Epilogue: I was what you are, you will be what I am

Crossing that war zone, they couldn't stay out of trouble for long. They ran into soldiers several times, and he did the same as before.

The first time, he had gone unnoticed. Surely they would have interpreted it as a coincidence.

But the second, the third? After that, anyone would have noticed. That he was doing it. That he was the one in control, somehow, now.

That was what mattered. That he was in control, and therefore he could get them out of here, safe and sound. Not fail them as he had failed his poor sister. Not fail at least now. Jonathan couldn't care less about everything else. How it was that he could control the robots and the larger implications, what could happen in the future.

At least for the moment.

If he focused on anything other than surviving and getting out of here, he would lose.

It doesn't matter if I become a demon, something that's not human. It doesn't matter. As long as I can save them, he thought.

They're all I have left now, he thought and knew, from the bottom of his heart. There was no more desolate feeling than that.

But at least he was indeed able to do it, Jonathan didn't speak in vain. Without suffering a single further loss, they left the city. And quite soon, to boot. It was so easy.

With that tremendous power at his disposal, it was even disgustingly easy.

Jonathan couldn't believe the power that demon had had at his fingertips. That he had gathered from the shadows, for years, waiting to unleash it upon them when the day came.

And that no one would have noticed until then, had they not stumbled upon the settlement that belonged to Max and decided to try their luck there.

No, not exactly.

Without having had the Pistol in their possession, the self-proclaimed God would not have been interested in them. It was only because of the heist that the situation had developed this way.

Of course, it was also only because of that heist that he had seen his sister again.

In that sense, at least, he could say that it had been worth it. In that sense.

Jonathan fell to his knees on the sand, watching the flames rising skyward, his ears filled with the screams of the massacre that was still in progress.

Even if he wanted to stop it, he wouldn't know how. There was nothing logical about what he did. Concrete. It was rather wild and instinctive.

Now he was lost. As if adrift, almost.

He didn't feel like himself. Jonathan hugged himself as if to confirm it, shaking from head to toe.

"What the fuck was that?" Mary summed it up well in very few words.

"Yeah. Jonathan, you... you... controlled them, didn't you?" Roxy asked, only it wasn't a real question to begin with, because she didn't wait for him to answer. "Fuck, it's been nothing but one crazy thing after another lately. Am I dreaming? Could it be that I'm dreaming? How is that possible?."

Did she mean her dreaming? Or him being in control of the robots?

One way or another, Jonathan wasn't well. He still felt like his head was going to explode from the amount of external information forced into his brain. Broken glass poking deep into him.

He couldn't think clearly with that pain.

But his thoughts were clear enough to answer Roxy's question. If she meant how had he done that. And it was most likely.

"After I fell unconscious, I saw that thing again," Jonathan explained, slowly, as if they had all the time in the world. But he was having trouble finding the right words. Besides, he didn't want to leave here. "I thought it was a dream. But it wasn't. It was something like what happened to us after we got caught by those wires. I guess it made contact with me again through that connection. In any case, it did something to my head.... My head was filled with...."

"With?" Jamie repeated softly, urging him to continue. But she wasn't looking at him. He knew why.

Jamie was crying.

"With him. It feels wrong to use 'him,' as if that bastard was a human being. But...."

"You're saying he gave you what he knew? How to control his army? All that?" The cascade of questions came from Mary's mouth.

"Yes. I don't know why, but yes. At least as far as I can make out all this.."

Jonathan glanced at Mary, sideways. She, after a while, offered him a hand to help him to his feet. He still wasn't feeling too well.

But at least he believed he would be able to walk to the vehicle without ending up on the ground, again.

And he was standing more or less well on his feet. More or less.

Roxy shook her head. Something seemed to have changed in her eyes, though Jonathan couldn't tell what exactly. Maybe because of his current state. Maybe because he didn't know her as well as he thought he did, after all.

"Whoever wins, we'd better get the hell out of here," she said.

"No." Jonathan flatly refused, without a second thought. He didn't need to think about it. It had just occurred to him. As he spoke, as he explained to them what had happened to him, what he knew now.

It had just occurred to him, but it made too much sense.

It was worth a try at least.

"Why?" Roxy asked.

"No," he repeated. ."We'll wait.."

"Do you think it's a good idea?" Mary asked, hesitantly. She seemed afraid of how he would respond. The mere thought of one of them being afraid of him made him want to vomit.

Yes, but he justified Mary's feelings, unable to bite his tongue.

"You can leave if you want to. You and you girls, of course. But I'm staying. Until they finish killing each other. If by any chance the government agents win, we'll finish the job."

Jamie took a while to respond.

"They won't," she said, staring into the smoke and flames.

It didn't take a genius to predict it, but, indeed, they didn't. They put up a valiant fight,but every last one of them was torn to pieces.

Then Jonathan and his team went back down to the city.

They walked through the flames and smoke.

The corpses, the pools of blood that stretched like carpets. They walked through that mess while the robots watched them silently, without attacking.

No, they were watching him, specifically. They knew they had a new master now.

Jonathan couldn't suppress a shudder.

"Clean up this mess!" Jonathan raised his voice, he had to try.

And they spread out, and got down to it for real. Uh. It wasn't that hard. No, it wasn't that hard once you already had the keys to the kingdom.

But unlike that abomination whose name he still didn't know, he had no interest in proclaiming himself as God.

Jonathan didn't want to gather forces, overthrow the government and raise a new world from its ashes.

The world could go on wallowing in the mud for all he cared. For one thing, the world was nothing more than a term for a bunch of strangers.

Second, they were mercenaries. Mud was their thing.

A new, better world would drive the business into the ground. Jonathan guffawed at his own joke, so suddenly that it startled his companions, so intensely that he ended up running out of air, prey to a hacking cough.

I'm more...individualistic. I only want one thing. The most important thing of all.

Finally, they reached the throne room. Tattered, yes, but now it offered little different appearance from the rest of the city.

Now. It was only a matter of time.

Like so many other things.

"Jonathan..." Jamie began, hesitantly. "What are we doing here? Your sister sacrificed herself for us. There's... nothing left."

Harsh words. Both for him and for her.

"I'm sorry. If I could go back, trade myself for her, I would. I would. I wish you could have... But no. I don't. I'm sorry.."

Jonathan crouched in the middle of the room.

Near where he had killed the damn thing, but it had nothing to do with the creature. Its body had been vaporized by the destructive power of the Pistol.

And everything important was now in his head.

The Pistol had left no trace. But the self-destruction of his sister's new body had.

Pieces. Flesh. Blood.

Jonathan came to the easy conclusion that nothing could be salvaged from her body. Even less from her mind. She truly had left nothing important behind. However...

"What are you talking about, Jamie? Even if you could do such a thing, I wouldn't let you. Do you know why?"

Jamie held his gaze. And she said nothing. Couldn't speak. No big deal, no big deal. He would speak for the both of them.

Jonathan smiled.

"Because I'm a selfish person. Because I want it all. And I'll have it all.."

As in any good system, there were memory banks in this one. Backups. So his words weren't empty.

He would have it all.

■

It took days of work.

Days only.

He supposed he assimilated the information quickly, since he had a reason to make the effort to do so. And though he said only days, they were really days, that is, full days.

Day and night, work without rest. And at last the fruit of his labor was in front of him. Today he would see if it was all worth it. They would see; they had stayed by his side, even though he had decided to do this and stay behind, to settle in the palace of the abomination.

"Okay," Jonathan murmured, putting on the finishing touches.

Then he simply waited. With his heart in a fist.

His sister opened her eyes. Looking at him, of course, she opened them wide. Surprised.

"Daniel? Is it really you?"

She wasn't surprised because she should have died and wasn't. She was because she had seen him for the first time in so many years.

She remembered nothing of today's events, as it was an outdated backup.

He wished he could say that she also didn't remember any of the abuse she had undoubtedly suffered at the hands of that creature. But it wasn't like that.

It wasn't as if the creature hadn't made a new copy since it'd given her a body.

It was a recent backup, a few weeks old, unlike many others. He supposed the thing had placed a high value on what it saw as its pet.

The mere thought was sickening.

"Yes," Jonathan said, smiling, "And now we'll be together. Forever. I'll never let you out of my sight.."

His sister lunged for him, hugging him tightly. She wasn't naked, of course. And of course he hadn't been the one to dress her. He'd seen her naked long enough, in fact, had meticulously shaped her body, with his own hands.

But it was, well. A matter of principle.

She wasn't naked, and she wasn't the little girl she had died being, either.

He had given her an older body, thinking of the woman she would have become if she had had the chance to grow up. If life had been less unfair to her.

"And what about Him?"

"I killed him. He won't hurt you anymore."

His sister hid her face on his chest with a big smile, but what she did was cry disconsolately. Even so, not everything in her tears was pain, there was also the happiness of the reunion. And happiness at the death of that monster. She did not even notice the presence of the other people in the room, who looked at the scene with warm smiles...

In spite of what this represented. And how aware they were of how unnatural it was.

Like defying death. Playing god.

But hey, in this day and age... Everyone was doing it.

You will be what I am. He heard that echo, again.

Jonathan ignored it as he hugged his sister back.

■

"What are we going to do now?" Jamie asked. They were both on the balcony, gazing out from the almost highest point of the palace at the panorama of what was now their city.

"They're not going to leave us alone. So what else can we do? Get ready."

The city had been restored to its former glory. What's more, he had taken the liberty of remodeling it according to his tastes. There was no trace of the horrible slaughter that had taken place here only a few days ago.

It was better than ever and buzzing with life. Artificial life.

On the rooftops, in the streets, there were dozens and dozens of robots. All subject to his will.

Their weapon against the world.

The shield to protect their happiness.

You will be what I am.