It
was always obsidian black in our cages, so we couldn’t see Dr. Bluespire, his
lovely assistant Veronique—or even ourselves.
What we looked like.
You
can feel yourself—textures: scaly or feathery.
But…it’s not the same.
I
think they must’ve used night-vision goggles.
Geraldo developed infra-red vision, and me: a kind of sonar. So, I guess darkness was part of The
Experiment. (Of course, everything was part of The Experiment.)
We
didn’t care that much what we looked like—because we were naïve. Most of our energy was spent on trying to get
out of our cages.
“But
you can’t leave,” said Bluespire, half-mockingly, half-hypnotically. “They won’t accept you, like I do. They’ll come at you with torches and
pitchforks.”
“Whose
fault is that?” said Geraldo.
I tried to be nice that time. “What if we say ‘Pretty please, with sugar on
top.’? And we’ll come right back, in an
hour.” (As if I’d never tried that.)
Geraldo ate Dr. Bluespire, first
chance he got.
I asked “What if he’s poison?” We were trained to be paranoid. “Or just a wax figure, or an innocent doppelgänger?”
“It didn’t taste like wax,” said
Geraldo. “And: no one’s innocent.”
But I took of Dr. Bluespire’s last
bit of advice to heart. I lived in the
sewers, where no one would see me. I
could be fine, living off eating rats and frogs, eels, human feces…
Geraldo
had more refined tastes. He was a
creature of the air.
I guess it’s natural we
separated. But we could keep in touch—a
kind of mental telepathy. Or haunting
each other, from far away. We were
brothers. Knew each other, inside and
out.
“So,
what are you gonna do with your life?” Geraldo asked me—over some distance.
“I’m
not sure,” I said. “What are you gonna
do?”
“Wreak
havoc,” he said. “Get vengeance on DARPA,
the faceless corporations—everyone who was responsible, for what they did to
us. Perhaps the whole race of humankind.”
I’m glad he went first. (And I always wanted to consider myself
human. Humanesque.)
“Well, then,” I said. “I guess I’ll save lives, protect the weak and
innocent. Widows and orphans…Truth,
justice, and the American way!”
Veronique
used to read to us: comic books, Charles Dickens…And sometimes we’d play good
cop, bad cop in the old days—just like Dr. Bluespire and Veronique played with
us. Veronique was good cop, of course. (Sometimes we played doctor.) It was all part of The Experiment.
The first time I met Geraldo on the
surface—in downtown Necropolis…The first time I tried to interfere in Geraldo’s
work: he killed me dead. (I wasn’t
ready.)
Geraldo
was a creature of the air. He could
breathe fire. My slimy skin was impervious
to fire. Still, it hurt my feelings
When that didn’t work, Geraldo ate
me—in one gulp. Just like he ate Dr.
Bluespire and Veronique. But I was
stronger than them. I could punch my way
out of his mouth and run far away—take refuge in the sewers.
So, I didn’t die from loss of blood—but
a broken-heart. Geraldo was my
brother. How could he do that to me? (When we were all alone, otherwise.) I was truly without a friend in the world—or so
I thought.
I
could feel my life draining away, and I let it.
Didn’t eat or drink anything, for more energy... [To be continued.]
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