The God Mars Book Five: Onryo

by Michael Rizzo

  We need to hunt them now. We need to kill every last one of them.

  I try to ignore Peter’s tenacious bloodlust just to keep us under control, but I don’t entirely disagree with it. As long as the Keepers think they can come back here some day, these people are in mortal danger. If they realize I’m not nearby…

  “They’re dug in too deep and too spread, and they know the territory too well,” Straker lets me know she’s heard Peter, and that there’s a tactical reason not to go after them. I also notice she hasn’t once specifically asked for mercy for her brethren, just prudence. For the greater good.

  The Ghaddar looks a little lost every time we have one of these partly unspoken exchanges, but seems to get the essence.

  In my head, Peter is harping on hindsight:

  If we’d come back sooner, we could have finished them before they got away from us. One problem would be solved.

  “I’m not killing over a hundred people as a preventative measure.” I only realize I’ve said it out loud after I have. Both my companions seem to have some understanding of my internal conflict.

  The Civvies are still watching us. They look like we’re deciding their fate. I suppose we are.

  “Come!” I call out to them. “Summon everyone! Come to the Barracks!”

  I stand in the wreckage of Thel’s suite. The Civvies line the catwalks around the inside of the dome. I count more than four hundred men, women and children, and those were just the ones brave enough to dare coming in here. And those that did, shuffle nervously, can barely bring themselves to look at me.

  “Listen to me!” I shout across the open space of the dome. “I am not a ghost! I am not a demon! I may be a monster, but I was once a human being like you. My name is Jonathan Drake.”

  I take off my mask and helmet, let them see my face. I hear them gasp, mutter, shocked that there’s flesh under the skull, that I look something like them. Thankfully they’re too far away to see my blood red eyes.

  “There are others like me. Strong. Fast. Hard to kill. Some are good…” I reach out, gesture for Straker to stand beside me, and put my hand on her shoulder. “Others are not. Thelonious Monk Harris. Asmodeus. Fohat. These creatures will happily kill you all and take your resources and homes for their own use. Those like me will fight them if we can, but this fight may take us far away from you. I have restored your security systems and set them to alert us. But it may take time to respond. You may have to shelter from them, hide, even run.

  “Your hatch locks are back online and no longer respond to your Keepers. This will buy you time. But if you need to, take masks and flee outside, overland. If you can, head northeast, for the eastern end of the mountain range that separates this canyon from its neighbor, and then cross it. Ask the Katar for shelter—we will make sure they expect you. I will leave you maps to find your way.”

  The muttering and shuffling intensifies. Straker was right: The thought of needing to defend themselves is terrifying, but the thought of having to go out into the open world is unimaginable. I have to make it worse yet:

  “As the Lieutenant has told you: beware of those you may meet or those that may come that look like they’re very sick or hurt or like they walk in their sleep. These were human beings, but the monsters have replaced their brains with machines that will infect you if they get close to you, turn you into things like them. Stay away from them. If you have to fight them, you must destroy or sever the head, but do not get close.”

  Their muttering becomes a rumbling. I have to stop. I’m only upsetting them, panicking them. But they have to know what they’re facing.

  I feel a wave of guilt, like I’ve left them vulnerable to this by forcing their protectors to abandon them. But then I also believe those “protectors” would have surrendered the colony to Asmodeus for whatever power he or Thel promised, offered the Civvies as slaves or meat bodies for Fohat’s experiments in abomination.

  I hold up my hand against their fear, and offer a poor excuse for what we’ve done to them whether Peter wants me to or not:

  “I… I killed your protectors because they chose to serve my enemy, because they murdered my family. And because I saw how they treated you. No human being should treat another like that.” Then I make a pledge I don’t think Peter’s ready to, but needs to. “If they forsake their wizard and their cruel, brutal ways, I will forgo my vengeance. I will hold my blade, and leave you to live in peace. But if they return and choose to harm you, I will not hold my blade, I will not forgo my vengeance, and then I will leave you to live in peace. Assuming any of us can.”

  I want to tell them that they need to learn to defend themselves if they want to survive; that if they won’t, then they don’t value their lives and the lives of their families any more than the Keepers do. But I think they know that well enough, deep down—any human being does. I think the best thing I can do is give them time to decide what to do and how to do it. I can’t imagine what their lives have been like, conditioned by fear and abuse. I look in their eyes…

  …and I want to say I don’t see people. But they are people. Human beings. They just need to remember that.

  I can’t help them remember that. I can barely remember what it was like to be just flesh and blood and bone, and it’s only been ten days. Peter may be preserving my mind, my personality, my memories, but he can’t hold onto what made me human, no more than he’s held onto his own humanity.

  I need to go. I have no right to be here.

  “There’s a manual alarm key on the security panels. Trigger it if you’re in danger. If I can hear you, if I can, I will come.”

  I put my helmet and mask back on, turn and head for the nearest hatch, get myself out of there, leaving Straker and the Ghaddar standing there like they don’t know what to do, like I’ve left something badly unfinished.

  I tell myself I don’t care.

  Chapter 2: Duty

  I get my first call on the fourth day.

  I’ve been watching the feed from the drones I’ve strung across the mouth of the canyon, having set their frequencies so my internal Mods can pick up the signals directly so I don’t have to stay inside the ship staring at monitors. I’ve even gotten used to getting video and graphics piped directly into my eyeballs—it’s just a matter of selective attention.

  I can’t stay inside the ship. Peter may be immortal, but I know I’m living on a clock. He’s tried to slow the physical conversion, but my skin is definitely changing color, my hair is getting darker and straighter, my face is less and less mine. I think it happens when we sleep—and we still have to sleep, despite all the other super-human wonders of Modded immortality. Peter may not be able to maintain control of his Seed’s default programming when he’s not conscious.

  (I also notice that when we sleep our dreams are less my dreams—the dreams I’m used to dreaming—and more his: abstract scrambled memories of Earth, of his life.)

  I know I need to stay close to Eureka, but my impatience keeps taking me east, out of the South Blade, like the wandering I can manage in a day’s light will take me to wherever Asmodeus is. I’ve wandered more than once toward the Katar canyon, but always I stop several klicks south of the tip of the Spine, like I don’t dare set foot in their territory, like I don’t want them to see me, even disguised as I am. (And who is it that I really don’t want to see me like this? My father? Or Terina? Am I really still holding on to that fantasy?) Whenever I detect a Katar patrol, I retreat before they detect me—a benefit of my enhanced senses.

  I’ve caught the Ghaddar following me on more than one of these recons, always at distance. I still don’t know why she’s stayed with me, but I can only suspect she’s somehow been reporting to Ram, or at least Straker, without me picking up on it. (How else was Straker at the colony just as I found myself there? I can’t believe it was just coincidence.)

  So I’m about eight klicks east-northeast beyond my drone perimeter at midday, just having finished Salat (and I’ve been neglecting Salat) whe
n I hear the manual alarm signal from Eureka.

  And that means I have to run if I have any hope of fulfilling my promise to protect. Thankfully, rage lends speed as it overcomes fatigue, and I manage to hack my way back through the forest in just under forty-five minutes.

  I take a moment to replenish my resources as I scan the colony site, breathing deep and absorbing from the green. I see no obvious sign of attack, but I know that the Keepers could certainly have entered the colony and retaken it without much violence—all they’d need to do is crack my locks. My only evidence that they haven’t is that I’m still receiving the alarm signal. The Keepers would certainly have detected and disabled the system if they’d re-occupied the Barracks, even with their limited tech skills. Unless they’re using it to set a trap for me.

  I decide to take a circuitous approach, Peter apparently content to give me full control, and head for one of the peripheral tunnel hatches. If the Keepers really don’t have the numbers to hold the colony, they can’t have set ambushes at every entrance (though they might have set booby traps).

  Now I’m wondering if it really was one of the Civvies that triggered the alarm—if so, the Keepers haven’t had much time to prepare for me, unless they worked out their tactics in advance while they stewed in their caves. Conversely, there’s also the possibility that the Civvies didn’t even try to call me, that they offered no resistance at all to their masters, even showing them how to summon me into their trap, hoping for mercy.

  I decide to go fully around the west side of the site, listening for their signals, looking for any sign of recent surface activity. I hear no Keeper signals, but, thanks to my enhancements, I soon find several sets of tracks. They look sloppy, like no attempt was made at stealth. And these tracks come and go from the hatch points. What’s especially odd is that one set of tracks—what looks like a party of half-a-dozen adults—appears to leave and not return. Perhaps they were out foraging or exploring when whatever happened. Or maybe their failure to return is the reason for the alarm.

  I scan the green up-canyon, looking for sign of activity, heat, motion…

  Zooming and magnifying, I see something that makes my guts sink: There’s a male Civvie… His bloody body has been strung up in the trees, on a rise visible from the colony. He’s cold enough to be perhaps a few hours dead. A message. (For me? Or for the Civvies?)

  We should have made Straker tell us where they were hiding. We should have gone looking for them, eliminated the closest threat first, eliminated all of them.

  I give Peter no argument.

  Too angry for caution, I head for the nearest hatch, and crack the airlock after only a cursory check for booby traps. There’s no ambush waiting for me in the tunnels below (disappointing), so I head in the general direction of the Barracks with purpose, ready to respond to attack at every juncture. I encounter no Keepers, but neither do I see any Civvies. Their living spaces appear to have been quickly evacuated.

  I stop and listen for Harvester signals. Did they come over the crest, circumventing my sensor perimeter? I feel a fresh wave of dread.

  All I hear is the alarm. And beneath it, the security systems indicate no hatch breeches other than my own entrance. But there have been several logged exits over the last few days, the hatches popped using the new codes I gave the Civvies. So they have opened the doors…

  I pick up my pace.

  I finally encounter life, and in quantity, in the corridors approaching the Barracks. The Civvies are packed in—and appear to be intact—like they’ve all gathered in a hurry. They’ve filled the corridors so tightly that I can barely pass through to the Barracks. They all turn to me when they see me coming, make the best path for me that they can. Their eyes beseech me, but they don’t tell me what’s wrong.

  I let myself through an unlocked hatch on a mid-level, and find the dome also filled with Civvies. It looks like a colony meeting. They all go quiet and look at me as I come in. They all look desperate, terrified, and unsure if they should really be glad I’ve come.

  “Tell me what’s happened,” I demand impatiently when they don’t brief me promptly.

  They make room for a middle-aged women to approach me on the catwalk. She’s been crying. She falls to her knees before me. I start to shake my head, to remind her not to kneel to me, but she starts sobbing. Another woman steps forward and speaks for her:

  “They killed her husband… They took… We sent a small group out to get food this morning… They didn’t come back. Then we saw the body…”

  I nod to let them know I’ve seen it.

  Of course Peter’s immediate urge is to go after the Keepers, search them out, and just start killing them as we find them, but I know they’ll be hiding, dug in deep. I could go get Straker and make her tell me where they are, if she even really knows, if they haven’t relocated since… It would take too long, and I still don’t know how to call her from long-range. Maybe the Ghaddar does. But if I even take the time to go back to the ship…

  I look to the hatches, expecting her to come in, having followed me again. Certainly she would have heard the alarm back at the ship. Of all the times for her to not to be following me around like a worried parent…

  I’m on my own. As far as Peter’s concerned, that’s just fine.

  Then I remember a tactic of my father’s.

  “I need volunteers,” I tell them. “Just a few. It will be dangerous, but I will try my best to protect you. And I will find out what they’ve done with your people. This I promise.”

  It takes a frustratingly long time to get five of them to stand up and come forward. The grieving widow is one of them.

  I make a show of going out to cut down the body. Small consolation: the mutilating wounds all appear to be post-mortem. The man was executed by having his throat cut. I visibly brood over him for several minutes, scanning the green.

  A better consolation: I see no sign of other bodies, or even blood-trails. So the Keepers may have taken them alive, having need of their slaves.

  I draw my blade and march straight off toward the terminus of the canyon.

  An hour later, my volunteers come out, brandishing pathetic homemade weapons. (I made them myself.) They take possession of the body, carry it back to the tunnels, with some of them nervously covering their retreat. Then they come back out and cautiously enter the forest, and begin to hastily gather, as if they need the fruits and nuts desperately enough to risk their lives again so soon. They don’t stray far from the nearest hatch, afraid to go too far into the green, not even to look for their missing family and friends.

  But they go far enough. Within fifteen minutes, a fire team of Keepers efficiently surrounds them, having crept up on them. I expect the colony is being watched from a nest on high ground that I haven’t found yet. I wonder what their spotter has made of my own disappearing act, though I may have been out of his sight when my armor did its camouflage trick. (They may not know I can do that, since they’d only ever saw their Reaper at night, and Peter usually wanted to be seen.) All I’ve heard on their channels are the briefest chirps and stutters—they’ve figured out I can listen in, so they’re being careful. Peter tells me it’s an old Earth code, and our Mods translate readily, though what their sending each other are only a few random numbers and letters, which probably have preset meanings. A code within a code. Smart.

  Too bad they don’t know about my camouflage.

  I manage to get right up behind two of them as they’re disarming and binding their prisoners, threatening to kill any who remotely resist. Then I intentionally step on some dry deadfall. They turn in time to see me “de-cloak”, my armor shifting back to black from the high-resolution optical pattern it had been projecting. My Nagamaki takes both their heads in one sweep before they can fire.

  I dash forward and run a third man through and use my sword up under his ribs to lift him up off the ground as he shoots me with his PDW. A quick jerk rips the blade out through his liver, nearly bisecting him. I make the
mess intentionally, for shock value. The remaining two Keepers back up, back away from their prisoners, turning their weapons on me.

  They seem to move so slowly in my distorted perception. I have plenty of time to shift my sword to my left hand, draw my revolver, and fire. I shoot one in the gun-hand, and the other in the knee and elbow. Then I feel the incoming sniper round, spin and cut it out of the air. Their marksman having given away his position, I make my calculations and send a .454 back his way. I get no further incoming rounds, hear no further code chatter.

  I turn my attention back to the wounded Keepers. I’m about to make my threats, when one of the Civvies surprises me by picking up a length of rebar I’d given him to use as a club, and smashes the hand-shot Keeper across the face, sending him sprawling. Inside my head, Peter can’t help but laugh. I holster my firearm.

  The other Keeper reaches for a grenade, and I stick my sword tip through the back of his gloved hand, pinning it to his jacket. I shake my helmeted head at him, then turn to the other, who’s still on his back, stunned. His face is bloodied, and he’s missing front teeth. The Civvy raises his club to finish the job, and I reach my left hand out as if I can grab him even though he’s just out of my reach. Then I surprise myself when the rebar baton flies out of his grip and into mine. Apparently I can generate a powerful short-range magnetic field—I remember Peter using it to “call” the Nagamaki to his hand after he’d set it down, but it’s not just my own sword I can so summon.

  The Civvy stares at me with wide eyes and open mouth, then they all drop to their knees. At least they don’t bow down this time. I hand the man back his bloodied club. His hands shake as he takes it.

  I bend down, grab the twice-shot and once-stabbed Keeper by the throat, pick him up, and let the other one watch me start to drain him. I have mercy halfway through the process, and snap his neck with a quick shake as he thrashes and fades in my grip. He’s dead and nearly skin-over-bones before I realize this is the first time I’ve consumed a living person, so taken by my rage that I barely stopped to think… It sickens me through, worse because of how easy it comes to me, but I tell myself need to make the example (and I can use the resources). The body looks like it’s been mummifying for weeks when I finally drop it. I can hear it crack, dry, when it hits the rocks. And I feel so strong, so much more than what I was, so much more than human…