The Deep Link (The Ascendancy Trilogy Book 1)

by Sicoe, Veronica

  Erano will be wiped off the planet.

  Someone—a TMC general—FH-something-GEN2—has ordered a genocide. And I'm square in the middle of it.

  38

  "Have you decided?" Gra'Ylgam asks. "We are about to enter their inhabited space."

  Amharr blinks. All his superior skills as a High Emranti have been corrupted: his ability to predict the evolution of complex events; his inclination to create order around him and subdue all disturbance factors; even his powers of concentration and swiftness of thought have waned. Because of the link. He can't stop diving into it, seeking out Taryn's thoughts and emotions, experiencing her. It consumes him like a powerful drug.

  "Dominant, we must act."

  "Bring the vessel to a stop," Amharr says. "Tell all Emranti aboard who aren't dealing with the Kolsamal rebellion to gather in the main bay and ready their strikers."

  Gra'Ylgam glares at him for a moment, then grunts. "I cannot give orders to Emranti."

  "Yes, of course... You are right," Amharr says absently.

  "Dominant, you must clear your mind. The rebellion on the lower decks is in full swing now. The Kolsamal have killed seven Emranti, and lost only thirty-four among their ranks. It's only a matter of time before they come for you. I won't be able to defend you."

  Amharr stares into the distance, caught in a maelstrom of Taryn's experiences—something wild and tantalizing about being chased through an information network.

  "We're closing in on the humans as well," Gra'Ylgam continues, stepping closer. "They will discover us despite our cloaking and engage us in battle. We are unable to properly fight them in this state. You must make a decision. You must do something!"

  Amharr snaps around to regard him. Then he grabs the Kolsamal's face. Gra'Ylgam clenches his jaws, trying to resist Amharr's surges. He starts to spasm, then bleed through the mouth, little green eyes locked on Amharr's in a painful stare.

  Amharr unlatches his fingers and Gra'Ylgam slumps to his knees. His autotrophs wither and die, first on his face, then down his neck and chest. His yellow skin turns ashen as Amharr's recombinant cells race through his bloodstream. They meld with the particles inserted to heal him last time and alter his body chemistry, change his metabolism and DNA structure with exponential accuracy and speed, endowing him with abilities much like the Emranti's. He should be able to manipulate the vessel's samyth and klaar, and even communicate with Onrysses on his own very soon. He should also be able to withstand Emranti inquiries from now on, and defend himself against their surges.

  Amharr inhales the Kolsamal's new scent, verifying the success of his unprecedented, irresponsible, yet utterly necessary deed.

  Gra'Ylgam's body adjusts, regaining its old strength and starting to find new one. He stands up, trembling and flexing, and faces Amharr eye to eye.

  "Now you can command the Undawan and all Emranti in its service," Amharr tells his mutant friend. "Go. Assume your duty, Dominant."

  Ga'Ylgam's muscles twitch. He forces himself to speak.

  "This is still," he snorts, "only procrastination."

  Amharr scowls at him for a second, then a strange new sound rings from his biphonic biosonar plates—a sound no other Emranti has ever made before. He is laughing. A human sound, as similar to Taryn's tickling laughter as he can make it.

  Gra'Ylgam growls and shudders, withstanding the strain of the changes acting on his body.

  Amharr inclines his head in a bow and walks past him slowly, each step painfully hard. He exits the vessel's crux for the last time, reeling under the nausea of his efforts to remain composed, almost wobbling, as if swaying in an unseen wind.

  39

  Bray is lost.

  The city comes crashing down around him as he races through its streets. In his mind, the man he's seen shorn in half keeps dying gruesomely, again and again. Bitter smoke fills his mouth and stabs its way into his lungs. His legs carry him without direction or purpose, hands uselessly balled into fists, face going slowly numb.

  Buildings everywhere are blowing apart or tumbling down, housing units collapse, trains and shuttles and cars shatter and burn. Everywhere civilians die.

  Bray keeps running.

  He keeps replaying the moment he activated that trigger, as if he can somehow find a loophole in the memory, slip through it, and change the past.

  Preston is gone; run off with some other Syndicate unit to dive into the quicksand of his war. Vik went with him. And Franky?

  Waking from a dizzying nightmare, Bray finds he's run back to the storage building. He stumbles into the crumbled building as if he's remote-controlled. Steel joists and girders protrude from the rubble like crushed, splintered ribs. Bray fights through the wreckage, calling "Franky? Hey Franks, where are you?"

  He should have dropped that detonator. Should've prevented that man's death. There were civilians down there—fuck!

  "Answer me, Franky! Where are you?"

  He crawls up the collapsed staircase, squeezing in between crushed panels and walls, digging through the rubble and cutting his hands on metal scraps. He should have stood up to Preston; should have refused to join this madness from the start. He should have stood his ground like Taryn. She has integrity—he doesn't. He's just a coward. No wonder she doesn't want him. A goddamn fucking coward.

  "Franky!" Bray screams. He bends over in a coughing fit. Kicks down a pile of scorched boards and stumbles into the attic room. Calls for Franky again, yelling at the top of his lungs.

  A moan bubbles up through the background noise, coming from the far right corner. Bray climbs over the remains of the ceiling, and finally finds him. "Hey, I'm here, buddy. I came back for you. You okay?"

  Franky's sunny blond hair is muddied with soot, one foot stuck under a chunk of concrete, his leg bleeding profusely through the shredded fabric. He bites his teeth together, eyes unfocused.

  "You'll be alright, Franks. Hold on." Bray starts looking for something to pry the kid loose with. "I'll get you out. Don't worry." Finds nothing but rubble. He grabs the chunk of ceiling with both hands, groans and pulls, and falls back with it, almost dropping it on his own boot. Franky screams in pain and swears loud enough that the walls ring with it. Bray helps him up carefully, holding him around the waist. "Can you walk?"

  "Hope so," Franky says. "Where's Preston?"

  "Fuck Preston."

  Franky stares at him, but says nothing.

  They hobble through the wreckage, Franky dragging his mangled foot. He's light as a child in Bray's grip. He really is almost a child. Kid's seventeen, for fuck's sake! Preston has children killing and dying on his behalf.

  He's let Preston kick them around for years. Accepted it, tolerated it, even tried to convince himself it was necessary. But he's been Preston's bitch from the moment he stepped out of that prison.

  No more.

  "Where you taking me?" Franky asks, forcing Bray to stop so he can rest. "Aren't we supposed to meet up with the others?"

  Bray startles. "Do you know where they are?" It dawns on him that he's completely ignored all his synet input ever since he touched that detonator. He never thought to check for Preston's latest orders, for the Syndicate's progress, or the next thing on his fucking to-do list.

  "I got updated coordinates just minutes ago," Franky says, slightly bewildered. "Didn't you?"

  "My synet isn't working right," Bray lies. He doesn't want to check it. In fact, he thinks of his mnemonic password and shuts the damn thing off. "You lead the way," he tells Franky.

  The air is hotter, denser somehow. The booms of explosions and demolitions, the screams and whistles of people and missiles, the sharp sizzle of lightning from the dome whipping the city, all grows louder and nearer with every passing second.

  "Bray, my leg hurts." Bray grabs Franky tighter and almost lifts him off the ground, holding most of the boy's weight on his shoulder as they walk.

  The bedlam's reached a new level. The TMC's retaliating in full force now. All hell's broken loose a
round them.

  Bray's lips are dry and cracked, his chest constricted and his muscles burning. Inside, underneath the fear of dying and the bitterness of failure, Bray's never felt more awake. His thoughts have never been clearer.

  "I can't walk anymore," Franky says, and wriggles free of Bray's grip. "My side hurts too, worse than my leg." He holds his ribs as he coughs, and leans against the back of a shattered building.

  Bray looks up. A Rebreather sucks in the whirling darkness overhead, rumbling violently. He tries to figure out where they are, but all the buildings look alien now, deformed and grotesque. It doesn't matter where they are. Everything's gone to fuck.

  "Snap out of it, Bray." Franky looks up at him, worried.

  Bray grins. "Snapped out of everything, Franks. Off the fucking grid, this time for good."

  "What the hell you talking about?"

  "Look around you." He spreads his arms wide in the downpour of dust and ashes. "It's Judgment Day."

  Franky shakes his head, and tries to get back on his feet. "We don't have time for this, Bray. Gotta find the others."

  "Well look at you." Bray smiles. "All grown up and determined. You wanted to ditch just a few days ago, but now you're all up for action."

  "I just don't want to die," Franky says through the rattle of scree pelting down around them. "Right now, I'd rather be standing next to Preston than out here in the line of fire."

  "True. That old bastard always stays safe from consequence."

  Franky almost gets his footing, but slides back to the ground. He grits his teeth, holding his bloody leg.

  A piece of overpass comes crashing down a few meters away, covering them in soot, and a stream of panicked, fleeing people gush out of an alley. A shower of bullets scatters them. They scream as they fall and sprawl face-down in the wreckage. Bray watches in horror as several Razers stomp out of the alley. Their joints hiss, guns snap into place, and their visors scan the dead at their feet. One of the weaponized androids turns toward them, and aims.

  In that near-infinite moment, Bray sees his life for what it really is:

  He's always been a tool, working in someone else's hands. Fear kept him obedient. Fear of facing the truth—that he's wandered blindly through a miserable life, with nothing real to fight for. Everything that could have meant something to him is gone. Hope too.

  Bray never felt freer in his entire life.

  He ducks and feigns right, then scrambles left and dives behind an upturned truck, out of the Razers' sight. One of them fires, peppering his trail with bullets, plumes of impact dust nipping at his heels.

  Bray peers around the edge of the truck for a split second—sees Franky slumped over, a mound of bleeding flesh—and crawls away on hands and knees, fleeing into a building.

  40

  I head back toward our apartment as fast as I can. I have to find someone, anyone, and warn them about the impending dome drop.

  People are running from fires, jumping out of buildings, screaming at each other. Hisses and whistles and the rapid pummel of bullets combine into a frightening cacophony. The Syndicate has squeezed the trigger and now the city bleeds, and the Trust is quicker and fiercer to retaliate than I ever imagined. There's no victory in sight, for anyone. People are just dying. Bodies lie crushed under fallen walls, heads shattered to pieces, limbs shredded, and faces eaten by fire.

  A group of people huddles behind a toppled passage, shooting and throwing flash grenades into the street. They've got plasma guns and automatic rifles, submachine guns and electro-net casters, and even knives and broken pipes. I slide along the wall and crouch behind a dumpster, looking for a way around them.

  I'm halfway past when the alley next to them bursts open like a ruptured vein. Half a dozen Razers come bleeding out in a volley of bullets, and batters them all into the ground. Every last one of them. The Razers march off in sync like a deadly cybernetic centipede. I run the other way.

  The streets are littered with wreckage and the air is filled with smoke. I stop to catch my breath beside the remainder of a water storage tank, sore and shaken out of my mind. A man lies against a wall across from me, breathing hard. He's cuddling something in his lap, his sleeves completely drenched in blood.

  "Are you okay?" I crawl toward him. "Do you need help?" His breathing breaks into a rapid sputter and he shakes violently. His hands work hastily before him. I get closer to see what he's holding, and realize it's his own guts. He's trying to stuff them back into his body. I jerk backwards. "I'm sorry," I choke, and swallow my own bile. "So sorry..."

  I scramble back to my feet and take off as fast as I can.

  I break into our old housing building, bump along the corridors and hallways, down the emergency stairs, and find the door of our apartment wide open.

  A couple of ceiling panels crash before my feet as the building is shaken by a nearby explosion. I step over them and enter. Conduits have exploded in the ceiling and sparks rain down from above. I tread carefully from room to room, a hand pressed over my nose and mouth. Then I see her, and my heart stops.

  An orange-haired girl lies on the floor, her overall splattered with blood, her face dull and livid. Denise's head is turned to the side, her green eyes glazed over and unfocused. And with a painful start, I realize she's dead.

  I run out of the building, eyes webbed with tears, and bump into someone's shoulder. He grabs me and crushes me in a desperate hug. "Bug-Nut, you're alive! Thought I'd never see you again. We gotta get to safety. The Ticks deployed the Razers, and some of our units retreated to the—"

  "They're all gonna die."

  "What?"

  "Everyone's gonna die." I stare at him, longing desperately to find comfort in his face. "The TMC's gonna drop the dome."

  "Oh fuck..."

  "We have to prevent the drop at any cost," I say, and grab Jade's arm. "We have to get to Hades."

  "What?"

  "We can't do anything from here. We have to break out and fly to Hades."

  "We can't! They'll shoot us out of the sky. If we get off the ground in the first place."

  I grab his other arm as well. "Jade, I know what I'm asking of you. I know this is probably going to kill us. I wouldn't even think of it if there were any other way, but there isn't. We have to do this—'cause if the dome falls and everyone dies, it will be on our hands, Jade, and you know it."

  He stares at me, thin-lipped and drawn. Then his eyes widen. "I remember Preston saying something about a Dart he's got ready somewhere near the Rebreather, just in case."

  "Why doesn't that surprise me," I mumble, my hatred flaring back up.

  "We have to hurry." He drags me out of the apartment and up the fire escape. "We'll have to hack it, and it won't be easy. Preston's a paranoid prick. That Dart's probably rigged to Kingdom come."

  "Let me worry about that."

  As soon as we're out on the street again we take off for the Rebreather. We keep out of sight as much as we can. Fallen buildings block most of the streets and alleys along the way, and the Razers are always just half a step behind us.

  The entrance into the maintenance shaft of the damaged Rebreather is unguarded. Jade smashes the com unit, picks the lock, and shoulders the door off its hinge. The elevator isn't working, so we take the stairs. Climbing the twenty stories to the Rebreather's shuttle dock seems to take forever, and we're both panting hard by the time we're done. We exit the narrow, circular staircase with the Rebreather's deafening machinery roaring above us, and emerge onto a double-decked platform.

  We're immediately swallowed by thick black smoke. I bite into my sleeve, clinging to Jade. We trudge through the fumes, checking the first deck, then climb up to the second. Two Darts are parked there. Their name does them justice; they look like rockets or some sort of missile.

  "Which one is it?" I ask.

  "What?" Jade yells over the cacophony.

  "WHICH ONE?"

  He shrugs, wipes his face, and picks the left one. He tries to open the small hat
ch, but his code isn't accepted. He moves over to the other one and cracks the lock. I climb into one of the two strap-chairs. Jade joins me and closes the hatch, shutting out the noise. The silence presses heavily against my skull.

  "Shit, this thing's tiny."

  "When we go up in flames like a freaking moth," Jade says, strapping himself in, "remember you talked me into it."

  "I didn't force you."

  "As if I could say no," Jade mumbles.

  "Look Jade, I'm sorry about—"

  He peers at me and smiles. "Shut up. Just make it worthwhile." I nod. "I hope there's some truth to those hacking skills you've been bragging about, Bug-Nut."

  I grin and crack my knuckles.

  41

  Bray stands in the rubble, looking down at Denise's mangled body. A shudder runs through him. His hands feel swollen and heavy, hanging limply against his dirty overall. He catches movement behind him and snaps around.

  Preston stands in the entrance. His beard is singed on the left side, and his burnt ear is smeared with grease that's dripped on his shoulder into long, smudgy stains.

  "Bray. Here you are," Preston says hoarsely. "Where's Franky?" He looks down at Denise, and sighs. "Damn it. Are you okay?"

  "I'm perfect," Bray says. He turns slowly, boots scraping against the rubble, and looks at the old doc. "What happened to your face?"

  "Missile missed me by a couple meters. Five of our men got killed, right next to me."

  "Toils of war, eh? All these deaths..."

  "Sunk costs." Preston's growing impatient. "Let's go, Bray. There's still a great deal to do."

  "No." Preston glares at him, taken aback. Bray smiles briefly. "You knew the war would escalate quickly. That things would get out of hand. You planned this from the beginning."

  Preston looks back at him, impassively. "We're wasting time here. Come."

  "You don't give a shit about the thousands of civilians who're dying because of you?"