Behind the Bitmask

by Jessica Kagan

  “they r lookin 4 u be careful,” the message said. I didn’t see any included information about the sender. Apparently, someone wasn’t getting enough characters for their SMS plan. The actual message was vaguely ominous, but certainly not anything new. After all, it was always possible that Sigmar would find out about our shenanigans and try another assassination. I made a note to write some sort of text message tracking script for my phone the next time we set up camp.

  I joined my companions to eat breakfast, and after a few minutes, Azure joined us, as well. Apparently, she’d woken up early and done something private; I hoped it had involved nudity. Try as Azure might to avoid reading my thoughts, I’m pretty sure she picked up on it and smiled.

  “Guys, whatever you do, don’t eat the snow around here. It tastes like Fluorinert,” she said.

  “Azure, we don’t eat snow even when it doesn’t taste funny,” responded Hax.

  “We might’ve boiled it if we needed extra water, but not if it’s contaminated like you say,” Paul added. As far as I know, our water supplies were okay for now, but if we couldn’t deal with the Fluorinert problem Azure claimed we had, then we’d probably have to start rationing it.

  “Hyperion’s revenge,” I muttered. The rest of the crew looked at me like they were expecting a follow-up.

  “She built supercomputers, remember? Maybe there’s been a coolant breach somewhere.” That was a quick and dirty hypothesis, but it seemed to satisfy everyone. We finished up our breakfast and discussed the possibility of rationing water; eventually, we decided not to bother unless we couldn’t find a safe source in the next twenty four hours or so. With that, we headed off. While the air was cold, wind chill was limited, and further precipitation was nonexistent, so we were able to get in about an hour of moderately-paced travel before Haxabalatnar spotted a small figure on the horizon that was apparently running up to meet us.

  “What’s his hurry?” he quipped.

  “I’m getting a bad feeling about this. Load your guns,” Azure responded. I trusted her enough to start prepping my P99, but Hax and Paul weren’t so quick to prepare their own weapons.

  “You sure that won’t just create tension?” Haxabalatnar asked her.

  “We’re out in the boonies. What kind of person would be here except intentionally?”

  Hax shrugged and pulled out his own gun. I was too busy getting my own ready to figure out what sort of gun he preferred, so I do hope you’re not a gun nut.

  After about a minute, the interloper reached us. This was a vaguely elvish-looking chthon; its face was emblazoned with colorful geometric lines that could’ve reasonably been either blood vessels or tattoos, and if you weren’t careful, its ears could poke your eyes out.

  “Pardon me, but does one of you go by the name of Charlotte Metaxas?” it said. I immediately pointed my gun at the chthon.

  “Who wants to know?” I snarled. To be fair, actually pointing a gun at a living being is stressful, and I didn’t have time to come up with something wittier.

  “Whoa! Too much pressure, man. I just want to talk!”

  I didn’t lower my gun. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Paul had pulled out his phone to load a spellscript. Almost immediately, I saw a mite burst out of the phone’s screen and start circling the chthon. Paul had presumably picked that technique up from Terminal, and I suspected he was going to maneuver it inside the chthon’s head, where it would explode.

  “Is this how my life ends? You know, death at the hands of a few crazies who can’t trust a fellow traveler?”

  “Shoot already! He’s one of Sigmar’s assassins-” Azure shouted. I think she continued in that vein for a second after that, but before I could do as she said, Haxabalatnar fired his gun a few times and literally gave the chthon a head full of lead. It slumped over.

  “Pish, that was easy,” he said, before turning to Azure. “What makes you think he was working for Sigmar?”

  “I’m a telepath, remember? I pick up on these things if I concentrate properly, and they don’t suspect anything-”

  The chthon’s head exploded in a mess of gore, as if to deliberately interrupt my girlfriend. How had Paul managed to get such a big boom out of a little mite? I looked at Paul for an explanation.

  “What? I heard what happened to Charlotte. If it doesn’t have a brain, it can’t threaten us.”

  That seemed like a reasonable explanation, although I’d been pretty sure Haxabalatnar’s bullet had done more than enough to destroy the chthon’s brain. We looted a quart of clean, potable water from the chthon’s possessions; then, at Hax’s request, we buried the chthon’s body in some snow. Dirt would’ve been better, but we hadn’t bothered to pack shovels, nor did we have any interest in writing a spellscript to move the ground. With any luck, some sort of winter scavenger would find the corpse before Sigmar began to wonder why I was still alive.

  It turned out that while having extra drinking water doesn’t hurt, we didn’t yet need to tap into it; we soon passed out of the contaminated area. I had resolved to write a stern letter to the locals at 3M warning them about letting their manufactures fall into hellish hands, but now that our risk of ingesting Fluorinert was nil, that urge was rapidly subsiding. Instead, when we set up camp, I started working on the promised SMS tracking code, borrowing Paul’s laptop so I could have a proper development environment to play with. For reasons I’m not entirely sure of, I still had a couple bars worth of phone signal. With that in mind, I was able to call up Agnus and have him conscript someone to send us test texts with which I could refine my code. A few iterations later, I had something I figured was up to par.

  I quickly determined that, barring strange bugs in my code (which wasn’t impossible because it’s hard to program on a laptop in a cave), the caller had most likely sent their message from some point on Earth. That didn’t narrow things down much. However, I still had the same number as I did back in my Earth-residing days. I had shared it with my parents, and they’d probably shared it with the churchies who were hopefully protecting my family from titanic blowback. Maybe one of them had been tipped off to the assassination attempt? If so, I would be thankful, but something seemed off about that explanation.

  Without any significant results (although the script might come in handy later), I abandoned the project and returned to the task of traversing the Chippewas. Over the next few days, though, I occasionally took time to look at some of my other spellscripts and make some optimizations, since Paul seemed willing to give me some time on the laptop even then. Maybe taking him along was a good idea after all?

  We made our way into a forest. The first sign that something was up that it was recognizably a forest; clearly someone with human expectations had been here before us. I noticed someone had been carving crucifixes on the tree trunks. Perhaps we’d stumble on a whimsical forest monastery full of aged, endearing hermits trying to live in harmony with nature (read: idiots). I doubted we’d be so lucky, though, so I’d cautioned everyone to stay on their guard. To their credit, they did, though I could actually feel Azure’s vigilance beginning to slip.

  The day before, when it’d become apparent we would need to traverse the forest, Paul had taken some of our rations and mixed them into what he called a “cold salad,” in the hopes that we wouldn’t have to risk starting a fire just to get some cooking done. Today, we’d finally had a chance to sample it. The salad was fine. I mean, I’ve had better salads, but those were in fancy restaurants, and it was at least a novel take on the usual hiking food. Plus, I’d had no idea that Paul could cook. I’d never seen him in the kitchens in my coven days. Maybe he’d had a chance to learn during his own exile?

  “Why the cold meal?” I’d asked when he’d served us our first portion. We had a tendency of rotating the cooking duties, and it’d immediately come to our attention that he wasn’t roasting a foraged animal or trying to bake johnny cakes or any of the o
ther staples you can prepare if you light a fire. Azure had excused herself a moment ago, claiming she wanted to pick the local apples. Awfully spontaneous of her, but...actually, that’s exactly the sort of thing she would want to do.

  “Well, I saw this cartoon on the internet a while back that says that you shouldn’t start fires in magical forests,” Paul explained. “So, I wanted to make some food that’ll last us a few days and doesn’t have to be reheated.” Haxabalatnar winced at this.

  “You can’t trust cartoons on the internet, Paul. They don’t have our best interests at heart and are usually just intended as quick entertainment,” he responded. It sounded like Hax’s idea of humor.

  “What, you think that just because someone goes to the trouble of putting a bunch of moving pictures under a public service announcement, that means the message is no longer valid?” snapped Paul.

  “Why do you have to take everything I say and twist it in ways no sane person could imagine?” I’d have to say Hax responded poorly. If we were still in the office, I think he would’ve let this drop, but we’d been traveling for some time, and things were getting steadily more difficult. Where was Azure, anyways? She ought to have been back by now. I’d come to notice that when she was around, I felt calmer and more confident in my ability to handle life’s difficulties. I suspected she was having the same effect on Hax and Paul, as well.

  “You hell-raised types are beyond hope! You just grow up in an environment of pure murder and chaos and crime-” Paul began, before an unfamiliar voice cut him off.

  “What, like abortions?” it said. One of the trees was talking to us. I really shouldn’t have been surprised, but I was.

  “You do realize that abortions are murder, right?” continued the tree, in a voice as sanctimonious as the cross carved into its bark and as stiff as the wood under it. Haxabalatnar and Paul finally noticed someone was trying to get their attention and stopped yelling at each other.

  “What do abortions have to do with this?” Haxabalatnar asked, as if he were interrupted by the trees every day and had learned to take it in stride.

  “Every life is sacred, my child, even if it is too young to defend itself from the sins of our world.”

  I’d heard this somewhere before, but I couldn’t quite place it.

  “What if the life is actively trying to prey on you, like termites?” Hax quipped. I had the vague sense that this was a terrible response. I guess he doesn’t get to converse with trees on a daily basis. I heard wood cracking somewhere.

  “You would deign to lower an unborn sapling to the level of a mere insect? Have you no decency?” said a new voice. I jumped and swung around – this one was behind me! As if one talking tree wasn’t enough.

  “I thought every life was sacred. What if an innocent bacterium decides it likes the taste of cellulose and decides to eat your bark? Is its life sacred, and if so, is yours not?” Hax just doesn’t know when to quit all of a sudden. To be fair, I think he was tired of people twisting his words.

  “The nerve of this man!” shouted the first tree.

  “Woman! You know enough to respect the rights of a child were one to grow inside your womb, do you not?” the second tree said to me. I decided to take a different approach than Hax.

  “Look, we’re just trying to safely pass through the forest. We really don’t have time to discuss ethics with you, so if we could just go about our way-” I began, before the second tree lashed out at me with its branches. I dodged with time to spare, thanks to all the training I’d been doing at Agnus’s court, but it still wasn’t a good sign.

  “You travel in the company of a willing murderer, woman! It is essential that he learn about the sanctity of life and the need to protect the innocent.”

  *Azure, help!* I thought. I had no idea how far she’d strayed, or if I could yet tap into our fledgling psychic link, but I’d do anything to keep us from being separated. The only laptop on hand was firmly in Paul’s grasp; he was furiously typing something into a command prompt. I didn’t want to interrupt him or cause him to reveal what he was doing because if Azure didn’t get here in time, he might be our only hope.

  “Did you know that a fetus can feel pain?” said the first tree. “Can you imagine being vacuumed into a trash can because your mother thought you might have a so-called ‘genetic disorder?’ Or having your head crushed because she supposedly didn’t consent-”

  “Okay, this is getting too dangerous. Charlotte, we need to get out of here,” Haxabalatnar told me. He had a point, but how? We were literally in the middle of this.

  “No shit. But where’s Azure? We can’t leave her here!” I responded.

  “If things get too ugly, we won’t have a choice-”

  “Silence, human! You will not go anywhere until you have renounced your evil abortifacient ways!” Both trees lashed out at Haxabalatnar forcing him to fall back into the grasp of a third, which suddenly wrapped its branches around him, caging him like an animal. He looked annoyed, but not surprised, like this happened to him all the time.

  “Okay, fine, whatever. I’ve just abandoned my dreams of becoming an obstetrician. Is that what you want?” he said. It wasn’t. The branches tightened.

  “That sounds suspiciously like what an unrepentant murderer of the unborn would say,” intoned the prison tree. Haxabalatnar suddenly realized what could happen to him if he didn’t figure something out. He was beginning to look less annoyed and more frightened. I immediately pulled out my phone and started loading a lighter script. A wick of flame burst forth from my phone. I hoped the trees would see reason because I absolutely didn’t want to burn down an entire forest. I took another look at Paul – he returned my look and nodded.

  Azure arrived at that moment with a basket of fresh apples in her arms and a complete disregard for what was going on.

  “Guys, you haven’t lived until you’ve had baked apples, and-”

  She quickly took in the situation. The basket hit the ground. Paul was still typing away.

  “What is that tree doing to Haxabalatnar?” she shouted. I think this was the first time I saw her angry. Good thing her ire wasn’t pointed at me.

  “I-” Haxabalatnar began before his tree prison slapped him in the mouth.

  “Another woman whom we must protect from this pro-murder abortion fanatic!” shouted the tree holding Hax captive.

  “Crud buckets! I should’ve known the Baptists were running amok in the Chippewas!” Azure’s hair crackled with daemonic electricity, and even if she wasn’t nearly as powerful as Sigmar, I figured the trees would be at least intimidated by her sudden burst of magic.

  “A titan!” shouted the first tree. They were.

  “A blasphemous titan!” screamed the second.

  “The power of Christ compels thee, unholy titan woman! To the gates of hell with you!” continued the first tree, but what value is there in threatening a hell-born titan with the idea of hell?

  “Look, this is my fault. I got excited about the apple picking prospects, and if I’d noticed how fervent the local flora was around here, I would’ve told you to take a detour,” Azure apologized to me.

  “Your daemonic trickery will not deter us from spreading the true faith, titan!” cried the third tree. “Leave us, so that we may baptize this wicked human and his misguided companions in peace-”

  Azure screamed something I couldn’t quite make out. I heard a thunderclap and saw a giant bolt of lightning strike the second tree. Her face was red, and her breath was suddenly labored. The tree looked unharmed by her attack, but then it suddenly recoiled from us (as much as a nominally sessile plant can) and wrapped itself in its branches. What had she just done?

  “What are we doing?” creaked the second tree. “We cannot hope to match a titan’s hate! God Himself has focused His wrath upon me for daring to hate the sinner!”

  “Have you gone mad? They are
murderers! They must suffer until they are redeemed-” the third tree responded before Azure struck it with another bolt.

  “God, why have you forsaken us? Has our wrath brought yours upon us?” it shouted, opening up its branches and dropping Haxabalatnar like a hot potato. He stood up and immediately centered himself in our group, casually picking stray twigs and leaves from his clothes.

  “Does this mean you’re letting us go?” Haxabalatnar asked his captor. Let’s see – two trees cowering in fear and maybe pain, and the rest suddenly trying to give us a wide berth. I’d guess we’re free to leave.

  “Sure, whatever. God will sort out His own. Go in peace, and do not tread the path of sin,” said the second tree. I moved to gather up our supplies, which had gone forgotten in the chaos, and as I began packing up the foodstuffs we’d been trying to enjoy, I had the nagging feeling I was forgetting something else. I turned back to Azure and Haxabalatnar and suddenly noticed an angry red pair of eyes behind them that didn’t belong.

  “EVERYTHING BURNS,” they said, before exploding into balls of dirty, oily fire that enveloped the first of the talking trees faster than I could say that eyeballs can’t talk. Azure gasped again.

  “I didn’t do this! I would never do this,” she insisted. If it wasn’t Azure who’d set things on fire, then it had to be…

  “What the hell, Paul? Azure had the situation under-” I began, before inhaling a mouthful of unexpected smoke and spluttering. Turns out, fire spreads pretty quickly in the wild.

  “Who dares summon an ifrit into our forest?” shouted the second tree. It too was then somehow overcome with a coughing fit.

  “The heathens are summoning daemons in our sacred grove! Kill them all!” responded the third, slowly but surely levering itself out of the ground. I wasn’t taking my chances with it.

  “This way!” Haxabalatnar called to us, pointing in what I was certain was a random direction and dashing off. Azure and I followed him anyways, rather than unnecessarily splitting up. I had to drop a bag of something to keep up and didn’t have time to do much other than hope it wasn’t too important. Paul finally picked up on how bad things were getting, slammed his laptop shut, and followed our lead, but he’d only taken a few steps when a previously inanimate tree came to life and knocked him back into the burning forest with a swipe of its branches. I didn’t exactly want to look back and see how this played out, but his increasingly faint screams suggested he wasn’t faring well.