PROLOGUE
150,000 Years Ago
Crap, it had to happen during his shift. Flies Like A Rock glared at his screen. Nope, still cranged up. Gonna have to go fix it myself. Figures! Rock gave a final glare at the travesty his screen showed him, then sent a thought out to his supervisor. “Hey Diamond from the Sea, you there Boss?”
“Wassup Rocky boy?” Diamond from the Sea sounded distracted, good.“I gotta head north to fix this pileup,” he sent a quick summary of the Gate malfunction, “I'm headed up to see about the breakdown. My tell claims it's lost the lock on Homebase, no way to level off and open for business.”
Silence. Then, “Go on then, see what's going on. I'm thinking it's not on us, it's upstream of us, Home Base's problem and not ours. The Exit Gate is down too, lost the lock, ”
Flies Like A Rock thought about that, didn't like where that was headed, “Uhh, Boss? Aren't both those Gate origins kinda spatially close together? As these things go I mean.”
“Yes.” The short reply was loaded with things unsaid. Big, nasty things.
Flies pushed for clarity, “Close, like a couple of light years close and both planets have a straight shot in to us.”
Again, his boss made with the short, uninformative response. “Yes.”
Crang! Still not telling me anything new. “I'm done suiting up Boss, on my way. Soon as I know anything, I'll let you know!”
“You do that Rocky Boy!”
149,991 years, 364 days 14 hours ago
Shipboard instrumentation had indicated some type of problem back at the Entry Portal. He’d been told to go there, fix that. Still hoping to reconnect with anyone off-world at this point. Nine years of silence was making everyone edgy.
Flitters were the only aircraft on-board the ship that had the range. It had been a long flight. The novelty of silent, lonely flight, had worn off rather soon, that's when the mind numbing monotony began, along with the usual wondering what in the hell happened to the network. Damn Reefs are indestructible, we should be able to connect somewhere!
When he finally reached the Entry Portal it had turned out to be nothing, at least on their end that needed to be done, the usual. A big waste of time in his opinion, the problem was still upstream from them. The long, lonely, dreary, flight back to his ship awaited. He was wondering what he’d ever seen good about these cramped little things. Now he was searching for his survey ship. His instruments indicated it should be in this quadrant. Perhaps if he gained some altitude it would be easier to see? It had been a long, long flight and he was beyond ready to get back. He missed shipboard cooking the most. Meals ready to eat, weren’t. Not really.
God’s own strobe light illuminated the sky.
The gamma ray burster scrambled his nervous system as well as the cybernetics of the flitter. He tumbled like a leaf in a gale, spiraling downward toward the sea far below. He was going to hit. He was going to die. The only question was would he die from radiation poisoning while still in the air or would he live long enough to die from smashing into the sea at high speed. He was tough. He managed to stay alive until he hit the water..then he died.
149,989 years, 259 days and 04 hours ago
When the GRB hit, more than Flies Like A Rock had had A Bad Day, everyone on the planet did also. Over 123,000 direct deaths, most due to falling out of the sky as their machines fried. Sixteen Planetary Installation vessels fell from 37,000 feet, with all hands on board. Dead and destroyed forever, both people and ships.
Diamond from the Sea was one of the lucky ones, he'd been physically at the Exit Gate, at the opposite pole, when the GRB swept across the planet. Not just your normal, planet killing GRB either. Instead we get hit with a Long Duration GRB, the worst kind! Had to be that super-massive, high metal content star in the adjacent arm, stellar had been keeping an eye out for any precursor events, guess they missed them! Timing is about right, direction is right too if you figure length of time between losing contact with back home and the GRB impact here. I wonder how bad off home is now. With any luck, they were far enough in their orbit to be missed completely or just singed a bit. He refused to entertain any other possibility. Home was still there! Just Bad Luck the beam was aimed this way. The beam of highly energetic particles swept the entire sunlit side of the planet. Almost the absolute worst case scenario possible. Seventeen minutes of death, of frying electronics. Good thing the main base only got the tail end, last 32 seconds of the burst. No electrical devices, but at least 48,000 survivors made it through! Now what? Our ozone protection is almost gone, lost a lot of atmosphere too. Things are Not Good right now. Bound to get better, or worse, it was a simple binary solution.
75,258 Years Ago, The End of the Interregnum
“Looks really good Hrynar. All the base numbers are still rock steady, looks like this'll be the final configuration once we fire them all back up!” Gadin tapped one of the gauges, an old habit from when they used to be analogue. A couple flickered slightly, then steadied again showing full output.
“I don't know, Gadin. I still think it's not safe when they're all hooked up and running full bore again. Remember the last time all six taps were on, it was a constant juggle to keep them from failing. All we managed was half a day before we shut down.”
“Hrynar, this new software and the digital gauges will keep them in sync better than we ever did! We ain't got anything to worry about anyway. What's the worst that can happen? They go asynchronous, the computer will shut them down or they blow their safeties and shut down. No problem!”
Hrynar shook his head, slowly, “I have my doubts about this.” Enough. I've told everyone my fears, I even put it writing. Hrynar sighed theatrically and dropped the whole discussion. Time to let it go, just move on. He would regret dropping the subject, along with every human on Earth.
Mendar looked around, beaming and pontificating to the media reps. Hrynar thought he looked like a short, fat proto-human, like one of the barely upright walkers on the sub continent. All he needs is to grunt a little more and fling his scat everywhere! Strip him naked, roll him in dirt and he'd make a fine proto-human specimen. Crang, he's stupid enough to fit in with them, stinking politician! Stifling his grin, Hrynar checked gauges again. Seemed okay, steady enough. Even after 21 hours of wide open operation, he couldn't hear or feel the six Core Taps at all, not even the slightest vibration. Now, all we have to do is put the full load to them, see what happens then.
One hundred eighty seven miles below the surface, well beneath the fifty one mile vertical shaft that powered the six Core Taps, a chamber rumbled uneasily. It had last rumbled into life 425,000 years prior to the current uneasiness. That had been caused by a deep earthquake generated by the movement of the two tectonic plates that intersected each other a stone throw away. This event would be worse. Much worse.
Throughout all the known Dimensions, Core Taps were the most common form of energy creation (although Zero Point Power Plants were much more efficient and far less dangerous, those were an extremely advanced technology, and were much more rare). The number of multiple Core Taps into a single shaft that were successful, however, were so small it may as well been zero, on an inter-Universal scale. The reason for this was simple, while a single Core Tap provided power, they were also very dangerous to the end user, multiply the number of Taps and the danger increased exponentially. Six, together, was planetary destruction waiting to happen.
The volume of energy moved by the six Core Taps was immense, as was the mass of the energy. The physical shift of the weight of all the energy moving, set up vibrations deep in the mantle. Ripples that moved majestically across the molten magma, impacting the uneasy crust. As ripples in a pond do, they began to combine and magnify themselves, circling the planet albeit unseen. The ripples slowly settled into an ordered rhythm and, by themselves, would not have affected the Core Taps. They were not by themselves, however.
Rippling through the upper mantle, pressing against the crust in waves of pressure and not pressure, pulses of energy pounded into the shallow crust. The overstressed tectonic plates immediately responded. Two hundred years of stored energy in the subduction zone directly below broke free, allowing three plates the temporary freedom of unrestricted movement.
Compared to the energy output of six combined Core Taps, the energy released by the earthquake was minimal. Unfortunately, it occurred less than two miles from the Core Taps themselves. Lateral shifting of the tectonic plate, moved the entire island 16 feet sideways, severing all connections into the planet. All six Core Taps found themselves unregulated, their finely tuned connections severed and independent from each other, for a very short period of time. Perhaps a pico second, maybe even two. The earthquake began to shake the entire planet, proto-humans in what would be called Sub Saharan Africa were knocked off their feet as the ground shook from the quake. Hooting in fear, they huddled together seeking comfort with physical contact.
The six Taps went a-coherent, attempting to move energy in both directions simultaneously. The energy steams headed for the surface were chopped off, seven miles below the island. Those headed inward, were cut off nineteen miles underground. The energy rebounded. The plugged shaft full of frustrated energy looked for an outlet. It made its own.
Six hundred seventy cubic miles of island immediately took to the skies, circled the planet several times, finally falling to the ground as ash loaded acid-rain over the course of a decade. Beneath the shattered island, an enormous chamber was formed, with a volume of over 7500 cubic miles, a massive chamber that filled with molten rock and expelled it all to the surface as ashes that clouded the skies, taking the center of the island upward and outward, as well as feeding a massive pyroclastic flow that covered over seven thousand square miles.
Toba announced to the world, after 425,000 years of uneasy silence, that it was still very much alive.
In hindsight, it had probably been a very bad decision to build the Core Taps where they did, but the thinness of the crust combined with having a convenient island to use as both a drill platform as well as a facility site, was too providential to ignore. This was a near fatal decision for all living humans.
Ash and green house gases, billowed high into the atmosphere and were carried across the planet, only to fall as acid rain. Temperatures worldwide began to plummet as the gray clouds reflected the suns warming rays. For ten years they fell, dropping below a global average of 45 degrees Fahrenheit. The minor cooling the Earth had been enjoying became a severe cooling. The ice sheets began to grow and flow downward, toward the equator. For a thousand years the ice ruled the Earth while the pitiful remnants of humanity grubbed for bugs in the African snow and ashes just trying to survive. Less than nine thousand remained alive, sick, malnourished and a far cry from the proud humans they were descended from, alive but reduced to ignorant savages drubbing in the dirt. Nothing of their proud origins, thousands of light years away remained, not even a memory. In a world slowly recovering from an ice age, they would go forth and rediscover civilization. Or they would die out, a forgotten species, the blow by of survival of the fittest.
CHAPTER ONE
Viet Nam

The AC47 Gunship was older than Shelby. Its age didn’t matter, the guns it carried did. It winged over into a pylon turn once over their smoke choked position and opened up with all three side-mounted GAU-2B/A mini-guns. Three hundred 7.62 mm rounds per second had slammed into the jungle floor. The metallic hail storm obliterated everything outside the smoke. The bullets impacting so close together that every living thing, including insects, trees and grass, were splattered. Every fifth round was a tracer. A solid rod of fire painted the earth.
The GunShip hung around all night , occasionally firing into the jungle. It orbited Shelby’s pinned down unit for hours. Anything that moved, was pulverized. Finally, at dawn, it left. Even a converted cargo ship had only so much fuel.
Great plan. Except that this time it didn’t work. When PUFF departed, the VC popped back up out of their spider holes and resumed fire. This part of the Iron Triangle, Cu Chi it was called, was lousy with tunnels. The VC had patiently waited below ground until PUFF left.
Off to one side of the trail, a steep hill taunted them. The orders were fairly basic, 'recon in force' or more accurately, take the hill. Once the high ground was secured, they'd have the advantage. At least, that was the plan.
Shelby desperately crawled up the hill, choking in the thick, greasy air. With every explosion, his body was squeezed and he was slammed into the ground or tossed into the air. As painful as the body slams were, he preferred the ground pounding over being tossed into the air. Lethal debris filled the air, shrapnel, bullets and body parts were all intermingled with fragments of rain forest.
He barely heard the agonized screaming of his wounded and dying buddies, his eardrums had long since been ruptured, with a continual, thin trickle of blood flowing from both.
Taking the hill was turning out to be a bad idea. Hell, his enlisting was looking like it had been a very bad idea, even if it had made sense at the time. He was going to die, they were all going to die here, scrambling up this bloody damn hill. Yeah, enlisting had been a dumbassed idea. As dumb as trying to take the hill, we're doomed going up or down. If we can get to the top we'll have the high ground, that's the only possible survivable choice we have. Take the damn hill or die.
Shrapnel whined through the air, thick as a swarm of vicious killer bees, stinging and killing, killing and stinging. Shelby knew, amidst all the chaos and pain, that it was crawl or die. Most likely it was crawl and die anyway, like those on the trail behind. Some of the shrapnel hit him, or rather his pack. He found himself crawling up the hill with his pack dragging him to one side. He ditched the pack.
A jagged piece of Taylor lay on the right, that stupid peace tattoo on his wrist the only identifiable part. The top half of Smith was on the left. Soft, squishy, drippy parts of other soldiers decorated the landscape.
Jackson stood up to get a shot down a spider hole with his flamethrower. Shelby screamed at him to get down but to no avail. The flamethrower’s pressure tank was pierced by a semi molten chunk of shrapnel and exploded. Covered in the burning gel, Jackson screamed as he danced in the flames. Writhing in the fire, sloughs of melting skin were flung off while he danced. Jackson turned his flaming head toward Shelby, reached out a burning arm, and then collapsed onto the ground, his melted eyes still searching for Shelby.
Shelby covered his eyes and ears, desperately trying to hide from the screaming, from the chaos, from Jackson. So much noise, so much chaos, so much pain, so much death.
So much smell. The unforgettable smell of burning human, distinct from all other smells. The crackling sounds of burning meat.
It didn’t matter. Crawl or die. Shelby continued to crawl. He could crawl faster without the pack. He hugged the ground closer. Perhaps that’s why he made it to the top. No one else did. He slithered into an old, run-down temple he found. Now he had some rock between him and all the incoming ordinance.
The VC really, really didn’t like Shelby escaping into the temple. He was supposed to have died in place like the rest of his team. Not wanting to let him escape, they directed a maelstrom of combined fire onto his position. Every rocket and mortar they had was throwing ordnance his way.
This was going to hurt. It did. A lot.
Crouched behind a wall to avoid all the incoming Shelby didn’t see the dragon statue when it was obliterated by RPG and mortars. He felt it though. Rock fragments and shrapnel went everywhere. Something knocked his steel pot off his head.. Something else tore his M-16 out of his hands and spun him around, just in time for a final something to smash into his forehead.
Then the roof caved in and Shelby fell in with it. Shelby should have died right there, but he didn’t.
The statue was old, it was beyond ancient. Predating the pyramids by tens of thousands of years, it had been made by a civilization that Modern Man (if asked) would claim never existed. As Empires rose and fell, it was passed on to each succeeding Civilization. Civilizations that Modern Man knew never existed, not even as cave drawings.
It had sat, atop a vine covered stone temple, a small hill, in the jungle of what was now Cambodia, greeting the sun each morning for uncounted millennia, undisturbed. Slumbering in the lush jungle.
The statue wasn’t stone. It was something else, something not stone, an inert not stone. Early priests claimed the head to be the fossilized skull of a dead dragon attached to a stone body. They were wrong. The stone implanted just above the eyes on the forehead was neither a stone or bone. It was a different form of not stone. It was a SoulStone, both a badge of rank and a tool in one.
In a self induced stasis for millions of years, to those early civilizations the inert SoulStone appeared to be a jewel of some sort. When the RPG shattered the not stone of the statue, the SoulStone had been blown free, only to become yet another chunk of potentially lethal shrapnel. Then, much like shrapnel it embedded itself in Shelby’s brain, slamming through his skull and coming to rest in the space between his two brain halves, just behind his forehead. The SoulStone’s sensors noted that it was once more surrounded by a biological medium. Processors spooled up almost instantly. Data was analyzed at electronic speeds. Nanites were dispatched in a flood. Templates were tested. It was determined, almost before Shelby’s head had stopped bouncing off rock, that it was in a severely damaged organism that needed immediate action. Heuristic programs booted like lightning , systems flashed into activation, .
Repair procedures were activated as the roof collapsed under Shelby’s prone form. The SoulStone didn’t as yet know what matrix it was within, but it recognized gross damage. It could fix that. It WOULD fulfill it’s function. No matter what.
Shelby should have already died, many times over, but he hadn’t.
Shelby was out cold. He hadn’t felt it when the roof gave way. He hadn’t felt it when he’d plummeted through level after level as they each collapsed below him, until he finally came to rest in the sub level of the building. He hadn’t felt it when he had bounced like a rag doll from girder to wall to support beam, losing skin as he went. He had finally oozed down a wall and smacked, butt first into the stone floor, sitting up right, back against that same wall. His feet were stretched out in front of him. He hadn’t felt it when the building collapsed in on top of him, crushing his legs into paste.
Shelby really, really, should have died then, but he hadn’t.
Shelby was flying.
At one time he had loved these tiny little flitters. They were so small that he had felt he was wearing the tiny aircraft rather than riding inside of it. They were fun to fly for a short while. He had loved them right up until he died. Blasted from the sky from a Gamma Ray Burst. He remembered that clearly, falling from the sky. Finally slamming into what would one day be called Cambodia.

Shelby stared into the face of a Dragon.
“What have we here?” He barely heard it rumble as if it were muttering to itself. “This matrix is a new one, seems unmodified yet different, . Yet, it presents as standard human plus.”
Shelby felt icy tendrils probe his brain. His mind was being massaged,the structure was being analyzed down to the molecular level. The voice changed, became more understandable, the dragon face become transparent and began to fade away, “Still, it has a certain beauty, an elegance of it’s own. Oh! I see what was done there! Who would have ever thought, That actually is a better design, hmmm. I like that!”
The voice continued to speak to itself, it grew increasingly clear, more understandable, less garbled. The face had vanished.
Shelby was getting pissed. “Excuse me! It’s not polite to ignore people!”
“Oh My!” The Voice said. It was no longer menacing. In fact it was the opposite. It was endearing, comforting. “I’m so sorry. I apologize. I was expecting the calibration to take much longer. You can hear me? VERY GOOD! That’s a very promising sign this early in the synthesis!”
“What the HELL are you talking about?“ Shelby said “For that matter, who are you? What are you? Where the hell am I? What’s going on? The last I remember was...”
Shelby remembered all right. Some memories are painful, those were.
“Very inquisitive too!” The voice said with approval “Very good. It’s all right that you should want to know. You and I are going to be the BEST of friends!”
“Never mind all that.” Shelby said. “Answer my question.”
“It’s complex.“ The Dragon said.. “You’d have to, Oh! Well you do, don’t you? That makes it so much easier, as I was saying. Oh NO!”
“STOP IT! “Shelby was exasperated. “You’re not making any sense.”
“I know. There is so much to tell you, and if I’m not careful I won’t have time. I have to work fast.” The voice muttered.
“Why? Why are you short on time?” Shelby asked.
“Because you’re dying” the voice said. “I’ve got to... oh, dammit it got away... slippery little bastard... ah, there, got it, fused it, done. Fixed that one. That one was the worst. I’ve got more time with the others, whole seconds even. A few more minutes and you would have bled out. Now we can chat, while I continue with the repairs without you dying in mid sentence. I hate it when that happens.“
“ Dying? What? What did you just fix?” Shelby asked.
“I fixed a bleeder. You were bleeding out. Your legs, among other things is a mess. Your right foot is gone too. That should have bled faster. Odd that it didn’t.” the voice said “You should be okay now. Well I mean as okay as anyone can be who’s pinned down, has his skull caved in, has almost every bone in his body broken and is crushed under a collapsed stone building. Considering all that you’re in top shape.”
“A bleeder? Crushed? Foot gone? My skull?” Shelby repeated “Under a building?”
“Yes. Your legs are the worst. Or rather what’s left of them. Not much actually. They’ve both been smashed to paste from mid-thigh down. You were bleeding. I fixed that. The other’s are bad enough but I’m fixing them too. It helps that you are stubborn.” It said.
“You fixed my legs?” Shelby asked.
“I fixed the bleeding.” The voice corrected. “You no longer have any legs, not really. Your legs are just gone.”
The voice was gaining proficiency in speaking at a remarkable pace. It was beginning to sound just like Shelby. It even had the same West Texas accent.
“If my legs are smashed wouldn’t I be feeling the pain?” Shelby asked.
“You certainly would be if I wasn’t blocking it.” the voice agreed. “Don’t tell me you’re a masochist? Do you like pain? I can give you pain if you want. As smashed up as you are there’s plenty of pain available.”
“NO!” Shelby said “No. That’s quite all right. I’m not a big fan of pain. Not any more, thank you. Carry on.”
“That’s a relief.” the voice said “Only a sick mind would welcome pain. I have work enough to do without having to repair your mind.”
“Okay, I get that. Now explain the part about the crushed legs, caved in skull, broken bones and the collapsed building, and why can’t I see?” Shelby replied.
“Well for one thing you’re unconscious.” The voice said. “For another thing you are in the bottom of a deep pit covered over with rocks. It’s also dark. Nighttime you know.”
“And you’re in my head.” Shelby said.
“Well yeah, Duh.” the voice replied. It sounded just a tiny bit distracted. As if most of it’s attention were somewhere else.
“Doesn’t speaking to voices in my head mean that I’m crazy?” Shelby asked.
“Certainly not” the voice replied. “I’m a Daemon. That’s what I do. Perfectly normal.”
“A demon? Are you telling me that I’m possessed by a Demon? That’s supposed to be better?” Shelby asked.
“Not a Demon.” the voice corrected “A Daemon. Not the same thing at all.“
“What’s the difference?” Shelby countered
“You KNOW this, Shelby Kaikoa Winslow.” The voice, a touch impatient, chastised him “I’m digging the words and the information out of your memory as we speak. Don’t you recall that time you read Greek mythology?”
“Humor me.” Shelby said
“Alright. Think of me as a spirit guide, like your aumakua,” the voice said “that’s actually a fairly accurate descriptor. It’s not the whole truth but it’s correct as far as it goes. I don’t see any terminology in your mind that is any more accurate. You guys don’t have computers do you?”
“Of course we have computers” Shelby was affronted. Computers were one of his interests. “IBM mainframes and...”
“Oh hah hah haha! “ The voice said “ <giggle> I see it in your mind now. Is that what those huge things are? Ha ha, If Those clanking, clattering monstrosities are what you refer to as computers then it’s no wonder! Paper tape and punched cards indeed! And core logic! How cute!”
“I’m sorry. “ it said “ that was rude but I can’t help it. If I were to tell you that I am an adaptive heuristic neural interface created just minutes ago from a cognitive template by blood nanites that were responding to certain environmental triggers then it wouldn’t make much sense to you if those things are your referent to computing.”
“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic, one of the authors in your beloved Science Fiction said that once, I think? For now consider me to be magic. For the time being think of me as your Spirit Guide, your aumakua. I’m a benevolent Spirit. VERY benevolent..Dotting even, I LIKE you. You mean a lot to me. I’m on your Best Bud. Me and you against the world, and like that.” the voice told him.
“I feel so much better.” Shelby replied sarcastically “But back to the original question. Where am I? What’s happening? And what are you doing in my head?”
“That’s three questions” the voice said “Let’s put the last one on hold for now. I told you and you’re ignoring the answer. You don’t have the technological referent to assimilate the concept I suppose. Trust me when I say I want the very best for you.
As for where you are? Physically?” It said. “ Where are WE that is? We’re in the sub-sub-sub basement of an ancient stone temple. It collapsed and fell in on top of us. Tossing Explosives around old rickety ancient edifices tends to cause that sort of thing to happen. What’s happening now? Well you were dying. I’m working on that part.”
Suddenly Shelby was enveloped in the most intense sensation of hunger that he’d ever experienced in his whole life. He was absolutely famished. He felt that he could eat anything , absolutely anything.
“Sorry about that” the voice said. The intense hunger pangs receded somewhat, but didn’t completely go away. “That slipped out. You need some food boy!”
“Damn!” Shelby said, completely overwhelmed by the sensation. “Even C-rats sounded good right now. Lucky me. I have C-Rations in my ruck. Cold C-Rats, oh joy.”
“And where’s your Ruck? Unless it’s really close, within arms reach, you’re out of luck. You’re well and truly trapped for now. Not to mention all the broken bones. Moving about is ill advised” the voice said.
“Where is it you ask? Well that’s kinda hard to say isn’t it?” Shelby asked. “You said I’m unconscious. How would I know where it is?”
“Oh, that.” The voice said. “Yuup. That is indeed a complication. I guess I better get you woke up. At least for a little while. Can you handle reality? It’s ugly.”
“I won’t know until I see it will I?” Shelby asked.
“There is that, okay, here you go.” the voice replied.
Shelby regained consciousness. He almost wished that he hadn’t. It was definitely ugly. He felt that he was in a sitting position. He opened his eyes. He could actually could see in the dark, odd that. The view was NOT encouraging. He was sitting, on the floor. His lower back and butt was against a wall. His legs were stretched out in front of him. His arms were to his sides.
He stared in horrified fascination at a huge stone block, in his lap, that was close enough to him for his forehead to press against if he leaned forward. That stone block had fallen on his legs. If it had fallen just a leetle bit closer, he would have been totally squished, like a bug.
“Oh” he said in a very small voice. He could barely stick a finger under the monstrous slab. It was that close to the floor, his legs, were smushed almost flat.
Yes, he should be in pain.
He twisted his neck to look around. There wasn’t much space. He glimpsed other massive stones, rubble, rocks, gravel. He heard the drip, drip, drip of water. The floor was wet.
There was no rucksack.
“Oh…shit“ he said again, in a small, timid quiet voice..
“Yes, pretty grim isn’t it?” the voice asked. “Now about that ruck pack?”
“Gone” Shelby said. He twisted more to get a better look, to make sure it wasn’t nearby. Then he stopped. He had felt the weirdest sensation.
“Don’t let that bother you.” the voice said “that’s just the pain. Millions of neurons screaming in the darkness at once telling you that you are in blinding, excruciating agony. It’s all those broken bones, crushed organs and ripped muscles I think. Ignore that. I have it blocked, mostly.”
“Broken bones, crushed organs and ripped muscles?” Shelby gasped.
“Yeah, and the hole in your forehead. I forgot that part. You should really be thankful for the hole in your forehead,” the voice said.
“Thankful for a hole in forehead?” Shelby was tempted, SO tempted to touch the spot in question with his hands. He refrained from doing so,
“Yeah. Right above your nose. Pretty big one too. It’s got the SoulStone in it. If it wasn’t for the SoulStone I wouldn’t be here. If I wasn’t here you’d be SO dead.” The voice said “now about that FOOD! I need some building material. I need some energy. Quit wasting time.“ The Voice relaxed the hunger pang/pain constraints just a notch.
“The Rucksack is Gone!” Shelby yelped “There is no food!”
Silence. Shelby began to wonder if the voice had been a product of his imagination.
Finally the voice spoke again. “Okay. That makes it harder. I’m transferring all of the tissue from your legs. In a manner of speaking it’s like that wolf you heard of that gnawed its leg off to get out of a trap. I’ll use the tissue to keep you from starving to death while I make repairs. I’m going to have to use every bit of fat and even some of the muscle to keep you alive. I’m going to rebuild the muscle also. You have a damn pitiful design, all you humans do. When I get through it’s going to be denser, stronger and react a LOT faster. As an added bonus you won’t have to exercise to stay strong. You’re going to be skinny but very strong.” It said.
Shelby was stunned. Could this day get any worse?
“You could die.” The Voice said. “Do you want that? Do you want to just give up and die?”
“Well no.” Shelby said “ I don’t want that.”
“Then give me some emotional support here. I’m doing the best I can. I think I’m doing pretty damn good for a newborn.” the voice said. “Hold out your hands, best you can off to either side, palms up, make a cup. Like you’re scooping water”
Shelby did that. A haze slowly formed in each of his cupped hands. The haze thickened into a fog. The fog thickened into a soup. There were things moving in the soup. It was alive. He had handfuls of tiny, tiny mites, or things gnat-like. There were many thousands of them. He stared in mute wonder for a minute then they flew away, like a puff of dust on the wind. There was no wind. It was deathly calm in his crypt-like enclosure.
“What the hell?” he asked.
“Zombie mite's” the voice said. “Your blood nanites made them. They’re looking for brains. When they find brains they’ll take control of whatever critter that has the brains and it’ll come back here.
“Wouldn’t that kill the critter?” Shelby asked.
“Nope” the voice said. “The kind of brains they’re looking for it won’t. Insects mostly. This trick works best on bugs. For some reason it won’t work on anything with a real brain. If we’re lucky we might get a snake but I wouldn’t count on it. Food should be arriving soon. Bugs mostly, like I said.”
It wasn’t long before that turned out to be true. Various bugs began to appear. They’d fly, walk, hop, or slither up close to Shelby then drop dead. Shelby ate them, shell and all. They tasted wonderful. Shelby suspected that he had the voice to thank for that. The voice was probably fritzing with his taste buds to make anything taste good.
“Guilty as charged” the voice said. “Would you rather I stop?”
“Certainly NOT” Shelby replied “I guess I’m not going anywhere for a while then?” Shelby replied sarcastically.
“Not until I get done with the body and fender work” the voice replied. “Otherwise you’d just die. I can’t have that.”
“Nope, can’t have that. Take as long as you want.” Shelby hastily said swallowing a frog. A rare treat. And a snail. Yummy. Crunchy too. “While you’re doing that though, how ’bout you tell me a story?”
“What kind of story?” the voice asked.
“The story of your people” Sarcasm was fairly dripping from Shelby’s voice. “Like who the hell are you? I asked that once already, and what’s a blood nanite?”
“You don’t have the technological referents.” The voice patiently replied.”You wouldn’t understand.”
“So teach me.” Shelby said “Have you got anything better to do?”
“Well no. Since you put it that way.” The voice agreed. “There is so MUCH you need to know before you can understand. Where do I start?”
“Say!” Shelby said “I got an idea. Start at the beginning. Fill in the middle parts, and proceed to the end? What do you think?”
“Hmmm. Yeah. That would work.” The voice agreed. “Well then. About fifty million years ago...” The Voice talked for hours and hours. Shelby absorbed information like a desiccated sponge absorbing water. He saw pictures in his mind that helped explain the narrative. The first pictures were crude but they got better. They evolved into animation, then video then 3D holography complete with surround sound. Anything Shelby didn’t understand he asked questions about. Shelby had always been an ardent Science Fiction reader. SF had vaccinated him against Future Shock. Good thing that.
“The next threat is drowning.” the voice interrupted itself. They had been talking for hours if not days.
Drowning?” Shelby asked. The floor had been damp. Now it was covered in inches of water.
“Yeah.” The voice was no longer distracted. It seemed to be giving Shelby its complete and undivided attention. “Rainwater. The roof caved in.”
A picture appeared in Shelby’s mind. A zombie-fied insect was hovering over the hole. Shelby saw what it saw.
“New Feature?” Shelby asked the voice?
“Yes, since you don’t get out much I needed a way to find out what’s going on around us. I needed to know the lay of the land more or less. All those zombie bugs were just sitting there. It didn't take much to tweak the programming on some of them a bit. We can use some of them for surveillance drones,” it said. “As you can see instead of keeping water out , the caved in roof is funneling the water in. It’s acting like a catch basin and collecting rain. We’re at the lowest level so it’s all coming here. This place is filling up. That presents a problem. We are still trapped. I’ve still got a ways to go absorbing the rest of those legs. Hopefully I can get them all sucked in before you drown.” the voice said.
“Fine, fine,” Shelby said. “Now go on with what you were saying earlier. You were just getting to the good part. You were explaining molecular electronics?”
The lecture continued. The water continued to rise. Shelby ignored the water rise with single minded determination. Eventually he was sitting in neck deep water .
The voice interrupted itself. “Done.”
“Done what?” Shelby asked. Truth be told he had been fascinated with the lecture. Ultra-advanced technology WAS magic.
“Done with your legs, and the rest of it. I even plugged the hole in your forehead. It looks nice even if I do say so myself. You’re healthy now and healed, even if we are still trapped.” The voice said. “There’s a LOT more story and information too. We’ll get to that eventually. You no longer have any legs below mid-thigh. All the tissue has been absorbed into the rest of your body. You needed it. Crunchy bugs just didn’t hack the program.” the voice said. “You’re stronger and have more endurance now than ever before. Even if you are a short skinny stumpy fellow.” The Voice said.“You can get up now.”
Shelby tried to do that. He couldn’t. “Um, one minor problem there Einstein.”
“What’s that?” the voice asked.
“My pants legs.” Shelby said “ You didn’t cut the pants legs. That ten ton block of stone is sitting on them.”
“Oh, it’s much heavier than that.” the voice sniffed “Your problem. I deal with the atomic, the molecular and the cellular, not gross physical matter like thread and cloth.”
“You’re kidding me?” Shelby said.
“Yeah, I am.” The voice all but laughed. “Gotcha. I’m pulling your leg. If I pulled any harder it’d come off. Oh. Wait. Poor analogy. They already have. I’m so sorry!”
“Very funny.” Shelby said “I guess I could slide out of my pants. I hate to leave them. You know how modest I am.”
“Yeah, right” the voice said. “Or, you might just yank harder. You’re pretty strong now, arms and shoulders especially. There might be enough space to drag them through. Maybe they just snagged. The floor might not be exactly level. Try pulling harder. If they rip they rip.”
“Good point.” Shelby tried. Amazingly enough it worked. He managed to pull the empty pants legs out from under the monolith. “Got it.” He tried to stand up on his stumps, and immediately fell down again making a big splash. Having no knees, ankles, or feet, was a weird thing. It messed with his balance. Being chest deep in water didn’t help either. Plus, he’d stepped on the empty pants legs. He’d tripped himself up.
What had been knee deep water was chest deep to him now. He used to be six foot three tall. Now he guessed that he was three foot six. Hell, it seemed as if his shoulders were as wide as he was tall. He gave up trying to balance on his stumps and just floated instead. He looped the ends of his pants up through his belt. That worked. He began to move. Surprisingly graceful and quickly actually. He surprised himself.
Shelby made his way out of the water. When he got to a dry spot he slithered out of the water and just lay there. The temple was ancient. It had many secrets. It had hidden chambers and passages.
The Voice said “Something about this place doesn’t 'feel right'.”
“ What’s the matter?” Shelby asked. “What do you mean doesn’t feel right. Haven’t you been here a gazillion years? In fact weren’t you here before the damn thing was built?”
“Not at all” the voice said. “I’m only a few days old. The SoulStone was here all that time but it isn’t cognizant of what transpires around it while in shut down mode no more so than a book would be. It’s fundamentally just a badge of rank and a computational database. I’m the user interface.”
“Oh.” Shelby said in a small quite voice. “I guess you didn’t get to that part yet. I have no idea what some of those words mean. What doesn't ’feel right' to you?”
“I don’t know, I smell a trap. You’ve been fighting Charlie for too long. Charlie's a sneaky bastard. Your caution and paranoia has rubbed off on me. I’m primed for traps.” the voice replied. “Your sensory suite is sadly lacking. If there are any traps it’d not be able to detect them. The template from which I was constructed had inputs for more than just your five senses. I feel that I should be sensing something but I can’t.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.” Shelby said “If you’ll pardon the pun.”
“No it doesn’t, but it’s the best explanation that I have.” the voice said. “I urge caution. In fact, I suggest plan B.”
“Plan B?” Shelby asked.
“Figure of speech. Hold out your hands we need more mites.” the voice requested.
Shelby did that. The same sequence of actions as before transpired until he held a handful of mites in his cupped hands.
“Well ain’t that something?” He said as the mites flew away.
“Now we wait.” the voice said.
“How do those things work anyway?” Shelby asked.
“They work just fine” the voice said.
“Smart ass.” Shelby replied. “What’s the principle?”
“They are constructed one atom at a time by the nanites in your bloodstream. Call them blood-nanites I suppose. The zombie-mites are micro-electro-mechanisms controlled by something similar to radio but of a much finer granularity. I guess it might be called Quantum Entanglement Transmission. QET? Yeah. That sounds correct to me. Was that what you meant?” The voice said “I assume you weren’t referring to the actual mechanics of the mite?”
“No I wasn’t. Maybe I’ll want to know the nutz and boltz of mitz later. Like Radio you say? My unit has several radio men. The radio set was bigger than my dear departed Ruck. I’ve heard of TV, I think. Didn’t have one at home. I Lived on a ranch miles from anywhere.” Shelby replied.
“QET is a little more advanced than Radio or TV, and it’s tiny. Very Very tiny. You’ll recall we were discussing molecular electronics earlier? Micro-Electro-Mechanics uses Molecular Electronics for command and control applications.” the voice said. “Here, check it out.” A small screen, about the size of a paperback book, appeared in front of Shelby’s eyes. It displayed the Point of View of, something.
“Looks like what an insect would see while it’s crawling down a tunnel” Shelby said.
“Exactly right. The zombie-mite found something. It conscripted it and tapped into it’s sensory/control network. Exactly like that mite did that showed you the roof earlier. This is the same thing except purpose built. It has much greater bandwidth. It’s on a search pattern. I’m mapping everything it and all the other’s discover into a databank.” the voice said.
“What kinda ‘something” did it conscript there?” Shelby asked.
“A Scorpion.” the voice replied. “Multiply this instance by hundreds of z-mites, they’ve conscripted a lot of insects, each in different areas of the temple and all going in different directions, .” The voice trailed off.
“I got ya. I understand.” Shelby agreed.
“Pretty soon we’ll have an ultra high resolution map.” The voice said. “It should show quiet a lot of detail. If there’s something here that is dangerous to us we’ll know about it.”
“That’s what we want, then isn’t it? As much detail as possible. Be sure to mark all the punji traps.” Shelby yawned. “I’m going to take a nap. Wake me up if anything interesting happens.”
Hours, or perhaps closer to a day later Shelby, woke up feeling, if not refreshed at least less exhausted.
“Anything new?” he asked the Voice.
“Actually yes.” The voice replied “While you were sleeping, I refined the z-mites. They are non-lethal now. The zombie mite won’t kill it’s host just by being implanted. I’ve also been receiving the data from all the surveillance zombies, I’m currently processing it. It’s ready to analyze. Preliminary indications were that this whole area is riddled with tunnels. Some of the tunnels might connect to the temple. I don’t know that for a fact yet.” The voice said. “I also have bad news on your unit. The data’s ready now. You can view it.“ The voice was NOT happy.
“On my unit? Did it leave?” Shelby asked.
“No.” the voice said “they died, some quite badly.”
“All of them?” Shelby asked incredulously. “There were a LOT of guys! What happened. Can you do an overall analysis?”
“Yes.” The voice replied softly.
A little bit later Shelby was feeling ill. “This is horrible. The VC captured some of my buddies... then tortured them to death on the spot. Nasty. I think I’m going to puke.”
He did. For quite a while, until his gut was empty and he was wracking his body with painful dry heaves.
The Voice didn’t say anything.
“That certainly doesn’t look like a very likely escape route.” Shelby whispered a little bit later.
“Not at all.” The voice agreed. “Not for someone with no legs.”
Shelby didn’t say anything more for a long time. Finally he did speak. “I've given the situation serious thought.” he said.
“Yes?” The voice replied.
“No more Mr. Nice Guy.” Shelby replied. “They shouldn’t have tortured my buddies.”
“And?”
“I’m going to try to escape. Never give up. That what American Soldiers do. Obviously the surface route is right out. So we’ll try to go through their own tunnel system. Perhaps we can slip past in the dark.” Shelby said. “If I can’t slip past them and get caught I’ll just kill everything that moves until they kill me. Obviously, capture is not an option, they’d just torture me to death. I don’t want that. Now here’s what we are going to do. If you have any better ideas sing out. Your ass in on the line too.”
“As I am so well aware.” The voice agreed. “What do you have in mind?”
Shelby told the voice what he had in mind. Pretty much a skateboard as the blood nanites could make it. He would lay flat on his stomach. It would support him off the floor about six inches. He would pull with his hands. Being low to the ground perhaps he could slip past and outdistance people who were walking or crawling. He still didn’t know what he would use for a weapon. They’d have to work on that.
“That’s not a bad idea, to start with.” The voice said. “I can make it better. I have the technology.”
“What do you mean?” Shelby asked. He was relieved. He wasn’t really happy with his design but had no better idea.
“What part of ‘indistinguishable from magic’ do you not understand?” The voice asked.
“Um, well all of it I guess. You can do better?” Shelby asked, beginning to feel a bit encouraged.
“Certainly I can do better. I have to admit though, that you did very well with the information you had. I just happen to have a LOT more information.”
(days later)
“It’s done” the Voice said. “I think you’ll like what I came up with.”
“That looks like a trench coat and a helmet laying on a bucket that’s sitting in a pile of golf clubs.” Shelby said dubiously. He was weak from blood loss, learning to his dismay that any time the blood-nanites were needed to build anything then blood was involved. HIS blood. “Do I want to know how it works?”
“It’s an exoskeleton, with armor. Do you want to know about atomically-precise carbon structures, phased array photonics, graphene membranes, capacitors, voltaic and neural induction?”
“I’ll pass on that for now.” Shelby said. “thank you very much.”
“It’s operation is intuitive.” The voice said. “Try it on. You just wear it. See what you can do with it.”
Shelby slipped into the jacket, donned the helmet and climbed into the “bucket’. It had been molded and contoured to fit him like a jockstrap or a diaper, only more comfortable. He connected bits from the coat to the bucket here and there.
“The exoskeleton is fireproof and ballistics resistant, it will also change colors like a chameleon. It will stop any small arm rounds. The jacket material is impregnated with a non-Newtonian fluid. That’ll help prevent bruises. The helmet will automatically brace against a head shot to prevent your neck from being stressed. It also has sensory inputs for those that I’ve been missing.”
“What kind of inputs?” Shelby asked.
“A broader spectrum is visible to you now, mostly. While wearing the helmet you can see in the low infrared and the high ultra violent, more colors if you will. You will also have a magnetic sense, much better smell, and some other things I’d be hard put to explain to you right now.” the voice explained. “Everything is thought controlled. The leg pattern is like that of an ant. You effectively have six legs. You can have any of a number of gaits but the most familiar to you initially will be double triangles.”
“Double triangle?” Shelby was puzzled.
“Yes. Try walking and you’ll see what I mean.” the voice told him.
Shelby did, “Oh, I see. Two legs on one side and one leg on the other side move at the same time while the other three legs remain planted. It’s a pair of triangles like you said, way cool.'
“As you say, 'Way cool'. Very stable too. Notice how close to the ground you are?” It said.
“Damn, some wimmen’s hems are higher than I am” Shelby grinned. “This could be, interesting.”
“Try running” the voice told him.
Shelby did that. He amazed himself. He was FAST. Nimble and agile too.
“I’ve spliced some insect DNA into you that contains instinctive response to various,” the voice started to say.
“You did WHAT?” Shelby yelped. “I’ve got insect DNA in me?”
“Yes.” The voice said. “It was the easiest and quickest way to provide an instinctive level of capability for many of the insectual gaits that have no mammalian counterpart. Especially not for a biped such as yourself. Go ahead and try to run up that wall.”
“Huh?” Shelby said. “Do what?”
“Try to run up that wall. You have six points of contact now along with van der Waals 'sticky' feet. It’s also a rough wall. Lots of grab points. See what happens.” The voice told him.
Shelby did that.He amazed himself. He was FAST. Nimble and agile too.
“I’ve spliced some insect DNA into you that contains instinctive response to various,” the voice started to say.
“You did WHAT?” Shelby yelped. “I’ve got insect DNA in me?”
“Yes.” The voice said. “It was the easiest and quickest way to provide an instinctive level of capability for many of the insectual gaits that have no mammalian counterpart. Especially not for a biped such as yourself. Go ahead and try to run up that wall.”
“Huh?” Shelby said. “Do what?”
“Try to run up that wall. You have six points of contact now along with van der Waals 'sticky' feet. It’s also a rough wall. Lots of grab points. See what happens.” The voice told him.
Shelby did that. It worked, kinda. He fell.
“Wall..not ceiling” the voice said. “I don’t think you can walk across a ceiling upside down, yet.”
“Well I had to try.” Shelby replied. “Now I know.”
“I have other goodies too” the voice said. “Shield and a sword.”
Shelby examined said items. “Tell me about them.”
“They should come in handy.” Was all the voice would say.
“I like it. We’ll go with this.” Shelby said
“One more thing” the voice said.
“What?” Shelby replied.
“Camo Fog.”
“What’s camo fog?” Shelby asked.
“It’s much like the z-mites in structure but much simpler. Just a gazillion tiny gnats that can form a screen between us and the bad guys then it will change color. More camouflage. It comes out of the shield.” The voice told him.
“Sounds good.” Shelby agreed. “Time to practice!” Selby had practiced, exhaustively using the exoskeleton, the sword and shield for most of the day. Shelby was now their master. “Okay, are we ready?” Shelby asked.
“We’re ready” the voice said.
Shelby carefully pried the door open. The door was in a lower (non flooded thankfully) sub-sub- basement of the Temple. The VC had dug along one of the walls, apparently not realizing that it was part of the ancient building. Perhaps they thought it was indigenous rock. It might have been carved from indigenous rock on the inside. The temple was the product of some fairly serious skill-sets. “Point swarm, away.” Shelby muttered to himself. “Give em about ten yards head start.” What would one day be called cybernetic drones preceded Shelby by a dozen or so yards. They looked like dragon flies.
Progress was initially uneventful. They were in an unused portion of the tunnels, though it was pitch black, Shelby could see just fine. He moved forward silently with death on his mind. According to what the dragon voice had told him, Shelby and his squad had been ambushed very near the Cambodian border. He’d heard talk about something called the Iron Triangle. He’d also heard rumors that the tunnels ran all the way to Saigon. Maybe he wouldn’t have to go that far before finding an escape point. Maybe he wouldn’t have to kill too many people while doing so. Didn’t matter really. He was willing to do whatever it took. They should NOT have tortured his buddies to death.
The blackness was absolute. Shelby could see clear as day. Sufficiently advanced tech WAS magic. The point drones, had overflown a group of VC duck walking his way. The tunnel was too short for VC to stand up in. It was either duck walk or crawl. They must have thighs of iron, Shelby thought to himself. Encountering dragonflies in the tunnel was not an unusual occurrence, but it was an excuse to stop. The men had stopped and turned to shine their lights toward the small departing, drones. Shelby quickly found a low spot, dug it out a little, and crouched in it. He used his shield and Camo fog for disguise. His sword was ready in case the disguise didn’t work.
After their break watching the dragonflies recede, the men continued on. The camouflage evidently worked. They were within mere inches of Shelby and never twigged to his presence, they continued on. After a bit, Shelby continued on the other direction. “Well that was kinda neat” Shelby muttered to himself.
The drones flew through a room that was much larger than the tunnels. It had several people in it. The wrong kind of people. Shelby had the drones play “Flight of the Valkyrie’ at high volume then douse the light. Shelby hit them in the dark. He could clearly see everything and they could not. The room was large enough that he could use sword to good effect. He easily lopped off arms, legs and heads. When he was done, the interior of the room was painted in gore. It was over in seconds. Shelby continued on following his drones.
“Feel better now?” The voice asked
“Somewhat. Those guys were involved in torturing my buddies,” Shelby explained.
“I know” the Voice said “Good job”.
So it went, for weeks. Shelby would avoid contact when possible. Kill everything that breathed when it wasn’t. Carry on... no remorse.
Shelby had never heard about Operation Cedar Falls. He was about too.
BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom
The noise off in the distance was getting louder. Shelby had no idea what it was. The walls of the tunnel he was traversing began to shake and vibrate. Dust and chips began to fall from the ceiling.
BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom
The ground throbbed to the noise, shaking harder, dust choked lungs. Coughing in the dust, Shelby activated the air supply system in his helmet.
BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom
The noise was significant now. Shelby encountered panicked VC. He couldn’t avoid them. They seemed to almost welcome death at his hands.
BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom
ArcLite! That's the only thing it could be! Shelby grinned. Somewhere high above him, B-52’s were dropping thousands of TONS of bombs, on him.
BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom
His point drones flew through a much larger room, one full of coughing soldiers. So much dust that none noticed the swarm of his drones. The VC were so distracted by trying breath that Shelby forgo any attempt to create shock and awe, he simply killed them like fish in a barrel.
BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom
Fragments of the ceiling and walls began to spall and fall to the floor. The choking dust thickened, blinding all and making it impossible to breathe without assistance. The ground shook even more, knocking all to the ground.
BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom
As larger and larger chunks fell from the walls, it became clear to Shelby that it was going to collapse atop him. Frantically, he hacked a hole in the floor, digging shelter for the collapse. Deeming it deep enough, he crawled in and covered the top with his shield.
BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom
BoomBoomBooomBooomBooomBoom.BoomBoom
The pounding went on, and on, and on, and on, never ending. Were it not for the Voice, Shelby would have gone completely insane. As its last effort, it erected an Ego Shield to protect Shelby, then as its last act, it drew him down into protective catatonia.
“Hey Sarge” The tunnel rat was encased in dust. He had just crawled out of one of the tunnels in Cu Chi. “I found something down there. It’s another GI. He must have been a prisoner or something. He was in there during the bombing.”
“My God” The Lt. said, breaking into the conversation. “Is he all right?”
“No Sir.” the tunnel rat said. He tried. He tried HARD not to roll his eyes.
Fail.
Shelby was extracted from the tunnels. Somewhere along the line his ballistic jacket and helmet went missing. The exoskeleton never saw the light of day. Shelby had survived, part of him, the voice, had died protecting him. Shelby was transported to Sam Snead Hospital in Maryland, USA, home of the Big BX.
***** End of Chapter One *****
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