Chromed- Restore, page 21
part #3 of Future Forfeit Series
“I figure they should see that.” Harry waited. The trees stilled, settling, peace returning.
Constructs came around the building at a run. “Lace?”
“On it.” There was a pause, the remotes skidding on the soft ground, then they fell, like someone cut their strings. “That should buy you a little more time.”
Harry saw a man walk from the trees, clothing in tatters, but face bright. He smiled, like Harry was the best thing he’d seen all day. “Don’t think I’ll need too much time. Make sure the gate stays open, Lace.” A woman in her late teens joined the man, hurrying forward. Then a child, maybe ten. An old man, hunched but moving fast. A middle-aged woman. A fat man in his thirties. They came in ones and twos. “Make sure the gate stays all the way open.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Afterlife without Bonus Round felt plain wrong. Mason knew from Dee’s data bible Sadie ‘inherited’ Afterlife. She’d changed the vibe, lost the customers, and stopped playing. The new paint and lack of drink-buying people aside, it still felt like her place, just like it had when that asshole Eckers owned it.
People came here for her, and today was no different. Mason lost track of her at Metatech, Sadie slipping out one of the syndicate’s gazillion side doors. His credit was still good, so he used it to get an auto taxi here. Not to his apartment, which held nothing for Mason, but Afterlife, which housed everything he held dear.
Laia was at his side, eyes wide at the marvels of Heaven. Mason reminded himself the kid had only spent a short span of time on Earth. The seam on the back of her neck was hidden by hair. Her link was on, but Mason left her alone. All that time on Abinal taught him things, but one might be more important than the rest.
Privacy was important.
Here in Seattle it was in precious short supply. It felt as if every person in the known universe stood in front of him. Wherever he went, there was a human. Lounging, screaming, or walking, going about their lives, but everywhere. Mason missed the quiet of Abinal.
Reaching Afterlife was like getting hauled from an ocean of acid. He shook water from his coat, entering the bar. No Sadie. No Harry, either. Lace sat with her face buried in a console. Her link was hot, the encrypted chatter feeling the right volume and frequency to be a mission. They hadn’t looped Mason in, and he didn’t mind. He didn’t want to shoot people. Mason wanted Sadie. Dinner and a movie, that was the deal.
He didn’t know what mission Lace was orchestrating, but Mason didn’t mistake the bloody metal of link architecture on the desk beside her, cables snaking to her deck. You don’t need to know what the mission is. You trusted Harry enough to let him shoot you. This is where it brought you. Harry shooting Mason felt like a mistake at the time, but it didn’t feel like one now.
A woman Mason knew from the link lounged against the bar. Delilah. She offered Mason a nod, holding a bottle of liquor up. Mason shook his head. “Where’s Mike?”
“Out the back.” She looked down, like the words cost her something she didn’t want to pay. There’s history there.
There’s history everywhere. Mike was en route to Carter, then. First things first. Time to ask his dead friend why she spoke to him in his dreams.
Carter’s room was smaller than her last prison. She looked more spread out, and lesser in a way he couldn’t put his finger on. Laia trailed in Mason’s wake, eyes still round. Mason walked to a line of server racks, putting his hand on them. “Hello, Carter.”
Mason. I’ve waited so long.
“She’s … busy,” offered Laia.
“She’s dying.” Mason left his hand on the server. “Carter died once. I was too slow.”
“You were alone. You’re not alone anymore.” Laia joined him at the server rack, resting her hand against the metal next to his. The server housing was warm, vibrating slightly, the tremor of a panicked beast. Dee’s data packet said Carter fought for her life against a titan.
“Carter’s alone now.” Mason shook his head. “I seem to be in all the wrong places.”
“You’re where you need to be.” Mason turned at Nura’s voice. Eloi stood with her at the open door.
“How’d you open the door?” Mason glanced at the open door. So much for expensive biolocks.
“It wanted us to.” Eloi shrugged. “You couldn’t get the faith you needed there. You had to win it.”
“By there, he means Abinal. By faith, he means love.” Nura looked at Eloi, her face stern.
“They’re the same thing.” Eloi offered Mason a half smile, a quirk of the lips that looked shy and alone at the same time. “Your best friend is in the clutches of a monster. A devil made by people. The second side of a coin tossed in the air. Heads or tails. Salvation or damnation.”
“This is bullshit,” offered Mason.
Nura laughed. “I knew you were the right one.”
“I wasn’t so sure,” admitted Eloi.
“Shh,” said Nura. “You can choose. Die, or live. Salvation, or damnation.”
“Carter lives and we all go to heaven?” Mason shrugged. “I guess I’ll make that trade.”
“See?” Nura beamed at Eloi’s glower. “Exactly the right choice. For the right reasons. The right place, and the right time, with the right people.”
“It’s still bullshit.” Mason patted the server rack. I’ll be along soon, Carter. “Where’s Takahashi?”
Mike, it turned out, was wallowing in a muck of self-pity so deep it went past his head and right to the roof. At Mason’s knock, he got a muffled go fuck yourself, Dee. Mason sighed, tried the handle, and when it wouldn’t give, set his shoulder against the jamb, forcing it. The door popped off its hinges with a crunch of wood and tinkle of metal.
Mike shot to his feet, sidearm whipping around. Mason took the gun from Mike like taking a rattle from a baby and smiled. “Hey.”
“I could have shot you.”
“Not even on your best day.” Mason spun the sidearm around its trigger guard, offering it butt-first to Mike. “You dropped this.”
“Mason fucking Floyd.” Mike breathed in and out a couple times. “Like the ghost of Christmas past.”
“I’m more cheerful.” Mason looked around Mike’s small room. It smelled of stale liquor and staler human. He wrinkled his nose. “You going to stay in here all day?”
“I just might.”
“Fair enough.” Mason did a lap of the room. It didn’t take long, just four paces each way. “There’s a storm coming.” Mason tapped his temple. “The data packet Dee put together—”
“Fuck her.”
“Right you are.” Mason rethreaded his line of thought. This … issue wasn’t in the data packet. “Anyway. Laia,” he jerked his thumb at the girl waiting in the doorway, her mouth an O, “needs her brother. We came from another world to find him. I hear all evil distilled into a single company, and they’ve got him. We’re going to bust him out.”
“And?”
“I could use a hand.” Mason sighed. “Even on your worst day, you’re worth twenty others. No one I’d rather have at my back.”
Mike tossed himself to the rumpled bed, closing his eyes. “Pull the door shut on your way out.”
Homecomings were never what you thought they’d be. High expectations, but the people never changed. Or if they did, it was in unpredictable ways. Take Mike, for example. Solid asset. Did Mason a favor when there wasn’t a percentage in it, and that counted for a lot.
Now Mike was broken, and Mason didn’t have the time to fix him. He suspected there wasn’t enough glue in all the world to put him back together. He made Afterlife’s bar, Lace still working, Delilah still drinking. Mason made his way to Delilah, sitting across from her. Laia snuck beside Mason, grabbing a glass.
Delilah watched the girl, eyes drifting to Mason, the tiniest hint of surprise there. “I see how it is.”
“You really don’t. But you do know where we need to go.”
“I know.” She pushed the bottle to Mason, and almost as an afterthought, a glass.
Mason took the bottle, poured for him and Laia. Delilah’s surprise glimmered a shade brighter, but she nodded in understanding. It’s possible she saw enough as a fourteen-year-old to know when and why to medicate. Laia leaned her head against Mason’s shoulder, clutching her whisky. Mason smoothed her hair. “We need to get Zach.”
“You’re going to end up dead.”
“It’s a factor.” Mason sighed. “Never thought I’d make it this far. In our line of work, we tend to leave young, beautiful corpses.”
Delilah laughed. “Enough clinic time and we can make the dead look like Hollywood stars.”
“I could use a hand.” Mason looked at the back door, behind which waited Carter’s struggle and Mike’s sadness.
“You want me to die too?”
“You got something special you want to live for?” Mason sipped liquor. He’d missed high quality whisky. “Aside from the free alcohol.”
Delilah’s eyes grew distant, looking over Mason’s shoulder at a memory only she could see. “Not anymore. I mean, there’s always more work, but … I’m off the clock.”
“Ready to go?”
“I’m ready.” Delilah tossed back the last of her whisky, slamming the glass on the bar top. “Let’s rock.”
Delilah popped the cork on a van, the doors whispering open in welcome. Toyota-Mitsu, nothing fancy, but the aircon worked and it had a hard link for the driver. Mason almost forgot what the tech felt like right in his mind. He patted the Tenko-Senshin as he got in, the little weapon ready and waiting. His trip to Metatech rewarded him with fresh ammunition.
Mason drove. He wanted to see the city, feel it, and being at the wheel was one of the best ways.
Also, his overlay still spat proprioception warnings from the lattice. The mechanical act of driving wouldn’t hurt. The city slipped by. Most things looked the same, but a few changed. A noodle place he liked was gone, the front a charred hole. A new statue in front of a Reed office was tagged with graffiti.
The streets carried the lice of looters and rioters. Mason pointed at an angry clot. “What are they so pissed off about?”
“Not having enough.” Delilah shrugged. “Others having too much. It’s the same thing.”
“Why now?”
Laia leaned forward from the van’s rear compartment. “Because it’s time. Because they’re tired and hungry. Because it’s been too long with so little.”
Mason nodded. “I get that.”
“We can help them.” Laia shook her head at Mason’s questioning glance. “Not these ones here, but all of them. While the mighty battle, the little are crushed.”
“Always been the way,” agreed Delilah.
“Let’s stop the syndicate war.” Mason smiled. “Nice, easy job for my return home.”
Delilah snorted, and Laia laughed. The van hummed along, heading for Human Energetics, and the devil that waited inside.
Chapter Thirty-Two
The problem with being in charge was having to tell people to do all the things they should be doing. Austin didn’t like micromanaging. Not at all. In this instance, it might be fair; his legion of Masters didn’t know this planet from a bar of soap.
Austin wrinkled his nose. They might not know much about soap, either.
Seattle spread around HumanE’s tower like a neon blanket. Austin was on the fiftieth floor, well under the cloud layer. He needed perspective, an opportunity to see things how the little people did. Out there, with the wind and rain, the city glimmered like a thousand fluorescent diamonds.
Austin had about a hundred of the so-styled Masters with him, milling about, and generally looking useless. He’d fed them. Watered them, too. Austin even offered showers, which was a thing they didn’t understand until Ruby threw a few in. Complied and docile, they did his bidding.
The problem was their initiative was near zero.
And the challenge with near zero initiative? Doom was fast approaching, and he needed people who could turn risks into opportunities. Austin’s optics zoomed, picking up the telltale gleam of aircraft lights. The people at Metatech weren’t even trying to hide their assault.
For a syndicate used to fighting wars, he’d have thought they understood unwinnable.
Maybe in this instance, they were angling for the whole blaze-of-glory shtick. Whatever game they played, it needed managing, and he didn’t have the time to tell each Master individually what to do. Austin opened his link. “Goliath?”
“Hello, Austin.” The machine’s comforting rumble sounded like it was right behind his shoulder, a soothing balm.
“Is Metatech making an assault?”
“It appears so. They have a number of aircraft, even more ground vehicles, and a lot of agents.”
“Damn.” Austin rewound Goliath’s line. “Wait. Did you say agents? Not remotes?”
“There are a few constructs, but most of the enemy’s force is organic in nature.”
“Well, that’s not management thinking.” Austin clapped his hands together. “Okay. Let’s get them turned back around.”
“You would like me to unleash hell’s fury?”
Austin raised an eyebrow. “By that, you mean, would I like you to send the Masters against them?”
“Yes.”
“Please do.”
The Masters in the room filed to the door, trickling away. They’d join Austin’s defense team at the base of the tower, hundreds of willing slaves with auto rifles and Complied will who waited to shoot anyone who got too close.
Alone, Austin watched and waited. Cams around HumanE showed the Masters leaving the base of the tower, still as a clump, but now with purpose. They marched toward the approaching Metatech forces, rain slicking their HumanE uniforms. Not a one seemed to care, which was how it should be.
An aircraft two klicks out trembled in the air, then veered right, impacting a building in a bright blossom of fire.
Below it, a ground vehicle speeding through the streets turned its turret on an allied ATV. Hard, brilliant blue-white burst of plasma fire scalded the rain, melted armor, and holed the ATV’s power core, blowing it into pieces.
The chaos unleashed by those who controlled minds was awesome, Austin had to admit. If these Metatech freaks hadn’t guarded their links, he’d have a more direct route, but this was just as effective. Right to the base operating system, as it were. No hacks, no links, straight in and go.
A glimmer of orange-red from Austin’s right caught his eye. He watched as a bus, trailing fire and molten metal, arced through the air, smashing into the side of HumanE a mere ten floors below. Austin kept his cool. He zoomed optics, seeing a mass of unwashed peasants marching on his location. At their head strode a massive total conversion, the Metatech crossed sabers on its front a clear mark of who and what the fuck he was.
He pinged Ruby. “You busy?”
“Just getting some upgrades. What do you need, boss?”
That’s what Austin liked about Ruby Page. Merciless. A stone-cold killer, but one that liked her job. She didn’t need to be Complied. She wanted to make him happy, if happiness came in large caliber bullets. “The Masters we scraped from the boot of that backwater planet? They’re out fighting the Metatech main force.”
“You need me to give ‘em a hand?”
“No, nothing like that. Turns out Metatech learned tactics. They’re sending a smaller force of what I believe are telekinetics to my location. I’d like you to go and kill them all.”
“Sounds fair. What about the kid?”
“Send him to me.”
“You want me to send our high-functioning telekinetic to you, and not to fight the other telekinetics?” Ruby sounded confused. “He’s like our fifth ace.”
“I’ve got a hunch about this. Trust me,” Austin lied. He didn’t have a hunch. Austin was concerned she might not win against people with angelic powers and wanted Zach beside him in case it came to a last stand.
“Always do, boss.” She closed the link.
Austin watched the approaching zerg of telekinetics. His hope was Ruby could smash the total conversion, and the rabble would break and run. He could mop ‘em up later. If Ruby proved insufficient and they got close enough to the tower, his Masters would bring them under control. After that, Zach, and punch-driving the enemy to compliance. Regardless, there would be fewer Metatech opposition, and his forces would include telepaths and telekinetics.
The telekinetic rabble reached the perimeter of his forces. Austin watched as they worked, fascinated. The men seemed to make a big song and dance about lifting heavy objects. Trucks. Air cars. Power substations. Whatever wasn’t too tightly bolted down became a thrown weapon.
Once airborne, the women poured on special sauce. The improvised weapons became fiery, burning even under the rain’s onslaught. Metal melted. The air crackled with suppressed rage.
All in all, it was a good show.
The star act came when they reached his forces. Augmented HumanE enforcers fired on the approaching squad. Bullets bounced from invisible shields. Austin’s agents were hit by smaller objects, or their heads exploded, or other violent ends, all without leaving a mark on the enemy. My goodness. Did the blood burst from that man’s skin?
He shuddered. “Goliath?”
“Yes, Austin.”
“On second thought, maybe get the Masters to loop around. Ruby might need an assist.”
“Yes, Austin.”
Austin watched as his Masters began a slow return. While some co-opted vehicles, the rest were on foot. Confusion took control. They wouldn’t make it back before Ruby engaged. This is why I hate micromanagement! He would put initiative coaching in the company’s staff training and retention plan if he got the chance.
Speaking of Ruby, she ran at over seventy kilometers per hour, streaking toward the rabble. She made straight for the total conversion. The TC, for his part, looked like he was spoiling for this fight. The metal man raised an arm, and the telekinetics scattered. They ran for buildings, down into subways, and into alleys.
