The Ghost and the Darkness Volume 2 (The Fallocaust Series) (55 page)

In the early evening after a long day riding the quad I noticed the road to my left starting to dip. I watched the terrain and saw that a drop off was starting to form behind the medians. Sure enough, two miles ahead I saw a large dip in the road, almost half a mile down; it looked like a large crater.

I slowed the quad down, Silas was silent while I did. I got off of it, though I left it idling, and grabbed one of my knapsacks. The knapsack that held Kessler’s severed head.

I took the bag and started walking towards the crater. Below my feet I could see broken medians and chunks of concrete that had fallen sometime after this bomb had hit the earth. It gathered at the bottom of the crater like water collects in a pool, all of it covered in snares of rusted wire, and from what I could make out, several cars.

Without a thought I tossed the knapsack down the crater, watching with grim pleasure as the brown bag hit the bottom with a satisfying thunk. A moment later my own spit joined it (that was for spitting on Elish) and I turned and got back on the quad.

“I won’t even ask,” Silas said from behind me. “Just like I won’t ask why you’re on a legion quad,
Raven
.”

“Good, don’t,” I said acerbically back and started back down the highway. I actually got more out of Silas’s little quip than he knew. It meant that once again Kessler had decided to leave out his knowledge of where I was. It also meant that Silas didn’t know I was starting to tap into this sestic radiation thing.

Those were both cards I could use in the future. For Kessler it was obvious blackmail once he eventually did crawl himself out of that crater, and as for the radiation, it was something I could do if I needed to go kamikaze on the King of the World.

Nothing interesting happened for the rest of the day. It wasn’t until late in the evening when I was fighting off fatigue that I felt Silas tap my shoulder.

He pointed to my right; I looked over and saw a row of yellow triangle signs, all of them reading ‘Keep out by order of Skytech’. They were the signs that Elish had told me to watch out for. I was here. I was on the border between the uninhabitable plaguelands and the north eastern greywastes.

“I can feel you starting to get tired,” Silas said. “Let’s stop and sleep for a few hours.”

“I’m not going to sleep with you around,” I said back darkly. “I’ll be fine.”

“The quad needs rest anyways. You’re already risking it overheating, look at the engine gauge,” Silas said. “Just do it. I need to stretch my legs.”

I gritted my teeth again but slowed the quad down to a stop. I turned it off and jumped off, feeling my own legs frozen and stiff. I grabbed the pack that Elish had filled with food and water and walked towards a median on the other side of the highway.

Silas walked around. I heard a few bones pop as he stretched. I took out a bottle of water but as I reached in to grab a Dek’ko energy bar I paused and debated the intelligence of that. But then again I had seen these same bars in the legionaries’ pockets and I had a legion quad so I could explain it away easily. I sat with my food and water my eyes never leaving the king.

There was definitely something off with him. Silas wasn’t making smart comments or walking with that swagger he always had. He was tense and his usual calm and smirking face was dark and lined.

I chewed on my energy bar, picking apart and analysing every movement he made. He was pacing like a tiger in a zoo; his hands moving from being on his hips to crossed over his chest.

This was not like him, not at all.

I wonder if this was as hard for him as it was for me.

Silas wiped his face with his hands, giving a nervous look down the highway. The signs were long behind us and now we were surrounded by what looked like melted metal. I had seen structures similar to this in Gosselin where a lot of the bombs had dropped but nothing compared to this terrain. It was like the entire world had caught flame.

“Is this because of the Fallocaust?” I suddenly asked. When he looked at me I pointed towards a large hunk of metal. It was such a weird shape it was like it had been melted down to bubbling magma and hardened again.

Silas nodded. “Yes, this used to be a big city. I lived here with Sky and Perish.”

“The radiation exploded it? How? Why did this place burn but everywhere else is preserved?” I realized that Silas had nothing on him. No bag of water and no food. I despised the thought but the melted metal around us and the charred landscape were starting to make the reality of just what we had to stop Perish from doing become a bit more real.

So I threw him an energy bar and then a bottle of water. He caught both in his hands but said nothing about it. He knew if he thanked me I’d tell him to shove it up his ass.

I wanted to kill him. Dear fucking god, every instinct in my body wanted to kill him. To the point where my hands twitched for my knife, my mouth salivated with anticipation of tasting his blood again. It was such an insane notion that I was riding with him right now, but the circumstances outweighed my need for revenge.

I had to have control; I couldn’t let Reaver win this time. I had to keep this uneasy truce between us and find Killian.

Then what?

I didn’t know, but I’d take it as it came.

After Silas took a drink of water, he answered my question. “The machine Sky created was basically a special room. When Sky or I went into that room and released our radiation it contained it. The more we released the more condensed it got. Later, Sky added these magnetic-type strips, Mag-strips he called them, to the walls to also draw out our radiation at a quicker pace. After he dragged me to this location he pushed us both inside of this room and shut the door.”

I realized I had stopped chewing as I listened. I didn’t want to admit this fascinated me. Who else knew what caused the Fallocaust besides him?

He continued, “He took me in there, and when I refused to release the radiation he tapped and extorted every trigger I had, every weakness. Sky knew me and he knew he had to break me down mentally. Because he believed the pulse would destroy the electronics, and thus, stop the Governments from dropping bombs on all of us. I had helped him come up with the idea but as we continued on our journy... I had second thoughts. I didn’t want to risk it.”

Silas let out a long breath. “The radiation between the two of us condensed and condensed, it was so bright. I had never seen such a brilliant and deadly white light. It was so much pressure against my body, and yet, I stayed entirely intact. After it had condensed to his satisfaction he pressed a little blue button on a remote he had.”

Silas paused, the sound of the energy bar wrapper crinkling underneath his hand. “The pressure immediately left my body only to be replaced by a roaring that almost deafened me. I fell to my knees with my clothing burning off of my body. The light was everywhere. He would tell me later I looked like an angel… but he just looked like the same devil to me.”

He was silent again, then his tone dropped. “We ran out of the laboratory as fast as we could, the radiation thick around us. I knew we had precious little time before the lab exploded, before the city exploded, and sure enough, it did. We got far enough away that when the blast happened we were able to resurrect out of the flames. If we hadn’t gotten far enough it would’ve taken twenty years for us to resurrect without immediately burning alive again. The fires of sestic radiation do not quell easily; they’re hot as you can see.”

He took a small bite and stared down at the bar. “When we got out of the city though, we realized – it had been a mistake. Just as I feared not only did the electronics get fried… but the sestic radiation had… it had… killed the world. All we could do was run back to what would become Skyfall and clear it away. The survivors safe underground being minded by Perish.”

Silas fell into silence.

“Both of you sound like batshit crazy assholes,” I said, taking a drink of water before I lit a cigarette. “Especially Sky.”

“I loved him all the same,” Silas replied.

“He didn’t love you though, eh? Nothing like hating you so bad he decided to learn how to kill an immortal,” I said, making direct eye contact the entire fucking time I said it. Though as I did I realized this was also something I shouldn’t know, so I added, “Perish told me all about what Sky did.”

There was a thousand pounds on my shoulders and twice as many worries, but I felt satisfied as I saw the pull on his lips. I stored that away in my brain to use for fodder later. I liked knowing his weaknesses. A lot of his weaknesses, I realized, I had learned during our drinking nights back in Aras. I knew his sensitive areas were not only Sky but rejection as well.

Poor miserable little king. I am a patient man, eventually I will kill you.

I have all the time in the world. I also have your first born and top councilman. Your second born and president of your scientific research company. And, hell, I even have Kessler’s son, which I am sure will be more than happy to fill in as Imperial Commander once his dad is realized missing.

Silas gave me a hard look and shook his head slowly. “You can nip all you want, Reaver. I am holding off riling you up for the sole reason that we need to get to Sky’s lab, not rip each other to bloodied pieces. I suggest you grow up, and put Killian ahead of your childish need to feel like you have the verbal upper hand with me.”

“Killian is all that matters,” I said coldly. I had forgotten how quick he was with his words. I had enjoyed him ripping Reno down when my friend had thought he had verbally topped him. Silas was a wordsmith that one and a manipulative fuck too.

“Then prove it and stop trying to give me reasons to attack you,” Silas replied. “When this is over with we can go back to our games, until –”

“It’s not a game!” I suddenly yelled, rising to my feet. To my own shock I felt a flood of emotion go through me. I think I was more mentally at my limit than I realized.

Silas gave me a dismissive look before taking another drink.

I ground my teeth. “You don’t get to pick and choose when you decide to take life seriously. Don’t you see what this does to your family?”

Silas rose to his feet, dropping the energy bar wrapper onto the ground. He dusted off his hands. “Everything ends up being a game. When you’re my age and you have seen everyone you love die, you will stop seeing people as people. They are nothing but ants in an ant hill, and you – nothing but a god among insects.”

“I’m not talking about the shit fucks in the greywastes or your stupid Skyfallers, I am talking about your family,” I said lowly. I started walking back towards the quad; I think we both realized no one was going to be sleeping. “You have like forty of those fucks, half of them are immortal if not more. They aren’t people who live and die and yet you treat them worse than an abusive boyfriend.”

Silas paused and I realized I had said way too much. He had been out of my life for so long I had forgotten that I wasn’t suppose to know anything about this. I steadied my heartbeat, it had sped up during my outburst, and forced it back into its normal rhythm.

“You don’t understand anything,” Silas mumbled to himself. He put a cigarette to his lips and lit it. “When you’re mine and we rule the world together, you will. Until then… you will not intimidate me, and you won’t take my aversion to your bait as weakness either. I merely have more pressing issues on my mind.”

“We’re not going to rule the world, Silas,” I said to him.

To my confusion he paused. He stared forward and I saw his adam’s apple move up and down as he swallowed whatever weight my words had put on him.

“You... you called me Silas. You’ve never called me by my name before,” Silas said quietly, but a moment later he shook his head. “Let’s go.”

I put out my hand to stop him, feeling my patience and restraint starting to wear down. A nerve was becoming exposed and he was stabbing it. “I know I was cloned from strands of Sky, but you get it out of your fucking head that we will ever be together. Not now, not after Killian dies as an old man, not a thousand years after. It’s not going to happen.”

Silas’s emerald-coloured eyes drew themselves up to mine.

And then Asher came back – I knew he was in there somewhere.

“Oh, it will happen,
bona mea
,” Silas’s voice dropped. I could see the darkness start to gather around him. I knew Nice Silas had just been shot in the head in front of me. Well, I had pushed him, it was my doing. “We have forever to rip each other to shreds, my love. Rest assured, you will be mine and you will love me more than any man has loved another man. This, yes, this, Reaver Dekker… I promise you. Even if it takes all of eternity, I will not give you up. I will have you, because I love you.”

I stood my ground, a cigarette hanging out of my mouth. I smirked at him as he glared back at me.

I leaned over until I was right in his face, our cigarettes, a blue ember and a red one, touching to create deep violet. I glared him down and our eyes locked, a depthless black and deep forest green. The colour that the world is now and the colour that the world used to be.

Reaver Merrik and Silas Dekker, almost the exact same person and yet literally born a world apart. Two men who had led such vastly different lives and yet here we were face-to-face, locked in what I knew would be the fight of my freedom. What could have been star-crossed lovers in a different reality, had been reduced to two mad men with the power inside of them to end the world.