Mask of Humanity

Peering around the corner, the boy saw dark shapes strewn over the floor, blood on the walls, bits and pieces everywhere.

‘He’s gone,’ whispered Perro, turning back to the others, looking to the big man who was crouched behind him. John met his gaze, gave him a nod. Everyone looked nervous, faces tense and drawn. They’d waited until they felt sure the killer must have gone, but they’d all feared he might still be here. Well, all but one of them, if Karl’s muttered words were to be believed

Perro saw John look to Cait, a tall woman with a bionic arm, and John tilted his head toward the corner. She nodded back. Then they both rose and stepped out past Perro, who slipped into their shadow.

‘Go on, move,’ snarled a voice behind him, and he glanced back to see Karl, holding the Chosen by the back of his shirt, shortsword digging into their prisoner’s back. The young man had his hands raised as he walked forward, grimacing.

The Chosen was only a little older than Perro, who found his eyes meeting the gaze of the other. Marion, that was his name. The killer had called it out. Those eyes were full of pleading. Behind Marion, Karl’s bionic eye spun in its socket, one of the camera lenses twisting to stare at Perro. Perro looked quickly away, keeping close behind John and Cait.

‘Christ,’ muttered Cait, and Perro peered around her.

He swallowed around the lump in his throat. The bodies of the Chosen were thrown about the corridor, blood and bits of… people, everywhere. Many of them had smashed heads and from closer up it was all made horrifying, awfully real. The smell of blood, thick and clinging, burrowed in through his nose and made something rise into the back of his throat.

Perro was holding his breath and trying to keep it in when Cait and John shifted, moving up the stairs, and the sight of someone with half a face, the rest of it just an ugly gaping red mess, came into view. All of a sudden he was bent over, leaning against the wall, throwing up the chunk of sustaining seed fruit he’d had for dinner. Shit. They didn’t have much of the seeds left. He shouldn’t waste them. He tried to wrestle it down but the image of blood everywhere and insides-on-the-outside was still floating in the back of his mind and he bent over again, every muscle tense as he vomited.

He felt a comforting hand on his back. His stomach stopped flexing and he paused, breathing, trying his best to keep his mind empty, shaking his head, wiping his mouth, staring at the wall.

‘You okay?’ came a voice, the owner of the hand

He glanced over to see Azure beside him, peering at him worriedly. He rose quickly, eyes wide.

‘Uh, yeah,’ he said, wiping his mouth with his sleeve, then wincing at the taste of the rotten cloth. ‘I just… must’ve been something I ate.’ He did his best to smile. Crap. He hadn’t seen her behind him. He turned to look down the corridor as though examining the carnage, keeping his eyes carefully towards the ceiling. Just a game, like in VR. That’s all. Nothing to worry about. ‘I mean, this is no big deal for me.’

He snuck a glance back and saw her frowning at him. She snorted and raised her eyebrows. ‘Alright, big man.’ But her pixie-like face gave him a little smile, and Perro’s heart turned over as he grinned back. John and Cait were coming back down the stairs.

‘It’s all clear, he’s not up there,’ said John, and Perro let out a breath of relief.

‘Four… five… six. Six of them,’ he made out Cait’s voice as she came closer, and he and Azure both glanced at her. ‘Six, that guy took out.’ Her eyes moved past to settle on the young Chosen, Marion. ‘Seven if you count the runner.’

‘I don’t,’ grunted Karl, pressing the youth towards the wall.

‘I told you, I didn’t even want to be here!’ said Marion.

‘Shut up, Chosen,’ snarled Karl, pushing him harder into the wall. Perro found himself stepping back. He’d seen Karl like this before, angry and vicious. He licked his lips, suddenly worried about what the man might do, seeing how Karl’s cold eyes were fixed on Marion, how his fist was clenched tight around the grip of his sword.

‘Who the fuck was that guy?’ continued Cait.

‘Someone we don’t want to encounter,’ muttered John. ‘It’ll be night soon, so we’re safe to stay here. The Chosen won’t be sending another group so late, and he won’t be coming back. But tomorrow, we’ll have to move on. Need to find somewhere else to stay, can’t risk either Chosen or... anyone else knowing where we live.’

‘We just found this place!’ moaned Azure from beside Perro, pulling his gaze. Another smile worked its way onto his face. She looked cute, with her face all scrunched up with annoyance.

‘I know,’ said John, shaking his head. He sighed. ‘I know.’

‘You sure he won’t be coming back?’ came a new voice, a tall, slender man with his face creased up like he’d just smelt something bad coming around Karl. Tom, the lawyer. Perro eyed him, certain that the man would have something to say.

‘That guy was crazy,’ said Tom. ‘You can’t predict what someone like that’ll do. We can’t stay here.’

‘We’ve got about twenty minutes to find somewhere new, then,’ said John, nodding to the torch. ‘We can either barricade ourselves up there for one more night, or go search for a new place and hope to find it in the next twenty minutes.’

‘Exactly. Don’t be an idiot, Tom,’ snapped Cait.

The lawyer sneered at her, moving past to poke around at the bodies. Maybe he’ll find a Seed. Perro hoped so. Since Tom had lost his he’d been insufferable.

‘It doesn’t matter, anyway,’ said Karl. ‘It’s just one man. Not even augmented. If he comes back, we can handle him.’

Azure raised her brows. ‘Like these guys handled him?’

Karl snorted. ‘He caught them in an ambush, took out half of them before they could react. Then fought them down the corridor, which is too narrow for more than two of them to take him on at a time,’ he spoke in a lecturing tone. ‘It was well-done, I’ll give him that, but nothing particularly impressive when you remove the strategic element. And from what I saw, the fact he came upon them in surprise then had the narrow corridor… it’s no more than luck. We’ll be staying up in the room. If he comes, just let him walk inside, then we attack from every direction. No problem. Seven against one. Easy.’

‘You can take the lead then,’ said Cait, nodding to him. ‘We’ll trust in you.’

Azure snorted, and Perro couldn’t help but chuckle with her.

‘Yeah? I will,’ said Karl, narrowing his eyes, staring at Cait with his human one. His bionic twisted, turning to Perro and Azure, then away. ‘Anyway, what about this idiot?’ He shoved at the Chosen again, pressing Marion into the wall.

‘I’m sorry,’ mumbled Marion into the stone. ‘I told you, I didn’t wanna be here. I’m not gonna try anything.’

‘We ought to kill him, just to be sure,’ said Karl, tone hard and vicious.

Marion sobbed, and Perro saw his teeth as the young man’s lips drew back in a grimace. ‘Please!’ he yelled.

‘No,’ said John, moving forward, grabbing Karl’s hand around the sword’s grip. The two matched gazes. ‘He’s just a kid,’ said John. ‘In the morning, we’ll let him go.’

‘He’ll go back to the Chosen,’ said Cait. John and Karl looked back at her, John frowning, Karl nodding, and she raised her hands. ‘Just felt I ought to put it out there. I don’t want his blood on my hands neither. But he will just go back to them. If we let him go, we better make sure he doesn’t have any idea where we’ll be heading tomorrow.’

‘I won’t, I won’t tell them anything,’ gasped Marion. ‘I promise, you can trust me. You saved me, from that… from that madman. They’ll want to hunt him down, they won’t care about you. I promise.’

Perro heard a snort and turned his head, saw Azure staring at Marion. She didn’t look convinced. She met his gaze, raised an eyebrow, then he felt a connection.

‘What do you think?’ she asked as he allowed the Link connection, her voice emerging from the tiny speakers in his ears.

‘Well… I dunno. I think Cait’s right. But we can’t kill him, can we? That would be… that’d be wrong.’

She shrugged. ‘It’s tough out here.’

‘It was tough on Earth, too, but we didn’t all kill each other. I don’t know what’s wrong with everyone, now we’re all here… everyone is acting crazy.’

‘It’s the Seeds. You can feel it, don’t you? How important it is. When it was given to me, that… that thing… I don’t know. I just know it’s important. I know if I finish it, something wonderful will happen. I guess a lot of people really want to finish their Seeds. But there’s only one way to do that. And now… well, I guess once people start killing, it gets hard to stop. And then, some people, like that guy… I bet this place is a dream come true for people like him.’

Perro couldn’t help but nod at that. He heard footsteps, and glanced back to spot the last member of their group, trailing behind, breathing a little laboured. Old Ben.

‘Trying to bring about another descent into barbarism, Karl?’ spoke the old man after regaining his breath. ‘Well, here I am again, to inject some civility into matters.’

They all looked to him, silent, waiting. Perro was curious to see what the old man would say. He’d often surprised them with his insight.

Old Ben quirked a smile. ‘Letting the boy go is the best move we can make,’ he said. ‘Tomorrow, when their people come here, they aren’t going to find our bodies. But they’ll be finding their own. They’ll want revenge, and who do you think they’ll assume killed all of these people, if there’s no one alive to tell them the truth, and all they knew is this lot were sent out to capture us?’

Perro shot a glance at Azure and she met his gaze, both of them frowning. Old Ben’s meaning was clear.

‘They’ll think it was us,’ said John, nodding. ‘You’re right.’ He moved to position himself beside Marion, looking at the young man who was still being held against the wall by Karl. John gestured and Karl pulled back slightly, allowing Marion to look up at John, who spoke. ‘If we let you go tomorrow, what’ll you tell the rest of the Chosen?’

‘That it wasn’t you guys, of course,’ said Marion quickly. ‘That it was that guy, that psycho.’

John stared down at the young man. ‘Alright. Looks like you’ll be spending the night with us.’ He glanced over at the rest of them all. ‘Lets head up, sort it out. Need to piece the barricade together and get it back in place before dark. Me and Cait will take anything of use from the… the dead, spare the rest of you the task.’

Karl let up a disgruntled sigh but towed Marion away from the wall, shoving him up the stairs. He held the sword a little lower, looking less inclined to stab Marion in the back with it.

Perro let out a breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding. No more blood would be spilled this night.

Old Ben tramped past him, and as the old man went he winked at Perro, who smiled back.