Soulforged - 3. Land of Immortals

"Soulforged - 1. Rovers and Refugees"  "Soulforged - 2. Recognized" 

Soulforged

chapter 3 - Land of Immortals


         Darian is cruising the urban neighborhoods south of Athendra. Strangely abandoned he thinks. Why are survivors like Jake and his family on the run ?
He gradually remembers more the more he sees. It has been several years since he set foot in these parts.
As a matter of fact; the foundations of his head-office and his first factory are located just twenty kilometers to the south. They are just ruins now, ruins of the birthplace of the last industrial revolution,... his revolution.

         Longtime it had been under siege during the first days of the occupation. Until the event that turned the war around happened. People called this campaign 'the heist', the prelude to organizing CRI, the Civilian Resistance Initiative. People that had the luck to be evacuated to 'the Free Cemps' called it like that. The Free Cemps were the first liberated area.
His industrial and administrative site was severely bombed after enemy intelligence got nothing out of the buildings. Darian is over that nowadays.

         After seeing more landmarks, he goes more determined on his way, now with a route and destination in mind. The biker travels north-west.

         He drives inward a large industrial area.
With the flip of a switch on the dashboard, the bike transforms. Hydraulic pistons alter the position of the suspension-shocks. Hereby also the ground clearance raises. And a little STO-compressor (steam take off) feeds pneumatic tubes going to the axles. The tires grow studs upon. This entire transformation only takes two seconds.
Off-road mode; a peculiar feature on this 'Wades Ravor prototype' motorcycle.

         Darian moves into a large industrial site of a before-war steel company. He probably used to own it in some way, he lost track of his own company's hostile take-overs. The area is twenty square kilometers in size; containing office buildings, large plains with piles of sediment, a network of large pipes, roadways and railways, metal frame towers, hangars and various facilities. You can say it is, was, a village on it's own.
He stays on the grass and follows the inside of the fence around site. Until he sees something of interest. The bike works it's way over rough rocky terrain toward a garage, a maintenance facility for mastodontic bulldozers, dump trucks and mobile cranes.
The large entrance gate is slightly open, but well enough for the bike to enter.

         Darian needs a moment to rest for a while. He steps off, and searches around in his bag strapped behind the seat. He drinks from the bottle of water, then produces the red and white box, seeking relaxation by the smooth taste of a senorita. Only three cigars he has left. After he lights it, he reflects on the events from this morning; the thrill of the chase, the thrill of seduction. He wanders how long it will take to forget Linda's face, her inviting eyes.
He exhales the dirty blue smoke, trying to see a pattern in it. But he can't reason with the symbolism behind natures physics. He sees right through it, right through the smoke. Darian finds himself looking at something you can't miss standing inside, a large yellow bulldozer.
From the perspective of his eyes, the shape of the bulldozer behind his bike surrounds his own mechanical companion. The eyes now are focusing back and forth on a specific spot on each vehicle. The black logo on the bulldozer, the same logo as within the flashy purple tribal design on the fuel-tank on the bike, it is the sign of the W, the signature of Wades' megalomaniacal enterprises.
"So this is my legacy."
A mind in grief reminisces about the person who created the tribal design.
His last family tie, even that one became broken in vein.
The tears are hard to fight back.


         Something is heard from outside. It draws Darian's attention. He searches in his bag, very careful not to make a sound. He produces his weapon of choice, a large knife. He slowly walks toward the gate. He twists the handle in his hand-palm around so the blade is pointing down. He scans the enlarging view to the outside, walking closer to the opening. Strafing right, so he has a sloping view through it. Cautiously approaching the entrance he keeps paying attention to the sound, to judge distance. He estimates that it's to the left, about 30 meters away. He slowly leans outside, looking alongside the outside of the wall. Behind the corner, he observes the flora. There it is, behind the bushes, his target. It moves to the left, behind the building. Darian immediately follows, sneaking across the wall. When coming to the corner, he peaks around it. His target again located. Seeing a chance, he swiftly runs behind a tree. His presence not given away by his movement. With a little shake of the fore-arm the knife shifts upward, now holding the blade between thumb and index-finger.
He tries to control his breath, the only way how is holding it often in. Waiting for the best moment to strike. He raises his hand a bit.
Confident that he will not fail to kill what he is stalking.
He sidesteps from behind the tree, causing him to get noticed. The knife gets quickly thrown to the target,... a fatal hit.
He walks to his prey; a delicious pheasant.
The bird gets plucked and prepared. With some dry wood he gathered outside he makes a fire, and piece by piece the tasty poultry gets roasted and devoured.
"Too bad a bottle of Chateau-Neuf-du-Pape isn't at hand to go with it," regrets Darian.


         In the garage he found not much to salvage, at least nothing he could take with him. It would take days to check out this entire site. But he is more eager to move on.
When he found his way out of the complex, he follows the road going north. It's an importing connecting road going to the harbor west of the city.
The sun is shining, warming the blue leather vest. Springtime is in its first days.
On the road lies a little town, which you quickly pass through.

         But when passing an intersection in this ghost-town our biker turns around. It seems like he has caught a glimpse of something. He rides back to the intersection and takes a right. Darian pulls in between a school and an apartment building, on a playground. He looks up to the side of the apartment building, to what has make him come nearer.
A dead body hold against the wall by several strings of barbed wire. The strings of the barbed wire are going to two windows at each side, connected to the inside. Strapping around the legs, arms and waist. The barbs prevent the body from sliding down, from entirely sliding down. The barbs ripped open holes in the clothing so you can see their initial point of penetration in the flesh underneath. Incarved cuts vertically under the barbed points. Darian dismounts his bike and opens the visor of his helmet. He walks closer to the wall, gazing at this poor man. The forehead is spared from any blood stains, in contradistinction to everything else. Writing in black letters on the forehead.
'CONDEMNED'

         Cullet of clear and green glass are sticking on the reddisch clothing. He looks at the blood on the wall around him, this victim must have been abled to move around a bit. Each movement must have been torture he brought upon himself.
Darian's eyes follow the dried-out bloody water fall down to the concrete ground. Several big pieces of broken glass bottles are lying alongside the wall.
The blood forms a large stain on the concrete.
Darian kneels down, with his leather gloves on he touches a little puddle, still liquid blood.
"O-negative fuel of life."

         Off course Darian doesn't have a gift to sense someone's blood-type; it's got to be O-negative.
In the war a small torn-away group of the CRI decided to help the war-effort their own way. Mostly naive biologists and scientists who thought they were still under Darian Wades' wings, but there is nothing known about the real mastermind. They developed a biological weapon; a virus they could not control the outbreak of; named 'the red plague'. The scientific name was never defined, due to the fact that the creators were the first casualties.
It was a blood-virus, causing the viscosity of the blood to alter over a few hours to each extreme. Or to enlighten it; from water to syrup and back. Vital organs aged very rapidly, clots of blood were developed and most tissue drowned in blood. Those infected died within a painful week.
Peculiar was that O-negative blood was totally immune. The virus also had a small effect on the animal world. A few species extincted. Most species had their own variation of the virus, reducing each species' quantity, but not as drastic as the human race. Dogs had total immunity like the 'o-negs' had. 'The red plague' is estimated to wipe out nine tenth of the human population, and one fourth of the fauna on earth.
It cured HIV and other blood diseases among the o-negs though.

"O-negative blood is the most animal like among humans, survival of the fittest is at hand."

(a darwinist)

"God will purify the many, He will quench war-hunger."

(a right wing catholic priest)

"Theres too many men, too many people, making too many problems, and not much love to go round, can't you see this is the land of confusion ?"

(a music idol)

"We few, the happy few, we are merely dogs."

(Darian Wades, industrialist)

"We are the chosen ones, let us unite and right the human race."

(unknown)

         We are the chosen ones. Or rather just them with the right biological signature, them at the positive side of the statistic.


         Darian finally let's his view stray from the wall. He looks around the plain while stepping back to his bike. Cigarette-buds lay scattered around the area.
The bike starts again, and drives off the plain. When passing the soil-filled flower beds between the former playground and the sidewalk he looks down. Tire tracks in the ground, recently made.
The biker drives inward the street, and continuous his journey.


         After a fifteen minute drive, he arrives at the destination he had in mind;
a gravel pit. Darian sets his bike in off-road mode and works his way over the piles of light-gray pebble. Until he almost comes to the end of the terrain. He parks his motorcycle next to a loading unit. The caterpillar arm of the machine is lifted, the end six meter in the air.
"And even in the right direction, about," he says to himself.
The visor of the helmet gets opened. Darian takes binoculars out of his bag. He climbs the caterpillar track. He lays down at the edge so he can overlook the panorama.
Though the sun is not obscured, still a cold wind is blowing. Even fairly hard in this open harbor area.
He views through his binoculars. There it is, in the distance, the place he wants to check out. One of the two coal-refineries in the harbor area.

         He is surprised at what he observes. There is activity all over the refinery.
The fences are all intact, it even seems reinforced as to standard. He spots two armed guards patrolling the perimeter. Some kind of turrets as strongpoints, on the corners and in the middle of long stretches of the site.
At a hangar stands an old green army truck. A few men are rolling barrels outside the hangar and loading them on the truck. Most of the chimneys are smoking.
All of them seem to wear the same clothing, almost like uniforms. Black pants with red patches on some points, black body-warmers with underneath some kind of red sweater.

         The truck is fully loaded and one of the workers gets in. He drives off. Darian keeps tracking him. At an entrance gate 200 meters further, the truck leaves the refinery, and follows the road leading to the city.

         The sound of seagulls irritates Darian. He tries to concentrate on what sound the refinery produces. He can't make out more then a low blended mix of engines and gas burning. A humming noise it seems. He estimates the refinery is running on twenty percent of the capabilities.
But the sound of engines is suddenly getting louder.

         It's just one engine he hears now. Startled he looks all around, trying to locate where it's coming from.
He can define what it is, a large steam-engine, high revving, coming very close very fast.
As he figured out that the sound came from behind a large mountain of gravel. It was too late, a vehicle jumped over the edge.
A thundrae, as it is commonly known; a large truck-like vehicle, the ladder-chassis of a truck, long triple suspension shocks, four wheel driven and low enclosure.
Darian jumps off the loader, landing on a large pile to the right. It was still a high fall. He struggles getting on his feet, the gravel underneath him crumbles away.
The sand-colored thundrae lands on the downhill with Darian's motorcycle in front of it. Full throttle the thundrae keeps his momentum and drives over the bike. The bike gets tormented, tumbling and sliding under the chassis. The thundrae smashes into the gravel-loader, which falls over and knocks Darian down. He did not get uphill in time. His legs are trapped underneath the steel construction. The pain from the weight of the loader and the stinging of the sharp gravel underneath is severe.
He tries to pull his legs out. Already two men dressed in the black uniform had jumped out of the thundrae and are running up the frame of the tipped over loader.
Darian gets out from his perilous position, but immediately finds himself in another one. As he stands up he sees a rifle pointed at him.
"Surrender at once!" says a man standing on the loader in front of him.
Darian raises his hands. The other man crawls over the loader and proceeds toward Darian. He takes away Darian' sidearm.
And he asks him "Who the hell are you ? What is your business here ?"
"Let's ask questions later. We'll take him to the capture cells," says the first man.
He turns his rifle and strikes Darian brutally in the chest with the butt of the weapon.
Losing his respiration, Darian falls down and passes out.



(chapter 4 under construction, writers block)