by D. H. Dunn
“Yes,” Nima said. “But first―the people who have been taken, by the Others, Kaditula said. Where are they? Who is taking them? Why?”
Merin made a fist with one hand and held it with the other, holding the gesture out to Nima. “They are the Others, they are in control of the Under. Most of them are from the same Out as Kad and me, but they have power we do not.” The woman leaned closer to Nima. “They have taken someone in your care?”
“Yes, my brother Pasang.” Nima said, fighting tears as she thought of all the times she had spent with Pasang. Childhood games, arguments, races, rivalries. Was it all over?
Merin nodded. “If he is of your kin, the Others have wanted many of them. If he is strong and well bodied as you are, I can tell you that he must live. The Others would not hurt him, as they need him.”
“Who are these Others?” Nima asked, leaning forward. “What do they want? Where-where are we?”
“That last. So hard a question, so difficult an answer.” Merin said. “One for which we have ideas, theories. Some facts. I will tell you what I know and have faith to be true.” She paused, touching both her hands to her forehead as she sighed. “You may not believe it.”
“After all this,” Wanda said, resting back on her hands. “I think I might believe anything.”
“Very well,” Merin said. “We have named where we are the Under. It is the inside of a great and vast mountain, perhaps the greatest in all the worlds. You come from a world, an Out that is very different from mine. I have heard of it, spoken to a few who know more of it. Your Out is very cold, a land of snow and ice, and a land without the nature and rules I know―nature and rules you would call magic.”
“I am sorry, I do not understand,” Nima said. “Kad also talked of Outs. You say that yours is different than ours. Is your Out a country?”
“It is much more than that,” Merin said. “An Out is more than a country, more than world. It is . . . your everything. All that you could ever see, could ever walk to. Your Out may have the same rivers, the same mountains as mine, but it is not the same Out.” She paused again, looking back and forth as she scanned their faces. “Perhaps there is an easier way to uncloud the answer.”
Merin took a small rock from near her leg and began to draw a circle on the ground. She then broke the circle up into many slices, reminding Nima of her grandmother’s pie. At the edge of each slice, she drew what looked like a star. She pointed to one of the stars, the one closest to Nima. “This is your Out. We call my Out Aroha Darad. It may be this one, over here.” Merin moved her finger to another star, nearer the center of the camp. “My Out is warmer, though not as warm as some I have knowledge of. My Out is a world of great magic, of sorcerers and spell-queens. Your Out has a mountain . . .”
“Everest,” Drew said, which drew a laugh from Merin.
“That is humor, and interesting,” she said. “On my Out the mountain itself is called Ish Rav Partha, but near its peak sits a great castle, the realm of the spell-queen Upala. She named her keep Ever Rest, which is the humor. It is from her sorceries, I suspect, we have all come to be here. But that is the later, I must speak of the now.”
“Magic?” Wanda asked, shaking her head.
Nima looked back at her, Wanda’s mouth closed in response. She expected a scientist like Wanda to disbelieve, to only trust what could be touched and studied. Nima understood that, she even respected it. However, there was much still she believed in that she could not hold in her hand.
“As you are from an Out with no magic, I understand your belief is tested,” Merin said, smiling at Wanda. “To continue, there are many Outs, many ‘Everests’ if you will, but we are in the one Under. We are Under the mountain, and here all the Outs are connected.” To illustrate her point, she dropped her rock in the center of her circle, between and touching all the slices.
“But . . . how?” Drew asked. “How are we here? What did we pass through?”
“In our Out, there is a queen, as I said. She is named Upala, and we lived in the lands between her and her brother, with whom she is in a constant war. They are both Manad Vhan, a race born to magic.
“Their power is of the air, and the Manad Vhan must be far from the ground to use it, as the earth is jealous and hates the magic. Thus, their great keeps and castles are built on mountains, to keep the Manad Vhan as far from the earth as can be. On our world, our people were divided by the sibling’s lifetimes ago, with each ruling half of us. Kad and I come from Upala’s people, these Others are under the dominion of her brother, Kater.”
“These people,” Drew said, “this Kater and Upala. Did they create these gateways? These portals?”
“No,” Merin said, shaking her head. “The portals are natural, if one knows how to see them. I have heard that Kater had no interest in them, but Upala studied their lore with obsession and her knowledge of them became vast. So great was Upala’s power she began to reach into other Outs through the portals, even walking among them for short times. She tested and tested, for she had much time―death cannot not touch her or her brother as it does you and me. Such is the way of the Manad Vhan.
“She underestimated her brother, though. He attacked her, high in her keep in her library where she kept her magics and many windows. There was a great battle, and many of us who served Upala in her keep had the misfortune of being there, like Kad and myself. There was a great clash between the siblings, and the whole of her library was sent through the barriers, falling into the Under. The windows to the Outs were scattered amongst the rocks and worm tunnels of the Under, and Upala and her library itself were buried in deep crevasse and canyon, the power of the clash burning through the rock itself and sending her a great distance into the depths of the mountain.”
Kad returned, along with a second man. Nima noticed Kad’s footsteps were lighter, as if he were hoping to keep quiet and allow his spouse to continue uninterrupted. He placed in front of each of them a small bowl filled with what looked like thick green water and sliced mushrooms. The aroma was not as unpleasant as Nima expected, and plucking a mushroom out of the broth and eating it she was surprised by its soft texture and hearty taste.
The other man appeared to be of Asian descent, yet he was not Sherpa. He stood behind Kad with his arms folded, wearing a tattered military uniform. His scowling face had burns and lesions upon it. He did not speak, and Merin gave no sign that she had seen the man as she continued, while picking at the bowl Kad had left for her.
“It is this reason―this library of Upala’s buried far into this mountain―this is why the Others have begun to raid into your Out. They seek healthy bodies, bodies with the skills to climb and search. The Others are strong, but they are few and cannot continue to risk their numbers. The passage down to the library is dangerous, and none have made it to the bottom and returned.”
“They need climbers for their upside-down Everest . . .” Drew said, shaking his head.
“So Pasang―my brother―he is being forced to climb for these people? Who are they?” Nima asked.
“Servants of Kater, the other Manad Vhan who rules in our valley. He is the brother and enemy of Upala, transported here along with the rest of us. We are simply caught in the middle, trying to survive and―”
The uniformed man stepped forward, kicking the stone from the middle of Merin’s drawing, sending it clattering off into the darkness. The smile left Kad’s face, but he gave no other response.
“Yes! That is it―we are trying to survive,” the uniformed man yelled. “Why do you bring more here, foolish man? We do not have enough food as it is―”
“You would leave them, Ham?” Kaditula asked. “We did not leave you when you came from your Out, your world of fire and hurt. We cared for you―”
“You needed me. You needed us.” Ham turned to Nima and the others, pointing at the burns on his face. “You see these? These are from my world. My world has been overtaken with nuclear war―fire that has swept from Asia and throughout the Oceanics. War
starting in places from people like you”―he pointed at Drew, then at Wanda―“people from the West. You and your kind brought your war to Korea. Russians, Chinese, Americans. You are all the same. Did it matter whose flag was on the bombs that fell? Not to us. Not to our families. Higher and farther from our homes we were driven, trying to stay away from the death, the radiation. Running for months, years. My comrades and I, when we saw the portal, and ran for it, ran for any chance to escape.” Ham pounded the side of his leg with his fist, glaring at them as he did so. “Now we are stuck here, just as you are.”
“Stuck here?” Wanda asked. Nima felt a new fear rising inside her, echoing the concern she heard in Wanda’s voice.
“That’s right!” Ham yelled back.
Nima noticed a slight vibration under her feet, but could not summon the strength to speak over the angry Korean. “Kad didn’t tell you that yet, did he? He and his wife are too busy trying to help you to tell you that you can’t be helped! There’s no way through the portals! Only the Others can get through them! These two are from the same world as them, but they don’t know how to use them.” Ham swung his arm around the room, indicating the rest of the gathered people, now staring. “None of them do! We’re all stuck in here, it’s a one-way door for us. Just a matter of time before we all run out of food, or fall down a chasm or . . .” He stopped, the vibration of the ground becoming much stronger. The people gathered by the tents began to run into them. Nima got to her feet as Kaditula and Merin shared a worried look. Ham gritted his teeth and spread his feet to keep himself stable. “Or you wait for the worms to get you.”
10
“People do not decide to become extraordinary. They decide to accomplish extraordinary things.”
—Edmund Hillary
Drew froze at Ham’s shouted warning. If the creatures approaching were large enough to create the tunnels they had just traveled through, they would be something out of a nightmare.
Nima and Wanda stood motionless as well, the two women looking back and forth while their new-found hosts became a flurry of action.
At one end of the chamber, Kad and Merin were running back and forth, covering many of the larger mushrooms with large sheets of what looked like burlap. Ham had taken up a position in the center of the circle of yurts near the small stream that cut through the space, brandishing a strange looking rifle.
The dozen or so other refugees had run into the structures behind Ham, a few returning brandishing makeshift clubs or cooking implements, eyes wild with fear. The shaking of the ground increased as Drew looked around, scanning the cave for a weapon or a defense, but the wide, massive cavern offered few possibilities. Pitifully small rocks were scattered across the ground, enough to annoy perhaps, but hardly something that would do any real damage.
He checked his jacket pocket, making sure his revolver was still there. The gun was only a last resort, Drew’s marksmanship had never been very strong. The weapon always felt uncomfortable in his hands, a clumsy weight of iron and fire. He preferred to use his fists when it came to combat. Less likely anyone would die that way.
Wanda and Nima were at his side, stunned and looking around as he was. Wanda had her handgun pulled, having already demonstrated both competency with the weapon and the willingness to use it. Jang and four other dead men could attest to that. Nima had one arm around Wanda, the other reaching out and grabbing for Drew’s as she tried to steady herself against the increased trembling.
Everyone in the camp had rushed into action at Ham’s first shout. The frustration inside Drew grew, outpacing his worries of whatever threat these worms might be. They were at battle stations and yet Drew had no job, no idea what to do. Nothing to do but stand there, not get in the way, and hope this was a false alarm of some kind.
With the huge tarps covering the collection of large, glowing mushrooms, the room had darkened and filled with shadow. What light remained came from glowing ribbons of colors running through the rocks and the swirling mists of the portals in the rear of the chamber.
“Drew,” Nima said, still holding on to his arm as another round of shuddering passed through the cavern. “What do we―”
“Here comes Kad,” Drew said, pointing at the small man, who was running back toward them with several sheets of burlap slung over his shoulder.
“Kad, we’re ready to help.” Drew looked around the camp, everyone was now standing in a state of readiness. “What do we do?”
“My apologies, friends, I should have thought of you.” The vibrations underneath their feet increased and Kad raised his voice to be heard over the sound. “This may be a passing underneath. We have done nothing to provoke them.”
As Adam spoke, the smaller man bent down to pick more mushrooms from the ground, shifting the sheets awkwardly to his shoulder.
“You brought these people through their holes!” Ham yelled from the center of the yurts. “That may be enough.”
“Move them toward the walls, Kad,” Merin yelled from her position about twenty feet away where she was busy placing rocks on the corners of a burlap sheet. “It may be that you are right. They may be only―”
Merin never finished her sentence, a pair of long, pink forms erupted from the surface underneath her. She was knocked off her feet as two huge worms launched themselves into the air, each one longer than Drew’s leg and twice as thick. Their mouths were lined with a circular row of teeth from which dripped a glowing, green spittle that hissed as it made contact with the air.
“Merin!” Kad yelled. He dropped his collection of sheets and fungus and ran across the camp toward his wife. Drew ran alongside him, Wanda and Nima close behind.
Merin dodged to the left of the two large worms, narrowly missing their wriggling, mid-air assault. The pair of creatures then plummeted to the stone next to her and shook there, reminding Drew of fish flopping on a deck.
He wondered if they were stunned or just exhausted from their leap. They recovered after only a second, twisting their bodies so their maws faced the ground, and quickly burrowed back into the rock, leaving new, smooth holes in their wake.
Kad knelt next to his wife, bracing her against the stone wall. The lower half of Merin’s makeshift pants appeared seared away, her left leg showing a series of open boils from where the creature’s acid had struck her. Through gritted teeth, she hissed while holding her leg.
Kneeling beside her, Kaditula gave her a quick kiss on her head before applying a crushed paste he had made with the mushrooms onto her leg.
At the other end of the camp, Drew could hear Ham yelling at the gathered people to put the tarps back on the glowing mushrooms. He could see several worms launching themselves at the glowing masses, with Ham attempting to ward them off with his odd-looking rifle.
The ground underneath their feet trembled again and Wanda had only a moment to shout before a new eruption of rock and debris exploded under Drew.
Drew had felt the buckling of the stone which triggered memories of heavy swells at sea. He arched himself to the right just before the worm broke the surface, avoiding the full force of the beast’s arrival. Wanda was thrown from her feet and she rolled along the ground and collided with Nima.
The worm turned, twitching toward where Kad was tending to Merin. It lifted its pinkish head in the air for a moment, swaying as if it were sensing something in the air, then it dropped to the ground and began inch-worming its way toward them at a surprising pace. Kad was hunched over his wife and unaware of the impending threat.
Drew ran after the creature before he even thought about doing so. Catching up with the worm, he bent down and grabbed it with both hands, pulling it up and away from the stone. The skin of the worm was slick and damp, and it weighed far more than Drew expected.
It was surprisingly strong as it twisted in his grasp. Its struggles unbalanced Drew and he fell on his back to the stone floor. He grunted in pain at the impact but was able to keep his grip on the worm.
With the creature’s horrifying maw
only a foot from his face, Drew afforded a view into its gullet, row upon row of teeth like tiny knives. Green, viscious fluid began to churn inside its mouth, producing a stench of rotting refuse that assaulted him like an attack.
Just as the worm’s mouth was about to bubble over with the verdant bile, Drew threw the beast away from him, his fingers gripping so hard his fingers pierced the foul, moist skin. Landing on the stone a few feet away, the worm burrowed back into the earth. Drew fought against the pain in his back as he struggled to get back on his feet.
The cries and shouts of another attack came to his ears, the firing of Ham’s strange gun sounding like the vibrations of struck metal.
A burst of stone just next to his head signaled another worm’s assault. A shadow crossed Drew’s vision as the beast arched overhead, at least ten feet above the stone.
Dazed, Drew watched the long, thick snake-like body of the worm hang in the air above him for a moment. In the dim light, he gauged this one to be slightly larger than the two before, it seemed to be about Nima’s size. In desperation he pulled his revolver, aiming the weapon as the creature writhed in the air, back toward Drew.
He dodged the spittle leaking off the its teeth and heard the fluid hiss into the dirt next to his ear. Pointing the barrel right into the creature's dark maw, he pulled the trigger, willing the rounds to go between the circular row of teeth. The weapon gave an empty, useless click in response, a dull waste of metal in his hands. He could see a new collection of green liquid forming on the fangs as the worm dropped quickly back toward him.
Nima crashed into the worm just as it was about to land on Drew, the maw aimed at his head. As effective as any block he had laid on the football field in high school, the small Sherpa leaned in with her shoulder and sent the creature sprawling several yards away. Nima caught a small spray of spittle for her trouble, crying out as the acid raised boils on her arm. She landed on top of Drew, who caught her and cushioned her fall.