by Curtis, Greg
Eventually the doctor turned around and started walking away. He had nothing left. But still he tried. Every step he took he stopped and turned back. Hoping perhaps to say something. To prove he was right. That he wasn't guilty of murder. But he couldn't find the words. His mouth continued to open and close wordlessly. And his face was a mask of horror. Eventually he reached the side of the house and was about to disappear out of sight when Will remembered one more thing.
“And go and tell Pastor Franks what you've done. He should at least know who stole the relic his church was entrusted with. Who betrayed them.”
Chapter Sixteen.
Elijah was shocked as he sat there listening to the doctor's confession. Except that he wasn't hearing a confession, or at least, not one within the confines of the sacraments. The doctor hadn't asked for that. He was just blurting out his crimes in public for everyone to hear. And the rest of the small congregation were sitting there listening and looking stunned. They didn't know what to think.
Neither sadly did he.
When he'd burst into the church ranting and screaming like a mad man, the service had had to be stopped. They couldn't continue over the top of him. Naturally Elijah had gone to him, understanding that the doctor desperately needed help and he'd asked the others to wait for him. They understood the need he was sure. But they like him couldn't understand what the doctor was confessing to. Or what he'd done. Not at first. The things he was saying didn't make sense. But then the guilt had finally become clear.
There had been a gasp when Reginald had simply shouted out to everyone that he'd stolen the sacred relic. After over a year of wondering, of failed attempts to find it, they'd almost given up hope of ever finding out who had stolen it. They'd certainly never expected the thief to be one of their own. But then to understand that not only had he stolen it but that he'd then lied to everyone about it for all that time – had even pretended to be searching for it; that had almost been like a physical blow.
And then had come this mad story about genetic therapy and inserting angelic DNA into a man. At that point no one had known what to think, least of all Elijah. And he couldn't get Reginald to make sense. To explain. Even though he'd taken Reginald to the back of the small church by then and was trying to get him to speak calmly instead of simply shouting and yelling like a madman, they could all hear every crazy word. But the doctor didn't seem to care about that.
He cared that he had harmed William Simons. He cared so greatly that the guilt was tearing him apart. And that was as it should be. But Elijah couldn't understand it. Not that the man cared. He should care. But how anyone could do something so monstrous to another human being and then be surprised and upset when his victim was harmed by it – that Elijah had trouble taking in. It made no sense at all. For a moment he wondered if the doctor had suffered some sort of psychotic breakdown. But if he had, Elijah didn't know quite when the breakdown had occurred. When he'd done this thing? Or now when he was trying to deny what he'd done?
“He thinks he's dying!” Reginald Millen wailed at him and Elijah sat there wondering why Reginald was so surprised. Because he had to have known that death would be the outcome. If what the doctor had admitted to was true then William Simons was almost certainly dying. He didn't know a lot of science but even he understood that the mixing of two such different essences, one vastly more powerful than the other, would have to be a mistake. Death would seem almost certain. And from what the doctor was telling him, it would be a terrible death. William was literally losing his mind. Suddenly Elijah felt ashamed for having made light of William's condition. Telling him that it was less than it was. It wasn't. It was surely far worse.
“What did you expect?” The pastor closed his eyes for a bit as he tried to think what to say. But he knew that there was nothing he could say that would bring the doctor comfort. Why he had done what he had done was beyond his understanding. And what the outcome would be was as well. It was madness on every level. But all he could do was speak the truth.
“He probably is dying. Even if his body survives as whatever bizarre chemistry experiment you've turned him into, his mind, everything that makes him who he is, is being erased. And it's being replaced with another mind that has never developed. Never had a thought. A baby's mind. Maybe the mind of a foetus. And not a human one.”
“An angel!”
The doctor cried it out as if defending himself. As if it was somehow right that he should turn a man into an angel and not a crime against God and nature. And presumably he did believe that no matter how insane. It was the only thing that made any sense to Elijah when he wondered why the man had done this thing. Reginald wasn't a bad man. He surely hadn't set out to cause suffering. But he had caused it. And now he didn't seem to be able handle it. The man was falling apart in front of him.
“No! Just the body and the brain of an angel at best. More likely some hybrid creature. But neither the soul nor the mind. Those things don't come from the DNA. They come from God and from living.” It seemed perfectly obvious to him. Why couldn't the doctor see it?
“Besides, that's assuming that what you've done is to create some sort of viable creature. There's no reason to assume that. You haven't replaced everything you said. Just ninety percent of the key differences. You've made a hybrid of some sort. And not all hybrids work. Mules are sterile. Ligers and tions tend towards becoming hugely fat. And their parents are much closer to one another than humans and angels.” Or so he assumed. But the changes he had witnessed in Mr. Simons seemed to confirm it.
“You can't say that!” Reginald screamed it at him as if he was lying to him somehow. He was obviously unable to face the truth.
“Of course I can. I'm not even a doctor and I know that much. If you've done what you say then William is in bad shape.”
He had to be honest and more than that he had to be firm with the doctor. The time for denial had passed. The time for recriminations and blame had also gone. Probably on the very day he had injected Mr. Simons with his concoction. It was time for only one thing; to try to fix the damage.
“And the only thing you can do Reginald is to try to fix it. Can you fix it?”
“He doesn't need fixing – he's perfect!”
And suddenly they were back in the realm of fantasy Elijah realised. The doctor was telling him not what he knew, but what he wanted to believe was true. What he had to believe. No matter how crazy it was.
“William's come to see me three or four times. And each time he's been more confused and more desperate. He didn't know what was happening to him but he did know it was wrong. He was very badly frightened. And now from what you've said, he knows he has reason to be. His mind is going. He's quite probably going to die. He is anything but perfect.”
“So is there anything you can do to stop this? Or reverse it? To give him some hope?” But even as he asked Elijah knew there wasn't. He could see it in the doctor's eyes. Hear it in the sudden silence.
“No.”
It was a long time before he said it. And when he did Elijah could barely hear him. Finally the doctor had stopped shouting. Instead, he was almost whispering. As if perhaps he finally understood what he'd done. And perhaps he also finally realised that the outcome would be bad. But it was far too late.
Elijah bowed his head in prayer, realising it was the only hope they had left. Both for William Simons and for Reginald Millen.
Chapter Seventeen.
Elijah stood at the door to William's flat and for a second or two and wondered if he really wanted to knock on it or not. He was actually frightened of what he might find inside. He also didn't know what to say. He'd counselled dying people before. But mostly they were people who'd had time to come to terms with their fate. He'd never had to counsel someone who'd been murdered.
Still, after Reginald had finally finished his confession, he'd known he had to come. He had to bring comfort to the man. Someone had to and there was no one else. But he didn't know what he could say that would be ev
en vaguely comforting. He didn't know that there was any comfort possible for William. Meanwhile the doctor was back at the church, probably still crying while other members of the congregation tried to care for him. That was how he had been when he'd left, and Elijah didn't know what to do about him either. Reginald had destroyed himself as well as William in his madness, and the pastor didn't know if either one of them could be saved.
Legally he suspected he should report this to the police. If he even knew where to find the police any longer. There were soldiers in the streets not cops, and they didn't know about crimes. They knew about keeping order. In any case while he was certain any number of crimes had been committed against William, he wasn't sure that the decision to report them should be his. It should be the victim's. After all, it was too late to prevent the crime and it didn't seem that there was any reparation possible. Informing the authorities might just make things worse for William as his condition became public knowledge.
Finally, after a whispered prayer, Elijah summoned his courage and knocked on the door.
It was a while before he heard anything, and he was beginning to wonder if he should knock again. Or if William was out. Or maybe that he simply didn't want to see anyone. But finally he heard the sound of footsteps in the hallway and braced himself.
When the doorway opened however and he saw William, his first thought was that he didn't look too different to before. But then he realised the man was standing in a darkened hallway in a bulky jacket with the hood up. William didn't want to be seen.
“Pastor Franks.” He greeted him easily enough, and that Elijah took to be a good sign. He wasn't screaming or crying or hurling abuse at him. “You heard I take it?”
Elijah nodded, not trusting himself to openly say what he'd been told. It still sounded crazy.
“Then …?”
“I came to help – if I can.” Elijah wished he didn't have to add the last, but it was true and he wasn't going to deceive Mr. Simons any further. He had been deceived enough already.
“If you can.”
William actually smiled a little as he said it, something that surprised the pastor. Having only just found out what he had a few hours before, he wouldn't have expected the man to be able to smile about much at all.
“Well, at least you're honest. Until he left the doctor was still trying to tell me that I had understood all along what he was doing to me. As if I had a bloody clue.”
“He isn't saying that now.”
“That's progress I suppose. Come through Pastor. I was out in the backyard having a cup of coffee. You're welcome to join me. And mind the holes in the floor.”
Elijah followed him through the hall, carefully avoiding the holes he'd mentioned. Two of the ice missiles had torn out most of the hallway floor, and in places he had to edge around them as best he could. But that was still better than he'd seen in a lot of his congregations' homes. Some of them had been hit by the lava bombs, and the houses were completely gone.
The backyard was a surprisingly nice space Elijah thought when he reached it. Quite large for a student flat's grounds. Especially in Westwood where land was tight. There were several large trees which would give good shade in summer and the grass was long and looked soft. There was also an outdoor barbecue area. A couple of wooden benches had been concreted into the ground on both sides of a fire pit. It looked like a good area to enjoy a summer evening.
Of course time and the string of disasters that had beset the city had left their own marks on the yard. And the most obvious of them was the wreckage of the shed and the huge crater beside it. Then there was the badly beaten piece of metal shaped into a table that Mr. Simons had placed over the fire pit. It looked like a piece of metal from a car that he'd hammered flat so that it could be used as a hot plate. Maybe that was what it was? There were enough dead cars around. Certainly it was being used as such from the metal kettle sitting on top of it. But that was just a sign of the times. People were having to make do.
When they reached the benches though William surprised him again. Instead of taking a seat on one of the benches he lay down on it, stretching out almost as if it was a bed. It seemed an odd thing to do when you had a guest. Surely most people would sit?
“I'm sorry Pastor, I know this looks odd and I'm not trying to be rude. But something's gone wrong with my spine and I can't sit any more. I don't really bend in the middle or anywhere else.”
“I understand.”
And he did. William had mentioned that his back was sore the last time he'd seen him. But even as he sat down Elijah was more bothered by it than he wanted to admit. Not because it was so sore that he'd lain down. But because of what it meant.
Degeneration. It spelled out a picture of his body slowly mutating into something that wasn't going to work at all. Little by little William’s body was failing. If his spine had fused and he was wearing those bulky clothes to conceal whatever else was happening with him, it suggested that the internal changes had to be even worse than what he could see. And they were moving fast.
He'd only seen William a couple of weeks before, but he'd been able to sit then however awkwardly and his clothes hadn't been so bulky. They'd become bulkier because whatever was growing out of him was getting larger. Elijah had a secret desire to see just what was happening under his clothes, but he refrained from asking about it. He was here to see if he could help, not to satisfy his curiosity. Besides, there was one other strangeness to wonder about.
“You seem calm.” In his position Elijah could only imagine that he would be climbing the walls with fear.
“I've had a few hours. And really, I'm still trying to take it in. But in the end there's nothing else to be done any more. And I've known that for a while. Hoping that the doctor would fix things was just a faint hope. Clutching at straws.”
“This has been gradual, and little by little I've been changing. Every day a little bit more. It's not like I just woke up and found myself like this. And I was fairly sure it wasn't reversible even before I spoke to the doctor. Long before. I went to the army doctors and they told me I had two hearts. After that I fairly much knew. The changes were too radical. The only difference is that now I know what was done. What he put in me. And that it was done deliberately. It wasn't just a secret experiment that went wrong. He actually intended me to transform – though not into this.”
Was that acceptance Elijah wondered? Resignation? Or denial of how serious things were? He didn't know.
“And now that you do know?”
“There's nothing to do. There never was. Not from the moment he stuck that needle in my arm.”
Resignation then Elijah gathered. He'd given up. And though it was a terrible thing to have to consider, maybe that was for the best. He hadn't accepted his fate, but he'd moved beyond hope and fear, both of which would have torn him apart. At least this way he might find a little peace.
“You know most people wouldn't be so able to deal with this as well as you seem to be doing. They'd be panicking. Desperate.”
“And you think I wasn't like that? I was. I spent weeks in a constant state of fear and confusion. You saw me. Now at least that's gone. I mean I knew it was bad. I just didn't know how bad. Now at least I know. I'm doomed. I don't really have to worry about it now. I’m just waiting for the end.”
“You don't know that.”
Elijah automatically denied him his claim, and then wondered why he tried. William surely understood how bad things were better than he did, and the last thing he needed now was false hope. Not hope of stopping this thing anyway.
“I pretty much do Pastor. The only things I don't know are how it will end. Will my mind fail completely before my body? Because I really don't want to end up as a drooling vegetable. Or will my heart or hearts or something else give out first? That would be better.”
Elijah wasn't quite sure what to make of his words. Whether he was being cynical and bitter, or realistic and sad. He would have reason to be all of those thin
gs. But the one thing he didn't seem to be was angry. That surprised him. So he asked about it as he got up and poured himself a cup of coffee from the kettle.
“Angry? What's the point of being angry?” William replied. “And at a mad man? It can't achieve anything. The doctor can't do anything for me. He can't stop it, he can't help and he doesn't even know what's coming. The only good thing is he can't do this to anyone else. Anger is completely useless.”
“So what do you want us to do with Doctor Millen?”
It was something that the pastor had to ask though he didn't really want to. Though it seemed unfair Reginald had fairly much destroyed himself with both his failure and the harm he had caused. And somewhere within him Elijah kept thinking, lay a good man. A good man who had done a terrible thing, and for no reason anyone could understand. He was already paying a price for that.
“You mean have him arrested? Excommunicated? What's the point?”