by Lisa Smedman
Now that promise was gone. Red Wraith's feelings of joy and delight were replaced by a sense of intense claustrophobia and fear as the intelligence that had been guiding him somehow changed into something dark and foreboding. Even though he was surrounded by inky darkness, Red Wraith had the sense of something watching him, judging him, sifting through his thoughts and seeking out all that was unworthy and vile . . .
Lines appeared, startling him out of his fearful reverie.
At first they were nothing more than vague suggestions of gray against the inky black void. Then they grew in luminosity and joined to form a geometric figure that was box-like in shape—a tesseract with Red Wraith at its center.
The "rooms" of the tesseract solidified, filled with objects. Each was detailed and distinct: a military office in London, a penthouse overlooking Berlin, the sauna of a private Turkish bath, a parking garage in a Paris condominium, a rooftop garden in the Saeder-Krupp corporate arcology in Essen, the interior of a limousine rolling through the streets of Antwerp, a villa in the hills overlooking Athens—and all of them disturbingly familiar . . .
Within each of these settings, a shadowy figure moved. They appeared ghostlike at first, and for a moment or two Red Wraith wondered if the tesseract was some sort of node, filled with other deckers. Then the figures also solidified. Although he should have been incapable of remembering them, Red Wraith recognized them at once.
Each was a dead man—a political leader or prominent figure whom the cyberassassin Daniel Bogdanovich had been sent to eliminate. While every one of them was recognizable by his or her build and clothes, each wore Daniel's face like a rubber mask over his own, giving them a terrible and horrifying symmetry.
Red Wraith adopted a defensive posture as the figures approached. They came at him from above, below, and all sides, each closing in from one of the many rooms of the tesseract. Red Wraith spun this way and that, wondering which attack would come first.
Without warning, he felt a dull thump at the back of his neck that sent his head rocking forward. As a wave of blood ran down his back, he realized what had happened. The cranial bomb at the base of his skull had exploded, rendering him utterly paralyzed. He was still upright and on his feet, but all he could do was stand frozen in place, watching helplessly as his attackers approached . . .
The first emerged from the office of the British secretary of defense, backlit by a wall-to-wall projected map of what had once been the European Economic Community. The secretary, wearing a crisp gray uniform decorated with medals, had lurched to his feet from where he lay sprawled on the floor next to his desk. He marched toward Red Wraith with his swagger stick tucked under one arm and his head lolling against his shoulder from the karate chop that had snapped his spine. His step was certain but disjointed, a shambling stagger. But his hands were still fully functional, and were monstrous constructions of gun-metal blue steel. As they closed around Red Wraith's throat he felt the bones of his spine start to splinter and crack . . .
The secretary of defense disappeared.
The German trade ambassador came next. He emerged from his penthouse suite wearing his housecoat and slippers and holding a snifter of the brandy that had been laced with 200 milligrams of strychnine—twice the dose required to kill a man. His face was twisted with pain, and occasionally he was forced to stop as his body jackknifed nearly double with the convulsions the poison produced. Yet somehow he continued to stagger toward Red Wraith, and somehow he avoided spilling any of the brandy in the snifter around which his portly fingers were wrapped.
Wrenching Red Wraith's mouth open with one hand, the German ambassador poured the amber liquid down his paralyzed victim's throat. Red Wraith choked and sputtered and felt hot brandy trickle like spittle from the corners of his mouth, but was forced to swallow just the same. Within seconds the strychnine hit, sending spasms of pain throughout his body. His gut felt as though it were filled with iodine bile, a churning sea upon which razor blades were bobbing, their sharp edges sawing into the lining of his stomach. His vision blurred with tears as the pain in-tensified beyond what he could bear . . .
The trade ambassador vanished.
The Russian policlub leader emerged from the steam room, his muscular young body wrapped in a towel. His damp curls framed piercingly intelligent black eyes that stared out from beneath the mask of Daniel's face. The bottom of that face was a bloody ruin. A portion of his jaw hung to one side on tattered strands of flesh—the exit point of the bullet that had been fired into the back of his head. He held a gun in his right hand—a Walther PB-120 with a body and silencer made entirely from fiberglass and plastic, materials that would pass through a metal detector without a blip. As super-hot steam swirled around his lower legs the policlub leader raised the pistol, sighted, and fired. Although Red Wraith was looking down the barrel of the gun, the bullet somehow struck him from behind, ripping apart his lower face and jaw in a bloody explosion of flesh, gums, and teeth.
Just as the first two men had, the policlub leader vanished.
Attacker followed attacker in rapid succession, each killing Red Wraith in the same way that he had been dispatched. But the last one—the Greek minister of finance—wasn't satisfied with merely slashing Red Wraith's throat with the spur mounted in the heel of his boot. Just as the steel blade bit into flesh, he transformed into an image of Lydia, her own throat gaping open in an obscene red grin that mirrored Red Wraith's own wound. She tried to speak, to whisper words of endearment to Red Wraith. But then blood erupted from her throat, fountaining over him in a ghastly spray. As she died, Lydia's eyes locked on his—accusing, wounded, filled with hate . . .
Unable to bear it a second longer, Red Wraith closed his eyes and choked back a moan of agony. Then he clamped down upon the shard of determination that remained. He refused to suffer, to die this way. This was all just some nightmarish hallucination, some deathbed construct with which his own mind had chosen to torment him as he lay on the verge of death. Summoning up the last vestiges of his will, he fought back, forcing his hands up and away from his body, palms outward against Lydia's chest, in violent defiance.
His ghostly hands passed right through her. And that gave Red Wraith an idea. His persona resembled a wraith, an insubstantial figure composed of red mist. He'd customized his masking program to allow him to pass through walls like a ghost. Perhaps he could use it to escape from the tesseract that enclosed him now.
Shaking off the last of the paralysis, Red Wraith hurled his body forward into the room that resembled the office of the secretary of defense. He struck the wall map at the back of the room, was momentarily slowed by it—and then passed through it as if it was not there.
He had escaped!
But the scene he found himself in was grim indeed . . .
* * *
Lady Death lay on her back on the rumpled sheets of the hotel bed. They were wet, but warm. She plucked weakly at the sheets with one hand and saw that they were splotched with vibrant red. The same red stained her fingers and, she saw when she looked down, her bare legs.
Harsh lights—the kind they use in operating rooms—glared down from above. Were they the lights that she had been rushing toward, just an eyeblink ago? They shone harshly upon the walls of the room, which were a sterile white, inset with medical equipment and monitors. A hiss of air conditioning washed Lady Death's skin with a chilling cold, carrying with it the sharp smell of medicine and disinfectant.
Dozens of figures crowded around the bed. Each was Shinanai—and yet not Shinanai. The skin on one was a little too ruddy, the hair on another a little too short or too long over the ears. That one's luminescent face paint was the wrong shade of blue, and the cast of this one's eyes was too angular. This one's mannerisms were too abrupt, not flowing and graceful like Shinanai's, while that one's laughter was too harsh and unkind.
The not-Shinanais crowded around the bed, poking at Lady Death's hair, clothes, and skin with cold fingers. All held hypodermics with needles the widt
h of her little finger and syringes the size of soda cans.
Flexible rubber tubing ran from the top of these hypodermics into their mouths, like drinking straws.
After pressing the skin to find a vein, the vampires plunged the tips of the needles into Lady Death's skin with painful jabs, then drew the plungers back. The syringes filled with blood, which the vampires greedily sucked up through the tubes, turning them from pale white to a murky pink. As they fed they smiled reassuringly down at Lady Death, dribbles of blood trickling over parted lips. Occasionally one would pause in her feeding and bend down to mark Lady Death's pale white skin with bloody lip prints. Then" kisses were gentle but delivered with remote formality, in just the same way that Hitomi's own parents had kissed her good night.
Lady Death stared up at the vampires, helpless and weak. Even though these were only imperfect replicas of Shinanai, a part of her knew that these creatures loved her. What they were doing to her was for her own good. It was a treatment, a cure for life. A mercy killing . . .
Realizing that she wasn't thinking clearly, Lady Death shook her head. What had happened? There had been a bright light, and Shinanai's voice, and then scenes from her childhood and early teenage years. They had sped by impossibly fast, like a tridcast skipping forward several seconds at a time: Hitomi playing in the Shiawase arcology's exclusive, executive-class daycare; her guardians beating the private tutor who had been caught teaching Hitomi an unauthorized subject—how to French kiss; trying in vain to gain the attention of her mother and father by wearing increasingly outrageous fashions and body art; the night at the Black Magic Orchestra concert when she had slipped free of her guardians and fled backstage to meet Shinanai. The final scene had been set in the hotel room in Seoul where Shinanai had made love to her. And then she had awakened here, in a room that was a strange blend of the hotel room in Seoul and her family's private medical clinic. . .
Horror returned to Lady Death as she remembered that she was dying. The vampires surrounding her bed took on a gruesome tinge then, their faces illuminated from below as the lights overhead blinked out. The shadowy figures rustled around the bed in the half-light—only the achingly sharp jabs of the needles they plunged into Lady Death's quivering flesh told her where they were. She lay in grim anticipation of the next piercing jab, unable to move because she was so weak from loss of blood.
A sudden thought came to her: the real Shinanai will save me. But Lady Death knew this to be a false hope. She was trapped here in this netherworld between life and death, while the aidoru was safely back in the real world, as were Hitomi's guardians and anyone else who might have rescued her. She was on her own. She was trapped in her own worst nightmare—one in which not even Shinanai could intervene.
A tiny core of anger blossomed deep inside Lady Death. She would show them. She was only a teenage girl, but once already in her young life she had fought off death. She could do it again.
She lashed out at the arm of the vampire nearest her, knocking away the syringe it held. Blood sprayed from the needle, staining the white wall in a jagged pattern. Summoning every ounce of her strength, Lady Death sat up on the bed, kicking and striking out with her hands at the remaining vampires and screaming as loud as she could.
Amazingly, they pulled away. In that split second she jumped from the bed and staggered to the door. But it was locked. The handle would not turn.
Lady Death looked desperately around as the vampires moved slowly toward her, hypodermics raised and voices hissing with whispered threats. The room did have one other door, she saw now. But upon it was a sign that bore a single character: the word "morgue." Lady Death was certain—although she could not say where this knowledge came from—that nothing living could pass through it. But technically, she was not a living creature. The Matrix icon in which her soul currently resided was that of a dead woman, a suicide victim.
Hurling herself toward the door, Lady Death wrenched at it. Unlike the other handle, this one turned easily. The door opened, and Lady Death plunged through it, slamming it behind her just as the vampires reached it. She saw that the door also contained a deadbolt, and turned the latch on it, sealing the vampires on the other side.
She turned around, relief washing through her as she realized that she was free of the nightmare in which she had been trapped a moment before.
But the landscape that the door led to was not one she would have willingly entered, had there been any other choice. . .
* * *
Dark Father was alone, in a place that was utterly dark, silent, and still. The transition was dramatic, abrupt.
Seconds ago he had been surrounded by joy, a beautiful light that drew ever nearer, and gentle, comforting murmurs. Now there was darkness, silence, and fear.
Dark Father tried to move but found that he could move his arms and legs only a short distance before they bumped into walls. He lay on his back on a hard surface that was lined with padded, silky cloth. He tried to sit up, but his head bumped against a ceiling that was only a few centimeters above his nose.
Walls, also lined with padded silk, surrounded him on al sides, only a centimeter or two away from his body.
Dark Father suddenly realized where he was. The tiny boxlike room, the silk-padded walls, floor, and ceiling, the utter stillness in which his racing heart beat loudly . . . he could only be inside a coffin. Had he died? Had they buried him? Had the doctors been misled by his ghoul's body and thought he was dead when he was stil alive, then interred him by mistake?
For several helpless, panicked seconds, Dark Father flailed against the prison that enclosed him, kicking his feet against the sides of the coffin. He clawed at the silk lining until it hung in shreds against his face and slammed his palms against the coffin lid.
"There's been a mistake!" he shouted. "I'm alive! Let me out!"
But his efforts were futile. The hollow thuds of his kicks and blows would never be loud enough to attract attention if he were buried and the lid was sealed shut with the pressure of hundreds of pounds of earth. And now the air inside the coffin was getting stale, as Dark Father sucked the last of it into his gasping lungs . . .
He closed his eyes against the darkness and balled his fists. There had to be a way out. There had to be.
But at the core of his being, he knew it was hopeless. He had about as much chance of becoming human again as he did of escaping this living hell.
A faint scraping sound caused him to open his eyes. He lay utterly still and listened, head turning to the side, focusing every scrap of his attention on the sound. Was it really the sound of someone digging? Had his thuds and shouts been heard?
The digging sounds became louder and closer. Now he could hear the scrape of something sharp against the coffin lid, and the click of a latch being unfastened.
Weeping with joy, he began to laugh through his tears as a crack of light appeared around the edge of the coffin lid. As it creaked open he sat up, ready to embrace his rescuer.
Then his mouth dropped open in surprise. "Chester?" he asked.
His son stared down at him. Clods of earth fell from his elongated fingers—he had used his untrimmed claws to dig the coffin out. Although his facial features were as African-American as Dark Father's own, Chester's skin was a pale, mottled white. His eyes watered and he winced in the sunlight that streamed down from above, reflecting dully on his hairless head. The boy was only eighteen, but the taint of ghoul was so strong in him that he looked like a man in his thirties.
"Hullo, Father," Chester said. Then he grinned, revealing jagged teeth.
"What happened to me, Chester?" Dark Father asked. "How did you—"
That was odd. Now that Dark Father's eyes had adjusted to the painfully bright sunlight, he could see his own arms and legs. Instead of the slightly grayish skin he expected, he saw black bones encased in loose black cloth. The noose still hung around his neck and his eyes were shaded by the brim of the black top hat on his head.
"What is. . . ? Where. . .
?"
Was he in the Matrix still? But this felt so real. Without the connection to his body, without the subtle cues that the RAS couldn't quite filter out, simsense was indistinguishable from reality. But if this was the Matrix, what was Chester doing in it?
"That's a good question, Father," the teenage ghoul answered. "The answer's pretty simple: I'm hungry."
Chester lunged forward, scrabbling with his dirt-encrusted hands at Dark Father's chest. The fabric of his suit tore away easily, revealing patches of grayish skin still clinging to his skeletal ribs. The boy fell upon these in a frenzy, tearing at them with jagged teeth. Searing pain lanced through Dark Father as he felt the flesh being torn from his bones. But the pain was nothing compared to the emotional anguish he felt. His own son—feeding upon him as if he were so much carrion. This was madness! Betrayal!
"Leave me alone!" Dark Father howled. He fought back, trying to push Chester away, but his arms were cramped after his confinement in the coffin. And the boy was young and strong. Now Dark Father could hear his bones cracking as Chester bit through them, slurping the marrow out of them as if they were syrup-filled straws.
Shaking with fear, Dark Father hurled himself from the coffin and scrambled out of the shallow grave in which it had been buried. Chester climbed up behind him, stuffing a chunk of Dark Father's flesh into his mouth as he climbed.
"Admit it!" Chester burbled in a gleeful tone. "You're just like me. A flesh feeder. A ghoul."
"No!" Dark Father howled. He staggered across a field of dark, soft earth. Chester ran after him, clawed hands plucking at Dark Father's tattered jacket.
Dark Father looked wildly around, seeking an escape route. But his nightmare was about to intensify. Gibbering voices surrounded him as ghouls closed in on every side, their eyes greedy with hunger and their clawed hands raised and ready. And each of them looked like a ghoulish rendition of the bounty hunter who had shot him a year ago . . .