Warborg - Star Panther (10 page)

“Oh sorry.”

“Tina, load you position into the transponder so we can find you.” Reese instructed. He watched in frustration as three different locations popped up on his instrumentation as the excited lieutenant fumbled with her instruments.

“Oh, the hell with this.” The tiny, excited voice snapped. A second later her ship’s distress transmitter lit up everyone’s sensors.

Good girl.
Reese thought as he listened to a recovery ship respond.

“Martin, Martin can you hear me?” Doctor Swain’s voice pestered. “Martin, wake up. Come on Martin.”

Slowly the droning voice made its way into Martin’s consciousness. “Doc . . .” Martin tried but couldn’t remember the rest of the name. He knew he should be frustrated, but it just didn’t seem to matter.

“That’s it Martin, talk to me.” Swain smiled at the first feeble response. “Come on Martin . . . Earth to Martin.”

The cobwebs cleared a little bit. “Doc?”

“Yes, I’m here Martin. Talk to me. Tell me your life story. Come on Martin, it’s time to wake up.” Swain kept prodding.

Martin began to focus. “Doc . . . man, have I got a hang over.”

“That’s it Martin, keep talking. Hello Martin.”

Martin opened his eyes. “Doc, I think there’s something wrong with my vision.” He mumbled, blinking and trying to focus. “Doc!”, clarity started coming with a rush.
Well, I must not be dead . . . or the devil’s got a sick sense of humor.
Martin took a giant mental breath as it all came back. “Hi Doc.”

“Welcome back Martin, just take it easy.” Swain sagged in his chair with relief. “Just keep talking, it helps blow the fog out.”

“I think I’m pretty much all here now Doc.” Martin did some mental math and a few other things to try and tell if he was thinking straight, the answers sounded right and he could remember the lyrics, so he figured he must be close. “What’s up with my sight . . . and my hearing ain’t up to its usual standard either.”

Doc genuinely laughed this time. “Well, you’re in a new container, you seem to have broken your last one.” Doc’s smile faded. “Martin, I don’t know how the hell you survived. Your old container was a wreck.” He brightened. “Glad to have you back.”

“Yeah, I had a little help with the container.” Martin sagged.

Swain seemed about to say something then thought better of it. “Well, I was able to cobble together most of your sensory patterns from the old container, but as you see, or don’t see,” he laughed at the dark humor, “we have to get you calibrated all over again.”

“Oh shit, wait a minute Doc.” Martin suddenly remembered the data he had stored in his container. “Were you able to pull the ship sensor data out of the container banks. I hope it was all there. Brian gave his life so we would have that data.”

Swain looked shocked. “What do you mean, gave his life for the data.”

“I don’t know Doc, I think that crazy son of a bitch went in knowing he wasn’t coming back out, and he was pumping data to me like mad right up until it got’em.” Martin sounded sad.

Doctor Swain blew out a breath. “We pulled a lot of data out of the container, Martin. Whether we got it all, we’ll probably never know. Your container was a mess.” His voice softened. “As for Brian, hold back on judging him for now, ok.”

Martin read something in Swain’s voice. “Ok, sure Doc.” He paused for a few seconds. “Hey doc, how long was I out?”

“They brought you in four days ago, Martin.” Swain faded a little with the memory. “When I first saw your container I thought . . . well you can guess what I thought.”

The vidphone buzzed in the lab and Swain reached over and poked the answer button. “Swain here.”

“Hi Doc.” Reese’s voice rumbled out.

“I’d know that voice anywhere, Hi’a Reese.” Martin laughed.

Reese smiled. “Well, I guess he’s still alive. I’ll pass the word. I know a young gal who’s been pine’in real bad for that no account over there.”

Swain relaxed for the first time in four days as the two warborgs bickered over his vidphone.
God, I’m glad things are getting back to normal, now if these two don’t drive me insane it could be a nice day after all.

Reese stopped laughing and grew serious. “Commander Briton wants to talk to you as soon as you’re up to it. We looked over that data you saved . . . we need someone who was there to explain it. The technology gurus are divided into a half a dozen camps over what really went on out there.”

“Reese, would you tell Commander Briton Martin should be able to hard link sometime tomorrow. Until then the Doctor’s orders are for him to relax and get his feet back under him.”

“Sure Doc.” Reese laughed. “I have to go help our good Commander Briton learn to pilot a strike fighter. Poor fella hasn’t flown in fifteen years, let alone as a tinman, and shows every minute of it. So I’ll fill him in. Good to see you up and around Martin.” Reese disappeared from the screen with a lopsided smile.

“Commander Briton’s going into a strike fighter?” Martin muttered to no one in particular. “Did I miss something?”

“Oh, you might say that.” Swain snickered as he rolled his eyes to the ceiling, he grew serious. “Commander Briton is now in command of the entire combat group, not just the cyborg contingent.”

“What?”
A cyborg in charge of manned ships, this is a new one.

“And it’s all your fault.” Doc taunted him with a smile. “It all started when our favorite borgaphobe, Commander Stratton, refused to order ships out to search for you. Briton went to Reese and they cooked up a plan with some fighter pilot named Leena to get volunteers from the manned wings to go out and search. There were over fifty ships out there at one point, and a few of them were heavies. Well, Briton had sicced a friend of his from the Inspector General’s Office on Stratton to keep him busy, and it worked. But after the search was over and the inspection ended the shit hit the fan . . .”

              . . .

Reese looked around Commander Briton’s virtual office with interest. His receptionist was a bio he could only talk to through a vidphone. The whole thing seemed a little bizarre, he also had some sort of physical office where he could meet bio’s, with him behind his desk in holotank. “Doc spent all day getting Martin out of his old bucket and into a new one. I don’t think I’ve ever seen the good Doctor this worked up.”

“Hmmm, yes. I talked to him earlier.” Britain nodded. “He thought Martin was dead when they first brought him in.”

“It’s no wonder. You should see his old container,” Reese muttered. “Or what’s left of it.” Reese Studied his commanding officer for a moment. “So, what did you want to see me about in such a rush?”

Briton closed his eyes and shook his head. “I’ve got Stratton holding on a line.” He took a deep breath and blew it out through his teeth. “He’s on a rampage, and I’m really exposed. What we did wasn’t against the regs, but it sure was unethical. I know if I were in his position, I’d be livid.”

Reese squinted at Briton. “We both know you wouldn’t put people in a position where they had to do something like we did, at least not intentionally.” He ended with his lopsided smile. “I guess we’re at that apple.” He sighed. “Hang on for a second, I’ll be right back.”

Briton raised his eyebrows as Reese blinked out of the office. The vidphone hold signal buzzed impatiently.

A few moments later Reese rematerialized in the office. “Commander, I need a second vidphone.” A vidphone popped into existence on the corner of the desk. Reese turned the vidphone toward him and pressed a couple buttons. He nodded toward the holding vidphone.

Briton shot a questioning glance at Reese’s non-committal expression. He hit the connect button. Stratton appeared on the vidphone. “Sorry to keep you wa . . .”

“Oh, stuff it Briton!” Stratton seethed. “Just who in the hell do you think you are? I told you I didn’t want to send any ships out looking for your tinman.” The disdain in his voice when he finished was clear.

“Yes Commander, I know. But I didn’t have any ships of my own so I asked for volunteers from the other groups.” Briton’s voice was flat.

“So you decided to risk how many, what fifty or so, of my ships to find a single tinman.” Stratton was visibly starting to shake. “Without bothering to inform me.”

“I notified your staff.” Briton stated.

“So you left me a message, how considerate of you.” Stratton hissed. “While I was going through an, oh so convenient, resource inspection. Cute Briton, real cute.” He leaned into the vidphone. “You’re through Briton, after I submit my report you’ll be directing garbage barges in some shit hole system in the middle of nowhere . . . if you’re lucky.”

Briton took a deep breath and maintained control. “That may be. But what was I supposed to do, just abandon my pilot?”

“Your pilot? He’s a tinman, not a pilot.” Stratton sneered. “Next time use your own damn ships.”

Briton was starting to turn red. “I would have, if I had any. But somehow my wings never seem to be anywhere near the strength prescribed by the regs.” He rocked back and stared Stratton in the eye. “And that
pilot
has over one hundred thirty confirmed kills, a third of them since he became a warborg.” He heard a sharp intake of breath from the other vidphone.

“I don’t want to hear about your staffing problems, because frankly, I could give a shit.” He smiled. “Maybe if you knew how to run a combat group you wouldn’t have these problems.”

Briton turned stony. “Maybe if every time I got the requested increase computer capacity for more cyborgs it wasn’t immediately reallocated somewhere else, I could support some more.”

“Bhaa, who’d want more tinmen around?” Stratton snarled. “They’re only use is keeping the real pilots alive.”

“So you keep saying,” Briton grated. “But I notice you seem to think the few I have make pretty good cannon fodder for the risky missions.”

Stratton smiled coldly. “Why send in manned ships with live pilots when you can use tinmen. Tinmen are already dead, we just haven’t bothered to bury them yet.”

“Thank you Reese, I’ve heard enough.” A woman’s voice came from the other vidphone. “Let me see these officers.”

Reese positioned the vidphone pickup to cover Briton and the other vidphone. There was an older woman on the screen who had obviously just been woken up. The two Commanders studied the disheveled image on the screen as she shifted her attention between them. “Major Reese, if you please.”

Reese smiled. “Yes ma’am. Commanders Briton and Stratton this is Vice Admiral Kiering of the Inspector General’s office.”

“Ma’am.” Both men responded automatically. Briton blinked a couple times and Stratton’s face pinched slightly.

“Commander Briton, you and I are going to have a long talk later concerning your interpretation of regulations.” She sighed.

“Yes Ma’am.” He glanced at Reese, who just winked back.

“Commander Stratton, you seem to have a problem with cyborgs.” Her face and voice were neutral. “Why?”

“Ma’am.” Stratton seemed to gather strength. “They’re an abomination, a soulless parody of the humans they once were. They should never been developed, and those that exist should be deactivated.”

“A man of conviction, I could admire that.” Her eyes gleamed. “So you would like to see all the cyborgs terminated?”

“Yes ma’am. For their own good.”

“So you advocate killing the living brains of the cyborgs?” She seemed to tighten.

“To save their souls, yes I do.” Stratton was proud of his stance.

“My niece is a maintborg with Deepspace Mining.” Her voice was steady.

“You have my sympathy ma’am.” He paled, but held to his convictions.

“Very well Commander, after reading the results of the resource inspection and having this discussion it is obvious that you are unsuitable for command, especially over cyborg forces. You are hereby relieved of your Command and will report back to Earth Central Command for review and possible re-assignment.”

“Ma’am.” He stared, hard faced into the vidphone.

“And Commander Stratton, I’m forwarding a copy of the inspection and a recording of this conversation to you Uncle. I don’t think even he will protect you this time.”

“Ma’am.” He paled to almost white.

“Dismissed Commander.” She snapped. Stratton snapped a salute and blinked off the screen. “Commander Briton.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

She smiled, “Reese has told me a lot about you and what happened. I take his recommendations very seriously. I hereby grant you a field promotion to acting Group Commander. Major Reese, you are witness to said promotion.”

“Yes, Ma’am.” Reese rumbled.

“Commander, you are the first cyborg commanding officer of a mixed group.” She grinned and laughed. “Please don’t make me look the fool.”

“No ma’am.” Briton smiled self-consciously. “I’d never let that happen.”

“Good.” Her face became more serious. “Now let’s talk about regulations. The real ones, not your loose interpretation of . . .”

Briton hid behind a neutral face knowing he was going to get shredded, inside he was laughing in delight.
Maybe now we can make this battle group into something.

              . . .

“It turns out, about thirty five years ago our Major Reese, then a bio pilot Lieutenant Reese, had a very green junior wingman named Kathy Kiering. He managed to keep her in one piece during the Slorr system rebellion. No mean feat. They’ve stayed in touch through the years.” Swain shook his head as he smiled. “Thank god.” He took on a cunning expression. “Do you happen to know a Warrant Tina Stricklin?”