by Jeff Taylor
“No! You have to stop him, Stepan,” he pleaded, his voice shrill. “He’s a monster! He will lead the cyborgs against us. He’s the one who will kill us all! Please, Stepan, kill him!!”
Treyklor was taken aback. He looked from Strinnger to Brill and back again. Brill saw the confusion in their eyes and sensed their doubt, but he had to make them believe. All of humanity depended on it!
“Listen to me, Stepan. The cyborgs, they came to me in a vision. I saw what they have planned, what he,” pointing to Con, “has planned not just for us but for everyone. They are going to take over. That is their symbol! If we don’t stop him now, all of mankind will be lost!”
For a moment, all was silent as Treyklor considered his words. Brill’s heart pounded furiously within his chest. Treyklor would save them, he knew it. As much as they had despised one another in the past, deep down Brill knew that the old soldier would do his duty and protect the innocent from an untold evil. The new-found trust was unmistakable, and when Treyklor finally parted his lips to speak, Brill knew he would hear words of assurance. He was sorely mistaken.
“You’re mad,” Treyklor said somberly, a hint of pity in his voice. “Perhaps you should reconsider who it is you should be afraid of . . .”
Reaching down to the edge of the bed, Treyklor grasped the bed linen and thrust it back. Then he released the harness strap over Brill’s chest so the old man could sit up and see for himself the condition he was in. Brill gave him a puzzled look and then lifted his head to see down past his body and to his legs. What he saw were not his legs, per se, but hollow, alloyed appendages attached to his body from the waist down. The old man’s body quaked as he stared at the foreign body purporting to be his. It wasn’t possible. He could feel his legs, his feet the same as before. This had to be some sort of trick. But when he wiggled a toe or bent his foot, the metal frame did the same.
Treyklor concluded “. . . because now, you are a cyborg.”
“No,” Brill breathed. His eyes fixated on the fleshless shells encasing, if not replacing his brittle bones. He felt nothing but shame. He had been violated, desecrated! But even more disturbing was the realization that what if the figure in his dream had not been Con and his bladed phoenix? What if he had seen his own future? What if he was the one to destroy humanity?
“No!” he cried once more. “No, no, no, no, no, no!!”
He thrashed violently from side to side but the bonds held him. The restraints on his wrists and ankles pulled tighter with his thrashing, but he was oblivious to the numbness overtaking his extremities. The medical staff soon burst into the room, pressing him down on the bed as they tried to hold him long enough to sedate him. Slowly, the world became shrouded in haze once more and the tension in his body eased. As the sedatives ran their course, he sunk back onto his pillow, tears continually streaming down his cheek.
He couldn’t go on, not like one of them. As sleep was about to overtake him, he took a deep breath and began the descent once more into unconsciousness. But just before, there came a sharp pang in his left breast, a stabbing sensation that otherwise would have paralyzed him with pain. He wanted to cry out but the medication made it impossible.
“He’s going into arrest!” he heard someone shout, but he no longer cared. His eyes closed once more, never to open again.
Strinnger and Treyklor stood just outside the door as Brill expired. Satisfaction at the death of another human being was not something Strinnger had ever wanted to experience, but as he stared at the shell of Naitus Brill, the mastermind behind every event that had changed his life in the last year, he could not help but feel vindicated. The lone surviving conspirator now joined his accomplices and their victim in the otherworld. Their dark fraternity had deprived mankind one of its greatest minds and no manner of justice seemed appropriate to Strinnger than an ignominious end.
The Third Consul was stoically silent. Strinnger would note later his surprise at the lack of emotion from his superior as he watched the man who irritated him more than any other die. But there he stood, silently staring at Brill’s face as the spark of life departed from his eyes. When the attending physician finally declared the time of death, Treyklor broke his trance.
“Let’s go,” he finally said, replacing his cap and turning away.
“Right behind you, sir.”
They had not gone but a few steps when the communications signal sounded in Strinnger’s ear. Pinching his right earlobe, he answered. “Strinnger.”
A bright, perky voice responded.
“Chief Strinnger, this is Persephone. I have the reports on the ambassadors’ arrival you requested. Your friend Mr. Drake just arrived as well. He will meet you here at headquarters.”
The olive-skinned brunette had been assigned to him by Treyklor from Nathaniel’s staff to act as his assistant and office manager, though she was qualified to do neither. Her vibrant, pale blue eyes blazed like sapphires on a thin face and almost sickly thin frame. She was a friend of Julia’s and his wife had gotten her a job when Nathaniel took over the company. After Carsus declared independence she jumped at the chance make history by working on the moon. She immediately resigned her post with the company and found a job with Consul Treyklor, who then in turn assigned her to Strinnger. She was a sweet, overly-enthusiastic girl who was as qualified run an office as a stapler, but Treyklor had kept her on. Strinnger suspected that Treyklor had given him someone inferior intentionally so that he would have to rely on himself more than anyone else. Treyklor did not believe in delegating too much and Strinnger hypothesized that he was trying to teach Strinnger to do the same.
“Well done, Persephone. Consul Treyklor and I are headed back to the LAB. Please confirm my reservations for the performance tonight.”
“Absolutely,” she beamed, “You told me she’s been down recently. I know a night at her favorite ballet will be just the thing to cheer her up! Julia’s a lucky girl, sir!”
Give it a rest, Strinnger thought. Persephone’s constantly cheery attitude was something he still had not grown accustomed to yet.
“Thank you,” he said, trying not to sound too sarcastic. “Just make sure the box seat is open. Strinnger out.”
“Trouble in paradise,” Treyklor asked, maintaining his gaze straight ahead as they walked down the lengthy hallway to the exit.
The tone in his voice gave no indication of his interest in whatever answer Strinnger had to say. Having worked with the Old Man long enough, Strinnger picked up on this and merely replied, “She’s still adjusting to living full-time up here without her family. She won’t admit it, but Tina’s decision to stay on Earth devastated her. It’s nothing you need to be concerned about though. We’ll figure it out.”
Treyklor merely grunted, keeping up his determined pace.
Despite the assurance to his superior, Strinnger was very much worried about his wife. A lunar lifestyle of hosting dignitaries and attending concerts while her husband saw to his official duties was not what she had envisioned when they had wed six weeks ago. Yet she understood that he had a responsibility not only to the people of Carsus but to her father’s legacy as well. When the details of the terrorist attack on the city and his efforts to stop them were revealed, Strinnger had become a national hero, earning the respect of his new community. He was the champion of Nathaniel’s dream and both Strinnger and Julia were dedicated to doing whatever it took to make that dream succeed.
The Consul and his chief officer were only a few meters from the hospital exit when something Brill had said occurred to him.
“Sir, what do you make of what he said about the phoenix on the flag?” he asked, pushing the hospital door open for the Consul. “It’s kind of weird that he would have seen it in a dream.”
“The man was insane. Forget anything he ever told you.”
Strinnger nodded in agreement. “Yes, sir. You know, the way he went on about it though, I almost didn’t have the heart to tell him that using it on the flag was my idea.”
&
nbsp; He glanced down at the platinum ring housing the blood-red stone adorning his right hand; the golden outline of the same phoenix on the Carsus flag was etched into the stone. The ring was a Kratin family heirloom, passed down from father to son. With no male to inherit it, Julia and Tina had gifted it to Strinnger and as a final tribute to their father he had proposed the new nation honor their founder by adopting the symbol of his family. He now was the protector of that family and would do so until his last breath.
EPILOGUE
The domed city gleamed like a bright blue marble in the sand as the sun descended behind the rusty Martian hillsides. The dimming red sky dazzled the abandoned remnants of dust deposited in the air by the storm that had vanished as quickly as it had appeared a half an hour before. Overlooking the solitary city of Aurora, a singular figure atop the caldera rim of the extinct Pavonis Mons volcano stared longingly on the city’s transparent dome, entranced by its beauty against the barren wasteland around it.
Eve was rooted to the frigid, red dirt. For years, this was what she had wanted, to feel the rocky soil beneath her feet, to stand on the edge of the new frontier and bask in the hope that a new life promised. In her dream, she shared the experience with someone she loved, but now that she saw the city, rising from the Oudemans crater and extending out to the ports and pods embedded in the cliffs of the immense Valles Marineris canyon, her heart raced at the thrill of a new adventure.
She had always dreamt of leaving the years of violence behind and starting fresh. No more lying, no more stealing and most importantly, no more killing. She had thought those dreams died with Nelsonn on that stone floor beneath Selene City, but, it wasn’t until then that they could now finally take root and bloom. With no ties, no family, and no friends left, she would be free to live as others did, allowing herself to be truly happy for the first time in a long time. Nelsonn had only held her back, denying her the hopes she’d cherished for so long. No more. Now she would live as she wanted. She could abandon the life of an assassin and begin anew.
In the six months after her escape from Selene City, she had pondered what to do with her life. Her bout with depression had almost proven as lethal as the poison on Con’s dagger, claiming her resolve and will to live. More than once, she’d considered finishing Con’s attack and ending what she saw as a useless existence.
The environment on Mars was harsher than she’d expected and the cities more widespread, like a collection of frontier towns on the edge of the unknown. Aurora was one of the most isolated, but also one of the largest. Carved into the rock and cascading into the Ius Chasmas like a waterfall of light and metal, the metropolitan colony was nearly impossible to reach by land. All supplies and personnel had to be flown into the massive hangars gaping open on the cliff face. To the northeast of the city lay the domed suburbia of the colonists’ residences cradled in the massive crater. Because of the colony’s remote location, as well as poor management, its production and growth had stagnated the last several years and only recently had it begun to show signs of progress, itself hoping for a brighter future.
Eve followed the curves of the marble-like dome until it reached the rusted soil. Beneath the shell she saw a bustling and vibrant city with towers reaching toward the sky around the remnants of the Precursor ship that began as its source, while hundreds of multi-colored specks darted in every direction likes fruit flies in a jar. In the shadows of the skyscrapers she would find refuge and blend in, disappearing among the crowds of traders, engineers, physicists, and sightseers.
About fifty kilometers to the west of the suburban dome, were an outcropping of buildings. From the columns of smoke and steam belching from their towers Eve concluded that these were factories and the utilities facilities, feeding essential water and energy to a city on the outskirts of habitable space. The series of a dozen or so scaffold-like buildings were covered with their own smaller domes and connected by a network of tubes and tunnels which she estimated to be a highway between each station and the city.
At the center of this industrial complex, she saw a lone structure much different than the others. A faint trail of smoke rose from it as well, but in a much smaller quantity than the monstrous towers surrounding it. Her helmet visor zoomed in on the solitary edifice and the display identified it as a local diner, Mal’s Place. From what she could see Mal’s was the only establishment in the area where the utility workers could get a bite to eat. Of course, the factories would have cafeterias, but experience told her that after a hard day of work, nothing beats a greasy spoon. It was out of the way, small, and far enough from civilization that the locals didn’t care who you were just so long as you got them their fries on time. Mal’s was indeed the place. In a few days she would be working there, in a mundane job, with ungrateful customers and long hours. She couldn’t wait.
Her visor alerted her that the last shuttle to the city would soon arrive at the station at the foot of the volcano. She nodded at the suit’s prompting and started her descent. She didn’t get far before something held her back. The pack strapped over her shoulders weighed on her. The desire to bring any part of her past suddenly felt like a burden she didn’t need to carry. Inside was everything she owned. If she was going to start fresh she needed to leave it all behind, everything, even her meager belongings. There would be no memories, no baggage, and no inhibitions; only what she needed to survive.
Removing the pack from her shoulders she laid it on the rocky ground. She sifted through its contents, methodically extracting item after item, leaving them bare on the red Martian soil. Clothing, mementos, even food packets from the Distant Horizon’s gourmet stockpile were discarded. Nothing was sacred, except for a few necessities. Soon the pack was empty apart from a few toiletries, a change of clothes, which she would discard as soon as she could buy some more, and her favorite red high heels. No sense in completely abandoning civilization.
She was just about to close the pack when something buried at the bottom caught her eye. Upside down at the base of the pack was a small four-by-six-inch plastic frame. She removed it and flipped the frame over, smiling at what she saw. On the back was a photograph she had not seen in several years, not since it had hung in the office of the Apollo Prison’s warden. It was a picture of a young couple, in full dress uniform, toasting one another in celebration of a championship performance at a long forgotten martial arts competition. A much more innocent version of herself smiled up at her while leaning on the shoulder of the man to her right. Eve’s long, gloved fingers gingerly stroked the face of her once loyal friend, Hiron Strón.
“I’ll miss you too,” she said.
Despite all she had done to him, all the pain and humiliation she had put him through, Strón had been the one to rescue her from the collapsing escape pod hangar when Selene City caved in on itself. He had been the one to fly her out of the station and had fought off Con’s poison. He never told her how he knew where she was, but that didn’t matter to her. The vision of him dressed in white from head to toe as he scooped her up and placed her in the escape pod was a blurred dream until she awakened in a hospital bed in Helsinki with him by her side.
She remained in intensive care for months while she recovered from her wounds. During that time, he never left her for more than a few hours a day. His usual dry humor and quick wit had entertained her and made her remember the days long banished to distant memory. In fact, in her darkest moments, he had been the one to lift her up, even planting the seed that would lead to this new adventure. He had given her hope and in more ways than one, saved her life.
During the course of their conversations, Strón had confided in her how he had survived the blast that decimated the Apollo Prison. Seeing Klindon’s escape in a modified drone, Strón had followed him. His pursuit had taken him out of the prison, but not far enough to escape the radiation of the nuclear blast. The burns that resulted from the exposure ravaged his body, leaving him disfigured and deformed. The white suit he wore hid the scars and contained the cancer
now devouring him from the inside out.
He had found a copy of the picture in his house in Finland and had left it on her bed the day she was discharged, himself nowhere to be found. It would be the last thing she placed on the shrine to her past life. She set atop the rest of the pack’s contents, their smiling faces gazing upward into the orange twilight sky.
There was only one thing more to do before she could head down the mountain. In her years as a killer for hire, her weapon of choice had always been the pair of short ninjato swords concealed in the posts of her pack. For the five years without Nelsonn, the swords had been her only companions, seeing her through good times and bad. Their smooth, carbon blades protected and distracted her from the times of loneliness and self-doubt. Her heart tugged at the thought of leaving them on top of the central mountain of the Tharsis region, but they were also the greatest symbols of her murderous past. There was no question in her mind she could not take them with her.
Finding the leather nubs at the base of the pack’s frame, she whisked the swords from their concealed slots, and held them up to the fading sun. They rotated in her gloved hand until the tips of the black carbon blades pointed downward. She then thrust the points at a slight angle, slicing into the rusted ground like a knife into soft clay. The swords’ handgrips crossed one another, forming an X just above the picture of her friend and her former self.
Eve took a deep breath then stepped back. She gave her belongings one last look then began her descent from the ancient volcano’s summit. This was it. Now, she could live her dream. Now, she could be free.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book represents twenty years’ worth of dreaming. During that time, many people have contributed to making this book happen. Specifically, I need to acknowledge those who helped the last few years in getting it done. First, my wife was a trusted sounding board for both her scientific insight and editing skills, as well as her knack for finding holes in the story that needed to be plugged. My mom Pat, an aspiring author herself, was a big support with her writing tips and suggestions. My brother Brad gave me the phoenix logo that I’ve dreamt about since I was fifteen. And I have to especially thank my friend Teresa Stevenson for her willingness to read and edit my incoherent drafts. Without her help, I don’t think I ever would have been comfortable enough publishing this or writing future books.