Cultwick: The Wretched Dead

by J. Stone

  Just ahead, he saw another blast of light and heard the sound of the gunfire, but it was cut short. An explosion echoed in the chamber, and the mine began to rumble from the effect. Bits of debris crumbled down from the ceiling and black smoke from the explosion filled the caverns.

  Coughing, Vincent hurried to slide his respirator over his mouth, so he could continue to breathe freely. In the chamber to his front, he could hear screams following the explosion and large chunks of rocks falling to the ground. It sounded to him like the explosion had caused a cave-in exactly where the rebels had been. Balancing himself on the still shaking terrain, Vincent rushed forward to investigate what had happened.

  He managed to reach the entryway to what had been a larger, open section, which was completely covered in large, fallen rocks and chunks of debris from the explosion. Bodies lay crushed underneath the hard pieces of earth, and the room had fallen silent other than the residual sounds of the ground shifting.

  In shock, he stepped forward and attempted to inspect the bodies that had been crushed. He tossed the boulders he could lift, trying to find who had been in the room at the time of the explosion. The first few he uncovered all looked like members of the confederacy. Eventually, however, he found a green and black checkered shirt like the one he had seen Felix wearing the last time he saw him.

  Unwilling to accept the truth, Vincent lifted any of the debris he could for a few moments. Underneath Felix’s dead body, Vincent found Cassie struggling to breathe.

  “Oh, thank you,” he said to himself with relief.

  He hurriedly removed more of the rocks, until he could pull her from under the cave-in. She opened her eyes and coughed from all the smoke in the air. Vincent took off his respirator and gave it to Cassie, strapping it around her head.

  “What happened?” he asked.

  “Felix...” she said looking back at her husband’s broken and battered body. Tears ran down her face and she knelt down next to him, grabbing his hand. “He shielded me.”

  “Vincent,” a barely audible and rough voice whispered from behind him.

  He looked around for someone else to have survived, but he could not find the origin. He waited in silence, hoping they would repeat the effort. The bounty hunter flipped the toggle on his eye patch to the heat signal setting, which he thought would be able to more easily catch any movement.

  “Vincent,” the voice coughed. With the aid of the eye patch’s vision, he could see one of the heat patterns moving from beneath the collapsed mine. He left Cassie sitting on one of the rocks, while carefully navigating the boulders, making his way to the other survivor. Lifting several of the rocks, he found that it was Hirim, but his abdomen had been pierced by a large chunk of the mine’s metal railing.

  “Vincent,” he repeated. “It was... Reginald.”

  “Maynard?” Vincent asked. “What are you talking about?”

  “He set... us up,” Hirim explained through great efforts. “He and Driscoll... are working together...”

  “Why would he do that?” the bounty hunter asked. “Kill his own people?”

  “Because they have outlived their usefulness, Vincent,” Maynard said from behind him.

  Vincent turned to see Maynard, Driscoll, and some of the rebels that had gone with Maynard standing at the entry to the chamber. Driscoll had equipped the mechanical hand tool that Felix wore when Vincent first met him, and he was toying with its capabilities.

  “The Chromework Confederacy was simply a means to an end,” Maynard continued. “With the events that have been happening in Cultwick and our new empress, things had to be concluded with this ragtag group.”

  “You... betrayed us...” Hirim hissed.

  While they talked, Vincent moved his good arm to his back and began blindly sifting through his tools. The darkness of the mine hid his movements from Maynard’s view, allowing him a certain amount of freedom.

  “No, I used you, Hirim,” Maynard corrected him. “I’ve found that the best weapon to use against your enemy is another enemy. I fabricated the Chromework Confederacy, so that the empire would focus all their resources on the rebellion rather than on the empress’ true threat - her daughter. Now that Viola Arkmast sits on the throne, my work as a rebel is over, and my life as her advisor has just begun. But now, I no longer need you. I thank you for your great efforts in distracting the empire for so long, but it is simply unnecessary now.”

  “And the rebels back in Pendulum Falls?” Vincent inquired. “What of them? You can’t expect they won’t find this suspicious.”

  “Right you are,” Maynard replied. “I have a team that will deal with them, and when the mayor is replaced, we will bring the city back under the empire’s control.”

  “How are Graham and Driscoll involved?” Vincent asked, needing to prolong the conversation a bit more. He meanwhile had collected a special component from his belt and was slyly attempting to slot it onto his pistol’s barrel.

  “They’re not,” Maynard answered. “Or at least they weren’t, until you involved them. Driscoll here proved quite invaluable in getting all my rebels into one easy to target location though. He is, however, yet another loose end that must be severed.”

  “What?” Driscoll asked, looking over to Maynard in confusion.

  One of the Maynard’s men, meanwhile, placed the barrel of their gun to Driscoll’s head and fired. Driscoll’s lifeless body toppled forward, landing among the other crushed corpses in the mine.

  “That just leaves you, Vincent,” Maynard continued and then looked over to Cassie who still sat near her husband’s body crying. “You and that woman who refuses to die. I do apologize for having to bring you and your girlfriend into this whole thing, but it does tie a rather neat bow around the whole mess. No survivors, I’m afraid. I’ve put too much into this to let you get in my way now.”

  “I’m not going to make it that easy,” Vincent replied.

  He had finished attaching the component to the barrel, and cross drew it with his left hand. The men at Maynard’s side also drew, and they were able to pull faster than Vincent was with his injury. He took one bullet in the stomach and another in his right arm, triggering a great deal of pain from the previous wound. Despite their shots, however, Vincent aimed the pistol above his adversaries’ heads to the low hanging ceiling of the smaller chamber. Pulling the trigger emitted a deafening blast, as the bullet left the pistol, and when it collided with the mine ceiling, it exploded, causing the cave to rumble once again.

  The rocks began to tumble down, and Vincent took cover behind the fallen boulders. The smaller tunnel chamber that Maynard and his men occupied, however, rapidly began to fall apart. They were forced to flee out of the tunnel, sealing Vincent inside. He collapsed to the ground, leaned back against a large boulder, and inspected the wound at his stomach. Blood soaked through his shirt, and he had no strength to properly deal with the injury. Vincent looked over to Hirim, who he discovered had passed sometime during the conversation with Maynard. He then turned back to Cassie, who still kneeled at her husband’s body with her back to the bounty hunter.

  “Cassie?” he called out.

  She didn’t move or respond, so he repeated, “Cassie?”

  “I’m here,” she simply said.

  Vincent’s head began to spin and the effects of repeated gunshots were starting to wear on him. “You’ve got to… get out of here,” he explained. “Get the chela… from Driscoll… clear the rubble… get to Polly… and get out of here… ”

  “Alright…” she finally said.

  Cassie finally looked back at him with a soot-covered face that had streams of tears washing away the grime. She stood and walked toward the tunnel that Vincent had caved-in and knelt down at Driscoll’s body, pulling the mechanical hand tool from him. She equipped it on her wrist and began pulling the fallen rocks out of their path.

  “I’m… sorry… I… couldn’t… protect… you…” Vincent said, as his vision dimmed and his head fell back to the rock
s behind him.

  Chapter 35. Pearl and the Escape

  She regained consciousness in the dark room, with her head throbbing and a pain shooting through her arm. Blinking several times, she eventually made out the image of a syringe sticking out of her right arm. She remembered a man had been in the room with her before she blacked out, but there was no sign of him, as she looked around the room.

  A fear and sense of urgency overwhelmed her, and she looked around in an attempt to find a means of escaping the chair. Leather bands were strapped over her wrist and ankles, keeping her securely in place. A table, however, had been left near her right hand with a scalpel laying on it. She attempted to work her fingers toward the metal handle, while the needle in her arm penetrated deeper into her with each extension of her fingers. Gritting her teeth, she finally reached out, grasping the scalpel and raked it toward her.

  With it in reach, she grabbed the handle of the scalpel and twisted it back, so the blade pointed toward her. She managed to aim the edge, so that it intersected with the leather strap. Working it back and forth for some time, the band eventually began to wear through, giving her a hope that she might escape the chair and the dark basement.

  As she worked on the strap, her mind focused on the peculiar concern that she didn’t know who she was. She had several ideas floating around in her head, but no single one sounded correct.

  She had memories of being Anne Pearce, growing up in Cultwick to parents, Clara and George. She remembered an older sister, Naomi, as well as a younger, Felicity. This set of memories seemed the most abundant, but also the furthest away.

  Pearl Hicks was the name belonging to the second set. It was a name that she had selected, but she didn’t recall where it had come from. She worked as a dance hall girl in Dust Grove at the Gem Saloon, before being involved in a rebellion against the Cultwick Empire. The memories seemed clouded and hazy, but there was a general warmth and happiness to them.

  Most recently, she had memories of Isabelle Sloan, wife of Owen Sloan, the Director of the Reclamation Bureau. There was something plastic, fake, and shattered about these recollections. Each memory didn’t seem to lead naturally into the next. Instead, there were large gaps and overlapping pieces that failed to fit together like they should.

  The scalpel scraped through the last bits of the leather band, and she freed her right arm. She reached over to her left hand and unhooked the clasp, freeing her other arm. With both hands loose, she slowly grabbed the syringe and pulled it from her tender and irritated flesh, groaning as the needle slid out of her.

  “Son of a…” she muttered to herself, tossing the needle aside.

  She unclasped the straps at her feet and then stood from the chair. Having not used her legs for some time, she tripped forward after standing. She caught herself on a table to her front but was aghast by what she found on it.

  A woman she recognized as Gwen Potter lay dead on the table, cut to pieces and a bloodied mess. The man that had shared the room with her, Dr. Webber, had done this to her, she recalled. He had been trying to do something to her mind, though she wasn’t entirely sure of what.

  She regained her footing and stood upright over the body. Looking down at herself, she realized she was wearing a beautiful green dress with a deep brown sash tied along her waist. It had been sullied by quite a bit of blood and was an absolute mess. More memories of her life as Isabelle came rushing back, and she remembered that the man she thought was her husband had been piecing her memories together at his own whim. The doctor had been assisting him in this endeavor, but for whatever reason they had abandoned her in the basement.

  Catching the glint of a metal hoop lying on a table in the corner, she walked over and inspected it. Picking it up, she recalled a young woman had given it to her. She knew she cared for her, but she could neither remember her face nor name. Lying next to the bracelet were clothes that she recognized as her own - as Pearl’s.

  Pearl slid off the bloodied dress and began putting the clothes from the table on. Lastly, she slid the bracelet back over her wrist. Immediately, she felt like things were beginning to set themselves right, and she allowed herself a brief respite from the fear and confusion that had permeated her mind since awakening in the basement.

  Above her, a loud bang echoed through the house, and she instinctively clutched a hand to her mouth to silence herself. Rather than wait to find out what it was, she knew she needed to get out of that house as quickly as possible. She dreaded what would happen if Owen, Deckland, or Webber returned, while she was still there.

  Attempting to silence her footsteps on the stairs as much as possible, Pearl made her way up to the main floor. She found herself in Owen’s office that she once recalled sneaking into as Isabelle. The memory seemed vague and somehow fuzzier than most of her other Isabelle memories. She knew that there was only one way out of the room, and summoning her courage with a deep breath she twisted the knob and cracked the door open.

  She peeked out into the hall, looking for anyone coming toward her, but it was empty. In the distance, Pearl could hear voices discussing something, but they were muffled beyond recognition. Hesitantly, she approached them noting a familiarity about them. Edging around a corner and facing toward the main entryway, Pearl caught sight of both Owen and Deckland discussing something just inside the house.

  “I told you, I don’t know,” Owen said to Deckland, frustrated. “That’s not what’s important now.”

  “Not important?” Deckland asked. “She was controlling all of us.”

  “Well, it’s over now,” Owen explained, rubbing his temples. “I need you to check on my experiment in the basement. Make sure she didn’t escape.”

  “You don’t think there’s more important things going on than your little obsession?” Deckland suggested.

  Glaring back at him, Owen simply said, “Go.”

  Seeing Owen’s face again triggered more of Pearl’s memories, but this time they were not of Isabelle. They were of Anne, when she was just a young woman. She had been working in a courtyard, attempting to sell commissioned portraits to the members of the crowd. Owen sat across from her, asking her to paint his image. She recalled him giving her the creeps even from that brief interaction, as he seemed to stare much too intently at her.

  She had not shown him much interest, and when he asked to take her to dinner, she declined his offer. He had, however, learned her name, and it turned out that it was more than enough for him to go off of. Owen began to show up places she regularly visited, and he would always ask her to accompany him to some restaurant, theatre, or art gallery. Her answer, though, was always the same, but her attitude became more and more irritable, as he went on.

  Eventually, it seemed that he had been rejected long enough. One day, Owen approached her asking one last time for her to join him for dinner. When she turned him down, yet again, he threatened her family. She rushed home to find that while she was gone someone had broken into their home. Her parents and both sisters had been killed, during what the inspectors called a ‘robbery gone wrong.’

  That night, a man came for her. With the combination of Anne and Isabelle’s memories, Pearl was able to discern that Deckland was that man. He stole her away from her home and took her to a lab that Owen had set up. He had a group of scientists inject her with a series of serums in an effort to control and reshape her mind to his desires. Through an error by one of her captors, however, the cell they kept her in was left unlocked, before they could complete the experimentation.

  After escaping, she left the city and headed west. She forged a new identity for herself and only ever painted in an effort to remember what had happened to her to cause her to lose the memories.

  Returning her thoughts to the present, she saw Deckland had left the entryway, making his way toward Owen’s office. Luckily for Pearl, he chose a separate hallway, which just left Owen in her way. He, meanwhile, walked into the parlor and prepared himself a drink. She knew she could sneak past him if she
tried, but the thought of what the two men had done to her held her back.

  She crept into the kitchen and retrieved a sharp knife from a wooden block lying on the counter. Behind her, Pearl could hear Deckland open the office door and begin to descend the stairs. She slunk back toward the office, being careful not to alert Owen to her presence. Sneaking into the room, she hid beside the doorway to the stairs that lead down to the basement. There, she waited in silence for Deckland to return.

  The creaking of the old wooden steps warned her of his ascension of the stairs. Pearl gripped the knife securely in her palm and prepared for his arrival in the office. Tucking herself tightly against the wall, she allowed him to walk past her enough, so she could clearly see his back.

  Images of her parents and sisters’ faces flashed before her eyes, and when Deckland was in position, she rushed forward, jabbing him in the back with the knife. He groaned, grasping at the knife and trying to turn toward her simultaneously.

  “You bitch!” he yelled, when he caught sight of her.

  She slid the knife out, and he faced her. Thrusting the knife forward again, she attempted to stab him in the gut, but he raised his hands in defense. Rather than piercing his stomach, the blade slid across his palm, slashing open the skin and spurting blood out toward her. He gripped it tightly, preventing her from stabbing again, but it sliced firmly into his hand.

  Deckland’s other hand grabbed Pearl’s wrist, and he pulled her close to him. She released her grip on the knife, reached around to his back, and slid a finger into his gaping wound, causing him to lurch forward and yell in pain. He managed to push her toward the doorway leading to the basement, and together they fell down the flight of stairs.

  To her luck, Deckland took the brunt of the fall, and he softened her blow. At the base of the stairs, however, he landed on top of her with the blade pressed firmly into his chest. Though he was left dead from the tumble, the heavy man pinned her under his body, preventing her from escaping.