Shadow on the Sun (8 page)

CHAPTER 12

Tengu Monastery

Noctis Labyrinthus

ANNOS MARTIS
239. 2. 12. 14:37

 

 

The day after the Flood, the day Vienne awoke in the monastery to find Durango gone, wasn't the worst. That day, her emotions were a complex soup of disparate feelings. She felt joy that she was free from Archibald and safe with the monks, but it turned to cavernous grief when she learned that Riki-Tiki was dead and that she'd died at Vienne's own hand. But the worst came weeks later, after she had shed the last effects of Rapture and after she'd vowed to wear ribbons of contrition until she'd paid penance for all of her crimes. That was when she began to miss Durango.

At first, she couldn't bear the thought of seeing him. Then she began to notice his absence. No jokes. No teasing. No senseless, heroic quests or tilting at moral windmills. No more deep blue-green eyes that made her skin tingle; no more looks that said her words were the only ones worth listening to. No handsome face made more alluring by the web of scars on his temple, the reminder that he'd risked his life to save hers. Day after day, she would find a reason to walk to the main gate. To open the door and stare into the distance.

But he never came back.

So when Ghannouj sent her to answer the gate, which he had not done in months, and she sprinted across the grounds so fast the wind sucked away her breath, she knew in her heart that the abbot had foreseen Durango's return. She would throw open the heavy wooden door and he would be standing there in symbiarmor, helmet in hand, armalite strapped over his shoulder, wearing that smirk that made her want to punch him and kiss him all at the same time.

“It's”—she begins as the door swings wide and she steps through the gate—“you.”

Nikolai Koumanov stands before her with a toothpick in his mouth. He tosses back his hair and grins. “Happy to see Nikolai,
jaa
?”

“Nyet.”
Without a micron of hesitation, she lays him out with a right cross to the chin, then slams the gate behind her.

“Who rang the gong?” Mistress Shoei asks as Vienne stalks past her.

“Some peddler,” she fumes. “I told him we don't want any.”

A growl stops Vienne in her tracks. The sound of a Gorgon bike is unmistakable, with its fuel-injected, six overhead cams, V-quad 3000-cc 286-horsepower engine, and glass-lined exhaust pipes. She turns around. “I wonder who he stole the bike from?”

Mistress Shoei follows Vienne outside, scratching her head. “The peddler stole a bicycle?”

“If it wasn't nailed down, I'm sure he would,” Vienne says as she spots Nikolai.

He's a few meters away with his back to her, sitting on a bloodred Gorgon, gunning the engine. Next to him is a second bike, which is ridden by a thicker, heavier young man with buzzed dark hair. He's wearing a velvet jacket just like Nikolai's, except the sleeves have been ripped off. Both of his upper arms are decorated with tattoos. One says “Ferro.” The other says “Mother.” And his fingers are stuffed in his ears.

“Brother!” the heavy one calls. “Enough with revving! Such a headache you give me.”

Brother? Vienne thinks. I'd hate to be the woman who had to raise this pair. Absentmindedly, she rubs her left pinkie and waits for the idiot Nikolai to realize that she's standing there.

“Golubchik moi,”
Nikolai croons. “Come out, come out, wherever you are!”

Vienne sighs. Of all people, it had to be him. How did he find her in the wilderness? What a presumptuous jackass! She wonders how good it would feel to punch him again. Then the wind blows a ribbon across her face, and she's reminded of her vow to avoid violence. She takes a cleansing breath and focuses her chi.

Mistress Shoei, however, has taken no such vow. She storms past Vienne, pushing up one sleeve, then the next, until she reaches Koumanov. Stupidly, he winks at the mistress and guns the throttle. Shoei responds by slapping his face, again and again with both hands. She doesn't stop until Nikolai jumps from the bike, his foot catching on the kickstand, and lands in the dirt.

“Hmph.” Shoei throws the switch to kill the engine. She shakes a silent but menacing finger at both riders. “No peddlers allowed!”

“Never has Nikolai Koumanov known such defeat,” he says, holding his reddened face.

“Is lie,” the brother says. “Mother Koumanov has many times slapped you.”

“
Vaikus
, Zhuk. Do not embarrass your betters.”

“That,” he says, “you have done better than I could.”

Vienne likes this brother. “Mistress,” she says, “I will deal with these two.”

“Fah,” Shoei says, then throws her hands in the air. “Peddlers!” She returns to the gate and sits down, pulling a rice cake out of her pocket.

“What do you want?” Vienne demands of Nikolai.

He slaps dirt from the seat of his pants. His rough edges give him an air of danger, an illusion that he probably encourages.

“What?” Nikolai throws his hands up, as if to ask what he had done to be so offended. “No welcome?”

Vienne folds her arms. “You two traveled hundreds of kilometers for something. It's not to steal, because a monastery in the middle of nowhere has no treasure you can fence. You want something from me. How did you find me?”

“Finding girl was easy,” he says, rubbing his chin. “No monks live near Christchurch, so after doing math again, we brothers came to very easy two-plus-two conclusion that girl was from monastery.”

“That answers the second question,” Vienne says. “Not the first.”

“See?” He gives Zhuk's cheek a hearty shake. “Smart. What I tell you?”

“
Jaa
.” Zhuk smacks his hand away. “Is smart. Keep hand to self.”

Vienne glares at them. “You're stalling.”

“How is it we are stalling?” Nikolai shrugs. “Suddenly, Nikolai is attacked by angry
babushka
and he is stalling?”

“I have work to do.” Vienne says. “What do you want?”

He sweeps a hand, his body silhouetted against the sky. “To take you away from all this.”

“Liar.”

“Ah.” He grabs his heart. “You cut me to quick.”

She walks away. “Be thankful it's all that got cut.”

“Wait!” he calls. “Brothers Koumanov have come so far. Hear us out.”

She keeps walking.

He chases her.

“How did you really find me?” she asks when he catches up.

“Gut feeling.”

“Then I'll thank your overactive gut to go somewhere else.”

“Gut cannot do that. You see, Nikolai needs girl's help and girl needs Nikolai's.”

“I find that hard to believe.”

“That I need your help?”

“No, that I need yours.”

He halts. “Always, you are so cold?”

“Sometimes, I'm colder. Now leave me alone.”

He grabs her wrist. “Listen!”

“Hands off!” She deftly extricates herself. “Nobody touches me.”

“T
òc˘
no,”
he says. Precisely. “Which is why we go to such trouble to find you.”

“No thanks.”

“Wait!” he calls. “Always, you are high-strung like tension wire. Vienne, Brothers Koumanov have come to offer job.”

Job? She stops and looks back over her shoulder. “What kind of job?”

“Kind of job girl like you likes most—dangerous,” he says. “Very dangerous. Most dangerous job of all.”

“Okay,” she says. “You've got my attention.”

CHAPTER 13

Tengu Monastery

Noctis Labyrinthus

ANNOS MARTIS
239. 2. 12. 15:17

 

 

“No thanks,” Vienne tells Nikolai. She tosses a small pouch of coin across the table in the kitchen hall. “I'm not a Regulator anymore.”

“Who is?” Zhuk asks. “Even
dalit
must eat,
jaa
?”

The word stings her.
Dalit
is the obscene word used to describe a disgraced Regulator. Both she and Durango are
dalit
and carry the shame the stigma has left on them. She bristles but feels the calming presence of Ghannouj, who sits on the rice mat beside her.

“Zhuk,” Nikolai says, “do not say such words.”

Vienne speaks calmly. “When I need to eat, there is food here. I don't need your coin.”

Nikolai pushes the pouch back toward her. “Think of children. Do children not need food? Where is coin to feed refugees camped on temple grounds?”

He has a point. More refugees from the front lines arrive every day. The monastery fields don't yield enough. The monks have begged scraps off the farmers from the collective nearby, but even the scraps are becoming scarce.

“Let me at least tell you about job,” Nikolai says, stacking the money. “Not all refugees come to monks. So they travel south across plain to New Eden, where is safe.”

“New Eden is safe? That pit of vipers?” She and Durango once used the town as their base. It was an easy place to get commissions because the Rangers turned a blind eye to criminals. People needed and were willing to pay for protection. “You'd have to be touched in the head to go there.”

“Is safer than war,” he says. “But not safe for travel, so refugees make caravan and hire Brothers Koumanov for security.”

“So it's just the three of us protecting a whole caravan of refugees traveling hundreds of kilometers?” Vienne asks.

“Just three?” Nikolai laughs. “Ridiculous!”

“Is seven,” Zhuk says.

“Oh, I like those odds much better.” Vienne rolls her eyes. “Who are we protecting them from?”

Nikolai rubs his fingertips together. “No one in particular.”

“He lies,” Zhuk says. “Is Scorpions.”

“This job just keeps getting better.” Scorpions are a huge gang of ferals who once lived in the Favela slums. Since the Flood, they've spread all over the prefecture. “Tell me again why I want to do this?”

“To be fair,” Nikolai says, “we told girl job was dangerous.”

“Very dangerous,” Zhuk adds.

Vienne crosses her arms. “More like insane.”

“Talk to monks.” Nikolai stands and gestures for Zhuk to follow him. “We wait outside for answer.”

When they are gone, Vienne turns to Ghannouj, who has remained silent. “Master, that is a lot of coin.”

“It is,” he says.

“Enough to buy food for a month. Maybe more.” She paces back and forth across the kitchen. The floor hums with each step. “What should I do?”

Ghannouj scratches the stubble on his cheek. “You should accept the job.”

“What?” she says, shocked.

“Sometimes I like to surprise you.” Ghannouj grins, the corners of his eyes crinkling. “You should join them. Once before, you left the monastery because you were not cut from the same cloth as a monk, and when you recovered, you tried again to wrap yourself in ill-fitting robes.” He takes her by the shoulders. “Vienne, you were born to be a soldier. If you remain here, you will waste your gifts. More importantly, you will waste away in a life that is not meant for you. Only outside these walls will you find happiness and the young man who has stolen your heart.”

He didn't steal it,
Vienne thinks.
He won it.

She presses the money into Ghannouj's palm.

Ghannouj removes three pieces and returns them to her. “For the children you find along your journey.”

She gives the abbot a hug. He smells of sandalwood oil and green tea. “Be safe.”

“Be safe yourself.”

Without looking back, she pushes aside the curtain to the door and steps onto the porch, where Nikolai and Zhuk are waiting. “Why should I trust you?” she says. “How do I know you won't try to sell me off to the Scorpions?”

“Because if Nikolai wanted to hurt
lapochka
”—he pulls a revolver from his sleeve—“he could have shot her twice already.”

“Is that so?” Vienne knocks his arm up, twists his wrist, and yanks the gun from his grip.

“Ow!” he cries. “Leave skin!”

Vienne pops the revolver's chamber and shakes the bullets into her palm. She reloads it, flicks the chamber shut, and gives it a spin. “Needs oiling.”

He sucks blood from the wounded fingers. “Nikolai has underestimated you.”

“You wouldn't be the first.”

“Õige!”
he says. “That is why Brothers Koumanov need you.”

“Okay, I accept the job,” she says, “under three conditions. One, no one is in charge of me, which means no orders.”

“Da.”

“Two. No funny business. This is strictly a professional operation. No thieving, No looting. And most especially, no familiarity among the corps.”

“Eh?” Zhuk says.

“Means no hanky-panky with girl,” Nikolai explains. “So
jaa
.”

“And three. I get to drive a Gorgon.”

“Nyet,”
Nikolai says. “You drive Zhuk's.”

“Nyet! Nyet! Nyet!”
Zhuk stomps the porch. Dust rains down from the willow reed roof. He thumps down the steps and toward the gate. “
Nyet
! Is final!”

Nikolai watches him go. “Don't worry. Zhuk will come around.”

“Give me a few minutes to take care of my duties, and I'll go with you.”

“Okay'?” he asks. “After such struggles and heartaches, you tell me just ‘okay'? Is that easy with you?”

“It's never that easy with me,” she says. “Just wait till you see me drive.”

CHAPTER 14

The Wilderness

ANNOS MARTIS
239. 2. 12. 17:26

 

 

The sun disappears into the fir trees as I cut through the woods. Behind me, the Tharsis Plain is quiet, the sounds of Lyme's army now a memory, except for the occasional aircraft. Keeping to gullies and using the scrub terrain as cover, I walk east, asking myself the same question repeatedly. What is in the case? Why is this object so important, and if it's so important, why has its existence been kept secret? What does Lyme hope to do with it?

“Feel free to answer at any time,” I tell Mimi.

“I have only theories,” she says. “Not answers.”

“I'm open to theories, too.”

When I reach the vastness of a rolling plain, a chilling zephyr sweeps across my face. It's going to be a cold night. I'll need to find shelter, maybe build a small fire, and then start again in the morning.

“Negative,” Mimi says. “You cannot build a fire. Lyme's forces will spot it within minutes.”

“Then I'll find a rock to sleep under for a few hours.”

“ ‘There is a time for many words, and there is also a time for sleep,' ” Mimi recites.

“Homer again?”

“
The
Odyssey
, to be precise,” she says. “Sadly, this is not the time for sleep. You must vacate the area as soon as possible. To remain in one place dramatically increases the chance that you will be detected.”

“Come on, Mimi. Just a couple of hours.”

“One hour,” she says.

I yawn and stretch. “Run a sweep of the perimeter. In case there's something that wants to eat me.”

“No predator on this planet would find your symbiarmor appetizing.”

The terrain is flat with low scrub brush, which means few rocks or trees for cover. Before I can find an even passable campsite, I hear a sound overhead. I see a quickly moving star. Then I realize—it's no star.

It's a searchlight.

“Evasive!” Mimi yells.

I dive into a ditch. “Why didn't you warn me!”

“There was no indication of a vehicle on my sweeps.”

A Dragonfly drops from its cover in the clouds, banking into a narrow canyon that leads to the larger Labyrinth. Smaller, lighter, and faster than a Hellbender, the Dragonfly depends on speed, maneuverability, and a composite skin that gives it a zero visibility electronic signature.

Which explains why Mimi didn't pick it up.

“Okay,” I say as the searchlight moves on. “I'll have to keep moving.
Piru vieköön
, I'm never going to get any shut-eye.”

“If it will make you feel better,” Mimi says, “I will sing a song.”

“That'll work,” I say. “Your singing could wake the dead.”

“Then why was I never able to wake you?”

“You're not funny, Mimi.”

“Yes, I am. You simply lack the capacity to appreciate my humor.”

 

“Where are we, exactly?” I ask Mimi after a few hours of walking.

“You should carry a compass.”

“I don't need a compass 'cause you're always telling me where to go,” I say. “So where are we?”

The sky rumbles. I look up. No clouds in the sky. Then I feel a buffeting of air before any source of the disturbance can appear. I scan the horizon.

“Mimi,” I ask, “what's wrong with the air?”

“There is an upper atmospheric disturbance caused by the introduction of an object of great force.”

“That would be a Crucible strike?”

“Affirmative.”

“Well,
ja vitut
,” I say. “Where's it going to hit?”

“I approximate a strike zone one hundred kilometers in any direction from your current location.”

“A hundred clicks?” I say. “That's not very precise.”

“I did say approximate.”

“What are the odds of outrunning it?”

“Nil.”

“Zero?”

“All previous Crucible strikes appear to have landed at undetermined intervals at seemingly random targets. Therefore, it is impossible to accurately forecast a strike zone. Fleeing from one strike zone would necessarily lead to another strike zone.”

“I can't outrun it?”

“That is what I just explained.”

“So I might as well stand here and see if it hits me.”

“It is your choice. However, any choice you make has the same likelihood of success.”

“How about I find a rock to hide under? How does that affect the odds?”

“Nil.”

“How about a hole?”

“Nil.”

“A deep hole?”

“Nil.”

“A black hole?”

“I calculate that the Crucible strikes are attaining very high velocities of at least thirty-five hundred meters per second or more and have roughly half the concussive force of the Hiroshima atomic bomb,” she says. “Therefore, unless you locate a hole that extends one kilometer below the surface, you will die in a Crucible strike. The only difference is that you will save someone the trouble of burying you.”

“I was hoping to be cremated when my time comes,” I say. “You know, a Regulator's funeral.”

“Then I recommend staying out of holes.”

I look up at the sky. Shield my eyes. “So what are you saying? That MahindraCorp's general is just randomly chucking these things?”

“That is my theory based on the evidence.”

Scary, but not effective. It's like spraying a battle rifle into the air, hoping that one of the bullets lands on your enemy's head. “How long before it hits?”

“Less than one minute.”

The buffeting winds are replaced by chain rumbling like a thousand turboprops. Within moments, I can see the bright orange-red tail of what looks like a comet.

I brace myself, though I know it's a useless gesture.
Helvett
, I'm an expert on useless gestures. I watch the Crucible pass over and shrink into the horizon to the south. As quickly as it came, the thundering noise is gone.

But that's just the calm before the storm.