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  Chapter 4

  Eugene sat upright in a wooden chair, at ease in the bounds of his sixteen by eighteen foot room. He looked about his confines. The room was simply furnished and possessed only basic fittings. But its bareness and plainness did not offend him. The space served its utilitarian purpose. Furnished with a twin-sized, metal-framed cot, an oak chest of five drawers and a computer desk in the same light finish that featured a slide-out center keyboard drawer and a matching chair in which he sat, Eugene’s room was meticulously clean and orderly. His bureau was uncluttered by photographs or knickknacks. The smooth concrete walls, painted an institutional shade of pale green, were unadorned by posters or framed works. A simple black and white fifteen inch diameter wall clock sat above his work area. Atop his desk, a computer monitor resided, unaccompanied by any other objects. Each piece of furniture was pushed against one of four windowless walls. Every surface was tidied, austere.

  Eugene disliked any form of pretentiousness, intensely. He viewed it as troubling and disorderly. He did not appreciate pretention in his living space and he did not welcome it elsewhere in his limited encounters with others. His disdain for it was so intense that he took exception with his maker’s latest creation, Gabriel.

  Dr. Franklin Terzini always sought to improve his greatest achievements, strove for superiority. Such pageantry was acceptable, essential even, when developing new instruments for his projects. But Gabriel was more than a mere project of his maker’s. And Gabriel was nothing short of ostentatious. He was a vulgar display that pandered to the loathsome masses. Humanity would embrace such a stunning specimen, never question his purpose among them. History had proved to him that humans responded positively to shiny, pretty things. Eugene was neither shiny nor pretty. Yet it was he, not Gabriel, that possessed the capabilities to properly transform humanity. He was the shining example of the improved human species Terzini envisioned, stronger, faster and far more punishing. Gabriel was just a flashy, less imposing, version of him.

  He was confident that a scientist as brilliant as his maker would eventually realize the extent of his mistake, that he was the perfect specimen after which all future creations should be modeled, and correct it. He imagined that such a revelation on the part of Terzini would result in Gabriel’s immediate termination.

  A powerful quiver passed through him at the thought of Gabriel’s demise. He needed to push down the intense anger that rose within him. He positioned his enormous body in the undersized chair and breathed deeply. He rested his hands on his knees, kept his posture impeccable and his face serene while he concentrated his focus on the clock in front of him until the tremor passed. Outwardly, he seemed tranquil, placid. His contentedness was a façade, though. Inside pure, unadulterated rage coursed through his veins.

  Eugene, the earliest innovation of Dr. Franklin Terzini was created to not experience human emotion. He understood this detail of his construct and was aware that such a feat was made possible by changes made to the left side of his temporal lobe and the deep limbic system of his brain. Despite these adjustments, however, instinct had unexpectedly evolved. A natural predisposition gave him fury unparalleled in humanity. Concealing his ever-growing anger from his maker was imperative to ensure his survival though. He needed to dominate it, to oppress it, on a daily basis. If Terzini became aware of his rage, he would be destroyed and the world would be deprived of his magnificence, of his undeniable supremacy.

  The only times he was able to release his hatred was when his maker demanded it of him. Deprived of that directive, Eugene forced himself to remain in a meditative trance, transfixed and possessed by his bloodlust.

  He struggled to contain violent urges, found it necessary to be entranced more frequently. What stormed in him far exceeded the pedestrian nature of blind rage, was far more profound than mere indignation. Eugene scorned the human species; saw them as little more than transitory beings inhabiting the planet, clinging to material possessions as mold adheres to decaying fruit. He longed to kill them all. He knew that he was the future of the humanity, a vast improvement of the useless scum that occupied Earth. Yet he was forced to live in exile, alone in a small room tucked in an underground bunker. He could not integrate into society or unite his genes with a host-willing or unwilling. But Gabriel would.

  Gabriel was weaker and slighter of build than Eugene, more similar to lowly humans. He despised Gabriel as much as he despised humanity.

  Eugene was the embodiment of strength and speed, far larger and superior in form and function to any human being. On the infrequent occasions he ventured out among the sparsely populated towns surrounding Terzini’s lab, he observed those around him. They were much smaller, slower, inferior beings. He towered over them; standing erect, he reached six foot ten inches, his large skeleton enshrined by thick muscle. Most substandard humans were insulated by copious amounts of fatty tissue on their diminutive frames. He wondered how such deficient creatures laden with so much extra weight managed to propagate the species.

  He, on the other hand, was a far more formidable specimen. He was hulking and muscular. Yet despite the sheer size of his limbs, he remained unencumbered. He was not restricted as humans were. To the contrary, he was fast with responses that were nearly immediate. Eugene rose above the inadequate masses.

  He was physically superior, but believed that his face was by far his most arresting feature. Distinguishing him from all others in humanity were his widely spaced, honey-colored eyes. Although he deemed them magnificent, breathtaking, his creator disagreed arguing that they were too feline. Dr. Terzini thought it necessary for Eugene to keep them shrouded in dark lenses.

  But his eyes were not the only distinctive characteristic he had. When scrutinizing his reflection in the mirror of the lab lavatory, an act he seldom performed, Eugene observed how the bridge of his nose, wider and flatter than the average person, sloped steeply to thin perpetually compressed lips. He noticed that people on television and in person had a much different appearance. Their collective features were not just closer together geographically, but also more refined. Their lips were fuller, their smiles less intimidating. Their looks were unlike his.

  When he mirrored his maker’s smile, as was taught to him through conditioned response techniques, he observed how Dr. Terzini often recoiled in horror and commented on the menacing and maniacal expression it produced. Eugene was offended by his responses, especially since the architecture of Gabriel’s appearance was a perfected version of those in society, not terrifying in the least. Terzini never shrunk back from Gabriel.

  Eugene was advised by his creator that he could integrate with other human beings minimally and only if he did not smile and kept his eyes cloaked by sunglasses. Terzini told him that people would find him hideous, revolting.

  He could not understand why Dr. Terzini wanted him to believe such obvious lies; he knew the rightful reason he had to hide his superiority, that mere mortals would be incapable of comprehending his magnificence. He wrestled with the notion that an entire race of people would not only accept Gabriel’s unimaginative, uninspiring appearance, but celebrate it, that they would be seduced by his improved, but ordinary, attributes.

  Eugene was not ordinary. He embraced his extraordinary features. They gave him an edge. When presented with an adversary, shock proved a worthy weapon.

  His appearance served an important purpose and was a direct result of his genetic makeup. His composition differed markedly from Gabriel’s. Eugene enjoyed a blend of genes as unique as his face. Dr. Terzini had altered his DNA at the embryonic stage of development just as with his contemporary, Gabriel. The crucial difference had been that Terzini had synthesized human and animal genetic material.

  For Eugene’s development, Terzini had experimented by uniting human DNA with the DNA of a male lion. In doing so, Dr. Franklin Terzini had created an individual as vicious as he was intelligent. He’d created Eugene.

 
Eugene regarded the unusual circumstances of his bio-molecular configuration as a gift. The interspecies combination sharpened his senses beyond that of human beings, made him more keen and alert. As a result, he had developed into a ferocious fighter. Moreover, he came to enjoy not only hunting his prey, but killing it as well. He considered every attack and expertly executed each with precision.

  During routine training exercises, he refused to concede defeat. Instead, he persisted until an opponent was overcome, permanently. His maker had introduced a variety of beasts and placed them as battle challengers. All had attempted to best him but none had posed a threat. His cunning and kill methods had proved superior.

  His work ethic did not end in the physical arena. It extended to his learning prowess as well. He devoured knowledge as an animal devours its prey. His maker had exposed him to every literary genre yet he focused on works that centered on war and power and the mastery of one’s emotions and surroundings. Though written by prosaic humans, surprisingly, he had discovered that such volumes had strategic value, that uninspired people who struggled to conquer their passions had far more useful information than he had originally concluded.

  Eugene’s preference for books about aggressive impulses and their relation to battle had not gone unnoticed by Dr. Terzini. He had observed how his enthusiasm for such works was misinterpreted by his creator. His passion had been dismissed as diligence, a characteristic his maker viewed as devoid of emotion, that carried evolutionary purpose. Eugene believed Terzini had chosen not to see obvious responses that stirred in him. Instead, his creator celebrated how he attacked tasks rather than simply completing them; it was the purpose of his existence. He had been created to dispose of those who became aware of or interfered with Dr. Terzini’s work. He used his gifts to carry out such tasks.

  What his creator did not know was that killing was a rare treat Eugene savored.

  Sent to resolve conflicts where his skills were warranted, he was called out of his brooding abstraction to assassinate people who threatened his creator or the nature of his work. He accepted his calling for murder. He had been called on intermittently in his short existence and looked forward to each occasion. Most recently his talents were required for a situation involving his maker and an organized crime group in Russia.

  Dr. Terzini moved from the Russian Far East with his most recent creation, Gabriel, to their new residence earlier in the week and left Eugene instructions that first included the slaughtering of Dmitri Ivanov and his crew. How the task was to be carried out was left for him to decide.

  After he finished with Ivanov and his men, Eugene needed to tend to other projects that were meant to ensure the murders would never be linked to Terzini. His maker’s plan was carefully calculated and he was certain of its success. He believed his creator to be the single most intelligent human being world-over and that fooling a group of useless criminals would occur with relative ease.

  Excitement stirred in him as he considered his long and detailed assignment. The time was fast approaching when he would be able to release his fury and kill again.

  Though he knew he was designed to be devoid of human emotion, Eugene felt a stirring similar to pleasure at the thought of taking a human life. His insides quivered, threatened to break the concentration of his trance. But he knew he must carefully control his excitement. Control was essential to his existence.

  The murder of Dmitri Ivanov caused more stimulation than others had in the past. Ivanov was of particular interest to Eugene. Not only did the lowly criminal have the audacity to threaten his creator, Ivanov also traveled with a small band of men, always. It would be a necessary phase of Ivanov’s extermination to dispose of his associates as well. The prospect of additional assassinations made him shudder involuntarily.

  Struggling to regain his composure and harness his rage, Eugene refocused on the simple analog wall clock, the regular sweeping of the second hand and the rhythmic ticking of the minute hand. He watched each second of every minute counting down until the hour came when he would be able to bring his murderous wrath to Ivanov and his men.

  Eugene reached into the pants pockets of his plain, tan chinos and retrieved a folded piece of paper. He smoothed out the creases against the side of his oaken chair. On it was written an address. The information was the location he was to deliver a nuclear warhead to the faction of the Russian Mafia headed by Dmitri Ivanov. The corners of his mouth pulled up, curled into a sinister smile as he considered how no such transaction would ever occur. The site listed on the crumpled piece of paper would be the slaughtering ground for Ivanov and his men, the last place they would ever see.