فصل 50

50

Pleading for Mercy

“Michael Vey,” Hatch said. “What’s with all you people being dead, then not being dead? Can’t you just stay dead?” Michael shook his head. “No.”

“I’m not surprised. I always knew you’d be back. As the dog returns to his vomit.” “That’s an appropriate metaphor,” Michael said, stepping toward him. He looked at Hatch with dark, electric eyes.

“Zara, stop him!” Hatch shouted.

Zara suddenly rose into the air, her hands raised in front of her. “You’re going to die, Vey,” she shouted.

“I already have,” Michael said. “You want my power? Take it.” Suddenly there was a massive exchange of energy between them, and Zara looked like an electric transformer hit by lightning. She screamed, then fell to the ground. Her hair and clothes were on fire, and her skin had turned black as ash.

“She probably shouldn’t have done that,” Michael said. He turned back to Hatch. “It’s over, Hatch. It’s time to pay for all you’ve done.” “For all I’ve done?” Hatch said. “For all I’ve done? I’ve advanced humanity, is what I’ve done. I’ve advanced science! Look at you. You’re nothing more than a science experiment gone wrong.” Michael looked at Hatch without blinking. “You have no idea how wrong.” Hatch turned to his guards, who had all picked up their guns. “Fire! Kill all of them!” Michael turned and looked at the guards, lifting his hand so his palm was open to them. “I’m giving you a chance to put down your weapons and surrender. I’m offering you mercy.” Michael spread apart his fingers, and an oscillating blue-gold bubble surrounded him and the others.

“Now!” Hatch screamed. “Shoot them, now!”

Suddenly the room erupted with the popping of automatic weapon fire and the sound of bullets ripping through the air. But louder than the gunfire was the syncopated beat of an electrical buzz as Michael’s aura disintegrated the bullets, like moths flying into a bug zapper. Or more like a comet flying into the sun. Taylor thought Michael looked almost bored with the exercise. Then the bullets began tapering off as the guns ran out of ammunition.

“Keep firing!” Hatch shouted.

Michael looked at him quizzically. “Why?” He stepped closer to Hatch. “Only a fool thinks he can keep doing the same thing and get different results.” He looked at the guards and shook his head. “I offered you mercy, and you tried to kill us. So now I offer you justice.” Michael slightly bowed his head and pulsed. A powerful blue wave that sizzled as it bent the air shot out from him. The guards disintegrated faster than their bullets had, leaving on the ground glowing molten puddles of metal, all that was left of their guns.

Next he held up his hand and the RESATs all blew. Everyone breathed out in relief. The Electroclan’s power was back.

Michael looked at Hatch. “What am I going to do with you?”

Hatch turned and ran down one of the corridors. Michael didn’t move.

“He’s getting away!” Taylor shouted.

Michael looked at her with a slightly amused grin. “No, he’s not.” Then he rippled in an electric wave and vanished.

At the end of the dark corridor, Hatch ducked into one of the utility rooms below the bowl and locked and bolted the heavy steel door behind him. All around him were sweating pipes running from the bowl. He turned a valve, and a blast of steam shot out behind him. Then he pulled out his handgun. “Come get me, Vey.” Suddenly the room began to glow with light. Hatch turned around to see Michael, glowing brightly, standing behind him. “Okay.” He looked around. “It’s kind of steamy, though.” Hatch emptied his gun’s clip into Michael, but nothing happened.

Michael just looked at him pitifully. “After what just happened out there, you don’t really think that gun can do anything to me, do you?” Michael smiled. “I held lightning.” Hatch dropped his empty gun to the concrete floor. “What are you going to do to me?” “What should I do to the man who killed my friends? What should I do to the man who tried to kill my parents? To the man who just tried to kill me?” Michael cocked his head. “Well?” Hatch was too terrified to speak. Then he squeaked, “Mercy.” “Mercy? I don’t think you know what that word means. Do you have any idea what it’s like to be locked in Cell 25? When you stop knowing the difference between reality and pure horror? Yeah, I do.” Michael’s eyes narrowed. “There’s an idea. I could put you in Cell 25 for the rest of your life.” Hatch turned white. “Please . . .”

“Please, yes, or please, don’t do that? Because just saying ‘please’ is kind of confusing.” “Please don’t,” Hatch said.

“Okay, that makes sense.” Michael took a deep breath. “Then again, the terror of being strapped down and slowly lowered into the rat bowl. Not something I like remembering. Should I do that? Feed you to your own rats? That would be kind of poetic. Kind of a Frankenstein’s monster thing.” Hatch didn’t speak.

“Or there’s the one thing I haven’t experienced personally, but I’ve seen the result. I could cut your tongue off and put you naked in a monkey cage. Three of your own inventions. I’ll let you choose.” Hatch just looked at him fearfully. “Please, just kill me.”

“Make up your mind unless you want all three. A month in Cell 25, a year in the monkey cage, then the rats.” Hatch turned and grabbed the door handle. Michael pulsed, shocking Hatch just enough to drop him to his knees. “There’s no place you can hide, Dr. Hatch. I’m everywhere.” He looked up at Michael from the floor. “Mercy, please. Finish me!” “You don’t give orders anymore,” Michael said. “I gave you a choice. Now, what will it be?” Hatch closed his eyes, then said, “The rats.”

“The rats,” Michael repeated. “Good choice. Terrifying and painful, but the fastest of the three.” Michael leaned against one of the pipes. “The problem with the whole rat thing is that I would be imitating you, and I never want to be accused of doing anything you would do. But then, if I put you in Cell 25 or in the monkey cage, that would also be an imitation, wouldn’t it? And that would make me like you.

“But I can’t leave you around either. You wouldn’t stop trying to rule the world. You would just keep getting into trouble. So I’m going to show you what mercy is and just say good-bye.” Hatch looked up. “Good-bye?”

“Good-bye, Dr. Hatch.”

Michael pulsed in full. The blast was so hot that it scorched the metal door behind Hatch a powdery white. Admiral-General Hatch, the self-proclaimed messiah, was nothing more than a pile of smoking ashes. Michael stepped on them as he walked through the door back out to the corridor. “So ends another would-be god.”