Tagged: fiction

While waiting, the medic allowed the recently imprisoned to sit up. They were patient as their body was checked, and a spray restorative applied to the scuffed skin that had been under the restraints. Several other armoured figures entered the room. Like the medic their armour was lighter. It was still whole body, hiding their faces behind large, egg-shaped, hardened resin masks. But there were no displacement screens to present fuzzy outlines so they were more distinguishable by body type and outfit.

For the most part they were technicians who carried out a battery of different tests and examinations of the room before setting up a small command post area. Boxes unpacked into desks of battle computer displays. The system looked like it could override enemy networks and host secure communications which was most satisfactory to the recent prisoner.

After what felt like hours, but was in fact only minutes, the technical team were ready and made a signal to the officer at the side of the bed. They turned. “Sir, the team is ready for you to connect now. They will instigate a safe connection protocol and then they will shut down all external monitors and recording so that you have a single access authority.”

“Good, very good.” He almost leapt from the bed but the medic placed a gentle hand on his chest to restrain him. “You will all receive a special bonus for this. I promise you.”

“Sir,” the officer said, “they are ready.”

 â€œGood,” he smiled. “Connect me and then you can all leave.”

“Sir my orders were to stay with you until we were ready to move you.”

“You can leave. Put me on a monitor or something.”

“Sir. I will not disobey an order. But I can stand in the corner of the room inside the door frame if that helps?”

“It is acceptable.”

They waited as the personnel moved from the room leaving a single technician and the original soldier. A nod to the technician indicated readiness. They had connected so often it was an instinct these days and so they were surprised to feel some trepidation. That was quickly lost as the data stream picked up. They were surprised at the connection speed and the cleanliness of the military construct program. They had encountered similar programs in the past but none so fast. Maybe it was because the entire system was dedicated to them.

They connected to the remote node of their secure storage network and awaited the intense battery of identification procedures they would have to endure. They knew that the first task to complete once passing the security was to pull a copy of the whole database and then wipe this location. Even if Drick’s people were magicians they wouldn’t have found a way into this store. Not in the time they had. But time was a luxury and give a good team long enough and nothing was impossible. Better to move the whole store to a new location and leave them with nothing.

They stared in shock as the lifeless body slowly collapsed in on itself then fell to the floor in a crumpled heap. It didn’t comically fall forward or backwards, just downwards. They were covered with blood, fragments of flesh and bone, but barely registered the fact. A low moan escaped from their open mouth to become a laugh. Nervous at first then growing to giddy uproarious outbursts that tinged on the hysterical.

“Well you’re dead now, Drick. You’re dead now.” They cried in glee. They would have cheered and leaped about if they were not chained to the bed.

There was a commotion in the adjacent room. It sounded like repeated shots from a rifle or machine pistol. If they got the weapon sounds right it was probably a flechette weapon. High powered, magnetic burst, projectiles. It ejected shards of metal in spray that shredded whatever it was aimed at to a distance of about thirty metres. Clumsy, but very effective. It was favoured by a number of street gangs. It was almost useless against modern armour. There was a new sound. Heavy thump sounds from a much bigger weapon. That was a gel blaster similar to the shot that Drick had fallen apart over.

There was a huge explosion that shook the room, rattling the door in its frame. From the adjoining room there were screams and then suddenly the door to this room burst open. They barely had time to duck beneath the covers, or bury their head into a pillow, before a young person came through the door. They looked more female than male, clear gang tattoos on the neck and face from one of the street racer groups. They would take careful note of which gang later. That gang would pay the heaviest price for their association with Drick.

The gang member saw them and was suddenly moving straight at the bed when a hazy figure appeared behind. It was someone in full combat armour with displacement shields to stop laser weapons and optical targeting. They had a weapon of some kind, long and bulbous, levelled at their shoulder. It was hard to determine details with the shimmering field. A single shot was fired and the gang member’s chest burst open in a manner the bed ridden captive would have called delicious. 

The ganger tumbled to the ground and the figure in the suit came through the door sweeping the room with their weapon at shoulder height. A second suited figure followed them sweeping their weapon the other way.

The occupant of the bed didn’t speak. They were still slightly stunned. It was a moment before they realised they were being addressed. “Sir. Sir. Are you hurt? Control we need medical in here, they are restrained and seem disoriented.” The figure looked over at their companion who called “clear.” Then they turned back, “Sir, can you understand me?”

“Y-yes,” surprised to hear their own voice stammering.

“We are here to rescue you. We will have you out of those restraints in a moment, a medical team will be here in a few seconds.” They turned to their companion. “Get those restraints off immediately, I will cover.” The other figure placed their rifle over their shoulder into a harness and moved over to the bed. A few seconds later they were free of the straps and rubbing bruised wrists.

“Thank you,” they muttered as a new figure, slighter armour and no displacement shield, came into the room. The new figure had the blue medic flash on their left shoulder, a sign of a non-combatant.

“Have you been hit?” the medic asked immediately as they came to the bed clearing their mask so that their face was visible. The text on their mask identified them as official medic, government registered, presenting as female.

“No, it isn’t my blood, it was theirs.”

“I still need to check you. Can I attach a monitor to your network port?”

“No. No direct connections. I will broadcast to your public feed.”

The medic pulled a small medical computer from a case and switched a few clumsy looking switches. Built for the battlefield or to be used in heavy suits it was bulky and durable. The device allowed the medic to bridge into the patients internal implants. After a few moments the medic nodded their head. “Seems within tolerable ranges. I can give you some sedatives for the tension.”

“No. I need to be alert.”

“I am going to give you a broad spectrum jab then, nothing but boosters and stimulants that will enhance your body and implants in self repair.”

“Good, when can I move?”

“In a few minutes.” The medic was readying a medical pharmaceutical module to mix up the required treatment.

“I need to get out of here as soon as possible. I have systems to lock down and a kill list to build.”

“Sir,” the first suited figure came back into view, “our orders are to keep you here while we secure the whole compound. We have to make sure we get the entire team that are situated in this area. Then it will be considered safe to move you. Your safety is our priority.”

“Dammit. Can you get me a secure network set up in here?”

“I can have a battle computer brought in with a direct line to a scrambled satellite link. That will have its own drone surveillance and mesh network. We can lock it down to being you as the only user. Is that acceptable?”

“It will have to do.”

There was a dry cough before a rasping voice spoke, “what the fuh.” Broken coughing from a dry larynx, “Where, where am I?”

Drick watched as they struggled to sit upright, hacking up dry lungfulls of air and squinting through eyes gummed by sleep. “Ah the sleeper has awakened. Well hello gorgeous. Don’t try to move too much or those restraints are going to cut into you.”

“What?” Eyes opened now and Drick was quickly recognised, “you,” came the harsh snarl.

“Me,” Drick smiled broadly.

“You are dead.”

“And yet I still appear to be breathing and walking around with all my faculties.”

“For now. When my people find you they are going to kill you.”

“So you have said.”

“Do you know who I am?”

“No idea. I always break into heavily armed clubs; mount a tactical assault to ensure someone leaves the safety of a difficult to access area, into an easier to access area; jump down an elevator shaft; kill a bunch of organics who are trying their level best to kill me; just as an exercise; without having the faintest clue as to who I am going to kidnap. So who are you?”

“I’m the person who is going to urinate on your corpse.”

“Not much of a threat is it. If I am already dead, why would I care if you used my stiff as a toilet? You have a very odd imagination, and this is all tedious. I wanted to have a little conversation. Do you think we can have that without the threats, bluster and general unpleasant imagery?”

“Do you want me to answer that?”

“No. I am actually setting down a condition, since we’d reached a natural conclusion to all the flippancy. I need to know who hired you? In fact, I need to know who that was and anyone else connected to them.”

“You think I am going to give you the name of my contact and their superiors? What makes you think I know them?”

“Well I cannot be certain, but you don’t strike me as a person who extends so much certainty of force without knowing that they are going to be able to collect payment. What would count as insurance if they did pay you and then set their own dogs or the Judiciary on you? What guarantee can a person like you have that they can maintain their seat in the shit heap. The answer is leverage. You have to have leverage.”

“Well that’s all guesswork.”

“It is, but it is good guesswork. You see, you’re a common brute. You use threats, intimidation, force, but without those you have very little. You are not clever enough to be useful, your skill is in supply of heavy support personnel. Probably you deal in drugs, sex, gambling, the usual side businesses to a low league enforcer. But you have little to keep you in this position. You’re cruel, but that’s not an uncommon trait. You have clever people who work for you, but you are just cruel, and maybe a little cunning. No, you have to have gathered something else. That’s leverage. No doubt you have recordings of delicate relationships with enough high level people to make taking you out of the picture more than a slight inconvenience.”

“Still guessing.”

“But you are not denying and I can tell by your face that I am in the right playing ground. So tell me, what do you keep? Where do you keep it? Or maybe you just let me know the little bits of info I need to know. Or maybe I pull it out of your head with a deep probe. ”

“Wouldn’t work. I have nothing stored that would incriminate anyone.”

“So you need to be connected to a network. Clever. Living connection for all business dealings, you are nothing but an encryption key. Well while I play the children listening next door will be hacking the heck out of any network you ever even looked at.”

“Doesn’t matter. They will not get anything.”

“They are good, little key.”

I am more than just a key. And you cannot get at any information I have. Try as hard as you like to break me, even if you succeed, you get nothing. My systems know when I am under duress, even if I were willing, which I will never be. You connect me to the networks and you get nothing. You torture me and you get nothing. You cannot do anything. Your best option is to start running and pray they don’t find you.”

“So it is the hard way.” Drick walked over to a table and picked up a dart pistol. “I am going to give you one last chance before I.” But Drick never finished the sentence.

The shot was fired from over thirty kilometres away. The target was confirmed, was being monitored. Painted as a kill strike with range and flight information by drones. They were a custom build less than five millimetres in diameter. They operated for a short time on a small piece of fissionable material before decaying to a husk. They were hard to detect and worked as a slave mesh unit, each one having a tiny range of transmission attached to a battery of mostly passive sensors. One or two of the devices would have their passive array swapped for a single active sensor such as a targeting beam. There were thousands of them attached to the guidance control of the weapon that fired the shot.

The missile it fired was also attached to the same mesh network. It was composed of a multitude of shells. Most of these contained booster stages for the central unit. This design allowed it to accelerate in a steady progression keeping the originating weapon small, and easier to manipulate. The shells accelerated this particular missile to a speed of over eighty thousand kilometres per hour. Most of the detection equipment would not even register its presence before it hit the target.

By the time it reached the fortified wall it was done with the accelerant shell casings and only had central shells. The first three of these were disposable material piercing jackets. The strike team had done their homework. The first jacket was disposed off after allowing penetration of the concrete outer wall; the second shell took the damage from the ablative shield on the exterior of the building; the third allowed the central core to pierce through reinforced armour inside the wall partition. At this point the projectile itself was travelling at only nine hundred kilometres per hour as all of the rest of the momentum had been absorbed.

It was fast enough for the fifty millimetre expanding gel round to enter Drick’s neck and blow the head, shoulders and arms from their body.

“So they had taken the bait” Hooper thought to their self as they watched the figure on an internal screen. Just a few hours ago part of Hooper wanted all of this to just go away. When they had discussed the whole situation with Drick and Krennar, Hooper had cautioned against jumping to conclusions. Sure it seemed as if the case was cursed, but it was likely just a massive embarrassment. Once it became too complex to hide then they would silently back down, Marsh cannot be that important.

Drick had argued differently, but Hooper stood steadfast until events overtook them. Hooper had to admit the facts had already pointed at someone doing a little more than just keeping face and rushing from embarrassment. It was a panicked scramble to tie up every loose end as fast as it appeared. The fact they had covered up a chase, the missing witnesses, missing data files, zero footage from any camera in the area, attempted pay offs, attempted assault at the Spaceport. It was pretty clear that someone was willing to pay a lot and make very sure to cover and bury whatever this was. Then there were the operations against Hooper at Judicial Central.

The first breach of the Judicial communications could have been put down to clever hackers and a lot of money thrown at a low level supply worker or contract personnel. Sure that level of communications surveillance was tricky, but it was possible. Using a local connection to facilitate a remote hack and monitoring was not impossible, just next to so as to seem improbable. It didn’t mean that there was a serious issue, certainly a call for a major investigation and review, but not a problem in the Officer Corps. 

However then there had been the direct theft of material from Hooper’s personal files on their terminal. Technically anyone could log into any terminal at Judiciary and do their job. It was how the system worked to the highest level of efficiency. But Hooper, like many of the older breed, had a favourite machine. A terminal that they had molded to work fast and respond to their particular way of doing things. Old pros always had a custom chip added to a favourite station. A place to do extra work, keep personal data, and as a dump store for the odds and ends of partial cases or stuff to follow up. Hooper had two, but they had always been doubly peculiar. Both of those terminals had been accessed and both had been cloned for the data in the personal space. 

Then Hooper had heard a report about two of the people on his organics list. One had accidentally stepped in front of an automated truck, which had a faulty line in its artificial navigation unit that meant it failed to stop, turning them into a smear along fifty-third inner city causeway. The other had decided to take a stroll out of their window three kilometres above the ground. The impacts against the gently sloping wall of the skyrise meant that what organic matter reached the base was a bloodied tumble of flesh and bone. 

Hooper had suspected for some time that there was something off about one of the Officer’s on the watch. Hooper had put it down to mild paranoia and the usual minor backstabbing and gossiping that kept people jostling for potential promotions. There were always promotions. Humanity was expanding in this section of space. There were the many bases that needed experienced judicial officers able to handle every job from making laws to being the prison guards. There were new worlds being colonised with megacorporations paying handsomely for Officers to run entire departments. Turnover up the ranks was high, and so everyone wanted to fast track up the ladder and off the world.

But, the breach of two machines was proof that it was much more than an opportunist looking for a better job. It was a serious breach of security and regulations. Someone was as much a traitor to Judiciary as a direct enemy of Drick’s. Hooper wanted to know who they were. They were going to pay to the law, and to Hooper’s boot which would need to be surgically removed from their backside.

Then Drick had brought the information about the hit on Krennar and Marsh. Hooper had wanted to immediately move them to a new location. But Drick had reasoned the logic of doing such. Anyone who was willing to send a team into Judicial Central would just trace and chase the next location. They needed to buy some time to work out and enact their next move. So they had come up with the scheme to let Marsh and Krennar die, and Hooper had come up with the idea of tracing the secondary check team. Anyone paranoid enough would double check they were dead.

Which is why Hooper was here.

Hooper watched in silent boredom as the prey opened both freezers and took a deep sample from each of the two corpses. Draining cerebrospinal fluid and taking a bone marrow sample from both. They wanted to check if the two bodies were clones. That was a wise move as they were. Very hastily grown clones, there was no life in them as they had been tanked in just a few hours. A lab analysis would be able to detect this in fewer than three hours, but that was mostly irrelevant. Their job had been to enable Hooper to smuggle Krennar and Marsh away, to buy time as potential corpses. This secondary work of bait was all a bonus.

Hooper was hoping that the suit worn by the now hooked little prey wasn’t fitted with low level radiation detection. The suit generally resisted all forms of electromagnetic detection, and that probably included the very high emitting radioactive detection, so there was a good chance it did not detect radiation in low doses. 

This would be helpful. As since the figure entered the room, and alerted Hooper, they had been subjected to highly targeted painting with particles of a particular isotope. It emitted radiation on a specific frequency. This was the reason Hooper had to be in the room. An organic had to be here to monitor the radiation levels and manually turn on and off the emitters. Automated systems were forbidden from taking decisions regarding toxins that affected people’s lives, except in life or death situations. If this went as it should, the target would be wearing a trackable suit, and Hooper would be able to follow them.

Hooper watched the figure leave slowly and gracefully the way it had entered. It made sure to clean all traces of itself. As soon as it was clear of the building entrance Hooper was out of his box and heading to the door, pausing for a few moments while the six clean up droids detached all the sensors, and emitters, that had been placed earlier. A check that all equipment was back in its place and Hooper left the building and all traces they had been there as well. Hooper took a short sprint to the waiting vehicle hidden in good cover. Hooper signalled their approach and got into the rear.

Hooper was just about to ask if the plan had worked when the vehicle started to move. One of Hooper’s internal screens lit up and they saw a target and trajectory for a vehicle ahead of the one they had just climbed into, it was from the overhead drones.

“Looks like this crazy shit worked.” said Rodero across the Comms unit.

Several hours ago the watcher had become the sleeper. It was inevitable. Organics, particularly mammals, ran by internal clocks. Even the most dedicated implant could only extend the circadian rhythm by so much before autonomous body functions began to suffer. But the watcher had known this to be, so had taken steps to account for it. 

The watcher had induced a deep sleep, almost a narcoleptic coma. Their implants served to activate the glymphatic system to release cerebral spinal fluid while stimulating synchronized waves of neural activity. This would cleanse the neural system of toxic proteins. At the same time the implant took control over areas of the hypothalamus releasing hormones to control the circadian slave oscillators controlling any effects of altered sleep patterns. The result would fool the majority of the body that it had a natural sleep and yet still allow the watcher to be woken at the right moment.

The watcher had set passive sensors in strategic locations around the room. To prevent detection and scaring away of the prey the sensors had no active component so were limited in their scope. But to their advantage the room was small and mostly barren so there was little cover of paraphernalia to mask readings.

This was fortunate as the prey, when they arrived, was wearing a full stealth suit. The suit had gravity compensation allowing the occupant to float, using an ion emitter of low charge, and fast decay, to propel the suspended form. The outside was a mixture of reflective, and absorbant, surfaces intended to dispel, capture, or reflect any known sensor. The suit emitted no light and would not reflect any, instead a field emission warped light around it making it invisible to most levels of the spectrum. Active sound emitters finished the rig, capable of masking any noise the occupant of the suit might make and including any sound within half a metre of the suits exterior.

The suit used a thin band of super high frequency radio waves on the electromagnetic spectrum to build a picture of the world outside as the same suppressant technology that rendered it almost invisible to detection also rendered it blind. This was it’s only drawback. When setting the passive sensors the Watcher had ensured they used broad spectrum to detect across all frequencies, the suit was visible to the system. 

The sensor sent a signal down a microcable at an undetectable voltage straight to the control unit hardwired to the access port on the back of the watcher’s head. This reduced the chances of detection to almost zero. The signal was quickly passed to a small surveillance computer, attached to the Watcher’s other access port, that determined the level of reaction. It passed on an instruction to the Watcher’s implant to wake them.

The implant started the process of recovery from deep suspension. First it fired instructions into the suprachiasmatic nuclei to change circadian rhythms and release hormones from the hypothalamus into the brain. The nuclei acted as the master oscillator controlling the body’s sense of time and tiredness. The implants manipulation of the nuclei would first wake the Watcher, and then act as if the body had been awake for a short time, reducing the effects of sleep. To aid the transition the implant created concurrent conditions in the optic chiasm below the nuclei which added the deception of the autonomous systems. The clock adjustment spread throughout the oscillators of the brain on a hormonal wave, followed by a secondary wave of adrenaline and serotonin bringing the mind to a pleasant alert state. 

The implant system relayed all the information from the passive sensors. The data was being refined moment by moment as the sensors tracked the motion and actions of the intruder. Hooper woke up gently and smiled inside the box. The waiting was finally over.

“That’s true, you are much more polite than that. Well at least when you are sober.”

“Amusing. How is Marsh?”

“He’s fine, Krennar, he has been awake for several hours.”

“Well that’s satisfying to know. You could have given me a stimulant to wake me earlier.”

“I could have but you looked so sweet all curled up in a coma.”

“An interesting redefinition of the word sweet.”

Krennar opened their eyes and blinked several times. The lights were muted but would still feel harsh. They recovered quickly and Drick guessed they had placed internal filters on using their implant. “Well I should probably attempt sitting up.” said Krennar as they carefully raised themselves onto their elbows.

“You look awful.”

“I am not suited to dying, apparently. Perhaps I should avoid it in the future.”

“Everyone dies sometime.”

“Yes, I understand that. Some of us die more than once.”

“Well if you do it often enough you get novelty clothing with a witty slogan.”

“Delightful, novelty clothing is something I always aim to achieve in a case.”

“Do you feel fit enough to get up and carry on? I have some things that your talents are suited for.”

“Oh, how fortunate for me. This, I believe, is going to count as extra charges, in fact I may have to invent a new category of pricers just for this.”

“Joys. Get up. I need help.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be dead?”

“Apparently so.”

“Then maybe I need to say encore?”

“Well it would be within the range of expected responses for you. I have come to accept that no matter what others might say, you will have something along a different dimension of conversational practicalities to digest.”

“I am not sure if that is intended as a compliment, or an insult?”

“I rarely insult in a casual fashion, and compliments I reserve for those that crave such pleasantries. Do I usually classify you as either craven or worthy of contempt? I have a lot more respect for you than that.”

“Your conversation is refreshingly complex which indicates there’s no immediate brain damage, though you took an awfully long time to come out of the coma.”

“How tardy of me, I really should be admonished for such errant behaviour.”

“Well if you insist.”

“Tell me, since I have no real interest in opening my eyes as yet, and I do not feel quite comfortable enough to link to system, are you really here? Are you in punching distance of someone proficient in such matters? Can I persuade them to hit you for getting myself involved in this whole sorry mess?”

“Yes. Yes. And they’re not that stupid.”

“I pay well.”

“I come with a bad reputation. Well, strike that, it is actually a good reputation, for being a magnificent bastard.”

“I have certainly heard you called worse, though I would never seek to use such profane monikers.”

“What does that mean? How far away were the third generation from the first?”

“Well rejection rates improved to one in a thousand from one in twelve, so that’s nine times better. Whereas incidents of cyberpsychosis went from one in six to one in a million.”

“That’s a nice round number.”

“It’s more like one million, twenty-nine thousand and seventy three. But one in a million sounded cleaner. I figure you don’t want the decimals for any of these stats?”

“No. What you are telling me is that the third generation were one hundred and fifty thousand times less likely to go insane?”

“That does cover all elements of the affliction from the milder more neurotic tendencies, all the way to full on reality altered mental collapse.”

“However, that’s still an impressive change.”

“You have to understand, Drick, that the idea of implants while normal to us, to others it is as alien a concept as you can have. It isn’t just a mental reaction, there is a lot of physical rejection that happens based on emotional response. It’s sticking things in your body and having them control parts of your reality and perception. That’s some gut wrenching alteration for the uninitiated. This could be the reason that Marsh’s unit was repressed so much. Maybe they didn’t want it doing anything more than translation to reduce the chance of him flipping.”

“That makes some sense. But it is still another niggle. I don’t wholly buy that he is just some long frozen man who has been in a chiller for over a thousand years. Why was he frozen for so long? Why wake him up now? Why the hell give him an implant? I get that you might want to speak with him if you did wake him up, but that implant is a heck of an excessive piece of tech for that.”

“I can’t help you any more than I have already Drick.”

“I know. I want you to dig around a little more into the base levels of the implants memory and operating processes. See if you can dig out how long it has been there and if there are any snatches of data residual in any of its systems. It is a small chance but you never know what you might dig up.”

“So what do you think?”

“I think he thinks he is telling the truth. Whatever that is.”

“I don’t want any philosophical or metaphysical bullshit. I want to know if it is the truth.”

“Now that’s an entirely different question.”

Drick sighed heavily, “okay, Rodero, I am not going to play language games, read between the lines or I’ll hunt you down and break your jaw.”

“There’s the Drick I know and am terrified off.”

“Good, so?”

“Look I wasn’t being wholly flippant. What Marsh thinks is what Marsh believes. I ran every kind of test I could think when you were both in the construct program. I also had a whole mess of systems monitoring every potential output in his head. I can tell you that they one hundred percent believe what they are telling you. Now, they are also a little confused, scared and I reckon deeply angry, or aroused, or both. But what they said about being ex-military, from the distant past, and having no clear recollection of much else. That’s all bona fide from my readings of what they believe.”

Drick chewed on a lip for a few moments and the avatar that was being presented to Rodero did the same. “Is it true, though? Or is there a possibility it is created and Marsh just wholly believes it?”

“Now that is a very good question. Aside from working out who or why, which could be any reason, I did wonder about that myself. But that brings us to the problem of the if. If the memories they were fake how would you know. If they could convince the brain, train the body, and simulate all the experiences, then there would be a slim to no chance of finding out what is true. So how do you find out if they have done that level of deception?”

“You asking me or telling me?”

“Little of both to be honest.”

“What have you tried so far?”

“Aside from the monitoring while he was in the construct I have also been closely observing the statistics during combat, including all the feedback from the integration with the implant.”

“And?”

“Well there is the fact that he is adapting very quickly to using the mechanics of interacting with the device. The other results fall within expected ranges for someone with his age and upbringing.”

“So the physical results fall within expectations but the mental agility is a little out of range? By what factor?”

“Hard to say. There is no real baseline to go from as there isn’t anyone with his specific background in the statistical research. However I do have some figures from colonies that were discovered after suffering abandonment for a time period.”

“Go on.”

“Well the particular group I have were from five hundred years ago, just after the second Expansion War. The colony was called Rigella and had been separated from the supply lines for close to a century. They had no innate power sources and so electronics had failed after twenty years, they had primarily fission power sources and not fusion hence the short lifespan of their power. The only machinery still working was self-regenerating atmosphere terraforming towers. They had returned to a mostly agrarian existence. The doctors and scientists tried to rehabilitate the society and bring them up to speed technologically.”

“What were the results?”

“Significantly higher cases of cyberpsychosis and a higher level of implant rejection syndrome. They were also very resistant to modern medical procedures. Took two generations to fully combat the negative culture and to score close to normal results.”

“How close is Marsh to their figures? The first settlers that were processed?”

“He isn’t close. He is close to the third generation, he is way below the rejection and dissociative readings of the primary group.”

“Missed me, ooof” Marsh backed away hurriedly as the reverse heel kick caught him squarely in the solar plexus with enough force to knock all the air from his lungs. The padding on the sparring suit took out most of the force, but it still allowed some through. Drick kicked like a mule on steroids. Way more of the impact from Drick’s attacks came through the suit. Marsh was comparing it to the force from the two other sparring partners. “Give me a moment,” Marsh said as Drick spun to face him.

“You need a little lie down, maybe someone to rub those sore parts and hush you with comforting words?” Drick spoke with a pout on their face.

“That’s funny, you are a real funny person, Drick. Maybe we all need a break, for sure. I just need a moment as if you hit me like that again I am likely to puke.”

“You wont get a break in a real fight, and you are not coming with us without a lot more practice.” Drick was calm but stern. “I know this is new to you but it isn’t new to the other side. They are going to have implants and they are going to have years of experience. You need to fortify, or you need to quit the idea of coming along. Which is it?” 

“I will fortify,” said Marsh. He nodded at the other two ‘Angels’ as Drick referred to them. Marsh had led all of the attacks and it had resulted in everyone being brought down by Drick. Might be time to change tactics.

The three of them circled Drick cautiously. As before Drick merely moved in a slow, graceful circle. Occasionally Drick would seem to half close their eyes as if focussing, Marsh surmised that they were reviewing the internal screens.

Marsh had been training with Drick for about five hours since leaving the construct program where Rodero and Drick had introduced him to all the capabilities of the implant in his head. It still felt wrong, a device that was melded to his brain frankly gave him the shakes. It was so alien. However, each new capability seemed to ease those feelings. Marsh had quickly learned how to call up visual aid; enhance his senses; and even semi-master answering a call, while resisting every urge his body had to speak out loud or gesture. The implant created its own form of internal construct that Marsh interacted with. It could display a representation of himself, or an avatar, to whomever he contacted.

Marsh currently had the implant helping him with the combat. It was tracking all the moves and suggesting positions, possible attacks and showing him potential targets. It also tracked all the motion on the court, using all of his senses and enhancing where it could. It was a ridiculously powerful piece of equipment and it gave great help.

However Drick always seemed to have the edge. They were quick. They anticipated fast, and they hit like a freight truck. 

Marsh rejoined the fight and had angled into position as the two angels spun and attacked Drick. Marsh kept on trying to get a jab in with a kick or a punch. Occasionally he feinted, mostly he was brushing empty air.

The angels were tiring as Drick seemed to goad them into making larger set piece assaults that were taken apart with an almost forensic precision of hits and dodges. Marsh joined the Angels to impart a fury of blows directed at Drick who was mostly dodging. The two angels saw a hole and pressed an advantage but it was a trap. Drick had led them into a position where they could be slammed into each other, their heads colliding.

That attack should have had Marsh as well, but he had dodged backwards a moment before. Now he bent his body low as Drick moved out of the assault on the angels, attempting a spin kick at waist height. It was a ruse and he hoped Drick would avoid it, or even better engage with the kick. Drick did the latter using a sweeping kick of their own aimed to the kneecap. Marsh had already flicked his body into a roll. The kick had moved him forward and now contact with the floor gave him the ability to thrust himself backwards. Powerful arms pushed hard against the ground and his legs shot out towards Drick at high speed.

Impossibly Drick wasn’t there. They had used their own kick as a ruse to back flip in front of Marsh. There was a moment where Marsh was in the air his head looking backwards at where Drick once was that he wanted to know how to teleport. And then Drick heel snapped his face into the ground and landed on his spine with a sharp knee. He hit the ground hard and shouted to break the fight.

Marsh waited a few moments to see what part of his frame would light up in pain. Thankfully the suit had a helmet and that was padded and protected in much the same manner as the rest of his body. There was a tingle from his neck, a throbbing in his spine, and his nose was bleeding lightly. Not too bad. Had the suit not taken out the force Drick would have crushed his face, broken his neck, and snapped his spine with that manoeuvre. “I think you killed me,” he said.

“That was my intention.”

“That’s so nice of you. I didn’t realise that you cared so much.”

“Well it is the level of care I afford everyone who I train with.”

“Yeah, I noticed when you aced the other two. So what has this taught me aside from you are one nasty piece of work?”

“Sweet of you to say. Time for you to practice weapons with Boomer. Rodero has a construct ready for you. Just find somewhere to rest and connect up with them, they are waiting for you.”