Stranger Souls

by Jak Koke

  The woman threw the green sand through this hole, the grains filling up the etched images. The fluctuating curtain grew less solid there, darkening where the sand covered the petroglyphs. Until there was a narrow tunnel through the ward.

  All the way to the Dragon Heart.

  "I'm in," said the woman.

  "About time," Liner said.

  The woman created a simple spell that Lethe watched eagerly. The spell reached out and lifted the Dragon Heart from its place, cradled by a bower of magic. Telekinesis. If Lethe could learn that magic, maybe he could move the item. He watched the item float on the spell's current, hovering over the trail of green sand, through the tunnel—the weakened space in the ward—and out into her hands.

  "Got it." She carefully turned it over in her two hands for a minute, mesmerized. The Dragon Heart looked large in the elf's cradling grasp, easily the size of her head. "Seems to be solid orichalcum," she said. "Sheila will be pleased."

  "Does it include the charmed orichalcum we sold to the wyrm?"

  "Most likely, but it's impossible to tell now. When this item was created, the tracing charm was destroyed."

  "The item is active?"

  "Most certainly."

  "Good. Let's go," said Liner.

  "Yeah, I'm getting edgy," the other mundane warrior agreed.

  The mage put the item into her shoulder bag and nodded to the others. Then they were gone, moving rapidly through the twisting tunnels, the maze of corridors in the depths of the lair. Lethe followed, unsure of what to do. Should he stop them? Should he follow them? Who were these people?

  Something happened then. An alarm sounded and many guards and spirits came. Total confusion. Shots fired and lots of magic. Lethe watched attentively, keeping close track of the Dragon Heart, but he did not interfere. The elves who had taken the item made quick time out the maze of tunnels to a narrow staircase that climbed up through the rock.

  They killed anyone who tried to stop them, something that seemed wrong to Lethe. The meaningless destruction of lives. They were nearing the exit, preparing to fight the small group of guards, when Lethe caught sight of someone . . .

  Someone different.

  She was an elf, seemingly, and she was in a position of authority. Lethe was inexplicably drawn to her. Such charisma, such beauty.

  She stood in an adjoining corridor at the center of a group of people. Drawing him to her with her commanding presence. In the physical, she was unadulterated, lovely. Elegant with her porcelain skin, emerald eyes, raven-black hair.

  She was fully in command of those around her as she spoke to an ork, tall and dark with more of those blank patches in his corporeal spirit. "What's going on, Jeremy?"

  "Brooks says that a small group has infiltrated the lower levels," Jeremy said. "But the treasury seems untouched."

  "Where are these culprits?"

  "We've lost them," Jeremy said. "Temporarily."

  "Let me know when they're caught. I want to know why they were in the lower levels."

  "They must have been after some of the treasure," Jeremy said. "But were scared off."

  "Maybe."

  I must talk to her, Lethe thought. I can tell her about the Dragon Heart and the elves who took it. But, unlike Thayla, she did not hear his emotions when he tried to talk to her, and she seemed to have no awareness of any world beyond the physical.

  Maybe I can use a physical body to speak with her? The thought came and he acted on it without hesitation. He surrounded the spirit of Jeremy, engulfing the ork's aura as he entered the metahuman flesh. He tried to be gentle with the fragile spirit, careful not to completely swallow Jeremy's will.

  Lethe filled the flesh as the ork's spirit shrank into a nothing, until it was safely absorbed by Lethe. He had taken total control of the body. This frail flesh that the metahuman spirits called home. Seemed so vulnerable. So weak.

  The flesh of this creature felt heavy and slow. He saw the warped and distorted image of the physical world through the ork's eyes, heard the dulled sounds through his ears. The flesh was clumsy and awkward compared to Lethe's pure spirit form. And had some unexpected side effects; the smell of the lovely elven woman had an arousing effect on the ork's body which Lethe found not unpleasant.

  Very strange, totally unexpected.

  "I must speak with you," he said, the words coming out clumsily through the ork's mouth. But they didn't sound like Jeremy's. The inflection was different enough that the elf turned to him.

  "What is it, Jeremy?"

  "I have taken over Jeremy's flesh," Lethe said. "Just to make contact with you. My name is Lethe, and I am what you call a spirit."

  She took several steps back and glanced with suspicion at the gun on Jeremy's hip. "What do you want. . . Lethe?"

  "What is your name?"

  "Nadja Daviar," she said.

  Nadja Daviar, Lethe thought. No, nothing. He had hoped that hearing her name would click some memories into place, but nothing at all had come back.

  "I can tell you about that which you seek," he told Nadja.

  "What do you mean?"

  Jeremy's body was growing warm from Lethe's influence. "The people who came here, in the lower levels. They took the Dragon Heart."

  "The what?"

  "The Dragon Heart," Lethe repeated as sweat broke out on Jeremy's forehead. "You don't know what it is?"

  "No."

  "An item created by Dunkelzahn. I need to bring it to Thayla."

  "Dunkelzahn never told me about any such item."

  Several magicians had surrounded Lethe by then, and some security guards had their weapons drawn, pointed at Jeremy's body. Nadja's aura was a maelstrom of intense emotions, but none of that showed on the surface. She spoke evenly, "What have you done with Jeremy?"

  "He's here," Lethe said. "I've just possessed him for the moment. I will leave soon, but I felt compelled to speak with you. I come from a place of light and song, a barren place made beautiful by the voice of a goddess known as Thayla. Her song is protecting the world, this world, from imminent destruction. She sent me to find Dunkelzahn and the Dragon Heart to help her."

  "Dunkelzahn is gone," Nadja said.

  Sweat turned to steam on Jeremy's skin, and a burning smell surrounded him. I must release this flesh soon, Lethe thought. "I have heard of Dunkelzahn's death," Lethe said, "and that is why I need your help. I cannot manifest to carry the Dragon Heart, and even if I could, I don't know how to get it across the barrier that separates your world from mine."

  Nadja shook her head slowly. "Lethe, I don't know . . . you sound sincere, but I know nothing of this Thayla. And Dunkelzahn never mentioned any Dragon Heart. What you are telling me sounds like an elaborate ruse. A trick of some sort to get some of Dunkelzahn's treasure."

  Her eyes were like fragments of deep green stone, and Lethe could almost see a hint of the fury inside. "But even if it weren't a trick," she said, "I don't think I could help you. My security forces will catch the thieves and whatever they took, including this Dragon Heart, but I simply can't act without investigating your story. Many people want part of Dunkelzahn's inheritance and will go to great lengths to get it. I'm very sorry."

  Jeremy's body collapsed to the floor just then, his skin bursting suddenly into flames. His heart exploded in his chest, and with one lurch, one convulsion, Jeremy died. Lethe was forced to leave the necrotizing flesh. And Jeremy's spirit came away with him, unraveled from its physical counterpart. The ork's spirit shredded and fled, disappearing in the gentle astral wind.

  In the physical, the ork's body lay dead and growing cold as the people crowded around. It disturbed Lethe profoundly. That was not supposed to happen. He had no idea what to do next. He had lost the Dragon Heart. He had killed an innocent metahuman.

  And besides all that, Lethe thought as he watched the sad look on the face of Nadja Daviar as she bent down to inspect Jeremy's body, I have alienated the only possible ally I might have had.

  13

  F
alling, falling.

  Jane-in-the-box plummeted into the digital vortex. Her persona pulled apart into its constituent data bits by the tornado of light and static. A whirlpool of purple threads—lightning without thunder. Only the deep hiss of random patterns.

  Then it was gone, and Jane found herself standing on a street corner. She was in her physical body, her real body—thin as a rail, skin and bones, unwashed brown hair matted like a bird's nest on top of her head. She felt frail, her bony knees threatening to buckle as she nearly collapsed to the ground. She needed food and a shower.

  What happened? Where am I?

  Tall buildings of concrete and mirrored glass reached up into a night sky around her, but there was no traffic on the city street. Street lamps illuminated the sidewalk, reflected in silver streaks that rose up the chrome windows of the buildings. But there were no people. Only Jane, a gentle breeze, and the absolute silence of the vacant city.

  Abruptly, someone touched her shoulder.

  Jane spun to see a young woman, human, about twenty-five years old with shoulder-cut blonde hair, fair skin, and ocean-blue eyes. She wore black jeans and a plain white halter top. "Sorry to startle you," she said, taking a drag on her cigarette. "Welcome to Wonderland. I'm Alice."

  Jane took a step back. What the frag? Wonderland was a Matrix legend. I'm still jacked in.

  The virtual reality around her was so real that it was indistinguishable from reality. An ultraviolet space. She could even smell the cigarette smoke. Jane had heard rumors that UV spaces existed, but had never experienced one. She hadn't given the rumors much credence, and she'd never believed in Wonderland—the infamous place inhabited by mysterious constructs and lost data.

  Jane looked at Alice. "Are you slotting me?"

  Alice laughed. "No," she said. "I'm not 'slotting' you."

  "Did you . . ." Jane began. "Were you the one—"

  "Who saved you from Rox?" Alice said. "Yes, that was me. I like you, Jane. I like what you're doing. But I hate Rox even more. Do you remember the Crash of '29?"

  "I was too young to deck then," Jane said. "But I know about it."

  "I was part of Echo Mirage."

  "What?" The members of the Echo Mirage team were the first to use direct interfacing with computers. The first deckers. They were the guinea pigs who did battle with the virus that crashed the worldwide computer network back in 2029.

  "I was in Rox's system when I encountered the Crash entity."Alice's voice broke momentarily.

  "What happened?"

  Alice steeled herself, her physical appearance seeming to grow more dense, if that was possible. She took a slow drag on her cigarette.

  "Never mind," she said. "It's simple really. I hate Rox, and I like you. I didn't want him to get you just then."

  Jane didn't know what to say. "Uh . . . thank you."

  Alice fixed Jane with a hard stare, her sea-blue eyes crystallizing to a frozen gray. Jane found that she could not move to look away.

  "I did not rescue you lightly," Alice said. "It took a great deal of effort, and much sacrifice. Rox's system is one of perhaps five in the world that are protected from me. For the present at least."

  Jane found she could not respond.

  "In return for saving your life, I will ask something from you in return," Alice said, then a smile graced her lips. "Not now, but in the future."

  Alice's smile hovered in Jane's mind, endearing and attractive, but haunting, overpowering, and not to be denied. "Goodbye for now, Jane-in-the-box."

  Alice's words whispered in her mind for several seconds after the silent city had faded around her. Then Jane was back in her riveted steel box, and the image of Alice's smile had dissipated. Wonderland was gone, and Jane wondered whether the shock of her encounter with Roxborough had induced a hallucination of the whole thing. It had been so real, like nothing Jane had ever seen on even the most detailed of sculpted systems. She hadn't known she was even in the Matrix.

  "Jane!" came a voice through one of her links. "Do you copy? Jane, where the frag are you?" It was Axler.

  "I'm here," she said, bringing herself back into focus. "Give me the status."

  "Status is that we're fragged up in the yin-yang down here. The helo went down. I was hoping Dhin had switched to Plan B, but I can't raise him, so he must've gone down with the helo, and we're pinned down so we can't make the T-bird."

  Jane scanned her other feeds, seeing Axler's mistake immediately. "Stand by, Axler," she said. "I'll have you out in nanos."

  14

  Ryan saw the world at a slant; his eyes open, his head hanging at an awkward tilt because the drug in the dermal patch on his neck prevented him from lifting it. The fiery afterimage of the helicopter crash glowed in his mind as he watched Axler and the others crouch in the cover of the jungle's undergrowth. Security forces from the clinic were scrambling across the open area and beginning to penetrate the thick greenery.

  "Jane, how are you going to get us out?" Axler yelled, even though she was speaking through her internal communications. "They've hemmed us in. We can't get to the T-bird."

  Just then Ryan heard the roar of an autocannon and the scream of jet engines as a Thunderbird blew into the space in front of them and mowed down the security forces. The Thunderbird was a huge vehicle, easily twice as large as the helo that had crashed a few minutes earlier. But the T-bird was an LAV, a low-altitude vehicle designed to move below radar. Meant for extended use in hostile territory, it was painted in camouflage greens and blacks and shaped like a bullet that had been flattened lengthwise. It floated on the thrust of six jets that pivoted independently.

  And as it flew past, the trees brushing its belly, the autocannon blew the trees to splinters as it tried to close off the sec forces. The noise deafened Ryan, the destruction phenomenal. "Axler," came a voice. Ryan barely heard it through McFaren's audio headphones. "Axler, do you copy?"

  "Dhin, is that you?" Axler said. "Where the frag have you been? Thought you'd bought the proverbial vatfarm when the helo went down."

  The T-bird banked around for a final sweep of the security forces, which had scattered before its onslaught. "I switched to Plan B as scheduled. I was in the T-bird, rigging the helo by remote control," Dhin said. "But the explosion caused massive feedback in my vehicle control rig, and I lost communications for a minute."

  "All right, cut the chat," Axler said, then she turned to Grind and McFaren. "You two ready?"

  "Been ready for five minutes now," McFaren said. The human looked pale, barely able to stand as he concentrated on his magic. "I've never seen so much juju tossed about like it was nothing. Luckily, only two of the really powerful mages seem to care about us."

  Grind just nodded, then lifted his arms as the T-bird descended, mowing down any remaining trees with its weapons. It took only fifteen or twenty seconds before it settled on a precarious mound of chunky pulp. Grind's metal arms were cold against Ryan's skin as the dwarf carried him up to the sliding side door and into the vehicle.

  Then the door slammed shut, and Ryan was thrown against the corrugated metal floor as the T-bird lurched into the air. Grind's metal arms lifted him into a chair that faced away from the near wall, and the dwarf used his third arm to pull the safety harness over Ryan's shoulders, buckling him in as the vehicle accelerated away from the fight. Or at least Ryan assumed that was what it was doing as it swerved and dodged.

  "Grind, get to the cupola and man the assault cannon," Axler yelled. "We're not in the clear yet."

  But the black dwarf was already climbing into the rear compartment, strapping himself in and plugging his hands into the control panel. "On it, chica," he said.

  That brought a quick glare from Axler.

  The central chamber of the T-bird was snug, with four chairs along the walls facing in toward cargo tie-downs. Only McFaren sat in the chamber with Ryan. The mage was limp, his body held in the chair only by the straps of his safety harness. Axler was in the back with Grind. Ryan could see Axler's left
side through the open compartment door as she sat at her console, and Grind's boots were visible on the stem of the cupola's high chair. Dhin was in the cockpit that Ryan assumed was through the small door on his right.

  "Incoming missile," came a synthesized voice over the speakers. "Ares Macrotechnology model CH45ET200A, Cheetah. Radar guidance with heat-seeking backup."

  "We've been painted." Axler's voice.

  "Activating stealth mode in two seconds," Dhin said through the speakers.

  "Flare balloon ready," said Axler.

  "Mark," said Dhin.

  "Flare away. Jamming chaff away."

  "Stealth mode engaged. We are running cool."

  Ryan felt the T-bird slow, and it immediately grew warmer inside the compartment. Then an explosion broke his ears and rocked the T-bird around him. The straps dug into his shoulders as the vehicle shook, but it was all over in a few seconds and everything seemed to be intact.

  "Yes!" cried Grind. "Dodged that fragger."

  "Nice flying, Dhin," Axler said.

  "They seem to be letting us go," Dhin said. "For the moment anyway."

  The speakers filled with a new voice, one Ryan thought he recognized, "We won't give them the time to send aircraft. Fly straight to the Canal Zone. I should have new identification for you within the hour."

  "Copy that, Jane-in-the-box."

  "How's the cargo?"

  Axler looked up from her console and glanced through the open compartment door to survey Ryan. "Alive, but he's been through some major drek, Jane. He's not himself. I had to dose him and carry him out."

  There was a pause. Then, "I was afraid of that," Jane said. "I'll get a doc ready to scan him when you get in."

  "Copy, we'll keep him safe."

  The T-bird ran steady and smooth now. And after a few minutes of silence, Axler and Grind returned to sit in the central compartment with Ryan and McFaren. McFaren sat up, said, "We're being followed in the astral. I sent some spirits to slow them down, but it might be a problem." And without waiting for a response, he fell asleep.