“Not out of cards yet, Alice,” Chris snarled, running his hands over his ruined blazer and the burnt skin beneath it. And then he said a word, a word she didn’t recognize, and she fell to her knees so suddenly that she actually bruised both of them, hitting the ground.
Chris grinned despite the pain, despite the smell of cooked pig that hung around him in a vile miasma.
“Starting to understand now? You were never your own creature.”
He said another word, which she recognized only as a command. She slammed her head down, her forehead hitting the stone with a resounding impact, leaving behind a little red splotch on the stone, like one of those red Chinese stamps they used to put on documents. She had only just started feeling the pain, radiating out from her forehead like liquid, seeping into her facial structure, her eyes, her brain, when her body repeated the gesture, arching like a snake ready to strike, and then driving her head into the ground again.
“Don’t you ever get tired of being told what to do, Alice? Don’t you get tired of doing things and not knowing why? Or are you that comfortable, being a pawn?”
Again. She heard Chris laugh distantly, the next time, when he caused her to fall to the ground, half-blind from the blood seeping down her forehead. Her hands were still clambering for purchase against the stone, trying to pull her back up into sitting position, when he said another word, and she was finally released from the compulsion, and fell back down to the ground in an injured heap.
Alice bled and held her head and laughed weakly, as hard as someone could who could barely manage to keep her eyes open. Then she said something. He could see her lips move, but he couldn’t make it out.
“What? Something to say? Even now, my dear, it isn’t too late to turn back.”
She tried again, and again he couldn’t hear her. He leaned close.
“Thank you…”
“For what?”
“For standing over me,” she said, smiling with a mouthful of stained, red teeth as she disappeared into his shadow.
Chris turned fast, but he wasn’t fast enough. Alice had both of her hands on his cheeks before he managed to turn his head. She could feel his jaw unhinged, and she knew that he meant to speak. It didn’t matter. He wanted to turn around. She helped him, and he spun, off balance.
She held his face close, pressed his lips against hers. They tasted like sweat, salt and water, just like tears. She wasn’t entirely sure where she sent his head. It took the body a moment to realize it, before it fell over sideways, pumping dramatic gouts of blood out onto the stone from the severed line of the neck, all over Alice’s old boots. She was upset about the boots.
“Oh, Alice Gallow, centuries pass and you never change,” the man in the purple robes chided gently, looking at Alice from behind with obvious benevolence. “But this is not the moment for our reunion. Until then, my dear.”
His voice was low and musical. He sounded like he’d just heard something really funny. Then he said something else, something that was like a word, in a voice of command, a voice that carried even throughout the massive dome. At once, Alice and Mitsuru fell to the ground, folded neatly like origami and then slept. Leigh stared in uncomprehending horror as the black blood drained slowly off what remained of her body and fell inertly to the ground. Xia had made it up to his feet just in time to catch Alice halfway to the floor, turning to face the Rosicrucian. It wasn’t entirely clear how a man with goggles and a mask could look angry, but Xia managed it.
“Enough, Xia. Your protocol won’t work on me. Anyway, do want to risk it? I know the word that will put her to sleep forever, the one that will kill her instantly, and the one that will take longer, but allow her to feel it. Would you prefer I picked one of them, instead of the word I implanted in her to cause instantaneous, sweet dreams?”
The man waited, smiling his small smile, and eventually Xia turned away.
“Don’t worry about it,” the man said gently as he passed by, his purple robe scraping the ground. “I’m here to see your boss anyway. He knows I’m coming.”
“It has been a very long time,” the man observed.
“It has,” Gaul agreed. “I’ve heard the ridiculous name you go by these days, and I’m telling you right now, John, I refuse to use it. Tell me, did it come with the robe?”
John Parson threw his head back and laughed.
“You’re the same as always,” John said, chuckling. “It makes me feel quite nostalgic. And the Rosicrucian thing, that was just a hint for you. A secret society of scholars and doctors, devoted to the good of man, working covertly in concert toward enlightenment for all. I thought the reference was rather obvious.”
“Is Mark with you?”
“Mark is contemplating the Outer Dark, as he always does. I do not believe that he will ever leave it again, though he does still live. He has found something, and sometimes, he tries to explain some of it to us. From the words he speaks, we have occasionally been able to fashion tools. Mark is still translating the old language, Gaul.”
“I assumed as much. There were a few survivors who heard part of a terrible word, a word that ate their minds out from the inside, during the first part of the attack,” Gaul said, shaking his head. “Mark must have gone mad years ago. Moreover, you must have, too, if you are trying to do what I think you are. Really, John, have you looked at your company? Weir? Even Witches?”
“You being bitter,” John said lightly. “I have subjugated a small number of Witches already, and more will follow. They are uniquely vulnerable to telepathy under duress; once you learn the techniques it is actually quite simple. Nevertheless, they are just tools, Gaul, a means to an end. It must bother you, the war you’ve been fighting for lifetimes, that I could end it so easily. Surely, you see it now? What we have discovered, the Outer Dark, those technologies you deem forbidden, they hold the key to the world we always wanted Gaul. No more fighting between Operators. An end to the war. No mass introduction of nanites to the population at large, no accommodation with the Witches. Just victory and a better world.”
“A better world?” Gaul demanded incredulously. “You can’t be serious. The Hegemony lost two-thirds of their cartel leadership. The Black Sun lost two full combat brigades. Not counting all the civilians you massacred in Central. I’ve seen the things you’ve made out of the Operators that followed you, the walking corpses you’ve created. No, I’m afraid that our definition of a better world is radically different, John. I assume you are here for the Source Well? I’m afraid you won’t be going any further.”
“You think that you can stop me?” John Parson asked as if he was genuinely curious, taking a step toward the door behind Gaul. “I can see that you are exhausted, you know. You’ve been overworking that marvelous brain of yours, and you’ve used too many downloaded protocols.”
“Nonetheless,” Gaul said firmly, crossing his arms. “I can stop you. And I believe that you know that.”
John Parson paused and looked at Gaul, evaluating. Gaul’s pink eyes were even more bloodshot than usual, and his skin was pale and feverish, his forehead glistened with sweat. He’d slept in the shirt and pants he was wearing, and they were wrinkled and dirty. He looked tired beyond any measure, but he didn’t look afraid. He looked both confident and resigned. John Parson sighed theatrically, and then stepped back.
“Perhaps you could, at that,” John said, with a small smile, “though don’t be certain that you have my measure anymore, Gaul. But, perhaps a deal, then, instead of a confrontation?”
Gaul couldn’t hide his surprise, though the break in his composure was momentary.
“Let us say,” John suggested, rummaging through his robes to emerge with what looked like an empty wine bottle, “that I were to simply take as much as I can pour into this bottle here, and then depart, with all of my servants, peacefully? What would you say to that?”