Chapter Forty-Five
The day Benjamin came back to town, he didn’t really pay a lot of attention to the details. If he had, he may have noticed all the things that were off. Like how he couldn’t remember the previous week, no matter how hard he tried. But a bottle of whiskey and a night in a cheap hotel room were enough to reboot the care factor.
He arrived knowing that something was wrong. His local contact was dead, so he came prepared. A gun, a backup gun, and enough cash for two boring weeks or two interesting days.
He studied the town, but found nothing out of the ordinary. On day two, he went out to the gas station where he’d last seen Jack. If something weird was happening, there was a pretty good chance those weird clerks would be tied up in it somehow.
The thing he didn’t know yet was that this was a well-worn path. He wasn’t the first Benjamin to do exactly this, and he wouldn’t be the last. He wasn’t even the first Benjamin. He wasn’t even a Benjamin. He was one link in a chain, and if the timing had been slightly different, he would have gone the same way as the others. Or maybe he would have gotten lucky and finished me off. We’ll never know.
He arrived at the gas station to find it empty, but the sound of screaming from outside by the dumpster alerted him. He drew his weapon and crept around back, taking refuge behind the trees and watching in silent horror as I murdered a man chained to a dumpster in cold blood. Rather than intervene, he stayed put to study me, to see exactly what kind of monster I’d become.
It wasn’t until the next day that his stakeout paid off. This time, he saw himself walk out the back door. He watched his own body step into the bear trap, scream, curse the world and beg for help before I finished him off for good.
He stuck around long enough for his emergency contact in Iceland to arrange a supply crate drop in the middle of the woods, at the exact latitude and longitude of the coordinates where he had formed his basecamp, eating squirrels and fish and setting traps like Rambo. When his backup gear arrived, he went on the offensive.
The plan was to jump me during one of my garbage trips, but his attack coincided with one of the few times I wasn’t around. Instead, Benjamin encountered another Benjamimic. After a short talk, he quickly realized that both of them were identical in every possible way. The other Benjamin had just gotten to town the day before, and now he’d gone out to the gas station where he’d last seen Jack. If something weird was happening, he explained, there was a pretty good chance those weird clerks would be tied up in it somehow.
Benjamin 1 was starting to put it all together, but he needed more proof, so he wandered back into town, retracing his steps. He found the hotel where he’d stayed all that time ago. After several days of staking the place out, he realized that more people were coming out of the hotel than going in.
He picked one to follow, a small, scrawny man, one who would be easy to shake down for answers. He followed him home, waited until the middle of the night, and broke into his bedroom. It was supposed to be a short fight, but after a few punches, the man turned into something else entirely. A creature capable of healing its own wounds. A creature strong enough to throw Benjamin around like a rag doll. A well-timed grenade made all the difference between escape and death, and as he watched his own wounds heal before his very eyes, this rogue Benjamin finally figured out the truth. He was one of those things, too. An inhuman sleeper cell, ready to trigger at any moment, sent to destroy.
He got in touch with some folks who owed him—the real him—a favor and cashed in. There was an arms dealer, a demolitions expert, a famous archeologist, and a massive church (he wouldn’t say which one, my only clue was that they owned their own country so do your own math). Over time, supplies trickled in. The most important was the dead man’s switch around his neck, which was tied to his pulse. He knew he couldn’t do anything if the powers-that-be were able to transform him into one of those things, so if his heartbeat ever went too high or too low, the collar would ignite with enough power to destroy his body before it could be used as someone else’s weapon.
During his time living in the woods, he came across something else, completely by accident. A weapon capable of shifting the tides of war, if he only had the means to wield it.
“Was it the .50 cal sniper?” I asked.
He smacked his forehead. “No. I didn’t stumble upon a fucking M93 Black Arrow in the middle of the fucking forest.”
“Don’t act like that would have been the weirdest thing we’ve seen out there.”
He elected not to respond with words, instead pulling the burlap sack off his back and setting it onto the counter.
O’Brien pointed with her gun. “What’s in there, and is it going to kill us?”
“No, it’s going to help us.”
He opened the bag and pulled out a disembodied human hand. Actually, it was an arm, all the way down to the elbow. But where the elbow should have been, it was buried in a black plastic flower pot and covered in soil. It took a second for my mind to catch up. When it did, I pointed and screamed, “HAND PLANT!”
“That’s right.”
“Where’d you find it?”
“There are satellite patches all over these woods.”
“I’m sorry,” O’Brien interrupted. “But, what the actual fuck?”
After I gave her a brief lesson about where Kieffers come from (which she was surprisingly receptive to), Benjamin showed off the absurd trick he’d learned in his time in the woods, giving the handplant a pencil and sheet of paper. We watched in morbid fascination as the hand slowly spelled out a message for us in barely legible handwriting. It was only four letters, but we understood right away what the Kiefferling was trying to say.
“ROSA”
The Benjamin clone explained how he put the pieces together and learned which Rosa he needed to investigate. Our Rosa appeared innocent enough, until he started digging into her past.
“Wait,” I stopped him. “I don’t think I want to know this part.”
“Good,” he said. “I wasn’t planning on telling it to you.”
“Oh.” I suddenly felt a strange regret in the stance I took. “Are you sure?”
“I’m not here to spy on your girlfriend for you, dumbass.”
“Rosa’s not my girlfriend. I don’t understand why so many people keep trying to make that a thing.”
“Here’s what I can tell you: Rosa is special. She has certain... abilities. I assume you’ve already seen them for yourself. Have you ever witnessed her speaking a language she shouldn’t know? Perhaps in a voice that isn’t hers? Have you ever seen her rise into the air under strength that isn’t hers?”
“Nooo.” I tried really hard to sound convincing, but I don’t think he bought it.
“Rosa is what we in the business call, ‘a host.’ She has the rare ability to serve as a vessel for non-terrestrial and non-corporeal beings. Her body can hold spirits, cosmic entities, even gods. That’s why the gas station owners wanted her around so badly. They planned to exploit her power.”
“How exactly does one exploit this power?” O’Brien asked. She had been listening quietly without any interruption until now. She wasn’t doubt-casting, and she wasn’t calling us crazy. It seemed as if she’d already witnessed enough to be one-hundred percent on board with the insanity. It was such a relief.
Benjamin stroked his dirty, overgrown beard and said, “There are many ways for the possession to take place, but only one way to control it. I need a very special tool for a very special ceremony. It was with a contact in Spain last week, but I got it shipped here. Unfortunately, it’s not some gun or explosive collar. It’s something way more valuable. I couldn’t take the risk of trusting the delivery to a smuggler, so I sent it certified mail. Jack, did you get a package this morning?”
I looked back at the package sitting on the counter. The Benjamin clone noticed right away and crossed over to it, tearing it open and pulling out the contents—a single ornamental dagger, cut from ivory and coated in jewels. With a smile, he let the blade dance around his fingertips.
“Huh,” I said. “I feel like I’ve seen one of those before somewhere.”
“I sincerely doubt it. This here is a D.E.M.—the single most powerful device you will ever encounter. Now, let’s get on to business. Where’s your little friend Rosa?”
“Far away from here. She and Jerry took his car and hit the road. I told them to go someplace I’d never be able to find them. They’re going to change their names, assume new identities, and never think of this town ever again.”
Benjamin stomped up to me, put the bladeless hand on my shoulder, looked me in the eyes, and said, “If that’s true, we’re all doomed. That girl was our last hope.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s the truth.”
Right then, the front door opened and Travis staggered inside, calling out, “Yo, Jack! Jerry and Rosa got bored and worried, so we came here to help out. They’re waiting in the car until I give them the all clear. WHOA! What is that on the ground?! Is that guy dead?! Great balls of holy shit! Oh hey, Deputy! I know I’m not supposed to be here, but you don’t have to worry about anything. Jack says we’re cool now because I gave him and Jerry and Rosa new clothes and agreed to let them all hide out at my place for a while. Don’t tell anyone though. It’s supposed to be a secret.”
***
The last time I performed a ritual ceremony at the gas station, I ended up opening a portal to the Akyak dimension. I was still dealing with the fallout of that decision, and sure as hell didn’t feel like a repeat. But, as Benjamin made it clear, this was our only option. This was our only chance to stop the army of mimics. The least we could do was hear him out.
He described the process to the others in clinical terms, the same way a surgeon explains a delicate medical procedure. But as he spoke, a new thought swarmed my mind, taking all of my focus and attention. If this Benjamin clone is telling the truth, then that implies a whole new horrifying reality, one so terrifying I hadn’t even given it any consideration before now.
The mimics don’t know they’re mimics.
At least, not until they mimicked out. The implications were myriad and awful. Every earnest plea from a Benjamin about to be shot was genuine. Everyone in this room who thought they were on the right side of the battle could be a sleeper agent. There’s no way of knowing if Doctor Vicedomini truly came out to the gas station with altruistic or sinister intentions. There’s a chance I might not have insomnia.
“...any questions?” Benjamin asked, increasing his voice enough at the tail end of his statement to pull me back to the moment.
“Will it hurt?” Rosa asked.
“Hang on,” I said. “Start over.”
“From where?”
“From the beginning. What exactly is our plan?”
He angry-sighed. “Okay, try to pay attention this time around. Our plan here is to resurrect the dark god.”