Deathstalker Honor (36 page)

“You have Moon’s memories,” he said sharply. “You remember me and Hazel. We were friends. How do you feel about us now?”

“Hadenmen do have feelings,” Moon said unexpectedly. “They are just . . . unlike human emotions. They arise from our minds, not chemical imbalances in the body. Understand that we give up much to become Hadenmen. Our sex is cut away from us, along with other unnecessary appetites and needs, and thus our thoughts and drives derive from different sources than yours. We give up human weaknesses to become something more, to become part of a greater whole. We do not feel pain or despair, heat or cold. We are never alone. My thoughts are logic, my dreams are mathematics. There is far more to me than the barely functioning creature you knew before.”

“Don’t bother trying to reach him,” said Hazel. “I tried often enough back on Haden. There’s nothing left of the Moon we knew.”

“I remember,” said Moon. “You came to me for Blood. Do you require some more?”

“No,” said Hazel. “I don’t need it anymore.”

“Very wise,” said Moon. “It is very detrimental to the human system.”

“Being human made you capable of things that are probably beyond you now,” said Owen. “Do you remember how you died, Moon? You were trying to activate the controls that would open the Tomb of the Hadenmen when the Grendel alien caught up with you. You fought, and it tore you apart, ripping your head from your shoulders with its bare hands. It had started eating your body when I found it and killed it. I tried to open the Tomb, but I didn’t have the access codes. Only you did. And you came back from death to give me those codes, speaking them with your dead lips. I couldn’t have opened the Tomb without your help. Do you remember any of that?”

Moon looked at him for a long moment and then looked away. “No. I remember none of that. It sounds very unlikely. Probably in the stress of the moment you imagined it. Humans do that.”

Owen decided he’d drop the matter for the moment, and let the Hadenman think about it. He was sure he’d touched something in Moon, even if the augmented man denied it. “So, how did you know where to find us, Moon?”

“You were detected the moment you entered the city. We have made this place over in our own image, and now every Hadenman is a part of the city, and nothing moves in it that is not us. Our sensors detected you and identified you to us as the Redeemer. So we came to escort you into the heart of our mystery. We will hide nothing from you. You and your Family have always been good allies to the Hadenmen.”

“You said that once before,” Owen said slowly. “But I never found the time to follow it up. Or perhaps I was afraid to. Exactly what dealings have your kind had with Clan Deathstalker?”

“Our association goes back centuries. Originally through the computers of Giles Deathstalker, who contacted the scientists who passed through the Madness Maze, and afterward made themselves over into the first Hadenmen, and then later, through various Family members, up until our abortive first Crusade. They supported us, provided what we needed, helped us remain hidden from the rest of the Empire. When the Crusade failed, and we fled to our Tomb to wait for better days, your Family kept a watch over us, until it was your destiny to come and awaken us. That’s how your dead father’s ring came to hold the coordinates for lost Haden. Everything was carefully arranged. You were just the last cog in a great machine.”

“And what was the nature of this relationship?” said Owen, holding his anger within him. “There must have been a deal. Who promised what to whom?”

“We would help the rebels overthrow the Iron Throne and place them in power. In return, the Hadenmen were promised planets of their own, and a percentage of the Empire’s population. A levy, a tithe. Millions of men and women, to be used as found necessary.”

“No,” said Owen. “No! My father would never have agreed to such a thing!”

“Are you sure?” said Hazel quietly. “Giles sure as hell wouldn’t have had any problems with such a deal. And you always said your father would make a deal with the Devil if that was what it took to get what he wanted.”

“The end justifies the means,” said Owen bitterly. “Anything for the greater good. The nobility of sacrifice, as long as it was-n’t his. That kind of shit was why I broke from him, and refused to be a part of his intrigues. But I never even guessed he’d be a part of something like this.”

“It was a good deal, from which both sides stood to profit,” said Moon calmly. “And entirely logical. We did our part, and the Empire is yours. Now we are taking what was promised us. Beginning with Brahmin II.”

Owen’s hand dropped to the gun at his side. Hazel clamped her hand down hard on his arm. This wasn’t the time. Not yet. “What’s so special about this world?” she asked. “This is the second time you’ve come here.”

“There are ore deposits here unavailable throughout the rest of the Empire,” said Moon. “No use to humans, but vital to Hadenmen technology. The native population is a useful bonus. Brahmin II is just the beginning. We will go from planet to planet, one at a time, taking control of the populations and their resources. The humans we will make over into ourselves, our numbers growing with every world. The Empire will be slow to see our threat. They will not go to war with us over a single planet, not in their present weakened condition. By the time they realize how much we have taken, and how many of us there are, it will be too late. The second Crusade of the Genetic Church will sweep across all Humanity, bringing the gift of transformation, and sooner than you would think, it will be a Hadenman empire.”

“Thinks a lot of himself, doesn’t he?” said Bonnie Bedlam. “Say the word, Owen, and I’ll tear this tin can apart and rip out his wiring.”

“Right,” said Midnight Blue, flexing her dark muscles. “One word, and I’ll reduce this bunch to their component parts.”

“A nice thought, but hold it for the moment,” said Owen. “There are still things I need to know. Whether I want to know them or not.”

 

Moon took them on a tour of what used to be Brahmin City. Inside the buildings, Moon showed them Hadenmen plugged directly into working systems, a functioning part of the city’s technical processes. Some had been partly disassembled to fit into the city machinery. Everywhere they went, unfamiliar machinery worked endlessly to unknown purposes. Owen became increasingly convinced that the whole city had been converted into one great machine, though its purposes remained unclear.

“So where are all the people?” said Hazel eventually. “I mean, the real people, Brahmin’s population, and the prisoners you took during the rebellion. What have you done with them?”

“Yes,” said Owen. “It’s time you told us, Moon. You couldn’t have turned them all into Hadenmen in so short a time.”

“They have been put to use,” said Moon calmly. “Nothing is ever wasted. We will show you everything.”

He led them into a tall steel tower with no windows, and the door closed and locked itself behind the last Hadenman to accompany them. Most stayed outside, but twenty augmented men remained with them. Owen didn’t let it get to him. The Hadenmen might think that twenty were enough to enforce their will, but they’d never seen Maze powers working at their full extent. They were in for one hell of a surprise.

Moon opened a door that looked like any other and ushered the human party into a Hadenman laboratory. And there at last they discovered what the Hadenmen had been doing with their human prisoners. Owen had to fight for control. They were waiting for him to break down. When he did finally fight back, he wanted to be sure it was his idea. He could feel Hazel shaking at his side. He didn’t dare look around to see how Bonnie and Midnight were taking it.

Before them, in a gleaming, spotless room that seemed to go on forever, the people of Brahmin II had been reduced to mere experiments. Some had been plugged into working machines, to see if they could function as Hadenmen did. Wires pierced their skin in bunches, and thin transparent tubing plunged into surgically exposed guts, gleaming red and purple in the unblinking light. Cables disappeared into gaping mouths and emptied eye sockets, and emerged again from gray brain tissues exposed by removal of part of the skull. There was no blood. It had all been pumped away. There were too many subjects to count, men and women who should have been dead, kept artificially alive in hell. All the subjects seemed to be aware of their situation and what had been done to them. But none of them struggled or protested.

“Why aren’t they screaming?” said Hazel. “Damn, I’d scream.”

“We removed their vocal cords,” said Moon. “The noise was distracting.”

“Why aren’t they moving?” said Owen, already knowing the answer.

“Movement was unnecessary, and might have interfered with the tests,” said Moon. “So we severed the spinal cord too.”

“Why?” said Owen, not looking at Moon, his voice cold as death. “Why all this . . . horror?”

“People have changed since we last walked among them,” said Moon calmly. “There are clones and espers and adjusted men, and even miracle workers like yourself. It is vital that we understand the current status of Humanity before we begin improving on it. This whole tower is one great laboratory—floor upon floor, rooms upon rooms, dedicated to discovering the hidden truths of what Humanity has become in our absence. Subjects are tested to the physical and psychological limits that we might better understand the ages-old question: what is this thing called man? Would you care to see our findings so far? Our test results have been most illuminating.”

Owen grabbed Moon by the arm and forced him around so they were face to face. “Are you proud of this, Moon? Of what you and your kind have done to living, sentient creatures?”

The question seemed to take Moon aback. “It is necessary. Suffering is transient, knowledge is forever. And none of the subjects are wasted. Those who survive the procedures will be made into Hadenmen, and they will never know suffering again. Those who die will supply body parts for the greater good. And everything that is learned here becomes part of the great pool of Hadenman knowledge. Man becomes more than man, by his own efforts. That is the creed of the Hadenmen.”

“But how do you feel about all this?” said Owen. “About the horror your subjects feel, and the horror of what you do to them?”

“There was a time,” Moon said slowly, “when that question might have meant something to me. But I have been . . . improved since then.”

“Like hell you have,” said Owen.

“Let me get this straight,” said Bonnie Bedlam. “All this Hadenman crap is new to me. You’re going to improve Humanity by cutting away all the things that make us human?”

“I thought you at least might understand,” said Moon. “You were not content to be as nature made you. You cut holes in your flesh to make room for metal. You endured transient pain for future gain.”

“Only because I enjoyed it, metalhead. It was my choice. You took these people’s choice away from them. That’s inhuman. And it stops right here.”

Her hand moved blindingly fast toward the gun on her hip, but the Hadenmen around her moved faster. Steel-knuckled fists hammered down in unison, driving her to the floor. Midnight Blue started forward, only to stop as the Hadenmen around her moved menacingly forward. Bonnie tried to fight back, but there were too many of them, and no room to move. Hazel looked at Owen, but he just stood there and did nothing, though he wouldn’t let himself look away. Hadenmen fists broke Bonnie’s dead-white skin and tore piercings from her flesh. Blood spurted thickly, and her eyes grew vague. Eventually she stopped struggling and lay still, and the Hadenmen drew back and let her be.

Midnight glared at Owen. “You could have stopped that.”

“Yes,” said Owen. “I probably could have. But she had to find out the hard way what they’re capable of. I wouldn’t always be there to protect her. Besides, she’ll heal. It’s what she does.”

“You cold-hearted bastard,” said Midnight.

“Sometimes,” said Owen. “You aren’t the only one who learned hard lessons from a hard war.” He moved forward to kneel beside Bonnie Bedlam. Her face was a swollen, bloody mess, one eye completely closed. She was breathing harshly, and her gaping mouth showed missing teeth at the front. “How are you feeling?” said Owen gently.

“Great,” said Bonnie, struggling to get her breathing back under control. “Give me a minute and I’ll get up and hammer the bastards.”

“No, you won’t,” said Owen. “This is their idea of a warning. Next time they’d just kill you. We can’t beat them like this. We have to think our way out. Now, will you please forget the solo heroics and follow my lead?”

Bonnie thought about it. “How many metalheads did I take out?”

“Less than one.”

“I’ll follow your lead.” Bonnie sat up straight, and concentrated. The puffiness in her face went down, and her swollen eye healed in seconds. New teeth pushed up out of her torn gums to replace those she’d lost. She stretched easily like a cat and rose to her feet in one lithe movement, smiling widely.

“Oh, man, what a rush.” She glared at the Hadenmen. “Next time I’ll plan it better.”

“Next time,” said Moon, “we’ll find a place for you in our laboratories. You only live now as a favor to the Redeemer.”

“Yeah,” said Midnight coldly. “I can see you and he are real close.”

Owen looked at her. “You’re supposed to be a warrior. Don’t you recognize the futility of overwhelming odds?”

“We’ve been through the Maze!” said Midnight. “Nothing can stop us!”

“You’ve never had to face the Hadenmen,” said Hazel. “If you want to get out of this alive, take your lead from Owen. He knows what he’s doing.”

Moon glared at Hazel, and then at Owen, and then turned away to offer Bonnie a supporting arm she didn’t need. Hazel moved in close beside Owen.

“Tell me this is all part of a cunning plan,” she said quietly.

“It’s all part of a cunning plan,” said Owen.