The Alchemist's Children: Panacea
CHAPTER TWENTY
After leaving through Fort Tiremound's massive rusty gate and following Niknak along the edge of the underground lake into the tunnels, the siblings learned quickly that moving beyond gremlin territory was extremely difficult. The tunnels weren't lit, except by some strange glowing molds and mushrooms growing between the jagged tunnel walls.
Callen and Ania were forced to learn how to navigate the hazardous environment rapidly in order to just keep the gremlin soldiers in sight. They crawled, climbed, jumped, and shimmied over pipes, rubble, and around narrow paths over pits. They trudged through the putrid-smelling water and dodged the occasional subway train when their path bent close to the surface.
As they hiked, there was no time for conversation. Not only were the siblings being pushed to their athletic limit, but the gremlin soldiers were anxious. They were anticipating a coming battle. They moved like a well-oiled unit, and they were obviously veterans of their secret war in these dark tunnels. However, they didn't move like they took their experience for granted, and cracks in their stone cold expressions revealed an anxious fear of what lay ahead of them. After about a day of travel, they stopped to rest when the tunnel went underwater.
"Short swim," Niknak said. "Rest. Hope good at holding breath."
Sarge began preparing a small fire as the rest of his team set a parameter around the camp. Ania handed Callen one of the field rations from her bag.
"So, you defeated two of our team, Marked One," Sarge said looking at Callen. "That's impressive." There was no anger in his voice.
"You aren't angry?" Callen asked as he tore open the field rations.
"No. Both Chuck and Glitch are great warriors. The Marked One is a greater warrior. Being defeated by you is an honor. " He said. "And there is no greater honor than dying in battle. So, if they die, you honor them two fold. Besides, you are to save our people."
"Righ..." Callen started to say sarcastically, but a glance from Niknak stopped him mid-sentence. "Ah, yeah. That's what I'm going to do. I'm your savior." He tried to sound confident, but Niknak's glance disturbed him. The look of murder glowed in the creature's eyes.
"I'm sure you need your rest, Marked One," Sarge said. "My squad and I have to set our parameter. We leave you two to eat." He stood up and left the siblings and Niknak at the fire.
After eating, Callen played around with his wrist computer to see what Felix had managed to install. Much to his dismay, the larger programs like the creature identifier, and some of the complex scanners weren't working because they required connection to the knight's database and it was searching for a signal.
"You think anyone can find us down here?" Ania said with a forlorn expression.
"Nope…there's no signal...we're too deep." Callen admitted. "It’s on us to make it back. I just wish that I had a chance to go back to before I ran after you and..." He cursed. "It was irrational. I don't know what was going through my head..."
"Don't do that," Ania said. "If you didn't I could be dead and so could Sadie and Tende. Those things could have burned through every one of us." She gave a thankful smile. "It isn't the best situation, but at least we have a chance to make it right. I'm thanking God for that."
"There's a waste of breath." Callen scoffed. "But, still, I can't deny your optimism."
"I don't like this either, Callen," Ania said. "But, here we are...possibly on the way to Dad's lab..."
"What's to like?" Callen sighed. "I just wish I had some concrete evidence that we were headed to Dad's lab."
"Don't we?" Ania asked.
"I don't consider religious dogma proof of anything," Callen said. "Sure, it suggests that, but I want to be sure. Maybe..." He glanced at Niknak, who had just pulled out a pipe and was lighting some strange cave mold.
"Can we talk with him here?" Ania whispered. "Maybe he'll confirm we're headed to Dad's lab."
"I don't know," Callen answered as he looked at Niknak. "I don't know if the Bunny-man even remembers..." He said, almost in disbelief. He hoped that Niknak would respond to his nickname, but he only briefly sneered and smoked his pipe.
"So, what was that priestess's deal?" Ania asked after Niknak didn't take his chance to speak. "She seems to be playing a game of cloak and dagger..."
"Yeah, and the riddles are nonsense." Callen agreed. "But, maybe the data the priestess gave me will shed some light on something." He unzipped his backpack and pulled out the flash drive she gave him along with his laptop. "Oh, by the way, your drawings saved my butt."
"Yeah?" Ania grinned.
"Especially the squid-skull," Callen said. "That's the priestess religious symbol. I admit, I don't like the coincidence with that being a symbol in the code I hacked or looking like the metal demons, but, hey...I'm not complaining..."
"Yeah, it's weird that it is also a symbol in Shadowborne," Ania said. "I saw the similarities, but I just felt as if I should add it to your computer decorations. I did it despite the chills it sent up my spine to add the skull of those monsters to my artwork..."
"Well, like you said before about my irrational moment, yours saved us too," Callen said. "Now, let me see what I can find on the flash-drive and salvage what I can from my damaged computer." He connected his wrist computer to the laptop and began setting up the parameters to upload what he thought was important. However, before he could activate anything, his wrist computer came alive. Something had begun uploading on its own. "What the..." He whispered and tried to get it to stop, but it was too late.
He pulled up the logs and read through the code. It wasn't a virus. He never got viruses, but whatever it was, he couldn't tell what type of file it was. He shook his head in confusion. He had built both of these devices and programmed everything on them. He shook his head. The file came from the drivers for the touch screen on his laptop. He tried to access the file, but it wouldn't activate.
He shut the laptop off once he determined it hadn't done anything harmful to his wrist computer. He shook his head and sighed before looking at Virette's flash-drive. Inside, he found an assortment of pictures of the pages of an old book. The pages were all handwritten in alchemy symbols making it impossible for him to read. The fourth page then had a picture that looked like a cylinder container labeled with the same symbols. The next page contained six metallic colored circles with more strange symbols next to them as well. The top was gold, silver, rusted iron, bronze, copper, and dark steel. The first four were crossed out, the fifth had the letters NN and AT next to it, and the final one just had AT next to it and was circled. "Guess this is what I'm to look for." He said to Ania as he highlighted the dark steel colored circle. When he did that, a note dropped down, which read: 'Carrier, needs to be retrieved... ~Virette.'
"What's it say?" Ania asked.
"I can't read it" He answered. "But there's hand drawings of some complicated containment canister that, Virette noted, needs to be retrieved."
"It has to be panacea." She stated. "But, why does she want it? Didn't dad make it for you?"
"As far as I know." Callen sighed. "But, who knows..."
"What are you going to do?" Tears gathered in her eyes. "If..."
"We're getting ahead of ourselves." Callen interrupted and flipped forward in the file. "One thing at a time."
As Ania calmed herself, he spread the pages out in his HUD so that he could see them all at once. He zoomed in on the last two pages, one looked like design plans for a human body with no face. In the lower corner, there were images of four faces. One had sad eyes and a tear, one was angry, one had its eyes and mouth sewn shut and the last looked like a skull. There were notes about recovery here from Virette as well, but he couldn't determine any more detail than that she desired what was on this page. The other page held images of a strange device that looked like one of the unused medical tanks in his workshop. He guessed the later, being that it was d
rawn among a group of machinery that looked vaguely familiar. It was here, among the variety of symbols, that Virette noted that was the Many's last place of mythological continuousness. However, she had circled everything, and what she wanted here was not specific. He wished he could understand the symbols. There was a chance that they would shed some light on the situation. He glanced at Ania and handed her his goggles. "Recognize the symbols?"
"The previous ones near the metal circles, are alchemy glyphs. But, not all of them are. I have no idea about the meaning and your guesses are as good as mine." Ania said, with a shrug. "But, some of her regular notes point to Virette thinking her god was trapped in something here...and she seems to think that freeing it will do something good for the gremlins. Maybe that's the cure they want?" her voice sounded hopeful. "Maybe it can work out for everyone...other than that, I got nothing."
"I doubt it will work out like that..." Callen sighed.
"I guess she wants us to collect that canister, those faces...whatever they are...and free her faceless god?" Ania sighed. "Are all of them together the cure?"
"Or just one of them or maybe a combination?" He leaned back on his hands. "There’re just too many holes here...I feel like we’re going on a high-stakes wild goose chase based on lies." Callen shrugged. "Maybe..." He looked towards Niknak, almost as if it was reflex to ask him a question.
Niknak was sitting by the fire with all his knives unsheathed and laid out in front of him. He looked as if he were in his own world. As he sharpened his knives, he mumbled and munched on a high-calorie energy bar.
Of all of his knives, the last one he worked was the one he paid careful attention to. It was a strange knife that sparkled in the firelight revealing a swirled three toned dark blue, dark steel, and silver blade, like an ocean during a storm. The single edged blade was about four inches long and reminded Callen of a dragon's tooth. The grip was made of some sort of white material carved or molded to maintain its gripping texture even when soaked in slippery blood. However, the strangeness of the knife was not what interested Callen. He recognized the knife. It belonged to his mother.
He took the last bite of his energy bar and flipped the final knife through his fingers like it was weightless. His hand moved like it was some sort of master dancer twirling his beautiful partner in the final musical number of an award winning performance. It moved in his hand as if the knife was a part of him, but he stopped as soon as he noticed the siblings watching him. He glared angrily at Callen.
"Wow," Callen said. "That is amazing." He drew a breath to transition to asking Niknak about the knife, but Kusari approaching them cut him off.
"Yes, very impressive," Kusari approached from one of the tunnels near their camp. "I have heard of your prowess, Prophet, but never seen it...until the other day." Her voice was dangerous and seductive obviously modeled after a combination of James Bond girls with an Asian accent. She stopped behind Callen and turned towards one of the other tunnels. "Sarge, Tuco, and Nikolai are on their way back. Sensors are in place. We will be able to rest for a bit."
Niknak snorted and looked up with a hateful glare. "No like." He sheathed his weapons like lightning. "Bad, bad. You very bad. No take." He twitched. "Must take!" He twitched again. "No! Bad, bad."
"Niknak, do you know my father?" Callen asked. He resisted the urge to call him Bunny-Man in front of Kusari.
Niknak's face seemed to get even angrier looking if that was even possible. "Master no talk. Bad, bad." He tightened his grip on the dagger he was sharpening. "Must stop! Bad, bad!" He lunged across the fire.
Callen's eyes instantly locked shut. The dagger cut only air and he felt its breeze against his neck. He swallowed hard and opened his eyes to see Niknak's neck being held by Sarge's muscular arm. Niknak's flesh eye grew wide with surprise. He started twitching as he stared at Callen.
"The boy must live!" Niknak growled angrily and began to twitch uncontrollably. "I got back just in time!" Sarge then threw him to the ground and Niknak's seizures got even worse. "Ah, what the hell is wrong with you, Prophet? We need the Marked One!"
Niknak continued to twitch for a few more seconds and then stopped completely. His electronic blue eye then pulsed like the light on a computer as if he was rebooting.
"What the..." Callen started.
"Ah, he always having problems," Sarge said. "That part of dah reason we were sent with you. He has always been an unpredictable asset."
Niknak began muttering on the floor about bads, liquid metal, kill, burning, mark, master, many and Thorne. The string of words was incoherent.
"He does that a lot?" Ania asked.
"Ah, he does...Priestess Virette calls them his trances. That's where his prophecy comes from."
"Like the Oracle of Delphi," Ania said. "You know, they were drugged..."
"Well, that's special," Callen said. "Besides him being crazy, what's the other reason you all were sent with us?"
“Our mission is to protect you," Sarge answered. "But, personally, I would like to see Forgeholm again with my own eyes."
"So, do you have any problem with opening the domain, like Bracket did?" Ania asked.
"If it does bring a cure to this plague, I do whatever I have to," Sarge said. "As will all of Alpha squad...we all volunteered and are sworn to help you find what will turn the mark outward..."
"Yeah, for some reason, that only make me picture me exploding," Callen grumbled.
"No, you must live," Sarge said. "You cannot explode, or we will fail to find a cure and retake Forgeholm."
"How many goblins exactly?" Ania asked.
"Could be a few thousand," Sarge said.
"And how many gremlin soldiers?" Callen asked.
"A legion or two." Kusari said.
"So, you only have about 200 soldiers to take on a few thousand? Assuming a low of 2000 goblins, we're outnumbered 10 to 1..." Callen sighed. "This all seems very poorly thought out..."
"We have faith," Kusari said.
"Great..." Callen scoffed. "Because praying wins wars...and cures illnesses." His voice was dripping with sarcasm.
Kusari raised her hand and began to mention Virette's name, but Sarge cut her off. "A conversation for another day, Kusari...we have much traveling ahead of us. And many goblins to slay...get some rest while you can."
Tired from all the hiking and climbing, Callen nodded and curled up beside the fire. As he relaxed, he watched Niknak twitching on the ground and fell deep into thought. The gremlins had been kidnapping, torturing and killing kids. It didn't sit right with him that he was now working with them. However, he didn't have much of a choice. For now, they thought he was some sort of godly savior, which meant that he and his sister were safe. He needed a way to ensure it stayed that way. He thought of his disruptor and wondered if it would be enough to stop an army of these gremlins.