Figures are depicted in multiple scenes – a man and woman sit amongst clouds, winged cherubs surround them, looking on them adoringly. Another painting depicts men at war, the man from before watching from the skies above. Another panel showing the destruction of the world, the man and woman, the only survivors. They appear in the neighbouring panel, surrounded by three children, one with small beady eyes – Ari realising this must be Eli and perhaps the other two are his siblings? Watching from above the family, a green-blue snake with silvery scales consuming its own tail.
Ornate chandeliers of gold, silver and crystal hang throughout, positioned along the walls on both sides and centre of the painted ceiling. The walls are decorated with old tapestries from hundreds of years ago. Amongst them hangs a mirror gilded in gold, standing from floor to ceiling.
As Ari passes, she catches a glimpse of her outfit and suddenly feels ridiculous. Her buzz cut seems out of place with her dinner-dress of a cream and gold corset, burnt orange flutter sleeves and skirt in folds and folds of silk. Underneath she still wears her tattered brown boots.
She is led down a curved staircase down to a vast foyer. Ari is amazed to find the ceilings to be even higher in here than the hall above. A colossal chandelier with crystals casting dancing rainbows around the room, hangs in the centre. The floors are shiny Carrera marble, so rare to see nowadays, being a stone that has not existed in nature for hundreds of years. Green marble pillars enclose the foyer, carrying the vast ceiling above. The pair continue on to a room just beyond, and Ari is startled by what she finds.
‘Arielle!’ Eli exclaims with glee, ‘I am so glad you could make it. Please,’ he gestures to an empty chair at the long dining table he sits at, ‘have a seat.’
Chapter FIFTEEN
Justin and Maude have finally arrived at The Eastern Graveyard of The Rebuplique after two days of non-stop trekking beneath the earth.
Night has fallen over The City, and as they dodge the spotlights, they creep through the darkness, blending into the shadows, hoods and masks hiding their identities. They come across a white delivery truck, back doors open, as an unmanned forklift unloads the pallets. The driver of the truck stands a few metres away, talking to one the Graveyards Elite Guards.
Maude climbs into the driver’s seat and almost chuckles to herself as she finds the keys in the ignition. As she starts the truck, Justin hurls himself into the back, shooting his arrows into the Elite Guard and truck drivers chests.
Finding a white coat and baker-boy hat in the seat adjacent hers, Maude removes her mask and transforms herself into the truck driver, whilst continuing to drive at full speed towards the exit. The licence plate is scanned on exiting, and the boom gates to The Graveyard dissolve into thin air as the truck moves through.
Justin climbs from the back of the truck into the front seat next to Maude, and as they pass the first checkpoint, before they know what has hit them, the Elite Guards are down, arrows sticking up from their chests.
The same happens with the next checkpoint and the truck continues racing towards the city centre.
The Republique’s dilapidated buildings on the outskirts come in to view and as they hear the sirens of the Elite Guard patrol vehicles whining in the distance, Maude parks the truck in a dingy alleyway. She and Justin hop out, weapons in tow and blend back under the veil of night.
◆◆◆
‘I’m so glad you could make it,’ Eli says again to Arielle, ‘Have a seat.’
Ari is speechless but slowly takes the seat, set out for her by the servant-girl. Sitting across from her in two cylindrical tanks with green-yellow fluid are two brains. Multiple wires and tubes hang from the tanks.
‘Meet my parents,’ Eli clarifies, pointing to the tanks, as his floating chair moves around the front of the dining table. ‘Mother dearest,’ he says pointing to the tank on the right, which Ari notices houses the smaller brain, ‘and father,’ Eli points to the tank on the left. Ari looks sideways to the servant-girl who now stands to her right, trying to understand what is happening and how this character in front of her can be so nonchalant about his parents’ brains on his dining table, but the girl keeps staring blankly ahead. ‘Will you not greet them,’ Eli asks, offended.
‘Um..,’ Ari is not sure what to say, or where to look, ‘Nice to meet you two.’
Eli smiles and returns to the head of the table, apparently satisfied with Ari’s greeting. ‘You look lovely,’ he compliments her, as he returns to the head of the table.
Ari looks down at her dress and hesitates, ‘Thank you?’ She feels utterly confused with everything that has happened and realises escape is going to be much harder than she first thought.
Another girl enters the dining hall, plates of food floating on hover-trays ahead of her. As she sets down the trays, Ari looks up and is surprised to find the same face of the other girl looking back at her. No, not exactly the same, Ari appreciates, her face is slightly rounder and her eyes slightly wider. After serving Ari and Eli the plates of food, the girl takes her place, standing near Ari’s left side, and stares blankly ahead.
‘So,’ Eli starts with a mouth full of roast pheasant, ‘You’re probably wondering why you are here.’
Ari shakes her head, ‘No, not exactly.’
‘Oh?’ Eli is intrigued to hear Ari’s reason for her capture.
‘I know you want me to work with your family and your army.’
Eli laughs a high-pitched laugh, ‘No, no. That was the plan my siblings had some years ago. But not me, no. Instead, you will be my pet. I need to complete my collection, you see?’ Ari does not respond, as she pushes the vegetables around on her plate with a fork. ‘My siblings did not agree with my hobby,’ Eli resumes, ‘So I had to take care of them.’ Ari swallows nervously, glancing towards the brains before her, which Eli sees. ‘What? Oh no,’ he laughs again, ‘I didn’t do anything to my parents. Unless, you say keeping them alive for eternity as doing something.’ He takes another bite of the pheasant, ‘No they were so old, and decided the best way to keep on living is to keep their brains alive and download their consciousness into the data-stream, rather than go on living like those corpses in The Republique. And when we acquire new bodies for them, I will replace those brains with their own.’
Feeling like she might vomit, Ari pushes her plate away, ‘So why am I here?’
‘Don’t you understand,’ Eli cries, ‘you have Healing powers. You will help me get better, you will continue to keep my parents and myself alive forever.’
‘And your hobby?’ Ari asks, feeling queasy.
‘Well,’ Eli says with glee, ‘I’m trying to collect all those like you.’
‘There are more people like me?’ Ari cannot believe that she and her sister are not alone.
‘Not Healers, like you and your sister,’ Eli responds and Ari feels her heart sink, as she realises Eli knows about her sister, ‘but other powerful beings.’
He gestures towards the two girls standing either side of Ari. ‘Beings like my dearest Mei Ling and Ai-Ling, who can cultivate the earth. What you eat has been created by my lovely Ai-Ling.’
Ari looks down at the colourful vegetables and thigh of pheasant on her plate then looks to Ai-Ling and Mei-Ling, astonished these two girls have the ability to produce food like the in The New World.
‘Impressive, isn’t it,’ Eli nods. ‘Especially with half the world still poisoned with radiation.’
He pauses and looks at Ari before continuing, ‘so what do you say? If you agree to become part of my collection, I will let you roam the Palace freely. If not, well, you end up back downstairs.’
Not wanting to endure being alone and unable to move, she agrees to his deal, thinking she might be able to learn the secrets of this place and find an escape.
Eli smiles his slimy grin, beady eyes lighting up at Ari’s agreement. ‘Excellent. Excellent.’
◆◆◆
Justin and Maude have finally made it through The Republique sewers to the Cha
vez’s Weapons Factory and Distribution Centre. The two figures cloaked in darkness, climb out of the sewer and onto the deserted street.
Just a few kilometres away, sitting by the Mantaro River close to the Western wall of The City, is a grey-brown building with a matching dome, half hidden in fog. A glass dome of greenery flanks either side of the vast structure. Justin and Maude make it to the security gate outside, almost invisible to the naked eye, but revealed by a slight shift in the items behind it – almost like static. Two panels flank either side of the gate, to be accessed at exactly the same time by The Weapons Factory employees, by retinal scan. Above are numerous small-sized cameras looking out to the city beyond. Maude points a scrambler – a tiny black device attached to her right wrist – in the direction of the security cameras to scramble their footage.
Taking up their positions by the security panels, the two assassins take out a monitor the size of their palms, from their cloak pockets. They connect the monitor to the panel by a black wire and after glancing at each other once, they flick a switch on the device and a bright light shoots forward, scanning each assassin’s eyes at the exact same time. Having overridden the retinal scanner with the hand-held device, the gate dissolves into the surrounding thick air. Looking around them one last time, Justin and Maude move quickly forwards, before the gate can come to life again. Maude clicks her scrambler device once more to reset the cameras to normal and then continue up the concrete path to the Weapons Factory.
Crouching, they keep close to the manicured hedges lining the way. Before long, they arrive at the left side of the brick building. Keeping close to the wall, to avoid the cameras, they move to the side stairwell – a galvanized structure – loosely bolted to the brick wall. Swiftly and without hesitation the assassins hurry up the metal stairs, lightly without a sound, and arrive at the heavy metal door at the landing.
Justin connects his hand-held monitor to the security panel to the right side of the door, scans his eye and he and Maude silently slip inside. The building is eerily dark. Maude opens the map to the Weapons Factory, clicking on the tiny black device on her right wrist. The Weapons Factory floor plan, in three dimensions, a blue glow of floors and walls, in miniature, now floats above Maude’s wrist.
‘This is the main office, where Madame Chavez should be. Her second in charge will be in this office, next door,’ she points to two square structures on the map.
‘The ballistic missiles sit below ground, here,’ she points to the basement, ‘and the two floors above – hand-held weapons. If be place the C4 at each of these pillars, it’ll undermine the whole structure of the Factory and bury this place in the dirt.’
After convening on their plan one last time, the two assassins continue on, moving across the metal walkway lining the outer rim of the factory wall, top floor.
Justin peers into the darkness, barely able to see more than a meter in front of him. He can’t help but feel this Factory is too quiet and should be abuzz with activity of the Elites’ servants and Sub-Elite guards keeping watch.
‘Something isn’t right,’ he whispers to Maude, who is close behind him.
Maude nods, though it is too dark to be seen, ‘I agree. I thought we would’ve come across some trouble by now. I was looking forward to kicking some ass.’
Justin cracks open a glow-light and the scene of terror before them is revealed.
Chapter SIXTEEN
‘What the hell?’ Justin cannot believe the scene his eyes were adjusting to.
Below them, lit up in the blue glow of the glow-light, are The Elite guards, piled one on top of each other, slaughtered at the hands of an unknown foe. Many have gashes so deep across their throats, the blood spilled now barely dried. Others have arrows sticking out over the left side of their chests. Some have laser-point holes between their eyebrows, eyes staring vacantly ahead.
Justin and Maude jump down from the walkway to the ground below and survey the gory scene. Amongst the bodies, Justin notices there are no commoners.
‘What happened here?’ Maude whispers into the darkness.
Justin shakes his head as he approaches a pile of dead bodies, heaped against a conveyor belt, which continues to move with a quiet hum.
‘It seems they’ve been killed in ways to make it look like somehow we were involved.’
‘How do you mean?’ Maude approaches another pile of bodies by the other side of the conveyer belt, examining how they met their grisly demise.
‘I use arrows, mostly,’ Justin explains. ‘You- your sniper gun, Xavier his double blades and Guy his daggers. Each of these Guards died by one of these means.’
‘So someone is trying to frame us?’ Maude looks up ahead, along the hall where the office to Madame Chavez and her second in charge should be.
‘I mean, we did mean to kill them all, but, why would someone do this? It kind of takes all the fun out it.’
‘The weapons,’ Justin says, more to himself, ‘They must’ve come for the weapons.’
‘Who?’ Maude looks around. ‘Who would kill and steal from Elites?’
‘No idea,’ Justin admits.
He and Maude move onwards down the hall towards the office of Madame Chavez. The door is already open, and as he looks down, he sees a trail of blood on the floor leading away from the large mahogany desk to a smaller metal door to the back of the room.
Justin follows the trail of blood. He opens the door, to reveal Madame Chavez’s second in charge, hands bound behind his back, laying on the floor of the closet, throat slit, blood seeping into the deep blue carpet.
Maude clicks her tongue. ‘Wow, seems like Edgar got what was coming to him.’
In his right hand, Justin finds a crumpled piece of paper. He unfolds it to finds words scrawled in a hurry: It is an Uprising – H. Chavez taken, weapons taken. Project La Vie breached. We will all perish at his hands.
‘Project La Vie?’ Maude looks to Justin, who shrugs back in return.
‘It looks like our theory of the weapons being stolen was correct,’ Justin says quietly. ‘Whoever did this, wanted to make it look like we were involved. Probably to continue The Elites eyes on The Underground as an enemy, whilst they continue to work behind the scenes, amassing their strength and power.’
‘But who are they?’ Maude contemplates, taking the note from Justin.
‘Whoever they are,’ Justin responds, looking once more at Edgar’s mangled body, ‘They know what they’re doing.’
◆◆◆
‘This is the main hall, The Hall of Tapestries,’ Mei-Ling explains, as she and Ari walk through a long hall, carpeted in royal blue with tiny Uroburos all over, walls covered in tapestries hanging from ceiling to floor.
‘Through those doors are the drawing rooms,’ she points to their right, ‘and through those doors is the Coronation Room, the Guard Room and antechamber,’ she points to their left.
She looks behind her, noticing Ari has stopped in her tracks, staring up at a tapestry. Mei-Ling approaches from behind and stares up at the tapestry too.
Ari is intrigued by the family tree that stands before her, denoting the countless generations who have lived at the palace, The Palace of The Founding Family.
Starting from the top, close to 400 years ago, she follows the names Augustus and Hadrada, down to the generations beyond. Along the way, other families blended into the tree, with names like Wiktoria, Niklas and Franz and family names of Zaria, Bogdan, Schmid, Schneider and Ivanov. She notices many of the families are second cousins marrying each other, likely a ploy to keep money and power in the family.
But it’s the last line of the family tree that catches Ari’s eye.
A line extending to Eleanor and Maxmillian Bancroft, with three children: Jonah, Nora and Elias, to the right of the tapestry. To the left is the tree of another family extending from a shared ancestor with the Bancrofts; with the names Anton and Olga Chvostek, and children Sara, Rudy and Andre Chvostek. A great slash divides the tapestry partly between the C
hvostek family tree and the rest of the families.
‘They’re related,’ Ari utters to herself, staring at the ornately embroidered piece of fabric before her.
‘We should carry on,’ Mei-Ling says, trying to usher Ari along.
Ari extends her hand out towards the tear in the tapestry, stopping short of touching it.
What happened between their families? She wonders.
She looks to the Bancroft family line, ‘What happened to Eli’s siblings?’
Mei-Ling ignores the question. ‘We need to continue on.’
Ari does not budge. ‘What happened to them?’
Mei-Ling looks around nervously and swallows hard. ‘They died.’
‘How?’
‘We are not permitted to speak on such matters.’
Ari grabs her hand in her own. ‘Tell me. Please. I need to know everything that has happened here so that I may find a way out and escape.’
Mei-Ling looks into Ari’s face, a pained expression on her own face. ‘There is no escape.’
‘No, there must be a way,’ Ari protests.
‘There is no way,’ Mei-Ling whispers, ‘my sister and I have already tried. There is no escape.’
‘I don’t believe you,’ Ari almost shouts back. ‘Tell me what happened to Eli’s bother and sister.’
Mei-Ling appears to be wrestling with her own thoughts when she finally concedes.
‘Fine, follow me.’
She leads Ari along The Hall of Tapestries to the main foyer, up through the marbled staircase, to the hallway of ornate framed paintings and crystal chandeliers. They enter gold-painted double doors, and take the limestone staircase in the spiral tower to the top of the Palace.
As Ari steps out on the threshold, her bald head is cold in the fierce winds that batter her and Mei-Ling. Her orange dress flits about her tiny figure in the dusk sky. As she looks out to the horizon, she notices the Palace is completely surrounded by water. No other structures or life are to be seen.
Elite Nation: Book One Page 8
