Chapter23- Molly
Northern Cambria, The Stone Age
She moved into the cave, alone. She could sense the heat; though not cold herself, she was cognizant of the difference. She longed for the embrace of another living thing, even if it meant death. Death, she thought, would be welcomed.
The woman had been ostracized from her tribe, an accursed witch tainted by dark gods that marked her as diseased. None would have her--not her kin, not her tribe, not her people.
She had discovered a cursed treasure--a thing that possessed her, took away everything from her, but her existence. It was a cruel punishment, trapped in a cage from which she could neither atone nor escape.
At first, her people tried to drive her away with sticks and stones. But they could not break her body.
Later, they tried to starve her, but neither food nor drink was a necessity for her any longer. This made poisoning her impossible, if they couldn’t break her skin or force her to eat.
Next, they attempted to pyre her, but the voices in her head warned her, and she freed herself before they could put her to the flame.
Once they realized destroying her was not an option, they shunned her. Their shamans worked their rituals and screamed their prayers and danced their dances and made sacrifices to the dark gods themselves to ward her off. But they could not exorcise her.
So in the middle of the night they abandoned her.
Finally they had rid themselves of her, for she refused to make an attempt to follow.
Alone, she wandered. No need for nourishment. No need for anything, but craving the company of her former life. Of companionship.
Now, in the cave of a savage bear, she hoped she would find a release. She prayed that the gods would use the animal to take her as a sacrifice, to cleanse her soul and release her from her prison.
The massive beast stirred from its slumber at her approach, but was slow to react. Its giant head considered her for a moment, but curiosity gave way to rage, and the cave bear lashed out with claw and fang. The bear tore at her. Took her neck in its mouth and shook furiously. Pushed her to the hard cave floor and pawed at her underbelly with its huge front feet, its nose curled over its horrific maw and its teeth snapped at her face.
It did this until its madden escalation turned into confused exhaustion.
Then something within this woman snapped. Her despair became her fury. Her rage at her family, her tribe, her curse--manifest in retaliation.
Unaffected by the onslaught of the bear, she turned her fists on the creature and within seconds was upon the thing, ripping at it bare-handed. She didn’t stop when the monster’s still beating heart lay in her blackened hands and its limp body ceased its struggle. She didn’t stop, until the animal was gutted, utterly.
No hunger drove her, yet she wolfed the dead heart down with several bites, in mimicry of wanton gluttony.
Bathed in gore, she tore the head from the bear and set it aside, then found a flint to craft a knife from.
Hours later, she had tanned the hide of the beast and fashioned for herself a cloak, a bear-head cover that she gut-strapped to herself.
Satisfied at her new clothing, she emerged from the cave and set off towards the encampments she knew was nearby. Not towards her former people, who were now forever lost to her, but to their neighbors. Their enemies. She would become their tool, now. And they, hers. If they resisted, she would have their hearts, too. She would not stop until she found a people recognizing her worth, realizing none could stand before her.
And her former tribe would soon run red with her vengeance.
#
“Move, girl.”
The voice echoed in Molly Murphy’s head. It was heavy and accented strangely, but she understood.
In the faint light of the tunnel, she could see herself--black and dull, absorbing the light without a hint of reflection.
Murphy’s head was still clouded with fever-dream visions of a primordial landscape and a red carnage in the wake of a black silhouette dripping crimson gore.
“Move,” the voice stabbed at her. “They’re coming, and if they catch you, you’re finished.”
She could hear them, now. The crackle of a radio. The hushed tones of men searching for something, clamoring towards her direction.
“Don’t wait. Don’t fight it. We’ll get through this. I’ll help you, golubushka. But you must do as I say, when I say it. Let me flow through you.”
Murphy stood, helpless for a moment.
“Christ,” a voice boomed out of the tunnel, “We’re too late.”
A man clad in black dropped into view. He was well-armed.
“This is Witness. In the sub-junction to your North, down a level,” the man spoke into a headset.
Molly Murphy sprang uncoiled.
Before she knew what she was doing, she had the man’s right arm locked at the wrist. He was as shocked as she--with precise fluidity, she moved her hands to pull The Witness’ arm taut and rolling her weight into him, snapped his wrist and elbow, finishing with his arm dislocated from its shoulder.
The Taser dropped from Witness’ hand and he howled in agony--a scream that was cut silent by a well-placed elbow to his windpipe, crushing his larynx.
Murphy was on the run before the vigilante hit the sewer floor.
She kept up a break-neck pace, turning here, crawling there, until she was sure a mile was between her and the man she’d just watched herself decimate.
She thought she should be spent, but there was no sense of fatigue.
“It’s strange, yes?”
The voice rang in her head so loud, she flinched.
“Who did you see? Was it one or many?”
Molly didn’t answer.
“Sometimes, they say, you live a hundred lives in an instant. Others, just one. They’re all in here. Sometimes you see them, fast, like a sped up movie. Sometimes they linger and you forget yourself. Eventually, you might learn to call upon them, when you want. Though they all eventually fade in time, golubushka. You get used to it.”
“What’s wrong with me?”
“Tunguska technology,” the voice replied sardonically. “You’re infected. You’re invulnerable. A decent payoff, even if the countdown clock is now ticking for you. What is your name, girl?”
“I’m Molly. Molly Murphy.”
“I’m Dmitri. Dmitri Krulevich,” the Russian’s voice was warm and smiling. “Call me Dimi.”
“What happened?”
“You are now in possession of a symbiotic parasite of extraterrestrial origin. It will eventually kill you, but I have ways to prolong your existence. We’re partners, you and I. Together we will do great things.”
“I picked up a ... thing. A ball.”
“Yes. That thing has forever changed you. Made you into something special. Light a candle, rather than curse your darkness, girl. Our time together is unfettered, but short. In that time, I will show you how to do things you’ve only dreamed of.
“Your former life is dead to you now. And why mourn it? Now, you are newly born. Those needs that held you back are all gone. Food. Drink. Drugs.”
“What do you know about me?”
“What’s to know, girl? You live in a sewer. Hand to mouth. I surmise your existence was previously ill-spent, otherwise, why would you be down here, yes? Stealing. Selling yourself. Living to feed that hunger that drove you down here in the first place. You are a book. You were human. Now you’re something more. All that was is gone, now. Cleansed.”
“No, that’s not true.”
“It is,” Krulevich said quietly. “Water feeds life indiscriminately: thistles, thorns, flowers, fruit--rain doesn’t argue its destiny, it just falls. We are the same. Don’t waste time fretting about a course you can’t change and make the best of the actions you have left. Survive.”
Molly Murphy hadn’t realized it until that dark, Russian voice stated it, but her addiction, the yearning pangs, they vanished without being sated. She had run farther and faster than she’d ever done before, but she wasn’t winded. That gnawing ache for her fix and the permanent emptiness in her stomach. Gone. She lingered on those feelings that had previously consumed her, but they couldn’t be found, like striking a match that wouldn’t light. She felt, for the first time since before she could remember, alive.
“Dr. Kandor calls them ‘Armageddon spheres’. Little balls that capture the soul and traps them for eternity. When they eventually overtake humanity and collect all their souls, the hammer for Armageddon will drop.”
Krulevich’s voice whispered in Molly’s head then spit an epitaph.
“Yahoodie Gnostic nonsense, but he believes it. Truth is, we are all trapped in here together. Like a great big living catalog of skills and memories. As you learn to tap into the network of souls, you’ll find there is little you can’t do. Trust me. Work with me, and I’ll see to it we make the most of our time together. But we must move quickly. Our plan is in play and we are needed.”
“There is one thing,” Molly Murphy hesitated.
“Yes, golubushka?”
Her mind raced with a sense of new found urgency.
“I will work with you, but you must do something for me first.”
“What is that?”
“That man. You .... We ... broke his arm.”
“Yes.”
“You can teach me that?”
“Oh, dear girl, I can teach you so much more.”
“Then, before I help you, you help me.”
A vision unfolded in Murphy’s mind.
“I want to do that. To my stepfather. That, and more.”
“Oh, golubushka,” there was no missing the grin in Krulevich’s voice. “Revenge. That’s my girl. Let’s to it, then.”
“Won’t we need something? A weapon?”
Krulevich laughed so loud in her head, Murphy was sure it echoed in the sewer.
“Golubushka. You are a weapon.”
#
“Oh no, you must savor it!” Krulevich chided. “The man barely knows he’s dead, let alone who killed him.”
Molly Murphy stood in the broken door jamb of Number 16 in the run down little tenement on Beasley Street. The cries of “Oh no you din’t” blared away from a TV deep inside the apartment in ironic commentary to the scene in the hall.
Murphy held the dripping-hot heart of her stepfather in her hand, towering over his obese form, dead now and sprawled in the foyer, his chest a gaping pit of bloody bone and flesh, the aftermath of cave-woman ferocity.
“That was easy,” she stammered.
“Oh, you are a terrible liar,” the Russian laughed. “But it will get easier, little girl. You took him out of your misery without the customary revel. ‘Tis a pity. Now you’re going to replay this over and over again and wished you’d said this or that.”
“Shut up,” Murphy shouted aloud, louder than she wanted to. “I was never good at words, anyway.”
“Actions speak louder than, yes? The sins of your stepfather have been paid in full.”
“They’ll never be repaid. Not after what he’s taken from me.”
“Well, let’s not get into a discussion of the Pyrrhic victories afforded by vengeance, or we’ll be here all day. Let’s go. Let’s not stand around waiting to be discovered red-handed, yes?”
Molly Murphy stood, wanting to cry, but unable to. A torrent of expletives escaped her lips.
“Go, girl. We’ll find the good doctor and get on with our lives.”
“There are others: Pimps. Boyfriends. Cops. Others I want to do this to.”
“You’ve got a taste for it, now,” Murphy’s head nodded involuntarily. “I’ve no doubt at the rate you dispatched fatso here, we could finish your list before the day ends, but there’s more pressing matters to attend to, first.
“Later,” the Russian promised.
“Now.”
“No!” Krulevich growled. “We’ve a time table to keep, and this little reunion is all the risk I care to indulge in at the moment.”
Reluctantly, Murphy turned from the apartment and walked towards the stairs, mentally completing her list of future retributions to be exacted even before exiting the building.