“You call me mother and that’s well said. I am your mother. What about your father, mm? Did he honestly think he could trap me? Trick me to fold? I’m not as much of a fool as Lucia likes you to think I am. Powerful, yes, dear. You’ve learned to use your wings. But I’m an old tigress and I earned my stripes by conquering the demons that tried to ward me back from the well of darkness I eventually consumed!” Leona drew her rapier again. The Andromeda’s face contorted into a screaming, grotesque mask. It froze that way, gyrating, focused on repurposing some of the excess energy building in her.
“You still haven’t understood, you arrogant fool! There are two people at war in this corpse. A whole legion and they are many! One will get the upper-hand. I already know who it will be and it is not Lucia!” Andromeda shrieked and ripped into her chest. She scooped her heart out of her insides. Try as many times as she might, her internal organs copied and replaced themselves. Those she pried loose became wet ashes, adoring the ground with a smoking pile of filth. Leona cringed, understanding just how depraved her sin was.
“I try to die and can’t! I try to live, impossible! You did this to me!” It was Jane’s voice now, screaming from deep within. The Andromeda flashed a heavy bursting pop that sent fluorescent dew drops like fireworks into the air around her from. Jane Lewis was reflected in the shape, clothed only in white light.
“Do you have any idea what you have done, truly? How wide the Poseidon Gates now swing to usher you in? Hell is moving, sliding harmonically, singing ridiculous anthems anticipating devouring you! It’s over. It’s over because I’m still alive and I will attain justice. I am Andromeda. Andromeda is me. We don’t belong to you or Lucia or anyone. I’m helping you to survive because I’m helping myself. I need my creator!”
The image of Jane began to thrash in a frenzied epileptic episode. Surrounding trees snapped like pencils, catching fire that rolled in oceanic waves across the forest, forming a ring about them. Leona could see now that either she would act and outsmart this thing that she’d created or it would have its way.
The wind picked up as if stirred by some force coming from the Andromeda’s magnetism. As if she was casting her curses back against the sun, trying to manipulate even the Cosmos to act in favor of her justice campaign.
“Wait, dearest. I have a better solution.” Leona held up a hand. The Andromeda paused, frozen in part by the magnetism that emitted from the Medusa’s hand and part from a willingness to hear out her idea.
“Why make you pay anymore for the sins of someone else, innocent young scapegoat? Doctor Kingsley has not yet atoned for his sins in unleashing me from my human bonds. What do you say to sacrificing him to the elements? He has my DNA within him and could bind and lose the dimensional transversals throughout the Universe for us. Then you and I wouldn’t have to pay the price of fire. Then we could be happy and reign forever and keep our best-laid plans. When greedy Lucia came to take that from us, Kingsley’s work would give us the escape exit.” Leona grinned.
“If you and I are one and he and you are bound, then yes, yes that is brilliance!”
“It’s madness too, don’t you see? Madness is the reason why I am free of any confines they hold me in. I have no idea why I denied myself the luxury of my insatiable psychotica for so long! How I held myself back wearing a mask that was never well-suited for my delicate features! No more, I say! The world will see me as I was always meant to be. Out of the darkness! I am the sun and the worlds and the destroyer!” Leona raised her hands toward the sky calling lighting down again. Andromeda’ stretched her hands back, calling the fire back to the pyre once more.
Leona stared into the flames, sniffing the air.
“I can smell his blood. He’s here, with my sister.” Leona’s eyes went wide with sudden fear. She shot off into the night, moving like a meteorite over the ground. Confused but eager, the Andromeda shot after her.
How inconvenient that she would become aware now at the critical moment when I must have no more complications to gain the upper hand! Leona felt the coolness of Kiara’s blood getting closer, drawing her to the fateful Dark Altar. Her little sister’s soul was waking up, calling out to her from the ground across the years when long ago this happened.
I’m coming awake now, Caroline. Kiara had felt her, too. After all the years of walking in a suspended animation state, she was hovering at the medial line between life and death again.
Leona had reached the edge of her map now. Everything she did moving forward would determine eternity for her and her place in the world. She gritted her teeth and closed her eyes, allowing the madness to saturate her, body and soul.
*****
Chapter 17
Halfway down the path, Kiara gave a cry and collapsed. She busted her chin on a rock. Blood welled up and she laid like a dead thing. Kingsley toppled to his knees, scooping her up.
“What’s wrong? Hey! Hey, it’s me…I’ve got you. You’re okay.” He knew it was a lie. It was selfish and stupid but it made them both feel better. This was a lie they could wallow in and hide hoping that maybe they could escape their hapless end.
“Hey, Doctor. I see you.” Kiara smiled and reached up to him. He smiled back, pulling a small packet of antiseptic wipes out of one of the many pockets his SWAT uniform had.
“Right, you need a doctor. You’ve got one.” He smiled, carefully dabbing the blood away with the stinging wipes. He knew that when she was ready she would tell him what was happening. Whatever she needed, he would give it to her. Even if it meant he had to hack his own heart out of his chest.
Her hand shot up, clutching his wrist. She brought it to her lips and kissed it, taking his pulse by feel against her cheek. She groaned.
“My sister is trying to find a way to circumvent the punishment. Lucia has sent the Andromeda to manipulate her into his trap for his own ends. Even he doesn’t truly wish to abide by the protocol that was instated with my creation. The infatuation with She-Hitler wasn’t over for Lucia when she failed him, I guess.” Kiara broke off coughing, holding up a hand to tell Kingsley she was fine. But he knew that she wasn’t.
“What’s she doing to you? Let me help. I want to help.” Kingsley cradled Kiara as close as he could. It was strange how a ruthless assassin such as he’d known her to be could be his helpless in his arms.
“She’s coming for you, Kingsley. Trying to get inside my mind, trying to stop me from being able to save you! Ach!” Kiara thrashed, writhing like a dying fish on hot coals.
An intense ringing split the night sky. Kingsley shrieked as the pain was like small explosions detonating deep within his brain. Birds fell out of the air like hailstones, pelting his shoulders. Some were dead on arrival and some died with impact. There was a stench like rotting seaweed and a white film began to fall out of the air by droves.
“What is it?! God, what is it?!” Kingsley scratched his skin trying to shake it off. He felt something slam against him and realized that Jessop had made his way backward on the path and was wrapping him in a flame-proofing tarp he always kept handy because of Centralia’s blazing core.
“It’s ectoplasm, man. Thought it was another one of those things science disproved, eh? It’s funny how many babies get thrown out with the bathwater when science ‘disproves’ something by disapproving of it!” Jessop gnashed his teeth, crying out loudly against the spray of the acidic substance. Kingsley shook himself and jostled Jessop.
“Okay, so, what the hell is ectoplasm…really?” Kingsley tossed about like a dying frog. Whatever this stuff was, it burned like acid!
“It’s a chemical barrier that separates our dimension from the Professor’s. The energy barriers—it’s difficult to explain, but there are mirror-barriers, photonic ones, holographic ones, acoustic ones, and so on. These are made from different types of rays like gamma and beta rays, and they partition off dimensions in the universe are rupturing. Hence their chemical cellular walls are shedding. It’s like when you have a skin irritation but it’s the skin
of the sky!” Jessop covered his ears as the shrill ringing began again.
Medusa rolled through the sky then, letting the ectoplasm roll over her naked body like she was only taking a shower. She steamed and flashed many times, reveling in her psychotic breakthrough. Far away, they heard the metallic rattling and creaking of what could only be defined as gates.
“Ah, it’s time. It’s time to pay the piper! Time to pay the piper! I will vanish into the immaterial. I will become like a flame. No one will ever find me!” The Medusa was cackling sadistically, crowing like a bird now, cawing and spitting up large mouthfuls of the steaming chemical spray. She extended her hand, beckoning to Kingsley.
“Time to pay the piper! I have found my atonement. You must make restitution for the crime of unleashing all of this upon the world! Think of your love!” Medusa’s eyes blazed. Thunder rolled far away. The sky was filling with countless Medusa doubles, walking on the steaming seas of flaming gelatin.
Kingsley looked back at Kiara. Her eyes were wide and she choked down her blood. Kingsley shook himself.
“What happens to her if you refuse me again? Come away with me, into the night. You opened up the jar, Pandora Man. Now close it.” Medusa pursed her lips. Golden liquid oozed from them as if she too was breaking through the seals that held the worlds together.
“No! There’s no breaking the protocol, Doctor! It’s me! It has to be me!” Kiara struggled against Kingsley. He was turning. He was deeply considering everything the Medusa was saying, manipulated by her seducing power one more time.
Then Jessop stood up and tossed his head. Electricity shot from the multiple rows of his teeth. The sparks ignited the ectoplasm like it was nothing but crude oil. The Medusa howled as instantly she burst into flame.
“Gift of her crazed science experiments, eh? I know what I’m doing. You never have to fall for her traps again, Doctor Kingsley. Not while I have breath.” Jessop stepped up onto a stone. He looked through the torrents of the plasma and the sudden currents of burning rain that came with it. Nature was turning on itself. The physical laws were disobeying themselves, as if the ostensible external programming that made them what they are was malfunctioning.
“We are going forward to die. Every last one of us,” said Jessop calmly. “Doctor Kingsley, nature made a joke out of us. Now the joke is on nature. We will return to the fibers that make up all life and the balance that is this mysterious universe. The world will be better when we sacrifice our existentialism so that they can be in it.”
Jessop turned to glare at the others to see if they were all on the same page. Slowly, Kingsley rose to his feet. He turned to look at Kiara, gritting his teeth.
“I want to carry you to our Altar.” He held out a hand.
The breath caught in her throat, the tears in her eyes. She nodded and took his hand.
He scooped her off her feet, carrying her like a bride. The sky gurgled and hissed, the air around them becoming viperous and toxic, exploding and yet reviving them with the constant breathable chemical these reactions produced. Without needing to breathe, they were kept alive.
Kingsley closed his eyes. The freezing, searing downpour cut into his bones, excruciating, mixing with the altered senses and neurotransmission of his own body to increase his capacity for pain. Each step would be a greater agony than his last.
Never mind the end of the world, or the need to atone for his actions. Never mind the fact that the energies were breaking and the universe was being totally reinvented. Forsake all the foolishness, life was vanity! Life was meaningless without Kiara Riveaulx!
Here at the end of life as it was known, Lucien Kingsley felt revived. Recreated, reborn, begun anew.
As his old life was stripped away, eaten by ectoplasm and spewed out, he felt his existence rolled up and polished off, cut from the bedrock of the human experience and refined like purest diamond. His life was failure and redemption. She was his redemption.
The curtains of the universe peeled back and now he could see his spirit reflected back on him in burning ribbons of the flesh that’s little fibers fell free of him. His doubles circled him and dissipated. Consciousness and life remained, returned stronger with every bout of dousing heat. His every blood vessel screamed her name. Chanted the mantra of her cause.
He would die and leave his old existence behind. He would follow Kiara into another dimension or several dimensions or even into the blackness of no longer being. They were a universe all their own and kept one another alive by the power of their linked consciousness. Wherever they continued to be or not to be, there was no question. Lucien Kingsley’s soul belonged to Kiara Riveaulx, and to the measures she would have to take to reverse her sister’s madness.
*****
Chapter 18
Leaf thought he had a handle on the pain. When sheets of ectoplasm began to tear through the cerulean vista that covered Florence, his understanding of pain was reimagined.
He screamed as he saw his own reflection scattered throughout the clear spray of lava lamp igniting substance. As Jane seized more control away from the Andromeda and started siphoning it into the collective consciousness, he too began to increase in energy. He was splitting doubles of himself. They were clear, silhouettes only, made of green and blue flames. They moved with the force of Roman legions, catching cars as they hailed down on people. Igniting them midair, the silhouettes breathed the explosions back up into the ectoplasm. The air was wreathed in hurricanes of fire.
“Leaf!” Derek’s voice reverberated off of the gelatin-like chemical as it dripped and splashed, pooling like oil on the streets of the historic city. Leaf moved toward the sound of his voice. In this darkened, flaming world, there was only one anchor.
Derek? Leaf felt the particles that held his mortality together moving and transformed by the ectoplasm, reacting with it in an extreme way that none of the others suffered. As his natural fire consumed it, he was slowly turning to a column of starlight, a form losing its material shape, becoming something else.
“Leaf, follow my voice.” Derek was shifting the earth, making his way through the throng. He tossed his head back, shrieking as lightning tore out of heaven and landed on his tongue. Somewhere far away, both men knew that Jane had reached her goal. She was moving the forces of nature, setting the course of the domino effect that would reverse Leona’s curse upon the world.
Derek’s light had burst through this hazy gauze-like fog for only a fraction of brilliant light. He was gone again as soon as he’d become visible, drowned in the press of this splattering venom. Leaf stretched out both his steaming hands and watched them shaking like reeds in a tornado. Where were the earth and the sky? What shape did reality retain?
Derek, I can’t…Leaf put up his hands to shield his eyes from a bright flash that shot out of the ectoplasm. The antique cobblestones of Florence’s streets shattered like glasswork, swallowing the ectoplasm in flashes.
The earth hung around them like sparks in the wind, small vacuum holes opening in midair and in buildings. It looked as if they were moving through the eye of a nuclear explosion, framed in slow motion, alive somehow long after the blast had rolled over. Either this was the art of dying or their world had also been hung in a suspended animation not natural for it. Leaf wasn’t sure which one scared him more. He couldn’t remember his first death. Was he ready?
Come to me, Leaf. You can.
For all the tremors that rolled through his bones and into the sidewalk, Derek was the only center the world retained. Steady. Steady like water, like mountains. Like all those things that had made the world a tangible entity, a living thing of its own. Leaf remembered life and nature and the world before the poison.
That world had once had a face. A brotherly face. A lightning rod, conducting all the power of life’s meaning back to the same source.
Come on…He wasn’t that far away. Leaf closed his eyes, feeling like salt had been propelled into them. With them closed, he had clearer vision. It looked like he was
standing in the Babylon furnace. Men were walking in it. Men with long, strange white robes.
Professor Lucia stood in the center of the ring. Cyrus Manson stood to his right hand and President Matthews stood to his left. Standing out in front of them, wearing a laurel wreath around his head, was Mr. Fulton.
You think that you have any power to stop the Order? We’ve been building since the time of the Pharaohs, son. Waiting always for the day when we would have a champion, an unlikely prodigy of pure genome that would lead us into a human revolution. Fulton smiled. His face contorted, flickering sparks along the edges of his charcoal smeared, blood-smattering lips.
None of this is real…Leaf pressed his fingers to his temples. He tried to block out the thought by sheer force of will. To no avail. Had this been a vision, then he might have succeeded.
Believe it, kiddo. This is more real than you’ve got any idea it could be. It’s just interdimensional. Transcendent, you might say. Cyrus took a step forward, the flames parting like waves around him long enough for his face to be clearly visible. He smiled and put a hand out to his son.
“Come with me, Leaf. We were a pretty good team when you were younger. We could do this. Who wants to wait for evolution? We could reinvent humanity now!” Cyrus smiled. Leaf’s eyes crossed.
“I’m sorry, but I was a creationist before that. Don’t believe we as humans should monkey with the formula of reality. Want me to back up my argument? Look around you!” Leaf felt tears of pain streaming down his cheeks. For a moment, he could breathe but the pain was touched by the clean air that encompassed his father. He was drowning in his agony. How could he surmount the odds if he could barely maintain the struggle of being?
“You aren’t human anymore, though, are you, son? The Parthenon has been unleashed! You’re a god! Embrace it!” Cyrus smiled. Fulton joined his side.
The Good Death Box Set: A Hard SciFi Science Fiction Series Page 42
