I dreamt again, and I am not sure why I woke up thinking about this, but it may be important. The Aeifain were the first to see the Great Ones join the war. A twenty story tall mutant dinosaur answered their call while we were still dabbling in mindless men that would attack anything within reach, their sanity shattered by what we pumped into them. As horrible as the Aeifain weapon could have been, it immediately turned on them, destroying their cities. They called upon others to fight the first beast. It worked, in a sense. They fought. But they still destroyed cities and devoured the population. Soon the Aeifain fled to the mainland, and began sacrificing people to the Great Ones.
The Whitestones went another route and created super soldiers from the ancient things they found in countries they conquered. The monsters could not stand the daylight, but they had the strength of four men and could drain a man of his blood in minutes. That is what they fed on; other men’s life force. Some said the soul also, and I think that may be possible because they soon started procreating on their own. Fledgling ‘vampires’ emerged, as well as flesh eating ghuls that moved faster than any man could hope to move. Half men, mixed with animals were sighted across Teurone. Some say these were the same beings, but I think that someone discovered how to recreate lycanthropy. They had as much control over these horrors as the Aeifain had over theirs, and as much as we had over what we created. First the concentration camps were emptied to feed these things, and afterwards the population of whole cities disappeared.
In the west, we regressed prisoners in our experiments, creating mindless hordes of hungry zombies. They could not be commanded though, and created more of themselves if they did not eat the brain of anyone they bit. We also worked with animals, creating monstrous versions of apes, insects, and even dinosaurs. And we had no more control of them than our enemies had over their creations.
The truth is, we did not create anything. We merely released what was waiting in the shadows that lurked just outside of our reach and understanding. Man is the key to his own destruction. We tried destroying these things with plasma bombs. Tikonama was our first attempt. It did not work. We should have known what would happen because of the tests in our own deserts. This is what gave birth to many of our own monsters.
I am face down in the mud and blood. I think it is daylight, but it is hard to tell with the constant cloud cover and thick walls of mist. I roll onto my back slowly, so I won’t attract unwanted attention. My brother lays five paces from me, torn limb from limb. Why? Why would they take him, but leave me? I clutch my chest as the tears begin, because of the pain in my heart. I feel the metal plate and small machine that pumps the hormones and adrenaline into my system when it is needed. Did they feel that I am one of them, that I am already a monster?
Am I? Am I the monster? I was created with the same research that made so many of the things for which I was built and trained to hunt. I have a plasma power core. I don’t tire like most men. I am stronger than any man known, except for those few that also were altered like me. No, I am still human. I destroy because I must. It is my mission, my duty, and I was given command of men to defend my country by destroying my enemies. I was told to avoid the monsters in the dark places. But this fog follows me now. I cannot escape it. I wonder if it covers the whole earth, or only where I am.
It doesn’t matter. I must get up. I must follow these monsters to where they go, and destroy what waits there. I think they are being called somewhere for a purpose beyond human understanding. So I won’t try and understand. I will not think. I will just act. That is what I was made to do. I will make history. I go now, to whatever waits for me.
Aetheric Elements: The Rise of a Steampunk Reality Page 58
