Prometheus Ascending

Chapter 2

Two

All the screens turned black.

After about thirty minutes, the sounds around the van subsided. Björn sat there in silence. He stared at the man he had just killed. Manasseh. He looked so frail in death, yet he was the most powerful man on this planet in life. The last eldest. Cunning like a snake, ruthless in his attempt to build this terrible world order, and, along with it, the perfect human. He had experimented on innocent people and children to create something that would help him escape death. He didn’t succeed.

But in the end, this monster had proved to be the bigger man. The moment Björn decided to kill his friend was the moment Manasseh accepted death and spared Adama.

Björn looked around. The signals on the screens of the van had turned into noise he barely noticed anymore. The tube that connected Manasseh to the computer via the bio-technological bridge lay on the ground like a useless piece of plastic. Adama had knocked over his chair when he left, and there it rested still, as if waiting for him to return. But he wouldn’t. Björn was alone. Completely on his own. The walls of the van suddenly seemed to suffocate him. He needed to get out. He couldn't look at this corpse any longer, the limbs that hung lifelessly from the chair he was strapped to.

He tore the door open and ran into the forest. It was pitch black outside. He hardly saw the tree trunks. While he ran he stumbled over branches and stones, fell on the ground that felt cold and soft under his body, got up again and continued the sprint towards nothingness. He ran into the direction of the sounds that came from afar. Somewhere very, very far.

When his feet stepped on an asphalt road, he looked around. There was no light except for the light of the moon. There was no border, only its metal posts in the distance. Normally, this digital wall of ones and zeros would light up with bright red to signal to everybody that there was no entering the city.

But it vanished, along with the glow of city lights behind it. The city that never slept, that always was alight with bright colors, stood perfectly dark. To the right was the stand of forest he had just made his way through, illuminated by moonlight that reemerged from behind the clouds. To the left, abandoned hills and pastures, and some ruined stone houses. Björn looked up and saw the endless stars. Even the light of the moon seemed too bright to bear. What had he done?

He coughed. His breath was heavy. Except for the rays of moonlight, darkness ruled over the Neutral Area and everything that lay in front of him. Pure, all-consuming darkness. In the forest, crickets murmured, and an animal howled, interrupted by the throb of gunfire and hollow outcries rising occasionally from somewhere far away, carried by the cold wind around Björn’s shivering skin. The world as he knew it seized to exist.

And it was his fault.

He had killed Adama, technically. He had pressed the button and unleashed all of Kaari’s madness into the world. Now it terrified him. What would become of Annie? Of all the Highlanders and Lowlanders? He hoped they would remain somewhere safe in the outskirts, that this war would spare them somehow.

What had he done?

Maybe he didn’t believe that Kaari would destroy everything. Ruin civilization. End so many lives. The howling and yelling sounds that came from beyond the city, louder now, sent a chill down his spine. It was a war out there.

Where would he go? What would he do?

He was powerless, and now he had nobody.

Adama left him behind, and he couldn’t blame him. He had lost the friend he had cherished. He had lost everything and sent the world into darkness.

What have you done, Kaari?

No. He had done it. He had only himself to blame.

Björn started hyperventilating. His vision blurred from the pain and the guilt that consumed him. From all the mistakes he had made. The sense of worthlessness. He sat down on the cold concrete and buried his head in his knees and tried to come to his senses.

He would die here, wouldn’t he?

He deserved it.

He would die from the hands of anyone or anything that passed by this road—a Sub soldier, a drone, a Global Army soldier. Unless…

What if he could stop this madness? He knew Kaari’s handwriting, her manner of writing code. Maybe he could stop her virus, help the authorities get back electricity, keep the damage within limits. Save lives.

Their lives. They don’t deserve to live.

But did they deserve this? Bjorn wasn’t sure. It felt like Kaari’s demon in his head again, her rage spilling over into his heart. It was wrong. The children in the Raising Centre didn’t deserve this. Caleb didn’t deserve this.

Caleb.

He, too, had trusted Björn. And what had Björn done? Sent him into his death, connected him to the underground. He couldn’t have known that Thomas was involved. Was this true, what Thomas had said about Kaari? That she had voluntarily chosen a martyr’s death? That she had believed the Sub nonsense even more than Thomas?

Björn took a deep breath. He didn’t know what to do. Accept Kaari’s madness or try to fight it. Memories of him kissing her resurfaced in his mind. He couldn’t remember how her lips felt anymore. Nor the touch of her skin against his. It was too long ago, and he had tried too hard to forget. But this Kaari, the one he remembered now, was gentle and kind, adventurous and strong. What on earth had broken her?

Prometheus.

She had talked about it a lot. Was it this code? Was this the prophecy?

Voices came from behind him. He jumped up, looking for shelter. A group of Sub soldiers ran at him. They have seen him already and roared a battle cry. Their black linen cloaks flowed as they rushed forward. One of them raised a saber to aim at him. They presumably took him for a refuge from the cities. Or they just lusted for blood, no matter whose it was. There was no escape for him now, and all questions faded away into the darkness he himself had created.