Admiral's War Part One by Luke Sky Wachter

Author:Luke Sky Wachter [Wachter, Luke Sky]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Pacific Crest Publishing
Published: 2015-12-30T19:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirty-five: Spalding and Shepherd

“You doing alright up here, lad?” Spalding asked solicitously from behind the Navigator. He was standing behind and slightly to the left of him, so while Shepherd was still struggling to face him he stealthily leaned around his back and plopped a flask of ale down next to the right side of his station’s touch pad.

“Y-yess,” the Navigator stuttered.

“Good! Say how’s the new headgear workin’ out?” he asked, clapping him on the shoulder and then allowing his hand to rest on the boy’s shoulder. “Any problems with the interface or the hardware? I can always take a look at if you need me to.”

“N-no,” said Shepherd irritably, dropping his shoulder so Spalding’s hand fell off, “an-nd it’s working re-eal goo-oo-ood.”

“Splendid,” the old engineer said with real happiness, then he steeled himself. Now that the pleasantries were over, it was time to address the reason he’d brought up the ale.

Frustrated, the Navigator made a fist and banged the side of his desk and then snapped his mouth shut. The lights of the built in cybernetics on the back of his head started flashing and a synthesized voice issued from the speaker built in the top of the console he was sitting at.

“My voice is still no good,” said the flat, synthesized voice coming out of the console, “but the interface is everything you said it was. I can actually do the high-level calculations again, even without the implant. I turned it off to check and something about the installation itself seems to have helped,” he explained, and at this he clumsily circled his hand over his chest. “The therapy’s helped with moving but I still speak worse than a toddler.”

“Good, good,” the old Engineer said gruffly, “well, I’m here cause those gorilla boys tell me this is as good as it gets without either more time—probably years—or more regen-therapies.”

“No more therapy,” came the flat, synthesized voice, followed with an abrupt movement of his arms and a jerk of the body. The angry expression on the Navigator’s face also gave emphasis to the flat unemotional voice.

“That’s yer choice, Mr. Shepherd,” Spalding said agreeably. “I’d be the last one to tell ye got to go back into the hands of those savages. Better a monkey playin’ around with the back of your head than a board-certified doctor any day of the week! At least the monkey won’t club you over the head so he can cut you open to see what’s wrong with you and then sew you back together,” he said passionately.

From the uneasy expression on the Navigator’s face—and the lack of spoken reply—Spalding figured the boy didn’t entirely agree with him but that was fine with him. After all, wasn’t that the whole bloomin’ point? Each and every man, woman, or genetically-engineered monkey ought to have the right to control their own body without some ham-handed butcher free to carve on him, her, or it anytime he pleased!

It was even worse than taxing a man because he had the temerity to die without paying his death insurance.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.