Author Notes – Wow, after all this time, I finally pick up this narrative again! It was yonks ago that I began this tale but strangely, as I returned to it over the weekend, the writing this brand-new chapter seemed to flow somehow. Kind of like the sea by the beach…
An Android's Nemesis
The lone biker felt every single one of the tiny rivers of perspiration that coursed their way out through the pores in his skin, felt each silvery trail of salt-flavoured bodily fluid as distinctively as though it was a drop of precious blood escaping through a hole that had been forcibly made in his flesh – each unsavoury rivulet was alight like a streak of fire beneath the glare of electrical light that shone over his head in a decidedly discomfiting way.
He yearned to squint and afford his eyeballs (which were bloodshot due to the excessive nature of his daily booze intake) just a FRACTION of protection from the light that was so harshly intimidating that it strongly reminded him of the many occasions he'd found himself sitting on the wrong side of the desk in a Police Interrogation-Room – in frankest honesty with himself, he actually found himself wishing that that was precisely where he could be right at this moment.
No such luck – the unpleasantly hot light came not from a small tabletop lamp which every Police Station known to man seemed to be issued with but from the brand spanking new light-bulb that had been screwed into the socket that dangled limply from the cracked and dilapidated ceiling, occasionally swaying.
And the reason that he denied himself the small relief of protecting his eyes against the garish light was one and the same as the cause for the desire he felt, sitting in the pit of his gut like a mound of soggy batter hastily wolfed down after breakfast beer, to be anywhere on the globe…anywhere other than in this room.
This deeply intense yearning for escape was not connected to any inclination toward claustrophobia – mentally deficient as even he couldn't have denied himself to be, he'd never suffered from that irrational fear and anyway the possibility was ruled out from the offset by the wide and open space afforded by the vast chamber-like room he so wanted not to be standing in right at this second.
Nor was it rooted in a fear of the darkness all around him – he hadn't been scared of shadows, whether engendered by the gradual descent of night or guarded eternally within the many undreamed of fissures and grottoes tucked away within the bowels of the earth, since he'd left the stage of pissing in his pants and at any rate the aforementioned and fully functional light-bulb kept steadily at bay whatever possibility for fear the shadows of this hated room may have held.
Not in the least…or, as the perspiring hood would have personally put it, no way in hell.
The nauseatingly unsettled sensation that saturated his very being with an almost superstitious fear of this place was rooted in firm and unshakeable reality…the firm and unshakeable reality of the solitary person who was seated in front of him.
This person whose eyes bore through his skull as he lived and breathed would have made the illusion of helpless entrapment shrink into sheer insignificance – this person would have made the darkness itself afraid had she brushed up against it.
The thug knew damned well the power that she held – it was this knowledge, the same knowledge that commanded the awe and respect of the army of thugs and hoodlums standing with their backs against the smooth grey expanse of the concrete walls that gave this room shape and form, that cursed him with his present intense case of the cold sweats and filled with a screaming terror in her mere presence.
It was the greatest power that one human being could have over another human being – it was the power of life and death.
"…and that's all she wrote." The last remaining member of the motorcycle gang that had messed with Eighteen and the girls and come off distinctly the worse for wear as a result concluded his full, extensive, self-flattering report of the situation that had begun, gradually unfolded and ultimately climaxed on the beach with his peers victimising a group of apparently defenceless females and getting their tails thoroughly waxed by one of their number. "Last I saw of em, the rest of the boys were hauling ass to some other area – I guess they wanted to put the miles between their backs and that blue-eyed psycho blonde into triple digits or something. The only guy who came back was me…"
Over the course of the story, the woman seated composedly on the burnt-out oil-barrel had listened in silence – silence so powerfully charismatic in itself that it seemed almost to form a vast and invisible that could and would, should he manage to irk her with a misjudged word or out-of-line sentiment, smash him into oblivion in the time it took a heart to beat.
The woman who inspired such an incredible level of loyalty (or perhaps it was simply terror) in every man in this room was, from the scant details that one was able to discern at close quarters, distinctly young – yet she was endowed by a bloom of lush maturity that was undeniable.
The crimson mask that she wore at all times bore a strong resemblance to that of a Mexican Wrestler, covering the top half of what must have been a beautiful face judging by the pair of smouldering and pouting lips that one upside-down triangular slit bared to the gloom-filled room – this mysterious human female was The Red X, undisputed and dreaded leader of the legions of scum that even now stood in rows on either side of the make-shift throne on which she was seated, a warrior whose ruthless and merciless wielding of power had blighted so many innocent lives and punished even those who had pledged undying loyalty to her in this very room.
As her voice addressed him, the sole remaining member of the biker gang cringed before a darkness that was much more substantially malevolent.
"Quite a distinction in the boldness category." The Red X's voice was as rich and light as the sun in a summer's day sky – every man in this room had come to learn, however, that at any moment it might suddenly turn white-hot and burn them. "While, at the same time, regrettably lax in the sense department. Well now…it seems that my reign is challenged."
Into the edge of her voice had crept a coolness that was practically sterile – allowing the biker an opportunity to see just how much sweat he could collect in his boots before he received rough justice, The Red X contemplated the situation with which she had been presented.
Over a year ago, shortly after the emergence and ascendance of Cell, she had made her first appearance in the shadowy criminal underworld – during those infamously bloody days, many sinister cartels and alliances had crumbled like cookies in her iron fist as she had taken on all challengers and absorbed all remaining survivors into her own budding empire.
Ever since then, having set up a base and training-centre in this abandoned old warehouse, she'd felt her mind drawing closer and closer to its state of final readiness – the dawn of the day on which she would be ready, strong enough and deadly enough to step out of the darkness and TAKE dominion.
All of this had her cold and calculating mind felt assured of – until the arrival of the ravishing, Amazonian young woman whose defiance and humiliating defeat of her adversaries had cast the glorious light of The Red X's certain triumph into the shadows of deepest doubt.
As a curveball this was unexpected, unplanned for…and utterly intolerable.
If this arrogant interloper was determined to dispute the superior might of The Red X…then she must fall before the superior might of The Red X.
"Before the day is out…I want this beauty standing in front of me." The criminal empress' voice sounded cold and metallic, like the blood of a long-stiffened corpse found lying in a ditch. "At my leisure, she will receive her sentence for the crime of presuming to defy me." It was surely a tick of the insufferable light but, as she gently and prettily cooed these words, the eye-pieces of her scarlet mask seemed to glow like burning embers. "Humiliation, destruction…and oblivion. These are the three leagues of the journey on which I will be her guide…the journey that awaits any who are reckless enough to throw the gauntlet down before me."
"Yeah, yeah! Sounds pretty damn sweet!" grinned the biker who clenched his fist in eager enthusiasm, clearly pumped by the image of the blue-eyed blonde being dragged here to receive her punishment for having humiliated him in front of the guys. "I can't wait to watch…"
Her soft and velvety voice cut him off, sharp, swift, efficient. "YOUR fate, on the other hand, was sealed from the instant you crossed the brink of my stronghold." Her rich red-silken cloak, which she wore in the manner of a shroud, opened up. "The penalty for shaming The Red X…"
An elegant hand, the fingernails of which were painted a dark-red that shimmered like wine, moved and the streak of silver that suddenly flashed was not any kind of liquid at all – it was in fact a five-inch long needle comprised of cold steel.
The biker had just the split-second that his brain required to register the tiny sliver of metal cutting a path through the air as it shot directly at him – as the second was concluded, his brain was pierced by the needle's razor-sharp tip and the start of the following second was marked by his instantaneous death.
As the body crumpled over like the limp bag of flesh and bones it had just been rendered, The Red X indicated with a dismissive wave of her throwing-hand for her minions to clear it away. "…is instant severance." She concluded her sentence vaguely, abstractly, already bored by the matter.
She was totally preoccupied by mental images of the young woman who had aroused her vengeful wrath…the young woman whose heart-stopping beauty, born grace, incredible power and unmatched prowess in combat (described by the piece of refuse whose time on this earth had just been cut brutally short) could belong to none other than the one and only Android Eighteen.
Behind the blood-red mask, her eyes narrowed in brooding rancour as she faced the very real threat that Eighteen's presence in the area held for her future plans…and reminisced venomously about the past event that bound the two of them together for as long as both of them lived beneath the same sky.
It was time to severe the bond that The Red X shared with Android Eighteen forever…and in order to do that she must first draw her hated rival into her world.
And the criminal empress had just the carrot-on-a-stick she needed in order to make the task mere child's play…
"This is weird, right here…" murmured Faris, more to herself than for the benefit of her friend.
"Mmm?" Linaly looked up as she caught the softly spoken comment.
Ever since leaving Cassie's trailer earlier that day, the girls had been strolling along the beach which was as peacefully tranquil as it had so far been every day of this summer – Linaly had been perfectly at ease as she'd chatted away even though she hadn't been able to shake off the feeling that Faris was feeling preoccupied this afternoon.
"Y' know…you've not been yourself since morning." Linaly remarked, "What's on your mind, honey?"
"Nonsense." Muttered the green-haired girl as she stared directly at the expanse of glittering water that rolled off across the horizon, not wanting meet her friend's eyes at present. "I'm always myself."
"What's gotten you into such a gloomy n' moody demeanour, sister?" Linaly smiled – whatever the issue was she could see that it was clearly troubling her friend and so she felt unwilling to let it go. "C'mon! A problem shared is a problem halved, as they say!"
Faris just shook her head – holding it high, she did not allow it to drift from the shining surface of the sea for so much as a second.
If there was one thing that Linaly disliked it was being ignored. "What the hoo-ha is wrong with you today, Faris?" she demanded – with the reflex of a greased-up snake, she reached out and took hold of her friend's arm, turning the other girl back to face her. "Are you going to tell me or are am I going to spend the rest of the day annoying you by asking until you do?"
Faris was scowling darkly as she snatched back her arm – that was unusual. "You really want me to explain what's bothering me?" she exclaimed – she stepped back and held her bare arms out wide. "It's this place! It's this feeling in the air all around me! Can't YOU feel it, Linaly? This sense that something's hanging over us all? It's like…it's like…the calm before a storm!"
Linaly was taken aback by the intensity of her friend's outburst, "Are you STILL worried about those guys?" she ventured, surprised by the wariness she heard in her own tone. "Faris, do you really think that they'd come anywhere near here after the way Eighteen handed them their asses? Forget them already!"
"I've forgotten them entirely ACTUALLY." Faris responded irritably – a thoughtful look had crossed her face. "But…now you come to mention it, was what happened yesterday really REAL? It…just feels like something out of a dream."
Linaly knew at once what her friend was referring to, "Who would ever have thought that Eighteen had it in her?" she nodded, "When we first met her, she was so quiet – she gave off an aura that just screamed 'I don't wanna talk about it!'. But when things heated up…"
Linaly's voice trailed off as she became lost in the reflections of the astounding spectacle she had borne witness to on the previous day…
"Talk about a lioness disguised as a lamb, right?" Faris summed up what they were both thinking, nodding her own head.
"And did you hear that pussycat ROAR?" Linaly grinned as she remained the extent to which their newfound friend had kicked butt.
"Hmm, well…I've got to say that I'm still not one hundred percent sure about her." Faris muttered – her eyes narrowed ever so slightly as she thought about Eighteen.
"What do you mean?"
"WELL…it's just that we know so very little about her. I mean, she just comes out of nowhere and all we know about her is her NAME. If it's her REAL name…" Faris wrinkled her nose as she decided to voice a suspicion that had been growing in her mind over the last two days. "But I bet that CASSIE…" she trailed off, seeming to lose what nerve she'd managed to work up.
"What ABOUT Cassie?"
"Come on, Lin! Look at the facts – remember how, when Eighteen turned up yesterday, Cassie invited her to join us just like that? She just asks over a total stranger who hasn't so much as breathed a word in our direction!" Faris argued as she looked Linaly straight in the eye.
"Oh, you know Cassie – she just felt Eighteen's loneliness and invited her over, that's all."
"That's what YOU think. Wanna know what I think?"
Linaly smirked, feeling amused and exasperate both at once. "Do tell." She invited, placing her hands upon the sides of her hips.
"You know and I know what a weird name 'Eighteen' is…it's not even a proper name!" Faris snorted, rolling her eyes eloquently.
"So what's the ingenius theory, O Mistress of Mystery?"
"I think that Cassie knows Eighteen from sometime before…and that Eighteen has amnesia." Faris extolled solemnly and then looked offended when her friend burst into laughter, "What?" she demanded crossly, "What's so out there about that? I once read about a girl who got into a car-crash and lost her memory – the guy who saved her life decided to call her 'Tuesday' because that was the day it all happened!"
"Mmm…I think I heard about that as well." Linaly chuckled as she thought about the novel she'd once seen her friend reading – as well as giving a new name to the amnesiac heroine, the hero of the story had also romanced her throughout nineteen sizzling chapters and it seemed that the bite of fantasy had infected Faris. "So, like, what then? You think that our girl got involved in a car-accident on the eighteenth of whenever-it-was that whatever-it-was happened…that we don't know actually happened?"
"Come on, Linaly, it's possible! Why else would Cassie invite someone she'd just met to spend the night at her place? Why'd she hint oh-so-subtly that we ought to leave just as we'd begun asking our new friend questions about herself?"
"Well then…" Linaly sighed in mock regret – she had spotted the largest flaw in Faris' fanciful theory several minutes ago and had been waiting only for the ideal moment to bring it up. "…can you explain THIS to me if that's so possible? If Cassie had known her before yesterday…why did she ask for her name?"
The silence that followed this coolly uttered question was deep and sheepish – tilting her head, Linaly watched Faris opening and closing her mouth, her cheeks blooming a deep red.
She almost laughed out loud – never before had she seen her friend look so utterly beaten!
Then Faris made an effort to rally again, "Well why else would she become so involved with a total stranger?" she demanded petulantly, a note of sarcasm creeping into her voice as she went on. "Because she's a good looking girl who looks cute in a skimpy bikini?"
Linaly said nothing in response – her eyes had just lowered and she was staring, seemingly fascinated, at her toenails.
"What?" Faris demanded, confused her friend's reaction. "WHAT?"
Linaly raised her eyes until they were level once more with those of her friend – taking a deep breath she decided to go for it. "Have you ever watched Cassie when we go nightclubbing, Faris? Have you ever seen her let herself be picked up by a guy?" as Faris blinked, she went on. "And take Eighteen. Those stunning blue eyes of hers…that perfect skin…blonde hair that the best models would make themselves mentally ill for." Her eyes were no longer avoiding her friend's but gazing directly into them and burning with meaning as she awaited a response to HER theory.
They had switched roles now – and this time it was Linaly who was pitching something to Faris, something that the latter found impossible to accept.
"You've got to be kidding me!" Faris burst out, her face turning starkest white and then deepest red. "You can't seriously be suggesting that…"
"Oh, I'm not suggesting anything." Linaly said as she folded her arms, "I'll tell you this much though; Cassie's a strange one, unfathomable. I've never been able to work her out."
"You're wrong…you must be wrong!" Faris stammered, her mind still reeling from the impact of what her friend had just pitched at her.
"What's wrong, Faris?" Though she remained calm, Linaly's eyes glittered with the hint of imminent fire. "Would it be a problem as far as you're concerned?"
"No, of course not, but…"
"Are you sure?" Linaly pressed, her tone mercilessly pleasant. "I mean, after all, it isn't every day you realise one of your friends may be…"
"No, honestly Linaly, it wouldn't bother me at all!" Faris felt more uncomfortable beneath the other girl's stare than she had surrounded by the bikers.
"Good."
With this the girls resumed their stroll – Linaly, however, could feel the tension that burned in the air that floated between herself and Faris.
"Hey you guys!"
The girls stopped and allowed their eyes to follow that voice back to its source. "Aha! Here come enigmatic Cassie and our mysterious cutie now!" Linaly exclaimed.
Sure enough, Cassie and Eighteen were walking toward them across the warm sand – they had changed back into their bikinis and Linaly noticed that Cassie was carrying a sports-bag, the strap slung across her shoulder.
"So…" Cassie smirked when she and Eighteen had finally closed the distanced and stood with the other girls, "…how did you two manage to pass the time without our enthralling society?"
"Oh, we got by." Linaly responded, her eyes flicking back and forth between Cassie and Cassie's bag – already could she taste one of Cassie's famous lunches. "Barely."
Faris could not help blushing deeply – after everything she'd been saying about the two of them, seeing Cassie and Eighteen again made her feel sheepish to a degree she had never dreamt of.
Cassie noticed this react and also shrewdly noted the conspicuous look of innocence on Linaly's face. "Anything happen before we arrived?" she asked mildly, teasingly pretending not to notice Linaly's interest in her bag.
"Nope. Come on, Cass, dish out the provisions before I keel over." Linaly chirped, holding out an expectant hand.
Cassie gave an inward shrug as she put down the bag and unzipped it.
"Oh, cool beans!" Linaly exclaimed as she saw a large cellophane-wrapped stack of Cassie's fish-sandwiches. "Hey, Cassie, let me help you to set the food out!"
There was a shared laugh.
Eighteen's face was light as she smiled at nothing in particular – since coming to this place she'd felt more happy and relaxed than she could remember having ever felt before.
For the moment her life had no direction, no ultimate goal, but for at least the time being she felt that it would definitely be nice to linger – a part of her wished that these moments would never fully pass.
She had no idea just how fleetingly her new life as a beach-bum was scheduled to last…nor of the terrible blow that fate even now prepared to strike her newfound happiness and contentment with.