by Molles, DJ
Perry’s relief at not killing them all tingled in his fingers. He wanted to have something witty to say, but all he managed was what Stuber always told him: “It’s just time and practice.”
***
No one stopped until they reached the top side.
The warriors had been reduced to prey animals, running on a drive they’d never experienced before in their lives. Perry and his team were perhaps the only ones that were accustomed to that feeling.
Their progress slowed as they mounted the long dark steps to the surface, lit by the glow of weaponlights from Stuber and Sagum and the three surviving praetors.
No one spoke. They saved their breath. But as they reached the top of those stairs and saw the dim outline of the door to the surface streets, glances were exchanged. The pure, distilled panic of their flight had been reduced with each step, though it still hung about them like the fog that never relinquished its grip on the East Ruins. But through that, their thoughts began to reassert themselves.
Demigods—an Inquisitor, and an outlaw.
Soldiers—servants of the paladins, and one who’d deserted long ago.
Outsiders—right alongside the people that murdered their kind for heresy.
And Perry. A part of all of them, and yet a part of none of them.
A tense truce seemed to settle over them, unspoken, but agreed to nonetheless. Expediency won out over any sense of duty. Like it or not, they were each now bound by an experience that no one else in the world possessed, and lashed together by the threat of what might come next.
Back into some semblance of reality, the haggard survivors stumbled out into the dim light of day, gasping for air, each of their legs unsteady and unwieldy with the effort of their flight.
As Perry’s eyes adjusted to the daylight, seven squads of praetors met his gaze.
The pack of wheezing survivors staggered to a halt before the rank and file of black armor and menacing helms. The first line of praetors, arranged in a block as though to take a battlefield, swept their rifles up.
“Hold!” Lux shouted at them, raising his longstaff against them. “Hold your fire! Stand down!”
Perry blinked away the mottled edges of his vision. Heaving, he cast his eyes across the ranks of praetors, wondering how they had stood in such perfect order when there were vicious Guardians about…
His question was answered as he looked far to the right, where the city streets opened up like a dry river bed in the midst of a canyon of ancient structures. Mixed into the flowing mists, crumbled buildings still smoked, and a pall of dust had not fully cleared. Rubble was scattered across the streets, as far down that avenue as Perry could see, until it disappeared into the gray fog. The wrecked bodies of Guardians lay, like a field of copper junk, some of them in pieces, some of them with gaping holes in their hulls, and some of them that looked like they’d been melted to slag.
None of them stood, or hovered. Whimsby was not there.
Perry whirled. Sagum stood a pace behind him, hands on his knees. Perry lunged across the space, barely aware of Lux’s continued commands to his praetors, and he seized the collar that still hung about Sagum’s neck.
“Whimsby! Whimsby, can you hear me? Are you out there?”
Perry’s pained shout drew a curious silence from the rest of those gathered.
Sagum’s eyes darted about, down the street to the obvious signs of a battle between the Guardians and the one that had been infiltrated against them. He managed to straighten, his shaking hands grasping the collar.
“Whimsby,” Sagum coughed out. “Answer back if you’re there.”
Perry stared at the cobbled together device. Waiting for Whimsby’s odd, drawling accent to come back to them. But silence was the only answer, and it pressed at his ears, as he sought to hear anything else but that terrible nothingness.
The nothingness of death.
“Perry,” Stuber said, laying a hand on his shoulder.
And he might have said more.
But then the ground under their feet heaved.
A shout of alarm went up from everyone on that street as they stumbled. A rumble grew from underneath them, like a volcano threatening to erupt. The pitch of its tone grew, heightened. A groan, deep and painful, that rattled up from the center of the earth and then reverberated through the circular tower over their heads, like the ringing of some massive gong.
Perry’s eyes darted upwards. Dust and debris crumpled from the massive structure, peppering the ground, causing Perry to jump back and a stir of confusion to ripple through the ranks of praetors.
For a moment, Perry thought it was an optical illusion, but then decided it was not. “The tower’s leaning!” he shouted, backpedaling. “It’s gonna fall!”
“Praetors!” Lux roared. “Fall back!”
Seventy-some-odd people spun on their heels and fled, down the wide avenue, into the field of copper wreckage where the Guardians had battled. The earthquake pursued them, causing them to stumble, and the rumble turned to an all-consuming roar that rattled their bones in the fragile flesh of their bodies.
Perry’s team took up the rear of the retreat by simple fact that they were the farthest back. Perry slung Teran and Sagum forward, pushing them ahead, and Stuber catapulted them even further, down the street, in the wake of the ranks of praetors that retreated in one disorganized mass.
Something struck the ground at Perry’s heels.
He managed a glance behind him and saw the tower falling, looming, its shadow casting darkness over them like grasping hands.
Shield!
Perry searched for it, and found it, meager and barely-recharged, but it was better than nothing. He flowed into it, gaining himself a small circle that glimmered at his back. The second it bloomed, something struck it—concrete exploding into red-hot chunks, steel splattering in white-hot bursts.
The shadow of the building engulfed him. He ran for the edges of it, as it grew darker and darker, like an oncoming eclipse, his legs barely able to do more than stamp at the ground on fatigued, rubbery muscles.
Stuber, dead ahead, looking back at him, uncommon fear in his eyes. Fear for Perry.
Stuber reached out his hand behind him, his eyes jerking up to the falling building over their heads. And Perry took that hand. And Stuber slung him hard, planting his feet to do so, stopping his own progress to give Perry an edge.
As Perry felt his feet leave the ground, he immediately regretted taking Stuber’s hand.
His body flew for the space of a few yards, his arms flailing for balance. His feet struck concrete again, but weren’t able to keep up, and he tumbled, somersaulting. He hit his back and slid to a stop, the wind knocked out of his lungs. But he rolled, still in possession of himself, and he thrust himself to his knees…
In time to see Stuber, charging forward, an avalanche of steel and concrete rushing at his heels, and then consumed by it, disappearing into a cloud of brown dust.
Perry tried to cry out, but the dust hit him like a sandstorm, filled his mouth with grit, and choked his throat. Debris clattered over him. He threw his hands up over his head, feeling the sharp edges of things slash at his skin, heavy, rough objects pelting his exposed head, tearing through his scalp.
Stuber!
The rumble did not end, even as the wave of fallen debris came to a stop, with a few pelting pieces, like the last few raindrops from a violent storm that had spent itself.
Hacking and coughing, Perry raised his eyes to see nothing but a brown-out of dust. It clogged his eyes, stinging and gumming them up, sticking to his sweating, blood-slicked face, creating an ochre mud across his features.
He raised trembling hands to his eyes, trying to rub the dirt out of them, but it only clouded his vision more, and stung like acid. He swore and spat, his locked-up lungs releasing, and allowing him to pull in air that only choked him more. He grasped his shirt, still sopping wet the recent explosion of blood, and he planted this over his mouth and nose, drawing air past
it and coughing acrid, muddy plegm.
He buried his face in the rough fabric, using the inside of the shirt to wipe his eyes again. Tears poured out of them, burning, but at least clearing some of the dust out.
Squinting past his swollen eyelids, he raised his head again.
Boots. Coated in the same mud as Perry’s face.
A racking cough from overhead, which turned into a wheezing chuckle.
“You crying for me, Shortstack?”
The relief that hit him was so hard that Perry thought he might sob. He shook his head, reached out and grabbed one of the boots, the only part of Stuber he could reach. “No,” he croaked. “Just dust in my eyes, you fuck.”
Rough, firm hands grabbed him up. Perry clambered to his feet, even as the ground continued to vibrate underneath him. Stuber’s face and entire body was a wretched mud-mask. Pale where the dust had coated sweat, and dark brown where it had coated blood. A flap of Stuber’s scalp hung open, pouring fresh streams of red down the side of his face. But he managed a smile, bright white amidst his dust-coated beard.
An explosion rocked them.
Green light blazed through the dimness of the swirling dust, like the sun trying to peer through clouds.
Perry and Stuber swung around, facing back across the mountain of debris that now stood between them and the place where the sons of Primus had been held for hundreds of years.
A mushroom-top of boiling, verdant light swelled from the ground, dissolving everything in its path as it exanded.
Perry and Stuber took a cautious step back, but the sphere of light then shrunk, and then flashed, and then disappeared.
Perry had no doubt about what had just happened. He felt the after effects of that blast of Confluence like static in his brain, a wave of power that threatened to short out his own meager connection.
The prison that had held The Nine had just been burst open.
Above the mountain of debris, above the cloud of dust, a figure rose. A giant, glimmering green between plated skin. First one, and then two more, and then all nine of them, gliding upward as though they weighed nothing, born aloft by their supreme control of the energy that coursed through the universe.
A ripple of cries sounded from behind Perry, but he didn’t turn to look. His eyes were fixated upon The Nine as they rose to a height far above the cityscape around them. And then they stopped, hovering in a circle. They looked around them, as though getting their bearings, and for a brief second, Perry watched each of their gazes pass over him and Stuber, and the praetors and demigods behind him, and he knew that they had been seen. But they were ignored. They were nothing to the sons of Primus. A mere distraction. An annoyance that had already been dealt with.
As one, the nine sons of Primus faced east, fixating on some faroff point. And then, one by one, they burst from their positions, rocketing towards the eastern horizon, tails of green light trailing them like comets.
Nine sonic booms shook the East Ruins as they shot overhead and disappeared.
Perry spun, watching their rapidly-fading contrails.
In the dusty, wreckage-strewn street, seven squads of praetors, two demigods, and two outsiders, watched them go in a hush of awe reserved only for the fearful observance of deities.
Stuber thrust a tired hand into the air. “All of that hubbub, and then they just fly off like a pack of geese?” He huffed. “Well that’s bullshit.”
But Perry knew where they were going. He shook his head, registering the sinking feeling in his gut, the knowledge that something had been done which could not be undone. History had fallen off that precipice, and it had fallen on the wrong side.
“They’re going to reclaim their birthright,” Perry murmured. “They’re going to The Clouds.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
THE TIDES OF HISTORY
“We have to warn them,” Lux said, stalking through the ranks of praetors as they pulled themselves to their feet, coughing and blowing their noses.
Mala trailed after him. “Where do you think you’re going?”
Perry and his three friends strode behind, keenly aware that on any other day, they were the enemy, and all these praetors would kill them without a second thought.
But not today. Today they were stuck together.
He hung back, with Stuber by his side, watching the two demigods from a few paces back.
“We have skiffs parked nearby,” Lux shot over his shoulder, then raised his voice. “Centurion Caeterus! Where’s my centurion?”
One of the three praetors that had escaped the underground chamber pointed back behind them. “He was lost, sir. When…”
Lux halted. “Godsdammit. Who are you, praetor?”
The praetor stood erect. “Decanus Pimms, sir.”
Lux jabbed a finger at his face. “You’re centurion now. Take control of these squads and ready the skiffs for immediate departure.”
Pimms blinked rapidly, his eyes white in his dusty face.
Lux loomed over him. “Is there a problem, centurion?”
Pimms shook his head. “No, sir. I’ll ready the skiffs.”
“Lux. Stop.”
Lux rounded on Mala. “You. You’re a traitor. You caused this.”
Mala’s face darkened. “As I recall, it was your energy bolt, fired into a situation you had no business being in, that caused this.”
Lux gritted his teeth. His knuckles were white where he gripped his longstaff. “If you had allowed me to do my job, then this would never have happened. Let us not forget that you were the one that assaulted the House of Inquisitions.” He sucked in a breath through his teeth. “I should execute you now, Mala.”
Perry stepped forward. “But you won’t.”
Lux spun on him, eyes blazing. Gone was all that calm control. Lux had been rendered down to basic, primal instincts. And deep inside of everyone, human or demigod, there is something that can fly into rage and fear and poor decisions, if it’s pressed hard enough.
“And you!” Lux growled. “A peon and a runt, a halfbreed, on some ill-advised quest born of the ignorance of your traitorous father—”
“Careful, paladin.” Stuber stepped forward, shoulder to shoulder with Perry. “Your tongue is loose with panic. I’d reign it in.”
Lux was beside himself, being accosted at every angle by those he saw as unworthy. “A deserter ex-legionnaire! You dare—?”
“To defy you?” Stuber offered up. “Yes, I dare. And do you really want another blood bath, right here and now? After all that you’ve managed to survive? Which, by the way, you only survived because we took the time to stop and pull you up off your ass, when we really should have just trampled you and left you for dead. Is this really how you want things to go right now?”
Lux’s mouth worked with indignant rage.
The praetors all around them seemed stiff and unsure. Perry had no doubt that if Lux gave the order, they would kill them where they stood. But they were as off-balance as Lux was. They didn’t know what their duty was at that point.
Perry placed a staying hand on Stuber’s broad chest. “Inquisitor Lux, we don’t need any more fighting. Not amongst ourselves. Not now. We’re beyond that. The conflict between us is over.”
Lux took a step towards him. “Over, is it? So says the halfbreed?”
Perry shrugged. “Quarter-breed, actually, if you think about it. And yes, that’s what I say. Mala wanted to use me to get the humans to revolt against you. But now the situation is much bigger. No matter whose fault it is, the sons of Primus are free. And you know what’s coming next.”
Almost reflexively, Lux’s eyes darted heavenward. Then back to Perry. “They’re going to destroy us. All of us. Because of you.”
Mala chuffed. “Or because of you, Lux. Don’t forget, there are several of us still living who witnessed what happened in that chamber. If you think that you get to shrug off your part in this, then you’re mistaken. You’re as responsible for what happened as the rest of us.”
> Lux’s rage guttered out. He raised a shaking hand to his forehead. “Primus help us.”
“Primus is dead,” Mala snapped. “He won’t help us. All that we have is each other at this point. If we have any hope of surviving the coming wrath, we’re going to have to figure out a way to work together.”
“We can help,” Perry put in. “Mala, you wanted me to be the one to unite the humans. I can still do that.” He gestured to Stuber, and Teran, and Sagum. “We can do that. Not to fight the paladins, but to fight alongside them.” He fixed his gaze on Lux. “And if you think for a godsdamned second that this is some sort of honor for me, you can shove that thought right up your ass, inquisitor. There’s a lot of bad feelings between humans and paladins. You’d know that if you ever came down to the Wastelands, rather than living your entire existence out in The Clouds. This isn’t going to be easy for anyone. But the other alternative is to be so stubborn that we bury ourselves.”
“The Clouds,” Lux said, appearing to come back to himself. “We have to warn them.”
Mala shook her head. “Lux. It’s too late for that. By the time you get there, the sons of Primus will have taken control. You’ll be swiped out of the air like flies. Besides…” Mala frowned and glanced eastward. “I don’t think they’re going to destroy The Clouds, or our people. I think they’re just going to take over. It’s their home. They want to rule it.”
Teran stepped forward. “And what about my people? What about the humans, and the Outsiders? What will the sons of Primus do about them?”
Mala looked at her. “I do not think they factor into the thoughts of the sons of Primus. If they do at all, then it won’t be good for your people. I do not know what kind of madness has taken them over the centuries. I do not know how they view humanity. But it was because of the destruction that they’d wrought on earth that they were imprisoned in the first place. If I were to hazard a guess…I would say that, at best, they will be indifferent to the extermination of your people. And at worst, they may want a hand in it themselves.”