I looked around me, braced for an attack from any direction, ready for shouting guards with big guns, or mercenaries with super-science weapons… but there was nothing. Just the silence and the stillness and the empty dirt streets. Except, when I looked carefully, there was something. The slow buzzing of flies, not far away.
Inside the huge earth clearing, the sun shone harshly on blunt and ugly steel and glass structures, presumably the science labs, surrounded by blocks of simple wooden terraces, low-ceiling huts mostly, the size of a village. It had clearly all been built for function, not style; thrown up quickly by people who had been on the move before, and were prepared to move again at a moment's notice. Doctor Delirium's little kingdom was a shabby state of affairs. The main building dominated the centre of the village, a steel and glass monument to the Doctor's ego. His main science lab, where he let his genius run riot.
I started down the narrow street, heading for the main lab. I was still tense, my skin crawling in anticipation of the attack I'd never see coming. From some hidden gun position, or some automated defence system like the perimeter force field. The sound of my heavy feet crashing on the ground carried clearly in the hush, and my golden armour blazed brightly under the hot sun, but still nothing moved in the streets between the low buildings. Nothing but me.
The sound of buzzing flies was getting louder.
I rounded a corner, and there on the street ahead were a series of vague black shapes. I couldn't work out what they were until I got close enough to disturb the black blanket of flies, and they sprang up into the air, leaving the bodies behind. There were dozens of them, stretching the whole length of the street. I looked back and forth, checking the side streets, and the bodies were everywhere. Dark huddled shapes, buried under flies. The dead men and women lay alone, in twos and threes, and in great piled-up heaps. I made myself walk on, flies buzzing angrily all around me now, harsh and strident. I stepped around and over bodies, some dressed in black and gold, others clearly scientists and workmen. Their ragged clothes were soaked in blood and their wounds were terrible. Flies crawled all over them, jumping up when I came close, and settling again after I'd passed.
The whole place was a Jonestown-everyone was dead. Only here, the people hadn't killed themselves; they'd killed each other. I moved out of one street and onto another, and the dead lay everywhere, broken and butchered. I knelt down to examine some of the bodies, waving the flies away with my golden hand. They hung on the air nearby, buzzing angrily but unwilling to approach my armour. I checked out the extent and origins of the wounds with my golden fingers. I didn't have to bother about infection, as long as I didn't armour down. The stench, of spilled blood and exposed guts, of so many dead people, suddenly became too much for me and I shut down the mask's? scent detectors. I daren't armour down long enough to throw up. I straightened up, and stepped back from the bodies.
I felt sick, in my stomach and in my soul. I had no place here, in this village of the dead. I wanted to turn and run and get the hell away, leave this madness behind. People aren't supposed to see things like this, do things like this. But I was a field agent, and I had work to do. I'd be weak later, when I had time. And if I had nightmares later, well, that came with the job, sometimes. Something terrible had happened here, and I had to find out how and why, to make sure it could never happen again. Duty and responsibility have their uses-they keep us going when courage might not be enough.
I made myself let the stench back in. It wasn't so bad, knowing it was coming. And bad as it undoubtedly was, there wasn't much actual decomp. Blood and guts, yes, but not much rot or decay. Given the blazing heat of the overhead sun, this wholesale slaughter couldn't have happened that long ago. This… was a recent massacre. Whoever or whatever had done this, I hadn't missed it by much.
So many dead. Dozens, maybe hundreds. I hardened my heart, and concentrated on the evidence. It was the only way to stay sane. I moved slowly, steadily forward, and the flies leapt on the air around me, buzzing hungrily. From the nature of the wounds, these people had shot each other until they'd run out of bullets, used the guns as clubs until they broke, and then they went at each other with machetes and axes, all kinds of improvised weapons, and finally, their bare hands. Empty guns with shattered butts lay discarded to every side, and bullet casings glistened in the bright sunlight. There was bullet damage all around, riddling the wooden walls of the surrounding huts. The sheer savagery of the wounds suggested… an overwhelming rage, a desperate vicious need to kill.
For a moment I was back in the Hall, as the mob killed my Molly, stabbing her over and over again.
These people had shot and stabbed? and hacked at each other, gouging great wounds in unprotected flesh. Hands cut off, bodies decapitated. Some had died with their hands locked around each other's throats, a grip so fierce it had not relaxed even in death. Others had died with their arms buried deep in opened-up guts. One man had yanked out his opponent's intestines, while his enemy had thrust his thumbs into his attacker's eyes. There were never any signs of defensive wounds. These people had been so intent on killing they hadn't even tried to protect themselves. Many of them looked as though they'd been attacked by wild animals, rather than anything human. But the real clue, as to what had happened here, lay in the faces of the dead. They were all the same: withered and ancient, burned out by the terrible forces that had raged within them. I knew what this was. I'd seen it before.
Everyone in Doctor Delirium's secret base had been given the Acceleration Drug. It could make you superhuman, for a while; incredibly fast and strong, inhumanly resistant to pain and punishment. But the Drug burned up all the years of your life, to fuel the superhuman abilities. A lifetime's energies, to make a man superhuman for a few days, or even just a few hours. They started out as Manifest Destiny's shock troops, created to be thrown against the Droods in armour. They fought well, and died quickly, like so many superpowered mayflies.
But they were fanatics; they knew what they were getting into. They paid the price willingly, the fools. This… was different.
I straightened up from examining a body that had been torn open from throat to crotch, and flicked the blood from my golden hands. The flies settled happily on the body again as I turned away. On the wall before me was a huge bloody stain, splattered across the whitewashed wood from top to bottom, spattered here and there with bloody bits and pieces. It took me a while to figure out what it was, until I looked down, and saw the deep footprints in the dirt, leading straight to the great stain. An Accelerated Man had run into the wall at superhuman speed, and exploded across it when he hit. Larger pieces had slid slowly down the wall, leaving dark trails behind them. There was nothing left on the ground to identify, even after I'd waved the flies away. It had all just… shattered, under the impact.
I wondered if he'd even tried to stop.
I walked on down the street, still heading for the main science lab. Halfway down, a house had collapsed in on itself, as though a bomb had gone off inside. I took a moment to peer through the empty window frame. In the gloom, I could make out several bodies, and bits of bodies. They'd destroyed the house, and brought it down upon themselves, because they couldn't break off from killing each other.
I hurried down the street, and turned into another, feeling like the only living thing in this place of the dead. I'd stopped trying to count the bodies, or even estimate their numbers. There were just too many. The closer I got to the main lab, the more there were. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of once rational men and women, driven to slaughter every living thing they saw by some insane rage. I wondered if they laughed, or cried. Or whether they'd been driven beyond such limited emotions.
Someone would pay for this. I would not stand for this. I would see someone paid, in blood and suffering.
I stopped abruptly, and looked quickly back and forth. I'd heard something. The first real sounds I'd heard in this place, apart from the constant maddening buzzing of the flies. I turned around and around, trying to pin d
own the sound. A rapid, repetitive noise, moving incredibly fast. My head snapped from left to right, following the sound. And then it suddenly changed direction, growing louder and more urgent as it headed right for me. I looked down a side street, and there was an Accelerated Man, sprinting towards me so quickly he was little more than a blur. My armoured mask slowed the image down for me, so I could get a better look. He was running horribly quickly, much faster than a man was meant to move. His arms flailed wildly, his ribs rising and falling so quickly I could actually hear them cracking and splintering under the strain. His feet dug deep ragged holes in the earth path, throwing puffs of dust and dirt up behind him. His clothes were ragged, and soaked in blood. More blood was spattered across his wild face, with its feral smile.
He covered the whole length of the street in just a few moments. Even with my armour speeding up my perceptions, I still had no time to react. I couldn't evade or stop him. All I could do was stand my ground, and brace myself. The Accelerated Man slammed right into me at incredible speed, but the impact didn't budge me back one inch. I felt nothing, even as I heard his bones crack and break and shatter as he slammed into me. He was thrown back, blood flying on the air, but somehow he still kept his feet. He regained his balance, and then bent forward sharply and threw up. There was blood in the vomit, and other things. He'd damaged himself seriously, inside. But still he wouldn't fall. The Acceleration Drug kept him on his feet, and the rage in his face kept him going.
He snatched up something from the ground. At first I thought it was a club, but as he waved it before me I realised it was a human thighbone, with blood and meat still on it. He flailed at me with the long bone, attacking me with superhuman strength and speed. But the bone just shattered against my armour, reducing itself to splinters in his hand. He finally made a sound-a high wailing scream of frustration, because he couldn't hurt me. I speeded up my armour's reflexes to match his Accelerated speed, slapped what was left of the bone out of his hand, and grabbed his forearms with my hands. He tried to break free, using all his strength, and his arm bones snapped.
And then suddenly his face grew older, sprouting thousands of wrinkles, years piling on in a moment. His eyes sank back into his skull, and the fierce light went out of his gaze. His strength and speed all ran out, and I was? holding a man so ancient it was a wonder he was still alive. I let go of him, and he fell to his knees. I knelt down beside him. His breathing was shallow and ragged, and blood drooled from his slack mouth. His skin was still aging. He looked desiccated, almost mummified. He forced his head up, just enough to look at me.
"A Drood," he said, his voice just a dry whisper. "Should have got here sooner, Drood."
"What happened here?" I said. I would have liked to lower my golden mask, so he could see a human face, but I couldn't do that. Too risky. "Where is Doctor Delirium? Did he do this? Can you… tell me your name?"
"The Drug," he said, and I had to lean forward to make out what he was saying. He was little more than skin and bone now, held together by a last few sputters of energy. "They gave us the Drug. It was our reward, for good service. Said it would make us stronger, faster. Superhuman. We'd feel like gods, they said… And we did, for a while. But we couldn't control it. I think… they added something to it. It drove us mad. Drove us all mad. They ran away and left us to each other. It's not fair. Not fair. I didn't come here to drink the Kool-Aid."
He died. I left him lying on the ground, as the flies descended. There was nothing I could do for him. My armour can do many wonderful things, but it can't heal.
I stood up and glared at the main science lab, my hands clenched into impotent fists at my sides. I could understand Doctor Delirium dosing his own people with the Acceleration Drug as a last line of defence, if he thought he was under attack… but no one knew I was coming. I hadn't known I'd be coming here, only a few hours earlier. And why add something to the Drug, to make them kill each other? Was this a Jonestown after all-had the Doctor killed his own people, and then killed himself? Unlikely. It wasn't in character for the Doctor, he was never that ruthless. He looked after his people, paid better than most, and anyway, Doctor Delirium should be on top of the world, right now. He'd finally found a way to blackmail the world and make it stick. He had no reason to give up.
And, the dying man had said They handed out the Drug. Doctor Delirium and… Tiger Tim? What the hell had happened here, when those two finally got together?
I strode on through the village of the dead, ignoring the bodies, all my attention concentrated on the science lab before me. The impeccably clean steel and glass structure shone brightly in the fierce sunlight, dominating the massive clearing made to hold it. When I finally came to the main entrance, the first thing I noticed was that the sliding doors were standing half open. I forced them all the way open, and the metal crumpled like paper in my grasp. I pulled the doors out of their frames, and threw them aside. I was past caring about the noise. I walked into the lobby, and there were no sirens, no alarms. No people anywhere. But the massive reception desk had been smashed and overturned, and all the furnishings were broken and scattered in pieces. The madness had found its way here.
The overhead lights were flickering fitfully, on the brink of giving up and going out. I couldn't hear any air-conditioning working. Main power had to be going down, on its last legs. The lobby gave onto a series of bland, featureless corridors that led deeper into the building. Gaudy coloured lines had been set down on the floor as a guide, but I had no idea what they stood for, so I just picked a corridor and started walking, threading my way through the maze. As I made my way inwards, the first bloodstains and bullet holes began to appear. And the first flies.
Someone had gone crazy with an axe; I found it embedded in a grey wall, the blade still smeared with dried blood and matted hair. Someone had shot out the windows, leaving broken glass all over the floor. It crunched loudly under my golden feet. Bodies lay here and there, in ones and twos, each one a bloody mess and a feast for the flies. More and more, I saw men and women dead at their desks, in offices and cubicles, still? at their posts. From the look of them, they never took the Acceleration Drug. Maybe they never got the memo. Maybe… the Accelerated Men needed something simple to start on…
Blood-spattered white lab coats, cut throats and smashed-in heads, people thrown around like discarded toys. A few had been smashed through glass partitions, some had been battered to death with broken chairs. Half a dozen were still sitting in their chairs, their heads torn off and piled up in the corner. When superhumans go bad, it's bound to be messy.
Scattered papers were everywhere, littering the floor. Probably important once, crumpled and torn now, all of them soaked in blood. Smashed windows, doors torn off their hinges, holes punched in walls, spattered with blood from broken hands. Fire damage here and there, put out by automatic systems. Smoke and water damage, from putting out the fires. And dead men and women, mostly scientists and office staff, who probably never even understood why they were being butchered.
I strode quickly on through the corridors, increasing my pace till finally I was running, doubling back and forth through twisting corridors whose pattern made no sense. I started to find corpses who had taken the Drug. Two young secretaries, little more than teenagers, had gone at each other with office scissors as their only weapons. They'd cut and slashed and gouged great chunks out of each other, stabbing and hacking with superhuman strength, giving and taking awful damage while the Drug kept them on their feet and fighting, long after they should have lain down and died. I didn't stop to mourn them. I couldn't. I had to find who was responsible. I needed to get my hands on them.
Why would Doctor Delirium have allowed this? To cover his tracks after he left? So no one would be left alive to speak of his future plans? Why kill all the soldiers? The Doctor had always relied on his mercenaries to do the heavy lifting. He was the boss, he never got his hands dirty. I'd been surprised to see him present at the Magnificat. Now this… Could it be, that just o
wnership of the Apocalypse Door was affecting him? Changing him, corrupting him… to the point where he would willingly open the Door and let loose all the hordes of Hell?
I made myself stop, and think. I found an office whose computer systems seemed undamaged. One machine was still running; someone had turned it on but hadn't lived to turn it off. I worked quickly, while the power still lasted. I pressed one fingertip against the computer, and willed golden filaments to worm their way into the guts of the machine. Luther was right; all I had to do was concentrate on what I wanted, and the armour did the rest for me. (I was going to have to think about the implications of that, when I had the time.) I persuaded the computer to throw up a map of the main lab, and put it on the screen. Doctor Delirium's private office was only a short distance away. I couldn't believe he'd still be here, after all that had happened, but even if he wasn't I should be able to find some answers. After all I'd seen, I needed some answers.
The office actually had a big brass plaque on the door saying DOCTOR DELIRIUM: STRICTLY PRIVATE. With green and red lights set in place above the door, to inform lesser mortals whether he was In or Out. Both lights were dead, and the door stood ajar. I stopped just short of the door. The Doctor might be gone, but in his present mood he might well have left all kinds of booby traps behind. Hidden guns or energy weapons, explosives triggered by an unwary footstep, deadfalls under the carpet. None of this would have had any effect on my armour, but I didn't want important evidence destroyed by a convenient fire or explosion. The office seemed quiet, and I couldn't see anything suspicious, so in the end I just pushed the door all the way open with a single golden finger. Nothing happened. I looked inside. The office was deserted. No bodies, no blood, no destruction-and no Doctor Delirium.
I strolled into the office and had a good look around. It wasn't much of an office, for a mad super-science villain. No frills or fancies, no super-science executive toys, not even a Tomorrow The World! poster on the wall, or a potted plant. Just a plain office desk, with the usual computer equipment, neat piles of paper in the IN AND OUT trays, and two chairs, on either side of the desk. No photos anywhere, of family or friends. He gave all that up, to become Doctor Delirium. I had to wonder… if he thought it had all been worth it.
From Hell with love sh-4 Page 15
