Trinity: Atom & Go Read online

  Trinity

  Atom & Go

  Zach Winderl

  Copyright © 2021 Zach Winderl

  All rights reserved

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  ISBN-13: 9781234567890

  ISBN-10: 1477123456

  Cover design by: Art Painter

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2018675309

  Printed in the United States of America

  Thanks to Jordan for putting up with a dream

  The man lay dying, not by Atom’s hand, but instead ravaged by a disease carving his lungs with more pain and precision than the gunslinger had ever inflicted on a living soul. Far beyond the help of doctors or medocs, the man dozed in a comfortable wandering, drug-addled haze.

  His eyes drifted into loose focus. “Lilly, be that you?” He squinted up at Atom.

  “No, sir,” Atom said, shifting in his bedside seat. “I was just hoping to have a word with Lilly. Is she around?”

  The man’s eyes sharpened. He tried to sit up, but the drugs and disease had wasted his body to nothing more than a skin-covered frame. Atom crossed his arms and gave a sympathetic smile. He surveyed the man’s face, taking in the parchment-like flesh hanging beneath a pair of deep, dark eyes.

  “What’s your business with her?” The demand brought a fit of coughing to the dying man’s lips. Blood dribbled down his chin.

  Discretion directed Atom’s gaze out the window. “I just have a message to pass along.” He studied a stand of hemlocks on a hillock across the narrow, alpine valley. He searched the dusky paths beneath the towering boughs. “Nothing more, for the time …”

  “Have you seen her recently?” Atom turned back to the man and fixed him with a sorrowed expression.

  “It’s been a few years. She left me here.” The man’s wan smile threatened to split the paper-thin skin at the corners of his mouth as he panted out his words. “She promised to come back. She said she needed money . . . money for treatment.

  “The sisters keep me . . . on charity,” the man coughed through his words. “They keep me alive. Probably hoping she’ll be back with money.”

  The man drifted. For a long moment, Atom studied the living corpse, then rose to his feet and stole to the window. He glanced over his shoulder before sliding it open to allow a cool autumn breeze to sweep the cloying scent of death from the room.

  He took in a lungful of the fresh air.

  The abbey overlooked a deep river valley. The sisters had chosen the site well, centuries before. Trees of gold and red swept down the steep evergreen slopes like hearty veins along the back of strong, hard hands.

  Only the copse of hemlocks afforded a more ominous color to the brilliant landscape.

  “Da.” Margo galloped into the room on an imaginary horse. “Watch Turtle, please.”

  “Who’s Turtle?” Atom turned back from the window.

  “My horse.” Margo rolled her eyes in exasperation and bunched her hands on her hips.

  From the midst of her stance, Atom snatched a glimpse of the girl’s dead mother.

  “Oh, Turtle. Bring her over.” A sad smile crept to his eyes.

  “Turtle’s a boy, Da.”

  “Lilly?” The dying man lifted his head with feeble strain. His eyes fluttered like delicate butterflies.

  “No, sir,” Atom said as he returned to his seat, leading Turtle with subtle turns of his wrist. “That’s just my daughter, Margo.”

  The man lolled his head to study the girl.

  Atom nodded to Margo and motioned her closer.

  “I had a daughter. Once upon a time.” The wet cough doubled the man in his bed.

  “She here?” Margo wandered over and leaned on the edge of the bed as the fit passed and the man collapsed back like a lifeless doll.

  “No, little one,” he gasped, trying to smile, but the effort seemed beyond his power. “She’s not here anymore. How old are you?”

  Margo held up two fingers.

  “Go.” Atom beckoned. “Let the man be. He needs his rest.”

  “It does me good to see children,” the man grumped. “All I get are stuffy . . . old sisters. They’re good souls. They care for me. No complaints . . . but they don’t smile. They don’t have energy like a little one.

  “Your girl does more for me . . . than all of them together.” The invalid pressed a button and the bed groaned to a sitting position.

  “I heard that, you old coot.” A grey-frocked sister strode through the door with a bowl of soup on a tray. “If I told the others how you really felt, they might start acting like little girls to amuse you.”

  “No, you’re fine,” the dying man whispered.

  “Excuse me, ma’am.” Atom rose, swept Margo up in his arms, and wandered out the door.

  Outside, Atom slipped Margo to the floor and led the way through the building’s maze of stone corridors to the front of the abbey. As they passed the ornate carvings of the front doors, Margo pulled at Atom’s hand and halted to study the flow of scenes that followed the journey of the Sisters of Reflection across the stars to found their secluded refuge on Dathan.

  Atom tousled Margo’s chin length hair and with a contented smile, wandered onto the broad porch that dominated the front of the abbey. The heavens crackled with lightning and a curtain of rain swept over the crest of the hill like the skirt of a woman’s dress.

  Off to the side, Daisy and Shi sat in a pair of rockers, their attention on a game board hovering in the air between them.

  “She here?” Daisy looked up from the game to squint at the approaching rain.

  Atom shook his head. While Margo wandered over and stood on tip-toe to watch the game, he stepped over to the edge of the porch. He leaned on the railing and stared out into the muddying yard. The rain pounded in waves, blurring the view of the valley’s upper slope.

  The pilot rose, stretching his back as he joined Atom at the rail. “So, what’s our play here?” He crossed his thick arms and planted himself just beyond the rain’s reach.

  Atom’s whip-thin frame seemed a wiry sapling beside Daisy’s solid trunk. For a time, Atom leaned in silence. When he rose, his hands drifted to rest on his rail-pistol slung low on his hip. He continued to study the rain, plans dancing through his head.

  “We wait,” said Atom as he looked up at the stormy heavens.

  Daisy crossed his arms as he weighed Atom’s words.

  “You reckin she’s really comin’ back to this place?” Shi slid a piece across the holo-board before rising, hitching up her gunbelt, and sauntering over to join the pair at the railing. “Way I sees it, she ain’t bin ‘round in two plus, so she ain’t comin’ back now.

  “Why’s this wendy so valuable anyhoo?” Shi grimaced out at the rain. “She’s jist one bounty on the board.”

  “Information.” Atom puffed out his cheeks, blowing a slow breath as he turned to sit on the railing. Most of the rain fell out of reach, but a fine mist drifted in, beaded on his jacket, and dripped down behind him.

  “You know I don’t flip a toss ‘bout yer reasons, but seein’ as we’ve time to burn here, you might as well spin the whole yarn fer us. Give us somethin’ to chew on while we wait out this here drizzle.”

  Daisy remained silent, but his eyes danced between the two gunfighters as he followed the conversation.

  “Not much of a story, as I know it,” Atom said. “This Lilly married into the G
enkohan. Jackall is the boke she married. He was some upper in the han. The Genko’s are a pretty influential family. Their han pulls a lot of weight at the Imperial Court.”

  “The stiff in there is a heavy?” Shi asked.

  “He’s not dead yet.”

  “Close enough.

  Atom frowned. “We’ll all be there someday. Fact is, he was high enough to have access to han secrets, and when he and Lilly bound the cloth, those secrets were open to her. When they took to the Black, those secrets went with them.”

  “And they’re worth killing fer?” Shi’s hands settled on her pistols.

  “I didn’t ask, but I’d wager they’re not too pretty.

  “Damaging to the han, or bigger?” Daisy asked.

  Atom shrugged. “Worth something to someone.”

  “Then why’re we here?” Shi grumbled. “Shouldn’t we be trackin’ this Lilly?”

  “She’s a ghost. That’s partly why the Genko’s are so riled. She has no trail and not even Kozue has been able to track her prior to marrying Jackall. They put the bounty because they think she was a plant to steal han information. They suspect she’s from a rival clan, perhaps hired from the Ghost Tribes, but they can’t prove anything unless they have her.

  “She might even have imp ties.” Atom shook his head and rubbed at his face.

  Shi whistled a low amazement as she strained to see past the rain veil. “That info must be fair heavy. I hope we’re makin’ more than our usual pinch on this haul.”

  “The usual.” Atom shrugged. “The job shouldn’t be too tough, even if she is a ghost.”

  “It’s tough killing ghosts.”

  “You have experience?” Daisy cocked an eyebrow over Atom’s head.

  “Well, not so much, but I imagine it’s tricky makin’ a ghost bleed.” She pulled her pistol and checked the action. “Ain’t no killin’ without some bleedin’.”

  “Not ghosts.” Daisy scowled at the gun.

  “Why here?” Shi ignored Daisy’s look and glanced up at Atom. “Years out and somehow you thinkin’ she’ll be floatin’ back through? If’n we can’t track her and we lack a proper start point, shouldn’t we be touchin’ off some a yer old sources to stir up some info?”

  “When she left Jackall here, she stayed for several weeks by his side. She may have been a ghost at one point, but she gave that up to take the Black. She built something with that man in there, and I’m wagering she’ll be back around. He’s on the doorstep.

  “She won’t let him cross over without a final goodbye.” Atom slipped down from the railing and wandered over to the hovering gameboard.

  In the absence of Daisy and Shi, Margo had taken over. Using the holo-cubes she built a pyramid for her hands to climb like conquering behemoths battling for control of the mountain.

  “So, we wait here?” Daisy followed Atom. “How long?”

  “Until she shows.” Atom dropped into a rocking chair just beyond the board, kicked out his long legs, and closed his eyes with a contented sigh. “In the meantime, we just stay out of the way and play nice with the sisters.

  ***

  Evening drew near, and the gloaming mixed with the continued rain to create a mist-swirled soup. Atom opened his eyes. He had not slept through the afternoon, but Margo lay sprawled across his lap, trapping him beneath her toddler mass.

  “Koze,” he whispered to his ship’s AI. “Are Daisy and Shi still back on the Ticket?”

  Margo stirred despite his attempts to remain quiet.

  “They are still here.” The AI, imprinted with his dead wife’s digital footprint, spoke in a soft voice, as if she might wake Margo.

  “Any ships break atmo?”

  “Not that I have detected, although someone crossed the abbey’s perimeter. From my mass calculation, it is a female, and she did an exemplary job of evading the security.

  “She didn’t count on me, though,” said Kozue and Atom envisioned a smug smile pulling at his dead wife’s mouth.

  “What else can you tell me?”

  “She appears . . . moving in a . . .” The connection fluttered. “Atom, I’m detecting . . .”

  “Kozue?” Atom glanced around, shifting up in his seat as his eyes searched the mist. “Koze, can you hear me?”

  The com remained silent.

  Atom leaned Margo to the side and craned his neck to scan the yard. The mist swirled, and phantasms of all shapes and sizes rose from the shadowed depths of dusk. Atom waited. Uncertain of what to expect, he prepared for the worst. Shifting his arms beneath Margo, he began to move just as a figure appeared from the gloaming. This figure remained steady and did not dance as the other vaporous illusions had.

  Rolling Margo from his lap, Atom rose. He wandered to the top of the porch steps and leaned against the support. Parting his coat, he hooked his thumb in his gunbelt with casual threat.

  He studied the figure ghosting through the mist. A heavy cloak kept out the drizzle and mist, but did little to hide the slight build of the woman beneath. Atom watched as she slid toward him without stirring the cloak.

  Keeping his hands in the open, Atom remained still. He reached up and scratched his stubbly cheek as he studied the woman.

  “Can I help you?” the voice, low and steady, wafted from within the shadowed cowl.

  “You’re a hard woman to find, Lilly,” said Atom with a knowing nod.

  “You must be mistaken,” she replied with the slightest hitch to her words. “My name is Marian.”

  “What brings you here, Marian?”

  The woman halted at the foot of the stone steps, half-a-dozen feet from Atom. “I came to see an old friend.” She stayed just beyond the halo of the porch lamps. “His last message seemed like his time was drawing short.”

  Atom’s gaze drifted past the woman to survey the yard. He held his tongue, but returned to studying her vague, cloak-muffled shape. As the silence grew between them, she idly shifted the hem of her cloak enough to slip a booted foot forth and draw a line in the damp soil along the edge of the light.

  “Jackall?” he asked.

  Her foot froze.

  “Unless your friend is hiding among the sisters,” Atom trailed off with a shrug, leaving dripping rain to punctuate the silence. “But I don’t recall any other men, and none of the sisters are sick, to my knowledge.”

  “Stranger, I don’t know what business you think you have with me, but I suggest you step aside and let me be. It’s a fact that I aim to see Jackall a last time, but after that, I’ll disappear into the Black. I don’t aim to harm any beyond those that seek to harm me.”

  A warm smile brightened Atom’s face, but he noted her hands shift beneath her cloak.

  “I’ve no quarrel with you.” Steel edged into the woman’s voice.

  “Genkohan pays well.” Atom drew his hand along his belt, pulling back his stained and battered brown coat to reveal his rail-pistol. “They prefer you alive to dead. That suits me fine as I don’t relish taking a life I don’t need to.”

  “You’re a bounty hunter?”

  “As the job dictates.” Atom’s smile grew frosty. “Hitman, debt collector, merch, smuggler, you call it, I’ve probably floated it.”

  “And why’d you take this job?”

  “It pays . . . food on the board, fuel in the tanks.”

  “What if it pays in death?” The woman edged forward into the light.

  Atom gave an easy laugh. “I’m at peace.”

  “And her?” The woman waved a hand to indicate Margo curled in the rocking chair at the rear of the porch.

  “She’s ready, too.” The smile faded as his hand drifted closer to his rail-pistol. “People have tried, but it always costs them more in the end than if they would have just walked away.”

  “And you always finish a job? What if I paid you more?”

  Atom shook his head. “I’ve never failed to complete what I started.”

  “Even if the cause isn’t just?”

  “I’m not paid t
o judge, just to complete a task.”

  “Then I’m sorry to break your streak.” The woman mounted the steps.

  Atom pulled his pistol, but before he could take aim, a vice gripped his forearm and a metallic hand caught him by the back of the neck, lifting him bodily into the air like a fish jerked from the water. His legs kicked like a panicking swimmer, even as his offhand reached in vain to loosen his assailant’s grip.

  With graceful poise, the woman glided up the steps.

  Atom followed her with his eyes. His head, pinioned by unseen hands, refused to move. He tried to angle his pistol towards her, but she reached out and slipped it from his numbing fingers. Then, she laid a gentle hand on his as she returned the pistol to its holster.

  “You won’t be needing that right now.” She lifted her head, barely revealing a flash of teeth in the shadows beneath her hood.

  Before he could gurgle a reply, the hulking assailant launched him into the stone wall at the rear of the porch, dropping him into a stunned heap beside the door. Atom looked up through swimming eyes to make out the hulking form of an armored golem. Gasping for breath, Atom tried to wrap his head around the disembodied scene before him.

  “Leave me in peace.” Lilly crouched down and placed a metal cylinder in Atom’s hand. “You’ve shown me a kindness in the past and I’m returning the favor. Next time I’ll aim to permanently preserve myself.”

  The woman rose and swept through the door. Her silent golem melted into the shadows of the yard.

  Atom lay still as his vision clouded.

  ***

  A few weeks earlier, when the One Way Ticket had set down on Nahant, Atom had left the confining walls to wander. No work, no buyer for his cargo of vaccines, he found himself with nothing more than time and frustration on his hands.

  He sauntered along a random portside street, a hand tucked in his coat pocket and the other tapping out a light rhythm on the handle of the battered suspensor-pram.

  “I love ship time.” He smiled down at Margo. “But I love fresh air, too.”

  The toddler craned her neck to look at her father, upside-down, and scrunched her face in a juvenile grin. “Yaya, ship time.” She furrowed her eyebrows, mimicking her father.