Chiron’s meeting with Amelia Aziner went about as well as could be expected. Roxy had gone along with the group, defending Chiron vociferously when Amelia had, at first, tried to treat Chiron like a machine. They’d eventually sat down all together, in the dockside lounge area they’d used before, but Chiron refused to provide his ident chip for their scanner, and Roxy backed him up. Billie suspected that with Chiron present, all the cyborgs still in the ship had a direct line to whatever happened. He was probably getting advice from his brethren as they went along.
“I don’t understand why you didn’t tell us you had cyborgs aboard when we first discussed the raiders. They could help us.” Amelia Aziner sounded mad, but Billie wasn’t impressed.
“I don’t know what you’ve heard, but the cyborgs who rescued us when the station was overrun aren’t what we were all led to believe. They remember, Amelia.” Roxy spoke with clear emotion in her voice. “They may have been more machinelike at first, but their brains have overcome the implants, somehow, and they remember who they were. The men they were—and are again.”
“Ridiculous,” one of Amelia’s companions scoffed. She’d brought more than just her grandkids to this meeting as a show of force, Billie reasoned, but it wasn’t really working. Chiron was bigger and more badass than any of the callow youths Amelia had acting as her backup.
“Cyborg,” Amelia Aziner addressed Chiron while Billie bristled at the condescending, disrespectful tone. “Do you really expect me to believe you can think and act on your own? I’ve seen what neural implantation does to a brain.”
“I wasn’t a doctor, ma’am,” Chiron replied, his sitting pose as human as he could make it, considering the mechanical limbs he sported. “All I know is that we’ve been waking up. I was one of the first men modified in our group, and I woke first. I remember my life before. I remember my family, my friends, my education and my career until the point where I was nearly killed. Then, there’s a blank when I believe my actions were totally under the control of the implanted computers in my brain. And then, slowly, I started to become more aware of my surroundings, a little at a time, until I realized what had been done to me and where I was.”
“Where were you when this process supposedly started?” Amelia still sounded skeptical, but a little more willing to listen.
“The first flash of awareness came when I was being ordered to shoot a child,” he admitted, grimacing.
A few of the people with Amelia gasped. The old lady looked a bit aghast, as well. “Surely not. The human military doesn’t commit atrocities.”
Chiron sighed and rubbed one hand over his jaw. “Have you heard of the Pollander Two Uprising?”
Billie got a sick feeling in her stomach. The news vids had been full of horrible scenes from the far-flung outpost where civilians had tried to stage a revolt against the colonial government and their brutal labor conditions. Due to the rich resources of the planet and its strategic placement in the galaxy, the government back on Earth had sent in troops to stabilize the situation.
“My platoon was under the command of Major Manachi. His idea of keeping the peace was to kill everyone in the rebel camp, including the non-combatants—the injured, old people, and mothers with children.”
Billie recognized the name of the officer. He’d been tried for war crimes later, when evidence of his butchery had leaked out, somehow.
“I remember seeing shocking body-cam footage on the news,” Amelia allowed, her words coming slower now, less accusatory.
“That was mine,” Chiron admitted. “When he ordered us to shoot the children, I…” His expression was pained. “I couldn’t. He didn’t realize it because the rest of my platoon was still under the compulsion of the computers in their brains. They mowed down those kids, and I had to watch,” he said, his voice filled with palpable pain. He paused a moment, then cleared his throat and went on. “Mercifully, the next command given, after the massacre, seemed to reboot my system, and I went back under. But I recorded the whole thing over my optical implant. During another lucid moment, I hacked into a news server and uploaded the footage before we left orbit. Thankfully, nobody ever traced the leak to me, but the news got out, and Manachi was punished. Others weren’t.” He looked grim. “After that, the waking moments came more often until I was completely self-aware again, and aboard Eagle Nest Station. I recognized the signs when others of the cyborg contingent there started overcoming their programming and was able to help them hide it from our commanders.”
“Are all of you…awake now?” Amelia asked tentatively.
“To different degrees, but yes. We all remember who we were, and we’re striving to reconcile that with what we’ve become,” he told her honestly.
“What was your name?” Amelia asked, her eyes taking on a shrewd light.
“Sorry, ma’am. You won’t get that out of me. As far as I’m concerned, my former identity is dead and gone. It’s easier that way.” He didn’t explain why, but Billie assumed he’d left family behind back on Earth. “My name is Chiron, now.”
Amelia cocked her head as if thinking. “Like the ancient Greek teacher of heroes?”
“I loved mythology as a young man. I studied the classics in school. When I ended up in the role of guide to the others, it seemed a good fit. I’m just a soldier. The rest… They’re the real heroes.”
Roxy reached out to her man, wrapping her hand around his upper arm and snuggling close. Amelia followed the motion with alert eyes. She seemed to finally realize that the machine sitting before her wasn’t just a machine. That’s when the real bargaining started.
They relayed the results of their meeting at another of the ship-wide gatherings after dinner that night. They had eaten fresh produce bought from the station after many of the women had returned triumphant from their shopping expeditions. Everyone was feeling somewhat mellow when the meeting began, but they didn’t stay that way for long.
They waited until the younger children—Sam among them—had been taken off to a play area before starting. Cordelia looked around the room with disappointment in her gaze, and people started to perk up and question what this impromptu meeting was all about. They didn’t have to wait long to find out.
“I’m glad you all had fun shopping,” Cordelia began. “The thing is… A few of your fellow travelers abused the privilege and the trust we placed in them. You may notice that Ms. Willow and Mrs. Longfellow and their children are no longer in their quarters, and in fact, they are no longer on the ship, at all. They will not be coming back. While it is true they both expressed a desire to stay on the colony, even before we got here and found out what was going on, they had also promised not to reveal the presence of our cyborg friends. Unfortunately, they lied.”
Gasps and expressions of disbelief and worry shone around the room. Cordelia waited for the murmuring to die down before continuing.
“We received some rather accusatory communications from station management and colony control and had to admit to the presence of cyborgs aboard.” Cordelia leveled her stern gaze on everyone. Even Billie was a little intimidated by that look. “A hasty meeting was arranged, and we have tried to make lemonade out of lemons, as the expression goes. Chiron met with Amelia Aziner and a delegation from the colony. Long story short, the colonists, at first, demanded cyborg compliance. They wanted us to leave some of the men here. They wanted to bargain with me to trade for them, like commodities.”
The disgust was clear in Cordelia’s voice. Billie realized she—and a lot of the others—had come a long way in their beliefs about the man-machines who had saved them.
“We refused, of course,” Roxy put in. “And then, Chiron had a few things to say to Mrs. Aziner.”
Roxy looked smug, winking at her big cyborg as he smiled gently back. It was so clear to anybody watching them that they were in love. They were totally devoted to each other.
“They thought they could command the cyborgs to work in their factories, or in some other industry, until such time as another raid happened and they needed protection. Then, they just assumed the cyborgs would fight for them, without question.”
“While we do, generally, like to help people out when we can,” Medeus put in from his position standing beside Chiron, “we have no ties to this colony. We’ve only just become self-aware, again. None of us are willing to go back to being pawns. We’re men with free will, and we won’t work with anyone who doesn’t understand that and respect it.”
A chorus of agreeable murmurs rose from among the women.
“That’s your right,” Billie found herself saying. She hadn’t meant to speak aloud, but when eyes turned to her, she elaborated, appealing to those sitting near her who looked undecided about all of this. “They didn’t have to take us with them,” she reminded her fellow refugees. “They could’ve left the station, and us, behind and never looked back. We owe them. At the very least, we owe them the respect due any other fellow human being.”
Many of the doubters nodded at her words, and Billie couldn’t help but look over to see Medeus’s expression. It was almost unreadable, but there was something shining in his eyes. Something warm that made her feel as if he approved of her outburst.
“Well said,” Cordelia complimented Billie. “There’s more. Once Aziner realized she couldn’t just command cyborg protection or trade for them, we really started talking. I think the biggest problem was that they saw us as either a threat or liars for not disclosing the presence of cyborgs aboard. Chiron was able to explain things.”
“The gist of it is that we might be able to leave them with some protection when we go,” Chiron said.
“The rail gun?” one of the ladies who’d been working with Roxy in the engine room asked.
Medeus nodded. “We’re going to give it to them. We’re not trading for it, exactly, though we’re talking about accepting some parts that they can easily spare from which we hope to build a replacement for our own use. We’ll advise them on where to install it for optimum coverage and provide detailed instructions for their people to get it down to the planet and mounted in place.”
“Why don’t a few of you just go downside to install it?” one of the women asked.
“A couple of reasons,” Chiron replied. “First, none of us want to take the chance of not being allowed to return to the ship. We’re safer up here where we have control of the systems. It’s not likely, but the colonists could attempt imprisoning us, and then, we’d have to break out and cause damage. Maybe kill people in the process. We want to leave here as friends, not make more enemies.”
“Secondly,” Medeus picked up right where Chiron left off, “we want the ship away from here before the weapon goes active. Just in case.”
Some of the women looked frightened, but many nodded, understanding the cyborgs’ reasoning. Billie knew there were probably a few more reasons that the men were keeping to themselves, but the first two were persuasive enough.
“Giving them the final pieces of the weapon will be the last thing we do before we undock,” Medeus went on. “If all goes well, we’re also willing to take a closer look around the system before we leave it entirely and see if we can find any clue as to where these raiders are, or have gone. Something’s been interfering with trade to the colony, and it might be something simple that we can fix on our way out. I’d rather leave this place as friends. We might have to come back here someday for more supplies, and it’s good to have at least one friendly port available during the storm in which we find ourselves.”
Amelia seemed more than satisfied when she saw the first pieces of the rail gun being offloaded from the Toby. A few of the less-modified cyborgs were openly working in the cargo area now, observing and being observed by the people in the corridor of the station. It was all very tentative trust on the station folks’ side, but also a subtle show of force from the cyborgs and refugees aboard the Toby.
Medeus had no doubt that the two defectors and their children had already told the station folk all they knew about the Toby and her crew. He felt betrayed a bit by those women and their kids but tried not to let it get him down. The support from the rest of the ladies meant a lot and was helping to boost morale among the cyborg crew. That was a good thing.
Perhaps the two who had abandoned ship had inadvertently caused a unification to occur that might otherwise have taken a lot longer. Maybe it would all work out for the best in the long run. He certainly hoped so.
That the majority of the women had spoken positively about the cyborg influence on the ship was a good, visible improvement. The early days on the Toby had been filled with sidelong glances and mistrustful looks sent in the direction of the cyborg men by the female refugees. When nothing untoward had happened, and they all started working together a little more, things had gradually changed.
The women had lost some of the fear. They’d been more at ease around the men. But full acceptance hadn’t yet arrived. Not for most of the men. Not for Medeus.
Chiron had his Roxy, and she was making great inroads in introducing him around to the rest of the ladies. They had been asking him all sorts of questions, and Medeus thought there was no better ambassador than the man who had awakened before all of them, and had successfully transitioned from cyborg to lover. Roxy helped, too. Her steadfast position beside Chiron and the rather obvious glow of happiness around her was very effective in disarming those who still felt a bit of mistrust in their hearts.
Medeus had it a little rougher than the others because of the obviousness of his repairs. He just looked more like a machine than most of the others. One of his eyes, half his face, most of his limbs, and more had been replaced with cybertronic parts. Unlike the other men, little time had been wasted on making his replacement parts look more like the original.
He had some truly gruesome-looking scars that the others didn’t have. As if the doctors hadn’t cared how he’d look after he was repaired. But they’d hidden the other cyborgs’ scars, so why not his? He would never know, and hadn’t really cared, until the refugees from Eagle Nest Station made him realize how scary he probably appeared to them.
He had never minded it…until now. When some of the children aboard stared, their eyes wide with fear as he passed, it bothered him. When the women moved to the other side of a passageway to give him a wide berth, he noticed, and it hurt.
But little things were helping him feel not quite so estranged. Billie’s smile. Billie’s admiring looks that she probably thought he hadn’t noticed. Billie’s kiss…
That kiss had rocked his world.
And the fact that she’d spoken out at that last meeting. She’d voiced her support in a way that had warmed the cold recesses of his mechanical heart. He hadn’t really expected her to say anything, but when she did, he could hear the truth of her belief—her faith in his humanity. It had been a humbling moment.
A moment that gave him hope. Though he probably shouldn’t even dream of such things. Chiron wasn’t half as scary looking as Medeus. Just because Chiron had been able to commit to a woman and have her return the favor, didn’t mean that Billie would succumb to Medeus’s dubious charms.
Medeus watched the offload of the rail gun components from a position of concealment within the cargo hold. He did not want any of the station people to see him. The cyborgs had discussed it among themselves and decided that only those who looked mostly human should be seen by the colonists. It was all part of the plan to try to convince the colonists that they were, indeed, men. Not machines.
Medeus had pointed out to his fellows that their future was uncertain. It would be better to leave this colony as friends, rather than enemies. They might want to come back someday, so anything they could do now to smooth the way later, was a good thing.
He was surprised when Billie walked up to stand beside him. She stood in the hatchway behind which he monitored the offload via a combination of the cyborg network, visual relays, and floater cams in the hold. He stood carefully out of sight, but Billie was probably visible to anyone who looked closely.
“How’s it going, Captain?” she asked, taking a look out the hatch herself.
“They should be finished shortly,” he replied.
“I’ve got the course we discussed plotted and laid in,” she said brightly. “Nav is ready when you are.”
“Good to know,” he said, wondering why she’d really come down here.
Maybe it was just curiosity. Maybe she was nervous about getting free of the station. Or maybe… Dare he hope? Maybe she had just wanted to talk with him. Be around him in a less formal atmosphere than the bridge.
“I’m glad you stopped,” he told her. “I wanted to thank you for speaking up at the meeting last night. That was kind of you.”
She gave him a surprised look. “It was nothing less than the truth.”
“Still…” His gaze met hers, and he noted that she didn’t flinch. She had never flinched from looking at his ruined face. She was a very special woman, indeed. “You didn’t have to say anything. I am grateful for your support.”
She stepped closer to him, turning slightly to face him. “I…” She took a breath before continuing in a softer tone of voice. “I believe in you, Medeus. I know you and your brethren have probably all been through hell of one kind or another. I don’t want any of us to cause any of you any more pain.”
“That’s…” He was so touched he had to stop and think for a moment how to reply.
But he wasn’t to get the chance. One of the cyborgs within the cargo hold signaled at that moment. Amelia Aziner was standing at the dock entrance, where she could clearly see Billie—a face she recognized from previous encounters.
“Mrs. Aziner has some questions, Navigator,” Jason relayed as he approached Billie. She turned away, and the moment was lost.
No matter. Medeus needed time to digest what she had said and the subtle nuances of her expression. They would be underway, soon, if all went as planned. He’d have time to talk to her, again, once he figured out what to say.
“Sorry. I’ll handle her. Could you page Cordelia, just in case?” Billie asked him before turning to go.
He agreed as she walked through into the cargo hold and then to the wide dockside hatch through which cargo was loaded and unloaded. Medeus followed her progress with a floating cam, even as he sent an alert through the ship, requesting Cordelia’s presence at dockside. Billie had left his side, but the fresh apple scent of her hair lingered in his brain.