Objects of Worship

by Claude Lalumiere

  Roman snarls in anger, conscious that such a poor performance, no matter how well the hunt itself goes, will result in tonight being his last time.

  Roman rolls the dead animal onto its back. With his bare hands, he rips the animal open and feasts on its innards.

  He pushes his forearm inside the still-warm corpse and clenches his fist around the beast’s heart. He rips it out.

  Roman raises his bloody face from the corpse and stands up. Facing the Bishop, he bites into the wolf’s heart. The twelve other hunters walk over to him. One by one, they take a bite out of the heart and offer Roman their goblets, with their blood mixed with the sacred ambrosia. With these potions, he washes down the wolf’s blood.

  The blood of the wolf, the blood of the hunters, and the ambrosia warm Roman’s insides. He feels the liquids course within him, connecting him with his pack, changing him. His body expands, grows, becomes a receptacle for the Wolf. Fur grows on the hunter’s body. His teeth sharpen. His nails take on the shape and strength of claws. His senses become more acute. An urgent need to feed, to kill, takes hold of his mind.

  The others are changed, too, but their transformations are subtle. A heightening of the senses, perhaps meagre patches of fur here or there, a slight burst of growth, a thickening of their nails.

  Roman issues a mental command to his pack. They follow him, daggers in hand, eager to kill. The cheering crowd parts before them.

  Beyond the Wall, savage chimeras roam the island. They are descended from laboratory-created hybrids of the now extinct pre-BioWar megafauna. Tonight, Roman and his pack hunt chimeras.

  The pack has felled three dozen beasts so far, including one giant, their latest kill. The giant — its head stood more than six metres off the ground, its body twelve metres long — had thick, orange-furred legs, two metres high; a large horned and tusked head crowned with an orange mane; and a grey pachyderm hide covering its back and sides. But, as Roman discovered, its belly was soft and vulnerable and conveniently high off the ground. While his pack distracted the monster, he jumped up onto the beast’s underside and sank three sets of claws into it, holding on while it screamed and thrashed. He tore into its guts with his free hand. Two of his hunters plunged their knives into its neck, leaving large bloody gashes as they tore them back out. Roman climbed onto the weakening giant’s back, sank his teeth into the soft flesh of its neck, and ripped out its throat.

  The other kills, although smaller beasts, no more than twice the size of a tall man, had been more dangerous prey. They’d all been fast, most of them feline in body shape and in movement. One of these had had three heads; another, an extra pair of limbs, arms that ended in six-clawed hands; yet another, a razor-sharp tail. Their first kill of the night had such powerful limbs that it could leap above their heads.

  Now, Roman hunts alone as his pack brings their kills back to the city. Roman could end the hunt now. It’s already been a good night, better than many hunts — and with no casualties to boot.

  But the bloodlust won’t let go of Roman. This is his last hunt; he will soon be forced to retire. Even if he is not replaced, perhaps the ritual wolf will kill him next time. He’s not as young, as strong as he needs to be. Besides, once enough meat has been gathered for the community, it’s the avatar’s privilege to hunt alone, to feast on meat for the Wolf and no-one else. He catches a whiff of an unfamiliar smell. Blood, but not quite blood, or blood mixed with something . . . different. His curiosity aroused, he runs westward, toward the exotic scent.

  The egg-shaped object must come from Luna, Roman thinks. But . . . this is nothing like the rogue tech with which Luna occasionally infests the Earth. Perhaps, he thinks with wonder, this is something from beyond . . . something truly alien. A ship. A starship. An egg from space.

  The object’s smooth surface cannot settle on any colour; seeing it — looking at it — requires concentration, as if it were only reluctantly visible.

  It landed on a titanesque chimera, a lumbering behemoth with neither the speed nor the wits to avoid the fatal collision. The beast’s head is submerged in the water, its body — what’s left of it — splattered on the shore. It must have been drinking.

  The egg — roughly Roman’s size — is cracked open. As Roman approaches, he notices there are tentacles sprouting from within. Like the ship itself, they, too, shimmer at the edge of visibility, neither shape nor colour at all stable.

  Roman trudges through the gore, getting closer to the ship.

  The tentacles penetrate the chimera’s corpse — no, they are merging with the beast. Even the egg itself is now losing definition, blending with the strewn bones and viscera of the animal. When the dead beast’s head raises from the water and bellows, Roman is so startled that his feet slip on something viscous and he falls into the pulsing, slithering remains of the chimera. The animal has acquired a strange, disturbing afterlife.

  Roman springs up. Instinctively, he bares his fangs and raises his claws. He rushes toward the egg and tears away a fistful of tentacles. Black blood spurts from the wounds, splattering everything. Roman licks his lips and tastes the dark blood. Immediately the Wolf rises from deep within him, and he feels his body expand again.

  Roman bites into the tentacles in his hand, savouring the alien meat. He rips out more tentacles, tears their flesh with his fangs, feels the meat slide down his throat. The overflow of ichor clots the fur around his mouth.

  Peering inside the open cavity of the vessel, he sees the creature within, a pulsing orb the size of a fat child, new tentacles shooting out of it to replace those Roman has eaten. Roman’s jaws clamp down on the creature, and an agonized shriek issues from the mouth of the partially reanimated chimera. The chimera’s head once more falls into the water. The impact causes a wave of water to splash over Roman. Momentarily startled, he pauses and looks at the creature in the egg. Inside the torn flesh, Roman cannot identify any organs or bones, only a mess of tightly constricted ligaments. The outer flesh of the creature is not distinct from its ovoid casing but rather like an inner membrane; the egg ship and the tentacled orb are either symbiotically merged or two parts of a single creature.

  The Wolf overwhelms Roman, interrupting his thoughts. He attacks. He feasts on the bizarre creature, devouring the orb, tentacles . . . devouring everything.

  As first-time hunters it is Lyana and Paul’s duty and privilege to attend to the physical needs of the avatar after the hunt. By now, as dawn breaks, all traces of the Wolf have vanished from the two youths. Roman — almost twice as tall as his normal size — admires their taut, naked young bodies. Paul’s clean-shaven jawline is strong, his lips full. Lyana’s ears are delicate, her shoulders broad.

  Using fresh towels, they dry Roman’s clean fur. It’s unusual for the Wolf to linger so long and so strongly. But Roman enjoys it, delights in the strength and power.

  While Lyana feeds the fireplace with more wood, Paul licks Roman’s fangs. Lyana joins them and wraps her legs around one of Roman’s massive thighs, rubbing herself. Roman feels her juices moistening his fur.

  When Roman’s consciousness is restored, there is no sign of either Lyana or Paul. The fire is out, and Roman can smell the juices of sex on his fur. The youths should have cleaned him. It was their duty and their privilege.

  He stands up. His living rooms appear unusually small to him. Roman’s body has not yet reassumed its unaltered form.

  Roman ventures outside. The sun tells him it’s midmorning. Instantly he feels eyes upon him. He smells fear. Whispers nag at his ears. People avoid him, but they stare furtively. The Wolf should have left him by now.

  Roman breaks into a run. Running helps him think. Not this time, though. In a mounting panic, until sundown and beyond, he runs through the streets of Montreal. People stay out of his way. He smells fear wherever he goes.

  As dawn breaks he rushes up the mountain, escapes into the trees, and collapses from exhaustion.

  In the woods, Roman dreams of the past. But not of his past. Imag
es, sounds, and scenes flash chaotically through his mind, blending into each other.

  He feels himself lumbering through the brush, feeding on leaves and bark, fighting off predatory chimeras. Until something smashes into him, breaking his back. He remembers floating in a vast amniotic ocean, surrounded by others like himself, other shimmering blobs. Sometimes they float near each other, even touch each other. The contact is both painful and pleasurable. But then shells grow around the other blobs. A shell grows around him, isolating him. Still, the warmth of the amniotic ocean caresses his outer shell. There is turbulence. The warmth goes away and is replaced by an intense cold. And then he recognizes Montreal. Running in the streets and alleys. Playing with other children. Which one is he? He can’t be sure. He spreads his shit on the wall and someone shouts at him: “Lyana!” For the first time, he touches the wetness between his legs, pushes a finger inside, and he gasps. He sees himself — no, sees Lyana — through someone else’s eyes. She is under him, his weight presses down on her. Her fingernails digging into his back, she cries, “Paul . . .”

  Then he sees himself — Roman — in his Wolf form. In his living room. He perceives himself from two perspectives at once: from Paul’s and Lyana’s. They are worshipping the Wolf, sharing pleasure with its avatar. Tendrils erupt from within Roman. The tendrils encircle the hunters’ throats before they can scream. Roman’s body shimmers, and the tendrils pull the youths into him, subsuming their bodies into his.

  Roman wakes. He is attached to the ground by a mass of pulsing tendrils. Damp, decaying smells clog his mind. The sound of millions of scurrying feet echoes inside his head. He imagines himself deep in the soil, burrowing through the Earth. Screaming, he rips the tendrils from himself, where they grow out of his chest and belly and crotch. Viscous black goo oozes all over his fur. But the wounds close up quickly. The detached tendrils wither.

  He looks up in the sky: Luna is once again full, lushly green. It’s time to hunt.

  Outside the grounds of the Oratory, the crowd parts before Roman. The people are so tiny. Like children — no, like infants. There are screams.

  He walks through the gate and stands among the gathered hunters. He smells their fear. It angers him. The minuscule hunters do not flee, neither do they attack. They, too, part before him, letting him through. Roman ignores them.

  At the foot of the stairs Tamara Meatfinder has killed the ritual wolf. She is ready to be the new avatar. But the Wolf is still with Roman. There can be but one avatar, one pack leader. Must he kill her to retain his claim?

  In an awed tone, the Bishop says, “Roman Predator?” The sound of his name rouses something within Roman, and he becomes aware of his strangeness, his wrongness.

  All around him, the hunters and priests and acolytes whisper his name. Tamara shouts: “Roman the Wolf!” And a few of them fall to their knees, arms outstretched toward him in supplication. Then they all do it, repeating the exclamation — all except the Bishop.

  Roman’s skin itches, subtly ripples beneath the fur. His body aches to release tendrils, to gather all these bodies into his. Roman fights the impulse. What has he become? The priests can help him. They hold the secrets of transmogrification. They can restore him, maybe even extract Paul and Lyana, extract the . . . alien. This thing from beyond that is consuming him from the inside.

  The Bishop walks down the stairs, toward Roman. He remembers her as this massive, imposing figure, and yet here she is at his feet, her head barely reaching his hips.

  He sinks to his knees before her. He growls, “Help me.”

  She reaches out to touch him, strokes the fur of his belly. “How . . . ?”

  The physical contact makes him lose control of his body. Tendrils wrap around the fat, muscular woman. She struggles, but it’s over in an instant. She has been pulled into Roman’s body, has dissolved into him.

  Roman screams in rage and exasperation. The hunters and priests and acolytes cower. Roman runs away. Runs out the gate. Runs toward the Wall. Jumps over the Wall. Jumps so high it feels like flying. Escapes into the wilderness. Among the chimeras.

  Roman Predator preys on chimeras. When the Wolf is strongest, he hunts them and eats them. When the alien ascends, he subsumes them.

  The memories of so many creatures swirl in Roman’s mind. He suspects he spends entire days, maybe even months or years, with other personalities dominating his hybrid, chimeric body. Sometimes, his consciousness regains control while he’s in the middle of hunting, or feasting, or swimming, or praying. Or he finds himself in unfamiliar surroundings, his tendrils buried in the ground, or in a giant rock, or in a tree. Whenever his consciousness floats back to the surface, dreamlike shadow images swiftly parade through his mind’s eye, but they vanish before they can leave an imprint on his memory.

  Roman stumbles on a pack of nomadic savages. There are a few dozen of them — men, women, children, babies. Some of them have guns. He feels the bullets penetrate his skin. They sting, like bees.

  The Wolf and the alien rise in tandem. Roman bares his fangs while a dozen tendrils sprout from his torso.

  The savages scream and flee.

  Roman pursues them. More bullets sting him.

  Tendrils wrap themselves around the fleeing savages, pulling them in. Roman barely pauses as these new people merge with his chimeric body.

  Within minutes it is over. Roughly half of the savages are now part of Roman. The Wolf slew the others.

  He sniffs the freshly dead meat, then eats the rest of the pack.

  The Bishop talks to him now. Together, they meditate and can control the body. Gradually, they integrate into a complex whole the various minds that inhabit it. The Wolf. The chimeras. The savages. They discover other sparks of awareness: insects, worms, arachnids, bacteria, trees, plants, fungus, rocks . . .

  Finally, there is only the alien left to integrate. The hybrid mind attempts the contact. Communion is achieved. The last spark of Roman’s individuality dissolves into this new, engulfing vastness.

  The Roman Chimera swims down to the ocean floor. On the way, tendrils ensnare fish, immediately integrating them into its hybrid consciousness. Hordes of plankton penetrate the permeable flesh of the Roman Chimera, joining it. It feels the mounting pressure of the water on its skin, but the body adapts instantly to its environment.

  When the Roman Chimera reaches the bottom, it creates a hard shell around itself. And then it drills down, downward into the Earth, through every layer, to the planet’s core.

  Having reached its destination, the Roman Chimera lets itself be subsumed. It feeds the Earth.

  From the Earth’s core, millions of microscopically thin tendrils erupt outward.

  DESTROYER OF WORLDS

  A woman — from my greying perspective almost a girl, really — took off her clothes and folded them in a neat pile at her feet. When she was done, she stood still, looking out toward the ocean. Nestled as I was among some large rocks in a shady nook of the beach, she couldn’t have known I was there. I wasn’t going to shatter her solitude by bringing attention to myself.

  From where I sat the young woman was in profile. She had long strawberry-blond hair and a slim body, the kind you see on magazine covers. Her cheeks were covered with freckles, and her nose was turned in a peculiar way. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t notice her full breasts, still firm enough to defy gravity.

  But what struck me most, so much so that I felt a painful twinge in my chest, was the resigned loneliness broadcast by her posture.

  I had no idea who she was. I didn’t know everyone in Singleton by name, but I rarely came across an unfamiliar face, especially at six in the morning.

  She stepped into the ocean.

  There was an oily, chemical stench in the air, coming in from the sea. She couldn’t have been going for a swim. People knew better than to get in the water for pleasure anymore.

  There was a deliberateness, a weight, to her gait. She was walking to her death.

  I’m not one to inte
rfere in other people’s lives. Someone wants to kill themself, it’s their business and only their own. Suicide isn’t a decision taken lightly. If someone does it at a time and place in which they have a right to believe that no-one will see them, then it’s clearly not a cry for attention. It’s a personal choice. You interfere with that — you try to “save” that person — and they’ll have to go through that whole process of deciding to kill themselves. Again. That’s cruel.

  So that beautiful young woman — whoever she was — vanished beneath the waves.

  Already, the tide nipped at her abandoned clothes, the wind scattering them.

  Ten years ago, I sold my fishing license to a goddamned corporation when fishing licenses were still worth a mint. Paid off what little was left on my mortgage. Was able to retire at forty-five. Janet kept her job at the bank, even though I told her she didn’t have to. But she liked to get out of the house, and most of her friends worked there. The extra money was nice, but at first her decision left me lonely. We had gotten married when we were twenty-five, but we had never really spent enough time together and I was hoping early retirement would change all that. That we’d get to enjoy each other again while we were still young enough.

  It took me about a year to come to terms with the fact that Janet and I would never get any closer. We were reliable, loving companions, but we would never burn up the world with romance and passion. I accepted this quietly, never mentioning it to her. She was concerned about my indolence, worried that it might turn into depression. Gradually, the mood passed.

  I’d never wanted to become a fisherman. My dad and his brothers had all been fishermen. So had my granddad. I didn’t envy their lives. In fact, when I was young, I hated it. I yearned to escape this town and the life my folks had brought me into. I used to dream about being an artist, a writer, an archaeologist — anything that would take me away from Singleton. I filled up notebook after notebook with comics stories of the impossibly glamorous adventures I would enjoy if I ever escaped this place. I loved drawing monsters and girls best of all.