Ragnarok (36 page)

 

 

V
IOLET
WAS
angry. Angry at Alf, angry at herself. She stormed out to Special Arsenal 2 to pick up a razor-chain whip and practice against some meaty but nonsentient grown targets on the range. Shredding something that could bleed always made her feel better.

She reached SA2's door and kicked it open to reveal Tahir and Thokk having sex on a crate of field knuckles. They were shocked to see her and quickly covered themselves with their discarded armor. They separated, stood up, and quickly became annoyed at Violet's lack of flight.

Violet couldn't move. She was transfixed by the sight of them naked together, violently thrusting and bouncing. She felt an instant envy like nothing she'd felt before. It was animalistic, beyond that it was an all pervading stink as if the Geki of Envy had burst into the air before her. The image tore through her rational brain, the part that might have told her to get lost.

She stared at Thokk, thinking of her pale, spread thighs from a moment before. Her moans, the way she grabbed Tahir's back and pulled it in toward her again and again before they jumped up at the sight of her. She saw their faces, angry at her and shouting for her to get out. It all skipped over her head. She could only see their faces in ecstasy a moment before.

They were on the same team. It was possible, not only possible, but it had happened after only days. She was furious. It should have been her and Vibeke. Without question she should have been fucking Vibeke on that damn crate for the last two years.

“For the love of shit, Vi, get out!”

She had no intention of leaving just then. She walked straight in, grabbed a chain-whip, and made sure to stop by the door and thoroughly sign it out. She pressed the fingerprint button and spoke properly. “Violet from Valknut team checking out chain-whip zero one from special arsenal two, on October seventh in the two thousand, two hundred and thirty-second year of the common era at fifteen thirty-two hours and seventeen seconds.”

The two just watched her, Tahir going flaccid and Thokk staring daggers at Violet for it. Violet linked the light off and slammed the door on them, then marched to the meat range.

She ordered out a standard target and went to town, slashing meat off its sides, splattering blood on the walls and floor. She gave up on skill within seconds and went for power. She cut the target in half, then cut it from its hanger. She kept whipping, with all the anger she could muster, and that was a lot. She shredded the target until she was cutting into the floor without any semblance of form or aim, finally throwing the whip down at the target and walking away, cursing under her breath.

She shoved her way past an onlooking citizen and headed for the barracks. She threw the door open and walked in. Vibs turned to her, her face pale in the room's light, her roots glowing under the black, her mouth slightly open, surprised.

“Tell me I'm not a useless bloody idiot.”

“You're not! What happened, Vi?”

“Nothing.” She sat on her bunk, right next to where Vibs was standing. She was eye level with Vibeke's breasts, centimeters away. The image of Thokk's chest bouncing with every thrust flickered through her mind. Vibs didn't step back.

“What's wrong?”

“Things… things just aren't….” She exhaled. She couldn't even put it into words.

Vibeke looked her over, genuinely concerned. She saw blood spatter.

“Is that from the range?”

“Yeah, the range.” The useless range. There was too much anger, too much regret to whip out of a simple target. Because it wasn't anger and regret. It was lust. The image of them pounding away had Violet furiously aroused. She was sick of talk and dispute. Sick of Vibeke's insolence. Sick of restraint.

“Take off your suit.”

Vibeke feigned shock. She practically expected it of Violet at that point. What she didn't expect was the strike of heat she felt herself at being ordered to undress. Despite all the calm logic filling her head, the thought of doing as ordered occurred to her and held a sharp appeal.

“What?” Vibs took a breath and turned away. If Violet stopped, she'd be okay. It would go away.

Violet didn't stop. “I said take off your goddamn suit.”

Vibeke turned to face her. “For the hundredth time, that's not something we can do.”

Violet saw through her. “You want it too, damn it.”

Vibeke looked down. She couldn't look Violet in the eye just then. She spoke to the floor. “It doesn't matter what I want. I chose to be a Valkyrie, I chose this life for myself.”

Myself. Violet's anger boiled up again. She didn't even think to tell her that it was working for Thokk. Vibeke had said she chose it for herself. For
herself
.

“Then how about me, you selfish bitch? You can beat yourself up all you want, but you have no right to take it away from me.”

“I don't fucking belong to you! I don't
owe
you!” Vibs snapped back. Talk about selfish.

“Yes, you fucking owe me! I just saved the bloody fucking world. The least you could do is eat me out or something!”

“You're out of your mind. Just think about what you're—”

“I've thought about it for two years, Vibeke! I've thought about you and craved you. I've wanted you naked in my arms since I met you, and I'll go insane if I have to wait another second.”

“You are going insane, look at yourself. Look at yourself, Violet. A team can't work like this.”

“I don't give a shit! I just want you. Now. Just get in bed and—”

“Violet! Stop! It's not gonna happen.”

“I love you, Vibeke.”

“I don't love you, Violet.”

It wasn't true. Even then, Vibeke felt a force behind her chest telling her to give in. She could throw it all to the wind and give in. She could be in bed with her in seconds if she just gave in. It might be better for the team if she gave in. She wouldn't let herself think it. She had to get out of there.

Violet stared. She wanted to speak but had nothing to say, no words came. There were no words strong enough. She wanted to command Vibeke, to order her to act like she knew she should and walk straight back to her and kiss her and fuck her.

But she couldn't. Vibeke turned to leave. She was simply walking out. Walking away. Like a Valkyrie would ever walk away from a fight. Violet was beyond furious, beyond rage.

She grabbed Vibeke by the shoulder and spun her around and slugged her as hard as she could.

Vibeke was spun around and thrown across the room, completely unprepared for it.

Good
, thought Violet.
She's halfway to her bed
.

Violet ran her finger down the back of her own suit, undoing it and letting it slip off. No thought crossed her mind. She just pushed Vibeke the rest of the way onto the bed and climbed in after her. Vibeke squirmed, lying on her front. She was pushing to get back up. Violet grabbed her by the hair and held her facedown on the mattress, then ran her finger down the back of Vibeke's suit. It pulled open across her back.

Violet took a deep breath and kissed her skin, and it was like an explosion of warmth across her lips. For years she'd dreamed about kissing that skin, and it was beyond her fantasies. Her mouth open, she dragged her lips across her back, kissing her more, harder and harder.

“You're worse than Mishka,” said Vibeke coldly.

It pinched her ego, but Violet didn't care. She was too happy just then, too turned on to consider it fully. She was being bad again; she knew that much but couldn't possibly bring herself to care.

“Yeah, I am,” she replied. Let Vibs deal with that. She pulled Vibeke's suit farther down around her ribs and touched them with her free hand, moving closer to her bare breast, dying to feel it. To squeeze it as hard as she could. To hear Vibs whimper and moan and give in and ride her face until—

“You're worse than my dad.”

Violet froze. She was, wasn't she? Her dad never molested her, never raped her. Violet realized it was going to be rape. What was she thinking? She pulled away from Vibs like she'd been stung. She took a deep breath and tried to bring herself back to the real world. Had she even just done what she thought she'd done?

Vibeke propped herself up on her elbows, then sat on the bedside.
Violet couldn't look at her. She'd gone too far. Much too far,
incalculably too far. And she'd lost whatever scrap of Vibeke's heart she ever had. She was worse than her dad. Violet shuddered.

Vibeke stood up and walked toward the door, pulling up her suit. God, she'd started undressing her, kissing her. Violet felt sick. Vibeke turned around and faced Violet. Violet couldn't look up.

“You—you can't do this, Vi,” Vibeke said in a broken voice.

Violet had to look. She had to look her in the eye and say something. She looked up and saw Vibeke staring at her with a crushed cheek. She'd broken it, snapped her skull inward. It was black already and starting to swell. Violet gasped. She'd done that. How was she even capable of it? She tried to apologize, but nothing came out. Nothing was good enough, strong enough.

“I'm—”

“Nothing will ever happen between us, Violet. Nothing. Not ever.”

It hurt more than her knuckles, which she realized were also broken. She couldn't breathe right, something was grabbing her lungs.

“Vibeke, I didn't—”

“Shut up. Just shut up and get it through your thick fucking skull. We're never gonna kiss, we're never gonna fuck, and…,” she lied, “I'm never gonna love you.”

She walked out the door toward med bay. Another sob hit Violet in the chest. Tears started to cut their way out of her eyes. She was crying, for the first time she could remember. She was ashamed, of the tears and of all she'd done. She felt such shame that it choked her, that it took control of her breath and her face and contorted her into a sobbing weakling. She'd felt nuclear fire, and it was nothing compared to this. She screamed at the top of her lungs.

 

 

W
ULFGAR
WATCHED
as they threw the last man into the blender. He'd lost too many men bringing the Ares back, but it had to be done. Unfiltered, the Ares now took up almost eight times its original mass. Filtration experiments had failed. The water was now a part of the living tissue of the men who drank it. Without every cell they read .2 percent short. With the gore intact, the analysis read 99.999997 percent intact. Enough for Pelamus.

“But you promised more, Little Boots,” said Pelamus. “I let you attempt the Yakuza contract because you said you had the other half.”

“I said I know where it is, your giant glowing tree,” replied Wulfgar.

“Where is it?”

“Kvitøya. I was interred there briefly in a ravine containing the device.”

“Then you will seize that ravine and ready it for my arrival. Then your contract will be complete.”

“There will be expenses.”

“Invoice the YUP; they will be paid.”

“Very good. I have to admit, Pelamus, I'd have done that part for free.”

“I have to admit, I'm a socialist. When you're done, you can have the entire YUP and all our topside assets.”

“Thank you, Pelamus. I do hope you won't flood the planet as soon as I do.”

Pelamus signed out without replying.

Wulfgar had no desire to see the world end for the sake of his profit margins. His spies in Pelamus's sub were certain that he had no intent to activate the device. He'd not have brought the Ares back if he expected him to. So he offered a better contract than the Yakuza and proved himself by stealing the Ares before they ever approached it, and he did the deed that could end the world but did so with the utmost confidence he would be safe on the surface.

That didn't stop him from invoicing himself a ticket back to Venus just in case.

 

 

V
EIKKO
'
S
HALLUCINATIONS
shifted rapidly. Random at first but succumbing to the fear. From trees and cacti to the notion he was in lung surgery, then to the visions of a flood, to Violet and Vibeke torn open and burning in radioactive flames, to Risto.

“It's called a ‘Farnesene Pulse.'”

There was diseased flesh, the stink of rot, of rotting alive. Seafoam washed over him and seeped between his teeth, choking him with salt.

“
You can find Farnesene in apples. Do you like apples, Veikko?
”

“Yes,” he gagged, the answer forced out of him. Veikko couldn't breathe regularly. Air came in minuscule bursts. It was a prison whose bars were surgically impaled through him. But he remembered the Geki. The pain hit his teeth again.

“It's a fear pheromone in some insects. RAND weaponized it for humans.”

He thought he threw up but couldn't tell. He could hear, but he was blind, unable to feel with his hands. He tried to look, but all he saw was fear. It was visible. He could touch it. It stung his fingers and made him shiver uncontrollably.

“There's no defense against it. It seeps through airtight seals. It works in a vacuum. It inflicts fear with no escape. There is only one way out.”

“Death!” shouted Veikko. Then he heard a bloodcurdling laugh, a deep laugh. Laughter in the Geki's voice. It cut into his brain through his temples. Like an electric shock. Suddenly he realized he was blind because his eyes were closed. He tried to open them but couldn't.

“You build up an immunity to it in time. We had to. To be Geki, we spend months inside the fear. We ingest it, we become it. We become toxic but immune.”

Veikko opened his eyes. He shut them just as fast, leaving only the impression. The Geki stood before him. He was tied to a steep diagonal panel of some sort. But he must have been hallucinating. Behind the Geki he saw his parents, slick and gray, dolphin-skinned with giant eyes on the sides of their heads.