Behind the Bitmask Read online

  Nicholas managed to pull himself back up to his feet, but Sigmar’s healing was beginning to give out. His movements were twitchier than before, and when he tried to remove the sword from his head, he couldn’t even get his hands to grasp the hilt before his brain to arm link severed; they now lay uselessly at his side. A burst of static came out of his mouth, and he vomited a small amount of metallic gray liquid that hissed and bubbled as it hit the pavement.

  With one last burst of coordination, he leapt at least a hundred feet into the air. I had the feeling that I should try to get out of the way of wherever he was landing, but when I tried, the pain in my broken leg was too much for me to bear. I probably only managed to shift myself an inch or so before Nicholas came crashing down on top of me feet first, and completely disintegrating in the process.

  I’d won the battle, but as far as I was concerned, Sigmar had won the war. Nicholas had apparently been wearing spiked boots, which had ripped a huge hole in my stomach. I could see my digestive system freaking out and suspected that if I so much as moved anything else, the entire works would liquefy or spew acid everywhere. Everything below where he’d landed was an uncharted dimension of pain and suffering that this hell couldn’t possibly live up to. I suddenly became aware that I was uncontrollably screaming obscenities and all sorts of nasty threats at the world, which at least suggested my lungs were in some sort of working order. In general, my upper body, while a bit battered, was hardly worse for wear, at least compared to the nightmare below the equator.

  Suddenly, I heard ambulance sirens. I tried to stop the flow of expletives, and after about a minute, regained control of my vocal chords. They were apparently the only thing keeping me awake, though. I managed to stop screaming, but I blacked out immediately after.

  “Where’s my fucking lower body?”

  I’m guessing that Nicholas’s corpse explosion had damaged some crucial part of my mind responsible for self awareness, as my ability to recognize my actions as my own had been sketchy for a while. Odds were I’d probably been shouting obscenities all this time.

  “Calm down. We’ll get you a replacement,” said a very tired-looking (and apparently human) hospital technician. He jotted something down on his clipboard.

  “You’re lucky there was anything of you left to salvage,” he continued. “What the here happened?”

  Human cursing breaks down (at least the more blasphemous sorts) when you’re literally in hell. Any chance I had at explaining how I’d gotten to this point went straight out the window as I noticed what the locals had done to me. I was immobilized from the breasts down by a series of tight metallic rings that looked more like a form of exotic corsetry than a medical device. My abdomen had been stitched up competently, but below my navel, my body “continued” in the form of an imposingly large, but cheap-looking plastic machine. A corporate logo claimed that this was the Hill-Rom Vital Tract 210A, and it was making a quiet whirring noise that lead me to think I would not live very long if it were to either get louder or stop entirely. At least, I wasn’t in any pain.

  “Before you ask, the 210A is currently acting as your kidneys, your liver, pretty much your lower digestive tract. It’s a great machine, but it’s really expensive to keep running, so we’re probably going to grow your magical replacement bottom tomorrow,” the technician informed me.

  “How is that possible?” I was angry and still trying to parse the situation.

  “Hill-Rom’s got a monopoly and a ton of patents on mission-critical life support systems. I think their CEO hired some lawyer daemons or something.” Good to know that someone was making a profit down here. The technician turned to leave, and then suddenly stopped.

  “By the way, do you want a straight up lower body replacement, or should we make enhancements?” he inquired. Tough question.

  “Enhancements?”

  “Cosmetic stuff. Vein reduction, reduced or increased hair growth, and so forth.”

  Not having to shave my legs was enormously tempting. On the other hand, I didn’t have a reliable income any more, and I figured anything elective would be unnecessarily expensive. Funny how I was willing to steal money to pay Terminal, but not for my own needs. In the end, poverty won out, and I informed the tech to give me a replacement that was as close as possible to the original model. Two days later, the tech returned with company – four robed daemons lead by a human surgeon in scrubs. I watched with unease as the tech trundled over to a mainframe in the corner of the room, lifted a tank of Fluorinert off a trolley, and dumped a gallon into a convenient receptacle. Why would they need to buff up the cooling on the computer for this operation? Unless...

  Oh, crap. I still remembered how I’d mutilated Clint’s soul back in my Aux-worshiping days. Was I about to suffer the same fate?

  “Good afternoon, Ms. Metaxas. I’m Doctor Sterling, and I’ll be overseeing your bodily regeneration alongside my surgery staff,” said the surgeon. Her daemonic host waved and gave me a thumbs up in unison.

  “As a safety precaution, we will be temporarily detaching your soul from your body and storing it on the mainframe. Once the regeneration spellscripts have rebuilt your legs, we’ll transfer you back,” she explained; the daemons gestured at the local machinery and tried to make comforting facial expressions, but that just made them look even more unnerving.

  “Well, I’m not going anywhere, so you might as well start now,” I told the surgeon, who seemed momentarily taken aback by my ability to speak coherently. She gestured for the technician to come over, and then arranged herself and the daemons in a rough pentagram around my life support machine.

  “I see that you have an embedded communications port. This will make the operation significantly easier,” she said. Then, she turned to the technician, telling him to “hook her up to the mainframe.” He plugged a USB cable into my wrist. I winced slightly as a hint of electrical current went through my body. I saw a flash of what appeared to be a folder of cat pictures, but it quickly retreated to the periphery of my mind.

  “Unfortunately, we can’t give you anesthesia for this type of operation – you have to be awake. Please do whatever you can to prepare yourself,” said the surgeon. I couldn’t think of anything that would help. Have you ever had your soul ripped from your body and lived to tell the tale? Someone at the coven apparently had when I was still a novice. He’s in a mental institution now. The technician walked over to the mainframe, and after inspecting some of the lights, gave the surgery team his approval. The daemons made a series of synchronized gestures, the coolant system began to bubble and fizz, and I felt OH GOD, WHAT IS THIS AGONY-

  It felt like my body was being crushed and forced down a microscopic tube. It felt like I was being ripped apart from the inside out. It felt like I’d been banished to a reality dedicated entirely to my own suffering, and that every moment was infinitely worse than the next. What was the point of having a mind and a soul if the entire universe is dedicated to annihilating both of them? What was the point of anything? Existence is torture is existence. Now, I know how Clint felt when I destroyed him.

  I knew that I was exaggerating how painful and awful the soul transfer was, but I also knew that my new propensity for hyperbole wasn’t stopping the pain. In fact, it’d probably do untold damage to my reputation if people ever found out that I can’t handle having my soul violated so thoroughly and systematically. I should’ve listened to the man I met who claimed to be a master of astral projection. If I could’ve willingly transcended my body, I wouldn’t be in this mess. I’d also get to go on all sorts of mystical journeys if I were so inclined. Since I can’t, though, I have to content myself with being vacuumed out of my (admittedly broken) body.

  Suddenly, the pain stopped, and I was floating naked in the void. This is how I know my experience was real – when I hallucinate this much, I at least get to choose I’m wearing. At least I have legs here. It occurred to me that I had passed
into the mainframe. Icons for what were presumably the mainframe’s files blinked in and out of existence somewhere in the distance. On a whim, I beckoned one over; it was a server log. Apparently, someone from a corner of hell unimaginable to humans had wanted to read the hospital’s mission statement. In some ways, that was comforting.

  “Charlotte, can you hear me?” said a voice that seemed to come from all around me, and even from inside my astral body.

  “What the hell was that?” I shouted back. I’d just realized I was supposed to be mad at how harrowing the transfer had been.

  “If we’d told you everything, you wouldn’t have taken it well. Just try to relax. It’s going to take about two days for us to regrow your legs. Catch up on your emails or something. We’ll put up a video feed, too.” I resolved to ignore the video feed. Either it’d be boring, or it’d be horrifying, and I didn’t need either of those in my life right now.

  Two days stuck in the mainframe. I had a while to meditate on how I’d gotten myself into this mess, but I couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if Sigmar sent another assassin after my regenerating body. Then what would I do? Would I have to take up a new one? How would they get a spare? I briefly entertained the idea of becoming a grizzled, middle-aged fisherman braving the northeast Pacific to bring crab to the tables of San Francisco. If that doesn’t give you a sense of the tedium, nothing will. To be fair, I did figure out how to send emails and text messages, but I kept my messages brief and tantalizingly useless. My acquaintances on Earth would have to content themselves with the news that I was alive, but probably wouldn’t be back for a while. I told my family that I was traveling for personal reasons, with the caveat that I’d eventually have to come clean to them about what actually was going on.

  After two harrowing days, I finally got another message from the hospital room.

  “Your regeneration went without a hitch. Prepare yourself for decanting,” it said. I felt a twinge of anxiety. Exactly how do you prepare to reenter your body? I found out a minute later – you don’t. I felt like I was falling before I woke with a start in the hospital bed. The machine that had kept me alive beforehand had been disconnected and parked off in a corner. I dragged my hands down my body and after finding a way through a coverall, was pleased to feel what, for all intents and purposes, was my own familiar flesh. Less pleasing were the hairs beginning to poke through my skin. Did I already need to shave?

  I heard a knock; the door swung open and admitted another hospital technician. He walked over to my bed and pointed to a nearby rack full of clothing.

  “We had to burn your clothes. You’ll want to pick out replacements. I’ll leave you to test out your new hardware,” he explained, before walking out and closing the door behind him.

  I swung myself out of bed and stood up, walked a few steps. If I somehow didn’t know I’d lost my last set of legs, I’d never have found out on my own. After some acclimation time, I walked over the clothes rack and pondered for a moment. I figured I was going to have to make a hasty exit yet again, so I begrudgingly took another t-shirt, a pair of black slacks, athletic sneakers, the whole nine yards. It’d have to do. Hell’s medical technology may be light years beyond what I had access to on Earth (though I’m not sure how they surged ahead), but the locals’ fashion sense needed work. Still, I expected the medical revolution to make its way Earthside in a few years. Lucky that I didn’t need to wait – the second assassin I’d worried about in the mainframe would’ve had ample time to finish me off otherwise.

  I thought the discharge was also going to go off without a hitch. But when I went through my personal belongings, I couldn’t find my sword or any of its related paraphernalia. I knew that it’d probably been polluted by Nicholas’s essence (and entrails), but this was a hospital. Surely they could clean it and disinfect it? The rest of the stuff in my backpack and my phone were there. Maybe this was a mistake. I planned to inquire about it once I checked out. I figured the rest of the process would be mundane, but then I saw my bill.

  “Fifty thousand dollars? That’s insane!” I shouted. A wheelchair-bound chthon angrily shushed me, but what did I care?

  “Please calm down, ma’am,” the receptionist responded. “Your insurance has already covered eighty percent of this bill and is only expecting you to front this last fifth of it.”

  Fucking high deductible health plan.

  “I can’t afford fifty thousand dollars! Even Americans don’t make that kind of money!” I shouted. My accounting days were very likely behind me, but I hadn’t yet forgotten the value of a dollar.

  “We also have many programs that would allow you to take out low interest loans for some collateral, or perhaps an installment plan would be more to your liking?”

  “This procedure costs more than a four year college! You didn’t even think to ask before you went straight for the expensive stuff, did you?”

  “We did what was necessary. Lord Agnus personally insisted that you be given the most effective treatment,” said the receptionist, as if this happened all the time. Did it? I guess most people don’t make their entrance here with a grand duel.

  “In fact,” she continued, “I believe he is interested in talking to you.”

  Oh dear. What business would this titan want with the likes of me? Maybe Polyphemus was wrong about just how deep the Lord of Vice had fallen.

  “In Agnus’s defense, you did kill what we are lead to believe was one of Sigmar’s finest warriors. Was this premeditated?” the receptionist asked.

  “Hey, hey! I don’t have to answer you. Just let me talk to your boss,” I said. Now that I think about it, that wasn’t very nice, but I’m pretty certain I was far from the worst person the receptionist had to deal with that day. She rolled her eyes, told me not to leave Agnus waiting, and turned to a mountain of paperwork. I was about to head off when I realized I still had no way to defend myself from predators.

  “One other thing – what happened to the sword I had when I came into the hospital? I’d like to have it back,” I asked once we’d confirmed the installment plan. The receptionist looked at me as if I’d gone insane for a second time.

  “Ma’am, the local titan lord does not permit visitors to his realm to openly carry weapons! If you want it back, you’ll have to pay him a visit to plead your case.”

  I’m guessing the titan’s security wasn’t as tight as this lady was suggesting because I’d managed to penetrate some distance into the city before I’d been apprehended by Nicholas. I wasn’t in the mood to argue with a receptionist, though, so I got an annotated map from her and left.

  Back into the city, where word had apparently spread about my duel with Nicholas. Had Agnus been telling his subjects about my exploits? I was getting a lot of stares on the street. This wasn’t good. If I couldn’t keep a low profile, Sigmar’s inevitable next assassin would have a fighting chance to pull off their mission and survive. I picked up the pace, and arrived at Agnus’s headquarters after about twenty minutes. Whoever this titan was, he sure had a taste for modern architecture. Maybe Hyperion had, as well, but so far this place seemed more inspired than the brutalist concrete of her factory and hydroelectric dam. Before long, I changed my appraisal – this wasn’t a headquarters, it was a palace, and one that I was sure was built entirely for pleasure and debauchery. If Sigmar laid siege to Agnus’s city, he’d be raising a flag over this palace before his minions were even in position.

  I didn’t even have a chance to buzz in and ask for access when the gates opened, and an enormously fat man dashed out of a door I hadn’t seen, skidding to a stop mere inches from me.

  “Are you Charlotte Metaxas, also known in some circles as ‘Ada?’” he asked. Despite his substantial girth and recent sprint, he didn’t even seem slightly phased by the exertion.

  “Yes, I am. Who am I talking to?” I was too shocked to even try and guess at what the local etiquette was like,
so I guessed that I had come off too brusque for my own good.

  “It’s me, Agnus! I’ve wanted to meet you for weeks now! Come inside. We’ve got all sorts of stuff you’d like!” I didn’t really the energy to keep up with his mile a minute pace, complete with cartwheels and flips and more jumping than was good for your ankles. The good news was that despite his apparent propensity for blackmail, he hadn’t tried to kill me yet. Would he be more understanding than Aux or Sigmar? Only time would tell.

  “Apologies if I seem a bit maniacal to you, but I just tried this new wonder drug from the human world called ‘cocaine.’ Have you heard of it?” Agnus said. I immediately looked at his nostrils, now that he was comfortably seated in his throne. Sure enough, they seemed a bit chalky, although I was more concerned about the subtle grinding noise that seemed to be coming from his mouth. It wasn’t good for humans; surely it wasn’t good for titans, either?

  Agnus had lead me on a grueling tour of all his court had to offer – upscale shopping, various forms of less interesting entertainment, food, drink, lodgings, conference centers, all presented with no rhyme or reason other than that he apparently believed I’d be interested. He eventually took me to his throne room, hoping that I’d give the furnishings the same level of attention that he had. He especially had focused on a series of lavish paintings he’d purchased from Earth. Apparently, they were very new; an unknown artist had spent hours toiling over them like a Roman mine slave, and once Agnus had bought them for an exorbitant price, that artist had found herself overwhelmed with job offers and now charged enough for her services to buy her own slaves if she were so inclined. I guess the actual paintings were nice, but who am I to criticize art?

  Imagine my surprise when I noticed that one of the paintings was an illustration of Edgar Atkinson! It sort of made sense that such an aged and powerful computer wizard would draw hell’s attention, but seeing his time-scarred visage in the throne room of a titan was still a shock. I briefly considered asking Agnus for a brick of cocaine, but I wisely decided against it, choosing to inquire about what he knew about old Edgar.