Chapter 535: Resurgence - Legends (2/2)
”We did, of course. Told Ol' Hiro that we had a couple dozen more and offered to drop the next one in his lap,” Dee giggled. ”Should have listened to MacArthur, though. He wanted to bomb China, Russia, everyone who so much looked at us sideways,” she looked down. ”God, it was a heady time to be alive.”
”I'll bet,” Daxin said.
”It was in the summer of '46 that I was looking over the blast wave computations that I saw something. A little tiny hole. A sparkle. I didn't have a name for it, not back then, but some of the energy 'tunneled' to another point,” Dee dropped her cigarette in an empty bottle. ”Everyone told me that it was just an anomaly, or an error in the calculations, but I knew what I'd seen.”
”That led to mat-trans,” Daxin guessed.
”Fusion interlacing of particles to cause reflective states across long distances,” Dee said. She ground her teeth. ”Fucking MIT told me in the spring of '47 it was all interesting, but there was no proof beyond my math,” she grabbed her cigarettes and bared her teeth. ”I needed a nuclear detonation to prove it. It took until the Marshall Islands until I could convince them to let me run a test.”
Daxin just nodded. He could feel the heat radiating off of her as her voice got tighter and tighter.
”Then that fucking big bug ripped out my fucking name!” Dee shrieked, jumping to her feet. She grabbed a beer bottle and threw it at the AI's hologram, the bottle whipping through it to smash into a video screen and shatter. ”Fucked with me! Fucked with my brain!”
She threw herself into the chair, folding her arms. ”I taught it a fucking lesson. Yes, I fucking did. Ripped that big bastard's brain right out of his fucking head and ate it right in front of him as he went with me through the first mat-trans. Everyone got to watch that fucking Lord Knight Mashram and his fucking pet 'Bound One' get their minds ripped apart right in front of them.”
She began to laugh again, rocking back and forth, holding her stomach.
Daxin just stared.
The Bound One, he thought. And Mashram. I wondered what happened to them.
Finally Dee wiped her eyes. ”I suckered that big idiot bug into replaying my memories of my first mat-trans, pulled him with me, ripped open both their skulls, and feasted on their thinky goo right in front of everyone there,” she giggled again.
”I knew Lord Knight Mashram,” Daxin started to say.
”Aw, did I kill one of your friends?” Dee said, her voice high pitched and mocking. She leaned back in the chair and put her hands under her belly button, over her inquinal ligament. ”Were you and the big bug and him gonna pick out curtains and have handjob Thursdays? Aw, it makes my vagina bones ache in sympathy.”
”You killed him before I could,” Daxin shrugged. ”He was an asshole who enjoyed what he was doing to people, and the Bound One was something I hated.”
Dee's smile vanished. ”Aw.”
”Last time I saw him, though, he had Peter with them. Did you see him?” Daxin asked.
”I saw a lot of people,” Dee's smile came back. ”Killed them all a few times too,” she waited a second then made a face when Daxin didn't take the bait. ”No. Never saw him.”
”So, between the last time I saw him and when you saw him, he dropped Pete off somewhere,” Daxin said. He tapped a finger on the table, the cybernetics clacking on the plastic surface. ”That might be useful.”
”He probably had the Bound One rip apart Pete's brain,” Dee laughed. ”Oh, make no mistake, he did a number on me. I just fought back the second time.”
”He wanted to show you that there was no hope against the Bound One,” Daxin said. He shook his head. ”He tried it on me but I was a little too...”
”Angsty? Sad about your favorite boy band breaking up? Oh, I know, you were a little too obsessed with the latest issue of Tiger Beat,” Dee guessed, smiling and bouncing up and down in the chair.
”I was going to say 'pissy', but sure, why not,” Daxin shrugged.
Dee made a face. ”I thought you were like the 'walking war crime', where's all that fury?”
Daxin sighed. ”I'm tired, Dee. I mean, I feel good, it was nice to help people again, but I'm still a little tired. I'm eight thousand years old.”
”Oh, wah wah wah,” Dee snapped. ”Do I need to kick you in the gut so your balls drop? The Jews survived the Holocaust I imagine you'll survive being a little tired.”
”Do you go out of your way to try and be offensive?” Daxin asked. ”You know, most of that doesn't work on me.”
Dee sighed. ”Truthfully? Yes,” she grabbed her expansive chest and squished everything around. ”I look like I'm smuggling cantaloupes, people see this honkers and as of then I'm simply a set of talking sweater meat.”
”So you go around naked,” Daxin smiled. ”If their brain is going to short circuit, let's just melt it down right out of the gate.”
Dee shot back a grin. ”Got it in one. You have no idea how many people have coughed up their lifeblood onto these milkers, with me moving around something sharp in their guts, and still can't look away from them even as I'm killing them.”
Daxin frowned. ”Does that really work?”
”It does on people who didn't leave their wang on a greasy cement chopshop floor next to a 350-V8 ripped out a Corvette,” Dee grinned.
”Huh. Weird. Different times, I guess,” Daxin said. He reached over and petted Fido's head. ”I didn't think you had random assassins running around killing people back then.”
Dee nodded slowly, all the humor gone from her face. ”We did. It's why my boys were so important to me. After some No Such Agency dipshit tried to make a run at me, I realized I was in just as much danger from my own government as the cock sucking Soviets.”
”The more things change,” Daxin chuckled.
”The more they stay the same,” Dee finished. She sighed and looked at the monitor. ”Oh, hey, the Incredible Multiple Man is there.”
Daxin looked down and petted Fido, keeping his face expressionless.
He'd had about enough 'truth' for the day.
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Dhruv felt his center bobble for a moment as he appeared in the room. The temperature drop was noticeable and he was pretty sure the station wasn't all that warm to begin with. He closed his eyes and a dozen of him peeled off of him, including three DS versions, all of them speeding away. He sent another order and felt the light cruiser come online and fire up its engines.
He'd be able to take the greenies home and take Peter back.
The space station was in rough shape. Most of the lights were out and he kept having to 'teleport' to the other side of blast doors. The cruiser burst out of Deadspace and moved slowly toward Theta Section, where there were a few lights and he could 'feel' the greenies huddled down.
It took him almost half an hour to find Marco/Peter.
The other man was sitting in one of the few warm and lit rooms, leaning against a nutriforge. He had a computer in his lap and was typing rapidly as Dhruv let his features shift.
”Peter,” Dhruv said gently, moving up to the other man and kneeling down.
The man looked up, his eyes haunted. He blinked a few times. ”Luke?”
”It's me, Peter,” Dhruv said softly. He brushed Peter's hair out of his face. ”It's me, brother.”
”You got here before I got to my legs,” Peter sobbed.
”I did, brother, I did this time,” Luke said.
”I killed them. The reset killed them,” Peter said, grabbing onto Dhruv and staring at him. ”I can't get the replication system back up, they're locked in the system. I killed them, Luke.”
Dhruv touched Peter's cheek. ”It's all right. It wasn't just you. Nobody's going to blame you.”
”I can fix it, Luke,” Peter said, looking down at the portable comp. ”I can fix it, I swear I can.”
”I know,” Dhruv said.
”I fixed it before. I can do it again,” Peter said. He looked at Dhruv with tears in his eyes. ”I can fix it again. I might not be able to get everyone back, but I can fix it again. You and me, Luke, we can save humanity again.”
Legion could feel the greenies were boarding the cruiser, the last of them making a rude gesture and a snarky equation toward the station itself and NSO in particular.
”We will, Peter, but first we have to save you,” Luke/Legion/Dhruv said.
Peter just nodded. He tapped a few keys on the computer. The lights dimmed slightly then came back up as Peter pulled a storage wafer carrier from the side of the computer.
”What about the Hellspace Breach?” Peter asked.
”I'll handle it, Pete,” Luke said. The waited until Peter put the wafer carrier on the chain around his neck.
Luke took his brother's hand. ”Let's go home, Pete. Close your eyes.”
The both vanished in a plume of twisting purple smoke that twisted back on itself, sucked into itself, and vanished.
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Dee looked up from the terminal. ”He's on his way back.”
Daxin just nodded.
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MANTID FREE WORLDS
Did anyone else feel that? It felt like an earthquake.
---NOTHING FOLLOWS---