In Memoriam
A ruthless mega-corporation controlled by a mechanized madman has driven China’s working class to the edge of desperation. With their lives crushed under relentless exploitation, the hope of revolution has become their only escape. When a kinetic energy bomb obliterates the heart of the resistance, it leaves millions dead, the city of Xi’an in ruins, and the survivors shattered. The flame of revolution fizzles to a spark.
Only Robert Lilly, a lowly private, refuses to surrender. Born with the ability to talk to machines, Robert devises a plan to outsmart the corporation’s forces. With nothing but his wits and a small but loyal squad at his side, he sets out on a perilous mission to dismantle the corporation’s most dangerous weapon.
Betrayed by allies, hunted by a merciless cyborg, and haunted by the devastation left in his wake, Robert struggles with the crushing weight of leadership. As the lines between hero and villain blur, Robert must decide how far he’s willing to go to bring down an empire bent on destroying his world.
When faced with a choice between saving the future or his own humanity, will Robert become the very thing he set out to destroy?
The Uprising must succeed—but at what price?
Xi’an, China
C.E. 2254 June 16
* * * * *
We were on our way to Xi’an when the rods fell, leveling the metropolis. Hot wind breathed the sickly sweet tang of death over my face. Xi’an’s distant skyline loomed, the carrion-encrusted teeth of a massive monster that had just devoured the lives of its twenty million citizens. It belched acrid fumes as it digested their dreams, their futures, and their fears. Oily fingers of smoke clung to the dark, mangled frames of ‘scrapers, their vacant windows staring forlornly across the plain.
Xi’an, whose name meant “Western Peace,” was once considered the root of Chinese civilization. Now, it was just a smoking ruin, twisted under a sky clogged thick with haze.
We jogged down a wide commuter maglev track, the late-spring heat already oppressive. Debris from the shockwave and the hollow shells of magcars blocked our path, blanketed in a thick layer of soot from the fires still burning around us. My heavy pack pinched into my shoulders. Sweat dripped down my back to pool just above the waistline of my pants. The temp meter on my Radlon suit read forty degrees Celsius.
“Street Dogs, form up!” my platoon leader shouted, waving his arm in a circular motion.
We came to an untidy stop, tripping over our own gear and elbowing each other in our haste to ‘form up.’ Standing in a mess, I surveyed my fellow soldiers. As new recruits, we hadn’t seen real fighting yet. Some of us never thought we would. But, now faced with the blackened corpse of Xi’an, I knew it didn’t matter whether we joined up for money, duty, or to get a piece of the action. The fight would come for us soon enough.
Our officers knew it too. Many were already veterans of the resistance, either here or in America. They had tried to prepare us, but we neither understood nor cared. How could we? We were too young to be driven by the fire of revolution. Too young to care about any picture bigger than ourselves.
The officers knew that, too.
“Pathetic,” scolded Staff Sergeant Mitchell, our senior NCO. His accent twanged like an out-of-tune guitar. “My ancestors, heroes of World War Three, would be rolling in their graves at the sight of you lot!” He continued.
He referred to a war over a hundred years ago between us genetically modified savants and the machine-enhanced people we called mechs.
It was a war that tore the world asunder. It was a war our ancestors had lost.
A fire crew rushed past, jostling us with shoulders and equipment, and drowning out Mitchell’s insults. They chased a spreading line of flames that was headed toward a silo of hovervehicle fuel. They were too slow.
The flames hit the silo and the block erupted with a whoosh of heat and fumes. Too quickly, my face grew warm and my eyes burned. I choked, snapping my visor down. The air filtration system of my Radlon suit kicked in just as fast, pulling the smoke away.
“Move back!” Mitchell shouted as we stumbled away from the inferno in a mass of legs and arms.
“Stupid private,” I cursed to myself when I finally caught my breath. I had thought we were safe, this far from the epicenter. It was the first mistake I’d make here in China, but not the last.
Shouts rang out over the roar of flames. “Wǒmen xūyào bāngzhù!”
Most of us stared in the direction like lost sheep until one of my teammates snapped through the comm. “They need help!”
I looked over at the private who’d spoken. His name tag read Rostbane. I remembered him from basic, a soft boy barely of military age with styled hair and manicured hands. Now he tossed his head in annoyance, attempting to dislodge the curly golden lock the mask trapped against his forehead. His eyes pierced through mine.
“Are we going to help or not?” He urged, tilting his head toward the commotion.
“No…why—?” I began, fear gripping at my chest.
This wasn’t my platoon. I was no leader.
But something pushed at me…determination and…action? I couldn’t fight the feeling. Soon it became mine. I had to help these people.
“Of course!” I shouted, the words tearing from my lips as if pulled by an invisible string.
A second man echoed my statement and we were running toward the burning building, leaping over red-hot coals, before I could even see his name tag.
As minimally outfitted as we were in our second-hand suits, the fire crew wore even less: grimy coats and jeans, decades-old respirators. Pushing past the gathered men and women, I skidded to a stop. A wall of flame roared from the ground, chewing at the remnants of an old holoboard broken from the roof of a nearby movie hall.
A woman, her eyes red from fumes, rattled a string of Chinese at me so fast I couldn’t comprehend it.
“She says the fire surrounded them. Two of her crew are still trapped,” Rostbane said from behind me.
Damn. I shook my head. The guy knew a helluva lot of Mandarin for an American from New Colorado. Based on my own upbringing, I was lucky I even learned a first language as well as I did.
“I’ve got this,” I said, still feeling that odd sense of urgency. I turned to the man next to me. “You in?”
The craggy faced private, Ferryman, gave a curt nod. “Hold on,” he replied, lifting his hands like a conductor.
The billboard broke apart, charred chunks of what looked like wood flew away. I don’t know what impressed me more: the existence of ancient wood in Chinese cities, or the machinations of a Kinetic—a savant who could move objects with his mind.
“Okay,” he replied, breathing hard. “Let’s go!”
Slipping through the remnants of the fire, we found two people huddled in the only clear spot on the floor of the burning theater. I reached a hand down to grasp the small gloved one of a teenager, thirteen maybe. She stared back with eyes both afraid and resolute, pleading with me over her ill-fitting respirator. I gasped in surprise.
“Yéyé,” she said without hesitation, pointing to the man, “Tā shòushāngle.”
Her companion, a man in his sixties, wore no protection from either flames or smoke. Burns covered his bare arms.
Sweat rolled down my brow but I couldn’t brush it away. My eye twitched. Heat seeped through my boots.
“Her grandfather is injured.”
“Thanks, Rostbane,” I grumbled. I could see that.
I lifted the girl to him, and he shepherded her through the flames. “It’s JR, by the way,” he called back, disappearing past the curtain of orange.
Ferryman helped the man up with another wave of his hand, an invisible force pulling him to his feet. The two of us guided him from the wreckage, allowing him to collaps only when we reached crowded, and only marginally cooler, boulevard.
The old man looked up at me, his red-rimmed eyes wet with tears. “Xièxiè,” he said through dry lips.
A shout came over the babble from the man’s grateful companions. “Lilly, Rostbane, Ferryman! What the hell did you think yer doin’ going off like that?”
Shit. Mitchell again. He sure did like yelling at us.
“You could have gotten yerselves killed! What have the officers told you?”
“Sarge…Isn’t this…our job?” I asked.
“Unless we’re not supposed to help people?” Rostbane added, flames reflecting in his golden eyes.
Mitchell glowered and grabbed Rostbane by the shoulder, dragging him back in line. “Yer not supposed to get yourselves killed before your first assignment. Stupid private,” Mitchell snapped.
He shoved me next, and I stumbled into Rostbane. The man muttered something not too kind about the sergeant, but I held my tongue. We hadn’t even arrived at the barracks yet and I’d already gotten myself into trouble.
Second mistake. Stupid private. I thought, cursing myself again.
Then, I saw the relief on the faces of the Chinese fire crew and the teenager’s happy smile. The old man’s hoarse words echoed in my mind:
Xièxiè—Thank you.
The first Mandarin I learned.
© 2020 Lyndsie Clark
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