by Brian Trent
He was afraid to hope that McCallister was emailing to let him know that spies in her organization had been ferreted out, Tanner’s imposter dispelled, and the war machine’s engines downshifted to a rumbling idle.
“Wait.” Celeste stood and pointed at him. “You said you had figured out what was happening.”
Gethin gave her his attention. His email screen formed a semi-translucent overlay across her face. “Researchers don’t deal in absolutes,” he said.
“Your working theory, then?”
“You know that professor friend of mine in Athens?”
Celeste nodded.
Gethin leaned against the wall. He gave a reluctant sigh, and the shadows of the bay formed a map of inky pools and plateaus across his countenance.
“Yeah. He’s actually Apollo the Great.”
She blinked a few times, like a sleeper uncertainly sloughing off last night’s dream. “As in, the Warlord Apollo?” she asked.
“The only.”
“Gethin, Apollo lived and died three hundred and fifty years ago. Before immortality and DCs. All the Warlords did.” Her mind raced to weigh the possibility. “But not before cryonics, right? Are you suggesting that Apollo had himself frozen at the time of death to await a secret resurrection?”
“No.” He minimized his email tab with a short, conductor-like sweep of his hand. “Celeste, we both grew up hearing stories of Apollo’s divine power. Calling down fire from the sky. Sprouting wings and battling angels of darkness. Turning night into day by his radiance. We live in a highly rational age now, so we realize these tales are just mythologized attributes of his military successes. It fits the model of earlier religiosity: burning bushes, angels bearing black stones, water turning into wine. It’s the ‘awe factor’ of our species, and it isn’t limited to gods. Secular hero-worship is alive and well. Look at the outcry over Salvor Bear’s death.” He panted, wiped sweat from his lip. “But what if this time it isn’t mythology? What if Apollo really had the powers ascribed to him?”
Celeste frowned. “Am I hearing you right, Gethin? You’re converting to the old faiths?”
He shook his head vigorously. “It’s not faith. Apollo is still alive and he calls himself Doros Peisistratos. His longevity is almost inconsequential compared to the other things he can do. Convert the matter of his own body into energy. Imitate anything or anyone he desires.”
“So if Apollo is still alive…then why not Enyalios?”
He nodded. She shuddered.
“And others,” Gethin said, a clammy hand touching his heart. “I think we have been tossed into the midst of war between two different, roughly equal factions. I think they have been fighting since well before the Final War. And I think I’ve never been more scared in my life.”
* * *
The ship landed beneath a rocky, gourd-like overhang south of Cappadocia to conserve fuel while they discussed their next move. The bay viewscreen displayed a local map in blobs of green and blue vector lines.
Celeste cracked out a beaker of brandy from her locker. She poured two deep glasses, handed Gethin one, and gulped half of hers before he had taken a sip. It burned like corrosive acid in her throat, spread warmly into the pit of her stomach, tingled along her limbs.
If there was one thing she could count on, it was the Mantid’s storehouse of liquor. Like the hold of a pirate vessel, enough loot was aboard that her entire squad could remain sated for weeks, eating canned soups, dried meats, dehydrated easy-prep meals, and washing it all down with stolen spirits.
She swirled the remaining brandy. “If there is a war going on, Apollo and Enyalios are presumably on the same side. They both signed the non-aggression pacts, along with Lady Wen Ying.”
Gethin swished his brandy in the glass. “True enough. But I don’t have to remind you of their differing methods. Apollo was an enlightened philosopher king, a uniter, the founder of a new civilization. Enyalios was a butcher. Eighty million people killed by his predations.”
Celeste felt her breathing coming hard and fast. “Those estimates are considered low.” She threw back the rest of her drink and was surprised by a warm, lustful tingle in her body. Warlord Enyalios. Mass murderer or not, he was the first man she had ever loved from afar. The deliverer of brutal justice for a brutal people.
Gethin drained his glass in one long, steady trickle. He placed it on the counterspace. “We both need to undergo a DC as soon as possible. This knowledge can’t die if we do.”
Celeste was stunned. “Why me?”
“Why not?”
“I thought you needed to be a citizen to have a sentient pattern registered with a Save center.”
Gethin laughed. “I’m betting it won’t be a challenge to get you registered.”
“And if I die?”
“Then you come back, like Ishtar from the underworld.”
“The goddess of love and war?”
“Aren’t you both?”
“Check your fucking messages,” she snapped, and stepped into the narrow shower cubicle, stripped, and disappeared beneath spraying water and steam.
He opened the email from Donna McCallister.
The IPC lieutenant’s face was a solemn rectangle, long and worn in a way befitting the dignified visages from antebellum currency, back before the advent of the IPC tradenote. More than two centuries old; to flip through her photographic record was to witness willful fluctuations between youth and matronly maturity, like the frames of an antique film projector looping the illustration of the human life cycle. She appeared young at the start of her career during the Saturnian Miners’ Revolt of 117. The photos of her began to show a swiftly aging matriarch by the time of the infamous Stillness attacks of the 200s. Then, in time for the unveiling of the IPC’s newest battleship fleet, she was young again. Donna McCallister. Summer to autumn to winter to spring.
Currently, she was in her matriarch season.
“Mr. Bryce?” she said to the recorder. “I must assume you survived the crash and are alive, in the Wastes, and deliberately evading our search teams.” She sighed deeply, giving an appreciative nod. “We found the bodies of Stillness troopers amid the wreckage, and last night discovered the charred remains of Colonel Leon Tanner in a maintenance tunnel beneath Old Athens. We don’t know all the details yet, so please bear with me. The man you spoke with was not Tanner. He was an imposter. We…don’t really understand how this happened.”
“Tell me something I don’t know,” Gethin muttered.
McCallister continued. “When we discovered Tanner’s remains, we downloaded his last Save and brought him back. He has no idea who was responsible for his abduction and murder. His imposter has vanished…as if into thin air.”
I’ll bet he did, Gethin thought. Or perhaps through a ventilation shaft like in Tycho Hospital to finish off Kenneth Cavor. Transforming his physical mass to energy and then worming into the vents, scorching them as he goes.
The silver-haired woman looked weary and exhausted. “Bryce, the airship recorder was disabled by the hijackers, but we have a pretty good idea of what happened. I’m guessing you think the IPC is in collusion with terrorists. This is not the case. We need you back, to help us shed light on the situation. Contact me as soon as you can.”
Gethin got McCallister on the line and started talking before she could cut in. “We know about the imposters,” he told her. “In fact, I have reason to believe there are two factions of these shapechangers involved in all this.”
McCallister looked pained. “Who are they, Bryce?”
“Doros Peisistratos is one. I need to find him right away.”
He expected McCallister to continue drilling him, and was mildly surprised when she said, “Just a moment. He left Athens for Japan aboard REP Flight 54021. His passport was scanned at the Shimizu pyramid yesterday at 6 p.m. Wait. I can’t get a lock on him.”
>
“Because he has no wetware,” Gethin explained. “So far that’s the only way I know to detect these…imposters. They possess no internal technologies. No detectable tech of any kind.”
“Stealth augs,” McCallister suggested. “I’m contacting our security forces at the pyramid right now to—”
“No!” Gethin insisted. “Do nothing of the sort. Doros trusts me, and if he feels threatened he’ll disappear. Literally.”
“Then we’ll put the pyramid on lockdown.”
“That won’t work either,” he said irritably, unwilling to get drawn into a deep discussion on this. Celeste emerged from the shower and treaded past the screen. McCallister stared at the naked apparition but offered no comment.
“Let me talk to him,” Gethin persisted. “When I get to Shimizu, I’ll keep an open channel to you, but it’s my show, got it?”
“Fine. Where are you right now?”
“You’ll understand why I won’t answer that query.”
The old woman regarded him solemnly. “What would you like us to do?”
“Your Shimizu office is compromised. The airship was transporting terrorists to the most advanced arcology on Earth, and that can’t be done without insiders. Issue a standing order to all Shimizu officers. Tell them local IPC personnel are to immediately confine themselves to their homes and offices until further notice. Then run a priority scan on every citizen. Tag all those who lack wetware, or possess signs of recent wetware implantation, and send me the list when I arrive. Should be a short list for Japan.”
“You don’t want a security detail? Gethin, if you’re right and more terrorists are there, what do you expect to do?”
“I’m going to reach out to the one group that couldn’t possibly be associated with Stillness,” he said, and disconnected the call.
Then he contacted the Faustians.
Chapter Forty-Six
Out of the Past…
Gethin ended the call with the Faustians and realized he was sweating. He poured himself a second brandy and drained it in a painful, inexorable swig, concentrating on the parching sensation in his stomach and knowing the pleasant numbness of intoxication would follow. The Mantid’s stealth thrusters thrummed, the vessel en route to the other side of the world.
Celeste leaned across from him, dressed in a fresh pair of cargo pants and pale red T-shirt, her thumbs hooked into her beltline. “That sounded serious. Did you just sign with the Devil?”
He looked at her sharply. “No, that’s your modus operandi. During one of my earliest anomaly assignments, I was asked to investigate reports of miracles among Abraham’s Flock. Ever hear of them? A bastardization of Old Calendar faiths. I hung out in their villages, watched their sermons of judgment and damnation.” Gethin sat up, his sinewy arms as taut as tree limbs. “And they did perform miracles too…with stolen arcology medpacks. But the fanaticism, the thirst for hellfire and destruction…well, it wasn’t really so different from your StrikeDown pals, huh?”
“I’m not with StrikeDown.”
“I’m smarter than anyone you’ve ever met, Celeste. I had you pegged when we had dinner in Athens.”
Celeste said nothing.
“This ship is an illegal AI,” he continued, “subcontracted by your StrikeDown associates. Now, that could be lots of people. However, you made a point of telling Howd that you were from Odessa. I thought that was interesting. You know who else is from Odessa? Konrad Dal. Known to the Outlands as King D. A savvy political genius in the mold of Warlords. He commissioned an entire fleet of Mantids, right? All carting their squads around, waiting for the acquisition of enough weapons to make StrikeDown dreams a reality. Weapons like those two missiles your doomed posse grabbed in the Hudson. Once things reach a critical mass, Dal pushes the buttons and gives Earth another dark age.”
The blood rushed to her cheeks. “We do what we can to survive.”
“The cry of the fanatic. At least we arkies are trying to improve the world, step by step.”
“We’ll see,” she hissed, mask off, talking straight to her enemy.
“And you know what else?” Gethin said in afterthought. “This clever ship might pull off a few hit-fade strikes, but IPC battleships will eventually scorch Avalon and every ship it made from the face of the universe and—”
Celeste hurled her glass at his head. It missed him by several inches…enough that he realized she hadn’t actually been trying to hit him. Then she crossed the distance to him, seized his tunic, and kissed him.
There was nothing sweet or soft about it. Gethin grunted, feeling her hands at his throat. She tore his tunic open, grasped the back of his head, forced him to look into her eyes.
He saw rage there.
And anguish.
And fear.
“Celeste, I—”
“Shut up.”
She tore the rest of his tunic away. His bruises and lacerations formed an attractive pattern of scarring on his arcology hardbody. Celeste yanked his sash through its belt loops and threw it noisily to the floor. Then she peeled out of her top, gripped him by the back of his hair again, and pulled him towards her.
Gethin instinctively took one nipple into his mouth, feeling it harden against the ministrations of his tongue. He was shivering, the past days of madness washing away in an emotional monsoon. He sucked one breast, then the other, while she pulled her cargo pants down over her sharply accentuated hip bones, letting them crumple at her feet. Celeste dragged her adversary to the floor after them. The steel was cold against her knees.
“Celeste—”
She pressed two fingers against his lips. They were slick with her wetness. Gethin’s protests evaporated as she lowered herself onto his mouth. She reached around and gripped his hardened member, beginning a maddening stroke that made Gethin groan helplessly as he pressed his mouth and tongue to her. Celeste began to grind in a steady, deliberate circle against him, hips rolling.
Gethin let himself be used. The floor vibrated behind his head, the brandy swam in his veins, and he thought of their hypersonic flight above thousands of feet of Earthly landmass. Celeste’s moans increased in pitch, and her first orgasm shocked him with its intensity. Her muscles were still contracting when she dismounted his face, flipped around towards his feet, and took him into her mouth. The suction pulled at every nerve ending in his body. When she finally mounted him, he was twisting in desperation for release.
It was a four-hour flight to the Shimizu pyramid. Their coupling seemed a delicious agony, a contest of willpower that ended in the first orgasm of his new body. Celeste’s hair was plastered to her face and neck. She curled against Gethin’s chest, her face wet with tears, never meeting his eyes or letting their fingers interlace. Neither had spoken more than simple words, urgent and bestial.
Gethin listened to her breathing. A half hour before their descent to Japan, they joined one last time. She lay on her stomach, feeling the seams in the metal plates. Gethin straddled the backs of her thighs and penetrated her slowly, teasing at the threshold, pressing deeper with each thrust, withdrawing completely before returning, over and over until he was buried to the hilt. When he came again, it felt like his insides were twisting into knots.
He placed his hands on her supple shoulders. There was an old knife scar just above the scapula.
At last, Celeste stood. “Get dressed,” she ordered, tying her hair into a ponytail.
Gethin complied, regarded her quietly. “What was that about?” he asked.
She closed her eyes and felt the change in pressure as they began the descent to Japan.
“Life,” she said.
Chapter Forty-Seven
Ten Thousand Thunders
For all its tricks, the Mantid could not possibly approach Shimizu without triggering a dozen surveillance tools designed to look for heat signatures, real-time optical distortions, w
ind modulations, ladar net, and the feedback from sonic air buoys. The pyramid’s AI net knew the positions of every bird and fish in a ten-mile radius, and Gethin feared that he and Celeste had already picked up an unseen automated escort. Without McCallister’s support, they would be blasted to shrapnel over the Sea of Japan.
At 7,000 feet tall, the Shimizu pyramid was the highest manmade structure on Earth (though not the largest – both the Apollonian Ring and Transatlantic Railway bested it in terms of mass and scale.) It floated on the water, chrome in the late afternoon sun, and the ocean could have been a mercury desert undulating around it…a surreal reinterpretation of the age of pharoahs, as a race of machines might have envisioned it.
Gethin had been to the pyramid twice in his youth. The people of Shimizu were like those of the rest of Japan; bright, eager technosorcerers who seemed to exist in a state of perennial optimism. And why not? Technology had been their timeless savior and had merged with the mystic’s promise of magic.
The Mantid maintained invisibility as it splashed down and cruised through one of the pyramid’s hangars. Thanks to McCallister, the docks were deserted of security personnel.
Celeste handed Gethin a fully loaded multigun with a bejeweled undercarriage of EMP cannisters. She also gave him a knobby, navy blue glove that felt far heavier than it looked.
“Ever used a shieldfist?” she asked, seeing his expression.
“I’m not a soldier.”
As she helped stretch it across his left hand and a portion of his arm, she explained its use. “The trigger is the rubber ball in your palm,” she said. “The harder you squeeze it, the larger the shield. This was slotted to my friend Rajnar…meaning that it won’t recognize you as its new owner. Make sure you keep it out in front of you when you deploy it, or you’ll decapitate yourself.”
Gethin breathed out slow and hard. “Good safety tip.”
There were no CAMO suits remaining aboard. Even her own suit, painted with phosphire back during the Hudson attack, had been fried during the blast that almost killed her, and the Mantid had been forced to slice it off her during medical treatment anyway.
