Page 11 of The Godhead Complex
To her, he was still gone.
His mind was more fragile than ever, still completely mad. Being asleep in the dreamworld for only ten minutes could sometimes send him spiraling into paranoia. But his visions never made clear sense. And because of her gift she was able to see clearly how the Evolution was meant to unfold. How it was exactly what the world needed to continue. She tried to tell Nicholas and Mikhail the things she knew, but they wouldn’t listen. To be fair, they might not have understood, anyway. The world needed more brilliant minds like hers to keep advancing. Visionaries. True Gods and True Goddesses. Damn, she had an ego.
The Evolution wasn’t for everyone, to be sure. No. It couldn’t just be handed out like loaves of bread on Sunday. There needed to be tough decisions in who advanced and who stayed within the confines of their own minds. And she certainly couldn’t let it be wasted on the population already infected with the Flare. It was a sacred thing, the Evolution.
She carefully set the vial back into the leather briefcase.
Years ago she’d have died for the mere chance that Mikhail might live. But now . . . now Alexandra would give him only one chance to join the Evolution or she’d erase him. Erase him without so much as a blink of regret.
Sadness, perhaps. But not regret.
Mikhail controlled his breathing, outside in the crisp Alaskan air, just as Nicholas had once taught him: inhale for three seconds, hold his breath for three seconds, exhale for three seconds. He repeated this without thought. The trinity. The power of three. The breathing was an attempt to control his anger but the efforts were wasted. There was no inhaling and exhaling and no mindful meditation that could calm him now.
His brain clicked with anger. The smell of Nicholas’ apartment hung within his nose as if a rat had crawled inside his skull and perished days ago. Thoughts became sounds within his head and those sounds were the symphonies of war. Guns firing. Knives stabbing. Swords swordifying. Mikhail’s feet took double the length of steps as he walked to Alexandra’s building.
Could a crazed Pilgrim have decapitated Nicholas?Possibly, but there was no doubt in Mikhail’s mind that Alexandra was the voice behind the command. When he couldn’t find the Coffin, the sealed red-leather case that held Newt’s blood, in Nicholas’ apartment, he knew who’d taken possession. Her love for power had finally outweighed her love for mankind. Or her love for a kind man. Nicholas was mad, but he was kind. And without his guidance, Alexandra wouldn’t be held to any standards . . . and Mikhail wouldn’t either. He didn’t have the capacity.
He searched his memory for Nicholas’ voice. Memories fragmented in Mikhail’s mind, blips of conversations, faded glimpses of events, but he knew for sure, surer than sure, that their former master had planned to release the Cure. He’d even warned Mikhail of all the ways Alexandra might try to get in the way. Mikhail ran through his mind like a maze runner to remember what Nicholas told him to do next, but he really only needed to remember one thing.
The Golden Room.
Nicholas insisted that when it came to Alexandra,“She doesn’t know what she doesn’t know.”But how could he not have seen this coming? Or did he know of his own end at Alexandra’s hand but wanted to save Mikhail from the unavoidable fear that comes with such knowledge? The walk, the building, stairs, the hallway. He was there.
Heat rushed to Mikhail’s hand as his fist formed tight to knock on Alexandra’s door, but she opened it before his flesh hit the wood. He immediately smelled vinegar and seaweed. Alexandra drank green tea so potent that the herbs smelled like fish, and she only used vinegar when she was deep cleaning. Cleanliness was next to Godliness, he knew this, but coating things in vinegar didn’t make someone a God.
“You’re late,” Alexandra said as she opened the door further to reveal a table, set with the red-leather Coffin case on top.The Cure.Mikhail inhaled for three full seconds, smelling the putrid vinegar, and held his breath for three seconds. “You’re thinking that will help you? Breathing exercises?” She squinted at Mikhail as she tilted her head. He exhaled for three seconds.
“I’m thinking it will helpyou.” He needed to keep his calm and wits about him, couldn’t let his anger cause him to mis-speak, couldn’t reveal more information than he meant her to know. He too had secrets.And she didn’t know what she didn’t know.
“You shouldn’t worry about me,dear Mikhail.” She openly mimicked Nicholas’ term of endearment for them both.
“What did you do? Who killed our Great Master?” Mikhail pushed past her and walked closer to the table that held the Cure. Alexandra touched the edge of a black cloth draped over another object, the same way Nicholas’ robe had been draped over his dead body. Mikhail shuddered. Behind the smell of vinegar was another smell. Death. Twice in the same hour, that stench.
“He was never our Master. Maybe he controlled you like a puppet, but fate is my Master.” With one long sweep, Alexandra pulled the black cloth to reveal a clear glass case. And there it was, inside. The head.
Mikhail coughed. The breath left his lungs so quickly that he couldn’t stop. Nicholas’ head. The former Godhead’s eyes looked right past Mikhail with a terrifying, horrifiable, blank stare.
“You have his head? For what? For this moment?” Mikhail turned away from Alexandra and from the part of Nicholas in the room. He inhaled. Held his breath. Exhaled. Three seconds each.
Alexandra walked over to Mikhail and placed her hand lovingly on his shoulder, but there was no love. Not anymore. “Don’t go erratic on me. The principles have done this to Nicholas.” Mikhail pulled away from her touch, from all the vinegar in the air. Her apartment would never be clean again—and she would never be a true God. Not like Nicholas. Not like him.
“The principles . . .” He knew them well, woven tightest into his brain, despite his difficulties. But he couldn’t understand how Alexandra justified murder as fitting into those principles. Nicholas had created the Godhead with the essence of three truths:
Patience in all things.
Integrity in all acts.
Faith in fate.
Mikhail spun around to face Alexandra, close enough for her to smell the rotting flesh of their Master trapped into the fibers of his robe. “You haven’t even planticipated what Nicholas—”
“Planticipated?” Alexandra cut him off with laughter. She never tired of correcting him. So what if he combined two words that meant the same thing. It was just one of many ways she reminded him that he wasn’t as gifted as her. Who gave a Crank’s ass if he never spoke in front of the people of Alaska like her?
Mikhail had bigger plans. Wars were fought with actions, not words.
He held Alexandra by the shoulders, sure now that she could smell the death still trapped on his clothing. He needed her to be as disgusted by her own crime as he was. “What you did is irre—” Mikhail waited for his brain to catch up with his thoughts, his visions. “Irreversible. Irrevocable.” He waited for her to correct him but she didn’t.
Alexandra wiggled out of his arms. “Yes. Evolutionisunstoppable. You’re right.”
