by JM Guillen
A lot of it.
“When I first learned about Sadhana’s conduit technology, I had no concept of what might power it.” Stone stepped to the edge of the table, showing us how it pivoted and turned with the spin of the gearwheel. “I assumed that, like the Facility, they had found some manual means of axiomatic manipulation.”
“This doesn’t look like anything the Facility does.” Wyatt’s voice held more than a hint of a shudder.
“This is the grand masterwork of Rebecca Thorne.” Stone paused, almost as if waiting to see if we recognized the name.
Rebecca Thorne, Irrational 9108. Anya didn’t miss a beat in bringing up the woman’s intel. “One of the Irrational subjects known to be present during Dossier I63-1998.” Anya glanced at Wyatt and then me. “Her presence was noted in the dossier itself.”
“That woman is a genius.” Stone rested his hand against the stainless steel table, staring at us with dark eyes. “Truly her only Irrational capability. Similar to the Caduceus’ trick of altering the processing speed of a Solomon’s Crown, Rebecca Thorne can alter the rate at which her brain processes information. She can make discoveries and leaps of logic that are exponentially beyond the ability of an average person.”
“That’s quite a trick.” Wyatt turned from Stone to me. “I have to admit, I’d rather deal with your garden-variety necromancer over someone who can always outthink you, every time.”
There are garden-variety necromancers? I linked to Wyatt alone.
“Exactly.” Stone pointed a finger at Guthrie. “There are very few dossiers dealing with Rebecca Thorne directly. However, it is actually not uncommon for us to find out that she orchestrated the Irrational activity.”
“She’s a player then. A manipulator.” I walked over to the device and traced my fingers along the cleverly articulated legs. Each of the mechanisms had a different device at the end of it, things that looked like nothing so much as various kinds of fantastical power tools—misbegotten pincers, oddly curved blades, and something that looked like a small radio dish with an amethyst set in its center.
“More than that.” Stone raised a finger for emphasis. “She’s one of the cosigners on the incorporation paperwork for Sadhana.”
“If I can ask…” Wyatt raised one eyebrow. “Why didn’t the Facility deal with this on a corporate, mundane level? Why aren’t we simply tryin’ to make certain that Sadhana goes out of business or that their stock prices plummet. Surely some fancy business voodoo would make ’em close their doors?”
“We have for the past seven years.” Stone smiled somewhat grimly, apparently pleased that Wyatt had thought to ask. “They continually act through shell corporations, and Sadhana is simply the newest.”
“I wonder why they bother at all.” I stopped inspecting the wicked device and turned to Stone. “Most Irrats are content with forming cults or cabals.”
“This is something new.” Stone wiped at his eyes. “And this device, Thorne’s creation, is just one arm of it.”
“Okay, I give up.” I threw up my hands and then faced Stone. “What does this device have to do with your dossier?”
“Everything.” Stone leveled his gaze at us. “The source of Irrational conduit technology isn’t technology at all.” He paused for effect, his projected voice gone low. “Instead I saw Thorne strap an Irrat in this thing. She calls it the Essential Auric Siphon.”
“Siphon?” Wyatt frowned. “You’re saying she’s taking something from the Irrats?” Wyatt blinked, horrified. “Suckin’ it out of ’em somehow?”
“She strapped someone into that thing?” I stared at the wide splotch of blood on the floor. “And the Irrat was the source of their conduit?”
“Yes.” Stone nodded gravely. “Rebecca’s ‘subject’ at the time of my dossier was a young woman who hadn’t dwelt in Rationality for many years. Her entire tribe had been cast into Topiatic Locality 287. The Facility has designated her Subject X.”
Stone spun the table so that we had a good view of the array of convoluted mechanisms at the top of it. “I have no idea how long the young woman had been held here. I only know that she didn’t speak any language that my Crown could translate and that her torture was horrific.”
“But to what end?” Even Anya seemed incapable of understanding. “Did they torture Subject X to force her to use her Irrational capabilities for them? Was she a temporal aberrant of some kind?”
“She was indeed.” Stone reached to the inside of his jacket and pulled forth the small glass canister again. “But she wasn’t being forced to do anything. More like they were sucking the raw fuel from her.”
That captured violet light capered and cast twisted shadows against the lab equipment.
With absolutely no ceremony, Stone fitted the canister into a small recess in the side of the mechanism with a small snap.
“The Essential Auric Siphon,” I repeated. It horrified me. “So they capture this young woman, they strap her into this device…”
“Somehow, it drinks her Irrationality.” Wyatt slowly nodded.
“It doesn’t drink it. Not exactly.” Stone retrieved his small canister with an audible click. “It doesn’t consume anything. It draws the substance out and stores it in these canisters.” He held the tube aloft.
“But… Why?” Anya seemed unconvinced, as if Stone had told her that the sky were red.
“These containers function as small batteries.” Stone tossed his upward, caught it, and put it back in his pocket. “They designed small bracelet devices. These containers snap into the devices and allow them to alter the axioms of time and space.”
“Well, that’s fucking neat.” Wyatt turned to me. “The Irrats get personal teleportation devices, and we have to request an act of Congress just to get a conduit for an extraction.”
I nodded as he spoke, but I felt distracted. I remembered the Padre and his two companions back in The Spire.
“Wait a minute!” One awful thought chased another as I sought the full horror of this place.
“Hoss?”
For a moment, I went silent, gears turning as the vast hatefulness ticked over in my mind.
“So down here, on Level-fucking-Topaz or whatever, Thorne is running her Essential Auric Siphon—running it with Irrats on that table. It’s torture.”
“Exceedingly nasty torture,” Stone’s voice turned grim.
“Then she’s placing some kind of energy or essence or force into those things,” I continued, pointing at Stone’s canister, “and building devices that can harness the Irrat’s power.”
“That’s correct.” Stone nodded, perhaps pleased he had hammered something through my skull.
“While up there,” I observed, pointing to the ceiling, “telemarketing cultists are enticing Irrats to give themselves over to Sadhana, to come to them for sanctuary!” I glanced back to Stone. “Is that right? Sadhana offers them safety from us, only to end up as raw materials for Thorne?”
“It’s worse than that.” Stone almost chuckled, but the sound had no humor. “Why do you think the sales staff has such a difficult time getting people to come in? Shouldn’t it be something they are eager to do, to avoid capture by Facility Assets?”
“I—” I hadn’t thought on it much to be honest. “I assume they don’t want to give up their lives; they’re not ready to vanish.”
“That’s certainly part of it,” Stone acknowledged. “But there’s more. Currently, Sadhana is only targeting the most elite customers, typically wealthy families who have children that have shown some aberrant talent.”
“They make them fucking pay?” Wyatt’s eyes went wide with revulsion. “The fuckers make the Irrat’s families pay for the privilege of comin’ in. Then, once they’re here…” He blanched in shock at the horror of it.
“I’m certain it’s presented as a treatment.” Stone’s tone sounded almost philosophical.
“The Facility has the means to gentle an Irrational subject.” Anya seemed uncomfortable comparing the
two. “Although I doubt the process is the same.”
“You can imagine it, of course.” Stone gazed at each of us in turn. “These people, terrified of Facility Assets, pay Sadhana vast sums for sanctuary.” His frown deepened. “Then, after being cut off from their old lives for a few months, they hear about a cure, something that will remove their little irregularity for the rest of their lives.”
“I bet they pay for that too.” I fumed. “I bet they pay whatever Sadhana wants.”
For a long time, the four of us simply stood in awe of Thorne’s horrific device.
When I looked at Wyatt, the bear of a man shook his head.
“I told ya, Hoss.” He sighed. “There’s’ nothing worse.”
“What?” I felt genuinely confused.
Wyatt looked from Stone, to me, and then back to that device, his face grim.
“Fucking telemarketers.”
34
The remainder of Stone’s tale came quickly, far more quickly than he would have preferred.
Understandable. Everyone loved an audience.
“While I planned the extraction, I gathered as many of the containment modules as possible.” He preened, proud of himself. “Before the events of fifteen November, I had forty-six of the little buggers. I even had a carrying case.”
“But only that one now.” I jerked my head toward the pocket where he’d stowed it, half-hoping he would pull the beautiful little glow out again. “Did they all look the same?”
“Oh no.” He smiled a little wistfully. “A veritable rainbow of shines and glowing bits, each in its own little container.”
“What happened?” Wyatt leaned against the wall as far from the Siphon as possible.
“Delacruz initiated conduit 4582, originating in The Spire.” Stone coughed, cleared his throat, and leaned back against the wall behind the Siphon. “I had the Irrational woman, Subject X, in tow—the woman who had been in Thorne’s monstrosity.”
“She just came willingly?” I raised a brow in doubt.
“Not exactly.” He folded his arms. “She had every right to be skittish. I only understood a wisp of her language.”
“What was it like?”
He looked puzzled.
“The wisp of language?” I clarified. “Cantonese, Italian…?”
“Ah.” He nodded his understanding. “Itza. A Mayan language. Almost dead today.”
“Weird,” Wyatt grunted.
“The conduit ignited and all seemed well.” Stone spoke softly, his resonate voice seeming to purr. “But the moment we attempted to traverse, some kind of reaction occurred.”
“Due to the woman?” Anya cleared her throat.
“That’s what I believe.” Stone gave her a tight-lipped smile. “The woman had some fairly powerful control over temporal axioms that emanated from a symbol on her forehead.”
The image that thought presented struck a chord. I again recalled the Irrats within The Spire. This time, memory served up the words of one of the other men.
“Do you think,” the first man asked, peering around, “that her Signum is still awake?” He gestured to his head as he spoke. “In this place?”
Dread settled heavily in my chest.
“I think we have a problem.” I met the gaze of each of my companions. “I think there is some intel that hasn’t been properly processed.”
“In my story, you mean?” Stone quirked his head.
“No. I activated with a cold boot before this all began.” I glanced at Anya, noting the intensity of her cool blue eyes as she gazed at me. “My mission specs stated that I should clear an area of The Spire.”
“Correct.” Anya nodded. “You were intended to clear the conduit foyer. Wyatt was to be inserted, and the two of you would come here. I would have followed.” She paused. “But you were impeded.”
“That’s a long story.” I winked at Wyatt, knowing how impatient he could be. “But the short version is that I encountered three Irrats on site. They bore badges with the Sadhana logo, along with odd bracers I could not identify at the time.” I paused and glanced at Stone. “They were looking for a woman. One of them mentioned a mark of some kind on her head.”
“Michael,” Stone leaned forward. “Does Gideon know this?”
“None of it.” I sighed. “When I finally made the Telemetry Relay Station, the Catalyst was intent on getting me up to speed. He never even asked about my experiences in The Spire.”
“Do you still have the phaneric data?” He frowned and shook his head, irritated at himself. “Of course you do. Would you send me a patch? To memory please?”
“Us too, if it’s no trouble.” Wyatt crossed his large, hairy arms. “Right, princess? You want some’a what pretty boy’s got?”
“It might be helpful.” She smiled almost shyly toward me.
I ported the incident to their memories.
“Oh my.” Stone looked toward me, his eyes wide. “Gideon doesn’t know this?”
“I don’t believe so.” I felt sheepish. “I should have off-ported when briefed.”
Brushing off my self-recriminations, I cleared my throat before patching, Gideon, I have a phaneric port that may apply to your current situation.
Please patch to memory. Gideon felt terse. I’m up to my eyes here.
Will comply.
In all of three seconds, our Catalyst responded. Holy fuck, Bishop. Why didn’t you patch me this earlier?
Things were fluid? I knew he felt my cringe over the link. Honestly, Gideon, I got a little lost in your update.
These assholes are bending temporal physics all over The Spire. He paused. You know this Padre guy, Stone?
He’s a dangerous man. If he’s there, you should know he’s an absolute fanatic. Believes he’s literally doing God’s work.
Wonderful. That pause came again, the one that told me that Gideon felt a little thunderstruck. Stone, why does Sadhana have dampening grenades?
I… Stone perused the data again and then looked to me. I hadn’t noticed that tidbit.
Well don’t look at me. I held up my hands.
Better late than never, Bishop. Thanks for the intel. Gideon didn’t seem angry. I will assume that this all came out while trading stories?
Something like that, Stone linked. I will apprise you when we make our move.
Acknowledged. Gideon vanished.
“Do you think Subject X attempted to use her capabilities as you stepped into the conduit?” Wyatt mused.
Stone cocked his head. “Whatever the cause, there was considerable axiomatic feedback when we attempted the traversal.”
“Feedback?” I hadn’t heard this part.
“The blowback on this end swallowed half a laboratory in an explosion of screeching noise and hurricane level winds. The Irrational woman, as well as a few Sadhana operatives, became engulfed by it.”
“That’s horrifying.” Anya’s head twitched as if she ran logarithms on the possibilities.
“I lost gear as well: my neural lacuna, Wrath-class explosives, and the carrying case with most of the containment modules.” Stone screwed his face into a disappointed grimace.
“And Delacruz. We have a lost Asset.” Wyatt, ever the pragmatist, tried to bring Stone to his point.
“Or…” Stone held up one finger. “Not.”
“I assume Delacruz was engulfed, swallowed up by that same blowback.” I glanced from Anya to Wyatt but neither indicated otherwise.
“Correct.” Stone said.
“Is the Gatekeeper here?” Anya cocked her head. “Is that why you believe we can access her?”
“I’d rather show you.” Stone bent forward, pushing off the wall. “It’s a short trip, but I have a special request.” He grinned craftily. “Could I convince the three of you to switch off your comms just for a moment?”
“Why the hell would we do that?” Wyatt cocked his head.
“Nothing sinister, I assure you.” Stone smiled. “I believe that Michael at least has already experience
d comm malfunction today. Did you have enough?”
“You’re damn straight.” I still remembered that eerie woman and her misbegotten numbers.
“Right,” Stone continued. “The advanced radionics present in some of these labs are absolute murder on Crown subsystems. I’ve found that by switching off comms, there’s no way to receive the emanations.”
“Of course, Demetrius.” Anya nodded.
I shrugged at Wyatt, and we switched off our comms as well.
Stone took point, leading us out the western door and down a flight of stairs that led into another workroom. It held racked cabinets of chemicals and an odd, pulsing orb attached to approximately ten-thousand cables.
I vaguely wondered if a kinetic blast would smash the thing.
We stepped through another door, took a right, and then found a hallway with wide double doors at the far end.
“Now.” Stone smiled, perhaps a touch long at Wyatt. “We are past the interference. Switch on your comms.”
The moment I did, I heard the automatic message. It sounded scratchy and impossibly distant.
My eyes went wide.
“Well, fuck me,” Wyatt swore softly.
This is Sofia Delacruz, Asset 217. I am alive. This message has been broadcasting for 91 hours, since the events of Dossier I88-1998. My systems are currently operational.
I am adrift in an unknown topiatic locality.
Spatial axioms are supra-Rational and contain aberrant vectors. Be advised: there are dangerous creatures native to this location, as well as sentient beings who may be hostile.
Recommend a Caduceus review the following before attempting extraction. Patch incoming.
Noise filled my Crown like steel through a shredder. Blotchy patches of impossible color danced before my eyes as my system attempted to make sense of the patch.
“Ach!” Anya swiftly brought one hand up to her temple. “That link is segmented poorly.” She blinked in anger and pain.
“Ah. Yes.” Stone looked apologetic. “There’s a tiny bit of synapse burn.” Stone agreed. “It’s a miracle we are receiving it at all, likely some quirk of the axiomatic backlash and the thin realmwalls of Sadhana’s laboratories.”