Tethered Worlds: Blue Star Setting

by Gregory Faccone

  "Can you not sense the mystic in it, Jorh-Dahk?"

  In a flash of insight he knew she was right. It explained everything. He could almost grasp the mystic part of Vanquo's compy now that he knew it existed. Almost.

  "Who are you people?" Nuria asked. "You're not imprimaturs."

  "Mystic and scientum? A hybrid?" Jordahk put two and two together, and the answer made his heart palpitate. "Archivers!"

  Abruptly, Jordahk's compy wrist became very heavy. It pressed down upon the table so hard he thought it would collapse. Khai gasped as the numenium coupling came to life. He felt an intense, localized pain in his brain that went far beyond the reach of whatever Khai was doing to help. A biting heat prickled his scalp.

  Hovering above Gaspar's crumbling block house, Judicum watched with passivity the coming onslaught. Then, the multiple rings of runes in his collar began to counter-rotate. Jordahk blinked his eyes rapidly in the real world as sweat poured into them, but it made no difference to his mystic vision. A force to be reckoned with was coming to life. Judicum solidified.

  The rotating runes glowed. Judicum's belt flared, as if a sun was reflecting off the platinum group metals of its construction. He began to move of his own accord, and Jordahk stepped back mentally.

  "Oh crud..." It was all he could think to say.

  Vanquo couldn't help but notice. "What's this? Putting on a final show for me before the end?" But there was a tinge of doubt in his voice.

  The gray probe and pulse troops attacked the former apparition. No longer a ghost, the shots bounced off. Grenades exploded all around him, not even leaving him singed.

  "Somehow, we have full resonance contact," Max said. "I think I'm getting used to the impossible."

  "Wixom... finish the mission." Jordahk found it hard to think. The intensity was almost intolerable.

  "It'll only take a few seconds now."

  Judicum's eyes flashed osmium blue, and he swept one arm dramatically. A glowing cutting-edge of the same color arced out over the terrain, cutting every soldier in half. The troops disappeared in energy wisps, and the grenadiers in fleeting dome explosions.

  "What is this?" Vanquo said.

  The virtual being of metal and light lowered to the ground and lifted his arms. The last hidden mini-tank flew into his hands. It glowed red hot, then white, until it blazed like a sun. He wound up and hurled the star at the first wedge of oncoming tanks.

  It detonated between the first two, causing them to flare into tremendous balls of energy. Those engulfed the next two tanks, and they, too, blossomed into white heat, which swallowed the final two. A burning V-shape was all that was left of six static torpedoes.

  It faded, and Judicum began to walk forward. The ground built and flattened before him, keeping his steps steady and unrelenting.

  With expanded clarity, Jordahk perceived more than the digital terrain of what could no longer be called a thresh. He also perceived what was happening around Vanquo's and Gaspar's compies. The conflagrations within the computer battle were now echoing across the balcony. Thugs and Polis looked about in concern.

  Vanquo grimaced. "Whoever you are, you're going to be very sorry."

  Judicum continued forward, unabated. He passed out of Gaspar's territory and crossed the once muddy road as it raised, solid beneath his feet. The second set of tanks, the oncoming wall, curved around him. When they were all an equal distance, they charged unnaturally fast. Jordahk sensed a tremendous burst of calculations in Vanquo's compy. As the tanks converged, they cracked open, allowing light rays to burst forth.

  They plowed into Judicum simultaneously. There was a tremendous flash on the battlefield, and the ground heaved outward in a wave. On the restaurant balcony, a thunderous boom sounded. Something shattered, and people shouted on both levels. A flaming mushroom cloud rose over the battlefield.

  "That had the power of an e-nuke," Max said.

  Vanquo smiled.

  The e-nuke churned in place, focusing its power. The battle appeared over. Then a dark image formed at the edge of the cloud. It shone brighter with each passing second until Judicum emerged, marching unwaveringly. He wasn't singed, and his eyes blazed burnished iridium. Looking into them was like beholding the heart of a fusion reactor.

  An ugly expression crossed Vanquo's face. He wound up to punch the old man again. But at the height of his backswing current arced across his entire body, and he spasmed wildly. None of the arcs went past Gaspar's compy bracelet, where their forearms were clasped.

  The restaurant floor broke discipline, and many rushed the door. It was more chaos than the few Polis were prepared to handle.

  Vanquo continued to writhe under the arcs of current, his men unable to aid him. When the energy subsided, his eyes were wild. He pulled frantically to break his arm lock with the old man. After multiple tries, he finally ripped free. They both fell back on their butts, and Vanquo let out a crazed cackle. The VADs around him faded.

  But before more was said, Jordahk felt himself tapped even deeper, and the mysterious bridge extended again. It already went from his compy to Gaspar's. Now it added another leg, pushing a few meters more to Vanquo's. The VADs returned, brighter than ever.

  "What the drak?" Vanquo said. "Impossible!"

  Jordahk felt stretched through the bridge, contorted and squeezed. Try as he might to keep them separate, the mystic world and the real one were merging in his mind.

  "You're not real," Vanquo said. He sounded like a man trying to convince himself. "Do you want to see the real power of a hybrid, you unreal thing? You don't know who you're dealing with!" Whatever pretenses of secrecy he had been operating under were gone.

  On the battlefield, the sky grew darker. It flashed a few times before unleashing a lightning bolt upon the still closing Judicum. His raiment turned white for an instant. When the bolt was gone, the ground smoked, but Judicum continued his inexorable strides, moving ever closer.

  Vanquo let out a stream of profanity and loosed a torrent of lightning bolts upon the irrepressible ghost of Thule-Riss Quext. Beams of coherent light flared off Judicum in every direction, but his incessant pace continued unabated.

  Suddenly, his voice boomed in both worlds. "I'm coming for you, Vanquo Vaporean." It was chilling.

  "Wixom, Max, did you do that?" Jordahk asked.

  "We haven't touched that thing since it came alive," Max said.

  Judicum glanced upward, and the dark clouds began to swirl, forming a whirlpool in the sky. It flashed brilliantly before 12 lightning bolts unleashed upon Vanquo's core block house. They launched with even precision, one a second, like a bomb timer in an action cineVAD. Vanquo flinched with every hit, and his compy hand clenched into a fist. When the last bolt struck, the block house blew outward, bricks streaking so far they disappeared from sight.

  The walls that would have made up the inner partitions were also blown away, and only a giant, dark egg shape remained in the center. It was streaked with thick swirls of shiny platinum and mirror rhodium.

  "I can get to his files," Wixom said.

  "Do it. Get what you can before it's too late!"

  Judicum came to a halt and reached out his hand. A deep, low rumbling filled both worlds. Jordahk felt intense pressure in his head and knew it was multiplied a million times against that exposed core. A cracking sound joined the rumble.

  Gaspar looked weak, but he was conscious enough to see Vanquo squirming. "I don't think he cared for your dancing comment." He grimaced at the suddenly pathetic sight. "Sowing and reaping, Vanquo."

  Vanquo tried desperately to open his clenched fist. His muscles spasmed. He tried to pull back the finger with the compy ring. Smoke rose from it. A sizzling sound was followed by the smell of burnt flesh.

  Vanquo screamed. "Get it off me! Get it off me, dammit!"

  Three men tried to pry his hand open. They jerked back when they touched the red hot ring.

  Judicum continued to stand there, arm outstretched. His flaming eyes became the color of
burnished numenium. Purple-white light lit the battlefield and the cracking core.

  Finally, the men pried Vanquo's hand open. Another man wrapped his hand in cloth to rip the ring from his boss's smoking finger. As he did, the cloth caught fire.

  The VADs didn't fade. Judicum continued without remorse, his outstretched hand clenched into a fist. Cracks spread across the entire surface of the egg representation, and it crushed abruptly to half its size. The pressure was too much for Jordahk. His own body was being crushed, and breath could no longer enter his lungs.

  "Judicum," Jordahk croaked, "enough!"

  The egg crushed one more time, down to the size of a super-dense marble. Judicum opened his hand, and the marble fell with a great impact, sinking into a crater. He turned and looked Jordahk in the eye. The penetrating stare made Jordahk recoil as if his every molecule was exposed. Judicum flashed toward him, growing large, then disappeared.

  Jordahk experienced a zooming out sensation. The multi-dimensional world streaked away from him, leaving only the chaotic restaurant floor. He blinked sweat from his eyes. Khai's hand was still atop his. Awareness of the here-and-now came rushing back. Nuria was standing and looking about nervously.

  "I have to get back to the apartment," she said. Her voice was tremulous. "Sosimo will be escorted home soon."

  "Go. We'll meet you there." They should try to maintain some scrap of normalcy. Nuria stiffly added herself to the crowd forcing their way out. "Wixom, do what you can to keep her below notice."

  The tumult was hardly less up on the balcony. Vanquo's burnt finger was stuffed in a water tumbler as he shouted at the goons dragging Gaspar away. Jordahk removed his hand, and Khai opened her eyes, blinking a glassy stare. Her skin wasn't its usual complex ivory; it was scarily white. As she sat back in the chair, her head lolled unnaturally. Her eyes could not focus on him.

  Jordahk's entire body was covered with sweat his clothes were still processing. The cooling of his coat was finally catching up, although his head still felt the aftereffects of the fiery heat. Khai was covered in a fine sheen of perspiration, but down either side of her face, from the temples, were streams of sweat. He felt her head. It was burning up.

  He poured his tumbler of water over her, trying to hold the cooling cubes atop her scalp with his hand. He did the same with her tumbler. With both hands on her head, he closed his eyes and concentrated. What he could do was an unknown, but he had to try. In a half-minute, the overtaxed cooling cubes lost their charge. Thankfully, with all the commotion, no one noticed his actions. Finally he felt their empowering connection.

  "Thank the Creator."

  Her eyes fluttered and focused. "Jorh-Dahk. We were victorious."

  "Khai!" Jordahk was tongue-tied, vacillating between anger and relief. "Khai... Don't risk yourself like that. We only do so when absolutely necessary, and with a plan."

  So this is how Aristahl felt when chiding him for unnecessary risk—though Jordahk thought this one worth the gamble. Perhaps she felt the same way.

  She lowered her head. "I did not anticipate such power, such heat. It was more than I could bear. Next time I shall be more prepared."

  "Next time?" Jordahk grabbed Nuria's water. "Drink this down, all of it. We have to get out of here. They're taking Gaspar away, probably to an airlock."

  He snatched the nutriment container and they slipped out with the last of the crowd.

  "Do not blame Judicum," Khai whispered. "He refused to let me bear the added burden from his presence."

  That was something to be thankful for. A supernova with a conscience. As they exited, Jordahk glanced back at the balcony. Vanquo, red-faced and disheveled, was looking their way.

  They ran down the alley with the long loping strides of half-gravity. A gate, designed to stop full-gravity through traffic, barred their way. Jordahk leaped up the corner where barrier and wall met. Using momentum, he bounced back and forth until he reached the top. He mantled over, landing with a roll.

  Khai angled toward the wall and jumped high. She made it halfway up, pushing off hard to propel herself to the top of the barrier. She made it all look like a gymnastics routine and pushed herself to a handstand before dropping gracefully over it.

  They picked up the pace, joined hands, and turned the corner onto the service way that ran behind the restaurants. Four goons were laying Gaspar down on a portable, unfolding stretcher.

  Max amplified their audio.

  "The old man's easy enough, but how do we get rid of the compy? The boss wants nothing left," one goon said.

  "I think the boss is owed favors down in fusion. They'll do it," another answered.

  "Can you see if they're armed?" Jordahk asked.

  "They have bracers, currently off, or I wouldn't be able to give you much," Max said. "They've got incapacitators, one has a long blade, one a pocket pistol in a treader holster." He highlighted the two with extras on their rets.

  Jordahk adopted a panicked expression. "Come on!" he yelled. "All that smelting ruckus. The Polis saw us. We can't get caught again."

  He bounded forward, pulling Khai behind. He had chosen the panicky role. Khai's cool demeanor wouldn't sell it.

  They raced towards the men, adding enough confusion to prevent dangerous long-range action.

  "Hey, get out here if you know what's good for you," a goon said.

  Jordahk dropped the nutriments and turned as if he was obeying. Grabbing Khai's arm with his other hand, he hurled her forward with enhanced strength. After their experience on the scout, half-gravity fighting was fresh, and they were well acquainted with each other's strengths. Khai put her feet in front of her, and twirled like a missile into the goon with the pocket pistol.

  His head jerked forward while his body was flung back. Khai pushed off the man's chest and angled for another goon, whose head she clotheslined with arm outstretched. She acted no differently than she had during their infamous workout. She seemed unafraid and exhilarated.

  Doesn't she know this is dangerous?

  "They've gone bracers on," Max said. A sleeve rolled back on their arms, revealing the metallic devices, and Max added an outline on the rets.

  Jordahk reached his goon, who had just enough time to adopt a ready stance. If he was more skilled he would have adopted a lighter stance to parry the incoming speed. Jordahk took what was offered, leaping high enough to put a treader heel into his solar plexus. The man staggered back but stayed on his feet. He was tough and meaty.

  The goon Khai clotheslined was staggering. She put an arm around his neck and spun him, her feet pivoting. It almost looked like something belonging on the dance floor. After two revolutions she let the man fly into the wall. He hit with a deep thud and slid down, unconscious. The irony would be if he was one of the goons who had done a similar thing the day before.

  Jordahk had to get back to his opponent, the biggest of the bunch, but knew the fourth goon had to be engaged enough to keep him from escalating the weaponry. That instant, Khai flowed by the fourth goon on her way back to the first. She hardly slowed, but the man's feet were abruptly swept. He hung in the air, doing a back flip before hitting the ground. She had bought them some time.

  Jordahk charged his opponent and landed a decent shot to his jaw. The man was more ready than he had looked. He moved with the punch and grabbed Jordahk's arm in his giant hand. It was a typical move for someone large. A spike of anxiety flickered to life. Despite all the training, Jordahk still lacked full confidence in hand-to-hand combat. But his goon wasn't trained, and Pankido relished such grabs, regardless of an opponent's size. With a twist to the weak part of the hand, Jordahk freed his arm, faked a face strike to throw the man off balance, and got a double grip on his bracer wrist.

  He felt a tremendous vibration go through his hand onto the bracer. It almost caused him to lose his grip. Ducking under the arm, Jordahk lifted the goon's wrist high from behind and torpedoed him into the ground. The man was a bull and wouldn't lose consciousness. But the one Khai swep
t was recovering and had to be dealt with.

  The leg-swept man rolled, and with surprising swiftness, drew his incapacitator. Jordahk got to him just in time to wrestle over it.

  Khai looked like she was dancing around her first opponent, but his trained eye saw they were exchanging numerous blows, though the goon's were all missing. If the girl saw an attack coming, she was almost impossible to hit. Jordahk had drawn the meatiest goon, but she the most skilled.

  While he and his goon wrestled over the incapacitator, Jordahk noticed the outline missing around the meaty goon. Had Wixom, that cunning machine, deactivated the man's bracer with just that brief contact?

  Max picked up on the familiar patterns lighting up Jordahk's brain. "His bracer's definitely off."

  Jordahk felt his hands buzz, and knew the fire system of the incapacitator was similarly compromised. He used footwork to turn his opponent toward the meaty man, and forced the weapon up.

  "Fire," Jordahk said.

  The report of an incapacitator was an annoying full-spectrum sound, with extra emphasis on the highest frequencies. A yellowish line of distortion connected with the meaty man, and low frequency bounce-back sound returned. He looked shocked to be hit, shook violently while trying to cover his ears, and collapsed to the ground.

  Jordahk twisted the ugly weapon from the man's hand, breaking a finger in the process, and gaining separation. Since the remaining goons still had operational bracers, he let the stor-all on his belt grab the incapacitator. He moved in to shut down his opponent, but just as fast as the goon had drawn the incapacitator, he drew a handle with his good hand. A short sword unfolded in a flash from it.

  "This just keeps getting better," came to Jordahk's mind, but he resisted the urge to say it again. After all, this was a fight of his choosing. But what option did he have? Let them take Gaspar away?

  The goon slashed with the sword. Jordahk dodged most of it, and his coat shrugged off the rest. In typical Pankido thinking, he had to get inside sword range, but the goon, while not overly skilled, was fast.