The Restoration of Flaws (The Phantom of the Earth Book 5) (38 page)

They entered the Main Level, and though Brody could hear the thunder from the battle in Artemis Square and Masimovian Center, there was no trace of the bloodshed here. White satin curtains hung along marble pillars overlooking bioluminescent streams. Massive shards of light broke through windows, windows and light that seemed out of place to Brody, given the darkness outside. Where the elevators and the tower’s spiral staircase should have been, stairwells appeared, endless stairwells that reflected from the walls, and between, streams that bubbled and boiled. Brody knew then that what he viewed wasn’t Masimovian Tower.

This was his Lower Level nightmare.

Did Connor and Pirro see it too? Brody wondered. He didn’t feel Antosha in his head, certainly not the way he had when they fought upon his re-creation of Candor Chasma.

“Father! Help me!”

“Did you hear that?” Brody said.

Pirro lifted an eyebrow. “All I hear is the fighting, my boy.”

“He’s in your head, isn’t he?” Connor said.

“There!” Brody sprinted to the stairwell. In the fourth or fifth layer of stairs and streams, Lady Isabelle carried Oriana. Synisms rushed around his daughter’s face. She looked like his daughter, and he wanted to go to her, but in a world created by Antosha, he could trust nothing and no one.

Cautiously, Brody moved onto the stairs.

Connor pulled him back. “Captain, where’re you going?”

“He has my daughter,” Brody said.

“He’s manipulating you.”

“This labyrinth has replaced the tower’s main level. I must go in.”

“We’ll not win, my boy, not on his terms, not that way.”

“I will go alone, if I must.”

Brody moved, and Connor and Pirro followed, up the white marble stairs, up and around, forever, it seemed. Oriana’s screams sounded as if she were shouting from a pit, another dimension, another time. Beyond the stairwell, streams rose, then the walls emitted sapphire bioluminescence, and in the hundreds of stairwells that reflected all around them, the Gemini emerged—Brody’s prehistoric likeness repeated and repeated.

They declared in unison, “
You’re a failure!
”

Then they hid.

“What’s going on?” Connor said.

“He’s in my mind,” Brody said, “digging where I cannot stop him.”

The Gemini all repeated his words, “
Digging where I cannot stop him, digging where I cannot stop him …
”

Brody ignored them.

They continued upward, then upon stones across one of the rising streams, to a new set of stairwells.

Oriana’s cries sounded closer, the Gemini farther.

Brody heard a strange, irregular clicking noise
.
When he turned around the next stairwell, a dark stone wall appeared, shrouded in mist.

Three dark horses with teal eyes galloped, closer and closer.

“
You’re a failure!
” the Gemini said, hundreds and hundreds of Gemini who jumped up the wall and marched, poked their heads side to side, crouched, and waddled. “
Failure!
”

“Get out of my head!” Brody tried to remember what he did, how he found his babies in his Lower Level nightmare.

“Failure!”

The horses and the wall and mist disappeared, replaced by stairs and Lady Isabelle’s cackle.

“Show yourself!” Connor heard it too. He unsheathed his sword, his eyes wide.

She burst through a waterfall, grabbed Connor, and pulled him down into a stream, where they disappeared.

Pirro dove in after them.

Brody rushed up the steps. When the stairwell ended, he jumped through a waterfall. The illusion gave way to the Gallery of the Chancellor, and the sounds of rushing water gave way to the inferno in Artemis Square and Masimovian Center.

The slab of marble in the gallery, near where Brody had received his Mark of Masimovian, was replaced with two marble slabs, equidistant. Pasha sat on the left, Oriana on the right.

They lay unconscious, or so Brody hoped.

Dr. Shrader moved between Brody’s twins.

Antosha emerged from behind the Vivoan sculpture of a grower’s hand, his eyebrows, eyelashes, and hair replaced by streaks of blood and blistered skin. His synsuit remained intact.

He puffed out his chest.

“There’s nothing like
pain
to remind transhumans that we live.” He grinned. “Don’t you agree?”

The gallery’s Granville panels rendered Reassortment Hall visible, where Verena, Xylia, Breccan, (and a child?) manipulated workstations. They were trying to free their comrades, who struggled behind glass cylinders, emaciated, wearing nothing but white shorts, bones protruding from every part of their bodies.

“Don’t send them to that island,” Brody said. “Send me. It’s me you want to suffer and die from Reassortment exposure, me who—”

“Killed Haleya.”

“Yes … you’re right … I see that now … her death
was
my fault … so release Oriana and Pasha and those people in Reassortment Hall, and send me to the surface without treatment—”

“Who said anything about sending them to the surface?”

Brody examined the panel. Water splashed and flowed down the hall’s inner walls.

Antosha wasn’t preparing them for ascent to the Island of Reverie.

He was flooding Reassortment Hall, with them inside.

Lady Isabelle threw Connor through the cedar doors upon the Pleasure Level, and his sword flew across the floor. Gusts of smoke from the battle outside spilled over the windows near the ceiling. Or was Masimovian Tower burning? Connor didn’t have time to find out.

He dove for his sword.

He couldn’t have said how he turned in time, but he met Isabelle’s downward thrust. Diamond sparked on diamond.

Connor’s blood sang. He was careful to keep his mind closed. He felt her knocking.

The waves in the ZPF closed upon him. He repelled her attack and swept her legs out, then rolled and lifted to his feet.

Connor’s Janzer synsuit gave him an advantage, if incomplete, given his visor’s weak point. Isabelle’s skin lay exposed all over.

But the supreme director was nothing if not tactical, as he knew too well. The swordplay was designed to tire his body and mind, eventually allowing her entry to his consciousness. From there, the lady could have her way with him, the way she had with Hans in the Department of Peace and with Father in Permutation Crypt.

Isabelle’s face did not hide her intentions
.
She seemed pleased with his attempts to block her. Connor might have the immediate tactical advantage, but time was on her side.

Upswing followed downswing followed sideswipe. Isabelle slung her sword with skill. In some ways, her technique reminded Connor of Aera, though Aera was far faster.
You may not enter
, he thought
.

The tango continued around a spa that bubbled with white rose petals, whose aroma mixed with the scents of death and smoke outside. Isabelle backpedaled, breathing heavily.
She’s tired.
Connor devised his strategy. She held her sword up, perpendicular over her head, her hair scattered, her face red. He heard her voice in his head, through Marstone.

Give yourself to me the way your father did.

Now she lied, for Father would never bow to her, not after what she had done.

You may not enter.

Pirro fought General Arnao on the level’s far side. He sprinted behind sculptures, spun, kicked, slid, and swiped. Diamond sparks flew in Connor’s peripheral vision.

The spa solidified, and Isabelle projected her mind onto its reflective surface. Connor saw Hydra Hollow, the terror birds, the BP, and Father at the precipice, standing, speaking—dying when Isabelle thrust her sword into him and cracked his bones.
She
did
kill him.
Connor took control of the ZPF and removed her illusion.

“You’ve grown powerful since the fever,” Isabelle said, “but you’re not my equal.”

She sent a burst of quantum waves over him, and Connor fell backward.
You may not enter.

Part of him knew what she’d shown him was true, though he did not want to believe his father would give his life this way. He pushed those thoughts out of his mind.

He stepped onto the spa, walking over the water as if it were solid ground. She followed him, as he knew she would, to get closer to his mind.

Connor blocked her next burst.
You may not enter.

Her screams gave Connor strength, and when next she lunged, he dodged her and smashed the handle of his sword into her face. She fell, blood dripping from her nose. He swung his sword down, but she parried the strike. He flipped over her onto solid ground, turned, and split the solid layer beneath her. She fell through. He resealed it over her, then sheathed his sword and steadied himself.

She fought him. He trembled as if lifting a Piscatorian submarine.

He kept his palms flat over the spa and screamed, blood dribbling from his nose, tears falling reflexively from his eyes.

Isabelle struggled beneath the surface, as if she pushed upon a sheet of ice.

She thrashed, her hair tangled, reminding Connor of a lavender cephalopod in Piscator Reef.

He sensed her death neared, felt her pain and fear …

“Release her.” General Arnao held a pulse gun to Pirro’s head.

I’m too close
, Connor thought.
Pirro wouldn’t want me to.

Pirro
did
shake his head no, but Connor couldn’t let his comrade die. He unsealed the spa.

Isabelle exploded out of the water, gasped, and grasped the ledge. Hot water and rose petals were slung over the marble.

She coughed water out of her throat and laughed.

“That a boy,” Arnao said. “I remember you.” He inclined his head. “I remember when I took you down in Gaia.” Arnao laughed while Pirro stealthily clutched a diamond dagger near the side of his knee, latched into the Janzer synsuit. “Your brother was so pathetic,” Arnao added. “He sobbed and begged for his life.”

“You couldn’t break him,” Connor said, “and you can’t break me.”

Lady Isabelle lifted a pulse gun, and Pirro slipped from Arnao’s grip and threw his dagger at Isabelle.

She dodged the salvo, and Connor threw his sword through Arnao’s head, evading Isabelle’s pulse blast. He focused his mind in the ZPF, thrusting Isabelle’s sword through her chest, into her heart, and twisted it.

Dr. Shrader telekinetically pushed a lever between Oriana’s and Pasha’s marble slabs, and a pillar elevated, covered with a glowing orb.

The Lorum.

Its gold, scarlet, black, silver, and yellow coloring twisted clockwise, then counterclockwise.

In Reassortment Hall, the water was now waist high.

An explosion in Masimovian Center shook the tower. A plume of fire and smoke danced beyond the terrace, lighting the hazy nighttime sky. Or was this explosion upon Masimovian Tower?

“Do you know why we convinced Chancellor Masimovian to send you to Vigna?” Antosha said.

Brody glanced at the twins and the Lorum. If he kept Antosha talking, perhaps he’d have time enough to determine his next move.

“We lost contact with the Lorum,” Brody said, “though I suspect it was really to provide cover for your return from the Lower Level.”

“Ah, first contact,” Antosha said. “Do you remember those days?”

“I remember my friend who devoted himself to research, who cared about Beimeni, who loved his eternal partner, who respected his captain—”

“And now I am the leader, the chancellor, and so it should be obvious to you, insipid as you are, that it was I who suggested we use the Warning, for I knew the Lorum hadn’t perished as some in Masimovian’s Administration hoped, and I knew you’d bring me the genome I required to create Earth’s first posthuman.”

“A psychotic dream that turned you against those you loved.”

“I fulfilled the dream; humanity shall return to the surface, for I’m connected to Dr. Shrader, and he to me, and soon I will provide the maximal genome to all the developers, and a new race of man will be born.”

“Under your control, like the doctor, I suppose.” Brody paused. “Have you learned nothing?”

Antosha didn’t respond, for the soft sounds of a deodar violin filled the room. When Brody and Antosha turned, they did not see Shrader, Oriana, Pasha, and the Lorum.

They saw Haleya Decca.

She danced, covered with moonflowers and amaranth silks, silks that streamed around her arms and back and chest and thighs, her skin as smooth as her voice, which Brody couldn’t help but savor.

Haleya sang “The Fountain” and moved like a belly dancer, sensually and spiritually. She batted her eyelashes, and she enveloped Antosha, who held her in his arms, entranced, engrossed by her voice and movements as much as Brody amid the Fountain of Youth, rendered visible around them, complete with spicy aromas, flowing water and oils, marble pillars drenched with blue bioluminescence around a plinth …

… A flash, as from a dying star, and Oriana’s illusion gave way to the gallery, to her, with Antosha, her lips pressed to his, a diamond dagger through his jaw and skull, his brain pierced by her kiss. His blistered lips and face felt as hot as Mars. He smelled like a cooked pig.

She pulled the dagger out, and he gagged on blood in his mouth. He, with Dr. Shrader, their minds as one, collapsed as one—and died.

Oriana dropped the bloodied dagger, shaking.

Her father ran to her and hugged her. “I thought I lost you.”

“That was my first deception.” She turned to Antosha’s dead body, then studied her palms. “What is this darkness he unleashed inside me? Does this make me like him? Flawed?”

“We all have flaws.” Her father kissed her forehead. “Darling daughter, neither any diamond nor any transhuman is perfect. You did what was necessary.”

“Necessary?”

Brody nodded. Oriana thought of her choice in the Cryo Room, not to kill Antosha, not to warn Mother and Father and the Regenesis team what lay ahead. In a sense, everything that had happened to the transhuman race, even Reassortment, all came back to that day in the Cryo Room, when she had snapped Dr. Shrader’s neck. What if Antosha had never learned to use the ZPF to kill? Could the world have been different?