by Andy Remic
~ * ~
Theme Planet
[Anarchy 01]
Andy Remic
No copyright 2012 by MadMaxAU eBooks
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And the Lord God planted
like, a garden, Eastward in Eden;
and there he put the man dude
whom he had formed. And
out of the ground made the
Lord God bro to grow every fizzy tree and weed
that is pleasant to the sight, man,
and all good for food and smoking and stuff;
the tree of life also in the midst of the
garden of the Eden, and the tree of
knowledge, and of the worldshell and, like, good and evil. Dude.
New Genesis 2: 8-9
The Revised & Rewritten Old Testament
Bible II: The Remix
~ * ~
PROLOGUE
HIT
Chains clanked.
Three thousand people sat in bright-eyed anticipation, knuckles white, teeth clenched, gasps gasping. Sunlight defined a glittering broad canvas, as big as the world. A subtle breeze ripe with vegetation caressed the graceful, mechanical ascent. There was a background of excited chatter, a hum of anticipation and energy.
Eventually, the climb ended a full five kilometres up. The world, the theme park, the Theme Planet, spread before the assembled ride freaks, colourful, and awesome, and vast.
To the left, fields of dancing pastel flowers jigged in the wind.
To the right, mountains of obsidian sat like majestic dragon’s teeth, quiescent, waiting, glittering.
Ahead, amidst gleaming oiled bodies, jewels sparkled on a turquoise sea crested with foam.
There came a hiatus:
A long moment of peace, and serenity, a pause for thought, a moment to study one’s own wisdom in these things; one’s own mortality; one’s own longevity; one’s own connection to God.
Then there came a bang, a clank, a lurch... and a sudden, violent drop into infinity and oblivion below...
Followed by three thousand screams as everybody waved their hands in the air.
~ * ~
The bitter mountain wind ruffled Amba Miskalov’s tight jacket. Pine scent filled her nostrils, the rich perfume of the forest. Slowly, she reached behind herself and tied her shoulder-length blonde hair into a pony-tail, then placed ski-goggles over her eyes and checked her twin silenced 9mm Heckler & Koch P7 pistols.
She moved through the red pine forest like a black ghost, halting by her skis. She glanced down the savage slope through mist and gloom, which dropped away into vastness and darkness beyond, more dangerous than any tourist ski-run. It was a scoop out of the mountainside. It was the mountain, mocking humanity with an impossible thrill.
She laid the skis delicately on the snow, and stepped in with tiny clicks.
It’s time, whispered Zi, her FRIEND, in the back of her mind, and Amba held a hand to her breast where the FRIEND lay absorbed, and felt her presence, like an oil cloud muddling her thoughts, a machine spirit reading her mind... before Zi shifted phase, and seemed to fade. In Amba’s coat, against her heart, she felt the hard metal of Zi under her skin and her eyes narrowed. No. Zi would not leave; could not. Not now. Not ever.
Especially when it was time for the kill.
Amba pushed off, elbows tucked in tight, and gave a small gasp as gravity took her in its fist and threw her down the mountain. In near-darkness she flitted through the snowy forest, trees slamming by to either side in an insane drug-blur, a game of reflex and courage and skill. Amba banked left - right - left, jumped a small embankment and sailed ten feet before touching down lightly and shifting almost imperceptibly right, skimming a tree with inches to spare, cold wind biting her, the forest absorbing her, and a distant owl hooting as if to mark her impossible passage.
Through the dark forest Amba flew, on a course almost pre-programmed in her skull from the previous day’s reconnoitre. But here, and now, this was no trial run. This was real, it was painful and pain giving; this was life and death.
Skis hissed on snow as the forest breathed around her. Cold air bit tiny triangles of exposed flesh. Adrenaline pumped. And then Amba saw the base flashing towards her, twin high watchtowers and an ominous smooth black wall topped with coils of razor wire.
Amba shifted her stance again, brain calculating fast, Zi allowing her to do her job. Pine branches whipped her. She ducked fast under a low bough that would have removed her head. In a flicker of ghostly white, she saw her target - a mound of banked snow. Her eyes shifted, gauging, and she was satisfied. Satisfied? If it didn’t work, she’d be dead, and nothing would matter.
She hit the mound at speed and sailed out over the abyss. Swiftly, she scanned for enemies. Counted eleven on the ground. Heavily armed. Machine gun nests in towers. She drew a P7, and a silenced shot spat through the night, single bullet exploding a watchtower guard’s head in a mushroom of brain slop and shattered skull shards. She shifted, and a second shot neutralised the second tower’s machine gunner with a hiss and a crack and a dull slap.
Still the guards on the ground had not spotted her; were not aware of her existence. Several were standing round a glowing brazier, warming gloved hands. Several more were patrolling the perimeter, machine guns lowered. Amba, her airborne arc beginning a descent, shifted her weight back and reached down towards her skis, angling herself for the five guards hovering beside the barrel of coals. One looked up, and his mouth opened in shock as Amba detached the binding on her left ski. The sharpened ski flew like an arrow, entering the guard’s open mouth, ski-tip exploding from the rear of his head in a tangle of bone and hair. He hit the ground at the same time as Amba, who whirled around, her second ski lifted in gloved hands and slammed like a sword at the four men. The ski hacked left, razor-edge decapitating a man, then right, slicing another from collarbone to hip in a whistling diagonal cut. Shouts echoed, surreal and detached. Cold breath plumed like smoke. Gunshots rattled as if through honey; through a decadent dream.
Stunned, the two remaining guards lifted weapons, stepping forward as realisation gripped their brains in its claws and forced them into stuttering action. Amba dropped the ski blade and leapt, right hand slamming the man on the right in the throat. He staggered back, coughing, as the other guard opened fire and Amba twisted, stepped back, and slammed the weapon down, ploughing bullets into frozen earth; she grabbed his hair and rammed his head into the brazier. The coals sizzled and he screamed and thrashed, but she held him there until he went still. When she eventually let go, she drew twin P7s and focused on the six patrolling guards - three groups of two - who had now noticed her arrival.
Neat, said Zi.
Fuck off and let me work.
Well, you know, if you need a hand...
From you, bitch, I will never need a hand. Just remember why you’re here, why we’re linked, and keep your damn thoughts to yourself.
The guards were shouting and pointing, and their comrade’s hair was on fire, face a mass of bubbling melted flesh as he flopped back limp from the brazier. They growled and opened fire, bullets whining, tracer flashing, kicking up earth and ripping into the gurgling figure whose windpipe Amba had crushed. Amba dropped to one knee and both P7s fired, methodically, systematically, bullets slapping across the killing ground and sending guards sprawling. Two down. Four down, machine gun bullets eating the night sky. Amba rolled right, and the final guards were charging towards her, faces grim under black matt helmets, eyes furious, guns levelled. Machine gun bullets ate across the frozen soil, and several pinged from the brazier behind her. Coolly, Amba dropped the spent mags from her weapons and slotted in fresh ammo. A bullet scraped past her arm, slicing the flesh; another grazed her neck, nicking her skin with a lover’
s bite. And they were there, huge men, heavily muscled, towering over her as she suddenly stood and flipped backwards, landing in a crouch, and two pops and a disintegration of lips and teeth and tongues and brain-mush beyond signified the end of the guards. They carried on running, out of sheer weight and momentum, passing Amba on either side before they finally hit the dirt on their destroyed faces.
Amba stood slowly and conducted a quick scan of the courtyard, where cobbles lay rimed in ice. She looked to the far doorway, the edges lit from within, and kicked into a fast sprint, stopping to one side of the portal. She reached out and flung open the heavy oak door, and machine gun fire screamed, opening the night like a zip.
It would seem they spotted you, soothed Zi in her mind, easing in there like cream into coffee, smelling the kill, the promise of the kill, and the need to take possession. The need to take control and... break free. Have some fun.
Focused and unwilling to chat, Amba grunted and rolled across the opening in a quick blur, loosing one shot down the corridor. The guard behind his mounted HMG fell hard and slid across the terracotta tiled floor.
They should give you a medal...
Will you SHUT UP!
Amba appeared silhouetted against the night and drifted along the cold tiles. She reached an intersection and paused, listening, recalling the layout of the facility. She eased up a tight spiral staircase, both P7 pistols before her, but met no more guards. There were more, though; there were always more.
She reached the top. Another corridor, dimly lit. At the end, she knew, was her target. She stopped, and looked around the corridor. She shrugged, and strode forwards, and her acute hearing detected the hiss of gas. Still she walked, and the hissing increased and now she spotted the nozzles set in the ceiling, could see a vapour easing free. No doubt some terrible toxin. Some violent and deadly poison.
Amba glanced up with interest, and walked on.
She stopped by the door, which was reinforced with steel. It was large, and heavy, and she took a deep breath and a step back, and front-kicked the door from its hinges and locks with a screeching groan of tortured steel. The door clattered across the room and half-crushed a large oak desk into firewood. Amba stepped inside and stared at the shocked man, seated to one side behind the part-obliterated desk and aiming a pistol at her. He fired and she twitched, a bullet whining past her head. Another shot spun towards her on a column of hot gas, and again Amba shifted so subtly she hardly appeared to move, and the bullet passed between arm and flank, making a dull thunk in the rich wood panelling lining the room. Amba dropped, and a small black knife appeared in hand from her boot. The knife whined, sticking in the man’s shoulder, and he cried out, fingers twitching spasmodically, forcing him to drop the gun.
Amba walked forward carefully, eyes scanning the room.
“Where is it?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Mid-stride, she drew a second knife from an inverted chest-sheath and leapt onto the flattened, armoured door, walking up to stand on the table, towering over the man.
“One more chance.”
“I have absolutely no idea...”
“Have it your way,” she said, face neutral.
~ * ~
After the screams, the whimpers, the pleading and the dying were done, Amba stepped from the smashed doorway carrying a small black case. She wiped a stray droplet of blood from her cheek and pulled free a tiny alloy ECube, which unfolded like a blood-dark flower in her small hand. It had the appearance of something extremely delicate and technologically advanced; in reality, it was very, very tough and technologically advanced.
“Maul, I need that airlift.”
“Fifteen minutes, Amba,” came his friendly bear-rumble. “I’ll grab you from the south tower.”
Five minutes later she climbed the stairs to the tower, eyeing her recent handiwork. The tower guard was slumped back against the wall, one arm thrown over his head, a bullet hole in one cheek, the back of his skull decorating the rough stones like Maju art. He looked strangely at peace, and Amba crouched by him, staring into glassy eyes.
“Was it worth it?” she asked.
Is it ever worth it? mocked Zi. Come on Amba, time to move. Next, you’ll be giving the fucker a bedtime kiss!
Amba climbed onto the narrow ledge, glancing at the vast drop to the rough earth and cobbles below. She leaned back, clipped the briefcase to her belt, hooked her fingers onto the ice-slippery tiles, swung out over the abyss, legs dangling, and hauled herself onto the steep slope with a grunt. Slowly, stooped, she walked up to the apex and stood, boots planted on the ice, surveying the land around her and the decimated base beneath. Snow-peppered forests spread off in every direction for fifty klicks, and Amba stood like a Queen surveying her Night Realm, head held high, eyes bright. Too bright. Almost as if they glinted with unshed tears.
Her ECube buzzed. “Three minutes,” came Maul’s rumble. “Did you bring the... General with you?”
“No, I’m... alone,” said Amba. “He didn’t make it.”
“Shit, Amba. You were supposed to bring him in alive!”
“He had a different agenda.”
“Romero’s gonna go fucking crazy, man.”
“He’ll have to go crazy, then, won’t he?”
She killed the transmission and breathed deep. Below, eleven corpses decorated the snow and ice-flecked earth. Even from this distance, Amba could see fresh bullet-chips in the stone. No doubt the Earth’s Oblivion Investigators, and the Ministers of Joy, would read the battle and understand exactly what she was. And of what she was capable. But then, they’d created her, so they shouldn’t fucking complain.
Maul’s words came back to her: Romero’s gonna go fucking crazy, man.
And as the Manta hummed low over distant forest, smashing through the night with rotors thumping and jets burning, so Amba smiled again, and gave a small nod. She would take any punishment without comment. For an Anarchy Android, an engineered human, an engineered killer and servant to the Ministers of Joy, this was simply expected.
Androids had no right of appeal.
~ * ~
THE MONOLITH CORPORATION™
Official Advertisement
AUDIO [deep male voice - think Clinty Eastwood]:
The Monolith Corporation™ in association with Earth’s Oblivion Government presents,
A Theme Planet™ Production!
VIDEO [close up]:
A man dressed in colourless, shapeless clothing. This man is a bland and colourless human. He is bowed with age, face wrinkled and worn by the ravages of time. The dude is defeated and... queuing... what he is queuing for is not quite clear, but the old bro is queuing and the queue is a long one; a very long one - [camera pulls back/smooth tracking shot]. The queue is an incredible and horizon-bending vast and terrible queue! A queue to make you sick! A queue to make you slit your wrists!
VIDEO [close-up]:
Watery blue eyes surrounded by wrinkles convey an inner message of emptiness, frustration and despair. CUT TO: The old man’s feet shuffling forward a step, then pulling back again to show thousands and thousands of people shuffling forward... all by a single step.
AUDIO:
A deep and throaty sigh [followed by the deep male voice again, think Minkles Caine]:
Are you tired of your life? Your existence? Your age, dude, your fucking age?
Are you disgruntled with an eternity of pointless queuing?
Like you get in every damn theme park ever created, bro?
VIDEO [close-up]:
A nod. Resignation. Disillusionment.
AUDIO:
Are you tired of your... molecules?
VIDEO:
The eyebrows lift, questioning. That old face is now full of dawning wonder, and suddenly filled with intelligence and inspiration and hope. Hope! Open, in fact, to the suggestion of a new and incredibly life-changing experience!
AUDIO:
Well dude, there’s no need
to be.
VIDEO:
Suddenly, this world-weary example of humanity’s disintegration is disassembled, beamed through the glowing atmosphere of Theme Planet™ - and reassembled with a look of total orgasm. The old man’s face is filled with new youth. Vitality. Eagerness. Energy, baby, fucking energy! He looks horny as hell.
AUDIO [song/accompanied by happy jolly music]:
It’s better than drugs!
It’s better than sex!
It’s fun, it’s fast, it’s neat..
If you haven’t been sick, you soon will be!
Zip through a thousand light years on... The Molecule Machine™!
VIDEO:
Molecules swirling to form an old man’s young smile.