Emperor-for-Life: DeadShop Redux (Unreal Universe Book 6)

by Lee Bond

  So where he had once told them stories, where he had made them feel smart and brave when they were under the influence, they now did the same in repayment, though silently. They each carried thoughts of hope and warmth in their endless hearts for Father Vasily, dreamed of a time when he was standing beside them once more, hoped with a fervor that drove Fenris ragged that soon, very soon, Father Vasily would become the man he was meant to be.

  They stood and listened to his words, words he shouldn't be speaking because a rallying speech from Vasily wasn't the sort of thing Fenris approved of: Vasily Tizhen wasn't Army and was no longer able to afford the luxury of consorting so openly with God soldiers of any type or rank…

  None of them cared.

  Neither those who followed Saint Candall the Righteous or Candall the Vengeful gave one wet fart what Fenris wanted when it came down to Father Vasily. They were all on the same page when it came to their adoptive Father. He’d been OverCommander for the longest of all such men, he’d done things for them that powerful Fenris and his equally powerful brothers could never understand, had suffered so much loss because of his enduring love and patience for moron-ified Goddies, so if Vasily asked them to stand in the goddamn rain while he recited terrible poetry for three hours before they shipped off to battle, then that was goddamn well what they were going to do, and they'd fucking do the shit out of that standing in the rain, listening to what would undoubtedly be terrible poetry.

  Being of Harmony didn't mean a damn thing when it came to stuff like this.

  This was about family.

  "You are lucky." Vasily whispered the words, and flinched when they boomed across the parade grounds. "So very lucky. I never thought in my entire life that I’d see you whole. It’s a gift to an old man unlike any other, and am blessed. I have always loved you, always sought to protect you and shelter you in your times of darkness. I never held your weaknesses against you, and nor should you. You are so very strong now, standing brighter and taller than I could have ever dreamed. You are your full and true selves and when we stand against the Enemy, the yellow streak of piss running down their legs will be an ocean.

  But that time is not now. That is later. For now, you move against an enemy very different than you might imagine. You know of the things they may have under their skins, but none of us can truly appreciate the changes that may've been wrought in them. I realize all save the youngest of you fought endless campaigns across The Cordon, and I know you are suffused with Harmony, but these Heavy Elites are your equals. Perhaps not all of them, but many of them will be deadly dangerous. They will stand against you, toe to toe. Blow for blow. You will be moving in greater numbers, yes, and in the end, you will obviously triumph. But I urge caution where Fenris would urge haste. Never forget, my children, that this is Trinity, and It brings more than just Specters and Heavy Elites to this fight.

  Trinity is and always will be a danger. Through their machine mind, our current enemies have access to weapons and technology that truly does surpass ours. Fenris would rather die than admit it, but it's true and I will not have you run into battle without knowing the truth. The Hand of Glory missiles Candall used in revenge will almost certainly be deployed this day. Entire ships, hundreds of thousands of your friends and loved ones can be snatched away from you in a moment, transformed into fire in the night sky. The machine mind has been preparing for this moment since It changed the terms of our deal a hundred years ago. This war makes that bloody apparent, even to a Onesie.

  To you, to you who are nearly immortal, a hundred years is as nothing. I understand that. I can see it in your faces from where I stand, but again, you do not know the machine mind as I do. I spent time out there, in Trinityspace. It is everywhere and It is in everything. It is vast and older than you all. A mere century? A drop in the bucket to you. To me, it is half my life. To It? All the time It needs to ready Itself. This was may have begun because of The Engineer, we may have been swept into it when our time would better be spent preparing for when Darkness Falls, but here we are, on the verge of our first true engagement. I know that you aren’t afraid. I know you’ll greet your death with open eyes and open arms because that is how you have always been. I honor you for that and would never ask you to do anything less than what you need. But still, I urge caution. There is a bigger battle, a larger war, just around the corner. I can hear whispers in the wind, my tired old mind feels faint tugs, warnings from the old OverCommander that The Engineer is almost done with his wandering, and that soon, he’ll turn his eyes back to the main goal and that, my children, that is what we were always here for. Some may say that you were born and bred for Universal conquest, some may say you were brought to this point so ‘bored OverCommanders would have something to do’ but I say different.

  You were always meant for the Falling Dark and the Rising Light. Always. I don’t know how I know, but I do. You were never meant for anything so petty as pushing back the limits of The Cordon for a greedy machine mind, you were never meant for something so trivial as a mad Chairwoman’s dreams of Universal Conquest but you were meant to do good. And there can be no greater good than assuring that what comes next is better than anything we ever had here, in this miserable old Universal.

  You will fight like gods. You will thunder across the heavens like Titans. You will war against demons. You will accomplish things you cannot imagine, and when the Light finally Rises, if we are all very, very lucky, we will become the stuff of myth and legend to fresh new people in brand spanking new worlds.

  But only,” Father Vasily, in his ascetic white robes, raised a finger, “only if you fight cautiously today. Keep your wits about you. They may have more powerful weapons of mass destruction, they may have tainted Heavy Elites who might equal you, but they are fresh in this world. They may have battled across The Cordon, but only for a hundred years. Enough to warp them into monsters great and small, but not enough to give them the wisdom you have.

  You fought on Capscallion in the Tardrive System. You hunted down the Sa’urr Sha-hayl in Vashal. The list is endless. You know more about war than anyone. Use that knowledge today. So that tomorrow, when I open my eyes and I see that Darkness has Fallen, I know that by the time my eyes close, the Light will have Risen, and that good was done that day.”

  Father Vasily closed the comm.

  The parade field, a vast stretch of land large enough to hold a million God soldiers as they stood boot to boot, shoulder to shoulder, was quite as a grave on a moonless night. Only the wind blew, softly, gently, through a forest of soldiers ten to fifteen feet tall.

  And then, oh, and then, as one voice, as one spirit, as one soldier, each man and woman proud and brave enough to wear the bland green uniform turned their heads to the sky and howled.

  The sound was heard very nearly around the world.

  The God soldiers were ready for war.

  ***

  “Those ships are fucking enormous.” Winker tapped the screen with a greasy finger.

  Toon slapped the finger away, then began rubbing the screen furiously to remove all signs of the taint. “They’re fucking hollowed out asteroids. Of course they’re enormous. Don’t touch my stuff.”

  “How are you getting this data?” Winker demanded, turning around in a tight circle. BattleScreens in nearly claustrophobic amounts surrounded the brightly colored Heavy Tech Expert on all sides, bright green and white displays revealing all manner of surprising things about the five asteroid ships on the far side of the Storm. “My guys can’t get anything past the interference.”

  “Your guys aren’t me.” Toon replied cockily. “Your guys haven’t done as much past The Cordon. Don’t. Touch. My. Stuff.”

  Winker’s greasy index finger hovered a few millimeters away from some random and useless-looking piece of crap. “Or what?”

  Toon flashed Winker a smile, and suddenly the BattleScreens were full of scribbles. Equation after equation after equation. A few seconds of this, and those were replaced by camera feeds of
the room they were in. Data models appeared, indicating random locations throughout. “You will go to each of these spots in succession, starting with the location directly behind me and ending with you by the furthest door to this room. You’ll obviously try your signature move of slitting my throat, but since I’ve told you I know where you will be, you’ll move on to the next spot on your already decided list. You’ll try to shoot me, but by this time, I’ll be on the move. Interior defense systems will shoot at you, but of course, now you know that, you’ll try to escape. Through the door at the back.”

  A nervous smile flitted across Winker’s mouth. Fucking old Heavy Techs. They were the weirdest of a weird lot. “And what happens at the door?”

  “Touch my stuff and find out, you fucking savage ape. Why are you even here?” Toon resumed looking at the asteroid ships. "Shouldn't you be on your own ship, pretending you're a Heavy Tech as well?"

  There was a lot of data and none of it made sense. She really didn’t care for the Latelian style of data communications; it took way too long to crack and when each line of communications was cracked, that particular feed shut down within seconds, leaving only dribbles of data, none of which was useful. It was almost like there was an even bigger network out there, one no one could see, one that was in control of everything. Because of that, damn near everything she learned was really only a best-guess.

  Winker moved a little further away from Toon. Just on the off chance that the broad had some kind of weird tech on her that'd kill him quickly. Marker's whole fucking crew -even good old Tanker now, which was a drag- were mad as mad could be, so it was better to be safe.

  “To find out why we aren’t moving against the asteroid ships. Why we’re waiting for these fucking God soldier assholes to move here. Seems like a bad fuckin' idea, you ask me."

  “Why don’t you ask Beeks?”

  Winker frowned. “Beeks got got. The Fibril killed him about a week ago. Went batshit crazy. Realized he was crazy, fed himself to the black hole generators.”

  Toon chortled loudly. “Fucking Fibril Techs. ‘Hey, let’s go visit the Aroonauts. They’ve probably gotten over the ass-stomping Star Specter gave them, let’s ask for a Fibril for our Tech Elite.’” She shot Winker a wicked smirk. “Like that makes any sense.”

  “Beeks was a good guy.” Winker snapped angrily. “And he made the suggestion. Anyways, if you would kindly explain to me why we’re waiting for a trillion Goddies to come this way, enlighten me. Everyone else in this madhouse just nodded at Marker’s suggestions like they were coming from God Himself.”

  “Prolly ‘cuz they’re terrified of Marker.” Toon replied, fiddling with some of the controls. She was almost positive there was another network out there. She could taste it on the back of her tongue, like bitter fruit. “As you should be.”

  Winker didn’t say anything. He just shot Toon a dirty look. He wanted to smack her, but no one knew what kind of Heavy Tech augment she really had under the hood. Whatever it was, it was powerful enough to ignore the tremendous amounts of static coming from the Storm; far's he knew, not a single other goddamn ship in this tossed-together armada was getting anything useful, and Toon's screens were full of shit. Stuff like that usually came with second and third order bullshit, so while Toon -brightly colored, with stupidly colored hair and even more stupidly colored clothing- looked like a fucking joke, there was every chance the fight would be over before it started.

  “All right, fine. Okay. If it’ll get you the fuck out of my offices.” Toon threw her hands up in the air and the screens returned to overviews for the asteroid ships. “Look. Each of those fucking things is about fifty miles big. And they're hollow. That’s enormous. Like, literally, the biggest things any one of us have ever seen. There’s no telling what kind of weapons they’ve got on board, and given the fact that inside each one of those big bitches is one of those weird guys that can float through space, it’s probably a bad idea for me to even be peeking at 'em. You wanna run over there, try to get inside? Don't fucking bother. Assuming we get through what looks like phase III or IV gravnetic shields, which I fucking doubt we could do no matter what we got, there's still the space-twats. Star Specter dropped all his knowledge on these yahoos, Winker. All of it. By all accounts, he filled their microscopic brains with shit we can’t even imagine, and because this fucking solar system had zero Trinity presence for the last five thousand years, that means zero accountability for their activities. They could have nanotech bombs or … who knows what. We handle this wrong, we're all dead. Which is why Marker's running point and not one of those shiny foreheaded dinks. If it was up to Relict, we'd all be dead by now."

  Winker pursed his lips thoughtfully. “Well that makes me feel loads better."

  "You asked. I answered." Toon showed the palms of her hands to her unwanted visitor. "Is that it? Can I go back to work now, or y'need your hand held a little longer?"

  Winker ignored the jibe. He was a guest and besides, he liked being alive. "Now you mention it, it looks like they're not even in attack formation. They're way too far away and once the enemy shows up, they won't be getting through."

  Toon shrugged. “Latelians are fucking weird, man. Got no clue why they aren’t killing us all. I know that’s what we’re all about. Maybe they're like Army commanders. Maybe they'll just sit the fuck back, drink some beers, watch their troops die. Now. Can you kindly fuck off? I’ve got shit to do. Why don’t you go hang out with Tanker?”

  “Tanker can go fuck himself sideways. Asshole.” Winker blipped out of the room, quick and quiet as a light being turned off.

  “I can feel you out there.” Toon dug into the feeds beaming out from the asteroid ships. The whole system was lousy with comm-traffic, just one big ball of noisy chatter beamed from one end of the solar system to the other, over and over and without stop, but out here, next to the Storm, most of that was phased out, leaving just the stuff from the ships. “And I’m going to find you.”

  ***

  "Now, listen up, you people. We don't got time to do this more than once and I sure as motherpuss don't plan on spitting these words out a second time." Foursie Ergot stamped his foot down once, channeling a bit of Harmony into the effort. The sound wave traveled through the assembled horde of Goddies and silenced their gossiping; all across Hospitalis, dozens of Foursies were going through the same steps, and Ergot wasn't lying.

  They didn't have time. The Trinity Army was already assembled at the far side of The Storm, preparing themselves for their arrival. They’d be laying down radar and scanner-invisible mines and deadly tripwire mines throughout the volume of space surrounding where they were deployed. They’d be hiding small but deadly space craft wherever they could, using the violence of The Storm as camouflage.

  In short, they’d be walking into a lethal trap. The only reason their side of The Storm remained free of surprises was because the Horsemen were out there in force. As ready as the Trinity Army was, they were definitely not willing to risk vicious Fenris or sly Lokken.

  When he was certain everyone was listening, Ergot started talking, using a combination of standard English and modified batlang to enrich what he was saying for their benefit. Wherever necessary, he further boosted the demonstration with Harmonically stored memories.

  "Some of you may have heard whispers that The Engineer's old company, UMDT, has been working on new gear for all of us. May have heard that our good buddy Ute was cranking out stuff for us." Ergot yanked the first of their brand-new prizes out of a container and held it up for all to see.

  "Battle prote, right? Standard, right? WRONG. Enhanced. New breakthroughs in flexible duronium. Clap it on," Ergot did just that, flexed his arm with heavy exaggeration, and kept on talking, flooding Harmony with a much more detailed breakdown of what these new protes could do, but saving the best for a visual display, "boot up the avatars, and jump right into combat. Someone gets too close with blaster fire, raise your arm like so."

  The entire crowd of Goddies hooted
and stomped their feet as a full-sized blast shield forged from flexible duronium spun out from the sides of the new battle prote, nice and slick as a fresh Onesie popping out the chamber.

  "Pretty great, right? Perfect for up close and personal deadly melee, which we all know is going to be rough with some of these Heavy freaks, or like I said, when you don't feel like being blasted down until the only thing remaining is your ugly-ass boots. Now, these bitches are only in the early stages. No reliable data on durability. Might work all the time, might work only once or twice, might not at all. Still. You're gonna use it. You're gonna make it work. And if you die, or it fails or whatever, we’ll rip the data from your prote for MK II, so, you got that goin’ for you. Ain't new gadget testing fun?" Ergot dropped the prote back into the box with a dramatic clatter and smiled at his brothers and sisters.

  "I can feel some of you wondering about breaching their black hole shields, and I'm here to tell you, quit yer worrying!” Ergot fished an ungainly looking spear-type weapon forged from black metals, save the tip, which was, as always, bright and shining duronium. Connected to the base of the spear was an even heavier-looking battery pack. "The nerds working at UMDT call this bad boy a Gravity Lance. Not for use by normal people. Not for use by anyone under a fully functional Three. For preference, you leave it to the big boys like myself. Power in these things make your legs melt right off. It is an ugly bitch and I'm telling you right now this thing wouldn't know what balance is, even if you burned the definition into it's side!" The crowd laughed derisively. They all knew the score. If all they had was a Onesie kicking around, they’d launch that Onesie at the enemy with a burning Gravity Lance in his or her hand and that would bloody well be that.

  "Lance works exactly like I'm showing you in Harmony. Concentrated ultra-dense gravity spike, projected from the duronium tip. Equivalent to three times standard generated shield. Best bet, keep your Harmony up the whole time. Nerds believe there’ll be significant blowback, either from the Lance itself, or from when the enemy ship's black engines go offline. Think party balloons going boom. Except when these go boom, you might find yourself three or four light years away from where you started with your head ringing like a bell. Talk to your Legion leaders for who is cleared to carry one. So hurray for you idjits that qualify for testing these here fuckers out. Ain't life grand? Next up!"