Into the Violet Gardens

by Isaac Nasri

  Chapter 26

  The car dashes from an aerial missile crashing onto the street’s concrete. Troy’s head knocks against the surface as the car tilts upon speed, and he covers his eyes to the blacken dust spitting his direction. His shirt stains to the ashen material. The vehicle enters a halt. Alana calls his attention and Troy lowers his wrist to find her uncle’s apartment tainted in flames. Debris descends onto the corridors leading to the entrance, and Troy’s stomach churns.

  Let’s just pray they’re alive.

  Troy gets off alongside Alana to sirens flood the torn neighborhood of Pelham Parkway. Alana tucks her arm onto the last sleeve of her cropped denim coat. Police cars scatter in place, and a human NYPD officer leans on one of the derelict cars, head waving to the blood streaming in his abdominal wound. The Virtual steps back to a resident’s body descending on the ground. The young teen, arms scarred in burns, raises an arm around his head, doing little to prevent the freezer from landing flat on his skull like an asteroid. Blood splashes on Troy’s pants, leading the cyborg to look up at one of the balconies and grimace to an evanescent shadow disappearing on sight.

  Alana exchanges looks with Troy, and swallows. Troy opens a hand, and his girlfriend takes it, squeezing it onto his grip. He gives the nod, to which a shaken Alana beckons in return, and he leads her down the steps. A fiery glow ignites inside the lobby. The crimson flakes breeze by, landing like a cool snowflake on the tip of his lips. This is what Soriana had tried to warn him about yesterday. Nothing compared to what he faced in the Amtrak. With Ottoman dead, Troy had no inkling of who's permeating the Jaguars of Apollo’s madness at this point.

  He tosses aside the wrecked door, and the cyborg’s skin rumbles upon stepping foot inside. Troy’s body and blood go numb like a polar bear marching into the sub-zero field as he trudges past the inferno. The flames rain and snake down at him, whirling over his shoulders and boots, leaving marks that tear on the fabric of his shirt. Despite this resistance, his muscles twitch as he paces. Any effort for him to get Alana to call Gabriel and Ricardo again would be vanity. Time could only be this magnanimous before it can bend against his favor. Either it was push or never, and Troy couldn’t afford for the latter, not for Alana.

  Troy grits his teeth to the smoke bellowing from where the elevator once stood. Before he can transition to the right of the hall, the cyborg frowns to a sudden cough. His grip loosens, and he directs his attention to Alana. She staggers to the firestorms and whoops to the conflagrated clouds swamping the ceiling.

  Goddamn. No.

  Troy rushes his arm around her, setting Alana close enough to him that she takes heed to his eye contact. Dots swarm in her pupils. The Virtual pats a hand to her coat shoulder before signaling it to her nose. She takes the hint quickly as she raises the collar over her nostrils, and Troy takes her hand immediately, knowing where her limits held her.

  Their feet clamp on the ruby puddle that flooded the hallway’s floor. Disfigured bodies of residents lay slouched on the wall, and craters plant on the walls. Troy locates and opens the door leading to the stairwell, leading to imminent waves radiating in his vision as he storms the stairs. Water drops downward, tapping against the railings. Adrenaline kicks in his blood as he continues to rush. The pistol seals inside his holster. He jerks to a scorching police officer crying out to him. Troy growls at the human on the ground clinging to his ankle until Alana kicks the officer’s head twice, tumbling her out of the way. Alana curses under her breath.

  The Virtual takes the tablet from the bag, attempting to diagnose the issue only for the panel to signal a visible MALFUNCTION alert to his chagrin.

  “Watch out!” Alana alarms.

  He freezes to a drone coming his way, but the cyborg cracks a scar into the quad’s digital program, shaking and revamping the algorithms until the quad elicits a gauche buzz. A blue bead flickers at the two, and the quad turns it back. Alana looks at Troy, raising an eyebrow in uncertainty, but the cyborg pays no heed once his reprogrammed quad guides them to the fifth floor entrance.

  The two make haste toward the unit, and the quad glides like a vigilant eagle in front of the pair in unison. That is, until the machine halts to what appeared to be Ricardo’s door unit, and Troy’s mouth drops halfway, releasing a soft gasp to the door in a bundle of charred ruins.

  “¡Tio! Gabriel!” Troy hears Alana as the cyborg let’s go of her. “Aye!”

  Dead silence. Troy steps in, spitting out a flaming chunk falling from the ceiling’s surface. Ceiling pipes and totems slump into the inferno that sizzled. The beating in his heart quickens to Alana’s cry echoing to the damage surrounding the living room. His heart stops, witnessing blood prints on the ground, and there laid Ricardo’s unconscious body tilted sideways. Soak drenches over his burnt ankle, and his anomalous baton twinkles in fresh blood. The drone whimpers as Troy trudges gradually. Ice courses within his fingers, freezing them in place.

  We’re too late.

  “Oh god. My fucking God…” Alana burrows her hands to her lips, eyes watering as she gazes in aghast. That is until a gag startles the two.

  “Alana,” a voice calls out. “Troy? Is…is that you?”

  Troy takes a step back, assuming it was coming from Ricardo, until he turns around. He inhales to see Gabriel grunting as he struggles to pick himself up. The Virtual rushes but Alana’s quick to raise her brother despite his opposing mass. Alana pulls Gabriel over to her, embracing and patting her brother as the dust settles away from his clothes. She holds him by the arm as he stumbles. The contract ends once Troy steps in.

  “They came,” Gabriel says rapidly under breath. His curly hair dishevels from the mattress's cotton, and his cheek’s blighted in ash. A round lump swells on his chin bone. Sweat dripping on his skin, he shoots a strange glance at Troy, mounting his eyes and opening his mouth. Whatever thought in mind struggles to release on sharp ears, and Gabriel blurts, “I couldn’t stop them before they…”

  Gabriel darts his nose to where Ricardo laid still only to recoil and turn elsewhere. Alana stares up and strokes her hands over his shoulder, soothing her brother as he sniffs. The fiery dust settles on Troy like blossom petals and his blood sinks. Troy looms close to Ricardo’s body, gulping to a light heave gushing out of the human.

  There’s still a bit of life in him. I hope.

  Behind Troy, Alana inhales vehemently. “Knew something was up. I tried calling y’all.”

  “I’ll check his pulse quickly,” Troy says to Gabriel. “Best you and he get out of here with us before anything else.”

  Gabriel catches Alana's signal to him, and the former nods. Imagine how much Troy could’ve spared to flee from this horror. Oblivion caught up so soon, even to Troy. Now they had to redress the burden in their hands.

  Troy kneels and turns Ricardo on his back. He holds his breath to the blood streaming down the tunnel of the human’s nostril and the visible slashes on his sleeveless shirt. Ricardo groans, and his mouth shifts. Despite the wraps intact, Troy’s prosthetic fingers sparkle, and the cyborg sniffs the voltaic scent in his hands. When he pushes his fingers onto the chest, a voice calls from behind.

  “So you…” Gabriel states lowly. “So you and my older sister finally got together.”

  The shock dies immediately in his hands, and the air turns still in Troy’s ears. The cyborg gazes to the wall’s brick, incinerating. Gabriel’s words scatter like fragments in his head, and his NI buzzes to the confusion at hand.

  Troy forces himself to look into Gabriel’s eyes. The Virtual rubs the side of his neck, unnerved. “I uh…I didn’t get that.”

  Gabriel lets go of Alana, stepping in his own space and wiping his forehead. The human’s cynic expression cuts clean into Troy’s purported disbelief, leaving the latter vulnerable. He never expected the possibility of this to come, especially in a dire hour like this. The moment he locked lips, pierced, and caressed Alana’s body inside the hazing bathtub, Troy realized that he opened his arms into a new rea
lity, and he and Alana could never return. The shadows carried the two partners safely until its eradication.

  Damn. We’re fucked.

  “Okay,” he emphasizes. His tone spoke in a casual essence, despite the tension stirred. “Alana. You. Prove ME wrong, you two. Yesterday night and—I’m not going into all that fruity detail, though. But, I didn’t want to believe it until now.”

  “Aye. Aye Gabriel,” Alana urges her brother diffidently. She looks briefly at Troy, sharing in his mortification. The drone wobbles, causing Troy to grimace at the unusual behavior. Alana takes a step toward Gabriel, even as her arms shake. “Listen. I don’t be thinking this the time to—”

  “Alana. I know this. I clearly heard voices—you and HIS, last night in my room,” Gabriel eggs on. He takes a distance from Alana, whose eyes rise. Ruby dust gushes from the exposed balcony, whirling into the space. “I don’t want to brush it off like that. Clearly, he wasn’t sleeping in mine…OR with uncle’s that night. Seems like your history with Troy shares a lot for you to hide. But at the same time…I’m not mad Alana. I’m not.”

  Troy strokes his elbow. Alana barely moves as Gabriel’s words trail like a bird’s chirp in the forest. Gabriel’s eyes narrow at Troy’s direction and then his elder sister’s. He continues, “Not like I’m going a stop you or anything. That’s not in me. I’m saying this because I just want the best. It’s okay. I’m just as fed up with the angry people controlling and running things to the ground. ” His expression loosens. “Let’s say something goes between me and tio—”

  “Naw Gabriel,” Alana says nervously. She steps close. “Stop.”

  “But you and Troy…that’s all—”

  “Step out!” Troy barks.

  The drone pervades a red beam at the three individuals, and its minigun twirls. Rising, Troy snatches and fires his handgun, combusting the quad’s wings. Troy catches Alana pull Gabriel three feet back to shadows approaching, and the cyborg’s ears shrill to the presence of two armored enemies that he noticed all too well.

  They’re back? Thought I got them!

  Alana calls out. “Y’all got NOTHING he need—”

  The formerly armed contractor, Ezra, signals toward the humans, and before Troy can even interfere, the contractor’s associate skids in front of him. She swipes, but Troy thrashes it aside. His veins twist to two unaffiliated Virtuals, cyborgs like him, trudging at his girlfriend’s direction, but she takes an obstinate stand. The two JOA soldiers stroll, unmoved by Troy’s pistol leveling at the two anxiously as he steps back. His position shields Ricardo as he groans.

  “So noble of you for the cause,” Ezra taunts. A vertical scar crosses his right eye, and a face mask conceals his lip. Scratches squally at his dense golden breastplate and kneecaps to where the radiating blast first hit him. His glance levels at the tablet drumming in Troy’s hand. “That thing came in handy. But you won’t need that anymore.”

  The moment Troy raises the SMART panel, he staggers to an immediate thump in his chest. He wheels his gaze from the screen. The scarred agent’s associate glosses over caustically to the battered Virtuals surrounding Alana and Gabriel. Not one rationale existed in their eyes, and Troy visualizes himself sinking. The abyss pulls him, darkening his view and Ezra’s words flow.

  Crestfallen, Troy’s grip on the panel cracks, and he flings his hand aside. Motion loses its momentum. The ground rattles to the shattering of the tablet, and the shards erupt. Gravity reverts to normality as the remnants lay in scatters. Troy’s throat soars.

  What did I just do?

  “What’s it going to be, my friend?”

  Troy’s view obscures and the room around him jiggles. Every concept he stood and carried forth in this harrowing week disintegrates like a palace sinking into the mudslide. How could he do this? Troy’s ignited something that will never alleviate, and he brought so much to it. The project he retained was nothing but a leeway to a grand insurrection. He was more than a fool to bring Alana into this.

  Ezra’s question rings in Troy’s brain, aching signals in his nerves. Hesitance sweeps as Troy shoots a glance at the mindless cyborgs from afar and then the two agents cornering him. His veins ignite, aggravating him. He clocks his pistol, and blistering grime lands on the muzzle. The recoil booms in his hand.

  The bullet sprints like an arrow into the neck of one of the cyborgs cornering Alana, and the victim’s stupor crumbles as his eyes bulge to the splattering of blood. Troy lunges, thrashing the hilt of his pistol at Ezra’s head. His associate, eyes veneered by her helm’s dark red lens, throws a kick, but Troy seizes the leg, whirling her weight against Ezra.

  Alana pounces onto the Virtual before Gabriel bashes the gaming console toward the head. The cyborg staggers, and Troy shuts him down with two rounds that implode a voltaic sparkle from the head. Adrenaline rushes in Troy until a swift motion advances. He grunts to a deep blow plunging his stomach, and Troy’s body rams against the totems. He attempts to rise, but his knees hit the ground. His pistol’s nowhere to be located.

  “Make the traitor submit Riza,” he hears Ezra command. “I’ll deal with these miserable humans.”

  He holds his breath to the blocks surfing in his vision, slightly obscuring his view of Riza in his way.

  “Should be fun,” she says in a whisper.

  Troy readies his stance, nearing his fists close to each other. Riza charges and Troy rolls away. Her fist inserts into the wall’s concrete, delivering Troy the chance to strike. His concealed knuckles clash toward Riza’s jawline and her left lens cracks. She stumbles to the impact, and Troy rushes in, honing his fist that hits flat on her pentagonal torso plate. Her illuminating palm thrusts against his chest, and stars bolt in his eyes. Troy guards the second blow, but it bypasses his defense, and a sharp pain ignites in his abdomen.

  Clutching to his hip, Troy heaves to violet blocks obfuscating his sight. Material and glass collide behind him. The effects leave him vulnerable to where a tight grip sends him kneeling once again. Riza closes her foot near her target’s chin, and her cybernetic hands clutch around his non-bionic arm, caging and twisting it gradually. Light triggers in her muscle fibers. Troy grits his teeth to the piercing in his bones as his arm bends. His interface unravels, flooding his world with indistinct pixels and incoming iridescent blurs. Folding his hand, Troy swats only for Riza to shift her head aside. The pain and dysfunction amplify, and his muscles arch.

  What is she even inflicting on me?

  Meanwhile, Ezra grabs Gabriel by the throat, hurling him toward the television like a ragdoll. Alana jumps at the PMC before he can even raise his foot. She pounds the flaming pan, but the agent catches her wrist, swinging and slamming her shoulders on whatever debris that stood.

  She yelps. “Troy!!”

  She throws the broken disk toward his way, and Troy seizes it. Riza had little time to counter as Troy jams the blazing edge at her temple. Troy breaks loose, grabbing her throat and casting her to the ground. Morphine flows in Troy as he catches her rise, hands blazing as he connects two deliberate jabs. Blood red particles splash against Riza’s battered face, and her skin lacerates. Soon the ceiling’s debris tumbles, catching the two off guard, and they pounce away. Lamps and wires sparkle.

  Troy growls and clutches his temple to the digital clouds plastering in his eyes. Currents penetrate his nerves as he taps his head. His sightings cleanse, and his tongue numbs to Riza on her feet inside the kitchen. His pistol trapped in possession of the contractor, the PMC laces her finger on the trigger and levels it upward. Blood streams down her left eye, and her teeth clench.

  “No!” Gabriel cries as the shot fires.

  Smoke bellows from the muzzle. Troy shields his arms, pushing back as his heart whisks. His apprehension cuts short to a thick arm shoving him down, and his shoulder hits the pavement. Gabriel’s body, leaping in mid-air, grunts to a bright red hole puncturing his shirt. The air escapes Troy’s mouth as he witnesses the shot blasting through Gabriel’s chest, leaving
nothing but a soaked bullet sinking to pass his spine. Gabriel’s head lands below Troy’s feet, and he gasps softly. His pupils shuddered until there was but an empty vessel behind them. Silence grips the collapsing living room and stabs tear Troy from within his gut. Troy shoots a flummoxed expression toward Gabriel’s killer, and blood rushes from his nose to the smugness on her lips.

  Alana’s choke breaks the deafening sound. In spite of her tears, she clenches her teeth.

  “PIECE OF FUCKING SHIT!!” she vituperates. Alana charges at Riza, but her ally hurls the human by the collar, whipping her coat away in a fury as she lands prone on the ground.

  Riza aims in Alana’s direction until she jerks to debris missing her by the head. Lowering his hand, a brand wave of energy circulates in Troy’s muscle fibers as he rises. More debris tumbles, showering his lower body in flames, and blazing steam bellows out of his nose. Hissing, Riza unleashes the trigger, but a charging Troy waves it off with shrewdness. The bullet deflects from his prosthetic arm, nailing a hole on the shelves, and Troy lands his blow.

  The PMC swears to the inferno lashing like a sting of whips at her nose and plate. The drive reaches its peak, and Troy’s fists jam simultaneously at her body. With a single kick thrusting and cracking the armor plate, Troy spreads his arms, mauling his scorching palms upon her head.

  The impact booms to where a wind wheezes by them. Flakes dance in his vision. Her helm crumbles as she wobbles. Snatching the pistol, Troy inserts and fires the last three bullets deep in her now barren stomach. He grabs her by the back of her neck, rushing her from the kitchen and toward the balcony, tossing Riza’s wizened body over the railing’s edge.

  Ezra’s mouth drops to what’s done, and a bloodied Alana rushes with a kitchen knife. He catches on immediately, slashing a cut that lacerates horizontally at Alana’s arms, and she cries. Catching her throat, the PMC raises a blood-tainted needle, fused at the midline of his bionic wrist, at Alana’s chest.