Star Force 12 Demon Star (46 page)

“Dad!” I shouted. “This is my father, Kyle Riggs.”

“Of course,” Adrienne slurred. “I’m so glad to meet the infamous Kyle Riggs. He’s just like you, sir.” She waggled a finger at Cybele. “He even screws aliens like her.”

My father raised his eyebrows high in surprise. He gave Cybele an up-down appraisal and nodded in appreciation.

“I see,” he said as neutrally as he could. He turned back to Adrienne, “and who might you be, Miss?”

“Miss Turnbull,” she said. “I’m the fool that wants to marry your son.”

She pitched forward then, and I thought at first that she was passing out. The truth was less happy.

She threw up on everyone’s shoes.

* * *

Without the powerful influence of Turnbull’s imposter working to impede my every action, I found life became much easier. Star Force officials quickly dropped all charges and canceled all warrants for my arrest.

Lobbying as hard as I could, I got them to release a critical update to their brainbox scripting. Hundreds of ships were updated without incident.

There were exceptions, however. AI systems on a dozen vessels managed to block the update and go rogue. Some of these warships killed their crews and then fought to the death with loyal Star Force ships.

Other AIs decided to flee, flying off into the darkness beyond the light of their local star. These ships were tracked for a time, but when it was realized they were heading for unexplored neighboring star systems, any effort to hunt them down was abandoned.

“I think it’s a mistake,” I told Admiral Chen four days after Cybele had fought Turnbull’s murderer on the floor of her office. “Those rogue ships have intelligent AI systems and onboard factories. In time, they could turn into the equivalent of Macros. I can foresee a day when they may infest star systems that we have no direct connection with but which represent a potential threat.”

Chen’s office had been cleaned but, despite numerous shampooing efforts, a ghastly brown stain remained on her carpet. I got the feeling she blamed me personally for this. While we spoke, she periodically glanced down at the stain. Each time she did so, she ground her teeth.

“You’re an ensign, Riggs,” she reminded me yet again. “While your opinions are vaguely interesting, they don’t hold any sway with the Joint Chiefs.”

“My father feels the same way I do,” I pointed out.

Chen gave me an irritated stare.

I knew I was pushing it. Just days earlier, I’d been on everyone’s termination list. But I felt it was important enough to take a career risk—those rogue ships had to be run down and destroyed.

“Your father,” Chen said, glancing at her ruined carpet again and flashing me another brief snarl, “is no longer a member of Star Force. He’s a retired celebrity from a time which is, thankfully, well behind us. His opinions therefore carry no more weight than those of any concerned citizen. He can’t possibly alter a decision made by our modern military.”

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Then I forced a smile. “I understand, Admiral, but as a final statement of my concern, I’d like to offer my services.”

Chen frowned. “In what capacity?”

“I’d like to lead an expedition to pursue the three rogues heading for Sirius. That group is the most dangerous in my opinion.”

For perhaps the first time since the interview had begun, I had her full attention.

“Cody…such a journey would take years.”

“Yes. I’m well aware of that. My crew should be made up entirely of volunteers.”

She looked troubled. “You really think the situation is that serious?” She began to pace. “We would have chased them, you understand, but they had a head start on the acceleration arcs. They can’t be run down until they decelerate to arrive at their target star.”

“Exactly,” I said. “My ship, should I be given a command, will continue to accelerate after they start to slow down. At that point, we’ll overtake them. I’ll do battle, destroy them, then reverse course and return to Earth.”

Chen shook her head. She still glanced at the carpet stain now and then, but she no longer curled her lip at me when she did so.

“I’ll forward the request,” she said, “but I seriously doubt it will be accepted. They would have to give you a battleship to defeat two destroyers and a cruiser.”

“Yes, that matches the details of my formal proposal.”

I handed her a data chip. On it was the strategic plan I’d worked up with Marvin’s help. He’d done the math, showing the type of ship and the length of time it would take us to run down the enemy. Our best estimate for interception was one-point-two years. The full trip, including deceleration and return, would take nearly three years in total.

Chen looked at the chip dubiously. Then she walked around to the far side of her desk again. There, she dug into her top drawer and returned to confront me with a small box in her hand.

“What’s this?” I asked.

She handed it to me. “Open it.”

I did so. I was surprised to see the insignia of a full lieutenant.

She shook my hand, and I felt numb.

“Congratulations, Riggs. You’ve earned a promotion.”

My eyes followed her as she went back around to the far side of her desk.

“Was there any chance before I came in here that these bars were going to stay in your desk?” I asked.

She shrugged without meeting my gaze. “I was given discretion. The promotion was subject to my approval. I decided during the course of this meeting that you earned the rank. Probably, you’ve earned it a hundred times over. Again, accept my congratulations.”

I nodded and closed the box. Adrienne would be thrilled, but I was too concerned for the future to enjoy the honor the promotion represented.

“Thanks for your consideration, and your patronage,” I told Chen, and I left.

* * *

The next day I returned home to my Dad’s place. My mom was on a trip to India, but she was expected to return in the morning. After a round of hugs and congratulations on my new rank, we sat down to talk.

For my father, the biggest worry wasn’t the rogue ships—it was the existence of an Elladan empire of mind-influencing blobs.

“They infiltrated Earth once, and they’ll do it again,” he said.

I’d come home with guests. On my left was Adrienne, on my right was Cybele, and crouching at my feet like a terrier was Marvin.

“I don’t think so, sir,” Cybele said. “From what I know of the program, it was abandoned years ago.”

My father shook his head and headed to the kitchen. He popped open three beers and walked back toward us. He handed one to me, then the second to Cybele. He drank the last one himself.

When Adrienne looked at him in surprise, old man Riggs shook his head. “I’ve seen you drink, girl. It isn’t a pretty sight.”

Adrienne reddened, but she didn’t argue.

After he’d downed his beer, he put his hands on his knees and studied Marvin. The robot returned the favor with three cameras. I couldn’t recall having approved the third one, but there it was.

“Marvin 2.0,” he said. “Has he told you who’s related to these Elladans of yours?”

I blinked and shook my head. “Who, Pop?”

“The Microbe colonies that live in the oceans of Eden-6. They’re the same basic stock. I’d always thought the Microbes had evolved in the Eden system, but tests performed on the squirting slime Cybele and Turnbull left on the floor of Chen’s office have confirmed they didn’t.”

For a moment, we were all baffled. Then I caught on, and I looked at Marvin accusingly.

“Did you know the Microbes were related to the Elladans?”

“They are a sub-species, yes,” he said. “The genus isn’t a precise match, obviously. In my estimation, the water-suspended colonies are a wild adaptation of the original form.”

“Exactly,” my father said. He laughed. “Same old Marvin. Always withholding information for some nefarious purpose of his own. This brainbox is cuter than the old one, I have to admit that. But you should never let him grow to where he’s bigger than a dog, son.”

“Why not?” Marvin piped up.

“It makes you too intimidating, robot. Once we let a machine get bigger than we are, humans tend to treat that machine as an adult and give it more and more freedom. We’re psychologically built that way. However, if you keep the robot small, you’ll hold onto the restrictions you so wisely put in place originally.”

Nodding, I swore to myself to follow my father’s advice on that point. He knew Marvin much better than I did. He was right anyway…the old Marvin had gotten out of hand under my lax control.

“An unwarranted injustice,” Marvin complained. “I hope you’re not listening to your ancestor, Cody. His ideas are outdated and—”

“Shut up, Marvin,” I said, “or I’ll have to pluck out that extra camera you stole.”

Marvin fell silent. His third camera retreated out of reach like the eye of a snail.

Turning back to my father, I discovered he was handing me another beer. I took it gratefully.

“Dad, how do you think the Microbes got there? Into the planetary oceans of Eden-6, that is.”

He waved his bottle at Cybele. “I’m sure she knows. Ask her.”

I turned to face Cybele. She’d regained her lovely super-human appearance, but there were flaws. Her right hand was deformed. The fingers were swollen like sausages and there were no fingernails on any of them. This was a lingering effect of her battle with the imposter.

Cybele looked embarrassed. “They must have come from the same infiltration project. An Elladan agent must have crash landed in the oceans. Since there was no local civilization, it must have degenerated into an aquatic colony as a means of survival.”

“Right…” I said. “Then the Macros discovered them, and later on Marvin did. But there’s something else I wanted to talk to you about, Father.”

“What’s that?” he asked.

I told him about Astrolyssos and the Ancients. He was intrigued. He admitted that he didn’t know if the Ancients as a whole would take offense to our attack on Astrolyssos, or if they were wandering individuals without a central government. We all tended to think the latter was more likely. They were so large they couldn’t easily build a civilization even on a star.

“They’re probably nomadic,” Adrienne said thoughtfully. “Star-dwellers that imagine themselves to be gods. They wander the cosmos to plague lesser beings as the mood strikes them. Mating occurs perhaps once every million years when they encounter one another. Very strange creatures.”

My father jabbed a finger in her direction. “You might recall that in my day we theorized the Ancients caused ice ages. Their visits match the dates of dramatic stellar events in history.”

“Well,” I said, “the ring Astrolyssos threw at us in the Trinity system sent us on a one-way trip home. I think it’s unlikely anyone is coming through to plague again us soon.”

“Except for more Microbe agents!” Dad said, giving Cybele a hard look.

“Astrolyssos did say he wanted to bottle humans up in our designated zone of space,” Adrienne agreed with me. “Maybe that’s a good thing. After having had a look at the rest of inhabited space, I find it rather peaceful here among our home stars.”

My dad laughed. He’d had more to drink than the rest of us. He stood up, yawned and stretched, then looked around at the three of us.

“Time for bed,” he announced. “Now, who’s sleeping with whom? Or are we talking about you guys needing a really big bed, here?”

He laughed uproariously. The women looked alarmed, and they reddened. I shook my head.

“Thanks Dad,” I said.

Later that night, when Adrienne was sighing softly in her sleep at my side, I heard a tapping sound.

I sprang up to investigate, but I found it was only Marvin. He was peeping into the room with a camera.

“Marvin?” I whispered. “What are you doing? It’s late.”

“I’m not sleepy—I’m never sleepy.”

“Yes, well, go find yourself something to play with.”

All three of his cameras focused on me for a second.

“I already did. Do you want to see it?”

Stifling a yawn, I followed him down a creaking set of stairs and went outside under the stars. There on the porch, I found what looked like a long, black snake.

“What the hell…?”

“It’s part of me—of my progenitor.”

Then I remembered. Years ago, when I was a young boy, the original Marvin had created a massive accident that had nearly burned down the farm. This arm had been blown off then. It was a coiling structure built with constructive nanites.

“It must have rusted solid by now,” I commented, poking at it dubiously. “Where did you find it?”

“At the bottom of an old well.”

“An old well?” I asked. “How did you get into that?”

“There were nails and concrete—it wasn’t easy.”

I shook my head. “Well, it’s a nice souvenir. What do you want to do with it?”

“There are some of the interior nanites that are preserved and functional. It’s part of me—the old me. That intrigues my mind, and I want to add this arm to my collection.”

“I don’t know…”

He made a plaintive sound. That surprised me. I’d never heard the old Marvin whimper or cry. He’d only spoken, and he’d never made sounds of anguish that I could remember.

For some reason the sound goaded me to leniency. Perhaps that’s what it had been designed to do.

Whatever the case, I let him have the arm. Happily, he worked on it for days adding new constructives and retooling the old. Eventually, the arm was as sleek and silvery-black as it had been when I was a kid.

He whipped it around at a different rate of motion than the others—could it be haunted by the ghost of the original Marvin? I didn’t know, but I wouldn’t have been surprised if it was.

Each night while I stayed with my parents, I found a reason to awaken and gaze up at the stars. They were as cold and distant as they’d ever been.

But they were known to me now. My crew and I had traveled together through more star systems than any other group of humans in history. I knew that out there, somewhere, there were beings building, plotting and actively seeking our demise.

It was an unsettling thought. It kept me awake, watching the stars all night. I couldn’t stop wondering what they might send down next to visit my green Earth.