Road to Abaddon

by Vincent Heeringa

  “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” she cried, tears streaming down her cheek.

  Wadid slowly shook his head.

  They would have stayed that way for longer except that a familiar voice broke their reverie.

  “How touching,” said Silas, who’d rounded the cylinder with his rifle levelled at Nassim’s chest. “The freedom fighter is reunited with the long-lost brother. It’s time to fight or die, Nassim. You choose.”

  “I’ll never fight for you,” Nassim breathed.

  The sound of the battle was getting closer.

  “That’s a pity,” snarled Silas. “You’d make a good queen and possibly even a decent wife. But there’s plenty more where you come from. At least he’ll make a good soldier,” nodding towards Wadid.

  Nassim and Afiz backed away and Wadid began to bash at the glass of his cylinder.

  “You’ll be the one dying, Silas,” said Nassim angrily. “You’re already losing this battle.”

  “You still don’t get it do you, girl? With this army,” and he gestured at the cylinders around him, “who can stop me?”

  Laser fire drew closer and Silas put his rifle to his shoulder, his finger curling around the trigger. Nassim winced as the gun exploded and she felt the warmth of her blood – the bullet had just grazed her, but it hurt like mad. She took a step back expecting the second bullet to find its mark but instead she saw enormous claws wrap around Silas’ neck and lift him clean off the ground. Silas screamed and fired again but the bullet shot wide and the mutant with the eagle claw wrenched the rifle from his hands as if it was a toothpick and held Silas aloft with a single, strong arm. Slowly it turned him around.

  Face-to-face with his creation, Silas wriggled and screeched: “Brother, put me down. Release me now! I just saved you!”

  But the mutant pulled him closer and snarled in a guttural drawl: “You are not my brother. You are no-one’s brother.”

  And slowly the talons closed on Silas’ throat while he thrashed and punched and kicked and screamed until all the life was throttled from him and his body dropped to the floor.

  Nassim and Afiz were petrified. The beast with the eagle claw took one massive stride over Silas’s remains and towered over them. It raised its massive talons ready to strike. But instead it hit Wadid’s cylinder. The glass shattered and shards flew over the children, followed by a flood of yellow liquid. Wadid was flushed from his chamber and slithered to a stop at Nassim’s feet.

  “Wadid!” she screamed and she fell on him, cradling his body.

  Wadid’s eyelids fluttered and he gasped for breath while Nassim stroked his face.

  “It’s me, Nassim!”

  He smiled weakly.

  “Oh, Wadid. Oh, Wadid.” And she hugged him tightly.

  Meanwhile the battle was becoming furious. Metrician soldiers streamed into the hall, winding their way through the maze of cylinders, capturing the startled mutants and shooting the last of the bandits. Silas’ mutant army was stillborn, his vision for a Lander revolution throttled at its first breath. And once again, Nassim, Wadid and Afiz were at wrong end of a Metrician barrel.

  The mutant glanced at Nassim and Afiz and then surprised them both with a wink. To their amazement, it spoke in a deep growl. “Take him. And the others. Hide.” With one massive stroke it smashed another cylinder and the next mutant poured on the floor. It then began to swipe at the adjacent cylinders, sending liquid and mutants gushing to the ground. All around them was awash with water and thrashing bodies, as if a primordial ocean had spewed up a new form of life.

  “Quick, let’s get him up,” Afiz said.

  Together they pulled Wadid to his feet. Nassim draped his arm over her shoulder and staggered towards the far corner of the building, away from the fire fight. Afiz did the same to a second mutant, who’d sat up blinking, like a baby waking from an afternoon sleep. Moving past the rows of still-intact cylinders, with the battle raging behind them, they found a dark corner where canon-fire had forced part of the roof to collapse. Wadid and the mutant flopped down looking exhausted.

  “I’m not leaving him,” Nassim said.

  “I know. I’ll go,” said Afiz. Before she could say, “be careful” he was gone, snaking his way past the cylinders in search of more freshly born men.

  Nassim crouched and held Wadid’s hand. She could feel the pulse in his wrist. He looked incredibly healthy, like a Greek statue, all sinew and bulging muscle. He was a little taller too and had grown a beard. In just four days he’d started to become a man. And yet it was so obviously Wadid.

  “What have they done to you?” she cried. He tried to speak but could only gurgle.

  Meanwhile, the battle continued and for the first time Nassim wondered just how Silas’ men had been able to hold out against so many soldiers.

  Within seconds she had her answer.

  From behind a portion of the fallen roof, Eagle-Claw emerged, this time carrying a Metrician laser canon in his talon and dragging a wounded mutant with his hand. With him was the oddest collection of fighters. Naked, and carrying all manner of machine guns and lasers, the mutants bristled with sweat and muscle. Some looked fully human. Others had body parts of animals. One had a third, sinewy arm protruding from its left shoulder. It carried three guns too. Another had the canine teeth of a large cat. Yet another gripped its rifle with monkey’s feet. In its tail was a grenade.

  “There’ll be more injured; do what you can,” Eagle-Claw said and then disappeared with his men, light blazing from the canon’s barrel.

  So, the mutant army lives! she thought. It gave her a little thrill. Perhaps there was hope after all.

  Chapter 26 - The Leap

  Snow settled on the floor as Jonah pulled the cabin door shut. He adjusted his eyes to darkness. It was the same hut that he’d first arrived in, only this time he was with the Padras Simeon and Amma Melania. They were sitting down and chanting a prayer that sounded to Jonah more like a stream gurgling over stones than human voices. They were preparing for the Leap. Jonah’s stomach flipped at the thought. Not only was he about to enter some weird dimension, this so-called third-place, but they were destined for Abaddon. He shuddered with the memory of it and simultaneously felt a thrill at the prospect of saving Nassim.

  It had been an emotional last few hours. After retelling his story in the summit garden and answering a barrage of questions from Simeon, Jonah was finally released to spend time with his father. He asked for someone to carry Petreus down to the jungle level of the ark. So Simeon summoned Mikhail who effortlessly hoisted Petreus onto his back and carried him across the star-lit lawn, down the flight of steel stairs and placed him in a wheel chair that was waiting at the bottom.

  “I’ll leave you to your goodbyes,” said Mikhail and trudged back up the steps.

  “Shall we?” said Petreus, nodding towards the dense undergrowth.

  The boggy ground made it hard going but with Petreus on the wheels and Jonah shoving from behind they inched forwards until they slid into the foliage and reached a small clearing beneath some palms. Jonah locked the wheels and eased himself onto an old log with his elbow touching Petreus’ hand.

  They sat in silence for a moment. The palms shone in the moist air and water dripped from above. It reminded Jonah of the tropical-themed park close his home in Madrid.

  “Ironic really,” Jonah said eventually, “me going off to fight and you staying behind.”

  “Ha, I didn’t think of it like that. I guess now we’ll know what it feels like for the other person after all these years,” replied Petreus.

  In the summer in Madrid, the wind would blow up from Africa and bring with it warm rain making the trees glisten like they were now. One of Jonah’s earliest memories was in that park. It was with Petreus and Lilian – before all this drama, even before Eva. He remembered his parents sharing an umbrella and laughing while he jumped from puddle to puddle, soaking his shoes and socks. He remembered so distinctly the feeling of doing something naughty and yet his
parents were laughing, egging him on. It was one of his few memories of her. He was only four at the time. She was already sick.

  “What was she like?” Jonah asked.

  “Who?”

  “My mum. Lilian.”

  Petreus chuckled. “Oh, I think you've asked me that question quite a few times already.”

  “I want to hear it again.”

  “Do you? Well, she was friendly and bright and had a smile that would melt stone. But you already know that. You’ve seen it in the holograms. I suppose I should tell you something you don't know.”

  Petreus scratched his chin.

  “Let me think. Well, when I met your mum at university I immediately knew that she was the one for me. Gorgeous and smart, she lit up the room. I didn’t think I had a chance! I was a nobody. I had no family and wasn’t rich. I didn’t have any fame or achievements to speak of. Not like her anyway. In addition to being so glamorous she was the daughter of the great General Kenrick – hero of the Great War! I don’t think she even noticed me.

  “By chance we were in the same tutorial. Enzymology I think. I was quite good at it. All those titrations; tiresome really and certainly not her thing. I made sure I became her lab partner and we kind of bonded. Or at least I did – and I think she could see that I had my uses. We nailed those labs sessions.

  “A marriage of convenience,” smiled Jonah.

  “Yes, you could call it that. I didn’t care what is was called.

  I just wanted to win her over.”

  “Which you did, obviously. How?”

  “The oldest trick in the book – a love potion.”

  “What? Be serious.”

  “I am! I used the lab to make esters, you know those sweet-smelling organic compounds that have odours like strawberries or apples or roses. I’d write notes to her and then soak them in the esters.”

  “You wrote love letters infused with love potion? That’s so corny!”

  “Yes, indeed,” said Petreus proudly.

  “And she fell for it?”

  “Hook, line and stinker. She was quite a romantic, your mum.”

  “And the rest is history, as they say.”

  “Well, not quite. There was her father to convince.”

  “GK?”

  “Yes, he wasn’t a fan. We had to keep our friendship secret for quite a while. Almost a year, in fact.”

  Jonah moved his head to the side, as if to say why?

  “GK was quite a protective father. You know he brought Lilian up pretty much by himself, don’t you? His wife, Julia, left him years before. Ran away with another guy apparently. Quite the scandal, given how important the family was and all that. GK was already a strict father but being alone made him even tougher. There wasn’t a lot Lilian could do without his approval.”

  “So when you came along …”

  “An orphan kid with an unknown past? I was on a hiding to nothing!”

  Petreus paused to take a swig of water and offered it to his son. Jonah could’ve killed for a Mets, but he hadn’t seen any since leaving Madrid. He drank the water greedily.

  “So how did you convince GK to marry his precious daughter?” he asked, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “Actually, I was thinking about this only a few days ago,” Petreus replied. “Lilian wore him down. She persisted in seeing me, despite his instructions not to. Then she would bring me up in conversations, boast about my academic success and point out that I intended to sign up for officers’ training once I finished uni’, and so on. Plus, he could see that I made her happy. But that wasn’t enough. I was only allowed into the family home once. He didn’t even shake my hand.”

  “What made him come around?”

  “One weekend she went to a big family thing and had a huge argument with him. She lay down an ultimatum: it was me or him. Apparently he said 'too bad, then. Goodbye.' She came back furious, swearing that she’d never see him again, that she’d disowned him, that she’d be better off as an orphan, like me. I felt really bad. I didn’t want to come between Lilian and her father.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Well, I thought this needed to end, there and then. I was in officers' training by then so I convinced a pilot friend to fly me to Sky London, based on some flimsy excuse, and I turned up at his office, unannounced. He wouldn’t see me. I sat outside his room for about two days! It was almost insubordination.

  “While sitting there I saw quite a few people come and go. Military, civilians and attendants. They all looked at me like, ‘who’s that guy?’ but no one was throwing me out. I took that as encouraging sign. But on the second day, this woman, who looked just like Lilian, marched straight into his office despite his secretary’s protests. There was about two minutes of shouting. I couldn’t decipher the words and she came out again, walked directly up to me and said in this gravelly voice: ‘GK will see you now’. Then she left.”

  “Who was she?”

  “Lilian’s auntie, Cressida.”

  “Auntie Cress?” Jonah suddenly remembered the grey-faced, charmless woman he was forced to visit every few years. Her house smelt of stale farts and there was always a hint of alcohol on her breath. She kept a stuffed cat on her dresser.

  “That old bag?”

  Petreus sniggered. “That old bag was a hero. I don't know what she said, but after her visit, GK relented and gave his assent for us to be married, which we did that summer. You were born a year later.”

  “I didn’t know any of that.”

  “No well, I guess there was no need. GK adored you. After Lilian died you were the only thing keeping him on my side.”

  “Except he wasn’t.”

  “No, as it turns out.”

  Petreus put his hand on Jonah’s arm. They’d never been touchy types, despite being so close. Jonah felt his skin tingle.

  “I’m sorry you’re having to do this,” said Petreus, tenderly. “I wish there was another way. I wish the Council hadn’t started this war. I tried to stop it. We tried to stop it. I thought we were winning. But we failed. There were stronger forces against us than we realised.”

  Jonah recalled the conversation with Sergeant Clunes all those weeks’ back on the rushball field. He’d been dying to ask his father about it and now seemed the right time.

  “Who are these forces?” he asked. “I mean, I thought there was only one Metricia. But when I was in the academy, a sergeant told me a story about you in the Malaysia campaign. He said that you made enemies by letting those mutants escape. Who are those enemies? GK? I thought he promoted you.”

  “Ha! Therein lies the rub, Jonah,” replied Petreus. He brushed a strand of blonde hair from his forehead and sat up in his wheelchair. “This is what I’ve been puzzling over. GK did promote me. I got a medal for that action in Malaysia.

  If it wasn't for me, those Landers would have been slaughtered. But I convinced the top brass, including him, that we had no business killing people for the sake of it. We'd won the war.

  It was time to leave. He agreed and he even worked hard to create my new role as Peace Consul. But I think it was a smokescreen. I think all this time he was building a mutant army in Abaddon and stirring up trouble with the Landers knowing that, in time, I would fail. I don’t think he wanted to kill me, exactly. What he needed was evidence that I’d been killed. When I disappeared it really screwed up his plan!”

  “So you were promoted so you could be killed.” Jonah marvelled at the callousness of GK’s plan. His own grandfather!

  “Yes, we’re at war with ourselves, Jonah. Father against son, brother against sister.”

  “Do you think that Auntie Cess was in on any of this?”

  “I doubt it. She and Julia dislike GK with a passion! I think they’ve always had suspicions about him.”

  “Julia? My grandmother? You knew her?”

  “Knew her? Yes, and still do, I hope. Last I heard she was alive and well and living off-grid in Byron Bay, Australia. When this i
s all over, we should visit her. Quite good surf, I’m told.”

  The surprises kept coming Jonah’s way but he didn’t have time to respond as Mikhail strode into the clearing.

  “I wondered where you got to. It’s time,” he said, his hands on his hips.

  Petreus grinned and leaned forward in his chair with his arms open. “Give your Old Man one last hug. It’s time to pass the mantle. This is your moment, Jonah.”

  They hugged and held onto to each other for a long time. Then Jonah stood and turned. He didn’t want Petreus to see his leaking eyes.

  “I’m so proud of you, Jonah. What you’ve been through, what you’ve discovered. If only I could join you. But these legs …” and he banged his stumps.

  Jonah turned to face his father, wiping a tear with his finger. “I wish you were too. I always wanted to see you fight.”

  “Oh, I nearly forgot!” said Petreus and from under his cloak he pulled out a silver laser pistol and handed it to Jonah.

  “I won’t be needing that anymore.”

  Jonah cradled it. How often had he coveted the weapon, sneaking a hold when Petreus wasn’t looking. Engraved in the handle was the symbol of Metricia and the letters PJS. The gun, glistening in the greenish light, felt heavy, as if it was more than an object.

  “I …” he began but Mikhail interrupted.

  “The padras is preparing the Leap. We must descend.”

  “Go!" said Petreus. “Go get her. And then come back! I want to take you down to Byron Bay!”

  It took all of Jonah's determination to turn and walk and not look back.

  ◆◆◆

  Mikhail led the way back through the strange ark, past the thrumming valves, down the mountain in the Kus and then struggling, on foot, along the snowy path. All the while, grief and excitement twisted knots in Jonah's belly. After an hour they reached the door of the cabin.

  “God-speed, young prince,” Mikhail said, bowing. It made Jonah blush. He barely felt like a soldier, let alone a prince. “We’ll meet again,” he mumbled in reply and shaking the snow from his boots, he stepped inside, closing the door behind him.