End of Women: Part Five

A Means Of Production

"There was a time I could see. And I have seen boys like these, younger than these, their arms torn out, their legs ripped off. But there isn't nothin' like the sight of an amputated spirit; there is no prosthetic for that."

Scent of A Woman, 1992

A bright light burst into life, blinding Robin temporarily. He winced, lifting a hand to shield his eyes. For a moment he saw nothing but the black outline of his fingers. It then blended with two distinct human silhouettes, broad-shouldered, with flat-top haircuts and hands folded across their torsos, revealing wide arms thick with muscle beneath black suits. The smell of burning was all around him; crude oil and wood and... flesh. Something was wafting through the air around him, large flecks of faint dust, white and powdery, like warm snow.

"Who are you?" He asked of the two humans. They did not answer him. They seemed impossibly tall. It was then that Robin's sense of position returned to him from his addled mind, and he realised he was on the ground, propped up against something hard behind him. He quickly scrambled to his feet, and the moment he did so, the click-clack of a gun froze him in place.

"Remain where you are." A deep, booming voice told him. It could have been one of the two humans. He could not see their faces still; even with his vision halfway returned, the blazing inferno behind them put them entirely into shadow from his perspective. 

Robin's jaw clenched, his fists curled and his heart began beating rapidly, his mind focusing. He needed a weapon and some cover; he began feeling behind him to see what he had been propped up against. Something metallic, and it stopped at waist-height. A car, a vehicle of some kind. He would roll over the hood and -

"I can see it happening, in your eyes." A different voice spoke this time. Someone was walking between the two humans, slow-paced, shorter than they were, and considerably thinner. His voice sounded older, more gravelled, and he was walking with a narrow cane. "The Trooper training does not die. Even in a situation as monumentally inescapable as this, you will not give in without a fight." 

The third human came to a stop in front of Robin, showing himself fully. He wore a presidential-style suit and necktie, and his face was indeed old, wrinkled by years, and topped with whispy grey flecks of hair over liverspots. Robin felt as if he recognised him, and felt no better for it.

"You cannot hope to fight your way out of this, though." The elderly statesman shook his ancient head slowly, eyes closed with a tsk tsk, "No Sir. You are like the woman who found a king's scepter in her cage and squatted down upon it, only to give herself thrush." The man leant forward. "You have royally screwed yourself."

"I saw what I saw." Robin bit back, wiping cold, dried blood from his nose. "I saw what you're doing."

"Yes, that's precisely what I mean, young man. Some things are not meant to be seen. Some things are only for the eyes of those who are permitted to know, and some things are not meant to be known at all."

Robin's blood began to pump faster and hotter. 

"Men in your position have been telling me what I need to know my entire life." He snarled. "I decided a long time ago, if I want to find out, I find out."

"And look where that got you, idiot." The man chewed the inside of his mouth with disgust. "You wanted to know about the extraction programme. You could not just do your job and leave the long-term planning to the big boys. Idealism is poison for reason. And what did you see anyway? Nothing you can explain. You have no idea what it is we're doing, and you never will." The man straightened up with a disdainful smirk on his white lips. "Troopers. Always more brawn than brains."

As the man-hag let out a cackle, Robin whipped the cane out of his hands and struck him full hard around the face with it. Blood sprayed in an arc from the man's mouth as he tumbled to the side, and everything slowed to a crawl for Robin; the two humans unfolded their arms and reached into their concealment inside their jackets; Robin did as he planned to do and threw himself over the hood of the vehicle behind him. Just as the sound of the old man's cry split the air, it was punctuated by a barrage of gunfire that ricocheted off the body of the car. Robin ducked his head down and spun left and right; he had maybe three seconds before the men marched around the car and pumped him full of shots. 

Ahead of him was a low trench, and his suspicions about where he was were correct. He rolled onto his side and slid into the trench, landing on a pile of soft, cold female bodies that were moving slowly, inexorably towards the inferno. Robin pushed a few aside, rolling them like rag-dolls, and buried himself under them, his face now crammed between the buttocks of one dead woman and the stomach of another.

He could hear shouting but not make out words. Something thumped into bodies nearby; they were firing at the dead females, trying to spook him out. The body directly above him jerked as a bullet hit it, and blood splattered across his face. He spat and shook his head as best he could, but he knew better than to move yet. 

He could feel the temperature increasing rapidly, from cold night air to uncomfortably warm, and then searing hot. The light from the inferno was building, so bright that the bodies ahead of him were glowing orange, fingers lit up pink and greyish red. He waited until the heat was enough to make him feel he would pass out, and then shoved the girl above him out of his way and leapt out of the trench.

BLAM-BLAM-BLAM.

A bullet grazed his arm as he ducked behind the first palisade wall of the elimination centre. He clutched at his arm, feeling warm fluid trickle over his fingers. At once the futility of his escape hit him; they would raise the alarm and put out a search party for him, no question. But just as the old man had said, he was a Trooper, and so if it meant dying in a fight, there was no other way.

The side-gate through the palisade was open. Robin ran for it, hearing no gunfire; over the roar of the fire he could hear only the yells and curses of the two humans as they no doubt tried to cross the river of bodies. He took his momentary advantage and raced into the empty, inactive watercage courtyard, passing between the gigantic vacant cages like a mouse through a maze. He was at the armoury in seconds, sucking breath as he kicked in the door and grabbed a shotgun off the rack. 

A thought occurred to him. He was going to die, and there was no way to avoid that. He would die, and none of the others would know what he knew. These bastards were keeping a select few females for themselves, violating the oath they had made others swear. If Robin had to die, then he would at least make covering it up all the more difficult for the liars.

He ran back out into the courtyard, keeping his head low and shielding himself behind the watercages. The two humans were nowhere to be seen. Quickly he levied two blasts against the corner gears of the cage nearest to him; the gears racked and split, the cage supports buckled. He ran on as the thing split open right down the seam and then collapsed into itself, tumbling down into the tank below. Robin was already at the next one, sights lined up to aim at the corner gears, when a pistol bullet hit the supports, bounced back, and struck him square in the chest.

Robin staggered backwards, the shotgun falling from his hands and clattering onto the floor. He held his chest and for the second time felt blood flowing over his fingers; copious, thick and dark this time. He took a raspy, guttural breath and fell onto his backside, slumping in the mud.