Chapter Thirty Three
“There is no one greater in this world than yourself. No matter who you are. No matter how low you are. Own it. Live it. Ignore the whims of the world, for they mean nothing compared to your own survival.”
–Hades, “Some Philosophical Shit”. 4 Years After.
* * *
Her fist broke through the surface.
Leah coughed up bloody bile mixed with dust, sunlight washing over her now that she’d escaped that hole. This was it.
I won!? Oh, if her lungs weren’t punctured right now, how she would be cackling like a madwoman. The Lord had sent His best… He’d buried her under an entire fucking mountain… But she’d escaped death because, at the last sliver of a second before the landslide struck, Leah dived into a nearby barrel and curled into a ball, letting her body get shattered upon impact while her brain stood a chance to survive unscathed.
It hadn’t been easy to get this far either. She’d been pinned hard between the rocks and broken wood. One of her arms had to be chewed off just to give her the leeway to wriggle free, and both legs were severed in the process of scrambling forth. Her surviving fingers were now bent and broken where she’d clawed through the loose dirt and stone, and her vision blurred after so much time and blood loss.
But she’d done it. Leah had survived. No help, no nothing. She’d defied the odds all by herself, yet again. Not even the Lord could defeat her!
Her torso slipped an inch. Leah instinctively gripped for something solid, but the fall was too quick. The ground quaked anew, her position unstable. A pop resounded out as a rock pinched her neck, and Leah watched without control as her last surviving palm went limp.
She knew this sense at once. That was her spinal column that’d been cracked. She’d just been paralyzed from the neck down.
A death sentence out here.
No… Fuck, no! Leah was at the exit. She’d made it! The odds had been impossible, but she’d survived. She did everything right. How could this happen to her!?
Her limp wrist dangled in front without answer.
* * *
Hours passed.
Vision getting blurry. Too much blood loss. Not enough oxygen. Couldn’t see straight.
Hollowing. Not Beholder trick. This time, for real. Rez draining out, little by little. Thoughts too hard to track.
Hand still in front. Still empty. Still too weak to save self.
She wanted to cry. She was dying. Right here. Right now.
There was no one to save her.
No one to help.
She was all alone.
All alone…
All…
A shadow passed in front. Took hand. Pulled. Moonlight now. Still hard to see. She blinked.
Figure formed in front. Red eyes behind ballistic helmet.
“Well, shit,” he said. “Not looking so good, boss.”
She blinked. Not able to do else.
“Come on, let’s get you home.”
Eyes blurry. Tears forming. She knew ballistic helmet.
Dwayne laughed. “What? Thought I wouldn’t come for you after Abraham won, huh?” He threw her decapitated torso over shoulder. “Eh, you got me. Maybe all this time’s given me a soft spot for you, Leah.”
He marched.
Tears flowed free. She was no longer alone.
* * *
Stein wiped the viscera from his hands, his chest caked twice as hard. “Twenty hours of surgery… That’s got to be a record.” His red eyes stared into her own. “How are you feeling, Leah?”
“Eyes… Clearing…” she wheezed, glancing from side to side. “Can’t… Feel… Else…”
“Can you tell me where you are right now?”
She couldn’t. The ceiling was made of concrete, and boxes lined the walls, though an IV dripped from a bag from one side, stained with black liquid. A fluorescent bulb flickered above.
When did she get down here? Leah thought back long and hard, but could only remember Stein leaning above as he fiddled inside her abdomen. Nothing before that, other than vague images and places, slowly coming back together.
Wait, if Stein’s here, then that means… She coughed. “Mother’s… Grace…”
He shook his head. “I’m sorry, Leah, but that is not true. As I told you before, we had to evacuate when the Inquisitors came. You’re now in the basement of the most secure building in Pandemonium, the Central Bank.”
Her pupils quaked. The memories were coming back, but they were so fucking jumbled. Just how long had she been down here, and how messed up was she? Better yet, how did this even happen?
She studied her body and remembered. Her shattered frame barely qualified as human anymore. She’d lost an arm, half of one leg, and another altogether. The skin of her chest spread apart, with the internal organs exposed for all to see. Even her skull had been cracked, with tubes running through them before disappearing into machinery behind.
“Can’t… Move…” Leah said.
Stein nodded. “Yes, Leah, that is the paralytic I introduced to maintain the surgery. It will wear off as blood reenters your circulatory system.”
“I’m… Fine…?”
He frowned. “We’ve had this conversation before, Leah. There is good news and bad news for you. Because of Dwayne’s intervention, I was able to oxygenate your brain enough to reverse your immediate hollowing. It will take some time for the neural pathways to reconnect though, so you’ll have difficulty pairing short-term thoughts with long-term memories. But you won’t have a full lapse anytime soon.
“However, the greater struggle is still to come. Your digestive system is, for lack of a better word, non-existent right now. Everything, from the esophagus to the lower intestines, was damaged beyond repair when you sustained your injuries. Until I can successfully implant donor organs and they’ve healed properly, your body cannot produce the nutrients your brain needs to sustain a stable reservoir. Any brain cells you lose during this time will be gone forever, along with the memories they held, and there is nothing I can do.”
She wanted to scream. A slowed but steady rehollowing, all while she lay powerlessly in this bed. The fact that she couldn’t remember having this conversation before proved it was already happening.
“Fortunately, hollowing is a process with both physical as well as psychological components,” Stein continued. “It occurs fastest when patients lose all hope. If you avoid that trap, you might make it to the other side as yourself. I must be clear with you though, Leah. No one has ever suffered these types of injuries and survived. Not without losing their reservoir altogether.”
He stared deep. “But there’s still a chance. If anyone could beat those odds, it is you, Leah. You just have to fight against it. You just need to find whatever it is that makes your life with living.”
My life… She concentrated hard, but the more the memories bled back in, the more futile her circumstances became. Her body was shattered and her city had been lost, and all she could do was lay here and stare. What a joke. Did she really have anything left to make this suffering worth it?
And yet, Stein still sat above. Watching her. Praying that this would not be where Leah disappeared for good. Could she let his work have gone to waste?
“Thank… You…” she squeaked. “I… Will… Fight…”
* * *
“‘Man cannot possess anything as long as he fears death,’” Fran continued. “‘But to him who does not fear it, everything belongs. If there was no suffering, man would not know his limits, would not know himself…’”
Leah watched on as Fran turned the page of her book, shifting between English and whatever language it was first written in.
The paralysis had worn off, but still, Leah could not move. Air forced its way into her throat through a tube, and every couple of minutes, her body convulsed when an electric shock jolted her dead heart into a beat, pressing blood and oxygen through her veins again. The IV had been swapped with a chained-up hollow, and a vacuum pump circulated its fluids into hers, replacing the exposed blood before it could coagulate.
And Fran had taken this opportunity to preach to her endlessly…
She scoffed. “Don’t give me that look, Leah. If what the doctor says is true, then your Rez is hollowed enough. Might as well take the opportunity to fill it with something other than that crude Hunting of yours.” She lifted her book and continued.
Leah supposed that this was okay. With nothing else to do, why not hear about a new book? Fran was right too. Something more profound hid beneath Tolstoy’s words. A certain poeticism she’d never heard before.
One of Fran’s guards entered, his rifle drawn. “Boss, we’ve got someone approaching on the northern perimeter.”
“Who?”
“Looks like that human woman showed up with a group of Beholders, waving a white flag. You’d better come up and see for yourself.”
Fran sighed. “Oh well, ‘tis no rest for the wicked, I suppose.” She set her book aside and strapped a riot helmet in place. Her guard began to wheel her away. “Don’t hollow out on me until I return, Leah. There’s plenty more where that came from!”
Her arms were tied in place to keep the convulsions from becoming too intense, but Leah managed to squeeze her braced fingers an inch.
It was the closest she could do to wave back.
* * *
“I see your legs are healing back nicely,” Chantelle said with a grin. “Stein says you’ll be back to full mobility before long.”
That was only half true, Leah knew. Dwayne had managed to dig up the limbs she’d severed a couple days back, but some chunks were beyond repair. Having small sections of muscles implanted would be less deleterious to her mobility than foreign replacements, but it was more than possible that she’d forever walk with a limp. Returning to full strength seemed like a passing fantasy.
And that was before her hollowing, which still pressed against her mind, every second of every day that passed while her stomach lining grew back. Two surgeries to go before you’re in the clear, she reminded herself.
“Looks like you’re starting to shrivel again,” Chantelle said. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of it.”
Her chest and scalp had been closed for the time being, but Leah still couldn’t move. Not with the defibrillator that spiked occasionally, along with the oxygen tube shoved down her throat.
Chantelle didn’t mind taking care of her though. Wiping away the dead skin, applying the preservatives, and giving her fresh makeup to keep her skin flush. She chatted casually as she went through the routine, as though nothing bad had happened.
Then Chantelle reached her midsection and cringed. A vile smell filled the room the moment she pulled up the plastic wrapping around her waist. Leah didn’t need to see the damage to estimate how fucked her bowels still were, along with how little control she had over them.
But Chantelle buried the wince with another smile. “At least you’re strong enough to crap again!” She drew some gloves and went to work cleaning it away.
If only Leah could respond, she’d say the one thing on her mind. How the hell do I deserve you?
* * *
“I raise you twenty pics,” Dwayne said, tossing the chips on the nightstand beside him. “What you want to do, boss?”
Leah blinked once.
“You sure you want to call? All you’ve got is a pair of fours.”
She blinked twice this time.
He shrugged. “If you insist.” He flipped over his own hand and chuckled. “Look at that, three of a kind. Another eighty pics for me.” He pulled the earnings his way and reshuffled the deck.
This was the most rigged game of poker imaginable. Because Leah couldn’t move, Dwayne acted as the dealer and challenger, and left her cards face up for both to see. She’d tried every strategy of communicating back via blinking too, from a simple one-two language style of yes and no to Morse-fucking-Code, but regardless of what she chose, he made every decision for her.
In the most Dwayne fashion imaginable, they had played over a dozen hands, yet he hadn’t made a single bet. He was just helping himself to a box of pics while Leah could do nothing but watch on.
And yet, somehow, this was still fine. Just having someone else in the room helped to keep her mind going…
* * *
“I kill Friar today for you,” Flamingo announced, the skeletal grin of his mask seemingly wider than usual. “I string him in Tartarus for all to see!”
He had others with him. A pair of surviving Hunters from El Dorado with their Día de los Muertos masks. From what Leah had been hearing, they’d been acting as the heaviest resistance against Abraham’s takeover.
Good shit, Leah scribbled onto a pad of paper. Make sure to spread their patrols thin. Thankfully, now that her fingers were strong enough, she could write without issue, which became her preferred method of communication. No more easy wins for Dwayne.
It couldn’t be helped either. Another complication had occurred with her lungs during the last surgery, and there was no telling when the tube would be removed for good. Stein seemed of the mind that he would keep it in place until her stomach acidity reached normal levels.
Flamingo raised a fist. “Tomorrow, I kill two Friar! They will be weak for when you retake your city.”
My city, she mused. Was it just for her?
Or did it belong to someone else?
* * *
“All things considered, could be worse up there,” Charon said, his face locked in its perpetual neutrality. “Beholders are letting me keep track of the Styx. Only difference is that they want my guys controlling who goes out instead of in. Oh well, Hades used to give me weirder orders.”
Of course, Charon would adapt to this new world order. He’d never given a shit who made the calls so long as he was the one who managed his coveted Styx. That he’d even made the hike over felt more like a courtesy call than anything.
Leah scribbled onto her paper. What are their numbers?
“Tough to say,” he said. “Been busy on the border, especially with those hollows still bearing down on us. Tried to let Abraham know, but he’s none too bothered. More concerned with getting everyone to show up to their daily sermons. It’s gonna be a real shitshow when they get here.”
Just give me yourguess, please.
“Hmm… I’d say there are four or five thousand wearing the cloak now. Could be more, but I don’t think less. They’re doing a lot of those baptism things these days.”
Four or five thousand? That was practically one-in-ten of Pandemonium’s total population… One-in-ten rezzers, all converted into them!?
“I should get going,” Charon said before standing. “Wouldn’t want the new boss asking questions.”
Leah hadn’t expected Charon to lead a coup by himself, but knowing that he’d rolled over with barely a fight stung more than anything else.
Then the impossible unfolded.
Charon turned at the edge of the door, some fluid running down his cheeks. “Get well soon, Leah. This city needs you.”
He left without another word while Leah lay still, bewildered. Hell had truly frozen over just now. In all her years knowing Charon, he’d never so much as shed a single tear.
* * *
These moments were the worst.
Leah lay in place while some old world romantic comedy played on the screen across her room. Stein had convinced Fran to install it. The extra stimulation would help stave off hollowing, he’d said.
And yet, Leah couldn’t concentrate on this. What did she care about the trials and tribulations of some dead, fictitious humans? Not with the shit that weighed her down.
She couldn’t remember the old guard of Pandemonium. The names “Mother” and “Hades” rang a bell, but she couldn’t place faces to them. Not anymore. Only moments half-composed, like one of these movies played back, with many scenes cut out, and the others without sound.
Her crews of days were gone, the Hunts she’d accomplished, the journeys she’d taken around this continent. The more this crisis dragged on, the more she lost. For fuck’s sake, she couldn’t even remember what Liam looked like or how they’d managed to cross the country together. Didn’t we get in a truck at some point?
Just like Stein said, despite all the amenities to slow down the process, nothing could stop this sustained hollowing. Until her body became strong enough to repair itself, all she could do was lay there, conscious of every second as her mind slowly degraded.
But Leah couldn’t surrender. Not after what everyone had done to save her.
They had all come through. The Council, the Hunters, the workers. Leah had been so certain that everyone else existed as little more than her pawns to be kept beneath her so they couldn’t rise above. That was the life she’d cultivated as Head Huntress. It had become the lens through which she viewed her world.
Not to them though. To Dwayne and Fran and Chantelle and Flamingo and so many more, Leah wasn’t some despot who’d squandered power for herself. She was just a friend in need who did what she could to protect their flawed, decomposing race.
Oh, how she wanted to cry. What did she do to earn such generosity? The Last Scotsmen had been wiped out during the landslide. Only Leah survived. Body shattered, reservoir slowly draining out, but somehow still alive. Still herself. Why did she deserve this second chance?
She stared into the flickering light above and knew the truth. God, the Lord – whatever He called Himself. He wanted to use this moment to finish what He’d started. Rezzers were a blip against His grand design. An error of free thought in an otherwise dead world. If Abraham succeeded in snuffing out the last of his defectors, no one could contest Him in wiping the slate clean.
That was why Leah had to fight. She could never allow that to happen to her friends.
* * *
Evelyn gasped. “How the hell are you alive?”
Leah tilted her head in thought. How had she, really?
She began marching around the basement, made awkward by the cane she’d been forced to use. Even with her body regenerated enough to move, most of the muscles were still recovering, and there was no telling how long it would take or if it could be done at all. The weight of her palm pressed against the cane as she limped about.
“Been asking myself that question a lot lately,” Leah said. “Part of me wants to say that it was my own initiative that got me through. Part of me knows it was dumb luck. But the truth is something else altogether.
“Perhaps it’s better to start by explaining how that landslide happened in the first place. I had Dwayne and Flamingo look into it as soon as I had the inkling. Sure enough, they found scorch marks at the top of that cliff, the kind that only plastic explosives could make. Abraham knew we were coming and made the ultimate gamble to see it through. Sacrifice his camp and a sliver of his followers, but kill me in the process. All framed as divine intervention so everyone else would fall in line.” She exhaled. “No, the Lord didn’t strike me down that day. It was just Abraham pushing his agenda, and I don’t know if it’s ever been anything different.”
Evelyn furrowed her brow. “It hasn’t. He’s been splicing rezzer brains into his Holy Communion that his people drink once a week. They’ve never gotten by on pure faith alone.”
Leah raised an eyebrow. She shouldn’t have been surprised. Even those hollows migrating to Pandemonium were all summoned by his Beholder friends, wandering the wilderness and slaughtering animals in key places so the blood would lure them near.
Yet, now that the pieces were falling together, the world got a little colder and darker for it. Could the Lord’s power have been this illusory the whole time?
“Regardless,” Leah continued. “I was as good as hollowed the moment the rocks pinned me down. But there was always something that kept me through…” She reached into her sheepskin jacket and pulled out her bellflower. Even in the dim light of the basement, she could make out its vibrant colors against the plastic sheen that kept it immortalized. “Do you know what this is?”
“A flower?” Evelyn asked.
“More than that. Back in early Pandemonium, I once grabbed one of these to keep as a memory of my own. A form of mental proof of my unique existence. The years came and went, and the Hollowing did the shit it always does, and then one day, that memory was gone for good. Just like that, a token of my identity had disappeared, one almost as profound as this scarf. This was the last time my reservoir had been driven to the brink, back when Liam and I first made the journey to Cheyenne.
“And do you know what he did in that moment? When I was at my weakest and thought I’d hollow out for good? He gave me another bellflower and promised that we’d make more memories. Better ones. Together. I’ve been plucking new ones every so often since, all to remind myself that my life is worth living. Even when the Beholders stripped me of everything else… My clothes, my weapons, my scarf. I still had this. My own form of strength to keep my Rez as my own. It is the sole reason I was able to stave off their indoctrination.”
Leah took a step forth. “However, part of me has never seen this bellflower’s real power until now. Abraham thinks that blind faith is a substitute for worthwhile relationships. That we can all combat the Hollowing indefinitely if we just believe in one man’s vision. Strength in numbers is a truth in this world. It should follow that absolute numbers begets absolute strength. But his Beholder ideology is rooted in a set of lies. No more than a fever dream.
“True strength can never come under those terms. It has to be rooted in the authentic relationships that we cultivate. Just as I saved Liam and he saved me, we both became stronger through our friendship together. That is what makes my life worth living. I suppose I’d always known this, deep down. But I’d forgotten. We’ve all forgotten.”
She thought back to Socrates. Though the memory of that day had blurred through her hollowing, bits and pieces still held firm. His version of reality missed the point. No one was truly alone so long as they never stopped reaching out to those they loved.
Leah met her in the eyes. “I may be a cold-blooded bitch, but I’m sure as fuck not blind to your suffering, Evelyn. You were driven right to the Beholders because of my narcissism. Your family came to me for help, and I shoved you in a closet to be forgotten. Someone like you, tossed to the wayside while your safety was left in the hands of someone who wasn’t nearly as invested.
“It wasn’t like I didn’t know how you’d react either. Frankly, I just didn’t give a shit at the time. Instead of treating your family with the respect and dignity you deserve, I thought your presence in this city could only make me weaker.
“Abraham’s been exploiting that gap. For you, for me, for us all. By dangling the prospect of eternal love and companionship, we’ve all become victims. No more than prisoners forever trapped inside his fever dream. We cannot escape if we’re doing it by ourselves.”
Evelyn stared deep. “What are you trying to say?”
Leah rubbed the plastic petals. “This world’s sitting at the edge of ruin, but there’s only one way to bring it back.” She handed over her bellflower. “Fight with me, Evelyn. Not as my soldier but as my friend. No matter what comes next, we can beat the odds so long as we do it together.”
For a while, Evelyn said nothing, her dark eyes cold and blank, and lips locked in a tight, thin line. Leah watched on in calm patience. The two of them might have started from opposite ends of the Hollowing, but they were both forged through the same fires. If anything, Evelyn stood as the human version of Leah. A pragmatic killer who fought until the bitter end and then some. All to keep herself and those she loved intact. How had she not seen this truth until now?
Evelyn grabbed her hand, the bellflower between their fingers. “First things first, we need to find Liam and my daughter.”
“Deal.” They shook. “Let’s end this.”
