The God Mars Book Six: Valhalla I Am Coming Read Online Free Page B

me in the same boat with the
sickeningly-vapid God-Wads: What’s my purpose in life? What’s my
Creator’s plan for me? Well, at least I know the answer to one of
those questions, so that puts me ahead of the game, doesn’t
it?”
    “If your purpose is me, then bring it to me,” I
demand levelly.
    The little corpse does an exaggerated shrug and
eye-roll.
    “You know it doesn’t work that way,” he
chastises me, pretending to be exasperated. “I can’t hurt you. You
can’t hurt me. So what have we got? Your compassion and my
Schadenfreude. I had compassion once. It sucked. It got me killed,
or so I’m told. Won’t make that mistake again. Can’t, in fact. But
you… I can stick hot pokers in you by hurting these pathetic little
creatures we used to be.”
    He’s right, and there isn’t a fucking thing I can do
about it. Unless I become what he is. And I think that’s what he
really wants, that’s what he’s always wanted: to prove we’re the
same. Brothers in sociopathy.
    The corpse-girl grins at my fuming.
    “Don’t worry. I’m sure I’ll move on when I get bored.
I mean, the whole zombie meme has been done to death, after all—no
pun intended. Okay, maybe a little pun intended. But then it does
still have some untapped potential… And it seems to upset you in a
new and unique way, so I must be doing something right.”
    I’m getting distracted by the sounds of battle
echoing in the tunnels. He’s wasting my time here.
    “Speaking of upsetting you in new and unique ways…
I’ve never been into little girls myself, but since I’m here, and I do like to watch, shall we see if you are?”
    He makes the dead girl start to undress.
    I feel a surge of shame and disgust and rage. It
propels my sword through her skull. It releases her body from his
control, but somehow I can still hear him:
    “Mission accomplished. You are just too easy…”
    I get back to the Pax, running. Asmodeus’ voice
echoes triumphantly in the tunnels.
    “Was it the pedo or the necro? Ah, well, maybe next
time… I’ll try to get someone more your type. And maybe a little
less ripe …”
     
    We need to contain this. We need to evacuate the Pax,
take away his Harvester fodder, even if it does mean putting them
back out in the open. We’ll need to get them out of his easy reach,
take away his fun, at least for awhile, long enough to clear the
Keep and seal up any sections we can’t secure.
    I know he’ll just go elsewhere, but maybe I can catch
him when he makes that move. Unless he already has.
     
    Our combined efforts get everyone out into daylight,
out into the bowl of the long box canyon that forms the approach to
the Keep. I jumped over another six disabled Harvesters on the way
out, and two dead Pax Hunters. Lux and Bly report similar
casualties.
    As the evacuees mill in the canyon, I listen for
Harvester signals. I hear nothing, but a gestating drone doesn’t
transmit until it’s complete and online. Any of these people could
be infected. We need to check them all. I count nearly four hundred
men, women and children. And then I get news that’s only part of
our problem.
    “Your containment is shot,” I hear Azazel, see him
circling above us in the Siren’s Song. He flashes me video from the
hull cameras and his own eyes: There are two other visible exits
from the mountain, both of them streaming terrified evacuees. Warm
bodies are fading into the forest.
    The Pax Hunters are holding the ones in the canyon on
the inside of their defensive wall, but the Pax instinct is to
hide, to fade into the green. I can see more heat blips slipping
away, some in small clusters, probably families.
    Small consolation: Most are heading generally west,
back toward their ancestral ruin. Away from Katar.
    “Try to gather your people together,” I encourage
Archer. “We need to ch…”
    I hear a signal, see a Harvester come staggering out
of one of the Keep caves. This one is a teen boy. The Hunters put
three arrows into his