“I do this for love.”
She said that a lot.
“Let go, let it wash over you…”
That was another good one, whatever it meant.
“Torment is something to be experienced, understood, in its purest form. Only then will you conquer it.”
Red couldn’t quite grasp that one. She had brought him to the limits of most traditional forms of torture, just shy of killing him, and he was convinced she was still not satisfied with the results. The first few times he had almost broken, he had foolishly entertained the thought that, surely, it was enough. Whatever her intentions, surely she had inflicted enough on him to achieve whatever sinister objectives raged through her diseased mind. But each time, she simply muttered in disappointment and had resumed her work.
This time, she laid down her tools with a sigh and folded her arms upon his bloody chest, resting her head on them playfully.
“This really would proceed much faster if you stopped fighting it, you know.”
His eye had nearly swollen shut, but he forced it open a crack to glare at her.
“Oh sure,” he wheezed. “I’m a…real…trooper…not dying…on you…yet…”
“No, love,” she said, pouting. “Not death, not ever, not for you. I mean you’re resisting. You’re still fighting the pain, still keeping it away. We will never get anything done without it.” She leaned forward, and Red felt something cold and edged brush against his cheek. He steeled himself, expecting a fresh onslaught of slow mutilation, but Doppelgaenger only chuckled.
“No, no,” she cooed. “That wasn’t my knife, silly boy. Just a keepsake from the man you beheaded a couple of days ago.” She leaned back and caught the pendant that swung from her neck. Her eyes lingered on it, appreciating how it gleamed in the stark glare of the overhead spotlight. “Vesuvianite gemstone, not uncommon in Hungary, though they’re usually not this rich shade of green; like jade, wouldn’t you say? He once told me he loved me too, you know. I thought I felt the same. It was a different time, and we were young. All that we did, all that we shared…it’s hard to believe how little I feel for him now. But at least there is a little, enough to dig up this small bauble, a memento of a different time, and wear it in his memory.”
She chuckled. “Bela once told me it was the focus of all his magic, and that if I wore it close to my heart, I would carry him with me. He told me if I gazed long enough through it, I could catch a glimpse of my future. I thought I was wise to the ways of the world, but at the time I really was a naive child. But who knows? He was the magician, not me. Perhaps there is something to it.” She leaned forward, and let the pendant brush against Red’s cheek again. “Have a look, my darling. Tell me what you see.”
Red forced his eye to open again, and glared at her.
“I see…” he coughed, and began again. “I see…my hands…ripping your head off…”
“Typical Djinni bravado.” She shook her head, disappointed. “Your feelings are understandable. I have been inflicting a lot of suffering on you. But could you do it? Really? It’s just us here, you know. You can be honest with me. It wouldn’t be the first time. I’m still the girl who, in the midst of some truly memorable nights, you bared your soul to. You remember? Sometimes it was almost religious, like we were taking turns in a confessional. And the thing of it was, we each knew the other wasn’t spinning some tall tale to impress. We were hearing truth. Our pasts…they betrayed how kindred we are. We understood. And we forgave each other and…oh! It was like I finally had met someone where that connection was just fated to happen, someone who had experienced the same loss, the same sacrifice, who had been so utterly betrayed by this horrific world…”
She paused to lay a hand on his chest, carefully avoiding his exposed heart. “You felt it, I know you did. What we shared…you can honestly say you could kill me? Even now, that you wouldn’t even hesitate? I’m still her. I’m still your Mel…”
“You’re…” Red coughed again, and almost choked before he spat out a mouthful of blood. “You’re not Mel.”
“You’re right,” Doppelgaenger nodded. “I’m really not. Would you like to know my name? My given name?”
“I…could…care less…”
“Karoline,” Doppelgaenger offered. “My name was Karoline Shäfer. I was born in the small hamlet of Riedering near Munich in 1908. I was a German spy following the Great War, a Nazi meta-warrior in the next and I have experienced more in my days than you could ever imagine. Except love. You, Red Djinni, are my sole link to love. And I tire of this, of waiting for you. If you will not submit to it freely, then you force my hand. Before, I desired nothing more than your body, and its potential. Now, I have a dream of us, of us walking this existence together, as one. And I will have it, even if I must force it upon you.”
She lifted herself off him, bounding to her feet and landing next to a trolley lined with hypodermic needles. She ran her fingers along them and selected one, seemingly at random. She turned back to Red, the needle held high, and approached him slowly.
“This is a cocktail of various muscle relaxants, a few neuronal suppressants and one very powerful drug that’s sometimes used to encourage the truth by unskilled interrogators. At this dose, it isn’t widely used, as it tends to cause cardiac arrest in most victims. On metas, especially one as physically robust as you, it might cause some mild discomfort, minor arrhythmias at best. However, it will completely abolish any sense of willpower you have left to muster.”
Red stared at her in horror.
“That’s right, Red,” she said. “You fought it well, but I need you to feel the pain now. All of it.”
Red began to thrash about, struggling madly against his restraints, but she ignored his attempts and plunged the syringe down into his heart. He froze, staring down at his chest as she pressed gingerly down on the plunger.
And then, he began to scream.
Doppelgaenger withdrew the needle and stepped away, out of the light.
“Heal, my darling,” she sighed. “Heal, and feel every exquisite moment of it. Heal, and we can begin anew.” And there, in the shadows, as she watched him writhe and shriek in complete agony, she began to sing.
“Meine Natur, ich kann halt lieben nur. Und sonst gar nichts…”
* * *
Somehow, he had robbed her of her will, and with it any ability she had of suppressing the pain.
His allies had left hours ago. She had given them what they wanted—the location of four safe houses, the identities of a handful of sleeper agents, and where she had hidden a few of their documents, stolen in a lucky turn of events that week during a rather dull charity ball for the Művészek Társaságának, hosted by Prime Minister Gömbös himself. They had taken it all, and she found herself almost giddy in the thrill of handing it over to them. Whatever Bela asked of her, she was happy to oblige, and more. She would do anything for this man, and each service she performed for him only heightened the anticipation of the next.
So she was somewhat surprised when he returned her to the stone slab. She didn’t see why it was necessary. Her will was his now. Whatever he wished for, she would gladly provide. She strained to watch as he tested the restraints. Her expression was one of curiosity as he opened his leather satchel and began to remove his surgical tools.
“What are you doing, beloved?” she had asked.
“Our work is done, my dear,” Bela had answered, his fingers twitching in excitement. “I believe I have earned something of a reward for my efforts. I have arranged it so that we will not be disturbed. It will just be us, for the time being.”
“Oh, wonderful!” she gushed. “What do you have planned for us, my love?”
“For me,” he grunted, wincing as he tightened her restraints, “and not so much for you. Though you will require your mind back for this.” He raised a clenched fist, muttered a few words, and let his fingers fly apart with a flash of light.
Karoline shook her head in confusion, as if awakening from
a long slumber.
“Why are you doing this?” she asked, her voice small and trembling. “What more do I have to give? I have already given you everything.”
Bela reached down, grasped her hair and pulled back, hard. She cried out, and grimaced as he pressed his face into her neck.
“Not everything,” he whispered, running his lips along the nape of her neck, and resting them just above her ear. “Sometimes, magic can be a crutch. A useful tool, when time is of the essence, but a bit of a cheat, I’ll admit. I haven’t seen the extent of you, or your mettle. I haven’t experienced everything there is to you, my beautiful Doppelgaenger, that can be hurt…damaged…broken. Perhaps there are parts of you that cannot be broken. The thought of it intrigues me. The mission was to learn everything you knew, and I’ve done that. Now, this time is for me. I wish to learn everything else about you.”
Karoline stared at him in confusion, and then in horror as he held up a scalpel to the light. He turned it over in his hand, admiring it, and peered thoughtfully down at her.
“I wonder,” he mused. “I wonder how long before the pain becomes familiar to you. Will you continue to scream? Or will you accept it, even embrace it, as one would an old friend? Let’s find out. Together.”
* * *
At some point, Red realized he had stopped screaming. He opened his eye, and saw her lay a bloody surgical circular saw down on a trolley. The pain was everywhere, yet it seemed muted, manageable somehow, and for the first time in what seemed like forever, he was conscious of his own breathing, of his surroundings, and he shuddered in relief. He couldn’t tell what she had been doing and looked down at himself. He couldn’t help it. He saw parts of him exposed, things he really shouldn’t have been able to see, with peculiar probes inserted here and there, each connected by insulated wire to an odd device that looked like a cluster of Tesla towers erupting in a multitude of directions from a common point of origin. Arcs of electricity danced across its surface, and he let his head fall back, closing his eye.
“You going to tell me what that thing does?” he croaked, and shuddered again as a million points of pain erupted again throughout his spent husk.
“Does it really matter?” she asked, and he felt a fresh sense of alarm as she climbed on top of him. “I promised you a few truths. Here’s a good one. Didn’t you wonder how, all of a sudden, Jensen was able to unearth a key piece of evidence to put you away? His investigations were taking a tad too long, and I had a schedule to keep. A little anonymous nudge here and there got him looking in the right spot. It solved a couple of problems. You were getting that look in your eye, like you were ready to bolt. Needed to lock you down, and it didn’t hurt that the video evidence pretty much shattered whatever reputation you had earned since your arrival at ECHO. I suppose it was too much to ask for everyone to have given up on you, but it certainly made them hesitate. That was really all I needed. A little time, enough to get you here, alone, abandoned.”
She leaned back, shifting her weight from his groin to his nearly dismembered legs. “Here’s another one. I didn’t choose you, Red. We were meant for each other. Did you never recognize more than a passing resemblance between our abilities? Shapeshifting is hardly a common meta-power now, is it? Granted, you believed your ability lies just in your skin, but recently you’ve been experiencing new facets of it, things that go deeper, like your new and remarkable healing ability. We all seem to have heightened healing to some degree, but yours goes far beyond any that I’ve seen. Did you never wonder where it came from? The Masters call it ‘Adaptive Advancement.’ As a meta-powered being evolves by experience, by necessity, it can call upon reserves to rise to new levels. Usually this process is slow, as abilities begin to ramp up when needed. Some begin with heightened abilities, far above their peers. Your ECHO ranks this in quaint Op levels. Some beings come into new powers, new abilities, through outside means. Take Bull, for example. His new enhanced skeleton is quite an upgrade, but that was mostly through Bella. Very few metahumans actually experience a sudden, eruptive blossoming of meta-talent, taking something relatively mundane and catapulting them to near godlike heights of power.”
“I’m guessing you did,” Red muttered.
“I did,” she nodded. “I didn’t begin so different from you. It took a man who tortured me, who took me to the very limits of human endurance, to open that door. Unending, searing and indescribable pain, coupled with the unforgivable torment of being nothing more than someone else’s plaything…it was the final stage. Pure helplessness, less than a puppet, really. I was nothing. And I knew it. That is what you will be for me, now. You will be nothing to me, to be used and tormented and thrown aside afterwards. How you must feel, how you will feel, I remember it like it was yesterday. You will feel everything. Know that I won’t stop; there is nothing I won’t do, until you understand what I went through, that day.”
“But it…doesn’t make sense,” Red croaked. “Why me? If we’re so much the same…why not someone…different? What can…I give you…?”
She favored him with a thoughtful look. “Everyone has a counterpart,” she continued. “All the stories point to it. One meta appears, another pops up with just enough to make the fight a challenge. There is balance in this, and the Masters do love a show, don’t they? There are no coincidences here. We were given these gifts for a reason. But the Masters can’t control everything, can they? Sometimes, repetitions come into play, and I’ve suspected something for much of my life. That my counterpart will bring me completion, will bring me something that everyone, even the Masters, have searched for since time immemorial. We are destined to be the first, Red, to join as one, because we are kindred souls with kindred abilities. Alone, we are just two warriors on opposing sides, doing battle for the amusement of others. Together, I believe the synergy will be immaculate. I believe we might become immortal.”
“Immortal,” Red gasped.
“Yes.”
“Together forever.”
“Yes.”
“Yeah…you can kill me now.”
“That would be such a waste,” she tutted. “After all this time, all this effort, to snuff out your potential now. When I first laid eyes on you, I knew it. The long wait was over. Everyone else had their counterpart, it seemed, except me. Eisenfaust had Yankee Doodle, Ubermensch had Red Saviour, Valkyria had Dixie Belle…but where was mine? It hardly seemed fair. When I saw you, I knew it had finally come. You were my destiny. And unlike the others, I had a way to truly make you mine. Of course, you weren’t ready. You are, I think, on the cusp of it, finally. Just a nudge or two more and we will see the Djinni rise.”
“I don’t…I don’t think you want that,” Red muttered. He turned his head to her, and marked her with a hate-filled glare. “You asked me before if I could do it. If I could end you, without hesitation. Just give me the chance, and I won’t stop until I put you down.”
“I’m counting on it,” she mused. “If nothing else, it should be a notable fight. I doubt anyone is watching this part. With the exception of a few quotable battle cries, the Masters do not have an appetite for dialogue. They prefer straight-up violence. And as much as I hate it sometimes, it does pay to stay high in the ratings.”
“Masters…” Red groaned. “You keep mentioning them. Who are they?”
“All in good time,” Doppelgaenger said with a smile. “If things go well, you will meet them all, perhaps even come to know a few as friends. I know a few who would love to meet you. You’ve become a bit of a favorite yourself this past year. You do have a way of getting yourself into horrific battles, being beaten to a pulp, but usually coming out on top. Some of them remember a time they could relate.”
“So good of you to want to share me…” Red grunted.
“Oh no, my love,” she said. “Make no mistake. You will be mine, and just mine. But I will offer you another truth. Before this is done, you will be offered a choice—to join me. It may not seem like it now, but I think you will want to. You w
ill experience something no other living thing has, except for me. So when I say that our…perspective…may change in that moment, trust that I am speaking from experience. Certain things, small things, won’t seem as important anymore.”
She lifted herself off him and began to sing as she gathered her implements together.
“Again with that stupid song…” Red snarled. “Whoever told you that you could sing must have been the most tone-deaf, polka-lovin’…”
“It’s a song from my youth,” she said, dismissing his scorn. “It translates poorly to English, I’m afraid, though one line does rather shine through. ‘Meine Natur, ich kann halt lieben nur…und sonst gar nichts.’”
“My nature,” Red murmured. “I can only love, and nothing else…”
“Very good,” she grinned, her eyes still focused on her tools. “I used to think it meant something else, that my only role was as the seductress, the trickster, the spy. And then I met you, and things changed…I changed. Before, it was for power, for domination. Now, I do this, and everything, for love. For you. I will have it all, and I will have you. Forever.”
She turned back to him.
“But first, you will have to understand. You will have to know, just how little you are.”
Her device sent fresh and mounting currents of pain coursing throughout his body. Red barely noticed as she mounted him again, riding him, writhing…he tried to look away, squeezing his eye shut and turning his head as far as he could against the restraints. She didn’t let him. With one hand, she snapped his head back and pried his eyelid apart, forcing him to look at her.
“You are nothing!” she cried. “You are mine! Powerless! Scream your terror, your frustration! All that you are, everything you ever held precious is gone now! From now, to the end of days, this is all that you will know! Forever mine! Forever mine! Forever…!”
* * *
“…mine! Forever mine! Forever mine!”
She didn’t even realize he had finished as his words faded away with his exhaustion. The pain persisted, he had even increased it somehow. But it was nothing to her now. He had taken her to the limit, and the endless agony had robbed her of any sense of feeling. She was numb to it all. All that was left, the one thing that could possibly remain, was a sense of self, but even that was slipping away.
Avalanche: Book Five in the Secret World Chronicle Page 42
