The townspeople applauded the arrivals. There were more cheers.
Paul clenched his fists. ‘We should let our people have the choice of surrendering, I suppose, or taking their own way out from the top of the battlements. It would have worked for Saiban if we hadn’t decided to bring him back.’ He watched the soldiers advance across the courtyard. ‘A matter of academic interest, I know, but have you remembered what you were supposed to remember yet?’
Dominion shook his head.
‘Then you’ve been no use at all have you, Dominion, old buddy? All this running and hiding and fighting? You were merely a clever conjuring trick of science all along.’
Dominion tilted his head down at the troops. ‘You’ve been too busy talking … you should have been looking.’
Paul looked down. The townspeople had parted to allow the troops through. That was the moment the light from the rising sun fell into the courtyard. When it lit the faces of the soldiers the men and women flinched backward as if they’d been struck by a blast of withering heat. The townspeople began to shout to one another. They raised their guns. The soldiers did the same.
Dominion smiled at Paul. ‘Don’t you recognize a fellow monster when you see one? Those people down there realized before you did.’
What Paul intended to ask was: Those are our troops? The gunfire stopped that. The citizens of Scaur Ness might as well have armed themselves with toy weapons. Their shots did little damage. The squad of God Scarers, however, dealt out a devastating barrage of machine-gun fire. The big calibre rounds smashed into the mob. From the tower Paul watched as saps burst under the impact of bullets. Arms flailed the air, mouths opened to scream, but the frenzy of movement only lasted seconds. As quickly as the soldiers started firing they stopped. Up here in the castle the only ones left alive weren’t human.
The aftermath was eerily peaceful. The soldiers – an elite squad of men and women – reported their arrival to the Brigadier. After that they stood in awe as Dominion entered the room.
The Brigadier confided to Paul, ‘In our little nation out in the desert Dominion is a legend.’ He smiled. ‘See how they salute him? You know, I think they’d rather worship him.’ He beckoned Saiban. The man walked holding the wooden plugs in his chest; he grimaced with pain. ‘Saiban,’ the Brigadier said. ‘I thought you’d like to know that your last message from the transit station got through. HQ dispatched this brave squad of transients via sea and air to rescue Dominion. If we ever start handing out medals, Saiban, you will be one of the first to qualify.’
Saiban managed a dignified composure. ‘Doing one’s duty doesn’t require symbolic rewards. The act itself is its own reward.’
‘Good old Saiban,’ the Brigadier chuckled. ‘Good old Saiban. Born to serve. Then reborn to serve again.’
Dominion approached. ‘I’m told the entire town is in our hands.’
‘So.’ Paul shrugged. ‘Our commando God Scarers have captured the town. We’re saved.’ He turned to Dominion. ‘Have you remembered what you were supposed to remember. Or isn’t that important anymore?’
Dominion didn’t answer the question. Instead he responded with, ‘Paul. If you come with me it will be better if I show you.’
Together they climbed the steps onto the walkway where it overlooked the town. The early morning sun made the tiled roofs glow red. Gulls called out as they glided on the warm air. The streets of Scaur Ness were deserted. Then Paul saw why.
He leaned forward, resting both hands on the battlement wall, as he took in what was happening on the beach by the harbour.
‘You’ve got your prisoners of war,’ Paul told him. ‘Though from here the population of this little shambles of a town doesn’t look much of an army.’
Dominion’s troops had ushered what must have been the entire population onto the sands. ‘So, Dominion …’ Paul watched the tiny figures in the distance. From up here they resembled ink spots on yellow paper. ‘At the risk of repeating myself too often: have you remembered what you were supposed to remember?’
‘My task?’ He took a deep breath as he gazed at the captives on the beach. ‘My purpose is to reunite human beings with the men and women who were brought back from the dead.’
‘Monster and man in perfect harmony, hmm?’
‘Yes. That’s my purpose exactly.’
Paul shrugged. ‘How do you propose to achieve that?’
‘Watch.’ Dominion raised his hand. Somewhere on the beach a soldier must have been waiting for the signal.
Then Paul watched in silence as a perverse version took place of Dominion’s great fishing spectacle of just hours ago. There was nothing he could do but stand there as the soldiers stretched out the old fishing nets, then swept the townspeople up in them before wading into the surf, hauling the netted men and women with them.
‘This is your solution?’ Paul whispered. ‘To drown them?’
Dominion didn’t answer. Not that there was any need. Events spoke for themselves. Soon those ink-like blots of humanity had vanished into the ocean. The beach was clean again.
When he managed to speak, Paul breathed, ‘I should have killed you while I had the chance.’ He felt cold inside. ‘Men, women, children. You monster. You filthy, disgusting monster.’
Dominion’s voice rang with clarity when he spoke. ‘I remember everything now. The commandos aren’t here purely to save me.’
‘No, they came to murder a town as well.’
‘And not just the town, Paul. All of you die, too.’
Paul felt a surreal calm steal through him. ‘Outlived our usefulness?’
Down in the courtyard Saiban, Xaiyad, Beech, West and the other survivors from the transit station were hauled out by the soldiers. There they were strangled by lengths of wire.
Paul, whether in this life or his previous one, was always vulnerable to the stray thought; as if he was purely a commentator on life, not a participant. His next thought ran something like this: Unless you’ve ever heard a monster scream before you can’t begin to imagine what the sound is actually like. It’s every pain you’ve ever endured, every act of humiliation you’ve suffered, it’s everything that’s made you cry.
Dominion’s blow snapped his spine. Doctor Paul Marais was dead before he hit the floor.
42
One Year Later
In the domain of Frankenstein, death isn’t always the victor …
‘She’s coming.’
‘Does she have the child?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good.’
‘Well?’
‘What do you expect me to do, Saiban?’
‘Go meet her.’
‘First things first, Saiban. There’s a new God Scarer to reintroduce to the world.’
‘A newborn can wait.’
‘Ah, that’s why you’re an administrator, Saiban, and I’m the medic. This wee lad’s reached a rather critical stage.’ He helped the newborn to his feet from a bench in the courtyard. The courtyard, itself, now served as the transit station. Blue awnings undulated in the summer breeze. Beneath the sheltering canvas sat a dozen regenerators. All demanded his attention because in an hour a new batch of God Scarers would be entering the world from those hourglass shaped vessels in gleaming steel.
He took the newborn by the arm and walked him to the open gateway of the Pharos. ‘My name is Dr Paul Marais. You’re going to be sick of hearing my bonny Scottish accent, but I’m trying to wake up your mind. We must get all those neurological connections firing. You need to remember who you are … what you are. And you have to learn about the world and our place in it. Now … do you remember your name?’
The man stood there in the white gown he’d worn for the transition from corpse to transient. His wide eyes regarded the gulls wheeling in the sky. Then he held up his hand to examine the smooth skin of the palms.
Saiban shook his head. ‘Doctor Marais, you should leave them to sleep longer.’
‘Ah, that’s where you’re wrong. T
he sooner their minds connect with memory the better their mental equilibrium. This gentleman came to us as an eighty-three year old with heart failure and dementia. He needs extra care to coax him back into the world.’
Saiban chuckled. ‘Have it your own way.’
Paul guided the man to the gate so he could look out over Scaur Ness that was bathed in sunlight. The regenerator had done its work well. The man didn’t appear a day over thirty years of age. His broad face was unlined. His thick hair didn’t have a single strand of grey. The physique was that of an athlete.
‘Look, Saiban. Isn’t it true? We do make beautiful monsters.’
‘You’re delaying the inevitable.’ Saiban’s smile was a caring one. ‘You should go to her now.’
‘I will,’ Paul said. ‘But first I need to fire up that brain in our friend’s head. Now …’ He pointed. ‘That town is Scaur Ness. A year ago it was in a hell of a state. Garbage littered the streets. Dilapidated houses. Rampant unemployment. A dispirited population. It’s easy to imagine the town had fallen under a curse. Do you remember the town, friend? You lived not far away, did you not visit it during your lifetime?’
The man gazed with those wide newborn eyes, as if marvelling at the cottages with their sparkling windows and neatly tended gardens.
Saiban laughed. ‘Shouldn’t you have begun your story ‘Once upon a time?’
It was good-natured teasing and Paul knew it. He exaggerated his Scottish accent as he said, ‘Ah, Saiban, be off with you. There’s a full bucket of water there by the wall and I’m not afraid to tip it over your bonny wee head.’
Saiban grinned. ‘OK, I can take a hint. Don’t forget your visitor. Have you decided what you’ll say to her?’
Paul felt the old tension return. ‘I’ll think of something.’
‘Think hard, Paul. She’ll be here in a couple of minutes.’
The man headed away under the canvas awnings. Saiban had changed now. His spirits were lighter, and he was good company. Funny how a man’s death can be the making of him. In Saiban’s case it was the third time of dying that produced the cheerful soul that Paul knew today.
‘OK,’ Paul said to the newborn beside him as he watched a fishing boat glide out of the harbour. ‘Where were we? Ah yes … Perhaps I should take Saiban’s advice on how I start this story …’ He glanced at the God Scarer, transient, monster, call him what you will. The eyes were bright, but the man still didn’t recollect that a few days ago he would have been a mere husk, gasping out his last hours in some remote cottage. Now everything had changed. ‘So, to serenade you with my charming Scottish brogue again: Once upon a time … a bunch of God Scarers came to Scaur Ness in the dead of night. The term God Scarer is a misnomer for it was we who were terrified. All of us bar one. He went by the name of Dominion. A giant of a man on a mission to reunite humanity with the monsters they created from their own deceased. I only learnt very late in the day how he planned to do that. He claimed he couldn’t remember but I’m not sure if he was telling the truth or not. Anyway, as we were under siege back there in that very building we were rescued by our own kind. And just as you’re no doubt telling yourself that I conclude here by saying that we lived happily ever after that’s not quite the case. What happened was that our fellow God Scarers killed all the townspeople. And as I stood on the battlements Dominion killed me, too.’ He breathed deeply, catching the scents of the ocean. ‘But of course, science gifted us the means to bring the dead back to life. So here we all are again. And Dominion got his way. He reunited humanity with its monsters by the simple expedient of killing every human being in the town and resurrecting them as God Scarers. You know something, friend? We were only a tiny part of the process. This was happening throughout the nation. Today, there is no prejudice because we’re all monsters now. Ah, once we have that brain of yours firing on all pistons you’ll be showering me with questions? Why does the rest of the world put up with it? I’d reply: that’s something to do with Dominion. Just what it is, I can’t begin to guess. And where is Dominion? Well, he’s out there somewhere.’ Paul nodded towards a blue horizon. ‘What is he up to? Search me, friend, but my guess is the age of Homo sapiens is at an end. Now, do you remember your name yet?’
The man thought hard as the breeze ruffled his black hair. Then he spoke. ‘Child.’
‘Ah … all the nurses call newborns Child. You’ll have to try harder than that.’ Suddenly, Paul’s muscles tightened. His sensitive hearing picked up the approach of footsteps. They slowed as if the person who made them was afraid to approach the Pharos. Paul found himself staring at the gap in the wall where the portcullis had once been. Any moment now the maker of the footsteps would appear. After she’d been gone a full year he’d accepted he’d never see her again. Now his heartbeat quickened as his chest grew tight.
He addressed the newborn transient, ‘Not long now.’ He closed his eyes as the sound of footsteps from beyond the castle wall became more purposeful. Paul spoke quickly as if to erase the sound. ‘Elsa. You won’t know Elsa. But she’s part of my story. She died, too, at the hand of a human. But we’re monsters. We’re not only hard to kill, we’re hard to stay dead. Our troops found her and rushed her to a regenerator. Her attackers were killed, too. They didn’t stay dead either. Now they’ve recanted their wicked ways and work with us now. See? The Good Guys and the Bad Guys all died. Now they’re back in the land of the living and the best of friends. Isn’t that the happiest ending in the world. No?’ So what does happen when she gets here? The question made his heart pound. The footsteps grew louder. Any second now she’d appear in the gateway. Any second … He found himself speaking non-stop to mask his anxiety. ‘And what do you make of our friend Saiban? It took several deaths for him to become the amiable man you see to day. By heaven, he was a dour piece of work in the old days. When we’ve time I’ll tell you how I had to plug wounds in his body with pieces of chair. The carpentry’s gone now, as you’ll have noticed. Saiban’s well but nothing will convince him to move to the Sahara where our people made their homeland. He won’t admit it but he loves this town. He even cuts the grass in the graveyard. It’s his way of paying his respects to all those that have gone before, and who didn’t have the opportunity of taking a second shot at life. And there’s West and Beech; they’re living under the same roof now. Didn’t I promise you happy endings?’ The footsteps grew louder. Each step produced a flash of recollection. Dominion thrusting the cross into the burning car. Luna breaking out of her tomb. The time I stood on the walkway to watch the townspeople being drowned. Dominion’s words: ‘And not just the town, Paul. All of you die, too.’ Then Dominion killed me. I woke up to see Saiban looking down at me. ‘Welcome, back to the world of the living, Paul. Don’t just lie there you’ve work to do.’ And how he’d buried himself in that work for the last twelve months. He installed the portable regenerators in the courtyard. The God Scarer troops collected the dead from the neighborhood. Then began the process of bringing thousands of men and women back to life. The end of the world as we know it.
The footsteps grew louder.
Paul turned to the newborn who’d just made that same journey – from death back to life. ‘So, friend. Remember your name yet?’
‘Joseph.’
‘Welcome back, Joseph. Go rest for a while and I’ll see you later.’
Those footsteps could be a colossal pounding on a door between two worlds. He’d been expecting this for days, but now the time had come the tension was almost unbearable. He fixed his eyes on the gateway with the town shining behind it – the image of pristine cleanliness. There, its population of transients lived and worked. All wore young faces; they were healthy; there was no disease; they would not age – and, so you see, he told himself, happy endings guaranteed. Only there was one person who wasn’t happy. And he was standing in that man’s skin. Oh, he’d dedicated himself to his labours here at the Pharos, but sorrow had run in his veins as if it were a new form of blood.
The footste
ps grew louder. He stood there in the courtyard, fists clenched.
Lately, Paul imagined what that moment of her return would be like, and here it was taking place before he could even plan what he’d say and do.
Then the figure appeared in the gateway. The woman’s hair was shorter now. In her arms she carried a baby.
Paul took a breath. ‘Caitlin.’
She met his eye as she placed a protective hand behind the baby’s head.
Paul said, ‘Dominion told me you were having a child but how he knew …’ Shrugging, he tried to smile and didn’t know if he’d succeeded in making anything close to one. ‘At times like this I can be usually guaranteed to make an extremely bad joke … but today?’ He shrugged. ‘It’s got me beat. I can hardly frame a coherent sentence. See? I’m—’
Caitlin moved forward and put her arm around him as she held the baby in the other arm. Paul hugged them both. This time he found he could laugh as he said, ‘Welcome to the monster factory.’ He looked down into both their faces – the woman and her child. ‘You know, it’s a long time since I’ve clapped eyes on a human being. Never mind one that’s the mother of my son.’ He touched her face. ‘So, is this simply a visit of mercy, or—?’
‘We’re here to stay, Paul.’
‘And then so you shall.’ Those were the words he wanted to hear, and yet….
‘But if you want us to be with you,’ she said, ‘then we’ve got to be like you. Exactly like you.’
‘Caitlin, there’s no need for you to go through transition. We can live together as a family.’
Her eyes held his. ‘We can only stay together if we become the same as you.’
‘Caitlin, you don’t understand. A living person can’t be submitted to the regenerator. It just wouldn’t work.’
Caitlin whispered, ‘Then what are you waiting for?’ She hugged the baby tight as she closed her eyes.