by Tony LaRocca
She opened and closed her hands. “There is a delicate, physiological bond between a mother and child during gestation,” she said. “It’s more than just physical; it’s psychological, shaping every neuron in the forming brain. Severing that too early can create a horrible wound that may never heal. Now, with the Sage, it may be possible to do it. But two decades ago, when we tried it with you, it caused you emotional trauma. Your grandfather calculated that your clones would most likely be mentally unstable.”
“So what’s Zero’s story?”
“They removed the ovaries and eggs from his mother,” she said, “and inseminated them in vitro. Zero was conceived and grown without nurturing, and without love. He’s never had that bond, so he never suffered from separation.”
“He never had a chance,” said Matthew.
“He’s lived ten thousand lives,” she said.
“Who are you trying to convince?”
Her face lost its expression, her twitching eyes hardening. “You’ll understand, someday.”
“Just go away,” he said. “I don’t want to see you right now.” He closed his eyes, inhaling and exhaling. That could have been me, he thought, all alone in a jar, in total bliss because there’s a machine tearing little bits of me away. That’s what they have planned for—
He felt her arms around him. He jerked back, but she held on. He gave up and just hung there, letting her hold him.
“So what happens next?” he asked.
“We can’t stop the Burning,” she said. “Future generations might survive.”
“But none of you.”
“No, none of us.”
He knew a solution existed, but could not bring himself to think about it. “Do you miss being, you know, normal?” he asked.
“I was a little girl when your grandfather implanted me,” she said. “I can’t picture my parents at all. I think deep down, I used to wish I had grown up with them—a mother to push me on the swings, a father to play games with. But honestly, I can’t remember being anything but a Cyleb.”
“That’s because they’ve given you new memories,” he said. “Maybe they just want you to feel that way.”
Her warm breath sighed against his neck. “That doesn’t help.”
He shrugged. “What about the general?”
She looked at the sunlight shining through the dome ceiling. “We call them the first generation, our true mother and fathers. They were created to be the ultimate soldiers, but they were too strong. Their creators found they couldn’t kill them, so they imprisoned them. There are three more, buried alive somewhere, like he was. Or maybe they put them on rockets, and shot them into the sun—I don’t know. But all the scientists, politicians, and generals swore that they would never do anything so dangerous again.”
“So what happened?”
“What always happens, another war. The lessons and promises don’t seem so important anymore. What is important is beating the enemy. The enemy doesn’t even matter, as long as he’s beaten. They bought us—me, my brothers and sisters—from orphanages, and turned us into these.” She held her hands out. Matthew could see a tinge of bright blue fire in her veins. “Powerful, but not too powerful. That’s why the third generation is in many ways less than my own, just as we’re less powerful than the first. Parents don’t like their children’s light outshining their own.”
“Mom’s not like that,” he said. “She’s fighting every second to not sink into the quicksand between her ears, and I’m proud of her.” He turned to face Sigma, her arms still around him. He leaned in to kiss her again, and she leaned in as well—
There was a flash of light, and a shimmering sound. They yanked away from each other as 0800 stepped in through a sliver of whiteness.
“Yes,” Sigma said, glaring, “what is it?”
The Cyleb looked back and forth between them, flustered. “You need to come with me,” he said. “There’s been a complication.”
They followed him to a holographic representation of an operating room. Alyanna lay on a cot, covered by a green sheet, an oxygen mask over her mouth.
“As you can see,” 0800 said, pointing to a monitor, “the embryo’s vitals have stabilized, for now.”
Matthew swallowed. “Another near–miscarriage?” he asked.
“Very nearly,” said 0800. “There are countless possible reasons why; I wish I could pin it down.”
“And, of course, if you remove the baby now, she might live, but then she’d be useless to you.”
0800 took in a sharp breath. “You need to understand…” he said, his voice trailing off.
“Just stop it,” said Matthew. “I get it, that’s the only way you’ll let them stay. You don’t have to keep this game up.”
“There is no game, Matthew,” said Sigma. “If we don’t remove the baby, she will die.”
“And you’re not going to save her for free, is that it?”
A conduit opened. General Jaeger stepped through. “No,” he said. “What do you think this is, a charity?” He stepped through Alyanna’s unconscious hologram. “You swore to obey me, without question. Are you breaking that oath now?”
“You lied to me,” said Matthew. “You said her purpose was to watch over me.”
“I never said that was her only purpose.”
Matthew looked from the general to 0800, and then to Sigma. He shook his head, slashed a conduit in the air, and vanished. He had to go somewhere else; he needed to be away. His breath felt tight in his chest, as if he were being crushed.
“Find me somewhere peaceful,” he said, opening a passage. “I don’t care, something nice and cool.”
He stepped through, onto a meadow of soft grass. The sky above was blue, with a spattering of white clouds. He sank onto the peaceful, green hillside, and lay on his back.
He heard a shimmering noise, and sighed. And now, we fight, he thought. He looked up to see Sigma staring at him.
He chuckled. “Smart,” he said, “they sent the honey instead.”
She tilted her head, squinted, and shrugged. She sank to the grass beside him, pausing to slip off her boots and socks. She lay on her back, her hands folded under her head. Her dark auburn hair was thick and wavy once more, though her face was still asymmetrical.
“They completed the implant,” she said. “Your mother will wake inside here, safe for now.”
“I figured.”
He stared at the clouds overhead. One looked like a duck. Maybe a dragon would be better, he thought. He smirked as its aerosol wings and beak began to stretch.
“You think we’re monsters?”
The duck–dragon waddled across the sky, breathing plumes of swirling cloud–flame. “I don’t know what I think anymore,” he said.
Wordlessly, she rolled on her side. She stared at him with dark, glassy eyes, the luminescent flecks in her irises sparking with golden fire. He kissed her. Her lips were gentle and soft, and touching them to his removed all thought and sense of self from his mind. She slid her hands around his shoulders. Within seconds, he was on top of her, fumbling with the buttons of her uniform. “I love you,” he said. He buried his face in the soft thickness of her hair, kissing the underside of her neck as he slipped off her shirt and bra. He pulled her pants down, and threw them aside, revealing her with one hand as he caressed her with the other. He stopped, drinking her in with his eyes.
“What is it?” she asked. “Am I that old?”
He swallowed. “It’s you,” he said. “What else can I say?”
She gave him a tiny smile as her eyes traced the length of his body. “What about you?”
He pulled off his clothes gracelessly, fumbling with his zipper and shoelaces. He lay on her, and wrapped his arms around her back, feeling the heat of her smooth skin against his. He kissed her neck again, and worked his lips down her body, sucking her thickened nipples into his mouth. Her breath came heavier as she let out a deep sigh from the back of her throat.
He could not stand wai
ting any longer. He climbed back on top of her, and lay between her thighs. He could not believe that he would be doing this with her, making love to her. He reached down, and realized his body had gone soft. He pushed against her, but it did not help.
“It’s…” he muttered. “Shit, I don’t understand what’s wrong.”
“It’s okay,” she said.
His face felt hot. “I—it’s…”
She shushed him, reached between her legs, took hold, and stroked him against her. “Good,” she said, her voice low, “it feels good.” She rubbed her body back against his with short, arching jabs, and he hardened within seconds.
He tore her hand away, repositioned himself, and inexpertly thrusted, hard. She dug her fingers into his shoulders, and sucked in air between clenched teeth.
“Go easy,” she said, “please.”
He stared into her eyes. They were wide, dark, and beautiful, their amber flecks glowing like stars. He pulled her tight to him, holding his swollen body inside of hers while he ground against her warmth. He swallowed a lump in his throat, realizing for the first time how much smaller than he she was now, how fragile and precious. He kissed her, and buried his face in her soft, thick hair.
“I love you,” he said, repeating it with every thrust. She said nothing, her eyes half closed and rolled back. She took slow, heavy breaths as they danced. The sun burned inside her, and he felt warm and safe there. His secret, most private dream had suddenly become real—
Without warning, he exploded. He could feel each spasm bursting up from the base of his body into hers. He cried her name, pressing tight against her, as if he could meld them together.
He blinked, his breath coming in quick pants, as a grin of pure happiness spread across his face. He looked down at her. Their combined sweat coated her breasts in a glistening sheen. “I’m sorry,” he said.
She raised an eyebrow. “Why?”
“It was so quick. Did you, you know…”
“Oh, don’t be silly,” she said. “You have no idea what that meant to me. Please, hold me?”
He slipped out, and lay on his side, facing her. She embraced him, locking her slender legs around his. He caressed her hair while he stroked her face. He saw her staring at his left shoulder, and he looked as well. The muscles there glowed, as if coals smoldered beneath his skin.
“Shh,” she said. She put her hand on his cheek, and turned his gaze back to hers. “Lay here with me for a little while, it’s all right.” He closed his eyes, and complied.
Malachi Jaeger watched from the hilltop, invisible to the lovers at his feet. He swallowed the acerbic bile that surged to his throat, pushing it to his stomach. He was beyond that silly, crude dance, he reminded himself, he had left it and its primate motivations decades ago. And if rutting helped cement the boy to his true family, then so much the better. He opened a portal, and slipped inside.
He flowed along the circuits of the Sage to his home. He had modeled it after his family’s house on Hilton Head Island as it was back between wars, when the waves of the deep blue ocean would lap on white sands. He wandered through empty rooms, following a rapid, staccato sound. Every few seconds, the noise would repeat. The hallways seemed pale and gray. Wind blew through them from open windows, billowing curtains with the air of the sea.
He came to a splintering, wooden deck, and the source of the noise. His father sat at a glass table, shuffling pinochle cards over and over as he gazed lifelessly at the shore. Jaeger sat opposite him.
“Deal me in,” he said.
He had remade his father from memory, a more deserving monument than a tombstone. Like so many, the man had no real grave. His remains were part of the NorMec soil now, just so much bone and ash. His father bridged the deck, and held it out.
“Are you going to cut?” he asked. “If you don’t cut now, don’t cry later.” Jaeger mouthed the joke along with his father as he halved the deck, and handed it back. It was what he always said. His father dealt each of them twelve cards, and turned over the trump. It was a king of hearts.
“No one understands,” said the general as he picked up his hand, and arranged the cards by suit. “The boy, the artist, David, even that whore—” His voice broke off. “They should all get on their fucking knees, and thank me. They would be dead without me, all of them.”
“I bet I dealt you the nine.”
Jaeger clenched the edge of the tabletop. “No,” he said. “No, you didn’t.” He played a ten of spades. “Why don’t you put your ace on that?”
“Oh, I wish I could,” his father said, tossing him a jack.
“Worst of all, the center is falling apart,” said Jaeger, sweeping up the cards. “There have been signs of instability throughout the family; my orders are actually questioned.” He coughed, and wiped his mouth with the back of a glowing, leathery hand. “The mutants in the West, they’re coming. No one understands that. I did what I had to. They might all hate me; I might be Clown–Face, the monster. But history will know I did what was necessary.” He lay down a marriage in diamonds. “Twenty.”
His father scribbled the score on a yellow pad. “Pick,” he said. “Every girl loves diamonds.”
Again, Jaeger mouthed along. He reached for the deck, and stopped, his hand frozen in the air. He felt a tickling at the base of his skull. It was not an alarm exactly, just a sense from his combined connections throughout the communications systems of NorMec. Something was happening that needed his attention. He looked at his father, and cocked his head.
“Be a dragon,” he said.
His father sat straight, dropping his cards to the table. “Specify,” he said in a monotone voice. “Chinese folklore? European? Tolkien? Novelty? There are over twenty specific varieties in the database.”
Jaeger closed his eyes. He stood. “Never mind,” he said. “Sleep. I love you.” He waved his hand, and his father, the house, and the rolling waves all melted to blackness.
The arsenal at Watervliet had built him new drones. He launched one, about half the size of a golf ball. From the Sage, he guided it across the increasingly deserted cities and fields of NorMec. His instincts steered it across forests and abandoned highways, until he recognized the deserts of New Mexico.
Of course, he thought.
Tanks and artillery lined the shield wall, aimed at the breach where he had made his escape. Like water through a hole in a dam, a never–ending gush of metallic insects spewed through. A trench had been dug to catch them. As soon as the pit filled, the tanks eradicated them with fiery ordnance.
Jaeger examined the flickering gap in the shield. It was twice as big as it had been when he had escaped. He surveyed the radio chatter, and located the man he was looking for. He set the probe down amongst the rocks, about a kilometer from the operation.
“Hello, David,” he said.
Colonel Rivers’s head jerked up. The officer stood a few hundred meters from the pit, alone, watching the systematic extermination through field glasses. He scanned the horizon, but could not see the drone. He touched the microphone on his headset.
“Hello, General.”
Jaeger tapped into the feeds from the tanks’ cameras. “Not going well, is it?” he asked. “I see you had your implant removed. Pretty wise, under the circumstances.”
“You did this,” Rivers said. “You couldn’t just stay dead, could you?”
“The obligation of any prisoner—”
“Shut up,” said David. “My God, what happened to you? You could have let those refugees escape. What you did at Watervliet was nothing but murder, cold–blooded and simple. You’ve become a monster.”
“You sent men to kill me and my family,” said Jaeger, his voice calm.
“Virtually. We just wanted to neutralize the Sage.”
“That would have been real death for us.”
Rivers laughed. The sound of artillery echoed across the desert as the metallic insects filled the pit once more. “Forgive me, General, but I’m a little busy here.
”
“I warned you, David. You’ll never stop them.”
“Because of you,” said Rivers. “We can’t get in there to seal the breach, because they keep coming. We can’t fire into the breach or enter it, because it might make the hole bigger. The shield would null the power of any anti–grav vehicle, jet, or rocket we try to send over it, and the same goes for anything that tunnels below. So tell me, General, what are we supposed to do?”
“Fight,” said Jaeger. “If you have the ability to survive, you will.”
“And what of your family?”
“The same goes for us. There are no short cuts, David.”
“Hah,” Rivers said. “And what are you, except a walking short cut?”
From within the Sage, Jaeger clenched his teeth. “What did you say?” he asked.
“Oh please,” said Rivers. “All you and your ‘family’ are is one giant cheat. What else do you call your implants and abilities? Face it, General Clown–Face was a creature of power. Malachi Jaeger was nothing more than poor white–trash who only got a field commission because everyone above him got killed. Without Benjamin and me, your life would have been useless.”
Jaeger felt drained of all emotion, as if black, frigid water had suddenly flooded the chambers of his heart. The sensation brought with it a surge of electric vitality, of holy righteousness. “I think this has been all too easy on you, David,” he said, his voice shaking. “I think you need to learn your limitations.”
He shot himself from the safety of the Sage through the communications network, bouncing his mind from transmitter to transmitter, until his consciousness reached the drone. He was exposing himself again, but he did not care. He waited until the artillery blast had cleared, and focused on the first metallic wasp that poured from the hole. He had ten seconds.
He swung the drone into the pit, programmed the autopilot, and leaped.
His consciousness traveled along the insect’s hive–mind receivers, and filled the cybernetic brain of the chosen WesMec mutant, cramming into the confinements of its circuits and synapses. He sped his mind to its utmost limit. It was nowhere near as fast as Matthew’s, but it was sufficient.