Zero's Return (59 page)

You could
make them sleep,
Twelve-A thought.  It was a thought he’d had more than
once.  Dozens of times.  Hundreds.

But if he killed
them
, why not
everyone
?  The doctors and military personnel
running the project weren’t the only ones who decayed inside.  They weren’t the
only ones who walked around with gaping tears in their beings, scarred by
putrefying wounds they quietly covered with expensive garments, paints,
accessories, and perfumes. 
Everyone
that he had felt was fragmented,
their spirits cracked, bitterness and sickness seeping through the crevices,
settling into their very depths, mixing with the pureness there, staining it,
and eventually leeching their own rancidity outward, lashing out at those
around them.  Everyone was desiccated, running on autopilot, throwing up
facades rather than showing their true natures, lying rather than telling the
truth, hiding rather than give up another ounce of the pureness they managed to
protect within.

The scientists
and soldiers who ran the project of Twelve-A’s creation were simply desperate
people, people who had once harbored hope to free themselves from a tyranny,
people who now quietly overlooked the actual application of their ideas and did
their jobs in mute silence, shielding their souls from the sickness they
witnessed because it was all they could do.  Because, if they didn’t, they
would lose their minds to the madness of the world.  The madness they had
helped to create, to perpetuate.

I could put
them all to sleep
, Twelve-A thought again, tears leaking from the corners
of his eyes, trailing down his cheeks.  It would be easy.  There was so much
pain, so much misery
everywhere
that he didn’t delude himself into any
kind of ‘escape.’  It wouldn’t matter if he fled to a deserted mountaintop in
the furthest reaches of the Arctic, or stranded himself on a lonely island in
the Pacific.  For him, there
was
no escape.  The mental and emotional
ache was always there, filling the back of his mind in a constant, rotten
drone.  Humanity was sick, dying as surely as that man in the desert, too tired
to get up and try and find water, forced into its fate by its own choices.

But if Twelve-A
silenced the half of Earth he could reach, why stop with half the planet?  Why
not find a way to reach the continents on the other side and slip the
other
half into that final peace?  And once he did that, why stop at Humanity?  He
had to strain and struggle to pick up the echoes from other planets, but the
echoes he had found told of the same miseries, the same hurts, the same
conflicts, the same cruelties, just in different forms.  If he decided to bring
peace to Humanity, why not board one of the ships and move on to the Ooreiki,
who were forced to fight and kill when their very souls screamed for peace? 
Why not end the terrors of the Dhasha, who were trained at birth to disregard
the feelings of any other species as insignificant meat?  Why not silence the
Jahul, whose empathetic, social natures had been twisted into money-making
greed?  Or the Jreet, who killed their own brothers and sisters in order to
survive to adulthood, only to serve fat, selfish politicians to the death?  Or
the Ueshi, whose short lifespans had twisted their innocent, pleasure-seeking
desires into something dirty, dropping most of them into a drug-induced haze
for the few turns they actually served out their lives?  Or the Huouyt, whose
every thought was one of selfish calculation, who thought nothing of stabbing a
companion in the back in order to make an acceptable gain?

Why stop with
Humans?

That had been
the question that stayed his hand, every time.  If he silenced the planet,
brought peace to his tiny speck in the corner of a single galaxy, why stop
there?  Why not move on, bringing the peace with him?  Why not stop until there
was nothing
but
silence?

Because, it
seemed, in existing, the sentient creatures of the universe had lost
something.  In gaining their sense of self, they had abandoned their connection
to their world.  Of all of the alien minds Twelve-A had brushed thus far, of
the entirety of
Congress
, only the Ayhi seemed to be capable of
maintaining that gentle awareness, that connection to one’s fellow beings…

…and were trod
upon by the others for it.

(Terror.)

The pounding
spasm of nearby fear assaulted him again and Twelve-A pulled himself further
back, desperate to locate it in the cacophony.  Instantly, the barrage of his
immediate surroundings hit him like a slap.

They
didn’t give me the sandwich I ordered.  This is
ham
, not turkey. 
Fuckwads.  I’m not going to tip them next time.  See how they like that.

That
bastard is sitting in my seat. 
I’m
the ranking officer.  It’s
my
seat.
  “Hey, uh, you going to be sitting there long, corporal?” 
That
fuck!  He
snickered
at me.  I need to write a report.  When the captain
gets done with him, he won’t be able to shit for a week!

(Terror.)
 
The fear that had dragged Twelve-A from his sleep was like a siren going off in
the din of mental voices, tugging at his heart, raking his soul.  He recognized
the psychic imprint of the scream and his chest clenched.  Six Six Five.  She
had barely survived the last few culls.  She was older than him by three years,
a lighthouse amidst the tiny motes of the Void.  He had watched her learn,
watched her piece things together, but as of yet, he had not had the courage to
approach her.  He hadn’t wanted to make things worse.  As it was, her tiny
understandings, her unhappy conclusions were only causing her more pain, more
unease, more chances to die for her knowledge.

This time,
though, there was a new quality to the fear.  Something deeper.  Something
overwhelming.  Devastating.  He began wading through the colorful motes of
light surrounding him, seeking Six Six Five’s luminescent pink-green being.

Like fog,
others’ thoughts clouded his path, forcing him to slow, to pick through every
wisp, every nuance of energy.  Unlike Ten-F, who could only see
some
things, Twelve-A could see it
all
; every thought, every fiber that made
up a being, every emotion and passing whim, and it made it that much more
difficult to search for those patterns he sought.  He might as well have been
standing on a beach, searching for a speck of sand.  Or looking at the stars. 
That’s what others’ minds looked like to him.  Stars.

I should link
to her,
Twelve-A realized, somewhat ashamed that he hadn’t yet.  He’d been
afraid of forging that contact only to lose her in a cull, which was just
another way the world could sear his soul.  Thus far, he’d been hiding,
protecting himself, and it was the only reason he hadn’t fallen into the same
madness as Ten-F.  He’d insulated himself from the misery of the world.

Still, Twelve-A
knew he was a coward not to have forged a connection with her, yet.  She, of
all of them, understood something was wrong.  And, like him, she was totally
alone. 
I’ll connect with her,
he decided again, stronger.  After he
did, he could always find her—or feel when she died.

Swallowing hard,
Twelve-A redoubled his efforts to seek her out through the mental blizzard.

Wow, those
automaton kids are freakin’
dangerous
.  I wonder what would happen if
one of them got out.  Man, they’d obliterate everything.  Maybe I should
request a transfer.  Something with a window office.  I hate fluorescent
lights…

I
really
want that new car.  Fucking alien banking assholes and their psychobabble
bullshit.  So what if I have a genetic predisposition towards overspending? 
That’s prejudice.  That’s
illegal
.  Well, if the bastards won’t give me
a loan, I could put it on a credit card.  I have enough credit left to keep
from going over the limit…

He killed
Charlie.  The psychotic ailo killed Charlie.  Oh my God, Charlie, I’m so sorry…

Cheese is
good.  I should eat more cheese…

(Terror.) 
Twelve-A’s
entire body spasmed when he brushed another flood of sickly yellow fear as it washed
outward over the star-studded fog of the ethereal plane.  He quickly turned to
follow it to its source.

That
fucker’s stealing my girl.  I want to stab him in the face…

My truck’s
gonna cost a grand to fix.  Aunt Jess’s wedding ring is worth a grand, and that
doddering old bat would never know it was gone.  She’s going in a home in
January, anyway…

I fucking
hate
Trivial Pursuit
.  I should stop letting them win.  Those lazy,
pampered cows deserve to have their insipid grins scoured from their vapid faces
with a gallon of bleach…

Six Six Five’s
mental cry had again faded in the sickly cacophony surrounding him, her wave
dissolving outward, leaving him nothing to follow.  Frustrated, Twelve-A closed
his eyes and centered himself, drawing inward again, pulling everything towards
him until the strands of his awareness were as close to his body as possible. 
Still, like vibrations down an old-fashioned phone line, the nearest thoughts
continued to assault him.

I’m
hungry.  I wish the Keepers fed me more…

I need to
pee.  I don’t want to get out of bed, but I need to pee…

(Terror.)
 
There it was again, like a strobe light through the darkness.  Twelve-A hurried
to follow it, passing the large yellow mote of Ten-F’s mind as he did.

That
disgusting bitch Molotov needs to die for keeping me down here.  If the cunt
comes back in here while I’m awake, I’m going to kill her, kill her friends,
and peel the skin away from her eyes with my fingernails.  Let
her
see
what it’s like.  I’ll murder all of the scientists for what they’ve done. 
They’ll die begging, just like in the Dark Room.  I’ll make them
afraid
,
too.  I’ll make them
scream
.  Just like they did with all those kids. 
Then I’ll kill everyone else.  They’re just animals, anyway.  They aren’t
actually
thinking
.  They deserve to die.  All of them deserve to die…

Beside her,
other large motes floated in the abyss, though their thoughts were simple,
pleasant.  Of anyone in Congress, only the minds clustered in the cages around
him seemed to be unbroken.  Twelve-A hesitated at these new, ringingly pure
minds, grateful for the reprieve.

I like my
blanket.  It’s warm…

My penis
gets bigger when I play with it.  I wonder if the Keepers would get mad at me
for playing with it…

My water
dish is empty.  I wonder if the Keepers would punish me for drinking out of the
commode…

(TERROR.)

Catching the
direction of the blast, Twelve-A once more focused his senses outward, a
localized push, directing his tendrils of consciousness toward that horrible
wash of terror that had woken him from his dead sleep, that was even then
continuing to increase in strength, like a fire before it went out.

“Doctor,
Ten-F’s drip bag looks like it ran out.  Biorhythms indicate she’s awake.”

Fuck me. 
Who was in charge of meds scheduling last Thursday?  Damn, that was me, wasn’t
it?  I was really tired…did I give her the right dose?  Did I give
any
of them the right dose?  I was still hung over.  God, I hope that shit doesn’t
come down on me.
 “Put her out.  Use the chip—we’re not taking chances with
that crazy bitch.  Then go find whatever incompetent furg installed the IV last
week and fire him.  I don’t tolerate mistakes on my team.”

“Of course,
sir.” 
Asshole.  Everybody knows you went out whoring in Nevada on your
vacation last week.  You were barely conscious when you were scheduling meds.

(TERROR.)

Keeping himself
as contained as possible, Twelve-A hurriedly pushed past the monitoring station
to concentrate his attention on the waves of overwhelming fear emanating from
deeper in the compound.  When he finally found her mind, it was a living wash
of terror, driving shards of it through his core.

He’s
killing me.  I’m getting culled.  Just like Six Two One. 
“Please don’t
kill me.  I’ll be a good soldier.  I swear.  I won’t talk back to Colonel
Codgson again.  I’ll kill the aliens.  Please let me kill the aliens.”

The agony in the
girl’s mental voice scraped at Twelve-A’s core, but despite his original
intent, he still couldn’t bring himself to make the connection.  Like the rest
of them, she was just an experiment.  Expendable.  She was going to die, and
the fewer links he made to those who were going to die, the more he kept to
himself, the more chance he had of surviving the torment of Life intact.

“We don’t
really need you.  We’ve got Twelve-A—whoa!”
 
I can’t believe I got
him to crush that last ice cube.  I
won
!  I’ve been working on that for
a
week
!  I gotta
tell
somebody!
 
“I just made it past
level
ten
.”
 

Still hovering
outside the girl’s mind, Twelve-A felt the reverberations of terror still surrounding
him, now dulled by her shock at the doctor’s total lack of caring.  It was what
Doctor Charles Shaw had
said
, however, that stabbed Twelve-A to the
core, hitting him directly in the heart. 
“We don’t need you.  We have
Twelve-A.”

They don’t
need her…because they have me.

Because he was
their prodigy.  He was what they’d been seeking to create all along.  Something
that could
kill
.  Something that could silence their opposition forever.