Brian got on the bus, as he usually did. And as usually happened, the old man came and sat next to him.
“Well, didn’t expect to see you again!” He put his hand on Brian’s knee, and gave it a gentle squeeze. “But, I suppose you’ve gotta go to work, and there’s no other way for you to get there.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, I hope there’s no hard feelings. Ooops—didn’t mean to make a funny!” He smiled and chuckled to himself. “It’s just that us old folks don’t get to have much fun, and we’re just kids at heart. Why, I might be seventy-two, but I’m really just thirty! I would be going out to parties, doing dome drugs, drinkin’, and gettin’ with every tight piece of ass I could see! But no tight pieces of asses want anything to do with me or my friends. Besides, we’ll be gone soon.” He paused for a moment, looking at Brian. “What’s wrong, young man? You ain’t sayin’ much.”
“I’m coming with you to your house again.”
The old man’s face lit up with a grin the size of the sun. “I knew it! I knew you liked it—I could tell that whole time!” He snuggled close to Brian, and ran his hand over Brian’s chest. “Oh my, we’re gonna have such a good time! And if you like, we can tie up one of my friends and make’em suffer—they’d really love it!”
The bus came to a stop, and Brian walked with the old man who could barely control his drooling. As they rounded the corner leading to his house, a contingent of archetypes could be seen standing at attention outside the old man’s house.
“What’s that?”
An archetype came out of a shadow, his weapon leveled at the old man.
“Don’t move! Raise your hands!”
“What’s going on, young man? What’re they doing?”
Brian shoved him to the archetype. “I’m gonna have a little fun, now.”
The archetype searched him, and then pushed him towards the house. As they got there, more archetypes could be seen herding a group of old men out from the house.
“What . . . what are you doing?!”
“Be silent!” shouted Brian, as he slashed into the old man’s stomach with his hand. The old man coughed, and began to shake, fumbling for his canister of air, which Brian took great delight in slapping out of his hands. Gustav came up to Brian.
“Ready, sir!”
“Then execute.”
“Take aim!”
All the archetypes raised their weapons, as the old men began to beg and plead. A few of them fell to their knees, or staggered forward, shouting and crying, screaming to be let go.
“Brian!” shouted the old man, “you wanna know where that bird came from? Do you really wanna know?!”
“Not really. Not now.”
Brian nodded at Gustav, who brought down his hand. “Fire!”
They all fell in an instant, the wall behind them stained with flesh and blood. The old man stood near Brian cried in shock, his pants now wet with the contents of his bladder and the hot, runny excrement from his bowels.
“Now, load them onto the truck,” ordered Brian of the old man. “Load them all!”
A pick-up was brought around, as the old man gazed at Brian, shell-shocked. “Why?”
“Just do it!” yelled Gustav, as he shoved the old man forward.
As the old man lifted the bodies of his fallen friends, he started to ramble to himself. Brian couldn’t help but listen, no matter how much he hated him. “Yeah, guess this is what it comes to. Dead at the hands of others. We lived this long, beating out the mighty Countdown, sacrificing our lives to build a better future, only to have the very instrument we brought back to life, cut us down. What a terrible irony! I always wondered what that word had to do with ironing.” About half the bodies were loaded, and he panted under the brilliant sun, sweat drenching his clothes. The archetypes laughed at the sight of such a pathetic creature, until Gustav motioned them to silence.
“Move it!” yelled Brian, “we haven’t got all day!”
An archetype fired a bullet at the old man’s feet, making him jerk up as if dancing a jig. He bent down, and went back to pulling the bodies to the truck, still mumbling to himself.
“Yeah, I sure could dance. I remember when I still played with women, in school, how pretty it all was! All the paper and flowers and dresses. All the young bodies smiling and pressing close, not caring what was going on outside, not seeing, or knowing that all . . . this . . . would come. Then, going out into the night air, hearing a few . . . Brian!” He stopped, dropping the last of the bodies next to the truck. “Do you know where the birds come from?! Did you hear of the plague that happened five years ago?! That’s when they took ‘em. When the Homestead finally had the chemicals, and the will, to do what needed to be done.” He broke down, and knelt on the ground. “And it was with these hands that I helped them.”
Gustav stepped forward, raising his gun, but Brian held him back, and bid him to retreat, just out of earshot.
“The only way to bring back the frozen embryos of all the animals we needed was to put them into a body. We tried with the dolphins, with the whales, but just couldn’t make it work. Then someone had the bright idea of putting an inseminated pig embryo into a human woman, one that was injured and in a deep coma. We pumped her with every anti-viral imaginable, forced her body to adapt, not to reject the foreign, disgusting birth inside her, and it actually worked! She was mother nature incarnate, in fact, we even named her, and all that came after her, the Eingana!”
“So we came up with the plague, and stole every child born that year. There is a facility, on Beaver Island, filled with the thirteen year olds, the missing generation, tied down and drugged up, and forced to bring back the animals of this world.” He stared hard at Brian. “That is where your birds come from—the Eingana, sentenced to a lifetime of abominable birth for the race of men. From them come your pigs, your cows, your sheep, your birds, your snakes—everything we had an embryo of, we have put into the wombs of those little girls, and made them carry it to term. I didn’t lie to you, Brian; I have much information on the homestead. Only problem is, I’m an integral part of it.”
Brian nodded to Gustav, who came back and fired another shot at the old man’s feet.
“Alright, alright.” He lifted the last body onto the truck. “Guess I deserve it. But don’t you think I deserve the young pretties of my own, deserve some recompense, other than the nightmares and guilt that have hung over me ever since? To see the world reborn, in the bowels of the enslaved?! To have to live with—”
“Enough!” shouted Brian. “Now, come here!”
The old man came over, his clothes stained with blood, his face covered in tears and mucus.
Brian turned to Gustav. “This man is guilty of the heinous sin of homosexuality. He does not deserve the bullet, rather, he deserves the blade!”
Gustav smiled, as he pulled out his knife. “Yes sir!”
The old man staggered back, terror gripping his soul. “Even after . . . all I told you! Even after . . . I know you liked it! I know you did!” Gustav advanced, and the old man’s eyes were transfixed by his blade, regarding the instrument of his doom. “I’ll be on your conscience, young man! Maybe not on the minds of these . . . animals, but—” Suddenly, Gustav plunged forward, striking deep in the old man’s side. “Damn! I gave my life . . . gave my soul, for humanity!” The other archetypes drew their blades, and advanced on him, but his eyes were focused only on Gustav’s blade which now dripped with his own blood. Brian sat on the ground, his arms around his legs, and smiled as they patiently played with the old man, tossing him back and forth, cutting deep, but not so deep that their fun would evaporate too quickly. Finally, the old man collapsed onto his knees, as the archetypes closed in around him.
“What . . . what is this? Who lives . . . who—”
The archetypes pressed in, hacking into skin and limb, until there was very little left to go onto the truck.
Gustav wiped his blade on his pants, and came next to Brian, who now stood in the l
ight of the rising moon, his eyes distant and vacant.
“Is our work done?”
“No,” answered Brian, with a thin smile. “Our work has just begun. Formation!”
The fifty archetypes ran and formed three short lines in front of him, with Gustav in the lead.
“There is a doctor who is killing fertile, pregnant women, in the name of power and greed. This violation breaks codes 113, 78, 45, 209, and, most importantly, the Prime Edict, that nothing shall happen to terminate unborn life.” He took a deep breath, as his smile widened. “As such, this doctor is sentenced to euthanasia! May his euthanization further improve our Homestead!”
“To the Homestead!”
In five Hummers they were loaded as the pickup with the bodies of the old men pulled away into the distance. As they crossed over road and bridge, Brian felt a new ego take control of his being—a more focused imperative. All the training and education he had received in leadership and military command surged forward in his mind, purging his immature desire to venture into space. It was late in the day as the Doctor Melon’s home came into view, and Brian smiled the smile of a man that knew his place in things, and understood his destiny.
“Break out the flamethrowers!” he yelled, as they pulled to a stop. “Unit one and two, assume standard pacification formation.” Two lines of Archetypes formed, one on either side of the house, as eight men carried flamethrowers and took up equidistant points forming a ring around the house. Brian stood for a moment, reviewing their formation, and then pulled out a bullhorn.
“Melon!”
A light went on, and the door slowly opened. The frail, old body of Doctor Melon came out, wiping his eyes.
“What . . . what is it?”
“Do you know who I am?”
“No—are you daft?! It’s too dark out, and these old eyes can’t see a thing.”
“I am Brian Torres, and you murdered my sister, Iris.”
Melon’s hand dropped from his eye, as realization spread over his face. “Your . . . your sister—she was infertile!”
“Liar!”
Brian went for a pistol from the nearest archetype, but Gustav ran over and stopped him.
“You give the orders, we do the killing,” he whispered softly. “You know that. That is the order of things.”
Brian nodded, as his face went blank. He put the megaphone to his mouth again.
“You have been found guilty of treason, guilty of breaking codes 113, 78, 45, 209, and, most importantly, the Prime Edict; that nothing shall happen to terminate unborn life.”
“No!” screamed the doctor, falling to his knees. “Don’t do this, Brian! Please!”
“As such, you are condemned to euthanization, sentence to be carried out—”
“Please!”
The word reverberated in Brian’s skull, for a moment stirring sentiment and compassion. Deep in his heart, he knew the doctor just felt frustrated and old like his father, and was growing tired. He knew the doctor probably did more good than evil, was probably, in the end, of more value to the Homestead alive than dead. But the face of his sister was as a thick blanket, killing warmth instead of stoking it.
Melon began to laugh. “You think you are so in control now, Brian, just because you’ve got these jack-booted thugs behind you? You know nothing! Why, you don’t even know that Jacob isn’t even your—”
“Fire!” screamed Gustav.
The guns fired in a short, one second burst, riddling Melon with hundreds of bullets. Then, the flamethrowers spit their accelerant and flame, converting the home and its former occupant into dust and ash.
“What was he going to say?” asked Brian, as Gustav motioned his men back into their trucks.
“In my experience, men facing death utter either all truth, or all lie, and either way, it does no good to listen to them.” An aide ran up to Gustav, and whispered in his ear. When he finished, Gustav came to attention before Brian, and said; “we have reports, sir.”
It was the first time Brian was called ‘sir’ in that manner, and he liked it. “Yes?”
“Scott is under siege. A large group of grunts are attacking, under the leadership of Deaconess Rodriguez.”
“Why?” he asked, confused.
Gustav shrugged. “Does it matter?”
Brian smiled, and nodded. “Not in the least. All archetypes; load your guns, board your vehicles, and head for Scott!”
“Yes sir!”
Chapter 17