Eden

Michael Krakowiak

Eden

         “Now, good doctor, won’t you be so kind as to give it to me?” asked a tall, slender, middle-aged looking man as he looked up at the chubby researcher. Through bright green eyes he exuded a predatory stare, the effect amplified by his jet black, straight hair falling into two thick, distinct strands in front of his face like a wolf’s fangs. As he stood dressed in black dress pants, a dark blue button-down shirt and a full-length, beltless black trench coat, he simply held his hand in front of him as a continuous stream of ocean blue electricity coiled around a portly, mid 40’s scientist’s neck, suspending him a few feet in the air. Frantically scanning the large, square platform they were both “standing” on in the middle of a hexagonal room filled with consoles, keyboards, and flat screen monitors, he realized his fate was sealed as he stared out through the massive space station window overlooking our blue and green planet in the darkness of space. His square-cut glasses were misplaced over his beet-red face that dripped sweat all over his stubbly goatee, his eyes wide with terror as he grasped at the energetic tether taking his very breath away.

         “I…I can’t…give you what I…don’t have…hack!” he managed to mutter exactly what the mysterious intruder didn’t want to hear before coughing up a lung and struggling in vain to swallow another breath. The intruder examined the scientist’s face closely and smiled serenely.

         “I’m nothing if not merciful. I’ll take your word for it…and you take your word to the grave?”  The intruder tightened his grip and the indigo serpent followed suit, tightening around its victim’s neck. The doctor’s face grew redder and began to swell like a water balloon while his eyes grew larger, looking as though they would burst like red and white grapes. Just before the life would be pressed from the tubby casualty, a human-sized, arrow-looking gust of concussive force blasts the intruder in the back, forcing him to lurch forward, lose his balance and temporarily release his hold on the good doctor.

         “You must be the Dr. Norton they sent me to get” grinned a young man of average height and toned build, no older than 18 with wavy, crimson hair and uncannily blue eyes as he lowered an extended hand, gloved as was the rest of him in a bright blue and black, skin-tight space suit.

         “And you must come to learn your place”, the intruder uttered calmly as he opened his hand in the young man’s direction and unleashed hundreds of lightning bolts in a cone-shaped wave. The young man quickly gestured at two thick, heavy consoles to either side of him with open hands and the wiry behemoths roared as they tore from their stations and floated in front of him, creating a barrier as they collided with the electric onslaught.

         “No, Richard, you can’t!” urged the doctor after finally regaining some semblance of composure. “You’re no match for an S-class psychic!”

         ‘How does he know my name?!’ thought Richard to himself as the consoles began to rip and tear slightly under the pressure, along with his arms and legs, straining to the limit as he could barely resist the continuous bolt stream. ‘Damn…this bastard’s too strong…I need to get the doc out of here’ was the only thought he could formulate as the consoles were nearly shredded and his defense almost destroyed.

         “Has the mighty V.E.R.I.T.A.S. fallen so low as to keep such mewling pups in their ranks?” the intruder quipped as he intensified the static flow. Seconds away from being overwhelmed and swallowed by a nest of voltaic vipers, Richard grew desperate. ‘It can’t end like this...I have so many questions…Nina…’

         “Rich?!” gasped a young blonde girl no older than Richard as she happened upon the pulse-pounding scene from an adjacent hallway, her expression being one of genuine shock at the sight of Richard.

         “Ah, more guests. Don’t fret, your interrogation’s next” smirked the super-charged attacker as he gave the buxom, sapphire-eyed girl with her hair in a bun, white lab coat and knee-length skirt a once over.

         “Leave…her…ALONE!” screamed Richard, his eyes glowing violet as a sudden surge of power courses through him, releasing a colossal force wave that disperses the lightning wave into tiny sparks all across the room’s walls. The force of the blast ripped all the remaining consoles out of their places and flung them towards the intruder so hard they were crushed against each other as they covered him like a tombstone of jagged metal, wire, and sparks. As he gathered his breath, Richard glanced at his blonde savior with a visage made up of equal parts surprise, angst, and relief.

         “Nina, what the hell are you doing way up here in a V.E.R.I.T.A.S. space station?!” he blurted obnoxiously.

         “How dare you! I work here, stupid!” she yelled back, trying her damndest to hide her flushed cheeks.

         As they locked eyes, a tide of mutual memories flooded them from the deep recesses of their minds. A young girl approaching a somber looking young boy and greeting him with childlike innocence. Seemingly endless conversations under a star-lit sky. Awkward, heated first kisses. Fiery romance, tender memories…and bitter, heart-rending pain.

         “You two…know each other?” inquired Dr. Norton as he gathered himself to his feet.

         “Maybe…once…” murmured Nina as her voice seemed to trail off into the distant past.

         “What do you mean, maybe?!” grimaced Richard.

“I mean I thought I knew you! How could you just leave after…after…” her eyes welled up with tears she thought she’d conquered long ago.

“I…I had no choice. After the New Haven explosion, it was either join V.E.R.I.T.A.S. or life in maximum security. They thought I had something to do with it…” He didn’t have the courage to face her gaze, and instead lowered his guilt-ridden face towards the floor.

“Ah, yes…New Haven. Truly an unfortunate incident. 103 reported dead, several others injured or missing. The entire F.B.I. building is nothing but rubble, now…” the doctor’s voice trailed off as well, a somber expression overtaking his plump visage.

In an attempt to avoid the freshly bubbling pain of old wounds, Richard quickly interceded.

“Doctor, I was sent here under orders from General Radcliff to find you and inform you of your new orders. You’re to enact the Draupnir Protocols and evacuate this station immediately.”

“Hehe…so that’s why they sent you” came a voice from beneath the pile of consoles. The wiry mess was engulfed in flickering electricity before the huge mass was repelled in every direction by a sphere of lightning with the mysterious intruder at its center.

“At first I thought you were a garden variety psychic and that V.E.R.I.T.A.S. had lost its touch. I’m quite pleased to see that I was wrong. To think they had an S class psychic in the wings like this…” he chuckled as he levitated to the center of the room, looking down upon the trio.

“Y-you’re mistaken, Krauser! Richard is C class...a-at best! They sent him in order to ensure his…s-safety! Anti-psychic sentiment is now rampant, in light of recent events. Events of which you were the architect!” blurted Dr. Norton in a nervous frenzy, oddly bold against his would-be murderer.

“Krauser?! THE Johann Krauser?!” blurted Nina, finally recognizing who they were dealing with.

“One of the world’s most powerful psychics. He’s wanted for the deaths of thousands of civilians and V.E.R.I.T.A.S. agents that died as a result of his mad crusade.” Explained Norton.

After taking a slight bow with both arms extended outward, “Thousands of human lives, mind you. I don’t concern myself with the fates of lesser beings…especially not when you seek to subjugate or kill my kind.” From his static barrier, a lightning tether whipped out with amazing speed to grab Dr. Norton and lift him high above Richard and Nina. “Tell them, Dr! Show them how your so-called “research” facility is little more than a sophisticated prison where you keep my kind locked up and experimented on like lab rats!” From his protective shell came another lightning whip, electrifying one of the ceiling monitors which quickly began to stream a long list of names and numbers, all under the heading ‘Test Subjects’. His eyes widened in amazement as he quickly looked at Nina, expecting the same surprise, only to find a somber, culpable expression overwhelm her face.

“You took part in this?! How could you, knowing what I am?! Is this your revenge for me leaving?!”

Nina’s eyes welled up with tears once more, trembling as she struggles to find the right words. “No! Not revenge! I wanted to help you! This research was supposed to help all psychics get a handle on their abilities, to function normally!”

“Help? That’s an interesting synonym for enslavement. Why don’t you enlighten us about the Draupnir Protocols, doctor? Don’t you think it’s only fair, considering that you already tried to enslave this child?” Krauser tightened his grasp on the doctor, squeezing him until he began to squeal like a pig.

“What the hell’s he talking about, Doc?!” screamed Richard, struggling to fathom the complex web of intrigue.

“The Draupnir Protocols…my greatest shame. This entire space station is one giant satellite. The research done in this facility was done on Radcliff’s command in order to find a way to isolate the very thing that makes you psychics function. Sad to say, we couldn’t find what makes a psychic able to do what you do…however, in the process we discovered a certain brainwave that acts as a telepathic override system, allowing any psychic in range to be controlled as though under telepathic suggestion of the highest caliber. Once Radcliff got word of my findings, he immediately commissioned the whole station to be able to project a planet-wide pulse of this particular brainwave.” Once he served his purpose, the tether disappears and Dr. Norton falls to the floor.

Richard’s hands were shaking with rage. “P-planet wide?! You want to enslave all the psychics on earth?! E-even still, what about all the psychics on the station? In V.E.R.I.T.A.S.?”

“Don’t you find it odd that they would send a so-called C class psychic on a top secret retrieval mission alone? You never paused to consider why it was that V.E.R.I.T.A.S. was so quick to offer you an alternative to life imprisonment after the New Haven incident, an event you supposedly had nothing to do with? There is great power deep within you. An S class psychic of unparalleled might…which is precisely why they used you as a living weapon in New Haven!”

“Used me?! What the hell are you talking about?! I blacked out…” his voice trailed off as he tried his hardest to remember.

“Ah, and there it is. Didn’t you ever ask yourself why you blacked out precisely when the event began? Do you think it happenstance that a mere courier could survive a package supposedly containing enough explosive to destroy an FBI building? Open your eyes! Yours was the first trial of the Draupnir brainwaves. You were the explosion!”

Richard once again looked at Nina, this time with utter disgust, as if she had something to do with this. Nina fell to her knees, shaking her head, desperate for Richard to believe her. “I had nothing to do with this! I swear! I…swear…” her pleas digressed into whimpers and sobs.

“Why would they attack their own agency?! It doesn’t make sense!”

“Once they’ve caused an incident to force anti-psychic sentiment to reach critical mass, they’ll have the excuse they’ll need to freely hunt us down, imprison us, or kill us…worldwide! No psychic will be safe! The only reason they would allow a psychic with your latent power to ever set foot inside their secret weapon…is because you’re already their willing slave.” Krauser’s barrier opened halfway and he extended his hand towards Richard. “Join me! Let us free our brethren and lay low this blasphemous weapon! Awaken the immense power within you…or a puppet you’ll remain.”

“I’m not who you say I am! I don’t have any of the power you’re talking about…” protested Richard.

“How disappointing. By the way, Dr., I don’t believe I’ll be needing your key card to open the holding cells anymore.” Krauser closed the spherical barrier surrounding him once again and released several massive lightning streams that surge through the entire space station, followed by a huge rumbling, the shredding of metal, and the cackling of snapped wires. From all sides of the space station, room-sized compartments filled with psychic test subjects are torn from the main body by surging tentacles of pure energy, and once separated the compartments are contained within the same spherical barrier Krauser crafted for himself. Several compartments begin to float in a large circle just outside of the planet’s orbit, almost like a mocking halo over the earth. “At first, I thought discretion the better part of valor. But how better to get my point across than with force?” grinned Krauser as the remaining scrap metal heap that used to be a space station begins to be sucked into orbit as a result of earth’s gravitational pull.

“Are you mad?! We’ll be pulled into the atmosphere in minutes!” yelped Dr. Norton in unadulterated fright.

“Correction, Dr: You’ll be pulled into the atmosphere. I can survive anywhere…even in the vacuum of space. I can manipulate the very atomic structure of the carbon dioxide exhaled within my sphere of influence, returning it into useable air to breathe.”

“D-don’t! I can give you something better! The coordinates and passcode to Paradise! S-surely you’ll want to find out about your origins!”

“Origins?! What does he mean?!” blurted Richard.

“Unfortunately for you, Dr., I don’t believe in myths. However…perhaps all you need to awaken your power, Richard, is a bit of…encouragement…” Krauser glanced between Dr. Norton and Nina with a malevolent, mischievous gaze. In an instant, two azure hooks fly from Krauser’s barrier to grab both Nina and Dr. Norton, holding them in mid-air while he spreads his arms, pointing at opposite sides of the room. From his hands erupt two massive beams of streaming lightning, each blasting right through the space station steel with ease. Two colossal vacuums form at the sites of the blasts with deafening whirring noises.

“Krauser! What the hell are you doing?!” roared Richard, doing his best to shout over the vacuums.

“Which will you choose, Richard? Your precious love, or your thirst for knowledge? Your past, or your future? Choose wisely, boy, and choose quickly”

“Goddamn you! KRAUSER!!!” A million thoughts raced through Richard’s mind. Glancing back and forth between the two captives, he knew it would be seconds until Krauser released his grip. ‘Will I have time to get them both? Do I have the strength left?’

“Q-quickly, Richard! I can grant you the answers to all the questions that have plagued you!” squeaked Norton in a shameless display of survival instinct.

“Richard…” was all Nina could whimper in between sobs, having resigned herself to whatever fate awaited her.

“If you must blame someone, Richard, blame yourself for your own inability. Remember, boy: In this world, might makes right!” were the last words Richard heard before Krauser released his grip on both his victims, himself crashing through the wide glass observation window to claim his halo of spoils and disappear into the darkness of space. Dr. Norton and Nina immediately began flying to opposite ends of the room, each screaming at the top of their lungs.

“HEEEEEEELP MEEEEEEEE!!!” squealed Dr. Norton as he soared through the room like a pig with wings.

“RICHAAAAAAAAAAARD!!!” cried Nina, her trajectory marked with a trail of tears.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGH!!!” roared Richard in desperation, summoning all the power he had left in him and enveloping the two in his telekinetic grip, transferring the remainder of his strength into telekinetically grafting his legs to the floor in order to anchor himself against the vacuum. After what seemed like ages of struggle, his left grip began to slip as Dr. Norton was hanging on by his lab coat, the thin fabric shredding easily against the force of the vacuum. Once the final thread was torn, Dr. Norton disappeared into the vacuum of space, leaving only ribbons of his coat in Richard’s failing grasp.  Having been freed of a dual burden, Richard focused all of his power into dragging Nina back towards him. After immense struggle, they embraced each other as desperately and as freely as they never have before. While Nina held onto him, Richard used the last bit of his strength in a last ditch effort to trigger the emergency quarantine walls on each side of the giant chamber. Three giant steel walls swept up to cover all the vacuums, and once the room was restored to relative balance, Richard collapsed backwards with Nina falling on top of him. When their eyes met, Nina whimpered as a single tear fell onto Richard’s face, trailing down his cheek as though it were his own. “Richard…” she whispered before she planted a soft kiss on him. Before he could respond, the entire station began to rumble with the whirs, snaps, and whines of a massive orbital object beginning to enter the atmosphere.

“What are we going to do, Richard?” Nina asked softly, as if she already had an answer she didn’t want to hear.

“The cruiser I used to get here is long gone by now. Even at full strength, I wouldn’t have the power to pull us off-course. The consoles are all shot…” He took a moment to sigh deeply, as if to release any lingering hopes. He gazed deeply into Nina’s eyes, and suddenly all the pain, the doubts, and the large rift between them melted away. “Nina, I…I…”

“The coat!” Nina suddenly realized, quickly rolling off him and grabbing the shredded lab coat. Inside the unscathed inside jacket pocket, she found what looked like a memory stick and an electronic key card. “Yes! Heehee!” she giggled as she held the keycard up high. “This is the keycard to the escape pods!”

Richard’s eyes widened with newfound hope and relief, but as he stood up the rumbling and roaring of destroyed machinery almost shook him back to the floor again. He quickly grabbed Nina’s arm and the two ran out of the bridge, winding down long, dark corridors until they reached the escape pods. They made a mad dash for the door and slid the keycard through the terminal.

“Come on…come on…” whispered Nina impatiently as the terminal began clicking, clacking, and computing until the hatch finally opened. They both quickly jumped in and Richard fell into one of the pod’s seats while Nina entered the flight data. In seconds they were ejected from the side of the twisted, falling steel behemoth, though the bottom portion of it was already beginning to glow golden as it started to clash against earth’s atmosphere. As the pod floated away, the two finally sat back on either side of what passes for an escape pod coffee table and sighed in extreme relief. After a moment of silence, Nina laid Dr. Norton’s lab coat on the table and Richard caught her gaze.

“Nina, I…what I wanted to say back there…”

“No need to say anything. Just know that I would never willingly take part in…in something so…”

“Speaking of which, what was Norton talking about? Something about Paradise? Origins? Any idea what he meant?”

“I have no idea. I wasn’t aware of the experimentation on this base because I wasn’t cleared to know, so there’s no way they would ever let it slip for me to come across something only Dr. Norton should know”

“Always with these GODDAMN SECRETS!!!” Richard roared as he slammed his fist onto the escape pod’s coffee table, sending the doctor’s lab coat, and the memory stick within, flying before they crashed to the floor. Instantly reminded of the memory stick’s existence, Richard grabbed it and plugged it into the display of the escape pod’s console. The monitor displayed just a blue screen at first, but then cut to a video with Dr. Norton sitting in front of a stationary camera.

“A-ahem! As per my wishes, if you’re watching this, then in all likelihood I will have left this cruel, miserable world of ours. I know I can never truly atone for the depth and scope of the crimes I’ve committed against others, myself, and the world, both through my research and my inability to resist the forces behind my work. Having said that, however, I feel it my obligation to do whatever I can to alleviate the suffering that I’ve caused in what little way I can, even in death. While I can’t offer wealth, power, safety, security, or even freedom, since all these can be taken away from you by the sinister powers that be, what I can give as a final gesture of atonement is something no one can ever take away from you: knowledge. At 57° 42' 30" North, 11° 38' 48" East, you’ll find a seemingly abandoned warehouse out in the countryside. Within this warehouse, towards the back, behind the gargoyles lies a large, old wooden trunk. Once there, place your right hand over the wooden panel in the center and say ‘He who seeks the power of God must first know the suffering of Man’. Within, you’ll discover the truth about your psychic powers, their origins and the very purpose for their existence…in a folder titled ‘Project E.D.E.N.’ I hope what you discover there will provide some small semblance of peace for your troubled existence. Vanguard Experimental Research Institute for Truth of Ascended Sentience, Dr. Samuel Norton, signing out.”

“Nina. Set our course for those coordinates.”

“But, Richard, we just barely…”

“What if Krauser’s right?! What if V.E.R.I.T.A.S. has been using me as a puppet all this time?! If they set me up from the start, I’ll never forgive them. I’ll never stop till they pay for what they did to me…which is why I have to know. Who I am, their role in all this, the origins of psychics…all of it.” Richard glanced at Nina with steely determination in his eyes.

“Plugging in the coordinates now. I just hope you know what you’re doing…” Nina spoke softly as she glanced over at Richard with hesitation and worry.

As the pod began its descent back to earth, the two gazed at the blue and green paradise called Earth, which seemed to glow with a serenity, mystery, and majesty unlike ever before.