The Mangrove Suite

by Tim Niederriter

  The rogue aeon approached the helpless purifiers in the center of the clearing. As she came closer, I saw her sleeves were soaked with blood up to the elbows. The eternal wound over her eye flowed with golden ichor, and the liquid dripped onto the forest floor with every step. Her gore-covered fingers made claws. She reached for the neck of the nearest purifier.

  My hands shook. “Stop.” I stepped out into the clearing, keeping my weapon trained on Yashelia as best I could. “Don’t hurt them.”

  She looked at me. Bright eyes gleamed in a blood-streaked face. With deliberate slowness, she reached out and seized the man by the throat. I squeezed the trigger of my shotgun. The weapon kicked into my shoulder with a roar and sent a spray of shot toward Yashelia. She snapped the purifier’s neck and caught the blast with his body in the same motion. He hung in her grip. Blood trickled through tears in his armor.

  Yashelia threw the body. The corpse hit me high along the chest. I pulled the shotgun’s trigger again as the impact bowled me onto my back. The shotgun’s sound burst in my ears, and the shot went into the smoke and treetops behind Yashelia. Raindrops fell upon my face. I scrambled free of the body, shoving it away with a mix of desperation and revulsion. I stood and found the other three purifiers lying at Yashelia’s feet, crushed or torn or strangled in instants.

  “Jethro,” she said. “You violated my mind.” She stalked over the bodies and advanced on me. I raised the shotgun. She batted the barrel to the side before I could fire. In the next instant, she tugged the weapon from my grip and tossed it away.

  I stepped back and plunged into the network. There, my perception of time gave me more thoughts before she could kill me. Still, it would only be seconds. Once in the network, I detected only two other minds left in the forest. Thomas, I recognized, hidden by the path near the clearing, and a lilting sonic mind I did not recognize, approaching from a path opposite the fires the purifiers had started, probably Yashelia’s illusionist. I drew back to myself. Inside my own mind, I raced to think of way to stop her.

  I opened my eyes. “Wait!”

  Her hand closed around my throat and cut off my airflow. My feet fell back apace. I glared into Yashelia’s face as she shoved my back against the tree. Thorns pierced my coat and dug into my skin. She smiled at me, a single line of blood flowing from the wound over her eye and dripping ichor onto my chest.

  “Maybe it’s not time for you to die,” she said. “I will clean you instead.” I grimaced as her grip relaxed and let me breathe again. Her free hand flew to the top of my head and pressed down. “You will enjoy being a slave. A good replacement for Rain. Yes, child, a good replacement.”

  I reached up and tried to remove her fingers, prying with both hands. She shook her head. “Do not fight. It will all be over soon.”

  I lashed out with a kick at her leg. I might as well have kicked an iron bar. I grunted in pain.

  She smiled wider and wider, lips running with ichor. Then I saw no more reason to struggle. The only thought in my mind was that this beautiful creature, this lethal goddess was doing me a favor. All my worries could leave me. All this chaos could end. A simple way to be. It could be mine.

  Then I tasted her kiss on my lips, covered with golden blood. Yashelia held my gaze with hers as she kissed me. Somehow, it all felt better now. I felt like my mind was falling asleep. Her kiss, the taste of her ichor, both were inhumanly sweet.

  My eyelids began to flutter. On the dregs of the ichor newly fed into my system with her kiss, I entered the network instinctively.

  A woman in the distance spoke, “Jeth, don’t give up. Jeth? Listen to me. She can’t clean you as long as you don’t have ichor in your system.”

  Rebecca’s voice sounded firm and human, not ethereal and sweet.

  “But she’s feeding me ichor right now.”

  “You have to fight. Thomas is on his way. We’ll all be there soon.”

  “I can’t fight. Not anymore.”

  “I left you, and I regretted it. Don’t leave me now.”

  Those words I never expected to hear, like words from a teenage dream. I opened my eyes and looked at Yashelia, lips still pressed to mine. I spat her own ichor into her mouth. The aeon drew back and screamed. Her hand tightened once again on my throat, and she began to twist my head. I gritted my teeth. A gunshot rang out and made Yashelia turn. Thomas stood at the end of the path, pistol held in both hands.

  I remembered the pistol I had retrieved from the fallen purifier and reached for it with a blind hand, mind blank except for the need to get the weapon. Yashelia turned toward Thomas slowly. I dragged the pistol from my coat pocket with a scratched and painful hand. I angled it upward and pulled the trigger.

  The gun screamed, and a bullet cut through Yashelia’s chest. She gave an animal roar and hurled me through the air. I hit Thomas like a flying rock, and we both went down. My spine ached, and I rolled off Thomas. I looked back at the tree. The light ship moved from overhead, dragging glowing lines, the purpose of which I did not understand, behind it. Falling rain doused the fires and reduced them to more smoke. Yashelia limped toward us from the place in the front of the tree where she had thrown me. Golden blood poured from the wound in her chest. A cloudiness fled from her eyes, making them look even brighter.

  Thomas grunted and found his feet. I pushed myself up on hands and knees.

  “We have to get moving,” Thomas said and helped me stand.

  I half-laughed, half-groaned. “No kidding.”

  He put an arm around my sides and dragged me after him, moving down the path. I looked back as Yashelia turned her back on us and struggled toward her tree. Her voice whispered after me on the network. “Look after Rebecca, Jethro.” She sounded resigned and exhausted.

  Thomas scowled. “Why is she letting us go?”

  “I think she’s tired.” I glanced back at the tree. The fire hadn’t touched it, but blood splashed across the trunk, and smoke darkened the branches. “We’re lucky to get away.”

  I put my head down, and we kept walking.

  Thomas and I emerged from the park, smoke billowing to the sky behind us and cold rain falling all around. Thomas’ van stood at the street corner before us. The side door slid open, and Rebecca waved us inside. We didn’t hesitate.

  As I climbed into the van her hand touched my shoulder. I met her eyes and smiled despite the bloodshed left behind in the park. The expression on her face more than matched mine. The door slammed behind me, and we sped off.

  Leaves

  Three days later, I still ached all over and my cuts were only just healing. Accessing a healing link would be too suspicious given the circumstances. Instead, I hid my cuts and scrapes under layers of clothes and left my apartment to meet Rebecca, Elizabeth, and Thomas for breakfast. Everyone but Rebecca was worse for wear after the chaos of that evening.

  The women filled me in about how Rebecca had awakened. I couldn’t tell if she was happy or not at the result, but I didn’t let myself worry about it. Thomas suggested, once we could get papers for her, we should find Rebecca an apartment in a different building in the district.

  She glanced at me for a moment, then gave a small smile and told Thomas she liked the idea. After what had happened with Yashelia, and what she had said to me while we fled, I only had a moment’s hesitation before I agreed. I figured if I wanted to be with Rebecca, I would have to give her some space first.

  A network message from Omasoa called me in to review some text packets for distribution to a production team. Reluctantly, I sent back that I’d be right there. I saw Ryan Carter on the train to work. He crossed the compartment and sat down next to me, a metal flask in his hand. I could only assume it held ichor.

  “You’re better with a gun than you ever said.”

  I frowned at him. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “I mean I saw you. And Fenstein. In that garden.”

  “How?”

  He tapped the side of his head, and then wiggled the flask. “I
worked analysis for the op. Don’t worry. I wanted to share some things with you.”

  I looked out the train windows at the rooftops flying past. “Thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it. A lot of good people died out there, and I want to know why.”

  “You still don’t?”

  Ryan shook his head. “A mad aeon and some kind of illusionist were too much for purifiers without power suits or military support. Sudhatho must have known that when he sent them in because they were the distraction he used to seal the garden.”

  “That light ship,” I murmured. “It was his.”

  “Right. And if Sudhatho knew they couldn’t win, he sacrificed them deliberately.” He scowled. “Let me show you what I know.” He held out the flask, but I shook my head. I was already on my dose of ichor for the day.

  I took a deep breath, and he reached out and gave me some memories he had found, the heavyset sensocycler, the purifier officer, and the furious battle he had seen from all sorts of angles. When the images and sounds subsided, I gasped for air. He put a hand on my shoulder.

  When I recovered a little, I turned toward him. “Let’s get to the bottom of this.”

  “We have to do it right,” said Ryan. “The aeons might not be supportive of what we need to do.”

  “Yeah. Sudhatho is one of their own,” I said. “So, that’s probably an understatement.”

  We talked a little about other things, though I don’t remember any of the subjects clearly. It didn’t matter, because though the sky looked darker through the week, there hadn’t been rain in three days. And when I got back to the tower that night, Elizabeth and I had a network to set up.

  Unregistered Memory, Ryan Carter, Security Analytics Offices, Marlowe Square

  He sat with a cup of ichor before him on the table. Whenever Ryan thought of the forest, and the great tree he had made out in the chaos of the failed attack he couldn’t help but shiver. All that mental power pent up and inaccessible by humans except when someone touched it. He exhaled slowly, trying to calm his mind. A sigh came out in place of normal breath. What does someone do with that much power?

  “Plenty of time to find out,” he said to himself, then checked over his new contacts. Alesia De Vries’ and Conner Kohl’s mental signatures drifted in his mind. He sipped his ichor, then leaned back and closed his eyes. A small smile worked its way onto his face, then he shot off into the mental city.

  I returned home to Lotdel tower that night and found Elizabeth waiting in the lobby. She stood up from the chair, where she had been sitting, and met me in the center of the mostly vacant room.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  Elizabeth shrugged. “I just wanted to talk to you.”

  “Can’t we talk upstairs?” I said.

  She shook her head. “Rebecca’s up there. The bureau didn’t accept her new papers.”

  I frowned. “I guess it can’t be helped. We’ll have to find a better set of those to get her registered. Don’t worry, I’ll take care of that as soon as I can.”

  “Do you want her to stay with you until then?”

  My eyebrows rose. “Is that what this is about? I don’t see how I could. Nageddia might start asking questions if I did.”

  Elizabeth looked down at her folded hands. “I talked to Thomas. She can stay in the Mangrove Suite for now.”

  “Thanks.” I remembered the memories she had shared with me from the past few days and put a hand on her shoulder. “For everything you’ve done.”

  She shrugged off my hand and walked back to the elevator. She hit the call button. I looked at her with her hair shining under the light veins set in the ceiling. Elizabeth looked over her shoulder at me. “Come on, Jeth. We’ve got work to do.”

  I smiled at her and followed her to the elevator. The doors opened, and we went inside. As we rode upward, I couldn’t help but ask myself a question that made me uncomfortable. Why had Yashelia wanted Rain so badly? I sighed as I realized, even if Rebecca knew, she might never want to tell me. Elizabeth and I stopped at the level of our apartments.

  We were about to part when I turned to her. “You ready to set up our news network?”

  “Not tonight.” Elizabeth put a hand on my arm. “For now, I just want to rest.” She slipped away, for once light to the touch. Something had changed between us, but I didn’t understand what, even with the memories she had lent me.

  I walked home, turning thoughts over and over in my mind even as my day’s dose of ichor ran out. I remembered the illusions I had seen in Yashelia’s garden, and the flooded woods of my childhood. I took a deep breath. The water began to rise once again.

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  Tim Niederriter has been reading fantasy and science fiction since he was five years old when his parents introduced him to the hobbit.

  These days he writes stories in science fiction, fantasy, and combinations of the two for himself and for others. When not writing fiction or losing at video games, he maintains a blog at dwellerofthedeep.wordpress.com, and you can find his personal website at timniederriter.com. He also talks on the podcasts “Of Mooks and Monsters,” and “Alive After Reading” available at mentalcellarpublications.com and wherever podcasts are downloaded.

  He lives in Minnesota for as long as the corn decides not to eat him.