Siren's Call

Maria

"You cannot keep your mouth shut if your life depends on it can you?"

"I can, but it doesn't, so I won't," was the reply.

"Proceed," she muttered.

"I was saying," her sister said with an irritated glance for the interruption, "That this is not going to be as easy as you seem to think. You know as well as I do the solar system is a war zone, and finding a metal pumpkin ten AUs away--"

"That 'metal pumpkin' is our sister!"

"True, but that hardly makes our task easier."

"Is the transmitter--"

"How should I know? We're ten AUs away and you know the transmitter doesn't carry that far!" Rosa fiddled with the end of her green scarf, winding the strands around her fingers. "Do you think we'll really find her? And if we do will it matter?"

Maria looked up at her, but could not meet her eyes. "I do not know."

"It's been over a year. I should have gone on my own--"

"Unidentified vessel, identify yourself and power down or be destroyed," a voice broke in on the comm system.

"Damnit where did they come from?"

Maria shook her head. "Looks like a Navy patrol vessel, Longbow class. Private courier Siren to Naval vessel, this is Maria Wolfe and Rosalia Perez of Mercury, on route to--"

"Stand down immediately or you will be destroyed."

"I am afraid we cannot do so, sir; we are on a rescue mission of considerable urgency--"

"You have been warned. We have a targeting lock on you and are commencing fire."

"Damn." Maria wrenched the Banshee hard to starboard as a spread of small projectiles whizzed by. "I suppose they're concerned about Cybrid movement--"

"Give me pilot," Rosa snapped.

"Done." Maria tapped her fingers several times on the central screen of her console. "Maneuver; I will plot an evasive course."

"Dream on," Rosa said as she spun the vehicle on the Y-axis, allowing the streamlined shape to cut through another stream of hull-piercing projectiles. "We'll never outrun that thing; we need to disable it."

"Rosa," Maria said patiently. "We are unarmed. They are armed, shielded, and rather larger than us."

"No kidding, little sis," Rosa said, her eyes narrowing. With a burst of motion she slammed her fists on several controls in quick sequence. A swarm of ECM pods vomited out of the ship's belly, drawing the fire of a group of missiles. White fire blossomed against the black of space, sending the little vessel tumbling toward the Navy ship.

Coughing, Rosa hailed the other ship. "You've made your point damn you!" she said. "We surrender!"

"Power down and prepare for force docking."

"How many people on that thing I wonder?" Rosa whispered as the other vessel drew closer.

"Normal staff for one of those is fifteen.

"Guessing with the war they'd not have so many people on a patrol vessel. Maybe ten."

"Good. Prepare for combat." Rosa wrapped her scarf around her green jumpsuit, and opened the weapons drawer underneath the console. She glanced at Maria, raised her eyebrows.

"You're insane, sis."

"They're coming to take us away hah hah," she retorted, grinning as she pulled a small cylinder from the drawer and fiddled with the dial on the back of it. She tossed the gas grenade at Maria and drew a pair of short sticks and tucked them in her belt.

"Freeze, put your hands in the air!"

"Make up your mind, sailor!" Rosa snapped, turning to face the five gun-wielding officers that arrayed themselves in front of the cockpit door.

The leader spoke into the commlink on his wrist. "Yes sir, two women. Not bad looking ones at that. Yes sir, I'll check. Ronalds," he snapped, glancing at one of his companions. "Do a scan, see that they aren't glitches."

"Malo," Rosa murmured. Maria nodded once, tensing her muscles.

"Sir! They're--" That was as far as Ronalds got before the butt of one of the sticks impacted his throat. He dropped his scanner and staggered backward into the wall, holding his throat and gasping for breath. The other stick spun rapidly in Rosa's palm, then sailed through the air to strike the leader square in the forehead.

Maria used the pilot's chair to ram one of the others into the back wall, then swung it in a circle counterbalancing her weight. She took the man out of action with a backward kick in the stomach, then turned to face the other two.

One of them was a middle-aged woman with rather more combat experience than those the sisters had taken out. She backed off with narrowed eyes and precise, considered movements. Rosa swung the sticks in a scissors pattern, driving the woman back briefly. "Back," Maria called as she kicked the chair. It flew past Rosa as she rolled out of its way, striking the group's leader who was returning to his feet, aiming his weapon at her back. The impact knocked the gun out of his hands, and it clattered deafeningly as it bounced off the wall into Rosa's waiting hands.

The woman threw her weapon down, apparently realizing for the first time it was not a good thing to use inside a space vessel, and threw herself at Rosa. She grabbed the gun's barrel and wrenched it to the side, using Rosa's momentary imbalance to kick her painfully in the knee. Rosa fell, rolled sideways into the woman's legs, and pulled the gun's trigger. Less than five seconds later a whirlwind of debris spun toward the portside bulkhead. Maria grabbed the last opponent and hurled him toward the breach. He tumbled toward the small gash in the wall, and was sucked up against it.

The older woman was lying on her back, unconscious. Rosa smiled and flipped her stick end-over-end into the air, glancing at Maria as it fell into her palm with a satisfying thud.

"Okay, do you all plan to do anything else stupid?" she asked the leader, who was holding his stomach and moaning. "Since our ship got banged up dealing with you idiots, we're taking yours. Naptime now." She grabbed the man who was still blocking the door, smacked him in the head, and tossed him into the cockpit. Maria glanced at her, then picked the gas grenade off the console and tossed it on the deck. White gas hissed out of it, filling the room as the two sisters left.

A hastily erected barrier on the other side of the airlock fell to their simultaneous kick, and the guard behind the barrier fell to Rosa as she clubbed her in the jaw with the stick. Maria caught the young woman as she fell and dragged her across the threshold into the Banshee, then followed her sister into the larger vessel.

Rosa accessed a comm panel and typed a few quick commands in it. "Oh no, it isn't this easy," she said with a grin. "Hah. Fools haven't changed one of their primary access codes in five years!"

Maria decided not to ask how her sister had acquired Naval clearance codes in the first place, and opened the weapons locker as her sister typed rapid commands on the panel. The lights flickered briefly. "Well, now the control center is locked and there are three more people we need to hunt down--"

"Two," Maria muttered, swinging a rifle (this one a space-safe light candlegun) toward the door as it opened and a gun muzzled locked on her.

"Freeze," the carrier snapped.

"Burn," Maria retorted, and pulled the trigger. The soldier shrieked as his uniform ignited and the gun's projectile chamber exploded in his grasp.

"That had to hurt," Rosa said distractedly. "Bad news. This thing is only one of six ships on this vector. And I think the rest are coming this way."

-----

"Weapons online," Rosa said.

"Not this time. Put all weapons power to the engines and we'll see if we can outrun them."

"We can't."

"Damnit, Rosa, we can't blow up Naval vessels!"

"Sure we can, it's just not a good idea."

Maria took Rosa's wrist in an unbreakable grip and locked her eyes on her. "Power. Down. Weapons."

Rosa's eyes searched hers for a moment, then she nodded slowly. "Weapons off, engines at one twelve percent... ECM pods ready for launch, but they're going to saturate our defenses."

"Probably," Maria said. "That's what we have the Siren for. Go down there and get those people off."

"Will do." Rosa vanished down the bridge access tunnel.

Maria glanced at the captain as he groaned and stirred from his position on the deck beneath the captain's chair. "Go back to sleep, Captain," she muttered, and touched his neck with a hypo. "Rosa! The gas is starting to wear off these people; we'd better lock them up tight."

"Yeah," Rosa said over the comm. "Stick them in the storage compartments in the galley until we can get them offloaded."

"Any ideas how we're to do that?"

"None. You can always pitch them out the airlock."

"I'm tempted. Get those people out of there now; one of those ships has a lock on us!"

"I'm working on it!"

"Work faster!" Maria rested her fingers on the console and stared at the readouts. One of the ships was somewhat ahead of the others and was burning on an intercept course that would match velocities with them in less than five minutes, barring any major course changes. She watched as a set of dots appeared in front of the other ship and spread out toward the patrol vessel. "Incoming, firing ECM pods, custom spread pattern." The ship lurched as it dropped a dozen of the pods in the missiles' path. "Shutting down systems in five seconds," she said. "Three. Two. One." She pressed a set of controls and the ship went dark.

The missiles arced toward them and started tracking, then one by one they shot over their heads and followed the ECM pods. A blinding explosion lit space as the missiles found their (incorrect) targets. Maria glanced at a small dot lagging behind the main cluster. "Damn, a straggler! Rosa, brace yourself!"

Thud.

The ship tumbled end-over-end and the shriek of escaping air sounded over the alarms announcing the escaping air. "Rosa!"

"I'm alright... I'm stuck on the outer hull between a pair of broken supports."

"I'll come get you."

"I'll kick your ass," she replied, and Maria's blood ran cold as Rosa began coughing.

"You're injured; don't give me any crap about it."

"Just a scratch. Take us out of here Maria!"

Maria typed a few commands then got up and snapped her suit helmet into place. She left the bridge and descended the ladder to the lower deck, her eyes going wide as she saw the extent of the damage. The hull was sliced open and black space filled a hole bigger than she was. It was amazing the missile had not severed any of the primary structural supports: the gashes wound around a black beam a meter wide. If that member had broken the ship's engine thrust would have crumpled the vessel like a wad of paper.

Rosa was outside the gash trying to free herself from a pair of deck plates that pinned her to the main hull. She heard Maria's approach via her footsteps on the hull and muttered a Venusian word Maria was not interested in hearing the translation of. "Damnit, I told you--" She coughed again, the bubbly kind of cough indicating internal injuries.

Maria braced herself on the hull and wrenched at the topmost plate, sending it spinning off into space. It wasn't that difficult; apparently Rosa was even weaker than she appeared.

"We're going back to the Siren," she told her, but no response came. Rosa's eyes had drifted closed and her head fell forward onto her faceplate as Maria lifted her out. "Rosa? Rosa!"

-----

Maria set the medical unit to work on Rosa as she climbed up to the control deck. The attacking vessels had got a targeting lock on the larger ship, and were just opening their missile bay doors as the Siren pulled free of the force dock.

"Medical emergency," the med unit called through the comm system. Maria swore, spinning the Banshee laterally through the cloud of debris the earlier missile strike had blown off the patrol vessel.

Her eyes narrowed as she plotted a course that would put the patrol vessel between her ship and the attacking fleet.

She brought the engines up to maximum power, turned the Siren face-down, and punched the Maximum Acceleration control.

She closed her eyes as the patroller erupted into a cloud of fire and garbage, which quickly puffed out and dispersed in the cold darkness of space.

Maria went down to the main chamber where the med unit was busy removing shrapnel from Rosa's abdomen. "How is she?" she demanded, grabbing a pair of gloves and putting them on.

"Massive trauma to the abdomen and lower chest cavity. It will be impossible to perform the necessary surgeries and keep her alive."

"Cease efforts to sustain metabolism. She's Immortal; she will not suffer loss of brain function if her body is... inoperative."

"Understood." On the monitor, Rosa's heart trace went flat.

"Rosa, I am here. Do not worry; you will be fine..." She took Rosa's hand and squeezed it, hard, then released her and picked up a scalpel. She closed her eyes. "Concentrate your efforts on repairing small nerves and arteries while I free the invasive material," she ordered the med unit.

A massive chunk of debris-- sharp debris-- was wedged up underneath Rosa's breastbone. Maria checked the scanner to verify it was not caught on anything vital, then slowly and carefully began to cut it free.

She froze as a shock raced through her. Rosa was calling out to her, and she had no way to answer. "You will make it though this, my sister," she whispered, knowing it was futile. With her nerve systems shut down she could not hear her.

Taking a ragged breath and trying to tune out Rosa's terrified mental cry, she set to work.

-----

"Rosalia has been successfully resuscitated," the med unit informed her.

Maria sighed. "Not that it will matter if we don't escape those patrollers," she muttered, climbing to her feet, wincing as her cramped leg muscles protested the motion.

She returned to the bridge deck and took in the monitors with a glance. She sat down slowly, her hands resting lightly on the navigation board.

She traced a finger over a set of icons: Cybrid icons that were the product of the vehicle's refitting with Cybrid computer systems. The resulting system was more powerful than the Banshee's original system, but also less stable. The main computer usually crashed any time it had to process any large amount of data.

Stored in the computer were Cybrid algorithms, she realized.

Her eyes found the tactical screen, which showed the patrol vessels ten light seconds away, closing slowly.

She began to type.

Rosa cleared her throat, startling her. "You idiot," Maria said with a scowl. "You're in no condition to be up!"

"Don't think I don't know that," she retorted, seating herself on the copilot's chair. "What're you doing?"

"Sending a distress call."

"Yeah that'll do a lot of good," Rosa muttered. "Who'll save us from the Imperial Navy?"

"The Cybrids?"

Rosa blinked. "I don't think I heard you correctly."

"We're near Venus and the Cybrids own that world just like they do Earth. We send them a distress signal and they're bound to respond to an Imperial fleet in their space."

"There are thousands of Cybrids orbiting Venus! They'll slaughter the Imperials!"

"I know," Maria said bleakly.

"We can't do this. You might be retired but I'm still an Imperial officer, and I'll be damned if--"

"Rosa..."

"Don't use that tone on me!" her sister blared. "Even if I had no objections, do you know how Jocelyn would react if she found out you set a mass of glitches on innocent people to save her? She--"

"I know!" Maria slammed her fist on the panel, making it rattle. "But we have to do something and that's the only thing I can think of. They already think we're Cybrids; there is no way we'll be able to negotiate with them."

"Siren to Naval patrol vessels," Rosa snapped at the comm. "Acknowledge at once."

"Go ahead," came the reply from the fleet's commander.

"Look up Rosalia Perez in the Imperial Knight's database," Rosa said. "And tell me if you get the idea she's a patient person."

There was a long pause.

"You're going to leave us alone, got it?"

"We can't do that and you know it."

"Well, tell that to the Cybrid force we're headed for," she replied. "We're quick and have good sensor masking. You don't. We do not intend to be stopped, and if it takes ducking into a glitch nest to shake you, we'll do it. Read my records and tell me if you doubt it."

Another, longer pause.

The channel was cut.

"You know, even if I was a total incompetent," Rosa murmured, "My reputation is enough to scare anyone off me."

-----

The Cybrid fleet did not detect them as they passed through Venusian space, though there was a scary moment when a dropship passed by less than a light second away, bearing for Earth.

"Want to guess what that thing is going to do?" Rosa asked, rhetorically.

"Going to drop more Cybrids on Earth."

Rosa sighed. "I wish we could do something about it."

"We can't," Maria said flatly.

"What's our ETA to the Jovian system?"

"Twelve days. I set up the fuel processor already to save time when we hit Europa."

"Good... reminds me of this old book I read..."

Maria raised a questioning eyebrow.

Rosa grinned. "A Chinese space vessel had to refuel on Europa since they didn't have the payload to reach their destination. So they landed and this big crawling plant came out and squashed the ship."

"Reassuring."

Maria tapped a command out on the console, then stood to go get something to eat.

Rosa's eyes went wide as Maria gave a startled cry and collapsed against the bulkhead.

"Maria--?!"

Maria's mouth moved for a moment but nothing came out. Finally, she said softly, "Jocelyn--"

"Can you hear her?"

"Yes-- she--" Tears poured down Maria's cheeks. "She's terrified... and it's getting worse."

"What do you hear?"

"She's-- she's crying out, for someone to save her... she--" Her voice trailed away and she drew a long, unsteady breath. When she spoke again her voice was quiet and calm. "A song... Whisper of the cold wind over the empty lands, nothing but ethane ice in my hands, no one can save me from this terrible fate, or could they? or are they really too late?"

Rosa closed her eyes. "Poor Jocelyn," she said softly.

"We'll get to her," Maria said. "We must."

-----

Jovian Defense Perimeter to unidentified ship. Identify yourself or be fired upon. You have one minute to comply."

Maria sighed and opened a channel. "Once upon a time an unarmed vessel would not be harassed every time it entered someone's sensor sphere... Unarmed Banshee-class vessel Siren out of Mercury, Maria Wolfe commanding."

"We'll run a voiceprint. What is your business in the Jovian system?"

"I need to speak to a member of the Tarazedi Alliance named Jason Sullivan, whom I last knew to be assigned to Europa. Also I need to refuel."

"Noted. I'll contact him and inform him of your arrival, if he isn't in combat. We are dispatching an escort. Cooperate with all orders given or you will be destroyed."

"Understood... another thing I should point out: my sister and I are both Immortals with organomech brains. We are not Cybrids. I'm sure you'll have to verify that, but I would appreciate if you would verify that rather than just blasting us out of space."

There was a long pause, then the channel closed.

"Ah, now that's reassuring!" Rosa said. Maria grunted. "Let's hope they find Icey before they just blow us up."

"Indeed. Sensors are picking up the escort coming out of Ganymede orbit. A half a dozen Conveyers. I don't know whether to be flattered or insulted..."

"Be scared," Rosa retorted.

"JDP-TA Sangr Vengaz here. Remain on present course. Shut down your reactors and activate your broadband slave controls."

"Reactors down," Maria said hurriedly, reaching for the switch. "I am sorry, but we have removed the slave controls from our vessel. If you wish we may charge our hull so you can put a tractor field on us."

"Negative. We will close to ten meters and surround your vessel. Any deviation from your present course will result in your destruction."

"They need to inform us of this?" Rosa muttered.

"Acknowledged, Sangr Vengaz... we will comply."

The black disc-shaped vessels appeared out the window silhouetted against Ganymede's gray surface, growing slowly and spinning. With a blaze of thruster fire the larger ships arced around the small Banshee and enfolded it, blocking out the view of the stars beyond.

"Aw, a hug, how sweet," Rosa said.

"Sangr Vengaz, may I ask our landing point?"

"You may not. Suit up."

"Damn, they're going to transfer us," Rosa said, zipping the front of her green suit.

Maria nodded, quickly tying up her black hair before putting on her helmet. "Oh well," she said, her voice muffled by the thick metaplas. She turned on the comm system and her voice returned to normal. "At least this way we might actually get to see Icey..."

"Maybe."

"Proceed to your airlock. We will send a team over to retrieve you. Carry no weapons or you will be killed."

"Right..."

They left the cockpit and entered the small airlock, waiting for the air to hiss out. The door opened and three figures in black-and-red spacesuits blocked it. Two of them entered the lock and took the sisters' arms, while the third held an unfamiliar weapon on them. Maria felt her feet leave the ground as the man gave her a tug, and raised an eyebrow. "You are in an anti-inertial field. Do not attempt to alter your trajectory or you will float off into space." She felt a hand at her back and realized with a sinking feeling that he was removing her thruster pack. One push and she would go spinning off into space with no way to alter her course.

"My compliments on your security," she said dryly.

The humorless beings did not reply.

"What is the radiation rating on your suit?"

Maria raised an eyebrow and glanced over her shoulder at Jupiter looming overhead. "Fully rated against UV and X, but I think you’d better get us under cover quickly." She mentally kicked herself for forgetting Jupiter's intense magnetosphere and radiation belts. She knew about them, certainly, but didn't consider the possibility of actually being exposed to it.

Fortunately, the officer had, and gave her a small hypo. "This contains a stabilizing agent; take it the instant you're aboard," he said, firing another small burst from his thrusters.

"Is Icey still on Europa?"

"Actually, no. He is on Io. You will be detained until he returns and corroborates your story."

"I have not given you one!"

"You will," he said ominously.

The disc of the nearest Conveyer turned elliptical and then rectangular as they arced around it. A small airlock opened and she sailed into it, bumping her helmet on the back wall as the inertial damper made her incapable of changing her course. Rosa grumbled as she tumbled into the airlock and banged into the wall as well. The door closed behind her.

"Pressure equalized," a female computer voice informed them, and they removed their helmets. They flipped the hypos on and injected their doses into their necks, wincing at the sudden stinging sensation.

"Okay, how long do we get to stew in the brig?" Rosa grumbled. "This is a bit ridiculous."

"Such inhospitable hosts," Maria agreed.

"You will be taken to a guest facility in Europa City," a voice blared from the wall. Maria raised an eyebrow; there was no speaker visible.

"You can interpret that 'holding cell'," Rosa whispered.

Maria was about to reply, either to her sister or the unseen voice, when she heard a familiar tone inside her head. She winced, pressed her hands to her temples. "Jocelyn..."

Rosa went to her and took her hand. "What is it? I can't hear anything."

"Her-- her power supply is disconnected, or damaged. She only has--"

"A week or two of reserve power..." Rosa said softly.

-----

"Maria!" Icey cried, rushing into the small room where she and Rosa were being held. He snapped a command at one of the guards in an unfamiliar language, and the older man looked suspicious. Icey took the man's arm and physically shoved him out of the room into the dimly lit corridor. "I told you," he said in English. "I know Maria and she's safe. And do you forget I outrank you?" His voice turned ominous.

"What's the trouble, Ice?" a new voice said. A tall, muscular officer with an impatient scowl stepped into the room.

Maria raised a disdainful eyebrow as the new arrival winked at her, and shot a warning glance to her sister as she smiled at the man. "Not a very good idea, sis," she said under her breath in Spanish.

Rosa looked at her with a mock-innocent look and she rolled her eyes.

"No trouble Vega," Icey was saying. "Just some of my friends from Mercury. I told you about them."

"The ones who rescued you when you were lost in the Antipode region?"

"Yeah... They have Immortal brains, and this guy thinks they're glitches." Icey chucked a thumb at the guard.

"Oh. You, get out," Vega said, and tossed the man out the door.

"We aren't here to visit, I'm afraid," Maria said. "Our sister's in trouble on Titan. We stopped here to refuel and got seized by these goons."

Icey frowned. "What's wrong with your sister?"

Maria shook her head. "She's dead. Her brain is still functioning, but it's running out of power. We have to get to Titan within the next week or two."

"Your Banshee could not make it that fast," Icey said.

"I know! But we have to do something!"

"What about that courier?" Vega said.

"Courier? What-- no way! Star would kill us all if we let someone take that thing!"

"If he's still alive himself," Vega muttered. "Remember the Council has decided to do some investigations in the Kuiper Belt? We can go do that and drop these two off on Titan."

Icey pondered the idea for a moment. "Yeah... we can try it, but we'd need authorization from the Council..."

Vega described what the Council could go do with itself, then glanced at the sisters. "Excuse my language, ladies." He looked back at Icey. "Come on! I am sick of Io and Europa! I need something else to do... and you know how I am in low-grav combat!"

Icey grunted. "Alright, but if the Council goes berserk, I'll be sure to let them know whose idea it was."

"I'll be out in the Kuiper Belt anyway so I don't care," Vega said with a grin.

-----

"Rosa, you need to find Jocelyn yourself," Maria said, standing in front of the small, sleek courier ship inside the ice cavern that served as a hangar. "I have to go to Earth and pay a visit to the cloning station..."

Rosa nodded. "Yeah. No way would she be able to survive the transition into an unfamiliar body with her power as low as it is..."

Maria glanced at the opposite side of the hangar where captured Cybrid equipment was strewn about. "I hope the Cybrids haven't reached Madrid..."

Rosa looked away, then silently turned to go. Vega stood in the airlock and called, "Ready for launch."

"Rosa?" Maria said softly. Her sister looked back at her. "Do be sure you find her." And she turned and left.

"I will," Rosa said to the closing door.

-----

Maria spent half an hour arguing with some flunky to give her her Banshee back for transport back to Earth. With each wasted hour and pointless redirection, she felt her sister's chances for life slipping away.

"Your vehicle has not been properly checked for monitoring devices--"

"Check it!"

"A search will take about two weeks--"

"I do not have two weeks," she said, glaring at the old woman in the commander's uniform.

"The security of this facility is a duty I take very seriously, Ms. Wolfe--"

"Captain Wolfe," she snapped. True, she had held such a rank in the Imperial Navy (sixty years ago) and probably outranked her from her Knight's service too, but the woman was not impressed.

"Captain Wolfe. We have much highly sensitive material here and I'll be damned if a person of unknown affiliation--"

"Ghosts of the Antipode, Fantasma Colony, Mercury, for the record," Maria muttered.

"To take an unchecked vehicle out of this facility without properly checking it for--"

"Give me another ship then."

"We have no ships available. Any flight worthy vehicles are sent to Io for combat duty."

"Which explains why mine is not available," Maria retorted. The woman paused. "I will hold you personally responsible my ship in case of it being damaged as a result of its illegal seizure."

"We're in a war zone--"

Maria stepped forward quickly and picked the woman up by the front of her uniform. "This bay will be a war zone if you do not provide me transportation to Earth immediately. And if my sister dies as a result of your delay I will challenge you to a vengeance duel as per Imperial law."

Icey stepped in. "Eh, Commander? I'd really suggest you do what the good Ghost asks before you become one with your vehicle bay..."

"You know this loathsome and disrespectful creature?" the woman said, not fazed one iota by her feet dangling half a meter off the deck.

"Aw, I think she's cute," Icey said. "Yeah I know her and I don't think I like seeing guests treated in such a manner as you have been treating her..."

"Who's treating who?" the woman snapped. "I've been physically assaulted--"

"You should be glad it's not Delithita you're dealing with," Icey said. Maria smiled slightly. "Give her back her damned ship, Commander. You've had ample time to check it out. If you can't run a scan of a little Banshee in three days perhaps you should be reassigned to a less challenging post. Like perimeter guard."

"Her Banshee is on Io," she bit out, and turned away.

Icey sighed. "Guess we go to Io then," he said, and gestured to the door. "After you."

Maria gritted her teeth at the thought of her white Banshee being dirtied with yellow sulfur dust, and stalked out of the bay without a backward glance.

"My GEIC is parked on the next level. Ganymede-Europa-Io-Callisto," he said at Maria's questioning glance. "It's a specially designed shuttle. Rides on Jupiter's magnetic lines of force. It pretty much sits in the crosscurrent, lets the flux steal momentum, and drops onto Io. We have a good window right now so we'd better hurry."

Maria nodded. "What is your rank here?"

"I don't have one. I was on Mars when the Tarazedis first landed and have been bouncing around the system ever since. I had them assign me as a floater, and I don't really have a rank other than HTY. Higher-than-yours." He grinned.

"Ah. You know, we could use you back at the Antipode..." "I know." He nodded slowly, turned and faced her. "TA is in a bottleneck right now. We are essentially the only defenders of the Jovian system. We have allies, but they have their own problems. We're stuck holding a massive force pinned to the inner Jovian system. We have land battles on Io..." He shuddered. "Big land battles. Space battles around the Io flux tube. We have a base on Amalthea, and are trying to construct a fusion weapon emplacement in Jupiter's atmosphere. We need everyone here."

Maria gazed at him levelly. "I understand. But you should be aware that our situation on Mercury is little better than it was when you left. We need you too."

Icey turned away.

-----

They made the trip to Earth in a stripped-down Conveyor with an oversized reactor and engine complex. The high acceleration left both of them confined to their crash couches for almost the entire trip. Only when they had burned past Luna and were aligning for the low-orbit aero breaking run did the vicious acceleration ease.

"Argh," Icey said. "Five days of that and I'm ready to just drive us into the goddamned planet."

Earth grew rapidly in the window, and disappeared as the Conveyor spun to decelerate hard just as it cleared the outer satellite ring. "Picking up a radar paint from San Tijuana area," Maria warned, just before a massive slug slipped by the shuttle's port side. "They have some good aim," she noted.

"Yeah, good aim this," Icey muttered, and turned the ship several degrees. The engines cut out for an instant then came back, and the Conveyor slewed in a vicious arc just before the next slug shot past. "Stupid railguns," he said, and then his voice was drowned out by the shriek of atmosphere on hull. "Aero braking sequence now!" The Conveyor turned ninety degrees, showing its wide cross-section to its path. The roar of air rushing over the hull was deafening.

After a minute it faded, and Icey reported the new orbit. "We have a nice ballistic, apogee sixteen kkm, impact in Europe somewhere..."

"Fine-tuning," Maria said, and fixed the flight path to intersect the flashing X on the console that was Madrid.

"Burn or float?" Icey asked.

"Float. No point risking a last minute glitch..."

"Um... I think a last minute glitch has found us..."

A Cybrid dropship loomed overhead, bearing down on them. "Unarmed," Maria said.

"Yeah, but Earth isn't!"

A slug slammed through the Cybrid warship, punching a neat hole directly through it. "Good that shot was from Barcelona not Madrid..."

"Yeah, we'd have been right in their line of oh shit--" Icey wrenched the Conveyor to starboard. A slug tore through the tailfin, ripped it off, and continued to the Cybrid ship.

"I've changed my mind," Maria said as she slammed her fist on the thruster control. "We burn down. Got parachutes?"

Icey moaned.

-----

"Ah, the Spanish plains," Maria muttered, as her feet struck Earth for the first time in six years. The shock reverberated through her already aching bones and she fell, tumbling down the small hill for several meters before she caught herself. Icey landed an instant later, ten meters away. "Let's go."

"I think Madrid is that way," Icey said, pointing to a fat column of smoke on the horizon. Maria squinted in dim sunlight (was high noon on the Spanish plain really that dark? or had she been on Mercury too long?) and found a spreading mass of fires beneath the smoke column. Tears filled her eyes.

"That's Madrid," she whispered.

Several hours later they reached the southern edge of the city. Rubble was stacked a dozen meters high. Small fires burned everywhere, adding to the mass of smoke that turned the sun into a dim red orb. The streets were broken and slabs of plascrete were strewn about beneath toppled overpasses. Few buildings remained in their area of town, and even in the distance the city center was not in much better condition.

Weapons fire lit the western sky and the ground below, as HERCs, tanks, and fighters battled it out. Maria looked around the ruined city and wondered what they were even fighting for.

"Glitch!" Icey cried out a warning. Reflexes honed by centuries of training made Maria spin, duck, and leap to her feet in the split-second before the infantry Cybrid fired a pair of thick green beams at her. She kicked her legs in mid-air, altering her trajectory, and landed right on the Cybrid. She smashed her fists into the control box, repeatedly, until it caved in and the machine fell silent. She looked at her bloodied hands as if not comprehending. Icey stood beside her and offered a hand up. He'd also dispatched a Cybrid, but he had used his laser pistol, judging by the smoking hole in the middle of it.

Maria took his hand pulled herself to her feet, and pointed to a nearby building. "That is our destination," she said. Icey looked at the small building, labeled simply Perez 12.

A minute later, as Icey kicked in the stuck door, Maria closed her eyes, knowing what she would see.

The place was a wreck. Toppled tables and smashed glass littered the floor. The tanks in which the clones of Jocelyn, Rosa, and herself lay awaiting their Immortal brains, were empty, their nutrient fluids splattered about. Tubes and wires lay severed on the ground.

Maria leaned back against the computer mainframe, and buried her face in her hands. Tears filled her eyes and sobs shook her as her last hope faded away.

/ < / << /