Morbius

by Brendan Deneen

  He placed his shoe on top of the tears and rubbed at them until they disappeared. Then he looked up and wiped his sleeve across his face, drying the wetness there, too. Franklin cleared his throat, walked over to his workstation without glancing at the creature on the operating table, and got to work.

  * * *

  THE WEEKS after that went by more rapidly than he could keep track of. He was given even more resources, and brought more humans to work on. Each subject reacted differently to the formula; each mutation was entirely different. Franklin was fascinated, carefully charting information about each subject pre-test and then post-test, seeing if there was a correlation between what they were like as humans and then as monsters.

  So far, it seemed random, but Franklin was having the time of his life trying to figure out any connection. With each subject he distanced himself more from any personal reaction. This was science, pure and simple. He had to remain aloof.

  One night, as Franklin sat at his desk, working on a new variation of his latest formula, he heard screams from the arena far above. He cocked his head to the side. The yelling sounded slightly different from the usual, but perhaps it was a particularly good match tonight. Those rich people certainly enjoyed their fights, and a new creature had been added to the mix. The vampire, lured into captivity by the promise of a serum that would sate his endless hunger.

  Franklin had helped them “acquire” him, and had been rewarded with samples of his unique blood. While he was curious to see what effects his formula would have on the thing’s metabolism, he had no desire to witness the distasteful—and frankly alarming—carnage. He would be given a full report, as well as the vampire’s corpse when it was dispatched by one of his genetically superior children.

  So he got back to work. He didn’t need to be there, could have stayed home in his fancy apartment and watched bad TV or made a phone call and done naughty things. These days, however, he enjoyed his work more than anything else. Besides, he was close to perfecting a new formula, something that would create an all-new strain of behemoths. Larger and more deadly than ever.

  So focused was he on the work, he didn’t notice the silence that had replaced the sounds of the match. He jumped, however, when there was a loud noise at the door to the laboratory. The locked door.

  Someone was trying to enter but they weren’t using a key.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  MORBIUS FOUND himself staring into a pristine laboratory, everything white and silver. State-of-the-art equipment populated the counters and cabinets, while computer terminals sat on several workstations. Under different circumstances, he might have described it as beautiful.

  Stepping inside, he closed the door behind him as best he could. The door would probably never close correctly again, but it would look normal enough not to attract attention. But the cultists would figure it out soon enough. He didn’t have a lot of time.

  Stepping cautiously, he moved farther into the room, a trail of blood marking his path on the floor behind him, almost artistic against the bright tiles. He scanned for a door, a vent, anything that might offer a way out of this tomb. Then he noticed a small man with wispy hair and glasses, hiding behind a stool.

  Morbius bared his fangs, more than ready to feed again if necessary, and walked toward the man. Grabbing him by his throat, he lifted the man off the ground. Michael’s claws dug into the flesh of his neck, drawing thin rivulets of blood.

  “Wait,” the man cried, holding up his hands in supplication, tears filling his eyes. “Don’t kill me, I’m not your enemy!”

  “Who are you?” Morbius demanded.

  “My name is Franklin Lattimer.” The man’s gaze flicked from side to side, avoiding direct eye contact. “I’m… I don’t belong here. I live in Katz Tower. I’m being held here against my will, forced to create monsters for some kind of cult. They kidnapped me and told me they would kill me if I didn’t do what they said.”

  Morbius felt his rage subside slightly. The man was small, weak, and malformed, not the usual member of Demon-Fire. His words had the ring of truth, so the vampire let go. The man fell to his knees, grasping at the bloody cuts on his neck and struggling to catch his breath.

  “What is this place?”

  “It’s… it’s my laboratory. Their laboratory. I’m a scientist, so they give me the tools needed to create the monsters for their fights. I don’t want to do it. Y-you have to believe me. I—”

  “How long have you been down here?” Morbius barked, walking around the lab.

  “I don’t know… years?”

  Morbius stopped in front of a glass case, his eyes widening.

  “I’m a scientist, as well,” he murmured. “Or I was. My name is Michael Morbius.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Franklin said, walking slowly toward the broken metal door. Morbius glanced over and the man stopped moving.

  “Come here.”

  Franklin swallowed nervously and then approached. Morbius pointed at the glass case.

  “What is this?”

  The man peered into the case. It was full of clear, soft plastic pouches, each one containing a different-colored liquid.

  “Those are blood samples,” Franklin said, “from some of my more, ah, extreme experiments. My captors’ experiments, I should say.”

  Morbius opened the case and grasped one of the pouches. It was cool to the touch. Inviting. He looked the man in his eyes. Franklin blinked rapidly, looking away. He was lying. He wasn’t here against his will. There was a hint of pride in the man’s voice when he discussed his work.

  With his free hand, Morbius grabbed Franklin’s shirt and pulled the man closer, baring his teeth.

  “No… please,” Franklin whimpered. At the same time, a commotion sounded outside in the tunnel.

  Just as Morbius’ teeth touched the man’s neck, the metal door burst open and a crowd of cult members came running in. In his surprise, Morbius let go of Franklin and the small man skittered off, disappearing into the growing mass of newcomers.

  Thaddeus stepped to the front of the undulating crowd, men and women alike. All of them carried weapons at the ready, and many wore cruel grins.

  “End of the line, Michael,” Thaddeus growled. “You’ve done irreparable harm to what I’ve built here, and now you are going to pay for it with your life. But don’t worry, we’ll take our time with you. No one is in a hurry, and there is no other way out… except through us.”

  Morbius couldn’t see past the red-robed cult members. He had never faced off against this many people, especially in so confined a space. And he was weakening—the effects from Jake’s blood were starting to wear off. If only…

  He looked down. He was still holding the vial of strange-looking fluid, and there were several more in the case. He smiled, then looked up and into Thaddeus’ eyes.

  “It sounds like fun,” Morbius replied.

  With lightning-like speed, he grabbed a handful of pouches from the case and held them above his head. As if on cue, the cultists bore down upon him. Using his claws, Morbius ripped open the packets of mutated blood and opened his mouth wide. He was tackled from every direction, blades entering multiple points of his body, but the various packets of blood burst open and the liquids cascaded down, drenching him in a crimson shower. Copious amounts fell into his mouth, mixing together into a gory cocktail.

  Pounded to the ground, Morbius swallowed. Blood erupted from cuts all over his body while an entirely different mixture slipped down his throat. He closed his eyes. The pain from the assault grew almost unbearable… and then it vanished entirely. His mind tunneled into a single pinprick of light. He heard Martine’s voice whispering to him, then Amanda’s, then Jake’s.

  Morbius… they said in unison. Rise.

  The living vampire burst out of the sea of red-clad cult members, slicing open opponents as he did so. The white room ran red with a veritable river of blood and shredded cloth. Leaping high, he landed on the ground at the far end of lab, placing his back against the
wall. As the enraged contingent of cultists surged, Morbius pointed a gore-soaked finger at Thaddeus.

  “I’m going to kill you last,” he hissed. “So you and Justin can be together in Hell.”

  Thaddeus bellowed, a sound of absolute rage, and sprinted forward. Morbius moved, too, and backhanded the man, sending him pinwheeling into a group of assailants. They all stumbled backward and one of their arms must have hit a light switch because the room was suddenly plunged into gloom, lit only by the random computer screens scattered throughout the laboratory.

  As the blood raced through Morbius’ system, the room was imbued with a surreal quality, the encroaching silhouettes taking on the aspects of an old black-and-white movie, tinted by intermittent splashes of red as the living vampire continued to wade through them. It became difficult to tell reality from hallucination.

  They slashed at him with knives and shocked him with electrical prods, but he barely felt it, distant nuisances as he responded to their violence with ten times the ferocity. Morbius sank his claws and teeth into tender flesh, and caught glimpses of their eyes. The pure hatred they showed was staggering—these men and women were willing to die for a cause he could hardly comprehend. Did they really think Demon-Fire had their best interests at heart?

  Their blind fanaticism sickened him.

  Yet he wasn’t going to allow these cattle to keep him from Amanda, from Martine. He would raze the entire cult if necessary, crisscross the country wreaking bloody vengeance if they touched a single hair on Amanda’s head.

  The thought of his friend, of what he had said to her the last time they saw each other, drove him farther into a rage, part of it self-directed, and he lashed out even more passionately, the mutated blood seeming to explode through every inch of his body. The lights began to strobe above him as he used anything he could grasp as a weapon to incapacitate his attackers, hurling equipment and opponents as if they were weightless.

  A twisted ballet of chaos and gore.

  Finally, the crowd began to thin, leaving the bodies of victims piled on the floor. As he slaughtered the last of the cult members who were still standing, he realized that the lights weren’t strobing at all. It was in his mind, the light show corresponding to the rapid-fire beat of his heart.

  The last man fell.

  Morbius stood still.

  He loomed above a bloody tableau of unmoving bodies. Inhaled a deep breath and held it for a second. The room was entirely silent, a stark contrast to just a second earlier. The silence was like a beast, tensed, waiting. He could feel its hot breath on the back of his neck.

  “You’re not quite done,” it whispered.

  A quiet scuffling sound reached Morbius’ ears. It was near the metal door, growing fainter by the second. Morbius made his way through the piles of bodies and finally reached the source.

  Thaddeus.

  Barely alive. Crawling toward the exit. Morbius reached out and turned him over. Thaddeus looked up at his enemy, blinked, and then spat in the living vampire’s face.

  Morbius wiped it away with the back of his hand, smearing even more blood across his cheek. The strobing fell away and his senses focused in on Thaddeus’s face, dimly visible in the gloom.

  “You’ve already lost,” the man gasped, blood leaking from his mouth.

  Morbius looked around the room, and then back at his prey.

  “Really?”

  “We have Amanda. She’s one of us now. Even if you manage to get out of here, you’re too late. You’re nothing. Alone. Pointless.”

  Thaddeus’ words pierced him more than the blades of the acolytes, because on some level, Morbius suspected that the man was telling the truth. He screamed in rage and sank his fangs into Thaddeus’ neck.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-0NE

  AMANDA WAS wracked with guilt.

  After her sister left the room, she finished every morsel of food that was left. She had wondered if perhaps the food was poisoned, but was ravenous, and quickly reasoned that they could have killed her at any time. No, Catherine seemed to be earnest when she said she wanted Amanda to be part of…

  What?

  The family business?

  The very concept made her shudder. She thought of her father. Was he even alive? Catherine seemed to think so, but Amanda didn’t know what to believe anymore. As she sat back on the couch, she also thought about what Catherine had said about Morbius.

  She didn’t want to believe it, but Morbius was largely an enigma to her, in spite of the time they’d spent together. His huge mood swings were nearly impossible to navigate, and the way he sometimes spoke to her was inexcusable. Yet she sensed goodness in him, beneath the pale skin and jagged teeth and sometimes vicious sneer. She genuinely believed that he wanted to do the right thing. His curse was real, and at this point, Amanda felt like she knew a thing or two about living a cursed life.

  As she gulped a glass of water, she stood up and paced the room, putting the empty glass on the small desk. There didn’t seem to be any other way out, but she wasn’t about to sit around and hope her sister was sincere. Wouldn’t try to turn her into a blood sacrifice again.

  Taking a deep breath, she stepped over to the door and knocked loudly.

  Silence.

  She knocked again. “Hello?”

  A muffled voice responded.

  “Yeah?”

  “Hi. I need to use the bathroom. Like, ASAP.” It was the truth, but she was met with another moment of silence, so she slammed her fist against the door and shouted, “It’s about to get messy in here! You think Poison-Lark is going to be happy about that?”

  Nothing.

  Swearing under her breath, she turned to head back to the couch when she heard the lock click. Her heart raced, but she forced her breathing to remain calm. She was only going to get one chance at this.

  The door swung open and she was faced with a very young-looking cult member, the red robe looking slightly too big for his skinny frame. He held a long-bladed knife in his hand, which she regarded dispassionately.

  “They don’t trust you with a gun?”

  “Demon-Fire doesn’t believe in guns,” he said, sounding vaguely unsure of himself. “We’re… better than that.”

  “Oh really? One of your buddies had a gun the first time your little cult kidnapped me.”

  “I heard about that. He was… dealt with rather harshly as a result. Now come on. To your left. I’ll be right behind you. I’ve been ordered to keep you under control, whatever it takes.”

  Amanda nodded, doing her best to look cowed. She headed down the hallway and could hear him following directly behind her. He was breathing heavily. Nervous.

  Good.

  They were in a decrepit-looking hallway with small, ancient-looking chandeliers appearing above them every dozen or so feet. More religious paintings adorned the walls, many of them slightly askew. The carpet was old and stained. Wherever they were, it smelled like mildew and neglect.

  “Nice place,” she muttered.

  “Quiet!” the kid commanded. “Up there, that last door on the right.”

  Amanda’s heart began to race again. The time was almost here. It was now or never.

  “You coming in with me?” she said as they reached the door.

  “Of course not,” he scoffed, “but there are no windows in there, so don’t get any ideas. If you’re not out in a couple of minutes, I’ll come after you, and it won’t be pretty.”

  “Okay,” she replied. “I’ll be quick.”

  She took hold of the doorknob and rattled it.

  “It’s locked,” she said, pretending to sound frustrated.

  “What? That doesn’t make—”

  Without looking, Amanda lashed out with her foot, connecting with the kid’s midsection. The breath exploded out of his mouth. He doubled over and fell back, but held onto the knife. She continued her motion, turning the rest of the way around, and lunged toward him, raising her knee as she moved and slamming it into his cheek. He flew back, bloo
d shooting out of an instant cut on his face and spraying the wall. It was similar to the move she’d used on the subway… the one that Morbius had made her practice over and over again.

  Why mess with something that worked?

  Pressing the attack, she threw a punch toward his face but he dodged it and slashed at her, catching her just below her shoulder, slicing into her upper arm. A shock of pain ran through her.

  “I’ll kill you!” he screamed, stabbing at her again.

  She screamed, too, right into his face, and blocked his attack with her injured limb, their forearms smashing painfully against each other. She used her momentum and head-butted his nose, breaking it instantly. The young cult member made a small, surprised sound and then collapsed in an unconscious heap.

  Amanda fell back a couple of steps, breathing heavily, and then pressed her hand against the wound. The cut wasn’t too deep, thankfully, but it burned like hell.

  With her good hand, she grabbed the knife out of the kid’s grasp, made her way back in the direction they’d come, and turned down a shadowy hallway, gritting her teeth against the throbbing pain.

  If she was going to die in this place—wherever she was—she wasn’t going to go quietly.

  * * *

  MORBIUS RAN quietly through the catacombs beneath New York City.

  He heard distant screams, full of pain and anger, but he avoided the cult members as best he could. He had no wish to engage in further physical violence. During the battle in the laboratory, the monster blood had worked its way quickly through his system. He still felt its residual power, but it was fading. Perhaps his body was adapting to it, so the effects were less… dramatic. Even so, his addiction to it seemed to be increasing.

  He wanted nothing more than to escape this tomb and find Amanda. Reaching yet another door, he pushed through, tensing himself for opposition, but found himself in a stone tunnel. Up ahead in the distance he could see a metal staircase. The one he’d fallen past what seemed like centuries earlier. This was it.