Red Twilight the Weaver chapter 10

Chapter 10:

Sonata of the Everlasting

After eating Jessica leads the young in cleaning. Pepper, Salt, and Mint have joined in. Mint looks to the motherly Kobolt "what is your favorite story."

Jessica lifts her head thinking "there are so many to choose from, how am I to find but one? With every year and every reading, I find thing ever deeper and more insightful in even the most familiar of my books."

** *

Marks arises from his sleep, images from the most potent dream in his life burned into his brain, he had seen himself passing a book form his withered and worn hands into the hands of a younger self. Marks swoops down picking up his cat, Nuku, with the intent of traveling to his office in the tower. He takes his heavy black overcoat from the door but fails to grab a shirt.

Nuku lies quietly in the jeep as her gentle master drive into his work in the early hours of the evening, Nuku like to drive, every day she rides in the car with him, and when they arrive at work, she gets a cookie.

Marks eye glassine with anticipation. Marks struggles to contain his excitement, all the mysteries of the last near hundred years have been revealed on-to him. He has become the vassal of unspeakable power; the endgame of his life is within reach.

Marks grips his cat firmly in his arms like a child as he makes his way up the hundreds of steps to his office. He has the energy of a schoolboy, empowered by his dreams. The way to his desk is lit almost solely by a lone spotlight. All doors open in his wake.

Nuku leaps from her keeper's arms to the spot on the table where she typically sits, she feels something is horrible amidst. 'They're here to early' she thinks 'where is the hairless man with my cookies, he meets us at the door every day?'

Marks slaps an empty notebook down on the table. Before he is done today this one and maybe a dozen more will be full. Marks lifts a pin high overhead and dynamically stick ink to paper. His teeth grind as his pin flies from corner to corner; he takes on an almost wolf-like exasperation as he lies over the book digesting every line as he writes. His lip curls and he cackles as the images he constructs start to divide out before him.

All the works of Marks life have been adding up to this moment, this glorious moment. A coworker of Marks once sad to him "Loath me for I am becoming Death." Marks is about to do the opposite 'I will conquer Death. I will, rob the Reaper of his power." Like a composer demanding strength of his orchestra, he thrust his arm to the side throwing ink into the air crossing his "T's" then again accenting the note he needs to remember. Finding he lacks the speed he needed to finish his calculations in a timely fashion he employs a second pen to write in a second book calling out the greatest of skill.

All strife, all heartache, his every experience, good and bad alike aligned in this one instance of triumph. An adulterous wife, his deceitful friends, the words of a monk from a distant land, his failure to protect one daughter, and the absences of another. All these events give him the passion to bleed out the poetry that must be his final works.

Like a painter he lashes his pens, his liquidly silver hair flows around his body like a typhoon, his hardy black jacket flutters like batwings in the night, the pages of his books thunder a warlike chant as page upon page flash by. Marks laughs in madness throwing his first completed book aside to make room for more. The work must go one. The doors remain locked long into the day; the lights remain off, Marks cannot be interrupted now.

Nuku sees her masters pain in his heaving breaths and the sweat rolling down his skin. She sits up and places a paw on his thermos inviting him to stop for a drink. Marks is feverous; he struggles for air as he works maliciously, he must not stop even at the coast of his very soul. His hand's cramp and arms become num with hunger his veins grow dark but with nerves of steel and a heart of stone he pushes against his mortality to carry on. Light trails from his pins as he slashes them across his body his eye burn with intellect.

Nuku pushes a plush mouse with a bow wrapped around its waist to remind her owner that it is approaching dinner time. Marks falls to his knees and loses the strength and focuses to maintain his grip on his secondary pin. He throws his third and fourth books form the table and focuses with all his might on his fifth precipitation runs in abundances from his face and hair. He slaps the table hard with one hand, and the old man forces himself upright.

He has found the soul. The very essences of life and humanity! Pieces of coding in our neuroses the hides the tiniest piece of our being that define the differences between artificial intelligence and pure intellect. With this knowledge, he will become the master of destiny. His useless wife and her shallow ideas will be the first to see the truest extinct of Marks Vigeta Karingson's near omnipotent might, then the fair-weather friend of his that is her boy-toy, this power will be their unmaking.

His foolishness has seen the end of enough lives. This foolery will mark the end of it all; when this work is finished, there will be no more sins. This revolution beyond the limitations of physical existences will be the end of everything for him. No more death no more hunger no more sickness. Dr. Marks Vigeta Karingson will cure all the ailments of humanity with this code. 'We will ascend, we will endure, hark onto ye all the day of giving is upon us. The end of suffering is here; all men will be with their brothers and sisters, lovers and beloved we will see the time of eternity as one mind. This is my last and finest gift on-to humanity; we need on gods and messiahs, our savors are ourselves, the endless reaches of the mind, our one concusses. Christ offered you eternal forgiveness; I offer you eternal life.'

Marks drops his pin the last of his strength has left him. He lies his head on his desk and wraps Nuku in his arms. The slender black cat looks at him a slight look of distaste and a hint of scolding in her eye, but loving adornment follows quickly as she places her paw on his shoulders and rubs her nose in his ear in an act of forgiveness. What goodness and humanity is left in this cold and hardened vessel seems to have leaked away and found its way into this motherly feline. With the loss of his children, Marks became more metal than man. The hardest part of this ascension is passed, tomorrow the next phase can begin, till then this old man can pray for the cleanliness of peace giving sleep.

The elevator door slides smoothly open. Marks steps out dressed in his street clothing: a hefty black leather duster style overcoat that would not have looked out of place in the second world war and matching slacks'. His long thick gray hair tucked into his jacket. Under one arm he carries with him a cat's crate. His longtime companion travels with him, a slick black tabby named Nuku, she wears a red caller. Marks is nearing eighty years old but looks young and vital as a man half that.

Marks strolls across the elegant lobby of the R&D office at which he works. Leaning against the security desk is a fellow doctor, Juan Sanchez, he is a Spaniard with dark hair tied up in corn rolls and a mustache, he has switched out of his work clothes and into an outfit only a college professor would wear. A green silk shirt with patchwork-sports coat and faded slacks. It looks as if he was engaged in a compelling conversation with the security operator, a man of color named Dwight Egget; he appears young muscular and bald.

Dr. Sanchez waves to call Marks over. "Dr. Karingson! Got a sec?" Marks looks down at his watch a hint of distaste on his face, 'I don't.' Marks began to approach the desk.

"Good evening, Dr. Sanchez, Officer Egget." He greets his co-workers with a slow, deliberate tone

"Working late?" Sanchez makes with pleasantries.

Marks looks down to his watch again anxiety getting the better of him.

Dwight had begun talking, but Marks has heard only half of what he said. "… so your kid had some accident, that's ruff."

Marks hastily replies, "It was no accident, I attempted to conduct a pRokedure I was not qualified to conduct. In my arrogance, I made a fatal mistake."

"What was the problem?" Sanchez inquires

"Hemophilic glucose disorder crystalic mutation, it's a type 1 disease; I'll spare you the details."

"What possessed you to think you could treat that…"

Marks cut him off again " before my employment with Claw co. International I had served at D.C.'s Pentagon health and human service department vaccinating soldiers. I was granted a pharmaceutical license as part of my formalized training." Every question this two muter is entirely predictable, Marks has answered every one of them 20 times already around the office.

Marks tones out again a moment as he feels around in his pockets checking for an assortment of tools he is caring on him. Egget speaks up "Marks if there is anything you need…"

"Yes, thank you," he reaches into Nuku's cage and unclips a portable hard drive from her collar "take this down to 'B ward' next chance you get and plug it into my desktop." Marks hands over the small tool as he makes his way to the parking garage door "also can you tell me if VP Ako Karingson is still in the building?"

Dwight laughs "you could just ask me if your wife is in" he looks down at his log book "looks like she is with A.C. Dem-row and your former lab assistant Allen Wesker at a budget meeting."

"Good, could you detain her?" Marks steps out.

"How long" Dwight questionably jokes.

"Indefinitely!" Marks yells back as he is on his way to the subterranean levels.

Dwight looks to Juan "What does he do here anyway?"

"Only: Cryonics, Bionics, cybernetics, gene splicing, genetic research, and robotics."

"Is that all?"

Juan shakes his head. Dwight holds out the USB drive, "You handle this shit; I don't want to risk breaking anything that might be worth more than my penchant."

Marks walks briskly through the silent parking ramps, making haste as he is a man with a purpose, it would seem strange that only ten hours ago one could not find a parking spot in this lot as every inch was covered, but now the only car in sight is Marks jeep. It's the middle of August, but already there is frost on the ground and a stiff chill in the air. Marks unlocks his car door and places Nuku in the seat alongside him; the back is filled with an assortment of devices. Atop his dashboard rest a camera the size of a deck of cards. After starting the motor, he flips on the camera.

"Vigeta, my old friend, I'm sorry things had to go this way." Marks starts the engine "I had hope for sixteen more months to work, but it would seem that the 'Powers That Be' had to forbid that from happening. I have no doubt you will have many questions about who we are, and mayhap what we were. You will certainly find your way to my office, read the files I have written, but words on a computer screen do no justice when compared to the expertise that comes with seventy or more years of life experiences. "

Marks turns the jeep around and makes his way down the street and onto the side roads. "you will hear many things about who we are, allow me to illuminate a thing or two with the moments we have left together. My only true regret is that I will not be present to watch you being born, that will have to be left to far less loving hands. First off, we are wed, our wife's name is Ako Esuna-Karingson, we have been together for fifteen years as of October, but we do not love each other, our union is one of convenience. Shaun Clawed saw me as his own personal Nicola Tesla, a Rokk star of the scientific world and it simply would not do to have a single superstar. So, a wife was bought and paid for in our name. If she loved anyone, it would be our old friend Allen Wesker."

"Next, we had a child, that is true, but we killed her. Her name was Tara she was conceived as part of an experiment involving in vitro birth, Ako and I both donated DNA for this project, hints why we were allowed to keep her. There was a deformity and as a result of my attempt to correct the anomaly… well, you'll figure it out… she would have been ten. There are a hand full of other experiments that required our blood after Tara: Tail, Nile, Jude..."

Marks makes all effort to stay out of sight staying on the side roads, weaving in and out of alleyways, he stays well below the speed limit "some may say that we consort with demons to harness our magic. This is not true, all that which we have, we have worked for. However, to say we know nothing of witchcraft would be far too modest. You will quickly come to find 'we' possess specific abilities that are quite uncommon. "

"After the 'Big One,' we moved to Tibet for some time, wherein we came to know a golden-eyed Taoist who offered to teach us a very old and spectacular martial-art he referred to as Ki-Ho, the blood sword style. With this knowledge in hand, a masterful individual could, in essence, separate their mind from there body and wield their spirit as an extinction of their will. It is no mystery why some perceive this as magic or devilry."

"You too will need a Nuku by your side, so I have arranged for this to be so. You will find in my office your own Nuku 2, or maybe I could say Nuku Nuku? ... Poetry was never amongst my greater passions…"

"My dear Vigeta in the time I have worked for Claw Co. R&D I have seen things that were never meant for the human eyes. I have seen into other men's fantasies, I have witnessed the fantastic evil's that come from science that is conducted without moral or restraint, I have even looked into the book of life beneath Cronos' arm, and I have both penciled in names and rubbed them out."

"Vigeta, we have done things in our life that we would not wish for any to ever speak of again, I have killed over two hundred men with my bare hands, and weapons I have constructed have tenfold that. I'm told that when a great age comes to an end that sometimes it will leave behind a rage that will burn away the past and a curse is then born. You are my curse. There are so many things I wish I could change. But now my faith lies solely with you."

Marks is swift and silent, but in spite that still he is seen. Allen, his form partner, has followed him step by step until at last, he reaches a place where he can do his bloody business without being seen. Allen drives an armored car discussed as a luxury sedan. He drives slow stays quiet, he leaves his lights off and tracks his prey via a tracking beacon hidden within the jeep. Allen is a young man still in his thirties, in spite of his occupation he is a fit man six feet tall 200lbs, he wears his hair short spiked up and pulled back.

Allen pulls in close to Marks. He flashes his lights only once in warning as if playing a game of tag then pounds the gas in his armored car slamming harshly into Marks back end, pushing him into a building.

Allen steps out of his car and saunters to Marks' Jeep expecting that the 'old wizard' would not die quickly.

Marks sits stunned for a moment then smirks whispering to his friend without the need to lift his head in confirmation of his approach. "Allen my friend, I wasn't expecting you to be so jolly on the spot today."

Allen smashes in the driver side window reaching in with one gloved hand he grabs the old man, dragging him to the street "tough luck old wizard, we have known for weeks you had plans to run." Allen's eyes glow like flashlights beneath the thick glasses he wears reflecting a yellow glow on his face. He is garbed in a tuxedo that would seem to fit the rich well, as for whatever Allen would be (murderer, assassin, contract killer take your pick) it looks almost comical.

"It looks as if time has been good to you, have you been keeping up with your studies?" Marks calm is unsettling "Frankly I'm surprised you came after me yourself, with your level of power and privilege you had no reason to come all the way out here in person," Marks ask tauntingly as he is thrown to the ground by the deceptively strong corporate executive.

Allen reaches around behind himself pulling out an affluent-looking handgun "what was the alternative? Hiring Death-Dealers? You would have killed them before they could get within 50 paces" Allen cocks his gun and holds marks to the ground with one foot.

"I have a question, old friend. Will you look after Nuku when I'm gone?" Marks request

"Of course, she was mine first anyway."

"Thank you" Marks grins

Allen points down at Marks drawing back the hammer of his pistol "Aren't you going to fight back at all; struggle, yell, anything?" Marks just grins and shakes his head "what part of this do you find amusing old wizard?"

"I'm wearing a Biometer."

"So what? someone is going to know your time of death."

"Oh, that will be only the beginning, when I die I will become more powerful than you can understand."

"Old man, you have finally lost your mind." Marks laughs the laugh of a lunatic as he is shot three times, twice to the chest once to the head the echo of the gunshot silenced well before the laughter of the doctor has gone.

** *

… Jessica continues "you see my dearest young ones, it is not just your body that grows with age, so too does your mind, ever-changing ever evolving, stretching and pulling in new and existing ways. When I was a church keeper in my early days of training there where many stories I just could not understand, but now in the fading summers of my life, everything seems to have a new light about it. The meanings of words even seem to change with the passage of time. Have no fear you will see this for yourselves soon."