“The ‘List of People who have to Die’,” said Wodan.
“Yes!” Korliss shrieked. “It was all so ridiculous, a nightmare, and it wouldn’t end. I left the thing on my desk for months, in plain sight, I wanted to be caught so badly. I wanted to be caught so that someone else would correct my mistakes. Eventually, I even lost the list. Nobody, Mister Kyner, nobody stopped us. Nobody stood up to the evil.” Korliss sobbed uncontrollably. “It was a wish, and we were allowed to follow through with it. To make a wish is to show a desperate need to minimize cause and effect... to admit one’s weakness in the face of an uncaring universe... to make life easier via pure whim...” Korliss fell to one knee before Wodan, body shaking as the sobs tore through him. “It is evil. Evil as pure laziness.”
Wodan stood over his fallen teacher. He watched as the confession washed his psyche, tearing evil from good. He wondered if there would be anything left of the man there was before, so long ago.
“I wonder,” said Wodan, softly, “how Luumis Lamsang ended up with that list.”
There was a sudden clanging sound behind them. Wodan whirled about and saw a clumsy shadow falling over the fire escape and onto the roof. There was a great flash of red in the distance, then they saw Luumis rising, saw him produce a long, wicked knife, saw his face contorted in hatred, the reflection of red fires burning in eyes shining with tears. He opened his mouth, lips quivering, and screamed out, “I grabbed that paper to jerk off into it!” and as the light snuffed itself out he dashed forward, low to the ground, knife glinting in the dark.
Korliss and Wodan both sprang towards one another, each thinking to save the other, and even wrestled awkwardly as Luumis collided with them. No one could see in the absolute darkness, they only felt the press of limbs and hot breath. Pushing, tripping, nearly falling. Korliss felt the blade bite into his stomach, then felt an all-consuming pain and could no longer breathe. He grabbed the attacker’s hand and pushed the blade deeper into himself. The hand tried to pull itself free, but he used the last of his strength to hold the blade inside, to hold the pain of living within himself. His hands became slick as blood gushed onto his arms. The hand yanked again and again, and eventually it slipped through the blood and freed itself from Korliss’s grasp - but Korliss held the blade tight in both hands as he fell and rolled away from the fight.
He heard the boys wrestling in the darkness, both growling like wild animals, saw shadowy limbs jerking, flailing, rolling about, heard them barking, heard a head slam into the ground, then they rolled and one was on top of the other. One of them shrieked in agony, then the sound stretched out into something nightmarish, a high-pitched bleating that was cut off by wet gurgling. He heard the sound of flesh tearing. One form lay silent and still.
Red flashes in the sky, one after the other. Korliss saw one of the boys crouching over the other, mouth hanging open, panting like an animal, blood dripping from his face and pouring from his mouth and hanging from his chin in thick lines. The other boy’s eyes were open in death, his face and chest covered in blood. His neck had been torn out, utterly beyond repair, blood bubbling and squirting from arteries ripped open by the teeth of his killer. The survivor cast feral eyes onto Korliss before darkness covered them again.
Korliss was horrified. The survivor moved toward him and, even though Korliss was no longer afraid of death, the idea that the monster would touch him was so repulsive that he forced himself to back away on his elbows. He was cold and too weak to move; he shut his eyes because he knew that his student Luumis had killed Wodan and was about to…
Warm hands held Korliss and braced his head tenderly. Korliss felt the simple warmth of human connection and, despite the cold coming to claim him, he knew that it was Wodan who held him. He reached up, hand shaking, and touched Wodan’s cheek. He stroked Wodan’s face and could tell that the boy was crying bitterly, but he could not feel any tears as his fingers slipped in blood. It was a great mystery to him that someone could be so tender toward him, but still do such an awful, unthinkable thing in order to survive. Had the poor boy been trying to protect him? He heard his own hand fall beside him, but felt nothing.
“You’ve gone,” Korliss whispered, unable to breathe. “You’ve gone… far beyond your teacher. Your mind, Wodan… your mind... is a weapon.”
Wodan laid his hand on his teacher’s forehead.
There was something he had to tell him. It was so hard to concentrate. Korliss sucked in a breath, one last gasp, then said, “But against your soul... the demons themselves... contend in vain.”
Then, finally, he rested.
Chapter Seventeen
The Trial of God
Sevrik Clash reigned as Head of Haven during the reconstruction. The Senators debated among themselves concerning the nature of the upcoming Emergency Election as bodies were dug up from the rubble and families grieved. Currents of electricity were restored, spreading first to the wealthier areas and then trickling, slowly, to the poorer ones. Scientific investigators found that there was virtually no leakage of radiation from the demolished plant in the north. And by Sevrik’s decree the murderer Wodan was allowed to stay with his parents, to help them rebuild and to wait for the judgment against him from the new Senate.
Sevrik and his daughter Mevrik stayed with the Kyners on several evenings. Mama Kyner was honored, bustling about the pair as she doted on her son. She never asked questions about the fate of her son, nor about his crimes. Papa Kyner rambled on with Sevrik about the troubles of underlings, and the two old men bonded easily, complaining warmly about the shortcomings of lackeys and the need to “go it alone,” and Wodan listened happily to them. Mevrik, who had proven herself a hero in the battle, seemed full of a quiet sadness. Wodan sat with her often on the Kyner’s stone balcony, watching the city and the sunset over the mountains. They sat in silence usually. Only once did she ask about Korliss Matri. Wodan told her only that his last action had been without hesitation, his last moment without cowardice. She seemed satisfied by this.
Many evenings went by like this. Nobody directly asked them why Haven’s temporary dictator would spend his time with poor laborers. Only Wodan knew, in his heart, but he held no ill will towards Sevrik for what he knew was to come.
Most of the talk in Haven revolved around the strange outcome of Didi’s trial, which the media called “The Trial of God”. It was the trial which proved to be Wodan’s own death sentence.
* * *
On the seventh day after the battle, construction crews moved about the periphery of Debate Focus, where crowds gathered for some distraction from the chaos. Sevrik Clash stood in the crowd, surrounded by Guardians. He beamed, knowing that the truth would come out, that his friend would shock Haven and redeem the crimes of their circle by casting the light of a new morality upon them. Thus would Haven be saved; thus would Korliss Matri be remembered as a hero.
“You, Didi,” said the Prosecutor, “have been charged by your own friend Sevrik Clash with the crime of tampering with the unborn. How do you plead?”
Didi sat at the stand, small, blinking in the harsh light of the winter sun. “Not guilty,” he croaked.
Sevrik frowned and his eyes widened.
“I would like to keep this short,” said Didi. “I am allergic to the light, you see, and the dust in this area is making it difficult for me to breathe.” He signaled to a junior scientist, who set up an audio player and a visual monitor before the Judge. The assistant elected a file on his small computer, and a low-quality, fuzzy audio file played. The crowd strained to hear, for many words were missing altogether.
Voice of Didi: So you mean to do it? You’re actually going to tamper with the genes of an unborn?
Voice of Another: Of course! You _____ can you, Didi? I mean to do it. No one can stop me.
Voice of Didi: It is a crime, you know.
Voice of Another: It’s a crime for the slave to tamper with his master’s business! Breaking a law devised by slaves, for slaves! Hah! I’ve never been a
fraid of such nonsense. You know that, Didi, so ______
Voice of Didi: What if I tried to stop you, Childriss?
Voice of Another: _______ now, wouldn’t it? Nobody can stop me, Didi. Out of feeble human flesh, I will make a god.
“The voices you are hearing,” said Didi, “are my own and that of a colleague, Doctor William Childriss.” The junior scientist turned on the visual monitor. As the screen warmed up, an image of a man emerged. His face was stern and severe, with cruel eyes and hair as white as the moon. In the crowd, Wodan gasped - it was the same man he had seen with Didi in the terrible cave in the valley, in the holographic record.
The junior scientist played another audio file.
Didi: Did you do it?
Childriss: I did indeed! I _______ and gave a child the potential to become a god. Now you must wonder which of the two of us is a coward, Didi, and which of us _______ ? Hah!
“My colleague had gone mad with power,” said Didi. “He told me about his criminal plan before he followed through with it. I only wish that I’d had the bravery to stop him. I admit I did not take him seriously. But after he followed through with his plan, well...” Didi signaled to the junior scientist, who played another audio file.
Childriss: You son of a bitch, Didi!
Didi: I’m going to turn you in, Childriss. You will answer for your crime.
Childriss: You ______ , Didi, you son of a bitch! You can’t do this!
Didi: Your only other option, Childriss, is to leave Haven, forever. To leave here and never come back.
Childriss: Didi, I - I’m going to kill you! I’m going to kill you, Didi!
Didi: These conversations are being recorded, Childriss, and will come to light in the event of my death. Besides, how would _______ , if I were dead?
Childriss: You son of a bitch, you ______ ... I swear to you, Didi, someday I will kill you!
“I suppose,” said Didi, “that Guardian Clash has told the court Prosecutor that he and I often spoke about the creation of a superman. Really, this was only a game among us. I was only repeating things which I heard Doctor Childriss say. The whole idea was never more than hypothetical to me. I am only sorry that Guardian Clash took our talks a little too seriously.”
The Prosecutor stood hunched over, whispering fiercely with his assistants, who nodded to him and whispered into telephones hurriedly.
Didi leaned back, said, “I threatened to turn Childriss in for what he’d done, and he left Haven. The man was insane and power-hungry, as you can clearly tell from the tone of his voice, if not his claims. He dreamed of having the power to control a human life, and that sort of thing can only be done in the wasteland, not in our good nation. That is where my colleague sent himself, a self-imposed exile.”
Didi crossed his hands in his lap. The Prosecutor mumbled incoherently, then said, “Well, sir, there is the nature of the low quality on those audio files. They shall have to be combed over.”
“You may study them in full,” said Didi. “They are quite legitimate.”
An assistant tugged on the Prosecutor’s arm, whispered, then the Prosecutor nodded and said, “Didi, it seems that this man Childriss was a rival as well as a peer of yours, was he not? That he was, in fact, a strong runner to become Head of the DoS. Is this not true? And it seems that after he left... you assumed leadership of the DoS! Is this not true?!”
“All of those statements are true,” said Didi. “And so, what of it? Should I have let him go without punishment because he had the chance to lead our Department of Science?”
The Prosecutor shook with rage and glared at his assistants as the crowd murmured. “Well, there is still the matter of your strange conversation which affected the lad who went on to murder a unit of Guardians. Did you not fill his head with a lot of talk about being a superman? A creature above the law? What do you have to say about him?”
* * *
Wodan and Sevrik walked along an avenue in the southern reaches. A train of Guardians followed behind. A squat, thick submachine gun clattered at Sevrik’s side.
“I told my parents not to hate you for this,” said Wodan.
“I wish they would,” said Sevrik, darkly. “But I think your parents are too good to hate anyone.”
They walked in silence for a while. Then Wodan said, “So Didi’s going to remain Head of the DoS/DoR?”
“Oh, yes,” said Sevrik. “He completely vindicated himself. But the Makers of Mothers are going to be abolished. This generation of children in their keeping will be the last to come through them. Pharaoh’s Curse is most likely gone, anyway.”
“So, no more supermen.”
“No... never again. The work of our circle is over.”
Wodan pointed at the construction crews and asked about the reconstruction.
“We’re going to redesign Haven. We always thought that the mountains would provide us a barrier... and they would, against invasion by sea or land. We never really expected a bunch of savages to attack by air! Our air power, our electricity, they were completely vulnerable. Also, from now on, we’ll only have one Guardian Force, with one Head. I was, at least, able to get the Senate to agree to that.”
They drew near the foothills of the mountains.
Sevrik cleared his throat, said, “Because of your efforts, Vachs and Udo have been forced into wealthy retirement.”
“Too bad for them!” said Wodan, laughing.
“Indefinite house arrest is the best you can hope for against men with connections like they have.”
“What about Cramer?”
“Who?”
“Seloid Cramer, Vachs’s secretary.”
“Oh, him. Lifetime imprisonment, I think it was.”
“What?” Wodan shouted. “That’s terrible! He was just a tool, Sevrik!”
“He should’ve known better than to be a tool for such a man, Wodan.”
“Why didn’t Vachs use some of his connections to get him a lighter sentence?”
“Vachs used up every favor he had to get every last Running Wind Senator to push me for one thing. And they pushed me hard. They were willing to concede on anything else. Some Running Wind Senators even agreed to not run in the Emergency Election, which is expected to go bad for them, anyway. They pushed me hard for one thing.”
Sevrik faded into silence. Then he said, “Tomasino is expected to win by a landslide. Looks like we’re in for a conservative Prime Minister, Senate Voice, and a heavily-conservative Senate.”
“Haven deserves it,” said Wodan, darkly. “If they’re not begging to be dominated one way, it’s another.” He thought for a moment, then said, “So, that point they pushed you on, that Vachs was so desperate to get. Is it about what we’re doing right now?”
“It is.”
Ahead, at the opening to the pass in the mountains, they saw Yarek Clash squatting on a high ledge, black cloak jumping in the wind. He stared down at Wodan.
* * *
“It was most wise of the Prosecutor,” said Didi, “to place young Mister Kyner’s trial before my own. His guilt would only help make my own seem more evident, I’m sure.”
Didi faced Wodan in the crowd, then said, “But a man can make a plan, can have a perfect to-do list, and still face surprises. You see, if life copied itself perfectly, mutations would never arise. Evolution requires that mistakes be made.” His words did not seem to make sense. Wodan knew that he was referring to the Kill List, but...
Didi gestured to the junior scientist, who displayed an X-ray diagram of a human body.
“The night that I spoke to young Mister Kyner, I was concerned that he might be the one that Professor Childriss tampered with. I ran a series of tests on him. Mainly, a blood test and an X-ray. I studied the results... and I found that he was quite normal. His amazing abilities and tenacity - and even his antisocial behavior, which the court has, unfortunately, found so vexing - are the result of natural selection. Childriss’s sick dream of creating a monster out of a man have not affecte
d young Mister Kyner, it seems.”
Sevrik gasped aloud. Wodan felt disappointment tainted by relief.
“And these tests are all open for critical analysis,” said Didi. “The legitimacy of my claim can be verified by another.”
“So...” stammered the Prosecutor. “You mean to say, he’s not… well, a freak?”
“Human,” said Didi, “all too human.”
There was silence in the court.
“Furthermore,” Didi continued, “As much as this civilized land would like to see that young man hanged in the name of good taste, it is my duty to add this: My X-ray analysis has revealed a cancerous tumor in the young man’s stomach, and it is my professional opinion that this malignant growth will kill him in the next few years.”
Wodan threw his eyes down, face burning. He felt hundreds of eyes running over him.
“Now, sir,” said the Prosecutor, “such details are... they should not be... it’s, I mean, it’s not right for you to give such personal information in a... in a trial of...”
“You wanted him dead,” Didi said coldly. “And so you will have your wish.”
Didi rose from the stand and walked away from the court. Guardians looked about in confusion. One rushed forward and grabbed Didi’s arm. Sevrik pushed through the crowd, shouted, “Unhand him! Unhand him!”
[Demonworld #2] The Pig Devils Page 29