CHAPTER EIGHT
AMBUSH / FRIENDLY FIRE, PART TWO
Mouse hissed at the darkness, baring her fangs at the sharp doubts that plagued her mind. She hated the blackness of night; she hated the tiny, basic system they were holed up in; she hated Ray for not getting away sooner.
No. She could never hate Ray, not even for a millisecond. But she was scared for him; she was terrified that Daemon had deleted him, or worse, infected the Web Surfr. Mouse's processor agonizingly replayed those last milliseconds she had seen Ray. He and Ethan had been racing toward her as she lifted Ship off the ground. Then, Ray had stumbled and fallen, his Baud scraping the ground as it clattered next to him. The Web Surfr had leapt up in the next instant and had been flying as fast as he could to her. But he had lost precious nanoseconds, and somehow — Mouse had mulled over it again and again, but she hadn't figured out why Ray had stumbled in the first place — he had lost energy and had collapsed. She had ached to turn Ship around and hurry back to rescue Ray, but the Guardians were already on her tail. If she had turned back, she would have been deleted and unable to save Ray.
Either way, Ray was gone and Mouse was at square one once more.
Unable to keep up her brave pretense any longer, Mouse blinked back the salty tears that threatened to fall from her eyes. She curled her hands around her arms and shivered in the cool night air.
It was colder than a well-digger's ASCII in Ship, in the middle of the night in Chidis. And Mouse, like some random idiot, was feeding her insomnia by repeatedly checking the controls in her ship.
Mouse leaned back and shut her eyes tightly, willing herself to focus. She knew in the back of her mind that Ship was fully functional; the one and only technician in the whole system had checked out the controls and replaced her power supply so her weapons system would work again. The thin, sallow-skinned sprite had informed Mouse that, besides a few minor scratches, Ship was ready for them to get up and go.
That was exactly what Mouse wanted to do: leave this tiny, run-down system and go find Ray. She would do whatever it took to rescue Ray from Daemon, even if it meant flying to the Supercomputer to find him. The only problem was, Ethan was stalling. Mouse wasn't sure exactly why; but she knew that he didn't want to leave when Ethan would make up a reason for them to stay in Chidis for one more second. They had come to this small system to power up Ship again and get going; they had spent almost a full cycle here.
A new question entered Mouse's weary processor: Did she trust Ethan? She quickly countered that yes, of course she trusted Ethan. Even though he bore the signs of Daemon's Infection, he had fought her control to free Mouse and Ray and take at least one of them away from Daemon's clutches. But his past behavior left her suspicious and tired of doubting the only sprite she could afford to trust.
Her emotions were a whirlwind of puzzlement, indignity, and anger. Confusion reigned supreme; for the first time in her life she didn't know what to do; she actually felt helpless, with Ray across the Net and not beside her. She sat in the hard leather pilot's chair in Ship; she wasn't lying on a squishy mattress under threadbare blankets, with her former lover hovering on the far edge of the one bed in their run-down motel room.
In the space of a few minutes, so much in Mouse's life had changed. She knew she would stay in Mainframe after the restart, and she had known that inevitably she would end up helping her friends to fight Daemon. But she never would have thought that one super-virus could control the Net so totally. Mouse had to admit, it was frightening when she remembered all the decimated systems she and Ray had visited, with little or no sprites who hadn't been infected or deleted.
On this journey through the Net, Mouse had learned more about destruction than she would ever have wanted to. Memories of her previous life and the new life she led had been dug up, triggered by the different sprites they had encountered. She had gained and lost friends; old and new lovers had been added to the mix. It was all getting to be too much.
Mouse forced her thoughts away from her own situation to ponder what had happened to her friends. She hadn't gotten a message from Dot in cycles; had something happened? Mouse dismissed her anxiousness, disgusted with herself; the paranoia of Daemon's invasion had reached even her, usually the calm one. Now, Mouse found herself worrying and thinking up countless "what ifs". She shoved aside those notions as well.
She hated nothing in the Net more than Daemon, Mouse decided. She resolved to track down that bitch of a super-virus and show her a world of pain for all the suffering she had delivered upon the rest of the Net.
But to find Daemon, she would have to haul her ASCII out of this two-bit system. Mouse growled and threw her hands up in surrender. Here she was, back where she had begun. She was going around in circles.
A faint sound reached her ears, causing Mouse to sit upright in her seat. Her head whipped around, her large eyes searching the darkness. Holding her breath, she carefully leaned her head out the window and surveyed the area outside Ship.
Footsteps crunched on gravel, and some breathless nanos later Ethan appeared from around the side of Ship. Mouse let out her breath, but a nano later she was alert again. What was Ethan doing outside at this time of night? Mouse settled back in her seat and listened for any more sound from her companion. His footfalls faded as he walked around Ship, but then they came again, louder than before, as Mouse heard the back hatch whoosh open. Ethan entered Ship and made his way down toward the pilot's seat, his black Guardian boots ringing out on the metal floor.
Mouse's back was to him; she spun around in her chair and jumped up. She curled her left hand into a fist and pointed the gold ring with her Mouse symbol straight at him. Ethan stopped short and stared at Mouse questioningly.
"Haven't you heard that it's impolite ta walk in on a lady without permission?" she asked, one flaming eyebrow raised in challenge.
Ethan had made sure that Mouse was asleep before he sneaked out of their motel room and down the rickety staircase. No one had been at the front desk to see him leave the motel and run outside into the freezing-cold night.
On their first second in Chidis, while Mouse brought Ship to the mechanic and consulted with him, Ethan searched around the system until he found a proper message station. There were hardly any people around; at least, as far as Ethan could see, the few sprites who lived here were holed up in their businesses.
Glancing around him to make sure no one was watching, Ethan punched in a foreign, untraceable address that no one in the Net could identify; it was used only in the Web. He drummed his fingers impatiently on the panel of the machine as the basic heap of metal took almost a millisecond to connect to the unusual recipient.
The moment the connection was secure, Daemon's burning eyes appeared on the screen. She was in a new host body, one that he didn't recognize, but he would know those eyes anywhere, in any time of his life; they haunted his dreams.
"Report." Her voice chilled him more than the night temperature in Chidis. Ethan had gotten this far, but he suddenly clamped his jaw shut, not wishing to tell Daemon about Mouse.
Bit by bit, the super-virus dragged the report out of him. When he had told her all she wanted to know, she smirked and said, "You know I was able to read your thoughts already, and we didn't have to go through that painful exercise." Her expression hardened. "But you have to learn, like my other slaves, that you cannot win against me. No matter what, you will bend to my control."
It was the inevitable truth, Ethan knew. He sighed miserably and stuffed his hands in his pockets. Mounting his zip-board, he flew quietly through the streets until he came upon the communications station. He quickly punched in the Web code that would connect him to Daemon, hating himself for each number and letter he pressed.
Daemon appeared on the screen, again in a host body. She was in her private chamber; behind her were those huge pods Ethan had glimpsed only once. Her hosts were suspended, one in each pod, like a Web creature's meal. He shuddered to think about it.
"Report," Daemon ordered tersely, her arms crossed over her chest.
"I'm stalling to keep Mouse in Chidis," Ethan said. "So far, it's been five seconds."
Daemon sighed and pursed her lips, looking like a normal sprite, as the woman whose body she now controlled had once been. "You both know I have the Web Surfr, and your companion will most likely want to come after him." Ethan could say nothing. "Bring Mouse to me; that way I can infect her, and she can be with her darling Ray Tracer."
Ethan's head jerked back as he again rebelled against Daemon's control. He gritted his teeth and fought to swallow past the lump that had lodged in his throat. Daemon watched his struggle with amusement and finally allowed him to speak by waving her hand; the lump disappeared, and Ethan gasped for air. "Please, Mistress, don't do that," he pleaded. "You can't do that." User, I sound like a basic little child!
"I know you have feelings for her," Daemon said, "but my only feeling is to infect her — or delete her."
"Either way, she'll be gone," Ethan said bitterly.
"That's my Infection," Daemon replied simply, and Ethan hated her viciously.
He tried for another approach. "Maybe we can reach a compromise?" he suggested.
"A compromise?" Daemon scoffed incredulously. "Do you remember who holds control over your puny life, sprite?" To prove her point, the veins around Ethan's icon glowed brightly. "You're still processing," Daemon reminded him; "that's a hell of a lot better than most of my slaves."
"Hear me out," Ethan pleaded; when Daemon said nothing, he rushed on. "If I keep Mouse here, or — or take her someplace else, and she doesn't go after Ray, will you not harm her?"
"She'll return to Mainframe — or Azrael — and alert the others," Daemon said. "There is no way that I will allow that to happen. You will bring Mouse to me within two seconds. Understand?"
I hate every pixel of you, you horrible, despicable thing. You're a vile, disgusting creature. You stink of evil; you have no core-com, just a cold black hole. I hate you for everything you've done; to me, to my friends, to everyone I've ever cared about.
Naturally, Ethan couldn't voice these thoughts aloud. But he knew that Daemon could read and was reading his thoughts, and he smirked. Aloud, he said only, "Yes, Mistress Daemon."
The super-virus closed off the connection, and her image was replaced with a black screen. Ethan stared at himself in the reflection of the dusty screen. His hands, balled into fists, trembled, and he felt the urge to smash the glass of the communicator. He almost did, knowing that it would be a wonderful thing if Daemon were unable to contact him. But no, then she would curl her claws into his processor and weed out every bit of information she could. It would be a much more painful experience, so Ethan resigned himself to not venting his anger on the station. He turned away, feeling his core-com sink into his gut for more than one reason.
He had done all he could, but Mouse was going to be taken to Daemon — and by him, no less! Ethan trudged back towards the motel, tears threatening to fall from his eyes. Mouse will get what she wanted, in a sense; she'll be going to Ray, was his only thought, grim and not very helpful.
As he approached the crumbling shack, Ethan caught sight of Ship standing near the motel. The second after they had arrived in Chidis, after Ship had been fully repaired, Mouse had landed it in front of the motel and had been readying it for flight when Ethan came down the stairs. He had made up some reason — he couldn't even remember it now — that they couldn't go. He had convinced Mouse, very much against her will, to remain in Chidis with him for another second; and another second; and another second.
The fact that Ship was in front of the motel didn't bother Ethan. What had surprised him was that he saw dim lights inside the ship. He carefully walked over to figure out what was going on. Upon closer inspection, he saw that the controls gave off a small light, and a lamp had been switched on in the darkness to illuminate the cockpit. Intrigued, Ethan opened the hatch to Ship and stepped inside.
As he approached the cockpit, he saw Mouse's hair and eyes glowing in the darkness. Ethan opened his mouth to call out a greeting, but he was stopped by Mouse's gold ring pointing at his face and her eyes narrowed in suspicion.
Ethan's core-com raced wildly. Had Mouse seen him? Did she know that he had been reporting to Daemon every night, against his will? He forced himself to not jump to conclusions, and he soon realized that Mouse was only annoyed that he had startled her, though the truth was, she had startled him. Mouse didn't know anything about Daemon or how close she was to becoming the next sprite infected.
Nonetheless, Ethan knew what her ring could do, from past experience. "Easy, Mouse," he said, as he slowly backed off. With a sigh, Mouse relaxed her hand and instead placed it on her hip.
"What are you doing out here, Ethan?" Mouse asked sharply; he had startled her, though she wasn't about to admit it. "You should be asleep at this time of night."
"So should you," he countered. He paused for only a nano before he spoke again, trying to make up an alibi as he went along: "I woke up, and you weren't in the room. So, I came down here to find out where you had gone. You had me worried, you know."
Mouse pursed her lips and looked away. After a moment, she returned her gaze to Ethan's. "Ah was checkin' up on Ship; ya know, makin' sure she was fully functional and all."
Ethan grinned wryly. "I should've known. You did that last night, too." Too late, the veins around his neck tightened, causing him to choke as punishment for his slip.
It was too dark for Mouse to notice the veins, but she frowned at Ethan's words. "Whaddaya mean, last night? What were you doing outside last night?"
The veins relaxed on his neck, but Ethan had no idea what in the Net to say. He fumbled for a proper explanation, mentally cursing Daemon for not giving him one; the super-virus didn't want to be discovered, after all, so why not give her slaves alibis to get out of sticky situations such as this?
Mouse's eyes narrowed even further. "Ethan?"
"I was talking to the landlord," Ethan finally answered; "the sprite who runs the motel." He felt a moment of relief that he had made up a suitable lie, but he quickly rushed on when Mouse looked only a little bit convinced. "I was trying to set up a deal with him, that we would stay for another cycle, maybe, but pay less for our room."
"Hold on!" Mouse interrupted him, one hand extended. "Stay another cycle? Ethan, we've been here for five seconds already. When are we planning to leave?" He didn't answer, and Mouse's temper flared. "Ah want to find Ray. For all we know, he's deleted right now. He's a close friend and" — she decided to let Ethan know how she really felt — "and Ah care for `im. Ah can't — Ah won't let Daemon have `im, you understand?"
"Yes, I do," Ethan snapped. His jaw tightened, but rather than say anything more, he turned and walked out of Ship. After a nano of consideration — Mouse had just been sitting in Ship because she had nothing else to do — she followed him, closing Ship's hatch and racing after Ethan.
The young Guardian had already entered the motel and started up the steep staircase. Mouse followed him — out of the corner of her eye, she noticed that there was no one at the front desk — but didn't speak until they had entered their room and closed the door.
"Ethan, now is definitely not the time to get jealous," Mouse said.
Ethan was surprised and a little shocked. Sure, he was somewhat envious of the new man in Mouse's life, but he and Mouse had parted ways a long time before Daemon infected him. Jealousy was only a small part of his reluctance to help Ray; the reason he had been stalling for time was his own love for Mouse. He didn't want to see her get hurt; he wished she had never become involved in any of this.
But if wishes were units, Ethan Hertz would own the Supercomputer.
Ethan's whole body ached with fighting Daemon's Infection. She knew his every thought and impulse; she clamped down on his rebellious intentions the nano he processed them. There was no way he could tell Mouse the truth, that he was still under Daemon's control and would eventually be playing into her hands.
Ethan tried to move his jaw, but it was frozen, and he couldn't get his voice to work.
"Look," Daemon sneered through his mouth, Ethan powerless to fight, "I'm trying to keep safe. I don't care about your precious little Surfr. I wanna save my own skin, and if that Surfr deletes, it means nothing to me." Daemon released him then, and Ethan gasped suddenly and rubbed his neck. He hated it when the super-virus did that.
He gulped — now back in control — when Mouse's eyes blazed dangerously. He saw her hands curl into fists, and he remembered that Mouse had a pretty mean right hook.
The hacker didn't resort to violence, but her voice was icy when she spoke. "Ah'm sorry you feel that way. But Ah'm gonna go save Ray — if Ah have ta do it myself." She spun on one heel and started toward the door.
A storm was building up in Ethan's chest, and he thought he would burst out of his own skin. He took several deep breaths, trying to keep his head above Daemon's overwhelming control; it crested over him in waves, and he felt indescribably weary from trying to fight her.
"I'm sorry," he finally managed to say, though the words came out as a wheeze. "I — I can't control —" He could say nothing more, and he watched Mouse through shadowed eyes.
Mouse slowly turned, her forehead creasing in puzzlement. For the first time she noticed that the veins around Ethan's neck were pulsing steadily. A trickle of fear invaded Mouse's calm; but she could trust Ethan, she firmly reminded herself. Nevertheless, she cautiously asked, "Ethan . . . are you all right?" as she reached out a hand.
"I'm fine," he forced out, his tone as curt as it had been before. This time, however, Mouse's look of anger was replaced with worry and pity. Ethan pushed her hand aside. "Get some sleep," he muttered, walking toward his side of the shabby bed.
Mouse headed into the bathroom to wash her face, her core-com heavy in her chest. She was no idiot; she could see how Ethan struggled against Daemon's control. She'd had no idea who was speaking back there, and it scared her that she couldn't recognize the sprite she used to be so close to.
Mouse knew that staying with Ethan was terribly risky, but he was the only sprite who could help her get Ray back. And maybe, just maybe, Mouse could cure Ethan of the Infection. She knew they could never go back to how they had been — their lives had turned in two different directions hours before — but at least her friend and former lover would be free.
A sound like a thunderclap resounded through the corridor, and Eide jumped almost a foot. She instantly recognized the noise as a gunshot, but the knowledge did nothing to slow her pounding core-com. She hadn't heard a gunshot for some time; even though the noise sounded far away, it meant that someone was coming — perhaps her way.
She briefly wondered where Axis was. As they were patrolling the southern apex, she had moved closer to the smaller, southeast point, realizing that if they had people assigned to only the four main points the Guardians could still sneak in undetected. Hopefully, Axis had stayed where he was to fight any Guardians that came his way.
Eide had already encountered a few, but the shots she had scored on their bodies did little to stop them. They were nearly indestructible, and on one occasion Eide had barely escaped with her head intact.
Silence had resettled over the room, and Eide expelled a breath she hadn't realized she was holding.
A sudden noise, clearer in the stillness, made her tense up again. Eide wished that she wouldn't have to be so spooked by this waiting, and that whatever was near would reveal itself and give her something substantial to see.
Her wish was granted. From one of the many snaking tunnels appeared a female Guardian with bright yellow-orange skin covered in neon green veins. Only the neck was revealed; white-and-purple armor covered the rest of the woman's body.
This Guardian seemed to have been separated from her group and had wandered through a tunnel looking for them. When she happened upon Eide, she stopped in her tracks and swiftly powered up her gun. Eide had no way of seeing the woman's face, but she had a sinking feeling that the Guardian was grinning at her.
Eide realized in a practical way that her blaster was much smaller and probably less powerful than the Guardian's. She also knew that she would have to resort to hand-to-hand combat when the need arose.
For a long time the two women stared each other down; their hands rested on their weapons, but neither shot.
Eide knew she had more to lose, so if she had any hope of surviving she should take the first shot. Her eyes hurriedly swept over the Guardian, searching for a weak spot. The only spot unprotected was the neck; Eide squeezed the trigger, and a laser pierced the Guardian's vein-covered neck.
The woman screamed in a guttural tone Eide had never heard from the mouth of any sprite. Energy — But not real sprite energy, right? Eide tried to reason — began gushing steadily from the wound, but the Guardian ignored it and aimed at Eide.
The mercenary dodged the shot easily; the Guardian had gotten clumsy. Her opponent took one hand off the gun to stem the flow of energy in her neck, and Eide knew this was her best chance to attack.
Eide holstered her gun and launched herself at the Guardian, her hands prepared to curl around the sprite's neck. The Guardian caught her in mid-leap, but Eide was ready. She twisted her waist and swung her legs at the Guardian's head. She struck the Guardian with two heavily booted feet and used the woman's armor to propel herself out of the Guardian's grip. Eide landed on her feet and grinned in a moment of self-congratulation. And Balu said I couldn't learn, she thought amusedly.
While her kick had pushed the Guardian away, it hadn't even knocked her out. Ignoring her gun, the Guardian lunged at Eide. The mercenary pulled back her fist and prepared to land on a blow the Guardian's helmeted face.
The Guardian grabbed Eide's wrist firmly and squeezed. Eide gasped and attempted to yank her hand away, but the much stronger Guardian twisted her arm around her back and yanked sharply on said arm. Sharp pains sank their teeth into Eide's body, but she somehow managed to kick the Guardian in the stomach, causing her to release her.
Eide groaned and dropped to the ground, cradling her arm against her side. It wasn't broken, thank the Net, but it throbbed with white-hot pain. Eide gritted her teeth and shook her head in an attempt to block out the quick-traveling ache.
A dark shape appeared behind the Guardian, but Eide couldn't see who it was; the sprite came up only to the Guardian's shoulder. As Eide watched, the pudgy sprite lifted his right hand. In it he held a long, thin staff tipped with a glowing, blue-green substance. Enlightenment struck Eide like a jolt of electricity, and she grinned.
The Guardian spun around just as the sprite tapped her on the shoulder with the rod. The Guardian yanked out her gun, but before she could pull the trigger, she was suspended in a seven-foot-tall file-lock.
Dram Freeware stepped out from behind the frozen Guardian and bowed mockingly. Eide rolled her eyes — his charm was lost on her — but gratefully accepted the three staffs he tossed her. Two she secured in her belt, while she gripped the other tightly.
"Use these wisely," Dram instructed. "There are twenty on each rod, if you don't aim it the wrong way."
"There you are," Eide grumbled in reply. "Where were you?"
Before Dram could answer, more Guardians turned the corner and opened fire on the two mercenaries. Eide yanked open a door and pulled Dram behind it, diving behind the shield a nano after him. The door was thick, but it wouldn't protect them forever.
"Where were you?" Eide panted as she switched the file-lock to one hand and unholstered her gun with the other.
Dram leaned around the door to deliver a shot that struck a Guardian in the arm, causing him to drop his blaster. Dram followed with a series of rapid shots before ducking back down. "Wounding some Guardians," he answered as he reloaded his gun. "I also got a ton of these in the armory," he added, waving a file-lock. "They're the best thing I could find that slows them down."
"Good idea," Eide commented, adding her gunshots to the mix.
A shot struck her small blaster squarely, and the muzzle melted over her hand. "FAQ!" Eide swore, quickly dropping the gun, which had been reduced to a useless chunk of metal. She sank to her knees and leaned against the door as Dram continued to send laserfire the Guardians' way.
He glared down at the spiky-haired woman. "Come on," he growled impatiently, kicking her sharply with one booted foot.
Eide resisted the very powerful urge to leap up and throttle him. Instead she stretched her hand to make sure it wasn't injured while wrapping her fingers around one of the file-locks. Dram Freeware was a strange sprite, Eide had learned in the hours she had worked with him. He displayed a wide range of moods, usually within one half-micro. She had never liked him, not from the nano she met him.
"I'm only outnumbered about fifteen to one," Dram reminded her. Taking a deep breath to steel herself, Eide slowly raised herself and gripped the staff tightly.
Eide took careful aim — she had only twenty shots — and applied pressure on the small black button on one side of the staff. A bright blue disc shot out, the force sending Eide backspacing several steps. The blue disc struck a Guardian squarely in the chest. The nano it touched his armor, the disc expanded to become a huge blue-green box. Within moments, the Guardian was suspended in a file-lock.
Eide was already taking aim again, lest the Guardians dodge out of the way. She brought down two more and calmly took her next shot; this one landed two Guardians in one file-lock, Eide noted with amusement.
Daemon was becoming puzzled and agitated, and her Guardians acted the same. The sprites from Azrael and Mainframe were proving far more resourceful than the super-virus had originally thought. Daemon quickly took control of her slaves, however, and they began to deflect the file-locks. Eide narrowed her eyes and concentrated harder.
Finally, the Guardians were all frozen, and nineteen of Eide's twenty shots were used up. A few of the more limber Guardians had caused her to waste one or two extra shots before she pinned them.
Eide stood up and stretched, her back sore from crouching, and challenged Dram with one word: "Ha."
He shook his head, sending his shaggy hair flying from side to side. "You're way too arrogant," he muttered.
"If you don't shut your mouth, Freeware, I will," Eide promised. "I've still got one shot left."
A shadow fell across her shoulder, and Eide was too slow to react. Dram roughly jerked Eide's staff out of her hands and shot over her shoulder. Eide ducked as the bright blue shot whizzed over her, where her head had been. After five breathless nanoseconds, Eide carefully stood up and turned around. The Guardian who had attempted to attack her was now lying on his back in a file-lock.
Eide spun back toward Dram. The shorter sprite, for his part, was smirking broadly. He handed Eide her file-lock with raised eyebrows, obviously waiting for her gratitude.
Eide sighed. "Thank you," she said grudgingly. She discarded the first staff and pulled the second file-lock rod out of her belt.
"My pleasure," Dram replied. He strapped his gun into the holster and turned toward a corridor that branched off from where they stood.
Eide's forehead creased in a frown. "Hey, where are you going?" she called.
Dram turned and answered, "We have to split up so we can stop more Guardians, ma'am." He raised a mocking salute to her, then spun on his heel and began to march purposefully away.
Before he reached the next corridor, a wave of hot energy blasted through, and Dram stumbled backwards to avoid being burned. Brushing off his slightly singed clothing, he hurried back toward Eide.
"What was that?" Eide asked.
Her question was answered, but not by Dram. Black smoke quickly rolled into the corridor, and the two mercenaries took cover behind the battered door they had used as a shield earlier. The smoke filled the room within nanoseconds, and already the temperature was rising, until the heat would become unbearable.
Covering her mouth and nose with her sleeve and narrowing her eyes, Eide crept out from behind the door, determined to see what was happening. Red and orange tongues of fire blazed in the doorway and began to invade the small room; the flames were already racing up the wall and devouring whatever they met.
She turned away and stumbled back to Dram. "There's a fire," she whispered hoarsely, collapsing beside him.
"I got that," was his wheeze of a retort.
Eide stood again, motioning for Dram to do the same. "We have to find a fire extinguisher," she said, and he nodded to show he understood. They searched the walls and small tunnels that branched off from this room, but the smoke was increasing, making it harder for them to see.
"Here!" Dram finally shouted, though it was muffled by the smoke and his clothes. He had run into an office that branched off from one of the corridors. When Eide entered the small office, she found Dram standing by a small glass case that contained the fire extinguisher.
Eide delivered a powerful kick to the glass, and it shattered. Dram dropped his sleeve and took the heavy fire extinguisher in both hands. Turning toward the red and orange flames that had crept up on them, he pressed down hard on the handle. Keeping a careful grip on the handle, he calmly sprayed billowing white clouds over the raging fire. Soon, the flames had been forced back, and the extinguisher was spent. Dram tossed the extinguisher aside and leaned heavily against the charred wall.
Now that the air was clear, they could figure out the source of the fire. Eide cautiously walked over to the corridor where the flames had appeared and thoroughly inspected it. "From the looks of it, the fire came from the eastern point," she decided, turning back to her companion. "It must have been burning for a while if it's already reached us. Who was in the eastern point?" Dram shrugged as if to say "How do I know?" Eide growled in consternation, but the anger soon faded as she pondered what to do.
"No more dallying." Dram's slow drawl startled Eide out of her thoughts. "We've got work to do." He straightened up, pulled the first file-lock out of his belt, and turned toward another side corridor as calmly as if the fire had not just happened.
He was right, Eide knew; they were likely to capture more Guardians if they split up. She nodded to Dram and headed not to the eastern point, where the fire raged, but toward another tunnel that would take her to the middle of the Principle Office. From there, she knew there were four main corridors; she could get to the northern or western point.
Eide wasn't a religious woman, but she offered a quick prayer to the User for whomever had been in the eastern point before or after the fire broke out; she suspected AndrAIa had been stationed there. She also wondered who had fired that one shot she had heard some time before Dram had caught up with her, and if the Guardian who had shot it was coming her way.
After assigning sprites and binomes to their spots in the Principle Office, Countess Avina and her personal guards searched for a place to wait for the Guardians. The eight apexes were all taken care of, and another squad of CPUs had stationed themselves in the center of the P.O.
The 18-hour-old's guards had tried to convince her that she should be hidden away so Daemon wouldn't find her. But Avina was as stubborn as the sprite who had ruled before her, and she ordered her guards to bring her to a place where they could do their part in the fighting. So, they went outside the Principle Office.
As they hurried through dimly lit corridors — the P.O. was like a catacomb, a never-ending maze, and right now the Countess was thankful for that — a single, loud gunshot struck the still silence as a hard object would shatter glass. Avina froze, her core-com hammering wildly and her breath hissing in the cool air that reached them from outside.
Countess Misoun didn't have time to consider the one shot, as a storm of gunshots resounded off the walls behind them. From the way echoes were traveling through the building, with no Guardians to follow them, the shots could be from the next corridor down or an entirely different point of the Principle Office. Avina decided not to take her chances, and she hurried toward the two heavy doors that opened onto the cold, black night.
They emerged between the northern and northeastern points of the Principle Office. By squinting, the Countess could discern the shapes of the identical apartment buildings looming behind her; in the other direction was a strip mall.
And on top of the Principle Office were several large, black, dangerous Guardian transports.
Avina inhaled sharply and quickly bit her lip to stop the cry from leaving her mouth. Her hands trembled, but she stuffed them into her sleeves so no one could see her fear. Glancing around at the circle of faces, she realized that even her guards, who had trained for hours to become her elite bodyguards, were nervous.
One transport detached from the roof of the Principle Office and slowly wound through the air on its way to the ground. The transport settled in front of them, making the ground rattle and dust rise up around their eyes. Dark shapes began to file out of the ship, and Avina heard the sounds of guns being cocked.
"Get ready," the Countess whispered. she pulled out a blaster and gripped it tightly, even though she was surrounded by her guards. Her escorts had refused to leave her side, and Countess Misoun couldn't help but be glad that they hadn't. She knew that with Ferias as her shadow and three burly men, she couldn't feel any more protected.
Guardians rushed at them from all sides, but they were ready. Her three most trusted guards ran forward to meet the Guardians, while Ferias lingered next to Avina. The Guardians had a difficult time knocking aside the Countess' bodyguards — rather, they were the ones who were pushed away — but some did reach the young sprite.
Avina wasn't helpless. Before her teenage hours, she had endured slow and rigorous training in various forms of self-defense. She employed some of those methods now, doing her best to drive back the Guardians who came at her; Ferias had her hands full already.
Even though she had some skills under her belt, Avina couldn't drive any of the Guardians to the ground. It had something to do with the fact that they were "deleted but still processing" as Axis had put it in a confusing explanation one second. Avina finally had no choice but to use her blaster. She had also done target practice, but at the time she had been several hours younger and had never imagined that she would actually be required to use it in a situation such as the one she was trapped in now.
The Countess flinched when the first Guardian she shot was flung to the ground. A cold absence of emotion blanketed her mind, and she forced herself to act numb to the groans the Guardians let out when they fell. They jumped up a few nanoseconds later, and soon gunshots riddled their armor, though they kept on coming.
Ferias shot a Guardian in the neck, and it sent him to the ground for good. She spared only a glance for the fallen sprite before she turned toward the next Guardian who was advancing in front of her.
Countess Misoun didn't hear the Guardian come up behind her. Only when a voice breathed in her ear, "A host for Daemon" did Avina react. She twisted out of his grip and kicked him as hard as she could.
Another Guardian grabbed her hair and yanked her head back, exposing her neck. Before he could press a small, hand-sized gun against her skin, Ferias shot him in the back with her blaster. His body jerked once, then his grip loosened on Avina's hair, and he fell, still.
Avina couldn't waste time to be shocked at her near-brush with deletion. Hearing a sound behind her, she swung her gun around and hit the next Guardian square in the chest. He was flung back several yards and smashed heavily into a cement wall; when his body hit the ground, he stayed there.
Ferias yanked the tiny gun out of the Guardian's hand and held it up to her face. After a few moments of scrutiny, she opened the barrel and emptied its contents into her hand. Ferias threw the gun aside and showed Countess Misoun the small purple darts. "Tranquilizers," she explained in her quiet, level voice.
Countess Misoun rubbed her neck where the gun had almost hit her. "He said something like A body for Daemon'," she offered, wondering if that made any sense. Her face contorted in fear for a moment, but the next nano her expression was smooth again. "I guess they really do want to take me away — and alive." She gulped on the last word.
Ferias laid a gentle hand on Avina's arm. "We will protect you, Your Grace."
They weren't finished with the fighting, however. More Guardians, seeing the young Countess, rushed at them from somewhere — Avina wasn't sure where most of them came from, and she couldn't help but think that there were too many to count and that they would keep on coming.
Countess Avina stubbornly shoved aside her pessimistic worries and stood her ground. Her bodyguards were ready to fight, and so was she. She took a deep breath and firmly told herself that she had to focus on one Guardian at a time; delete one, delete the next, delete another, until they were all gone.
This was going to be a long night.
Axis resolved to tell Codec he wanted to be partnered up with someone else next time as he quietly made his way through the corridors. It was eerily silent down here, and Axis saw no Azraelian guards. Either they were deleted, he couldn't help but think, or — the more optimistic view — they had moved to other parts of the Principle Office and were still fighting Guardians.
As of yet, Axis hadn't encountered any of the infected Guardians, and of that he was glad. His plan — the best he could think of -- was to meet up with Bob, or maybe Eide, and proceed from there.
As he treaded silently down the corridor, a large, armored shape slammed into his side. Axis choked on a scream and kicked the Guardian roughly in the chest. The infected sprite stumbled back several steps. He shook his head from side to side before jerking his gun out of the holster and shooting at Axis.
The lanky sprite ducked down, at the same time bringing out his blaster. He rose, taking quick, perfectly accurate shots at the Guardian. Though he hated deletion, Axis Lurker scored highest of all The Net's Own in target practice.
The bullets struck the Guardian's armor, but they did little to deter him. He advanced and punched Axis in the face. Axis' head snapped back, and he heard a sickening crunch. Now it was his turn to fall back, his blaster slipping from his fingers as his hands came up to cradle his broken nose. Energy gushed down his face, and for a moment he trembled as the urge to vomit weighed heavily upon him.
Axis pushed aside the pain and gathered his resolve. He bent to pick up the blaster and spun toward the Guardian. The Guardian had expected the puny sprite to falter or even be knocked unconscious. Axis reacted too quickly for the Guardian to match with his own reflex, and so he took all of the shots from Axis.
Axis was a practiced physician, so he was able to come to a conclusion of how to wound the Guardian as he watched his opponent stagger and fall heavily against the wall. He lunged at the Guardian and pressed him against the wall. He pushed the muzzle of his gun into the Guardian's unprotected neck, and his finger tightened on the trigger. His breath caught in his throat, and his core-com was beating rapidly. Axis shut his eyes for a fraction of a nanosecond and reminded himself that the sprite he faced had been deleted a long time ago, and the infected Guardian he was finishing off was just a shell.
In all sensibility, a thin sprite like Axis shouldn't have been able to beat down a muscular, well-trained Guardian, especially if said Guardian were controlled by a powerful super-virus. True enough, the infected sprite had been caught off-guard by Axis' quick reflexes, but now he was ready. He wrenched out of Axis' grip and rammed him into the opposite wall. Axis yelled and flailed with his legs, but the Guardian punched him repeatedly in the face.
Axis gasped and willed himself to ignore the searing pain all over his face. His hands hung uselessly at his sides. As the Guardian continued to pummel him, Axis hurriedly unlatched his belt and looped it around the Guardian's neck, cinching the leather tightly.
The Guardian stopped punching Axis, and his hands went to his neck as he fought to rip the belt off. Axis knew that the Guardian wasn't being choked and wasn't likely to conveniently fall to the ground, but he did know that his opponent was slowed down, for the moment.
Axis picked up his gun and held it to the back of the Guardian's neck. If his reasoning worked — and Axis prayed to the User, because otherwise he would be one dead sprite — injuring the host body beyond processing would stop the Guardian. Axis' hand didn't shake anymore, and with a cold cruelty, he applied pressure on the trigger. The shot, at its close range, blew through the Guardian's neck, and he slumped to the ground. Axis knelt by the Guardian and cautiously inspected his prone form. The veins around the Guardian's neck tightened. The glowing green color seemed to spasm; then the veins went a dead black.
Axis pushed himself up with one hand, feeling as if he inhabited another sprite's body. He was jolted back to reality by the queasiness in his bruised face, and Axis opened his mouth to take in noisy gasps of air. This was why he hated fighting.
More Guardians were coming, Axis could tell by the growing noise of boots striking the metal floor. The sound was coming from the direction of the western point — where Bob and Matrix were stationed, Axis recalled, his core-beat quickening.
Axis flattened himself against the wall and struggled to breathe quietly through his broken nose, though it brought fiery pain. The Guardians bounded past him, toward another apex of the Principle Office.
When Axis was sure that no other Guardians followed their comrades, he stepped back out into the open. Pointedly ignoring the deleted Guardian, Axis went to retrieve his belt from the sprite's neck. As he straightened up, his pants, with nothing to hold them, slid down his legs.
A bark of laughter escaped his lips. Axis was unable to hold back the guffaw that followed, and he laughed loudly for almost a millisecond until his sides ached. Here he was, having just escaped a life-and-deletion situation, and he was laughing because his pants were unbelted.
A platoon of CPUs sprinted past the side corridor, but after a moment they stopped and retraced their steps. They lingered in the doorway, surprised and puzzled at the sight of a lanky sprite with his pants pooled around his ankles.
Axis' chuckles abruptly stopped when he saw the CPUs standing at the doorway with raised eyebrows. "Hello, gentlemen," he said pleasantly as he pulled his pants back up and secured them with the belt, after wiping the Guardian's energy off the leather. "I was fighting a Guardian," Axis explained when they still looked dumbstruck. "I choked him with this," Axis added, pointing to the belt. The CPUs slowly nodded, one by one, as if that explained everything.
"Hel — help . . ." a familiar voice cried out suddenly. From the eastern apex of the P.O. came a sharp gasp, followed by soft, weak-sounding cries. The CPUs all turned their attention toward the corridor.
"I'll go that way," Axis spoke up, and the sprites and binomes turned back to him. "If there's a Guardian, I can delete him. I saw the rest of the troops go this way." He jerked his thumb in the direction the infected sprites had gone. "Why don't you all go after them? If I went after the Guardians, I'd be sorely outnumbered, but you all will make it pretty even."
The CPUs agreed with his reasoning. Shouldering their weapons, they headed in the way Axis had pointed. For his part, Axis slipped his gun out of its holster and slipped around the corner he had heard the cries coming from. He slowly advanced forward with the weapon held out, in case a trap awaited him.
Axis jumped around the corner, his gun pointing at any threat. But no one leapt at him, and when he did a quick search, he saw no sign of Guardians. In fact, there were only blue-gray metal walls stretching ahead of him. Axis frowned and continued down the corridor. The cries had stopped, but someone gasped in the stillness, and Axis followed the breathy whispers as well as he could. The sprite's — or binome, Axis reasoned — breathing turned loud and ragged, then stopped altogether.
Axis rushed around another corner; he was sure he knew where the victim was. He caught sight of an average-sized sprite sprawled on his back, and Axis' face split into a grin. He hurried forward, pleased that he had found the sprite — but when he reached the injured man, the smile dropped from his face, to be replaced by a look of horror.
Bob's prone form lay on the ground, quivering. His silver suit was stained with blue-green energy that gushed furiously from the wound in his stomach. Axis knelt by the Guardian and gasped, "Oh my User!" while he fumbled in his pocket for a communicator. He turned it on and frantically yelled, "Dram or Eide, I need you in the northwestern point. Now!" He left the communicator on and stuffed it into his pocket.
Axis carefully lifted the Guardian's head. Bob's whole body was shaking, and his eyelids fluttered unconsciously. Axis pulled off his jacket and held it over Bob's stomach to stem the flow of energy. Bob muttered something, but it was too low for Axis' hearing.
"Quiet, Bob," the mercenary instructed, trying to keep his head up while he continued to apply pressure to the injury.
Bob looked up at him with feverish eyes. "It's so cold," he whispered, his body convulsing. "Why is it so cold?"
Axis raised his head and yelled, "Help! Somebody, please come! It's Bob! He's been hurt! Please, help!" in the hopes that some guards or one of his friends would hear him. But none of the CPUs came; they must have already been too far away to hear his shouts.
Bob groaned, and his trembling increased. Axis pressed his hands, already soaked with energy, down harder. He took a trembling breath and cried out again for help.
"It's okay, Bob. Just stay still," Axis instructed softly. Bob started to mutter again, but his quivering ceased a little.
Axis tried calling for a third time, with no answer. Finally, he started to rise. "Guess I'm going to have to take matters into my own hands," he said to himself, with a glance at his energy-stained hands. He placed his hands under Bob's armpits and slowly lifted the Guardian up. Bob's eyes rolled back into his head, and Axis realized that he was out cold. He tried to lean the Guardian against his shoulder, but the older sprite was dead weight. Nonetheless, Axis supported Bob's body against his as he tried to walk out of the chamber, with one hand still on Bob's stomach, towards the center of the Principle Office.
He had gone four shaky steps when Bob's weight became too much for him, and Axis staggered and fell. Bob dropped to the ground with a groan, but he was still insensible.
Axis pulled his communicator out again and spoke into it, "Eide, Dram, you get your ASCIIs here — the northwestern point! Bob's been shot, and I need help to get him out of here! Oh, where are they, dammit?" he whispered to himself.