And then an explosion tosses the Operative like a doll into the air. Another follows—so powerful it rips through several adjacent corridors. Walls tear like tissue paper even as the Operative strikes what’s left of them. He smells his own flesh burning. He can’t see Sarmax anywhere. All he can see is marines swarming in toward him from every direction. He opens fire on them. Something sears in toward him.
His world goes dark.
Light’s everywhere. Wavelengths bombard them from all directions on all spectrums. Their suits are being scrambled. Their systems are going haywire. They can’t see a thing.
“Show yourself,” screams Haskell.
“We’re right here,” replies a woman’s voice.
Haskell feels something slam against her. She totters. Something stabs her through her suit. She topples. She feels her body going numb. She’s being lifted off her feet. She’s murmuring curses. Her helmet’s being pulled off. Someone’s hands touch her forehead. Someone’s lips kiss her on the cheek.
“Christ we’ve missed you,” says that voice.
Memory crashes down upon her.
PART IV
CONFLAGRATION AND RAIN
Of course,” says a voice, “you couldn’t win.”
Claire Haskell opens her eyes. She’s sitting in the corner of a small room. It’s empty except for her.
And Morat.
He’s sitting cross-legged against the room’s only door. He looks totally undamaged. His new head’s smiling.
“You couldn’t win,” he repeats. “Then again: you couldn’t lose. You were fighting your own kind. You were fighting your own nature. But don’t be too hard on yourself. You weren’t to know. And now the time for fighting’s over.”
Haskell exhales slowly. “So the Manilishi was bullshit?”
“Not bullshit,” replies Morat. “A useful fiction.”
“And the Rain?”
“Conceived by Matthew Sinclair shortly after he was appointed by President Andrew Harrison to head up CounterIntelligence Command. Shortly after Harrison took power as the first president under the Reformed Constitution. The first and last, Claire. Because tonight he’s going down. And his Throne is going under.”
She stares at him.
“Autumn Rain,” he repeats. “Conceived by Sinclair and green-lighted by Harrison as the ultimate hit team. Engineered assassins who would be unstoppable. Who would decapitate the Eurasian high command in the first minutes of the next war. Who were bred in the same vat and trained together from birth. Who included among their members a woman called Claire Haskell. And a man called Jason Marlowe.”
“You bastard.”
“I won’t deny that.”
“Where is he?”
“You mean Jason?”
“Yes, damn you!”
“He’s fine.”
“Where is he?”
Morat smiles. A screen appears to the side of the door. It shows a room identical to this one. Marlowe’s sitting in one corner. His eyes are open. His expression’s blank.
“What the fuck have you done with him?” says Haskell.
“The same thing we’ve done with you,” replies Morat. “Restored his memories.”
“He looks like he’s lost his fucking mind.”
“Don’t you feel the same way?”
“Fuck you,” she says. “Tell me about the others.” The ones she didn’t even know she’d forgotten. The ones who are making her realize just how much she’s lost…
“They were marked for death by the president himself. Written off as too great a risk. They got wind of it, chose the path of Lucifer. But the Throne beat them to the punch. And the Praetorians slaughtered them.”
“But failed to finish the job.”
“Indeed. Those who escaped went underground. Where they devised a second coming. A whole new plan.”
“That plan being?”
“You already know it.”
“Oh Christ,” she says. “Oh no. Fuck you.”
“You shouldn’t hate me, Claire. Once I was the envoy who called himself Morat. Now all I am is your humble servant.”
“You mean the Rain’s.”
“They’ve waited for you for so long,” says Morat. “It’s time you went to join them.”
“I can’t,” she whispers.
“You must,” he replies. “Find in yourself that strength.”
He stands up even as the door behind him slides open.
T he door of Spencer’s mind has been ripped from its hinges. They administered the drug they call ayahuasca about an hour ago. They’ve cut him off from zone. Now he’s locked in a room beneath the Andes even as all other locks are withering.
“Fuck,” he says.
Nothing happens. Everything convulses. He feels like he’s being thrust straight through the center of the Earth and clean out the other side. He feels himself catapult out into the universe. The pressure on his chest is growing unbearable. His eyes are like crystals frozen in some everlasting ice.
“Ah fuck,” he says.
The walls of his cell are shimmering. His chains are disappearing. That pressure’s vanishing. Suddenly there’s nothing holding him in place. He can get up. He can stand up. He can flee.
So he does. He moves toward the wall. It seems solid. But he’s not fooled. He can trace a route straight through it. He starts to move out into the living rock.
“Going somewhere?” says a voice.
He doesn’t even need to turn. He can see everything. The door to his cell has opened to the corridor beyond. Two Jaguar soldiers stand there. Neither wears armor. Both are heavily armed.
“Maybe,” he replies.
“We’ve got something for you far better than that wall,” says one of them. The man speaks neither English nor Spanish. But somehow Spencer understands every word anyway. He turns around.
“What are you talking about?”
“A gateway.”
He lets them lead him down that corridor.
The Operative sits in a room. Darkness sits within him. He can’t believe he’s been taken prisoner twice in the same mission. By the same outfit too. Now he’s somewhere in the heart of Nansen. In a loose-fitting grey outfit. There’s no sign of his armor. He doesn’t know how much time has passed. He’s not even sure he cares.
A screen’s descending from the ceiling of his cell. It unfolds before him.
A face appears upon it.
A nd now we’re all here,” says Morat.
Ten meters down the corridor from the room in which Haskell awoke: Morat’s just opened the door to another room. Haskell looks inside. Marlowe looks up at her. He smiles weakly.
“Claire,” he says.
She steps within, steps to him. Sits down next to him. Puts her arm around him. Lets her head rest on his shoulder. Tries to talk on wireless.
But can’t.
“As I’m sure you’re figuring out,” says Morat, “we’ve disabled those of your neural links that enable dialogue. Though even if we hadn’t, it wouldn’t matter. Each of you knows the same as the other.”
Haskell ignores him. She kisses Marlowe on the cheek. “How do you feel?” she asks.
“Like shit,” he says.
“Makes two of us.”
“I remember them all,” he says. “All of them. Iskander and Indigo and Roz and Nils and Miranda and—”
“I know,” she whispers. “I know.” She looks at Morat. “Which of them are still alive?”
“They haven’t told me,” replies Morat.
“You’re lying,” says Haskell.
“It’s not like I need to know.”
“Well, who’s in this base besides us?”
“Some very impatient people.”
“Let them wait a few minutes longer,” she says.
“I want to see them,” says Marlowe.
“You’re right,” replies Haskell. She stands up. “We have to face this.”
S pencer’s being dragged up step after step. What looks
like jungle’s far beneath. What looks like sky is far overhead. It looks like this is some kind of simulation. Because as far as he knows he’s still deep underground. The walls around him must be screens. Or else this is all virtual reality. Or the drugs. It scarcely matters. It’s the realest thing he’s ever seen. A sliver of Moon’s stretched amidst the clouds. He’s reaching the pyramid’s roof.
Torches burn at all its corners. Men wearing headdresses stand at intervals along its edges. Spencer’s hauled past them to the raised dais at the roof’s center. An altar rests upon that dais.
As does a throne. A man’s seated upon it. Linehan lies prostrate in chains before him. The man who’s been dragging Spencer throws him down.
“Gaze upon the Great Cat,” he says.
Spencer raises his head to look at the man on the throne. He wears a jaguar skin. Its arms drape down his shoulders. A face stares from between its jaws. A smile slowly appears upon that face.
“So now the one who calls himself Lyle Spencer comes before us,” says the man. “His people are about to perish utterly. They need one who can reach the afterlife before them. One who can bear witness.”
“Who are you?” says Spencer. A guard brings a boot down on his back.
“No,” says the man sharply. “Let him converse freely. The sky’s own finger penetrates his brain. We grant him the privilege of discourse.”
“You’re not getting a thing out of me,” says Spencer.
“Nor do I need to,” says the man.
In the bunkers beneath Nansen there’s a room. In that room a man’s gazing at a screen. The man upon that screen wears the insignia of a SpaceCom general. He looks like he’s lived life too long beyond the bounds of gravity. His face is sunken. What’s left of his hair is almost white.
“I’m Anton Matthias,” says the man.
The Operative looks at him. “Yeah?”
“You’re the Praetorian who caused us so much trouble.”
“And you’re the traitor who’s still causing it.”
“That’s one way to look at it,” says Matthias.
“You got another?”
“The real traitor’s the Throne,” says Matthias. “For thinking that he could do a deal with the East. For succumbing to the poison called détente.”
“And for daring to purge the poison within Space Command?”
But Matthias only laughs.
“Why the fuck am I still alive?” asks the Operative.
“What if I said it was because I can still use you?”
“I’d say you’re full of shit. I serve the Throne.”
“Carson: in about ten minutes there’s not going to be a Throne. You’re one of the best agents operational. We’re going to have need of people like you in the days to come.”
“That makes no sense. If you had any sense, you’d kill me now. Seriously—why are you keeping me alive?”
“Why don’t you take me at face value?”
“What happened to the rest of my team?”
“They sold you down the river.”
T he control center of SeaMech #58 of the late Indian Republic is a large circular room. The central floor of that room is sunken. The walls of that lowered chamber are lined with darkened screens. Morat walks Haskell and Marlowe to the top of the steps, sits cross-legged there while they walk down toward the bottom.
Two figures stand there. A woman and a man. Haskell remembers both of them. She wants to cry. But instead she just stops at the foot of the steps.
Marlowe doesn’t. He keeps going, embraces them both. Both are weeping. Marlowe turns back toward Haskell. She can see he’s shaking.
So is she.
“Oh fuck,” she whispers.
“Yes,” says the woman. “It’s us.”
“I’ve missed you both so much,” Haskell mumbles. Her knees feel weak beneath her. Her eyes burn as she blinks back tears. She feels the past swinging in upon her—long-ago days of sunlight, nights set adrift upon the wash of time. She feels her heart overflowing: reeling at those memories awoken, seeing that flesh brought back to life before her….
“You never left our hearts,” says the woman.
“But we lost you all the same,” says the man.
“You’re the ones who’re lost,” says Haskell. They gaze at her. They don’t say anything. “You—you killed thousands when you blew that Elevator. You’ve turned this city into a fucking slaughterhouse.”
“Claire,” says Marlowe. “Wait a second.”
She looks at him.
“I think we need to hear their reason why,” he says.
“Whose side are you on?” she asks.
He looks confused. “Yours,” he replies.
“By definition,” says Morat. “He’s in love with you.”
She whirls then, practically spits up toward Morat’s face: “You prick! Stop fucking with our heads!”
“Morat answers to us,” says the man. “And as for you and Jason: we’d never tamper with our own. All we’ve done is remind you of what really happened.”
“Yeah?” Haskell looks scornful. “Seems like everybody’s got their own version of that.”
“Meaning what?” asks Marlowe.
“Meaning how the fuck are we supposed to know the latest thing to hit our heads is real! Jesus fucking Christ, Jason. We’ve been skullfucked again and again and again and now you want to say this is fucking different?”
“Of course it’s different,” says Marlowe. “It really happened.”
“So let them prove it!”
“Trust your heart,” says the woman. “You’re one of us. We wouldn’t have brought you here if you weren’t.”
Haskell looks at her. Her hair’s dirty blond. Strands of it hang across her face. But she still looks all too like the child that Haskell remembers.
“You used to wear your hair so short,” says Haskell. Her voice catches. She can barely hold back the tears now.
“Times change, Claire.”
“And now you’re massacring city sectors.”
“You had to be convinced you were dealing with a rogue AI. Believe me, we could have done far worse.”
“So it’s you who’s in charge of this?”
“We’re all in charge, Claire. What we’ve done in HK, what we did to that Elevator, what we’re about to do to the world: the responsibility is ours.”
“I’ll say,” says Haskell.
“We had to seize it,” says the man. “It was either that or keep on running from people who had bred us to kill only to decide it was us who needed killing.”
“You’re part of this,” says the woman. “Don’t deny it. We’re back from the dead. And now we’re going to show the world a whole new way to fight.”
“So watch the dance of the puppets,” says Morat.
The screens light up all along the walls.
T ime on the edge of nothing. Time to churn up shapes that flit through shadow. Time since they dosed you: more than eighty minutes. Time you started seeing…
“You gaze upon Paynal, Spencer. The living incarnation of the lightning. The messenger of the Hummingbird that men call Huitzilopochtli and that your people will know as the instrument of their destruction.”
“Fuck,” says Linehan suddenly. He’s laughing like a crazy man. He’s laughing like he’s on the ayahuasca too. “Listen cat-man: this man works for a low-rent gang of data thieves called Priam. Bunch of mercenaries looking to make a buck. He’s got nothing to do with anything you’re talking about.”
“But he does,” says Paynal. “Has the little death granted you no insight? This man you call Spencer works for the ones you call Information Command. The handler you call Control works for Stephanie Montrose. Who reports directly to that monstrosity you call your Throne.”
Linehan stares at him. Then he swivels his head in Spencer’s direction.
“Goddamn you, Spencer. Is this maniac right?”
“I don’t know,” mutters Spencer. “I don’t fucking know.�
��
“There was a time when all the men and women under heaven knew their own names,” says Paynal. “Now we live in a world where faces are shadows and mirrors treachery. A world where humans are sundered from their pasts. It was to prolong such a world that this man was set like a snare to lie in wait for the last survivor of a wayward team running from their SpaceCom masters. A snare set by the vultures of InfoCom. Spencer’s leaders put him in your path, Linehan. They sought to dangle bait that would attract the Rain themselves. But how were they to know how adept our claws are at slipping flesh from hooks? Now we have the living proof of how the Yanquis themselves brought down their own edifice. This man Linehan has already made a full confession. Soon we shall broadcast his statement to the world.”
“And while you’re at it,” snarls Spencer, “make sure to tell them how much you’re loving Autumn Rain’s cock. How all you’ve got to offer is more bloodshed and more butchery.”
But Paynal just smiles. “Blood will flow like our Amazon used to before we attain the peace we seek. But the Rain don’t rule us. We treat with them as equals. And tonight we’ll rise to heights your people never dreamt of. Heralded by our releasing your souls to beg the gods to grant victory to the greatest missile strike ever undertaken. We’ll expend ten times the munitions we flung from our cities three days ago. We’ll fire from our hidden bases all along the Andes. We’ll pound hell into the ocean. We’ll smash the Yanquis’ low-orbit facilities into oblivion.”
“But that’s what the Rain wants,” says Spencer. “You do that, and you’ll start war between the superpowers.”
Paynal shrugs. “So much the better.”
“So much the better when we smash you,” screams Linehan. “We’ll raze these fucking mountains and bulldoze what’s left into the fucking sea!”
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