Charger Chronicles 3: Charger the God

by Lea Tassie

  Charger's hand slipped to the handle of his short sword. "You're right. We have been wronged, brother. I am sorry for what humanity has done to you. You gave them everything and they only took more from you. You have suffered something I can never hope to understand. You are by far the best thing humanity has ever had in its possession, and they should pay for what they did to you."

  "To us, brother!" the younger Charger said, as he placed his hand on the old vampire's shattered shoulder armor, and gave it a solid, confident shake.

  "To us," the old vampire agreed. "What do we do next?"

  Just as the younger vampire opened his mouth to answer, the old and battered Charger drew his short sword, blazing into white hot plasma, and thrust it hard into the young Charger R/T's chest. It happened fast, the crystal shard doing its part through time and space at an inconceivable depth of science.

  And the deed was done.

  "I am sorry, brother, but the madness has to end with you. I meant every word. You were wronged, but we can't destroy the future for that." Within seconds, the young, strong beast slumped over into the twisted arms of what once had been a good man. From somewhere deep inside Charger's shell, Henry's eyes looked out at the world he had built. They filled with tears and, for a moment, he hoped that what he had done here was for the right reasons.

  Charger walked to the tree the next morning before the sun rose. For a long time, he spoke with a scruffy, stray dog about his life, then stood up and stepped into the sunlight, as the whisper in his mind commanded him to do.

  When he next opened his eyes, he was flat on his back, staring up at the most magnificent blue sky he had ever seen. The warmth on his face was strong and his body felt good, felt healed. He stood up and saw a nearby stream with clear running water. He walked, without limping, without pain, to stare into the water at his reflection. It told him he was still Charger. But younger, stronger, more vibrant, his expression more angelic than demonic. All around him, in every direction as far as he could see, were groves of beautiful trees decorating a verdant plain.

  From inside his mind, he heard the whisper.

  She simply said, "All this I give to you." Charger looked out at the forests of what would someday be known as the state of Texas. It was 1432 CE and he was in the territory of the Creek Indians.

  Far in the future, the people of Deleray's town saw to the burial of the creature they thought was a god. The corpse was a young powerful-looking demon with a knife wound in its chest and burn marks on its strange armor.

  Chapter 20 Hidden menace

  Dart sat on the unpainted cedar garden seat in Reader's orchard, his swirling black cloak folding itself around his body, his wizard's hat tilted to one side of his head. "So, Reader, you're all grown up. And you've had how many children?"

  "Exactly what I was programmed for," she said. "One thousand." She was almost as tall as him, with a thick mass of red hair tumbling around her shoulders. Though an adult now, she still had the air of a little girl.

  "Which means you have twelve years left to live."

  Reader smiled and smoothed her plain green linen dress over ample breasts and hips. "It will be longer than that. My children need me." The blue crystal shard which did her bidding hovered near her shoulder.

  "But Charger R/T and I programmed you for only twelve years of life after you gave birth to the new human race. I know, because I checked that part of the code just before I sent you and Earth into this solar system."

  She smiled again. "Doesn't matter. You told me I'd have the power to read and to change minds, so I'm sure I can read and change my own programming."

  "I suppose it's possible. But you certainly can't change my mind."

  She focused her gaze on him and he could feel waves of power washing through him. After a moment, they stopped and she frowned. "Why can't I even read your mind?"

  "Because my brain functions logically, not emotionally." Dart relaxed against the back of the garden seat, relieved to know that she couldn't control him. "Maybe you can change my father's mind, since he often reacts emotionally, but don't count on it."

  "Are you telling me you have no emotions?"

  "Of course not," Dart said. "I'm still human enough to have emotions, but I don't allow them to cloud my thinking."

  "I still have twelve years to figure out the programming," she said. "Dart, where have you been all this time? It seems such a long time since you said goodbye and sent me away because the giants were attacking. Did Charger R/T win the war?"

  Dart laughed. "Oh, yes! He knew he would win, of course. He destroyed the giants and the black spheres and threw them into the sun. Then he crushed the entire solar system into a black hole."

  "I'm glad," Reader said. "That means my family is safe from those villains." She shifted a bit so that she faced Dart directly. "If you went to the other side of the galaxy, how did you manage to find me?"

  "I can blink from place to place, just like Charger R/T. In fact, I now have most of his powers. I had a little misadventure on Planet B, where I first landed, and decided Earth was a better place to be. Anyway, I thought you might need help with something. So I blinked from planet to planet until I found you." Dart stared at Reader for a moment. "Didn't Charger R/T tell you all these things?"

  Dropping her gaze to the grass at her feet, she said, "Oh, a bit. But I've been too busy with my children to pay much attention. And he just wanted to disappear so nobody could get at him. You know what he's like."

  She was hiding something. Dart wished he could read minds. But he doubted that she'd teach him how to do it. "Remember the whole history of humanity that I told you?"

  "Of course. It is embedded so deeply in my circuits that I can never forget."

  "So you still like stories? Shall I tell you the story of Planet B?"

  She nodded. "Yes, please. It'll be like old times."

  ***

  Several weeks later, Dart interrupted his exploration of Earth and blinked to Reader's small cottage. The place was situated on level bench land a couple of hundred feet above the broad river valley below, and he found the view delightful. The river, according to history, had once been known as the Columbia, the mountains to the west as the Cascade Range. Green, yellow, and black farmland made a crazy quilt of the valley floor. The sun shone, butterflies fluttered, and Reader invited him to sit on the garden bench with her. She put a plate of cookies and a pot of tea on the rough wooden table before them.

  "Where have you been?" Reader asked. "My three little hamlets are all within a twenty-mile radius and it's a long time since I've been anywhere else. I like to keep an eye on my children."

  "You do an excellent job of being a mother."

  "Don't make silly statements," Reader said. "That's exactly what you created me for, isn't it?"

  She was as fast as ever with the smart remarks and he wasn't going to dignify that one with a reply. "I've always been curious about Earth because the only time I spent here was the few days it took to prepare you for recreating humanity." He leaned back and stretched out his legs. "It's a beautiful planet. I think I'll be happy here, so I've built a simple nest high in the tallest redwood I could find. And every day I wander around to see what I can see."

  Reader glanced out at the valley. "It is perfect, isn't it? So where have you ventured?"

  "Oh, here and there. Mostly places where I already know the history."

  "Would you want a woman as a companion on these trips?"

  "No," Dart said. "I’m not into the Adam and Eve scene. Don't try to mother me, Reader. I like the solitary life."

  "Just trying to help," she said.

  Dart rose. "Then help me find out what's wrong with Earth."

  "There's nothing wrong with Earth!" Reader looked indignant.

  "How do you know if you've never gone more than twenty miles away? Bring your crystal shard and your mind-reading ability and we'll blink to where I was this morning, on an isolated southern continent. I think that was where the Dinosauroids
lived before the Grays ruined Earth with the Night of the Black Rain. I watched a deer come out of the trees and begin to browse on a low shrub. Suddenly, it vanished."

  "Didn't you look for it?"

  "Sure. There was nothing there. No body, not even a stray hair. Though the earth was slightly disturbed, I think."

  "You imagined the whole thing!" Reader said. "How could a deer just vanish? It probably fell into a sinkhole."

  "And the sinkhole closed up around it?" Dart shook his head. "No, the ground was solid. And the field was flat to the horizon. No rocks, no cliffs."

  "All right, I'll go with you."

  She grasped the blue shard and took Dart's hand. They blinked. Two seconds later they rematerialized in an open field, with a forest of pines off to the left.

  "That's where the deer came from," Dart said, pointing at the forest. "It strolled out and began browsing on those shrubs, right there." He moved his pointing finger to some low bushes ten feet away. The sun had just risen and the air was fresh.

  Reader walked ahead to the location Dart was pointing at, and looked around at the ground. "I don't see anything. Are you sure you saw a deer here?"

  "Of course I'm sure."

  She looked at him doubtfully. "And this is the exact same place?"

  Before Dart could reply, she exclaimed, "Oh! I just felt something underfoot. In the earth. Like a vibration." She paused. "It's gone now."

  "Can you read what's there?"

  Reader went quiet, focusing on the ground. Then she shook her head. "Not a thing."

  "If it eats deer, shouldn't it have a mind you can read? Or is it only human minds you can read?"

  Reader frowned. "I can read any creature that has a mind, no matter how primitive, and even basic impulses in nonsentient beings. I have to be able to do that, you see, so I can change them if I want to."

  "But I'm sentient and you can't read my mind," Dart said gently.

  "You're different. You're more powerful than I am and you can shield your thoughts from me. So can Charger. But nobody else can." Reader turned back to stare at the ground again. "There's something alive just under the surface," she said, running a hand through her thick red hair, "but I don't know what it is. I do know that it doesn't have a mind."

  "We could try to dig it out," Dart said.

  "No," Reader said. "Leave it alone, whatever it is. If it likes the occasional feast of venison, that's no different than a puma." She glanced around. "Anyway, this is an isolated continent. There's no way it could travel to mine and interfere with my children."

  "Well, if you're sure…"

  "I'm sure. Let's go back."

  ***

  Reader sat quietly in her small house, watching the peaceful activity in the fields below, and wondering if it was time for the blue shard to build a fourth hamlet. The population of the first three was growing rapidly and, while her children were still eating well, it might be time for them to cultivate more farm land and expand the flocks of sheep and herds of cattle.

  Perhaps it was time to start inhibiting the number of births. She had already slowed the rate of development for children so that it took them almost as long to reach maturity as the old humans. It would be criminal to allow the planet to be engulfed once again with billions of humans, draining and poisoning its resources. And, of course, fighting over them and destroying each other.

  If she provided her people with more technology, they could do the building and developing of land themselves. But no, it was too soon. And maybe it would always be too soon. They were happy and productive in a pleasant rural life. More technology might make them restless and greedy. They might want to re-activate the silent cities and find new amusements. They might decide to make war.

  Reader rose to make some tea. No, she would leave things as they were. The children received a good basic education and were creative in all the arts. Perhaps someday, far in the future, when she could be certain that their ethics and motives were pure and unshakable, she'd let them make such decisions for themselves.

  She had just placed the teapot on the table when someone rapped at the door. Reader opened it to find Pine, the headman from Arcadia Village, on his knees, and accompanied by an amazing metal apparition which had the shape of a human, but couldn't possibly be one.

  "Get up, Pine," she said. "I've said I don't want any of you kneeling to me."

  He shook his head and kept looking at the doorstep. "Oh, Queen of the World, here is another god. I don't know what to do."

  The metal apparition spoke through a slit in the helmet it wore. "For God's sake, woman, get me some morphine!"

  Shocked, she stood silent for a moment, and let the apparition's jumbled, frantic thoughts roll over her.

  "I'm in pain. My skin itches. My joints ache. I need morphine; it holds me captive. I want to go home. Where's my world? Where are my notes for that last experiment? What's this strange place? What's happened to me?"

  Obviously, this creature who reached toward her with a metal claw was a human. Of some sort. "Pine," she said, "I will take care of this new god. Go home and don't worry."

  Pine rose to his feet, backed away from Reader and the metal man, and hesitated. "The god said some interesting things. He said he came from a city. My Queen, do cities have more gods like this one?"

  "Go home," Reader said firmly. "Now."

  Pine went.

  Reader reached into the metal man's tortured mind and soothed it, led his thoughts away from itching skin and the demands of addiction. It was a weird, unpleasant experience being inside his chaotic mind. The thoughts and memories were jumbled, scattered, senseless. They clawed at one another.

  "Go sit on that bench," she said, pointing to her garden seat at the edge of the orchard. She assumed he could sit; his limbs appeared to be jointed in the right places. "I will bring tea." She had no idea whether or not he could drink anything, or if he wanted to, but she certainly needed a stimulant.

  The man, if indeed it was a man, obeyed her, his legs creaking slightly. Reader followed with her tray and focused part of her powers on his mind, the rest on trying to make life seem normal again.

  "What's your name? Where have you come from?"

  There was a hesitation, then the mechanical voice said, "My name is Doctor Lorenzo Jules. I am the head of the biology department at Port Townsend University. I have been in hibernation and I need to find my people."

  She could feel his mind becoming restless again. "Who are your people?"

  "The other professors, of course! And my friends. But some disaster must have struck the coast. I could find no life in Seattle or anywhere around there. Who are you?"

  She ignored his question. "And what year did you go into hibernation?"

  "In 2050. The government had once again rejected my recommendations, in favor proceeding with CGY International's cryogenics program. The fools! They will never resolve the cellular degradation resulting from freezing the human anatomy."

  Reader could hardly believe it. That date was 2,866 years in the past. Years full of history. He had survived the Night of the Black Rain, when the alien Grays covered Earth in a five-foot-thick layer of hot iron shards. He had survived bombings and earthquakes and floods and the planet being moved to another solar system. Could she explain all that history to him? Should she?

  "The window is calling me. I'll jump. Twenty-one stories down. That would finish me, that would get rid of the morphine dragging me down. I'm always craving. I need the drug. How else can I stabilize my brilliant mind and slow it down so it doesn't tear me apart?"

  Finally, his mind was making some sense. But she didn't think it would survive learning how many years had passed. "What were your recommendations?"

  "Why, about hibernation, of course! You've read of me, I'm sure. But I couldn't make the military understand the relevance of my program. They still believe that we can travel great distances to the stars without aging. They are idiots!’

  Doctor Jules was agitated, his brain p
roducing such violent electrical flares that she was amazed he couldn't see them. She reached into his mind again and smoothed its functioning.

  "No, I won't jump. I'll prove to this ignorant and stupid world that my hibernation program works perfectly. I'll show the bastards!"

  Obviously his hibernation program worked extremely well, since he'd been asleep for nearly three thousand years. The old humans, the ones who had all died when Charger R/T destroyed the solar system, wouldn't have needed it, for they had been immortal.

  Her new humans were not immortal. She intended that they should go through the natural cycle of life and death, just like other living creatures. A person who lived forever would merely suffer excruciating boredom and probably create trouble because of it. Some people, if they believed they had all the time in the world, would have no motivation to do anything. She would not allow her children to sit around like a bunch of zombies, staring into space. Their lives needed to have shape; they needed goals.

  "Do you know how long you were in hibernation?" Reader asked. She couldn't resist teasing him about it just a little.

  The mechanical voice was slightly hesitant. "No, but it can't have been very long. Something went wrong. The contractors who built the concrete bunker two levels below the basement of my house must have made an error. Or the self-aware computer I hooked up to the web and to my brain must have failed, even though it was the most powerful I could buy. I told it to keep me in hibernation so I'd survive far into the future."

  "And so you have."

  Doctor Jules waved a hand in what seemed an angry gesture. "This isn't the future! No big buildings, no spaceports. Just a few peasants herding cows. I'd say the computer took me into the past, except I don't believe in time travel. And it can't be the past, because the city of Seattle looks the same as it did when I lived there. So some disaster must have caused all the people to be evacuated."

  "Wrong, wrong, all wrong. No body. But heart, lungs, brain. Even blood. No body. I am a metal man. Wrong. Taskers, Taskoids. Computer made body with Taskoid technology. Wrong. Skin itches. Brain itches! Wait, no, morphine takes it away. Yes?"