by Lee Doty
Chrome’s eyes narrowed. Fleet lay on the floor of the elevator as if in repose in a coffin. His body was stretched out peacefully, parallel to the doors of the elevator. His arms were crossed across his chest, a single three-inch red X drawn across each closed eye with what looked like dark red lipstick. On the back wall of the elevator was a message drawn in large block letters with the same red lipstick: “FOURTH PLACE!” Beneath the letters were three more stick figures lying in the same position as Fleet with a large red X over each eye.
“Crow.” Chrome breathed. He gestured for Trunc, their Close, to clear the elevator. Trunc stalked forward, carefully clearing the small elevator. Seconds later, Trunc shouted, “Clear! No sign of Crow, but Fleet’s weapons and most of his armor and equipment are gone.”
At another gestured command, Trunc dragged Fleet from the elevator by one of his wrists. He’d had to improvise because the strap used to pull wounded teammates was on the back of Fleet’s missing plate carrier.
“Orders?” Chrome asked into the command channel.
***
“Well, I can’t say I’m surprised.” Xian said after Bai had finished his report, “And I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t just a bit excited. It looks like I get to get my hands dirty.”
Bai was silent, and after a moment, Xian continued, “Such a shame. We’re getting a bit low on experienced Falcons, and we’ve already lost two full teams thanks to Crow, but if we’re being honest, we probably had to retire the lot just from coming into contact with Ash and Crow so long after their ‘deaths’ in the Hallow.”
Xian gave a theatrical sigh, “Prepare them for my arrival.”
“Yes sir.” Bai said, “They will open the lobby door when they’re ready for you.”
“And make sure your Clerics are quicker on their kill switches this time.” Xian said.
***
Before Crow had left the elevator, he’d used Fleet’s knife to pry open the control panel and then to cut the control wires. He then climbed through the access panel and onto the roof of the elevator before they’d reached the lobby. When the doors had opened in the lobby, he’d used Fleet’s knife to wedge the lobby doors open from above.
With the control wires cut and the outer doors wedged open, Crow knew that the elevator wouldn’t go anywhere, but he could only hope that the door open alarm would not sound. Unfortunately, wiring and control systems had not been a major part of his training. He shook his head, wishing Shadow was here with his extensive tech training. Crow hoped that the kids at the church orphanage in El Salvador were getting maximum use out of his teammate, because it was blasted inconvenient for him.
On the other hand, Crow thought, at least Shadow would live through this night. At least he was happy. Still, Crow missed him… he wished he were here to be reunited with Ash, to help him rescue her. On yet the third hand, Crow was glad that his friend was far away from here and far from the decisions Crow had been forced to make tonight.
Crow had broken his vows, those he’d made to God when he’d entered the priesthood, and those he’d made to himself. Crow had killed eight innocents, Falcons like he had been, unaware of the evil they did. Crow sorrowed for them, for the lives they’d been forced to live, for the harsh end that he’d brought to them. What he’d done had hurt—still hurt. But the only thing that burned brighter than that remorse was the purpose that consumed both mind and heart.
He knew that what he’d done was right. With the same certainty that he knew that it was better to turn the other cheek, that love and service were the highest callings in life, he also knew that Ash was in danger. As he’d killed the six Falcons on the train platform, his mind had burned clear and bright with purpose. Evil must be resisted. To spare an unrepentant killer was to be responsible for every future victim. To turn away from the responsibility to make peace through force in favor of the false and fleeting peace of surrender was to deny the existence of evil in the world, and therefore to devalue the good.
Of course, none of this had been clear on that platform with the eight Falcons that had been chasing Ash. He’d simply walked up to them, unwilling to kill them, but needing to protect his teammate, even if only by delaying her pursuers.
Crow remembered it clearly, the light that had come to him on that train platform. It was a clarity that only enters the mind and the heart from the outside. It was the brightest inspiration he’d received in months of earnest prayer and study. It wasn’t quite a voice, yet it seemed to communicate more than a voice could. It seemed to be a thought built only of clear and undeniable truth.
He remembered standing on that platform with the eight innocent yet lethal Falcons. He remembered the weight of the stolen compact pistol in his jacket pocket, the comforting feel of the priest’s collar around his neck, and he remembered the willingness to die in the name of love.
He had been about to rush the eight armed Falcons from ten yards back, putting his faith in God to spare him or not, as He might see fit.
Then, just as his weight had begun to shift for the lunge, the not-voice had not-spoken: “Pacifism is a luxury bought for fools with the blood of soldiers and policemen. In this world, peace must be made by the strong and the good.”
And Crow had understood. It had not been those words, but more an understanding that could be roughly approximated with those words. Standing on that landing, he understood what his calling must be: Wrath.
The same calm contemplative wrath that had cleared the temple of the moneychangers in Jerusalem two thousand years ago, the same wrath that had ended slavery and freed the victims of tyranny since the beginning of this fallen world.
In the world to come when the lamb would lie down with the lion and the spirit of the Lord would fill the earth as the waters cover the sea, there would be no need for soldiers, but in this world, the one where slavery comes when good surrenders and real peace only comes when evil is vanquished, the highest calling was that of the reluctant, long-suffering servant soldier. He needed to be a priest of justice in addition to a priest of forgiveness.
Crow had pulled his stolen pistol, and the Wrath had filled that train platform. It had filled his heart with sorrow as he killed six of the Falcons on the platform, then two more on the street above, but the sorrow could not drive out the certainty, the duty.
In the elevator shaft, listening to the chatter on Delta’s team channel on his stolen communicator, Crow again felt the certainty that his path was right, and that certainty helped him to move forward with his foolish plan. Crow opened the communicator to Delta’s team channel and tapped out a quick message in Morse, tapping his finger on the contact microphone. He desperately hoped that Chrome could understand the significance of the message he’d left in the elevator.
He hoped that Chrome hated him less than he thought.
***
“Objective update follows:” the Cleric said into the command channel. From his body language, Chrome guessed that the captain of Root was also receiving a message from his Cleric, but he had no way to be sure they were hearing a similar change in orders.
“Objective update, go.” Chrome said just a few seconds before Root’s captain.
“The current situation requires insertion of a Veteran…” The Cleric said. Chrome and the captain of Root shared a quick surprised glance. This contingency was one they’d covered in training, but neither knew of a specific instance where a Veteran had been introduced into a mission. Of course, Chrome was pretty sure that as rare as Veteran interference might be, going on a snatch mission for the ghost of two long-dead Falcons was even less common.
Since the incursion, this mission had been like no other, and he couldn’t explain all of the variances in the play modes. As he stood, listening to his Cleric’s instructions, he was peering into the elevator from which they’d dragged Fleet, staring at the stick figures and the script of the message Crow had left them, it occurred to him just how odd this situation was. Was he supposed to understand that the Clerics had simulated C
row and Ash like they simulated all missions? Was he supposed to believe a cleric programmed Ash to attack with only a frying pan… if so, that was something Chrome wouldn’t have anticipated from Ash, yet now that he knew she’d done it, it fit with who she was, how she thought, with her unique sense of humor, her love of the ridiculous delivered in a serious tone. If this were a normal mission, he could imagine Ash talking about it later, imagine her commentary on the mission feed that the Clerics would make available to all other teams, free of entertainment credits. Though Chrome would never admit it, he enjoyed Phoenix’s post-mission netcasts.
Was he supposed to believe that Crow’s insulting message was a simulation? Was he supposed to believe that the Clerics programmed the lipstick in the elevator? What was the other option? That Crow and Ash had escaped into the Hallow nine months ago? That they had been living in the computer simulation and that the Clerics needed the other teams to catch them? Why not simply pull the plug on the servers if all else failed? And if this was as the Clerics said, and just another simulation—then why?
“Delta: confirm.” Chrome said into the command channel after the Cleric finished delivering his instructions. He’d heard the instructions, but they didn’t seem relevant to him somehow. There was nothing immediate for his team to do anyway. Across the room, the Tech from Root was crossing the lobby to open the exterior doors so that the Veteran could be deployed to them.
Chrome was still staring into the elevator, thoughts filled with an unquantified anxiety, when the team channel opened.
There was only silence and a faint tapping sound, a barely audible click in the soft gossamer background static of the open channel. Chrome looked at the two conscious members of his team, neither looked like they were broadcasting, as their hands were far from the throat switch of their communicators. Trunc hadn’t noticed the open channel, as he was doing his job covering the elevator, but Zed was giving Chrome an odd look, eyes wide. Chrome gave him a questioning look, and Zed pointed to where Fleet lay. More specifically, he was pointing at Fleet’s throat, and at the spot where the communicator was no longer strapped around it.
Family
Chicago, “2117” (2017)
Crow stood in his armor in the ceremonial hall, his black combat boots on the polished marble floor. He stood at the center of a six foot white marble circle in the middle of the hall’s dark stone floor. Behind Crow, half way between Crow and the inside of the circle, Tink and Shadow stood, one on each side of him. All three of them stood at attention, ready for the ceremony.
First, the metronomic click of boots, and then the new recruit came out of the shadows of the hallway and through the stone archway. She was shorter than Crow, her body lithe beneath the minimal black armor of a Close. Her eyes shone with anticipation, and though she was trying to repress it, Crow could still see the smile trying to pull its way onto her face. Her movements panther-confident, yet somehow prom-date hesitant, her eyes shining with purpose and a mirth that somehow surpassed the solemnity of the occasion. Rather than detracting from the power of the moment, her bright eyes and restrained smile seemed to increase the sense of immanence, of convergence, of the promise of a joyful union.
As practiced, she stopped before Crow, just outside the white circle on the floor, looking up into his eyes. Her smile flashed out at him twice, each time she was able to repress it, to wrap it in the solemn face that was expected of her here, but each time the smile was covered, it only burned brighter in her eyes.
He began the ritual: “What will you have?”
Her eyes shone, “Purpose in struggle. Companionship in fire.”
“What do you bring?” Crow did not smile back, he did not.
“I bring focus, purpose, faith,” Ash said, serious voice, playful eyes, “I bring myself as sacrifice to the team.”
“Then step into the circle,” Crow’s voice caught, but he continued, “Step into the circle and be one. Step into the circle and become.”
Crow took a half step back and Ash stepped into the circle and stopped in front of Crow. Shadow and Tink moved up to stand on the right and left of them, the team forming a smaller circle at the center of the circle in the stone floor.
Crow put his hands on Ash’s shoulders, feeling the hardness of the curved armor that covered them. Ash put her hands on Crow’s shoulders and smiled.
And the world changed. He smiled back.
Tink and Shadow both put a hand on Crow’s shoulder, over Ash’s hand, and a hand on Ash’s shoulder over Crow’s hand.
Crow pronounced, “There are only threats and teammates.”
“Victory is life.” Ash said.
“Victory is life.” They all said as one.
“Then what the Clerics have joined, let it endure!” The voice of their Cleric filled the hall, amplified like thunder booming off the stone floor and walls, “Forward through fire, forward through death, the circle will hold! Forward and forever! Amen and amen!”
***
Chicago, 2020
The doomed Falcon opened the door and Xian stepped into the lobby, carefully repressing the smile he felt. He would win again. With control of Ash, he had control of Crow, of that he was sure. With that advantage, he would kill or recapture them both. Either way, they would soon be dead. The OSI man would die now, or later in a torture room, but the result would be the same either way. All eight of the remaining Falcons would either die in the coming fight, if there even was one—or they would die when their Clerics threw their kill switches after the mission objectives were complete, or they would die after they had retrieved them and while they slept, dreaming their cold dim dreams of the Hollow. There was no path ahead where Xian would not win.
Survival, Xian thought, to see every threat lying at his feet—that was the only victory, the only way to feel alive. And right now, Xian felt alive. Like when he and his team were in the field long ago, like when his brothers had risen in revolt and he had turned on them, everyone had died and he’d lived on, smiling.
Like now, except now the smile had to be hidden for just a little bit longer.
***
Not far outside Chicago, 2020
Bai stared at the tactical screen, lost in thought. More specifically, he was staring at Ash through the helmet cam feed from Root’s Close. The Close, along with the team’s Sniper, were guarding Ash as she sat with her back against the half wall in the mail alcove of the lobby.
She sat next to the OSI’s wetworks chief. Both were secured with their arms behind their backs, identical riot cuffs on wrists and elbows. Both had nearly identical apprehension wounds on their right thighs, with identical tourniquets two inches above the entry wound. Both had identical black ball gags in their mouths, and both wore almost exactly the same expressions on their faces: amusement.
As he watched, Ash gave the OSI man a wink and he shook his head, a smile pulling at the corners of his eyes, though it was unseen behind the gag in his mouth. If Bai looked at just the eyes, he would have guessed that both had just experienced a small but embarrassing setback at the end of an otherwise satisfying day. Both seemed to radiate a patient consternation that looked a lot closer to faith than to despair.
Bai would have expected this from Ash, especially when she was still under the hood, when she thought she was playing a game in the Hallow. However, he was surprised at the change that had come over the OSI’s man. Something had happened in the elevator. It made Bai nervous—what was he missing?
As he stared at Ash, trying to understand whatever she might be planning, he noticed that she looked different than she used to when she was under the hood. For one thing, she had hair, more than whatever she had when her handlers had shaved her head every few weeks. Bai noticed she also had a hairstyle. For some reason, it made Bai smile to think of the mighty Falcon Ash in front of a mirror straightening her raven hair. The hairstyle was simple, and still it was inexpertly done, as if she’d been doing her hair for about nine months and had become proficient, yet not expert w
ith the hairspray or whatever.
She didn’t wear makeup, but there was a certain style to her clothes, an awareness of fashion enough to coordinate colors, but not enough to make her shop anywhere more extravagant than Target. The overall impression that Bai was left with was “high school sophomore”, and the thought made him… what? It made him uncomfortable, maybe these small details were reminding him that she was a person. Sure, she’d been grown in a tank, and she had the mind of a genius and the body of a minor super hero, but she was human, and she had been used by Bai’s masters for as long as she had been alive. Then Bai realized that what he was feeling was empathy. In a way, he envied her. She had been a slave for four years, but Bai had been a slave for twenty-nine years. She had been grown in a tank and imprisoned in the dim simulation of the Hollow, but he had never known his parents, and had been raised in something between a government orphanage and monastery, a cradle-to-gun prep school for operatives.
She had recently discovered that she was a slave, but Bai had known since the first time he had seen one of his classmates murdered for a mistake. He’d been eight years old, and so had the girl who had been murdered.
And what was he now, Bai wondered, half slave, half master? He had killed three people directly, each time a handler who had made a mistake, or been unlucky… and each time, he had feared that if he didn’t contain the blame to those below him in the organization, it would be him who was killed by his superiors.
Bai wondered if anyone in the Forbidden City had ever been free.
He looked again at the screen, at Ash, bound and gagged, but smiling—free.
It was then that he understood the change that had come over the OSI man. Maybe it wasn’t only empathy Bai was feeling. Maybe it was respect—an awed respect, the kind his masters had always tried to instill for themselves in their slaves. Their goal was for the fear and greed to turn into this feeling, but though Bai had mimicked it many times, he had never felt it until today.
