The God Mars Book Six: Valhalla I Am Coming (50 page)

I run up the slope, run toward the gunfire.

My accidental companions are running for their
vehicle, while Kel picks off the Shinobi that try to pursue them. I
see the heat-shapes of three bullet-riddled bodies, none of which
are Sakura.

They seem to have a clear path, but I’m concerned for
traps, or for Shinobi that may have gotten past Kel (or me, when I
was inside the ‘Horse) to lie in wait. Horst seems to share my
fears, because when he pops the rear lock, he first sprays PDW fire
inside, then reaches over Jenovec’s body, pops the inner hatch, and
tosses in a frag grenade.

That may or may not be enough, I know. I’m about to
signal them to wait for me, when I hear lift jets. I turn to see
two Shinkyo pocket fighters rise up out of the pit, and start to
kick in their thrust engines.

I draw my pistol and punch three explosive rounds
through the hull of one, aiming roughly for cockpit and engines. It
sputters and spins in, but the other is already burning fast west.
But then Kel’s twenty flares, and the ship’s port engine explodes.
A second shell misses, but the next bursts the cockpit as the
aircraft passes over. The ship noses into the ground a few hundred
meters from the ‘Horse, and the tanks burst and flare.

Assuming a loyal Shinobi pilot wouldn’t simply run if
his mistress had just been shot down, I run for the ship Kel took
down. As I’m getting with a dozen meters, the shattered remains of
the cockpit blow off, and I see arms and then a torso claw up out
of the smoking interior. Then a body flops out onto the ground.
Tries to stand.

It’s Sakura. She’s badly hurt, kimono shredded,
soaked in blood.

I don’t give a fuck.

I charge into her. She does her best to try to
receive me. She’s still fast, still strong, but her right leg is
badly damaged, and I think she’s been partially blinded by
shrapnel. She goes at me with her claws and I let her. She slices
into my ribs, my shoulder, my face. I punch her in hers, crushing
her mask and her jaw. Then I hit her again. And again. She tries to
stay on her feet, but soon I’ve got her up against the hull of her
broken ship, pounding her into it, breaking her with my bare…

Her head explodes. I didn’t hear the shot. While I’m
still stunned, another explosive shell blows through her torso.
What’s left is shredded, pulverized meat and bone. I can see where
her brain was, see down into her what’s left of insides. I’m
wearing a good part of her.

Kel’s big gun is still smoking.

I’m about to demand Why? Why the fuck did you do
that? But Kel turns and rolls back to the ‘Horse.

Covered from head to boots in gore and horror, I’m
pretty sure I know why. And I should say thank you, but I’m still
too angry, my righteous fury thrashing inside me like a spoiled
child because a prize, a toy, got taken from it.

Thankfully, Horst and Simmons and Smith and Lyra and
Scheffe are perfectly competent to check the ‘Horse over for booby
traps, because I’d rather they not see me like this.

I’m shivering, almost convulsing. I know what happens
next: I let my rage take me, let it take all of me, let it feed me
the unbearable ecstasy that it’s always ready and waiting to offer.
And now I feel the crash coming, shattering me, because my
self—whatever pathetic thing I have that others might call a
soul—has to come back, has to deal with what I’ve done here, what I
let myself do, what I
enjoyed
doing. Again.

Again
. For all the evil I’ve done, I’d like to
say this was different, that I’ve never massacred human beings like
they were so completely beneath me, like they only existed for me
to destroy them, to enjoy destroying them. But that would be a
lie.

I keep my distance from the others, the ones that I
“saved” tonight. I hide in the darkness, and start eating what I’ve
sown.

From the memory files of Lisa Ava, 7 June 2118:

“You’ve done the best anyone could, given the
situation, Colonel Ava,” General Richards takes a quiet moment to
praise me. “I’ll make sure that’s known up the chain.”

“So far I don’t see how I’ve been successful, sir,” I
deny.

“I haven’t done any better,” he admits, finally
letting me hear his fatigue.

The sun is rising. We’ve been at this for nearly
twenty-three hours now, but Orbit still won’t budge, nor will
Earthside: Even with the proper code sets, they can’t trust that
General Richards, or anyone that was with him at Melas Two, hasn’t
been compromised. Having Jackson out of play only reinforces that
for them. So that means there’s no one down here they’re willing to
talk to. And they haven’t come back with any kind of solution of
their own to this impasse.

It certainly doesn’t matter that I checked Richards
and his team myself, and so did Dee, and are convinced they’re
clean of any infection or tampering. Just like it doesn’t matter
that everyone who was exposed at Melas Two is still reading
completely clear now three days post attack. Earthside isn’t
willing to risk that this isn’t just another part of Asmodeus’
grand plan (or Chang’s, assuming he was the black nano-mass we all
saw).

So we’re still cut off from Orbit, and our satellite
eyes along with them; still lacking long range communications.
We’ve spent the last daylight cycle planting more signal boosters
so we can start to fly proper recons, to get eyes on what we did to
Liberty.

(What
we
did to Liberty. Not Jackson. He just
pushed the button. We sent the nuke, expecting to need to use it.
Just like we stuck four more on a clumsy vulnerable rig that we
still can’t find.)

When we do finally get flights out there, there’s no
sign of life at or near zero, just a seared and scoured devastation
zone hundreds of meters in diameter, still partially masked by
smoke and dust. And no sign of the Warhorse Long Range Recon, not
anywhere near the site, not even tracks that say it approached the
survivor colony. (But the colony survivors had the rover. How did
they get the rover?)

I’ve replayed Michael’s plaintive pre-blast calls
over and over—he doesn’t mention if the vehicle is intact, or where
it was when the bomb went off. He can be heard calling to the
mission commander, calling the names of Major Corso and Lieutenant
Horst who was on the crew, calling to his “companion” Specialist
Jameson… But there hasn’t been a word since the detonation—the
remote repeaters are sending back nothing but our own chatter. It
could imply that the rig was inside the blast zone and we haven’t
found it yet, and that he was as well. Or that he has another
reason to maintain silence. I prefer to assume the latter.

If not, my small comfort is that he’s already walked
away from a rail-gun strike. And we’ve all apparently seen Chang
back after a close encounter with a far more powerful warhead.

(Potentially hundreds of innocent people killed by
our unreasoning fear, and this is my wishful thought. But it’s not
just for him. It’s for the people on that rig, including Horst and
Captain Smith, fine officers that I’ve had the honor of serving
with since before the so-called Apocalypse. And I feel sick about
that wish, for caring about those few I know over all the others
we’ve killed or injured horribly.)

I do what I can do, which is send another flight out
looking for them now that the sun’s back up. (Would they have kept
moving if they could? Would they have continued the mission despite
what had happened?)

While we wait for the ships to de-ice and spin up,
while we listen to otherwise dead air, I see Richards take the
moment to approach Dee as he stands statue-still watching the
screens. (Is he actually
watching
the feed, or is he just
plugged directly into it?)

“Were you… Are you really the same AI from the
original UNACT?”

“My core code is from that original digital entity,
General,” Dee responds evenly, not changing gaze or expression.
“And I do have memories of your grandfather. He was a good man, a
good leader.”

“He was that and more,” I add, and my own memories of
Thomas Richards flash through my head with the perfect clarity that
tells me they’re digital, not organic. (Did they download when I
was upgraded? Or did my upgrades enhance my existing memories? Or
is there even a distinction, since I know the story of some other
me in some other time is bullshit?)

We watch the AAVs launch and head east.

Colonel Ava?

Voice in my head. I know it, but had no reason to
expect it. Dee turns to face me, telling me that he’s receiving as
well.

“Is this Bel?” I reply out loud, which immediately
gets Richards’ and Kastl’s attention.

“Have him patched through on one of our channels,”
Richards allows.

I heard. Give me a second.

“Give me a second,” Dee repeats.

Then we get not only audio, but video as well. Bel
looks like he’s inside their salvaged UNCORT ship, the twin of the
Lancer.

“Mr. Shaitain,” Richards greets him formally if
awkwardly.

“Just Bel, really. The rest is from a bit of a phase
I’d rather forget.”

“Bel,” Richards accepts.

“We’ve had a few bad turns here,” I downplay.

“Nicely understated, Colonel. And yes, we’ve been
monitoring. Please know that none of what’s happened was your
fault. Or yours, General. We’ve all been out-maneuvered by the same
monster more times than we’d like to count, and people have died
each time.”

“And if you can’t beat him, what hope do we mere
mortals have?” Richards confronts.

“We’re working on that, General,” he tries to assure,
though not very convincingly. Then his rather elfish brow knits.
“But there’s been… well… a bit of a wrinkle.”

“Do I want to know what you’d call a ‘wrinkle’?”

Bel takes a breath. I realize he looks shaken, is
trying not to look shaken.

“Beginning at the whatever… You should know that we
managed to take the Toymaker Fohat into custody after the attack on
Katar and contained him…” He shows us footage of a wasted, skeletal
figure trapped in some kind of Iso unit, restrained. One of his
arms is barely skin over bone that looks like little more than fine
twigs. Even his skull looks disproportionally small. They must be
starving him, keeping him weak. “Not pretty, I know, but some would
argue the fucker deserves worse.
Most
would argue the fucker
deserves worse.”

“Have you been able to learn anything from him?”
Richards keeps to business, ignoring Bel’s pervasive
irreverence.

“Asmodeus kept him in the dark, stole his technical
expertise, then manipulated him into our hands,” Bel regrets. “But
that’s not why I’m calling. I thought you’d like to see this,
considering…”

We get video that shows the whole linear section of
the ship, probably from a security camera above the forward hatch.
Bel is sitting at one of the ship’s science stations, either dozing
or lost in thought. The lights flicker, static sparks over the
screen, and he starts alert a fraction of a second before the
screen goes black. No: It
floods
with black. He plays it
slower, showing a pure black wave bursting into the ship and
knocking him back, swallowing everything. The timestamp counts off
twelve seconds, and the blackness recedes as fast as it came, as if
sucked out. Bel is stunned, thrown back into the bulkhead. The
containment unit is broken open, but Fohat isn’t gone, not exactly.
What remains in the couch he was strapped to is a desiccated
skeleton. It looks charred, as if thoroughly incinerated.

I see Azazel come running in, staggering, looking
like he’d also just been hit by something. Bel drags himself up,
gets to the Iso, and cautiously touches the skeleton. It crumbles
like burned paper.

“I don’t think it was a trick,” Bel says, now
sounding fully unnerved. “Fohat was neutralized. Completely
destroyed. There’s nothing left of him viable.”

“Where are you?” I ask urgently. Then correct for the
sake of his security: “Where
were
you when this
happened?”

“Let’s just say we’re local to you,” he’s not
trusting enough to give up his location. “That was two hours ago. I
didn’t want to call until I’d run some tests. It
is
Fohat.
Was
Fohat. And he’s dead.
Dead
dead. Not only merely
dead, but really most sincerely dead.”

I feel a chill. I suppose Bel and Azazel and the
others are feeling variations of the dual implications: If this is
what it looks like, then Chang can kill Asmodeus. But he can also
kill anyone like us. And if he can kill us…

But there’s another, more immediate implication:

“If that was Chang, he’s
here
,” I decide, “in
the Trident.”

“Unless he’s already moved on,” Dee considers with
truly stunning detachment. (He must not be bothering to mimic
emotional responses, not now.)

“It was Chang,” Bel insists heavily, sounding
certain. “He… He spoke to me. He told me he was going to make
things right.”

“Then I think I know where he’s going,” I make a
fairly obvious conclusion. I’m just surprised he hasn’t busted in
here, dealt with Jackson, considering what Jackson’s done in
Asmodeus’ thrall (or not).

“Can we track…?” Richards starts to ask. But then an
alert siren goes off and Kastl interrupts us.

“We have a situation in Medical!”

“Colonel Ava, this is Ryder,” he patches her in. “I
just found Doctor Halley down… She’s a little beat up, minor cuts…
But Colonel Jackson got loose. It looks like he tore out of his
restraints and smashed his way out of Iso. Right through the
reinforced polycarb…”

We see the mess, see one of the med techs tending to
Halley’s bloody forehead. There are two H-A troopers with them.

“He’s masking himself,” Dee discovers, unable to
locate him using the base sentry systems.