Saul of Sodom: The Last Prophet

by Jinn, Bo

  The elevator stopped on floor 55. Two SGs led the way and the other two brought up the rear. He followed through a dark, narrow passage, passing a series of numbered doors on both walls. Not a word was said nor a sound heard save for thumping of boot heels echoing down the corridor. He felt like he was being led to an execution. The possibility entailed no stretch of the imagination. He counted down the numbers on the pristine doors until the two SGs in front finally stopped outside a black door; the number “7773” etched on a silver plaque on the front.

  Silence…

  Seconds later, a voice came from the other side:

  “Enter.”

  The door opened and the two Guards in front turned, then stood aside.

  He eyed them warily as he walked through and came into the empty, windowless room.

  A single source of dim pale light shone from the middle of the ceiling over two chairs set opposite one another. He stopped as soon as he entered. The door shut automatically behind him, causing his eyes to shoot over his shoulder.

  In one of the chairs in front of him, there sat one of the only people in Sodom he knew, a man with whom he had been acquainted since the very first day. The man sat with both arms on the rests of his seat. Two cobalt eyes flashed perspicaciously behind the clear, frameless lenses of his pince-nez. After a quiet intermission, the man spoke in a low baritone.

  “I cannot tell you what a delight it is to see you again… Saul Vartanian.” Dr. Augustus Pope bore the semblance of a man on the brink of old age, which, these days, meant he could have been anywhere between 50 and 150. The ice-blue eyes behind the pince-nez were pupilless so that it was never clear where the neuralist was looking, much less what he was thinking. “Please sit.” Pope waved a welcoming hand over the opposite chair.

  The vacuous eyes pursued him as he came forward and lowered into his seat. He silently determined not to speak unless Pope spoke first, and to say as little as possible whenever he did.

  A small turtle-shell table was set between them; on top of it were set a slim crystal tablet, two glasses and a silver, cubic article which he could not identify as anything in particular. He glanced over each item, before looking back up at the neuralist, who appeared to be anatomising everything from the dilation of his pupils to the intervals between his breaths. “You are thinking,” said Pope, “about how long it has been since we last met, correct?” His voice was low and calculated. “I have no doubt you remember precisely how long...”

  “Eleven months and...”

  “...Thirteen days,” Pope nodded slowly. The formless smile crept further up his lips. “You have been using the Gregorian calendar. A most peculiar habit. You had started counting the days that way the first time we cleaned you.”

  “How long ago was that?”

  The smile retreated from Pope’s face and his air became instantly more daunting. “Never ask questions which are either unanswerable or irrelevant, Saul. It is the definitive stepping stone to defection.” He stopped and adjusted the pince-nez over his cold eyes.

  A silence followed which he dared not break. One thing was certain about neuralists; they knew more about you than you did about them. Being face to face with Doctor Pope again was only slightly less unnerving than the prospect of a summary execution.

  “You require my seal of approval to return to active duty.”

  “Yes,” he replied, after a long delay of contemplation.

  “Very well… Then, we may begin.” Pope leaned forward, took the slim tablet off the table and leaned back again, crossing one leg over the other. He laid the tablet on his raised lap, took out a long pen-shaped implement from the breast pocket of his waistcoat and started tapping at the screen.

  “Apollo; record,” he pronounced in a raised voice.

  The small box on the table started to glow with a pale light.

  “Day: seventy-five, eighty-seven, thirty-one, eight-hundred and forty-seven hours,” Pope began to recite. “Subject: Martial Saul Vartanian. Caste -- First Tier Ares. Three-hundred and forty-seven days since previous session. Cause of visit: General evaluation.” Pope leaned back into his seat and the hollow eyes looked up again. “I shall now proceed to ask you a number of questions, which you shall answer truthfully. I need not tell you that if you lie, I shall know…”

  He assented to the neuralist’s words with a silent stare.

  “I suppose we can start with a more generic question,” said Pope: “What have you been up to for the last three-hundred and forty-seven days?”

  “Not much,” he replied, after another delay.

  Pope bowed his head somewhat disappointedly and tapped away at the tablet screen. “You withdrew most of your savings from your martial account about four days after we had last met.”

  “Yes.”

  “Five million Dimitars… Quite a fortune. Was there a reason?”

  “Bank transactions are traceable,” he said.

  “Then, you were hiding from us,” said the neuralist

  He paused to consider his response, but gave none.

  “Is that why you have taken such pains to change your appearance?” The neuralist’s eyes studiously hovered over him, and another long silence followed.

  At this point, he took out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from his coat pockets. He leaned forward, sparked the lighter, puffed and the smoke rose from his lips.

  “You are not making this easy, Saul,” said Pope. “Are you trying to give the impression that you are on the brink of defection?”

  “I am here, am I not?” He flicked the lighter away with a clink and held the cigarette in his lips. “Whist we are on the subject; what is the definition of defection these days?”

  “The definition is quite standard.”

  “Your definitions are constantly changing,” he said, blowing a mist of smoke.

  “Defection is an advanced state of psychological rebellion against martial order,” Pope elucidated sternly. “It occurs in varying degrees, naturally; however, defectors tend to deteriorate over time and they very seldom recover.”

  When he finished, Saul surveyed him through upturned eyes. He took the cigarette from his lips and blew another cloud of smoke. “We all have problems with society,” he rumbled. “You must be more specific.”

  A clear smile across the ashen visage sent a chill through him. Pope reclined further back into his seat and tapped at his flashing screen again.

  “Answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to the following questions,” he instructed. “The truth, as always.”

  He held an affirming silence and took another draw of his cigarette to hide his unease.

  “In the last three-hundred and forty-seven days,” Pope began; “have you procured an assignment?”

  He removed the cigarette from his lips and exhaled.

  “No.”

  “Have you had regular intercourse?”

  “Define regular.”

  “Once every ten days.”

  “Yes,” he lied.

  “Different partners?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good…” Pope hummed and tapped away at his screen. “Have you ever cohabited with anyone for more than thirty to forty days, intermittently or otherwise?”

  “No.”

  “Have you indulged any sort of affection for…”

  “No,” he answered promptly.

  “Have you dabbled in any form of transcendentalism, spiritualism…”

  “No.”

  The light from the tablet screen flashed reflecting off of the round, opaque lenses with each question.

  “Have you ever considered or attempted escape from martial order?”

  “…No.”

  He had paused too long with his answer.

  The vacuous eyes shot up piercingly over the lenses. Pope cocked his head back and slowly removed the pince-nez over his eyes. “I feel I should remind you, Saul, that the confidentiality between a neuralist and his patient is inviolable as a matter of UMC law. Even in a hearing before
a martial court, nothing said here can be used as evidence against you. We are clear on that, are we not?”

  He did not believe any of it for a minute.

  “Yes.”

  “Good.”

  Pope tucked the glasses away and leaned back in his seat.

  “Then, I shall repeat the same question … Have you…”

  “Yes,” he answered promptly.

  The same insidious smile crept subtly up the neuralist’s lips once again. “It’s perfectly natural for the mind to desire what it cannot have,” he said, with a hollow tenderness in his voice. “But, then, there are several undesirable things that are perfectly natural. Do you understand, Saul?”

  Pope uncrossed his legs and slipped the pen into the breast pocket of his waistcoat. “I think we can skip right to the question upon which hang all the rest..,” he said, placing the tablet gently on the table-top. He leaned back into his seat and laced his thin, grey fingers over his abdomen. “The neural program…”

  The cigarette hung loose in his lips as he breathed in another lungful of smoke and held his silence.

  “Saul, do you know what the neural program is for?”

  He had very definite ideas about what the neural program was for, none of which he would dare utter in present company. He chose his words carefully.

  “The neurals stop us from… feeling things,” he said.

  Pope’s lip vaguely curled.

  “Your phraseology, though clumsy, is accurate enough,” he replied. “To be more precise; neurals correct all the useless neurological appendages of your long and blundering past. We are all born sick. That is nature’s way. No organism is perfect.

  He puffed away at his cigarette with a glower and did not answer.

  “Would it not be so immensely conceited, Saul,” Pope continued after a brief silence, “to believe that every thought, sensation, emotion; every pathological inclination that enters the skull is worth preserving? Some inclinations of the mind must be tempered. Others… must be eradicated.”

  Pope stopped when he perceived the contempt growing in him, then bowed his head. “You must know, Saul, that the Commission does nothing for its own sake. We are not tyrants and we are certainly not interested in deceiving you. You are valuable to us. Our world – our order – depends on you. Can you understand that?”

  He took the last draw of his cigarette and flicked the butt away.

  “I understand,” he nodded.

  Pope nodded and the formless smile resurfaced. “Splendid,” he declared rapidly. “Then, there is nothing more to say.” He drew the pince-nez once again and placed them over his eyes. “You will immediately resume with the program and follow all the recommended directives.”

  The neuralist reached under his suit jacket and took out a small black canister with a white label on the front and held the canister up in the air. “Tailored to your individual neurology,” he assured with a cold, cobalt gleam in his eye. He opened the canister and rolled one small, silver tablet onto the turtle shell table-top. “One to three tablets every day. Five days’ intermission every thirty-day cycle.” He recited the prescription like a mantra. “You would do well to plan your prescription around your time in the war zones. There should be enough there to last you three cycles. I expect to see you in at least one-hundred days to restock, so that we may track your progress. Agreed?”

  The question went unanswered.

  He leaned forward, took the canister and tucked it under his coat. Meanwhile, Pope also bent over and reached under the table, and when he straightened up, he was holding a glass bottle containing a clear liquid. He took the top off the bottle; poured two measures of the viscous fluid in either glass, and the sweet fume of distilled ambrosia filled the air.

  “To your health.”

  Pope raised his glass and waited for him to take his own, which he did, then popped the tablet into his mouth and gulped down the ambrosia.

  When the last bulge in his neck receded, Pope knocked back his own drink and exhaled triumphantly. “Congratulations,” he pronounced. “You have passed evaluation.” The neuralist rose from his seat and took his coat. “Your record will be updated by tomorrow,” he reassured. “All that is left is to wish you the best of luck on your assignment.”

  Pope took the computer tablet and the small cubic device off the table, tucked both underneath his coat, arranged himself and pressed back on the pince-nez, sparing one last vague smile as he walked past Saul’s chair.

  “Welcome back, Martial Vartanian.”

  He heard the door open and close behind him. When the footsteps faded away down the empty corridor, he placed his hands on the side of his chair and rose to his feet, stood and waited.

  About a minute later he raised his head, poked around the back of his jaw with his tongue, cocked his head forward and cupped his hand over his face. The tablet rolled out of his lips and into his hand and he tucked it discretely into his pocket.

  He emerged from the Vanguard main entrance just under an hour after arriving. The big GMDs in the plaza broadcast a commercial for the latest in Landis Corp.’s wartech line as he made his way across the bridge and back to the capsule terminals.

  The capsule stopped on 3rd Echelons, Nozick Prospect and down the street and to the right was a long, narrow and obscure path linking Nozick Prospect to Dragon Boulevard.

  Republic Alley was a known dreg street in Durkheim, and ran through the bottom of a deep urban crevasse in the lower levels of the sky city. The alley was starved of sunlight by day and pitch black on moonless nights like these. It reeked of dried excrement and rotten everything, as did most dreg precincts. In martial metropolises, where dregs were accorded the same fundamental rights as vermin, residing in the most unpleasant corners of the city was the best way to avoid danger, especially at night.

  Halfway down the alley, over an arched doorway, a rusty, blazoned sign read “DUKE’S MESS” in lashes of red spray-paint, and a clique of dregs lingered around the middle of the alley as far away from the main streets of Durkheim as possible. When they caught sight of the familiar silhouette approaching, they greeted him with reverent nods and the word “Martial.” He lowered his head as he passed under the rusted sign and into a tunnel, down a flight of stairs.

  A large room was lit with flickering tubes of dim, pale neon and filled with long aluminum tables and rickety metal benches which looked to have been bent out of scrap. A dozen pairs of tired eyes were upturned to the holoscreen in the upper corner. Others were asleep, sprawled out on benches and on the sheeted floor. Duke Maclean, a.k.a “Dreg Duke”, the old mess-keeper, used to let the dregs stay in when he locked up his mess at night. The stocky, thick-bearded, box-skulled and heavily tattooed ex-patriot (which was the term for ex-government soldiers) was behind his counter, getting his mess ready for the following day.

  As soon as Saul entered, old Duke turned, put down a big pan full of thick broth which he had been pouring into a mess tray. He straightened up, tall and barrel-chested, wiped his rough paws in a tattered cloth and took the cigar nub from his teeth.

  “Guid mornin’,” greeted the burly innkeeper, rubbing his thick knuckles into his sore eyes and poking his blackened tongue on the insides of his cheeks. “Yer early,” he said, his voice gruff and tired.

  “Is it a bad time?”

  “… Nae bad time.”

  “How are things?”

  Old Duke puffed on his cigar. “Cannae complain,” he moaned, with a jagged-toothed smile and a raspy chuckle. He stretched his neck back, rolled his head from side to side and the thick vertebrae popped in realignment.

  “Do you have my package?”

  “Aye…”

  Duke nodded, then clasped his cigar in his teeth and limped away.

  The conversation seldom varied.

  The heavy-set old mess-keeper hobbled into the backroom, where his consignments of food and water from the civils were kept. He came back a minute later holding a parcel, untidily packaged in brown paper and
bound with duct tape, and laid the parcel on the counter. “All there,” he said, taking the cigar from his teeth. “Yer usual, plus that – eh – other thing ye asked fer. Almost got stopped at customs.”

  “Did the Commission give you trouble?”

  “Nae trouble.”

  “Good,” said Saul, examining the parcel. “About the money….”

  “Giit teh fuck.” Dreg Duke rolled up his sleeves and returned to the work for which he derived no profit, no glory and certainly no assistance.

  He tucked the parcel in his coat and thanked him with more sincerity than usual. He would have preferred a more formal farewell with the only man in the martial world he could remotely call a friend.

  The cubicle door shut. The chronometer read 2330. He dropped the package on the small counter top and stretched out his neck. His joints throbbed and ached under weeks of accumulated insomnia and malnourishment.

  There was a small sliding door over the cluttered counter, and the green light over the door meant that the freight chute was loaded. He pressed the button near the light. The door slid open and he took out the following days’ provisions: six small boxes of desiccated protein isolate and some sawdust-textured, barely edible matter which took on the taste and consistency of sludge whenever he mixed in the hot water. The door slid shut and the light went red.

  He picked the jasmine-scented sheets up off the floor and laid them in a pile on the mattress, lit a cigarette before taking his knife and carefully cutting across the tape on the folds of the wrapping. Inside, there was a carton of Lucky Strike cigarettes, an unlabeled bottle of earth-brown single malt, and a most curious third item which one would be even more hard-pressed to find in the martial world than scotch or cigarettes: A book. More unusually; a paperback book. The bold title on the front cover, provocatively read:

  “UNITED MARTIAL COVENANT AND THE BIRTH OF NEW WORLD ORDER”

  Books were not outlawed from the martial world. However, any piece of data that entered Sodom did so digitally. It was not known whether the Commission filtered out any “undesirable” material from cyberspace, but it was almost certain that they did. Emails, phone calls, bank transactions – everything went through the Martial Nexus. Everyone was free, provided it was known exactly what was done with that freedom, and it was likely that political literature ranked high on the Commission’s blacklist. That said, if there was anyone in the martial world who could smuggle in illegal contraband, it was Dreg Duke.