So, then, is the knot of Love severed; a plague shattered—a plague remains.
Hark! Comes the vessel: a broken man, his pieces paired to the shape of love fallen.
And when shard greets shard and two among the countless broken become one, a new path will unfold, and an untruth will stand…
That an unworthy vessel for an unworthy city will cast low the shackles of lust, and seed what is for the rebirth of love…
-Stormsparrow’s Chorus
30-3
Half-Chained Love (II)
Once upon a time, about twenty years and a whole lifetime ago, Chambers’ fuck of a father caught him stealing a sip of beer. Chambers was maybe four at the time, and with all the beatings and concussions he got, the memories weren’t that clear, but he could remember the taste. Dark, bitter, and more than a little cheap. He could remember the brand. Vishlash. Non-Guilder enterprise, which was why it probably went out of business before long.
Anyway. Daddy-o didn’t much like little Chambers getting into his cheap hooch, but the old man wasn’t that bright either. So, what followed was your typical piece of shit move of forcing your kid to drink the bottle. All of it. More than the taste and the brand name, Chambers remembered what it was like to choke and gag. When there was too much going down his throat. He remembered kicking, coughing, and the tip of the bottle hitting that thing at the back of his throat over and over.
Only reason why he didn’t choke to death was his grandfather stumbling back in. That interrupted things. And whatever was said ended with dad throwing the bottle at the wall.
But choking… that’s about how the city looked to Chambers right now. Returning to matter through the loudspeakers of a high-rise bar a block away and a few hundred meters above the now quarantined Everpeace Tower, Chambers, Cas, and Marlowe mingled amongst the day-drinkers and gazed beyond the window.
The upper Warrens was always a hive overflowing with people and activity, but he couldn’t remember traffic ever being as congested as it was today. They ran from Tiers through the Layers like solid chains, aeros bumper to bumper with horns blaring, flanked by golems for security. Meanwhile, drones filled up every inch of space that remained beyond the sky lanes drifting slowly in their defensive sorties as they faced distant chains of traffic—other Guilds doing the same thing, trailing down like metallic willows.
Behind them, a faint, shimmering presence loomed from the edge of the Tiers. The substance was encroaching, seeping closer moment by moment. But that didn’t stop people from coming out, going to cafés, sitting on their verandas. Well-to-do subjects and long-slumming Citizens studied their new, unfortunate neighbors. In the horizon, a Rendbomb burst, and space itself folded inward like a piece of crushed paper. Every now and again, someone would jump from on high, their bodies splashing apart against passing drones or upon the roof of an unmoving aero.
Then, there were the ads.
+SPECIAL DEAL! SCHEDULE YOUR OWN SUICIDE APPOINTMENT TODAY AND GET EXCLUSIVE ONCE-IN-A-LIFETIME REBATES!+
+YOUR FAMILY’S FUTURE. YOUR FINAL PRESENT. SAVE THEIR LIVES. SERVE YOUR GUILDS. EARN YOUR DEATH.+
+EVERY LIFE IS PRECIOUS. ESPECIALLY YOURS. SO CHOOSE STORMTREE TODAY, AND WE’LL MAKE SURE ITS PUT TO PROPER SERVICE.+
Suicide promos were ceaseless. Even more than before. Chambers saw plenty of those everyday when he lived in the gutters or the Spine, but the Throat and Light’s End were “pristine” territory. Where the useful wager-slave were. Guess desperate times increased the recruitment range.
War was about to kick off anytime, after all.
“Fuck that’s a lot of ‘fugees,” Chambers muttered under his breath. “Don’t ever remember them coming from on top, though.”
Cas snorted. “Yeah, well, the entire city’s technically theirs. They’ll just push the locals out of their houses and take whatever they want. They’ve done it before, they’re doing it now. Back during the Second Guild War when Highflame was sacking and burning their way across the Sang territories, plenty fled downward too. Subjects that tried to stay were met with bribery. Then gaussfire. This isn’t a new song.”
“Colors are going to fucking Color,” Marlowe sneered. Of the three, she fit the current scene the most. She wore a holovest sprouting floral patterns around her body while her hair seemed to glow a dark red beneath the somber ambiance of the bar. The vibrating waves of bass furled around Cas, subservient to his powers, while the other “customers” present danced their woes away, throwing down cups of liquor and vials of Numb one after another.
They came to survey the Everpeace Tower, and found it a uniquely veiled patch of space among the other structures in the area. Being a Sang-controlled district, most structures were cybernetic in design and vertically built. Tall towers made to resemble blossoming trees sported floral rooftops, branches that doubled as bridges between blocks, and public transit designed from a district-spanning circulatory system. Chambers’ Bioigniter could feel the pulsating of a heart within all the major structures. Techno-thaumic reactors—with a biological twist.
And then there were the organisms drifting through the air. Calvino said those were viruses meant to tag everyone present within the district for future tracking needs. Realizing that, Chambers took special care to redirect the viruses away from he and his cadre. No need for that.
A protective shroud stretching some ten kilometers in radius sealed away the quarantined area. Swarms of heavily armored bioforms swam through the air, guarding a blood-red security grid just behind. The largest among them were chimeric mixtures of Deepmaw Whale and a Queen Bee, their large bulbous bodies festooned with small bio-spawner sacs on their undersize. The primary defensive bioforms used these leviathans as minor bases of operation.
“There should be a Fleshtech inside the Whalequeens too,” Cas said, narrowing his eyes. “I count twenty so far. That’s some pretty heavy security for just a quarantine, but no Knots.”
“Maybe they’re overstretched?” Chambers asked.
“Probably. Getting some more imaging from Sunrise. Things are kicking off in the dark between the No-Dragons and Sanctus. Hidden plagues are sweeping across the border. And a few Chronoframes were spotted by exo-stellar imaging. Calvino doesn’t think they’re going to go loud, but a few blocks might go up in flame. A couple million deaths before days over.”
“Like every other day before, huh?” Chambers said.
The Columner shot the people in the bar a disdainful look. “Sure seems like we’re trying to keep it that way, doesn’t it?”
Cas might’ve judged them, but Chambers couldn’t. Frankly, he still had a hard time reconciling who he was now to whom he had been just months ago. He would have given anything to have the lives of someone here. Light’s End. What a nice existence. Not so many people trying to snuff you;, betters drugs; a view of the sky; actual quality services…
But he was in the war now. And the people around here didn’t even seem willing to face the world out their windows. They had minds and bodies and all that other shit, but they didn’t use them. And they dulled their minds to hide inside themselves. Like Chambers did with his vics. Like everyone did to hide from the pain in their lives.
Damn fools. So was he. No hiding from the Substance, though. That was coming whether these people liked it or not. They could dance today away, and drink tomorrow as well, but come a time after that, the war would still be on, and the sky will fall. Then, it would be down into the Throat, the Spine, the gutters…
And then what? Were they going to just abandon the city? Where was everyone going to run? New Vultun used to be like a ravenous animal. Now, it was more a nu-dog with its head cut off, legs still kicking but the path long-lost. The Guilds were scrambling. But the people just tried to pretend nothing was happening.
Chambers didn’t know if he wanted to join them or scream in their faces about what was coming. He settled for envying them instead. Ignorance was bliss. But Ignorance also meant someone else decided your fate. And Chambers? He saw too much to go back now. There was no comfort in the passing pleasure. Only a delay of dread. Best get on with being terrified and do the right thing while pissing himself.
Using his Domain of Biology, he spent a few hours tracking the bioforms. Cas vanished into the noise again to do some up-close scouting while Marlowe—well, she started socializing. Asking questions. Speaking to the bar owner and chatting up subjects and Citizens alike for insights. The way she could just move between the Tiersfolk and the gutterborn was something else. And they took to her as well.
She made them laugh. She started arguments and somehow managed to get those she pissed off to buy her drinks. And Chambers got the distinct impression she was getting far more useful intelligence through her methods compared to him or Cas. He didn’t know how she managed it; when he spoke to most people, he was plenty good at making them leave him alive. That was about the only true social engineering skill he had.
She seemed good with all people. And that…
He wondered if he could have been like her if they swapped lives.
Thinking that made him wince internally. No. He didn’t want her to have his life. He didn’t want anyone to have his life. There were enough Chamberes in this city and plenty more broken little people.
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Forcing his attention back over to the Whalequeens, Chambers noted that the major bioforms rotated in and out from the quarantine demiplane, and that the smaller drones they spawned returned to the spawning sacks to be recycled on a regular basis. Afterward, an exchange of genetic material would take place between all the Whalequeens until they all shared some of the disassembled drones. For what reason, Chambers wasn’t sure, but his Bioigniter offered terse words of guesswork.
“Recycle material! Processing. No Mind-World. Information from blood. Shared information network.”
Yeah. Yeah. That makes sense. It was also probably their best way in. Chambers just needed to hijack one of the bioforms for him and Cas. He could melt the two of them into its body and ride it back into one of the Whalequeens and pass through without issue. Only danger was fucking up the biomancy.
“No danger,” the Bioigniter said. “Flesh is ours to smelt. Fire too. Bomb if fail. Trust.”
The Bioigniter was a simple, confident guy. Chambers could appreciate that about them.
“And remember: the Rash is still active inside the block,” the Fucktopia giggled.
Good point. Our advantage.
“Anyone ever tell you that you make weird faces when you speak to your Heavens?”
Chambers jumped at Marlowe’s words, and he spun round to face her, holding his chest. “Jaus—fuck!”
“Caught you deep in the moment, huh?” Marlowe said, a wry grin pulling at her lips. And then the light hit her just right, and her skin just—fuck, why was her skin so smooth? Why did her hair glow. Her eyes were changing colors with every blink. He didn’t even know she could do that—
He coughed. “Yeah, I, uh. I was just monitoring the things to do the stuff for happening after, you know.” The words left Chambers’ mouth. What the fuck was he saying? Was he having a stroke?
The Fucktopia made a low rumble. “No. Don’t be mean to yourself, Aedon. You’ve just been without any intimate contact, and now an attractive person of the opposite sex is in front of you, and your Lustaway is down, but you’re still subconsciously trying to repress yourself, so your mind feels all tangled up. You’re just starved.”
Just starved. When was the last time he had been intimate? When was the last time he held—
Kae. He remembered shielding her from Zein. He remembered—
Fuck. They were supposed to bring her back. And now, he was picking up pieces of Love and Avo. Would Chambers find parts of her in there as well? Was there anything left of her?
The glint of mockery in Marlowe’s eyes died. “Chambers? You alright?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” Chambers sighed. “I just… There’s shit to think about hard. Real hard, you know.” He rubbed his face.
“Yeah,” Marlowe said slowly. Then, without warning, she reached out and took him by the hand. Chambers blinked but didn’t fight it, letting himself be dragged along. Marlowe’s strides were quick and dexterous, somehow navigating the twisting bodies dancing between the couches and seats as she led him to the bar top where a Sang in a neuter-mask wearing a six-armed antform bio-rig mixed and poured drinks in a constant blitz of motion.
The music was a dull thrumming now, but every now and again, an off-beat would force its way in and shake the building—a distant warhead going off by the feel of it. Parking the both of them next to the counter, Marlowe waved the bartender over and made an order without consulting Chambers. “Two Strawberry Apocalypses. Double the venom.”
A tendril of ghosts left her mind and imps passed over. At least that still worked. But all the money stored in the Deep Nether—shit, he wasn’t an economist. No point in thinking about that.
“So,” Chambers said, grunting awkwardly as a drunk Scaarthian slammed into his back. He winced as she put her massive hand on his head too keep herself from falling over.
“Thanks, little ‘un,” she slurred. Chambers picked the wrong time to inhale as she breathed.
“What’s a Strawberry Apocalypse?” Chambers asked.
“Sweet and fresh cocktail spliced with a slight hit of joy. It’ll pick you up.”
“Joy?” Chambers said. Might not be the best time to get high. “Yeah, I appreciate—”
“Relax, it’s not enough to send you into a bliss spiral,” Marlowe chuckled. “Just enough to put a smile on your face. It’s half the reason why I haven’t solved my own equation and gone off into the Big Nothing yet.”
“Here-fucking-here,” a Sang sitting next to them said, holding up her own Strawberry Apocalypse in mock salute.
Now, Chambers did some drinking before, but bars and getting drunk weren’t his favorite thing. Mainly ‘cause he knew who might become when he had too much. And that was one of the few things Chambers couldn’t handle too great. The echo of his old man; not the hangover.
“Boosting metabolism. Just burn. Yes?”
What the Bioigniter meant to say was: “I can burn the drunk out of you.” Which was appreciated. But Chambers still felt a bit on edge.
“You can say no, Aedon,” Fucktopia said calmly. “Tell her why. She’ll get you.”
He considered that for a moment, but decided against it. Nah. A drink won’t make me anything like him. Just a drink. And it’ll pick me up.
A pulse of unease came from the Fucktopia. “Are you doing this for her or you? Are you staying hard for yourself right now, or getting soft because you're getting hard for this girl?”
That sent Chambers’ thoughts stuttering to a halt. But just then, two chitinous hands planted two tall and bright-red glasses next to him with synchronized clicks. A strawberry was left impaled through a straw and half-submerged in the liquid. It bubbled thick and carbonated at the same time. Without hesitation, Marlowe picked hers up and started sipping.
Hesitantly, Chambers did the same. I… want to do this. It’ll be fine.
The Fucktopia didn’t say anything.
Giving it a tentative sip, the taste that danced over Chambers’ tongue was as Marlowe said. Damn sweet. Too sweet for liquor, and so carbonated it tickled the roof of his mouth. Then, a fresh smell came over him. It flowed slow. Like there was a sticky quality to it, but as it rolled down his throat, he felt it grow heavier and press down on the discomfort levered inside them.
“How is it?” Marlowe asked.
“It’s uh… not bad,” Chambers smiled. It wasn’t a big smile, but it was more than nothing. “Thanks. How much do I—”
“Fuck you, I’m paying,” Marlowe cut him off. Looking around the room, she shrugged. “People here are flicking imps around like there’s no tomorrow anyhow. Might not be. Deep Nether’s gone, so the stocks, bonds, markets, and all that other shit is fucked, fucked, fucked. No one knows if they’re rich or poor, and word out on the street is that martial law will becoming into effect soon. And also, a Dowager might be coming to the Warrens to form a new bureau.”
“You got all that just by talking to people?” Chambers asked.
“Yeah. Rumors and exaggerations, but hey, that’s what the people here are saying.” Marlowe shrugged. “Most people here worked in blood-tech, bioform design, biofarming, or accounting.”
“Accounting?”
“Everyone needs a number cruncher. They make the world go round.”
Chambers snorted. “‘Clads would beg to differ.”
Marlowe’s expression flattened. “‘Clads will break the world and look around afterward, wondering where they’re going to find dinner. Or a reason to live.”
They both fell silent. Chambers coughed. “So. You’re good at talking to people, huh?”
“It's what I do for a living?” Her eyes swirled up at an angle and she frowned. “What I did. Not sure if the FATELESS Thoughtcast is coming back on after recent events.”
“Eh. We’ll fix Avo and Avo will fix it. The way it goes.”
Marlowe studied him for a moment. “You really, really trust him, huh?”
“More than I trust myself,” Chambers said without hesitation. “Shit, if he were here, half this stuff might be fixed already. Unfortunately, what we got is me.”
“And me. And the cultist. Three’s a pity party.” Marlowe smirked.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Chambers winced.
“Yeah, you did. But I’ve been there. I know.”
“You do?”
“Yeah,” she said, nodding. “I’ve uh… I know that look on your face. I’ve had it before. The ‘why the fuck am I here’ look. Why me and not someone else.”
And suddenly, Chambers felt very naked, very vulnerable. He skipped the straw and took a gulp of his drink. He needed more joy right about now. “You sure you’re not a Necro or something. Because I’m feeling a bit mind-fucked right now.”
“You’re a real sweet-talker, aren’t you Aedon?” He tried his best to stop staring at her lips. He failed. “No. Not a Necro. Just thought you could use some company at the end of the world.”
“Yeah? Well. Thanks. I, uh, I think I found a way into the plane. While you were talking and stuff.” Chambers squared his shoulders.
“No shit? How’s that?” He told her what he observed and illustrated his plan to intrude using the bioforms. She looked considerably more impressed than he expected. “Wait, you can do all that?”
“Yeah,” Chambers muttered. “Canon of Biology.”
“That’s fucking nova. I bitch about ‘Clads but… what’s it like?”
Chambers paused. What was being a ‘Clad like? He angled his head as he looked for the words. “It was like… being able to push back against the world when it pushes you. It’s like moving the unmovable. It’s like… like you actually have weight. Real weight. Weight the world can’t deny. It’s like you matter for the first time in your life. And that you’ll be here no matter what. Even in the face of death. It’s like feeling real. Like a real person.”
When he finished, Marlowe’s expression turned absolutely blank. “That good, huh?’
“No. Better. And worse. I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t just a lucky piece of shit. Just the right guy who fucked with the right rotlick.”
“And what makes the Citizens anymore or less lucky than you?” Marlowe asked. “I didn’t ask to be born. Neither did you. We’re just here. None of this is real. We’re just… shitty people. Here. Making up stories on why we’re the lucky ones. Why we deserve it. No one deserves it. No one has it coming. But it happens. It just does. I didn’t ask to be born.”
And something about her seemed hurt. Hurt in a way Chambers almost understood. “You too, huh? Was it your dad or your mom?”
Marlowe leaned back and cocked her head. “Yes.”
Chambers guffawed. He couldn’t help it. “Now, see, that’s how I know you’re a Guilder—whatever I got, you had to have more.”
She wasn’t prepared for his statement—was taking another sip from her drink before it sprayed out of her nose. For a few moments, she covered her face, shaking.
“You alright.”
She gave him a thumbs up. Which turned into a middle finger.
Outside, a flash cut into the room, bathing everyone in shadow. Not a few kilometers away, a mushroom cloud rose and part of the district came asunder. But people just kept dancing and drinking, because though thousands probably just died, that was far away, and this was here.
Marlowe giggled. And it was a melody.
The apocalypse could wait a little while longer.