Boss King and the Blade

Jay’s Mobile Workshop, the Wastelands

Jason and Jacinta

Jason was in the laboratory, running more tests on the unusual blood sample when the call came through. Jacinta got to the phone first, her conjoined brain only partly occupied watching Sou-Kor dramas that she streamed directly into her cortex.

“Zeke!” she exclaimed using their shared voice box. “What’s gone wrong now?”

“Hi Jay” came the chirpy tones of their mutual friend. Jacinta often wondered if he knew the truth about them, that there were two distinct minds occupying the one body. “Why do you assume there is anything wrong? Maybe I just called you to say hello?”

“It’s nearly dusk and you should be lounging on the roof of your RV with an Espresso Martini, watching the sun go down” Jacinta replied. “You would only call me at this time if the world was on fire”

“Hah! You know me too well, Jay” he answered, then his tone sobered. “You’re right though. Those kids you helped, Boss King and Melody, they got attacked at their home earlier today”

“I heard about it” Jacinta acknowledged. “The same ones who tried to infiltrate the Central Markets?”

“Yeah” Zeke confirmed. “Looks like they are going to make another attempt on the kids, but it is too far from the Hole for my drones. I need to ask you a big favour”

“I’m not a Freelancer, Zeke” she reminded him. “This is just a mobile workshop, fixing people up for a reasonable price. I don’t fight in wars anymore”

The line was silent for a moment, only the sounds of distant music and the cries of stall holders audible as Jacinta listened with all of her attention.

“They’re just kids, Jay” Zeke said at last. “I’m calling in what other help I can, but you have the best chance of reaching them in time”

Jacinta turned her mind to Jason, sensing he had abandoned his research and was paying close attention to this call as well.

“How about it, partner?” she asked him via their own special link.

“Give me the co-ordinates Zeke” Jason answered for them both. “I’ll break out Ol’ Betsy for one last time”

“Copy that” Zeke responded. “I’m sending you the data now. Check your stream”

“Will do” Jacinta said. “You’ll owe me big time for this one”

“Sure” Zeke agreed easily. “Just take care, both of you. I don’t have many friends left”

He ended the call and Jason and Jacinta turned to each other in their shared world.

“Guess he knows” Jacinta said with a mental shrug.

=====

The Slippery Sod, Fisherman’s Wharf, Port August

Bloody Sunset

“Hey Boss, the sensors detected multiple vehicles leaving the SAND warehouse” Sunset yelled from where she sat on the forward deck of the Slippery Sod. She had a datapad in her hands, monitoring the remote devices while she ate her supper.

“I figured that would be the case” Hammer yelled in reply, striding along the middle deck in her direction. “I just had a call from the Guild. They are calling in our marker for the last mission, so get your gear on and head to the bikes”

“It’s for the girl?” she queried, setting her plate of fish curry on the rusty decking. “We aren’t going to hurt her are we?” There was a note of urgent concern in her voice that made Hammer pause and lock his eyes with hers.

“Course not!” he grinned. “The kid is coming here with a couple of protectors, but our Mister and his friends are going to try and stop them. Our job is to make sure the kid gets to Port August in one piece”

“Cool!” Sunset replied. “That’s the kind of mission I like!”

“Me too, kiddo, me too” he agreed.

=====

Distribution Warehouse, outskirts of Port August

Harmony-Three

“We are en-route now, Mister August” Harmony-Three advised the Envoy. He was considered the trusted hand of the Hive Father, his word being the words of the blessed leader. Yet he had none of the charisma that the Hive Father projected whenever he transmitted words of encouragement and praise to the followers.

Mister August was a hollow shell she reckoned, simply a vessel like a cup or bottle that relayed their Father’s words to his people. He had little of the warmth that Alex-Four showered on the Agents and Blades, rather he was as cold as a Guard clone.

She shrugged such heretical thoughts aside, concentrating on the mission ahead. Her team had barely returned to the base in Port August, exhausted and nursing injuries, when the order had come to deploy once more. It was no surprise that she was being sent against the clone woman and the children, perhaps in the hope this time the Agents would be victorious.

Harmony wondered whether the girl would manifest her Shadows and use them against the Hive. The very thought sent a shiver down her spine, that a Heretic should have such mastery of the Hive Father’s gift. This girl, Melody-Six, was not a Shadow Blade she decided. That was too inadequate a description for the power the girl had shown her.

Melody-Six was a Shadow Master!

Thursday, October 2046

Guard van, En-Route to Port August

Melody-Six

“They’re coming” Melody said. “I can feel it like a buzz in my head, like a vibration in the air”

Trixie was checking the road ahead, her green eye glowing brightly as she tried to pierce the dark road before them. The van’s headlights shone for a hundred meters on the wide highway, yet the only thing visible were the white painted markers flanking either side as they flashed past. Beyond the glare of headlights everything else was impenetrable blackness.

“I believe you, Melody” Trixie assured her. “Whatever that stuff is inside of your blood, it gives you Abilities I have never seen before. You are not an Awakened, I think it is something far more powerful”

Melody felt gratified in a way, that the woman acknowledged the shadows lying within her. They were indeed more powerful than Melody had expected, greater perhaps than the Shadow Blades she had met in her Nest. She remembered seeing what Eleanor-Two had been capable of, as well as what it had cost her.

She held her right arm up and examined it, thinking how it felt when she had summoned the Shadows without conscious effort to save Trixie. Her blade had severed the induction cable with incredible precision, avoiding any injury to the big woman. There had been no pain at all, either forming the blade or drawing it back into her flesh.

There had been no appreciable fatigue either, as if her body was drawing on some other power source to fuel the Shadows.

“It’s an arm” Boss King offered sarcastically from his seat in the rear. “You’ve seen those before, haven’t you?” He held up his own pair in demonstration. “See, I’ve got them too”

Melody was tempted to call forth her Shadows on the boy, but common sense prevailed. She couldn’t help but notice the small hole punched through the driver’s window next to Trixie. For all the control she had shown in cutting away the cable, she had made the blade longer than it needed to be.

“Mine are cuter” she replied instead, making light of the danger they knew was coming. The buzzing in her head grew more intense and she stole a glance at Trixie. “See anything yet?”

“Yeah, I’m afraid so” Trixie replied. “Two vans at least coming towards us, running without lights. Strap yourselves in tight, the Hive has found us”

Melody could feel the Agents in the vehicles, sensing their presence by the traces of Shadow they carried in their blood. They were her enemies and her family at the same time.

“Please don’t hurt them, Trixie” she asked her companion. “They don’t understand how much they have been lied to”

“I’ll try not to” Trixie conceded grimly. “Depends on if they know the game of Chicken. Brace yourselves, this could end very badly”

“Chicken?” shouted Boss King, trying to look over their shoulders as the van began to accelerate. “Are you crazy? What if they don’t let us through?”

“That’s easy, Boss King” Trixie assured him with a mad grin. “We’ll stop really fast, or at least the van will”

=====

Leading Hive Van, halfway to Port August

Harmony-Three

“That’s definitely them!” Harmony declared to her team, sitting beside Simon-Three as they raced through the dark night. Her new helmet visor displayed the world in shades of black and greys, the oncoming Police van lit up with its own headlights. “Vehicle Two, hold formation with us! We need to force them to stop”

“Copy that, Vehicle One” came the reply over her helmet earpiece. The second van slid in place alongside, the two vehicles effectively blocking the width of the highway as they raced towards the target. A third van laden with extra equipment lagged behind by fifty meters, trailing in the wake of Harmony’s lead vehicle.

Harmony watched with rising concern as the Police van rushed towards them, lining itself up on the white painted centre-line of the highway. Her helmet display advised that the vehicles were approaching at a combined speed close to one hundred and eighty kilometres per hour.

“Don’t yield, brothers and sisters!” she commanded into her microphone, linking her to all of the Agents. “The blessing of the Hive Father is with us!”

The oncoming vehicle stayed resolutely in the centre of the road, its headlights blazing into her eyes. At less than thirty metres to impact, the van exploded with light and sound! Sirens screamed and red and blue lights dazzled from multiple points on the roof and front.

“Arrgh!” yelled Simon-Three and instinctively jerked the steering wheel, sending their van crashing into the white posts that lined the highway. There was a savage thump as the Police van barrelled past, tearing the side mirrors from her van and forcing them into the shallow drainage ditch along the road edge.

Harmony screamed in panic, all thoughts of the Hive forgotten as the van fish-tailed between the tarmac and gravel road edge, ripping the marker posts from the ground as they went. With a final shower of dirt and dust, the van skidded to a stop and silence fell.

“Vehicle Two, do you copy?” Harmony breathed into her microphone, feeling bruised and raw from where the seat harness had kept her alive. They took some moments to reply in a voice as shaky as her own had been.

“We copy” came the response. “I think we are in the ditch so it may take us a while to get back onto the road”

“Vehicle Three is still mobile” came another voice over the shared channel. “What are your orders, Agent Harmony?”

“Launch your drones, Vehicle Three” she answered, her voice regaining its composure. “Vehicle Two, leave anything you can’t carry and we’ll pick you up”

“Copy that!” her Agents confirmed. Harmony spared a glance at Simon-Three, his gloved hands still locked in terror on the steering wheel. She reached out and laid her own hand on his shoulder, making him turn towards her.

“You did well, Simon” she assured him. “That clone woman had to be driving the van, because no human would be so reckless”

“Thank you, Harmony” he mumbled in reply. “I am sorry I let her past. I won’t fail you next time”