First Contact

Chapter 907: It All Falls Down

I believe in myself so I have already won! - Unknown

That's not how any of this works! - Unknown

I'll carve that on your headstone. - Terran Descent Humanity

Believed in self so already won. - Inscription on a grave monument, on a dead world.

Herod found himself flipping over, the world spinning right before he slammed into the ground, driving the breath out of him in a whoosh. Dhruv held his wrist, twisted Herod's arm, and growled "tap out" while Herod was still trying to figure out what happened.

Herod smacked the ground and Dhruv let him go, holding out a hand to pull Herod up to his feet.

"You can't let them take control of your arms or legs, Herod," Daxin said from where he was sitting on the log, watching Dhruv's lessons in hand to hand combat.

"I've never had to fight before," Herod said, breathing heavy and his back aching. "Now you're trying to teach me hand to hand before we go into a nightmare."

"That's why you need to learn," Dhruv said, taking a basic offense stance. "Again."

Dee shook her head and laughed. "You two are the worst teachers ever," she laughed.

"You think you can do better?" Daxin asked without any rancor.

Dee nodded, standing up and brushing off her skirt. "Sure."

"By all means," Dhruv said, standing up straight. He reached out and patted Herod's shoulder. "When she's done chewing you up, I'll help you again."

Herod just nodded, feeling his mouth go dry as Dee walked up.

"I'm going to teach you the basics," she said. "Nothing fancy. A hip throw at the most. The same thing taught to generations of Hamburger Kingdom soldiers that enabled them to destroy the enemy in close quarters combat."

Herod nodded, wiping his mouth.

"Put all that fancy shit out of your mind, Harry," Dee said. She moved up next to him. "We'll combine some karate and judo and you'll be fine, Daniel-San. You aren't competing for the All-Valley Tournament against Cobra-Kai, you're just trying to survive mortal combat."

Herod just nodded.

"Follow my movements," she said, her voice soft. Her arm moved in a circle. "Wax on," she moved her other hand in an opposing circle. "Wax off."

The gathered immortals watched with interest as Dee then did a few other movements, then walked over and sat down.

"Keep going. Wax on. Wax off. Paint up. Paint down," she said. She picked up a bottle of narco-brew and took a long drink.

"Is this going to work?" Dhruv asked.

"We have a limited window to teach him. You're trying to teach him super-Immortal combat style like he's going to fight in Outworld. I just want him to survive long enough to get away," Dee said, shrugging. "You guys have enough cyberware to build a toaster, most of your muscle is gene-tweaked bioware. You have thousands of years as soldiers and thousands of man hours in combat. He's got none of that. So, return to monke it is."

Daxin nodded. "I get it."

"Figures you would," Dee said dryly.

-----

"Watch," Dee said.

Herod nodded and Dee stepped toward Dhruv.

"Please, don't hurt me. Please, I'm unarmed and just a woman," Dee said, stepping forward, holding her hands up and out. "Please, mister, don't hurt me. I'll do anything you want."

Dhruv opened his mouth to protest, glancing at Daxin.

Dee grabbed him, dropping her right arm down, pulling him close. Dhruv went with it, automatically, to break the hold and keep his balance from the sudden yank that Dee stepped into.

The carrot hit him just under the ribs, angled up, and Dee 'punched' him with the carrot four times, as Dhruv broke the hold and shoved Dee away.

Dee went with it, stumbling away.

Herod noted that she was in control of the stumble, staying on her feet, giving Dhruv her profile, while still holding one hand out.

"Please, don't hurt me," Dee kept saying.

Dhruv shook his head, smiling.

"Nicely done," he said.

"Don't butter my muffin, you could have stopped me eight ways from Sunday and almost accidentally did out of reflex," Dee snapped. She looked at Herod. "A superior combatant isn't going to fall for it, so it's a last resort or your opening move."

Kalki gave a slow clap. "It would fool many," he said.

"Pet your goat," Dee snapped. Dee turned to Herod. "Say whatever you need, beg, plead, cry, have your hands up so that they see you as unarmed, helpless and weak."

Daxin stepping up, putting his hand on Dee's shoulder.

"She's right," Daxin said.

Dee suddenly spun and drove the carrot into Daxin's side, punching rapidly. "THAT'S MY PURSE! I DON'T KNOW YOU!" she screamed.

Daxin laughed as Dee stepped back, biting off the end of the carrot.

"Speed, sudden shocking violence. Don't think, just do it at the first opportunity," Daxin said as Dee went over and sat down. He drew a line up his side with one finger. "Lungs are right here. Puncture those, take away their breath, break contact, let them drown," he tapped under his bottom rib on his chest. "Here, upward angle. You can't miss the heart or something good, even on a lot of xeno-species."

Dee swished her mouth out and spit into the bushes. She took a bite off the mangled carrot, chewed, and swallowed.

"OK, Pinocchio," Dee snapped. "Wax on. Wax off, Daniel-San."

Herod sighed and kept repeating the motions.

-----

The lights were red, harsh sodium lights, that filled the corridor with crimson light. It was used for shade repellent, as shades usually avoided both sodium lights as well as the color red. The paint on the walls was red, the doorways lined with salt.

The figures that were in the hallway cared nothing for that.

They looked like people, only slightly thinned and elongated. Their 'skin' was black charcoal with cracks filled with molten red fluid. Their mouths were elongated and filled with needle teeth in front of molten maws. Their eyes were burning pits of molten rock. Their hands, at the end of too-long arm, had long fingers with too many joints and long claws.

Harry didn't pay any attention to all of that beyond letting it snapshot into his brain as he charged, leveling both pistols and pulling the triggers.

All eight of them flinched slightly as he moved toward them.

That wasn't right. Things should move away from them. Should be shocked into immovability or into panicked flight.

Instead, the prey was coming straight at them.

The bullets, carved with the sigil of the Digital Omnimessiah, exploded on the black charcoal, bright gold flashes that made the figures howl.

One reached for Herod and he slapped the arm away, pushing the pistol into its mouth and pulling the trigger.

The back of the head exploded outward and the figure fell into ash. He pushed the barrel into the face of the other and shot it in the eye. It exploded into flinders of ash.

One swiped, the talons shredding his shirt, but Herod was dropping backwards in a roll, his thumbs releasing the cylinders, the empty shells falling around him. He got on his feet, reloading the pistols in a clumsy looking motion that was done with practiced smoothness.

If you do something enough times, it becomes automatic, no matter what the circumstances are. Wax on, wax off, Pinnochio.

The six remaining started forward and Harry took two steps forward, snapping the cylinders closed and firing in the same motion.

Both shots went through open screeching mouths and the shades collapsed into ash. Two more shots and one went down, the other shaking its head as the glowing gold streak above one eye showed the shot had missed.

The other three charged.

Herod fired twice, one puffing into dust, the other knocked sideways.

The last swung a clawed hand and Herod slapped it aside with the engraved barrel of the pistol, shoving the barrel into the mouth of the screeching shade and pulling the trigger. The shade vanished and the last jumped at him, talons leading the way, mouth opened in a screech of rage.

Herod stepped into it, twisting slightly to get between the outstretched claws, shoving the pistol into the mouth and pulling the trigger.

The body puffed into ash, swirling around him.

Against any other foe, the mass of the body would have taken Herod down to the ground.

He moved up and glanced into the room.

Empty, but a crack in the wall.

Herod stepped forward, putting his forearm against the crack, closing his eyes and concentrating. He muttered a prayer quickly, using the words and cadence to focus the power and let it flow through him.

"In your name, end of line," he said.

The crack filled with golden light that burned brightly.

Herod turned and left the room, elbowing the switch and closing the door behind him. He reloaded the pistols, slowly, using loose rounds off his gunbelt rather than the speed loaders.

He was proud of himself that his hands didn't shake.

He was afraid. Afraid that the shades would rip his guts out, afraid that he'd blow it and everyone would die.

He could remember when the fear he felt now would have paralyzed him, reduced him to curling up and hoping nobody would hurt him.

"How do you deal with the fear?" he asked. He was sitting on the ground, leaning against Dee's skirt covered legs, his head tilted onto her thigh.

"It's part of being alive, Harry," Dee said softly, stroking his hair. "It's part of the human condition. We're afraid of people bigger than us, stranger than us, that we don't know, that we don't understand. We're afraid of the dark, we're afraid of the baby choking on its own spit because children are retards, we're afraid of burning dinner and having to go hungry."

"I've never been afraid like this," Herod admitted.

Dee gently touched his cheek. "You've never had to do anything like this," she said. She stared at the fire. "The thing is, Harry, you have to learn to do things even when you're afraid. The heroes, the real ones not the ones see on the tee-vee, they were afraid the whole time. They just did it anyway."

"How did you deal with it?" Herod asked.

"I did what had to be done. If I didn't do it, who would?" Dee asked softly. "Going to the store was a risk I'd be beaten up, robbed, maybe even raped as I walked to and from the store and home. I did it anyway, because my mother and father were working the field and my baby brother was hungry."

"Your brother," Herod asked. "What happened to him?"

"The Nips killed him," Dee said. Her voice was suddenly empty. "He was a church aid worker, a teenage civilian, and he died in something called Bataan. His mantra of 'just helping people' earned him a Nip sword in the gut when he tried to stop their soldiers from executing sick civilians."

"Oh," Herod said.

"People only respect strength, Harry. You could have the cure for cancer in your hand, but if you're weak, or they hate you enough and think they're strong enough, they'll kill you and step on the cure to do it," Dee's voice was still cold and empty. "Remember that. If you appear weak, they will try to kill you. If you are weak they will kill you and mock you as you die."

"That's why I begged my dad to teach me to kill with a knife before my tits came in," she said. "I never forgot that Oakies ate my dog."

Herod said nothing, just leaned against her leg as she stroked his hair and stared at the fire with shuttered eyes.

The communication center was just up ahead.

The dogboi howl had sounded three times more, all of them crackling and distorted, full of static.

And useless.

The hallway was swarming with shades. A few black with red cracks all over them. The rest were all white line-art. All of them screaming, tearing at each other, attacking each other, rending their own flesh with their claws.

He checked the load in his pistols.

Twelve shells.

Twelve shots.

Harry nodded to himself, his back against the wall, the communications center just around the corner he was next to and ten more steps past that.

"Thirty steps down. Ten more," he said. "Third down and ten," he said, repeating what he'd heard Daxin say a few times.

He took a deep breath, lifted up his pistol and touched the brim of his hat with the front sight.

"In your name, end of line," he whispered.

He came around the corner, firing, spacing his shots, seeing the effects before firing the next shot.

Each bullet plowed through multiple shades, making them vanish in a spray of clear and slimy ectoplasm. Some screamed as they sprayed into goo, others just popped, and a few held on for a second before popping.

Three shots from each of the pistols and all that was left was four of the Hellshades.

Herod walked forward, his eyes on the communication center's door.

The four Hellshades came at him, screaming.

He shot two in the mouth, one through the eye.

The last was on him and he parried a swipe with the barrel of the inlaid pistol, the impact hard enough to numb up his fingers. Another swipe and he blocked it at the wrist with his forearm, feeling the shock through his arm and shoulder. The teeth seemed to elongate as the mouth stretched downward.

Its breath stunk of brimstone and sulfur.

It slashed at him again and he managed to slap it aside with his forearm even as he pushed back.

The Hellshade hissed as its feet scraped up thin curling slivers of deck plating.

It pulled back its arm to try to slash him across the face.

Harry jammed the pistol into its mouth and pulled the trigger.

The back of the shade's head exploded and it puffed into flinders and sparks that went out as they drifted toward the floor.

Harry wanted to lean against the wall and breathe heavy, but instead he pushed forward, getting to the door of the communication center. He tapped the button and the door beeped twice and buzzed once, telling him it was locked.

He holstered one pistol and put his hand on the panel.

It beeped twice and the door slid open.

Shades poured out, screaming, and Harry backed off, holding the pistol in his left hand up by his face, vertical to the ground, cracking open the cylinder and letting the shells fall out.

Harry realized he had no choice as the hallway flooded with dozens of shades, all screaming and wailing. They all turned, as one, and began sweeping toward him.

He held out his right hand in a stop motion, his hand cocked at the wrist, his fingers outstretched.

He reached down, into himself, where the fear was.

"You control it, don't let it control you," Dee whispered.

He grabbed the bridle in the fear's mouth and yanked on it, hauling it up.

"No," he said.

Lightning crackled down his arm, dancing between his outstretched fingers.

The shades stopped like they had hit a wall, screaming and struggling, clawing at the air.

"To rest."

Harry made a fist.

The shades popped.

Harry staggered as the power he was holding drained away, but he still pushed forward. Two steps and he stiffened his legs, willing his knees and hips to hold his weight, and controlled his breathing.

The communications center was empty. Most of the monitors were cracked, dead, or smears of red and black. Dead pixels littered the screens.

Harry stepped into the room, moving up and putting one finger against the input/output jack.

It only took a second.

The dogboi howl sounded out again.

Rich, strong, full of life.

Harry triggered it again.

And again.

He wanted to sit down in the chair, wanted to just put his feet up and maybe drink a narcobrew.

But he knew there was more to do.

If not you, then who? Dhruv asked in his memories.

Harry turned and walked out into the hallway, confidence filling him, pushing away the fear for a moment.

He knew it didn't matter how scared he was.