Awakening XIII

I walk along the greenhouse path, heading towards the elevator back into the building proper. (I still don't know how the Freemasons managed to conceal a hundred-yard-high arboretum atop an office building.) I plan as I go, somewhat distracted by the lush and colourful vegetation surrounding me. I need to go to the 'throne room', where the Freemason leader ordered me imprisoned, and, hopefully, where he still is. There, I'll confront him and either persuade him to destroy the heart and disband his organization (...somewhat unlikely, I realize), or imprison him and his minions with the Device and pound the heart into pulp myself. Then... well, there's no time to plan for what happens after that; I'm at the elevator. There's no time to waste; every second I take to find the throne room heightens the likelihood of a chance encounter with a Freemason in the halls.

As the elevator descends, I ponder on how unfortunate it would be to see, as the doors opened, a crowd of Freemasons right outside.

I get lucky - the corridor is still deserted. I hurry down it and try to remember the way I was dragged to the prison cells after I was taken to the throne room, so as to be able to backtrack. My effort at the time (to memorize the route, in preparation for this very contingency) pays off. I walk back past the beating heart (there's no time to destroy it now, and I don't really have a suitable tool - that'll have to wait), and take the route that Roshan and the other prisoners used. There's no sign of them. I continue, following the turns, until I come to the corridor just in front of the throne room, guarded by two Freemasons.

I duck back, but one of them's seen me. I hear him tell the other guard, "I think I saw someone over this way. If I yell, come running." I back away from the corner, trying to be quiet and yet fast-moving. I don't want to use the Device here - there's too much risk of wasting my chance, before I get to the Freemason leader. I look around, and spot a ceiling vent, a mere foot above my head. It won't be the first time I've used one of them. I jump, pulling it down and tossing it aside. The Freemason, not yet to the corner, exclaims at the noise. As inspiration hits me, I grab the money in my pocket (stolen from the Freemasons in the first place) and toss it to the ground, hoping that will distract the guard for a moment, and jump straight up, scrabbling for a grip.

I get one - somehow, on the nearly sheer sides of the shaft - and with the strength of desperation and a great deal of discomfort, pull myself up into a horizontal segment. I look down for a moment (where the guard stands, looking up!), take my bearings, and start crawling.

I'm very glad that I'm not claustrophobic.

A minute and two wrong turns later, I arrive at a wall vent in the rear of the throne room. It's just as lavish and ostentatious as I remember - covered in gold and precious metals, with the Freemason leader on his tall throne in the centre of the room, flanked by half a dozen minions. He has his hood thrown back, and is busy lecturing Roshan and the prisoners insolence in attempting to escape. Roshan, though surrounded by guards, isn't paying much attention to the Freemason king - his eyes are flicking around the room, hunting for some way to escape. He's holding Rebecca's hand. I feel a spark of jealousy light in my breast at the sight, but I force it down. Now's not the time for that. Now is the time... for action.


I open the lockbox, taking out the Device and holding it carefully in my hands. It's key to the plan. Dramatically, I push the vent cover off from the wall and, as the minions and leader turn to look, I jump down, landing in a crouch. I nearly collapse as my thrice-wounded knee burns with pain, but I force myself upright, declaiming, "You are done!"

Perhaps I should have spent some time planning my speech.

I continue, as the Freemasons guns from under their robes, "I have in my hands a device which can defeat you all!" I hold the Device high, my finger poised over the circuit. The minions show no inclination to stop, but the Freemason leader gestures them to halt. As his minions flock around him, he asks me with an air of disbelief, "Who are you, and what do you think you're doing?"

I respond dramatically, noting Roshan and Rebecca organizing a silent escape behind the Freemasons' backs, "I am stopping your reign of terror! For decades now, you have sacrificed countless innocents to fuel your idiotic plan. The Cold War is over! You will never create your invincible fortress! Destroy the heart and disband your organization, or I", as I gesture with the Device, "will disband it for you!"

The Freemason leader responds contemptously, as behind him Rebecca and Roshan together gag and pin the guard left to watch them, "You have no idea of what you're talking about. Once a daimone is summoned, it cannot be dismissed again. The destruction of the heart would free the daimone, which, I think, is something neither of us want."

I answer incredulously, "You summoned a powerful demon with no way to get rid of it afterward?"

The leader ignores my comment. Roshan and Rebecca have wrestled the guard out of sight, and most of the prisoners have already followed. He continues, "If you use that device, you will destroy the heart and free the daimone. The jewel at its center is a heart-seed - twin to the one from which the heart grew. The creator, one of our own, was sent to the cells for making it in a foolish attempt to end the experiment. Thankfully, he was unable to work up the nerve to use it, but he managed to render the device inaccessible to us before he was captured. I don't care how you got it, but you are in no position to threaten us. If the heart dies, no-one profits. Just put it down and come quietly, with your twin." He looks around at this, and I can see surprise dawning on his face as he realizes that Roshan and the others are nowhere to be seen.

There is absolutely no reason for me to trust anything that he says. He is a monster, and the leader of monsters. I stand to lose everything I have gained - even my life - if I put down the device. Even as I think, the Freemasons are beginning to crowd around me.

I look the Freemason leader in the eye and say one word. "Nuts." My thumb is closing the circuit even as the breath leaves my mouth.

Outside the bubble, it appears that the Device has quite a different effect. It's hard to describe, but a sort of hole opens up in the Device, and then rapidly swells, growing (as I drop the Device and back away) to human height, hovering in the air. Through it, I can see the 'bubble' fold and collapse. It's a cacophonous noise, as walls bend and crumble, beds collapse, and the iron bars of the daimone's cage bend and break. Everything seems to be growing... smaller, somehow. The daimone looks toward me as the bubble collapses, seemingly unharmed by the chaos all around, and smiles, saying, "You did free me, after all!" Then she somehow steps out of the hole, right in front of me, and, with a smile and a "Thank you!", tears my right arm off my body and kicks me into the wall.


I think I black out a moment from the pain. When I awaken, I see the daimone wreaking havoc around the throne room. As I watch, she tears the Freemason leader's head off with a single gesture and throws it at another Freemason with incredible speed, knocking him to the ground. Some of the Freemasons fire at her, but she's too fast for most of them and doesn't seem to be slowed by the bullets that do hit. She changes as I watch - she grows taller, harder-skinned, and I think she's starting to grow extra arms on her sides. Her wounds close slowly, as she disassembles another Freemason, tearing him apart one limb at a time. The survivors break and flee, but she follows inhumanly swiftly. The daimone has a red-stained smile on her face the entire time.

So here I am, lying in the corner of a body-draped throne room, bleeding to death. I... guess I made the wrong choice, though looking back, I don't really know where I went wrong. My vision is growing dark. I just wish... I wish that I hadn't freed the daimone. I don't want to die - I don't want to die! - but here, as a superfluous Roshan with no-one and nothing to call my own, destroying the Freemasons here might have been... almost worth it.

A shadow falls over me.

I guess I've... run out of time.