Chapter 66

6 In a vast, dark room, red lights ran between geometric floor tiles, casting a dim light at distant shadows. From the center of the room’s dome-shaped roof hung an enormous screen that flickered with white light. Clack. Clack. Clack. The sound of footsteps approached. Where leather boots fell, the floor tiles lit up, casting a glow on their wearer. Hair and eyes of burning crimson. The mycelium of the Rust-Eater spread across half his face like a battle scar, and he wore an expression of intense wrath that creased his handsome features. “…” He glared at the screen. On it, he observed the invasion of Imihama, watching his pure-white robots blast the city with blue particle weapons. He watched the gallant forces of Japan ride against them. “Apollo!” Clack-Clack-Clack. A faster pace of footfalls rang out on the tiles as a single figure approached him. “Have the mushrooms cleared up? I was worried about you! Whah…? You look scary! Are you okay?” “Joy! Be considerate! Apollo has only just woken up!” A third person appeared, clutching the one called Joy by his hair and tugging him back. Joy turned and screamed at him, upset. “Why do you keep pulling my hair?! You’re so rough, Rage! Don’t you know how to be gentle?!” “It’s you who’s too soft. A little roughhousing’ll toughen you up.” “Listen, you!” “Silence.” The two jumped and froze as Apollo’s deep, booming voice turned the room to ice. He spun and shot them a glare with his mushroom-infected eye, which couldn’t quite blink all the way, before continuing. “I thought I told you it was bad manners to argue in public. You are my avatars, so why is it you still cannot understand?” Joy looked down at his feet meekly, while Rage stood up straight, almost at attention. As Apollo had said, these two were his avatars, and thus they looked to be almost exactly his equal in all respects. They had his trademark red hair and red eyes, and although mechanical seams were visible running across the skin of their faces, they appeared far more convincingly human than the rest of Apollo’s army. The two of them were far from identical, however. Joy’s face lit up with the innocence of youth, while Rage always seemed unable to conceal his displeasure. “…Whatever. Etiquette also dictates that I must forgive your transgressions. Now… Give your reports.” “See for yourself, Apollo!” shouted Joy gleefully, pointing at the screen, as if he had already forgotten he was being scolded. It showed a real-time account of the united Japan forces fighting a losing battle against Apollo’s army. Right now, the prefectural bureau of Imihama was in the midst of being converted into a multistory apartment complex. “We struggled against the mushrooms at first,” he explained, “but the antidote you created worked wonders once we applied it to the White! Look at that building! We made it out of all their dead bodies!” “Hmph! What do we gain from taking this city? Old Japan had no prefecture named Imihama. It’s a waste of memory that’s only going to be washed away in the end.” “You’re just angry because I’m the one who beat them, aren’t you, Rage?” “You little…!” But Apollo scowled at him, and Rage froze. Folding his arms, Apollo gave a satisfied nod and spoke. “There’s no need to chase down those who flee. These fools only become more stubborn the closer they are to death… I’ll cut down on the White and divert all excess memory to the restoration.” “It’s finally time to begin, is it?!” “Now that we’ve confirmed the efficacy of the antidote program, yes. Good work, Joy.” “Anything for you, Apollo…!” Joy seemed ecstatic to hear Apollo’s words of praise. Rage tutted under his breath and interjected. “Apollo, there’s something else I wanted to mention.” When Apollo nodded, Rage changed the channel on the screen. Now it presented an aerial view of the entire area around the Kyoto prefectural bureau. “I thought we were done with Kansai.” “Look here,” Rage said, enlarging a portion of the image and revealing the bullet train speeding from the station atop the bureau roof. “The Tokaido Chuo Maglev?” asked Apollo. “Why is it online?” “The trains of old Japan are beyond the means of modern monkeys to operate,” Rage explained. “They lack the authority, and more importantly, the identification to do so.” “And yet it moves, Rage?” Joy interjected. “That’s why I reported it!” As the other two argued, Apollo simply gazed at the image, thinking. Then, with a flash of realization, his eyes went wide, and he muttered a single line. “It’s Hope.” ““…Hope?!”” the other two exclaimed in unison. “It’s the only possibility,” said Apollo, still staring at the image. “Only four people have access to the Tokaido Chuo Maglev: Me, the two of you…and him.” “But he’s dead!” bellowed Rage, lost in confusion. “He betrayed you and stood with those monkeys…and you killed him! I saw it!” “Yeah! We both did! We watched you smash him to pieces!” “Not exactly. I simply returned him to the particles whence he came.” Apollo scratched his lip with his thumbnail, showing not a shred of emotion. “But what if he could somehow preserve his consciousness, even as a stream of particles…?” “Whaaat?!” “Something always seemed wrong. Why was it we faced resistance at every turn? While we slept, could it be that he has been guiding this land’s evolution, infesting it with spores that consume the Apollo Particles…all so he could stand against me this day?” Whether he was asking himself or telling himself was not quite clear. Apollo’s two clones simply stood speechless as he muttered under his breath. “In that case…perhaps that strange command language they call mantra is his doing as well…” Apollo weighed the facts carefully before pivoting on his heel and walking away. “A-Apollo!” “Rage. Put up a level-four barrier around all of Tokyo. Use my memory if you have to.” “A barrier? B-but, Apollo, Joy already defeated the Japanese army…” “Hope is our enemy now. And we know not what he is planning. Knowing him, he likely has an ace up his sleeve. We must exercise the utmost caution, or he will ruin all we have worked for.” “An ace, you say…?” Apollo’s right eye shot open, revealing the fungal filaments across its surface. After he turned to inspect the look of understanding on the faces of Joy and Rage, the square-shaped panel beneath his feet sank into the ground, becoming a high-speed elevator that transported him to the lower levels. “…You think he’s nervous?” muttered Joy, after he was sure Apollo was long gone. “He looked even scarier than usual…” “Unlikely. I doubt Apollo can even feel that emotion,” answered Rage, his eyes as fixed as Joy’s on the spot where Apollo had just stood. “Don’t forget: He off-loaded all of his negative emotions onto us, his avatars. All we must do is follow his commands. Apollo’s only weakness is his obsession with etiquette. If that obsession threatens to obstruct his plans, then…” “…I know. It’s my job to twist that etiquette so that it serves our needs. Is that what you wanted to say?” Joy seemed a little miffed as he replied. Still, he stared uneasily at the square-shaped hole in the ground. I’ll bring it all back. No matter how long it takes. Ten years, a hundred years… I will bring it all back from the ashes. I promise. And then, I’ll see you at last. Apollo watched the fragmentary thoughts flit across the back of his eyelids as if they were no concern of his, then opened his eyes with resolution. “I will see this through to the end… No matter who stands in my way,” he muttered, and put whatever he was thinking about out of his mind. His scarlet hair bobbed ever so slightly as the elevator descended at breakneck speed.