Fade

by Chad West

  Neighbors were huddled in their yards, whispering, pointing. He would drive it on the rim. Getting away was all that mattered. He couldn’t be… His head swam, then bright circles of pain began to radiate behind his eyes. He pulled at the door handle and felt it give, felt his hand slide from it, felt himself falling. The sirens were so close, then so far away.

  ***

  “I have known, Kah’en,” Aern towered over his beaten servant, his leathery black skin shining with sweat. Two Fade warriors held Kah’en up by his blood-clothed arms, “and have waited.”

  Kah’en opened his mouth to speak, but coughed instead.

  “This Jonas is not as clever as he thinks, either.” Aern’s yellow smile and bright red eyes seemed to float before him, the darkness settled in the woods almost as dark as Aern’s skin now.

  “There are others.” Kah’en managed to say.

  “Yes, and only you know who they are. But it just took one to betray you. And you are the head of this foolish revolt; I will cut that off and the body will die.”

  “Then do it. But,” Kah’en’s breath came hard, “know that you are dishonoring the—”

  Aern pulled loose the scepter that always hung at his side and swung it into Kah’en’s face. “You. You will live to watch your revolt die. But you will no longer speak to me.” Aern was shaking. “I trusted you, warrior. You were of the Queen’s chosen!” he said in a hiss.

  Aern turned, walking away, then stopped, his back turned, a dozen gray, crisscrossed scars standing out like light there. His thick neck twisted a little to his right, but merely enough for Kah’en to hear him. “You began to say that I am dishonoring our people. Our tradition. No? You are wrong. I am doing what billions of our people would not. I am restoring order. I am making right the Universe.” Aern dropped his eyes to the black thatch of trees sprawled out before him. “This is why I will always be your master. The humans call us murderers and heartless. I dare not think we are either. We simply strive for a higher purpose. You used to know this, Kah’en.

  “When our Queen rises, we will take our place as the Universe’s center, and all will be as it should. Are we to be reviled for this? For merely fulfilling our destiny? For ridding the world of those who would oppose? The Queen would do no less, and our Queen is perfection.” Aern sighed. “I do not revel in your death, Kah’en. Know this. You were a great warrior and representative of our Queen. But no more.”

  The lone sound for a time was Kah’en’s labored breathing.

  “You may have one more word with me. I grant it to you,” Aern said, in what Kah’en imagined was nostalgia for their past relationship. But Kah’en did not hedge.

  “The Queen is majesty. You were our greatest hope of finding her. You speak of destiny, but you just swing your blade wildly in frustration now, Aern. You will end us. Because this great expedition is no longer about the great Queen reborn, but about you.”

  Aern was silent, but his fists were tight balls. “You have lost your faith, Ka— Traitor. Death is too good for you.” With this he walked away. Kah’en’s eyes widened. He had just been given a sentence far worse than any slow death Aern could have imagined for him. He would be banished.

  THIRTEEN

  Years before, Aern opened his eyes to find himself on the cold wet ground of the battlefield. Defeated, but not dead. A low wail of silence buzzed in his ears. He placed the palms of his hands on them trying to press the high squeal away. Aern pushed himself, sore and stiff, to a sitting position. Ash and snow eddied about the pavement where his army lay dead. There had been ten of them, and they’d been ambushed by the Earthers where there weren’t supposed to be any Earthers. The sound of the wind slowly replaced the whine in his shell-shocked ears.

  He stood, ignoring the trembling in his long, barrel-wide legs. Armor, which once gleamed in the bright of day like the corona of a star falling upon you, or the bright rage of some mad god, was dull now. He was bleeding, but a quick examination let him know he would live. But they had left believing him dead. His enemies had left him to rot, running off too soon to brag of how they had abolished his terrible reign. They would wish they had put a bullet in his head, or lopped it off. Eventual defeat was inevitable, time and fate decided such, but defeat from which a warrior rose and left the enemy unpunished was unfathomable.

  Great gusts pressed on him; sore and weak, he was unbent. The elongated skull of some alien beast hung from his shoulder, clanking hollowly against his metallic side. He narrowed his eyes against the onslaught of wind and snow, studying each of the dead—some human, most his. Two of his men seemed to have escaped. He took a few, limping steps forward and crouched to close the eyes of one of his dead. It was in that action that he knew the scepter was gone.

  He searched the ground, scorched from their battle, struggling to see through the growing mist of snow that was foreign to his planet. The scepter was nowhere. The smell of blood, thick and heavy, and the odor of wasted rounds and explosives tinged the air. He would remember that smell. It would be the odor he gave back to them—both for their attack and for even touching the scepter. It was the element that linked them to their great Queen, and he believed it would be his duty to put it back in her hands at her resurrection.

  It had been morning during the battle, and now the veil of dusk was lowering as he made his slow way back to camp. It was possible, he thought, that one of the surviving warriors had taken the scepter, also believing him dead. But he feared this was empty hope. The humans would already suffer, either way, but for this, for the Queen, he would march forward without pause, wading in their blood until he retrieved her scepter.

  ***

  “Jonas.” The voice was pleased, but tired.The heavy doors into the lab closed behind a professorial-looking man wearing the gray fatigues of the Resistance Army. Jonas, his brown hair a curtain over his downturned head, looked up from the microscope he was peering into. “Turner. I heard your battalion ran into a small group of the Fade and both kicked their ass and brought me a present.” He smiled, which felt unnatural, like he’d almost forgotten how.

  Turner smiled back, set a metal box on Jonas’ workstation, and lifted a rod no more than two feet long from it. It was the color of bleached bone, but straight, a small bulb at its end—a round, amber jewel. “What you think it does, J? I’ve been scared it was going to explode or something the whole way here.” He chuckled and handed the thing to Jonas, who stood to receive it.

  “May just be some sign of that bastard’s leadership. Nobody’s ever reported seeing him using it as a weapon. But the big sucker carries it wherever he goes. I don’t care if it’s just a stick as long as it pisses somebody off that we got it.” He ran his fingers down its shaft, which was rough, cool to the touch. “How the hell did you guys manage to catch Aern with so little protection?”

  Turner cocked his head to the side, shrugged. “Arrogance. Didn’t think we’d be there. That area is lousy with those freaks. But we had found a supply depot they hadn’t found yet. Bottom line, our desperation paid off. We got the supplies. We had a couple casualties, but brought down the big man.”

  “Mm,” Jonas said and took a deep breath. He walked to the other end of the room where he placed the rod onto a circular platform and punched in a few commands. He stepped back and watched as the platform began to turn, sliding the rod under a metal arm which scanned it. The platform came alive with color as the machine started analyzing the rod, laser-light bouncing off its surface. Jonas was sure they would find out very little from Aern’s scepter, but it felt good to have it. “Maybe we turned some kind of tide,” he looked at Turner, “taking Aern down.”

  “Hope like hell so.”

  A screen began listing the dimensions of the object, its weight and what the rod was composed of. This was about all Jonas expected to get. But, he thought, he might just display the thing above his fireplace once they won the war. Then something caught his eye. “What the heck?” Jonas took a step closer to the screen and then Turner joined h
im. The data the computer was spitting out in quick, dense streams was far too complex for a simple bludgeon. Another screen came alive next to the first, drawing a more and more complex representation of the rod. Turner narrowed his eyes at the screen Jonas was now almost touching. He asked, “What am I looking at?”

  Jonas didn’t respond for a long time, studying the information. “You see that?” He pushed his finger at an enlarged view of the crystalline structure at the rod’s end. Several long equations scrolled below the image of what might have been a bubble in the jewel. “Up close, that looks a hell of a lot like the power source they use to open their wormholes.”

  Turner frowned. “What does that mean? Is this some version of those boxes?”

  Jonas studied the screen a moment longer, then sat back. “I don’t know. Looks way more complicated. But this thing’s old. Computer says two thousand years, at least.”

  “Doesn’t make sense.”

  Jonas sighed. “Lot of data coming off this thing.” He looked Turner in the face for the first time. There were fat bags under bloodshot eyes. “Go get some rest in one of the bunks. You need it, I’d imagine. I’ll be up most of the night figuring this out.”

  “Well, let me know, man. Thought I was just bringing you a fancy stick.”

  Jonas breathed a laugh. “Bullshit, you thought this thing was going to blow off your hand.”

  The man smiled. “Whatever. I expect my medal of honor to be by the side of my bunk when I wake, buddy.”

  ***

  In the gun-metal light of evening, Aern had stumbled into his stronghold, his anger exceeding his pain, but not by much. His medics came to him, but he pushed their support aside. Each slow step he took left bloody footprints on the floor, but he would take those steps unaided. His men stared, awed and confused. He had all but risen from the dead in their eyes. To fall now was to cast seeds of dissention, doubt. He would be strong, even though he was anything but right then.

  He stumbled before them, summoned a breath and spoke. “The humans have taken our Queen, Mira’s, scepter.” His eyes, thick drops of a fine Bordeaux, moved across the crowd. “Gather. It will be mine again.” With that, he moved away, the medics close behind.

  Nil, Aern’s captain, took his place. “You have heard Aern. Track the scepter and ready yourselves for war.”

  The angry cry, the thirst for blood and vengeance in their growl, pleased Aern as he lay down, pushing his armor from his torn body. In a moment, he slept.

  When he stood whole again before the vast army gathered about him, the earth to his sun, they awaited his command in silence. He savored their yearning for his direction. “We go,” he said, and it was all that he said before walking out in front of them, leading them to the battle none of them doubted they would win.

  ***

  “So, this is some sort of proto-gate design? Is that what you’re saying?” Hud Nelson, the scientist in charge at the bunker which Jonas had called home since the Fade had sliced and diced his brain, barely kept his smile from becoming a full-on grin.

  Jonas found the smile catching. “It has to be. Way more elegant than the Fade’s stuff though. Maybe made by some other culture? Reverse engineered by the Fade to create those gates.”

  “And you can do the same?”

  “I mean, we already had the portal box we scavenged from the battle in Houston.” He ignored the look Hud gave him when he mentioned Houston—that pity that came from anyone who knew what had happened to him there. “But, um, this… This is like finding a blueprint. Just in the past six hours I know twice as much as I did about their technology. If I’m seeing what I think I’m seeing, I believe we can do better than make our own portal. We can cripple anything that runs on that blue juice Earth-wide.” Jonas smiled again. “Permanently, Hud.”

  Hud patted Jonas’ back so hard it stung. He let out what was almost a cackle. “Does Project Omega have this information yet?” He stood rod straight, arms akimbo. “This is outstanding!”

  “Sent it out this morning.”

  “Damn. I’m sure as hell glad you’re here, Jonas. You were a damn good soldier, but you were always a nerd genius at heart.”

  Jonas laughed. “I don’t disagree.” He tapped a few keys, “Something else, Hud. I called in Thompson. The technopath.”

  Hud’s face scrunched together.

  “It’s an ability; lets him communicate with technology: control it, rewrite code, break down firewalls. Whatever.”

  Hud smiled. “Don’t know the guy, but he’s got a handy ability.”

  Jonas shrugged, long over being awestruck by special abilities. “Brains, computers. It’s all just electronic signals.”

  “He helpful at all?”

  “Found something. Not sure yet. It was a deep encryption.” He met Hud’s eyes, “I mean real deep. I kind of doubt the Fade even knew about it. I actually don’t think it was meant to be found.”

  “Any idea what it could be?” Hud asked.

  “What he got out so far has similarities to the portal addresses we saw in the Houston box. Actually very similar to Earth’s address.”

  “You said this probably wasn’t even their tech right? Something they stole from another culture? That four-armed lady on their armor? Definitely not Fade. Could be her race this technology came from. Maybe their Queen did come here before.”

  “Well, the address was similar to ours, but… I don’t know, just some strange differences. But, that’s a mystery for another day. Sent that to Omega, too. Thompson’s going to follow up with them. He’s confident he can coax the rest out of the data we sent to Omega.”

  The blast shook the building, almost making them both fall. An alarm railed against the intrusion, and then coughed to a stop. Both men looked at each other, pale.

  “They found us,” Hud said. “Shit. They found us.” He was shaking.

  Jonas stood. “Get some Powereds down here and then head downstairs. There’s more chance you’ll be safe there.”

  Without a word, Hud scrambled to his feet and to a nearby radio. “We need every available Powered in Lab A. Repeat: Lab A. Priority Red.” The radio clattered to the counter and he was gone.

  Jonas armed himself as best he could and punched up the security footage. Three out of the seventeen cameras in the building were already down and Fade warriors filled the view in at least half of the rest. “Damn,” he said, slamming his fist on the counter, seeing Aern striding by one of the cameras. Jonas watched as they tore through the facility, as they came ever closer to the lab. He watched the Powereds that had been dispatched to protect the room torn to pieces just outside. He heard them scream. Jonas saw one of the Fade approach the door and place something on it. The explosion sent him flying into the back wall. In a daze, he watched them fill the room, and as Aern stepped in, they parted. He stopped where his scepter lay and took it. Jonas was losing consciousness, but he saw the smile that Aern gave him before turning to leave.

  FOURTEEN

  The floor was unkind to her bare backside and elbow as Cynthia fell off the bed, now awake. The crumpled, pale bed sheet ran between her legs and over her forearm, the shed skin of a snake that had crept over her sleeping body in the night. She lifted it up and tossed it toward the bed. Her head was full of cotton balls and her eyes painted with a thin glaze. She righted herself and stared through half drawn lids at nothing, trying to get her bearings.

  Joey was at the door, staring at her and she had to will herself to meet his gaze. “I need you to get out of here, Cyn. Got my providers coming by.”

  She nodded, fully realizing that she was naked and thinking that if she sat still long enough he would get the message and give her some privacy. He stayed. She began scouring the floor for the inevitable pile of clothes, just finding a single sock at first. Panic and anger began to rise in her as Joey just stood there, like she might pass out again if he wasn’t watching over her. (Of course, she might, but that was not the point.)

  The greater portions of the deta
ils of the night before were not so much available, but her nudity seemed to tell a story of its own. She slipped on her single sock and crawled around to the front of the bed where, eureka, her pants lay. Her panties were nowhere to be seen, but she pulled her jeans on anyway.

  She retraced vague memories of sniffing, snorting and swallowing anything she could get her hands on. The memory of her argument with Jan returned with a sting. She grimaced and stood on boneless legs, laying her right arm across her breasts as she continued her search from higher ground.

  She gathered the rest of her clothes, threw them on and pushed numb fingers through her dry, ratty hair. She brushed past Joey into the living room, which was empty of people. “Thanks,” she muttered, not sure why. “For the fun,” she added.

  He smiled for the first time. “My pleasure.” He chuckled. “I half figured I’d have to dump your dead ass in a trash bin after the amount of shit you took, girl. Glad you’re among the living.”

  Cynthia frowned. “I guess.”

  “Later then?”

  “Mm,” she moaned, uncertain of anything at the moment, and walked out the door.

  It felt like someone was squeezing her eyes when she stepped into the mid-morning sun. She growled, ground them shut, and shaded them with her forearm, taking a tentative step forward. She tried her best to search the street for her car before remembering that she’d walked there, which took the last of her resolve. Standing in the middle of the road, she let out a heavy sigh that even she could smell. She made her slow way over to a small copse of pines across the street. There, she let herself slip onto the cool ground.

  Women who were men, cabaret rock music, late nights with bottles of red wine and good friends, tattoos that blacked out the pink of her arms and vast amounts of illegal substances. This, dotted with short-lived dalliances with men—who were always the wrong men—and the hard life of a musician: always waking up in a new city, the smell of the last still on her clothes. She would raggedly drag her way into her forties, find her way, settle down with a semi-successful poet or artist from the West Coast and spend the rest of her days waking to the sounds of whooshing waves and the bitter aroma of Java’s best coffee wafting in from the kitchen. That was, in all truth, her dream life.