The Verse of Sibilant Shadows: A set of tales from the Irrational Worlds

by JM Guillen

  Firenzei screamed. A scarlet blossom of blood spattered against the wall.

  The gun hit the wall and fell.

  Part of his hand fell to the floor.

  For a moment, all I could see were his eyes. They burned through me, aflame with shock and malice and hate.

  Then he was gone.

  He had me. Wyatt looked at me, shaken. Using the secondary comm, he was too stunned to speak aloud. I was focused on Anya’s link, trying to get a location on her.

  I put my hand on his shoulder. We have to go.

  We are within one hundred feet of each other, although of course all I have is signal strength, not direction. Anya sounded apologetic.

  I could sense pain through the link.

  Anya? Are you injured?

  She paused just the tiniest moment. I am operational but will need assistance. She paused again. Hold one moment while I patch Wyatt the axiomatic specs he will need to pass the snares.

  Understood. I was worried about her. I couldn’t shake the feeling that she wasn’t being completely honest.

  Wyatt twitched from the size of the patch. Immediately, he disengaged the static field. The bullet caught within tore through the air and buried itself in an office wall.

  “There’s not too much to this.” He smiled at me, but it was still shaky. “If we alter the axioms around the snares, then they won’t meet their prerequisites to go off.”

  WHUF. He placed one in the center of the hallway and then walked over to the side door I had opened. WHUF.

  I sent a link to Anya. He set the spikes. Are we clear here? I paid very close attention, trying to determine how badly she was hurt.

  She took a moment to respond. Readings are ambient Rationality zero, Michael.

  I peered into the room.

  It seemed little more than storage. I stepped inside, brushing some of the white powder from my body as I did.

  It was dim inside. Shadowy.

  Seems clear in here. There is another door on the far side.

  Wyatt linked back. Understood. I’ve got yer six.

  I slipped to the next door, listening at it carefully.

  Nothing.

  I cracked it open and peeked through. Beyond, I saw ragged green carpet. A light flickered overhead as if it were about to go out, and—

  Anya.

  She crouched on the floor in a small pool of blood. In the dim light, her fair hair seemed almost angelic. When she looked up at me, I could see pain in her eyes.

  “Anya?” I stepped closer. There was blood on her leg.

  It was her knee. She had torn her shirtsleeve and was using it as a makeshift bandage, but there was a lot of blood.

  The asshole had brought her here, shot her kneecap, and then came back to deal with us.

  I won’t be able to walk. Her voice was completely matter of fact. I’ll have to lean on you, but all my gear is still operational.

  That wasn’t what mattered to me. I was just happy she was alive.

  “Come on. Let’s get you up.” I linked to Wyatt as I helped her stand. She’s injured. Asshole shot her kneecap.

  I could feel Wyatt’s anger. I’m glad you took his hand off. I’m glad.

  “My right leg is fine, if you can support my left one, then we can move.” She smiled briefly, and that pained me most of all. It was truly awful that Anya needed to have her kneecap shot before I could see so much of her smile.

  It was beautiful.

  “I have you.” I put an arm around her.

  I started to say something else, but a sound suddenly rumbled through the room. It was ominous, a machine, like a giant engine. I gave her a look.

  “That’s the second time.” She nodded across the room at a wooden door. “It was a little louder last time.”

  Wyatt, I’m moving ahead here.

  Copy that.

  I’m leaving Anya here. She’s can’t walk without help.

  He said nothing, but I could feel his fury with Firenzei over the link.

  Slowly, I limped Anya toward the door. When we got there, I leaned her against the wall. I was alarmed at how pale she looked.

  “I’m going in first. Wyatt is running back point. He’ll be along in a moment.”

  She only nodded. Her pale face looked so tired.

  I opened the door. The system time showed we had been down here too long already. Twenty-seven minutes remained.

  The sound rolled over me the moment I opened the door, along with the smell of burning oil and hot metal. Steam and smoke were everywhere. Moving frantically among the machines were several men wearing white coats, rubber aprons, and gloves. As soon as one saw me, he yelled something unintelligible. Russian again? Maybe.

  They all panicked.

  Three of them ran for a door on the other side of the room. Two stayed behind, one cursing the men who ran. The cursing man wrenched at a gigantic gear. It seemed stuck, but then he got it to move. After just a few centimeters, something whirred deep within.

  The world trembled.

  The fuck? Wyatt was succinct as ever.

  A large spike in Irrationality. We just stepped to neg 23 and back, all in a matter of a few milliseconds.

  I sprinted across the room, drawing my weapons as I did. I must have looked like a madman, covered in blood, my own and Firenzei’s. Further, I still had white fire retardant in my hair and clothing. I charged across the room, screaming, and holding two swords over my head.

  So, yeah.

  Neither of the men decided they had what it took to take on a screaming maniac. They followed their fellows only to find that their friends had somehow sealed the metal door from the other side.

  “Vot blin zasranec!” One of them yelled. The other turned on me, his fists clenching. Behind his antiquated gas mask, I could see nothing of his face.

  Then, WASPS! It was all I had time to link.

  Another small spike. What is your status, Michael?

  Not good!

  A small cloud of wasps angrily buzzed around me. They weren’t typical, garden-variety wasps either; they seemed longer than my finger. I waved my arms wildly, stumbling backward to avoid being stung.

  I tripped over a small table and flailed onto my back, trying to keep my face covered.

  I’m incoming. Wyatt’s link was gruff. Hold on, Hoss.

  Focused on keeping my face covered and trying not to get stung, I didn’t see Wyatt come in. I didn’t even know that he was close until I heard the WHUF.

  Somewhere, a man screamed. The gigantic wasps vanished.

  Here. Wyatt stood over me, holding out a hand. Some kind of hallucination. I couldn’t even see what you were flailing at.

  I pulled myself to my feet and looked around. Wyatt had shot one of the men through the foot, spiking him to the floor. The other one was nowhere in sight.

  There was another one. Wyatt raised one eyebrow. He just stepped through that door like it was nothing.

  You got any effects on that spike?

  Nothing yet. It’s just holding him there. I can dial something up if we need to.

  I picked my katanas up from the ground and sheathed them on my back. Then, I turned to the Irrat that Wyatt had caught. The man was in obvious agony from the spike through his foot and had pissed his pants.

  “You’re on the wrong side of this one.” I made my eyes hard. “Maybe we can have a talk and this doesn’t have to end poorly.”

  “Maybe I no talk you.” The man’s voice was muffled from the mask. “Maybe I tell fuck yourself. Maybe you die here.”

  I sighed. “That’s not the kind of talk I meant.” I reached for him and pulled his mask away from his face. He was middle aged with a shock of white hair. Tiny scars ran down one side of his face.

  The man’s eyes went wide with horror.

  “No. Please, you don’t.” He wrung his hands together in supplication. “Please, you don’t.”

  “Fine.” I let the mask snap back onto his face. “But you’re coming with us.”

&
nbsp; I didn’t have any axiomatic binders or even plain old zip-cuffs. Taking him along was going to be a problem.

  This machinery is binding and weaving local axiomatic strands. Anya had hopped into the room and leaned against the wall. Her face was pained, but her fingers twitched as she worked. Whatever this device is, it might be what created the axioms that split this topia from ours.

  I linked back to her. We have an Irrat here who was part of the crew running this thing. If we can take him along, the Designate might be able to get answers. I have no binders though.

  That is a problem. I’m already concerned about the speed of our progress.

  This door is a steel composite. I can melt our way through it. Wyatt spat on the floor. Time’s a tickin’. He gave me a glance.

  Wyatt was right. Exposed to the strange axioms of this place, our time was running out. Eventually, our viral mecha would stop producing oxygen. We were already slowed by Anya’s injury, and now I was taking an Irrat prisoner.

  “Present for ya, pal.” I stepped up to the Irrat.

  “What you do?” He was horrified.

  “No time, friend.” I drew back and then punched him in the face. The man doubled over and lay unconscious.

  “Classy.” Wyatt gave me a grin. But practical.

  Should just end him. I glared at the unconscious Irrat, irritated. Protocols stated that known Irrational targets were to be taken for reconditioning or killed.

  But then, protocols didn’t really cover much about this operation. I was more interested in getting home alive, and for the moment, the man was out of commission.

  If Wyatt judged my action, he didn’t give any sign of it.

  “We need to move along.” Wyatt adjusted his gear. The spike through the man’s foot hissed as Wyatt altered its makeup. It simply vanished as the metal became oxygen and water.

  I held an arm out for Anya, who leaned on me again. I could tell she hated feeling so powerless.

  You well enough? I looked at her as I linked to her only. I thought she might prefer the privacy.

  I am in considerable pain but handling it with my mecha. She gave a short nod.

  We stepped forward as Wyatt reduced the door to slag. Let’s move along. We need to find our way to an extraction.

  She didn’t say anything, but I could still feel her emotion through the link.

  Despair.

  Anya didn’t think there would be an extraction for us.

  21

  The hallway beyond the gear room was long with thick, red, shag carpet. The lights overhead flickered, and more than a few were out. Wyatt pulled point, keeping the tangler at ready. I had no doubt that he had some nastiness keyed up in case we made contact.

  We didn’t however. We crept down the passage, coming to another series of the wide, round vault doors, all along the left side.

  “‘Second Circle, Ǣtern,’” Wyatt squinted as he read the small brass plate next to the first door. Then he glanced at the second. “‘Din D’lorr.’ The fuck?”

  They went on and on. Some of the names were simply nonsensical, such as “Modriin” or “Lucimiir.” Others were more descriptive such as “The Last City of Man” and “The Labyrinth of Isowyr.” One was even labeled “The Starsailed City of Mür,” which I found intriguing.

  Then, Wyatt stopped in his tracks. He stared at one of the small plates.

  “I…” He peered closer, as if trying to make certain. “I prefer the sound of this one.” He tapped the brass plate. “Manhattan, New York.”

  “You’re shitting me!” I felt hope rise in my chest. “No way, there is no way…”

  Wyatt gave me an unbelieving grin. “Surely not. Too simple, right?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t think we have an option other than to try. We can’t stay here much longer.”

  Agreed. Anya wasn’t even making the pretense of speaking out loud, not in her current state. Their technology seems centered around topiatic manipulation. Also, the men who ran through here are gone without a trace. Manhattan is terribly convenient but not unlikely.

  “They’re new brass plates.” I mused as I ran a hand around the edge of them. “This place hasn’t been here for long.”

  “Maybe we weren’t so far off.” Wyatt pushed the button marked Manhattan. “Maybe not a travel agency for Irrats but a Grand Central Station.”

  When the door opened, three of the gas masks hung on hooks in the back of the elevator. Wyatt gave them a long look and then winked at me.

  I couldn’t stop grinning.

  The elevator went up and up and up, seemingly forever.

  Anya’s eyes went wide. We are back to Rationality zero. She smiled. Not ambient Rationality zero; this is home.

  Wyatt punched commands into his keypad until his gear hummed. “Be that as it may, I’m not—”

  The Designate was like frost-covered knives in our minds.

  I require confirmation and access code check in.

  I grinned like a kid at Christmas. It’s us, Designate. I am Michael Bishop, 108. I felt my Crown whir as it synced with the Lattice. We need an immediate extr—

  The door opened into a shadowed room. The moment it did, two men with automatic weapons turned toward us.

  “Fuck!” Wyatt’s fingers frantically typed as they opened fire.

  WHUF. Almost instantly, he had a stasis field queued up and a hemisphere of opaque silver appeared three strides in front of the elevator. Wyatt turned to me, but I already had the emitter gearing up. I felt the coolness on my skin as I faded from sight.

  “I’ve got us covered. Go,” Wyatt snarled.

  I knew he couldn’t see me nod.

  I drew the katanas as I stepped from the elevator.

  The stench of the room hit me in the face. I felt a deep despairing in the pit of my stomach as I recognized it.

  Four of them, Michael. There was a distinctive pause as Anya correlated her readings. Vyriim in each.

  I heard her, but a familiar and foreboding sight riveted my attention. In the dim light of the room, I saw column-shaped canisters lining one of the walls. Three of them were emitting a soft green light, and I could see the human forms within them.

  Designate, I made certain that my cadre could hear me as well, our local coordinates are a breeding chamber for the Vyriim. We request immediate extraction and advise the Facility to use extreme caution regarding this location.

  Another one? I could feel Wyatt’s despair. Here? In Manhattan?

  I moved gracefully around the edge of Wyatt’s globular field. I could see one of them. He approached cautiously, his weapon held out in front of him, showing no sign of sensing me.

  Affirmative. I rolled my neck, loosening up. I’m going in.

  As the first of the guards came closer, I spun toward him. Pure grace and invisible blades, I had him on the floor in a scarlet pool before he even realized what was happening.

  Thick tentacles spilled out of his gut through one of my gashes, but the Vyriim was sluggish, seeming confused.

  I sliced it into four pieces before it was even entirely out of its host

  I’m at yer 4 o’clock, Hoss. Coming around the other side. They know I’m here and are trying to triangulate.

  Copy that. I could make this quick, and I needed to. The less automatic gunfire that was going off in the building, the quieter things stayed.

  “Hello, Michael.”

  I turned, surprised I hadn’t seen Rudolfo Firenzei standing in the shadows to my right.

  How had he seen me?

  I was only stunned for a moment, but that could be all he would need. With the Adept engaged, I swung toward him hoping to have him on the end of my katana before he had the opportunity to say another word.

  I wasn’t fast enough.

  Firenzei lunged for me, reaching with his one good hand. As I swung on him, his fingers clasped the front of my jacket.

  Then, for an eternal instant, I was cold. Frigidness clawed into the center of me. I could not catch my breath
and then…

  Then I was falling.

  Later I would realize that he had simply used his temporal drift, same as he had Anya. We appeared across the room, several feet off the floor. While I floundered, he knew exactly where we were and what to expect. As such he was able to slam me to the ground, stunning me.

  I dropped my swords.

  He brought his face centimeters from mine so that I could see the madness dancing his eyes, could smell his fetid breath.

  “We keep talking about who should be afraid, you and I.” His leer was wide, dancing with madness. “I thought perhaps it was something we should settle once and for all.”

  Then, they came for me.

  The strands were tiny at first. Things not much thicker than a hair wriggled around his eyeballs toward me, reaching for my face. When I saw the tendril slithering from his nostril, the thing as thick around as my pinky, terror clutched at my heart.

  I began to scream.

  Even in my adrenaline-fueled horror, I could not push him off me. I had to watch as the hungry aberrations squirmed toward my eyes, my ears, my nose, and my mouth.

  The sensation of the small tentacles twisting and oozing into my body almost drove me mad. I had never stopped screaming, but as I felt their warm wetness in my ears and nostrils, my cries became so loud that my voice cracked, and I could scream no more.

  Pain blossomed unlike anything I had ever known. I could feel the serpentine movement in my sinuses, could hear the wetness of the tentacles in my ears.

  Hoss—?

  Then, with a blindingly painful burst of wetness somewhere at the base of my spine, I felt the Vyriim in a way I never could have dreamt.

  Wordless sensations drifted through my mind. Things that were more like concepts, primal ideas that felt older than the Earth.

  Space, shaped differently than I had ever known, created directions that my mind could not bend to reality. There were ideas that I didn’t have enough senses to perceive. I learned the ancient and secret names for what they did, names that were forgotten ten-thousand years before man stumbled out of the jungles.

  One.

  The Vyriim were one. One organism. In the same way the hairs on my body might look like different things but were not, these Vyriim were a single, ancient mind, a mind that was driven, insatiable.