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

by Lee Bond

  Shummy made to deflect the question a third time when suddenly, something clicked inside him. This oddly colored woman was extremely interested in hearing what he had to say, so much so that she’d all but forgotten about trying to find different ways of removing his limbs from his body. He thought about the letter in his pocket, and about the things they’d all been specifically told to not talk about.

  Most importantly, they weren’t supposed to talk about Antal, the Galaxyship, or the fact that they were waiting to have a fight that would end the Universe. Mostly because you sounded like a fucking lunatic when you started talking about this kind of stuff, and also because people who got paid to think a lot harder than God soldiers were of the opinion that no one else would believe them.

  Shummy had a feeling in his guts that said Toon, with her rubber brain and stretchy body, might just be open to the real truth. “We don’t got a lot of time, and if you see any of my buddies coming this way, you got to let me go and pretend you’re captured, because if not, they’ll prolly kill you and … they’ll tease me for the next thousand years.”

  “You’re more concerned about being teased than my death.” Toon delivered this line as flat as she could.

  “Well, yeah. You’d be dead. You won’t have feelings or nothing anymore, so it’s not like I’d worry.” Shumanski wiggled a bit underneath his giant rubber prison. Now that he was on the floor, he was actually quite comfy. “Okay, so, here’s the thing. What I’m about to tell you isn’t something you’re supposed to know, but you strike me as someone who can handle it.”

  “Get on with it already, you big lummox.”

  Shumanski took a breath and started talking. Hopefully by the time he was done, she’d be on their side and they could go and do other things. “We, the God soldiers, are destined to fight in the War to End All Wars. Our enemy is a monstrous being who’s been alive for more than thirty thousand years. His goal is to destroy…”

  ***

  Ergot sucked on a tooth as he roamed silently through the cavernous corridors of the Galyssian craft, half a mind on the efforts of the Goddies aboard, the other half on the upcoming double-threat that was waiting for him; he was more or less proud of the showing here today, with the ‘worst of the worst’ Heavies that the system had to offer, though he was personally of the conviction that the relatively easy victories had more to do with the fact that they were all bound up in Harmony. The Heavies aboard this ship weren’t pushovers. They had long and storied careers across The Cordon.

  Ergot knew this because they were still alive. Successful Heavies didn’t die cross-Cordon. They came home and were too weird for the people around them, so they clustered and congregated amongst their own kind.

  No, no, their victories today –even with the regrettable detonation of a few ships and the loss of all those lives- had everything to do with Harmony and that was that. Harmony made you stronger, it made you faster, it put you in touch with a wellspring from which you could pull the memories and experiences of your brothers and sisters, no matter where they were in the solar system and that was how they’d won.

  The Rittu-wearing idiot, for example. If Candall hadn’t been able to resurrect the memories of long-fallen Goddies for Durn to sample, they’d all be in a lot worse trouble than said Rittu-wearing idiot was even aware.

  “Thank Pete the guy takes it off sometimes.” Ergot rolled his shoulders as he walked around a corner. “This whole fucking boat would be full of little teeny tiny Rittu babies, all looking for hosts.”

  “The fuck are you talking about?” Someone’s voice whispered thinly through the slow-moving air of this obviously rarely used corridor; there was dust everywhere, and someone hadn’t been interested enough to disguise his tracks.

  Ergot bounced a few simple seeker avatars down the hall and back. Technically, he supposed it was just him sending his brain or whatever down there to take a peek, but he –most Goddies were in the same boat- felt way more comfortable adhering to the whole ‘avatar’ thing. “Your friend in the camouflage hood and cowl. It’s a symbiotic Offworld alien from a species called the Rittu.” The Foursie crouched down and doodled in the dust with a finger. The Heavy at the end of the corridor was a rough sonofabitch, which meant that taking him down safely and easily would not only be difficult, it might not even be possible.

  “Never heard of them.”

  Faint footsteps reached Ergot’s senses. If he weren’t a Goddie, the sound wouldn’t even be observable. He moved further in to the corridor, mindful that he was almost certainly walking into a trap, though not the kind that’d befallen some of his brothers. This area of the ship was too old and not traveled enough to carry spears in the walls, acid in the ceiling, or a floor that’d fall away into a vat full of genetically modified sharks.

  “Not surprised.” Ergot commented, sniffing the air. There was a second, thin scent in the air. As expected. There was someone else down there, someone not saying anything, someone dangerous. The Foursie grinned toothily. “We personally stomped them flat at least five times, if the memories are correct. They’re a persistent race. We never found out if they evolved naturally or if they were one of the many experiments that went wrong. Tenacious as hell, though. They gift the wearer with … well, I’m sure you’ve seen what your friend can do when he gets worked up.”

  “Iago.” Someone supplied casually. “And if you guys go up against him, you’re going to regret it. You might be immune to damn near everything we can throw at you, but he’s on a whole other level.”

  Ergot bounced through Harmony, took a peek through Durn’s eyes, and came back in less than the flutter of a heartbeat. “In point of fact, he’s currently negotiating his release from the side of a wall, where two of my men have got him pinned like a camouflaged butterfly. He’s also being schooled on the gravity of his Rittu-problem, and how best to deal with it.”

  “Not possible.” Someone shouted back. Footsteps were no longer faint, but insistent, indicating someone was running away from him once more. “You would’ve had to kill him.”

  Ergot picked up speed, just the tiniest little bit. He was in no hurry to meet the man with the faintly floral odor; this whole thing bore the hallmarks of a trap, absolutely, but whoever the second man was, he was someone serious.

  “We’re actually trying to kill as few of you guys as possible!” Ergot shouted after the man he’d been chasing for the last ten minutes. The Goddie stifled a yawn. He hated these kinds of affairs.

  Ergot sent out a more solid pulse of Harmony-driven avatars, this time intentionally allowing the energy to spill out into the more observable frequencies so that whoever the other guy was would know just what he was dealing with. It wasn’t the best of tactics, especially if the unseen opponent possessed something truly impressive, but at the same time, the Foursie wasn’t entirely certain if he cared any longer.

  These were the last two Heavies aboard the ship, and while Shumanski was perhaps getting a little too friendly with the woman who’d only just released him from a very comical prison, everything was well under control and in order.

  If it came down to it, the Universe wouldn’t miss a few Heavies. There were more on the other side of Huey’s Shield.

  “And why would that be?” Marker demanded just as he jabbed an illegal-to-even-know-it-existed Vampire Blade at the Goddies face; the blade, underlit with a sickly red glow, throbbed and pulsed in excitement as it sensed a true smorgasbord of life essence.

  Ergot didn’t waste time. Didn’t need to. Combat readiness for a level Four God soldier was a thing of legend. Reaction time was … if not automatic, so close to it that it was nearly unmeasurable. So, as the unnamed –and presumed Commander of the Heavies, if the outfit he wore was any indicator of status- Heavy arced upwards with his vicious blade, Ergot’s hands seemed to sprout standard issue solid duronium knives, complete with wicked hooks at the tips as kind of an … argument stopper. The unwholesome looking red-lit sword skittered and screeched against the duronium
blades, showering the smaller Heavy with sparks.

  Marker stepped backwards swiftly, dragging his blade downward and against the knives in his enemy’s hands, gritting his teeth against the sharply shrieking metal on metal clamor that echoed through the tight corridor.

  Those blades were tough! Marker stepped back another step or two, feeling Zipper dancing around nervously about ten feet behind him; they were –more or less- holding the deadly Heavy in reserve against the moment it developed that he was incapable of dealing with this God soldier on even terms. It wasn’t likely. The Goddies were tough, but Marker had been through hell and back collecting more than a single instance of illicit Cordon-tech.

  He was a rarity in the world of Heavy Elitism, and this Goddie was going to learn his lessons.

  Ergot nodded once, in recognition of an honest foe, ever-mindful of the man in the back; now the fight was properly joined, the someone he’d been chasing was no longer interested in hiding, and was plainly waiting for his moment in the sun to shine. As he brought more of his essence online in anticipation of a difficult fight, the Foursie nevertheless dispatched an avatar or two to see if there was anything they could pry loose from the Heavy’s cybernetic systems.

  The Foursie spun his knives around in his hands, purely for show. “Better things to do, Heavy. More important things to do.” Avatar pings from the man in back revealed nothing of interest, so they bounced on over to the burly, broad-chested and wide shouldered Commander of the Heavies.

  Ergot appreciated the man. Even if many outsiders found that kind of sentiment weird –especially since they were both trying to gut each other in the most dramatic way possible- you simply had to appreciate a worthy foe; merely by looking at the Heavy was to give you a sense of all that he’d been through in his time across The Cordon, and from the looks of things, the man had been through more than his fair share.

  Marker snorted. The Vampire Blade in his hands –wrested from the cold, clammy grip of the last Vetala ever to gaze upon the darkly lit skies of the blackened crater of a world called Sunless- growled and demanded blood. It’d been … cured … of it’s need to feed every time it was unsheathed, but when confronted with such a smorgasbord, Marker held concerns that it might not go back willingly.

  The Heavy adopted a battle stance more appropriate to fighting someone who had five feet and somewhere in the neighborhood of a thousand pounds on you. “What could be more important than all this?”

  Ergot considered throwing one of his knives at the man in back. It’d be out of his hand and into the guy’s chest before anyone knew what was happening and would honestly be so much more relieving. Having to keep an eye on the guy when his boss who –according to those dilly-dallying avatars who were flat-out being lazy- was sporting a collusion of Cordon-tech was just a giant pain in the ass.

  His opponent started swinging that deadly sword around again, forcing Ergot to deflect the hungry-edged monstrosity with his own ancient weapons a second time; unlike the last sweep -destined to cleave his skull in twain- came sideways, so as the Foursie neatly slid his blade against the red-rimmed edge coming sweeping towards his guts, Ergot stepped backward about a foot, intentionally kicking up a fine cloud of thick dust.

  Marker growled in frustration as the Vampire Blade crashed into and through the bulkhead on the Goddie's right, digging a deep furrow exposing thick cables and wires that'd also been sheared. Sparks, smoke and fire started guttering from the jagged rip. Combined with the cheap-ass dust attack, the Heavy found himself spluttering backwards, grit in his eyes and foul burnt plastic fumes crawling down his throat.

  "Would you fucking step up and do something for once, you fucking fuck?" Marker stepped back another three feet as the Goddie pressed the sudden advantage. "I mean, really."

  Zipper danced back and forth on the balls of his feet, nerves turning him into what could only be described as an Autonomous Sweat Factory. He'd never sweat so much or so furiously in his entire life. "I can't! I can't get a clear shot and there's no fucking way I'm gonna risk hitting you."

  "Fuck my life." Marker stepped left to avoid a savage downhanded sweep from the one glittering blade, ducked down so low his knees swept the ground to avoid having the tip of the second blade from being drilled into the side of his head, then scooted forward so he wound up inside the unbelievably swift Goddie's perimeter.

  Eyes widening in surprise at the Heavy's speed, Ergot had no choice but to step forward as well, using his broad body to bounce his foe backwards. Advancing against the enemy also guaranteed an injury from the deadly weapon, but the difference lay in the severity.

  The Heavy was intent on disemboweling him, and Ergot didn't like the thought of that, so ... brutal sweep against the arm.

  Marker howled with savage fury as the Vampire Blade slammed into the Goddie's upper forearm hard enough to lop the fucking thing right off, only instead of being greeted with a severely injured enemy combatant, all Marker got for his trouble was the smell of charred meat mingled with singed fabric and an equally ferocious bellow from the Goddie.

  Enhanced cybernetic systems detected an increase in speed and agility from the enemy, and as wide eyes caught sight of a gleaming metal undercoat -which explained why the lumbering behemoth wasn't limbless- that shone so brightly in the dimly lit corridor, Marker's own systems sped up.

  "Ouch." Ergot paused to consider the extent of the damage to his flesh, allowing the avatars that ran most of his systems -again, merely a fallacy, but a functional one- free range to combat the Heavy; a solid strip of flesh, roughly three feet in diameter, had been completely scorched free to reveal the duronium chainlink armor that kept all the important bits where they needed to be. He demanded data on the vicious weapon from any and all sources available, settling in for the long wait, letting his body do it's thing.

  Something was wrong with the blade. Marker had had the Vampiric weapon for nearly fifteen years and had learned, through patient -and sometimes bloody- trial and error precisely what each of the different sounds chuckling out of the seemingly possessed sword meant.

  The weird warbling chortle issuing from the thick pommel right that second wasn't one he'd ever heard before, but it was definitely one he understood right away.

  Distress. The Vetala was in distress!

  Without taking eyes off the Goddie -who inexplicably seemed to be paying very little attention to what was actually going on, even as his body became a whirling dervish of blades and kicks- Marker shouted at Zipper one last time.

  "I don't give two goddamn shits in the fucking inky black one way or the fucking other if you can't get a clear shot. This mother- ahh, fucking hell that stings- fucker is a literal fucking slab of ... motherfucker! Hit him now or I'll fucking Mark you right now, you asshole!"

  Marker wasn't a pretentious person, so this time, as he escaped yet another cyclonic sweep of blades -he now had two deep, aching and ragged gashes, one on his left forearm and the other a stinging lash from collarbone to collarbone- it was without grace or skill. He flat out booted the Goddie in the balls and ran backwards as fast as he could go, relying on those same cybernetics that were allowing him to keep up with his enemy.

  Long accustomed to being present when Zipper powered up, Marker counted down from three, then dropped to the ground at the very last second. There was a barely palpable pop, a very noticeable depression of something flinging through the air, a kind of invisible-yet-trackable projectile, and suddenly, Zipper's attack slammed into the Goddie.

  Goddie Ergot, a Foursie with nearly four thousand, eight hundred years of life, looked on, nonplussed, as dozens of seams popped open across his considerable frame. Rivulets of blood started streaming beneath his one good clean uniform. "I only just had this thing dry-cleaned."

  "Are you kidding me right now?" Marker demanded even as Zipper started generating a second attack. It wouldn't be as efficient as the first one, not so soon, but they needed to take advantage of the situation, no matter that the Goddie appeared more
upset over the bloody uniform than the actual wounds incised into his very flesh.

  Ergot trained his attention wholly on the man in the back, dispatching only a few cycles of thought on his primary foe; the ragged, bloody gouges he'd received for getting too close were keeping the Heavy preoccupied for the time being, so there wasn’t too much worry from those quarters.

  Crouched on the ground near the man with the weird skin-splitting talent, the presumed leader of these Heavies looked … irritated. He'd never encountered anyone who could split a person's skin open before, and avatars running through the wound effects were declaring the blow a kind of atmospheric discharge that exposed skin to a shearing effect.

  Atmospheric effects were easily dealt with. Now that he knew what to look for, it was ... yes. Harmony burned through him, just in case what he was planning on actually failed to work and he needed to heal himself on the quick. A HUD-countdown flicked down and Ergot prepped himself. It'd take split second...

  The blow erupted from the man called Zipper's central core and flashed across the distance between them, a mostly invisible roiling of air pressure. Moving quickly, Ergot popped his prote-shield out and braced himself for impact.

  "About fucking time." Marker ground the words out the moment he felt Zipper's blow brushed past him; without wasting anymore time or effort, the Heavy quickly grabbed hold of the power that he held nestled deep within him at all times and gestured in that old familiar way, that way that took that energy and transformed it into whatever he willed.

  In this case, he willed death. Pure and simple, without garnish or flourish. They needed this monstrosity calling himself a Goddie dead and burning so they could move on to the others, to free the Trinity forces from captivity.

  Alarm bells trilled through Ergot's mind, automatic sensors that continually swept the surroundings for all signs of trouble detecting an attack that had to be directly related to the odd gestures the Heavy on the ground had done at precisely the same time as Zipper's deadly atmospheric attack.