by Russ Linton
"Dad, you gotta move. I can't..." A whisper, barely above the crackle of flame.
I slump and pull his head into my lap. Reach behind his neck. Undo the mask. My breath quivers in ragged, unsteady gulps. I peel away that part of him I never really wanted to accept.
There's no tightness to that lantern jaw. His mouth slips open. No pain, no peace, just the tilt of what used to be life succumbed to the pull of gravity.
"Dad..." I struggle to get closer. "You can't...you're the Crimson Mask, the fucking..."
Insides, thoughts, they're all boiling. An uncomfortable warmth seeps into my bones. Steady smoke issues from the fire. There's the gaping hole, calling. One more death-defying run and I'd be free.
But then he'd be alone. Boiling or frozen, nobody should die alone. Nobody. Dad wasn't there for me much growing up, but there was never a doubt he'd always be around. I lower my cheek to his forehead, gazing numbly into the distance.
Hours spent at the comcen tracking down each cable, months in the crawlspaces of an Arctic bunker, a lifetime hunting for the terminal ends, manipulating the final destination, feeding my digital obsession, a familiar sight worms its way through the grief. Fiber strung underneath the stage. Twine from a labyrinth-breaking spool. It runs a straight line underneath the stage floor and then dips away into a larger space.
Shortwave.
Gently, I let Dad's head down. His mask wadded in my hand, I stuff it into the now empty holster on my vest. Point and shoot.
I crawl toward the stage, avoiding the scrapped equipment, the pools of roof tar, the fractured lumps of magma. Time Slip’s coffin isn't far, still clamped shut in this world, the real world, where people die, for good.
A short drop and I'm underneath the stage. There's enough illumination from the fire to follow the bright orange cable highlighted against the shadow. One hand tracing it, one on the gun, I crawl, then shuffle, then stagger deeper. Stairs are carved into the foundation ahead. I lumber down them into a cool darkness, isolated from the smoke and destruction racing for the sky.
The exposed cable runs through the frame alongside a door. The door has been reinforced, and there's a keypad off to the side which backup power somewhere in the bowels of this place has kept alive. I dig out my multitool.
My hands are shaking. I've done this before, in a training ground where Dad left me. Two years lost in a montage memory where I leveled the fuck up. Leveled up to kill the son of a bitch who did this. Powers or no, he's as good as fucking dead.
A final tweak and the keypad shorts, the numbers flare and cycle through a crazy dance. I ease the handle, just enough to unhook the latch and finish it off with my foot. Gun up, I'm staring down the sights at Shortwave.
"Cashing in my miles, motherfucker."
Chapter 43
SHORTWAVE LOOKS UP from a battered desk—his own little bunker. No lights, a dim green shimmer dapples the room. Could be from the monitor on his desk, as ancient as it is. The guy obviously isn't a Windows user. Hardcore command line only shit going on. But no, that glow is familiar.
The source is Aurora. She's in a corner trapped behind a mesh of metal. Surprise registers across her smooth brow. She's being held in an upright sarcophagus cage, the design exactly like Eric's in the infirmary.
Classical music blares from a sleek chrome turntable. The rich horns sound almost as though they could be from the orchestra pit right behind me. The delicacy of the notes has a disorienting contrast with the surprisingly cool and smoke-free room. But all I need to do to refocus is picture Dad. Lifeless.
"Peace be upon you, Spencer."
"Shut your fucking mouth!" The words burn my raw throat, dragging in the inferno I left behind.
Shortwave's mouth collapses into his reddish beard. Rather than being surprised or pissed off, he seems worried and not about the gun in his face. He spreads his fingers, letting his hands hover above the keyboard and slowly rises. "What's wrong?"
"What's wrong?! What's wrong?" My hand is shaking too much. Point and shoot, sure, that easy. A mouse and a targeting reticle, I'd have taken the shot already. I add another hand and try to steady the gun. My vision blurs. "You killed him." I choke out the words through the tears. "You...fucking...killed...him."
He dips his head and begins to work his way out from behind the desk but stops, displaying empty hands, as I fumble with the gun. Aurora's smooth features crease. She leans against the cage but flinches away as a spark fizzles along the frame.
"As you know, our security cameras have been shut down. I didn't see." Gray-blue eyes bore into mine. "I am sorry."
I want to tell him off and can only manage a strangled grunt. Sweat causes the gun to slip, and I fight to keep it level. The trigger feels loose. I squeeze, lightly. It should be enough pressure. What the fuck does it take? Aurora gives a panicked yelp.
"I never wanted anyone to die. Sudak, Cosmonaut, those revolutionaries fighting their senseless war over the physical world in Ukraine. The Mujahideen I operated against in Afghanistan. The same ones who took me in as a guest and not an enemy. Who taught me to live for the greater community. Ways more precious than my Soviet upbringing ever was. Life is precious, Spencer. We shouldn't fight. We shouldn't die in wars of others making."
A quick jerk of my finger and my ears ring. Flowing passages in the music filled with violins and cellos take a catastrophic skip. The entire turntable leaps and shards of vinyl shower the room.
I've felt it. The necessary pressure on the trigger. Easy and irresistible. I train the gun back on Shortwave. "Then why did he have to die? Why him?"
"Please, understand, Spencer. Some Augments, they don't kill each other, they kill themselves. We're born to be weapons, merchants or heralds of death. It is regrettably in our nature to be expended for a cause greater than ourselves. I mourn your loss, but humanity has a real chance at peace. Augments have a chance at peace."
For whatever reason, I find myself trying to make sense of the words. Letting go of the anger would be a mistake. I need for it to take over.
"You're ready to die for that cause?"
"I have found my cause, and it is not at the mercy of a government or even an ideology. It is for the future. Brutal, uncaring, time crushes all foes. But we can survive. When we work together through the community, the Collective. We can be a sequence in an open chain, every contribution recorded, plain for the wide world to see." He gestures toward the terminal on his desk.
"And enslaved to your every keystroke, huh? All of this at your disposal."
"You misunderstand. This is a revolution which is already in place. I needed to but give a simple push to start the irresistible churning of the gears. Distributed finances, energy, an economy based on sharing and not preying. Governments and corporations refuse to accept..."
"Shut up!" I shout. "You have an answer for everybody, don't you? Cyrus. Polybius." I motion the gun toward Aurora's cage. Heat's building on my back. The fire raging above us, hard to say how long we've got. "Not me. Enough of your bullshit. Let her go."
His shoulders slump, and he rakes his beard. "I cannot."
She's a bigger danger than the gun pointed at him. I get it now. She can ruin all of this. Our own giant reset button. The one I couldn't convince Eric to push.
"Afraid she'll fry your little revolution? Let her go."
"I won't."
"Oh yes you will." I thumb back the hammer.
He smiles into the barrel and takes a cautious step forward. "Too many have died today. Your father has given a sacrifice. I suspect members of our Collective have as well. I've lost many of the first generation of citizens not born of flesh and blood but of silicone, precious metals, and alloys. But their contributions have been recorded and logged. They have left their legacy and not just a path of destruction."
A sharp pop. My ears back to ringing.
Aurora gasps. Shortwave stares at the gun, smoke trickling out of the barrel. His head dips and scarlet phlegm strings toward the floor, past a spreadi
ng stain of bright red under his white tunic. Head up, he grimaces with shock and even betrayal in his eyes. One last look I never got to have with Dad. A shared moment stolen by this selfish piece of shit.
Bam.
"Spencer!" Aurora screams, but I don't hear. Only the ringing of the gunfire in the confined space and the action of the hammer as it unleashes yet another round.
Bam.
He stumbles against the desk, propped on one arm, his other trying to hold in the blood. Whimpers come from Aurora's corner, and I ignore her as I advance. Somebody has to pay. Dad doesn't just die without an answer. Mom, or what she used to be, buried in a desert, alone, frightened with nobody to save her. None of these sons a bitches understand. None of them get it. I'm not powerless. I'm not their fucking pawn.
Bam.
He's on the ground now. Blood pools around him in rhythmic surges. He crawls toward the chair, leaving a slug-like trail of glistening wet, a dark swath in Aurora's uneven light. Fingers claw at the cushion, and he drags himself upward, the wheeled office chair skittering almost out of his grasp. He coughs up a lapful of blood. The one arm pulled tight, spasms, and he reaches for the keyboard.
Bam.
His precarious balance ends as the final bullet rips through, sending his body to the floor and the chair careening toward me, wheels leaving a trail of blood. A final shudder and Shortwave dies.
The gun clatters to the ground.
Staggering forward, I walk right through his blood, my shoe and pants spattered, my bare foot warm and slick. I want to drop to my knees and be sick, but there's nowhere to fall without saturating myself in the guilt. I shut my eyes and lean heavily on the desk.
"Spencer," Aurora calls once more, this time her voice is a soft whisper.
What just happened? We came here to stop him, right? Mom said it—certain things had to be done. This was war, none of it pretty. People died. This is what Dad tried to protect me from all those years.
Tears fall in a sudden torrent. Collapsed against the monitor, I try my best to hold back the sobbing. This is a thing best done alone, and the intensity of Aurora's presence is a constant reminder that I'm not. She's got to be watching with those empty eye sockets, creased by concern. Not since the bunker have I cried this hard. Big chilling puddles on my pillow out of fear for Mom or myself. A grief which quickly became self-pity and self-destruction.
"Let me out," Aurora pleads. "Please."
A sharp intake of breath and I swallow the rest of the pain, dragging my sweat-soaked shirt across my face. Somebody else needs me. I'm not too late. There's a simple release latch, but none of it that she can touch. On a gurney in the infirmary, the whole apparatus had a defined intention. Here, the purpose is obvious.
Sniffling to cut off a stream of snot, I stop short of the latch. Shortwave kept her alive but quarantined. Locked away in a cage designed by the guy I only hours earlier called family. With our base compromised months ago, Shortwave could have easily stolen the design. No telling how much he knew about our movements. About where we'd be. Then there was Chroma in the loop talking to who knew how many denizens of the darker regions of the net. Shortwave himself, maybe.
"Hold on," I say, headed for the computer.
The corpse. I focus as much as I can on the monitor. Bloody fingerprints smear the desk, the chair. A reminder of how determined he was to reach it. Opening the door for Aurora too soon might just fry it.
There's a command line chat open. A black void punctuated by green text. He might have been trying to get out one last message or maybe kill it before I saw. I've got to get my shit together—there could be something important here.
A conversation, time stamped back to about twenty minutes ago. It's all chatter filled with abbreviations and leet speak. There's a warning which synchs up to Dad's watch on our departure time from the hotel. Another heads-up on our progress. Files being transferred. Brief instructions for admin access, remote logins.
Char knows all those.
Says one reply.
Heads up, security going offline.
Says another.
Early EMS arrival not scare them off? WTF is going on?
Not long before I put a boot through the door.
Don't hurt anyone, all right? Aurora's the only one we might need to... Talk to Spence. Tell him what you told me. He's got to understand.
Every last message from 3n1g|/|4.
I'm not sure how long I stare at the screen. Aurora's still trying to get my attention. Her eerie calls sound more distant than ever. A shout across a vast canyon. My body's switched over to autopilot and my brain a damp sponge settled in my skull. I flick the latch and a hand, my hand, hinges the cage open.
That queer green glow envelops me. Haunting sobs unleash into my shoulder as every hair on my head prickles.
She's crying. The disembodied girl, crying for me. I should understand why, but I don't.
"Stop." My own voice is spectral and monotone. "We need to get out of here. Find Mom."
"Yes," she sniffles. "Where was she last?"
"On the balcony, headed toward the upper gallery."
She nods, and we're coming apart on the charged air. For the first and only time, the spread of my molecules over an unbreachable distance is a relief.
Chapter 44
MORE GUNSHOTS FILL the air. I glance at my hands as they materialize and gauge the weight, the heft. Empty. Wasn't me this time.
Aurora's shunted us to the mezzanine behind the balcony seats. Where the theater had seen some patchwork, this is a disaster. Smoke billows out from the passage where the main theater continues to burn. Plaster chunks litter the floor. Open arches line the walk, their railings long since salvaged or busted.
"Wait here," says Aurora. I turn in time to see a wisp of green vapor slice the smoke and vanish.
I'm on the move toward the gunfire, ducking through each arch to try and see. Mom needs to be safe. She must be. Below us lies another narrow hallway filled with debris and lined by flaking walls. Sounds of the struggle continue up ahead from the lobby.
Gunfire has stopped, replaced by shouts. I think I recognize Hound's commanding voice. I give up trying to get a vantage point overlooking the lobby and rush headlong toward where the mezzanine ends at a flight of glassy marble stairs. Open arches race past with glimpses of a sun-flooded space and shadowy movement. I take the steps two at a time, hitting the first landing underneath a grotto of exposed brick and a domed, speckled ceiling.
Danger's near the bottom step, gun ready, taking cover behind the marble rail. Hound's nearby, protected waist down by a counter. Both of their guns are trained at the far end. Our former traitor doesn't even bother to look my way.
I hustle down the stairs, heedless to whatever is going on, wanting only to find Mom. Arches which mirror those on the overlooking mezzanine floor frame the exterior doors and divide the sun into distinct portals extending into the smoky room. Outside, I catch the pulse of emergency lights.
Two more figures are poised on the opposite side. Cyrus and Polybius provide stark cutouts against a brilliant white. Ignoring Hound, I shamble into the line of fire. Cyrus has a gun of his own pointed toward our end, perhaps a first. Mom dangles in his other arm with his elbow hooked under shoulder, and his forearm pressed to her neck.
"Get to cover, dammit," Hound shouts. His protests don't last long. A flash and all eyes turn upward.
Chest arched, head hanging at full rest along with his massive arms and legs, Dad's lifeless body hovers several feet from the floor. Aurora is little more than a green mist swaddling him in smoke and sun. Her aura plays across the gilded flecks of the ceiling. She carefully lowers Dad to the floor. I stagger into the open and fall at his side.
"Cyrus," Aurora's faraway plea beckons. "Do something."
Dazed, Cyrus places Mom in Polybius' arms. The code smasher looks like he's about to advance as well, taut skin straining against metal seams. His sorrow is impossible for me to reconcile with the treachery
.
Cyrus approaches, and both Hound and Danger leave their cover with guns half-raised. Aware of their attention, Cyrus squats and sets his own gun on the ground. Nobody speaks as the healer crouches opposite me, dark eyes full of pity, maybe regret. I've given up trying to understand why these former people do the things they do. Power trips, egos, heroism, villainy—none of it fits or even comes close to offering a full explanation.
The steady crackle of the fire could be a gentle rain if not for the smoke roiling across the ceiling, a gravity-defying fog. A cacophony of sporadic beeps from the trapped miners warns of the constant danger. Hound has moved nearly as close as Cyrus. Weapon lowered, he places a hand on my back.
Cyrus performs a brief inspection. More medical than miracle. "We all need to get out of here," he says. "The fire..."
A hammer clicks somewhere behind me.
"I'll be able to tell you when we gotta go," says Danger.
Cyrus squares up, searching for my gaze which I don't feel I've got any control over. "I never wanted this to happen," he says.
"Then why do it?" I whisper, a cold accusation. We went searching for him in the first place, worried he'd been swept up by insurgents or Shortwave's goons. And then I remember. "You took his powers."
He doesn't respond. Jaw clenched, he stands and switches to Hound. "I'm sorry. I can't do anything."
"Can't or won't?" I rise, staring him down.
"Believe me, I would if I could." He clears his throat. "Sean's dead. I can't change that."
"And for what?!" I shout. "For fucking what? Some washed up communist and his people's army of machines creating virtual fucking money?"
I've stepped over Dad's corpse into Cyrus' personal space. There's a gun I dropped somewhere on the floor in a pool of blood. There's even one right here, by my foot. I lunge and snatch it. He's too quick. Before I've raised up, he's got a hand immobilizing the slide, the other strikes the grip, and the pistol spins free taking the skin off my thumb. Hound's barrel snaps toward us to join Danger's, but Cyrus tosses the gun behind him, keeping a solid hold on my arm.