by Hanks, Greg
“Go, go!” yelled Dodge, yards away.
Gear took heavy fire from both Vexin and Dodge as they converged on his position. Their tactic gave us time to recuperate and pave our own way toward Gear. The doppelganger spun over the second tier, still spurting out bullets, and disappeared behind the next trench.
It was time to spread our ranks.
I tapped Tara’s shoulder and directed her to move up to the top ring. She didn’t hesitate, all the while keeping her aim locked on Gear’s last position. Dodge caught my drift through the fuzzy blue “G” and jumped a few flights of stairs. Now we had the bastard pinned. There was absolutely no way he was coming out of this alive. Three turrets and four mercenaries versus one man. There was no— Something churned and sawed through the floor and desks, running in a straight line to Tara. Massive destruction peeled away as the mysterious object cut through the ground. The weapon hit a bump and bounced upwards. Tara jumped over an entire tier as the weapon smashed against the desk she would have been at and subsequently exploded. The area rained with bits of metal and synthetic fibers.
Gear emerged from his hiding spot just as Vexin approached on the level below him. The clone lunged and wrapped his arm around Vexin’s neck, kicked off of the desk behind him, and they both toppled over the tier and into the next trench. A struggle ensued.
I rushed over to Tara. She lay against a broken chair in a trench, covered in debris.
“Hey!” I shook her body.
She didn’t move.
“Tara! Please!”
Her eyes flickered. My heart slowed. She gasped and coughed a cloud of dust into my face. Her head was cut up, but for the most part she looked okay. I helped her stand and we entered the battle again.
Just as we stepped into the bottom floor, Dodge had jumped onto the desk above the struggling duo, aiming his weapon into the fray. But he was too late. Gear thrust Vexin’s body upward and fired at Dodge with a handgun. The two bullets struck Dodge in the shoulder and hip, sending him back to the floor.
Vexin took advantage of the moment and heaved his entire weight onto Gear, pushing their combined mass into the stairwell path. I had to take the shot. But their struggle was too violent; I feared my aim wouldn’t be precise. Standing there like an idiot, letting Vexin be smacked around, Dodge saved me from an impossible decision.
Three bullets cut into the thick armor on Gear’s back. He seized in pain, releasing Vexin from underneath. A smoky mist sprayed from the joints and creases in his armor, shrouding everything within ten feet in a murky gray haze.
Dodge fired anyways. The ELBR’s high rate of fire purged the area, twanging off the metal surfaces. The cloud of smoke filtered throughout the room, disorienting the turrets and displacing our squad. I felt like I was walking through a dense swamp. I could hear my own breaths, as if they echoed against the mist.
When the smoke finally cleared, all I could see was Gear holding Vexin hostage with a five-inch dagger. Gear’s helmet was broken on one side, revealing a patch of black curls and one hyperactive eyeball. The thick blade danced at the edge of Vexin’s throat, nicking his skin ever so lightly.
“Drop it! Do it, now!” commanded Dodge, closing in.
Tara and I carefully approached from different angles.
“Shoot him, damn it!” croaked Vexin.
The inhumanity within Gear’s mind claimed victory. He drove the long blade underneath Vexin’s Oversuit, forcing it up through his ribcage.
I took the shot. Gear’s head jerked to one side and blood trailed behind him as he fell to the floor. Vexin dropped with him.
I dropped my rifle, running full speed at the twitching corpse of our clone. I fell onto his body and started laying my fists into his skull. At first, the pieces of his helmet nearly broke my bones, but once I got past the armor, the flesh smashed like a birthday cake. Again and again I brought my knuckles down. Blood and brain tissue slapped my face, but I didn’t feel it. I couldn’t feel much. I could only experience psychopathic vengeance. All of the hatred and black emotion broke free from their safe within my mind. I let everything out. I swore. I screamed.
When I started hitting solid floor, Tara finally ripped me away.
“Mark! Stop! For God’s sake!”
My eyes burned from Gear’s blood. I spat upon the floor and rolled away from Tara’s grasp. I crawled to Vexin’s limp body, feeling a hot fever rising within my sinuses.
Vexin lay on the floor, the knife still sticking out of him like a pitchfork. The pool of blood beneath him continued to grow. Dodge hovered over, saying nothing. Tara dragged her body over and the three of us listened to Vexin’s last struggle for words.
“I guess now,” he coughed up a dollop of crimson, “I guess now I can see my w-wife.”
Dodge smiled faintly. “You had a wife?”
“She was your type,” Vexin chuckled, blood smeared like ruby red lipstick.
Dodge closed his eyes and stifled a laugh. Vexin raised a hand and Dodge grasped it with a powerful return.
“My brother,” said Vexin, starting to fade. “My brothers.” Vexin looked at me as I hovered on his left. He then blinked to Tara. “My sister.”
She smiled behind globes full of tears, grasping his shoulder.
Then, Vexin looked upward, eyes glazing over. He removed himself from the world. “Kyla,” he muttered. He stayed like that until his chest stopped moving.
Tara began to sob. Her barrier of stoicism was broken. Her head fell onto Vexin’s forehead and continued to cry.
Fuzzy atmosphere and sauna-like fumes overcame me. Bollis was gone. Now Vexin. I didn’t care anymore. I broke open the soldier cocoon and allowed my inner self to run free. My head dropped onto Vexin’s side. Dodge and I joined Tara and the three of us cried until there were no more tears.
The darkest hour of my journey had come at last.
64
It was there—in the quiet, blood-drenched Conference Station—that I finally began to understand who I was.
“It’s time to go.”
Dodge’s words found no place in my entombed state. I was frozen in a sarcophagus, hidden away for a millennium. I swore I even saw my own body as I floated above like a paralyzed ghost.
Tara wouldn’t say anything either. Her face was as red as a hot iron, with puffed checks and bloodshot eyes. The two of us survived only because of a thin strand of twine that struggled to hold onto our hearts. War. Death. Fear. This was not the life I wanted. I was breaking apart.
Dodge noticed our lack of movement. “Guys . . . I can’t lose you, too.”
Tara raised her eyes. “I . . . I can’t.”
After realizing there would be no one else to take my place, I stood up. This task, however deranged and unfair, required our full attention. There was no more running. No more crying. No more denying.
I offered a hand to Tara. She resisted for a moment, but then gave in.
“There will be time to mourn them later,” Dodge said.
Celia’s face appeared in my mind. If only he knew what we knew.
Tara and I picked up scattered weapons, but our energy levels were low. I walked over to Gear, desiring his devastating weapon. The remains of his body reminded me of dog food, steeped in bloody juice. I didn’t think twice, snatching his weighty rifle and admiring the intricate design. The power from the device transferred to my fingertips. I familiarized myself with the mechanics and the magnets in my Oversuit accepted the new rifle without hesitation.
I was glad to be moving again. The use of my muscles took my mind away from horrible thoughts. One in particular regarding my mental stability. If I ever got out of this alive, I knew I would be messed up forever.
“What do we do now?” asked Tara. She maintained a depressed mood, like every ounce of energy had been sucked from her body.
Dodge sighed and started tampering with the control panel below the rotating “G”.
“I don’t know,” he said. “There has to be—”
The h
olographic “G” rippled and a humongous video feed of Justin’s face burst into view.
“Can you see me?!” he shouted, shaking the entire room.
“Yes!” yelled Dodge, covering his ears. “And we can definitely hear you.”
“Finally!” he exclaimed. “I could only get the turrets working—you’re welcome by the way—but trying to actually reach you guys sucked!”
None of us smiled.
“Um,” Justin said, “got sticks up your butts er something?”
Dodge ignored the comment. “We need to find Slate, Justin—”
“Wait . . . where’s Balls? Vexin?”
No one made eye contact with the boy.
“They’re dead?” A slew of vulgarity proceeded from his mouth. A glimmer of sadness shot across his eyes.
“So, can you find him?”
“All right, all right,” Justin said, still perturbed. “Gimme a sec’!”
“We don’t have much time, Justin!”
“Blah, blah, blah,” the boy mocked, tuning out Dodge as he worked.
Dodge looked annoyed and turned to Tara and I. “You two ready?”
We nodded, though we didn’t want to be. Little by little, our minds were returning to us. Rage replaced our sadness.
“Uh oh,” said Justin. The serious tone in his voice meant something was really bad. The three of us approached the pedestal. “Something’s happening. Things are flagging up like crazy!”
And then the sirens began.
“Justin?” I pressed. I twirled around, wondering what Slate had up his sleeve.
A woman’s voice echoed throughout the Conference chamber.
“All personnel: evacuation protocols are in effect. Evacuation protocols are in effect. All personnel . . .”
“What the hell is going on?” Dodge exclaimed.
Justin’s huge head shook. “You guys need to scramble your butts outta there, now! Some kind of toxin-crap is going to be released!”
I turned to the others and said, “Slate.”
“What do you mean, ‘toxin-crap’?” asked Dodge. “How much?”
“Enough for an evacuation,” I answered.
“What’s Slate thinking?” Tara exclaimed. “He’s destroying his own facility.”
Dodge slammed the switchboard. “Give us something, Justin! Where is he?”
A thought struck me. If Slate was turning this place into a toxic soup, he only had one thing left to do.
“Justin,” I cut in, “does the roof of the Rectory have a helipad?”
The boy clacked away on his end.
“There’s only one,” Justin said. “And it’s right above you.”
“And what about the cure?” I asked. “It has to be here. Is there anything you can find about it?”
Justin worked for a moment. Tara gave me a face of anticipated frustration. She wondered what kind of plan I was concocting.
Justin’s face flashed white as he opened a new window. He frowned. “There’re hundreds of schematics, it would take me fo-eva to find the place.”
The north door opened, revealing six flustered GenoTec scientists, running for the exit behind us.
“I think we found a way around that,” I told Justin.
Tara and Dodge ran up two different stair paths, cutting off the scientists on the highest circle tier. I came up the center, aiming my newly acquired rifle at the head of an older man.
“Where is the cure?!” I shouted, plowing him down to the ground. I pressed the nozzle of the rifle onto his chest and repeated the question.
“Are you crazy?! We’re all gonna die in thirty minutes if we don’t—”
Without a moment’s notice, a loud crack filled the air and a bullet hole appeared in my captive’s head. The perpetrator tried to run, murder weapon in hand, but Tara tackled him to the ground. Even at the end, these men and women were still loyal to Slate.
Dodge commanded the others to kneel and move against the wall. Tara broke the rogue scientist’s hand and kicked away his pistol.
“Where’s the cure!” she screamed.
Before any more damage could be done, a woman at the end of the row shouted.
“Cloud 2! The cure is on Cloud 2!”
The man under Tara’s leg growled. “You stupid—”
Tara whipped her boot into his face, knocking him out.
“What’s Cloud 2?” I asked, wrenching her head around.
“It’s b-below us,” she shivered. “This level is Cloud 3.”
The woman informed us that samples of the cure were cryogenically frozen in a small structure annexed to Cloud 2. When we confirmed the fastest route, we let the scientists go, watching them run in hysteria toward the west exit.
“Why don’t we just get the cure and escape?” proposed Tara. “Forget about Slate.”
Dodge intervened. “Because, we don’t know if Slate’s sabotaged the cure. Perhaps he’s taken the last dose for himself. I’m not about to underestimate him.”
“How can we know for sure?” she continued.
I kept my eyes to the floor. “We can’t.”
Dodge and Tara slowly understood the complex issue. There was no way of telling if Slate had the cure, or if the cure was still on Cloud 2. With only thirty minutes, going after one option wouldn’t allow us to back track for the other.
Dodge bit his lip. “We have to split up.”
“No!” said Tara. “It’s a suicide mission for whoever doesn’t find it!”
“Tara,” I said, grabbing her arm, “right now, the cure is the only thing that matters. We can’t afford to lose it. The toxins are going to contaminate everything. We won’t be able to come back.”
“We have to decide now,” said Dodge.
The three of us blinked. If we separated, there was a high probability that we would never see each other again. Our communication would be severed. The comfort of backup would be gone.
“I’m going after Slate,” I said.
Tara whipped her head to me. “Mark—”
“We are running out of time! We have to make a decision.”
Dodge stepped in. “Look, if things go south, Mark could take the helicopter. Tara, you and I would be close enough to get to a lifeboat. This can work.”
Tara looked back at me. Her viscous blue eyes ripped at my heart. Dodge started gathering anything else he could use, while Tara approached me with a stern face.
“I don’t want to lose you,” she whispered.
“You won’t,” I assured. “Slate’s cornered. I can handle him. I’ll take that helicopter and meet you guys. We can finish this, Tara.”
“You don’t even know how to fly a helicopter. And Slate? You can’t take him alone, Mark!”
“Tara, please.” I grabbed her hand and moved closer. “I need you to believe in me.”
She bit the inside of her cheek. “Of course I believe in you.”
“All my life I’ve wanted to be someone important. I’ve wanted to do something worthwhile. I can do this. I have to do this.”
Her lips twitched. Her eyes watered. But Tara remained calm. She knew the reality of the situation.
“Mark,” she whispered. The warmth from her presence strengthened my desire to succeed. “I love you.”
The words hit my face like a wet rag. But the shocking cold turned to a flame that burned without ceasing.
I leaned in and we kissed, sealing our affection. Her soft fingertips grazed my cheeks, incapable of fully holding on. The moments after the kiss seemed otherworldly. An aura of blissful, breathy, incinerating desire floated around us.
I didn’t know if I would ever see her again. The thought sent chilling beams through my legs. But I knew we would try everything we could to make sure that never happened.
“Tara.” Dodge approached the staircase below us, finished with his private conversation with Bollis’ corpse.
Tara and I broke apart and backed away from each other. The time had come to put an end to Archturus Slate’s sup
remacy. We briefed Justin on our decision and he agreed to help in any way. Tara, Dodge, and Justin faced me before I turned to the stairs toward the west exit.
For the first time in a while, Dodge smiled. “No mercy, Mark.”
I looked at them one last time and said, “Always.”
65
The metal walls flew past me. My legs charged down the curved hallway, back to the foyer where Bollis had been first shot. A few scientists screamed by, blurred by my incomparable speed. I wanted nothing more than to see this through to the end. As I stormed through the bowels of Axxiol, somehow I didn’t feel like I was fulfilling that desire.
Maybe it was the fact that I was alone.
I had no clue if Slate was really going to be up there. But Justin told us the toxins were to be released from Cloud 1, where most of the Edge production took place. Slate wasn’t going to be found anywhere near ground zero.
I rounded the corner to the foyer and sprayed two soldiers about to stop me from boarding the express elevator. Running employees found different exits. I approached the elevator located in the middle of the back wall and called it to pick me up.
I kept watch on my surroundings while I waited. The simple fact that the elevator was already at the roof confirmed my suspicions.
Thick metal arms wrapped around my neck from behind. The shock of my enemy’s arrival sent me overboard. I crouched, bending us over, then jumped and rolled forward, sending the metal-head into the elevator wall. Both of us fell into a heap, but he was knocked out.
I didn’t have time to breathe as the next soldier approached from the hallway, a few feet behind his unconscious ally. I ducked, sprung my rifle and opened a vertical fissure into the soldier’s abdomen.
Then a razor wire voice came through the intercom.
“You were always smart, Mark.”
Slate. His speech impediment produced goose bumps. I hated him so much more than I ever did. But I didn’t retaliate. The elevator only needed to arrive, and then we would settle things.
“But I still expected more from you. For the first person to come out of just one month of training with such skills—you could’ve done more. I could’ve shown you a world without bounds, Mark. I could’ve made you a god.”
