Posted: Sat Dec 19, 2015 3:04 pm
WHITE RABBIT
Dense fog blanketed the low-lying fields, obscuring Neste from Marcus’ view as she moved through the morning gloom. His stooped form bent lower from time to time as his cybernetic eye ferreted out the rapidly cooling footprints left in the moist ash. He paused at a low wall, retching as particles assaulted his lungs. She’d crossed here. Her warmth still graced the stones. Calloused hands slipped his respirator into place, and then he hauled himself over the wall to drop to the withered pasture below.
Rising steam obliterated the construct’s tracks. He pressed his back against the wall and groaned. Why would she come out here? His father and Ocho had both predicted her departure yet both had also remained mute when pressed for the answer to that question. Ocho insisted he stop her. His father insisted no one interfere; the young man was to contact him instead and he would handle it, whatever it was.
“Where are you bastards now?” the Rassophore growled. More importantly, where was she? He cast his gaze into the gloom and gained nothing.
The spent carpule pierced the flimsy barrier encapsulating the fungal pool to land amid the white filaments and blue bulbs. Neste followed it.
The sickly scent of bitter almonds assaulted her nostrils. She staggered as cyanide stormed her respiratory system. Her engineered body compensated, each cell’s mitochondria waging war in a violent bid to maintain cell respiration. They would lose. The carpule’s contents sabotaged the entire brilliant design. Now she need only silence her processor. No more bootstraps.
Now giddy, Neste closed her eyes to savor the chemical rush. She threw her head back to mock the unseen sun, derisive cackling bubbling from her taunt lips and exposed tongue.
“One carpule makes you hover, and one carpule makes you fall, and the ones that Rodney gives you, don't do anything at all,” Neste hurled her arms wide to dance to death’s soft refrain. “Go ask Malice when she’s ten feet tall.”
Marcus’ eyes narrowed suspiciously. She was singing! The tune warbling though the fog struck home, however. Home! Not this fucked up dimension, or even Bielefeld. Home was the Daemon world: the depressing workshops and factories that comprised his father’s headquarters, where not even the innocent couldn’t escape his cruel hands, and Grace Slick’s “White Rabbit” unremittingly echoed down every last corridor to drown out his victims’ screams. But this wasn't something she was supposed to remember. His father erased all that.
He set off once more, this time at a run and now utterly determined to find her. Stop her. Damn her!
The construct danced in the vibrant blue fungus pool, her woolen overcoat flapping in the mists as she endlessly warbled the dreadful tune. Marcus slowed to a jog and then stopped short of the pool’s edge. The lyrics were clearer now that he was close. His brow furrowed.
Neste's voice, as soothing as the caresses she bestowed upon him as a child, rang out with absolute clarity. “And if you go chasing innocents, and you know you're killing thrall, tell 'em a hemorrhagic hive has given you the call… call Malice, obliterate them all.”
“The fuck you babbling?” the angry words fluttered from his lips faster than sensibility could hold them back. “Neste, get out of there. Come here!”
His fingertips tingled as he lifted a hand to gesture at her. She had put up one of those wonky Nifid barriers to keep him out. It was feeble though. If push came to shove, he’d dart in and snatch her.
She paused and turned towards him. Marcus’ heart leapt to his throat and he dared to hope, but it was fleeting and swallowed once their eyes finally locked. The ancient construct had always been his last bastion of sanity in a world filled with Chaos’ horrors. But now? There weren’t any mutually shared memories dancing behind her hard, hollow eyes. The fretful young man in front of her was a stranger. The knowledge chilled him to the bone.
“Septimus?” Neste’s expression softened as she beheld the young man in his red priest’s robes.
Trembling fingers hastily unfastened the protective respirator to expose his face. Marcus inhaled the corrupted air. “Look at me, Neste. It’s Marcus. It’s your Little One. It’s me. You shouldn’t be out here. Let’s go back to the Building”
“When the men on the chessboard get up and tell you where to go,” her voice haunted the fungal pool, ringing softly in the mists as it grew in sinister tremor. “And you've just lost half your consciousness, and Logic is no more… go ask Thaddeus, I think he’ll know.”
“Alright, we’ll visit my dad. Let’s do that, okay? Please, Neste?”
Marcus felt his chest constrict as Neste drew the Drone’s sidearm from her pocket. His eye widened. He was out of his league. This was the majors. He wasn’t about to stand around chatting with her if she was intent on driving him away, and he wasn’t entirely certain she would fire a warning shot before putting a round through him.
“When reason and proportion have fallen sloppy dead, and Ogoti is talking backwards and Naomi's lost her head…”
“What?” Trapped between flight or fight, the young man’s mind frantically sought to piece things together.
“Remember what FUBAR said?” Neste coolly raised the weapon but, to his horror, the muzzle came to rest against her own temple.
“DON’T DO THIS, MAMA NES! DON’T YOU FUCKING DO THIS!”
“Feed your head…”
Marcus flinched at the muzzle flash, his unblinking optic recording the instantaneous blossoming of Neste’s skull and grey matter. The aerosol cloud tainted the mist a smeary pink shade as her headless body toppled, rigid, to the rank fungus beneath their feet. He was dimly aware of the hoarse shriek tearing from his own throat.
Feed your head. Her final words became an ear worm.
“No, no, no…” Shock delivered pure ice into his veins, shattering Marcus to his core. The fog closed in to oppress him. He hissed her name between shallow, hyperventilated breaths, and forced himself to press against the barrier's edge.
The mycelium and ascocarp bulbs mocked him as the fungus rapidly closed in to consume her body. Her elegant fingers twitched in final cadaveric spasms. He couldn’t leave her there. He couldn’t leave her broken on the ground. He couldn’t abandon her, not here. Fuck his father’s orders. Fuck the man that took everything from everyone.
“Etiam in morte, superest amor.” Marcus drew a steadying breath as his fingers pulled his priestly cloak more tightly around his shivering form. He knew deep down that Ocho was wrong about the field. He knew it, just as surely as he knew his earlier wrath at Drova was fueled by the loss of Scel, and just as he knew his own love for Giovenith would carry beyond his own mortal coil. Neste’s memories were gone, but not Scel’s. And he knew it was Scel that called to him now. He’d retrieve the body and bring it back, and then he would find Septimus. They would restore her, just as she had restored Septimus. The older cyborg would know how. Marcus would never doubt the veracity of that belief.
Feed your head.
The young man confidently lifted his foot and took a step into the Nifid pool, daring the universe to doubt the power of love as he pushed through the flimsy barrier. His heavy heel carefully came to rest between the almond scented ascocarp bulbs.
Marcus Usseio had never been so wrong in his entire, brief life.
Dense fog blanketed the low-lying fields, obscuring Neste from Marcus’ view as she moved through the morning gloom. His stooped form bent lower from time to time as his cybernetic eye ferreted out the rapidly cooling footprints left in the moist ash. He paused at a low wall, retching as particles assaulted his lungs. She’d crossed here. Her warmth still graced the stones. Calloused hands slipped his respirator into place, and then he hauled himself over the wall to drop to the withered pasture below.
Rising steam obliterated the construct’s tracks. He pressed his back against the wall and groaned. Why would she come out here? His father and Ocho had both predicted her departure yet both had also remained mute when pressed for the answer to that question. Ocho insisted he stop her. His father insisted no one interfere; the young man was to contact him instead and he would handle it, whatever it was.
“Where are you bastards now?” the Rassophore growled. More importantly, where was she? He cast his gaze into the gloom and gained nothing.
The spent carpule pierced the flimsy barrier encapsulating the fungal pool to land amid the white filaments and blue bulbs. Neste followed it.
The sickly scent of bitter almonds assaulted her nostrils. She staggered as cyanide stormed her respiratory system. Her engineered body compensated, each cell’s mitochondria waging war in a violent bid to maintain cell respiration. They would lose. The carpule’s contents sabotaged the entire brilliant design. Now she need only silence her processor. No more bootstraps.
Now giddy, Neste closed her eyes to savor the chemical rush. She threw her head back to mock the unseen sun, derisive cackling bubbling from her taunt lips and exposed tongue.
“One carpule makes you hover, and one carpule makes you fall, and the ones that Rodney gives you, don't do anything at all,” Neste hurled her arms wide to dance to death’s soft refrain. “Go ask Malice when she’s ten feet tall.”
Marcus’ eyes narrowed suspiciously. She was singing! The tune warbling though the fog struck home, however. Home! Not this fucked up dimension, or even Bielefeld. Home was the Daemon world: the depressing workshops and factories that comprised his father’s headquarters, where not even the innocent couldn’t escape his cruel hands, and Grace Slick’s “White Rabbit” unremittingly echoed down every last corridor to drown out his victims’ screams. But this wasn't something she was supposed to remember. His father erased all that.
He set off once more, this time at a run and now utterly determined to find her. Stop her. Damn her!
The construct danced in the vibrant blue fungus pool, her woolen overcoat flapping in the mists as she endlessly warbled the dreadful tune. Marcus slowed to a jog and then stopped short of the pool’s edge. The lyrics were clearer now that he was close. His brow furrowed.
Neste's voice, as soothing as the caresses she bestowed upon him as a child, rang out with absolute clarity. “And if you go chasing innocents, and you know you're killing thrall, tell 'em a hemorrhagic hive has given you the call… call Malice, obliterate them all.”
“The fuck you babbling?” the angry words fluttered from his lips faster than sensibility could hold them back. “Neste, get out of there. Come here!”
His fingertips tingled as he lifted a hand to gesture at her. She had put up one of those wonky Nifid barriers to keep him out. It was feeble though. If push came to shove, he’d dart in and snatch her.
She paused and turned towards him. Marcus’ heart leapt to his throat and he dared to hope, but it was fleeting and swallowed once their eyes finally locked. The ancient construct had always been his last bastion of sanity in a world filled with Chaos’ horrors. But now? There weren’t any mutually shared memories dancing behind her hard, hollow eyes. The fretful young man in front of her was a stranger. The knowledge chilled him to the bone.
“Septimus?” Neste’s expression softened as she beheld the young man in his red priest’s robes.
Trembling fingers hastily unfastened the protective respirator to expose his face. Marcus inhaled the corrupted air. “Look at me, Neste. It’s Marcus. It’s your Little One. It’s me. You shouldn’t be out here. Let’s go back to the Building”
“When the men on the chessboard get up and tell you where to go,” her voice haunted the fungal pool, ringing softly in the mists as it grew in sinister tremor. “And you've just lost half your consciousness, and Logic is no more… go ask Thaddeus, I think he’ll know.”
“Alright, we’ll visit my dad. Let’s do that, okay? Please, Neste?”
Marcus felt his chest constrict as Neste drew the Drone’s sidearm from her pocket. His eye widened. He was out of his league. This was the majors. He wasn’t about to stand around chatting with her if she was intent on driving him away, and he wasn’t entirely certain she would fire a warning shot before putting a round through him.
“When reason and proportion have fallen sloppy dead, and Ogoti is talking backwards and Naomi's lost her head…”
“What?” Trapped between flight or fight, the young man’s mind frantically sought to piece things together.
“Remember what FUBAR said?” Neste coolly raised the weapon but, to his horror, the muzzle came to rest against her own temple.
“DON’T DO THIS, MAMA NES! DON’T YOU FUCKING DO THIS!”
“Feed your head…”
Marcus flinched at the muzzle flash, his unblinking optic recording the instantaneous blossoming of Neste’s skull and grey matter. The aerosol cloud tainted the mist a smeary pink shade as her headless body toppled, rigid, to the rank fungus beneath their feet. He was dimly aware of the hoarse shriek tearing from his own throat.
Feed your head. Her final words became an ear worm.
“No, no, no…” Shock delivered pure ice into his veins, shattering Marcus to his core. The fog closed in to oppress him. He hissed her name between shallow, hyperventilated breaths, and forced himself to press against the barrier's edge.
The mycelium and ascocarp bulbs mocked him as the fungus rapidly closed in to consume her body. Her elegant fingers twitched in final cadaveric spasms. He couldn’t leave her there. He couldn’t leave her broken on the ground. He couldn’t abandon her, not here. Fuck his father’s orders. Fuck the man that took everything from everyone.
“Etiam in morte, superest amor.” Marcus drew a steadying breath as his fingers pulled his priestly cloak more tightly around his shivering form. He knew deep down that Ocho was wrong about the field. He knew it, just as surely as he knew his earlier wrath at Drova was fueled by the loss of Scel, and just as he knew his own love for Giovenith would carry beyond his own mortal coil. Neste’s memories were gone, but not Scel’s. And he knew it was Scel that called to him now. He’d retrieve the body and bring it back, and then he would find Septimus. They would restore her, just as she had restored Septimus. The older cyborg would know how. Marcus would never doubt the veracity of that belief.
Feed your head.
The young man confidently lifted his foot and took a step into the Nifid pool, daring the universe to doubt the power of love as he pushed through the flimsy barrier. His heavy heel carefully came to rest between the almond scented ascocarp bulbs.
Marcus Usseio had never been so wrong in his entire, brief life.