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As promised, the six mediators who arrived to escort Elys back to her apartment were convincing, but polite. They spoke on their in-helmet communication system during the brief airship trip to the roof of Elys’s apartment building. Like the wide doorways, Alyansan architecture included airship towers on all the buildings to allow for CRU accessibility.
In her apartment, Elys paced. It was the largest space she’d ever called her own, but the mediators outside, ready to block the exit with their armored bodies if she opened the front door, made the place feel too small.
Their positions matched the partial conversation with Krebs published in the archive, which made it sound like Off-world Affairs would be handing Elys over in exchange for Krebs’s Republic money. This was, according to Taia, “...not lying. It’s just the first part of the truth. Everyone can have the rest when you come back to Alyansa.”
Still, she had an entire world’s assembly blueprints at her fingertips. There must be something she could assemble, do, or memorize to make it easier to get out of whatever cell Krebs would put her in.
Was Krebs used to holding prisoners? If he made a mistake, she wanted to be ready to take advantage of it. She ordered the biggest rare earth magnet she could carry in a pocket, which had to be manufactured with more specialized equipment than her home assembler contained. The magnet seemed innocuous enough that Krebs might let her keep it, and it would also manipulate or damage all sorts of gadgets that Krebs could employ against her.
If she had a pickup — which she wouldn’t, it’d be the first thing Krebs would take — she might convince the shipboard AI to add her to the lowest level of security door access, especially if nobody had prepared it to hold prisoners. Ship augmented intelligences were far simpler than MCAIs, which made fooling them easier in some ways and harder in others.
Elys settled on her couch and queued up everything the city had on modern ship AIs, and Krebs’s specific vessel. She thought about adding an article to her reading list on how many Alyansans disappeared in Republic space every year, but knowing that would probably scare her too badly to memorize the ship layout.
Off-world Affairs found Krebs’s ship, said Nisse in soothing gray text that hovered in the air near the articles. It’s in a stellar orbit.
“Thanks,” Elys signed. She was too tired of thinking about Krebs to acknowledge him any louder than that.
Even if he evaded the city’s oversight, the Alyansan people would keep track of him. And a stellar orbit was farther from her than a Mayari orbit would have been.
In a way, it was a good thing she’d never gotten around to telling her personal feed that she was alive. If she survived whatever Krebs did to her before Taia got her back, she could tell people then.
Hours later, a conversation invitation interrupted her reading. When she accepted it, Taia appeared saying, “Hey, how are you doing?” She wore her own face, with Troll and Mighty bouncing around her legs, included in the visualization as nearby loved ones. Nisse added text translations around them telling Taia Yay, you’re here, I missed you!
Elys had missed her too. “Working on some ways to make your heroic rescue easier, after I have all the information I can find on Krebs’s ship.”
“It’s not heroic if I’m doing it because I get lonely with just the dogs in bed now.”
“You’ll be putting yourself in danger to get me out of there. That’s heroic. Glad to hear I’m outpacing the competition, though.”
“Yeah, trust me, there’s nothing sexy about... You know what? Forget I said anything. Only sexiness happens in that bed.” Taia looked up and to her right, then walked somewhere. Her visualization acquired a mug of tea and transmitted an approximation of the floral scent and taste to Elys’s brain.
“Let’s confirm that when I get back.” Elys never had much luck with flirting at a distance.
“Let’s.” At least she made Taia laugh. “Oh, and I’ve been learning about what the off-world operator types have been using for the past few years. All the current information is in the secure archive, so whatever they’re doing now is even more effective than what I’m reading about. Anyway, they have special pickups and a lot of implanted and grown tech. We’ll get you some of that.”
“Under my skin? I’ve seen how that goes wrong.” And how prison staff let a damaged implant fester far too long before they did something about it.
“You’re thinking of metal and plastic components, right?” Taia shook her head. “I’m not a surgeon, but I know that artificial material isn’t good for people. Here we mostly implant stuff your body already makes. It’s totally safe as long as it develops properly, just like any other part of our bodies.”
“Are those special pickups required for all that lab-grown stuff to work? Because Krebs is not going to let me keep mine.”
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Taia talked Elys into letting doctors slide a biocompatible microphone under her collar bone, opposite a tiny transmitter. It took two repetitions of Elys asking what bone Taia was talking about before she used a term Elys knew, which didn’t make her any more confident in this procedure. If it worked, it would be more reliable than relying on Elys to remember everything Krebs might say about the Republic’s invasion plans.
Although the mic would remain active until Elys was back in Alyansa and Krebs was as close to a prison cell as she could get him. The ship stopper, an implanted transmitter loaded with Off-world Affairs’ collection of shipboard AI cracking routines, would keep Krebs’s ship from speeding up, leaving its current orbit, or turning to evade pursuit, should it try to leave the orbit he and Off-world Affairs had agreed on.
Simultaneously, the transmitter was supposed to signal Taia’s CRU that Elys had found information vital to securing Alyansa against the Republic invasion, and Elys was ready to leave the ship. Somebody from Off-world Affairs with less than the usual amount of self-preservation was currently attaching the shut-down mechanism to the propulsion system in Krebs’s ship. But no matter what it’d do if it worked, triggering it relied on a pickup Elys wouldn’t get without a fight.
Both devices were too small to feel. The incisions barely had time to ache before medical professionals swiped some device over them until the cuts became faint pink lines in Elys’s olive-toned skin. Since the devices were made of something even her immune system thought was her own bones, they shouldn’t appear on any technology scans Krebs conducted.
“Our Off-world Affairs operation coordinator says that ideally—”
“Please,” Elys said. “Don’t talk about ideal situations. We won’t get them.” This was at least the fourth time she’d called Taia out on that point.
Taia rolled her eyes. “Off-world affairs made the ship stopper to be activated with a pickup, how’s that? They say any pickup should work.”
“There’s one other thing,” Taia said. “I know you have trouble hearing. Don’t you want the doctors to see if they can fix it?”
“Something’s wrong with my brain, not my ears.” A problem people sometimes had well before Hochberg and her famous mutation, which would make much less money for whoever someday solved it. “I’m sure your doctors have procedures that’d affect it, but I’m used to dealing with it the way it is. I don’t want to make major changes right before... Well, not right now, thanks.”
Taia chuckled. “Yeah, I know what you mean about unnecessary major surgery.”
Elys ducked her head to hide her blush. “Highly unnecessary, in your case.”
What she’d told Taia was the least important of Elys’s reasons for leaving her hearing the way it was, although it was the easiest to explain. Even if she made time for major surgery and it went well, what if she didn’t like the new way the universe sounded? Nobody could restore her current auditory experience after it’d been surgically altered.
“Remember, we’ll be watching for your signal, all day every day,” Taia said. “A person and the city both. When that transmitter activates, we’ll know you’re ready to come home.” Nisse put a message alert in the corner of Elys’s vision, which she ignored while Taia continued, “And if we don’t get the signal in forty-eight hours, we’ll come get you anyway.”
The message was from Zahra Wirth. If the Republic’s really coming after us, it’ll set back Honesty Alyansa’s work by decades. Don’t let them do it. As if all Elys needed to go through with this was heavy-handed encouragement from someone who’d used Elys to further her own agenda.
Despite what Taia said and Zahra Wirth implied, Elys’s odds of leaving Krebs’s ship on her own terms were pretty bad. She’d do the best she could to find what Alyansa needed to protect itself, and if anyone could make that improbable rescue happen, Taia could. Elys had to believe she’d do what she said she would. That was the only way she’d be able to follow through with this plan.
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The day the mediators would hand Elys over to the RIS, she put on what she’d typically been wearing around Alyansa. These clothes were comfortable, they had lots of pockets, and it wouldn’t matter what she wore. Krebs would give her whatever he wanted her to wear and she’d be stuck with it.
For a while, she watched protesters on the street outside her building. The transcript of their shouting indicated that some were drumming up votes for a proposal to stop Off-world Affairs from trading Alyansan citizens to the Republic, like Off-World Affairs’ partial archived record of the conversation with Krebs implied they were doing to Elys.
Other protesters wanted a CRU to take Elys to a hospital, since they’d concluded that this was an elaborate suicide attempt. The remaining minority shouted about stopping all dealmaking with the Republic. Somebody caught her watching and pointed. When the protestors started waving and shouting at the cameras, Elys disconnected from the street feed.
An hour before the mediators who’d take her to Krebs arrived, Taia appeared at her door. She didn’t even look at the mediators standing guard outside. She just hugged Elys as soon as the door opened.
“How are you doing?” The kindness in Taia’s voice reminded Elys of just what she’d agreed to do, and made the muscles in her stomach clench even tighter.
“Well enough.” Elys nodded to the mediators outside, but they weren’t in on Off-world Affairs’ plan, and they didn’t return the gesture. Elys shut the door.
“I don’t even know what to say.” Although, that’d never stopped Taia before. She started the cooker making tea. “I’m proud of you for doing this. I’m going to miss you. I... I’m really going to miss you, until we get you back. And we will.”
“I know.” Elys didn’t, but sharing her doubts would make Taia work even harder at the futile task of making Elys feel better about becoming another of the RIS’s prisoners. “I’ll have you out there backing me up. I’ll be fine.”
Taia gave her a look that said “don’t,” so she must’ve seen through Elys’s attempted optimism. “Do you... Is there anything you want from me now? Or that you want me to do while you’re gone? It doesn’t look like you have any pets or plants that need watching.”
“No. I’ll feel better just knowing your CRU is ready to come get me when I know what the Republic’s planning for Alyansa. And for now...” Elys accepted a mug of tea. “Could you just sit with me until it’s time to go?”
“Of course.”
They sat on Elys’s couch, crammed together on the right half of it. The warm mug in her hands and Taia’s sturdy weight against Elys’s side slowed her heart rate to a manageable level. Nothing else she’d tried this morning had.
“This has been one of the most challenging, interesting, exhilarating weeks of my life.” Elys’s hand gripped Taia’s. “And you’re the one who let me meet the city, and see Alyansa, and... live here. So. Thank you.”
Taia sniffled. “Thank you for helping us all keep living here.” If she started crying Elys would too, and they’d be a mess. But if that was what she needed, then Elys could tolerate a few minutes of falling apart.
They both put their tea on the little tables attached to the couch at the same time. The impact when they hugged each other with the same desperate force made Elys laugh a little, but Taia was crying into her shoulder, and Elys started too. They held each other until mediators let themselves in to take Elys to Krebs’s ship.