Wilfred part 10 - Everything's a mess

Kaylin woke by the sound of someone calling her name. It was a light high pitched tone. 
"Kaylin! Kaylin!" She was lying in a bed made out of satin pillows, cowering under a blanket. Small paws stomped over her body and soon a warm tiny tongue licked her all over her face. 
"Oh, Kaylin! I missed you so much! Where have you been? Oh, I'm so glad you're back! I love you, I love you!" Kaylin opened her eyes and tried to protect herself from the energetic pomporean puppy's licks. She forced him down under the blanket and hugged him tight to hold him still. 
"Hi, Doggo." She mumbled happily. Then she felt someone sit down in the pillows beside her. A hand stroke her hair gently. She looked up at the pitch-black silhouette of Wilfred. His purple glowing eyes was the only illumination in the shadow. He leaned forward and the light from the window revealed his face. 
"Good morning Kaylin." He gave her a warm and friendly smile. 
"Wilfred…" Kaylin whispered confused. Her memories of the day before were fuzzy and she couldn't quite recall where she was nor what had happened. 
"Where am I?" She asked confused and looked around in the old temple room.

The old temple walls were partly covered with purple satin cushions and curtains. Golden goblets stood on a mahogany drawer and the floor was covered with a thick dark carpet. She herself seemed to be lying on an altar of some sort converted to a bed. It was covered with pillows and blankets. 
"Everything's alright now." Wilfred said comfortingly. "You're back with us." 

Kaylin sat up and looked around. Slowly she recognized the place as the main temple of Blacktown. She hadn't been here since the rebel base was founded. 
"What happened?" She asked confused. 
"You teleported us here." Wilfred said excitedly. "It was marvelous Kaylin. I knew you had it in you. I've never experienced anything like it, it was just like you said, a shortcut."
"I teleported all the way to Blacktown?" She asked surprised. Normally she couldn't teleport further than viewing distance. Then she realized, the AR glasses were gone. She couldn't see Dawson's glyph anymore.
"Wilfred!" Panicky she gasped his robe. "I need to…" Kaylin fell silent again, staring straight through Wilfred’s chest. Wilfred looked a bit confused at first but then he smiled comfortingly.
"It's okay Kaylin, everything's fine now." 

***

Three nights had passed since they got back from the disaster which now was the shifter district.  Wilfred leaned against the window-ledge and looked out over Blacktown from his usual spot in the temple ruin. Along the stairs, leading up to the temple, black banners waved in the wind. At the square below them, a few shifters walked around and examined the big golden jackal statute. 
"Look at them… from up here they look like small ants running around. No clue of their future. No clue that this might be their last summer walking on this planet. They just look so... small and insignificant…" he made a pause. "I guess this is what it feels like to be a god. To look down at your subjects worshipping you." He sighed concerned. "I need to tell them sooner or later that we're going to demolish this planet only to rebuild it from scratch. We're almost there, we just need a few more rebels and then we're ready to go. But now, when we're so close, I cannot help but wonder, if it is wise?" Wilfred turned around to look at his friend. "Kaylin, do you think I'm doing the right thing?"
Kaylin didn't answer. She sat completely still and straight on her bed. It looked uncomfortable and almost unnatural.
"Kaylin?" He asked but still got no answer. "Kaylin!" 
"Hm?" This time she looked at him, but with an absent disinterest. 
"Did you listen to anything I just said?" He asked.

Ever since he got her back she had been like this, quiet, inexpressible, not at all like herself.  There were times when the old Kaylin surfaced. But that were the times when she had fear and paranoia in her eyes. Something was very wrong with her. He, himself, had been feeling indecisive lately. Questioning himself and the wisdom of his actions. He used to have a plan, a goal that he never derived from. It gave him the strength to keep on fighting. But it seemed so feeble right now. Was shrinking the planet into a black hole really the best option? What if Life’s human had been right?
“Am I doing the right thing, Kaylin?” he asked again. 
“NO!” Kaylin shouted, jumping off the bed. “You have to stop this! It’s madness!” But even as the first words left Kaylin's mouth Wilfred could feel his determination return to him. He was doing the right thing, no question about it. It was so clear to him he couldn't understand why he had ever doubted himself in the first place. 
"YOU HAVE TO STOP! YOU HAVE TO FIGHT!" Kaylin shouted ripping down all the golden goblets on the drawer beside the bed. Then she stopped, just as suddenly as she had started, and sat back down on the bed as nothing had happened at all. 
"Gods Kaylin, what did they do to you?" Wilfred said. "It was that damned blue wolf, the psychic, wasn't it?"
"It was the human," Kaylin answered flatly, staring at him like she was looking straight through him.
"The space professor?" Wilfred asked surprised. 
"You have to kill him. Kill the human Wilfred." she urged. 
"He's already dead, don't you remember?" Wilfred sat down beside her on the bed and hugged her tightly. "Oh, Kaylin, poor Kaylin, what have they done to you?" They had stayed in Blacktown for three nights to let her rest, he had hoped she would get better, but no improvement seemed to have been made. She seesawed back and forth between utterly mad and completely calm and apathetic.  It hurt him to see her like this, but he could not let this stop him and his plans, not now, when he come so far.  

"Kaylin, can you take us to the secret base?" Wilfred asked, but just as he was going to tell her about its location she answered. 
"Yes." She rose from the bed almost in a mechanical motion and went to the middle of the room. With a large motion with her hands, she opened a round hole in the air. Wilfred stared at her in wonder. This time she created a perfect portal. The hole was like a window to the oilfield. 
"Let's go." She said and held out a hand for him to take. 
"This it's amazing Kaylin." He said astonished and took it.

Much like walking through a door they walked through the portal hand in hand. The concern for Kaylin's poor condition was soon replaced with excitement for her improved abilities. They arrived at the old workers' dwelling. Wilfred opened the old door. The wooden floor creaked under his feet as he walked inside.  
"Cameron?" He called but got no answer. Two empty coffee cups stood on the table but otherwise, the house seemed empty. He walked out again and kept calling for her, she couldn't be far away. 
"Cameron! Cameron where are you?!" Wilfred shouted across the field. A few crows lifted by the sound of his voice, but otherwise, it was completely quiet at the oilfield. Kaylin followed closely behind Wilfred as he searched the field. 

As they walked around a corner of a big pump station Wilfred bumped into a stranger. Both of them stumbled a few steps backward, surprised by the other one. The stranger was a thin, short ginger. Dressed in one of their own garbs.
"Ah! It's you!" The stranger shouted. "Can you tell her to stop?! This is getting on my nerves!" Then he turned away mumbling. "E equals mass times speed of light squared. E equals mass times speed of light squared."
"Who are y…" Wilfred started asking but the stranger started yelling again.
"Shut up! Shut up!" The man covered his ears and looked like someone who unwillingly attended to a death metal concert.
"What?" Wilfred asked disturbed. This was clearly not a person in his right mind. 
"Can't you hear it?!" He yelled. 
"Who are you?" Wilfred asked threatening. The stranger let go of his ears and stared at Wilfred for a second looking like he could not understand Wilfred’s question. Then he smirked and made something which barely reminded of a bow. 
"My name is Nuclear. I sometimes go under the name 'the wise', or 'that waking apocalypse'. I'm one of the ten and member of the council." This time he didn't yell but talked in a softer manner. Wilfred doubted every word the stranger had just said. It was hard to believe that this short, thin, and wide-eyed little man would be one of the ten energy shifters. This 'Nuclear' seemed to twitch sometimes. Like something was poking on his attention and disturbing him. Otherwise, he stood with a straight back and with an aristocratic expression in his face. Wilfred raised a hand towards him, ready to implode this intruder if he tried anything funny.
"If you truly are an energy shifter," Wilfred snarled. "I will kill you." 
Nuclear looked confused at first, but then he took Wilfred’s hand, shaking it friendly.
"Oh, you misunderstand, my good sir. I'm at your disposal."
"You're what?"
"I've joined your side. I'm here for Gravity. She, your friend promised me I would get the pleasure to kill him when this little rebellion was over with." Nuclear smiled sadistically. "I've dreamed of the day he would perish for centuries now." Nuclear then shrugged. "He won't be gone forever though, he'll get reborn sooner or later. But this time he won't be the one making the rules and I would finally get some revenge for all the times he killed me."

Somehow Wilfred had not counted with this. He had not counted with having even energy shifters joining a rebellion. This could prove useful beyond anything. How many more members of the council could they convert? If one of them felt a hatred this strong against their leader, he could possibly not be alone.
"What was your name again?" Wilfred asked and returned the handshake. "Nuclear, the wise, or the apocalypse?"
"Nuclear suits me just fine. But there was another name I've got… it was pretty important… but why…? The old man waffled about it..." Nuclear turned away again and with both hands covering his ears. "Shut your mouth! I'm trying to remember something...! My name… Shadow… Shade something…?" Nuclear let out a scream of angst. "How will I ever be able to think over all this noise?!"
"What's wrong with you?" Kaylin asked concerned.
"She's doing it! Down there!" Frustrated he pointed at an unfamiliar crater 20 meters behind him. "The world is screaming with joy! Can't you hear it?!" Nuclear shouted like he was wearing thick headphones.

Wilfred looked over the edge of the newly dug crater. Cameron sat at the bottom, digging in the dirt with her bare hands. She picked up a handful of sand and watched it vanish in her hands with a gleeful grin on her lips. 
"Cameron, what are you doing down there?" He asked.
"Can't you hear it Wilfred?! The chanting? The grains are begging me to dissolve them into energy!" She shouted overjoyed. 
"I hear nothing Cameron…" he answered worried. She looked at him for a second and then she quickly crawled up from the crater. She held up a handful of sand to his ear.
"Listen!" She urged. "Listen to them! They're all so eager to be energy again!"
Wilfred removed her hand from his ear.
"Are you feeling alright Cameron?"
"I feel better than ever! This is amazing Wilfred! Nuclear showed me, I had no idea the world could sing! Did you meet Nuclear? He's a good fellow, the council had suppressed him so he gladly joined us. I promised he would get to kill the old man, once we're done with everything." She rambled overjoyed and let the sand vanish from her hand.
"Have you checked on the old man?" He asked.
"What? Yes, or… no. We looked on him when we got back here. That was… two days ago?"

Wilfred was worried. Everyone seemed to have their own insanity trip for the time being. First Kaylin and now Cameron as well. He couldn't even tell for himself as he yet again started to doubt his own plans. He walked to the makeshift prison where they held Gravity. If Cameron hadn't looked after the badger for two days he ought to be hungry by now. Not that he would die from starvation, but Wilfred saw no reason to starve him. If anything the old man got even more annoying when he was hungry. 

The stench hit him as soon as he opened the hatch. It was the stench of a body that had been decomposing for a day or two. 
"No…" Wilfred gasped. "No, no, no!" He cursed as he covered his mouth and nose with his sleeve and ran over the floor. "You're not dead! You can't be dead!!!" He turned the corpse around. Both eyes were missing and white larvae crawled in the skin openings. How had this even happened? Cameron hadn't checked on him for two days… could it have been Nuclear? No… there was no sign of damage on the corpse and Nuclear seemed eager enough not to have done it yet. Wilfred rose again, disgusted by the stench and the awful sight of the dead badger. This had been suicide, it was the only explanation. As Gravity had seen that even his own council members switched side he had realized he was on the losing side. He had killed himself in a desperate attempt to destroy Wilfred’s plans...