0:02

Chapter twenty three, Sasha

0:05

Rolling Fuck trundled forward, crunching

0:08

its way over the Texas Plains and leaving a

0:10

carpet of flattened grass and broken trees

0:12

in its wake. And Sasha Marian,

0:14

situated in a little purple building atop

0:16

one of the city's tallest spires, couldn't

0:19

quite believe her eyes. In spite

0:21

of its many wheels, the city didn't look like

0:23

the kind of thing that should be able to move. It

0:26

was as if the Empire State Building had

0:28

taken up jogging. Sasha

0:30

had been more or less alone since the war Council

0:32

had concluded. She'd wanted to go up

0:35

to the bar with Manny and Roland, since they

0:37

were the only people here she even sort of knew,

0:39

but their conversation had seemed a private

0:41

sort of thing. At first, she thought

0:43

that her hosts had made an oversight in leaving her

0:46

unwatched. Surely they wouldn't let someone

0:48

who had been their enemy just a few days ago wander

0:50

freely through their home. But as the

0:52

hours went by, it became clear that's

0:54

exactly what they'd done, so

0:56

Sasha explored it had been exhilarating.

0:59

Actually, every inch of the city was

1:01

different and strange and new to her. Across

1:04

the gantries there were numerous market stalls

1:06

with fresh meat and produce. At first

1:08

she recognized all the foods, but the

1:10

higher and further she went, the stranger everything

1:12

seemed. The meat went from beef

1:14

and chicken to alligator in zebra and mammoth,

1:17

and eventually something Sasha thought

1:19

might be from an actual dinosaur. She

1:21

was sure it was all lab grown, and the produce

1:24

was certainly gene modified. At

1:26

one point, she came across a kiosk filled with

1:28

fruit that had been tweaked to take the shape of gigantic

1:31

erect penises. There were penis

1:33

watermelons, penis oranges, penis

1:35

apples, and even bags of tiny penis

1:37

shaped grapes. She knew she

1:39

should have felt disgusted. Two weeks

1:41

ago, Sasha would have been horrified, but

1:44

somehow she just wasn't.

1:46

She felt a vague sense of unease awkwardness

1:49

at the sight of so many genitals, but after

1:51

all she'd seen in the Heavenly Kingdom, it didn't

1:53

exactly horrify her either, How

1:55

could it. The fondl boats

1:57

were another matter. The sight and the strange

2:00

sky's sweet smell that wafted out of the grinding,

2:02

groping crowd inside it made her queasy.

2:05

This is exactly as depraved as Pastor Mike

2:07

said it would be, she thought. But she also

2:09

thought, is this really worse than all that

2:11

violence and death? Who were they hurting?

2:14

The Lord? Said a shrill, small

2:17

voice in the back of her mind. Why

2:19

would God hate this and not the hanging of good

2:21

people? Sasha wondered, Why would

2:23

this make him angry but not the butchery inside

2:25

that factory? You know what

2:28

the Bible says, Sasha, There is no getting

2:30

around that. The scriptures were clear.

2:33

Well maybe they're wrong. Then maybe they've

2:35

always been wrong, or maybe I read them

2:37

wrong. Maybe they didn't say what I thought

2:39

they said. It was odd, how

2:41

freeing that thought was. She

2:45

made her way past a fondle boat, and, for no

2:47

reason beyond curiosity and the desire

2:49

to stretch her muscles, Sasha started to climb

2:51

upwards. The gantries that made up

2:53

the bulk of Rolling Fox Walking Space were

2:56

fairly easy for a human to traverse.

2:58

They had high walls, so even the very drunk

3:00

were unlikely to fall, and in spite of

3:02

the city's clutter and bustle. Its designers

3:04

had done a good job of making two clear

3:06

lanes for foot traffic, but the gantries

3:09

only gave Sasha access to a handful of

3:11

the strange, glittering buildings that dotted

3:13

the city's rolling superstructure, so

3:16

she left them and she climbed up. It

3:18

was not an easy climb. Here and there she found

3:21

small sections of ladder or knotted rope

3:23

to ease her passage. For the most part,

3:25

though she climbed hand over hand up the criss

3:27

crossed metal girders. She passed

3:29

several buildings filled with people drinking and

3:31

partying. Sasha didn't stop to talk.

3:34

The climb was hard, but at least it allowed her to

3:36

avoid awkward conversation with whatever

3:38

manner of creatures lived in this place. By

3:41

the time she reached the top of the spindle, Sasha's

3:43

body was drenched in sweat and her arms

3:45

were too sore to pull her up one more foot.

3:48

She was grateful to whoever had decided to

3:50

cap this spindle with a tiny purple shack,

3:53

and she was even more grateful that the shack appeared

3:55

unoccupied. Sasha pulled herself

3:57

inside and collapsed on the floor for

4:00

a while. It was all she could do to regain her

4:02

breath. She wondered, in

4:04

a vague sort of way, if she'd just broken

4:06

into someone's home. Nobody

4:08

had warned her that there would be certain places she

4:10

couldn't travel here, but no one had told

4:12

her much of anything at all. After she'd arrived,

4:15

Sasha took stock of her surroundings.

4:17

The interior of the room was plush. The

4:19

walls were carpeted in thick, cushiony velvet.

4:22

The floor below her seemed to be some sort of

4:24

black shag. There was a framed picture

4:27

on one wall. Sasha didn't recognize

4:29

the artist, but it looked like a cross section

4:31

drawing of a handgun with fetuses as

4:33

the bullets. The sight of it made her feel

4:35

a bit sick, but there was also something about

4:38

the art that drew her eyes. The

4:40

center of the room was a low, flat table

4:42

that appeared to be made entirely of mirrored glass.

4:45

There was a pile of white powder on the center

4:47

of the table, along with a strange, rectangular

4:49

piece of green paper. Sasha

4:51

picked up the paper and stared at it. It took

4:53

her a moment to realize what it was. Money

4:57

said a voice from behind her. Oh, it

4:59

used to be once upon a time. Sasha

5:02

frose stiffened. She turned round,

5:05

not sure what to expect, but with an apology

5:07

already spilling out of her mouth. I'm sorry,

5:09

sir, I didn't. Something in the man's

5:11

smile and the relaxed slump of his shoulders

5:13

made her stop talking. He stood in the doorway

5:16

of the little building, just a few feet in front

5:18

of her. She had no idea how he could

5:20

have climbed up and in there without her hearing

5:22

him. She didn't remember the man's name,

5:25

but she recognized him from the war Council.

5:27

Those writhing snake tattoos identified

5:29

him as clearly as a name tag. I'm

5:32

she trailed off. He smiled at her. There

5:34

was something about his eyes that seemed off

5:37

wrong. She couldn't place it. His

5:39

pupils were somehow different than they should have been

5:42

when he spoke, though his voice was warm and

5:44

friendly. You are Sasha

5:46

Maarian, the girl who was brave enough to

5:48

flee her home and family for the Heavenly Kingdom,

5:51

and then brave enough to leave it when she realized

5:53

what it truly was. His head

5:55

dipped down into a slight bow, I'm

5:58

Jim Shannon. It's an hon at a eat you,

6:00

Miss Marian. Jim squatted

6:02

down on his haunches and dropped his arms in between

6:05

his legs. It was a casual motion,

6:07

but he executed it with almost mechanical

6:09

precision. There was something to his movements

6:11

that spoke of terrible potential energy,

6:14

kinetic force just waiting to be unleashed.

6:17

It's nice to meet you, she said,

6:19

because what else could she say. Jim

6:22

smile didn't change, but his eyes did.

6:24

His pupils contracted and then changed shape

6:27

from a circle to a spiraling, rounded

6:29

star. No, it's not,

6:31

he said. That's not a lie to each other.

6:34

Eh, Sasha, I'm weird. I'll move

6:36

wrong. My eyes. As

6:38

he spoke, his star pupils started to spin

6:40

in a hypnotic spiral. Are wrong.

6:42

They don't look human. I can hear

6:44

your hotbeat elevate as we speak. I

6:47

can smell codazol in your brain and

6:49

elevated levels of blood glucose. I

6:51

can see in your eyes that me say

6:53

in this has made you even more nervous.

6:56

Yes, she admitted, Yes, you're

6:59

right, you are me. That's

7:01

perfectly normal, Miss Marian. It is

7:03

not an act of weakness to admit fear

7:06

quite the opposite. You feel better, now,

7:08

don't you? She actually did.

7:11

There was a queer sort of relief in admitting her

7:13

fear and discomfort in this man thing's presence.

7:16

I do feel better, she said. Why

7:19

is that admitting fear

7:21

is the first step to conquering it. You

7:23

don't strike me as someone who wants to live

7:25

in fear, miss Marian. You do strike

7:28

me as someone who seeks control, strength,

7:31

power over your own life.

7:34

I, she sputtered, I don't. I don't know.

7:36

A week ago, i'd have told you God was in control

7:38

of my life. Sasha looked down

7:40

at her lap, suddenly embarrassed. It

7:43

wasn't very long ago, but it feels like a lifetime.

7:46

It was so peaceful, just handing over

7:48

control. Jim nodded

7:50

and leaned his head forward a few inches. That

7:53

didn't end well, though, did it. Sasha

7:56

shook her head. You traveled

7:58

to the heaven the Kingdom with a certain set of

8:00

beliefs about the universe. Those

8:03

beliefs met reality. Reality

8:05

broke them into little pieces. There's

8:08

no shame in that. It happens to all

8:10

of us. Now you're a bit older and

8:12

a few bits wiser. She

8:14

looked up at him. His smile seemed somehow

8:16

softer. Now she felt like opening up,

8:19

confiding in this stranger. Sasha

8:21

wondered if that was another aspect of his modifications,

8:24

some alteration of his body chemistry and physical

8:26

appearance that allowed him to seem more familiar

8:28

and trustworthy to her. She opened

8:31

up, anyway, I just don't

8:33

know what to do now. I guess I could go home,

8:35

but I don't think I was wrong in leaving home. I don't

8:37

want a life in the American Federation. I

8:39

know that. I just you don't

8:42

know what's right, Jim finished,

8:44

in a voice that was gentler than she would have guessed

8:46

he was capable of sounding. She nodded

8:48

as she struggled for her next words.

8:51

I know I can't go back. I don't know where

8:53

to go next. I don't have any money or

8:55

really any useful skills, so I can't go

8:57

to California or Cascadia. I

9:00

doubt this place will take me, she gestured

9:02

down at the rolling city below them, And even

9:04

if they would, I don't really feel comfortable

9:06

here either. Hm.

9:08

Jim nodded and leaned back. Perhaps

9:11

he said, you should weary, less about

9:13

where you want to end up and more about

9:15

what you want to end up doing. I

9:18

don't have any options, Sasha said,

9:20

fighting down a rising panic that tickled

9:22

the back of her throat. I didn't even finish

9:24

high school. I've spent the last two years preparing

9:26

to join the Kingdom. I don't know how to do anything

9:28

useful. That's where you're wrong,

9:31

Jim said, in a firm voice. You

9:33

lied well enough to hide your intention from

9:35

your parents and am fed law enforcement.

9:37

You did that for years. Sasha

9:40

wanted to argue that she hadn't lied, not according

9:42

to Pastor Mike's definition of the word, but

9:44

she stayed silent while he spoke. You

9:47

escaped from one of the most fortified botas

9:49

in the world, Jim continued, And you

9:51

did useful work in a medical facility.

9:54

Then you helped facilitate the escape

9:56

of several prisoners from the Kingdom jail.

9:58

You functioned effective in a firefight

10:00

and killed a trained soldier in hand to hand

10:02

combat. Then you killed another man

10:05

and stole a vehicle to aid your comrades

10:07

in an escape. Am I missing anything?

10:10

Sasha looked down again. She didn't

10:12

speak. She felt bad about taking praise

10:14

for murder, especially for Darrell's murder.

10:17

She did, however, feel a tiny swell of pride

10:19

at Jim's words. It was immediately accompanied

10:22

by a flood of guilt. Killing is

10:24

not something to be proud of, she said,

10:26

Oh I disagree, Jim

10:28

chuckled. Killing is a highly technical

10:31

skill, and you've proven yourself a talented

10:33

amateur. With some training and a

10:36

spot of chrome, you could really be something.

10:38

He trailed off. Sasha was quiet

10:41

for a moment. She looked into Jim's eyes

10:43

and tried to read something in them that

10:45

proved a fool's Errand there was nothing

10:47

in those orbs but cool confidence, And

10:49

even that might be false. What did

10:51

any gesture or look mean from a man

10:54

who could control every aspect of his body

10:56

right down to his pupils. I

10:58

don't want to get better at killing, she told

11:00

him. I don't want to fill my body with unnatural

11:03

things. Just thinking about it makes

11:05

me feel ill. And yet

11:08

Jim said, what do you mean? And

11:11

yet she asked, And

11:13

yet that thought intrigues you too.

11:15

It's no use, hadn't it. I can taste

11:17

deceit. Sasha shuddered

11:20

a little at that, but she couldn't deny that he

11:22

was right, as much as the idea repulsed

11:24

her. She'd spent too much time powerless to

11:26

not crave power. I'm

11:28

not looking to push you into anything, Sasha,

11:31

but I would like to provide you with a unique

11:33

opportunity. What do you mean,

11:36

she asked. He smiled, plopped

11:38

down on his butt, and swung his legs in to sit

11:40

cross leg give on the shag carpet. Jim

11:43

stuck a finger into the thick black fibers

11:45

of the carpet and started tugging at them. It

11:47

was an idle, nervous gesture, and Sasha

11:50

found it oddly endearing. Part of her

11:52

suspected that had been his goal. I

11:54

mean that I would be willing to take you on

11:57

as a project. A project,

12:00

he nodded. My organization

12:02

has access to skilled surgeons, military

12:05

grade agmatics, and vat growing organs.

12:07

I'll front the bill and I'll train you, and

12:09

in return, you'll work for me forever,

12:13

she asked. Jim laughed. She

12:15

felt a little annoyed by that, and it must have

12:17

shown on her face because he stopped Sary

12:20

Sara. He said, it's just that

12:23

be debt, slavery, you must not know

12:25

this, but I helped kill the last country that

12:27

lived on this land in that sort of thing.

12:30

So how much time would I owe you, Sasha

12:32

asked? Five years, he said.

12:35

Sasha's heart trembled with excitement at

12:37

the offer. When she thought about the way

12:39

the adrenaline had coursed through her during

12:41

the fight in the clinic, she wanted to say

12:43

yes, But when she thought about Darrell

12:46

bleeding out next to his car, the shame

12:48

inside her overwhelmed everything else.

12:50

Sasha knew she couldn't handle more weights

12:53

like that on her conscience. I

12:55

don't want to kill people, she said

12:57

in a tiny voice. Shame dripped

12:59

from resyllable That's

13:01

fine, Jim said, his grin

13:04

widening. We always need medics.

13:06

You've shown an aptitude for that already.

13:08

I have a feeling you'll take well to combat

13:11

engineering. There's plenty for you to do

13:13

without pulling a trigger. If

13:15

I work for you, Sasha said, I have

13:17

a feeling I won't be able to avoid pulling

13:19

triggers. None entirely,

13:22

Jim shrugged. But any shooting you'd

13:24

do would be an immediate self defense,

13:27

and you'd have the right to refuse an emissions

13:30

that violate your moral code. I

13:32

know that's important to you. The

13:34

way he said that last bit set the hackles

13:37

on her neck a rise. Is

13:39

it not important to you, she asked,

13:42

morality? I mean? He

13:44

swung his hands out to the side, palms

13:46

up in a vaguely buddick pose. When

13:49

I was a young man, not much older than

13:51

yourself, I knew a lot of gallant men

13:53

who claimed to live by codes of honor.

13:55

Such things were fashionable in the warrior

13:58

culture of a Diyan empire. None

14:00

of those codes stopped the men I knew from

14:02

serving that great beast we called a state.

14:05

When you see enough good moral men

14:07

enable war crimes, you stop seeing

14:10

value in the term morality. So

14:13

what matters to you, Sasha asked,

14:15

what do you believe in change?

14:18

Miss Marian. He smiled, revealing

14:20

rows of pearly white teeth, the snake

14:22

tattoos on his chest and shoulders, writhed

14:24

in excitement, I believe in

14:27

change. I grew up in a time

14:29

when the climate changed and my home became

14:31

a deadly broiler. Politics changed,

14:34

and democracy became a dictatorship

14:36

of capital. For a time, I

14:38

believed in the promises of change handed

14:40

out by progressive politicians and scent

14:42

of old revolutionaries, but every

14:45

one of them was either co opted by the system

14:47

or killed by it. He shrugged

14:50

and cast his eyes down to the carpet for

14:52

a while. Just a moment his mask slipped,

14:55

Sasha saw a deep, yawning pit of

14:57

despair in the tight lines at the edge of his

14:59

lips, and the subtle twitch of muscles below

15:01

his left eye. It passed, and

15:03

a black velvet smile took its place.

15:07

Then I met a man who showed me the way.

15:09

Nothing new could grow on this continent

15:12

until the weeds of the old were pulled out

15:14

by the root and tossed into the compost

15:16

pile of history. So he

15:18

said, forget the old debates about

15:21

what system should replace capitalism.

15:23

Kill the state, and the seeds of a thousand

15:26

new worlds will sprout on its corpse.

15:29

You've seen two of those sprouts already,

15:32

Sasha shook her head. If you're

15:34

referring to the heavenly Kingdom,

15:36

it's a nightmare. The old US

15:38

can't have been worse than that, Jim

15:40

shrugged. Depends on your perspective.

15:43

I suppose tell miss Sasha you

15:45

left the amphid the old U, say's

15:47

most direct successor state. Why

15:50

was that? Because it's a soulless

15:52

pit, she said, the words almost leaping

15:54

from her throat. Jim smiled at

15:57

that. This isn't though,

15:59

is it, He gestured out at the city

16:01

of wheels below them. No, Sasha

16:04

said, whatever else it was, rolling

16:06

fuck was not soulless. Neither

16:09

is the Navajo nation, Jim said, or

16:12

Cascadia the black Stone Nation.

16:14

Even the Mormons are up to some interesting things

16:16

these days, one faction at least.

16:19

So which do you believe in? Who do you fight

16:21

for? He grinned again, Night

16:24

the child, As I told you, I

16:26

fight for change, to cast down

16:28

the ossified bones of the old world

16:30

and make space for the new. I

16:32

owe allegiance to no national god

16:35

save perhaps Lady Airis,

16:38

who he smiled. A bit

16:40

of smugness leached into the expression. She

16:42

could see it clear as day right around his

16:45

eyes. It should have repelled her more

16:47

than it did. Airis was

16:49

the Greek goddess of discord, back

16:51

when people cared about what the Greeks

16:53

believed. She set the spark

16:55

that lit the Trojan wall. I know it's

16:57

a bit silly reaching back to that old mythology,

17:00

but I can't help myself. There's

17:02

something about those old gods that calls

17:04

to me. I can identify with

17:07

them. He leaned in. There was

17:09

an eagerness to his posture, his tone,

17:11

his eyes. The snakes jerked and

17:13

spun on his muscled chest and arms.

17:16

I'm offering you a chance to join us

17:19

on Olympus. Dear Sasha, you've

17:21

spent your time in worship. It's

17:23

time to embrace your own godhead,

17:25

leave your antique books behind,

17:28

and rewrite the world with your will. I

17:31

don't know if that's what I want, Sasha

17:34

said in a still small voice. She

17:36

tried to ignore how much part of her ached

17:39

for what he promised. The thought of killing

17:41

again nauseated her as much as it excited

17:43

her. But the thought of having power, the

17:45

kind of power she'd seen Roland exercise,

17:49

that was intoxicating. She

17:51

hated how badly she'd started to want

17:53

it. Well, you don't

17:55

have to decide now, Jim shrugged

17:58

his shoulders and gave an amiable smile. Aisle.

18:00

The floor rumbled underneath them. There

18:02

was a loud clattering wine as the whole

18:05

structure of Rolling Fuck came to a slow

18:07

stop. Jim waited for the scrunching

18:09

noise to cease, and said, come and watch

18:12

what we do today, then

18:14

make you call Rowland.

18:19

Dawn broke just as Rolling Fuck pulled

18:22

to a long, slow stop by the shore

18:24

of Lake Wago. The city had taken

18:26

the long way around the reservoir, which had

18:28

added at least an hour to their journey, but also

18:30

put a sizeable water barrier between Rolling

18:33

Fuck and the advancing forces of the Heavenly

18:35

Kingdom. It had been a tight fit

18:37

at several points, and Rowland had enjoyed

18:39

watching the wheeled city crunch over several

18:42

abandoned homes in many a street lamp.

18:44

But eventually the pilots and navigators had

18:46

found a suitably large public park and

18:48

brought Rolling Fuck to rest there. It's

18:51

a nice sunrise, Manny said. The

18:53

kids stood next to Rowland on a wooden

18:55

deck built onto the side of the main roller

18:57

Skofucker. Mike had assured them this spot

19:00

provided the best advantage point to watch

19:02

the rising sun. It looked like he'd

19:04

been right in that the sky around them

19:06

was a heavy blend of red and orange that brought

19:08

up fragmented memories of my ties and

19:10

fireballs and Roland's head clouds

19:12

clustered at the top of the horizon, ripe

19:15

to bursting with the color and light of the new days

19:17

sun. Roland nodded. Yeah,

19:21

the shame no one who lives here gets to see it.

19:23

Manny said, I've never seen the city this empty.

19:26

Roland looked over at his young friend. The

19:29

boy had seen a lot for his age, and Roland

19:31

could see how much it pained him. Sorrow

19:33

had as sent all its own. The plunging

19:35

levels of nora, panephren and serotonin brought

19:38

out the sharp stink of cortosol in the greasy

19:40

odor of opioids. Lurking

19:42

just below those smells was the odd, spicy

19:45

tinge of the I L eighteen protein.

19:47

Roland could almost hear it weaken the valves

19:49

of Manny's heart. I imagine

19:52

this sucks extra much for you. I mean,

19:54

he's been where they are right twice,

19:57

Manny said. Roland nodded and

20:00

an't exactly recall, he admitted, but

20:02

I expect I had something to do with the first time.

20:05

Manny looked over to Rowland. Chemically,

20:07

it was clear the kid was battling him a lunge

20:09

of sadness, trauma, and anxiety.

20:12

His actual thoughts, though, were just as hidden

20:14

from Rowland as they would be from any stock human,

20:17

perhaps more so. There were moments

20:19

when Roland feared he was losing the ability

20:21

to read human emotions or even display

20:24

them properly on his face. Was

20:26

that look you're given me? He asked? Finally,

20:30

what do you mean? I can't tell

20:32

what a look on your face means, Rowland explained,

20:34

And I'm curious. Are you angry at me? Manny

20:38

shrugged, and then he sighed. His

20:40

shoulders slumped, his head drooped forward

20:42

and down just a bit. No,

20:45

he said, I'm not angry. What

20:48

would I even be angry about? If you can't remember

20:50

what you did back? Then are you even

20:52

the same person who did those things? And

20:54

even if you are, maybe you were doing the right

20:57

thing. I assume someone was at

20:59

some point that fucking mess of a war. Maybe

21:01

everyone was, Roland offered. I

21:04

know the heavenly Kingdom think what they're doing is right.

21:06

Manny said, I also don't give a shitting

21:08

dick what they think. They're murderers. They

21:10

can all sit and spin. You're

21:13

confident in me murdering the lot of them is the right

21:15

thing to do, then I'm confident. It's

21:17

better than letting them win, Manny said.

21:20

Roland nodded quietly and stared out at

21:22

the rising sun. The red had

21:24

faded and the orange had grown brighter. He

21:26

could see the shape of the sun behind the clouds

21:29

missed rose off the field in front of them, and

21:31

across the lake. A low light fog

21:33

rolled in over what appeared to be an old golf

21:35

course. You're probably

21:37

right about that, Roland said, But

21:40

where does it end. It ends

21:42

when they're beaten and Austin is safe.

21:45

Manny's words were forceful, but he looked

21:47

down and away from Roland when he spoke. You

21:50

know that's not true, Roland said. I

21:52

forget my own name a lot of the time, and I still

21:54

know you're full of it killing these fox buys

21:57

Austin time, and probably not a lot

21:59

of it. Are still millions of guns

22:01

and millions of piste off desperate people

22:03

in this ragged chunk of country.

22:05

So what are you saying, Roland? It'd be better

22:08

to just let the one place around here that isn't terrible

22:10

get eaten by darkness. No,

22:13

Roland said, but read the writing on

22:15

the damn wall this place. He

22:17

waved a hand out in a gesture that encompassed

22:19

the whole horizon is fucked.

22:22

Don't stay here and die with it. Manny

22:25

crossed his arms in front of himself and leaned

22:27

forward onto the railing of the deck. His

22:29

head slumped into his hands, and he was quiet

22:31

for a while. Roland knew the army

22:33

of the Heavenly Kingdom was less than forty miles

22:35

distant. The scent of that vast ramshackle

22:38

horde had grown more prominent over the last

22:40

few minutes. His nose took in the stink

22:43

of diesel, the ozone odor of discharging

22:45

batteries, and the cumulative reek of hundreds

22:47

of vehicles worth of engine oil. Behind

22:49

those prominent smells lurked the foul

22:52

Ganger in a stench of ten thousand men, sweating

22:54

fear and stress out of every pore. Roland

22:57

looked down over the deck and onto the yellow

23:00

mass that led up to the shores of the lake. The

23:02

warriors of Rolling Fock had started to assemble

23:04

themselves. There, a large group

23:06

of men and women had started to unpack dozens

23:09

of quadrfracts. The four legged

23:11

robots had been built by Boston Dynamics

23:13

back before the fall of the old us they'd

23:16

been meant to ferry men and equipment up steep

23:18

Afghan mountain sides. Roland

23:21

stared at them, and he stalked through the

23:23

lab, a razor sharp machete in one

23:25

hand and a machine pistol in the other. The

23:27

air reeked of blood ahead of him.

23:29

He could smell the fierce weat wafting off two

23:31

engineers as they hid beneath an overturned

23:33

metal table. Pieces of robotic

23:36

equipment were scattered on the floor. Roland

23:38

reached out his senses and felt that these

23:40

were the last two people alive in the facility.

23:43

He stepped forward, swinging his blade

23:45

in an arc that he knew would end in flesh.

23:48

Roland shook his head and pulled himself out of

23:50

the past. The flashes of memory

23:52

were growing more frequent. Guilt came

23:54

with them. It took some effort to force

23:57

his mind to focus again on the world around

23:59

them. Boland looked back out at the

24:01

mustering yard. Warriors

24:03

dawned armor, a fantastic array of

24:05

old fashioned, polished steel plate mail,

24:08

ultra modern powered body armor, antique

24:10

flak vests, and a significant number of costumes.

24:13

He watched a man in armor that mixed the

24:15

aesthetic of a Polish winged hussar with

24:18

an Imperial stormtrooper. Help a woman

24:20

in a crop top Neil green GIEI suit

24:22

as she locked a pair of rocket launchers onto

24:24

the flanks of one of the four legged robots.

24:27

Over to his left, another group of warriors had

24:29

started to assemble the city's vehicle pool.

24:32

Ramps had descended from garages in the bellies

24:34

of the rollers. A slow, steady stream

24:36

of armored vehicles motored their way down the

24:38

ramps and into the ragged lines on the field.

24:41

The bulk of rolling Fox vehicles were either

24:43

modified APCs or armored motorcycles

24:45

sporting portable field guns or automatic

24:48

grenade launchers on side cars. There

24:50

were tactical arguments for the use of such

24:52

vehicles in open field combat, of course,

24:54

but Roland suspected they'd mainly been picked

24:57

because they were fun to drive. Almost

24:59

every vehic Cole's engine had been souped up well

25:01

beyond any potential battlefield benefit.

25:03

Most of them also had nitrous oxide tanks,

25:06

although Roland suspected those

25:08

were more for huffing than they were for speed.

25:11

Where did they get all this stuff? Manny

25:13

asked Rowland. I had no

25:15

idea, Roland said, But when the old

25:17

government fell, it left behind a lot of equipment,

25:19

basses and basses full of mothballed ordinance.

25:22

I guess as these guys got in early before the

25:24

rush and grabbed what they could. At

25:27

that moment, Rowland caught sasha scent

25:29

moving down one of the spindles above the main

25:31

roller. His hind brain guessed she was

25:33

headed to the deck he and Manny occupied.

25:36

Roland couldn't smell Jim, who was good at

25:38

staying hidden, but he knew that Sasha couldn't

25:40

have known where they were on her own. That

25:42

meant Jim had likely sniffed Manny out

25:45

and made the same assumption about Rowland's location

25:47

that Rowland had made about Jim's.

25:50

It wasn't long before the sliding metal door

25:52

slid open and Jim and Sasha walked out

25:54

onto the deck. Jim was in his familiar

25:57

battle gear, his blood red chaps

25:59

almost own in the blinding light of

26:01

the morning sun. He had a smug,

26:03

self satisfied grin, and gigantic

26:05

pupils that spoke of recent drug use.

26:07

Beside him, Sasha looked disheveled and exhausted,

26:10

but jittery. He could smell the coffee

26:12

wafting from her pores. Hey, fuck

26:14

nuts, Roland said, Hey, Sasha.

26:17

She looked confused for a moment. Jim

26:19

just nodded and said, hey, shit

26:21

bird, Hey Manny. Manny waved

26:24

vaguely at them, without turning his head to meet

26:26

them. He continued to look out at the army assembling

26:28

in the field. It's a pretty cool showdown

26:31

there, Roland said. I kind of wish I had

26:33

some dissociatives and maybe a blunt. Now

26:35

would be the time for one. Ah

26:38

she, Jim said, Just so

26:40

happens, I got both. He stepped

26:42

up alongside Roland, extended his fue

26:45

arm and then tapped his left index finger to

26:47

the back of his right hand. The tip

26:49

of that finger detached and rolled up onto

26:51

his knuckle. A lion of white powder poured

26:53

out onto the back of Jim's other hand. He

26:55

offered it to Roland. Sure, Roland

26:58

said, and railed the line. Ketamine

27:01

wasn't Roland's favoritest of drugs. He

27:03

preferred m x E if he was going to snort a

27:05

dissociative ant. In all honesty, a big

27:07

bottle of d x M heavy cough syrup

27:09

mixed with vodka was even more his speed,

27:11

but hey, drugs was drugs. Once

27:14

Roland had finished, Jim poured out another line

27:16

and offered it to Manny. No thanks,

27:19

said the fixer. It's pretty

27:21

good stuff, Roland said, in a helpful tone.

27:23

Ketamine goes well with unspeakable violence.

27:26

Might be fun to watch the battle that decides the future

27:28

of your people from inside a cahole. Mannie

27:31

looked defended. Roland shrugged.

27:33

He glanced at Jim, who gave him an I don't

27:36

know why you're looking at me. Look I'll

27:38

try some, Sasha said, I mean,

27:41

fucke it? Why not? It

27:43

was a little cute how she stumbled over the fuck

27:45

Roland found it in deering. It seemed Manny

27:48

did too. The cocktail of dopamine,

27:50

testosterone at oxytocin that wafted

27:52

off and made his feelings as clear as day. Hell

27:55

yea girl, Jim said, with an exaggerated

27:58

Southern twang. Get all over and

28:00

rail this that means

28:02

snorted, Roland said helpfully. Sasha

28:05

approached Jim's arm. She looked him

28:07

in the eye, then looked over to Roland, and last

28:10

to Manny. Then she stared down at

28:12

the powder as if she was hoping it would say something

28:14

to her. It didn't, but she leaned

28:16

in any way and snorted about half of it before

28:18

she sneezed and then wretched, and then staggered

28:21

to the side of the deck and vomited over the side.

28:24

Jim and Roland laughed in sheer joy.

28:26

Manny, being a good person, moved

28:28

to hold her hair back and help her deal with the puky

28:31

aftershocks. While the humans engaged

28:33

with their frailties. Roland and Jim did a couple

28:35

more lines each. That was

28:37

terrible, Sasha said. A few minutes

28:40

later, here Jim chuckled

28:42

It takes some getting used to, and

28:44

then the door slid open again. Skullfucker.

28:47

Mike walked out onto the deck. Boy

28:50

ass hats, He called out, We're

28:52

about to war up. You should get down to the field

28:54

as app if you want to see the face taking what

28:58

Manny asked. Excuse me, Sasha

29:00

said, at the same time, Mike just laughed

29:02

and clapped them both on the shoulders. I'll

29:04

explain down in the field. Get a move on.

29:07

He nodded to Sasha and added, there's

29:09

a pukewash station just inside into the

29:11

right, next to the bathroom. Right,

29:14

Jim rubbed his hands together in excitement. Why

29:16

don't you kids go roll with skull fucker

29:18

Mike. I've got to get Roland up to my mechanics

29:21

so we can suit him up. Roland

29:24

didn't like the eagerness in Jim's eyes or

29:26

the excitement in his voice when he said that

29:28

there was something indecent about it. But

29:30

a promise was a promise, so Roland

29:33

nodded and gave Manny a little squeeze on

29:35

the shoulder. I'll see you soon,

29:37

buddy, This won't take long, Manny.

29:42

Skull fucker Mike, Manny asked as

29:44

the chromed man led them through the gantries and

29:46

towards the elevator. What exactly

29:49

is so special about Roland? I mean, he's a

29:51

nice guy, but what makes him so much scarier

29:53

than the other chromed folks like you and Topaz?

29:56

What do you know about Roland's past? Mike

29:59

asked? In return, very little

30:01

Manny admitted he doesn't seem to remember

30:03

much. I've sussed out that he was in the army back

30:05

before the revolution. He's talked about

30:07

fighting in Turkey, but also in Dallas

30:09

and Denver and a bunch of other American cities.

30:12

Mike nodded, Yeah, we met

30:15

in Dallas, back before it was Ciode de

30:17

Muerta. I had just been dishonorably

30:19

discharged from the Marine Corps for He

30:22

frowned, shook his head, and continued,

30:25

it doesn't matter what. For I was broke

30:27

and I had a body fellow Uncle Sam's chrome.

30:29

He wanted it back. I wound up

30:31

taken shelter in the White Rock Commune.

30:34

Roland was there too. He was pretty political

30:36

back in those days, always quote and baccoon

30:38

in and Ochalon and Red John. Did

30:41

you guys actually know Red John? Sasha

30:43

asked. Up until that point, she'd walked

30:45

quietly in the rear of their little group. The

30:48

few times Manny had glanced back, she'd

30:50

had her head down, stuck in her own little world.

30:52

But now she was alert and engaged. Manny

30:55

guessed it was hearing the name of the famous revolutionary

30:58

that had done it. That's odd, he thought.

31:01

I never met the guy, Mike said, But Rowland

31:04

did. He was in real deep with that whole

31:06

circle. So was that weird fucker, Jim.

31:08

I was tight with Rowland, but I've never gotten to the

31:10

political side of things. I liked

31:12

smashing stuff and they needed stuff smashers.

31:16

How does this relate to why Rowland's

31:18

Rowland? Manny asked, Well,

31:21

I've known old Rowland for a while. Magueni

31:23

was still fully himself. He was always

31:25

cagy about his background. But we had

31:27

our theories, and mine was

31:29

that he'd been part of Project Orange.

31:32

What was that, Sasha asked, Holy

31:35

fuck. Manny said he'd

31:37

heard of Project Orange, although he wasn't

31:39

surprised Sasha hadn't. The am

31:41

FED was the closest descendant of the old United

31:44

States. They'd have kept most of the bad

31:46

stuff out of their history books. Well,

31:49

you know, Mike said. Through the twenties,

31:51

the military struggled with declining enlistment

31:53

numbers. All the little resource wars

31:55

climate change sparked created a need for

31:57

a capable, nimble force that could project or

32:00

without requiring a public commitment of force.

32:03

So back in the late thirties, the U. S. Military

32:05

started fucking hard with gene editing

32:07

tools and bio mods. At first,

32:09

it was just basic upgrades to select combat

32:12

units, early versions of the healing suites

32:14

y'all both have now. Then they moved on

32:16

to carbon fiber laced bones, bullet

32:18

resistant skin, nanohaling suites.

32:21

The end result was Project Orange,

32:23

the best warriors in the whole military loaded

32:25

down with experimental self adapting,

32:27

neural and physiological upgrades. Yeah,

32:31

man he added, it was a real success, right till

32:33

they wiped out a whole city. Skufucker.

32:35

Mike nodded and looked back to Sasha. He's

32:38

talking about the Battle of Inserlik. I've

32:41

heard of that. Sasha said, a US air strike

32:43

had a giant munition's cache. Like ten

32:45

thousand people died. Schofucker.

32:48

Mike gave a noncommittal grunt. There

32:50

was one version of the story, he said.

32:53

The story I heard, the story everyone

32:55

told back then, is that it was Project

32:57

Orange. They blew up a city.

33:00

Sasha asked, they didn't

33:02

blow it up. Manny said, they just

33:05

butchered everyone, mostly in hand to

33:07

hand combat. The DARPA

33:09

guys miscalculated. Mike nodded

33:11

to Manny. They'd entirely revamped

33:13

the endocrine systems of these soldiers and

33:15

made them immune to exhaustion and gave them

33:17

perfect situational awareness.

33:19

But it also made bloodshed. He trailed

33:22

off and frowned while he searched for his next

33:24

word addictive. So

33:27

what happened to Project Orange, Sasha

33:30

asked, Well, said Mike,

33:32

the scientists did with scientists do. They

33:34

refined things, They revised their hypotheses

33:36

and tweaked their creations until the Joint Chiefs

33:39

had another job for the Orange Team.

33:41

They must have done well for a while, and Sir

33:43

Luke was thirty nine and no one heard shipped

33:45

from them until forty one, when they hit that protest

33:48

in Denver, six hundred

33:50

dead, Manny said, reciting the facts

33:52

he'd memorized a half dozen times during his

33:54

elementary education, including

33:56

a sitting senator. They

33:58

reached the lift doors, which slid open

34:00

once they got close. Sasha and Manny

34:02

stepped in first, and Mike came after them. He

34:05

fiddled with the control screen on the wall for a moment.

34:07

I'm just making sure this thing is set to normal

34:09

human speeds. We don't want any more puke

34:12

from yall today, Mike winked at Sasha.

34:14

As the lift doors closed, there was a

34:16

soft clump sound and Manny felt the

34:18

lift descend. So yeah, schoofucker,

34:21

Mike continued. The President deployed the

34:23

Orange Team against a fortified camp that had

34:25

blocked off access to most of downtown

34:27

Denver. They cleared out the camp sure enough.

34:30

After the bloodbath, some hackers with a Jesture

34:32

collective took close to a terabyte out of the

34:34

Pentagon servers. It contained

34:36

a few files on Project Orange and a partly

34:38

redacted report on the INSURLC massacre.

34:41

And then Sasha asked, Mike

34:44

shrugged. Then they disappeared.

34:46

They weren't used during the revolution, and they'd

34:48

have been pretty damn handy for the old US. At a

34:50

couple of points midway through the war,

34:52

we recovered some intel that they'd been wiped

34:54

out some terrible accident in orbit.

34:57

Only only Roland

34:59

Manny said softly, yep,

35:01

Schoofucker. Mike nodded, that was certainly

35:04

my suspicion, still is, but the fuckers

35:06

never confirmed it or denied it, not

35:08

that he remembers now anyway. The

35:11

lift reached the ground with a gentle bump.

35:13

Its doors slid open to reveal an army

35:16

six hundred people in three large clumps

35:18

out by the shore of Lake Waco. To

35:20

the left was the city's vehicle pool. In

35:22

the center, where the infantry be decked in a ridiculous

35:25

melange of medieval weaponry, small arms

35:27

and handheld field artillery. And

35:29

then to the right where the quadrifracts.

35:31

The sight of them took Manny's breath away. There

35:34

were well over a hundred of the strange horse

35:36

like robots. Most of them were still

35:38

being fussed over by the riders, having bolts

35:41

tightened, weapons belted on to their chassis,

35:43

or, in a few cases old timey

35:45

leather saddle strapped onto their backs. Manny

35:48

saw one saddle with what looked like a large

35:50

purple dildo attached to it. The

35:53

quadrifract riders were the most uniform

35:55

group of warriors on the field. While

35:57

rolling Fox infantry wore everything from romanly

36:00

genery armor to bikinis made of bullets,

36:02

the cavalry ward nothing. Even

36:04

from here he could see that every nipple in the

36:06

group was as hard as diamond. They

36:08

were all covered in the same sort of led

36:10

tattoos that Jim wore, but where

36:13

his took the form of ever writing snakes,

36:15

theirs appeared in blotches of gray black

36:17

static all up and down their bodies.

36:20

What are they? Sasha asked, voicing

36:23

Manny's thoughts too. The

36:25

elite skullfucker Mike said.

36:27

The best of the city's warriors real tough

36:30

motherfucker's mostly former soldiers

36:32

who augmented their government issue upgrades

36:34

way back in the day. Some of them

36:36

have five or ten thousand hours of combat experience

36:38

stored in their bodies. Why

36:40

aren't you out there, Manny asked. H

36:43

He grunted. Quadrafracts make my

36:45

ass look big. Besides, Topez

36:47

is a sniper. She keeps to the rear

36:49

and I keep to her. It's not as fun as

36:51

fucking ship up at the front eFront. His

36:54

lips curled up into a wistful smile. But

36:56

we all got to grow up sometime well.

36:59

Sasha and Manny gawkeed the main rollers.

37:01

Other lift descended. The doors opened

37:03

just twenty feet to their right. Nani

37:05

Yazzi was the first one out. She moved

37:07

slowly. Some of that was surely due

37:10

to her advanced age, but there was also a

37:12

note of ritual to her movements. It

37:14

was something in the arc of her spine, the

37:16

cadence of her step, the way she held

37:18

her head. The enormous gold bladed

37:21

knife in her hand didn't hurt either. Behind

37:24

her walked the citizens of Rolling Fuck.

37:26

There were around fifty of them in the lift, but

37:29

as that group walked forward, ropes and

37:31

ladders began to roll out from all around

37:33

the enormous wheeled city. Within

37:35

a matter of minutes, hundreds and hundreds of people

37:37

had descended. More continued to disgorge

37:40

from the lifts under the main roller. In the rear roller,

37:43

the riders had all formed into ordered ranks.

37:45

They stood at something very much like a military

37:48

attention. It was the only time he'd

37:50

seen post humans do anything in an orderly

37:52

fashion. Nani Yazzi stood

37:55

in front of the cavalry, and the human civilians

37:57

clustered behind her in a big semicircle.

37:59

The other warriors gathered behind them.

38:01

Mike maneuver their little group to a hill that overlooked

38:04

the whole scene. It took almost twenty

38:06

minutes for the entire city to gather. What

38:09

are they doing, skulp fucker, Mike, Sasha

38:11

asked, only stumbling a bit over the curse

38:14

word in his name. This

38:16

is what I wanted you to see, he replied. She's

38:18

about to take their faces. Roland,

38:23

the process of getting ready for war made

38:26

the bile rise up in his gut. That

38:28

was curious. Roland's stomach didn't

38:30

still produce bile, not the same kind of

38:32

vile it had when he was human. It had been

38:35

years since his nervous system had been natural

38:37

enough to respond to anxiety with any kind

38:39

of physical symptom, and yet

38:41

there it was. The bile, or the hallucination

38:44

of bile, curdled at the bottom of his stomach

38:46

while Jim's men strapped him into the murder

38:48

suit. The armor they'd constructed

38:51

was altogether different from the powered armor he'd

38:53

faced a few days ago in Dallas. It

38:55

was also different from what little he remembered

38:57

of the armor he'd warned as an American soldier.

39:00

That made sense, of course. Roland's

39:02

wet waar got better with time and experience.

39:05

Gear did not age so well. He

39:07

watched while Sardar bolted a gauntlet

39:09

into place over his left forearm. In hand,

39:12

he could tell it was made of boron nitride

39:14

carbon tubes, but the weapon's blister carried

39:16

a sextette of tiny rockets that were

39:19

not familiar to him. Sar,

39:21

what are these things? A smile

39:23

split the little man's dark, handsome features

39:27

scatter rocklets, he said with relish.

39:29

Each of them contains twelve guided

39:31

solid fuel warheads the left

39:33

hand or all anti personnel built to blow up

39:36

big the right hand rockets. He tapped

39:38

the second gauntlet, which sat on the work table

39:40

next to him. Those pack a tiny bronze

39:42

dart. One will penetrate a Leopard Mark

39:44

five's front armor, no problem.

39:47

Roland's sighed and looked around at the Workshop

39:49

of Death that Jim had flown out here. From

39:52

the outside, it had looked a bit like a shipping container,

39:54

but painted a glossy white. Its

39:57

edges were rounded and smooth, and the whole

39:59

thing looked sl enough that it could have been an apple

40:01

product. Inside the box

40:03

was wall to wall weaponry in armor Jim's

40:06

personal stash. Roland couldn't

40:08

actually name any of the weapons inside.

40:11

Most were similar enough to older weapons

40:13

systems that he could make an educated guess

40:15

as to their capabilities, but there were

40:17

strange new things on the walls that he'd

40:19

never seen before. Jim

40:22

sat in a comfy chair at the rear of the workshop

40:24

and watched start our work while he sipped

40:26

scotch out of an enormous ram's horn. So

40:29

this so's it's like your man cave

40:31

or what Roland asked him Jim

40:34

took a deep gulp and then smiled. I

40:36

find it relaxes me, he said.

40:39

I spent a lot of time carried in this collection

40:42

over the years. I spent a lot of time working

40:44

on that suit, too, so don't fuck

40:46

it up. Something tingled

40:48

at the back of Roland's mind. The suit

40:50

had clearly been built to his specifications.

40:53

That suggested Jim had been planning this for

40:55

a while, but Rowland had been retired

40:57

at Cammeltoe until very recently. So

41:00

how hey, man, I need your port, Sardar

41:02

said. The squat mechanic held up a pair

41:05

of fiber optic cables that terminated in peculiar

41:07

boxy plugs. Not unlike old ethernet

41:10

cable, they were connected to a metal

41:12

breastplate on the table. Roland

41:14

pointed to a pair of lumpy, white scars

41:16

on his lower back. The input

41:18

sockets are in there. They've scarred up. You'll

41:20

have to cut em back open, but it should fit. But

41:23

it should still fit. The nice thing about DARPA

41:25

engineering is that a little bit of blood and skin never

41:27

gets in the way. Sardar

41:29

set to work carving the sockets back open.

41:32

Roland felt the pain as a distant sort of

41:34

itch. He was having a hard time focusing

41:36

his senses on his immediate surroundings.

41:39

The smells of the advancing army presented

41:41

an almost overpowering flood of data.

41:44

Roland had loaded up on ketamine and vodka

41:46

to quiet his hind brain, but all that interfered

41:49

with his introspection. He built

41:51

this thing for me to wear. Jim, how long have you

41:53

been planning this? He is, Jim

41:56

said, his fourth rightness, surprised Roland.

41:59

You'll pass as hum is a mistake, Jim

42:01

continued, brought on by your overactive

42:04

conscience. They are still so much

42:06

you need to do in the world. I

42:08

figured at some point you'd realize that yourself,

42:11

so I kept my men working. Sardar

42:14

lifted the heavy metal breastplate up over

42:16

Roland's head and settled it over his shoulders.

42:19

The weight was comforting. A cold

42:21

electric shock ran through his body as the

42:23

armor connected to a central nervous system.

42:26

Roland felt parts of himself wake up

42:28

that he hadn't truly realized were asleep.

42:31

Something in him had missed that feeling, and

42:33

he felt guilty for that. I'm

42:35

taking this thing off the instant. The fight's over,

42:37

Jim, you wasted your money. Jim

42:40

smile only deepened. You've forgotten

42:42

how fun it is, Rowland, and

42:45

you've forgotten what it's like to be a fucking human.

42:47

Roland countered, have you always been a sociopath?

42:50

Is this what I was like back before whatever took

42:52

my memories? Jim's amused,

42:55

smiled and shift by so much as a nanometer.

42:58

Roland felt a spike of irritation before

43:00

he was distracted by Sardar. Raise

43:02

your hand, please, the mechanic said. He

43:04

lifted a four barreled machine gun on a circular

43:07

frame and slid it around Roland's right arm.

43:10

Sardar bolted the weapon into place while

43:12

he explained it's a stack charged

43:14

machine gun magnetically fired, similar

43:16

to the old metal storm weapons. But this fucker's

43:19

capable of putting out twenty thousand rounds per

43:21

second. How long an a fire?

43:23

Sardar laughed a little less than a second.

43:27

The mechanic turned back to his table, and Roland

43:29

tried to direct his wandering mind back

43:31

to the conversation with Jim.

43:33

You're going to love it, his old

43:36

friend said, I know you've been lovin'

43:38

it when you've fought your way out of that citia

43:40

could smell the dopamine waftin off

43:42

your brain from all the way out here. Sardar

43:45

snapped a queasts around Roland's thigh. The

43:47

armor also sported a bulky weapon's blister

43:50

on its outside edge gas grenade

43:52

launcher. The mechanic explained, should

43:54

co great with all the frag rocklets. Uh

43:57

so we're committing war crimes now, Roland

43:59

asked him, with more indignation than he

44:01

really felt. Jim rolled his eyes.

44:04

Is just he a gas? He said, mostly

44:06

at least I may have included some

44:08

aresolazed l s D in there. I've

44:11

been on a big psychochemical warfare

44:13

kicked lately For a little

44:15

while Sardar worked in silence, Jim

44:17

drank and Roland stared near him, but

44:20

not at him. The self inflicted

44:22

haze in his head had cleared a bit. That meant

44:24

his hind brain grew louder. By

44:26

now it was all but shouting about the approaching

44:28

army. Roland felt a trickle of adrenaline,

44:31

oxytocin, and endorphins. His left

44:33

hand twitched involuntarily. He

44:35

felt the power of the weapons system around

44:37

him, and he felt the power in his own body,

44:40

something like a rousal gripped him. Roland

44:43

fought it down as best he could, but

44:45

it lingered there at the edge of his consciousness.

44:48

I've been remembering more, he said

44:50

to Jim, as much to distract himself as

44:53

out of a desire to get it off his chest. M

44:56

Jim cocked an eyebrow in interest. I've

44:59

had a few big sshes of memories. Once, when

45:01

we drove into Dallas, past the side of the Lakewood

45:03

Blast, I remembered. He

45:05

locked eyes with Jim, and Jim nodded

45:07

back his eyes said, I know

45:10

so, Roland moved on. The

45:12

memories come most intensely when I'm in

45:15

combat. I remembered hiking with

45:17

Topaz. I remembered burning the Taz

45:19

in Denver. I got flashes of you and

45:21

me in Mexico, and a lot more.

45:24

I'm still certain through it. It's confusing

45:26

because there's no timeline for any of this, just

45:29

associated memories I know happened. At

45:31

some point, Jim leaned forward,

45:33

his eyes flashed with excitement interest,

45:37

and he said, tell me, have

45:39

you been able to draw any conclusions about

45:41

who you were from what you've remembered? Have

45:44

you gotten any insight into the old

45:46

Roland. Roland frowned.

45:48

He'd been so focused on trying to remember his

45:50

old life that he hadn't given much thought to what the

45:53

memories he had said about the man he'd been.

45:55

As he pondered, Roland's mind lingered

45:57

on the memory of shooting the Cheney Boy in the

46:00

act of the head. I think

46:02

I used to be a lot more like you, Roland

46:04

said. Jim grinned, his

46:06

lips curled up to reveal long rows

46:09

of white, straight teeth. That's

46:11

true, he said, Why else do

46:13

you think I've missed you so much? Sasha?

46:28

A part of Sasha had believed that after

46:31

the Heavenly Kingdom, nothing she saw whatever

46:33

shock her again. That part of

46:35

her was proven wrong when Nana Yazzi's

46:37

aged, darthritic hand began to messily

46:40

carve at the first warrior's face. Her

46:42

target was the young woman with the chrome hawk

46:44

Sasha had seen in the War Council. The

46:47

carving was a messy thing. It took

46:49

the better part of a minute for her to slice

46:51

and peel the skin free. Sasha

46:53

noticed that there was very little blood. It

46:56

was messy, but not as messy as it should

46:58

have been. Once she was finished, Nana

47:00

Yazzi stepped back with the woman's face in

47:02

her hand. As she did, dozens

47:05

of citizens stepped forward. They pulled

47:07

out daggers, swords, straight razors,

47:09

and switchblades of their own. Each civilian

47:12

paired off with a warrior and began to carve.

47:14

Some of them were quick and practiced. The

47:16

motion of their hands reminded Sasha of

47:18

an autopsy video she'd watched in one of

47:20

her pre met classes, but the other

47:23

citizens were cruder with their cutting. A

47:25

few verged on brutal hacking

47:27

and slashing at the faces and necks of their persons.

47:30

None of the post human warriors showed any

47:33

signs of pain or discomfort. They

47:35

just stood, unmoving and without

47:37

their faces, seemingly without emotion.

47:40

I don't understand, Sasha said.

47:43

She hadn't expected to say it out loud.

47:45

The words just slipped out. It's

47:48

a symbolic thing, Scoffucker Mike

47:50

explained. Before they leave, the

47:52

city's warriors give up their identities to

47:54

the group. They leave their humanity behind

47:57

and bloodied tatters in the hands of their friends

47:59

and loved ones. It's a way of making

48:01

sure the city civilians don't leave a

48:03

war without blood on their hands, and

48:05

it makes them look fucking terrifying, someone

48:08

said from behind them. Sasha turned

48:10

around. A short, fit man approached

48:12

them. He had a thin build, but his body

48:14

was girded with lithe muscle. There was

48:16

something familiar about his face, the short

48:19

mop of curly black hair atop his head.

48:21

The man smiled when Sasha saw him,

48:23

revealing pointed metallic fangs. Hey

48:26

wait a second, low, Topez,

48:29

Skolfucker, Mike said. Manny

48:31

looked shocked as well. He stared at the man

48:33

in surprise. Topez, what

48:36

happened? There was a woman with

48:38

those exact same teeth yesterday when we arrived

48:40

at the city. Sasha hadn't gotten a woman's

48:42

name, but she'd borne a striking resemblance

48:45

to this man. I felt like a man to

48:47

day, Topez said, what with the war and all?

48:50

Sasha finally realized what had happened.

48:52

Of course, she thought these people can

48:54

change their physiology on a dime, Ah,

48:57

Manny said with a nod. Skolfucker.

49:00

Mike walked up to Topaz and the two embraced

49:02

and then kissed. They twined their arms

49:04

together, and a few seconds later, Topaz

49:07

seemed to finally notice Sasha's presence.

49:09

Sorry, he smiled as he spoke, But

49:11

I don't believe I got your name, Sasha.

49:15

Sasha Mariian. Topaz stepped

49:17

closer. Well, Sasha Mariian,

49:19

He said, in a low voice, how are you liking?

49:22

Are strange ways and customs? They're

49:25

interesting? Sasha said diplomatically.

49:28

Do you find this place more to your liking

49:30

than the heavenly Kingdom? Topaz stepped

49:33

closer. Sasha took a step back and

49:35

then another. The man's expression was

49:37

friendly enough, but there was a sort of queer menace

49:39

in the set of his shoulders. It may have had

49:41

something to do with the very large rifle

49:43

slung across his back. Sasha

49:46

started to sweat. Fear gripped

49:48

her mind. Topaz back

49:50

off, schoolfucker. Mike's voice was devoid

49:52

of anger, but firm. You're scaring

49:55

her. Topaz stopped

49:57

and stared at Mike. His expression

49:59

went from plo said smile to rage, and then

50:01

back to a smile, almost faster than Sasha

50:03

could process. Sorry, darling,

50:06

he said, in an artificially chipper voice.

50:08

I just wanted to make sure our guest was enjoying

50:10

her stay here. He looked to Sasha,

50:12

again. You are, aren't you? Yes,

50:16

good, Topaz purred, Hopefully

50:19

you won't be joining any more extremist groups

50:21

to get my friends killed. He turned

50:23

immediately to Manny and with barely a

50:25

pause for breath, embraced him and kissed

50:27

his forehead. I'm proud of you, buddy,

50:29

as far as I'm concerned your family.

50:32

Manny mumbled his thanks and returned the hug,

50:35

but he glanced at Sasha and they shared a what

50:37

the hell look? Schoolfucker.

50:39

Mike seemed to want a plaster over the awkwardness.

50:42

Yep, he said, We've made some wonderful

50:44

friends these last couple of days. He

50:46

pantomime looking down at his watchless wrist

50:48

and checking the time. Oh my goodness,

50:51

he said, in mock surprise. Look at the

50:53

time, Topaz, We've got a war to get to. You

50:55

kids had better find some decent seats. Topaz

50:59

smiled at skulf Ger Mike, his eyes

51:01

lingered on the big man's face, and then drifted

51:03

back to Sasha. Enjoy

51:05

the show, he said, with an empty

51:08

smile. Rowland,

51:11

it was windy on the landing pad. He

51:14

and Jim stood next to a heavy black

51:16

feetole aircraft, the steed that would

51:18

carry him into today's massacre. Roland

51:21

could taste the dying summer and the faint

51:23

stirrings of a North Texas fall in the

51:25

air. It was cooler than he'd have expected

51:27

this time of the year, grayer too. A

51:30

gust of chill wind blew across his face,

51:32

and Roland found himself falling back

51:34

in time again. He was shorter,

51:37

The world seemed sharper, even though his senses

51:39

were dim and unenlightened. Roland felt

51:41

a hand about his own. It felt big, powerful,

51:44

and comforting. He looked up and saw a

51:46

woman standing over him. She was tall,

51:48

a giant. Her hair was brown and straight

51:50

and long and clear as day in his mind's eye,

51:53

but her face was blank, obscured even

51:55

in memory. His head turned to track

51:57

the passage of a blowing leaf. He felt

51:59

chill winter air on his arm, and he watched

52:01

as a red sedan rumbled past them, spraying

52:03

water into the airs, and hit a puddle on the asphalt.

52:06

Rowland pay attention. Jim's

52:08

voice snapped him back to reality. The

52:10

other chrombed man held a paper thin tablet

52:13

in front of Roland's face. That memory

52:15

flash had been the most immersive yet, although

52:17

not the longest. He was a little confused

52:19

at that why that moment? Had it just

52:21

been the similarity in weather or Rowland?

52:24

Jim was angry. It was actually somewhat

52:26

refreshing to see genuine emotion on the other

52:28

man's post human face. Veins

52:31

bulged at his neck and his eyes were fully

52:33

open. Roland caught a harsh whiff

52:35

of methamphetamine from his breath. All

52:37

right, all right, fucking chill, Roland muttered,

52:40

what am I looking at? He needn't

52:42

have asked. Once he focused on the tablet,

52:44

it was obvious that it displayed a map of the area

52:46

around Lake Waco. Rolling Fox

52:48

warriors and vehicles were displayed in little blue

52:51

pinpoints. Jim scrolled up a few

52:53

inches and Roland saw a swarm of red.

52:55

It was half over the Brazos right now,

52:57

and it crept millimeter by millimeter towards

53:00

their position. The river slowed

53:02

him down a bit, Jim said, but the bridges

53:04

there was still in good order. I'd say they'll

53:06

hit rock Creak in about ten minutes. Roland

53:09

nodded and asked, couldn't we have killed

53:11

those bridges bought some hours? Jim

53:13

gave a careless shrug. Why would we want

53:16

to slow em down? We're ready enough. No

53:18

sense in dragging this out. There

53:21

was a strong smell of ozone as the V Toll

53:23

aircraft next to them woke up. Red

53:25

lights glowed on the missile pods slung under

53:27

its belly. The chain gun on its

53:29

nose cycled. The whole thing hummed with

53:31

potential energy. It was too modern

53:33

for Rolland to know the make and model, but it reminded

53:36

him of the Russian Coba Assault transport,

53:38

which had been state of the art back in the mid forties.

53:42

So is the plan, he asked Jim

53:44

Well, His friend said, we know they've

53:46

got at least a half a dozen mobile antire

53:48

batteries old US Patriot threes

53:51

inaccurate garbage. Nothing I'm worried about.

53:54

The name conjured up a ghost of another memory.

53:57

A big Patriot battery wheeled around

53:59

on its truck size chassis. He heard

54:01

the machine whine of the motors, and then the reek of

54:03

fear hit his nose, as rich and heavy as Texas

54:05

thunder. There were missiles in the air aimed

54:07

at him as he fell. They were child's plated

54:10

dodge in his suit. He descended his fear

54:12

stink rolled up towards him from the soldiers below.

54:14

The poor fucker's Rowland. Jim

54:17

shouted, I'm not gonna have to find another murder

54:19

guerilla to take your place. What No,

54:22

Roland shook his head. Sorry, he said, just

54:24

memories. Jim gave him a long

54:27

look and if then you need to

54:29

talk about right now? No, Roland

54:32

said, it's just the memories

54:34

are coming at me faster now. It's distracting.

54:37

That makes sense, Jim said, I'd

54:40

imagine stimuli that reminds you of

54:42

your past could prompt your brain into sudden

54:44

healing. He reached

54:46

into a bag at his hip. It looked like a standard

54:49

dump pouch meant for half spent magazines

54:51

in the heat of battle, but Jim pulled out

54:53

a fully loaded crack pipe. Even unlit,

54:56

it smelled like burning tires at

54:58

a non percent pule. Jim held

55:00

the pipe up to Roland right.

55:03

Roland grabbed the pipe and lifted it to his lips.

55:05

Jim reached out and flipped on the lighter built

55:07

into his index finger. He held it

55:09

under the glass bubble of the pipe. The rocks

55:12

vaporized into white smoke rolland

55:14

inhaled and felt the vapor dissolve into

55:16

his blood stream through his mucous membranes.

55:19

There was a tingle as the crack reached

55:21

his brain's ventral tegmental area, and

55:23

said, in essence, you know how much dopamine

55:25

you were planning to produce? Make a ship load

55:27

more than that. The happy chemicals

55:30

flooded Roland's mind. His anxiety

55:32

at their recently churned up memories faded, as

55:34

did the memories themselves better.

55:37

Jim asked, super good, Roland

55:40

said, can I Jim waved, show

55:42

a man keep the pipe. In fact, he

55:44

pulled his index finger free from his hand and

55:46

gave it to Roland. Keep that, I'll

55:49

grow a new one. Cool. Roland

55:51

took the finger, flicked it a light, and took another

55:54

deep pole of burning crack, so

55:57

he said, as he exhaled a plume of crack smoke.

55:59

The plan right, said

56:01

Jim, like I told you, Rock Creek

56:03

is where we planned to hit him. The Edmund Fitzgerald

56:06

here. Jim banged a hand on the side

56:08

of the vToll craft. It's gonna take

56:10

you up to around fifteen thousand

56:12

feet and then drop you right on the heads.

56:15

I expect we'll take some flak afterwards.

56:17

But this bird can handle it. And besides,

56:19

he raised his voice and jerked his head towards

56:22

the cockpit. Anderson's piloting

56:24

it today, and it's not like I give a shit if

56:26

he does. In response, the

56:28

nosegun wheeled around on its mount and locked

56:30

on to Jim. There was a clinking sound as

56:32

it ratcheted around into its chamber. Jim

56:35

rolled his eyes. Fucking pilots. Anyway,

56:38

me and my people will be with the Roland fuck

56:40

folks getting shot at. He tapped

56:42

Roland's helmet. When we're ready for you,

56:45

I'll ping you both, and Anderson can drop you

56:47

on top of the asses. So

56:49

Roland asked, I've just got a fall

56:51

on top of a hostile army and start shooting.

56:54

Jim nodded, right, then,

56:56

let's get started. Manny.

57:01

Years ago and what now seemed like another

57:03

life, Manny had gone to watch an outdoor

57:05

movie at Silker Park in Austin Ghostbusters.

57:09

He was pretty sure it had been Ghostbusters.

57:12

Hundreds and hundreds of people had shown up,

57:14

families with children and couples on dates,

57:16

and so so many dogs. The

57:18

sound hadn't been great, and the projectionist

57:20

could have been better, but he remembered the evening

57:22

fondly. Rolling

57:25

fuck before a battle reminded him of that experience.

57:28

The people were different. Very few of them

57:31

were children, but clusters of citizens,

57:33

friend groups, and families and families of

57:35

friends had set up little viewing nooks

57:37

across the wheeled city itself and in

57:39

the field in front of it. The whole scene

57:41

would have been idyllic if they weren't about to watch

57:43

a battle. The vehicle's cavalry

57:46

and infantry were already almost out

57:48

of view. He could just barely

57:50

see shapes out on the horizon setting

57:52

up firing positions on top of buildings

57:55

in Rock Creek. They moved so damn

57:57

fast. Manny didn't think he'd ever

57:59

get used to the pace of post human life.

58:01

He knew Topaz and Skullfucker Mike were somewhere

58:04

out there, he knew where they'd be soon,

58:06

and in spite of their confidence, he worried

58:08

for them more than anyone. He worried

58:11

for Roland. Drinks

58:13

for everyone. Donald Ferris said

58:15

he had a tray full of drinks in his hands, fresh

58:17

from the bar. He sat down next to Nana

58:20

Yazi and smiled. Manny and Sasha

58:22

sat on the opposite side of them in a booth

58:24

in the main roller's bar, looking out over

58:26

Waco. Donald started handing

58:28

out beverages, first bubbly drinks

58:30

and long brown bottles that smelled familiar

58:33

Coca cola. The old documentarian

58:35

said, not the stuff they still sell all

58:37

over, the original recipe with cocaine

58:40

and alcohol. It's great ship. We

58:42

go through gallons of it every day.

58:45

Nana Yazi took a sip from hers and smiled.

58:47

It's quite good, she said, and

58:49

the intoxicating effect is mild.

58:52

Our chromed comrades have a stronger variant.

58:54

Of course, we're all humans

58:56

here. Donald smiled more or less

58:59

Many took one of the cokes, sipped it, and

59:01

nodded to Sasha. It's really good,

59:04

he said, you should try it.

59:06

It was good, and it didn't seem like it was too

59:08

strong. Nanny took another sip

59:10

and smiled. As Sasha grabbed her bottle and took

59:12

a gulp. She seemed to like it. There

59:15

was a loud pop sound from somewhere up above.

59:18

Manny tensed up, but then he tracked its

59:20

origin to one of the landing pads that extended

59:22

from a gantry tower at least a hundred feet

59:24

above them. Dozens of small black

59:26

shapes flitted out from it and soared forward

59:29

off in the same direction the army had gone

59:32

spy drones. Donald Ferris explained,

59:34

they'll be at the front by the time the fighting starts.

59:37

This all seemed so weird, Sasha

59:40

said, I think I read about people doing something

59:42

similar during the Civil War. They'd set

59:44

up picnic blankets on hills overlooking the battle.

59:47

Donald Ferris grunted and shifted in his seat

59:50

a bit awkwardly. Nani Yazi

59:52

smiled and said, it is a bit like that.

59:54

The differences that we're not doing this to

59:57

be voyeurs. We won't see much

59:59

fighting. What will we see?

1:00:01

Just watch? Donald Ferris said, and

1:00:04

reached for a tiny shot glass filled with a yellow

1:00:06

brown liquid. But ever drink

1:00:08

first, it'll help. Manny

1:00:10

took one of the shot glasses and moved to belt

1:00:12

it down, but Nanyazzie put her hand on his.

1:00:15

That's fine, te quel a son, I'd recommend

1:00:18

sipping. So he sipped

1:00:20

it and it was good. The burn

1:00:22

rolled down his throat and mixed with the cocaine

1:00:24

and alcohol from the Coca cola. A

1:00:26

comfortable, warm haze settled over Mannie.

1:00:29

He was about to encourage Sasha to try

1:00:31

some when another sound intruded. The

1:00:33

high hum of drones filled the air. Mannie

1:00:36

fought down an irrational surge of anxiety.

1:00:39

He wasn't sure he'd ever feel comfortable

1:00:41

with the sound of drones again. Each

1:00:43

of these drones was the size and rough density

1:00:45

of a rottweiler. They flew in pairs,

1:00:47

connected by what looked like a thick, bindy white

1:00:49

tube that hung between them. Several

1:00:52

pairs settled in front of the main roller's bar

1:00:54

in a stable hover. With a whirr and a click,

1:00:56

the white tubes in between them opened up and unfurled

1:00:59

into screens. A second later, the

1:01:01

screens lit up. Manny took

1:01:03

another sip of Truly Fabulous tequila

1:01:05

and looked back across his new friends. Donald

1:01:08

Ferris looked somber as solemn and gray

1:01:10

as a granite wall. Nana Yazi

1:01:13

seemed almost excited, as if she'd reached

1:01:15

the first jump scare in a good horror movie.

1:01:17

Sasha hadn't touched her liquor. She

1:01:19

didn't seem to have taken more than a few SIPs

1:01:21

of the coke Manny found himself wondering

1:01:24

what would happen to her after all this? What

1:01:26

am I going to do after this? Manny

1:01:28

realized with a bit of shock that Oscar's wife

1:01:30

was the only person he'd messaged in almost a

1:01:33

week. He hadn't sent anything to his family

1:01:35

or his friends back in Austin. He'd

1:01:37

had the excuse of his deck being deactivated

1:01:39

when he'd been inside the Kingdom, but now

1:01:41

that he was back and his deck was functional, his

1:01:44

lack of communication felt less and less

1:01:46

defensible. Just thinking about Ayisha

1:01:48

and the terrible news he still had yet to deliver

1:01:51

brought a spike of anxiety that was somehow worse

1:01:53

than his fear over the coming battle. There's

1:01:56

a certain sound that happens when a large

1:01:58

group of people all noticed some thing at the same

1:02:00

time. That sound shook Manny

1:02:03

out of his contemplation and alerted him to

1:02:05

the fact that something had started to happen on

1:02:07

the screens. He looked up, and he

1:02:09

saw that all the screens scattered around the

1:02:11

city and hovering over the field now shared

1:02:13

the same images. One side

1:02:15

of the screens displayed a video feed of a man

1:02:17

in full tactical armor. His eyes

1:02:19

covered by goggles and his head protected by

1:02:21

a black helmet. He was seated in

1:02:23

the cupola of an armored vehicle rolling

1:02:26

fast over the highway. Next

1:02:28

to that video feed was a picture of the same

1:02:30

man Sam's armor in more peaceful

1:02:32

days. He was fair skinned, with red

1:02:34

hair and an easy smile. He wore

1:02:36

a shirt that Manny guests signified

1:02:38

his allegiance to some sports team. In the am

1:02:40

fed the images sat there alone

1:02:43

for a second. Manny

1:02:46

looked out at the horizon towards Rock Creek,

1:02:48

where Rolling Fox soldiers had embedded themselves.

1:02:50

He saw three black gray contrails rush

1:02:53

out from an old office building and out towards the

1:02:55

highway. The Heavenly Kingdom's forces

1:02:57

were just barely visible to his naked eye,

1:03:00

tiny ant sized tanks and transports.

1:03:02

All three rockets hit, and the black

1:03:04

smoke of the detonations obscured the

1:03:06

head of the vehicle column. And

1:03:09

then on the video feed, a rocket burst

1:03:11

right above the man in the cupola. Manny

1:03:14

watched as he was torn apart in a hail of

1:03:16

shrapnel. The video and the still

1:03:18

image of his smiling face were replaced

1:03:20

a second later by a looping video of an

1:03:22

older man playing with a baby girl. He

1:03:25

picked her up and spun her around, and the camera

1:03:27

zoomed in on his joyous smile. Another

1:03:29

video played of a younger man attending

1:03:32

his high school graduation. More videos

1:03:34

and still images popped up, displaying

1:03:36

gentle moments in the lives of at least a dozen

1:03:38

different men, and then all the screens

1:03:41

cut violently to video of

1:03:43

and exploding a PC. Manny

1:03:45

jerked back in surprise. He

1:03:47

saw that Sasha had reacted similarly.

1:03:50

Naniazi just sat and stared, her

1:03:52

face unreadable. Donald Ferris

1:03:54

frowned, and when he noticed Manny looking

1:03:56

back at him, he waved a gentle hand towards

1:03:59

the screen and the word watch.

1:04:02

Manny turned back to the screens in time to see

1:04:04

them populate with more faces and more looping

1:04:07

videos. He watched his children

1:04:09

open birthday presents and celebrated graduations.

1:04:12

He saw young men pose with team mates or

1:04:14

hug their kids. He saw pizza parties

1:04:16

and Christmas mornings and laughter and love,

1:04:18

and then another vehicle detonated.

1:04:21

The screen cleared, and then it populated

1:04:23

again with scenes from four more lives.

1:04:26

Next to video of a detonating leopard tank,

1:04:28

the parade of shattered lives went on as

1:04:30

rockets, mortars, and now gunfire lashed

1:04:33

out from Rock Creek and towards the vehicle column.

1:04:36

Rowland isn't even there yet. This is just

1:04:38

the beginning, Manny stared out,

1:04:40

numb and queasy, and watched as the Heavenly

1:04:42

Kingdom's armored spearhead changed direction

1:04:45

and began the drive to Rock Creek. They

1:04:47

were firing now, too, pouring explosive

1:04:49

shot and long range rockets into the neighborhood.

1:04:52

This is what you wanted, he reminded himself,

1:04:55

as the parade of death sped up Rowland.

1:05:00

It was downright cold at fifteen thousand

1:05:02

feet. Rowland relished the bite in

1:05:04

the air and stared out the Edmond Fitzgerald's

1:05:07

side window. As he hit Jim's crack pipe for

1:05:09

the last time, his synapses

1:05:11

bubbled with dopamine. Now he couldn't

1:05:13

stop his lips from curling up into a grin

1:05:15

as he looked out onto the distant fields below.

1:05:18

Five minutes to drop point, the pilot's

1:05:20

voice echoed through the cargo compartment. Normally

1:05:23

it would have held an array of smart bombs or close

1:05:25

as salt drones. Today it held

1:05:27

only Rowland. He stepped forward

1:05:30

towards the rear bay doors of the craft. The

1:05:32

feeling of the cold deck under his feet and

1:05:34

the elevated hemoglobin levels in his blood

1:05:37

brought the threat of another rush of memory

1:05:39

to Roland's mind. The dizzy glee

1:05:41

of the crack high helped him shrug it off. Combat

1:05:44

soon, battle and battle drugs.

1:05:47

He tried to temper his excitement. He

1:05:49

didn't want to crave that high as much as

1:05:51

he did. It'll just take a few seconds,

1:05:54

he told himself, and then I can disengage.

1:05:56

He could already feel the Heavenly Kingdom's army

1:05:59

far below settling in Their

1:06:01

nose had been bloodied by rolling Fox rocketry,

1:06:04

but they'd suffered relatively few casualties.

1:06:06

So far, the plan did seem to

1:06:08

be working. Dozens of vehicles and thousands

1:06:10

of men had already moved into position around

1:06:12

the Rock Creek neighborhood. Roland

1:06:14

could hear the sounds of their mortars, recoilless

1:06:17

rifles, and assault guns opening fire.

1:06:20

He reached out with his senses and tried to find

1:06:22

Topaz and Skullfucker Mike in the mess,

1:06:24

but their scents and heat profiles were obscured

1:06:26

by shellfire and smoke, Roland

1:06:29

was able to locate Jim, as well as Bigsby

1:06:31

and his assault team. They were hunkered

1:06:33

down at the edge of the neighborhood, embedded

1:06:35

in an abandoned apartment complex, and engaged

1:06:37

in a furious firefight with the Heavenly Kingdom's

1:06:40

vanguard. Roland could smell the

1:06:42

dopamine rushing into jim synapses from

1:06:44

fifteen thousand feet in the air. His

1:06:46

heart began to beat faster. He felt

1:06:48

his left hand start to shake, not in

1:06:51

fear, but in delirious anticipation

1:06:53

of the battle drugs. Another flash

1:06:55

of memory took him, and his hand shook

1:06:57

so bad he could barely hold the needle straight. He'd

1:07:00

already missed the vain troice. God darn it, God

1:07:02

damn it, he cursed, before taking a deep breath

1:07:04

and preparing himself to try again. Sixty

1:07:06

seconds to drop. The pilot's voice

1:07:08

pulled Roland back into the moment. That

1:07:11

memory had felt weird. It had been blurry

1:07:13

in his mind's eye, but Roland's arms and hands

1:07:15

had felt smaller than was I shooting

1:07:17

up dope as a teenager. He knew

1:07:19

the answer based on his current predilections

1:07:21

was probably Roland

1:07:24

shook his mind away from the past and focused

1:07:26

again on the war downstairs. The

1:07:28

Kingdom had moved quickly. He guessed around

1:07:31

four thousand of their men were already in position.

1:07:33

These would be the elite, their most veteran

1:07:36

fighters, the soldiers wearing power armor

1:07:38

or writing in real armored transports and not

1:07:40

up gun trucks. He could feel the

1:07:42

rest of the Kingdom's army flung out far behind

1:07:45

them in a long tale that stretched back

1:07:47

to the brazos. How many of these

1:07:49

men will die today? How many are already

1:07:51

dead? Seconds

1:07:54

his nose caught the distant gasoline reek

1:07:56

of a flamethrower opening up on a squad of

1:07:58

advancing martyrs. That's out to be Gym

1:08:00

Right five seconds, the

1:08:02

jump light turned from red to green, and the bombay

1:08:05

doors opened with a rush of air and wind

1:08:07

that cracked the uncovered skin on Roland's

1:08:10

face. Three, said the

1:08:12

pilot. He stepped out to the ledge and planted

1:08:14

his feet. The world whipped by around

1:08:16

them at a maddening speed. Roland

1:08:18

looked down, focused and saw the heavenly

1:08:20

Kingdom's army underneath him, dozens

1:08:22

of vehicles and thousands of men had taken up

1:08:24

position in a large park and several buildings

1:08:27

surrounding Rock Creek. Two large

1:08:29

gatherings of mortars and a trio of Leopard

1:08:31

tanks made up the bulk of the artillery now

1:08:33

pouring fire into rolling Fox forces.

1:08:36

There were also several large field guns and

1:08:38

rocket batteries currently being bolted

1:08:40

into place in an old parking lot behind the

1:08:42

park. Competent Roland

1:08:44

was impressed by how the Kingdom's soldiers had parked

1:08:47

their armored transports to help complete a fortress

1:08:49

wall around one side of Rock Creek.

1:08:51

They'd sent a few probing attacks of power armored

1:08:54

troopers, but he could tell they wouldn't

1:08:56

launch a full assault until they'd flattened the

1:08:58

neighborhood to a trickle

1:09:00

of endorphins and serotonin enjoined the soggy

1:09:03

mush of dopamine and Roland's synapses.

1:09:05

He closed his eyes and with a thought, activated

1:09:08

the sundry weapons systems that Sardar had

1:09:10

wired into his body. The missiles

1:09:12

in their pods hummed, and the barrels around his right

1:09:14

arm chimed in readiness. Lyrics

1:09:17

from a half remembered song flitted across

1:09:19

his mind. Time, time,

1:09:21

time for another peaceful war. One

1:09:25

Roland stepped off the back of the craft

1:09:28

and into the skies embrace Sasha.

1:09:33

The faces flashed by, along with video

1:09:35

clips and curated posts from social media,

1:09:37

and of course, scenes of death. Some

1:09:40

of the men died from sniper fire, cut down

1:09:42

as they ran for cover. Others died

1:09:44

in long range firefights or from shrapnel.

1:09:47

The pace of death had gradually risen over

1:09:49

the course of the battle. Some of

1:09:51

that was due to the fact that the martyrs had sent

1:09:53

in several assault teams to test the metal

1:09:56

of the Defenders. Those men had died

1:09:58

fast and badly. Many

1:10:00

of them had been burnt alive. The sight

1:10:02

of it all should have horrified her. She wanted

1:10:04

it to horrify her. Everyone else at

1:10:06

the table had tears in their eyes. Even Nanny

1:10:09

Ozzie was crying, and that lady looked like she'd

1:10:11

been through some ship. Since when a

1:10:13

you curse like that? Sasha

1:10:15

felt a pang of guilt at how easily the swear

1:10:18

word had come to her mind. Then she

1:10:20

felt really, really stupid. She

1:10:22

was literally watching people die. She'd

1:10:25

killed two human beings less than forty

1:10:27

eight hours ago. What the fuck does

1:10:29

cursing matter, but still the

1:10:31

guilt was there. Perhaps what she felt

1:10:34

was a betrayal of her past self, or

1:10:36

maybe she was just dumb. Sasha shook

1:10:38

it off. She tried to focus on the carnage.

1:10:41

It was horrible, She knew that in a detached,

1:10:43

academic sense. She couldn't quite

1:10:46

feel the horror, though. It was as if

1:10:48

shooting Darrell had opened up a great, gnawing

1:10:50

hole inside her heart, and that hole

1:10:52

had spread like a black film

1:10:54

over her entire body. All

1:10:57

her feelings seemed so distant now.

1:11:00

She wanted to cry about Darrell. She wanted

1:11:02

to cry about this. She wanted to cry

1:11:04

for Susannah and Anne, left alone

1:11:06

in that living hell of a kingdom. She wanted

1:11:08

to cry for herself too, but she

1:11:11

couldn't, and so she didn't. Instead,

1:11:13

she sat and watched as the warrior gods

1:11:15

of this strange city helped the martyrs

1:11:17

earn their title. Sasha

1:11:20

looked out at the citizens of Rolling Fuck. Most

1:11:22

of the people she could see were crying, and even

1:11:24

those who weren't looked shaken, horrified.

1:11:27

The perpetual party atmosphere she'd come

1:11:29

to associate with the city of Wheels was gone.

1:11:32

It had been suspended to allow for pain.

1:11:34

Sasha wanted to hurt with them, but

1:11:37

instead she thought about the offer that man Jim

1:11:39

had made. She thought about the squeaking

1:11:41

sound of the razor blade ripping out of Roland's

1:11:44

forearm. She'd seen the way he fought.

1:11:46

She longed for the high that had come with the violence

1:11:49

and the clinic, but she couldn't stand more of

1:11:51

the guilt killing Darrell had brought her. I

1:11:53

could be a medic, Sasha thought, Jim

1:11:55

said so. She looked up to

1:11:57

the screens again at the parade of death.

1:12:00

She wasn't sure if any of the dead had been rolling

1:12:02

Fox soldiers. It didn't look like it,

1:12:05

But as she settled back in to watch, something

1:12:07

glitched on the screens. The stream

1:12:09

of faces sped up well past the point

1:12:11

where she could focus on any of them. Then

1:12:14

the floe stopped, sputtered, the picture

1:12:16

glitched out, and then righted itself. Whatever

1:12:19

algorithm handled the show eventually stabilized,

1:12:22

and the individual images on each screen shrank

1:12:24

to accommodate many many more people,

1:12:27

a flood of the dead and moments from their

1:12:29

lives. The nature of their deaths

1:12:31

changed too. Most of the first

1:12:33

waves seemed to come from a sudden burst of explosive

1:12:35

detonations. But the explosions stopped

1:12:38

and the dying continued, and whatever was

1:12:40

killing the martyrs now moved too fast

1:12:42

to be clearly seen. What's

1:12:44

happening? She heard Manny ask, is something

1:12:47

wrong? No, the

1:12:49

old man said, that's just Rowland.

1:13:02

Rowland. Forty five

1:13:04

seconds after his feet hit dirt, Rowland

1:13:07

was out of AMMO. He'd managed to do a

1:13:09

tremendous amount of damage in that short span

1:13:11

of time, decimating their mortar batteries

1:13:13

with cluster rockets and clearing the martyrs away

1:13:15

from their field guns with a mix of gas

1:13:17

and fragmentation grenades. He'd

1:13:19

emptied his machine gun and three long

1:13:22

bursts, mostly aimed at the infantry who

1:13:24

had been clustered behind the APC barricades

1:13:26

when he landed. Then he'd taken to scavenging

1:13:29

rifles from the dead and emptying those into targets

1:13:31

of opportunity. By the one minute

1:13:33

mark, Rowland's high brain estimated he'd

1:13:35

killed or wounded close to a thousand men.

1:13:38

The sheer ferocity of his initial assault

1:13:40

sent the Kingdom's forces reeling and cleared

1:13:42

a circle of ground around him. About two hundred

1:13:45

meters wide. Roland finished

1:13:47

gunning down the crew of a Patriot battery

1:13:49

and ran for an abandoned anti tank rifle

1:13:51

lying next to a pile of bodies. Bullets

1:13:53

smacked into him from all sides, diversionary

1:13:56

fire meant to distract him from the uparmored

1:13:58

Mattis a PC that suddenly gunned

1:14:00

its engine and barreled towards him. They think

1:14:03

they can run me over, Roland realized

1:14:05

with something like glee, so he slowed

1:14:07

down, reducing his sprint to something

1:14:09

like a normal human running speed, while the vehicle

1:14:12

closed the gap between them. He jumped

1:14:14

at the last moment, landed on the APEC's

1:14:17

roof and punched a hole through the top armor

1:14:19

with both of his fists. Then he gripped

1:14:21

the ragged metal at the sides of the hole and tore

1:14:23

the APC open. The smell

1:14:25

of fear hid his nose as he tore through the concrete

1:14:28

wall. The room held a dozen men, a

1:14:30

mix of guards and officers. One man

1:14:32

in the middle wore the stars of a general in the United

1:14:34

States Army. Some of the soldiers

1:14:36

screamed, a few opened fire, but the

1:14:38

general just stood there while Rowland killed.

1:14:41

He didn't even blink, No fear poured

1:14:43

off him. It's our fault, the

1:14:45

general said once they were the only men left

1:14:47

alive in the room. This is all our fault,

1:14:50

Rowland time. A bullet hit his face

1:14:52

and Roland snapped back to reality. The

1:14:54

men in the apec below him were dead. It

1:14:56

looked as if he'd shredded them with his bare hands.

1:14:59

But while he'd lost in a memory, two more

1:15:01

a PC's had roared up and disgorged

1:15:03

a dozen power armored soldiers. They

1:15:06

shot him with big guns, weapons meant

1:15:08

to hurt monsters. He avoided some

1:15:10

of their rounds, but not most. Roland

1:15:12

lost the better part of his right hand, a chunk

1:15:14

of his skull in his left knee. It hurt,

1:15:17

but that didn't stop him. He leapt

1:15:19

off the Maddison. Soon he was among them, ripping

1:15:21

off armored plates and shattering bones

1:15:23

with his bare hands. The battle drugs

1:15:26

poured into his brain and lit his synapses

1:15:28

up like the New York Skyline. Roland

1:15:31

let out a terrible whooping cry that was

1:15:33

half laugh and half scream, and he tore

1:15:35

into the men as they tried in vain to

1:15:37

do him real harm. It took

1:15:40

nineteen seconds to eliminate them all.

1:15:42

As the last man dropped, Roland realized

1:15:44

with some surprise that he could hear Jim's voice,

1:15:47

distant but getting closer. His old

1:15:49

friend was charging, screaming out war whoops,

1:15:51

and firing those big dumb pistols. Then

1:15:54

he heard the familiar crack of a Dragonov

1:15:56

sniper rifle Topaz his rifle.

1:15:58

He remembered it now the sound was as familiar

1:16:01

to him as the voice of his own mother. Holy

1:16:03

shit, Roland realized that for

1:16:06

the first time in years, he could remember

1:16:08

the sound of his mother's voice. Her

1:16:10

name and face were still lost in memory,

1:16:12

but all this violence was clearly knocking

1:16:14

some things loose. He took a step

1:16:16

back behind what of the intact a PCs

1:16:19

to avoid a spray of heavy machine gun fire

1:16:21

and take stock of the situation. Now

1:16:24

that he focused, he could feel the hoofbeats

1:16:26

of rolling Fox cavalry. He could sense

1:16:28

that many of the city's infantry had charged

1:16:30

out from their positions in Rock Creek to

1:16:32

meet the martyrs in hand to hand combat.

1:16:35

The Heavenly Kingdom was not in flight, not

1:16:37

yet, but they would break soon. Roland

1:16:40

knew it he could smell it in the air. Time

1:16:42

to stop, now, time to let Schoffucker,

1:16:44

Mike Topaz and the others finish the fight.

1:16:47

He'd done enough, He knew he'd done

1:16:49

enough, and yet the

1:16:52

drugs. Even after just a

1:16:54

few seconds out of direct combat, the high

1:16:56

was starting to fade, and Roland wanted

1:16:58

more. He thought about cracking another skull

1:17:01

in his hand. Itched. He heard one of the martyrs

1:17:03

open up with an automatic grenade launcher and

1:17:06

thought about how good that gun would feel

1:17:08

bucking against the meat of his shoulder. The

1:17:10

man with the grenade launcher was close. Roland

1:17:13

could close the distance between them and two maybe

1:17:15

three seconds. No, you

1:17:17

don't need to do this. Stop. Fewer

1:17:20

people will die if you just, Roland

1:17:23

charged Manny.

1:17:26

Manny had seen nine people killed by

1:17:28

bullets or bombs. He'd seen a good deal more

1:17:31

fresh corpses in the aftermath of firefights.

1:17:34

He had a strong stomach, and he was not easily

1:17:36

distressed by gore. The opening

1:17:38

stages of this battle and the war ritual

1:17:40

had been unsettling, but not because

1:17:42

of the violence that changed

1:17:45

soon after Roland landed. He's

1:17:47

just tearing people apart, Manny

1:17:50

said, without really meaning to say anything

1:17:52

at all. Donald Ferris replied

1:17:54

with a grim nod. It's

1:17:57

hard to watch. Nanny Azi admitted

1:17:59

as an their dozen lives and did messily

1:18:01

on the screens before them. It'll

1:18:03

be over soon, though they can't take

1:18:06

much more of this. I haven't

1:18:08

seen any of your people die yet, Sasha

1:18:10

said, is that abnormal? No.

1:18:13

Donald's voice was grim. There will

1:18:15

be a lot of injuries, but I don't expect

1:18:18

Rolling Fuck will lose a single warrior,

1:18:21

good, Sasha said, is

1:18:23

it? Donald asked, of course,

1:18:25

it's good. You silly fuck. Nana Yazzi

1:18:27

snapped, that was the first time Manny could

1:18:30

recall hearing her angry. I

1:18:32

disagree, the old man grumbled. We're

1:18:34

on a precipice here, the edge of a deep

1:18:36

cliff. Every time this happens, we get

1:18:38

a little closer to falling off. What

1:18:41

do you mean, Manny asked, He

1:18:43

means, Nana Yazzi replied with a bit

1:18:46

of drunken slur to her voice. He doesn't

1:18:48

trust the people of this city. He thinks

1:18:50

they'll get a taste for war and this whole experiment

1:18:53

will turn into a nightmare. You

1:18:55

can't trust the dark, Donald Ferris

1:18:57

insisted, and We're in the dark here,

1:19:00

he waved out at the field and the hundreds of

1:19:02

people watching the faces of the dead and tearful

1:19:04

silence. Right now, we've managed

1:19:06

to lash together a chain of rituals that

1:19:08

keep them peaceful. How long can that

1:19:11

last? Naniyazi glared

1:19:13

at him, and then shifted her gaze to Nanny.

1:19:15

She pointed a finger at Donald. He

1:19:17

thinks we should have let your people die. I

1:19:20

think we have a responsibility to intervene.

1:19:23

I'm not saying we don't. Donald

1:19:26

Ferris insisted, I'm just saying

1:19:28

I've seen how this story ends. History

1:19:31

may not repeat itself, but it does.

1:19:33

Rhyme, pithy, Naniyazi

1:19:36

said, But oh. She

1:19:38

stopped mid sentence and stared out into

1:19:40

the screens. Mannie looked back

1:19:42

just in time to watch the flow of dead faces

1:19:44

speed up again. The screens jerked

1:19:47

and shuddered to accommodate the new flow. Once

1:19:49

they adjusted, Mannie was shocked again at

1:19:51

the violence on display. He saw

1:19:54

men run through with lances, gutted by scimitars,

1:19:56

burnt by napalm, and trampled under the spiked

1:19:58

hoves of quadrufrats. Oh

1:20:01

God, he moaned. Ah Yes,

1:20:03

Naniyazi sighed, that would be

1:20:06

the cavalry. It won't be much longer

1:20:08

now they're here to finish

1:20:10

the job. Rowland,

1:20:14

the Knights of Rolling Fuck were a sight

1:20:16

to see. Truly. It wasn't often

1:20:18

that Roland came across something that registered

1:20:21

as completely new to the deep, battered

1:20:23

banks of his memory. But there was

1:20:25

no deja vous here, no sense

1:20:27

that he'd watched anything like it before.

1:20:30

Rolling Fox riders worked in two and three

1:20:32

person squads, mostly using

1:20:34

a mix of hand grenades, small arms, flame

1:20:36

throwers, and melee weapons for shock value.

1:20:39

Their timing was exquisite. One

1:20:41

hundred riders hit the martyrs at the same

1:20:43

time. They didn't seem to have specific

1:20:46

targets or goals beyond causing

1:20:48

mayhem, but they did this expertly,

1:20:50

spiking armored vehicles and field guns

1:20:52

with white phosphorus charges and scattering

1:20:55

any clusters of martyrs they could find. The

1:20:58

woman Kashore rode past him,

1:21:00

her face skinned and weeping blood as she lobbed

1:21:02

a hand grenade towards a group of martyrs hunkered

1:21:05

behind the shattered remains of a public restroom.

1:21:08

She pulled a maqua wheedle with an iron

1:21:10

trunk and gleaming obsidian blades free

1:21:12

from her belt as her steed leapt over the burning

1:21:15

wreckage of a jeep and bounded towards

1:21:17

the survivors. Roland followed

1:21:19

her, tearing a piece of rebar free

1:21:21

from some rubble as he charged. The

1:21:23

restrooms were at one end of what had once been a

1:21:25

giant playground in a public park. It

1:21:28

had been derelict for more than a decade,

1:21:30

but the corpses of swing sets and remnants

1:21:32

of slides were still visible. Several

1:21:34

hundred of the martyrs had fallen back to this position,

1:21:37

trying to create some sort of defensive

1:21:39

line. Panic and mass death

1:21:41

had robbed them of a lot of cohesion, but

1:21:43

they still managed to pour a lot of

1:21:45

fire into Roland and Cashori as they charged.

1:21:48

A rocket propelled grenade hit the chest of

1:21:50

her quadrifract and burst, ripping

1:21:52

off one of the machine's legs and sending the Chrome

1:21:55

Woman tumbling to the ground, gravel

1:21:57

and rubble embedding itself into the red musculature

1:21:59

of her bleeding face. Roland

1:22:01

didn't stop for her. He charged ahead,

1:22:04

absorbed a few dozen rounds of small arms

1:22:06

fire, and dodged a handful of rocket propelled

1:22:08

grenades. He hid a group of twenty

1:22:10

three men clustered behind a long, still

1:22:12

glass barricade and several heavy metal crates.

1:22:15

These martyrs had been trying to get a trio of

1:22:18

anti tank guns back into the fight. They

1:22:20

gave up on that once Roland had closed

1:22:22

to about twenty feet. One of them,

1:22:24

an older man with a spine, shouted words

1:22:27

of encouragement and charged forward, firing

1:22:29

with a dozen of his men. These

1:22:31

soldiers weren't wearing powered armor. They

1:22:34

weren't good enough to hit more than one and twenty shots.

1:22:36

They wore old, up cycled body armor.

1:22:38

Only a few of them had bayonets. They

1:22:41

presented no real threat. Twenty

1:22:43

seconds n I can put every one of these fuckers

1:22:45

down for the rest of the fight. No one

1:22:48

needs to die. His hand twitched,

1:22:50

the river of dopamine, and his synapses shrank

1:22:53

to a babbling brook. Roland felt

1:22:55

a craving rise. Maybe

1:22:57

just a few more he was among

1:22:59

them. Roland found that brave old fucker

1:23:01

picked him up by the skull and used him as a flail

1:23:04

until the bones of his face came loose

1:23:06

and Roland's hands. He deployed

1:23:08

the razor in his wrist and started slicing

1:23:10

off hands and ears. He moved on

1:23:12

to slashing tendons and muscles, and eventually

1:23:15

just hacked at his enemies like a drunken

1:23:17

butcher. One boy dropped his gun,

1:23:20

tried to back away, and fell on his ass.

1:23:22

As Roland stalked towards him, the

1:23:24

protesters screamed and screamed. They swung

1:23:26

sticks and tried to bash him with their shields, and

1:23:28

he knocked their clumsy strikes aside and waded

1:23:30

into the mass. Roland didn't even consider

1:23:33

drawing a gun. He tore every

1:23:35

fistful of human flesh, sent a wave of orgiastically

1:23:38

bubbling through his brain. A young woman

1:23:40

screamed and tried to run, and he grabbed her hair

1:23:42

and pulled in the sound of her neck snapping almost

1:23:44

made in shriek with joy, Please,

1:23:47

said a different man, before Roland shattered

1:23:49

his skull against the pavement and left

1:23:51

up to chase down a trio of fleeing martyrs.

1:23:54

He was back and in serlick, bloody and injured,

1:23:56

an almost snowblind from the battle drugs.

1:23:58

Roland shoved his way through the door and into

1:24:01

the air raid shelter he'd already pulled a

1:24:03

grenade free from his harness when he found himself

1:24:05

face to face with a room full of women and children,

1:24:08

old men and young boys, civilians,

1:24:10

unarmed and with sudden

1:24:12

shock, Roland realized he didn't

1:24:14

care about that last part. His synapses

1:24:17

screamed for more. Roland obliged

1:24:19

them, My god, stop stop.

1:24:22

He came back to himself and realized

1:24:24

he was on the ground and locked into a pretty darn

1:24:27

good half nelson. It took him a moment to realize

1:24:29

that woman Kaushore was the one holding

1:24:31

him. Oh, he said, what

1:24:34

the fuck man? Roland

1:24:36

looked around. None of the martyrs near

1:24:38

him were still standing. It was hard

1:24:40

even for his hindbrain to identify how

1:24:43

many people had fallen around him.

1:24:45

He guessed south of a hundred, but not far

1:24:47

south. The number was shocking. It

1:24:49

implied a longer blackout than any of

1:24:51

the others. What was scarier was

1:24:53

the sheer violence evident in these men's

1:24:56

death. Most of them were in more than

1:24:58

two pieces. Are you not flip

1:25:00

out? If I let go? Roland shook

1:25:02

his head and Cashorey released him.

1:25:04

He turned around, still seated, and looked

1:25:06

at the young woman. She was filthy

1:25:09

with grime and blood, some of it her own.

1:25:11

Her skinless face wept red. But even

1:25:14

so he could still see the judgment

1:25:16

in her eyes. That was

1:25:18

not fucking necessary. She said,

1:25:21

I'm sorry, I Roland,

1:25:24

it was skufucker. Mike Topaz

1:25:26

trailed behind him at a sizeable distance,

1:25:28

sweeping the field with a rifle. Roland

1:25:30

tried to catch his eye. He avoided Roland's

1:25:33

gaze for a second or two, but then they connected

1:25:35

and she stared at him with those big,

1:25:37

brown, tear stained eyes. This isn't

1:25:40

what I wanted, Rowland, This isn't what we said

1:25:42

we were fighting for. This is just butchery.

1:25:45

He felt angry at her blind rage

1:25:47

that warred with his love. Of course, it's butchery,

1:25:49

he screamed. The world is built by

1:25:51

butcher's dude, kashore

1:25:54

He slapped him hard, and Roland came

1:25:56

back to himself, scofucker. Mike was

1:25:58

closer now. Roland looked for Topaz

1:26:00

and found him. He was closer to and

1:26:02

looked worried, but he didn't say anything.

1:26:05

Is Roland all right? Mike asked Kashouri.

1:26:08

Was he hit? Sure, But that's

1:26:10

not the problem, Kushorey said, he

1:26:12

just went bug funk on like a company of those

1:26:15

guys, ripped them apart with his bare

1:26:17

hands. It's a fucking relapse,

1:26:20

said skullfucker Mike. He knelt down

1:26:22

in front of Roland and put a hand on his shoulder.

1:26:25

Buddy, he said, it's done.

1:26:27

They're starting to run whole army.

1:26:29

You'll be routed in a few minutes. You

1:26:31

just sit here and catch your breath and

1:26:34

routed. Roland looked around and

1:26:36

realized his hands were shaking. He

1:26:38

felt a vast, throbbing emptiness

1:26:40

in his synapses. He realized

1:26:43

that the emptiness was always there, and

1:26:45

had been for as long as he could remember. Most

1:26:47

days he hid it under a haze of narcotics,

1:26:50

But now that he'd had it filled for just a

1:26:52

minute, it's emptiness hurt like

1:26:54

an amputated limb. He looked

1:26:56

out and saw that, yes, skullfucker

1:26:59

Mike was wrecked. Several

1:27:01

pockets of Martyr still held out, but

1:27:03

the bulk of the vanguard was either dead or

1:27:05

fleeing for the line of transports and technicals

1:27:08

that stretched back to the Brazos. It

1:27:10

felt like the rest of the army had started the

1:27:13

slow process of halting and reversing

1:27:15

its advance. The Kingdom had

1:27:17

decided to pull back. Are

1:27:19

you done or not, Roland asked an

1:27:21

evil voice in the back of his head. If you're

1:27:23

not done, if you want more, you'd

1:27:26

better go get it. Roland

1:27:28

leaned back. He looked from skullfucker

1:27:30

Mike took a shore and finally to Topaz.

1:27:33

Then he reached behind him, grabbed a busted

1:27:36

rifle he could use as a club, and stood

1:27:38

up Roland. No, skullfucker,

1:27:41

Mike started to say. Roland didn't

1:27:43

hear the rest. He bolted off as

1:27:45

fast as he could run in the direction

1:27:48

of the fleeing martyrs. Sasha

1:27:52

it was amazing how much she could tell about

1:27:54

the course of the battle just from watching the faces

1:27:57

of its casualties. The pace of the killing

1:27:59

and escalate it to a certain level, and then

1:28:01

started to slowly fall. More

1:28:03

and more of the men died with their backs to the enemy

1:28:06

running. Sasha guessed that meant the

1:28:08

army, or at least a lot of it, had

1:28:10

started to break. The pace of death

1:28:12

slowed to a trickle. Well. Then

1:28:15

Donald Ferris grumbled, it seems

1:28:17

like that's more or less settled. I'm going to

1:28:19

get us another round. I think we've all eaten

1:28:21

enough guilt. Father, He stopped,

1:28:24

his jaw dropped. Oh no. Sasha

1:28:27

turned back to the screen to see that the roll of

1:28:29

the dead had started to increase again. These

1:28:32

men were running too, but most of them weren't

1:28:34

dying to ranged weaponry. They were

1:28:36

being grabbed from behind, ripped apart,

1:28:38

or club to death by something moving far

1:28:40

too fast for human eyes to focus on.

1:28:44

Roland Manny said in a dull

1:28:46

voice filled with sorrow. Sasha

1:28:48

scanned the faces of her table mates. Manny

1:28:51

looked almost overwhelmed with guilt. His

1:28:53

eyes were watery, and he just kept shaking

1:28:55

his head and muttering to himself. Nanny

1:28:58

Yazzi's mouth was closed, her face

1:29:00

looked tight and frozen in horror.

1:29:02

Donald Ferris was quite clearly furious.

1:29:05

His face was so red. Sasha worried his

1:29:07

heart might give out, and yet she

1:29:10

felt nothing. That's curious,

1:29:12

isn't it. Sasha could remember how angry

1:29:14

she'd gotten as a girl when she read some

1:29:16

story about anti Christian brutality

1:29:18

in Turkey or Illinois. She remembered

1:29:20

being horrified by the execution she had witnessed,

1:29:23

but she could only picture her emotional state

1:29:25

and those moments from a great distance,

1:29:28

as if she were staring at it through the fogged

1:29:30

up lens of a telescope. Why

1:29:32

am I not angry? Why am I not horrified?

1:29:36

Her concern over this fact actually generated

1:29:38

a stronger emotional reaction than

1:29:40

anything happening out on that battlefield.

1:29:43

Sasha stared out at the cameras and the

1:29:45

continuing parade of violence. She

1:29:47

heard Manny cursing under his breath. She

1:29:50

heard Nana Yazi fight back a sob,

1:29:52

but Sasha felt nothing, save perhaps

1:29:55

a bit of jealousy. Rowland,

1:29:59

the scene out by the Brasos felt less like

1:30:01

a battlefield and more like a playground.

1:30:03

This might be the highest I've ever been, he

1:30:06

thought, as he broke a man's neck with the back

1:30:08

of his hand. Bullets whizzed by

1:30:10

as a few of the braver soldiers tried to cover

1:30:12

the retreat of their comrades, most

1:30:14

of them, even the drivers, had abandoned their

1:30:17

transports. Hundreds of men were already

1:30:19

wading into the river, tearing off their armor

1:30:21

and tossing aside their weapons as they plunged

1:30:23

in. The Heavenly Kingdom's army

1:30:25

would not rally any time soon. A

1:30:28

martyr turned and drew his knife in a feeble

1:30:30

attempt at resistance. Roland caved

1:30:33

in the man's stern hum with a fist and squashed

1:30:35

his heart like a june bug. Ten meters

1:30:37

ahead, he saw three soldiers preparing

1:30:39

to make their stand behind an overturned flatbed

1:30:42

truck. As he ran, Roland grabbed

1:30:44

at his scarded rifle off the ground, a Thompson

1:30:47

submachine gun. He realized it

1:30:49

didn't feel like a reproduction either. Roland

1:30:51

brought the gun up to his shoulder. The Thompson

1:30:54

gun bucked in his hand. Roland laughed

1:30:56

as he danced through the Charnel house that had once

1:30:58

been a forward operating bay. Most

1:31:00

of the National guardsmen were dead, but his nose

1:31:02

told him one of them was still in the game. Roland

1:31:05

turned past a hesco and saw the young man

1:31:07

propped half up against a pile of sandbags.

1:31:10

The boy held a hand to a bleeding hole in

1:31:12

his gut. His black face was bloodless,

1:31:15

pale, and young. So young.

1:31:17

Roland didn't know if he'd ever seen a soldier

1:31:19

who looked that young. There was something familiar

1:31:22

about the boy's face, Rowland,

1:31:25

the kid said, and recognition dawned

1:31:27

in Roland's eyes, and then

1:31:29

he was back. He was about fifty yards

1:31:31

further ahead than he'd been before he blacked

1:31:33

out. The Thompson gun was still in his hand,

1:31:36

pointed at a man twelve yards to his left

1:31:38

who was scrambling to get a wire guided rocket

1:31:40

launcher into a firing position. Roland

1:31:43

put a bullet through his brain. He turned

1:31:45

past the burning wreckage of a semi truck. A

1:31:47

dozen bullets impact at his chest inside.

1:31:50

Then three martyrs charged him, their bayonets

1:31:52

fixed. The hit wasn't bad, nothing

1:31:54

but a flesh wound schofucker. Mike looked

1:31:56

worse. He lost most of his left arm.

1:31:59

Topaz had in three rounds to the dome,

1:32:01

but she was still firing her dragon off. Roland's

1:32:04

mind stretched into the city of Dallas around

1:32:06

them. There were a lot of men coming their way,

1:32:08

but those men were mostly police swat

1:32:10

officers, nothing substantial, no

1:32:12

one who could stop them from getting this bomb

1:32:14

where it needed to go. Roland

1:32:17

screamed as he broke his Thompson gun over the

1:32:19

head of another martyr. Then he reeled

1:32:21

back and dropped the gun. That last

1:32:23

memory had felt different, like it unlocked

1:32:25

something Roland shook his head. The

1:32:28

last martyr in front of him broke and ran. Roland

1:32:30

didn't even think to chase him. His head

1:32:32

hurt in a way he couldn't remember it

1:32:34

ever hurting before. What the hell is

1:32:37

going on? It had all started the second

1:32:39

he'd thought about the bomb. As small as

1:32:41

nukes go, just about one megaton.

1:32:44

It matches the ones that fought Leonarwood.

1:32:46

The Guardian already released the hacked documents

1:32:48

showing the government considered bombing several

1:32:51

of the separatist camps. I think

1:32:53

we can trust the American people to

1:32:55

put two and two together, Jim

1:32:57

smiled. Roland did not. This

1:33:00

was his plan, but he didn't like it. He

1:33:02

knew, though, that it was the only way forward

1:33:04

for the revolution. There has to

1:33:06

be another way, said schullfucker Mike.

1:33:09

This feels wrong, really really

1:33:11

wrong. The floodgates of Roland's mind

1:33:13

opened, and a tidal wave of memory swept

1:33:15

him away. He dropped to his knees.

1:33:18

The martyrs around him continued to flee,

1:33:20

too, shocked and awed to take advantage of his

1:33:22

vulnerability. The battle drugs

1:33:24

were gone now, or at least he couldn't

1:33:26

feel them anymore. Hundreds of memories

1:33:28

assaulted his consciousness thousands.

1:33:31

For the first time in years, Roland knew

1:33:34

who he'd been, who he was again.

1:33:37

I'm back, Roland

1:33:39

stood. He took one halting step

1:33:41

forward, and then another, and then he

1:33:43

leaned against the frame of a broken a PC

1:33:45

for a little while as he pictured his mother's

1:33:48

face and voice for the first time in years.

1:33:51

He wanted to sob, but there was no

1:33:53

time. He knew who he was now,

1:33:56

and he knew what he was bound to do if he stayed

1:33:58

this way. Roland's gents wouldn't

1:34:00

allow that, so he trudged forward

1:34:02

until he found the right tool, a

1:34:05

handheld grenade launcher clutched in

1:34:07

the dead hands of a martyr. He

1:34:09

took the weapon and sat cross legged

1:34:11

and the blood soaked Texas dirt. Roland

1:34:14

looked up at the sky one last time and

1:34:16

allowed himself a long moment to remember

1:34:18

his parents and his brother, and the day

1:34:21

he and Topaz had first met. And

1:34:23

then he closed his eyes and pulled the

1:34:25

trigger. Manny

1:34:34

Nanni Yazzi, Sasha, Donald Ferris,

1:34:36

and Manny had all rushed to a transport

1:34:38

as soon as Roland's face showed up on the screen.

1:34:42

It seems the drones either didn't know or didn't

1:34:44

care enough to separate dead friends from dead

1:34:46

foes. Maybe that was the point Nani

1:34:49

Yazzi drove. It took about six minutes

1:34:51

for the shiny green jeep to make its way over

1:34:53

the broken roads and towards the side of the battle.

1:34:56

No one spoke. They reached

1:34:58

the battlefield, there so many

1:35:00

dead people. Manny had seen a lot

1:35:02

of carnage in his life, but nothing like

1:35:05

this. The stinches of burning flesh,

1:35:07

opened bowels, and burning fuel were so

1:35:09

overwhelming they almost knocked him down. Donald

1:35:12

Ferris and Nana Yazzi looked just as queasy.

1:35:14

Only Sasha whether the sights and smells

1:35:17

with calm. She stayed focused enough

1:35:19

to spot skullfucker Mike and the mess and direct

1:35:21

Nana Yazzi his way. Rolling

1:35:24

Fox soldiers were out in force. They

1:35:26

stalked through the killing fields in groups of four

1:35:28

or five, searching for survivors or

1:35:30

just looking for loot. Mike stood

1:35:33

with Topaz and Cashore and a couple of chromed

1:35:35

Manny didn't recognize. Most

1:35:37

of them were seated by a handful of large metal

1:35:39

crates in the center of what had once been a large

1:35:41

playground. Oh god, the

1:35:44

dead men here had been torn apart. There

1:35:47

was so much blood, more than Manny had

1:35:49

ever seen. It sluiced around on the

1:35:51

concrete like some sort of macab kittie

1:35:53

pool. The jeep came to a wet stop

1:35:56

in front of the group. The act of breakings

1:35:58

into spray of gore out across Skullfucker

1:36:00

Mike's legs. Hey, he

1:36:02

said, what are you all doing here? Rowland?

1:36:06

Manny said, what happened to Rowland? Mike

1:36:09

looked confused. Topaz raised

1:36:11

his head up to look out at them. Many was surprised

1:36:13

to see tears rolling down his face. His

1:36:16

lip trembled a bit, but when he spoke

1:36:18

there was steel and fury in his voice.

1:36:21

He decided to keep killing. I'm

1:36:23

sure he's still killing now. No,

1:36:26

Manny said, he's dead, or that's what

1:36:28

the drone said. We have to find him. Get

1:36:30

out of that seat, Mike said to Nanny Yazzie,

1:36:33

I'm driving in an instant

1:36:35

Topaz. His tears stopped, and before Many

1:36:37

could say anything, Topaz hopped

1:36:39

into the back seat of the jeep. Fast.

1:36:42

Topaz told Skullfucker Mike as he took

1:36:44

over from Nanny Yazzi go very

1:36:46

fast. It didn't take

1:36:48

long to find him. Roland's route

1:36:50

through the army was painted in red. Hundreds

1:36:53

of dead men, maybe more than a thousand, made

1:36:55

a clear path with their corpses. That

1:36:58

path didn't end until they were almost at

1:37:00

the brazos and they saw where Roland

1:37:02

had fallen. Roland's armored

1:37:04

body was splayed out limp next to

1:37:06

the carcass of an old semi truck. There

1:37:08

were two very dead men directly in

1:37:11

front of him, but neither of them looked to have

1:37:13

done him in. Roland hadn't

1:37:15

gone down to enemy fire. He

1:37:17

jammed a very large gun in his mouth

1:37:19

and blown the top off of his head. To

1:37:21

all signs and to all logic, he

1:37:24

looked dead. Donald Ferris

1:37:26

shook his head and muttered something. Sasha

1:37:28

just stared. Nana Yazzi put her

1:37:30

hand on Manny's shoulder. He

1:37:33

was, she started to say, but she

1:37:35

was interrupted by Roland. As

1:37:37

he lifted his ruined head up to look at them.

1:37:40

His eyes were still unfocused. Blood

1:37:42

drooled down his nose, out of his mouth,

1:37:44

and down from the gaping exit wound in his

1:37:46

forehead. He spat out several

1:37:49

teeth Manny saw daylight through

1:37:51

his skull, but still Roland

1:37:53

was able to speak. How the

1:37:55

funk are you people, He asked,

1:38:18

so m

1:38:38

o o