The Loss Queen (Approaching Infinity Book 5) Read online

  “Ban. . .”

  “You can consider your sins at leisure in hell.” In Ban’s left hand a replica of the Carving Knife blurred into view. He brought both blades together, crossing them to cause a sonic boom. Visible spirals of compressed air lashed out, cycling towards Jav, cutting tracks, great X’s, in the ground between them.

  Jav raised his arms against the sudden assault. He had encountered the Wind Fission techniques countless times in the past and had what was perhaps an unhealthy disdain for them, which he’d never consciously voiced, so was shocked by what Ban had produced. The cutting waves came at him head on, and then unexpectedly from behind and both sides. Jav knew instantly what was happening and was impressed. He knew that Ban had trained with Laedra Hol, but not the particulars of what that training had wrought. Here it was: Wind Fission controlled and directed by AI.

  Luckily, none of the cuts that resulted were very deep, and the Carving Knife could only assert its power to reopen old wounds if the blade itself made contact, but once again, Jav was losing blood, and more than he could afford.

  Ban advanced through his own flurry unscathed and sought to cut Jav in half with his two Knives. Jav met him blow for blow, fending off the blades with his forearm Bones or the plates that covered the backs of his hands, but as he did, the words of the Kaiser Bones echoed again through his head: a prolonged engagement is not sustainable.

  He hated what he had to do. Despite his emotional emptiness for the last twenty years, Jav hadn’t lied about thinking Ban a good person. He felt like he’d known Ban since long before his awakening, had watched him train, had seen again and again that he was an honorable man, easily living up to Raus’s memory or exceeding it.

  “Ban. I never trained with you because I knew you couldn’t beat me. Your Carving Knife is dangerous and your AI Wind Fission is impressive, but neither is sufficient.”

  Though he’d never sparred with Ban, Jav had seen him spar with others, had seen his performance on the custom gravity block, and knew that he had gone no further than twenty-six standard gravities. Ban was good, but not good enough. Jav parried Ban’s attacks, gauging his speed and strength to confirm what he already knew, and then went on the offensive. He turned his parries into strikes, cast Ban’s arms wide, and struck with a straight-arm palm strike to the chest. Ban folded in half and streaked backwards into the ruin of Gran Pham’s body, just as his brother had.

  “You can’t outfight me,” Jav said. “You don’t have to forgive me for Raus, but join me. Help me stop the Empire.”

  Ban rose and crossed his blades again. Deep ruts crisscrossed the ground as the winds rushed. Jav held his arms open, as if giving in to the inevitable, and his smoke effigy was dashed to fleeting wisps. Ban felt immeasurable pressure between his shoulder blades as Jav drove another palm strike into him. This time he shot forward, skidding to the ground, leading with his chin.

  Jav approached him slowly. “Give up, Ban. Join me.”

  Ban got to his hands and knees and stood with his back to Jav. “What assurances do I have that you won’t kill me?”

  “If I wanted you dead, Ban, we wouldn’t be talking. I want your help.” Jav stretched his hand out to him.

  Ban glanced over his shoulder to regard the gesture.

  For a moment, Jav thought Ban would turn and offer his own hand. Ban did this, but not in the spirit of friendship. He spun with incredible speed, flashing the Carving Knife, with little chance of missing his target.

  Wind Fission cuts slashed the spaces between the Kaiser Bones, upon Jav’s torso and upper arms, but Jav held the blade of the Carving Knife firmly in his left hand. The edge dug into his palm, drawing blood and Ban wasted no time in activating the Knife’s power. Blood spurted from Jav’s right side, but merely wept from the countless other cuts, both fresh and reopened. Despite this second explosive loss, Jav did not budge.

  Ban attempted to wrest the blade free of Jav’s grip, but could not.

  “I’m sorry, Ban,” Jav said, shaking his head. “I tried.” He calculated AI as he felt Ban struggle, mentally and physically, to retrieve the Knife. Jav raised the protruding tip so that it was just before his chest and swept the palm of his right hand against the flat of the blade, snapping it in half.

  All of the tension in Ban’s body eased in that instant. Jav opened his left hand to release the base of the blade, but it was already gone. He stepped back three steps, his breast heaving with equal measures of fatigue, shame, and regret.

  Ban said nothing. He, too, took a step back, but clumsily. His bones and muscles didn’t appear to be working together anymore. He was still Dark, but translucent gray veins stood out upon his ragged poncho, over his face. He threw the poncho open, reaching out helplessly with both hands for what Jav couldn’t imagine, to reveal more veins, pulsing ever more rapidly.

  Fifteen seconds: Ban had begun to take on the same translucent cast, his “skin” turning gelatinous to a depth of one centimeter and falling away in quivering chunks in places.

  Twenty-seven seconds: A wave of blisters rising from beneath the gelatinous flesh spread from Ban’s Knife hand, up his arm, across his chest, down his torso, enveloping his head and whole body.

  Thirty-three seconds: The blisters popped in succession, releasing a mixture of blood and liquefied muscle and bone, and emptying the “sack” that Ban had become, which now collapsed to the ground shapelessly.

  This unrecognizable heap continued to ooze, blister, and pop until there was nothing left but a rank puddle. Jav had turned his back on this, though, watching only long enough to confirm that Ban’s Artifact had been destroyed. He called Gran Mid over to burn the remains. Holding his side, he turned to face the dancing flames, which lit his blood-washed form strangely. He grew faint and nearly collapsed. He was cold and couldn’t feel much of anything. He leaned against Mid’s first rib and slid down its length to the ground where he proceeded to weep.

  9

  TITAN SQUAD

  SPECIALIST WAICE

  10,923.025.1300

  Planet 1612 (Loss)

  Barcos Steppe

  While using the Black Light Rail, Waice’s visibility was indeed limited. The speed at which he traveled was itself somewhat of an impediment, but the pervasive mist compounded things. Though it was essentially impenetrable to vision, it did transmit and refract light. With the sun permanently setting and no sign of human habitation for hundreds of kilometers in any direction, light was rather scarce if not altogether absent, so when the mist below him bloomed like a pale red-orange flower, his interest was piqued. He came to an inertialess stop in the air and dropped, using the power of the Whirl Plate to slow his descent. Free fall wouldn’t hurt him, but Waice had no idea what he was dropping into, and wanted to give himself as much time as possible to react to whatever might be waiting for him.

  When he got low enough, he saw the endless press of standing bodies—Raus Kapler’s army. Though they weren’t moving, and certainly shouldn’t be a threat to him, he didn’t want to be caught in their midst. He cut the influence of the Whirl Plate and let gravity take him. He landed in a crouch upon the head and shoulders of a former Heavy Air Division soldier, sprang forward in the direction the corpse troops faced, to the top of another about twenty meters away. From there he could see unmoving skeletons mixed in with the corpses and a clearing with signs of fire, some of which were exhausted, some some still burning. Gran Mid was in the open area, intact, but Gran Pham didn’t appear to be so lucky. He jumped again, landing catlike upon a carpet of cremated remains. He reigned in his disgust and moved cautiously towards Gran Pham, realizing a bit too late that it might not be a good idea to get too close to one of the Empire’s most deadly mobile weapons when potentially on opposing sides.

  Part of Waice’s view of Gran Mid had been obscured by Gran Pham’s head, but as he neared and his angle of approach changed, he saw that Jav Holson, painted red with blood, was standing there, staring at him.

  “I can’t fail, Waice,” J
av said raising his hands for the Kaiser Claw. “I’m sorry.”

  “Wait!” Waice cried. But Jav was coming towards him, using AI to close the distance. Waice reacted instantly, fearlessly. He formed the fore-knuckle fist and drove it between Jav’s outstretched hands, straight for the spot between Jav’s, empty black eye sockets.

  Waice’s Phantasma Screw drew upon the power of the Whirl Plate to generate enormous amounts of spatial turbulence. When his fist encountered the area of influence of the Kaiser Claw, the two attacks fed upon one another, destabilized, and exploded with inordinate, exponential force. Both Shades were cast back from the point of destabilization, into black unconsciousness.

  • • •

  Jav sat up and instantly regretted it. His body ached, his head throbbed and pounded. He touched his fingers to his forehead, which felt hot and wet, and realized that he wasn’t wearing the Kaiser Bones. His clothes—black leather jacket, white T-shirt, baggy black pants tied off at the ankle, black fabric shoes—were intact. He checked his right side, pulling his T-shirt up, and probing again with his fingers. There was a nasty bruise, but the skin was unbroken. He stood on shaky legs, saw that Waice, also normal, was lying on the ground alive, but unconscious.

  Waice was here, but Gran Mid was not. There was no sign of Gran Pham, or his or Raus’s troops, or of any of the fighting that had taken place here, either. Knee-high grasses soughed and swayed with the onset of a cool breeze. The sun was not where he had remembered it. It was still in the west and low in the sky, but not yet at the horizon—and its color was different. No longer white, it was a blazing orange ball, radiating warmth, waning but still vital. The mist had burned off, and the sky was a deep bronze pierced by brightening stars.

  He turned in a circle, taking in his surroundings and was somewhat shocked to see, at the top of a lone grassy hill, an angular and ornate structure, a building that filled him with a combination of sadness, dread, and longing, all couched within inexplicable nostalgia. A black fence of wrought iron surrounded it, giving it a menacing air, but as every other direction presented an endless, featureless plain, he set about climbing the hill, walking the paved lane the led up its slope.

  As he got closer, he saw that the building rose eight or nine stories, was composed of red brick, and was faced with several rectangular windows, all curtained or otherwise blind. The lane passed through the open gate, and circled before the main entrance at the front. Jav stood at the door, which was of heavy wood, elaborately carved, and knocked. It opened slightly inward at his touch—it wasn’t latched—to reveal darkness within.

  “Hello?” he said. There was no reply so he pushed the door to open it fully and stepped across the threshold. As his foot touched down onto the tiles of the entryway, he experienced a powerful, penetrating sense of déjà vu.

  He stood in a yellowed room, which had likely started out white. A bell dinged behind him and he heard the swish of metal against metal. He turned to look, responding to the sound, and saw that the wooden door was now two sliding metal doors, closing. Besides the sudden change in environment, however, he was most shocked by his clothes, or rather, his restraints. His arms were crossed so that he was embracing himself and his sleeves were fastened behind him.

  Straitjacket.

  Everything he wore was white. The waistband of his pants was elastic, his feet were bare.

  Patient.

  The floor was cold tile, but different from that of the entryway, and everything echoed uncomfortably. A woman wearing a white hat worked with her head down behind a chest-high counter straight ahead. To the left and right were wide, white-enameled doors with push bars at waist level to operate them. Standing before the door to the left was a young, dark-haired boy, perhaps in his teens. He held a white rabbit in his arms and stared at Jav with a mix of sorrow and accusation. The door to the right burst open presently, and two men stomped through, both panting. They were dressed in white, but not the same way Jav was. Their arms were free, for one thing, and they wore shoes.

  Orderlies.

  “There you are,” the smaller of the two men said. “Decided to come back, huh?”

  Jav saw that the man wore a little plastic rectangle upon his breast that read “MARCUS”. His voice seemed familiar, but he didn’t know Marcus’s face.

  The other man towered above Marcus. His plastic rectangle read “TOM”.

  “It’s a good thing,” Tom said.

  Jav winced at the sound of Tom’s voice. It, too, was familiar, but as with Marcus, Jav had never seen his face before.

  “Dr. Gordon’s been looking for you,” Marcus said.

  “Which one?” Jav asked reflexively and immediately wondered at his question. Which one?

  “Don’t start that again,” Tom said, placing a huge hand upon Jav’s shoulder.

  “Yeah, it’s a shame,” Marcus said. “We just got you lucid and you pull a stunt like this. You make things tough for ol’ Tom and me.”

  “Well at least he’s let up on us and started in—”

  “Shhh,” Marcus hissed through clenched teeth, but it was too late.

  “—on the real psychos.” Tom said, instantly regretting it.

  A petite woman wearing a white coat over a simple black one-piece dress stood at the inner door. She held a clipboard in the crook of her right arm and had her left hand firmly on her hip. She wore glasses and her hair, chestnut brown, was like a silk cascade. She did not appear to be pleased. “Talk like that will get you fired, Tom,” she said.

  “Jennifer. . .” Jav said without having to see the plastic rectangle peeking out from behind the collar of her white coat.

  “That’s Dr. Gordon, to you,” Marcus said.

  Tom bowed his head. “Sorry, Dr. Gordon. It’s just that he’s such a scrapper, and them others are so. . .” He fumbled for the right word, knowing that just about any he chose would not go over well with Dr. Gordon. “Well, it’s like he had some kind of, whaddaya call it. . .”

  “Epiphany? Revelation?” Marcus offered.

  “Yeah, one of those. It’s like he stopped being one of them and was like trying to be one of us.”

  Dr. Gordon relaxed then. “So it looks that way to you, too, Marcus?”

  Marcus shrugged. “Afraid so, Doc.”

  “He’s still very sick. They’re all sick, Tom. Please don’t forget that.”

  “Yes, Dr. Gordon.”

  “Let’s get him back to his room,” she said. She pulled a small card from her pocket and ran its edge through a machine against the wall next to the door. A green light over the door flashed and she leaned against the push bar with her hip, opening the door. “How did he get out this time, anyway?”

  “Not sure,” Marcus said. He and Tom followed her with Jav between them.

  Jav offered no resistance. He turned to look at the boy with his rabbit as he passed through the door and felt an overwhelming sense of shame.This place seemed so familiar, the unfocused nostalgia growing with each step. His mind drank in every detail. He knew Jennifer Gordon. They’d been lovers. Well, he thought they’d been lovers, but now he wasn’t so sure. He hoped they didn’t encounter the other Dr. Gordon, her husband, he now remembered. He thought there might have been more to his anxiety regarding Howard Gordon, but couldn’t boil it down to anything specific.

  They passed through another door and entered into a corridor lined on either side with what he knew were patient rooms—padded cells, actually. His own was just ahead on the right. As they approached, the door to the cell closest on the left shook in its frame. Through the small inset window, Jav saw that a man was alternating between striking the window with his forehead and the door itself with his shoulder. When the man realized someone was in the hall he peered through the window with wild, angry eyes.

  “Raus?” Jav mumbled, frowning.

  “Lassen Sie mich raus!” the man cried, staring murder after Jav as they passed.

  “Tom, please see to his restraints when we’re done here. Call in a unifo
rm if you have to. He’s going to hurt himself if he hasn’t already.”

  Tom sighed. “Yes, Dr. Gordon.”

  Jav was confused. Things seemed just as they should be and completely wrong at the same time. When they reached his room, he stared at the name printed on a plate fixed to the door:

  No. 6

  STRAUSS, JACOB

  He frowned again. It’s not that it should have read “HOLSON, JAV”, but something was wrong. As he was ushered into his monochromatic room, his feet sinking into the floor’s padding, he turned suddenly. Tom started, but Marcus calmed him.

  “She’s got this, Tom,” Marcus said, leading Tom out. “It’s like you said: he stopped being one of them. Now come on. I’ll get the sedative for number ten and meet you back outside.”

  Dr. Gordon was preparing a small glass vile tipped with a needle. “You have to promise not to sneak off again.”

  Jav nodded, and sat down against the soft, cushioned wall at her urging. She squatted next to him, the tops of her legs jutting beautifully from the bottom of her dress.

  “And to stop getting into fights.” At this she grinned. “Though that last one almost made me feel like you were my knight in shining armor. It was very sweet of you to try to protect me.” She drew very close to him now, eye to eye. Her breath was hot and fragrant. She hovered before him for a moment before closing her mouth around his in a long, sensual kiss.

  If the shot ever came, Jav didn’t know it. Her kiss was enough. He felt himself sinking and everything went black.

  • • •

  Jav awoke slowly to darkness. Light shone intermittently through the open door. Though padded on the inside, the door was obviously constructed of metal, but was now cast wide and bent beyond function. He found himself still tightly locked within the straitjacket, but it offered no real obstacle to his balance as he rose to his feet and peered cautiously from the doorway.