Shockball

by S. L. Viehl

  I couldn’t take another moment of it, and my voice rose to a shout. “Tell me who Yei is!”

  “He’s the grandfather of all monsters, Cherijo. You know who he is.”

  I backed away. “No. He wouldn’t do that. Not to a child. He told me he wasn’t—He wouldn’t—”

  “But he did.” Rico’s voice became a gentle caress. “He infected himself from a biosample he’d gotten from one of the research facilities he worked for. Some archaic, extinct bacteria no one had even heard of. He liked to give us all challenges, didn’t he?”

  I turned my back on him.

  “I didn’t know what he intended to do when he put me in the restraints. Until that particular day, the nerve-webbing had been the worst, and I’d gotten used to spending hours wrapped in that. I didn’t struggle. I don’t think I was even frightened.”

  “No.” I pressed my hands against my ears. “Don’t.”

  “He could have administered it with a syrinpress, but he was a stickler for details. He wanted it introduced to my body the way it would have been when it existed. So he infected me the time-honored way.”

  I closed my eyes. My hands slipped down to my sides.

  “When he was done with me, he infused himself with the correct antibiotic treatment and then he monitored me, to see if my immune system would destroy the bacteria by itself.”

  “It was just another test to him.”

  “Yes. Just another test.” Rico came up behind me, lifted my hand, and brushed a kiss against the back of it. “Be glad you were perfection, little sister.” He got close enough to whisper in my hair. “Brutal things happen to imperfect children.”

  My face was wet, and I was sobbing. It made it hard to speak evenly. “You never needed me as your team physician. You’re using me to get back at him. Have you been signaling him, taunting him about me?”

  “I merely made our parent aware that his most cherished creation now belongs to me.” He guided me back to my chair and pressed a glass of wine in my hand. “Drink. You’ve had a shock, and it will help steady you for the rest.”

  I put the wine aside. “The rest?”

  “I have to tell you about my plans. My holy mission, given to me by the gods who watch over little children in the wilderness.”

  He was descending back into the madness, and this time, I had a front-row seat. Keep him talking.

  I cleared my throat. “I’d like to hear about it.”

  “When I escaped from our father, it was revealed to me. In the wilderness, as I lay dying. I am the reincarnation of Atse Hastiin—First Man. Born not of woman and man, but of the universal forces that once created the gods.

  “Since my enlightenment, I have been waiting for the reincarnation of my Atse Asdzan—First Woman. Together we will slaughter the Yei, and go on to populate this world and the next with our wisdom, and our children.”

  “We, as in I’m this First Woman.” I made it a statement. Who else could it be?

  Rico smiled. “That he loves you makes it all the better.”

  “You can’t infect me with the syphilis, and you can’t make me give the disease to Joseph Grey Veil.”

  Anger slammed over me as my brother reacted to my guess with an outraged scream. “It is not a disease! It is a gift of enlightenment! I have given it to my tribe, to enlighten them as I have been. I have sent it across the mountains so the Diné may know the beauty of seeing through my eyes.”

  I wasn’t falling for that. “That’s why you’ve been arranging all those marriages? Sending all those men back to the Four Mountains? You really are trying to create a global epidemic.”

  For a moment, a flicker of rationality gleamed in his eyes. “The Shaman is consulted on all matters of serious health concerns for the Native American Nations.” Joy lit his dark face. “Can you imagine his reaction when he learns his sacred Navajo have shared in the gift he gave to me? Do you think he will observe them to see how their immune systems respond, Cherijo?”

  I didn’t have to state the obvious. I knew at that moment that there was no medication, no therapy for him. My brother was totally, conclusively insane.

  I tried delicacy first. “I’m sorry for what he did to you. As much as I appreciate the honor you’re offering, I have to decline.”

  That seemed to stun him. “I offer you revenge for everything he has done to you, and to your brothers, and you refuse me?”

  Delicacy wasn’t going to do a damn thing. “Yeah.” I got to my feet. “Let me help you, or let me go.”

  “You think I need you?” He walked over to me, and with that same, cheerful smile backhanded me with his fist. I went down and out of reflex covered my head with my arms. His foot drove into my bicep. “You’re not fit to lick my footgear. But since you refuse me, it makes everything much simpler. I’ll let you live long enough to watch your lover die.”

  Now I dropped my arms. “What are you talking about?”

  “My men have replanted all the explosives beneath The Grey Veils. The triggering device is hidden inside the World Game sphere. When Nilch’i‘ crosses the touchzone line, a sensor planted in the field will activate the trigger, and blow Joseph Grey Veil straight to hell, along with his precious research facility.”

  “Chief.”

  We both looked over at Hawk, who was standing just inside the door.

  “Come and have a drink, old friend. We are celebrating the coming festivities above.”

  “Grey Veil’s facility lies directly within the San Andreas fault zone.”

  Rico took another sip of his wine. “So?”

  “If you detonate those devices, millions will die in the subsequent destabilization.”

  Rico set down his glass carefully, and started toward Hawk.

  “Hawk, get out of here!” I yelled.

  “You question me? You, my brother, my lover, my shoulder-talker?”

  Hawk bowed so low his brow nearly touched the ground. “Chief, I respect and honor you in all ways. Let me serve you, let me be your tool. Listen to my words and hear the truth of them.”

  Oh, God, he was going to end up a smear on the floor covering. “Hawk, run!”

  “My warped songbird sings badly tonight,” Rico said, caressing Hawk’s cheek. Then he began to beat him, using his fists and feet. Hawk never raised a hand or tried to defend himself, so he went down quickly. I tried to pull Rico off and got tossed across the room. My head hit something hard, and everything went black.

  When I opened my eyes, Rico was dragging me into a hogan. Ropes bit into my arms and legs. We were back underground, but the cavern was completely deserted. Of course, everyone was still in the underground arena passages.

  Had he killed Hawk?

  “I will come back for you as soon as Reever and our parent are dead. Enjoy these last hours.”

  He closed the door covering, then I watched as he nailed it shut.

  It took a couple of hours to work my way out of the ropes. Once I’d bound the cut on my arm with a piece of fabric torn from my tunic, I tried to force open the door, but it was sealed tight. There was nothing in the hogan I could use to make a hole through it or one of the rounded walls. They were too thick.

  I had to get to Reever before the World Game started, but how? Hawk was either dead or in no shape to help me. No one else knew where I was. It was hopeless.

  Then again, when had hopeless situations ever stopped me?

  I hammered on the sides and door of the hogan. I screamed for help. Screamed until my throat was raw and my voice nearly gone. I had to keep making noise and someone would hear me.

  Hours passed. I alternated yelling with pounding. I kept at it with such concentration that when the door was wrenched open, I nearly decked my rescuer in the face.

  “Oh!” I reeled backward and smacked the back of my head. Kegide reached in to help me out, and I threw myself into his arms. “Kegide. Thank God. What are you doing here?”

  He smiled, reached down and pretended to stroke a small animal.

/>   “You came to play with the cats. Of course.” What should I do first? Disarm the bombs by destroying the trigger. Duncan. I had to get to Duncan. “They’re not here, Kegide. Hawk took them up to the arena. Can you take me there so we can both play with them?”

  He shook his head, then I remembered. The subway transport couldn’t be moved unless it held enough people to pull it up the incline. There had to be another way—

  And there was. I took his big hand in mine “Come with me.”

  In the storage room, I mounted the platform and tugged on the chain. It felt sturdy enough, but getting me up the air shaft would be a tight squeeze. Kegide would have to haul on the chain. Once inside, I wouldn’t be able to lift my arms.

  With simple words and gestures I showed Kegide what I needed him to do. Then I got on the platform and helped him pull me up to the entrance of the shaft.

  It was more than a tight squeeze—I felt like a square peg being forced into a triangular hole. As I ascended, the surfaces of my body, along with my arms and legs, scraped against the shaft’s rusty interior. I could hear Kegide grunting in the storage room beneath as he hauled on the chain.

  At last I was on the surface, in a clearing behind the villagers’ fields. I stepped off the platform and yelled down to Kegide, “I’m out! Thanks!”

  Getting to the arena was my next problem. I had no idea how to get out of the mountains and down to the city. The village itself was completely deserted.

  They’d gone to the game, too. However, if they’d gone to the city, that had to mean they had more than horses for transportation up here.

  I found the old glidecar hidden inside one of the grain storage sheds at the end of the village, and checked the batteries. There was enough charge for a one-hour ride. The trusting owner had also left the ignition sequence uncoded, so I got the engine started with a few jabs on the keypad.

  I flew straight up, pushing the vehicle’s atmospheric tolerances so I could get a good look at where I was. From this height, it was easy to spot the city, and the small dot that represented the shockball arena.

  I might have just enough charge to get there.

  It had been years since I’d driven, but I didn’t hesitate as I descended and leveled out the glidecar. All I could think of was Duncan, and how little time I had left to get to him. I pointed the vehicle’s nose toward the city, and slammed down hard on the accelerator.

  I thought nothing else could possibly go wrong after that. I found out differently when I hit the glide lanes leading to the arena, which were choked with fans headed for World Game.

  Claxons blared. Voices shouted. Fists waved. And everywhere were the Gliders’ team colors, and the number fourteen.

  My batteries were going dry. “This isn’t going to work.”

  I ended up abandoning the stolen vehicle in the emergency lane and running the last mile. I shoved my way through the river of spectators flowing into the entrance gate, and came up short when a mechanical arm shot out.

  “Present your seating pass.”

  I didn’t have a seating pass. Frantically, I looked around, and spotted a middle-aged man arguing with his wife.

  “—shouldn’t play? Look at Jory Rask!” the wife was saying. “How many downs did she score last season? Forty?”

  “It’s a man’s game, you don’t know what—”

  I reached over between them. “Excuse me.” I snatched the pass chip from the man’s fist. “Thank you.”

  I shoved the chip in the drone’s arm slot and vaulted over it. Behind me, the couple screeched their outrage. I kept going, dodging around concession carts and the long lines of customers winding around them. At last I found a door markedmaintenance, slipped inside, and headed for the lower levels.

  A console I passed displayed the minutes left until the game started: twenty-eight. It took me another ten to find my way to the bunkers where the Night Horse had set up camp.

  Everyone was gone from there, too. I thought of what I’d told Kegide. Where were the cats?

  “Cherijo.”

  Hawk stood at the entrance to the bunker. He looked like he’d been put through a disposal unit backward. Jenner was under one arm, Juliet under the other.

  “Thank God.” I hurried over to help him. “Why didn’t you run when I told you to?” I ran my hand along his spine. “Did he hurt your back?”

  “No. Just my front.” Hawk’s split lips barely formed the words. “I will recover.”

  “Rico set up my husband to be the trigger for the explosives in the fault. I’ve got to get to him and warn him about the game sphere.”

  “I can get you inside the arena as the team patcher, but how are you going to stop Reever from playing? The drone officials don’t let anyone near the field.”

  I took Jenner from him. “Reever and I can communicate in other ways.” I knew I could initiate the link, but only if I was physically close to him. “I have to get on the field.” I stroked my pet as I recalled the spectator I’d seen hauled away by drone officials. Scratch pretending to be an enthusiastic fan. Team staff members were either seated in the stands or watched from boxes during the actual game. There was no way I was getting anywhere near that field unless—

  “Do you know where the players’ locker room is?”

  “Yes.”

  “Take me there.”

  We found a couple of small containers to put the cats in, which did not make us very popular with the felines.

  I wrestled with Jenner. “Thanks for bringing the cats, I think.”

  Hawk tried to stroke Juliet’s head and reassure her as he lowered her into her temporary carrier. She clawed both his arms. “After last night, I was afraid Rico might harm them.”

  Once His and Her Majesty were secure, we carried them with us to the arena’s lower corridors level. I filled Hawk in about some of what Rico had revealed to me, including the delusional plot to spread the syphilis bacteria throughout Four Mountains.

  “If I am able to get out of here today, I’m finding a way for Reever and I to get off the planet. You need to warn the tribal council at Four Mountains. Tell them everything I’ve told you about the disease. Give them the books Wendell found. They will help.” I recalled what Rico had said. “Do you think they’ll try to ignore or conceal it?”

  “The old way was to revere those whose minds existed in other worlds,” Hawk said. “Rico believes, as they did, that the mental illness he suffers is enlightenment. But I don’t think the Navajo will wait and watch their people suffer the same fate. They will go to the reservation doctors.”

  We were nearly to the underground access panel when someone stepped out into the hall directly in front of us. I relaxed when I saw that the figure had a flight suit on and a smiling, happy Terran face with two distinct bumps on the top of his head.

  “It’s Dhreen,” I said to Hawk. “He’s on our side. Come on.”

  Dhreen removed his Lok-Teel mask and checked his wristcom as we reached him. “About time. I was going to come down looking for you. Sphere-drop is in only a few minutes. Reever’s playing first string today.”

  “No, he isn’t.” I quickly explained the circumstances behind the pending disaster, then asked, “If I can get Reever out of the arena, can you take us to a place where they won’t find us for a while?”

  “I can get you off planet, if you want.”

  “You got a starshuttle?”

  “I stole it, just like you told me to.” Dhreen’s smile wavered a little. “There’s only one thing I want in return.”

  Probably wanted me to check Ilona and see if she had a little horn-earned bundle on the way. “Name it.”

  “What your father promised to do. Help my people. Come to Oenrall with me and cure them of the sickness they have.”

  I’d agree to anything to get to Reever and prevent California from splitting into a lot of little pieces. “Sure, I’ll go. I don’t know about a cure, but I’ll give it my best shot.” I glanced at Hawk, who was lagging behind. “G
ive me a minute.”

  I walked back to where he stood. “You’re not coming with me, are you?”

  “No. Dhreen can take you the rest of the way.”

  “I can’t repay you for what you’ve done for me. You’ve saved my life twice. You opened my eyes to a lot of things I’d never considered, too.”

  “It is trivial compensation for what you’ve done for me.”

  I thought of him living in those underground tunnels, never feeling the sunlight on his face. “Come with us. We’ll find a better world.”

  “No, patcher. As tempting as it sounds, I belong in Leyaneyaniteh, with my chief. He will need me even more after today.”

  “If that’s your final word.” I put my arms around his contorted body, and hugged him. “I’m going to miss you. Thank you for helping me understand my blood. I’ll always think of you whenever I hear anyone sing.”

  He held me tight for a moment, then let go and hobbled off.

  Dhreen led me to the locker room, and the Oenrallian filled me in on the starshuttle he’d “borrowed” from a Terran trade jaunter who was at that moment sleeping off the flask of spicewine he’d consumed, courtesy of Dhreen.

  “After I used his access chips, I wondered if anyone would try and halt me, even with the mask. It was more rudimentary than I contemplated. I strolled in purloined it from the nucleus of New Angeles Transport, can you put faith in that?”

  If I could understand half of what he was spouting. “Do you know something, Dhreen? The more nervous you get the worse you massacre my native language.”

  “Literally?”

  “Really.”

  The interior of the locker room was Uttered with discarded clothes and damp towels. Someone had prematurely opened a bottle or two, and the smell of synalcohol was strong. A maintenance drone trundled around, collecting the used linens for sterilization. It halted as soon as it picked us up on its sensors.

  “May I be of assistance?”