“I will have facts, Adram,” Uriel said, prying the man’s fingers from his shoulder. “Nothing more or less.”
“Sure, sure.” Adram took a sip of coffee, then gestured toward the desktop and its display of neat ledgers. “You can really make sense of all that?”
“This is my domain,” Uriel said. “I can make the numbers speak – assuming I care for them, encourage them. Control them.”
“You make it sound like you’re a king, Uriel.” Adram laughed. “King of the ledgers.” He leaned down. “You’ll make them speak good things about Project Omega, right?”
“The numbers do not lie. I will say what they tell me.”
“They don’t lie. Cute. Look, Uriel. If you are so good with numbers, why do you always see the opposite of what everyone else knows?”
“Everyone else is wrong.” Wasn’t that obvious?
Adram sighed. “You realize that this is why nobody likes you, Uriel.”
“That statement is patently false. My wife and son both like me.”
“I wasn’t trying to pick an argument,” Adram said. “I was trying to help you out. As a bud.”
“A . . . bud.”
“Sure.”
“You.”
Adram sighed again, standing up straight. “Project Omega is going to happen, and it’s going to make us all very rich. You count those beans, Uriel. Count them well. And take a piece of advice – for once? Make them say that Project Omega is ready to go live.”
Adram patted Uriel’s shoulder, as if with affection, then he ambled away, raising a hand toward Jane and calling out something flirtatious.
CHAPTER
TWO
I WOULDN’T be here if I hadn’t grown weak, a part of Siris thought.
The Dark Thoughts were stronger now. Siris recognized them as part of himself, and had admitted – to his shame – what he had been. A warlord. A despot. A murderer.
He didn’t remember that person. Whatever had been done to him . . . it had wiped away those memories, permanently. He felt blessed for that, was thankful for it.
The process, however, was incomplete. Those terrible memories had been taken, but that left him with something more primal. Instincts. The brutality of a creature who had lived as a tyrant for eons.
I could have dominated, ruled. I had the Blade. I could have left the Worker alone, could have slain Raidriar. Now . . . now all that is left to me is vengeance.
Siris threw himself to his feet, eyes squeezed shut. For a moment, he let the Dark Thoughts – the shadow of his ancient self – control him.
He caught the God King’s arm as it reached for him. Eyes still shut, Siris spun around, twisting the arm in its socket and popping the joint at the shoulder. Raidriar screamed. Siris felt the man writhing, cursing, spinning into another attack. Siris stepped away, but a shade too slow. The God King’s leg sweep sent him tumbling.
He kicked as he fell, striking where he knew – somehow – the God King would be standing. Siris’s foot connected with something hard – the God King’s knee.
A snap, accompanied by another scream.
Siris moved. No thought. No planning. He scrambled forward, eyes still firmly shut. He couldn’t trust them. Trying to rely on them only got him killed. Over and over.
His hands found an arm. The God King reached a clawlike hand to Siris’s face, ripping at the skin.
Siris ignored the pain, methodically grabbing his enemy by the head and pounding his skull against the floor.
Smash.
Smash.
Smash.
Like a primeval man breaking open a fruit with a tough rind.
Time passed. Siris eventually became aware of himself in the prison, kneeling over the God King’s bloodied corpse. Raidriar, the God King, did not breathe. Siris’s own breathing went in and out with ragged gasps.
His eyes finally worked, but he didn’t see much. An open cell of rough-hewn rock – the soul prison in which the Worker of Secrets had been held.
Much of the floor was coated with dried blood. His, and that of the God King.
This is what I can do, he thought. When I let my Dark Self free.
He forced down those instincts. It was a struggle, one nearly as difficult as killing the God King had been. Eventually, Siris reached forward and pressed his thumbs into the God King’s eyes, bursting them, though the creature’s skull had been cracked wide open by his attacks.
The skull would heal – but the eyes would come last.
“Thanks for the tip,” Siris said, stumbling to his feet.
DEVIATION
THE SECOND
THE TIME for the meeting with the executives, including Mr. Galath, approached. Uriel could do nothing more to prepare, so he diverted himself by summoning some different ledgers. A pet project of his.
Like all ledgers, these did not lie. They showed him that Mr. Galath, the chairman, had been withdrawing resources from the company. Subtly, slowly. Uriel had access to all of the accounts, though he wasn’t technically an accountant. He needed these numbers to create his risk assessment charts.
Mr. Galath was up to something. He was the source of pretty much everything that the company had created, from the satellite technology to the new data compression methods. Galath was a genius – but genius in and of itself was unremarkable. What made Galath special was his ability to run a company at the same time. He was smart, but also wily.
It had only been six months since Galath had revealed the technology that had been christened Project Omega. Teleportation. Real teleportation. Six months of frenzied work to test products, to obtain patents, to prepare for a world reveal.
And yet, during all that, Galath had been subtly moving resources to another, hidden project. One nobody else seemed to know about. But Uriel had found it in the numbers, for the numbers did not lie.
How he wished he could make people act like the numbers did. Rational, consistent.
This is something big, Uriel thought, sorting through the ledgers. Important.
But what? That was Uriel’s pet project. Trying to figure out what it was, to guess what Galath was attempting to accomplish. What would his next wonder be?
As Uriel worked, his screen’s automatic reminder feature pulled up the news of the day. Mary was behind that, as part of her desire for him to pay more attention to the outside world.
He wasn’t certain why she bothered. The news had nothing interesting for him. More killing in the Middle East. The war in South America. Radiation poisoning from the bombs in India.
Wasn’t progress supposed to have brought an end to all of this? What of the wonders of technology? We look down on the ancient days for their brutality, but when people murdered each other then it was by the dozen. Not by the million.
Modern men were the real barbarians.
He closed the news feed and turned back to his spreadsheets. Curious – according to Galath’s schedules, the chairman had been vanishing for long periods lately.
That’s odd . . . Uriel thought, noticing something else. Meetings before each disappearance, usually with someone from the company. Not always executives.
Each time an individual met with Galath in one of these instances, they immediately took a leave from work. So far, none had returned, yet all were still drawing salaries.
He’s gathering them, Uriel thought. The best of the company, judging by the numbers. He’s placing them on the new project. Uriel pulled up some more files, noticing that each person chosen got a promotion around the same time.