by David Brush
“He died because of you!” James spat back at the doctor, turning the full fury of his gaze onto him. “Because you kidnapped him! He only said what he did to try and save me.”
“Omar died because you helped to free a mentally unstable convict. Do not allow his sacrifice to be meaningless, James. Join me and we can avenge your friends and family. Together we can crush these uprisings and carry our species forward into the Golden Age of Man. This senseless violence has to stop. It’s taking too many lives. It’s wearing our people down, James. It’s degrading our empire, and for what? Soon all that will be left to fight for is dirt and ash. Think what we could accomplish if we laid down our arms and worked side by side. We could rebuild our lost cities, heal our wounded, and rise again, stronger than before. You’ve seen firsthand the progress of the IMMORTAL Initiative. By combining our talents, we could give mankind eternal life, and with it, build an empire unconfined by the terrestrial boundaries that shackled our forbearers. We could conquer the stars and finish fulfilling the destiny of Man.”
“You’re deluded,” said James, shaking his head lightly. “Everything you touch withers. You’re no different than Dante, you just worship a different god. If you touch one hair on Haley’s head, I’ll skin you alive.”
“I’ve no intention of harming my guest here, James. I just need to hold onto her until you’ve allowed reason to seep into that seemingly thick skull of yours. It’s obvious that your grief is blinding you, so I’ll give you time to mourn before demanding a choice. Just remember that your father saw the wisdom in unity, and I’m hoping that in time you will as well. I’m leaving now, and she’s coming with me. If you want her back, we’ll be at the Atria Plant. This cell door will open in one hour’s time. I’ve commanded the remnant here to allow you to leave unmolested. Think very carefully about the future that you want to help create, James. I’ll see you soon, I’m sure,” said Nightrick, lifting his captive up off the ground and beginning to walk away.
“Nightrick,” said James, causing the doctor to look back. “I will kill you for this.”
“I wouldn’t get my hopes up if I were you.”
And with that, the doctor left.
CHAPTER TWELVE
James collapsed into the sand again, this time unsure of whether or not he would be able to get back up. He crawled along, clawing futilely at the fickle ground as the last bit of moisture dripped out of his body onto the golden dune beneath him. Raising his gaze up to the cloudless sky, he squinted at the blinding sun that was now in full retreat to the west. He’d been aimlessly trudging through the desert for at least two hours now, and it was beginning to take its toll. While Nightrick had made it abundantly clear before departing the Toxic Truth that he wanted James let go, the sadists left to carry out those orders had interpreted them in a very broad way. Certainly they had let him go, but at no point had the doctor specified what exactly the prisoner was allowed to take with him. The guards stripped his gear from him and threw him out into the brutal Brukan Desert. He rolled over onto his back and shut his eyes as the searing hot sand continued to burn his body. His skin felt thoroughly cooked, bright red, like a piece of iron drawn forth from a forge. On top of that, the dull, throbbing pain in chest was beginning to sharpen. It would be over soon enough. He tried to turn back over, but couldn’t quite muster the strength. Giving up, he closed his eyes and stopped squirming, letting the heat take him. Right as he grew still, he heard a soft sound approaching from the horizon. As the noise grew louder and louder, James opened his eyes again and squinted out over the boundless, rolling terrain. There in the distance, approaching quickly, he spotted a small convoy of black jeeps headed right for him. He consumed what strength he had left hobbling into an upward stance. No doubt a quick execution beat the protracted end he was facing there in the heat. The young rebel did his best to stand upright, so that he could face death with some level of dignity. As the vehicle’s occupants drove into view, his heart sank again.
“Mr. Mercer, it appears that there’s no avoiding you today,” said Dante as he jumped out of the jeep and into the warm sand. “I take it that if you’re here, my faithful servant met his end in Charon. Dr. Reya here was just telling me about you and your friends. Hard to believe that I’ve lost all three of my Archangels in one day thanks to you four. I must say though, that you survived this long is nothing short of a miracle. And for us to find you on our last pass through the desert? I’m beginning to feel that our destinies must be intertwined. Perhaps the Lord wills that I use you as a tool.”
At that point, James was too weak to even utter a response. He just stood there shaking as his muscles begged to give out, wishing with all his might that he could somehow find the strength to kill Dante.
“You seem resourceful enough, and it’s obvious that Dr. Nightrick wants you for some reason or he’d have killed you when he had the chance,” continued Dante. “The man is unfeeling, but hardly cruel. I doubt he knows that you’ve been cast out into the desert. I take it you’re a chemist?”
James gave a shallow nod in response. He could barely look on Dante as the blinding sun set against his figure, framing him in an otherworldly aura.
“Perhaps you would care to join me then? After all, our common enemy awaits us, and I could always use another talented chemist for what’s to come.”
James nodded his head meekly in agreement.
“Excellent,” said Dante, turning towards one of the men sitting in the jeep behind him. “Get him some water and help him in. It’s time we evacuate the desert.” He turned back towards his new chemist. “A heathen converted in the wasteland. I think I’ll call you Saul. You will be my instrument, and with you I will spread the faith far and wide.”
James floated through the void, looking for the dancing flames of Haley somewhere off in the distance, but no matter which direction he swiveled his head, only darkness met his gaze. Her light had gone out at last. He swam farther into the blackness, then felt himself begin to fall, like a rock hurtled off of a mountain. Down and down he went, crashing onto a dry, cracked surface. He looked around at the sundered terrain, bathed in a purplish light from someone unseen source. The ground beneath him looked like a lakebed, long since vaporized.
“Hello?” he called into the ethereal vapor around him.
“Hello, James,” said Megan, walking out of the fog. Behind her hobbled Matt, his leg torn asunder and his lips sewn shut.
“You’re…you’re alive,” he said, backing away from the two.
“No, James. You saw to that. Remember?” she said, reaching up and lacing her fingers through the skin and bone at the top of her skull. She pulled the flap aside, and it fell loosely down, connected only by the untorn skin at the bottom.
“I’m…I’m sorry. I had to. You didn’t give me any choice. I had to save my father.”
Megan glided towards him. “You killed us, James, and you killed Haley too.”
“No…,” he said, backing up even further. “She’s still alive. Dr. Nightrick has her at the Atria Plant. It’s not too late to save her.”
“But who will save her from you?” asked Megan, her voice like a hollow echo. “You’ve been with the Crusaders for weeks, and still nothing. You’ll never see Haley again.”
He stopped moving as he felt the dry ground begin to wet beneath him, gaining a muddy texture. “I will. They’ve been having me produce Induction-grade chemicals. They’ll need more equipment to use the massive stockpiles. They have to attack the Atria Plant or the Rikon Plant, and the Atria is larger. It’s the only place on Earth where they could hope to get enough equipment to use it all. It’s not too late.”
“Oh, but it is,” said Megan. “Look around you, James. Even the Crusaders are using Induction now. The people have forgotten what they’re fighting for. The good are always the first to die in war. All that survives is that which can…the cruel, the treacherous, and the willful. You’re alone now, James, and you always will be.”
He tried to run, but
the mud had gotten too thick. He couldn’t even pull his leg free anymore. Slowly, he sank into the bottomless sludge. Matt hobbled over to the pit, making a horrible sound, as if he was trying to speak without the ability to do so anymore.
“What? What’s he saying?” cried James, sinking ever deeper into the muck.
“Failure,” replied Megan, echoing into the boundless fog. “Failure. Failure. Failure.”
The boy looked out on the two figures floating above him, and then the mud overtook him. He tried flailing as his lungs filled, but to no avail.
James shot upright on the lumpy mattress he’d been given, woken by the pounding against his door. He sat there, heart racing, as the sound of the unoiled doorknob turning echoed off the dank walls of the cellar he called a bedroom. Two militants stood in the doorway, coil rifles slung over their shoulders. Black silk cloth hung loosely from the Crusaders, covering them from head to toe, with only a thin slit for their eyes.
“Get up,” said one of the men. “It’s time.”
“Time,” said James, wiping away a bead of sweat from his damp forehead. “Time for what?”
The Crusaders didn’t bother with a response. They just grabbed the young rebel and forced him onto his feet, marching him out of his chamber and down, towards the laboratories farther below ground. When they reached their destination, the men nodded towards the plain metal door. As James entered the chamber, followed close behind by his escorts, he found a man strapped to an operating table in the middle of the room, sweating profusely and shaking in terror, struggling against his restraints to free himself.
“Good evening, Saul,” said Dante, patting him on the back. “Tonight you will truly become one of us.” He gestured at the two men standing in the doorway. “Strap him down.”
“Wait wha…” started James as they roughly seized him up and shoved him down onto the table adjacent to the occupied gurney. He tried to shove the soldiers off, but they were simply too strong for him. He squirmed as they pulled the restraints around his arms and legs, binding him to the table.
“Well, now that that unpleasantness is out of the way, I believe we can begin,” said Dante, eyeing the two unwilling patients. “Brothers and sisters, welcome. You should be honored to be a part of what transpires here this evening, for tonight we take the first step into a new age of revelation.”
The first man’s eyes widened in horror while James looked on in fury. Both victims began flailing even harder, trying to break the straps that bound them.
“These men are an abomination before our Lord,” continued Dante. “They have served the forces of evil faithfully and they deserve none of our mercy. But despite their grievous crimes, the chalice of our Lord’s kindness never runs dry. Tonight we will turn our enemy’s weapon against them. Tonight we will begin winning converts through the very means that they have used to enslave us. Dr. Reya, prepare Dr. Tellman and our dear friend Saul for Induction.”
The group of Crusaders stood there for a moment as a heavy silence settled over the room.
“Dante, Dante, please!” pleaded Dr. Tellman. “I told you everything you asked! I helped you make this possible! Let me continue my work for you! I swear my loyalty to you will be unwavering.”
Dante raised his hand, silencing the man. “Oh, Dr. Tellman, I know all about your loyalty. Trust me when I say that shortly, your allegiance will be as real as the fear you feel now.”
“Please! PLEASE!” screamed Tellman, jerking like a fish out of water.
“Someone muffle the good doctor. I would hate for him to strain his voice so shortly before being reborn.”
One of the techs in the room carried out the order, gagging the raving captive with a dirty rag. Everyone else in the chamber just stood there, struggling with the wave of cognitive dissonance that was washing over them.
“Dante,” said James, his fury quickly turning into desperation. “Dante, listen. If you Induct me, I’ll be less effective as a chemist. I’m no good to you like that.”
“Unfortunately, Saul, you and Dr. Tellman here have yet to take up the faith. Once you have, I’m sure you’ll still serve some purpose. If it turns out to be cannon fodder for the more pure among our ranks, so be it.”
“God damn you, Dante. You’re a fucking snake,” said James, now thrashing against his restraints as hard as Dr. Tellman. “You won’t get away with this.”
“Oh, I think I will, Saul. You don’t seem to understand the simple truth of the matter: you belong to me. You’re my property and I’ll do with you as I please,” he replied before turning back towards the still unmoving crew.
“Sir, you can’t seriously mean to go through with this,” said Dr. Reya, trying her best to keep her voice steady. “What about free will? A forced conversion is no conversion at all. We’ve sent thousands of men to their graves with the belief that they were dying to prevent this very process from occurring. It’s disrespectful of our dead to even consider carrying it out.”
Dante regarded her for a moment. “We’re saving these men’s souls, Doctor. Surely you don’t oppose offering them eternal life? These men used their free will to make the wrong decisions, and now we are using ours to save them. It’s corrective therapy for a damaged soul. Can there be a greater victory?”
“But who are we even binding them to? Why bother?” asked another member of the assembled.
“Why, we’re binding them to the Lord of course,” replied Dante. “They will spend the rest of their lives loving and serving our master, even if it is in a slightly different manner than we do. Their devotion will be as real as our own. They will be the first soldiers in our army of converts which we will use to break the power of those who would stand against us.”
Though the assembled still looked rather uncomfortable, the response got them moving again. The technicians set to work preparing the chemical cocktails that would be needed for the procedure, trying all the while to ignore the muffled pleas of the men behind him. Once the rest of the machinery was set up, Dr. Reya hooked the final nodes into Dr. Tellman’s skull as another chemist poured the necessary chemicals into the metallic tubes that lingered just above their unwilling patient. The balding man tried squirming, but his restraints had been tightened and he was held firmly in place. All he could do was look up helplessly and wait. James watched as Dr. Reya checked off Dr. Tellman’s setup and moved over towards him to begin inserting the nodes into his own skull.
“Wait! Dante, hear me out!” said James. “I have a weapon that could help you win the war, but if you Induct me, I might forget how to make it.”
Dante frowned. “I highly doubt that you have a superweapon hiding in your head, Saul. Now be quiet or I’ll have you gagged like Tellman.”
“It’s a hypervolatilizer! It vaporizes liquids at unprecedented rates. It can also suspend heavier chemicals within the vapor. You could use it as a chemical weapon.”
“I think I’ll pass. We have plenty of chemical weapons already, and trust me when I say that they work just fine as is. Now get on with it, Dr. Reya, before I lose my patience.”
She hesitated for a moment before picking up the syringe-laden tube and moving back towards James.
“If you dumped it into the chemical cocktails that you’re using here, you could use it to Induct people via gas attacks,” said James, trying to move his head away from the needle that Dr. Reya was reluctantly approaching him with.
“Wait,” said Dante, signaling for the physician to step back. “Would that be possible, Doctor? Could Induction be carried out with gas if the chemicals were suspended?”
“Frankly, I have no idea,” she replied. “The targets would have to be primed with neural mapping beforehand, or we’d have to find a way to guide the process chemically, but I suppose it’s possible. No one has ever been able to try it, so who knows. Until now there hasn’t been a way to vaporize these chemicals without causing them to lose their integrity. If what James says is true, it just might work.”
James leaned fo
rward as best he could. “The hypervolatilizer could stabilize and vaporize blood, let alone Induction-grade chemicals. I can’t tell you whether the bindings will stick without proper neural mappings, but I can tell you that if they do, you’ll be able to Induct entire cities in a single stroke. Think of the potential. If you Induct me, then you risk losing the formula as a result of turnover sickness. Don’t lose thousands of converts trying to win one.”
Dr. Reya nodded. “That’s true, sir. There’s a chance that he’ll forget how to make the product if we Induct him. It’s not unheard of to lose small fragments of memory during the process.”
Dante stared down at James for a long moment. “Then release him.”
As Dr. Reya undid the young rebel’s straps, he clambered up and slid against the wall, shaking and clutching his seizing chest.
“We’ll see if your compound will be of any use to us, Saul,” said Dante. “If it isn’t, you’ll be back here soon enough.”
James nodded, trying to recompose himself. Dante turned towards the raving Dr. Tellman, waving the techs back to the occupied gurney.
“Some would call this poetic justice,” said Dante, looking down on his captive. “Today you are born again.”
He signaled Dr. Reya, who promptly initiated the procedure. The prisoner closed his eyes tightly as the machines whined to life. When he finally opened them again, James found a pair of sickening, glazed brown pupils staring back. A short time ago it might have been enough to make him ill, but now he felt nothing looking back at the man. He just gazed deep into the brown glaze.