Radion’s chimera, Foxy, walked in step with him, throwing a wary eye on Gaffon’s chimera, Trepidos, walking in step with Gaffon, and returning the charm. Foxy looked like its master; it was thick bodied, heavily muscled, hairless, a mismatch of colors, its tail a snapping robot viper, its paws with talons that would rip your face off with just the lightest of brush strokes, the middle of its body armored with the thorax of some metal-insect. Foxy could live on grass or sand, or dung, in keeping the insect genes; the insect was from a planet where the adults were as large as some spaceships, and ridden like dragons. Foxy’s name was meant to be ironic; the animal looked dumber than paint. Still, Gaffon would not have been keen to put that theory to the test.
Her own chimera, Trepidos, had humanoid genes mixed with her. She was incredibly beguiling to beast and humanoid alike, sporting a sleek, feline figure. These kinds of chameleons were the exceptions, and only the Gaffons on each world and on each ship had one. They were impassible. No humanoid could get beyond them whenever their master was asleep, when they excreted pheromones so powerful that sex with them was inevitable enough. The longer the sex went on, the louder and more boisterous it got, the more animated, and the more the victim sunk into a drug-like stupor from the neurotoxins in the chimera’s saliva and vaginal secretions. The outcome was always the same: either the chimera’s master awoke amid all the noise and killed the attacker, or the chimera killed the assailant. And if someone had approached during sleep that didn’t mean the chimera’s master harm, too damn bad; they should have known better.
“What beguiling treats does the pretty lady have in store for me?” Radion asked.
Gaffon wondered if he truly fancied her in this guise, or if he was being sardonic in light of her last remarks.
“You are well aware that the Tinka Galaxy is at war with the Kang?”
“It’s a nasty rumor, which no one believes, so, of course, everyone believes it. No doubt you started it. If anyone can sink their fangs into every one of our people at once, it’s you.”
“I’m afraid I wasn’t trying to mess with your minds. We must prepare for attack, however unlikely. More specifically, I want to capture one of their dragon ships, retrofit it, upgrade it so it can be turned effectively against all the other dragon ships fool enough to enter our air space, so we can capture some more, enough to build an air force with we can turn on the Kang when the time is right.”
Radion laughed raucously, but most of all, condescendingly. “And you want me because I’m the only one you know who is likely to go more than a few rounds with a Kang drone. Are you going to lie about that too?”
“What would be the point?”
Radion reprised his laughter, but there was no condescension in it this time, just thoughtfulness. He was considering her proposal. “You are Gaffon. We’d never have chosen you to speak for us if you couldn’t plot more than a few steps ahead.”
She sighed. “If you must know, I want to apply lessons learned from the dragon ships to our own dragons.”
Radion took a deep breath. “Those things don’t like coming to the surface. They’re adapted more to their underwater world.”
“Changes will have to be made to them as well.”
“You’re thinking of adapting them so they can make the rogue worlds insurmountable, and free up your budding dragon ship air force to do what they were designed for, patrolling space about their worlds, beyond the planetary atmosphere.”
“Well?”
“It’s a good plan. But you’ll need more than me.”
“And who better than me to recruit the rest of the team most likely to bring down a dragon ship in one piece?”
He laughed. “You mean at all.” His laughter morphed yet again without pausing in between for the beat change. “Very well. How much time you fancy we have to put this team together?”
“None at all.”
His expression grew hard fast, a testament to the mercurial temperaments of her people and their short tempers. “You ask too much.”
“I don’t ask anything beyond what is necessary.” Gaffon pointed to the sky when Radion insisted on ignoring the warnings of their chimera, who had both been snarling and yapping.
He beheld the dragon ship, filling the sky, glowing with its own illumination in the darkness of Gamora.
Their people were already opening fire on it with everything they had, from laser weapons—including laser cannons meant to be fired world to world—to launching nuclear rockets against it. Gamorans were all immune to nuclear radiation to a high degree. After today, they would all have the booster shots needed to protect them against most any kind of fall out, the kind of shot Radion had just received. The mushroom clouds rose over the dragon ship like a forest floor sprouting spores.
The one-directional fire continued, as the Gamorans continued to exhaust their retinue of weapons on the dragon ship. Gaffon’s people were no longer launching the weapons solely from the ground, but from jet fighters and other planes taken to the air.
The eeriest thing of all was that the dragon ship just hovered there, refusing to return fire. Its people were fully exposed by a hull they could never bother to seal, many clinging to the surface of the dragonship awaiting the order to engage. The fact that not a single weapon had so much as forced the lowliest of Kang drones to even break a sweat unnerved Gaffon terribly.
“I’m starting to like these guys,” Radion said, his eyes to the sky. “They’re everything we’re not, disciplined, restrained, efficient. Techa forbid they waste a drop of emotion that might drain their energy and will to fight later, or deplete their own weapons when it just isn’t necessary.”
“Wait till they start tearing through our people like butter. See how long your love fest lasts then.”
“Truth be known, I don’t much care for my kind, or anyone really. I do admire a good fight though. Nice of these bastards to provide us with one, not to mention the chance to test our latest upgrades. Hand to hand combat is so much more gratifying than throwing spitballs at one another through space, don’t you agree?”
“I agree we better get our asses in gear,” Gaffon said, the alarm bell sounding in the rising tone and pitch of her voice, “and find our teammates, before it’s too late.”
“Nonsense. We can let the Kang clear the clutter between us and the warriors we most need for us,” Radion said, his eyes staring admiringly at the Kang and their warbird.
“You’re a real humanitarian, you know that?”
The Kang had received their marching orders, some thought-impulse sent from a Ming that had come to the window on one of the decks of the dragon ship, looking aggravated no technology so far had risen to the challenge of his impeccable mind. And from that same look, it was clear he was going to make the Gamorans pay for greatly disappointing him.
The drones jumped from the ship, from high enough up in the air to shake the ground on their landing, and to shatter the bones of most every other humanoid body in The Collectors’ Menagerie—were any present beside the Tinka.
The Gamorans were hardly waiting for an invitation to mix it up, up close, throwing themselves at the Kang.
The Kang, for their part, couldn’t be bothered to draw their weapons, swatting their attackers away from them like flies with their bare hands.
Gaffon hated to admit it, but Radion was right. It was going to be a hell of a lot easier to spot the needed assets to fill out the ranks of their Special Forces fighters this way. Just look for the last ones standing.
For her part, Gaffon couldn’t help but note the Kang’s modified fighting style. Very possibly the version of Gaffon whose mind the Kang Queen was sucking dry right now had convinced her that the Gamorans, like all Tinka, would be more impressed by the Kang, and more willing to be assimilated, if they respected their adversary as equals, as one and the same on the things that mattered most to them. Bravery. Fairness. Equality. Individualism. Was the Kang queen just being a cunning wench? Kang drone individuals? Surely such a thi
ng was impossible.
Still, Gaffon noted that the drones were willing to let themselves get surrounded, to meet their adversaries on the same terms, fighting one on one. And when several charged the encircled ones at once, they refused to call for reinforcements, or to engage with fighting methods other than the ones utilized by the locals: various forms of martial arts, mixed fighting techniques, boxing, wrestling—whatever their opponents preferred. The drones were able to match combat styles in kind because the Kang Queen had already sucked the intel out of Gaffon’s head and downloaded it to them.
Radion was right about one thing: the Kang were damned efficient in everything they did, be it fighting, or assimilating.
Gaffon was madder than ever. She panned her head to Radion and saw the same look on his face. So, he wasn’t being taken in either. Good. Likely none of the recruits he was considering would be either; they would not be the ones standing around the fights, watching and staring. They’d be the ones still fighting.
“I think I found us our first recruit,” Radion said. His eyes telescoped out of his head, the adaptation of a soldier who couldn’t be bothered to carry field glasses. He was now applying a digital zoom to magnify the image further without distorting it; another advantage of having a mix of silicon and carbon substrates underlying his body. Gaffon could see the jump magnifications on the refractions off his enlarged eyes. He was spying someone far in the distance, up on a hill in a valley of hilltops and surrounding mountain crests both. And, yes, some of her people were fighting on the mountain tops as well.
Radion bounded after his favorite gladiator, giving the best performance, determined to get there in time to save him from the Kang warrior, who might not continue holding back—if he was holding back—as he got closer to death.
Gaffon had no choice but to follow Radion. One thing was certain: their new teammate would need sweet-talking that would take more finesse than Radion could manage. Radion would need her.
ONE HUNDRED TWENTY
ABOARD THE NAUTILUS
The nun gazed at Cronos galloping back and forth on his war horse, anointing the ship with smoke from the thurible in one hand, carrying his flaming crucifix with the other. She shook her head in dismay, but said nothing.
Later, when they crossed paths again, Cronos brought the horse to a halt before her with a squeezing together of his knees. “Why haven’t you removed me from active duty?” Cronos asked. “Isn’t it your job to decide when PTSD is compromising our functioning? You know all the lifeforms aboard this ship and what they’re capable of better than anyone else.”
“So far, your insanity is keeping you alive. If I cure you of it, you will go back to getting killed far too frequently. The truth is, you’re not good enough to be part of Omega Force anymore, not out here, not with what we’re up against. It seems no amount of nanite upgrades can impart to you what you need to carry on. And you don’t have the skill sets needed for Alpha Unit. Truthfully, I don’t know what to do with you. My recommendation is: get madder still. It is vaguely possible that divine madness suits you, if it is divine. If it isn’t, you may well learn to make it so.”
The nurse was headed away from one of the rooms with the bioprinters, which were still spitting out more of her, from what Cronos could see, peeking into the room.
Where was the nun heading off to? She looked all too mission focused for his taste.
***
Cronos noticed, no matter how far out on the Nautilus he got, away from the inner courtyard, he was running out of galloping space in the halls. He had resorted to walking the horse slowly now through aisles of hospital beds adorning the corridors.
Observing the triage bays the Nautilus decks had been turned into for the first time, Cronos approached the nun. “What the hell?” he asked. His flaming crucifix lay on the floor by his side. His war horse, standing behind him, rested its head on Cronos’s opposite shoulder, feeling no less enervated.
“Mother’s bioprinters are down. The war continues. I’m currently all that stands between life and death,” the nun explained, refusing to interrupt her surgery in progress on a Theta Team member. Her surgical staff, androids, one and all, were running up to her to show her video screens of their patients. She downloaded what they needed to know about the one of a kind lifeforms so they could commence their surgery from the gruesome pictures of their current state.
Cronos looked up at the Escher painting of the nun operating in a hospital seemingly without end that the Nautilus had been turned into. “Where did all the other copies of you come from?”
“When Mother saw her bioprinters failing, she had the foresight to print up as many of me as she could before they went off line completely.” She glanced at him. “Maybe you could pay a visit to as many of the patients as you can. It may do them good to see you.”
“You mean, compared to me, how bad could things be for them, really?”
“Precisely.”
He wrenched his face out of shape. “I swear you are as hurtful as any Catholic nun I’ve ever had the displeasure of knowing.”
All the same, Cronos embraced this latest assignment as a holy duty, as he embraced all his assignments. He had taxed God with saving his ass enough for one day on the front lines. God could use a rest from his labors, and so could Cronos. His bedside manner, besides, wasn’t half bad. Better than the nun’s, that was for sure.
***
“Three Skyhawk clones are on their way in,” Mother announced.
The nun pulled her hands out of the Theta Team member’s thoracic cavity, addressing her robot assistants. “Take over for me.” Two other clones of the nun had already extracted themselves from their surgeries, downloading to the robots by their sides at their operating tables—the gurneys—what needed to be done to finish up. All three of the nuns were headed toward the three Skyhawks.
“My Theta Team operatives always have priority,” Mother informed the threesome of nuns on the march.
“Their impact on the war effort is calculable, Mother. Skyhawk’s is not.” The three nuns spoke as one.
Mother backed down.
The medical robots were wheeling in the Skyhawk clones. The gurneys were themselves robots, which could seal their triage victims in to facilitate healing if necessary, procuring a hyperbaric chamber on the spot, or putting their patients in cryogenic freeze until additional medical care could be provided. The gurney-bots came with a compliment of medical nanobot hive minds to be injected for routine maintenance.
Whatever the situation with these Skyhawks, it was pretty serious. One had been put in a hyperbaric chamber. Another in cryogenic freeze. The third was covered in what appeared to be millions of army ants, crawling over every inch of him. The nuns realized, of course, those were the microbots, as opposed to the nanobots, and they were trying to fix the damage to Skyhawk enough so the nanobots could take over, working on an even smaller scale.
The three Skyhawks were coming from three different battlefields, so the dissimilar injuries were not a surprise.
“Any way we can get more Skyhawk clones into the field?” Ariel asked. She was the Alpha Unit cadet coming in with the Skyhawk riddled with “army ants.”
“There are a limited number of them for a reason,” the nun explained without interrupting her surgery in progress on this Skyhawk, a.k.a. “the Ant Man,” or taking her eyes off her subject. “The wild card effects they exert make it too difficult to control the future, for Mother. Even the Cream Umbrage are begging us to keep their numbers to a minimum. He’s giving them headaches. For the record, it is extremely difficult to overload a Cream Umbrage—or any color in the Umbrage line for that matter.”
“You say that as if there are other colors of Umbrage we don’t know about.”
“There is an entire color spectrum full of them. That’s why Solo and the rainbow eyed ones have the eyes they do, so they can see into the minds of each colored Umbrage in the rainbow.”
“So, the other colors are extinct?”
Never mind the very horrifying realization that Theta Team was deployed almost solely to Legacy Tech habitats, and that those habitats each had Patent and Alpha Unit clones to make the most of the warring capabilities of those assets. And still Theta Team wounded were piling up in here!
Ariel glanced over at the piles of writhing bodies on the floor that there weren’t enough gurneys for, Alpha Unit, Theta Team, even Omega Force, the piles seemed not to discriminate. The autobots piling new bodies on top with their giant tractor scoops were turning those heaps into mountains with each drive through. The agonized cries were only muffled by the wounded pressing down on their lungs and faces. Fainter moans emanated from those too far gone to produce more sound. No one was giving them the time of day. “What’s with the red carpet treatment those soldiers are receiving?” Ariel asked, noticing a clone of herself in the heap she felt particularly vested in getting immediate help.
Moving Earth Page 100
