Death’s Dimensions a psychotic space opera

“I’m taking her back!” Baker answered, firing a blast at the naked man. He yelped and fell down, grasping the bloody hole in his left calf.

Baker tried to become oriented enough to find where Delia’s clone had hidden. The jigsaw starlight flashed back and forth across him, pounding in his head like glowing fists. Then he heard a buzz and a whine that dropped in pitch.

Out of fuel. I really need this crap.

He began falling, slowly, tangentially to the point at which he had been hovering. Since the atmosphere was rotating with the faster rate of the sphere’s inner surface, the breeze again wafted him spinward, urging him toward relative motion with the surface and greater acceleration rates.

He brushed a treetop, shattering the dead branches. It slowed him enough-rather, imparted more of the sphere’s motion to him-that when he hit the dusty square of a dead lawn, he rolled and bounced without much damage. He retrieved his rifle, discarded the depleted flying harness, and sought his bearings. A kilometer spinward and north of the equator, a slender figure jumped from a bush and into a house. He ran toward it, trying to maintain his footing despite the constantly shifting shadows.

He passed a pathway intersection to see Brennen running unsteadily toward him, favoring one leg. He raised his rifle and fired at the other leg. The man screamed and stumbled, pawing at his hip. Dust flew up around him, then darkness enveloped the scene.

“I get you, Hunter!” Brennen cried from the shadows. “I give you dirty death for pain!”

Baker smiled and said, “I’ll give you a clean one.”

Out of breath, his bones aching, the pressure suit at full dilation to evaporate sweat, Baker approached the house. A dry, shriveled body hung from the tree in front of it, a faded note pinned to its rotting jumpsuit. Baker strode past it and kicked open the door.

“It’s all right. Come on out,” he said. “You don’t have to hide. I’m here to help you.” I wonder how much of that she understood. She’s only a clone. How long could he have had her, anyway? Half a year, if he arrived when he said he would. Maybe much longer, if he wanted to case the system first.

Footsteps stamped down the back stairs. He raced into the sudden night to see her disappear down a path. He looked over the small hillock and caught sight of her when a square beam of light arced across the farm.

“Hold it! Stop. I’m not like him!”

She tried climbing a terrace. He bounded after her and seized her by the waist, pulling her down on top of him.

Up close, she looked truly filthy. Dust and scars covered her naked body. Her hair hung in matted clumps. Her breasts were black and blue, as were her wrists and thighs. She tried scratching at him with nails split and broken to the quick.

“Leggo,” she screamed, her voice a high-pitched imitation of the hairy man’s speech. “Gotta runaway.”

“You’re safe and you’re coming back with me. I’ve got someone waiting for you.”

“Not I!” she screamed, looking about her. “I tried hurt You.”

“No you didn’t.”

She pounded against his chest. “Not You,” she said, pointing to her groin. She pointed away from them. “I! I!”

Brennen and she were the only ones alive. “You” and “I” were the only names he needed to use, so she learned those names and he was too crazy to bother correcting her. “You”-he pointed at her-“and I”-he pointed down the pathway toward the figure of the other man, gripping his legs and whimpering.

“Yeah! I. Who?” She nodded at him.

“Jord.”

She tugged at his arm. “Fast, Jord and You. We hide. Hide!”

Baker felt his consciousness slipping away at the sound of the word. He jerked his head back, screaming. “No!”

Her damned voice was all I needed to free myself was a single word and now I’m no longer watching but-

“Delia!” “Who?” Virgil spun around, witnessed the insane display of light and darkness cascading about, and trembled. Carnival! And Death Angel has been through all the rides.

A howl caught his attention. He saw Brennen in the pathway and shouted, “Mad Wizard! You brought me here?”

“No,” the woman said, tugging at his arm. “You take Jord and hide.”

“I’m Virgil,” he said, pointing toward his heart.

“No. I tried”-she made an explicit gesture-“to You.”

“No, you didn’t-” wait, wait. Something that just happened when the dead man was… Right. She’s all screwed up, confused by Master Snoop’s light show.

“Mad Wizard”-he pointed at the man-“I won’t get You. Virgil will protect You now.” He pointed at his chest. “Virgil.”

“Virgil, Jord. We go.” She ran off, her thick, matted hair slapping against her back. She led him toward the equator.

Poor dirty Death Angel. Take you out of Mad Wizard’s house and back to Circus. “This way,” he said, leading her up the curving meridian pathway. “It’s easier.”

“No,” she pleaded. “I live there. I take You there!”

“I is Mad Wizard. Call I Mad Wizard.”

She looked at him, frowned, and said, “I is Mad Wizard. Mad Wizard live there?”

“Yes. But Mad Wizard is hurt-” he pointed back to the path. Brennen had managed to crawl to a utility cart.

“Mad Wizard gone?” She pointed toward the small cart bumping across the cluttered pathway toward another meridian.

“Don’t worry. He’ll have to get out and climb after a bit anyway. And even in low gravity, he’s got two bad legs.” The dead man inside me is good with a rifle. “I can get- Virgil can get You away from Mad Wizard.”

Her eyes brightened and she nodded. “Take You away!”

They ran up the pathway, passing dead men, women, and children. Children die the worst. They have the imagination, but not the means or skill. Most must have just starved to death or been killed. Maybe by Mad Wizard.

He looked across to the neighboring meridian. Brennen had abandoned the cart, but his powerful arms possessed enough strength to propel him at a fast clip up the side of the sphere toward ever-decreasing gravity. Virgil disconnected his rebreather.

“Death Angel, follow me! Mad Wizard wants to get somewhere fast!”

The air stank, dry and stale. The humidifiers and treatment units had broken down years before from disrepair. The woman reeked of unwashed flesh and greasy hair. He ignored the assault of odors, ignored the confusing flashes and beams of misguided light and concentrated on climbing the steepening hill, following the retreating Brennen.

Nearing the north pole, almost weightless, I watch her fall back, Coriolis taking her stomach by the inner ears and twisting. And Mad Wizard speeds up where muscle counts. Death Angel grabs my leg to drag me down but I pull her up with it and we’re through the hatch.

“Where you going, Mad Wizard?” he yelled down the axial tube. “You think I can’t catch you?”

“You got her she’s mine!” the voice called back.

Virgil reached into his pouch and withdrew a stun grenade. Twisting into position as he hurtled down the circular passage, he heaved the activated ball of plastic explosive toward the fleeing man. “You want Death Angel? Take Nightsheet!” Virgil shouted. His own velocity added to that of his throw; the charge sailed past its target in a few seconds and kept going. Brennen watched it whiz past and desperately tumbled to stop his own forward momentum.

Virgil and the clone hit a solid wall of air. Like swallows in a hurricane they stopped, blasted backward by the explosion. In an instant, the force had spent itself and Virgil grabbed at a support brace.