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

  How do I escape? How do I prevent becoming that brain in a box? How?

  And over and over, because she could not lie, being what she was, she choked out words he would not understand. Refused to understand. I do not know. I do not know.

  But you can see the futures! All the futures! How do I escape?

  I do not know, she would wail, or scream, or whisper from cracked and bleeding lips, from a throat too raw to do more than whisper. I do not know. I am not what I was. I do not know.

  And so her answer never varied, not when Shen Xue tortured her with means arcane and means mundane. Not when Verdigris ordered the men clad in black to inject strange drugs that made her veins cry and sent stranger visions than she had ever seen in all of her vast experience stream through her fevered mind.

  Not when, in exasperation, they shattered her wings, first one, and then the other. She could only repeat the truth, for that was all that was left to her. I do not know.

  And at length, Shen Xue finally said what she herself had been saying, in tones of detached disgust. “The creature is no longer Celestial. It truly does not know. We are wasting time.”

  She sensed the holographic image of Verdigris approaching the perimeter of the arcane circle inscribed on the floor, felt his eyes on her. Felt his anger. But he was silent for a very long time.

  Then, at last, he spoke. “She doesn’t know anything new, but there are still memories of the future in there. We’ll take her to my psi lab and I’ll have them out of her with a telepath. Even if we have to carve them out of her goddamned mind. At least we’ll know what to avoid.”

  And then the footsteps, heavy and labored, light and indifferent, faded, and she was left alone with the pain of her shattered body.

  But piercing through the blood-red curtain of the pain came…finally…a thought. I am not what I was. But I can still will my own death.

  She knew death, knew all the ways there were to come to that door. She had passed in and out of it countless times, as escort to others, guiding them, sometimes carrying them. She had taken Mathew March through that door.

  It had not been Permitted before, but surely it was now. She was no longer needed. John Murdock could hear the Song now, and the Song would guide him. The last of her powers would go to him when she died. And Verdigris—Verdigris must not extract what little she knew of the futures from her. Above all, he must not learn of John, and what John was poised to become! His psychics could, and would, pull that information from her mind, and then John would become his target.

  Death was nothing in the face of that last possibility. Yes, death would be Permitted, she was sure of it.

  Yes. Yes, at last it had been accomplished. Her work was done. She allowed herself to let go, to fall, to fall into deep and comforting darkness. Death was easy, it was living that was hard.

  The pain fell away. Feelings faded. Moments were lost, though timeless time remained. From a distance, she saw the great things that burned within him, and was so proud, so proud of what they had been, of what he would be. And then that spun away into the darkness and was gone, and all she felt was the longing for her wings, to fly again, to fly into the darkness, to fly into Eternity.

  And yet, she hesitated, for just a moment.

  Then the wordless words came to her, the last thing she needed to do. One last word of farewell that she must send out, before she could be free.

  With all of her heart, and her soul, and her fading strength, she sent it. A shout? A whisper? Both?

  Oh, my Beloved…Beloved…goodbye.…

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Rubicon

  Mercedes Lackey and Cody Martin

  The ’hood was quiet this afternoon. Well, it was cold, overcast, and what with the wind, pretty nasty out; not the time for kids to be out on the home-made playground. John liked this sort of weather, though; it was a welcome change from the usual boiling heat that defined the South, and Atlanta in particular. He had finished walking his beat for the day, and with nothing else immediate on the duty roster he had chosen to devote some of his free time to doing handyman work around the ’hood. He desperately needed some rack time, but the Commissar worked them all like “nekulturny running dogs,” and he was no exception, so rather than having her “find” something for him to do, he’d opted for outside work. It beat the hell out of scrubbing the floor, or worse, babysitting the Bear. Despite John’s weariness, keeping busy had the added benefit of keeping his mind off of things…for the most part.

  John Murdock certainly had a lot on his mind. The war, his new living situation, his past. More than any of that, however, today he was thinking most about Sera, and the music he had been hearing. What both of them meant to him, what he should do about it. Every time he seemed to find an inroad with either one of them, the path dwindled away before him, leaving him lost again. Sera was…very, very good at evading him, especially since their last conversation. And chasing the music was like chasing a phantom. The more he chased after it, the faster it got away from him. Frustrating for a man that was used to solving problems, no matter what.

  So, unable to make headway with that situation, today he chose to solve different kinds of problems, nice, easy, physical problems, hoping that working on them would quiet the chatter in the back of his mind.

  Jonas, the elderly black shopkeeper that served as John’s interface with the community, had met him at the playground after his patrol was over. “Got one of the boys watchin’ shop for me;” the old man had said with a snort. “Kid needed somethin’ to keep his dumb ass out of trouble.”

  Today’s project was taking some of the scrap metal that residents of the ’hood had been salvaging and making a new set of monkey bars for the playground, bigger, more elaborate, and better suited to the older kids. John and Jonas had selected the most suitable pieces of pipe, then designed the equipment. John would take care of welding everything together, since welding rigs were scarce in this part of town and prohibitively expensive on top of that—and that didn’t even add in the cost for the generator to run an electric welder, or the gas bottles, for a gas welder. After that Jonas would get some of the youths from the ’hood watch to sand everything down so it was safe and have the younger kids paint it however they liked. It’d be something everyone could be proud of and enjoy, that way. Little things like this served to bring the community that much closer together.

  John was holding a pair of borrowed welder’s goggles to his eyes; using a thin concentrated flame from his right hand, he was putting the finishing touches on the six post frame that would make up the body of the monkey bars, when all the comm channels in his head seemed to erupt at once.

  First a burst of confused words, none of them making sense. Then Gamayun. “…but am getting ping from headset—”

  Vix interrupted. “That’s the headset ping, there’s no lifesigns ping! And she’s dropped right off the magical radar!”

  “…the hell just happened?” That was ECHO CEO Bella Parker. “I just got a…like a board upside my head and it’s Sera, only then she just vanished out of my skull!”

  “I don’t know, that’s what I’m trying to find out!” Vix shrilled. “She’s gone, Bells, I haven’t got her live anywhere!”

  John shut off his fires, causing Jonas to cock his head to the side. “Hey! This is Murdock, what the hell is goin’ on? One person tell me, not all of ya at once.” John felt a block of ice slam into his gut. He didn’t like the sound of the comm chatter, nor the panicked tones he was hearing from people he depended on to keep their cool when all hell was breaking loose. This had to be bad for any of them to sound like that.

  “Gamayun, take him!” Vix snapped. “I’m busy here!”

  The voice of Gamayun took over, as the others snapped off their links to him, for now, at least. “Comrade Seraphym was to being sent by Commissar to ExpressEx Depot for courier duty,” the Russian told him, her voice strained. “She did not check in when arrived. I am having ping to headset there now, but Comrade
Victrix says are no lifesigns, and that she cannot detect Comrade Seraphym by nekulturny magics either. Commissar Bella is to being say she has big empathic strike which is somehow linked to Comrade Seraphym. ECHO Corbie—is on way—” There was a long pause. “ECHO Corbie is to being on scene, this moment, following locator. He is finding…headset, camera, and lifesign relay, all in pile. Nothing else.”

  “So there’s no body. She’s not dead. I’m on my way.” John turned to Jonas. “Emergency, man. I’ve gotta go. It’s Sera.”

  Jonas slapped him upside the head. “Well, get the hell on then instead of jawin’ at me, ya damn fool!”

  John didn’t need any more encouragement. He dropped the welder’s goggles at his feet and took off running; Vix had already projected the path onto his HUD.

  * * *

  John’s enhancements had been keyed up from the moment he had left the ’hood playground; it took almost no effort to do so, now, and he ran at incredible speeds, faster than any ordinary man and most metas could. When he skidded to a halt, sending up clouds of dust and bits of broken asphalt at the end of the path Vic had laid out for him on his HUD, Corbie was already working the scene, bending over an area marked off by crime-scene tape, and startled at his sudden arrival.

  “God’s balls, mate. You got here right quick.” The winged meta held up bagged equipment; the Overwatch Mark One gear that John remembered Sera always wearing. Something about…Vix not being able to install the Mark Two internals on her. Sent her magic haywire or some such. “I got these. And I got this.” He held up a smaller baggie, that seemed to hold a bit of broken…something. Crystal? Glass? It was a barely translucent black-red. “And this.” This, at least, John recognized. A spent syringe.

  Corbie seemed to be listening intently for a moment; probably to Vix. “Just a sec.” The ECHO meta pulled something out of his pocket and unfolded it. It was a piece of paper with some sort of complicated diagram on it—it seemed to have been painted there in copper ink. He put it down carefully on the asphalt, and a moment later, there was a piff of displaced air, and Vix’s little stone helper Herb appeared in the middle of it. Corbie handed off the baggie with the syringe and the other with the bit of crystal in it. Herb took both and clutched them to his chest. There was another piff and he was gone.

  John started scanning the entire area, looking for anything that might have been missed. “Overwatch: command: open Vix. Vix, I need everythin’ you can tell me ’bout what you just got sent.”

  “I don’t know about the syringe yet. The rock is…it’s anti-magic and anti-Celestial. I’ll know more when I can analyze it.”

  “So this was specifically tailored for Sera. Someone who knows what she really is, an’ was comin’ after her only. This wasn’t a random hit.” John’s mind was racing with possibilities, scenarios, suspects. Who could do this? Why? Kriegers looking to pick them off one by one?

  “Comrade Murdock, answer.” That was Untermensch, on the CCCP frequency.

  “Murdock here. Go ahead.”

  “Am finding slow drain from main petrol tank into sewer, with sensor on it. Someone installed it, since last time we inspected. Comrade Angel was sent to make pickup because there was no fuel for Urals.”

  “A set-up to give whoever did this the best chance to get Sera out an’ alone. Snatch job. Someone’s got her; there’s no blood here, no body. They either wanted to disappear her, or whoever it is is takin’ her for somethin’ else. All of this is tailored for her. Am I off on this? Vic, Unter?”

  “Ten-four, Johnny,” Vix replied, her voice grim.

  “Am seeing no other conclusion,” Unter agreed. “Only other comrade being able to fly is Commissar, and if it was Commissar they wanted, they would most likely nyet have taken Seraphym on whim. Nor would being use anti-magic device.”

  “Murdock,” the Commissar snapped on the same frequency. “You are to be reporting to HQ now. We are not needing to lose two workers in same day. Let Comrade Witch do what is needed. CCCP must regroup and discover if this is attack only on Comrade Sera or on CCCP as a whole.”

  “Commissar, respectfully, I’m gonna request to stay on the scene.” Before Saviour could answer, John snapped out an order of his own. “Overwatch: command: close CCCP channel.” He breathed heavily for a moment, composing himself. Corbie had taken the cue and was busy on the perimeter. He knew he was probably going to get his ass kicked for disobeying the Commissar like that, but he didn’t care at the moment. “Vic, I imagine you just heard all of that. I’m not quitting this. Okay?”

  “Very okay. I’m keeping Gamayun from reopening your channel until I let her. Johnny, short of Bella, you’re the one of us with the best chance of finding her. And I won’t let Bella go hunting. I’ve got Bull sitting on her to make sure.”

  “That’s ’bout the size of it. I’ll get her back, Vic; count on it. What can you tell me from what Herb brought you?”

  “The crystal is something really, really old, which makes me figure they used all or part of some artifact someone dug up. Like I said, anti-magic and anti-Celestial. The anti-magic part is pretty specific. Blocked the ability to be found by someone like me, and how the hell do they know about magic locators, and blocked her powers. That’s why she dropped off my radar. Anti-Celestial…not sure what it would do to her. She’s not an angel anymore, but she’s also not just a meta-human.”

  “And the syringe? I’m guessin’ somethin’ to incapacitate her.” John wasn’t accustomed to praying, but if there was anything out there, he was praying to them that it wasn’t anything immediately lethal.

  “Just got the mass-spec readout from it. Matches propofol. That’s a knock-out-an-elephant drug. Practically instantaneous.” There was a pause, but with background whispers that suggested she wasn’t done yet. “Johnny…find her. You’ve got to find her. You’re her only hope.”

  “I’ll find her, Vic. Or I’m goin’ to die tryin’. Either way, I imagine that a lot of other folks are goin’ to buy the farm on the way. Keep the Commissar an’ ECHO off of my back. I need all the help I can get, but I don’t need anyone gettin’ in my way. Whoever grabbed her did it with a purpose. I can’t imagine that purpose is goin’ to be very comfortable for her, or have her long for this world.” John was warring with a lot of emotions; fear, hate, rage, vengeance, and the barest hope. He had to get Sera back. “Roger that?”

  “Leaving your channel closed to everyone but me.” Another pause. “Shit.”

  “What?” he snapped. Vickie cussed in probably more languages than John could count. When she did it in English, it usually meant something bad.

  “Eight-ball gives it 85% probability it’s Verd.”

  “We got any leads ’bout where he might be? I know he’s gone to ground.”

  “In the wind. Bella had a plan to smoke him out, but it never went anywhere. Hell, he has more money than a lot of countries, he could be right under or on top of you and we probably wouldn’t know until it was too late.”

  “So, that’s a ‘no.’ Gotta be him using his faction that he split off from Blacksnake; that’s a lot of manpower, but still nothin’ concrete to go on.”

  “…look, I know you don’t much like all that business that went on between you two…before you woke up. And I know you don’t like magic. But I was not saying you’re her only hope lightly. You two are still connected, magically, spiritually. If you try, I am pretty sure you can sense that connection and follow it to her, and I am also pretty sure there is nothing that can block it, because it’s not magic and it’s not celestial.”

  John waited a beat. “This isn’t any hoodoo bullshit or anythin’ like that, right? Cause…there’s somethin’ I’ve only told Sera…I’ve been hearin’ music when I’m around her. Like, weird strains of stuff that I’ve never heard before. She said I had to listen to it. Does that track for you? Y’think it’s that connection?”

  “If it’s not, I don’t know what else to suggest.”

  “Then that’s what we’re going wit
h.”

  As soon as John had finished the sentence, he was doubled over with the most incredible pain that he could ever remember feeling; it was from no cause he could fathom, either. It was as if all of his senses were on fire; he could feel a distant despair, a longing for release, almost insurmountable anguish. And it wasn’t his, but he owned it all the same. He struggled to breathe through the pain, falling to his knees and fighting to stand again. The edges of his vision flashed between darkness, flaring white, and deep red. Sera’s dying. He didn’t know how he knew, but he was certain of it all the same.

  He felt hands on his shoulders, steadying him. He whirled around defensively, hands up and immediately sheathed in fire until he saw it was Corbie. “Whoa there! What’s wrong, mate?” the ECHO meta exclaimed.

  “I’ve…I’ve gotta go. Right now. I’m sorry, but I can feel her. She’s in pain. Goddamnit, she’s dying!” John extinguished his fires with an effort. He felt himself retreat from the edge of panic, going cold, building his resolve. It was a practiced response, but one that took more will than ever before. “It’s Sera. She’s still alive. I know it.”

  Corbie stepped back. “Go!” he said, simply. “Get ’er back, mate.”

  John didn’t waste any time. He ran. His enhancements keyed up already, he ran. He let the music guide him. It was fading in and out, and he stumbled and fell several times when jagged rays of pain lanced through his entire body; it felt like his core was being torn apart with rusty knives. He raced through the destruction corridors, breaching their barriers with a blast of fire when necessary, and crossing through the untouched neighborhoods and streets of Atlanta. He was almost a blur to anyone that happened to see him; weaving in and out of traffic, jumping over barriers, dodging pedestrians. He couldn’t go fast enough, he knew he was losing her, losing Sera…she was growing further and further away with each passing second.

  Then, as he tried to put on yet more speed…there came a whisper in his heart.