Variance Page 9

  In unison, the crowd shouted, “Ten!”

  “Highlighting targets. Designated boundary set to half a square kilometer. Three hundred drones. Nyle is inside your zone. Defensive posture.” Siren’s hands shook as she floated all around him.

  “Six!”

  A hundred meters to Paul’s right, Nyle, inside a red Frequency suit, disappeared from view. The swarm of drones flew in circles above him. Material ejected around him to form the protective dome as he turned invisible. Siren’s eyes scanned all the battle data clustered on his interfaces.

  What happened at Azure?

  “One!”

  Paul took a deep breath, and Cellular Infinity overworked his adrenal glands. A blaring horn boomed slowly throughout the arena as he remained in place. The drones bundled up into a sphere. Supersonic bullets kicked up sand everywhere, pinged his suit, and made him partially visible.

  Siren’s voice, initially drawn out, returned to normal speed as Paul regained his senses. “Thirty-drone detachment inbound with suppressive fire from swarm.” Siren set a flight path highlighted by a blue translucent line. She wanted him to fly away as far as possible.

  He imagined himself flying and followed the line. Siren used material to redirect bullets back to the detachment. Drones deflected their own bullets and continued onward.

  “There’s more net energy loss than gain. We have to take a different approach. We’ll die running away.” Paul watched his energy meters drop below 70 percent.

  “We can’t take that risk of fighting them. The objective is survival. Let Nyle handle the swarm.” Siren started calculating his chances of surviving. The swarm directed their attacks toward Nyle.

  Paul remembered Nyle’s face full of blood, the thud of Cyprian’s small body as the thug slammed it into the ground, and the urine evaporating on Pela.

  “I’m going to help him.” He broke away from Siren’s path.

  She recalculated a new path as he flew toward the group head-on. “You’re increasing our chances of failing.”

  “Failing is me not living up to my moral values.” Identifying gaps in the formation, he cut through multiple drones with spears, hooks, and disks. Siren deflected projectiles and ripped energy cells out of the closest drones. Metallic parts fell around him from swift disassembly. His energy replenished instantly.

  He felt alive. “Wow.” A laser beam bounced off several drones, heading toward him. He terminated the beam with a shield. A small cavity sizzled on the shield’s surface.

  Siren said, “Nice block.”

  The remaining drones immediately flipped around, halted, and formed the outline of a hexagon. Bright blue lines of electricity connected all corners to each other, creating an electrical net. The formation expanded and hurtled toward Paul as another formation approached from his rear with a volley of missiles.

  “Incoming.” Siren focused material into a half sphere.

  Paul converted material into turbines. He flew toward a volley of missiles, and a deafening pummel of explosions shoved him into the net. He fell from the sky as his armor solidified. He soared down a four-hundred-meter drop. Bullets zipped and pinged his armor. Everything turned dark.

  What happened to Variance?

  Siren Audialed, “Restarting. Keep your teeth locked together, and don’t bite your tongue. Brace for impact.”

  Falling blindly, he anticipated the crash with a long, drawn-out grunt and eyes closed. He slammed into soft sand with his back, knocking the breath out of him.

  While he struggled to breathe, Siren disconnected the umbilical cords from the shield to prevent further material hardening. The sand under the shield glowed red and melted.

  He had not expected to lose so soon. “Need a faster fix.”

  “It’s just a small hiccup.” Siren’s voice quivered. “We can regain control of the fight.”

  Blasts lifted him upward. He felt the remnants of shockwaves pass through his chest as his suit protected his lungs from collapsing. The sensations and bangs petrified him.

  Facing away from the shield, he stared at a drone formation while in midair. He was not ready for this. Even Siren was overwhelmed. He needed to focus and overcome.

  He crashed into the ground and watched the formation direct its firepower to his right, away from him. A bright curtain of blue plasma evaporated bullets and exploded incoming missiles in flight. The energy engulfed the formation and liquefied the metal before dissipating into the air. Nyle’s Frequency suit hovered above.

  The formation with the electrical net disbanded into single electrical links and attempted to cut Nyle while firing at him. Waves of energy pulsed out of Nyle’s suit, destroying drones or steering them away from him.

  The suit’s power amazed Paul enough for him to ignore Siren’s muffled chatter. If his girls could have witnessed its power up close, they too would have been in awe. But they would never live to see another day with him lying down on the ground, defeated.

  Nyle requested communication, and Paul accepted. “You can do better than this. Get up and fight.” He thwarted the swarm’s overhead barrage of long-range weaponry.

  Paul looked at Siren, who disappeared and reappeared with data all around him. He pointed at the swarm. “Siren, let’s take them down.”

  She cleared his interface. “Material’s stabilizing with resistance, but we can try. Ready when you are.”

  “Fly in and rip them apart.” He stuck his fist out, and she bumped it.

  “Why are you standing there? I’m running out of energy.” Nyle’s waves reduced, letting several projectiles pound the ground around them.

  “Force the drones to centralize by sending them pulses of energy rings.” Paul touched the shield and returned it to normal. He launched upward toward the swarm.

  “That’s illogical. Drones have more protection against energy when they’re together,” Nyle said.

  Paul thought twice about ignoring a remark from an experienced fighter. However, he had to follow his instinct. “Narrow in your beams.”

  Positioned close to the arena’s ceiling boundary, the swarm shifted into a diamond pattern, with the leading end facing Paul. Nyle’s circular beams whooshed past him and skimmed the outer edges of the formation. He flew forward with wings.

  The swarm unleashed its inventory of bullets and missiles. By imagining spiraling fractals coupled with Siren’s processing power and another injection of adrenaline, Paul formed an outer layer into a spinning drill and redirected bullets and blasts away from him. Siren minimized direct impacts through calculated material transformations and curved material perfectly to cause the bullets to ricochet. To compensate for missile blasts, sections of the drill opened and minimized the impact area. The opposite inner end of the drill captured the blast and redirected it downward, providing extra thrust.

  “You’re doing great, Siren.”

  With an average of fifty-seven impacts and blasts per second on the never-ending six-second ascent, Paul’s energy meter dropped below 40 percent. The multiple booms of explosions turned into a single tone as his drill cut through smoke and fire while in continuous reformation. His heart felt as if it would explode out of his chest.

  As he inhaled, one second away from the closest drone, with 32 percent energy remaining, material snaked under the drones and ripped the energy sources out. The drill material pierced deep into the formation and dispersed, weaving around and disassembling the drones. Exhaling, he eliminated forty-nine drones with full power, showering the area with electrical sparks and inanimate machinery.

  He pressed forward and redirected projectile fire to fleeing drones. Disabled drones sank at an alarming rate until only a few remained. Nyle vaporized them and soared around him.

  The crowds cheered. Paul and Nyle had been the first to clear their area. Three hundred scorched drones were piled on the sand below.

  Sire
n spun around and hugged him through the suit. Her pressure calmed his adrenaline rush. “We did it.”

  Tears ran down his face as he laughed. “We did. We did it.” Tingly sensations erupted all around his body, especially on his hands and feet. He lowered himself onto the ground and rested within the suit.

  Siren displayed data and video of his defensive fractals. “Look at that complexity. We were able to deflect all streams of bullets. The brain-training sessions did help.”

  He took a deep breath. If not for Siren’s ability to protect his chest, his lungs would have collapsed from the missile blasts. “I really loved how you were able to handle all of the blast waves. I had some difficulty breathing, but you kept me alive.”

  “Hot potato.” She giggled and continued replaying her recordings.

  Hot potato.

  “Great job, rookie. You set a new record.” Nyle’s massive armored arm pointed at the scoreboard.

  Paul had set an arena-clearing record by defeating 258 drones in less than five minutes—ten minutes ahead of the previous record.

  He heard the crowd chanting, “Killer.” His face with the name Killer appeared on all the screens. Ryan must have registered him under that name.

  “Nyle, thanks for helping me out there.” Paul hovered into Nyle’s shadow.

  Nyle opened his cockpit, panels of metal spinning away from the chest. With a face of perfection and no signs of injury from the neighborhood beating, he stood up and waved.

  “Don’t thank me. Thank Ryan. If Father Kaiser believes you’re the one who can save us, you have my support. Now, go get your fame and glory.”

  Paul nodded with a smile, happy to see another Utopian fighting on his side. He returned to bay four. A clash of reporters and spectators filled the bay. He stood at the edge of the gate and removed the Variance material from his head to reveal his smile.

  A reporter asked, “Is it true that you’re from Azure?”

  “Yes. I’m an Azurian Utopian, fighting for justice and peace.”

  Another reporter stepped forward. “What kind of technology are you using?”

  Siren hovered next to him, her face blushing in a bright orange hue.

  “Xenoalloy-xenopolymer-electro-nanotechnology and—” As he was about to mention Siren, he felt something warm dripping down his lips.

  A random person shouted, “His nose is bleeding!”

  He tapped his nose with his large Variance hand and smeared blood on the smooth, reflective surface. His Cellular Infinity continued to degrade as alarms blinked on his interface. Siren pointed at his head to scan for aneurisms and tried to adjust his cells.

  “Move, asshats. Make way. Killer’s manager coming through.” Ryan penetrated through the crowd and reached Paul. “You have to recover. Pick me up, skip the postfight interview, and take us to the ship.”

  “Where are we going? I need to get ready for the next match.” Paul formed a comfortable caged platform and carried Ryan over the crowd.

  “Spring. You’re dying.”

  7

  B2-F-CW

  PAUL LAY DOWN INSIDE an enclosed capsule. The cold, flat surface glowed a light blue the same color as a tree’s energy core. Ryan said the capsule was the Kazat version of Cellular Infinity, designed to cure diseases, illnesses, and injuries but not to halt the process of aging. When used together with Cellular Infinity, it damaged the artificial cells because the machine recognized them as a threat. It used blood transfusion, which made Cellular Infinity work harder at multiplying cells. This made sense, considering Statice’s medical add-on to his interface reduced his life expectancy from one hundred to seventy-five years.

  Would he live to return to Azure once the war ended? Would he live to see his family on Xameeshee once he secured Forever Spring for refuge?

  For the first time in his life, anxiety started to drive him mad with the same cyclic thoughts, even though he always had positive thoughts and confidence. He could not stop questioning himself. He felt both excited and scared. He felt capable of taking on the world, only to feel doubtful the next second. He’d won his first match in style, but the nosebleed made him worry about the next match.

  All of these thoughts had to be part of his hormonal destabilization. He had to accept the feelings and move on.

  Ryan transferred all the files over to Paul and spoke through Audials. “Here’s everything. When the healing process is complete, the lid will raise itself, and you can head to the ship.”

  Where should he start? He opened up videos of the day he’d left, all from Kaiser’s view.

  Kaiser had his family pack everything in haste. He made quick movements with his hands and arms, pointing and directing, while running and stopping. Machines disassembled and packed everything in the bay. A moving train entered and collected all the equipment in a smooth transfer process. Rumbling echoed into the bay. Statice and Lily ran around wide-eyed.

  Kaiser acquired a small transport ship and watched another tree disintegrate in the distance. Dust and screaming followed the booming crumble. He piloted the ship through to the bay and ordered the train to depart. Paul’s family entered, and flight suits wrapped around them.

  They flew over the tree grounds and pitched toward space. Large bloodred Crimson spaceships hovered above a layer of thin clouds, releasing plumes of yellow dust into the atmosphere. Lily kept her eyes closed. Statice stared at the ships in awe. Amaryllis wrapped her arms around the girls. Kaiser rocketed to a distant forest undisturbed by Crimson. The video ended.

  Paul opened a video from Amaryllis.

  Lily lay down on Amaryllis’s lap, her head covered by her arms. “Lily has a fever. She hasn’t slept well for several days. It seems that the CI breakdown turned into an epidemic. Statice has sinus congestion. So far, my health has remained strong with no signs of CI degradation.”

  She petted Lily’s hair. “We hope you’re holding up, especially before your first battle. We have faith in you. We miss you. We wish we were with you.”

  Paul cried and pressed his lips tightly together.

  Statice stepped into the video, waving her hand. “Hi, Dad. We hope you’re ready for Divine Might. We received Siren’s upgrades and implemented them into four new brains and material. We should have suits in a day or so, so don’t worry about us. We have supplies, places to hide, and plenty of machines to assist with production.”

  The video ended.

  Paul opened Statice’s video.

  “Speaking of production.” Statice guided the camera to show a new bay full of machines. He guessed they were probably capable of producing fifty simultaneous suits. “We’re almost complete with the pilot plant and the hacking program to control most of Xameeshee’s spaceships and vehicles. When I have a safe opportunity, I’ll try to hack Crimson’s systems to find vulnerabilities.

  “Once it’s finished and all of the punch-list items are addressed, we’ll send out the engineering details and have robots replicate this at every tree. Kaiser’s working on a plan to convince people to use the suits.” She sniffled.

  Lily poked her head up. Her eyes were reddened. She spoke through Audials via Statice. “Please be safe. We’ll be waiting for your next message. We love you, Daddy.” His family waved with half smiles.

  Bye.

  Paul closed his eyes to clear the tears. Uncertain about how the capsule operated, he kept his hands at his sides to avoid interfering with the healing process.

  He opened his blurry eyes and viewed Kaiser’s video.

  Kaiser stood in between Variance printing machines, with arms crossed and hands under his armpits. “Your family’s safe. We have all the resources we need until you arrive—or end the war, whichever comes first. I’m doing my best to help, but with CI crashing everywhere, people are changing faster than they can adapt. I’m hoping to use that to my benefit to convince them to fight. I have the support o
f several key leaders, who are willing to dedicate at least a thousand defenders.”

  Kaiser shivered in place. Was the bay that cold?

  “I really hope you win your first match unharmed. It’s a dangerous sport. I’m just happy that you made it this far. I hope Ryan sends a video of your meeting with Shadow. It would be interesting to watch.”

  Kaiser kept his gaze toward the floor. He appeared doubtful or uncertain. “Your family is safe. Dedicate your focus and energy to your mission there. Hope to hear from you soon, Paul.”

  Why did Kaiser seem worried?

  Paul closed the videos and found Lily’s unopened video, which was marked private for only him to see. He disconnected Siren from his mind.

  In the video, Lily spoke through text. “Dad, I wanted to tell you this earlier, but Kaiser sent you off in a hurry.”

  She hesitated and sighed. “All right. Here’s the truth. I stole her from the development office and reprogrammed whatever I could.”

  She stole? She’s able to lie and hold secrets?

  “There’s more code to her that I don’t know about. We needed a brain, right? That was the only brain I could find. Please don’t be mad at me. I did program her with a protective function. Just keep your eye on her true identity. I hope she’s taking care of you. I have to go. Hot potato, Dad. I love you.”

  The blue lights inside the capsule dimmed, and the lid tilted away to one side. Needles attached to his arm automatically detached and stowed away in a safe compartment. The punctures sealed without a drip. Inside a mucky and sandy closet large enough to fit the capsule, his sphere, and some janitorial supplies, he reconnected Siren and found her sitting on top of the sphere with code dancing in front of her.

  The data disappeared, and she approached him. “Good morning, Paul. How are you feeling?”