by Quil Carter
I said nothing. What could I say?
The next words from his mouth showed a level of hurt. “We’ve been so close these last few years,” he said quietly. “I’d… I’d hope I would be the first to know. Love, I could’ve… I could’ve helped you the moment you suspected…”
“You two are close,” I said. “And I didn’t want you to tell me I was crazy for thinking it.”
I heard Silas shift around. “I… I understand,” he said. Another thing I was surprised about. He was… he was still calm and helpful. He hadn’t blown up on me yet.
My suspicious heart was confused, but I was too tired to analyze it.
A hand was placed again on my face. “How about this, my poor love.” He stroked my clean-shaven cheek with his finger, and our eyes met. “You relax for three days. Take three days off. I’ll go down to the evidence storage by myself, and I’ll bring you back the entire box.”
I looked at him. There was hope, guarded hope, but the ghosts of the past kept cutting it down whenever it tried to sprout from this frozen ground. They told me he must be up to something. This was Silas… he was always up to something.
What else could I say though? He was giving me what I’d asked with only the thinnest of strings attached. Not only did I have no choice but to agree, I had to do what Julian had taught me, and continue to swim with the current.
“Will you… will you bring me back the surveillance video of that rooftop?” I asked him. If Silas was being underhanded… there would be no way he could fake those tapes. “And any… I need itineraries from the Jackson compound. Traders, slavers, people he met with. Could you bring that to me?”
Silas nodded, and framed my face with his hands. He gave me a loving smile, a smile that held no masks.
When had he stopped putting masks on in front of me?
Or perhaps… it was my own vision that had changed.
Could he honestly be wanting to help me?
“Of course, love,” Silas said. “Whatever my love needs to put his mind to rest… I will provide for you, and we’ll watch those tapes together. I just…” The smile grew in tandem with the wetness that made his eyes shine like dew on emerald grass. “I’m just so worried about you, baby.”
He put his arms around me, and held me to him. “Tell me you’ll be okay?” he choked.
I patted his back, and felt myself relax in his hold.
“I’ll be okay,” I whispered back. “As soon as I have my answers, as soon as I know who I’m sleeping beside each night… I’ll be fine.”
CHAPTER 65
“It’s such a beautiful day today,” Perish said happily. He was looking around the park with a smile on his face, his eyes squinting from the sun shining down on the two of us. “I’m glad it’s spring time now. I always loved April.”
“Yes,” I said. I stepped over the rope that hung between the iron posts, ones that made up the boundary of this park, and felt my shoe sink into the green grass. There was a vast carpet of green in front of us, speckled with people, dogs, and large trees that rose several storey’s high. “Winter has its perks, but it is nice once the sun starts making more of an appearance.” My eyes shifted away from the Skyland park, and began mentally going over every building I could see that had a flat roof.
There were four possibilities, but in order to determine which one was the one Vlad was standing on top of, I had to go back to ground zero.
I had mentally prepared myself for this, all yesterday and today, and I knew I could do it. It would be difficult, but the ends justified the means.
So, with that thought in my head, I walked towards the spot where Finn had been shot and killed, my head held high and my body steel.
Perish followed behind me making small talk, but once he realized where I was going, he was silent.
It pulled at my heart when I saw the memorial. Set up underneath a tree was a photo of Finn, surrounded by bouquets of colourful flowers, handwritten notes, and even several still lit candles.
At first it was difficult for me to see a picture of his face. That smile so full of life, his bright blue eyes that always seemed excited about something, and those blond curls I’d loved so much. But as I walked towards it, my pulse quickening, I realized there was no crippling sadness… only fierce determination.
“He was always my favourite,” Perish said quietly beside me. “He reminded me of someone I knew when I was younger. Someone who… who is long gone. Elish, I know you’ll probably hurt me but…” He paused. “If you ever wanted me to make you someone like him… I will.” Even saying that out loud had him wincing, as if expecting the verbal lacerations… but I only nodded.
“Thank you, Perish,” I said. I could see the surprise on his face. “I’ll keep that in mind.” I swallowed hard, my heart aching, and my feet took me to the memorial.
The grass was pounded down around this area, and there was an outline of where the portable washrooms had been as well. I positioned myself until I was sure I was in the right spot, and I looked around the park.
This is where I lost him.
This is where my partner died.
I closed my eyes and reminded myself that I was strong, and filled my lungs with warm April air.
I’m a chimera. I have to act like it.
I’m doing this to avenge Finn.
I drew up that horrible memory, the moment the bullet entered Finn’s head. It had come from the west, and exited…
My eyes snapped open. I looked to the west and I saw the red brick building, an office building, I believe, but instead of running to it, I looked to the east and walked towards one of the trees that had surrounded us.
My heart tightened up like a closed fist.
In front of me, embedded in the tree…
… was a bullet.
The bullet that had taken him from me.
I reached to my side and brought out a knife I always carried around. I began to dig the bullet out of the tree, as Perish stood quietly behind me.
“Silas… Silas has the bullet that you were shot with,” Perish said. “I think you should get it.”
I picked the bullet out of the tree, it was just a hardened twist of metal now, and looked down at it. “Perhaps it would be fitting… in some macabre–”
I stopped as I glanced up. Perish’s eyes were downcast, and once again flickering around.
But there would be no silent drilling for information this time. I had Perish with me today for a reason.
I put a hand on his arm, and slipped the bullet into my pocket. “Come on, old friend,” I said to him. “It’s time for us to go back to the lab.”
Perish squinted, then looked ahead. “It is time, isn’t it?” he said. “I have work to do on… on that pulser.”
The smell of antiseptic and plastic filled my nostrils as I stepped into the lab with Perish. Every lab I had been to seemed to have that same scent, except the greywaster ones always fostered faint hints of greywaste ash.
I made sure the doors behind us were secure, the card key reader’s light was red which meant it was locked. Sacario and Mantis weren’t scheduled to come in for work today, and I knew that they would call Perish first if they planned on getting in some overtime.
It would be just me and him, alone for the entire day… which was exactly what I needed.
“It’s nice spending time with family,” Perish said. He was in the kitchen now; I could hear the tinkling of bottles as he dug around the refrigerator. “I do enjoy Uzeyer and Sacario, but we’ve always had a connection, I think. Do you think so too?”
I turned the bottle of clear liquid upside down, the needle deep inside, and began to draw the liquid into the syringe. “We’re both the quiet types,” I agreed. “Our personalities compliment each other. I know with you… I can get work done, and enjoy the company at the same time.” I flicked the needle to release the several air bubbles I could see, then casually put the hand that was holding it, into my pocket.
I walked out into the
kitchen and saw Perish’s back. He was rooting through the cupboard now, a package of snack crackers beside him and a package of cured arian meat. “We’ll get lots of work done tonight,” Perish said. “And perhaps–” I quietly closed in on him, and before he even knew what I was doing, I slid the needle into his neck and pressed down on the plunger.
There was no struggle, there was no fight. Perish accepted the needle with nothing more than a slight jolt, then he slumped over, and into my arms.
I had too many questions inside of this chaotic life – and it was time for me to get some answers.
Answers that I knew that Uncle Perish could get for me.
And perhaps… I was also undoing an injustice that had happened to this man years ago.
An hour later, I was using the surgical saw to cut through the last slice of skull to make a perfect square. I’d pinned back his scalp in several places, and though some blood was dripping down the hair-covered flap, it was minimal. There was never much blood loss with these procedures, and I’d become a pro at tying off veins.
I put the saw down, my nose being flooded with the smell of burning flesh and bone, a unique smell that reminded me of the greywastes. I gently lifted the piece of skull from Perish’s head, and was intrigued when I immediately saw the damage that Silas had done to Perish.
There was an obvious chunk missing from the back of the born immortal’s brain, fully healed as well. What Silas had told me seemed to be correct: Because Perish would be fully healed the next time he died, his immortality wouldn’t see it as something that had to be repaired.
Which meant my job was rather easy. Digital surgery I had no idea how to reverse, but it looks like Silas just did a hack job.
I brought out my scalpel and began shaving off bits of the brain. I needed every healed area to be damaged, then, if my theory was correct, Perish’s brain would heal the area and… he would be the Perish I knew when I was younger.
It didn’t take me long to damage the area of brain, and within twenty minutes, I’d dispatched Perish and had quickly sewed up the wound on his head. Once I was finished, I moved Perish into his apartment inside the laboratory, and absentmindedly began licking my blood-covered fingers.
While I waited for Perish to heal, I smoked an opiate-laced cigarette, a new one they were testing out with china white, and sat down on the couch with an open bottle of cherry cola.
I decided to watch some television while I waited for Perish to resurrect. I rose and began searching for the remote, and spotted it on top of a table covered in a red table cloth, also holding the clothes Perish had been wearing that day.
But once I’d grabbed it, I noticed something. There was a small Ziploc bag sticking out of his pant’s pocket. I assumed that it must be cocaine, so I dipped my finger into the bag to confirm it to myself.
But when I tasted it, I was surprised to see that it was absolutely tasteless, my tongue wasn’t going numb either. Curious, I walked over and grabbed Perish’s laptop. He had that program he’d used to identify that mystery substance Julian had put into that purple tin all those years ago. It was simple enough, you put a small sample of the drug onto a test strip attached to a USB device, much like the ones diabetics used to test their blood sugar, and plugged it into the computer.
I sat down on Perish’s chair and took another drink as I waited for the results. However, as I waited for the program to do its thing, I found myself suddenly feeling dizzy.
And not only that…
My sleeve wiped my nose when it began to run, and just as I was realizing there was snot dripping down my face, I also realized I was drooling as well.
What in hell’s name is this…
And that’s about all I remember; I blacked out after that.
I wasn’t sure how long I was out of it, but I awoke to someone patting on my face. At first, thinking it was Julian, I moved my head away from him and mumbled a threat, but upon doing that I heard a familiar laugh, and my eyes flew open.
Standing over me, was Perish – and he was making direct eye contact.
“An intelligence chimera decides to taste an unknown substance from a mystery bag found in the pocket of a scientist… I designed you completely wrong, didn’t I?” he said, joy rolling around his tongue like a marble.
It was him.
Well, I’ll be…
Perish Fallon was back.
Perish extended a hand and helped me sit up. I realized I was lying on the couch, either he had moved me or I’d been able to stumble there myself. “Amazing what a little brain surgery can do, hm?” I said to him. “I never would’ve thought I’d miss your sarcastic face.”
Perish laughed and walked behind me. Even his laugh had changed after Silas had gotten to him. “I kept trying to convince myself I didn’t miss me either, but… but I held onto sanity long enough to put your nose in the right direction.”
“Unfortunately, it took longer than both of us would’ve liked,” I said. I sat up on the couch and took a cigarette he’d offered me. “The first time… it was so long ago.” There was a flicker of guilt when I realized how long. “I apologize… I didn’t do this sooner.”
Perish weaved his fingers through his short black hair, his head shaking back and forth. “We were both victims of the same mad man,” he said grimly. He crossed his legs and pinched the filter of the cigarette with his fingers. His abilities were back, which meant his mental abilities would be back as well. Silas had told me once that Perish had lost his abilities when his O.L.S was made, but it looked like that either wasn’t the case, or the brain resurrecting had returned them. “That’s one of the many highlights of being immortal… you’re damn fucking patient.” He looked over at me, his pale blue eyes sparkling with new life. “You’re old enough to be immortal, you look as sexy as a fucking god at the age you are now.”
I gave him a flat look as he shifted himself closer to me, and an even flatter one as his eyes seemed to drink me in like I was imported wine. “Yes, you’re definitely at a good age,” he murmured. “I sometimes wish our wissenschaftler made us a bit older. You’re a lucky man, Elish. You’ll see one day just how different people treat you when your physical age is that of an adult male. Yes, twenty-four is still an adult. But you?” He slapped both hands on each side of my face, I stared at him, a bit taken aback. “You are a god to be reckoned with.”
“And you’re a bit more nuts than I remember,” I said, and he laughed richly at my comment.
“Not nuts, just… so fucking happy to be back.” Perish leaned back with a cigarette in his mouth, and for a moment, his eyes closed in contentment. I allowed him the interlude of silence and watched the blue ember brighten as he inhaled.
When he finally spoke, his tone had lowered, the excited madness temporarily gone. “When you woke up after that surgery, the one when you were fifteen years old, when I saw how gone you were… I thought we were both screwed.” His eyes opened, and he took the cigarette from his mouth as silver smoke burst from his lips. “My brief moments of sanity… no longer could I try and tell you to fix me… all I could do was watch with sadness as Silas forced you to lick his shoes.”
A prolonged silence took the two of us, settling in to this strange air that had overtaken the room and leaving us both with no pull to say more words. There was a lot to say, but somehow, the silence between us seemed more fitting. We were both victims of the same man, and even though our mental hands had been tied… we’d been trying to save each other for years.
“Thank you,” Perish said finally. He looked over at me, and our eyes mirrored the same looks of both solidarity and determination. “No one has had the balls to stand up to him until you.”
There had been people… but they were dispatched quite quickly.
“You’re welcome…” I said, but then I felt the need to add. “This wasn’t all selfless reasons however.”
“And you think me deactivating those implants was purely for your benefit?”
My solid expression
turned shocked. I don’t know why I was so shocked. It had been a lingering belief for many years that it had to have been Perish. But I thought…
“How could you keep your mind together for long enough to take out those implants?” I asked. “When you slipped back into the old you… it was for seconds. That surgery would’ve had to take hours.”
The smile that found Perish’s lips echoed pride. “I had help,” he said. “You’re not the only one I’ve been able to signal. There was someone else… two people. An old friend and someone I’ve grown quite attached to.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a beeper. Then he began to press buttons on it. “I’ll be needing his help sometime soon. I suppose he would be happy to know I’m back.”
I knew who at least one of them was. “Joel?” I asked. I had positive memories with that man. I hadn’t seen him since that day in Krieg. Oh, how excited Finn had been to explore the ruins. “It was him, wasn’t it?”
Perish’s smile turned warm. “Yes,” he admitted. “Joel and I go way back. He’s a good friend of mine, and also my errand boy, though he always hated when I called him that. Joel was with me when I found Julian. He was my middleman since Mr. Remmington had a strong distaste for Skyfallers.” Perish reached over and grabbed my cherry cola and took a long drink. “Joel secured Julian for me, and my friend. Well, your friend too. He performed the surgery on you.”
I absorbed the information, but something didn’t make sense. “You were with it for that long? To give all those instructions?”
Perish took another drink, one so long it emptied almost the entire bottle. “Joel has some talents. He knows how to talk to people,” he said as he put the bottle down. “I would attempt to explain it further, but it’ll only lead to more questions.”
That statement did explode my mind with more questions, but I decided to let that sleeping dog lie. “I have enough unanswered questions in my life,” I said honestly. “I’ll accept your explanation… and I won’t try and borrow more.”