Chapter 47: While Rome Burns (1/2)

When the bathysphere reached the shore, it stopped at the only place which the Meta-Gang hadn’t opened fire on yet: their own turf.

Ryan walked the streets of Rust Town, people fleeing the neighborhood in panic on the other side of the road. The toxic atmosphere, already terrible, was now saturated with smoke and ashes. Without his mask on, the courier might have coughed every minute. The locals were so terrified of the orbital bombardment, that they trampled on other people while trying to escape.

Another pillar of light hit New Rome’s south, illuminating the skies and causing a mini-earthquake. A building crumbled at Ryan’s left, forcing him to use a time-stop to avoid falling stones and glass shards. He kept going through the chaos until he reached his destination.

The Junkyard.

Before going to this cursed place, the courier had tried to contact, well, everyone. But he received no answer but static when he used his phone. Either the orbital laser had damaged underground cables and other methods of communications… or there was nobody left to answer him.

And when he had looked at Ischia Island from the coast, Ryan only saw flames and smoke.

Ryan had seen the worst hells the post-apocalyptic Earth had to offer across his travels. Irradiated cities, mutant-infested ruins, Monaco, and stuff straight out of H.R. Giger’s worst nightmares. But none had hit him as hard as New Rome’s current state.

The courier had found his bad ending, and it was all his fault.

He shouldn’t have waited for Leo’s Carnival to arrive in town nor left the bunker in the Meta’s hands; even Augustus would have been more responsible than Adam with this technology. The courier might not have pulled the trigger, but he left the gun for anyone to find.

Ryan was alone now, just like when he lost Len the first time. Except for all he knew, she probably died on that island. Died saving him.

He would have to go back in time. He couldn’t continue after this.

All Ryan could do now was clean up the trash.

As he walked inside the Junkyard’s ruins, Ryan started to hear music. An indie-rock tune, sung by none other than Big Fat Adam himself. Only rats watched as the courier made his way through molten trash hills.

In preparation for the confrontation, Ryan had rigged a bomb hidden beneath his suit alongside his other ultimate weapon, to explode on command. It would make him reload should Adam have one last trick up his sleeve. Thankfully, he always kept a dose of Rampage on himself, and so juiced himself up for the big finish. One way or another, this run would end soon.

The scene that awaited the time-traveler at the Junkyard’s center was almost surreal, even by his standards.

A mighty, technologically advanced communication tower had sprung from the ground, close to the bunker’s entrance. The device reminded Ryan of a black obelisk, albeit one covered with antennas pointed at the sky.

And the Meta-Gang were partying in its shadow.

They had cleared the trash around it to form a wide area of ground on which to stand, half the size of a soccer field. After all that happened during this loop, only five of the Psychos had survived to its final conclusion: Big Fat Adam, Frank the Mad, Acid Rain, Sarin, and a fifth soon-to-be-dead maniac. And instead of securing the area, the group had decided to hold a music jam. Acid Rain and Sarin were playing guitars, Frank was at the bass, Adam sang with a mike.

Ryan recognized the fifth one as the Land’s rumored true form, which Jasmine had briefed him on. He could have mistaken the deformed creature for a parody of Area 51 aliens: a misshapen, mouthless humanoid with baby-like short legs and a humongous, hairless head. Unlike its softer grey-skinned cousins, the Psycho seemed almost entirely made of solid dirt, with her eyes glowing yellow.

Holding a rock concert while the city burned? Typical Psychos. But worst of all, Adam looked happy. Blissfully happy, even as smoke and firestorms filled the skies.

This. This scene summed up the Meta-Gang in a nutshell.

“You should have named yourself Big Nero, Whalie,” Ryan taunted them as he revealed himself, laser blade in his right hand and a sharp edge to his wit. “That would have been more appropriate. Though I would have suggested a fiddle.”

The music stopped, as Ryan leaped onto the open field and faced the Meta. The Land immediately reacted by mentally lifting dirt below her, forming a platform to fly on. Perhaps her geokinetic power was inversely proportional to her range, and fusing with an area came at the cost of precision.

“A thief!” Acid Rain snarled, throwing away her guitar and drawing a knife. “I’ll gut him open!”

“Behind me, Mr. President!” Frank the Mad declared, rising from behind the bass and tossing it out of his way. The three meter and a half-tall titan prepared to smash the courier like an egg.

Adam raised a hand, stopping his teammates dead in their tracks.

“Come on,” Hannifat Lecter said with a cheerful grin, eyeing Ryan with amusement. His soft human skin quickly turned to a shell of hardened carbon. “It’s Cesare. He’s almost part of the family.”

“And soon I will be an orphan,” Ryan replied with venom. His eyes trailed to the tower behind the group. The Meta must have caused the tremors Len sensed beforehand by unearthing it.

“Wait, he’s alone?” Sarin asked the Land, who raised her tiny arms in confirmation. “Wow, it’s true what they say. Some folks are just too dumb to live.”

“Don’t worry about that, Miss Flatulence,” Ryan replied, stretching his limbs. “You won’t live past the next ten minutes.”

“And here I thought you came to listen to our performance,” Adam said with mock sadness. “It’s Franz Ferdinand’s This Fire, mate. One of the last songs the band recorded before the wars. Still, call me surprised. A full blast on that island and you lived? They don’t make doomsday weapons like they used to.”

“So, you were targeting me personally?” Ryan asked. “I’m honored you thought you needed a Mechron-made WMD to take me out. Must have been hard to see me with a paunch that big.”

“You and the precog princess. When things started to go sour, I tried to look for the cause, and your name came up a lot.” Adam raised his fingers as if to count. “First you got Ghoul, then you put Psyshock six feet under the only way he could ever be. Then the Land tells me you convinced Augustus’ goons to give pursuit instead of letting us skip town. That’s an awful lot of coincidences, mate. I think you knew exactly what we came in town for, and tried to beat us to the prize.”

“What can I say?” Ryan shrugged his shoulders. “I’m a cheat. Did you see the name Cesare in the Dynamis’ files? Because it looks like you sent them a pretty nasty severance package.”

“Their Elixir supply and resources were useful… until they weren’t.” Adam dropped his mike and adjusted his clothes. “There’s a whole juice lab down there, mate. Advanced enough to make knockoffs of our own. For my men, that’s all that matters.”

“But not for you,” Ryan noticed. “Before I kick your whale ass and make sure this horrible moment never happens again, you’re going to answer one question, because I truly want to know.”

“A last request?” The Meta straightened around Adam and tossed away their instruments, like a hyena pack waiting for the signal to attack. “Do tell, I’m in the mood to honor it.”

“Why?” Ryan asked, pointing at the burning city. “Why?”

Adam chuckled. “Actually, mate,” he said, a savage grin on his face. “This is all your fault.”

Ryan’s fingers tightened around the laser blade. “My fault?”

“Your fault. See, I’ve been juicing up on Elixirs for almost fifteen years. You know the drill. My genetic code degrades, causing cellular degeneration, shortening telomeres, mental instability, tumors, etc... until I take a shot and become healthy again. For a while, I was happy that way. Until I noticed a tiny problem.” Adam raised his thumb and index finger, keeping them straight and close to one another without touching. “My powers are starting to go, let’s say, haywire. I guess the Elixirs can’t heal everything, ya know? Bugs slip through.”

“You’re going to die.” Having studied their condition, Ryan knew very well that the Elixirs Psychos consumed were just delaying the inevitable. “Good.”

“Yeah, yeah, well, I came to this place because I thought I could find a cure. But now that you killed Psyshock, we can’t fully hijack Mechron’s central mainframe. We could only settle on partial control.” Adam shrugged, though the dangerous glint in his eye betrayed his true feelings. “Thanks for ruining everything, boyo.”

“You’re welcome. I did my best.”

“Well, looks like you messed up pretty bad then. Because partial control meant we could get our hands on that big interstellar firestick… and it got me thinking.”

Adam looked into Ryan’s eyes, and for a second, the courier saw it all. All the sociopathic, solipsistic narcissism lurking beneath the friendly facade. The savage beast wearing the human skin.

“I’m going to die, but you people…” Adam’s sneer turned into one of pure hatred. “You will continue to live your miserable, meaningless lives as if I never existed. That’s fucking selfish, mate. So I figured, pharaohs and kings, they were entombed with their slaves; that’s just the way things are. If I have to go, then my sendoff party will set the whole place on fire.”

Jonestown.

It was Jonestown all over again.