by J M Guillen
“Over here!” one called to his comrades from behind a large bank of computer equipment. “Take cover, you idiots!”
Not today. I grinned, half-sprinting, half-hobbling over to a niche in the wall behind the bizarre device. From here, I could take aim and remain mostly unseen.
I raised the Stilettos and shot the first man squarely in the back of the head.
Much like Edmund earlier, that single shot liquefied the man’s skull.
“Oh fuck!” One of his allies had been sprinting over to him, rallied by his call. Then the man’s skull had exploded, splattering red and gray all over the metallic bank of devices.
The thug froze in place, horrified.
“K’verta!” From my left, the young Kab woman leapt, her feet spinning. Her pristine robes blurred around her as her boot connected with the side of the gaping man’s face and dropped him to the ground with a sickening crack.
“Nice.” I nodded at the woman.
Michael. In those two syllables, Anya made me stop short.
Something had gone wrong.
If this is the Parabola, it is a partially energetic construct. Much of the device does not exist within this topiatic reality.
That’s just great. I spun, diving behind a bank of computers.
Next to me, the graceful young woman gestured at one of the riot-geared men who ran up on us.
Her igneous sphere hurtled toward him with all the force of a meteorite slamming to Earth. In mid-air it elongated, becoming less globe-like, more akin to a flat blade.
It sliced into the man’s neck, cooking the flesh even as it killed him.
“Wow!” I gaped at the young woman. “Remind me to never piss you off.”
“Kirizin.” She nodded, drawing the word into a hiss.
Can you spell the implications out for me, Anya?
I cannot even make out the full workings of the machine, she clarified. It is quite difficult to say what the ramifications will be from its destruction.
Copy that. I stepped out from behind the network of computers, my Stilettos blazing. With a series of siiiiuu siiiiuu singing through the air, I forced three of them back toward the large door and the nightscape beyond.
We mostly got this. Wyatt sounded positively chipper.
Lookie here. I dropped an orange indicator token over a man crouched behind the ATVs just outside. The bald man gestured frantically as he spoke with two of his allies, and even from here, I saw the dark nimbus hover around him.
I see. Wyatt grunted as he dodged a thug swinging the butt of a rifle at his face.
That’s the Irrat who saw me in the hallway.
I have a second Irrational blip on my array. It appears to be in the corridor outside this room, at functional north 38 degrees, fourteen tack 537 by functional west 88 degrees, eighteen tack 372. It is moving in our direction.
What? Did we walk right past it? Irritation flooded Wyatt’s link.
It only just appeared, Asset Guthrie. The target may be an Irrational human.
Fine. I drew my Stilettos and kept my gaze sharp. I’d like a marker on the second Irrat, Anya.
She said nothing, but a small green marker appeared, moving toward us.
Handle the first ’Rat and his buddies? The Tangler hummed as Wyatt geared up. I’ll play clean up in here, let you know if the second fella steps inside.
You always take the easy chores, I teased. Fine. Anya, I’m initiating my gear.
I toggled both of my packets and faded into nigh-invisibility even as I felt ribbons of silvery grace tease through my limbs. Sure, my Irrational friend saw straight through the Wraith but imagined his baseline friends might have a more difficult time.
Understood, Michael. Anya sounded a touch distracted. I will watch for pattern loss on your packets.
I sprinted past Wyatt, dodging to one side as he swung the Tangler toward another hostile. Then I drew both of my katana and hurled myself toward the three men taking cover outside.
“Watch it!” Baldy scarcely had time to cry out before I leapt through the open door, swinging a katana directly at one of his allies’ face.
My target started and blindly brought his pistol up in my vague direction.
In the end, he had no chance. Before the man understood what happened, I pushed my blade squarely through the left side of his chest.
His ballistics vest slowed the strike, but not nearly enough. He gaped stupidly, staring around, as if in death he might be able to catch sight of who had done him in. He whispered a single word, a bubble of blood on his lips.
He fell.
“Kris!” the soldier standing next to him cried out in a wail of terror and rage. He also brought up an automatic pistol but found no target to shoot.
Meanwhile, my darkly haloed amigo spun directly toward me. That veil of shadowed wrath swirled over him, and his eyes burned, frigid and unearthly. In an instant, the smoky darkness coalesced into something like a wispy, reptilian form that hovered over the man as an etheric cloak.
I continued my spin, letting my own inertia carry me forward.
The man mourning his companion must have heard a scuffed footstep or felt the wind from my spin. He brought his pistol around, aiming in my general direction, and fired three times.
I ducked and drove my second katana squarely into his gut.
He gurgled with agony, whirling his weapon to one side, and fired again, missing me cleanly.
The Irrat leapt then. He stood four or five strides away, yet somehow sprung near me, bounding the distance as easily as taking a single step.
“I see you!” he hissed, a serpentine sibilance cutting through his words. He swung his right hand high, swinging downward with a curved blade. “Issithrk sees you, mortal!” The shadow-lizard’s mouth moved with the words.
The mouth of the man beneath did not.
Interesting.
I leapt backward, away from his dying friend. That blade whispered as it sliced by my face, closer than my last shave.
I dropped one of my katana and stumbled, stunned at his wild attack.
The Irrat didn’t let up for a second, swinging again even as he landed.
I rolled to one side, frantic to get out of his range.
He kept coming.
The whirling man’s semi-automatic weapon, the one he’d almost ventilated my skull with a few moments ago, still hung from his shoulder. He hadn’t even reached for it.
Instead he bounced forward, light on his toes. That inhuman glow burned in his eyes, shedding an unclean light on my skin. An echo of that same piercing light created his transparent reptilian cloak.
“Cannot run.” His wide, crazed eyes poured light. “Not from one who is touched. Not from the blessed.”
The man’s raptor hood preened like a shy high schooler given a compliment and raised a spiky head crest. He drooled as he lunged forward another time, his blade whistling as he slashed back and forth through the air. Then, as if I hadn’t even engaged the Wraith, as if the Adept didn’t augment me at all, he leapt at me, wicked blade held high.
I swiped my remaining katana up, aiming for his arm.
He pulled the blow and rolled when he landed.
His eyes bulged. His tongue lolled from his mouth, not quite imitating the motions of the shadowy reptile encasing his head.
More than an Irrat, some logical part of my mind registered. An Irrat with a friend.
I took another swing with my katana, watching how he capered lightly on his toes. Predictably, he hopped to his left, easily dodging the blade. I whipped my Stiletto up. As my Irrational foe dodged the katana, I fired quick bursts of kinetic energy squarely in his midsection.
WHUB-WHUB-WHUB.
This particular Stiletto still had a wide field. Three blasts of energy roughly the size of cannonballs struck him at nearly the same instant.
The Irrat didn’t even have the breath to cry out. The force hurled him over thirty meters into the twilight. He landed in a heap beneath that alien sky.
<
br /> He didn’t move.
Dead?
“Better safe than sorry,” I muttered.
I’d learned that lesson from Gideon DuMarque long ago. Otherwise, with my luck, I’d be right in the middle of dealing with other hostiles and this guy would leap back into the fray. It would happen at the worst possible moment, and I’d be screwed.
I scooped up my blade and toggled off my packets, trotting across the powdery soil in the direction he’d fallen.
Keeping both Stilettos aimed on him, I nudged his ribs with my foot.
No response.
Alright, I did a bit more than nudge.
Nothing.
“Okay.” I nodded to myself, satisfied. “Good enough for me.”
A screeching howl erupted from my left.
I whirled.
A ragged, reptilian figure, wrought from shadow and wind, hurled itself at me from the spot where I’d shot the Irrat. Its eyes burned with arctic fire.
“Oh, boy.” I spun sideways, trying to keep the spectral-beast in sight.
It resembled an immense, humanoid reptile, with vibrant stripes of azure sparkling along its silvery scales and within its boggled chameleon eyes. It bounced its hunched form on three-toed feet and swiped at me with gangling arms, tipped with talons of living darkness.
“Ack!” I leapt backward and landed in a crouch.
On pure reflex, I brought my Stiletto up and fired squarely into its foul reptilian head. My shot rippled through it like sunlight through water.
The transparent, malignant thing remained untouched.
It drew back one of those serpentine limbs, swiping again as it leapt toward me. Those wicked claws had no difficulty striking their target.
I fell backward, rivers of pain burning through my chest. It missed the quasi-steel jacket altogether, instead shredding my shirt. Blood trickled from a dozen narrow slashes.
Michael? Anya abruptly linked. Please report.
I’m dealing with some class of Aetheric Deviation. I rolled to one side, as it leapt and came down right where I’d been. The fucker just popped up out of nowhere.
A Deviation? I felt her head twitch. Non-physical?
Quasi-physical. The Stilettos don’t touch it.
Do you believe it to be native to this topia?
Allied creature. It gave that Irrat extra-human capabilities. I put down the man, but this ectoplasmic thing remained.
Troubling. She paused. We are clear inside.
I sure could use the hillbilly. If he can ground the Deviation, we’re golden.
An Eidolonic Lock. She nodded in approval, likely pleased that Wyatt would be putting the Tangler to a Facility-approved purpose. I will send Asset 423 right over.
Copy that.
I triggered the Adept again, thinking any bit of speed and agility would help. Assuming the wretched thing had given its host the power to see right through the Wraith, I didn’t bother activating the packet. It would be worse than useless.
As sweet agility traced its way through my veins, I rolled far to my left and sprang forward to draw the reptile’s eye.
I didn’t have to kill it; I only needed to stay alive until Wyatt showed.
“Hey there, asshole.” I smirked at the pseudo-reptilian bane, watching carefully.
“CCCCcchhhhhhh,” it hissed. Just like the Irrat, the filmy, not-quite-solid aberration hopped from one foot to the other and peered at me.
When it tensed its legs, propping itself up on the balls of each foot, I hurled myself sideways.
I landed on the other side of the dead Irrat and scrambled a couple of steps backward.
The ragged, shadowy form turned toward me, its back to the glass doors and the ATVs. It lurched forward a couple of short hops, a motion I mirrored, stepping back. The dusky abomination kept those alien eyes squarely on me, its mouth gaping open.
WHUF, WHUF, WHUF. Three of Wyatt’s spikes stabbed into the alien grit beneath our feet, all near or around the spectral thing. It cocked its head and gaped at the spikes uncertainly.
Uniformly, the spikes began to pulse a shimmering green as Wyatt entered in algorithms.
“Hey, shithead.” I waved one arm, drawing the abomination’s attention again. “Right here, fucko.”
Here’s the field. Wyatt laid down a series of circles all across my visual array. They resembled a Venn diagram, each circle centered on one of the spikes.
Roughly in the middle, the gangling creature stood and hissed. It turned abruptly toward Wyatt, who had slipped up behind it.
Initiating Eidolonic Lock, he informed me, without even a glance at the reptile.
Understood. I drew both Stilettos.
The moment those spikes stopped pulsing, they bathed the area in a cool, sharp light that burst upward in three cylinders, none of the energy passing beyond the circles of Wyatt’s radii.
The overlap caught the Deviation squarely in the center of its chest. As the light began to flash again, Wyatt frantically worked his keys, altering the very nature of matter within the creature’s body.
The seething thing screeched, wracked with agony. It trembled and spasmed caught in the grip of the Artisan’s alchemy. Before my eyes, the ghastly reptile solidified, gathering about it the alien mass of this world.
Anytime, Hoss, Wyatt prompted, clear even over the racket the Deviation continued to make.
Copy that.
I brought both weapons up and aimed directly at the now-solid aberration. Without hesitation I fired each three, four times.
They didn’t all hit; we didn’t need them all to hit. My kinetic bursts tore into the rigid body of the reptilian obscenity, liquefying its form into quivering, syrupy plasma.
The screeches abruptly halted. Wyatt struck a few more keys, and the verdant glow faded.
A noxious, nauseating blob of mutilated flesh fell to the ground.
4
“Gross.” Wyatt regarded the putrescent mass. “Worst piñata ever.”
“I just love it when you’re helpful.” I turned back toward the enclosed chamber. “Come on. We have work to do.”
We hadn’t taken five steps before Wyatt stopped and gaped at the ATVs.
“We don’t have time to go muddin’—or whatever it is you people do.” I shook my head. “Get your head in the game.”
“No, Bishop.” His whispered voice caught me off guard. “Look.”
It took me a moment, in all honesty. At first, I saw nothing where he pointed. But the longer I stared… A whisper of eldritch color burned in a halo around the vehicles, twinkling and flashing in an undulating fashion. That shine originated somewhere along the hand throttle, though I couldn’t be more exact without getting closer.
“That’s not bizarre or anything.” I chewed my lip in thought.
The radiance writhed in the air. Its pattern reminded me of the gathering force inside the Atrificia as it hovered over the crystalline device.
“Remember what melty-face said about radionic transmitters?” Wyatt raised an eyebrow.
“I do,” I responded.
“This means I get to check the ATVs for orbs, bud.” Wyatt held out one hand, palm up as if to say ‘obviously.’ Without waiting for my response, he trotted over toward the parked vehicles.
Eleven late-model four -wheelers all sat parked together, lined up and ready to romp into the alien desert beyond.
As I stepped over to where Wyatt crouched, that unearthly glow sharpened, as if the energy grew stronger the closer I got to it.
Did it grow brighter the more I paid attention to it? Maybe.
“There.” Wyatt gestured at a tangle of black wires wrapped all around a silver mounting bracket. The device had been welded onto the ATV and held a small brass globe securely against the vehicle.
“Just like Thorne’s,” I marveled. The device sat at the center of the undulating radiance, gathering it in. “So this is one of their Radonic Transmitters?”
“I might be forced to borrow an ATV after all.” Wyat
t gave me a cat’s grin. “Sounds just awful.”
“They might have to charge.” I peered closer, noting the trigger switch on the side of the sphere. “But beyond that, they seem to be what we need.”
“Lookit the back.” Wyatt tapped the rack behind the driver’s seat. Four canisters were stowed on the back of each ATV, secured with steel braces.
I studied the devices, and then glanced up at him.
“More of those resonators.”
My forehead wrinkled.
He pushed his hat a little further up his head with a sigh. “The things Thorne said had been tampered with,” he clarified.
“Oh.”
“They have conduit cables runnin’ off the left. Plugs into the side here.” Wyatt raised an eyebrow. “Might work like batteries.”
Gentlemen? Anya’s link caught me off guard. If you are finished outside, we should discuss how to deal with the Parabola.
Copy that, Twitchy. Wyatt stood and shot me a sideways grin. We located the Radonic Transmitters.
You did? Her eyebrows raised slightly.
Wyatt did, I clarified. It’s looking more and more as if we might make it home.
That is excellent.
I stepped inside and stopped in place, stunned.
A minor cataclysm had taken place inside the bay.
At first count, I saw nine corpses—four of which appeared to have had their throats slit by our Kab ally’s shapeshifting sphere. Two men had been cooked to death, while another lay shattered, as if his flesh had been glass. Scorch marks scored the far wall, and two silvery stasis fields shimmered by the door. Flames covered one computer bank releasing black smoke to creep along the ceiling and eventually roll outside.
“Wow.” I studied Wyatt and let out a low whistle. “You’re really getting creative with that thing, aren’t you?”
“Desperate times, Hoss.” A cunning smile capered on his lips. “Don’t worry, I’m keepin’ a record of everything I’m tryin’ out here. I’m interested in showing the Designates what can be done.”
“Yeah.” I shook my head as I took it all in.
The equipment Wyatt wore had a singular intention on dossier: to counter the reality-altering effects wielded by creatures from beyond our world. The lizard-lamentation outside had been just one example. Dozens of ‘approved procedures’ were in place to offset Irrational horrors.