Read Inherited War 1: Retribution for Free Online Page A

systems.  So we need you, umm I mean, we would ask if you can come down to the AI core, please, Sir.”
    Feng thought for a moment and said, “I will be right there.”
    Cole had fallen asleep after his work out and when he had awakened there was a plate of that green slop just inside the inner door.  He had slept through his chance to see how the guards brought him his food.  Of course they just may wait till he was asleep to bring it every time.  Oh well, he had worked up an appetite earlier and this time they brought a bag he hoped contained water.  Suddenly, half way through eating his meal, the inner door slid open and both guards stalked in aiming the meanest looking rifles Cole had ever seen.  Nice hardware he thought.  Though I wish it was pointed somewhere else, if they shot me with those there wouldn’t be much left of me.  “Hi ya guys, what can I do ya for? “ He asked.  “Strong silent types, I get it.  How about some names? No?  Okay well you kind of look like lizards to me so I’ll call ya…” Cole was interrupted before he could finish.
    “Slowly walk out of the airlock human.”  He recognized Captain Stubing’s voice.  “Keep your hands up above your head and my men won’t have to hurt you…too much.”
    “If it isn’t my old chum Captain Stubing.” Cole said as he placed his hand on his head.  What the hell was he thinking? He had to start controlling his stupid mouth.  “Err okay guys I’m coming out.  I got my hands on my head.”  He slowly started moving towards the door.  The hallway on the outside was brightly lit, with floor and ceiling lights running the length of the hallway.  The hallway itself was a shiny grey steel color.  He could see doorways on the opposite side from his.  “Not that I mind getting out for a bit but mind telling me where we’re going?’
    “Someone wants to talk to you and there is only one place to do it , so you get to see if you can control yourself or if my men get to blow your legs off.  All I need is you alive, legs are a bonus.”
    “ Aye, aye Captain,” he said back, “lead the way.”  The Captain turned and went through the opposite door from Cole’s cell.  They went about a hundred feet before they got to another door that opened to what looked like an elevator.  They got on and the Captain said “AI core level.”  The elevator started to move down, at least that is what it felt like to Cole. After a few seconds it stopped and the doors opened to a perfectly spherical room.  Floating off the floor in the dead center, with a walkway leading to it, was what looked like mercury, also in a perfect sphere.  “Wow, that’s cool, does it turn into a T-1000?”
    The Captain turned and said to Cole “I gave it ten minutes to talk to you.  Do not waste it being a smart ass.”  He then turned towards the floating globe and said “Ten minutes, then I get my answers. And he will be bound here at the door.”  The guards pulled his hands off his head, put them on either side of the railing, and then cuffed them together.  They turned and walked out with the Captain.   Cole heard the door whisk shut.  He turned and looked around as much as he could. “Hello.”  He shouted.

    “Hello Cole, I have been waiting a long, long time to meet you.”  That was odd, the voice seemed to be coming from the globe of mercury but there were no speakers that he could see, or no person for that matter.  “We only have a short amount of time and I have much to tell you.”
                  “Who are you?” Asked Cole.
                  “I am the ships AI and the Captain is about to foolishly let me into the main systems and allow me to take you to where you are destined to go.  To the Last Fleet, so you can free the Galaxy from the tyranny that replaced the rule of man twenty thousand years ago.”

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    Exactly ten minutes later the door behind Cole whirred back open and in came