Sic Semper Tyrannis: The Chimera Adjustment, Book Two (Imperium Cicernus 5) Read online

  “The rich really are different,” Masozi said scornfully.

  “In many ways, I suppose that’s correct,” Jericho allowed, “although I doubt that Stephen viewed any life lost in the stand at H.E. One as worth less than his own in any objective, measurable sense.” He remembered a particular conversation regarding that subject, and quoted Stephen, saying, “’A neuron is not inherently more important than the muscle it directs, since only by working in tandem can they accomplish anything meaningful. The muscle, however, is more durable than the neuron and so it requires less tactical priority—both offensively and defensively—for the organism to maximize each part’s present and future contributions to the whole.’ I’ll never forget how he phrased that,” Jericho added with a note of wonderment at the old man’s ability to reach people in a meaningful fashion. Jericho believed it was that, more than Hadden’s intellect, which had made possible H.E.’s rise to Sector-wide power.

  They sat in silence for several seconds before Masozi shook her head in resignation. “If he really believed that,” she said dubiously, “then, extending the metaphor, it would mean that his corporation and all of its attached assets, including us,” she said pointedly, “are the muscles while he was the neuron.”

  “It would seem,” Jericho agreed, sensing he knew where she was going but deciding to let her get there on her own.

  “If that’s the case,” she continued, proving Jericho’s foresight correct as she did so, “then this particular body doesn’t need its brain anymore? That doesn’t make sense,” she said with a severe shake of her head.

  Jericho snickered softly, though he could empathize with her cognitive dissonance over the subject matter. “Sure it does,” he said knowingly, “after all, I’m sure you’re aware of basic Newtonian physics.”

  Masozi arched an eyebrow skeptically before she took his meaning and scowling, but Jericho decided the opportunity provided by her verbal gaffe was too good to pass up. So he drank the last of his water and set the cup on his plate before standing from the table, prompting her to do likewise.

  “A body in motion,” Jericho recited the old axiom as they deposited their empty trays on the rack beside the door leading to the corridor, “tends to stay in motion.”

  “It’s good that you arrived,” Jeff said as soon as Jericho and Masozi stepped onto the bridge, “we’re just about to reach Manticore’s Phase Threshold.”

  “Right on schedule,” Jericho said with an approving nod.

  “Why are we going to Manticore?” Masozi asked, her jaw still throbbing from where Jericho had caught her with that beautifully-timed right hook. “Isn’t it just a few transfer stations and asteroid mining outfits?”

  “The Manticore system is composed of a red dwarf and three relatively massive gas giants,” Jeff replied, turning to Jericho with a quizzical look as Masozi had apparently sparked the curiosity of the Zhuge Liang’s captain, “but none of the orbiting satellites are habitable in any meaningful fashion. So, yes, the only human settlements are found in the asteroid belt between the first and second gas giants.” He turned to his cousin and abruptly asked, “Why are we here, Jericho?”

  Jericho folded his arms across his chest, his face its usual, unreadable mask of pale, time-worn skin. “This is where the tribunal will be held,” he replied matter-of-factly.

  “You’ve mentioned that before,” Masozi interrupted before Jeff could do likewise, “what ‘tribunal’ are we going to?”

  Jericho smirked and turned to Masozi, giving her a pointed, appraising look from head to toe before saying, “Yours, Adjuster Masozi Blanco. You did just complete the largest Infectus Adjustment in Virgin’s history, after all, and that kind of thing requires review by the immediately superior Adjuster.”

  “Right,” Masozi said tightly, more annoyed at his patronizing tone than anything else, “but you already killed the immediately superior Adjuster.”

  “That’s true,” Jericho allowed, his smirk slowly dissipating to a grim expression, “so I suppose it’s not only your tribunal we’re going to attend.”

  “We’ll reach the Phase Threshold in ninety seconds, Captain,” the Helmswoman reported professionally.

  “Looks like the time for banter is over,” Jeff grumbled, casting a dark look in Jericho’s direction as he moved to resume the command chair. When he reached it, he activated the ship-wide intercom and said, “This is the Captain; we’ll be breaking Phase in sixty seconds. All hands are required to strap into their breaking stations. Condition Two is now in effect throughout the ship. Repeat: Condition Two is now in effect.”

  He deactivated the intercom and Masozi saw Jericho strap himself into a nearby, vacant seat so she did likewise. The timer on the main view screen at the front of the bridge showed thirty seconds remaining to Manticore’s Phase Threshold, and as those seconds ticked down she realized this was the first time since she had been aboard the vessel that it had come out of Phase Drive—in fact, it was the first time she would ever come out of Phase Drive since it was her first interstellar trip of any kind.

  But she refrained from asking foolish questions pertaining to the number of times the ship and crew had successfully navigated the supposedly volatile transition from using a Phase Drive to using a ship’s standard engines. In truth, she was more curious than she was anxious—though it would be a lie to say that the sole reason she gripped the arms of her chair was in preparation for possible whiplash.

  “Phase Threshold in five,” the Helmswoman reported, her verbal countdown now synchronized with the one on the view screen, “four…three…two…one…dropping out of Phase now.”

  The ship did indeed lurch, but not altogether violently. It was more like the vessel had suddenly come in contact with molasses, and every movement was slow and deliberate as the Zhuge Liang slewed gently from side to side for several seconds before the odd, slow sensation disappeared.

  “Phase Drive is now offline,” the Helmswoman reported professionally, “we’ve returned to normal space, Captain.”

  “Good work,” Captain Charles acknowledged before flipping the ship-wide intercom back on. “All departments are to relay status reports immediately.”

  A few minutes of tense silence later, Captain Charles peeled his eyes from the readout attached to the arm of his chair and nodded in satisfaction. “Sensors,” he turned to the man at the Sensors station, “give me tactical updates as soon as they come in.”

  “Aye sir,” the Sensor operator acknowledged.

  “All right,” the Zhuge Liang’s captain said, turning to Jericho with no small measure of relief on his previously anxious features, “it looks like everything’s in one piece. Barring unforeseen obstacles, where would you like—“

  “Captain,” the Communications operator—who was an alien with a physiology that most closely resembled a four-eyed octopus—interrupted via her feminine-sounding vocalizer, “I began scanning various periodicals and newsfeeds as soon as we entered the system, per Adjuster Jericho’s instructions and in accordance with your prior approval.”

  Captain Charles turned to the alien’s and asked, “What is it, Comm.?”

  “One of the cyphers which Adjuster Jericho provided has revealed a message,” the Comm. officer reported as her tentacles moved feverishly over the custom-built controls of her station—controls which were clearly designed for her physiology, “would you like me to put it on the main view screen?”

  “Do it,” Captain Charles instructed, prompting Jericho and Masozi to look at the screen as the relatively empty tactical overlay representing the Manticore System was replaced with a stream of text-based extranet pages.

  When nearly a hundred such pages had been populated—a process which took only a few seconds—various phrases, numbers, and symbols were pulled from them. This was likely done in accordance with a cypher similar to the one which Masozi had broken while aboard the Esmerelda Empatica in Benton’s private shipping container.

  Eventually, a coherent message was formed o
n the screen and Masozi saw Jericho calmly undo his harness straps after that message appeared. “Is that everything?” he asked with a tight note in his voice.

  “It is,” the Comm. officer acknowledged promptly. “No other cyphers produced confirmable results; this is the only message I have found, and it is complete.”

  Masozi saw an anxious look come over Jericho’s face, and she looked back to the screen with puzzlement as she read the message:

  A Tiger waits for sunset while Vipers multiply with each wave; With a broken wing, the Beach is not safe for a Hawk.

  “What does it mean?” she asked as Jericho re-read the message several times before he turned to Captain Charles.

  “How fast can you make Far Point Station?” Jericho asked measuredly.

  The Zhuge Liang’s captain paused for a moment to consider before replying, “Six hours, maybe a little less.”

  “Do it,” Jericho instructed before turning to Masozi, who in spite of her lingering resentment toward him found herself nearly swept up in the excitement of the moment as he said, “we’ve got a rescue to plan.”

  Chapter IV: A Flightless Hawk

  “So she’s one of your former operators?” Masozi confirmed after they had donned their all-black body gloves outside the Tyson.

  “She is,” Jericho confirmed, “in fact, she helped me with my third Adjustment in New Lincoln the morning we met.”

  “The one where Stiglitz tailed the Adjustee back to his apartment,” Masozi nodded slowly, recalling the story as Jericho had relayed it to her. “I thought you said she died?”

  “Baxter was the only one I’m certain didn’t survive,” Jericho replied confidently. “Shu was working with me when it got too hot and I had her bug out.”

  “How can you be certain she’s here?” Masozi asked skeptically. “Off-world transportation costs a lot, and the odds that she’d be in Manticore are pretty slim even if she did get off Virgin…”

  “I’m not certain it’s her,” Jericho admitted, “but this was an agreed-upon rendezvous point I discussed with the best of my assistants. Besides, if it is her then it’s worth the risk; outside of Benton and Baxter—both of whom are dead—she’s the best operator I’ve ever worked with.”

  “What about Eve?” Masozi asked, wondering if Jericho had omitted her on purpose or if he was less aware of her abilities than Masozi was.

  He paused and quirked a grin, “Well…you’ve got me there, but I haven’t really worked with her so I’m sticking with my current rankings. Regardless,” he said as he checked a data link before tucking it into his belt, “we’ve got a chance to make a significant addition to our tactical resources, and I think it’s worth the risk.”

  “Why aren’t we bringing Eve onto the station?” Masozi asked, realizing only after mentioning her that she might prove beneficial on this particular trip.

  “Far Point is an old transfer station originally used for mineral wealth, but it’s been converted into an off-shore haven for the Sector’s elite. As a result, it isn’t exactly a data-rich environment since the people who live there prefer to keep to themselves,” Jericho explained, “which is why I chose it as a rendezvous point. Eve will be more valuable piloting the Tyson and providing comm. support than she would be while crammed into a hand-held device during this trip.”

  “I heard that, Jericho Winchester Bronson!” the loudspeakers on the Neil deGrasse Tyson’s exterior shrilled with Eve’s indignant voice. “The nerve on some people—you still owe me for that EMP over Pemberton’s safe house so don’t go writing checks your wrinkly ass can’t cash!”

  “At least I’ve mentally assigned you a gender,” Jericho retorted without even looking at the shuttle, where Eve’s personality matrix had been uploaded a few hours earlier in preparation for the mission. “That’s got to be worth something, doesn’t it, Eve? Besides, you know what they say about old dogs and new tricks.”

  “Ha!” Eve’s amplified voice scoffed with what seemed like genuine outrage, and in spite of Masozi’s previous disgust with Eve’s hyper-feminine, over-sexualized image—likely crafted by Benton to serve as an outlet for myriad fantasies which she would prefer to never analyze in any way, shape, or form—she found herself grinning as Eve continued with her rebuke. “I’ll have you know that Benton wasn’t responsible for half of the things you thought he did as your operator. Do you remember that drone strike outside of Tsushima?”

  “Yes, Eve,” Jericho replied irritably.

  “Well that was yours truly,” Eve snapped proudly. “Benton couldn’t even figure out how to block the thing’s wireless tether, let alone assume flight control over it in time to turn its weapons against that team of commandoes who had you dead to rights in that abandoned factory. And how about the sleep gas in that orbital pleasure resort where you waxed Sotoropolous…or was it Anthopololous…you know,” she said irritably, “that guy with the Greek-sounding name who stole the vaccines from the Southern Bloc during that outbreak of Yvardian Plague?”

  Jericho stopped and actually turned to face the shuttle with a brow lowered in consternation and concern. “That was you?”

  “Of course it was!” she said exasperatedly. “Benton was asleep at the time; didn’t you think it was at least a little strange when he didn’t immediately answer your calls?”

  Jericho nodded, but Masozi saw something in his eyes that suggested Eve’s answer had been far from satisfactory. “I suppose I never gave it much thought,” Jericho said off-handedly as he zipped up the backpack and gestured for Masozi to board the Tyson, “after you.”

  The Neil deGrasse Tyson launched from the Zhuge Liang’s shuttle bay as soon as the warship settled into a station-keeping position just outside of Far Point Station’s zone of control.

  “We’ll dock with the station in eighteen minutes,” Eve reported, her digital avatar having taken up semi-permanent residence in the central display of the shuttle’s cockpit. The craft’s course made a smooth parabola toward the nearest arm of the giant transfer station, achieving geometric perfection in its heading which would have been impossible for a human pilot.

  “Thanks, Eve,” Jericho said perfunctorily as he worked at his own console. After a few seconds of calling up diagrams, he found what he was looking for and indicated the dock nearest the designated rendezvous point. “Can you handle the handshake protocols with the station without giving their security any of our personal information?”

  “If Schrödinger's cat blows up, but no one ever sees that it happened,” Eve began in a philosophical tone, “did the kitty really go kaput?”

  “Eve…” Jericho growled.

  “Get a hold of that acetylcholine, will ya?” Eve sighed. “Of course I can make nice with a grumpy old station computer long enough to get you kids off and running.”

  “Good,” Jericho said as he saw Masozi absently chewing on her lower lip. He suspected she had arrived at the conclusion he’d hoped she would, but he knew it was best if he made her open the conversation—which she did just a few seconds later.

  “This is a trap, isn’t it?” she asked, thankfully cutting through the preamble.

  “Almost certainly,” Jericho agreed as Eve adjusted the Tyson’s course to bring it nose-on to the transfer station, where Shu was hopefully waiting.

  “And we’re just going to walk into it?” Masozi asked bluntly. “That doesn’t seem very smart.”

  “Maybe not,” Jericho admitted, “but we don’t exactly have a lot of time after Blanco’s announcement. Besides, if my hunch is right then we’ll be killing two birds with one stone by walking into this particular trap.”

  “Can you please just be straightforward for once?” she asked tersely.

  He suppressed a grin as he nodded, knowing that if he was in her position he would probably share her resentment. “The Manticore System isn’t just the site of that old battle between the Founders and Admiral Yuan,” he explained as the transfer station loomed ever larger in the Tyson’s forward window. “In recent ye
ars, owing to its…some might say extreme emphasis on personal liberties, the Manticore System has held more than its share of tribunals.”

  Masozi visibly swallowed a knot, but recovered her composure as quickly as Jericho had expected her to. “Why aren’t we bringing Hadden’s legal counsel, Ms. Schmidt, if you expected the tribunal during this trip?” she asked steadily.

  “Because I doubt they’ll be interested in hearing what she has to say just yet,” he said as Eve pulled the Tyson into position just a few meters from the docking collar Jericho had ordered her to approach. “But, if we’re lucky, we’ll both live long enough to attend the meeting where Ms. Schmidt’s skills can come to bear.”

  The smell of greasy, industrial air—a smell Masozi thought she recognized as belonging to cheap air recyclers, if the cheap holo-novelists who wrote about such things were to be trusted in their descriptions—was nearly overpowering as she stepped off the Tyson and followed Jericho onto the station.

  The station was an old style, twin hab ring design measuring nearly five hundred meters across. It was huge by any standard, and at the rings’ centers was a long, cylindrical storage unit which had apparently been filled with minerals harvested from the Manticore System’s rich asteroid belts.

  But it had been half a century since the Manticore System had seen anything resembling the bustling commerce which had paid the construction costs of this particular station, and the lack of regular maintenance was obvious wherever she turned. Rust streaked down the iron plating which served as the inner bulkheads, and steam occasionally hissed from badly-joined pipes which looked so corroded they might well burst at any moment.