Wolverine: Weapon X

by Marc Cerasini

  While the men studied the map, Miko quietly curled up in the corner, hugging her legs, her handgun dangling from one hand.

  “We’re less than four kilometers away,” said Logan. “Get on this road, follow it along the river valley, past this fishing village to the hills beyond.”

  “That chopper better be waiting for us,” said Langram as he jumped into the driver’s seat. He shifted the vehicle into gear, and the APC lurched forward on its six massive wheels. Langram quickly made a U-turn and went in the opposite direction.

  Logan climbed into the seat next to him and lay the machine gun across his lap. Miko had another AK-47 strapped to her back, the leather case of ammo on her shoulder. She rose up on her haunches, gazing placidly through the bulletproof glass at the road ahead.

  “There’s the highway, but there’s no gate on this end of the complex,” said Logan, rechecking the map. “You’ll have to make one.”

  “Right through the fence,” said Langram.

  “You know that’ll alert the Koreans.”

  “Don’t look now, but I think they’re already alert!” Langram yelled, grinding the gears and stepping on the gas.

  From a false storage tank directly ahead of them, a dozen soldiers burst through a steel door. Leading them was an officer clutching a pistol and gesturing wildly at the oncoming vehicle.

  “Maybe we can bluff them,” said Langram.

  A shot bounced off the armored car, then came a sustained crackling as all the soldiers opened fire at once. Bullets glanced off the thick-skinned personnel carrier like acorns bouncing off a car, filling the cramped compartment with noise.

  “Guess that didn’t work,” cried Langram. “Hold on!”

  He swerved enough to clip the first soldier who reached the roadway. The broken man flew backward into the arms of the men behind him. As his troopers were bowled over, the officer blew a whistle and fired a pistol at the APC. The bullet bounced harmlessly off the shatterproof glass next to Logan’s head.

  Then came a crash as the APC flattened a chain-link fence and rolled over the twisted debris. Another jolt, accompanied by blinding sparks and crackling volts, shook the vehicle as it ripped through the electrified fence. Langram jerked the steering wheel, and the six tires skidded along damp grass before lurching onto the tarred road with a bump. The heavy armored personnel carrier lumbered away, Langram put on the gas and got them moving at the vehicle’s top speed of forty kilometers per hour. Logan watched the soldiers recede in the rearview mirror. From somewhere behind them, the angry wail of another alarm faded in the distance.

  “We lost ‘em,” said Langram.

  Logan gripped his machine gun. “The hell we did. They’re gonna be up our ass in no time.”

  Langram looked at his partner, only half-surprised to see a grin on Logan’s face.

  “A bloody, broken heap on the cell floor a couple of hours ago, and now you’re itching for action. I guess all the rumors I heard about you are true, Logan.”

  Logan ignored his partner. “Coming up on the village,” he said. On the horizon, dark silhouettes were framed against the moonlight.

  Minutes later, they rumbled through a ghost town. Headlights illuminated dark wooden shacks, every one abandoned. Doors hung from hinges, grass grew wildly around the ramshackle structures. The stone gate at the entrance to the village had tumbled to the ground. In the black water, boats were moored, some of them half sunk. Sundered fishing nets blew idle in the wind.

  Farther along, a large cannery facility loomed in the night, completely desolate and tumbling into the river, piece by piece.

  “The pollution from that poison gas factory upstream has been real bad for the local economy,” said Logan.

  Langram swerved to avoid a two-wheeled cart abandoned in the roadway. “At least there are no goddamn civilians to get in the way.”

  “No one lives in this place. It is a land of ghosts,” said Miko, staring straight ahead. “Their leaders make poison while the people starve to death.”

  Logan frowned as he squinted into the horizon. Miko turned away from the window, lost in her own tortured thoughts.

  The APC skidded around a corner, and Langram shifted gears as they began to climb up a low hill. They were still paralleling the river. To their right the forest had become dense once again, the land rising to low hills on either side of them.

  “Almost home now,” said Langram. “Less than a kilometer, then we can ditch this piece of junk and take to the woods.”

  As they crested the hill, the engine sputtered and Langram worked the clutch. “Don’t die on me now you piece of—” A string of curses followed.

  “I can’t believe it’s this easy,” said Logan “Why haven’t they chased u—”

  His question was interrupted by a loud crack as the personnel carrier was rocked by a sonic boom from the antitank projectile that zoomed over their heads.

  “Look out!” Miko cried.

  Bridging the road fifty meters ahead was the boxy silhouette of a North Korean tank, surrounded by dozens of soldiers. Behind the tank, several large trucks were parked to the side of the road, disgorging troops.

  “Hold on!” bellowed Langram.

  With a lurch, they were thrown to one side as the APC left the road and bumped across rough, rocky ground to the dense forest ahead of them.

  “We can lose that tank in the woods,” Langram cried. His words were nearly drowned by the sounds of cracking tree limbs as their vehicle struck down a sapling and tore the branches off several low hanging pines.

  Logan clutched the roof with one hand, his AK-47 with the other. As the APC rumbled up a steep slope, its wheels spinning through loose dirt, Logan saw fire burst from the muzzle of the tank still parked on the road. He heard the report of the cannon a split second later—just as the large shell ripped through the trunk of a tree in their path.

  Wood splinters filled the air, and Langram hit the gas. Miko was thrown to the steel floor as the personnel carrier lurched forward. It hopped a ditch, skidding on wet, smooth rock. The APC leaned to one side. Langram fought the wheel, trying not to roll over.

  “Got it,” he cried as the vehicle stabilized.

  Inside the cab, as Langram concentrated on driving, Logan and Miko hung on. None of them heard the tank’s third shot or saw the muzzle’s blast. But they only felt the spine-cracking impact as the sabot round tore through the carrier’s steel armor like a rock through a plate glass window.

  The personnel carrier shuddered, then blew into halves. Both ends tumbled down the hillside, spewing fuel, tires spinning.

  * * * * *

  Something lurched inside his brain. Logan found himself spinning through a void.

  No, it’s not me. . . I’m just lying here. It’s the whole world that’s rolling over.

  He heard a mechanical tick. Then a whir, like the sound of a tape rewinding. The noise seemed somehow comforting and he lay, eyes closed, listening to the constant drone until it faded from his consciousness. Finally, another click snapped him awake. Logan heard a beep, and a woman’s voice spoke his name.

  “Mr. Logan… I don’t know if you can understand me…”

  He opened his eyes to stare at a metal ceiling, its recessed lighting dim. On the floor, bits of silicon and shards of glass sparkled around him. Looking up, he saw the observation window had been broken, spears of glass still in the frame, some spattered with black drops. Computers were smashed, their monitor screens shattered.

  “… Use your imagination, Ms. Hines,” a voice boomed. “Think of the horror of it all…”

  I can’t think . . . must’ve been some party, and someone ruined it.

  Logan rose, wobbling on unsteady legs. My clothes are gone, he realized. The soldiers… they must have taken them…

  Then his memory faded like vapor, and Logan wondered vaguely who “they” were. Woozy he leaned against a computer console, staring at hands stained with clotted blood.

  My own . . . or someone else’s?
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  “…He’s lost a lot of blood…” said the voice.

  “Yeah,” growled Logan. “I’d like to see the other guy.”

  The voices came from all around him—the walls, the ceiling, the consoles. They spoke in a crazy loop. Logan heard snatches of busy conversations that did not seem to connect in any rational way.

  “…Deadwood… Please respond… Logan is alive…”

  Despite his pain and bafflement, Logan smirked. “You bet I am…”

  “…But security took care of Logan, Professor… I’m bleeding to death… Bloody massacre…”

  “There will be, pal, when I find you…” Logan wheezed. Especially if you don’t shut up and let me get my bearings…

  Logan slumped in a chair. Eyes closed, head drooped over a computer terminal, he tried to recall where he was, how he got here.

  “…Mr. Logan has shown uncanny tracking abilities…”

  “Yeah, and I’m butt naked, too.”

  “…Killing everyone in sight. Running amok, you might say…”

  Logan opened his eyes—and saw a severed hand lying on the console in front of him. He jumped backward, out of the seat.

  “…Are you aware of what is happening at this time? I’m losing men in Zone Two…”

  Logan warily scanned the room, slowly backing into a corner. “Who’s pulling this stunt? Answer me!”

  Near his ear, the voice boomed from a speaker—

  “… Deadwood. I’m deadwood, Cornelius…”

  —and Logan knew.

  It’s a recording . . . Some kind of random playback. Nobody’s controlling this. I’m alone here.

  Panic gripped him. Got to get out…

  “…Weapon X has escaped… I am not in control…”

  He bolted for the door. Took the metal staircase to a platform below. He looked down into a deep metal well, smoke curling up from the bottom. Logan soon turned away from the pit and found a hatch, blown open, its lock twisted on the floor. The yawning tunnel behind the door led to another corridor. At the end of that corridor, a long hall fanned out in either direction. Logan paused, wondering which way to turn.

  Smoke . . . the smell of ozone . . . machinery humming. This place is industrial … maybe military . . . don’t like the army and they don’t like me. Better get out of here before I get drafted…

  He crossed the threshold, past the broken hatch, and followed the long, blood-spattered corridor, then turned right.

  Place is a maze—or a tomb.

  He wandered through the dimly lit steel cave until he reached an elevator. There was no power and the doors refused to open, but Logan soon found the stairwell. He climbed the steps until he saw the radiation warnings.

  Must be a reactor . . . gotta be people there. Nobody leaves a reactor running when they’re not at home…

  But the reactor’s control room was deserted, the core running on automatic. The entranceway seemed undisturbed except for a section along the wall that was a shattered, smoldering wreckage. He detected a whiff of cordite.

  Shooting. . . what went on in this place?

  He saw a weapon lying on the ground, a Heckler & Koch UMP barrel bent.

  Why the gun? This can’t be a military installation, too sharp. These computers are Buck Rogers. . . the army doesn’t have state-of the-art facilities like this . . . could be SHIELD… maybe. But why would Fury’s bunch mess with me?

  Logan sniffed the air again, and this time he smelled blood. Finally, he spied the body of a portly, middle-aged man sprawled across the main console. Mesmerized, he approached the grim scene, gazed down at the dead man’s features.

  He wore a lab smock, stained crimson. His ribs protruded from a ruined chest. The man had been gutted, brutalized. Yet his face seemed composed … almost resigned, which made the violence done to him all the more horrendous to Logan.

  He’s been cut—real bad—three in the gut, then eviscerated. Brutal . . . senseless. Unless there’s some kind of sick vendetta.

  He stared down at the man’s features, at the glasses shattered on the floor, and started to remember.

  I…I know this man. In a memory, a dream. A dream of dying.

  Logan reached into his mind for an identity an emotion—some connection to this man. He came up with nothing. Whoever he was, Logan bore him no animosity. He left the reactor room, moved on.

  He found a dead man several levels higher. The man lay face down near a cart of equipment that had been overturned. He’d also been slashed, his carotid artery laid bare by a bladed weapon.

  Not the only victim, either He knew there would be more.

  Death. This place reeks of it. Hanging in the air like heat… but who did the killing?

  Afraid of the answer, Logan held up his hands, stained by congealed blood.

  All over me, but no wounds. . . my blood? Must be . . . or did I knife this guy? What’d he do to me? This corpse …the one in the reactor room. And that hand back there. That severed hand…

  A memory flickered and died. Logan’s limbs began to quiver and his back slammed against the wall.

  Did I finally flip out? Lose my mind and kill everyone in here, and now I don’t remember it?

  He moaned and clutched his head.

  Wouldn’t be surprised . . . my old partner Langram warned me that this would happen, sooner or later “In times of peace, a man of war sets upon himself.” That’s what he told me once. Said I was a man of war . . . or was it a born warrior? Anyway, why am I thinking of Langram? Is he here somewhere? Did I kill him, too? I need a fucking drink.

  The recorded conversations, which sounded like technobabble for so long that they’d faded into the background, suddenly invaded Logan’s consciousness when a frightened voice repeatedly cried out his name.

  “…Mr. Logan… Mr. Logan, sir.” A woman.

  “…Come, creature. Into the pit…” a man’s voice screamed, choked with emotion.

  Suddenly, Logan’s forearms ached. He rubbed them, felt muscles bulging under the skin. An uncontrollable spasm made them roil unnaturally. Pain permeated his arms.

  “… I don’t know if you can understand me, sir.” The woman again. Pleading.

  A sharp pain lanced through his wrists, and he flexed his hands.

  “… I can’t stand pain,” the woman sobbed. She was barely comprehensible. “Physical pain. Burned with chemicals . Please, I beg you. Kill me quickly…”

  Is it Miko? No. This doesn’t make any sense.

  Logan’s fingers curled into a tight fist as agony gripped them. He stared down at hands frozen into clutching claws. Soon something warm and crimson. Three bloody wounds like stigmata on the tops of each hand. Then steel claws emerged from their sheaths, ripping through tortured flesh, extending their full length. He threw back his head and howled.

  “…Run, Mr. Logan, run!” the woman cried. A moment later, a scream, and Logan knew she was dead, too.

  “…Am I dead?”

  This time, he recognized the voice. His own.

  “…Dead? Am I a walking dead man?”

  “…You are an animal!” screamed a voice tinged with insanity—and suddenly, a face to match that cry exploded into Logan’s mind. Blad. Patrician. High cheekbones, rectangular glasses. Arrogance melting into an expression etched with fear.

  My tormentor. He must die! Or is he already dead?

  “… I am Logan,” his own voice boomed from hidden speakers. “Logan! I am a man …”

  He stared down at the blood-dewed silver claws in disbelief His mind broke as waves of memory drowned all reason. The violence continued to build in Logan’s mind.

  Animal? Yes, I am an animal, a beast and a machine. A thing they made me.

  Logan held his arms extended, silver claws protruding from his wrists. He tried to rip one of the blades out, gashed his hand to the bone—and in the wound, under the gore, the silver adamantium steel gleamed.

  They found me. Found me out. Learned my secret. Brought me here. Cut me. Got into my bod
y.

  “…Animal! … You are the animal …”

  Totured me. Tore up my mind. Got to get away, away from here… now.

  Logan ran. Blindly. His own recorded voice shouting in his ears, battering his brain with images of merciless and deliberate torment. Endless. Soul-searing.

  I’m running. Running in a dream.

  Moving full bore, he slammed into walls, burst through partitions, leaped over savaged corpses. The floor sprouted spikes that pierced his feet and still he ran. Time stretched and the atmosphere thickened. His legs and arms felt weighted, his progress slowed. Behind him came the sound of snapping fangs, like claws scraping on chalky tombstones.

  Something on my heels, moving with me like a living shadow. Tracking me by the smell of my blood.

  Logan ran faster, afraid that if he stopped or even slowed, the shadow thing would catch up, overwhelm him, suffocate him. Drag him down into the darkness forever.

  And I won’t be able to scream, or fight it off because it’ll be inside me . . . under my skin . . . inside my bones.

  Using the abhorrent steel claws to slash through a bolted door, Logan raced up a flight of stairs—felt like hundreds. Each stair sprouted a ragged spike, each step became piercing agony.

  Running like a truck. Barreling uphill with a full load… trying not to flip, to fall. Can’t keep up this pace. I’m losing ground, and that thing. . . It’s gaining…

  He felt a force tugging on him, drawing him back even as he tried to surge forward.

  It’s grabbing at me. Snatching at me with veins like ropes, pulling me back. Tendons like chains, like wires—like strings and a puppet.

  Then the field of spikes he’d been running through crawled along the floor, along his body. Suddenly, Logan was sprouting spikes, just like the floor, the walls. Long. Sharp. Gleaming metal. They burst, bloodless, from his shoulders, torso, hips, thighs.

  Long, thin fingers curling around my ribs. . . Muscles stretching spine bending back. . . It’s tearing at me, dragging me back into its hungry darkness.

  As he ran, Logan left a gory trail—crimson footprints.