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This message Four to Six was posted by niobe on Thursday, April 18, 2002 at 18:03.
Four.
The Doctor washes his hands. I feel the hypo sliding gently in, and the area between my shoulder-blades goes slowly numb. I hear the clicks and pings of impossibly sharp instruments being readied for use. Austen knows what he’s doing, even if he hasn’t seen this in a long time.
A dozen elegant metal rods and curves, some fine wiring, little germanium studs. None of it would look out of place in an exhibition of art deco jewelry, but together it makes up the last part of the device buried within me. These wires, these coils, these components serve as a collector for all my residual bioenergy - my life-force, if you prefer - and should allow me some degree of control over it. I have only a vague idea how it should work. Not wholly convinced it will. But I have to know.
The doctor works quickly, cleanly. As each component takes its place among the mesh of metal filaments encasing my third to fifth thoracic vertebrae I feel closer to the Truth. Flex my fingers as rain starts to fall outside. I wish I had more of the self-seal polymer.
The doctor steps back. "Do you want to see it? Before I sew you up, I mean?"
I lift my head and crane it over my shoulder. He holds a mirror. A small neat X has been cut in my upper back, the edges tucked up to show a small knot of circuitry and various shades of red.
Is he done?
"Yes. Just this." He takes a needle from the table and finishes the work.
The wound stitched, I wrap a bandage over it, around and across my breasts. As the local anesthetic wears off the whole area begins to itch. I perch on the edge of the doctor’s only chair as he prepares some food.
As I watch him, it slowly dawns on me that something’s going very wrong with my perception. Either he’s moving far too slowly, or - no, that’s not it. Puzzled, I stare into my palm, close it into a fist. Huh. Look back at him. I close my eyes. Still there. Fingers in my ears? Definitely not imagining it. I wasn’t expecting this. Need to investigate further.
He comes back from the stove with a bowl of soup. "If I’d known you were coming," he says, "I’d have baked a cake."
I trace him placing the bowl in my hands and think about this. The idea was to modify my own biofield. Somehow I’m picking up his. Predicting his nerve twitches - sensing his movements before he even makes them. Now that’s interesting.
"When will you be ready to try it out?"
Try it out?
"Projecting the field, I mean."
Ah. Soon as I eat this.
As I wait for the soup to cool, I dig through the leftovers of the stolen bioenergy harvester. Turn the chromed casing over in my hand, clip out some pieces that might be useful later.
Oh...
The first thing I did, even before I left the Red Right Hand complex, was scan this thing. I mean, it’s obvious. Check for a homing device, a locator, whatever. This was such a desirable piece of tech they were sure to fit one; I disabled it without a second thought.
Mistake. There was a subsidiary system. I didn’t pick it up at the time, because it only went active when the casing was broken. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I should be shot. Scan it now. There’s a signal blaring out, has been for... about half an hour. I disable it, but they’ll be here any minute. Probably are already.
Get down.
"What?"
Down!
We drop to the floor. I just felt someone moving outside. No, three people. Moving up to the fence. Six people. Ten. Surrounding the building. Leveling rifles at the windows. Red Right Hand security team. Fingers tightening. One’s about to speak.
"OKAY. GAME’S OVER. COME ON OUT."
The doctor stares at me. "They followed you?"
I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.
The breath goes out of him. I break eye contact, but feel him sweeping his head toward a corner of the room. Crawling over. Pulling back a rug. Struggling to lift a heavy trapdoor.
A tunnel out? No way.
"Hardly." He beckons me over. It’s a cellar... no, a bunker. Lined with metal plates that might be inches thick. All the equipment he managed to get away with. "In!"
I can feel the men scaling the fence. The voice comes again. "YOU DON’T STAND A CHANCE. JUST COME OUT."
I drop into the darkness. The doctor looks down and gives me a thin, cruel smile. "Always promised myself I’d take a few of Them with me. Stay here." He drops the door and all is black.
Except that I can still feel what’s happening above. The team are almost in the house. The doctor crosses the room, reaches under his chair as I saw him doing before. He’s groping for something. I feel fingers on triggers.
I am almost deafened by the thick roar of an enormous explosion. One by one, the traces above ground blink off.
#
#
#
Five.
Seconds tick away. Nothing moves.
A minute. Still nothing.
Run my fingers across the rough ceiling, trying to find the edges of the door. Chances are I’m under a whole heap of debris, but the hut didn’t seem too sturdy so I might be okay. There is a lot of resistance, but eventually I force the heavy trap open. Dust and fragments of metal trickle into the cellar. Tentatively peer out.
Lift myself out, part-unwound bandages protecting hands against the flash-heated metal surround. Doctor Austen was never a man to do things by halves. Must have left serious charges all round the place. The whole area has been rubbed out, and small fires burn under the edges of corrugated iron sheets. A few broken bodies.
Much as I’d like to pay my respects, I have to get away. No time to look for my kit either. Got almost everything I need in the car. The one thing I can use from here I saw in the cellar. Might be twenty years old. Hope he hasn’t tinkered with it too much. Grab it. Go.
Skip over the twisted fence. Getting really dark now, as I run through the trees, branches whipping at me. Wonder how many more RRH men there are. Can hear a helicopter somewhere behind me. Breathing hard now. People shouting nearby, but not close enough to trace them. A searchlight begins to play across the trees ahead of me.
Alright. Here’s something else for them to worry about.
Way back, when still with the Organization, we activated the prototype biofield projectors with a powerful electromagnetic pulse. The EMP is overused in science fiction for overloading and shutting down electronic equipment. Thing is, it actually works. We had real trouble getting a pulse powerful enough to trip the switch but narrow enough not to affect too much other tech. This grenade-sized device was the most focused thing we came up with, but it’ll still interfere with anything in a half-mile radius.
The helicopter passes close overhead, searchlight filtering through the branches. My thumb goes to the toggle, presses down hard.
For a moment I feel like I’m having a heart attack. Then it softens to a choke. Then I’m okay. The copter’s control-correction systems don’t do so well. The tail rotor keeps cutting out, sending the sharklike machine into an increasingly violent spin.
A good time to be somewhere else. I head downhill, trying to cut round and back to the dirt road where I left the car. If there was any more tracking equipment - infra-red, whatever - I’m betting they’ve been fried. I can trace people now, running up in the direction of the ruined shack. More confident with each step, I’m swift and silent.
I find myself at the edge of the forest, looking down on the car. Two uniformed men stand by it, guns ready. A pair of unmarked trucks sit unattended nearer the main road. Look around for a rock, something to throw. Without warning my foot twists - the ground gives out - I spill down the sharp slope directly in front of them. Second mistake. Not my day.
Feel the two rifles being pointed at me. No sign of them firing, even as I get to my feet; want me alive. Suits me. Ten yards away, they stare me down.
After the kick from the EM pulse, the plastic strip down each arm has begun to glow a soft blue. The light swells beyond it, takes the form of heatless flames dancing up my arms. Hope I don’t look as surprised as these guys. Concentrate, and the flickers coalesce into a dozen knifeblades. I must be a fast learner. But they’re beginning to get nervous.
Perfect timing. The helicopter pilot must finally have lost it. A fearsome grinding noise from some distance away as it drops through the trees, and another huge explosion. Always enjoy that bit. It’s enough to distract the men for a split second.
I’ve crossed the distance in the blink of an eye, the small blue knives retreating into my arms and re-emerging as metre-long scythes. Weave to avoid the soldiers’ reactions. Open them right up. Ugly but over fast.
I guess it works.
The EMP killed all chance of getting any of the vehicles started. I tear open the trunk, pull on a sweater, a jacket, scan the holdall, sling it over my shoulder and head back into the trees. Still the best. Still alive. But how long that lasts depends on how quickly I can get to the city, and how quickly I can find the Dark Knight.
#
#
#
Six.
Not the sort of place I’d have expected to find the Dark Knight. But that’s part of what makes him so successful; he keeps you guessing.
It took two days to locate him and two more to follow him here. Before disabling the last rank of sensors and defence mechanisms I check the tracker display strapped to my thigh, confirm one last time that he’s on the other side of the city. Fine. Let’s see what we can find. Slide the door open a crack, slip through.
The warehouse itself is much as you’d expect. Girders, boxes. No lights on. I pick my way between tarpaulin-draped crates, bulky machinery under polythene - draw up sharply. Right in front of me, a subtle change in the nature of the darkness. The shadows flow, wrap, knot themselves around an imposing figure, stock still.
The Dark Knight.
A voice like a falling portcullis. "Yes?"
I’m not used to being expected.
"Nor I to being followed."
I move cautiously back, but there’s no sign of him attacking. He doesn’t think I can hurt him. He’s almost certainly right.
It’s been a while.
He doesn’t reply.
Perhaps I should go.
"Perhaps."
...
"Why have you been following me?"
He has something I need.
"And you didn’t want to ask?" Still he makes no move. Wait - is he smiling?
I... knew he was working with the Lair Legion now.
"Meaning?"
I want it for something they wouldn’t approve of. He would refuse.
He is larger, darker even than before. Definitely not smiling. "My methods are no concern of theirs."
...
He turns his back and sweeps imperiously down the aisle formed by two rows of piled-high crates. "Very difficult to just vanish like that. Took me a while to figure out. But you’ve made up a lot of ground these last two years."
What?
"This meeting did not take place."
A spotlight snaps on. A briefcase sits in the tight white circle.
The Knight’s voice echoes from the far corner. "You will not find me here again. Don’t expect any more favours. And don’t get in my way."
The shadows relax. I’m alone.
This poster posed from 168.143.113.107 when they posted
Message Thread
- Four to Six - niobe - 18:03 on April 18, 2002
- Seven. - niobe - 18:14 on April 18, 2002
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