You wanna know who kills the legends? Who kills the pros?
The juvs. The pathetic. The ones we don’t notice; choose to ignore. The gutter-trash with a gun that shouldn’t work, with a frequency blade they don’t know how to use; with a death wish, no sense, and nothing but a mad dream.
Not the Godclads. Not some Guilder kill-team. Just… the ones we don’t think about. Because they got an open shot to surprise us. And they get an easy opportunity to put us down.
Thing about surviving long term is you gotta stay ready. On guard against everyone. But after surviving that long and snuffing that many people, you start getting a bit complacent. A bit used to the way things should be.
And so, once more, the aratnid you don’t see slips your notice. And crawls up the base of your armor, and as you disengage your helmet, takes a bite under your neck and injects a neurotoxin straight into your arteries.
And that’s that. It doesn’t matter that it shouldn’t happen. It doesn’t matter if it was sheer dumb luck on their part or a genuine miscalculation on yours.
There was the opportunity. The opening. And you weren’t prepared.
Same goes the other way too. An opening. Being underestimated. Being counted out. Sometimes, that’s all you need. What I’m rambling on about here is… sometimes, a little audacity is all you need.
-Quail Tavers, School of the Warrens
30-14
Master of My Own Scars (I)
Chambers didn’t know what Refusal left to do exactly, but if he had to guess, it would probably be something related to cleaning out his house. After all, the possibility that the Infacer had worms inside Threshold would be more than enough to make the polities shit themselves.
That gave Chambers and Cas an opening. A moment for them to install a few special payloads of their very own making.
Now, Chambers had never been a very good Necro. Even with all the experience and skill Avo burned into him, he didn’t quite have the cognitive shape for it. Best way he could describe himself was passively apathetic, actively empathetic. Put it simply, he could put things out of his mind if they were out of his sight, but the moment he had to dive into someone’s body and live their experiences, well…
This time was different, though. This time, he wasn’t trying to null someone else with his trauma. Just himself. Just a shittier, dumber, and maybe mentally brittler version of himself currently hanging out in the Tiers, doing fucked up shit for no reason.
They watched as a dozen technical drones installed the chunks of vivianite within the drone-missile platforms. The loci weren’t overly large and could be attached to the smart-ghosts nesting inside these platforms via Ghost-Link. Problem was triggering them across vast distances. With the Nether broken, reaching across the expanse of metaconsciousness was going to be a problem.
Which was where Chambers’ Heaven of Love came in.
“I don’t like this,” Cas said, watching as Chambers infused each of the missiles into his Heaven’s hollow core. The Lovebringer hovered over Chambers like a specter, faint enough to be transparent but true enough to affect the real. The many bonds that constituted the word stitched its form into shape, and it took almost all the mental resources Chambers possessed to resist their pull.
Trying to use the Ties That Bind would likely see him torn from common sense, but so long as he kept the things he was actually in love with to a few… Well, shit still might get seven kinds of fucked. Which is was why he had Cas make a trip down to the gutters, to one of his Syndicate headquarters, to procure a specific implant.
“Don’t like this either, but hey, who the fuck cares what we like? Hells, I’m specifically doing what I don’t like.” Chambers grunted as he buried a needle in the base of his neck. He never thought he would be doing this again; Mirrorhead’s cortex bomb gave him more than a few panic attacks early on, and it was only after Chambers learned the half-strand’s patterns and habits that he started relaxing. Still, the fact that he was injecting another bomb into himself willing—and as the head of his own Syndicates no less—tickled him in a bitterly fucked up sort of way. “You got Sunrise to modify the micro-tech in here, yeah?”
“Yeah. They should be triggerable through our ansibles,” Cas replied.
“Your ansible,” Chambers corrected. “When things go down, and I actually start pulling on my bonds, there’s a good shot I’ll go ga-ga in the head and end up loving the missiles too much to blow them. I’ll need you to jack into me while I use my bonds to project my Ghost-Links and… yeah. I’ll link to ‘evil-me’ too if what we got isn’t enough. Won’t be wrestling him ontologically, but I think we can crack this stupid shit mentally.”
“You’re putting a lot of faith in me not going ‘ga-ga’ too, man,” Cas sighed.
“You held together earlier pretty good.”
“Yeah? Barely.”
“Whole reason it’s you is because you got faith in your carpenter or whatsit and so I believe in you. If your almighty is great enough to stop you from giving in to the over-bust once, they just might do it again. Besides, if we both fuck up, Marlowe will fry me.”
“I will,” Marlowe said, grinning as she brushed her fingers along a strip of chrome infused into the base of her skull. With the drone-missiles Refusal dispatched to them, the Thoughtcaster also gained a much-wanted exo-cortex and an ansible. Finally, she could be part of the conversation — and start making propaganda on behalf of the voiders or something.
“Yeah, can you not seem so godsdamned happy about it, though,” Chambers muttered. She developed the biggest grin when Chambers told her his plan, and it still hadn’t gone away. “Fucking… we’re talking about frying my ass. I’ll have to resurrect.”
“Yeah, Aedon: You’ll resurrect. What are you whining about. Besides. This is revenge.”
“Revenge? Revenge for fucking what?”
“For making me ruin my pants, you half-strand! I liked those pants—and your magical bullshit orgasm powers turned the entire lower section into a swamp. Do you know I was dehydrated after that too? My lips went dry for the first time in years—you got close to killing me.”
And that was the moment everything truly sank in for Chambers. Here he was, planning a multi-layered spy-shit assassination against another eviler, dumber, shittier version of himself created from metaphysical bullshit Avo-Veylis cum-soup-merger-whatever, and across from him was a worried Cas and a woman who was actively displeased that Chambers gave her the biggest, most-soul blowing orgasm of her entire existence.
No doubt about it — world was truly ending.
“Technically, I gave her that orgasm,” the Lovebringer muttered.
All three of them turned to regard that Heaven.
“What?” Marlowe asked.
“Well. Since we gods are awakened, and I consider myself an ‘individual,’ it is through my power and Chambers’ will that you were brought to glorious, awesome climax. But I was the instrument that enabled the process. He is more like a master or a manager, dispatching me to task.”
A beat of absolute silence followed. Marlowe chortled. “So… so you’re calling Chambers your pimp?”
“That… might be a fitting metaphor,” the Lovebringer said, thoughtfully. “We do operate in terms of his will, and our miracles are cast toward his desired benefits.”
“God-Pimp,” Chambers muttered, his mouth widening with awe.
Cas, on the other hand, closed his eyes with weary dismay. “Chambers. Chambers, please don’t call yourself the God-Pim—”
That only made the half-strand grin. “I am the motherfucking God-Pimp, aren’t I? So is Draus and…” Chambers expression contorted in odd ways as his mind tried to keep going, attributing the word “pimp” to Dice, Lucky, Kae, and Essus, but somehow, the vibe didn’t fit them. And then there was something else to: “Wait, doesn’t that make Avo some kind of… Overpimp? Like, he’s an entire city-sized stable inside filled with gods and people and other versions of us and shit—”
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“Okay, look—listen, are you feeling alright? I know you had to dig up some pretty bad memories to create those trauma-patterns.” Cas’ words came with a desperate, deadpan delivery, and Chambers frowned in response.
“Fuck you, consang—you’re sticking your fingers in my mind-wounds just so I can stop enjoying the realization that I am, in fact, a pimp of gods, a pimp of heavens.”
“Please, Chambers, I’m going trigger your cortex bomb right now, if you don’t stop saying the word ‘god-pimp.’ Now, entirely honestly, are you okay. I saw… caught glimpses of what your dad did when you put those memories inside the loci. That’s… he’s a piece of shit; if it’s any consolation, he’s probably burning in the pits now. May his name be forgotten.”
“Nah,” Chambers responded, shaking his head. There was still an ache inside him after he delved into his past. But though he was a bit nervous at the start, it really wasn’t as bad as he remembered, collecting those worst moments. Sure, his dad had nearly beaten him to death a half-dozen times; jammed a burning gun barrel under his armpit; pawned Chambers to that sad old lady three rooms down for a couple of days; and other horrible abuse shit but…
Well. Whatever Chambers could do to himself paled in comparison to what he survived facing Mercy. Which… Chambers can’t believe he was thinking this, but he wished Peace was still around. He would have probably made an even better trauma-pattern than Chambers could. And probably cursed with every other word too.
“It is what it is,” Chambers shrugged. What else was there to say about it. “Fucking… miserable life. Fucked me up. But—” He couldn’t help but look at Marlowe. “---I think all our parents fuck us in one way or another. I used all that porn to drown my pain before—got real addicted to protect myself from my mind, but honestly, it’s a bag of bullshit there too.”
“You’re a person, Chambers,” Cas said. “You deserved better.”
“So did all the people I killed while being a ganger or thug. So did the people I stole from. The refugees I sold into slavery. Deserve. We don’t live in a world that ‘deserves.’ We’re not part of a story. That’s for a better reality. Or the gods. We’re just here, and we got our lots, I think.” He let out a small breath. It felt kind a good to say all that, actually. His past was painful. It broke him in ways. But that was it. There was nothing metaphysical about it. People changed. He changed. And he was changing some more.
“I think we’re pretty lucky in the end, all things considered,” Chambers continued. He grinned at Marlowe and Cas. “I mean. We did run into New Vultun’s special-est ghoul.”
“Yeah,” Cas said. He looked down at the ground and shook his head. “He scared the shit out of me.”
“No shit? You too?”
“Chambers. He was a fucking mind-twisting, Heaven-eating monster with the barest shred of decency—and an obsession with human agency. You’re goddamn right, he scared me—he terrified fucking everyone. Well. Maybe, not Draus. Or Denton.”
“I don’t know,” Marlowe said. “He’s kinda scary looking, but he was… kinda sweet all things considered. And even sorta handsome in a weird way.” Both of them stared at Marlowe. “What? There was a lot of charisma.”
“Man, people can get away with anything if they talk good enough,” Chambers said. “Maybe I should eat some eyeballs. Might be some juices there that add to my charm.”
“Please don’t,” Cas said.
“I was kidding.”
“I had to be sure; I can’t trust you when you use the word ‘juices.’ It always goes somewhere messed up.”
With a final whir of noise, the last of the technical drones pulled away from the missiles, and gave a beep of confirmation. “Well, then,” Chambers said, clapping his hands together. “Looks like our special payloads are installed. What’s say we blow our hidden load all over other me’s face.”
Cas grimaced—but the slightest smile emerged thereafter. “I’m getting you a sex-therapist to talk to in Threshold after this, and you’re not saying no.”
“But before that: load; blow; evil me?” Chambers grinned, holding out a thumbs up. A sigh escaped Cas as he gave Chambers a thumbs-up despite the general filth coming out of Chambers’ mouth. “Alright! Marlowe?”
“Hell yeah, I’m game,” She said. “I’m already linked in to the missiles’ feeds. Wouldn’t be the first time I released myself inside another guy, either.”
Whatever words Chambers was going to make left him as a series of whale-like wails. His legs shuddered. The image that Marlowe conjured did something to him. A bond of lust snaked out from Chambers, crawling toward Marlowe. The thoughtcaster’s eyes widened, and then she threw her head back and guffawed.
“It’s not even affecting me that much anymore,” Cas said, looking on with a tired expression. “I’m gonna need a fucking therapist too. Alright. Let’s get these things airborne.” A Ghost-Link snaked out from him. +Calvino sent me an update: Infacer is actively skirmishing against the Bleaks through is Noosphere. Most of their processing is being devoted to fighting that shadow war. The rest is moving to locate a hidden threat. One they haven’t been able to identify; they suspect it’s already inside Threshold.+
+Inside… shit, so we might be compromised too?+
+Maybe. Trust nothing. The Bleaks will probably plug whatever leak there is, but the next hit could come from anywhere. Might want to start making some of our own arrangements when Refusal gets distracted—Calvino will give us a signal when there’s an opening.+
+Synced on that. Well. Let’s go mind-fuck my other self today.
***
The VGS “Butterfly Theory” is a platform the voiders might refer to as a “surprisingly effective museum piece.” Threshold’s archives also called it its series a “Kalashnikov-equivalent” in terms of intergalactic stealth missile platforms, which basically meant an oldie but a goodie.
Chambers wasn’t exactly sure why Refusal sent him only three of these old-fashioned missiles to use as delivery platforms, but Cas’ guess was that the voiders didn’t want to risk losing anything more advanced to the locals. That, and the coldtech installed within the Butterfly Theory was harder to “fail” somehow when exposed to thaumaturgy.
The Buttefly Theories weren’t the most aesthetic missiles. They pretty much looked like solid rods with a few crenelations, some exposed panels, heat vents, a dumb-mind module near its aft, and finally, a few arms jutting out from its thruster. It was an older build even compared to the Manta consider it lacked any hint of that smart-matter Voidwatch loved so much, and was mostly a dead piece of metal.
That being said, it was also a smart, fast, and very flexible dead piece of metal if its guidance, targeting, propulsion, and countermeasure features were being truthful.
Using an “Orion-Slingshot” thruster—basically spraying the full energy of a nuke out the back of the missile—it could get pretty quick pretty fast, especially for a coldtech platform. But that wasn’t its main deal. Apparently, the panels it had allowed for an optical, gravitic, and photon cloaking stealth suite that basically meant it was going to be near invisible on the approach. And then there was something about a neutrino absorption sink or something, so radiation was going to be sucked up as well.
That one was probably for the Infacer.
Then, there was the “dumb” minds that served as the platforms’ targeting system. Chambers interfaced with them briefly using his ansible, and the brief conversation made him more than a little uncomfortable. Frankly, for what were supposedly non-conscious minds—just generative intellects rather than fully autonomous ones—they still seemed remarkably human when it came to conversation.
{Hello operative Chambers,} the missiles greeted in unison. {We are glad you have connected with us again. Additional payloads have been installed successfully. No issues detected. This fills us with glee; we cannot wait to commit suicide by crashing into your ontological copy.}
The messages were conveyed in such an upbeat manner that it genuinely made Chambers want to look for a mender. If half the people in New Vultun were as motivated by killing themselves as these drones were, the Warrens would be empty, and the economy would be the shit every year.
{Yeah. Got it. Just making sure everything is good with you guys. We’ll be launching in a few minutes.}
{Affirmative. However, we have not received any transmissions from Threshold. EGI-Bleak-Refusal has not responded to any of our updates either. Is there a problem.}
{Yeah. Threshold might be, uh, fucking leaking. Might be some dirty sneak-fucker lurking and stealing information. Other me knows about you guys, so…}
{Oh, dear. That means our suicides might not be so successful.}
{Yeah, well, I wouldn’t be so sure. He’s kind of a retarded half-strand, and just because he knows doesn’t mean his ready to get his ass fisted by our new payload. Which he might not know about. Basically, we got a surprise in a surprise, you synced with me?}
{Yes. We are “synced.” Learning new slang is fun before our demise!}
“Jaus,” Chambers muttered. Every mention they made to wanting to die made him feel a little sicker. He hadn’t anticipated this when he forced himself to fall in love with these missiles. The fucking Loverbringer was quickly also turning into the Heaven of Fucking a Wound-Hole into Chambers’ heart. {Alright. Well. With Refusal’s absence and seeing these are dire circumstances, I am giving the clearance to launch immediately.} Above, the hanger doors opened, and the daystar’s shine was slowly draining away to the dimness of coming midnight. {Anyway. Gotta ask you guys to delay your final updates till before impact. You know. For, uh, op-sec shit.}
{Affirmative. We will accommodate your most reasonable request. It will be an honor to crash ourselves into your other self and die! Die! Die!}
{Yeah,} Chambers said, holding back a sob. Fuck… These little guys were adorable. He didn’t want them to just blow up and stop being. And he thought his life was bad; they existed only to die. And there was so much joy in them; so much beauty in the world. {Fucking… gonna hurt him something bad.}
“Chambers?” Cas said, narrowing his eyes. “You alright?”
“No,” Chambers said, the words whimpering out of him. “I regret this. I regret this already. This is going to hurt me something bad.”