Afterburner (SS Mini-Series)

Episode 2-3: Clockwork

    Carlotta refuses to let Clyde help her with the heavy machine, and she dragged it up to the fourth floor without any complaints. She's covered in sweat, her usually neat hair pulled into a tight bun now has strays frizzing out and touching her red cheeks.

    "Last floor, how coincidental," she says.

    "I'm sorry, but my nose says this is where the smell is the strongest. She probably wanted a good place to keep a lookout, hopefully, she didn't see us come in," I say.

    I keep my footsteps quieter up here, I don't want to give her a chance to plot a setup or try jumping out of a window. The smell is strong up here; thick and oily as if it could be a dense fog if we could see smells. I wonder if an Animatrix victim will get that power. What would they do with it?

    My nose touches the door and I pull back a little embarrassed. "It's this door," I whisper, "Carlotta, get the machine ready. I have a feeling she's waiting on the other side."

    Carlotta sets the machine down and flips some switches. What we didn't expect was for it to start making a whirring noise loud enough for someone on the other side to hear. Clyde gently moves me to the side and kicks the door open. At first, it flies off its hinges and speeds inside, but expectedly, the door and its pieces slow to a crawl in mid-air.

    Standing in front of the debris is Clockwork clutching her bloody side with only a bra and jeans covering her. Bandages have been wrapped around her stomach, it's already soaked with fresh blood. She didn't have the tools to close to the wound, I'm guessing.

    She steps to the side and lets the door hit the wall at full speed. Clyde and I rush in, bumping into each other trying to squeeze through the door at the same time. We slip in, Clyde at full sprint, and me tripping and rolling on the floor.

    Clyde is immediately slowed down, and it gives me a perfect chance to grab a sharp piece of the door and throw it at her. It hits her fresh cut, but it doesn't stab. She screams anyway and speeds up Clyde's running, forcing him to smack his nose on the wall at a dangerous velocity.

    I stay on the floor and use my gun to shoot a light fixture mounted right above her. The shards explode, but they too fall in slow motion. She leaps to a nearby desk and grabs a pen from it, throwing it at me and speeding up the pen's drop. It goes so fast that it completely impales my bicep, coming out the other side in a bloody stream.

    "Agh! You bitch!"

    Clyde's eyes finally stop crossing and he focuses on Clockwork. She sees him and runs to the window. She shatters it with her elbow, but before the pieces can fall outside, she freezes them like a suspended jigsaw puzzle. One by one, she plucks them from the air and throws the shards at Clyde.

    Clyde covers his eyes, the glass shards ripping through his shirt and skin, his forearms are turned to red ribbons as blood spurts from the deep gashes. When she runs out, she freezes him instead.

    "I told you two to just leave it alone! I saw you through the window, I knew you were going to sniff me out. I was going to jet after I patched myself up, but I ran out of time," she says.

    "Egh! Carlotta, get the machine!" I scream.

    She walks in with a fully charged machine, a wide nozzle pointing at Clockwork. "Nice to meet one of the Animatrix victims. I'm quite shocked to see such abilities existing on this planet in my lifetime."

    Clockwork scoffs. "What's that, a new and improved time stabilizer? I hope for your sake this one works better than the last."

    I laugh too. "It's not a time stabilizer, it's a particle accelerator."