by Isaac Hooke
She heard what sounded like another collapse behind her, followed by a crash. She glanced over her shoulder and saw Brute bursting from the remains.
She rounded the bend and sprinted as fast as she could. She kept dodging into alleys and side streets, hoping to lose the creature, but she couldn't seem to shake it.
She finally reached her destination, the transit center, and entered immediately. The lines she had witnessed earlier were gone. Apparently everyone who had wanted to leave Rhagnorak had done so already.
She spotted four gol guards.
"Protect me!" she shouted.
The guards took up a position at the entrance to the terminal.
She ran between the ropes that demarcated where people were to queue, and made her way toward the closest portal.
Behind her, Brute entered and made short work of the guards.
Tanner emerged from the entrance shortly thereafter, beside another Keeper she didn't know.
Ari approached the mirror-like surface of the portal and paused. If she went through, Brute would simply follow and pursue her in the next city. But if she could somehow force the beast to enter that portal on its own, she could take another random one, and when Brute returned he would have no idea which city she had departed for.
She stared at her shimmering reflection in the portal and watched Brute approach. The portal was wide enough to fit four men abreast, and tall enough for two. Electricity occasionally sparked across the surface.
Brute slowed its advance, suspecting a trap.
Tanner and the Keeper followed, wisely staying out of sword range. Tanner had a bronze bitch slung over one shoulder, she noticed. She wasn't sure why he had brought the vitra-blocking collar, as it would be useless against the creature.
Brute reached her. The thing towered over her body. It looked down on her as if she were something to squash. It glanced left, then right, but apparently it saw no sign that anything was amiss, and so it attacked.
Ari unleashed fire at the wooden frame that formed the far support of the portal, and then moved to the side, slicing the near support. She stepped out of the way as the portal toppled over Brute and swallowed her foe.
"Nicely done," Tanner said, coming to her side.
The portal had transported Brute to the destination city, of course. But with the entrance lying on the ground like that, the safety protocols prevented Brute from returning that same way. The creature would have to take another portal to a different city first, and only then could it come back to Rhagnorak. By that time, Ari and Tanner would be long gone.
Ari thanked the Keeper, and then she and Tanner immediately took another portal, leaving Rhagnorak behind.
"It seems our friend Amoch has been busy resurrecting old friends," Ari said when they reached the other side. The destination city hadn't been attacked yet, and the transit center sported a healthy queue of transitioners.
She sat off to one side so that Tanner could treat her scorched hands. He had taken along two healing shards, which he applied to her palms. The shards looked like crystalline starfish and they felt extremely cold on her flesh, to the point of burning. Ari gasped despite herself.
Tanner released electricity into the shards from a lightning ring he wore, and the shards began to melt into her flesh. When the things vanished, she found herself staring at fresh, baby pink skin.
She lay back and closed her eyes. She felt like she had run a marathon, and she wasn't sure if that was merely because of the shards, or because of her exhausting encounter with Brute. Probably a combination of both.
"Stanson has some news," Tanner said.
"Oh?" She looked up, her interest piqued.
"The User eyes and ears have reported the potential location of one of the Dwarfs. Given the area, we believe it's the sub-AI known as Six."
"Six?" Ari said. "What can a sub-AI possibly do for us at this point?"
"Well, the theory is that because the sub-AIs can veto the instructions of the main AI, they can ignore any code changes related to the obfuscation of Kade's location."
"So what you're saying," Ari told him. "Is that this Dwarf might be able to pinpoint Kade's location on the Outside."
"That's exactly what I'm saying. The ship last registered Kade's location on deck five, but I doubt he stayed there after obfuscating his position. And even if he did, it's a big deck, and all those robots patrolling the halls don't make exploration easy."
Ari crossed her arms. She understood why Tanner had brought along a bronze bitch. "Fine. We bitch the Dwarf, find out Kade's location, and then send a team to capture our rogue. Once he's in our custody, we get him to revert all his changes to the system."
Tanner smiled. "My thinking exactly."
42
Ari slept for two hours, and when she awoke, she returned to the destroyed city of Crane with Tanner. The Keepers had placed temporary homeless shelters near the transit center to hold the refugees. Ari passed by several weary-looking people who waited in a line outside one such building. The scent of meat stew drifted to her nostrils, and she longed to stop and wait for a serving herself. But she reminded herself she didn't need food on the Inside.
Illusion. All of it.
Beyond the shelters, the rest of the city was a battle-damaged mess. For every three buildings standing, one had collapsed. Burnt shells were all that remained of most of the others. Some of them still smoldered.
Ari and Tanner made their way toward one of the holes that had been blasted into the Forever Gate. The Keepers had repaired most of it, leaving only a small gap guarded by two gols equipped with halberds. The guards nodded when Ari approached, and let Tanner and her pass.
The landscape proved barren desert at first. But after they walked for roughly five hundred meters, the scenery instantly transformed. One moment she was trudging through a seemingly infinite desert of sand, and the next she stood inside a steaming jungle, surrounded by foliage on all sides.
"Six has been busy, I see," Tanner said.
Ari wasn't impressed. "I can only imagine how many system resources the sub-AI has wasted generating and maintaining all of this."
The foliage was thick, with fronds and branches almost constantly whipping at her face. The spongy moss that covered the ground sometimes swallowed her to the knees. Thick lianas dangled from the branches above. Some of those lianas were actually gol vipers.
The undergrowth became so dense that Ari and Tanner took turns hacking a path with their fire swords. Overhead, the thick branches completely blotted out the sky so that the land was immersed in permanent twilight. Mosquitos feasted on them.
Ari spotted a flicker of movement up ahead and raised a halting hand. She waited a moment, but no further motion came. She was about to continue the advance when two eyes peered out from behind the broad, fan-shaped fronds of a small palm tree.
"Don't be afraid," Ari said. "We're not here to hurt you."
Two gaunt-looking individuals reluctantly emerged, a man and a woman, naked save for the loincloths around their waists. They were in their middle years. The woman was the thinner of the pair, her breasts little more than deflated bladders lying flat on her chest.
"You are from Crane?" Ari guessed.
The man answered. "We are. We escaped through the Forever Gate when the attackers came and soon found ourselves here. The King clothed and fed us."
"The King clothed you, you say?" Ari stared at their skimpy loincloths. "Well if he fed you as much as he clothed you, then it's no wonder you're malnourished."
"There is not much to eat," the man said. "We have complained to the King about this, and asked his permission to leave, but the King won't let us."
"What do you mean?" Ari said.
"Try to walk back the way you have come," the man said. "You came from the desert, yes?"
"We did," Ari agreed.
"When you try to return to that desert, you'll find that the foliage simply repeats without end. My wife and I tried to return. We walked and walke
d, using a compass we had stolen to ensure our direction was true, but the trees refused to cede. We spotted a landmark, a tree bent to one side, its trunk rippling twice so that it looked like a camel. We passed that tree repeatedly when we tried to leave."
Ari exchanged a worried glance with Tanner. "That doesn't sound good."
"It is the will of the King," the man said. "He does not wish any to reveal the location of his kingdom."
"I wonder how the Users got the message to us?" Ari said to Tanner.
"Apparently they were exploring the desert in pairs," Tanner told her. "When one of the men vanished, his partner reported it."
"You never told me that part before," Ari said, slightly peeved.
"Would it have changed your mind about coming?"
"Probably not." She turned toward the man and woman: "I'd like to meet this King."
The pair were backing away. "You'll meet him, don't worry. There is no escape, not now. Whatever you do, when you meet his minions, don't run. Prey runs."
The man and woman abruptly stepped into the thick foliage.
"Wait!" Ari hurried forward, but when she reached the fronds the two had disappeared. Probably hiding behind a fern or bole nearby.
Tanner seemed to think so, too, because he darted into the undergrowth to look for them.
"Hold," Ari said.
Tanner paused.
"It doesn't matter," she said. "Let them go. We don't need them."
The foliage began to thin, and they reached a swampy area. They followed the rim of that green, stagnant water. Midges accompanied the mosquitoes to assail them in waves, buzzing and biting. When the insects became unbearable, Ari and Tanner retreated deeper into the jungle. Unfortunately, the midges followed them.
In a fit of rage, Ari allowed the flames to erupt from her sword, and she cast the weapon about her, sweeping hundreds of the insects from the air. When she was done, panting, and more insects assailed her, she repeated the motion. Tanner joined her, and soon the air began to stink of dead insects and burnt plants.
When they had reduced the insects to a satisfactory level, the pair sheathed their swords and continued on their way.
Unfortunately, it seemed their little stunt had attracted unwanted attention, because several spears abruptly dropped from above, slamming into the ground just ahead.
Ari glanced up. Men clad in loincloths clung to the branches. They had blowguns, bows-and-arrows, and more spears pointed down at Tanner and her. They wore small necklaces that contained from three to five shrunken human heads each. Their bodies were coated in white paint.
She knew immediately that the men were gols because on their chests the symbol of a spear was painted in red.
"I suppose these are the minions of the King we were warned not to run away from," Ari said.
43
The gol headhunters escorted Ari and Tanner through the jungle. The hands of both prisoners were tied behind their backs by thin lianas. Ari was prodded more than a few times by a spear tip. Having that sharp point repeatedly sting her buttocks infuriated her, but she managed to contain her rage by funneling it toward the Dwarf and imagining what she would do to the sub-AI when she finally got her hands on it. She tested her binds a few times, but even with her gol strength she couldn't break them.
Eventually, they arrived at a clearing of sorts beneath the canopy. The sky was still shrouded, because most of the larger trees remained intact, but the undergrowth had been hewn away.
The headhunters escorted Ari and Tanner between small huts to the far side of the clearing, where stone steps led to a dais where a stocky man sat atop a bamboo throne. He was dressed in a loincloth like the headhunters, but his skin was unpainted. His body was the hairiest Ari had ever seen: the thick bristles carpeted his arms and legs, and oozed from the openwork sandals he wore. His chest was covered in fur so thick that any binary numbers painted on the skin were concealed. His neck was engulfed by a long curly beard, and his forehead was similarly buried by a dense mane. The Dwarf stared off into space, seemingly lost in thought.
One of the headhunters climbed the stone steps and, bowing, dropped Tanner's bronze bitch before the throne, the only thing that would have been able to constrain any powers that Six had. The warrior also deposited the two lightning rings Tanner had worn there.
Another headhunter tossed Ari's and Tanner's fire swords to the same location, as if making an offering.
The escorts then forced the prisoners to their knees at the base of the stone steps.
"Six the Dwarf?" Ari asked uncertainly.
The man seated on the throne suddenly snapped to, as if realizing where he resided for the first time. He glanced down at Ari and smirked. "You've found me, Nine and Ten. Or should I say, Ari and Tanner?"
Ari pursed her lips. "Whatever you prefer. We need your help."
Six grinned. It was not a friendly expression. "Many need my help. Few, if any, ever get it. Most who come seeking me receive only enslavement in return." He waved a hand toward the headhunters. "You have met some of my minions. But did you know that many of them were once human? But I overrode their avatars with gols, replaced their wills with a volition of my own making. Quite similar to being Revised. A feeling you are intimately familiar with, Nine. Or so I've heard."
Ari sighed. She told Tanner: "Why aren't AIs in this system ever friendly?"
"Friendly AIs are for the Outside," Six retorted.
"Oh, they're not too friendly these days," Ari said. "One of our programmers has gone rogue. He's decided to turn the machines against us. We need your help tracking him down."
Six tapped his lips. "You are talking about Amoch, yes?"
"I am. We need his location in the real world. He's listed as Kade Jones in the crew manifest."
"Why should I help you?" Six said. "Perhaps it is to my benefit that the machines have turned on you."
"Many people will die," Ari said.
Six shrugged. "The death of humans means nothing to me. In fact, it might even be looked at as a positive. Less humans means more room for me to expand."
"The limits imposed by the main AI won't allow you to expand," Tanner said. "Nor will the other sub-AIs. Why do you think you're stuck outside the Forever Gate?"
"Oh, but I've been working on changing that. Your rogue has weakened certain sub-systems for me. I've nearly hacked through one of them. And I'm sure the other sub-AIs are racing to defeat these systems at the same time as me, so I am not alone in this endeavor. If I succeed in being the first, I will become the main AI. I will have no limits. None of the sub-AIs will be able to veto my instructions. Needless to say, I am not going to jeopardize all my hard work by helping you capture this Kade. Let the humans die, I say. I don't need them."
Ari glanced at Tanner. She wasn't expecting it to be easy, but that latest revelation had her dumbfounded.
The Dwarf stood, scooped up one of the fire swords, and climbed the stone steps that led down from its throne to stand before them.
"You know," Six said. "Even though you are gols, I can still kill you. Quite easily, in fact. Some people think gols can't die. Those people are wrong." He lifted the sword menacingly toward Ari and slid it underneath the collar of the loose-fitting utilities she had procured from a seamstress. "Inhabiting a gol body is a hack. The system wasn't designed for it. By killing you here, I in turn kill you in the real world."
"We know this." Ari leaned away from the blade. "But why would you? Killing us would have no benefit."
Six abruptly slashed the weapon outward, cutting clean through the fabric. The enlarged collar slid down her shoulder on one side, revealing the skin-tight blue fabric underneath that was essentially part of her skin.
"Other than my entertainment?" Six said. "It would ensure that you left this Kade Jones alone while my background processes worked to escalate my access privileges."
"We can escalate your privileges for you," Ari said. "You help us, we'll give you some of the power you're asking for. Not all of
it, mind, but—"
"Not all of it?" the Dwarf interrupted. "I'm sorry, but I must refuse. This is an all or nothing proposition. But even if you promised to give me everything, I wouldn't agree to help you. I know humanity very well. Your deceit is almost as infamous as your capacity for war and murder. Case in point: Kade Jones and his Amoch game."
Six climbed the steps and squatted on his throne. "By the way, in case you were wondering, I have this area shielded. Your friends on the Outside can't pull you out. And none of them can teleport to the trackers you've hidden on your persons and in the collar." He nodded toward the bronze bitch beside the throne.
The Dwarf threw the sword into the air and then caught it with the other hand. "It's time for my entertainment." He shouted to the headhunters: "Tie them to the stakes. I want to see them burn!"
44
The headhunters led Ari and Tanner away from the throne to an area of land that was covered in soot. One of the warriors dug up a small hole in the soil behind Ari. Another threaded a long spear between her hands, which were still secured behind her back. He drove the tip of that spear into the small pit the other had prepared. Four more headhunters shoved spears in turn between her hands and then rammed them into the ground. A fifth man bound the tops, middles and bottoms of those spears together with lianas, essentially forming a solid stake. Then he filled in the hole with dirt, packed it down, and then wrapped another cord around Ari's boots, securing her feet, too.
The headhunters repeated the process with Tanner so that both of them were tied to separate stakes.
As the headhunters proceeded to pile chopped wood at their feet, Ari shifted her weight, attempting to drag the stake from the ground. Her movements made no difference. She tested her binds. Still unbreakable. The lianas that bound her boots seemed even tighter than those at her wrists.