Cyber Dreams 2.34 - Into the Wild (Patreon)

Have a nice weekend, folks! Thanks for your comments and feedback :)

-Plum

Juliet sat, head resting against the rattling hull of the fluttercraft, eyes closed and a million thoughts racing through her mind. There were so many twists and turns to her subterfuges that she was starting to struggle to keep everything straight. Angel was the only “person” who knew everything about her, who knew she was Juliet Bianchi from Tucson and had a warrant on her head from WBD. To everyone else, she was lying to one degree or another.

Her friends, Honey and the others, knew some of her secrets, knew her name at least. Rachel and her people knew her as January, the people at Grave knew her as Lydia, and she was hiding things from them all. “I can’t take this much longer, Angel,” she subvocalized, though she probably could have spoken aloud—the fluttercraft was noisy, and, as she glanced around, it looked like most of the others were dozing off or preoccupied with their AUIs.

“Do you want to seek an extraction from Grave?”

“No, that’s not what I mean. I mean everything. I want people around me to know who I am! I want to be myself . . .” She sighed heavily and spoke again before Angel could reply, “I sound like a baby. I know there are plenty of folks with bigger problems. It’s just . . . it’s exhausting trying to remember who knows what about me and who I’ve told what lies to.”

“I can try to help you with that, prompt you with a list of reminders when you’re speaking to certain people . . .”

“No, Angel, it’s not that I can’t remember. I mean, thank you, that’s nice, but it’s the necessity of it that’s exhausting. I just want to fucking be myself.”

“When you finish this job, it will remove a layer of duplicity. You can stop being Lydia Roman.”

“Yeah, I know. Finish this job. What does that even mean? I could bail anytime, and I’m pretty sure I’ll have earned a pretty big payday from Rachel. It seems like GARD is burning the GIPEL project without my help. Still, I have a bad feeling Vance, and the others won’t let the work they’ve done just disappear. Then there’s the matter of the subjects who escaped. What if they’re as dangerous as Joshua Kyle?”

“Well, I believe we already made their plans difficult to achieve by taking the data drive. Their leverage and the data on the GIPEL were all on it.”

“Assuming that was their only copy.”

“I’ll work on trying to track them down, but we still have leads to follow up in Grave Tower—the WBD agent, for instance. He may know if they had other copies.”

“Yeah, when we get back, we’ll pay him a visit. I mean, it’s kind of crazy—messing with a WBD agent, but they have thousands of employees, right? What are the odds he knows anything about ‘Juliet?’ Besides, we have leverage on him. Do you think Garza will really be able to deal with Gordon and Vance? If she doesn’t, we’re going to have to handle them.”

“I don’t know, Juliet, though Commander Garza seems like a very capable woman.”

Juliet looked at the other recruits across from her. Delma had her eyes closed, and her face seemed too relaxed to be feigning sleep; her head kept flopping to the sides, and she’d jerk it upright. Addie was staring into space, and her eyes twitched rapidly—playing a game if Juliet had to guess. Jensen, though, was staring at a point somewhere around the middle of the fluttercraft hull, and every now and then, he’d blink; otherwise, Juliet would have suspected him of sleeping with his eyes open.

She wondered if she could trust any of them, and then she had another battle with her conscience. Why shouldn’t she try to find out? If she found herself picking up a private thought, she could stop listening, right? She was in dangerous waters, and it would make sense to use every tool at her disposal. Juliet hadn’t asked for the GIPEL, but she had it, and it seemed like she wasn’t the only one. It would be foolish not to learn how to use it more effectively.

She stared at Addie for a minute, really looking at her green, LED-lit eyes and the little laugh lines around their corners. Then Juliet closed her eyes and tried to blank her mind. To make it easier, she subvocalized, “Angel, turn off my ears for a minute. Let me know if someone speaks to me.” Suddenly the noise of the fluttercraft was gone, and she was sitting in a dark, vibrating void. She pictured Addie’s eyes, and she listened.

White is so cool but so intimidating! Why’s he so friendly with Roman? She’s such a stuck-up primadonna! Why’d she sit on that side of the craft when the rest of the recruits were already on this side? Does she think she’s better than us? Why’s she always gotta show me up? I can’t believe she’s already better at the physical tests! Doesn’t she rest? When does that bitch sleep? I need this job way more than she does; I can just tell! At least Arnie and Raul are gone; that’s gotta improve my odds, right? They won’t kick me at this point . . .

Juliet shook her head and opened her eyes, jerking her gaze toward the front of the craft so as to avoid looking into anyone else’s face. She’d gotten a lot more from Addie than she’d wanted, that was sure enough, and Juliet felt reasonably confident she was who she seemed to be, not another plant, and not planning any duplicity. Juliet didn’t really like the impression she’d gotten from her, but at least it was typical animosity, not some kind of deep-seated scheme.

“How’s the lattice looking?” Juliet asked Angel.

Her auditory implants clicked, and then Angel said, “Activity spiked for a moment, but nothing like when you received the blast from Kyle. It faded quickly when you opened your eyes, and I didn’t detect any dangerous temperatures.”

“Thanks.” Juliet closed her eyes again and cleared her mind, and this time she concentrated on Jensen, imagining his pale blue eyes and sardonic grin. Almost immediately, she began to hear some of his thoughts:

Easy going. Keep it easy. Newbie training, then back to the tower, and I can keep working on Cecile. She’s about to crack, for sure. Get her in my pocket, and then it’s just one step to the elusive Fredrick Timms. Damn it, though, I was getting so close! Why’d they have to ship us off when I was inches from closing out the contract? Oh well; it’s been a long few weeks, but the payday will be worthwhile . . .

Juliet feared her face would betray her, and she felt she’d heard enough. She opened her eyes and carefully studied the back of one of her hands, hoping to sever whatever connection she’d made. Jensen was clearly hiding a lot, but it didn’t seem to have anything to do with her. “Angel, who’s Frederick Timms?” she subvocalized.

“He’s one of the board members of the Grave corporation.”

“So, you might find this interesting; I think Jensen’s an assassin, and he’s here to kill Timms.”

“Did you ‘hear’ his thoughts?”

“Yep.”

“Are you going to do anything about it?”

“I don’t know, to be honest. I have my plate kind of full, and it seems like it might be smart to stay out of his way. Of course, that means I’ll be an accessory to murder, at least in my mind . . .” Juliet trailed off and thought about that. Would she feel bad knowing she might have stopped Jensen from killing someone? “I suppose it depends on what Timms is like and how risky it would be to stop Jensen. Shit, Angel, do I want to? I mean, you don’t get to be a board member of a company like Grave unless your closet’s pretty full of skeletons.”

“I’ll do some research.”

“‘Kay, I’ll put it on the back burner for now.”

Juliet turned her attention to Delma and her fitful sleep. She looked so tired but also very peaceful and sweet, with her face relaxed in slumber. People were funny that way, but she supposed other animals were, too. When Juliet was young, her family dog was a regular terror in the neighborhood. He chased other dogs and cats, barked all the time, growled, and generally made everyone regret his existence. Unless he was sleeping—when that dog was asleep, Juliet had wanted nothing more than cuddle up with him, pet his soft fur, and absorb his warmness. He’d let her do it, too. Those little naps made up for all the barks and messes.

Juliet banished the memory, letting her smile drop away as she pictured Delma in her mind. She concentrated and tried for a long while, but no words came to her. She was about to give up, but then, like a soap bubble in the sun, glistening and glimmering with multi-colored shifts of light, an image began to resolve in her mind.

Juliet was looking up from a bench in front of some lockers. She recognized the scene: the locker room on B7, where the Zeta units ran their PT courses. She was pulling on some socks, and that’s when she realized it wasn’t “her.” The legs were too short, the feet too small, and the AUI was foreign to her with monochrome pale yellow-green lines and a watchdog icon that took up a lot more real estate—a low-end retinal implant with lower resolution, then. Was she seeing through Delma’s eyes? Was this a memory? A dream?

Suddenly the watchdog app turned gray, and a voice said, “You ready to make up for that shitty performance, Granado?”

She jerked her head away from her socks toward the entrance to the locker room, and there he was. She’d dreaded this but known it was coming. “Not again. Not so soon!” she breathed, and hot tears started to fill her eyes.

“Suck it up, Granado. You should be happy I’m giving you this opportunity. Come on now, let’s head to my office. I don’t want to keep that watchdog off longer than I need to.”

Juliet snapped her eyes open and looked at Delma. She was squinting, and her mouth was twitching. She mumbled and jerked her head, and it seemed obvious to Juliet that she was having a bad dream. How much was based on reality, and how much on fear? Juliet felt like she’d need to talk to Delma, but would the other woman ever admit it if something like that had happened, especially if the watchdog was listening?

Juliet resolved to try to figure it out, to try to get Granado talking. In the meantime, she wouldn’t let that horrific nightmare last another second. She leaned forward and jostled Delma’s shoulder until she startled, shaking her head and inhaling deeply through her nose. “You looked like you were having a nightmare. Besides, I think we’re getting close.”

“Ayup,” White said, clearing his throat. “Look lively! We’ve got about ten minutes to target, and then we’re going to practice flutter-rappelling! Houston, pass out the gloves.”

“Aye, Sarge.”

Delma was still slightly shaking her head, clearly disoriented, but she caught Juliet’s eyes and smiled at her. “Thanks,” she said.

“Yeah.” Juliet winked at her, then took the thick meshweave gloves Houston handed her, noting the plasteel pads sewn into the grips.

“We’ll be rappelling down to the camp,” White said, standing to face the recruits. “Just like you did during week one in the sims." Turning to Juliet, he said, “That’s right, isn’t it, Roman? They told me you all practiced this . . .”

“That’s right, Sarge.” Juliet nodded. She’d dreaded the activity at first, but when she figured out that her enhanced arm could grip the rope with little risk of failure, she’d gotten over her fear pretty quickly, earning marks just as high as some of the others, including Jensen, who she now knew was a secret operator. She grinned at that thought; she was holding her own with a genuine ghost, an assassin working deep undercover. Holy shit, she thought, I’m really doing this stuff!

They lined up, and Houston said, “No harnesses, Sarge?”

“That’s right. We’re Zeta Protocol, not some prissy corpo-sec. At this height, you’ll likely only suffer a break or two if you fall, anyway.”

“Hoorah!” Jensen grunted, and Juliet recognized the sound from military vids and wondered what it meant. Houston grinned at the sound, though, and gave Jensen a fistbump. Delma glanced over her shoulder at Juliet and shrugged, and Juliet reached up to squeeze her shoulder. She suddenly felt very protective of the other woman.

“Sarge, I can probably just drop. My legs are cyber,” Addie said from behind her.

“Practice the rappelling anyway, Hunter.”

“Aye, Sarge.”

“Houston! Drop in 3 . . . 2 . . . 1 . . . go, go go!”

With those words, they were off, and not one of the recruits fell from the rappelling line. When it was Juliet’s turn, she stepped out of the fluttercraft, holding onto the thick, spongy cable, amazed at how stable it was, hanging stationary in the air over the side of a mountain. It was warm out, but not terribly. The sun was going down, and wintertime around the Santa Rita mountains was pretty damn nice if you asked her.

Juliet started to admire the sunset, but White shouted at her to get moving, and she slid down the line. She gripped it just as they’d been taught and slid easily, admiring how the glove protected her hand; she never felt any heat or friction on her skin. As she descended, Juliet breathed in the fresh, pine-scented air, admiring the scattered canopy of mesquites, pines, and junipers. She even saw some palo verde trees nearby, and when her boots crunched into the rocky soil, she caught the scent of greasewood.

Houston was securing the bottom of the line, and he shoved her off to the left, upslope, and barked, “Guard the perimeter.”

Juliet saw Granado kneeling by a cluster of tan-colored rocks, aiming her SMG downslope, and so she leveled her electro-shotgun toward the upper slope and waited for the others to descend. They came down, one by one, and then the fluttercraft rocketed away, streaking toward the valley west of the canyon. Juliet knew they weren’t too far from Tucson and wondered if the craft would head that way to wait for their mission to end.

“What’s the move, Sarge?” Houston asked.

“We’re gonna pick up a trail up that road we passed. There used to be a public park here, but the road’s overgrown, and there’s likely to be some scavs around, so keep your heads on a swivel. We’ll camp upslope a ways, and tomorrow we’re hiking up to a place called Josephine’s Saddle.”

“That’s where the research facility is?” Addie asked.

“Yeah, I guess, but it’s more like a camp than a facility from what I’ve seen in the briefing doc.” White started trudging down the slope toward a broken, grass and scrub-covered road.

“People used to come up here for picnics or something?” Houston asked, glancing down toward the valley stretching away. It looked surprisingly green, considering they were in the middle of a desert.

“Guess so. I look like a tour guide, Houston?”

“No, sir. If you were my tour guide, I’d ask for a refund!”

White chuckled and shifted his enormous rifle. Juliet saw that he wore a harness mounted to the side rail of the gun, and all he had to do was swivel it so it pointed up while he hiked, resting a hand on the stock. “That’s cool, Sarge,” she said, pointing to the harness.

“Oh yeah. This baby gets a little unwieldy on long hikes.”

“Is that the gauss rifle you were telling me about?” Delma asked.

“You’re talking about me behind my back, Roman?” White asked, grinning at Juliet as the unit scuffled down the long, rocky slope.

“Will we get a chance for shooting, Sarge?” Addie asked, stepping around Juliet, so she was closer to White. Juliet smirked and stepped aside, grinning at White’s ribbing and choosing to ignore Addie’s interjection.

“Yeah, for sure. If we don’t have to deal with hostiles in a . . . hostile manner, I’ll make sure we get some practice in.”

“Can I try that gauss rifle? I’ve heard a lot about them,” Addie pressed, and Juliet saw Jensen rolling his eyes so hard, she was afraid, they’d get stuck pointing backward.

“We’ll see.” White didn’t frown, but he didn’t smile, either.

“Sarge, why’s everyone always wanting to touch your gun?” Houston asked, and Jensen barked a laugh.

“Houston,” White’s frown was suddenly quite pronounced, “that’s because I keep it clean and don’t put it in places it doesn’t belong.”

This time everyone laughed, and Houston was the loudest of all. After things died down, Houston said, “Damn, Sarge, I knew you had a funnybone. I guess you were just afraid to show it around Polk.” As Houston said the injured sergeant’s name, his smile faded, and he shook his head. Everyone was silent for a moment, and then he said, “Damn. Brains are funny things, you guys. For a minute there, in my mind, Polk was just fine and waiting back at base for us.”

Addie and Jensen looked confused, but Delma spoke up, “We saw her.” She jerked a thumb at White. “We waited outside while they were working on her. She came through, but they’re not sure if she’s going to . . .”

“Be the same,” White finished. “Some damage up here.” He knocked on his helmet. “It’s my fault, really. I should’ve been there before she caught that guy.” He looked at Juliet and added, “I should’ve been there with you.”

“We should have!” Delma said.

“Sarge, all due respect,” Juliet said, “That’s bullshit. There’s something screwy with the watchdog. You know how to follow dotted lines through straight tunnels. I think someone on the inside was helping those guys escape.” Juliet knew she was walking a fine line speaking about that; there was no way she should know anything about the watchdog problem, but, in her mind, it was a reasonable assumption.

“We’ll see. My footage is under review, but, yeah, I’ve had my PAI play back the whole thing for me twice; I don’t see where we messed up.”

“Same,” Delma said.

“What the fuck are you guys talking about?” Jensen asked, and Addie grunted her agreement with the sentiment.

“That’s a story for the campfire. Come on, folks. Haven’t you ever wanted to have a campout with your dear old sarge?” White lengthened his stride, and the rest of them hurried to keep pace.