Chapter Fifty-Four - Phoenix

“It’s a polite and accepted fiction that an incursion is defeated when the samurai swoop in and kill the last alien trying to ruin humanity.

The truth is a lot more complex, mostly owing to the mechanism by which our alien invaders function. They adapt. They are not a singular living organism, but a collection of different types of creatures that can evolve and change to best accommodate any given circumstance. These changes are, generally, fairly slow; but they are fast enough to be troublesome.

The truth was discovered in 2022, when the Ohio incursion returned from the ashes, and humanity discovered that the Antithesis could burrow and hide and scheme while we expected them to remain dead.”

--William Hart, Excerpt from Essay on the Recursion-Factor of Antithesis Incursions, 2028

***

I leaned back in my seat and stared at the map. The ex-nature reserve, according to the Wikipedia article Myalis brought up for me, was sold to an organization that was all about protecting nature and such. That organization was a shell owned by a mining consortium that immediately set up shop to mine... “What the fuck is vanadium?”

Lucy shrugged and Deus Ex blinked a few times. “It’s a metal used to make alloys of other metals. Why are you asking that?”

“Says here that Black Bear is set up near two mines. One’s a vanadium mine, the other titanium. I know what titanium is.”

“Does it matter?” Deus Ex asked.

“Well, maybe it was like, a uranium mine or something? Radioactive antithesis doesn’t sound like something I’m keen on dealing with.”

She nodded. “Right. Those are annoying. I really shouldn’t argue against doing more research. Anyway, Black Bear is the priority. There’s one Vanguard already on the scene, but he’s not the greatest when it comes to defensive actions. That’s why I wanted to send you.”

“Um, I love Cat, but I don’t know if she can take on all the aliens on her own,” Lucy said.

“It’s a stealth incursion,” Deus Ex said. “They’ll follow different rules. Most big incursions are swarming ones. The Antithesis produce as many creatures as they can and spread out quickly while fighting off whatever resistance they’re up against. A stealth incursion is significantly slower. There’s going to be a hive, but it will look very similar to the nature around it.”

“So why don’t we just use some fancy tech to find the hive and carpet bomb it?” I asked.

“That’s... exactly what we want to do.” Deus Ex stared at the dumbass still standing on the table, and soon it displayed an image of the globe. Just the hemisphere that we were on. “The incursion is here.” A red dot appeared. “So we’re going to strike... like this.”

Blue dots appeared around the red one, forming a circle that went most of the way around it. Then another set of dots appeared closer. Then another. Each one overlapped with the previous a little, and each new circle was closer to the middle until finally a single dot hit the red dot dead-centre.

“Are those bombs?”

“Orbital strikes,” Deus Ex explained. “We don’t use those in cities. The earthquakes they cause tend to be bad for infrastructure.”

“I imagine,” Lucy said. “So why do you need Cat if you’re going to bomb the place from orbit?”

“It’s a strike, not a bombing, technically. And we need Vanguard to protect Black Bear. If the city went off the grid, that means it’s being attacked already. They might not even know it yet. The one Vanguard we have on-scene is... not very useful for that kind of thing. Basically, make sure the civilians are safe while we bomb the hive, then help with the clean-up after.”

“That sounds doable.”

“It’s the kind of thing that’s good for newbies to do. It’s not too dangerous, will get you some points, and it doesn't require that you be too strong.”

“Wow, thanks,” I deadpanned.

Deus Ex nodded. “You’re welcome. You can take Gomorrah with you, if you want. It would be nice to have even more boots on the ground. The military should be rolling in tomorrow afternoon to do a full visual inspection of the area.”

“Is this common?” Lucy asked. “The whole stealth incursion thing?”

“It can take years to completely clear an area,” Deus Ex said. “Even with a lot of Vanguard looking for them, the Antithesis tend to be able to sneak by and form new hives. They’re usually spotted as soon as they start, which means we can destroy them quickly, but there’s almost always another ready to form somewhere else.”

“That’s disturbing.”

“They’re an infestation,” she said. “Like cockroaches, but worse. Sometimes they’ll hide as parasites in animals for years, sometimes they’ll burrow into the ground and wait, other times they’ll spit pollen-mist in the air that’ll be carried a long way with the wind. If you don’t dispose of the bodies correctly, then they’ll regrow, and if you don’t pay attention, they can burst out of an area with a bigger, stronger force than even an initial incursion.”

“Damn,” I muttered.

“About a quarter of the incursions you hear about are just remnants of an old one that resettled in an area with lots of biomass and that formed a new hive.” Deus Ex shook her head. “We’re getting better at tracking them. More satellites, more arrays dedicated to spotting them, and more Vanguard overall to do clean-up work.”

I hugged Lucy a bit closer and tucked my face in the crook of her neck. She smelled like those fancy shampoos in the penthouse bathroom.

Refocusing a bit, I considered the job. The overall details weren’t my problem. Deus Ex just wanted me to pop over to that little town and keep the folk there safe, maybe kill off any aliens that were annoying them. It was... not a terrible idea?

It would mean more points, at the very least, and I was running kinda low on those. “Do I get paid for this?” I asked.

Deus Ex blinked a few times, then shrugged and took a swig from her drink before answering. “I guess. You probably won’t make many points, so it’s fair. Uh, I don’t know how much your time is worth.”

“A million an hour,” I said.

“Okay.”

I stared. That had been a joke. Well, part-joke, part wild stab in the dark. “Uh, okay then,” I said.

Deus Ex flicked her hand to the side and her empty can sailed through the air and landed dead-centre in a garbage can across the room. “I need to get home and sleep,” she said. “I might just auto-pilot my way there at this rate.” She yawned, and for a moment it was easy to forget that she was a hardened alien killer.

Then she scrunched her nose cutely, sneezed, and a helmet unfolded out of her collar and covered her head. “You alright?” Lucy asked.

“...I’m fine. I’ll see you tomorrow or something. Get to Black Bear within the next couple of hours, they really need the help.”

Lucy and I got up and escorted Deus outside where her big laser hover things were waiting. She stepped onto a little platform between the two, waved at us, then took off. Soon, her little platform was pointing straight up and with a burst of light she jetted off into the sky until I couldn’t make her out as anything more than a distant twinkle.

“She’s kinda nice, deep inside,” Lucy said.

I snorted. “She’s a bit nuts.”

Lucy leaned in closer. “Are you going to go?”

“It’s good credits, and I could use the points,” I said.

Her grip around my arm tightened. “It’s dangerous.”

“Yeah, but everything is,” I said.

“Don’t be like that, you know what I meant.”

I sighed and turned to plant a kiss on her forehead. “I’ll be fine,” I said. “Promise. Plus, Gomorrah will be there. I think the most dangerous part of the whole thing will be holding back from corrupting her.”

Lucy snorted as she pulled me into a hug. “Fine then,” she said before her hands started to wander. “Just come back, okay?”

“Sure thing,” I said.

We returned back into the museum, and I split from Lucy for a moment to make a call. She had plenty to keep her busy, especially since Myalis was there to help her contact all the contractors we’d be needing to get the place fixed up. At least we had more cash secure for that, or would soon enough.

I searched through my contacts until I found Gomorrah’s number. It rang once before she answered. “Cat?”

“Heya Gomorrah,” I said. “What’s up?”

“Not very much, is something wrong?”

“Yup,” I said. “There’s an incursion up north. An hour’s flight from New Montreal near some little town. Place called Black Bear. There’s a samurai there already, and they’re about to go all orbital strike on the hive, but the folk there need some people to keep them safe.”

“Are you serious?” she asked.

“Yeah. Dead serious. Wanna come over to my new place? We can chat in person, then head out if you want to. There’s more points to be made, and you know, civilians to protect and all that.”

Gomorrah took a moment to reply, and when she did, it was with a big sigh. “I’m on my way.”

“You’re the second best,” I said as I hung up. It made Lucy smile. I made sure to send her the museum’s address too.

Now I just had to wait... and maybe get all of my gear together. I had the impression that things would be a bit more hectic than what Deus Ex implied.

***