Thank you Wenfei for your insightful comments on my last post. Your comment was three times as long as my post. I think I speak for many when I saw "Holy shit!" Had a lot of insightful bits, drenched in your usual sexual references. Much appreciated =)
Also, I said DECLINE of gaming, not stock market crash kaboom of gaming >.> CP's fail internet is aiding things along though since its nearly impossible to play a decent multiplayer match without shouting "OH GOD I'M FROZEN" and watch everything unfold in front of my eyes at hyper speed 10 seconds after it actually happened.
The following is the prologue and chapter 1 of my foray into writing some stuff. Shout outs to Vic and Ryan for their proofreading. No shout out to MS Word for its quirky formatting and strange inability to remove dashes that it automatically filled in.
Lilium (Pilot)
Prologue
Year 3 - Return
Three years. Three years is a long time to chase and flee. It wears down the mind as much as the body. Has it really been three years? He could not feel his legs anymore. Three years? Arms felt numb, but his fingers still moved, barely. Or is it four… A cough, and blood leaked into his mouth, the metallic iron seeped into his tongue. Wouldn’t the first year count as year zero? How much time has actually—
A blow to the head disoriented him from his thoughts. He felt more fluid ooze down his face, sticking to every pore. Vision blurred back and he saw the same image he saw for hours; pristine clean white walls, shelves of beakers, and precision instruments. Expensive equipment, none of which wanted to be contaminated with his blood. And yet there he was in the center of this vault of science, shackled by the arms and legs, face to face with a man twice his size who now just appeared as a shroud of black. Three years right? Let’s just say its three years, so then this is year two. It became harder to think, too many blows to the head, too much blood on the ground. Okay so this is year two. He saw the next blow come and braced his body.
Moments passed before he regained his thoughts. Breathing became wheezing. A few blinks of the eye to clear out the redness. There was a stabbing pain in his chest that radiated to his head. Definitely cracked a rib or two there. Punctured lung? Perhaps. If so I’ve got about twenty minutes or so left. The shroud finally spoke.
“Last chance Damon. Where is Lilium?” He pulled out a pistol, a click and the safety was off.
A giggle. Where is Lilium? What a stupid question! Now Damon was laughing, every expedited breath for every laugh shot riveted across his entire body. The question was too funny though, he could not stop laughing. The look of frustration on the shroud’s face snapped into something far more malicious.
“You don’t get it do you?” Cackling laughter. “She’s dead. She is dead.” Raucous laughter. Damon coughed and saw crimson fly from his mouth. Guess that was my lung after all. His words were interrupted by the staccato of gasping laughter. “Dead. Dead. Dead. She is dead. She is dead! Dead!”
Three years. Four years. It doesn’t matter. She’s dead. She’s gone. And all you can ask is where she is. Idiot.
Roar of laughter. Roar of gunpowder.
A grey smoke lingered in the air.
Chapter 1
Year 0 – Declarations
It is ten minutes from the start of a new year and the energy could be felt coursing through the air even at the usually quiet, out of place bar. Toby ordered another two more Scotches and passed the second one to his friend, Harrison.
“So you are going to make it to the wedding right?”
“Harrison, I’m your best man, of course I’ll make it.”
“Alright, I’m just worried that’s all.” They both took a long drink, and then Harrison spoke again, “Five dead in that last attack? They blew off a chunk off of that building and you’re not worried at all?”
Toby let out a slight chuckle. The drink was getting to him. “Of course I’m worried. It’s the best paying job out there though. I’ve got to deal with these student loans chewing up my ass left and right.” He glanced at his friend; Harrison did not look very reassured.
“Anways,” Toby continued, “the heck are you doing here with me in a bar, shouldn’t you be with your fiancé?”
“She’s out in Germany for a business trip. I’ve got one last hurrah with you before getting into married life.”
Toby raised an eyebrow. “Geez, you might want to call her or something, I’m sure she’ll like it.”
“Good old Toby, always know what to do for the ladies.”
The two friends laughed and drinks were had. People in the bar started gravitating towards the TV and the ball drop that was to welcome the new year.
===
The keycard swiped through, disengaging the metallic locks with a heavy thud. Andrew Ferguson put the card back into his pocket and walked past the two armed guards stationed at the blast proof door. He entered a room far too empty and bare for its sole inhabitant. A plastic desk in one corner, light in the center, and on the other corner there sat one little girl on her bed, waiting for the man to walk through the door.
Ferguson took a few steps in, his footsteps hitting the ceramic floor with an uncomfortable weight, and like clockwork, the guards closed the doors behind him. Every step he took made a slight echo in the windowless room, until he finally reached the girl on her bed.
She was small with pale skin that had been denied the nourishment of sunlight. Faded brown hair and dim green eyes were the only hints of color, other than the plastic center IV line with a bright blue cap coming out from her right arm. It’s for my cancer she would tell the other children at her secluded private school. With that the other children would leave her alone, not wanting this cancer and plastic protruding from their bodies.
“Hey honey,” Ferguson whispered, fearing that somehow the guards would be able to hear through the soundproofed doors. “How have you been today?”
The girl settled into bed, “I’m tired. I had to sit in the chair for hours today.” Ferguson patted the girl on the bed and proceeded to pull the sheets over her small frame.
“Were you a good girl and sat very still?”
She tilted her head up and down, “Yes, but then I felt very sleepy afterwards. I don’t feel sleepy anymore. Can you tell me a story?”
He gave a weak smile. “There was once this beautiful princess with long flowing hair--”
The girl squirmed under the blankets. “I already heard that one, tell me another one.” Ferguson looked around the room and tried to recall old children’s stories from his past. Ten years. Ten years old. She knows so little and yet I can’t find one good story to tell. How did Snow White--
Two knocks on the door broke his recollections. His watch notified him of the time, there were just a few minutes left before midnight and before his time was up.
A yawn came from the girl, her eyes weighing down, “Can I see Mommy?”
===
Two quick coughs from the silenced pistol and the guard who had once been standing so vigilant now lay in a deepening pool of his own blood. The machines he spent his life protecting sustained their unwavering hum.
Such a silent little monster you are. The shooter put his hands on the chamber and felt the heat dissipate. Such devotion you have.
The shooter stepped towards the machines. Stacks of computer servers, disk drives, crisscrossing cables and blinking lights radiated a silent energy. Millions of dollars of electronics holding unfathomable amounts of research were in this room, just one room of dozens, everything labeled with the much coveted GeneTech logo.
The fourth and eleventh are all that is needed. The corresponding parts of the machine were removed with care and the shooter neatly tucked them into his coat pocket. He started to walk out the door, but stopped to kneel next to the dead guard.
===
Glasses chimed across the bar as the hour struck midnight and cheers for the new year were heard.
“A toast, to your wedding and married life.” Toby raised his glass.
“And to you, hopefully you’ll have a woman in your life at some point.”
The friends laughed as they enjoyed the last of their drink. Toby felt the cool burn of liquid down his throat and his mind was set at ease.
===
Ferguson pulled out a silver necklace with an L pendant dangling at the bottom.
“L for Lily.”
The girl caught a glimpse of the metal in front of her eyes, her words crawled out of her mouth as she succumbed to sleep. “L… for my name too right? Will I…I ever get a necklace,” Another yawn. “Like that?” She was asleep.
Ferguson slowly rose from the bedside.
“This will be yours Lilium, when you are free.”
Ferguson slipped the necklace back into his pocket and signaled the guards to let him out.
=====
With pistol firmly pressed against the lifeless skull, the shooter muttered words only the dead have heard as the weapon coughed again.
“In somnis veritas. I am the Shepherd and you are not worthy of the Flock.”
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