Gunship (49 page)

The room was silent as they pondered Duv’s words. Tiny knew she had to speak next. She convinced herself it didn’t matter, she didn’t belong with these people anyway, this was just her latest assignment. But inside, she cringed at what she knew would come…when she told them what she was, everything would change. She stepped forward anyway.

“Jackson’s right. It was Seth in that gunship. He didn’t want you to know, so he faked a comms issue. But he talked to me during the battle.” Duv looked up, staring at Tiny. “And he was supposed to be following us out, at least that’s what he told me. But then again, I haven’t been read in on his mission. Only Commander Zain knows the full details.”

Duv blinked, confused, while the others tried to make sense of what Tiny was saying. Only Reilly and Chang exchanged looks and braced themselves for what would come next.

“I am sure you all have heard about the Gaiden? They are special assassins and protectors of the galactic leadership, recruited through the AOC. Their recruitment is very selective, and the process has been kept a secret to prevent individuals from producing false positives or trying to stack the deck for candidates who might be less than well equipped for such a life. Obviously, what I am about to tell you is classified.” Tiny looked around, making sure everyone present understood what that meant. “If you reveal this information to others, your life may be forfeit.” Heads around the room nodded their acknowledgement. Satisfied, Tiny continued.

“The government identifies top performers through school test trending. Those individuals are tracked over a period of years for consistency and then given a specialized battery of tests at an undisclosed location. Candidates are typically selected for testing between ten and fifteen years of age. If the candidates perform well, the government notifies the parents and the child is taken for training at a covert facility. At the height of the program, the AOC had trained almost three hundred Gaiden to serve in special mission areas.” Tiny scanned the room, using the time to organize her thoughts and close off her emotions before speaking again.

“The war found new uses for the Gaiden, and their skills became legendary. Frequently, the tide of battle was turned based on the actions of a few Gaiden warriors working in concert with special operators like the ISUs.” Tiny’s face grew somber. “Politicos, however, became involved in the war. They defied the galactic constitution and began to attempt to direct the military and the Gaiden. With no experience or understanding of war to guide them, the politicos’ decisions were ineffective and dangerous. We began losing to the aliens. Thousands were killed as they debated over what to do. Their inaction caused the Gaiden leadership to splinter into two groups: those who continued to follow the Forum and support the government, and those who believed the loss of life was too great to continue to back the politicos. The second group sought an alliance with the aliens in the hopes that a treaty could be created to halt the bloodshed. When the Forum found out, they were enraged. They ordered the Gaiden who remained loyal to the AOC to seek the others out and eliminate them. After the war, only a few Gaiden lived on. Their skills and training were preserved in a computerized archive system by the man who had helped to create them: Commander Alex Zain.”

Tiny could see eyebrows go up around the room at this announcement. Zain was a war hero, that was well known. But very few people knew that he had created the Gaiden. There were a few murmurs and whispers. Only Chang seemed unsurprised by the news. Tiny forced herself to stay on task, realizing that she was unconsciously putting off the worst. It had to be said, and this was as good a place as any. Besides, she had a promise to keep. She glanced to where Reilly stood. The Captain’s eyes were on her, watching to see if she would keep her word.

Tiny looked down, steeled herself, and then looked around fiercely as she spoke her next words. “I am one of the few original Gaiden left, one of the ones Commander Zain recruited. I was still too young to fight at the time of the war. The government hid us at the end, ensuring my survival and that of the others who were with me.”

Her words echoed off the metal walls of the gunship as her audience tried to take in this information, but Tiny pressed on, needing to get as much of it out as she could, preparing for the inevitable.

“Today we face a new threat. Razam Welch has been running a shadow government for five years now. At first we ignored it, thought it was just a criminal enterprise. Over time, it became apparent that Welch was not a common criminal by any means. He established ties with our alien enemies and forged new relationships, possibly even trans-galactic relationships for the first time in history. By the time the full extent of his network was realized, it was already too late. War was on the horizon. Commander Zain realized that the Gaiden would be needed again to help counter this new evil. We have had to rush our plans even as Welch has begun nipping at our heels with his covert forces. In order to get enough Gaiden for the ISU wing, Commander Zain was forced to create an aggressive new training program, designed to rapidly prepare recruits for the war. Even so, we will not have the necessary numbers before the war begins.”

“How many are there, if you can tell us?” Chang asked, his face stern as he contemplated the coming battles. Of those in the room, he knew better than any of them the impact that the Gaiden had on the battlefield. To have one or two Gaiden in a battle was like having an entire extra squad with heavy weapons. Without them, against Welch and his alien weapon systems, they would die very quickly.

“Of those experienced fighters, we have only eleven left. We will be hard pressed, as you have already figured out, to effectively combat Welch and his military. This is why Commander Zain has begun recruitment again and has been trying to accelerate the program.” Tiny paused, wishing she could soften the blow of her next words. “There are seven in training right now. Seth Jackson is one of the youngest to ever go operational.”

Trace Callum swore quietly. The others either stared at Tiny in shock or fear or looked away. Reilly and Chang focused on Duv, who had stood and was now turning between the wall and Tiny, blindly raking his hand through his hair, trying to understand. Reilly felt the familiar ache swell up in her chest watching him. He looked like a trapped animal, desperate for a way out but knowing there wasn’t one. This would not go well.

“One of the youngest what? My son is what?” Duv asked, his face taunt, his eyes angry.

“Your son is a Gaiden, recruited by Commander Zain. And I am his trainer,” Tiny said.

With a roar, Duv lunged across the room as Reilly and Chang grabbed him to keep him from going after Tiny. Marek joined in as Duv threw himself against their arms, cursing the air, cursing Zain and Tiny, pushing to break free. Reilly grabbed his arm as he tried to level his blaster at Tiny, stripping the weapon away as the others pulled him back. He fought through the sea of arms, charging again for Tiny. At the last minute, Reilly stepped in his path, catching the blow he had aimed for the Gaiden’s head.

She gripped his hand forcefully, pushing back, and stepped in as Duv glared at her. “Get out of my way, Captain. I’m going to kill her, right now.”

“Duv, you need to sit down and listen to what she has to say—”

“Damn her and you to hell! Ain’t none of you in my place right now! None of you! I’m supposed to just sit and listen to how she and fraggin’ Zain turned my boy into some kind of monster?” Duv wrested his arm back from Reilly, his eyes smoldering with rage. “What do you know, anyway? Isn’t like you’d understand, you got no family to worry about; anyone you ever loved is dead! There’s no one for them to take away from you! So since you’ve got nothing to lose, I guess it doesn’t matter about the rest of us! Is that it, then? We just have to suck it up? Well, I can’t be like you and just forget about them all! He’s my son! I can’t just put that behind me! You’re all fraggin’ bastards!”

Reilly felt Duv’s words as they belted her in the gut. She knew he was speaking out of turn. He was hurt, he was afraid, he was angry, and again he was blaming himself for something beyond his control. And he was drunk. She could smell the White Lightening on him. Still, it caught her breath as she reeled from the verbal blow. Instantly, Jeremy’s face flashed before her eyes, followed by others, too many others to count, yet she did. He was wrong. She remembered them all.

Duv used that moment of unbalance to strike. Before Reilly could react, he pulled a knife and drove it deep into Tiny’s shoulder. Blood poured out around the guard as she stood, staring at Duv, unmoving, unflinching. Reilly took all this in as she connected a solid palm strike to Duv’s head then followed up with a knee to the chest and a combo that knocked a tooth out and sent him to the floor. She realized as she looked down at Duv that the Gaiden had made no effort to defend herself.

Duv looked up at her, shaking his head. His lip was bleeding as he coughed and scrabbled around on the floor for the missing tooth. He stayed down. Reilly hoped he wouldn’t get back up. She looked around the room, angry at the situation, angry at Zain and what he had done, angry at herself for losing it.

“Anyone else have a problem with Tiny? She’s here because I asked for her to be. I didn’t say it was going to be easy to hear, I just said it had to be heard. Anyone else want to have a go at the Gaiden?”

Duv staggered back to his feet as Reilly turned to face him again. He looked past her at Tiny, but before he could move or say another word, Reilly knocked him out. Marek stood to go to Duv, but Reilly stopped him.

“He’s drunk as shit. Leave him there until we’re done. We’ve had enough interruptions, let’s just get through this.” She turned to Tiny, who was staunching the blood with a rag from the kitchen as Chang slowly pulled the knife back out. “Can you go on, or do you want someone else to speak until you get that taken care of?”

Tiny looked around the room. At least there would be no more hiding, they knew what she was. She could see the fear on some of their faces. Good. They should be afraid. Then she looked at Duv’s limp body lying on the floor. The Captain had stood for her, even though she was on the wrong side of this mess. And Chang was still standing nearby. He casually watched the others, but she could see that he too had palmed a knife and was ready to respond if anyone else decided to strike. For that alone, she owed them the truth. And the telling wouldn’t get any easier with time.

“I’ll continue now,” she said, wiping a bloody hand on her tac-pants then brushing a strand of hair from her eyes.

Tiny began to explain how Zain had identified Seth from his test scores by accessing the main education center systems owned by the government. His scores had been off the charts. When the crew landed on Roen, it was just a matter of time until one of Zain’s men had found an opportunity to get a specialized edu-system into Seth’s hands. Typically, candidates would be taken to a training center, but Zain chose to keep Seth with the crew and train him remotely. The crews listened attentively while Reilly, Chang, and Trace asked a few questions. Tiny answered as best she could. She continued her story, talking about the problems Seth had started to have, how Zain had sent her forward to be his trainer but to also keep an eye on his mental health.

“I thought he was following the protocol,” Tiny said, shame creeping into her voice. “But he changed it. No one knew what he was doing.”

“What do you mean?” Reilly asked suspiciously, her skin crawling at a thought that had just begun to occur to her.

“Gaiden are subliminally trained using loyalty to the government and its members. The idea is implanted when we are young. People think it’s mind control, but the true goal is to give us such a strong loyalty that we will hold up in even the worst situations, even under torture. This training has saved many lives and protected galactic security for many years now.” Tiny paused again, uncomfortable with what she had to share next.

“One of the main things our trainers know not to do is to tie emotions to that loyalty, especially emotions such as love, hate, fear, or anger. The use of an emotional bond creates an unstable relationship in the code which can make the operators uncontrollable and subject to dangerous whims. It can leave back doors in the programming that can be exploited, manipulated over time by anyone who knows they are there. That emotional bond can also lead to conflicts within the brain that can cause it to shut down. Captain, you saw this firsthand when Seth was confronted with the situation of having to protect the edu-system from you. It caused a conflict in his programming, caused him to lock up at a critical moment.”

“Tiny, are you saying…” Reilly began.

Tiny turned her dark eyes on the Captain. “Commander Zain modified the code to use emotions with Seth, specifically love of family. If I had to guess, that’s why Seth showed up at the space station. Somehow he found out we were in danger, and his programming compelled him to come save us…or, to be more specific, it compelled him to come save his father.”

Reilly looked at Chang, the implications of this action dawning on both of them. Seth had been programmed to defend them, his family, from danger. Zain had created their own Gaiden to protect them by using Duv’s son. But why?

“Did you know Zain was doing this?” Reilly demanded, her eyes flashing dangerously as she came off the wall.

Tiny looked away, mortified. “No. When I became part of the crew and learned Seth’s story, I realized he should have never been chosen for such a role. Commander Zain restricted the information I had access to. He was supposed to brief me on the boy’s training and operations when we took Seth to Raptor Base. Instead, he lied to me about how he planned to use the boy. He told me that he would fill me in when we returned from the rescue mission. I don’t think he was expecting us to make it back, or if we did, he already had a plan in place to cover up what he was doing. But I don’t think he expected Seth to leave in order to rescue us, either.”

Reilly nodded and crossed her arms, thinking. “So anything or anyone that is a threat to Duv or to the crew, Seth would be forced to respond to it?”