Shadowkill

1

He lay on a hard cold cot in a room filled with white glare.

He was aware of everything, but felt nothing directly; no sensation, no emotion reached him through the fugue state the Dyslaera called nincs-othran which had wrapped around him the moment his body was seriously threatened.

“STOP THE DRIP. NOW.”

Boss Questionman, he thought, cracking his whip over his crew. If he could have felt anything, it would have been a musty smugness. Dyslaera weren’t so easy to tame as all that. We’ve done worse to each, other than you can dream of, worm. You can kill me, but you will not bend me.

Touching him, here there places he could see places he couldn’t see, sensors and probes, testing TESTING…

“READINGS THE SAME AS WITH THE OTHER DYSLAERORS, ADJUSTED FOR AGE AND PHYSICAL CONDITION. FUGUE STATE, SENSITIVITY TO INVASIVE TECHNIQUES ALMOST NONEXISTENT, NO PAIN RESPONSE, RESPONSE TO THE ADZTERPINE IS ANOMALOUS, EVEN IN TERMS OF THE REACTIONS OF THE OTHER DYSLAERORS…”

The voice went on, a dull monotone listing with little elaboration the tics and tots of his body… when it stopped it was several moments before he realized the silence. And when he did, the silence was filled again with the booming voice.

“HMM. EACH OF THEM SEEMS TO BE WIRED DIFFERENTLY. RIGHT. I WANT A SAMPLE SERIES FROM HIM AND THE OTHERS, YOU KNOW THE REGIMEN. ONE CAVEAT. THIS ONE HAS TO BE KEPT ALIVE AND INTACT. ORDER OF THE GRAND CHOM. WHO ALSO REQUIRES US TO CIRCUMVENT THAT FUGUE STATE BEFORE HE’S TOO OLD FOR ANANILES. I WANT THE SAMPLES ANALYZED AND THE REPORT ON MY SCREEN IN THREE DAYS.”

He lay on the hard cold cot while techs worked over him, faceless men in heavy silver bodysuits, their eyes obscured behind magnaviewers, their hands shielded by the translucent film of silvaskin.

Nothing bothered him. He didn’t care what they did, he just wanted them to get done with it and let him go back to planning his escape. nincs-othran protected him and at the same time narrowed his focus drastically; everything he did, every thought that flickered across his mind dealt with escape. He could wait with a terrible patience for the slightest of openings and explode into action the moment it showed. There was nothing yet. This lot were careless around him, they weren’t fighters, not any kind of combat types. If he could get at them, they were dead and he was gone, but their machines were sleepless and ubiquitous, not subject to lapses of attention. If the crack came, it would be in the interface between man and machine. It would come. He waited.

Fishing 1: Kikun And His Gods

Spirit Hound put his head down and snuffled at the traces, but it was no good, the white threads issuing from the only ship left in view were dissolving like smoke blown by the wind. He struggled to run faster.

The ship faded, vanished.

Spirit Hound whimpered and whined and dug at the nothingness he ran on and through. He cast about, ran this way, ran that.

Kikun!

Hound heard the name, turned his head. The fine white threads that ran behind him were raveling, on the point of breaking and dissipating, leaving him stranded.

Kikun!

The name pulsed along the threads. Their white brightened, thickened. They twitched at him, tried to pull him back.

The twitch was harder. Spirit Hound hesitated; he wanted to go forward, but there was no more forward to go into. He turned and ran back along the threads.