Chapter Summary: Karl and Ethan infiltrate Miranda's lab with devastating results.
X
"Alright. Let's go."
Heisenberg tossed his chin at the staircase before turning away from Ethan and pressing a cigar between his lips. Ethan walked behind him in silence, his thoughts upon the matter private as he followed Heisenberg through the very depths of the factory.
It was better that way, Karl figured. There was too much going on in his own mind anyway. His thoughts had become a viscous stew simmering above a raging fire at the thought of finally killing Miranda. There was no way of knowing what would come of that night's mission. They had waited around long enough, both of them bidding time for their own separate reasons until a shared glance across the room a few hours later had delivered the harrowing message: it's time.
It was highly possible that things would go terribly wrong. Or terribly right. But either way, if a confrontation ensued, Karl swore to himself that he'd end the night with his gloves drenched with Miranda's blood. Finally.
Still, he couldn't shake the image of the coming storm from his mind. It was anthropomorphic in a way: the rain clouds like cheeks ballooning out under red-tinged slits of sunlight glaring back at him with an eerie uncanniness to human eyes. He imagined the blackened hand of God reaching down through the clouds, clutching around for him, saving him from what he felt would be his final sin. For God so loved the earth that He sacrificed his only son. Had Jesus's death and martyrdom saved Him from the temptation of vengeance, Karl wondered. What would the Sacred Son have done if he had no reason to fear the wrath of His father? Would He have sought revenge upon all those who had dared to wrong Him?
Probably not. Karl had often found Jesus to be a pitiable and lackluster character.
Karl pushed open the door to this makeshift garage. Various metal tools and gadgets glinted wickedly upon the wall, lighting the dim space with their strange luminance. Ethan stood silent in the doorway as Karl swiped a matchstick against the wall and lit a single lamp. The shy firelight swished along the outlines of two vehicular prototypes that Karl had been working on for the past few years: four-wheeled machines made in similarity to American vehicles. Karl hadn't had an opportunity to test them out, seeing as his reclusiveness kept him shackled to the confines of his factory. But he did not doubt his ingenuity in the matter. They would serve their purpose.
"Gotta license for that?" Ethan asked, tilting his chin at one of the vehicles. Karl smiled and licked his dry lips.
"Ain't no license in the sticks," he growled back before tossing a key at Ethan. "What? Oh, come on. Don't tell me you're scared."
The statement could have implied anything: that Ethan was scared of driving the machine, that Ethan was scared of Miranda and their holy plight against her, or that Ethan was scared of the futility of all impassioned crusades. In any case, Ethan caught the key against his chest with a telling fumble before tossing it in the air once more.
"You're a good man," Ethan said for no reason that Karl could decipher before throwing his leg over the patched leather seat and shoving the key in a rusted slot. There was something commanding and confident about the way that Ethan settled into the machine, like he had been born to ride through a nameless Romanian village in the saddle of a ragtag piece of junk. Karl gave him an appreciating once-over before jumping onto his vehicle and twisting at the controls. The four-wheeler gave an aggressive hum beneath him before rousing itself with a throttle that shook his very bones. The sound of it was deafening, but pleasingly so as he flicked his hand through the air. In response, the metal doorway before them began to crinkle upwards, revealing in inches the moon-slicked night sky beyond. The world outside looked deceptively peaceful as if teasing the two men with its serenity. Karl wrung his hand across the handles, clicking the mechanisms into place as his eyes rose with the ascending metal gate. After several quick jabs at the dashboard, he found a radio station playing hard rock that was loud enough to make the makeshift garage quiver with the reverberations. Good. He needed something to drown out his thoughts anyway.
"Ready!?" He screamed over the sound of the music, and was pleased to see Ethan grinning from his place beside him.
"Ready!" The American called back before lurching forward with a jolt. Karl watched with pride as Ethan sped ahead of him, clearing the garage in mere seconds. He thrust his foot against the gas pedal and followed in hot pursuit. Cold night air blasted across his face, drawing his cheeks into a snarl and slinging water from his eyes. The pale yellow, weed-strangled fields of the factory porch began to blend into a frenzied abstract picture with odd, distorted shapes as he sped past. Ethan really did know his way around scrap machines. He had already made it to the bridge separating the factory lands from the rest of the village.
Moved by some unforeseeable instinct, Karl shoved his foot against the brake pedal and swung his four-wheeler around. Dust rose in a frantic whirlwind around him as he leveraged his strength against the handles, yanking the machine around with his weight before coming to a shivering stop. The factory loomed in front of him, more stately and intimidating than he had ever seen it. And yet, standing there before him as an ancient monster vacated by humans and painted over with starlight, it was beautiful. So, pressingly beautiful in its towering resplendence that it sent a shiver down his spine. There was something about the way that it looked then that made him realize that he might never see it again.
"It's been one hell of a ride," he muttered into the wind before crooking his pinky finger at the building. The twinkling lamplight behind the factory windows seemed to wink back at him, its closed double doors like a mouth shut tight above the crooked staircase. In the span of a mere moment, the memories of his livelihood within the factory seemed to flash before him: crawling across the stone floors as an infant, stumbling behind his father's horse in the yard as a young man, strolling through the endless halls as a lonely village lord. Each and every version of himself had returned, coming alive once again in the thrum and twang and shiver in the air, just to say goodbye.
"Fuck," he whispered before twisting the handles and swinging the four-wheeler around once more. He wanted to remember the factory like that: vacated but homely. A breeding ground for his torture. A witness to his ascension.
He twisted the knob on the dashboard until the music was loud enough to make the machine shudder. Ethan was a few feet ahead of him, bent over the dashboard with his blond hair whipping wildly in the wind. Karl's bottom lip rolled from between his clenched teeth as he applied steady pressure to the gas pedal, gaining traction. In the span of a few seconds, he had closed the distance between himself and Ethan. Now, the American whipped his head up and looked over at Karl. There was a fiery passion in his eyes that seemed to dim at the sight of whatever expression Karl had been holding. Even then, traveling over a hundred miles per hour through the barren village avenues, Ethan had been able to see right through Karl: straight into the depths of his soul. Ethan mouthed something that was lost beneath the sound of blaring rock and roll music and screaming machinery. It could have been anything: Are you okay? Or I trust you. Or I hate you. Or, simply, eat my dust, you ugly magnetic freak.
In response, Karl lifted his hand from the handle and raised a fist towards the night sky. The rubber clasp in his hair wriggled itself free from its bind, causing his hair to blast around in his cheeks and temporarily blind him. Still, riding side by side with Ethan, lost in the cacophony of raging metal music and whistling wind, he felt in himself a thrill and expansiveness that had no end. There was no one left in the village to witness the moment shared by the two men - no one in the rotting fields or falling cemetery or shadow-laden avenues. They rode past unhindered by the lost crowds and, in every space, Karl watched his geographical history slough past: the docks where he had befriended Sal, Alcina's castle, the gardens of the Beneviento home. Gone was the Black Church in a vortex of dust, gone was the bakery where he had lingered as a lost, hungry child, and gone were the stables where Ken's dogs had torn away at the flesh of Marianne's legs. Gone, all of it: soon-to-be-forgotten remnants of his life in the village. With every thrust and throttle of his four-wheeler, a piece of him was whizzed past and left behind, never to be retrieved again.
The storm roiled and gathered along the edge of the village, watching, the only other witness to the erasure of his past and the fruition of his coming demise. He could smell the rain in the air.
It was only when the border of Miranda's laboratory unveiled itself beyond the mist did Karl turn off the radio and gesture for Ethan to slow down. They pulled their vehicles into a silent idle, guiding their four-wheelers on paddled feet as they made their laborious approach. Karl tossed his leg over the four-wheeler and signaled for Ethan to do the same. Whatever free-spirited and untrammeled mood had possessed them during their ride had evaporated, only to be replaced by a tense silence that betrayed the somberness of their procession: tread carefully, infiltrate Miranda's lab, find information about Rose, and get the hell out of dodge.
Silently, they stashed their vehicles in the shadows of a dilapidated building and continued forward on foot. The world around them was eerily quiet as if the very atmosphere was holding its breath. Every once in a while, the sound of chirping crickets would reach Karl through the thunderous beating of his heart. Moved by instinct, he clutched his golden cross to his lips and gave it a swift kiss before crouching down behind the gate. Miranda's laboratory loomed only a few feet away. His eyes were immediately drawn to the empty black space behind the windows, and then to the doorway hanging open like a hungry, empty mouth. A hundred years, Karl had spent quivering beneath Miranda's shadow. His familiarity with her cold presence - and lack thereof - told him that she was not there. Still, he could not take his eyes off the yawning doorway. It was as if Miranda's essence was still there: reaching out with a phantom hand, gesturing with two crooked fingers for him to come closer.
He heard Ethan settle into a crouch beside him. He could smell the sweat dripping off of the other man, and could feel the nervous tension spanning between them. It had all suddenly become so real: no longer were they standing around in the safety of the factory exchanging banter and wit and curses. Now, they sat upon the very precipice of their mission, awkwardly leveraged upon the threshold of their crusade. For some unfathomable reason, Karl looked down and cast his gaze upon Ethan's shoes: handsome brogue boots with a low heel, glinting dark leather brown, and still laced tight. It occurred to Karl that Ethan must have only just gotten home from work only moments before his life had fallen apart. He hadn't even had time to change out of his damn shoes before his 'wife' had been shot and his daughter had been snatched away right before his very eyes. This, for some reason, caused a strange sense of melancholic endearment to well up in Karl, endearment that was quickly dissipated by the glance that Ethan shot him.
"Well?" The American whispered after wringing the sweat away from his jaw. "Are we going in?"
"We agreed that you'd stay here while I looked around, Ethan."
"Then what the hell are you waiting for?" Ethan hissed back.
"Oh, lower your goddamn voice, will you? We still don't know if she's here or not."
"Seems empty to me."
They both glanced up at the open door simultaneously. Karl couldn't help but feel that something lingered within the hauntingly quiet space. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, feeling that familiar chill radiating along his back teeth. By that point, he had reeled in full control over his powers. The laboratory was filled with metal objects - he could feel their magnet pull radiating through the space like electrified tendrils reaching out for him and raising the hair on the back of his neck. He gave a soft grunt and yank of his head, latching onto these tendrils and giving them a pull with his magnetism. Seconds later, the sound of something large and heavy crashing to the floor echoed from within the laboratory. Without even having to step foot in the space, he had been able to knock something metallic to the floor.
Ethan jumped and glanced at him in annoyance. "The hell was that?" He asked suspiciously and Karl smiled, listening intently.
"If Miranda was truly inside of the lab, we would have heard her walking around to see what had fallen," he said after a moment. "I think it's safe to say that we've been left bereft of her saintly presence."
"Great. Then let's go."
Karl watched in alarm as Ethan sprung up and began to walk toward the laboratory. He uttered a soft curse before jumping up and running after him, stopping only once to grab Ethan's arm and yank him around. The American cast him an annoyed glare before pulling his arm back and settling his hand on the hilt of the gun sticking out from its holster. Mia Winters was in the lab, Karl knew that. It was highly possible that she was curled upon herself only a few feet below them, and he could not have Ethan discover this. He reached out again and Ethan jerked his arm back.
"You're not stopping me," Ethan whispered before turning to face the open doorway. Karl stared at his neck, suppressing the desire to whine 'but we had a deal!' But to do so would have been foolish. Now that the secret to Rose's reanimation was so close, Ethan's resolution had intensified. Getting between him and fixing his daughter would most likely result in a bullet in Karl's head.
So instead Karl hissed in disgust and then placed his boot upon the cement stairway. For a moment, both of them seemed to be frozen with trepidation as they gazed through the doorway. Then Ethan sighed, his gaze wandering along the glittery tendrils of white air dissipating before his lips.
"I've been meaning to ask you," he finally said, never once looking Karl in the eye. "Your mother. What happened to her?" He paused, letting the question settle between them. For the life of him, Karl could not figure out why Ethan had chosen to ask such a question at that moment. "I read all of your diary entries," Ethan added, somewhat sheepishly. "You never mentioned her once. Just a lot of bullshit about your brother and father."
Karl snickered and braced his forearm against his knee. "May God rest her poor unfortunate soul," he said thoughtfully. "Ol' papa used to tell me...she gave birth to my brother…saw his face and proclaimed that she was looking 'pon the cheeks of a cherub. Held him tight to her tits and kissed his little ugly-ass forehead until the crying stopped.
Then she started to convulse and cry out and whatnot, said that something was tearing her up from the inside. Took me no more than a few seconds to pop my little head out like some kind of surprise birthday present. She didn't even know that she was having twins." Karl paused and gazed at his heavy black gloves. Several snowy icicles drifted past his fingers as he pulled them into his palm.
"Anyway," he said slowly, thoughtfully. "Papa said I didn't make a single noise when I came out. Just clawed my way out of her womb and stared back at the world with my ol' Devil eyes. H-he said that she took one look at me and fell still, her face all contorted and red. She didn't scream or nothin'...just looked me in my eyes and fell dead upon the spot. They buried her, out there in the Potter's field. E-even as they tossed the dirt over her body, she held onto that frightened look ...like she had seen something she wasn't supposed to. Like she had looked into the eyes of Lucifer himself. Papa said I killed her. Maybe that's why he hated me so much."
"Is that why you tried to be a loyal son for Miranda?" Ethan asked. "You felt like you had to atone for something?"
Karl sucked his teeth. He was still staring down at the ancient bruises discoloring his wrists, his thoughts incomprehensible and distant and searing. "Let me ask you something. Y-you ever feel like no matter what you do - no matter how many times you've been brought to your knees - God-duh is just sitting up there laughing at your pathetic attempts to atone? It's all just an act and we're just circus performers to him."
"Never thought that God was more than a showman," Ethan said back. "And a shitty one at that. Sometimes you've just gotta laugh right back at him." Ethan tossed his chin at the doorway, effectively severing the intimate cords of their conversation and grounding Karl back into the reality of the plight. "Come on. Let's go."
Karl watched as Ethan disappeared beyond the doorway then, after a few indecisive seconds, followed after him. It was the second time that he had voluntarily set foot in Miranda's laboratory following the Prophetess' swift execution of Marianne. It was all the same as he remembered it: moist walls of rock dewy with phosphorescence, old wooden cabinets filled to bursting with a mishmash of medical knick-knacks, cluttered tables, and odd tapestries hung up at random. He realized that he had been holding his breath as he crept up to the lone table in the middle of the room. The surface of it had been stained over with rust-colored splotches, varying in freshness and color. The stains were like a map blooming along the surface of the table, its edges blurring together and meshing the histories of those who had fallen prey to Miranda's scalpel: himself, Alcina, Salvatore, Donna. Ken, Marianne, Mia Winters. The table itself had bore witness to the martyrdom of so many within the village. But was it martyrdom or victimization, Marianne had once asked him. He didn't fucking know. All he knew was that the table awoke in him an unshakeable sense of unease that threatened to trigger those old childhood memories-
He turned away.
Ethan had clicked on a flashlight and was sweeping its light along a desk pushed up against the opposite wall. A few feet away from the desk sat a wood-paneled door hanging crooked off of hinges drilled into the stone wall. Karl knew, from intel provided by his snooping servants, that that door opened out upon a stairwell, upon the bottom of which stood a chamber that most likely held Mia Winters. There was no sound coming from beyond the stairway and Karl hoped that Mia was either sleeping or dead. Ethan looked up and flashed his light across the door before turning to look at Karl.
"Do you think we should-?"
Karl gave a curt shake of his head. "Nothing but old junk down there," he said, all the while acutely aware of the tension in his jaw. Ethan's brow furrowed.
"I'm not leaving without finding information on how to fix my daughter. And I'll sort through 'old junk' if I have to-"
"Oh, stop talking so loud, will you?" Karl warned him. "We'll start by searching up here. If we don't find anything, I'll go downstairs and take a look around while you cool your jets up here."
"You seem really desperate to keep me from exploring the entirety of Miranda's lab," Ethan said. The flashlight hung limply from his hand, its yellow light rocking back and forth across the ground and leaving the rest of his face swathed in shadows. "You worried that I'll find out something you don't want me to?"
"Ah! Perhaps I'm just worried that Miranda will come back any minute and shove that God-duh damned flashlight down your throat if you keep standing around talking!" Karl ripped the sunglasses from his face with an impatient tug. "Or I might just be inclined to do it myself! You Americans talk too much, you know that? Always blah-blah-blah."
It was enough to kill the mood between them. They found themselves in separate corners of the room, each of them engrossed in the task of sifting through Miranda's personal artifacts and unearthing her secrets. While Ethan was less concerned about the state of the office - even going so far as to take a sheaf of papers and sweep them onto the floor - Heisenberg was more deliberate. Rummaging through Miranda's personal items felt, in some way, dishonorable to him. He felt like he was a child rummaging through his mother's dresser, unveiling her private, intimate life with every object that he cast aside. There were golden rings and empty bottles of Alcina's wine in one drawer, and in the next several pictures of the village lords at young ages.
There was one in particular that caught his eye: he and his brother dressed in striped pajamas, aged nine, standing side by side with petrified deer-in-the-headlights expressions in that very same room. Along the top of the blurred photo was scrawled a simple note: Subjects Number Fourteen and Fifteen. It pained him to think that, even then, she had seen them less as sons and more as experiments. Fodder for the progression of her medical science
For no reason that he could rightfully discern, he pocketed the picture along with several of her gold rings. There was a scent riding the air, wafting up suddenly from the drawers that he yanked open and the articles of clothing that he pushed aside. It was a scent that had no discernible name, but he was well-acquainted with it nonetheless: a soft, subtle scent reminiscent of clothes stored too long in the closet and, ever so faintly beneath it, the spicy musk of Miranda's own sweat. Surreptitiously, he picked up a lab coat - stiff and still starkly white - and held it to his nose before taking a deep breath in. The smell of it caused his stomach to flush with heat and his eyes seemed to prickle in response. It was then that he realized that he still loved her and maybe after all was said and done, he'd never be able to rid himself of his childish and desperate sense of enamourment with her.
Then his eyes flew open.
He glanced over at Ethan. They had both heard it: the creak of the metal gate outside swinging open. Ethan uttered a soft curse and threw himself to the ground, sliding on his belly beneath the table until he was obscured by the black tablecloth sweeping across the ground. Karl's heart began to thud in his throat and he looked wildly around the room. One hundred years old, and he hadn't exactly grown shorter or less sturdy. There wasn't anything in the room that could hide him except for the wardrobe hanging partially open. He clambered inside without hesitation and pulled the door close as far as it could go right as the door to the laboratory was pulled open. Sweat raced down his brow as he stared through the part in the wardrobe doorway. It'd be impossible to close it completely, seeing as his own cursed bulk left no room in the damp space.
He pulled his body back, retreating quietly behind the old wire hangers and neatly folded jackets as he watched a shadow descend across the room. A faint humming reached his ears and he realized, with a jolt, that Miranda was already in the room. He watched her figure pass before the wardrobe that he was hiding in, and then stop at the table. She sighed - deliberate with its daintiness - before removing her coat and setting it on the table.
"Heisenberg!" She called out in a tinkling falsetto. And then, "Hei-sen-berg. Come here, son."
He waited with bated breath, his eyes bouncing between the shadows of Ethan's feet just slightly visible beneath the table and then Miranda's body just a few inches away. She braced her hand upon the table's surface as she slid out of her boots and rubbed the back of her foot against her ankle.
"You're a bit too old to be playing hide and seek, don't you think?" She called out. "But if you insist…mommy will come and find you."
How the hell does she know that I'm here, Karl thought to himself in a panic. Shadows began to slide back and forth beneath the table as Ethan shifted around. Somehow, Karl knew that the other man had drawn his gun.
"For nothing is hidden that will not become evident, nor anything secret that will not be known and come to light," Miranda continued in a light-hearted tone. "Karl. You are testing my patience. I will count to three. One…two…"
Karl couldn't help it. Perhaps enchanted by the Bible verse or moved by instinct to serve his mother, he shoved the door to the wardrobe aside and tumbled onto his knees before Miranda. His eyes traveled up her legs, to her abdomen, and her chest, before sweeping across her neck and coming to rest upon her face. There was no way for him to know how she felt seeing him fall out of the closet, seeing as her face had been obscured by the wicked bird-skull mask, but still, he searched the narrow slits of her eyes for disappointment.
"Oh!" She said as if he was a guest who had just arrived in time for tea. "There you are! What were you doing in my closet?"
"I wanted to surprise you, mother," he said in a gravelly voice. "I…missed you. J-just thought I'd stop by and say hello."
"Always a flair for the dramatic!" She chirped before ruffling her hand through his hair. For a moment, the feel of her touch was euphoric enough to make tingles explode all along his skull. Then suddenly her grip tightened and she pulled him up by his hair.
"Are you alone?" She asked, watching his cheeks redden as he massaged his fingers along his aching scalp.
"Why wouldn't I be?" He hissed back. She snickered.
"Because, as we've previously established, you are just full of surprises. Ah! I wouldn't be surprised if…Ethan Winters was hiding out somewhere in the room. A subtle one, he is, but I've heard he can be quite dramatic himself-"
"Ethan Winters is dead," he said quickly, too heated to notice her use of the present tense, and then added as a reproach for her manhandling him, "I told you already. I set Sturm on his ass and then burned his body."
"Of course, you did. Of course, you did. And, as per our agreement, I'm assuming that you have all four flasks on you?"
"I got 'em somewhere safe," he said, evasively enough. "But how did you-?"
"Know that you were hiding out in my closet? Simple. I've known you for over a hundred years now. I could pick out your ripe factory scent before I even opened the door! Come, come. Let us make something of this surprise visit, shall we, Heisenberg?"
She didn't bother waiting for an answer. He watched from beneath his brow as she circled the table and lifted a thick glass goblet from one of the shelves. There was something off about the way that she was moving. He noticed it immediately: the slow deliberation, the calculated grace, the odd smile hanging around beneath the gold beak that did not reflect in her blue eyes. Her demeanor reminded him of the coming storm: coiled, electric, ready to strike at any moment. There was something that she wasn't telling him and this unsettled him deeply.
"A toast then!" She proclaimed, filling a glass to its very brim with what smelled like brandy. His hand wrapped automatically around the glass as she reached for her own. Then, without warning, she shoved her glass with such force against his that half of his brandy jumped out of the cup and went cascading across his shirt.
"To my sweet, humble, loyal son," she continued unfettered. She leaned back against a shelf, tossed one leg over the other, and stared him down as she swished her brandy around her glass. "Fortune truly has favored you, my love. To look at you now, I feel my heart swelling with so much pride that I fear it may burst! The last Village Lord standing when all else have fallen.
Now, I know you and I may have had a rough start but you came around eventually, and for that I thank you. Truly. To think that you would smile in the face of all of your trials and tribulations, to bare your teeth back at the world when it had so wronged you-"
"M-mother Miranda-" he tried. But she held her glass up, stopping him with so slight a gesture.
"You never shied away from a challenge. And I will admit, I did challenge you. But it was all a test, you see. I had to know if you were strong enough to bear the weight that I put on you. I had to be sure that you could withstand the storm of my blessing! Take, for example, the matter of Rosemary Winters-"
It was at that moment that Karl became acutely aware of Ethan's hidden presence within the room. The shadows beneath the table had ceased to move, and it was almost as if Karl could feel Ethan holding his breath. He wanted so badly to rush across the room and clamp his palm over Miranda's lips. But he had been struck frozen by fear and a snaking, harrowing anticipation of what was to come.
"We don't have to talk about that-" he said quickly but, once again, Miranda silenced him with a robust laugh.
"And why not? Does the memory of what you did still arouse you? Does it 'turn you on,' as they say out in America? How fitting. Well! I don't mind taking you on a walk down memory lane. I do so love the way that you blush when I say just the right thing." She twisted around and set her glass down behind her before turning to face him with a wicked glint in her eye. "Tell me. What did you say to Ethan Winters before you had your brother kill him? In him, did you find a cathartic confessional? Did you lick your lips and admit to your greatest sin to his bloodline? Did you tell him about that night?"
"Stop! Stop!" Karl cried. "For the love of God, Miranda, STOP!"
"Ah!" She screamed, the sound of her shrill voice echoing around the room and deafening him. Drowning him out. Defeating him. "So you didn't tell him that you were the one who cut up his daughter?! That you laughed as you ran your blade against her soft skin? That, when you were done, you lapped her blood from your palm like a hungry dog?!"
Absolutely none of this was true. They both knew this. That night, after Miranda had ordered him to cut up Rosemary and separate her severed limbs into several glasses, he had struggled to keep the tears from pouring from his eyes. His hands had shaken beneath the eyes of the village lords, and he had muttered prayer after prayer beneath his breath as he pushed the pieces of Rose's body across the table. That night had broken him, they all knew it. For some reason, Miranda was lying about the terrible event.
And suddenly Karl realized: she knew that Ethan was in the room and was intentionally baiting him to come out.
"Did you tell him what you said when you were finished," she continued in a slow, venom-filled voice, watching the horror spread across his face. "How you bemoaned the fact that you hadn't had time to cut a slit between Rose's legs so that you could-"
There was a crash and cacophony as the table was overturned. The last thing that Karl saw was the triumphant look on Miranda's face before Ethan stumbled out from beneath that stable.
"Shit," Karl said, before turning to face Ethan.
X
Ethan.
Ethan shoved the table away and scrambled out from beneath its veil. The tablecloth twisted around his legs and he stumbled into the opposite wall, hitting the rocky surface with enough force to send an electric shock through his entire body. He shoved his hand against his nostril and turned around, not sure if the red that he was seeing was blood or the heated, wriggling haze of his own anger. Finally - finally - he realized why the rat bastard had been trying so hard to keep him away from Miranda.
Karl Heisenberg was a liar: a sadistic, disgusting, desperate dog without a speck of morals in his coked-out head.
Ethan yanked his face away from his hands and turned to face the other two. Karl was standing a few inches in front of Mother Miranda, his hand thrust between them defensively. But who was he defending? Ethan or Miranda?
Ethan took a moment to look him up and down, to really take him. He realized that he had never taken a good look at Heisenberg. The thought of doing so was unnerving, as Heisenberg's very aura rebuffed the curious gaze. Ethan took in the high workman's boots, the brown trousers hanging ill-fit and loose around the lord's legs, the belt slipping clumsily beneath the bulge of his gut.
Then Ethan's gaze traveled higher to the stained yellow shirt, the black leather gloves cartoonish in their proportions, the coat of stiff whiskers lining the man's throat, and finally the pale green irises so bright and pronounced in the reddened scleras that they betrayed the mutant within.
It was as he stared into those damned eyes that he realized that every inch of Karl was ugly. So pressingly, vulgarly ugly that it was pitiable. No wonder God had abandoned the small Romanian village. If he was God, he would have wanted to get as far away from Karl Heisenberg as possible.
Did you tell him about that night…that you were the one who cut up his daughter…you lapped her blood from your palm like a hungry dog….you bemoaned the fact that you hadn't had time to cut a slit between Rose's legs-
Ethan put both hands on the handle of his gun and raised it until Karl's face loomed just beyond the barrel. His finger curled around the trigger, ready in an instant to put the damned mutant bastard out of his misery. But he couldn't. Not yet. There was a question at the back of his mind that was begging for an answer.
"You fucking son of a bitch," Ethan said with a hitch in his voice. "You goddamned piece of shit-!"
"She's lying," Karl said. "Don't let her get into your head."
"You told me that Salvatore Moreau had cut up my daughter," Ethan said, acutely aware of Karl's hand still held aloft between him and the grinning Miranda. "You told me that you were the one who tried to stop him!"
"Christ - I didn't have a choice, Winters! She was forcing my hand! So I've done some things that I regret. Trust me, Ethan, I-"
"Trust you? Trust you?" Ethan cried, blinded by the tears running down his face. "You killed my daughter!"
"Miranda killed your daughter. Ethan, look at me! Look me in my eyes. Why the fuck do you think I'm here?! Why the fuck do you think I joined you in the first place!? For fuck's sake, I'm trying to do right by Rose!"
Miranda started laughing then, so raucously and loud that both men looked over at her in surprise. She began to clap her hands behind Karl. And still, his arm remained thrust in front of her. Protecting her or protecting Ethan, no one knew anymore.
"All loyalties are tested when desperation comes into play!" She cried. "Congratulations, Heisenberg! You've finally shown your true colors! Allow me the courtesy to do the same!"
"You vile bitch-"
Karl's words were cut off by a sudden grunt, so small and soft that it could have come from a child. His eyes met Ethan's from across the room and Ethan saw in them a panicked confusion. Something had happened and it took Ethan to realize that Karl's feet were dangling a few inches off of the ground. Then his gaze traveled downward, to the dark patch blooming across Karl's shirt and the tip of a blade protruding from his belly.
Several things happened once. Karl slumped to his knees and fell forward onto his face as Ethan began to fire round after round in Miranda's direction. Her eerie laughter filled the space as she rose into the air, a dark and shadowy blackness unspooling from her like many watery snakes. Each bullet was engulfed in a swirling vortex of black that quickly reformed and closed in upon itself. Ethan ducked behind the overturned table and continued to fire as a shadowy whirlwind overtook the room, coating everything in a malicious darkness.
"Pathetic," he heard her voice cry from several places in the room. Ethan braced his arm across his face and began to crawl toward Heisenberg's limp body. All at once he was lifted from the ground and slammed back down by an unearthly and unseeable force. Still, he rolled over onto his back and continued to fire at the monstrous blackness rolling back and forth across the ceiling like a flitting shadow cast from a roving fan. A burst of feathers gusted across his face as he reached towards Heisenberg and hooked his fingers in the man's collar.
"You will never have Rose," came Miranda's disembodied voice as Ethan dragged Karl's body towards the door. "You will never love her as I do! You can't! You are a disgrace of a father!"
Keep moving, keep moving, Ethan thought to himself. He clenched his teeth, narrowed his eyes, and barreled for the open doorway with Heisenberg in tow. Yellow veins of crackling gold erupted all around him, blinding him and lighting his way in turn. Fueled by instinct, he squirmed around and fired a round at the phantom mass that most closely resembled her head. He heard her give an ear-splitting cry as simultaneously the darkness swirling around him dissipated. Seeing his chance, he gave Heisenberg's body a tremulous yank and pulled him out of the door.
Once in the field, he continued to run. The snow crunched under his shoes, causing him to slip and stumble to his knees several times. He turned around and watched the distance span between himself and the laboratory as he dragged Karl through the snow. For some reason, Miranda had not followed them. An electric yellow light flashed beyond the gaping windows as black rivers spilled along the sill. Unable to take anymore, Ethan fell to his knees and watched, panting, as the darkness beyond the window began to evaporate. The whistling wind carried the faintest sound of Miranda's laughter-
Then, suddenly, it was over.
He watched as a black mass roiled along the window and then rose into the air. Heavier and heavier it grew until its viscous thickness had completely coated the sky. Then, in a magnificent twirl and coiling, it sped away and disappeared into the distance. Ethan dropped his hands onto his knees and mentally willed himself to keep breathing, just keep breathing.
Below him, Karl gave a curious 'hm?' and began to stir. Ethan watched as the man pushed himself up and looked around before looking down at his belly. He placed both hands on his bloodied stomach and looked up at Ethan with a gaze so raw that Ethan realized that he was pleading for something. Behind Karl lay a path of snow blackened by blood.
"You-" Karl started.
Ethan reared up and began to kick him. Karl curled over himself with his arms wrapped protectively over his stomach. But still, Ethan showed him no mercy. He kicked Karl's neck, kicked him in the chest, kicked his back as Karl huffed and squirmed around in the snow, his mouth gaping like a fish out of water. It was only when their eyes met - green eyes full of terror and blue eyes full of hatred - did Ethan crook his leg and land one well-aimed kick beneath Karl's chin.
Karl sprawled backward, his arms thrust by his side in the snow as if he was a kid on the verge of making a snow angel. Then, as Ethan watched with mounting disgust, Karl began to laugh. Blood sprayed from Karl's nose and between his teeth as he curled onto his side.
"Beating the shit out of me won't bring your little girl back," he informed Ethan. Ethan crooked his leg back once more and Karl cowered. "And Miranda was right about one thing: you're one helluva disgraceful father, Ethan!"
"And you think you're some type of saint?"
"Whatever the hell I am, I can still do a lot more for you than you're willing to realize."
"Consider this relationship terminated," Ethan interjected. "From here on out, my business is my own. I'm going to save my daughter. And if you get in my way-" Ethan held his gun by his head for emphasis. "You can consider yourself as good as terminated, too."
"Well! May the best man win!"
Ethan had no time to ponder what this meant as, with one final vengeful kick, Karl's head snapped back and the man promptly fell limp in the snow. The wind picked up, casting glinting icicles across Karl's face. And Ethan left the village lord thus: hands sprawled out as if in supplication, mouth still hung open around some unuttered prayer, his face for once peaceful and devoid of malice as blood bubbled along the corners of his beard and dribbled into the snow.
X
Author's Note: No, Karl's not dead. Yet. We still have two more chapters to go!