13. Circus Charlie (18)
13. Circus Charlie (18)
Everyone who worked at the station knew Ella well. The station horses had once bolted in a mass escape, and she'd rounded up every last one of them inside a day. That was why she could come and go here like it was her own home.
The letters Ella brought were logged into the ledger one by one by the station clerk and slotted into the post office boxes. Her name was Gwen, the stationmaster's daughter, a year older than Charlie and Anna. She'd learned her letters as a child, which was why she handled all the station's clerical work.
"Gwen, is Troupe Leader Wonderstein really arriving today?"
"Hmm, I'd say so?"
Gwen remembered the handsome visitor who'd passed through a few weeks ago. He'd stayed in Alamo less than a day, but his face and name had left a sharp impression. So when the circus school kids had stopped here on their way back from their field trip two days ago, she'd been able to tell Ella that Wonderstein was on his way.
Stagecoaches in this era were divided into freight wagons and passenger wagons. A traveler would check the stage route, pay the driver the fare to a given station, and board. Passenger wagons couldn't carry much luggage, though, so heavy baggage had to be sent ahead on the freight wagons. The freight wagons ran the same routes ahead of the passenger wagons, dropping off luggage at the designated stations, where it was held in storage until the traveler arrived.
Gwen had seen the name tag on the freight that arrived the day before yesterday and deduced that Wonderstein would arrive today.
"So when do you think he'll get here?"
"Hard to say? Based on the distance from the station where he sent the luggage, it ought to be today... Probably not until the afternoon—oh!"
Gwen abruptly covered her face with her hands and stared past Ella. Ella turned to follow her friend's gaze. The station dining room entrance. Standing there was a blond man in his twenties in a black suit.
"Troupe Leader!"
"Miss Ella."
Ella shot to her feet and threw herself at him, wrapping him in a fierce hug. Wonderstein flinched for a moment, then slowly accepted the embrace.
"You were out of the village?"
"Yes! My friend at the station told me you'd sent luggage ahead."
"Luggage? Ah, that."
Wonderstein recalled having shipped his belongings to Alamo before setting off to track Igor's collaborator. That she'd gotten clear of the village just in time thanks to that was a stroke of luck.
"My luggage, then..."
Before he could finish, Gwen, who'd been peeking at Wonderstein's face from behind the table, sprang up and blurted out. Both her cheeks were flushed bright red.
"Your luggage is in the storage shed, sir! But we stack everything from the outside in by order of wagon arrival, so there'll be a bit of a wait to get it out..."
"I see."
Wonderstein looked toward Alamo. He could feel it. Something akin to himself was over there right now.
He was worried about his old friend. Given his ability to sense living presences and his talents as an acrobat, slipping away from that place would be nothing for him. But his friend wouldn't abandon his students to save himself.
He hadn't sixteen years ago, either. He'd only left that hellish scene after making sure his pupils were under the protection of the rescue squad.
"Miss Ella, would you mind collecting my luggage for me? Crossing the desert alone has left me rather tired..."
"Yes! Leave it to me and get some rest!"
Ella answered briskly and headed off to the storage shed with Gwen.
He waited until she was completely out of sight, then slipped out the back door. He spread his wings and shot up into the sky. Five kilometers was a distance he could cover on the wing in under five minutes.
Moments later, Wonderstein entered the airspace above the village, folded his wings, and descended to the ground. If he flew straight at his friend from here, all he'd do was draw the enemy toward his friend. He needed to approach from the outskirts, making his presence known, and turn the enemy's attention naturally toward himself.
He touched down at the slaughterhouse on the village's far edge. The owner's severed upper body lay sprawled in front of the building. Wonderstein examined the cross-section of the wound.
A cut made by Mantula's Blade. Igor's work, unmistakably. Wonderstein followed the trail of destruction deeper into the village. Along the way he came across people dying.
"Hurgh..."
"P-please, help me."
"It hurts, it hurts, Mama..."
None of them were normal. Some had been torn apart or crushed by the attack. Others had been infected by Devolut, parts of their bodies grotesquely warped.
Seeing him walk through this hellscape unscathed, people reached out for salvation. Some were younger than Ella. But Wonderstein regarded them with a detached glance and moved on. The safety of his friend mattered more than these humans who meant nothing to him.
Victor wouldn't have done this. No matter how urgent his own circumstances, he would have offered at least some aid to the people in front of him.
Wonderstein normally worked hard to behave morally, almost compulsively so. He considered that the way to live like a human. He believed it was the conduct befitting the person whose likeness he wore.
But in a crisis like this, his true nature surfaced. The face of a callous monster.
Walking on, he soon came upon the scene of the slaughter.
"Gyaaah!"
"You monster!"
"Run! Make for the station!"
"But, but that thing's—"
"It's coming!"
Chasing the fleeing villagers was a beast the size of a house. It looked like a creature built on a canine base. It was slaughtering people indiscriminately, fangs and claws tearing through them.
"Grrrr!"
After its latest rampage, the monster rolled its eyes toward the newcomer. The creature had one command: kill everything alive. It hurled itself at him.
Wonderstein extended an arm toward it. The space between his index and middle fingers split open with a sound like tearing canvas, the cleft running all the way to where his elbow would be. Between the parted flesh, sharp teeth like jagged sawblades pushed through.
He seized the monster's foreleg with that maw and tore it off.
"GYAAAH!"
The creature screamed and thrashed on the ground, its leg ripped away. Wonderstein watched it and smiled thinly. From his other arm, he drew out jagged spikes of bone and launched them at the beast. They flew with the speed of bullets and shattered its skull and spine.
"Grrrk..."
The monster's body slumped and collapsed. Just before its breath gave out, it blinked at Wonderstein—a gesture of gratitude. But what Wonderstein was thinking as he watched, no one could tell. He was smiling as he always did.
"Are you all right?"
Wonderstein checked on the survivors. But his figure—drenched in the monster's blood and entrails, still smiling—was nothing short of grotesque. To the panicked people, he didn't look like a savior. He looked like another monster.
"Run!"
"A d-demon! A demon's appeared!"
"M-monster!"
Wonderstein watched the fleeing backs and let out a bitter smile. It was a familiar sight. Over the past ten-odd years he'd saved countless lives, but not one human had ever thanked him. They all feared him.
Just then, a ringing shout erupted from across the street.
"Killing a cute dog! You some kind of animal abuser?!"
A short, stocky old man with a long nose limped out from inside an alley on one bad leg.
Their eyes met in the open air.
"Frank Wonderstein."
"Igor."
The old man bared his teeth in a grin and spread both arms wide.
"How long's it been? Eh? Ah, right. First time since Viscount Bergson died."
"A year."
"Did you ever go see the viscount's daughter? Cure her illness?"
"..."
Seeing Wonderstein unable to answer, Igor clapped his hands as if he'd expected exactly that.
"Kekeke, guess not. Figures. You exist because of me, after all. Why not just give up? Like me, the only way you can use Devolut is to make people look ridiculous, to mock them, to deceive them. Yes. Only in the ways that amuse Kirkeus."
Wonderstein didn't dignify the mockery with an answer. Instead, he studied the other man's body and spoke in a guarded voice.
"You've gained more eyes since last time."
"Kekeke, don't think I can manage many more now. I felt it when you took José. Had a bug planted in him. So? How do the new eyes feel? Hard to resist, isn't it? Like you're about to be sucked right in? Only a matter of time. A matter of time. We'll become one again."
"It won't go the way you think."
"Impressive confidence. That face you go around wearing give it to you? But it won't matter. You can never be him. You can never be Victor. You're nothing but a cheap imitation of him, Experiment Subject 24601."
At the sound of his original name after so long, Wonderstein glared at him.
"You're no true Igor, either. His body is just a shell you use to move about on the surface, Plague Lord."
Igor's laughter cut off. He fixed Wonderstein with a murderous stare.
"Wrong. I stand here as Igor."
"You're deluding yourself."
Silence stretched between them. Both mouths smiled at each other. Both pairs of eyes glared death.
Then leaves, stalks, and fruit made of blood, flesh, and bone sprouted from both their bodies. They took on threatening shapes, poised to stab, tear, and shred each other.
The clock tower rising at the village center tolled noon, and the two BioMancers lunged at each other.
***
The camel carrying the blood-soaked children burst into the station just as Ella stepped out of the storage shed with Wonderstein's luggage. She recognized the camel her friends were riding. It was the one a group of traders had left behind as payment for their dealings when they passed through the village not long ago.
The watchtower staff had spotted them from a long way off and rung the bell furiously, so everyone at the station had come outside to see.
"Is that blood?"
"What's going on?"
"Good heavens, they're children!"
"Somebody get medicine and bandages!"
The station erupted into chaos. The sheriff, who'd been napping, came running down when he heard the news and examined their condition.
"Stationmaster, do you know these children?"
"Y-yes. They're from a village nearby..."
"Alamo, about five kilometers that way..."
Ella pushed through the crowd and stepped forward.
"They're my friends!"
She hurried toward a friend who'd just finished receiving emergency treatment.
"What happened? What's going on? Did you run into a wild animal on the way?"
A girl who'd been staring blankly, as if her soul had left her body, looked up at Ella's face. Something seemed to click, and she murmured at her.
"E-Ella. That man you brought."
"Brought? Who?"
"Th-the... the troupe leader you said you were following..."
Ella recognized her as one of the friends who'd tattled to Master and Anna about seeing her with an outsider last time. She was one of the few circus school kids who knew Wonderstein's face.
"Why? Troupe Leader Wonderstein? What about him?"
"That man... he w-wasn't human. He was a monster."
"What are you talking about?"
"A demon. That man you brought... a demon..."
The girl recalled the figure standing there, arms transformed into monstrous shapes, drenched from head to toe in gore. Her eyes rolled back, and she fainted.
Meanwhile, the sheriff, who'd been questioning the other survivors, shook his head and straightened up. He'd heard much the same story. Monster, demon, fiend.
"They're all out of their minds."
"An Abyss Demon in broad daylight? Not likely."
"Could it be a bandit raid?"
"We'll have to call in the Guard Corps."
Ella's head snapped up.
She didn't know what had happened, but danger had come to the village.
"I'm borrowing a horse!"
"H-hey!"
"What are you doing?!"
"Ella! Wait, Ella!"
Gwen tried to grab her, but Ella was faster. She seized a nearby horse and swung herself onto its back. The station's horses were constantly rotated whenever a stagecoach arrived, so this one had never met her before, yet she handled it as deftly as if she'd known it for years.
Grandpa, Anna, Mickey, Viola, Veronica, August... please be safe. All of you.
She spurred the horse hard and raced toward the village.
