by Lee Doty
The truth: He was a slave. The knowledge seemed to hit him in the core, leaving him reeling. Where he might have expected rage or denial, all he could feel was a dizzying nothing.
As he watched, a tear slipped from Zed’s impassive face, surprising him. Again, Chrome signaled him ‘quiet’. Chrome saw Zed’s face tighten with control, and he wiped at his eyes with his fingers as surreptitiously as he could.
The hiss was again accentuated with the muted tapping, “believe. I am not your enemy tonight. There is a detonator in your heads. I saw them use it to kill Tink and the remaining members of HoldFire in Virginia”
The channel closed. Trunc hand-signaled Chrome “Question. Affirmative?” Though his face was carefully neutral, Chrome knew him, could see the terror in his eyes.
Chrome’s face set, jaw tightening slightly. Though his placid mask would survive all but direct and careful examination, his eyes burned with fury. His team. Doomed.
Zed looked around casually, then hand-signaled “Question. Deception?”
For a moment, uncertainty brushed lightly over Chrome, like a caress on the skin, more remembered than actually felt. But though it was a tempting doubt, it never touched the certainty that filled him. Crow was clever. Crow would lie to him to further his own objectives, but if he was lying, then he was a simulation, and then Crow wasn’t even Crow. But looking at the message in the elevator, remembering the taps of the message in Morse, Chrome knew. Even taking aside the information that Crow had shared, Chrome still knew. During all those days watching the league fatalities’ mechanical walk and dead eyes at the library. He had known, not clearly, not perfectly, but he had known—and he had despaired.
Chrome thumbed the channel open and tapped out, “Believe. Is there hope for us?”
Chrome’s eyes darted between Zed’s and Trunc’s. The silence stretched on for a few agonizing seconds.
Then the channel opened and Crow tapped, “maybe. I will help if I can. An EMP disabled mine. The OSI will help if you allow them. They are the Clerics we should have had.” Silence on the open channel, then, “Ash.” pause “Please help me.”
Chrome looked at the other members of his team: impassive faces and keen, worried eyes. He looked at the message in the elevator. Where before he’d only felt frustration, now the insult seemed a bond between them. Weird, he thought. There was an odd feeling in his chest, like fear, but sweeter. It constricted his throat, put pressure behind his eyes. It was as if he could feel an emotion with his body, something that had never happened in the Hollow, and something he’d never had time for in the Hallow until now. The emotion he felt didn’t have a name, or maybe he’d never been taught its name. Whatever it was, it was like friendship, like wrath. The feeling was like what the Clerics had always told them they should feel: it was a holy fire and it was calling him forward into action, into danger. It was like he’d been created to feel this feeling, not deliberately, not by the Clerics, but still—made for this.
Whatever it actually was, Chrome settled on simply thinking of the feeling as Wrath. His heart told him he would tear the world of the Clerics into bloody pieces. His head told him he would die trying. The Wrath told him he was going to try and that nothing else mattered.
Chrome’s face moved from impassive to hard, and Trunc and Zed’s faces mirrored his, except that they were both smiling a wicked, triumphant smile. Then Chrome realized that they were mirroring his face exactly. They were a team, and there were only threats and teammates… the Clerics were right about that.
As one, their faces moved back to neutrality, their masks back on. Chrome tapped into the communicator, “We will help. We will die.”
A moment of silence, then Crow tapped, “What will you have?”
Chrome’s face hardened, he tapped, “Purpose in struggle. Companionship in fire.”
“What do you bring?”
“I bring focus, purpose, faith. We bring ourselves as sacrifice to the team.” Chrome tapped.
Trunc and Zed nodded fractionally to Chrome. There was a second of silence, then Crow tapped, “Then step into the circle and be one. Step into the circle and become. There are only threats and teammates.”
“Victory is life.” Chrome tapped.
“Victory is life.” Crow responded.
***
Chicago, Now
There was a swift motion behind Ash as Trunc swept his knife down, deftly severing both pairs of riot cuffs that had secured Ash’s elbows and wrists. Ash rolled forward, but instead of rolling up to her feet, she switched her hips and scissor kicked the legs out from under Root’s tech, who was bringing his sub-gun up to engage Chrome. The Tech’s shot went wide, slamming into the ceiling above Chrome, who had drawn his pistol and was sending round after round into Xian’s torso as he stumbled back clutching his throat. Xian fell back, landing artlessly on his rear, both hands still locked on his bleeding throat.
As the Tech fell backwards, feet higher than his head from the force of Ash’s kick, Ash switched her hips again, reversing her direction and kicked him in the faceplate, shattering it with her shin. She then grabbed his leg as he completed his fall backwards and dragged herself into a mounted position on top of him. She pushed his head back and to the left with her left hand on his helmet, slamming it harmlessly into the carpet of the lobby, but better exposing his chin. She hit him as hard as she could with the heel of her right hand, driving his chin to the left and up. The Tech stiffened, then partially relaxed, knocked insensate.
The unconscious Tech’s submachine gun was on a single point sling over his head and shoulders, so Ash passed it by, instead snatching the Tech’s pistol and knife out of their holsters as she dismounted, rolling to the left side and coming up to one foot and one knee in a shooting stance. She surveyed the room for threats…
***
When Chrome made his move, Crow had been ready. He stepped quickly to the side, bringing his submachine gun down and fired two quick bursts into the Close that was moving to secure him. The bursts went through the CQB specialist’s arms as he held his weapon out in front of him. The heavy bullets passed through the arms, then bounced ineffectively off of the armor over the Falcon’s chest. The Falcon stumbled back, losing control of his weapon as his damaged arms stopped working and Crow put him down with another burst to the leg.
He then swung his weapon to cover the other two members of team Root, but they were already down. Before the action had started, Zed had moved into position behind them and when Chrome had moved, he’d used only four bullets. Double tap to the base of each Falcon’s head just under the helmet. He’d fired from close range. They both lay dead in front of the bound captive in the mail alcove.
“Clear!” Zed shouted.
“Clear!” Ash and Crow echoed at nearly the same time.
Chrome stood over Xian on the ground, covering him with his pistol. “Ash,” he said conversationally, “Cover him, please. If I drop dead suddenly, shoot him in the head, please.”
Already the blood had mostly stopped flowing from Xian’s neck, but his intended defiant curses came out as a gurgling groan. Still clutching his neck, he glared at Chrome with undisguised hate.
***
A spark of surprise, a surge of unexpected and provably ridiculous hope—and then the realization came with a dark bloom of all-consuming terror: Bai was dead. Dead! No matter how this turned out, Xian was the only member of the organization who had a hope of surviving the wrath of their masters after a screw up on this epic scale. Ironic, Bai thought, as Xian was the only one who had been shot seven times and had his throat cut. Life was definitely not fair.
It was up to Bai to kill Delta as soon as Xian was safe. After that he and the two remaining Clerics in the trailer with him would be killed. Either quickly by the chain of command, or slowly and personally if Xian survived.
This realization and the panic it brought crashed over whatever he’d been smiling about when the remnants of Phoenix and Delta had taken both Root and Xian apart i
n a matter of seconds.
He stared at the tactical display, assessing the situation. Xian was down, wounded but healing. Root’s Sniper and Captain were dead, killed from behind by Delta’s Tech. Ash had incapacitated Root’s tech, Crow had temporarily crippled Root’s Close. From telemetry, the Close looked to be combat ineffective until they could get a kit on the wounds in his hands and arms, and even then, he’d not be one hundred percent for hours.
And there were three Clerics in this trailer who wouldn’t see tomorrow’s dawn.
Bai could not see a way out of this.
The terror had come with a shock, an unexpected wave startling a sunbather, but it receded quickly, only leaving him cold. As he looked across the trailer at the two other doomed Clerics, Bai saw fear and discipline to varying degrees, but no regret. Bai had been afraid for so long that its touch had grown familiar, it’s threats and taunts as predictable as the course of the sun across the sky. Fear held him in her arms, but her touch had grown cold. What Bai felt now, at the end of his life, was sorrow. Sorrow and regret. Sorrow for the prison of his life, regret that he had been a model prisoner.
Bai looked again at the tactical display, he saw Crow and Ash. He saw those strong enough, fortunate enough, to break their chains and live free. He didn’t feel the impotent rage that seemed to be consuming Xian. What Bai felt was envy, but not the hot and cloying covet of jealousy. Instead, he felt the bitter sweet of seeing prisoners escape from an impossible prison. The sweet of them vaulting walls and dodging bullets, seeing them defying all odds and disappearing into the night.
The bitter came from seeing it all from behind the bars of his own cell, a cell with neither door nor handy spoon for digging.
His birds, Bai thought, so long gone. Free even at the end of all his endeavors to stop them.
“I am sorry.” He said, looking at them through the screen as if through the bars of his cell.
“What?” Cleric Liu said, desperation drawing his voice tight.
Bai turned from the screen, a small sad smile on his lips. He looked at Liu and Jen as they sat behind their terminals. Liu was covering his terror with a frenetic anger, Jen had lapsed into a blank, shocked stare. They had to know that it was over. Bai felt pity for them, his fellow inmates. They had committed no crimes that brought them to the prison of the Forbidden City. If the crime was anyone’s, it was the fault of their ancestors. Ancestors who allowed themselves to be prisoners at some level, to allow themselves to believe the party lies, to be so passively and easily ruled, who had chosen a cold peace of bondage to the struggle to be free. Ancestors whose final sin had been committed, either through action, or inactivity, or even death, had been to abandon their children to the state.
The communicator on the wall clicked open. Chrome’s voice filled the room, “And now it is time for your move.” He said, “You can kill us with a press of a button, I know. But you can no longer hold us. We will not be your slaves.”
Bai flinched, the words felt like a blow.
Liu began to scream into the channel, but it was all bluster and impotent threats.
“I am sorry.” Bai repeated, voice rough.
***
Chrome keyed the command channel, looking into the Veteran’s bright, spiteful eyes. He delivered his ultimatum looking into those eyes, as if the Veteran somehow embodied the evil that had dominated Chrome’s life.
When he released the transmit key, their Cleric came on immediately. He’d either consciously dropped or entirely forgotten to disguise the emotions in his voice. Whatever signal processing the Clerics used to make their voices sound synthetic over the command channel was still working, so the voice itself still held the same velvety antiseptic synthetic texture, but machines do not splutter with impotent rage.
“You will lower your weapon NOW!” The Cleric shouted, “NOW!!” He repeated, then he switched tactics, moving toward explicit threats, “If you don’t comply right fu…”
There was a pair of clipped staccato booms through the headset that made Chrome flinch, hand going instinctively to his earpiece. The channel clicked closed.
He’d not taken his eyes off of his prisoner, nor had the Veteran terminated their staring contest. When Chrome had flinched, the Veteran had smiled, but now he looked puzzled. Chrome realized that the Veteran had thought that the Clerics had set off the charge in his head, and that Chrome was in the process of dropping dead. He’d then been confused, then disappointed, Chrome noticed. Chrome was reasonably sure that the disappointment wasn’t necessary, as he couldn’t see a way that he wouldn’t drop dead either now, or soon. He had no illusions that the OSI would be willing or able to remove the device from his head quickly enough to matter. He’d made his choices and his sacrifices. Crow, his old enemy, would live on and Chrome and Delta would now die in fourth place. He found that thought amusing, and considered a smile, but it was not his way.
Which was why the smile that spread across his face surprised him, and sparked a new level of hate in the Veteran’s eyes. Chrome would die, but not as a slave.
He toyed with the idea of shooting the veteran in the head now, even though he was the only leverage he had to keep the Clerics from killing his team. He didn’t see a way out for them, and he liked the idea of the final act of defiance. He was pretty sure the rest of Delta would like that too, but they were his team and his responsibility. He wanted whatever life they had left, even if it were measured in minutes or seconds. The Veteran was an enemy, but he wasn’t worth even a second of his team’s life. He was a problem to be dealt with, not worthy of the cost of hate’s mistakes.
The command channel chirped open, but it was not their Cleric who spoke. “Chrome, would you give a headset to Ash, please?”
Chrome’s brow furrowed, “Who is this?”
“My name is Cleric Bai. Like you, I do not have a last name. Please. We do not have much time.”
Chrome snapped his fingers, looking at Trunc, who stood between him and Ash. When he had Trunc’s attention, he pointed to his own communicator, then at Ash. Trunc understood the command, but it confused him. Trunc didn’t argue, but instead simply removed the radio from his throat, and the earpiece from his ear. He walked to Ash and handed them to her. During the process, his wary eyes never left the Veteran.
***
Ash keyed the communicator, “Ash, go.”
“Hello Ash, Crow.” Their Cleric said. “It’s been a long time.”
The voice seemed to rock through Ash’s head, clarifying, purifying her memory. That voice had been there from the beginning. It had spoken the counterpoint to her first liturgies, guided them through every pre-action planning session and after-action debrief. The voice of her Cleric seemed to cut through the last vestiges of the mist surrounding her past, organizing the clutter, adding discipline to all the information.
“You.” She breathed, “We trusted you.”
“You were built to trust me.” Bai responded. “I was built to manipulate you. We both did our part, but I am sorry. I was also built to be a coward.”
“Were you built to be sorry?” Ash asked, intending sarcasm but failing.
“No.” He laughed, “No, I think that part is just me.”
“Then pleased to meet you.” Ash said, adding a subtle emphasis to the last word. “Do you have a name?”
“Bai.”
“What happens now, Bai?”
“Now I die.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Bai paused, “Because I have randomized the kill codes for Delta and the remaining members of Root and River.”
“What does that mean, Bai?” Chrome asked.
At his use of the Cleric’s name, the Veteran’s eyes narrowed. Chrome tightened his focus on the Veteran, he let it show. The veteran seemed to relax slightly, but Chrome could tell that he was fast approaching a decision point for desperate action.
“It means,” the Cleric replied through the team channel, “That the City will not be able to remote kill you,
at least not without a brute force attack on the codes, which may take some time.”
“Why?” Crow asked. “Why help us?”
“Because, I am a coward.” Bai said, “But now the only choice left to me is how I will die, and I have barely enough courage to make even that choice.”
“That doesn’t sound like cowardice to me.” Crow said, still covering Root’s downed Close.
“No time.” Bai said, cutting Crow off, “I do not have the codes for my own kill switch. Here is what you must know before they end me: The master who built you is an extension of the Chinese secret police called the Zijin Cheng, the Forbidden City. They are essentially the same organization that the OSI is for the Americans. They are loosely controlled and as independent as they are secret. They are merciless, they raised me in a school even less gently than they grew you in your tanks. You are almost four years old.”
“Four years old?” Crow burst out.
“What are you doing, Bai?!” Xian shouted, voice like burnt rubber and gravel. He could only hear the side of the conversation in the room with him, but he could tell that whatever was happening, it was a betrayal. He winced, hands tightening on his wounded, but nearly healed throat, “What do you hope to accomplish? Do you think you can save…” Chrome shot him twice more in the guts, silencing him.
“No time!” Bai shouted, “Listen! You must kill the man you have as prisoner now.”
“Why?” Ash asked.
“Because he is like you, only from an earlier generation. He was built without the lies of the Hallow and Hollow. He knows what he is, and he was built to love it. His generation rose against their masters in the Forbidden City, but he was the only one allowed to survive because he was slippery enough to turn on his brothers and make it look like loyalty to the City. He will kill you without hesitation, he will kill you with relish and slow concern if he gets the time. There is no prison that will hold him, no force but death that will stop him. He will kill until he dies, and he will do it with a smile of triumph on his face.”