Mad Gods - Predatory Ethics: Book I (12 page)

As I intended, the horse pinned its rider to the
ground. He hadn’t had enough sense to jump free of the falling beast. I jumped
past the thrashing steed and slashed down with the axe, taking off the rider’s
head. It landed before me as I hit the ground.

The lord’s remaining retainers yelled murder at me
— at least I think it was murder. They were speaking Greek as they rushed
to avenge their fallen benefactor. I rose to meet them, for only three remained.

It is important to note that when you are facing
numerous foes — five or more — you should wait until they come to
you and then respond to their attack. However, with four or fewer, it is
prudent to bring the attack to them. This generally works because they don’t
anticipate this approach. Also, they are far too few to hamper each other.

The first man to meet me was wielding both axe and
short sword, as was I. Our axes met and ran up the shafts until their heads
clanged together. He pulled his away and took mine with it. I knew that I did
not have the luxury of concentrating on this; I had two others with whom to
deal. As he continued his attempt to fully disarm me, I kicked at his exposed
leg. He fell, but I didn’t have time to dispose of him, as both of the
remaining minions attacked in unison, one from the left, the other from the
right.

Without warning, the horse’s cries of pain distracted
me from the fight. I didn’t care enough to waste my time dealing with these
three. I wanted to go and put the poor beast out of its misery; my attackers
didn’t share my sentiments. I took a few seconds to recover my fallen axe.

They did, however, change their earlier tactic of
simultaneous attack. The one on the right slashed left to right at my
midsection and I pushed him into his companion. They both fell in a heap and I
split one’s head open at the nose and cheekbones, while the other’s hands came
off with two quick slashes of my sword.

In battle, you don’t have to kill someone outright;
the actual aim is to keep him from being able to fight. It didn’t matter to me
if this man survived, or if he died immediately. He might live, despite the
blood that spurted out of his stumps, but what concerned me was the horse,
whose labored breathing was punctuated by wet gurgling. The poor thing was well
on its way to death, though I couldn’t seem to force myself to approach it any
faster.

I was finally over it and it looked up at me with an
immeasurable terror. It did not want to be there, among all this carnage. As it
lay on its side, I saw confusion, terror and disbelief in its expression.
Because I had been the one to bring it down, it feared me. It also knew that I
intended to kill it. It still did not want to die and it did not know that it
would, despite its desires.

I also saw rage in its eyes — anger, which
connected to the anger in me. It screamed why. Why does all of this have to
keep happening? However, the anger in me ran deeper than that which was
reflected in the horse’s liquid, brown eyes. It remembered many other cruelties
and brutal actions, committed knowingly, or without care.

This anger, this rage was a difficult thing to
articulate, either for a beast of burden, or for a screaming savage, more
familiar with killing than living. Someone must answer for all of this. God
seems to be too easy of an answer. Why would I lay this in front of someone, or
something, I’ve never seen, heard, tasted or felt?

An answer came from unknown depths — laziness.
If I relinquished all of this suffering and pain to a higher knowledge, I would
be lazy. I am responsible for my own pain and pleasure. No one else supplies me
with either. I was also completely responsible for the poor horse’s pain. I lay
the tip of my sword on its neck, put my weight behind it and pushed, ending its
pain in a single heartbeat.

The horse died and I followed it. Unfortunately, I
had forgotten about the final man in the rider’s retinue. I remembered him as
he pushed his sword through me and I saw the tip emerge from my front.

I felt a tugging on it, but my muscles had contracted
around it and he could not pull it out. That’s another thing you must remember
in battle. A sword is best used to slash, because if you use it to impale, you
then run the risk of having to fight against internal organs and muscular
contractions in order to reclaim your weapon.

My earlier revelation was colored red by my own
blood, as well as the bloodlust that washed over me. I would die, but so too
would this panting Byzantine. I left my own sword in the horse, and with both
hands on the axe; I turned and swung with all of my remaining strength. To my
satisfaction, I split his axe halfway up the shaft. My swing and connection
with the weapon had brought it to his feet and he stared down at his fragmented
shaft, as well as my own fully intact steel.

My mouth was filling with the coppery taste of blood,
yet I still smiled at his dawning knowledge of death. I didn’t regret granting
the horse relief, for I had been the one responsible for its pain. I did regret
that killing this man had brought me so much pleasure. He must have found my
smile ghastly, coming, as it was, on the cusp of his own death. I even managed
to laugh at his terror, coughing up a mouthful of blood in the process, before
I lifted up my axe, catching him on the chin with its back spike. He stumbled
backward from the blow.

I clasped the shaft in both hands and lifted it over
my head. I brought it down on him and removed his right leg at the knee. Before
he could reach the ground, I swung again, but this time from left to right, and
removed his other leg at the knee. I stood over him for a few quick seconds as
I enjoyed his anguish and cries, before I hacked at his upper body and head,
like I was felling a tree. No armor stopped me, and when I was finished,
nothing humanly recognizable remained.

When it was finally over, I gave the bastard another
blow before I left the axe buried in the mound of carnage, which he had become.
I did not fall to my knees, then to the ground, as I had at Thermopylae and in
the arena, but I toppled from my standing position and fell onto my dead foe.

I resented him because he had taken me away from a
new awareness of my own existence. Not about this life or any other, but about
my own place within all of them and in the wider understanding of Man’s global
influence. Each person’s accountability was only a microcosm of the whole. It
wasn’t a simple smaller example but an exact reflection of the whole. Every
action no matter how small was consequential to the rest of creation. It
mattered.

How do I hold others, gods or devils, accountable for
all of this? We’re the ones, not only committing these atrocities, but also
placing the blame on other shoulders. If I were to forgive myself or God
without understanding my own responsibility would this decision matter?
Absolution is empty if it’s easy. It doesn’t have any weight or substance. It
hasn’t been achieved through toil and trouble — with that I certainly was
familiar.

Too much philosophy had taken residence in my raging
thoughts. On such an intricate subject, I operated with a sword and scarred,
calloused hands. My capacity to succeed in this self-appointed task was
questionable. I lacked the sensitivity and insight to make enough of a
difference to force understanding.

TIME: SEPTEMBER 5TH, 1961. ALEXANDRIA, EGYPT

Kosta stopped reading, tucked the Codex under his arm
and, with a bolt of understanding, hurried home to pack his things. Without
going any further, he knew he had to find this Antichrist, originally fated to
begin his reign where, for centuries, a conqueror had lay dead. In Alexandria,
he was to begin life — the conqueror who would put Alexander to shame.
Kosta knew that the birthplace had recoiled from his reading, to the opposite
side of the globe. He would continue his reading as he journeyed there and
interceded, taking the infant into his care.

As Kostadino XI told him, his participation was his
own choice. Kosta chose to involve himself. He wanted to steward, this terrible
fate in another direction, which would be the child’s choice. Kosta wouldn’t
impose any of his own Orthodox beliefs. Now he didn’t follow a path, but was
operating outside any written or accepted dogma.

- Dark Genesis -

TIME: FEBRUARY 5TH, 1962. SAO PAOLO, ARGENTINA

A bald, goateed man, of average appearance, watched a
small house where a difficult birth took place. Intent as another, Jose
Savourez nervously eyed the house, crossing himself. Jose tightly held his
crucifix with both hands and, once again, began his litany of prayers.

He begged God’s forgiveness for their sex before
marriage.

He begged God to provide safety for both the baby and
the mother.

He begged for a son.

He simply begged.

At the sight of the abhorred cross, the bald man
fought the retching in his throat. Jose Savourez promised everything and
anything with a devotion only shown when men feel desperate. When the screams
became too loud for him to bear, he pocketed the crucifix, lit a cigarette and
walked past another man who didn’t quite fit in the neighborhood. He was
dressed in tan and olive drab and he moved to the shadows, unseen by the bald,
goateed man whose eyes never left the house. In the darkness, the tan and olive
drabbed man’s body coiled with shock. He hadn’t anticipated anyone else would
stumble onto his plans. Discreet steps would have to be taken.

It became quiet inside the little house. All that was
heard was the low drone of the radio and the mother Maria’s, labored breathing.

The news spoke of worldwide events.

French leader De Gaulle was talking about Algeria,
but the midwife, Bonita, was too preoccupied to listen. She was trying to ease
the mother’s pain and discomfort, as well as instructing the other two women.
One woman, Gladys, was wiping Maria’s brow with a damp cloth and whispering
soothing words of encouragement. Bonita asked if they could change the radio
station to something besides the news. Some music might help them all.

Gladys was a large woman; dressed in a tan peasant
frock, a brown scarf keeping her steel grey hair away from her drawn, gentle
face.

The second old woman, Paula, was standing to one
side, with a cauldron of boiling water and fresh linen. She was rail-thin,
dressed entirely in black, including the scarf, which held back her hair. She
was fidgeting, pacing, attempting to restrain herself from jumping into
Bonita’s position. Paula had a way of adding anxiety to any situation.

“This is taking too long. You’re doing something
wrong, Bonita.” Paula knew that she could do a better job than that heathen
woman. It was whispered that she wasn’t even Christian. It was wrong to let her
deliver little babies. It was wrong.

“Paula, hush, there is nothing wrong. Maria is
probably having twins or something.” Gladys was barely maintaining her normally
abundant patience with the kinetic little woman. She had been going on without
a pause for the past two hours — this is wrong, that’s not right, that’s
wrong. Over and over.

She focused on the laboring mother. “You’re doing
wonderfully, dear. Now, just listen to Bonita and don’t worry.”

“No, no there’s too much blood. There’s much too much
blood. Bonita, you’re doing something wrong.” Paula moved forward, shaking like
a leaf, leaning over Bonita.

“Nggggnnaaa!!! Oh my god!! Bonita, I’m going to split
in two!” Maria gasped between heavy breaths, her eyes racing about the room.

“Hush, dear, hush,” Gladys reassured the mother.
“This is your first birth. It’s always hard. Why, Paula squeaked once and
fainted straight away. When she woke four hours later, we handed her Anna to
her. Nearly gift-wrapped, she was.” She saw that Paula was getting too close to
Bonita and decided that she needed something else to distract her. A quick
prick to her pride was just the thing.

“That’s not true. I was awake through it all!! You’re
lying!!”
That fat bitch,
she thought,
she’s probably in league with the heathen
.
Sometimes, Paula felt like she was the only god-fearing woman in all of Sao
Paolo.

“Now, Paula. Every good woman in Sao Paolo knows you
fainted with your first, and, for the next two, yelled as though they were your
first. She wouldn’t let her poor ‘Beto near her for at least three months.”
Gladys stifled a mischievous smile across her warm, wrinkled face. It didn’t
take much to get Paula going.

“Liar! I was awake through all…” Paula’s heated
defense was cut short by a scream and Gladys’ yelp of pain as Maria squeezed
her hand for support.

“Arghh!! Bonita! How much longer?!!” Maria rasped out
the words.

“Soon, dear, soon. I think I can see the head now.
Not much longer.” Bonita tried to stay focused on the laboring mother.

“Aiee!! Bonita, there’s something wrong. There’s too
much blood!! Too much!!” Paula renewed her litany of error.

“Paula, shut up!!” Finally, Bonita could no longer
tolerate the crone.

“She’s right, Bonita. The baby should have been out
by now. We have been here since yesterday’s dusk and it is sunset again.”
Gladys was reluctant to agree with Paula.