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Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
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Alliances Old, Alliances New
Part 5
“I’ve dreamed of this for years, Mason.”
Eckhart shuddered to full wakefulness to see Adam removing a syringe from his left arm, from which the sleeve of his jacket had been neatly sliced away. Adam wore an unwholesome smile.
“Doing a little medical research in the Breedlove tradition?” Eckhart said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“With his Third Reich origins, Breedlove never did have much concern about ethics.”
“Paul was a brilliant man, whatever his origins. He was one of the most gifted innovators of our time.”
“Who bequeathed a plague upon mankind as his miserable legacy.”
Eckhart realized he was losing sensation in his hands and feet, and that general numbness was spreading. He dreaded that Adam had perhaps given him something to relax every muscle, including his heart, but he refused to give Adam the satisfaction of appearing fearful.
“He was a great man, Mason. Even you respected him.”
“Until I learned the truth of the man. Adam, he was a brilliant fraud, from his name to his feigned concern for people. And he made you part of his fraud, though he did not have to work hard to convince you to assist him. You plunged in without reflection. But you never did make a habit of considering the consequences of your actions.”
Eckhart tried to move his right hand, and found he could not.
“You lack the intellect to understand the significance of his work.”
“Which you, naturally, have in abundance, since the great man himself pronounced you the smartest man in the world. Do you know why he told you that? So you would be the one to come in on weekends and holidays and tend to experiments so Paul wouldn’t have to.” Eckhart laughed. “Breedlove deceived everyone around him in some fashion. That’s how he survived and flourished. You’ve learnt some of those lessons but you’re not nearly as good at it as the old Nazi was.”
Adam looked puzzled. “Aren’t you beginning to feel a little peculiar?”
“I’ve felt peculiar for most of the last twenty years, thanks to you.”
Adam said nothing for a moment, knowing better than to deny responsibility to Eckhart.
“Well, that’s all about to end.” Adam pulled a pair of scissors from a pocket and stood over Eckhart, wearing a queasy-making smile. “Whether you’re numbed or not, I’m going to begin.”
The biopolymer skin Eckhart wore consisted of several layers, intended to give it strength, flexibility, and limited porosity, but it was not engineered to resist scissor blades, though it did have limited self-sealing properties to protect against small, simple punctures. Adam snipped away at the upper arm, removing a thin strip less than an inch wide extending from just below the shoulder to the elbow, the skin below exposed to the air.
“There. That’ll give you something to think about.” Adam grinned unhealthily, and met Eckhart’s eyes.
“Paul would be so proud of you, Adam.” Eckhart was calm, rational, fully in control, although the implications of such exposure were disease and death.
Adam had expected a different response.
“I’m going to go check my email.”
Eckhart fought the impulse to inspect his exposed skin until Adam left the examination room. Some sensation remained in his upper arm, and he was startled by the unfamiliar sensation of coolness arising from sweat freely evaporating from his skin. He had not felt that in years.
Eckhart was long past the time when antibiotics needed to be infused into his system. Bacteria and bacteria spores adrift in the air would settle onto his exposed flesh. Having no defense against them, some of those organisms would find conditions favorable, commence multiplying, and infection would spread throughout his body and kill him. Death would not come quickly.
Eckhart had schooled himself to a high degree of personal control. He could avoid any outer impression of panic, but he lived daily in dread of bacteria and viruses, and now found himself in the middle of what he feared most.
Adam, in the best of circumstances was not a stable personality. Moody and emotional, Adam was not predictable. Overt cruelty was a new aspect, however, making him more dangerous than ever. There was no telling what else he might do.
Whatever Adam had injected, sensation was now dulled throughout Eckhart’s body. He wondered if this served any purpose or was merely Adam’s way of asserting more apparent control. He considered coping by imagining himself elsewhere, but realized whatever had been injected possessed the additional effect of making him alert and aware mentally, unlike a pain killer which tended to put one asleep. Adam did not want him to miss one moment of his slow slide towards death.
Eckhart realized Adam must have been prepared at any time to deal with him as a prisoner, to have such specific medications stocked and available. He was puzzled all over again why Adam so effectively fooled people despite his moodiness and emotionality.
Finding reasons to go on had never been a problem before this. As no one else alive understood, Eckhart knew how unstable Adam was and how dangerous it was to be subject to his whims. Even if anyone knew where he was, all Adam had to do was seal all the entrances. Sanctuary was a fortress, capable of holding out through a prolonged siege. Eventually, even Adam would run short of food or toilet paper, or something, but by that time, Eckhart knew that he would be long dead. He could not imagine a way out, and knew if he wasn’t careful, Adam would use this against him.
Eckhart was also sure Adam would never allow himself to be trapped deep inside a mountain. No doubt there was at least one escape route out, probably only one Adam knew about. He was likely to have made provisions for an escape and setting up life with another identity.
He heard the door to the examination room open, but the effort required to turn his head was too great. Adam’s voice and that of Shalimar informed him soon enough who was present. He wondered what other surprises Adam had waiting.
They came to stand before him, talking about Eckhart as if he was not even there.
Shalimar wrinkled her nose in disgust. “He’s beginning to smell.”
“Only to your sensitive self. He’ll keep a few more days,” Adam assured her.
“Things smell pretty putrid in here to me.”
“This is going to take a little time. Isn’t this worth a little discomfort?”
“What are you doing to him?” Shalimar asked.
Adam pointed to Eckhart’s exposed arm. “I’m just letting nature take its course, and letting things happen the way they should have years ago. For now, anyway.”
“You’re going to let him rot?” Shalimar asked, wrinkling her nose once more.
“Something like that.”
Eckhart watched Shalimar’s face, unsure what he saw there. Disgust?
Adam turned to Eckhart. “You’re awfully quiet, Mason. That’s not like you. You always have something to say.”
“I thought you were doing an admirable job of explaining your methods and yourself. Pray continue.”
“How do you do it? You’re more dead than alive to begin with. How do you keep going?”
“Because I believe in things outside of myself. What I do isn’t about me. It has never been about me.”
“You live on hate. Hate defines you. Without your obsessive hatred of mutants and of me, you don’t have anything left in this world.”
“No, Adam. That’s not true. There is little in this world worth the energy of hating.”
“Not even me?” Adam sounded both disbelieving and disappointed.
“Especially not you. You are an intelligent individual who has turned his gifts and energies towards negative goals. Everywhere you go, you leave a trail of changed and shattered lives, without a twinge of conscience. You are a perversion of what a good researcher should be, and what you could have been. How could I hate such a failure? Feel pity, perhaps; feel annoyance at the squandering of talent, but hatred? No. I used to believe you were a talented con artist, but I’ve come to think you believe your own lies.”
“You sound like you’re describing yourself, Eckhart,” Shalimar challenged.
“Really? My history with Adam extends a good deal farther than your own. I know things about Adam that I’m sure he has never shared with you. Of course, there are some things he has never shared with anyone. There is no record of Adam ever being born, for example. I could never determine if he happened like the rest of us, or if Breedlove manufactured him.”
“Manufactured?” Shalimar looked puzzled.
“Manufactured. As in android.” Eckhart watched Adam’s face carefully.
Adam smirked. “You’re crazy, Mason. You’ve been crazy a long time.”
“I’ve read Breedlove’s original lab notebooks from the 1950s and 1960s. My German is good enough for that. He had a wide-ranging, if unholy intellect, and androids were a possibility that fascinated him. I’ve wondered if you aren’t in some sense Paul’s son, partly mechanical, partly electrochemical, and partly some grafting of his own flesh.”
“You’re delusional.” Adam did not sound so sure.
“I don’t think so. Paul could have created you, trained you, wiped your memory clean and then sent you off to college at the age of twelve. Breedlove charities paid your tuition. Genomex recruited you. And you’ve never wondered why? You’re the scientist, Adam. Isn’t good science a matter of asking the right questions?”
“You’ve been living inside that plastic skin for too long. Your brain has become pickled.”
“In the years when we were friends, you never once mentioned a single childhood memory, not even in the presence of my own son Grey. That’s very odd. Some childhood memories should have been prompted but not in your case. Perhaps you were assembled at the apparent age of ten, loaded with the proper software and memory, and shipped off to college when you were ‘twelve’.”
“Your son?” Shalimar was astonished.
“Yes. Adam had no friends, and I used to invite him to my house on weekends. I felt sorry for him. I know how it is to be an isolate, so I had him spend time with my family: cookouts in the backyard, fishing trips with Grey, that kind of thing. Adam even came along when we went to cut down our Christmas tree. Yes, Adam was there for all of these things.”
“That sounds unbelievable,” Shalimar said. She could not imagine Eckhart as any other than the odd man she knew now.
“Tell her it’s true, Adam.”
“It’s true,” Adam said grudgingly.
Shalimar knew they had an extended history, but these details were wholly unfamiliar.
“I welcomed the lost-soul nerd into my home, and he repaid me by betraying my trust, didn’t you, Adam?”
“That was a long time ago,” Adam said, avoiding Eckhart’s eyes, and Shalimar’s as well.
“A long time? Do you think time excuses destroying my family?” For a moment, Eckhart allowed emotions free rein.
Shalimar turned to Adam, looking for an explanation, but none came. Adam remained silent.
“Adam, you’re such a fraud. You tear apart my family, assist Breedlove in creating several thousand unhappy anomalies, spread their slow-moving plague through the world, and still you believe you’re a good man—or whatever you might be.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Are you, or are you not, human?”
“What kind of question is that?”
“One to which I was unable to obtain a definite answer. Surely you can tell me. I received reports indicating you are other than human.”
“It’s an absurd thing to ask, Mason.”
Eckhart smirked. “I’ll take that to mean you are an android. That goes far to explain how little regard you have for humanity. Perhaps in humanity’s demise you imagine the rise of your own kind.”
“You’re insane,” Adam responded, still not addressing the issue.
“Really? So much about you makes little sense otherwise. I wonder what Jackie and Danielle would think of the question?”
Adam seized scissors from a drawer and began cutting open the biopolymer about the top of Eckhart’s arm. Once he had cut completely around, he unpeeled the plastic from the entire arm.
“Running short of patience, Adam?” Eckhart asked, regaining perfect outward poise.
“I’m tired of listening to you.”
“You never listened to anyone. You’ve always been out of control. Paul should have pulled your batteries early on.”
“Your whole arm is exposed. By morning, things should be interesting.”
“I will begin going septic. Without heroic intervention, I will die. And you believe living memory of what you have done with die with me, don’t you?”
“Who else is left?” Adam asked.
“Grey. He’s not a little boy any longer. He’s almost done with his undergraduate work.”
“Everyone knows you had no contact with your children after Jackie left you.”
“Everyone was wrong. When you let someone know what you love, you’ve given them the key to destroying you. Grey and the twins aren’t small children any longer and don’t require the careful protection of children.”
“I don’t believe you. You never spoke of them.”
“Disbelieve at your peril. There are people to carry on my work and my children know who did this to me. They’ve heard the whole story.”
“Good fantasy, Mason.”
“Fantasy? I told each of my children the truth to their faces when they became old enough to understand.”
“Impossible.”
“Really?” Eckhart asked.
“You never left Genomex except for a few hours at a time.”
“There are aspects of my life of which you know nothing, Adam. We all have our secret lives. I’m careful to protect that which is important to me. I could not be part of their lives the way I wanted, but they did not grow up thinking I abandoned them or did not care. They grew up knowing most of the truth, that I was ill and could not be with them, but within the bounds of my life, I’ve been the best father I could manage. They talk to me about most anything you’d expect. They know I love them.”
“Very clever, Mason. I had no idea.”
“You weren’t meant to have any. They are my children. My concern. Nothing that you would understand.”
Shalimar knew Adam well enough to know that his present anger was just barely controlled. If Eckhart pushed just a little more, Adam would strike out. Then she realized that was likely Eckhart’s intention, to avoid a drawn-out death by infection.
“Mason, how long do you think you can last with your arm exposed?”
“A matter of days, depending upon the virulence of the organisms introduced.”
“It won’t be pretty,” Adam said.
“The very same end awaits all your ‘mistakes’. Why did you make so many of them? Was there a competition between you and Breedlove? What are you planning on telling your ‘children’ when they start dying off? Tell them that you meant well, but things just did not go as hoped? And what are you going to tell their children? I could understand creating a handful of these tragic lives, but thousands, then to run away when the time came to clean up the mess? That’s criminal.”
“And what do you call what you’ve been doing the last few years?”
“Highly unpleasant, but necessary dirty work. This is not the life I planned to live, but it is a necessary one.”
“You enjoyed it,” Adam said.
“No. For you, this may have been entertaining, amusing, fodder for your curiosity, but for me it’s a nightmare from which I never waken, trying to stop the plague you’ve unleashed.”
“What you need is an inoculation.” Adam grabbed Shalimar’s wrist, and dragged her bare arm against the length of Eckhart’s right arm, quickly, before Shalimar could react.
“Ow! Adam!” Shalimar’s wrist and arm hurt, and she was not pleased with being forced to touch Eckhart, who appeared even less pleased about being touched.
“There! Now we won’t waste time waiting for just the right microorganisms to waft through the air to you! Staphylococcus aureus should do just fine.” Adam looked pleased.
“I think you missed your proper time in history, Adam. Your sensibilities are medieval.”
Adam smiled. “That’s enough for now. I’m going to give it some time…for growth. Shalimar, I would wash that arm thoroughly…just in case.”
Adam strolled from the exam room, Shalimar a few paces behind him. As she reached the door, she paused until it closed behind him. She turned and looked back towards Eckhart, then turned off the light.
“Try to rest,” she whispered.
Eckhart was exhausted by his confrontation with Adam. He was grateful for the silence and dark, but was made more aware of how hungry he was. He closed his eyes and slipped into troubled sleep, plagued with disturbing dreams.
He had no idea how much time had elapsed when he awoke to the sound of light footsteps on the hard floor. In the dim light, he was certain only that his visitor was not Adam.
Shalimar turned on a bench light, and turned to see Eckhart watching her warily.
“Is Adam sending in the second wave of tormentors?”
“Adam didn’t send me. I’m not sure what you can or cannot eat or drink, so I just brought you some orange juice.”
“That’s safe enough. Why are you doing this? I’m puzzled, Miss Fox.”
“I don’t approve of the way Adam’s treating you. I refused to have anything to do with the gang he contracted with to capture you.” Shalimar released Eckhart’s right arm, and handed him the tumbler of orange juice, which he drained.
“Thank you.”
“Do you want another?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“What else can I bring you? What kind of food?”
“Very simple foods. My digestive enzymes are limited. My usual diet is almost pre-digested. My gut flora cannot handle complex foods. Adam doesn’t know you’re doing this, does he?”
Shalimar shook her head.
“Be careful. You do not want to be on the receiving end of his wrath.”
“I’m going to leave your left arm clamped down. I won’t be long.”
Shalimar returned with more juice, simple sugar cookies, and potato soup. She retrieved a bottle of vitamins from a bathrobe pocket. “I take these myself. You look so suspicious.”
“I have a suspicious nature. Life taught me that. Frequently, it proves useful. I’m not ungrateful. Ingrained attitudes are difficult to change.”
“I think all the food here is okay.”
“Too late now if it isn’t. Thank you, again.” Eckhart managed a weak smile to try and convince Shalimar of his gratitude.
“I went and talked to a lot of my friends who used to be in the underground. Only the ones who have committed crimes have heard from the GSA. Like you said.”
“I concern myself only with the troublemakers.”
“That’s why Emma and Jesse joined you, isn’t it?” Shalimar asked.
“That, and to be together without Adam’s interference. They were going to leave Mutant X sometime soon. I simply provided them with a solid reason for leaving when they did.”
“Adam is not pleased with their engagement.”
“That really is not his business,” Eckhart said softly. “Adam always did have difficulties with behavioral boundaries.”
“Adam likes to think of us as his children, and the reminders that we are not, well, he does not care for those reminders.”
“It could be simpler than that. He might think of you and Emma as his private preserve. Adam’s ego knows few limits. What he does not know, he makes up. When he does not find the past convenient or useful any longer, he changes his memories.”
“What are your kid’s names?” she asked.
“The oldest, my son Grey, is nearly done with college; the twins, Michelle and Deirdre, are a few years younger.”
“Twins?”
“As I once was. Marc drowned when we were eight.”
“To hear Adam tell it, one day you showed up at Genomex hell-bent to make him miserable with very little else in your thoughts. Adam never said anything about your having a family.”
“He has reasons for not wanting to remember, or for remembering things differently.”
“Adam has a lot of secrets he hasn’t told me, doesn’t he?”
Eckhart nodded. “Be wary. His affections turn on a knife-edge, and perceived slights or disloyalties are not forgiven or forgotten. Genomex was once full of people who used to work for Adam but transferred out at first opportunity. I’m sure he describes his departure from Genomex in terms of heroic escape, but the truth is that by that time his attitude towards the staff had become hostile and combative, and he had nearly killed me. Breedlove was sliding down into a romanticized memory of his own past, and was the only one left who would try to work with him. Even Paul Breedlove was becoming fed up with him because his conduct was becoming more disruptive. Meetings with Breedlove were increasingly acrimonious as they took on more and more of a disciplinary nature.”
“How would you know?”
“Some of Adam’s sins were security matters. Using the onsite computer network to anonymous, slanderous email, for example.”
“Adam?”
“For Adam, all slights are personal and never forgotten.”
Eckhart drank some juice, and then continued. “Adam was not pulling his own weight, and the early indicators that the mutants were all likely to suffer from compromised immune systems were overwhelming. There was a technical meeting of the leading researchers who presented proofs of these outcomes to Breedlove and Adam. Breedlove had the humanity to accept the data as legitimate. He suffered an emotional breakdown soon afterward and was never himself again. His life’s work had been discredited and damned for the perversion of science that it was. Adam became loud and angry and by day’s end had quit Genomex.”
“Adam says he quit when he found out what was really being done with his work.”
“That is absurd, and I will tell you why. Adam spent nearly twenty years at Genomex. He used to be called the ‘Prince of Genomex’, because it was obvious Breedlove was grooming him as his successor. No one works at that level in a technical field without knowing exactly what the overall project involves. Adam was not only designing experiments, but coordinating the work of hundreds of other people. He wasn’t off in a corner on the periphery of research; he was directing it.”
“You’re saying he’s lying?” Shalimar asked.
“He is not telling the truth of those days. Possibly he’s told himself the lie so many times he now believes it. Even if Breedlove managed to dupe Adam for twenty years, given Adam’s position, wasn’t it his responsibility to know and understand the work being done by people and labs working under his authority?”
“You’re making a lot of sense. I almost wish you weren’t.”
“Does it make much sense that I, in various security capacities, knew better than Adam what Genomex was doing? And that I was directing it? No. But Adam always knew.”
Shalimar‘s disappointment was obvious.
“I’m sorry, Miss Fox, but that is the truth of it. Consider yourself fortunate; when I discovered the truth of his character, he left me like this.”
“Adam says that was an accident.”
“Adam says a lot of things that just aren’t so. I’ll be ill if I eat any more, Miss Fox. Thank you.”
“Do you want anything else?”
“My medical team?”
“I can’t help you with that.” She smiled slightly, picking up on Eckhart’s subtle sense of playfulness.
“I’m puzzled by your kindness, but I am grateful for it.”
“Some things just aren’t right. I’ll do what I can for you.”
Eckhart nodded towards his arm. “What Adam does not know is that I have recovered some ability to resist disease, but I remain far from normal. I will take a long time to kill this way.”
Deep underground, Eckhart lost all sense of ‘day’ and ‘night’. The next time someone disturbed his sleep, the intruder was Adam, who looked well-rested, perverse and malevolent. Eckhart had seen that look before and knew it implied nothing good.
“Since Shalimar made that remark about the way your beginning to smell, I’ve set up a cage for you to better control the odor.”
“How thoughtful.” Few things annoyed Adam more than individuals he could not impress or manipulate.
“I’m not doing it for you, Mason. I’m doing it for Shalimar. She has such finely tuned senses.” Adam paused, inspecting Eckhart, searching for evidence of infection and decay, but finding none. “You look to be in surprisingly good condition. You should be showing signs of your exposure to bacteria, viruses and all the other microscopic life and near-life forms. Could it be that some of your well-paid research teams has found a partial cure for you? You must have a number of people dedicated to that task.”
Eckhart took his time to respond, studying Adam’s eyes and wondering if they contained rods and cones or manufactured light and color sensors. He could not be sure if Adam’s comment indicated an expectation of obvious deterioration, or if Adam was being cruel.
“No.”
“No? Well, too bad.” Adam shrugged, as if dealing with a trivial matter. “Brennan will escort you to your new quarters.”
Having no means of defense and no possible escape, Eckhart was not about to argue with a street thug already motivated to fling him into a wall hard enough to kill him. Brennan came to stand over him, grinning a dull-witted smile. He was enjoying having the advantage over Eckhart, who allowed himself to be herded off to the room Adam described as a “cage”.
Brennan opened the door, stepped back and allowed Eckhart to enter, shutting the door without comment.
The room must have served as a guest room, and had its own private bathroom. Eckhart examined it carefully to see if it was overrun with mold, and was relieved to discover that it was not. However, the door locked from the outside. Adam was prepared for all manner of guests.
The room appeared stripped of most furnishings, leaving only a bed, which did have several blankets. Sanctuary, deep in the earth, was damp and chilly.
Late that evening, Shalimar opened the door, and found Eckhart dozing. He woke suddenly, startled at the sound of Shalimar’s footsteps. She carefully closed the door behind her, making no sound, then turning on the overhead lights.
She was wearing a shapeless, full-length pale pink bathrobe.
“It’s just me. I can’t stay long because Adam and Brennan will be back soon. I’ve got something for you. Antibiotics.”
“Where?” Eckhart asked, puzzled.
“Where did I find them? A lot of people don’t complete a course of antibiotics, no matter what their doctor says. I collected these from Emma’s and Jesse’s rooms.” Shalimar handed him the bottles.
“Thank you, Ms Fox.” He read the labels. After more than a decade of treatment, Eckhart knew the efficacies and drawbacks of most antibiotics as well as most physicians. “I don’t know how effective they will prove, but they cannot do any harm.”
“Are you hungry?” Shalimar asked.
“Not yet. What are Adam and Brennan doing?” He wasn’t sure she would tell him, but Adam had left him undisturbed for a long while and he was curious to know what absorbed Adam’s attentions.
“Working on the Double Helix. Adam has to do everything now with Jesse gone and Brennan isn’t picking things up very quickly. In fact, I think Brennan does not want to learn. It’s too much like honest work for him.”
“Jesse must be missed here. He’s capable, adaptable, and dedicated.”
Shalimar smiled, then realized who she was smiling at, and about whom. “Yeah. Jesse’s a good guy. And a good friend.”
Eckhart swallowed two of the more potent antibiotics. “I’ll find a good hiding place for the balance of these. What is Adam’s mental state?”
“Moody. He’s brooding over something. If he was female, I’d swear he had PMS.”
“I’m probably not dying fast enough for him. Or perhaps moon phases affect the efficiency of his batteries.” Eckhart watched Shalimar’s face to see what she made of his speculation.
Shalimar did not quite understand the last comment, wrinkling her nose in puzzlement.
“Batteries, huh? I’ll sneak back later with some food.”
“Miss Fox, be very careful. Adam is dangerous. I’ve seen him rationalize whatever destructive behavior he commits. He is capable of turning on his friends with no hesitation.”
“I’ll be careful.”
Left alone in his subterranean pen, Eckhart once more reviewed possible paths out of Adam’s control, and again could discern none workable. He was deep underground in the lair of a probably certifiable Adam, who commanded the loyalty and strengths of a pair of mutants. Eckhart assumed he was on his own and anticipated no help from anyone outside. Shalimar’s unexpected assistance would extend his life several days, but he could feel strength leaving him, and worse, driving off his despair was becoming difficult. He knew that would make him less able to perceive an opportunity should one arise. A long time ago he had read that “fear is the mind-killer”, and surely that was true.
Shalimar padded silently back to the kitchen, intending to stuff her bathrobe pockets with food for Eckhart. Brennan kept the place stocked with snacks and treats. Shalimar suspected him of keeping a secret stash of Little Debbies and Moon Pies in his room for ‘emergencies’.
She startled at the sound of Adam and Brennan returning from the Double Helix, voices loud and angry. They were doing a lot of arguing lately which drove Adam to antacids and Brennan to all but choke himself on Twinkies. Brennan’s excesses were beginning to show, but Shalimar hadn’t thought of a way to gently tell him that he was on the threshold of going to fat.
“Brennan, you have to learn to pay careful attention to any maintenance done on the Double Helix. If something goes wrong at ten, thirty, fifty thousand feet up, you can’t just limp to the side of the road the way you can in your old Camaros. The ocean of air is unforgiving and the Double Helix is all but impossible to glide to dead-stick landing. Without power, she’ll fall to the earth with the grace of a rock.”
Shalimar had heard this particular rant before from Adam. Some variation of it emerged following most every session when he attempted to teach Brennan anything technical. Brennan always responded the same way, sometimes using the same words, swearing he was trying the best he could, and that Adam should give him points for making the effort.
Adam would answer with, “Effort is nice, but doing a task properly and well is the only thing that matters.”
“Like us, Adam?” Brennan would say, smirking, and move on to Little Debbie Nutty Bars while Adam fumed. How convenient if would be for Adam it would be if Brennan would just become all that Jesse had been. The desire was unrealistic and from what Shalimar could tell from the lack of improvement in work or attitude, Brennan was unlikely to replace Jesse in a technical capacity.
“Adam, I don’t have the patience to listen to this again. I’ve heard it before. I’m trying the hardest I can. Just give me time.”
Brennan grabbed a box of Twinkies and stalked off to his room, where he would be safe with his martial arts magazines and his pornography.
Shalimar waited until she heard Brennan’s door close. “Adam, I don’t think Brennan is going to be your new technical guy. I don’t think he wants to learn. If he wanted to be a technical guy, he would have learned that kind of thing and not become a thief. I think you’re going to have to start recruiting on the outside again.”
“That approach failed three times already, Shalimar.” Adam was smiling his I-know-more-than-you-do smile that made Shalimar uncomfortable.
“Try again. Brennan’s not going to become Jesse, as useful as that might be.”
“Damn Jesse! I let him work on all kinds of upstream tech here, and even paid him an allowance! What was he thinking?” Adam pounded his right fist into the nearest counter top.
“I have a pretty good idea, Adam. ‘What kind of future do I have with Mutant X if I do all the support work, get none of the credit, and am taken for granted, while a guy with limited smarts gets all the attention?’”
“This is about Brennan? Did Jesse say that to you?”
“He didn’t need to. You’ve assumed good, reliable Jesse would always be there to take care of the difficult technical tasks, no matter how you treated him otherwise.”
“That was his job, Shalimar! What was he supposed to be doing?”
“And what is Brennan’s job? Consume his weight in Little Debbies daily?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Adam asked.
“All Brennan’s good for is to be what he’s always been, a thug. Now he’s Adam’s thug. But you favored him over Jesse.”
“Jesse’s just jealous. He has to get over those unresolved issues with his father. He wanted me to be his father and I’m not.”
“Adam, I don’t know what else to tell you. You drove Jesse away.”
“Jesse and Emma sold out to Eckhart for money!”
“That isn’t true. Jesse could match or top what Genomex is paying him. It’s not about money; it’s about being valued, and having the chance to become even more skilled. It’s about being treated like an adult instead of a kid.”
“You think Eckhart values Jesse? Jesse’s just a tool to him. Eckhart uses everyone. That’s always been his style.”
“Adam, I think you’re wrong about that.”
“Shalimar, if conditions here are so miserable and unpleasant and I am so unfair, treating you like children, I don’t see you or Brennan making any moves to leave.”
“Where would I go? I have nowhere to go. Brennan has only one place to go: prison. For a long time. Where else but here is he going to be kept in unlimited snack foods, get respect for doing what he’s always done, and be secure from the police? How many police departments are still looking for him? Most of the local ones, right?”
Shalimar was nearly in tears. She had not realized until this moment that she stayed with Adam not because she believed in what he was doing, but from lack of any other choices. Now, she felt trapped.
“Maybe you should leave, Shalimar. Maybe your time of usefulness to Mutant X is at an end. You seem to be getting a little ouchy on those knees, anyway. I don’t know what you’d do out there, though; you’re not exactly trained to do anything. Maybe you’d be good in zoos. I’m not sure I could give you a good recommendation, however.”
“Adam!” Shalimar had seen Adam this mean and nasty once before, when ‘poisoned’ by a character-altering toxin. Now, she questioned if the toxin had changed him, or merely removed some self-control. His eyes looked flat and emotionless, curiously non-human.
“I don’t want to be taken for granted, either!” She turned and bounded off to her room, saddened and hurt. Nothing Adam had said surprised her. That he said all of these things at once was different, and she was left to conclude she was foolish not to have put it all together a long time ago.
She hoped Adam would apologize later, but he never did.
Shalimar couldn’t sleep. Between feeling suddenly trapped with a hostile Adam and a food-focused felon, and realizing what Eckhart said was true, Shalimar was deeply unhappy.
She understood that she needed to change her circumstances, that she needed to leave Sanctuary and start her life over somewhere on the outside. Perhaps Jesse and Emma would help her, if she could convince them she had nothing to do with the bloodbath at Genomex. But how could she do that? They both knew how deeply loyal she was to Adam.
In the old days, she talked to Jesse and Emma for hours at all hours. Their phone number was no secret but was openly listed in a public directory.
Shalimar wished she could pick up the phone and talk to either of them now. Calling that number from any phone in Sanctuary would trigger an alert to Adam, even setting off an alarm in the middle of the night to wake him. In moments, he would know who she was calling, and a few moments after that, he would be pounding on her door, screaming a demand that she explain herself, or worse. If she didn’t immediately release the door to open, Adam would key in his codes to override her settings. Adam would invade her lair, her safe place, and getting rid of him to restore peace and quiet could take hours.
As long as he believed he could influence an outcome, Mason Eckhart never gave up on anything. Looking about his private pen, he realized Adam might just have handed him a chance of survival by moving him here.
Between Shalimar’s generous feeding and fortuitous find of antibiotics, he did not feel well or strong, but he was no longer losing ground. Perhaps some restored functionality of his own immune system was involved. Perhaps improvement continued following his release from stasis. He started to hope that he could will his way back and regain lost strength. Wouldn’t Adam be surprised?
Inactivity was now as much Eckhart’s enemy as Adam. Still weak, he willed himself to rise from the bed to begin walking about the perimeter of the room. Resting as needed, he guessed he could cover the equivalent of several miles a day. Adam had once tried to kill Eckhart in a clumsily staged industrial accident and discovered his former friend was hard to kill. Only heroic medical treatments, a strict regime of blood transfusions, and Eckhart’s fierce personal will to survive and prevail kept him alive after Incident X, and he remained a very difficult man to kill, as Adam was about to re-learn.
Emma and Jesse drove up the access road to the graveled parking area as they had done many times before, but this time driving a dark blue Genomex issue sedan. The area was full of old Camaros, many more than before. They parked as they always had, and ascended a poorly marked trail to a well-hidden steel door.
Emma looked back at the collection of ancient Camaros.
“Do you think it’s possible they’re breeding back here, making rust-babies when nobody’s watching?”
Jesse laughed. “Maybe the word is out that this is a dumping ground for useless Camaros.”
Emma turned back to the door. “Speak ‘friend’, and enter,” Emma said.
“If only it could be so easy,” Jesse reflected. “But, this is Adam. Adam can be very lazy.” With that, Jesse unhesitatingly punched in the old access code, which released the door.
“And Adam rants about Mason being arrogant,” Emma whispered.
“Unless Adam’s setting a trap,” Jesse replied. “Adam probably has no idea how difficult an opponent I can be.”
Emma giggled softly. “Brennan probably couldn’t remember new codes. Adam probably had to re-enter the old one so Brennan wouldn’t be out here all night sleeping in one of his ratty old Camaros with nothing to eat unless he as carrying some Moon Pies.”
They entered Sanctuary and were met by deep silence.
“Nobody’s home,” Jesse said. “Ah, an antacid run for Adam, a snack and treat run for Brennan, and a relief from living underground run for Shalimar. Brennan was looking chunkier when I saw him. Wait here. I’ll make sure the Double Helix is gone. Then we’ll find Mason.”
Jesse found the hangar bay empty. “Yes, they’re making a Twinkie run.”
Since Eckhart was not being held in the examination room, they guessed correctly he must be in one of two sparsely equipped guest rooms. Emma tried one door while Jesse tried the other.
Emma found Mason pacing the far wall of the room, a dark blue blanket draped over his shoulders. He stopped, turned, and faced her, not quite believing what he saw.
“Emma.”
“I’ve come to save you again. You look surprised.”
“I am.”
Emma smiled. “Jesse and I could not leave you here with Adam. Jesse’s here, too.”
“I did not expect anyone to give a damn. Anyone who ever cared about me is gone.”
“Not so. Jesse and I do. Everyone seems to be gone.”
Jesse entered the room, and whispered, “Not anymore. The Double Helix just came back. I could hear the engines out in the hallway. Let’s not get trapped in here.”
“You’re ready to confront Shalimar and Brennan?” Emma asked.
“We came here knowing that was likely.”
“I’m not going to be much help to you,” Eckhart said. He uncovered his exposed arm. “Adam’s been busy with me. I’m going to require medical attention.”
Jesse smirked. “I’m relieved we won’t have to carry you out. We didn’t know what kind of shape you’d be in. If we hurry, we might still beat them out of here.”
Moving quickly as they were able without making much sound, they made it as far as the Meditation Pool before they were discovered.
Brennan lumbered in from the hangar bay, chewing on the remainder of a Little Debbie Zebra Cake. For long moments, he started at Emma, Jesse, and Eckhart in dull surprise, as if unable to process the sight. Finally, he was able to frame a comment.
“Well, look what’s here. Adam, you won’t believe what I’ve found. Better hurry.”
“Brennan, don’t mess with us. We’re going to walk out of here with Mason, and not make any trouble for you if you won’t make trouble for us,” Jesse challenged. We didn’t come here for a fight, but we’re prepared to deliver one.”
“Hah. Jesse, you’re crazy. Eckhart’s not leaving alive. Adam’s wanted to get his hands on Mr Creepy for years and he won’t just give him up.” Brennan began generating a swirl of sparks between his hands, a gloating smile on his face. “Looks like you and Emma won’t, either. Not that you deserve to leave alive.”
Jesse shook his head, wondering how he had ever counted this selfish, shallow, stupid soul a friend. “Brennan, you’ll never be more than a common street thug. And you’ll keep chasing kid-dreams of hot cars and great babes. You’ll always be a kid, despite your years and no matter how silly the pose looks. You will never be any kind of man.”
Brennan laughed nervously as Adam and Shalimar arrived behind him.
Adam stepped in front of them both. “And you, Jesse? What about you? How do you live with yourself? You’re a traitor to your own kind. You’ve sold yourself and them for money, sold them out to Mason Eckhart.”
There had been a time when Jesse would not have argued with Adam, but he did now, without hesitation and with conviction. “I haven’t betrayed anyone. What I have done is help a lot of people leave behind a life on the run and live productive lives in the larger society.”
Adam was stunned at Jesse’s speaking against him. He was expecting the compliant Jesse of the past, who would go along with everything Adam said and did, who followed Adam’s commands without question or doubt.
“If anyone is a traitor, Adam, it’s you,” Eckhart said. “You’ve already destroyed lives by the thousand. But to this day, you gloss over your perversion of science and feign ignorance of what hundreds of researchers did under your personal direction. By unleashing this genetic plague, you’ve betrayed the whole of humanity, sowing the seeds of mankind’s extinction.”
“Someone will find a way to fix the flaws,” Adam answered. “Advances will be made. Science always goes forward.”
“Perhaps. Perhaps not,” Eckhart said. “There are no certainties. Even one generation of human pain is too much pain, just because you lacked the wisdom to stop when you knew the oldest mutants were doomed.”
“In the meantime, all the mutants you created have to face the certainty of degeneration and early death.” Jesse had never been so angry with Adam.
“We have to live with the reality that our children would be just as flawed as we are,” Emma said. “Adam, that means I won’t have children because unlike you, I’m not going to create human pain.”
“You’re both so ungrateful. What would you have done without me? I gave you tremendous powers.” Adam looked bewildered.
“Lived a normal life. If I could give my powers up in return for a normal life, I would do it,” Emma said. “They are no gift. They are a curse. I can use them to positive purposes, but they limit who I can become.”
“You’ve got them well-trained, Mason. How did you do it?” Adam smirked.
“All I had to do was tell them truth. You tend to be sparing of the truth, Adam. Can you contradict the facts of their condition? Can you offer any hope other than the vague promise of someone someday somehow will fix the problem? No, you cannot.”
“Adam, Mason’s not controlling us. We are acting as we choose.”
“You’re a fool, Jesse. You would never do these things on your own.”
“We’ve never undergone any training or conditioning from the GSA or anyone else. Emma and I are not wearing governor or any other control device. Our thoughts and our actions are our own. Now, we’re going to leave.” Saying that, Jesse took a step forward towards the exit.
“Brennan…zorch him,” Adam commanded.
Brennan smirked, and did as he was told, forming a lightning bolt, then taking easy aim at Jesse.
Neither Adam nor Brennan noticed Shalimar as she dropped down into a crouch, and sprang forward to topple Brennan to the floor before he could harm Jesse.
Brennan was caught off guard, not anticipating an attack from behind. He tumbled out of the fall, and quickly regained his footing, turning in anger to Shalimar.
She landed awkwardly, and hard, dragging herself away from Brennan, clasping her left knee with both hands, face distorted by pain.
Brennan was oblivious to her discomfort. “Shalimar, have you gone crazy?”
“No. You have. You fool,” she shouted in her rage and pain, her eyes flashing feral. “That’s Jesse.”
“Doesn’t matter. Jesse and Emma have gone over to the other side. They’re enemies. Jesse’s not one of us anymore.”
“Just let them leave! We can’t hurt Emma and Jesse. They’re our friends.”
“Were our friends, Shalimar. Brennan’s right, Shalimar,” Adam said. “They’ll destroy us if we don’t destroy them first.”
“You blight every life you touch, Adam,” Eckhart said. “Your capacity for destruction is unbounded.
“Brennan, finish what you started, but start with that one,” Adam said, pointing to Eckhart with a flourish.
Brennan was quicker in forming a lightning bolt this time, taking aim at Eckhart and getting off the opening burst before Emma could cloud his mind and stop him short of a full delivery.
Eckhart was thrown down and back to his knees by the partial release, slightly dazed and disoriented, but aware.
Emma turned and ran to him, kneeling. “Mason?”
Adam grinned unpleasantly, flashing an angry smile. “Mason, is it? How touching. Emma, you are an ungrateful wretch. When I took you in, you were a confused, frightened little girl. I tried hard to make something better of you, to raise you up above the level of the ordinary and banal. Now, look at you, wasting your time and your gifts on that weak, pathetic, pitiful specimen of humanity.”
He’s jealous, Emma realized. He wishes he could believe I would care as much about him.
“Mason, can you stand on your own?”
“Yes. Emma, don’t turn your back on Mulwray.”
Emma stood up and faced her former friend and mentor. “And now I’m a thinking, independent adult woman, and you really don’t like that, do you? You cared for us only when we were trusting children who did not question the words or intentions of the Great Adam, the Prince of Genomex, who had all the answers!”
Adam’s face flushed with embarrassment and rage. “Brennan, zorch them all!”
Brennan would require more time to form a lightning bolt his time.
Eckhart knew this; he stood up, turning to Emma, “Emma, if you could control Mulwray, Jesse and I…”
Emma did not wait for him to finish. Making the most of the increased lag time between charge beginning to full-charge release. She filled Brennan’s mind with overwhelming fear and panic, then temporarily blinded him. The results were better than she hoped.
Brennan’s response was to whine and thrash in rage, striking out wildly.
Emma fine-tuned her assault, convincing Brennan he was in fact confined, reducing him to whimpering, howling confusion, inside a rigid tube two feet in diameter.
“Emma cannot maintain this degree of control for long,” Jesse said.
“I know,” Eckhart replied. “We need to neutralize him in the water. Jesse, take one arm, and I’ll take the other. He’s going for a swim.”
Together they grasped the unseeing, confused, panicky Brennan, and dragged him to edge of the Meditation Pool.
Eckhart turned to Brennan, looking into his dull, unseeing eyes. “Mulwray, you’re nothing but a savage bully.”
Brennan hit the water, generating a geyser of sparks. Drained and weakened, he sat dazed in the water, still blinded and panicked to the point of inaction.
Eckhart turned back to Adam, who still blocked their passage. “Well, Adam, have you had enough? Can we simply leave?”
“This is different Mason, you getting physically into things. You usually are so careful to protect yourself.”
“I’ve nothing left to protect. The integrity of my biopolymer is already compromised. Your pet felon will need time to recharge before he can threaten anyone. It’s time to step aside and let us through.”
Shalimar was still huddled in pain.
Eckhart turned to her. “Ms Fox? Can we do anything for you?” He said no more, not wanting to betray her.
Shalimar’s voice was small and strained. “Yes. Jesse. Emma. Please don’t leave me here.”
“Do you want to go with us?” Jesse asked.
“Oh, yes. I can’t stay here. And I don’t think I can stand on my own, either.”
Adam’s eyes looked crazy now. “Another ungrateful traitor! I should have gotten rid of you months ago when I knew your knees were going.”
“You knew I was coming apart and you kept putting me at risk?” Shalimar asked, still not wanting to believe the worst of Adam.
“Of course. That’s your purpose.”
Jesse strode toward Shalimar. Adam turned from Eckhart and lunged at Jesse’s back. Eckhart moved swiftly to trip Adam, collapsing him into the floor face down.
“That’s enough, Adam,” Emma warned. “If you move from where you are, if you so much as twitch, I’ll leave you blind and helpless for hours.”
Shalimar struggled to stand, bracing herself against Jesse, standing on one foot.
“Emma, I need some help here,” Jesse said.
“The bad knee is just too painful to bear any weight. I can hop, but that’s all.”
Random sparks burst around Brennan as he sat stuporously in the water, looking up dully at the spectacle of Adam’s empire falling apart.
Jesse, Emma, and Shalimar hobbled over to stand above Adam.
Jesse stood over his former mentor. “Adam, if I ever find out that you’ve got another ‘team’ to feed your ego, I swear I’ll find you no matter where you are, and I’ll stop you.” They continued on to the door.
Eckhart stood just short of Adam’s head. “And I’ll back him with whatever he needs. Adam, your life is not over. Turn your considerable talents to some positive endeavor, and try to make amends for the horrific mess you’ve made of your life and so many others. Goodbye, Adam.”
Mason Eckhart turned and walked swiftly to the door, not troubling to take a last glance back at the fallen Adam and the still-sparking Brennan. He stepped out through the door to the outside, and was relieved to be free and breathing the clean air of early evening.
Ahead of him, Emma and Jesse were helping Shalimar into the car.
“Where do we take her?” Jesse asked.
“Genomex. There would be too many questions asked at any other hospital. I need prompt attention as well. Both of you need to know Ms Fox had nothing to do with the savages who raided Genomex, and that she helped me survive in there. Ms Fox, I promise you will receive the best care.”
“As your prisoner?”
“As my guest. What you do when you knee is repaired and function is your business.”
“We really should contact local police and let them capture Brennan,” Jesse said.
“Too dangerous,” Eckhart replied.
“What do you think Adam will do, Mason?” Emma asked.
“Exactly what we warned him against. He’ll form a new team, probably a more dangerous team since his potential recruits are now criminals or insane. Adam could make me very miserable, although I suspect when I ask for a broader mandate to use force against him, that request will be granted.”
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Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
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