by S. Harrison
“The emotions you’re feeling right now are not mine, Infinity. You care what happens to them!” I shout toward the eyeholes as I crawl along the tether.
“Shut up,” she growls between breaths.
“You’re a better person than you think you are! Deep down you’re good!”
“I said . . . shut the hell up!” she barks, and the waves of guilt are quickly overridden by new and much more turbulent vibrations of anger. I hold on tight as I’m buffeted up and down by the emanations of rage, but Infinity’s defensive protests only serve to prove that somewhere underneath all her stubborn denials . . . she knows that I’m right.
Infinity glances over her shoulder, back the way we came, and Brody is now a tiny figure in the distance behind us. Infinity looks ahead again. “I’m a weapon,” she whispers. “That’s what I was made for; that’s what I am.” She mutters the words in time with her footsteps, like some kind of twisted mantra, as the intensity of the rippling anger reverberating around me begins to settle into a shuddering hum of controlled fury. The whipping of the tendrils thankfully lessens to a degree where I can carry on clawing my way forward, and I shake my head in disappointment at Infinity’s pigheaded stubbornness.
Putting one hand after the other, I look toward my goal, and through those eyeholes I see Infinity scanning along the path into the distance, focusing on the line of cherry trees approaching up ahead.
She slows to a stop, and as I look out her eyes, I can see why. The walkie-talkie that I dropped when Brody and I were being chased by the Lobots lies on the path at her feet. Quietly catching her breath, Infinity bends down and picks up the radio, but as she straightens, I hear a sound rippling through the darkness from her keen ears. It’s a beat, a barely perceptible, far-off thudding noise. I recognize it immediately, and I can tell Infinity does, too, as a feeling of wary anxiety undulates through the void. Those footsteps can only belong to one person. Gazelle. Infinity looks ahead into the distance, toward the corner near the lamppost. Its light is falling across the piles of debris, casting a patchwork of shadows over the pale surface of the promenade. The rhythmical thumping is getting louder and louder.
Infinity scans the areas of light and dark between the broken structures and toppled towers, and the source of the sound, which we were both expecting, is suddenly revealed as Gazelle leaps into view from behind the crumbled facade of a pockmarked building, flying through the air like she has wings on her heels. She thuds against the ground, and clouds of concrete dust billow around her cybernetic feet as she comes to a skidding halt. Infinity focuses directly on her. I gasp with surprise as the view through the peepholes suddenly rushes forward in a blur of colors, zooming in across the distance to the lamppost like Infinity has binoculars built into her skull. Gazelle’s image now fills Infinity’s whole field of vision. I can clearly see her standing in the light, her Lobot-encased head twitching from side to side, the way a wild animal would if it were sniffing the air for its prey.
Gazelle’s attention is piqued, and her head snaps in one definitive direction. Infinity quickly looks in the same direction, and through her binocular vision I see a magnified image of Brody, far in the distance, his overstuffed satchel bouncing against his hip as he jogs along the path toward the door in the hillside. A horrified ripple of realization shudders through Infinity as her view snaps back toward the lamppost. I see Gazelle do a quick half crouch, and then she takes off. Bounding swiftly in long, leaping strides, she goes vaulting over a six-foot-high pile of rubble as easily as I could step over a curb on the street and hits the ground running on the other side, traveling at an inhumanly fast pace.
“Oh no,” Infinity and I both whisper at exactly the same time.
Infinity has been standing in one spot, watching Gazelle from a distance, while poor, clueless Brody has been tripping motion sensors all the way toward the hillside. Gazelle is going to cut him down. Pop his head open with one swift kick of those lethal legs, just like she did to Jennifer.
I want to shout out into the darkness and plead for Infinity to help Brody, but I clearly don’t need to say a word. Waves of panicked concern ripple through the void, and Infinity suddenly bolts into action, taking off like a shot back down the path toward him. Through Infinity’s sensitive ears, I can hear the thuds of Gazelle’s powerful legs on the ground. Infinity glances sideways at her. Through the binocular vision, I can see Gazelle making short work of traversing a sand garden as she crosses it in a couple of bounds and goes flying between two cherry trees and onto the wide expanse of manicured grass that stretches all the way to the base of the hill.
Infinity’s arms blade through the air at her sides, and I can hear the rapid pitter-patter of her shoes against the pavement as the wind whistles past her ears. I thought Infinity was running fast before, but somehow she’s kicked it up into a much higher gear. I can feel the surging determination coursing through her entire body as she sprints back toward the hillside, tracking Gazelle as she goes.
All of a sudden I see the four red Lobot eyes clamped on to Gazelle’s face turn as she glances in our direction. She’s spotted us, and I silently pray that she swerves this way instead, choosing Infinity over Brody, picking on someone her own size and leaving him alone. But my hope is immediately dashed as the red eyes snap forward again, and she resumes her unfaltering line directly toward Brody as he slowly jogs along the path far up ahead.
Gazelle is still at least three hundred yards from him, and the soft grass is muffling her footsteps, so Brody is oblivious to her approach. If he would just look over his shoulder and see her coming, if only he were closer to the door, he might be able to rush inside and hold it shut against Gazelle long enough for Infinity to get there. But wishing for something doesn’t make it so. Brody isn’t looking back, and even though he’s barely thirty seconds away from the door, three hundred yards are a handful of strides for Gazelle. Infinity is pushing herself as hard as she can and running at a blistering pace, but it’s glaringly clear that there’s absolutely no way she’s gonna reach Brody in time.
“I’m almost at the door, Bit,” Brody’s voice says from the radio clutched tightly in Infinity’s palm.
She squeezes the “Talk” button and shouts with heaving breaths, “Brody! Behind you!”
Brody looks back over his shoulder, and his eyes go wide with horror as Gazelle forcefully bounds across the wide expanse of grass toward him. She’s halved the distance in four seconds flat, and in five more strides, she’ll be upon him.
Brody quickly turns and quadruples his pace to the door, as Bit’s voice screeches from the radio. “Finn?! Is that you?! Brody! What’s happening?”
“Finn?” Jonah’s voice issues from the radio. “Are you OK? Finn?”
Grunting with frustration, Infinity throws the walkie-talkie aside and pushes on, but I can tell that this sprint is quickly taking its toll. A steady pace with measured breathing, Infinity can handle, but keeping this sustained and staggeringly high speed up is something entirely different. I’m amazed that Infinity has managed to maintain it for so long, but it’s very clear how much she’s struggling as she begins to slow. She’s gasping for breath, and I can feel her muscles burning with effort as she tries to summon every last scrap of her dwindling energy reserves in a desperate attempt to cover the remaining sixty yards to Brody.
With Brody’s increased pace, he’s only seconds from the door. Through Infinity’s keen ears, I can hear him panting for breath, and through her eyes, I can see his arm reaching out for the handle, fingers splayed, barely inches away from salvation. But it’s too late. Gazelle blazes toward Brody, and with two final thudding strides, she bounds through the air, and I’m filled with agonizing remorse as she whips her leg directly at his head. I’ve seen too many people die today. I simply can’t watch another friend be murdered, and I screw my eyes shut, plunging myself into darkness as the brutally vicious slamming sound of Gazelle’s foot connecting echoes through the void around me.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“Brody!” Infinity bellows into the night. Considering how exhausted she is, the breath it took to call his name could only have been summoned from a place of rage or pain. But the anger and sorrow of loss are not what I feel rippling all around me. Instead, the emotion surging forth from Infinity is one of overwhelming and absolute . . . relief.
I open my eyes, and what I see through Infinity’s view instantly causes me to share her emotion. Whether Brody saw Gazelle out of the corner of his eye at the last conceivable moment or ducked out of the way with a hearty dose of pure, dumb luck, I guess I’ll never know, but right now I really don’t care how it happened, because all that matters is that he’s alive. With his hand reaching up and clutching the door handle, Brody is squatting in a low crouch, with Gazelle’s foot solidly wedged in the metal door just above him. If he were standing, Brody’s head would have exploded like a piñata, but instead he’s gulping air, staring at Infinity in disbelief as she runs toward him.
With less than twenty yards to go, Infinity’s binocular vision snaps back to normal. She’ll be by Brody’s side in only a few short seconds, but up ahead I see Gazelle perform a deft one-footed jump with her free leg and slam her left sole against the door. Her trapped limb quickly wrenches from the hole with a squealing scrape of metal against metal, and she thuds onto her back on the pavement.
Infinity thrusts her hand out, pointing in warning as she shouts to alert Brody. “Look out!” Gazelle kicks into the air, her whole body flipping up into a standing position as Brody quickly leaps up and tries to pull the door open to get inside. With a lightning-fast side kick, Gazelle’s left leg shoots out, slamming it shut again, yanking the handle from Brody’s hand. Deftly hopping from one foot to the other, she unleashes a vicious roundhouse kick at Brody’s head.
He ducks again, but this time he dives as well, and Gazelle’s right foot barely misses the top of his skull once more as he oafishly rolls in an uncoordinated tumble and comes to rest in an undignified heap right at Infinity’s feet.
Brody scrambles around behind Infinity as Gazelle turns to face her. Infinity stands loosely, with her hands on her hips, wheezing for air. She’s absolutely exhausted and in no condition to fight. In stark contrast Gazelle’s stance is solid and strong. Both hands are balled into fists, and everything about her aggressive posture screams that she’s ready to fight to the death. All of that, combined with the Lobot attached to her head like a parasitic helmet, makes for a very intimidating sight.
But something doesn’t quite add up. The Lobot’s legs and tendrils are wrapped around Gazelle’s chin and throat, and the rest of its body has folded over her head, but under the four glowing red circles that cover Gazelle’s actual eyes, the lower half of her face, from the bridge of her nose down to her chin, is completely exposed. That’s what doesn’t match. Her body says kill, but her trembling lips and the tears streaming down her cheeks tell an entirely different story.
“Hello? Is someone there?” she whispers feebly. “If . . . if someone is there, please . . . help me.” Poor Caitlin is trapped inside her own body, powerless against the Lobot. Turning your friends or comrades against you is bad enough, but hearing the desperation in their voices as they’re forced to murder you is an evil gouged from the hellish depths of a twisted mind. The people who designed and made those brain spiders are a bunch of sick bastards.
Gazelle raises her fists, and a still-panting Infinity grabs the satchel tightly in her fist as she lifts the strap over her head with the other hand, freeing her up to fight.
“Help,” Gazelle sobs as tears drip from her chin.
Gazelle shifts her footing into a combat posture, clearly getting ready to dash and kick with those formidable skull-crushing weapons she calls legs.
I can feel Infinity’s rapidly beating heart slow to a crawl, as if she’s willing it to do so. I can’t feel any fear or apprehension from her at all as she takes a huge breath in through her nose and releases it, gathering the meager dregs of her remaining energy into one single concentrated point of explosive power. Unlike her, nervous tension is coursing through every fiber of me. Only a few seconds have passed, but it feels like Infinity and Gazelle have been staring each other down forever. I clutch tightly to the tether in the void, waiting with bated breath for the moment—
Suddenly Infinity whips her right hand up, throwing the satchel hard at Gazelle’s head. Infinity takes two quick steps and leaps directly after it, twisting her body into a rapid rotation as she sails toward Gazelle. Gazelle quickly raises her hands to swat the satchel aside, but her eye line is momentarily blocked, and that’s exactly what Infinity was counting on. She spins a full 720 degrees and lashes out with her leg, unleashing her gathered energy in one savage burst as she brutally pounds Gazelle in the stomach with the heel of her foot.
The vicious kick folds Gazelle in half, and she flies backward and crumples to the ground. The whole flawless maneuver was executed so quickly that the satchel hasn’t even hit the pavement when Infinity lands back on her feet in a fighting stance with her fists held out in front of her.
The heavy fatigue that Infinity had banished immediately returns like a weighted cloud, filling every corner of her body. Her heart starts drumming in her chest again as she sways unsteadily on her feet, heaving huge lungfuls of air. She gave everything she had to that one kick. But it certainly did the trick. Gazelle lies on her back, and a gurgling cough lurches from her throat as a mouthful of vomit globs from her lips and creeps down the side of her face like milky oatmeal. This fight is done.
Infinity looks over her shoulder at Brody. He’s still sitting on the ground, and he smiles up at her. “I knew you wouldn’t leave,” he says.
Infinity is still too breathless to speak, so she just shakes her head and smiles back at him.
Suddenly Brody’s eyes go wide. “Infinity,” he says anxiously, staring in Gazelle’s direction.
Infinity quickly looks back at Gazelle, and genuine surprise courses through her, and me, as we both watch Gazelle slowly getting to her feet. A blow like the one Infinity delivered would easily incapacitate anyone; that should’ve been the end of it. But apart from the smear of puke and the grimace of misery on the lower half of her face, Gazelle is standing there as if nothing happened at all.
Suddenly two sharp four-inch-long spikes erupt from Gazelle’s knees, poking holes through the skintight black material of her uniform. More spikes begin snapping forth, piercing through the fabric in three long rows, all the way down each of her shins. A sickening knot grips my stomach as the alarming new development is topped off by two six-inch blades that flick into position from the front of each of Gazelle’s robotic feet. Jonah may have recruited her to be a Savior, but the weaponized features of Gazelle’s legs definitively reveal her past as a lethal covert operative.
“Please, someone . . . help me,” Gazelle pleads meekly, but her will is not her own, and her body charges forward and springs into the air. Gazelle’s powerful leg swipes at Infinity.
Infinity leans backward as quickly as she can, but her energy is spent. It’s making her slow, and the tip of one of the blades slices a small cut in her neck.
Gazelle plants the flying foot on the ground and skillfully pivots as her other leg kicks straight out behind her.
Infinity tries to fend off the attack and divert Gazelle’s foot, but this is no ordinary human leg she’s dealing with, and Infinity’s tactic is completely ineffective as the blow pummels into the lower left region of her rib cage. It’s like getting hit by a battering ram, and the awful sound of crunching and snapping precedes the agony of broken bones skewering into flesh. It’s in that very moment the searing pain brutally reminds me that those ribs also belong to me, and I scream out into the void as warning tones of injury peal and echo through Infinity’s head.
Infinity is thrown onto the ground, clutching at her side. Gazelle advances to finish the job, and I can feel the void grow heavier and thicker as Infinity tries to focus her concentration
on healing the damage that’s been done, but she’s clearly having trouble focusing, because nothing is being fixed.
“Let me out! I can heal us!” I call into the void. I don’t know how I can do it; all I know is that something unlocked in my head after I woke up in Dr. Pierce’s lab. Now, unlike Infinity, the healing happens for me without thinking, like how I can solve complex math equations by feeling the right places to put the numbers, without having to formulate at all.
“Let me out!” I call again, but either Infinity doesn’t hear me or the stubborn bitch is ignoring me just like before.
Running on pure adrenaline and survival instinct, she scrambles backward across the pavement and onto the grass. I can’t see Brody from Infinity’s view; all I’m focused on is Gazelle as she gets closer and closer, but I lose sight of her when Infinity flips over onto her knees and pushes against the ground in a desperate attempt to stand. I hear the sound of movement and see the flicker of a shadow, and then there’s a heavy, pounding thud as Gazelle’s left foot stomps onto the back of Infinity’s hand, pulverizing it into the dirt.
Pain and alarms wail all around me, but they suddenly erupt into real and blinding agony as Gazelle’s right knee slams into Infinity’s back, the four-inch spike impaling her body, our body, right through the shoulder blade. I scream out into the darkness as deafening chimes of damage throng inside the void.
Infinity is trapped beneath the weight of Gazelle’s legs. She can’t move, and the darkness around me rocks like an earthquake tremor as I feel Gazelle punch Infinity hard in the back of the head. A pounding shock of vibration shudders all around me as Gazelle lands another fist onto Infinity’s skull. The void shakes violently again from another savage impact, and all of a sudden the consistency of the dark changes from thick molasses to invisible vapor as the view from Infinity’s eyeholes dims and flickers. She’s losing consciousness. If that happens, we’re dead.
