Archangel

by Mich Moore

selected to physically join the team."

  "THAT'S A LIE!" Broussard raged. "THIS IS ALL A LIE!" The orange balloon zoomed in towards him and took aim. "NO!" The balloon backed off just as a double-wide trailer home dropped from the skies and smashed itself to bits in the field. As a whimsical coda, a white commuter plane emerged belly-up from a towering wall of churning fog and lightning and speared the wall directly behind the sitting Efflin. The being paid it no mind.

  Broussard became nearly hysterical. "STOP THIS! YOU'LL DESTROY THE COMPLEX!"

  "That is the purpose of the storm. Calm your fears. Your friends and colleagues are safe for the moment. But Redstone will come down, as well as the production facility being built in Michigan, thereby forcing Washington to move production of the Archangel to safer grounds in the UK."

  Hot tears streamed down Broussard's face. "OH, MY GOD! OH, MY GOD! WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO ME?"

  "Because these are our orders."

  "BLAST YOUR ORDERS AND ... LET ... ME ... GO!!!"

  "Don't worry. You will be set free soon." Z checked his watch. "Neal, the Efflin have an offer for you."

  "Let me go!"

  "They want to keep you on the Archangel project. It is a significant honor."

  "I don't care! NOW LET ME—"

  Broussard was sprayed again. His head lolled a bit and his eyes rolled upward.

  "Neal?"

  "Hmm?"

  "Can you hear me?"

  Broussard raised his head. "Yes," he mumbled

  "Are you going to allow me to finish?"

  "Yes." He breathed in and out deeply.

  "Listen. The Efflin would have you bring your expertise and your special relationships with the DATs to bear upon Archangel. However, there is the matter of your criminal background."

  "I have a pardon. From the president. You should know that."

  "Yes. Unfortunately, the Efflin don't recognize presidential pardons for capital crimes."

  Broussard shrugged. "Whatever."

  "Mr. Broussard, it's a problem. If you accept employment with the Efflin, you will have to complete the terms of your sentence."

  "What? Send me back to prison? If that's the deal, then no thanks."

  "No. Besides, we could hardly take the time for you to serve forty years and then go through an appeals process." The plates of imported granite that made up the façade of the main building began to flap wildly in the wind. "There is another way. One that would speed the process."

  Broussard shook his head. "The answer is no. Marcin, or whoever you are, I don't believe one thing that you've said. And to be honest, I don't have to. For all I know, this could be some Advance South simulation. I've heard the rumors. Now why don't you and your buddies do me a favor and disappear."

  "While your mind sorts through the fantastical bits and drills down to the comfortable, old reality? Neal, you are not dreaming. This is no 'separate reality.' And life as you knew it will never exist again."

  Broussard's eyes unfocused. A long "ahh" sound came from his mouth, and his head began to pitch drunkenly about his shoulders.

  "Neal?"

  "Yes?"

  "Can you hear me?"

  "Yes."

  "I need your answer."

  His head stopped moving, and he managed to hold it upright. "Z, I'm not looking for another situation. I just want my life back, with or without Archangel. So if I have a choice, then I'm choosing that. Can you understand?"

  "If you choose that path, you will die. Out here. In the storm."

  "No, I won't."

  "It's the truth! You'll never make it to the shelter now."

  "I will!"

  "Neal, even if you could make it to the shelter, within a year you'll be dead."

  "No!"

  "Yes. You and every man who watched those bombs explode in Kentucky. Your friend, Mr. Chang, is aware of the situation."

  Broussard was crying now. "This isn't real. I've just got to wake up. I've got to get to the storm shelter."

  "You won't make it, Neal. I speak the truth. You will die here just like Jansen. And you will go to your grave with the bloodstains of three innocent people on your hands."

  Broussard fumed silently.

  Z pressed on. "Being unprofessional and insensitive are hardly stellar qualities, but possessing them is not against the law. Maybe their actions were against your company's policies. And, if that was the case, then you should have taken up the matter with your superiors instead of following your own lethal counsel."

  Broussard did not reply.

  "But," Z continued, "what's done is done. Act one is complete and now it is time to prepare for act two." Z stood up from the table that they had shared over the past half hour. "You took three lives. Efflin law demands that you meet that debt by relinquishing your own."

  Broussard laughed out loud. "Well, I guess I should have seen that one coming!"

  "It would only be a corporeal death. Your electronic brain structure and your entire essence would be captured. You would still be you. But more importantly, that 'you' would still be alive, and learning and working with Archangel!"

  "Sure! Sure! I'd still be me but only about two hundred pounds lighter. No, thanks! Now, I've listened to you and your little presentation for the afterlife. I've given you my answer. We both understand each other's position. Now, keep your word and let me go."

  Even before he had stopped talking, Broussard could tell that he was free. He raised his leg up and kicked the table hard. The kick was a lot softer than he would have liked, but the table did move some distance across the ground with a satisfying screech. Then he stood, turned, and kicked his chair. It clanged away.

  His large hands rolled into fists. His eyes were wild, filled with pure hatred. "No more prisons." He charged straight at Z and knocked him over. Z fell backwards onto the hard concrete. Broussard was on him so fast that the other man had no chance to defend himself. Broussard began to pummel the other man's face with his hands until blood spurted up at him. Throughout the beating, Z made no sound.

  Images filled his mind. His victims. "No. Wait! You don't understand!" His uncle. "You are the best thing to ever happen to this family." Dana Zyck. "It's okay, chief." Grace Montgomery. "I love you." The rage fled his body, leaving only grief behind. But his hands were still punishing the physicist.

  "Stop. Please stop! Z finally called out weakly.

  Broussard focused on the man beneath him. His face was covered with blood. Blood. Broussard groaned. No more blood. The sight of Z's fluids snapped him out of his frenzy. What am I doing? Oh, please. Not this again. He stopped throwing punches and rolled off the bleeding man, breathing heavily. Broussard held up his red-streaked hands. "More blood," he whispered. A cry of pure misery escaped him. He slowly stood. Z remained on the ground, semi dazed. Broussard stood over him, well within striking distance. The physicist instinctively covered his battered face with his arms. Broussard held out his hand. "Can you stand?"

  Z nodded.

  Broussard grabbed one of Z's hands and hoisted him to his feet.

  The soundtrack to the destruction of Redstone was suddenly back on. The tornadoes, now visible, were gyrating all around the complex like gray belly dancers. And Redstone was shrieking in agony as they fell to the serious business of tearing it apart.

  Tears streaked down through the dirt that was blowing onto Broussard's anguished face. "I'm sorry!" he shouted above the rising din. "I didn't mean to hurt you! Forgive me!"

  Z's blood-soaked mouth opened, and two of his teeth fell out. He turned to look at the still placid Efflin and then back to the engineer from Lincoln Hills. "That is what they wanted from you. See you soon."

  "WHAT? NO! WAIT—"

  Another slit unzipped itself in the air above Z's right shoulder, and a blue cube, small enough to fit into the palm of a man's hand, tumbled out. He immediately knew that it was alive: every few seconds the cube's innards would pulse with a frosted light, exposing an intricate network of arteries and veins and f
uzzy organs. He did not sense an intelligence from it but instead a steady and intense level of interest. He wondered if a living being could have one capability exclusive of the other. The cube began to spin very, very fast on its x-axis and to change its color from blue to lavender to orange.

  This time, Broussard was able to summon the energy to be utterly amazed at what he was seeing.

  "It's beautiful," he murmured.

  The cube suddenly went completely dark. Without warning, it flew directly at him, pissed something cold on his face, and then settled on his left cheek and attached itself to it by sinking long fangs into his flesh.

  Broussard gasped in pain and surprise. He attempted to knock it off, but his hands remained impotently stuck at his sides. He was now in total agony and he let out a long "Arghhh." Tears burst from his eyes.

  Just as the pain intensified, a sharp thunderclap swung down hard above Redstone, shaking it to its foundation. The sky cracked open and the pitch-black storm roared in like a thousand angry dragons. Before Broussard had a chance to scream, a tornado reached down and gripped him in its powerful jaws and began to hungrily suck him through its kilometer-long gullet. As he began to rise high above the earth, he started to pinwheel uncontrollably. Flashes of other debris caught in the storm's maw flashed out of the chaos: house planks, a roof followed by a naked woman in curlers. Eerily, she seemed to slow down as she spun by him, and their eyes met briefly for one gut-wrenching moment. And then she was gone. Broussard rode the monster whirligig higher and higher. Rain and dirt pelted his head and filled his mouth. He began to choke and lose consciousness. He thought of his Uncle Curtis and of his mother's