Narican- the Cloaked Deception

by D M Robbins

  Tanz and I are confused. His hands are bleeding. I need to get him out of here and fast. That attempt was clearly everything he had, his eyes close again as we descend toward the vat. The machine groans. Five feet, four feet, three feet, two.

  Beefcake #4 releases what must be the toxins from a tub with strange writing. Blue and green inks spray as we descend.

  Willing my legs to move, aligning with my cells, my legs rotate once, twice, then stop. I flex and release, flex and release, pumping my blood, wiggling my toes and feet, willing my heart to work harder. I do it again, closing my eyes and concentrating all energies as if trying to jumpstart a car while thinking about the sun’s power.

  A fire burns inside and my legs stutter, pumping, then stutter again like a rusty, seized up machine. Tanz’s feet dangle in the steam as we drop lower. Slowly my legs raise up and down, up and down, like jogging in place, up and down, up and down. I’m catching fire now.

  The thugs don’t hear the revving sound over the groaning machine. My thickening legs create friction and heat, like thick steel pistons pumping. I am moving up and down, up and down.

  The movement catches Beefcake #4’s eyes.

  He stands, hand on hip, and asks, “Sir, who are you?”

  “Well, who are you?” I ask in return, feeling the power of the Sun Clan growing in my bones.

  He steps closer, wagging his finger at me. “No, no, no, sir,” he says.

  I pop him in the head and chest knocking him halfway across the room.

  The other two beefcakes rush me. I flip up, releasing my hands and pop them so hard with my spinning pinwheel legs and hands they fly off into the air like nothing even touched me. They get wedged into the plaster wall.

  Inches from the boiling water and swirling toxins I jump up, releasing Tanz then kick the rack, snapping it in two.

  Surprised by my ability, I say to Tanz as we stand alone for the moment, “I didn’t know I could do that. I’ve only run fast before. This time my hands moved equally fast.” I hold out my powerful, rock-hard fists.

  “Aligning with Source you are. The iron crystals in your blood have mixed with your cells, unfolding them.”

  Alarms sound and Qualmsy’s voice comes over a speaker: “All security to the Rack. That old man and little boy cannot leave here. One free trip to the Bahamas for whoever gets ’em!”

  I consider the door but that seems like a bad idea.

  “What do we do?” I turn in all directions, seeking escape.

  “Can you go up?” asks Tanz.

  I look at the plaster above. “There’s a ceiling, Tanz.”

  “Yes, and we’re below ground. Through doors will not help.”

  I do see his point.

  Tattoo rushes me from the machine room. I sidestep and hurl him twenty feet, feeling flawless, powerful.

  The metal door flies open. Several more deadened eyes stare in.

  “I’ll try. But it’ll be a short ride if it doesn’t work.” I grab Tanz. My legs pump and rotate. My body thickens like a battering ram. The deafening sound increases, wind blows the hanging shirts. My skin tightens, eyes close. We lift off the floor, hovering as they lunge at us. I cover Tanz then smash up through the ceiling.

  Sounds of snapping wood and flooring, the taste of plaster dust on my lips. Up through another floor and ceiling, past two young girls playing cards on the floor nearby, then through another floor and ceiling breaking through to crash land on the roof under a dark sky of haze clusters. Plaster dust is all over us like ghosts. We tumble and roll. Tanz rolls off the edge. I grab his wrist quickly and yank him up.

  The haze and dark forces that float around the building descend with scary, agonized faces. Entities are trapped inside them. I can see and hear them moaning with anger, in pain.

  “Don’t look at them,” he says. “They will disorient you. And I am not strong enough.”

  The roof door is kicked open and several beefy guys spread out carrying bats, crowbars, knives. The dark forces move in, attempting to gnaw on us. I shrug one off my shoulder but three more come. I swat them away as I rotate around Tanz, protecting him. Eyeballing the building across the street.

  Tanz shakes his head. “You cannot make it. We must find an alternative escape. What you just did should have drained you.”

  “No, I feel good. I can make it,” I say, eyeballing the next roof. More dark forces float up through heat ducts and roof vents.

  My legs have stopped for the moment only because I put the brakes on, having learned to control them. As the dark cloud closes in, I feel sorrow, anguish, heartache.

  “We have no choice.” I start my legs up again grabbing Tanz.

  “You’re going to kill us,” he says.

  “Better us than them.”

  Lighting strikes off my heels, picking up instant full speed, running the length of the roof then zooming off the edge into the air. Shoes melting on fire.

  “Ahhhhhhhh,” we shout, shooting like a bullet into the sky past the next building and the next and the next then crash landing onto a smaller building three blocks away. Going faster and farther than I expected.

  We tumble, roll, and stop. It’s quiet. The sky is clear.

  “You are growing stronger,” Tanz says.

  I smile, lifting him and looking for a staircase.

  GATHERING AT THE SAFE HOUSE

  With eye watering speed, I carry Tanz through a back alley of broken glass and garbage past a homeless family huddling together. Newspapers and plastic bags swirl in our wake. The family huddles closer, a father trying to protect them. With our passing the man’s arms spread wider.

  Upstairs in the rear of the safe house I place Tanz against the wall a few feet from where the roof caved in and sky is exposed. Rafters slope above wooden plank flooring.

  He’s groggy and weak. “I’ll retrieve the bags and iron crystals. Get you strong again.” I zoom out past the family. A few blocks away I skip over the ten-foot garden fence as if skipping over a stick. Apple and cherry trees sway as space and time bend.

  Grabbing our bags from behind the bush I pause, inhaling deeply for a moment. It’s peaceful, dark, while a few stars sparkle dimly above. The fragrance of tulip and rose fill the air. I wonder about my home out there, far away.

  Back at the safe house Tanz has propped himself against a brick pile in the corner partially hidden by shadows. A yellow moon hangs low over the city. Reaching for the crystals in the bag he shakes the plastic container.

  He pops two pills and hands me two. “Getting low.”

  Pulling out his cell phone, he presses a button. “Good evening, M. This is T. Sorry to call so late… Thank you for understanding… Dubious times indeed… I’d like to place a carry out order. Double… Yes, double… How soon? Yes, I know to order ahead of time, that it’s not easy to get… It will be a few days, I understand. Thank you. Good night, M.” He flips his thin phone closed and lays his head back.

  “Um, who was that?” I ask, standing near him.

  “A contact uptown.”

  I peer at him with hands out to my side.

  “Oh, a provider, one who gives humans hope. An evolved human,” he says, tucking the container into a pouch. Within seconds his pale eyes have grown brighter, more alert against the shadows of moonlight.

  Safe, thickness now leaves my body. I relax, making sure to sit along the wall this time.

  Tanz rifles through his bag again. “Here.” He sticks out his hand with an individual size Tupperware and plastic spoon.

  “Vegetarian chili, I warmed it up in my domicile prior to receiving a punch to my face. It is true, everyone does have a plan until they get punched in the face… Still warm,” he says, smiling, crumbling up crackers.

  “Thank you.” He does amaze me, this man. This stranger. I eat wondering about Narican, my family, and what it means to be Sun Clan. A faint sense of Jintara hangs from a distant murky memory. A smile. A spear. Running. Laughter. Playing.

  “I’m sorry I never asked,
but do you have any family? You know all about me, but I don’t know anything about you.”

  Setting down his meal, he says, “Yes, a wife. She too was an accountant.”

  He brightens at the idea of her. Sitting up in pain presenting images of love and joyous equations upon their ceiling while lying on the floor of their home as they figured out the universe.

  “Well, is she here? Maybe the cleansing has worn off and we can find her.”

  “No, she is not. We had even picked out names for our child.” He shows images of her pregnant and them running with him trying to save her. “Struck down by a dark blade of mist, the same as your father. She was murdered.”

  She disappears into the mist like ash from a fire. He continues with the imagery and different parts of the scene. He pauses, touching her face.

  I look away as the image fades. My privilege saved me and got her killed. I feel alone in this cold city. Jan and Robert were also killed because of me. Sadness sweeps over me, tears fall. Tanz looks on.

  “It is not your fault, Claremone. Forces exist beyond us.”

  I stand and pace between the shadows of moonlight. “I’m so sorry, Tanz.” Anger grows at my past powerlessness, ineptitude, ignorance.

  “This stops with us… no matter what. But we have nothing to go on. Nothing. I saw you couldn’t get to Qualmsy. I know you tried.” I kick debris in my path as if it had something to do with this.

  “We failed.” In the moonlight I stop pacing and clench my fist, raising it to the sky. “Why? What do you want of us?”

  Tanz gazes upon me with the same affection he looked upon his wife. “If we’d had our child, I’d want him or her to be like you. Thank you for asking, however, I did not need to reach Qualmsy to read him.”

  “You didn’t?”

  “I touched the man you refer to as Tattoo in the same location Qualmsy had touched him when I unceremoniously entered the room. Let us look together… Come, sit…” Tanz stares at me with fatherly eyes as he pats the floor next to him.

  He begins the scene when Qualmsy laughs, leaning on Tattoo. We then enter Qualmsy’s DNA traces and see him leaning into the window of a black tinted limousine earlier in the day, and an exchange of cash. We cannot see a face. There are government plates on the car as it zooms away.

  “83% Complete.” Tanz leans back while the equation fades.

  All he says is, “The chain maker…”

  Silence fills the air as the decaying building settles.

  “We must visit the capital,” he says, rubbing his chin.

  “But what about Qualmsy and his goons?”

  “Once we chop off the head, the body is soon disoriented. We will return and chop it apart,” he says with unflinching warrior eyes that glow, staring off into the darkness. Under his breath, I hear him say, “For you, my love.”

  THE DEMON TRAIN RIDE

  We hop on an early morning train packed with passengers out of Main Street Station to head for the capital. The conductor looks at our tickets and escorts us to seats at the front of the train. A window on the right looks upon tracks and the dark tunnel ahead while the left window shows only graffiti. The brakes release and the train heaves forward. Now rolling under Big City, the steel cars jostle, picking up speed down the tunnel.

  I glance back at people reading newspapers, playing on phones, sleeping. I lean over to Tanz and say, “I’m sure Qualmsy’s boss knows we escaped.”

  He nods, unfolding his newspaper. “We must count on that.”

  “Kimbel is running for Citizen Leader. How interesting,” Tanz says. The paper displays color pictures of him fighting a bear, showing off his chest chopping wood.

  “Whatever happened to content and good judgment? Perception is harder than thinking.” He pauses. “Where are the evolved ones to lead this blind race?”

  “Are there aligned ones?” I ask. “Higher humans?”

  “Yes, a few.”

  “How do you become one?”

  “I do not. But for them—” he shrugs over his shoulder to the car behind us—“it is simple, so simple really, though they find it near impossible. Flow downstream with one’s consciousness and they shall arrive at an enlightened state. Be aligned with source, the soul’s energy signature. One’s true path. The beacon planted in them for that. If only they would listen. Not muddle through a filter of fear. Really, it is a refusal of these distractions and restrictions. Simply do not honor the fear and the reduction of one’s character.”

  Tanz folds the paper, placing it meticulously on his lap. “Wake me when we get there,” he says, closing his eyes.

  I nod and stare out the window. The train bounces out of the tunnel under the river and into the next province. For several minutes we pass decaying buildings, rundown warehouses, through an area that used to bustle, now empty.

  A world of wonder opens as we dive into its splendor. The landscape is a natural world of fields and forests rolling down from rugged rolling hillsides thick with thigh high country grass. An hour passes, my eyes fixed upon the exciting terrain, there are evolved ones here. I wonder who.

  In school we learned this land was quarantined after an unknown explosion, and the Citizen Leader office deemed it uninhabitable. It’s why those buildings were abandoned, water supply fouled. Strange inexplicable events happen here unsuitable for the common citizen. Or so we’ve been told. There are no towns between Big City and the capital.

  Nature reclaimed this area decades ago with the occasional chimney still standing and red barn fallen on its side. Farmland poisoned. A no man’s land of marauders, outcasts, and renegades. Rumor has it they live in these hills, in caves, and are dangerous.

  The train is a nonstop between Big City and the capital. No stations wait in between.

  *

  We come over a pass and the view stretches for miles along a valley floor up to the next rocky hillside.

  Up in the distance a dark storm hovers over the horizon, subduing the sun. Darkness spreads, feathering out. Swaths of trees sway in the distance, their wills bent by some unseen force snapping them upright as wind rolls down the hillside straight for us. The capital is in that direction.

  Tanz snores and mutters recipe ingredients, “Add a tablespoon of olive oil and a pinch of salt for eureka, a delicious casserole.” Expressions of interest spread across his face. I feel bad elbowing him. He startles and scowls.

  Out the side window the day is still untouched by this incoming monster. As we approach its body climbs higher, spreading further. Clouds swirl and spin.

  Tanz knocks on the conductor door next to us. The bearded man with a black pony tail gives him a thumbs up then goes faster.

  Darkness and wind hurl over the terrain. The train moves full speed as the storm tumbles in a fury, tearing up land. Tanz bangs on the locked door again and raises his hands, motioning for the conductor to slow down. The man points to his watch as if staying on time, offering another thumbs-up.

  Wind rips up the track in front of us. Boards, one by one, right at us. Wood planks and six-inch spikes fly like daggers, cracking the window and impaling the car’s steel membrane. Spears miss my face by a foot. I now see the body of this beast towering as I press my face against the window. A twister forms at the storm’s front. But there’s no rain. Darkness trails behind the cyclone as if pushing it, directing it.

  “We’re going to hit it,” I say.

  Tanz’s eyes scan the storm like a camera lens adjusting and accounting.

  “I cannot see inside this mass. Brace yourself.”

  I wedge my feet in front and hand against the sidewall.

  The tornado pulls back then lurches forward, rushing us. Remaining tracks fly off as if we’re playing chicken with the Devil.

  The sound is fierce like some angry god coming down to smite us for our wicked deeds. Darkness fills every window and crevice. The angry storm smashes full force into the car like a pissed off bull. The impact lifts the rear of the car knocking people out of seats. The car
smashes back to the ground wobbling. Another hit comes. Still moving forward, the train teeters another hundred yards then tips. Gravity pulling at it.

  The sound is like a great ship on the sea creaking and listing after hitting an iceberg, metal peeling and bending.

  “We’re going over!” I say, wedging myself in.

  Crashing down now skidding on our right side over jagged rocks and dirt. Luggage tumbles from racks above. Sandwiches go airborne. People fly through the air and fall into aisles. My grip slips. I smack against the now horizontal conductor door and grab the bar above, swinging from it as the train continues on. Tanz bounces off the wall landing on luggage below.

  Scraping the earth, the train skids, bouncing along. In the chaos, screams fill the car. Balancing my feet, I scan the disarray. Momentum slowing, I balance my feet shifting with the heaving train.

  Wind can’t run into a train. Not like that. I look at the tickets and us in the front seat of the front car. Then I hear the noise as the train lurches to a stop. Metal peels and shreds as the tin can above is ripping open.

  People scream, running to the rear. A few people near us are ripped out into the cyclone’s body and darkness beyond as Tanz and I stumble to the rear of the car.

  A black, impenetrable sky hovers. Branches and luggage swirl, potato chips float past. Man, I’m hungry. I look into the darkness and swear I can hear voices. Then we both peer at something grayish white descending from way up high. It begins taking shape. We look at each other.

  Jagged canine teeth the size of a Toyota pierce the black, grinding down onto the train and chewing up the interior and metal of the car.

  “That’s no wind…” Tanz shouts.

  “What do we do?”

  “Run!”

  With others we run into the back. Teeth behind us like PAC-MAN. Ripped out seats and train chunks pass into the wind chomping and sucking everything up. Still the wind spins, wrappers and papers hit me in the face. A businessman’s combover blows from side to side. Luggage and people swirl above into the wind.