A Thing Which Could Not Be Put Back
anonymous
August 18 2010, 00:41:57 UTC
As far from the door as he was Hal Emmerich could hear electricity crackle. If he set one foot on that floor the shock would snap through him like a bullet and he would be dead before he understood why, but it wasn't meant for him.
There was nothing left for him to do.
When he'd first come to Shadow Moses and saw its gray body hulking from the endless snow, bright in the reflected light that seared as much as the cold, they'd told him what they told everybody, which was, "Welcome to the end of the world."
The halls were like tubes of concrete and tile and sound reflected. Outside of his door there was screaming.
They were only told the code names and that they were lucky to get that much. They went among the other soldiers and never bothered to hide their difference. When their leader came into the lab he said, "So you're the designer," as though he were completing a thought. The others stayed away heat and burning smells and noise of the smelting furnace and the hangar, but he was there, hand on the scaffolding and looking far up, watching REX being born.
Gunshots and a scrape like metal.
He leaned over the console in the lab and studied the blueprints, schematics, simulations and equations and weapons data. He asked questions with an intelligence that Hal thought, remembered thinking and always would, was wasted holding a gun.
"I didn't know soldiers were into this stuff," Hal said.
"The good ones are," said Liquid. His hand was on his shoulder.
Hal didn't know how long he'd been alone here. He had jammed himself in a corner between the wall and the locker, pressed against the two walls. He leaned his head against the concrete. His communications hadn't worked for a long time.
A radio howled static.
"Wait," he said, and he did, cocking one eyebrow the color of sand in a dune's shade in expectation and watching him.
He was out of ways to lie and say he didn't want.
The last person he'd seen was a soldier who said, "He'll be after you. Stay here."
Liquid had clearance to lock doors that no one else could open. He touched Hal with hands that were warm and callused when he took off his gloves and never called him by name.
When he kissed him it was like running your fingers over the surface of the sun, a moving searing reaction that was the center of everything.
He moved over him, kissing his neck with an open mouth, and for something to hold onto Hal tangled his fingers in his long hair.
He wasn't betraying anything. He'd never been loyal to anything else.
Hal heard a sound like a spatter of raindrops hitting a roof, and in his head saw blood hitting the wall.
Liquid wasn't touched by the cold. If he felt pain he wouldn't know what it was, like the creatures at the bottom of the ocean wouldn't have words for tide and current.
But what the shape of him in shadow sitting at the side of the bed made Hal think of was the holy men who renounced the world and rang bells so you would remember.
Muffled by the locked door there were footsteps, then a whimper and a long sigh.
Lights from the lab's consoles flashed their messages to no one.
After the coup Hal only saw him once, long enough to know everything.
"If you really think he was made to be a better soldier than you and you're going to fight-"
He'd tried to point out the flaw in the logic, but the look Liquid gave back before the door slid closed said that he already knew.
There weren't screams anymore.
Footsteps, or metal on metal.
The light by the door blinked and they stopped.
Hal closed his eyes against the sight of the door opening and waited for the end of the world.
PS from Writeanon
anonymous
August 26 2010, 07:31:16 UTC
Very belated remembered that I forgot to say, I know I completely failed at fluff and the general spirit of the prompt. This is just what jumped into my head and wanted to get written down. So if somebody else also wants to take a crack at filling it, please go ahead.
There was nothing left for him to do.
When he'd first come to Shadow Moses and saw its gray body hulking from the endless snow, bright in the reflected light that seared as much as the cold, they'd told him what they told everybody, which was, "Welcome to the end of the world."
The halls were like tubes of concrete and tile and sound reflected. Outside of his door there was screaming.
They were only told the code names and that they were lucky to get that much. They went among the other soldiers and never bothered to hide their difference. When their leader came into the lab he said, "So you're the designer," as though he were completing a thought. The others stayed away heat and burning smells and noise of the smelting furnace and the hangar, but he was there, hand on the scaffolding and looking far up, watching REX being born.
Gunshots and a scrape like metal.
He leaned over the console in the lab and studied the blueprints, schematics, simulations and equations and weapons data. He asked questions with an intelligence that Hal thought, remembered thinking and always would, was wasted holding a gun.
"I didn't know soldiers were into this stuff," Hal said.
"The good ones are," said Liquid. His hand was on his shoulder.
Hal didn't know how long he'd been alone here. He had jammed himself in a corner between the wall and the locker, pressed against the two walls. He leaned his head against the concrete. His communications hadn't worked for a long time.
A radio howled static.
"Wait," he said, and he did, cocking one eyebrow the color of sand in a dune's shade in expectation and watching him.
He was out of ways to lie and say he didn't want.
The last person he'd seen was a soldier who said, "He'll be after you. Stay here."
Liquid had clearance to lock doors that no one else could open. He touched Hal with hands that were warm and callused when he took off his gloves and never called him by name.
When he kissed him it was like running your fingers over the surface of the sun, a moving searing reaction that was the center of everything.
He moved over him, kissing his neck with an open mouth, and for something to hold onto Hal tangled his fingers in his long hair.
He wasn't betraying anything. He'd never been loyal to anything else.
Hal heard a sound like a spatter of raindrops hitting a roof, and in his head saw blood hitting the wall.
Liquid wasn't touched by the cold. If he felt pain he wouldn't know what it was, like the creatures at the bottom of the ocean wouldn't have words for tide and current.
But what the shape of him in shadow sitting at the side of the bed made Hal think of was the holy men who renounced the world and rang bells so you would remember.
Muffled by the locked door there were footsteps, then a whimper and a long sigh.
Lights from the lab's consoles flashed their messages to no one.
After the coup Hal only saw him once, long enough to know everything.
"If you really think he was made to be a better soldier than you and you're going to fight-"
He'd tried to point out the flaw in the logic, but the look Liquid gave back before the door slid closed said that he already knew.
There weren't screams anymore.
Footsteps, or metal on metal.
The light by the door blinked and they stopped.
Hal closed his eyes against the sight of the door opening and waited for the end of the world.
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