The Beauty of Destruction (14 page)

Living in the Church wouldn’t be so bad, perhaps even working for them eventually, though he intended to spend a great deal of time just relaxing initially. He would become a burden on their resources, a parasite. He was quite looking forward to it.

He was also pleased that Talia would be staying in the Cathedral, almost as pleased as he was about Scab leaving. He wondered if he’d taken the human-aping psychosurgery too far. Was he actually in love? He wasn’t sure he was entirely enjoying the sensation. It did go some way towards explaining why he was walking down an arched walk towards Talia’s room, once more carrying a surgical steel rose, a bottle of red wine, and a bewildering array of narcotics. For some reason he felt this was his time. Perhaps they could consummate what so far they had only done in immersions. The wine had even been grown in hydroponic vineyards in the Cathedral! It wasn’t from an assembler.

Vic let off a little spurt of pheromonic irritation as he saw Talia and Elodie emerge from the human girl’s room. Elodie’s P-sat was bobbing up and down on its AG motor at her shoulder. Vic tried to purse his mandibles – it didn’t work – as Talia failed to notice him. Elodie, however, glanced his way and turned to lead the girl in the other direction.

‘Talia! Elodie!’ Vic called. It was a little odd, he had been certain that the two females hadn’t just disliked each other, but had in fact utterly despised each other. Vic couldn’t be sure but various senses and neunonic analysis routines were telling him that there was something slightly off about Elodie’s body language. Whatever it was, it was gone when Elodie turned to face him, smiling. Vic momentarily forgot about it when he noticed that Talia had been crying, yet again.

‘What’s wrong?’ he asked. It had become a common greeting with them.

‘Beth fucked Scab,’ Talia said. She sniffed, and wiped some of her running eye make-up on her sleeve.

Yes!
Vic couldn’t help himself. He was still a little confused as to Elodie’s presence.

‘And you’re … ?’ he said, turning to look at the feline.

‘She’s been a real friend,’ Talia said, turning to look gratefully at Elodie, who was smiling sympathetically. ‘She knows what it’s like to be fucked over by a sibling.’

‘I mean, yes, I’ve been hateful to her, but she’s still crew. I mean, I’ve practically sprayed all of you. You know how territorial we are, but it’s compartmentalised, you know?’

His nano-screen and antennae were picking up something in the air, some ever-so-subtle nanites. He guessed it was some kind of nano-screen, perhaps a privacy or stealth screen.

Vic nodded understandingly. The tray and its contents crashed to the floor as he reached for his laser pistols and ’faced targeting information to his power disc, grabbing it from his back with his lower left arm. His P-sat fired once, the energy dissipation grid on Elodie’s chitinous armoured bodice flared, and then it dropped to the ground. He flung the power disc and that also dropped to the ground. Elodie was moving, drawing her own weapons. It had all happened too fast for Talia to react. The targeting graphics overlaying Vic’s vision were almost exactly in the correct place as he brought the twin double-barrelled laser pistols to bear; he was about to ’face the command to fire when the wall reached out, grabbed him, and partially enveloped him.

Talia started to run. Elodie swung her leg around and the sole of her high-heeled boot slammed the girl into the wall, holding her there. The position looked as graceful as it looked uncomfortable. It would have been impossible to hold any augmented person against the wall like that, but Talia wasn’t augmented.

Elodie was still looking at Vic, partially encased in the wall’s smart matter and unable to move. She burst out laughing. ‘I put a back door into as much of your gear as I could on board the
Basilisk
. Nothing personal, I just like a bit of insurance when I’m working with other people. If your own defences hadn’t been quite so good I would have meat-hacked you, but I guess you’ll have to remain Scab’s bitch,’ she told him.

‘You hacked the Cathedral’s systems?’ Vic asked, appalled, thinking of the smart matter that imprisoned him.

‘No. The Church must have ordered us locked down. I’m running a stealth screen, which is spoofing their sensors, screens and security swarms,’ Elodie explained. It was obvious to Vic that she was impressed with her own cleverness. Talia was whimpering, trying to get free. ‘Shut up!’ Elodie snapped, all trace of humour gone from her expression. ‘I do not like you. The hours I have just spent listening to you whine have, if anything, just increased my disgust at your simpering existence. Normally I’d just meat-hack you but apparently you have to remain pure. So you do as I say or I’ll hurt you in ways that will make your previous embrace of victimhood pale into insignificance. Do you understand me?’

Talia made more whimpering noises in answer.

‘For fuck’s sake.’ Elodie removed her boot and Talia slid to the ground. The angry feline yanked the human to her feet and started dragging her down the corridor. Vic noticed that the feline had two black orbs, with visors adhered to them, attached to her belt.

‘Why are you doing this?’ Vic demanded.

‘Greed, fear, being pissed off at Scab for dragging me into his shit, getting to see this whiny bitch vivisected … Shut up! Plus wanting to be on the winning side, but mostly greed.’

Vic had to concede that they were some good reasons, though the vivisection seemed a little harsh. ‘Elodie, don’t do this,’ he pleaded. He was seeing his opportunity to be the hero in Talia’s eyes slipping, well walking, well being dragged away from him.

‘Perhaps try and negotiate first, then shoot me?’ Elodie shouted over her shoulder.

‘Would it have made any difference?’ Vic called after her.

‘No!’ Elodie grabbed Talia, who flinched at her touch, and then reached for the extruded handle of her P-sat, the AG motor pulling them both into the air.

The Monk had dropped the coherent energy field and re-opened herself almost entirely to the Cathedral’s systems as she removed the assemblers and inspected new pink flesh. The AI was running extensive diagnostics, as were her own systems, repeatedly checking that she was not still compromised. Erring on the side of caution. The meat-hack had been delivered in saliva. It had happened when Negrinotti had kissed her. She knew the possible consequences of her slaved actions but she didn’t want to face up to them right now.

‘You’re gonna fucking die,’ Scab spat at Churchman. Churchman contemptuously turned his back on the bounty hunter.

‘Talia’s gone,’ the Monk told him. Scab stood up. She could hear his bones resetting.

‘That girl,’ the deep amplified voice from the armoured exoskeleton muttered.

‘The sensors can’t find them,’ the sergeant in charge of the militia squad told Churchman.

‘Yes, we might actually have to fucking look for them!’ Churchman shouted. Then he sent out an open ’face to everyone in the Cathedral. It contained images of Elodie and Talia.

The Monk could see Scab picking up the glowing E-javelin, looking at Churchman’s back.

‘Listen, wank stain,’ she told the human killer. ‘Negrinotti fucked you over just as much as she did us, maybe more so. She took a half-assed stab at framing you. So you tell me what’s important here?’ Scab glared at her. ‘Yes, nothing resolves a situation like a good glare! Priorities?’

Scab shared a ’face from Vic with Churchman and the Monk. The three of them started to move.

Vic was ’facing a situation report to Scab, Churchman and the Monk as the smart matter released him. He leant low, grabbing the power disc and the P-sat on the run. He clipped both pieces of equipment to his armoured frame and made sure they were completely powered down. He could reboot and run diagnostics later but he couldn’t risk having them active again if he caught up with Elodie.

He was sprinting as fast as his power-assisted frame would allow. He drew his triple-barrelled shotgun pistol and broke it open, replacing the current load with saboted seeker micromissiles, and loaded EM, heat and visual pattern recognition targeting information into the missiles’ limited AIs. They weren’t AG-driven smart munitions but they’d do in a pinch.

‘She’s heading for the closest airlock,’ Vic ’faced to the others.

‘She’s too smart for that,’ Scab ’faced back.

‘She had two suits clipped to her belt,’ Vic replied. That didn’t make any sense to him. Even if Elodie managed to get out then the Church would just pick her up in Red Space.

‘She’ll double back, head for somewhere less obvious,’ Scab told him. Vic heard a distant bang. The sound of superheated air exploding. The laser Elodie’s P-sat was armed with. He changed direction and wished he could trust his P-sat enough to use it.

Elodie practically had to jam one of her suppressed autopistols into the militia woman’s visor and empty the entire clip. The visor cracked and a human head became a red cavity. Elodie returned the autopistol to its holster-clip and grabbed the advanced combat rifle from the militia woman as she fell to the ground. Two S-sats lay inert on the ground nearby, momentarily overwhelmed by her ’faced hack. She kicked out at the other militiaman trying to bring his weapon to bear, knocking him off-balance. Her P-sat fired at his animatic visor again and again, giving her enough time to empty the four grenades in the
ACR
’s grenade launcher at the squad of militia that had appeared at the end of one of the corridors leading to the airlock. Talia was running again as the space suit struggled to grow around her. It was probably the bravest thing the girl had ever done. Elodie threw the
ACR
. It spun through the air and hit the human in the back, knocking her to the ground.

Proximity fuses triggered the grenades and they exploded in staggered airbursts. The force of the blasts sent armoured militia tumbling back down the corridor, bouncing off the wall. The other militiaman was still trying to bring his
ACR
to bear, the energy dissipation grid still glowing from her P-sat’s laser. Elodie drove her claws into the visor, the heat having weakened it. Envenomed nails found flesh. He staggered away from her, screaming, dropping his weapon.

Above her, the smart matter floors and ceilings were peeling back, presumably to allow access to something she didn’t want to have access. Angrily she stormed over to Talia and placed the visor in front of the girl’s face. The suit grew round to meet it and hold it in place. She stood on Talia’s back and forced her face-down onto the floor, then pushed the clawed fingers of her left hand into the viscous globe on her belt. The space suit started to grow up her arm. She had to get outside the Cathedral, transmit, and hope that Patron lived up to his promises. If not, she had been assured that she would be less well rewarded when she was cloned, though if Scab survived she knew he would come after her.

She heard the chemical propellant motors on the micromissiles first. She looked up, drawing her still-loaded autopistol as she transmitted one of her utility hacks. Two of the missiles veered off, exploding in the ceiling and wall. The third hit her in the side. The force of the explosion spun her round, taking her off her feet. Her armour was cracked, her skin had hardened beneath it but shrapnel and the force of the blast had taken its toll. Her internal medical systems rushed regenerative nanites to the internal and external wounds. Incoming beams dressed pher in neon as the energy dissipation grid on her armour struggled to cope with multiple hits from Vic’s laser pistols. He had them in his lower limbs as he sprinted towards her, his upper limbs reaching for her. He looked like he wanted to pull her head off with his power-assisted claws. She didn’t bother firing back. Instead she grabbed Talia and pulled the girl in front of her – the spacesuit had hardened enough to protect Talia from the micromissile blast – and put the autopistol to her head.

‘Dead woman’s trigger, Vic,’ Elodie told the ’sect as the spacesuit continued to grow over her. Vic skidded to a halt.

With her free hand she attached the visor to the suit over her face. She reached into a pouch that had grown out of the suit and removed a handful of thermal seeds. She was aware of the smart matter ceiling still peeling open far above her.

‘Do you think that Scab gives a fuck about your dead woman’s trigger?’ Vic asked her. There was movement above her. Elodie glanced up.

Vic watched as Churchman fell from the
Basilisk II
through the vast hole the Cathedral’s AI had peeled open in the smart matter of the levels above them. His AG motors carried the exoskeleton down. Neither Scab nor the Monk were bothering with their P-sats, they were just plummeting.

Elodie made a decision. Vic started to move. The feline had made the wrong decision on so many different levels. Elodie raised her autopistol and fired a long burst into Scab’s groin area. Vic had no idea if the bullets penetrated Scab’s armoured clothing and then made it past the hardening skin armour, but when Scab landed he seemed angry.

Scab tore Elodie away from Talia and threw her against the wall next to the airlock. Vic grabbed Talia. The Monk triggered the coherent energy field generator and was enveloped in yellow light. Whether through spite or as a result of the dead woman’s trigger, Elodie fired another long burst from the autopistol, this time at Talia. Vic started to turn. The Monk landed between Elodie, Vic and Talia. Bullets were halted by the energy surrounding the Monk, like insects in amber. Scab, screaming, rammed his spawn blade into Elodie’s chest, and emptied all six rounds from his tumbler pistol into her face. She slumped to the floor, leaving a red mess on the stone-like wall. In a fury, Scab rammed one of his filed nails into the ruin of Elodie’s eye socket. Vic knew he was releasing a virus into the feline that would torturously destroy her neunonics and liquid software, scramble any attempts at uploads, and hopefully junk any backups so she couldn’t be cloned, depending on which system she was linked to in the attempt.

‘I saved you!’ Vic told Talia quickly.