by Tony LaRocca
Chi let out his breath in a long hiss. “I thought we were supposed to be undetectable,” he said.
“We are,” said 4021, “if no one knows what to look for. This is set to our exact cloaking frequency. Someone was expecting us.”
Chi closed his eyes. Help me, he thought, reaching his mind across the desert. I’m here, help me.
The radio crackled into life. “Cyleb transport,” a voice said, “this is Lieutenant Bellerman. You are ordered to land immediately. Do you copy?” A few seconds passed. “Cyleb vehicle, we know you are receiving. Acknowledge.”
Cut it off, Chi instructed silently. 4021 complied. Chi shook his head, cursing himself for his carelessness. At this velocity, they would reach the shield breach in two minutes. They were so close. He looked at the blip of the approaching tank on the scanner. He had never expected them to be spotted; he had not made a contingency plan.
“The frequency is changing, sir,” 4021 said. Chi focused his attention back on the aerial pulse. “It’s almost as if—”
The world before Chi’s eyes exploded into spiraling forks of violet light. He shook as if electrocuted, his convulsing muscles no longer his to control. He could make out the figure of the younger Cyleb writhing and clawing at his helmet as he collapsed against the side–stick. He felt the transport dip, and veer to starboard.
He heard the screech of tearing metal, and then silence as the safety system enveloped him in foam. He held onto his breath, and accelerated his mind. The roar of the crash and the sensations of his body slowed. His heart pounded at what seemed to him like once every three seconds. Bile crawled up his throat as his stomach and intestines pushed millimeter by millimeter towards his chest. We’re upside–down, he thought.
His brain throbbed, as if it were a balloon too large for his skull. The effort needed to keep his damaged mind accelerated was taking its toll on him; he would not be able to keep it up much longer. He opened his mind to those of his squad–mates.
—possibly an attack, 0194 transmitted to his brothers. The words came at Chi in a stream of gibberish he could barely understand. In his weakened state, he could not keep his mind from slowing. Sir, is that you? 0194 asked. We lost contact with you, 4021, and 6923.
The words came faster and faster. Pain bloomed on the left side of Chi’s jaw with agonizing slowness as it mashed against the inside of his helmet. We’ve been intercepted by the Regular Army, he transmitted. 4021 and I synchronized with some sort of tripwire pulse, and they changed the frequency to something that scrambled our neural pathways. They attacked us. I don’t know about 6923, but 4021 took it on full force.
Yes, of course, sir. 0194 replied. It came across as a high–pitched “Yesucorser.” He sent some more, but Chi could no longer understand.
Keep things tight, he thought, each word harder to send than the last. I have to return to—
He lurched forward as the world snapped back to normal speed. He lay on his right side in the darkness of the safety cocoon, the iron tang of blood in his mouth. After a few seconds, he heard a muffled chime, followed by a faint hissing noise. It grew in volume as the emergency system sprayed his protective shell with solvent. He peeled a handful of dissolving slime from his visor, and pushed himself to his feet.
4021 lay twisted across his controls. His faceplate had shattered. His cybernetic veins were ruptured and charred. He looked up at Chi with dull eyes that glistened with streaks of emerald. Even here, Chi thought. He watched the Cyleb twitch as the pathogen ate away at his brain. He drew his pistol, and fired.
“Open,” he said, coughing on the smoke. The atmosphere stank with the odor of burning copper and plastic, even through the bio–scrubbers of his helmet. The transport did not respond. “Is anyone near the manual release?”
He heard a hiss, followed by a grinding noise. “Come on, push,” said 0194. After a minute’s labor, the port side of the transport, now on top, cracked open.
“Is everyone all right?” Chi called as the smoke cleared.
“Over here, sir,” 0194 said. Chi moved to the back of the transport. 6923 lay on the deck, a torn support beam protruding from the remains of his torso. “It must have got him before the foam solidified.” The impact had fused the block of metal to the grating. The top and bottom halves of the Cyleb’s body slipped from around it in two pieces, like the run–off slag of an untidy welding job.
His blood was mixed with a brackish, cobalt–blue fluid. Oh no, Chi thought. Though the abdomen had been cleanly bisected, the blood vessels of both halves had cauterized. He could see the brackish healing gel bubbling on his brother’s flesh, attempting to mesh the walls of his ruptured organs together. Chi followed the viscous streams along the metal floor.
They seeped from a pile of torn vinyl casings that protruded from underneath the broken beam. He dragged them out. Only one of the five packs of iatric fluid had not ruptured. Chi felt a wave of panic rise in his chest, and released dopamine to counter it. He lifted the ruined top half of 6923’s body, and tucked the remaining pack underneath. He rummaged for a thermal blanket, and covered the corpse’s face.
“Is everyone else all right?” he asked. “Report.” The Cylebs answered, one by one. The only casualties had been 4021 and 6923. Of his squad of six, four had survived. “Let’s get out of here,” he said. “Company will be coming soon.”
“Listen,” said 5002. The sound of an approaching engine echoed from the east. “It’s eight klicks away.”
“Come on,” Chi said. “Let’s get outside.”
As they climbed from the transport, he sent a signal to 0194. The exertion raked his brain like shards of glass. Brother?
Yes, sir?
Chi hesitated. Do you understand how crucial this mission is? he asked.
Yes, sir.
They crawled over the side of the overturned transport. Chi coughed. The hacking sent his back into spasms. He winced, pressing his hands against his knees until they passed. A sacrifice or more may be necessary, he sent. He explained his plan.
0194 considered it. I understand.
Thank you, Chi replied. Inform the men.
They heard a quick succession of pops. A series of flares floated down around the squad. Their blue flames sputtered in the sand as with a roar, a tank descended into the artificial day.
Chi straightened, despite the pain that ran through his skull. “Fall in,” he shouted over the engines. His head throbbed. He knew something had broken inside him.
Panels in the side of the tank slid open. Two turrets extended, clacking into place. Chi’s mind picked up the shock of his brothers. He had failed them. Forgive me, Father, he thought, lowering his head.
“Chi!”
He raised his eyes. Lieutenant Bellerman stepped out of the tank, and into the night, followed by a sergeant wielding a rifle. The sergeant clambered up the side of the Cylebs’ transport, and dropped inside. “There are no orders for you to be in this region,” Bellerman said. “Do you mind telling me where the hell you were going?”
Chi took a deep breath. “We were patrolling for victims of the Burning, when something took control of our transport, a sort of electromagnetic interference. It drove us off course.”
“Off course?” Lieutenant Bellerman asked. “Chi, your post is on the southeast coast. You’re a thousand miles away. ‘Off course.’”
“You attacked us,” Chi said. His knee buckled, almost sending him face first into the sand. 0194 reached out to support him, but he brushed his brother’s hand away. “We are part of NorMec Gov. We are fellow soldiers. So, why?”
The sergeant climbed from the transport, his rifle slung across his back. Chi’s heart sank when he saw what the NCO held in his hands. The soldier ran over, and handed Bellerman the remaining iatric–pack. The lieutenant took it, and chuckled. He unsheathed a knife from his belt, slit the pack open, and drained it into the sand.
“Chi, you are so full of shit,” he said. “Consider yourselves under arrest. Order your men to drop th
eir weapons, and put their hands on their heads.” He turned to the sergeant, and whispered in his ear.
Father, Chi shouted in his mind with all of his strength, pushing through the pain that seared him like a white–hot coal from one temple to the other, if you can, it has to be now. He looked at his squad. Would they—
His jaw clamped shut with a snap, grinding his teeth together. It felt as if someone had poured icy water into the folds of his brain. He fell to his knees, clutching his skull. His brothers trembled, sharing his agony.
“What the hell are you all…” Lieutenant Bellerman’s voice trailed off as the turrets swiveled to face the two Regular Army men, their rotary chambers spinning into life. The desert canyon echoed with a heavy staccato. After ten seconds, the whirring noise died. The smell of cordite and blood filled the air.
Chi rose to his feet. He walked to the corpses, and gazed at what remained of their faces. He pulled his boot back, and kicked the pile of meat adorned with a golden bar.
Hurry.
The command came from the west. Chi motioned to 0194. “Let’s get this tank operational,” he said, “we have a job to do.”
“Yes, sir.”
Chi looked in the direction of the shield breach. I’m coming, Father, he thought. I’m coming.
Paul LeCeld’s jibe had only been half–true. Alyanna had left her estate a few times since the accident, mostly to bring Matthew to visit his grandfather. She leaned back against her car’s upholstery as it flew to his cottage, her hand clenching the door handle until her knuckles were white.
“Can’t you drive any faster?” she asked.
“I apologize, ma’am, but I am unable to break the—”
“Shut up.”
She dialed her father’s number for the fifth time that evening. After a few seconds, his liver–spotted head floated above her dashboard. “This is Doctor Benjamin Dvorkin,” he said. “I cannot answer your call right now…” Alyanna mouthed the message along with him. Finally, it got to the beep.
“Dad, it’s me,” she said. “Come on, pick up.” There was silence. “God damn it,” she shouted, and stabbed the disconnect button. It was typical. He nagged her at least once a week, asking about Matthew, was she taking him to school, both of them needed to get out more, she was putting on weight… and now, when she needed him more than ever, he was screening her calls.
“How much longer?”
“Five and a half minutes, ma’am.”
She looked out of the window. She had taken a few stimulants, and the caffeine did not mix well with the alcohol in her system. She felt exhausted and wired at the same time, as if marionette strings controlled her sleepy body. Her heart pounded when she thought of the female Cyleb, of her cold, electrified hands touching her son. The thought of Matthew dying alone in a hospital, surrounded by those freaks, made her feel sick. She shook her head, and buried the image. She was good at burying things.
No, she told herself, squeezing her eyelids tight, as if darkness could protect her from her thoughts, be truthful. You’re a coward. You ignored his temperature, you ignored his weight, and you ignored his eyes. Is that how you wanted him to spend the end of his life? Being ignored by you?
“Stop,” she whispered.
That, and making him feel like shit just because he scribbled on a painting. Very nice. So scared that he had to run and get help on his own, all because Mommy was out selling her—
“Stop!” she screamed. “I tried. I tried, and they stopped me.” She pounded her fists against the dashboard. “Stop, stop, stop!”
“The vehicle is stationary, ma’am.”
Alyanna opened her eyes. They had landed. How long she had sat there, throwing a fit on her father’s lawn, she did not know. She jumped from her hovering car, and ran to the house.
“Dad,” she shouted. Why the hell did he have his shield up? “Dad?”
The front door slid open. Everett glided across the walkway on two wobbling wheels. Although an older model than Richardson’s Jeeves, he was the same type of domestic robot. His barrel chest and egg–shaped head lent him a human form, his visible spinning gears more for style than function. He had the manor of a stereotypical British butler, complete with an upper–class accent.
“I am sorry, Alyanna, but Doctor Dvorkin does not wish to be disturbed at this time.”
“Then he’s inside?” Alyanna asked.
“Um.” Everett considered this. “Well, I did not say—”
“Dad?” she shouted at the house again.
“Really, madam, this is most unseemly,” the Jeeves said. “Why don’t you try again at some point in the future? Now run along. There’s a good girl.” He turned his back on her, and rolled towards the door.
“Matthew,” she said. “Matthew’s in trouble.”
Everett stopped. His head swiveled a few degrees. “Master Matthew is in danger?”
“Yes,” she said. “Please let me in.”
The Jeeves’ eyes twitched from side to side. “Perhaps the doctor wouldn’t mind you coming in after all.” He nodded, and the shield flickered out of sight.
Alyanna ran up the steps. “Where’s Dad?”
“I do not know.”
“You said he was inside.”
“No, you assumed that. You see, I do not know where he is, but he definitely has not left the house—not through the doors or windows, in any case.”
Alyanna stepped through the doorway. “Dad?” she called. She ran past a wound–down grandfather clock into a living room lined with overflowing bookshelves. She moved past them to the dining room, ignoring Everett’s pleas not to track mud on the carpet. She made her way back to the foyer and up the stairs, calling for her father. She threw open the door to his bedroom.
Benjamin sat in a chair facing the window. For the first time in Alyanna’s life, he looked like an old man. His fine, white hair glistened with sweat. He gazed at the ocean, his jaw slack. He wore a tattered cotton robe over his pajamas. He clenched his right hand in a fist.
“Yo,” Alyanna called down the stairs, “he’s right here. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because he can’t see me,” Benjamin said in a raspy voice, without turning his head. “I’ve programmed him to ignore me. I didn’t want him to stop me.”
Alyanna stared at the back of his head. “Stop you from what?” she asked.
“This,” he said, as he uncurled his fingers. There was a red capsule inside. “It’s an evil little device the boys cooked up two wars ago. It explodes when mixed with the enzymes in saliva, obliterating everything in a ten–meter radius. Cute, huh?” He let out a long sigh. “The funny thing is, it turned out the mutants didn’t have amylase in their DNA anymore. So the alternative was to send an unsuspecting platoon in with capsules disguised as meal pills. They could march deep into enemy territory, set up camp for the night, and boom.” He threw his hands into the air, chuckling. “Ingenious, really.”
Alyanna took a deep breath. Her mouth worked silently. “Are you telling me you…” She bit her lip, and shook her head. “Dad, please, I’m so sorry, I want to give you whatever you need, but I can’t even think right now. Matthew’s in trouble.”
“I know,” he said, his voice a low moan. “He’s dying. He doesn’t carry your immunity.”
Alyanna lifted her head. “You knew?” she asked. Her inward fury had found an outlet. She grabbed her father’s forearm, and spun him around. “You knew, and you did noth—” Her voice broke off when she saw his face.
“Yes,” he said, staring at her with eyes veined in jade. He nodded at the capsule in his hand. “That’s why I’m taking the coward’s way out, before all the ghosts in my head can accuse me of letting them down.”
“They came, and took him to the hospital. He called you, and they took him away.”
A spark lit in Benjamin’s eyes at last. “What?”
“I was working, and Matthew called you. Somehow, he got connected to the Cies. They took him to Manhattan.” Benjami
n sank back in his chair. “They won’t even let me see him. And the head Cyleb acted like she knew you.”
Benjamin’s brow furrowed. “She?” he asked. “The Cyleb was female?” Alyanna nodded. “What did she say, exactly?”
“She said something about being a civil servant, and not knowing her place. And that I was the daughter of the great Doctor Dvorkin.”
Benjamin mouthed the words. He placed the capsule on the arm of his chair with reverence. “What did she look like?” he asked.
“Thin, mid–thirties, with brown hair. She didn’t give her name. But her eyes… I didn’t know Cies had eyes like that, all glowing, and full of hate. It was like she had something against me, because of you.”
“Was there anything on her chest?”
Alyanna thought for a moment. “I saw something blue, a medical patch.”
“All right, but what was above it?” Benjamin asked. Alyanna shook her head. “Concentrate, hon. It wasn’t a number, not if she was female. It must be a Greek letter.”
“Don’t yell at me,” she said. “It was an E, but it had all kinds of sharp angles.”
“An E with sharp angles,” Benjamin said. “Sigma?”
“Who’s Sigma?” asked Alyanna.
“One of the originals. No, that’s not quite true, she’s one of the second batch.” His eyes closed. He rubbed them, his breath rattling in his chest. “I’m sorry, Alyanna, someday, I hope you can forgive me.”
“For what?”
Benjamin met her gaze with veined eyes. “Let’s go,” he said as he pushed himself out of his chair. He coughed a glob of phlegm into a handkerchief. “I’ll get us in to see Matthew, and I’ll get some answers.”
“Answers to what?”
Benjamin looked at the pill. He straightened, some of his old vitality returned. “Let me get dressed,” he said. “It seems those ghosts aren’t ready to let me rest just yet.”