Gudsriki (24 page)

“Violet would never kill you.”

“You're not Violet.”

“I'm starting to understand the appeal of being.”

“You'll never be her. You're a shit imitation.”

“You really do want me to kill you.”

“Yes.”

Vibs closed her eyes. And waited. The hand was still around her neck, strong. She could feel it was unlike any human hand. It had the power of an FKMA robot inside it. It wouldn't strangle her. It would crush her neck to a centimeter's diameter.

Then the hand was gone. She opened her eyes to see Nel right before her face. Grinning.

“I have other plans for you,” she said.

Vibeke stared at her. Nel unstraddled her and sat down in her seat.

Vibeke had no idea what happened. Or what she'd created. Nel didn't act like any human, least of all Violet. She had given a ronin Tikari human form and a human brain, and it was completely unpredictable. Even Sal had been following Veikko's commands. But Nel had no commands. Just a body designed for combat, possibly one of the most deadly weapons ever designed.

In that respect she had replaced Violet quite efficiently. She had a fighter, a tactical partner again. A better one, likely the best in existence. Dr. Niide's latest was an astounding piece of battle hardware. Vibeke only regretted having given it Violet's face. And heart.

Nel had lied outright for the first time. She didn't know what she wanted to do with Vibeke. But leading her to think it amused her. She could control Vibeke and that control felt very good. The girl that had gotten Violet killed was feebleminded compared to her, and Nel could use that. She didn't know for what. She could inflict such pain upon her. She didn't know why she wasn't. She could have killed her. Easily. She wanted it. She could have tortured her in ways a human body couldn't come close to committing.

But she didn't, and she didn't know why. Or at least didn't want to admit she was riddled with empathy. Seeing a person so broken, so sad, so confused… it stayed her hand. The appeal of hurting her diminished. Nel resented that. She was originally designed to kill and now a force stopped her from doing so. Even without Violet's memories of loving the stupid woman, it was saddening to think of hurting her. Ever so slightly more than it was appealing. Nel was frustrated.

“I'm frustrated too.”

Nel looked around. There was nobody in the cockpit with them. The voice was in her head. The same way Violet remembered a link hitting her consciousness. But there was no net to link through. Nel had only had a brain for a few hours. She assumed the voice in her head was normal. Until it spoke again.

“You're in my brain, aren't you?”

“Who are you?”
Nel asked.

“I should get to ask first. You're in my brain.”

“You're in mine.”

“I was here first.”

Nel felt a shiver. She didn't speak again.

“I'm just saying, you're new here. I've been here for years.”

Nel ignored it. She was afraid to think about it; if she thought to herself the other voice might hear it.

“
I do hear it,
” it said.

Nel cleared her mind. She allowed no thought to form; from the depths of the insect mind in her chest she forbade her brain to make a peep.

“It won't work, it's
my
brain.”

“Well, it's mine now,”
thought Nel,
“so you can fuck right off.”

The voice went silent, but Nel remained on guard. She tried to place such a phenomenon in Violet's memories. She couldn't. She tried her own meager memory banks, simple records of flight settings and kill orders. Those were the closest things Nel could find to the voice. When Violet told her to do something. She felt a chill.

But the chill wasn't from the voice. It was from the map on the windshield. As Elba's stats and coordinates blinked on the windshield, she started looking around frantically.

“What are you doing?” asked Vibeke.

“Nothing,” Nel replied.

“You're twitching around. Is something wrong?”

“No,” she said. She wasn't sure what
was
wrong. Suddenly she spoke without thinking, “Other than the mission.”

“To kill Wulfgar? You don't want to?”

Nel tried to figure herself out. “I've just never done this before.”

Vibeke scoffed, “You're afraid?”

That was it. “Yes.”

“How the fuck can you be afraid? Violet was never afraid, and you're a mechanized version of her. How are you even capable of fear?”

“Ask Dr. Niide.”

“He'd say you're a killing machine. Like, literally a killing machine. I can't believe you'd experience fear.”

“Then explain why I feel so afraid.”

Nel didn't feel shame in being afraid. She felt justified. And above all unique. If Violet was never afraid, then she was truly nothing like Violet. She was Nelson. The thought made her stronger, despite the weakness.

Vibeke stared at her. Disappointed but mostly just shocked. She understood how it could happen; in fact it was inevitable. A human brain that had seen all the violence and mayhem of Violet's life but hadn't actually done it. A newborn shown every act of brutality a Valkyrie could commit, now asked to do the same.

“Okay, so you're afraid. You don't need to be. You're nearly invincible.”

“I'm not afraid of dying.”

“What are you afraid of?”

“I don't know.”

Vibeke never had to talk anyone down from an irrational state of fear. She never had to do anything like it, certainly not in the ravine. And above all not to Violet. She tried to empathize but felt only disgust. A thing with Violet's face that was afraid. It degraded her.

“Some Valkyrie.”

“I'm not a Valkyrie. I wish I were, but I'm a generation late.”

“You're at least part Valkyrie. Valkyries aren't afraid of anything.”

“You were afraid to tell Violet how you felt about her.”

“What, you kept my memories?”

“No. Violet was more perceptive than you gave her credit for.”

Was it true? She knew it was. She'd always underestimated her. Because she couldn't read, because she wasn't as smart as her. Even because she was a younger team member, though she'd never let that affect her outlook on Varg. She felt the pang of her unfair treatment. And her ongoing, even less fair treatment of the replacement. But she had no idea how to baby talk the thing. She wouldn't try if she did.

“I don't know how to tell you how not to be afraid. We never had to deal with it. So deal with it yourself. Just don't be afraid.”

“I'll try.”

The conversation only made Nel more frightened than she was before. She felt sick. She reviewed Violet's memories of fear. There were few. Most were related to Vibeke, not to missions. She had simply never felt outright afraid. Even at Udachnaya she was… inhuman. Nel was quite confused.

Vibeke looked to her. She was ever so subtly shaking.

“Okay, you want to know how to not be afraid?”

“Yes.”

Vibeke slapped her face as hard as she could. It stung her hand. She remembered there was metal under that skin. Nel looked at her furiously.

“Why did you do that?” she demanded.

“Are you afraid?”

“No, I'm pissed the fuck off!”

Vibeke smiled. “See? Worked perfectly.”

The cockpit flew from the sunset into night, toward Elba.

 

 

W
ULFGAR
'
S
BUSY
morning continued into the evening, and late into the night.

“Sire, Zhongguo negotiations are going well.”

“And the UKI?”

“Still refusing to meet. Multiple offers of treaties have been turned down. The former GAUNE territories simply prefer fighting and dying to accepting Ulver rule.”

“Prepare to retake Unst.”

“Yes, sire.”

Uggs left.

“Are you learning, Hati?” Wulfgar asked.

“Learning, sure, job training for a job I won't accept.”

“You'll accept it in time. Power is hard to give up. Impossible to give up. You have the ear of the leader of the free-ish world. I defy you to say you'd give even that up without reservation.”

“I'd give it up without reservation.”

Wulfgar frowned. It was time to tell her. She had to know her old home was safe to move on.

“I've sent a company to Ballard Heights.”

“What?”

“They'll maintain order perfectly well in your absence. No looting, no vandalism, the arcology is safe. That dog is safe.” He smiled.

“You put arcology under military control?”

“You wanted to ensure their safety, so—”

“Not at the cost of a garrison!”

“Our operations are unaffected, I assure—”

“No, Dad, no, the people in Ballard live there to be free of shit like that! They built that entire arcology to avoid control!”

“And it got them into a pit of looting and inter-floor violence.”

“You have no understanding of freedom. You don't respect theirs, and you don't respect mine!”

Wulfgar scratched his leg with his other foot.

“Goddamn you. I'm not gonna run the planet. I'm not gonna keep you amused here. I'm gonna escape this hellhole and fight, organize a rebellion against your troops at home if I have to. I'm going home, Dad, one way or another. I will never stop, never ever stop until I've rid Ballard of any trace of military control, until I've restored freedom, cleaned up the place, and restored an order that progresses from the people themselves. That's what needs to happen, there and here! Until the people you want to control learn to control themselves, there can be no lasting order!”

“Listen to yourself! This is why you
must
take over from me when the time comes! Hati, you're perfect for—”

She held up her hand and motioned for him to stop. He did. She spoke calmly.

“Dad, I've felt closer to you in my time here than I ever have before. And I love you as my father, and I won't deny it. But I need to go home now, and you need to withdraw your troops. I'll give you tonight, until the morning board meeting. And at that meeting you'll announce that I'm leaving. You'll announce that I'm leaving or announce that I'm a captive. You'll have to keep me in the prisons like your other women. Because I won't be anything more than that to you ever again. I will never lead. I will never advise. I'll go on a hunger strike until you set me free or I die. Or you can do what you know is best for me and let me go home. Tomorrow, Dad. I'll see you in the boardroom.”

She left. He didn't need the night to decide. He cursed himself. He had betrayed her. Like he had so many times before, he betrayed her. He knew it then with utter clarity: he was wrong. Hati would be a perfect leader, yes, but she was also his daughter, and he had no right to dictate her life. He had to let her go. She would hate him forever. There was no going back now, but he could do one damn thing right for her and let her go.

The board meeting couldn't come fast enough. He'd recall the troops immediately, and he'd put her on an express armored pogo home. So she could curse his name forever. He'd earned that. He'd live with it. But Hati wouldn't. She'd be home, for better or worse. She'd be where she chose to be.

He was on the verge of tears. He couldn't allow that. He had to get moving.

“Send in Michelle!” he ordered. Michelle entered.

“Report.”

Michelle took a deep breath. “We have lost the 6th Army.”

“
What?
How is this possible? You estimated the Christian militia at 750 men!”

“It was less than that, sire, but they asked for terms of surrender. As soon as they got to talking to the negotiators, they began evangelizing. The negotiators fell for it, then the commanders, then their troops. Our own men killed anyone who didn't. The 6th Army is now controlled by the enemy. And… they believe you to be the antichrist, sire.”

Wulfgar sat back and shook his head. He couldn't believe it.

“Sire.”

“Yes?”

“That's not all, sire.”

“What the fucking frock else could go wrong tonight?”

“There are reports of at least seventeen other unrelated Christian organizations developing independently of the Tromsø militia. They crop up randomly whenever some ancient line of believers—suddenly free of the UNEGA ban—chooses to exercise their divine command to preach the word. Two major Muslim militias have begun ethnic cleansing in Hayastan and Türkiye, a third is enacting Sharia law by violent force including kamikaze missions in—”

Wulfgar sighed. Michelle spoke again.

“If I may recommend a course of action?”

“Yes! Please!”

“Their patterns aren't those of a normal belligerent. They shouldn't be classified as one.”

“And how would you classify them?”

“As an infectious disease.”

Wufgar considered it. “Go on.”

“Their pattern very much resembles the plague we're fighting in Ellada or the zombie hordes in America and Bharat. You've directed all the functional electronic antibiotics to Greece, but for every individual cured, two more became infected. For every zombie shot down, a thousand more overcome the defenses. But the vaccines at Katerini are working. That's what we must do. We must develop an inoculation against Christianity.”

Wulfgar objected, “We have it! Evangelism, sedition is punishable by fifty doleo lashes and death. What better inoculation is there?”

Michelle explained, “They don't fear death. They welcome torture and their own demise. Every Christian killed spawns extremism in five more. There's no punishment that doesn't reward them, in their minds, with heaven eternal. So they have no fear. We must find a way to instill fear in the fearless.”