Wings still fluttering and frying random airborne molecules of dust and mayhem, Cyn raised a fist and screamed, “Death to the enemy! Death to the Ghoul Lords!”
The moon shone down. The stars gleamed. Blood flowed and guts spilled.
Greedily, she checked the battlefield again, from left to right.
A few beasters fell to agile stinkers that climbed them and struck. A few humans fell to sprays of friendly fire that threaded between the line of Ghoul Lords, guards, and stinkers. Minor, all minor.
“What else can I do?”
The Worshippers and Mercantors were reachable by flight but would likely be as successful as this. Boring.
She raised her head, grin widening, teeth showing. The rogue queen.
From the middle of the fanned-out armored column, a stark blue-white light rose, spreading in an inexplicable way, surging in a wide swathe as if it accelerated. The night’s darkness was eaten away. Yet it did not bother the beasters? Once her eyes adjusted to this unnatural light, Cyn zeroed in her demon sight. She focused and found she was witnessing the ride of Maura on Toother, galloping with her hand held high, sword clasped with its point upright.
The blue-white, eye-scalding glow came from the sword. The field of light froze the Ghoul Lords that encountered it and as Maura and Toother passed them, they shattered.
“Fuck. The bitch. She does have an Ice Sword! I knew it.”
Tempted to zoom down there and wrestle it from the fae female, she flew lower, closer, only to recall Vargr and Rutger’s presence.
The rogue queen would do as a goal. Here had become a boring massacre.
A little regretfully, because after all they were great fucks, she sent a final glance to Big Mo. Rutger still rode atop the centipede vehicle, spraying bolts and bullets merrily, and there she spied what she could not believe.
A small purple bot clung to Big Mo’s roof.
Little Mo had hitched a ride—no doubt he thought to protect her. Well, clearly, he was safe, as was she. This battle was won, done and dusted.
Time to go.
At that she carved a flight path in an arc, aiming toward the distant edge that overlooked where the rogue queen resided upon the rubble of the unnamed quarter.
Chapter 20
Dawn was still hours away. As she flew over the unnamed quarter, Cyn surveyed the enemy forces. Pitiful, really.
She rained down flame then unslung her rifle and coolly reloaded it, after which she sprayed a good amount of flechettes upon the heads and tentacles of those below. Aliens and people died and disintegrated. Blood spattered their uneven terrain. There were few humans left here, though it seemed they had still been made to grow fields of crops.
Once upon a time she’d been like them. Vegetarians for the win, unless… she wondered if the humans were ever fed other humans. Ugh.
She waited to see what moved.
Her prolonged barrage had blown away most of the guards and the Ghoul Lords—of which in total there were five… had been, five. Cyn landed, boots skipping over the debris before she found a firm, stable place to stand. The rogue queen’s lumpy mound reigned over the Topscape, like a slumped wedding cake over a table. The total surface area here was small compared to Warrior Quarter.
Firing in bursts on the last few guards who were plainly confused by the lessening Lure, she padded nearer, knowing that only one Ghoul Lord remained beyond the mound. She’d sensed this one from above—Avidex, he named himself, and she’d stabbed the monster once, long ago. He’d tried to kill her at least twice.
This night she’d finish killing him… it.
The humans were mostly dead, caught in her remorseless spray of flame and flechette rounds. A few crawled nearby, whimpering. Cyn ignored them. This Ghoul Lord she hunted was different, judging by its mental signature, and she was not about to fail at this last hurdle.
Different in a very strange way.
She stalked nearer, walking in a curve to circle the queen mound.
The first moving thing she saw, past the queen, resembled a naked human. Cyn lit up her hand and softly walked closer, her boots crunching on gravel. No Ghoul Lord could hurt her, not by itself. It had tentacles, she had fire, brimstone, a rifle, and Willow, and a few sundry knives.
Then she stopped, halted dead as the creature ahead turned to face her.
“Willow?” Fuck, this was impossible, and she spied the umbilicus-like tissue leading around the corner. That was joined to the Avidex alien.
Her eyes began to weep red fire, motes raining down, and her hands trembled with anticipation of this kill. How dare it desecrate her friend. She raised the rifle in one hand, the flame in her other, prepared to turn everything before her to cinder and ash.
Wait. The word sounded in her mind and she gaped.
“What?”
I am Willow, no, not the original. I’m a copy but my… mind is still me, Willow. Please, I beg of you Cyn, let us go free.
What. The Fuck. Was this thing serious?
Look within and you’ll see the truth. Or ask me about that time you visited the sex shop with Rutger and Vargr. Or how Toother raced around with Mads on his back.
“So.” She gulped. It meant little to nothing. “So you have Willow’s memories. That’s a reason to kill you.”
No. I am Willow. Not just her memories. I am her. Avidex says he’s not sorry he did what he did to you, but he understands why you think it bad.
Then she distinctly heard Willow sigh inside her head.
I’m sorry, Cyn. This has been like educating a slime mold.
What? Cyn scratched her head with the end of her rifle. Not safe but still. That wry comment sounded so much like Willow.
The Willow copy cupped her hands and knelt.
He is possibly the last of his kind, considering the events of today. I gather this is worldwide, and I swear he has something resembling goodness inside him.
Why was she even considering this request?
“Really, Willow. This is you?”
I think so. It’s difficult to be sure. I mean I’ve tried to keep notes, but this idiot won’t write anything down.
That sealed it, somehow. It was her. This strange being was her friend.
She didn’t have friends anymore though.
No soul equals no friends.
Where was Little Mo when she needed him?
“There’s nowhere for you to go. This thing is too low to launch.” She waved at the rogue queen. Killing her and… the Ghoul Lord was probably a kindness.
We will eject all other genetic material placed in this queen by other Ghoul Lords, and anything else unnecessary to us, and then we might reach the outer atmosphere and escape this planet.
“You truly want to go with this thing? Why don’t you stay?”
Because, this is all that is left of me. A copy. Willow opened her arms. I go with Avidex or I die. Please, Cyn, let us go.
Why in damnation were her eyes watering?
Cyn found she was almost strangling her rifle, and she slowly slipped it around to her back, clasped her hands at her front—as much to still her burning hands as anything.
What part of herself wanted to let them go? Her demon self or her older, gentler… okay backtrack on that one, she was never gentle. Her nicer but badass self?
She went to one knee and stared at this Willow, swore to herself over and over while behind her the human detritus wept and cried.
Her demon part gave no mercy. Maybe this was her last chance at being good?
“The others will be here soon, and they will not let you leave. They will destroy you both.”
Avidex says fifteen minutes, tops, for us to launch. He’s been preparing for this ever since I suggested how to do it.
Cyn almost laughed. That was her Willow.
Okay then.
“Go,” she whispered. “Go.” Then she bowed her head.
She waited.
Thank you was the last communication she had from them, from Willow.
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She waited, not daring to move for fear she would do what she would regret, still torn by this decision. Did she want to do this as a last rebellion against the demon nanites that were taking her over? Or because it was the worst most immoral choice possible?
Avidex was her enemy and a Ghoul Lord. This was siding with him. With them.
She did not know. She clenched her fist and buried it in the rubble before her, crushing it into the dirt, the sand, into the pulverized concrete, until it hurt, until blood welled from her fingers, until flame licked up from beneath the pieces of rock and the rock blackened.
It reminded her.
Pain made the world spin.
Pain told you that you lived.
The queen shivered and shook the surrounding ground, making Cyn’s teeth rattle.
However they accomplished this ejection of genetic material, this triggering of the launch, she felt the rumble and heard the burbling sounds as they built in volume. Within ten minutes, give or take a few, the queen lifted away, softly, separating from the Top of this quarter.
It floated, actually floated, rising into the star-strewn sky, and she knew wing-soldiers had seen the fuss and were coming. Fleshy, goopy substances were shed and sheeted down onto where the queen had rested, splashing, but mostly sparing Cyn.
One blessing at least. Showering off goop would be disturbing.
The wing soldiers would be too late.
And still, she did not know if what she had done was right or wrong. She’d believed the words of a simulacrum that was only a copy of someone she’d once known.
Slowly the queen shrank smaller and smaller until she was a dot in the sky.
Then she was gone.
Others came.
She remained.
From the sounds behind her they were landing. She smelled and sensed her bondmates. It was a trigger for rage. They wished to keep her, to remove her powers. With these powers she became far more than any of the beasters.
There was a certain need for finality. “I suppose you’ve come to say goodbye?” She flexed her fingers as she straightened and stood—extended, flexed them, surprised to find herself growing claws. They couldn’t hurt her. All the bullets that’d come at her today had vaporized before they’d struck, and she’d tried out the bastardium previously on a finger—stabbed herself—just in case.
Still she did not turn and look.
“No. We haven’t, Cyn.”
“What then? I have no need for streamers and cake, just a farewell will do. I will finish this.”
“No.” That was Rutger, in a measured if shaky voice. She could tell he’d crept closer.
Red motes dripping, hands afire, she whipped around and cried a warning, “Stay back!” and smote the surrounds with a warning blast of intense fire that curled across the ground.
Smoke rose, fragments blasted past her face. She didn’t bother to blink.
Through the shimmer of superheated air she saw what she had wrought. A small metal creature lay on its back, melting. Its many limbs were curling up and bending, dripping metal. Its mind was blasted and silent. It died the death of a thing that had never truly lived.
Her eyes widened and she froze.
“He only wanted to help you,” someone said.
Purple paint peeled from the metal.
Little Mo.
No. Aghast she choked on the words she needed to say.
A net of steel fell on her, and the first shot took her in the heart, halting its beats, and threw her backward so she toppled.
They bore her snarling down to the earth, and shot her again and again, her body jumping with each blow. They injected something into the port. Her bondmates and Maura, her betrayers. She fought them, but her blows were weak.
“You shot her, Maura?”
“Yes. With those nanites I didn’t dare give out to anyone. We’d never have gotten an injection in otherwise. My last resort. She just released a queen and tried to burn us all. What else could I do?”
The blood in her veins was freezing, propelling ice along the tiniest vessels, forcing through the tributaries of the great river of her blood system. Half-blind, shivering, she felt her body shutting down.
“What nanites?” someone asked.
“Angel ones.”
Angel? She snarled again before she died.
Blackness reigned.
Chapter 21
Something pitter-pattered through her brain.
She woke to them injecting more of whatever froze her blood and screamed, trying to batter them away, but they had her restrained. Her hands and legs would not move. She swore and swore until another substance felled her, ice in her veins, washing away reality.
Days of such torture seemed to follow, in fits and starts. Her eyes were sometimes open but unable to see or swivel. The actors in this play of horrors were her previous friends and lovers, and though she begged them to stop, they did not.
More injections. Food forced into her mouth when she could not see the spoon. The metal clinked on her teeth.
She swallowed, determined to get stronger so she could do very bad things to them all.
Until one day, or night, she opened her eyes, and the world stayed in place.
“Cyn?”
She blinked and looked at who this was, recognized them.
“Vargr?”
“Yes. We’re here. Been here all the time. It’s been five days. Maura says your demon nanites are finally in balance.”
“You…” She coughed, remembered the words. “You gave me angel nanites?”
“You heard that? She heard that.”
“Yeah.”
She licked her lips. “You are in so much trouble.” It came out croaky but was a nice threat.
He leaned sideways and spoke to another beaster, a huge horned one.
Rutger, oh, of course.
“Does she sound sane?”
“Too sane.”
Everything came flooding back. The battle, Willow, the queen taking off, and what she’d done to poor Mo. She’d killed him.
“I melted Mo,” she whispered squeakily. “Fuck.”
“Yeah. You also let a queen go. A scout saw it happen. Why?”
“Willow. Willow was there. God, I’m tired.”
She started to drift into sleep.
“Undo the restraints.”
“Hey, don’t worry about Little Mo. He’s okay.”
“Impoffible,” she whispered through numb lips, before drifting off.
“Not impossible. Or impoffible either.”
Next time she woke, they lifted her into a sitting position, and she realized she was on a rooftop with the stars out above.
“Nice.” Then a mechanical creature trotted up, clicking softly, blocking out the sky, shoving its cold nose into her face. Half the size of a pre-apocalypse puma, with twitching metal ears and yellow eyes, it withdrew but thumped a paw on her chest. Someone had coated it with a velvety black fur.
“Good morning, Miss Cyn,” it said in an almost familiar voice.
She squinted, held up her shaking hand and grabbed its ear. “Mo? Little Mo?”
It wriggled loose its ear and sat on its haunches, making it too short to see properly unless she sat higher. So she did, sliding her back up the lounge.
“It is I. Despite your apparent attempt to melt me I survived, due to a back-up. I cannot remember the attempted murder, actually.”
She smiled but remembered and grieved again at what she’d done to him.
“I’m so sorry, but so glad you’re alive! Do you… do you remember saying you would keep my soul safe?”
“I do.”
“Well, it worked. You saved it for me.” Someday, she would explain this better, because it was so very true, even if he had the comprehension of a child. Then she added quietly, “Thank you.”
“You are welcome.” Mo nodded slowly, looking wiser than the bot ever had as a spidery bot.
“Meet MechaMo. Remember the design Ki
ko was drawing?” Vargr leaned down and kissed her on the mouth before ceding position to Rutger who pushed him aside and kissed her too.
“Hi there, babe.”
“Babe? That again?” She rubbed over her face with her hands then put those hands on both of them—on their asses to be exact. “What did you all do to me?”
“Well. We saved you from becoming bad.” Vargr straightened, spine cracking, wings shifting. He reached back to scratch at his neck. “Angel nanites for one, though that was Maura’s idea. When we found you, did you know you’d gone stripy red all over?”
“No.”
“Well, you were. Scary chick. Fire was dripping off you everywhere…” He waved his arms like some swaying underwater seaweed. “Your eyes were this pure mean-ass red. Well, you’re not that now.” He folded his arms.
“No?”
“Yeah. Prettier now. Definitely. Now you’ve half angel and half demon nanites. It took days for them to stabilize.” He looked across her to Rutger, who nodded.
This was sounding ominous. She lay back into the sun lounge. A sun lounge beneath a starry sky. But she was alive. “So what color am I now? My arms are more white than anything. Though when she looked closer, she had scattered fronds of paler pink, like she’d rested against a wall of freshly painted pink plants.
“You’re…” He glanced at Rutger. “You?”
“Coward. You’re very pale with other bits. Sort of.”
They both looked nervous. “Fuck. Get me a mirror STAT.”
“Here.” Maura strolled up. “I thought you might want one.”
“The lady with the ice sword.” Cyn narrowed her eyes but took the offered circular hand-mirror. “Any other secrets?”
“No. Not yet. It was the bastardium in the etched blade. It has some weird but interesting effects.”
“Do tell.”
“I’m glad this worked on you, Cyn. I would’ve missed you, my friend.” Maura smiled and the joy in that smile became her, changed her.
She was a beautiful woman with her blue-and-white living hair, blue-threaded skin, and that strong but elegant way of walking and holding herself. Somewhen, somehow, Maura had turned into a fae ice princess.
“I’m sorry, but I told no one about the sword. It seemed too dangerous, and I wasn’t sure it meant anything at first. Fae plus bastardium leads to all sorts of other things.”
Cyn Page 16