The Black Death

Razha earned the alias of the “Black Death” on her last day of graduate school. She didn’t quite graduate, nor was she expelled, nor did she properly withdraw from the program. In fact, according to university records, she died.

The night of her death, Razha was in one of the unused lab rooms in the basement of the alchemical studies building, working on an extracurricular research project, along with her favorite undergraduate student. Marisio Teranas was a prodigy of alchemy, top student in Razha’s introductory class. His talents were far beyond that class after a few private lessons by “Professor Annosov,” as he called her. She told him it wasn’t correct yet, but also to keep using it rather than being on a first name basis in public. She always called him Maris, though.

He was a mountain, even taller than Razha and seemingly double the mass. He could lift her off the ground with one hand, she learned the first time they practiced martial arts together. And he could certainly throw a punch. He once dropped a Purist unconscious with one blow when they came to disturb their favorite bar. Sometimes those types would make the mistake of assuming he was one of them, just because he too liked to keep his head shaved. They would quickly regret it. All in all, Maris was the only colonizer she really trusted, and at the time, probably her closest friend.

A knock came at the lab door, and the locked handle rattled as someone tried to turn it. “Fuck,” Maris said, looking at the volatile explosive alchemicals laid out on the counter before them.

“Just stay quiet.” Razha calmly walked to the door and unlocked it. It was only the janitor on the other side.

“Sorry, didn’t know nobody was in here at this hour,” he said.

“It’s okay. I’m a grad student, this is a private tutoring session.” She showed him her school ID.

“I’ll clean up in the morning, then.”

He closed the door.

She returned to the counter. “Don’t worry, there shouldn’t be any faculty in here or anything, and I’m perfectly allowed to use a lab for teaching,” she said.

“Well then teach on, Professor.”

“I think I have nothing more to teach you about this particular field of alchemy. In fact, I’d welcome your opinions on the design.”

He looked over the device--glass bottles of two liquids that, when joined and exposed to air, would produce a white-hot and uncontainable fire. In between was a powder charge that would shatter the glass and scatter droplets of the fluids across a whole hallway. Attached to that was a primer that would ignite electrically, linked by a short tube to an old silver pocket watch. It was her father’s.

“I think it’ll work perfectly. Do you wanna check my circuitry?” he said.

“Nah, you’re my student, you did it right.”

“I hope so, I wouldn’t want to fail your class.”

She reached up and put her hand on his shoulder, and for a rare moment looked directly into his eyes. “Are you ready?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you sure of this? There is no going back, ever,” she said.

“Yeah, no question, I’m in. Are you sure?” he said.

“Yeah. I’ve been ready to die a long time.”

Razha put on her long black coat--brand new, her last purchase in Mallikus City. It would conceal her nicely to anyone who happened to see her slip away. Maris picked up the heavy device, and Razha opened the door and peered out of the hallway. It was clear. They brought it up the stairs to the building’s second floor, and set it carefully in the hallway. The windows here overlooked the front door.

“You go write our message on the wall outside, that wall will be dark at this hour and nobody will see you. Then, wait at the meeting point, just smoke some katal and act natural,” she said.

“How long will you be?” he said.

“I’m gonna make sure that janitor leaves first.”

“Good luck.”

“I’ll be fine. Next time you see me, I’ll be dead.”

He gave her a big, tight hug before setting off. She watched out the windows and waited impatiently for the moment. An hour passed, and finally the janitor walked out. She got to work immediately and wound the knob on the watch until it was just five minutes to midnight. Then, she walked out.

It definitely hadn’t been five minutes when she heard the burst, like a gunshot. But she was nearly out the door. She ran from the building, wrapped in her black coat, as a bright white light shone from the shattered second floor windows, and the roaring sound of fire carried across the courtyard.

People were already coming outside to see. She slipped into an alley between dorms and circled around toward the back of the building. She could see the flames coming from the roof. The bright light illuminated the message painted in black on the back wall:

  THIS IS FOR ALL THE LAND YOU POISONED WITH YOUR BLACK DEATH!

She took her last look and headed out of campus, slipping by the gathering crowds. Elsewhere in the university district, she met up with Maris again. They embraced like family long separated.

“Welcome to the world of the dead,” he said.

She leaned against the wall next to him. Her hands were shaking and her breath was short. “It went off a little too soon, Maris.”

“Fuck! Sorry, I had a feeling I fucked something up.”

“Could’ve been worse. But I’m afraid I’m going to have to give you a failing grade in introductory alchemy.”

“What for?” he said, actually looking offended.

She looked up over the building at the smoke billowing over the roof. “Unsafe lab procedure.”

“Well, I’m afraid your tenure is over, Professor, regardless.”

She pulled a matchbook out of her coat pocket. “Just one more fire for us to set tonight.”

He nodded and pulled a bundle of papers from his pocket. Razha held her own documents out above his and struck her match against the bricks beside her. Once the paper caught, they both dropped it on the pavement.

“Now we’re ghosts. We’re nobody.”

In the University of Kogaku’s Department of Alchemical Studies, graduate students could reserve lab space for private research all hours of the day and night. It was department policy that these sign up sheets be kept off site from the lab building, a precaution due to the volatile and explosive materials that were stored in the building. One graduate student and an undergraduate, Annosov and Teranas, had signed in that night, but never signed out. Both of those students were reported missing, and after a week not turning up, sentinel detectives decided the two students had perished in the fire. The newspapers would report that two young men had died. One was posthumously granted a doctoral degree. When the new building was built, their names would be inscribed on a plaque, and dedicated in a ceremony before all the school.

Graffiti found on the remains of the back wall indicated to the sentinels that this was not an accidental fire, but the work of terrorists. Razha’s involvement was quickly and categorically dismissed, her standing among the department faculty was too flawless. After the blaze had finally been quelled, all that was legible from that message were two words: BLACK DEATH. Nobody was able to identify the arsonists, but one janitor did witness a figure in black fleeing from the scene. So the rumors began, and spread like fire from the capital across the nation.