Bubblegum Chaos: Mote in the Eye of Eternity pt 6
This story is set 100 years after the fall of the Knight Sabers. The
events at the conclusion of Bubblegum Crisis/Crash have been slightly
altered for this fic. Contains mature language, themes and sentence
structure; don't fear the semicolon.
Seventy Five Years Earlier:
TO: DESTINY
FROM: Operative J. Malso
RE: McNichol Situation
Gained access to subjects private files. The following are excerpts
from his diary. Unfortunately the subject does not date his entries or
organize them chronologically, possibly to confuse anyone who stumbles
across them. Continued observation is not deemed necessary and
containment protocols are being enacted.
>From the Private Files of Leon McNichol
Classified Secret Level 2
I guess I knew things were about to change right after I saw Priss and
Nene leave ADP HQ. Priss was visiting Nene and my gears have been
turning since right after fight with the Mover. Something about the way
they looked back at me told me there was something going on. Priss had
this look in her eye I've never seen in anyone before, part excitement
and part resignation. The look someone with a death wish gets right
after seeing the glowing light at the end of the tunnel. And Nene, well
she looked as flustered as I'd ever seen her.
They left real quick after I showed up, Nene's eyes moving like she
felt guilty or something. She knew exactly how much I'd found out and
how much I was guessing. Their behavior had me interested so I hurried
to my workstation and scanned the front camera displays. Sure enough the
two were in the process of hopping into a van. A woman who moved with
the grace of a gymnast helped them in. I vaguely remember her from Hot
Legs, a friend of Priss' whose name I could never manage to remember.
Then the van drove off, four people on board counting the driver. Maybe
more but I'm almost certain about the number and identity of the
occupants <Intel Note: There were six passengers according to the
surveillance boomers: Stingray's daughter, Nene Romanova, Linna
Yamazaki, Priss Asigiri, Stingray's son and one Dr. Raven.> It struck me
as I closed down the sensors: in all the time I'd known Priss I'd never
seen her ride anything but her bike.
I watched the Knight Sabers die that day. The TV was playing in the
holding cell they put me in after I punched the Chief and the news was
on. How easily Genom's PR people twisted public opinion and how quickly
people forget. I'm quitting the force as soon as the paperwork gets
through. Some good news though, the Chief said he won't press charges.
The fat fuck couldn't look me in the eye. Don't know what I'll do now
though.
<Next Entry>
If I held out hope for this city it was gone this afternoon. Despite how
I left the ADP I keep in touch with a couple guys there, mostly Wong. I
always play it off as research for another case, but Wong knows I'm
trying to learn as much as I can about Genom's plans for the city. I
just hope he doesn't get himself in any trouble on my account.
<Next Entry>
Three weeks since I opened McNichol Detective Agency. I borrowed some
money from one of the least respectable of Tokyo's back alley lenders
and leased a little office in a nice quiet neighborhood. I've had some
cases, nothing special but enough to keep my head above water. I go down
to Hot Legs every once in a while and see if I was wrong about her. Oh
yeah, the Replicants broke up.
<Next Entry>
Ten years in this business have taken their toll on me. Wong died last
week, a tragic case of friendly fire and a hero's burial for the first
of the Genom Police to die in the line of duty. Christ, ten years gone
by and I haven't gotten anything done. I leave the ADP with this idea of
settling things up for Priss and Nene but I haven't gotten more than a
scrap or two of real evidence against Genom. And now they are the
government. Someone's been following me for the last week, shadowing me
pretty well. Probably a boomer. Maybe I finally pissed off too many
people, but I'm in too deep to stop now.
<Next Entry>
I finally found it. I know how to bring Genom down. Wong got it to me,
though it took almost a month to get from where he hid it to me. It
showed up this morning, carried by one of those old courier robots, the
ones Mitsubishi used to make before the big G. Wong set it up so it'd
come here if he didn't reset the thing's timer. I can't go public with
it yet, since it needs one little bit of confirming evidence. Who'd of
thought it'd all come back to Jenna? I just need to find her and see if
she got the other half of Wong's package.
"Oh Ruler of Your Creation, how is it that you can show souls things
that are to come? In what manner do You show the future to man, for whom
nothing future yet is?"
St. Augustine, XIX, Confessions
Sam Spade Archetype:
Chiriko stood in the observation bubble, staring 'down' the length of
the Tonobu. The little hemisphere of transparent metal sat midway down
the ship's length, nestled between the broadside particle beam
emplacements. In her mind's eye Chiriko watched Farpoint Prime tear
itself apart, helplessly witnessing a small holocaust that would be
covered up and forgotten. It weighed on her spirit, knowing that she
could've done nothing about it. And more it made her frightened.
It scared her because she saw the old Councilman's dead eyes or the
ease with which he threw away a million lives just to spite Genom. Was
Isis capable of something like that? The councilman knew her, quite well
from the familiar manner in which they spoke. Did Chiriko really want to
be involved in something like this?
The barest of flashes warned Chiriko she wasn't alone anymore. "Leave
me alone, Isis," she said without turning around.
"I don't think that's a good idea. You've got some questions, don't
you." The voice was rational, almost cold.
Chiriko snorted, a trickle of amusement running through her. "I've got
some questions all right. One of the ones that's been bugging me lately
is how we accelerate when the engine looks off." She pointed down at the
dead antimatter drive to emphasize her question.
Isis allowed herself a slight smile. "We've got another drive," she
said mysteriously. "Thought up a hundred and sixty years ago by a man
named Pendelton. I'd explain it to you, but-"
"I just wouldn't understand?" Chiriko said bitterly.
"Can you do seven dimensional integral calculus?" Isis responded, a bit
of scorn in her voice. Chiriko was silent.
"Who was that guy, really?" Chiriko asked after a pause.
"Mackie Stingray. He helped design the original Knight Sabers'
hardsuits along with your firm suits and this ship. His sister was one
of the Sabers and his father invented the boomer."
"How did you know him?"
"Chance encounter," Isis said evenly. "After I figured out who he
really was I came to him for help."
Chiriko was silent for a moment, gazing down at where she though
Farpoint used to be. In the murky blackness she could see nothing.
"Why are you doing this?" the musician asked finally.
"Because no one else will," Isis said, winking out as soon as the words
left her mouth. She left Chiriko alone in the bubble. What did I expect
her to say? Chiriko asked herself before returning her gaze to the
distant stars.
Ingrid slammed the heel of her palm against her opponent, hardwired
nervous system damping the pain of contact. Stepping back she issued the
mental command to her OS, which responded by activating her Toto
implant. A thirty centimeter cord dropped from a concealed port in her
wrist to dangle for a moment before Ingrid whipped it across her
target's torso. The machine came apart, leaving Ingrid standing in the
training center panting for breath.
"Wow," she heard from the control booth. "That was pretty good."
"Thanks Andrea," Ingrid replied. She wasn't certain why Isis had them
train without the firm suits, but after a couple of sparring matches
with Chiriko, Ingrid acknowledged the necessity of continued hand to
hand training. Even with her modifications the Japanese woman could wipe
the floor with her, a fact that galled her.
"Do you want to try again on level 8?" Andrea asked, a bit of
nervousness in her voice.
"Nope, I'm pretty tired. Guess that makes it your turn," the older
woman replied, grinning as she stepped into the command booth. Patricia
tossed her a towel, which Ingrid gratefully accepted. Andrea was getting
out of her seat, grumbling.
"I don't get why I have to train like this. You guys and Subon are the
fighters, I'm just computer backup."
Neither of the other women replied, having heard this exact objection
many times in the past. Instead Ingrid tapped the computer into the
proper configuration and set the difficulty level to four. "We're
starting you at four again, okay?"
"Sure," Andrea said remorsefully.
Patricia watched as Ingrid hit the start button and the holograms began
advancing on Andrea. She looked at Ingrid, only half watching the combat
taking place in the room beyond.
"I haven't managed to talk to Chiriko since she came back from
Farpoint," Patricia ventured as Andrea got thrown across the training
room.
"I don't particularly care. If this was Genom's Military she'd be out
of a job or facing a court martial. She abandoned us and took off on her
own. And lets not even get into her behavior on the Boundless," Ingrid
replied, her tone one of frank anger. Chiriko hadn't followed one of the
commands she'd given when they were on the Boundless and responded
bitterly to any comments Ingrid offered.
"She did get here before you did, maybe she's bitter about Isis picking
you for tactical command," Patricia offered, wincing as Andrea received
a couple of hard punches from one of the hologram/force field
combinations.
"I don't think so. The two of us never really got along," Ingrid asked,
a touch of genuine regret in her voice. The damned Japanese woman was so
infuriating, but she fought like a woman possessed. If only she wasn't
so insubordinate, Ingrid thought with annoyance.
"Owwwww!!!!!!" Andrea said as she slammed against the wall. The
computer decided the match was over and Andrea sheepishly stood up. She
wordlessly left the training room and entered the control room, face
blank.
"Nice try," Ingrid told her, receiving a noncommittal grunt as a
response. "Pat?" she asked her companion.
"Sure. I'd like to try ten this time," she responded. She rose out of
her chair and entered the training room, taking a brief moment to limber
herself up.
The crash course in hand to hand she had gotten from Chiriko combined
with the last couple of weeks of training had made an impression on her
and she'd gotten quite good at fighting. She could take Ingrid two falls
out of three if the other didn't use her implants and she'd even beaten
Chiriko once. In her suit she could handle either of them easily, at
least in hand to hand combat.
Finally ready she signaled the others to start the program. The
ghostly shapes that formed around her advanced, moving smoothly even
though they nothing more than a combination of laser projectors and
energy fields.
She lashed out at the closest one, blocking one of the quick jabs the
generally humanoid shape threw at her. The force field connected on her
forearm, allowing her to redirect her enemy's momentum by shifting her
stance. Her other hand slid easily past the other defenses and connected
with the shape's center. It winked out of existence as she faced her
other opponents.
The remaining two forms moved closer, the computer adjusting their
behavior to suit her movement better. They lashed out, forcing Patricia
to back up, keeping them from encircling her. She lashed out at one of
them, driving forward with a kick to the 'stomach' to back her opponent
up then darted past the other as it tried to close with her.
"Damn, she's fast," Andrea said in the control room, watching the
fight. Patricia moved gracefully, almost keeping a dancing rhythm as she
fought.
"Very fast. Almost as fast as I am," Ingrid said, a tone of light awe
in her voice. Who were these people, she wondered again, who put Genom's
finest men and women to shame almost without realizing it?
"She can beat you up most of the time," Andrea said impishly, watching
as Patricia dispatched the second of the computer targets. She glanced
at Ingrid, looking for a response. There was none.
"True. In her suit she can beat up Chiriko," Ingrid answered, a touch
of amusement in her voice. She remembered the musician's reaction the
first time Patricia beat her. She savored the memory of that fight.
"She'll beat level ten today," Ingrid ventured.
"Care to wager on that?"
"What do we have to bet?" Ingrid asked, watching the girl out of the
corner of her eye. Such a sneaky girl, Ingrid thought.
"How about you owe me one if I win," Andrea replied, keeping her eye on
Patricia. The last opponent had stepped up in skill, and Patricia was
having more difficulty taking it out. She was still pushing it back
towards the far wall.
"And how about you make my bed for a month if I win," Ingrid replied,
intentionally taking the tone of an adult to a child.
"Fine," Andrea said, a little edge to her voice. Make her bed? The
hacker thought with annoyance.
In the training hall, Patricia had blocked three quick head strikes,
dodging low as the computer pushed back at her. Two 'kicks' sailed over
her head, followed by a downward strike that narrowly missed clipping
Patricia's head. Patricia sidestepped, lined herself up to the side of
the overextended opponent and lined up for a shot. As the kick developed
Patricia stumbled, having gotten her balance wrong and fell to the
floor.
Ingrid groaned as the computer quickly finished her off. Andrea simply
smiled and left.
"Pat, you've really got to stop screwing up like that."
"Sorry," Patricia said from the ground, nursing the bruise to the small
of her back.
Ingrid stepped from the little shower in her room. She moved languidly,
enjoying the few moments of calmness before her next mission. Isis had
told them what she was planning, where they were going and what was
expected of them. It was a daunting mission, more ambitious than the
comparatively simple smash and run of the Boundless.
She picked out her clothes, simple tourist wear Isis had provided from
the ship's stores. She pulled it on, noting the fine quality of the
fabric. Isis took her clothes seriously it seemed, as both the fabric
and the stitching were flawless. Another piece in the puzzle, Ingrid
thought, wishing she could put them all together and find out exactly
what Isis was.
She started packing with a sigh, carefully rolling her other sets of
clothes into small cylinders of fabric. A habit from her days in Intel,
but one that was more efficient than folding. The small shoulder bag
seemed empty anyway, as her firm suit would be taking the place of most
of the toys she used to pack. At the thought the firm suit quivered
slightly along her back, reminding her of its presence. Still she
brought her PDA and a camera just to be convincing as a tourist. After
carefully arranging the contents of her bag she stepped back and
smoothed her hair.
Her hair had grown in the last couple of months, reaching down below
her ears now, and it had a much more wild character than it used to. In
the confusion surrounding her change of jobs it had slipped her mind to
worry about her hair, though Andrea managed to keep hers cut short. Now
it seemed almost fitting.
She double-checked her packing job, insuring everything was in its
place and properly secured. Then she stood up, adjusted her OS and left
the room.
Andrea glanced around the airlock, noticing the graffiti and stickers
plastered all over the interior of Havoc Station's main public airlock.
Unlike Farpoint, Havoc was a shit hole. And that was being generous. The
airlock held the smell urine and bad air scrubbers with a hint of ozone
to carry it off. In all her time in the Orbitals she'd never once seen
an airlock like this.
She glanced around at the others; only Patricia seemed to notice or
react to the smell in any way Andrea could figure. Chiriko stood
stoically at the opposite side of the airlock from Ingrid, dressed in a
pair of slacks and a two-year old Kansai Tigers jacket, the lettering
worn from many successive washes. Unlike the others in the team,
Chiriko had been packed when she joined, and she wore mostly her own
clothes, almost as if to spite Isis' clothing selection.
Such a child, Andrea thought with annoyance. She ran her finger along
her neck to her interface plug, feeling the hollow sensation in her head
she got when she wasn't plugged in. No way to use her suit and get
through customs at the same time.
The inner door to Havoc opened, revealing a large central plaza. It
could have been Middle Town on her old station, but seeder and older.
Havoc was one of the oldest stations in orbit around Earth to support
and meaningful population, and with age came corruption. Before Genom
bought Havoc from the European Space Agency sometime around the '40s it
had been a research facility dedicated to refining zero gee construction
methods. Genom didn't need any more construction facilities so it was
gradually converted into one of the first Space Cities.
Now it was a disreputable mess, filled with human trash and the boomers
that kept them in line. Even the Causeway, commercial center of the
station, looked as if its heart had lost long ago and any upkeep since
was just following the motions.
"Nice place for a vacation," Chiriko said sarcastically, directing the
comment to Andrea. She had been quiet and moody since Farpoint, but as
far as Andrea was concerned she had always been moody and quiet.
"What are we doing here anyway," Patricia asked, glancing at her watch.
"Getting a ticket for Earth and getting the hell out of here," Ingrid
told her, shifting her small bag to the other shoulder. Her black eyes
shifted quickly and Andrea could tell she was checking the net through
her internal connection. Bitch, she thought darkly, feeling a withdrawal
tremor building. "Travel agencies are along the Causeway, about a
hundred fifty meters that way," she pointed down one of the beaten paths
that snaked through the mass of people that made up the Causeway.
"Mason, it smells," Chiriko said finally as she negotiated her way
through the mess. "Worse than the Docks back home." Andrea noticed
Ingrid grinning slightly at the admission of weakness.
"Lets get moving," the woman said, absently brushing one of the hanging
strands of hair out of his face. Andrea shouldered her bag and followed
Ingrid as she made her way among the various people in the streets.
Its much worse than Middle Town, she though as she watched the hungry
looking shopkeepers stare at them as they walked by. Others watched too,
more predatory expressions on their faces. Chiriko took the rear,
glaring back at the human trash lined up along the rickety shacks that
passed for shops.
They walked for ten minutes, the pace slow due to the mass of people
and the unhurried speed at which they moved. For Andrea it was extremely
frustrating, the slowness around her reminding her that she was stuck in
Slow Time for another couple of hours.
"Damn it!" she swore as she stumbled on the badly maintained path she
followed.
"You okay?" Patricia asked from behind her, a hand resting on Andrea's
shoulder to stabilize the younger girl.
"Fine," she barked, shrugging the hand off her shoulder and following
Ingrid's lead.
She heard whispers behind her, their meaning lost in the din of the
Causeway. Chiriko and Patricia talking about her. Andrea shook her head;
the Wire was getting to her now.
They finally made it to the Travel Agency, a small enclosed building
directly in the center of the lower level of the Causeway. A small neon
sign flashed above the entrance, blinking 'Travel' over and over. The
archaic light made Andrea's face look sickly in the reflection of the
building's dirty front window.
Inside the building was a dirty room, its d馗or uninspired aside from
the pictures that hung from the walls. A glossy printout was tacked
above the receptionist's head, the bright glaring picture of a wide
expanse of beach awesomely incongruent with its surroundings.
"Can I help you?" the receptionist, a tired looking woman several years
past her prime, asked blankly.
"Four tickets to Earth, please," Ingrid asked in a voice that sounded
na�e enough to match the tourist outfit she wore. As she had aboard the
Boundless, Andrea couldn't help but be impressed with the woman. She was
certainly the best choice for the de facto leader position.
The woman behind the desk looked back at Ingrid, eyes alert for the
first time since the girls had entered the building. She looked
appraisingly at the four girls, noting their clothing. "You've got all
the proper paperwork, correct?" she asked.
"Of course," Ingrid responded, making a show of digging through her
purse for the digital passport Isis had provided. Andrea and the others
followed suited, still silent. The woman checked each passport by
linking it to the ratty old desktop on her desk. She mulled over the
results of her background check for a moment, then looked up and smiled.
Andrea found herself releasing a breath she hadn't known she was
holding as the woman said: "Where on Earth did you want to go?"
Customs passed over them quickly, mostly grinning and making innuendo
as the four girls passed through the checkpoint. It was in the exact
center of Havoc Station, along the axial passage where the station's
pseudo-gravity held no sway, so the women coasted along the passageway
toward the far end of the station. Motorized holds whirred along the
hall, which was in much better shape than the rest of the station.
They reached the far end in a few minutes, a large transparent sphere
capping the central corridor. Outside were hundreds of space ships, of
every shape and size. Bustling trade ships brooded in their holding
patterns as small sleek ships that were probably pirates unlatched from
the docking facilities. All the ships were beaten and old, sharing an
unknown quality with the Causeway below.
Chiriko recognized that quality from her time in Osaka. The black
market auctions were steeped in it, the subways oozed it and she'd even
felt it in the clean halls of Farpoint. She couldn't name it, but she
could tell the others could feel it too. As far as she knew that was her
only real connection to her teammates.
The Knight Sabers paused for a moment, all lost in thought for a
moment. A sense of completion seemed to hover around them. The beginning
of this, for lack of a better name, quest was over and they could all
tell it. Below, at the southern tip of the continent of Africa, lay what
Isis said was the key to the end of Genom.
Author's Notes:
Part Six wrapped up, with a plan of the next story arc kicking around.
This series seems to be in pretty good shape, at least from my angle. I
should have the next part on the FFML when I least expect it. This part
drew background from the AD Police Files graphic novel, mostly for the
Leon's notes part at the beginning. St. Augistine's quote is from an
excerpt in Time, edited by Johnathan Westphal and Carl Levenson. I can
be reached at www.brandeis.edu/~jmele or jmele@brandeis.edu
Thanks for Reading
Fnord.