Darklight Pirates
Chapter Seventeen

Kori Tomlins stared at the blank wall, elbows planted on a bare wood table in front of her. She didn’t see the cracks or peeling surface or ugly color that hadn’t been popular in two decades. She saw a map of Burran, complete with military posts marked clearly, precise notations showing response times to border incursions by both Eire and Uller guerrillas. More than this she saw plans for civil uprisings, not only in Eastminster but in other large Burran cities. It all came together, and it all existed in her head.

She and Bella had been constantly on the move for weeks, dodging military patrols and police. Whether they sought her or believed she was dead mattered little if they swept her up in their increasingly effective capture nets. Once they identified her, she was certain to be executed. Goram Weir had to remove her permanently to maintain the publicly released fiction that she had gone crazy with grief over her daughter Ebony’s death and had murdered Bella before committing suicide. Or had the lie changed? Keeping up with the constant flood of news releases from the capital, all with Weir’s fingerprints on them, only made her angrier.

A hesitant knock came at the door. She wrapped her fingers around a small lasepistol in her lap, turned slightly so she had an easy shot and then called out for whoever was there to enter.

When the door creaked open enough to see her visitor, she laid the pistol on the table and motioned for Herold to sit. He looked around like a trapped animal, his dark, squinty eyes darting about. He was buck-toothed and had a nose the size and color of a turnip. Thin coppery hair had been swept straight back on his almost bald head. One ear was burned away, and scars crisscrossed his face like a street map of Eastminster. No one gave him a second glance out on the street, especially not the police hunting for guerrillas. Whatever a freedom fighter looked like, it wasn’t like this drowned rat. That made Herold all the more useful, that and his cleverness in making and planting bombs.

“Well? What happened?”

He smiled at the question. His protuberant teeth could not hide the gaps where several in the back of his mouth were missing. He pulled a chair up and sat to her right at the table. Eager with his news, he leaned forward. Her nose wrinkled at the stale sweat and decaying food odor.

“As you instructed, Mistress. The first bomb was a dud. The bomb squad arrived. The second, the one they had not noticed, removed seven of the ten technicians working on the first. I overheard a senior officer declare that they would use only robots and drones from now on.” Herold smiled even more broadly. “I have planted significant bombs in their robots already.”

“Before they powered them up for use? Good. What of the demonstration tonight?”

“Oh, it will be spectacular. Not even the Programmer General could evaluate the effect on the people when hundreds are killed.”

“The Programmer General,” Kori said. She spoke with such venom that Herold recoiled.

“I apologize. I should have said Weir. I did not mean your husband would--”

“He abandoned me. He and Cletus came in those robotic suits, and he left me to die.”

“I am sure--”

“You weren’t there,” she snapped. “When I could have been rescued, when I and Bella could have been taken to safety, he left me.”

“You do not believe he was killed after a bad Drop?”

“Weir’s lies are pathetic. Even when he had experts like Sean Scarlotti manipulating the news, he never delivered believable stories. Oh, my husband is alive. No matter what Weir says, my husband is alive.” She gripped the lasepistol so hard, her finger slipped and pressed the trigger. A thin pencil of coherent light drilled through the wall where she had stared so intently before Herold interrupted her.

“Mistress, please, I am loyal. There is no need to kill me. I meant nothing. Of course your husband is a coward and a fool.”

“My entire family is useless to me. Ebony died and Bella is worthless for what I need. She huddles in a corner all day and cries.”

“She is very clever and has helped with some of my designs.” He smiled in remembrance of those bombs.

“When I forced her to. She lost her lover, her sister and brother and father. She spiraled into despair and doesn’t have what keeps me going.”

“What’s that, Mistress?”

“Hatred.”

Herold licked his cracked lips and looked around for an escape route. He half stood, then sank down into his straight-backed chair, gripping the seat on either side of his thin shanks. Trying to speak, he looked like a fish gasping for water and replaceing only polluted air.

“What more do you have to tell me?”

“You must meet with the cell leaders to coordinate their activities. Random trouble is too easy to predict and counter. Weir is not the Programmer General your husband was, curse his name, but he is good enough to anticipate anything less than a clever battle plan.”

Kori had read about government opposition back on Earth and had adopted the cell system for her resistance. She knew the cell leaders but none of those in their individual cells. Each of the members knew of others in different cells. Her instructions could be passed throughout a large spider web of provocateurs quickly, without use of public communication. Word of mouth had proven safer than any comlink the government might tap. Drones always presented a problem, hovering high enough in the air to be unnoticed but equipped with sensors able to pick up the sound of dandruff falling to the pavement. But drones could not be everywhere all the time, no matter how many were arrayed against her.

“The first attacks will be against the drones. Cut off surveillance and the government will go berserk worrying what is happening.”

“Good, Mistress, good. Have you contacted the leader of the Eire freedom fighters?”

“Freedom fighters.” She spat the name out. “They seek to enslave Burran and take our resources. If we didn’t control the space ports and off-world trade, they would have launched an invasion years ago.”

“They are government backed, true.” Herold’s head bobbed like a cork in a rapidly flowing stream. “They maintain the fiction they are unable to control the fighters invading along the coast.”

“They threaten our aqua culture farms. If they poison them or seize them for Eire, Weir will be forced to mobilize against them or half of us will starve by winter. That will take the pressure off martial law in the cities when he moves the soldiers. Local police lack the numbers, training and equipment to successfully stop us.”

“And then, Mistress? What will you do once the soldiers march to chase those naughty Eire freedom fighters back across the border?”

“First things, first.” She had vague ideas, nothing more, but to say that to Herold would diminish her effectiveness in his mind. For all she could tell, he had no political ambitions. He simply liked to watch his bombs blow up buildings and vehicles.

And people.

“There are stories. New stories of aliens. The Sporr have been building a network in our cities for years to disrupt us, to take this planet for their own.”

She stared at him. Her contempt rose.

“The Sporr are meter-tall spiders. Don’t you think we would have noticed them before now?”

“They hire human agents. There are always those who would betray their own families for a few luxuries. It’s said the Sporr have a drug that--”

“Enough of that. We have to deal with Weir. Forget mysterious sabotage done by alien agents and concentrate on overthrowing the tyrant.”

Herold’s head bobbed furiously. He stood and meticulously moved his chair back to the table. He looked up at her accusingly and blurted, “I need more ... supplies.”

The most effective way of controlling him was to withhold what he desired most. She had to be careful not to deny him what he considered a minimum or she would lose him, but too much? He enjoyed seeing things blow up. Let him indiscriminately explode his bombs and there would be no directing his efforts again.

“You’ll get your explosives.”

“I can make those. I have the 3D printers and the raw material. I need electronics for detonators that cannot be detected or jammed. Printing those circuits takes too long.” He turned sly. “If there were a riot in the civic plaza, a quick strike might liberate what I need from the government warehouses.”

“Liberate? Yes, that.” Kori wanted to laugh at the delicate way Herold spoke. For such a violent man, he chose his words to dance about his true intentions. “I need to get a better strike team together.” She mentally worked through the cell leaders and their reports, but none stood out as a good choice. “Give me a day, and I’m sure the proper equipment can be dropped on your doorstep.”

“My doorstep is rigged to explode. Come to the side door.” Herold bowed as if she were royalty. She suspected he did it to hide the expression on his face. Did he smile? Was he amused? Was that a lie or a joke?

“I’ll let you know. There are many other plans to coordinate. Many.”

“Of course.” He bowed again and backed away, spun and quickly left the room. The door lock clicked shut behind him.

Kori closed her eyes for a moment, the myriad threads of all her plans swirling in her head. To tie them together. Which to knot? Which to cut? She went to the window and pressed against the wall beside it to take a look outside without being readily seen. A half dozen drones whirred past the third story window. She lifted her hand to hide her face, looking between long, delicate fingers. She needed a mask to prevent facial recognition drones from identifying her. Even if Weir thought she was dead, a routine ident check would set off alarms all the way to the capital.

Eastminster wasn’t much of a city, but she had chosen to make her base here. Going to a larger city was out of the question. Weir--or more likely Aaron Riddle--would have increased surveillance on anyone traveling to or from Eastminster because of the rioting. Travel restrictions grew more stringent weekly. She ran her fingers over her cheeks. Some wrinkles. Not many. A mask would change the color of her skin, remove those wrinkles, give her back twenty years of youth. Or was it better to add years to her appearance? Her life to this point had not required her to think in terms of predators and prey.

She preferred being the hunter to the hunted. First, she had to learn the rules to know how to more successfully fight Weir. Then her plans could be firmed and made more effective. The Burran military was hardly more than a well-armed police force, even the High Guard. There had never been a serious war to hone their skills. She had to replace ways to use that inexperience against Weir. And against Riddle. Of the two, she felt that he had greater ambition. He certainly commanded what force there was to bring to bear since Weir had shown himself inept using the Blarney Stone.

She backed away from the window and went through a door leading to a smaller room. This held a Faraday cage in the center, a small dome of copper strips woven into a loose mesh arching over the girl hunched at a terminal.

“What success, Bella?”

The young woman jumped and banged her head against the copper mesh, recoiled and rubbed the injured spot on her scalp.

“Don’t do that. You startled me. I was concentrating and--”

“What success?”

“Come into the cage.” Bella scooted her chair to the side and unwound a strand of wire holding a crude gate in place. “It’s the only way I can be sure we’re not being spied upon.”

Kori looked around the room. It had been painted atomic blast white. Any drone or nano camera would stand out against the starkness. More than this simple precaution, she had three teams of techs sweep the entire building randomly during the day. Even then, she worried. It was good that Bella understood the risks they took.

She turned, bent low and scooted under the cage. The cramped interior forced her to drop to her knees beside the desk. Standing would have tangled her hair in the wire. She almost laughed. This absurd situation took her back to when she was a child and had a small fort all her own down by the River Claddy. The river had chewed away part of a sandstone cliff. She and her best friend, Greta, had completed the rocky room and outfitted it with a small tea service, mats to sit on and even a glowstick for light. They pretended to have escaped from treacherous pirates one day and became those very pirates the next, ready to sally forth and conquer the seas. Kori’s smile faded when she remembered how Greta had died in that cave, caught by a storm surge and drowned.

She had never told her parents, or Greta’s, how that had been their place together. In death it became hers alone. She never returned.

“You look sad, Mama.”

“What have you found? Have you worked around the Blarney Stone’s security?”

“The master computer is not what needs to be entered. The control algorithm Papa wrote will give complete control over the entire system, distribution of goods, military deployments, economic and population projections, even the menu for the Programmer General’s dinner. And no, I haven’t been able to take over the CA. Papa was very good and never shared all the secrets of his work with me.”

“He wasn’t good. He was an evil man. He hid everything from you intentionally, to keep power for himself.”

“You’re sure it was Papa and Cletus in those monster robot fighting machines?”

“They left us. They saw me and left immediately. They wanted the soldiers to kill me. Us.”

“There was so much smoke and confusion. Or maybe it wasn’t them in those machines.”

“The warriorobots were what they had gone to Far Kingdom to bring back. Your father didn’t share that with anyone else. He would have piloted one. Cletus wouldn’t have let him go alone. Toys. That’s what they were.”

“I don’t understand, Mama. Why cause such havoc and then leave if they saw you?”

“They wanted to be sure we were dead. Doomed. Only luck allowed us to get away with a squad of soldiers intent on killing us on our trail.”

“I can’t believe either Papa or Cletus would do such a thing.”

“They did! They did, and I am going to have my revenge.”

“Is Weir lying when he said that everyone aboard the Shillelagh died because of a Drop failure?”

“Captain Sorrel was too good a commander for that to happen.”

“There’s more you aren’t telling me, isn’t there? Were you and Papa having problems before he left for Far Kingdom?”

Kori held back a flood of black anger. She had always been faithful. She doubted Donal could say the same of his own fidelity. There was no proof, but he controlled the Blarney Stone, and alibis and doctored records were a simple matter for the Programmer General. She had always wondered about his aide, the scrawny blonde with the hatchet face and the way she eyed Donal like a feral cat ready for a tasty morsel.

“Weir is a liar who thinks reporting your father’s death will put him in a better position to remain in power. He plotted the revolt, and now we are going to deny him his victory.”

“He controls so much of the country, but he is faltering when it comes to maintaining adequate food and water supplies. From what I have found, he has given Riddle complete control of the military, from Low Guard to High.” Bella paused, pursed her lips and pushed a strand of hair away. “I don’t understand that. He has shown some real expertise taking over the Blarney Stone to the extent he did. Why give a man like Riddle a weapon to pry power away from him? He should have kept some troops under his personal command, but he didn’t.”

“He trusts Riddle. That is a mistake.” Kori thought on this. “Even if Riddle isn’t all that clever.”

“He was never much of a soldier.” Bella reached over and worked on the primitive computer terminal to bring up a personnel record. “He was at best competent, never outstanding in any evaluation.” She smiled. “It’s in his psych report that he would turn passive-aggressive when Cletus was promoted over him.”

“Cletus.” Kori spat out her son’s name. “The two of them, father and son, were after something on Far Kingdom.”

“Cletus is very clever and willing to take risks on new tactics. I’m sure he and Papa intended to bring back those robot killer machines to end the border scuffles.”

“To quell any chance Eire or Uller might invade. That makes sense.” Considering the status of the Burran military, the introduction of such potent warriorobots provided an easy way to settle the problem. “Those warbots might escalate the fighting, though, if Eire thinks it has to buy a few of its own to defend itself.”

“I don’t think Riddle is playing enough attention to border incursions. All he’s done is send a few swarms to observe.”

“What is it, Bella? The way you said that tells me you’ve something in mind. Tell me.”

“I asked myself what Cletus would do and--”

“Don’t say his name again.” The blood rushed into Kori’s face, turning red with fury.

Bella paid her mother’s reaction no heed. Her eyes fixed on the computer terminal’s faintly glowing green screen as if the truth of the universe displayed there.

“I wondered if the swarm might be turned back against Weir. Or Riddle, actually. With a little rooting about in subroutines where they’d never consider it possible, I can send the swarm against any Burran drone. Within a few minutes, I can knock out every last one of them, whether they’re spy drones or carrying heavy armament. Do you want me to do that?”

“Wait, no. Not now. Save it. We need a secret weapon. It won’t pay to show our full capability right away.” Kori felt a glow of pride. Her daughter would make a suitable Programmer General when they deposed Weir. Bella required guidance, but she provided that. “What else can you do, turning government equipment to our ends?”

“That depends on what you want, Mama. I can send part of a swarm against a tank and put it out of commission.”

“How? Aren’t the tanks sealed?”

“IFF. Identification Friend or Foe. The swarm can use recognition signals to get through the electronic and physical seal. Only a few nanos need to get inside a tank to put it out of commission. I can cut off the air supply or cause their batteries to explode or--”

“The shells. Can you detonate the shells carried in a tank’s magazine?”

“I suppose. That would mean the swarm got into a different compartment since crew and magazine are isolated from each other by a heavy hatch and a thick armor bulkhead.”

Kori and her daughter began to plot a dozen other ways of subverting an observation swarm to destroy any force opposing them. Weir would fall. And Kori vowed that when she held the reins of power, Bella doing her bidding, Donal and Cletus would be found. No matter where they were, she would replace them and pay them back for condemning her to death.