Stranger Souls Read online

  He checked his face with his hands, finding himself unshaven, but generally intact. No broken bones, no permanent physical damage. Mentally, however, he was unsure. When would his memory return?

  "Good morning," came a voice from above. A deep rumbling sound from the speakers, a British accent he thought he recognized. "I trust you feel better?"

  He looked around the room for the first time. He was on a single bed in a small room that boasted only a small sink, the bed, and a bank of machinery along the wall next to him. In the metal façade of the electronics was a small screen, flickering to life.

  The man on the screen was someone he had seen before. He knew it, but was unable to put a name to the handsome young face. The deep blue eyes, the curly dark hair, the confident smile—it all seemed familiar.

  "I seem to be in one piece," he told the man on the screen. "Excellent."

  He knew the voice to be the same as the one he'd heard in his dreams, a reassuring bass in proper English. The voice comforted him, made him feel secure. He trusted the man with that voice.

  "There is one thing," he told the man. "I can't remember who I am or why I'm here. I don't remember anything."

  The man smiled on the screen. "Worry not, my friend. Your memory will return over time. And for a while you might be confused, but that will pass. As for who you are . . ."

  "Yes?"

  "Your name is Thomas Roxborough. You're me!" He sank back into the rough sheets of his bed. Yes, he thought, that makes perfect sense.

  6

  The Aztechnology cybermancy clinic was a squat, three-story block fortress, hidden in the jungle of northern Panama. Only those with connections and nuyen to burn could afford the services provided by the clinic's doctors and mages. Most of that nuyen went into research, and much of that research was aimed at solving one problem. Getting the clinic's major owner and permanent resident into a functional human body.

  Today, the clinic's board room was small and cozy, its rectangular shape just large enough to accommodate the centerpiece—an oval-shaped, fake cherrywood table surrounded by high-back synthleather chairs. Thomas Roxborough saw the room from the video cameras, his rig interface sculpting the input from the three cameras and the room's microphones into a seamless composite—a 360-degree sensory perception of the board room.

  Roxborough had become used to seeing the world this way. For the past six years his body had been confined to a support tank—a vat of saline and enzymes upon which his physical existence depended, controlled by computers and constantly monitored by technicians. He was barely alive; his own immune system had nearly destroyed him. It had only been his wealth and determination that had let him survive for so long. His massive funding of Universal Omnitech, and his refusal to sit idle and die without a fight.

  At the board room table were Meyer and Riese, sitting opposite each other as they waited for Roxborough. Meyer was the mage—an elf man with a long brown ponytail, brown eyes, and a typically arrogant disposition. But he was the backbone of the cybermantic procedures, so Roxborough put up with his ego and insubordination.

  Riese was the scientist—a short human woman of remarkable energy and intelligence. Roxborough actually liked her because she was usually pleasant, content as long as she could perform her research. Riese had a pretty, round face and brown hair that hung just below her ears.

  Roxborough activated the holoprojector so that he would appear in the chair at the head of the table. The two hushed their discussion as Roxborough's holographic representation solidified. His simulacrum looked nothing like his old body, from long ago when he was a corporate raider, walking around in the real world. No, this was the image he'd been using since being locked into his vat—a human, young and handsome with blue eyes and curly brown hair. He might have looked that way in his twenties had he not been so addicted to the rich delicacies of a gourmet diet and the exquisite taste of tobacco.

  "Hello," he said to the others.

  "Good morning, Mr. Roxborough," they said.

  Roxborough shuffled through some holographic papers. "Let's get down to business," he said. The papers were unnecessary, of course, but he found that it put others at ease. Made them more comfortable with his simulacrum. "I have spoken to the subject, and he seems to be reacting well to the treatment. Is this your prognosis as well, Riese?"

  Riese brushed a hand through her mouse-brown hair. "Essentially, sir ... yes, it is. But it's too early to tell if his memory is completely destroyed. The laes did the trick, but we'll have to wait and see whether the synaptic remapping is effective."

  The elf leaned in. "I think there's a serious problem with this subject," he said in a voice that was both condescending and effete.

  "And what might that be?" Roxborough asked.

  "His magic is extremely strong. His aura hasn't changed since the laes was administered. I just have an odd feeling about him. Even if the biology is effective, I'm not sure the cybermantic procedure will work on this one."

  Roxborough looked at Meyer, focusing down on his face. The on-line voice stress-analyzer indicated that Meyer was telling the truth as far as he knew it; he didn't seem to have any hidden agenda for telling Roxborough this. Except perhaps to cover his hoop if the magic frags up.

  The experimental procedure that would liberate Roxborough from his prison of macroglass and saline was a two-step process. Step one was technological—the subject's mind was wiped with drugs and his brain was remapped by implanting new memories. And also, according to Riese, retroviruses and trypanosomes were used to redistribute the synaptic relationships, strengthening some while weakening others until the actual neuronal map looked like Roxborough's. This step had worked on eight or nine test subjects and was almost routine by this point.

  But the second step, which involved magic, had worked on only three test subjects. Roxborough didn't understand the details, but it involved techniques similar to those used in cybermancy. Meyer had explained it to him several times, but Roxborough always had to think of it as an exchange of spirits. In cybermancy, the mages tried to tie the subject's spirit to his body even though there was too much metal in the flesh to hold the spirit. The spells acted as a tether to the subject's will.

  The experimental spirit transfer was supposed to work similarly. Meyer and his mages would tether Roxborough's spirit to Ryan's body after Ryan's spirit was forced out. According to Meyer, the trick was to bring Ryan's body to the point of death, but not over, then form a bridge with blood magic such that Roxborough's spirit would cross into Ryan's body. Ryan's spirit would be released, then the body's wounds would be healed, but it would contain Roxborough's mind, memories, and spirit.

  I will be physical again.

  "So," Roxborough said, letting loose with his full sardonic tone, "you want me to scrap this one, an otherwise perfect specimen, because you have an 'odd feeling' about him?"

  Meyer was used to these sorts of meetings, however. "I'm just giving you my opinion as head mage. I advise caution. After the last suite of retroviruses, we should give this subject plenty of time to adjust to your brain patterns. Your memories may take longer to settle in. If his aura has changed some by then, perhaps we can proceed with the transfer."

  "Your concern is noted, Mr. Meyer," said Roxborough. "But hopefully unwarranted." His simulacrum leaned in close and his voice rose slightly. "Let me make one thing perfectly, fragging, clear. I want this one. This man's body is perfect. Unmarred. Beautiful..."

  They sat speechless, knowing better than to interrupt.

  "You will make it work, or I will replace you with those who can. Understood?"

  Riese nodded, but Meyer just stared into the glossy surface of the board room table. "I don't think you—"

  "No slotting excuses!" Roxborough's voice was blaring from the speakers now. "It has worked on our test subjects, and it will work with this one. You will make it work, or I will get rid of you . . ." He paused to let them think about that. Nobody left the delta clinic to pursue other career
s. They would be killed and they knew it.

  Meyer looked up into the eyes of the simulacrum, his face a mask of controlled rage. Mouth drawn into a tight line. "I scan," he said, then abruptly stood and walked out.

  Roxborough put a smart frame tracer on him to follow him with the hall cameras. There was nowhere he could go inside the complex to escape Roxborough's scrutiny. And the great thing was—the wiz thing—Meyer knew he was trapped, but couldn't do anything about it.

  That's why I'm the fragging boss, thought Roxborough. That's why I own nearly a third of Aztechnology. Power, he was addicted to it. Power over the little people. Over the information.

  Power over everything, with one exception. One huge exception—his own body. His corporeal form, which had decided to eat itself up from the inside.

  Soon, he thought. Soon I will have that power as well. I will be fragging unstoppable in Mercury's body. And I will have it. The man who was Ryan Mercury is gone, erased like a recycled datachip. And in his place, grows the man who will become me. First, my personality and my memories. Then, in a few weeks or a month, the ultimate hostile takeover—my will. My spirit. Me.

  7

  "I call you Lethe," came the voice of the goddess, "for you have forgotten your way."

  Lethe basked in the sound of the goddess' voice. He soaked in the blinding light that shone from her. The light and the sound that radiated from her, washing away shadow and fear.

  Lethe had existed in that place of exquisite beauty for as long as he could remember. And only recently, in the last few moments as he measured time, had the goddess stopped her singing. A song so perfect, so painfully wonderful that he could not move. Could do nothing but bathe in the beauty of her song.

  The goddess was smaller in form than Lethe, and she had a distinctive shape—a body, marked by symmetrical appendages. Legs and arms, he suddenly knew. Delicate and beautiful in their fragility. Her hair was black, the antithesis of the light that radiated from her, and it framed her face and gave it juxtaposition. Shadows to her light.

  "Lethe, listen to me," she said, "I am called Thayla, and I need your help." A thrill passed through him as she spoke. He would do anything for her. "You are an extremely powerful spirit, and you can help me. You are here for a purpose, though I don't know exactly what it is. Dunkelzahn must have sent you, or Harlequin. You have an important role to play or you wouldn't be here. You aren't from Darke, that much is obvious, so you must be here to help."

  Lethe had no memory of anything other than this place. Nothing other than the goddess—Thayla, with her light and song. He wanted to help her, but didn't know how to answer her. Her speech seemed to be a physical thing, and he had no physical form. He didn't think it was necessarily physical, however. He approached her, and projected his emotions, his love for her. And they came out as words, "What can I do?"

  "Look around you," she said.

  Her light waned slightly as he took in the landscape, and a stiff dry wind came up. Lethe felt it, though the air passed through him. The sky above was colorless and flatly bright without any light source. The ground below was hard and cracked, a brown rocky surface underneath him. And as Thayla's light diminished, Lethe saw that a deep chasm surrounded them on three sides. That they stood on the tip of a sharp outcropping of stone.

  Thayla stood at the very tip, the chasm dropping away in front of her precipitously. Lethe had no concept of the depth of this chasm; he could not see the bottom. And as he turned, he saw the outcropping widen behind them, thickening into a broad arc. The chasm marked the edges of the arc's surface with the dark line of its abyssal depths as it stretched away behind them, widening ever so slightly as it extended. Until finally it connected with solid land in the distance.

  "This outcropping is the result of unnaturally high magic," Thayla said. "The Chasm, here, is the gap between our worlds and those of the . . . the . . ." She faltered, pain evident in her speech.

  Lethe turned to look out across the abyss. Now that Thayla had stopped singing, wind roared around them, throwing her hair across her face. The far side of the chasm was barely visible in the blowing distance, but Lethe could make out a similar cliff at the reaches of his perception. He could see a similar outcropping protruding toward them from the land on that side. Darkness clung to the land mass, and revulsion rose inside Lethe as he looked at it.

  "I am here to prevent them from completing their bridge," Thayla continued. "They are evil and horrifying and more powerful than we can imagine. If they can finish the bridge, they will come in droves. And when they come, they will destroy everything they can touch. They will torture us. They will make us all do things ..." Again her voice wavered.

  Lethe shivered at her distress. Her voice was powerful even in shock.

  Thayla took a breath and composed herself. "As the natural cycle of mana increases, the Chasm will grow narrower. But these outcroppings are unnatural—spikes above background that result from the use of blood magic. Our worlds are not ready."

  "But your singing . . ."

  She smiled at him, the light beaming from her and warming him. "My song stops them. You see, they cannot stand to hear it, and my voice carries even across the Chasm."

  Lethe knew it to be true; her song was the light. It was the beauty that had immobilized him for as long as he could remember. In fact, he recalled nothing of his existence before, if he had even had one. Time had had no meaning for him until she had chosen to stop her song and name him.

  "There are those on our side who are working to accelerate the completion of the bridge, those who are puppets of the Enemy and who are trying to hasten their coming. Look." She pointed back down the outcropping.

  At first Lethe didn't see it because it was so small, a shadow among shadows. But when Thayla began to sing again, filling the world with light and beauty, a tiny blemish of darkness remained. It was almost insignificant, and it lasted only briefly, but Lethe had seen it—a flaw in her song.

  "They have found one who can withstand the song," she said. "She is not strong enough to stay long, but I fear her strength will grow. And when it does, others will come. They will kill me or make me leave."

  Lethe's spirit sank as Thayla's song died away.

  "Unless you stop them," she said.

  "How?"

  "You must find the great dragon called Dunkelzahn. He came to me a while ago to see how I was. It seems that Harlequin, the elf who helped restore my voice and put me here, never told anyone about Mr. Darke. Never warned his companions about the efforts of Aztechnology to use blood magic to bring on an early Scourge. That elf has such hubris!

  "When Dunkelzahn learned that Harlequin had entrusted the fate of our worlds to the strength of my song, he came to see me. Dunkelzahn knew that my song had failed once before, and he was furious at Harlequin for his over-confidence. For leaving me with only the protection of mortals.

  "Dunkelzahn told me that I would not be able to hold off the Enemy's forces for longer than a few hundred years. He said they would find a weakness in my song. He said he needed more time.

  "Dunkelzahn promised to create an item that would ensure that the Enemy would not cross over prematurely. The Dragon Heart."

  Thayla bowed her head. "But that was some time ago, and the dark spot is growing. I fear something has happened. Will you go and find Dunkelzahn? Will you bring the Dragon Heart to me?"

  "I will."

  "Thank you," she said. "Go now, so I can continue my song. You will not be able to leave after I start singing."

  It filled Lethe with sadness to leave the goddess, Thayla, but he did as he had promised. He moved at the speed of thought, traveling along the spine of the arc to the main landscape. In search of the great dragon Dunkelzahn and the Dragon Heart. He hoped his quest would be quick because he already yearned to hear Thayla's song again, to bask in her light.

  8

  He woke from a nightmare, gripped by chills. His body slick with sweat, his chest heaving as he gulped air. The drenched
sheets clinging to his body in the heat. He opened his eyes to a dark clinic room, trying to focus on the dim lights of the electronics on his right and the soft sounds of distant voices.

  The images from his nightmare flickered too strong in his mind, the terrible sounds and smells overpowering him. They were more like memories than dreams. Like forgotten trauma that he had shoved from his mind because the act of remembering was too painful. Crashing back on him now, shivering through him like cold wind.

  Sensation of drowning. Locked into a plexan vat filled with saline and enzymes. He had no lungs, and his next breath never came. He panicked, thrashing and struggling. Aching just to inhale once more. Just to take one more breath.

  But he knew he never would. That he would never escape the vat.

  Now, sitting up in his clinic bed, he breathed deeply. Relishing the clean air. Filling his lungs long and slow.

  More visions of his dream rushed through him. Sensations of his disembodied heart thudding inside his liquid tomb, sending subsonic ripples through the vat. Thud. Thud. Thud. Until his ears resonated with the endless ticking, like Chinese water torture. Driving him slowly, inexorably, insane.

  He shook his head and took another breath. The clinic room was dark around him as he swung his legs out of the bed and stood for the first time since he'd awakened. How long had it been? A day? A week? He didn't know; there were no windows in his room.

  He walked to the sink, three steps across the hard tile floor. The only light came from the wall of electronics and through the small window in the door. He turned on the water and cupped his hands under the flow, bending to get a drink. The water was cold and clean against the back of his dry throat.

  There was a mirror above the sink, and suddenly he wanted to see himself. To know that he was whole and human. The disparate images from his nightmare had faded, but a solid memory was forming in his mind. A cohesive pattern.