Cacophony

by Aaron Frale

  The realization had come to him this morning. The body of the acolyte had been pressed against his. In the dead eyes of the person who would never ascend the ranks of the priesthood, he understood the reason he had hung on all those years.

  His daughter's experiment in a perfect civilization had failed. It hadn’t accounted for impulsive behavior. A leader in a position of power could crumble a culture with one rash decision. Even though she succeeded in making a world where there was no debate and only action, society was only as healthy as the person in charge. There were no suitable people to be in charge, not even Dr. Ray himself.

  Despite his best efforts, he was a victim of recklessness. As much as he tried to delude himself, killing the acolyte for one night of fleeting pleasure risked everything. While the High Priest would tolerate a slave going missing, the priesthood was only reserved for those with the rare genetic combination to distinguish the auditory differences of the cosmic microwave background radiation.

  Maybe he’d get away with it this time, but since acolytes were a scarce resource, it would only be a matter of time when the High Priest would make the decision any leader would make when someone in the group threatens a scarce resource.

  Since his time was limited, Dr. Ray had known there was one solution all along. Dr. Ben had discovered the way forward for humanity. He lacked the gumption to use it. Now it was a simple matter of refocusing the power. There was one loose end he’d have to tie up after he was finished here.

  Dr. Ray worked. The clarity had returned.

  15

  Patel, DeAndre, and Azerius ducked through the corridors toward the machine. They hid when possible and killed when they had no choice. The ceremony taking place in the throne room had emptied out most of the corridors, so they were making great time.

  As much as it was nice to have Azerius’ blade watching their back, DeAndre had to temper the guy because when they had to take out a few cultists guarding the way they were headed, the man stabbed them one too many times. There was eliminating obstacles in your path and then mutilating the corpses. Azerius seemed to want to leave nothing left of any cult member.

  After weaving through the tunnels below the castle, they finally got to their target. It was the machine. DeAndre kicked open the door to the room that housed it, and the thing was more significant than he had imagined it to be. It was a massive piece of equipment with tendrils that reached out to hundreds of teens on platforms throughout the room. A black liquid oozed through spikes that were stuck into various points of their body. They were whimpering.

  Since there were no cultists in the room, DeAndre got to work. He powered down the machine and used his speed advantage to disconnect the people just like Ludie had taught him. The massive ear spikes were last. He activated the collar on the one he had freed, and the girl groaned and began to come out of her haze.

  After the first one puked and sat up on her table, a priest wandered into the room to see why the machine wasn’t active. When he saw what was happening, he ran. Patel charged him, thrust her blade into the guy, and said, “DeAndre, hurry! We are about to have company.”

  Azerius and Patel readied their weapons and turned toward the entrance.

  ∆∆∆

  Meathook and Magdalena clomped through the ground floor of the castle. They had a less stealthy approach and clobbered any cultists who happened to get in their way. Since most of them were at the wedding, it wasn’t as much of a fight as they thought, but it was still enough to break a sweat.

  Meathook had spent hours back home swinging his hammer. The irony was that it wasn’t because he thought that he’d one day join a multiverse agency in charge of safeguarding humanity. It was because he was in a Viking themed metal band, and he played the part of Thor. They would scream old Nordic poetry and smash things on stage with a giant hammer. It was all part of the act.

  The reality was that he wasn’t the strongest person of his world, but compared to the rest of the multiverse, he indeed was a Viking god. The funny part was that it was Ludie who first approached him about his ability. At first, he thought the kid was a fan. Not that people would know him from his band because he wore a mask on stage and went by a pseudonym. One that he decided to keep for the Tuners as well.

  The fans would be the people who knew he came from a famous family. They were more interested in his grandfather, who defined metal, or his dad, who owned the biggest rock studio in the country. That was why when Meathook got into the family business, it was a band made entirely from stage personas. No one went by their real names, and since most of his friends were the progeny of the music industry, they all wanted to be known for their music, not their genetics. For their drummer, it was because his mom was a famous easy listening star who was known for her beautiful singing voice.

  That’s why they were stuck playing the dingy clubs rather than opening for whatever band was the flavor of the year because they didn’t use the parental connections. It also made the choice of leaving his bass playing career behind a little easier when Ludie approached him about joining the Tuners. Getting to swing his hammer for real was a perk. Doing something worthwhile that would never be in the shadow of his parents was the deal maker.

  Now he’d get to smash things for real. They approached a large stone doorway at the end of a courtyard. It was precisely where Ludie said it would be. It was locked. Meathook didn’t think twice. He went to town on the door, brought his hammer down on it, and chipped away some of the rock. He swung again and took out some more of the stone.

  “This is going to take a bit,” Meathook said. Magdalena turned toward the courtyard to look for cultists. After a few more blows, an arrow came down from the walls and stuck into Meathook’s hammer. He plucked it out and saw more were arranging themselves on the ramparts. Soon, more arrows rained down upon them.

  Just as Meathook was about to give it up, Magdalena pulled out her quarterstaff and swung it at a metal placard of flames rising from a lake of lava. She knocked it loose and brought it over to shield Meathook and herself. The arrows clinked harmlessly off it. He continued to swing away at the door despite the arrow sticking out of his calf.

  ∆∆∆

  Deep in the caverns, there were two double doors. They were adorned with a depiction of a large flame with two burning eyes. Two guards stood at the entrance. Jon walked right up to the men, who were double his size, and said as Ludie had coached him, “I invoke the right to mate.”

  The pair opened the doors into the cavernous throne room chamber. The bridge leading to the island at the center had an army of cultists standing in their clan groups at regular intervals along the way. There were ledges throughout the walls of the room that were packed with cultists. Even the statues along the length of the bridge had people clustered on top.

  At the island in the center was the ceremony. One of the higher-ranking priests was the officiant to the dark wedding. The High Priest, decked out in ceremonial robes with a crown of bones, walked down a path in the center of the island that was lined with new heads of slaves. Fresh bodies hung from the X’s around the island, dripping blood into the flames. Hailey was brought in on a chair raised high by four cultists. She wore a crimson wedding dress that shimmered like it was burning. Her hair had fiery streaks of red dye, and when Jon got close, he saw that they had even gone so far as to give her red lipstick and contacts.

  The officiant had a slave brought to him. The neck of the boy was sliced, and the blood poured into a goblet. The priest began his sermon. “Let the lifeblood that sustains the Flame also sustain the strongest of us all on this day when the Holy One will seek a mate so that his legacy will live on and echo throughout eternity.”

  The High Priest drank from the goblet. The eye of the slave was removed next. One was thrown into the lava. The other was given to the High Priest, who chewed it down.

  The officiant continued. “Let the Holy One see the path of the Flame and guide us down it to eternal devotion.”

  By th
e time they were going for the ears, Jon had arrived at the island. He called out, “I invoke the right to mate!”

  The High Priest turned toward Jon while all of his followers watched. There were whispers from the crowd and shuffling before everyone fell silent. The High Priest nodded to the ones holding Hailey in the chair, and they set her down. They removed shackles on her ankle and wrists that kept her in the seat, and she had a collar that helped with the gravity.

  As soon as she was free, she lunged at the High Priest. He pressed a button on a remote he had pulled from his robe, and Jon could see the sparks surge from her collar. She knelt on the floor in pain. “Yes, that’s right. Kneel to your new master.” He tossed the remote to the priest and said, “Make sure she doesn’t interfere.”

  Jon readied his weapon and said, “Come at me. Or you are too weak to do it yourself. You need your minions to do it.”

  The High Priest turned toward Jon and Ludie and said, “I see you have acquired a minion of your own. He was weak and always meant to serve.”

  Ludie was about to rush forward, and Jon held him back. “He’s just trying to get us to break the rules, so he can have his people dispose of us. Fight me now. Or I will take my mate back.”

  The High Priest tossed his dress robes aside. Underneath, Jon could see the extent of the burns all over his body from their first encounter with him. Half of his skin was charred. The other half was mutilated with intricate scars over every surface of skin. The man ejected one blade from an arm piece and pulled out a large one from a scabbard on his belt. They were jagged with a green tinge.

  “What’s that green?” Jon asked Ludie.

  “It’s a poison from a plant in the area. It’s quite deadly. If it makes contact with your blood, I’d say you have about five minutes,” Ludie said.

  “Now you tell me,” Jon scoffed.

  The High Priest didn’t wait another second. He charged, and Jon parried the first two attacks. The crowd erupted in cheers. As Ludie suspected, all eyes were on the fight.

  Jon circled around the island and moved in for an attack. The High Priest was quick, blocking the blow with the smaller weapon, and slicing with the larger one. Jon dodged, and the sizeable sword nicked the hair on his head.

  The crowd screamed and jeered. They were overcrowding each other on the ledges, and a few fell into the lava below. The priest holding Hailey hostage zapped her another time. Ludie took the opportunity while everyone was distracted to sneak to the back of the throne room and trigger the secret door.

  Meanwhile, the fight raged on. The High Priest was excellent and almost wounded Jon on more than one occasion. One thrust even hit him square in the TF3 and crushed the device. He was lucky that it wasn’t his leg.

  Jon tried everything he could to best the High Priest. He cut down one of the X’s and tried to push it onto his opponent. He picked up a golden bucket glowing with hot coals and threw it into the guy’s face, but the man kept coming. Jon was exhausted from the fight, and the High Priest didn’t even seem to be making much of an effort.

  ∆∆∆

  DeAndre dashed between the slabs, unhooking people as fast as he could and turning on their collars so they could walk. He didn’t even stop to help them out a little before moving onto the next one. Meanwhile, Azerius and Patel were barely holding off the horde at the front door. Wave after wave of cultists attempted to burst through and stop them from freeing the slaves to the machine.

  Patel struck down a cultist and fended off two more. Azerius was almost knocked down by three, but one of the freed prisoners clunked one over the head with a club they had procured from a body, and Azerius was able to take out the other two. Several more cultists joined the fray.

  No matter how many they took out, more were coming. They needed to get everyone off the machine and get out. While Patel’s tough skin deflected every blow that came her way, the battle was wearing her down. Soon she would drop not from wounds but exhaustion.

  Right as DeAndre was on the last one, the burning in her arms made her leave a gap in her defenses. She did not lift her blade high enough, and a cultist’s sword struck her in the collar. It wasn’t hard enough to penetrate her skin, but the collar shorted out, and the gravity of the world took her over. She collapsed to the floor. She reached for her TF3, and her opponent kicked it away and smashed it. He pressed his sword on her neck and leaned forward.

  Before the cultist standing over her could push down with enough force to run her through, DeAndre ran at full speed and went across the room in a blur. He wrapped his nunchucks around the attacker’s neck and pulled so hard the man’s head popped off and rolled to the floor. Azerius and the few more willing to fight dispatched the last of the cultists. They cheered, and DeAndre shushed them.

  They could hear the roar of more cultists charging through the tunnels towards them. “Come on,” DeAndre said. “Help me pick her up.”

  Azerius helped with Patel. She grinned and said, “You see Hailey’s sister?”

  DeAndre said, “No, but there is no way she would have lasted that long. Not on this machine.”

  “Actually,” Azerius said. “They rotate them out in shifts. Since tuning ability is so rare, they only let them spend a couple of months on the machine. Then they nurse them back to health and do it all over again. There is a chance she is there awaiting her next shift.”

  “Where is it located?”

  “Not far. Further down the tunnel. Take a right and two lefts.”

  “Get Patel and the rest of them to safety,” DeAndre said and held out his hand to Azerius.

  The former cult member accepted the grip.

  DeAndre turned to the survivors. “You can trust this man. He risked a punishment worse than death to save you. Follow him. Those who are strong, help those too weak to walk. Get moving before the cultists come back.”

  Azerius and another survivor helped Patel. The others gathered the ones too weak to walk, and they filed out into the tunnels. DeAndre ran to the machine and found the terminal. He entered the commands as Ludie had instructed, and it began to overheat. Soon, the room would be a crater, and the tunnels would collapse. DeAndre had to be quick.

  He ran from the room through the passages. He whipped past another group of cultists heading toward the machine. After the first left, there was an explosion that knocked him off his feet. He could hear the tunnels behind him collapse. Hopefully, there would be a tuning spot even if he couldn’t get the people back to Universe One.

  DeAndre stood back up and ran until he came to the second left. He peeked around the corner and saw one acolyte standing in front of a door. The kid was barely fifteen. DeAndre turned the corner with his hands up. The neophyte nervously pulled out a spear. His hands trembled as he pointed it at DeAndre.

  “You don’t want to do this,” DeAndre said. “You have two choices. You can put your spear down and walk out of here with the rest of them. Or I will disarm you and leave you at the mercy of your leaders.”

  “They’ll kill me,” the boy squeaked.

  “The clock is ticking.”

  The boy put down his weapon, and DeAndre pushed past him. He opened the door to the room beyond. There were kids hanging on straps around their shoulders. Black goo was packed into their wounds. The acolyte said, “They hang like that to prevent bedsores. There is no danger of them running because they don’t get the collars until it is time to collect them for another round in the machine or the clergy need them as slaves.”

  DeAndre saw collars stored in the corner. “Help me get them on,” he said.

  They began to put collars on all the victims and cut them down one by one. While DeAndre worked, he heard voices coming from a door off to the side. He could hear a girl say, “Help us.”

  “What’s in that room?” DeAndre said.

  The kid said, “That’s where they put the kidnap victims to test our hearing.”

  “Keep working,” DeAndre said and shoved a collar into the neophyte’s hand.

&nb
sp; The Tuner walked toward the door and opened it. What he saw shocked him. There were kids in rows of cages. Most were weeping, and all were still wearing the clothes they had on when they had been abducted. On one side of the room were people who couldn’t function in the gravity of this world. Most were marked Sacrifice to the Flame, and a few were labeled for use in the machine. On the other side were people who could stand and walk. They were sorted into warriors and priests.

  DeAndre remembered the recruiting ceremony Patel had told him about. It was all a sham. The High Priest knew the outcome of what would happen to the kids before it had even started. The scary part was that there was more people in this room than what the Tuners had seen before HQ fell. There were even more cages being built. They had grown exponentially.

  The cultists were farming children.

  DeAndre wondered why Ludie had never told them about this place. The kid knew the plan was to try and save as many people as they could, and they could have sent another group. Now DeAndre was forced to improvise.

  He started with the cages. There was a lever that opened to let them all out. He told them to help the others who couldn’t stand on their own. After he had freed all the new recruits, he peeked back into the other room. The neophyte was talking to two cultists and pointed toward the door.

  DeAndre cursed and turned to the group. “Can anyone fight?”

  A girl he had freed from the warriors' cage said, “Two years of martial arts.”

  “Good,” DeAndre said. “Grab a weapon.”

  The girl and a couple others went to the rack were the cultist jailors kept various implements. Most of them looked like torture devices, but they could be used as a weapon in a pinch. DeAndre told the others to help with the people who couldn’t move. He had just finished instructing a kid on how to use the gravity collars when the two cultists burst through the door. DeAndre charged with his makeshift squad. He disarmed both cultists in a blur, and the others took them down.