Deathstalker Legacy

  "Shut up!" said Angelo. "Shut up, damn you!" All the hairs were standing up on his arms and on the back of his neck. He was sweating and his hands were icy cold, as though someone had just walked over his grave. He was scared, horribly scared, and he didn't know why. "You're here because I ordered you here, to listen when I speak! You don't have to die. You could go back to the surgeons, go under the knife again. Let us put controls in your heads. Live on in service to the new Church…"

  "No," said Joy pleasantly. "I don't think so. We won't go back to being human. To being only human. We'd rather die."

  "Then die," said Angelo Bellini viciously.

  But even as his hand moved towards the control on his desk that would detonate the new transmutation bomb under the Ecstatics chair, Joy leaned over suddenly, reached under his seat, ripped out the bomb and held it up before him. He looked at it curiously for a moment, and then tossed it across the desk, aimed nicely to land right on the control that would activate it. Angelo screamed and shrieked with horror, and erupted up out of his chair to grab the bomb with both hands. He moved quickly away from the desk, put the bomb down on the floor very carefully, and then backed away from it; his mind full of the awful death of the previous Patriarch. He spun around, breathing hard, suddenly sure Joy would be leaning over his desk with his hand poised over the activation pad; but there was no sign of the Ecstatic anywhere. He'd left as silently as he'd come, while Angelo was preoccupied.

  How could he have known the bomb was under the chair? What else did he know, and who might he tell it to? And what one Ecstatic knew…

  Angelo leaned over his desk, and hit the comm panel with unnecessary force. "Security! There's an Ecstatic loose in this building! Kill it! Shoot it on sight! And when you're sure the unnatural thing is dead, bring the body here to my office, so I can see it for myself!"

  Security sped through the Cathedral at a run, driven on by Angelo's increasingly hysterical orders, but the Ecstatic was nowhere to be found. No one saw him leave, and he didn't show up on any of the security monitors. Which should have been impossible. So Angelo got on the comm again, to some of his more fanatical Neumen supporters, and personally gave the death order for all the Ecstatics. In any city, on any world. Let them see what excommunication from the new Church really meant… Let the law bleat what it liked; by the time they got their act together it would all be over. And if any of his Neumen assassins should be caught, well; fanatics were always so eager to become martyrs for their Cause…

  The Ecstatics as a movement were finished. They were already as good as extinct. They were history.

  But somehow that didn't comfort Angelo Bellini at all.

  Ahead of you is terror…

  Within the hour, the Parade of the Endless was swarming with Neumen fanatics, proud in their new Church armor, hunting down Ecstatics with gun and steel and missionary zeal, killing them openly in the streets. The peacekeepers mobilized in force to stop them, calling in reinforcements from all the surrounding cities, but still they were too widely spread, and greatly outnumbered. Excommunicated, condemned, and damned by the Church as heretics, the Ecstatics were thrown out of their seminaries, retreats, and churches, and the doors slammed and locked behind them. No one in the Church would hide or succor them. No one dared. The Neumen ran through city streets howling like wolves, blood dripping thickly from their blades. Most of the Ecstatics were easy targets. They didn't run. They walked calmly through the streets, unwilling or unable to defend themselves. They smiled kindly on their murderers, making no attempt to escape, and they died easily, still smiling their disturbing smiles. The bodies piled up, and blood ran in the gutters of the perfect city. When individual peacekeepers got in the way, the Neumen cut them down too.

  The Paragon Emma Steel heard shooting, and came swooping down on her gravity sled, to see half a dozen Neumen assassins in Church Militant trappings pursuing a lone Ecstatic down a main street. They were openly firing disrupters, but somehow their target was never where they aimed. He ran down the middle of the road, luckily free of traffic for the moment, while people lined both sides of the street and jeered and yelled crude insults at the running man. They scattered like sheep as Emma's sled came shrieking down at full speed, and she slammed it to an abrupt halt between the running Neumen and their prey. The six men stumbled to a halt as she jumped lithely down from her sled, her gun and sword already in her hands. They were fanatics, but they knew who she was.

  They looked at each other, and then at the Ecstatic, standing quietly just beyond Emma's hovering sled, looking back at them, smiling. The Neumen looked at Emma Steel, slowly advancing on them, and anywhen else they would probably have done the sensible thing and turned and run. But their senses were maddened by the chase, blood from their previous kills still dripping from their weapons, and after all, there were six of them against just one Paragon. And they knew from the riot that sometimes Paragons die just as easily as anyone else. One man raised his energy gun, and fired it point blank. The force shield on Emma's arm intercepted the blast, and the energy beam ricocheted harmlessly away. Committed now, the Neumen howled wordlessly and threw themselves at her.

  Emma cut down the first two to reach her with ruthless efficiency, her sword a blur as it cut through throat and gut. She surged forward while her first two victims were still crumpling to the blood-spattered ground, and then she was in and among the other four before they knew what was happening. They cried out as steel ripped through their flesh, while all their swords found was air. They were fanatics, but Emma Steel was a warrior. She killed them all in a matter of moments, and then looked unhurriedly about her. Six dead men lay in bloody heaps in the street, and she wasn't even breathing hard. The crowds lining both sides of the street were silent, their faces sullen, angry, cheated out of the death they wanted. One of them stepped forward, her face drawn in cold, ugly lines. She glared at Emma Steel.

  "How dare you interfere in God's work! He is an abomination! He has to die!" She looked around her, seeking support. "Kill the abomination! The Paragon can't stop us all!"

  "I can stop you," said Emma Steel. She pointed her disrupter at the woman's forehead. "And you'd be surprised how many people I can cut down, if I get annoyed enough."

  The crowd looked at the dead Neumen in the street and began to break up and drift away. They might believe in the principles of Pure Humanity, but they weren't ready to die for them. Not yet, anyway. The would-be rabble rouser glared at Emma one last time, spat at the Ecstatic, then turned and walked away. Emma kept her gun trained on the woman's back until she disappeared down a side street, and then she put the gun away and turned back to study the waiting Ecstatic. He was standing right beside her, still smiling. Emma gave him her best glare.

  "What the hell was that all about?"

  "I am Joy," said the Ecstatic. "You must protect me. It is necessary. I know things that matter. I see the Empire that's coming, born in blood and terror. I see legends walking and heroes gone bad. Your aura is really quite magnificent, you know. The Light People swarm around you like moths drawn to a blowtorch. The one you trust most will betray you. It's really very sad, but then most things are…"

  "What are you talking about?" said Emma. "Why were those Neumen creeps trying to kill you? The comm channels are full of dead Ecstatics all over the city. What is going on?"

  "We are excommunicated," Joy said patiently. "Our murder has become a blessed act. The Angel says so. Mostly we don't care. Life and death aren't nearly as different as most people think. However, I am different. You may have noticed. I know things. Secrets; past, present, and future. I can't tell you what; others might rip the knowledge from your mind.

  Emma nodded slowly. "All right; that last bit actually made some sense. You'd better come with me. I'll see you're put in protective custody until we can sort this madness out."

  "Alas no," said Joy. "There's nowhere you can put me that they couldn't find me. Neumen walk through walls and under doors now. Only one place safe in this w
orld, for such as me. You must take me there. Guard and protect me all the way. Take me to New Hope, Emma Steel. For all our souls' sake."

  "The esper city? The heart and home of the oversoul? What makes you think they'd put themselves on the line to protect you?"

  "Because the mind people still remember what it was like to be hunted."

  Emma couldn't argue with that. She looked around her. She and the Ecstatic were the only people left on the deserted street, but any number of faces were watching from windows. Someone would have called the Church by now. Which meant more Neumen assassins were undoubtedly already on the way. And if Joy really did know something that he wasn't supposed to know, something dangerous enough to threaten the new popularity of the Church Militant… Emma smiled unpleasantly.

  "All right, Joy, you've got yourself a ride. Get up on the sled behind me. But keep your hands to yourself, and if you get airsick, try and aim most of it over the side. And pray the espers will be as welcoming as you seem to think. No one gets into New Hope without permission."

  "My point exactly," said the Ecstatic.

  Emma grinned despite herself, led him back to her hovering gravity sled, helped him on board, and took off, climbing for the clouds as fast as the engine could take her, to avoid providing a target for rooftop snipers. The sooner she got to New Hope the better. She couldn't have felt more of a target if she'd had a bulls-eye painted on her back.

  The esper city of New Hope, central nexus for the oversoul, was only ten miles or so due north of the Parade of the Endless, but the Neumen did everything they could to prevent Emma and her new friend from getting there. First came the gravity sleds, dozens of them, sweeping down from above, disrupter fire raking Emma's sled from all sides. Emma bucked and weaved, riding the air currents for all they were worth to keep her flight unpredictable. Her sled's force shields flared and coruscated, soaking up the discharging energies, always on the very edge of overloading and collapsing, but somehow still maintaining their integrity. It seemed her passion for upgrading and tinkering was paying off after all.

  Energy bolts seared all around her, shooting in from every side as she threw the sled back and forth, rising and falling on the gusting winds between the towering buildings. At this speed the bitterly cold air cut at her like a knife as it buffeted around the edges of the prow force shield, but Emma didn't give a damn. Her blood was running hot, and she was grinning more widely than the Ecstatic. This was the first decent workout she'd had since she got here. At last the enemy had revealed himself, and she was going to make him pay for that foolishness in blood. There was no one who could fly a gravity sled better than her. She'd learned her skills the hard way, fighting air pirates on Rhiannon.

  A dozen gravity sleds came at her in a wave, opening up with every energy gun they had. Emma hauled her sled around in a tight curve, yelling for the Ecstatic to hang on tight to the crash bars. For a moment she was flying sideways on to her attackers, disrupter fire chewing up the face of the building behind her. Walls and windows exploded, hot fires blossoming out onto the winter air. The Neumen sleds swung around to block her path, leaving her nowhere to go. They thought. Emma swung her sled around and dove right into the heart of the burning building.

  At the speed she was traveling now, the flames could hardly touch her, and the force shields soaked up most of the heat; but even so, for a moment it was like flying through the sun. Emma squeezed her eyes shut and held her breath, and hoped her passenger had enough sense to do the same. A moment later she punched through the windows on the other side of the buildings corner, and she was out of the flames and back into the crisp cold air again. She whooped loudly, and pulled the sled around, bearing down on her previous attackers from behind. Her hair felt crisp and singed, all her bare skin tingled painfully, and one shoulder of her cloak had caught fire. She slapped the flames out almost casually, and whooped again as she opened fire on the Neuman sleds with her disrupters. The Neuman sleds exploded and blew apart, burning wreckage and broken bodies falling from the sky like charred birds, plummeting to the streets far below.

  They should have invested in proper rear shields, like her.

  Emma could have called for assistance on the Paragon emergency comm channel, but she didn't. Partly as a matter of pride, but mostly because she didn't know who she could trust anymore. Joy was right about one thing; Pure Humanity had supporters everywhere these days. Even among the peacekeepers. Safer by far to get the Ecstatic to his sanctuary at New Hope as fast as possible, and hope the espers were as glad to meet Joy as he seemed to think. Even the Neumen would have more sense than to take on the oversoul.

  So she gunned her engine for all it was worth, fired her overheating guns at anything stupid enough to fire at her, and occasionally rammed a slower moving gravity sled that didn't get out of her way fast enough. She was singing the old war songs of Mistworld now, from a time when her home planet had been the only rebel world that dared stand against the dreaded Empress Lionstone. Her voice rang out, proud and defiant, as she fought her way past overwhelming odds. She'd taken some hits, her sled's armor looking distinctly buckled and battered in places, but most of her force shields were still up and holding, and she was almost at the city limits. Next stop, New Hope. It occurred to her that if this many people were so desperate to try and stop her, then what the Ecstatic knew, or thought he knew, probably was worth protecting. Even if she didn't have a damned clue what it might be.

  She shot past the last of the high towers and out into open air, and suddenly there were no more gravity sleds. She powered on, leaving the city behind her. It slowly occurred to her that even the usual commercial sky traffic seemed to have chosen other lanes. She was alone in the sky. Emma scowled, immediately suspicious, and checked her sled's sensor displays, but nothing was showing anywhere near her. It would seem she'd got away with it. The Neumen had given up the pursuit. But Emma Steel was not only a Paragon but a Mistworlder, with all that rebel planets native cunning and paranoia, and she knew better than to rely on instruments alone. Particularly when every instinct she had was screaming at her. So when the fifty-ton military gravity barge emerged suddenly from out of the clouds right in front of her, she was ready for it.

  There was no doubt the barge was military, even though someone had gone to great trouble to shut down all its markings and insignia. Either it had been hijacked by Neumen, or it was crewed by Pure Humanity supporters from within the military. Either way, it was big and brutal and coming straight at her at a rate of knots. The whole huge shape of it was protected by overlapping force shields, and it was packed with rows of disrupter cannon, already moving to target her. Emma dove for the ground immediately, practically sticking her sled on its nose. Joy hugged her around the waist with both arms, and she let him. She scowled fiercely, running strategies quickly through her mind. She hadn't anticipated a bloody gravity barge. Big bastards, and powerful with it. Far superior shields and firepower to anything she had. But barges were notoriously slow and hard to maneuver, compared to a sled. She couldn't outrun it, or hope to evade its targeting computers for long, but maybe, just maybe, she could out-think the people running it. A ship's only ever as good as its crew…

  The first disrupter beams shot past her, worryingly close. She pulled out of her dive, pulling back on the yoke so hard the engine screamed in protest. Emma ignored it, roaring towards the open horizon, sacrificing some speed to her dodging and ducking, barely a dozen feet above the ground now. People traveling on the roads below looked up with startled faces. Emma felt like waving, but didn't. She had her dignity to consider. She pushed her engine's speed well past its theoretical limits, and the whole structure of the sled shook and shuddered beneath her. The engine was making really unpleasant sounds now, and threatening to get nasty. Emma spoke soothingly to it. She'd done a lot of work on the sled. It would hold together. It would have to. Disrupter beams stabbed down all around her, blowing smoking craters in the ground, for all her evasive tactics. Think, dammit, think. There h
ad to be a way…

  The answer came to her in a flash. It was a crazy, dangerous answer, and if anyone else had suggested it she would probably have shot them outright, just on general principle, but… Emma Steel howled her war song in a cracking voice and sent the sled shooting up into the sky again. She shut down all her force shields, feeding the extra power to the engine. Behind her, the Ecstatic had buried his face in the small of her back so he wouldn't have to see what they were doing. Emma didn't blame him.

  The gravity barge loomed up before her, filling the sky and growing ever more massive by the moment. She shot up past its nose, missing the prow by barely a yard or so, and kept on going. Its disrupter beams went nowhere near her. Emma pulled the sled over in a great loop, till they were actually flying upside down, held in place only by the sled's emergency crash webbing. The blood poured out of Emma's head and rushed towards her boots, but she was damned if she'd faint. She kept the sled speeding through its great loop, powered on by its straining engine until, so suddenly it took her breath away, they came dropping down out of the loop, right way up again, and closing in fast on the rear of the gravity barge.

  Heading, in fact, straight for the exposed rear vents of its engines. The one place not protected by force shields, so the engines' energies could dissipate safely. Bit of a design fault, really. Emma opened up with every disrupter she had, and the explosions that followed were satisfyingly loud and large and nasty. Heavy jets of flame shot out, that Emma avoided only with some desperate last-minute maneuvering, followed by clouds of thick dark smoke. The barge tilted slowly over onto one side, as fuel cell after fuel cell shut down rather than add to the explosions, and the gravity barge began its slow, implacable descent towards the ground below. Emma laughed harshly, turned the sled around, and headed once more towards New Hope.