Chronicle of Nautilus

Chapter 34: A Monster in The Dungeon

“Open it now!” Tom ordered.

“Why should I?” a voice from a small rectangular window replied.

“Because—” The door budged slightly. “—I could go in with the door.”

“C’mon, relax.”  An ugly cripple opened the door and spit his words,  “You’re not welcome? Just so you know. ”

“As if I would care.” Tom walked forward ignoring the guard.

This place contained the necessary evil he allowed to exist. At all times there were people of different nature. The needs and desires they had might have been restricted by law.  But Tom knew that they would find ways to get what they want. Why not give them a taste of satisfaction in a controlled environment?

The screams and moans echoed in the distance as Tom moved in the darkness. He quickly got to the end of the maze to the office of a little crime lord. He turned the knob and entered silently.

The room was different from what he had seen a couple of years ago – tidiness, expensive furniture and erotic pictures were substituted by piles of junk.

Tom misplaced his leg and got bruised by sharp edges of a dismantled industrial drone.  He jumped over a heating element that probably was once a part of chemical labs equipment. With next precisely placed step he avoided a thick tangled wire, which must have once been a part of a powerful heater. After the footing was clear he stopped, and inspected the place again.

Immediately his attention was caught by a metallic arm moving behind a junk pile, picking out tiny wires of what Tom identified was a plasma module from advanced security equipment. As he got closer and closer to the arm he felt more and more compelled to turn around and leave. During the last year there had been too many surprises.  He stepped round the pile and saw a creature - a human shaped machine, far from perfect.  He knew the remains of the man in the shell once.

“Lou, what the hell have you done to yourself?” Tom asked his giving no effort to hide the disgust.

“Oh, a bit of this, a bit of that,” the creature replied cheerfully. And out of nowhere his mood changed. He snapped, “Who dares to disturb me?!”

The creature took a moment of thought and continued with a calm voice. “Oh, it’s you my old friend. Happy to see you, no one visits me anymore.”

Even for Tom, who had seen more atrocities than anyone, the glitching half-human was deeply disturbing. He asked compassionately, “You little poor man. You must have been busy, so busy…”

“Yes, busy…”

“I trusted you and you tricked me, Lou. What happened? Who wrote the reports in your place for the last year?”

“Not your business!” The man hissed and continued cheerfully. “It’s all me, it’s just old Lou, yes.”

“Here, let me help.” Tom extended his hands and helped Lou to extract the wires out of small tubes from the device. The creature had hard time coordinating his moves. “How long will it take for you to finish this?”

“Years or two, or more or even more… hard to get the rare ingredients, you know.” The creature focused on his shaking hand while putting a wire into a small box.

“Poor Lou, tell me, what friends are visiting you these days?”

“Only old friends. But they visit Lou only for business. No one comes to ask how I do. Bastards!” he spit the last word.

“I see. Tell me Lou, how do you do?”

Lou replied spouting with childish optimism.  “Oh I’m fine, now when you asked. Once I finish I will be even better. Everything will be much better.”

“You seem to be glitching. Could I help you in any way?”

“Don’t worry for Lou. Everything will be fixed when I’m done. Is there anything Lou can help you with?”

“Yes.” Tom noticed he had gained confidence of the creature. “There is someone who wants to hurt us all. Have you heard of it? He has many faces and one of them is Glen Usher.”

“Glen is a nice guy, he brings me things, I give him things, we talk.”

“What are you talking about? What are you trading? Where does Glen apply those items?” Tom again took out a few wires out of the device and put them in a small box to help the creature.

Lou replied in his old human voice, the voice Tom used to hear before his man turned into a freak “Glen is on to something, I don’t know what, nor do I care much. I need to do everything possible to finish this ‘suit’. I’m running out of time. He brings me the parts I seek. I give him what he needs – mainly explosives and custom weaponized drones. You know him. He would get them elsewhere if not from me. There are other people who like to trade. Some stuff I gave him is very rare, you should watch—” Lou glitched out again and started hissing sarcastically. “The great Tom Landau comes to visit a worm such as me, such honor. One of many who had forgot Lou, but Lou will make you remember him, yes he will.”

Tom took a step away from his unstable ex-protégé and said, “Oh I will remember you, don’t you worry, old friend. I will check on you from time to time from now on.”

Lou started laughing silently and murmuring words. He did not stop before Tom had left.

How was he still in control of this place? Tom asked himself, Were the people inside afraid of him, or…

He opened a random room - a dead body was rotting on the ground. He opened the next door and there - five people lying on white hospital beds were being watched over by a man in white suit. The third room he checked was a couple lying in bed naked, their eyes frozen directed the ceiling looking at illusions induced by the a liquid being injected to their veins through drug bags hanging on the wall. Tom skipped a couple of doors and entered the fourth room of his choice. There lay a pile of dead bodies, the smell was unbearable. The last picture was more than enough to understand the situation this place was in. An action will be needed to be taken to fix it,  he thought.

Tom was about to leave when a boy accidently bumped into him. The boy’s insides shook, the sound of metal scratching against metal could be heard. The boy stood up, slipped past Tom and sprinted into the darkness.  Landau turned around. He caught on the running kid in a second, he gripped the boy by the shoulder, turned him around and gently pushed him against the wall.

“What’s the hurry?”

“Not your business,” the boy snapped. He used his arms to crush Tom’s controlling hand, but to no avail. The boy’s effort did not go unnoticed. Tom felt as if small powerful clamps were closing on his hand. “Tough bastard!” the boy cursed.

“You’re so funny.” Tom smiled at the kid. He grabbed the boy’s shirt with his free hand and lifted it up – there was a plastic cover on his belly. Tom took it off. A synthetic kidney slightly covered by metal on one side could be seen. “The hell,” Tom silently said and let the boy go.

“Scum!” the child shouted into Tom’s face before running away into the maze.

Tom left the building without straying away from the main path. There was a taste of disgust in his mouth.

******

Once he got back to the office he sent his men to get to the maze to clean it up. They did a great job, but there was only one problem. When they got there, Lou and the boy had already disappeared.

Tom sat on a couch, checking different designs of explosives and drones on the projected windows in front of him. He picked out devices and dragged them to the side. There was a steel ball with the size of a fist, the eye it had projected four laser beams. Another window had explosives of different types – a matchbox and a few kinds of grenades, sparkling in different colors. Tom looked at the windows murmured “What are you up to?”