A Hundred Words for Hate

CHAPTER SIX

A door opened on the far side of the laboratory and Remy watched as a young man, who might have been one of the two who had accompanied Jon to Boston, entered. He was wearing only a T-shirt and baggy shorts now.

Malachi stood silently, watching with an unwavering eye.

“So he’s going to eat the fruit?” Remy asked, as the young man sat in a leather chair that had been brought from a closet and placed in the center of the room.

“Yes,” Jon answered. He too was watching the man, but his expression told Remy that he was clearly upset. “Nathan . . . excuse me, the volunteer will ingest a piece of the fruit, and we’ll record the results.” Jon cleared his throat and coughed nervously. “Hopefully his sacrifice will not be in vain.”

“The effects of the fruit are that powerful?” Remy asked.

Jon nodded. “We started our research with some of the older seeds, but the results were pretty horrible. It created a psychic link too powerful for a human being . . . even a Son of Adam, to withstand.”

Technicians began to fasten the young man’s wrists and ankles to the chair with thick leather straps.

“Is that really necessary?” Remy asked.

Malachi answered this question. “Even though the effects are diluted by ingesting the meat of the fruit as opposed to the seeds, the result can still be quite . . . violent,” the elder angel explained.

Remy stared at the volunteer, now looking small and defenseless beneath the humming fluorescent lights. “Are you sure this is the only way to get what we need?”

Jon looked to Malachi, but this time the angel remained silent, the human visage that he wore grim.

“It is the only way,” Jon confirmed softly. “We believe he’ll be linking with the actual Tree of Knowledge, in effect with the Garden itself, and in doing so, he’ll know what the Garden knows, and be able to tell us where the other half of the key is located.”

“Let us begin,” Malachi said, waving Jon on with his hand.

Remy watched the man’s features tighten as he steeled himself; then Jon picked up the tray of fruit and walked over to the volunteer restrained in the chair. The two looked at each other for a moment.

“Are you ready?” Jon asked, setting the tray down on a small table beside the chair.

“I am,” the man who Jon said was named Nathan replied.

Jon nodded, accepting his friend’s words, and stood, staring . . . waiting.

“You’re going to have to help me,” Nathan said finally, looking down to his bound hands and feet.

Jon laughed nervously as he reached for a pair of tongs. He used the tongs to pick up a slice of fruit and brought it toward Nathan’s mouth.

“You’re sure about this?” he asked again.

“Just get on with it,” Malachi growled impatiently.

Nathan closed his eyes and opened his mouth slightly.

Carefully Jon placed the fruit on his friend’s tongue and stepped back, his shoulders slumped. He tossed the tongs on the table and gestured for the techs. “Take this away,” he ordered.

Nathan’s expression had been almost trancelike as he began to slowly chew the piece of fruit in his mouth.

But that suddenly changed.

In the blink of an eye, it went from dreamy to nightmarish, his body going rigid, straining against his bonds.

Jon moved toward his friend, placing a comforting hand upon his shoulder. “Relax,” he said. “Let it come.”

Nathan looked at Jon, eyes pleading, the veins in his neck bulging and pulsing rapidly with the beat of his heart. “I didn’t know. . . .” He gasped, white foam spilling from the corners of his mouth. “I wouldn’t have—” His words were cut off as his body was racked with bone-breaking convulsions.

Remy was tempted to go the man, to find some way of helping him. And as if reading his mind, Malachi’s hand dropped upon his shoulder.

“It is necessary,” the elder stated, eyes riveted to the horrific scene unfolding before them.

Nathan’s head thrashed from side to side so unnaturally fast that the movement was actually blurred. He screamed as if his soul were being torn from his body.

“Isn’t there something we can do?” Remy asked, not wanting to watch, but unable to look away.

“Nothing,” Malachi answered in an emotionless drone. “The fruit must take hold. Only the Sons of Adam can do this. . . . They are from a special human strain, and only they can withstand the punishment of making the connection. Any other human would have been dead in seconds.”

Nathan’s head finally stopped moving, but his face was scarlet red and the blood vessels in his eyes had burst.

Jon was staring at Nathan; a single tear began to run down his cheek, and he quickly wiped it away. Remy could only guess how horrible it was for him to watch what was happening to his friend, knowing that he couldn’t help.

A loud crack, like ice beginning to thaw on a frozen pond, startled Remy from his thoughts. At first he couldn’t find the source of the sound; it was repeated again and again, and each time the body of the man in the chair shook with a violent spasm. Blood began streaming down Nathan’s face, running into his screaming mouth, and then hanks of hair and bits of flesh-covered bone began to fall away as his skull opened.

The sight was so horrific that Remy didn’t even notice that the volunteer had stopped screaming.

An electrical hum filled the air of the lab and grew in intensity as Nathan’s brain swelled, oddly resembling a cake rising in a pan that was too small. Crackling bolts of electrical energy were released from the pulsing gray matter, slicing across the room, into the sapling version of the Tree of Knowledge. More tendrils of energy erupted from the tree, crisscrossing about the room, making contact with everything . . . and everybody.

Remy gasped as the energy touched him; it struck like a scorpion’s stinger, entering through his chest and exiting just as quickly through the toe of his left shoe, rousing the Seraphim inside him.

The power touched Malachi as well, the elder standing perfectly stiff as the strange energy moved through his body.

It seemed to be affecting the Sons of Adam even more, as one by one they dropped to their knees.

“What’s happening?” Remy asked.

“They are all connected now,” Malachi explained.

“Us too?” Remy asked, feeling nothing but the eagerness of the Seraphim to be free.

Malachi shook his head. “No, we are not of the Garden.”

Nathan’s head looked like the Fourth of July on the Esplanade, jagged bolts of energy shooting from the pulsing gray surface illuminating the air above it.

“It is closer than you think,” the man suddenly proclaimed, his voice sounding as though it were coming from an old stereo system. “Bouncing from reality to reality, it comes to us. . . .”

Malachi strode past Remy. “The key,” the elder angel demanded from Nathan. “Where can we find the other half of the key?”

“The key,” the man repeated. “One half is with us, close by, and the other . . .”

Jon let out a low moan, his head swinging loosely upon his neck.

Remy noticed that two of the techs were on their feet now, stumbling across the room to their workstations, pulling out their chairs and sitting down as if drunk. One of the pair, a heavyset man with a haircut like Moe Howard’s, pulled a drawing tablet from the things on his desk and began to draw. The other was leafing quickly through a book of maps.

“The Garden yearns for its children,” Nathan announced. “For too long they have been apart. . . . Too long have they known loneliness.”

The Sons were crying, and Remy almost wished he could experience what was happening in their heads, for he remembered the Garden too, and envied them.

“We shall be together again,” the man’s voice boomed. “Forgiveness bestowed as you pass through my open gates.”

Then the man’s eyes began to flutter crazily, and the corners of his mouth twisted downward in what appeared to be a pain-racked frown. Remy glanced around the room and saw that all of the Sons were wearing the same bizarre expression.

“Come quickly, my children, for there is danger present.”

Malachi stepped closer to the ranting Nathan.

“A secret enemy grows within my bosom,” he said, writhing against his bonds. “A danger that threatens not only Eden . . . but the world of man . . .” His voice grew louder and the electrical discharge from his exposed brain became more intense.

“And Heaven itself!”

A searing flash accompanied those words, disintegrating Nathan’s chair. His body was lifted into the air on tendrils of blue energy, and the acrid smell of burning ozone filled the air.

“Let me show you this evil,” he proclaimed.

The Sons were listening, their faces twisted in expressions of pain as they waited for Eden to show them their enemy.

Malachi stepped into the pulsing blue light, the crackling rays of mental lightning raining down upon him as he reached up to drag the figure down to the ground.

“What are you do . . . ?” Remy began as the elder pinned the thrashing figure to the ground with one hand and reached for Nathan’s obscenely swollen brain with the other. Malachi wrapped his clawlike fingers around the pulsing gray brain matter and squeezed.

The Sons began screaming, grabbing for their heads, and a searing flash of blue forced Remy to cover his eyes as Nathan’s brain popped in Malachi’s constricting grip.

Remy lowered his arm and, as his vision cleared, he saw that the Sons were scattered about the floor, writhing and moaning in pain. He quickly looked to Malachi, who stood above the newly dead volunteer, wiping his gore-covered hand on a handkerchief.

“What did you do that for?” Remy demanded, stunned by the sudden violent act.

Malachi dropped the filthy cloth, letting it flutter down to cover the volunteer’s ravaged face. “I know of the secret enemy,” the angel said. “It is a clear and present danger to us all . . . a danger that lurks around every corner, watching . . . waiting for us to expose ourselves.”

Remy didn’t understand, his look urging the elder angel to continue.

“There are those who would refuse Adam his birthright,” Malachi offered.

Jon rose on shaky legs and stumbled across the room, nearly falling as he knelt by his friend’s side.

“Why did you kill him?” Remy asked of Malachi, watching as Jon took his friend’s blood-spattered hand in his own.

“There was no choice,” the elder angel replied. “The connection was growing and he would have felt it.”

“Who? Who would have felt it?”

“He who would see Adam die here . . . never to be embraced in the bosom of Eden.”

The Sons of Adam were coming around now, rising shakily to their feet, the experience having left its mark.

“You know him from your last encounter in Eden,” Malachi explained. He was looking at his hand, still wet and glistening from the brain of the volunteer. “The Cherubim sentry,” he said.

“Zophiel.”

Remy wondered why nothing could ever be easy.

According to Malachi, Zophiel had eventually ended up on Earth as well, and now that Eden was returning to this plane of existence, he too was hunting for the keys. The elder angel had mentioned violent incidents at other Sons of Adam locations around the globe as proof that this danger was real.

Remy glanced to the left at Jon, who was driving him back to the airstrip. He didn’t look so good.

“You all right?” he asked.

Jon didn’t answer, lost in thought and staring straight ahead at the desert road.

Remy reached across and touched his shoulder.

Jon started, looked at him, and then back to the road. “I’m sorry. Is there something wrong?”

“No.” Remy shook his head. “Just wanted to be sure you’re okay.”

Jon gave him an odd look, then reached up, pulling a tiny hearing aid from his ear and stuffing it into the breast pocket of his shirt. Remy hadn’t even noticed it was there.

“Sorry about that,” he said. “The batteries must be dead. You’re going to have to speak a little bit louder.”

“Have you always had a hearing problem?” Remy asked, raising his voice.

The man shook his head. “I lost it in my early teens,” he said, staring out through the windshield. The plane came into view through the shifting dust blowing across the desert. “Actually it was when Malachi first arrived.”

He smiled, but Remy could see little amusement there.

“The whole voice-of-the-divine thing,” Jon explained. “He was rather loud with his proclamations and damaged my eardrums.”

They reached the plane; Jon shut off the van’s engine and turned toward Remy.

“I want to thank you for coming,” he said, extending his hand.

Remy shook it. “My pleasure. I hope I can help.”

“Those should make certain you can,” Jon said, pointing to the papers resting in Remy’s lap.

When the volunteer’s mind had connected with them, showing the Sons all that Eden had to share, two had written down what they had seen, providing Remy with a detailed map and specific information on where the second half of the key could be found and who it was the detective had to find.

“The pilot has already been instructed to bring you to an airport in Thornwell. From there you can rent a car and head to the designated location,” Jon said as they got out of the van.

He met Remy in front of the vehicle and reached out to shake the detective’s hand.

“Good luck,” Jon said. “Hopefully we’ll be seeing each other again soon.”

“Take care,” Remy said, clutching the important papers beneath his arm as he proceeded toward the foldout stairs that would take him up into the jet.

The pilot was standing there waiting, saluting Remy as he passed through the rounded doorway inside. The stairway was retracted, and the door closed and secured as Remy took the same seat he’d sat in on his way out. Buckling himself in, he removed his phone from his jacket pocket to check for messages.

This was a new phone, finally replacing the archaic one that he’d had for the past ten years, and he had to think about the steps to play back voice mails.

A message from Fernita was the first he heard. It wasn’t uncommon these days for him to get calls from the older woman, but this one sounded a bit off. Remy didn’t like the hint of panic he heard in her voice. If he’d been heading home, he would have taken a drive over just to be sure she was okay. He considered calling her back, but then thought better of it, deciding that maybe it would be best to just wait to see her until this case was over and done, but the tone of the old woman’s voice disturbed him.

An idea began to take shape. An insidious concept, but one that the more he thought about it, the better it became.

The new phone had texting capability—his old one probably had too, but it wasn’t something Remy had ever thought to use. He tried to recall what he’d read in the owner’s manual as he set about sending his very first official text message.

Madeline would have been so proud of him. His wife had always been the first to embrace technology. He probably wouldn’t have even owned a cell phone if it weren’t for her.

Slowly his fingers played over the tiny keyboard, spelling out the message he would then send to Steven Mulvehill. Remy finished the message, then read it over and could barely contain his smile. He had told his friend about the wonderful old woman recently, and Steven had seemed genuinely amused, wanting to meet her. Well, here was his chance. In the message he asked if Steven would mind stopping by and checking things out, just to be sure that she was all right. As a special incentive, Remy promised the homicide cop a steak dinner at the Capital Grille and a bottle of twenty-five-year-old Macallan single-malt if he did this special favor for him.

There was very little Mulvehill wouldn’t do for a steak and a good bottle of Scotch.

The plane’s engine began to whine, the private jet starting to taxi down the runway, preparing to take him on to the next leg of his journey. He hit Send, watching the message disappear into the ether, and smiled as he returned the phone to his coat pocket.

Remy was certain he’d be hearing some serious shit from Mulvehill on this one, but what were friends for if they couldn’t be taken advantage of?

Nathan had been Jon’s closest friend.

They had grown up together in the various Sons of Adam communities, mortal enemies at first, but gradually becoming as thick as thieves.

And so much more.

Jon ran his key card through the security gate and entered the biodome, placing the card back inside his pocket. Nathan had always wanted to help; he was just like that. If it would advance the cause in any way, he would be the one to try to march it through. When they’d first begun to discuss human testing in regard to the fruit of the tree, he was the first to put his name on the list.

Nathan had described it as wanting to do something, to not sit around waiting for things to happen, but to actually contribute to things moving forward.

I hope wherever you are, you’re happy, Jon thought angrily. There were plenty of others in the Sons who would have volunteered, others Jon wasn’t so close to. It made him feel awful, but he secretly wished that one of them had been the one to taste the fruit, and not Nathan.

Another door slid open before him with a hiss of hydraulics, and he was hit with a blast of unusually frigid air. The air-conditioning must have been on the fritz again.

As he moved down the silent corridor, his mind continued to wander. A chill not caused by the air-conditioning ran down his neck as he recalled the moment Nathan’s thoughts—imbued with the power of Eden—touched his mind. Jon had never experienced anything like it, and hoped never to again.

He had been dwarfed by the immensity of it, a feeling so big that it threatened to swallow him up where he would disappear forever. Was that what returning to the Garden would be like? he wondered. Becoming part of something so big that one would lose any chance of individuality? If that was the case, he would much rather stay where he had been born.

From birth he’d been taught about the Sons of Adam’s holy mission, and had applied himself to the rules and regulations of the order’s cause, but deep down he had never expected their beliefs would come true.

Although he’d kept those thoughts to himself.

And now they were that much closer to its actually becoming a reality. The Garden of Eden was coming here . . . to Earth. It was a concept that he was having a difficult time wrapping his brain around.

Jon’s mind raced as he passed through a doorway into the cafeteria. A cup of coffee was what he needed, before the sad task at hand.

It was strangely quiet, even for this time of day. He paused, looking around, and saw no one. Not even the cafeteria staff.

“Huh,” he muttered to himself, moving on through the empty hall, the reason he had come there forgotten.

Distracted from his coffee needs, he exited into another corridor, continuing on to his destination with a heavy heart.

He’d promised Nathan that he would take care of his remains. Neither of them had been sure what would be left after the exercise, but Jon had promised to dispose of them with dignity and respect.

It was when he’d seen Nathan’s body, after Malachi had . . .

Go ahead, he thought. It’s true. How else could it possibly be described?

After Malachi had killed him.

It was as he looked down at his friend’s ruined form that he knew where he would take Nathan’s remains.

His friend wouldn’t be around now to return to the Garden, but he could at least find peace in the beauty of the biodome’s garden. That was where Jon would take him and lay him to rest. It was the least he could do for his friend.

Nathan’s body had been taken to one of the dome’s freezer units, where many of their medical supplies requiring refrigeration were stored. He was certain that Nathan wouldn’t have minded taking a short break there until Jon could get back to him.

The medical wing was empty as well.

“What is going on here today?” Jon said aloud as he entered the empty wing and went to the cold-room door. Taking a few deep breaths, he grabbed the door handle, pulled it open.

The stretcher with Nathan’s body resting atop it was waiting for him. At least that was where it was supposed to be, he thought as he grabbed the chilly ends of the metal stretcher and pulled it from the refrigerated room.

Another wave of sadness spilled over him as he maneuvered the stretcher down the hall and toward the exit. The Sons of Adam lived a very long time, some stretching into the hundreds of years, and it was quite disappointing—no, worse than that, tragic—that his friend wouldn’t be around to share those years with him.

But Nathan was all about the sacrifice, especially since Malachi’s arrival to the order.

Before the angel came, the Sons had just existed, living their dayto-day lives, caring for the father, and waiting for a sign that the sins of the first man and woman would be forgiven.

Many believed that Malachi was that very sign, an agent of Heaven brought to them to help make their reasons for existing a reality. Jon believed that the angel had come to them with a purpose, but wasn’t quite sure if said purpose was to benefit the Sons’ cause, or something more personal. These were his own intimate thoughts, thoughts that hadn’t been uttered to a soul.

Except for Nathan.

Hands on the corner of the cold metal of the stretcher, Jon stopped to gaze down at the sheet-covered form lying there before him. He’d been able to hold himself together, but he felt the grief inside him build to an incalculable level, and there was no amount of strength that could hold it back.

In the currently empty corridor he began to cry. As the tears came, memories washed over him, the two friends throughout the many years their kind were allowed to live. For a brief moment he wished that he were like all the other human beings out there, no longer special—no longer of the special line—for he would likely be close to death now, and wouldn’t have to know this pain much longer.

He was tempted to pull away the sheet, to look upon his friend’s broken remains, but didn’t care to soil his memory of him. He remembered how he had looked in the lab . . . how he had looked before Malachi had . . .

Killed him.

Jon ran the back of his hand over his face, wiping away the tears and snot, wiping away the residuals of his sadness. Steeling himself, he continued to wheel the stretcher down the empty corridor on the way to what would be Nathan’s final place of rest.

Reaching the entrance to the botanical garden, Jon walked around the stretcher to open the door. Always the efficient one, he was already reviewing the supplies that he would need in order to prepare Nathan’s grave. He knew that there were shovels inside, so that would pretty much take care of it: a shovel, and perhaps a nice rock to mark where he lay. Jon reached inside his pocket and removed something that he had brought from his room. It was a leather pouch filled with his collection of marbles that he had accumulated over the years. Nathan had always admired them, and Jon thought that he would bury them with him—a piece of himself to accompany his friend. Jon was about to lose it again, so he sucked it up, preoccupying himself with the thought of where he’d need to dig, and how long it would take him to finish.

The door started to slide open as he walked around the stretcher, but he noticed that the door had opened only three-quarters of the way. Great, he thought, something else for maintenance to look at.

He returned to the door to check whether something was obstructing the track.

The first body was just inside the door, a splayed arm jammed against it preventing the door from sliding completely back.

Jon didn’t know what to think entering the botanical garden, about to ask the man—his name was Rudolf, and Jon had never really liked him all that much—what the matter was as he knelt down beside him, but Jon knew that he was dead before the words could even leave his mouth.

Instantly slipping into emergency mode, Jon stood and headed for a phone just inside the room to the right of the doorway.

This was when he noticed the other bodies all along the path leading into the garden. They appeared broken . . . bloody.

Were those bite marks? he wondered with escalating horror.

He then knew why the other areas of the dome had been so quiet—the residents were all here. Not realizing it, he had begun to walk the path, stepping over the bodies of the people he had known all his life. All dead, all wearing expressions that could best be described as shock . . .

No . . . the look was surprise.

Reaching the clearing, he noticed that the tropical forest was completely quiet; even without his hearing aid, he could hear that the bugs’ and birds’ voices were silenced. Maybe they knew to be silent . . . or maybe they were dead too.

The most bodies were in the clearing, stacked like a huge pile of dirty laundry . . . dirty, bloody laundry. Jon froze, searching the green of the man-made jungle, sensing that he wasn’t alone.

“Show yourself.”

The words left his mouth before he could consider them, and they brought with them a response that he really didn’t care to experience.

There was laughter from the jungle, low and rumbling, more like a growl. He could feel it low in his stomach, as well as hear it. Jon couldn’t tell exactly where it was coming from; it seemed to come from all sides . . . from everywhere.

And then there came the fire.

It was like a living thing, leaping out from the concealment of the trees and bushes . . . tongues of flame consuming everything in their path as they made their way toward him.

Jon spun around, running across the body-strewn path on his way to the exit. He imagined the bodies, his friends, reaching up to grab at his legs and feet, not wanting him to get away, not wanting him to survive. He could feel the fire growing in intensity behind him, nipping hungrily at his heels.

He could see the door up ahead, the stretcher holding the body of his friend just outside it. That was his goal, he decided, feeling a tongue of fire lick at the salty wetness of sweat on the back of his neck. He wanted to reach his friend.

If he was to die, he wanted it to be with him.

Jon made it to the exit, passing through the doorway with one final push, jumping onto the stretcher, feeling the body of his friend beneath him as Hell opened its awful mouth to consume them all.