“Yes,” Owl Man says sadly. “He was driven insane at the hand of his brother, and the pair have been at war ever since.”
I stare at Owl Man, then at the doc, who is shivering and gazing out over the water blankly. I try to imagine what that must have been like, to have destroyed the mind of the person you cared about most in the world. And despite all that I know about him, and everything he has done, in that moment I feel sorrier for Dr. Oystein than I do for any other wretched soul on this wreck of a planet.
FIVE
We follow a bend in the river, the towers of Canary Wharf standing tall and proud above us, looking like they’ve been moved here from New York or Tokyo. There was an underground shopping center beneath the skyscrapers. I bet it’s now packed with zombie bankers and stockbrokers, nearly as ghoulish and harmful in death as they were in life.
Owl Man catches my smile and cocks his head. “Something amuses you?”
“Lots of things amuse me,” I tell him, letting the smile spread. “The thought of your head on a pole, or seeing an asteroid land on Rage and squash him like an ant.”
“It’s good that you have not lost your sense of humor,” he says.
“That’ll be the last thing I lose,” I boast. “When you’ve stripped everything else away, I’ll still be chuckling. I’ll take this grin to the grave.”
“I hope so,” he says earnestly. “I’ve grown surprisingly fond of you, Becky Smith. I would like to think that when you pass you do so on your own terms, with no regrets. Really, in the end, that is the most any of us can hope for.”
“You’re wrong,” I tell him.
“Oh?”
“We can hope to take some others down with us.” I smirk.
Owl Man giggles, sounding for a moment like Dan-Dan. I stare at the weird-looking man more closely.
“Where were you when all this was going on?” I ask.
“When my father was fighting with my uncle?” He sighs. “I was at work in another part of the lab.”
“I mean afterwards, when Mr. Dowling ran away. I’m guessing he ran?”
“Oh yes,” Owl Man says glumly. “As his mind caved in on itself, he ran as if he was on fire. In a way, he has never stopped running.”
Owl Man crosses his legs. Sakarias looks up to make sure its master is comfortable, then relaxes again.
“Forgive the cliché, but I found myself on the horns of a dilemma,” he says. “I loved and admired both men. I was distraught when my father severed all ties with us and set off down his own mad path. Oystein did not share all of the details with me. I think it would be fair to say that you massaged the facts to suit your story?”
He throws the question to Dr. Oystein, but the doc ignores it, submerged in his own lonely little world. Owl Man grunts and continues.
“I guessed there was more to it than I had been told. I carried on working for my uncle, but tracked down my father on the sly. He was a mess, even more out of control than he is today, but determined to strike back. He had lost interest in the living. In his crazed state, he craved chaos.”
Albrecht had bounced back swiftly from his total mental collapse. He hadn’t found his new persona yet–the clown costume was many years away–but he’d regained his basic faculties and set his sights on pitching the world into a crazy mess, to mirror the rocky realm of his troubled mind.
The deranged Dowling brother decided to let Oystein unleash the hounds of Hell, but he was determined to keep the living around too. He longed for war, an eternal struggle between the living and the undead, so that he could cavort at the center with his army of mutants.
“Obviously I knew that Albrecht was insane,” Owl Man says, “but he was the only person who had the power to stop Oystein from wiping out the human race.”
“You cared about the living?” I ask skeptically.
Owl Man chews at his inner cheek. “Honestly? No. I never truly did, even when I was one of them. I always felt detached from ordinary people. But I relished the extraordinary. The minds of rare individuals like Albrecht and Oystein were magnificent jewels. I was worried that we might lose them forever, that my uncle would produce a race of drab, unimaginative, soulless clones.”
Owl Man decided to tread a dangerous line, to serve two masters at once, and work for both of the brothers as they continued with their experiments. He helped where he could, as he had before, but also served as spy and censor.
“If I felt that one of them was heading down a damaging route, I tinkered with results and spoiled their experiments,” he explains. “For instance, when Oystein was close to perfecting a virus that would wipe out humanity, I subtly interfered and distracted him.”
But Owl Man knew that the doc would make the breakthrough in the end and produce the virus that would rid the world of its human stain. He wouldn’t dare release it until Albrecht had made progress with his babies–Oystein was afraid to remove all evidence of Homo sapiens from the history books before his brother had lined up their replacements–but time was running out.
“Hold on,” I stop Owl Man. “If that’s true, then if Mr. Dowling had stopped trying to clone babies, Dr. Oystein would never have released the virus. Why didn’t you convince him to stop?”
“I suggested that,” Owl Man says, “but the babies fascinated him, and by that stage he lived only to satisfy his own interests. He didn’t want to stop Oystein totally, merely halt him at a certain point and hold him there.”
As Mr. Dowling got close to cloning a crop of mutant babies, Owl Man knew it was time to make a decision. He could no longer walk a tightrope between his father and his uncle. He had to choose.
“As much as it pained me, I betrayed Oystein,” Owl Man says. “My plan was to dispose of him and take his place. I hoped to then keep Albrecht in check by convincing him of the merits of a different strategy. He was hell-bent on chaos, but I felt that he could achieve that without creating an army of the undead. If he built up his mutant forces, and added scores of cloned babies to the mix, they could start a war with humanity and keep it running as long as he wished.”
“Hardly paradise on Earth,” I growl.
“Not an ideal situation,” Owl Man agrees, “but it would have been better than what we have now, billions killed, the living dead run wild across the globe. Sometimes the lesser of two evils is the most that we can aim for.
“My attempt on Oystein’s life failed,” he continues, “but I managed to make off with a sample of Schlesinger-10, which I found hidden away. I handed the vial over to my father, acting as if that had been my goal all along—he didn’t know that I had meant to thwart him. The gift pleased him at the time, then utterly delighted him later, when we came to realize how unique the sample was.”
“What do you mean?” I frown. “Schlesinger-10 isn’t unique. The doc must have loads of the stuff knocking around.” I stare at Owl Man, feeling a sudden sinking feeling in the pit where my stomach used to be. “Doesn’t he?”
Owl Man shakes his head. “It was a one-off success, a chance quirk that he was unable to repeat, no matter how many times he tried.”
“Bullshit,” Rage snorts. “You’re telling me he came up with the formula and then forgot it?”
“Certain chemicals reacted in a way that they never have again,” Owl Man says. “There must have been something mixed in with one of the solutions. He was never able to figure out what that was.”
“That’s why he was so desperate to retrieve it,” I groan. “He didn’t have any of the virus himself.”
Owl Man looks confused for a moment. Then he smiles. “Oh, that’s right, you think–”
“Enough,” Dr. Oystein snaps, and Owl Man winces and falls silent. I guess the doc has had his fill of listening about his one great failure.
“Let me get this straight,” Rage mutters. “There’s only one vial of Schlesinger-10 in the world, and Becky has delivered it to the one person whose goal is to release it.” He catches my eye and laughs. “Good going, girl. You couldn’t have
made more of a balls-up of this if you’d tried. This is the end of humanity, and it’s all Becky Smith’s fault.
“You know what?” a beaming Rage adds as I glower at him. “It’s days like this that make it worth getting out of bed!”
SIX
I’m sickened by what I’ve done, the way I’ve played into Dr. Oystein’s hands. I spend the rest of the boat ride trying to break Owl Man’s hold over me. I want to hurl myself at the doc, knock him overboard, drag him to the bottom of the river and crack his head open as we go. But my body rejects my command every time. I’m fighting a lost battle, but I don’t let that stop me, trying and trying and trying again to free myself of Owl Man’s mental shackles.
As we draw close to the pier for the O2, Dr. Oystein stirs and tells Rage to dock. I glance up at the famous landmark. It’s always reminded me of a giant Frisbee with a load of spikes sticking out of it. My dad used to call it an eyesore, and for once I agree with him.
We get out of the boat, Owl Man pausing to whisper in my ear, “Stay close and be a good girl.” It’s not a request, and I find myself sticking by his side, an obedient little puppy.
We advance on the dome and I wonder if the doc is taking us in to catch a concert. Maybe he’s put together an undead band and wants to rock out as he brings the world to its end.
But he doesn’t aim for the regular entrance. Instead he circles round until he comes to what looks like a service door, covered in electricity symbols and warnings to keep out. He produces a key, unlocks the door and we step into a small room filled with machinery and a high-pitched whining sound that sends nasty shivers down my spine.
Dr. Oystein hurries to a wall of pipes and controls, and presses a few buttons. There’s a clicking noise and a crack appears down one side of the wall. As the doc pushes forward, I realize the wall is set on hinges, like a swinging door. We follow him into a brightly lit corridor and the wall swings shut behind us. It’s instantly much quieter.
At the end of the corridor we come to a set of stairs and head down until we reach a platform overlooking a series of cubic rooms, each encased with glass walls and ceilings. There must be dozens of these cells, each neatly ordered, filled with scientific equipment, test tubes of all shapes and sizes, storage files and more. People are beavering away in some of them, living scientists by their look and smell. They ignore us and concentrate on their work.
“My laboratory,” Dr. Oystein says, smiling fondly. “I had this place built when they were constructing the Millennium Dome, as it was originally called. It seemed like the perfect place to base myself.”
“I’ve gotta hand it to you, doc,” Rage says, “this is well cool. It looks like a villain’s secret hideout in a James Bond film.”
Dr. Oystein chuckles. “I must admit, I was a fan of those movies, and they influenced the style that I requested of my architects.”
“How did you keep this secret?” I frown. “This is a major public building. There must have been TV cameras filming it all the time as it went up.”
“Secrets are best hidden in plain view,” the doc says. “With all the work going on, it was easy to slip in a few extra teams unnoticed. You can get away with anything if you have the right contacts. And I had the very best.”
The doc starts to descend and we trail along behind. On the ground floor he walks past some of the cells, explaining their purpose, what the equipment is for, the experiments he has conducted in them, what his teams are working on now.
“This is a particularly important room,” he says at one point, stopping before a cell that looks no different than the others, except for large, sophisticated freezers set along three of the walls. “The freezing units are full of embryos waiting to be fertilized. There are more in similar laboratories worldwide.”
“You mean you’re making mutant babies like Mr. Dowling’s?” I ask.
“No,” he says. “These will be ordinary human babies.”
I stare at him uncertainly. “I don’t get it. I thought you wanted to replace the living. Are you telling us you plan to resurrect humanity?”
Dr. Oystein shakes his head. “Humans were given enough chances. We must never allow them to hold sway again.”
The doc turns slowly, casting his gaze around the clinical glass complex.
“Albrecht’s babies are the future,” he says. “But they will need to be guided and directed in their early years. It will be a long time before they’re ready to take their place as the new rulers of this planet.
“I realized early on that we should not delay the elimination of the living while we waited for the babies to mature, as Albrecht’s cloned children might be tainted by humans’ bad habits. But we couldn’t simply abandon the infants either, so young and defenseless.”
“The babies?” I snort. “Defenseless? Hardly! They’re deadlier than a shoal of piranhas.”
“In certain ways,” Dr. Oystein admits. “But in other ways they’re helpless, and will be for decades to come. They will need guardians, people who love them, who will raise them to be pure and true. I couldn’t trust adults to serve that purpose. But I could trust–”
“–children,” I finish with an understanding growl.
Dr. Oystein nods. “My Angels. So named because I wanted them to be guardian angels. Children and teenagers who had not been warped by the world of their elders, who believed in justice, truth, honesty, goodness.”
“Like you?” I sneer. “A guy who lies to the people who love and serve him, who cheats and kills them if he has to?”
Dr. Oystein’s gaze drops. “Your accusations hurt me,” he says softly, “but only because they are valid. I am a liar, a cheat, a killer. The things I have done are beyond forgiveness, even though I have done them in God’s name, for the sake of this world’s future.
“I will not live to see the fruit of my handiwork,” he goes on. “I will step aside soon. I am of the old breed, and there should be no place for my kind in the new world. The Angels will take my place. Knowing nothing of my deception and dark deeds, they’ll carry the spark of hope that I instilled in them, and fan it fully into life.
“I promised to release you from your pain when our work here is finished,” the doc says quietly. “Perhaps I will set my own soul free at the same time. I doubt it will go to the same place as yours–I fear I shall never see the gates of Heaven–but it will be a relief to put this ghastly business behind me.”
I stare at the doc, disturbed and confused. “You don’t want to set yourself up as president or emperor or whatever?”
“Perish the thought,” he snorts. “My aim has been to tear down the rotting foundations of the old world and clear the way for a fresh start. I see no part for myself in the gleaming new society that is to come.”
“That’s why I returned to the fold,” Owl Man says. “It became evident, after I failed to kill my uncle, that he was going to release the virus that would turn billions of people into zombies. He had the backing of powerful figures across the globe. The process had been set in motion and could not be stopped. So I worked with him again, covertly, to do what I could to ensure that the apocalypse passed with as few glitches as possible.”
“We needed to bring things to a head,” Dr. Oystein says. “Albrecht had been avoiding direct conflict. I had to set the undead against the living to bring him out of hiding. Chaos would lure him into opposition and force a showdown. I had faith that the vial of Schlesinger-10 would resurface, as it has. Now we are free to press ahead. We will rid the world of its human curse, track down my brother and put him out of his misery, take the babies into our care and reeducate them, build a race of leaders worthy of this magnificent globe.”
“That’s all well and good,” Rage sniffs, “but it doesn’t explain why you have all these human eggs on ice.”
“Ah yes, the embryos.” The doc smiles. “I knew there must be a bridge between the reign of humanity and the babies. My Angels will be that bridge. It will be a hundred years or more before the babies
come of age and are fit to rule. They’ll be able to sustain themselves during that time. They don’t need to eat often, and they can eat anything. Revitalizeds, on the other hand, need brains and, while we have enough stored away to last for many years, the supply won’t last indefinitely.”
My eyes widen. “You’re going to breed humans,” I gasp. “To serve as fodder for your Angels.”
“Yes,” Dr. Oystein says. “We’ll grow them in facilities like this one, ten or twenty years from now, when the human-killing virus is no longer active. A crop of babies every nine months. We will let them grow for a year or two, then harvest them. Brains for all. The fuel that my Angels will need to oversee the building of the new world.”
“Yum-yum,” Owl Man murmurs, licking his lips, and, at that, even the usually unshockable Rage looks queasy.
SEVEN
“You’re a monster,” I tell the doc.
“Yes,” he says glumly. “I have had to become one.”
“No,” I retort. “Don’t try that crap on me. It’s not something you’ve been forced to do. You’ve chosen this path. You’ve already killed billions of people. Now you’re going to target the rest of them, then breed specimens just to eat. It’s because you enjoy it, because you’re sick in the head, even more so than your messed-up brother.”
“You misjudge me,” Dr. Oystein says. “This gives me no pleasure. I am simply doing what is required.” The doc taps the glass and points to the embryos in the freezers. “Each egg, once fertilized, has the potential to be a messenger of peace and love, a prophet, a saint, a philanthropist. But we all know that most would turn out to be vicious, self-centered and petty. History tells us this. Ever since the beginning of time, we have been creatures of conflict and hate.
“World War II was the final nail in the coffin. It was clear that the situation had spun out of control. I did not even need the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to prove the point for me. We were on a one-way road to destruction and we were going to take the entire planet down with us.