by Peter Heaton
Certainly she’d take money or even credit with the Custodians. He’d used all that the slaver had given him, but he could purchase more. She might help. It might just be enough to throw off Verzatz’s plan.
He turned, trying to get sight of Annelle but lost her in the crowd. He hugged along the right side of the wall, watching as those that had entered the Hall began to fill the vacant rooms. There, turning right at the end of the hall, he thought he saw her blonde-gray hair.
Izaac began to jog, reaching the turn. He came out into an open atrium. Two other hallways opened up to either side, with rooms that were specially designed for a sharing group: larger and more accommodating than the smaller single rooms. He saw Annelle pass into one, and the door shut behind her.
Pain poured into his mind without warning. It racked his brain, forcing him to his knees, waves of angry hurt bashing themselves against the shore of his sanity. He fought his way through the ensuing fog, trying to reach back into the present.
What the hell . . . ?
A synthesized gong rang, scattering his thoughts like scared baitfish. Synthetic manipulation hummed behind each crashing noise. Izaac struggled for air, his mind fighting to right itself.
See you soon, the note had read.
The gong sang again.
Bodies began to appear at each tunnel. Finally his mind dragged itself through the weeds. Shared sessions are beginning, he thought. A sudden pain slipped into his mind and with it the memory of the sudden, awful sensation that had overcome him. Izaac’s hand went to his gun.
“Fuck it,” he muttered, drawing the weapon from his holster.
The rememberers were funneling into the open chamber, pushing past Izaac and depositing themselves into the appropriate rooms. Most passed unaware of his presence. His eyes wide and wild, Izaac began to search the faces of those around him, darting from one to the other. Breathe, Izaac told himself. He paused momentarily, a hand absently patting a pocket.
What did I lose? he thought.
The moment passed and with it the sensation. Again his eyes went back to scanning the faces of the passing crowd. He could be anywhere. He could come at me from any side. Chances are I won’t see him coming.
Izaac could feel the presence of the unseen blade, could feel it taunting him. Already it had pierced his side, even though it had yet to be drawn from its sheath.
See you soon, he heard the words whistled through sharp teeth, each one vibrating slightly like the gong’s ringing. A phantom pain stabbed him between the ribs. A blade grinned in the dark. Izaac fought his body, trying to keep it from reacting to the imagined hurt. His eyes went back to work, scanning faces as fast as his mind could keep up.
Something was wrong. There was a strange buzzing in his brain. He had forgotten something? No. He was missing something? No. Nothing had ever been there.
He tried to reach out across his neural link stretching out for the end point, focusing hard, ignoring the faces around him. His temporary ignorance of his situation a direct cause of the sudden loss he was feeling.
At the end of the neural link Izaac felt . . .
Nothing.
Emptiness. His thoughts echoing into the uninhabited space until they were swallowed entirely by the void.
Then he realized that the seeker was dead.
Verzatz, he knew, needing no confirmation. There was already enough anger built up towards that thing that there was nothing for him to feel but guilt and sadness. There wasn’t pain anymore, as much as a perpetual feeling of loss, physical and spiritual.
Izaac had known how dangerous Verzatz was. And still he had sent the seeker after him, alone.
He wandered the room for a few minutes, not having registered that the atrium had long since emptied. Thinking that maybe he was wrong. Trying again and again to reach the seeker through their link. But every time there was nothing. His right hand absently pressed against his left shoulder, trying to replicate the warmth of the seeker’s body.
Izaac scanned the room one last time. Breathe. Push it away. Now isn’t the time for . . . any of that, Izaac thought. But his mind wouldn’t listen. Instead it decided to conjure up an image of Kelli, her brown body nude but not visible beneath the sloshing water. Come in, she urged, It’s warm.
“Not now,” he said to no one.
He begged for time to stop. To give him a moment to reconcile everything. But if the seeker was dead, that meant Verzatz was close. If there was a time to mourn, it was not now. That didn’t keep the guilt from settling in around him. You got it killed. And now you already want to forget it. So you don’t feel bad.
No, Izaac told himself. So I don’t die.
He started towards the door of the room Annelle had entered. If Verzatz did show himself, at least she would know what he truly was. She’d seen it in that one brief moment with him. It had been written on her green eyes. If things went bad, there was a chance she’d help.
He walked up to the room. It was still unlocked. The door slid open without a noise. Izaac stepped in, expecting to see—
Not expecting to see a nearly empty room.
There were chairs all right, but they were all vacant except one. Izaac stepped forward into the room. The chairs were against the far wall, just at the range where the details of things became blurry. It was Annelle, sitting there. But she looked stiff and scared, not excited for the coming moment.
The neural link was nagging at him, reminding him that it was no longer filled with the comfort of the seeker’s presence. Keep breathing, he thought.
That jarred another memory: Breathe, inhale. You’ll smell him first.
His gun was out as he moved forward. Annelle came into focus: she’d been tied to the chair, her mouth subtly gagged. He turned, but too late. A hand, small but incredibly strong, gripped his gun hand.
Izaac felt the point of a chain blade pressed somewhere between his shoulder blades.
He felt the heat of the man’s breath on his neck. The earthy tones: a blend of dirt and wet animal fur, mingled with the terrible taste of cloves.
“Should I do you like you did him?” The voice was deep and dark.
Too slow, Izaac thought. Too stupid.
But Verzatz was close. Just how Izaac liked it.
At the slightest hint of movement from Izaac’s muscles the whirring blade mangled his coat, shirt, and blastsuit. He felt warm liquid begin to run down his back.
“Don’t make me do it,” Verzatz whispered.
“I’d be making you?” Izaac asked in reply.
“Yes-s-s-s-s,” he responded. Wet slobber dripped onto his neck. “I’m not ready yet to kill you.”
Izaac felt intense pressure in his forearm, as if either bone was poised to snap. His body relaxed away from the pain, allowing Verzatz to push him forward, toward the struggling form of Annelle. Izaac allowed himself to be guided forward, trying to keep his back from touching the edge of the chain blade.
Izaac wasn’t stupid. He knew whose chain blade that was.
“What are you waiting for?”
Verzatz brought Izaac’s arm up, the gun pointing at the Starkisser.
“I’m waiting for you to kill her.”
Izaac froze, trying to drop the gun from his hand. But Verzatz was fast—he caught Izaac’s fist and held it tightly to the gun.
“If you drop the gun, I’ll just kill you and then kill her. But I don’t want to do that.”
“You know I’m not going to.”
“That’s what you think,” retorted Verzatz, and with a laugh he pressed the chain blade into Izaac’s back. His whole back became alive with sensation, and he heard himself scream. Then the pain disappeared, leaving behind only a hot, burning fire.
Verzatz pressed his face up against Izaac’s. “Isn’t this fun?” he inquired.
Izaac could feel the giant smile plastered on Verzatz’s face, the smooth, clean skin of his cheek. Already he could feel the strength leaking from his back. He’d probably missed his chance.
“Why not just kill me?”
“Because I owe you. You had to go and kill him.”
“He deserved it. He did some nasty things. But you know all about that.”
“But I’ve done such nastier! And you came here for him. I may as well have been . . . this stupid cow,” Verzatz motioned to the Starkisser.
She looked scared, unable to comprehend that this was actually happening.
“That’s what this is about?”
Verzatz kissed Izaac on the cheek. “Oh, no, no, no—NO!” The scream was sudden and loud, blasting Izaac’s eardrum. “You killed Ibor.”
“Then just kill me.”
“It’s n-o-o-o-o-t th-a-a-a-a-a-t s-i-i-i-i-m-m-m-m-p-le, Izaac.”
It was in that moment that he felt the loss overcome him. It was the seeker he was reaching out to, the thing that had been there for him when he’d screwed everything up.
Emptiness.
A blackness that ate his thoughts.
The warmth on his shoulder.
The presence in his mind.
All gone. Never to come back.
In a wash of blackness, Kelli came then, and he knew it was her because they had been intertwined: the two beings that he had been intimately connected to beyond anything else.
Until your heart is black and blue?
But that wasn’t the question she was asking. He saw an angry moon. He felt the tears trying not to drop from her eyes.
Yes. Forever, until my heart is black and blue, Izaac replied.
“Hey,” Verzatz said, nudging his head sharply against the back of Izaac’s. “No falling asleep on me. You need to be here, Zackie boy. In the moment, man. In the now.”
What has a black and blue heart?
Dead Izaac.
“Come on, Izaac,” Verzatz whispered.
The taste of yazzat was overpowering. Izaac fought to keep himself from retching.
“This can be fun,” the killer continued, his voice still quiet. The blade began to press against Izaac’s wound, ever so slowly. “We can’t have pleasure without the pain first. All you have to do . . .”
The blade lingered for a moment, the pain evening out to a bearable level. Then the knife crept forward, and the pain surged to a crescendo.
“Just pull the trigger. It’s not hard. Here, I’ll do the aiming.”
Right as Verzatz began to regrip his arm, Izaac tried to pull his own arm free and turn his body. The pain in his back stopped him in his tracks, like a train rushing at him full speed.
“Oh, yes. Look how he wriggles!”
Verzatz had Izaac’s gun pointed at Annelle. It bobbed and weaved slightly. The Starkisser’s eyes watched the barrel of the gun, flinching occasionally when she thought the trigger had been pulled.
The pain began again. Izaac couldn’t think for the pain. It consumed him. He revolted against it, his body straining to do anything to stop it. Twisting and turning didn’t help; it only enhanced the fury with which the claw tore at his back.
“I’ve told you what you have to do, Izaac.” He felt Verzatz breathe on his ear again. “Why did you have to go and kill him?” the man whispered. “Why, Izaac. Why?”
Izaac mumbled a response. The words were nothing, gibberish that happened to be on the tip of his tongue.
“If you want, think of it like pushing a button. Just pushing a button, Zackie boy. The rest of it, that’s something else. Something that we can both say you didn’t do. Can you see this? No? I’m winking, Izaac. Winking. Nudge, nudge. Our . . . little . . . secret.”
There was nothing but the pain. Nothing else. Verzatz faded from reality. Everything disappeared. Bright white light surrounded him. But the bright white was angry, searing his back. Boiling his skin.
It wasn’t light.
It was just—
Pain.
What is it? he struggled to recall.
Pain. More pain.
What is it that can make it stop?
Please stop.
Pain. A new level that he would have never thought could exist.
Stop. How?
He felt himself swoon. It hurt so much.
Just push the button.
Izaac pushed the button. Once. Twice. Three times.
Verzatz squealed with delight. The pain faded but did not disappear. It was still raw and raging, stomping across his back in its fury.
It was a lie, Izaac thought. This will never go away.
“I’ll see you when you wake up, Zackie boy. Hey,” Izaac felt something sudden and sharp against his cheek: a slap. “Hey, hey, h-e-y-y-y-y-y. Don’t forget when you wake up now—what you did. There’s a taste of what Ibor felt. Maybe you’ll see that’s punishment enough.”
Then the hands holding him up were gone, and the floor fell down on him. Words swam through the murk in his mind, even as his brain began to shut down.
What has a black and blue heart?
Dead Izaac.
Chapter Five: Kiss of the Lystere
Breathing consciously, Izaac cut each inhalation short, so he wouldn’t feel the agony in his back. Jumbled. In his mind. Everything. He had found Verzatz. Had he? He remembered hot, foul breath on his neck. His mind was dark—all the power had been shut down.
Not just his mind—his body too. Held down by some unseen force. Was he broken—as broken as the bird that he’d watched Verzatz send to its death? Izaac managed to wriggle an arm and feel—he was strapped down—his right forearm, throbbing with the effort, a ghost of the pain that was intertwined with some memory lingering just on the edge of his conscience. He felt sick to his stomach, afraid that he’d done something terrible.
A-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-r-r-r-a-a-h-h-h! he wanted to shout but even thinking that forcefully hurt him.
Breathe, he reminded himself. Izaac tried to focus on his surroundings. He was on top of something. Inside something. A dark space. His eyes couldn’t make out anything.
It started to come back to him—Verzatz had found him. He forced his mind to focus, the memory of past efforts causing him to search along his neural link. No, he remembered, the seeker is dead.
That wasn’t it. There was something else. Something terrible. Something his subconscious was desperately trying to keep him from remembering. Izaac flexed his right hand, trying to work out the knotted muscles. The ghost of a mechanical-like grip on his forearm made him flinch.
Just push the button, the clove-scented words had suggested. Just push the button, and it will all go away.
As if the sun had emerged from clouds, he saw her face suddenly and clearly: green eyes bright with horror. Then the bullets had hit. One through the cheek, a second through the neck, and the last through the head.
At least there had been some kindness: her sudden suffering had been brief.
His head spun. His back ached. His hands, looking for something to hold, found neither gun nor knife.
Why couldn’t he just kill me?
Another moment through the cobwebs: Izaac lying in bed, bathing in the glow of the shining sun. He remembered the feel of the smooth skin in his arms. The stickiness of his back from the sweat on Izaac’s own chest as he traced a hand across it. Verzatz, he whispered, although his voice had sounded so strange, alien—the oxymoron had almost broken his mind then: the fact that he was remembering everything as if he had lived it, but the memory was so impossibly twisted that it couldn’t be his own.
You are more perfect than you know, the slaver had whispered.
Izaac could not forget the lust and the love he had felt for the creature in his arms. The way he soaked in the stench that wafted off of the young man’s body.
Get out! Izaac screamed in his mind. His own throat too parched to dare vocalize his anger; he felt as if his voice would rip his throat open. Get OUT!
But the memory would not listen. Even though it hadn’t been his, the memory clung to him more firmly than his own remembering stored in the Hall of Memories. Even though he had experienced his own eleven times total, even
though he wanted nothing more than to remember his feelings from that one memory, to remember them so well he would never forget them.
Maybe it was the strangeness of the alien memory—reinforced by his own mind’s curiosity for the unknown—that kept that stolen moment fresh in his mind.
Why couldn’t he just kill me? Izaac thought again. And the answer came to him: Because he wants to break me first.
His hands groped around for anything: a latch, a button, a handle to give him leverage to try to pull himself out of the tube he was in. But his body would not move, he could only reach blindly about with his arms. His fingers brushed nothing but smooth plastic.
Nothing to do but wait for Verzatz to come finish the job. Maybe he wasn’t even in Memory Hold anymore. Maybe he was on board the Crimson Talon, and Verzatz had bigger plans for him. He remembered Ibor Nabaldian then, how calm he had been when Izaac had found him, even though he knew that Izaac had come to kill him. Maybe it was time for that. Time for acceptance.
No! Izaac yelled silently.
His hands continued their search. He began checking his own person and found that he was wearing a light cloth gown and nothing else. He tried to reach for the straps holding him down, but the latches were out of his reach. His back roared with each effort, the pain piercing him so savagely that he felt it in his chest too.
The wicked blade, spinning forward slowly, pushing forward a hair’s width at a time. The blade that had belonged to Hawk.
But there was something. He had killed Nabaldian. He’d given all those slaves they’d found on the derelict cruiser, their throats cut, some small piece of justice. But it did nothing to make him feel better. They were still dead. And soon, he would be too.
More than anything in the world, more than his empty neural connection or wishing Verzatz had killed him or reversing the murder that he had committed, Izaac wished he could be home with Kelli.
He tried to picture her face: her round cheeks, her deep, hazel eyes, the ghosts of creases forming on her forehead because she always lifted up her eyebrows when she laughed. But each detail came separately, creating a disjointed picture that did not satisfy his urging. And then, when he had finally pieced them together, red, violent holes appeared on her right cheek, her neck, and her forehead. And she wasn’t Kelli anymore because the skin was leathery, tanned to a dark beige, and the hair was blonde with streaks of gray.