by The Behrg
You hear what you want. You always have. But these people don’t like you — you’re not their friend. They look at you and despise you. You’re pathetic; barely even there.
Kenny wiped his nose on his sleeve.
I knew you wouldn’t come back when you left. I knew it and I let you go anyway. And then do you know what I did? I let out a breath I’ve been holding my entire life. What relief. What joy. To finally see you leave.
“I know you don’t mean that, Ma. And I’m going to prove you wrong.” Kenny pushed off the ground from where he had been sitting since his last fall, standing on the uneven dirt he hoped was still a part of the road. “But you’re going to be even more disappointed in me. Because I’m not giving up.”
Kenny did a quick two-step shuffle, hobbling on his bad foot, followed by another. “And when I get home, you’ll see my name on the credits of the most important documentary of the year. Maybe even the decade.”
Another painful shuffle.
“And when I move out, you’ll be so sorry for the way you treated me, for all the horrible things you’ve said over the years. But even though I’ll forgive you, I won’t move back in.”
Another step. And another.
“It’s over between us, Ma. I’m moving on. Starting my life. And I’m not looking back.” A smile had crept onto his face, despite the abject pain rocketing up his leg with each step.
Had the darkness lifted, he would have known he wasn’t blind after all. The mask and thick layers of duct tape had in fact provided enough protection. He would have also realized that he had missed the fork where the road turned in toward town, missed it by over a mile. The backroad he now traversed, called la Calle Verena, eventually lead to a small waterfall and cenote, frequented by tourists on those rare occasions that they came this far south. But the waterfall, as well as the pool at its base, were now located nineteen-hundred-and-eighty-two feet below the road Kenny trod, a road which ended abruptly. Into thin air.
The smile remained on Kenny’s face up to his last shuffled step.
Verse XXIV.
Something in the air had changed. The reek of death and decay still permeated the room, but was masked beneath an appallingly sweet fragrance. Appalling because it didn’t belong.
Faye was pressed against the cold bars of her prison cell as if a magnet were drawing her against them. A sudden violent shiver swept through her body. Her throat was hoarse but they had finally heard her. The echo of footfalls loomed over the otherwise eerie silence.
Someone was coming.
Though the Shaman hadn’t done more than touch her, she felt as if she had been raped. And that’s exactly what he had done, at least to her mind. She could still feel the aftereffects of that man in her head, speaking with parallactic dissonance.
She had always known evil existed in the world in the form of humanity’s depraved. The sole purpose of murderers and psychopaths, in her mind, was to blind the world to real evil —the evil that resided in each and every normal person on earth. Easier to point the finger than admit to the demons crawling in one’s own skin.
But this — this evil was different. This evil was a force. And she was trapped in the same room with it.
A flash of light bobbed against the dirt floors before their alcove. They were here.
But there was no they.
A single soldier appeared, turning down the short path that led to her cell wearing an orange hard hat. His thick goatee only partially hid his scowl.
“Get me out of here,” Faye said in a single exhalation.
The soldier kept his eyes on the darkness around her, wary of what might appear. He slid a hard cased pouch between the bars, the sort that might hold reading glasses.
Or maybe a key?
Faye took the case, opening it greedily. Inside the pouch was another syringe. Its molten liquid gleamed in the dull shine of the soldier’s flashlight.
“The general said don’t drop this one,” the man said in Spanish before retreating.
“Wait!”
He was gone before she had time to utter another plea.
Faye glanced around what little of the cell’s walls she could see, searching for a camera. It had to be here, somewhere. A good thing then that she had pulled her shirt back on. But if there was a camera, it meant they wanted a performance. And Faye knew how to perform.
“I have a plan,” she whispered, hoping they didn’t have an audio feed. “Do you want to get out of here? Escape?”
The Shaman didn’t answer. He had sunk back into the shadows. Where he belonged.
I am not a victim, she thought, willing herself on.
Faye flipped her hair to the side, wondering if the syringe would even work. They had tranquilized him last night when he had been floating in the rain, but she remembered multiple shots. How many had it taken to bring him down? More than what this small syringe contained.
“I can’t do this on my own. And you can’t stay here. You know they’ll kill you. They’ll try to get what they want — information, or … whatever it is you have — but I’m guessing you won’t give them much. In which case, they’ll make you suffer. Until you die.”
The sweet fragrance in the cavern suddenly grew stronger, like overripe apples or some celebrity’s new line of eau de toilette. She could almost see a haze in the dark, swirls of a lighter shade tumbling amidst the blackness.
“So we can either work together or we wait, and neither of us make it out alive.”
Silence from the darkness. A swirling mist glowed against the endless backdrop. Almost a deep jade color.
“Come on,” she shouted. “You can bend the world to your whim, shape the elements, yet you let man lock you in a cage? Are you that weak? That powerless?”
A puff of green mist lightened just before her, a face coming out of the floating tendrils.
“They are not Man.”
Faye gasped, barely recognizing the Shaman. It was him, every aged crease on his face present, yet he was different. Stoic. Immortalized. A King.
His skin shone with an ethereal radiance, his stooped and feeble posture now bearing a majestic strength. The green haze trailed after him as he moved cautiously around her, avoiding contact.
“Come.”
The word was spoken like a master calling its dog, knowing it would obey.
Faye followed him to the cell’s entrance, the rusted bars enveloped in a cloud of green. “Who are you?” she asked.
“I am Eternal.”
He seemed to be studying the hardened rock wall next to the gate. The way he moved, the way he spoke; it was like a completely different person was before her. Could this be what everyone was after? Not the Shaman himself, but this … entity that had taken control of him?
“You’re not the Shaman.”
The being turned around to face her. Its eyes were like falling through a galaxy.
“What are you?”
“I am a Maker.”
[Grower]
[Destroyer]
The words tore through her mind like screeching brakes. Faye pressed one arm against her head in an effort to keep from collapsing.
“Here you would call me God.”
“I don’t believe in God,” Fay managed.
The hint of a smile broke across the Shaman’s lips. “Takushkansh’kan believes. Soon it will be your turn.”
He placed an open palm against the cavern wall next to the gate. His touch became a caress. Words so quiet Faye couldn’t make them out slipped past her. And then the rock began to move.
The wall disintegrated before the Shaman, crumbling like a sand castle before his touch, only these grains were fist size boulders raining down around them. Dust spit into the air with the dirt’s release and Faye closed her eyes and mouth as it swept past. She heard the shrieking of metal and opened her eyes. The gate hung at an angle, having bent at its own weight, no longer being held up on one side. It hung in open space where it had previously been bolted to rock.
“Come,” the Shaman said, staring at her. Or through her.
“Why are you here? What is it you want?”
“God has no reason. God does not want. God is. God creates.”
“If you’re God, why are you trapped in a mortal’s body?”
The Shaman’s eyes flashed, green haze seeming to trickle out from them. “My time has not fully come. But soon. Soon.”
The Shaman’s words from earlier came back to her — Nothing will remain of what was. Had her father known what he was after? What he had discovered? What he may have unleashed?
“Kneel,” the Shaman said. Or Maker; Faye refused to think of him as God. Still, she found herself falling to her knees. She searched blindly on the floor with one hand behind her, knowing her life depended on this moment.
Inktomi must deceive the Grower … Help him.
“The Shaman.” Faye’s words felt weak; still she pressed on. “He’s fighting you, isn’t he? Let me speak to him.”
“You are strong. Like Inktomi. You will be dura’kan.”
Faye somehow understood the word’s meaning, but there was no suitable translation for dura’kan, at least not in English. Enlightened, strong in body, mind and spirit, but a slave, a … host. Words only scratched at its surface, though Faye knew what it ultimately meant. He intended to use her, inhabit her, as he had the Shaman. She continued prodding behind her, her fingers sticky with the gore of the dead soldier.
She had to find it!
“Inktomi was to be dura’kan. You are stronger than he.” The Shaman, or Maker, or whatever the hell he was, moved toward her, towering over her. “Blood of Inktomi, the Spider’s Fangs, the honor …”
[Healing]
“… will be yours.”
The Shaman’s words from earlier swam through her mind.
Daughter of Inktomi. Do not accept the healing.
“Rise.”
Faye pushed herself up off the ground, standing on shaky legs.
“Discard that poison.”
She threw the syringe against the wall where its remnants exploded, plastic breaking.
The Shaman held his hand out, but didn’t touch her. “Accept the healing.”
[Honor]
Faye lowered her head, as if in submission. She was about to find out just how omniscient this god really was. She moved forward, but rather than move her head to his outstretched hand, she sprang, launching herself at the native.
The Shaman moved like a snake, dodging her ploy while keeping his hands and body just out of reach. But Faye wasn’t through. She lunged at him again, diving toward him and catching him off guard. As they fell, her body on top of his, she plunged the second syringe deep into the Shaman’s chest, praying she struck his heart. She had finally found the broken syringe she had dropped earlier, when she had first entered the cell, amidst the gore on the ground. Its shattered casing had been what she had hurled at the wall in dramatic display.
Beneath her weight, the native landed hard against the earthen floor.
“I’m not your dura’kan,” she shouted, watching as the life slipped from the Shaman’s face. “I am who I’ve always been, who I was made to be. Hari’chauk!”
The Shaman’s body went limp beneath her. He blinked, eyes finding her, coming into focus. Gone was the regality, replaced with a tired sadness. “Hari’chauk,” he said, before his head rolled back, limbs dropping lifelessly to the ground.
She had done it, deceived a god. Or whatever this power-tripping monstrosity really was. But she knew, too, that the Shaman had helped her. Saved her. Prepared her for this encounter.
Become hari’chauk!
He was fighting this thing inside him, this … Maker, this god. As she stared out into the dark hall beyond the crippled gate, she realized she would fight right alongside him. Hari’chauk. Monster or savior, she wasn’t sure which she had become. She also wasn’t sure it mattered.
Verse XXV.
The cenote was the size of a backyard swimming pool, vines and moss draping over its circular edges to the water twenty feet below. The water flowed in and back out from some hidden underground source. These quiet oases hidden within a jungle were always a wonder to Dugan, haphazardly dotting the savannahs. With the goggles on, however, the water looked anything but inviting.
While Remmy had agreed to take them to the prison’s entrance, he hadn’t been completely forthright. This cancerous pool, filled with floating specs of bioluminescent light, was their only way in.
Zephyr had the priest pinned to the side of the jeep, lifting him off his feet with his good muscled arm. “There has to be another entrance.”
“There’s not,” Remmy sputtered.
“They sure as hell didn’t bring the Shaman through here,” Kendall said. “The general would still be floating at the bottom.”
“How certain are we they didn’t take him somewhere else?” Rojo asked.
“Where?” Dugan asked.
“I don’t know; another outpost or building?”
“There’s nowhere else they could have gone.” The fingers of Dugan’s right hand itched, missing the cigarette that would normally be there. “Release him, Zephyr.”
Remmy collapsed to the ground, crying out in pain as he leveraged his broken arm to break his fall. Zephyr left him there, marching over to join Dugan and the others. They deliberated for another few minutes, though Dugan remained resolute.
The priest told them about a room up a winding staircase carved out of rock. Water from the underground river pooled there, though without movement, it stank worse than the pits they used as latrines.
“The guards would dare us. To swim through that poisonous bog to the connecting river beneath. It was a game to them,” Remmy said. “They wouldn’t stop anyone wanting to escape. In fact, they encouraged it. Every year there would be someone who’d try, someone who thought they could beat the system, who’d mistake foolishness for bravery. Their bodies would be brought back, bloated and misshapen, so full of water they looked completely deformed. But there were always rumors. Of some who escaped.”
“That how you got out?” Chupa asked.
“God, no, I’ve always been aware of my mortality.”
“How do you know it actually connects?” Rojo asked.
“The bodies made it out. One way or another. Some though, the corpses they brought back; well, there was enough of a difference to stir an ichor of doubt.”
Kendall kicked a rock off the edge. Somewhere between the gray air and water it landed with a plunk. “So they killed someone else to make it look like they had drowned.”
“Those were the rumors. Or maybe we wanted so bad to believe that we created the subtle nuisances ourselves. Faced with a life of imprisonment, men will cling to the flimsiest of straws and call them hope.”
“Like religion,” Dugan said.
“Religion or madness, those were our choices. We did what we had to. To survive.”
“What I don’t get is why you didn’t leave?” Kendall said. “Once they stuck you in that church, why not catch a bus out of town? Disappear? It’s not like you were chained to an altar.”
Remmy huddled in on himself, as if cold. “I have my reasons.”
“You started believing,” Dugan said. “That’s why you stayed. Religion and madness — they’re one and the same. Neither survives without a little proselytizing, right Father? Even if that preaching is only to yourself.”
“You’re here; I’ve done my part. Let me go or do with me what you want.”
“How far is it? To the cave?” Zephyr asked.
“A hundred, two hundred meters; what do I know? We couldn’t trust anything the guards said then, I’m not likely to believe them now.”
“There’s a big difference between a hundred and two hundred meters,” Kendall said.
“How big?” Rojo asked.
“The difference between being dead or alive,” Zephyr said.
“You’ll have to look for a narrow shaft that rises
into the pool,” Remmy said. “I don’t imagine much light will be getting through with the amount of filth that clogged the way down.”
“I don’t know about this,” Rojo said.
“Dugan?” Zephyr asked.
“What if the priest is setting us up?” Rojo asked. “Once we’re underground, in those currents? Not easy to swim back.”
“Actually the currents would carry you back,” Remmy said. “You’ll be swimming against them to get there.”
Rojo let out a nervous laugh then moved away from the group, massaging his beard. A nervous energy spread through the others.
“It’s suicide,” Rojo breathed.
“People have swam much farther,” Dugan said.
“People who trained for it. For years.” Zephyr turned to address the others. “A hundred meters under water is a good two minutes. And that’s on a level swim. Most people will tap out before they hit fifty. Seventy-five, and your lungs’ll feel like they’re being ripped from your chest.”
“It’s a good thing we’re not ‘most people,” Dugan said.
“Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s perfect. They’ll never expect us. But this ain’t some swim meet where second place means a pink ribbon instead of a blue. You don’t got what it takes in there?” Zephyr motioned to the pool beneath them. “You’re fish food.”
“You should be one to talk,” Chupa said. “Or you going to doggy paddle with one arm?”
“At least I didn’t get myself shot,” Zephyr quipped back.
“Don’t,” Dugan said, getting between the two men and separating them at arm’s length. “No one goes who doesn’t feel comfortable doing this. I mean that.”
“So we’re really gonna do this?” Rojo asked.
A loud splash sounded from below, everyone turning to see what it was. The bulky form of Oso glowed down in the water. He made his bear call, signaling them to join him.
“What do we bring?” Kendall asked, already back at the Jeep. Zephyr moved to join him.
“Oxygen?” Rojo asked.
“Yeah, you wish,” Kendall said.
“Nothing you don’t have to. Maybe a knife.” Dugan removed his leather notebook, holding it out to Chupa and looking him in the eyes. Chupa looked back at him questioningly. “In case we don’t make it back.”