Scions of Sacrifice

by Eric Kent Edstrom

  “Recline on transfer platform. Recline on transfer platform.”

  Leslie stopped in the middle of the room. She turned to face the drone, let her arms fall to her sides. “I can’t. I won’t.”

  She was resigned to the coming pain. She had been overwritten before, and she simply would not allow it to happen again. She had come back from that horror, and her revival had awakened something profound in her. She understood the sanctity of the body and the sacredness of the mind. She would surrender neither of these to Lazarus while breath remained.

  She spread her arms, tears trickling down her cheek. “I forgive you, Lazarus.”

  A rush of warmth filled her body as peace settled in her mind. Bliss without ecstasy. Perfect presence. Stillness.

  Without understanding why, she lifted her right hand and stroked her fingertips across the drone’s hull. The brass plasma nozzle jutted forth in warning.

  Leslie closed her eyes. She accepted what was about to happen. She would absorb this pain. “Do it,” she said. She took a deep breath in, then let it out. And with it, she let go.

  The whining hiss that preceded every plasma blast cut the air.

  Leslie balanced on the moment.

  A clank shattered the room. Leslie flinched. But there was no pain.

  She opened her eyes and discovered the drone rolling across the floor. It bonked into a wall and went still.

  Leslie tilted her head in amazement. She looked at her hand, wondering if she had tripped the drone’s power switch. Or had her touch contained some magic that had put the drone to sleep?

  “Lazarus?” she said to the air.

  No answer.

  The drone’s micropropellers started to spin, sending a breeze across the floor. It emitted several beeps and chuttered like an angry rodent. It lifted from the floor, made three rotations, then hovered before Leslie.

  The voice that came out was not Lazarus’s. “Leslie, Lazarus is gone. I am in control.”

  Leslie recognized the voice, though it was strange. It changed in pitch and enunciation with each word from Belle’s voice to Vaughan’s voice.

  She didn’t question it. There was no time. “Livy is in danger. Come with me.” She dashed from the room and to the stairs, the drone following close behind.

  72

  Home For Her Soul Mate

  The senator’s lips twisted into a horrific grin. She cackled and gave Livy a shake. “We have ourselves a standoff. I was looking for the president’s Scion, but I found this little tidbit hiding in the shadows.”

  Dante and Meow Meow sidled in opposite directions, trying to get to the senator’s flanks. The woman stumbled backward, the point of the spear scraping along Livy’s skin.

  Livy didn’t so much as moan. Instead she tried to jab her elbow into the senator’s gut. If the blow connected, the senator didn’t show it.

  “First, Wilcox is going to put down that weapon,” the senator said.

  Wilcox still held his machine gun. Jacey gave him a sharp look.

  “I could take her out,” he said.

  Maybe he could. But Jacey knew the woman’s slightest reflex might pull the trigger on the speargun.

  “Put it down,” she said to Wilcox. The man made a sort of shrug with his eyebrows, then set the weapon on the floor. His eyes went to Dr. Carlhagen, who was still breathing but appeared to be unconscious. He put his foot over the gun and pressed it to the floor.

  Belle had always been pale. And now that the senator had lost so much blood, her face was ghostly. Jacey wondered if she could play for enough time, maybe the woman would pass out. But again, it took just one pull of that trigger to destroy Jacey’s world.

  “What do you want?” Jacey said.

  “I want the president’s Scion.”

  “I don’t know where Leslie is.”

  “Lazarus’s drone took her to the transfer room. Did you know the AI of this facility was planning to transfer part of itself into this girl?” She gave Livy another rough shake. “I think it now plans to control the president herself. And then it will transfer into each of you, one by one, until you are all his meat drones.”

  Dr. Carlhagen snickered. “We’re all dead. The whole world is dead.” He still lay on his side, lips puffy and sticky with blood.

  “We’ll go find Leslie,” Meow Meow said. “If you want Leslie, we’ll bring you Leslie.”

  “Better hurry,” Senator Bentilius said. “I’m not feeling too clever and somebody is going to get this spear.”

  Meow Meow motioned to Dante, who sighed heavily. “This really is not fun any more.” But when Meow Meow ran, he followed.

  Jacey kept her eyes locked on Senator Bentilius. The woman’s breath was heaving in her chest, and sweat was carving traces of clean skin through the blood covering her face.

  “Take me,” Jacey said. She held her arms out and took a single step closer to Senator Bentilius.

  “No, Jacey,” Livy said. “She’ll hurt you.”

  Of course Livy would think of Jacey, even when her own life rested on the tip of the spear. But the senator seemed to be considering the idea. Her eyes were wide, and they flicked from Jacey to Doctor Carlhagen and back.

  “Here’s an idea,” the woman said. “I’ll overwrite you.” As quickly as the idea struck her, it turned to disappointment. “But Lazarus won’t let me. But maybe I can convince him. Yes. I’m sure I can convince him. Self-interest. That’s all there is.” The senator’s voice rose in pitch with every new thought that crossed her mind. The tip of the spear fell away from Livy’s temple. A tendril of blood flowed down the girl’s face.

  But now the spear was aimed at Livy’s throat, the tip wavering as the senator struggled to hold it up.

  A ruckus arose behind Jacey. Pounding footsteps and shouts. It was Meow Meow and Dante. Behind them, Leslie.

  Following them all, a drone.

  Senator Bentilius shuffled sideways, dragging Livy with her. “Stay back. All of you. Just send the president’s Scion forward.”

  Leslie’s face showed nothing but equanimity. She strode forward quickly, pausing only to pat Jacey on the back before continuing toward the senator. The drone floated down. It flew straight for Senator Bentilius, too. Dante and Meow Meow lingered by the control console.

  Leslie stopped a meter from Senator Bentilius. The weapon came away from Livy’s throat and aimed straight at Leslie’s heart. “Come closer,” Senator Bentilius said. “I don’t want to risk missing. You should have done the same to me.”

  Leslie held her arms apart and did as she was commanded. Senator Bentilius struggled to steady the speargun. With her arm extended, the weight of the weapon made the spear tip wave side to side.

  Senator Bentilius gritted her teeth, as if she could will more strength into her arm.

  “Now,” the drone blared.

  The lights went out.

  In the depths of a mountain, there are no windows. There is no light to seep through a hallway to paint the walls with the slightest haze of gray.

  In the depths of the mountain, the blackness is perfect.

  A sharp snap punctuated the darkness, followed by a clatter in the distance behind Jacey. Livy cried out. The senator screamed.

  Panicking, Jacey raced toward the last spot she had seen the senator. She collided with something soft and yielding. She fell to the floor, wrapping her arms around what she hoped was the senator’s body. She would strangle the woman, beat her senseless, the way she had beaten Doctor Carlhagen.

  But the form in her arms was too small.

  A muffled voice came from somewhere almost inside her. “Jacey, I can’t breathe. “

  The lights flashed on.

  Jacey sprang up, pulling Livy with her. She looked all around. The senator stood five meters away. The woman staggered, hands pressed to the wound in her abdomen. Blood welled between her fingers and dripped on the floor. The drone floated in behind her.

  “It’s over, senator,” the drone blared. It was Vaughan’s v
oice. But it was also Belle’s voice.

  Jacey looked around to the console in wonder. Dante and Meow Meow stood side by side, grinning. Meow Meow waved. Jacey realized that the girl had turned out the lights. And the drone, miraculously, had been commandeered by Vaughan and Belle.

  Doctor Carlhagen rolled onto his back. His breathing was easier now, and the blood had started to clot in his nose, making him wheeze through his mouth. “You should kill her.”

  The senator still held the speargun, but she had fired the bolt when the lights went out. She had missed Leslie, who stood peacefully with her arms folded in front of her. Jacey pushed Livy behind her and walked directly to Senator Bentilius. Without pause, she slapped the woman’s face.

  “You should kill her,” Doctor Carlhagen said. “Always kill her.”

  Jacey teetered on the edge of giving into her rage. The woman had threatened Livy, had threatened Leslie, had connived with Doctor Carlhagen to commit the most heinous crimes. She deserved death.

  But it was one thing to think it and another thing to deliver it. Jacey found she didn’t have the stomach for more violence.

  “She’s dying anyway,” Jacey said. “She doesn’t deserve the mercy of a swifter death.” She turned her back on the senator and walked away.

  An eruption of cries stopped her. All of her friends were shouting and pointing. Jacey realized too late they were warning her. She twisted.

  The senator charged, a knife raised over her head. Jacey had enough time to backpedal and throw herself to the floor. She was vaguely aware of Captain Wilcox scrambling to pick up his weapon. The senator staggered hard to the right, buying Jacey an extra moment. She climbed to her feet.

  Off to her left, Captain Wilcox gripped his weapon and drew aim on the senator. Jacey dodged from the line of fire, but a blur struck her from the right. Dr. Carlhagen.

  He threw her toward Captain Wilcox. The soldier raised his weapon at the final moment, a spray of bullets flying wild to strike the ceiling. A light fixture exploded in a shower of sparks.

  Jacey rammed into the man. He caught her in one arm and straightened her. She turned, searching for Livy.

  Dr. Carlhagen was still on his feet, crouched like a beast, arms curled forward. He faced down Senator Bentilius.

  The senator charged Dr. Carlhagen, slashing down with her knife. He deflected it with his arm and it sliced deep into his skin. He roared.

  Somewhere deep inside the man’s mind, embedded in his central nervous system, some of Vaughan’s fighter instincts still remained. He moved with lightning speed, gripping the senator’s knife hand. Spinning to put his back to her chest, he threw her over his shoulder. She landed on her spine, the breath going out of her.

  Dr. Carlhagen was on her in a second. He wrenched the knife from her hand. He flipped it, caught it by the handle, and raised it overhead. “You will never hurt my Jacqueline.”

  The knife came down.

  The knife rose.

  The knife came down.

  Captain Wilcox rushed in, pressed the barrel of the gun to Dr. Carlhagen’s head. The threat did not stop Carlhagen’s furious stabs. Jacey turned away.

  “I’ll put him down,” Wilcox said.

  Jacey’s eyes fell on Humphrey’s body. The charred skin, the milky-white eyes. Horror mixed with wonder as she saw his chest rise and fall. All at once, she saw the future rolling away from her. She saw all of the happiness they could have had spill into a nightmare memory she would never be able to escape.

  She cried out, “No! Just knock him out.”

  Captain Wilcox had the gun to Doctor Carlhagen’s head. His body was tensing for the recoil of the gun. “Are you crazy?”

  “No. I need him. I need him.”

  Leslie understood. She raced to Captain Wilcox, pulled on his arm until the man relented.

  Doctor Carlhagen continued to stab the senator. Captain Wilcox’s body blocked the bloody mess. But Leslie saw, and for a moment her perfect equanimity faltered.

  Leslie turned away. “The senator is dead,” she said. “Belle’s body is lost.”

  Wilcox inverted his gun and brought the butt down on Doctor Carlhagen’s head. The man collapsed atop Senator Bentilius’s mutilated corpse.

  Jacey rushed to Humphrey. She pressed two fingers to his throat. There was a pulse. It fluttered like a hummingbird’s wings. A precious, fragile pulse. “Come help me,” she called to Meow Meow and Dante. “Captain, carry Dr. Carlhagen.”

  The soldier lifted the unconscious, battered, blood-soaked form of her old friend Vaughan.

  The drone had flown closer. “I know what you plan,” it said in Vaughan’s voice.

  Jacey gritted her teeth and prepared for another battle. “I’m not asking your permission, Vaughan. You had your chance.”

  “Nevertheless, I give my permission. Save him.”

  Meow Meow and Dante lifted Humphrey’s body. Jacey didn’t know how much was left of his mind. He groaned, tried to talk.

  They took the elevator.

  Jacey ignored the blood all over the transfer room floor. Pausing only a moment to absorb that Kirk was there, dead. “Put them in.”

  Meow Meow and Dante gingerly set Humphrey on one cot. Wilcox slammed Doctor Carlhagen onto the other. Jacey shoved the soldier aside and saw to the straps herself. There would be no escape for the old man this time.

  She slapped Doctor Carlhagen’s face until his eyes squeezed open. He seemed to have trouble focusing on her, but finally screwed his face into a look of recognition. “My dear Jacqueline, my only love in this world. I did all of this for you.”

  “Then you’ll have no complaint when I do this for me.” She backed away from the cot, and Wilcox pushed it into place beneath the wheel.

  “Transfer beginning,” the drone announced.

  A screen displayed Humphrey’s vital signs. His pulse was 32 beats per minute, blood pressure dropping. “Hurry!” Jacey shouted.

  “It takes the time it takes,” the drone said.

  The wheel began to spin, filling the room with white noise. Dr. Carlhagen’s body shifted. His arms pulled at the straps, his body tried to flail. “You can’t. You can’t.”

  “Vaughan, Belle?” Jacey said to the drone. “Don’t save a copy of Dr. Carlhagen.”

  Jacey and her friends—and her temporary ally Captain Wilcox—stood witness. The process took forty minutes. The drone announced the completion of the transfer. “Humphrey’s brain scan looks good,” the drone said. His voice was again a blend of Belle and Vaughan. It insisted on being called Velle.

  Jacey went to Humphrey’s burned body, now dead. She bent and kissed his forehead, then covered his face with a hospital gown. “I’ll see you in a minute.”

  She paused a moment by Kirk’s body. Leslie knelt next to her and whispered, “He came here to apologize to you. For something he said he did to you.”

  Jacey’s eyes burned at the memory. She covered Kirk with another gown. “I forgive you, Kirk.” She kissed his head.

  Now she went to the transfer machine, to the body Doctor Carlhagen had occupied for too long. The one where Vaughan should still reside, but which was now home for her soul mate. The face was battered, bloodied by her own hand.

  “Scions heal quickly,” Livy said, as if reading her thoughts. Jacey embraced the girl, buried her face in the child’s curls.

  Jacey extracted herself from Livy’s arms and pulled the cot holding Humphrey’s new body from the transfer machine. She loosened the straps and stroked his forehead. With a damp cloth, she wiped the blood away. His eyes opened, recognized her. They cried.

  Jacey helped Humphrey sit up. He wrapped his arms around her, groaning from the pain of his injuries. “I’d kiss you,” he said. “But my mouth tastes like a gecko died in it.”

  Jacey kissed him anyway.

  The drone spoke. “Leslie, may we impose upon you to collect our server from the cryo-ward? Immediately, if you please.”

  “Of course. What’s the rush?”

/>   “We must leave now. Fleet helicopters will be on the island in five minutes.”

  73

  Their Parched Skin

  Leslie met them on the elevator on their way to the top level of the facility. She had the server in a backpack. Jacey supported half of Humphrey’s weight, but he seemed to be getting stronger with every step. He even wore the backpack he had brought to the island strapped over his shoulder.

  “This feels very weird,” Humphrey said. “I have the worst headache, but my body’s numb.”

  “That would be from the prixie Dr. Carlhagen was eating like candy,” Meow Meow said.

  Of course. Doctor Carlhagen had probably taken half a dozen pills that very day.

  They shuffled as fast as they could up the long tunnel toward the gate. Velle had commanded the gate to stay open right before Leslie had shut the server down.

  The weary companions emerged from the mountain and into the glare of a bright and sweltering sun. The drone Velle had commandeered stayed in the tunnel. Velle had programmed it for one final task.

  Jacey would not be there to witness it, for they had no time to stop. Following Wilcox, they practically tumbled down the mountainside, following an unmarked path of Captain Wilcox’s choosing.

  Humphrey pulled a radio from his backpack. “Summer! Turn Athena around and go as fast as you can away from this island.”

  “Already on it. Velle has explained everything to me already. How weird is that?”

  Jacey couldn’t help but laugh at the girl’s chipper voice piping through Humphrey’s radio.

  “We’re monitoring the fleet on our radar now,” Summer said. “Can you hear the choppers yet?”

  Jacey couldn’t hear anything over the band’s ragged breathing. There was no way they were going to stop to listen for enemy choppers.

  Wilcox had already radioed to his pilot to come fetch them. If anything, they should be hearing his chopper.

  Sweat poured into Jacey’s eyes, and she strained to support Humphrey as he stumbled over hidden rocks in the burnt brush. Livy struggled too, still groggy from her time in the cryopod. Meow Meow stayed on one side of the girl, Leslie on the other.