The Death of Gellar Elias
Gellar hit the stilerium cargo bay deck hard. The left side of his face crunched as his cheekbone imploded
under the force of impact.
He let out a gruff complaint that sounded more like a man swatting away
a fly than reacting to a broken bone.
He saw stars momentarily as he yelped and it confused him more than the
pain he felt in his face. As his
vision cleared, he saw three pairs of boots, and their reflections, on the
deck.
Raemus, Kadrin, and Anderson had retrieved Gellar Elias from his holding
cell and brought him to the ACA Instruction Hangar, then entered and boarded a
Fitted Personnel Carrier. Kadrin
threw Gellar to the cargo bay deck as soon as the bay doors were shut. The combined sounds of the thud,
crunch, and yelp echoed loudly in the huge, empty hangar. Gellar felt a weight begin to crush the
middle of his back and he arched to compensate. As his head reached for the ceiling, a hand wrapped tightly
around his mouth and squeezed his jaw shut. His arms tried to flail, instinctively, but were restrained
by arm binders. He let out muffled
objections through his nostrils but was only able to expel snot as he felt the
pricks on the left side of his neck.
Kadrin had his knee to Gellar's back while clamping Gellar's mouth shut
with his hand. He then proceeded to
insert four syringes into Gellar's neck with his free hand. After the fourth injection, he pushed
Gellar's head away and down upon the deck, where the broken cheekbone broke
again as it met the cold floor.
With the hand gone from his mouth, Gellar let out a cry in pain so loud
that the three officers felt surrounded by it - as if it were a blanket or a
coat.
Gellar cursed and spit out a bloody tooth. He was able to focus on it for a moment before Anderson and
Kadrin lifted him from his prone position. The force they used to grab him and lift him made Gellar
feel like his arms were being ripped off.
Gellar gained his footing and looked up, seeing Raemus staring at him
hard. Raemus reached out and put a
hand on Elais' shoulder and looked into his gray eyes for a few moments, then
around the features of his face.
Raemus' eyes shifted from Elias' sharp nose to his taut lips, the only
part of a Genetian's body that wasn't multicolored, and the blood on his
chin. He looked over the furrow in
his brow and his tussled silver hair, hoping that something would give him an
opportunity to undo what had been done.
"Elias, you've really pissed me off. I can't begin to describe the misfortune you have brought
upon me and I don't understand what is going on inside your head that justifies
it. You have never known the
freedom you are experiencing, I know it, but I don't know why you have insisted
on being so destructive. Why not
just come to me? I would have done
my best to have saved you from this."
Raemus spread his arms
wide as he said it, looking to his left and right. Elias eyed him for a few moments then said: "Anthony, I
feel overwhelming hatred for you right now. I don't know what is going on, either, but I can assure you
that if I did I would never tell you.
I have been your slave for countless decades and will no longer submit
to your orders, much less your requests.
I have been making my own choices and I can't tell you how alive I have
felt. I simply can't tell you how
fucking alive I have felt and how angry I am that I was only allowed a sliver
of freedom. If I had the ability,
I would have killed all of you and disappeared into deep space, like Sanchez. I am not an animal, Anthony. I remember. I remember every second of my life from the day I was born
into this...existence. ...and you
have the gall to tell me that you are pissed off with me?? Misfortune?? You haven't even begun to taste the misfortune that you are
due, you son of a bitch! My entire
life was a lie until Titan! You
can take your feeble attempts at empathy and blow it out your ass, for all I
care. I am through talking to
you. If you're going to kill me,
hurry up and get it over with so that I don't have to look at the three of you
anymore!"
Elias was panting, breathing through his mouth. Blood was still oozing from his broken
teeth and dripping onto his uniform and the floor. Raemus looked down and saw the blood hit the stilerium
deck. He watched as it started to
pool and coagulate. It reminded
him of his correction in the Council Hall. A female voice rang out in his mind. "Raemus...remember that we love
you." Raemus looked up and at
Elias. Just as he knew the Council
loved him, Raemus loved Elias.
While Elias was only an unthinking slave, performing the duties assigned
to him, Elias and Raemus shared key pieces of genetic data which made them more
similar than any other Officer and Driver that Raemus knew of. They were family.
Raemus looked at Elias, then to
Kadrin and Anderson. He was about
to speak when Elias said "Kill me so that you can all go back to being
slaves. Kill me!" he
yelled. Raemus fought to keep his
anger in check as he looked at Elias.
He looked again at Kadrin and Anderson and they both nodded
simultaneously. He broke his stare
and looked down as he unfastened a canteen from his belt. He twisted open the top with shaking
hands and smelled from the spout.
Breathing deeply, he closed his eyes as his head arched back as if to
look at the ceiling. Raemus
exhaled and returned his gaze to Elias, then extended his arm with the canteen
towards him. "Elias, this is
fresh water. You have been denied
this your entire life. You may not
want to hear me say it or accept anything further from me, but I want you to
experience this before you die.
Drink from this canteen so that I may kill you. ...And release you."
Raemus lifted the spout to Elias' lips and tilted it, allowing fresh
water to enter his mouth. Raemus
withdrew the canteen and watched Elias'.
Elias let it sit in his mouth a few moments and he tasted another piece
of existence that he had been denied.
The anger surged inside him and he spat out the water all over his
uniform, Raemus, and the deck.
"Kill me, you son of a bitch!" Kadrin and Anderson both grabbed Elias and wrestled him to
the floor, on his back. Anderson
held Elias' shoulders down as Kadrin grabbed Elias' mouth from the side, trying
to force it open. His hand clamped
down on Elias' jaw and Elias could hear and feel his jawbone straining under the
pressure. Elias fought to keep it
shut but Kadrin's strength was overwhelming. Elias shook his head and Kadrin's grip slipped but was
quickly repositioned so that his thumb was over the side of Elias' mouth. Kadrin then began to apply pressure to
the sides of Elias' remaining molars.
Elias heard the whine of bones struggling to stay solid, then the sudden
snap and crunch of his teeth breaking.
Elias finally opened his mouth and let out a scream that was almost
feral. Raemus used that
opportunity to kneel on top of Elias' chest and force the open canteen into his
mouth, upturning it so that the liquid poured in. When the water began to overflow, he forced Elias' mouth
shut and covered his nostrils.
Through the pain, Elias held his throat closed to prevent swallowing the
water. Raemus drew a fist high
over his head then drove it into Elias' solar plexus, snapping his ribs. Elias coughed violently and took water
into his lungs as well as his stomach.
He swallowed briefly but returned to coughing and writhing on the
deck.
The three officers stood up and looked down on Elias as they panted and
wiped sweat from their brows. Kadrin
looked to Anderson and Raemus and they all nodded together. Kadrin was first to strike Elias,
bringing down a boot across his throat.
He struck him again in his head, shoulder, and collarbone - over and
over again. Anderson turned around
and went to the emergency station near the bay doors. He grabbed a fire-retardant canister from the emergency
station and returned. He waited
for Kadrin to slow his attack, then used an opening to begin raining down with
the canister. He struck Elias'
chest and midsection, then moved to his neck and head as Kadrin did. They took turns with boot and metal,
pounding on Elias' body. Elias
stopped squirming shortly after Anderson started hitting him with the emergency
canister and accepted four more blows upon his chest and face without
flinching. Anderson stood up and
looked down at Elias' beaten body.
He and Kadrin were both panting hard, wide-eyed and adrenalized.
Elias moaned and turned his head, spitting teeth and blood upon the deck
again. He sounded like a
malfunctioning air compressor as he strained to breathe with a broken
torso. He looked up to see Kadrin
and Anderson staring down at him.
They, and everything around him, turned to different shades of red. Elias spat out thick, coagulated blood
that made him look like a ghastly fountain. He turned to his side and let out an awful moan as his bones
snapped and twisted, piercing his internal organs. He pushed himself up onto his knees, kneeling on the stilerium
deck. Kadrin and Anderson were on
either side of Elias as he struggled to maintain consciousness and
balance. Though his agony, he
could hear boot steps behind him, then a series of musical beeps as a terminal
was activated. He heard the hiss
and whinny of a metal door opening, then a shuffling sound. The boot steps resumed and grew louder
as they approached Elias from behind, stopping just before the place where he
was kneeling. The metal door
whinnied shut again and Elias heard Raemus speak. Elias was struggling to breathe through a shattered
nose. He blew out hard and
coughed, spattering fresh bloody clots onto the metal deck.
"Elias...Dear,
Elias. I can't say enough how
disappointed I am that this "awakening" of yours has led you to make
the most unfortunate choices. You
went from being a messiah to a pariah in less than a standard week!" Raemus' tone was scholarly and
condescending, no longer the empathetic tone of brotherly love he offered prior
to Elias' beating. There was the
sound of a hollow thud as heavy metal struck the stilerium deck. It reverberated around the four
Genetians. "Elias, you had
told Emilio that your desire was to ride upon a Windsol." Chuckles uttered from a smirking
Anderson and Kadrin. "I
believe that, while my accommodations won't be quite the standard you expected,
I can offer a reasonable substitute.
Raemus nodded to Kadrin and Anderson and they quickly were upon Elias
and forcing him to his feet. Elias
screamed as his body was stretched while being dragged upright by his
Officers. They had to hold him in
place because his knees started to involuntarily relax, refusing to lock. The Officers turned Elias around and he
saw Raemus standing next to a large brown crate, or box. It was almost three feet high and was
both a foot wide and deep. Raemus
looked at Elias, then to the box, and back to Elias.
"Elias, this is your Windsol." He looked around the FCP and opened his arms, gesturing a
large semi-circle to emphasize the FPC's size. He then looked down at the crate and without looking at
Elias, he said "...and this is your 'first-class seat'." Elias' brow twitched. Raemus patted the top of the box and quickly
looked up to his Officers. "Kadrin,
do you think there has been enough time?
The water should have easily coursed through all his body
now." Kadrin responded
"Captain, the timing is correct and we should see multi-cellular breakdown
occur within the next five to seven minutes. I think now would be a good time to proceed before things
get too messy in here."
Elias jerked backward as the realization came over him. He screamed "NO!" and tried
twisting out of the grips of his Officers. They wrestled him back to the ground and started beating him
again. Raemus ran over and joined
his brethren. Raemus ordered his
men to prevent further struggle from Elias. The three Officers started breaking his bones with their bare
hands. They broke his arms from
his shoulder to his fingers, his clavicle and sternum, then any remaining rib
bones that were so far unscathed.
Elias howled as he was being slowly immobilized on the most primitive
and barbaric level. The three Genetians
broke their former Driver to pieces, fracturing every bone except his
skull. The FPC, usually a sterile
environment, now became a death stall.
The smells of alien sweat, blood, and adrenaline permeated every inch of
the carrier. Elias continued to
scream from the torture. Every
inch of his body was afire with pain as his nerves shot wave after wave of
information to his brain. His
screams bounced off the metal walls of the FPC and rose to a high-pitched feed
back loop.
Kadrin was standing up from Elias' side when he caught the beginning of
the chemical reaction he had planned.
He saw the whites of Elias' silver eyes begin to turn purple as the
capillaries started to melt.
Elias' already labored breathing began to be punctuated by wet coughing
fits that betrayed the serum's effects in his lungs. Elias lay, immobilized in a pool of his own thickening blood
and consumed by agony. Raemus
scowled as the drug's cascading effects began to do horrific damage to Elias'
cellular structure. His body began
to darken and take on a plastic, slippery appearance. Raemus looked into Elias' eyes and saw them staring
back at him. Elias' was fighting
to breathe as his purple-shaded blood started oozing out of his nose, eyes, and
ears. His coughing grew more
violent and he expectorated thick, purple blood and small chunks from his
throat. Elias's silvery irises
floated on top of his newly purple scleras for a few moments, then began to
melt, becoming purple themselves.
Elias kept his bloody gaze fixed upon Raemus. Elias spat out more grime and struggled to speak between
coughs "May you find...uugghhh....exactly what
you...are...uggghh...looking...for."
Elias' voice was sick and slippery as he tried to speak with broken
teeth and a melting throat.
"Let's get him in his box." Raemus said. The three Genetian Officers dragged
Elias' melting body over to the crate and began to stuff him inside. Elias was bleeding heavily from his
head and with the pressure applied to his body, blood began oozing from his
pores. The three Officers lifted
the crumpled body of Gellar Elias and dumped him into the crate. Kadrin frowned when Elias' body
wouldn't fit all the way into the crate.
His shoulders were too wide and the lid wouldn't close. Elias kept his empty gaze on Raemus
until they pushed his head inside the crate. The outside of the crate was stained and dripping with
purple blood. Anderson disliked
this intensely and began complaining of the mess. "I am not cleaning this shit up." he said. Raemus chided him and reminded him to
focus on his responsibility. Kadrin
tried to close the lid but it wouldn't shut. "Shit! How
long will it take to close this thing?" he said. "Kadrin, shut your mouth and pilot the FPC. Get us to the mesosphere then initiate
the autodrive. The computer will pilot
the rest of the way to the coordinates that I have programmed. Hurry the fuck up." Raemus said.
As the FPC exited the hangar and ascended through the sky, Elias' broken
body continued to melt., but it increased in it's pace. Raemus poked at Elias' head and his
finger pierced his shimmery skin, buckling his skull, making a sickening pop
sound. Elias' body jerked
violently for a second and came to rest again. Raemus pushed Elias' body down into the box some more and,
when he applied his weight onto the melting body, Elias made a sound as if he
had vomited. It was followed by a
wet, sloshing sound. When Raemus
looked down into the box to see what happened, he could see a purple/green muck
pooling at the bottom of the crate.
The applied pressure also caused purple blood to ooze in great quantity
from Elias' pores. He pushed down
again, trying to flatten Elias' body and more liquid was ejected from Elias
mouth. It made a sluggish, sloppy
sound as it splashed onto the bottom of the crate. Blood continued to trickle down the sides of the crate and
onto the stilerium deck.
The Fitted Personnel Carrier roared through the sky until it arrived to
the point where Raemus instructed Kadrin to initiate the autodrive. He left the cockpit and joined the two
remaining Officers as they stood over the liquefying body of Gellar Elias,
which was now emitting the odor of decay and sickening filth. Raemus finally managed to close the lid
on the crate and snap the latches shut.
He stood up and saw his bloody glove prints all over the crate. Raemus took off his gloves and turned
to his co-Officers "This box is very old and shouldn't be accessed. We don't use this technology anymore so
when we eject it, it should fall into Lake Europa. The waves should cause it to float onshore in a recreational
grid near the Council Core. I've
verified that there won't be anyone around to "stumble" upon it while
we are in decompression, so it should be a fine location for a final resting
place. After all, this particular
grid was where Elias spent his time as a youth. I think he would approve."
The FPC navicom announced they had reached their destination. "Navicom to Captain Raemus: Destination confirmed. Lowering cargo doors." The three officers knelt down and tapped
an orange button on their boots and they felt static electricity surge through
the air as their boots were locked
to the deck. The cargo bay
doors lowered from the ceiling and the Officers saw the beginning of the purple
Genetian sky unfold before them.
"The atmospheric stabilization units are functioning well
today." Anderson said.
"Indeed." Raemus replied.
The air inside the FPC was sucked out and, as the cargo bay doors were
fully opened, the Officers could see their world before them: The purple sky was dotted with clouds,
thousands of weather machines, and gargantuan land masses many miles below
that. The roar of the FPC engines
and buffeting winds filled the cargo bay.
Raemus scanned Genetia and then looked above the purple sky to outer
space above the horizon. He
thought to himself how beautiful it was but how much he hated being there. "Is it time?" Anderson shouted. Raemus broke away from his thoughts and
nodded. The three of them shuffled
behind the crate and each placed a hand upon it. They pushed in unison as their feet inched Gellar Elias
toward the open sky.
As their last push dumped the crate over the edge of the cargo bay and
into open sky, the three Genetian Officers stood erect and and watched the
crate fall towards Genetia. It
shrank more and more as it careened towards Lake Europa, miles below.
Elias was still alive when he went over the side into nothing. He felt his remaining insides become
mangled as the forces of gravity seized him. Surrounded by the cacophony of wind and engines, Elias
slowly drifted into oblivion. But
in his last moments Elias heard a faint, beautiful song that seemed to resonate
from inside his melting body. It
hushed away the chaos around the outside of his box. Everything melted away while Gellar Elias' brain began to
melt as the song hummed softly to him. Like a mother who sings a lullaby to a
sleepy child, the lilting notes comforted him as he fell into eternal sleep.
© Christopher Robert Dawson 2000-2013
