The God Mars Book Three: The Devil You Are (18 page)

“Come! Quick!” she urges as I’m reassembling myself
(and pleased to discover I still smell like her).

“Trouble?” I want to know, but she won’t say, just
grabs her mask and pops the hatch.

She leads me on a merry (and it does seem merry)
chase down toward the floor of the dome, down toward the main
entrance, the bone path and the skull hill. I hear the sounds of
cheering, rising and falling, and I think I know what I’m running
into even before I clear the green to see.

I left Murphy. All night. In the care of blood
enemies.

In a circle of Cast at the base of the skull hill,
he’s having it out with Two Gun. The two of them are doing an
impressive job beating the hell out of each other. Both are quick,
skilled, brutal, smart fighters. They strike and kick and grapple
and throw each other around, blocking and countering, equally
matched. They use a combination of familiar techniques and
instinctive freestyle. Murphy’s managed to receive a bloody nose
inside his mask, but that seems to be the extent of the damage
they’ve done each other. It isn’t until I’m close enough to
intervene that I realize I don’t feel or hear the sounds of honest
rage or desperation between them. They both seem to be… having
fun?

Fera has a hold of my arm, stopping me, gesturing for
me to keep quiet. I look across the circle, see Mak, holding both
of their gun belts.

The throng cheers when Two Gun lands another solid
hit, and they both wind up on the ground hard. Then just as
quickly, they break from each other, drag up, circle, get their
breath. Lunge…

“He’s a good fighter,” Fera assesses as we watch.

Two Gun manages to get the better of Murphy, taking
him down, trying to choke him out with his legs, but Murphy’s wiry,
starts to get out of the hold, reverse it…

The cheering gets silenced by a new cry, and Mak
holds up a hand. This gets Two Gun to disengage, let Murphy go,
gesturing him to stop, be quiet.

“Hunter Killer,” Fera tells me, pulling me for the
green. Everyone scurries away like animals into the brush. I watch
their heat shapes move, fan out, hold. Then new shapes glow live
among them—I realize these are their heater-generated decoys.

Mak tosses Two Gun and Murphy their weapons as she
runs. I follow them as they scramble for cover, hunker, wait.

“Your pet has skills,” Two Gun whispers to me, out of
breath. Mak signals for him to be quiet.

I hear something unexpected: short bursts of
full-auto fire that sounds like a UNMAC ICW. Then a grenade blows
somewhere in the green. But I didn’t hear ASVs. Nor do I pick up
any Link chatter.

There’s a crunching of heavy boots coming up the back
side of the skull hill. I realize the area is probably in view of
Gardener’s cameras—the H-K were probably watching the “play” fight
between Murphy and Two Gun, trying to make sense of it (maybe even
thinking he might be getting initiated into the Cast
community).

A red H-A suit crests the hilltop, plants, scans.
Takes another potshot into the green.

“Murphy-7!!” Palmer’ s voice buzzes out of the armor.
“I’m here to rescue you!”

He doesn’t sound remotely sincere.

A spear flies at him, but he deftly dodges it, sends
back a burst of caseless rounds. I hear someone cry out, watch a
heat-shape scurry away limping, then fall. He’s managed to access
the suit’s heat imaging.

That’s enough of that.

I pull away from Fera, step out into the path. Get
shot at. Show him how easily I can block bullets. Then dodge a
grenade.

“
I want my gun back!
” he shouts at me like a
child.

“
I
have your gun!” Murphy shouts back,
stepping into view. But he doesn’t have the weapon un-holstered.
(But then Two Gun steps up behind him, both of his own revolvers
pointed steadily at Palmer.) “Let me guess: You couldn’t petition
Hammond-8’s gun, so you got creative, took one of the dead
Unmaker’s suits from Secure Storage.”

“I tried,” he confirms, sounding almost broken. “I
even petitioned to have
your
gun, but it was voted heirloom.
The whole service denied me. But this is better.”

“No, it isn’t,” I tell him drolly, turning my rage
into a more creative solution. I mimic MAI’s code, hack his
imaging, shut down his enhancements. Then his O2 feed. I expect
it’s beginning to get stuffy in that helmet. He raises his weapon
to send another grenade at us, but it won’t function. So I
explain:

“The suit and the weapon are AI controlled. You can
use them on manual, but an AI with access can override your
commands. Emergency protocols. Or I can.”

Since he’s not a UNMAC trooper, he doesn’t know how
to switch back to manual. He struggles with the ICW, trying to find
a way to make it work. Then he has to rip off his helmet just so he
can breathe and see.

I’m enjoying his panic when Fera decides he needs to
be more finally neutralized, flies up the hill in a blur of
crimson, slams Palmer with her whole body, takes him off his feet
and throws him head-first down the hill. She jumps down on his
chest before he can get off his back, aims her blades for his
now-unprotected face.

“No!” I stop her as Murphy runs forward. The moment
gets frozen: Palmer turtled in the stolen suit, Fera inches from
ending him, Murphy obligated to stop her…

“He’s still my partner,” Murphy tries. “He…”

A scream of wind interrupts us. The rafters of the
dome get slammed by a sudden storm. The sky goes dark and the air
gets hazy with dust.

I can feel the air around us charging, even before an
artificial lightning bolt arcs into one of the dome ribs. There’s a
deafening hum building up.

Fera has scurried off Palmer, though he hasn’t
managed to get up yet.

“Stay!” I try telling her (and everyone else), head
for the gateway hatch.

Outside, visibility has dropped to nothing—everything
is a thick ochre cloud. I consider putting my helmet on, but I want
him to see me, I step out where he can see me.

As quickly as it hit, the blow dies down, the dust
slowly clearing. Revealing a shadow in the sky. Then a shape. A
cross built of scavenged colony scrap, hundreds of meters long.
Hovering low over the dome.

I look at the open maw in the nose of the thing,
looking for signs of damage from the Shinkyo Kamikaze attack. I see
none. The railgun looks repaired.

The big ship is alone, though: no Zodangan airship
escorts—maybe that lesson has been learned. But the “wings” of the
cross are hung with dozens of the new light 4-wing pod
fighters.

Fera, Murphy, Two Gun and Mak are behind me despite
my warning. They pay for their curiosity when we all get scooped up
by magnetic lift and carried up, up over the bow of the flying
fortress (and probably intentionally, giving me a good look down
the “barrel” of the railgun).

After the impressive ride, we get set down on the
forward deck, pretty much right where I got myself “killed” last
time. Only this time, I don’t get kept waiting. There’s already a
platoon of black uniforms in rank to greet us. And Chang, standing
in the middle of them, perfect black silhouette, walking cartoon
shadow.

Faceless, he opens his arms as if to embrace me, but
doesn’t advance. Starts laughing. Leaves us all hanging like that
for too long.

“I’m sorry…” he eventually gasps out an apology of
sorts. “It’s… It’s good to see you again. Your old self. New self.
Like that. I…” He seems as flummoxed for coherent words as he was
the first time we met. “I really don’t know what to say. You
present an impossible mystery, Destroyer. You
can’t
be here,
not like this. But by all reason and science, neither can I. Seeing
Ra was shock enough… My enemy has a sense of humor, and apparently
more ability than even I feared…”

Now he steps closer, as if examining me, appraising.
He ignores my allies completely.

“This
is
you,” he finally agrees. “Makes
sense. But Ra?
Ra
?” Something about that amuses him. He asks
me: “Why
Ra
?”

“I don’t know,” I admit warily. “Why not Ra?”

He laughs again.

“You have your memories? You must have lost a few of
the more trivial files. Ra.
Ra
!” he says it like I should be
in on the joke. And I get vague images. Music. Wild performances.
Special effects. Silly costumes.

“Ra is a
pop star
!” he finally can’t wait for
me to catch up. “A ridiculous attention whore! Fancies himself a
serious artist? Models himself on a
sun
god? He has his
worshipers, granted, but he’s… You really don’t remember this?”

“Missing the trivia,” I deflect (though I am now
playing memories of some of Ra’s more popular performance
pieces—some of his compositions
are
catchy). Then admit,
hoping he’ll be forthcoming: “Including who sent me. UNMAC thinks
it was you. A trick.”

I really am amusing him.

“Now
that’s
a sense of humor,” he declares.
“Ultimate irony: He sends a pop star. And you—that part makes
sense. But you don’t know why or how or what… That
is
funny.
You have to see how funny this is.”

“Too many dead people,” I bring him down. “Tends to
kill my sense of humor.”

“Fine,” he accepts, sounding only mildly irritated.
“So: Why are you here? I mean
here
here: this ruin
specifically. Happy accident? Expecting me?”

“Looking for you,” I lie with a partial truth. “You
were headed east when we lost you.”

“But it’s not
we
anymore, is it?” he
criticizes, calculating. “I expect your old command is as scared of
you as they are of me. So: is this the new army? A few mortal
monkeys with pistols and knives? Best you could do in a pinch?”

His disdain at least tells me he didn’t come looking
for recruits. So

“Why are
you
here?”

“My people still need to eat,” he admits (though his
use of the word “still” is ominous at best). “And as for me, I need
to make sure nothing the old colony labs were working on has gone
wrong. Engineering life… Stupid, dangerous pride. Man trying to
play God…”

“Isn’t that what we did?” I confront him.

“See: You
do
remember. What we became. What
I’m trying to stop from happening again. We did play God. We even
started thinking of ourselves as gods. A whole world full of gods.
Some of us even named ourselves after our myths. But we both know:
‘Demon’ is the better word for what we became. Demon. Devil. Petty.
Selfish. Destructive. Sick. Even your wife—what was her name?
Didn’t she join one of those Live Guro cults? Wasn’t that why you
left her, let the marriage expire after only one contract
cycle?”

I feel pain. Simmering hate. I get flashes of memory:
blood and horror, nauseating. I push it away. He’s trying to get to
me. (He apparently
is
getting to Fera, who tenses to spring
at my side. I put a gentle hand on her to reassure, keep her
holding. The others are also waiting for whatever signal I may
give, however confusing this whole show is.)

“So now what?” he shifts when I don’t respond. “We
can’t hurt each other. We
should
be on the same side. Or we
could waste each other’s time.”

He may be right, at least about not being able to
permanently hurt him, and wasting time trying. So I decide to work
around the problem. I reach out, pick up his command signal—his
link to his ship—hack it. He’s a scientist. Brilliant. But my mods
are military, intel. I get in.

His ship creaks, starts to shift under us, tilts. I
can hear metal complain as I turn his lift and thrust systems
against each other.

“Really?” he dismisses me. Tries to get control back.
Fails. Decides “I guess we need a distraction.”

“Oooh. Pretty hair…” I hear a familiar voice, however
muffled through a helmet mask.

I turn. Just as before, Bly has appeared behind me:
Medieval armor, black surcoat, bug-skull helmet with silly dragon
wings. Broadsword that gutted me.

“I wouldn’t,” I warn him, not letting go of the ship.
“Last time was Chang punishing me. This time he’s handing you to me
to see what I’ve got. You’re expendable, just like all the rest of
your people.”

He doesn’t give ground, either doesn’t believe or
doesn’t care.

Just to add to the distraction, Chang’s troopers
bring their guns up. I fully expect Chang would be smiling if he
had a visible face.

I feel Two Gun and Murphy get ready to draw. Mak
fills her hands with knives. I start to warn them: “Keep low,
I’ll…”

But Fera springs forward, flies into Bly.

“NO!!”

I can’t reach her to stop her. She manages to block
Bly’s sword, slams him across the faceplate and sinks her
right-hand blades into his neck between visor and bevor, twists,
digs. He barely staggers, grabs her by the hair and pulls. She
doesn’t scream. She kicks. Slashes. Bly twists, spins, throws her
free of him, follows with his blade. It catches her across the
stomach. I watch it lay her open. She flies back. Hits the deck
hard. Slides over the edge. Gone. There’s blood on the deck where
she hit…

I’m running at him when Two Gun draws and shoots him
in the face—this barely fazes him—but I’m on him, drawing my own
sword, slashing and hacking, a whirlwind. Cleaving his armor like
wood. He manages to block my blade once, and it almost takes the
sword out of his grip. I chop his blade—like I did the first time
we met, like he did back to me the second—and it complains but
doesn’t break. A second hit takes it out of his hands. But his
armor is already repairing itself. I hit him in the back of the
knee, where he has no plate—it doesn’t sever the limb, but I can
feel things pop and snap and he goes down. I do similar damage to
his arm, then aim for his neck…