Dominion Rising: 23 Brand New Science Fiction and Fantasy Novels

by White, Gwynn

  The tux slid back and Bronson rotated his bald ball of a head up to blow two smoke rings above the three. Then he looked down at Leta and let out another of his huffy laughs.

  Leta cringed her nose and nothing else.

  36

  Leta’s reaction must not have been sufficient entertainment for Bronson because he returned his attention to Abby and business. “So, what you really would like to know about is Valon.”

  “That’s why I came,” Abby said.

  “Sure.” The large Maro shrugged. “Doesn’t matter really.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You have no idea what you are going up against. They say the tide is turning.”

  “The tide is turning?”

  “That’s what they say, the tide is turning.”

  “Why do they say that?”

  With an ominous tone, Bronson added, “Because, we own the planes.” Bronson held his gaze on Abby for a second, looking for a wound, then began to chuckle.

  “I’ve heard that,” Abby said.

  “It’s true. Valon is back, you’re right about that. But you’re only one for two. You’re wrong about the Jasper, Squire. The Jasper is real.”

  “Believe what you want. All the same, you don’t seem surprised I’m here looking.”

  “I figured you’d come sniffing around sooner or later. Your friend Labreque was working for Valon. Made quite a few trips through here.”

  “Working for Valon?”

  “Not directly. Valon had an Arcadian hire Labreque to find the Jasper. Valon’s building an army, and there’s going to be another war. The old ways will be the new ways, and this time the mortals will be wiped out.” He drew from the cigar and blew another smoke ring, this time to the side of his desk. “Shame, really. I do so enjoy mortals.”

  “The Bureau would never let that happen,” Abby said. “Their reach is further than ever. The corporates and the syndicates have gotten too strong. The syndicate clans, including yours, have too much power at stake to risk another war.”

  “It’s not always about the power.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The Jasper,” Bronson said. “I don’t think you understand just what the Jasper is.”

  “A Chi stone, healing stone, dream stone.”

  “Oh, but you’re wrong again. The Jasper is so much more than that.”

  “Enlighten me.”

  “The Jasper is a weapon of the Elders.”

  “You telling me that statue really is a jadeite device?”

  “That statue makes the owner a jadeite device. That’s why it’s called a dream stone. Imagine jumping from one plane to another without having to travel through a Bubble, a true desultor.”

  “Imagine that,” Abby said. “But that’s impossible.”

  “You of all people, Squire. You’re being thick. It’s not the stone. It’s the technology. The Jasper is a nano delivery system—jadeite nanos, that’s how it works—turns the carrier into some kind of super being. The old text says the energy of the warrior carved into the Jasper goes to the holder of the stone. An energy of individual power and will, dispelling the fear, worry, and doubt that holds one back.”

  “Compelling the possessor to take action,” Abby added.

  “Yes, there you go. Boosted physical vitality, strength, extended life eternal—unless you remove the head, I suppose. The syndicates and the Bureau have been working on this for years. My sources tell me there was even one of your kind filled up with jadeite nanos. A Bureau Boy.”

  “You don’t say? You know who?”

  “No, they’d never let that out. Anyway, I was told the experiment failed and that the agent was a quack. Don’t matter, really. Valon beat the Bureau. He got the thing first. Now you mortals don’t stand a chance.”

  “So what? Valon becomes a walking Bubble, a desultor. That’s a good trick, but not a wipe-out-the-mortals kind of trick.”

  “Yeah, that’s the thing. You see, this happened before. Those jadeite nanos have to power and propagate or they’ll burn themselves out, so they compel the owner to help them spread, like a virus, and they apparently only get their power from mortals.”

  “The nanos feed?” Abby asked. “Like a virus?”

  “It’s a weapon. The Elders set it up that way.”

  Jazz interrupted. “You said it’s happened before. I thought this was just found.”

  “Nothing is ever really lost. It was hidden, and it was found. That’s the cycle of all things. Your friend Squire could tell you that. When Squire’s friend Labreque came around—and I’m sure that’s what brought you here—he had a book full of runes. Ironically the same as the Arden Mortuus crest. Anyway, he was the one that figured all of this out. Said the Jasper has wiped out mortals before, entire civilizations, the Inca, the Aztecs, as recently as the twentieth century in Moscow and Berlin.”

  “The sacrifices, purges, holocausts,” Abby said.

  “Labreque believed all of those sacrifices of the past were to power the chi in the stone. It’s karma. Kill the rich, become rich. Kill the intelligentsia become the intelligentsia. Ignorance, really. Just a virus needing to feed. Valon isn’t interested in power as much as using the Jasper as a weapon.”

  “Well,” Abby said, “tell me where Valon is and I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen.”

  “That is an offer I would love to take you up on, Squire. Unfortunately, I cannot.”

  “Let’s make a deal,” Abby said. A hand pressed down on his shoulders. Kazo and the Maro from the door had approached from behind. “Hey. What’s going on? I thought we were good?”

  “Oh. We are, Squire. Unfortunately, I can’t let you leave. There’s a price on your head.”

  “That’s ridiculous.” Abby attempted to stand, but the Maro above had him pinned in the chair. “This is a bit theatrical. How much do you want?”

  “Don’t embarrass yourself, the sum has gone to favors. In fact, as of late, a bidding war.” Bronson rotated the tip of his cigar, and Kazo dropped his hand onto Leta’s shoulder. “And I have a place for your sweet-smelling pet as well.” He glanced toward Jazz. “I enjoy doing business with you, Jazz, so you can either leave and live or stay and die, your choice.”

  “Bronson,” Abby said. “This is bad business.”

  “I assure you, this is out of my hands.”

  “C’mon—” Abby began one more plea, then held his tongue as the Maro in the corner abruptly drew a phase pistol from beneath his jacket.

  The tall Maro moved forward and for the first time since the three had entered the suite, spoke, “You’re ours, Squire. Get it through your head.”

  The timbre of the voice was unmistakable. Abby’s eyes darted up to the Maro’s face, his optic photons flipping in the same instant to confirm the identity of the tall Maro in the corner, the Maro that he’d sent to the Carcerem Prison Plane:

  Acore.

  37

  Bronson snorted. With Abby’s optics shifted, the shimmer no longer hid the Boar warrior’s snout and tusks. Bronson was again moving his jaw up and down. His mouth became a small bouncing box between his meaty jowls. The porcine Maro’s jaw clicked loudly up through Abby’s skull.

  Abby realized Bronson had a chin chip.

  Bronson said he’d heard them, and that was how: Bureau tech.

  A thought of fair play tickled the back of Abby’s mind. The mortals had reengineered the Maro organic shimmer and shift into tech, so naturally the Maro at one point would adopt mortal tech for themselves. The chin chips probably worked even better on the dense-boned boar. His mandible was twice as thick as that of a mortal, so there was a good chance he had twice the antennae.

  This new bit of information appeared to please Jazz. The boyish smile across his face told Abby what he might have already known. Through the chin chip, the Boar said, “One chance. Make it count.”

  Jazz lifted his brow high and his hands in the air. “Wow,” he said. “I had no idea. I don’t suppose I can hav
e something for the tables?”

  Bronson nodded then turned his rotund head toward the two at the near side table. “Boys.” The two continued to paw through the air with no regard for the giant Maro at the desk. He cleared his throat and raised his voice, “Boys.” Nothing. Then he barked, “Boys!” Both of the mortals slowly twisted their necks toward him, their eyes a soapy glaze. Abby realized their eyes hadn’t merely been modded, they’d been replaced with access points. Their world was around the clock screen time, and they were most likely completely blind to the reality around them. Bronson lowered his voice, “Could you please grant Mister Jazz—”

  Jazz cleared his throat.

  “Please grant Mister Jazz a standard kal two-credit sum.”

  The glaze-eyed pair at the table simply responded by resuming their mid-air pawing.

  Jazz glanced at his wrist. There was a soft ping.

  “Okay then,” he said, lifting himself from his chair. “Good day, Bronson.” He leaned toward Abby and Leta, began to say something, then just nodded.

  Leta didn’t face him. What she made of Bronson’s chin chip statement, Abby wasn’t sure, but he knew his old buddy would never miss an opportunity to take a free credit.

  Jazz straightened his lapels and exited the room, leaving his cohorts to the Maro.

  Abby wondered why Bronson wanted them conscious. They could easily have tapped him with a taser.

  Abby was missing something.

  Though the pressure on Abby’s shoulders kept him from standing, his arms were free. His whole body was free. A sudden pelvic thrust could easily maneuver him from under the weight the Maro exerted from behind, except there were certainly two drawn weapons to his back and he had firsthand experience that hesitation with a phase pistol was a non-issue for Acore. The odds were that if he drew on two, the third would fry him. They wouldn’t expect him to shift far spectrum as they would Leta; very few had personal quants, and his special skill was a Bureau secret. Still, that didn’t matter, because the Maro could shift up spectrum with the same ease.

  A premonition burst into the front of his mind. The scenario he’d contemplated played out in rapid-fire variations. His breathing became uneven. In each blink of a vision, he simultaneously drew his blade and thrust his lower body forward in a spin. Each time his shoulders dropped away from the clawed hand pressing him down, his blade flamed open, clear of the chair on the spin, deflected a blast from Acore, flew up, around and through the two Maro behind, then, mid-turn, Acore pulled a second shot.

  Again and again the vision blinked into his mind, suppressing his view of Bronson before him, producing a nauseating flicker between the now and the possible. The vision kept slightly changing, always ending with Acore’s second shot.

  Abby didn’t have to process the blink to understand why the possibilities never played out quite in the way he’d envisioned. That was the case with these blinks, these premonitions. Mere images caught in a mirror, telling a fraction of the story.

  Acore raised his phase pistol and let loose a blast just as Abby had predicted. However, the blast came before Abby moved, and the blast wasn’t directed at him. The blast was directed at a blade by the door, and he recognized the hum of the weapon. Every blade has a theme song, a pitch indistinguishable from another with the naked ear, but with a chin chip, each has a signature, and the humming torch behind him that’d just deflected Acore’s blast belonged to Jazz. The deflected blast flew into one of the mortals in the corner, exploding him back against the wall. The hands on Abby and Leta’s shoulders released at an angle, a detectable spin toward the door. Abby thrust forward and drew his blade up with the swirl twirl he’d envisioned. The heads of Kazo and the other Maro flew free. He’d thrown all momentum into the spin to make the cycle back to Acore. Due to his tactical mods kicking in, the world had slowed. His spin through the air gave him the sensation of hovering above the chair while the suite slowly circled around him. When he reached Leta, she too appeared to be hovering as she dove across the floor to the side of the desk. From between her legs, she pulled the small chromium fang. An arc of blue lightning manifested around the sharp point of the tiny pistol then lashed forward. Abby’s eyes followed the path of the bolt as he spun and watched the atomic menace blast a hole a foot in diameter through Acore and the French door behind him.

  Abby landed with one foot anchored, the other forward, the hilt of his blade tucked to his side, the tip at Bronson’s neck. The Maro in the corner was in shock. Acore glanced down toward the part of him that was no longer there, then crumpled to the floor.

  “A fang,” Bronson said. “You are full of surprises.”

  “You’re lucky,” Leta said. “That particle displacement could have been yours.”

  Jazz tapped Abby on the shoulder. “It’s okay. He’s not with them. He gave me the heads up.”

  Abby held for a few seconds more then let the blade retract.

  Bronson let out a few huffs of relief. “Thank you, Mister Jazz.” He hunched his brow toward Abby. “There was nothing I could do. Valon made a move on the syndicate right after taking possession of the weapon.”

  “So, he’s used the Jasper on himself?” Jazz asked.

  “The implication is enough. Word is that he will soon.”

  Jazz tilted his head toward Abby. “What does he want with him?”

  “No secret Labreque was your friend. Sooner or later Squire’d be sniffing around. Dunno for sure. Whatever reason, he has an appetite. Anyway, you did me a favor. That Arden has been breathin’ down my neck ‘til I can’t stand no more.”

  Jazz opened the humidor. “You mind?”

  “Help yourself, why don’t ya? You have less than a minute, I’d say.”

  He grabbed a couple of the cigars and handed them to Abby then took a couple for himself. “You know where to find Valon?” he asked.

  “I wouldn’t worry. He’s going to be looking for you.”

  Abby shrugged his brow and moved toward the door.

  “Nothing personal, but…” Bronson said, gesturing toward the French doors. “Wouldn’t look right, you strolling out that way. The place is loaded with friends of the Arden Mortuus.”

  “Right.” Jazz nodded. He drew his blade.

  “Ah,” Bronson interrupted, “if the lady doesn’t mind? Less mess.”

  Leta raised the fang. With a rapid series of bolts, the French doors that made up the wall disappeared.

  “You’re good?” the old Boar asked.

  Jazz smiled. “I called the glider when I stepped out.”

  “Well,” Bronson said. He smiled from behind the huge desk. “My pardon, Miss. Nothing personal. If the tide is turning, may the way be kind.”

  The three returned the smile then launched themselves out of the suite and down into the pit of the Marquis.

  38

  Abby veered his head away from a barrage of phase pistol fire that would have decapitated a mere mortal. Slivers of crystal broke away from the thousands of chandelier shards as they shattered in the crossfire. Abby’s arm flew up to protect his face while he peered down to target. Red overlays circled nearly every face in the pit. They were almost all Maro, almost all a threat. Crosshairs popped into view, followed by flares from his extended arm as his dual-function blade sent fuchsia bolts toward the firing Maro. From his peripheral, the bright glint of the chandelier was closing in, then it was falling. Leta or Jazz had blown away the thick chain upon which the great crystal light hung.

  Abby continued to fire, twist, and dodge. When he reached the falling chandelier, he kicked his leg up to step onto it. Along with Leta and Jazz, he rode the heavy crystal hoop down toward the curtained entrance. With the high ground, they were able to clear the opposing fire before touching down.

  The maître d’ gawked at the ton of crystal heading toward him.

  The cascade of hooped crystal fell forward, settling at the frozen Maro’s feet. Abby’s world resumed a real-time state. The maître d’ rocked his head side to side then sl
owly scanned the faces of the three, resting his puzzled gaze lastly on Abby. Abby smiled as he strolled past, and Jazz nodded politely. Leta disregarded the Maro altogether.

  39

  Abby exited the Marquis, brushing the dust of crystal shards from his shoulder. The three walked calmly toward Dexy, waiting at the end of the red carpet as Jazz said she would be.

  The valet, a mortal, stood pleasantly by the glider, the hatch slowly rising by his side.

  No alarm had been set off outside of the club.

  They were almost clear.

  Then the alarm rang out.

  The giveaway was in the valet’s expression. In the tinted glass of Dexy’s forward canopy, Abby saw the reflection of three Marquis bouncers running out the door. The valet’s face first went blank then fearful.

  “Stop them!” a voice rang out from behind.

  The valet’s head pivoted to the three, the door of the Marquis, then back.

  “Now,” the Maro behind yelled.

  The young mortal’s arm lifted, lowered, then moved toward the hatch.

  “Don’t—” Jazz yelled too late. Dexy sent a jolt through the valet, sending him flying a meter back.

  The three dove in as the glider dropped away.

  “Is the kid going to be all right?” Leta asked.

  “Yeah,” Jazz said as he scurried forward into the cockpit. “Just a taser shock, that’s all.”

  Abby slid in shotgun.

  Rods of light zoomed past the canopy. Abby looked up toward the promenade. The three bouncers that’d pursued them from the Marquis were on the ledge, firing down. Then he saw something else.