Tech World (Undying Mercenaries Series) by B. V. Larson Read Free Book Online

shrinking. The single large tire that looped around the vehicle went limp and shriveled to nothing. The central motor became a bumpy cube of metal. The seat he’d been riding in folded away as if it had been so much paper.
    Within a minute, the entire thing was down to shivering mass about the size of an orange crate. Carlos picked it up, tugged at the sides and they pulled up to form a carrying bag, complete with a shoulder strap. He heaved it onto his back and grinned at us. 
    “Pretty neat, huh?”
    “Yes,” I nodded, laughing. “That is pretty cool. Let’s go up the ramp.”
    Together, we marched up into the gloomy interior of the lifter.
    The lifter wasn’t crowded. In fact, it was almost empty. That was strange all by itself. Burning fuel to boost less than a hundred passengers into orbit wasn’t efficient, but the crew did it anyway without even announcing the lift-off was coming.
    Only the warning tones and a few recorded messages warned us that heavy G-forces were imminent. Natasha, Carlos and I all strapped in, pulling down the safety bar over our heads and slapping the chest harness buckle into place.
    “This is way too familiar,” Carlos said.
    When I didn’t react right away, he had to emphasize his point. “You remember the first time, McGill? When we went up in one of these deathtraps and, in fact, died?”
    “Yeah, I remember,” I said. “Except I didn’t die. Not that time.”
    “You expecting some kind of thank-you rubdown? ‘Cause you’re not getting it. Not this time. I repaid that debt.”
    “Shut up, Carlos,” Natasha said.
    He grumbled, but he did shut up—for a few minutes. Once we broke into orbit and the powerful weight of acceleration left our bodies, he perked up again.
    “I got that message last night, big guy,” he said. “A little love note just after midnight. The Primus must have been thrilled.”
    I looked at him. “What do you know about it? Why would she care so much?”
    “Are you kidding me? She’s Hegemony now. She figures Varus is just an embarrassment—a stepping stone from her past. She’d rather not have us do anything else dramatic now that she’s out of our outfit. She has plans, baby. All the way to the top, and she doesn’t care who she has to blow to get there.”
    Carlos had never been a tactful guy, but in this case, I figured he was dead-on target. “You think that’s it? She’s out of Varus, so if we screw up she’ll get the blame?”
    “Yeah, something like that. If we get sucked up into Hegemony, it’s some other guy’s fault if old McGill goes hillbilly on the Nairbs again.”
    I nodded slowly. “What do you know about this deployment?”
    “Sudden and unwanted. I’d prefer to be back on Miami beach. This is total, sugar-spiked bullshit.”
    “Yes,” Natasha exclaimed suddenly.
    We glanced over at her. She was working her tapper as usual. She had a cable running from her arm into her pack which was sitting in the seat next to her strapped in like a toddler.
    “What do you have?”
    “I’m linking up!” she declared, eyes shining. “I can do it.”
    “Yeah, so?” Carlos asked.
    “That means we can still vote,” she said.
    We looked at her for a second. Finally, I caught on. “You mean because we’re up in space, our vote wouldn’t count?”
    “I say we do it right now,” she said. “All three of us. If we don’t, we could get disconnected again. I’m running on a thin tunneling-hack right now to get a stream off this ship and down to central.”
    “Could that be it?” I asked aloud. “Could she have called this emergency deployment just to scramble the vote? Once we’re up here, we’re out of range.”
    “Yeah, maybe,” Carlos said doubtfully. “But that seems extreme.”
    I was tapping at my tapper. I fired off a message to every marine on the lifter. Carlos got it right away, and he read it aloud. “You’ve all been tricked. Vote now, vote fast, or you’ll be silent hogs forever.” Carlos looked at