by S A Asthana
“I will take her out.” He was a student trying to please again, a pupil sitting in the front row, taking notes diligently and nodding along to the headmasters. Nothing had really changed. His wings were still clipped. Hell, they’d been ripped out. There was no real power in his title.
“You will do that, even if it means laying New Paris to waste,” the child said. He sounded like a stubborn brat. That face was more pronounced now somehow, or was that his imagination? Maniacal eyes. The teeth seemed too pointy. All incisors. “Do this swiftly and efficiently, and you will have redeemed yourself in our eyes. Fail, even partly, and there will be consequences.”
“Yes, I think I c—”
Frank was cut off by the first ghost who boomed like Zeus of old. “We do not expect you to think—we expect you to execute, human.”
The floor vibrated under Frank’s boots. He shut up and saluted, face red, but the phantoms disappeared before his hand could make it to his head. The blue eggs were black once more.
There will be consequences. No thinking, just executing. A mere human. These threats and assessments were familiar. They’d been leveled against him increasingly in the past few months. Frank stood motionless for several heartbeats, his right hand remaining at his temple. It was hard to fathom, but Port Sydney had officially declared war on New Paris. For the first time in one hundred years, one colony was going to attack another. A single bead of sweat worked down his long nose and when it arrived at the tip, dripped onto a large wet spot on his neatly pressed uniform. The butterfly’s wings were continuing to disrupt the Solar System all because of Bastien, the righteous buffoon.
∆∆∆
An hour later, Frank was back in the massive docking bay. Cube stood at alert with a hundred Alpha unit soldiers lined up in neat rows behind it. All eyes were on the General. With back straight, he shouted, “Okay, listen up, soldiers! We have a clear task ahead of us. Kill Marie Dubois, the so-called Queen of New Paris.”
The soldiers bellowed, “Yes, sir.”
Feeding off their energy, Frank continued, “She is a threat not just to her own people, but to the entire Solar System! Her downing of our vehicle proves it! She shot the first salvo, and now, we will respond. You will rain Martian hell-fire on her.”
“Hurrah!” The soldiers raised their Shift X assault rifles into the air. The men and women were fueled by pure adrenaline, charged for the attack. Some thumped their chests, sounding dull thuds against the skintight armor underneath their camo.
“This operation will be no different than those last year when we sought out and destroyed the Gemini pirate fleets.” Frank was careful not to call the new retaliation a war. That term had a debilitating texture. He didn’t want these men and women overwhelmed by the prospect of their upcoming actions. They would figure it out soon enough. Drawing parallels to past operations felt right for the sake of his soldiers. He put extra weight on his final words to them. “You will be liberating Parisians from a living nightmare. Take pride in your efforts.” He did what needed to be done. He said what was needed to get things done.
Cube took a heavy step forward. “General, we are deploying the top tier of the Alpha unit for this mission. They are ready.”
“Good. How about the tanks?” Frank surveyed the men and women with a thin smirk.
“We have three TopGunner tanks aboard the 1.V10 already.”
“Excellent,” Frank noted as he brushed a lock of white hair back into its designated place. “Run your plan by me.”
Looking down at the superior, Cube started, “My team is aware of New Paris’s layout. We will land over the city’s East District, Marie’s personal quarters, and blow our way down into the sewers. From there, our objective is clear—wipe out any resistance as we make our way to her. Once she is neutralized, we secure the East District and set up base. At that point, New Paris will be within control. We are projecting a twenty-four-hour completion time.”
“I want it completed in half the time,” Frank snapped.
“General, that'll add extra load on the operation. It was not part of the calculations.”
Frank shot Cube a steely stare, and with his square, clean-shaven jaw jutting forward more than usual, barked out, “I don’t like repeating myself.” He sounded like the thundering High Council somehow, as if he was a physical extension of their methods. Was that how he was viewed by his subordinates?
“Disregard that concern,” Cube said. “Operation will be completed in twelve hours.”
“Very good.” Frank placed his hands on his hips. “I have full confidence in you and I am sure you will not let me down. Otherwise there will be consequences.” The robot nodded subserviently. “Get going then. Report results when finished. For the High Council!”
Cube nodded. “For the High Council!”
The robot’s about-face to the Alpha unit was smooth as if it’d swiveled on wheels. The soldiers clicked their heels in response. Their lead continued, “Operation Liberate New Paris commences now. Board craft.” Mechanical and firm. But still monotone.
Soldiers turned row by row like a well-choreographed dance team towards the 1.V10 docked a short distance away. They boarded single file through its expansive cargo hatch. A voice came on the bay’s speakers and boomed over the stomps of boots. “Ten minutes, eleven seconds remaining for launch. Please evacuate the docking bay if not departing.” The voice was Lieutenant General Smith’s, the softness familiar to Crone.
Perhaps she might have been a better choice to lead this attack. Frank watched Cube like a hawk. The robot stood at the back of the line. Frank wanted to believe in its abilities, but he had doubts. After all, Cube had not been successful in bringing back Bastien. Sure, it wasn’t necessarily the robot’s fault, but the failure was there.
As Cube disappeared into the 1.V10, Frank exited the bay and walked into an adjoining control room, one outfitted with over a hundred monitors. Lieutenant General Smith sat at one but came to attention at the sight of her superior. Frank motioned for her be at ease. She went back to communicating with the craft’s pilot through one of the green displays in front of her. “Open entryway.”
A hatch door slid open in the bay’s roof just above the craft revealing a deep, otherworldly orange sky. As the Martian atmosphere leaked in, fans spun wildly along the walls, filtering away toxic elements. Despite their effort, Frank could still smell the familiar Martian stink—the planet smelled like rotten eggs. Why did we want to terraform this again?
The 1.V10 came to life with a low mechanical din. The control room’s walls vibrated and a familiar rumble pulsed under the floor. What a beauty. Blue lights lit up the sides of the craft one by one, signaling its readiness. Smith leaned into a microphone and instructed, “Disengage battery charge.”
A long wire with an adapter at the end disengaged its clamp from an inlet on the craft’s side. It retracted like a snake, the soft outer covering sliding against the floor and working back into an outlet in the wall. 1.V10s, like all other Martian spacecraft, juiced their batteries from solar energy harnessed by the facility’s outer wall panels.
“Power on,” Smith said.
The spacecraft rose slowly as if it was a feather, leaving the floor underneath without a trace of smoke. The ion propulsion engines processed what little waste they produced internally, recycling it into more energy. They were effectively self-perpetuating systems after the initial charges provided by their battery packs. One of the many ironies of modern humanity was its lack of waste and pollution. It had only taken an all-out nuclear holocaust to achieve the efficiency.
The 1.V10 disappeared out the bay door and became nothing more than a blip on radar screens in the control room. The General’s stare lingered, his thin lips pressed together so tight that blood had stopped flowing to them. The High Council’s words echoed in his ears— fail, even partly, and there will be consequences. A security camera whizzed in the corner, its black lens focusing on Frank’s back.
CHAPTER 18: MARIE
Marie stood atop a large stone pedestal and surveyed her soldiers like a teacher taking stock of students. There were a thousand men, all packed tightly into a single chamber. Each stood alert with arms by the side and feet planted firmly on the ground. Their helmets were off, the whites of their eyes visible. They were scared, unwashed children. Just to Marie’s liking. She didn’t care much for loyalty. Fear was a mightier fuel, after all. Loyalty allowed room for questions and objections. But fear did not. Gods didn’t need objections and other such inconveniences. Divinity was beyond reproach.
Marie was no guru leading followers to a better life. She fancied herself more a deity requiring sacrifice. A divine being similar to those in antiquity, under whose watch the populace lived with constant dread. Her kingdom unfolded where peasants were afraid of angering their destiny’s ruler—the world she’d wanted, the world she’d built. She couldn’t help but beam with pride.
Commotion disturbed the room when a girl of no more than twelve was dragged in by a loup. She twisted and flailed. “Pitié! Please, I don’t wanna die.”
The guard slapped the child and threw her to the floor. There she cowered into a fetal position, her eyes swollen shut. Loups formed a semicircle around her and turned their heads to Marie for direction.
The queen’s plastic face held a wicked smile tight within its grasp. She stood in a flowing black antique gown, a robe à la française, its lacy cotton skirt encrusted with tiny, shimmering diamonds as if stars to a dark night. Her six tentacles snaked around her head like a gaudy Medusa. The hair was pulled back into a bun tight enough to tug up the corners of her eyes. It would have made a finely crafted façade had it not been for the trails of dried mascara staining her cheeks, and the red residue, remnants of euphoria, caking her lips like a narcotic lipstick.
“Oh, sweet child,” Marie shouted down to the girl, like a fashionable demon. “Don’t cry, my dear. Don’t cry.”
The child whimpered in terror just like all the other children that had come before her. They were so easy to terrorize. Meaningless little pieces of flesh. Didn’t they know how worthless they were?
“Do not think your death will be in vain.” Marie’s arms were held high for effect, her smile so broad it could rip apart any second. “No. It will deliver us, this city and its people, through the challenge that looms large ahead. You’re lucky to be the chosen one. You, my sacrificial lamb.”
The child wrinkled further into herself, her limbs trembling uncontrollably. “Please, please, my goddess, don’ kill me. I don’ wanna die! I have a lil’ brother. He’ll have nobody if I die.”
“What?” The Queen cupped a hand to her ear as if straining to understand the child’s plea. She’d understood every last word. The children always whined the same in their last moments. There was always some sibling or invalid father or whatever that needed help. Petty excuses. Couldn’t they understand the important role they were playing in New Paris’ destiny? Ungrateful little shits.
“Please, I don’ wanna die.” The girl whimpered, her button-nose red.
“Louder! I can’t hear you.” Marie cackled impishly, drawing her fingers across her lips like a mischievous clown. She could barely contain her excitement over what was coming next.
“I don’ wanna—”
Marie decapitated the child with a tentacle. The small head rolled to the foot of a soldier, a boy not much older than the sacrifice. His face froze. All eyes were upon him as he confronted this test. Would this child do what was needed, or would he shrivel at the responsibility that lay at his feet?
The boy puffed out his sunken chest, picked up the head by its unwashed hair and held the twisted features high. “Our sacrifice will make us untouchable.”
“A la bataille!” His peers snarled like wolves, their lips curling back to reveal rotting teeth. Marie flashed a rabid smile as her tentacles snaked downward one by one and secured the headless corpse within a metallic grasp. The body, its twitching limbs and severed arteries, was raised for all to see. A thrashed rag doll.
“I bless you all with the sacred blood of this sacrifice,” Marie shouted at the top of her lungs. “It will make you strong.”
She swung the corpse wildly from side to side. A crimson stream sprayed from its wound in blind spurts and the front line of soldiers rejoiced in the splatter, baptized by blood. They held up their red palms, breaking into prayer. “Je vous salue, Marie, pleine de grâces, le Seigneur est avec vous.”
Her eyes widened in satisfaction, their whites crisscrossed with red veins. Pray to me! Her tentacles released the corpse and let it fall back to the ground like a useless sack of mud—its job was done.
I am a giant. I can crush anyone or anything that attacks me. Belle, Cube—everything. A God with no fear!
Holding up her right hand, she shouted, “The Sydneysiders come for me! They are emboldened by their lust for power. They are jealous of our kingdom, and they want it for themselves! But we will not let that happen! You will not let that happen! You will protect your goddess.”
The loups roared in agreement, “A la bataille!”
“We need to be prepared.” Marie raised a fist into the air. She was suddenly Joan of Arc. “Who can I count on to take over Hafiz’s position and man my army?”
The soldiers shouted amongst themselves like baying wolves. From somewhere deep within the pack a thick voice boomed, “I will.”
All eyes honed in on a rock of a man. The soldier loomed large over his peers at almost seven feet, his shoulders twice the width of those of Hafiz. He removed his helmet to reveal a block of a skull, shaved and tattooed with the city’s wolf emblem.
Marie’s eyes drew on him like thin slits. “What's your name, warrior?”
“His name is Viktor,” several loups replied. The man had a small sloped forehead, wrinkled and leathery. A monolith towering above a sea of stones, a tower that had seen its fair share of action.
Marie wiped blood from her nostrils with the back of her hand. “And why should you lead my army, Viktor?”
Silence pierced the room. The question was his to answer alone. The man pushed forward through his peers, his mass leaving gaping jaws in his wake. Once at the pedestal, he bent to one knee and with eyes to the ground replied, “I have your army’s loyalty.”
“So what?” Marie pressed, wanting to test this boulder. She swatted his response with her hand. “So did Hafiz.”
“I wouldn’t have died at the hands of Cube.” Viktor slapped a fist into his right hand. His black eyes locked with Marie’s. The confidence was admirable.
“Hypothetical,” she countered. “There’s no way to prove that one.”
Viktor stood slowly without removing his gaze like a giant muscle rising from the earth. Marie flashed an expectant grin. What could he possibly say now?
“I can take care of you in ways Hafiz never could.”
A gasp ran through the loups. All eyes fell on Marie. Would she approve?
She took a deep breath and nodded. Viktor would do, a man strong and brave, among other things. The Hafizes and the Bastiens of the world were a forgotten memory to her, mere tools discarded after their use. A new, improved trinket stood in front of her.
If it's a war the Martians want, a war they will get. Let the High Council see once and for all I am a real goddess, the true leader of New Paris.
CHAPTER 19: BELLE
Belle fell to the ground, exhausted. New Paris was close, but it was the longest mile ever trekked. Steep dunes and shifting sands didn’t lend well to long walks. Her calves were on the verge of splitting.
A blue palette bled in from the horizon and spread across the night sky like a lazy tide. The morning sun peeked from behind distant dunes, its sliver of yellow becoming larger by the second. Soon its heat would overwhelm the landscape.
“So damn beautiful,” she remarked. “Such a shame we destroyed it all.”
Bastien plopped down a few feet away. He sighed while tightening the shirt around his leg wound.
“We are destroyers. That’s what we do. Monsters who build only to tear down. And we’ll do it again.”
Belle chewed on his words. She wanted to believe in humanity, in hope, but it got harder as the years went by. Bastien was right.
He added, “World War Three wasn’t the exception to the rule. It was the rule.”
The bleak outlook of a fugitive on the run, someone grappling with their demons. “It took thousands upon thousands of years for man to crawl out of caves and build civilizations,” he said, “but only an hour to bring it all crashing down.”
Right again. The last world war had lasted only fifty-eight minutes. Everyone in the Solar System knew the story. It was the mother of all stories. Some had heard it from their parents, others from teachers. An atomic warhead was detonated over the United Empire of America on Christmas morning. The culprit remained unknown. The holy capital, Washington, District of Christ, had been annihilated within seconds.
The superpower hadn’t taken the attack lying down. Its response had been swift and paranoid as its nuclear arsenal elements rained down all over the world. The deadly green fogs, sliding around the deserts, were also America’s doing.
Those with the means, the Japanese and the Australians, had left for their fledgling colonies on the moon and Mars, respectively. These new homes were expanded into what they were today. Powerhouses. But those who couldn’t escape, like Belle and Bastien’s ancestors, had stayed behind and dealt with the nuclear fallout—dark nights that stretched for years, radiation, massive extinctions of species and cities. It was a miracle New Paris even existed. It would be a shame if it too would be destroyed.
Belle’s face went long and her back curved. Bastien sat with his back straight. Despite cuts and bruises, there was something unbreakable about him. He was shirtless, his lean, muscular physique on full display under the morning’s glowing light. The chiseled jaw and nose cut a fine profile. He was a tall porcelain statue, a military frame at its finest. His broad back and triangular form were a marvel. Belle forced away her stare and focused on the sky.
