James Swallow - Deus Ex - Icarus Effect

Saxon got to his feet. “Are you serious? Disloyal how, exactly?”

Namir tossed the loaded pistol onto the floor between them. “I’ll explain it to you if you live past the next five minutes.”

“You actually expect me to—” Hermann never let him finish. The German was swift and he came up hard, striking with that armored fist of his in a short, hammer-blow punch. Saxon barely had time to deflect it.

He was aware of the others drawing back and away as Hermann moved in and came at him again. This time, Saxon was a half second too slow and the metal-clad fist clipped him across the shoulder. Even a glancing impact was enough to rob him of a little balance and Saxon shifted his weight. Even if he wasn’t sold on this sudden, enforced bout of trial-by-combat, the younger man certainly was. Hermann glared at him, sizing him up; the way he did it made it clear to Saxon that the German had given plenty of thought to how he would fight him if the opportunity arose. He had a sudden mental image of Gunther taking him down, stripping his corpse for parts to bolt on

to himself like a hunter taking the skull and pelt of a kill.

Saxon dodged the next punch, and the next, but then his luck ran out. Hermann connected with a heavy strike to the sternum that rattled Saxon’s rib cage and ghosted the taste of blood up his throat. The other man glimpsed the flash of pain in his eyes and for the first time since he’d met him, Saxon saw something approximating a smile flicker briefly over the German’s face. He came back in like thunder, a flurry of fast kicks and faster punches that Saxon had to work to deflect, never once getting the chance to attack in turn. The young man’s nerve-jacked speed was far in advance of Saxon’s own reflex booster, maybe a custom model or something the Tyrants had granted; it didn’t matter. Trying to match Hermann blow for blow wouldn’t work.

Instead, Saxon let the other man’s overconfidence take the lead. He let his guard go loose, and the hammer-blows started to land. Finally, Hermann connected with a punch that sent Saxon reeling, down to the concrete floor.

He blinked away pinwheels of pain from behind his eyes. Hermann went down in a looping sweep, grabbing for the pistol; he took his gaze off Saxon in that moment, chancing that his opponent was winded. His mistake, then.

As the German snatched up the weapon, Saxon rocked off his augmented legs and collided with Hermann, sending him reeling toward the edge of the light cast from the overhead bulb. The hand gripping the gun came up and it turned into a wrestling match.

For long moments they both strained for the superior position, but Saxon had the power, and the will to take the long road. Finally, with a savage twist of his wrist, he pulled the pistol away and elbowed Hermann hard in the throat, putting him on the ground.

Saxon weighed the gun in his hand.

“You gonna do it?” asked Barrett.

At the periphery of his vision, Saxon saw Namir shift slightly, his hand moving out of sight. Hermann looked up at him, silently furious.

“No,” Saxon said at length. “I’m not going to do it. Because there isn’t any bloody traitor, and I don’t play games like this. I’m a professional.” He flipped the gun over and held it out, butt first, to Namir.

The Tyrant commander took it with a nod. “The right call, Ben. If you had pulled the trigger, I would have shot you myself.”

Hermann got up slowly. “Then both of us would be dead.”

“Rounds in the gun were blanks,” said Barrett. “We’ve done this before. We ain’t stupid.” A

smile crossed his scarred face. “You did good there. You got steel. I’m impressed.”

Saxon frowned. “A test?”

“In a way,” said Namir. He nodded to them all, and when he spoke again his tone was all command. “We’ve got another assignment, in America. We fly out tomorrow, so make the most of your downtime tonight and be sure to prep your gear.”

“That’s it?” Saxon took a step after him as he walked away. “You got nothing else to say?”

Namir glanced over his shoulder. “What do you want, Ben? A membership card? You both proved yourselves. You’re part of the Tyrants. Until death.”

The Ohama Center—Washington, D.C.—United States of America

“We don’t have all the answers.” Anna watched the hacker as he crossed to the minibar behind the skybox’s line of seats and did something to the lock to make it open, fishing inside for a slender can of Ishanti. He popped the cap and drained the energy drink in a single, long pull. “Ah. Better.”

Beyond the sound-screened window, she saw William Taggart bow slightly as something he said earned a round of applause from his audience. The resonance of the clapping was distant, like faraway waves.

“What do you know?” Anna demanded. “I’m tired of your games.”

“Games haven’t even started yet,” said D-Bar. “Not for you, anyhow.” He sighed. “Let me put it another way… You ever heard of something called ‘the Icarus Effect’?”

“Sounds like a Las Vegas magic show.”

The youth chuckled and discarded the empty can. “Yeah, I guess. The Tyrants certainly have a way of making people vanish, that’s for sure.” He came closer, became more animated. “You know the story of Icarus? Guy and his dad build a set of wings, guy gets bold and flies too high, too close to the sun, guy gets dead. Same idea. It’s a sociological thing, see? A normative process created unconsciously by a society in order to maintain the status quo, keep itself stable.” D-Bar talked with his hands, making shapes in the air. “Whenever someone threatens to do something that will

upset the balance, like flying too high… the Icarus Effect kicks in. Society reacts, cuts them down. Stability returns.” He sighed. “That’s what the Tyrants do. They enforce that effect for their masters, only they don’t wait for it to happen naturally. They choose whose wings are gonna be clipped, if you get me.” He jabbed a finger at the air. “These creeps, they’re all about power. Anyone who threatens them, anyone who makes waves, gets dealt with.”

“Threatens them how, exactly?” said Anna.

“You know what they say; if you wanna make enemies, try to change something. People invested in keeping things the same don’t like it when you make waves.” He fished in his pocket and pulled out a data slate. “Look at this. These places and faces mean anything to you?”

Anna glanced down and images scrolled past her: a highway accident in Tokyo that claimed the life of a cybernetics researcher; a string of missing-persons reports from a Belltower law enforcement detachment in Bangalore; the violent mugging of a senatorial aide in Boston; an augmented teenager killed by police snipers in Detroit.

At first, she saw nothing that registered with her; then a face she recognized from her own investigations passed by—Donald Teague, an advisory staffer at the United Nations, shot dead in Brooklyn by unknown assailants. An eyewitness report talked about an ambush of Teague’s car and three men in black combat gear, and of the almost military precision with which the kill had been made…

She blinked, and for a moment the dark memory of a day in Georgetown pressed in on her thoughts, threatening to overwhelm her. Anna stiffened, forcing the recall out of herself. She read on. There were other points where the files connected to those she had discovered on her own. Men and women from corporations, government figures, those with international or UN connections like Teague. All of them either dead, missing, or assaulted. She halted on one image in particular; Senator Jane Skyler, caught by a stringer’s camera six months ago as she was wheeled through the doors of a private D.C. medical clinic. Matt Ryan’s blood was rust-red on her expensive silk blouse.