Chapter 559: 4th & 10 (1/2)
”The best way to understand humanity is to understand one simple thing: A human's body, brain, and mind is made up of a semi-random assortment of things that all hate one another to the point of being able to destroy or damage any of the others. The thing is, they all hate you more.” - Former Grand Most High Sma'akamo'o, from I Have Ridden the Hasslehoff
General NoDra'ak watched with interest as the video playing, with Exquisite standing off the side on a hoverlift, showed the Terran Staff Sergeant being led into a room. He noted that the TDH had a white steri-plas hospital gown on him, heavy grav manacles, a collar, and a harness. His eyes were still wide, glowing a soft amber, and his mouth was twisted into a wide grin.
The two Tukna'rn infantrymen guided him into the chair as two others in full power armor stayed far enough back that they'd have time to pull the triggers on their SMG's if the Terran moved too quickly. The two Tukna'rn attached the grav-spike to the table, keeping the Terran's hands on the table, and moved away.
The Terran turned and looked at everyone, grinning.
”Y'all seem a mite bit nervous now,” the Terran said, his voice full of mirth.
The Tukna'rn didn't rise to the bait, just stared.
”Y'all boring,” Nimbly said, looking forward. He looked up at the camera, his grin getting wider.
Exquisite paused the video.
”Here, you can plainly see the evidence of phasic energy as well as Enragement,” she said, using a laser pointer to draw attention to the eyes, then down to the collar, which had small wire thin tendrils of bluish electricity moving across it. ”This interrogation room is psychically shielded as well as having phasic dampeners online.”
She clicked the handset and the video kept moving.
A russet mantid with a gold streak down her back came in and sat down, with a black mantid beside her. Nimbly's attention was pulled from the camera to the door a slight second before it opened and he watched as the two Mantids moved to the chairs.
”Hello,” Nimbly said, smiling.
”Good evening, Staff Sergeant Nimbly,” the Mantid, whose ER ID said ”Major Peeks Beyond Surfaces”, said gently.
”My, so formal,” Nimbly said. ”Good evening to you too, ma'am,” he looked at the black Mantid. ”Military intelligence enhanced reality blockout. I'm in the presence of planners and plotters.”
The black mantid nodded. ”Lieutenant Colonel Ever Vigilant Watcher,” he said.
Nimbly just nodded. ”Colonel.”
”How are you feeling, Sergeant?” Peeks asked.
”Better. I can tell this isn't another simulation,” Nimbly said. He smiled again. ”Wasn't sure at first. Sure now.”
Watcher cocked his head, his antenna flicking. ”How?”
Nimbly smiled. ”No Mantids in the simulation. At least, not in the parts I was in. Lots of Pubvians, Vulkerkin, Treana'ad, and Terrans. Even Rigellians and Kobolds. Saw most of the races that everyone had met by the Glassing, but nothing Post-Glassing,” Nimbly said. Somehow his grin got wider, his eyes widening. ”Even met a Treana'ad Digital Sentience, despite there never being a record of such a thing.”
He tapped his fingers on the table and NoDra'ak noticed a few sparks jump out.
Watcher nodded slowly. ”Have you ever been SUDS washed before?”
Nimbly's smile vanished. ”You tell me, snake.”
Watcher lifted up a bladearm and summoned a holoterminal.
Exquisite paused the video. ”We'll watch this in regular time, then in slow motion. I want all of you to see this, then understand exactly what you are seeing.” She unpaused it.
Alarms howled as Nimbly suddenly lunged forward. Something exploded under the table, the grav-manacles on his wrist showered sparks. The grav-cord between his wrists thinned and streaked.
Nimbly grabbed at the holodisplay that had just been summoned up in midair. It collapsed in his hand, wadding up, and sparks shot out, pixels showering away from where his hand had hit. Nimbly yanked his hand back as he sat down, the hologram tight in his fist.
It was over so fast that Tukna'rn had barely gotten their weapons lined up.
”I don't like holograms,” the Terran snarled.
Exquisite paused the video.
”You are seeing that right. He literally snatched the hologram. Somehow, he launched and attack reminiscent and with the digital fingerprint of a Post-Glassing warboi onto the hologram emitter and the buffer where the data was contained, damaging both irreparably,” Exquisite said softly. ”The data is completely held in his fist, and in his datalink.”
She rewound it and everyone watched in slow motion as the appearance of the hologram galvanized the Terran into action. General NoDra'ak paid particular attention to between the outstretched fingers, the eyes, and around the datalink on the side of the Terran's head.
Tiny, hair thin, almost invisible arcs of electricity were between the fingers, the eyes flashed to cold crimson in the depths that still did not blot out the cornflower blue of the eyes, and tiny threads of blue electricity spread out from the datalink across the skin.
NoDra'ak noticed that the words will still legible on the crumpled hologram, that it was bunched up exactly like if it had been paper.
The video went back to full speed.
Neither Tukna'rn moved as Peeks held up her left bladearm to stop them. ”Why not, Staff Sergeant?”
”Because holograms lie, they hide the truth, but most of all,” Nimbly said. He grabbed the hologram with both hands and twisted, shredding it into pixels that showered out of his hands and onto the table, where they bounced, glittered, and faded away. ”You don't know if they're watching you.”
Peeks and Watcher looked at one another a moment.
Peeks adjusted her ID tags around her neck, then nodded. ”According to your records you were killed during the Crevega Assault at the end of the Clownface Nebula Conflict,” she said.
Nimbly nodded. ”Someone put three shots into my back from an alley. Nobody ever found out who did it.”
Peeks just nodded.
Nimbly looked at Watcher. ”It was 12.5mm Low-V APERS, from a standard issue Confed Magac pistol. One in the back of my head, one into my spine between the shoulder blades, one into my heart from behind. Subsonic rounds, holographic camouflage, standard infantry boots,” he slowly started to smile. ”Wanna know what I think, spook?”
Peeks cleared her throat. ”We're more interested in what happened when your life functions terminated.”
Nimbly stared at the black Mantid for a long moment, silent, just smiling. Then he shook his head. ”I remember staring at the gutter. It was raining and there was water in the gutter. Everything went black, I woke up in the hospital after having been rebooted. Only time anyone managed to whack me.”
Peeks nodded. ”This time was different?”
Nimbly stared at her. ”As different as you and me, sister.”
”Major,” Peeks corrected.
”Major,” Nimbly smiled.
Exquisite paused the video and rewound it, showing the byplay again. ”Here we see a major change in Staff Sergeant Nimbly's personality. Prior to his death during Second Hesstla, he was extremely self-disciplined, noted for professionalism. Even after his 'death by misadventure', he was still professional and showed no hostility to covert action operatives, Mantids, or anyone else, chalking up his death as a case of mistaken identity.”
She looked at everyone gathered. ”This version is highly aggressive, agitated, and provocative.”
She started the video again.
”Will you describe the last time?” Peeks asked.
Nimbly smiled wider. ”I spent three weeks camping on a storm swept beach, just me, staring at the gray cloud covered sky, the gray water with white edging on the waves, the wind, the blackish gray sand, the grey rocks. I made a fire with driftwood, found some flotsam and jetsam and made a shelter, and ate fish.”
”Before the Second Battle of Hesstla?” Peeks asked.
”No. After I was killed. After I was released from what the nurses called 'Traumatic Death Recovery' and allowed to wander around the waiting zone,” Nimbly said. ”My nurse was a Pubvian woman. I'd never seen one before.”
Peeks nodded. ”Can we back up. To the moment you died.”
Nimbly nodded. ”It didn't hurt. I was beyond pain. Jacked up on stims, anti-rad meds, coagulants, and the good ol' Alley Bama Trucker's Friend, or, at least its equivalent about ten thousand years later,” Nimbly said. He started laughing and NoDra'ak noticed he sounded half crazed.
But NoDra'ak had been an officer for centuries. He'd heard laughter like that.
Usually when a Terran was pushed until his back was against the wall and there was no hope.
His brain made an odd connection, and he suddenly heard the sound of a choir of young Terran female children singing Ave Imperator.
Across the battlefront, the sounds of conflict grew quite still, and were silenced as one the soldiers once again cling to their prayers, when the amount of hope left is none
His medical harness hissed as it gave him a shot to restore his focus.
I will show no fear this night