by Lee Bond
Ute followed Innit through a portal, then another, and suddenly they were in an office. From the smell of things –not to mention a few personal touches here and there- they were in Innit’s office, which was damned near just as surprising as the fact that the man was alive after nearly five thousand years being dead. The Fivesie picked up a piece of stray paper and read the information printed on it. “Requisition form for Class ‘A’ narcotics? Really?”
Innit struggled into the reinforced chair he’d commissioned to be built, mindful of the crystal in his chest; he made damn sure that by the time his wide ass was parked, his uniform was covering it as best as possible. The Novinians almost certainly knew he’d made contact and shrouding the blasted thing probably wouldn’t do anything at all beyond pissing them off, but … there were things that needed to be said.
Things he wouldn’t have said, had his Latelian guest been anyone other than Ute Tizhen. The moment he’d laid eyes on the man, though, he’d known his own life was over.
Hell. His life had been over with the moment he’d agreed to come and do this dirty work for the Dusties.
“Specters are a helluva crew, Ute.” The titular ‘commander’ for Trinity’s Military Services gestured for the Goddie to sit down as well but was unsurprised by the refusal. Couldn’t blame the guy. He was in hostile territory, in the presence of the enemy commander, and when they woke up, half a dozen Heavy Elites were going to be pissing and moaning across all the comm channels. “In this kind of deployment, they need to get … recreational from time to time. Even Army is getting in on the racket.”
“This is for doralzapine and sedemide.” Ute dropped the paper onto the desk. “So, you’ve either got Specters and Regular Army who’re up for three weeks at a time who then choose to sleep for a week, or a crew of simultaneously wired and placid soldiers.”
Innit shrugged again. “Weird deployment. Are our guys on the inside making any headway? Not that I expect you to reveal trade secrets or anything. Just … are any of them doing well?”
“Well.” Ute strained his Harmonic senses towards the crystal in Innit’s chest and was mildly shocked to feel his questing intellect gently but firmly rebuffed. Not in any kind of intelligent way, more like … a barely conscious sea creature responding to a threat. Once he pulled his senses far enough away, the defense mechanisms inside the crystal stood down.
“We did use a load of Glory missiles to blow up a bunch of spectacularly assholish Heavies, only … only that didn’t work out so well, I suppose, in the end. Well, for us guys it turned out okay, but for the leaders of our merry band of goofs, not so much. A handful of your guys tried infiltrating small town government, and that was going along super well until their cover got blown on account of how one of them didn’t know the local slang or something. I dunno. I wasn’t really involved in that side of things. I was more … just kind of kicking around with Nickels most of the time.”
“Garth Nickels.” Innit leaned back in his chair, thoroughly enjoying the groaning and squealing from the specially-built hydraulics designed to handle his weight. “If I could travel back in time to stop him from being such a colossal pain in my ass, not only would I do that thing, I’d see if his unkillability was in him right from the start.”
“You trained him?” Now that was interesting! “He wasn’t … he wasn’t like he is now?”
“Hell no.” Innit scoffed at the thought. “When he was dumped in my lap, by Trinity mandate, no less, he was … well, fresh ain’t the word to describe him. One look at the man and you could tell he’d had some kind of training somewhere in the Universe but … he was different. Didn’t know who he was. Lost, inside. Definitely wasn’t the ass-kicker you got now. Whoever he is, whatever he is now, he’s very different than that kid. The kid was likeable, in a fucked up sort of way. Had a real tendency to get himself into serious shit. This one time, right at the beginning? Had Tynedale/Fujihara so hungry for his blood that they’d mobilized against us. Against Special Forces. Got to the point where the other Specters were going to kill him, so the Old Man let him out to take care of business all on his own.”
Ute felt like he’d heard the particulars of this tale from someone before now, but he wasn’t going to interrupt Innit. The feeling that their conversation would soon be going down a very dark, very different path, very quickly, permeated everything. Innit had the aura of an old man telling his last few tales, and if that was the case, the Fivesie was determined to make his old friend happy. “Went sideways?”
“Christ yes.” In his chest, the crystal was growing hot, hot enough to warm the duronium frame it’d been stuck inside, hot enough to make the flesh curling around the exposed system grow uncomfortable. The Novinians. They were growing impatient.
They could go screw.
“I mean, the man taught the entire Conglomerate a very valuable lesson in the process, mind. They see him coming, they all run the other way, but … he kind of destroyed a solar system in the process.”
Ute laughed, thinking of all the damage and mayhem the Engineer had caused, right from the very moment he’d set foot on glorious Hospitalian soil. “Sounds about right. From that to this. What the hell is Trinity thinking?”
Innit shrugged. “No clue, Ute. Not a single goddamn one. The official line is that Nickels is a danger to the continuation of Trinityspace, and since you guys are harboring him … you know how it goes.”
Ute chuckled at Trinity’s assessment of Nickels. “Trinity’s not far off, you know. It’s a lot complicated, but sure, the machine mind has it right enough. Just so you know, Trinity isn’t much better for the continuation of Trinityspace, either. Not now. There’s all kinds of shit…”
Innit held up a hand, tapped the uniform-covered crystal meaningfully. “I know, friend, I know. More than I ever wanted, but … in war we’re not really given a lot of choices. And sometimes the path we take may seem like the right one until we’re too far down it to go back the way we came.”
“What the hell is that thing?” Ute demanded, finally breaking with unspoken protocol; upon a time, he’d had a full conversation with one of his brother soldiers while he’d been pretending to not see the immense blade sticking direct out the side of the man’s skull. The soldier, to his credit, had been more interested in talking about the latest Game stats than acknowledging he’d been leaking brain juice onto his shoulders.
“A binding contract, old friend. One I agreed to because, at the end of the day, no better options presented themselves.” Innit displayed the crystal properly for Ute to see. Bright rays of light spilled out across the desk, kicking, long dark shadows into existence. Oh yes. The Novinians were … displeased.
“After the Old Man disappeared, this deployment needed a new man. For whatever reason, Trinity Itself chose me. Out of everyone else in the entire Universe, It chose me. Didn’t want Regs in charge of this festering shithole for some stupid reason. Maybe … maybe It always knew what I was, knew that when it came down to it, I really was the best one for the job. Only …”
“Only you died.” Ute pressed the point, not because he was morbidly trying to bring Innit down a peg or two, or that he thought he was a zombie, but because he had legitimately been one hundred percent dead. “You died, and recovering your corpse at the time hadn’t been a really good option. Not without losing more. You were dead.”
“I got better.” Innit grunted softly and shifted to a different position, futilely hoping that the burning in his chest would go away. Not only did that not work, there was now the definite sensation that they were being listened to. “Long after you guys were all gone and away and all that, my … corpse … was discovered by some random Offworld species. Wanderers through space. No fixed address. Tech wizards, guess you could call ‘em. They dug me up, put me back together. Was dead for so long parts of me’d decayed and they didn’t understand a good goddamn thing about Latelian tech, so when I did wake up, I … wasn’t exactly a Goddie anymore. Still pretty tough, but that spark that
connected us all, I guess it’d given up the ghost.”
Here was a perfect time to tell Innit about Harmony and all the wondrous things it could do for a man, but Ute held his tongue, and for one very good reason; the crystal in the man’s chest was watching him, assessing –somehow- the levels of power he possessed, both as a Fivesie and as someone packing a very particular flavor of Harmony. The Fivesie was beginning to see the edges of what Innit had gotten himself into, and …
It wasn’t looking good.
Innit waved a hand. “Anyways, about a thousand years later, plus or minus … you kind of lose track when you’re a cybernetic slave for a bunch of aliens. You know, I never learned their names? What they called themselves? So odd. Anyhow, about a thousand years later, they got into some trouble with some solar system or other, pissed them right off. They called up Special Services, and the old man sent a horde of Specters after ‘em. I was the spoils of war. Politoyov recognized my worth … what I was, even, but said nothing about it. Gave me a job, gave me a new name, well, sort of, put me in charge of training all the asshats that fell so far the only place better than SpecSer was death itself, and there you have it.
Flash forward to a few months ago, and Trinity’s knocking on my door.” Innit clenched his massive teeth together as the heat radiating outward from his Novinian heart blazed particularly brightly. “It wants me to be here, in charge, running the show, only I know I can’t do it. Not nearly as good as the Old Man. Hell, we had supply clerks as could do a better job. But … I had to take it.”
Ute jerked his chin at the crystal. The brilliant blue … he’d seen it before. It was a color not of this Universe, a reflection of power so intense that one man had done the most miraculous things with it. When Garth had encountered it, he’d been less than pleased.
It wasn’t something he was all that happy to see either, nestled inside Innit’s duronium chest; Garth Nickels himself had been weighed down by the considerable burden that colorful light represented, and he’d been born to the task.
One poor, resurrected God soldier didn’t stand a chance. No matter how powerful a God soldier could truly become over time, with training, and with access to Harmony, the brilliant blue power streaming from Innit's chest…
Was beyond anything anyone other than Garth could bear. Whatever –more probably whoever- that crystal represented … it wasn’t good. Ute knew that if Garth was here right that second, he’d be shitting all of the bricks ever to be shat and fiendishly trying to map a way out.
“What’s it doing to you?” Ute demanded, quite openly displaying his full willingness to rip the fucking thing right out of his friend’s chest, if that was what it took.
“Right now?” Innit ran a hand across the chunky stone, fingers smarting from the action. “Right now, I think it’s trying to remind me of what I’m supposed to be doing, but since I’m here and they’re … where they are, they kind of have to let me do this my way. Beyond that?”
Ute smiled and nodded sarcastically. It was worse than he thought. “Yes, Captain Innit, beyond that.”
Innit shrugged helplessly. “Makes me feel like I used to, back when I was a proper Goddie. Smart and fast and fearless and so very capable. I needed that kind of boost, Ute. I’m in charge of … so many things. It’s a mountain, and it’s sitting on my chest, even with the help. Anyways, it wasn’t … it wasn’t until after they’d given it to me, after I felt reborn … that they told me what they wanted from me.”
“I do not like the sound of this at all, Innit.” Ute shifted until he was out of the path of the radiant illumination. “Not at all.”
The pain was intensifying, and along with the growing agony sliding into his nervous system to deliver an extra-special zing of earnest pain there was the tiniest of whispers, the softest of voices. Oh, he was upsetting his new masters a great deal, for them to reach through the crystal.
Innit smiled, ran a hand across the stone in his chest. It was something he did a lot, these days, and he knew precisely what it meant. As he dragged a thumb across the humming rock, a fat spark spat upwards, singing the fine hairs off in a puff of smoke. “They … they have so much power, Ute. More than I ever believed. I mean, I’d always heard the rumors, always kept up-to-date on Trinity’s Avoidance Laws. I spoke with the Old Man a few times about them, pushed, once, to move our base somewhere else, only to be told that there was no way we were going anywhere. Shortly after that, he came to my doorstep, with that stupid fucking grin on his face and those stupid catchphrases, none of which made any sense, most of which spread through the barracks like wildfire.
Around that time, there was a growth in sightings of the locals, but none of us Specters gave it any thought. We just thought they were either growing bored of living in their underground caves or that they’d grown curious about the city that’d sprouted up around our training facilities. Either way, the Dusties … they started making contact with the new … colonists, I suppose would be the best way to describe them, and at first, it seemed like things were going to be okay. There was a little bit of trade, these funny little trinkets with tiny chips of stone in them, all different colors, and soon enough everyone on the base was wearing them and that was fine until some of the rougher Specters were the ones who started encountering the locals…”
Ute watched Innit trail off into silence, hand running restlessly over the blue stone, over and over again, ignorant of or incapable of feeling the pain from each of the sparks that came to life thanks to his actions. Whoever had done this to one of the oldest God soldiers in the Universe was going to suffer for their hideous crimes, that much Ute knew without thinking. He was in full possession of his faculties, but … he wasn’t himself. The Fivesie doubted even Innit himself was aware of the difference.
“Go on.” Ute replied encouragingly, nodding his head in interest. “What happened?”
“Trinity Avoidance Laws are very specific, old friend. In the case of the Dusties … sorry, Novinians … the clauses are perhaps the most specific of all. None of us knew why until it was too late, and by then … too late.” Innit flickered a smile. The voice sighing up at him through the crystal was insistent, the pain like neon lights under his skin. He felt positively incandescent, but he was still himself. “You can talk to them, if you’re brave enough. You can interact with them if you’re insane. They love a good time just like everyone else. But … but if you lay a hand on them, under any circumstances, friendly or otherwise, that’s it. Death penalty. Executed right there on the spot, by the offended Novinian him or herself. We lost a handful of Specters that way until we realized … well, until Commander Politoyov realized … they were looking for one specific Specter. You see, they’re unstoppable, Ute. They move like liquid lightning and own weapons powered by crystals like this one. Different colors do different things, and they love to dispatch their rightful duty every time the Law was broken, but … they got to a Heavy. We believed they thought the Heavy was dead, but now that I’m here doing what I’m doing, I think they let him live … just enough … to pass a message along.”
“I know where this is going.” Ute shivered suddenly, as if the room had dropped twenty degrees in the space of two words. The world around him felt like it was on a track, a single, narrow, very well-defined track and by sitting in this room with a ghost from the past, he was being dropped right into it, with no hope of freedom.
Innit smiled craftily, the pain making the gesture seem lazy. “Always were the smartest asshole in the room, aren’t you?”
“Takes one to know one.” Ute shot back.
“You got that right.” Innit shifted more, causing the reinforced chair to moan and groan, weirdly enough in tune to the silent forces pushing him deeper into fresh new levels of pain. The ex-Goddie hoped to hell and back that the Novinians, there at home, were sitting there in amazement at his endurance. At the sheer marvelous strength he was displaying. So that when the time came, when Ute Tizhen strode upon the surface of 9-Nova-12, they trembled.
They deserved what was coming to them.
“Garth Nickels.” Innit let the name out like a sigh, unsurprised to see Ute’s blunt nod of acceptance. “They were looking for him, trying to draw him out in the open. They were actively engaging our men, intentionally riling them up to the point where physical contact wasn’t only likely, it was fucking inevitable. Only … Nickels was never allowed off base. A troublemaker, he was. Setting the mess hall on fire while trying to recreate pizza. Getting into fights with Heavy Elites. Blowing shit up while tinkering. You’ve met the man. You know what he’s like. So he was always on lockdown. No fun times for him. So when the Old Man figured this out, when he saw what was happening … he arranged things. To get Garth Offworld. Contrived to give the man a captaincy. Oh, you should’ve seen them, Ute. They were so angry. They sent a representative to the Old Man. Demanded they be given ‘the Enemy’ on a platter. They … they hate him so much, Ute. They want to pull the Universe apart looking for him, but … they can’t see him when he’s not in front of their faces. So … so … they …”
Ute wordlessly took in the war of pain battling out across Innit’s broad, homely face. Muscles twitched mightily under skin, while skin itself seemed like it was going to split open at any moment. The Fivesie could barely believe that the man was still alive, still able to speak, chalking the whole thing up to his construction; the first ten or so generations of God soldier rolling off the assembly line had done so with nearly ten times the amount of duronium coating as newer models, which was why today, many of the Threes and Fours were so powerful.
The only thing missing in Kaptan Innit was the song of Harmony, any Harmony, but with the power flowing from that crystal actually dampening his personal song, Ute couldn’t take the risk; Innit hadn’t finished telling his story, but the Fivesie already knew where his journey was going to take him.
And he was fine with that.
“So they trapped you.” Ute whispered, finishing the story. “They gave you the power to be you again, and once you were alive as you hadn’t been since before leaving on that fateful mission, they hooked you. Told you to come here and what? Wait for me, specifically?”