DISCLAIMER: Carnivale and its canon characters are the property of HBO and the show's producers; no copyright infringement is intended.
Note: This fic was a followup to "Rape," but can be read as a standalone. Like all speculative Carnivale fiction written at an early date, it's been rendered AU by later-established canon.
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It's not fair, Hack Scudder thought bitterly. Not fair to either my son or me. I've tried so hard, for so many years, to live my life responsibly, use my powers responsibly...
He'd still been rebelling against the Templars when he enlisted in the Canadian Army midway through the Great War. But seeing the horror of war had changed him. He'd served his hitch without killing or wounding anyone; he'd always aimed to miss, never gotten caught at it. Surreptitiously, he'd healed many wounded, especially civilians caught in the crossfire. He'd prayed fervently that God would allow him to heal only where it was appropriate, and take the necessary life-force from appropriate sources.
On returning to Carnivale after the war, he'd been stunned to find the psychic Apollonia in a catatonic state and himself unable to heal her. She'd snapped out of it just long enough to warn him that Lodz was a dangerous foe and urge him to flee. He'd sensed that he needed to survive and evade his enemies, for the sake of a mission many years in the future. So he'd taken Apollonia's advice.
He'd exiled himself to an armpit of the world, the last place any sane manager would bring a carnival. Thrown himself into backbreaking work. But he was never sufficiently exhausted to know dreamless sleep. Not a night or day passed when he wasn't tormented by a dream or vision: of evil that had been, would be or merely might be, or of evil happening in the here and now. The here-and-now revelations had a special, sharp-edged clarity that left no doubt about their truth.
Much as Hack resented the Order that had raised him, their teachings were never far from his mind.
"You are the descendant of an unbroken, thousand-year line of Templars, and the reincarnation of at least a dozen of those ancestors. You are what you are because of the rituals we performed, to assure that the Avatar would be born among us in this most crucial of times.
"If you die or fail, and you have a son, the responsibility will pass to him."
It was a burden no man would want...and no man who was a man would impose on another. Least of all on a son he'd fathered in a long-regretted moment of wanton selfishness.
The Templars had taught him the extent - and the limits - of his powers.
"You possess healing powers, but they are governed by rules. The life and health you give must be taken from somewhere else - from vegetation or animals, perhaps even from humans.
"You are capable of restoring a dead person to life. But you can only do so by killing another; and it will have to be murder, not a voluntary sacrifice. Any murder is a sin that will have severe consequences.
"Lesser sins, even some murders, may not cause you to forfeit the role of Avatar. The murder of an innocent surely will."
He'd vowed never to try to reverse human death.
He'd vowed that consciously. But he sensed now that deep down, he'd always known it would come to this.
He deserved to have it come to this. No one else did.
Does every man realize at some point that he'd be willing to trade any life - any number of lives - for a certain one if it were lost?
Hack didn't question his decision, as he lurked in the stifling mine where he'd toiled for so long. He was going through with the plan. There was no basis for choosing among his fellow miners: they were all ignorant, intolerant, unlikable - but all blameless in that unacceptable death. Unfortunately, he had to act quickly, and these men were the only prey available. The next one who came down the tunnel would be his victim.
But oh, Ben, what will I be doing to you? I'm sorry, I'm sorry! It's so unfair - to everyone.
A helmet light appeared in the tunnel. Hack had turned his off, the better to catch the other miner off guard. Still, he waited until he could make out Carl Butridge's face.
The face was bewildered. "Scudder? Why -"
The query ended in a strangled gasp as Hack drove his pickaxe into the narrow chest.
He tried to retrieve the weapon - his initials were scratched on the handle. But he couldn't pull it out. So be it. I never expected to get away with this, to make anyone believe a denial.
Grimly, he reflected that these miners would have blamed him - the "outsider" - even if he wasn't the killer. He'd worked alongside them for almost a decade. But he'd always been an outcast because of the education he couldn't hide, the carny background he'd admitted during a rare night of drinking.
He heard distant voices, so he relit his helmet light and fled, for now, deeper into the mine.
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Four hours later Hack faced a far more difficult choice.
He'd stayed in the mine, hoping to escape during the night. But he'd underestimated the passion Butridge's murder would arouse in the normally stolid miners. They were tramping through the tunnels now, seeking to terrorize him, bellowing about their plan to lynch him. He didn't doubt for a second that they meant it. If he somehow managed to slip around them, they'd hunt him down.
I'm no longer the Avatar. Even if I were, I wouldn't be immortal. Harder to kill than most, but not immortal. A lynching would have killed me when I was the Avatar, and it will kill me now.
I'm no longer the Avatar...and yet I still have powers. I can feel that I do.
The Templars had taught Hack Scudder well. He didn't know details of the apocalyptic struggle that lay ahead; perhaps no one did. But he understood these powers and how to use them.
Death would be a relief. Freedom at last, whatever the consequences of my sins.
The tramping of booted feet, the calls for revenge, came closer.
A relief for me, freedom for me. What about Ben?
Closer still. He took a step backward and found himself flush against a wall, with no more room for retreat.
Ben is the Avatar now, one way or another. A mere youngster, who'll have this terrible cross to bear because of my failure.
If I die he'll be totally alone.
If I live I'll be able to give him some guidance, make it at least a little easier.
If I live, I'll see the man he becomes...
Hack Scudder made his decision. Standing alone in the depths of the nearly played-out silver mine, he spoke aloud to the mountainside. Coldly and ruthlessly, he ordered: "Collapse on my pursuers. Kill them all."
The mountainside did as it was told.
Hack stood his ground, ignoring the rain of rocks all around him, ignoring the men's dying screams. Clinging firmly to the belief that his section of the tunnel would remain intact, the air would remain breathable, because he willed it so. He refused even to cough, lest he seem to be ceding a bit of control.
After a good twenty minutes he spoke again to the mountainside: "Make a path to the surface, for me only."
And it was done. The escape route created was so natural in appearance that it took him some time to find it and crawl through it, but he never allowed himself to doubt.
It was only when he stood outside, looking back at the tomb of five hundred innocent men, that he whispered, "My God. What have I done?"
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Hack waited until he was well outside the new-made ghost town of Babylon before he sank to his knees in the dusty road and prayed.
"Please, God...I know I'm a sinner, with no right to beg any boon of You. And I also know I succeeded in what I set out to do in that mine, because there are rules, and the rules were followed.
"But please, please, will You let me see that I succeeded, without having to wait any longer or travel any farther?"
He wouldn't have been surprised if he'd been struck by lightning for his presumption.
Instead, the scene changed suddenly, and he found himself an unseen observer in a shabby, poorly equipped medical facility...
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The country doctor was about to make the first cut of an autopsy when the naked 14-year-old on the examining table gasped sharply, and his eyes flew open.
The doctor dropped his scalpel.
The boy looked around, bewildered. "Wh-where am I? What happened?"
"Ah - everything's gonna be all right, son." The doctor covered well, all things considered. Trying to hide his shaking hands, he continued, "I'm Doc Willoughby. Old man Lawson caught you breakin' into his hen-house, remember?"
"I was hungry."
"I can believe it," the doctor said with a sympathetic nod. "A lotta folks are goin' hungry these days. Lawson's an asshole."
"Am I under arrest? Wh-why ain't I got no clothes on?" By now the boy was terrified.
Willoughby peeled off his surgical mask so he'd appear less intimidating. "No, no, you're not under arrest -"
"Why was you pointin' a knife at me?"
"Oh, hell. Calm down an' listen, all right? I'm a doctor. Lawson beat you real bad, uh - Ben, is it?"
"Yeah, Ben."
"He beat you real bad, Ben -"
"He was hittin' me with his shotgun. That ain't nice."
"No, it's not. You were, uh, out cold for a while, an' I was gonna operate 'cause I thought you might have, uh, internal injuries. But I'm guessin' you don't, now!" The last sentence was a hasty addition, as one bound took Ben off the table and halfway to the door.
The boy looked back at the doctor, but kept a leery distance. "You was gonna operate on me without no ether?"
"No, no!" The flustered Willoughby took a deep breath and came up with yet another cover story. "I just had the scalpel in my hand while I was sort of lookin', plannin' where to cut. My assistant was gonna come in an' give you the ether before I did anythin' else, I swear!" Ben looked mollified, so Willoughby felt safe in asking, "Do you have any pain, son?"
"No. An' I ain't your son!"
The doctor sighed. "Okay, Ben. I'm sure no one's gonna hold you for anythin' - they'll just be glad to hear you aren't hurt. But for now, will you come back an' sit down while I find out what happened to your clothes?"
Ben returned, grudgingly, to perch on the edge of the examining table.
And then, for an instant, he seemed to look directly at Hack, and recognize this apparition as one he'd seen before...
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Hack was smiling and weeping at the same time, and the tears flooded his vision, and all at once he was back in the road, back in Texas, where he'd just become a mass murderer.
Oh Ben, I'm so sorry for the hardships I've caused you.
If I could have, I would have forced your mother to have an abortion. But now you're a person, and she doesn't love you and I do, and I would have given anything to be able to carry you off and raise you myself. But I couldn't do that without exposing you to the enemies who wanted to destroy me.
Through his tears, he glimpsed, dimly, a part of the future. Saw that he would try to make amends for his sins by performing more healings, voluntarily giving away bits and pieces of his own life-force until he'd wind up as a wraith who was neither truly alive nor truly dead, able to materialize only briefly.
But I'll be here, here for you, Ben, not in some faraway heaven or hell. That's all that matters.
If I could, I would have given my life to save yours tonight.
Instead, I may have given my soul...
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The End