Planet Chimera (20 page)

“That explains the butler at Baron Smith’s
compound,” I grumbled, biting my fingernail, as I realized
something important. “I knew there was something wrong with that
chap. But what is he planning on doing with them?”

Reaching down, I pulled on the level,
located on the side of one of the monitoring machines, and broke it
off. I turned around, exhaling deeply, and kicked apart another
machine, a clicking noise erupting alongside a tiny mist of smoke.
Whether I succeeded or not, I would make it my sole purpose, right
now, to delay the madman’s conquest of earth. His plans affected my
future goals, for the many centuries to come, and I could not have
that. Earth, I believe, deserved to have one madman—me—running amok
and not two. Once I was done destroying the controls, I plodded
across the floor, carefully watching the mechanical men, and hoping
they wouldn’t spring to life without warning.

The next room was slightly gloomy, a place
where all the mechanical construction was created: the madman’s
laboratory, in my own perspective. It housed strange weapons,
devices of complex mechanical function, strange blueprints on all
the walls, and books of anatomy and magic. It was amazing,
definitely, something you didn’t see every day. And seeing all of
these weapons of mass destruction, in a room with no guards
stationed inside it, I would be wary of a trap, of a ruse, but I
wasn’t. So many things were out of place: the room full of immobile
mechanical men, the room filled with weapons, and the lingering
silence that had taken over the whole complex. I could feel the
hair on my neck stand, my heart rate increasing, and a shift in the
air around me. The anxiety was slowly killing me. Reaching for a
gun, I saw a string pin, below the butt of the gun, and saw some
gears turning in different directions. Something like methane gas
oozed into the whole room, and behind me, a small fuse flickered
into a small flame.

“Oh crap,” I turned around, and began to
dash for the next door, as I realized my blunder.

Violently, the whole room
exploded—the force and pressure of the flames sending me crashing
through the metal door, with my whole back ablaze. I landed, chin
first, against something cushy, and stood up to take off the coat.
It felt like my back had been burned off, like there was no skin
left. I pulled the fur coat off, throwing it on the ground, and
sighed deeply, turning my head around. I saw twelve guns pointed at
my head, small red dots dancing around my face, and heard the
sounds of safeties being removed. The room, a luxury suite, with a
king size bed, a large, brown dressing table, a soft carpet, a
fireplace, three night lambs, was housing a battalion of mutant
chimeras. I also noticed a gigantic rocking chair, covered in cushy
cotton, being rocked around by someone facing the fireplace.
The madman
, I
thought.

“Professor Roger Dozer, I presume,” I asked,
placing my hands above my head, whilst facing the rocking seat. “We
finally meet at last.”

“Rave, enough with the formalities, old
friend,” he replied, his voice tense and grim, without looking back
at me. “How long has it been, three or four hundred years?”

“You seem to know me,” I whispered,
surprised, as I took two steps towards him. “Who are you, if I may
be so bold? I believe, people should face each other, when they are
speaking directly to each other.”

“The immortal monster, Rave, the terror on
earth,” he shrieked, throwing something into the fire. “You dare to
talk to me that way, after what you did to me? I was your friend,
your only ally, and the only man whose dreams aligned with yours.
Think, Rave, use that tiny feeble mind of yours to uncover my true
identity.”

“Give me a clue or something,” I smirked,
the mystery behind his identity vexing me a bit. “Say something
that might jolt my memory; after all, I took a lot of lives over
the centuries.”

“Fine, you brutish oaf,” he sighed, raising
his right hand, which was missing an index finger. “You took that
from me, after you betrayed me on the night of the Fang Moon.”

The Fang Moon, a night where mediocre mages
were given a chance to prove themselves, and transcend into
powerful wizards. It was a night where many things like murder,
sacrifices, suicides, occurred, and it only took place every five
hundred years. The memory of that night eluded me, but I remember
taking a bounty against a specific target, a person who was close
to me.

“This is impossible: I killed you,” I
gasped, realizing his true identity. “You can’t be alive, you just
can’t be.”

“I could say the same thing about you, but
look at where we are,” he laughed, standing up, his back facing me.
“Can you believe it, Rave, that we would meet like this, three
hundred years later.”

“So, Zad, you are Roger Dozer?” I asked,
placing my hands down, feeling my stomach tighten. “You are the
madman—I cannot believe this, even though I am seeing it with my
own eyes.”

Turning around, he grinned
at me, cross-eyed, forming a gun gesture with his right hand and
placing it against his skull. Zad was a tall, thin man, with a face
that would scare most children into wetting their pants. He had two
sets of sharp teeth, two on the top and two on the bottom, a square
jaw, a metal nose, blood-shot sclera, and pointy cheek
bones.
The
fool
must have done several facial reconstruction surgeries on
himself
, I thought. He was unlike the man
I knew from before. I mean, yes, three hundred years ago he was
crazy and violent, but not build a mountain base, and kidnap people
crazy. He had ideas, plans for world domination, and taking over
Cyborg City, but it was all just games and illusions. And I did
kill him, yes, and I did cut off his index finger as proof of my
work, and it haunted me for a few years. But before that, he had
become hostile and violent, and he would have become a full blown
threat, had he achieved powers on the night of the Fang
Moon.

“How are you alive, Zad? Did you also become
immortal like me?”

“Nonsense, Rave, immortality is so
overrated. You gained that ability at a great cost, a price that no
one should ever have to take, and that’s not something I agree
on.”

“I killed you, Zad, I took your life with my
own hands, so tell me the truth. How are you still moving around?
How are you still amongst us, three hundred years later, if you are
not immortal?” I lashed at me, taking a few more steps towards him,
and stopping when a few mutant chimeras stepped into my path, guns
aimed at my heart.

“Yes, you destroyed my flesh, but you did
not destroy my mind, which was something you should have
considered. In the event of an early demise, a thing that I had
foreseen, I instructed another colleague of mine to transfer my
mind into the body of another using a powerful machine I created.
It is the reason why I have lived this long, and the reason why you
can’t kill me.”

“That is sick, Zad, you are truly a
monster.”

“Oh, Rave, you have some nerve to call me a
monster, considering all of the lives you have ended upon this very
night alone. Yes, I was watching and recording all of your
movements, since the moment you arrived at the mouth of my lair. At
first, I wasn’t sure it was you, so I hatched a scheme to test out
your skills and abilities, to see if you were the real Rave I knew
and loathed. I could have ordered my men to burn your body in the
flames, but I didn’t because I was curious to see if you would
revive back to life without a body. And I must say: I want that
body of yours more than anything now. With your body, your power,
and my mind, I will take over the whole galaxy.”

“Zad, its official, you have truly lost your
marbles, old friend. All that time I spent with you, all that time
I listened to your rants—I should have realized how serious crazy
you were. I truly regret not finishing the job, when I had the
chance.”

“Fret not, Rave, we all make mistakes, it’s
a part of life, but we also get chances to make amends of those
regrets. Ah, the true wonders of life are amazing, aren’t they? We
have seen time progress, witnessed history in the making, and now
we get a chance to rewrite what should have been history, and what
should have been erased from it.”

“That much we can agree on,” I smiled,
popping my knuckles, observing my surroundings for any openings.
“Destiny has granted us this chance to meet again, face to face,
and finally settle our score.”

“Tonight, you will die, Rave,” he whispered,
turning around, and posing in a ridiculous stance. “It was decided
the moment you crashed onto this planet, and there is nothing you
can do to prevent it.”

“Are you stupid or something, Zad?” I
laughed, the pain in my back gone, “In case you have forgotten, I
am immortal, and even if you manage to maim me, you won’t be able
to kill me.”

“Come here, Rave, sit with me,” he waved me
forward, gesturing one of his bodyguards to pull me a chair from
the left corner. “Are you still a fan of Rum Tea?”

“Yes, I do happen to drink it on special
occasions,” I replied, walking over and taking a seat next to him,
crossing my legs. “Why do you ask?”

“I happen to have some in my room,” he
smiled, whispering something into a mutant chimera’s ear. “I think
we should have one last chat before we settled our vendetta, don’t
you agree?”

“Well, you do have all the guns, so I have
no choice, but to listen to your madness,” I chuckled, my gaze
fixated on a strange gun that I could see on the other side,
through the wide glass I was facing. “I am impressed, honestly, by
your level of ingenuity, Zad. That gun you created is extremely
powerful, and considering you have the element of surprise, you
might be able to take Cyborg City.”

“What in the,” he spat out his drink, gazing
at me with fury. “How do you know of this, Rave, tell me?”

“One of your soldiers happened to tell me,
before he cooked,” I sniffed, glancing at the hot liquid on his
white shirt, the hot steam still oozing from it. “You shouldn’t
open your mouth so carelessly, but then again, you were always the
bragging type.”

“This will not go unpunished,” he roared,
standing to his feet, pulling out a flintlock, and shooting one of
his bodyguards in the head, and killing it. “Next time he we think
twice before telling others my plan.”

“Zad, he wasn’t the one who told me about
your plans.”

“Oh, crap, I always do that, I always end us
shooting the wrong person. He should have said something if it
wasn’t him, but he kept his mouth shut. Is it that hard to say it
wasn’t me, huh, you stupid creatures?”

“I really don’t regret my attempt on your
life, Zad,” I added, picking up a cup of hot tea from a servant
mutant. “Thank you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean, Rave? Think
before you speak ill of me; after all, I have the guns and they are
all pointing at you.”

“If I had left you alone that night, you
might have taken a life, gained extraordinary powers, and have
become a true threat to the world, like you are right now,” I
replied, sniffing the rich aroma, and taking a sip. “There is no
limit to your insanity, and anyone can see that.”

“My insanity,” he screamed, pulling a chunk
of his grey hair out before, shooting me in the left knee. “You
dare come onto my planet, destroy my plans and goals, and then have
the nerve to lecture me about my insanity? Tell me, Rave—since you
immortal, do you feel pain? Or is that feeling lost to you?”

“You psychotic madman,” I laughed out loud,
the pain in my knee brutal, hoping to intimidate him. “I am going
to kill you before this night ends.”

“Rave, this night will never end,” he
smiled, shooting my other knee, and exploding into a fiendish
laughter. “I also control this weather; the blizzard will never end
as long as my device is running, and as long as I hold breath.”

“I am glad you told me that,” I panted,
placing my hands against my knees, in order to stop my body from
losing too much blood. “It makes my goals a whole lot easier
knowing that.”

“Hey, release your hands from your knees, so
that I may shoot them once more,” he snickered, tramping forward,
and bending down close to me, with his gun pointed at my chest.
“Come on, Rave, move your hands away—I love the sound of knee bones
breaking against bullets; it’s truly delightful.”

“From one killer to another, back off,” I
snarled, moving my head closer to him, as I fought a temptation to
reach out and break his jaw off. “You might not like what you see
if you come closer.”

“Fine, Rave, have it your way,’ he
concluded, turning around, and returning to see his seat. “Oh,
yeah, I also have red pastry cake, imported from distant galaxy, a
billion miles from here. You should try it while it’s still
fresh.”

“You shoot me in the knees, laugh at my
expense, and then offer me cake?” I asked, suppressing my anger, as
I burst into a fake laughter. “You truly haven’t changed one bit,
Zad.”

“Do you want to see something amazing,
something cool,” he fidgeted, pressing something in his pocket, a
big grin on his face. “I think you are going to love this as much
as I will.”

The room suddenly vibrated, the gears
stationed above it turning, as it began to move towards the left. I
glanced down and noticed that the ground was actually made of
glass, and I could see all the move parts beneath it. The room
moved for a few seconds and stopped, above the gigantic gun, and it
was overlooking some sort of blood stained room.

“This is where I have my prize fights to
determine which of my creations will advance in rank,” he
whispered, whilst munching on the cake, a truly unpleasant sight to
behold. “I captured some of your new colleagues and I will pit them
against the death-row inmates, who pledged their loyalty to me in
return for freedom. This is going to be good.”