Glossary of Terms
Adept: An agent of the Kinship, an intelligence gathering organization run by the Commonwealth of Planets.
Floater: A person totally disconnected from the Grid.
Grid: The galactic-wide network used primarily by the Kinship.
HUD: Heads Up Display; the visual representation of the Grid every Kinship agent sees in their field of vision, specifically information such as heart rate, air temperature, and grid connection strength.
Locus: Node or intersection point of networks on the Grid; has come to also refer to any physical place where people gather, such as a city. Plural, loci.
Medbot: Medical robot often used in place of a medtech.
Medtech: Low level medical worker
Nanomarkers: Microscopic robots that infuse the blood of Kinship agents and enable them to access the Grid anywhere, anytime as well as communicate with each other via synthetic telepathy referred to as commlink messaging. These tiny devices are also used by the Kinship to track the location of any agent. Every second of an agent's activity is recorded in the Grid logs.
Stim: An addictive stimulant narcotic popular on Commonwealth planets.
Chapter One
LOCUS: UONRA, ANTENOR PRIME
As darkness fell, Lieutenant Jana Randall watched a thousand neon skyscrapers light up Uonra's metropolis. Her last sunset as a Kinship adept.
"This isn't worth a court martial." Jana turned around and yanked up her sleeves.
Sharp synthetic light from the window behind her cast jagged shadows on the floor. A few feet away her partner Rodrik leaned on the doorjamb, arms crossed. "Screw the court martial, Jana. I'm not giving up on months of work. It's worth it even if the Kinship can only shut down Domek's black market in this sector. We'll be heroes."
Tang of alcohol, stab of a needle in each arm. The medtech at the rundown clinic finished hooking Jana to the cell separator that would remove her blood's microscopic markers, tools the Kinship used to track its agents. Jana flexed her hands. She felt naked and exposed without her body's constant companions of the last six years.
Hook-up complete, Rodrik pulled the medtech aside, slipped a month’s worth of illegal stim into his palm, and hustled him out the door.
"I haven't been off the grid since I joined up." Jana concentrated on the rhythmic click and whoosh of the machine to tap down her frustration. "Without our nanomarkers, if anything goes wrong--"
"There's no way around this, Jana." Rodrik glanced over his shoulder down the hallway.
Shit, had someone discovered them at the clinic after hours?
He crossed the room and leaned in close, fair brows knit together. "Last night our informant got a look at the specs for Domek's scanners. They're tuned to pick up old nanomarkers like ours. One step into Domek's territory and we're dead."
From the supplies at her bedside, Rodrik slapped microderm patches on his own IV nicks. "They're starting to trust me. I can't do this without you."
Jana looked away from the intensity in his green eyes. "We’re re-injecting as soon as this op is over."
He nodded. "Enjoy the freedom for a change."
Rodrik smiled and kissed her, a quick slip of tongue over lip laced with a note of ginger from their last meal.
Jana licked her lips, dizzy from the transfusion. "Even a stim bribe won’t be enough to keep news of two AWOL Kinship operatives under wraps. We need to get out of here."
More than just the espionage arm of the Commonwealth, the Kinship was a way of life for its agents and to break from it, taboo. Removing the microscopic robots from their bodies and disconnecting from the "grid," the network that bound the Kinship together, made Jana feel rudderless and alone. Rodrik, however, obviously felt liberated.
Jana wasn't alone, though. The two of them sat in the same rudderless boat together, no matter what. She never could say no to Rodrik.
"I need just a little bit more time. You know I'm right about this," Rodrik whispered low. The warmth of his breath caressed Jana’s ear. "It's the only way this op will work."
Jana didn't expect Rodrik to understand. He always pushed the limits of Kinship control. Jana stood between the two and kept Rodrik from pissing off the wrong people or worse. This time, as always, her partner was counting on the payoff to get them out of trouble. If she held on just a little while longer, Jana could bring Rodrik back in line. She could save him before it all fell apart.
She'd trust him one more time, just one.
#
Two hours later, floaters now with no grid access, they could go anywhere. Per Domek's instructions, they went to the Boundries.
9/30/2009 10:11 AM
"We should have checked in." Jana kicked an ancient syringe of stim off the road. The lights of Uonra glowed in the distance like smoldering stardust in a sea of dark matter.
"And blow our only chance? I can get us past Cartel security. The Kinship wants someone on the inside. I can make that happen."
Jana clicked the gun's safety off. "Doesn't appear anyone has lived here since the fiberoptics failed."
Their gunlights glared off broken glass ahead, storefronts looted long ago. Jana flicked off the light. She didn't need to see skeletons of a previous generation.
"Yeah, well, gated communities and two-car garages in the Burbs are all great, but if you don't have access to the grid you're out of luck."
A grid they weren't tied to anymore.
Rodrik pointed north. "St. Gereon’s is 800 meters ahead."
Jana nodded, logging the same intel on her cortical heads-up display or HUD. The countdown clock in her vision's bottom right corner ticked away. She shifted the N-40 tighter to her torso and double-checked the coil gun's night sight.
A paranoid SOB, Domek chose the Boundries meet-point for one reason: Uonra's security forces disrupted plasma weapons here. Her preferred D-90 was worth crap outside the city checkpoints. Instead, the N-40 launched a poisoned projectile powered by a single electromagnetic coil.
"We have one hour fifty-seven minutes to check in before Command realizes we’re off the grid."
"Relax, Jana. Even with our old wetware they can track our last known location, but we'll be done with this op by the time Command finds us." Rodrik handed her a round palm-sized device. "It's a signal booster that will amplify our residual nanomarkers so we can use the commlink. The Kinship can't yank our leash every few nanoseconds, but you didn't I'd leave you in the cold, did you?"
Jana pocketed the device, but didn’t answer, didn’t need to. They had worked together for seven years, longer than most level five adepts lasted even singly. Each had other partners, but none whose ware had meshed so easily, both in the field and off of it.
She still didn't like breaching protocol. They were alone, which made her feel vulnerable. She needed protective hills around her, Rodrik needed open spaces. Despite the long partnership, static weakened their connection and Jana couldn't force Rodrik back to regs without losing him altogether.
Jana and Rodrik turned the corner and the ebony bulb steeple of St. Gereon’s loomed ahead, its massive structure blotting out the moonlight. She took point. The Cartel knew only Rodrik, so on this op Jana was expendable, a bodyguard. If Cartel security got fidgety, it would be better if they shot her first.
Her boots crunched on the disintegrating asphalt, and the air held a bite to it, a crispness that shot through the sinuses and made for sharp clear night vision.
They skirted the old church, not a single sensor firing on thermals. Jana doubted they’d beat the Cartel to this meeting, but so far the thugs were laying low. She nudged open a side door, Rodrik behind her, and followed the wall toward the chancel. They passed tall granite columns casting shadows like giants lurking in the dark.
Just past the columns, thirty meters in front of them shone a single thermal image, a man standing in front of the altar.
"Domek," Rodrik whispered in Jana’s ear, his hips against hers. She smiled, felt how the op revved him up.
Jana clicked on the booster.
<Switch to commlink messaging> she transmitted to Rodrik over the HUD. They had to stay close though, without the nanomarker signal boost the HUD's range was restricted.
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<Have a fix on the bodyguards?>
<Negative. Stay here while I scan the perimeter.>
Jana swung around the back of the church, running parallel scans around the columns. The old building had a lot of places to conceal someone, especially Cartel special forces. Domek rarely traveled without bodyguards, in fact he rarely traveled at all, and his personal appearance tonight irked her.
"Welcome, Rodrik," Domek said from his high point. "Few people meet me in person."
"Fewer still remember it," Rodrik replied.
The Cartel king laughed. He seemed relaxed, unconcerned about her location. A classic profile, the man possessed a strong nose and a chin covered in a close-cropped beard. Gray lined the temples of his brush cut hair.
Domek stalked down the altar steps. Moonlight filtering from the blasted out windows above cast him in shades of gray. Dressed in black, Domek glided like a wraith around the church’s nave.
"I can’t say you will either." Domek’s smile brightened.
Six Cartel commandos came out of the darkness decked in thermal camo, a display of strength that cost Domek quite a bit of cred and meant only one thing. He knew they were Kinship.
All she could do now was to try to get them out still breathing.
<Down. Now!> Jana transmitted, but Rodrik ignored her. She shot a commando two meters in front of him, two projectiles launched in quick succession, and hit him in the throat. The soldier collapsed, convulsing.
Another fighter grabbed her in a choke-hold, but she sank to the floor and slithered out of it. Jana rammed the gun under his chin and fired straight through the sinus cavity to the brain. He too fell back, convulsing, the poisoned tip of the projectiles finishing what the sharp points started.
Domek took refuge on the altar and Jana leaped after him. She didn’t make it. A projectile plunged through her shoulder, ripping flesh and propelling her to the ground. Her head slapped off a step leading up to the altar.
So much for getting out of here still breathing.
Jana's muscles spasmed and the moonlight sped away in a smear of radiance. She tasted tasted on her tongue. Across the nave, Rodrik knelt, arms yanked back. Blood dripped into her eyes, but Jana could still see the coil gun pressed to his skull.
Rodrik tilted his head toward her and the commando pressed the gun harder.
<Goodbye, Jana.>
<No! Rodrik—>
But the seizure whipped through her brain, the HUD's feedback distorted her vision, and warm blood gushed from her shoulder.
The coil gun popped and Rodrik slumped just as the darkness took her.
#
LOCUS: GUROVA MOUNTAINS, ICO
Brannon rarely thought of that other man's woman, but tonight he longed for her. Long limbs, soft touch, warm breath, memories implanted with Brannon's uninformed consent and triggered by the rich aroma of bloodstar. The memory of a woman who died a thousand years ago.
In the present, his cousin Eshana stood at the deepest end of the grotto, her knee-length red tunic and leggings sprinkled with dust and her brown hair tied to the side in a braid. Even from a distance, her skin glowed golden and Brannon wondered how many bloodstar
9/30/2009 10:11 AM
cheroots she'd smoked already. Eshana smiled when she noticed Brannon and hurried to greet him.
"Cousin!" She spread her arms wide for an embrace.
Brannon lingered at the cave's threshold, uneasy with so many familiar faces. They all believed him to be the Consort, and yet few would ever know the truth.
"Eshana, a dhama." Brannon returned the hearty welcome with a quick hug and let her lead him deeper inside the Sian resistance headquarters. "You've been recruiting again, I see. So many are just children."
He spotted an orphan boy, born not more than fifteen years past, whose parents had been good friends to him. On another bench a young couple whispered to each other with heads bent close. All of these young ones held the power of peace in their future and yet they would rather fight.
"More Iconnu join our cause every day, Brannon. I don't need to recruit. So many are tired of how the Dynasts treat us and are willing to fight for freedom."
"I don't know how much help I can be tonight. I've already met many of the people here."
"And I know what you're going to say, so don't. They all agree with Temair's interpretation of the prophecy. Face it, Brannon, people want to see you in the flesh."
"I can't save them any more than you can."
"Absurd. Everyone believes you're the Consort, the Aonachd, all right? I know you don't want to hear it, but you're their avatar, their reincarnated god. You give members of the Sian something to fight and hope for. I've never understood why you see it as a liability."
He sighed, an old quarrel. "Is Temair going to be here?"
"She's just arrived." Eshana pointed.
The high priestess Temair appeared at the cave entrance, clad in the lapis robes of the Tentii, a strict religious sect who dedicated their lives to the worship of Ursara. Few knew as he did that Temair held a loftier title than a mere high priestess.
"Does she come to all of the meetings? It's so far from the northern priory for her to travel."
Eshana nodded and watched Temair walk across the grotto. "She hasn't missed a one. It's in the priory's best interest to have a representative here, I suppose. The Tentii still thinks it runs the Sian Council."
"This is not a safe place for you, Brannon," Temair said as she joined them. With each movement her crown of lapis threads, interwoven with her long jet hair, whispered about her shoulders.
"Nor for you, priestess."
"As the son of the Lady of the Isles you should take greater care. If something should happen to the Aonachd--"
"None of us are safe while the Dynasts remain on our world." Eshana's gaze skirted the cave, always gauging the mood of the crowd.
"I want to at least discuss other possibilities," Brannon said. "We don't have to send our children out to fight the Dynasts."
"We've tried talking, Brannon." Eshana balled up her fist. "And we've gotten more laws prohibiting our movement. They retaliated to the Targren Bridge bombing by restricting us to certain quarters of Dun Brata. While you've been negotiating with them, the police have enforced restricted work permits."
"Eshana--"
"That shield of theirs will destroy our way of life if we don't destroy it first." Louder and facing the small crowd, Eshana continued. "We must send the Oligar a message! It's time we take down the Citadel launch platform. We raid the Oligar's Citadel!"
The small crowd cheered, forgetting that the Sian Council hadn't always been dedicated to war. Once it was a peaceful assembly of Iconnu tribes. Despite his ancient claim to lead these people, Brannon felt alone in the throng of righteous voices.
"Listen to me." Brannon stepped out in front and the crowd quieted. He was the Consort after all. Some would heed his warning.
"If the Sian proceeds with this raid on the Oligar's Citadel, many lives will be lost. I am not averse to fighting and have bled alongside many of you."
He thought of that orphan, of the parents lost. "Are you not weary of fighting?"
Brannon paused and let the meaning of his words sink in. The rhetoric tasted sour in his mouth, the bait to a trap he could never spring. How could he remind them that the Consort already lived among them when he felt like a fraud? Brannon stared hard at the young couple he saw earlier. He hated using a lie against them, but what other options did he have?
"You." Brannon pointed at a teenager. "Do you love her?"
The boy nodded. Brannon stepped closer.
"It's easy to fight and give your life for something. It's harder to try to live in peace. What will you do if she's killed on this next raid? How will you feel then?"
The boy looked down at the ground. A hushed moment passed and the girl stood. Never taking her eyes from Brannon, she took the boy's hand.
"I couldn't bear abandoning him." She said and pulled him along to flee into the cool night.
Many of the remaining members stared openly at the exit, clear longing etched on their young faces.
"We must defend our homeland!" Eshana raised her fist. "When have the Iconnu shied away from a challenge, from war?"
Brannon spoke softly, but his voice reverberated through the cave in a way Eshana's shouts could not. "When have we neglected peace? The Iconnu have always considered war a last resort and I say we have other options open to us still. I believe we can yet bargain with the Dynasts for control of the launch platforms."
A few more inductees stood and hesitantly left the grotto. He ignored Eshana's glare, as if she could stab him in the gut from across the cave.
In all, twelve youths left the Sian meeting and Brannon secretly cheered that those twelve would not die in a few weeks. Still, he knew Eshana could not be convinced to cancel the raid. So Brannon would join them, if not to keep the group from slaughter, then at least to prevent his cousin from getting herself killed.