Cypher (The Dragon's Bidding Book 2) (16 page)

Goosebumps washed
across Fitz’s arms, the hair standing erect. “The ultimate in plausible
deniability. Even you don’t know you’re the guilty party. With a set of
invented memories, it could anyone, even you or me. And we’d never know it.”

A spot between her
shoulder blades itched, and she fought down the urge to whip her chair around
and scan for danger behind her.

Pike dropped his fork
and waved both hands at her, seemingly aware of the thoughts churning around
inside her head at the moment. “Don’t worry. It didn’t work. Project Mimic
failed and they shut it down, rather quickly in fact. I haven’t decrypted all
of DeWitt’s notes yet, but the problem stemmed from the two personalities being
unable to co-exist in one body.” Pike leaned closer to her. “When you talked to
this Cypher yesterday, did you see any trace of Triumvir Youngblood? Anything
at all?”

Fitz let her memory
slip back to yesterday, back to the filthy alley and the hard body against
hers. The kiss had felt the same, had sparked a fire inside her as it always had,
but the fingers that stroked her skin had been rough and grimy, the nails
dirty. Had Cypher’s desire been sparked by Wolf’s feelings for her? Or was she
only seeing what she wanted to see, hoping there was some trace of the man she
loved inside a stranger?

“Possibly. But I
thought you theorized that they gave Cypher part of Wolf’s memories so he’d
have access to the palace and the skills to pull off the hit. That might be all
I saw.”

Pike’s head nodded in
excitement. “Yes, and that’s going to work in our favor. Mimic failed because
the two personalities continually fought for control of the body.”

“But I thought you said
the host wouldn’t be aware of the implanted personality, and vice versa.”

“Not at first, but
think of the type of person they’d use—an agent who, at best, is a soldier,
maybe a killer, or assassin. He won’t have a meek, quiet personality that’s
going to accept being taken over easily. He’d probably be a control freak,
someone who’s used to being in charge, and he would struggle to get back in
command of his own body. Even when the subjects knew it was part of the mission
parameters to stay concealed, the technicians reported that they fought to get
free of the secondary persona. Perhaps it’s some inborn quirk of this dominant
type that drives a person to exert control over their own existence. So much so
that they abandoned the project as infeasible.”

“Cypher doesn’t strike
me as a submissive personality, either,” Fitz stated. “He said that if he gave Wolf
back his body, he’d die, so he’ll fight to stay alive. He may have started life
as a simulation in a computer, but now he’s convinced he’s a thinking, feeling
being, and he’ll do what’s necessary to survive—even if it means hanging onto
control of another man’s body.”

__________

The anonymity of gray
work overalls blended Cypher into the crowd as he strolled up the companionway
from the shuttle into Coronia Station. Dozens of similarly dressed techs
scurried aboard in time for the midday shift change. Case draped over one
shoulder, he stayed with the crowd until he reached the first cube hotel, then
dropped out to rent a unit for the next six hours.

Little more than a box
two meters to a side, the rental contained enough room for him to stand, a bed,
toilet, and wash basin. He stripped out of the coveralls, down to the tight-fitting
armorcloth underwear. From his case he extracted a pressed and folded black
uniform and donned it, adjusting his cap in the tiny metal mirror over the
basin. He stuck a mustache to his upper lip and brushed it into place, then
used lenses to change his blue eyes to brown. With one last attention to
detail, he picked a speck of lint from his dark sleeve with its single purple
hash mark.

Certain he looked the
part of a well-groomed SpecOps officer, he hoisted his case, locked the room
behind him, and headed across the mezzanine. His inhead chrono told him he had
time to kill, so he opted for a cup of tea to sooth the jitters crawling up his
spine. Jitters he couldn’t allow himself to show.

After dosing his drink
with milk and sugar, he walked over to the railing overlooking the main
concourse. A young blonde woman stood alone, gazing at the planet dominating
the darkness beyond the plexisteel dome.

Coronia was one of
three major orbital stations that ringed Scyr, but the only one to share space
with the military. Most naval personnel transiting between assignments, or on
shore leave, passed through the commercial side to reach the military
installation to board a shuttle bound for the Rokotski Shipyards. Some of the
smaller warships even docked here, such as the Empire’s newest corvette.

He leaned against the
railing, just slightly closer to her than was acceptable for strangers.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?
No matter how many times I see a planet from space, I’m still awestruck by the
experience.” He affected The Other’s cultured accent.

“Oh, yes, it’s
gorgeous. This is my first time…” Her voice juddered to a halt as she turned
and took in the black uniform.

Cypher flashed his most
innocent smile, and she seemed to relax.

“My first time
off-world, I mean. In the military, you do a lot of traveling. You must have
seen hundreds of different planets.”

He sipped his tea and
shifted several centimeters closer to her. “Yes, but you never get used to the
wonder of it. Where are you bound?”

“Rainbow, of course.
Hottest vacation spot in the Human Sector. Now that the world is open again
after that horrible mess with the old Emperor…” She stiffened as her gaze
dropped to his collar and the lightning bolt insignia that identified him as an
augie.

“Oh…uh, I guess I’d
better hurry. Can’t miss my flight.” She dumped her half-filled coffee cup in
the recycler and rushed away at a speed just short of a panicked run.

Cypher watched her
retreat, his smile growing darker. Fear. He could get used to that reaction
from people. It felt…safe. He chuckled and drained his cup. The chrono counting
down in his inhead prompted him. Ten minutes. Time to get moving.

The rolling stair took
him down to the main level, where he slotted into the crowd moving toward the
military checkpoints. The riders approaching him shifted casually aside, as if
unwilling to admit that the uniform frightened them. He imagined leaping at
them and watching horror twist their bucolic features before they ran
screaming. The fantasy must have unconsciously sped up his steps, because the
check point came into view several minutes too early.

Cypher stepped to the
side, put down his case, and feigned a frantic search through his pockets,
looking for a misplaced ident-card, while he studied the gates. Security, tight
under normal circumstances, had been heightened substantially. Along with the
normal biometric equipment, each gate now boasted body scanners, installed
specifically to spot augies. The usual military police had been replaced by a
pair of combat-armored marines with not only sidearms, but pulse rifles too.

A light flashed on his
inhead warning that the countdown had reached zero; it was 1200 hours. Time to
get this cluster-fuck underway. He took a deep breath and damped down the
garnshrike-sized flutters in his stomach. Everything depended on Smiley now. If
he and his hackers hadn’t done their job, if that asshole had decided to sell
him out, then Cypher would be walking into a set of impeller blades. Those
marines and their pulse rifles would leave barely enough of him to scrape up
off the deck plates.

He clipped his ID to
his jacket pocket, rolled his shoulders, and plastered an innocuous smile on
his face before strolling toward the gate. The marines stepped forward, tension
stiffening their posture as he walked up to place his case on the scanner.

“Please, step through
here, sir.” The taller of the two guards motioned him forward.

By the second step,
alarms pulsed and the scanner lit up with flashing red lights. The fact that he
didn’t hear the whine of two pulse rifles power up told him they’d been
prepared for as much.

“Please step over here,
sir, and scan your ident-card,” the guard said.

“Of course, Sergeant.”
Cypher kept the smile locked in place, but his lungs refused to move air
through his tight throat. Here’s where it could get dicey. On the machine’s
monitor, a tech studied the image of him displayed by the scanner. Superimposed
over the outline of his shape, every bit of technology, every computer, every
reinforcement in his body pulsed an angry red in time to the alarms. He
unclipped his ID and swiped it, feeling sweat beading beneath his fake
mustache. At the same time, he slapped his left hand on the plate for the
biometrics to sample. The seconds clicked by with glacial slowness, and Cypher
began to compile a list of profane adjectives describing Smiley’s parentage.

The alarms stilled.

Cypher eased out the
breath he’d been holding. Smiley’s people had done it. They’d make the switch.

“You’re cleared, sir.
Someone will be along shortly to escort you to the ship.” The marine guard
handed him his case.

A few minutes later, a
tall woman in Fleet blue stepped forward to greet him. Her complexion and eyes
were the color of hot chocolate, her black hair shot through with silver.
Lieutenant Commander pins decorated her collars. The skin around her eyes
crinkled as she regarded him, then held out her hand.

With proper military
protocol, he came to attention and bowed his head before accepting her hand.
“You’re Captain Wellborn’s XO, Commander Mandisa?”

“And you must be
FitzWarren’s Lieutenant Pike. Welcome to the
W.A. Youngblood
, or as we
like to call her, the
Mad Dog
.”

“Thank you, ma’am. I’m
sure you and your crew are excited to host the Emperor this evening. I’ll try
to stay out of your way as much as possible while I get everything set up.”

“I’m sure you won’t be
a problem, Lieutenant,” she said as he fell in step with her.

No. The problem
wouldn’t be his, but the next time the real Braylin Pike tried to use his
ident-card, he was in for one hell of a surprise.

Once past the
checkpoint, the sumptuous décor and cheerful colors of the commercial station
gave way to utilitarian military gray. Cypher followed Mandisa, the woman
walking with eyes straight ahead, spine rigid, and hands clasped behind her
back.

“Lieutenant, I was not
informed of any change in plans, or that you would arriving early.”

“I’m aware of that,
ma’am, but as I’m sure you can appreciate, Imperial Security is quite busy at
the moment and we can’t always adjust our schedule to fit everyone else’s
needs.”

She glanced over her
shoulder at him, dark eyes narrowing. “In other words, you thought that if you
showed up early, you’d catch us with our pants down.”

“No, ma’am. That
thought never entered my mind. I’d prefer to get this over as quickly as
possible, with a minimum of disruption to your preparations, and get on to my
next appointment.”

Which is catching the
Trans-Gal Starliner outbound for Willcommin at 1435 hours. I plan to be light
years away when this mess blows up.

“You won’t be staying
aboard for the festivities?” Mandisa turned down a companionway where station
workers hung imperial purple and gold bunting. A wide swath of similar-colored
carpet adorned the hallway, stretching all the way to the ship and up the
boarding stairs to the
Mad Dog
’s airlock.

“Mere lieutenants don’t
rate invitations to imperial functions, I’m afraid. I only follow the orders
I’m given, make my inspections and file my reports.”

“About those
inspections… What exactly are you looking for?”

What indeed? Cypher
hadn’t the slightest idea why Braylin Pike had been sent up here in advance of
Gray Eyes and the Emperor’s party. Smiley hadn’t seen fit to supply that
information. He’d have to figure this out as he went along. “With the recent
attempt on the Emperor’s life, we can’t be too careful.” As they stepped into
the hangar bay, he pointed out the knot of workers struggling to hang two
garrison-sized flags from the overhead beams.

“With all these
preparations, there is an unusually large number of station workers in here.
Plus, you still have all of Lister’s engineers making the necessary last minute
adjustments to the ship before handing her over to us. Every one of those people
needs to be checked out.”

Mandisa stopped and
studied him, a muscle in her jaw straining before she spoke. “I can assure you,
I have personally vetted every civilian worker we have on loan from the
station. And while Miah Lister has vouched for all of her people, that didn’t
stop me from checking each and every one’s personnel jacket. As of this moment,
there is only one individual in this hangar bay that I wouldn’t stake my
reputation on, and that’s you, Lieutenant.”

Hazel Mandisa didn’t
appear to be intimidated by the black uniform—not one little bit. He might have
to do something about that.

Cypher turned and
strode toward the ship. “Then it appears my job here is going to be simple.
Shall we get on with this?”

He paused at the foot
of the boarding stairs. “I’ll need an office, with access to a computer, and
some privacy, Commander. Yours will do nicely.”

She pushed past him,
eyes frosty, and stalked up the steps. He followed, smiling behind her back.
The way to deal with hard asses was to be just a tad bit harder.

Bathed in the harsh
lights of the landing bay, the corvette had the sleek, brutal lines of a
predator. Built to be as deadly in atmosphere as in space, a tall vertical
stabilizer rose from the rear of the fuselage, its missile tubes extended as
techs swarmed over it. The ship’s smart paint was programmed to display the
imperial rearing quolla, a broken starship in its talons. Closer, on the flank,
he noticed the visage of a snarling wolf, a banner above it declaring that this
was the
Mad Dog
, while below the image were the vessel’s more official
identifications, the Imperial Naval Ship number and the name
W.A.
Youngblood.

In mid-step Cypher
froze, his body locking up on him. He plunged into a void, cold and dark as
dropping into a deep, sunless sea. Something enormous brushed past him, rising,
an amorphous shape built only of thought and seething anger. Then he was alone
in the emptiness, unable to feel his body, hear his breathing, or heartbeat. He
screamed, but no sound came because he had no mouth. Without hands, he clawed
at his prison. A single dot of light appeared above him, even though he had no
eyes to see it, and he threw every particle of his consciousness toward it. The
light erupted around him, bursting like a soap bubble. The Other flowed past,
sinking, his hatred and anger acid against Cypher’s thoughts.

He slammed back into
the world with enough force to stagger him. Gasping, he clutched the railing to
keep from going to his knees.

Mandisa turned back, a
touch of dark humor in her voice. “Having a problem with the stairs,
Lieutenant?”

He sifted through his
still-rattled thoughts for a suitably sharp rejoinder. “Not at all, ma’am, but
you might want to have one of your crew look at this carpet on the steps. It
wouldn’t do for the Emperor to fall flat on her face when she comes aboard your
ship, now would it?”

Arching an eyebrow,
Cypher waved for her to continue, while inside his mind he trembled like a child
who’d awakened to discover the nightlight out. Only a monster really did lurk
in that darkness inside him.

How had The Other done
that? Taken back control of his body and thrown him into oblivion. Could that
happen again? He’d fought his way out this time, but would he always be able to
do that? What if The Other found the strength to reclaim his body and cast him
once again into that inner darkness, to have no sensations, no stimuli, no
awareness beyond a jumble of terrified thoughts? Locked in an empty hell while
The Other lived his life until death took him. Would that even be a release for
him? He was only a computer program. Wasn’t that what Gray Eyes had said? What
if that program went on running, forever, with him growing mad and madder
still, until…

Sharp words broke him
out of his terrible musing, to discover he’d reached the inner airlock hatch.

“Lieutenant?” Mandisa
studied him, eyes narrowed. How long had she been talking to him, while he
stood as blank eyed as an automaton?

“I said, we need to get
you logged into our ship’s locator system. Just so we can keep track of where
you are while you’re aboard the
Mad Dog
.” She waved a young ensign with
a tablet forward.

The woman scanned his
indent-card and presented her handheld for his palm print on the biometric
reader. “This will get you into the ship’s computer, Lieutenant.”

Feigning suspicion, he
hesitated for a second. Sitting inside a docking bay, the
Mad Dog
should
be logged into Arachne, the fleet’s main computer, but it wasn’t unheard of for
a ship to remain on its internal computer systems, pulling updates only every
hour or so. If that was the case, there was a very real possibility that
Smiley’s switch hadn’t reached the ensign’s unit and all hell was going to drop
on his head as soon as he touched that screen. He tensed. At hyperkinetic
speed, he could be out of the bay and back up the companion way, but he’d still
have to face those marine guards. They’d be ready for him. As fast as he was,
he couldn’t outrun Mandisa’s comm signal.

He touched the screen.

“Thank you,
Lieutenant.” The ensign smiled up at him, tucked the unit under her arm and
hurried away. Just like that, it was over. Cypher tried not to let the commander
see the nervous breath he puffed out.

“Do you plan on subjecting
the Emperor and her party to the indignity of a scan?” He rubbed his palms
together.

Mandisa smirked. “Of
course not. We make special provisions for our
important
visitors. Now,
if you’ll follow me.”

She led him along the
main corridor that ran the length of the vessel. On a warship this compact,
with space at a premium, the hall was narrow, barely wide enough for two people
to pass. Pressure doors transected the passage every ten meters, forcing them
to step over the low thresholds. Techs in dark coveralls bearing the ship and
galaxy logo of Lister seemed more common than naval personnel. They swarmed
around open inspection panels and over exposed ducting.

“There seems to be an
awful lot to be done. The ship is going to be ready for the Emperor’s
inspection, isn’t it?” he asked.

“Don’t get your panties
in a wad. I’ll see that it gets done. And on time. As long as I don’t keep
getting interrupted.”

A pair of Lister techs
approached, forcing the two officers to flatten against the bulkhead to give
the women room to pass. The taller one, with a black pony tail and exotic
features, started to speak, then shook her head and continued past.

Cypher kept his face
down and cap low. Here on board the ship he faced the greatest risk of
recognition, despite his attempts at a disguise. He brought up his tactical
display and checked his six. One of the women had stopped, and he could almost
feel the weight of her gaze on his back, but he kept moving.

He stepped through the
open door where Mandisa waited, taking in the cubical in a single glance.
Beyond a workstation and computer, the tiny space allowed only for two chairs,
one comfortable looking and padded behind the desk, the other straight and
hard, close enough to the front that the Commander could reach across and bite
the head off any inept ensign unlucky enough to occupy it. Commendations and
plaques from her previous assignments covered the walls, but neither there nor
on her workstation did he see a trace of personal adornment. No homey pictures
or holo-cubes of smiling grandchildren; only a hard-edged space for a
hard-nosed officer. There was a tiny processor, good only for coffee or tea,
and the single door on his left undoubtedly led to her living quarters.

He commandeered her
chair and put his case down. “This will do nicely. Is there a freshener
nearby?”

She curled her lip, but
pointed to the door. “Through there, in my private quarters, and to the right.”

“Good. Now, shall we
get started. If you’d log me into your computer?”

Mandisa leaned across
the desk and rapidly input an alphanumeric string. His heightened perception
caught the sequence and stored it in memory. Once in the personnel files, he
began with the station workers, scanning through every detail of their mundane
work history and private lives, while the Commander watched him with the
intensity of a hungry cat. Boredom had long since set in by the time he reached
the end of the station’s files and moved on to Lister’s. The first entry
stopped him.

“The woman we passed in
the hall…
that
was Miah Lister?”

“Yeah, I’d have
expected a smart intelligence officer like you to know that.”

“Sorry to disappoint
you, but I don’t often get the opportunity to make the acquaintance of many
high powered CEOs.”

Had Lister known The
Other? She’d seemed unduly interested in him. He’d have to make a point of
avoiding her, just to be on the safe side.

His body’s co-habitant
had nothing to say about Lister. In fact, he’d been strangely quiet since his
abortive attempt to hijack this body. Having to fight off another such attack
now could prove disastrous.

He returned to the
appearance of reading, trying to come up with a way to get Mandisa out of the
room without arousing her suspicions. Tension charged the air in the cubical,
so that when her comm peeped, they both jumped. She rose and turned her back to
him, whispering, as if that would keep an augie from hearing both sides of the
conversation.

“Yes, Captain?”

“Hazel, can you step
down to my office for a moment?”

She glanced over her
shoulder at him, as if deciding if he was worth stalling off her commanding
officer. Apparently not.

“This will only take a
minute,” she said, and stepped out.

Cypher leaned back and
stretched before picking up his case and walking toward the side door.
Surveillance on board a warship was virtually omnipresent, but there were a few
places that even imperial spy-eyes shied away from. Places like a line
officer’s private bathroom. He stepped into Mandisa’s freshener and shut the
door behind him.

Echoing the commander’s
personality, the toiletries were stowed in the cabinet, ordered by purpose and
size, and the towels tri-folded and hung on their bars to display the
embroidered ship’s logo.

Kneeling, he placed his
case on the toilet and opened it, pawing through the tablets and folders until
he located the scanner. He removed the back and began ripping out components
and dumping them down the room’s recycler. The remaining parts he rearranged,
adding the timer from his appointment pad, and plugging in the power core from
his sidearm. He hated disabling the weapon, but he hadn’t wanted to face the
inevitable questions trying to bring a second power core aboard would have
generated. He dug into his pocket for the last piece, the canister packed with
those damn black darts. Made of organic material, it had gone through the
security scans undetected.