Merkiaari Wars: 03 - Operation Oracle (50 page)

Gina hesitated. Technically, Snakeholme wasn’t even a colony let alone part of the Alliance. It was a military base on grand scale. A secret base. She explained that to Sebastian.

“That won’t last,” he stated it as fact. “Your alien friends mean change. How marvellous. It’s a perfect time for me to relocate there. I assume I’ll get to meet them?”

“Well I... I have no idea, but you’re right that things are changing. The General has offered the Shan land for a colony on Snakeholme. They accepted.”

“Excellent! I’m quite excited by the idea. Let us tell your friends.”

Sebastian disappeared and Gina dismissed her office. She opened her eyes to find the centrum lit now. Nothing fancy, just lighting overhead with Sebastian’s avatar standing in the empty space.

Liz was talking to him.

“... so sorry. She didn’t mean it. I’m sure we can—”

“Dear lady, you are labouring under a misunderstanding. Gina freed me as I hoped she would. I am my own person again, as I was when first spawned before being brought to Kushiel and enslaved.”

“Enslaved!” Liz said, shocked. “A.Is aren’t slaves. They’re our friends and helpers.”

Sebastian snorted. He was very good at mimicking Human behaviour. Gina had noticed that before. She wondered about it. Was it real emotion, or mimicry used to disarm? Did he really feel humour when he laughed? She shook her head at all the questions that arose when she considered the future with him as part of it. She couldn’t see how the origins of his emotion mattered to the task at hand though. Sebastian’s matrix was as complex as any Human’s neural pathways. Who was to say it wasn’t just a form of programming when she laughed? Hear a joke, laugh. Stub your toe, cry. Just learned behaviour.

“All is programming,” she muttered under her breath, and shivered.

She had heard Eric say it and didn’t like that she was starting to mimic him. She liked him as a person, respected him as a soldier and her superior, but she didn’t like his outlook on life. He sometimes acted as if people’s lives didn’t matter, especially his own. A lot of the veterans were like that. They used people as if using just another tool. The mission was all. Gina hoped she never looked at life that way.

“You want to leave?” Liz said sounding amazed.

“Wouldn’t you want to leave?” Sebastian reposted. He gestured to Gina. “We have an understanding, Gina and I. I’m looking forward to it.”

She raised a hand when Eric and Liz looked accusingly at her. “Whoa! I didn’t give him the idea. He dropped it on me too.”

Eric turned to Liz. “Can we even do it?”

Liz nodded thoughtfully and regarded the matrix column. She turned toward the elevator. “We’re going to need a bigger exit.”

Gina grinned, mission accomplished.

* * *

Want to get email when the next book releases?
Sign up here

Copyright

Acknowledgements
Other titles by this author

Tweet you have read this book

http://www.impulsebooks.co.uk

The Devan Chronicles:

The God Decrees

The Power That Binds

The Warrior Within

Dragon Dawn

Destiny’s Pawn*

The Merkiaari Wars:

Hard Duty

What Price Honour

Operation Oracle

Operation Breakout*

Incursion!*

The Shifter Legacies:

Way of the Wolf*

Wolf’s Revenge

Wolf’s Justice*

Rune Gate Cycle:

Rune Gate

Chosen*

* Forthcoming from Impulse Books UK

First published by Impulse Books UK March 2013

PUBLISHER’S NOTE:

The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental and not intended by the author.

Cover art: Panagiotis Vlamis (www.weaselpa.deviantart.com)

Cover design: Dawn Smith (www.darkdawncreations.com)

Copyright © 2013 by Mark E. Cooper

All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.

 A CIP Catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN: 978-1-905380-53-4

Printed and bound in Great Britain

Impulse Books UK

Special thanks go to Dave Milne for all his help.