Scientist: An Earth 340K Standalone Novel (Soldier X Book 1)

by D. P. Oberon

  Dang lifted his head up and roared at the dark sky. Lightning crackled and illuminated his entire outline. It resembled a beast from Hell.

  He shoved his hands against the perimeter of the dome, his thick claws glinting against the yellow light cast from the urban farm below. Dang’s claws sliced through the elastoplast like it was gelfoam, and then the muscles on his forearm, back, and legs tensed as he tried to lift the dome that weighed half a ton and had been put in place by a cranebot.

  The roar that shot out of Dang’s mouth ricocheted against the sky.

  The dome shifted and tore the roof apart.

  Inside the Water Spinach Inn, the kitchen bustled with the energy of a feast being prepared. Little Lizhang, assigned to the duties of pressing together the freshly made dumplings, paused and cocked her head.

  “Mommy, did you hear that?”

  “What, darling?” Nuan asked, as she put a new batch of dumplings into the skillet. The thud-thud of Old Man Yok cutting fresh chives echoed to her right.

  “That loud noise,” Lizhang said, stopping from pressing the dumplings. She thought she heard the sound of a roar from one of her favorite extinct creatures. Only recently, they’d studied the extinct animals in her class. A tiger; that’s what it sounded like. Another voice told her to stop being silly. You can’t hear extinct animals, it said.

  “Loud noise? Darling, it’s probably the laborers across the street working on those pipes. They’ve been fiddling with those pipes for over a week now.” Nuan took out the set of twelve dumplings from the skillet heavily dripping with oil and put them onto the kitchen-wafer. The wafer sucked the oil and left crispy dumplings.

  “I’m starting on the Sichuan sauce,” said Old Man Yok. The smell of numbing peppers and fresh chilies filled the air with smoke causing Lizhang and Nuan’s eyes to water.

  “I didn’t see any laborers when I went out to play, mom,” said Lizhang.

  But her mother didn’t pay any attention. Lizhang spoke again and then sighed. Her mother’s hearing had been damaged after all those beatings endured from her father. She wanted to go to her mother and wrap her arms around her because she suddenly felt scared.

  “Try to keep the dumplings pressed together, darling. These are coming apart,” said Nuan.

  “Okay,” Lizhang said. But just then a booming sound rattled overhead. She gasped and her hands fumbled causing one of the dumplings she pressed to fall against the ground where it spewed its crushed garlic, bok choy, and tofu intestines.

  “Darling,” said Nuan. “Do you want to go to the salads instead?” Her mother bent and picked up the dumpling, cleaned it, and then expertly pinched its lips together.

  Lizhang reached forward and clasped her hands around her mother’s waist. Nuan looked down at her daughter and kissed her. “It’s all right now, darling. We’re safe here.”

  Dang felt dumbfounded as he stared at the urban farm. How had his two cripples managed to achieve this?

  Five trays splayed out like fan fins from the thin poles. Ten plants per fan blade. Fifty plants per fan array. Six levels of them all the way to the ceiling. Fifty times six. Three hundred. Eight poles arranged around the urban farm. Eight times three hundred. Two thousand four hundred possible plants. In such tight, cramped quarters it shouldn’t have been possible.

  Anger grew within him. The only consolation was that many of the circular holes within the trays sat empty of the rich foamy soil that sat in the others. Obviously, the soil had been hard to come by.

  He huffed a half-growl. Where the heck was the Chao-chao plant? He had seen it so clearly from the roof, but now that he was in amongst all the greenery, he couldn’t find it. He moved from the edge of the room toward the center and his huge bulk pressed against the aisles causing some trays and entire poles to fall to the ground. Plants fell and crushed underneath his feet. He stopped as he spied a drawing on the back of one tray.

  It was his daughter’s drawing. She loved to draw birds flying out of a window. A speech bubble that pointed to the bird said, “tweet, tweet.” There was a man without eyes: Hazou. He had his hands around an old man and old lady. Dang faltered as he stared at the last two people. The man had empty eye sockets but the woman who leaned her head against his shoulder couldn’t be anybody but his wife.

  The anger flared like the power in a vibro-blade. He shouted and ripped the tray apart. It scattered in the air like confetti.

  A deep growl came from within his throat and he stared around with red in his eyes. Only this time, he wasn’t a pitiful, weak human. He roared and spat out hot sizzling triangles of flame that burst against the plants.

  Except something fell through the shattered transpasteel dome and landed in the room. He barely registered it coming through. It stepped out of the flame and confronted him.

  “Triant scum,” Dang growled, padding around the room. “I remember you.” His tail reared in the air behind him swiveling this way and that, scanning the entire room.

  “Traitor,” said Jingfei. Her three sharp legs that scuttled on the floor like katana vibro-blades glinted against the fire. She grabbed a used sack of soil and buffeted at the growing flames.

  “I’m going to kill you,” said Dang. Sockets that dotted his chest spat out small missiles that zoomed into the air and exploded in calculated precision.

  Jingfei shifted as if she operated under different laws of time. Her dual curving hands formed into a quad vibro-blade and slashed through each of the missiles somehow causing them to alter their trajectory. The missiles flew past her. Only the triant did something and black spheres enveloped the missiles. The missiles exploded but their energy was kept within the sphere.

  The triant hadn’t lost a single step. Dang pounced and his entire body hurtled toward Jingfei. She danced out of the way; her sharp limbs sliced at his arms, neck, and legs.

  Dang tumbled on all fours and stared up at her. The cuts across his hands and back healed instantly. His tail whipped behind him and spat sizzling vitriol that flared into the air like a corona.

  Dang blurred forward. He couldn’t believe how his body worked at the speed of his mind. The triant’s stabs went through his body but he didn’t even feel it. He slammed Jingfei’s octagonal chest plates and sent her flying into the air. She twisted in the air and pushed against the wall, somersaulting over him, and then landed right in front of him.

  Dang advanced. Jingfei’s eyes shifted to the left. He followed her gaze. The Chao-chao plant, a dwarf of its former size, sat within one of those trays. He lowered his jaw involuntarily.

  “The People’s Favor is dead,” he said. “I’m going to disembowel Diaochan while she’s alive. And then I’ll feed her to the dogs on the street.” He said this as he lunged at Jingfei; his tail already moved toward the Chao-chao plant and slammed it sending it hurling into the air.

  Jingfei rushed toward the Chao-chao plant and caught it as it fell, but she didn’t escape the poison that came out of Dang’s tail and seared her chassis from head to toe. Her silverite armor didn’t break but she elicited a scream as it heated the chassis to super-hot levels and she cooked within.

  Dang grabbed the Chao-chao plant as the triant let it go in shock. “You’ve never felt pain like that, have you? Who do you think I was made to kill?” The Chrysanthemum Striped Tigers had stolen the triants’ blueprints to be able to create a countermeasure: the xu-tigers.

  He grabbed at Jingfei’s neck and twisted it. Something snapped and he threw her dead body into the air. Her body fell like a blanket and he kicked at it using his two powerful legs while balancing on his front paws. Her body crashed through the window and tumbled out of the highest level of the Water Spinach Inn.

  He brought more flames to life around the greenhouse. He ensured the flames had built to a steady level. Thick smoke oozed down the stairs. His huge eyes reflected the furnace he left behind him.

  Lizhang’s palm slicked sweat against the stairs’ handrail. She turned back one last time to look at the light comin
g from the ground floor kitchen. She’d left after giving her mother a fresh batch of dumplings. The smell of the Sichuan chili pepper sauce still hung in the air. She stared up the dark of the stairs. There’s nothing there, silly, she told herself. Except for her favorite place in the world: the urban farm where Uncle Hazou let her decorate the trays with her art.

  As she got up to the second level, a crackling sound came from above and dark smoke pooled on the intermediate landing.

  Normally, the noises of Uncle Hazou and Uncle Wenqi having their friendly arguments would greet her, but in its place was stark silence. She sniffed her nostrils and thought she caught the scent of smoke. It wasn’t the Sichuan chili. This smoke stayed at the back of her throat like a stuck fish bone and she found it hard to breathe. A coughing fit erupted from her mouth.

  She stepped forward slowly going up the third level and as she reached the top, raw heat waves fell onto her. Her eyes widened. The roaring sound came from the urban farm. The plants! She almost turned back to get her mother but her resolve solidified and she burst into the greenhouse.

  The creature emerged from the fire glowing. It had orange, black, and white stripes that only became clearer as it stepped out of the flames that lashed it. It stood tall and just as wide.

  “Lizhang.” It’s sharp-toothed maw opened and sent saliva falling to the ground where it hissed and burned through the floor.

  Lizhang screamed. A demon, her mind said. A demon! She slipped on the stairs and cartwheeled but the demon was so fast it caught her. Tears filled her eyes from the pain as the demon held her up by the roots of her hair. She kicked and screamed at the pain.

  “Shut up!” said the voice. “It’s me.”

  Beneath the visage of the beast, Lizhang could make out the outlines of a man. His face lay there barely visible beneath the blanket of a beast. His wide nostrils flared outward and the widely spaced green eyes stared from the swirling patterns of the beast’s face. In the dim part of her mind, Lizhang knew this extinct creature was a tiger. But tigers walked on their four legs whereas this creature walked on two. And it looked more vicious than the tigers she’d seen on her holo-vids.

  “Papa?” Lizhang squeaked, for a moment forgetting that she dangled ten feet from the ground.

  “Shut up, where is your mother?” The beast’s hands slapped at her. It felt like being punched and her head lolled back from the blow. Her screams died down at the second hit. But all she could say was, “What have you done, Papa?”

  The throw sent her across the landing where she slammed against the banister and tumbled down the stairs. He came after her, thumping on the ground making it reverberate. The hot-clawed hands shook her shoulder. “Where is your mother?”

  “Kitchen,” she whispered.

  “And those two fucking cripples?”

  “Night mark...,” The world started to fade in Lizhang’s eyes.

  She yelped as he reached for her and slung her over his shoulder. He stomped down the stairs. Something soft and wet fell in rivulets down her forehead. It tasted of iron.

  “Let’s go and visit your mother. She’s probably been missing me,” Papa said.

  Lizhang couldn’t hear anymore. The cut on her scalp and the head trauma sent her into unconsciousness.

  Nuan realized her daughter had gone once the smell of burning reached her nose and she double checked to make sure it wasn’t coming from any of the food inside the kitchen.

  She thought she could dimly hear something crackling, but didn’t give it much thought. The roiling smoke that came wafting down the stairs and through the kitchen doors told her otherwise. She stripped her apron and headed for the stairs.

  Nuan’s scream was so loud that it caused Old Man Yok to overturn the entire boiling hot wok filled with Sichuan chili pepper sauce.

  The monster stepped out straight from hell and right into her kitchen. He stank of fumes and reeked of fire. He radiated a palpable evil as he blocked the only exit. Lizhang’s limp body slung across his shoulder oozing blood across the monster’s striped fur.

  He looked like a walking tiger. Only she could see Dang’s features within that face.

  Dang said, “Honey, it’s such a wonderful family reunion.” He pointed his tail—a thick thing that moved like a serpent—at Old Man Yok. The end of the tail consisted a mouth that hissed open, bearing serpent fangs. The tail pulsed twice, sending super-heated green flechettes ripping across Old Man Yok’s chest. He careened into the wok holding the hot chili pepper sauce and screamed as he died.

  Nuan ran toward Old Man Yok but something slammed against her back. She slammed into the kitchen bench, injuring her wrist, and then another blow to the head sent her to the floor. Terror and fear didn’t go away even when the world slipped and turned into growing black dots. Her last thought was of Lizhang, praying that her daughter was still alive.

  Chapter 23 - Wrath

  The Water Spinach Inn burned.

  Hazou, Wenqi, and Lady Lee stood behind a barricade, their feet ankle deep in a mixture of slush from the air-tinged rain, ash from the fire, and the trash from the street.

  Urumqi had been on security lockdown, in effect martial law, since the People’s Favor arrived.

  Recon-drones swooped above the inn, looking like elegant birds of prey. Their telemetry reported everything to the temporary command tent in the middle of the road. The People’s Favor stood inside the tent surrounded by layers of security talking angrily to one of her subordinates.

  Four of the largest anti-fire mechs in Urumqi trudged through the road after being air dropped. The mechs stood tall, the fire casting their burning shadows behind them. Six thick tubes stuck into their backs, sucking fire-foam from a cylindrical hydrant at the back of the command tent. More pipes connected to their shoulders and hovered into the air, darting closer and surgically spraying purple fire-foam where the burning building needed it most.

  The external blaze died down quickly and a thousand small helibots shot out from the mechs backs and flew into the Water Spinach Inn where they doused the interior.

  Diaochan watched all of this with barely repressed anger. She sent Jingfei to this place to get the Chao-chao plant. Her interface normally showed Jingfei’s whereabouts but once she’d set them free, she’d lost the ability to track them. Now she hated not being able to tell what happened.

  Tall sentinelbots marched up and down Tinmai Street. The entire city sat in lockdown, and the orbital defense facilities lowered themselves so that they were visible against the skyline. All of this to protect me, thought Diaochan, as she stared at the wreckage. And yet, I only care about what’s in there, she thought. Why hadn’t Jingfei contacted her?

  “Are they finished?” Diaochan asked Anastasiya, the People’s Scientist, and one of three Ten Divine Dragons that were present. According to Jingfei, she could be trusted. The other two were Giang, the People’s Servant, and Dusadi, the People’s Trader. There had never been such an upper echelon gathering in Urumqi in over a thousand years.

  “We need to wait until the securibots have searched the perimeter before....”

  “Enough. I’m going in.” Diaochan walked out of tent. One of the recon-drones spotted something of interest and unicasted it to her. She barreled through the large group of securibots and headed to the barricade. Something made her stop in front of the two scientists and the old woman. She held up the barricade. “Come. Let’s see what’s left.”

  Wenqi, Hazou, and Lady Lee passed through the barricade’s gates. Securibots shadowed Diaochan, and several peeled away to shadow the two scientists and the old woman.

  Everything lay in smoke.

  Diaochan followed the path to the rear of the house. The triants had been made from slivers of Diaochan’s own body and mind. Even disconnected from Jingfei, Diaochan should’ve felt something. There was nothing.

  More and more security presence trailed Diaochan the deeper she got. Several recon-drones flew lower spreading their red light and scanning the wreckage. />
  She headed unerringly to the recon-drone who contacted her. It dipped its body as it hovered; its two eyes pooled red light on the ground highlighting something that reflected light against the ash. The drone switched off its light when she trod near the item of interest so it wouldn’t interfere with her own optics.

  She would’ve almost missed it if the green plant didn’t grab her attention. Next to the green strip of bok choy—that miraculously hadn’t been burned—lay a silverite scythe-like limb belonging to a triant. The stench of smoke puffed into the air as Diaochan knelt and placed her hand on its limb. The securibots quickly moved a huge tray that held burned dirt.

  The three sliced shaped legs were exposed next, and the octagonal chassis that looked like it had been seared by something. The triant’s domed-shaped helmet rolled down an ash mound. Diaochan’s dual hearts seemed to slow and her vision made the world pulse all around her. For a terrifying moment, Diaochan wondered if Jingfei’s head had been ripped from her body.

  Diaochan put her hand over the chassis and opened a conduit into the wireless interface. Bits of light flew from Diaochan’s fingers into the chassis. She extracted the video footage of Jingfei’s final moments. A part of her brain watched the footage analytically, the other screamed in pain.

  Jingfei exited her chassis because of the heat. Diaochan’s eyes widened as the realization swept through her. For a few seconds, she became Jingfei as she was kicked out of the third level to crush against the ground, her chassis actually broken. She’d been unconscious and when she woke she’d been inside a roaring fire. Jingfei had unlocked herself from her chassis and crawled through roaring flames.

  No! Diaochan’s mind screamed. Her eyes refocused on the pale three-legged thing with the twisted arms. It almost looked like a dead octopusbot smeared in the ashes. Diaochan staggered forward and crunched to her knees. Her hands shook as they hovered over the body. A triant’s body. Diaochan turned the body over.