Enemy

by Paul Hughes

  Zero-Four tensed his grip on the gauntlets.

  ANOTHER JUDAS HAS APPEARED.

  WHAT POWERS OF OBSERVATION YOU HAVE.

  OUR FORCES HAVE BEEN NEUTRALIZED. SHALL WE SEND FOR A LARGER STRIKE TEAM((?))

  AGAINST THAT JUDAS IT WOULD BE FUTILE.

  WE CANNOT LET IT INTERFERE.

  SOON IT WILL NOT MATTER. SOON THEIR HIVE PATTERN WILL BE CONSUMED IN OUR HOLY FIRE AND THE PURPOSE WILL BE OURS.

  INDEED. OUR VICTORY—

  ...—-...

  agony. innate agony.

  WHAT WAS THAT((??))

  FROM UPWHEN—OUR FORCES...

  NO THAT CANNOT BE. VICTORY—

  THEY DID NOT SUCCEED IF WE HEAR THEIR DEATH WAILS FROM THE STREAM.

  WE DO NOT KNOW.

  SILENCE((!)) THE STRIKE FORCE WAS SOMEHOW DISPATCHED. NOW WE MUST ACT BEFORE WE SUFFER THE FULL BRUNT OF THE JUDAS FORCE.

  WHAT... WHAT DO YOU MEAN((?))

  WE HAVE ENOUGH PATTERNS TO COMPLETE THE PURPOSE NOW. THOSE WHO HAVE NOT BEEN UPLOADED ARE UNWORTHY OF OMEGA. WE CAN ELUDE THE JUDAS VIRUS AND SET A PURPOSE POINT VECTOR IF WE ACT IMMEDIATELY.

  WHAT COWARDICE((!)) YOU FEAR THE JUDAS((?)) WE MUST DESTROY THEM BEFORE—

  a flash of brilliance. a dying scream.

  I FEAR NOTHING. WE LEAVE AT ONCE.

  it stares into its dead compatriot.

  I FEAR NOTHING. THE PURPOSE COMES FIRST. THE PURPOSE WILL BE COMPLETED.

  the black closes

  {simon... where’s shiva...?}

  The two Judas faced each other, engaged in an unconscious dance of dominance like two scorpions, circling, poised to strike.

  ((...))

  {simon. where is shiva?}

  ((he’s burning in hell, as you will.))

  {what?}

  ((you’ve betrayed us all, malachi. an enemy strike force traveled upwhen. you let them slip through your fingers. they killed shiva, and then they killed command.))

  {no—how? Kilbourne—}

  ((kilbourne is dead! they destroyed command!))

  {you lie. you are a traitor.}

  The galaxy seemed to explode, bathed in harsh radiance.

  ((the star. they’ve collapsed the star. the purpose—))

  A Judas fleet fell through the dying star. Fifteen Golgotha. One Gethsemane. One Mecca.

  Sapphire’s fleet.

  ((who’s that?))

  Mara had been resolutely flying at max speed down the Stream, trying to put more distance between herself and the crumbling universes behind her.

  Several other Judas had succumbed already, simply too drained to go on. They had fallen behind and paid the price in the horribly small white explosions of their deaths.

  Without warning, a When hole emerged directly in front of the fleet where none had existed before, and before they could react, they were all thrust into an unknown When.

  Into the midst of an Enemy fleet.

  Sapphire screamed.

  IGNORE THEM((!))

  REROUTE FORCES AROUND VIRAL FLEET. THE PURPOSE IS WHAT MATTERS NOW. DO NOT WASTE ENERGY ON DESTROYING THEM((!))

  INTO THE STREAM, NOW((!))

  The Enemy fleet, like a school of stingrays without substance, so beautiful and fluid in form, deftly avoided Sapphire’s armada and plunged past them into the open When hole.

  The Judas were disoriented, wary of the situation.

  And from nowhere, a Mujahadin appeared.

  Sapphire jumped. “Open fire. Open fire!”

  Simon saw the window of opportunity.

  Malachi’s attention was focused on the incoming Judas.

  Simon opened fire as he distanced himself from the Mujahadin. He had no idea what fleet that was, but it was predominantly Golgotha, and that was a good sign. They were moving to intercept.

  Malachi reeled from the barrage. His weapons ports flared and he targeted Simon, but his shot went wide as a strategically placed arc of light lanced through his hub. The mechanical sentience that had been Malachi flared from existence. He was no more.

  ((burn in hell, malachi.))

  Simon powered down with great relief. These Golgotha were allies, then. Maybe all hope was not lost.

  The shell that had been the Judas Mujahadin Malachi spun from the force of its violent death. It was ensnared by the gravity well of the third planet and pulled down, intimately close. His body careened over countless barren miles, scorched earth left in the wake of the Enemy scourge. But this was yet a young planet, and if given the chance, it would live again. The Enemy harvest had eliminated the primitive reptilian lifeforms of the planet, but life would flourish once more. Malachi’s body crashed to earth in a volcanic valley, shattering the planet surface with its massive form, finally coming to rest in a vast pool of magma. His structure easily withstood the temperature as he was immersed in the molten rock. Down, down, down he sank, never to see the light of day again...

  ...At least until sixty-five million years later when the Diablo Mining Company, facing bankruptcy, drilled a new shaft deeper than ever before, searching for copper, finding only an impenetrable metal wall, and the military would quickly move in, sealing off the area, sending down investigative teams who would eventually enter this vessel in the earth and find within it an orb of stars...

  Oh well. That’s another story.

  Simon was filled with relief.

  ((identify yourself, golgotha fleet commander.))

  She did.

  “It’s just a little girl.”

  Jennings, West and Patra were on the bridge, staring raptly at the holograph projected before them. Patra had arisen from her slumber unaffected, yet distant. Zero-Four descended from the battle chamber, stood transfixed at the image.

  She couldn’t have been more than sixteen, a frail, gaunt figure just now becoming a woman. Yet her eyes betrayed her true age. Her haunting silver eyes were the ancient eyes of someone who has seen too much, lived too much, hurt too much for someone her age.

  Her light brown hair fell into her eyes, and she swept it back in a reflex gesture. Patra noticed with some trepidation that the hair was not entirely brown… Some disturbingly silver strands highlighted it throughout. And her face shimmered not only with the perspiration of her exhaustion but also with the inhuman sheen of the countless infinitesimal strands of silver interwoven with her flesh. She shook with exhaustion and pressure.

  “Judas Golgotha Mara Commander West, Sapphire.”

  West spun around to find Patra gazing quietly at him. He looked back at Zero-Four questioningly, but Zero-Four motioned for silence. West turned back to the image.

  Jennings was mesmerized. “Can she really be the commander of one of these,” he motioned to the vessel around him, “and be so young? She looks so... so tired.”

  Zero-Four tilted his head in an almost tender gesture. “Sapphire West. Made commander at age fourteen. Led the Altwhen Containment Forces. A hero.” There was an air of sad reverence about Zero-Four as he looked at the wasted figure before him on the screen. He whispered, almost to himself, “Children fighting wars of time. Children.”

  Patra’s head looked up to meet the gaze of the young woman projected ghost-like before her.

  Silver eyes...

  The warrior child.

  My god. The warrior child.

  She buried the thought deep, deep in her mind.

  On the screen, the girl turned from Patra and spoke again. “And you are Judas Golgotha...” She hesitated.

  ((simon. judas golgotha simon.))

  “Simon? I thought you were a Gethsemane. Reynald told me—”

  ((reynald? is he with you? is he safe?))

  Her eyes were cast downward, and Zero-Four noted how tears stood on the verge of running down her cheeks. “He’s dead.”

  ((oh. i... he... he was—))

  “—Maggie’s captain. He was a good man, and he gave his life for the Judas. He—…” Her voice trailed off, and Zero-Four knew from her concentration that she was communicating with her Jud
as, Mara.

  She snapped herself out of her reverie, signaled by the silent communication with Mara. Her face became panic. “We have to get out of here now. The wave’s getting close—”

  “What wave?” Zero-Four broke in. “The timesweep waves coming from upwhen?”

  “The Stream—It—.” Sapphire didn’t know where to begin. “To destroy the Enemy fleets and the Mujahadin, Reynald and the others inverted their Shadows in the Stream—” “Sweet Richter… They released the reformat virus? What effect—”

  “The Stream’s been splintered. It’s falling apart, tearing from existence from the future to the past, rewriting the program with an empty reality. It’s drawing near.” The look of desperation on her face was enough to convince Zero-Four. “We need to leave now!”

  “Simon, prepare to enter the Stream on a Purpose-point vector. Maximum speed.”

  ((yes, michael.))

  “Sapphire, is your fleet ready?”

  “As ready as it’ll ever be.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  They left the When, abandoning Malachi’s body to whatever fate would have it.

  ANY SIGN OF THE VIRUS((?))

  NONE YET... BUT THEY WILL COME. THEY ALWAYS DO. THEY WILL NEVER BOW DOWN TO US.

  READY PATTERN LOAD PLACEMENT FOR FINAL COUNTDOWN INITIATION. THIS TIME THE PURPOSE WILL BE COMPLETED, AND ONLY WE, THE HOLY, SHALL REMAIN. ONLY THE VISION OF OMEGA WILL REMAIN.

  ENERGY LOAD IN PLACE.

  RELEASE CONTAINMENT SEALS.

  SEALS RELEASED. PATTERN LOAD INFUSED.

  ASCENTION AWAITS US. OMEGA WILL BE COMPLETED.

  Zero-Four stood on the bridge watching the Stream swirl by in a nightmare cacophony. He was lost in his thoughts.

  “Michael?”

  Zero-Four knew they would come back, knew the question before they asked it. Zero-Four turned reluctantly, looked at these innocent people, dreaded what he must tell them.

  “She’s your daughter.” He whispered, barely audible.

  West held Patra close. He shook his head, uncomprehending. “How’s that possible? How could—”

  “Time is a cycle.” Zero-Four sat, hunched forward, his hands limply hanging between his knees, the gauntlet interfaces so painfully visible. He looked old. Wasted. “Time’s a cycle, and it’s our curse. We float through it in so many ways.”

  “This isn’t the end.” Patra spoke gravely, knowingly. “This war’s only just begun for us.”

  Zero-Four looked at her, a sad smile on his face. He slowly nodded. “It’s just begun.” He looked back at the floor.

  “I couldn’t tell you before. You weren’t ready. I wasn’t ready, but time’s running out.”

  “Tell us.”

  Zero-Four sighed, the sigh of ages spent fighting the war between times.

  “I knew at some point in this war, I’d have to find someone… That I’d meet someone who’d be right for the mission.”

  “What mission?”

  Zero-Four laughed quietly to himself, his smile breaking Patra’s heart.

  “This isn’t a mission from Command. This is a decision that I had to make by myself. They never wanted to complete the task, but I now know that it’s the only way.”

  West sat down next to Zero-Four. “Michael, you want us to do something for you. Just tell us.”

  Zero-Four turned to West and looked into his eyes. Yes, he’s the one.

  “You don’t remember me, do you?”

  West shook his head. “We’ve never met before you rescued us.”

  Zero-Four nodded. “Yes, we have. We met an eternity into the future, on a world that was falling apart. On a world that the Enemy was uploading. There was only room for the children, and you placed your twin daughters on the escape vessel. You gave us your daughters so that they could survive, and you remained behind to die in the Enemy upload.”

  West’s face was blank. “We have to leave, don’t we?”

  “I have to send you into the future.”

  “But why?”

  Zero-Four lips quivered barely noticeably before he spoke, but Patra saw and understood before he uttered the words. “You have to kill me before I can build the machine.”

  West’s face remained cold and blank. “You’re sending us to kill you.”

  “As a child. Before there’s any chance of me even thinking of the machine. You have to kill me before I can destroy everything again.”

  Jennings shook his head, a frown on his face. “You can’t blame yourself for all of this. There’s no way you could have known that the machines—“

  “That doesn’t matter anymore. The fact is that I built a machine that would attempt to end all of existence. And it may still succeed, unless I can guarantee that I never think of the machine in the first place. The only way to guarantee that’s to make sure I’m not alive.”

  A heavy silence filled the room. The only sound was the non-sound of Simon racing furiously into the past.

  “I first realized what had to be done at the resurrender.”

  “You’ve said that word before.”

  Zero-Four stood, paced slowly around the circular chamber. “The resurrender. We engaged the black around the third planet’s moon, but there were so many… We sent a small force to the planet surface to save as many people as we could. Richter stayed behind to lead the forces battling the Enemy. There were so many.

  “I was on one of the rescue vessels. We loaded as many people as we could, including your twin daughters, onto the Judas. Maggie and Simon were among the rescue Judas that day… If they’d stayed in moon orbit, they would’ve been killed. We left the atmosphere to find a vast field of dead Judas and a waiting armada of Enemy. It was the longest and bloodiest battle we’d fought up to that point.

  “Most of the rescue vehicles were destroyed as soon as they left the atmosphere. The Enemy swept down upon the planet and began the upload. But the battle raged on above the surface. They were about to capture my vessel when Richter distracted them, flew between us. Richter fought like a madman, taking down so many of the damned before they engulfed his vessel, the Lazarus. In the instant before they uploaded him, he called out to me, to all of us. He commanded us to leave, to escape before the Enemy took us all. He gave his life so that we could escape. He commanded us to regroup, to build our forces again, and to attack the Enemy with no mercy at every possible opportunity, to attack them with the last of our strength until we ourselves were no more. He told us never to surrender again.

  “He could’ve killed himself before the Enemy took him, but by sending his last message he gave them enough time to capture his pattern. We barely made it out of there, but we did as he’d commanded. We regrouped, we rebuilt, and we’ve not surrendered again. That’s why I have to die. Richter was consumed by Omega, when it should have been me, Omega’s creator. He died so that I could live. He wanted me to be the Judas commander. As it was, Hannah Kilbourne took over. I’ve never deserved Richter’s sacrifice.”

  Zero-Four regarded them with eyes that were beyond cold.

  “I haven’t lived since Richter died. With my death, this war will never happen.”

  West looked resolutely at the black of the floor. “You’re sending us into the future to kill you. And then what?”

  “You’ll live out your days in the future. You’ll grow old. And hopefully you’ll never have to put your daughters on a Judas and send them into the sky. Hopefully you’ll live in a world that’ll never see the Enemy. You’ll grow old and die together in the future without the Enemy war.”

  “If we kill you, this won’t happen.”

  “There’s no guarantees. I’m not the only person to envision the emulated escape from the dying planet. But that’s where you come in. You’ll be a safeguard against the invention of the machines. You have to ensure that the machine’s never built. Your daughters will have to ensure that the machine’s never built. They must ensure that the Judas legacy is never lost, and that the Enemy is never created.”

/>   Tears rolled down Patra’s face. “Lifetimes we haven’t lived yet, deaths we haven’t died... I had a vision of this, of three people crashing from the stars... But now all of that’s gone, and all I see, all I hear, is the whispers. Faint words, a constant hissing sound at the back of my mind.”

  “The Enemy.”

  “Yes. Urgent. The conversations are so fast. Like they’re finally ready. For their ascension. For the completion of Omega. Time’s running out.”

  Jennings looked gravely at Zero-Four. “So how do we get there, Michael? How do we begin?”

  Zero-Four studied the three innocents before him. “No one’s forcing you to do this. I can’t command you to give your futures to this cause. I can’t—”

  “We know, Michael.” Jennings interrupted. “We know. I can’t speak for Patra and West, but I give my life freely to this cause. I’ll die for the Judas.”

  West looked up. “So will I. To save the future...”

  “And to save the past,” Patra continued. “I’ll go where they go. I give myself to the Judas.”

  They stood as one, the saviors of futures long dead.

  Simon raced onward into the night.

  (has he spoken to them?)

  ((yes. it’ll proceed as planned. they’ll take my longboat. it will at least get them there.))

  (they’re brave.)

  ((yes.))

  (you know we won’t survive this.)

  ((i know.))

  (perhaps...)

  ((what?))

  (the longboats are capable of limited shadow jumps.)

  ((with residual shadow energy.))

  (perhaps... if we’re sending them to the specified when, perhaps there’s a way to save our other passengers. i have two standard complements of droptroops on board...)

  ((what are you saying?))

  (we could use the longboats to transport our pattern caches to safety... to spread them throughout time. to ensure that the judas will live on.)

  ((guardians... sprinkled through time. watching, waiting.))

  (making sure the enemy doesn’t rise again. diffusing into the native populace. devoting their lives to keeping the judas legacy alive.)