by JM Guillen
Alpha, I have a bit of an idea?
I’m all ears, Guthrie.
If this stuff is biological, it shouldn’t be too hard to shatter. I bet me and twitchy here can find a resonant frequency that won’t break Sofia’s bones.
She’d appreciate that, I chuckled.
There is still the matter of potential toxins, Anya reminded us.
Yeah, I don’t know how much you know about the tangler, but it vents some pretty nasty stuff. Every Artisan you’ve ever seen is jacked up on type III viral mecha, just to keep their blood, kidneys and liver clean.
Since when do you care about your liver?
Point is, this pack I wear has about twenty vials of type III. He patted the bundle on his right hip gently. I can probably spare a few to hopefully detoxify Senorita Sarcasm over there.
Good play. How long do you think all that will take?
I’ve determined the resonant frequency in the time this conversation took, Anya linked, with more than a little pride.
Link me the stats, and let’s get ’er done. Even if the mecha doesn’t work, she’s coming with us.
Excellent work, you guys. I couldn’t help but smile as I linked. Let’s get Delacruz out, and then we’ll move on.
Catacombs
A few minutes later, Delacruz was conscious. She stumbled like a newborn giraffe, but she stood.
What was that stuff? She picked some of the yellowish resin from her skin and flicked it away. I feel like I’ve been drinking for three days.
What kind of lady knows what it feels like to drink for three days? Wyatt teased.
Alabama, I will drink you under the table and laugh while I do it.
We’ll have to try that sometime.
“She still owes me a drink sometime.” I jerked my chin at Delacruz. “But I’m glad to see that she’s up and around.”
“Eventually I’ll remember how to walk.” She bent over and retrieved the gatekeeper crossbow. “What’s next?”
This way. I gestured down the hallway. It’s our next rift.
“Let’s fucking close the thing and get gone.” She shook her head. “I didn’t even get to see any of Rome, but I think I’m done here.”
While my friends had freed the Gatekeeper, I’d stood in the hallway, on the alert. I’d watched the light from the pool flicker and had the opportunity to enjoy a dee-licious scent that seemed to stick to my skin like rancid fish shit.
Any moment, I’d expected frog monsters to come pouring out of that room. Yet they hadn’t.
All remained quiet.
I’m going to hold on triggering the Wraith. I nodded at Delacruz to indicate she should do the same. Froggy could definitely see me, and it seemed like cult boy had a decent idea where I stood.
It isn’t worth the wear on your synaptic systems if the packet is not functioning properly, Anya agreed.
What I want to know is why. Wyatt tapped at a few of keys as he linked. I’ve never encountered Irrats that can just dismiss a packet.
I don’t know that’s what this latest guy was doing. I shook my head. Not like Amir, anyway. That asshole would just wave a hand, and my shit would shut down.
The Zealator had some kind of substance around his eyes. Anya linked. Perhaps that allowed him greater perceptual acuity?
My question stands, I still wanna know how they do it. Wyatt glanced up from his keys, and light filtered through his oculus. Although, for now, I’ll table the question.
Good call.
We stood in the small room. It appeared just as the other crypts within the catacombs, save the stinking pool of bubbling malevolence in the back corner. Just as the first one I’d seen, the liquid burned a deep blue. The color almost boiled in my mind and hurt my eyes in a way I found difficult to explain.
Not simply the cerulean of a deep ocean, the liquid shone a blue that promised at eternity of dark waters and a cold, merciless death.
I do not like that thing. Sofia glared at the pool. It throws aberrant vectors all over the place, Alpha. No functional apertures until Slim here gets it closed.
“Workin’ on it.” Wyatt tapped at several keys and turned a small crank with his other hand. “Those vectors make things a little harder to figure. Fucks up my math.”
“Well, get on with it.” I sidled closer to one of the doors and peered around the corner.
I hated how quiet the room had become. My hackles were up but not for any specific reason.
This just felt like a trap.
I toggled the Adept on and kept one hand on a disruptor, the other on a blade hilt.
I wanted to be ready for anything.
“Got it.” Wyatt turned the tangler toward the pool, and its whining kicked into a higher pitch. “On yer mark?”
“Fucking do it.” I nodded at him. “You don’t have to wait for my say so on those things.”
WHUF! A mirror bright dome appeared over the rift, effectively sealing it. I knew the barrier would last until, say, gravity ceased to be.
“That seemed easy.” Delacruz glanced behind us and then down the eastern passageway. “I don’t like it.”
“I don’t either, but it doesn’t matter.” I turned to Anya. “We had one more of these things nearby?”
That’s an affirmative, Alpha. I will update the map.
Less than an instant later, a new locale appeared upon my display. The second rift wasn’t quite thirty meters away.
“Let’s move.” I gave them a thumbs up.
“Bishop!” Wyatt stared behind me and gaped in surprised disgust.
“ROOAAAAAK! ROAK!”
I whirled.
An amphibian malignancy shamble-hopped toward us on all fours. Even at a squat, its domed back almost brushed the hallway ceiling itself. The leviathan resembled the other croaking, ichorous things, except considerably larger. Rolls of flabby flesh hung around the waddling horror. Feelers, like those of an ancient catfish, writhed around its mouth, and enormous, inhuman eyes filled up half its face.
Those orbs radiated malevolence and madness.
Although I stood six meters away, the stench all but overpowered me.
Damn. I covered my mouth, instinctively.
Yes, it emitted the rancid fishy-ness the others had, but something else colored that aroma as well. It reminded me of musk, the scent of bestial rut.
Oh, oh God! Delacruz felt as if she might be ill.
That’s a negative for me, Hoss. Wyatt backed up a few steps. Permission to seal the hallway?
Before I had an opportunity to link, the thing opened its maw.
Faster than I could see, its whip-like tongue snapped out and struck directly at Wyatt’s leg.
It struck and wrapped twice around his entire thigh.
The ichor on the giant toad’s tongue hissed where it touched Wyatt’s denim-covered leg.
The fabric began to smoke.
Hoss! Fuck! He jerked against the abomination’s tongue, but it held fast.
Until it retracted and pulled him flat on his ass.
Shit!
WHUF! WHUF! WHUF! WHUF! WHUF! WHUF! Wyatt sprayed spikes wildly as the creature dragged him toward its maw.
Not one of them came close to the abomination, however. Most stuck in the ceiling above it while a few others clattered noisily to the ground.
However, my barrel-chested friend weighed in at over one hundred fifteen kilograms. Perhaps the aberration had Wyatt down but dragging him into its mouth was another task altogether.
Damn, oh Goddamn! He wrangled himself into an almost sitting position and madly tapped away at the keys on his hip. However, less bulk on the floor meant less drag holding him in place.
The repugnance jerked him forward another half meter or so, and Wyatt flopped down onto his back and cursed.
I leapt, my katana in motion before he moved another centimeter. The blade swung down, and my packet systems made every motion perfect, savage.
I severed its tongue with a single graceful arc of my katana.
Get it off! Wyatt had a knife he’d pulled from his belt. It’s acidic! As Anya bent over to help him, he frantically attempted to cut the leg of his overalls off.
Furious, the neander-frog took a hop toward me and opened its gaping mouth. A stream of liquid shot into the middle of my chest.
Immediately, the fabric began to smoke and hiss.
Michael!
“Fuck me!” I scrambled back, and frantically tried to unfasten the clasps to my body armor. The acid quickly melted away the outer casing, and I panicked. I had no idea how well the shirt beneath would protect me if the substance got through.
Facility body armor wasn’t very thick, after all. Unlike conventional vests, it didn’t operate on the principle of disrupted kinetic force. Instead, it countered that force directly by altering axiomatic specifications.
It hadn’t been constructed to withstand abominable frog acid.
In seconds, I had the clasps undone and had shimmied out of it. As I tossed it to the ground, the bestial nightmare took another hop and landed squarely in front of me.
“Roooooaaak!” it screamed as its tongue bled down the side of its face. It reared up on its hind legs, pulled its arm behind itself, and swiped at my head.
“Aaack!” I ducked and winced. I knew in my heart I hadn’t been nearly quick enough. However, as I dropped into a protective stance, I noticed something unusual.
I kept falling.
I rolled out of Delacruz’s aperture, right next to where she stood.
It took me a moment to realize what happened.
The lady had saved my ass.
Pure Facility grade genius. She gazed down at me, as I lay sprawled on the ground, and smirked.
Get back! Wyatt, who had hacked off the left leg of his overalls, backed toward the stasis field he’d left across the rift. His fingers danced madly upon his keyboard, and I realized his plan in an instant.
Seven different spikes in the ceiling burst with white-hot radiance. In less than five seconds, the heat had become so intense that molten blobs of stone began to rain down. They struck the mountainous toad’s wet flesh and seared it, unleashing the most unholy smell.
“ROOAK! ROOOOOOOAK!” Screaming with agony, the hulk turned to run.
Another piece of molten fury fell upon its head, and the behemoth panicked. It crouched down, its powerful legs prepared to leap back into the passageway from whence it’d come.
The fuck you say! Delacruz linked as she ignited an aperture in the midst of that molten rain. Effortlessly, she whipped the tip of her weapon up and took aim. The instant the polypheme leapt, she fired.
That shot was a thing of beauty, a perfect example of offensive porting.
Stunned, the creature found itself leaping into a glowing blob of furious, hellish torment. It smashed into the clump headfirst and buried itself up to its chest in the flowing stone. It screamed, agony and fury echoing in the passage. It thrashed wildly, and tried to pull itself loose…
But failed.
Its twitching movements eventually slowed, and then stopped.
The room filled with acrid smoke.
“Smooth, lady.” Wyatt cleared his throat and hacked a bit.
“Fuck, Wyatt.” Sofia gave him a cheesy grin. “Michael’s talked about your cooking before, but I never knew.” She coughed and pulled her shirt over her face.
“I told you!” I hacked as I got to my feet.
Can we make fun of the genius after we get away from the barbeque? Wyatt also covered his mouth and shuffled toward the door.
Anya pulled at her ever-present strings. We can return to the last chamber, and Asset Guthrie can unseal the western corridor.
Yep. I’d already begun to move but had to stop almost as soon as I’d started. Coughing, I started to retch and had to fight to not vomit. The smell of rotten, cooked fish clung to me, permeated my clothing, and stuck to my skin.
God, but I needed a cigarette.
2
Quickly, we passed back the through the shadowed catacombs. Wyatt had the stasis field down before we even arrived at it, and we slipped through another two musty-scented crypts.
The rift is ahead, Anya informed us. Three rooms forward, and then one more to the north.
I’d like to take a moment to have a friendly chat, Wyatt linked us.
Yes, yes. You brilliantly slaughtered Franken-frog. We don’t have any whiskey or bacon, big guy, Sofia teased.
Naw. He shot Sofia a smile. I don’t need you guys to talk about how brilliant I am. It gets old.
What else could there be? I gestured widely, as if blown away by the thought.
These guys aren’t connected to the Vyriim. He eyed me. You get that, right?
Well— I started to counter but then stopped.
We hadn’t seen any Vyriim. As in, at all.
I thought the froggos might just be one of their servitors, right? Designates say the Vyriim have dozens of races, all bound to their will.
But we’d see something at least. I felt Sofia’s frown through the link. We’ve killed a few of these guys. Not once have I been concerned that a fucking tentacle monster was going to rip into me and infest my stomach.
No, I groused. It’s aberrant tadpoles instead.
Not a single member of Sadhana. No Irrats with weird, reality-altering tech, the Alabamian genius continued.
After Ryuu Tower, I would expect a high-level functionary of the Vyriim to be present at any of their incursions, Anya agreed. One of the Drażeri, perhaps.
Remember those fucking tapestries they had everywhere? Vast scenes of conquest? Wyatt shook his head. The Hidden Road doesn’t feel like that. I don’t know what all these toad-fuckers are about, but none of this looks like Vyriim inter-realm conquest.
Fuck. I shook my head. Wyatt, I hate it when you’re right.
Now, I get that what we’re doing here is important. We need to bring in Amir, sure. And yeah, the plague frogs have gotta get put down. They’re bad news.
Right? I needed him to get to his point.
Right. He held up one hand, as if he thought I might argue. But should the Designates deign to get in touch with us, Alpha, I think we might oughtta let ’em know one thing.
What’s that?
This dossier may not be what they had in mind for us. We may not belong here at all.
Okay?
Because this isn’t about the 15 September thing, Sofia realized. Are we off task somehow?
No, Anya interjected. The Citadel Initiative is not intended to only deal with Aberration 45171R and their servitors. While it might be our current focus, the long-term intention involves dealing with large, significant intrusions such as this one.
“Not exactly my point,” Wyatt pointed at Anya. “I’m just saying it’s important to note that these events may be separate from what the Facility believes. Correlation does not equal causation.”
“Because we don’t really understand the fifteen September thing.” I paused. “Like, even a bit.”
“It’s easy to imagine everything rests on the machinations of squiggly,” Wyatt agreed. “But I’m starting to think that date is something altogether different than what we believe.”
“The Rook never was able to say why the Vyriim chose that date.” I sucked at my teeth and thought
Just a thought. Wyatt shrugged. Also, you should tell the Designates how I served you all frog legs. And that they were amazing.
We fell silent after that, watchful.
The next rift only took us a few moments to get to, and we passed through the darkness unmolested.
The silence felt deafening. Even with optics on, we could only see so far into the creeping gloom. The passages amplified echoes. Dripping water, scurrying animals, and other undefined noises would cause us to start and bring our weapons to the
ready.
That Zealator is still down here. I glanced at Anya. After he pulled that little trick with the clay disk, he read as an Irrat, yes?
He did, she confirmed.
But nothing now? I scratched my face, thoughtfully. No other signatures?
The only Irrational signature on my interface is the rift.
Well, be on guard. I don’t believe he just up and vanished.
After a few more steps through the ruined catacombs, we found the rift.
The azure pool gleamed with dark desires, a lure into cerulean horror. It had leaked into one of the hallways and completely blocked egress into the room beyond.
No toadies. Wyatt glanced around. Giant or otherwise.
I assume the last aberration we faced was a male, Anya informed us as if we’d wondered. That might account for the difference in physiology.
Don’t care, Crocodile Hunter; I’m just glad it’s dead. My Artisan turned and gave me a pointed glare. I’m sealing this bitch.
“Get it done, Guthr—”
“ROOACK!”
We spun at the sudden cry, weapons ready.
Creeping up behind us came two of the miscreations, shambling in the darkness.
“ROOACK!” The sound echoed menacingly.”ROOoooOOACK!”
See, this is what I expect. I turned to Anya. Non-stop crazy bullshit.
“Oh, fuck!” Wyatt cried and stumbled into Delacruz.
My hand clutched a disruptor holster even as I noted another toad-strocity had lurched from the pool, its empty eyes leering savagely at us.
In that instant of distraction, I heard the crystalline tinkle of shattered glass.
Michael! Anya linked, panic infusing the line. She struggled against the spreading resin, which had already begun to entrap her legs.
[Fuck, no.] Delacruz took a step away from the goo, making certain she didn’t get any on her. Without taking her eyes from the substance, she whipped her gatekeeper crossbow toward the nearest frog-thing and fired a quarrel.
She speared one amphibian through the slimy flesh of its leg.
It croaked in terror and agony, before it flashed in sudden, brilliantly scarlet light.