Anarchate Vigilante (Vigilante Series 4) (26 page)

“Charlotte! Are you there? This is Eliana. I’m Matt’s
girlfriend! Can you answer me?”

Charlotte saw the sudden appearance of light as the boulder blockage was pulled away from her, leaving a shoulder high pile of debris. She pointed her laser at the bright hole. A woman’s voice called to her.

“Charlotte! Are you there? This is Eliana. I’m Matt’s girlfriend! Can you answer me?”

Was this really a human woman? The woman who’d hovered above her while she was outside? Recalling the fake Matt who had used Matt’s recorded voice to trick her into revealing her location, she
thumbed on her laser.

“Stop! I’ve got a laser pointed your way!” she said, then pulled back sharply as two Spy Eyes whizzed into her space. On instinct she fired at one, killing it. Before she could get the second one the woman
yelled.

“Charlotte! Stop shooting. My combat suit is on AutoDefense mode! I’m overriding its program to fire on you with my shoulder lasers! I’m real! I’m human!”

Charlotte recalled the white ceramic armor of the combat suit that had floated above her. She knew something this woman should know, if she were not an alien imposter.

“Tell me the name of the animal heads on Matt’s suit!”

A chuckle sounded from the other side of the boulders. “Wolves! They are the heads of wolves. They never give up on the hunt, just like Matt.”

Charlotte shivered from the cold, felt a
headache coming on from the rock strike, and decided to trust the answer. And the human-sounding chuckle. “Here! I’m tossing my laser through the air hole! I’m not armed anymore.”

Eliana saw the laser pistol fly through the air hole to land at her feet. Before she could stop it, Petros aimed her right shoulder laser at the pistol and melted it with a single pulse of
green laser light.

“
Damn it Petros! Stop!” she cried, using her PET thought link to order the CPU to Standby. “I order you to stop all offense actions! There’s an unarmed young girl behind those rocks. And she’s Matt’s sibling. Do you wish Mata Hari to disassemble your CPU?”

“No,” the CPU said in a soft voice. “Please, mistress Eliana, do not cause me to lose awareness. I thought we were becoming . . . becoming friends.”

Eliana sighed. Managing a CPU on the edge of self-awareness was not anything she had studied on her homeworld of Halcyon. Gad. She had a baby CPU to tend to now!

“
Good, little Petros. Now, quickly remove those boulders so I can give Matt’s sister a hug!”

Charlotte watched, still on her knees, as the pile of boulders flew away from her to land somewhere down the mine shaft. In front of her stood the white armor of the woman who’d told her to take shelter inside the mine shaft. Advice which had surely saved her from nuclear incineration. Putting her right hand against the shaft wall, she stood up slowly.
She dropped the water bottle that she had held onto.

“Eliana?”

“Yes!” said the combat suited figure who slowly walked forward. Her face was illuminated in the helmet light. The woman’s jade green eyes focused on her. “There’s blood on your head! Are you able to walk?”

“Yes. I think so.” She stumbled toward her brother Matt’s girlfriend, then began to
weave.

“Hey girl!” cried Eliana as
her arms caught Charlotte before she could fall. “Come here and let me give you a hug!”

She felt the woman move her armored arms slowly, so as not to crush her against equipment modules that adorned the suit’s chest, hips and biceps. Were those rocket gun tubes on her biceps? Charlotte looked up, seeing a caring smile. “Uh, you’re all white skinned. Are you an albino?”

Eliana laughed loud enough to echo off the shaft walls. “Yes. And no. And it’s a long story. My hair and my eyes are human normal. But I’ve got a nice tail from being a crossbreed. My Dad was a Direndl tree dweller! Hey, come on. My suit’s tractor field will hold you to me as we fly out of here and up to Matt’s shuttle
Ariadne
. We gotta get you inside and away from the local radiation!”

For the second time Matt stepped out of his Interlock Pit and faced the red-
bordered pressure hatch that linked the Spine hallway with the Bridge. To the right his Mom also stood up from her accel-couch, as eager as Matt to see Charlotte. The hatch hissed open.

“Mom!” cried a red-haired
Charlotte as she launched herself at Kristen Dragoneaux, their sobs and cries mingling together as they embraced and hugged like there would be no tomorrow.

Eliana entered behind Charlotte and
walked in her combat suit to stand beside his own Suit, against the back wall. A hiss sound told him she was coming out to share his joy. He tossed a dress her way, knowing she would need it on the cold Bridge.

To Matt’s left stood Mata Hari in her Spy
holo mode, her hand holding that of her partner Gateway, who wore the image of a Greek farmer in mud-spattered trousers. Both AIs were watching the very human celebration of two humans who had been kept apart for fifteen years. Were the AIs learning something about family?

With a grin he could not hold inside
, Matt tied the sash of his robe and walked barefoot to the last surviving member of his family.

“Hey, Charlotte! You got room for your big brother?”

His sister’s puffy red eyes looked at him from her embrace of their mother. “Matt! Oh Matt! I thought I’d never see you or Mom again! Get over here and be with us!”

Matt did as ordered. He wrapped his arms around both women, feeling their
warmth, their
realness
. Blinking his eyes, he felt tears well out.
Damn it all!
But he’d done the near impossible. He deserved to feel good for a little while. Bending his head down, he touched his cheeks to theirs.

“Missed you both
! Love you both!”

With mutual cries they welcomed him into their embrace, kissing
him, sniffling along with him and celebrating the gift of lives newly liberated.

In his mind, Eliana summed it up. “
Matthew, this gift of reunion is what it’s all about. The fighting. The danger. The battle against unknown dangers.” Dressed in the outfit he’d tossed her, Eliana walked over and leaned against his back as he hugged his women. “Every thinking person in the galaxy needs to welcome home their family member from cloneslavery captivity!” she whispered.

Matt agreed with Eliana. And it reminded him that Mata Hari had talked about herself and Gatekeeper as if they were a family. His Vigilante partner was even fabricating a purple metal geodesic globe into which she would move her crystal mind pillars from their place in a corner of the Bridge. She wanted mobility of her physical mind, in the same way the
mentalities of BattleMind and Gatekeeper could move in space or on a planet thanks to a Repulsor pack.

What else did the AI want?
A child?

That was surely the need and desire of his Eliana. She had shared everything with him. The dangers. The threats. The uncertainties. And the hope that his crusade to end cloneslavery in the galaxy would succeed, despite the increasing combat sophistication of the Anarchate battle fleets. And the slyness of their Intel operatives. This case of holo faking was something new to
Matt. But not to the Anarchate spy who had used it in trying to capture Charlotte.

He pulled back from the group hug with his Mom and Charlotte. “My family,
please accept into our clan my Eliana. She saved Charlotte. And she is a wonder!”

Behind him Eliana moved in to hug the last two survivors of his first family.

Soon they would rendezvous with the rest of Hexagon Prime fleet behind the gas giant Muddysomething. While they would talk of tactics and strategy before leaving the system, he hoped there would be time for him and Eliana to be together. To love each other. And to hope for a special future together.

CHAPTER
ELEVEN

Matt expanded his Interlock Pit awareness to bring into mind communion the pilots of his fleet, including Eliana who was now back aboard her ship
Altuna
. He and Eliana had shared a few wonderful hours together. But now was the time for business. In mindlink the mind shapes of each pilot hovered above the green meadow of
Mata Hari’s
Park habitat. A beautiful and calm place like the Park seemed to please everyone, even his ally Toktaleen. Who tilted his two head antennae toward Matt even as his lower arm pair rasped anxiously.

“Vigilante leader,
to where do we Translate now?” asked the giant yellow ant.

“
Wherever the Anarchate does not expect us to appear!”

Suzanne reached over to hold George’s hand as a small replacement for the in-person contact
they all needed. She frowned. “Matt, the presence on Thuringia of a fake Matthew tells me other parts of the Anarchate are busy hunting for you. There could well be more battleglobes on their way here!”

George
lifted Suzanne’s hand, kissed it, then smiled at Matt. “Battlemate, my wife is likely correct in her assessment. She was the IT manager for Omega Casino, as you recall.” George ran a free hand through his thick black beard in a body sign Matt knew indicated concern. “Plus she and Eliana have this precog thing. What says your look into the future, my love?”

Suzanne’s
green eyes went distant for a moment, then fixed back on everyone. “No more battleglobes incoming for the moment. Thuringia will not be harmed by the Anarchate for sheltering Charlotte.” She blinked slowly. “But some moon base minds say our human colonized worlds are being visited by Anarchate agents, looking for evidence they are helping us. Morrigan will be visited soon.” She bit her lip. “It would help our Irish refuge if we could draw attention away from Morrigan and toward new attacks on Anarchate bases.”

George
the wrestler folded hands in his lap and fixed on Matt. “My friend, your
geis
obligation to dead Helen remains and I support you wholly. But we must do something to protect Morrigan. More attacks will draw attention to the attacks.”

Matt
nodded, recalling Morrigan’s support for their anti-cloneslavery crusade, and felt as Suzanne. They must resume the offense against the Anarchate. “Agreed, Suzanne and George. But to quote Sun Tzu—
He whose ranks are united in purpose will be victorious
. I may be the leader, but I am not blind to advice. Does anyone else in this fleet have ideas on what we should do next?”

Ben Ayers tipped back his brown bush hat, his expression sharp as that of an Aussie fox. “There are other Flesh Ma
rkets elsewhere in this sector,” he said in an accent similar to George’s Celtic. “There’s one just over in Sagittarius-Carina Arm, opposite the location of Sol. And one further along, toward Kappa Crucis cluster and Morrigan. My fiancé died in the slaver attack on our colony. I want more dead Flesh Markets!” Sarah reached over and hugged Ben, whose grim look lightened. “Vigilante, we could attack those Flesh Markets on the way to dropping off your mother on Morrigan. And also hit any Anarchate tachlink bases along that route.”

Matt had not forgotten his Mom, who had been quiet in her accel-couch since their arrival in Pi-3 Orion system. She was a trooper who, since the
ir family picnic in the Park, had come to understand that his family time was limited by his obligations to Hexagon Prime fleet. And now young Ben was showing him an option that he should pursue.

“Agreed, Ben. Good point on getting my Mom
and the three cloneslaver base captives to Morrigan. The first of the Flesh Markets is M2-9, a planetary nebula. It’s about 2,100 light years away from here, in Sagittarius Arm.” He smiled at both Suzanne and Ben. “We can get there within a week or less. Which gives the two of you time to confer together. On one of your ships.”

Mata Hari’s mind image moved from red cloud essence to her Lady of the Sword persona. Her sword was uplifted. “Matthew,
we need to Translate away from here. The moon base has surely called for Anarchate help.”

Oh, so true. “Everyone, thank you.
Head for your Interlock Pits and in five minutes we head for M2-9!” A frown on Suzanne’s face made him pause. “Or, we Translate right after Ben and Suzanne have chosen a ship for their conferring on tactics!”

Everyone in the mindlink laughed or rasped limbs. Matt just kept a mental lid on the time he and Eliana had shared together. No need to provide the group with laughs like the nice romance between Sarah and Ben.

“Exactly right!” Eliana whispered in his mind, her pale face flushing red.