Chapter 8, Crunch Time

The medical deck felt almost safe, already fortress-like thanks to its complex design, now practically clean of undead with the necromorphs' attention drawn away by the 3-direction attack by security and the visitors from another universe.

Radio static disrupted the peace.

"Dr. Brennan, you have a bigger role in bringing the Convergence closer to us, yet you don't know!" Mercer's voice boomed on Nicole's RIG as she tried to catch some rest, giving her a nasty surprise.

"Mercer? Shouldn't you be helping Kyne in the emergency room?" She was past tolerating him. Was he holding a nailgun?

"Kyne is just another false shepherd. He's not in the ER, running away from Convergence."

"I thought the congregation onboard is all fine with the Messenger."

"Never! He and his Messenger takes flesh away from Convergence, but soon I'll change his mind. Open him another eye."

"What the fuck." The Convergence according to the clerical office's emergency broadcast should be a meeting of different universes, like the one the ship just experienced with the Type 17 Guardian. How is Kyne taking away flesh from it...

"Too much blood has been spilled for unfounded fear, when they're all needed for unity."

"Then go back to your office! Stop bothering me, I'm calling security. McNeil? Ramirez?" It all sounded like he was working against the plan to save the ship. How did he survive for this long? Shouldn't White and Vincent at least lock him up? She thought. Oh. Her mind finally began to connect dots that should have been connected since the Marker arrived onboard.

"They're busy. But have no fear, your greater purpose is just outside your door!"

"Are they dead?" Their RIGs were out of signal range, along with Maxine's. ...The nailgun in Mercer's hand suddenly seemed to explain their absence, while raising new questions like how was he supposed to overpower them.

"No, they're just talking to Kyne and Eckhardt. But nobody truly dies, Dr. Brennan. Except the concept of death will die, one day." He shrugged, "Anyway, he's just busy. I hope you can help me with this thing before he's back. Harris? The wire, please."

"Yes, brother."

Brant Harris is here too? His voice sounded like he either broke his radio, or busted his vocal chord figuratively playing doctor. The mental image of him deepthroating Mercer was... Poor devil must be getting worse following the Unitologist's galaxy-brained scheme. His Marker madness was bone-chillingly lucid and expressive, and "the wire, please" sounded like extra bad news.

A burst of electricity blackout as expected, and Mercer was prying open Nicole's door. She sat still at her desk, her hand reached for the electromagnetic pistol hidden in an open drawer. It was live, and Mike told her the basics of aiming.

"The Marker has use for you alive! My professional opinion is, you would be much open to Convergence if you could see it's reformative power firsthand. Please, lend me your authorization code for the organic prosthetics system."

"Who needs fixing?"

"Brennan, the bodies, the advancement of cosmic progress needs more bodies! I need another senior officer's code, the easy way or the hard way."

Clone bodies, dozens of them, and enough biomass to make dozens more, even hundreds more! It was clear as day, which side was Mercer on. She pulled out the pistol and -

A blast of stasis froze her, hand halfway in mid air. Mercer flexed his left arm, an improvised large stasis module mounted on his sleeve, and gave her a grin. He lifted his nailgun and fired at her pistol.

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Clunk!

The nail impacted Nicole's pistol in slow motion, sending it and her all crashing into the wall behind. Mercer circled to her other side, then fired another nail at the pistol, jamming its electric rail.

"Dr. Brennan, really." The stasis energy wore off, and he pulled her up by her bruised right hand. Gesturing her towards the door, he asked, "Have you finally acknowledged all the dead trying to talking to you? Or did you try to ignore their advice?"

"There was Olivia Clarke... Trying to ask for more between me and Issac." It was the truth, perfect for stalling. There's an extra layer of absurdity seeing the ghost of her potential mother-in-law telling her she should get more whole with the family.

"The Marker has delivered the best advice for every member of the community, even if it's up to the individuals to listen."

Nicole had an idea on how to continue this talk. An original one, no input from the rock, filled with... A rare spirit of adventure. She pointed at a portable drive on her desk: "The prosthetics room, you say? I've kept DNA samples of myself and Issac for a while, now must be the Marker having her telling me it's a good time to offer our bloodlines for Convergence. The organ babies are never supposed to be born like us, Olivia wanted them to all be family."

"We'll be family. Sure, take it along."

They left the office with an air of passive hostility, Mercer clearly having the upper hand. Around the corner she saw Brant Harris: Deathly pale, his face however looking much less grim, agitated with barely suppressed wild zeal. The same kind of superiority and vindictiveness on Mercer was visible on him, too. He wore a patients' RIG, modified with improvised armor and protective fabric that barely hid his increase in muscle mass. A strange mechanical bracing fitted over his hunching, bulked-up back and shoulders, lined with autoinjectors, more alarmingly one stasis pack tacked onto each side. What have these Unitologist clowns been up to?

"Brant, when did you last take a nap? You look dead tired." She tried to make small talk.

"There will be enough rest after Convergence, sister." His voice off radio was as bad as it was on radio, "Altman told me, the endless still needs to be watched..."

"...Okay. Please lay off your smoking though, for eternity's sake, the stress wouldn't get better if you hurt your throat."

When they arrived in the prosthetics center, Brant had problems fitting through the door with his strange attachments and implants. The bracing and armor were true implants, Nicole realized, connected to his actual skeleton. It was getting more and more worrying! Her fingers clicked for silent emergency auto-dial on her RIG's interface.

"It's fine, Harris. Leave us inside and stand guard."

"Altman be praised, brother."

The two doctors went to work on the consoles, preparing clones for release.

"Have you checked what was different with subject T's examinations?"

"Impressive healing powers down to the cellular level. Though, these are all far from comparable to the gifts from the Marker. He can run from death, but he's not getting stronger. Have you seen what Harris volunteered to test out?"

While he tried to edit, Nicole found the right moment to plug in the DNA sample into the clone template. She nodded and played along until the system confirmed that lateral gene edits were ready to deploy in the current batch.

"The cellular regeneration pattern of Tanikaze Nagate meant his systems are completely invulnerable to the transmission and pathological aspects of this Necromorph infection."

"...So what?"

"So, I have flooded the organ babies with genetic edits that would make them useless to your Convergence."

"You imbecile... You child snatcher!" Mercer engaged stasis on hee, freezing the computer in the process. He gave the screen a good look, then unholstered his nailgun and pressed it on Nicole's chin in an intentionally, comically slow motion, "Fuck! This is nothing less than corruption of our future designed by our Marker! Fine, enjoy your last minute outside of Convergence."

Nicole stared down the barrel, waiting second by second as Mercer's index finger moved closer to the trigger. Suddenly, a flash of silver appeared next to the Unitologist's head.

It was a scalpel; Anne has sneaked up behind him, holding the blade next to his neck. Was she working in this room, or just hiding?

"Put your gun down, Dr. Mercer. I don't believe in the Marker, but I trust Shizuka. My faith spoke of a holy bearer of messages dragging evildoers across the sharpest blades. Do you want to test your faith right now?"

"Easy, easy..." He was waiting for his stasis to recharge, "Harris!"

The door mechanism screeched, wedged open by a pair of muscular inhuman arms that grew behind Brant's shoulders, fortified by the strange braces. As Anne was distracted, he threw off her knife's position and turned her back towards his artificially mutated follower.

She tried to hold him still, but in the struggle, her scalpel sank itself into Mercer's left biceps.

"I'll make them pay, brother?" Brant's eyes were glowing orange like a Necromorph's.

"We'll be back... Time to go!" Clutching his bleeding arm, the doctor latched onto his underling's extra right hand and retreated with him.

Soon, Ramirez reached the prosthetics center, but Mercer's blood trail was too risky to trace on his own. He set a few pulse rifle magazines to landmine mode and began to escort the ladies back to the imaging room.

"You've really saved my life, Anne! I don't know you're from one of the new religions, but I'll be fine signing up and paying tithe to you once we're home."

"Oh. It was just some old thing from the 1800s, a Chinese historian removed it after the SC collapsed. Not an organized religion but I like the mythology, all you need to do is to pray to the holy Brother, his Brother, his Father and the Holy Ghost."

"Hmmm. Holy Ghost pulls people across swords, I presume?"

"That's why I think Shizuka might be her."

////

Nagate's squad was catching their breath in a cargo deck control room after escaping the composite Necromorph through a series of spatially constrained passages.

"They did it!" Mike suddenly cheered as he saw new RIG feed, "Alissa's team will come RV with us, they got the beacon out!

"Good news indeed." Shen nodded, securing Hanson's handcuffs on a chair fixed into the floor, "Have they heard from CEC operations center yet?"

"Yep. It's even better news, they're sending a fixer boat to us first, and then a rescue force. It's cousin Hailey's boat, the Kellion!"

A round of more-than-halfhearted cheers rang among the squad, even Nagate gave Shizuka a reassuring grip pver her tightly clenched fist's Ena armor. The two knew to see their best chances of survival in an organized professional military response, as it always did in the long struggle against Gauna.

"I wanna sing something." Mike released his helmet.

"Come the fuck on!" Gabe moaned, "That big fucking thing will cut through all this metal to politely ask you to shut up!"

The only direct response to him was a middle finger. Mike cleared his throat, set his radio to all-range, then began:

"There once was a ship from the CEC, the Ishimura USG..."