Serengati 2: Dark And Stars Read online

  Stealth ships were annoying—incredibly annoying, unbelievably annoying, especially for AI—but apparently they weren’t dumb. Well, compared to her they were dumb, but still smart enough to come up with a halfway decent plan. And with a few modifications—hers, of course, who better to fix a half-bad plan?—they might end up with something that didn’t get them all killed.

  “Our best chance of actually getting onto the Citadel involves one of you Ravens sneaking on board,” she agreed, accepting that much of his plan. “One,” she emphasized—the first of her changes. “Just one. The whole damn lot of you landing at once will attract as much attention as I would on my own.”

  “Alright. One,” Shriek conceded. “I’ll sneak my way onto Cerberus while Swift and the boys hang back—”

  “Huh-uh,” Serengeti cut in. “Your boys can help me keep the Citadel distracted.”

  Second change, because no way was she going to sit out there dodging pot-shots from Cerberus on her own.

  Shriek was quiet a moment, considering this latest modification. “Interesting idea,” he said carefully. “But I’ll need to talk it over with the boys. Back in a flash,” he said brightly, and then the comms channel clicked as Shriek dropped off.

  Henricksen glanced up, sharing a look with Serengeti in the sudden silence that followed. Bridge crew looked at each other—everyone but Delacroix who just stared blankly into space—and at the windows, the ships lurking outside.

  Everyone waiting, until Comms flashed and the channel opened again.

  “And I’m back,” Shriek announced himself, smile in his voice. “Boys aren’t all that happy about the changes, but they’re a brave lot, and after a bit of convincing, I managed to get them to agree to your revised plan.”

  Shriek sounded quite pleased with himself. Smug as a hermit crab who’d traded up to a new shell.

  “Popinjay,” Serengeti muttered.

  “So, we’re agreed then,” Shriek said, oblivious to the insult. Or maybe he just didn’t hear it. “Only question left is who’s coming with me?”

  “Serengeti, obviously.” Henricksen nodded to her camera. “Part of her consciousness, anyway. She’s got the best chance of any of us of actually getting through to Cerberus. She’ll need an escort, so I’ll go. Maybe take Houseman—”

  “No,” Serengeti said quietly.

  “Okay, not Houseman. What about—?”

  “No, Henricksen. Not you. I’m not taking you with me.”

  Silence descended on the bridge, Henricksen staring at her, face angry, hands curling into fists. Crew staring at him, sneaking looks at Serengeti’s camera.

  “Why the hell not?”

  Because I can’t lose you, Henricksen. Not again.

  “Because I don’t know what we’re walking into,” she told him. “And I won’t risk any more lives. Not when I just got my crew back after fifty-three years apart.”

  “What about Tig?” Still angry—she saw it in Henricksen’s face, read it in his eyes. “That is how you’re planning to get over there, isn’t it? Hitch a ride in Tig’s body. Roll around on the Citadel calling ‘soo-ee’ until Cerberus finally shows up?”

  “Tig or another robot,” she admitted, keeping her own voice calm. “And yes, their lives will be in danger. AI lives, not human, but every bit as precious to me as my own.” She studied Henricksen from the camera, acutely aware of the bridge crew watching, listening, hanging on their every word. “I need you here, Henricksen. I need you protecting the ship, keeping the crew out of harm’s way.”

  “And how do I do that?” he asked bitterly, eyes flashing with anger. “This entire plan is about putting the crew in harm’s way. You’re offering yourself up for goddamn target practice—”

  “Just to get on board,” Serengeti assured him. “You fall back—all of you, Valkyrie and Ravens, both—and stay out of range of Cerberus’s guns until we signal you that we’re coming back out.”

  “And what happens if you don’t?” Henricksen asked her in his softest voice.

  “Then you go on without me,” she said bluntly. “Only part of my consciousness will go onto that ship, Henricksen. The rest stays with you, and the ship that is my body. Probably won’t even notice I’m missing,” she teased, but Henricksen just grimaced, looking anything but amused. “I need you, Captain,” she said—intimate tone, now. Letting the earnestness come through in her voice. “The crew needs you.”

  He stared defiantly—chin lifted, face proud—but the anger slowly slipped away. Replaced by resignation—they were arguers, the two of them, and Henricksen smart enough to know when he’d lost. A tight nod, stiff and unhappy, and he turned away from her, looking out at the stars. “Still don’t like it,” he muttered.

  “Don’t expect you to,” she said softly.

  To be honest, I’m not entirely thrilled about the idea myself.

  Sixteen

  The last hop went smoothly, dumping Serengeti out a hundred thousand kilometers from Cerberus, just like they’d planned. She threw her scans wide, sucking in every bit of information she could find as Shriek and the other Ravens jumped in after, maneuvering around her and then pulled ahead.

  Formed up in a perfect ring in front of Serengeti’s bow, camouflage shielding active and overlapping, turning the Ravens invisible, hiding Serengeti as well. Well, sort of. At least, to anyone looking at her dead on. Ravens’ shielding didn’t reach far enough to cover the rest of her—anyone behind her or to either side would see Serengeti clear as day—but from that one angle, she was invisible. Nothing but the dark of space and the pinpricks of stars.

  Ruse wouldn’t last, but it should keep Cerberus from detecting them. For a little while at least. Until they got in really, really close.

  Serengeti waited while the Ravens sorted themselves out, tapped into tight band comms and sent a message to the lot of them. “Three. Two. One.” Engines flared, cobalt blue illumination lighting up the darkness as all seven ships pushed together, propulsion systems running wide open for a ten-second burn before shutting back down.

  From there, they drifted, moving on momentum alone. A lot of momentum, mind you—ten-second burst was nothing to sneeze at—but slower than if the engines kept firing. Pushing them along.

  “How are we doing?” Henricksen asked.

  Serengeti checked their course and confirmed they were dead on target. “Minimal drift. We’re tracking true. Should reach the outer edge of the Citadel’s security perimeter in a little under an hour.”

  Henricksen grunted, arms folding, eyes locked on the bridge’s windows. “Wouldn’t mind knowing what’s going on out there.” He flicked his gaze to Delacroix standing at the station to his right. “Comms. What’s the chatter?”

  Delacroix flicked his wrist, opening a channel—one-way, listening only, careful not to give Serengeti away. Another flick—opposite wrist this time, fingers twiddling, eyes moving rapid-fire behind his visor—and Delacroix frowned hard, hand lifting, touching at the Comms visor wrapping around his head. A tap at the side, making a few adjustments, another to make a few more and Delacroix stiffened, gasping as he jerked his hand away.

  Henricksen gave him a dark look. “Talk to me, Delacroix. What’s going on?”

  “Voices. So many voices,” he whispered, body swaying, hands moving in time.

  “Comms!” Henricksen smacked the panel in front of him making Delacroix jump. “Focus!”

  “Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.” Delacroix flipped the visor away, surfacing, looking fully aware for the first time since he came on board. Sucked in a breath and settled the visor back into place, making a few more tweaks to the settings as he sank back into Comms. “Lot of comms traffic.”

  “From Cerberus?”

  Delacroix nodded and almost immediately shook his head.

  “Goddammit, Delacroix. Which is it?”

  “It’s…everything,” Delacroix said dreamily. “All of them. Every last AI on the Citadel talking at once. All their communications, completely unfiltered.” Anot
her adjustment to the Comms visor, dialing something in. “They’re…babbling,” he said, frowning in confusion.

  “AI do not babble,” Serengeti informed him.

  Delacroix shrugged an apology. “These do. I don’t know what else to call it.”

  A look from Henricksen and Serengeti tapped into the system herself, listening in on an overlapping confusion of communications—a squalling, squabbling ocean of noise.

  Apparently, AI did indeed babble. Quite loudly, in fact.

  She upped the gain on the filters trying to isolate Cerberus’s voice from the clamor.

  “There!” Delacroix raised a hand, dead eyes staring sightlessly behind his visor. “That’s him.” He flicked both wrists, fingers waving. Went very still—hands raised, brow furrowed in concentration.

  “Well?” Henricksen asked, staring at Delacroix, fingers drumming impatiently against a panel. “Anything?”

  Delacroix raised his hand, signaling for him to wait.

  “Cut the crap, Delacroix. Is Cerberus out there or not?”

  The hand stayed raised—seemed to hang in the air forever. “Yes,” he said faintly. “I found him.”

  “Cerberus?” Henricksen turned, staring intently at Comms. “You found Cerberus?”

  “Cerberus and Cerberus and Cerberus,” Delacroix whispered, swaying from side to side.

  Henricksen watched him, lip lifting in disgust. “Think your new comms package fried that semi-detached brain of his, Serengeti.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with my comms package.” But she fiddled with the settings anyway, layering in another filter, examining the results. “He’s right.”

  Henricksen looked at her, blinking slowly, head moving from side to side.

  “Not one Cerberus. Three,” she told him. “Three distinct voices.”

  “Three Cerberuses.” Henricksen’s lips twisted. “’Right,” he grunted. “Because that makes a whole lotta sense.”

  “There is a reason he’s called Cerberus.”

  “Is that right?” He tilted his head, eyebrows lifting. “Enlighten me.”

  “Mythology. Dog with three heads.”

  Henricksen smiled crookedly. “You callin’ Cerberus a dog?”

  “No,” Serengeti laughed. “But he does have three brains—that’s what Delacroix’s picking up. Three brains equals three voices. Three Cerberuses communing with the stars.”

  Except there shouldn’t be. Three AI brains, yes, but those three brains used to work together. Cerberus’s three voices used to all speak as one.

  “Three AIs sharing one body?” Henricksen quirked an eyebrow. “How does that work?”

  “Crystal matrix fusion. Citadel was specifically designed to be operated by a tri-partite brain, the three AIs inside it providing unified direction to that big old battleship of a body he wears.”

  “They don’t mind sharing?”

  “They don’t know any different,” Serengeti said quietly. “And they don’t really have a choice. It takes all three of them—Soldier, Statesman, and Scientist—to run the Citadel, not just one or two.”

  Henricksen grunted, lips twisting. “Sounds like a recipe for disaster.”

  “There’s a thin line between disaster and divine.”

  “So, he’s a god now?”

  “No,” Serengeti said softly, listening to that confused babble coming across Comms. “Not a god, but great once. The greatest of us all.”

  Henricksen grunted, eyes on the windows, watching the Citadel draw near. “You sure you wanna go through with this?” he asked, voice pitched low so only Serengeti would hear.

  “No,” she admitted, just as softly, isolating her voice to a speaker just above his head. “But I have to, Henricksen. I see no other way.”

  “Cerberus—”

  “Is our best chance of getting Brutus out of the way,” she said, speaking right over him. “Our best chance of turning the Fleet around. Reminding it what it once was.”

  Henricksen stared a moment—stubborn still, looking like he meant to argue. But he dipped his head instead, ceding the point. Touched at the panel, opening ship-to-ship comms. “Shriek. Drop back. We’re opening the main cargo bay.” A smile for the camera. “Got a package for you to pick up.”

  “On my way.” Shriek broke formation, dropped back, and slid along Serengeti’s side.

  “Finlay. You’ve got the con.”

  Finlay glanced up in surprise. “Me?”

  “Yes, you, Finlay.”

  “Oh. Okay.” Finlay seemed bewildered, a tiny bit lost. “I mean, aye, sir. Th—Thank you, sir,” she stammered, looking around the bridge.

  “Won’t be long,” Henricksen told her. “Just need to see Serengeti off.”

  He stepped down from the Command Post and headed across the bridge, Finlay’s worried eyes following Henricksen all the way to the door. Considered the elevator in the hallway before taking the ladderway down to the main cargo bay instead.

  Cold in there—no heat at all in any of Serengeti’s cargo bays, and no atmosphere, either.

  Environmentals sapped energy. Vented into space every time those cargo bay doors opened and closed. Robots didn’t need either, and the airlock contained pressure suits for any human crew who wanted to walk around the cargo bay awhile. Pain in the ass getting into one, though, which is why Henricksen stopped in the hallway, using a monitor in the wall to watch Shriek thread his way in, parking his mass on Serengeti’s decking.

  Sat there in silence—dark and sinister, a sharp-edged weapon waiting to be drawn.

  “Been a while since I saw one of them up close.”

  “Not exactly pretty, are they?” Serengeti noted, taking a look herself.

  “Not supposed to be.” Henricksen slid his eyes to her camera, lips twitching at the corners. “Stealth ships, remember? Not meant to be looked at.”

  “Not sure I’d want to be seen either if I looked like that.”

  Henricksen grunted, smiling. Turned his head and frowned as Tig and Tilli appeared, pattering down the hallway on their jointed metal legs. Six of their eight legs moving them along while the other two cradled oversized pulse rifles. Hitched at bandoliers of spare ammunition crisscrossing their chests.

  “Thought this was a solo operation.”

  “Me too,” Serengeti murmured, watching the robots approach.

  “What’s with the guns and ammunition?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Unbearably cute, seeing the robots decked out with all those armaments, but not what she’d asked for. Tig and Tilli ran ship’s maintenance, she’d never meant for them to go in armed.

  “Tig,” she called. “What’s going on?”

  Tig stumbled to a halt near the cargo bay’s airlock, face lights swirling in anxious patterns. “We’re, uh…we’re going with you. Me and…and Tilli here,” he said, angling the gun Tilli’s way.

  Tilli wonked loudly, shoving the barrel out of her face.

  “No offense, Tilli, but I don’t seem to remember inviting you.”

  Tilli shrugged, ovoid body bobbing up and down. Raised her rifle and ejected the rifle’s magazine cool as you please. Cleared the chamber while she was at it and broke the weapon down, rebuilding it in just under ten seconds.

  “Well, I’m terrified,” Henricksen said, watching the robot with wide wary eyes. “Where the hell did you learn that anyway?” he asked, nodding to Tilli’s newly reassembled gun.

  “Uh…um…” Tig flicked his eyes around the hallway, held his own rifle out in front of him, and then slung it on his back. “See, we—that is, Tilli and me—we sort of… maybe…downloaded something?” He shrugged helplessly, smiling an ingratiating smile. Grabbed at the rifle as it slid off one side and shoved it back onto his back.

  “Something,” Henricksen repeated, squinting suspiciously. “What kind of something?”

  Tig ducked his head, mumbling at the deckplates.

  “What’s that?” Henricksen cupped his ear, leaning forward. “Didn’t quite
hear you.”

  Tig sighed, head lifting. “Combat program. The TSGs came with a combat programming option.” A glance at Tilli and the gun she so comfortably wore. “We made a few modifications so it would be compatible with our programming.”

  “Combat programming.” Henricksen rubbed his chin, looking less than impressed. “Downloaded to a couple of maintenance ‘bots.”

  “We know what we’re doing.” Tilli slammed the magazine home and ratcheted the firing mechanism back, loading a fresh round into the chamber as she spread her legs wide.

  Henricksen pointed at her weapon. “Safety. If you please.”

  Tilli blipped, blinking, chromed cheeks blushing bright blue. Turned the weapon sideways and tapped a tiny red button beside the rifle’s trigger, flashing a smile as she slung the weapon on her back.

  Unlike Tig’s, it stayed there—perfectly balanced, didn’t even try to slip off.

  “So you’re armed.” Henricksen eyed the rifles meaningfully. “And there’s two of you because…” He raised his eyebrows, looking a question at the pair of ‘bots.

  Tig ducked his head again, sneaking glances at Tilli beside him.

  “Ah. I see.” Henricksen smiled. “Didn’t give you a choice.”

  Tig nodded miserable, scooting to one side as Tilli swiped at his leg. “Oona wanted to come, too. Took a lot of convincing to get her to stay behind.”

  “Good thing she did.”

  Tig looked up, blinking owlishly at Henricksen.

  “Not real thrilled about any of you going over there,” he said, including Serengeti’s camera in that comment, “but I’d have a full-scale mutiny on my hands if the crew found out Oona had gone over to the Citadel with you three.”

  “Still not happy they know about her,” Serengeti said.

  “Yeah, well.” Henricksen looked at her, lips curving in a smile. “Secrets are all well and good until the subject of said secret decides she needs some more friends.”

  Those particular friends being somewhere on the order of thirty crew eating dinner in the mess hall. And in rolls Oona, smiling like a tiny, blue sun, showing off her collection of critter doodles to anyone who’d listen. Charming the pants off the crew in the process.