Seed: Destiny - Chapter 3

Reptile left the Hive with singular focus. Like any good dad, he let his heart lead him through any peril for his lost daughter. Love tugged each step harder than gravity and fear, dragging him deeper into the darkening woods. His deliberate direction, however, betrayed his secret origin. Eyes of the other side peeked throughout the forest, and it wasn't long before he was hunted by deranged Dwellers bent on consuming life with their expanding magic. The witch in the woods was only the first, and a taste for blood flowed through the legion of conjurors.

After reporting his failed incursion to Grover and Alice, he did what he always did to get things done in the face of resistance: blended in, disappeared, and became a ghost behind enemy lines. As he sank into the vile shadows, he did the things Dwellers did, repulsed by every sin but accepting the stains on his soul as a fair price to find his girl. Once the smell of civilization was washed clean by gore and despair, he made his move.

He knew what words might turn a key into the upper ranks of Dwellers and find an audience with those who might know Sarah's location. While he commanded a brigade of degenerates in the west for his deposed queen, he met nasty travelers seeking a king in the north, a true master of the evil energy still swirling around the world. At first, Reptile's hubris let slip that he was the royalty they sought, the man commanding the Dwellers to glory. Laughter let him know that he was nothing like the legend, a mythical entity that compelled Seed's minions far and wide to do more than revel in what they had already wrecked.

With a dead gaze weighing down his best poker face, he said to the first witch who would listen, "I seek the king."

"Don't we all, dear?" the witch replied, exhaling satisfaction and subservience to the higher power. "What would our master want with you?"

"I led the other side before seeing the truth. I want to be of use. I want to see the end before my own."

Reptile struck the right note. The witch nodded her approval. Witnessing the Dweller hordes in motion, one might see only clumsy malice and vain mayhem, but a grounded objective underpinned the infectious chaos. Seed escorted death. The Dwellers capable of understanding their place in fate wanted to finish the job.

From what Reptile could glean from his long travels through occupied territory, grim finality was the highest promise of the king. The Dwellers' distant overlord preached his unique connection to the wicked spirit breathing life into their ambition. He was chosen to usher nothing less than the end of days. As told, the anointment brought him power, and his proclamations were not hollow. He could wield Seed's carnage nearly at will and sans the theater of lower witches. Once his unification with destiny was completed according to prophecy, he swore that he would assume robes of blood and ride the seven-headed dragon, whatever that meant. Reptile assumed it meant snuffing any future past Seed.

"If you seek the king," the witch instructed after sizing up Reptile, "travel to the Mog in Minnesota. Hurry, though, I can feel the end growing near." The witch turned to rejoin her companions standing among some hosts, all of whom appeared docile and under her control.

Minnesota was familiar enough, but the Mog would take some investigating. The witch had said the words directly, however, as though Reptile should already be aware of what would undoubtedly turn out to be a terrible place. Whatever and wherever it was could wait. He might not get a chance like this again.

"One more thing before you go, darlin'," Reptile begged the witch, "I'm also looking for a girl... Well, a young woman."

The witch stopped but didn't turn. Reptile had given her more than she needed to sniff out his sham. His move was hawkish and born of desperation, not as reptilian as his typical mode, but the wastes were vast and information scant. Traveling their tangles ate too much precious time. And his mission objective was the highest prize he could imagine, the kind of objective that should have been handled by an indifferent tracker instead of an anxious dad. "What girl?" the witch wheezed.

Reptile answered straight. He knew how to bluff when he was holding nothing. "Her name is Sarah. I've been trackin' her for weeks." Reptile wiped the mud off his shirt to express displeasure at the task.

"And how would I know who..."

"She's pregnant," Reptile interrupted any denial. "That's what I hear, anyway. She might have passed this way maybe a week ago."

"Why do you follow her?"

This was the problematic and inevitable question. "I love her more than anything and I want to save her from your disgusting army," had to be hidden deep inside his chest when Reptile responded. But he was ready. The best lie touches truth.

"She's my daughter," Reptile exhaled with a breath of humility. "She tried to show me the reality of our future. I couldn't see it at the time. I want to tell her she was right. I want to help her with what I think she's trying to do."

Reptile had walked his deceit right up to the line and dangled a treat over the edge for the witch to snatch. The king, for reasons unknown, hunted pregnant women. Dwellers often spoke of the ghoulish quirk when they recited tales of the leader they'd never met. Reptile wanted to know why almost as much as he didn't. Regardless, he hoped the witch's desire to serve her master would cloud her vision.

Without a word, two hosts walked toward the witch and took up guard positions next to her. Reptile drifted a hand resting on his belt, inching it closer to the sidearm tucked behind his back. He had another above his boot and yet another under his shirt. A knife hugged the bottom of his other leg. If the witch wanted to get nasty, she'd be hit with more than she bargained for. But they weren't there yet. Perhaps the witch was only protecting herself against Reptile's reaction to bad news, news he might not be able to bear.

"You're in luck, my child," the witch finally replied with her back still turned. "I can help you along to where you're supposed to be." Good news, but witches typically didn't revel in helping. She leaned slowly to her companion and began to whisper in its ear. At her command, the metal animating the monstrosity began to flow softly onto the ground, leaving a flimsy bag of flesh to slump into a pile.

The gun was out and concealed behind Reptile's leg. He didn't know what was happening, but the probability of a bullet traveling through each target in front of him had risen rapidly. He waited, coiled like a snake while keeping a cold facade.

"I can feel more now," the witch continued. "The more time I spend with the spirit, the more it speaks to me. For instance, if I'm touching the metal below," she said while she knelt and placed a hand on the bloody mound next to her, "I can feel the metal above."

Reptile raised his brow along with his gaze. Only a lonely breeze patted the tops of the trees. She was just screwing with him, he thought. The odds of going loud notched higher as the strange seconds passed. He would have to kill all these degenerates and start again from square one. How depressing.

"You told me your secret," the witch whispered away her last moments as Reptile moved his finger from the frame of the weapon to the trigger, "so I will tell you mine. I can feel the drone overhead, the one watching us both." Her smile packaged her hate while she waited to savor Reptile's response.

He didn't know what she was talking about. He didn't have a drone. Did he? He looked up, again. Shooting pain through his arm shouted to him that he'd fallen into a trap. His holler only lasted long enough to regain his wits. He scrambled to find a thin needle of Seed's metal sticking through his wrist above his weapon like a spear. It had struck like lightning from the gory pile.

Tactical time had come and gone. Time to fight for his life. Reptile let the pain scream while he pulled against the impalement to reach for the boot holster. Another sharpened shaft shot through his other hand and leg. Reptile shouted in excruciating misery. Both hands were pinned. He would be forced to tear his flesh against one of the wounds to break free. He gritted his teeth and pressed with all his panic and rage, but it was too late. The witch caught his throat in her hand before he could twist away.

"We will all lie together when our work is done, my child," the witch offered as she looked into Reptile's eyes. "And now below," she ordered.

A puddle of Seed moved from under the witch's fallen companion, flowing like a stream to surround Reptile's boots. He looked, trying to catch a glimpse of his demise, but the witch yanked his jaw high to watch him suffer his end. "It's hot," he gasped. The metal crawled up his limbs, consuming him as it slithered.

"Yes!" the witch hissed with delight.