Ben Chaney - Son of Sedonia

Mason halted them at the edge of an alley and all pressed against the wall. Broadcast his view to the squad over the Neurals. The target building sat to the right, atop a long stairwell. Mason pressed his throat node three times. Vaughn heard a beep in his inner ear each time. Hold sign… They waited in silence.

“Recon altitude reached. Stand by for audio, depth, and thermal data.” The pilot’s voice buzzed in each officer’s inner ear, and a digital task bar appeared in their Neurals. 30%. 67%. 100% . Vaughn watched blobs of color focus into distinct, outlined figures all around him. People sleeping on the floor by the dozens in several shacks. A woman bathing her baby by candlelight. A couple making love under a lean-to. As if they all lived in houses of blue glass.

In the target area above and to the left, he saw the shapes of nine men. Two sat on buckets outside, dozing with submachine guns on their laps. Four inside sat around a table working on something. The remaining three stood around the room, pacing and talking to one another. A sound-wave readout in Vaughn’s Neural tracked and recorded the conversation.

“—need to tell Suomo we got all the tech we need, man! I’m knee- deep in switches and pipe, but I ain’t got much left to put in ’em!”

“I hear you, I hear you! But I can’t keep tellin’ him that every time I go back to the Club, man, he’ll put a bullet in me just for gettin’ on his damn nerves!”

“Well tell him again! And explain if he wants to shoot somebody for bringin’ the truth that he’d best shoot me, cuz ain’t no way I can keep makin’ shit blow up if I ain’t got the main ingredient!”

Mason tapped his Neural screen, selecting the two targets outside the house. Marked one ‘ Mason ’ and the other ‘ Vaughn .’ Vaughn gulped and pushed to the front. They each slung their SMGs back around their shoulders and un-holstered sleek, black pistols. Pressing the mag release, Vaughn double-checked the ammo. Stun spurs. He clicked the mag back into his pistol and chambered a round. A digital countdown started as Mason took aim. Vaughn gulped a bad taste in his mouth. Okay…just like the range at the Gate…

One. Two. Three. Vaughn and the First Sergeant leaned out of the alley and fired. The spurs found their marks in the flesh of the guards. Both convulsed, then slumped where they sat. Vaughn exhaled. Mason turned to the officers in the alley. Waved them forward as the scene inside the shack played over audio.

“What the fuck you lookin’ at? Go! Tell ’em now!” A T99 with the face of a pitbull and build of a silver-back gorilla waved a giant chrome-plated pistol toward the door.

“Oki, come on, man…he’s either high, drunk, or sleepin’ right now…maybe all three,” a fat gangster said. His double-chin wagged as he shrugged. Oki thumbed back the hammer on the gun and waved it again. The fat guy rolled his eyes and turned to leave when his SMG strap caught on the chair of one of the techs. The tech’s skilled hands flew up and away from his work in an instant, a metal pipe full of gray putty on the table. Wires stuck out of it on all sides, one of which was connected to a gutted light switch. The tech turned to look at Oki, staring wild-eyed over a dust mask.

“Lopei, don’t move…you stupid, fat piece of shit.” Oki walked over and gently unhooked the strap from the chair. Lopei backed away, sweat pouring down his face from under his backward ballcap.

“Outside! Now!” Oki pushed him toward the door with the gun barrel. Lopei’s huge clumsy legs barely managed to back-pedal.

“Man, Oki, chill!” the lanky T99 in the back said, “You’ll push his ass over and he’ll—”

They all heard it. Footsteps outside coming up the stairs. Before they could react, two white discs slid under the door and exploded in a blinding flash. EXOs rushed in firing stun spurs. The first two hit Lopei and sent him to the floor in a massive heap. The others sprayed across the techs. Half-blind, Oki squeezed off four ear-shattering rounds at the shapes in the door, pushing them back. It gave him and the lanky T99 time enough to find the window and scramble through it.

“Shit!” Shima yelled, cranked up his Augmentors, and took off after them out the window. Mason reached for the crazy bastard and missed.

“Vaughn with me!” Mason shouted, “Dreivan, take the squad and—”

Vaughn switched on his legs, shoulder, and grip assists then stopped. Turned and looked. Dreivan, the dopey rookie from the briefing, had taken a bullet in the throat. No vital signs appeared in the Neural readout…just three letters. ‘KIA . ’ It didn’t come close to sinking in.

“Officer Babb, take the squad, secure the prisoners, and prep Dreivan for dustoff!” Mason said. The First Sergeant grabbed Vaughn by the flak vest collar and yanked. “MOVE!”

After Mason disappeared through the window, Vaughn stepped back from it. He took a breath, hopped to the window frame, and pushed off. He sailed through the hot, damp Rasalla air. Came down silently on a concrete roof below, muffled by a dampener pulse. Mason was already way ahead, chasing after Shima. Vaughn put everything he had into the Augs to catch up, leaping, diving, and vaulting through the schizophrenic landscape.

A squad cam window popped into his Neural as they reached Shima. Officer Babb’s live feed streamed in.

“Uhh, sir, Dreivan’s twitching…his RFID may be on the fritz, should we call in the medivac?” asked Babb. In the feed, the other officers struggled to move the fat T99’s face-down body. Vaughn could hear them in the background.

“Je-sus! This shit-bird weighs a metric ton!”

“Turn on an Aug boot and kick him over…”

Mason, mid stride, tried to keep his voice down in reply.

“Negative! That man is KIA, now get off the comms! ” Mason said as the fat T99’s body flipped over in the feed… wide awake and clutching something to his chest.

“RASALLA!” the T99 yelled.

The feed cut out. The shockwave slapped Vaughn in the back before he heard the deafening blast. Searing heat filled the air behind him. Ears ringing and bleeding, Vaughn rolled on the dented tin roof where he’d landed. Saw the curling molten cloud rise into the sky.

“NO!” Shima yelled, sprinting past Vaughn and Mason toward the blast. Mason caught up in two strides and grabbed Shima’s camelback.

“No, Shims!”

“LET GO! They could be—” Shima protested.

“They’re all KIA, and we will be too if we stick around—DEBRIS!” shouted Mason. Flying chunks of cinder-block, scrap metal, and charred whatever fell from the sky, some of it stabbing into the rooftops like throwing knives. Vaughn pushed out of his dent on the roof and stood up.

The three of them ran for cover.

MATTEO AWOKE IN the dark, panting and sweating. The dream images still flickered through his mind, becoming fainter but no less real. Or terrifying. Blaring engines and fire. A dark space with a broad window of fiery light ahead. Everything shaking… screaming and crying. He recognized, and yet didn’t recognize, his voice among theirs.

As the vision slowly cleared, he remembered where he was. Utu’s recovery ward in the Temple of the Wheel… a long narrow ship hull, gutted to fit two rows of bedrolls. He could have gone back to the family apartment days ago. Back to work in the Pits. But Utu, upon studying Matteo’s lost expression, said the same thing every morning.

“Hmm… more rest. Yes. More rest and another day of hot food, and you’ll be free to go.” He would end with a squinting smile. Something hid behind it, Matteo could tell, but nothing to fear. A soft bed, three meals a day, and no Pits… hard to argue with. Even if he couldn’t sleep more than a few hours. The Choice wouldn’t let him. In the stagnant darkness, his mind throbbed with possibilities.