by Lee Bond
“No sign, sa.” All of them answered, precisely three milliseconds behind the other. They were practicing their Harmony. It was something all the new Goddies did. It was, as Huey would put it, eerie as fuck and could he put an end to it, Herrig would do so.
“If he arrives, you will contact me before anyone, yes?” Herrig bundled up the Sheets he’d been working on and handed them to his valet, an abundantly quiet and pensive Foursie who took her job with fanatic levels of enthusiasm. Thus far she’d nearly killed the same tea girl fifteen times for coming into his private offices unannounced.
If the world found out a tea girl was making very nearly as much as a CEO of a multi-planet business, they’d shit bricks, but dammit, she seemed to be the only one on the planet who knew how to make a proper cup of tea and death by accidental head removal seemed to finally be off the table.
The God soldiers saluted. “Yes, sa. You above all others.”
Herrig nodded, and turned away, certain that if he could hear the Harmony, that sentence would be ‘You above all others, until it is time’. He’d heard his last Foursie say it once under his breath after nearly dismembering the tea girl, and twenty minutes later he’d been gifted with Sidra, a far more stable companion.
***
The second place he visited, and stayed longer at, was Bravo. Previous Chairs had avoided both it and, honestly, The Peak altogether; The Peak was –had been- a most singular concentration of everything that the Regime did that was awful and horrific. As far as Herrig could tell, Chairwoman Doans had never set foot inside the epic mountain fortress until the last few months in office, and with everything she’d done to advance her dreams of Universal Conquest by cover of Darkness, he couldn’t help but commiserate.
For some, The Peak held nothing but darkness and misery.
These days –and at his command- most of the political prisoners had been set free. Those few that’d been actually legitimately guilty of some infraction or were genuinely insane had been mercifully and gently put down. Not the most palatable of decisions, and Herrig still got a bit queasy in the stomach at the mere thought of arriving at them –mostly because Fenris had made an off-handed comment about how he, Herrig, was beginning to see the world very clearly indeed- but … they had no need of mad prisoners.
There was only one prisoner in The Peak now, and unlike those olden day detainees, this one wasn’t under any guard at all. The insane genius Hollyoak had the ‘run’ of the entire ‘Peak’ facility all to himself. God soldiers, even ones repaired with Harmony, were forbidden to go within one hundred meters of the place, and that included simply walking by a wall that separated one area from another; the bizarrely modified pint-sized madman was capable of singing in machine code, machine code that had untoward effects on any God soldier within earshot.
Herrig wanted the monstrosity dead. Dead for creating the Gunboys, dead for allowing Gurant to transform into a corrupt Harmony Soldier that –according to Solgun- could’ve conquered the entire Universe on his own, dead for a hundred million different reasons. It was the first time that the chubby ex-Trinityman had ever truly wanted anyone dead. He didn’t even need to think about it, or deliberate. There’d been no hand-wringing, no hemming, no hawing. Following Hollyoak’s destructive and thankfully aborted attempt to override God soldier controls, Herrig had had the paperwork signed, sealed and delivered to OverCommander Vasily before the sirens had been turned off.
Fenris wanted the freak alive. Fenris didn’t understand what Hollyoak was, and that was … distressing. Fenris examined Hollyoak on a daily basis. Sometimes with the assistance of one of his brothers, but most often alone. About the only ‘good’ to come from Fenris’ ‘examination’ was that it was most often done with the diminutive freak bound to a gurney.
Herrig wasn’t certain how much longer he was going to be able to allow that to continue. As Chairman for Latelyspace, a living Hollyoak represented a threat just as bad as the Army currently trying to hammer its way through the shield surrounding their system.
The Chairman turned his mind from Hollyoak. The monstrous midget was at the other end of the Peak, currently –he surmised- being poked and prodded by a gruesomely curious Fenris.
Bravo was within reach. If he wanted –and he probably would before his time in the room was over- he could stretch out one hand and touch the curious metal hull that held Garth inside. It felt like nothing except, possibly, wet.
Latelian scientists said it felt like nothing, that the sensation some small number of people privileged to touch Bravo claimed they felt was, in fact, the human mind and body attempting to fabricate a feeling that should be there. Quadronium was extra-Universal matter. It didn’t interact with their Universe in any way.
Except when it did. The metal –everyone still called it metal, though Garth insisted that it wasn’t metal at all but extruded and reformed energy from a pocket Universe inside their own ‘pocket’ Universe- was impervious and untouchable and mysterious and would remain that way forever. There wasn’t a single scientist attached to Bravo that thought otherwise, and after lengthy discussions with Huey prior to his departure, they’d even given up hope that artificial intelligence would assist.
Instead of trying to figure Bravo out, they were now trying to reverse-engineer duronium; they weren’t admitting to it, but Herrig believed that everyone including the scientists themselves had fallen prey to Regimist propaganda concerning the discovery of duronium, and Garth’s revelation about what Bravo was actually comprised of had thrown many of them into a days’ long stupor.
If Bravo was absolutely and utterly impregnable because it was the physical extrusion of another semi-Reality, how, then, could that long-ago brilliant scientist have carved a sliver of metal from the hull? That was the question they were asking one another. Forbidden by Regime policy to physically interact with The Box, they’d never once had the opportunity to search for where the shard had come from. They’d taken proof of creation on faith.
So now they were trying to figure out if that scientist had miraculously happened on the formula for duronium on his own or if he’d been helped along the way by Bravo itself.
Either way, Herrig was more than content to sit and pretend to do work with the ancient vessel less than arms’ length away while scientists shouted and hollered and sometimes came to blows over popular theories.
The most cherished icon of Latelian society made Sidra nervous, so she stood a ‘respectful’ distance away, for which Herrig was grateful; female Foursies were inexplicably statuesque. He rather feared he was going to have to requisition another bodyguard because … because.
He was Chairman. He had other things to think about.
Somewhere in the background, a scientist squawked loudly. Sidra virtually materialized at his shoulder, already scooping his Sheets up in one hand and him in the other. She hauled him as gently back to the observation area as possible.
“What, er, is the meaning of this?” Herrig demanded as he put his glasses back on his head properly.
Sa Verton pointed at the Screen bank they were all staring at with an admixture of ghastly excitement and nervous terror. “Spike. In the … foundation.”
“Foundation of what?” Herrig took his Sheets from Sidra and tucked them into their carry-all.
“Of the Everything.” Another scientist answered.
Herrig turned to look at Bravo. “It’s not doing anything. It’s still just sitting there.”
“Screens say otherwise.” Verton insisted, pointing with a narrow finger at a bar graph that was slowly inching its way upwards. “This says it’s getting ready to do something.”
Herrig licked his lips. “Awesome.” It was about goddamn time. He expected that any second now the invisible door was going to explode off its hinges and Garth Nickels was going to come wandering out jibber-jabbering about Swan Halen or whoever and then they could all go about the business of getting Aleksander Politoyov and his damned Army off their borders.
***
Fenris looked up from the prone figure of Hollyoak. The mite had passed out from the ‘gentle’ questioning again. “Is the body in place?” he asked through the Harmony.
Nalanata, the one who everyone ignored because had yet to say anything to anyone not of the Harmony, responded. “This bloody body is heavy as a black star, Fen.”
The others, situated throughout the citadel, chuckled.
“Harmony rewritten God soldiers such as Sa Gurant do tend to the heavier side.” Fenris poked the should’ve-been-aborted madman with a pinky. Disgusting, yet so … curious. He had no basis for comparison as to how or why Hollyoak had come into being. The man was divinely inspired, to be sure. But was the divination Harmony-wrought or just … madness? “But you didn’t answer my question, brother.”
A grunt escaped and echoed through the Harmony. “As close as it’s going to get, Fen. Be easier if I could get a bit bigger.” Nalanata grunted again.
Lokken broke in. “Is this necessary?”
“Not … not entirely.” Fenris admitted. “But surely you, too, are curious about this disgusting thing.”
Shrugs from his brothers whispered through the Harmony. Fenris accepted their ambivalence with grace. They could take or leave any knowledge gleaned from his proposed experiment. The leader of the Harmony soldiers continued. “And besides, this will be a wonderful test for the one who would be sixth.”
“Now that,” Stride said impishly, “is something I am far more interested in.”
Nalanata interjected. “Can I leave now? This corpse is perhaps the foulest thing in Existence. It rubs me raw in every way possible.”
Fenris twitched his mouth. “I disagree. What is to come will surely violate all of your dainty senses a thousandfold, dear brother Nalanata. I ask again: is Gurant’s corpse close enough?”
“We’ve been simulating fracture and collapse patterns for months, Fenris. The moment we detected a pulse to the engines, the Planck-second we determined his plan. Our models are as close to what will truly come to be without actually being.” Nalanata booted Gurant in the head and walked away. “Unless the Unreal Harmony decides it doesn’t want this to happen, this miscegenation will quite literally land beside that toad.”
“Good.” Fenris nodded. “Now, everyone, I advise we make ourselves absent and let these people deal with what is going to happen on their own.”
Solgun sighed. “Can we go frighten the Army for a bit? Everything’s so boring right now.”
Lokken, Stride and Nalanata’s desire for that option flooded the Harmony. Fenris nodded. It was important to get the Army as riled up as possible, because sooner rather than later, Huey was going to come home and the split-second that his shield went down was important.
Because the Harmonized Goddies needed testing, too.
The Peak started shaking.
***
Sidra stepped forward and addressed the Chairman, mentally adding the honorifics she’d been forbidden from saying. “Sa Herrig.” Leader of the New People, Most Trusted. “We must leave.”
Herrig held his glasses on with one hand; the sympathetic vibrations in the room had nearly everything loose jumping and skittering like living things and he’d be –heh- damned if he was going to miss whatever was going to happen next. He shook his head. “No.”
“The scientists are leaving, Sa Herrig.” Revitalizer of Latelyspace, Healer of Broken Soldiers. “You cannot remain.”
Herrig straightened his back and stared defiantly at Sidra. “Foursie Sidra, if you cannot remain at your post, if you cannot follow your orders as I have given them, I suggest you remove yourself to the other room. If you are frightened of what might happen, then by all means, leave. I am staying.”
“But … The Bo… Bravo … it might blow up. It looks like it is going to blow up.”
Herrig smiled. “Have you learned your new lessons well, Sidra?” The Chairman knew what Fenris and his gloomy brothers were teaching the soldiers, knew that they claimed understanding what was to come was integral to understanding how to work their wondrous bodies and minds without the interference of the chemicals the Regime had been feeding them for thousands of years.
Sidra stuck out her considerable chest and nodded firmly. “I have, sa. We must End so something new, something wondrous, can Begin. It is the way of things.”
Herrig pointed at Bravo, which was shifting in place so violently cracks in the surrounding walls were beginning to appear. “And the man inside?”
“He is the Engineer, Sa Herrig. The Creator. Without him, there can be no proper End. Without him, we will fall on the stars like a plague. We will destroy before we are destroyed. We will deny the M’Zahdi Hesh their bountiful meal in the hopes they will learn to be more careful. If we are lucky, our destruction will end them as well, and the Engines of Creation will be … free.” Sidra smiled. The first time she’d heard those words, felt them issuing forth through her feeble grasp of the Harmony, she’d wept.
After four thousand years of death and war and watching friends and family disappear and die, she’d never have imagined there could be beauty in death, majesty in the end, but, with Fenris’ aid, they all knew the truth. This war, this end, this death … would mean more than any other in recorded History. If she died on the front lines battling whatever horrors the Heshii cooked up or right now, right here in this room protecting the most foolish human being she’d ever met, a man who loved her people more than he had any reason to and thus deserved to be loved in turn, so be it. All deaths this close to the End were good.
“My friend is in there, Sidra.” Herrig sat down. “My friend is in there and if his ship blows up, there is little point to me going on without him. You Goddies have your Ending. I have none. I will offer my hopes to Garth Nickels by sitting by his side. If he dies here, he will not be alone.”
Sidra Deschayn, four thousand one hundred forty-two years old if she was a day, had seen awful things. Had done awful, terrible things in the name of progress, in the name of protecting the Regime, in dark servitude to Trinity Itself. The Harmony was helping her –all of them- deal with the madness that’d curled into their souls.
Never in her life had she seen a normal man be so brave. She moved to stand behind him, knowing the she could never move from his side. She would live for Herrig DuPont. She would die for Herrig DuPont.
Herrig stiffened when the weight of Sidra’s hand rested ever so gently on his shoulder, then relaxed.
Bravo continued to rumble in place.
***
Ex-Chairwoman Alyssa Doans looked up at the sky, squinting angrily as she always did; spEyes were an ever-present facet of her life, and had been since the moment she’d walked out of her old offices in Central more than a year ago. They followed her day and night, tracked her every movement, recorded and reported everything she did to the renamed Ministry of Information.
As Hamilton Barnes, who she still didn’t believe was not The Last Loyal Man turned … turncoat, had promised so long ago, everyone knew where she was and what she was doing all the time. Last she’d heard, some enterprising Latelian had figured out how to hack into the spEye-feed and was making a fortune on the black market by selling her most private moments to the highest bidder.
No matter. Alyssa cackled and spat at the invisible spEyes. Oh, she knew they were there. You couldn’t see them because spEyes were tiny, but they were there. It didn’t even matter if they were there or not, because with the proteus on her wrist relaying her position through the ‘LINKs to the avatars set to control her desires through the awful voting system, her … freedom was limited at best, a joke in truth.
Alyssa Doans, once the most powerful woman in the solar system, lover of the most powerful man in the solar system, finished washing her face in the park drinking fountain as best she could.
For the first few months, it’d been hard. Oh, it was still hard. Impossibly so. Relying on the goodwill of others for basic sustenance was a thing normal people who’d fallen on hard
times would struggle with. For the woman who’d once dreamed of conquering the entire Universe, of wrestling the powers of control from Trinity Itself … well, now, some lessons come steep, come hard, and cost more than anyone could’ve possibly imagined.
In the beginning, she’d rarely chosen to use the Pariah System to get the things she’d needed to live through the day. No, she’d chosen instead to belittle, badger and outright force people to give her the food off their plates, the credits in their pockets, their beds at night; the Pariah System, at the start, had been a toy. She’d demanded starships and billions of credits and mercenaries and the deaths of people who’d looked at her funny.
It’d been a game because back then, she’d still thought of herself as Chairwoman. She’d imagined that, at any second, she’d figure out some way to steal the Chair back from that fat, balding man who wasn’t even Latelian, for the Love of Pete!
So rather than use the System for food and drink and shelter, she’d squandered precious requests on things designed to resurrect the power she’d once held, going from house to house and knocking politely on the door and then, essentially, invading a private residence.
Alyssa didn’t know if the Pariah System had just allowed her to treat polite Latelians that way or if it’d taken so long for things to change because Hami… Huey hadn’t considered the possibility of her audacious behavior, but, the ex-Chairwoman reflected, it probably didn’t matter because the System had ultimately smacked her down, and hard.
She remembered the day most clearly. Freshly showered and fed by The Rennats, a lovely family positively aflutter with excitement and pride at having provided for a wrongfully deposed Chairwoman, she’d headed towards the next home on her list of People Who Would Provide; ironically, the Pariah System was responsible for providing her with a geographical breakdown of wealthy Latelians most likely to be predisposed towards providing aid.
