“Nothing I say will make you understand.” He poked at a filthy test tube. “I've tried and you never listen.”
Kora shoved his arms aside and loaded the glassware into the chemical washer. She didn't trust Ishmael to have it done before they left. Dirty equipment in the sink all week wouldn't bother him, but she wouldn't be able to sleep at night. “I would listen if you told me something that makes sense. The fact that you've refused to tell me the truth is the whole reason we're going.” She slammed the lid shut and pressed the start button. “I love you more than anyone, but I wish you were straight with me.”
Ishmael ran a tentacle delicately down her cheek. “Unlike Randall, I've never lied to you. But I know you, Kora, and the only way you're going to believe anything is if you find out for yourself.”
Chapter 2
The parts of Santa Monica that sat outside of Mirafield's walls were surprisingly squalid. Ragged children played in the streets and people on the sidewalks waved their fists and threw trash at their limo. “I didn't realize the rest of the city was so poor,” said Kora.
Randall held out his glass and Alex refilled it with champagne. “These people are out here for a reason.”
“And what's that?” asked Kora.
“They lack either talent or motivation. In many cases, both.” He gazed languidly out the window as he sipped from his tall glass. “If they were worth their salt, they'd be on the inside of Mirafield's walls instead of the outside.”
Kora stared at a six-year-old girl on the sidewalk, her tattered pants hung off of her lean body as she trailed along behind her mother. She'd heard her maids complaining, once, that since the government collapse, the rich had taken over everything, leaving the rest of the population to suffer. “Many of them are just children, Randall.”
“Then their parents are to blame for their laziness.” Randall turned and talked to the driver through the intercom. “We’re confirming permission to enter Ruby’s property.”
The limo thumped over a cluster of potholes in the Pacific Coast Highway as it passed an abandoned gas station. “Why couldn't we take a helicopter?” asked Kora.
“Your mother, Ruby, hates them. Wouldn't allow us to land any sort of aircraft out here and she has a powerful force field that would take an army to bust through.”
“Why on earth would someone want to break into her property?”
“It's more for those trying to get out,” replied Randall. “She inherited land out here and during the great economic collapse of twenty-five she opened a private prison.”
A prison. Years ago, Ishmael told her that Randall sent his enemies to a prison in Malibu. Kora hadn't believed him and after that, Ishmael just did his work and never told her anything.
“Ruby is the warden, among other things.” Randall laughed nervously. “She's a bit eccentric. A real estate mogul, television entertainer, and a pioneer in synthetic science. She's also a huge vampire fan which leads me to one very important request. I know you're familiar with our no-vampire policy at Mirafield—”
“Of course, because I'm the one who created it,” interrupted Kora. Glowing fairies, green-skinned mermaids, centaurs—Kora made them all. Her wealthy and eccentric clients hired her to create every kind of strange artificial being imaginable. Except vampires. That’s where Kora drew the line. Every day another rich weirdo placed an order for a sexy vampire mistress or a brooding hunk, but Kora held firm. Vampires freak her out.
“I know your distaste for the dark creatures, but Ruby can be very convincing, my dear.” Randall turned to his assistant who'd spent the car ride attempting to set Kora on fire with her eyes. “Alex, make me a vodka tonic. I need something stronger to face that woman. I'm not sure why the air isn’t reaching back here. I’m suffocating.”
He fiddled with some knobs that sent a stream of cold air into Kora’s face. When she turned to the window to escape the blast, she saw tall cliffs rise up in the distance like thick, jagged scars against the smooth beach. “I’ve seen this place before,” she said in a daze.
“It’s called Point Dume,” said Randall, rattling his ice cubes around in his glass before taking a drink. “It’s where movie stars used to build fancy homes during the early part of the century. Ruby moved out here somewhere around the twenties.”
Through the mist, Kora saw the vague outline of a massive structure perched at the edge of the cliffs facing the ocean. She pushed up off her seat to get a better view, but it disappeared as they raced around a bend and came to a stop before the ruins of a grocery store. The skeletons of burnt-out mansions haunted the hills above the highway as if hoards of angry villagers had stormed through with torches and set everything ablaze. She noticed a toppled post beside the road that read, Dume Drive. The driver spotted the sign as well and turned, the limo’s tires crunching over piles of dead palm fronds as it crept toward the ocean.
The mansions along Dume Drive were in even worse shape than those dotting the hills along the highway. Many looked as if they’d been torn down and blazed, leaving nothing behind but driveways leading up to piles of ash. Dead rose gardens spread along both sides of the road and Kora inhaled sharply when the castle emerged through a jumble of eucalyptus trees. It looked like a massive sea creature that had fallen asleep after an exhausting climb up the cliffs. Smooth rocks covering the walls gleamed like a thousand iridescent scales stretched over rounded muscles. A variety of aquatic gargoyles scowled down from every archway, the largest a menacing squid that looked nearly identical to Ishmael. It writhed above front doors carved with a hellish assortment of sea monsters. A pile of wind-blown debris lay before the doors as if no one had opened them in decades. Kora would have thought the building abandoned, like everything else in the area, if not for the presence of an enclosed construction scaffold several floors up.
The limo descended a steep drive and came to a stop before a pacing figure dressed in an elegant black robe with a fur-trimmed hood. Kora instinctively sank down in her seat while Randall sprung from the limo with outstretched arms.
“Ruby, you look ravishing as always,” he said.
“And you look drunk as ever, Randall,” she replied in a hoarse voice, followed by an infected cough. “Someone removed enough of your flesh to make another one of you. I suppose that makes you quarter of a man, now, instead of half.”
Randall paled, his lips moving as if searching for a reply. “I have been working out lately.”
“Where’s my new body?” demanded Ruby.
“We have your glorious new vessel right here,” said Randall, pointing at Alex as she guided the synthetic’s temperature controlled chamber up the steps.
Kora watched through the open door as a man with a massive hump directed Alex to place the synthetic's chamber on a long gurney. Kora had never seen anyone so deformed, and it made her stomach swell with nausea. She watched the hunchback fasten the chamber down with a series of leather straps and roll it away, nearly slamming it into Randall who was too busy prattling away at Ruby to notice.
When Alex returned, Kora reluctantly climbed from the limo. “This doesn’t seem right. No one told me we were going to a dumpy old castle.”
“Too much dirt and ugliness for you, Doctor?” replied Alex, prodding Kora up the steps into a room that looked fit to imprison a medieval queen.
The robed figure tossed back her hood to reveal the powdered face of an old woman with dark eyes lined in coal. Her hair was neatly cut Betty Page style but a stripe of gray divided the black at the top of her head like a stream of dishwater through a pool of ink. A set of vintage diamonds circled a neck that at one time must have been long and graceful, but now sagged with papery skin. Two bright red lips parted to reveal a row of teeth that were as white and straight as sun-bleached bones. “What do we have here?”
“You remember Kora?” Randall seemed relieved that he was no longer alone with Ruby.
“You must be the new client,” said Kora. She held her hand out in an effort to appear professional.<
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“This can’t be her.” Ruby stared at Kora’s fingers, then ran her eyes wildly up and down her body.
A nervous smile twitched onto Randall’s face. “What could you possible be mean, Ruby dear?”
Ruby grabbed Kora’s arms and raised them to the sides as if performing a physical examination. “You've brought the wrong girl.”
“I know what you’re thinking, but I can assure you that this is Kora,” said Randall.
Ruby growled and circled Kora like a suspicious cat. “But it looks nothing like her. I would never have approved of something so…excessive.”
“How am I supposed to look?” said Kora, making no effort to hide her irritation.
Ruby leaned forward until Kora could see the dark makeup trapped in the wrinkles around her eyes. “You always wanted to be pretty. I’ll admit the blue hair is a surprise but the rest is predictable. I should have known you’d pull a stunt like this. Are you trying to impress someone with this cheap circus?” Ruby cranked Kora’s head sideways to peer inside her left ear. “There’s a definite lack of symmetry, but I have a feeling you did that on purpose. Everything you do has some sinister reason behind it.” Ruby sauntered over to stand before Alex who towered over her. She started with her feet and slowly worked her eyes up to Alex's defiant face. “You’re Randall’s favorite kind of candy. Lucky for you, he has a foot fetish. Are you strong?”
Alex set her big feet apart and straightened her shoulders. “I was designed for battle.”
Ruby laughed and then coughed. “I may not look it, my dear, but so was I.”
“Alex,” snapped Randall, “go get my luggage out of the trunk.”
Ruby swung around to face Randall. “You don’t think you’re staying?”
“I know we discussed this,” said Randall, pressing his hands together, “but we want you to reconsider this dangerous request that we leave during the project. Mirafield never allows employees to work offsite without proper security in place to ensure everything runs smoothly and our interests are protected.”
“I don’t give a damn about your interests. Kora and the synthetic body are mine, and I want them here alone,” said Ruby.
Randall drew in a deep breath. “We need to think carefully about who we’ll be marketing the product to when this is all over: sensible tycoons in need of a beautiful new body. With all due respect, my dear Ruby, you do have a history with mutants.”
A wry smile twisted Ruby’s bright red lips. “It’s time to trot home with your little blond warrior. Don't you have a wedding to plan?”
“And an entire celebration to launch our new products, but you come first, my dearest Ruby,” said Randall as she herded him toward the door.
“Yes I do, but I have everything I need. Goodbye.”
Randall blocked the door with his foot. “Then I’ll be back for the surgery and Kora, remember, absolutely no vampires,” he said right before the door slammed closed.
Chapter 3
Ruby dropped her robe to reveal a black, bias-cut dress that dripped with lace. It was several sizes too small in the girth but spilled down to a pair of velvet, six-inch heels. Despite her advanced age and weight, she took off at a surprising pace and if not for the rhythmic pounding of her shoes, Kora would have thought she was rolling on casters. A series of torches ignited in a row illuminating a tunnel that looked more like a naturally formed lava tube than a manmade structure.
“You don’t have electricity out here?” asked Kora.
“I despise electric light. It hurts my eyes,” replied Ruby without slowing down.
They turned a bend and Kora was heartbroken to see the tube descended at an even steeper angle, sinking all her hopes for a bright sunny room. “Who built this place?”
“My eldest, Humphrey. Like you, he has an annoying obsession with windows and light. It’s been hard to keep him under control over the years.”
Kora glanced around at the thick black walls surrounding them. “Seems to me you’ve done good job.”
Ruby didn’t respond and Kora, still struggling with the idea that this old woman was her mother, fumbled around for something to say. “I had no idea you were alive and well in Malibu. I’ve often wondered if I had any family. Did you know I was at Mirafield?”
“Of course.”
They passed a long line of pictures on the wall and Kora, who soon felt winded, stopped to catch her breath while examining one. It was a glossy photo of a young Ruby (with the same hairstyle) standing next to a leather-clad vampire who pretended to sink his teeth into her white throat.
Once she noticed Kora wasn't behind her, Ruby stomped back with a scowl. “What is it now?” Her irritation melted into a lascivious grin. “Ah, you're gazing at Darius Windsor, a wicked, wicked man. I’ve had a lifelong weakness for vampires. For a while, actors satisfied my appetite, but it wasn’t long before I craved something more… authentic. One week from now, I’ll have two real vampires.”
Kora laughed, thinking it was a joke, until she noticed Ruby’s face remained stern. “Synthetic vampires are a bad idea.”
“You make fantasy creatures all the time. Ridiculous things like fairies. Randall showed me a minotaur you made a while back that was mildly interesting, but for the most part your creatures are nauseating.”
Kora's face heated up along with the words on her tongue. “At least those sorts of fantasy creatures are harmless. Vampires drink blood so there's no way to chip them and make them safe around humans. They're too dangerous and I refuse to make any. Not even one.”
Ruby, who seemed unaccustomed to hearing any opinion but her own, raised her painted eyebrows. “While you're here, you'll do whatever I tell you.”
“No I won't,” said Kora. “Vampires shouldn't exist beyond the pages of books.”
“I don't know much about books, and I have one of the greatest libraries on the West Coast, but I do know movies, and when I see something on the silver screen that I want, I create it. Pure and simple. Whatever I crave, I make without consequences.”
“There are always consequences. As creators, we must be careful what we bring into the world.”
Ruby pressed a black tipped finger into Kora's chest. “Inside that half-assed shell, you really haven't changed a bit, have you? Still sooooo shallow and responsible. Remember, daughter, I taught you everything I know. All of your riches and your fancy apartment—you'd have none of it without me. Your scientific knowledge is a poor copy of mine. Never forget that.”
“Ishma—” Kora thought twice about revealing her precious squid to this strange woman. “My assistant taught me a lot of what I know, not you.”
Ruby pushed open a door that was much wider than the others. “I see you need proof. That hasn't changed.” Hundreds of torches burst into flame, drenching the room in a light more appropriate for practicing witchcraft than science. An iron tower thrust up from a stone base toward the vaulted ceiling like a muscular arm topped with fingerlike trestles that gripped a tarnished ball nearly twenty feet in diameter. Around this sphere hung an intricate web of rods and metal coils attached to oblong rings. The contraption resembled a primitive model of the solar system that looked ready to come alive with a few vigorous turns on some rusty crank.
“What’s that for?” Kora pointed at a thick metal slab at the base of the tower. Worn leather straps hung from each corner of the rectangle along with three wide pieces of metal that threaded down the center like belts.
“That’s where my creations lie after I've removed them from the tank. Their platform moves on a gyroscope to keep them at an optimum angle to absorb energy. I’ve stood here many times as the main coils shot a million volts up the line and spun that ball into a fiery explosion like a portal into hell.”
“This is really an amazing set. Randall mentioned you used to have a reality show about freaks and mutants.”
Ruby’s rapturous face melted into a dangerous scowl. “This isn’t a set.”
Kora laughed. “You’re kidding, right?
”
“This is my main laboratory where I completed most of my creatures. You'll meet a few of them later.”
“There’s no way you could make anything in here. These machines are junk. Movie props.” Kora knew she’d gone too far when Ruby’s face, already pale beneath her makeup, turned chalk white.
“How dare you, of all people, lecture me!” Ruby raised her arms so the fabric of her dress spread out on either side of her like black wings and for a moment, Kora believed the woman capable of zapping her into a toad. “I created life long before you came along and fashioned yourself into my hideous shadow.” Ruby breathed heavily through flared nostrils until she slowly lowered her arms and a pained expression twisted her face. She pressed her hands against her chest.
“Are you okay?” asked Kora. “Why don't you let me listen to your heart? I'm an excellent physician.”
“No,” heaved Ruby. “It doesn't need to beat much longer. Forgive me. I forget my manners. You must be exhausted after that long drive. Allow me to show you to your room.”
Kora exhaled a breath she’d held in, relieved that Ruby wasn’t going to attack her. Something was definitely wrong with the woman both mentally and physically. She followed Ruby back to the mouth of the lava tube where she unlocked a thick wooden door. They stepped into a windowless, damp bedroom lit by a single torch. A rusty Victorian zoo cage sat along the far wall with the word MONKEYS spelled in the twisting iron fretwork at the top. Even in semidarkness, Kora saw dirt on the walls and floor, and she felt certain the smell of mildew was emanating from the bed.
“A prop from one of my favorite movies, Satan’s Zoo,” said Ruby, pointing at the cage as she descended the shallow steps to the stone floor.
“Interesting, but why are we here?” asked Kora.
“This is where you'll sleep while you're here. It's one of our best guest rooms. If you need anything, just pull that rope and Ivan will come.” She pointed at a grimy tassel hanging near the bed. “Now rest. You must be exhausted.”
Synthetic: Dark Beginning Page 2