Variance Read online

  Paul smacked his head while closing his eyes as hard as he could. “Pela, give me an opening. I’ll take care of this myself. Follow my lead if you want.”

  Pela waited for Ryan’s command.

  “Pela, now.” Paul hovered down and stepped on the bottommost drones. Their surfaces steamed as they cooled down.

  The drones crawled away, and Paul descended into an inferno. The outer layers of his suit burned while Siren continued to cycle, cool, and repair material. Flames swirled around him and out of his turbines. He reactivated his Visuals and found the remaining twenty combatants fighting for the stronghold.

  “What are we doing, Paul?” Siren flew facing him with her back toward the stronghold.

  “With everyone fighting, no one will be able to gain time. We’ll save as many people as we can. We have to redeem ourselves somehow for what you’ve done.”

  Siren jerked her head back. “You’re blaming me?”

  Ryan highlighted several eagles approaching them. “Nyle, Corda, take care of the birds.”

  “Are you listening to me?” The fire covering Siren swayed away, with Amaryllis taking her place.

  Sounds dulled to silence around Paul. He stopped breathing and tried to make sense of the fire dancing around Amaryllis. “Amy?”

  “Paul?” Amaryllis’s soft voice reached him loud and clear. She touched his face.

  He touched her hand with his. “Is this real?”

  “Paul.” Siren repeated his name as her image replaced Amaryllis. “You’re seeing things. I had to sync with your brain to control you. You were heading toward a dragon’s mouth.”

  Two minutes remained. An immobile Abstract fighter falling down appeared in view. “There.” Paul soared toward the fighter. “Pela, I need a few drones on my tail.”

  Drones appeared by his side, and Paul reached the fighter. He lassoed the fighter and pulled the fighter onto a few drones. Several shockwaves rocked him from above, followed by pieces of smoking and burning metal falling around him.

  Pela spoke with uncertainty. “I have a damaged Legacy fighter. I don’t know if—”

  “Try your best. One minute and fifteen seconds remaining.” Chains of blasts intensified, and more shockwaves passed through his body. Siren countered the blast waves and prevented his lungs from collapsing.

  Cyprian hovered within the stronghold. “Safe so far.”

  “I saved another crippled fighter.” Nyle hovered next to Paul. He pushed the fire away in a wide dome of cool air and held on to the legs of a Frequency fighter.

  An eagle whooshed past Paul and took Nyle and the other fighter down into the fire. He followed and tried to keep up.

  Nyle’s camera flickered. “Critically damaged. Ejecting.”

  “I’ve got you.” Paul soared as Siren locked on to Nyle.

  Nyle’s suit exploded, emitting a glowing blue light that engulfed and vanquished the fire around him. The clashing energies created a moment of silence, only for the fire to overcome the explosion and burn the ejected cockpit.

  Paul’s tentacles grabbed Nyle and spread a thin protective layer of material over the surface. A team managed to force everyone, including Cyprian, out of the stronghold. They accumulated time from zero seconds.

  Thirty seconds remained.

  “Cyprian, get back in there.” Ryan swung and jabbed his sword at an eagle that tried to rip his shield apart.

  A green curtain of energy kept Cyprian at a distance. “I can’t.”

  “Their Frequency fighter has terraform-grade barriers.” Corda flew around the boundary.

  “I’ll take Nyle.” Pela carried Nyle off Paul’s hands.

  Paul launched toward the green energy.

  Siren highlighted the field and used the data to calculate the expected damage. “We might not make it.”

  “Fuck it.”

  Paul cut through the field and cut the team’s time at eighteen seconds. Siren cycled material in fluidic motion but failed to delay the material from freezing. He let out a sharp shriek.

  The tip of a disintegrating harpoon from a Legacy fighter pushed him forward and pierced his back, ten centimeters to the left of his spine and just below his lowest rib bone, knocking the wind out of him. All he could think about was how he had failed to detect the attack.

  “Stay with me. Keep on fighting.” Siren ejected the harpoon, and he fell downward. She broke his descent with enough material to generate small turbines but ran out of material to cover his wound.

  The wound sizzled with a stinging sensation that turned numb. He was vulnerable. He was dying.

  Was this how things would end?

  The battle interface clock counted down from ten seconds.

  Siren disappeared, along with most of his interfaces. Outlines of his family’s faces appeared in the fire. Caring less about where his dying body sailed, he reached out to them. They smiled, laughed, and screamed with distinct tears. Their faces blurred, and the fire and radiation vanished, replaced by a clear view of the scorched giant sand dunes of Forever Summer.

  Pela’s drones hovered under him as his turbines froze. The drones lowered him toward the ground with his team flying nearby. He heard nothing except a constant high-pitched tone in his brain.

  Paul could see the distorted images of his teammates talking to him on his Visuals. He could not understand or hear what they were saying. He could not think except to process the things that moved around him. He could not speak, but he felt drool dripping down his lips. With effort and whatever material he had left, he rolled himself over and faced the sky.

  Dull booms erupted overhead. Colorful fireworks filled the skies as the crowd’s cheers filled the arena. Terraformers rose into the atmosphere and disappeared behind the clouds. The hexagonal force field panels withered away.

  He spoke through Audials with great difficulty. “Siren?”

  Siren’s voice sounded low, tired, and deep within his mind. “Yes, Paul?”

  Was death emptiness? Or was this like the other times he had gone unconscious?

  “I’m going to close my eyes for a second.”

  She replied in an inaudible whisper.

  With nothing else to do to stop dreading death, he closed his eyes and hoped to awaken inside a medical capsule again.

  Don’t let me die. Don’t let me die. Don’t …

  11

  W2-F-HR

  A CALM BLUE LIGHT WOKE PAUL. He felt like a spirit separated from his body. A much larger medical capsule lid raised upward, and he found himself inside his team’s building. His Visuals rebooted. Thirteen days to live. No, twelve. He was not sure if he could handle another near-death experience. He felt brain-dead.

  He sat up. Ryan and Corda had brand-new Legacy suits fitted with large plates of Variance and large mechanical limbs. Nyle’s new Frequency suit stood at the same height as the Legacy suit. Pela’s Controller suit was a massive ball of drones. Siren was standing next to a tall Variance suit that stood at the original height of a Frequency suit.

  Siren turned and smiled. She approached Paul and picked up a plate of food from the briefing table. “How are you feeling?”

  Shit.

  “Morning, champ.” Ryan saluted Paul while walking to the capsule. “Briefing will take place on the flight to Forever Fall. The arena’s not far.”

  Murderer.

  Paul took the plate from Siren and placed it to the side. Siren transferred some of her material from her body and covered him in a bodysuit. Pent-up rage billowed from his emptiness as he stared at Ryan.

  “Whoa. What’s wrong?” Ryan shrugged.

  Paul remained silent. He was not sure what he wanted to say.

  “I’m really sorry, Paul. We all are. And we did what we could to save others. We saved five other fighters.” Ryan shook his head and stepped away.

  They’
d also killed four fighters directly and four fighters indirectly.

  Siren leaned in to touch his knee. “We had to.”

  Paul swiped her hand off his knee. He slid off the capsule and stumbled his way out of the massive gate toward the morning sunrise, with Prism’s orange glow peeking over the horizon. Siren followed him.

  Somewhere in the middle of the grass field, colorful fires surrounded him. He kept himself from screaming as the burning sensation told him the fire was real. As his throat revved into a scream, the fire disappeared. He spun around and found Siren standing behind him.

  He patted his face and body. Everything felt normal.

  “Some of your intestines and organs were replaced. You had radiation poisoning. You almost died this time.” She kept her distance.

  “Siren, since when did you become a killer?” He remembered preventing her from taking a Legacy fighter’s life.

  “I was thinking about you and your family. The entire team and your goal would’ve died hours ago if I hadn’t done something. You have to make up your mind. There was one point when I had to stop you from injuring someone. Remember?”

  Cyprian was not the one who had murdered a whole team singlehandedly. Siren had betrayed Paul. He stepped toward her with hands ready to grip her at her shoulders.

  She stepped back and closed her eyes.

  He held back, gritting his teeth with rage. “What the hell are you doing killing people? You used an innocent boy to take the lives of others. A little fucking boy! You put blood on his hands, and he’s Utopian.”

  Pela ran from the gate. The rest of the team watched.

  Paul’s hands turned into trembling fists around Siren’s shoulders. She cried shiny blue tears. “I thought you were better than that,” he said. “I thought you were smarter than that.”

  “Paul, please. Siren is just like any other human—a woman. She saved your life. She saved all of us. And speaking as a Utopian …” Pela looked for words on the ground.

  “It could’ve been worse,” Siren said, continuing Pela’s thought. “I calculated everything and minimized the number of casualties on our part. Please understand that I tried my best.”

  Something about Siren made him want to punch and kiss her. He shook his head. “Dammit, Siren. I just hoped for a different version of the championship—one without you killing. We are not Kazats. I’m trying to set an example of our purity through this fucking game.”

  Pela lowered Paul’s hands away from Siren. “Siren didn’t kill the fighters. Nyle dealt the final blow. She just helped disable the fighters. I know it sounds wrong, but it’s war, Paul. Death is inevitable on both sides, regardless of race or beliefs. You can’t seriously believe that disabling fighters and ships would not result in casualties. Didn’t you guys think about that?”

  Paul grew defensive. “Of course we did.” Pela was right. “I had a different mind-set back then.”

  “I’m sorry, Paul. This is reality.” Pela bowed her head and turned away. “We have to leave.”

  Had he been living a false dream all along? He believed in taking a clean path to victory, but he felt depressed that a fellow Utopian accepted taking someone else’s life. Shadow and Kaiser were right: he was changing. Why bother with the process then? He might as well kill everyone with his powerful murder weapon.

  Fuck it, right?

  Siren stepped toward him and wrapped her arms around his chest. “No, Paul. We are not like Shadow. We are better than that. We were forced into a situation. Please forgive me. We are still good. You are still good.”

  He used to be perfect. Xameeshee had sculpted him into a monster. He was more monster than pure. Would that matter in the end? He wanted to kill Shadow anyway, right?

  He took a deep breath. “How did it feel?”

  Was it satisfying? he wondered. Did Siren feel the pulse of the human heartbeat when her material pierced through flesh?

  “It wasn’t satisfying. But knowing that we could live another day and that you were one step closer to seeing your family again, I didn’t let it bother me. I promise not to get in your way again. Just know that I will do anything I can to keep you—keep us—alive.” She leaned in to give him a hug.

  Would Amy want to see him hugging another woman? Maybe that was why he kept envisioning her.

  Siren looked into his eyes.

  No, Siren.

  His heart and body belonged to a Utopian woman on a one-way ticket to Xameeshee. This was not what he needed right now.

  Paul moved around her and headed for the building. Her fingers brushed against his hand. Ryan’s and Corda’s suits revved and roared, shaking the ground beneath his feet.

  What do you want from me? What does everyone want from me? Fluid built up in his throat. He spat out a clump of blood onto the cool, wet grass.

  This fucking world was killing him.

  Fuck this place.

  Everyone was waiting inside a massive underground half-dome chamber, all thirty-three of Forever Fall’s best participants grouped into eleven teams. Three individuals were Kalliro champions representing themselves. They stood alone in the center.

  Paul hovered in the center of a sphere cockpit located inside the chest of his giant Variance shell. He and Siren kept their eyes on the champions. She sent microscopic globes within arm’s reach of the flowing golden armor.

  Bands of golden material swirled in opposite currents on the Kalliro surfaces. They towered over Controller suits, but Legacy suits dwarfed them. No one stood around them, probably because of their radiation emissions or their intimidating headdresses of curved and tilted halos with glowing yellow eyes. Siren gathered data and updated all Variance material in real time.

  What happened to the prizes from our victory?

  Data flew all around Siren. She seemed indifferent. “Ryan traded the capitol building reward for new suits with upgrades, particularly to reinforce the suits with nuclear blast–rated cockpits. It’s not guaranteed that they will survive the lethal forces inside the cockpit. He also used the mineral rights to buy materials and hire contractors to rebuild Forever Spring’s walls. We were underprepared material-wise in the last battle, so I asked for more materials. I made sure we had enough to protect everyone in the most severe radiation fields and environments.”

  “Info’s coming up. Systems check, everyone.” Ryan’s mechanical panels and engines moved for functionality. The entire floor chattered with mechanical whirring and roaring engines.

  Championship battle type: Nuclear countdown plus terrain, multiple beasts, and drone survival. Battle platforms: Conventional, hybrid, modified, and high-radiation warfare. Primary obstacle: Maze. Time: 10 minutes. Bonus: First kill grants team five-second shortcut. Second kill grants replenishment or ten-second shortcut. Consecutive kills grant five-second shortcuts. Team kill grants thirty-second shortcut. Restrictions: Cannot kill beasts. Cannot destroy maze. Penalties: Beast kills result in disqualification. Reward: Fastest time for a single competitor to exit grants team entry to Forever Winter championship, ownership of Forever Fall’s nature district, and partial water rights to Forever Summer’s mountain region. Event carries on regardless of declared victor until bomb detonation.

  Of course, the rules were not in Paul’s favor. Team Variance would have to kill a team to secure a win. They would have to kill many teams as quickly as possible. He squinted hard and wiped his face with heavy pressure. I’m pissed off, but that doesn’t mean I have to kill others. I just want to kill Shadow.

  “How’s everyone feeling?” Ryan rotated his upper torso several times.

  “All go. I love the new features.” Nyle’s hands moved all around his cockpit.

  Pela seemed bothered. “Great to have a larger inventory of drones. I just hope I can manage them all.”

  “I’ll help you. Don’t worry.” Siren continued crunching data.

 
Pela smiled. “Thank you, Siren. You’re so helpful.”

  “Cyprian, how about you?” Ryan stood next to Cyprian’s new Variance suit.

  For a moment, Cyprian said nothing. “Ready, I guess.”

  Paul assumed Cyprian preferred not to shed more blood. But then again, Cyprian had expressed interest in killing people when Paul had first met him. He could not protect Cyprian’s innocence, and the event had no flexibility.

  Everyone remained silent.

  “I love the upgrades. Imagine the shit I can blow up and the bodies I can slice.” Corda’s face scrunched up as she motioned her killing moves, only to look away from her camera. “Sorry, Paul. It’s just a figure of speech.”

  Paul looked at his faint reflection inside the transparent cockpit. His tired look, sunken eyes, and long hair and beard accurately portrayed his feelings. He did not care. “Whatever. It’s fine. I’m ready.”

  The data around Siren froze. She looked at him for a moment and then continued her calculations. “I don’t know what you want to do. Do you see a way of obtaining victory without killing?”

  He could not think of anything else except not killing. “Cyprian, Siren, and I will protect the team in any conflicts. Do what you must, but we will not partake in killing, if it comes to that.”

  “It will come to that. When that damn thing rises in the center, you’re going to want to kill everyone in the chamber to get the fuck out.” Ryan pointed into the distance.

  Visible via Siren’s microscopic cameras from above, a large, circular bomb rose from underground in the center of the chamber. All the surrounding teams stepped away. The chamber rose upward for a while with a deafening whir. Everyone remained silent and shifted his or her attention from the champions to the bomb.

  Paul wondered how many tons of nuclear power were packed inside the bomb.

  “More than enough.” Siren watched his heart and breathing rate rise.

  He took deeper breaths and shook his head. One more day. He needed to see his family again. He wanted his life to return to normal. He wanted all his non-Utopian experiences to end. He wanted to be back with his loving wife and princesses. Only then would everything be all right.