A Perfect Machine(66)

Silence. A few coughs. More uncomfortable shuffling.

“Actually, kid–” Kendul said.

“Don’t fucking call me kid,” Marcton said. “Do not.”

Kendul raised both hands, palms out. “Actually, Marcton,” he said, “can I have a private word? My crew can get weapons ready. Your crew can jerk it. Or whatever the fuck they do when they’re not being run down by my Hunters.”

A few people way at the back chuckled, but quickly stifled the sound.

Marcton cocked his head. “Over here, old man.”

The two men broke away from the group, their footfalls like rifle reports in the ensuing silence. Once they were out of earshot, the larger group divided itself into Runners and Hunters, with only the occasional cluster of both – unlikely friendships formed in the heat of battle.

Marcton brought them back to the warehouse’s main office, closed the door behind them.

“Listen, Marcton,” Kendul said, leaning against the doorframe. “This is gonna sound melodramatic, but… we have a secret weapon.”

Marcton barked out a laugh, then another. When he realized Kendul wasn’t joking, he frowned, said, “What, you’re serious?”

Kendul waited a beat, then said, “Adelina.”

Marcton’s frown deepened. His mind scrambled.

“Palermo’s daughter,” Kendul continued when Marcton didn’t respond.

Marcton moved behind the desk, sat down in the office chair – now, he realized distractedly, his office chair. “Yeah, I know the name. And?”

“She’s alive,” Kendul said.

“Like fuck she is.”

“Well then fuck is alive and well, Marcton, ’cause I know exactly where she is, and I might know how to reanimate her body so that–”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, back the fuck up, Kendul,” Marcton said and stood. “What kinda crazy bullshit do you think–”

Kendul moved forward quickly, got right in Marcton’s face, his voice now dropped an octave. “This isn’t bullshit, and you need to shut your fucking hole and listen to what I have to say, you little dickhead. We don’t have time for anything else. It sounds ridiculous. It sounds impossible. I get that. But that day in that house when Adelina… changed… whatever Palermo told you happened, that ain’t what fucking happened, OK? He thinks she died, but she didn’t.” Kendul stepped away from Marcton now, slowly. He dropped his eyes to the floor, raised them back up to Marcton. “She didn’t.”

Marcton’s face clearly showed his confusion. His mouth opened and closed several times, words nearly coming out, but never quite making the leap from thought to speech. Kendul wanted to keep explaining, knew that time was of the essence, but he also knew he had to let Marcton process this information, or nothing else he said would properly filter in.

Marcton sat back down in the chair, looked out the window into the warehouse. His eyes darted from person to person, never settling on any of them. Processing, processing…

“OK,” he finally said. “Let’s say Adelina is alive. She’s one person. How the fuck does that help us?”

Kendul said, “She’s not a person, kid. Not by a long shot. Not any more.”

Marcton let the “kid” remark slide. Kendul’s words hung in the air between them for a moment longer, then Marcton said, “You’re going to have to just fucking say it, man. I am completely lost, and in no mood whatsoever for guessing games. Spit it the fuck out.”

“She’s a machine,” Kendul said. “Well, not entirely, but mostly. About the same as what you describe this… beast as.”

And just in that split-second hesitation before Kendul said “beast,” Marcton had a flash of insight, knew Kendul hadn’t originally intended to use that word. He was about to say something else.

“What were you going to say instead of ‘beast,’ there, Kendul? What do you know that you aren’t saying? I find it very fucking hard to swallow that this is your only secret in this situation.”

Marcton stood again, walked over to Kendul, looked hard at him, watched his eyes. Kendul was good – very good – at schooling his face, but not quite good enough for Marcton. The new leader of the Runners saw it in Kendul’s eyes, saw it as though it were written right on his forehead:

“You know, don’t you? You know what this thing is. Because it’s happened before.” Marcton saw the truth of it plain as day on Kendul’s face. “And it was Adelina. Jesus fucking Christ!”

Kendul knew there was no point in trying to hide it any more. Besides, there was no time for games. Palermo was dead. The whole society was at risk of exposure with Kyllo now rampaging around. “Yeah. Henry Kyllo is the guy’s name,” Kendul said, sagged against the wall near the office window. “We tried to hide it again – just as we tried to hide it when Adelina ascended.”

Marcton was genuinely shocked – but mostly at the first part of Kendul’s little speech; he barely heard the second part. The color drained from his face. “Wait, what!? This? This fucking abomination is ascendance? This is what we become when we reach–”

“Yes!” Kendul shouted. Then: “Yes,” he said again, quieter. He couldn’t look Marcton in the eyes any more. Just stared down at his feet. “We didn’t know what would happen if people found out. We thought it would be over. Everything. Our whole way of life. To be fair, though, we didn’t know – still don’t know – what the final ascension looks like because we stopped it happening in Adelina. Palermo couldn’t bear to lose his daughter, even for something that was supposed to be an honor. We knew it would happen again, but we hoped it wouldn’t be while we were leaders. But it did. And he’s bigger than Adelina was, and certainly more exposed. We thought we could contain it, thought that by the time it happened, we could–”