Brian stood. “Very good, Eeelement.” He gestured at Eadie’s group with his steel rod, which he held like a sword. “I claim theeese. The Round can take spoooils from the ooothers.”
A three-shot burst sounded from somewhere. The Fiend in the window collapsed, falling onto the jagged glass at the bottom of the frame. A few shots sounded return fire, followed by another three-shot burst from a different location. Lawrence crouched behind a chair.
Ground floor of the building where Sato was reunited with the General
Sato pulled the body of a dead merchant toward him, tearing the bloody white shirt away and wrapping it around the end of the steel rod he had taken from the room. The added bulk would give his broken hands something larger to hold. He experienced every detail of the fabric, the way the fine crisscross of its weave stretched and distorted as he wrapped it around the metal, the tiny stresses in the threads, even the minute particles of lint, dust, and blood that dotted it. The knots he tied appeared the size of doorways as he focused on them.
This sword was not yet sharp, but its blunt edge might give more satisfaction in the kill, anyway.
Kill. The word hung in his mind, stuck in the Juice that flowed thickly through him. Kiiill. The sword shook in his hands but he was satisfied with his grip in spite of his four splinted fingers. Out the window, two of the despicable black-suited merchants appeared.
He leaped forward, swinging as he flew through the window frame, directing his focus to the closest merchant’s throat. The world froze, silent. The sword sliced through the air, the target throat consuming his thoughts, looming large as a melon, then wrapping around the blunt rod. The head rolled forward but did not detach. The rod stuck, momentarily bound by the loose skin it was unable to cut.
The kill was certain. Sato filled with energy, as if the dead man’s Life Force was flooding in through his sword grip. Sato landed lightly on his toes, palming the dead face backward to free his sword and snapping his head toward the other merchant. His blade knocked the man’s gun away and Sato stepped in, closing the distance and slamming the sword handle into the man’s forehead, where it embedded and stuck with a wet cracking sound. He had to follow the man to the ground to recover it, yanking it out with a twist and a rough jerk. His flesh prickled with energy, his muscles writhing against his bones in celebratory ecstasy.
Standing over the two black-suited corpses, Sato let child-like glee take over his senses. Each breath he took seemed to scream out to his kills, following them as they rejoined the Life Force, taunting them with the life he still lived. The blood slicking the floor filled the room with its dense coppery smell and Sato had a fleeting desire to cover himself with it, wrapping himself in its delicious power. Around his feet, aged, terrified merchants and prostitutes writhed and crawled away. He raised his sword to strike the closest one—a bald merchant wearing some sort of robe.
“Rounder Saamurai!”
It was Coiner, standing before him now with a Frontman and a single Round. Sato fought down the need to kill the merchant, forced his sword tip to the ground, and bowed. Coiner turned to the Round, waving them in the direction of the crowd that had earlier fled the hotel.
The hotel lobby
Eadie clutched the old revolver in one hand, the stick in the other, peering cautiously around the side of the overturned table. Old Fart had said there might be a couple of shots left if the bullets were still functional.
Outside, the Fiend Brian Samurai had killed two men with the steel rod. Then suddenly more Fiends had appeared, and now they were mixed in with the crowd from the hotel, jumping around—celebrating?
No, not celebrating. Not jumping around. Fighting!
… No. Not fighting, either.
Slaughtering.
People in the crowd dropped like bloody rag dolls as the Fiends whirled between them, killing with knives and clubs, their guns slung over their shoulders and their feet making splashing and splattering noises as they traipsed through the carnal mess on the concrete. They stripped valuables from the bodies before they hit the ground.
The one Brian had bowed to was taking small things from his pocket—coins?—and dropping them on some of the corpses. He turned again to Brian. “Leading your own raid on a praaactice exercise was very impreessive. Your Round handled every Unnamed before mine could aaact. But moooore will come. Unnaaaamed, and maaybe Feds. We have insuffiiiicient numbers to deal with that leeeevel of threat. We must go now.”
Brian’s eyes flicked toward Eadie, widening as if asking for orders. Eadie shoved her palms at him as if pushing him away. He bowed to the man in front of him. “Yes, Paatrol Leeeader.”
The crowd of Fiends thinned and disappeared.
16
En la calle
Rosa walked as quickly as she could with Mari in her arms, but she and Arrulfo still trailed the rest of the group. “Which company sent the Sinnombres?” Rosa asked him in Spanish, breathing heavily.
“Nobody knows which company. They all look the same. That way nobody can link the employer to whatever bad stuff they do. But more important, Rosa, why are we still alive? Why did the Demonios fight for us—or at least for her?”
Rosa’s feet made coarse shuffling sounds as she forced her way over the gravel. “Everyone believes in her, that’s why. Even the Demonios.”
“Look at this, now she is taking us out of the Zone. Soon the night will be fully dark, but where outside the Zone could a group like this hide?”
RickerResources Building, CBD
Chairman Ricker sat facing the door. Behind him, the sprawling gray city stretched to the horizon. A black-suited man entered the room and stood before the desk, eyes directed downward. Fading daylight still shone in through the glass roof and was reflected in the gleaming marble floor.
“I see you’re alone,” Ricker said.
“Yes, sir.”
“Let me guess.” Ricker stared at the man for a moment. “You got into some trouble. She was more difficult to apprehend than you thought. Somehow, you ended up killing her instead of bringing her to me. Hmmm?”
The man inhaled as if to speak but Ricker cut him off. “I bet you’ve brought me an ear! Or a blood sample that matches her school records? An eye that matches a facescan? What damned thing in a jar have you brought that proves you took care of what I assigned you to do?”
“We do not have anything yet, sir. We lost eight men trying to capture her, sir, but—”
“You lost eight men? A nineteen year-old waitress outsmarted you and you lost eight men?”
“We … followed the Negro to a hotel in the Zone, sir, and there was a Fiend raid. The Fiends killed the team at the hotel and the team that had been called as support. By the time our reinforcements arrived there were only naked corpses, which the locals were carrying off for carbon recycling.” The man cleared his throat. “Our two teams were no match for a raid, when a hundred Fiends popped up shooting, sir. There was nothing we could do.”
Amelix Retreat
A SUBSIDIARY OF AMELIX INTEGRATIONS
Reconditioning Feedback Form
Seeker of Understanding
INVOLUNTARY, GRADE TWO
Subject: #117B882QQ
Division: Corporate Regulations
1. Please describe today’s combat simulation exercise.
Today I was taken prisoner.
I don’t know how it happened. One minute our team was moving through the Zone, scouting, and the next I’d been bayoneted in the back and dragged into a building with guards all around me. They cut my clothes off and one of the guards urinated in my face.
The stab had collapsed my lung, I think, so I couldn’t breathe well and I was compelled to ball myself into a fetal position to ease the pressure in my chest. I had to breathe through my nose because they repeatedly gagged me with urine-soaked fabric. They had two metal paddles connected to a machine, and they kept repeating the same pattern: Wave the paddles in front of my face, apply them to some part of my body, and shock me with enough electrici
ty to cramp every muscle and black out my vision. Every time I regained focus, they waved the paddles in front of me and began the process again. I don’t know how many times they did this before they started asking me questions.
They wanted to know about my team, how many of us there were and who was with me. They wanted to know what I did at my job, who I worked with, and where in company housing I lived. Everything.
If I spoke as soon as they removed the gag and kept talking about what they’d asked, the paddles stayed out of my vision. Whenever I hesitated or changed the subject, the sequence would begin again, and nothing I could say would stop it from running its course.
Then I realized that my team must be just outside somewhere. The Heaves hadn’t carried me far. I yelled and screamed for them when the gag came out, making as much noise as I could before they shocked and re-gagged me. Still, I knew it was my best chance at staying alive, so I screamed again the next time the gag came out.
My team arrived! They sniped several guards and made a rush inside to get me, helped me stand and stagger toward the exit. Another group of A-Heaves came running. Every one of us was hit by gunfire, and Burt died, but they got me out. About an hour later the A-Heaves caught up with us again. We’d all been bleeding and we’d lost Curtis, but we held our ground a long time. Eventually we were all gunned down, but we prevented them from taking even one of us prisoner. I’ve never felt so honored to be part of any group as I was at that moment. That feeling disappeared later in the day.
2. Please share some details of your experience in group therapy today.
I asked if anyone else felt like they weren’t sleeping enough, as if our allotted six hours of sleep might be more like two or three. They all said they were sure they were getting their full six. At the time I thought it was just exhaustion from the nightmares. Now I’m pretty sure that’s not it.
I was tempted to refrain from writing this. Pathway amplification is making me retch right now, and whatever I say will only make you tighten the screws more, but you require complete disclosure and I find I can’t resist. The only option you’ve left me is to confess that I see this and let you purge such thoughts from me.
After group I began to wonder about my experience here, my connection to the group, my exhaustion. Why had nightmares developed into waking fears, and why were those fears so incredibly intense? And how had I come to rely on a strange image of the workings of an old-fashioned clock, with little gears turning and marking off the time, to get control of the pathway amplification again? Where did that image come from in the first place? Why did it make me feel so happy and reassured that everything I am experiencing here was beautiful and right?
I was fixated on the guard and my disgusting, humiliating captivity. I reminded myself that it hadn’t actually happened, no matter how real it had felt; it was just a hologram. But then I realized everything here is a hologram, and that’s when it clicked.
I used to think it was strange that I had to fill out these forms. Why make us give feedback when you weren’t changing anything in response to it?
But that wasn’t true. Something did change: my nightmares.
I “go” to group meetings, combat simulations, and religious services through the computer. You control every aspect of my interaction with the world, and there can only be one answer. You’re putting in subliminals! YOU are feeding me the nightmares!
It’s just like the job I used to do: You data-mine these answers and insert programs to change whatever thoughts you don’t like! That’s why you won’t let me write on paper. Humans aren’t even reading these responses, and in fact, I’m starting to wonder whether the other Seekers in my group are human. Why rely on the influence of erratic, unpredictable, flesh-and-blood people when computer-generated companions would be so much more reliable and effective?
3. Please consider other events of the day, such as religious services, mealtimes, and interactions with your Accepted advisor, and explain how these experiences helped you grow and change.
After I realized that my heroic team might be just a set of programs, I lost interest.
4. Please share any additional thoughts or comments.
Computers are reprogramming me.
Trying to hold on to my own thoughts here is pointless.
McGuillian Diner
“Look at that, Diane,” Mr. Stuckey said, leaning on the kitchen door. “I was afraid the incident had scared folks away for good, but the customers seem to be back today. This’ll help me when corporate jumps down my throat about the whole mess.”
“Yes, sir,” Diane said. “This is the first time we’ve been packed since Eadie’s been gone. Same ol’ crowd. Students and a few nostalgic corporates. It’s sorta late for a dinner rush, though.”
“I’ll take ’em.” Mr. Stuckey touched a dirty shirt sleeve to one eye, laughing sadly. “I just looked around the place for her. Couldn’t help it. I’m so used to teasing her about how she brings in the big crowds.” His eyes welled up a little. “Excuse me a minute, will you, hon? I think the carbon recyclables need to go out.”
He picked up the half-full bin and hauled it over to the rear entrance. He leaned toward the tiny window in the closed door to check the alley outside. There was no such thing as being too careful when one’s business was this close to the Zone.
He gasped, dropping the bin and sloshing its contents onto the floor. He looked again through the window. The eyes were still there. And a face. With a long wound down one side. He cracked the door open. “Is that you?” he whispered.
Eadie nodded. She had strategically placed herself off to the side of the door where the camera would have only a shadowy image of her. “We need a little help,” she whispered.
He opened the door a bit wider. A wedge of light spread across the alley and damp night air came rolling into the stuffy kitchen. Eadie was not alone. The rest were also positioned just outside the camera’s gaze. Behind Eadie, a man with his back to the door was helping a young man in a tattered student uniform with a nasty injury on his forearm. Next to them, a bum was downing a bottle of sodje …
The two who helped her out of the diner that day!
He thought he glimpsed a few others, too, hanging further back in the shadows …
Mr. Stuckey winked at Eadie and rolled his eyes up at the camera mounted above his head. “I thought you were my delivery man,” he said brusquely. “I don’t do handouts, especially for a whole pack of vagrants. Now beat it before I call corporate security.” He winked at Eadie again and closed the door.
Returning to New Union territory
Feeling a sense of calm satisfaction, Sato addressed the other man in his head. “This potion makes concentration easier. I can block you out completely, now. But I hold no hostile feelings for you at this moment. Your new lust for blood has reunited me with the General, and for that I am grateful.”
Sato patiently guided his remaining Elements back toward the New Union’s headquarters, following in the path of Lux’s Round.
“It was her will for me to go. I shall eventually serve her in the battle to save the Life Force, and you will not stop me. But you will have all the blood you want.”
In the mine
“He’s turning it into a mercenary house, Jack,” Li’l Ed whispered. “All Unnamed! It’s crazy! Look, he’ll be back in here soon. We’ll tell him we appreciate the offer, but our answer is no.”
“Matt Ricker is dead,” Jack said. “His friends are still in the academy—they’re graduating and taking jobs with the company right now. They’ll be our bosses when we graduate, and they’ll stay our bosses for our whole lives. Sett’s dad is right, Ed: This isn’t some minor data slip-up or inventory error. It’s a much bigger deal than that, and to those guys, it’s personal. They’ll never forget it.”
“They will. Reconditioning wipes the slate clean—everyone knows that. We all get a chance to prove our loyalty and start over—”
“Start over where? How? We both have enemi
es for life inside McGuillian now. You don’t seriously expect them to just forgive and move on?”
“Yes, I do. And anyway, how do you know it would be any better here?” Li’l Ed lowered his voice even more, to a whisper so soft it almost disappeared. “Sett’s father might not be any more stable than Sett was. He doesn’t seem particularly sane to me.”
“You go back if you want,” Jack said. “I’m staying here.”
In the Federal truck
Agent Hawkins kept the EI’s intercom in voice-only mode as he drove.
“Daiss,” he said. “We got ’em. Infra-red cameras picked up dimensions matching the girl, the Williams kid and the bum. They’ve got some others with them, too. They’re behind the diner right now. Must not know we’ve got IR back there.”
“Who’s closest?” Daiss asked.
“Agent Reda from the Thirteenth—he’s on his way. I’m close to you so I’ll pick you up. Be outside and ready to jump in.”
New Union residences
“Quite stimulating, this Juice.” Sato said, pouring sodje for the patrol leader and the Frontman. “I am sad to feel it disappearing.” They were in the Frontman’s quarters, with Sato on the floor across from the other two, who sat on a leather seat against the wall. Both men were staring at Sato with unabashed suspicion.
“That’s why we drink, Samurai,” the Frontman—Lux—said. His long ropes of hair swung as he tilted his head for a deep drink. “As the Juice works its way out of your system you’ll need more sodje to keep yourself stable. Sometimes Elements sob, thrash around on the floor, even shit themselves when it goes. But there’s nothing to do about it except wait for the next battle. Just keep reminding yourself that there will be more.”
“All right, Samurai,” the patrol leader said. “Tell us. How did you know the Unnamed were following those two?”
The Book of Eadie, Volume One of the Seventeen Trilogy Page 26