The Wyrms of &alon

You told her to do what!?, Heggy typed.

I mean, it’s working, Jonan texted.

Well, damn you, and the horse you rode in on! Heggy texted back.

Heggy stashed her console in one of her pockets and then picked up the pace. She also felt like shit, but then, so did everybody else these days.

Especially now.

There was a frog in the hallway. A big frog, as big as the horse that had appeared in the lobby. It was green and corpulent, paunch-bellied, with bulging yellow eyes that twitched in its slime-slicked sockets. It sat on a lily pad that hovered maybe an inch off the ground.

Further down the hall, fists hammered on the insides of doors.

People were stuck, and couldn’t get out.

The frog’s gullet ballooned with chirruping noise. The creature’s edges flickered with pixelated instability.

Damn hologram, Heggy thought.

It was Jonan’s idea, obviously, and he’d made Ani his accomplice.

“Dr. Marteneiss!” one of the nurses yelled. She was trying to calm some of the patients, but to little avail.

“Frog! Frog!” one of them said, pointing a trembling arm at the hologram in the hallway.

Sadly, enough of the patients’ minds were far enough gone that they thought the holograms were real. The patients scattered like frightened children, much to the other healthcare workers’ dismay.

“I’ll handle it!” Heggy said. “Just get the doors unlocked. We can’t deal with a crisis without the manpower to do it!”

“Right!” the nurse said, replying with a nod.

Heggy charged through the frog.

She had a bit of a trek to go through.

As part of Dr. Derric’s, Lokanok’s, and Howle’s three-way insubordination stunt, Jonan had proposed a brilliant idea for a distraction: fuck with ALICE and make the doors lock on their own and the hologram projectors go hog wild. And as much as Heggy hated to admit it, Jonan’s plan appeared to be working.

Everything was coming up crazy. It was like the most demented Cheldmas house she’d ever seen. The hospital was full of life, and it was annoying as hell.

Big-eyed M-pop idols walked along the walls, singing a fast-beat tune. A can of soda pop hovered menacingly above the E Ward’s reception desk, slowly spinning to show off the brand’s logo. There was a calming cypress grove by the trauma stations, and a Benundi drake rodeo act was playing out in the Suture. Heggy dimly recognized some characters from her grandniece’s favorite video games waving in front of one of the cafeterias. Pixelated curtains crisscrossed hallways like electrostatic cataracts, amid the fake gunfire coming from a chase scene from an episode of CSI:EPD playing out in real time.

That last bit really threw Vernon’s men for a whirl.

Whether it was because no one noticed her, or they were simply too busy to care, nobody stopped Dr. Marteneiss as she made her way to an IT station out in the big hall in between Wards E and D. It was simple set-up: a desk and counter here, some consoles set up behind them, and some more consoles set up on the wall. There was pair of shoes and a half-torn buttoned-up shirt on the floor behind the chair behind the desk, and for a second, Heggy wondered if that might have been a hologram, too, but then realized it was real when she saw the actual hologram: an animated chili-figure of Werumed-san dancing in the middle of the hallway. He was dragging his fingers over his face horizontally, making Vs with his index and pointer fingers.

Speakers further down the hall blared out sound effects to accompany the holograms set loose in the hospital. Some of them were quite loud.

Heggy did a double-take when she thought she saw a real live demon prowling down the hallway, only to realize it was just an illusion.

Next to the screens up on the wall behind the IT desk, a door was ajar.

Room 112.

Heggy figured there was all of two minutes left before one or more of Vernon’s soldiers tracked the madness to its source.

She was about to fling the door open and storm inside when the door opened on its own and a certain Dr. Ani Lokanok came creeping out through the opening.

She couldn’t have looked more suspicious if she’d even tried. Ani looked left and right, to check if the coast was clear, only to flinch, wide-eyed, as she locked gazes with Dr. Marteneiss.

She stuck out her palms in self-defense.

“Dr. Marteneiss, I can explain!”

“Don’t need to,” Heggy said. “Genneth and your boyfriend already filled me in. Now, c’mon,” she waved her arm, “let’s skedaddle.”

Heggy led Ani out into the Hall of Echoes. She had to hiss at Dr. Lokanok to try to not look so guilty as they passed a group of soldiers traveling in the opposite direction across the marble expanse.

The great outdoors beckoned.

“Try your best to look like you’re just out on a stroll,” Heggy whispered, as they crossed the sett-stone paved street, toward the Garden Court.

Ani furrowed her brow. “I don’t see many people strolling,” she said.

The two of them settled down under the wilting boughs of a sickly willow, near the edge of Garden Court. Heggy felt dirt-tired, and from the looks of it, so did Dr. Lokanok, but nerves had a way of keeping you on your toes. They stood by the roses, and lavender, and boxwood, where the grass’ edge came up against the black links of one of the military’s hastily erected fences.

Ani leaned against the willow’s trunk. Withered leaves fell from its boughs like dying butterflies. The tree itself bowed down, like a penitent at Divulgence.

Heggy spent a few minutes just looking around warily, sick with worry that she was about to get caught abetting a disturbance of the peace.

But no one came.

Ani seemed to drown in gloom. She kept looking over at the General Labs building, expecting something to happen, even though nothing did.

Normally, Ani was a vivacious young thing—perspicacity personified, with a big mouth and even bigger glasses. But, now Dr. Lokanok was as silent as the sea, and just as turbulent.

It was clear the news of her father’s death had hit her like a ton of bricks.

The afternoon was getting long overhead, not that the overcast autumn skies showed much sign of it. Sunlight poked shy holes through the lopsided quilt of overhanging clouds. Vernon’s boys had been busy as beavers, building up their improvised military facility from black latticed walls and copious amounts of tarp.

She had to hand it to them. The set-up they’d made in the Garden Court was as secure as any Heggy had ever seen. They’d built a miniature aircraft hangar in one corner of Garden Court Drive: white tarp strung on metal ribs, packed full with a handful of aerostats. Troop transports—wheeled or treaded—were scattered like sentinels along the four-cornered street. The fronds and fans of granite sett pavement were the floor of a never-ending security checkpoint.

The Garden Court itself was a sea of tents, framed by black lattice walls, watchtowers, and fellas with big armor and even bigger guns.

Especially the white ones.

Last Heggy had heard about those heat rays, they were supposed to be experimental.

No time like the present, I guess, she thought.

The garden and the drive were littered with lines of people and tides of trash. Heggy saw discarded wrappers, cracked consoles, abandoned bags. Entire garments had been shed onto the street or the grass. About half the tents were privy to those lines, the people in them waiting to be checked and tested, hoping for some kind of treatment, or—if possible—admittance into the hospital. The rest were makeshift clinics, which meant little more than cots and blankets and whatever smattering of supplies ALICE’s rationing protocols would let them spare.

“I can’t believe they keep coming…” Ani muttered.

“People are stubborn,” Heggy replied, “especially about dyin’.”

Survivors kept trickling in through the checkpoint set up at the Crusader Hill tunnel. Spitfire flashed every now and then—sometimes literally so, if it came from the heat rays—either from soldiers stationed up on the balconies of the buildings around the Garden Court Drive, or from the barrels of the guns beneath the roving aerostats. Heggy knew the damn things were there to protect everyone, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that they were vultures lying in wait, circling over one of mankind’s final bastions.

Even with her PPE still on—the damn things were basically glued to their faces now, 24/7—Heggy could still pick up a trace of a tangy sweetness in the air. She knew what it meant—and that it meant nothing good—but, at this point, that was little more than icing on the cake.

“So…” Ani coughed softly. “Now what?”

“Well…” Heggy said, with a sigh. “Ordinarily, I’d say… stay out here, get ourselves an alibi.” She looked over the scene in the Garden court, noting several groups of soldiers were entering the stairs in the street and making their way down to the garage.

“I sense a ‘but’ coming,” Ani replied.

“Guilty as charged,” Heggy said. She crossed her arms. “What were you doin’ in there?”

Ani looked at her quizzically. “I thought you said—”

—Heggy waved her arm in dismissal. “No, I mean, why were you stickin’ around after you’d done what needed to be done. If someone else had wandered in there before me…”

Ani lowered her head. “I was doing some extra stuff that Jonan suggested. It will take a while for anyone to unfuck the system.” She looked over to GL again. “I just hope that gives Genneth enough time…”

“Right now,” Heggy said, “I don’t know what the hell is going on with your guys’ scheme. I’d text Jonan for more details, but I have a feeling he’s a bit busy right now.”

Heggy looked down at the floors. The flowers drooped and sagged, with petals wilted and pale.

“Did y’all plan somethin’ beyond ‘make a distraction and then go for broke’, or am I supposed to believe that Dr. Howle and those knights are just wingin’ it right now?”

“If anyone could figure out how to fly,” Ani said, “I think it would be Genneth. Though, most likely, it would be by accident.”

Heggy exhaled and shook her head. “That’s not exactly reassuring.”

For a couple more minutes, both of them stayed quiet. Ani kept looking over to General Labs, but there was nothing of interest happening.

Well, other than people dying all around.

“Do you really believe Genneth, all that stuff ‘bout the ghosts?” Heggy asked.

She wasn’t sure if she believed it herself. Heggy had been trying to keep some distance between herself and the seemingly supernatural parts of recent events. It was easier to just keep on trucking, moving ahead like a shark.

She figured she could work out the details later.

“Genneth wouldn’t lie about something like that,” Ani said. “And, even if it was too good to be true—that one of his patients was somehow in contact with my father’s spirit—I trust that Genneth would find some way to make it all worthwhile.”

Turning, Heggy looked Dr. Lokanok in the eyes. “I’m sorry about your father, Ani. Truly.”

Ani stared at her for a while, wide-eyed. Tears glistened in the dying sunlight.

“Th-thank you, Dr. Marteneiss,” Ani said, quietly. “I… I keep wanting to think that what people are saying is right, and that these really are the Last Days. Maybe then, I could have faith that I’d get to make things right with him in the world-to-come.”

Heggy stared at the younger doctor, not really grasping her reasoning. “I’ll admit,” she said, “I’m not as deep of a Lassedile as you, Dr. Lokanok, but, how can this not be the Last Days?”

Ani chuckled softly. “You’re like the millionth person to ask me that question. I’d groan in frustration if I could, but… I think I’m long past the point of frustration.”

“Would you mind humoring me?” Heggy asked.

“Fine… fine,” Ani said. She coughed. “It’s… it’s like I told Genneth,” she said, “I think.” She was far from the picture of confidence. “Where’s the Light?” Ani looked up at the overcast sky. “The Last Days are supposed to be a battle between Good and Evil, and I hope I don’t need to tell you which side is supposed to win. So… where’s the Light? Where’s the victory?”

“I…” Heggy pursed her lips in thought. “I like to think the victory is in the good that we do,” she said. “There’s no real reason for good things to happen, so every one of them is precious. It’s our light, as my Dad used to say.”

Ani nodded. “Yeah, I agree.” She sniffled. “But… scripture says we’re gonna win, so…” Dr. Lokanok struggled to smile. Hers came out fractured and hesitant. “So,” she said, “this can’t be the end, right? The Light has to shine, first. It has to.”

It worried Heggy that Ani sounded like she was trying to convince herself more than anyone else.

Heggy nodded. “Yeah,” she replied, “I guess… when you put it that way, I can see what you mean.”

“And,” Ani added, “maybe Genneth seeing this plan through to the end might just be the first step.”

“I don’t know what hurts more,” Ani said, softly, “knowing that my father probably died a horrible, agonizing death, all alone, tortured as part of a military experiment, or knowing that the last thing I said to him was me being angry as hell. All my life, I wanted to make peace with him. I wanted to make things right. But… now, I never will. And yet…”

“What is it?” Heggy asked.

Ani shuddered. “Angel’s breath, this is going to sound awful, but… I’m angry at myself for being upset.”

Heggy’s brow crumpled up so high, she worried her skin would be ripped right off the bone. “Why on earth would you be angry over that?”

Ani shook her head and looked up, searching for the Sun. “Why do I get this reprieve? Why do I get to grieve my loss, when Alon Lokanok is just one among the billions of lives that were swallowed up by this nightmare? Shouldn’t I feel the weight of the world on my shoulders? Isn’t that what makes us human, empathy?” She cried openly now. “Or is there something wrong with me?”

“Honey,” Heggy said, her expression utterly flat, “that’s Genneth’s thing that you’re doin’ right now, and I don’t think he’ll be pleased to see you stealin’ his spotlight.”

There was a moment of silence. “That’s not funny,” Ani said.

“Dr. Lokanok, you have survivor’s guilt.”

“Well, I wish I didn’t,” Ani replied.

Heggy shook her head. “Be careful what you wish for.”

Ani waved her hand. “And what about you?” she said, unexpectedly trenchant. She lowered her voice. “You knew what your brother was doing this entire time. He’s killing people, Heggy.”

“I know,” Dr. Marteneiss muttered.

“Even now,” Ani continued, “his orders are killing people, and you’re just standing here doing nothing. And you think you can talk to me—or Genenth—about guilt?”

Though Heggy wasn’t exactly used to being directly challenged like this, she knew all about keeping her temper under control. When you stubbed your toe on a rock or your superior officer called you a “fucking moron”, you didn’t scream and yell—and it wasn’t just for the sake of decorum, either. In the military, indulging your impulses was an easy way to win an express ticket to an early grave. You didn’t get to make a fuss when you were sneaking in through the back entrance of a Costranak drug cartel’s compound, and if you did, the guards on watch would find you and blow your brains out.

Still…

Heggy stared at Ani. “I guess you’re not the only one who’s havin’ to repeat themselves today. She clenched her fists. “I tried to get my brother to stop, but… he wouldn’t listen.”

Ani stared at her.

“That’s why I’m helpin’ y’all with this little fit of insubordination,” Heggy continued. She shook her head and pursed her lips. “Even so… I understand where Vernon is comin’ from, all the same. It isn’t right, what he’s doing, but… I’d be lying if I said he wasn’t doing it for a good cause, and for all the right reasons.”

“They say the road to Hell is paved with good intentions,” Ani quipped.

“The ends don’t justify the means,” Heggy replied, “except when they do.”

“So how do you know which is which?”

“I don’t, but I still try,” Heggy said. “You’re not the only person who’s unsure of themselves, you know.”

There was a moment of silence that wasn’t silence—it was just the absence of two people talking. Eventually, Heggy broke it.

“Angel’s spit,” she muttered, “what I wouldn’t give for a cigarette right now.”

“You smoked?” Ani asked, tilting her head toward Dr. Marteneiss.

“Yeah, it helped keep me focused back when I was still servin’ as a combat medic. I quit it when I quit that.”

It was at that time that a soldier finally noticed the two of them and walked up to their position. He was one of Vernon’s elites. You could barely see their faces through their sleek, slicked back tear-drop helmets. Heggy could almost swear she could hear power buzzing in that slender white rifle of his.

Fuckin’ laser beams… she thought.

“Hey, you two,” the soldier said, “what are you doing?”

“Takin’ a break,” Heggy said.

“Yeah, well, you’ve been there for long enough. Either get moving, or get back to work. This area needs to be secured, especially after the hologram fracas. Beast’s teeth, I hope they find whoever did that…”

Heggy turned to Ani. “Well, Dr. Lokanok, you heard the man. Let’s get a move-on.”

Ani nodded.

The two physicians started walking over to the tents.

“You done this before?” Heggy asked.

Ani nodded again. “Yeah, yeah, I know what to do.”

And then some loudspeakers up on one of the guard towers crunched and turned on. They started broadcasting Vernon’s voice for all to hear.

“Everyone,” he said, with a noticeable sigh in his voice, “I’ve got some news you’re all going to want to hear.”

A stillness seized the air.

“Oh fuck…” Heggy muttered.