Prophets

from a console on the bridge, surprised at Mosasa’s disembodied voice. “Kugara, take Wahid and go to Fitzpatrick’s cabin. Take Nickolai into custody.”

She looked around, as if searching for him. “Nickolai, why?”

“He confessed to sabotaging the tach-comm—”

“What?”

“He is in the employ of unknown forces and is unpredictable. I want him restrained in a cabin, and I want you guarding him during the jump. Tsoravitch will handle your station.”

“But—”

“Now! I’m not going to allow this to delay our jump!”

Less than a minute after Mosasa had said, “Stop testing me, priest,” The door to Mallory’s cabin slid open. Nickolai turned and saw Wahid and Kugara standing on the other side.

“Yeah, I was fucking paranoid.” Wahid shook his head and gave the two of them a thin little smile. He pointed the brick of a gamma laser at Nickolai’s midsection. “Do me a favor,” he said. “Unholster that slug thrower and toss it over here.”

Kugara pointed her needlegun at him and looked at him with a hard expression that told him nothing.

Nickolai knew that he could easily take out the two threats in front of him, disarm them before they fired, if he cared to. But what point was there to it? He could take over this ship, and then what? Drift until the abyss claimed him?

Better to accept his fate with what little dignity he had left.

He took Mr. Antonio’s gun from its holster and gently tossed the weapon to Wahid. It felt blasphemous, watching one of the Fallen catch the icon.

“We’re going back to your cabin, tiger-boy.” Wahid told him.

Nickolai nodded.

Wahid grimaced and gestured with the gamma laser. “Move it.”

The two of them allowed him to take the lead, and as he passed them he noted his last chance to overpower both of them before getting shot.

“What the hell were you trying to do?” Wahid said from behind him. “Why didn’t you just strap a bomb to your chest, you morey fuck? It’d be quicker.”

Nickolai didn’t answer. For himself, he knew the answer. If Mr. Antonio had told him the consequences of his sabotage, he never would have agreed. Suicide was the ultimate cowardice, and while Nickolai might have been damned for many things, cowardice would never be one of them.

But why did Mr. Antonio wish Mosasa dead in this particular fashion? Nickolai was a warrior and had access to the whole mission. Had he been given simple instructions to eliminate the AI—or even the whole crew here—he could have done so. Even if there was some doubt about the location of Mosasa’s AI brain while they were planetside, once they were on the Eclipse the nature of interstellar communication meant that the thing had to be on board.

Nickolai went quietly to his cabin. Kugara stepped in behind him. “Arms behind you.”

“What?”

“Do what she says,” Wahid told him.

Nickolai complied. He felt her grab his wrists and start wrapping something around them. He glanced back, and saw her pulling a roll of emergency sealant tape around his limbs, the same material that you’d use to seal tears and punctures in an environment suit or a ship’s hull in a pinch. It bonded to itself and other synthetic materials instantly.

“My arm . . .” Nickolai began to say. But it was pointless. Did it matter that the tape binding him permanently fused to the pseudoflesh of his arm?

His real arm felt the warmth as the tape bonded to his artificial limb.

“Legs,” she told him.