8

Prime led me to the second deck. From the outside, the ship seemed smaller at two hundred feet and about eighty feet at its widest, but its interior could hold much space. Prime probably wanted me to build interior cabins and compartments in the future. He did mention construction orders, after all. The nanites and the drones could create anything I put my mind to, but I reckoned this ship had its limits since he mentioned a lack of supply of raw materials earlier. How much was left?

Twenty-one percent, Prime answered.

Oh, well. I might have to look for more.

The stations in orbit have a stockpile of raw materials. Further repairs on this vessel can be done in the central control station to improve hull integrity and restore shield capacity. Crew accommodations can be designed and arranged from there.

And that meant I had to go to space.

Correct.

I paused. Space. One word gave me so much dread, and it’s almost nauseating just thinking about the possibilities. What else could I do up there? The void was limitless. Death, especially. Lots of ways to die up there, too.

To make things easier on myself, I designated the hostile aliens as The Quartz due to the crystalline protrusions coming out of their vessels and The Architects for Prime’s bosses and the creators of the Forerunner Directive. The latter elicited no reaction from the machine, though I hoped he’d correct me with the right name. It can’t hurt to try. Prime had many secrets hidden by classified red tape behind his code, so it shouldn’t surprise me he could see through my tricks. I told the others about the names I gave the aliens, and they all agreed to use them from now on. But I turned down Freddie’s suggestion of renaming the hostile aliens into “the motherfuckers.”

Prime directed the drones to fly down and fished out the struggling pilots in the water, including their hefty ejector seats. About a third of the second deck’s floor parted open, lowering into a ramp. A strong gust entered the room, and I had to shield myself from the cold. The water must be freezing down there.

The drones dropped the two pilots on the ground from where the others and I stood. They discarded the ejector seats to the side before retreating back through the entryway to get the other pilots still in the water. One was unconscious on his back, and his cracked helmet and mask still covered his head. He must have been hit by the crystalline ship when he ejected. The other scrambled up to his feet, removing the helmet and throwing it aside as he hurled a harsh cough. A glob of water poured out of his mouth. He was younger than I expected, with short light-brown hair and blue eyes, cool olive skin, and standing around six feet tall. He looked a couple of years older than me. The name tag on his G-suit read: Lt. Ben Amendola.

Amendola’s gaze landed on us, then down to my combat uniform, and a look of confusion crossed his face. He might have thought I was a soldier and that the ship also abducted us. It was only for a moment before I realized where his hand was reaching for, a SIG Mauer M17 on his holster. He pulled and aimed it at me.

No. Not me. Amendola was aiming for the drone hovering behind me.

“Get down!” He shouted.

“No! Wait—!”

All eight drones lunged and hovered before me, blocking his view. The nanites exploded out of the walls, buzzing around me like locusts, a quarter of it hugged and stitched around my body like armor. Amendola pulled the trigger and got a couple of shots on one drone before the other seven shot out several tendrils, grabbed his ankles, and lifted him upside down. A tendril gripped too tight on his wrist, and he screamed, letting go of the weapon. He clutched the injured hand, which he cradled close to his chest. The others had their guns out but were unsure whether to aim at the pilot or the drones.

Shit! “You called that a basic defense mechanism, Prime? You almost killed the guy!”

“He is a threat. He must be neutralized.”

“Let him go.”

“He must be neutralized.” Prime’s voice repeated, reverberating in the enclosed space. The pilot stopped yelping momentarily, eyes fleeting around for the source.

“No, he’s human. Not a quartz.” I turned to Amelia. “Get the weapon.”

Amelia nodded, plucked the gun from the ground, and held it ready.

“Do you even know how to use that?” He asked Amelia.

Amelia flicked the safety off. “Parris Island. Learned plenty of ways to kill a man there.”

He paused. “You…you guys are Marines?”

“Prime, let him go,” I ordered again.

A tiny hesitation, then the tendrils unclasped themselves from the pilot, and he fell head-first to the ground. With a strangled yelp, he rolled himself over, then back to his knees. Instinctively, he reached for his holster, grasping an invisible weapon that was no longer there. Breathing hard, he studied me and the others for a second. The drones retreated while the nanites returned to the walls.

“No. Can’t be.”

“Can’t what?” Rachel asked. She also held her gun at the ready, trying to be intimidating.

Amendola’s brows furrowed. “Are you the aliens? You looked like a bunch of kids. What are you, twenty?” He regarded me.

I recognized his voice from the comms. He was the pilot I was talking to earlier.

“No, we’re definitely not aliens, man,” Jason said, chuckling. “We’re just good old boring humans. And also, we’re not kids. We’re like close to your age.”

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The lieutenant ignored Jason’s remarks and crawled over to the other pilot. He lifted off the cracked helmet and the mask, revealing a man of similar age as him, with dark skin and short-buzzed hair. His name tag read: Lt. Francis Lehane.

“Wake up, you fuck.” Amendola slapped the man’s face a few times and shook his body, but he did not wake up. “Frank. Come on, buddy. Wake up.”

Check the unconscious pilot’s vitals, I thought to Prime.

The nanites approached Lehane, marching like a spreading network of thick veins centered around his body. Amendola tried to swat them away when they crawled up to his compatriot, but the nanites persisted.

“They’re not going to harm him. I ordered them to check his vitals,” I said.

Amendola stared coldly. “You can control them?”

“It’s a long story, but don’t disrupt what they are doing. They’re very good at fixing someone up. Trust me.”

“I’m not so sure if I can trust any of you. You’re on this ship, and it fired on that—” He took a deep breath. “—That crystal ship. Sorry, but I don’t trust y’all.”

“That’s a good policy, actually,” I said, stepping closer. “Look, man, you don’t have to trust me. But you can at least trust the guy who blew up that ship firing on your squadron and led it out of New York.”

“Is it really gone? You killed it?”

“Dead under the water, lieutenant,” Freddie said proudly. “If it weren’t for him, the city would be just a pile of rubble by now.”

Amendola hesitated before giving me a tiny nod and stepped back. The nanites swarmed Lehane, but the examination finished within a minute. Lehane took a large breath, coughing, head swiveling around to face me and the drones hovering near me. Amendola crouched by his side, whooping loudly and gleefully, telling him he would live.

“The impact from the vessel had paralyzed him from the waist down,” Prime reported. “His vitals are stable, but he has suffered a severe concussion. Urgent medical care is recommended.”

Amendola’s face faltered. “Can you do anything else?” He asked. “Please. Save him.”

“I’ll try.”

The other drones returned with the other four pilots, gently placing them beside Amendola and Lehane. Two men had broken legs, but one was more severe than the other, with his femur sticking out of his suit. Another had third-degree burns on his torso, and the last had thick shrapnel attached to his right abdomen. They were gravely wounded, barely hanging there by a thread. I ordered the nanites to treat their wounds, but they only stabilized their vital signs and stopped them from bleeding out.

“Er, is something supposed to happen?” Tom whispered.

“Yeah, but I don’t know why the nanites are not healing them,” I said.

“Do you think we should call someone? Maybe drop them off at a hospital somewhere?” Amelia asked.

“Maybe.” I turned to Prime. “Can you fix them using more of the nanites as you’ve done with mine?” On reflex, I touched the back of my head.

“Yes.”

I waited for an elaboration, but he remained silent. Amendola sat rigid, waiting.

“Well, can you do it?” I asked again.

“Denied. The organic is not authorized.”

“I am authorizing it.”

“Denied.”

“But I am the forerunner. You said so yourself.”

“Yes. You are the forerunner.”

“Then, why can’t I authorize it?”

“They are not the forerunner.”

I breathed out a frustrated sigh. “You mean to tell me the nanites are only reserved for me? That I’m the only one they’ll heal completely?”

“Yes.”

“But they are human, the people you are assigned to protect. Isn’t that correct?”

“Yes. Correct.”

“So, protect them.”

Still, Prime did not give up. “Parameters are not set. Authorization denied.”

“Um, your robot’s broken, Tony,” Jason said. “Did we break it during the fight? Are we fucked?”

“No, there’s something else I’m missing. Hold on.”

I took a deep breath and tried to replay everything Prime had said since I was in the sphere. I couldn’t remember any specific statement he said, a manual, a rule, anything! My mind was empty. Amendola was busy tending to the other soldiers while they all gave me odd looks. So far, only Lehane, the man with the third-degree burns, and the man with shrapnel stuck to his abdomen were in grave conditions. I gestured for the others to stay in the cargo hold.

“Watch them,” I said to Tom and the others and walked up to the first deck.

“Where are you going?” Amelia asked.

“Finding another way to heal them. It’ll only take a minute,” I said, giving her a small smile. “You won’t be alone.” I glanced at the sixteen drones and the other Marines around the room.

“Well, better hurry up. They give me the creeps,” she said, looking at one of the hovering drones.

“I can’t help you with that. Until then, make sure he doesn’t do anything stupid.” I pointed to Amendola.

“I’ll make sure he behaves, boss,” Freddie said.

“You mean we will,” Jason said.

Rachel rolled her eyes. “Go. We’ll be right down here. I might as well check up on my truck and see if your robot damaged it.”

I smiled. “Just send me the bill.”

I continued up to the first deck and walked into the cockpit. I ensured that Prime and I had privacy and that he wouldn’t broadcast his answers across the entire vessel. Sitting behind the wheel, I ordered the ship out of the storm. I remembered that one of the quartz’s ships was above Paris, and I wanted to be as far away from it as possible while my ship healed. I headed for Boston, thinking I could drop off the pilots at the nearest hospital if this didn't work.

“Is this channel private?” I asked.

“Yes, forerunner.”

“Okay, good.” I cleared my throat. “Prime, if Amelia is hurt, will you conduct the same procedure you have done to me?”

“Generalized scenario. Countless unknown variables for Amelia Hansen’s theoretical physical condition.”

You want me to be more specific. “Alright. If Amelia suffered the same injury as Lieutenant Lehane, will you proceed with the same procedure?”

“Yes.”

I blinked in surprise. I thought it was only reserved for me. “Okay…why?”

“Amelia Hansen is citizen one.”

Citizen? “How about the same scenario, but for Jason Navarro.”

“Yes.”

“Explain.”

“Jason Navarro is citizen two.”

My brows furrowed. “And to Tom Hennig and Alonso Ruiz?”

“Yes. They are citizens three and four.”

“Why did you designate them as citizens, Prime?”

“They have accepted your authority.”

“Explain.”

“They are now subject to your authority as the forerunner. The people of Earth must recognize you as their new sovereign.”

Prime had said that before. What was the Forerunner Directive again? Prepare the planet, but for what?

“Advanced Technology.

Expansion.

Authority.

Obedience.

War.”

It didn’t feel good hearing it all over again. I could feel my blood pumping against my eardrums, a slight lurch beneath my feet as the ship started moving away from the storm. “I did no such thing, Prime. I did not consent to become a sovereign, leader, or whatever you call it. The world has enough leaders for that.”

“I am a virtual intelligence. My likes or dislikes are beyond irrelevant, and neither are my personal opinions, which I cannot produce. What matters is my advice given by the comprehensive parameters of my mission. Nevertheless, you have consented to become the Forerunner of Earth—”

“I did, but that’s not—”

“—you have consented to protect this planet from all threats—”

I paled, and my hands grew cold. I got where he was going with this. “Prime, listen to me—”

“—And you have consented to the power and responsibility that the position bestows. All parameters have been recorded, acknowledged for my superiors’ reference, and approved. Therefore you have consented to become your people’s sovereign. Any laws, social, cultural, and political facet of your planet is null and void under your word and personhood. Everyone is now your subject.” A pause. “This is the purpose of the Forerunner Directive. You are now the sole leader of Earth.”

Ah. Fuck.