“I don’t know anyone named Noah,” Viveka said. “Who are you, and why are you using my phone at Gehenna?”
“I’m a fan of your work,” the voice said, “and I’m using your phone at Gehenna because that’s where I am right now.”
“Is my friend Christmas there?” Viveka asked, concerned.
“I’m the only person here at the moment,” Noah said. “Can you come to Gehenna right now? It’s important that I talk with you.”
“We’re talking right now,” Viveka said.
“Yes, but what I want to discuss with you has a visual component. Can I look forward to seeing you shortly?”
“I’ll be there in about fifteen minutes.” With that, Viveka ended the call. She turned to December. “I’d better go. Will you come with me?”
“Of course. I want to meet this fan of yours.”
“It’s within walking distance,” Viveka said. “We’ll go there together, but I’ll go in first. I’ll leave the door open so you can follow me in, ten minutes later.”
“Why the delayed entrance for me?”
“If this Noah means me harm, I’m sure I’ll find out shortly after I meet him. Then I can call for you,” Viveka said. “If you come in with me, he might conceal his intentions.”
December nodded. “That makes sense.”
“I just hope he hasn’t hurt Christmas. His life is in its early stages and he has so much to learn. I’d hate for anything to happen to him.”
“You just called Christmas ‘he.’” December said. “Before you always said ‘it.’ Your concern has brought out your maternal side.”
Chapter 17
December walked with Viveka to the bus stop across from Gehenna.
“Now wait here,” Viveka said. “I’ll go in and leave the front door unlocked for you. After ten minutes, follow me inside. Obviously, if you hear me call for you, don’t bother waiting.”
December watched as she walked across the street. He wished he could walk by her side into the building, to make sure she wouldn’t be hurt. She was the toughest woman he knew, but still, he felt protective of her. He’d lost contact with his relatives, over the years – even his father. Viveka was the closest thing he had to family.
After ten minutes, December walked up to the front door. The door was unlocked, just as she’d said. He walked past the statue of Viveka and entered the bank lobby. Apparently the statue’s flames were allowed to burn throughout the night. Certainly that seemed to be in sync with Viveka’s tremendous confidence: her blazing fire should never be extinguished, even for a moment.
The building’s fluorescent lighting was off, but the fiery glow from the statue lit the way for him. To the side, he saw a stairway leading up to the second floor. A door was open, with plenty of light pouring from the room beyond.
He hurried up the stairs. The open door was in fact the double-doorway of a large meeting room. He entered and immediately saw that the mechanical surgeon had been moved into the room. Viveka stood next to the machine, and behind it stood two large cylinders, like the one that housed The Sentinel. Swaths of pink silk had been wrapped around the cylinders.
“Viveka!” he said. “What’s going on here?”
“I’m not sure,” she said. “My mystery man Noah hasn’t showed up yet. He did leave the lights on in this room. That’s why I’m here.” She tapped the mechanical surgeon. “Someone’s been moving things around. They’ve been using my equipment, too.” She pointed to a dried smear of blood on the machine’s grid. “Using it extensively.”
“What’s in those cylinders behind you?”
“Good question. Apparently someone wants to surprise me. I’m wondering if that pink silk is their idea of gift-wrapping.”
“Who do you suppose that ‘someone’ is?” December asked.
“Let’s find out,” Viveka said. She cried out to the room, “I’m here! Come out, come out, wherever you are!”
A door opened in the back of the meeting room. A gray-haired gentleman in a black trenchcoat entered the room. He looked like he was in his sixties. The handsome, wrinkled face seemed familiar to December. He just couldn’t remember where he’d seen it before.
“Hello there!” the man in the trenchcoat said, heading toward them. He spoke in the same gruff voice as the man on the phone, so it had to be Noah. “What a pleasure to see the two of you. I was only expecting Viveka.” December noticed that the man walked slowly, with a slight degree of stiffness.
“I know that face,” Viveka said, shocked. She turned to December. “That’s your face in your senior years, along with the hair. From the exhibit I’ve been working on.”
“You are correct,” the man in the trenchcoat said, now in a considerably younger voice – the same voice as December. He stepped up to a gurney set next to one of the cylinders. Various items, including stainless-steel tools, were set on the gurney. He pulled off his hair and face, revealing a head composed of a skull-like, stainless-steel framework. He then picked up and put on another face from the gurney. He finished his preparations by applying a wig of thick black hair.
He now looked exactly like December.
“What have you been doing, Christmas?” Viveka stared at the robot with horrified disbelief. Then she realized that she needed to compose herself, and she forced herself to smile. “Did you prepare a surprise for your mother?”
“Mother?” the robot companion said. “Yes, you must be my mother, since you created me. I hadn’t thought of that before.” He nodded toward December. “I guess that makes you my father.” He walked up to the nearest cylinder and rested a hand on it. “I have been busy, and I did prepare a surprise. Two surprises, in fact. Would you like to see them?”
“Certainly, yes,” Viveka said.
December nodded. “Go ahead. Unveil the surprise.”
Christmas reached into a pocket of his trenchcoat and pulled out stainless-steel scissors. He slid a blade of the scissors under the silk and snipped the fabric away – first on one cylinder, then on the other.
The pink silk fell to the floor. In each cylinder, a naked body was bound upright with swathes of silk to a metal rack. Both bodies were submerged in the beige fluid that its inventor called Aqua Viveka. One was male and the other was female, and both were crisscrossed with incisions, held together with surgical staples and sutures. Both bodies were quite beautiful, if one was willing to overlook the signs of extensive surgery.
“You should be quite proud of your mechanical surgeon,” Christmas said to Viveka. “I used it to assemble both bodies, once I’d harvested the components. That in itself was an incredibly complex task, requiring a great deal of planning, preparation, and travel. I taught myself to drive your silver van. I also chartered some private flights through one of your accounts.”
Christmas was so caught up in telling his tale, he did not even notice the expressions of horror on the faces of Viveka and December.
The companion moved to the cylinder that held the male body. “When I found the folder that Viveka had left in the office … the one with all those pictures in it … I was absolutely enthralled. The most beautiful people in those photos were drag queens and human dolls. That’s what started the project in my mind. Those pictures, with the names and contact information on the back. So convenient! It got me thinking. What would happen if I could reassemble the best features of the most beautiful ones?”
He pointed to the face of the man in the cylinder. “It occurred to me that Monica Delectable had to be an incredibly handsome man under all that makeup. I looked online and saw that I was right. The face, eyes and ears came from Monica, along with the arms and hands. Most of the rest came from Vandric Bell, including the lips. Full but manly lips. Beautiful. His hair was a little on the thin side, but that wasn’t a problem. Later on, I saw that under his wig, Georgia Peechy had a beautiful head of hair, so I used that.”
He moved to the cylinder that contained the female body. “For our young lady, those luscious lips came from Geor
gia Peechy, along with the vocal cords for singing and those nimble hands for playing the guitar. The eyes, face and ears came from Claudia Maresko, and everything else came from Elektra Sparkz. Every time I took the parts I needed, I stored them in Aqua Viveka for later use. Before I disposed of the contributors, I replaced the parts I’d taken from them with bits from three homeless people I came across. I then made sure the bodies of the contributors were mostly ruined. That way, when the authorities examined what was left of them, they might not realize that any parts had been removed.”
Contributors? Viveka thought. Doesn’t he mean murder victims? She was aghast to learn that her seemingly friendly companion robot was in fact, an insane serial killer. She did her best to maintain a calm, even cheerful demeanor, so that Christmas wouldn’t do anything potentially harmful to either herself or December.
“I had no idea I’d created such an intelligent being,” she said. “A genius, really. Clearly you are my finest work ever. How were you able to track down your … contributors?”
“It was easy to learn their schedules – they always posted their upcoming appearances on their social media,” Christmas said. “I had no difficulty in disguising myself when I approached them. I’ve been calling myself Noah Vale, whenever I had to provide a name.”
“Noah Vale…? Ah! No avail,” Viveka said. She had to admit, her mechanical man was clever. “You’re certainly an ingenious fellow. Can you tell me why you’ve created these fleshy collages?”
Christmas walked up to his creator and tenderly took her hand. “Because I’m in love with you, Viveka. I created two beautiful young bodies for us – one for me and one for you. Your mechanical surgeon can transfer our minds into these bodies. Then we can both feel pleasure and truly enjoy life.”
“Why can’t you feel pleasure?” December asked the companion.
Christmas turned his way and frowned. “My flesh is made from silicone. I can’t feel anything.”
“That makes sense,” December said. “But why would Viveka need a different body?”
Viveka threw back her head and laughed. The companion laughed, too. December simply stared at them, puzzled.
“My dear December,” Viveka said. “You’re not laughing. Surely you must realize, I’m … different. After all, I know things the average person could not possibly know. I create the strangest projects imaginable. Clearly I am not like other people.”
“I am in awe of you,” December said. “But I’m gay, so I’m not about to fall in love with you, like our friend here. I believe what I want to believe about you. So what is the truth I’m overlooking? Is it terrible? Will it make me hate you? If that’s the case, don’t tell me.”
She nodded to Christmas. “You know the truth – because I made you, and I talked to you the whole time. You tell him. I’m not sure how to phrase it.”
The companion walked toward December. When he was only a foot away, he stopped and looked him in the eye. “Viveka is a witch,” he said. “She’s older than you realize. You’d be surprised to know how she retains the look of youth. Her beauty regimen is extensive. Even so, her sense of touch has diminished with time.”
“But only slightly,” Viveka said. “I haven’t turned to stone.”
“How old are you?” December asked her.
“Most people my age are … well, dead,” she said. “But I want you to know, I don’t worship Satan and I don’t have evil powers. It’s something that runs in my family. An occasional mutation among the females. It comes with an IQ that puts us ahead of the curve, knowledge-wise. Our health is incredible. In fact, I’m still fertile. I could have another baby, if I wanted to go to all that trouble.”
“Another baby?” December said.
“I had one, many years ago. I’m a grandmother now. Does any of this bother you?”
“Of course not,” the model said. “You’re my friend, whether you’re a witch or not. It doesn’t matter if you’re fifty, two-hundred, or two-thousand years old. I don’t care if you’re King Tut’s sister. I’m just glad that I know the truth. It’s all so fascinating. Now we’ll have so much more to talk about, for years to come.”
A tear of happiness rolled down Viveka’s cheek.
“Truly, her age doesn’t matter,” the companion said, “because soon, she shall be reborn.” His tone went beyond simple joy. This was the voice of a champion – a victor, supremely self-satisfied. “Together, Viveka and I will enjoy the pleasures of living in perfect young flesh. We shall become the ultimate lovers – both of us luxuriating in our beautiful new bodies.”
December looked at the male form in its cylinder. “I’m surprised you didn’t steal my body. That would’ve been easier.”
Christmas simply stared at him. “I already look like you. I can do better.”
“I’m so flattered.” December turned to Viveka. “I hope you plan to destroy him.”
Viveka walked up to the cylinder that held the female body. She realized that from this point on, she would have to choose her words carefully. “I’m certainly proud of your work, Christmas,” she said, studying the craftsmanship with a critical eye. “You made some remarkable choices, and displayed incredible initiative. Your work also provided a thorough test-drive of both the mechanical surgeon and Aqua Viveka.”
She then turned to face the companion. “But now I must be honest with you. It saddens me to tell you that your efforts were all for nothing. I have no intention of leaving this body, and no wish to be your lover … or anyone’s lover. I have work to do – a fascinating array of projects – and the agenda you have in mind for me simply wasn’t meant to be. Plus, you overlooked one vital fact when you created a body made of flesh for yourself.”
“And what is that?” the companion said, his eyes wide with dread. The glorious bravado had left his voice.
“You think of yourself as a person,” Viveka said, “but you’re not really alive. The mechanical surgeon could do nothing for you. You do not have a brain or life essence that could be transferred into that body. Your presence could never be housed by that flesh. You are a machine, my friend.”
For a moment, Christmas simply stared into space.
Then the companion dropped to his knees and released a prolonged wail. It could only be described as a thirty-second burst of loud, furious static – a forlorn machine-scream.
When the cry ended, Viveka approached the companion and took his head in her hands. She then gave it a quick turn, up and to the left, resulting in a loud click. His eyes rolled up into his head and he toppled on his side, as lifeless as a ragdoll.
“The poor thing,” Viveka said. “He couldn’t bear knowing how horribly he had failed. I’m afraid the news fried his circuits, so to speak. I’ll still use him in your exhibit. But, I’ll need to take out his intelligence circuits before I reactivate him.”
December looked down at the companion’s limp form. “How are you going to tell the world about all the chaos our robot friend caused?”
“Simple: I won’t.” Viveka held out her arms and raised her shoulders slightly at the same time – a huge, expressive shrug. “The world isn’t ready for any of this. It’s a pity, really. He really was my best invention! He even managed to fool me, and I’m the one who created him. But his actions must remain an unsolved mystery. Besides me, you’re the only person who knows the truth. You can’t tell anyone – not even Eryk or his investigator. As far as the world is concerned, the killer is still out there. Can I trust you to keep this to yourself?”
December gave her a wink. “Who’s going to believe a male model?” A thought occurred to him. “I guess Sinthia gave up the show for nothing. But I can’t let her know that.”
“She’ll be fine. I’m sure she’ll end up at the helm of Queen Of Tarts, like you said.”
He nodded toward the cylinders. “What are you going to do with those bodies?”
“I hate to let anything go to waste,” Viveka said. “As long as I refresh the Aqua Viveka from time to time, our pi
ckled pals will keep indefinitely. Who knows, maybe someday we’ll be in a terrible accident and we’ll need those bodies.” She smiled fondly at December. “We do look after each other, don’t we?”
December smiled back. “Yes, we do.” He sat on the floor next to the companion. “Poor little goober. He looks like he’s asleep. He did have a grand master plan, didn’t he? He was deeply smitten with you. If his scheme had worked, you could’ve had a hot new body and a sexy lover. You missed out on that. Doesn’t that make you sad?”
“Not at all. I’ve known passion over the years,” Viveka said. “I’ve experienced bliss with many wonderful lovers. But I’ve grown past cheap thrills.”
As she was talking, Viveka picked up the pink silk on the floor and wiped the dried blood smears off the mechanical surgeon. The machine was coated with a special stain-resistant polymer resin she’d invented, so it could be cleaned with incredible ease.
“These days, I look forward to traveling and giving lectures,” she said. “I adore working on my incredible projects. Our robot friend didn’t take any of that into consideration. He thought he loved me, but he didn’t, really. He loved the idea of me.”
“Truly profound,” December said, standing up. “Now let’s get back to the club for more dirty martinis. That’s the real Aqua Viveka, as far as I’m concerned.”
With that, they linked arms and headed out of Gehenna.
About The Author
Mark McLaughlin’s fiction, nonfiction, and poetry have appeared in hundreds of magazines, newspapers, websites, and anthologies. His most recent releases include four collaborative story collections with Michael Sheehan, Jr. – HORRORS & ABOMINATIONS, THE HOUSE OF THE OCELOT, CITY OF LIVING SHADOWS, and THE PRISONER OF CARCOSA. Mark’s solo story collection, EMPRESS OF THE LIVING DEAD, features tales of horror and dark fantasy.
Be sure to visit Mark’s Amazon author’s page to find out more about his various works: www.amazon.com/author/markmclaughlinmedia.
Also, you can visit Mark’s website at www.BMovieMonster.com.
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