He was planning a circular flight, more or less. He had overflown West Point earlier and there was nothing new to report from there. Now he was heading for Hartford to check on the Damned Ones. Below him was Danbury, which the West Point mercs had been interested in for no reason anyone could think of. It was unoccupied. It was unoccupied…
There was activity on the ground. Someone was down there, moving among the buildings. There were indications that makeshift fortifications had been added on some of the streets in the city centre. Had the mercs begun to make their move?
He dropped to a thousand metres, or thereabouts, and took a closer look. There was no sign of armoured vehicles, but those could have been hidden. More telling, the people he could see were in no kind of uniform. Mercy had said the mercs were all in fatigues, but these people were in a random assortment of clothing. Quite a bit of leather, which did not look like it had been tanned particularly well, was on display.
Joe had just decided that these were Damned Ones when the sound of bullets whistled past him. Someone down there had spotted him and taken exception to his presence. He accelerated upward as fast as his power would take him and, after a few seconds, the firing stopped. Yes, they were probably Damned Ones. And they were moving closer to Indian Point, into an area the mercs at West Point had marked on their maps.
Something was definitely going on and, whatever it was, it did not seem like it was a good thing.
New York Authority.
‘Waveguide divide Titans into five “ranks,”’ Nick said. He had been persuaded to give a bit of a lecture on what he had learned over their evening meal, which was being held in the girls’ lounge tonight. ‘This ranking system essentially divides Titans by how well they have integrated whatever energy they use into their system. Rank one indicates someone barely integrated. They can survive on a little less food, they heal a little faster, and they tend to age well, but they are little different from a normal human, aside from whatever powers they may have.’
‘Presumably, they aren’t usually that powerful,’ Joe said.
‘Yes, but there are exceptions. Frankly, these rankings are fuzzy at best. The most integrated, rank fives, are verging on immortal. They don’t age. They don’t need oxygen, food, or water. They heal incredibly fast and are even capable of regrowing lost limbs.’
‘And they can apparently recover from being killed,’ Mercy put in.
‘There are documented cases of such occurrences, yes. Ranks two through four fall between those extremes, obviously. Uh, all indications are that rank fives cannot have children and that two through four are less fertile than typical humans. Biologically, it makes a degree of sense. Longer lives mean less need to reproduce.’
‘And living forever means you never have to,’ Mercy said. Well, if she was one of those, given her preferences, children had been unlikely anyway.
‘Precisely,’ Nick agreed. ‘There are other classifications. Juggernauts come in four classes varying according to size and toughness.’
‘Size?’ Sophia asked.
‘The first two types are human-sized, but their skin is tougher than usual. They tend to look like someone… twisted them out of shape. At higher levels, they come in around nine feet and are able to stop bullets, but they also tend to be more monstrous. The one who killed the old President Richard was the highest level, though Waveguide have information on him suggesting that his invulnerability is somewhat beyond that of a normal Juggernaut for an interesting reason.’
Mercy gave a sort of grinning frown. ‘Don’t keep us in suspense.’
‘He’s always accompanied by six lieutenants. They’re known as Anathema, apparently. The titles the Damned Ones use are… imaginative. These six lieutenants appear to grant The Damned a greater degree of damage resistance than normal. Damage incurred by one of the group is shared among the others, reducing its overall effect. This is particularly the case with The Damned, though the others benefit from it to some extent. So long as they live, he is practically invulnerable. On top of that, when they are in close proximity to him, he’s protected by a barrier field similar to the one Mercy is able to project but more extensive.’
‘So, with his Anathema nearby,’ Mercy summarised, ‘nothing much can get to him, and what does get to him barely affects him.’
‘Correct. He would be a very dangerous opponent.’
‘And he’s moving his people into Danbury,’ Joe said. ‘It sounds like they’re preparing for another war over Indian Point. What are we going to do about it?’
‘I’ll go see the president in the morning,’ Mercy said. ‘I think it’s time Security started taking an active interest and their commander-in-chief needs to make it happen.’
5th June.
Hart appeared in the corridor as Mercy made her way toward Faith’s office the following morning. He was frowning at her. ‘Do you really think President Richard has time to deal with you whenever you feel the need to drop by?’ he asked before Mercy could open her mouth.
‘She’ll want to hear this. Joe–’
‘I’ll be the judge of that. Come into my office and tell me whatever “intelligence” your French friend has come across and–’
‘That worked so well last time,’ Mercy said. In an instant, she was past him and continuing toward the door to Faith’s office.
‘Hey!’ Hart yelled, but by the time he was running after her, Mercy had knocked and opened the door.
‘Mercy.’ Faith’s voice could clearly be heard from within, sounding pleased. ‘To what do I owe this visit?’ The tone went more negative. ‘Whatever it is, it’s going to be bad, isn’t it?’
‘There are some coincidences piling up I don’t like,’ Mercy replied, moving into the president’s chamber. ‘Around Danbury.’
Hart pushed through the door before Mercy could close it. ‘If Colonel Garner has military intelligence, I should like to hear it first-hand,’ he said.
‘Very well,’ Faith said. ‘You found reference to Danbury at that mercenary base, right?’
Mercy nodded and took a seat. ‘And now there are Damned Ones fortifying the city centre. Joe flew over there yesterday and saw the same sort of people he saw in Hartford. They shot at him. Not very effectively, but they fired at him.’
‘To be fair, that’s not unexpected. They’re a belligerent group.’
‘We’ve no positive proof that they’re Damned Ones,’ Hart said.
‘Because you decided not to investigate Hartford,’ Faith said. ‘You never told me they were back, and you decided to ignore Capitaine Janvier’s intelligence.’
‘There was no reason to suspect they were a threat, President. We’ve seen no signs of them reconning Indian Point or the buffer zone. We’ve seen no signs of direct action from them for decades.’
‘Hm. Well, now there are indications of direct action. They’re establishing a staging post, aren’t they? They’ve used Danbury as a forward base for attacks on Indian Point before. I want this checked out, General. Send a scouting team out to Danbury.’
‘As you wish, President. I’ll issue the orders immediately.’ Hart got to his feet and headed for the door, flashing a glower at Mercy as he did so.
‘When I said I was unopposed for this job,’ Faith said when the door was closed behind Hart, ‘I wasn’t entirely accurate. Peter entered the race initially and then pulled out when it became clear he would get little support. He was popular among some of Security, but everyone else wanted me.’
‘He thought a leader with military experience would be better?’ Mercy asked.
‘That was the idea. I really thought he’d given up on that ambition, but maybe it’s just been on the back burner all these years.’
‘I doubt he’d actively undermine security here. He doesn’t seem to like me, or my access to you anyway. Maybe he’s just jealous.’
‘Ha! Well, possible. We’ll see what the scouts say about Danbury. Did Joe see any heavy weaponry out there?’
Mercy shoo
k her head. ‘Nothing out in the open.’
‘Okay… Well, it may be that they aren’t an immediate threat, but I’d like to know one way or another before they become one.’
7th June.
Faith was looking worried. ‘I have a presidential request,’ she said as soon as Mercy walked into her office.
Mercy had the strong feeling that things were not going well, so she was expecting the request to involve a lot of destruction. ‘What do you need, Madam President?’
‘The scouts we sent to Danbury haven’t reported in for twelve hours. I need you to go out to Danbury and see whether you can find them.’
Mercy’s eyebrows rose. ‘A rescue mission?’
‘Yes. Basically. Any intelligence you can pick up while you’re there would be useful, but I want my scouts back.’
It was highly likely that that was not happening. Twelve hours without any communication suggested that Mercy’s mission was going to end in failure. ‘Do you have any idea where they were? Aside from “near Danbury.”’
Faith nodded. ‘We have a last known location.’
‘Okay. I’ll get Joe to help with recon and see what I can find out.’
Danbury, CT.
‘If they were using unencrypted radios, the Damned Ones could have heard them giving their location.’ Joe’s voice came to Mercy over radio, but they were using the digital radios they had brought down on Pallas. Even if the Damned Ones had detected the transmissions, it would have been nothing more than noise to them.
‘Apparently, someone thought of that,’ Mercy replied. ‘They use a one-time pad encoding system in situations like this. I guess, if they had the equipment, they could have located the scouts by triangulating the broadcast, but it’s pretty unlikely. Are you seeing anyone near the target?’
‘It’s quiet.’ Two thousand metres above Mercy’s head, Joe was looking down through a pair of field binoculars Security had provided. It was not exactly the most perfect surveillance method, but it was better than going in with no clue of what she was facing. ‘There’s still activity in the city centre. Be careful.’
‘I’m being as careful as I can.’
In fact, Mercy was using her new abilities to her advantage to ensure that she was rarely in any position that could be seen without standing right next to her. She was hopping through the city, scouting out her next target and then translocating from cover to cover. From the air, Joe had thought that Danbury was moderately intact, but when you got closer you could tell that it had seen much better days. Shops had been broken into, looted, and trashed. Then the weather had got in through the broken windows. Mercy found a couple of skeletons among the ruins, likely people caught in the open during a Wave Storm. One definitely had been since the bones were charred and scattered over the floor of a shop.
‘Huh,’ Mercy said as she came across something which was not human remains, ‘scat.’
‘Any idea what from?’ Joe asked.
‘Well, technically not, but it looks like giant rat droppings, so I’m going to assume this is from those rat hound things.’
‘We live in a world where there are things called rat hounds.’ It sounded like Joe was sighing as he said it.
‘Yeah, well they’re dangerous to individuals, so I’d rather not actually meet any. Though I suspect that’s just to human individuals.’ Mercy made her final jump to an office building south of the city centre and started inside. The scouting team had reported their position as being on the roof.
‘We’re still human, Mercy. We may be a little superhuman, but we’re still human.’
‘Of course. Just a turn of phrase. I’m inside and on my way up. This place is a mess, but it seems to be structurally sound.’ Which was true, but she was not entirely sure how long that would last. Her spatial sense gave her the kind of view a structural engineer would likely have killed for. She had to narrow her view to see the details, but she could see cracks in the concrete wherever she went. There were no windows left, the panes having fallen out of the frames. Without people to maintain the building, it was slowly falling to pieces. Sooner or later, the whole thing would collapse.
‘Any sign of the scouts?’ Joe asked.
‘Not yet. There are too many floors between me and the roof. I can’t see through all of them.’
It had obviously been an office building. There were a lot of open floor areas with various dividers, desks, chairs, and other office staples in various states of decay littered about them. The weather had got in through the fallen windows. Filing cabinets and metal chair frames were rusting. The surfaces of desks, made from cheap laminated board, were warped and, in many cases, beginning to grow crops of fungus and even grass. On one of the upper floors, Mercy spotted a sapling growing out of a drift of soil which had somehow blown in and piled against a wall. Nature was pretty clear on its intentions: without people to stop it, it was going to take back every inch of the planet it could.
Thirteen storeys up, Mercy began to detect signs that she was not going to be rescuing the scouts. Her spatial sense spotted something which looked uncomfortably like a skeleton in one of the corridors on the top floor, two floors above her. As she climbed further and more of the environment was revealed, she found more bodies. Up here, the building had been divided into offices for the upper management staff. The scouts had been using one of the rooms as a weatherproof base, and that was where most of them had died.
‘This isn’t good,’ Mercy said into her radio as she approached the body in the corridor. ‘This guy looks like he was cremated on the spot.’
‘A Titan then.’
‘Probably.’ The man had been charred down to the bone. Crisped flesh still clung in places along with some parts of his field uniform which had managed to survive the fire. The weird thing about it was the scorch pattern on the floor, which hugged the fallen figure too closely for a natural fire. The man and his clothes had burned. His surroundings had not.
The others had suffered various fates inside the room. One had been reduced to a burned skeleton like the one outside. Two appeared to have just been shot multiple times. The last had been shot, but it looked like the bullets had been on fire when they had hit him. It was like he had actually been shot with bullets of fire, somewhat like Mercy’s Annihilating Bullets. There had definitely been a Titan here.
‘Wait, weren’t there supposed to be six of them?’
‘That’s what you told me,’ Joe replied. ‘A six-man team. You’re missing some?’
‘One. I have four here, one in the corridor, and no sixth man.’
‘On the roof? I can’t see anyone from up here.’
Mercy lifted her gaze, looking through the structure without really using her eyes. ‘No, I can’t either, but I may be missing something. I’ll go up and check.’
She did not make it to the roof. On her way back to the staircase in the centre of the building, she spotted something on the other side of the building which looked like a human, huddled into a corner and screened by a couple of filing cabinets which had been dragged together to form a barrier. As she got closer, the shape became clearer, as did the PDW the man was holding onto as though his life depended on it, which it possibly did.
She stopped outside the door of the office. ‘Hey in there. My name is Mercy Garner. President Richard sent me to find you.’ There was no reply. ‘I’m coming in. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t shoot me.’
When she pushed through the door, she was unsurprised to see the man pointing his weapon at her from across a rusty filing cabinet laid on its side and heartened by the fact that he did not immediately pull the trigger. He was young and scared. He was wearing a helmet, but the chin strap was loose, indicating that he had just rammed it back on when he had heard someone moving about in the building.
‘What’s your name, soldier?’ Mercy asked.
‘S-Steve, uh, I mean Private Kerry, NYA Security, service number–’
‘I’m here to get you out, Steve, not take you t
o a POW camp. How did you survive?’
‘I got lucky. I was on the roof when they came. I heard the screams and hid here. Th-that was last night. There was a woman with them. She had horns. She was b-burning Dwain alive when I looked down the corridor.’ His eyes were going wild and he was about to seriously freak out.
‘I also don’t need a full report, Steve. Save that for when you’re back in the city.’
The look of pure hope which filled his face was wonderful and only spoiled by Joe’s voice in Mercy’s ear. ‘There are men moving in on the building. I count ten. Armed. Moving like they’re military. They’ve cut off the exits.’
Mercy had meant to try out carrying someone with her when she translocated herself. That was yet to happen, however, and Steve looked a little too freaked as it was without adding an untried teleport stunt to the mix. If she had time to make sure nothing went wrong, sure, but there were armed men moving up the building and she was not sure how long she had.
Steve had obviously spotted Mercy’s expression shifting. ‘Something’s wrong,’ he said, fear returning to his voice.
‘We have company, but it doesn’t sound like they’re Damned Ones. Stay here and shoot anything that isn’t me who comes through that door.’
‘If they’re not Damned Ones…’
‘I’m not sure who they are. I just don’t get the feeling they’re here on a rescue mission.’ Turning, she left the room and headed back to the stairwell. She could hear movement from below as she got there, maybe five or six storeys down. Not rushing. They were taking their time and doing things properly. A few seconds later, she saw them in her spatial sense: five men in combat uniforms carrying assault rifles. They weren’t from NYA Security, but the kit looked familiar. How had the mercs from West Point found out about the scouts? More troubling: where were the other five?
Titans Page 14