Variance Read online

  Praise for Book 1 of Raise Your Weapon,

  Variance

  “A grand, epic, upbeat sci-fi adventure with an anime influence.”

  - Kirkus Indie - A review service from Kirkus Reviews

  “Variance is an energetic novel with a lightning-fast pace.” - Foreword Clarion Reviews

  “An adrenaline-fueled thrill ride seasoned with a hint of family values that will satisfy action junkies and video gamers alike.” - The BookLife Prize

  “A fascinating story, delightful and with a satisfying ending. A masterpiece!” - Christian Sia for Readers’ Favorite

  RAISE YOUR WEAPON

  VARIANCE

  JOSEN LLAVE

  VARIANCE

  RAISE YOUR WEAPON

  Copyright © 2017 Josen Llave.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  iUniverse

  1663 Liberty Drive

  Bloomington, IN 47403

  www.iuniverse.com

  1-800-Authors (1-800-288-4677)

  Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

  Illustrations by Bartosz Siegieda

  ISBN: 978-1-5320-1280-8 (sc)

  ISBN: 978-1-5320-1279-2 (hc)

  ISBN: 978-1-5320-1281-5 (e)

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2017902021

  iUniverse rev. date: 09/21/2017

  To the woman who turned me into a midwife, the girl who named a lizard Lost and Found, and the boy who sends his balloons into space.

  Acknowledgments

  I want to thank the following: my wife, Vicarose, for supporting me and putting up with my writing and brainstorming for so many years; the experienced and friendly staff at iUniverse for helping me with my dream of publishing a novel; Rances, who provided a Surface and chatted about the story for years; Scott A. Jones, an awesome, experienced sci-fi editor and mentor who provided superb, quality critiques and feedback; Bartosz Siegieda, an incredibly talented illustrator who surprised me with his breathtaking illustrations and attention to scientific detail; Jackie and Jacobi for reading revision after revision and not giving up on me—or excommunicating me; Jenny, Kristine, and Cathy for providing feedback throughout the development of the story; the founder and staff of the National November Writing Month for pushing writers to write; NaNoWriMo fellows Amy and Rob for book swapping (I hope both of you achieve your dream of publishing too); Tim for being the victim of countless involuntary brainstorming lunches; and Riki and Jhun for brainstorming. I also want to thank Deadmau5 for the song “Raise Your Weapon” and Noisia for remixing it, because without that song, the idea of this book would not exist. Thanks also to the creators of Final Fantasy VII, VIII, and XI for expanding my imagination; Nobuo Uematsu for enhancing my imagination with his music; Stan Lee for creating X-Men; George Lucas for creating Star Wars; The Matrix; my army buddies, who, since 2001, believed that I would one day write a book; and the Llave, Schwartz, Santos, Badulis, Tangonan, Coughlin, O’Brien, Clave, Delacruz, and Enriquez families—gotta represent. Most importantly, I want to thank my dad, Jose; my mom, Luz; my stepmom, Alicia; my mother-in-law, Rosita; and my other mother-in-law, Ligaya.

  Contents

  1 Opportunity

  2 Engineering

  3 Endeavor

  4 Perspective

  5 Differences

  6 B1-S-CW

  7 B2-F-CW

  8 B3-W-CW

  9 Radiance

  10 W1-S-HR

  11 W2-F-HR

  12 W3-W-HR

  13 WX-X-X

  SOL SYSTEM

  PRISM’S MOON—XAMEESHEE

  AZURE—FIVE TREES OF FOREST OMICRON

  XAMEESHEE—DIVINE MIGHT STADIUM

  1

  Opportunity

  HE WAS THE ONLY UTOPIAN traveling toward danger. He should not have been there.

  Paul Benedict sprinted on a smooth grass field as sleek outbound trains zipped beside him and transport ships thundered above. In organized lines, millions of people were walking away from the burning structural fragments plummeting from a nearby tree, a five-thousand-kilometer-high conical archology. The fragments broke through a layer of clouds and thumped against the tree’s sloped crystal-white facade. Bright red explosions highlighted the clouds.

  He slowed to a jog as he approached a crowd. Having commuted and sprinted for hours, he straightened his blue polymer Azurian jacket. Those around him donned their best outing attire, perfectly shaped and colorful polymer sundresses and suits, in addition to their smiles and unshakable happiness. Paul was not smiling.

  In the distance, the tree fragments whistled and crashed into the ground. The impacts shook the earth under his feet. Everyone else continued walking away. He paused, petrified at the rising dust cloud.

  What am I doing? Someone else can save Azure, right? He wished he could avoid adapting to his newfound emotions of anxiety and doubt.

  His Visuals, the neural-optical interface that projected images in three dimensions directly onto his visual cortex, flooded his view with data on translucent virtual panels. The hazard-recognition program highlighted the dust cloud and tracked the trajectories of falling debris. It warned him to evacuate the area. His medical interface ordered him to relax and breathe.

  Breathe. As he took a deep breath and exhaled, another warning appeared: “Danger. Consistent atypical Utopian conduct. Cellular Infinity unable to maintain immortality and perfection. Remain in place for evaluation.”

  If he retreated and pretended nothing was happening, as everyone else was, he could keep his privilege of immortality and a perfect life with his family—if the aliens did not kill them. If he continued forward, he would face mortality but could potentially protect his family from the aliens—if the aliens did not kill him.

  He brought up the profile pictures of his wife, Amaryllis, and his two daughters, Statice and Lily. Like the fire in the sky, Amaryllis’s wavy auburn hair contrasted with her ice-blue eyes and her silky, smooth skin. Statice was an adolescent copy of Amaryllis, except her pale skin resembled the complexion of his fear-stricken face. Like the people around him, Lily donned a smile that stretched from cheek to cheek, except her smile was the most beautiful smile and could bring him peace.

  Distant rumbles and explosions brought him back to reality. Through a telepathy interface called Audials, Paul Audialed to his family, “I received the warning.” Chills ran through his body. He shuddered at every explosion and rumble in the distance.

  Amaryllis appeared and replaced her icon. She Audialed, “You are brave. Just follow the path. They’re attempting to negotiate with one of the scouts right now. This is our best chance at getting any viable data from the Crimson armor.”

  Paul knew Amaryllis’s calm composure contradicted her high heart rate, which appeared on his Visuals.

  Statice, their older daughter, leaned forward. “You have fifteen minutes after the final warning before the medical drones abduct you. Wi
thout the data, we can’t engineer the battle suit.”

  Paul had expected such an informative and accurate response from her—something he did not need.

  Lily’s eyes gleamed as she stepped in front of Statice. “We’re in this together, Dad.”

  Paul could only see Lily’s eyes from the camera’s view, but they told him everything she felt—hope. It was exactly what he needed for motivation.

  He nodded. Don’t stop. He moved the images aside to his peripheral view. Amaryllis prescribed a path through Visuals, and he sprinted toward the base of the attacked tree.

  After sprinting for three kilometers, he reached a dusty area of rubble and craters. For the first time in his life, he noticed a layer of perspiration on his forehead. He had never sweated before. Deformed pieces of metal covered in dirt mixed with blood caught his attention. As he stepped closer to inspect in disbelief, the air burned his nostrils.

  Also for the first time in his life, he coughed and heaved, spitting saliva and stomach fluid. White dust clumped on his forehead. He scanned for falling debris. A layer of clouds flowed around the tree with several breaks that revealed the damaged upper levels.

  This is insane.

  Amaryllis Audialed, “You’re clear from above. There’s no movement. You have to keep going, honey.”

  Paul continued into the building lobby, where thousands of people were evacuating. Families carried on with casual conversations, while others laughed and shared food. He saw not a single hint of fear or urgency.

  How were they able to remain calm even with Cellular Infinity? He could not act normally, knowing that the killer aliens were right above them and that the tree might crush them. His arms shook. He crossed them in front of his chest to stabilize them.

  Several strangers took notice and gazed at him as if his behavior were more unnatural than an alien attack. With care, he weaved his way around the crowds and entered an empty elevator to return upward. Through Visuals commands, he directed the elevator to rise to the four hundredth floor, the location of a Crimson scout. He leaned against the doors, away from the window, and the elevator rushed him upward.

  As he approached the upper levels, several moments of vibration slowed the elevator down, causing its alarm to go off. He screamed at every ring, expecting the elevator to fall at any moment. With a slow shuffle, he looked out the window toward the tree’s glowing blue central energy core and found falling debris.

  He jumped back with a yelp. The elevator stopped, and as its doors opened, turbulent wind and black smoke rushed in. Paul covered his ears as a louder alarm pierced his eardrums. Again, he coughed his lungs out.

  A break in the smoke occurred every several seconds. Amaryllis brought up another line for Paul to follow. He moved a hand over his mouth, tasting sweat, dust, and smoke, as the alarm stung his exposed eardrum. He reached for a small, rectangular detector attached to his polymer suit and detached it.

  There is no way I can do this.

  He stepped out of the elevator and walked a few meters along the path. A surge of wind pushed him a step back, clearing the area around him for a few seconds. The elevator disappeared.

  That could’ve been me in that elevator. He circled around aimlessly, forgetting his path.

  “You have to follow the path.” The inconvenient alarm overpowered Statice’s Audial voice.

  Paul could not take a deep breath to relax.

  His Visuals failed to detect anything through the smoke, while warnings appeared everywhere for him to evacuate. He ran and quickly tripped, slamming and screeching against the floor. His shin and face ached. He closed one eye at the pain and dirt. Warnings from his health interface erupted before him. He moved the messages aside, stood up, and shuffled forward, kicking his feet at every step.

  The floor rocked in every direction, accompanied by monstrous creaking and cracking. This is impossible.

  He reached an intensely heated area. Sweat dripped and burned into his eyes. He rubbed his eyes with the sleeve of his polymer suit, blurring his vision.

  He Audialed, “I can’t see or breathe.” He had never felt so uncomfortable in his life.

  “You’re almost … There’s a scout on the other side of … We can’t see any other way around. All but one camera … side is destroyed. It’ll take an hour to walk around and … Something’s keeping it in place.” Waves of deep reverberation with fire crackling broke up Amaryllis’s message. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry.” Paul inhaled what burning air he could. “I love you all.” Even his mental voice choked with smoke.

  Through the camera, he saw himself covered in dirt and black streaks. Smoke soot lined his chiseled jaw, and gray dust covered his sleek brown hair. Noticing the opening beyond the smoke, he shuffled back, returned the detector onto his back, and oriented his body toward the heat.

  I’ve made it this far. Here we go.

  With eyes closed and hands over his face, he screamed and ran. Heat burned the backs of his hands and sizzled the sweat on his forehead. He jumped as high as he could and tucked his body inward. He landed on his side and rolled until he bumped into an object.

  Hot potato.

  His scalp burned, and he patted it down. The pain turned into numbness as daylight appeared in his blurry vision. As he lay on the floor, he rubbed his eyes and found a man in a blue Azurian cloak lined with pulsing lights. The man was standing between him and the alien. Others stood around, all looking at him.

  The scout, who had a humanlike body, wore a full, muscular armored suit of reflective black and gray panels that blurred and hummed. A small red circle was positioned in the center of the aerodynamic helmet.

  The man in the cloak was Azurian leader Kynast. Kynast was the best person to help Paul and his family mass-produce a defense suit against the Crimson invasion. Kynast looked at him and then looked back at the Crimson scout. The presence of both beings stole what breath Paul had left after all the smoke inhalation. He remembered what he needed to do and detached his detector.

  Without movement, the scout pulled Kynast closer. Paul grabbed at Kynast’s ankle but missed. Kynast screamed louder than the alarms as his body contorted and shrank in size. The cracking and snapping of bones replaced the gaps of the alarm’s silence. Blood erupted and then returned to Kynast’s body like a solar flare. Kynast’s remains of bloody mush and fibrous muscle floated centimeters away from the scout’s body. Paul ignored the critical data populating in front of him.

  Is this real? His planet’s leader had just been assassinated in a disgusting and horrific execution.

  Paul and others, except for a man also wearing an Azurian leadership cloak, involuntarily drew toward the scout. Paul screamed, dropped the detector, and struggled against the gravitational pull to run away.

  This is it. He was not going to see his family anymore. He began to text his family his last words while sprinting in place.

  The man in the Azurian cloak stepped between Paul and the scout, and the pull on him ceased. While others shrank into their spherical matter, a green curtain of energy danced around him. The scout moved a step forward, and the light intensified.

  Paul made eye contact with the man. From the shared expression of fear and widened eyes, he knew the man acted out of impulse and was just as scared as he was. Paul accidentally kicked the detector, and it slid in between the scout’s legs. The gravitational force caused it to elevate, fall, and slide close to the edge of a gaping hole in the tree’s exterior wall. With no means of escape except for the blaze through which he’d entered, he knew he had to grab the detector and continue getting data.

  This is going to hurt.

  Hoping his body would not compress, he ran around, and the man followed, staying between him and the scout. The voices of his family calling out to him echoed in the chaos around him. He grabbed the detector, and the building swayed. He lost his balance. Hi
s body slammed against the edge with one leg dangling down the four-thousand-meter drop.

  Although his scream dwindled into an airy squeal, he continued screaming. He raised his leg over the edge and crawled away. He looked across at the tree’s pentagonal formation, and his scream turned into a chuckle. I almost died.

  In a whoosh, the scout vanished, and the man remained. He pulled Paul up and shook him. In a raspy voice, he yelled, “Are you crazy?”

  Paul Audialed, “Sir …” Piles of bloody masses covered the floor. He cleared his throat. “Can you please get me out of here? The main entrance—”

  The man held Paul tightly at his suit’s collar and dragged him back to the edge. Paul tried to brake himself by pushing his feet to get away. He let out a squeaky scream.

  The man used his body weight to keep Paul right at the edge. “Stop squirming. I’m waiting for my ship to—”

  Paul attempted to jerk his body toward the room. Instead, turbulent wind, the unstable tree, and his unbalanced posture rocked both of them off the edge. Instead of dying at the hands of an alien, he would fall to his death because of another defective Utopian. He began to text his last words while tumbling.

  The loud air resistance deafened his ears as the alarms faded away. The top section of the tree collapsed onto itself and crashed toward them. Plumes of pulverized dust and debris exploded and chased after them with rapid acceleration.

  He cried. His family screamed.

  His text read, “Iiiiiiii AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAhhh loooooooooove.”

  A green oval-shaped spaceship banked in front of them and flew downward, aligned with their freefall path. A hatch opened, and they entered the ship. Black material projected out of the floor and encapsulated their bodies. The suit oriented his body at a reclined angle perpendicular to the floor, and the ship’s oval interior displayed the outside chaos in full view.