A Beast with a Smile

Clark passed out soon after we escaped the horde of demons. Archy called them Oscuri. They were what remains of humans after being exposed to a high dosage of Alpha-serum. The things that they kill also turn into the Oscuri, like a disease.

If Clark hadn’t accidentally triggered his powers, we would have all been cursed to the same shadowy fate.

I shivered. The elemental clones disappeared once we were a safe distance away inside the abandoned sewer and Clark fell hard into the disgusting green water. I pulled him out quickly and threw his regular five-year-old body over my shoulder, feeling proud about his bravery.

“There must have been a miniature war down here,” Archy said, holding up a rusty assault rifle.

He disintegrated it to replenish his lost light. The water was a bottomless pit filled with forgotten weapons and armor. The walls were scratched deep with black, long indents. The floor was stained with a thick paint of silver.

“They were probably trying to kill the Oscuri,” I concluded, wanting to separate us from them even more.

The rain had yet to give up; I could hear the thunderous pounding of the storm throughout the sewer.

Anything was better than those terrible shrieks.

Car lights passed by through a drain on the roof in the distance. We were getting closer to the facility and I couldn’t decide which was better, the nest of shadows or the army of trained killers.

Voices rang along the walls as Archy pulled me to the wall under the drain.

“Sir, I have urgent news from the sky watch,” a soldier called nervously as he ran through the rain.

“What is it, Private Jenson? You better not tell me you lost them. I’m in a good mood and it’s a really bad idea to ruin it,” Tyler answered.

Jenson stuttered, trying to format the perfect response, “We found where they landed, sir. The builder’s blood soaked the ground and fragments of his helmet were found around the area, along with the tracks of the abomination twin.”

“And where did they lead?” he asked viciously, as cold as the frozen air.

“To the Oscuri nest. We entered the cave prepared to shoot to kill,” the soldier cowered beneath his words.

“But what?” Tyler asked impatiently and annoyed.

“The Oscuri filled the room. No one could have survived the attack.”

Tyler audibly signed at the news. I could hear his boots squeaking as he paced back and forth.

“Did you see them die?” he asked, stopping his pacing.

“No, sir. It was too dangerous to go any further in the room.”

I heard Tyler mutter something, holding back his anger.

“Thank you for your service, soldier,” he said oddly happy.

“Thank you, sir. Wait, why? No! No! No! Please...” Jensen’s voice was muffled by choking and the popping of steel on bone.

I pressed my free hand on my mouth to hold in my terror. The sound of a man’s spine being pulled through their mouth will never leave my memory. The loud plop of the uninhabited body clapped through the drain like a drum. Archy’s face had turned a sickly green. He grabbed my arm and we ran away from the scene.

Archy puked all over the white carpet of the room we crashed into. We had entered the Utah facility through a new doorway that Archy created by absorbing a sewer wall. The room was white and every wall except the one we broke down were clear glass panes.

“He’s a monster. The guy was just doing his job. His own man,” Archy said, wiping his mouth free of spit strings.

I patted his back, trying to comfort him.

“Let’s just be happy Clark wasn’t awake to be scarred for life unlike me and you,” I said with an awkward false smile.

Archy walked over to the sleeping child and worked up his own smile.

“Yeah, wouldn’t want to ruin his innocent mind before he gets to sex-ed,” he laughed to himself.

Clark was stirring around in my arms, like he was having a bad dream.

“Elizabeth,” he mumbled faintly.

She was around here somewhere, we just needed to find her: a task that was easier said than done.

After searching a dozen floors filled with hundreds of empty cubicles and abandoned store rooms filled to the brink with dusty computers and broken desks, I began to wonder why a military base would need office supplies. Archy had said thousands had died.

Is this where they all worked? Like mind wiped slaves?

We cleared floor after floor, all nothing but ghosts and cobwebs. Archy assured me that there were no cameras on the civilian floors. He said there was no point since there was nothing there to steal and everyone supposed to be on it was under Atom’s control. Their every thought and move were controlled.

We grew higher within the floors of the skyscraper; the black, scarred ground grew darker and vaster with each story. We didn’t stop climbing until we were at the top. A new obstacle blocked our way: a massive black door that I recognized from the cells in the children’s ward back in Harrison. It sat steadily at the top of the stairs.

“Well I think we found what we were looking for. If I was hiding a kidnapped girl that’s what I’d hide her behind,” Archy huffed out of breath from all the stairs.

“Planning on kidnapping a girl? At least wait until we save this one,” I teased.

He smiled with newly rosy cheeks, “I’d rather be the knight in shining armor who saves the damsel in distress.”

“Save the princess from the tallest room in the tallest tower,” he muttered to himself, repeating lines from an old movie.

When Archy attempted to absorb the door like he had done with the others before it, the white spectacles that normally flew free from his hand’s like snow did not disintegrate the door. When the light touched the door, the white stained black and fell to the ground dead as a door knob.

Archy quickly released the door looking pale and afraid.

“It’s not supposed to do that. Whatever this thing is made out of...” he shivered like he caught a sudden cold, “It disrupts my powers. I can’t break down this door.”

I remembered the black orbs that I saw in the cell.

That’s their purpose.

Archy leaned against the opposite wall from the black gate, pondering about a solution to an impossible problem. I set the sleeping child that laid cozily on my shoulder on the ground next to Archy. I lined myself in a boxing position with the door and prepared a mighty punch. I closed my fist, swung my shoulder, and then, snap!

I held my breath, keeping the amount of agony in my twisted hand at bay. The knuckle of my pinky had popped back towards the start of my wrist while my fingers were bent in awkward and abnormal ways. I lost my footing and fell back into an inattentive Archy, pinning him against the wall.

“Ow!” he yelled, “What’s wrong with you?”

I held up my hand.

“So much for invincibility,” he said shocked.

It was a strange feeling to be feeling anything at all. Over the past day I hadn’t felt any sort of sensation. No pain, no fatigue, nothing, but in an instant it all came flying back, just to leave just as fast.

We both watched as my fingers straightened with a crack and the knuckle slid back to its place of origin.

“I think I’m going to puke,” Clark said, finally waking up from his nap and looking at my handy work.

Archy and I chuckled, happy to see the little guy return to the world of the living.

“Seriously, that was gross. The most gross thing I have ever seen, and I’ve seen an old lady in a bikini,” he gagged as he stood up.

“What did I miss?” he asked.

“Do you remember anything from the cave?” Archy asked hesitantly, slipping away from in between me and the wall.

“Yeah!” Clark answered, kicking Archy in the shin, “You’re not supposed to shoot those at people. You could’ve killed me.”

“Ow...I’m...I’m sorry. I thought she was going to hurt you, but I ended up doing more damage than I ever wanted to. Clark, you have superpowers. You saved us all,” Archy said, trying to change the subject.

Clark held a suspicious countenance, pressing his lips together and squinting his eyes.

“Was it cool?” he asked, holding the same look.

“The most amazing thing I have ever seen,” I answered while smiling like a fool.

His suspicion broke into joy as he danced around the stairs. I laughed and smiled while watching the boy do his happy dance and I only stopped because my visions of a forgotten life returned.

I saw a ghost made of gray mist running up the stairs with me held tightly around his shoulder while guards fired down at his pursuer: a shadow in black that never stayed in one spot for long.

Scavenger would teleport from guard to guard, disarming then disabling them one after another. The man in gray stopped at the door and turned to face my oldest friend.

“You don’t have a lot of time left little wolf. They’re due within the hour. You can kill me after the job is done,” he said, punching four numbers into the keypad, then fleeing through the partially opened door.

I walked up to the keypad with the numbers one, two, six, and zero glowing. I knew the date that it was supposed to be: the day my life lost its light, the day Freddy Sims was killed.

I entered 1026 and the door beeped open.