Solar Kill

by Charles Ingrid

Skal nodded. He gave a bark of farewell and the skimmer shot into the new dawn.

  The Purple lowered his sighting glasses. From the high plateau, he had a splendid view of the destruction roaring down on Shining fur-grinning tooth. His employer would be very pleased. Even if the Fisher emperor survived, he would be greatly humbled and devoid of authority. Mission accomplished. He heaved a sigh.

  “You’re sure that was Jack who went over when the dam wall blew out?”

  “He’s the only one out here with a suit besides you.”

  The Purple shook his head. Nobody could have survived the fall, even in a suit. And with the tons of water falling on him… He turned to his aide. “What about the girl?” The least he could do was make sure Amber was safe and would receive Jack’s death benefits.

  “She wasn’t there, sir, when we went to pick her up,”

  “What? Why wasn’t I told?”

  The man shrugged. “We were told not to delay your leaving the palace.”

  Purple swore. He swore long and loud and obscenely, his voice lashing into the pure mountain air of a newborn world, tearing into the pink-toned sunrise until even his aide’s ears burned red. Then the Purple stopped. “Any idea where she’s gone?”

  The aide shoved a note into his hand.

  Purple grasped the situation immediately, if not entirely accurately. This Rolf was an enemy of Jack’s; he had Amber, he wanted Jack. It was an age-old scenario. He read through the note again, without surprise. He’d never met a mercenary without a checkered past; Jack was no exception. He folded the demand and put it in his breast pocket. If Jack couldn’t be found, he’d have to deal with this himself. Provided of course, this Rolf survived the flooding himself.

  “Get me a skimmer,” Purple ordered. “I want to recon the area.”

  Bogie worried at him, wouldn’t let him sleep. Boss? Boss? You’re too cold.

  Jack groaned. Even that minor effect cut through him like a knife. The suit had collapsed on him, he could hardly breathe. With great effort, he managed to get his right arm back in his sleeve and tried to wipe his face plate clean.

  Silt. He was buried under a wall of silt. With God knows how many tons of water on top of that.

  The good news was that at long last, he’d come to rest.

  Bogie nudged at him again. Too cold, Boss. The inner voice sounded sluggish.

  Jack ignored it. He decided he was face up in the silt, since all the weight seemed to be on top of him. He could try to claw his way out… Jack took a moment to reflect. Was it dying on him, now, after all this? Or sickening? Or regressing? Why? The sentience fed off him, that much Jack knew for sure. It could only grow when Jack was in the suit. And as afraid as he was of the berserker it might possess him into becoming, he did not deny the strength it had given him in the past. Jack sighed. “We’re alive, Bogie. And where there’s life, there’s hope.” Jack moved inside the armor.

  The nudging became remote.

  “Bogie? Come on now. I need you to help me run the suit, if we’re to get out of here alive.”

  “Well, because while I do one thing, you can do another. Right? You’ve triggered the suit’s functions before.”

  (hatching) Bogie said.

  Hatching? Jack wondered. Or something like it. He shivered. It was cold inside the battle armor. Some of the functions were down. Chips jarred loose by the fall or connections severed, he had no way of telling. He took a deep breath, and found it stale.

  “Then I’ll do it myself,” Jack said, suddenly panicked. If the refreshing pump was out, he was in for a very rough time of it. He had no desire to suffocate at the bottom of the world.

  Every movement through the ooze was painstaking. His right leg, still a little numbed, responded fitfully to the requests he made of it. Jack squirmed, swam, shivered and resettled. He had only his senses inside the armor, baffled and faulty and easily fooled as they were, to tell him if he was making headway. But the silt seemed to give way.

  He worked for what seemed hours, until his face was flushed, and the sweat trickled all over him. Bogie trilled happily. Body heat, Jack realized. And maybe the sweat. Both of them seemed vital for Bogie’s growth.

  Jack paused as he also realized that the catch bag wasn’t hooked up and he could no longer bear to hold his water. With a sigh, Jack let down, and his boots filled. The suit fought to filter the excess out and he was left with the faint apple cider smell of urine. Plus he squished a little as he began to swim upward again.

  The ooze and silt seemed interminable. Then Jack struck something with his gauntlet. He reached out carefully, grasping whatever it was he’d touched. He fumbled through the mud until he touched it again. A branch! And a fairly stout one, sucked down with him. Jack grasped the branch and pulled it to him.

  Then another followed, as he blindly felt along it, the second entangled in the first. If he could break them and tie them together into a kind of mat—he’d have some purchase to stand on. Then he’d be fairly sure he was making headway.

  Hands trembling inside the gauntlets, afraid of crushing the branches with his power, Jack wove them into a very rough raft. He swam until he could stand on top of the mat. He pushed down. The mat pushed back, very gently. It wouldn’t take much—but it held.

  Using the mat as a reference point. Jack began swimming again. His air grew too hot and too stale. He gasped and sweat and clawed. His thoughts swam until Bogie said I fix it. and then the air became a little sweeter.

  Ouch said Bogie.

  Jack grinned, as he realized the sentence had just fixed a short in the circulatory pump.

  He crawled away from the mat slowly but surely. His heart began to pound. He stopped. Bogie sighed. Something in the adrenaline, too, Jack thought. Something he shed as waste, with the hormone in it. He thrust the realization aside. Unless he got out of here, he’d never have to worry about what made either of them tick.

  Suddenly, the helmet broke into water. Dark, murky, but liquid. Jack let out a yell. He felt its echo inside. As the face plate washed relatively clean, Jack chinned on outside lights. The illumination bounced back at him, giving him only a few inches of sight, but he saw the splintered trunk of an immense tree close to him. Jack reached out and grasped it, using it to lever himself out of the mire.

  Now he was clear. He took a deep, shivery breath. He kicked vigorously in an attempt to wash the silt out of the boot jets. With any luck, the power vault would work. If not, it could back up and blow him to kingdom come. He hesitated only a second, looking up, into the flatness of muddy waters, knowing that somewhere above him would eventually be the sky.

  He triggered the vault.

  Skal stood uneasily beside the skimmer, watching the waters churning, as trees and shrubs and dead bodies floated past him. Mist had sent him to wait there, but he could see no sign of Jack. A second skimmer circled him once, then settled down beside him, and the commander he knew only as the Owner of the Purple got out with a grace even the Fishers would admire.

  Purple looked at Skal and put out his hand in that peculiar way the strangers had. “Seen anything?”

  Skal shook his head. “No. An Elder of my people has instructed me to wait here, though.”

  “Is that right?” The human with silvery hair and a metallic blue jumpsuit lounged back against his skimmer. “Would that be one of the Elders who makes rain?”

  “It might,” Skal said shortly.

  “Then I’ll wait here, too, if you don’t mind.”

  Secretly, Skal did, but he did not say as much. He watched the dark waters alertly.

  The Owner of the Purple crossed his arms over his chest. “Not much left of Shining fur-grinning tooth’s city,” he said conversationally.

  Skal ducked his head, hiding his emotions except for an electric twitch at the end of his tail and the flattening of his whiskers. “Did the emperor survive?”

  “I’m told he did. However, he has called for a council to replace him, and to coordinate aid all over the world. He
has retired his title.”

  Skal let his teeth show in pleasure. He said nothing.

  The Purple cleared his throat. “You were a friend of Jack’s?”

  The Fisher considered that, then said. “Yes. I think so.”

  “I may need your help, then, if Jack is lost. There is an enemy of Jack’s who has taken Amber…”

  Skal turned then, his glance flicking away from the flood. “An enemy of Jack’s is an enemy of mine. Where is she held?”

  “In the capital, at one of the evacuation centers. We may have to fight for her,” Purple warned.

  The Fisher tail lashed. “I’m ready,” Skal said solemnly. Just then, he heard a bubbling in the waters. Water already churned brown began to thrash white, and he saw the being rise, just as Mist had named him, like a small sun, glowing from the flood.

  Jack saw the two skimmers and the two figures waiting for him. He gasped with surprise and the suit collapsed on the bank under him, its energy spent. It wasn’t until he’d hit the open air that he realized the damage he’d taken … and lived. Purple sprinted forward and wrenched the helmet off. Jack lay gasping for fresh air.

  Skal leaned over him and grinned. “I think Mist would better have named you Fish-out-of-water,” the Fisher said.

  Jack choked, then got out, “You’re safe? All of you?

  “Yes.”

  Purple knelt by him compassionately, opening up the seams of the battle armor and helping him out. Jack let the man bear his weight as they stood together.

  “And that’s the good news,” Purple said.

  Jack turned wearily to him, his heart sinking. “And what’s the bad?”

  “Rolf has Amber.”

  Chapter 23

  You’re not getting back in that suit,” Purple argued. “Take mine.”

  “Yours is antiquated. Besides, I want to use my own equipment.”

  Skal lashed his tail. “And you won’t go alone. I’ll go with you.”

  Jack stopped short. Bogie was braced up against the Purple’s skimmer, and, hands trembling. Jack was working on it as well as he could. Despite the healing Bogie had begun on his right ankle, Purple had crude splints strapped to it. He stood lopsided, trying to keep his weight off it. Purple had draped a light shirt over Jack’s bare torso, which was already showing huge black and blue bruises from the battering he’d taken.

  Jack shook his head. “This is my fight, Skal. Rolf will be expecting a small army. Even if he’s in an evacuation center, I’m ready to guarantee he has it cordoned off. Alone, I might be able to make it in unnoticed. But even if he does see me coming, he’s going to let me through. The man has a score to settle and I’m willing to bet he wants to blow my head off personally.”

  Skal stroked his whiskers flat. He said nothing, but his large eyes narrowed a little.

  Jack reached out and took him by the shoulder, “We’ve shared the knife, my friend, and I know you want to help. But this is my fight.” He dropped his hand and hobbled back to the suit. It was crimped and dented and silt had he worked its way into the Flexalinks everywhere.

  Purple handed him a crescent wrench and a probe. He wrinkled his nose. “That thing needs to be drydocked and flushed out.”

  “I know. But it’ll work for me.”

  “Look … let me radio this guy. Our employer is arriving this afternoon. He’s been apprised of the job you’ve done and he’s very pleased. I know he’ll foot the ransom for you as part of your bonus.”

  Jack paused. He looked at his friend. Purple had gotten a streak of mud worked into his silver hair, but his expression was earnest. “It won’t work,” Jack told him. “Rolf has what he wants—he wants Amber. All he wants from me is revenge. If he doesn’t get it, then he’ll still have Amber. He’ll bolt and run if we try to delay … and he’ll know we’re setting up something. He wants a four o’clock meet and I have to give it to him.”

  “Then what do we do?”

  “Stand by to get Amber out, no matter what happens to me.”

  Skal and Purple both nodded solemnly. “We’ll do our best.”

  Jack hesitated a moment, then reapplied himself to repairing Bogie as best he could. Purple helped, before he commented, “It’ll never be the same.”

  “Yes, it will.”

  “Better to get a new one, Jack, later.”

  Jack laughed shortly. “Only the emperor’s guards have the new ones.”

  “I’ll put in a good word for you.”

  “Right.” Jack reached for the wire strippers, thinking that had been one of his goals. Now he had only one thing on his mind and that was the rescue of Amber. Once she was delivered, then he would think of the future. A wire spat at him. He found the short and bypassed it, thinking that he and the suit were a lot alike … weapons, both. Just point them in the right direction and fire.

  He was tired of being pointed in the wrong direction.

  The back of his hand brushed across the chamois to get to the circulatory pump. Bogie seemed to have done a good repair job there … the microcircuitry responded well to the probe. Behind his back, Skal and Purple exchanged brief looks.

  Purple’s radio beeped. He climbed into the skimmer to answer it. Meanwhile, Skal shifted uneasily. “Mist calls to me,” he said, finally.

  Jack sensed a final parting. He put his tools aside, wiped his hands on his hips. “You’ve been a worthy adversary,” he said, “and an even better friend.”

  Skal’s whiskers twitched in embarrassment. The dark brown hide with the golden mottles shivered. He put the ivory-handled knife into one of the pockets of the clean pants Purple had loaned Jack. He snapped the pocket shut. “I want you to keep the ceremonial knife,” he said, “though it is customary to return it when the battle is ended, regardless of the outcome.”

  “If it’s customary—” Jack began, but Skal held up a hand. “Mist-off-the-waters, One-arm, and I agree,” he said firmly. “Because of our fighting here, we have long to wait before being accepted into the Dominion, I’m told.”

  “There has to be a unified government.” Jack agreed.

  Skal showed his teeth in mock humor. “That may never happen among Fishers. But keep the knife, and show it, and tell of us—that we may never be forgotten, regardless of our foolishness.”

  “Being a part of the Dominion doesn’t give immortality.”

  Skal shrugged. Jack watched his sinuous body ripple with the movement. “Among the stars, who knows what immortality is, Little Sun.” They touched hands, briefly.

  “Good fishing,” Jack wished.

  Skal nodded. “Still waters,” he returned, then, with a flick of his tail, was in his beat up, primer-colored skimmer, and gone.

  Purple leaned out of his. “That was Holcombe. He says that Rolf is holed up on the penthouse floor of the International.”

  “Then the best way to get in is from the top,” Jack said, tearing his attention away from the disappearing skimmer. He slapped his suit. “Time to do some climbing.”

  Sarge always told them the suits could do anything. Anything, except, perhaps, rappel down the side of a twenty-story building. Jack hung by his lines, feet swinging, rope caught on the nearly imperceptible edge of the scales of the Flexalinks, crimped open along one of his many dents. His throat went dry. The more he swung, the more those links would saw away at the rope, until, sooner or later, the suit and the rope would part ways. He looked down again. There was no way he and the battle armor would survive another drop, even though a watery surface reflected back at him. Flood waters had receded only a fraction.

  Purple manned the winch on the rooftop. His voice filtered in over the com line. “What’s wrong, Jack?”

  Jack was glad he’d left the helmet on. “I’m snagged,” he said. “Any ideas?”

  “You’ve got enough rope to swing on. What have you got to lose? Otherwise, I’ll have to crank you back up here.”

  Going back up meant they’d have to go down the stairwells. There was no problem there, except intellig
ence had told Jack that the wells were guarded by a small army of mercenaries. Jack had lost his taste for blood.

  Hi, Boss.

  “Hi, Bogie. Just wake up?”

  Hatching (regeneration) Bogie responded. Jack reflected that, talking to the sentience was like talking to an idiot. Sometimes it made sense and sometimes it didn’t.

  He stared at the sun-screened windows reflecting the suit back at him. The glare wiped out any sense of being able to see inside. For all he knew, Rolf and a small army were staring back at him,

  “Bogie, can you operate my left glove?”

  Which left?

  “Ah, this one,” Jack answered, and flexed, in spite of being dropped another breath-taking foot by the maneuver.

  The gauntlet began to open, even though Jack’s hand wasn’t moving. “That’s it.” Jack said, stopping the eerie sensation. “Only I want you to hold on tight. Clench it.”

  Clench?

  Jack projected a bloodthirsty image of strangling a foe by the neck.

  His hand clenched firmly.

  “That’s it. Now keep it that way even if my hand slackens. Okay?”

  Yes.

  Now Jack could turn all his attention to his right hand, controlling the rope sling, and his basic weaponry. Once he swung in through the glass, all hell was going to break loose, and he wanted his full attention on returning fire.

  “Jack, what’s up?”

  “I’m going to try to swing in and kick my way through the windows,” Jack told Purple.

  “All right then. Good luck.”

  “Right.” Jack took a deep breath and began to swing.

  Amber sat uncomfortably by the windows, watching Rolf pass across the promenade. They were watching the stairwells, he and a small army of mercenaries, rifles ready, waiting for Jack to show up. She tried to roll her shoulders and ease the tense muscles, her hands still bound behind her back. She glared at Rolf. If he hadn’t put some kind of psychic muffler on her, she’d consider blasting him anyway. Now, drugged, considering was all she could do.

  She squinted. White sunlight glared off the heavily tinted windows. It was the brightest she’d ever seen the sun since she’d come to this marshworld. But then, it had been raining almost constantly. Fuzzily, she thought of looking for rainbows. Amber turned her head, eyes narrowed against the glare. The opalescent sun swung closer, coming right at her bedazzled eyes.