Chapter 3
Chapter 3: His name was Bill
(NOTE: This is the oldest of the chapters I've written, that is, it is the only 1 of the first 4 that was not rewritten when I began writing again. That said, there are things in it that do not match up as well with older and newer chapters, but it's still important, no skipping!)
He sat there, tapping his toe along to some half forgotten melody in his head. That was about all he could do in his situation. It wasn't like he could snap his fingers or clap along or slap his thighs.
Years of false promises and misdeeds had earned the BioSuit known as William this cage of his. It was a cozy little number, concrete walls with bars submerged deep in them for good measure. The tiny scrap of light that did filter his gray walled cage managed to miraculously shine right in the eyes of the would-be prisoner.
Not that he was a prisoner in the traditional sense; When it came to the Underground, very little of what went on could be labeled as 'traditional'. He would be kept locked down and prone until they needed him. This was the way of things. This was his life. Sit, stand, maim, sit. Repeat. They would keep him here until they needed his indispensable services.
When one's existence and purpose in life becomes inevitability, life becomes a one way street with no side roads.
He would destroy anything that got close to him. When his rage was unbound, he was unstoppable. He acted without logic, or at very least, he acted beyond any normal person's logic. There was no sickening coldness to his actions. If anything, it was the raw fury of his logic that got to them. Blood everywhere. The screams... would follow a normal man to his death.
Afterward, he would be returned. They had the finger on his button, and if there was anything he feared, it would be an early demise.
"Oh... I weep for myself. I shed tears from the blackest of black eyes for my poor bereaved creators, who would do such a thing to their humble servant,"
Bill had taken to melodrama in recent months. It passed the time, finding flowery ways to say life was shit. This was a new development. He had not been like this, before.
"Quit your whining. It's your own fault you're in there, monster." A particularly disgruntled employee yelled. He was one of the many who had the misfortune of keeping watch over the captive BioSuit.
"How so, good sir? Is it not the fault of my creators who, not only put me where I am, but made me as I am and forbade me the ability to change? Is that in itself not worse than any crime I could commit?"
The guard responded eloquently by kicking the cell, succeeding only in stubbing his toe against the hard metal of his steel toed boot when it met the concrete. It made a dull thump that was hardly recognizable by the prisoner.
"What good will that do you, my dearest friend?" Bill prodded at the man. His eyes glinted in the light that shined onto them.
Those black, black eyes. Always watching, waiting.
"Monster..."
----
The machine that dominated bulk of the room roared with activity, bathing it in red light. Very soon though there was a relative silence: only the working of simple electronics and the deceleration of gears and wheels.
Life poured into a vessel. What is a BioSuit but the container for an intelligence? It was a tool for the domination of the world, the domestication of man. Utilize man's greatest strength: Science coupled with imagination and raw desperation. Use the engine of one's destruction as the machine that would advance humanity into Eden. This was one of the artificial beings that would shape society into the perfection that Apath wanted.
Tubes and wires and pistons all disconnected themselves and sunk back into the Cradle Under the cold glare of Dr. Hughes, on June 16th 1994, the TestType 07 woke to the world.
---
"My name is William Sullivan."
The blond boy winked.
"But you can call me Bill."
A week had passed since Gabe's victory on the battlefield. In the immediate aftermath, the young BioSuit had refused to talk to Kathryn, absolutely furious but unable to vent his frustrations.
She had warned him. She had said, "Are you sure?” He shouldn't blame her at all.
Like humans, BioSuits are not always rational beings. It's much easier to project guilt than to blame one's self.
He had since calmed down. There was still a tension in the air, the sort that's so thick that you can't breach it for fear of making things worse, but like all things time would erase this particular unease.
The blond boy, Bill, took a seat next to Kathryn. Her face was a mixture of disgust and hatred that Gabe did not quite pick up on.
Even with the tension, and the unspoken claim to blame and guilt that they both had, they still managed to grasp onto the small part of normalcy in their lives. Wake, work, eat. The part that crossed paths for the two of them was the eating part, and thus they were eating together. Lunch in the cafeteria. Same as it ever was.
"Hello,” He looked from the unresponsive Engelmacht to Gabe.
"Hello." Bill said again to the other member of the table.
"Hi..."
Gabe looked at the young man. He looked at his blond hair, at his pretty face. All he could see from his side of the table was a black turtleneck that clung to him, but somehow Gabe imagined the boy was wearing slacks.
Gabe glanced at Engelmacht, who continued to pretend neither of them was there.
"Uhm, it's good to meet you. My name is Gli--"
Gabe stumbled over his own name and blushed under Bill's amused gaze.
"Gabe. My name is Gabe."
Bill's arm, like it was a million miles long, extended over that wide wide expanse. All sorts of borders were crossed; Engelmacht looked like she had just been scandalized by him.
Gabe reached out too, his arm traveling the long distance to meet Bill's hand.
They shook.
Bill's powder blue eyes met Gabe's emerald green ones.
"Lets be good friends."
---
The time spent with Bill seemed to melt away like butter and Gabe found himself wondering how he could have lived before. It was as if he had a second life, far divorced from the one he had spent with Engelmacht.
As soon as Bill had appeared, Engelmacht changed. Before she was a silly, blushing woman. She fawned over glitch like some sort of over-attached girlfriend.
"How are you doing?"
"Do you like your food?"
"Let me fix your shirt..."
What was she to Gabe, and what was Gabe to her?
Since then, she had not been around, much less than before at least. At any given time when Gabe was not with Bill, Engelmacht probably wasn't there. If Bill was with him, the doctor definitely wasn't there.
"She's like a ghost. I wonder if I pissed her off somehow..."
The truth of the matter was, even if he had, he probably wouldn't care. The times he had with Bill were full of adventure and merriment.
"So, you're like me?"
Bill jumped up on the ledge and sat, facing the digital sun. They were inside the VR simulator.
"Yep, I'm like you. I'm a BioSuit, the Type 07. Designed by Dr. Hughes, I'm the last of the ProtoTypes."
Gabe looked up at the younger boy and couldn't help but feel awed. Gabe's own birth had been bloody and confusing, but Bill knew exactly what was going on.
"I'm going to be the strongest fighter the Underground has. They'll have no choice but to use me. Even when they hit full production, I’ll make sure I'm their go-to guy."
There was very little about the Underground that Gabe knew. Their goals and aspirations were a mystery to him. The sum of his knowledge was that they built him, and they built him for a reason. Up until now, he was still clueless as to what that reason was.
"Hey Gabe?"
In slow motion the purple haired boy turned to face the questioner, his friend. His innocent green eyes blinked and his pupils danced around as he took Bill in, absorbing the features of his face. The prominent but soft jaw line, a perfect Aryan nose; Bills big blue eyes and feathery blond hair.
"What is it?"
Bill’s brilliant eyes stood wide open and unfocused.
“What do you want to do in this world of ours?
“Our world?” Gabe was confused
“This, the world of our people. We were created to lead them into the next stage. We’re supposed to control them, to stop their base instincts and show them the right way. Force them to be what they’ve always been capable.”
Gabe’s eyebrows dipped inward as he frowned.
“If they’re forced… have they accomplished anything? What’s the point of forcing people to do something they don’t want?”
Bill didn’t smile, nor did he frown. He continued on in his melodious low voice.
“They want to because we are here. Someone wanted it or we wouldn’t be created. If we wait too long, then their species will be held back by the worst of them. We’re the culling song, we’re the special ones who spurn forward their existence.”
“But do we have the right…?”
“You don’t know them like I do, Gabe.”
Bill jumped from his perch, and kissed Gabe on the forehead. He grasped Gabe's arms in his hands.
“They're not all like Kathryn, and they’re certainly not like me.”
Gabe looked at the hands clutching his arms.
“I’ll have to decide for myself, Bill…”
Bill blinked.
"I love you." Bill said.
Gabe stared straight ahead, unbelieving.
Bill turned back towards the solar representation.
"Together, we'll defeat everyone who stands in our way. We’ll take over like our genes instruct us to. Will you follow me, Gabe? Will you help me build the new world we were made for?"
Colors exploded before Gabe's eyes, and the simulation disappeared.
---
"I hate him."
Blood dripped from her lips.
"I hate him."
It traveled to her chin and then dripped onto her white white white labcoat.
"I hate him."
Her teeth sunk into her thumb.
"He took my baby away."
Eyes wide, unfocused, jumping.
"He took my lover away."
A quarter inch deep.
"He took my new LIFE."
She screamed.
She screamed some more. She screamed and screamed and screamed. She screamed until her throat was hoarse. Screamed until it was raw. She began to cough up flecks of blood.
Her mouth was slick with copper.
Then, silence. Breath in. Breath out. Calm.
She picked up the coffee table and flung it by the leg. It impacted and broke against the wall
"Don't leave me!"
She flung dishes, theey shattered against the door.
"Don't abandon me!"
Slivers of wood stuck in her knuckles as she pummeled furniture.
Silence. Breath in. Breath out.
"I’ll make you…. I’ll make you love me.”
Her eyes had no connection to reality.
“I’ll make you love me Gabriel.”
---
The new world we were made for. Is that what this was all about? Gabe didn’t know very much, but he was beginning to get a really bad feeling, crawling through his guts. The elation he had heard when Bill spoke the words “I love you,” slowly retreated to bottom of him when he realized what he might intend. Gabe didn’t know the world. He didn’t know what was out there. But “take over” was “take over,” and build sounded a hell of a lot like rebuild to him.
There was an echo, in the back of his head, something about BioSuits and the wave of the future. The world, rid of the people who had harmed his kind, but the screeching pain that sliced through his brain that followed those echoes was enough to drown them out.
Kathryn was now there. She looked at his face, but not at him. She looked through him. He was not there. Her eyes seemed to dilate and the corners of her mouth twitched up and down.
“Hello Dr. Kathryn.”
Dr. Kathryn said hello back.
“How are you, Dr. Kathryn?”
Dr. Kathryn was just fine, thank you.
Gabe stared straight at her.
It was several days after the simulation with Bill. Gabe had not seen Bill since then. It was actually the first time he had seen Kathryn in weeks.
Now she stood in his doorway, completely disconnected from reality, leaving Gabe unsettled.
“Kathryn… is there anything I can do for you?”
Kathryn twitched and nodded once, stepping into the room. Then she nodded again, paused, and once more dipped her head in assent.
“Yes… yes, there is something you can do for me… oh yes I think there is.”
Gabe frowned deeply and took a step back. Kathryn overtook his retreat and smashed her mouth against him. Her tongue darted out and probed his mouth, desperately searching. Without any sort of legitimate reaction he could make, Gabe flinched and lost his balance, falling to the floor. Kathryn clung to him with brute force, refusing to allow her lips to become detached from his.
Finally Gabe regained his senses and twisted his head away.
“What the hell are you doing?” He yelled, her face still centimeters from his own
“Oh Gabe it’s so beautiful we can have sex all day and never worry about children. I’ll wait on you hand and foot, just your private servant I’ll make you so happy don’t you see you don’t need anyone else! I’m all you’ll ever need, I’ll take care of your every fantasy!”
She reared up and tore her blouse open, her breasts falling out. She grabbed them and pressed them into Gabe’s face.
“Aren’t they wonderful?
Gabe’s mind and body were suddenly doing battle. He knew this was insanity but he was fully aware that a gorgeous woman was practically begging to have sex with him. Somehow, his good sense won out and he managed to force her off of him, careful to avoid touching the rapidly increasing amount of exposed skin on her body. He clamored to his feet, slamming against the wall in his hurry to keep his back from being turned to her.
“Eng-Kathryn?! What’s gotten into you!” Gabe had his hands slightly raised, in case he needed to catch her, but she seemed as though she wouldn’t be taking herself from the floor for the moment.
“Why… why can’t you just love me? I’d give you everything you want… Anything any man could want…” Her hair fell over her eyes as she half lay half sat on the floor, crying softly.
Gabe’s expression remained frozen for a moment, unable to process. With a sigh and a shake of his head his posture softened and he lowered his hands to his sides. For an instant he considered picking her off the floor but he was too frightened to get close to the woman again.
“I don’t even know what I want… so how could you give it to me?” He said.
"Wait, please!"
Kathryn scrambled up to him on hands and knees, clutching herself close to his leg. Gabe froze, his throat tightening. Kathryn's tears soaked through his jeans, moistening his leg. With stubborn effort, he managed to pull himself away.
Gabe opened the door and stepped out of the room. He didn't look back.
----
From down the long white hallway Bill saw Gabe exit his room in a hurry. He increased his own pace to catch up. The door had already sealed by the time he passed it, and the soft sobs of Engelmacht just barely penetrated the thick plastic door.
Gabe managed to evade Bill, leaving the blond haired man standing confused at the end of an empty hallway.
---
Gabe didn't know where to turn and finally found his way to the cafeteria. Sitting behind a pillar opposite the entrance, Gabe hoped to avoid any stray eyes. The few people who were in the room avoiding looking at him, like usual, so he felt alone, which was exactly what he wanted at that moment. Men and woman in white lab coats, all in a row, moving their hands from plate to mouth, plate to mouth, over and over again. Gabe had no appetite, and the mechanical action suddenly seemed repulsive.
"Who are these people, these scientists. What is the point of all this? Work and eat and then what?" He asked himself quietly.
Their faces, all of them, might have not have even existed, and Gabe would not have been able to tell the difference. They were completely ambiguous. None of them had a recognizable feature.
"I shouldn't be here. This place, nothing in it makes sense. There is no meaning here."
He sat thinking for over an hour, watching the white coated creatures go about their lives. He needed to move around, burn up some energy. He decided to go to the training center and break a bit of a sweat, and hopefully clear his mind of his worries.
He pressed his palms against his eyes, then got to his feet.
"Where is Bill?"
---
"You stupid woman. What are you doing down there? It's pathetic. Did you really think someone like you could convince him to stoop down to your level?"
Engelmacht stared with iron eyes at the dented door frame. Her face was still slick with her own tears but now could have been carved from stone. Her teeth ground loudly in her own mouth.
"I don't have to listen anything an incomplete freak like you might say." She spat.
Bill's eyes flashed with rage. He lunged forward with his arm cocked and back handed her across the face. She flew back, landing sprawled on the floor. Quickly her face and eye began to swell. Her mouth hung open, and she sat shaking in fear. Slowly recovering, she bite her tongue to choke back a bitter remark.
"Where did Gabe go?" Bill said, looking down at Engelmacht with cold blue eyes. His face was entirely calm now, high up above. Superior.
Engelmacht paused before answering.
"I don't know," her lips slid down into a sneer, "he left in a hurry."
Bill barked out a harsh, mean laugh.
"Oh I'm sure he did. Nothing like filth to offend the new upper class. But I must thank you, I suppose with out you he might never have been created. You and humanity have my thanks, gratitude from the bottom of my heart, for the depth of your arrogance."
His grin was savage.
"You played god just long enough for your creation to begin to topple you." he said.
He spun on his heel and exited the room. His right hand twitched agitatedly, as if it wanted to grab something just out of reach.
"Gabe... what's going to happen?" Engelmacht said.
---
Gabe had only managed to pummel the punching bag for a few minutes before Bill walked in. His face looking chipper but his eyes were decidedly dark, giving him a dsiticntly off balance appearance. Gabe wiped his face of sweat, and watched as Bill approached. He seemed remarkably intent on something.
"Gabe. I've been looking for you." Bill said. Gabe turned to face Bill and saw his hand moving erratically.
"Something up?" He kept his eyes from glancing at the movement from the corner of his eyes.
Bill shrugged "I want to know something, Gabe. I want to know what you think of the mission."
Glitch shook his head, "I'm really not sure about that mission, but more than that I'm not happy here. I don't feel like I belong. I can't see the purpose to all this, to them, to us. It's all a blur, a swirl of pointlessness. It's like we are bound against our will to this place, but no one has a will anymore so it doesn't matter. No one is resisting." He said.
Bill was obviously becoming more agitated "No, it can't be like that. We're supposed to be together, Gabe, partners, bringing in the new world, the revolution. They don't know what's good for themselves. Even our creators, they have no idea what the truth is. Soon they will unleash us though, and any who would try to hold us back are holding nature back. We are nature and beyond nature, we are the next stage in evolution. We cannot let them be held back. You have to help, you can't be one of them Gabe. You have to! We need to establish this new world so everyone can be saved. Can't you see that we're the only ones who can do this?"
Gabe sat passively, his face betraying nothing. Inside there were no words, only a growing sense of panic. There was a sense that he was being used, or would be used for something terrible. The idea that his purpose might be decided without his consent made his insides churn and he struggled not to scream out his indignation.
"Bill, I'm leaving this place. I'm not a revolutionary. That's not my life. That's not what I want." Gabe said.
"What do you want?" Bill's eyes were sad and dark.
"I don't know... but I know it's not that." Gabe replied.
Bill remained silent. They stood in this abusive, foreboding silence for several moments before Gabe spoke again.
"I can't dedicate myself to the changing of a people I've never met. These people here, they aren't humans. They are just machines in white. We're more human than they are."
Bill's mouth twitched at the word "human."
They stood silently once again, both waiting for the other to speak.
"Goodbye, Bill." Gabe said.
Gabe left. Bill cried.
---
He needed to leave, now if he could help it. He was reasonably sure that Bill wouldn't turn him in immediately, if at all, and the same he felt was true of Engelmacht, but in spurning both he was afraid that one might impede his escape. As worried as he was that Engelmacht might still be in his room, he needed to gather the few things he owned before leaving.
The door to his room was open, attempting to close against the damage that had been done to it and failing eternally. Engelmacht was gone, however, so that was a bit of a relief.
He fished through his things. There really was very little that he had to his name, but he dressed himself in the uniform they had provided for him and looked into a mirror.
"My eyes... they seem sad. Here's hoping we can change that." He grinned at his own smile in the mirror. The fuzzy purple hair, strong nose, green half coat and slacks... they formed the image that was himself. He added that smile to his internal image.
"I'm going to fight to make that smile stick."
He bid goodbye to his room, to his life, and left it.
---
There was an elevator, he knew, that went to the surface. He planned to escape through the top of the elevator and climb until he was out of the Underground. It wasn't a terribly involved or thought out plan but it was the best he had and he needed to run with it. Not much more to it than that, he figured. On the way, he found himself face to face with Bill and Engelmacht. They were arguing.
"He's going to leave, you've scared him off. You stupid damn woman!" Bill smacked Engelmacht across the face, who took the impact in stride, rearing back and spiting in Bill face.
"You idiot. Have you any idea what you're really doing? They'll never use you. When they begin production they will throw you away and build a new generation of command units. You'll be lucky to experience another year of functionality." She said while bracing herself for another blow. In the process she noticed Gabe standing there.
"Gabe!" she exclaimed.
Gabe walked up to the two, irritated.
"What the hell is this?" He turned to Bill, furious, and shoved his shoulder, "What the fuck? Why the hell did you hit her?"
Bill sneered, "She's a stupid fucking woman. She has no intention of improving humanity. She's just trying to cool her soaking hot loins. A technophile, a pervert of epic quality. She built the demons that will remake humanity to satiated her carnal urges."
He barked a laugh.
"How filthy."
Kathryn flushed crimson but remain behind Gabe's back, protected.
"Bill. Why do you have a prosthetic?" Gabe asked, face unaffected.
Bill's right arm was no longer a normal arm but a long tubular machination, his hand, still twitching, now a claw. It was dangerous.
"Oh, I think I might need it. That is to say, I don't think you'll be leaving. If you try and go, I will stop you. With my own hand I will prevent you from falling into the laps of our enemies." Bill said.
"That's bull. I'm not going out there to help anyone, I just wanna live my life, see what the point is. I'm not going to do anything. Bill, let me go." Gabe said.
Engelmacht grabbed Gabe's arm "No, please don't go! You don't have to fight, I can make you a home here, carve out an existence for you and I! We can be happy. There's nothing but pain and death outside. You'll regret it... please...! They'll destroy the outside world, Bill and the others, they'll kill them all!"
"Shut up!" Bill's claw snaked out and grabbed Engelmacht by the head, lifting her off the ground then throwing her violently against a wall. She slumped, unconscious and badly injured.
"Fool, as if you would eve--" Bill was cut off as Gabe slammed his fist against in the blond haired man's face, flipping the man at breakneck speed into the ground. Blood splattered against the tilled floor. Slowly, Bill rose back to his feet, jaw unhinged, eyes dancing.
"Don't you fucking touch her like that. She's not innocent, but you don't have any right to hurt her." Gabe said, fist still clenched.
Bill wiped his mouth on his sleeve. His jaw bone was cracked, and hung lower than it should. He propped it back into place and scowled.
"Now let me leave, and don't ever touch her again." Gabe said.
Bill mouthed one word.
"No."
---
Bill swung his claw around, wiping it into Gabe's left arm. Gabe rolled with the blow and from a sliding crouch grabbed onto the flying and extended prosthetic and swung over it. He planted his feet and charged Bill, leaping forward with a spin, and kicking out at Bill's legs. Bill jumped over the blow and landed on his left hand, pushing off the floor and back into the air. He landed and stepping around used his inertia to swing his claw at Gabe again. Coming higher this time, Gabe bent backwards to avoid the blow and then flung himself forward, letting loose a punch into Bill's midsection. Bill took the blow but grabbed Gabe's arm with his left, and elbowed his forearm with the free prosthetic. Gabe yelled out as the metal bruised his extended limb. He folded himself up and then kicked out, slamming his boots into Bill's thighs, throwing his grip off of Gabe's arm.
Gabe cradled his right arm in his hand; Bill had gouged deep gashes into it with his fingertips as Gabe pulled away. He charged again, leaping completely over Bill's next prosthetic attack.
Bill smirked, having anticipated that. He changed the course of his arm on the fly and whipped it straight up into the air, catching Gabe in the leg and sending him into a spin. Bill changed the course once more and raked his claws across Gabe's back before the air born man was able to return to the ground and regain his footing.
Keeping his back to the wall he breathed deep; his lower back was bleeding from where Bill had slashed him and his arm was throbbing with pain.
"Fuck, how am I gonna beat him? He's been training all this time without me. He's been designed to kill god he's gonna kill me look at his face it's not right it's like a mask he's having too much fun he's angry oh Bill what's happened?" Gabe thought.
Bill had stopped though. He knew what to do next, what his ace in the hole was. This fight would be over in an instant and he could take Gabe back with him, have his memory erased, start again, make him his partner, and go on as if this had never happened. Yes, that would be best. Better through force and force of will than anything. If Gabe wouldn't see things his way, he would have to inflict those view on him like lashes.
He thought then about Engelmacht. The woman, that woman, was such a disgrace. He had read about the things she had done. Sexually abusing she the Type 2 until it committed suicide, in and of itself heinous ethically, and against one of his brethren no less. Her terrible design modifications to the Type 3, attempting to enhance its want of physical contact, which only resulted in making it a psychopathic killer. She was hardly fit to be called a scientist and yet she still roamed about the Underground like a mouse with no hope of finding the exit to a maze. She was a hold over, from an era that she herself destroyed. It was only through the activation of the Type 6 that she even could hope to keep her position. Saving Gabe might help her position, he reflected, but that transgression would be worth it to regain his friend. Bill smiled, waiting for Gabe to make his next move.
Gabe dropped, and flew towards Bill in a sprint. Bill retracted his arm and held his hands to his side, inviting Gabe to him. When Gabe was in range, Bill's hand vanished behind his back, and in a moment Gabe was in blinding pain.
Time slowed down. Gabe could see red flying across everything. His clothes, his face, all across Bill. Bill's face was aglow with a smile. Gabe tumbled over something, skidding across the floor, spreading his gore. He screamed out in agony, clutching his shoulder. The blade had come from nowhere, and the stroke had been precise. Bill had cut off Gabe's left arm.
It was bleeding out on the floor behind him, not that he cared about that. His stump was squirting blood all over the white white hallway. Attempting to prop himself up, hand slipped from under him and he fell face first into the tile. Gabe moaned in pain.
"You see how easy it was to reduce you to this? This is our power. We can make it so no one ever has to feel what you are feeling again. It's all about distributing power. The Underground will make everyone equal, and then things like this wont happen anymore." Bill said. In his hand he held a thin sword with a strange bulb coming off of the hilt. The blade itself looked like a long flat rectangle.
Something ruptured and burst in Gabe's shoulder. He yelled as the pistons in his body depressurized and blew his now clotted stump away from him. A clean metal interface remained, his nerves no longer registering the damaged limb. He struggled on the ground in the pool he had created, slipping on the thick rapidly cooling liquid. He finally got to his feet, unconsciously holding his shoulder where has arm had just been.
"What's wrong with you... are you crazy?" Gabe said.
Bill shook his head and his smile grew. Gabe, in the back of his mind, recalled the smile of a woman, moments before the world went black.
This place, he realized, the Underground, it warped people's minds. Cut off from reality, from civilization, these people were rotting. Their hopes and dreams grew in the dark, moldy and unhealthy. Bill, Kathryn, the woman in his memory, all of them had something wrong. Was it the place that had done it? Or was it only people like them that would appear here? Gabe couldn't make a decision about that, but more and more his choice to leave seemed to be the right one.
How could he get past Bill?
Gabe didn't hesitate. He grabbed his stump and threw it full speed. Bill brought up his prosthetic to block it but the force of the impact of the body part against his metal weapon covered his face with blood. He spit the coppery tasting substance out of his mouth and found Gabe already on him. Gabe pressed his shoulder up into Bill's jaw, smashing his teeth together. His boot came down and slammed his heal on Bill's toes, preventing the other BioSuits from falling away from the blow. Then Gabe's fist landed in Bill's gut. Bill was stunned, so Gabe dropped back and slammed his knee into Bill's groin. Bill yelped and fell to his knees, and Gabe kneed him again in the face. He felt Bill's nose shatter against him, and his already bloody jeans freshly warmed with the red life source.
"Goodbye Bill." Gabe said. He turned to leave and felt something tear through his torso. It burned white hot like he had laid on a stove. He head twisted round to see Bill, face bloody and smashed, prosthetic claw extended. Bill's metal hand had embedded itself in the flesh of his back. Immediately Gabe could tell that some of his ribs were broken but worse than that, Bill must have been at least 4 inches deep into his body. The claw twitched and Gabe screamed.
Bill used Gabe's weight to pull himself off the floor. He tore his hand out of the one armed man's back, yet more gore splattering across the wall. Gabe collapsed.
Bill began to beat Gabe. He was savage. The intent wasn't to kill him, merely hurt him. Bill wanted to hurt Gabe badly. He pummeled Gabe's face, smashing it with the butt of his blade. He kicked him in the side, and then would slash him open, centimeter deep cuts that only served to enhance his pain. Gabe writhed on the floor. Bill's face remained cold and passive then, no longer a hint of enjoyment, or righteousness. It was only empty, necessary violence to him.
Gabe screamed out, twitching with each approaching attack. His heart began to beat harder and harder, and his insides tensed and fluxed in terror.
There was a shriek. The whole of the world went white as the sound became louder and louder. Gabe's head split open.
---
Bill was dead. His body parts were strewn across that crimson hallway. His face was smashed in, his chest collapsed, and his limbs had been severed violently. Torn free, not cut.
Nothing was white. The color was red, red everywhere. Gabe's clothes were tattered, and he was covered in the same sickly color as the rest of the hallway. Whether it was Bill's or his own he could not tell.
He retched. He had killed his best friend. What had happened? What in God's name had he done.
Engelmacht sat sullen in the corner, her tears had burrowed through the dried and flaking spray on her face.
"You're gone Gabe. No more Gabe. Fly fly away Glitch." She said.
Gabe looked at her, and looked at Bill's corpse. Near his foot Gabe saw the sword Bill had used. He took it into his hand, looking at the strange thing.
"It's a blocksaber. If you hit the button on the side the blade will retract in and you only have to carry the hilt." Engelmacht said. She got unsteadily to her feet, and walked over to where Bill's unattached prosthetic lay. It had been pulled with the shoulder still attached to it. She pressed something and the chunk of meat fell away, leaving the prosthetic mostly intact. She gave it to Gabe.
"For your arm. You'll need it. You can shift the position of the thumb so it feels right on your left side." She said. Her voice remained emotionless.
Gabe took the arm and attached it to the metal shoulder socket that his own now amputated arm had occupied earlier. Small pistons sealed in and suddenly he could feel the metal arm as if it were his own.
"I'm... going to go now." He said to her.
She stepped forward and pressed her lips against his. She kissed him deeply and finally he kissed her back. She slipped something into his pocket.
"This will let you get to the surface using the elevator up the hall. Leave the city right away," she paused, then said, "It was the virus system that did it. If you live your life they way you want to, you wont need to ever worry about it again."
"Kathryn..." Gabe said. He looked divided, but nodded. He kissed her once more and then ran.
---
The cameras in the hallway returned to life after Gabe had left. The body of William Sullivan was found soon after.
(NOTE: This is the oldest of the chapters I've written, that is, it is the only 1 of the first 4 that was not rewritten when I began writing again. That said, there are things in it that do not match up as well with older and newer chapters, but it's still important, no skipping!)
He sat there, tapping his toe along to some half forgotten melody in his head. That was about all he could do in his situation. It wasn't like he could snap his fingers or clap along or slap his thighs.
Years of false promises and misdeeds had earned the BioSuit known as William this cage of his. It was a cozy little number, concrete walls with bars submerged deep in them for good measure. The tiny scrap of light that did filter his gray walled cage managed to miraculously shine right in the eyes of the would-be prisoner.
Not that he was a prisoner in the traditional sense; When it came to the Underground, very little of what went on could be labeled as 'traditional'. He would be kept locked down and prone until they needed him. This was the way of things. This was his life. Sit, stand, maim, sit. Repeat. They would keep him here until they needed his indispensable services.
When one's existence and purpose in life becomes inevitability, life becomes a one way street with no side roads.
He would destroy anything that got close to him. When his rage was unbound, he was unstoppable. He acted without logic, or at very least, he acted beyond any normal person's logic. There was no sickening coldness to his actions. If anything, it was the raw fury of his logic that got to them. Blood everywhere. The screams... would follow a normal man to his death.
Afterward, he would be returned. They had the finger on his button, and if there was anything he feared, it would be an early demise.
"Oh... I weep for myself. I shed tears from the blackest of black eyes for my poor bereaved creators, who would do such a thing to their humble servant,"
Bill had taken to melodrama in recent months. It passed the time, finding flowery ways to say life was shit. This was a new development. He had not been like this, before.
"Quit your whining. It's your own fault you're in there, monster." A particularly disgruntled employee yelled. He was one of the many who had the misfortune of keeping watch over the captive BioSuit.
"How so, good sir? Is it not the fault of my creators who, not only put me where I am, but made me as I am and forbade me the ability to change? Is that in itself not worse than any crime I could commit?"
The guard responded eloquently by kicking the cell, succeeding only in stubbing his toe against the hard metal of his steel toed boot when it met the concrete. It made a dull thump that was hardly recognizable by the prisoner.
"What good will that do you, my dearest friend?" Bill prodded at the man. His eyes glinted in the light that shined onto them.
Those black, black eyes. Always watching, waiting.
"Monster..."
----
The machine that dominated bulk of the room roared with activity, bathing it in red light. Very soon though there was a relative silence: only the working of simple electronics and the deceleration of gears and wheels.
Life poured into a vessel. What is a BioSuit but the container for an intelligence? It was a tool for the domination of the world, the domestication of man. Utilize man's greatest strength: Science coupled with imagination and raw desperation. Use the engine of one's destruction as the machine that would advance humanity into Eden. This was one of the artificial beings that would shape society into the perfection that Apath wanted.
Tubes and wires and pistons all disconnected themselves and sunk back into the Cradle Under the cold glare of Dr. Hughes, on June 16th 1994, the TestType 07 woke to the world.
---
"My name is William Sullivan."
The blond boy winked.
"But you can call me Bill."
A week had passed since Gabe's victory on the battlefield. In the immediate aftermath, the young BioSuit had refused to talk to Kathryn, absolutely furious but unable to vent his frustrations.
She had warned him. She had said, "Are you sure?” He shouldn't blame her at all.
Like humans, BioSuits are not always rational beings. It's much easier to project guilt than to blame one's self.
He had since calmed down. There was still a tension in the air, the sort that's so thick that you can't breach it for fear of making things worse, but like all things time would erase this particular unease.
The blond boy, Bill, took a seat next to Kathryn. Her face was a mixture of disgust and hatred that Gabe did not quite pick up on.
Even with the tension, and the unspoken claim to blame and guilt that they both had, they still managed to grasp onto the small part of normalcy in their lives. Wake, work, eat. The part that crossed paths for the two of them was the eating part, and thus they were eating together. Lunch in the cafeteria. Same as it ever was.
"Hello,” He looked from the unresponsive Engelmacht to Gabe.
"Hello." Bill said again to the other member of the table.
"Hi..."
Gabe looked at the young man. He looked at his blond hair, at his pretty face. All he could see from his side of the table was a black turtleneck that clung to him, but somehow Gabe imagined the boy was wearing slacks.
Gabe glanced at Engelmacht, who continued to pretend neither of them was there.
"Uhm, it's good to meet you. My name is Gli--"
Gabe stumbled over his own name and blushed under Bill's amused gaze.
"Gabe. My name is Gabe."
Bill's arm, like it was a million miles long, extended over that wide wide expanse. All sorts of borders were crossed; Engelmacht looked like she had just been scandalized by him.
Gabe reached out too, his arm traveling the long distance to meet Bill's hand.
They shook.
Bill's powder blue eyes met Gabe's emerald green ones.
"Lets be good friends."
---
The time spent with Bill seemed to melt away like butter and Gabe found himself wondering how he could have lived before. It was as if he had a second life, far divorced from the one he had spent with Engelmacht.
As soon as Bill had appeared, Engelmacht changed. Before she was a silly, blushing woman. She fawned over glitch like some sort of over-attached girlfriend.
"How are you doing?"
"Do you like your food?"
"Let me fix your shirt..."
What was she to Gabe, and what was Gabe to her?
Since then, she had not been around, much less than before at least. At any given time when Gabe was not with Bill, Engelmacht probably wasn't there. If Bill was with him, the doctor definitely wasn't there.
"She's like a ghost. I wonder if I pissed her off somehow..."
The truth of the matter was, even if he had, he probably wouldn't care. The times he had with Bill were full of adventure and merriment.
"So, you're like me?"
Bill jumped up on the ledge and sat, facing the digital sun. They were inside the VR simulator.
"Yep, I'm like you. I'm a BioSuit, the Type 07. Designed by Dr. Hughes, I'm the last of the ProtoTypes."
Gabe looked up at the younger boy and couldn't help but feel awed. Gabe's own birth had been bloody and confusing, but Bill knew exactly what was going on.
"I'm going to be the strongest fighter the Underground has. They'll have no choice but to use me. Even when they hit full production, I’ll make sure I'm their go-to guy."
There was very little about the Underground that Gabe knew. Their goals and aspirations were a mystery to him. The sum of his knowledge was that they built him, and they built him for a reason. Up until now, he was still clueless as to what that reason was.
"Hey Gabe?"
In slow motion the purple haired boy turned to face the questioner, his friend. His innocent green eyes blinked and his pupils danced around as he took Bill in, absorbing the features of his face. The prominent but soft jaw line, a perfect Aryan nose; Bills big blue eyes and feathery blond hair.
"What is it?"
Bill’s brilliant eyes stood wide open and unfocused.
“What do you want to do in this world of ours?
“Our world?” Gabe was confused
“This, the world of our people. We were created to lead them into the next stage. We’re supposed to control them, to stop their base instincts and show them the right way. Force them to be what they’ve always been capable.”
Gabe’s eyebrows dipped inward as he frowned.
“If they’re forced… have they accomplished anything? What’s the point of forcing people to do something they don’t want?”
Bill didn’t smile, nor did he frown. He continued on in his melodious low voice.
“They want to because we are here. Someone wanted it or we wouldn’t be created. If we wait too long, then their species will be held back by the worst of them. We’re the culling song, we’re the special ones who spurn forward their existence.”
“But do we have the right…?”
“You don’t know them like I do, Gabe.”
Bill jumped from his perch, and kissed Gabe on the forehead. He grasped Gabe's arms in his hands.
“They're not all like Kathryn, and they’re certainly not like me.”
Gabe looked at the hands clutching his arms.
“I’ll have to decide for myself, Bill…”
Bill blinked.
"I love you." Bill said.
Gabe stared straight ahead, unbelieving.
Bill turned back towards the solar representation.
"Together, we'll defeat everyone who stands in our way. We’ll take over like our genes instruct us to. Will you follow me, Gabe? Will you help me build the new world we were made for?"
Colors exploded before Gabe's eyes, and the simulation disappeared.
---
"I hate him."
Blood dripped from her lips.
"I hate him."
It traveled to her chin and then dripped onto her white white white labcoat.
"I hate him."
Her teeth sunk into her thumb.
"He took my baby away."
Eyes wide, unfocused, jumping.
"He took my lover away."
A quarter inch deep.
"He took my new LIFE."
She screamed.
She screamed some more. She screamed and screamed and screamed. She screamed until her throat was hoarse. Screamed until it was raw. She began to cough up flecks of blood.
Her mouth was slick with copper.
Then, silence. Breath in. Breath out. Calm.
She picked up the coffee table and flung it by the leg. It impacted and broke against the wall
"Don't leave me!"
She flung dishes, theey shattered against the door.
"Don't abandon me!"
Slivers of wood stuck in her knuckles as she pummeled furniture.
Silence. Breath in. Breath out.
"I’ll make you…. I’ll make you love me.”
Her eyes had no connection to reality.
“I’ll make you love me Gabriel.”
---
The new world we were made for. Is that what this was all about? Gabe didn’t know very much, but he was beginning to get a really bad feeling, crawling through his guts. The elation he had heard when Bill spoke the words “I love you,” slowly retreated to bottom of him when he realized what he might intend. Gabe didn’t know the world. He didn’t know what was out there. But “take over” was “take over,” and build sounded a hell of a lot like rebuild to him.
There was an echo, in the back of his head, something about BioSuits and the wave of the future. The world, rid of the people who had harmed his kind, but the screeching pain that sliced through his brain that followed those echoes was enough to drown them out.
Kathryn was now there. She looked at his face, but not at him. She looked through him. He was not there. Her eyes seemed to dilate and the corners of her mouth twitched up and down.
“Hello Dr. Kathryn.”
Dr. Kathryn said hello back.
“How are you, Dr. Kathryn?”
Dr. Kathryn was just fine, thank you.
Gabe stared straight at her.
It was several days after the simulation with Bill. Gabe had not seen Bill since then. It was actually the first time he had seen Kathryn in weeks.
Now she stood in his doorway, completely disconnected from reality, leaving Gabe unsettled.
“Kathryn… is there anything I can do for you?”
Kathryn twitched and nodded once, stepping into the room. Then she nodded again, paused, and once more dipped her head in assent.
“Yes… yes, there is something you can do for me… oh yes I think there is.”
Gabe frowned deeply and took a step back. Kathryn overtook his retreat and smashed her mouth against him. Her tongue darted out and probed his mouth, desperately searching. Without any sort of legitimate reaction he could make, Gabe flinched and lost his balance, falling to the floor. Kathryn clung to him with brute force, refusing to allow her lips to become detached from his.
Finally Gabe regained his senses and twisted his head away.
“What the hell are you doing?” He yelled, her face still centimeters from his own
“Oh Gabe it’s so beautiful we can have sex all day and never worry about children. I’ll wait on you hand and foot, just your private servant I’ll make you so happy don’t you see you don’t need anyone else! I’m all you’ll ever need, I’ll take care of your every fantasy!”
She reared up and tore her blouse open, her breasts falling out. She grabbed them and pressed them into Gabe’s face.
“Aren’t they wonderful?
Gabe’s mind and body were suddenly doing battle. He knew this was insanity but he was fully aware that a gorgeous woman was practically begging to have sex with him. Somehow, his good sense won out and he managed to force her off of him, careful to avoid touching the rapidly increasing amount of exposed skin on her body. He clamored to his feet, slamming against the wall in his hurry to keep his back from being turned to her.
“Eng-Kathryn?! What’s gotten into you!” Gabe had his hands slightly raised, in case he needed to catch her, but she seemed as though she wouldn’t be taking herself from the floor for the moment.
“Why… why can’t you just love me? I’d give you everything you want… Anything any man could want…” Her hair fell over her eyes as she half lay half sat on the floor, crying softly.
Gabe’s expression remained frozen for a moment, unable to process. With a sigh and a shake of his head his posture softened and he lowered his hands to his sides. For an instant he considered picking her off the floor but he was too frightened to get close to the woman again.
“I don’t even know what I want… so how could you give it to me?” He said.
"Wait, please!"
Kathryn scrambled up to him on hands and knees, clutching herself close to his leg. Gabe froze, his throat tightening. Kathryn's tears soaked through his jeans, moistening his leg. With stubborn effort, he managed to pull himself away.
Gabe opened the door and stepped out of the room. He didn't look back.
----
From down the long white hallway Bill saw Gabe exit his room in a hurry. He increased his own pace to catch up. The door had already sealed by the time he passed it, and the soft sobs of Engelmacht just barely penetrated the thick plastic door.
Gabe managed to evade Bill, leaving the blond haired man standing confused at the end of an empty hallway.
---
Gabe didn't know where to turn and finally found his way to the cafeteria. Sitting behind a pillar opposite the entrance, Gabe hoped to avoid any stray eyes. The few people who were in the room avoiding looking at him, like usual, so he felt alone, which was exactly what he wanted at that moment. Men and woman in white lab coats, all in a row, moving their hands from plate to mouth, plate to mouth, over and over again. Gabe had no appetite, and the mechanical action suddenly seemed repulsive.
"Who are these people, these scientists. What is the point of all this? Work and eat and then what?" He asked himself quietly.
Their faces, all of them, might have not have even existed, and Gabe would not have been able to tell the difference. They were completely ambiguous. None of them had a recognizable feature.
"I shouldn't be here. This place, nothing in it makes sense. There is no meaning here."
He sat thinking for over an hour, watching the white coated creatures go about their lives. He needed to move around, burn up some energy. He decided to go to the training center and break a bit of a sweat, and hopefully clear his mind of his worries.
He pressed his palms against his eyes, then got to his feet.
"Where is Bill?"
---
"You stupid woman. What are you doing down there? It's pathetic. Did you really think someone like you could convince him to stoop down to your level?"
Engelmacht stared with iron eyes at the dented door frame. Her face was still slick with her own tears but now could have been carved from stone. Her teeth ground loudly in her own mouth.
"I don't have to listen anything an incomplete freak like you might say." She spat.
Bill's eyes flashed with rage. He lunged forward with his arm cocked and back handed her across the face. She flew back, landing sprawled on the floor. Quickly her face and eye began to swell. Her mouth hung open, and she sat shaking in fear. Slowly recovering, she bite her tongue to choke back a bitter remark.
"Where did Gabe go?" Bill said, looking down at Engelmacht with cold blue eyes. His face was entirely calm now, high up above. Superior.
Engelmacht paused before answering.
"I don't know," her lips slid down into a sneer, "he left in a hurry."
Bill barked out a harsh, mean laugh.
"Oh I'm sure he did. Nothing like filth to offend the new upper class. But I must thank you, I suppose with out you he might never have been created. You and humanity have my thanks, gratitude from the bottom of my heart, for the depth of your arrogance."
His grin was savage.
"You played god just long enough for your creation to begin to topple you." he said.
He spun on his heel and exited the room. His right hand twitched agitatedly, as if it wanted to grab something just out of reach.
"Gabe... what's going to happen?" Engelmacht said.
---
Gabe had only managed to pummel the punching bag for a few minutes before Bill walked in. His face looking chipper but his eyes were decidedly dark, giving him a dsiticntly off balance appearance. Gabe wiped his face of sweat, and watched as Bill approached. He seemed remarkably intent on something.
"Gabe. I've been looking for you." Bill said. Gabe turned to face Bill and saw his hand moving erratically.
"Something up?" He kept his eyes from glancing at the movement from the corner of his eyes.
Bill shrugged "I want to know something, Gabe. I want to know what you think of the mission."
Glitch shook his head, "I'm really not sure about that mission, but more than that I'm not happy here. I don't feel like I belong. I can't see the purpose to all this, to them, to us. It's all a blur, a swirl of pointlessness. It's like we are bound against our will to this place, but no one has a will anymore so it doesn't matter. No one is resisting." He said.
Bill was obviously becoming more agitated "No, it can't be like that. We're supposed to be together, Gabe, partners, bringing in the new world, the revolution. They don't know what's good for themselves. Even our creators, they have no idea what the truth is. Soon they will unleash us though, and any who would try to hold us back are holding nature back. We are nature and beyond nature, we are the next stage in evolution. We cannot let them be held back. You have to help, you can't be one of them Gabe. You have to! We need to establish this new world so everyone can be saved. Can't you see that we're the only ones who can do this?"
Gabe sat passively, his face betraying nothing. Inside there were no words, only a growing sense of panic. There was a sense that he was being used, or would be used for something terrible. The idea that his purpose might be decided without his consent made his insides churn and he struggled not to scream out his indignation.
"Bill, I'm leaving this place. I'm not a revolutionary. That's not my life. That's not what I want." Gabe said.
"What do you want?" Bill's eyes were sad and dark.
"I don't know... but I know it's not that." Gabe replied.
Bill remained silent. They stood in this abusive, foreboding silence for several moments before Gabe spoke again.
"I can't dedicate myself to the changing of a people I've never met. These people here, they aren't humans. They are just machines in white. We're more human than they are."
Bill's mouth twitched at the word "human."
They stood silently once again, both waiting for the other to speak.
"Goodbye, Bill." Gabe said.
Gabe left. Bill cried.
---
He needed to leave, now if he could help it. He was reasonably sure that Bill wouldn't turn him in immediately, if at all, and the same he felt was true of Engelmacht, but in spurning both he was afraid that one might impede his escape. As worried as he was that Engelmacht might still be in his room, he needed to gather the few things he owned before leaving.
The door to his room was open, attempting to close against the damage that had been done to it and failing eternally. Engelmacht was gone, however, so that was a bit of a relief.
He fished through his things. There really was very little that he had to his name, but he dressed himself in the uniform they had provided for him and looked into a mirror.
"My eyes... they seem sad. Here's hoping we can change that." He grinned at his own smile in the mirror. The fuzzy purple hair, strong nose, green half coat and slacks... they formed the image that was himself. He added that smile to his internal image.
"I'm going to fight to make that smile stick."
He bid goodbye to his room, to his life, and left it.
---
There was an elevator, he knew, that went to the surface. He planned to escape through the top of the elevator and climb until he was out of the Underground. It wasn't a terribly involved or thought out plan but it was the best he had and he needed to run with it. Not much more to it than that, he figured. On the way, he found himself face to face with Bill and Engelmacht. They were arguing.
"He's going to leave, you've scared him off. You stupid damn woman!" Bill smacked Engelmacht across the face, who took the impact in stride, rearing back and spiting in Bill face.
"You idiot. Have you any idea what you're really doing? They'll never use you. When they begin production they will throw you away and build a new generation of command units. You'll be lucky to experience another year of functionality." She said while bracing herself for another blow. In the process she noticed Gabe standing there.
"Gabe!" she exclaimed.
Gabe walked up to the two, irritated.
"What the hell is this?" He turned to Bill, furious, and shoved his shoulder, "What the fuck? Why the hell did you hit her?"
Bill sneered, "She's a stupid fucking woman. She has no intention of improving humanity. She's just trying to cool her soaking hot loins. A technophile, a pervert of epic quality. She built the demons that will remake humanity to satiated her carnal urges."
He barked a laugh.
"How filthy."
Kathryn flushed crimson but remain behind Gabe's back, protected.
"Bill. Why do you have a prosthetic?" Gabe asked, face unaffected.
Bill's right arm was no longer a normal arm but a long tubular machination, his hand, still twitching, now a claw. It was dangerous.
"Oh, I think I might need it. That is to say, I don't think you'll be leaving. If you try and go, I will stop you. With my own hand I will prevent you from falling into the laps of our enemies." Bill said.
"That's bull. I'm not going out there to help anyone, I just wanna live my life, see what the point is. I'm not going to do anything. Bill, let me go." Gabe said.
Engelmacht grabbed Gabe's arm "No, please don't go! You don't have to fight, I can make you a home here, carve out an existence for you and I! We can be happy. There's nothing but pain and death outside. You'll regret it... please...! They'll destroy the outside world, Bill and the others, they'll kill them all!"
"Shut up!" Bill's claw snaked out and grabbed Engelmacht by the head, lifting her off the ground then throwing her violently against a wall. She slumped, unconscious and badly injured.
"Fool, as if you would eve--" Bill was cut off as Gabe slammed his fist against in the blond haired man's face, flipping the man at breakneck speed into the ground. Blood splattered against the tilled floor. Slowly, Bill rose back to his feet, jaw unhinged, eyes dancing.
"Don't you fucking touch her like that. She's not innocent, but you don't have any right to hurt her." Gabe said, fist still clenched.
Bill wiped his mouth on his sleeve. His jaw bone was cracked, and hung lower than it should. He propped it back into place and scowled.
"Now let me leave, and don't ever touch her again." Gabe said.
Bill mouthed one word.
"No."
---
Bill swung his claw around, wiping it into Gabe's left arm. Gabe rolled with the blow and from a sliding crouch grabbed onto the flying and extended prosthetic and swung over it. He planted his feet and charged Bill, leaping forward with a spin, and kicking out at Bill's legs. Bill jumped over the blow and landed on his left hand, pushing off the floor and back into the air. He landed and stepping around used his inertia to swing his claw at Gabe again. Coming higher this time, Gabe bent backwards to avoid the blow and then flung himself forward, letting loose a punch into Bill's midsection. Bill took the blow but grabbed Gabe's arm with his left, and elbowed his forearm with the free prosthetic. Gabe yelled out as the metal bruised his extended limb. He folded himself up and then kicked out, slamming his boots into Bill's thighs, throwing his grip off of Gabe's arm.
Gabe cradled his right arm in his hand; Bill had gouged deep gashes into it with his fingertips as Gabe pulled away. He charged again, leaping completely over Bill's next prosthetic attack.
Bill smirked, having anticipated that. He changed the course of his arm on the fly and whipped it straight up into the air, catching Gabe in the leg and sending him into a spin. Bill changed the course once more and raked his claws across Gabe's back before the air born man was able to return to the ground and regain his footing.
Keeping his back to the wall he breathed deep; his lower back was bleeding from where Bill had slashed him and his arm was throbbing with pain.
"Fuck, how am I gonna beat him? He's been training all this time without me. He's been designed to kill god he's gonna kill me look at his face it's not right it's like a mask he's having too much fun he's angry oh Bill what's happened?" Gabe thought.
Bill had stopped though. He knew what to do next, what his ace in the hole was. This fight would be over in an instant and he could take Gabe back with him, have his memory erased, start again, make him his partner, and go on as if this had never happened. Yes, that would be best. Better through force and force of will than anything. If Gabe wouldn't see things his way, he would have to inflict those view on him like lashes.
He thought then about Engelmacht. The woman, that woman, was such a disgrace. He had read about the things she had done. Sexually abusing she the Type 2 until it committed suicide, in and of itself heinous ethically, and against one of his brethren no less. Her terrible design modifications to the Type 3, attempting to enhance its want of physical contact, which only resulted in making it a psychopathic killer. She was hardly fit to be called a scientist and yet she still roamed about the Underground like a mouse with no hope of finding the exit to a maze. She was a hold over, from an era that she herself destroyed. It was only through the activation of the Type 6 that she even could hope to keep her position. Saving Gabe might help her position, he reflected, but that transgression would be worth it to regain his friend. Bill smiled, waiting for Gabe to make his next move.
Gabe dropped, and flew towards Bill in a sprint. Bill retracted his arm and held his hands to his side, inviting Gabe to him. When Gabe was in range, Bill's hand vanished behind his back, and in a moment Gabe was in blinding pain.
Time slowed down. Gabe could see red flying across everything. His clothes, his face, all across Bill. Bill's face was aglow with a smile. Gabe tumbled over something, skidding across the floor, spreading his gore. He screamed out in agony, clutching his shoulder. The blade had come from nowhere, and the stroke had been precise. Bill had cut off Gabe's left arm.
It was bleeding out on the floor behind him, not that he cared about that. His stump was squirting blood all over the white white hallway. Attempting to prop himself up, hand slipped from under him and he fell face first into the tile. Gabe moaned in pain.
"You see how easy it was to reduce you to this? This is our power. We can make it so no one ever has to feel what you are feeling again. It's all about distributing power. The Underground will make everyone equal, and then things like this wont happen anymore." Bill said. In his hand he held a thin sword with a strange bulb coming off of the hilt. The blade itself looked like a long flat rectangle.
Something ruptured and burst in Gabe's shoulder. He yelled as the pistons in his body depressurized and blew his now clotted stump away from him. A clean metal interface remained, his nerves no longer registering the damaged limb. He struggled on the ground in the pool he had created, slipping on the thick rapidly cooling liquid. He finally got to his feet, unconsciously holding his shoulder where has arm had just been.
"What's wrong with you... are you crazy?" Gabe said.
Bill shook his head and his smile grew. Gabe, in the back of his mind, recalled the smile of a woman, moments before the world went black.
This place, he realized, the Underground, it warped people's minds. Cut off from reality, from civilization, these people were rotting. Their hopes and dreams grew in the dark, moldy and unhealthy. Bill, Kathryn, the woman in his memory, all of them had something wrong. Was it the place that had done it? Or was it only people like them that would appear here? Gabe couldn't make a decision about that, but more and more his choice to leave seemed to be the right one.
How could he get past Bill?
Gabe didn't hesitate. He grabbed his stump and threw it full speed. Bill brought up his prosthetic to block it but the force of the impact of the body part against his metal weapon covered his face with blood. He spit the coppery tasting substance out of his mouth and found Gabe already on him. Gabe pressed his shoulder up into Bill's jaw, smashing his teeth together. His boot came down and slammed his heal on Bill's toes, preventing the other BioSuits from falling away from the blow. Then Gabe's fist landed in Bill's gut. Bill was stunned, so Gabe dropped back and slammed his knee into Bill's groin. Bill yelped and fell to his knees, and Gabe kneed him again in the face. He felt Bill's nose shatter against him, and his already bloody jeans freshly warmed with the red life source.
"Goodbye Bill." Gabe said. He turned to leave and felt something tear through his torso. It burned white hot like he had laid on a stove. He head twisted round to see Bill, face bloody and smashed, prosthetic claw extended. Bill's metal hand had embedded itself in the flesh of his back. Immediately Gabe could tell that some of his ribs were broken but worse than that, Bill must have been at least 4 inches deep into his body. The claw twitched and Gabe screamed.
Bill used Gabe's weight to pull himself off the floor. He tore his hand out of the one armed man's back, yet more gore splattering across the wall. Gabe collapsed.
Bill began to beat Gabe. He was savage. The intent wasn't to kill him, merely hurt him. Bill wanted to hurt Gabe badly. He pummeled Gabe's face, smashing it with the butt of his blade. He kicked him in the side, and then would slash him open, centimeter deep cuts that only served to enhance his pain. Gabe writhed on the floor. Bill's face remained cold and passive then, no longer a hint of enjoyment, or righteousness. It was only empty, necessary violence to him.
Gabe screamed out, twitching with each approaching attack. His heart began to beat harder and harder, and his insides tensed and fluxed in terror.
There was a shriek. The whole of the world went white as the sound became louder and louder. Gabe's head split open.
---
Bill was dead. His body parts were strewn across that crimson hallway. His face was smashed in, his chest collapsed, and his limbs had been severed violently. Torn free, not cut.
Nothing was white. The color was red, red everywhere. Gabe's clothes were tattered, and he was covered in the same sickly color as the rest of the hallway. Whether it was Bill's or his own he could not tell.
He retched. He had killed his best friend. What had happened? What in God's name had he done.
Engelmacht sat sullen in the corner, her tears had burrowed through the dried and flaking spray on her face.
"You're gone Gabe. No more Gabe. Fly fly away Glitch." She said.
Gabe looked at her, and looked at Bill's corpse. Near his foot Gabe saw the sword Bill had used. He took it into his hand, looking at the strange thing.
"It's a blocksaber. If you hit the button on the side the blade will retract in and you only have to carry the hilt." Engelmacht said. She got unsteadily to her feet, and walked over to where Bill's unattached prosthetic lay. It had been pulled with the shoulder still attached to it. She pressed something and the chunk of meat fell away, leaving the prosthetic mostly intact. She gave it to Gabe.
"For your arm. You'll need it. You can shift the position of the thumb so it feels right on your left side." She said. Her voice remained emotionless.
Gabe took the arm and attached it to the metal shoulder socket that his own now amputated arm had occupied earlier. Small pistons sealed in and suddenly he could feel the metal arm as if it were his own.
"I'm... going to go now." He said to her.
She stepped forward and pressed her lips against his. She kissed him deeply and finally he kissed her back. She slipped something into his pocket.
"This will let you get to the surface using the elevator up the hall. Leave the city right away," she paused, then said, "It was the virus system that did it. If you live your life they way you want to, you wont need to ever worry about it again."
"Kathryn..." Gabe said. He looked divided, but nodded. He kissed her once more and then ran.
---
The cameras in the hallway returned to life after Gabe had left. The body of William Sullivan was found soon after.