Clio and Cy: The Apocalypse

by Christopher Lee

  Cy was truly half man, half machine. His intuition bordered on the realm of magic, harnessing powers that Leonardo da Vinci and Michael Angelo could only have whiffed at in a far off dream. Einstein and Newton were snot-nosed toddlers compared to his intellect. Every now and then, however, Cy showed that he wasn’t an actual god. Infallible human hands made him. Still, he was the greatest thing ever created by any earthling.

  Cy had the strength to match, made of improved graphene, far superior to its original, first discovered in the 21st Century. Back then, mechanical engineer James Hone of Columbia University was quoted as saying. "It would take an elephant, balanced on a pencil, to break through a sheet of graphene the thickness of Saran Wrap." Three hundred and seventy times stronger than steel, able to band gap currents of electricity, now, in its new and improved form, it ran through Cy’s frame as the greatest super conductor in existence, fused through every part of him.

  CHAPTER 6 - DARKNESS WAY

  "Men fear death as children fear to go in the dark."

  - Francis Bacon

  South Carolina:

  RMB Jackson:

  The Underground Passageway:

  Urged by love, thoughts of finding her mother pulled her inside. She squeezed through the hatch and entered the earthen cave. Like slave runners once had, clandestine men built the secret passageway during an evil time, during the early part of the war. Quietly, the battle still raged inside of the survivors that were left.

  Clio ventured through the tunnel, afraid to look where her light shined. No choice, she had to move forward. The cave meandered, jagged and uneven; as if she were inside the road kill guts of a giant python. Clio felt the air temperature drop. Must be going deeper, she thought. Crawling through the low places, she skimmed her backpack off the dirt ceiling. A dark mysterious tunnel was bad enough, and the sudden lapses in subterranean consistency were unnerving. Uncomfortable, she crawled, wishing the path would widen.

  Not sure I can make it through that, Clio thought, looking at a narrow opening where the tunnel had bottlenecked to the size of a football. There was no other way – go forward or crawl back to the shelter. Clio removed her rucksack and tried to cram it through a hole not much bigger than her head. Pushing and slinking along, she rammed the pack through the narrowest part. Then her head… Her body… Going deeper…

  Caught under a mini avalanche, dirt fell from the constricting walls while Clio wiggled forward. She struggled through the collapsing earth, clawing to make the rucksack size hole bigger, rooting like a mole. Three feet… Clio couldn’t hold her breath any longer and inhaled loose granules of airborne grit, sucking them up her nasal passages. Four feet… She felt sand going deep inside to her brain. Clio spit and gritted it out. Six feet… She tried to rush through but progress was slow, feeling the weight of falling dirt. Eight feet… Clio pulled her trailing body through the tunnel, digging off her elbows like a land gargoyle. Ten feet…

  Finally clear… She could breathe. The pathway widened… Covered in dirt, she looked like an aborigine girl.

  Stretching up as far as overhead clearance allowed, Clio made it to her feet and hunched along until she could almost stand like a proper human. Brushing the dirt off her body, she walked toward an unknown destination. Clio seemed to be slowing, or losing strength. That’s it. I’m going uphill… I think… She wasn’t sure. It was hard to keep her sense of direction in the dark confines of the snake’s belly. The flashlight’s bright center revealed the path’s rough surface. Light faded out weaker and wider, casting ringed shapes over the terrain like electric tie-dye as she walked.

  Moving through the tunnel with swimming thoughts, Clio kept the flashlight shining far out ahead of her. The photon pistol… Thinking about her weapon, she panicked, Clio couldn’t remember how to use the thing. The more she thought about it, the more she felt lost.

  After dropping her rucksack on the ground, she grabbed the weapon, pulling it out in a hurry. Breathe Clio… breathe… She listened to herself and steadied. Holding the flashlight between her chest and chin, she clutched the pistol and felt the safety switch, exploring the weapon… there it is… She traced over the trigger. Confidence calmed her. That’s right… like that… click… aim… squeeze…

  Without the flashlight on, it was pitch black inside the tunnel, not that Clio turned it off for a second. She’d risk killing the batteries before she did that. It was dark but… The tunnel smelled like something… It smelled… familiar. Like dry mud that’d been hosed wet, remembering that scent due to her mother washing it off her hands and arms countless times when she was younger.

  She dreamed of a small creek bed before the war started, they were just flashes in her mind, but it was a real place. She was only four or five then… maybe. Getting muddy, splashing and frolicking, she was always down there playing. It was one of those rare memories from a tender age that would always stick with her – she knew she loved the creek, recalling being a mucky dirt ball for at least a year of her life. She was happy then… Maybe all people felt like that before the war started… happier, even the adults, Clio pondered…

  Her happiness was eaten away and only a distant memory now. She’d been swallowed inside the belly of the snake for a long time. Clio slowly lost track until her six senses were infected like snakebite. Several hours drifted away and it was impossible to tell minutes from hours. The shelter vault under her home was child’s play compared to this tunnel. Clio’s depth perception fried in a crosswire melt down. Time slipped away. Tick… tock… tick… tock… tick… tock… Six hours ticked down.

  Ten hours bleed off. Tick… tock… tick… tock… Thirteen hours drifted away. Seeing something ahead, she walked closer. It was a glimmer of hope. Slicing through the darkness, it came down from the top. Light was shining in. Am I hallucinating? She wondered, looking up. It’s a… a… hole…

  High up, but it appeared to be another tunnel. The air smelled right, fresh… Clio moved directly under the blinding light. Squinting, she could see the sky in a blue sliver. Then she realized something with dread. If she wasn’t hallucinating and it was a tunnel leading up, it was too high to reach. It was an impossible exit. Defeated, she sat down…

  She drifted off to sleep, unaware for how long when she woke. After a few hours of smelling the air and basking in the taunting light, Clio abandoned the overhead shaft.

  Seventeen hours inside the cave… Clio pressed on but seriously argued with herself about turning back. Non-stop, she argued. Guided by instinct, she continued moving. She was threatened with growing doom, and her flashlight was fading in the darkness. Nineteen hours... Tick… tock… tick… tock… Twenty-one hours passed. Twenty-two… Clio banged her light as it dwindled down to pathetic bleakness. Twenty-three…

  Hour Twenty-Six and Clio’s mental shell cracked. Clio’s mind formed into the first stage of psychosis. Hallucinations floated, seeing things as if she’d gone into the rabbit hole. Things hovered in front of her – things that weren’t really there. The illusions weren’t necessarily bad. Her defenses were trying to protect her through the feel-good-blanket of euphoria. Clio had a psych dinner for the eyes and a feel-good show performing inside her body. Caught between the edges of ecstasy and madness, she almost got used to her new state - enough to control it anyway - keep going...

  Clio slowed… She looked down, shining the remaining circle at the ground in front of her feet. Stopping, she squatted to inspect, brushing her hand over the marks and feeling the ridges over her fingertips - those almost look like tracks, or paw marks, or … something…?

  Maybe I’m hallucinating them? The tracks waffled between fantasy and reality. They were real… they weren’t real… they were real… they weren’t real… Her mind changed every few seconds until she drifted off in euphoria, forgetting about them. Suddenly, a fresh set pulled her back to reality.

  More tracks? Can’t be… they don’t look right… I’m seeing things… They were real… they weren’t real… they were real… no, they we
ren’t real…

  Clio continued down the tunnel and flashed the hazy spec from her flashlight onto the dirt wall beside her. The young girl’s defenses kicked in. She was stoned and high as a kite. Look at these things... Clio thought with a happy smile, running her hand over the primitive designs. Several grooves ran laterally along the wall. Delayed fear pulled her back to earth after she realized what they were. Claw marks were gouged in deep through the dirt.

  Aiming the spec of light on the adjacent wall, she went to the marks, ugh!!! She ran her hands over them, terrified at what she felt. Clio was also now aware that her euphoria lost some of its chemical kick. Taking over at the helm, fight or flight was operating her controls. Unfortunately, she was sharper, not one hundred percent, but the fog was lifting. Keep going, she told herself. Oh… my… God… Clio thought after looking at a new set of markings impossible to ignore.

  They were everywhere.

  What made those? Clio didn’t want to know the answer and chastised herself for asking. X patterns… Crosses… deep territorial marks were scored into the sides of the tunnel. Not markings like a raccoon or something small would make. They were five to six feet off the ground. Whatever scratched these obviously eats meat, big slabs of it, she pondered.

  Doing her best to move forward, the twelve-year-old began to tremble and shake, wanting to run, but to where? The place became giant - and the passageway’s diameter expanded as if a whale swallowed her whole. Eight feet high and seven feet across, Clio kept moving through the wide-open cavern.

  Oh thank God! Her mind praised with joy, seeing a sliver of light shining down inside the cave. End of the line, she’d made it, and the tunnel’s exit was finally before her.

  Before she ran out, she needed time to think. Clio needed to pee anyway, realizing that she’d been holding it since she entered the secret passageway.

  Clio smelled swaths of fresh air and wanted to run to the light, but she knew better. Pants down around her ankles, she squatted to tinkle, waiting… Finally flowing after a long pause, Clio avoided getting the pee on her shoes, squirming around on her heels and balled-up-toes.

  Freedom was almost hers; the opening was only a few yards away. Clio gasped… As sure as the incoming daylight, she heard movement. What is it? All the hair on her body stood erect, as if each follicle were saluting like her father’s commando brigade.

  Clio was still peeing with her pants around her ankles and her heart was pounding. Sifting down amidst the sunlight, she witnessed sand falling inside the passageway exit. Something was scratching and digging and breathing over the hole. Like shudders opened in an ancient room, light bathed the falling silt.

  Suddenly, it appeared like a hanging bat. A terrifying head popped inside the cave.

  “Sssshhhhaaa,” it hissed, exposing its fangs and staring with yellow eyes.

  The creature dropped down inside the cave, facing her after twisting and landing perfectly. “Ssshhhhaaa,” it hissed again, and coiled its body, ready to spring. The creature was the size of a grown man and ripped in muscle, blocking the exit. Tasting her, the charcoal skin monster sniffed the air, emitting a foul stench.

  Clio grabbed her pistol, aiming and shivering with her pants bunched over her feet. The gun rattled, shaking in her unsteady hand. Her pungent urine slowed the creature’s attack, its senses stifled by the strange odor. Things slowed and the weapon steadied as she watched herself from on high.

  The creature lunged and Clio shot. “Zzzzzzzzwhhhap!”

  Locking her grip in fear, she squeezed the trigger and didn’t let go, shooting a constant stream of flesh destroying light that loosened the earth like a sand blaster. Clio released the trigger but couldn’t see through the dirty storm. Breathing hard, the child watched the dust settle and clear. Gross! Bloody creature parts were revealed in the aftermath of photon wash and the incoming sunlight.

  Clio was too afraid to move and looked at the exit. What if more of those things are up there? Waiting for me… Outside, however, is not what she needed to be worried about.

  She heard it behind her. A new threat was hunting her from deep inside the cave. The twelve-year-old remembered the vertical tunnel. What if one of those things dug it as another way to get down inside this cave?

  The beast grew louder and Clio felt as if she was in a nightmare. She was. The thing was on a mission toward the young girl, coming fast and making noise, hissing and scratching. “Ssssshhhaaa.”

  Dirt loosened from the earthen ceiling and its viscous breathing echoed down the tunnel. Energy moved beneath her feet. She was sure of it. Something was running hard and fast and coming her way.

  CHAPTER 7 - LIGHTNING POWER

  Alexandria, Virginia:

  “Good morning Dr. Marcus.”

  “Good morning Cy.”

  “Something new for me today?” Cy asked, sensing his creator had another test in store.

  Dr. Pressfield scrunched his face together, thinking, looking into his cyborg’s torso, as if searching for the right answer, expecting it to burst from his creation’s perfect chest. “Thinking about it Cy.”

  He knew there was only one path to take and with that realization, tranquility settled enough to allow him to make eye contact with Cy.

  “You’re not sure though, Dr. Marcus, are you?”

  “Cy, sometimes I think you can read my mind.”

  “You know that’s technically impossible Dr. Marcus.”

  “Yes Cy, I know…” Dr. Marcus said, hiding the fact he wasn’t actually sure if his young cyborg could fortune tell.

  Cy called his creator by the title and name, Dr. Marcus. He did things like that even though he wasn’t specifically programed with that directive. Somehow coming from Cy, it sounded right. He knew how to be formal and personal at the same time, showing respect and affection equally, with a simple mention of “Dr. Marcus.”

  “Something dangerous, Dr. Marcus?”

  “Yes, for anyone in the world it would be, but for you… I don’t know… that’s what I want to find out...”

  “I can tell how much you care about me, Dr. Marcus,” Cy stated, using a tone that elicited how much he cared about his creator, too.

  As if to amend his statement, Marcus held up his hand and shook his head no. “That came out wrong… It’s something more, Cy… more than a test,” Dr. Pressfield announced.

  “Oh, I see. Something important needs to be done, and through the act of doing it lays the test, too?”

  “You’re an amazing creature, Cy. You sure know how to make me proud,” Dr. Pressfield said with goose bumps tingling down his arms.

  Cy walked toward the window with the sound of his gentle steps being placed on the oak floor and looked out. “What do you need me to do Dr. Marcus? Where is it that you’d have me go?”

  Marcus looked at his cyborg’s back. “I need something to continue my work,” Dr. Pressfield affirmed.

  “You need a power source, don’t you Dr. Marcus?”

  Dr. Pressfield smiled and nodded his head up and down. “Yes, right again Cy, I need a power source.”

  “The one you spoke of in your old laboratory? The one in Washington, DC?”

  “Yes, Cy, that one. There’s no other way for me to continue my work… to build you a friend.”

  Cy stared out the window and then turned back smiling. “I have you, Dr. Marcus; I don’t need any more friends.”

  “I appreciate that Cy, but the world, I fear, needs more like you…”

  “True, I wouldn’t want to deprive the world of my wonderful personality and charm, Dr. Marcus. Heaven knows it’s in much need these days,” Cy said grinning, lifting his head in pretend arrogance.

  It was things like that that made it impossible. Dr. Pressfield loved his creation like the son he never had. Impossible not to, given the fact his young cyborg was funny and charming. Impossible, like a puppy dog giving you cute eyes and wagging its tail; Marcus had to love him.

  Cy gazed out the window again, dreaming in ways on
ly he could. Pivoting away from the scenery, he faced his master, patiently watching.

  Feeling eyes, Dr. Marcus Pressfield pondered in his head and turned, looking at his creation. “I don’t know if you can find it Cy… or if it’s even operable if you do… but…”

  “It’s worth a shot, Dr. Marcus… You know it and I know it.”

  “Yes… I think you’re right, Cy. It’s worth a shot.”

  Washington, DC was in ruins, along with most of the United States. Dr. Pressfield knew his former laboratory was probably under thousands of pounds of concrete and rubble, but Cy was correct – it was worth a shot. Dr. Pressfield, “the scientist,” needed a power source. He needed a unique generator.

  Only a few existed in the world and it just so happened that one was in his old office. Super charged; it was able to reach gigavolt potentials with an energy output in excess of 100 megajoule. It was a masterpiece of technology. An intense 10 million Ampere-GeV proton beam drawn from Dr. Pressfield’s generator could ignite a deuterium thermonuclear detonation wave in its cylinder, where the strong magnetic field of the proton beam entraps the charged fusion reaction products inside. Meaning: Dr. Pressfield’s super battery could produce concentrated power the strength beyond a Bolt of Lightning. And, it was the size of a toaster.

  Dr. Pressfield looked at Cy, feeling his heartbeat pounding. “It would be dangerous, Cy. You know the things that are out there.”

  “I do, Dr. Marcus, and I have no fear of them.”

  Dr. Pressfield knew that Cy wasn’t programmed with fear, but then again, he was part human. “Are you sure, Cy?” Marcus asked.