Rich Larson - [BCS299 S01] Read online

  “Hell and paradise.” The scope lingered over a sculpture, humanoid figures bent double under the weight of a stylized satellite. “The worst part is that I am happy,” the sniper said, with no trace of it in their voice. “I am very happy. I wouldn’t wish this condition on anyone else.”

  They sighed. There was a puff of dust, and a part of the sculpture suddenly sagged, unmoored, the shape of a shattered head lolling to one side, a red blossom against the chalky white. The countersniper’s long rifle was knocked from its tripod.

  “Friend, do what you came for,” the sniper said. Their scope retracted for a moment, then refocused on our moving squad.

  There was a confused instant in which I waited for the sniper to give the all-clear, to inform the squad that their passage was unimpeded. Instead they started to hyperventilate. I was hooked into the rifle through my brainport, and so I felt each smart bullet scream away into the distance and saw each one strike home on the scope. The squad fell in a ragged line, one after another, and I was the one killing them.

  I tore the tendril free and dove onto the sniper and put the obsolescence needle into their neck. The rifle kept firing as the sniper twitched and convulsed. I tried to turn it away from the window, but the pseudopods fought me, keeping it pointed at its targets. Finally it shuddered to a halt. The nerve cables writhed once more around the sniper’s stiffening body, then went still.

  It was my responsibility to retrieve the prototype, gun and sniper both, but the smart mines swarmed around them, preventing me. Instead I staggered down the winding spiral stairs, ushered out by their blinking red eyes. I was barely clear when they began to detonate, triggered by some long-dormant virus, some funerary arrangement the sniper had made for themself.

  The bell tower went up in flames, then came down in more of them. The heat of its collapse scalded my face. Something came spiraling out of the conflagration and landed at my feet: a single, singed-black wing.

  I made no more notes.

  © Copyright 2020 Rich Larson