Catwalk: Messiah (26 page)

He raised his glance to the next sarcophagus. The air seemed to leave the room. His cop skills should have kicked in. He wasn’t certain what to expect anymore. He should have stopped and revisited the analysis and investigation skills he’d learned in his years on the police force. For some reason, he couldn’t tap into that memory, not here, not in this awful place. He forced one cybernetic footstep, then another. He muttered the closest thing to a prayer he could remember.

Cat brushed the dust and grime aside, his heart heavy with expectation. His hands cleaned away the dirt. The face looking up at him was older. Lines set in the stone around its eyes. Cat touched the stone face of Delambre. A laugh choked to silence in his throat. Delambre had offered so many jests, so many threats, so many challenges. It had all been an act. Cat smirked. Maybe Eva was the one with all the knowledge. So what? Delambre was the one who reeled him in and earned his trust. Maybe they’d share a glass of Blevins blend down the road to celebrate that very transaction.

The hitman pulled the lid aside. It teetered for a moment before falling to the floor. When the dust cleared, Cat found himself staring at a simple, nondescript, black coffin.
Anonymous. This was a simple, everyman’s final resting place.
Cat stared at the glossy black paint, watching the faded reflection of his own yellow eyes. Maybe Delambre was the man he claimed to be. Maybe he was just an act. Cat prayed silently it would be vacant. His hand shook slightly as he unlocked the coffin lid. With a deep breath, he opened it.

His prayers went unanswered.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

Delambre was paler and thinner than Cat remembered him. It was as if his eternal optimism and faith had deflated. With that gone, the geneticist’s body seemed to age by decades. His clothes showed no signs of blood. His bones appeared intact. He most likely faced his death with the dignity he carried in every action.

Cat caught himself smirking. Hell, Delambre had probably told the scientist, his old colleague-turned-lunatic, exactly how his death was planned out down to the finest detail. There was nothing the scientist could pretend to know that Delambre hadn’t already surmised. Still, here the clever old fox rested, reduced to a corpse in the underbelly of a hollowed-out cathedral, abandoned and alone.

Delambre, I failed you.

Cat absently straightened the collar and shirt of the dead man, the memories and thoughts hammering down on him. He recalled each of their interactions. He was surprised how much he respected Delambre’s sarcasm, sharp wit, and fearless protection of his daughter. Eva. Cat exhaled sharply, laying his gloved hand on the chest of his deceased partner. “I’ll keep her safe, Delambre. I promise.”

Cat stared at the geneticist’s face waiting for some snide but humorous response. The world was silent, distant, meaningless. He could almost see his breath in the stale air.

A slight sound of metal on metal alerted him from his trance like a cold shower. Instinctively, the hitman pushed off of Delambre’s chest. He leapt over the sarcophagus and rolled to his feet on the opposite side.

The baton snapped to full length in his right hand, Cat looked up to face his new assailant.

A bizarre creature, hardly more than a metallic skeleton, returned his gaze. From skull to toes, its body was covered in brushed chrome. Dreadlocked braids hung from the back of its head. Its eyes were vacant, skeletal holes, reminding Catwalk of the dead man in the sewer. Its teeth had been filed to point, providing the creation a feral grimace. Its cheekbones were raised, extending the jaw lower. The head hung at an awkward angle, nearly resting on its metallic shoulder. As it moved, the skull craned to the opposite side, as if the neck couldn’t support the weight of its head.

Its body bore hardly any mass. The tips of its shoulders, collarbones and ribcage were sharpened. Its razor claws gripped the side of the sarcophagus where Catwalk had just stood. It gazed at him. A guttural vibration escaped its fanged mouth. It stepped backward and pulled aside the fractured piece of the sarcophagus. The stone crumbled to ash in its hands.

“Famyne.”

The being raised the pace of its vibrations, sending out a chittering sound in acknowledgement. Catwalk leapt forward, swinging the baton in a backhand strike. The enemy’s skull merely bounced from one side to the other like a rag doll. It swung a claw in response, catching air as Catwalk rolled beneath the strike. He forced a sidekick into Famyne’s exposed ribs, above where a human’s kidneys would be. The creation bounded off of Delambre’s tomb and struck the floor. Cat paused a moment, the light glinting in his cybernetic eyes. Any human, normal or enhanced, should have collapsed at that strike.

It had no organs. This thing was a hardened, sharpened exoskeleton. Cat shook his head. Where was a good frag grenade when you needed one?

Cat targeted his enemy and changed his strategy. He grabbed a chunk of concrete from the shattered sarcophagus lid, throwing it hard at his enemy. With surprising speed, Famyne raised its arms in a protective X-block. The stone erupted into dust.
 

The dust hung in the stagnant air. Famyne leapt forward, attacking with its claws. Its guttural vibrations spiraled upward, something akin to a scream. Cat retreated, blocking the first strike with his baton.
 

The second strike glanced off of his armor. Sparks followed. Cat gritted his teeth, silently thanking Eva for her armor design. Famyne bore down on him with a series of strikes. Cat blocked everything he could. He slid or stepped backward under the tornado of metal blows.

His chest burned. His shoulders screamed at the impact of each blow. Famyne closed on him. Faster and faster, the skeletal machine cut at him. The baton flew from his grip, clamoring loudly against the stone floor. He lost count of how many strikes the MetaHuman landed on him. His fingers went numb. Then, his hands. He was running out of room.

Then, he saw it. Every blow was aimed at his head and chest. Fatal strikes. Cat dropped. The impact knocked the air from his lungs. He relied on the non-human part of his arsenal. His cybernetic legs slammed into the skeleton’s legs. Famyne fell hard. Cat launched upward and over it, landing several meters away. He’d lost his baton, but it had gained him distance. His arms were burning. His lungs were on fire.

The skeleton rose to its feet as Cat drew the shotgun from its place on his back.
 

“Enough cuddle time,” he scowled, “you gotta die.”

As he squeezed the trigger, Famyne threw the baton back at him. It forced his shotgun blast upward. Pieces of brick fell around and between the two combatants. Cat slipped in the debris and fell back against Delambre’s tomb.
 

Leaning on the old man for strength one more time.

Famyne rose to its feet before Cat could. Its head rolled across its shoulders. Its vibrating voice howled at him. It struck first with one claw. Cat managed to block most of the strike with his armored gloves. The second came down. Cat rolled to his left. Famyne’s claw buried into Delambre’s corpse.

Cat struggled to get his arms free. Famyne didn’t attack. It stopped moving. Cat pushed off of the sarcophagus and rolled to his feet. He watched in silence as tubes running along its exoskeleton illuminated in a deep crimson. Delambre’s form withered instantly, his skin peeled tightly to his skeleton and then tore apart. Famyne devoured the old man in seconds.
 

“Holy...shockin…hell,” Cat managed to breathe out.

Famyne swayed on its frame, the glow of its veins slowly descending to black. Cat stared mutely as it regained composure. Its skeletal gaze swung around to find him again. Cat’s gaze went from Delambre’s remains to the metallic assailant. His eyes flashed brightly sending an errie glow about the room. Rage replaced fear.
 

He heard the echo of a metallic scream, his scream, fill his head. He kicked a chunk of cement in its direction. Famyne brushed aside the attack. Cat dove to his right to create space and distance. He slid between two of the sarcophagi, hoping for time to reload the shotgun.

Famyne’s vibrations grew slower, more controlled. Either feeding had sated it or there was something Cat was missing. It spoke to him, offering up something he couldn’t decipher. “Kiiiiii….Miiiiii…”

He realized he was holding his breath when he heard the sound of metal on stone. Famyne crawled atop the next sarcophagus. It extended its metal claws against and into the stone. The chant continued. Its head flailed from side-to-side on its neck. It repeated its vibrations, the breaks coming in the same cadence.

“Kiiiiii….Miiiiii…”

The clash of metal on stone repeated again, nearer this time. Famyne dragged its claws over the sarcophagus, leaving deep scars in the stone. Cat gritted his teeth. The hair on his neck rose as Famyne stepped onto the sarcophagus above him. The vibrations repeated, closer now. Cat craned his head. His gaze and the barrel of the shotgun were aimed directly upward.

Famyne extended its inhuman gaze over the side of the stone tomb. Cat’s eyes met the holes of Famyne’s skull. The pressure built in his lungs. Clenching his teeth, Cat pulled the trigger.

The ringing in his ears made concentration impossible. He felt as if he’d ignited nitrous oxide behind his eyes. He wanted to scream, cry, vomit, anything to relieve the searing pain in his skull. Sparks showered over him as the shotgun shell struck the being directly in its face. He dropped the gun and landed on his hands and knees in the wreckage.

The jackhammer in his head began to subside slowly. He managed to get up on one knee. If that didn’t do the trick, he wasn’t sure what he had left. He recognized the skeleton’s vibrations mixed in odd harmony with the ringing in his head. They were slower, not more controlled, but more…desperate? He stood up, leaning hard against the sarcophagus. One of Famyne’s legs rested atop the opposite stone structure. The force from the shotgun blast had blown it backward. It lay still among the debris between two of the sarcophagi. Fighting the noise in his head, he found the shotgun. It laid massive in his hands.

Cat rounded the tomb, shotgun leveled before him. The chrome being laid on the floor, arms extended outward, half of its face destroyed by the shotgun blast. Its right eye and cheek were mangled, and when it saw him, its left eye displayed recognition. It repeated the former vibration, only this time it was slower, almost slow enough to understand. “Kiiiiii….Miiiiii…”

Cat stepped closer, cautiously. Famyne made no motion to defend itself or move at all. A puddle of liquid was forming quickly beneath it. The hitman cocked the shotgun.

“Kiiiiiilllllll….Miiiiii…”

Two steps closer. Suddenly, he understood.

“Killllllllll…Meeee…”

Cat recognized the liquid pooling beneath Famyne. It wasn’t the sustenance from its victims. It was brain matter and blood. He nearly gagged at the realization. The creation wasn’t a creation at all. It was a MetaHuman ripped from its own form and transplanted into this chrome skeleton. It was a human who could never again be human.

“Kill…Me…”

Tears welled in his eyes as he squeezed them shut. Raising his arm, he could feel and taste the suffering Famyne was feeling.

He pulled the trigger.

The suffering was over.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

Cat arranged a small pyre for what was left of Delambre. He’d managed to ruin the closest thing to a burial the old man could have been given. Fire cleansed the soul or something like that. In truth, Cat didn’t want the insects and rodents chewing on the desiccated skin and organs that were once his friend. He burned Famyne’s skull, also. That was partially out of mercy. It was also finishing the job.
 

Catwalk returned to the drainpipe. The familiar flickering ring of light was still visible at the ladder’s apex. He pushed his tired arms further up the metal ladder, rung after wet and rusty rung. He reached the top of the ladder, stopping at a wooden trap door. He weighed his options. The shotgun was an option, but shooting blind wasn’t the best option when dealing with a mad scientist. Save the shotgun for the scientist. He looped his cybernetic leg around the ladder, inhaled, and drove an elbow strike to the center of the door. It splintered like flotsam. Torchlight flickered in the area above. He shook his head, grabbed the next rung, and pulled himself upward.

If he hadn’t spent his teen years in the religious orphanage known as St. Patrick’s, the setting would have been alien to him. Instead, he recognized most of the trappings right away. Cat rose to his feet, standing in the center of an expansive worship area. Long, wooden pews lined the room before him, facing an elevated stage. A pulpit stood on one side of the stage, opposite a large statue of Jesus Christ. Cat paused for a moment. Had he even laid eyes on the biblical icon since he left the orphanage? Between the pulpit and the statue, at the midpoint of the stage, stood a large stone altar draped in rich scarlet and purple velvet. The cloth was well-pressed, free from wear and stains. It certainly was a recent addition.

The rear wall behind the altar was nearly ablaze with the light of an amazing amount of candles. Wax dripped down the wall, and the candleholders, an eerie mix of white, black and red. Someone had taken a long time to light those candles.
 

Someone who was expecting him.

Metallic objects on the altar shimmered in the candlelight. A polished goblet, bowl, and knife reflected the flickering glow of the flame. Cat remembered communion and wondered what spin the madman would put on the ceremony. The faint remains of incense clung to the air. The drapes on the altar were flawless. The same could not be said for the rest of the room. Dirt and grime covered the pews. The hymnals and copies of the religious text were water-worn or chewed on by rodents. A layer of black soot and dust covered the stained glass of the windows. Without lighting, the vaulted ceiling disappeared into darkness.

A confession booth stood along the left wall, the enclosure wherein subjects bared their souls to the holy man, and were granted a task to achieve atonement for their sins. As a cop, Cat had plenty of run-ins with so-called holy men. Usually, these religious figures were devoted practitioners of faith. Other times they were the most deviant wolves in sheep’s clothing.