‘Now we’ll find out,’ said Pierce Lewis moving forward. ‘Now we’ll find out properly, the way it ought to be done.’
‘Nope!’ Edge Fenris insisted. ‘Didn’t see your faces, don’t know who the fuck you are.’
‘You know me, Mr Fenris.’
‘That’s comrade to you, buddy!’ Fenris snapped. ‘We’re equals here asshole, don’t think you can tickle my balls with the mister title.’
‘You don’t look on equal terms to me,’ said Lewis.
And Berengar the Bear booted Edge hard in the gut and sent him swinging, coughing up bile and he thought he might vomit what contents of the alcohol wasn’t yet digested from last night’s binge. He heard a rattle, the familiar sound of a vandal’s toolkit, the soft hiss of spray and the smell of paint. Hattle stepped forth with a spray can, his face concealed behind a mask.
‘Did you spray my property?’ Lewis asked.
‘Eat a dick!’
Hattle sprayed the blue paint over Edge’s face and he spluttered and coughed and gasped for air. He stepped back, allowing Lewis to kneel beside Edge and he asked again.
‘Did you spray my property?’
‘Lewis!’ He coughed. ‘I can’t get you out of my mind. I swear all I think about is you and your fucking house.’
‘Sounds like a confession to me.’ Said Berengar.
‘Of course it does, meat-heads like you aren’t programmed to understand irony.’ Edge snapped.
‘Who did it Edge?’ Lewis asked again. ‘Who did it?’
Edge squinted through the runs of paint and stared vengefully at Pierce Lewis.
‘Fuck you.’
Lewis stood and kicked Edge in the head, sent him spinning around and around, strung up and still dangling by his leg.
‘My father used to own this city.’ He declared while roaming around Edge. ‘The worker rebellion cost him his life. Those savages murdered him.’
‘You just don’t wanna admit it, buster!’ Edge grinned, ‘your daddy just didn’t see it coming.’
‘Regardless, we learned a few things to keep the population in line back then. Fear is an affective mobiliser. Fear for the lives of their family more than their own usually. I think, though, I’ll need a different approach with you.’
Hattle dropped a canister by Berengar’s foot and began pouring a thick brown liquid around the workshop. He saturated the dust covers and hauled it over Laux’s equipment.
‘Hey!’ Edge shouted, kicking with his other leg, trying to catch one of them. He smelled oil, and then he saw Berengar kneel beside him. He handed Edge Fenris a penknife and smiled wide.
‘Good luck,’ he said, walking away.
Then Lewis took out a metal snap lighter, and started the flame. Edge stared at him in horror.
‘Taking bets,’ said Lewis.
‘I’m betting he won’t make it,’ Hattle commented as they shifted towards the hangar door.
‘Wait! WAIT you cocksuckers!’ Edge shouted, already struggling to reach his ankle with the knife. ‘Have you got my fucking cigarettes?’
‘No last requests, Edge.’ Lewis said.
‘Are you really gonna kill me because you’re pissed off about your painting? I thought you looked beautiful, with the tash and the Third Reich swastika.’
‘No,’ Lewis laughed. ‘We’re making an example of you for fucking around with my shit. I knew it was you Edge. Ever since you came here you crossed me, you have been real vocal about my views.’
‘That’s because you’re the only one here who wants to make it so everyone sees things your way you unconscionable fuckwit!’
‘Burn in hell you Marxist shit-bag.’
And with that, Lewis tossed the lighter and the fires started small and wide, roaring up gradually into six foot smoking flames.
-27-
The fire had disturbed the festival celebrations and a swarm of people began running to the event.
‘What’s happening?’ Pania asked.
‘Fire!’ Kyo shouted, grabbing her wrist and dragging her to the air zone. ‘There’s a fire on the air zone!’
From the stage, Laux saw the roaring red flames surging out of the hangar door, red and white hot dentations licking the night, shining through the corrugate failings in the walls. His jaw dropped in shock and he turned to one of the Cymorg musicians.
‘You!’ He pointed. ‘I’m going to need that amplifier; does it have an independent power supply?’
The skinny man with no shirt looked back at the large cymatic amplification disk on stage and nodded. He removed his Cymorg mask and spoke.
‘Yeah, but it won’t last long.’
‘Unlatch it from the stage and get some strong people to shift it. I need to acquire a vehicle.’
Laux vanished into the crowd and hurried towards the hangar doors. A few were unwinding a pressure hose from the emergency fire pumps built into the air zone in case of a crash. And they unleashed a large spray of foam into the flames. Pania arrived near the front, screaming into the fires with distress and calling for Edge Fenris.
‘EDGE!’ She roared at the top of her voice, trying to get close to the ravenous fire. ‘EDGE!’
Kyo pulled her away and she fought with him for a while.
‘You can’t go there!’ He shouted. ‘Not until the fire’s out…’
‘But he’s in there!’ She said through tears.
Suddenly, a four wheel drive jeep sounded its horn, parting the crowd as it bounded towards the hangar. Laux rode up on the back, his voice amplified through a huge cymatic plate which also rode on the back, wobbling unstably. The jeep turned around and faced the plate toward the fires.
‘Back!’ Laux yelled. ‘Everyone back!’
The Cymorgs all unloaded from the jeep and ushered people away from the device. Once they were at a clear distance, Laux set the amplification drivers to maximum, and adjusted the cymatic frequency. A single ultrasonic bass sound rumbled through the air, vibrating through the bones of anybody quite close. A long collimator telescoped from the amplification source, changing the nature of the ultrasonic frequencies, focussing the sounds deeper into the Hangar where the fires burned hottest. They watched as the fires in the hangar were driven down by the sonic waves, and the driver reversed the jeep further into the hangar, urging down the flames further still until only smoke issued from whatever was left smouldering in the darkness. Once the fires were out, the device powered down.
*
It had been an anti-climax to what should have been a great night for all. Kyo sat over a burnt out polymerite airless tire, head in his palms. Pania lumbered over a broken crate. Smoke still issued from the hangar’s depth in mild wisps. Several air zone engineers and helpers were volunteering to clear the disaster and search for anything salvageable, but so far they came up empty.
Laux stared into the void for what felt like a long time. Enaya and Daryl Sanders were around the area, Daryl doing his bit to help others shift burnt out and broken equipment. For the first time since Laux arrived he could see the hangar door fully open, burnt out and charred guts exposed for all to see, his work burned to cinders.
‘I’m so sorry Laux,’ Enaya said, touching his arm. He looked down to see she was offering a mug of tea but he shook his head.
‘Any sign of Edge?’
‘No,’ she sighed. ‘But it’s not likely anybody would have survived.’
‘Who the hell could have done this?’ Kyo shouted angrily, standing suddenly and kicking a spare scrap of metal. The cylinder bounced down the air zone road but it was heavier than he was expecting and Kyo cursed to himself and hobbled around to walk off the pain. ‘Did Edge fall a-sleep smoking or something? What the hell?’
‘I don’t think so,’ said Daryl, coming out of the hangar holding what looked to be charred metal oil canisters. ‘Somebody poured it around the hangar.’
‘Vandalism?’ Laux said with surprise. ‘Why? Who would do that?’
‘I bet I know who!’ Pania suddenly reali
sed, also climbing to her feet now. ‘I bet it’s that swine Pierce Lewis.’
‘I bet you’re right!’ Kyo agreed, fangs flashing with rage.
‘That’s a heavy accusation,’ said Enaya, ‘we need to deal with this issue carefully. If he’s guilty then we can have him exiled, and not just from our district but from the whole damn city.’
‘Perhaps I can take a look at this evidence?’ Laux asked. ‘It’ll take me a little longer to determine without my lab and workshop, but I believe I can get to the bottom of it somehow.’
‘We brought Hattle Lewis in to have his finger prints stored in the database,’ said Daryl. ‘He’s been in trouble before. Nothing to warrant getting him exiled but people wanted him to be put on file. He was monitored by the community for years and it calmed him down…until recent events it seems.’
‘Alright,’ Laux nodded, receiving the evidence.
‘Excuse me,’ a new voice suddenly said.
They turned to find Vilen Krupin and Lyov approaching from the air zone. The silver Perigrussia Skybus sat distantly, shining in the sun like a titanium arrow.
‘I’m badly sorry to hear about celebrations last night,’ he smiled wide. ‘We come to pay regards.’
‘Thank you Krupin.’ Said Daryl, ‘as you can see this is a disaster, I don’t think there’s anything more you can do to help.’
‘No,’ said Krupin, far too happy with himself for Enaya’s comfort. ‘However I do see the rumours I heard are true.’
Enaya suddenly realised he was looking at Kyo. The Olympian kid stood with his back to them, hands behind his head, analysing the hangar in search of his missing friend, tail swinging from the back of his pants.
‘Hey boy!’ Lyov shouted.
Kyo turned around and they saw his eyes.
‘Give me a smile,’ Krupin said, smiling wide.
Kyo had been provoked this way before, usually by Atominii hardlanders, so he was familiar with the subtle hostilities. He hated Krupin right away, and right now he wasn’t afraid to show this asshole that his tolerance for bullshit was at its peak.
‘There’s nothing funny about this!’ Kyo said, ‘but if you wanna see me smile you can go piss on your crappy boots, how’s that?’
Lyov and Krupin burst into laughter, patting one another’s shoulders. Enaya didn’t like the tension they were creating and felt it necessary to interrupt.
‘Vilen Krupin we have a lot to do here,’ she started. ‘Please give us space.’
‘I’ll be giving you quite a lot of space from now on Miss Chahuán.’ He said, leaning sideways to speak quietly by her ear. ‘I wonder how much time you’re going to need to think about the hard evidence I’m about to give the Atominii? Hmm? Two days? Three? What do you suppose will happen when I tell them there’s an Olympian Genetic child living in an anarchist city?’
Enaya’s heart pumped, her eyes tried to fix on something as she thought about a clever response but nothing came. Only the fear now dwelled in her heart, the fear of the threat of war.
‘Interesting,’ he went on. ‘I believe you say in English that the shit really hit the fan.’
-28-
Daryl Sanders chose a discussion room at a district’s Local Federation of concurrence for their private meeting. He wanted to do his best to appease the irascible visitors of any ill tempers in the calm of the room’s large rounded walls. He’d reached Dak and Sonja for the arrangement, Kyo had no idea this meeting was taking place. A giant circular table sat densely in the centre, displaying a thousand bits of touch-reactive information floating around its surface. Dak and Sonja sat at one side while Enaya Chahuán and Daryl Sanders took the head of the table.
The visitors settled into chairs, only the coach Vilen Krupin and Lyov decided to show. Behind them, the panoramic view of the city shimmered with a bustle of daily activity. Krupin slumped heavily into one of the boardroom chairs and his body guard stood attentively by his side.
‘The gene-freak is Olympian genetic,’ coach Krupin continued in his cavalier manner. ‘I cannot overlook it. Olympians are illegal.’
‘Kyo is of no danger to you,’ said Daryl with his arms folded.
‘Of course not now,’ said Krupin, ‘he is boy only. But later, when he is man, he will be monstrous. He will spread his seed and make more; he will pollute the world with his race. This cannot be accepted.’
‘How dare you,’ Sonja heaved bitterly. ‘And who are you to say his kind is pollution, as though he’s not human?’
‘He is dangerous. They are violent, you know this, yes?’
‘As opposed to who?’ Dak re-joined, punching his hands down on the table and sending a shockwave of luminosity rippling across its unyielding electronic surface. ‘You talk as though the human race has existed with undisturbed peace all this time? As though the Titans are not right now imposing their ideological edifice onto everyone in the world? They seem to believe being elites they have all the answers and know what’s best for everyone. Or locking out their own citizens with huge walls in three hundred mile an hour winds with no food or water!’
‘You are anarchists,’ said coach Krupin with an offhanded shrug, ‘Trotsky fuckers!’
‘You’ve no idea,’ Daryl sighed, ‘as though we follow the work of one man, are you so ignorant you assume we’re Trotsky’s children? That his word is truth and cannot be progressed? You should keep talking about things you know about, like training humans to tear each other to pieces.’
‘Even now you think you are above law. That law does not occur to you. So you breed shit! Breed shit and try to train it to be human, to be good. They are not like dogs. They are too smart for parlour tricks, when he learns to outsmart you, he will realise his potential and take this city for himself.’
‘Don’t you pretend to care about this city!’ Sonja quickly snapped. ‘That’s for us to worry about. Not you!’
‘He is gene-freak. They were bred for self-interest and to make power claim.’ Krupin maintained.
‘Oh listen to this horse-shit! Like I don’t know my own son...’ Sonja vehemently ascended.
‘It’s not your son,’ said the coach obstinately, holding up his finger. ‘It’s a mutant. It is boy of some Olympian scum, perhaps even Blue Lycan.’
‘Alright that’s enough!’ Daryl called. ‘Settle down. We need to get to the root of this. Enaya Chahuán was coordinator when Kyo came here; she will help describe the situation moderately. I believe she was informed of the facts and I’m sure they were recorded in the Q-net’s sub-data schedule.’
‘When Sonja and Dak brought him in,’ said Enaya Chahuán, folding her arms. ‘They appealed to the local Federation to keep the child and raise him as their own. Here, we take everyone in. We are a world of rejects. That gene-freak as you call him is no different from any normal thirteen year old kid. But you’re right about one thing...he’s smart…because he already realises that the values he has learnt here are all about freedom and compassion and altruism the Atominii is incapable of offering and in fact they would simply kill him. He is of no danger to us or to you.’
‘I said already, not today he isn’t,’ Krupin explained, picking at his teeth with a thumb nail. ‘And I must inform the authorities. This situation is a political one.’
‘How can you do this?’ Daryl said. ‘You know damn well what the Atominii would do to us if they discover this kid here. They’d wipe us out. Hundreds of thousands will be executed or homeless. And why? Because you say law is law?’
‘Exactly.’
‘See reason, Mr Krupin.’ Enaya Chahuán pleaded. ‘We are a culture; you’ve no right to impose a national law on a transnational scale if you believe in national borders at all.’
‘I do see reason,’ he simpered leaning on his elbows. ‘The law is not national one, it is global one. But...we can making deal, I think.’
‘What deal?’ Dak said.
‘Give boy to me.’
‘What?’ Sonja gasped.
‘I can look after
him. I can make him powerful, mould his mind. I can give him warrior discipline and the Atominii need never know of him. This is what he was made for...’
‘No!’ Dak said obdurately. ‘No way. Not a chance.’
‘Give boy to me,’ said coach Krupin again, ‘I can give him good home. You are fair democracy, so maybe let your people decide. Tell them this. Either they give up gene-freak to me, or Atominii cities will know about his existence on earth and action will be taken to remove him by force and condemn the anarchists to global rule like everyone else.’
Krupin’s eyes began to scintillate with electronic data, as ocular contacts started panning across his vision in luminous flavescent fields. Krupin smiled broadly as he reviewed the images.
‘I have many pictures of witnessing mutant as evidence,’ he claimed, ‘I see clearly your gene-freak on the air zone runway and I have authenticity stamps already associated to prove this is no AI forged imagery.’
‘Don’t do this Mr Krupin,’ Enaya Chahuán once more tried. ‘All you’re doing is turning a city against a child. He needs us; he wants to be here...’
‘You make him soft,’ said the coach.
‘If you take him,’ said Dak, ‘I will report you to the Atominii for having an Olympian. They’ll wrap your head around a wheel.’
Coach Krupin chuckled delightedly and Lyov smiled frigidly.
‘No my anarchist friend. They will do much worse to him than to me. I could be vaporised at worst. But boy will be tortured until someone else makes him asset. Of course on black market, he would be worth many Atomons after obedience training. You should know they have certain criteria for that. Illegal genetics cannot breed. They’d have to castrate him. Maybe even remove mutations he has. Those teeth too. They’re only good for war, don’t you know that? He would be fine soldier. Boy will be killed horribly if he resists them. I will at least be merciful, I am good leader.’ And Krupin fingered something out of his teeth nonchalantly and concluded with a thoughtful hum.
Chaos Cipher Page 27
