I slump on a seat, overwhelmed by the toxins in my blood and the afterglow of the mindbombs in my head. I listen to air rushing in through the broken window in rabid, choppy gulps, and struggle to stay conscious. The clattering of the rails buffets and lulls me as the train rips faster along the Wall, but I can't slip yet. They have mindbombs and marines and the power to rupture minds from afar, and I don't know anything about them. I need to be ready. I need to get safe. I need some kind of answers.
I bring up my node and make two short, sharp calls, matched with blurry pulls on old bonds like a drunken harpist. The train rocks me onward like a crib, speeding now with no driver at the wheel. Everybody's dead. I'd like to get up and stop it, but I'm too tired. I can't move at all, can't think, but something drives me on.
I daydream of Loralena and my children as I sway down the length of the train, trailing one of the Kaos rifles. The door to the driver's cab blows off its hinges easily. The controls are simple enough, and the train brakes. I send it back the other direction at full speed.
Time and places zip by like postcards from another life; halting the train then staggering through the little town of Brink, climbing back up the rails of the rollercoaster in Candyland. I surface briefly standing amidst the rubble of my tower of memory, panting with the dizzy exertion of the climb. The sun is low behind the clouds, and it's getting dark. The air is humid, thick with the scent of boiled sweets, and here before me Mr. Ruin is still alive.
Barely. He is entrenched within the innermost walls of his mind, fending off the encircling tsunami of nonsense I injected into his brain. Perhaps he's already Lagged his memory of Napoleon to keep himself alive. Perhaps he's sacrificed all memory of torturing my family. Soon enough it'll all be gone, and with it the spark that keeps him alive.
I can only hope it isn't too late. He's the only one who knows what I'm up against.
With a chock of wood as a hammer and a spike of twisted coaster-track nail as a pick, I crack open his skull like an egg. Three blows and the bone shears. He whimpers. Ven did it once for me. A bead of metallic liquid leaks out of a fresh bloody furrow in his forehead. More follows, and the silvery engrams run down his face like yolk.
I sag beside him, with everything I can do, done. I am too exhausted now; the mindbombs and the drugs have finally worn me down, but it's all right, it must be all right, because help is coming and I can rest for a little while.
I wake into the noisy hammering of a narrow, dark tunnel.
It's not where I passed out, not the rails atop Candyland. I try to get up but I'm strapped flat on my back, arms and ankles pinioned. I lift my head an inch and hit the tunnel ceiling. Rounded plastic walls encircle me bare inches away, lit by a dim glow coming from the tunnel's end.
The shape of it is familiar. The thump thump sound of hammering all around is familiar. It's an EMR; once used for imaging brains, these huge pieces of medical equipment were co-opted in the Arctic War by Soul Jackers like me to hack into enemy minds.
Now I'm in one, and it's turned on, and that makes me very afraid.
I crane my neck and press my forehead against the curved plastic, peering down the length of my body to study the glow at the tunnel's end. I can just make out the control screen, half-obscured by a bulky figure leaning in to read the data flow. He must see my rise to consciousness reflected in the readings, because the EMR responds, and the imaging magnets whirring around the donut frame ramp up in volume.
thump thump
thump thump
thump thump
I bite back panic. My head throbs. I try to remember how I got here, but it's difficult with the magnetic waves washing over me. I snag hold of something, a memory, and the cold chill of fear pushes to the fore as it comes back. I was on a train headed home from Candyland, and there was an attack. I remember the mindbombs and everybody dying and...
They've got me. Fear swallows me up.
I thought I was safe, thought I'd done enough, but now I'm here and there can be only one reason they've strapped me into an EMR: to jack into and raid my mind. As I think it, I feel the signs that it's true; the tell-tale traces of invasive passage worming within my own Molten Core. Someone's been searching inside my Soul, delving through the burning ocean of thought that makes me who I am, and that is horrifying and terrifying. What have they stolen? What have they changed?
I try to reach in and isolate their trails but I can't jack at all with the flood of electromagnetic waves beating me down.
thump thump
thump thump
thump thump
I'm trapped. I bite back a cry for help and try to shuffle off-center out of the EMR's focus spot, but I can't budge an inch. The cuffs on my wrists and ankles bite sharply, and there's a throbbing pain in my right palm that I can't fathom.
I'm helpless. I steel myself. They already know I'm awake.
"Let me up," I call toward the figure at the screen, trying to sound strong but my voice comes out in a panicky croak. "I can't breathe."
The figure at the EMR monitor shifts position, and my heart skips a beat. There's something familiar about the lines of the silhouette.
"Why did you call me, Rit?" the figure asks. It's a man's deep voice but I'm too confused to remember how I know it.
"I was-" I begin, then forget what I was going to say. The EMR is jumbling my thoughts. Stay long enough in one of these and you'll be forever scrambled. I try to reach out through the bonds but the electromagnetic barrage fences me in. I try again but the flows are a shell I can't escape. Panic rises again and again I barely chew it back.
Call him, he said? I don't remember. I made calls on my node, yes, but…
I lose the thread of whatever I was thinking, sent reeling back to where I began.
"What do you want?" I ask. Maybe this time I manage to mask the fear in my voice. "Who are you?"
The figure leans closer to the EMR's tunnel mouth; now the weak light illuminates him from behind, showing solid shoulders, thick arms and a square-shaped head.
"What do you think the old bastard wants, Rit? The same shit he's wanted since the start. I warned you."
Warned me? I don't understand. I don't know who 'the old bastard' might be.
"Who?"
"Apparently the two of you killed his son together," the voice goes on. Almost bored, maybe angry through the boredom. "Ten years ago. But the Don never forgets, Rit. I know that well enough."
The Don. Don Zachary? Is it Don Zachary from the Skulks doing this to me? I'm almost happy. Better than Ruin's people. And Rit?
Rit. Nobody calls me that now. I blink, trying to focus, so close to remembering. After that train there was Candyland, and two calls, and one of them was to Don Zachary, and the other...
"Carrolla?"
He laughs, deep and without any trace of humor. "You've screwed me again, Rit. You've screwed us both this time. He's really pissed. You better think of something clever to say."
The EMR gets stronger then, like he's punishing me. The hammering becomes all that I can hear and see and feel as magnetic waves pound me like a waterfall.
thump thump
thump thump
thump thump
3. DIGGING
I wake and there's a sharp throb in my right hand.
I still can't move, but the lights are up and I've been slid halfway out of the EMR tunnel, now surrounded by people. When I crane my neck I can see them from the chest down: three thugs in dark jackets circling me; a pale and sweating Carrolla at the EMR monitor, ten years older than when I last saw him and wearing it poorly; and another man leaning in, pressing close to my belly to make himself seen under the lip of the EMR roof, with the craggy face and outsized nose of a man I remember too well.
Don Zachary. He does look pissed.
"Now we talk," he says.
thump thump
thump thump
The EMR doesn't stop but it's been turned down. I'm less confused, and I can think. I reach out through the bonds
and try to burrow into the Don, but the EMR shell is still too strong.
"Is he trying to get out?" Don Zachary asks over his shoulder. Carrolla grunts. The Don peers at me. "You're here, son. This is happening, and there's just one way out."
He keeps talking but I switch off, trying to make sense of how things came to this pass. I remember calling the Don from the train, because he was the only one with the resources to protect me from mindbombs. I called Carrolla because he was the only one who might be able to keep Mr. Ruin alive. I implanted the drive to help me deep in their minds, and they shouldn't have been able to resist.
Yet here we are.
A hand swipes into the EMR tunnel and backhands my face. I rock to the side and back, feeling the shock and the sting.
"Listen carefully," the Don says, pulling back, his lip curling in anger while his old eyes gleam. I get the sense he's been waiting for this moment for a long time; eleven years to be precise, since I hacked his bunker and Jacker his mind. "You're going to tell me exactly what you did," he says slowly, "how you jacked me without an EMR, down a node line, from so far away. You're going to teach that skill to my Jackers, and then, if you're lucky, you'll get to die alone."
I peer up into his vicious, wrinkled old face, marred by the big broken nose, cataracty eyes, a chin too small for any crime-boss to have, and can't think of a word to say. He was always brutal, and we both know what his threat means; my family are on the line. I'm not ready for that though; the disconnect from what I'd expected is too strong.
"I told you to help me," I say, unable to get past it. "On the node you agreed. I felt it. Why aren't you helping me?"
Don Zachary gives me half a grin, half a sneer and leans in close. "Surprised, are you? I owe as much to you, I suppose. You taught me all about it when you broke into my head and stole my son." His anger creeps through, hot still despite the years. "That was fucking wrong, son. You don't steal a man's child."
He backhands me again. Just for fun this time, because he definitely has my attention. I gasp and roll my jaw. It doesn't seem to have done anything for his rage; if anything it's brought it to the surface.
"How?" I manage.
He taps my temple hard, like he's trying to drill his knuckly finger into my skull. "You took too much. My son, you, the Skulk, the girl? You got greedy. You left a gaping hole in my head and you didn't fill it with anything. I suppose you thought I wouldn't notice?"
He's angry and he's proud at the same time. He should be. Most people have no idea when you take a memory from them. A bit of déjà vu, maybe, some confusion and they dismiss it and move on, but not for people who know their own minds well, like the Don. I should have expected as much. I could have mixed up a memory engram to fill the space I'd carved out, a joy-patch or something, but I wasn't thinking back then. I was on the run, and arrogant, and lost.
"I'm sorry," I say.
He snorts, briefly sated. "Of course you are. Everyone is when they get caught. You thought you could break into my head and take what you want, but I noticed. I hired Soul Jackers to investigate; it didn't take long to weed you out. Imagine my surprise. Just gone, the people on Skulk 47 said. I went to your jack-site and found I'd already repossessed the place! What a puzzle that was. We'd even made marks on the walls for how we were going to refit it." His breath comes faster now; revenge eleven years coming, and he's lost in the moment. "Then one of my own boats turns up along the Wall, and we backtrack its navigation record to the old 53, where I find three of my men in a wrecked shark arena, brains turned to soup." He stabs my temple again, sending stars across my vision. "You were lazy. You didn't tidy up your trail at all."
Tears spark in my eyes, from the slaps, from the shock, from the fear of what's coming next. He's right, I didn't tidy up my trail, and I haven't tidied up my trail this time either. Mr. Ruin found my family; now his friends could find them easily too…
He hit me again. "Look at me, son. Good. So we hunted you, found you in Calico. Nothing we could do about that, not with our deal with the city, so we waited. Nice family, cute kids."
My breath stops in my throat. There it is. If Zachary knows them, who doesn't? Ruin's friends could be with them even now, dropping mind-bombs on the Reach…
"Please don't."
"Don't," he repeats. "Easy to say. You didn't give me any choice, did you? Didn't have mercy? Just ripped my boy away, and now eleven years later you come asking for help, trying to Lag me again?" Now the light in his eyes looks half-mad. He stabs his finger in my forehead again. "I get a jack every day, because of you. That's not comfortable, you shit. Eleven years of jacks just looking for you, and then one day there you are, making me talk about going to Candyland like I'm some kind of slave."
His throat palpitates; this is eleven years of impotent rage coming due. My mind reels and I crane my neck to look at Carrolla, putting the pieces together in my head. He never really got free. He's been here ever since. He's not going to help me now.
The Don thumps me again; the sound claps out in the narrow confines of the EMR, like taking a plank of wood to the face. "There's nothing good coming for you, son. Only bad things the longer you hold out, until you tell me what I want to know. How did you Lag me down a node line without any equipment at all?"
4. NAILS
I don't know what to say. I don't know what to do. I can't jack my way out of this.
"Take another," the Don says, and pulls away.
Two of his men, bought-and-paid-for ex-marine Hawks by the look of them, press in before I can figure out what he's talking about; one of them holds my right shoulder down firmly while the other unties the strap on my right wrist. Velcro rips free and he holds up my hand for me to see.
My jaw lolls; it doesn't look real. At once I know what he's done. Three fingers and my thumb are gone, severed at the palm, and jutting in their places are four rusty black nails.
Nausea floods me.
"We got started while you were under," the Don says. "I couldn't wait. You'll be awake for this one."
He produces a pair of shears, the kind you'd use to trim bushes in the park, and opens them around the base of my little finger. Things start to swirl, from the fresh ache and the EMR thump and the nausea. The world veers gray and I try to jack into it. My fingers and thumb are already gone. I reflexively try to move them, pulling on tendons that now connect to nothing and only grate against the metal embedded in my hand. I watch the dark black nail-lines shifting underneath my skin like parasites.
I start to faint.
"No," says the Don sharply, and points at Carrolla, "keep him awake."
The EMR ramps up and the wooziness passes quickly, sharpening my senses.
"For that attempt, I take two," says the Don.
The shears are already crusted with blood. He snips my little finger with a sharp crunch, staring into my eyes throughout. The digit drops somewhere by my side, there's the pain and there's blood and a horrific kind of disconnect as I watch my body permanently mutilated.
He doesn't wait, following up with the index finger of my left hand. Now I'm not thinking; I struggle and thrash and cry out for them to stop, but it doesn't change a thing. This is the Don after all, he just watches me while his men free my left hand and hold it up. He closes the shears around my thumb, wraps both his hands around the handles, and cuts.
My thumb cuts, crunches, and breaks free. I want to vomit. I gag but nothing comes. He savors it as I bleed.Calmly, like he's done this a thousand times before, he picks up my thumb and little finger and puts them both on my chest. Neatly arrayed like Napoleonic soldiers. I bite my lip so hard it bleeds, striving for control.
Next they hammer in the nails. That hurts a lot more.
When it's done I tell the Don everything, like I did once before. I tell him about Mr. Ruin and the aetheric bridge, about the power of broken bonds and his son dressed up as Napoleon, about mindbombs on the train and why I asked for his protection.
He listens and nods along. When I'm do
ne he pats the back of my nail-fingered hand, almost tenderly now, spiking a special kind of pain. "Thank you," he says. "That's good. But I don't care. You know what I want. Tell me or I bring in your kids and we get creative."
I just stare at him. There has to be a play here if I can only find it. He doesn't give me long, and holds up the shears again. All the rumors about the Don are true. I've always been lucky. He'll take my fingers and toes and at some point will I give him the bonds and the bridge?
Then something spills out. Maybe a way.
"Wait," I say, "just wait a second, Mr. Ruin! The man on the rollercoaster. Carrolla, I told you to save him. Tell me he's alive! Do you have him?"
The Don frowns, like he's disappointed. It's not enough. The shears open around my ring finger.
"He taught me!" I blurt. "I only ever did it with his help, I swear. He's dying though, maybe he's already dead. Let me jack his mind and I can tell you! He's the one who killed your son, after all. I'll drag it out of him, I promise." A pause. "That's what you want, isn't it?"
The Don raises his hand and the shears pause, hovering around my index finger. He looks at me with new interest, then turns to Carrolla.
"You jacked the comatose one, didn't you?"
Carrolla nods.
"What did you find?"
"His mind's frozen solid, like a wall. I couldn't get in. I don't know what happened, what could cause that, but he'd be dead if he wasn't on life support."
The Don considers, then points at me. "Could he get in?"
It takes a Carrolla a long moment. He's wondering what my game is. Have I got a plan, something to make his life worse again, or maybe something real? "He might be able to," he allows. "He's a much better Jacker than me. He's the best there is."
"And can he do anything to us from inside? Is there any danger in this?"
"None," Carrolla says blankly. He sees no hope in this. He's showing only the face of a whipped dog, and Don Zachary believes it because it's real. Carrolla is broken. "If they're both in the EMR, he's helpless. He can't do anything."
Soul Jacker Box Set Page 21