Chương 63: CHAPTER 62 – Weak Forces

The sound of morning gulls and the icy sea breeze roused his hearing and his sense of touch, but it was only the sunlight that woke him fully. A lance of sun forced his eyelids open, imprinting on his eyes a sky lightly clouded, almost resembling a flock of sheep. The rustling of leaves accompanied his movements, disoriented by the frost." Where am I?" He stared at the scars across his chest in silence, running his finger over them.

To his eyes, they looked like a series of dark lines, but at intervals they reflected small numbers and symbols. He noticed, lying beside him in the damp grass, a ruined and burned lab coat." What became of the reactor? Why does my head hurt so much…" He picked the garment up from the ground and put it on, despite it being cold and wet. He pressed his hand to his head, trying to stay conscious. He looked around, curious about the sea of bare trees surrounding him.

A few steps away, a brick path covered in yellowing leaves." Is this the Institute? None of this makes any sense." Ignoring the pain in his temples, he began walking along that path, wrapped in the shadow of the clouds and the trees. With every step, he felt his head grow heavier and his vision blur, and yet his legs kept moving. His foot struck something, rousing him from his stupor. His eyes began to function normally again, focusing on the metallic green of the bench before him.

A warm sensation crossed the pores of his skin, drawing him ever closer to that wet, leaf-covered metal. He sat down, pressing his head into his hands, his elbows on his knees." This is where we spoke… But your name here was Lamb." He blinked to clear the tears and mucus from his eyes, but everything had already vanished. The rock, the forest, the delicate touch of the dew, and the cold wind had all disappeared, and the only company left to him was the sun over that endless expanse of grass.

He gripped the slats of the bench, his breath quickening." Is this where the wicked end up? It does not seem so bad, after all." A single step, and the grass transformed into brightly coloured flowers with long stems, unfamiliar even to him." I have failed, so why do I feel so free?" He picked a single white flower, gem-like, its petals square as a child's. He stroked its head before casting it into the wind.

"You are finally here! You truly have terrible taste in clothing." He turned sharply, finding before him an enormous oak tree, reaching almost to the sky. At its foot, a figure wrapped in a white coat, covered in ash and ruined by fire. He stared at that woman in silence, through his glistening pupils, without realising he had already dropped to his knees in the flowering field." So this is what this place has in store for me?"

He could not control his own lips, pressed into a grimace of grief and sorrow, stained with tears. She shook her head, smiling with her face streaked by burns. She extended a hand, wrapped in shards of iron and lacerated, urging him to come closer.

"We meet again, Gray! You missed me, didn't you?" Grayson Dirac could not hold back his tears, dropping his head to the ground. With force, he struck the earth, clawing at the soil with his nails.

"Come now, stop that! It grieves me to see you like this." Erika took a step forward, rousing the scientist from his delirium. A tear slid across her burns, silencing Grayson.

"Are you not glad to see me again? Has work taken a piece of your heart, perhaps?" Grayson stared at her in silence, shaking his head slowly. Erika nodded, with a faint smirk.

"Why are you here? What is this place? I am dead, I was killed… Why am I breathing, why am I crying?" Erika looked at him, lowering her head and picking a flower from the ground.

"You are not dead, and I am not Erika. This space is something within your own psyche. You are still breathing. It is simply that you are dreaming of something, right now." She broke the flower between her fingers, letting the petals fall onto the earth.

"Is that not too real to be a dream?" The scientist murmured, meeting Erika's gaze, silent and motionless within that smile.

"It could well be, given that you are no longer a human being at this point." The sleeve of her coat lifted at once, pointing to his right. Grayson turned his gaze, catching sight of a dense cloud of lightning bolts, grim and bluish. Wrapped in a veil of shadow, a black and rotting field, where no life stirred in the wind. He stared in horror at the motionless figure at the centre of that graveyard, petrified by its appearance.

At the heart of that ruin stood himself, his horns broken and lit by the reflections of the lightning. He immediately fixed his gaze on the scars across his own chest, disgusted by their resemblance.

"You now stand at a crossroads, and you will not wake until you have chosen which path to walk." The entire field around them vanished, leaving them immersed in an enormous, boundless white space. Both stood, separated by a thin line traced by blackened leaves.

"Do you know what this is?" Erika pointed the tip of her foot against the boundary, and Grayson did the same, shaking his head.

"It is the end. The border that separates all things." Erika smiled, taking a step backward. Behind her, like the distorted reflection in a puddle, an expanse of grey sand began to manifest, beneath a sky of shadow. Behind Grayson, an enormous forest wrapped in rain and the untouched light of dawn.

"I am here, and you are there, and this is precisely the first choice you must make." Erika smiled, pointing at his chest. The scientist felt at his own heart, finding no beat.

"Erika Well is dead, and she will never return. Your heart does not beat because Grayson Dirac died along with her, or at least, that is what you believe." Grayson continued to listen for a heartbeat.

"I dedicated everything I had to making her happy, to seeing her again... And now you tell me it was all for nothing? You tell me it is already over? That my humanity, my history, everything I have done, amounted to absolutely nothing?" A smile began forming on his lips as he pressed his hand to his face.

"Was everything I thought a lie made from my dying body?" His hysteria died down the moment he saw Erika's expression. The tears stopped running down his face, and a shiver pierced his skin.

"Unfortunately, you must let her die if you wish to keep living. She has accepted it, but you continue to despair." Erika took another step back, drawing ever closer to the reflection behind her. Grayson reached out his hand, setting his foot beyond the boundary. In that instant, an expression of horror appeared on Erika's face, and she lunged toward him at once. The scientist fell to the ground, pressing a hand to his cheek. Erika was breathing hard, her hand dripping with blood.

Her trembling pupils, in eyes filled with crimson tears, reflected the shocked face of Grayson.

"Why?" Her hand began to tremble, spraying blood across the leaves and the white floor. Her voice was broken, getting rasper and harsher every second.

"Do you not see that everything you do wounds her? She only wants to see you change your path, and here you are, already prepared to kill yourself." Grayson pulled his hand away from his cheek, lingering on the small drops of blood smeared across his fingers.

"You tried to forget it, to tell yourself it did not matter to you, but all of that was only a way of refusing to accept anything. You rejected everything, even your own life, and now you still try to flee from everyone and everything." Grayson rose to his feet, staring at her, motionless, his eyes wide.

"Who are you, really?" The whisper echoed through that space, sending the reflections behind them rippling, as when a stone strikes water.

"You can consider me your conscience, or of everything. I can't speak of what I am. I can only speak of what you can do. You sacrificed yourself to become Erika's lover, but you are not a role, you are a person." Erika's figure began to shift, transforming into the monstrous apparition at the centre of that dead clearing.

"You are not even a monster. You are Grayson Dirac. You must remember what you are beyond everything." Around them, the reflections began growing clearer and larger, stabilising into the infinite white of the horizon.

"You must live… Otherwise every promise, every wish, and your own existence will vanish." Grayson stared at that image, so different from himself, for a few seconds, sighing slowly.

"How can I do that… I have attempted to kill thousands of people. How can someone like me possibly be destined to live, after all this?!" He struck his own chest with his hand, pressing his nails into his skin. The figure's hands, once again bearing Erika's likeness, stroked his face. The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

"You must try to live again to find out… This is a farewell for me, but not for you." From the horizon, great waves emerged, flooding everything, slowly reaching their throats. They found themselves staring at one another through the abyssal blue, only a few steps apart.

"I am glad to bid you farewell one last time. Perhaps we will meet again in different guises in the future, but for now, my regards." The current carried them apart from one another. Grayson thrashed, trying to seize her, but his weakened body could not resist the force of the water.

"You are that figure, right?! You were there! What are you!" A gleeful smirk appeared on the silhouette's face, illuminated by a flash of purple and golden lights.

"I wanted… I wanted to talk more! Don't go… DON'T GO!!" These words turned into bubbles, shattered instantly by the violent motion of the sea. His vision darkened, lost in an unknown abyss. Before him appeared an enormous column of an uncertain colour: perhaps white, or perhaps something else entirely. The gigantic cylinder began to pulse, echoing through the seabed like a heart. With every contraction, new numbers clouded its surface, until they branched out like roots in the deep water.

Grayson fixed his gaze carefully on the column, drawing ever closer, its surface mirroring his own reflection. It was exactly like that monster everyone had called the Architect, and yet its expression was far removed from the one on the scientist's face. A faint smile, framed by eyes charged with determination. Grayson, by contrast, was worn out, dark circles weighing down his already dull, heavy gaze.

"You…" He extended his hand to touch it when suddenly other figures occupied the reflection. Behind him appeared two distinct men, their faces obscured. To his right, a tall man wearing a long coat with bluish patterns and a bandage covering his eyes and the bridge of his nose. To his left, a figure mantled in a bluish robe, his hands covered in dark scars resembling lightning. Both pointed at Grayson's reflection, which was growing steadily more faint and evanescent.

Before the scientist could touch it, the column crumbled, raising a current that immediately carried him back toward the surface. A blinding light utterly ruined his awakening. His throat was dry, his eyes moist and weary despite his rest. He lifted his torso, feeling with every movement a sharp, intense pain beneath his abdomen. He looked around, fixing his gaze first on the dark blankets and the walls papered in red and black.

Before him, an enormous window overlooked an industrial city, one the scientist had never seen in his life.

"And now, what place is this?" He murmured, forcing himself to stand. Nausea overtook his senses, sending him staggering toward the glass. With difficulty he managed to sit in the armchair with its broad backrest, decorated with golden crests. He looked around a little, fixing his gaze on the canopied bed and the great door of thick, dark wood. He wore nothing but a nightshirt and bandages soaked in ointment.

"We do not advise you to speak to him, Mrs. Worhol. We do not yet know whether his condition permits it." He heard a murmur of voices from beyond the door, followed immediately by silence. The heavy wooden door opened, admitting a woman dressed in a red suit with a honeycomb pattern. The moment she saw him, she smiled and turned toward the doorway, seized a tray, and closed the door behind her.

"Good morning, sleepyhead! You have no idea how worried you have made me." The tray in her hands trembled with every step, stirring the dark liquid inside the blue glass carafe. She slowly set it on the small table beside the armchairs and sat down as well, fixing Grayson's face. The scientist remained motionless, staring at that sharp, feminine face, charged, at the same time, with determination and a sinister aura of power.

"Not hungry? Look, they are not poisoned." She extended her fingers toward a silver plate, full of thin golden rectangles covered in a glaze. With a smile, she put one in her mouth and began chewing. Grayson did the same, surprised by the taste, and immediately reached for another. Without realising it, he began pouring the boiling drink into the cup, under the woman's rapt gaze.

"I had not imagined you had such an appetite…" She poured herself a drink as well, sipping slowly from the steaming cup. The woman studied him for a few seconds before clearing her throat.

"Is it not impolite to leave the entire conversation to the woman?" She smiled, tilting her head as Grayson continued eating and chewing. When every plate on the tray was emptied, the scientist fixed her with a veil of confusion and embarrassment.

"Who are you?" He asked, setting the cup on the table and straightening his nightshirt as best he could. The smile on her face immediately widened, almost as though a sense of pride had been kindled by that question.

"Lexa Worhol, current director of Machinamentum." Grayson looked around in silence, beginning to gather every clue. He fixed his gaze on the luxury of the bed, the crumbs of the delicacies, and finally the woman before him.

"That Machinamentum?! The war industry that grew rich during the conflict and controls the whole of Sector III? THAT MACHINAMENTUM?!" He fixed his gaze on the floor as thin drops of sweat began forming on his brow.

"Yes, we are exactly what you think, and no, we are not as cruel as you believe." Lexa seized his hands, forcing him to look her directly in the face. The scientist swallowed, realising he was incapable of fleeing from that woman.

"These days we are, to put it briefly, a 'Research and Development Centre.' Certainly, we produce weapons, but for different kinds of clients and tasks." The expressions on their faces were opposite: Lexa smiled with joy, while Grayson wore a grimace of anguish.

"You are not convinced, are you?" Lexa released him, withdrawing into her armchair. Grayson let out a sigh of relief, immediately covering his mouth. The light struck the room a second time, reflecting off Lexa's eyes and her bracelets.

"If you still do not trust me…" A gelatinous black mass gathered at her feet, crackling and clinging to the legs of the chairs. Suddenly, the substance withdrew behind Lexa's armchair, emerging with human features. It did not take long for the shadow to become an exact copy of the real Lexa.

"I am exactly like you." She smiled, immediately withdrawing her clone and fixing the astonished Grayson.

"Or at least, roughly so. You are an even more extraordinary case than mine." Lexa rose to her feet, adjusting her hair at the back of her neck and fixing her gaze on the smoke rising from the black and white smokestacks of the factories.

"Perhaps now we can give you the explanations you de—" A faint little laugh reached her from behind.

"Kill me." Lexa turned toward him. Grayson's face was wrapped in a veil of resignation. The first tears were already ready to fall from his eyes.

"Someone like you can kill me, right? I would wager you are capable of it. Please, kill me." The scientist turned toward her, his smile decorated by a copious flow of tears. Lexa stared at him for a moment before drawing closer to him.

"I would rather not…" Without warning, the woman wrapped her arms around his neck and stroked his silvery hair. Her perfume bonded itself to Grayson's skin, slowly taking root in his memory.

"Even if I had the means to do so, I would not. I know what you have been through, and that is precisely why I brought you here." Lexa slowly drew away from him, fixing him with a stern, dark expression.

"You have the right to live, as we all do, even though we are not human. I imagine you too have someone you owe something to, or some goal." Grayson's heart plummeted in his chest, leaving him motionless, staring at his own hands.

"I would like to have you at my side. I know you have everything necessary to help me, and I will help you. Believe me. I have never forgotten a single debt in my life." Lexa clicked something in her ear, and after a moment, a pair of masked women in uniform entered the room. In their hands, an envelope and a red box.

"Consider them a personal gift. After all, I did drop a bombardment right on top of you." The attendants immediately handed the box to the scientist, followed at once by a set of keys. Grayson hesitated to open the packages, limiting himself to staring at the reflections on the gilded metal.

"Unfortunately, the room is not yet ready, but we have a residence near the laboratory, if that would please you." One of the women explained, indicating the smaller key, shaped like a silver corkscrew.

"I do not want an answer right away. Rest, and think it over. Whatever it is, we can accommodate it." Lexa rose, gesturing to the two women to precede her. With alarming speed, they left him alone. The sunlight faded just as quickly, almost as though time itself had stopped.

"Even though you are confused right now and do not know what to do, know that you have every right to remain here. All of us were bad people, at some point in our lives." She seized the door handle, obscured by shadow.

"The truly bad people are the ones who stop, on that road." A gust of icy wind filled the room, bringing Grayson back to his senses. Lexa slowly vanished beyond the doorway, leaving only her words to keep the scientist company." I am certain that whatever you choose… You will not regret it." Grayson took the box and the packages and set them at the foot of the table, slowly rising to watch the sun return to shine beyond the smoke.

He glanced at the symbols carved into his chest and at his own reflection in the glass, sighing.

"Must I truly choose?" He murmured to himself, gathering the packages from the floor and arranging them on the armchair.