Battalion 1

Dr. Irvine passed back and forth between two capsules, tapped on the controls, and both covers opened. Rhinehart and Henshaw took a long time to come to their senses.

Rhodes and his people stood in silence while Rhinehart opened his eyes. The battalion interfaced with him, but none of them could see Rocky. He kept himself small and silent.

Rhinehart groaned and his hand drifted to his head. He squinted trying to see through his puffy eyelid.

Rhodes went over to his bed. “How do you feel, Lieutenant?”

“Captain….” Rhinehart croaked. “What happened?”

“Rocky malfunctioned. You’ve been offline while we try to figure out how to correct the problem.”

“I don’t……I don’t remember anything…..”

“You don’t remember what you were doing right before you woke up here? Do you remember anything that happened in the barracks?”

“No. What happened in the barracks?”

“What’s the last thing you remember about talking to Rocky?” Rhodes asked.

Rhinehart frowned, shut his eyes, and then scowled at the lab around him. “I remember….I was sitting on the edge of my capsule about to go to sleep. I was talking to Rocky…..and then I wound up here.”

“Rocky is making himself small and silent right now. We’re going to interface with you and make him big, okay? Then we’ll see if he’s functioning correctly. Are you ready for that?”

Rhinehart sank back into his mattress. “Sure. Do whatever you have to do.”

“At least Rhinehart will be too weak to attack anyone if he has a problem,” Murphy growled from the side.

Rhodes, Lauer, Oakes, Dietz, Fuentes, and Thackery all entered the interface. All their SAMs watched, too.

“You can make yourself big again, Rocky,” Rhodes ordered. “Let Rhinehart see you.”

Rocky expanded. He didn’t look like a Khikvid anymore. He was back to looking like a horse. “Here I am,” he announced in his higher, softer voice. “It’s good to see you again, Dane.”

“Hey, pal,” Rhinehart husked. “How you doing?”

“I’m doing well, but it’s good to be back. We’ve been offline for a long time.”

Rhodes didn’t see anything wrong with their interaction. Could the problem be so simple to correct just by changing Rocky’s appearance?

Only time would tell. Rhodes turned to Henshaw. She took longer to wake up. She moaned with her eyes closed.

Rhodes and the others interfaced with her, but Rhodes didn’t see Koen. Rhodes didn’t even see a pinprick that might have been Keon hiding from everyone.

“Where is he?” Murphy asked.

“He doesn’t want to face us after trying to kill Henshaw,” Wild muttered.

“He must be here somewhere.” Rhodes turned to Dr. Irvine. “Can you make Keon bigger so we can see him?”

Dr. Irvine scowled at his equipment. “According to my readings, Keon is already as big as he can get. He should be covering the whole Grid right now.”

Rhodes looked around at nothing. “Am I missing something?”

Henshaw stretched on the mattress again. She started to raise her hand toward her head.

He didn’t see anything out of the ordinary until Henshaw’s SAM started to expand. It hovered to one side of her head and got bigger….and bigger.

Rhodes stared at the image. It wasn’t Koen’s chubby panda face. This one was a hard starburst of crystalline shards jutting outward from cold, mean eyes. Glass shards made up the SAM’s tight, hard lips.

“Who the hell are you?” Rhodes gasped.

“Legacy,” the SAM growled in a low, deadly snarl. “And you are Captain Corban Rhodes. I thought I killed you.”

Rhodes opened his mouth to say that, no, Legacy didn’t kill Rhodes, but at that moment. Rhodes caught a flash of movement in the corner of his eye.

Henshaw raised her arm to touch her head and face. She still didn’t open her eyes.

Rhodes didn’t think anything of that movement at first. He’d seen countless people do that when they first came out of conversion cycles, especially long ones.

His stunned surprise at seeing a different SAM in Henshaw’s interface distracted Rhodes for a split second.

Then he realized she wasn’t raising her hand to her head to rub her eyes or run her fingers through her hair. She raised her arm to aim her scourge gun at her own face.

Lauer and Oakes both realized the same thing at the same time. “Captain—look out!” they both yelled.

Rhodes spun around. He was the closest to Henshaw.

He dove on top of her arm and forced it down on the bed. Her long conversion cycle made her weak enough for him to restrain her easily.

“Shut her down!” he yelled to Dr. Irvine. “Take her offline—NOW!!”

Irvine pounced on his controls and scrambled through a rapid flurry of button pressing. Henshaw went limp and Legacy disappeared.

Rhodes slumped there breathing hard. “Jesus!”

“What the hell was that?” Coulter stammered.

“Legacy must have replaced Keon somehow. The SAMs got switched.” Rhodes turned to Dr. Irvine. “You have to take Legacy offline and replace him with Koen.”

“I can’t! Uninstalling a SAM would kill her.”

“Then how did Legacy do it?” Oakes asked. “He must have switched them somehow—which means he took Keon offline and replaced Keon with himself. You should be able to do the same thing.”

Dr. Irvine shook his head over his components. “I don’t even know if we have Keon online anywhere anymore. He might be gone.”

“Then you’ll have to install another SAM for Georgie,” Rhodes replied. “You have to find a way to permanently deactivate Legacy. He’ll kill anyone you install him in.”

“Give me some time,” Dr. Irvine exclaimed. “I’ve never done this before.”

Rhodes stared down at Henshaw. It couldn’t be as hopeless as this. She got along so well with Koen. How did this happen?

In that silence, he heard Rhinehart talking to Rocky. They talked easily to each other and Rhinehart laughed at something Rocky said.

Rhodes turned around to look at them. Rhinehart sat on the edge of the bed. He was still smiling from whatever Rocky just said.

“Do you feel okay, Lieutenant?” Rhodes asked.

“Yes, Sir. I feel fine—just still a little weak.”

“You’ll be all right. Your strength will come back.” Rhodes got serious when he turned to the SAM. “Do you remember what happened, Rocky? Do you remember how you and Rhinehart got here?”

“No, Captain. I don’t remember anything except….Rhinehart was sitting on his capsule like he said. He was getting ready to go to sleep.”

“Do you remember how it was when you first came online? Do you remember how much Rhinehart hated you because of the way you looked and sounded?”

The horse head tilted to one side and its eyebrows furrowed. “I don’t remember that, Captain. Rhinehart and I always liked each other.”

“So you don’t remember Rhinehart threatening you?”

Rocky’s eyes shot open. “He did what?”

“He didn’t like the way you looked. You caused some kind of stress response in him. He only started liking you when you changed your appearance.”

Rocky made a slight sneering expression. “I’m sure I would remember that, Captain.”

“My point is that your original appearance caused him problems. I want to make sure you don’t revert back to your old default appearance if something goes wrong.”

“This is my original default appearance, Captain. I don’t have any other appearance I could default to.”

Rhodes dropped the subject and turned back to Henshaw. She was still unconscious. “What’s the story?” he asked Irvine.

“I found Koen’s original activation programming. I just have to isolate Legacy’s so I can make the switch.

“It can’t be this easy,” Wild muttered.

“As soon as you make the switch, I want you to delete Legacy’s program—permanently,” Rhodes told Irvine.

Irvine only nodded. He didn’t act like Rhodes giving orders was anything out of the ordinary. “I will delete it. We can’t risk it infecting someone else.”

“Can I go back to the barracks, Sir?” Rhinehart asked. “I need to lie down.”

“Sure, Lieutenant. You go with him, Coulter.”

“Yes, Sir,” Coulter replied and he and Rhinehart left.

Rhodes didn’t like seeing his battalion getting smaller and smaller. He had to get Henshaw back.

Some computer program either shooting her in the head with her own weapons or causing her to be taken permanently offline—he couldn’t accept either of those outcomes.

Rhodes and the others stood around waiting for another half hour before Irvine finally said, “Okay, I’m ready to make the switch. If it works, she should be back to her old self. If it doesn’t, she’ll be dead.”

“Do it,” Rhodes ordered.

Irvine tapped his components some more and then approached the capsule to wake up Henshaw. She went through the same groaning process.

Rhodes kept a close eye on her to make sure she didn’t point her weapon at anyone.

She eventually opened her eye and her vision swam back into focus when she saw Rhodes. “Captain…..you’re okay!”

“I’m okay, Georgie. We figured out what went wrong with Koen.”

Her face drained of all color and she looked around. “Where is he?”

“He wasn’t the one who tried to kill you. Another SAM removed Keon and replaced him. This other SAM was the one who tried to kill you, but we switched them back. The rest of the battalion and I are interfacing with you. We’ll be with you when Dr. Irvine brings Keon online. Are you ready for that?”

She glanced the other way and nodded, but she didn’t look ready.

Rhodes dipped his chin at Irvine and Irvine did something on his machines. A collection of grid lines appeared in front of Henshaw and went through the usual series of shapes.

It eventually took the shape of a panda. Black and white fur appeared between the grid lines.

“Keon!” she exclaimed. “You’re back.”

Keon looked around and saw Rhodes, Fisher, Lauer, Wild, Fuentes, Van, Thackery, Koenig, Dietz, Zen, Oakes, and Dash all staring at him. “Was I gone?”

“You were offline, but you’re back now,” Rhodes replied. “How do you feel, Koen? What’s the last thing you remember?”

Keon frowned. “I remember….we disembarked from the Ero…..and Dr. Neiland told us we had to come to the lab for testing. Henshaw sat down on the stool and the technician did something to her head. She started to get really angry….and that’s the last thing I remember until right now.”

“That’s when it must have happened. Legacy must have switched places during the behavioral protocol adjustment.”

“What’s Legacy?” Henshaw asked.

“Never mind. We can leave as soon as you’re ready to come back to the barracks.”

“I’m ready now.” She grimaced at the lab. “I can get my strength back in the barracks. This place gives me the creeps.”

End of Chapter 37.