Demons of Hate

Chapter 16, Page Four: Demons of Hate -- pic and text

After a time she saw the sight of structures and buildings, and as she came towards them she saw, finally, movement of life. But as she came closer she stopped, eyes wide. Life was, perhaps, not the right term. They looked and moved like men, but their faces. . . . skinless – ripped, red, and raw, muscles moving as their features snarled and grimaced. She gave a small gasp, and perhaps he’d been listening, because he responded at once.

“You see them, I assume? What’s left of the life of men in this place? Hideous, aren’t they?”

“What are they?” she asked softly.

“I call them Marked Men. They were humans, once, soldiers. You can see their uniforms. Soldiers of the Bear and the Bull, united at last in this place. United by their hate, of the living. For years they’ve only had me, and they feared me. I wonder what they’ll think of you? They were men, but now they’re just demons of rage. Perhaps you don’t care about the ones that were Legion, but I wonder, does it affect you to see the Bear-soldiers this way? You opposed the Bull; that I know. But the Bear, perhaps you had a soft place in your heart for them?”

“You’re wrong,” she said softly, more to herself. “I’ve. . . always hated the Bear.”

“Do you? Well, I suppose you have cause. The Bear has left its share of grief in your path, and most of it you were too foolish to avoid. I imagine that the Bear would make a good scapegoat for you, someone to blame when you felt that you couldn’t blame the true source. Much like the Bull, back when they first tried to take the Dam, and lost. I was there, early on, I felt their anger and hate. It was when I first knew, for truth, that they’d lost their way. I saw the Dam, and the flag of the Bear, and I knew how it would eat at Caesar’s mind. A mighty symbol of the Old World, the Dam, and a mighty symbol of the new world, the Bear. A might that could, finally, challenge the Bull, make it prove its own worth, in the plains around the City of the Light. It was my first taste of despair, when I saw it. I knew what would happen. Mighty cause turned to pettiness. Violence for purpose turned to violence for rage, no purpose, no progress, no cause. All forgotten. And it all came to pass, just as I saw that it would.”

“But why are they here, in this place? What happened to them?”

“The destruction of this place is what made them what they are. The powers that cracked this land twisted them, corrupted them. Kept them alive, burning inside, even as the winds and the sand that they carried flayed at their flesh, broke open their skins and tore them to pieces. The Bear was here because they heard of this place, this place that you had helped build. The people that had no part of either that you helped to grow here, no desire for battle, no desire for war, only peace, caught in the middle. You should have known, Courier Six, known they would come, but you didn’t. The fame of this place started to spread, it was inevitable. The Bear saw things that they wanted, here, and what the Bear wanted it took. Same as everywhere else. And what the Bear wanted, the Bull wanted as well, always. There was a battle here, between them. Before this place had a chance to build itself strong. But it wasn’t the Bear and the Bull that destroyed this place. It was you, Courier Six. Only you. You killed the soldiers, and you killed the people here, who had no part in that war, who only wanted to leave alone, in peace.”

Her eyes and jaw clenched shut, tightly, her heart ash. “I could. . . I could never do that.”

“Couldn’t, or wouldn’t? Those are two different things. Wouldn’t implies intention, desire. Purpose and knowledge, and you were always too ignorant of those things. Couldn’t implies ability, capability. I assure you, you were capable of destroying this place, because you did, even if, perhaps, you didn’t intend to. But you don’t have to believe me, there was one other witness, one other mind, of a sorts, that remembers what happened here. This machine, that is our link. It was here, it remembers, you can ask it yourself.” A whisper of noise, and he was gone. She looked at her companion then, with new eyes. She tried to give voice, to seek confirmation, but she couldn’t. She didn’t want to know. But the machine itself gave a sad, mournful sound, and that was confirmation enough. A moan of her own, involuntary, escaped from her throat.

One of the ruined figures below looked up then, and saw her. With a guttural roar of rage, it came at her, hands clenched on a tarnished blade. Others heard the noise, and they too came at her. She had to keep moving, she couldn’t die here. People were depending on her, and she herself had not had all her answers. She brought up her rifle, and flowed into her dance of death.