Slowly Sparrow started to regain her lucidity, although for some reason she couldn’t connect to the interface. Wait, she’d lost her connection to the interface, she’d never not had it before. Plus her pod seemed unusually bright and she risked opening her eyes again to investigate, hadn’t she heard Chloe say something about her pod at some point; maybe it was malfunctioning. Her chest felt funny and she felt it rise up and down alarmingly rapidly. Slowly, she remembered; there had been an attack but not much else for the last two standard hours.
Slowly Sparrow opened her eyes and was greeted by a view she didn’t recognise but as she looked around she saw a wounded Ms Liu was holding her from where she was propped up on an acceleration couch. “Ms Liu,” she said weakly, “where am I?”
“On a shuttle giving me the biggest fucking headache of my life,” came a voice that she recongised as Mr Choudary’s. Looking around she also saw the Honourable Harriet Elizabeth Ellis, sitting scowling on another of the shuttles couches.
“You should terminate me immediately, it is your only hope to avoid execution.” Sudden awareness that she was out of her pod and not projecting this time dawned on her.
“We’ve done this bit,” replied Mr Choudary, “Ms Liu wants you kept alive and she’s the only one with a gun on this boat.” She looked up and Chloe grinned back at her.
“He’s right, but I’ve also got a plan,” she smiled, “Sparrow look at your left arm.” Looking down she saw an ident tattoo’d on her red flesh, fading fast. “That will be the nanos Amir injected you with, good aren’t they. Once they’ve patched you up I’ll program them to make a replication implant and no one will know you haven’t had them your whole life.”
“In the meantime you better start getting her story straight,” grunted Mr Choudary.
“My story?” she asked, confused.
“Yes Sparrow,” replied Chloe, “I’ve built you a new identity. Your name is Rita MacLeod, you are a Warrant Officer class 2 in charge of the water recycling detail. You don’t yet have wardroom privileges but you’re earmarked for early promotion to class 1. Previously you served on the Mandela for your initial training and then the Sevenoke before you were posted to the Whittington last month. You were born in the Borough of Croydon Without exactly twenty years ago yesterday; so I've aged you five years. You were selected for early conscription due to your unusual capability profile for the role of Naval systems tech.”
“That’s probably enough,” Amir interrupted, “as long as she has the basics down she can pass off anything tricky as trouble remembering after her injuries.” Then turning his attention towards her.
“What’s your name?”
Sparrow paused, her design had never designated a name. Sparrow has been what the Captain had decided to call her. She thought nothing in her design stopped her for giving herself another new name. Yes it would be ok.
“Warrant Officer Rita MacLeod,” she said slowly.
“Good, at least you’ve got that down; have you memorised the rest.”
Again she thought, without the interface she was totally reliant on her own memory. After some time reviewing it she felt confident she had and answered, “Yes Mr Choudary.”
“Well at least we won’t have to worry about you calling me by the wrong form of address.”
“Yeah I thought it would be easier for her if she kept her warrant,” Chloe said distantly.
“Good idea; faked that too did you?” Amir replied, before adding, “are you ok?”
“Just a bit woozy I guess.”
“The medical sloop should rendezvous soon with us, not long now,” he said as reassuringly as he could.
“Right, and now you.” He said as Sparrow saw him turn to face the grumpy mayor’s daughter sat on the opposite couch. “The easiest thing,” he continued, “would be to insist you’re too tired and in shock to be debriefed today or tomorrow and that you just want to recover in peace and call your family. If you can’t escape debriefing just remember any mention who Rita really is will mean death for all of us most likely.”
“Yes sir,” came the sarcastic response.
Amir was about to bite back but just as he went to open his mouth the comms unit went off. With a sense of dread Amir knew he couldn’t ignore it, ignoring it would be suspicious if this wasn’t already a call telling them all to prepare to be arrested. His mouth going dry he lifted the receiver.
“Captain of Marines Choudary,” came the voice of the Captain, “congratulations on carrying out a successful evacuation.” Amir felt himself relax a bit.
“If you can call losing a whole fire team in the process a success.”
“I wish I had better news here, but we’re dead in the water, the pilot is dead,” Amir’s ears pricked up at the mention of the pilot but was relieved to hear for the time being the Captain at least had come to her own conclusions, he heard her continue, “268 souls lost at the latest count, another 130 stacking up outside Medical.”
“Sounds pretty rough Captain.”
“We got mauled pretty well and good,” the Captain sighed. “Still I’m pleased you managed to grab Lady Ellis, as well Ms Liu and Ms MacLeod,]; I’d have hated to lose either of them.”
Stunned, Amir didn’t know how to respond, had the Captain been in on Ms Liu’s half baked plan all along, surely not? Eventually, he managed to answer, “Well it would have been remiss of us not to evacuate the wounded.”
“Indeed,” the Captain said. “Well, enough time trying to sort this mess in the peace of my cabin. I imagine Lieutenant Asher has created uproar already on the quarterdeck and I need to see how many of the other twelve Lieutenants are actually still alive. Best of luck Mr Choudary.”
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
“And to you Captain,” he replied before putting down the receiver. Turning to Chloe he asked: “Was the Captain in on this?”
“No,” said Chloe in a startled voice.
“Well she knows, and for some unfathomable reason instead of shopping us I think she’s covering for us,” he shrugged.
Chloe’s face lit up, “I knew it, I knew she had a soft spot for Sparrow.”
“Rita,” Amir corrected.
“Yes well,” Chloe replied, “you hear that...Rita, Captain has your back.”
“That’s terrible news,” Sparrow sobbed, “that’s another person I’ve put at risk of execution.”
“She put herself at risk Rita,” Amir replied, “She could have easily reported us to the without’s authorities, you’d be dead and we’d have been up on a remote link court martial within half an hour and probably shot not long after, but instead she’s acknowledged you as one of her crew. That was her choice not yours, don’t beat yourself up about it.”
They all settled into an uncomfortable silence. Sparrow tried to make sense of her body, she was paler than she had imagined and now in the clear light and atmospheric environment she could see her limbs, almost translucent, and judging by how her flight suit fell they were much slimmer and shorter than she’d thought them. Suddenly she felt an uncomfortable pressure in her lower abdomen. She whispered her concerns to Chloe, who barked at the mayor’s daughter to take her to something called the head. Visibly disgusted the other girl got up and hefted Sparrow to her feet.
“You’ll have to show her what to do,” Chloe shouted, “I don’t think she’s ever had a piss before.”
The mayor’s daughter groaned even louder at that and bundled her across the cabin and shoved her through a small door off at one side, through a small chamber and into the left of one of two even smaller doors. In the room was a curious metal seat with a big whole in it’s centre.
“Well, get that flight suit down to your ankles for a start, and then sit,” she said with contempt dripping from every syllable. Even so Sparrow complied and sat on the strange metal chair as instructed.
“What do I do now Lady Ellis,” she asked meekly.
“I don’t know, relax your muscles or I don’t know squeeze them or something, you just know how, even babes in arms can manage it!” she said exasperatedly.
Sparrow knew about urination, just that she was never really aware of it before; she supposed she had been catheterised in the pod and then suddenly looking down she saw a rapidly receding mark on her abdomen which surely must have been the site of a stoma that the nanobots now circling in her body were busy reversing. Suddenly she thought the stoma would have discharged into her pod’s fluid, the fluid she had breathed, the fluid she had swallowed for sustenance, the fluid that had touched every part of her. Sparrow wretched and threw up the contents of her stomach onto the floor in front of Lady Ellis, or rather onto the honourable lady’s shoes.
“Oh sweet Jesus,” she cried out, “you really are a disgusting creature.”
“Sorry my lady,” Sparrow mumbled, “I could not help it.”
“Ugh,” the Lady Ellis groaned again, “come on go as quick as you can and then let’s get your mouth rinsed off and I’ll see what I can do with the mess you’ve made of my shoes.” Sparrow, with the motivation of being sat next to her own vomit finally was able to go after another minute. Then she found herself being navigated over her pool of vomit and led more gently this time; although that may have been only because her flight suit was still tangled around her ankles. In anycase, she was being led to a small basin, where Lady Ellis pressed a button and cupped her hands together to catch the water that spouted out a chrome tap above the basin. “Rinse your mouth out with this,” she said, placing the side of one hand onto Sparrow’s lips and tilting it gently as she opened her mouth letting the water flow in. Sparrow swished it about in her mouth and then leant over the basin to spit it out. As she rose again that was when it happened, for the first time she looked directly at the mirror and saw herself. Her skin was not pale, it was deathly white and sunken across the features of her face and drawn tightly against each one of her ribs. Her hair was split and dull, her body was emaciated; there was barely any muscle on her bones let alone the healthy layer of fat she’d always imagined herself to possess. She screamed.
“What the fuck is going on,” screamed Mr Choudary as he crashed into the cramped anteroom. “And why is she naked?”
“How else do you think women can piss in a flight suit,” spat back Lady Ellis.
“Well, what about the vomit?”
“I realised what I’ve been breathing, eating, drinking my whole life,” Sparrow offered up shyly.
“Christ, that’s disgusting,” sneered Lady Ellis, “just thinking about it makes my stomach turn and all.”
“And the screaming?”
“I saw myself in the mirror,” Sparrow answered, “I am not who I thought I was.” She felt her eyes start to water and then the sensation of tears flowing down her face.
“Chloe, this is one you might need to handle,” he shouted back into the cabin, before turning to Lady Ellis. “Well go on get her decent and then get her over to Ms Liu.”
“I’m not one of your bloody marines,” she shouted back.
“Yeah, well consider yourself enlisted into the Honourable Company of Marines princess if we’re going to get out of this.” And with that he strode out of the head and back into the cabin.
“Come on then,” she beckoned at Sparrow to step forward, so she did. Lady Ellis hoiked up her flightsuit and then manhandled her arms through the sleeves before finally zipping her up again whilst she grumbled, “hand maid to some fucking freak.”
Sparrow’s tears fell faster as she was turned and pushed back into the cabin and shoved down roughly onto the acceleration couch next to Chloe.
“What’s the matter Sparrow,” Chloe said, using her old name deliberately
.
“I am not how you described me, Ms Liu. I am as the Lady Ellis confirmed a freak.”
“You’re not a freak Sparrow, far from it, you’re a victim, kept just on this side of life and death in your pod. I realised that the first time I disconnected you for a medical diagnostic. I knew then as I looked at the starving child I was lifting out of the pod that I would help you escape that life. When the Captain threw you your first commissioning day party and you projected that generic avatar I was so disappointed. For despite everything dear, you were a beautiful child. So when one day, after we had been talking for many months, and you asked me what you looked like I told you how I imagined you to be if you had been allowed to develop normally. The image of your projection is what you will transform into now you are free.”
“Hangry is she,” Amir japed, “try this. Naval emergency rations, carb block. Filling, nutritious and tastes of absolutely nothing. Should be a good one to warm her digestive system up with right?” He finished before throwing a foil packet towards her. “Tuck in,” he said to her.
So she unwrapped the package to reveal a yellowy brown block. She bit into it and indeed she only felt the floury texture of the block; there was very little to taste. Nevertheless she persisted and finished the entire block.
“Don’t worry this won’t be forever,” Amir said smiling at her, “but when you haven’t used your stomach properly for a while you need to warm up before you start tackling things with actual flavour. Now, soya that will be forever once you’re up for eating protein.”