Deathstalker 04 - Deathstalker Honor

darling.”
    “Was that… Blood?” said Hazel.
    “Hell, no. I’ve moved way beyond that. Owen showed me the way. My Owen. He was never afraid to
    try anything new. Anything that might give him an edge. Between us we’ve tried practically every battle drug going, and every chemical that might help us expand our Maze-boosted minds. There’s nothing like expanding your personal universe and clearing out the cluttered parts of your brain. I’ve illuminated parts of my mind that most people don’t even know they’ve got. If you listen carefully, some days you can hear my synapses frying. It was the Maze that started it. The biggest rush of all. Never found anything to equal it. But I keep looking. Drugs, battle, a little private sex and suffering; it’s all a rush.”
    “You sound just like Valentine Wolfe,” said Hazel.
    “The Emperor?” said Bonnie. “My hero.”
    Hazel looked sharply at Owen, but he didn’t respond. The streets of Brahmin City slowly began to change, as Hadenman additions finally began to appear. Human buildings had been removed from the city streets like rotten teeth yanked from the socket, and replaced by sharp new edifices of steel and tech. None of them felt like talking anymore, and they all carried their weapons in their hands. There was still no one to be seen, and the only sounds in the ominous quiet were their own footsteps. The city became increasingly disturbing. The new elements had not been designed with human logic or comforts in mind. There were strange angles and unnerving shapes. Gleaming and brilliant, they glowed silver from within, setting up echoes in the mind, pushing thoughts in directions the human mind wasn’t meant to go.
    There were still no Hadenmen anywhere. It was like walking through a city of alien dead, or alien dreaming. The light from the shining artifacts was subtly cold on their skin, like the caresses of passing ghosts. Owen kept glaring about him. He had no doubt they were being watched. He could feel the pressure of coldly observing eyes. His head hurt. His fingers tingled uncomfortably. Somewhere far away he could hear a low, continuous thudding, like a single working machine, or perhaps the great artificial heart of this inhuman city. The air seemed to be gusting steadily back and forth, as though the streets were breathing. Owen began to wonder if perhaps they were walking through a single living organism, a city awoken into an artificial life and sentience. The Hadenmen were quite capable of such a thing. But then, where were all the people who used to live here when it was just a city? Bonnie Bedlam turned suddenly and fired her disrupter, the energy beam blowing apart a glazed silver node halfway up a building on their left. Gleaming fragments fell like metal snowflakes, and the sound of the explosion seemed to echo on forever. Owen and the others looked quickly about them, weapons at the ready, but nothing was moving anywhere. Owen glared at Bonnie. “What the hell was that for?”
    “I didn’t like the way that building was looking at me,” said Bonnie calmly. Owen struggled to hold on to his temper. “Well, if the Hadenmen didn’t know we were here before, they sure as hell do now!”
    “You’re welcome,” said Bonnie.
    “Uh, Owen,” said Hazel quietly. “I think we can definitely assume they know exactly where we are.”
    Owen looked around to discover a small army of Hadenmen had appeared out of nowhere, in utter silence, and now surrounded them on all sides. Owen decided he was going to stand very still and hoped the others had the sense to do the same. There had to be a least a hundred of the augmented men, tall and perfect and standing utterly still with poised, inhuman grace. None of them were carrying obvious weapons. They didn’t need any. They were weapons. Their faces were completely expressionless, though their eyes burned with a golden glare, as though small nuclear fires burned in each eyeball. Owen looked at Hazel, and they both pointed their guns at the ground, just so there wouldn’t be any misunderstanding. Bonnie was looking a bit restless, so Midnight gripped her right arm firmly with one hand, just in case. For a long moment the humans and the Hadenmen just stood and looked at each other, the Hadenmen augmented by human tech, the others enlarged by the alien tech of the Madness Maze. None of them strictly human anymore.
    Owen thought furiously. This was exactly the kind of confrontation he’d hoped to