Incandescent with rage but now unarmed, Ack-Ack Macaque screeched at his attacker and did the only thing he could think of. Bending at the knees, he waited until the cyborg took another swing, and leapt, launching himself over the gangway’s rail. For a split second, he seemed to hang in space. The turbines spun beneath him, ready to crush and mangle him. Then his tail hooked one of the wires supporting the walkway. He swung down and round, passing beneath the feet of his surprised attacker. His hand grabbed the underside of the gangway, and he let the momentum carry him, so that he came up the other side and hit the cyborg in the head with both feet. The impact jarred every bone in his body and snapped the metal man’s head back on its shoulders. Something cracked, and the figure staggered.
Ack-Ack Macaque dropped to the floor. When he got back to his feet, he saw the cyborg tottering, its head dangling behind it, held in place by electrical wires. Ducking under its swiping, blindly scissoring arms, he grabbed its overalls by the knees and heaved. The metal body went up and backwards, and toppled over the rail into the engines below.
For an instant, it seemed to bob and dance on the spinning turbines before getting caught and dragged into the machinery. He saw the head fly in one direction, one of the arms in another. Then its torso must have caught on something, because there was an ear-splitting bang, and the engines whined into smoke and silence.
Looking back to the hatch, Ack-Ack saw Erik and Cuddles were watching him with wide, awestruck eyes.
“Come on,” he barked, ears ringing in the sudden silence. “I need you guys to grab hold of this device and get it back to K8 on the Sun.”
Erik the orangutan blinked at him.
“What about you, Chief?”
“Me?” Ack-Ack Macaque scowled down at his damaged jacket. “I’m going to need my chainsaw and some ammunition. I’ve got some unfinished business with Célestine.” He tried to pull the two sides of the slit together with his hands. “And, while you’re at it, see if you can find me some goddamn safety pins.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
AMELINE
TWELVE KILOMETRES ABOVE the battle-torn fields of northern France, the former trading ship Ameline slowed to a halt in the air. The ship had been travelling at Mach 4, but now it was stationary, hanging in the sky like an impossible statue. In cross-section, it was a snub-nosed wedge, its sheen of blue and red paint bleached by the light of a dozen alien suns. Jacked into its virtual senses, Katherine Abdulov looked down at the carnage beneath. Even from here, she could see the Leviathans crawling around like tracked armadillos, and the massive airships harrying them from above.
“Any sign of Célestine?” she asked the ship, and felt it run a sensor sweep, scouring the countryside below for signs of their quarry.
> DIFFICULT TO TELL.
Kat heard the ship’s words in her mind via her neural link, and pursed her lips.
“But this fits her M.O.?”
> OH, DEFINITELY. THERE ARE A LOT OF CYBORGS DOWN THERE. MONKEYS TOO.
“Monkeys plural?”
> IT SEEMS NAPOLEON’S FOUND HIMSELF A POSSE.
Kat gave a weary sigh.
“And what about our other target, the Valois woman?”
> ACCORDING TO RADIO TRAFFIC, SHE’S ON ONE OF THE AIRSHIPS.
“You’re sure?”
> SURE AS CAN BE.
“Have they seen us yet?”
She felt a shiver in the connection, like the electronic equivalent of a sniff.
> WE’RE INVISIBLE TO THEIR RADAR. THE ONLY WAY THEY’LL NOTICE US IS IF ONE OF THEM STEPS OUT ON DECK AND LOOKS UP WITH THEIR EYES.
“Which is always possible.”
> MEH.
Kat took a moment to savour the view: the clear blue skies and rolling brown and yellow countryside, the grey urban sprawl of Paris to the north and the sea to the west. All of it alive, untouched, and relatively unspoiled. Djatt, Inakpa, Strauli… Those tragedies seemed so long ago, so far away—and yet their pain never lessened, never left her. And so here she was at the other end of the universe, trying to save this world—trying to avert yet another apocalypse.
She opened a channel to the forward weapons pod, where Ed Rico lay cocooned in alien technology, as much a component of the gun as its operator.
“How are you doing, Ed?”
“Hanging in there.” His voice sounded bubbly and distorted, forcing its way up through layers of alien mucus.
“Keep an eye on the horizon,” she told him. “I’m going to try landing on the airship, but if this all goes tits-up, we can expect an armed response.”
“Don’t worry.” He sounded like a man choking, pushing each syllable through the glop that filled his lungs and throat. “I’m on it.”
“Thanks, Ed.” She turned her attention back to the downward view. The airships moved like armoured clouds, raining fire on the tanks, which in turn resembled the restlessly moving buildings of a mobile city.
“Okay,” she said, “let’s go down there and say hello.”
She looked down and flexed the fingers of her artificial left hand. The metal of the fingers and wrist had been stained and half-melted during an attack by the Recollection.
The ship trembled around her as the engines changed their pitch, and the deck skewed forward.
> DESCENDING NOW.
Through the ship’s senses, she felt the wind caressing the outside of the hull and the hairs on her arms and neck prickled in response. Tingles in her feet represented the push of the thrust, growls in her stomach the power of the engines.
“Let’s try to do it gently this time,” she implored the cranky old spacecraft as she felt it fire up its fusion motors. “Remember, we want to speak to these people, not incinerate them.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
WRENCH
OING WAS THE first to die. A tall, golden-skinned female cyborg came crashing through the engine room door. Her mane of bright red hair gave her the look of an idealised Roman centurion, and her shining blades were black with blood and gore. She dispatched the chimp with a single backhand swipe of her arm, gutting him with a vicious slash from right hip to left nipple.
As Oing collapsed in a flood of gore, Boing opened fire with his sidearm. K8 covered her ears. The gunshots were shockingly loud in the confined space, but seemed to have little effect on the gleaming woman. When the gun was empty, Boing threw it at her. It hit her on the chest and fell to the deck.
K8 looked around for a weapon, but the only thing with any heft was the wrench she was already holding—and even that looked pitifully small and ineffectual compared to the half-metre blades extending from the woman’s sleeves.
The cyborg looked down at the gun on the floor.
“Is that it, Cheetah?” she asked. Her voice was rich and deep, and only slightly human. Boing snarled. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other and tightened his grip on the bayonet in his other hand.
“That’s not my name.”
“Do you think I care?”
She raised her arms—one held forward defensively, pointing at him and daring him to rush her; the other pulled back, fist level with her ear, ready to strike.
Boing growled.
Feeling helpless, K8 called the hive for assistance, but they were all too far away to offer practical help.
All save one.
Be strong, my child. The Founder’s words emanated an indignant and flinty resolve. K8 squeezed the wrench in her fists. Boing and the golden woman were circling each other.
Help us.
I am trapped on the bridge with Valois and the Marines, but I will come as soon as we can.
We need you now.
I’m afraid that’s not possible.
K8 felt anger stir up inside, let it leak onto the communal channel.
Then what bloody use are you?
She crouched beside the metal cradle she’d improvised on the engine room’s floor, thinking maybe she could unplug the power cables she’d just connected and use them to elec
trify the deck. She didn’t know whether doing so would affect their cyborg attacker, but was certain it would, in all likelihood, kill her and Boing.
Best leave that as a last resort.
Motion caught her eye. Boing leapt forward, lunging with the bayonet. His long, hairy arm gave him tremendous reach and the tip of his weapon actually touched the golden woman’s breast before her arm—moving so fast it was little more than a blur—swiped him aside with all the power of a car crash, sending his broken body tumbling and flopping across the deck like windblown laundry.
Sickened, K8 swallowed hard. Slowly, she rose to her feet, wrench held shakily before her. At this point, her fear and anger had become interchangeable. She couldn’t tell where one finished and the other began, but both were firing her with a desperate, insane urge to fight back, no matter how mismatched and hopeless the struggle—the same instinct she imagined filled swimmers and led them to struggle in the jaws of a shark, or compelled doomed cavemen to pit their fists and fingernails against the claws and teeth of a sabre-toothed cat. Whatever happened here, she knew she would not beg, would not grovel, and would not die like cowering prey. She knew that if the Skipper were here, he’d do the same. He’d never give up, never surrender, and never give his opponent the satisfaction of seeing his fear—and neither would she. She took a deep, steadying breath, and gripped the wrench with both hands. Gold eyes flicked in her direction. The cyborg let its head tilt to one side. It looked her up and down, from the ratty baseball boots on her feet to the tousled top of her carroty hair.
“Oh, relax,” it said. “I’m not going to kill you.”
K8 felt her jaw clench. The golden woman stepped towards her, moving on thin, graceful legs.
“Jeez,” the cyborg said, “you look so short.”
K8 worked her lips. It took her three attempts to make her voice work.
“Stay back.”
The woman smiled.
“I’m not going to hurt you, K8.” With a sound like scraping cutlery, her stained blades retracted into her sleeves.
“How do you know my name?”
“How do you think?” A shining hand reached out, plucked the wrench from her grip, and tossed it away. “I’m you, you dumbass.”
“M-me?” In her head, K8 could feel the other members of the Gestalt recoiling from her.
“Yeah, girl. I’m the version of you from the other world. You know how this works.”
“But I would never, never—”
“Never can be a long time when you don’t have a choice.”
With her back to the wall, K8 looked around for a way out. Her eyes fell on Oing and Boing, still lying where they fell.
“Why did you have to kill them?” she demanded, cheeks burning.
“They were in my way.”
“And me?”
“You can be saved.” The gold woman shook her red Mohican, which shimmered in the light like strands of fibre optic thread. “You can come with us, and have a body like mine.”
“But, I—” K8 stopped, surprised to hear herself using a singular pronoun. “I…” the Gestalt were still there at the back of her mind, but their voices were quieter now, less intrusive—and where once there had been ‘we’ and ‘us’, now there was only ‘me’ and ‘I’.
“Are you listening?” The golden woman reached for her. “I’m trying to save you.”
“Well, I don’t need saving.” Still distracted by the changes taking place in her head, K8 slapped the cyborg’s hand away. “I don’t need you, or anybody else.”
The gold woman cocked her head in amusement. “But you’re so lonely.”
“No, I’m not.” K8 bunched her fists. “I thought I was, but I’m not.”
“Because of the monkey?”
K8 felt her heart rattling against her ribs.
“Yes, the monkey.”
The golden woman straightened up and made a show of looking around the room.
“Then where is he, eh?” She bent forwards, putting her face level with K8’s, and K8 could see her own distress reflected in the polished mask. “Everybody let me down; why should you be any different? Where’s this hairy ‘friend’ of yours when you need him? And where was he when I needed him?”
A cough came from the door. They both looked around to see Cuddles standing on the threshold. The big gorilla filled the entranceway with his muscular bulk, the Gatling gun cradled like a toy in his massive hands.
“Ack-Ack sends his regards.”
A fat, leathery finger squeezed the trigger and the gun’s barrels spun. The cyborg tried to leap aside but, fast as she was, she couldn’t outpace a weapon capable of firing fifty rounds per second. The room flickered as fire danced from the gun. K8 let her knees give out and collapsed to the deck, landing on her hip. Above her, her golden counterpart jerked and danced like a marionette as bullets punched through her metal skin, into the flesh and wiring beneath. Stray shots riddled the rear wall. Used shell cases showered around the gorilla’s feet. The chattering roar of the gun filled the room.
And then all was quiet.
The minigun’s spinning barrels whined into silence and the last spent case jangled on the iron deck. The room stank of hot metal, spilled oil and gun smoke. K8 uncovered her ears and looked up. The perforated cyborg stood swaying. It put a hand up to the smoking holes peppering its chest, and then dropped heavily to its knees.
“You idiots,” it wheezed.
Cuddles pushed up his sunglasses and fixed the woman with a sharp-toothed sneer. His feet straddled the end of a long, grey, coffin-shaped box. He dropped the minigun and pulled out a large silver pistol, which he levelled at her head.
“Fuck you, lady.”
After the whining din of the Gatling gun, the pistol’s shot was a flat crack. The bullet hit the cyborg in the forehead and her head tipped back on her neck. Something snapped in her chest, metal parted and, as if in slow motion, her head and shoulders broke from the ruins of her trunk. They fell backwards with a heavy thud. The rest of her body—sparking wires projecting from the shards of her chest—tottered for a second on buckling legs, and then collapsed in the opposite direction.
STILL FEELING NUMB, K8 helped the gorilla lug the stolen shield device across the deck to the cradle she’d built. At first glance, it appeared to be a sealed container with no obvious controls or openings, save for a power coupling at the narrow end. As Cuddles kicked the remains of the golden cyborg out of the way, she ran her hands over the edges of the box, searching for seams or hidden catches.
“Any idea how it works?” the gorilla rumbled. Grease and dirt streaked his white vest, and his sunglasses perched on top of his head. The dog tags around his neck clanked quietly when he moved.
K8 sighed and shook her head. Her pulse still roared in her ears and she felt sick. She couldn’t believe she’d been talking to another iteration of herself; that the brain in that precious metal physique had once belonged to a girl almost identical to her—a kind of twin sister, but a shadow sister that had turned to the Dark Side, renouncing her humanity and morals in exchange for a shot at immortality. K8 shook herself and decided she’d worry about the philosophical implications later. When all this was over—assuming they lived through the next few hours—she’d have time to freak the hell out. Right now, she had a job to do, and the Skipper was counting on her to get it done. Hell, the whole future of the world depended on it.
She coughed and cracked her knuckles. Then she gave the grey box a prod with her toe.
“I guess we just plug it in and see what happens.”
She helped Cuddles guide it into the makeshift cradle and was gratified to see it was an almost perfect fit.
Let us help, child. The Founder’s voice echoed in the spaces behind her conscious thoughts.
Get lost.
Our minds, working together…
K8 screwed her eyes shut and tapped her knuckles against her temples. She’d yearned to rejoin the hive, craved its comfort the way a raindrop craves
the ocean; yet now, a crack had appeared. She could still hear them, still feel them, but they’d let her down in a moment of need. They’d left her hanging, high and dry. A rift had opened and now she wasn’t sure it could ever be repaired. She wasn’t part of their collective any more. In facing death, she’d found herself.
Shut up and get out of my head.
All that mattered now was the task at hand, and the Skipper’s plan.
You can’t shut us out.
Leave me alone.
You hate being alone, all by yourself. Don’t you remember? Don’t you remember how hard it was, how lonely?
She picked up the power cable and rammed it into the waiting socket, twisting and jiggling it until it slid home. The number of voices in her head rose to a chorus, a multitude. A whole congregation of true believers called to her, beseeching her.
Come back to us. Be one with us again.
Tears rolling down her face, she crammed her fingers into her ears. They sounded like disappointed primary school teachers and she tried to drown them out the only way she knew how.
La la la la, she sang to herself, inner voice almost shrieking the words she remembered from a childhood spent as the only ginger kid in her class, the words she’d used to block out the schoolyard taunts.
La la la, I’m not listening.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
MARY SHELLEY
ACK-ACK MACAQUE LEAPT from the rear of the crippled Leviathan, leaving it straddling the road, and ran on all fours across the field. The fighting had intensified, with the tanks and airships exchanging fusillades in an almost continuous bombardment, and he hoped everybody’s attention would be fixed on their opponents rather than scanning the grass for scampering primates.
He didn’t know for sure which tank Célestine was in, but he had a fair idea. So far, the Leviathans had arranged themselves in an arrowhead formation, with one at the rear, close to the portal—and that was the one he was running towards. The Duchess might be a deranged and evil bitch, but she was also very keen on self-preservation. She wanted to live forever, which meant she wouldn’t be riding in the vanguard with the rest of the grunts; she’d be at the back, close enough to command the battle but sheltered behind the first wave of tanks. And, now he was on the inside of the ‘V’, he made straight for her.
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