“No, she’s down to the bone,” I assured him. I paused. “Actual armored lining?”
Lyth grimaced. “Armored lining, metal spine, titanium extruded tendons. They tweaked her muscle fibers, so her strength is enhanced and her reaction time increased. She’s ex-Ranger…but so is everyone on Juliyana’s ship.”
“They’re not all enhanced like Calpurnia,” I guessed.
“She’s unique,” Lyth admitted. “We’ve seen enhancements at the Institute. Had requests for them more than once, from those who don’t understand what we actually do there. But I’ve never seen anything like Calpurnia, before.”
The Institute’s aims were the exact opposite of Calpurnia’s. They put AIs into unenhanced, utterly human bodies.
“So, what are you going to do?” I asked. “About Juliyana,” I added, for Calpurnia could clearly take care of herself. Although I did wonder why Juliyana had got together with a human who was more cyborg than woman.
“I’ll do what I’ve always done,” Lyth said. “I’ll wait Juliyana out.” There was more than a dollop of wry self-awareness in his voice. “She will be back.”
Through the nanobot constructed walls of the diner, a metallic grinding sounded. I jerked upright. “Lyssa?”
“The outer hatch just opened,” Lyssa said. After a pause, she added, “It is Calpurnia.”
“She opened the outer hatch by herself? While weightless?” The outer hatch was too heavy for the average human to open without assistance from Lyssa.
“She put her boot on my hull,” Lyssa said, sounding affronted.
I glanced at Lyth, startled. “You weren’t kidding about the enhancements.”
“I didn’t think mind-reading was one of them,” he replied. “It has to be a coincidence that she arrived right now. What does she want, Lyssa?”
“She wants to speak to Danny.” Lyssa paused again, for she would be standing with Calpurnia, talking with her even as she was talking to us. “She didn’t realize that our ship time wasn’t matched to theirs. It’s just past noon on the Penthos.”
“Bring her here,” I told Lyssa, for the diner was neutral territory, and Lyth’s presence would stop me from over-reacting. “And turn the lights up, please.”
The light level rose and Lyth winced and blinked, adjusting to the brightness.
I didn’t bother warning Lyth to be nice to the woman because I knew damn well he’d be nicer than I would. I, on the other hand, wanted to rip the metal guts out of her.
—26—
Calpurnia glanced around the diner. Her gaze paused for a long heartbeat on the street view through the windows, but as it was night out there, most of the residents of the sleepy little town were off-stage.
Then Calpurnia’s gaze moved on, sizing up, taking in details. She was measuring the room the way a combatant did, but her nod to Lyth and me was polite, even relaxed. She came to a halt a few paces away from the table. The overhead light made the thick golden streaks in her hair gleam. I wondered if they weren’t cosmetic, after all.
“Sorry to disturb your evening,” she told me.
“But now you have…?” I replied.
She blinked at that. “I have the coordinates for the closest planet we suspect to be staked out by the Blue ones. We should move there as soon as possible.” She stepped forward and put a datasphere on the table in front of me.
I looked down at the scratched old ball, puzzled. “You could have given those coordinates to Lyssa and left us undisturbed.”
Calpurnia shook her head. She had a narrow, delicate chin, which was at odds with the bouncing, muscled strength of her. In fact, her face was a lovely heart-shape, which I had failed to notice until now. “Using Lyssa for communications would be against the terms of our contract.”
Both Lyth and I stared at her.
“What?” I managed to ask.
Calpurnia stood at ease, her feet apart, her hands neutral, hanging at her sides. She shrugged, as if we had merely raised a brow, instead of being utterly speechless. “No AI assistance. They’re paying a bonus for us to do it the hard way.”
Paper charts and printouts. Manually figuring out odds and locations…
“No one can operate without AI assistance in deep space,” I shot back, my ire rising. “Whose stupid ass idea was that? It puts the entire fucking ship at risk! What was she thinking, taking a contract like that?”
“We can use computers,” Calpurnia said, with the tiniest of shrugs. She seemed uninterested in our horror, which made me calm down a fraction and wonder if her indifference was hiding something.
“Who is your contract with?” I demanded, suspicion building.
“I can’t say,” Calpurnia replied.
“Fuck non-disclosures,” I began heatedly, but Lyth squeezed my arm, this time, and I sucked back in all the venom that wanted to spew.
“It doesn’t matter whose signature is at the bottom of the contract,” Lyth told me. “It won’t be a real name. But I don’t need to know the real name.” He looked at Calpurnia, his gaze steady. “They’re Humanists,” he said, for my benefit. “One of their own got snatched by the Blue ones, and they want them back…but on their terms.”
Calpurnia crossed her arms, which made her impressive biceps and shoulders flex.
“That is why Juliyana didn’t come to me for help,” Lyth added. I could hear the bitterness in his tone, buried but there.
I studied Calpurnia. Had she dropped this morsel upon Lyth to make him hurt? She had succeeded, if that was her goal.
“I want to speak to Juliyana,” I told her.
“I speak on her behalf,” Calpurnia replied.
“You could represent the ghosts of the Imperial House of fucking Tanique, and I still wouldn’t deal with you,” I told her. “You have a personal agenda, and you’re using the current situation to advance it. That makes you an unpleasant human, and means you’re tripping me up.”
Calpurnia opened her mouth to speak, her eyes narrowed angrily.
I didn’t give her the chance. “If Juliyana wants us to cooperate, she can get her ass over here and deal with me, captain to captain. Otherwise, go back to your ship, detach, and fuck off. I’m
