The Gordian Protocol

by David Weber

  “Number two 12mm’s out!” Philo reported. “Ammo feed’s been cut!”

  “We’re in trouble!” Elzbietá flipped their temporal vector, but the signal from the chronoport held solid. The enemy pilot had changed vectors almost perfectly in sync with her.

  “It’s coming in again!”

  “I can’t get away from it!” she said.

  The chronoport phase-locked once more. Missiles sprinted out of its launchers, and more slugs struck the hull.

  Philo worked his controls, but the Gatling guns only took two out. One exploded near the Kleio, and most of its shrapnel missed, but the last one hit the nose dead on and the front third of the ship blew apart. They spun wildly away, and Elzbietá fired the remaining thrusters at full to bring them back under control. She steadied the ship and checked what they had left.

  Two graviton thrusters, both showing yellow and small splashes of red, and two 45mm and one 12mm Gatling guns, both nearly out of ammo.

  “What do we do?” Elzbietá turned to her copilot. “That thing is tearing us apart. We can’t hit it, and we can’t run away.”

  Philo sat in his seat like a statue, fingers hovering over the controls. The word STANDBY hovered over his head.

  “Philo?”

  The text vanished, and Viking started moving again.

  “I’ve got it.” He faced her. “Get in close.”

  “You want me to get closer?”

  “Trust me. This is all we’ve got left. I’ll hit them this time.”

  The signal from the chronoport grew stronger, and the range of potential locations narrowed.

  “Get as close as you can before it phases back in!” Philo said. “Hurry!”

  Elzbietá swung the joystick to the side, then shoved the throttle forward with a Valkyrie’s scream, and the TTV sped into the heart of the chronoport’s projected arrival.

  *

  “Phase-lock complete,” Vassal reported. “Firin—”

  A hail of 45mm rounds—fired by Philo before the chronoport completely phased in—struck Pathfinder-Prime’s bow. They pounded through its front armor and drilled deep into the ship’s interior.

  Blasts opened the front of the bridge. Vassal’s connection with the rest of the ship dropped out, and more explosions obliterated its box. The stream of high explosives tore through the interior, piercing people and seats as if they weren’t there, and more explosions pulped Durantt and the crewmembers sitting in front of Shigeki.

  He didn’t even have time to recognize the totality of his failure. Before his synapses could form the first coherent thought, a 45mm round punched into the center of his forehead, the payload triggered, and his head and shoulders blew apart in a grisly spray.

  *

  Benjamin stabbed the tube into his stomach.

  “Gah!” he cried as microbots flowed into the wound. He tossed the vial aside, and it clattered and rolled across the downed chronoport’s wing. He collapsed on his back, arms and legs splayed around him, chest heaving with each labored breath.

  “Get yourself up!” Klaus-Wilhelm grabbed his shoulder. Benjamin winced as his grandfather propped him up against an armor panel that bent sharply upward. He shoved Benjamin’s gun back into his hands. “You with us?”

  The train whistled, louder and coming closer.

  “Yeah.” Benjamin gasped and nodded. “I’m still here.”

  “Stay sharp.” Klaus-Wilhelm clapped him on the shoulder, then pointed across the field. “Those bastards are coming back.”

  “Wonderful.” Benjamin coughed and winced as he shifted himself around. His entire midsection burned, but he soldiered through it and slid his MP40’s muzzle forward over the wing’s cover. His mask outlined a large force of Admin gathered at the end of the forest. Special operators opened fire from the tree line, and a horde of drones charged out with two STANDs boosting up the flanks.

  He ducked back down, and shots zinged off the bent armor plate.

  “No one gives a centimeter!” Klaus-Wilhelm shouted. “This is where we hold! Hold, d’you hear me?”

  A dozen MP40s chattered savagely, and drones burst apart. More leapt or flew over the wreckage, and the STANDs boosted forward as they cut loose with guided grenades.

  An explosion knocked Benjamin back, and he gasped as he hit the wing. He forced himself upright, the taste of iron filling his mouth, then raised his weapon and pulled the trigger. Drones exploded under his fire, and he hammered them until the clip ran dry, then yanked out the magazine.

  He patted his belt, found another magazine, and raised it to the receiver. His vision darkened, his breath shortened, and he missed the slot. The magazine fumbled out of his fingers and slid away across the wing until it came to rest against Raibert’s broken thigh.

  He checked his belt again.

  Nothing. He was out except for standard bullets.

  A train whistle blared twice.

  “They’re too close to the tracks! Push the bastards back!” Klaus-Wilhelm ordered.

  “We’re trying, sir!” Anton shouted, spraying bullets.

  Benjamin crawled behind cover until he reached the end of the upturned panel and was about to stretch out his arm for the magazine, but then stopped. The nose of the second self-replicator rocket peeked out of Raibert’s torn backpack, its conical tip gleaming in the sun.

  Aha!

  Benjamin looked around frantically for the launcher, but didn’t see it. Had Raibert even come back with it?

  No. No he hadn’t.

  Damn.

  “The train’s at risk!” Klaus-Wilhelm barked. “Hit them with everything you’ve got! PUSH THEM BACK!”

  The train whistled again, dangerously close now.

  Benjamin steeled his nerve and reached for the rocket. A mag dart clipped the top of his sleeve, and he winced in fresh pain, but he grabbed hold and pulled the rocket back into cover. He cradled it against his chest, found the dial, and cranked it down to its lowest setting.

  Fear of this weapon.

  That’s all he needed. Fear so deeply engrained in the Admin’s collective psyche that they enshrined laws prohibiting its creation and waged wars to stamp out anyone who dared defy those laws. Fear now ripe in their minds from the demonstration Raibert had so generously provided.

  Fear would drive them back.

  Benjamin’s knuckles whitened as he clenched the rocket’s shaft and pressed it against his chest. He nodded grimly, coming to terms with what he was about to do.

  “It’s not working!” Anton cried out, ducking behind cover. “I’m out of ammo!”

  “Here!” Klaus-Wilhelm tossed Anton a magazine. “Make every shot count!”

  Benjamin closed his eyes, made the sign of the cross, and sucked in a deep breath.

  “EVERYONE!” he shouted at the top of his lungs. “COVER ME!”

  He vaulted over the panel and sprinted toward the advancing Admin forces.

  “What are you doing?” Klaus-Wilhelm barked. “Get back here!”

  A STAND boosted across Benjamin’s path. Its heavy rail-rifle fired, and two hits stabbed him in the chest. Blood sprayed from his mouth and nostrils, partially obscuring the inside of his mask, but he kept his balance and charged straight at the STAND with a berserker’s fury.

  Klaus-Wilhelm sprayed the combat frame with automatic fire, and its boosters faltered just enough for Benjamin to close the distance. He raised the rocket over his head two-handed, like a stubby spear, and the STAND swung its incinerator up.

  The weapon ignited with a whoosh, and blue flame cooked his flesh through holes in the uniform’s prog-steel weave. He screamed as he brought the nose of the rocket crashing down. The fuse struck the STAND’s chest, the dispersion payload detonated, and Benjamin’s hands and arms vanished as the explosion flung him back.

  A rusty aerosol sprayed everywhere, coating the STAND, the ground, several nearby drones— —and the front half of Benjamin.

  He fell onto his back and gasped for air as replicators burrowed in
to his flesh through holes in his armor, through the bloody stumps that used to be his arms, and commandeered his own circulatory system to eat their way through his body.

  The STAND stumbled back, boosters sputtering. Liquid rust oozed out of its chest, internal systems caught fire, and it collapsed upon itself.

  The Admin forces broke almost instantly. They knew the weapon they faced. They feared it, perhaps more than anything else they had ever faced, and they fled back toward the tree line, putting as much distance as possible between them and the blighted ground.

  A black border encroached on Benjamin’s vision. His body felt hot. So incredibly hot. And yet, for a moment he wondered if the replicators had stopped working because his pain slipped away and a strange lightness settled over him.

  “No! Stay back, sir!” he heard someone say.

  “Let go of me, damn it!” another man cried out. “I’m not losing him, too!”

  Benjamin’s last breath wheezed through pale lips as the train roared past, whistle blaring.

  And the sword cut the knot.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  Denton, North Carolina

  2017 CE

  Benjamin silenced his alarm clock and smacked his lips. He sat up in bed, rubbed the crusty sleep from his eyes, then blinked around at the bleary gloom of his bedroom.

  The numbers on the alarm clock cast the queen-sized bed in a greenish hue, and he flashed a despondent frown at it. Today was not a day he’d been looking forward to. Today he had the privilege of attending his first of several gender awareness sessions.

  Uuuuuuuuh…

  Oh well, he thought. No use putting it off. Let’s get this over with.

  He shuffled into the bathroom, squeezed a glob of paste onto his sonic toothbrush and gave his teeth a thorough scrubbing. Then he flossed between each tooth, rinsed his mouth for one minute and spat, and shuffled over to his closet. Neat rows of button-down shirts hung organized from lightest to darkest. He selected one of his two gray shirts and a black bowtie and suspenders, avoiding all the cheerful colors. He was in a dark mood.

  He put the shirt and a pair of black pants on the ironing board, rubbed his eyes again, and made his way to the kitchen counter. He opened the refrigerator, took out a plastic bag of fresh strawberries, and put four on the cutting board before returning the bag to the refrigerator. Then he cut each strawberry into quarters from tip to stem, raked the pieces into a bowl, and added milk and Cheerios.

  Sitting at the counter, he curled his toes up for warmth and crunched down on the first spoonful. He chewed slowly, thoughtfully, and pondered the day to come, trying to remind himself that this was a critical step in his master plan. That stupid as this was going to be, O’Hearn was doing exactly what he wanted him to do.

  It didn’t help a lot.

  “Gender-sensitivity training…” He stuffed another spoonful robotically into his mouth, then raised both eyebrows. “You know, it might not be as bad as I think.”

  Yeah. Right.

  It’d probably be worse.

  He finished his cereal, drank the milk, then rinsed off the bowl and put it into the dishwasher. He reclaimed his clothes from the ironing board, put them on, and checked his reflection in the mirror.

  “I look like I’m going to a funeral,” he muttered, then shrugged. “Oh well. They’ll just have to deal with it.”

  He grabbed his wallet, phone, and keys, reached for the door—

  And froze.

  His mouth opened in a silent scream as the sudden shock clubbed him to his knees. His arms dropped limply at his side, hanging there as if they belonged to someone else, and then, slowly, his hands rose to his head. A torrent of thought roared through him with sledgehammer force, burning him, deafening him, scouring away reason and sanity, consuming him. He squeezed his eyes shut as if that could stop the flood, but it poured over him and through him. It tore him apart, stripping his mind layer by layer.

  Alien thoughts crashed across his being, drowned out who he was. Memories he’d never had. People he’d never met. Places he’d never been. A big, crazy man knocking at his door. A Viking with an aviator helmet. His own grandfather, but younger than he’d ever seen him. Machines that couldn’t possibly exist. SS troopers fighting the machines.

  And a woman he loved with all his heart.

  Two realities collided. Thoughts converged, swirled about, tore at each other, fought each other, and yet both were equally real. It was impossible. It couldn’t be true! He was here, in his home, but he was also dying! How could that be? How could any of this be possible? His mind reeled as twin realities poured into a container that should only ever hold one.

  His elbows hit the floor, his arms cradling his head in fragile self-dense as he collapsed completely. Phantom pain echoed through his chest and stomach, and he curled into a knot around the agony, gasping for breath that wouldn’t come. What was happening to him? Was he dying right now?

  But then the fog in his mind began to clear, and he realized the horrible truth.

  He wasn’t dying.

  He was already dead.

  He’d died in battle trying to save Adolph Hitler. Had succeeded in saving that monster’s life. And he’d sacrificed an entire timeline with untold billions or even trillions of people to do it. He’d been eaten alive achieving those goals…and he’d done it willingly!

  “No!” He writhed on the floor, the agony of that thought far worse than any physical pain, any fear of mere death.

  He’d willingly participated in a temporal genocide greater than the most wretched monsters in human history could even have imagined, but that wasn’t the worst of it. He’d made himself responsible for all the atrocities of World War II. For the Holocaust, the Chinese Revolution, Stalin’s Russia, the Korean War, Pol Pot…

  The horror crashed down on him, smashed him like the hammer of hell itself, and under the guilt for those billions of lives, behind it, slicing through it like Satan’s own sword, was the memory of the single life he’d valued above all others.

  And he’d killed her, too. Erased her from existence.

  How could this be? How could any of this be true?

  And yet he knew with absolute certainty that it was.

  The chaos ripped and tore at him, the pandemonium screaming inside his skull, the conflicting memories desperate to escape. It went on and on and on as his mind tried—tried desperately—to reject the memories of the Benjamin Schröder who’d done those hideous things…and failed. He couldn’t shut them off, couldn’t deny them, and in their echoes, in that torrent of confusion and anguish, he saw the madness coming for him.

  Knew he was already mad, because there could be no other explanation.

  Yet somewhere in the midst of that maelstrom, there was an echo of calm. A gestalt—fragile and fleeting—hovered just beyond his reach, and his agonized mind reached toward it. Reached and touched a moment of clarity. This other, alien, horrifying version of him had already experienced this. It had already been torn apart, shredded under the impact of his memories, and it had struggled long and hard to banish those memories, the memories of this universe. And for a time it had enjoyed some small measure of success. Yet that other Benjamin had known even then that his success could be only fleeting, and in the end he’d been made whole only through acceptance.

  And that was because that other Benjamin, these memories, were a part of him. However much he might hate them, however terrible the pain, they were part of him. He couldn’t escape them, couldn’t will them out of existence. There was only one thing he could do, and so he opened himself to them, instead. He let them course through his mind, clinging by his fingernails to what sanity remained, and slowly—so slowly—they…settled. They echoed and reechoed at the heart of him, tearing him apart, yet even as they did, they made him…complete. He felt them fusing together, turning him into someone—something—neither of his realities had ever been, and his fists clenched as the torrent slowed from a tsunami to a flood, and then merely to a river,
and then—

  His breathing slowed. His muscles slackened. He flopped onto his back with his limbs spread wide and stared at the ceiling for minutes. Hours, maybe? The thoughts settled and congealed, piece by piece, and in the end, he sat up, whole again.

  “God,” he breathed. “What have I done?”

  And then he wept. He buried his face in his knees and let the grief and agony take hold. He’d killed her. As surely as if he’d held a gun to her head and pulled the trigger. He shook his head as tears trickled down his cheeks. He rubbed his face against his knees as the long, shuddering sobs wracked him.

  What kind of monster was he?

  *

  Benjamin drove up a gravel road on the outskirts of Denton and parked his car at the crest of the hill. He climbed out, closed the door, and stared across the field of barren dirt spotted with leprous clumps of weed. It was the site of Irwin’s Steak & Seafood restaurant. Or would have been, in another version of the timeline.

  Here it was just a vacant lot.

  He rounded the car, opened the passenger door, and took a narrow, white cylinder off the seat. He walked across the field, gravel and stubble crunching under his shoes, until he reached the center, then he dropped to his knees and picked up a handful of dirt. In his mind, he saw the drones bursting through the windows. Raibert shooting them down.

  And Ella on the ground, bleeding, dying.

  He tossed the dirt into the air, and the wind scattered it.

  This was where he’d proposed to her. Before she ceased to exist…

  He didn’t know where he should do this. Her grandparents had died in the Holocaust, so there were no houses in Denton that belonged to her family. No gravestones either. All of it had been erased. The university had changed so much as well, so using that didn’t feel right. A movie theater stood where her old apartment had been, and their favorite restaurant was now a landfill. None of those were suitable.

  But this place was different. It was quiet here on the edge of town, and a barren patch of earth seemed fitting. This was where she’d been wounded by the Admin, where her blood had been spilled in the other universe. He popped the lid off the cylinder and took out three fresh roses he’d bought on the way over.