Chromed- Rogue

by Richard Parry

  “Jesus,” muttered Lace, voice almost lost against the noise of destruction. “What a killjoy.”

  The tunnel was dark, dry, and cold. Harry couldn’t really feel it, but his optics caught the occasional misting of breath from Lace over his shoulder. The floodlights on the front of the chassis pushed in front of them, the light white and clear.

  There was nothing here. No activity. No people, or machines. The bulbs strung along the tunnel were dark. “If this place belongs to Reed, they haven’t used it in a long time.”

  “Yeah.” Harry heard Lace tap keys. “It’s going in the right direction.”

  His overlay dropped a target box over an auto turret ahead, the barrels pointing to the floor, still and lifeless. He clanked past it, the floodlights leaving it behind in the dark.

  “Okay,” said Lace. “Let’s say it’s Reed’s tunnel. That was a gun, right?”

  “Auto turret. Sure.”

  “City planning don’t put auto turrets in.”

  “I’m with you. It’s Reed’s tunnel.”

  “Thing is…” She trailed off as Harry’s floodlights found the nose of a jeep around a corner. The doors were open. He checked inside. Empty.

  Harry tapped the jeep’s hood, clank clank. “Thing is, this jeep didn’t drive itself here.”

  “Where are all the people? The jeep didn’t drive itself, sure, so where’s the driver? This tunnel is big.” Lace rapped on the side of the chassis. “Right?”

  “Don’t do that.”

  “What?” Lace knocked on the chassis again. “This?”

  “Yeah. I…” Harry wanted to drop it. Pretend he hadn’t said anything.

  “What?”

  “It’s nothing.”

  “It’s not nothing.” Lace sounded exasperated. “It’s something. What is it?”

  “Christ,” said Harry. “I should leave your crippled ass here.”

  “Just tell me.” Some of the old, playful Lace crept into her tone.

  “I can hear it.”

  “That’s why I did it.”

  “No,” said Harry. “I can hear it inside. I don’t know what you’re doing, but you’re hitting just the right spot to carry through. What they left of me still has ears. I shouldn’t be able to hear it, but I can.”

  She didn’t say anything for a moment, and when she did the laughter had gone from her voice. “Oh.”

  “It’s nothing. Anyway.” Harry straightened, looking ahead. “Reed’s tunnel. I figure we’re probably no more than a minute away from the main hangar.”

  “There should be some guys there, right?”

  “Right.” Harry clanked through the dark. After a minute the floodlights showed a huge set of steel doors. The doors were open, yawning a welcome.

  “I have to ask you something,” said Lace. “It’s kind of serious.”

  “All right.” Harry swiveled the chassis, scanning the open doorway. No damage. No gunfire. Just … open.

  “Let’s say you’re a major syndicate.”

  “Define ‘major.’”

  “Leader in the porn industry.”

  “With you so far.” Harry grabbed a door, pulling. It moved a couple centimeters. Heavy, but not stuck. Someone opened it and left it open. Not a mechanical fault.

  “You’ve got this big tunnel that leads into your secret lair.”

  “Lair?”

  “You say headquarters, I say lair. Same same.” Lace sniffed. “You’ve got a couple of options. Option one, you have a bunch of dudes, big guns, lots of security.”

  “I’m still with you.” Harry walked into the room.

  “Hold up. Option two is you have a big tunnel leading right to the heart of your lair. Open door, no guards.”

  “I see where you’re going with this.” Harry’s optics scanned, finding no targets. “This feels like option two.”

  “What I want to know is, why do you leave your balls hanging out like this?”

  “I don’t think we’re going to work it out standing around here.”

  Lace sighed. “I think you’re right.”

  Harry strode into the dark. Ahead, the overlay tagged a small light, a tiny glimmer in the gloom to the left. “See that?”

  “I don’t see shit, except a big-ass empty hangar.”

  “There’s an elevator up there.”

  “Really?” She shifted in her hammock, sighing. “If I had a dick in my face I couldn’t see it.”

  He clicked off the lights, the hangar dropping to night. “See it now?”

  “I’m scared of the dark.” After a moment, Harry figuring her eyes adjusting to the dark, she said, “I see it. Good eyes, Harry.”

  “Best money can buy.” He cranked the floodlights on, the lamps humming, vigilant against the dark. Harry pushed on, servos whining, until they reached the elevator. It was large, a caged unit with bright yellow warning barriers.

  “You’ve got to wonder what that’s for.”

  “It’s for lifting shit.”

  Lace made a duh sound. “Why’s it only go down?”

  Harry looked closer. “Must be another one here for going up.”

  “Do it,” she said. “You know you want to.”

  “Lace, we’re here to save a couple kids and get out.”

  “But what if they’re down, not up?”

  “I … hell.”

  “Do it. Do eeeeet. Do it. Doit doit doit doit—”

  “I’m doing it.” Harry lifted the yellow barrier with a metal hand, clambering into the cage. It creaked and groaned as he slid the barrier closed. Harry clicked the button to take them down. As the car descended inside the shaft, Harry waited, motionless. They descended, meter by meter, deep into the rock below the city. “They’re not down here.”

  “The only reason you have an elevator that only goes klicks down in your secret lair is if you’ve got a dungeon there.”

  The elevator clanked to a stop. “Or a reactor.” The Apsel logo stared at them from the darkness, the hum of the fusion core almost a feeling.

  Lace hmm’d. “Let’s torch it.”

  “We can’t torch it. I don’t have a really big fire. It’s a reactor, Lace. I don’t want to blow it up.”

  “Pussy.”

  Harry shuffled the chassis’ feet. “Say. There was a big APC upstairs, wasn’t there?”

  “Think so.”

  “We could blow that up.” Harry thought for a moment. “We could blow that up down here.”

  “Now you’re thinking.” Lace’s tone was gleeful. “Let’s do that.”

  The hardest part about running for your life when you really didn’t care was habit. Going through the motions, even though you had nothing left worth saving.

  The plan was simple — they’d put the APC in place, jacked its smaller reactor, and got out of Dodge before they blew the core. Harry thought he might have stayed below if he didn’t have precious cargo.

  Harry waited as the elevator rose. “You hacked the APC?”

  “I hacked the APC.” Lace typed on her deck. “Something’s wrong. I want to be in charge of the timing, but… Oh. Oh shit.”

  “What is it?”

  “Hold on,” she suggested.

  “What do I hold on to?” His optics scanned for a hard point, but it was an elevator. Just a wire basket suspended over certain doom.

  “It’s got some kind of—” Lace’s words were gobbled by an explosion. The whole shaft shook, a fireball rising below them. Harry could see the firestorm’s light as it raged closer.

  “GO!” screamed Lace as the car settled on the upper level.

  Harry tore the door from the elevator car, tossing it aside like tissue paper. He pushed the overtime hard, the reactor on his back peaking into the red as his metal feet dug into the hard concrete floor. He leaped from a sprinter’s crouch, the big chassis roaring.

  He snagged Lace from behind. Her face was frozen in a scream through overtime. Harry could see her body pulled about like a rag doll. He shoved her into the digge
r arm’s bucket, cupping it to the front of the chassis. There wasn’t time to be gentle.

  The fireball blasted around them, heaven’s fury unleashed.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The vaulted door reached up into the black, tall metal stretching fingers toward the roof. Mason touched the surface. His gloves said it was cool, but a crude hole with soft edges showed where a laser cut through. “Carter, I’m here.”

  “Go away,” she said. “Aster’s already inside. He’s got about a hundred guys.”

  “I can take Aster.”

  “I know, but he can take you too. It’s the math. I can’t stop running the numbers.”

  Mason put the case down, the tips of his gloves rasping on the clasp. “Are you with me? Can you see this?”

  “I’ve never left you.”

  He put a hand on the lid. “Have you heard about overhyping something?”

  “Just open it.”

  Mason flipped the case open, the old dress nestled inside. He held it up, playing Tenko-Senshin’s light over it. “I’m sorry it’s so old. It’s a ball gown. I thought you might want to go dancing.” The link was quiet, the hiss and pop of static the only noise. “Are you—”

  “Don’t see me, Mason. I don’t want you to look at me.”

  Mason let the dress fall. “I’m coming in. I’ve made it in time. I’m going to get you out, then we’re going dancing.”

  “You’re going to die.” Carter’s voice was flat, resigned. “Look. See.” The overlay chattered, showing two men standing guard. Their rifles pointed at the door. Zane Aster, standing by another vaulted door in a long room full of computer servers. Racks of them stretched long in the dark quiet of the basement. A large laser cutter worked on boring a hole in the door near Aster, the circle of melted metal almost complete. A woman operated it. Auto turrets hung dead and lifeless from the ceiling, cores blown. Shattered pieces of metal mixed among bodies of the fallen. The overlay picked out one form, different, the Reed construct’s synthetic body laying with a sword. It was riddled with holes. A further ten men and women in white Apsel tactical armor were spread through the room, pale ghosts in cover, hiding, waiting. Ready to kill.

  “Huh. Best get started.”

  “Mason.” Carter sounded lost. “Mason, I’ve got something for you as well.”

  He glanced about the entrance chamber. “There’s nothing here.”

  “Do you trust me? I’m not sure if this is going to work. It might kill you.”

  He hung his head. “Always.”

  “Okay. Before we start, I wanted to say… Of all the people in this world, I’m glad to have known you, Mason Floyd. You are my best friend. You made it all worthwhile. You are the finest part of me. I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry? About wh—” The link flared bright, hard, hot, too much, it was burning in his mind, pain like a star, the noise louder than anything. The universe roared.

  Mason opened his eyes. His face pressed against the cool of the concrete floor. Mason lifted his head, a line of drool stretching to the floor. He wiped his mouth on the back of a glove, leaving a glistening trail.

  Something was different. He could feel the teeth in his head. Mason’s toenails hurt. His skin was alive. A clank of metal sounded from the other room. He flowed upright, the movement sure and simple as he reached for the door.

  “Mason.” Carter’s voice was stretched thin as he let the overtime fall around him. He moved inside, ducking behind a piece of shattered machinery as enemy rounds filled the air. They were too slow, too sloppy, hitting nothing.

  “Excellent!” Aster spoke over the local link, his voice clear through the overtime. “I’d hoped to get you both, a sort of two-for-one deal.”

  Mason could see the Reed construct’s synthetic body struggling to rise. His overlay marked the Apsel men and women in the room converging on his position.

  “It’s hard. I tried to fight like you, but I never learned to dance. It’s so badly damaged, but…” Carter sounded strained as the construct struggled to a kneeling position, the ruined face staring. It held its sword out. “Take your sword, kensei.”

  Okay then. Mason moved, the little pistol held low. He darted from cover to cover, ducking through the server racks. Small arms fire shattered machines around him, plastic and metal falling as a dark rain. It felt slow, easy, as he raised the Tenko-Senshin. The little gun growled and chattered across the hard link, then screamed its fiery hate. A man’s body pulled apart, flakes of white armor and burned meat spraying in a wet silhouette across the ground behind him. Mason rolled, staring into the construct’s eyes as he snagged the sword’s hilt.

  The lattice pushed him, spinning him away from the bright light of a laser as it touched the air where he’d stood. Mason held the sword low, blade a centimeter from the ground. He felt the lattice pull his neck to the side. His spine popped and cracked. “Okay, let’s play.” Mason raised the sword in a salute before breaking into a sprint.

  Gunfire tracked him as he moved. The lattice was alive, and he could feel the bright urgency of the reactor in his chest. The overlay marked a woman with a rifle behind a row of servers. Mason slashed the sword through the machines separating them. The blade cut through her rifle and her hands, pieces of metal and flesh falling. He spun around the edge of the racks, the sword slashing a horizontal line, and the woman’s head bounced into the dark as her body slumped.

  The blade he carried was light, its edge old steel and kept promises. A man drew a bead on him, rifle barking. The lattice laughed and shivered as it pulled him aside, his feet hitting the rack of servers to his left, spinning him through the air. Mason landed, taking a knee, the sword falling straight and true. The man’s body slid open down the middle, the two halves falling away.

  “Oh, Carter. What have you done?”

  “I fixed you.” Carter’s voice was tight with fear. “Stop fucking around. Remember, he’s mil-spec. He’s almost here, God, help me, he’s almost here!”

  Mason saw Aster’s hands on the big door as she spoke. Gairovald’s assassin held a grenade. Mason sprinted, the Tenko-Senshin held true as it fired on Aster. The other man moved like silk and water, holding the woman at the cutting laser in front of him. Her body was torn to shreds. Aster tossed the grenade through the door, ducking to the side in a smooth motion as he pulled two long knives out.

  “Great,” Aster snarled. “It’s—”

  Mason’s rush hit him, and the two men tangled, Mason’s sword cutting up and out. Aster’s blades flashed and stabbed. Mason’s sprint took him three steps past Aster, and he stared at the blood coming from his chest. The knives had cut hard and deep, pushing through creases in the Metatech armor. He slowed, coughed blood, the lattice bunching and churning, before he fell to his knees.

  Aster stood behind him, a smile on his face. His mouth started to open, a faint look of surprise on his face as his head fell from his shoulders. His body toppled, metal and blood visible in the stump of his neck.

  “Goodbye, Mason,” said Carter.

  The grenade exploded behind the vaulted door.

  The EMP hit hard, his lattice struggling for a second before holding him up in careful hands. An Apsel agent rounded a line of servers and the sword snaked out and cut him down. Mason didn’t even feel himself do it. He reached for the door, pulling it open.

  Carter’s room wasn’t big. A structure of glass and wires stood in the middle, a thing of diamonds stretching up the entire two-story height of the room. The light inside had burned out, leaving it dark, empty, the essence gone.

  The room was otherwise empty. Mason stepped over the discharged EMP. He looked around. “Carter?”

  The link was cold and silent. Empty.

  His gaze found the rear wall, big black letters stenciled against the whitewashed concrete walls.

  “No,” he said. “No.”

  The letters were tall, uncompromising. They left no argument.

  COMPUTER ADVISOR: RESEARCH, TACTICS, AND RESPONSE.


  CARTR. No, not Cartr.

  Carter.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Mike watched the kid tear up the building, shrugging concrete, rebar, and metal aside like paper. It was like watching a cyclone, except cyclones were a lot slower. Sweet baby Jesus. The floor opened above Mike, rubble showering as Zacharies shot through, standing upright on a chunk of broken concrete. It had carpet attached. The kid rode it like a massive surfboard.

  “Is…” The feed crackled, Sam’s voice dropping away for a second. “…Like he’s surfing.”

  “I was just thinking that,” said Mike.

  “You’re … thing is, we can’t … clearly.” Sam’s voice cut out like a bad drive-through. Not now. Mike slammed a hand into the side of his head, and the link flared clean. “Which is it gonna be?” Her southern drawl never died.

  Mike hefted his sidearm, sprinting up an incline of rubble. “Show some initiative.”

  “You didn’t hear what I said, did you?” she snapped.

  “Not a good time.” The ceiling above Mike cracked. Dim light came through as Zacharies punched through. Mike heard the kid’s exultant shout. He hauled himself up and saw a big room, badly finished. Walls ripped out, carpet mismatched. A raised floor — is that an actual dais? — at one end, people holding it. The Reed asshole stood wearing a neat suit and a cheap smile. At the other end of the room another man stood with Haraway, but she looked stoned or drunk. The kid’s sister Laia was right in front of him.

  “Hey. You need a hand?” Mike’s lips felt thick and puffy, the overtime making the words difficult. He gave a virtual nod down the link. “Sam? Necklace.”

  “Got it.” The black circle around Laia’s neck cracked down the middle, falling free. Laia’s eyes widened.

  Mike’s lattice turned him toward the Reed man as the asshole moved, pulling something from his jacket. Mike raised his own sidearm and shot him twice in the chest, then faced the front of the room before he’d finished falling. “Kid, time to go.”

  “No.” Zacharies didn’t turn. The slab he stood on hovered, pieces of concrete and metal swirling around him, their orbits smooth and regular.