“Wait,” M-Bot said. “You’re leaving me with him?”
“I’ll be back tonight,” I promised.
“I see. Could you come to the cockpit so we can speak in private?”
I looked at the ship, frowning.
“I don’t want to explain in public why I like you better than the engineer,” M-Bot added. “If he heard me go on—at length—regarding his irresolvable flaws, he might feel belittled or despondent.”
“Well, that part is going to be lovely,” Rig said, rolling his eyes. “Maybe we can find a way to shut off the personality.”
I pulled myself up into the cockpit. The canopy moved down and sealed with a whoosh. “It’s all right,” I said to M-Bot. “Rig is good people. He’ll take care of you.”
“I am, of course, simply emulating the way humans play irrational favorites over one another. But could you not go?”
“I’m sorry. I’ve got to go learn to fight the Krell.” I frowned at the tone in the robot’s voice. “What’s wrong? I told you, Rig is a good—”
“I am willing to accept that he is until evidence proves otherwise. This is a problem: I appear to have lost my master.”
“I can be your new master.”
“I cannot change masters without proper authentication codes,” he said. “Which I just realized I do not remember. The problem, however, is larger than this mere fact. I do not remember my mission. I do not know where I came from. I do not know my purpose. If I were human, I would be . . . scared.”
How did I respond to that? A frightened starship?
“Don’t worry,” I said. “We’ll give you a new purpose—destroying the Krell. You’re a fighter. M-Bot. I’m sure that name stands for something exciting. Murderbot . . . mayhembot. Massacrebot. That’s it, I’m sure. You’re a frightening, all-powerful death ship designed to fry the Krell and save humanity.”
“I do not feel very frightening,” he said. “I do not feel like a death ship.”
“We’ll deal with that,” I promised. “Trust me.”
“And can I trust that those words are not . . . a falsehood? Like the one to tell the engineer’s parents?”
Well. That came back to bite me faster than I’d expected.
“I must ask you,” M-Bot said more softly, “not to tell any others about me. I assumed you’d understood this earlier, when I explained my orders. I am supposed to ‘lie low,’ which is a colloquialism for remaining inconspicuous. You should not have told the engineer.”
“And how would we repair you, otherwise?”
“I do not know. Spensa, I am an artificial intelligence—a computer. I must obey my orders. Please. You can’t turn me over to your DDF. You must not even speak of me to anyone else.”
Well, that was going to present a problem. I wanted to get this thing flying, and once I did, that would mean flying it to help in the fight against the Krell. And if we couldn’t fix it . . . well, I’d need to turn it over. Regardless of what I thought of Ironsides, I couldn’t just sit on this ship forever. Not if it could mean the difference between the survival and extinction of humanity.
I had opened my mouth to argue with M-Bot further when a set of lights started flashing on the dashboard.
“Multiple atmospheric incursions have been detected by my short-range sensors,” M-Bot said. “Debris has begun falling toward the planet, with forty-three ships following.”
“Forty-three?” I said, glancing at his sensor readout. Short range for him was apparently still pretty long, by our standards. “Wow. You can spot them, even in a debris fall?”
“Easily.”
Proof already that the DDF could use this technology. Our scanners weren’t as accurate as that. That knowledge immediately made me uncomfortable.
Still, forty-three Krell? The maximum they ever fielded was a hundred ships, so this was an impressive force. I hit the button to open the canopy, then hauled myself out and hopped off onto a rock.
“Krell,” I said to Rig. “A big flight.”
“Are we in danger here?”
“No, they’re coming from the other direction. But the cadets have been training long enough now that Ironsides has started sending them up for real, as support units, during combat. Firestorm Flight went two days ago.”
“So . . .”
“So I’d better get going. Just in case.”
19
I started running.
A sense of anxiety built in me as I heard the distant sound of debris hitting. I somehow knew that Ironsides would send my flight up for this attack. She liked testing cadets in real combat experience, and we were far enough in our training that Cobb had warned we’d soon be sent into some real battles.
It was our turn. The time had come. So I forced myself into a jog—then a dash—across the dusty ground.
Sweat pouring down the sides of my face, I felt a horrible inevitability as I approached the base, where warning klaxons blared. Not fear, really, but dread. What if I was too late? What if the others went into battle without me?
I entered the base, then rounded the outside wall toward our launchpad. A single ship sat there, alone. I had been right.
I reached my ship in a sweaty mess, pushing my own ladder into place as several members of the ground crew noticed me and started yelling.
One got there in time to stabilize my ladder. “Where have you been, cadet!” she shouted at me. “The rest of your flight went up twenty minutes ago!”
I shook my head, sliding into the cockpit, too exhausted to speak.
“No pressure suit?” the ground crewer said.
“No time.”
“All right. Don’t make any sharp ascents then. You have clearance to go. Call in to your flightleader, then move.”
I nodded, then pulled on my helmet. This one—like the one in the training room—had the strange lumps inside, to measure whatever it was they wanted to measure about me. I flipped on the flight radio band as the canopy lowered.
“—don’t let your nerves get the best of you,” Jerkface was saying over the radio. “Stay focused, watch your wingmate. You heard Cobb. We don’t have to fire. Just focus on keeping yourselves from being turned to slag.”
“What?” I said. “What’s going on?”
“Spin?” Jerkface asked. “Where have you been?”
“In my cave! Where else would I be?” I engaged my acclivity ring and launched my ship upward. G-forces hit me, and my stomach felt like it was trying to escape through my toes. I slowed the ascent. “Repeat that part to me. You’re going into battle? You’re not staying at the edge of combat?”
“The admiral finally wants to let us fight!” Bim said, eager.
“Contain yourself, Bim,” Jerkface said. “Spin, we’re at 11.3-302.7-21000. Get here as fast as you can. Ironsides has ordered us into a small firefight alongside a flight of full pilots. We’re there to confuse the enemy and hopefully split their attention.”
In other words, we’re being sent in as targets. I thought, wiping my hand on my jumpsuit, my heartbeat thrumming, sweat making my hair stick to my face. Or they are. Without me.