Subversive Elements (Unreal Universe Book 2) Read online

  He was missing something elemental.

  Further investigation revealed that massively thick duronium plates waited to drop between the inner ring of columns and arches for The Museum ‘proper’ and the outside world.

  Chad built a chain of events in his mind. The Chairwoman issues the order, the plates drop to protect everything and everyone inside The Museum, the bombs armed themselves. God soldiers work their way through a few of the bomb-laced arches, turning into splattered guts and twisted metal. Bits of The Museum collapse downward, filling the messy arches with thousands of tons of rock. The Army wonders what is going on and pauses to rethink their plans, suspecting they may have underestimated their opponents. Meanwhile, the extremists are in charge of a very nearly impregnable fortress doing God knew what to a large array of prisoners.

  “Nice.” Chad admitted pleasantly. He applauded the ingenuity the mysterious bag-toting infiltrators were displaying. The moment Doans did anything to recognize their presence inside the institution was the very moment she put them in complete control of the entire facility. It was a great plan.

  Someone pointed a gun at the back of his head. Chad -aware of the person’s movements since he’d entered this particular part of the hallway- slowly raised his hands and locked them behind his head. Then, showing how still, cautious, and cheerful he was, he turned around. “’allo my son.”

  “What you doing?”

  Chad shrugged at the stereotypical Latelian twat. “Nuffink.”

  “What’s wrong with your mouth?”

  “Wot?”

  The would-be terrorist shook his head angrily. “Why do you talk like that?”

  “Cor, mate, I is not go ‘round askin’ why it is you lot’re all very tall, now does I?” Chad demanded huffily, offended beyond all belief. If he weren’t so interested in seeing how Garth would fare against this infiltration, he’d be of a mind to run around and kill them all with his own bare hands. The rudeness of it all! “’s not polite, neever, just like pointin’ a gun at a fella’s ‘ead when there’s people comin’ down the walkway.”

  Brady tilted his head until he caught a glimpse of a family walking down the hall, rubbernecking at the different styles of Latelian war-vessels hanging from the ceiling far above their heads. He started sweating. If any civilians saw the bombs or him standing there with a gun, the alert would go out too soon and Vilmos would kill him.

  Chad grinned. “Now, mate, I is not innerested in stoppin’ wotever it is you fellas are all about. Why don’t you put the gun away, hey?” When his ‘captor’ hesitated, Chad added, “I found the explosive device about five minutes ago, my son, durin’ which time –if I was that sort of lad- I could of most defin’tly called the police, yeah? This place would be crawlin’ wiv those bloody great big monstrosities wot you is callin’ Goddies, right? I would fink that the absence of said ogres says you is still in the green.”

  Brady holstered his gun, dumbfounded. “What are you doing here?”

  “Me?” Chad indicated himself. “I is ‘ere sightseein’, mate. You know, getting’ a look o’ the ole motherland, as it were. Hail Lately an’ all that sort of fing. Rah rah rah.”

  “You’re … you’re not going to interfere?” Brady asked slowly, finding it difficult to understand the situation. In his entire life as a hidden agitator he’d never once run into someone who didn’t care.

  “Nah.” Chad unlaced his fingers. He was rather impressed with how well he was doing, making himself a new friend. It really was all in how you talked to people. His therapists –if they weren’t all dead- would be impressed. He knew he was. “’ow many o’ those bombs you got left, sonny Jim?”

  “Dozens.”

  The assassin held out his hands. “I is finkin’ you lot could use a little ‘elp, yeah? Quicker done is better done, know what I mean? Or,” Chad said with a smirk, opening his trench coat, “I could use some o’ me own.”

  Brady stared at the racks of flat grenades hanging off the man’s legs and chest, mouth wide open. Common sense quickly chased away the trickling sense of worry in the back of his mind. Sense told Brady that not only should he decline the strange man’s offer but also that he should not mention the man to Vilmos or any of the others. They wouldn’t believe him. He didn’t believe him and it was happening to him. He wandered away saying, “N…no, thank you sa. We’ve got the situation under control.”

  Chad waved goodbye to the puzzled terrorist. “Oy, if you is ‘avin’ a change o’ ‘eart, I’ll be around ‘ere somewhere. I ain’t got nuffink planned for a couple o’ days.”

  As soon as the terrorist was gone down the way he’d come, Chad pulled out one of the small grenades and examined the small, flattish device. He stared thoughtfully off into the distance, trying to suss out what the crazy Latelians were hoping to get out of the day. The assassin came to a decision.

  Murmuring to any Voices who might be listening about the wisdom of keeping quiet whilst he worked with highly volatile weapons, Chad fiddled with the explosive before connecting it to the one already in place. When it went off, well… people were going to be really quite surprised at the destruction such a tiny little thing could bring. He grinned like a loon for a bit before coming to his senses. Couldn’t be seen being … strange.

  Whistling ‘Rule Britannia’ loud enough to draw stares from the few people walking the halls alongside him, Chad went in search of all the other little bombs left by his new playmates, hoping they wouldn’t mind the additional firepower. He really was quite curious to see just how the Kiv-crackers would stack up against the heavily modified God soldiers.

  xxx

  Next to the open-air coliseum in the middle of The Museum, the Hall of Warriors was the largest single ‘room’ on the property. In addition to having enough space to support the presence of all eight hundred winning Contestants over the last four thousand years, it needed to be able to accommodate the bulky Box whenever it was Hospitalis’ turn to host the event. There was only one way into and out of the Hall, and when you walked in, The Box immediately confronted you with its immensity. Following close on the sheer scope of the thing was the realization that you were in the presence of something that was at least as old as Latelyspace.

  For many who came to the Hall, The Box was overwhelming. It carried with it the strength of ages. It was a firm reminder to every Latelian about how they’d conquered their own weaknesses, and how, through superior technologies, they’d taken the higher path by trying to show other systems the error of their ways.

  Garth took one look at The Box and wanted to scream in rage and frustration. He wanted to throw up and to pull the walls of The Museum down around his ears.

  It was a fake.

  Admittedly, it was a cunning fake. All the details were there, from the weird engravings along the sides and the top right down to the vaguely hand shaped area many thought was a palm-scanner. The dimensions of the ship-clone were perfect, as well. Nevertheless, a fake it was. A fucking lie and everyone –including the beautiful, funny and intelligent woman beside him- was buying into it as surely as they wasted their time on a nonsensical blood sport.

  He wanted to punch The Box hard enough to break it.

  Gazing on the replica served one purpose only; it told him how hard his life was about to get, how bloody, how violent. Maybe that was more than one purpose. Garth wasn’t entirely sure. It was taking all his concentration not to lose his shit in front of Naoko.

  “Is it not wonderful?” Naoko reached out with a delicate hand to touch the protective glass. “Five thousand years old or more and it shows no sign of age.”

  Garth -who felt it showed its three-month age perfectly well- sighed inwardly as he summoned up the courage to be fake in front of a woman he thought he loved.

  “This is amazing.” He play-acted with a pitiful amount of sincerity. He really did want to throw up. He couldn’t even pretend on Hospitalis. Garth remembered quite clearly being one hell of a liar and con man on several planets across The
Cordon. Hell, his first epic mission –launching that building into space- had been almost all shuck and jive. On Hospitalis? No skill at all. It was as if Bravo wanted him to lose. “Is it really five thousand years old?”

  “I think it is much older than that.” Naoko admitted. “Much.”

  “What gives you that idea?” Garth asked, running a hand across the glass. It’d be the work of seconds to get through the thick clear casing to lay his hand directly on the metal ‘Box’. It wasn’t necessary; it was just something he thought about doing to vent his frustrations at failing his goals at every goddamn turn.

  Naoko moved from the center of the room towards the display case holding the body of the first recorded Game winner, Allyn Devince, moving her man away from The Box. Garth’s sorrow and frustration at seeing The Box was –whether he knew it or not- a palpable thing. People unfamiliar with his history wouldn’t be able to puzzle out why he was so … distraught … after seeing something so profoundly old and awe-inspiring, but Naoko was aware of his past, and she knew why instantly.

  The Box in The Museum wasn’t real.

  The revelation was unsurprising, not when you considered the long and bloody history The Box carried with it. Before becoming a source of national pride, the mysterious relic had kicked off dozens of civil wars that’d come close to destroying Latelyspace even as scientists struggled to understand its deepest mysteries. Following the discovery of the Shard and the resolution of their woes, it made perfect sense that those long-ago rulers hide the relic whenever possible. No one wanted civil war. It was terribly unpatriotic.

  Assuming that no one outside a select few had ever seen the original, it took no effort at all to convince everyone that what they were seeing was the real thing.

  If Garth’s records were truthful –and there was no reason to disbelieve their veracity- he was the only non-Latelian person in the system who knew exactly what The Box looked like, or it’s true purpose. A tremor of excitement rushed through Naoko. Garth Nickels was a man who could open The Box! How … miraculous. How … terrifying. No one knew what was in there, and yet the man off to one side of her could –would- do just that!

  “Nothing, really.” She answered in response to his earlier question. “It is just that there is proof that it has shown no sign of aging since it was discovered. If it has never appeared to aged, it is logical to assume that it could be any age at all.”

  “Never thought of it that way.” Garth conceded. With a massive effort, he pushed both his rage and disappointment at the false Box out of his mind and turned to the case Naoko’d was standing before. Pointing his giant foam finger at Allyn Devince, he asked. “So this is the guy that won the first Game, eh?”

  “He is indeed.” Naoko touched the flash plaque and they watched the little reenactment of Devince’s win. In comparison to today’s method of combat, watching the average-sized victor chase after an equally puny opponent was almost comical. If it weren’t for the fact that -in the mind of every hardcore Gamehead-, the Game had been going steadily downhill since the introduction of the Goddies, it would be funny to Naoko as well.

  One thing setting Allyn Devince apart from victors of the day was his actual skill in martial arts, and if someone from one of the other weight groups could ever withstand a single punch from a God soldier, their skills would become evident –and greatly appreciated- as well. That couldn't happen, not now and probably never again.

  “Gee whiz.” Garth sympathetically dodged a crippling roundhouse kick that knocked Devince’s opponent right on his ass. “That looks like it hurt.”

  Naoko clutched Garth’s hand. “Didn’t you get kicked like that?”

  “Heheh.” He rubbed his temple. That kick had been about a hundred times worse. “Guess buddy hit me so hard I forgot all about it.”

  Garth gestured at Devince’s mummified remains. The ancient Latelian stood close to five eleven and looked like he’d weighed all of two hundred pounds while alive. A far cry from what was common nowadays.

  “What’s goin’ on with this guy?” He stepped back to make a point by indicating the first Latelian in the group of warriors that started showing signs of … gigantism. “Matter of fact, if I do this right, you all didn’t start gettin’ ginormous until … uh … two thousand years ago?”

  Naoko shrugged. “It is a mystery all its own, sa. The most common theory is that early experiments to provide us with God soldiers for our wars proved inheritable.”

  “Doesn’t that bother you?” It’d bother him. It should’ve bothered Trinity, too. There were so many mysteries surrounding Latelyspace.

  Garth studied a few of the weapons interred alongside Allyn. He wouldn’t know unless he could get it loose, but the man’s mace looked as though it ran off a power source. Now that would make for a more exciting match!

  Naoko moved to stand in front of her next favorite Game winner, the first female in History to take The Box. “Why should it? We are healthy, we are strong. I would think those attributes,” she gestured to her body, “are worthwhile, no?” she smiled prettily and laughed at Garth’s red cheeks.

  Naoko touched the flash plaque for Si Antonia Simes and motioned for Garth to come watch. As Si Simes’ victory had only been a thousand years ago, the footage for her win was archival instead of a reproduction.

  “Si Simes is the last of the completely unengineered winners. Many today believe she won by default because ‘it was time for a woman to win’.” Naoko tried to hide the disgust in her voice and failed; as a Gamehead, it didn’t matter to her if the winner was male, female or other. All that mattered was skill, and the thought that the crowd’s responses had been manipulated to provide for a female victor was upsetting.

  “What do you think?”

  Naoko stopped the footage and replayed the best moment of the woman’s fight, a ten-second slice where she leaped up above her opponent, came down behind him, slid behind his legs and flipped him straight into the ground with enough force to make Garth’s teeth rattle. “I think Si Simes won because she was a fine champion. Few warriors today can match her skill. I think she was the first and last female victor.”

  “Ouch.” In that one statement, Naoko conveyed her dislike for the God soldiers perfectly. Since the introduction of God soldiers, at least thirty female soldiers had ‘taken The Box. “But you didn’t really answer my question, from before, I mean.”

  Naoko had never really thought about it, and said as much to Garth, adding, “We are a very healthy society, physically. The weakest of us is still quite strong, and illnesses are rare. Barring genetic diseases for which there are no cure, tragic accidents, and, of course, fighting in the Game, our life span is close to a hundred and fifty standard years.” A grin curling her lips, Naoko decided to throw caution to the wind. She put her hands on her hips and winked saucily at Garth. “Do I seem unnatural to you?”

  Garth blushed again. Even with a giant foam hat on her head, Naoko was amazing. “Uhm, no.” He moved closer, surreptitiously removing his foam hand so that by the time he got up to her, he was able to slide both hands around her slender waist. “As a matter of fact,” Garth continued, moving in for a kiss, “I think you’re the bee’s knees.”

  Finally, a cheesy comment that –while it made no real sense at all, least of which because bees had no knees- didn’t make him feel like a fucking moron.

  When their lips pressed together, the Universe stopped. All they could feel was a perfect sense of peace, a moment of profound joy almost unbearable to contain. Garth watched Naoko’s eyes close, and he followed suit. Holding Naoko in his arms was like nothing he would ever be able to describe beyond ‘the right thing, always’. They drank each other in, the strange bond flaring wildly in Garth’s mind.

  They parted, opened their eyes. Naoko’s green eyes peered into Garth’s normally ice blue ones; right now, they were the calm blue of an endless sky. She opened her mouth to say something, but could only flick her tongue across her upper lip. A clatter at the entrance
turned Garth’s soft blue eyes back into the hardened diamond she’d come to expect.

  “Shit.” Garth leaned in closely, feeling the heat from his body mingling with Naoko’s. He had an intense desire to take her from The Museum quickly and let whatever was going to happen happen on its own, but he couldn’t. It was already too late and he still couldn’t consign these people to death.

  “Listen to me very carefully, Naoko. There are some very bad people in this Museum with us, and they’re going to cause trouble. If whoever made that noise is here to ‘escort’ us back to the Viewing Room, we need to go with them as quickly and as quietly as possible.” The urge to run from The Museum ran rampant for a few seconds, literally making him shake with the effort of fighting it off. Bravo wanted him out of The Museum and away from the fighting, which only served to reinforce his reasons for staying.

  “What … what are you going to do?” Naoko whispered, suddenly very frightened.

  Garth caught the eye of the man coming to collect them. He kissed her on the cheek, seeing she was frightened and hating the fact that the safest course of events for her was to follow his suggestions. He should’ve done the right thing, should’ve made her leave The Museum. He’d been selfish, but now there was nothing to do but forge ahead.

  “Something.” He whispered back. Louder, in the direction of their ‘visitor’, “Is there something wrong, sa?”

  Coreman smiled easily, exuding the professionalism of a lifelong Museum employee. “Nothing is wrong, sa. I’ve just been asked to go around and ask everyone to join us in the Viewing Room.”

  Naoko slipped her hand into Garth’s for support. “That’s … unusual, isn’t it?”