Collision: Book Four in the Secret World Chronicle - eARC Read online

  He struggled for the words, remembering how to speak again. “Where…my men. Where are my troops?” He still had to squint; his eyes hadn’t adjusted to the bright light in the room yet; harsh halogens, they had left him half-blind.

  “ECHO troops are being back at their own HQ. Comrades Untermensch, Mamona and old man Bear are here. You are being only casualty…well, were only real casualty of infil team. Pavel’s arm has been replaced with a spare, and Mamona’s fractured arm has been set. Angel took you and went poof. Then, you are being poof back into CCCP recreational room.”

  “What…? I don’t know…any of those names. Who are you?” The shape was coming into focus now; obviously a woman from her voice. She was tall, with the classically beautiful features of a statue rather than a model or Hollywood starlet. Her black hair was cut in a severe style that was even with her jawline. She wore a white doctor’s coat with a stethoscope poking out of one pocket, over what looked like a uniform; it differed from the coats Army docs wore only in the red star and Cyrillic nametag where an Army doc would have just the nametag, in English.

  “Shto?” The woman blinked very blue eyes. “You are not being to remember? Not ECHO? Not CCCP? Not battle?” She muttered something in Russian. At least, he thought it was Russian.

  “I’ve heard of ECHO, lady. Everyone has…where the hell am I?”

  She held up an imperious hand. “Wait. What is last thing you remember?”

  He paused. “I can’t say, ma’am.” He held up a hand, mirroring her. “I remember it, I’m just not allowed to say. Sorry.”

  She pursed her lips. “Chert. What is year? Month? Day? Who is being win World Series?”

  “…It’s 2006, August, 31st day, and I don’t really follow baseball. I’m more of a football kind of guy.”

  The doctor’s face froze for a moment. She licked her lips. “It is being 2014, Comrade Murdock. It seems you are missing more than your clothing.”

  Everything went very still for him for a moment. If he believed this woman—and he had no reason not to—he had lost eight years of his life. God only knew what had happened in that time. She mentioned ECHO, as if he had been working with them, which was impossible—something called CCCP, as if it was accepted he was a part of them. Commies obviously—so—whatever had happened, had been drastic. He was overcome with nausea and disorientation. “Ma’am, I’ve got one last question for you before I throw up.”

  “Shto?”

  “Where are my pants?”

  * * *

  The group walked down the labyrinthine hallways of the CCCP HQ, heading for the Medical Bay. Jadwiga, callsign Soviette, was leading the way, and explaining while they walked, Bella and Saviour beside her. Vickie and Sera trailed behind. Vickie was not even sure she should have been there. Except—except that somehow she had gotten all tied up with this. Sera had materialized in her workroom, Bella was her dearest friend—the two of them were connected somehow, Vickie’s mage-sight clearly showed the bond between them. Jadwiga was going on about trauma, transitory amnesia…Vickie wasn’t paying much attention to it. Sera—well, Sera wasn’t The Seraphym anymore, wings notwithstanding. She reminded Vickie of the description in the fairy tale of the Little Mermaid, how, once she got legs, she walked in pain as if every step was taken on the blades of knives. Bella reflected that pain. But how, or why this had happened—Vickie still wasn’t sure. Sera hadn’t said more than a dozen words so far.

  As for what they were going to see, in the CCCP medbay…Vickie wasn’t sure what that was going to be, either, at this point.

  Hope and despair flickered over Sera’s face by turns.

  “…so…here,” Jadwiga said, opening the door to the medbay. “Here is being comrade patient.”

  The group entered the cramped medbay. Sitting upon a gurney in the center of the room wearing only a hospital smock and a pair of skivvies was John Murdock. But, at the same time, not. This John didn’t have darkness under his eyes. The same quiet intensity, but none of the troubles which had seemed to weigh him down even before he knew of his own impending death. The scars were still there, but they seemed fainter, unimportant now. Not really a part of the man that was sitting in front of them. And he still had his same lop-sided grin.

  “Howdy, y’all.” He regarded the group, still smiling. “Now, who exactly are you people, an’ what the hell am I doin’ here?”

  * * *

  Bella was hyper-aware of Sera behind her. There were only two people in the whole world (as far as she knew) that knew anything at all about the angel. She was one. John Murdock was—or had been—the other.

  Now? Well, Sera was no longer an angel. She no longer had that feeling of infinite power, infinite certainty, and infinite control. Her wings were feathered, not fire. According to Jadwiga, John was back, but completely cured of what had been killing him—and Vickie had also said that Sera wasn’t an angel anymore. Since the last time anyone had seen either of them, it had been together, it was pretty obvious that the one thing had to do with the other.

  Right now, Sera was vibrating with mingled hope and despair, so much so it was making Bella’s empathic shields hum.

  According to Jadwiga, this was the same man, in every way but two. He was perfectly healthy, and the cellular disorder that had been killing him was now gone, as if every bit of damage had been instantly healed, the dysfunction removed. Jadwiga couldn’t tell what had done that, and she was the more experienced healer of the two of them, and a full MD to boot. “Is being magic,” she had said, and shrugged. That answer produced a derisive snort from Natalya.

  And now, here was the man himself, sitting on an examination table, looking entirely like himself. Sera peered around Bella’s shoulder, her wings trembling so hard that the feathers rustled.

  “Who exactly are you people? I expect some answers, and right quick.” he said, looking directly at Sera for a brief moment.

  Bella had never actually seen someone’s heart break before, but the change in Sera’s expression showed that moment in agonizing detail. Bella’s shields rang like a bell with the blow of grief and loss.

  And then—Sera was gone. Literally flying from the room, and out an open hallway window. Bella was torn—follow Sera, or try and sort out Murdock? She’d never catch Sera; she couldn’t fly, and certainly couldn’t move that fast. Throttling down her own feelings, she turned to Murdock.

  John only looked mildly surprised, but still expectant for an answer. “Well?”

  Untermensch laid a hand on Natalya’s shoulder. “Commissar…”

  Saviour nodded. “Da. Comrade Murdock. You are seeming to be experiencing memory problem. For past year and more, you have been sturdy worker and operative for the Super-Sobratiye Sovetskikh Revolutzionerov. You Amerikanski are being know this as CCCP. This occurred after an invasion by an army of Nazi-affiliated metahumans and—” she paused.

  “Oh for godsake, Nat, say it. Aliens. Big, ugly, aliens. ET, but not cute, not friendly, and as far as we can tell, planning to wipe us off the planet.” Bella crossed her arms over her chest, trying to physically hold in her churning emotions.

  “They attacked almost every major city on Earth a little more than a year ago in a coordinated strike, decimating much of the world and killing untold numbers. The attack was to soften up the governments of the world, and cripple ECHO, as well as other metahuman crime and logistics organizations. Since then, you have been helping us and ECHO fight these fascista. Questions, comrade?”

  John’s jaw didn’t quite drop, but it was close. “This has to be bullshit. What happened to my troops?”

  “I am not knowing which troops you are speaking of, Comrade Murdock,” Saviour said crisply, “but if they are the ones in Costa Rica—”

  Unter coughed. Nat’s mouth snapped shut self-consciously. John stared at the two, his gaze going cold and dead for the barest second. Bella knew that look. She’d seen it before. It meant that John Murdock was considering every option he had…and a lot of those options i
ncluded killing someone. The tension in the air was ready to snap like an icicle; Bella found herself holding her breath, waiting. It was Untermensch that broke it before things turned to the unfortunate.

  “Comrade, my name is Georgi Vlasov. My callsign is ‘Untermensch.’” He paused for a moment, to see if any recognition sparked in John. “You and I are being comrades in arms for the last year. During this time, we have killed many fascista, and struck hard blows against their efforts.” He paused again; still, nothing but that expectant look from Murdock. At least the murder had gone out of his eyes. “Comrade, when you came to us, you were injured and were being on the run. It is our understanding from what you told us that you were the only survivor from your unit. I am sorry, comrade.” Unter looked away briefly, then back to John.

  Bella saw that John believed Unter; Murdock had a way of judging sincerity in people, and he always used to go with his gut. Emotions passed through John—no, they tore through him. Bella braced herself against them. Rage, despair, confusion—disbelief—the disbelief started to win. And who could blame him? Even in a world full of metahumans, this must sound like a bad science fiction movie. Show, don’t tell. That would be the best way to cut through whatever walls he was already trying to put up between himself and reality.

  She strode over to the medbay window and yanked up the ugly Soviet venetian blind. It clattered and sunlight poured in the room. “Look for yourself,” she said curtly. “That’s Atlanta out there. What’s left of it. What the Kriegers left us.” John looked at her hard, then hopped off of the examining table. He strode quickly to the window, peering out of it.

  Without looking away, he started to speak in harsh tones. “What the hell happened? Is everywhere like this?”

  “We are being on edge of what nekulturny teevee calls ‘destruction corridor.’ Enemy marched war machines towards ECHO HQ and were not gentle about doing so. Many cities have them.” Nat’s jaw tightened. “Red Square is similarly…disrupted. My CCCP was there for a…meeting with officials. They came for us metahumans, we know this now—” She broke off. “I will to being get you briefing.”

  “Um,” Vickie said softly from somewhere near Bella’s elbow. “I can do that. I’ve got all the records and the hardware with me to make it happen, it won’t take long. Heck, I can start on it now.”

  Nat nodded curtly. Bella took up where she had left off. “The world economy is devastated, but…coping. Relief efforts are going on everywhere. Cities are full of these corridors; the countryside was impacted the least or not at all, and it’s hit or miss with manufacturing and industrial centers. The thing is, now we’re finding out that the Kriegers had weapons cached damn near everywhere, and cells to activate them. Every time things seem to get a little better, they activate one, there’s a helluva lot of fighting and death until we get it shut down, and governments go ballistic.”

  “Sorry, Kriegers?” John shook his head, uncomprehending.

  Vickie ducked out from under Bella’s elbow, her laptop open, typing away. “Here,” she said, shoving the thing at him. “That’s the enemy. We call them Kriegers, for ‘Blitzkrieg.’ They seem to be a combination of the aliens and a pile of Nazi metahumans and fanatics that escaped after the War. And recruits.”

  Light from the screen flickered on his eyes, mirroring the emotions that flitted through him. “So…y’all are fighting them? Stopping stuff like this,” he gestured towards the ruined buildings outside, “from happening anymore?”

  “Nyet. We are not doing so well as that. Trying to keep them from turning the world into giant labor camp,” the Commissar said, grimly. “Conventional forces—well, being to look at screen, comrade.”

  Bella sighed. “There are a handful—and only a handful—of metas and special weapons that do anything but dent these guys and annoy them,” she said, sensing that his first instinct was to head straight for the nearest Army base and volunteer. “Most of those aren’t in the arsenals of most armies. Uh—and you happen to be one of the metahumans that can actively hurt them. Same for me, the Commissar here, most of CCCP…oh, yeah, I’m the head of ECHO…I guess you don’t remember that.”

  John did a spit-take. “What? You said…that I’m metahuman?”

  “Uh, yeah. You’re some sort of fire-chucker. Plus…” She rubbed her temple. “Evidently you were in some kind of super-soldier program. You wouldn’t tell us much. But you’ve got implants. And fire, which doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the implants.” She sighed again. “Conventional troops are good if we’re the spearhead, Murdock. Without us…conventional troops are just a blunt stick against a hungry tiger.”

  “You’re…what’s your name again, ma’am?”

  “Bella Dawn Parker, callsign Belladonna Blue, and acting head of ECHO. I’m not technically the CEO, that’s Yankee Pride, but that’s an administrative position and we’re on a war footing. So sometimes they call me a CEO too.”

  “You’re not feeding me a line about any of this, right? No BS?” John met her eyes. His were searching, looking for anything to latch onto. He needed someone to look to as an authority. That made sense, he was a soldier, after all…or at least, the him of eight years ago had been. And given he was US, Army, he wasn’t going to look to some commie foreigner as that authority, at least not yet. It had to be her.

  Mutely, Bella fished her ID out of a pocket and handed it to him. As she touched his hand, she tried to send him a thread of reassurance, juggling her need to help him with the ethics of imposing anything on him.

  John scanned the ID quickly before handing it back to Bella. “I need some time to think on this. And I’ll be needin’ some more information; hell, all of it.” He looked to Natalya. “I’m guessin’ from your charmin’ Muscovite accent that you’re in charge of this bunch?”

  Saviour nodded. “I am being Commissar Red Saviour, second of that name, of CCCP. Your commander, Comrade Murdock.”

  Bella nodded. “Technically you should be in ECHO, but given that you clearly did not want your former…friends…to know you were even alive, this was the best place for you to go. You’ve also had Blacksnake sniffing at your heels…with guys with katanas. Who put holes in you. It’s a long story. I’ll cut to the chase. Until a few minutes ago as far as I can tell, you were dying of whatever gave you that fire-chucking ability. And…something happened to you. Vick, scan him would you?”

  “You mean—” Vickie looked up at her, a little apprehensive.

  “Yeah I need to confirm my hunch. Make with the finger wiggling.” John tensed as Vickie approached him, looking to Bella. “It’s OK. She’s a magician as well as a computer wizard.” Now that has to be a mind-screw, on top of everything else.

  Vickie paused about a foot away from him, and flexed her fingers. “All right. This won’t hurt a—”

  “—YOW!” There was a pulse of white light, emanating from the center of John’s chest, that hit Vickie squarely on her outstretched hand.

  Vickie staggered back. Her short hair was literally standing straight up.

  Bella grabbed Vickie’s elbow and held her up. “Vick! Are you okay?” She did her own version of “scanning,” making sure there was no damage. No physical damage at least.

  Vickie put shaking hands up to her head, smoothing down her hair. “Uh…yeah. Ever stick a fork in a light socket? Don’t. But…yeah, he’s…fixed, and the same, only different. And it’s not ‘magic’ as I understand it. It’s, well…” she waved her hands, vaguely. “Bigger. A lot bigger.”

  “Sera,” Bella said flatly. Vickie nodded.

  “What’d she just do to me?” Bella recognized John coiled and ready to spring into action. All of this was strange and new to him, and it must have been very frightening.

  “She didn’t do anything to you. You did it to her. She was trying to ID what it was that fixed you, it didn’t want to be ID’d, and it bit back…” She shook her head. “Look, Vick, job one, get Murdock briefed. I’ll try and find Sera, among everything else that’s going
on.”

  “Anyone gonna ask what the hell I wanna do, maybe?” John’s back was against the glass window, his arms crossed.

  Saviour snorted. “You are being registered member of CCCP and under my orders, Comrade. That was by your own—how you say—enlistment? So I am still your commanding officer, nyet?”

  He bristled. “Lady, until about 10 minutes ago, I didn’t even know you existed. I’m slow on most days, so you’re gonna have to be real slow with me now. Especially in telling me what the hell to do. Savvy?”

  “Lyuboi. Your callsign is now being Slow Boy. So, Slow Boy, you are to being briefed on last eight years by ECHO Op 3 Victoria Victrix. When you are to being caught up, then we talk. Daughter of Rasputin is also bolshoi computer wizard, anything you are needing to know, she can find. Da, Victrix?”

  “Da, Commissar.” Vickie tucked her laptop under her arm. “I’ve got it from here. Just one thing, Commissar?”

  “Shto?” Saviour said, turning back.

  “Can we please find him some pants?”

  * * *

  It’s the same man. It’s not the same man. Absolutely contradictory statements, yet somehow, both were true. Still…that could happen in magic and physics, which were more closely related than most people realized. So…all right, first things first. Get him up to speed on current events, then hit him with the personal stuff.

  Fortunately, there was a crap-ton of media documentaries about the Invasion and subsequent events. Vickie just searched out the most unbiased (BBC and a select mixture of online reporting, which was no big surprise for her), downloaded it and put JM in a chair and the laptop in his lap. Thankfully, he was dressed now; a spare CCCP coverall. He picked at the insignia now and again, clearly less than comfortable with it.

  “There,” she said. “That’s about two hours. Pause it and ask questions if you want to.” While he was watching, she was going to cobble up something showing him clips of himself in the CCCP. Maybe get other records. It was a good thing she carried a spare netbook; it was powerful enough for that task.