Chapter Five: Beauty and Beast
Overwhelmed at last, Dexter surrendered to his emotions. DeeDee held him in her lap as he quietly cried against her shoulder, finally, for a moment, acting his age. It was more than he could bear and yet, for her sake, he would endure. He just needed to give in and be weak to regain his control, and so he poured out the fear and pain and despair gripping him.
After what seemed like hours to DeeDee, his sobbing subsided into rough, hiccupping gasps that wracked his body and made him groan and shiver. Gradually he calmed down as the pain of the day faded and once again he fell asleep in her arms. DeeDee just held her brother tightly, wrapping the lab coat around him as she tried to keep him warm and comfortable. She rocked back and forth, remembering how that simple motion had gone so far to soothe him as a baby.
How much longer? How much longer? When would they get here? How much more could he take? DeeDee's faith in their friends was absolute, but if they weren't rescued soon there wouldn't be anything of Dexter left to rescue. He hadn't been able to eat much. His bleeding gums were too painful even to sup the watered-down paste she'd made from cereal she'd found in the field rations, and his throat was so raw from screaming that he could barely swallow.
She had thought she couldn't have been more frightened to see Dexter return all bloodied the day before, but she had been wrong. Seeing him so cold, so pale, as if he was already dead, had almost sent her into a panic. Only his need for her help had kept her from screaming. That, she supposed, was bravery, though she didn't feel particularly brave. She could not compare to her brother. How he was still managing to hold on she could not begin to guess, but she knew full well that he was doing so for her sake. Because of that, she would not, could not fail him.
The door opening startled her. Usually the lights came on for a few minutes first to announce the arrival of the Mechs and to let their fears and imaginations run rampant. Still clutching the sleeping boy in her arms, determined not to give him up, DeeDee twisted around to see who or what was there.
Her hopes of a rescue were dashed at the sight of a lone figure, small and slight, standing in the doorway. The person stood back in the shadows, but with a familiar gesture they motioned for her to join them.
Gently she lowered Dexter to the floor, smoothing his hair a final time before stepping away. With dread in her heart she stepped out of the cell and into the darkness beyond. The hall was as she remembered it, industrial and dank and positively warm compared to their cell. As soon as she stepped past the door it closed again, sealing Dexter in. Did they mean to do to her what they had done to him? He still hadn't told her what their captor had did, she could only guess from the damage done to him. Strangely, though, she did not feel threatened. Perhaps it was the absence of the Fusion Mechs. Perhaps because the figure was the same size and build as her brother.
Her brother. She gasped as the figure moved close enough for her to recognize the face. This was his Fusion, his doppleganger. One of his dopplegangers. From what Number One had once told her, there had been many copies of her brother made and discarded by Fuse. Green-skinned, red-eyed, he was a nightmare come to being. She could not say he was alive. She didn't know what he was besides unnatural, an evil reflection of Dexter, and she drew away from him.
"I do not intend to hurt you," he said.
The voice was deep and rough and had an echoing quality to it, as if the Fusion was speaking from the bottom of a well. It nothing like her brother's unbroken tones, and his Russian accent took on a sinister sound.
"You can talk! I didn't think you Fusion ur-things could!" she finished lamely, not sure of what to call this imitation brother.
There were many names for these strange and powerful beings. They differed vastly from the Mechs in their size and intelligence and capacity for independent reasoning. Most people fighting for the Earth called them Fusions or dopplegangers. Samurai Jack had called them Oni Demons. The Kids Next Door called them by negative numbers. She remembered Grim calling them all 'cheap wanna-be undead zombies.' Dexter simply called them Ur-creatures (and by default DeeDee did as well). They had been made as exaggerated and warped versions of some of Earth's greatest fighters, with similar powers but vastly different emotions. It had become something of a mark of distinction to have a Fusion counterpart. DeeDee knew of more than a few people who had claimed to have seen Fusion version of themselves when in fact they were a rarity and reserved for a select few. She certainly hoped that she never saw a slime-green ur-version of herself running around. She looked awful in green.
And what had Dexter said the first time he had been brought him back from the lab? Only one person had spoken . . . Dexter's own, evil opposite was the one doing all these terrible things to him! She stared, horrified and revolted.
"Most can't. I'm not like most of my kind. I've been made and remade over and over again, each time a little closer to perfection."
"Closer to Dexter, you mean," she defended. "What do you want?"
"I want to end this," the Ur-Dexter replied. His hands, covered with green gloves, balled into tight fists before he pointed at the door behind her. "That one in there is very stubborn. If he does not give me the information I seek, I will kill him to keep your side from benefitting from his creative genius."
She took fierce pride that her brother had frustrated their enemy so completely. "Well, why am I here?"
"To control him."
"So what do you want?"
The red eyes narrowed. If some deep and dark fire had burned away all the goodness and love in Dexter, leaving nothing but a blackened shell of what he had been, then this was exactly what he would have looked like: intense, wicked, interested only in expanding his knowledge regardless of the cost to others. He reached out, forcibly turning her head so as to look at her face full on. Even in that simple, brief touch DeeDee could feel his immense strength. It was frightening in something so familiar. His gloves were clammy and he smelt of the muck Fusion spread to infect territory and create fighting machines. His lab coat, an exact copy of the one her brother wore, was the color of blood.
"You are a pretty thing," the Ur-Dexter sneered, "but you are as stupid as he said."
She jerked away from his touch, lifting her chin in defiance and tossing her hair back in the same motion. She felt something, something strong and furious, and she realized it had to be hatred for this . . . ur-thing that looked and tried to sound like her brother. "He didn't say that. Not to you. If Dexter was going to say something like that about me, he's brave enough to say it to my face. He has said it to my face, as a matter of fact." Her eyes narrowed sharply. "I'm not stupid. I'm just not as smart as my brother. No one is. Not any of the Kids Next Door, not Mandy, not Fuse, not you." She spat the last word as if it tasted like spinach.
As if she had offended him, the Fusion drew himself up sharply. "I am a replica of him. A perfect copy."
"Well, no, I'd say that you're a cheap one. If you're so perfect why do you have to torture my brother for information? Why don't you know it all already like he does?"
He cast her a venomous look, his red eyes penetrating and betraying his ire. She felt a stirring of pride to have pricked him so. His control was not complete after all.
"Mandy has kept him too safe. We have not been able to update our data on him since this conflict began. I was created before he had a chance to study the Omnitrix and before he perfected the Megabot X-P 4000 Bravo."
"So much for perfect!" was her bubbly rejoinder.
He ignored her gushing. "The Megabot is unimportant. It's just another machine for us to learn and destroy. It's the Omnitrix that I want. Imagine, if you can, legion upon legion of alien fighters, all serving Fusion. Earth would fall in a week and with such power nothing in the universe could stand against us."
"Well, what I can imagine is you taking your rotten planet and going away right now. Earth won't fall. Planet Fusion will."
Her bravado had no effect on him. He was not human, after all, for all he looked like a dark and twisted version of her brother. He returned to the subject at hand.
"Conventional means of persuasion and physical pain have not worked on Dexter yet, but he cannot resist much longer and with his will broken I will be able to probe his memory freely. It's no longer a question of if, but when. I will get this information from him, DeeDee. If not, by this time tomorrow he will be dead. And where will that leave you, sister?"
"I'm not your sister. And I'll be with my brother."
He snorted, his gravelly accent so harsh on her ears when compared to her brother's good-natured lilt as he said, "Oh? Do you really think I'd let my 'sister' die?" The underlying threat was plain, and his thin lips curled into a sneer.
"I'm not your sister. And if you're a copy of my brother Dexter, then you know how many times I've wrecked his work. What makes you think I won't do the same thing to you, pal?"
He barked a laugh. It was a wicked sound, and if she had not been so very furious she would have backed away.
"What makes you think you'll get the chance?"
"Dexter thought he could keep me out, too."
"If you want him to live, you will persuade him to submit to the mind probe. The pain will be minimal if he does not fight it. I want his memories, not his life. Given the choice I would sooner have him live long enough to see your side defeated. He has caused us a great deal of difficulty in our plans. I am very close to getting past his defenses. He has been strong, stronger than even I expected, but his strength has been used up. He cannot succeed against me."
She shook her head. A large portion of Dexter's vocabulary was beyond her ken, but she was quite the expert at piecing together his meaning from the entirety of his sentences and his expressions. She found it was much the same with this ersatz copy. "My brother won't lose to you. You're a liar. A liar and he's not! You're going to kill him anyway, aren't you, so why should he tell you? And why would I help you hurt him more?"
The Ur-Dexter frowned, his red eyes filled with something akin to anger.
"Perhaps you are not so stupid after all. Persuade him to cooperate and I will cease torturing him."
"Right." She planted her fists on her narrow hips. "Like that will fix anything you've already done to him?"
"It will make his death easier."
"For you, maybe." She snorted, losing all interest in the conversation as she mounted her high horse. "Why should it be easy? Let me back in there. I want to be with Dexter, not you."
"Say your farewells, then. You will not see him again after tomorrow."
"Says you," muttered DeeDee as he opened the door and she strode back into her cell with all the dignity of a princess.
OoOoOoOoOoOoO
In her absence, Dexter had roused. He grouped about blindly, searching for DeeDee, trying to call out but able only to produce a faint creaking noise from his ruined throat. He was frightened, but for her alone. He was well beyond caring what happened to himself.
"Dee?"
"I'm right here," she said comfortingly, dropping down beside him. "I'm right here, Dexter. I just stepped away for a minute. Don't try to talk." As she spoke she pulled him back into her lap. He felt fragile, as if the life in him was evaporating even as she held him.
True to form, he ignored her, struggling to form each word. "T'morrow . . . he will win."
She wondered if he could have overheard their conversation. She didn't think so, because whatever the Ur-Dexter had done had affected his hearing. "No. Don't talk like that. Just don't talk."
He rasped a low, painful sound that was close to a laugh. "Doesn't matter. I can't . . ."
"Shh." She curled herself around him and put her lips close to his ear so he could catch her worlds clearly. "They'll come for us. I know they will. You just have to hold on a little longer."
"Glasses?"
"I have them right here. I kept them in my pocket. Do you want them?"
"No. Just keep them. Keep them safe."
"O-Okay."
He leaned into her again and she held him tenderly, stroking his hair until he lapsed back into sleep. She was glad he couldn't see the tears she silently shed at the sight of him so defeated.