I hear metal shear, grind. The gun stutters and stops. But then there’s a different whirring sound, one I know is a Box bot rotating its cube-like sections, probably bringing up another gun. I hear the slow banging of some kind of heavy weapon, steady and precise, but nothing flies at us. I risk raising my head.
The gunfire has cut away enough of the growth to let me see: It is a Box. One gun is twisted and smoking. It’s in-process of rotating to bring up another shielded head array, replacing a mangled one. I see it slammed by incoming fire, high-caliber and explosive. It tries firing back. Then I see a flash of light come out of the green, dancing around it, shimmering, leaping. It’s…
“Hah! Too predictable…”
Lux. The immortal. Golden hair, pale skin, shining polished plate armor. All grace and speed and violence, like this is a dance. He/she is up on the machine, driving her/his sword into the secondary head array. There’s an arc of electricity, a shower of sparks. I can smell ozone and burning circuitry and seared flesh. The bot spins sections, throws him/her off, but she/he lands gracefully, pauses to appraise his/her work. The Box is blind.
It tries firing wildly, but she/he simply steps in and hacks its remaining guns. Then out of the brush steps a larger, bulkier figure in black armor. Azazel. He raises the heavy rifle he’s carrying, waits for Lux to finish and step out of the way, and then surgically pumps rounds in through the gaps in the machine’s sections.
“Rest and be at peace, poor servants,” Azazel wishes the wreckage when it finally settles. I remember that some of Chang’s bots are actually cyborgs, run by human brains salvaged from his wounded fighters, horrible.
“A week buried in a cave, and this is the reception we get,” Lux complains lightly, sounding more in his/her female aspect at the moment. (The gender swapping she/he does is unsettling enough, but he/she’s so generally androgynous that one is never sure what she/he is at any particular moment, especially under his/her gleaming armor.)
“Good to see nothing’s changed,” Azazel jokes, his voice deep and rich even through his dome-like helmet.
“Lux! Azazel!” I impulsively call out. My companions rise more cautiously, neither appearing injured. The two immortals seem to take a confused moment to recognize us, but then do.
“Hah. Old friends! I see you’ve finally made it to the party,” Lux sounds at least amused to see us.
“Not a safe place to be,” Azazel warns. I notice he doesn’t remove his helmet. He’s also favoring the left side of his torso armor. There’s a jagged hole through the plate that’s the size of my fist. It looks wet, but against the shiny black plate I can’t tell if there’s blood. As I watch, it slowly starts to close itself, but does so much more slowly than I’ve seen immortals self-repair before. He scans the green all around us, not fully lowering his weapon. “These things don’t travel alone.”
“He’s right,” Lux goes serious, though her/his voice keeps its melodic sweetness. “What are you doing here, children? And are there more of you in this nasty gorgeous place?”
“My father is taking the rest of our group—forty-five of our original seventy-five—around the north side of the mountain, headed for Katar,” I report quickly. “One of their people has granted us passage.”
“Lucky for you,” Lux says, “the Katar are not terribly fond of strangers. Neither are their neighbors the Pax. Of course, nobody seems to be on this bizarre rock.”
“Katar is still safer than here,” Azazel assesses, looking back over our heads. With some of the foliage cut away by the fight, we can see the sharp, jagged crest of the Spine Range. (Being able to see any landmark so clearly is at least a small comfort.) “The bots don’t usually leave this valley.”
“Though they have been attacking the Pax,” Lux corrects him. “Maybe concerned they’ll join with the Katar, pose a threat.”
“The threat being a really big slaughter might get satellite attention,” Azazel grumbles. “Though Chang might not care about that if his new ride is ready.”
“You saw the storm?” the Ghaddar finally speaks up, focusing on the urgent.
“Crawled out into it,” Azazel tells her. Then explains: “The rim around the Grave crater is laced with caves. Chang has had us trapped in them for the last eight days, along with a company of his human troops and an amusing selection of Fohat’s new monstrosities.”
“You’ve seen Chang?” the Ghaddar wants to know, as do we all.
“Only from a distance. He’s not really trying to hide from us, for some reason, but he’s kept us too busy to get anywhere close to him, sending his monsters after the locals when we try. He knows we won’t leave them to try to handle his slaughter machines alone—they have settlements, children, and nothing much that can stop his beasties. We tried to slip in through the cave maze, hoping to find a way through to the crater so we could take out his bot factory, his ship factory, but he was expecting that. He pinned us down and then blew the tunnels, buried us along with his own, even set his bots on his live personnel, whether they’d switched sides or not—just another play to keep us busy. It was a slaughter…”
“The others are with you?” Murphy asks when Azazel trails off. “Colonel Ram? Bel? Doctor Stilson?”
“We were separated,” Lux sighs, frustrated and tired. “Almost from the start. They may be out. They may still be in. We were lucky to find an exit, and that was probably only because Chang had blinded himself with his own cloaking storm. Of course, we came out even further away than where we started.”
“We can’t communicate, not over any distance,” Azazel explains. “What the Katar call Lucifer’s Grave is an ancient crater: A meteor strike penetrated a layer of magnetite that had been permanently magnetized way back when the planet still had a dynamic core. The place is snowy with background EM, and charged debris is scattered all over the Blade. It’s probably why he picked the place: his ship’s lift engines won’t show on satellite over the environmental noise and the stronger Atmosphere Net here. Plus, there’s a lot of iron compounds handy. And titanium. And ground water—melt is what created the cave-maze, and left a sink that takes parts of the crater down who-knows-how-deep. It’s a perfect base.”
“But you’ve seen his ship?” I want to confirm. “He’s rebuilt his Stormcloud?”
“We were close enough for a glimpse through the storm when he took it up. It’s a work in progress. But this one looks like it’s got dual main guns. Built for fighting and launching flyers. Not for housing personnel.”
“What’s left of his conscripts are being treated as slaves, held under the guns of his bots and ‘borgs,” Lux adds. “We managed to break a few dozen free from a supply-gathering party about seven weeks ago, got them away before more bots could come retake them. Bly took them west. He’s hoping to find a safe place for them, away from here or anywhere Chang might be tempted to go. But that’s the only shot we’ve had at any kind of rescue—he’s kept the meat workers close to home ever since.”
I catch Murphy and the Ghaddar both looking at me, just as I’m wondering if these might be the same refugees as the ones we fought at Concordia. It’s clear they’re considering the same tragic possibility. But Bly wasn’t with those people. Still, I don’t say anything about it, and neither do my companions.
“What are you three doing coming this way?” Lux gets back to the immediate.
“One of ours—A young Jinn, a Terraformer—recognized the storm for what it was, ran into it,” the Ghaddar explains, sounding like she’s calculating exactly what to say and not say. “He may be trying to avenge his father, killed by Chang’s first railgun.”
“The Guardians have been grounded, disarmed,” Azazel says like he knows.
“They have,” Murphy confirms. “But he’s no Guardian. One of their youngsters. More eager than smart.”
“If he’s gone that way, he’s probably already in pieces,” Lux says, nodding in the direction of the Grave.
“You need to get out of here,” Azazel insists. “Re
turn to your people. We’ll find your friend, if he’s still alive.”
None of us move.
“Don’t be stupid,” Lux argues, voice going deep. “You can’t even see them coming in this. You’re good—I know that well enough from our previous fun—but you’re still just plain meat, and I’ve seen more than enough of it shredded since we wandered into this pretty little garden of murder. I’ve been fucking wearing you people…”
“Too late!” Azazel announces, spinning and firing through the green, first south, then southwest. Lux crouches. Murphy and the Ghaddar get low. I’m down on my belly behind my rifle, burrowing to hide in the shredded greenery, despite knowing that the bots can probably see my heat.
There’s a crushing/rustling sound coming at us, from multiple directions. Lux springs just as a Bug bot comes flying through the brush, slashing as it tumbles on its six bladed limbs. Lux gets sword into one of the heads as he/she flies over the top of it, then clips off a limb as it tries to turn. Murphy shoots it in the other head, nailing it with a penetrating HE round. It starts flailing, blind and broken.
Azazel punches holes in another as it tries to charge him. He has to sidestep it at the last instant, drawing his stout blade in the same movement and hacking. But he has to turn because another is coming. I manage to hit it in the torso, then get my own head shot as it hesitates, targets me. Azazel blows off the other head as it comes for me.
The second bot, injured, goes for Murphy, only to have the Ghaddar leap on its back. She lets it throw her off, leaving behind a charge that blows the bot in half at one of the torso joints. Murphy finishes one head as it tries to recover. Lux stabs the other.
But our breather is brief. Azazel is scanning the green.
“More! I count six… No… Eight!”
I hear the rustling, get ready… but the sounds pass us. Headed north.
“What…?” I start asking dumbly.
“Standard tactic,” Azazel explains quickly. “They hit us, we break a few. So they go looking for anything warm and tender they can find, make us chase.”
My father. My people.
“How far away was the rest of your group?” Lux lets me know she/he’s thinking what I’m dreading. My companions look back the way we came.
“Two klicks,” Murphy guesses, “depending on how fast they’re moving.”
“Not far enough,” Lux decides darkly. “You still want to go find your Terraformer?”
Through the brush, I see a swarm of butter-flies suddenly take to the air, then trees being pushed down. Over the crushing, I hear the distinctive treads and motors of Boxes, following behind the charging Bugs at their own slightly more leisurely pace. Ignoring us. Heading for the western tail of the Spine Range. I look south, like I have any hope of seeing Erickson through the green. Or like I’m expecting him to come running, somehow knowing what trouble we’re in. (Or Azrael. Where has Azrael gone?)
“We need to go back,” I decide, like I’m in charge. The others follow me like I am. Running.
Part Two: Companions in Arms
Chapter 1: My Brother’s Keeper
From the active journal of Elias Carter:
If I wasn’t on the Ops deck, I wonder if they would have told me.
“Contact fading,” Technician Sung says like this is nothing, routine.
“Maybe just a test of the lift engines,” Guerrero—his Ops-shift partner—guesses too casually for reason.
“Is that what I think it was?” I ask a pointless question. I know they won’t answer me, and they don’t. It’s like I’m not here, like they’ve treated me since I arrived two days ago; like every team has treated me at every Station on every stop I’ve made. But you’d think they would make an exception, given the circumstances. “That was a Stormcloud-class maglev ship.”
It’s like I’m not here.
“Have you seen it before?” I interrogate the backs of their helmeted heads as they stare at their screens. “Did you know it was there?!”
I’m losing my temper. I tell myself I have reason—I should be screaming.
“Did you know it was there?!”
“Stand down, Doctor Carter,” a calm voice comes from behind me. I turn to see Council White—in physical person, not Avatar—come in through the airlock hatch. Alone.
“You knew this was out there?” I don’t let it go, but manage to bring my voice down. Calm. Breathe. Center. “How long have you known?”
“They arrived just over two months ago, moving their personnel and equipment into the magnetic crater,” Council tells me like it’s not important. “This is only the second time they’ve managed to get the new ship airborne for any length of time.”
“And what are we doing about it?” I start to lose my calm again, catch myself.
“We are monitoring.”
“That ship can fly,” I confront. “If it has a railgun like the last one did…”
“Then we will be a target.” Council walks around me, up to the screen array—his window on his corner of our world, our only direct window on the Vajra. With a thought, he calls up a file video, zooms in on the crater-sink that’s known as Lucifer’s Grave by the locals. Up on the raised rim that circles two-thirds of the crater’s circumference is a man-shape, but absolutely black. The time-stamp is four weeks ago.
“Chang,” I name out loud. “You’ve been watching him—just watching him—all this time. Doing nothing? Watching?”
“His perimeter is protected by his machines.” He shows me video images I recognize as Boxes, Bugs, and variations thereof, moving through the dense greenery.
“Our Guardian forces could break through, destroy his ship. We could alert our allies, the anomalous immortals…”
“We are alerting no one,” Council insists, not turning to look at me. “Our communications may be monitored. What do you expect would happen if the UNMAC Command had this information?”
He calls up other images: Maps of the region. Human populations are highlighted.
“Won’t they see for themselves?” I criticize, holding.
“They have not seen, not yet. Chang is using the natural magnetic field of the region coupled with our own Atmosphere Net to mask him from EMR scans. He is otherwise visually camouflaged inside the sink.”
“They won’t see him until he moves to attack,” I guess. “Assuming this Station isn’t his first target.”
“We will act when the time is right,” he fails to be convincing.
I hide my seething behind my practiced stoicism. I have, after all, had more reason to practice hiding my rage over my lifetime than many of my fellows.
“And what if my brother is out there?”
I get no answer.
I let myself out.
I go back to my assigned quarters, my plain guest suite. The bare walls and simple furnishings are soothing. I don’t bother to activate a landscape wall, not caring for artificial distraction—not even a file view of the valley below this Station, however edited to promote a sense of serenity (obviously, it wouldn’t show me signs of Chang’s sinister activities).
I sit on the tall-backed sofa, balance, and try to systematically let go of my frustrations, release the past, settle in the current moment. I find the process gets more difficult each day I’ve been on this so-called search.
I can’t help but recount the days: Fifty now, since the Council finally gave me its permission to pursue my brother, to leave the security of the Station. But security has been the rule ever since, blocking all effective progress in that endeavor. I have been flown by shuttle from Station to Station, and only at night, traveling up over the Planums, with random intervals of days in between, in assumed hope of convincing the ever-watchful and paranoid Earth that we are not scheming some imagined horror. But at each Station stop, I am allowed to do nothing but watch passively from Ops, as if my brother would simply walk out in front of our remote eyes.
And now here I am: The end of the road, the end of our world. White Station. Our gr
eatest facility, on the far eastern edge of our network. Custodian of the Vajra, our proudest achievement: Deep, rich, lush. With additional Atmosphere Net reinforcement and a wealth of local resources to tap and process. And at least two functioning, thriving civilizations, now developed to the tipping point of evolving from violent competitors to cooperative trade partners.
But Chang is here, too. And Chang is a true scourge. He will strip this land, enslave and slaughter its people. (There’s no choice in that: they’ll be killed if they resist or if they join, their homes destroyed to feed his mad obsession.)
For some reason, we don’t seem to be very concerned about that. This despite the fact that we’re still repairing Green Station from the devastation dealt by his railgun, and the damage to the environment in Melas Chasma may take decades to undo (assuming Earth—or Chang—lets us). Instead, I and many of my fellows have been kept busy with bizarre projects, ordered by the Council (specifically Council Blue), that have nothing to do with creating a defense against our twin enemies, or even repairing the destruction they’ve done.
Allowing myself to get distracted (having nothing else to do but meditate), I brood over the various assignments again, attempting to see a pattern, a reason for all the unexplained demands:
Our geologists and chemists have been made to run deep core samples in hundreds of locations throughout our tap network, comparing them against surface regolith, looking for any structural inconsistencies down to the sub-atomic level, and especially comparing the temporal isotope markers. So far finding nothing remarkable, they’ve recently been ordered to go far beyond the current reach of our Taps, and missions have been sent to sample the Planums, away from the terraformed valleys.
Our astronomers have been tasked with re-mapping the cosmos, calculating galactic, stellar and planetary body movement, with the odd challenge of comparing their findings to old (and often non-scientific anecdotal) data, to re-create a cosmic clock from scratch, and then test it for errors.
The God Mars Book Four: Live Blades Page 14