The Forever Hero Read Online Free Page B

devilkid’s heels crashed into his leg.
    Marso slapped the syringe against bare flesh.
    The boy convulsed as if a current had passed through him, and it took all of Corson’s strength to hold him.
    â€œHold him!”
    Corson said nothing, but glared at the red-haired officer.
    By the time the young savage had collapsed, Corson’s arms ached, and his back felt stiff and sore.
    â€œWhere do you want him?”
    â€œBack on the stretcher. I’ll plug him in there, but that won’t hold him for more than a standard hour or two.”
    â€œWhat?”
    He’d seen the dosage she’d injected, and it would have laid him out for days.
    â€œCorson. He may be a devilkid indeed. He’s not too far from full growth, but the muscular and skeletal development indicates he’ll be capable of taking you apart with one hand. If we’re wrong, and he’s less mature than I think, he could be a physical superman, but I don’t think the readouts are that far off.”
    â€œWhat about brains?” the engineer asked dryly.
    â€œHard to tell. Probably no genius, but bright enough. Be difficult to tell what cultural retardation has done to his innate capabilities, if anything.”
    Corson stretched the slight frame out on the pallet. Marso used three sets of straps before adjusting the headband and contacts.
    â€œWhew! Could use a little freshening.”
    â€œNo survival value,” snapped the ecologist.
    Corson looked over the boy’s face. Even unconscious, he did not appear relaxed. A residual tension centered around the closed eyes, and there was a sharpness to the nose uncommon to a mere boy.
    â€œIs that all he is? Just another specimen?”
    â€œGiven time, given some education, he might be human. Right now, he’s more like the proverbial wolf child, though I’d bet on him rather than on the wolves. I wonder if he really is a child.”
    Corson frowned and rubbed the middle of his forehead with the thumb side of his clinched fist.
    â€œYou just said he was.”
    Marso continued to work, sitting at the console and adjusting the feed to the headset.
    â€œI said there was no sign of puberty and the associated developments. Those could be delayed because of environmental conditions, diet, who knows what. The other indications are that he may be older than twenty standard years. Brain scan patterns show more than a child’s development.”
    Corson switched his attention from the lieutenant to the child/man/??? and realized that the unconscious figure’s lips were moving.
    Marso followed his gaze.
    â€œThat’s a good sign. Shows verbalization ability is present. The sooner we’re on the same wave length the better. Once he gets proper medical care and diet, I don’t think brute force, other than sheer imprisonment, will keep him anywhere.”
    The chief engineering officer turned to leave.
    â€œLet me know if you need help, brute force variety. I question whether your specimen believes in sweet reason, particularly on the wave lengths you have in mind.”
    â€œWe’ll see.”
    He could feel her eyes boring into his back as he thumbed open the portal and continued his inspection of H.I.M.S. Torquina , the newest of the Service’s survey vessels, and dispatched for that reason alone to begin the preliminary survey of Old Earth, otherwise known as Terra, that would precede the clean-up pledged by the newly crowned Twelfth Emperor.

VIII
    The first tests of the jumpshift were the drones. They returned unharmed.
    The first full-scale test followed with a fusactor-powered in-system inertial driver. It did not return. Nor did the five ships that followed. The small drones continued to function superbly. Their jumpshift was powered with stored energy.
    Finally, the UNSRF team theorized that the shift itself might have disoriented the fusactors. In response, they built a ship that was little more than an immense assembly of