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Superworlds - Prologue - The Long Walk
🕑 Added 2023-06-07 08:12:57 +0000 UTCTen thousand miles apart, two men who had never met prepared to die.
For men of a similar age, facing similar fates, they had very little in common. The first, Tse Chi-li, was long, lean and wiry, a native son of Jiangxi with hair like black straw and a face riddled craterous with pockmarks. He moved very little and said even less, quietly awaiting his final step to annihilation with the same fatalistic silence with which he had approached every other. He sat in his cell in Ganzhou, staring unwavering at a rough-edged, thumb-sized divot in the grey cement floor, and whatever thoughts swirled dark inside his head stirred no ripples on the surface.
The second man, Cyrus Corbin, had never been so laconic. Six foot four, two hundred and forty pounds, he was a hulking cudgel of a man, his head clean-shaven and an assortment of crude tattoos etched black and grey across his body. His skin, a ruddy veneer stretched across vascular, steroid‑built muscles, was white flayed tan by a lifetime of sunburn, and the beard that dangled over his chest was a near half-foot of coarse, unkempt wire. Unlike Tse Chi-li, Cyrus had no qualms about making his displeasure known; he swore with vitriol and violence at every shadow that passed outside his Houston prison cell, lurching forward and slamming into the unyielding stone walls whenever anyone dared walk by.
Neither man knew the other existed and if they had neither would likely have cared.
Though they might have, had they known what would come next.
*
Tse Chi-li finished his last meal, jaa-jyang-myen and huíguōròu, in silence, then placed the chopsticks and bowls back neatly on the serving tray. He dabbed his hands, lips and cheeks with the soft cotton handtowel, then folded it over twice and set it down at the entrance to his cell beside the empty steel tray and small porcelain baijiu cup. He rose, rapt three times against the metal bars, then retreated four steps to turn and kneel facing inwards, his hands held unspeaking behind him. He wore plain, simple clothes, a white button-up shirt and grey loose-fitting pants, both pressed and freshly laundered; small gifts from the guards, like the rice-wine, tokens of comfort and respect. The men who guarded Tse Chi-li were not his friends, nor his employer’s, but neither did they have any desire to incur either’s wrath.
From behind him Tse heard the rattle of his cell door opening. His lips twitched as footsteps scuffed across the concrete floor, but he otherwise gave no resistance as a firm grip slid his hands into long steel‑mesh gloves. The guards behind him murmured words and with neither protest nor complaint Tse allowed his arms to be drawn through a carbon-fibre straitjacket; then, encased and restrained, he opened his eyes, turned and was led from his cell in silence. The guards in the hallway outside nodded to him as he passed, and the calls that came through the bars from his fellow Ganzhou Prison inmates echoed well-wishes and support. His arms bound, Tse Chi-li nevertheless walked on his own motion, guards’ hands light on either elbow; silent and unflinching, even in the face of death.
A ferrous nematomancer, Tse Chi-li had worked eleven years as a paid killer for the Triads, able to extend thin metal cords from his fingers which wormed and burrowed beneath his victims’ skin. He had been convicted of murdering thirteen people. He was thought to have killed hundreds more.
*
When Cyrus Corbin’s time came, it came with darkness. His last meal had been a bucket of southern‑fried chicken, onion rings, biscuits, mashed potato and gravy. They’d given him a family pack of gummy bears too, as well as a pitcher of beer, which of course Cyrus had chugged down in one swallow then smashed against the wall in the hope of getting a shard of glass worth shanking with. He made no effort to hide this; subtlety was not Corbin’s strong suit. His room, a ten-by-twelve tomb of featureless cement, contained nothing beyond a cot and a lidless steel toilet, a neon light in the centre of the roof and a Perspex camera in the top right. The walls were sealed with fire retardant, and at any spike in temperature the reinforced steel door would lock, the food slot would seal, and all air would be vented from the room. It was a cell designed to hold a pyromancer, and there was a neutraliser stationed on the cellblock around the clock in case any of the safeguards failed. Cyrus knew all this, supposedly, yet nevertheless tried to burn his way to freedom at least twice a day.
Today though, when the venting started it was not in reaction to any insurrection – the light in the cell just abruptly went out. Cyrus leapt to his feet, flames racing up his forearms and across his prisoner yellows, as all around him the room hissed with a familiar, ominous rush. The giant convict howled, levelling every curse he could muster, roaring of mongrels, race traitors and purity of blood, swearing he’d burn their families alive. The hiss seethed on, indifferent, sucking out the sounds of his slurs. A few seconds later the fire spewing from Cyrus’s hands wavered, followed shortly by his shouting; and then, like always, he fell to his knees gasping and collapsed unconscious on the floor.
The men who entered his cell a minute later wore full body-armour modified from fire‑fighting gear and were accompanied by two neutralisers. They cuffed the unconscious Corbin, strapped him to a gurney, and injected him with paralysing agent from the neck down before wheeling him out. All had been briefed on what to expect. Cyrus Corbin, pyromancer and avowed white nationalist, sentenced to death for burning alive a bus full of black children. A man who had rejected all attempts at telepathic rehabilitation, who had never shown any remorse. There were prisoners in the Houston penitentiary who got second chances. Cyrus’ were up.
At 8:30am Central Daylight Time, separated by half a world, Tse Chi-li and Cyrus Corbin were led through their respective jails towards the rooms where they would die.
*
Tse Chi-li’s guards walked him down and around a winding corridor, through patches of shadow and artificial light until finally they came to a halt before a steel bulkhead. There was no ceremony or fanfare, no audience – only two men, standing waiting in black business suits. The first, a stout, balding Chinese official, moved in front of Tse, waving the guards a step back.
“There is still a chance for you, Chi-li,” he said in Cantonese, “Give us the names of your associates. One way or another, we’ll find them. There is still time for clemency.”
The prisoner did not meet his eyes, merely continued staring straight ahead. After a few seconds’ silence, the squat man in the suit shook his head and motioned to the guards. One of the wardens spun the wheel of the door and with a heavy creak it swung open, and Tse Chi-li was pushed inside.
*
The chamber to which Cyrus Corbin was dragged was rectangular, with rows of chairs on one side facing a long viewing window. The guards pulled the door open and dragged the unconscious man inside before unbuckling, unloading, and re-buckling him upright to a white multi-point restraint bed standing alone in the centre of the room.
Outside the chamber, a crowd gathered. Led in by guards in twos or threes, some old, some younger, they filled the rows of green plastic chairs assembled outside the one-way window looking in. Some were stony-faced, some murmured, some sobbed – most were African American, and most were dressed in the black of church clothes. The outliers were the lieutenant governor of Texas and the state’s chief prosecutor, who sat side-by-side and silent at the end of the front row in their respective blazers and business skirts. The former took some quiet, vindictive pleasure in seeing justice wrought against these lowlifes; the latter always forced herself to attend these executions to remind her of the true consequences of her success. All of them, officials, guards and guests, had signed aggressive, comprehensive non-disclosure agreements and all of them had agreed, retroactively, to have all details from today’s events telepathically purged. There were no phones permitted in this hall, no photography. Those who attended today would leave only with the knowledge that Cyrus Corbin was dead, and a final vision of his corpse.
Comments
Haha that's a great fact! Where do you learn these things haha Do you know why they don't provide them with a last meal anymore? That seems almost cruel, I mean if you're going to kill someone, seems the least you could do... anyway, the more you learn.
Scott Crawford
Fun fact!(/s) Texas no longer provides a last meal to death row prisoners. However, this is an alternate history story and the change only occured in 2011, so it probably doesn't apply here.
