Last Playground

by Geoff North

  Her foot slammed into his chest before he could ask another question. The force sent him through the air and into a cubicle wall ten feet away. “We don’t care about the girl.” She was on him again in seconds. “Her uncle was much more powerful—much more imaginative.” Fingernails that had ripped into his back now tore the hanging skin from his hand. She threw the synthetic material away like a used glove. “And I wasn’t after a tracking device. The Agency knew you would eventually return here. Neal’s world is dying—his most noble creation couldn’t resist coming back to the center of it all to try and fix things.”

  She made the word noble sound like an insult. Oscar studied his fleshless mechanical hand—silver cables for tendons, red and green wires for veins. He closed the fingers into a fist. He had never felt so real, and at the same time, never appeared so…inhuman. Oscar’s entire existence had been a lie. He knew her words were true. His brain was like the rest of him. Mechanical.

  It isn’t fair.

  Oscar threw all his android power into a punch at her throat.

  She was faster.

  His fist crumpled in like a tin can between her fingers. She twisted and tore the hand off with a sickening snap. Oscar stared dumbly at the stump of dangling wires. They sparked and sputtered weakly. He had been damaged in the past; pieces of skin had been torn and glued crudely back into place over the years. Other injuries—like the artificial flesh missing from his left forearm—he’d learned to live without altogether. He could hide missing skin with shirt sleeves and pant legs. He couldn’t hide this. A part of him was gone. It couldn’t be replaced and it would never be repaired.

  It doesn’t hurt. I can’t feel a thing…I am not human.

  “What’s the matter, dear?” Her fingers wrapped around his arm below the elbow. “A robot can manage just fine without a limb or two.” She took hold with her other hand around his bicep and started to twist. Oscar watched with revolted fascination as she bent the forearm back, past the natural limitations of the elbow. There was a loud crack—the titanium joint snapped as easily as a chicken’s wishbone. She pulled the forearm away and let it drop to the floor. Her forehead slammed into his face, returning the head butt he’d given her with twice as much force. Oscar staggered back and fell over an operating bed. The woman was on top of him a second later, straddling his chest. Her powerful legs held him to the ground and a steely grip wrapped around his throat, pinning his head to the floor.

  He went instinctively to remove it with both hands but only one was available to him. It would take a long time to get used to, he thought, provided he survived this encounter. She maneuvered his hand beneath one knee and held it there. His other arm—the one that now ended at the elbow—thumped harmlessly into her side. He wouldn’t survive this encounter. She was stronger, faster, and a whole lot meaner.

  “Why?” He managed to choke the word out.

  “You were correct. The S.S.I.A. no longer exists. The power signature emanating from the farmhouse Neal grew up on—the unclosed portal to this world—was discovered by secret operatives a decade ago. I’m talking about operatives from the real Earth, Oscar—not the made-up worlds you’re familiar with—these people take things seriously. But they couldn’t find a way to enter this world. It wasn’t until a couple of years ago that they figured it out. They’ve been here for months now, tapping into the dying energy source and trying to siphon it into the new one.”

  She let a bit of pressure off around his throat, not enough to allow him to move, only enough to let him speak. “W-what new energy source?”

  “The big dolt upstairs.” She indicated with a lift of her eyes. “He never leaves the top floor anymore.”

  Another floor?

  “As long as we remain quiet we’re free to work below, creating new androids and advanced life forms.”

  Oscar pictured the terrible creatures they’d encountered in the tunnels below. Why? Why had these mysterious rogue agents from the First World crossed over to this one? What was their ultimate goal?

  As if she could read his mind, the android woman answered. “The possibilities this world holds are immense, Oscar. The army we’re creating here to take over Earth is only the beginning. The power Neal once had—that incredible atom located at the center of his brain—that’s what we’re really after. Neal’s world…the real world…the entire universe will be ours to control.”

  Though horrified, Oscar was hardly surprised. Control. It’s what the greediest of humanity craved. Ultimate power through limitless creation.

  “They’ll stop you,” he gasped. “You’ll never get away with it.”

  Her nails tore into his stomach, digging. “It’s already begun. There are agents spread all throughout North and South America. Communist China comes next; after that, Russia and Europe will be easy to infiltrate.”

  He couldn’t feel his mechanical guts being ripped apart, but he could hear it. And he was powerless to stop it. The fingers were headed for his heart—the self-regenerating nuclear power cell that ran everything.

  “Stay still, my love. This will only take a few more moments.”

  Why go to all this trouble? She has the power to tear me limb from limb. She could knock my head off with one blow. Why does she need to rip me apart from the inside?

  Oscar no longer trusted his mechanical eyes. Had a shadow fallen over the woman’s face, or was he merely beginning to shut down? Her gaze lifted. The shadow was real. A white-gloved hand came down and grabbed the arm choking Oscar. A second later it was gone. So was the grip around Oscar’s throat. She gaped at the stump where her arm had been attached to her shoulder. Pink bio-fluid oozed out over torn wires and steel tendons.

  A deep voice spoke from behind Oscar. “I…don’t…think so.”

  Oscar craned his head back and saw a powerful figure casting the shadow. White gloves, white boots and cape, and a big white ‘P’ emblazoned across a rippling chest on a spandex suit of black. One of the monstrously thick arms swung through the air. The android woman was struck with a backhand and sent flying. The force slammed her through half a dozen operating theatres and into the building’s wall at the far side of the room. Oscar sat up and watched as her destroyed body unpeeled itself from the dented steel wall and slumped to the floor. She didn’t get back up.

  Oscar looked up at the figure still standing over him.

  Pipes scowled at him. “What the hell are you looking at?” The big hand that had destroyed the female android curled into a fist.

  Chapter 23

  The mammoth-sized wannasee began its second charge at the old farmhouse. Bertha watched through a gaping crack running down the living room wall that hadn’t been there before she’d gone upstairs. Logan buried his face into his grandmother’s blouse. They were backed against a wall behind an overturned, rotting chesterfield. Erin wrapped an arm around his head so he wouldn’t hear or see the creature crash through. It was the least she could do.

  Selma, Esme, and Paris fought down the last of the wannasee that had clawed their way through the broken windows and stared with the others as the massive creature bore down. There was nowhere to take cover. Nowhere to run. When it hit, the entire house would fall on top of them, burying any left alive beneath tons of rubble.

  Bertha yanked her sword from the doorframe and lined up the point with where she believed the creature’s misshapen forehead would be once it crashed through. The thing would trample everyone in the stampede, but the barbarian woman’s steel would be sharp enough and strong enough to pierce through its gray skull. If this was to be their final stand, the creature was going out with them.

  There was a loud crack and the beast stopped in its tracks six feet short of the wall. It fell to its side with a thump and stopped moving. Bertha could see a light trail of plaster dust, a smeared white line suspended in midair.

  “What is that?”

  “Sh-shield,” Paris grinned. He was resting on his hands and knees, sweat dripping from his pale face. “I got the idea ups
tairs to erect a second wall around the house.”

  Esme helped him to his feet. “Your magic powers have returned!”

  “Just barely. It will only last a few minutes. The blood now running through my veins—your vampire blood—it’s changed me. I thought it was just the cold in Artica Land…but it’s more than that.”

  She gave him a hurt look. “You would’ve become one of those things if I hadn’t bitten you. I saved your life.”

  “I’m not complaining.” He kissed her forehead.

  Bertha returned from a quick survey of the kitchen. “It’s only bought us a little time. The creatures have the house totally surrounded. When your invisible wall falls, they will be back on us.”

  “We can hole up in the cellar,” Erin Stauch offered.

  Selma nodded enthusiastically. “Any place is better than staying here.”

  Bertha considered it. “We may be better able to defend ourselves if they only have one way in at us.” And no way out, she thought. They would be trapped but she didn’t share that with the others.

  “Make up your minds,” Paris said, staggering forward. Esme reached out to hold him up.

  Erin limped through the rubble towards the back entrance down a littered hallway. Logan held her hand, skipping over sagging floorboards and broken ceiling tiles. “Here,” she called out, kicking away a pile of animal droppings from a rusted ring set in the floor.

  Bertha moved more debris, revealing the wooden door surrounding the handle. She pulled up but it wouldn’t budge.

  “It’s the damn weather in this country,” Erin said. She flashed her grandson an apologetic smile. “Wood gets damp in the hot summer months and dries back up during the cold winters. It swells. We’ll never get that thing up.”

  Bertha ran her sword blade through the ring and wedged the sharp end into the floor. “This house isn’t in your world. There aren’t any seasons here.” She pulled up on the hilt, using the blade as a lever. There was a loud squeal and the door lifted. Esme pushed it up enough to let everyone scramble down into the darkness. Bertha went last, letting the door thump back down into place behind her.

  A ball of white light formed above Paris’s head. “An easy spell,” he said. “Sorry it isn’t any brighter, but it’s hard to maintain while keeping the walls up outside.”

  It was dirtier below—if possible—than it was on the main floor. The walls were nothing more than crumbling dirt. Piles of dried soil rested up along them where rockier chunks had given way. There were rusted paint cans, preserving jars, broken tools, and discarded oil tins everywhere. Paris sat on a moldy stack of newspapers and magazines. “No place like home,” he sighed.

  Erin cleared her throat weakly. “This cellar was Herb’s responsibility. I can’t tell you how many times I got after him to tidy it up.”

  It reminded Selma of Gunnarson’s encampment back in Canis Major.

  Logan saw a big yellow pail sitting on the floor with an upside-down happy face painted on it. He stepped away instinctively and hugged his grandmother. There was something wrong about it.

  “My little Neal snuck down here a time or two,” Erin continued. “Used to scare the heck out of him. But that imagination of his just wouldn’t keep him away. He could make a game out of anything…out of any place.”

  “So we’ve seen,” Selma added.

  They waited in silence. The minutes dragged by slowly as all ears strained to listen above. When would the invisible walls fall? Would the floor above their heads hold the weight from the inevitable rush of wannasee? What kind of horrible creature would discover them first, and how long would it take them to work their way into the cellar?

  It was cool and damp. It started to get colder. Logan shuddered and held his grandmother tighter. Bertha could see her own breath as she exhaled. She looked over to Paris suspiciously. “Is your light drawing heat from the room?”

  He shook his head. “N-No chance of that… It requires barely any energy.”

  It got colder still.

  Away from their little huddle—from the darkest shadows opposite the stairs—a voice began to speak.

  “Hold on a little while longer,” it whispered.

  They all started and turned towards it. A second light, a very dull blue glow, drifted slowly around a discarded water heater.

  “Is that you?” Esme asked Paris. He shook his head again adamantly.

  “Help is on its way.” The voice grew slightly stronger and the glow began to solidify into human form. It was a little girl but the voice was definitely that of a grown woman. “You’re going to be okay.”

  Logan felt his grandmother’s body stiffen. She pushed him away gently and stumbled towards the ghostly image, ignoring the pain in her side. “Nancy?”

  Bertha grabbed Erin’s arm and pulled her back.

  She shook it free. “It’s my Nancy… It’s my daughter.”

  Selma sank further back into the shadows. On top of everything else, the teenager couldn’t handle a face-to-face meeting with the ghost that haunted her dreams. She turned her head to the dirt wall. She didn’t want to be seen by it.

  “How have you been, Mom?” The apparition looked down to Logan. “Oh my little boy… How you’ve grown.”

  Logan shut his eyes tightly and backed into the dirt wall behind him. It was his mother’s voice, but the image was that of a child. He didn’t recognize her.

  Erin Stauch however, did recognize her. She remembered perfectly how her daughter had appeared as a child. There was a long pause as mother and daughter stared at each other, separated six feet in physical space and an unfathomable distance between dimensions. “I’ve…missed you. I’ve shut myself away on this farm and neglected your family… I’m so sorry.”

  “I’m okay, Mom… Everything is wonderful here. Dad sends his love. Let go of the pain and start living again.” She looked at Bertha and the others. “I guided these people to you. I showed them the way.”

  Esme whispered into Paris’s ear, “Of course… She was the one that brought us here from Artica Land…to protect her son and mother.”

  “I sent you to Artica Land from that distant galaxy to discover the old spinning thing. It was the only way to redirect you here. My brother wasn’t the only one to possess…abilities.” The ghost spotted Selma cowering up against the dirt wall. “What’s wrong, Selma? Why won’t you look at me? Don’t you want to tell Brinn that you saw me?”

  The spirit began to shimmer and blur. She looked back to her mother and smiled. “I have to go now.”

  Erin stepped forward, her hands reaching out. “Stay with me.”

  The spectral representation of Nancy became unfocused, began to flicker. “Take care of my family, Mom. Love my son as much as you loved yours…as much as you loved me.”

  “Have you seen Neal? Is he alright? Is he…happy?”

  The ghost either hadn’t heard or chose not to answer. Erin could no longer make out the features of her daughter’s face. “Something wonderful is about to happen, Mom. You’ll see… Tell Brinn I love her…it wasn’t her fault. Tell her we’ll—”

  The voice cut out in midsentence. The blue light vanished and the six were left standing in a loose huddle around the diminishing light above Paris’s head.

  Erin took Logan’s hand and squeezed. The boy’s eyes were tear-filled. “Mom?”

  “Yes… That was your mom.”

  There was a thunderous crash from above. The walls had fallen and the wannasee were upon them.

  Chapter 24

  “Well? Are you just going to sit there with half an arm and stare at me, or are you going to explain what you’re doing here?” Pipes hoisted Oscar to his feet.

  The android staggered back down to one knee, his mechanical guts spilling out onto the floor from where the woman had torn him open. “I…don’t feel so good.”

  The costumed hero stepped back to get a better look. He studied Oscar quizzically. “Should I know you?”

  The man’s arms were comically larg
e, his biceps as thick as tree trunks with forearms to match. The legs by contrast looked almost too small. His barrel chest and abdomen rippled and flexed, the four-foot-wide shoulders were a mass of corded muscle that sloped up into his head on either side, making it appear as if he had no neck at all. His face was all jutting chin with a determined slit for a mouth, his eyes close set and deep blue. The hair on his head was slicked back, creating a prominent widow’s peak of jet black. He was the ultimate over-the-top image of a super-hero that only a child’s mind could envisage.

  “I’m Oscar Williams. I work for…I worked for the S.S.I.A...”

  Pipes scratched his anvil-shaped chin. The white of his gloves and boots were stained and dirty from years without washing. The cape that ended at the back of his knees was just as filthy and frayed at the edges. “Oscar… Yeah, I remember; Neal talked about you decades ago…when he was still alive. I’m surprised we never met back in the good old days.”

  The android attempted to stand again but failed. “I’ve…I’ve traveled here with friends…Mar-Marshal Lowe and a robot called…called Regieeeee—Reginald.” Oscar closed his eyes and gave his head a hard shake. It was such a human reaction, a totally useless attempt to clear and recharge the dying circuitry in his head.

  Pipes grinned. “Angus Lowe? Now there’s a guy I do know. Where are they?”

  Oscar pointed to the ground. “Beeeeeee—below… One floor.”

  The hero rushed to the elevator and punched a code into the keypad. The doors dinged and closed a moment later. Pipes turned back to Oscar, still grinning like an oversized child. “Me and Angus used to hang out with Neal a lot. Angus came first, but I was his second and most powerful creation.”

  Oscar was unable to respond. He could only stare out, unblinking and silent, his one arm frozen against his midsection.

  And I was his last. I was there the day he died. I should’ve saved him. I should’ve known. Perhaps if any small part of me was real…I could’ve made a difference.