by Peter Clines
Nothing. He couldn’t see anyone anywhere. He reached out and guided a few more exes down to the intersection. Thirty different views, but nothing.
“You think you can hide from me?” The dead took in a breath and shouted in the street, “I’M LEGION! I’M EVERYWHERE!”
The words echoed on the street for a moment. Then silence settled down across the street and coated everything. The air grew still.
Do you take the name of Legion in vain, little soul?
He poured himself back into the old man with the bad knee and grinned. “I am Legion, bitch,” he growled at the air. “I’m death incarnate. I’m the guy who killed the world.”
He had the unmistakable sense of someone standing right behind him. Behind all of him. Every ex within his reach felt a warm prickling on their backs and shoulders, a faint pull on the eyes. All his bodies looked around and saw nothing, but the feeling remained.
You insult the great name of my sibling with your ignorance and arrogance. Perhaps a lesson in humility is in order. If nothing else, it should relieve my boredom while I await my new vessel.
Legion rolled his fingers up into tight fists. All of the walking dead within three blocks copied him, guided by his anger. “Oh, yeah?” he spat. “Fucking coward. Come out here and give it your best shot.”
And a few moments later, every ex in Los Angeles County screamed at once.
“MA’AM,” SAID FREEDOM, “sir, with all due respect, this is your fault.”
It made Stealth pause. St. George had said it was possible to catch her off guard, but this was the first time Freedom had ever seen it happen. He wondered how often anyone dared interrupt the woman.
He was in Stealth’s meeting room with the other heroes. It was a rare thing for Freedom to be invited to these morning meetings. He understood they were informal, though, and the other heroes had known one another for years.
The cloaked woman stood on the other side of the conference table and stared at him. He’d learned to sense her stares, even through the blank balaclava she always wore.
St. George stood next to her, leaning against the edge of the table. He’d looked preoccupied for the whole meeting so far.
Barry was in his wheelchair off to the side. He was also much more subdued than normal. If fact, Freedom was pretty sure the man hadn’t spoken yet.
Danielle sat next to the wheelchair. He’d come to learn what a rare thing it was for her not to be wearing the Cerberus armor if she had a choice. Even now, with Lieutenant Gibbs and the boy, Cesar, able to operate the battlesuit, it was still her wearing it more than half the time. He’d known a few tank officers who were the same way—not comfortable unless they were surrounded by steel.
The arrangement of the room also didn’t slip by the captain. He’d been on this side of similar tables three times before. Two of them were for official inquiries into the deaths of soldiers under his command. The other was when he was brought into Project Krypton and had the full scale of the project revealed to him.
He still wasn’t sure which type this meeting was. All four of the heroes looked uncomfortable. It could be going either way.
“Please,” said Stealth. Her voice was ice. “Continue.”
“I’ve been here for eight months now, ma’am, and this is the first I’ve ever heard of a high-security prisoner in the Mount. One being held a hundred yards from my own quarters.”
“Are you claiming you have never heard of the Cellar?”
“Of course I’ve heard of it, ma’am,” he said. “Everyone in the city has. And everyone has a different idea what it is. I’ve been told it’s a quarantine area, storage for ex-humans, and where we keep monsters.” He gestured at St. George. “One very excited little boy told me it’s where you hide the magic lantern that gives you your powers, and you have to go down there to recharge.”
Barry looked up at his friend. “You’ve had a magic lantern all this time and you didn’t tell me?”
St. George smirked. So did Danielle. It didn’t break the mood, but it cracked it enough for everyone to breathe.
Freedom plowed ahead. “Who is the prisoner? Why did you have him locked up? And where did he get all these primitive weapons from? Is it some … ritualistic thing?”
“Man, that’d be nice,” Barry said. “So much simpler.”
“Speaking of ritual,” said Danielle, “wasn’t Max supposed to be here for all of this?”
Without turning Stealth pointed over her shoulder at one of the numerous video screens in the room. The high angle showed Max in another meeting room somewhere. He was scratching notes and symbols on a huge whiteboard. His brow furrowed at the board as he went back and erased a pair of lines. “He has been notified twice,” said Stealth. “It was a courtesy. We do not require his presence.”
“Still working on his demon-banishment thing?” asked Barry.
“So he claims. Legion’s scream seems to have worried him.” Stealth tossed something onto the marble tabletop. It made a hollow sound as it bounced over to Freedom. “This is the weapon the prisoner attacked you with?”
He picked it up. “It looks like it, ma’am. I couldn’t be certain. I only saw it for a moment.”
It was a thick piece of pale hardwood. It had been scraped down to something that was almost a blade. He recognized the scratches down the length from crude weapons in Iraq. Someone had dragged the spike across rough stone or concrete to shape it.
Then he registered the thick knob under the handle.
“This is a bone,” he said.
“Yeah,” said St. George.
“Someone slipped your prisoner a leg of lamb when you weren’t looking?”
“It is a human tibia,” said Stealth. “To be precise, it is the prisoner’s left tibia.”
Barry tipped his head back and rubbed his temples.
Freedom set the bone down. “I’m pretty sure the prisoner had both of his legs.”
St. George nodded. “Yeah, he did.”
Freedom frowned and nodded at the table. “And the whip?” It had been coiled and stuffed into a large evidence bag. He wondered how Stealth had actual evidence bags when his people were using Ziplocs.
“Identifying exact muscle tissues is more difficult without certain tests,” she said. “However, judging from the density and length of the sinews, I feel confident saying it is comprised of nine sartorius muscles. There are also eleven molars worked into the braid, to increase either traction or damage. Possibly both.”
Danielle shuddered and looked away from the table.
Freedom pondered this for a moment. “So there are multiple victims,” he said. “He killed other people before he got out and we missed it somehow.”
St. George shook his head. “No,” he said. “They’re all his. The prisoner’s.” He tapped his fingers on the tabletop for a moment. “Looking at these and some of the evidence we found in the Cellar, we’re pretty sure he was tearing out his own bones and muscles to make weapons and tools.”
Freedom blinked. He opened his mouth to respond, then shut it again. After another few moments he spat the words out. “And you never noticed this how, sir?”
“We never noticed,” said Stealth, “because he would grow new ones.”
The huge captain dwelled on her words for a moment. “Before the fall,” he said, “there was a hero with healing powers. The one named Regenerator.”
“Also sometimes called the Immortal,” said Stealth. “His real name is Joshua Garcetti.”
“He was attacked and bitten in a field hospital, wasn’t he?” Freedom glanced at St. George. “I thought he died near the end.”
“Not exactly,” muttered Danielle.
“Josh survived the bite,” said St. George, “but it canceled out his powers. He was just a normal guy with a messed-up hand where the infection had gotten trapped.”
Freedom recalled the prisoner’s withered hand. “So he was in the Cellar? Why?”
St. George drummed his knuckles on the table.
Danielle shifted in her chair. Even Barry squirmed a bit. Stealth stared at the huge captain.
“What did he do?” asked Freedom.
“You have to understand,” said St. George, “Josh had gone insane. Seriously, honestly insane. He managed to hide it from us for a year while we were establishing the Mount. None of us knew.”
“Knew what, sir?”
“Sixteen months ago,” said Stealth, “we discovered Regenerator’s affliction was an elaborate somatoform disorder, one where his abilities allowed his guilt to physically manifest as an injury.”
“Guilt?”
Danielle reached up to wrap her hand over her mouth. She turned to study one of Stealth’s video screens.
St. George looked at Stealth. “What you are about to hear, Captain,” she said, “is known only by the four of us and now yourself. It does not leave this room under any circumstances. Ever.”
They told him everything.
St. George had seen Captain Freedom mad before. Back at Krypton, when the officer had been brainwashed into thinking Stealth had killed his commander, he’d been furious. The icy calm that settled over the giant officer now, though, was even more disturbing.
“He did all of this,” Freedom said. “Your partner is the source of the ex-virus.”
“He is not our partner,” said Stealth.
“I never even met the guy until we set up the Mount,” said Danielle.
“This man is responsible for everything,” hissed the captain. “For the deaths of millions of people.”
“Billions,” said Stealth. “By the last known population numbers and projected estimates, five-point-four-two billion people died in 2009 as a direct result of the ex-virus.”
“My men died!” shouted Freedom. “That man caused the death of dozens of soldiers under my command. You knew this and you said nothing to me about it.”
“Lots of people died, Captain,” said St. George. A cloud of smoke rolled from his mouth as he said it. “Everybody here lost friends and family and loved ones. You think we haven’t all thought about going down there and chopping him up until he stops healing?”
“And why hasn’t anyone?”
“Because we’re the good guys,” St. George told him. “We remind everyone that sometimes you’ve got to do the right thing even when the wrong thing would be a lot easier and make you a lot happier. We’re the ones setting an example so all of this doesn’t turn into a Road Warrior movie. That’s our duty. And yours.”
It was enough. The huge officer calmed himself.
“He was being punished,” said the hero. “We told everyone he went insane and killed himself. He was always so depressed about his wife, no one questioned it. He’d spent the last year and a half in a twelve-foot-square cell. He hadn’t seen daylight that whole time. I was the only person he ever got to talk to. We even stopped feeding him once we realized he doesn’t need to eat. Once there’s some real stability here, we were going to turn him over to the people for a trial.”
“As someone who understands morale issues,” said Stealth, “I am certain you also understand the need to keep all these facts secret until then.”
Freedom’s jaw shifted. “Unfortunately, ma’am, I do.”
“As such,” she said, “our primary concern is not justice but containment. Which means recapturing him must be our highest priority.”
“Problem,” said Danielle. She tapped a finger on the map. “We can’t go after him without crossing Max’s magic symbols.”
“If they are real,” Stealth said.
“That thing outside looked pretty real,” said Barry. “With all the teeth and the fire and the twisting body parts. It was like a John Carpenter movie come to life.”
“It exists,” said Stealth, “but that does not mean it is a demon. Or that it is being held back by magical symbols.” She gestured at the maps. “The exes will follow Regenerator as long as he remains within their range of sight or hearing. If St. George or Zzzap reaches sufficient altitude, they may be able to see a pattern of movement, much like a tide or current. This will give us a general sense of his current location.”
“I’ve got a question for the floor,” said Barry. “Is this really a bad thing?”
Stealth turned to him. “I beg your pardon?”
“Okay, so Josh got out. And he got out of the Mount. Out of our whole complex of New Los Angeles or whatever we’re going to call it.” He shrugged in his wheelchair. “So now it’s him alone against Cairax McBitey and, what, five million exes here in Los Angeles. Six hundred million or something in North America. Not to sound harsh but … well, it sounds like the problem’s dealt with.”
“Or is it?” Danielle pulled her arms tight. “Can they actually kill him?”
“Forgive me for saying so,” said Freedom, “but from what you’ve told me, can anything kill him?”
There was a quiet pause.
“To the best of my knowledge,” said Stealth, “he has never been decapitated.”
“Oh, come on,” said St. George. “Are we going to hunt him down and chop his head off?”
She bowed her head inside her hood. “I was merely offering a possible scenario where his powers would not allow him to regenerate.”
There was a brief lull, and then someone cleared their throat.
Max sat in a chair at the far end of the meeting table. His suit was navy blue with a paisley tie of red and silver. St. George realized he could barely see Jarvis in Max’s face anymore. There was a little something around the eyes, a bit in the cheeks, but for the most part the salt-and-pepper man had vanished.
Another person consumed by the dead.
“Sorry I’m late,” Max said. “I was up all night working out a couple ideas before I lost them. With Cairax being so determined and aggressive I figured I needed to put some serious thought into banishing him.” He swung his feet up onto the table.
Freedom glanced at the door. “How did you …?”
Max twiddled his fingers in the air and smiled.
“He is wearing rubber-soled shoes,” said Stealth, “and the doors have pneumatic hinges.”
“Do you have no sense of wonder in your soul?” Max shook his head. “Good news is, I’ve got it figured out. I’ll need four days of prep and I can get rid of Cairax for good.”
“Really?” said Barry.
“Yep. So, what did I miss here? Anything that’s still relevant?”
“Josh’s escape,” said St. George, “and if we can go after him or not.”
“Anyone crossing the wards before I banish Cairax would be bad,” said Max. “Refresh my memory—who’s Josh?”
Danielle sighed. Stealth stiffened and crossed her arms. “Joshua Garcetti,” she said, “better known as Regenerator.”
“Wait,” said Max, sitting up. “Regenerator’s still alive?”
“Yeah,” said Barry. “You missed the big catch-up.”
“No way? It’s like we’re getting the band back together again. Where’s he been?”
“He was our prisoner,” said Stealth, “until he escaped two and a half hours ago. He is somewhere in Los Angeles beyond the Big Wall.”
“WHAT?”
Max leaped out of his chair so hard it skittered across the floor and hit the far wall. He looked at each of them in turn. His eyes were wide and his chest heaved. He pressed his hands against the tabletop. “Regenerator is out in the city? He’s past the wards?”
St. George nodded and shrugged. “Yeah.”
“Does he still have his powers? Just before everything collapsed I heard he’d lost his powers.”
“Still got ’em,” said Danielle.
“He took over a dozen twelve-gauge slugs during his escape,” said Freedom. “They barely slowed him.”
“Oh, Jesus,” muttered Max. He reached back and grabbed the back of his head. “Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck.”
Stealth crossed her arms. “Is there a problem?”
Max’s eyes were still huge. “Problem?” he ec
hoed. “Well, everyone in Los Angeles has maybe nine or ten hours left to live. But other than that, yeah, things are just fantastic.”
“EXPLAIN,” SAID STEALTH.
Max shook his head. “Okay, look, the whole reason Cairax Murrain can’t manifest is because any host needs to meet two major conditions. They have to be alive and they need to be durable enough to survive the process of possession. That’s why it was so important that George didn’t go past the barriers. It could kill anyone, but it could actually possess him.”
“Okay,” said St. George with a nod.
“Well, now there’s a body out there that won’t die. Regenerator can take all that damage and keep going. He’s viable. So the instant he says yes, Cairax is going to start moving in, just like I did. And once he’s got flesh he’s going to march in here and kill every single man, woman, child, and fluffy kitten in the Mount.”
“But we’re safe inside, right?” Barry waved his arm at the window. “That’s the point of the symbols.”
Max shook his head. “We’re not safe. This isn’t remotely safe anymore. This is like being out in the middle of the ocean, a thousand miles from anything, on a six-dollar pool raft with a great white shark circling you. Except the raft has a hole in it and the shark’s armor-plated, on meth, and has a laser cannon mounted on its skull. That’s about how ‘safe’ we are.” He started to pace. “The wards only block his essence. They meant he couldn’t make someone pop inside the Mount. Once he’s got a body he can walk over those hexagrams just like you or me. And then everyone in here dies.”
Danielle played with the edge of the map on the table. “You sure do talk a lot about how awful this thing is.”
“Because I know you’re not getting it,” snapped Max. His pacing carried him from one side of the room to the other. “You all keep thinking back to George beating up a zombie, half-breed version of Cairax and telling yourself it’s no big deal.”
“And this is worse?” asked St. George.
“It’s the worst thing ever. Period. Every book you’ve read, every movie you’ve seen, this is a thousand times worse. This is one of the things every single villain you’ve ever heard of is based off because he’s so evil, knowledge of his existence leaks between dimensions. He’s so terrifying that when a bunch of idiot Satanists set him loose in the fourteenth century his name entered the language and became the word for plague.”