New Olympus Saga (Book 2): Doomsday Duet (16 page)

Oh, well. He would have to work with whatever little bits he’d gleaned. Breathing exercises, for one. He might not need to breathe, but breathing helped set the stage for controlling the body’s autonomic systems. He needed to learn how to arrest his breathing, and slow down his heartbeat, all while being distracted by those pesky Orientals breaking every bone in his body and then massaging the broken bits to tear the flesh around them, which was rather distracting. It was going to take a while.

He’d been doing the breathing exercises for about two hours when he heard the block of stone sliding back. The anticipation of what would happen next was pretty bad, but he forced himself not to cower and whimper. It wouldn’t help – if it had, he would have cowered and whimpered like a champ – and it might actually hurt. The guards, mostly ethnic Mongols, had developed some measure of respect by the way he comported himself during the treatments. He took one deep breath – he’d actually managed to keep his pulse rate down, which helped steady his nerves – and thought of a few choice insults in the Khalkha dialect the guards used amongst themselves. He always regaled his welcoming committee with some colorful commentaries on the sexual habits of their mothers, sisters and cattle.

Footsteps echoed through the opening. Normally it was three of them, a Celestial and two vanilla jailors, but he only heard one set of steps this time. He didn’t like that. Any change in his routine, even his current routine, wasn’t likely to be good. The jailors usually brought a lamp along, too, but this lone visitor seemed at home in the pitch darkness.

The footsteps stopped a few feet away. Daedalus considered launching himself at the unknown arrival, but decided to wait until he knew who he was dealing with.

“
Ni hao
,” he said in Chinese.

“I am rather well, Mr. Smith.” The words were spoken with an impeccable Standard Received English accent. Daedalus recognized the voice, although it had been almost five decades since he’d last heard it in person.

I am FUBAR
, he thought idly. He was lucky he had used the ceramic bowl before sitting down for his think, or he’d likely have pissed himself.

Light appeared, not from a lamp or a torch, but emanating from the tall figure standing in front of him. The garb of the tall Chinaman wasn’t his usual outfit. The official newsreels and pictures the Empire put out for propaganda purposes always had him clad in the traditional Qin Dynasty Dragon Robes, richly embroidered silk, either yellow, red or blue, depending on the occasion; the complex and impractical gowns allegedly took years to tailor to perfection. At the moment, however, the Dragon Emperor, destroyer of cities, very likely the most powerful Neolympian to ever walk the Earth, was clad in simple nomad clothing: a
deel
-style overcoat, fastened with a silk-and-leather belt, over riding trousers and boots. The man in the Mongol outfit was tall for an Asian, close to six feet, athletic, handsome even with that ridiculous long mustache hanging from his face. The Emperor’s eyes had a feverish glint that Daedalus found he couldn’t meet for more than a few seconds.

This was a man who had knocked Ultimate through a mountain, who had taken Janus’ battleship-melting energy blasts and come back for more, who had killed seventeen Legionnaires with his bare hands. Daedalus Smith could bench-press three thousand pounds and his right hook could shatter bricks. Against the Dragon Emperor, his chances in a fight were as good as a newborn baby’s. Maybe worse than that: the Emperor might find a baby too cute to squash like a bug.

Daedalus had planned for an eventual confrontation with the Chief Chimp. Much of his secret research, the stuff he’d never shared with his pals at the Legion, involved ways of dealing with the arrogant Chinaman once and for all. He wasn’t ready yet, though. Even if he had his full bag of tricks, it wouldn’t have done him any good. The Godkiller program was nowhere near ready to deal with the Emperor. It was irksome, being utterly at someone’s mercy.

“I trust you have found the accommodations entertaining enough,” the Emperor went on in a pleasant tone of voice, as if they were a couple of old college chums meeting on a cruise ship or tennis court.

“They’ve certainly kept me busy. If I have the time, I’m going to write a travel guide about the delights of the Empire,” Daedalus replied glibly. He might die in the next few seconds, so all he could do was face his fate with dignity. “So what brings you to the Presidential Suite, Mr. Qiao? Come to discuss the terms of your surrender?”

The Emperor’s face tightened slightly around the lips. “That name is no longer relevant, Smith. Do not use it again. I do note, however, that you have regained some of your memories from our encounter with Mr. Night, if you remember my old identity.”

“Some? I remember everything, pally. And Mr. Night? He works for me now. Well, he pretends to work for me. He thinks he’s using me, I think I’m using him, and the wheel goes round and round. He doesn’t know his little forget-me spell faded away a few years back. Please try not to tell on me if you ever run into him.”

“If I ever lay eyes on that creature, I will crush it like an overripe grape.”

“Small wonder he never comes by your neck of the woods,” Daedalus said, just to pass the time. As long as they were talking, nobody was breaking his bones, and he might even learn something new.

The Emperor looked intently at Daedalus, as if trying to divine his thoughts at a glance. “What game are you playing, Smith? When I regained my memories, I made inquiries about everyone present at that meeting in New York. The Gypsy woman seems to have disappeared altogether. Cushko is doing much the same as I am, while indulging in his romantic fantasies of a Ukrainian Nation that never truly existed.”

As opposed to your utterly pragmatic fantasies of an Imperial China straight out of legends and fairy tales, with a dash of Genghis Khan thrown in
? Daedalus thought but was smart enough not to say out loud.

“Damon Trent seems to live a quiet, almost ascetic life for a man of his wealth,” the Emperor continued. “Although I suspect he is one of those masked vigilantes you Yanks are so fond of.”

He is the Lurker, as a matter of fact. But if you think I’m going to share that tidbit with you, Solly, Cholly.

The Emperor paused for a second, but when Daedalus refused to take the bait, he went on. “And that leaves you, Mr. Smith. Amassing wealth like a merely human capitalist. Fashioning devices instead of improving and mastering your native abilities. One would have expected you to be my rival in power, somebody like the Iron Tsar. Instead, you are a trinket maker, only slightly more powerful than a mere human. How did that come to be?”

I didn’t sell as much of my soul as you or Cushko, that’s what happened.
“I must have gotten the short end of the stick.” It was close enough to the truth. He’d done everything he could think of to improve himself, but his physical powers had stubbornly remained at Type One levels. He thought that his early experiments with the Shadow Energy, the force that animated the abominable Mr. Night, had stunted his progress. That was something else he wouldn’t share with the Chief Chimp.

“I could continue the interrogation process,” the Emperor said casually. Daedalus barely resisted cringing at the idea. “But given that you are largely powerless, unable to overcome even the least of my Celestial Warriors, I think I can make some use of your paltry abilities instead. You will be taken out of your cell for twelve hours a day, which you will spend in my workshops, under the supervision of my Artificers. If you perform adequately, you will be given better food and gentler treatment. If not…”

“I hear you, pally,” Daedalus said casually. Outside this hole in the ground, he would have a lot more choices. A lot more chances.

I will make you eat your words, Chimp
, he thought coldly.
I’ll destroy everything you built here, you just wait.

You won’t save the world. That’s my job.

Tule Desert, Nevada, March 16, 2013

Ain’t nobody else gonna save the world.

That thought had kept him going during the three months he’d spent laboring for the Emperor – and the sixty years he’d spent building toys on behalf of the Freedom Legion, for that matter. That’s all they thought he was good for: making toys. He couldn’t wait for the charade to be over, when the imbeciles he’d had to tolerate for the better part of a century found out what was what.

Daedalus wasn’t quite ready to have his secrets revealed, though. As Johnny-Boy Clarke, the Great Colored Hope, and the Blonde Genius talked themselves into figuring out the truth, he activated the contingency plan he’d been saving for an occasion such as this.

It had taken decades of preparation, building hidden backdoors into the Legion’s systems, like the one that allowed him to eavesdrop on Doc’s comm even when it was turned off, which he’d used to overhear his confab with the two most powerful morons on the planet. Or the careful alterations to the security cameras in Slaughter’s lab, so he could come in late at night and do some work on Doc’s Brass Man suit when nobody was looking, in preparation for the day when he’d have to take out the fair-haired do-gooder once and for all.

It was the best kind of chess game, the one where the other bastard didn’t even know he was playing until all the pieces were in place and only one move was left. A part of Daedalus regretted the necessity of what he was about to do, but another part was exultant. The blonde super-genius had never figured out that his scruples were more deadly than greed or ambition. His good intentions would destroy humanity. Only Daedalus was willing to do what was necessary, willing to deal with the devil – three different devils with their own agendas, as a matter of fact – and ensure the Earth didn’t end up as a depopulated mudball floating meaninglessly in space.

“Checkmate, fucker,” Daedalus hissed, and sent forth a mental command that set in motion three chains of events. A microscopic bomb built into Doc Slaughter’s cochlear implant went off, scattering his overrated brains all over the Nevada desert. A moment later, the same command caused the Brass Man suit to explode, shredding it and the body inside, and ensuring that nobody, not even the Faggot Godfather on his best day, could put Doc back together again. And, throughout it all, a multi-spectrum holographic projection made it look as if John had smashed Doc’s skull with his fist and then torn his armor apart. Daedalus had been particularly proud of that trick: he’d programmed the illusion himself, creating no less than two hundred variations to account for as many possible circumstances as possible. It was as neat a frame-up as one could conceive, and worth all the hard work he’d put into it.

Saving the world wasn’t an easy job, but it was the only job that mattered.

Christine Dark

Lake of the Woods, Ontario, March 16, 2013

Tears were running down her face when Mark was done telling his story. She hugged him tightly. He’d spoken in a detached, impersonal way, but the emotions that had emerged as he spoke had been almost overwhelming. “I’m so sorry,” she said.

“Not your fault,” he replied, not hugging her back, arms hanging limply down his sides. “But that’s how it is. I’m fucked in the head, and I’m not going to get any better.”

“It’s not your fault,” she told him. “You didn’t know what was happening until it was too late.”

“If I’d known, I’d still have smashed that fucker’s head through the wall. I wanted him dead. When I felt him getting turned on while he was killing me, I knew somebody like that didn’t have any business being alive. That’s what I’m trying to say here.” He stepped away from her, and she let him go. “I don’t want your pity. I don’t need anybody’s pity. And I don’t need any psychobabble, either. Yeah, I know a part of me is killing my asshole stepfather every time I kill some other asshole. I know. And I don’t give a fuck. I’ll kill assholes like that whenever I can. I’d kill them all if I could.”

Beneath the nasty words, Christine heard Mark’s thoughts as if he was speaking them out loud.

This is when she leaves me. This is when she runs away from the monster I am.

The resigned sadness that followed the thought made her want to cry again.  She groped for him and he came to her and held her.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

A few hours before they’d been laughing and prancing through the woods like two infatuated teenagers. This was the same Mark who had made love to her last night and earlier today. For a while, he had set aside his rage and been happy. She could help him deal with it. She could help heal him.

Or he can drag you down with him. Or he can turn that rage on you one day. He didn’t just kill his stepfather, don’t you get that? He
became
him.

The thought was so ugly, so monstrously unfair, that she wished she could reach into her head and tear it out. But she had thought it. She could make all the jokes about her brain acting as if it had a mind of its own, very funny, ha ha, but those were her thoughts, her doubts and fears. The intensity of Mark’s emotions scared her, terrified her. A part of her wanted to do just what he expected her to do. Turn away from him, run away from him.

Just like his mother had done. That thought almost made her start crying again.

I’m not going to leave him. I’m not going to betray him.

We’ll see
, her nasty side said inside her head.

* * *

When they came out of the kitchen, Kestrel and Condor were pointedly looking at the computer monitors and pretending they hadn’t heard their little episode in the kitchen. That suited Christine just fine. She was completely wrung out, and all she wanted to do was go to sleep for a day and a half. Mark squeezed her hand and she squeezed his.
Okay. We’re okay. It’s all good in da hood. And if I keep telling myself that, I might even believe it.

“Any news?” Mark asked Condor. Good, he was all business again. Just the way they all should be right now. Let’s set aside the drama and concentrate on slightly more important matters like staying alive, saving the world, all that happy crappy.