black polo shirt and tan shorts his mother laid out for him two days ago, but those clothes had grown wrinkled and ragged.
A part of Gannon felt guilty for having delivered the boy to that place of evil. But Gannon long ago became proficient at hiding guilt in a dark closet at the back of his mind.
'Come out of there, child,' the Missionary commanded.
JB moved slowly at first; another sign of fatigue. But he straightened, swallowed a deep breath of resolve, and exited the cell. Gannon saw the Missionary's smile of victory falter for a second, perhaps in surprise at the boy's fortitude. 'Hey, sport,' Gannon spoke in as friendly a tone as his limited acting skills could muster. Jorgie ignored Gannon and asked the Missionary, 'What is going to happen to me?' The agent of Voggoth answered, 'You're going to visit with your father.' To Gannon's surprise, the boy showed no enthusiasm. No matter how young his age, apparently Jorge was no fool. JB told the Missionary man, 'You should not be doing this.'
As Voggoth's minion led them along a circular artery-like corridor lit by small glowing orbs he said, 'I came looking for your mother many years ago; before she knew she carried you in her womb. Had I found you that first day this conflict would almost certainly have been settled quickly. Oh, how glorious that would have been.'
Gannon asked, 'What do you mean? You went looking for him?'
'Voggoth sent me to draw a blade across her throat.'
Gannon wondered exactly how long the Missionary had served Voggoth.
In response to his captor’s revelation JB muttered, 'I’ll remember that.'
'As for your father, several of Voggoth's children were sent to greet him. I understand they found his parents, but of course he escaped.'
'You should not be doing this,' the boy repeated in a voice filled with a surprising tone of authority. 'Your Master does not know.'
'Quiet, child. You are a present to my Lord. After I break you apart I will take you to Voggoth when I make my pilgrimage. He will demonstrate to all the inferiority of your species and perhaps hasten final judgment upon your people. My reward will be great'
'You don't live,' the boy said. 'You are empty. This whole place is a big empty space that needs to be filled.'
The kid’s words caused Gannon’s arms to bubble with goose bumps; he saw The Order in a similar vein as young Jorge. However, unlike Jorgie Brad Gannon chose to serve Voggoth in the name of self-preservation.
The Missionary argued, 'You know nothing of The Order. You are of an inferior race. Your people are ignorant and fragile. Voggoth is strength. He is a living God.'
'He is no God, and he is not alive. You're dead. You're all dead!'
The debate halted as the corridor opened to the large room where spindly leg-like appendages churned atop a blob of machine. At the bottom of the pulsing, beating, rumbling contraption laid Trevor Stone, his eyes covered by a fibrous mask and slimy appendages wrapped around his body.
'Father…' JB's voice shifted from defiant to that of a scared little boy. 'Father! What have they done to you?'
Sobs came one after another in heaves as he raced to Trevor's side and studied the motionless man. JB’s face twisted, alternating from agony to repulsion and back again.
But just as Brad Gannon felt certain the curtain would fall on Jorge Benjamin Stone’s composure, the child’s disposition took a turn in a new direction. More specifically, JB’s eyes grew sharp and so cold that it seemed the temperature inside the chamber dropped a dozen degrees in an instant. Then those eyes found the Missionary man and dug in like daggers.
The Missionary did not seem to notice; he was too busy soaking in the glory of what appeared to be a victory for him. As the agent of Voggoth spoke, Gannon worried that perhaps this particular minion’s surprising cache of ambition might prove his undoing.
'Your Father, the great leader of mankind, is weak. We have done nothing but remind him of his deeds. He is being destroyed by his own fears, his own guilt, his own sense of loss. And look at him…his mind has failed him. Surely the champion of humanity should be stronger. But like all of your species, he is weak.'
'You are a bad man. This is a bad place. You will wish you hadn't done this!'
'Quiet! You are in the presence of greatness. And now you can join your father.'
Another platform protruded from the wall alongside Trevor. A circular bulge grew from the machine at the head of that platform. Tiny tendrils wriggled there like worms squirming through rotting meat.
The monks who guarded Trevor followed the Missionary's orders and lifted the little boy on to the table. Jorgie offered no resistance; his eyes remained fixed on his father in an expression suggesting a thin line between sorrow and rage.
JB warned, 'You are not supposed to do this. It's not allowed.'
The wormy tendrils reached from the bulge and clamped on the child's head like suction cups. Thicker appendages squirmed from the platform and coiled around JB's wrists and ankles, securing him in place. The Missionary hovered alongside while Gannon stood several paces away, unsure if he wanted to watch. The guards- the monks-waited.
JB grunted and closed his eyes. His lips quivered, perhaps in pain. The Missionary leaned in and his eyes grew wide.
'Yes! Yes! The machine is pushing into your mind and sifting through the building blocks of your body. The Bishop says you are the purest sample of your race's life pattern. Now I will rip that pattern apart and expose it as weak and unworthy.'
As he spoke, the agent of Voggoth reached to the machine. As the Bishop had done before, a bulb-like appendage sprouted from the wall and enveloped the Missionary's hand.
Gannon watched, sparing a glance to the top of the contraption high up where the things that resembled the legs of a giant spider stuck in taffy cranked away at their hideous work faster and faster. The droning of the machine grew louder.
'Let me in your mind,' the Missionary urged through clenched teeth. 'Let…me…IN!'
– Tucker used his fingers to silently count to three. When he raised the third digit, one of the other Internal Security agents-the one with a barbed wire tattoo on his bicep-kicked hard, snapping the latch and busting open the apartment door.
Tucker led the three men inside, swiveling his pistol from side to side as he surveyed the living room. He saw DVDs and compact discs scattered on the carpet in front of a modest entertainment center. He caught a whiff of a harsh chemical smell then spied an open nail polish bottle on the coffee table.
'She's here,' he said to the other two agents. 'Denise! Come out, your mother sent us!'
The men slithered through the apartment. Tucker barged into a small bedroom decorated with old school rock and roll band posters including Led Zeppelin and DEVO. Bright sunlight and a warm July breeze blew in through an open window there. Tied to one leg of the small bed was a rope, the rest dangled out the window.
Tucker scanned outside and saw nothing but a patch of closely grouped White Ash trees two stories below.
'Damn it! She's gone rabbit. Let's go.'
Two minutes later Tucker knocked at a first floor apartment where a placard indicated 'Supervisor'. A one- armed chubby fellow with splotches of sweat all over his green tee shirt opened the door.
'Yeah? Whatya want?'
Tucker flashed his Internal Security badge. 'I'm looking for Denise Forest. I've got a message for her from her mother. She wasn't home. Do you know where we can find her?'
'Denise?' The chubby fellow grew a frown as if Denise's name caused a sour taste in his mouth. 'Don't surprise me that she wasn't home. Probably out causing trouble.'
'Do you know where we can find her? It's urgent. Important business.'
'Oh yeah, important business,' the man considered. 'Well, she goes off on her bike and hangs out with friends sometimes down at Church Circle. You might find here there in some of the abandoned buildings. Kid knows how to hide, so she's gunna be tough to find.'
'We'll find her,' Tucker assured and then led his men outside to a sedan. The chubby caretaker watched them go and then closed the door. Denise popped up from behind the counter of the eat-in kitchen. She asked Barney, 'Where's Church Circle?' — The Order's massive machine pulsated like a beating heart. The strange legs or arms or
