Okay. Here goes. About thirteen years ago, my adopted uncle Misto — or as everybody else knows hm, Dr. Joseph Michaelson, Professor Emeritus of Theoretical Physics at Morchatromik U — and my father, Dr. Walter Weatherspark, Professor of Biotechnology at the same, along with Dr. Viktor Arkenvalen, Professor of Biochemistry, and his wife, Dr. Anastasia Arkenvalen, Professor of Computer Science — along with their then-teenage daughter, Rojetta Arkenvalen, and a eighteen-year-old yours truly — were messing around with the idea of Accelerated Evolution.
It all started with Clive Barker. Y’know, Clive Barker — the guy who made Hellraiser and Nightbeed? Dark fantasy meister supreme? Well anyway. Dad had gotten ahold of one of his books, called The Great and Secret Show. In that book, these two characters — a freaky occult-obsessed maniac named Jaffe and a decadent but beneficent scientist named Fletcher — invent a mystical serum called “the Nuncio” that can speed up the evolutionary process, taking any intelligent being lightyears beyond its present state of physical and spiritual development, even propelling it beyond the realm of the flesh and into the world of the spirit entirely. Well, we realized pretty quickly we couldn’t achieve anything that grandiose — I mean, we’re not freakin’ gods, right? And magic is a bit beyond us — well, right now, anyhow — but we came up with a way to do something similar. Gods help us all, we came up with a way. It bore less resemblance to Clive Barker’s Nuncio, though, and more resemblance to the original first season 1963 Outer Limits episode “The Sixth Finger,“ in which an unnamed scientist in a remote Welsh village invents a machine that can artificially accelerate the mechanism of evolutionary mutation . . . and, of course, a disgruntled local miner named Gwyllim Griffiths — who isn’t the brightest bulb in the box — volunteers to be the guinea pig . . . with of course horrific results. The scientist first advances him a few hundred years up the scale . . . then a few thousand . . . then a few million. We were hoping to achieve the same effect, only, y’know, without the “horrific results” part. We didn’t exactly succeed in that second department.
You could even say we were also inspired by King Koopa’s “evolution machine” in the Super Mario Brothers movie, if you wanted to. I mean, the idea has been around forever . . . a way to cheat mother nature, to beat her at her own slow, methodical game wherein she forces us to go the long way around and climb evolution’s long, arduous ladder the slow and painful way. Maybe this idea — the “evolutionary accelerant” idea — is an expression of our collective desire to ascend beyond what we are now the fast and easy way, without acquiring the bumps and bruises that come from the hard work of doing things the way mother nature intended. The ultimate convenience. Maybe that core idea, floating around in the nebulous, collective unconscious of the Science Fiction Universe, is an expression of the evolutionary drive itself. Maybe it’s an expression of our frustration that we can’t just jump to the last page of the book and see the way the plot turns out in the end.
What we did, we called Enhanced Predictive Genetic Adaption. In other words, we used artificial intelligence, together with advanced biochemistry, to predict which changes might happen next in a species’ genomic development over time, based on which changes had occurred over time in the past evolutionary history. We developed a serum that my dad called “Mutagenesis X-119.” A breakthrough. Let’s say that the “nanogenes” in the serum — and yeah, dad totally stole that term from Doctor Who — know that over time, an organism developed a certain way. Apes developed into Cro-Magnon man, then into Neanderthals, then into Homo Sapiens. Right? Well, the serum we developed would, using artificial intelligence and generative algorithms, attempt to guess what the next phase of the organism’s development would be. What direction it would go in. And then it would attempt to mutate the organism into that next phase . . . without waiting for mother nature to do the job over thousands or millions of years. And then if you told it to, the serum would go on, mutating and changing the organism, into the creature of the next phase beyond that. And so on. Mutating and changing the organism into whatever came next, and next after that, along a projected trajectory of probable future mutations, all extrapolated from its evolutionary history . . . with the probabilities becoming less predictable as it went along.
We also figured out a way to program the nanogenes to adhere to a privileged set of outcomes . . . to bend the curve of evolution so that apes could become semi-sentient para-humans . . . or quasi-sentient cat-people . . . or almost-sentient rat-people . . . or, could come as close as possible to something in-between all of the above. Or — and this was where the trouble really started; gee, y’think? — the serum could even turn ordinary Humans into Superhumans. Like I told Ravenkroft the other night: Pure research scientists never see the light at the end of the tunnel as the oncoming headlamp of a locomotive made of pure frakkin’ evil.
Of course, the initial version of the serum was dangerously unstable and didn’t work quite right. But we never got a chance to get beyond the beta version, because after they developed it, something went balls-up wrong. Dad, Misto, and Viktor — and me and Rojetta — all warned Anastasia not to jump the gun and inject herself with it. But she was so gung-ho on human testing, and so driven, and so curious — I’ve never met anyone more passionate about science in my life — that she did exactly that. And what was worse, she did so without giving the remote nanogene control software a privileged evolutionary trajectory to follow . . . or specifying a stopping point for the mutations. She said she wanted to “go all the way” . . . to the “apotheosis of human development.” Meaning she wanted to see the ultimate form of humanity. The very end-point of the human race. What we would be like at the very end of our species’ climb up the evolutionary ladder. I daresay the woman was nine kinds of looney tunes.
The computers obeyed her instructions. Or lack thereof. Or at least, they tried to. I remember being there that night in the lab. I remember Anastasia’s eyes popping open and each eye roving around, independent of the other as she grinned maniacally, and her skin began to turn green, the veins and capillaries surging up beneath it. Creepy as frak. I remember sparks bursting out of all the equipment as she arched her back and screamed, and rose up off of the table, levitating, clenching her fists, and writhing in the air like she was possessed. I remember some invisible hand grabbing me and flinging me across the room, and seeing Viktor and my father also whipped through the air by unseen forces. Oh yeah. She went total Sith Lord on our asses. I woke up, my father hovering over me asking me if I was alright. Anastasia was gone, and the lab was in ruins. Everyone was banged up. Turns out the serum had given Anastasia telekinetic and telepathic powers. And it had changed her physically, as well. What we’d witnessed had been the initial surge of energy through the quantum vacuum as her powers had taken hold of her for the very first time, and she had freaked out. Nobody knew where she was, where she had gone, or why.
Days passed. Then, there was a break-in at the lab. We all rushed over, but it was gone. All the equipment, stolen. Disappeared. We didn’t connect it to Anastasia . . . at first. Then, the next day, we saw on the news that there had been a freak break-in at the zoo . . . Several animals had disappeared, taken right out of their cages. We didn’t connect that at first, either. It was actually Rojetta that pieced it together a few days later, when there was a murder at the medical school — a young doctor had been brutally stabbed, and his brain surgically removed — and then the next day, a break-in at the coroner’s office, and three fresh corpses were taken. We knew it was her. It had to be.
Viktor railed at my dad, Walter, blaming him for his influence on Anastasia, blaming him for all of it, telling him it was his fault this had happened . . . that he had led them down this path. Poor Viktor worried himself to death over Anastasia’s fate, not eating, not sleeping, fearing more for her life than for those of her victims. The police were baffled at the grisly nature — and strange methodology — of the murders, but we knew who the culprit was. Viktor was terrified of what would happen when they finally had to face her. With Misto’s help, dad built a set of weapons designed to take Anastasia down — a specialized Electromagnetic Pulse-Blaster that would disrupt her neurophysics. Viktor refused to be armed with one, saying the pulse could kill her. Misto did what he could to comfort his friend. Rojetta was beside herself. Her mother was missing, and presumed a murderer. And Viktor, as torn up as he was, was no help in comforting her. Misto and dad and I tried our best to be there for her, but we weren’t enough. She cried, and cried, and cried, and walked around like a zombie most of the time. She tried to distract herself with school, but she was a total wreck inside. All I could do was be there, a shoulder to cry on.
Another week passed by, and there was another murder. Days later, another. And still no sign of her. We started to investigate. There were clues left at each crime scene. Scientific equations written on the walls in blood — that we knew were left as messages intended for only one audience: Us. She wanted us to come and find her. Two more murders, and then three more. More break-ins and stolen equipment from laboratories, lab supply companies, and hardware stores. Viktor grew desperate, despondent.
And man, his relationship with Rojetta really suffered. When he’d married Anastasia, her daughter Rojetta, then only five in 2002, had hitched along for the ride. And by the time all this happened, in 2014, she was a sixteen year old rebel in high school, and whoa boy, she positively railed at her dad for “losing mom to some effed up mad science experiment.” Only she didn’t say “effed.” She turned against my dad, hating him so much that, I tell you, the looks she gave him could have melted cold iron. But she reserved her deepest scorn for Viktor, who had, and I quote, “dragged mom into your world of screwed-up shit,” and, I further quote, “turned her into some kind of messed-up freak,” and who now, I quote again, “wanted to go after and kill my goddamn mom, the woman you swore in front of God and me to love, honor, and protect!” And then she’d slammed the door and cried herself to sleep. Two years later, she’d go off and leave for college, to live in the dorms at Morchatromik U, where Viktor still taught at the time. Though I guess that was around the time that his teaching career was on its last legs and its last shallow breath, because that was around the time that his sanity had reached its breaking point.
Anyway. We deciphered the equations and solved them. Well, Misto did. They gave us a set of coordinates. The old, abandoned mental institution high up on the craggy, forested hilltop across from Morchatromik University’s campus, Saint Mungojerry’s Hospital For The Mentally Infirm. So. Me, dad, Misto, and Viktor, we packed up our gear, and one rainy night, we set off for St. Mungojerry’s on the hilltop.
I remember that night well. A thunderstorm raged in the sky. It rained on the just and the unjust alike. Everybody had blood on their hands, even if it was invisible to everyone except them. Our hands in particular dripped with the invisible scarlet reminders of the evil we had unleashed, the terror we’d let loose, and especially for the one innocent life that, at least to poor Viktor and Rojetta, had meant more than any other. The one we’d sacrificed to our vision and, well, scientific megalomania. Viktor had gone from loving Walter like a brother — close now to him now for so many years — to outright hating him. Things had moved too fast, had gone too far. For my part, I only hoped we could find a solution that didn’t rely on too much violence.
There’s an old atheist argument that goes like this: If what you’re praying for is in God’s plan, then praying for it is senseless, because it’s always going to happen anyway; it’s inevitable. But if what you’re praying for isn’t in God’s plan, then praying for it is ridiculous, because it’s never going to happen anyway, so prayer in that case is equally useless. So even if you believe in God, why pray at all? And if there is no God, then prayer is unnecessary, because there’s no one listening. And if there was no one listening that night, then all our words at that point fell on nonexistent ears. We were on our own. Just as we were on our own when we invented that serum. But Anastasia wasn’t on her own. We would find a way to save her. I would find a way to save her. Or so I thought.
The four of us stood there — me in my Mark V Evangeliojaeger; it was the first time I had ever worn it outside the Mechanology labs — and dad, Viktor, and Misto, outside the old asylum on the hill. Behind the four of us stood Misto’s battered black van. When the asylum had first been constructed in the early 1900’s, the enormous, castle-like building had originally been a tuberculosis hospital. Later, in the 1950’s, it had been converted into a mental institution, which it functioned as until its shuttering in 1989. And it had stayed abandoned . . . well, until 2014, when Anastasia took up residence. I remember everything in vivid detail. The cracks in the concrete became gushing wounds as the rain poured down; it battered the steepled Viktorian rooftop and dripped from the rafters. The old asylum stood there like a cursed tomb awaiting us four doomed Egyptologists, its fortress-like walls crawling with coiled veins and arteries of ivy, the eyes of its many of its windows long-since poked-out. But brand new halogen lamps burned brightly behind some of the windows, and occasionally, a bright flash — the telltale sign of an electrical arc leaping across a pair of steel terminals — would fluoresce behind the old, broken window panes, signaling that life, of a kind, dwelled within. We could hear the sounds of zapping, clanking, thudding machinery coming from inside, a steady rhythmic pulse of groaning wheels and a steady electric hum, like high-tension power lines. Outside, five floors up, near the gutters along the nearest rooftop, a foursome of solemn-looking ravens roosted, perched on the ancient structure’s concrete moldings. Watching us.
“So,” I said to dad, “I know we should’ve already thought of this, but — what’s our play?”
Walter shrugged. “Hell if I know, sweetheart. We know that the serum pushes lifeforms toward their evolutionary apotheosis, based on which of their genetic switches are turned on, and which ones are off. But we also know it doesn’t work quite right, because in the brain, all the switches are on, all the time . . . so the nanogenes in the serum get confused, and so every lifeform’s evolutionary development becomes different . . . The serum doesn’t take any two organisms in the same forward, evolutionary direction. But, we’ve seen that all primates that we’ve artificially evolved with the serum do tend to have some things in common: Telepathy. Telekinesis. Enhanced intelligence, speed, strength, dexterity.”
“So Anastasia’s now basically a psionic warrior and a super-soldier,” said Misto, his grip tight around the barrel of the tranquilizer gun he carried. “One that’s definitely not cut from the same cloth as, say, Professor X or Captain America.”
“No,” said Walter, “I’m afraid she isn’t like Cap or the Professor.” He double-checked the knobs and switches on his electromagnetic pulse blaster. A motor inside it spun up to full-speed. A crackling noise came from the coil. “Tell me something, Viktor. How many murders does last night’s make?”
Viktor blinked, seemingly taken aback. He clenched his fists, and said, in a terse, clipped tone, “Twenty-one, I think.”
“Twenty-one people dead,” said Walter. “That’s twenty-one casualties so far . . . and all of them attributable to us, Viktor. To our failure to maintain control of the experiment. Anastasia might have killed those people, but we made her capable of it.”
“Don’t blame yourself, dad,” I said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “It’s not our fault that she’s done what she’s done. Her choices are hers, aren’t they? I mean, she’s the one who decided to inject herself. She’s the one who made that call. Not you, or me. Or any of us. She did that herself.”
I got the feeling that Viktor wanted to strangle me, based on the look in his eyes just then. He glared at me sullenly, and he shoved the Colt .45 revolver he carried into his pocket quickly, as though overcoming the urge to use it on me. Nobody else noticed; but I noticed.
“You mean you made her capable of it,” muttered Viktor. “You, Walter. Dizzy. Anastasia followed the protocols that you insisted we come up with. It’s not Anastasia’s fault that she succumbed to temptation and curiosity . . . Not after all the grandiose speeches you two made! Not after you put all those strange and ‘glorious’ ideas in her head! Why, you practically seduced her into the notion! You — !”
“Viktor,’ said Walter, with a resigned sigh, “what’s done is done, and what’s past is past. Right now, in the here and now, we need to find a way to neutralize the threat we’ve created. And yes — preferably without killing your fiancé.”
And what else could Viktor say at that point? I mean, dad was right. That was what we were there for. That was what had to be done. I admired him for wanting to find a way to neutralize Anastasia without killing her, without hurting her — insofar as that was possible.
“I dunno, Vic,’ said Misto. “Are you sure that Anastasia — I mean, your Anastasia, the woman you love — are you sure she isn’t dead already? Are you sure that that . . . thing in there . . . is still her somewhere inside? That she isn’t gone?”
Viktor turned to him, his jaw agape. “You take that back,’ was all he could manage in a hoarse whisper. “A man has to have hope, Michaelson! Do you hear me? A man has to have hope!” He grabbed his friend by the lapels. Surprised, Misto stumbled back a pace or two, and took Viktor with him. “What else am I supposed to cling to, Michaelson?’ he asked, his voice cracking on the final syllables, “What am I to cling to, if not hope?”
“Hey, hey . . . Vic, it’s gonna be okay,” said Misto. In retrospect, lying to him.
“Yeah,” I said, knowing I was lying too. “We’re going to get her back, Viktor.”
“Al — alright, alright,” said Viktor, letting go of Michaelson’s sport-coat. “Yes. Of course. I’m . . . I’m sorry, Michaelson. I just . . . just sort of snapped, there. Forgive me.”
“He’s not the one you have to worry about,” said Walter. “She is. You know she can probably read our thoughts at this distance.”
“God I hope not,” said Misto. “Walter, what’re we actually gonna do here? How the hell can we take her down? She can move quicker than we can . . . Hell, she can use telekinesis and just move us, if she wants to! She can read our intentions before we act; she can read our minds right as we aim at her, and right before we fire!”
“Ah, I planned for that!” I said, grinning. “Here, hold this.” I handed my Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster to Viktor, took off my backpack, and pulled out four large pieces of folded aluminum foil and welded metal pieces, which unfolded into four tetrahedron-like shapes, each one with a circuit-board and eight double-A batteries mounted to it. “Here,” I said. “The ultimate in fashion accessories, guys. Supercharged tinfoil hats . . . Electromagnetic Shields for our brains. These’ll protect us; they’ll scramble our brainwaves, so she has a tougher time zeroing in on our thoughts, and-or controlling our minds or fooling us with illusions, and whatnot. It makes her power of telepathy zip-zero-nada useless on us!”
’My darling Dizzy,” said Walter, “you never cease to amaze me with your genius, and your stellar aplomb for technological sorcery.”
“Thanks dad,” I said, blushing. (I’ve never been able to take compliments. It always embarrasses the heck out of me.)
“Tinfoil hats!” said Viktor, examining his. “Surely you must be joking!”
“I most certainly am not,” I said. “And don’t call me Shirley.”
“How can you crack jokes at a time like this?” asked Viktor, as he put on the hat. “How?”
“Humor,” said Walter, “is our first, last, and only defense against the heart-pounding terror and absurdity that the universe inflicts upon us with our very existence, Viktor. Now then.” He flicked the “on” switch of his new hat. I grabbed my Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster back from Viktor. Walter said, “Let’s move.”
The rain had slackened up somewhat; it now only spit water at us instead of dousing us; the thunder rolled only in the distance, and the lightning flashes were now far more sporadic. Viktor fell in line behind Misto and Walter and me as we made our way from behind the stone wall to the old asylum’s front entrance — two large, archway-covered sets of glass-and-metal double doors; someone had shattered the glass years before and bent the metal here and there. The alcove, foyer, and lobby beyond lay pitch-black and as silent as a tomb as we crept toward it, our weapons drawn and ready — Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster; tranq gun; Colt .45. The watchful ravens above abandoned their perch and flew away caw-cawing and flapping their black wings as we approached the doors and walked through. Viktor swallowed a loud lump of fear as we entered the shadowy blackness of the old building’s lobby. A deserted, ivy-overgrown, rounded reception desk sat in the center, as did various tarnished pieces of bric-a-brac and fallen concrete. Part of the floor above this one lay crumbled and broken at our feet.
Just then, a security flood-lamp — obviously a new addition to the building — suddenly activated. A brilliant, nearly-blinding white light illuminated every crevice of the entire foyer and lobby, throwing shadows everywhere. I shielded my eyes against the light’s bright irradiance. Walter’s silhouette aimed his Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster at the light, and with a loud CRACK! and a flash, the flood-lamp died, and the glaring, garish light went out.
I had to rub my eyes to make the spots and splotches of color go away, and it was a full minute before I could see straight again in the dark. Luckily, dad and Misto had come prepared: They each pulled out a flashlight, and soon we had plenty of light to see by. At the other end of the lobby, two large staircases on either side led upward, and behind them stood four elevators, looking ancient, neglected, and decaying . . . except for the one in the far left corner, which looked shiny and brand-new.
“There,” said Misto. “The elevator.”
“Well no shit, Sherlock,” I said.
“Gee, y’think?” said Walter. “I never would’ve guessed that.”
“Hey,” said Misto. “I’m stressed here. Shut the fuck up, the two of you.”
Viktor didn’t say anything. I guess he was busy thinking that this was a rotten time for banter.
We got in the elevator, the light inside it clicking on as the doors closed behind them. The only button available was labelled “Hell.” Walter pushed it.
“Alright,” he said, turning to Misto, me, and Viktor, prepping the Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster to fire again. “When these doors open, be ready for anything. No doubt she has goons working for her. Probably mind-controlled . . . but otherwise, innocent. So no fatal wounds, unless it’s in self-defense and you’ve got no other choice, okay?”
“Right on, dad,” I said.
“Check,” said Misto.
“Yes, of course,” said Viktor, seemingly irritated that Walter felt the need to repeat this.
The elevator moved and my stomach lurched, and then, the doors opened, revealing one of the strangest sights I swear to the gods I have ever seen or ever will see in my life. All I could do was stare for a moment, gobsmacked. Totally, utterly gobsmacked.
Standing in the long, wide hallway in front of us stood three large, silverback gorillas, two male and one female, as well as a large male chimpanzee — all of whom walked almost-upright and had an eerie glint of intelligent awareness burning deep in their eyes — that someone had dressed like gangsters from the 1940’s: Custom-tailored, gorilla-shaped, pinstriped zoot-suits and dark fedoras, replete with tiny rose-blossom corsages on the lapels of their double-breasted suit-coats. Beneath their coats, the gorillas and the chimp wore strap-on gun leather gun-holsters and in each, a large, high-caliber Smith and Wesson 500 pistol. I shit you not.
“Er, um, okay . . .” I said, raising an eyebrow. “That’s kinda peculiar.”
“Well you certainly don’t see this everyday,” said Walter, nodding in agreement.
Viktor, of all things, actually smiled. Ladies and gentlemen, do you know what this means?” he said, turning to us. We just stared back at him. He barked a laugh. “It means she still has her sense of humor!” He sucked in a slightly-shuddering breath and repeated, almost like a protective incantation, “She still has her sense of humor.”
“Let’s hope you’re right, Vic,” said Misto.
The three gorillas and the chimp all reached into the sport coats of their zoot-suits and pulled out their Smith and Wesson handguns. And with eerie, preternatural dexterity, they all four cocked back the guns’ hammers and pointed them at the four of us. The chimp strode up to Misto, and smiled a toothy grin at him, and then — again, I shit you not — opened his mouth and spoke . . . albeit, in broken, fractured English, but still — guys — he had been given the power of speech . . . God, that alone was enough to overwhelm even the sense of imminent doom that hung like a noxious cloud poisoning the very air that we breathed.
“Wolvie . . . “member you,” said the chimp, seemingly speaking only to me and Misto. You . . . nice to Wolvie. Do you . . . “member? “member Wolvie?”
“Oh yes,” said Misto in a hollow, haunted voice. He nodded vigorously. “I remember Wolvy, alright. Sure I do. I remember.”
And it was then that I recognized the chimp. Which is a whole other narrative in itself. So here goes.
See, we had first tested the serum on chimpanzees. At first, the results were disappointing. The chimps showed no signs of increased humanness” after a week of exposure, and that had been with the Computer-Control Matrix running at full bore. But then, after two weeks of treatments with the serum, we saw that one of the chimps — whom Misto and I had playfully named Wolverine” — had begun showing signs of increased intelligence and awareness. He could assemble his favorite puzzles more quickly than before, could assemble more complex puzzles in less time and remember how they went together . . . He’d begun to pick up on new sign-language faster than ever, and had grown more “talkative” and “creative” . . . He began to ask questions that implied a philosophical response, the answers to which he at least seemed to grasp the rudiments of . . . And, he learned how to use both fine-grained and cruder tools: He could cut with a scalpel or use a screwdriver or a hammer; then later he could read schematics and solder circuits accordingly; he could hammer-in nails; he could fasten a seatbelt, and could play chess. Most of all, he could comment, offer observations, and even joke” in sign. He had become, in short order, the most intellectually-advanced non-human primate on the planet. That, and he showed an amazing ability to heal from wounds quickly . . . as though he had become a “Super-Chimp.” We never tested this theory, but Viktor had even speculated that due to his incredible healing abilities, Wolverine could’ve even survived getting shot at close range.
But, the experiment ended badly. One day, dad had said that that they we’d learned all we could from Wolvy, and that since his role was over, in order to protect the project’s secrecy, Wolverine, sadly, had to go. Misto and I protested severely. It was the first time I remember ever hating my father over anything, and to this day, whenever I think about it too much, it still rubs me the wrong way. But anyway. Dad made the mistake of saying this within earshot of Wolverine, whom he thought was asleep . . . but who had in reality heard every word. The next day, when Misto and I came into the lab, we found dad and Viktor cornered there, with Wolverine holding a gun on them. Dad held a syringe in one trembling hand. A nearby set of bookshelves was overturned on the floor, the books spilled everywhere.
“Wolvy . . . know,” the chimp had said, and mine and Misto’s jaws had dropped. The chimp had actually spoken, or had tried to, and could now form simple words with its — no, his — larynx. Evolution in a bottle! Yeah, tell me about it! Wolverine’s words are burned into my brain. “Wolvy know . . . Walter . . . want to kill . . . Wolvy. Walter . . . want to kill. Walter . . . no kill. Walter . . . be killed. Wolvy kill . . . Walter.”
“Get the gun, get the tranq gun!” dad had cried out, his wide eyes never leaving Wolverine.
“Do it! Now, Michaelson!” Viktor had said. “For God’s sake, do it now!”
And, to his credit, Misto had only hesitated for the briefest second. He ran back into the office area and had grabbed the tranquilizer dart gun off the rack, loaded it, and then ran back, took aim, and fired at Wolverine. He missed, which gave Wolverine just enough time to leap up off the table, grab onto the swinging overhead fluorescent light, swing over to the large windows mounted near the ceiling, grab a tire-iron from off the peg-board, shatter the window, and disappear into the warm summertime night.
We hadn’t seen him again. Until now.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“You will follow Wolvy, now,” said the chimp, putting the gun up against Misto’s chest, and casting a snide, sidelong glare at Walter and Viktor. “But will give Franklin, Crick, Watson weapons. Now.”
Franklin, Crick, and Watson, I thought. Oh, of course; the scientists who discovered DNA. Reluctantly, Viktor handed “Franklin” his Colt .45 revolver. I guess he was glad to be rid of it. Walter hesitated a moment, then handed over his massive Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster to “Watson,” and I handed over mine to “Crick.” The silverback held my weapon before him and examined it thoughtfully. Misto handed over the tranq gun to Wolverine. Thusly disarmed, we put up our hands. Wolverine grinned at us.
“Now you see . . . how it feel,” the chimp said. “To be in cage. To have no say. To have no choice. In experiments.”
“I think you know that that’s very wrong, Wolvy,” said Misto. “Remember, we talked about good and bad. Right and wrong, Wolvy. And I think you know right from wrong. Don’t you.”
“Yes,” said Wolvy. The chimp lowered his eyes. “Wolvy understand. Right, wrong. Difference.”
“Yeah, Wolvy,” I said, nodding. “We talked about this good and bad thing, back at the lab, “member? Before you ran away. Now, whadda do you think you’re doing right here, right now? Is it kinda a good thing — a thing you should do — or a bad thing — a thing you prolly shouldn’t do . . .”
Wolverine lowered his eyes, and appeared to think carefully, his brow furrowed for a moment. “Don’t know. The Mistress. She rewards . . . Wolvy. Praises him. Tells him he is good . . . gives him food and shelter. Does not throw things at him. Does not kick at him and say “get away. Shoo.” Does not chase him with darts, nets, and guns, like men with badges do on streets at night. Mistress . . . good to Wolvy. Treat him like a person. The way . . . you did. Not . . . like these two.” He gestured at Walter and Viktor with the gun.
“Yes,’ said Misto, “but do you think that the Mistress herself is good, or that she is bad . . . beyond just the way she treats you, Wolvy?”
I had to admit, Misto was probably pushing his luck, here. The chimp was advanced, yes, but . . . He could only take his reasoning so far.
“Don’t know,” said Wolverine shaking his head. “Don’t . . . understand. Cannot . . . ‘grok,’ like you say to Wolvy.”
“Well, think about that Wolvy,” said Misto. “The way Walter and Viktor here treated you was, indeed, wrong of them. The same way the way the Mistress will treat me and them is just as wrong. Evil . . . Bad. She will do bad things to us.”
“No . . .” said Wolvy. “Mistress . . . good. Mistress repays evil Humans with more of own evilness. Mistress would not hurt good Human . . . like you.”
“You’re wrong, Wolvy,” interjected Walter. “The Mistress especially hurts good Humans. She hurts them the most, in fact.”
“Shut up, Human! Quiet!” said Wolvy, and backhanded Walter across the face with his gun-holding hand. Walter stumbled to the side, his lip and nose bleeding, cradling his face in one hand, giving Wolverine a nasty, violent look. I started forward — I wanted so badly to teach that frakking chimp a gods-damned lesson in manners — but Viktor and Misto held me back. The gorillas raised their weapons and aimed them at the four of us. Walter, Misto, and Viktor quickly raised their hands again. It took me a minute or so to calm down, but, glaring at Wolverine the whole time — he and I now had a reckoning coming — I did so as well.
“There’s no need for that, Wolvy,” said Misto, in an amazingly calm voice. “We’ll come with you peacefully. But Walter is right, Wolvy. The Mistress hurts good Humans, too. The Mistress is not good. She is bad. She is evil. She is wrong.”
“You . . . you will come with Wolvy . . . now,” said Wolverine, appearing to shake off the philosophical conundrum, and pointing his gun at them. “You will follow Wolvy, Franklin, Watson and Crick, now. Wolvy . . . take you to the Mistress, as she has said for him to do. Come, Humans. Follow.” He waved his gun in the air in a “hurry up” gesture, a consternated look on his worried chimp face, and then turned around, and began loping the other way, toward a large set of wooden double-doors that, presumably, opened onto part of the second floor of the eastern wing of the hospital. Walter gave me and Misto a cross look — well, what the hell had we done? — as Franklin and Watson opened the doors and the four apes entered, us four humans following them. Well, what else had Walter expected me and Misto to do? Punch the chimp — or one of the silverbacks — right in the face and then run for it? “Wolvy” could’ve easily overpowered all four of us in his Enhanced state, and God alone knew what the silverbacks were capable of!
The apes led us into a long, wide, arch-roofed hallway that the architects had divided-up into two rows of spacious hospital rooms and offices — ten rooms on each side — and that terminated in another set of wooden, double-doors at the other end, through which there came the muffled sounds of churning machinery, the crackle and hum of flowing electricity, and the noises of animals in cages. Deserted, the rooms echoed with the silent footfalls of aged past, with holes knocked in most of the walls, graffiti spray-painted everywhere, the floors and doorjambs covered in dust, soot, ash, and debris. And mixed in with the rest of the noises coming from the doors at the far end, I could just barely make out a human voice . . . a male voice, babbling and pleading — no, begging — for mercy, for reprieve . . . for salvation from a grisly fate. Walter and Misto exchanged a worried look as the four of us progressed down the hallway behind the foursome of creatures.
The doors opened on their own, and a thick, billowing fog gushed out, as though the doors had opened onto the innards of a cloud. Viktor gasped as from out of the pouring fog, there emerged Anastasia. She floated in the air, her feet a yard off the ground, and she wore a white satin dress replete with frilly-lace, a corset, and a spiraling sash that wrapped around the curvy, clingy bottom — the dress she had picked out for hers and Viktor’s wedding — and over the top of that, a white lab-coat that strangely went with the dress, somehow. Her skin gleamed, drained of its color . . . almost pure alabaster, and her eyes — their pupils now slitted, like a cat’s — shined a bright, jade-emerald green; a bright, radioactive light. Her lipstick, bright red, and her eyeshadow, a dark blue, seemed like paint applied to a mannequin. Her eyes had grown larger — easily twice the size of a normal human’s. Her mouth had grown wider, and her teeth had become a row of deadly-looking fangs. Her arms seemed more muscular, and her fingernails were now sharp claws. The top part of her head, from her forehead, over to back behind her ears, had enlarged as well, as though her brain-pan had grown in size. The skin and bone there had grown almost translucent, allowing for a blurry glimpse into the exaggerated brain-matter and blood-vessels beneath. Glittering diamond-like particles swam in the thick crimson fluid that surrounded the brain itself . . . the nanogenes from the serum, doing their part to push Anastasia forward into the future of human evolution . . . or at least what they had calculated it to be based on her genetic profile.
“Gentlemen, Dizzy, how good of you to come, at long last!” she said, and smiled a fangéd smile at them. “Welcome to my laboratory, my little home away from home! I have such wonderful things . . . to show you!”
“Oh, Anastasia . . . Anastasia, my God! Thank the gods, it’s you! You’re alright!” Viktor said, obviously unable to help himself. He moved to embrace her — she floated down toward him, as well — but the silverback gorillas got in the way, protecting her. They glared at him, aimed the revolver and the Electromagnetic Pulse Blasters.
“Hi, Aunt Ana,” I said to her. “We’re here to bring you home.”
“Home?” she said, cocking her head. “But dear Dizzy, I am home. This is my proper place . . . my laboratory. The place. I belong. Doing the good work, to bring enlightenment and the future to the rest of the Human Race. ‘The future of tomorrow, today.’ Isn’t that the slogan of your company, Walter?”
“We’ve come to bring you back, Anastasia,” said Walter, his tone brisk. “Not to see what craven madness you’ve been up to since running out on us. Now c’mon. Stop this foolishness, and come home with us. If you really want to help humanity, then come home and help us log all this data into the system. So come on back to the lab, so we can get all this down, and get you back to normal.”
“Dudes,” said Misto in a small voice, looking first at Viktor then at Walter. “She’s brutally murdered twenty-one people. Exactly how does she come back from that?”
“Misto, no!” I hissed. “Ix-nay on the urders-may!”
Anastasia smiled a humorless smile at them. “As I just told your daughter . . . I am home, Walter. I belong here, with my work. I’ve created quite the laboratory out of this old, haunted palace of madness. I’m not coming back with you. Not ever. Don’t you see? I’ve gone beyond the experiment. Beyond all of you. Even you, dear sweet Viktor. We no longer exist on the same plane of humanity, my love. It’s sad — but there it is.”
“Don’t say that, Anastasia!” said Viktor. “Please! Say anything but that . . . I beg of you! Please . . . listen to Walter. Come back with us; come back to the lab. Let us fix all this. Let us help you.”
“Well if you want to help me,” she said, and smiled a mirthless smile, “then you can do so by putting on some gloves and a white coat, and helping me carry out my experiments here. It’s ever so exciting, the work I’ve done! So far beyond what we’ve done all this time, with such limited, human tools, faculties . . . and frailties! I find now the plateaus of thought I can reach . . . are much higher than before. The complexities I can carry in my head were unfathomable to me mere months ago. Now . . . now you have to see it, experience it, to believe it. In fact, I’ve prepared for this. I have injections ready for the four of you, too . . . if you’re ready, that is . . . ready to ascend to the next higher plane of thought and discovery!”
“I’m afraid we’re not interested, Anastasia,” said Walter. “We need you to come back with us . . . willingly or not. If you’re willing, then good, so be it. But if you’re not willing . . . then so be it. In such a case, we’ll have to take you by force. That’s not something we want to do, trust me.”
Anastasia tittered laughter at first, then broke into a rollicking, cackling guffaw that sent a shiver creeping down my spine. I’m not afraid of much, guys. But I am afraid of that kind of insanity, that kind of callous disregard for reason. It was like listening to a cruel parody of the old Anastasia’s laughter; Like seeing someone perform a one-person satire of everything I had once loved about my Aunt Ana, right down to the diamond-like glint in her eyes. I’d used to think her laugh, and that twinkle in her eye, was sweet, a reflection of the sweetness of her sense of sentimentality and humor. Now, the off-kilter gleam of madness in her eyes was a warning to others to stay away — stay far away.
“And just how, pray tell,” she said through her laughter, “are you going to accomplish that?’ Her laughter cut-off abruptly, and her face became stony and resolute, her eyes aglow with a hideous, ferocious green luminescence. “I hold the reins of power here. Only I command what is in this place, this sacred space, where the glory of Creation happens at my beckon and call. You four are so pathetic. You come here, full of machismo, bravado, and the male ego . . . waving your primitive weapons around like there’s a cock-measuring contest afoot . . . even you, Dizzy, armed as you are with weapons created from technology none of you have the insight to ever understand nor can ever truly grasp the scope of . . . and all of you, wearing those ridiculous things on your heads, thinking they can shield your thoughts from my all-seeing sight . . .”
She clenched the fingers of her left hand into a fist. And suddenly, my head was exploding and caught in a pair of invisible vice-grips. It hurt like hell. I remember my hands going to it, grasping it, and I screamed in pain. Viktor dropped to his knees, the pain in his temples probably overwhelming every other sensation, just like it did with me. I got dizzy — no pun intended — as the room tilted on me, my stomach rebelling at the rapidly-mounting sensation of vertigo I found myself experiencing, as Misto and Walter also went to their knees, with Misto crying out in pain, too. It got hard to breathe, and I could feel my chest constricted as though a boa had curled around me and was throttling me by inches. I reeled from the agony in my head and ribs, and then suddenly, just as quickly as it had come . . . it all faded away, all of it gone in an instant. Anastasia unclenched her fist and smiled a devious smile at us. I sucked in a huge gasp of air, breathing normally again and thankful I could do so. I was on the verge of passing out. Anastasia cackled at us — slowly, hatefully under her breath, her glowing eyes meeting our fearful gazes.
“You see?” she said. “You have no power here, Walter and Desirée Weatherspark . . . Viktor Arkenvalen . . . Joseph Michaelson! You may be wizards of space and time, masters of all the arcane wonders of science . . . but you have no hold over me here, in my Fortress of Solitude. Now, then. Be good houseguests and come, follow me. As I said . . . I have such wonderful things . . . to show you.”
I exchanged wary glances with dad as he and Misto and Viktor all got back up on their feet, and Misto and I just looked at each other. Misto merely shrugged, as if to say, Don’t ask me . . . I’m as bugger-all out of ideas as you two are.
Anastasia turned, and floated away from us. “Come,” she said. “Follow me.” When she saw we weren’t following, she turned around again and said, “It’s not like you have any choice, my dears. So you might as well humor me and follow.’ She turned, and began floating away again.
I turned to dad, and he shrugged, and started walking after her. The rest of us followed suit.
We followed Anastasia as she floated through the doors and into the next room. The next part of her laboratory featured large, arched windows of safety-glass; lightning flashed beyond them, casting the lab in stark, shadowy relief every few minutes. Everywhere, lab-animals squeaked, squealed, and squawked in cages. A pair of lemurs watched us with curiosity gleaming in their eyes; another chimp gazed through the bars of his prison with sentience burning in his retinas and irises — Wolvy regarded him with a deep sadness in his own eyes, and then looked at Walter scornfully . . . then surprisingly looked at Anastasia with some degree of scorn, as well. A cage full of rats chittered and stood up on their hind-legs to watch us newcomers.
Elsewhere, the raucous squealing of a throng of bats announced their presence in the rafters, the shadows there blinking open their lamp-like eyes, the darkness stirring as they unfolded and shuffled their wings. A large hoot-owl who stood upon a perch nearby rotated his head around, his luminous orb-like eyes full of wonderment at our arrival. The animals all did these things with an alarming uniformity of purpose and movement . . . a symphony of eerie awareness. Elaborate contraptions of chemical glassware sat bubbling and misting on every surface. The susurrations of Bunsen burners and the zap of lightning across spark-gap terminals lingered on the air, which reeked with the odors of urine, feces, various chemical compounds, and the acrid smell of electrical ozone.
And, across from where I stood, there stood what looked like a human-sized stasis chamber, only outfitted with a surreal array of hoses, pipes, power cables, and circuit boards connected to a bank of 1,024 high-powered server slices, with Ethernet cables running every-which-way along the floor. A large, open space near the middle of the room held perhaps the most frightening of Anastasia’s apparatuses, its ordinariness marking it scarier than the rest: An operating table, stained with blood and featuring padded restraints. A thick, gnarly bundle of wires descended from the ceiling and connected to a series of electrodes mounted just above the place where a primate’s — or a human’s — head might lay, right in the center of a foreboding stereotactic surgical frame. Light glinted off of the various rods and fasteners. My heart beat a little faster on seeing this.
Anastasia rose higher into the air and spread her arms out, and smiled. “Behold!” she said. “The place where the Great Work unfolds! Here, I have devised methods of improving Humanity far beyond the crude first steps that we’ve so far envisioned, gentlemen. Here, I have laid the groundwork for a whole new phase of Human evolution! All I need now is more test subjects as I work out the kinks in the various variations on the serum. The sounds you heard earlier were those of the last subject dying, I’m afraid. The serum overloaded his nervous system, burned him out completely. You will go out from here, and gather them for me. My new test subjects. My New Humans. And, you yourselves will be test subjects. In fact . . .” She smiled broadly. “I’ve meant to test one of the newest variations on my version of your formula, Walter, for some time now . . . I just hadn’t gotten around to it, yet. Franklin! Crick! Bring the chubby black man with the spectacles forward, if you would. Put your guns to his temples.”
“NO!” I shouted, and I was joined by an unexpected compatriot.
“No!” croaked Wolverine in a small, hoarse voice, taking a step toward her, his chimp-eyes growing larger, as the gorillas Franklin and Crick grabbed Misto by the arms and led him forward, struggling against them, then forced him to his knees and put both their guns to his head and each chambered a round into them.
“Anastasia, don’t do this!” said Walter, while Watson held his gun on him, me, and Viktor. “You’re only making this worse for yourself!”
“There now,” said Anastasia, still smiling. She floated downward, toward one of the lab tables, and retrieved a syringe that sat in a rack of test-tubes. She plunged it into a flask that featured a greenish-glowing liquid that seemed to spin and stir itself, with hundreds of tiny, glowing, insect-like pinpricks of light dancing within it in spiral formation. Anastasia filled the syringe, and then floated over to where Misto knelt, still struggling against the muscular gorillas’ hold on him upper arms, their guns still aimed at the sides of his head. He met Anastasia’s stare head-on.
“You don’t . . . you don’t scare me, Anastasia,” he said, though I could plainly see he was terrified. You go Misto, I thought. Give ‘em hell. “Go ahead,” he said. “Inject me with that. If it makes me more like you, you’d better watch the fuck out, because if it does, the first thing I’m doing is using my new powers to come straight after you, woman.”
“Oh, so full of false courage,” said Anastasia in a pouty, pitying voice. “I almost feel bad doing this. Well. Almost.” She jabbed the syringe into Misto’s neck and squeezed the plunger. Michaelson cried out in pain as the green-glowing liquid shot into his bloodstream Anastasia pulled the syringe out of his neck and tossed it aside. “Aw,” she said, with cloying, mock sympathy, “it would appear that Paul Muad’dib has taken the Water of Life. Let us see if he can transmute it and have visions. After all — the Sleeper Must Awaken, right?”
The gorillas released Misto from their grasp and he almost fell forward, but caught his balance just in time; he got up, one uncertain leg at a time, and finally stood, trembling, clasping a hand to his neck and wincing.
“What . . . the fuck . . . did you just do to me, woman?” he said. “What did you give me?”
“Why, a gift!” replied Anastasia, floating back up and away from them and laughing. “Nothing more. But then, oh so much more! A gift that will continue to give to you for the rest of your days, Joseph! A transfiguration spell of my own design, a little sorcery to spice up your life. And if I’m not mistaken, tonight is a full moon, so lucky you, you get to experience the change on your very first night as a . . . well, let’s call it a Therianthropic Deviation. Now, then let us see what miracles my genius has in store for you in three . . . two . . . one . . .”
Misto yelped in pain, and bent double, clutching his stomach in agony, and fell to his knees, his eyes scrunched closed, sweat standing on his brow. Blood ran from his nostrils as he trembled and grit his teeth. His shirt — then his sport coat, then his pants — ripped as his body swelled; his arms, his chest, his shoulders and ribs made cracking noises as he cried out in torment. I could only watch, stunned at the sight of my friend transforming, mutating. Michaelson clenched his fists and threw his arms out his sides as his muscles firmed up and rippled up and down his arms, as though he were a weight-lifter whose physique had developed within minutes instead of weeks, his musculature bursting out beneath his skin like popcorn kernels popping. His bones crunched, crackled, and distended as his limbs grew larger and longer, his shoes splitting open as did his pants, ripping and tearing as his body quickly outgrew them. His skin changed color, going from a deep chocolate brown to a bright blue, a slightly darker shade than that of a summer afternoon’s sky. His hair changed; he had always sported an afro, and had little in the way of chest-hair. But now he grew longish fur all over — a silky smooth fur, also a bright blue that matched his strange new skin tone — that worked to cover up his private parts as well as flowed down his arms, chest, backside, and face. His teeth grew, too — and he grew a few new ones as his face changed shape, as well. His nose and mouth elongated and stretched away from his face as the bone structure changed, developing into a canine snout, his jawbone distending, so that he now possessed a half-wolfen, half-Human head, but with a mouth that remained as articulate as any Human’s. His fingernails became claws, as did his toenails, and his sex organs retreated to inside his body. His eyes changed last — they became a brightly-glowing yellow. Viktor — and Walter, from the look on his face; and me, too — we could only half-believe what we beheld: A muscular, blue-skinned, blue-furred werewolf — through in truth, more of a lycanthrope, perhaps — now stood before us, retaining just enough of Misto’s facial features for us to be able tell it was still him underneath . . . but alien enough to be unsettling, though strangely comical with the tinfoil pyramid hat still sitting cockeyed on his blue-furred, wolfen head.
Misto — or rather, the Werewolf — examined his blue-furred hands and body, his yellow eyes wide, breathing heavily, his wolfen jaw agape at what he saw.
“No!” he rasped in an all-too-human voice. “No! What have you done to me!”
“Given you the power of transfiguration!” cried Anastasia. “Be thankful, you dolt! I’ve given you the gift of evolution into a higher form!”
“No . . .” said the Werewolf in a hoarse whisper. He clenched his fists. “I’ll kill you for this!” He narrowed his yellow eyes at Anastasia.
“Michaelson? Is that . . . is that still . . . er, you?” asked Viktor.
Was this an illusion that Anastasia had planted in their minds, or WAS this really reality? Had she really done that to Misto? Dear gods, what if she had? Would poor Misto he stuck like this forever? She had mentioned the full moon . . . so maybe he would only transform like this for a few days each month? I glared at Anastasia, wanting to make a move, but not knowing what the hell it could possibly be, and unable to believe she could be so cruel, so hateful. For the first time tonight, I saw her plainly for what was now . . . an eldritch horror, a dark terror, a nightmarish menace to everything and everyone, perhaps even the planet. Dad was right. She needed stopping. Not killed, of course — no, never that; I couldn't bear the thought of Aunt Ana dying by our hands — but she did need to be stopped. But how?
“Of course it’s me,” said Michaelson in that same gruff, deep voice he now possessed. “I’ve . . . changed is all.” He sounded horrified when he said the word. “Thanks to her.” Raw anger in his voice now. Then, he grinned, showing all his new teeth. “But she’s actually made a big mistake. I’m a lot stronger than I was five minutes ago, I think. And I don’t . . . think she can read my mind anymore. Go ahead, Anastasia. Try it. See if you can.”
Anastasia blinked a few times, and her smile turned to a sneer. “So? What of it! I can still read theirs. And your body language is easy to read, Joseph. You might as well telegraph your every thought. But since I can’t read your mind, that means you are now nothing more than a failed experiment. And failed experiments must be destroyed.” She raised her hand and crooked her fingers, and Viktor noticed Wolverine look at Misto . . . then look back at Anastasia . . . then back at Misto, and then back at Anastasia with a worried, consternated look, the wheels in the chimp’s simple — but not stupid — brain whirring. Then, he darted over to Misto and stood in front of him, getting between the three of them and the three gorillas and Anastasia.
“NO!” cried the chimp, spreading his arms to either side in a gesture of protection. “No more! You will not hurt Joey! Stop!”
“Oh, Wolverine,” said Anastasia, again with mock sympathy, “I had such high hopes for you. Now, to see them all dashed . . . So disappointing. Oh well. I suppose when you work with someone else’s leftovers . . . Watson, Crick. Be dears and deal with him, would you?”
Watson and Crick drew their Smith & Wessons, and aimed them at Wolverine. The three gorillas — Watson, Crick, and Franklin — screeched and hooted, and made a beeline for Wolverine as he hollered incoherently and leapt up onto the operating table and swung from the light-fixture that hung down above it, aimed his Smith & Wesson at Watson — the first to reach him — and pulled the trigger twice. Two shots of flame erupted from the muzzle of the gun, and Watson went flying off the table and landed on his back. The female gorilla, Franklin, screamed, and ran to Watson’s side, then came at Wolverine, attacking him, roaring with fury at him as she closed in on him. Wolverine evaded her and fired another shot, this one taking her down but not killing her; the bullet struck her in the shoulder, laying her out on the floor, blood erupting from the wound, but not putting her down. Clutching at the wound, she got back up and came after Wolverine afresh. Wolverine ran for it, scrambling away as fast as he could, as the other male gorilla, Crick, roared, thumped his chest with his fists, and then also gave chase, trying to head Wolverine off at the pass by going around the other side of the room. Meanwhile, Anastasia — clearly alarmed — floated higher, toward the vaulted ceiling of the place. Also meanwhile, I ran to the fallen Watson and grabbed my Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster and yanked it out of the fallen gorilla’s hands, and then took aim at Anastasia.
“No!” cried Viktor, rushing to stop me, just as he saw Misto go after the female gorilla, Franklin, chasing his tranquilizer gun. It had one cartridge loaded into it already; the others he kept in the inner-pocket of his sport-coat, which now lay draped — ripped and in tatters — over his skin, as did the remains of his shirt and pants, as did the split-open remnants of his shoes. Viktor reached me just as Franklin took aim at Wolverine and fired the tranq gun at him, just before Misto reached Franklin and tried to wrestle the tranq gun away from her. Wolverine went down, but as he did, he tossed his Smith & Wesson at Viktor, who tried clumsily to catch it. He had never been good at sports. Yet he just managed to catch the thing in his arms and fumble it into his right hand, where he aimed it right at my head just as I was prepared to fire the Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster, just as Anastasia swooped through the air above, engaging in evasive maneuvers.
“Dizzy, stop! STOP!” cried Viktor, the Smith & Wesson trembling along with his hand.
“Viktor — I have to do this!” I yelled at him. “For her own good, for the good of the world!”
“There has to be another way!” he screamed at me. His arm trembled more and he closed his eyes, and pulled the trigger, and — click. The gun didn’t fire. He opened his eyes again, and with a yell of frustration — but a look of relief on his sweaty face for just a moment — he threw the gun away and reached to grab the Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster out of my hands. I yanked back on it, and we wrestled for control of it.
“I’m sorry, but there isn’t!” I cried. “Now get out of the way and give me that back!”
“I can’t let you hurt her!” yelled Viktor. Then, in the struggle between us, the Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster activated. The coil of copper wire inside the glass barrel lit up with a bright blue hue as arcs leapt from one end to the other, a loud, buzzing hum emanating from the blaster, and a fierce bolt of blue-white lightning jumped from the tip of the gun to across the lab, where it briefly latched onto a series of rack-mounted computers, all of which erupted into a blazing shower of brilliant yellow sparks that exploded out of their black metal cabinets, the rack itself scooting across the floor and toppling over. As Viktor and I struggled, another bolt blasted out of the gun and zapped upward, toward where Anastasia hovered near the rafters, just barely missing her. She then reached out with her hands before her and spread her fingers as she levitated; serpents of eldritch power arced forth from her fingertips, touching down all across the lab, some of them arcing through the bodies of Walter and Misto, but not Viktor and I. Misto fell to his giant, blue-furred knees, clutching at his chest and wincing in pain, a growled yelp of agony escaping his snarling, wolfen lips.
Meanwhile, Franklin and Crick continued to chase Wolverine around the lab; he evaded them expertly, picking up glassware and equipment and throwing it at them, breaking it over their heads and bodies — not that it made much difference — and still fleeing. He turned and fired another two shots from his Smith & Wesson at them, and they fired at him with theirs; both their shots missed, instead plugging bullets into the concrete walls of the place and in once case, the ceiling. But, one of Wolverine’s return-shots struck Franklin square in the head. She slipped on the floor and fell onto her back, dead, the bullet having struck her in the brain. Blood flew from the wound as she died instantly, her hulking body hitting the floor with a dull thud. The other shot, aimed at Crick, missed, and Crick — Franklin’s death momentarily distracted him — stopped to holler in protest at what Wolverine had done, long enough for Wolverine to run down out the doorway and the hall, where he shot out one of the ancient asylum’s windows, and escaped into the downpour of the thunderstorm outside. I had a feeling we would never see the chimp again.
“Gah! Fuck! My heart!” Misto cried out, the bolts of energy from Anastasia’s fingertips still arcing through his body. “Walter . . . Walter!”
“I know . . . argh . . . me too!” yelled Walter in response, as he gripped a nearby lab table for support, his whole body shuddering as the power coursed through him. Presently, he let go of his Electromagnetic Pulse Blaster and the table, and fell to one knee, grimacing in torment as the fillings in his teeth caused the inside of his mouth to flicker with pyrotechnics, his eyes buzzing back and forth in their sockets, his hand also going to his heart, gripping his chest tightly. Viktor stopped struggling over the Blaster with me and looked up at Anastasia. I yanked the blaster back from him and took aim at her. It was hard to get a bead on her because she kept frakking moving around.
“Stop!” he yelled. “Please, Anastasia, stop this! Stop hurting them! You’ll make their hearts explode!”
“That’s the general idea,” she replied, and cackled mirthlessly, her grin a garish, menacing parody of good humor. She leaned into her attack, and the lightning forks escaping from her fingers seemed to intensify, as did Walter and Misto’s cries of anguish.
I glanced at the controls. Not the lowest setting; that would never work on something as powerful as what she had become. So I set it to the “medium” setting, then hoisted it up, and spotted her through the thing’s rifle-like sites. There, magnified in the lenses, she turned to face me, her eyes meeting my gaze. I had her in my sights at last. I hesitated only a second. I didn’t want this to kill her. I hoped it wouldn’t kill her. But I had to save my dad and Misto. So, I did what I had to do: I pulled the trigger.
The bolt leapt from the electrode on the end of the gun, burned through the air, a thin filament of blue-white hell loosed upon the Earth, and then slammed into Anastasia.
She screamed, tossing her hair and arching her back, her eyes wide and disbelieving, and then she fell from her levitating vantage-point and crashed down onto the floor in a heap, flopping over onto her back, her arms and legs akimbo — still breathing. For a second, my heart stopped. Did I kill her? Or almost kill her? My innards and lurched upward and into my throat.
Viktor ran to her side, where she lay crumpled on the floor, still breathing, though her eyes were closed and her brow seemed knitted, her face knotted in a grimace of perpetual consternation. He propped her up in his arms, his breathing ragged, barely conscious of the tears flowing from his eyes.
“Anastasia? Love? Anastasia?” he said, his voice cracking at the last. “Please, wake up. Anastasia? Please, oh please, please wake up. Anastasia, please. Anastasia, wake up. Anastasia . . . Anastasia? Are you in there? Please, oh please, wake up my love, wake up . . . Anastasia . . .” From the corners of his eyes, he saw Walter and Misto pull themselves to their feet, and make their way toward him. “Stop!” he said as they approached. “No! You — get away from us! Just get away! You did this . . . you did this! This was what you wanted . . . this is what you planned to do! You condemned her to this from the moment we set foot here . . . in your minds, the two of you . . . you did . . . you condemned her to this, to living death . . .”
“Viktor — ” began Walter. I walked up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder. He tuned to me, and I simply shook my head.
“I said shut up!” cried Viktor as he cradled Anastasia’s sleeping form in his arms. “Shut up, shut up, shut up! This is what you intended all along. Not saving her, not getting her back . . . No. This. This is what you wanted. This.”
He turned his head and looked at me, and there was a horrible look of accusation and hate in his eyes.
“You did this. You, you little bitch! You did this to her! I HATE YOU! DO YOU HEAR ME? I WILL HAVE MY REVENGE ON YOU! ONE OF THESE DAYS — ONE OF THESE DAYS! I WILL HAVE MY REVENGE!”
He set Anastasia aside — gently lying her on the floor — and got up from where he sat, picked up the electromagnetic pulse blaster, and aimed it squarely at Walter and me, his aim tremulous, as he himself trembled, unsteady on his feet, his whole body shivering, his skin pale, his eyes reddened, his voice still cracking in places, the rage and grief all leaking out of him like a toxic chemical spill.
“Now,” he said, aiming at us. We raised their hands, exchanging a worried look. “I’m taking Anastasia and your van, Misto. To my parents’ summer home. To the cryogenic stasis chamber we built there. That will sustain her, until I can find a way to wake her up. Don’t speak to me ever again, any of you. Don’t call, don’t write, don’t message me. Do not contact me. Ever. You’ll stay away from me — from us — ALL of you, if you know what’s good for you. Especially you, you murdering bitch. You can come pick up your van at the summer house, Misto. But come alone. Don’t attempt to come inside or see me. Just get your van and go. I’m done with the you of two and your “ideas” and your ‘friendship.’ Forever. Murderers. Especially you. You murderous little bitch!”
Misto lowered his hands slowly. “I’m just . . . getting the keys, okay Vic?” He reached into his pocket, got the keys, and then tossed them at Viktor, who caught them in one outstretched hand.
He renewed his grip on the Blaster and then said, swallowing a heavy lump of nerves, “Alright, then. You. Misto. You look fairly big and strong, now. Pick up Anastasia and take her to your van. Buckle her into the passenger seat. And you. Walter. You gather up as much of her research material as will fit, and load it into the back and side of the van. Now. C’mon, the both of you. Move.”