CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

WITH UNNECESSARY MENACE, all three hybrids crowded into the small space. They closed the door behind them without physically touching it. One of the three stepped forward. In a flash of bright light and hot wind a voice drilled into my head.

Not fancy new laboratory, Little Buck, but original one. Lab where miracle is beginning over one hundred years ago. I started work. Now is time for you to lead and Oleg follow. The twitchers remained motionless.

I nodded my head. I’d said I would do anything, and I’d meant it. I would follow this out to its end, whatever that meant, if it could save Evie. I stopped, my hand on the spine of What is to be Done? God, if you exist, just don’t ever let Evie find out how far I went.

I tipped the book until the shelf clicked. Standing back, I waited for the twitchers to do the rest. They refused to oblige. With a grunt I tugged the heavy door open using both hands. “After all we’ve been through?” I shrugged and started down the narrow spiral of stairs.

The mood last time I’d descended the stairs couldn’t have been more different. Evie and I together, embracing the adventure of the unknown. Now I took each step as a gesture of acquiescence. The lab below held nothing remotely close to adventure anymore, only regret, shame and a fear I’d never see Evie again.

Yes, now you know taste of what Oleg endure many years. The voice responded to my thoughts.

Silently, I responded back. Is that what you want? For me to suffer? To fulfill some screwed-up sense of revenge?

What Little Buck suffer, Oleg suffer. We suffer so other men to take what do not rightfully own. But suffering makes us strong, stronger than oppressors. Soon, Little Buck, power return to rightful place.

I continued down the nearly pitch black stairs with one hand on each wall, helpless to silence the lecturing voice.

Little Buck, human image is to be fundamentally flawed. If we are saving universe, evolution must be given hand.

Gratefully, my background mind resurfaced in place of the voice. Never had I been so glad to hear nothing except the chaotic chattering of my own untamable brain. The thrill soon faded, and I assigned the background to the most basic routine I could think of—caloric expenditure versus intake. Maybe I was hungry.

After several more seconds of silence, I reached the bottom of the stairs and staggered blindly into the cavern that had once been Oleg Rodchenko’s secret lab. The twitchers seemed to have no need for light. With total confidence in their surroundings, they formed a triangle, their shoulders nearly touching me. There we stood.

After a few minutes, the silence became a blessing. I thought I could fall asleep on my feet, maybe truly sleep for the first time since I was a boy. Nothing more could happen to me. Vaguely, my mind wandered to the last words of the voice, of Oleg. I supposed it made sense to think of Oleg, the voice and the red-eyed man as one in the same.

What flaw had he been referring to? Death? Mortality? Was the lost gene now going to lend evolution the hand it needed?

Little Buck ask right question. Form wrong answer. Death is mercy for weak.

The twitchers retreated, taking several steps back.

Come. I share with you story, allowing you to create own ending. Now walk.

I shook my head, speaking out loud. “I can’t see.”

Man need not eyes to see. Eyes only one means to gather sensory data of outside world. Oleg show better means.

“Fine.” I started across the echoing space at a casual pace.

Faster.

I started to jog.

Faster. Run! Run, Little Buck, where Oleg not to follow.

I ran, my heart pounding, eyes hungrily stretching into the blackness for a single mote of light. I kicked something solid with my shin and stumbled, blurring the black in front of me with waving hands.

Is Oleg of red-eyes right behind you? Run!

Catching myself, I spun into an open space, the sound of my own breathing mapping the emptiness around me.

Run!

Like a scared boy, a boy left alone in the desert of the Arabian Oil Zone, the sole survivor of his father’s failed expedition for oil, I scampered through the pitch-black cavern. I side-stepped tipped tables and jumped mangled shelves. I searched for an exit, for a crevice to hide in, any way to escape the voice.

But there was nothing, nothing except the abandoned ruins of my predecessor’s laboratory. I spun, taking in the whole of the cavern. Seeing it, somehow without sight.

Now Little Buck see truly. Is gift from Oleg of red eyes. We are not like other men, men with small minds gobbled up by avarice and superstition. Oppressors to take life from men who struggle to live. False gods to satisfy human hunger they are becoming. Those men speak of Oleg as bogeyman, as tormented demon of man bent on petty revenge. Is lies created to justify own evil.

Silence extended in every direction. I took the bait. Why then? If not revenge, why have you come?

Ah, Oleg almost forgot. Is time for story, story of little boy and boy’s father lost in desert. I think you will find certain similarities, no? Come. Follow tracks at feet.

I looked down. Two steel rails extended the length of the lab. I could think of no productive means to resist a voice in one’s own head, so I didn’t try.

Little boy’s father show potential for greatness. He saw injustice of limited fuel, but fail to understand fundamental flaw of humanity. Unwilling, he became partner to further corruption. Worse still, little boy’s father fail first responsibility to little boy. Family is everything. Is no humanity to save without not saving family first. Thus father commit unforgivable sin, please you to be pardoning religious expression. Greatness must never come at family expense.

I interrupted. And what of your family, Oleg of red eyes? If you don’t mind me asking.

Is important question. No, is critical. Here. This place where Oleg first given order to work. Oleg is promised, do good work and see family again.

The voice came thick in my head, as if breathing through gelatin.

And for time, I saw my Tatiana again, together as family.

The connection broke. I stood in front of a solid rock wall, swallowing the tracks at the base of it. Seconds later, the voice returned.

Now Uncle Oleg and Little Buck are family.

No. Evie is my only family. If you were really a father you would know that.

Student well not to test teacher.

Look, Rodchenko, I don’t care why you or any of the others want my research. Understand one thing. I want Evie safe. You do that, and you’ll get my research. Hell, I’ll throw in myself for free.

Very well, down to business. Your daughter is already returned home. Is totally unharmed.

I need proof. Show her to me.

Show me lost gene and Oleg allow video connection with daughter at home from main computer terminal. As long as security is not triggered, such call is possible, no?

You know good and well it is.

Until job complete, you come with us. Barring complications, daughter is safe from Oleg forever. Now both know terms of arrangement.

How do I know you’re telling the truth?

Little Buck is still alive. Daughter is still alive. Oleg is man of honor, unlike those who pull strings. You have choice. I have already decided. As boy you were not ready to embrace full potential. Only see Oleg of red eyes as nightmare, as demon of desert. Uncle Oleg save you from desert sun and wind. I show little Buck how to survive in own mind.

My mind is a curse. Flashes of desert sun and wind split my consciousness, days and nights in a cave. No. Stop it. My hands spasmed, my neck jerking.

Is not curse. Is truth. Is power to live in truth. Pain is lie. Death is greatest lie, created only as means to separate weak from strong. You, Little Buck, are strong! Now use horns and open wall!”

Floating in the air, a mirage appeared in the vibrating particles surrounding me—a metal bull’s head. Its two long horns shot up and out from the wall. Drowning in my subconscious, I yanked down on both at once. The horns gave way much the same as the spine of the book in my office. Gears above me screamed with movement and rust. Oleg’s voice rose over the noise, joined by a rushing sound like that of an approaching storm.

Remember, pain is lie! Death is lie!

A torrent of flaming tongues burst from the ceiling as the stone wall withdrew. My skin became synonymous with burning—coated with tar and lit on fire. The stench and smoke choked all efforts to scream. Nothing of my consciousness existed but pain.

Yet rushing through, around and over everything, the background current of my brain remained. The static of my subconscious bore my mind upon an ocean of physical suffering, like oil in water, keeping me from drowning. Routine after routine, it intercepted the flame and pushed back the tar.

Until a thunderclap emanated from within me, disintegrating the barriers I’d maintained between my two minds. In a storm of oil and water, I surged forward, gripping the set of horns. Yanking the left then the right and replacing them in reverse order, the fountain of flame ceased. The cavern fell quiet, the only sound my heavy breathing. Naked and caked in soot, my chest heaved as my lungs struggled to filter breathable air from the smoke.

The smoke and soot were real. The fire had been real, not a trick of the mind. But my skin—I ran my hands across my chest and up the sides of my legs. I had felt it burning, smelled the stink of melting flesh.

Now Little Buck is grown man. Come. For sake of daughter, for sake of common good, sometime is necessary to bite hand that feeds us.