Silence (30 page)

“
By any chance do you know
anything about this?” Camillio Tyche asked Sheikoh
shrewdly.

“
Well…” Sheikoh murmured
slowly. “I have good news and bad news. Good news is we probably
don’t have to worry about that ‘Celestial’ going  to tell on
us. The bad news… well I think that’s something we’d better discuss
in person.”

“
From the offices of the
Supreme Centaurai, Ghost was able to secure the phone lines and
take control of Interium’s intranet. Possible eavesdroppers are of
no concern,” Dream replied archly.

“
Still, mate. This is a big
one,” Sheikoh murmured into the cellpad.

There was a sigh on the other end of
the line.

“
Okay, Silence. You’re in
the East Side, of course?” Tyche asked reluctantly.

“
West,” Sheikoh replied.
Tyche didn’t ask any questions.

“
Then we’ll meet in the
house that we met in yesterday. Be there within the next quarter
hour.” Tyche ordered over the line.

The connection broke. Sheikoh flipped
the trinity shut and shoved it in his pocket. Then he ran through
the streets. He had a ways to go in only fifteen
minutes.

The dirty street looked exactly the same as it had last time.
There might have been one or two more bums than before, but Sheikoh
didn’t have time for a head count. He trotted up the Celestial’s
rotting porch, opened the door, and walked into the dreamlike, blue
lights of the house. In the flickering blue of the room, Sheikoh
was surprised to see that both Indigo and Ghost were there, as well
as Camillio Tyche.  

The shadowy Celestial sat at the head
of the blue-gleaming table, radiating disapproval. To his right,
was a wary, defeated- looking Indigo, and to his left was a
hard-eyed Ghost. Sheikoh noticed that both of them sat farther from
Tyche than they had at their last meeting.

Sheikoh took the same seat he had
before and launched into the unabridged story of everything that
had happened to him since meeting the Centaurai Aide. While
explaining what had occurred after he’d killed the four Celestial
and fitted the amulet into the Codex, Ghost and Indigo’s eyes
blasted him with their disbelief, but Tyche listened to Sheikoh
intently, with an interested expression. Then when Sheikoh
described his encounter with the Sycrarian, Khryzt, three pairs of
eyes widened. He finished to the sound of stunned silence until
Tyche cleared his throat.

“
The creature called
Khryzt… Are you sure it said Sycrarian?” the Celestial asked
Sheikoh, who nodded.

“
Khryzt said something
about being exiled from a dark moon,” Sheikoh said slowly, his brow
crinkling. He didn’t want to leave anything out this
time.

“
The Black Moon, you mean?”
Tyche asked him with barely suppressed excitement.

“
Yeah,” Sheikoh responded.
He watched Tyche curiously.

“
Records allude to the
Black Moon as the home of the Sycrarian, or Demon kind. They are an
unbelievably powerful sect of entity,” the Celestial explained
quickly, before gesturing for Sheikoh to continue.
  

“
Khryzt went on and on
about something called the Celestial Crescent, and from what I’ve
gathered, I think that our beloved Centaurai somehow managed to get
his hands on it. Do you know anything about that?” Sheikoh asked
Tyche.

    “
Hmm…”
Tyche rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. “I’ve never heard of this
Celestial Crescent. Could it mean that the Centaurai controls this
Khryzt..? But if so, why would Vest decline to have the creature
finish off his two would be assassins..?”

   
The
Celestial gestured at Indigo and Ghost carelessly. Sheikoh saw
Indigo’s jaw tighten with anger at Tyche’s dismissive
tone.

    “
Especially if one of the two held control of Interium’s
communication,” Ghost threatened the Celestial in a steel
voice.

    “
Ghost,
you are absolutely right! There must be some way that we can use
that to track the Centaurai and the Sycrarian! Is there anything
you can do?” Tyche exclaimed, intentionally misunderstanding
Ghost.

The leader of Legacy held the
Celestial’s eyes unrelentingly, nodding only when Tyche finally
added;

“
Please? We just need to
know whether they’re heading for Intrasentient City or
not.”

   
Ghost’s
two index fingers simultaneously clicked buttons on his silversteel
wrist cuffs, and the air between them shimmered with a projected
keyboard. He keyed something in as fast as lightning. The screen of
Ghost’s monocle was flooded by pictures of Emili wearing a pair of
flaming eyes along with lines of backwards letters. He wasn’t sure
how he was supposed to feel.

    “
She
jumped the southern section of the wall, carrying an unconscious
Vest,” Ghost told them, reading.

“
Well, that changes things
and not necessarily for the worse. Our prime objective is now
acquiring the codex. As soon as the three of you help me achieve
that end, I’ll make you each immeasurably wealthy. As well as
taking care of Vest,” Dream resonated through the dancing, blue-lit
room with a smile.

“
Easier said than done,
Dreamer. I notice that you didn’t mention demons anywhere in that
tidy little plan of yours,” Sheikoh retorted.

He was surprised when Tyche flashed
him a smile.

“
While researching that
amulet that you’re wearing, I found a story of a Celestial that
used it to incapacitate Golems, that is demons possessing anything
to confirm their animation and anchor them in the real world. As
soon as he got the amulet over their heads, the entity immediately
lost consciousness,” the Celestial told him confidently.

Sheikoh nodded uncertainly, unable to
find it in himself to voice the real objection that tortured him.
Something had to be done about the demon, but he wasn’t sure that
he had it in him to do it himself. Sheikoh couldn’t bring himself
to face the girl that he loved. He couldn’t aim a pistol Emili’s
freckles any more than he could bring himself to shoot
Dorothi.

But he couldn’t just stand by and let
Khryzt tarnish Emili’s memory. Under the mask of Emili’s face, the
demon would inevitably wreak untold destruction. Sheikoh knew that
he might be the only one who could stop it.

As much as his gut twisted at the
thought of assaulting Emili, he couldn’t allow the creature to
invade Emili’s body without reprisal. The demon had invaded Emili’s
body and raped her soul. Could Sheikoh really stand by and let it
happen? He clenched his teeth in frustration. It boiled down into
an impossible choice. He could either kill Emili’s body, or let the
demon go free to do what he wanted with the girl that he
loved.

His chest swelled, conflicted at the
enormity. Indigo’s voice interrupted his thoughts.

“
I killed the Coascendant.
Pay me now, Celestial, I’m done. This thing is more than I’m
willing to fight,” Indigo muttered.

It was the wrong thing to
say.

The whites of the Celestial’s eyes
flooded blue. Everything, from his irises to the whites of his eyes
glowed brilliant blue. The show of power was puny compared with the
leaping flames of Sycrarian-Emili’s eyes, though still mesmerizing.
Tyche leveled an outstretched clutch at the ganglord.

Indigo let out half a cry that cut off
with a gasp. Sheikoh watched as Indigo’s enormous body was lifted
twitching into the air and then pressed against the sharp
chandelier. The ganglord wore an expression of agony, like Dream or
Camillio or whatever was lifting him up by his very blood. The
Celestial’s voice took on the menacing twin-timbre he shared with
the demon.

Sheikoh shivered, suddenly
cold.

“
You were
hired to take care of the Coascendant
and
the Centaurai. Failure isn’t due
any reward; you would do well to remember that,”
he spat menacingly.

Tyche’s clutch held the quivering
giant, suspended in the air above the table for a moment. Then
suddenly the blue lights in the Celestial’s eyes sparked out and he
let his hand fall to his side. Indigo’s body fell heavily onto the
runed table with a dull thump. Sheikoh was a little surprised that
the table held under the weight of the massive man’s fall. Ghost
leaned down and whispered something into Indigo’s ear, before
turning to address the group.

“
A strong light is showing
up on the Celestial Imaging scope. The demon seems to be somewhere
inside of the Schizn Canopy,” Ghost told them tersely.

Camillio Tyche’s face lit up with its
earlier excitement.

“
The time is at hand.
Follow the Sycrarian through the Schizn Canopy and get the amulet
around its neck. Then all you have to do is kill the Centaurai and
bring me back the codex as well as the Sycrarian. You will each be
400 million dots richer at the completion of the task,” Tyche told
them all with excitement.  Sheikoh looked at the Celestial
with disbelief.

That was it? Everything that Emili was
to him had been packaged into the order ‘bring me back that codex
and the Sycrarian’? Sheikoh wasn’t going to give the arrogant
Celestial Emili to bind and experiment on. He could easily imagine
the Celestial locking her into a cage and hiring scientists to fill
her up with tubes and needles. He felt sick.

Sheikoh glared at the smiling Tyche.
Upon looking at the monster, an intense hatred flowed through his
muscles. He suddenly stood up and turned, kicking his armchair onto
its back.

“
Silence! Wait!” the
Celestial ordered him. When Sheikoh didn’t stop, he turned to
Ghost.

“
I notice
you shoved the fate of the world on the three of us, while you cool
your heels back here. No thank you, Cel-
ass
-tial,” Sheikoh parted harshly,
sharply twisting the doorknob.

Sheikoh furiously strode out of the
flickering, blue-lit room. When he’d first entered, the magical
flames had seemed mystical, but he’d suddenly realized how
pretentious they were. They grated on his nerves along with
everything else about Camillio Tyche. It was pathetic to see how
far the Celestial went to impress them. Then treat them with
contempt.  

“
SILENCE, I’M NOT FINISHED
WITH YOU! YOU HAVE TO EARN YOUR PAYMENT!” Tyche shouted after
him.

Sheikoh didn’t even look back. He
wasn’t about to sell Emili for any payoff in the world. He raised
his hand and aimed an obscene gesture behind him.

“
Bring Silence back here!”
The Celestial ordered sharply.

Sheikoh heard Indigo’s
heavy, booted footfalls behind him. The ganglord must’ve been
itching for a good fight if he was running to obey the Celestial.
Sheikoh kept walking until he heard Indigo’s heavy breath.
Mess with me now, you’re gonna die,
Sheikoh vowed coldly.

He didn’t even turn to face the
ganglord though. He just let Indigo charge him, focusing everything
on his sense of hearing. At the last possible second, Sheikoh
twisted and flipped the bigger man over his shoulder. Indigo
retaliated midair, flinging a lightning kick at Sheikoh’s face.
Sheikoh dodged, but only just; he felt Indigo’s boot graze his
forehead. The surprise attack had cost Indigo though; Sheikoh
watched the six and a half feet of muscled man fall
hard.

Keeping his eyes on Indigo had been a
mistake though. Sheikoh realized as Ghost’s quicksilver fist
slammed into his cheek. The blow jarred through his skull. Sheikoh
stumbled back a few more steps and then arranged himself into a
defensive stance. Ghost must’ve slipped to Sheikoh’s side like a
wraith while he was distracted. He wasn’t sure how the wiry Ghost
could have possibly hit him like that.

The two appraised one
another with their guard’s up. Sheikoh leveled a glare at Ghost. He
was the master of sneaking around, not some Century
washout
. From the corner
of his eye, Sheikoh saw Indigo recover, rolling up into a battle
stance. The two members of Legacy advanced on Sheikoh, slowly
circling around his sides. Ghost tossed his monocle into a nearby
patch of grass. Sheikoh backed up with a hard gleam in his eyes.
Behind the gangsters was the Celestial.

“
Sheikoh, listen to me,”
Dream’s whisper echoed in the silence of the night.

“
I’m not going to run
around and risk my life for you anymore! This job is officially
over! Done!” Sheikoh spat, furiously

His fury suddenly exploded, drenching
the night with a haze of blood red. Sheikoh forced his cyborg limbs
into overdrive and bounded over to, then through the Indigo’s
guard. The motion was so fast that the ganglord barely had the time
to even arrange his face into an expression of shock before
Sheikoh’s kick blasted into his solo plexus. The force rocketed
Indigo backwards, and knocked the air from the man’s
lungs.

Then Sheikoh twisted his death glare
to aim at Ghost. He crouched, pulling out his electroblade out of a
boot and sprung high into the air in a single fluid movement.
Sheikoh flew high up, over the roof tops, staring at Ghost with
wild eyes. He hung for a moment, looking at the man. Ghost’s
expression was unconcerned; the leader of Legacy stepped out of his
battle stance.