by Adam Thielen
“Nice hair,” he said.
“Same to you.”
* * *
Matthias reached the dorm just behind the two corporate guns. The scene was worse than he thought. Several men were hunkered down behind their vehicles waiting for them, and a large weaponized monocopter hovered above the roof. Matthias flinched as it opened fire straight down onto the building. “No,” he pleaded.
His two men had taken cover behind their own cars and provided cover fire as Matthias charged in between them toward the entrenched attackers. “I’m headed directly to the building. Stay safe but keep them occupied,” he ordered.
Moving in between the cars Matthias kept his head low. From his left a mage made his presence known by throwing a fireball at the car. It collided with the hood of the Orget and the motor lost power. The car halted only a few feet from the large hole that used to be Taq’s room. Bullets peppered the vehicle exterior. Matthias ducked down. The titanium mesh would hold off most of the small arms fire.
Roger stood up at Marcus’s signal. He sprayed gunfire from his modified Arklun manufactured assault rifle. Marcus’s timing was perfect. One of the targets had turned and exposed himself to fire on Matthias’s vehicle. The ball of fire that engulfed the front end a moment later took them both by surprise.
“Mage!” He yelled. He looked to Marcus who had started moving around the right side of his truck to try to get a better angle on the attackers. Roger looked back toward the remaining threats. His enhanced vision highlighted each of them, despite their cover, using movement and lighting algorithms, aided by small drones high in the sky. Though if one were a mage, he could not tell which.
One of the figures moved. He was behind a mobile ballistic barrier, which was little more than a light bullet proof cloth that could be framed and spiked into the ground. He did not appear to be holding a gun, at least not one large enough to be extrapolated into Roger’s enhanced vision. A grenade, it has to be, he thought, as the figure flung one arm outward and his vision showed, for just a moment, an object separate from him. It moved too fast to track in the dim lighting. Roger prepared himself for cover or to throw it back, but it never appeared at his feet or around him.
Without warning, his car leapt into the air and his feet disappeared behind him. As he fell to the ground, one of the attackers opened fire. Blood sprayed out of his chest and shoulder. Roger landed face down and a second later, the car landed on top of him.
Marcus got a clear shot at the scalp of one of the men crouched behind a car. Red mist exploded from the right side of the man’s head as the left side caved inward. He then threw a smoke grenade in between himself and the rest of the attackers. He knew he was running out of time and had to stretch out the minutes until his death.
* * *
Ritter was always talented, but more than that he was devious. While other mages spent all their time obsessed with efficacy, he was instead obsessed with utility and precision. He found with practice he could create precise bursts of fire and electricity in small amounts. Ritter’s sole focus became learning how to manipulate explosives. They had all the efficacy he needed. But making them go exactly where needed and explode exactly when needed, without the need for detonators or timers, was his craft.
It did not take him long to become noticed by Grapeseed special security. They gave him something close to a real life in return for service. His days consisted almost exclusively of training. They subjected him to whatever drugs or cyber that might enhance his abilities. Most of it did not.
On his first deployment, Grapeseed performed a hostile takeover of a competitor, Plethora Inc. Unprovoked, other corporations would have stepped in as part of the corporate constitution. However, Grapeseed had offered what was considered a fair price for enough shares of Plethora’s stock to become a majority shareholder. Plethora declined. A mediator was called in. No agreement could be reached. They were given one last opportunity to accept a final offer with a fifteen percent increase in the bid. They declined. Grapeseed went to war. Plethora, like all corporations with any sovereign territory, had a large security force, but they were not prepared for the onslaught of Ritter and his mastery over explosives. Almost all corpsec personnel carried at least one grenade, and in a decisive skirmish he detonated the enemies one by one.
Now Ritter was sent on a mission to wrap up a loose end unraveled by a data thief. He was not told that the target was a mage guarded by MESS wardens, but it did not come as a surprise considering the building they were assaulting. This revelation did not rattle Ritter. He had learned that most mages cannot perform under pressure, and while he acknowledged their potential, he did not fear them. They would cower and hide at the sight of violence, he was sure.
When they assaulted the building, they came in strong by blowing out the outer wall. Ritter was taken by surprise as the mud engulfed his boots and those of the men with him. He had never seen or felt such power before. Mages willing to burn out for their craft did not last long and became merely cautionary tales.
Four men went into the building to kill this mage and anyone who got in their way. Ritter would wait outside, away from the MESS warden and where he could guard against any response forces. That force came quickly. Once again a surprise, but not a concern given that the force was comprised of only three men. Then only two men, with one pinned down in his wrecked car and the last hiding behind smoke. Ritter’s force had numbers, but he felt unease at the loss of some of his colleagues during the fight. The monocopter on site yet provided him with a sense of security.
* * *
Marcus sprinted to the overturned car resting on top of his comrade. The wind favored his smoke. It drifted to his left, allowing him to move behind another vehicle and flank Ritter without any of the men noticing. Matthias had to still be alive in his SUV, but the thermographic image of his body had remained still after being shot at.
The monocopter whirred loudly, gaining altitude. Marcus looked up and saw it point its guns in his direction. “Damn it,” he uttered. But instead of firing, the guns then turned various directions at random. The body of the craft began bucking wildly. This caught the attention of Ritter and company.
Marcus saw movement out of the corner of his eye; Matthias! He was making a run for the hole in the building. The mage jerked his head in Matthias’s direction. Marcus emerged from cover and fired on the mobile barrier. It flapped about, absorbing the blows without puncturing, but the sound and movement startled the mage. Matthias was far faster than he’d ever seen a person move. The vampire leapt into the room and out of site before the attackers could react.
“Take care of him!” Ritter shouted, pointing at the dorm. The remaining three men chased after Matthias. The mage pulled a mini grenade from its pocket and rolled it past Marcus’s feet. Marcus sprinted to the car on his right and dove to the ground. As he hit the ground, a second grenade rolled to a stop two feet from his face.
“Shit,” he said, trying to roll away, but it was too late; the blast tore him apart.
Ritter heard the monocopter whoosh upward. He stared as it shrunk in size. Then it stopped, and began to grow as it descended. He panicked and ran behind a vehicle as the copter slammed into the roof of the building. The ground moved under his feet as the impact flowed down the rigid foamcrete and through the earth. The top of the roof and lip of the overhangs exploded into dust, and a haze instantly filled the air. Glass that had remained in place after the initial assault shattered, and the second floor partially caved in above Taq’s room. The shrill sound of grinding metal filled the air.
Ritter could not leave without completing the mission. He felt the presence of the warden inside the building, and his particular skillset was not useful in tight hallways. He was outside, alone, and covered in dust.
* * *
Matthias leapt into the remains of Taq’s room. He moved into the hallway, scanning both directions. He had to keep moving. Turning right, he sprinted down the hall and turned the corner. He stopped and
listened. Matthias could hear the slight footsteps of men above him somewhere. He also heard two or three sets of footfalls moving cautiously in his direction.
Matthias went up the stairs and listened again. Only the sound of men below now. He waited impatiently as they crept toward the stairs.
“They are in here,” Matthias heard from up another flight of stairs.
“Bravo, single enemy moving on your position,” he heard from down the stairs.
Matthias could hear both sets of men move toward the stairwell where he waited. The stairs were wide with steel guard rails on each side. He slinked out of the stairwell and leaned against the wall next to the doorway.
WHAM! Matthias’s feet left the floor as the building shuddered and a deafening rumble bounced off the walls. For a full second the dorm shook violently. He stumbled as his feet landed, then darted for the stairs up. He stepped onto the guardrail and then leapt upward to grab the third-floor rail. Matthias deftly pulled his legs up and slid them in between the rails.
He drew both of his semi auto handguns. They were slightly larger than average, with extra plating on the outside for weight. To him they weighed nothing, but would resist any sudden kickback, fire with great accuracy, and rechamber reliably due to the added inertia. They both had laser sights that oscillated in a specific pattern to paint a target on whatever he was aiming at, rather than a simple dot. A strobe was mounted above the barrels.
Matthias rolled into the hallway backward, laying flat on the floor and activated the strobes. Both men were to his left. The entire hall was illuminated once every point three seconds. On the first flash the attackers were stunned and practically blind in the dim light of the emergency power. On the second flash, unable to see, they lifted their rifles well above where Matthias was situated. Matthias took aim. On the third flash all three fired; only Matthias’s shots landed. One of the gunmen fell backward. The other man lowered his rifle, correcting his aim. On the fourth flash they both fired and the man twisted around. The shot had hit him on the shoulder. Two more shots hit him in the back and he tumbled forward.
Matthias winced in pain; his thigh had a hole in it. Blood pooled in it and spilled onto his pants. As his fingers lifted off the triggers, the strobe deactivated. He pushed down on the ground with the barrels and stood up. Even without attentive listening, he could hear the remaining men vaulting up the stairs to reach the sound of gunfire. They wouldn’t rush into the hall; that he knew. Instead they took positions behind the wall and one of the men poked his head out to get a visual.
Matthias slashed downward with his katana. The man dropped to the floor, the top part of his head landing first. The other two men turned their rifles to the wall separating the hall from the stairwell and opened fire, but Matthias slid out of their cone of blind fire. The wall exploded into a cloud of foamcrete and plaster as bullets pulverized the wall. When the men paused to reload, Matthias moved directly in front of them. He lunged with the sword in his left hand, plunging it into the throat of one of the men and firing a shot into the face of the other.
Matthias doubled over in pain. Two more bullets had hit him during the shootout, this time in his gut. He limped toward the first two corpses, assuming somewhere in that general direction he’d find Taq. At each door he stopped and listened and heard nothing. He passed the janitor’s closet and almost reached the end of the hall when he heard a sound from behind. He went to the door of the closet and listened. He could hear the breath of two sets of lungs.
He knocked on the door. “It’s Matthias.”
The lock clicked and the door opened. There stood Tamra with Taq flung over her shoulder.
* * *
Kate’s lips enveloped his. Taq felt her arms around his head. He pushed his tongue into her mouth. Kate returned the favor. Dust swirled around them, carried by a breeze sweeping over the small town. Taq pulled away first.
“What was that for?” he smirked.
“That was overdue,” she replied. “But how did you find me here?”
Taq told her of his previous trip to the dream world. “The thing is, I feel like I’m inside someone else. Like part of me isn’t me. I’m driving someone else’s car.”
“I don’t feel that, at least not yet” Kate said, pondering. “So you got my message even while here? Strange. Before you came, I seemed to wake from this place for a minute. But I wasn’t… where I was before. I think I was close to you. There was a helicopter or something.”
“Not ringing any bells,” said Taq. “Where are you now?”
“I… somewhere inside Grapeseed corporate, probably a sublevel.”
“Crikes. What are you doing there?”
“Would you believe I think Grapeseed is behind this place?”
“No,” he said flatly. “I don’t know,” he amended. “What made you think that?”
“That’s hard to explain,” she started. “A lot of trails led to them. Trails that started with stories of dreams of this place on the net.”
“Other people are here?” he asked.
She nodded.
“So you broke into Grapeseed over some dreams?”
“Actually, Matthias hired me to look into something, but the trail went cold. I needed direct access to their network,” she explained.
“Look into what?”
“Ask him, privileged information.”
Kate closed her eyes. “It’s just like people said, Taq.” She took a deep breath. “It’s real, or very very close. This is something beyond normal existence. This might be more real than the facade. This might be a world within our world, or our world might be a world within this one.”
Taq looked around smirking. “I’m fairly certain this world isn’t creating any other worlds.”
“Not completely certain though,” she retorted. “I have spent a lot of time inside non-construct space. The mind does funny things when experiencing information directly and pseudo traversing cyberspace.” She grabbed Taq’s hand with her own. “Touch, smell, taste, they just seem artificial after a while. Created, unnatural perhaps.”
“Maybe you should lay off a bit,” he said.
“I have. I just can’t shake the feeling. I am tired of the world. Tired of the mega corps, the mage exploitation, the poverty, the concrete and steel. The complacency… “ she trailed off.
“I can’t argue there,” he said. “But my world is a little brighter today.”
She smiled. “You’ve been here more than me. What are we doing?”
“I came here to find the man that killed Amy.”
“But why?” she asked
“I don’t know,” Taq answered. “I feel like I must kill him. If we find him, I will try to understand why before I do it.” His eyes lowered. It sounded so ridiculous now, like he was playing an absurd game. His eyes came up to meet hers. His mind was flooded emotions, including a tinge of fear that her interest would again wane.
“Wait,” she said, interrupting his thoughts. “Is Tamra or Matthias with you somewhere?”
His eyes widened as he recalled the attack. “Tamra,” he said. “I must have passed out.”
“How can we wake up from this?” Kate asked.
“We wake up when we wake up,” he said.
They walked to a general store and started asking about Tom Morrison. No one seemed to know him by name, but they mentioned the Navajo Rail company office. Once there they were told that he was in fact employed by them, but the clerk would not tell them anything else.
“Let’s talk to some of the workers here,” Kate suggested.
Most said they didn’t know him. But on the third try, after describing his appearance, one of the men maintaining a caboose recalled Tom. “Oh, that fella,” he said with surprise. “I din’t know he worked for the rail. Seen ‘em board the train few times though.”
“We have a package for him,” lied Taq.
“Aight,” he said, scratching his chin. “I reckon he’s a house in the east part of town. Figure we both l
ive ‘round there.”
“How do you know that?” Kate asked.
“Well, I live ‘round those parts, and I’ve seen ‘em on his horse. Why don’t ya check with the post?”
So they did. The postman gave the address and pointed them in the right direction. East, just as the other man had said. As they walked out the doors, Kate stumbled and Taq caught her.
“Hold on Kate,” he lowered her onto the edge of a step. He watched her eyes roll back. “Try to stay with me, Kate.”
“I feel disconnected,” she said. “I’m sorry.” She slumped onto Taq’s shoulder. He carried her back inside to get help.
* * *
Matthias leaned against the wall opposite the door as Tamra carried Taq out of the closet. “How bad?” she asked.
He grunted. “Normally I’d be feeling a bit better by now.” He limped to one of the corpses and picked up a rifle. He ejected the clip and removed one of the bullets. Matthias put the tip to his tongue and pressed it there. He scraped his tongue along his front teeth and dropped the round. “There’s silver laced in these bullets.”
“What does that mean?”
“One of our secrets,” he said. “Silver is toxic to our blood.” Matthias doubled over and sprayed yellow vomit onto the floor.
Tamra turned away. The smell almost caused her to vomit in turn. It smelled like a rotting corpse. “Oh god.”
“Yeah. Apparently not secret enough,” he said.
“Silver is too expensive to waste,” she noted. Noxcorp was the largest corporate holder of silver in the world, and any time the price lowered, they bought it until it went back up.
“It’s possible they were just being cautious, but…”
Tamra nodded. “What do we do?”
“If I don’t get someone to take these bullets out, I’m dead,” he said.