Hardbingers

21

The Oculus's insides jumped as the ringing of the phone jangled through the enveloping darkness. With each passing minute the temperature had dropped, but his body was nowhere near as cold as his soul.

For as he'd sat in this black neverwhere he'd been forced to listen to the Adversary as he whispered his insidious, serpentine soliloquy.

What I'm going to tell you will upset you, make you doubt yourself and your calling…

The Oculus hadn't thought that possible, and had listened through a wall of iron confidence. His calling was his heritage, in his genes.

But now…

As Rasalom had talked on, his words rang true, resonating with the Oculus's own questions about the Ally's recent alarms. And toward the end, as he saw how it hewed to a certain frightful logic, he realized that Rasalom might very well be telling the truth.

It sickened the OcuJus to his soul to realize that he might have been involved in—

He heard the phone's receiver rattle off its cradle and a voice say, "Hello?"

Rasalom had picked up the call and… it took the Oculus a few heartbeats before he realized that Rasalom was speaking in a perfect imitation of his voice.

"Very well. Good work… You sound upset. I can hear it. 1 feel your pain… Yes, well, we answer to a higher calling, don't we? You must take solace in that."

Then the sound of the receiver returning to its cradle.

"And there it is," Rasalom said softly in his previous voice. "Confirmation from the yenigeri themselves. A bit late calling back, don't you think? Perhaps because they're upset. I sensed their inner turmoil. They aren't yet aware of what I've told you, and perhaps they never will be, but they sense that something is not right, that something is askew. It's causing confusion. And confusion is… delicious."

And then those eyes with the unblinking stare hovered before him again.

"Well, now that the Alarm has been answered and the mission complete, I don't see that I have any further use for you. The important question is, how to dispose of you?"

The Oculus's bladder clenched. The yeniceri—what were they doing? If only one of them would call, or stop in, or—

"But another question is, what to do with your daughter?"

Not Diana! No, please!

If only he could speak, shout…

Rasalom's tone became mocking. "Ah, the concern of a loving parent for the safety and well-being of his beloved offspring. I sense your terror, your dread, your plummeting self-worth because of your helplessness. Tasty."

The Oculus's mind screamed for help. Where was the Ally in all this? Where was the Sentinel? Or even the Heir? Why was this being allowed to happen?

"On the other hand, I may let her live. Give those lackeys you call yeniceri someone to rally around after they work through their loss, their sense of impotence and worthlessness. After a suitable period of self-flagellation, they'll recover and move on to a renewed purpose, a sense of hope, a search for redemption after having failed you so. Let them feel they've succeeded in protecting their new Oculus, then crush them again."

Bastard.

"I know what you're thinking: Why do this piecemeal? Why not go from Oculus to Oculus—say, one a day—and kill each in a serial massacre? Perhaps because all the pieces of the elaborate clockwork I've been assembling are not yet in place. And although the deaths of the Oculi are necessary to the plan, they are but one facet. So it amuses me to spend the intervening time—and you may trust me that it will not be long—removing you poor excuses for prophets at random intervals. The human mind is comforted by patterns, but I shall offer none.

"Now, a question you're probably asking—besides why must I face this alone?—is why is he telling me all this? Well, call it a weakness, but the truth is, my existence does not allow me much opportunity to talk about these things—at least with someone who knows the truth."

The Oculus wished he could shout his own take on the truth: You want to gloat!

"I used to have a companion. I called him Mauricio, but that was not his name. I could discuss anything with him—even argue with him. I miss that. He died along with your beloved Twins. A mutual tragedy."

The Twins? Dead?

The Oculus had been all but sure that their absence meant they were dead, but now to hear it from the Adversary himself…

If he'd had a voice he would have sobbed.

Rasalom heaved a sigh as heavy as it was artificial.

"But enough talk. Time to get down to business. Your demise must occur in a way that causes the most consternation, evokes the most revulsion in the survivors. I'm good at that. An artist, you might say. I've already done my masterpiece—hard to believe it's been four years already. I tailored it for a certain man—to drive him to his knees, to crush him into the dirt. I thought I'd succeeded, but I've learned he's still standing. I intend to remedy that. As for you, however… you shall be an acceptable lesser work."

And then the cold, silent, wrenching, tearing agony began…