The Beauty of Destruction

by Gavin G. Smith

  ‘No!’ Churchman screamed and leapt again. He landed on a fighter that had just passed under the frigate. His boots adhered to the craft but its speed meant he had to grip a handle that had just extruded from the craft’s hull.

  Beth’s blood carried an ugly matter-hack. Ridiculously expensive tech designed specifically to beat Church defences with one order. Transmit. The telescopic array opened a bridge and did just that.

  The fighter’s forward-manoeuvring engines burned, braking the craft to stop it crashing into the wall that even now was opening for Churchman. Churchman leapt from the fighter, the twin AG motors attached to his exoskeleton carrying him through the hole in the smart matter wall. As he landed in the corridor he could already hear the screaming.

  ‘Let me go! I’m going to fucking kill him! You hear me, Scab! You’re fucking dead!’ The Monk was writhing against her restraints. Both her arms ended in bloody stumps. All the extruded weapons, several S-sats and a squad of nervous militia were covering her. She had already opened her neunonics to the Cathedral’s AI. Her internal systems had been fighting the sophisticated meat-hack the entire time. It had worked because it had sequestered her, controlled her, rather than attempting to root out the Church’s secrets, which would have triggered the conditioning. Her clearance and reputation had done the rest, allowed her to get as far as she had.

  ‘I’m calm,’ Beth said. Churchman was receiving her medical telemetry, she was anything but, though he couldn’t see any remaining trace of the meat-hack. Her own, not inconsiderable, internal systems had tracked it down and destroyed it.

  ‘Let her up,’ Churchman ordered, ’facing instructions to the Cathedral to do the same. The AI, which irritatingly had facets of his own personality, protested, as did the militia squad leader. ‘Now! And get medical assemblers on her arms.’

  The smart matter released her as two of the militia affixed assemblers with graft attachments to the Monk’s severed limbs. As soon as they had done that, Churchman picked up the protesting Beth and tucked her under his arm. Another AG-motor-assisted leap carried him out of the corridor and back onto the fighter, which was turning even as they landed on it. They would have to go slower this time. Beth had less protection than he did.

  ‘I’m going to kill him this time,’ the Monk ’faced him.

  If he was being honest he had been more than a little disappointed in Beth for her liaison with Scab. It had seemed like the sort of self-destructive thing her sister would do. If, however, sex had been the vector for the meat-hack then he could understand the violation. Even if he had wanted to stop Beth from killing him, he wasn’t sure he could. Except that it wasn’t Scab who was missing.

  The Previous Night

  She could understand how it had happened. She knew when it had happened. It had been while Scab, Vic and that insipid human bitch had been on their Key trip. The Elite had come through the wall of the Monastery. A moment later special forces contractors were levelling weapons at them, and the tall, thin man with the deep voice and skin so pitch black it seemed to absorb light, was standing over her. He had touched her. Just laid a hand on her head. It had been creepy. It had also been a contact transfer for what she had assumed was liquidware with a nanite carrier.

  She didn’t want to think about how easily it had bypassed her internal security. The liquidware had assembled itself and integrated with her own. Basically it was information and a small, limited capability AI. The AI projected an image straight into her neunonics, overlaying what she could see in the real world. It was how she could still remember what Patron looked like because, subjectively, in her darkened room, he was standing at the bottom of the bed looking at her.

  It didn’t matter who she was, her capabilities, what she’d done; she still found herself clutching her legs to her chest against the wall as far away from where she perceived the AI projection of Patron to be. Despite the fear, her neunonics were running through the data on the rest of the liquidware that had invaded her system. It was information gathered by Consortium intelligence contractors, everything they knew about Church systems.

  ‘I have a proposition for you,’ Patron said, his deep, resonant voice making her feel part aroused, part nauseous. ‘Would you like to be richer than Croesus?’

  ‘Who’s Croesus?’ she asked. The AI projection of Patron sighed.

  Her flesh itched like crazy but the assemblers had not fully regrown the missing parts of her limbs. As Churchman leapt from the fighter to the landing pad, where the sleek Basilisk II was berthed, the Monk made the considered and mature decision that she was going to kick Woodbine Scab to death.

  Churchman put her down and both of them strode towards where Scab was struggling with his smart matter restraints. Security satellites, the heavily armed version of P-sats controlled by the Cathedral’s AI, were so thick in the air above him it looked like the microcosm of a planetary blockade.

  ‘Move!’ Churchman snapped at the militia surrounding Scab.

  Beth assumed that the tiny bits of smoking wreckage were all that remained of Scab’s P-sat. The militia cleared the way. Scab was frothing at the mouth, toxic saliva making his make-up smoke. He looked like a rabid animal. There was nothing in his eyes that Beth recognised as human, let alone sane. He was surrounded by inert, in some cases warped, smart matter. His left arm was free. As they approached there was a glow from the tentacle holding his right arm. It was cut apart as the energy javelin cut through the smart matter as though it wasn’t there.

  Churchman moved first, with surprising speed for his metal bulk. A golden foot stamped down on Scab’s right arm. The Monk heard the bone snap. Churchman was in the way, she couldn’t get close enough to Scab. She suspected this was what he had intended. Churchman reached down and plucked the E-javelin from Scab’s hand as the smart matter restraints released him. Scab started to move. Beth triggered her coherent energy field as spit gun needles and monomolecular discs ricocheted off Churchman’s armour. Some of the militia backed away, taking hits on their armour. Churchman reached down for a struggling Scab and picked him up by his skull.

  ‘This is what it feels like to be helpless!’ Churchman’s amplified voice shouted. He slammed Scab back into the ground, then picked him up again. The Monk heard Scab’s armoured skull start to crack as Churchman squeezed. She was worried that Churchman was going to kill him before she could. ‘Where is Negrinotti?’ Churchman demanded. It was written all over Scab’s face. He didn’t have the slightest idea what Churchman was talking about. She accessed the Cathedral’s systems. Negrinotti was nowhere to be found. She wasn’t the only one.

  Some Minutes Ago

  It was almost a physical difference. Vic was still cautious but he could see an end in sight. Freedom from Scab, though he would need to survive the inevitable assassination attempt that would come from the severing of their partnership, as well as the booby traps that Scab had installed in his personal systems over the years.

  Living in the Church wouldn’t be so bad, perhaps even working for them eventually, though he intended to spend a great deal of time just relaxing initially. He would become a burden on their resources, a parasite. He was quite looking forward to it.

  He was also pleased that Talia would be staying in the Cathedral, almost as pleased as he was about Scab leaving. He wondered if he’d taken the human-aping psychosurgery too far. Was he actually in love? He wasn’t sure he was entirely enjoying the sensation. It did go some way towards explaining why he was walking down an arched walk towards Talia’s room, once more carrying a surgical steel rose, a bottle of red wine, and a bewildering array of narcotics. For some reason he felt this was his time. Perhaps they could consummate what so far they had only done in immersions. The wine had even been grown in hydroponic vineyards in the Cathedral! It wasn’t from an assembler.

  Vic let off a little spurt of pheromonic irritation as he saw Talia and Elodie emerge from the human girl’s room. Elodie’s P-sat was bobbing up and down on its AG motor at her shoulder. Vic
tried to purse his mandibles – it didn’t work – as Talia failed to notice him. Elodie, however, glanced his way and turned to lead the girl in the other direction.

  ‘Talia! Elodie!’ Vic called. It was a little odd, he had been certain that the two females hadn’t just disliked each other, but had in fact utterly despised each other. Vic couldn’t be sure but various senses and neunonic analysis routines were telling him that there was something slightly off about Elodie’s body language. Whatever it was, it was gone when Elodie turned to face him, smiling. Vic momentarily forgot about it when he noticed that Talia had been crying, yet again.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked. It had become a common greeting with them.

  ‘Beth fucked Scab,’ Talia said. She sniffed, and wiped some of her running eye make-up on her sleeve.

  Yes! Vic couldn’t help himself. He was still a little confused as to Elodie’s presence.

  ‘And you’re … ?’ he said, turning to look at the feline.

  ‘She’s been a real friend,’ Talia said, turning to look gratefully at Elodie, who was smiling sympathetically. ‘She knows what it’s like to be fucked over by a sibling.’

  ‘I mean, yes, I’ve been hateful to her, but she’s still crew. I mean, I’ve practically sprayed all of you. You know how territorial we are, but it’s compartmentalised, you know?’

  His nano-screen and antennae were picking up something in the air, some ever-so-subtle nanites. He guessed it was some kind of nano-screen, perhaps a privacy or stealth screen.

  Vic nodded understandingly. The tray and its contents crashed to the floor as he reached for his laser pistols and ’faced targeting information to his power disc, grabbing it from his back with his lower left arm. His P-sat fired once, the energy dissipation grid on Elodie’s chitinous armoured bodice flared, and then it dropped to the ground. He flung the power disc and that also dropped to the ground. Elodie was moving, drawing her own weapons. It had all happened too fast for Talia to react. The targeting graphics overlaying Vic’s vision were almost exactly in the correct place as he brought the twin double-barrelled laser pistols to bear; he was about to ’face the command to fire when the wall reached out, grabbed him, and partially enveloped him.

  Talia started to run. Elodie swung her leg around and the sole of her high-heeled boot slammed the girl into the wall, holding her there. The position looked as graceful as it looked uncomfortable. It would have been impossible to hold any augmented person against the wall like that, but Talia wasn’t augmented.

  Elodie was still looking at Vic, partially encased in the wall’s smart matter and unable to move. She burst out laughing. ‘I put a back door into as much of your gear as I could on board the Basilisk. Nothing personal, I just like a bit of insurance when I’m working with other people. If your own defences hadn’t been quite so good I would have meat-hacked you, but I guess you’ll have to remain Scab’s bitch,’ she told him.

  ‘You hacked the Cathedral’s systems?’ Vic asked, appalled, thinking of the smart matter that imprisoned him.

  ‘No. The Church must have ordered us locked down. I’m running a stealth screen, which is spoofing their sensors, screens and security swarms,’ Elodie explained. It was obvious to Vic that she was impressed with her own cleverness. Talia was whimpering, trying to get free. ‘Shut up!’ Elodie snapped, all trace of humour gone from her expression. ‘I do not like you. The hours I have just spent listening to you whine have, if anything, just increased my disgust at your simpering existence. Normally I’d just meat-hack you but apparently you have to remain pure. So you do as I say or I’ll hurt you in ways that will make your previous embrace of victimhood pale into insignificance. Do you understand me?’

  Talia made more whimpering noises in answer.

  ‘For fuck’s sake.’ Elodie removed her boot and Talia slid to the ground. The angry feline yanked the human to her feet and started dragging her down the corridor. Vic noticed that the feline had two black orbs, with visors adhered to them, attached to her belt.

  ‘Why are you doing this?’ Vic demanded.

  ‘Greed, fear, being pissed off at Scab for dragging me into his shit, getting to see this whiny bitch vivisected … Shut up! Plus wanting to be on the winning side, but mostly greed.’

  Vic had to concede that they were some good reasons, though the vivisection seemed a little harsh. ‘Elodie, don’t do this,’ he pleaded. He was seeing his opportunity to be the hero in Talia’s eyes slipping, well walking, well being dragged away from him.

  ‘Perhaps try and negotiate first, then shoot me?’ Elodie shouted over her shoulder.

  ‘Would it have made any difference?’ Vic called after her.

  ‘No!’ Elodie grabbed Talia, who flinched at her touch, and then reached for the extruded handle of her P-sat, the AG motor pulling them both into the air.

  The Monk had dropped the coherent energy field and re-opened herself almost entirely to the Cathedral’s systems as she removed the assemblers and inspected new pink flesh. The AI was running extensive diagnostics, as were her own systems, repeatedly checking that she was not still compromised. Erring on the side of caution. The meat-hack had been delivered in saliva. It had happened when Negrinotti had kissed her. She knew the possible consequences of her slaved actions but she didn’t want to face up to them right now.

  ‘You’re gonna fucking die,’ Scab spat at Churchman. Churchman contemptuously turned his back on the bounty hunter.

  ‘Talia’s gone,’ the Monk told him. Scab stood up. She could hear his bones resetting.

  ‘That girl,’ the deep amplified voice from the armoured exoskeleton muttered.

  ‘The sensors can’t find them,’ the sergeant in charge of the militia squad told Churchman.

  ‘Yes, we might actually have to fucking look for them!’ Churchman shouted. Then he sent out an open ’face to everyone in the Cathedral. It contained images of Elodie and Talia.

  The Monk could see Scab picking up the glowing E-javelin, looking at Churchman’s back.

  ‘Listen, wank stain,’ she told the human killer. ‘Negrinotti fucked you over just as much as she did us, maybe more so. She took a half-assed stab at framing you. So you tell me what’s important here?’ Scab glared at her. ‘Yes, nothing resolves a situation like a good glare! Priorities?’

  Scab shared a ’face from Vic with Churchman and the Monk. The three of them started to move.

  Vic was ’facing a situation report to Scab, Churchman and the Monk as the smart matter released him. He leant low, grabbing the power disc and the P-sat on the run. He clipped both pieces of equipment to his armoured frame and made sure they were completely powered down. He could reboot and run diagnostics later but he couldn’t risk having them active again if he caught up with Elodie.

  He was sprinting as fast as his power-assisted frame would allow. He drew his triple-barrelled shotgun pistol and broke it open, replacing the current load with saboted seeker micromissiles, and loaded EM, heat and visual pattern recognition targeting information into the missiles’ limited AIs. They weren’t AG-driven smart munitions but they’d do in a pinch.

  ‘She’s heading for the closest airlock,’ Vic ’faced to the others.

  ‘She’s too smart for that,’ Scab ’faced back.

  ‘She had two suits clipped to her belt,’ Vic replied. That didn’t make any sense to him. Even if Elodie managed to get out then the Church would just pick her up in Red Space.

  ‘She’ll double back, head for somewhere less obvious,’ Scab told him. Vic heard a distant bang. The sound of superheated air exploding. The laser Elodie’s P-sat was armed with. He changed direction and wished he could trust his P-sat enough to use it.

  Elodie practically had to jam one of her suppressed autopistols into the militia woman’s visor and empty the entire clip. The visor cracked and a human head became a red cavity. Elodie returned the autopistol to its holster-clip and grabbed the advanced combat rifle from the militia woman as she fell to the ground. Two S-sats lay inert o
n the ground nearby, momentarily overwhelmed by her ’faced hack. She kicked out at the other militiaman trying to bring his weapon to bear, knocking him off-balance. Her P-sat fired at his animatic visor again and again, giving her enough time to empty the four grenades in the ACR’s grenade launcher at the squad of militia that had appeared at the end of one of the corridors leading to the airlock. Talia was running again as the space suit struggled to grow around her. It was probably the bravest thing the girl had ever done. Elodie threw the ACR. It spun through the air and hit the human in the back, knocking her to the ground.

  Proximity fuses triggered the grenades and they exploded in staggered airbursts. The force of the blasts sent armoured militia tumbling back down the corridor, bouncing off the wall. The other militiaman was still trying to bring his ACR to bear, the energy dissipation grid still glowing from her P-sat’s laser. Elodie drove her claws into the visor, the heat having weakened it. Envenomed nails found flesh. He staggered away from her, screaming, dropping his weapon.

  Above her, the smart matter floors and ceilings were peeling back, presumably to allow access to something she didn’t want to have access. Angrily she stormed over to Talia and placed the visor in front of the girl’s face. The suit grew round to meet it and hold it in place. She stood on Talia’s back and forced her face-down onto the floor, then pushed the clawed fingers of her left hand into the viscous globe on her belt. The space suit started to grow up her arm. She had to get outside the Cathedral, transmit, and hope that Patron lived up to his promises. If not, she had been assured that she would be less well rewarded when she was cloned, though if Scab survived she knew he would come after her.