The old man appeared in the periphery of his vision. His raised hands poised at his side could have been either a gesture of surrender or a second’s distance from drawing a gun. “She did live, Mamoru. Our agreement said nothing about what she may do to herself.”
“Where is she?”
The Sentience reached up, adjusting his hat. Metal discs adorning the crown rattled. “You are convinced her disappearance is of my bidding?”
Mamoru’s feet slid a few inches further apart, he gazed down. “You will know where she is. You see these truths.”
Chuckling, the sound of dried weeds crackling in a flame, swirled in the air on all sides. “You are so quick to seek a new master, Mamoru?”
“I do not wish to serve you, Akuryō. I simply acknowledge your power.”
The old one’s eyes flared red. “She is in the city.”
Mamoru closed his eyes. “What have I done?”
Footsteps passed in front of him. “Is the question rhetorical, or do you expect an answer?”
Blankness filled his thoughts. Mamoru looked up at a cracked rust hole in the roof, peering at the deep blue sky above. The memory of dragging Sadako across the wasteland came with soreness in his fingers from where the cable had dug in. He remembered the face of a little girl with glowing blue eyes. She had looked at him with worry, which changed to fear and then pity. Her angry glare dissipated, leaving him standing in a field with a knight and a slender, effeminate man in a robe. A flash of a white-haired woman with green eyes passed before him. His next torment took the form of sinking despair as the people of Querq told him his sister had gone.
“I do not remember.”
The old gunslinger walked a few steps further away and paused in a shaft of sunlight. “We have reshaped the world, the way it has always been. For all of mankind’s technology, one thing remains true. They love nothing more than to kill each other.”
Mamoru stared at a puddle lapping at his boot.
“There is no purity in it. I am an agent of purity, Mamoru.” The hazy image of a pudgy man in a suit appeared to the side, seated behind a lavish desk, surrounded by holo-panels and expensive food. “A worthless man has power over those he should not.”
The executive bellowed. Behind him, an image of a muscular man faded in, a laborer of some kind climbing out of a dented exoskeleton. Another man in a blue dress shirt handed him a credstick and offered an apologetic shrug. Cyborg replacements walked past, AI-models, workers who did not need pay.
“Power comes from strength, Mamoru.”
Both men faded. In their place appeared a mountain of smoldering rubble. The laborer emerged, clad in dusty brown leathers, climbing to the peak of a twisted metal spire. He raised a sword overhead and howled.
“Power earned is power deserved.”
Mamoru gazed at the barbarian until he dissipated back to the mists from whence he’d come. “What of the girl?”
The Sentience knew of whom he spoke. Her image appeared between them; long, black hair, dark skin, perhaps nine years old, war paint and dust her only raiment. Pouches dangled from a leather cord strung with beads around her neck, and her anklet of copper wire glinted.
“She is strong,” said the old man.
Mamoru raised an eyebrow. “The child carried a pistol. Is that not power undeserved?”
The little girl looked down at her hand, where an old-world gun had appeared. She ran her fingers over it as if it were an object of reverence.
“Is it not?” Mamoru held one hand up, waving his index finger in the gesture of pulling a trigger. “A child with a gun could kill your warrior as easily as snap her fingers.”
“Mamoru, that girl would take a man’s life as easily as you. The executive? With the same weapon, he would lack the conviction. He orders others to do what he cannot stomach to do himself. The child has no such qualms.” The ancient gunslinger paced in a circle around the girl, who stared at Mamoru as if she could put a bullet in his heart without batting an eyelash. “Strength is not always physical. When she must use her weapon, she will not hesitate.” The old man whirled, flaring his coat. “The executive ignores the primal laws of nature. He lets his body waste while he drinks in false power. A king incapable of besting his serfs is no king. If his underlings decide to disobey, he cannot stop them. No, Mamoru. It is not the same.”
“You adore their suffering, their starvation. You make them kill each other or lead monsters into their midst. Will she even grow up?”
An old hand with paper-thin skin settled atop the child’s head, patting her like a beloved granddaughter. The girl smiled up at the Sentience, and a second later, burst into a wisp of smoke.
“Yes, Mamoru. You felt her words with me. The girl will grow strong, and guide her people into the new world we have made for them. She will be a great ruler in ten years’ time.”
“What have I given you for my sister’s life?”
A long sigh blew the rot of carrion into the air. “This place is mine. Power earned in the fires of war. I am the anger of the innocent, Mamoru. You have brought down the vengeance of an angel to return the land to me.”
Mamoru’s eyebrows drew close. “The ship.”
“Yes. It will tear down the heavens and rain fiery wrath upon the metal scab which defaces my land.”
At the far end of the hangar, an image of West City appeared, as if viewed from a distant mountain peak. A searing comet struck at its center, triggering a rippling wave out to each side. Darkness spread from the impact point as the city collapsed in on itself, exposing the land beneath.
“Millions of people will become part of me, Mamoru. Stress and heat will crush the elevated city. The destruction will spread. What does not burn or collapse will be consumed by my influence. Society will become as humanity was always meant to be.”
“The strong rule the weak,” whispered Mamoru.
“You learn fast.”
“Chaos and death. That is not what humanity desires. What of poetry and art? What of beauty?” He thought back to his Edo Castle of matchsticks… and Nami.
The old man laughed. “My beauty lies in the simplicity of the struggle to survive, where the human will to endure is all that matters.”
“Sadako…” Mamoru sank to his knees.
“My lands will grow. My presence will grow. You were pivotal, Mamoru. In the midst of what is to come, I will become even greater. Sadako will not perish. I shall spare your sister, beyond our agreement.” The old man smiled. “You will be reunited in my world.”
Mamoru breathed in and out… in and out…. A tear ran from each eye. “You shall guide her to me so that I can be reminded every moment what horror I have visited upon this Earth.”
A hissing rush consumed the sound of footsteps. Mamoru looked up. The rickety old cowboy burst into a spinning whorl of black vapor that sank to the concrete, spreading out into a layer of inky fog that seeped into cracks. In seconds, no trace remained, leaving Mamoru alone with his thoughts.
57
Archon One, Arsenal Zero
Anna
Security officers in enamel white armor bearing the logo of Edmonson Memorial Starport herded travelers out of the terminal. The mood of the crowd turned angry as people shouted about missed flights and non-refundable fares. Anna pulled open the side door of a stolen van, holding the hands of psionic children as they jumped down to the street. Alastair hovered at her side, still frightened, but calmer than he’d been back at the corporate campus.
“Everyone stay together,” said Anna. “This is the moment we’ve all been… well, this is the big day.”
Lucy emerged from the van, with Meredith clinging to her. Both of them paused next to her with terror on their faces. Their dingy school uniforms looked every inch of being worn for months straight.
Please, Miss Anna. We don’t want to go into space. Meredith’s lip quivered and she burst into tears. I want to go home.
I miss my Mum and Dad. The telepathic whine of the younger girl spike
d guilt into her heart.
I don’t believe them. Lucy chimed in next, a little hope shining under the dread in her eyes. You didn’t kill that other girl. You’ll help us, won’t you? Please let us go. You said we could leave if we wanted.
A man a short distance away handed a toddler to his wife before getting in the face of a female security officer a head shorter than him.
“You can’t just kick us—”
The woman walloped him across the face with a short-barreled assault weapon, knocking him to the ground and aiming at his back. Screams rang out from the kids around Anna; the sudden high-pitched cries of horror seemed to startle the woman away from firing. The man whimpered and crawled away, holding his bleeding face as the security officer went statue still, staring into space with a shocked expression. She continued to aim at the ground where the man had been.
Dissent in the crowd quieted. People went from resisting the militarized evacuation to fleeing from the armed security forces.
Lucy and Meredith wrapped their arms around Anna, shivering. Rooted in place by a child on either side, Anna continued ushering the others out of the van to the last. The British girls whimpered and whined as she waved her arms in an effort to corral the group into a coherent mass.
“What’s going on?” asked a pale boy with a Romanian accent.
“We’re borrowing the starport,” said Anna. “Come on, everyone inside. Stay together. We’re not going to hurt anyone. They’re going to try and stop us from getting away.”
A week ago, she would have added ‘because they want to kill us,’ but she didn’t believe it so much anymore—at least not here, or even in England.
The girls pulled at her, attempting to resist her dragging them past the doors. Anna clasped their hands the whole way down the main concourse. Alastair followed close behind. More security officers chased people out of shops and cafes along the side of the entry hall. Her charges clustered in a tight group, terrified at the chaos going on around them. The scene struck her as something she’d expected in the ACC, not here. Granted, the people with weapons weren’t pointing them at the psionic children.
Please, Anna. I miss my mum and dad. Meredith set her heels, sliding. You said you weren’t going to force us to go.
She looked down at the pitiful faces staring up at her, grateful that telepathy didn’t care about enormous lumps in her throat. I don’t want to go either.
The girls blinked at her in surprise, evidently having expected the usual ‘but we have to’ response.
Buck up, mite. I’m serious. I don’t want to go. She squeezed their hands. I’ll get you home.
Adoring smiles from both girls made her angry—at Archon.
A circular arrangement of holo-panels, each the size of a living room wall, hung in midair over the main information desk at the center of the terminal hub. Anna glanced up at a domed ceiling made of triangular clear panels, six or seven stories tall. Three levels ringed it, packed with more shops, restaurants, and places to entertain oneself while waiting for a departure.
Talis, at the side of the larger portion of their group, engaged in a conversation with an older woman who wore a cloth version of the security force uniform. Straight hair like burnished pewter ran to the middle of her back, and her expression looked stern, yet distant. Whenever Talis’s lips moved, the woman spoke into a comm, directing the security team, a puppeteer working her dummy.
Some of the kids who rode with Anna ran off to their parents or older siblings, who’d arrived in other vehicles. A few grumbled about Archon’s promise to bring non-psionic family along with them and wondered if anyone had gone to fetch them. The rest, younger teens who didn’t yet trust anyone, trudged over in a cluster. Meredith and Lucy continued pressing themselves against her.
“Alright, alright, alright,” Anna shouted, sounding frustrated and angry. “The lavatory’s this way. We don’t have all day. Damn tiny bladders. Alastair, please wait here with the group while I run them to the loo.”
“Aye, mum.” He fidgeted. “Be careful.”
Anna stormed off, dragging the girls behind her by a hand around each wrist. Every time that boy called her mum, she felt like Archon punched her in the stomach. The boy couldn’t be blamed for it; for him, she had only pity. She didn’t glance back or wait to see what, if any, reaction Talis showed. A telempath could read emotion but did not necessarily know where that emotion came from. Hopefully, her anger at what Archon had done to these girls would be mistaken for irritation at a pair of whiny brats demanding to go have a wee.
She followed blue holographic signs pointing the way to bathrooms until she could slip out of the dome hub to a smaller hallway. Empty ticket counters lined one side, interspersed with rental car booths. More shops lined the left wall, selling luggage, clothing, toys, and electronics—all of it quite a bit more expensive than it should be.
Only security officers remained, walking like a zombie patrol. They gave her suspicious glances but seemed to recognize her and did not stop to talk or question.
I don’t have to go. Lucy stumbled in her effort to keep pace.
Anna stopped, looking around. She peered down at the girls. Stay quiet and stay close.
They nodded in unison.
Anna reached out with her mind, linking to the sentience of three men and two women in security armor. Without the effects of Zoom clouding her mind, she found it a simple task to force their minds to disregard the trio. The children huddled so close to her, the three of them became one entity she could lift out of the troops’ consciousness. As good as invisible to the security team, Anna crept forward. It felt strange to use that ability for a noble purpose rather than breaking into a corporation to pinch trade secrets or befuddle a jewelry store clerk to nick a necklace she could sell for food. Is this how Aaron feels being with Division Zero? She pulled the girls close, guarding as much as hugging them.
Eight agonizing minutes later, she reached the end of a corridor where a short stairway led to a door that opened to a starport employee parking lot. No longer needing to concentrate on her power, she took the girls’ hands and hurried outside.
“You made them ignore us,” whispered Lucy. “Can you teach me that?”
“Maybe once we’re all back home… I think I’ll be joining you back in London.” If I survive this. Anna pulled out her NetMini and ordered a PubTran car. “Look, I don’t have a lot of time.”
“Why are you scared?” Meredith blinked. “You said we weren’t kidnapped.”
Anna looked downcast. “I think I might’ve been wrong.”
Small hands gripped her arm.
“I think I was abducted too.” Anna stared at the floor. “I… I just don’t know.”
“What’ll we do?” asked Meredith.
“There’s not much time. I have to go back. I dunno, maybe I can stop this before anyone gets hurt. Two choices. I can put you on a shuttle to London. There’s a man there I think I can trust. Hughes.”
Lucy shivered. “Agent Hughes is the one what sent us here.”
“Aye,” said Meredith. “He’ll arrest us again.”
Anna hugged them. “No, he won’t. He thought he was helping you, but he didn’t understand. Things have changed. He’ll take you to your parents. The other option is you can go to the police here.”
“I want to go home,” whispered Lucy.
“I’m scared to fly alone.” Meredith stared at her shoes. “I want me mum.”
A tiny grey and cyan car squealed to a halt. The side door hatch opened with a pneumatic hiss.
“Thank you for using PubTran Corporation for your transportation needs,” said a young, male voice, brimming with forced cheer.
Anna looked from the girls to the car. What am I thinking? Buying tickets for a flight to London and sending a pair of terrified kids with no identification on their own to a shuttleport? She cringed. Damn Old Bill for making me distrust the police.
“Come on.” Anna pulled them to the car and pushed them inside.
“You’ve been through a lot, be brave a little while longer.”
“Please state your destination,” chirped a cheery electronic voice.
“Take these children to the nearest Division 0 office. They’re victims of a kidnapping.”
“Summoning authorities,” said the car.
“No, it’s too dangerous here. You have to get them away from here. Take them to the police.”
The car ignored her.
“Dammit, how much will it cost to drive them to the police?”
“Emergency transportation service is available for three hundred credits,” said the car.
“Bloody mercenary trash.” Anna reached in, swiped her NetMini, and leapt back before the door shut on her.
Lucy and Meredith pressed themselves into the window as the car pulled away, both crying but with grateful smiles.
Anna held up a hand to wave. Tell them the truth about everything.
The girls nodded. They kept staring at her until the little car disappeared down a ramp to the street level.
Anna’s mind fixated on the expressions on the girls’ faces, a mixture of forlorn and hopeful, as the little PubTran car drove off. She trudged back into the starport, unable to get the image out of her head. She halted at the edge of the crowd, feeling a small bit of relief from the general sense of elation. The rest of the people there, from a starved-thin six-year-old boy taken from the German underground to a middle-aged Iranian man, seemed thrilled to be finally about to live Archon’s dream. As far as she knew, only Meredith and Lucy had families that wanted them in a country where they didn’t face death or incarceration for being ‘gifted.’ The refugees from ACC-controlled regions weren’t so lucky. They wanted to go off into space.
Anna squinted with sudden doubt of the sincerity of their joy. They seemed too happy at the prospect of leaving Earth in a stolen starship, with not a single experienced crewperson running it. It seemed no better than trusting a blind person to drive a bus, and yet they all brimmed with excitement.
Angel Descended (The Awakened Book 6) Page 50
