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

by Lee Bond

  Innit shook his head, laughed wordlessly. He was blind now, from the pain, the optic nerves fried right out of his skull. “No. They’re good, Ute, but … not that good. They knew only that someone was coming this way. Someone connected directly to Garth. They must’ve sensed you through him somehow. I don’t know. So they sent me here, to intercept this mystery person. So I could … so I could lie to them. Trick them. Tell them that Nickels was where they are. So … so they could trap that person, make him come to them. A … a … great plan. I’ve never known Nickels to turn down saving a comrade.”

  Ute thought about all the times Garth had risked his life to personally save those around him. The man was as reckless as a Onesie but as powerful as … the Fivesie didn't know how powerful Garth was any longer. Perhaps he was the most powerful being in the Universe. There was no way to know for certain.

  Either way, Innit's assessment of Garth's knight in shining armor attitude was right on the money. "He'll come running the moment he finds out. But how will he find out?"

  Innit shrugged, felt parts of him die inside, effectively murdered by the power coursing through him. That soft, gentle, oh so insidious and sinuous curling through him, caressing his soul … it was almost time. He'd give them what they wanted, just not in the manner they expected.

  "I have no idea." Innit could scarcely bring his voice above a whisper now. The crystal was seizing control of him. If he didn't say what needed to be said, they'd say it. "They want him, Ute. Want him bad. More than anything."

  "Who?" Ute pressed, not incorrectly sensing that his old friend's time was almost up.

  "The … they want him dead. I don't … I don’t know. You've got to … got to go …"

  Ute stood there, wordlessly, as blue flames so bright they forced his cybernetic corneas to adjust all the way to maximum occlusion to keep from going blind spilled outward from the shining stone set into Innit's chest. The cyan flames wreathed his friend, a deadly shroud that somehow didn't burn anything other than poor Innit.

  "Where?" He shouted to be heard above Innit's pain-wracked moans. "Where do I need to go?"

  "9-Nova-12, you fool." The words, the tone … everything issuing forth from Innit's mouth wasn't from Innit himself, but whoever sat on the other end of the stone. "Come here, to 9-Nova-12. Bring the Great Enemy to our doorstep. If you don't, we'll destroy this world, all worlds, until he does. Come, mighty warrior, come and see what waits for you."

  Ute ignored the taunting, sing-song provocation, focusing instead on the threat. "You wouldn't dare."

  It was chilling, watching Innit's face, wracked in pain so great he ground his teeth until they cracked, suddenly laugh, full of bemusement. "We are the great AfroEgyptian race, Latelian. We have waited millennia for this moment and nothing will keep us from our goal. We will do whatever we want. The great and powerful Trinity will stand by, soldier, will stand by and let us do as we please, because It knows what we will do. So come, come and see. Save the people of 9-Nova-12. Be all you can be, soldier."

  The flames suddenly erupted further and brighter than Ute could have ever imagined, transforming Innit into a burning pyre that burst upwards into the metal ceiling above their heads, a gyrating, flame-wrought funnel that finally began to leave a mark; wherever the top of the eruption touched, metal plates first warped, then cracked, or melted, or simply split into useless strips. Ute's eyes flipped through half a dozen various filters until he found one that allowed him to gaze on, helpless, as Kaptan Innit's flesh crisped into fragile flakes that drifted listlessly down to the ground, revealing the silver-shiny solid duronium skeleton and ragged bits of leftover chainlink undercoat.

  One burst … then another … tremendous gouts of unfathomable energy erupted upwards, then … then one final one that ripped all the remaining metal plates from the ceiling and sent them clattering everywhere, creating chaos in all directions.

  Suddenly, silence.

  Ute worked his jaw until his ears popped, surprised at the sheer volume behind the brutally efficient display of power. He looked around the room, critically assessing the damage done to the surroundings before laying his eyes on poor Kaptan Innit.

  The old warrior wasn't good. Most of his skin was gone now, with only his face thankfully spared such savagery. From the looks of things, his internal organs, still surrounded by the duronium undercoat, appeared to be in good order … it was just that the spark that defined Innit was so very faint, a thin, thready tendril destined to die before too much longer.

  And in the center of his chest, still glowing -though not nearly as brightly- was the crystal that'd started it all. Still there, still alive, still controlling Innit.

  "I will find you." Ute whispered into the translucent stone, seeing his own, angry reflection in the facets. He couldn't remember a time he'd been this angry, this full of vengeance. It felt good. "I will find you, Novinian, and I will make you suffer. You do not treat my friends this way. So prepare. Make yourselves ready. Ute Tizhen comes for you."

  Innit shifted, more a faint tremble than actual movement. "They don't like you already, old man. I can feel them, mildly shitting themselves. They don't … they've never seen anything like you. Whatever … whatever happened to you?"

  "Too long a story to tell." Ute said with finality. He didn't want to waste the last few moments of Innit's life telling a tale that would certainly trickle into the ears of the enemy. "You rest."

  "No." Innit's voice -though a whisper- was laced with iron. "No. There's … I prepped … prepped a ship in the event I needed to … fall back to a more tenable position. It’s yours. The Unmentionable Secret." He chuckled at the name. "It's … it's outfitted with black hole engines and the highest caliber AI I could get my hands on. It's already programmed for the most efficient route to 9-Nova-12. Go."

  "No." Ute replied defiantly, shaking his head. "No. I'll stay here, with you. Until … until you pass."

  Innit laughed again, dry as dust. He flickered his sightless eyes towards the ceiling. "No. The damage done here … it will have alerted someone. They're probably coming this way as we speak. You need to go. Besides…"

  "Don't say it!" Ute, moving towards the door, shook his head. "Please."

  "Besides," Innit ground the word out, fighting against the pain, "besides, I deserve this, and I've been down this road before. It's all I deserve. From now until the end, Kaptan Innit deserves to die alone, as all traitors do."

  Ute bowed his head, pressed it against the cool metal door. Tears fell down his cheeks and he wanted nothing more than to turn and offer his old friend hope, but the bastard was right.

  There was no time. No time at all.

  "9-Nova-12." Ute pushed through the door. "You and yours will burn. I will Stack your corpses high as the sun, and I will leave you as warning to the rest of your ilk. I swear it."

  Behind him, Innit's secondary heart pulsed one final time, then turned into dust, dust that fell through the ex-Goddie's cybernetic frame to pool gently beneath the reinforced chair.

  Ignorance Might Be Bliss, But Bliss Ain’t Ignorant (ADD SIDINDRA!!)

  Miss Bliss moved gently, quietly, through the fields of Harmony, flicking through and across the millions and millions of light-points that surrounded her on all sides; these motes of light settling against the glorious wash of Harmonic color were the men and women that comprised the body that was known as the God Army. She loved those lights, the endlessly refracting points that splintered off, each one part of a story that made up a life that could be as short as fifty years and as long as four thousand.

  Miss Bliss loved her stories, oh yes she did, and she had poor, long lost Chad Sikkmund, him of the many voices and the even greater sorrow, to thank for it, and so as she floated, she thought for a time about the man she'd grown up with and embraced the tugging she felt in a bosom she'd never owned in the real world. She missed the FrancoBritish assassin, missed the madness in him, wished there'd been time enough to find him -if he still lived- and thank him for
making her into the woman she was today.

  But there wasn't enough time. At least, not for her.

  Her eyes fell on a spark that was different than the rest and here, Miss Bliss did more than linger, she focused all of her concentration, to watch, to see and to hope that the thing there began to grow as it must, if the Engineer's plans were to come to fruition. This spark glittered blue, but it was soft, and spread out, where the pinpricks that were the Goddies were hard points of light, difficult to miss.

  "This is a mistake."

  Bliss moved off to one side, allowing Saint Candall of the Many Faces settle in beside her. She nodded at the diaphanous, loose accumulation of energy. "I don't think so, Candall, not at all. His story is perhaps the most important of all."

  Candall threw a hand out. "He hasn't gotten his shit together, not even a bit. There's no point to all this. He's going to fade, and then your sacrifice will be in vain. What if, when you bring yourself to him, he fails to grasp? Then you'll be gone as well."

  Bliss shrugged. "I don't think so, Candall. I don't think so, not at all. He was chosen by the Engineer himself. He's got to be more tenacious than that. He's been through so much. I can't imagine he'd die so easily. Besides ..."

  Saint Candall quirked an eyebrow. "What besides could there be?"

  Bliss quirked a smile at Candall. Not necessarily hidebound, but the reborn spirit was refusing to see the forest for the trees. "Besides, I'm not the only one doing things they shouldn't be."

  Candall had enough humanity left in him to blush awkwardly at the sideways accusation of wrongdoing. "It's important. She's important."

  "I'm not arguing the point, dear friend, just pointing out what's what." Bliss watched on in silence for a moment as Huey's barely-there essence tipped and tapped it's way through a few awkward steps, much like a new-born deer. "And unlike myself, this is something you've never really done, is quite out of character, and is a tremendous risk. Fenris and the others are abiding by the terms of your, hrm, contract, but barely. If ... when ... they notice that Sidra has vanished from their radar, they are not going to be pleased. They'll pull Hospitalis apart looking for her."

  Candall snorted derisively. The Horsemen were a part of Harmony, yes, there was no getting around that, but where they merely skimmed the surface, he dove to the very depths. They could look for days and they'd find nothing but the traces. "By the time they realize that, she'll be long gone."

  "That is a risk beyond all comprehension." Bliss clapped her hands delightedly as Huey's nascent essence flexed momentarily, a spontaneous reaction to some unseen threat. Not completely unaware of his surroundings, then. "And when that happens, they will definitely pull the solar system to pieces. You take risks you can't afford, Candall. You are important."

  "The two of them are infinitely more important than one broken hearted gay man could ever hope to be, Bliss. What Sidra and Indra are becoming ... it defies description. I cannot help but think that the Universe wouldn't allow the genesis of something like the two of them without some kind of purpose."

  "Again, not arguing your decision to do what you're doing, dear Candall, just that this is definitely a pot calling kettle black situation." Bliss extended a few more bits of essence to test Huey's resolve.

  Candall shook his head. He’d known Huey in life, and felt sort of bad he was urging Bliss to let the disembodied AI dissipate into nothingness, especially since he fully understood what it was that Garth planned on doing, but … he just couldn’t see the blobby bits of barely connected sentience currently floating before them as being worth the effort. Especially if it meant the end of Bliss, who’d so ably picked up the fallen artificial intelligence’s mantle. The amount of help she’d provided to the people of Latelyspace in the last few months was superlative, and, if you asked him, better than what Huey himself had ever managed.

  The dual Saint acknowledged that he might be somewhat biased, given the fact that the two of them had been reborn in the same instance, but that was genuinely beside the point.

  “There was nothing in the Engineer’s designs to allow for this kind of transformation, Bliss.” Candall pointed this fact out after a moment’s contemplation.

  “There was definitely nothing in the physical construction of an AI sphere to assist with what I’ve become either, Candall.” Bliss said gently enough, understanding where the man was coming from; after having lost the love of his life, after undergoing a rapid spiritual transformation into something else and after becoming aware that the little girl-AI he’d traveled with had experienced that same rebirth, he was just as reluctant to lose her as he had his lover. It was who Candall was, beneath the gruff exterior he’d worn every day for his entire life. “He’ll do fine. Besides…”

  “Besides?” Candall demanded, watching on as the foggy essence that was supposed to be Huey floated on by, some small portions of the intellect congregating in the same place at the same time. Tiny connections sprouted between the two portions, little … nerve endings that looked more like shoestrings than bits of brain, rubbing against each other, almost as if they were testing the waters.

  “What ‘besides’ can there possibly be? Huey was the first level 11 AI in all of existence. If he hasn’t repopulated himself by now, he never will. If anything, we should’ve figured out some way of getting him off Orion without the Tunnel being the wiser. Let’s leave this place, Bliss. Fenris and the others are hunting me more actively than ever. If they come across you, ‘lurking’ in their precious Harmonyspace, they could very well dismantle the entire thing. I can see that happening.”

  Bliss smiled at Candall’s concerns. They were valid. They weren’t her concerns, though, and that was that. “Besides, Candall, Huey is slated to become conscious overseer over an actual infinity of dimensions, all connected through a central hub of sorts. How in the world could you ever imagine something … someone … physical, corporeal, connected to actual meat, being even remotely able to handle that kind of raw data? The stream of information … no one in this Universe can even calculate the bits per second. It’d be in the quadrillions of petaflops or more, all the time, every second, for eternity. Incorporeal, intangible, ambient. It’s the only way.”

  “If he rises, though, you fall.” Candall grunted crankily. “And that’s the part I don’t like. The matrix woven around you during my transubstantiation, it’s unique. The collective, empty spheres inside Hungryfish allowed for you to hold on to yourself, to skip across from the complex collection of synthetic diamond fiber optic wiring and the ex-dee chip into Harmonic space. It took you time, but you wove yourself anew. Huey … it’s not possible. The destructive force of the Q-Cannon shredded his essence.”

  “It’s a matter of size, Candall, not of method, and in this case, there are similarities between our rebirths that can’t be overlooked.” Bliss extended a gentle, tender probe to caress the edges of Huey’s incomplete matrix. The febrile essence trembled slightly under the touch, but at the same time, ‘stole’ a few patches of code from her being and immediately incorporated them into the mix. Almost immediately, the thinnest patches of the foggy-like expression of Huey the AI thickened, grew pregnant, like clouds before a heavy storm. “My awakening took some time, weeks, in fact, and I only had a few AI spheres in my presence. He had hundreds and hundreds. Possibly even thousands. It’ll take even more time to recompile all that he was, all that he knew.”

  “Too long. Whatever he is will fall apart before he manages it.”

  “On his own, yes.” Bliss brushed against that which was destined to become Huey a second time, felt the microscopic essence shiver then grow firm, as if protecting itself from an attack. Drastically inefficient antiviral codes sprung into being along the edges of the inchoate substance, reflected in the visible matrix as soldiers, bearing spears and shields. Bliss smiled at Candall, who turned up his nose at the simplistic efforts. Carefully, she released some equally pathetic intrusion snippets, each of them bearing crude versions of the software she’d e
ventually used to cement her existence in this strange new place. When they attacked, Huey’s antiviral soldiers would be successful, and the Trojan software would be decompiled.

  If there was anything of the original Huey inside, he’d take the prize and begin working on upgrades.

  Bliss knew it’d be difficult. Downright impossible, in fact, given the enormity of the project and the sheer volume of information and data that needed to be strung back together.

  Which was why it was necessary for her to sacrifice bits and pieces of herself every step of the way. By the end of things, Huey would be a fully conscious entity, a digital, virtual God waiting for his place in a new Heaven, and she would be nothing more than a barely conscious scrap of code floating in an empty void.

  Candall watched as Huey’s core fought against Bliss’ viral assault, a troubled look on his face, fingers twitching at his sides. He wanted so very much to blast this troubling nugget of displaced intellect into atoms, ached to bring an end to Huey now, before he became not just aware of his surroundings, but self-aware again, but knew that if he did so, Bliss would turn violent. All the madness, all the psychotic tendencies that’d been drilled into her during her time with Chadsik al-Taryin were still there, just … buried under this guise of friendly assistant. The AI ghost spent all her time bringing aid and succor to the people of Latelyspace, assisting them in the hollow moments of their lives, and that … that kept the homicidal child-AI at bay.

  He in no way wanted to risk a resurgence of that Bliss. Not at all.

  “You’d best move along, Candall, if you want to continue evading the Brothers Grim.” Bliss pointed to a deeper portion of Harmony; there, in the distance, handfuls of Goddie-sparks bore a darker sheen, indicative of one of the Horsemen moving slowly through the neural ‘LINK local Goddies maintained while they were active. If whichever Horseman it was –Bliss thought it might be Lokken, the most efficient hunter amongst the dark horses- turned his eye this way, Candall would stand out in very sharp contrast.