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Herringcarp Gothic - Chapter Eleven: Mirror Images
This story continues from Chapter One: Amnesia
Chapter Two: Monsters on the Loose
Chapter Three: The Black Chapel
Chapter Four: The Cabinet of Dr Morningstar
Chapter Five: Flesh and Blood
Chapter Six: I Am John’s Psychosis
Chapter Seven: The Romance of Heresy
Chapter Eight: Whispers and Screams
Chapter Nine: Blood Sacrifice
Chapter Ten: Dance of the Dead Men
***
The sleek pink limousine turned drove down the parking ramp into the underground garage. An automatic door sealed off the foul weather outside. The vehicle drove through the empty lot towards the one illuminated section in a far corner. It cruised to a halt behind the metal frame where the young woman hung.
One of the interrogation team hurried to open the rear door. A young Asian woman stepped out, her wall-tailored suit and expensive shoes bringing the only splashes of colour to the basement area except for red.
Akiko Masamune, head of the Masamune crime family, moved over to example the ruin on the torture frame. It had once been human.
“Is she ready to speak?†Akiko asked the assiduous bodyguard at her side.
“Yes, Akiko,†answered Midori with a little bow. “She resisted for a long time. True ninja. Now she is broken. She will confess in exchange for being allowed death.â€Â
Akiko looked up at the wrecked remnants of the former mercenary known as Ultraninja. “You will speak with me?†she demanded.
The prisoner looked down at her captor with her remaining eye and spoke through a toothless mouth. “Yes, lady,†she managed. Blood spilled over her chin as she talked.
“What is your name?â€Â
A pause. A last resistance. Midori applied the shockstick.
“FÄÂng Jakayla,†Ultraninja confessed. She hadn’t spoken the name since she’d commenced her training at the age of six.
“Who taught you?â€Â
“The Yellow Tiger Brotherhood, in Huaxia, Cathay Block.â€Â
“Who do you serve?â€Â
A sob. The torture had cut deep. “I pledged myself to the Parody Master.â€Â
“He is dead.â€Â
“Yes.â€Â
Akiko half-turned from the prisoner as if not interested. “What did you do for your Parody Master?â€Â
“I infiltrated Herringcarp Asylum. I joined the Hooded Hood’s assembly of villains.â€Â
“She was protected from the Hood’s usual detections by her Master,†Midori interjected.
Akiko nodded and turned back to the bleeding captive. “And what did you do then?â€Â
“I… smuggled a device into the Hooded Hood’s stronghold. A bomb.â€Â
“What kind of bomb?â€Â
“A Narrative Bomb. A device created by the Shaper of Worlds in case she ever needed to destroy the Hooded Hood. My Master had captured it and he desired I use it.â€Â
“A weapon capable of destroying even the Hooded Hood, designed to destroy him,†marvelled Akiko. “And you detonated this bomb?â€Â
“I did as I was instructed.†Ultraninja’s tears were stained red.
“What happened then?â€Â
“Herringcarp Asylum was destroyed. All those within had their storylines erased. The Hooded Hood was sent to the worst fate that the Shaper could devise for him. I do not know what that would be.â€Â
Midori spoke quietly in Akiko’s ear. “The destruction may not have been complete. The Hood’s son, Denial, managed to retrieve the lost villains and use them against the Parody Master in the final struggle.â€Â
Akiko gestured her to silence. “Where was the Hood when the bomb exploded, Jakayla?†she demanded of Ultraninja.
“It was in his throne. That was where I was told to conceal it. I activated the timer then fled.â€Â
“Like a ninja,†scorned Midori, who followed the way of the samurai.
“Could the Hood have survived?†demanded Akiko.
“I do not see how. The weapon created to destroy him exploded beneath him. His whole house was erased from existence. I did my duty.†Ultraninja shuddered. “I did my duty.â€Â
Akiko looked over at the technical experts. They confirmed that the captive had spoken the truth.
“You may die, Jakayla,†Akiko said. “Midori, see to it.â€Â
***
“What… what was that?†breathed Dr Winkelweald as he tore his gaze off the images reflected in the cold glass before him. The scene had been so pervasive, so realistic that he had even forgotten the extremity of his peril.
Now he turned and the Red Angel bore down upon him.
***
The woman on the railroad tracks flexed her arms and legs but the bonds that held her were well tied. She recognised the knots.
“I don’t suppose there’s any point me saying you’re never going to get away with this?†she asked in a tone that was more weary than frightened.
“No particularly,†admitted her captor. “Although I imagine you will.â€Â
“Well, you won’t get away with it,†she argued. “The boys’ll be here soon and then they’ll kick your scrawny butt from here to the moon. Just saying.â€Â
“You are probably wondering why they haven’t already come to your rescue, Miss Waltz?†suggested the Hooded Hood.
“Well, I did summons them a while back but I guess if there’s a Xenathon on…â€Â
“They have not come because this time I did not allow it.â€Â
Lisa frowned. “What do you mean, not allow it. I’m the amorous advocatrix. I have powers to summons people. Sure, it works best if I’m actually in court, not tied to a railway line, but the boys of the Regulars know better than to avoid that special tingling they get when I need them here. It’s come and rescue me or face a paddling.â€Â
“Alas, on this occasion your team-mates have each found themselves diverted to a summons from an alternative-reality Lisa,†the Hood explained. “Jarvis now faces a dangerous battle on Dinosaur-Earth where the Reptile Legion seeks his doom. NTU-150 struggles on Natural-Earth where no technology functions.â€Â
“Will he notice the difference?†wondered Lisa.
“Visionary’s trials of fudgy peril at the whim of a juvenile pachyderm are especially amusing. Each of your comrades faces a similar end on parallel worlds where another Lisa had been endangered and sent out for help. Each faces doom.â€Â
“Ooo, doom!†Lisa squirmed. “Okay, so now come to the bit where you gloat me through why I’m tied to a railway track? I mean, why aren’t I being thoroughly ravaged right now? I promise I’m thoroughly ravagable.â€Â
The cowled crime czar backed away a step. “I am not that kind of archvillain,†he told the first lady of the Lair Legion.
“What, you don’t ravage on the first date?â€Â
“You seek to distract and delay me while your ingenious comrades find ways out of their traps,†the Hood noted. “They will, of course, but not in time to thwart the will of… the Hooded Hood!â€Â
“Love the accent,†Lisa said, “but that doesn’t explain the railway lines. I mean, I appreciate the classics as much as anyone else but…â€Â
The Hooded Hood began to explain about the use of a cosmic office-holder to derail a train of thought. Lisa skipped over the bit about squashing Hedgehogs of Time and destabilising the universal axis and cut to the end. “So I get mashed by a locomotive and you get to rule the Parodyverse? Yes?â€Â
“Indeed,†breathed the Hooded Hood.
“And that’s your preferred option over the ravaging, is it? Really?â€Â
The Hooded Hood leaned forward. “I apologise for the necessity, Miss Waltz. It is for the greater good.â€Â
“It really isn’t,†Lisa told him. “Look, in the time we’ve been the League of Regulars we’ve battled all kinds of menaces. Including Baron Zemo and his Scourge three hundred and eleven times. All those world-conquering, universe-dominating types all thought they had good reasons for their conquests. And you know what? They didn’t. So if you think some hoodie-come-lately’s going to make any difference…â€Â
The Hooded Hood managed a low chuckle. “You believe this is our first encounter? Miss Waltz, this is the culmination of hundreds of confrontations I have had with this and other iterations of the Lair Legion.â€Â
“The who?â€Â
“The League of Regulars. My power is to retrospectively rewrite events. When an encounter has not gone well then I have simply erased it and done it over.â€Â
“So your power is basically to cheat,†the amorous advocatrix accused. “You do a save-game then go back to it if you don’t win the boss-fight to get to the next level.â€Â
“I walk the myriad different possibilities and select which outcome prospers,†countered the Hood.
“So in all those hundreds of times you tied me to the tracks here to get me run over by… whatever all that stuff you told me about was, you never decided to find out just how easy my bodice comes unlaced? I mean, it’s specially designed that way.â€Â
“Miss Waltz, I told you…â€Â
“Yeah, but you’re a big meanie villain and they don’t always tell the truth, do they?â€Â
“The Hooded Hood does not lie.â€Â
Lisa squirmed again in her bonds. She could feel some of her comrades getting nearer. Her repeated mental summonings were acting like beacons across realities if only she could delay her captor long enough.
“Fortunately you do have that sexy Latverian accent,†she said out loud. “Er, I mean okay mister, if you don’t lie, tell me you haven’t actually thought about pulling me off these tracks and heading to a nice five-star honeymoon suite hot-tub somewhere exotic.â€Â
“That would not be appropriate,†the Hood told her.
“So you have thought about it then? There’s hope yet. I give good hot tub.†Lisa’s smile could have melted icebergs.
“You… remind me of someone,†confessed the Hood. “Someone I knew long ago.â€Â
Lisa suddenly became serious. The tone in the archvillain’s voice demanded it. “Someone you cared about?â€Â
“You look a little like a woman who was kind to me. A woman whom I did not treat well.â€Â
“So in her memory you’re getting me run over by a train?â€Â
The Hood looked up, his face angry. “You think this a game, Miss Waltz? I know you seek to delay me until your comrades arrive. Two of them have already been here and I have destroyed them.â€Â
Now it was Lisa’s turn to blanche. “Destroyed them? What do you mean? You can’t destroy them!†She bit her lip. “Who did you…? No, I’d know if I couldn’t summons them because they were…â€Â
“Marksman is no more,†the Hood told her. “You will not remember him. He never was.â€Â
“You’re claiming you erased a Regular entirely, so much that I don’t even remember summonsing him?â€Â
“Indeed. But to assist your credulity I will permit you to remember the Shaper.â€Â
“Carrington!†Lisa cried. “What have you done to him?â€Â
“He was far too dangerous to be allowed in your Legion,†the Hood insisted. “He must have known when he chose to assist you what the consequence would be.â€Â
Lisa pulled at he bonds in earnest now. “If you’ve hurt him, hurt any of them, I will…â€Â
The Hooded Hood looked into the mists along the line. There was the ghostly echo of an approaching train.
He looked back at the first lady of the Lair Legion, struggling in her distress.
“This is not a worthy way to triumph over my enemies,†the Hooded Hood decided. “This is not the scenario I require.â€Â
His eyes flashed green as he reset reality once more. Lisa vanished back to the Lair Mansion with no memory of her encounter.
“Maybe next time the seduction?†the cowled crime czar allowed himself to speculate. Miss Waltz had been absolutely right about her being thoroughly ravishable.
***
“I… I know her,†said Amnesia, slowly. “I’ve met her before. And him, that man, that Hooded Hood, that was…â€Â
Her revelations were halted as the Red Angel caught her by the throat.
***
Hodak the Wise limped up the hill to the Thin Place. The old shaman waited for him by the Turning Stone.
“Will you do this?†the shaman asked in a fearful whisper.
“I am chief, What else is there to do?â€Â
The whole land lay in unnatural shadow from the vast thing in the skies above. Bigger than a river, bigger than a forest, and covered with glowing lines that shifted like snakes it had hung there for three days and three nights. The giants inside it had come forth as they pleased and no spear or rock could stop them.
“Some things can not be fought,†the shaman said, in warning or comfort. “No man can kill a tiger.â€Â
“I have killed tigers,†replied Hodak. He looked at his ash-spear, the handle carved to show his prowess, the flint tip honed to deadly sharpness. “It needs a plan and working together. It can be done.â€Â
The shaman pointed up to the thing in the sky. It could send out lights that cut up the forest like a bear’s pelt, tearing lose long strips to be pulled up into the heavens. The landscape the people had always known was forever changed. “That is not a tiger, Hodak. That is the gods.â€Â
“They are not my gods.†The intruders did not protect or teach. They had shone their lights and taken Hodak’s people, torn away Hodak’s wife and children. Hodak knew in his soul that now his family were dead and that their deaths had not been easy. “It is my duty to get rid of these enemies.â€Â
The old shaman bowed his head. “You know what happens beyond the Turning Stone? Men who enter the Thin Place cave never come back. There is madness there.â€Â
“There is power. I need power, to kill these enemies that have killed my people. I am chief. I should have done better.â€Â
“I went to the opening once,†the shaman confided. “When I was young, when my master was teaching me the mysteries. I went alone and I listened to the voices and to the screams. It changed me. I came back shaman. I almost came back mad.â€Â
“I will go to the cave. I will fight the demons there. I will silence the cries. I must. There are secrets there. One of them must tell me how to kill these gods.â€Â
The shaman did not speak. He clasped his chief’s shoulder and stood aside. He wept for Hodak, and for the people, and for the future he could see but not understand.
Hodak went to the turning stone and snapped his war-spear over his knee in sacrifice. Blood was easy to offer but the weapon had defined him as chief for so long. He laid the pieces at the base of the dolmen and limped down the spiral path towards the Thin Place.
The legends of his people said there were ghosts there. Hodak ignored the apparitions, strange alien things that were almost human. Only a few were substantial enough to grab him and those he shrugged away.
The whispering began at the mouth of the cave, and that was where the next test began. The old shaman had ventured here once and had returned forever altered, apart from other men, uncanny. The words Hodak heard were alien, different, but the ideas they carried seared into his mind, filling it with memories of times and places that had never existed.
Hodak would have gone mad but his fury at the enemy gods burned so strong.
There were new words in his head now. Already Hodak the Wise knew how limited his wisdom had been. Now he had ways to comprehend, for names divide up the universe and allow it to be told as story; and a story that can be told can be directed.
“Space robots,†Hodak growled. “Celestians. I will see you dead.â€Â
But the Celestians did not live, not truly as a man did. They were like… like dogs, bred and used by men, shaped for purpose and set on their course. Those who created them were the true enemy.
“Creators… I will come for you.â€Â
Nobody had passed the threshold of the Thin Place cave and returned. Hodak went in.
The tunnel was very narrow. It corkscrewed downwards in utter darkness, sometimes so small that Hodak had to push one arm ahead and squirm like worm. He tore the skin from his chest and back on the harsh rock. He ignored the pain.
Time meant nothing here. Hodak might have crawled for an hour or a week or a hundred years. His fingers were numb and he could hardly breathe. His head pounded.
The madness clawed at him, welcoming him in, seducing him with fantasies and fears, shredding his soul. Hodak held to his one purpose and kept moving. He let the phantasms tear the rest of him away; he didn’t need those parts any more. He kept only that deadly determination to see the creator gods destroyed.
Only then could his people be free.
He tumbled through an unsuspected hole and fell hard onto the cavern floor below. It took a moment for Hodak to accustom himself to the weird green light that flickered across the walls and longer for him to understand where he was. This was no natural chamber but rather constructed from shaped black blocks. A slab occupied one end of the tiny room.
The place’s name came to him unbidden: the Black Chapel; or perhaps Hodak named it then. Names were power.
Hodak could feel the destinies shifting around him. Here was madness, yes, but also inspiration and passion, all distilled in this sump of fate.
Hodak the Wise waited and thought things through. There was no time here. There was only the moment, and Hodak used it as he needed to understand what he could.
“There is power here,†he said to himself. “It has destroyed all the others who came to take it, who got this far. If I take it then I will be destroyed.â€Â
Destruction was useless. Hodak could not find or punish the cruel creators if he was destroyed.
“I cannot wield this power, then,†he reasoned. “So another must do it. One who thinks as I do that the Space Gods and their masters should fall. One who will conquer all if he must to that end. One wiser than me. One more cunning and more deadly.â€Â
The green energies swirled around the walls as if in encouragement. This place needed a purpose, sought a meaning. It did not yet know what it was to become but it needed someone to express its pain. It too would adopt a master, give him asylum, offer him its riches and cruel blessings and a place to stand to change the universe.
“That is what I must do, then,†understood Hodak. “I must make a champion who will do what must be done.â€Â
The stone slab was an alter but there was no sacrifice on it.
Hodak used his last strength to crawl atop the stone and offer himself.
“Take me then,†he told the Black Chapel. “Use me to make your master.â€Â
For a long time nothing happened. Hodak wondered if he would die here in the cold.
Then grey spectral things began to seep from the walls and move towards him: memories and determinations and deadly purposes. As they approached they pressed together, folding into each other, shifting and sorting themselves until just one grey-cowled figure loomed over the chieftain and looked upon him with luminous green eyes.
“Good evening,†said the creature, before it make Hodak its own.
***
“What?†said the Red Angel, staggering back from the mirror, dropping his victims for a moment. “Who?â€Â
Then he understood. “Of course. My hidden enemy. The hooded foe. Very clever – but now your hand is revealed. You have played your cards and they were insufficient.â€Â
A dry ancient voice from nowhere spoke back to the angel: “Noted.â€Â
Wangmundo howled as he dived from the shadows and lunged at the Red Angel, tearing, clawing, biting as he bore him to the floor.
Amnesia and Winkelweald toppled backwards as they fell, but now the glass of the mirror was as insubstantial as they. Now it was a Portal and they dropped through it and vanished into the depths beyond.
***
Continued with The Rise of the Hooded Hood
***
Original concepts, characters, and situations copyright © 2010 reserved by Ian Watson. Other Parodyverse characters copyright © 2010 to their creators. The use of characters and situations reminiscent of other popular works do not constitute a challenge to the copyrights or trademarks of those works. The right of Ian Watson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. |
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... And now we understand the why behind the black chapel and the particular form of "asylum" that it offers to the would-be destroyer of gods.
Interesting that Morningstar the angel should be his foe, since both exist to serve as adversaries to higher powers.
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