Mercury gets Amira's folder on the front seat, writes: "Unstable, put on watch."
"Lisan, I never asked, how did your implant repair me? How did I live?"
"Because you didn't allow yourself to die."
"And you heard something screaming inside me, and you were nearby."
"Correct. It appears that fate wanted you to live."
"All this talk about fate . . . you didn't hear any of my crew?"
"No. I was blind in the desert, only following cries of awakening."
Mercury stays silent.
"We're going back. I need to get my belongings and get us a room in a building nearby."
"Mercury . . . who are you doing all this for?" he asks.
He blinks.
"I'm doing this for what I'm indebted to."
". . . I see."
Driving past the city, they enter the path again to Mala.
"I much prefer Mala than this," Lisan says.
"They're all the same, just under a different coat of paint," Mercury states.
Time passes, as silence fills the car.
. . .
Then, the GPS speaks, "Your destination has arrived."
The priest and the Replicant enter the base again.
"Supervisor Selune!" Mercury calls.
He leaves the file on the table, reconsiders.
She is nowhere to be seen.
Weird.
Every soldier is stunned.
Quickly, a soldier comes up to him, "Are you . . . 'Mercury?"
"What?" He asks.
Suddenly, a woman rushes behind him, and pats his shoulder.
"Alright . . . first lieutenant, get back to your duty." She points at the table as he walks away.
"Sorry about that." She smiles. "C'mon, I'll show you the change room."
"Before that . . ."
"Hm?"
He hands her the file.
"Please . . . don't throw this away."
"I'm sorry . . . don't be mad at me." She looks down, expressionless.
She leads Mercury and Lisan to the men's room.
"Here you go, General Mercury, and Father . . ."
"Lisan," the priest says.
"Father Lisan!" She stares at the tall, long tiger-haired man.
He smiles at her, takes off his sunglasses, and stares deeply at her.
Continuing to smile, she is lost in the layers of gold.
She bows down, "Forgive me . . . father."
Lisan walks into the men's room, his white robe brushing the floor.
"What did you apologize for?" Mercury asks.
"I-I don't know . . ."
Mercury gives out a faint smile, pats her shoulder, and goes into the room.
. . .
They wash up, and get in the vehicle again. As the black car flashed past the bridge, and entered the hollow country.
Zi Jin Cheng.
A home for the Bearers. Their long-silver musket-rifles laying on their shoulders awaits another brutality. Bald, pale, thin lips that never open, but their ears wide—only in hearing the next order.
Millions survive here—but do they live?
Lisan exhaled as the vehicle whirs a tune of nation.
"Steel cores forge the steamy dawn, Silent voices march as simply one, Freedom's shadow embarks, just as we all are . . ."
The priest glanced at the radio as if it were blasphemous. He turns it off calmly.
Mercury is quiet, a fist planted on his temple, pondering.
"We're the only ones outside in this dull place," he muttered.
Gradually, the pace picked up, and picked up.
Until—
The GPS uttered: "Your nearby hotel has arrived."
The building looks as regular as they all are.
Getting out, Mercury raises an eyebrow.
They entered, observant.
Inside, they peered at the dust-filled luxury. Crimson couches, gold lamps, and a carpet of wool lay soft. Past it, a clean, spotless reception desk in front of a model-like woman greeted them with piercing blue eyes.
Mercury asked for a booking, and smiled, brushing his hair and wired dreadlock back in charm.
Lisan noticed, faintly laughing.
The woman gave a keycard with "143" etched deeply into it, then pointed to an open stairwell to the left.
Both men walked through dusty railing. Silver wires dangle from red ceilings. They reached the fifth floor that matches the same threshold that their room number would place.
Lisan broke in laughter. "Did you like her?"
"I mean, yeah. You can't blame me," Mercury smiled.
Each room passed. Aromas of dust, and air permeated deeply.
139 . . . 140 . . . 141 . . . 142 . . . and—143.
Mercury swiped it, and the room opened by itself.
. . .
A perfectly clean room. No spot, no mess.
Mercury smirked, waved Lisan to enter. They sit down simultaneously, letting out a sigh.
Lisan creaked upward. "I'll be right back."
Mercury glanced as he walked away. Alone.
He peered to the right, saw dark curtains, and flipped them open.
It displayed a greenery of nostalgia. Blooming flowers and trees whisper in lullabies. He noticed a tab faint. He knelt, clicked it, and saw an array of options.
Elegant Beachside, Cozy Treehouses, Calm Campfires, Fantasy Aquariums, Stone Castles, Chilly Tundras . . .
"So that's why . . ." Mercury mumbled.
He saw an off button, then pressed it.
Whumpf.
Slowly unveiling itself. Then, reality showed its true colors.
"And they call us deceivers," Mercury cackled deafeningly.
He held his artificial heart, as he fell backwards.
How chaotic . . . and I know. They know, but refuse.
His cackling didn't halt, until he felt a rush. A rush like blood, but not the same.
Miracle-made veins rush blood to his brain and—he passes out. A static sound of derealization hit.
It spiked in his eardrums. A drowning sound of sand funneled into his brain. An asphyxiating anguish.
Until—
. . . .
Driftfall: Guilty Trance.
Mercury stared into darkness.
Cold, crisp winds passed by him, surreal in a manner that nearly fooled him.
A desert of white snow with patches of blood. Three shadows standing in front. Three withering trees stand behind them. Sixteen unidentified shadows in human figure stand tall far past them. Vast fences rest between the Replicant and the ones that couldn't.
Mercury opens his eyes. "I'm passed out." Then he notices.
"Nasir, Kadir, Farhan . . . the platoon . . ." the Replicant whispered.
In unison, they whispered: "You could not replicate us."
"There was no time . . . would you rather me die too? Yes, I'm distraught that you perished, but wouldn't you be at least glad that I lived?" Mercury interjected.
"You died, Mashia. You killed me too."
"If you had a shred of humanity left, and held back . . . I would've been saved by the evangelist, right?"
Mercury smiled. "Yet, you aren't you. You are a pretender." He began to laugh.
Suddenly, the Replicant tore the fence open, snapping every tie of chrome-bar bit by bit. The shadows stepped back.
Mercury walked through the broken steel.
"I will account for all your lives. I will live what you have, and tenfold past it." He put his foot down in front of Farhan.
"Tell me! Are you ready to see that my life was worth it after all?"
Shocked, the shadows dropped their jaws.
"I am a Miracle! You are not against me, for you now stand on my shoulders!" He paused.
"To Recurrence of all!" rallied Mercury.
Strong gusts passed, but Mercury didn't falter. The bloody tundra obeyed. His yellow-green eyes sharpened, his pale skin brightened, and his snowy hair whirled in dexterity. Within the bleached breeze, the shadows smiled as they began to decay.
They all bowed to Mercury. And like snow, they decayed fully. They withered once again . . .
Mercury closed his eyelids shut, long eyelashes scratching his dark eyebrows. He embraces, as he exhales.
"I will all live, you. To survive what you are worth." Sighing heavily, in grace.
Then—all went black again . . .
Driftfall: Complete.
My dream concludes, enlightening like the stars, and my reality regresses to live once more.
All of a sudden—
. . .
Mercury's crusted eyelids creak open.
"Happy belated, June first." The reception woman endeared in an empty expression as she shakily handed him a cake with candles shaped in a "20".
It was nighttime now.
Mercury leaned upward. "What . . . what's this?"
"My birthday celebration," the priest smiled.
The woman's hand hovered over the candle. Instantaneously, it glowed brightly.
Mercury blurted, "But it's June Sec—"
"To her, it's . . . my birthday," the priest uttered.
Mercury forced a timid grin, "So . . . you're 20?"
In a rhythm, the pretty-faced reception lady walked out.
"Oh please . . . The woman is just like you."
Lisan smiled, eating the cake. He continued, "Care for a slice, Mercury?"
"Elaborate," he said.
"You have a mind that thinks for itself." Lisan pulled a paper and pen, then started writing.
Holding it out, it read: "They all listen closely."
They?
Mercury mouthed the words, and Lisan nodded gently.
He looked at Lisan, faintly holding in laughter. Then, they guffawed until tears rained uncontrollably, until every listener knows that they're aware.
"Ahh. You know what, Mercury? Let's stop acting for these fools. I only serve the man above, not the ones we stand beside."
"Yeah, and who gave them so much authority anyway?" Smiling, Mercury lay on the bed. "Lies. They lie and can't even keep a clean country!"
They shook hands with firm arms, as they are brothers not by blood, but by drive. Cackles bloomed through the halls.
. . .
The reception woman was listening from outside the door—she never left. She stood straight, mouthing words, as her eyes luminate brighter.
A human? No, a Mercury without thoughts. Suddenly, the door opened—Mercury stood out the door, perceptive.
Nobody was in sight.
I have to get back quickly. I have a gut feeling. The last remnant of my platoon.
He left through the stairwell.
Something whispered to itself, "My Bearers decreed. Erase them. Mercy is rebellion."
In horror fashion, the reception woman dropped from the ceiling.
"01000001 01101100 01101111 01101110 01100101." Converting, it meant: "Alone."
Uncannily, the android swiftly opened the door with an eye scan and shaped its hand like a sharp spear.
Aiming for a quick strike, she flashed forward to see—
"P . . . pr . . ." her voice stalled, rebooting past binary, ". . . iest?"
Instantly, the grinning priest waved softly. As she was sliding forward, a rope-pulley system caught her. Its gear twisted, hugging her leg tight. A separate rope for pulling lay in his hand.
"Turn off your node of attack."
The woman whirred like a broken machine, without a word.
"I know you feel pain. Revere."
. . .
No response.
Scoffing, Lisan pulled the rope ever so slightly. An excruciating anguish spiked through.
"Gah!" she muttered, withstanding it.
"Inform me—would you like to be separated, part by part, in a garbage dump as you still breathe, Replicant?"
She shook violently. The rope was not ordinary—soft like yarn, yet with the tenacity and force of barbed wire.
It uttered, "Mercy, please . . ."
". . ."
"Gah! I don't want this! Let me go!"
Her leg gripped tighter by the rope as she trembled in mechanized angst. She noticed the details of what she was tied to. "No . . . no, you didn't—That's not rope!"
"Truth. It will gnaw at you until you speak only of gospel."
He looked at the woman with a glint of scorn in his golden eyes.
"You once had a mind." Declaring, "Now, turn off your connection."
Whirr. Sizzle. Buzz . . .
Her eyes dimmed as she sighed.
"Done. What is it you want?" the Replicant lady croaked.
"Your repentance, and answers."
"Never!" she roared ignorantly.
The room's quiet hum did not change.
Lisan exhaled and pulled it tighter. A suffocating despair shrouded every wire coursing blood throughout her body.
Pain was still accepted. One-to-one copies of another—just not the same soul.
As the soul can never be replaced. But a miracle did it anyway.
Lisan preached lightly. "How does it feel, being a slave who looks down on other slaves?
"You know nothing! The Bearers know what's right, and you are arrested by me!" the Replicant refused to give up.
"Despond," echoed the evangelist.
Abruptly, the woman went out like a luminant firefly.
Lisan shrugged, untied her, and dragged her past the hallway.
Feeling the presence of an empty room, he opened her eyelid to scan the door. It opened slowly on its own.
He placed the Replicant on a bed, looked behind as he locked the room shut, and walked back.
The priest whispered, "I never even asked for the poor girl's name."
He stared at the hand that pulled the rope. And—Simultaneously, he subjugated.
Snap!
Snap!
Snap!
Snap!
Snap!
. . .
Remorselessly, he shattered all five of his dense fingers like sprigs, one by one.
"By this, I forgive thee." Lisan's face remained blank.
. . .
Mercury arose from the stairwell. His fatigued, dark under-eyes cast a shadow under the small lights as he held a bag.
I can finally sleep . . .
Scanning the keycard, he entered the room.
He lumbered across the soft wool carpet and crashed into bed, letting go of what he held as he began to snore face first.
Lisan covered his whole body with the woolly blanket, not breathing a sound, as if listening. He could only think whilst engulfed by darkness.
How many more like her? How many more will pass by, and I say nothing? Up until today, I let inaction depart, for I never knew it.