Good and Evil : Freeland - Part Two (9781628547375)

by Pulver, William

  The ground shook outside of the Pillar of Larami. It sounded like the whole cave-system was collapsing. It was time to do something, but Brody wasn’t totally aware of what. He used his telekinetic powers to try to weld the doors shut, but a more powerful being forced them open. Simultaneously, a wraith of wind sped the pages of the Good News Book open to the scripture: Tan dathyl leagen delucelaleh, et basi pes boln cariaragend aakwry. Sleb boog sun dathyl ariar et muslonsetera. Seven towers held light, by carrying energy they emitted. Time made yellow the planet by collapsing these lanterns.

  The last thing that was heard was a whisper in Brody’s ears. It said, “I am you, and you are me. Together, we will save all humanity. Now go and be fruitful, my prodigy. You are the chosen one. Go find your friends.”

  The doors slammed shut and the Good News Book started on fire. There were footprints in the ashy residue. There were two footprints, and they were the same size as Brody’s. The fire died and the beakers broke open. The holy fluid put out the flames, and the smoke appeared as apparitions. An image of those who Brody had just left behind, even his angelic steward, Harmonia, was amongst the entities. Her being was cloaked with angel’s wings. Brody had set her free from his captivation as she turned her head and fluttered away, looking somewhat disappointed. With everyone gone, Brody felt empty and loneliness followed.

  On with the show, Brody thought to himself. The future is still in my hands.

  He raced down to the robot control booth and manned its pedals. One after the other, he sped back and forth until coming to a huge crevice in the middle of a vertical canyon. A reservoir of boiling water spanned across a variably wide chasm; it was no feat for Brody to attempt. Instead of going for a swim, he jumped up in drilling mode and came back down, headfirst, through the rock to make a tunnel beneath the lake of lava water. For hours, he drilled up, down, and diagonally, until reaching the other side closest to those in need of saving. The open-roofed room with a waterfall coming down from a rise on the other side of the cavern was one of massive size with leftover bodies, with some of whom he was familiar. Once he saw Treble’s mom’s body wearing a ceremonial death wreath of interwoven vines and tail-lit bugs draping from around her neck, her frame propped up against a dead, gem-missing Pastie’s body, he knew he was close to the rest of his friends. The open-restraint tab connected to the slab of stone had blood on it that outlined a human silhouette, like murder tape. Brody knew the silhouette from heart. He had seen it many times in the moonlight at the water’s edge of the Warm Curtain. He hoped his friends were all still living.

  In reclined mode, Brody could only see rock through several of the cameras, all except one. The middle one was showing a dark hole high off the ground of the slab table room. It was not too high that he couldn’t have the robot pull itself up, but once at the brink, Brody had to hunker the metal man to get him through the spinning cylinder tunnel. Quickly making it through there, he was on to the rope swing. Luckily, the long arms of the robot could reach the rope, clinging to the other side of the empty dark hole of the vertical elevator shaft. With a mighty swing, he was on to the other side, sprinting through the opening hollow. Once upon the punched-out walls room, Brody was able to maneuver up into the space that all his friends were occupying. It was an awful carnage of death that filled the upper room. Each and every one of his friends was gone, except Isaic, Treble, and Lexie. There was no bringing the others back. They were taking an eternal dirt nap, literally. He used the robot to scoop the friends up and lowered them down to board the robot. Then, he saw her idle, listless body: Abby Lacrosse. Could you still be alive? Oh, please.

  It was decision time: to forgive or not to forgive. His heart raced rapidly; the pulse was making his temples bulge out. He got a hot flash that sent sweat to the palms of his hands. His anger emerged through all the calamity; he had always been trying to think of ways to manipulate the system. He never took the time to iron out his women issues. The anger turned to fury; his vengeance came to life. The pressure cooker was now on fire. With all of his other friends gone, why not just put one more old flame out?

  “Daddy isn’t around to protect you now, you worthless little tramp.” The ghost of Treach returned with a fully opened can of whoop ass. In his gangster ways, he took over as the predecessor, kicking Brody out of his spot. Vengeance was his. It was on!

  Treach, via Brody’s body, woke her up by blaring a fearful yell into the microphone. The noise reverberated off the inside of the garden room, and she arose. Having already loaded the three down by hand to the elevator at ankle-level for Isaic to carry them in, Treach left his best work for last. She must not have partaken of the fruit because Abby was now oblivious to her whereabouts. In a second’s time, she was up and running, screaming at the top of her lungs in fear. No matter how fast she tried to run, Treach was always one step ahead of her. He pinched her by the shirt collar and forcefully pinned her to the ground. She slowly got up like a maimed animal after getting hit by a Mack truck, but she didn’t get very far. She was being chased from behind in the direction of the hollow elevator shaft where the rope was slightly out of reach. She tried her best with what little energy she had left, but fell short in mid-air, a quarter of the way over the unlit hollow. Down she fell through her life’s dark hole to death. It was Treach’s fault; he pushed her over the edge. No one else saw. No one else knew she was even there except Treble, Isaic, and Lexie. One wasn’t going to say anything, and the other was Brody’s betraying, best friend. Isaic wished it had been him who had thought of doing it. She was finally gone. Brody felt sad that Treach was such a prick.

  The three still living—a weary-eyed cheerleader and two football players—were set on trying to figure out all of this mess. Isaic, who’d tricked the others to eat of the forbidden fruit, with the most of his energy restored, was the first to approach the room Brody, Treach, Lars, Chester, Robber, and Harmonia were in. He entered the parcel and gave his friend a hug. Instantaneously, Brody came back and started to cry from anguish.

  “I tried to send you guys visions through the Pasties; did you ever receive any of my messages?”

  “Yes, my dearest friend, we saw them all. I have believed in you from the start. The others—well we will just say that you can’t win them all. I meant to show you something when I got to see you again. I don’t think the battery is alive enough for you to see, but here, try these party-cam goggles on.” Isaic took the glasses from around his neck and strapped them on to Brody’s face. The magnetism within the robot gave a jolt to the battery long enough for Brody to see everything that happened. Knowing that she was now gone, he requested his friend Treble be brought in for some explaining. Before he went out to get him, Isaic pulled a bag of firebugs from behind his back and swapped Brody for some inflata-steaks like they were at some long ago fur trading extravaganza. They chatted about old times until Brody reminded Isaic of his request.

  “Hey buddy, how goes it? Long time, no see, eh?” Treble came in and greeted Brody.

  “Cut the crap, Treble. What the hell is going on?”

  “What do you mean? Why are we in here?”

  “No, why did I just see you getting your freak on with Abby?”

  “Oh that… well, you see, I—I mean, we got drunk and… she! Dang man, you are just going to have to forgive me. The forces were strong with that one. She overcame me. I couldn’t hold back. You guys were through anyway. What do you care?”

  “It just makes me feel like crap when my best friend gets with my ex-girlfriend so soon after our break up. It kind of makes me think that you had wanted her ever since we were going out. What about DeAnn? Does she know about—you know, the incident?”

  “No, and she is not going to find out, right?”

  “I guess not, friend. Abby is gone anyway. Hey, I know how you can make it up to me.”

  “Any way, bud.”

  “Go get Lexie for me. She is still down
there, isn’t she?”

  “Yeah, she has been run through the mill, though. I will go see if she is even alert.”

  “Would you do that for me, friend?” Brody kept rubbing in the friend part.

  “Right away.”

  Treble went out the door and stood in the middle of those who hadn’t been dragged into the soul-shooter chamber for a proper burial, yet. He found Lexie amongst them and whispered in her ear. “Come with me. I think you are going to be able to fulfill one of your wildest fantasies.”

  “You found Brody?”

  “Just come with me.” Treble winked as he held out his hand to help her up. She suddenly stood and wiped the tiredness from her eyes, quickly prepping herself for finally being able to be with the one whom she was obsessed. In total excitement, she danced up and down like she had just scored the game-winning touchdown for the champion Bobcats. Treble calmed her long enough to cover her eyes and bring her to Brody.

  “Hi, Lexie.” Treble walked out and shut the door as he took everyone else on an excursion of the facility. “How have you been?” He barely got out the last part as she thrust her lips against his. Feeling him up and down and all around, she began thrashing at his vinyl suit like a cat fighting its way out of a feedbag.

  “You don’t know how much I have missed you.” Her stylish brown hair and beautiful puppy-dog brown eyes glistened as she threw back her head, exposing her strong neck. Her pearl-white teeth glistened as she smiled and spoke. “I have saved myself for you. I told you I would, and I kept my promise. Take me now. We are all alone. I am all yours. Do to me what you will. This is it, our last chance.” She grabbed his hand and placed it on her firm shoulder. He quickly reached up and grasped both sides of her jaw, trickling his fingers ever so slowly down through the valley to her navel. She moaned in a ticklish, ecstatic fashion where curiosity got her juices flowing. This was all new to her. The thought of going the distance made her body tingle from head to toe. A fire shot through from the center all the way out to her fingertips. She commented on how she could feel her hair tingling at the roots, like it was growing. He accidentally brushed the outside zipper of her skintight jeans as she fell over backwards in ecstasy. Brody held back long enough to look into her eyes. His mood swing badge was on fire.

  “Are you sure you are ready for this? You have denied me, oh, about three hundred times now. The farthest you have ever let me go is third base. Is this going to be another one of those times? My boys can’t handle that anymore. They are still blue.”

  “I’m positive. It’s now, or never. Our only chance to get away with it.”

  “Okay, but first, I want to take you on a little ride.” Brody removed his hand from inside her flat stomach and hunched over as he grabbed her by the hand. He ushered her to the other-room-entering pod in the back corner of the room. She was caught up in giving herself up for the first time; the ride just added to her already circulating bodily flow.

  “This is surreal. I can’t believe this is even happening. We are going to make love inside of a robot. Who does that for their first time? Who does that in general?”

  Brody responded, “Does what?”

  “Who makes love in a robot?”

  “Lots of people have. You just don’t know any of them.” He laughed as she started rubbing on him while pulling herself close to his body.

  “You make me so hot.” He gasped.

  Brody turned the lights down low inside the creator quarters once they entered from the raised room of capsule shafts. He lifted the screen from the robot’s window of eyes and let Lexie see what was going on outside. At that moment, all of the Pillars of Larami stood in an open cavern huddled in unison as the congregation of the magistrates was underway. They had teamed up and destroyed the majority. Left were the stragglers who were undecided, caught between deciding which way to turn.

  “Nothing like having an audience, huh?” He said.

  “They can’t see in here, can they?”

  Brody used a button to bring the Hope diamond eyes in from the lust, dust, and diamonds room. The sound of a vacuum sifted through the still as Chester’s eyes emerged up through a tube. Brody took the blue diamonds and put them in a vice. He rotated the clamps until they had the gems centered and then pushed another button. The hydraulic forks pushed down on the jewels until they were crushed into a fine, pulverized powder. A wave of death stopped every existing Pastie, in every form, where they stood. They all froze back into the stone from which they had been chiseled. Mysteriously, the Pillars of Larami froze as well. Their purpose wasn’t even real. The roof of the cave collapsed, and the truth came out. The vaporous mirage that had been keeping Freeland hidden was now no longer. It had evaporated out toward Nostradama. Millions of stars emerged from the normal color, returning night sky, and a wind pushed the clouds away, making the ambience more vivid. Heaven was seen in its sphere of everywhere-ness. It was approaching, as if it was drawing them, and planet Trendago, in to it.

  Brody undressed Lexie in the dark pod and laid her on a cot. She pulled him down with her and held her breath as he slowly and cautiously rubbed against her. She almost backed up off the cot from the hormones exploding in her body. Brody grabbed her by the shoulders though as he lay by her side, snuggling ever so close against her. She relaxed enough for him to caress her skin. She was almost begging him to head for the plate; her body was still tight but smooth and inviting. For nearly three minutes, Brody was holding on to her like he wanted it to last forever. A kaleidoscope of sporadic thoughts went through his mind. The most relieving of those was the internal ecstasy ride he was on, now that he had finally tamed the love of his life, Lexie Weier-Fox.

  Unfortunately, just as he was about to make his move by climbing on, Lexie started to fade. Her perfect, nude body started turning to stone, especially her heart. Her beautiful brown eyes lost charisma as they glazed over and seemed to harden. Brody checked for a pulse. There was none. She had turned Pastie. Someone had already infiltrated her and her mind. Brody lost her. Thankful the loss came while she was still alive, Brody projected that having stayed with her and things worked out, he would have been deprived of her twenty-three years from now to cancer. Sadly, it was in her cards genetically; the same thing happened to her mother and father at the same age, when they were physically forced apart. The tragic magic number was a family curse that he had no interest to pursue and lose after having devotedly loved her for that long of a time frame. It just wasn’t practical. Maybe the fear is what pushed her away. His fear of losing another loved one to any form of cancer. So he let her go after trying to get one of the things he most wanted from her, in the first place: her heart.

  The son shone down, true as light. Christ had been watching over the planet the whole time. He was the solar star, the protector of all who could be forgiven on this second-chance planet of Trendago. In the midst of an ethereal light shining all around inside the bottom of the unprotected portion of this diabolical cave system, Treble entered the room Brody was in and held a mirror up to his face. Treble was glowing with an effervescent whiteness all around him as he said, “This is who you are. Now you see who everyone else has seen since you got into your wreck. I am sorry I have to be the one to show you, but what are friends for?”

  Brody looked into his reflection from the mirror in Treble’s hand. He saw a blond hair, blue-eyed kid, someone he had been looking for since the beginning. At that moment, he realized who he really was. Guilt made him let go, and the wage of a sinful death made him perish.

  Chapter 13

  Genesis

  “Good and evil fight within us all each and every day. The lessons that we are being taught, and what route we choose when we identify the difference between the two, define us in our moral character. I have failed more than I have succeeded, but I still believe in God. The devil has tortured me through free will for the major part of my life, and I know it is n
ot in me to have the strength to fend him off. It is my faith in the fact that God can, and I believe God has given me a second chance.” Brody awoke as alert as he was before the wreck. As if he had an immaculate reception of life. He had finally been healed within from the last seven years of inner-darkness.

  Brody looked over at the nametag of one of the third-shift interns who had been sitting with him during these wee hours of the morning,

  “Bonnie Hopkins? Is that really your name? Wow, I feel like I have known you forever. You are more beautiful than I’d imagined you during my sleep. You don’t even want to know what you have been doing in my head. Your acts were sinister. What year is it?”

  “You are finally awake! That’s awesome! It is 2019.”

  “What month and day?” Brody tiredly rubbed his eyes with the palms of his hands.

  “It is Friday, the twenty-first of December—well almost the twenty-first. In five more minutes, it will have been exactly seven years and three months since your wreck. We were wondering if you would ever come out of it. I lost a hundred dollars on you a year ago. I bet that you would be coming out of it then. I’ve got to call in the doctors.”

  “No, no, don’t do that yet. Please! I am not ready to be hounded by people.”

  “But I have to tell them. They have been waiting since, forever. You are a medical breakthrough in the science of biofeedback

  world.”

  “Please don’t tell them yet. Can you and I just talk first?”