David Gunn - Day of the Damned

It was here OctoV first landed.

A bronze statue near the gate shows him in a bulky space suit carrying a helmet. He’s wearing primitive gravity boots and has an air scrubber on his back.

It is unlike any other statue of our glorious leader. These show him as he now is. Aged fourteen, in cavalry uniform, with elegant ringlets falling to his shoulders, and a sabre belted to his narrow waist.

Sven?

‘Fuck . . .’

‘Sir. Are you all right?’

I’m on my knees, fighting the urge to vomit. Around me the hard edges of the city fade to leave static in my mouth.

Sergeant Leona’s speaking.

Hers isn’t the voice I hear in my head.

Is that you?

Waves of nausea rock me.

We’ve been here before. In my head is the voice of the only man General Jaxx will bow his knee to . . . Mind you, it’s been a while since you could describe OctoV as anything approaching human.

That’s not kind.

The words fade and with it the nausea.

Leaving me on my knees, being watched by Anton, Sergeant Leona and Sergeant Toro. Anton looks worried. Toro looks shocked. Leona’s expression is harder to read.

Wiping my mouth with the back of my hand, I push myself to my feet and spit.

‘What happened?’ Anton asks.

Makes me realize he’s never seen me do that before. ‘You don’t want to know,’ I tell him. Only he does, and so does Sergeant Toro.

Can see it in his face.

‘Wetware.’ That’s the most I’m going to say.

Toro’s stare hardens.

Wetware is illegal. It’s also favoured by the metalheads. Since the Enlightened want us dead as badly as we want them wiped from the face of this galaxy, and it’s only fear of the U/Free that keeps us from slaughtering each other, owning a symbiont is close to proof of treason.

‘The general knows.’

Shouldn’t have said that. I’m supposed to be ex-Legion.

‘Did some work for him,’ I say. ‘Like you. Nothing special . . .’

The sergeant smiles sourly. He thinks he knows what nothing special means. It means I only just came out of it alive. And I have more sense than to talk about it to him or anyone else, ever.

Five minutes from here is a brothel, with wide beds and fresh food, alcohol and girls who’ll be only too happy to help us relax, or not . . .

As I said, I own the place.

Keeping it safe, and collecting their cut for keeping the neighbourhood safe from outsiders, are the Aux, my team.

It takes effort to keep walking. The turn-off to Golden Memories is deserted at this time of the morning. In the distance, a girl with blonde hair splashes water from a pail across a pavement outside.

Looks like Lisa to me. She could be settling the dust or washing away last night’s vomit. Depends on the evening everyone had.

Anton’s staring around him.

‘God,’ he says. ‘This is grim.’

Sergeant Leona catches my eye. Doesn’t look bad to us.

The houses have doors, roofs and windows. Most of their glass is unbroken. All right, the cats are thin, and the only dog we see has three legs, but it’s alive, and the cockcrow from a yard behind says chicken is still on the menu. There are cities where cat is what you get served. And the only reason you get cat is that all the dogs have gone.

‘What?’ Anton demands.

‘Just thinking . . .’

He opens his mouth and shuts it again.

All right, I know. Thinking makes me bad-tempered.

I lead them away from Golden Memories and down a narrow lane that skirts the landing field. Somewhere along here is a hole in the mesh. Unless someone’s mended it. They haven’t. Not sure who would anyway.

Maybe someone owns this field.

Hard to tell, looking at the derelict warehouses around its edge and the fleet of rusting cargo carriers awaiting a wrecking crew.

‘Through here,’ I say.

We push our bikes to keep the noise down.

Sergeant Leona needs help getting her bike through the mesh. Anton assists her, being the gentleman he is. Between them they manage to get the bars well and truly trapped. ‘Out of my way.’

Moving them aside, I rip the wire with one hand and pick up the bike with my other and drag it after me.

‘Wait here,’ I say. ‘Anybody asks, you’re looking for work. If they want to know what you did before this, ignore the question. That’s answer enough.’

I leave them looking worried.

Probably wondering if I intend to come back.

Guess the landing field looks odd unless you’ve seen one before. A mountain of engine parts, endless scuttling bots chewing steel down to dust, more broken tugs and cargo carriers than you can imagine.

The man I’m looking for lives in a warehouse. Since he’s fucking one of the girls from Golden Memories and he knows that I know he’s been drinking on a free tab for the last six months he’ll probably help.

That’s help, without threats being needed.

It’s his kid I spot first.

‘Sven . . .’ he says.

‘You didn’t see me.’

‘Didn’t I?’

‘Absolutely not. You understand?’

Blue eyes look from under a fringe. I was ugly as sin as a kid. This boy lacks the ugliness but his intensity keeps friends away. He’s ripping legs from a bucket of combat bots he drops in the dirt. After a few seconds, the bots uncurl and begin eating their own weight in shaved metal.

It’s the only way to get the bastards to repair.

I taught the kid how to do that.

From the look of things, he’s repaired thousands, because I can see them eating their way through huge sheets of space plating. And a rust-stained circle now surrounds his dad’s warehouse where other cargo carriers used to be.

‘OK,’ he says. ‘I didn’t see you. Didn’t see your friends either.’ He points into the distance where Anton and the others stand.

‘Your dad in?’

The boy nods.

‘Is he alone?’

A grin greets my question.

‘Angelique’s gone home for the weekend.’

He makes it sound like a trip to the country.

Since I know the furthest she’s been from Golden Memories is eight streets, Angelique’s obviously staying with her aunt, who lives in one of the shacks above the market.

‘Here,’ I say, emptying coins into his hand. ‘Buy me a tortilla and get one for yourself.’

‘What about them?’

I nod, and he scurries away.

The stairs to Per’s office are rusty. They also creak. So I’m not surprised to open his door and find myself staring at the muzzle of a Colt automatic. It’s large calibre, with old-fashioned sights.

His finger is on the trigger.

‘Fuck,’ he says, lowering the gun. ‘Thought you were-’ He hesitates, thinks about whether he wants to finish that sentence.

I leave him to it as I look round his room.

A double mattress, a screen fixed to the wall, an old leather chair with a gash across its back, a stack of something that looks like memory boxes, a bucket full of broken combat bots, half of them waving their legs like upturned crabs.

He’s tidied up since I was last here.

A bottle lies on its side.

‘Angelique doesn’t like me drinking.’

‘So you drink when she’s away?’

He grins, an unshaven grin that doesn’t reach his eyes. He’s been on a bender for longer than a single weekend. Which might explain why his son is already up and Angelique’s staying with her aunt.

‘You can feel it?’ he asks me.

I look at him, wondering . . .

‘Static,’ I say. ‘That’s what I can feel. A flat taste like blood in the back of my throat.’

‘Sven,’ says Per, ‘I didn’t mean literally.’

‘Oh.’ Shrugging, I look at him.

‘All the same,’ he says, ‘that’s a pretty good description.’

‘For what?’