Hell On Earth 2

Chapter X: Gone Like the Wind

Sebastian paused as he looked at Taylor with a feeling of guilt as if what he'd say next would get himself killed.

"It's outlandish, but due to desperate times, I think you should try to break Eric's focus," he said. "Sharon-- Eric's mother, told me while I worked with her--"

"If you call experimenting on people 'working with them' ", Maverick mumbled under his breath.

"As I was saying," Sebastian said rudely. "She told me all about the voices and how it was as if they were talking about her failures, deepest guilts and secrets, creating an obsession for her. Fortunately, she didn't fall for these tricks because she was stronger than the other subjects... mentally speaking; but, I think that maybe if you give Eric what he wants, the obsessions can go away."

"That's bullshit if I've heard of it," Gabriel remarked. "What do we do-- simply let Taylor go back to that son of a bitch who isn't even human anymore?"

"You do realize that technically, all Infected are humans, right?"

Gabriel shook his head in disbelief.

"Sebastian," Taylor spoke up. "Why would I need to do this? It doesn't make any sense-- how would you know that this would work?"

Taylor's words seem to cut through Sebastian, but at that moment, he decided to answer... truthfully this time.

"Look," Sebastian started. "Before living the rest of my life with the 5-6, I... had someone special to me: a brother. Up until that point in time, the community I was with was strong-- able to protect my family and I. My father was the kind and caring leader of the group, but my mom... polar opposite; lived in an 'every person for themselves' type of lifestyle. When they were unfortunately mutilated, I was alone, terrified to lead people.

Soon, death surrounded us from every side, the Infected slaughtered our people, mutilated and viciously murdered children, women, no one was safe from their wrath. But alas, we were saved... just when we thought our community's extinction had arrived. The 5-6, get this, saved us; I was the most grateful, practically begging the 5-6 to take us in-- help us learn how to survive, in exchange for protection."

"But wasn't there no Infected before your experiments," Gabriel asked. "This doesn't make any sense."

"You are correct," Sebastian answered. " In the essence of successful Infected. But the reason that I know is that... my brother, he was one of the 12 volunteers for the 'Firefly Initiative'. Despite the paranoia of the other victims, my brother included, I was too horrified at what I had created, so I tried to reason with him-- answer his needs. To my surprise, it worked... till I was forced to put him down."  Sebastian choked up pretty hard, trying to maintain his cool. Taylor instinctively tried to comfort Sebastian, but he gestured in denial.

Maverick sat there speechless. Sure, he was bitter and untrustworthy of Sebastian, but he couldn't help but find himself trying to give Sebastian the benefit of the doubt. Gabriel, on the other hand, thought that Sebastian was telling a bunch of bullshit, and wouldn't have any of it.

"I... I'm sorry," Mason said with sympathy. "I couldn't imagine--"

"Don't worry about it," Sebastian tried to smile through. "It's hard, but I can only now hope to make things right, to truly find the error of my ways-- help put an end to this shit."

"Don't worry, Sebastian," Taylor assured. "We'll find a way to work things out: together."

***

While Haven and the rest of the community were trying to plan a course of action, Eric had just returned to the old 5-6 warehouse, where he had murdered Slash. He made his way over to an area, caked with dried blood on the floor-- marking the spot of Slash's corpse.