by James Maxey
We reached an opaque panel different from the glass squares we’d been passing. Bobbie knelt and took out a tiny power drill and started unfastening bolts. “There’s a storage cabinet behind this panel,” she said. “We should be free of surveillance for the moment.”
I stretched my arms over my head, then cracked my fingers. “I could just punch my way in. I mean, it’s glass.”
“I assume this is more false stupidity?”
I frowned. She was right. I got that smashing out glass panels wasn’t stealthy. I knew it wasn’t a good idea, and I knew it wasn’t something we were going to do. So why had I said it? Was I really so used to being the funny guy that I couldn’t turn it off even in front of someone who didn’t find me funny? Or was her lack of amusement perversely stoking me to act even dumber?
She worked the last bolt free and set the panel aside. Nudging the storage cabinet out of the way only took one hand for me. We crawled into the dome. The air inside was stuffy as hell, hot as a sauna, and steamy as if someone had just poured water over the sauna’s rocks.
“Technosaur likes the atmosphere to resemble that of her home era,” said Bobbie. “Carbon dioxide is about five times the level of the air we’re used to. Your body is going to tell you you’re suffocating because of all the CO2, but you’re not. There’s plenty of oxygen.”
I nodded, though knowing this didn’t make breathing any easier. We moved through the shadows, hunched over, until we reached a large central support shaft. In the middle of the shaft at ground level were a pair of metal doors. It looked like any old elevator you’d see in an office building, just surreally out of place surrounded by jungle.
Bobbie looked at her watch. “We shouldn’t have to wait—”
The elevator dinged and the door slid open.
Sasha stepped out.
Behind her, in the glare of the elevator, I could see Elsa and Reverend Rifle slumped against the walls, not moving, their faces pale and sitting on their shoulders at unnatural angles.
The floor of the elevator glistened red, like someone had spilled tomato juice. My nose wrinkled as the stench of blood hit me.
Sasha snatched a broad leaf from a plant next to the door and used it to wipe the blood from her fists. Her eyes were bright as she looked at Bobbie and said, “Everything went exactly as planned.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Damn Dirty Ape
MY GOD!” I CRIED, pushing past Sasha into the elevator shaft. I knelt, placing my fingers on Reverend Rifle’s neck. He had no pulse. I didn’t even bother to check Elsa’s condition. Her whole windpipe was gone. “What happened, Sasha? What happened?”
“I killed them,” said Sasha, in her usual chipper tone.
“Why?” I asked, my voice choked, unable to turn around to look at her.
“We were done with them,” said Bobbie. “They served their purpose in getting you here. They would only try to interfere with what comes next.”
“I’m sorry, Harry,” said Sasha. “I know they were your friends, but they were going to die anyway. I did it fast so they didn’t suffer.”
“You… you needed them… to rescue your mother,” I whispered, not understanding how their deaths benefited Sasha and Bobbie at all.
“No,” said a woman’s voice from behind us. “I had no need of rescue.”
My blood turned to ice. I stood slowly, turning around, to find a tall woman, her gray-streaked hair pulled back in a stern knot, dressed in a white lab coat. At her side was a four foot tall chicken-lizard I recognized as Technosaur. The two smallish females were flanked by more imposing figures on each side. Technosaur was guarded by three mechanical raptors standing at about my shoulder height, with nasty looking hind claws and jaws full of glinting teeth. The woman was accompanied by three large man-animal hybrids, a lion, a tiger, and a bear.
“You know who I am,” said the woman in the lab coat.
“You’re… Anastasia Moreau.” I swallowed hard. “You’re… my mother.”
“I’m glad to hear you use that word,” she said. “Family means a great deal in this world.”
“So does friendship,” I said, clenching my fists.
“Harry, calm down,” said Sasha. “We only want the best for—”
With a savage growl, I swung at Sasha, a good, roundhouse sucker punch right to the jaw that dropped her where she stood. The animal men and mechanoraptors launched into action, leaping toward me. It was bad odds, but I was in the mood to break things.
The nearest mechanoraptor reached me a fraction of a second before the rest. As he thrust his head in for the kill, I leapt up and used his skull as a springboard over the scrum of robots and monsters. I landed at the tail of the trailing robot and grabbed it with both hands. I dug in my feet and swung with all my might, using the dinosaur as the world’s least aerodynamic bat to knock the other two raptors off their feet, tossing them into the bear man and lion man. The tiger man, alas, had some moves, summersaulting over the falling bodies to land right on top of me, digging his claws into my shoulders. One of the mechanoraptors was already getting up again, swinging its toothy jaws toward me, so I lowered my head and charged with the tiger guy still clinging to me. I slammed him hard into the robot’s jaws. The pain of having a dozen knives sunk into his back loosened his grip and I tore free of him, spinning around to grab the jaws of the next raptor as it charged me. I twisted its head hard, breaking whatever bolts and pins held the skull to the spine. I tore its lower jaw free, a three foot rounded steel triangle studded with razor spikes, and used this to slash the bear guy across the face a few times before he fell away, blinded. The lion guy threw himself at me and I let go of the jawbone and gave him a double-fisted punch right to the center of his chest. I felt bones crack, some in my knuckles, some in his rib cage, but a second later I was the one still standing.
There were two raptors left, but they’d backed off, circling me, their AI trying to figure out an area of vulnerability.
“What a magnificent specimen,” said the chicken-woman.
“I told you he was worth waiting for,” said Dr. Moreau.
“If you were waiting for me to kick your ass, definitely worth the wait,” I said.
Just then, something relatively light landed on my back. I felt twin needles sink into my neck. I spun around, watching as Bobbie flipped away. I reached for the pains in my neck and pulled away two syringes. “Son of a bitch,” I mumbled, right before the world went black.
I WOKE IN A CELL, iron bars forming one of the walls. I rolled to my feet, shaking my head to clear the cobwebs. I guess no one had told dear old mom that I bend iron bars like they’re made of taffy. Wasting no time, I grabbed the bars. There were a lot of sparks and smoke as I fell backward. The last thing I remember was that my hands were on fire.
THE NEXT TIME I woke up, my hands were bandaged. Sasha was standing outside the cell.
“The bars are electrified,” she said.
“Got it,” I croaked. “Thanks for the heads up.”
“You hurt Ceril really badly,” she said.
“Which one was he? The bear guy?”
She nodded.
“He going to die?”
“We hope not,” she said.
“You killed my friends,” I said.
“I like to think they were my friends too,” she said. “The reverend was always nice to me. Killing them fast was kindness. They would have died painfully when mother releases the virus.”
I cradled my aching head in my hurting hands. “Virus,” I said. “Some kind of doomsday bioweapon?”
“A cleansing agent,” said Sasha. “A necessary step.”
I didn’t know what to say. There was nothing at all I could say. Sasha was a true believer in Dr. Moreau’s brainwashing. She had clarity. Direction. Purpose. Though I had every reason to hate her, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for her.
“Why am I even here?” I asked.
“For your own safety,” said Sasha. “When the virus is rel
eased, all of mankind will be dead within three days. Mother didn’t want you lost in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, fighting for survival. We’ll all be comfortable and safe here while the rest of the world is purified. Then, we’ll be free to live where we wish, as we wish, above ground, in the sunlight.”
“Oh God oh God oh God,” I whispered. “This can’t be happening.”
“Please don’t be sad,” she said. “We only want what’s good for you. I want you to be happy. I want us to be happy together.”
I gave her an incredulous stare.
“Don’t look at me like that,” she said. “You have to believe me. I love you. One day, you’ll love me. We were made to be together.”
“Fine,” I said. “If you love me, let me out of here.”
“I’m here to let you out anyway,” she said. “Mother wants to see you.”
I gave a grim smile. “Not as much as I want to see her, I’m guessing.”
“Please don’t try anything,” she said. “The collar you’re wearing will shock you to unconsciousness.”
I moved my hand to my neck, finding the metal ring. I was still so frazzled from the drugging and the electrocution I hadn’t noticed it.
“It will also be triggered if my brainwaves enter an unconscious state,” said Sasha. “So please don’t hit me again.”
“My punch doesn’t seem to have done you any permanent harm,” I said.
“I lost a tooth,” she said, opening her jaws wide.
This news cheered me only a little.
She unlocked my cell door. “Follow me,” she said.
I stumbled forward, unsteady on my feet.
“Do you need to drape an arm over my shoulder?” she asked.
“Keep your stinking paws off me you damn dirty ape,” I mumbled.
“I’m not dirty,” she said. “I just showered.”
“Washing off my friends’ blood.”
“Please don’t hold a grudge,” she said, sounding genuinely distraught.
I followed her in silence as she led me through a labyrinth of halls and stairs. There were no windows. I had the sense we were underground, a hunch proven true when we walked up the last flight of stairs into actual sunlight. We were back inside one of the greenhouse domes I’d seen on the reverend’s map. It was midday, judging from the sun. The air in the dome was noticeably cooler than the atmosphere of the first dome we’d entered, and the air felt cleaner and fresher. My brain no longer screamed that I was suffocating.
We walked along a carefully landscaped path to reach a large pool filled with glimmering goldfish. From the middle of the pool rose a series of terraced steps, and at the top terrace was a goddam throne, with Dr. Moreau sitting in it, an inscrutable smile upon her lips.
“Of course you have a throne,” I said, wearily.
“Technically,” Moreau answered, “this is belongs to Technosaur. She built these domes when she first escaped NASA. Once she partnered with me, she gave me this space for a research facility. I’ve not had much time to modify the décor. I have, though, modified the atmosphere to be less oppressive.” She shook her head. “The irony, of course, is that Technosaur wants to wipe out mankind right at the moment when they are doing their best to increase CO2 back to prehistoric levels. In another century, I suspect Technosaur would find the air much to her liking, if we’d chosen to let mankind live.”
“So let them live,” I said. “What can you possibly hope to gain by killing mankind?”
“Have a seat,” she said, pointing to a marble bench at the foot of the terraces.
“I don’t mind standing,” I said.
“As you wish.” She rose from her throne. “Bobbie informed you that Technosaur comes to our world from the age of dinosaurs.”
“I got the briefing, yeah.”
“Did she also tell you that thousands of eggs belonging to Technosaur’s kin remain on the moon, locked in suspended animation? Naturally, she wants to revive them. If she did so in a world of men, her people would be treated as test subjects, laboratory curiosities. Far better that the Earth be emptied so that they have room to thrive and grow.”
“What’s in this for you?”
“Oh, her goals only tangentially overlap mine,” said Moreau as she came down the steps toward me. “I don’t intend to allow her to revive her people. I’m already working to save the world from one invasion. I would hardly care to facilitate another.”
“Invasion?” I said.
“Of aliens,” she answered.
“The Lawful Legion has dealt with alien invasions before,” I said. “Hell, that’s pretty much a normal Tuesday for them.”
“No dear,” said Dr. Moreau. “The Lawful Legion are the alien invaders. One aspect of the invasion, at least.”
“As a former member, I don’t remember getting that memo.”
“I wouldn’t expect them to advertise it,” said Moreau as she reached me. Though she was tall for a woman, I towered over her and could have snapped her in two if not for the damn collar. “I doubt that most of your teammates even know they’ve descended from aliens.”
“Are you talking about the Aussies?” I asked.
She nodded. “I first became aware of them while working on my doctoral thesis over thirty years ago. I found that a small percentage of my samples had DNA strangely free of copy errors. It took me many late nights poring over x-ray chromatographs before I finally realized the truth. Aliens were living among us, with adaptive DNA capable of breeding with humans. People possessing this DNA rose to the top ranks of their chosen endeavors. Most of the gold medal winning Olympians who contributed samples to my study tested positive for alien DNA. Worse, every day there were reports of superhumans, men like Golden Victory, fighting battles with other superhumans. Earthly DNA couldn’t produce such extraordinary mutations. This had to be manifestations of the alien strands.”
“Okay, you were on to something,” I said. “Val’s father worked for the government. He told her all about the Aussies. Since you know what they’re called by the government, I’m guessing you must have read Cut Up Girl’s book.”
“I didn’t need to,” she said. “I’ve found out all I needed to know over the years. The government wouldn’t release the data willingly, so I made alliances with the sort of people who could steal the information I needed. I never turned to crime for financial gain. I was made into a criminal because I wanted information that every living being should have a right to know.”
“Fine,” I said. “You don’t think you’re a bad person. What does this have to do with making human-animal hybrids? What does it have to do with making me?”
“That’s simple,” said Dr. Moreau. “The more I tested, the more fragments of alien DNA I found among the population. But I took inspiration from my great, great, great grandfather, and realized that only a human with no alien contamination could be used to create a human-animal hybrid. If any of the superadaptive alien genes were present, the hybrid embryo would be ‘corrected’ to be fully human. At the same time, I saw the genetic modifications the alien DNA made that allowed for cross-species mating between a human and alien, and realized it would be possible to tweak mammalian DNA to allow for hybridization among a broad range of mammals, not just chimps. Still, since chimps were closest to humans genetically, you were the first of my trials.”
I flinched as she raised a hand to touch my cheek. She turned my face toward hers. “I hadn’t developed a successful incubator at that time. I carried you to term in my own womb. I gave birth to you, Harry. You suckled at my breast. This created a bond between us, a bond I still feel in my heart every moment of my day. You’re my son, Harry, and I want you as part of my life.”
“You have a great way of showing it,” I said.
She frowned. “I never intended to abandon you. My connections to the criminal underworld which brought me so much data about the Aussies proved to be a liability when one of my associates was captured and turned me over to the authorities in exchange for
leniency.”
She turned away, her back to me. “They took you from me and locked me in prison. They wouldn’t even acknowledge my parental rights. They viewed you as an unholy thing, and me as an abomination.” She took a deep breath, and turned back. Her eyes were moist with tears. “When I escaped and created my next generation of hybrids, I did all I could to contact you, but soon after you became a captive of the Butterfly House. You resurfaced as a member of the Lawful Legion, but I couldn’t be certain of your loyalties. It was only when you killed McGruber and were on the run from your own colleagues that I felt it was safe to bring you back into my life.”
“You could have just texted me,” I said. “You didn’t have to go through this ruse to bring me here. You didn’t have to kill my friends!”
“They were going to die anyway,” she said. “When the virus is activated—”
“Sasha mentioned a virus,” I said. “I’m fuzzy on the details.”
“There really aren’t any details you need to know,” said Moreau. “I’ve genetically engineered a virus that will kill anyone with alien DNA, even if it’s only fragmentary. Out of a surfeit of caution to make sure the alien genes can’t adapt, I’ve made the virus strong enough to kill pure humans as well. Only new-men like you and your siblings will be untouched.”
“See?” I said. “You were being all nice with the whole mom bonding thing and now you’re back into full supervillain mode. You’re going to kill mankind to save it from some alien genes?”
“I’m saving the world from the ultimate invasive species,” she said. “If those incompetents at the Butterfly House had taken the trouble to give you a proper education, you’d know that invasive species are the most disruptive of all ecological threats. The world will suffer short term pain, yes, but, in the long run, it will emerge healthier than ever.”
