Planet Chimera (18 page)

“Why does everyone keep saying that,” I
sighed, shaking my head, and plodding towards it. “Do I have a face
that says otherwise? Tell me, honestly, I wish to know.”

“Yes, you do,” it screamed, as I squeezed
its jaw tightly. “You have that kind of face.”

“Oh, good to know,” I replied, releasing my
hands from it, as I grabbed the chain and pulled the mutant chimera
away. “It gives me a lot to think about—when I watch you burn
inside the furnace.”

I kicked it good on its right cheek, and
thoroughly tied the chains around its arms and wings, making sure
it wouldn’t try to escape. And just to be certain, I maimed it in
the left leg, stopping when I heard its right femur snap, and a
painful cry from the beast.

“You see, Helberd, I am not a nice person,
truth be told,” I whispered, walking towards the furnace, opening
the metallic door, and squinting my eyes from a wave of heat that
struck against my face. “You monsters shot me down, hunted me, and
had the nerve to cut off my head from my body. Do you have any idea
how much that hurt? It is an unpleasant experience, I tell you, and
a thing I don’t want to experience again. But on the bright side, I
found out that it wouldn’t kill me, and for that, I owe you a debt
of gratitude. And with that being the case, I will give you one
more chance to tell me about your master, the owner of whatever
this place is.”

“If I tell you that, he will kill me,” he
pleaded, panting heavily, only one of his eyes open. “He might look
human, act like a gentleman, but he is a beast at heart, I warn
you, a pure, evil being.”

“That’s not what I asked you,” I boomed
back, picking up his unconscious partner, tossing him inside the
furnace, and closing it shut. “I want you to tell me about your
master. As you have just witnessed, my patience hangs on a whim,
and if you don’t tell me what I need to know, you will join him
shortly after.”

His partner screamed, to my delight, his
body burning quickly from the fierce fire residing inside the
furnace. And upon hearing the cries of his partner, Helberd, began
to shiver with fear, his eyes widening, and the confident look on
his face turning into pure terror. That was the exact reaction I
was looking for. His fear, his terror—it was the exact tool I
needed to pry the information from him, but time was the one thing
I lacked.

“Are you ready to talk? I mean, I highly
doubt you would like to experience what your partner is
experiencing first hand, would you?”

“Okay, I will tell you what you need to
know; it’s not like it will do you any good, since you will never
get to him. You will be dead before you even know it, I guarantee
you that.”

“Enough small talk, vermin, just tell me who
this man is, and everything he is planning. Don’t skip out on any
details, if you know what’s good for you.”

“His name is Professor Roger Dozer, also
known to everyone as the Madman, and he wears a grey lab coat, a
loose black shirt with suspenders, and high, leather boots. He sits
on a golden throne, on the third floor, a ten minute walk from this
place, and he usually spends his time in his laboratory, doing
experiments on his captives. The corpses you see here are the
results of his failed experiments at turning ordinary people into
chimeras, and then into freaks like us.”

“But why do you follow him? You all seem
like intelligent animals, capable of making rational decisions for
yourself and your combat prowess is incredibly amazing.”

“Yes, that may be so, however, he holds us
prisoner in our minds, and we cannot go against his wishes or we
will die. I know who I was before my mind was altered, my body
modified with gears and magic, but I can’t think of anything
besides obeying my master’s wishes and commands.”

“I cannot say I understand your emotional
pain, not that I am trying to, but I don’t want you to stop
speaking on the account of feeling emotional. I want to know what
his true plans are, what his real objective in shooting down these
ships is.”

“From what I heard—this is a rumor, so I
have no idea if it’s true— he is using the captives to create his
new army, a mutant army to be exact. And he plans on invading
earth, capturing Cyborg City, and enslaving its entire people.”

“Is he mad or something? What sort of lunacy
could drive a person to such a goal? Cyborg City is heavily guarded
by cyborg soldiers, battle drones, and combat cannons, which makes
his goals impossible. He wouldn’t even be able to get past the
electric barrier that guards the city, unless…..his soldiers did
not operate on electricity. Of course, it is completely messed up,
but genius, nonetheless. That’s why he has been altering you all to
run on steam power, in order to counter against the effects of the
barrier, simply incredible. Perhaps, he is not as crazy as you all
make him appear to be. I believe its time I had a little chat with
him.”

Standing up, satisfied with his responses, I
strolled towards the furnace, humming, and opened the door up
widely. I pivoted back, grabbing his leg, and dragged him to the
door, planning on tossing him inside, too.

“This is nothing personal, lad, but if I let
you leave, you will more than likely come after me. And, yes, I did
say I would let you go, so here you go.”

I tossed him into the furnace, a stoic
expression on my face, closing it behind me without even a hint of
regret inside my cold heart. He screamed in pain, banging his hands
against the door, hoping to change my heart. He had some nerve,
considering the hundreds of corpses he and his partner had burned
in this furnace, and they took pleasure in it. Suppose it wasn’t
their fault, they were simply following orders, but it was by their
hands that these atrocious crimes had been committed.

“Crap, I should have asked him for the
directions to get to the third floor,” I snickered, glancing at the
furnace, as I no longer heard his cries of pain. “Although, the
challenge of finding it by myself will prove to be amusing.”

On the floor, a few meters
from me, I saw one of the creatures’ weapons, a flintlock of gold
and silver, fully loaded and ready to fire, the oval muzzle of the
facing the door of the furnace. I trudged forward, bending my back
and picked it, before straightening back up. I examined the gun,
placing my index finger on the trigger, pointing it in every
direction with lightning reflex speed.
It
shall make a fine weapon for killing mutant
chimeras
, I thought.

The wind howled through the small cracks in
the infrastructure, the light from the moon fading from sight, and
the smell of the corpses as repulsive as before. The horrors that I
had endured, ever since I landed on this planet, would not go
unpunished. All those who hand wronged me would fill my wrath to
its full extent, and it was a privilege only a few ever got to
experience. I would not show any of them mercy; I would send them
all into the eye of the abyss.

Turning around, the flintlock placed on my
holster, and the chain in my left arm, I sauntered out of the
compartment, headed for the madman’s laboratory.

14

I arched my eyebrow,
looking left and right, unsure of which way to go. To my right, a
strong draft of wind blew past me, the cold air hurting my nose,
and to my left—I heard screams and the sounds of whips
cracking.
Left seems like the place for
fun
, I thought. I whistled away, hands in
my pocket, drawn towards the chaos, walking in the left corridor.
The walls were smooth like marble, a dark brown in color, with a
few painted symbols of unknown origin. A door, on my left, forced
me to stop and retrieve my borrowed flintlock. I heard no commotion
inside, everything was quiet, and a truly maddening silence that
unsettled me. Reaching for the silver knob, I turned it to the
side, hoping to open it, but the door wouldn’t budge open. It was
sealed up tightly to stop anyone from entering, or, perhaps, stop
something from leaving.

What am I even thinking about? Why am I even
bothering with this stupid door?

I sighed, placing the flintlock back on my
holster, the chain rattling in my arm, and walked away. It would
have been nice to see what they were hiding inside; however, time
was the one thing not on my side. But the one thing I had on my
side was the element of surprise.

“Time to get to work,” I exhaled, turning my
skin black as the abyss, and my fingernails sharp and long as
razors.

I prowled through the
walls like a shadow, like a phantom, stalking the area for prey.
The corridor, to my disappointed, forked again into two different
passages, forcing me to choose again the path I wished to take. And
again, I followed the direction of the screams and whips, planning
to investigate the reason behind their cries. Footsteps, coming
from something big, forced me to hide in the shadow of the wall, my
breath held, as I waited for the threat to pass. All I saw was its
faint shadow, its misshapen form, which served as a reminder of the
dangers that awaited me. I exhaled slowly when I could no longer
hear the creature, advancing further into maze of a base. Stopping,
looking up, I stood aghast in what appeared to be the factory,
where they created the mutant chimeras. The place was big, far too
big to be inside a mountain, and it housed mechanical contraptions
of great magnitude. Several mutant chimeras roamed the area, some
of them in the air, and some of them stationed on the ground—all
guarding the area from intruders. They were ships, on the furthest
side, being serviced and repaired, and by my guess, their transport
to earth for the invasion. This was my ticket off this planet. The
temptation to just blitz forward, ignoring all the dangers, and
commandeering one the ships, was overwhelming. The problem I would
encounter, with that direct plan, was being shot down again by
their special weapon, and forced to endure this madness all over
again.
First plan: destroy the special
gun.

The mechanical contraptions ran on some sort
of external power source, most likely a lot of water and coal in
abundance, and this whole terrain was full of it. Keeping out of
sight, I crept further into the factory, hidden behind a metal
drain pipe that connected to every machine inside the plant. Up
above me, I saw people in cages being transported into one of the
machines, and once they were inside, they screamed in agony for
several seconds, as horrible things were done to them. The one who
were weak and fragile for the procedure were thrown out of the
machine and into some sort of dumpster. To even imagine what was
going on inside would even haunt me for all eternity.

“Hey, you there,” a voice cried out, causing
me to turn my head to the left. “Please help us, stranger.”

Below my feet, there was some sort of
compartment, which housed the captives, and it had small holes to
let air in. The prison cell was buried on the floor below me,
hidden from prying eyes by pipes and meter gauges, as if they were
trying to hide something inside.

“I can’t help you at the moment,” I replied,
walking towards them, kneeling down, and scanning the area for
enemies. “If I try to help you, I will lose my element of
surprise.”

“Wait, please, I can help you find what you
are looking for,” he pleaded with me, sticking his left hand
halfway through the hole. “I can help you find what you are looking
for.”

“And how do you know what I am looking for?”
I asked, blinking, my curiosity roused by his unexpected
response.

“I know that you are looking for the special
weapon that shot you out of space, and you plan on killing the
madman.”

Yes, you are right, but how do you know of
this?”

“I have the ability to read the minds of
others, a dormant ability found in my species. I know where it is,
and if you want to find it, you have to set us free.”

“Tempting, but no thanks; I will enjoy the
challenge of finding it by myself.”

“But you are running out of time, Dark
Assassin, your mission target will leave in the next three days,
and your objective will fail.”

“Bastard, just how much of my mind are you
reading? I should cut your tongue out, just for knowing all of
that.”

“Oh, don’t worry about your secrets—I will
not tell anyone as long as you help us out.”

“And what about the other inmates, who just
heard you say those words to me?”

“Well, I didn’t think that far ahead, but I
am sure they will keep their beaks shut from freedom, isn’t that
right, guys?”

“Oh yeah, absolutely, definitely will keep
our mouth shut,” the men, in the background, replied at the same
time.

Crap, this was definitely the unexpected
mess I was afraid of. There was nothing that irritated me more than
blackmail. And under a different circumstance, I would have killed
them all for knowing my secret, but this was no ordinary
predicament I was in. Besides, I needed a distraction—something to
draw away the numerous guards in the factory, and buy me enough
time to find and eliminate the madman. Glancing down, I moved some
of the stuff out of the way, locating the metal rail above the
outer lock. The lock, a relic from the past, was made from thick,
reinforced gold with circular striations in the middle, and it
required some sort of special key to unlock it. I pulled out my
flintlock, aimed it at the lock, and pressed my finger on the
trigger, debating on my plan of action. If I fired, they would
surely hear me, and in a matter of seconds, this area would be
swarming with mutant chimeras.

“Use your physical strength,” the man said,
his small finger pressing on the rail, and his grey eyes glomming
slightly. “Breaking this lock, I am sure, is child’s play for
someone of your caliber, Rave.”