Holy Gothica was a city on the perpetual brink of ruin, conditioned to accept whatever horrors the world hurled at it. Tonight was no different. Somme led the way down the red-lit narrows of Yoshiwara, ignoring the stench of sewage and overpowering perfume. Amadeus kept close to his side, wrapped in his pale coat, though his stature alone attracted unwanted eyes. Amongst the punks and delinquents, they were oddities. Even with his zoot suit and tea shades, Somme’s fashion was dated at best. And yet, he’d see this through.
“What do you think?” Somme tipped his hat at a passing call girl. “Quite a sordid district. Most wouldn’t dare be caught here.”
Amadeus nodded, slowly. “It is rather nostalgic.”
“I’d imagine so,” Somme said, “given Victor’s history with this place.” He glanced back at his accomplice. “How much of him is in there, by the way. And how much is, well, you? Do you take my meaning?”
“More than I’d care to admit,” Amadeus said. “I share bits of memory and feelings, mostly echoes of raw emotion. It’s why I found Victor so revolting. He was a coward riding on the charity and coattails of others. Unworthy of being called a messiah.”
“Sometimes I wonder how much of that is you,” Somme mused, “and how much was Victor’s own self-loathing—”
“Enough,” Amadeus snapped.
“Very well,” Somme pressed on, “I’ll leave it be.”
As they sauntered up High Street, the doctor spied a triple-tiered pagoda on the horizon, wreathed in paper lanterns and garish decor. Amadeus paused dead in his tracks, eyes widening upon the spectacular sight. “This place….”
“Oh?” Somme cocked his head. “That’s the Sunset Pagoda. Excellent dive, from what I’ve been told. Quite popular with the aristocracy.”
Amadeus did not reply, as if lost in thought.
“Are you all right?” asked the doctor.
“No. Let’s keep moving.”
Somme nodded slowly, but Amadeus lingered a moment longer. Colorful slums loomed inward, red and black, stacked atop one another in jerry-rigged patterns. Judging by the tolling bells and smell of gutted fish, they were nearing the wharf—close to their destination.
“I remember now,” Amadeus said. “Xanadu. It’s there, isn’t it?”
Somme nodded. “A thousand feet below, but yes. It indirectly fuels the entire power grid but predates the city and earliest settlers. It’s quite a wonder of the world, really.”
“I’d hate to be you if you’re lying, doctor.”
A chill ran down Somme’s spine. He was well aware of Amadeus’s capabilities and destructive temper. He never forgot when the fiend destroyed his entire lab. Or when he slaughtered an entire hall of senators. Amadeus was a creature without restraints or limitations, save for his own childish tendencies and impulsivity. And yet, what was happening to him? If Somme didn’t know better, he could’ve sworn a tear trickled down Amadeus’s cheek.
I have truly created the ubermensch….
#
In the corporate fortress of Xanadu, Edgar was as secure as his patents. He spent another night lounging in the office. Flames smoldered in the fireplace, fleeting, little more than embers in the making. He skimmed a few ledgers and headlines, contemplating what a dumpster fire the world had become—the Imperium had massacred an entire city, reducing it to a smoldering heap of rubble in the blink of an eye. To think, Edgar started out as a chocolatier, only to wind up an accessory to rebellion. Deep pockets that funded guns and guerrilla fighters.
Treason by any other name….
Edgar stared at the grandfather clock by the wardrobe, debating whether or not to don his smoking jacket. No, it wasn’t time for opium yet. Nevertheless, the weight of the world was as oppressive as ever. Despite his best efforts, Chimay had been annihilated by the Imperium’s weapon of mass destruction. No message in a bottle could change that. Edgar had lied, dodged, and cheated death to get this far. Sooner or later, his luck would run dry, and it would just be him and the firing squad. Until then, he’d do the best he could.
Too late for anything else….
Even if the world was ending, Edgar could live with most of his choices. And for those he couldn’t, well, he’d honestly attempted to redeem himself. One couldn’t do more than that.
His little placards and diplomas hung from the wall in a gallery of achievement. They meant so little now. Adrift in apathy, Edgar opened that silver locket, caressing the photo of Lady Fukuhara, his late beloved. What would she say if she saw him now? Would she even recognize him? Some questions were best left unanswered.
Edgar opened the drawer, uncovering an old revolver. He checked the cylinder—six cartridges. It hadn’t seen action in years. And yet—the shrill ring of a phone shattered the silence. Out of instinct, Edgar snatched the phone, raising it to his ear.
“Hello?” he asked.
“Edgar? It’s Ludwig.”
“Ludwig? Ah!” His heart stuttered. “I mean—I’m grateful to hear your voice. After hearing news of Chimay, I feared the worst. How are you doing?”
Ludwig sighed deeply over the line. “Well, as I can be….”
“Understood,” Edgar took a swig of brandy, “how may I be of service?”
“I’m calling to fill you in on a few details,” Ludwig began. “First off, Victor’s dead—”
Edgar choked and spewed his shot in shock. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me correctly. Suicide, it seems. Amadeus is still at large, and the world stands on the brink of a war of three powers. The Entente is divided on how to respond. Some say we form an alliance with the Imperium. Others say we surrender outright. Lumiere is bogged down in procedures, housing Chimay’s people as refugees and a government in exile.”
Edgar paused, trying to process that Victor, of all people, had taken his own life. After everything they’d been through. Shock numbed his grief, and another shot would quell his spirits. “And the others? Are they alive and well?”
“Charles went off on his own. Beatrice is still with me. We’re desperately trying to regroup. Sufficed to say, things are looking bleak. Therefore….”
“Let me guess,” Edgar sighed deeply, “more guns and steel?”
“Actually, we were wondering if you could join us outright. In Lumiere.”
Edgar cracked a sad laugh. “You know I can’t do that.”
“You’re not the only one clinging to hope,” Ludwig said. “A nation’s been murdered overnight. Millions dead. We can’t afford to be clandestine anymore. Just take some vacation time or something. I,” he paused as if enduring the taste of begging, “I need your help.”
Edgar didn’t speak up. The implications of war washed over him like a tide of boiling oil. It was true, the cause was all he had, and yet, Yoshiwara was his responsibility. If he committed treason against the Imperium openly, then everything he’d work for, the oasis of nighttime pleasures and everyone in it, would be assimilated into the state by force.
“That,” he managed, “may raise some flags.”
“No shit,” Ludwig said, “but you’re a skilled pilot, and the Chimay Air Component is sparse to say the least. Can you sit by and let the free world be destroyed?”
“No, but I can’t sacrifice Yoshiwara either.”
“I see,” Ludwig paused, “what a pity.”
With a hollow click, Edgar was left alone with his guilt. Not all wars were fought on the battlefield. What else was there to do? Cower in his fortress? Try to outlast the end? No, he would die standing. The Imperium was destabilizing in real time, and the Entente was no better off. This enclave of thieves and whores was all he had. It was his home, his responsibility to protect. Or so he told himself. Regardless, the old clock ticked on.
Midnight was around the corner.
#
Somme shivered in the brisk air as the clock struck the Devil’s Hour, as static slithered from the foul corners of the abyss. The World’s Xanadu Exposition was a fairground of red and white spirals. Dead wind cut to the bone, but Amadeus did not so much as shudder. The fiend stood stoic and still as if analyzing the lay of the land.
Something about the image enthralled the doctor. Though the park was closed, Amadeus had no issue slicing through its locked gate. His minions weren’t far behind. He led a small force of legionnaires down the midway and past its minigames. Under the cover of a radio surge, security cameras had been disabled, and the drones shut off, but a lonely light shone from the chocolate factory proper, amongst the smokestacks, implying a presence within. The squad passed the carousels by, not bothering to stop and smell the cotton candy.
Clad in vile baroque armor, the legionnaires were adorned with skulls and grisly trophies from massacres, far from the champions Somme had designed. How the creatures managed to evade detection, the doctor hadn’t a clue but suspected malefic sorcery at work. Such reavers stalked the paths in between trimmed hedges, hell cannons at the ready. Amadeus kept a firm hand on his sword’s hilt, leading the way by Somme’s side.
“This park belongs to Edgar Muncheasun,” Somme said, “a local business magnate and fellow colleague of Doctor Murdoch. We’ve worked on many projects together once upon a time. He’s a deceptively cunning man. Best keep your guard up.”
“I’m sure my soldiers can handle a chocolatier.”
The doctor rolled his eyes. “Overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer—”
The sound of gunfire shattered any and all sense of cover. A legionnaire collapsed to the cobblestones in a splatter of daemonic bile and steel scraps. Somme dove behind the hedges, cowering from searchlights beaming atop the factory, hands over his ears.
“Attention,” said a snide yet shaky voice over a loudspeaker, “you are trespassing on private property. Don’t bother denying it. We have your faces on camera. Leave now, or I will use deadly force—well, additional deadly force.”
As spotlights scanned the midway, Amadeus stood tall and grim. Subtlety was never his strong suit. Somme could only watch in awe and horror as the fiend drew his blade, taking a stance like a knight about to raid a dragon’s keep. Beneath his hood, he gave a murderous smile.
“I know that voice,” he muttered.
Amadeus gave the signal, and his flame troopers spread liquid fire across the courtyards, engulfing the fairground within moments. He trudged through the napalm, unfettered and unafraid, as if the flames were a lover’s kiss on his heels. Bullets meant nothing to his armor, for Somme himself had it forged in the deepest foundries. With inhuman strength, Amadeus grasped the wrought iron gate and tore open a path straight into the factory.
“Don’t just stand there, good doctor,” he called, “you’ve yet to fulfill your end.”
Once inside, Amadeus led the way in a frenzied crusade, cleaving through steel doors and slicing apart security drones, livid with psychotic passion. Somme followed with grave caution, not wanting to anger the fiend or get caught in the crossfire. To think he’d created this monstrosity. This was a creature of malice incarnate. One driven by spite alone.
“Edgar,” Amadeus muttered, as if struck by a sudden memory, “the Baron of Yoshiwara?” He clenched his sword’s hilt. “The one responsible for her death….”
“Amadeus—?”
“I thank you, good doctor. It seems I have a score to settle with your former colleague,” he salivated with rage, “I only hope he squeals as loud as before.”
Somme didn’t understand it then but knew something was horribly wrong with his protege. Amadeus’s facade was beginning to crack and splinter, revealing the lunatic underneath. Here and now, it seemed the fiend’s priorities were no longer with the Machine or even to usher the world’s rebirth but to relish in as much slaughter as possible.
#
Edgar stared out the window in horror. His heart raced as his mind was flooded with a hundred possibilities of who or what did this. The vandals weren’t stormtroopers by the look of it—armor polished and blades sharp. They opened fire into the courtyard, lunging through the windows, one by one, in a raid. And yet, there was something familiar about their motions.
“Edgar,” screamed a familiar voice, “come out and face me!”
The chocolatier reached for his pistol. Judging by the stomping footsteps, soldiers were scaling his facility as he panicked, raising his attractions to the ground. Fear smoldered into rage. With the slam of a big red button, the chocolatier activated a few desperate measures.
“Please insert the clearance code,” said a robotic monotone.
“Jawbreaker,” Edgar said with grim conviction.
Gunfire erupted from his hidden turrets as he gave a satisfied sneer. It paid to have friends in advanced weapons development. Whatever agents the Imperium had sent to kill him would need to do better. With a flick of a few switches, he activated his sweepers and elite drones. That would buy him enough time. With a deep, shuddering breath, Edgar barreled out the door to greet the invaders. Atop a red carpeted staircase, he took a few steps, pointing his revolver with a steely click, staring down at a figure in a white coat and red armor.
“I see you’ve finally decided to come for me,” Edgar’s voice quivered. “Tell me, did the Empress send you?”
“Don’t play coy with me,” the fiend tore off his hood, revealing a familiar face, “I remember it all too well. When Yuko died in my arms.”
Victor…?
Edgar’s aim began to shake, eyes widening in terror. “That’s not possible. He’s—”
“Dead in all but name,” Amadeus snarled, “but he lives on through his daemon. I am everything that Victor was afraid of becoming. I have removed all obstacles in my pursuit of greatness. And now, I will do what he could not—bring you to justice.”
Edgar thought things were better, that Victor had let go of the past. The chocolatier was well aware of his own failures and misgivings when Yuko died on his dismally misguided account, but this was unexpected and unacceptable. A degree short of betrayal.
Edgar took a mock stance as if preparing to engage in a duel, only to flee deeper into the factory. The fiend howled and hacked his way forward, leaving strikes and slashes along the green plaster walls. The pursuit led downward, deep into the engine rooms. Amongst the corridors of brass pipes and great steel turbines, he fired blindly into the facility. For a moment, Edgar thought he’d lost the pursuer. He slammed a few digits into a keypad, trying desperately to remember the proper code to access the hangar bay. Why was Victor’s daemon after his blood? It couldn’t simply be revenge. No, it had to be something else.
Unless….
Amadeus barreled through the concrete wall, heaving and seething. A monstrous hand hoisted Edgar by the throat as a pair of eyes burned with violent madness. Edgar gasped at the thick iron grip, wheezing for words, reaching for his gun.
“I remember now,” the fiend said, “the Machine. You showed it to me. Months ago. It rests here. Beneath the city streets.” His fingers crunched into Edgar’s neck. “Go ahead, beg. It won’t save you. I’ll finish what I should’ve done that night—”
Edgar pulled the trigger. Amadeus howled in sudden agony, grasping as a bullet sliced through his ear. The chocolatier landed on his feet, only for rage to boil in his chest. “Let me guess,” he wheezed, “you want to usher in the end of civilization? As if you haven’t done enough already. All I see is a man who thinks he’s mankind’s salvation, deaf to his own flaws and grievous sins. And I am intimately familiar with that death trap.”
Amadeus spat at his feet.
“You know,” Edgar sighed, “I never understood why villains are so obsessed with destroying the world. That’s why you came here, isn’t it? To press the big red button?” He sighed. “I must ask, ‘then what?’ Dominating a world of cinders seems a little, well, boring.”
Amadeus stood, slowly. “Think of it as a blank canvas,” he hissed, “to create a better world in my own image. You should be thanking me.”
“Well, aren’t you just a whiny little misanthrope?” Edgar pointed the revolver at the fiend’s forehead. “Shall I put you out of your misery? No,” his lips curled into a smirk, “I’ll settle for a little humiliation.” In a fit of spite, Edgar raised his aim and fired wildly into pistons, lathes, and other more delicate equipment. Jets of steam filled the room with piercing howls as the overhanging lights began to flash red. Amidst the chaos, the chocolatier barreled to the right, only to hurl his gun into the gears. Smoke filled the air. The fire was rising.
“Good luck sifting through the rubble!”
The passing seconds were a montage of dodging steam and flaming debris until Edgar slid down a peppermint pole into a hidden hangar—what would’ve been the aviation wing of his private museum. For now, he’d settle for a quick escape. A long-range interceptor would do the trick. Sneaking into the cockpit of a jerry-rigged spitfire, he hit the ignition and took flight into the unknown. Moments blurred together until grief reared its ugly head.
One by one, the streetlights flickered on from afar as the chocolate factory stood stark against the chemical flames, smokestacks collapsing under the toll of stray explosions. Edgar’s life work lay in ruins. There was no going back. He was soaring across the Gotland Wastes and gaining altitude. There was no choice but to leave Xanadu to its fiery fate. As tears trickled down his cheeks, Edgar kept a stiff upper lip. One day, he would return to Yoshiwara. Until then, there was a long flight ahead and much work to do.
Looks like I’m going to Lumiere after all….
#
When Somme had caught up to the fiend, Amadeus clenched his fists and gritted his teeth. There was nothing for it. Soon, the factory would be nothing but ash and smoke. They’d find another way. Somme barreled for the exit, but Amadeus took his time, striding through the flames, only to pound the wall in frustration, like a toddler throwing a temper tantrum.
“If I may be so bold,” Somme said, “we should probably get out of here.”
Amadeus sighed and trudged ahead, ignoring the pipes clattering down from the ceiling. When at last they’d escaped rubble and ruin, Somme watched a fighter plane take flight and make for the Gridiron beyond the blazing horizon. Sufficed to say, this was a setback.
Edgar had escaped. The Machine lay under a heap of rubble.
“Do we have a plan b?”
Amadeus strode down the charred midway, though such heat was nothing compared to the wrath smoldering in his soul. “Yes. To give pursuit. I’m going to reach the Machine, one way or another.” He glowered at the doctor. “Make no mistake, I still have use for you.”
“Ah,” Somme said, “and what may that be?”
Amadeus pointed his blade towards the Phonos Engine and its tall, piercing lights. “I need you to be my eyes and ears in the Imperial Court. It’s doubtful that I’ll be welcome in those halls. You must keep me informed on the Empress’s course of action. The war is not over.”
Somme cocked his head. “I don’t quite understand. Why do you wish to end the world? I’ve thought it over and, well, just can’t wrap my head around it.”
“Look around you, doctor,” Amadeus said. “Crime, poverty, despair, all enforced by a jackboot to the throat. No matter what the propagandists say. Something needs to give. Something at the very foundation of reality.” He raised his head, gazing upon the Iron Sky and fleeting beams of moonlight. “If the Far Messiah created the world and everything in it, what does that make me? I am not a god, doctor, but I’m pretty damn close. And I’ll soon be remedying that altogether. It’s time to usher the deluge.”
Somme stood awestruck at his creation. Fascinating. Truly fascinating. If only all scientists could be so lucky to see their hypotheses challenged by their own creations. Amadeus was a god in the shadow of another soul. A megalomaniac who could back up claims by force. What the world must be like through his maddened eyes—unable to see beyond his own hubris. And yet, like any scientist worth his salt, Somme would see his experiment through.
“The Empress will be flying to Lumiere in the coming days,” he said, “I assume you’d like me to fill you in on the so-called peace talks?”
Amadeus nodded, slowly. “Among other things.”