The Malice (12 page)

Exertion soon takes its toll on old wounds. Duet pauses, leaning heavy on the wall. She raises a hand to her visor, letting her head drift down, taking its weight. Grief grumbles from deep within, threatening to wake. She takes a deep breath, swallows, and looks up.

Vesper is there, one step above her, hand held out as open as her face.

‘What?’ growls Duet.

‘Let me help you.’

‘I don’t need …’

Fractionally, Vesper’s hand lowers. ‘I, I didn’t thank you for saving me, and before that, in Sonorous. There were so many of them and you stood up to them all.’ Their eyes meet. ‘I owe you everything.’

Duet’s frown trembles. Another deep breath, another swallow. She grabs at Vesper’s hand, a quick, rough gesture. ‘Come on. Let’s climb.’

Together, they make their way up. The kid skips down to meet them, bleats, skips up again.

At the top, the ground is mercifully flat and good progress is made. The rocky ground gives way to fields of wild crops. A sudden explosion of life, the giant stalks sprout manically for miles, pale yellow, aspiring to be trees.

They plunge inside, and fall down onto ground a step lower than expected. Soon the world becomes a series of bending bars, fibrous, bowing to make room for more. An unending vista of gold. Often they stop to check their position with the Navpack and breathe deep of the blue square above their heads.

Beneath their feet the soil is thick and dark, rich and squishy. Vesper hears crunching and looks down. Tainted things squirm in the mud, a writhing cluster of cockroach shells. Where the girl’s passing has flipped them over, a pink underbelly is revealed, sickeningly soft, featureless.

Ahead, the stalks part to reveal the resting place of an old Auto-farmer. One of the last, for years its bladed arms have hung still while legions of creatures investigate, making homes among its wires, tucked safe behind plates of steel. Earth and machine blend together, one seeming to grow out of the other.

Flowers sprout from its cracked eyes, roots twist about metal toes.

Vesper stares at it for a long time.

Duet notices, stops. ‘What is it?’

She smiles. ‘It’s beautiful, don’t you think?’

‘No.’

‘How do you know? You haven’t even bothered to look.’

‘Yes I have.’

‘No you haven’t!’

She grits her teeth. ‘This is stupid.’

‘Just look. It won’t take long.’

‘Fine.’

She glances at it and mutters agreement, keen to move them on. In places they push the stalks aside, in others they step around them. The kid stays close, sneezing often.

Vesper nudges Duet. ‘What did you think?’

‘Of what?’

‘You know.’

‘Oh, it was …’

‘What?’

‘Different.’

‘Different?’

What little patience there is evaporates away. ‘What do you want me to say? What do you want from me? It was a broken machine. So what? It won’t help us survive, it doesn’t even work.’

Against all sense of self-preservation, the girl smiles.

‘Why do you keep staring at me? Oath or no oath, if you don’t get that smile off your face, I’ll kick it out!’

The smile gets broader still. Vesper holds up her hands as Duet advances towards her. ‘I’m sorry. I’m not laughing at you, I’m happy for you.’

‘What are you talking about? Make some sense, damn you!’

‘Your speech. Since Sonorous, it’s been broken but now that you’re angry with me you sound natural again.’

Duet stops and slumps against the foliage. Thick stalks sway but don’t fall. Hands cover a face covered by a visor. She tries to breathe, tries to swallow it down but this time the grief is too strong. Tears come, thick and fast, misting her visor, misting the world.

For years, Massassi roams. She samples food, samples bodies, takes what she wants, breaks what she wants. She is young, angry and, for the first time, free.

Without forcing it, she gets stronger. She sees the light in everyone now, sees their true faces without trying, hears their voices stripped of pretence. People quickly bore her. Each new acquaintance robbed of mystery, just another animal with nothing special to say.

Pleasure is pleasure, however, and she enjoys travelling, exploring the contours of the world. Unrendered food is a particular high.

Mostly, she forgets about the chink in the sky but as time passes she finds it bothering her more and more. Like a stone in her shoe it is trivial yet omnipresent. The feelings recede as she travels north but after a month or two it returns again, and her stomach clenches.

At first, she tells herself that she notices because she has become sensitised. Then she tells herself it is because her new senses are more powerful now. At last, she admits the truth: Whatever is wrong is spreading, getting worse.

Perhaps it is boredom that makes her go south, perhaps it is a late blooming sense of duty or an itch that demands scratching, but south she goes. Jump boots propel her along, their design an affront to all her old safety regulations. Between them and her glider, she makes quick work of the journey.

Massassi arrives at a quarry. A handful of people watch over automated loaders and mining mechs. Scores of tools rise and fall together, regular, tireless, while vehicles rush about clearing the growing piles of rock.

Neither machines nor overseers attend to her arrival. The disinterest is mutual. Massassi focuses on the sky. She sees it, ordinary, cloud painted, part blocked by smog from nearby factories. But she also sees more, the film of blue reality stretched thin like a boil, filling with an alien pus. Directly above the quarry, the sky is folded, as if being pressed towards the ground, a giant inverted pyramid, roots hidden well above the horizon, its apex somewhere within the earth.

She glides closer, careful not to touch it, and spirals slowly down. The tip is not within the quarry itself, not yet, though the diggers aim that way. Massassi lands, boots hissing as they absorb the impact. She detaches her glider, planting the two halves into the ground before the wings have fully retracted and begins to dig.

Before long she finds it: the narrowest point, sharp and focused. But then she finds it is not the end. Beneath her, the sense of wrongness widens again, as if the point she has discovered is not the tip at all, rather the meeting place of two pyramids, one on top of the other, mirrored forces, trying to push into the world. The point she has found is the place of greatest pressure. It is not under the dirt, not literally. Normal geography does not apply. The thing Massassi sees is out of phase. There is no space for it to be here, yet the pressure continues to build.

Sooner or later, something will give.

She reaches out with her metal arm. Silver light spills out as the iris in her palm opens. She hesitates. There is nothing in the world that scares Massassi now but this is something else, something not in or of the world. It is bigger than her.

In spite of this, perhaps because of it, she makes contact.

A line cuts through fields of crops, three metres wide, stretching from the eastern coast to the western one. In places, it is broken by remains of man-made structures. Once a wall of light stood here, holding back the spread of taint, now it is gone. So have the trains that used to link it to the north, so have the magrails that powered them. Scavenged, buried, stolen or eaten, integrated into a hundred new ecosystems.

Vesper steps into the space, stretches her arms.

On the other side, giant crops continue but are made to compete for dominance. Thick runners drape across the yellow stalks, excreting spore clouds from little holes in their knobbly flesh. Branches like hands sprout from the ground, choking the life from other plants. Among them insects hang heavy in the air, rat-sized, their bellies swollen with blood.

The girl shudders, turning up the collar on her coat, wrapping arms and clothing around herself, tight. Duet hangs back, only exposing enough of her face to peer along the open channel, first left then right. The kid bounces past her, past Vesper, crossing the space with enthusiasm.

Hooves connect with something hidden.

An old cable tightens, snaring legs, bringing the kid to the ground with a thump. A trap set by the First’s hunters. Vibrations travel along its length, rapid, determined and half a mile away, a bell sounds, prompting unseen forces into action.

The kid makes his own sound, less subtle. It is clear he finds his predicament unacceptable.

‘I told you we should have traded it.’

‘Quick,’ says Vesper, racing towards the kid.

Duet’s reply is whispered from cover. ‘Leave it!’

‘You can’t say that!’

‘I can. Whoever set this will be less likely to follow us if they get a meal.’ She meets Vesper’s eyes as the kid squirms against his bonds, bleating, desperate. After a moment Duet breaks away, abandoning stealth, cutting the kid free.

He springs up and turns a quick circle, happy again.

Duet scowls, remaining uncharmed. ‘We’d better get moving.’

They run on, quickly swallowed by the fields.

Vesper is distracted by the abundance of life. Unknown creatures hang like fruit, waiting for night to come. Strange things moan under the earth, sliding worm-like through soil where swollen flowers grow, their stalks so bloated they almost fold in on themselves, their colours too pale, washed out.

Duet grabs Vesper’s hand and pulls her along, always forward, cutting a path where necessary.

Often, Vesper glances behind her. She sees movement, buzzings and crawlings, but no hunters. ‘Shouldn’t we try and hide our trail?’

‘No chance. The ground is too soft here. Our best option is to outrun them.’

‘Okay. Do you think we can do that?’

‘Not if we keep talking.’

They run on until breath becomes ragged. Eventually, though, they have to stop, weighing wasted time against the need to rest. Sweat glistens on Vesper’s head and neck, attracting attention. Some of the insects are too big to fly. Instead they jump from tree to tree, armoured monkeys, gangling, with bladed faces and gemstone eyes.

On the girl’s back, the sword hums, restless.

At the sound she looks up to see tainted insects all around her, hanging, four to a stalk.

The kid tucks himself behind Vesper’s leg.

Wings thrum all around them.

None move to attack.

Seconds pass, tense, Duet with her sword ready, Vesper with her gun.

The swarm watches them. Within a score of labium, proboscises quiver.

Duet steps forward, sword raised and the swarm fall back, maintaining distance. She steps forward again, testing. Once more, the swarm retreats. With growing confidence, she advances, pulling Vesper with her. Bulbous, faceted eyes fix on the girl and the goat.

She keeps her sword arm extended and herself between predators and food, increasing pace.

The swarm allows her passage, falling back in a rough line.

They walk on, nerves tight. Weapons are lowered but not put away. The action elicits a hum of excitement from the swarm.

Vesper glances about, eyes wide. ‘What are they doing?’

‘I don’t know,’ replies the Harmonised, blinking angrily at sweat collecting behind her visor. ‘But I wish they’d get on with it.’

One of the swarm swings closer. Duet raises her sword again. It springs back.

Still further they go, stalked by the swarm. Whenever heads droop or steps falter, the swarm inches closer. When Duet or Vesper realises, they snap back to attention and the swarm gives ground, though never quite as much as before.

Back and forth, back and forth, like a sinister dance, playing out to its inevitable conclusion.

When Duet finally speaks, her voice is dulled but firm. ‘They won’t leave us alone until they’ve had their fill.’

Pale faced, Vesper nods.

‘I’m going to give them your goat.’

‘You can’t!’

‘It’s that or I sell myself to them. Unless you have a better idea.’

The girl frowns, thinks. She looks around for inspiration. After a moment, she shakes her head, bitter. ‘Okay.’

‘Maybe we were right to save it after all.’ Duet raises her sword.

The kid looks up at the girl, cute, oblivious.

‘Wait! Don’t do it yet.’

‘Why not?’

‘I … Just give me some time to think.’

‘We have to do this now. Get away while they feed.’

Vesper’s eyes flit towards the kid and away, unsure if it is best to watch his end or not. She decides it is nobler to look. Changes her mind. Changes it back. Tears threaten to come. The swarm creeps a little closer. ‘Okay. Do it.’

Duet nods, raises her sword swiftly …

And all at once, the swarm disperses, buzzing away into the darkness.

Silence pours in after them, shocking and sudden. But not pure. From behind them hushed feet approach. One of them missteps and a shell cracks underfoot, thunderous.

Girl and Harmonised exchange a look, speaking as one. ‘Run!’

Fatigue forgotten, they flee. Vesper stumbles, nearly falls but momentum keeps her on her feet. Duet keeps pace, one hand pressed against her side while the kid follows, mouth open, delighted.

Behind them, unknown hunters give chase while all around, the inhabitants of the yellow forest choose whether to run or hide, to watch or pursue.

The point where the pyramids touch is small, small enough for Massassi to curl her fingers around it, enclosing the distortion in her fist. From her open metal palm, her essence shifts, exploring, sensing.

The divide between dimensions is thin here, stretched to breaking point. But even the tiniest film remains an infinity, too vast for her to comprehend. There are no cracks or splits, not yet, but what remains is so weak that she is able to feel things on the other side, like touching faces wrapped in plastic.

It is tantalising. There are hints of wonders beyond imagination, of terrors, of oddities that threaten madness, of more.

She strains her senses, tries to understand what is there.

Unformed shapes lurk on the other side, alien things, fluid, vast. She can almost define them now, almost taste them on her tongue. Fear tickles her thoughts, thrills through her body. A part of her wants to stop, does not want to know any more.

Silvered fingers clench and she dares to go deeper.

Her essence finds the weakest place or perhaps it is pulled there. She will never be sure. There is a growing desire to retreat, racing to match the need to go further.

Like a hand on a window, her essence rests against the divide. From somewhere on the other side, things notice. They rise from dark places and storms of swirling madness, forming from unthinkable ideas. Chunks of void break away, becoming hungry holes that swim towards her.

She sees it all then, and understands.

So many of them! Drawn by ethereal currents like scum down a plughole, swirling towards the world, poised to pollute, to change, to destroy. And behind them, gaping open, is an incomprehensible dark, ready to drink the silvered light of her true self whole. For a deadly moment it takes her attention, the other monsters fading from sight.

All becomes empty.

There is nothing.

Nothing.

Noth–

No.

She holds the thought. Forms it a second time.

No.

She has been to this place before. She will not allow it to take her. She will not.

Her hand opens, her palm closes and her arm drops away.

Massassi walks clear, returning to her own solid world. She thinks of all she has seen. Of the multitude that is coming. She has always been alone but for the first time in her life she feels incredibly, painfully lonely.

*

Duet tries to count the hunters as she runs.

Vesper tries not to fall over.

The kid simply runs.

Behind them and the hunters come the swarm, and further back, a host of opportunistic beasts and scavengers.

Vesper sees some higher ground and makes for it. The slope sucks speed from her tired legs but she persists. The hill is covered with stubbly grass. It snaps underfoot, smearing her boots, garish and green.

At the top she sees the crops stretching for miles in every direction. Endless yellow, waving softly in the wind, sickly. Further south however, the stalks are overshadowed by tall buildings and taller spires. Gravity defying roads spiral around and between them.

Wonderland.

It is not as grand as Vesper expected. Her uncle had talked of lights, lights everywhere, with more variety and warmth than the Shining City’s cutting brightness. The only lights she sees now are reflected sunsbeams, red and gold, winking suggestively from the highest towers.

Even so, it brings hope.

‘This way!’ she shouts, running down the other side of the hill, enjoying the sudden burst of speed it gives her.

The kid struggles to keep up.

On and on they run, hunters hot on their heels.

Duet glances back, sees figures flitting between the stalks, details too easy to discern. She sees clothes, old but maintained, and weapons more advanced than sharpened sticks.

Across the narrowing gap between pursuers and prey, darts begin to spit, thin, spiteful things. Several find their mark. They lack the strength to penetrate Duet’s armour, lodging themselves into the metal, shallow, to become unwanted accessories.

The Harmonised spreads her arms wide, keeping close behind Vesper.

Only luck and lack of height protect the kid.

One punctures the bag on Duet’s back, cracking a small tube within. Soon, tablets weep from the hole, hard and blue.

Vesper keeps the image of Wonderland in her mind. She tells herself it cannot be far and gradually, the world comes to agree with her. Greys and blues become visible between the stalks.

‘We’re nearly there!’ she cries.

She makes it to the first structure before realising that Duet no longer shadows her. Whirling round, she sees the Harmonised doubled over, clutching at her side. Old wounds have rebelled, fed up of being ignored.

As she rushes back to help, the fastest of the hunters arrives. A short man, bulked with muscle. He hurdles a treacherous root, winding his dartgun, firing.

The missile streaks over Duet’s bent back and buries itself in the thick fabric of Vesper’s coat, half an inch from her neck. The girl raises her own weapon. There is not time for hesitation but no desire to pull the trigger.

She points low, away from the hunter’s body, and squeezes.

A searing light stabs out, too fast to avoid. It burns a hole through the hunter’s thigh, scorching flesh, then biting into the foliage beyond.

The man screams and goes down.

Duet looks up, intent, forcing Vesper to focus on her. ‘Go!’

Instead, she grabs Duet’s hand. ‘It’s not far, come on!’

‘No,’ replies Duet, shaking her head, giving Vesper’s hand a final squeeze. ‘I’m done. I …’

Before she can finish, the man screams again. This time with words: ‘Help me!’

Vesper turns back but the man is not where he fell. The swarm has found the injured hunter, crawling under his legs, hooking into his skin, lifting, dragging him away into depths of the yellow forest. The girl just has time to see the man’s face, to register the panic and pleading before he is gone.

Unaware of their colleague’s fate, more hunters burst through the undergrowth.

Vesper fires again and figures hurl themselves to the ground, shaking the long grasses with curses. Then she runs, keeping a firm grip on Duet, who adds her own seasoning to the hunter’s words but allows herself to be pulled along.

Branches tug, vines threaten to trip. Vesper ducks and jumps where she can, pushes through where she can’t. Cuts and stings collect, aching muscles make their presence known but all bow down to the need to live. Adrenaline urges her on and all at once they break clear of the stalks, almost falling into the city.

Suddenly, the ground is hard, shocking legs, and resonating to the pitter patter of hooves.

Duet comes to a stop on her knees. ‘I can’t …’

Vesper points the gun back the way they came. She sees no targets but keeps her guard up and breath held.

Time passes.

Nothing comes out of the forest.

No hunters or wild creatures, not even the hum of a tainted insect. Were it not for the darts protruding from Duet’s shoulder plates and the one still in Vesper’s collar, it would be easy to pretend the hunters were never there.

Hastily, Vesper pulls out the scope with her free hand and puts it to her eye. Enhanced sight penetrates the shadows, reveals a group pulled far back, arguing. She cannot read their lips but their expressions are clear enough.

‘They’re afraid.’

‘Of what?’

Vesper shrugs. ‘I don’t know. Us?’

Duet’s laugh is bitter. ‘I doubt it.’

‘At least they aren’t chasing us any more.’

‘For now.’

‘Good point. Let’s go!’

The Harmonised holds up a hand. ‘Don’t think I can. My busted side can’t take any more running.’

Worry lines appear on Vesper, hinting at an older face yet to emerge. ‘Okay.’ She gathers some debris, a faded piece of panelling and a withered half of a water container. She covers the Harmonised with them, concealing everything save the tip of her helm and the toe of her right boot. ‘I’m going to get help. Stay there.’

‘Funny.’

‘I’ll be back soon, I promise.’ She looks at Duet, moves closer and reaches around the panelling to take her hand, squeezing the gauntlet tight. ‘I promise, okay?’

‘You know it’s a crime to lie in the presence of The Seven?’

Vesper smiles weakly. ‘I know.’

The medical bag is left by her side, along with the last of their rations. ‘I don’t know how long I’ll be but, hopefully, you can last for a few days at least. Not that I’ll be gone that long. I should be back in an hour at the most. Maybe two.’

‘Enough talking.’

‘Right.’ She turns to go.

Eyes smile behind the visor, not soft, but softer. ‘And the sooner you go, the sooner you’ll be back.’

Vesper brightens. ‘Right!’

‘Right.’

The girl sets off at a run.

From a gap in the side of her cover, a small head appears. Dark eyes regard her a moment more than is comfortable, then the kid bounds away.

Duet mutters to herself, twisting to look through a hole in the panel. The yellow forest remains quiet, mysterious.

Apparently, she is alone.

One hand rests on her side, the other on the hilt of her sword. Both are useless. Another look through the hole reveals an unchanged view. Wincing in pain, Duet takes a blue pill from the bag. It is not enough. She reaches for another, surprised to find the tube broken and empty. Quiet curses fill the air while she investigates the bag more thoroughly. A variety of pills present themselves, several not normally available to citizens of the Winged Eye.

She weighs them in her palm, knowing she should not use them while cheeks flush red, guilty.

*

A fly weaves its way through the Fallen Palace, buzzing past sloping rooftops. The Man-shape waits for it, leaning out of a leaning tower, mouth open. When the fly arrives on tired wings, it does not land as expected, instead zigzagging back and forth over the cavernous split in the infernal’s head.

For a moment the Man-shape is confused. Then it remembers, summoning its tongue from deep within and draping it over lower teeth.

Immediately, the fly lands.

The Man-shape’s head closes like a steel trap. A droplet of blood spurts, and with it, a whisper of essence.

It digests the message slowly, pondering the contents. Only when the Man-shape steps away from the window does it notice Samael standing in the doorway.

The Man-shape frowns, trying to adopt an expression of displeasure. However it has met very few humans, and those it has have been in states of extreme distress. As a result, all of its attempts tend towards the comic.

A wheeze escapes Samael’s lips and his shoulders shake. The half-breed laughs rarely these days, so he makes sure to enjoy the moment.

The Man-shape turns its back on him. Its usual control seems to weaken. Shoulders slump, arms hang slack.

Samael steps closer, curious. He hears the infernal drawing in air, manipulating it.

Within the cave of the Man-shape’s stomach, muscles contort and bones shift, a delicate operation. At last, the air is pushed out, undercut by distant buzzing. ‘I have been practising my speech again. What do you think?’ Samael’s shoulders clank as he raises them. ‘Is that all you can say? Even the master could not speak. Certainly none of the pretenders can manage it. They say the First speaks as the mortals do. Talk with me. I wish to practise.’

‘Why?’ Samael hates the sound of his voice. It is too quiet, too full of echoes. Wrong. Since his creator changed him, he has been losing it, a little more every year.

‘Because,’ the Man-shape replies, ‘you are all I have.’

‘This place is full of half-breeds.’

‘Born here. Their shrieks do not interest me.’

‘I am ready to let it go. Take it from me if you want.’

‘No. Such cuts always bleed and you must remain intact if you are to save the master’s legacy.’

Samael’s hair brushes his shoulders as he shakes his head. He is bored of these discussions. His impulse is not to rule but to … to what? His steel hill is no longer safe. His desire to watch and defend against the Breach has come to nothing. Next to the Yearning, he is nothing. There is nowhere to go. No purpose to motivate and so he stays. Caught by inertia.

The Man-shape continues: ‘Do you ever wonder why we are this way?’

‘No.’

‘No?’

‘Yes.’

‘You do. Of course you do. Like you, I do not remember much of my time before the master. Before I came to this place, I had no form, no function. I have always thought that the master gave me these things but lately I have begun to doubt.

‘The master’s will shaped ours. It created everything. Our hierarchy, the displays, all of it stemmed from the master’s wishes. But where did the master draw inspiration?’

‘I never knew your master.’

The Man-shape carries on as if Samael had not spoken. ‘We are unlike the mortals. Superior, and yet we copy them. I think it began when the master forced itself into the shell of our enemy, taking on her shape and, I think, more than a slice of her thoughts. The master believed her shell fully purged before taking residence but something of the foundation must have remained. And then, during our battles to transform this world, the world transformed us.’

‘Where is this going?’

‘Yes, where is this going? I wonder that often.’

‘The Yearning will take us all soon.’

‘Will it? My Zero in New Horizon brings news. The Malice has returned. An old tooth in young hands. It sharpens by the day. That is what will end us all.’

Samael nods, accepting the inevitable, feeling neither joy or sadness.

‘Unless,’ the Man-shape adds, ‘it could be controlled.’

‘Impossible.’

‘I am going to send word to the others and they will hunt the Malice down and find a way to turn it on the Yearning. It is our only chance.’

‘Then do it.’

‘I will. But first I wanted to tell you.’

‘Why?’

‘To give you a head start. Whoever succeeds in this will become our new monarch.’

‘I am not interested.’