Rebirth (Game of the Gods Book 1)

by L. Fergus

  “Yes, it’s a family heirloom. I gave it to you knowing eventually the rest of your mind would be set free.”

  “You mean Kita?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why is she important?” PL demanded.

  “You mean, why didn’t I come sooner?” said the Angel. “Ignorance is bliss, big sister. This separation from yourself was meant to give you a chance to rest. Galina woke you up thinking you’d do anything to get out of this place. When you refused, she believed she could put you back on the shelf. Her own narcissism let her underestimate you again. The genie’s out of the bottle and I’m happy you are.”

  “You’re my sister?” PL said, looking up, her eyes wide.

  “Yep. You don’t see the family resemblance?”

  “Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”

  “You’re going to know soon enough, anyway. My name is Tina, and I’m this way because of you. You’re a big reason the universe is the way it is.”

  “You said you wouldn’t help me. Why?” said PL, confused. “But you are.”

  “I won’t travel with you like I have before. I will come if you get into big trouble.”

  “What am I supposed to do?”

  “That you’ll have to figure out for yourself. I’m here to help you escape this injustice.” Tina pulled PL to her feet. Kita towered over her by almost a foot. Tina laughed. “I’m glad you haven’t grown again.”

  “Did you die to become an Angel?” said PL.

  Tina raised an eyebrow. “In a manner of speaking. Luckily for me, my guardian angel was there to save me.” She turned her attention to Rabbit. “As much as I hate to stoop to such measures, my sister can’t get out of here without help. And, you are in the right place at the right time, or the opposite, depending on the point of view.

  “For you, little white rabbit, I’ve taken the liberty of altering all the video footage, logs, and physical evidence to show you had a wonderful time not only tonight but have been ever since a few months after you arrived here when Kita was brought here for a medical exam. Hidden financial records will show you’ve been paying off your guards to falsify your reports. I know you’ll die first before anyone finds out, so to give you some incentive, get her out alive and the records will disappear.

  “That is if you wish to come back here. I have a feeling you’ll want to forget coming back to the Political Bureau by the time she’s free. Kita has a certain charisma about her.

  “And if you betray my sister, I will kill you myself. Believe when I say, it will be a mercy killing. My sister’s favorite saying is: the only thing worse than a spy, is a traitor. And, you already are the spy part. I take my sister’s safety very seriously, and I have the power to find you anywhere at any time. On the flip side, my sister is known for rewarding those who are loyal to her. Do you understand?”

  Tina waved her hand, and Rabbit nodded.

  “Will you help?”

  Rabbit nodded again.

  Tina backhanded her, causing PL to jump.

  “I know when you’re lying,” said Tina. “No amount of training or practice can keep the truth from me. Since you don’t wish to help, let me show you what awaits you.”

  The pair vanished, leaving PL alone. “Hello?” she called, afraid. “Is she actually our sister?” PL asked Kita.

  “I don’t know. Tina seemed to know a lot about us. More than we know.”

  “Why do you think she won’t tell us more?”

  “I’m sure there’s a good reason. But, she’s willing to get us out of the city. That’s something.”

  “Do you think we could reach California or Rio?”

  “We can go anywhere we want. Galina won’t catch us again.”

  PL sighed. “I hope you’re right.”

  “Hey, what’d I say about being a defeatist?” Kita said gently.

  “You haven’t had to live here for all these years. It’s like it will never end.”

  “It’ll end. I promise,” said Kita as Tina and Rabbit reappeared.

  Rabbit looked pale.

  “The universe is a spectacular place, isn’t it?” Tina asked Rabbit with a big smile.

  Rabbit’s eyes were wide as she nodded slowly.

  “Sorry to leave you alone, big sister. Jess and I had a long talk. She’s more than willing to help.”

  “Intimidation doesn’t get loyalty,” said PL.

  “True, but that’s up to you to earn. Isn’t that right, Jess?”

  “Yes,” Rabbit said, still shaken.

  Tina’s eyes twinkled. “It’s time to see about getting that door open…”

  “Can I get dressed first?” said Rabbit. “As soon as we open the case, a direct alarm will go off to every guard and station in the city.”

  “I can block that,” said Tina. “Kita, why don’t you escort her and get her dressed.”

  “Ok,” said PL.

  “And Kita,” Tina said with a smile. “Know that I love you. My last piece of advice is, don’t seek revenge right away. Follow the breadcrumbs, instead.”

  “What?” PL said, confused, but Tina collapsed into a point of light and vanished.

  “And one last thing, Jessica Rabbit,” Tina’s voice came out of the air. “A word of caution, don’t fall in love with her.” The tiny Angel’s laugh faded away.

  “Definitely an intelligence operative,” Rabbit muttered, ignoring Tina’s warning. “She couldn’t have been anymore cryptic. We’ll figure out everything later. Come on.”

  “What did Tina tell you?” said PL.

  “I don’t know. She wiped my head after the talk. All I’ve got is the emotional response to it.”

  “Which was?”

  “Curiosity, awe, and understanding. She made everything make sense. I do know helping you will be far better than serving the Emperor. I have no idea why. It seems we both have holes in our heads. She did say the more you grew, the more I’d understand.” Rabbit went to her closet. She pulled out a set of combat fatigues, boots, belt, and fresh underwear.

  PL leaned against the doorframe, watching.

  “You mind?” Rabbit hissed at her.

  “Oh, sorry,” PL said with a shy smile. She went back into the hallway and waited until Rabbit appeared.

  “Won’t that give us away?” PL said, seeing the uniform.

  “It should give us enough cover if we run into trouble. Your sister has made a fake version of you that returned to your room. That means they don’t know you’re missing. Tina is also keeping any alarms from going out. It should be clear until we get to the shuttleport. How we’re getting a shuttle, I don’t know, but your sister says you’re good at improvising.”

  “I suppose. I try to be as meticulous as possible. Missing a detail can get you or your employer killed.”

  Rabbit nodded. “You’re better than most of the prims living here.”

  “Prims?”

  “It’s the nickname given to the locals, who are convicts serving out their life terms,” Rabbit said. Coming closer to PL, she wrinkled her nose at the smell. She didn’t say anything and waved PL to follow her back to the lockup.

  Rabbit stopped at the door and went through the multistep process to open it.

  “Political Bureau Captain Jessica Rabbit,” she said in an even voice.

  “Captain Jessica Rabbit, authenticated. The reason for entry request?” said a VI.

  “Inspection of item number seven-seven-two-six.”

  “Granted,” the VI said as the door opened.

  “Captain Jessica Rabbit with a supervised visitor named Kita.”

  “Authenticate,” said the VI.

  Rabbit walked PL through the steps.

  “Access denied. Captain Rabbit is not an authorized chaperone of Kita.”

  “Who is authorized?” Rabbit demanded.

  “Political Bureau Deputy Secretary, Senior Command General Galina Lyakhova or Full Fleet Admiral Rene Sheppard.”

  “That’s odd. I’ve never heard of her. Why would a Shadow
Fleet officer have access to a secure Political Bureau vault?”

  “The door’s open, can’t you go in without me?” said PL.

  “Yeah. I might not be able to leave with the ring,” said Rabbit.

  “Can we trick the computer?”

  Rabbit thought about it. “I’ve got it. Help me toss a couple of these guys across the door.”

  “What will that do?”

  “The door won’t close automatically if it thinks guards are responding to an emergency.”

  They each picked up a body and laid it across the door opening.

  Rabbit grunted. “Here goes nothing.”

  She entered the room and waved PL to follow her. When PL crossed the door threshold, alarms went off. The door closed partially and then retracted.

  “Come on,” Rabbit said, hurrying to the drawer that held the ring.

  “Whoa, what’s that?” said PL, pointing to a case holding a set of leather armor, swords, and a black compound bow.

  “I have no idea why that’s in here. It’s just junk.” Rabbit shrugged as she hurried to open the drawer. She swiped her finger, but the drawer remained lock. “Try leaving and then coming back in.”

  PL left the room. The alarms in the lockup quit.

  Rabbit tried the drawer again, and it opened. The ring was the only content in the padded interior. She grabbed it and yelled for PL to come back in. “Here!” she yelled over the alarms.

  PL took the ring and looked at it. A black tendril of fog swirled up and around PL’s head. The fog went up her nose. She lifted off the ground.

  “Do you feel that?” said Kita.

  “I feel a lot, most of it not good,” said PL.

  “Not the physical. We’ll get over the physical. It’s hate, resentment, pain, anger—”

  “It’s our parents, the castle where we grew up. The crest on the ring is our family crest. The P and L on the ring are for Priatt Logine, our father. We were nobles. Our parents died during an attack. He…He’d never say that…” PL gasped.

  “He called us a monster,” Kita snarled.

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Mother died defending him.”

  “No, she was running from something. She’d rather die than go back. Look at us,” Kita said. “What’s on our face?”

  “Roses, I think. Why? We don’t have them anymore.”

  “Who’s the giant with us?”

  “I can’t remember his name, but he was important,” said PL. “We beat him in a fight for the roses. He took us away from the castle after Mother and Father died. We were crying over what Father said. He called us something—something that made everything better. Do you know what he said?”

  “Oh, we had a cat!” said Kita.

  “That’s not a cat. That’s a…a…lion,” PL said, scared.

  “Sarge was his name.” Kita sighed. “The cat, not the man.”

  “Look at the weapons we’re using,” PL said to Kita.

  “We’ve seen those before…In the case.”

  “It’s Dusk and Dawn,” they said together. “Those weapons and armor belong to us.”

  “They belonged to Mother, and she gave them to us,” said Kita.

  “We need to get them out of that case.”

  “What else do we remember?”

  Together they went through a group of memories like flash cards.

  “We obviously had a busy early life,” Kita said when the flood of memories subsided.

  “Both good and bad,” said PL. “Why do you think we were shown all those dead people?”

  “I think…because we killed them. That’s why we’re a monster. We like doing it. It makes us feel better. Blood is happiness.”

  “Ew,” said PL. “But, I don’t do that.”

  “What if we’ve unlocked it?”

  “We kill only when needed. If it makes us happy, so what? As long as we don’t do it because we have a desire to.”

  “I can live with that.”

  “We need to get to Mother’s equipment.”

  Kita giggled. “And Jess looks as if she killed us.”

  “Do we still want to call ourselves PL?”

  “After what we just learned about him? Let him rot,” said Kita.

  “I agree. Our name is Kita and seems to strike fear into people. I say, let’s give them what they want.”

  “No, better idea,” Kita countered. “Let’s go with something else. Better to hide at this point. You’ll remain our face.”

  “How about Kat? It’s Kita-ish,” said PL.

  “Works for me.”

  With a thud, Kat landed on the concrete floor.

  “Kita, are you ok?” Rabbit asked, poking Kat. “What was that? What went up your nose?”

  Kat rolled over and grunted. “I have no idea, but I unlocked some of my memories. I just lived twenty-three years in a few seconds…and call me Kat. I don’t want people to know I know who I am.”

  Rabbit pulled her to her feet. “Ok, if you say so.”

  “I need what’s in that case.”

  “I can’t open it.”

  “I’ve got to get in.” Kat went over and inspecting it. It didn’t have glass, but a protective barrier. When she touched it, she got a nasty shock. “Interesting,” she muttered, “but, this is meant to stop a normal human.”

  “You are a normal human,” said Rabbit. “Don’t do anything stupid that’ll get you hurt or killed.”

  “I’m not a normal human. I’m cursed,” said Kat. “I’m stronger, more durable, and heal faster than you do. I’m sure they have to know. Why don’t you?”

  “I…Ah…if anything like that is in your file, it’s not available to me.”

  “Well, let’s see how durable I am.”

  “Don’t,” Rabbit cried as Kat pushed her way through the barrier. Ignoring the shock and the barrier slowly dissolving her flesh, she reached in and grabbed Dawn. A black tendril of fog snaked its way from the sword, through the barrier, and into Kat’s nose. She lifted off the ground.

  “‘Well Daddy, you’ll be happy to know I won’t be playing soldier anymore. Instead, I think I’ll be what I am; a girl trained as an assassin.’ We said that to Father,” Kat said to Kita. “That’s what we are, an assassin. That’s why Tina told Jess to fear us. We are a spy hunter.”

  Images of her training with Sarah, her teacher, came to her mind. They had spent hours on weapons training, followed by even more on the art and tradecraft of being an assassin. She saw her one-sided love affair. Sarah hadn’t been in love with her. Instead, she’d thought it amusing to teach a noble to be an assassin and kill her own. The last memory showed Kita and Sarah dueling in the top of a warehouse, and finished with Kita cradling Sarah’s head in her arms, crying. A shadow with a tail fell over her, but there was nothing more.

  “I hope we’re not as hard on all our lovers,” said Kita.

  “She deserves it,” said Kat. “That is a sick thing to do.”

  “But, look what it got us.”

  “I don’t think being an assassin is worth a broken heart.”

  “She didn’t love us. It’s only fair we got her head and skills. I do know broken hearts heal in time. No matter how much they suck.”

  “Do you think we filled the void?”

  “I think there’s a mushy and gooey part in here somewhere—that’s not you,” Kita teased.

  “I’ll show you who’s mushy and gooey,” Kat said alluringly.

  “Now, that is narcissism.”

  Kat swung Dawn, cutting off a section of the base. The barrier collapsed, and she sank to her knees, sharing a laugh with herself before standing up.

  “Kat! Dammit, what did I tell you?” Rabbit scolded.

  Kat looked at her burnt arm. Her hand barely had any flesh on it. “Cool,” she said as she wiggled her skeletal fingers. She turned around and picked up Dusk. She flourished the two swords, ending with a strike against a rack of rifles. The steel restraints clanged to the
floor.

  “How is that possible?” Rabbit demanded. “Let me see those.”

  “No,” Kat said firmly. “They are molecularly perfect and never dull.” She turned around and put the swords in the weapons holder. She picked up the armor and looked it over. Made of hardened leather on the outside, the inside had a silky layer over a material she couldn’t identify. A pair of spiked bracers, boots, upper arm pads, and thigh pads completed the set. In the thigh pads, she discovered a dozen throwing stars. She pulled one out.

  “Here, think fast,” she said to Rabbit and flicked her wrist.

  Rabbit flinched as the star went by her ear, bounced off two walls, and back into Kat’s hand. She shook her head. “Slow. You’ve got to do better than that.”

  “Are you insane?” Rabbit yelled. “What happened to you?”

  “I know most of my life up until I was twenty-three. I fell in love with a girl who didn’t love me, but she taught me to be an assassin. Later, she took a contract out on me, and I cut off her head for it. That’s what I am, an assassin. This armor is most definitely meant for me. And unlike you, I don’t care if you watch me change or not.”

  “Oh, no you’re not,” said Rabbit forcefully.

  Kat giggled. “Try and stop me.”

  “You are not putting that armor on until you get a shower. You smell like…this stupid city. Follow me.”

  “What’s wrong with how I smell?”

  “If you want anyone to ever get close to you outside this hell hole, you need to not smell like it. Grab your stuff.”

  Kat gathered up the equipment and followed Rabbit through the station to the shower room.

  “Soap, shampoo,” she pointed to dispensers on the shower’s wall.

  “What is all that?”

  Rabbit winced. “Soap for the body and shampoo for your hair.”

  Kat shrugged and stripped off her clothes and dropped them on the floor.

  “No, you put those in the trash,” Rabbit ordered, pointing to the receptacle.

  Kat picked them up and dumped them in. Rabbit set the receptacle to incinerate and started the process.

  “Oh, hey, wait,” Kat called. “I need…”

  Rabbit hit the buttons frantically, trying to stop the machine.

  “A towel or something to dry off with,” Kat finished, giggling.

  Rabbit scowled angrily.