He tweaked something in the paint and I felt the motion like he had reached in and was pulling my veins apart. A steady tug, like I was being drawn and quartered from inside. “No, there have been no loose ferals strong enough for an institution like Excelsine, radical mage haven that it’s become. And it was easy to spin and sate the public after dear Rafi used ferals for his own means in Salietrex. Which is why when I heard about a feral at Excelsine, I knew.”
I swallowed. It wasn't anything I hadn't known. I'd been marked from the first. Even Will, who had accepted me immediately, had known there was something sketchy about why there were no other ferals at Excelsine, even if he hadn't been able to verbalize why.
“It used to be that we'd add a single mage to the menagerie every month or two—the menagerie your little band is trying to ruin. But with your arrival in our world and the magic you so liberally spread, that timetable could be increased tenfold. Ah, look at you,” he mused. “Trying so desperately not to attack me in anger. Afraid that your merry little band would pay for it? You'd be right.”
I laughed, trying to relieve my rage and fear. “How did you decide who to keep alive?”
Why wasn't Christian in one of those cells?
“The instructions were always to take a feral and leave a replacement in its place. However, if something happened...” He shrugged. “There are always more eggs. Worrying about a broken egg is senseless.”
“My brother was one of those broken eggs.”
“And now he is dead. Move on.”
Words in response were all choking me, the fury collecting inside the expanding bottle of my chest. “What do you want, with all of this? What is Genesis Omega to you?”
He smiled. “Why, I want the same as you, Miss Crown. I want to set the Third Layer to rights. I want to get our society back on track. Wars, terrorism, pestilence—”
“Half of those ills are from you.”
“Yes.” There was a smile underneath the fury still visible on his face. “We all play our parts. Some of us are simply assigned the wrong character to play.”
“You think yourself the hero?”
“Oh, no, I am decidedly the villain of this piece. But it doesn't matter what you or I think. It matters what the mages of the future think. History will remember me in a polarizing, yet magnificent way. What sort of hero will I be looked upon, that I had the strength to undertake this task? They will view my actions and see a person who was willing to make the decisions that others could or would not make. Like you. You can't even sacrifice your least pawn.”
“And you seek to sacrifice everyone. A monster.”
“Not all. Many. And a monster I will be. But time leaches emotion from decisions. Makes results far more black-and-white.” He smiled. “The way that I already view it. I could always see what was wrong with society. It was easy to see. I wondered why others couldn't, then I realized that their minds were far too small and their abilities far too weak.”
“Like the non-magicals? You want to cull them, too?”
He moved, and I moved again, keeping Table One between us, as if that would help me.
He smiled. “The non-magicals are weak and dying. They kill the planet around them. But they have enviable technological minds, constrained as they are by physics, and every so often they produce magical children. Magical children who often have great powers. Why? What is it about these late blooming mages? What does it mean for our society if we take them out of play? I'm a scientist, at heart. I needed the data.”
“So, the ferals—you were taking them, testing on them to see if you could sacrifice the entire layer?” I felt another orb erupt. Time...
“The entire layer? Dear me, no. You, dear child, are both the means to the end and the stopper in all of this. You are the prime example of why we need their stock, the cattle of their herds, no matter what the other data says. The outliers. You, a child raised in the non-magical world by non-magical parents. Your powers exceed so many others. If I were to eliminate the non-magical world, I lose the ability to find more of you.”
“Just have to cull some of them, then?” I sneered.
“The weak. Mages, non-magicals, and magical beings—all the weak must be removed. They sap our resources, our magic, our time and energy. Gone.” He wiped a hand. “The ones who prey on society. The poor, the indigent, the anemic, the stupid. It should appeal to you, really. For one who values intelligence and initiative in others—a self-starter, I think you First Layer types say—your new lower intelligence class will be all those of the middle. The entire structure will be strengthened. Like the way you are remaking the Third Layer—an otherwise brilliant strategy. Removing the decaying, decrepit parts, then strengthening all that remains. All those people who will never accept you, I can make them go away. You can help decide who goes.”
“I'm not causing mass genocide.”
“Are you not? What of the creatures you will uproot?”
“I'm making provisions for them.”
“Cages? Pens?”
I smiled tightly. “That's the gift of being an Origin Mage. I can remake worlds within worlds for them.”
“Without magic.”
“Or maybe just with a different kind.”
He narrowed his eyes. I felt a curl of victory, but turned the conversation quickly. “Those you deem weak give strength to those you deem strong. In the emotions that you disdain. Compassion, aid, community. Part of the human mindset involves developing tools to help those who are sick or disabled.”
“But that's to my point.” He leaned forward as if we were in concordance, but he couldn't hide the coolness in his gaze. “You cull the lowest denominator, and the tools developed become those that help the middle—tools that are more exceptional and thrust society on an even faster path.”
“You deem yourself a philanthropist then?” I asked coldly.
“I deem myself the monster that will do what is needed,” he replied in kind. “And history will hate and secretly celebrate me for it.”
“I will not celebrate you.”
“We’ll see. I have nearly everything I need for Phase One. I need just one more thing.”
“Phase One—the loss of a million, just to see what happens?” I said bitterly.
He smiled and rotated a multi-colored sphere in his palm. “I know what will happen. A million to set the stage. To see the forces clamber. What million is chosen? Why, you could have a say in that. Come willingly, and I will let you choose the first set. Even spare your friends should they fall within.”
He held up his hand and instead of the device I was expecting, there was a giant cloud of magic, swirling and roiling. It was an oddly chaotic element for a man so precise.
My mind connected the points of chaos. I could see it—the roiling magic, the genocide, the decay of humanity. I could see how Stavros could do it, if he put pressure on just the right points of the layer system, which always hovered in the air around me now, even without my regular magic streaming within.
“So, is this the end of your villain monologue? Showing me your magic, telling me whatnot of your grand plan before I destroy you?”
“Oh no, dear. This was me giving your brain an exact run down of what is going to happen so that you can understand and draw the mental schematics I require of it.” The whisper of magic fell over me again.