The Blood Solution (Approaching Infinity Book 3) (45 page)

As he drew nearer to the Palace, Jav was relieved to see that many still lived. He stopped when he came across Vays, resting up against the Palace exterior, and Set tending to him.

“I’m glad to see you’re still alive,” Jav said to Set.

“Once you cracked his face, Braams either lost or gave up his control. I tried to get as many people back here as possible, including him,” Set pointed with his chin to Abanastar’s prone form some ways away, “but I think you saw that I was only partially successful. If I hadn’t been Dark, I’d probably be decorating the ground as well.”

Jav nodded.

Set turned to Vays. “You okay? Looks like Bela is on her way back, but I want to go check on Slowe and the others.”

“Yeah,” Vays said. “You go ahead.”

Set regarded Jav, as if just now noticing his changed appearance, and hesitantly clapped him on the shoulder before taking his leave.

“How about you, Holson?” Vays said. “Are
you
okay?”

Jav stared at him with the inscrutable crease “eyes” of the Ritual Mask—the living shadow eyes had receded. Finally, without saying a word, Jav shook his head and walked off towards the ruined facade of the Palace.

He jumped up to the first exposed level with no effort and no AI. Though the fires had subsided and the smoke had thinned, he paused there a moment, focusing his attention on one area in particular, hesitant to proceed. But he did proceed, jumping again to another level exposed higher up. He stood now in what was left of his quarters. It was black, smoky, and sticky with oozing resin. In the far corner was a huddled shape, blackened and reduced by the tremendous heat. He regarded the dark red briquette still clasped in his left hand, then the shape in the corner again. His closed his fingers about the contents of his left hand and squeezed, raising his fist and letting the resulting powder fall free. He snapped his hand to be rid of any residual dust, took a step forward, and crouched down before Mao Pardine. After a time he reached out and gingerly took up her remains. Cradling them to him, he began to weep within the boney shell that covered him.

“I’m going to take you somewhere beautiful, Mao, while such a place still exists here, and I’m going to bury you there. In a beautiful place, surrounded by beautiful things, where no one—” His breath caught before he could continue. “Where no one can hurt you. You’re going to see Mai now. Tell her I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

Jav backed out of the corner slowly with Mao in his arms, turned to stand at the edge of the broken floor, and shot like a streak from his place.

After three months, much of the gaping hole Braams had left in the Vine had grown back, though it was discolored, and like Raus’s right arm, would be a permanent scar, a reminder of all that was lost on Shaala, now Planet 1405. With Braams fallen, the remaining Entitled offered little resistance, and that very day, Icsain proved his value by locating and enslaving them all—twenty-seven of them—with the Relic Cords. Iss and Voskos, now Planets 1406 and 1407 respectively, had no real defensive capabilities since all the Entitled had come to Shaala for the fight. Those of the Three Worlds, regardless of their plight, were loath to turn their mass drivers against each other. The planets had been tethered with heavy, reinforced blind runners within fifteen days of the Vine’s initial planetfall on 1405 and by now, the germs and toxins imported from thousands of other defeated worlds had reduced all populations to negligible levels. There was no one left on any of the Three Worlds who was not dead or dying.

The resources harvested from Three Worlds were staggering. The cost was just as staggering, but the Empire enjoyed a return to conditions not experienced for several decades now, perhaps even centuries. The Vine would heal completely. New Grans would be built. Plans were being laid and changes were taking place.

At the base of the Palace within the encircling courtyard walls, the Emperor addressed the survivors of Braams’s assault. The Palace regularly accommodated three hundred thousand people, but the courtyard held a mere third of that number. Reconnecting with the rest of the Empire would take time, but they were in no danger now, and if a new danger should appear, they were well-equipped to meet it, or would be very soon.

The image of the Emperor, a giant carved gourd with subtly shifting fire-lit features, flickered within a half-enclosed dais of what appeared to be woven driftwood set within the facade of the Palace, just above the main gates.

Arrayed below, the Shades made a line and were backed by the hundred thousand survivors. All of them faced and were intent upon the Emperor.

“We have suffered much,” the Emperor said, his voice booming, but a whisper at the same time. “Wheeler Barson and Lor Kalkin will be sorely missed. As will our friends and family lost in the terrible fire which nearly ruined us all. But we can rebuild. We
are
rebuilding. And now is the time to make new traditions to meet the future as we enter into it.

“Since the inception of this Empire, there have always been three Generals and a Squad of three Specialists. That has served until now. Our conventions have been strained beyond the breaking point and we must adapt.

“From this day forth, with the inauguration of the 21st Generation, the Generals will be four. Squads, too, shall consist of four. Our numbers are incomplete, a condition that has plagued us for some time, but this shall soon be rectified.

“First, though, we must offer our thanks and say farewell to the 20th Generation. Mefis Abanaster. Tia Winn. You have served the Empire in what will likely prove to be its darkest era. You have each earned early retirement and a world of your choice. I am only sorry that Wheeler Barson cannot join you.

“Lor Kalkin survived the Plague Squad and led the Death Squad. His contributions will not be forgotten. The Death Squad is hereby retired, but its remaining members still have work to do.

“Jav Holson.”

Jav stood straight. He was clad in the Kaiser Bones, which were fully restored. When he returned a week after the day he’d defeated Braams, there was no sign of the augmented form he’d assumed. He’d been sullen and hadn’t offered any explanations. No one had pressed him.

The Emperor continued, “You are now First General of the 21st Generation. Your Gran, Gran Mid, is already under construction and should be completed in another ninety days.”

Jav bowed. “Thank you, Lord Emperor.”

“Raus Kapler.”

Raus stood next to Jav, towering above him, making him look like a child.

“You will Join Jav Holson as a General of the 21st Generation. The construction of your Gran, Gran Pham, is similarly underway.”

“Thank you, Lord Emperor,” Raus said.

“Icsain.”

Next to Raus was Icsain, impassive as ever.

“You, too, will join the 21st Generation Generals. Your Gran, slated to be known as Gran Lej, is still in the planning stage and will take substantially longer to complete.”

Icsain bowed, but said nothing.

“This brings us to our fourth General,” the Emperor said. “Gilf Scanlan. Step forward.”

From the rows of people close behind the Shades, consisting mostly of Division Directors, Gilf Scanlan, Director of the Military Hardware Division, stepped out from his place and moved out to the space between the Shades and the main Palace gate.

“Gilf Scanlan. We are fortunate that you have survived. We will not tempt fate any longer with your mortality. Your genius has aided the Empire countless times and in countless ways. It will be preserved. This day you are a Shade of the Viscain Empire.”

An animate length of vine darted out from beneath the Emperor’s image. It snaked agilely down to Scanlan, bearing with it a strange device, that was roughly cube-shaped, and fifteen centimeters to a side.

Scanlan accepted the package and examined it briefly, immediately intrigued by the intricate clockwork gears that turned and worked. He sought the power source, a motor, a spring, anything that might account for its motion, but saw with a glance that it was, in its way, like a mobius strip, self-powered, and thus also a perpetual motion machine.

“Take the Creation Cogs. Accept your gift and be transformed.”

“Yes, Lord Emperor,” Scanlan said. He hesitated for a moment, taken by the beauty and simplicity of the Artifact and unwilling, only for a moment, to give that up. But he wasn’t giving it up. He hugged the cube of what looked like brass and bronze to his breast where it disappeared with a blinding flash.

When the light faded and Scanlan was Dark with the Creation Cogs, his body was thick and heavy with blocky brass plating. He now stood taller than Jav and Icsain, but was not quite Raus’s equal. Set within his chest, exposed and delicate and contrasting with his stalwart appearance, was a more elaborate version of the Creation Cogs, ticking, working away at infinity. All of him appeared to be brass. Over his right eye was a thick monocle, the casing held by a chain, the lens rotating with its own agenda.

“Take your place with your fellows, Gilf Scanlan.”

Scanlan turned and took up a position between Icsain and Vays, both of them moving slightly to afford room for his inclusion.

“Our armies from now on will consist of the dead, of puppets, and of machines. We will no longer endanger the lives of men, nor will we make use of genetically engineered simpletons. Generals of the 21st Generation, we salute you.

“Forbis Vays. You will assume the First position, heading the newly formed Titan Squad.”

“Thank you, Lord Emperor,” Vays said with a bow.

“Brin Karvasti. You will formally join Forbis Vays as a Specialist on the Titan Squad.”

“Thank you, Lord Emperor,” Brin said, nodding uncomfortably in a nervous attempt to bow, then bowing properly.

“Though the Titan Squad is incomplete,” the Emperor said, “we salute you. Once we have resumed contact with the rest of the Empire, the Artifact Competition will be held as planned, and we will perhaps consider Locsard for a potential candidate.

“We are close to
The Place with Many Doors
. I can sense it. In its way, it attempts to dissuade us, to deny us, to repel us. We will not be deterred. We have already come too far. Great rewards
always
require great sacrifice. We will not let what has already been sacrificed go to waste.

“That is all.”

While Dark with the Suicide Knife, Stoakes is sheathed in shadow and seems to possess little substance; he is more like a dark, animate mist, though he is in fact solid at his core. In this state he weighs a single kilogram and can float given strong enough winds or thermals.

Though Stoakes is an accomplished, self-taught fighter, the Suicide Knife has the ability to capture the image of up to 20,000 individuals in the Midnight Mirror, the reflective surface of the dark blade, and subject them to mass suicide. When an image is recorded upon the Midnight Mirror, Stoakes stabs himself to have the effects dealt to the reflections’ owners.

The Knife provides other powers that, combined with Stoakes’s skill, have made him quite useful to the Emperor as a covert operator, even in his retirement.

When Dark, Bela Fan is covered in a thick, protective layer of glossy white enamel that flexes to accommodate her every move. She also gains a prehensile tail, two meters long, issuing from her lower back and buttocks, which she can use quite effectively as a weapon. The tail is 25 centimeters in diameter at its base and tapers to a one centimeter point.

In addition, her Artifact significantly bolsters her cryokinesis. This, combined with her mastery of Sinzer Method Projection, makes her quite deadly, able to flash-freeze her opponents through and through.

While Dark with the Essential Oil, Dolma Set takes on the appearance of an anthropomorphic cross between an eel and a shark. His mouthful of glassy fangs can infect opponents with a debilitating hallucinogenic poison. His “skin” while Dark is made up entirely of folding placoid scales, which can smooth down to make him nearly frictionless.