pulled the trigger.

  Just a memory, Sage told herself. Keep going! She got back to her feet and scrambled over to the command console, activating the ship.

  The floor began to tremble, and at that very moment a portion of the command deck’s viewport shattered. Someone wearing black armor fell through. Sage leapt out of the way as the body slammed down where she’d just been.

  When she flipped over, ready to fight, she hastily realized that there was no man inside the suit. In fact, it wasn’t a suit at all. It was an android, but not the clunky, useless types left chugging along on Ceres Prime. This one moved with the fluidity of an executor. Its eyes shone bright and red, like the core of a planet split open.

  “What have you done to the Creator?” the abomination asked. Then it charged at her.

  She didn’t even have time to question what it said before it was upon her. It swung down, and she raised her artificial arm to block the blow. It paused after she did, tiny red lights around its eye-lenses beginning to rotate rapidly. She took the opportunity to unsheathe her wrist-blade and swipe. The android sprang back to action, evading the attack easily.

  Before it could counter, Sage rolled backwards and flipped onto her feet. The android bounded forward to reengage her. It moved with lightning quickness, and with only one arm of use against it, Sage was at a severe disadvantage.

  She channeled all her training, staying light on her feet as she danced around a flurry of precise strikes. She repeatedly used her human hand to feign attacks and try to get the android off balance, but none of it worked. It had an answer for every move.

  So she created space between them again to bait the thing. As it sent a punch pistoning toward her head, she sidestepped and slashed at its limb with her wrist-blade. The tip scratched its forearm, but that was all.

  In a move that no human could pull off, it bent backwards at the waist, twisted its entire body, and swept out her legs with a kick. The android then leapt straight up into the air, its head almost striking the ceiling, before plunging toward her. She was barely able to roll out of the way before its knee dented the floor. She swiped again, blindly, but this time the android grabbed her artificial arm and flung her across the room.

  She slammed sideways into a console. Quickly, she rolled over and did her best to track the android as stars danced across her vision. The thing slowly approached her, its hellish eyes smoldering.

  “Come on, creature!” she growled, lifting herself into a battle crouch. Her metal fist tightened as it got closer, the sharp blade fixed to it gleaming blue from holoscreens above. Then, just before she could pounce and try to catch it off guard, Cassius shouted, “ADIM, stop!”

  6

  Chapter Six—Cassius

  “ADIM, stop!” Cassius bellowed from the entranceway of the freighter’s command deck. His unkempt hair was stained by a splotch of blood where Sage had struck him. His finger rested securely around the trigger of his pulse-pistol, even though he kept it aimed at the floor.

  ADIM froze and regarded him. Sage paused for a second before springing at the android. Her attack met only air as ADIM deftly evaded her. He grabbed her by the neck with one hand on her way by, and by the artificial arm with the other, hefting her up and stretching her body. She kicked and punched at him with the two limbs she still had at her disposal, her human fist meeting his chassis with little impact.

  “Let her go,” Cassius commanded. ADIM didn’t listen entirely, but he noticed the android’s grip loosened a bit, enough to allow her to gag.

  “This unit cannot. She will try to harm you again,” ADIM responded. He stared at the blood on Cassius’ head.

  “ADIM, you will let her go,” Cassius demanded more firmly. He stepped beside them and pointed his gun at Sage. “Trust me, she won’t.”

  This time ADIM listened and released her. She fell onto her knees, grasping at her throat as she gasped for air. Cassius kept his aim steady on her as he approached.

  “Impressive, Sage,” he said. “There aren’t many people in the Circuit who thought they could catch me off guard and lived to talk about it. Trust me, it will not happen again.” He pressed the barrel of his gun against her temple.