Deathstalker War d-3

by Simon R. Green

  The thing that looked like Beatrice Christiana surged forward incredibly quickly. Disrupter muzzles emerged from the holes in her hands. Dazzlingly bright energy beams blazed through the crimson air, narrowly missing Owen and Hazel as they threw themselves to one side, and striking Giles square in the chest. The impact threw him to the ground. Hazel brought up her projectile weapon and opened fire, but the bullets rebounded harmlessly from the steel chassis under the flesh covering. Owen fired his disrupter, but the machine just ducked under the energy beam and kept coming. She was on Hazel before she could drop the gun and draw her disrupter, grabbed her by the throat with one hand, and lifted her up into the air. Hazel dangled helplessly, choking as the metal fingers cut off her air. She clawed at the metal arm with both hands, feet kicking a good yard above the floor.

  Owen threw himself at the machine from behind, but she wheeled inhumanly quickly, and slapped him away with her free hand like a bothersome child. Hazel's eyes bulged as she fought for air. Owen was quickly back on his feet, boosted, and came at the Fury again. He ducked under the sweeping arm this time, and drove his sword at not-Beatrice's unprotected throat. Steel slammed against steel, and the impact jarred the sword out of Owen's hand. He didn't hesitate and slammed his fist into its metallic side with all his boosted strength behind it. Amazingly, the steel ribs dented under the blow, and she staggered to one side, still holding on to Hazel. Owen hit it again and again, ignoring the pain of his skinned knuckles, doing damage, but not enough to make her drop her prey.

  And then Jenny Psycho stepped forward, a sword blade of shimmering psi energy emerging from her hand. She chopped down, and the energy blade sheared clean through the machine's arm. Hazel crashed to the ground, the steel hand still crushing her throat. She thrashed back and forth, tearing at it with both hands. Owen was quickly there beside her, and between them they broke the metal fingers one by one and pulled the hand away. Owen threw it to one side, and it lay twitching on the ground like a giant malformed spider.

  The thing that looked like Beatrice stood facing Jenny Psycho, who grinned at it nastily. The energy sword disappeared from her hand, and she made a beckoning gesture. Beatrice looked at the esper for a moment, a quizzical expression on her artificial face, then suddenly she convulsed, her back arching. Strange noises came from her mouth, and her chest and sides bellowed in and out. And then her mouth stretched impossibly as all her artificial guts came fountaining up and out, pushing the teeth aside as they came. More and more flew from her mouth, torn out by Jenny's esp, and she staggered back and forth as the high-tech contents fell to the ground at her feet. Finally there was nothing left of it but an artificial shell, tottering on its feet. Her workings lay steaming and twitching on the ground, spread over a wide area. Jenny smiled again, made a pushing gesture with one finger, and the lifeless shell crashed to the ground and lay still. Owen and Hazel got to their feet, and looked at it.

  "The girl had guts," said Hazel, her voice just a little rough.

  Owen winced, and moved over to Giles, who was sitting up and shaking his head muzzily. Owen helped him up. "You took a disrupter blast point-blank in the chest," he said, almost accusingly. "Why aren't you dead?"

  "Force shield," said Giles briskly. "I've been working on it since Haceldama. Takes a lot out of me, but I think I'm getting the hang of it. You could do it, too, if you practiced."

  "Never seem to have the time," said Owen. "You know how it is; when you're running a rebellion, it's one damned thing after another."

  The rebels dusted themselves off, and turned back to face the Throne. Lionstone stared back at them unflinchingly. "You always break my favorite toys. Very well, let's try something else. Owen Deathstalker, Hazel d'Ark, Code Blue Two Two."

  She smiled triumphantly as she spoke the control words implanted in Owen's and Hazel's minds by the treacherous AI Ozymandius, but then her smile faltered as they just stood there, unmoved. Lionstone tried the control words again. Owen smiled at her.

  "That won't work anymore. We've moved beyond that."

  Lionstone spun on Jack Random. "You are still my creature. Obey me. Kill your friends!"

  Random smiled, and shook his head. "Sorry, Lionstone. I'm not under your control. Never was. Control words won't work on what we've become. I only went along to be sure of ending up here, right in front of you, just in case Owen and the others didn't make it. Ruby went along with it, once she realized what I was up to."

  Ruby sniffed. "If I'd known it entailed being chained up like an escape artist and kicked around like a rag doll, I'd have thought twice about it."

  "I had to be convincing," said Random. "Besides, you're always telling me how tough you are. I knew you could take it."

  "Well next time, I'll be the one in charge, and you can get chained up, and see how you like it."

  "Kinky," said Random. "Remember, Ruby, it's all for the cause."

  "Stuff the cause. I'm in this for the money, and don't you forget it."

  Random sighed, shook his head, and turned to look at Alexander Storm. The two men who used to be friends stared at each other.

  "I'd been having my suspicions about you for quite a while, Alex," Random said finally. "Little things I was beginning to remember about Cold Rock. Things about you that didn't add up, compared to the man I used to know. I put it down to age at first. We all change as we get older. But I didn't want to believe how much you'd changed, till you used the control words on me. So I went along, to find out who you really were these days. Damn it, Alex; did I really let you down so badly? I never meant for you to be hurt."

  "Oh, you always meant well, Jack," said Storm. "You promised me all kinds of things, but you never delivered. So I went to people who would keep their promises. People I could trust. They looked after me, treated me well. More than you ever did."

  Storm was trembling with anger by the time he finished, almost spitting the words at Random, trying to hurt him, even now. Random sighed, and met Storm's gaze unflinchingly. "You poor bastard. You could have come to me anytime. Told me. We could have worked something out. I would have understood. You were my friend, Alex."

  "You were always so bloody understanding! Saint Jack, the hero and savior of the downtrodden, who had time for everyone but his friends! I got sick of your endless nobility, of having to be the selfless hero again and again, and to hell with the lives we might have made for ourselves. This is all your fault, Jack. You made me what I am. You're responsible for everything I've done. And now I'm going to die here, because of you. I know that. But I'll hurt you one last time, before I go."

  He surged forward, a hidden knife suddenly in his hand, heading not for Jack Random, but Ruby Journey. His knife flashed for her throat before Random could even begin to react. But Ruby's hand came up impossibly quickly, slapped the knife aside, and then she punched Storm over the heart with all her strength behind it. Her fist sank in as far as the wrist, right under the sternum. Storm stopped in his charge, as though he'd run into a brick wall. All the color went out of his face, and he crumpled to the floor, just an old man who'd been hurt so badly he couldn't even breathe. The knife fell from his hand as the feeling went out of his fingers. Random was quickly there at his side, but by the time he'd taken Storm gently by the shoulders, the old man was already dead, his heart crushed to a pulp by a single blow. Random stood up and looked at Ruby.

  "He was my friend, for a long time."

  "I know," said Ruby. "That's why I killed him. So you wouldn't have to."

  Random nodded. He couldn't bring himself to thank her, not now. Maybe later.

  "This is all very interesting, not to say sentimental and downright sickening," said Lionstone. "But the game isn't over yet. I still have a few cards left to play. Let's try an obvious one, this time. Guards! A Lordship to whoever brings me the Deathstalker's head!"

  The guards standing in ranks behind the Throne rushed forward as one, their holographic disguises as burning angels falling away to reveal the armored men beneath. The monof
ilament swords in their hands were real enough, though, power-driven swords with an edge a single molecule thick, capable of cutting through anything. That many men, with that kind of weapon, could have stopped an army in its tracks. So the rebels didn't let the guards reach them. Jenny Psycho gestured, the power units that maintained the monofilament edge suddenly shorted out, and the swords were suddenly just swords again. While the guards were coming to terms with that, Random and Ruby hit them with a rolling wave of pyrokinetic fire. The guards burst into flames, some dying immediately, others turning and running, as though they could leave the deadly flames behind. As they ran they lit the Court like so many blazing candles, until one by one they fell, and guttered out.

  Lionstone stared blankly at the charred and steaming carnage around her Throne, and then turned to her maids-in-waiting. "Kill them! Kill them all!"

  The maids surged forward like attack dogs unleashed. Pointed teeth showed in their snarling mouths, and steel claws snapped out from under their fingernails. They were trained and deadly beasts of prey, conditioned to die rather than fail, packed with cybernetic augmentations. And Jenny Psycho stepped forward to meet them alone.

  "This has gone on for far too long. It's time to end it now."

  Her mind leaped out and dropped upon the maids, sinking deep into their minds and battling the conditioning at its roots. The maids fell to the ground, screaming and crying out, rolling and clawing at the floor like animals as an invisible war was waged in their minds. Jenny ripped away the conditioning with her esp, undid the neural connections and reconstituted the damaged brain tissues, returning the maids to who they had been before Lionstone took them to be her slaves. It was all over in a few moments, and then Jenny withdrew from their minds. The maids stopped their animal behavior and sat up, suddenly human again for the first time in years. At first they were stunned, and then slowly they came to themselves—their old selves. Some screamed, and tried to hide their nakedness. Some screamed, remembering what they had done, had been commanded to do, by Lionstone. They shook and shuddered, unable to cry with their artificial eyes. And some just looked around them in utter confusion. Toby Shreck stared intently at one of the maids, and then stepped forward.

  "Clarissa? Clarissa, is that you?"

  She looked at him blankly for a moment, and then recognition flooded her altered face. "Toby! Cousin Toby!"

  She ran forward into his arms. He held her tightly for a moment, and then took off his battered jacket and wrapped her up in it. Clarissa looked around her, at the Hell Lionstone had made.

  "Are we dead, Toby?"

  "No, love. You're alive again. The rebellion is here, and all the prisoners are being set free." He looked back at the others. "She's Family. Gregor's niece. Lionstone took her as a maid and made a monster out of her, and there was nothing any of us could do. Thank you, Jenny. Strikes me there are a lot of people who are going to want to thank you, too."

  "No big deal," said Jenny Psycho. "I think there's been enough fighting and killing. That's Lionstone's way. We're supposed to be different. You and Flynn look after the maids. We still have work to do."

  And as Toby and Flynn gathered up the maids and ushered them away out of the line of fire, Jenny moved back to confront Lionstone again. And then she stopped, and looked around sharply as Captain Silence moved uncertainly forward, staring at her searchingly. She looked at him flatly, not making it any easier for him, but eventually recognition flooded into Silence's face.

  "Diana?"

  "Not anymore," said Jenny. "That was somebody else."

  "I hardly recognized you. You look so… different."

  "It's called growing up, Captain. Happens to everyone eventually."

  "You know this person?" said Lionstone, frowning.

  "Of course he does," said Frost. "This is his daughter, Diana Vertue. Ship's esper on his last command."

  Silence looked at Frost. "You knew? How long have you known?"

  "I recognized her face on a Security posting some months back."

  "Then why didn't you tell me!"

  "You weren't ready to handle something like this. I'm not sure you're ready now. And I didn't want you distracted from your other responsibilities."

  Silence turned back to Jenny. "I'd heard you joined the underground. But what happened to you? To your voice? You look…"

  "Like I've been through Hell? That's because I have. This place doesn't frighten me. I've seen the real thing. I'm not Diana Vertue anymore. She died screaming in the esper interrogation cells in Silo Nine. Also known as Wormboy Hell. I'm Jenny Psycho now. For now and always. But then, we're both different people than we used to be, aren't we. Father? You've changed, too. This close, I can feel the Maze's energies working within you. How does it feel, Father, to know you've become the same kind of person you used to track down and kill?"

  "Diana…"

  "Jenny. I'm Jenny now."

  "All right, Jenny. I never knew they'd put you into Silo Nine. If I'd known, I'd have…"

  "You'd have what? Smashed your way into one of the Empire's most strongly guarded prisons to save me?"

  "Yes," said Silence simply. "If I'd known, I would have come for you."

  Jenny nodded slowly. "Yes. Maybe you would have at that. But you didn't. On the planet Unseeli, you promised me you'd never let me be hurt again. You lied. Daddy."

  "I'm sorry, baby. I'm so sorry."

  "And now here we are, on different sides of the war, and all because of the Iron Bitch. How can you still defend her, after all she's done? After all she had done to me?"

  "She's my Empress," said Silence.

  Lionstone jumped down from her Throne, stalked over to Silence, and slapped him hard on the face. His head rocked under the blow, but he held his ground. Lionstone stuck her face right in front of his, so close that when she spoke, her spittle sprayed his cheeks. "Traitor! Damned traitor! You hid your powers from me, you failed in every mission I gave you, and now I find your own daughter is one of my greatest enemies!"

  "That's all true," Silence said steadily. "But you are still my Empress."

  Lionstone laughed in his face, and drew back her hand for another blow. And then she gasped, her eyes widening as an unseen force gripped her hand firmly and jerked it back. She tried to break free, and couldn't. She looked across at Jenny Psycho, who was scowling at her.

  "That's enough of that, bitch. That's my dad you're messing with."

  "I appreciate the gesture," said Silence. "But let her go, Jenny. Please."

  Jenny sniffed, released her hold, and gave the Empress a mental shove that sent her stumbling back toward her Throne. Lionstone quickly regained her balance and seated herself on her Throne again with defiant dignity. She was still the Empress, and she still had weapons she could use. She glared around her, and her gaze fell on Valentine Wolfe.

  "Don't look at me," said Valentine. "I know a lost cause when I see one. I could fight for you, I suppose. I have drugs for that. But I really don't see the point. The rebellion's time has come. It would seem I jumped ship from the underground a little too early. So. I will withdraw to the sidelines and offer my services to whoever comes out on top. People like me are always useful."

  "You're not fighting because you're afraid your makeup would get smudged," said Hazel.

  Valentine smiled. "That too."

  "Do you really think you can be forgiven for what your war machines did on Virimonde?" said Owen. "For the slaughter and suffering and horror you brought to a helpless farming people?"

  The Wolfe shrugged. "I was only obeying orders. Not an original excuse, I'll admit, but then the old jokes are always the best. And I can be very loyal, for the right rewards. And I'm sure the underground leaders will recognize my worth. I know things, you see. Things the underground will need to know, if it's to take control of the Empire without unnecessary suffering and destruction. Which is more important to you, Deathstalker, seeing me punished or rebuilding the Empire with the minimum of bloodshed? No, they'll pardon
me, no matter how much the rabble scream for my head. I'm just too valuable to waste. Not to worry, Deathstalker. You've still got Lionstone to kill. Enjoy yourself. Knock yourself out. It's not every day you get to murder an Empress."

  "Execute," said Owen.

  Valentine smiled. "Don't you just love euphemisms?"

  Lionstone turned desperately on her Throne to her two bodyguards. "Razor! SummerIsle! Defend me!"

  "No," said Kit calmly. "I don't think so. Because of you, David died on Virimonde. I only came back here for a chance to watch you die at close quarters. And do the job myself, if necessary. My David is dead. I'll enjoy watching you die, Lionstone."

  Razor drew his sword and spun it around in a vicious sideways arc aimed at Kit's neck. But for all his Investigator's swiftness, he couldn't catch the SummerIsle off guard. Kit's sword was in just the right place to block the blow, as though he'd known all along what Razor was going to do. And maybe he had. He was Kid Death, after all. The two men sprang apart, and then circled each other warily, two practiced killers come together at last in a match that would finally decide which of them was better. Their swords slammed together, withdrew, and then spun through a dazzling series of cuts and parries. Razor was an Investigator, trained since childhood to be the perfect killing machine in the Empire's interests. Kit SummerIsle, Kid Death, was a natural-born psychopath, with a genius for swordplay and slaughter, who had killed his whole Family just for the fun of it. Two men who had taken Death as their mistress, and knew nothing of quarter or mercy. And in the end talent won out over training, as Kit dared Razor into a corps a corps, smiled at him over the crossed swords, then stuck a dagger in Razor's ribs with his other hand. Razor looked startled for a moment, as though he couldn't believe it was happening, then he fell to his knees as the strength suddenly went out of his legs. Kit knelt down with him and pushed the dagger in a little deeper. Razor dropped his sword. He met Kid Death's eyes unflinchingly and even managed a sneer.