by Eddie Patin
"What about gargoyles?"
Jason paused, then looked over the list again. In the immediate area, he didn't see anything mentioning gargoyles. "Nope."
"Must be because they're golems," Riley said. "Made by the necromancer, I reckon."
"I guess. I also don't see any mention of this 'Weave' cosmic entity."
"Probably one of the fruking unknowns. Let's get going. It's about two miles to the village."
Jason picked up his AK-47 and they started walking.
"So..." Jason said. "You wanna try our luck at the village?"
Riley looked back at him as they hiked along the grassy valley. He was carrying two rifles—one in his hands and the other on his back—but still looked comfortable. His hell-hound hide duster fluttered with the occasional gust of wind. "Well, Royce said that it was a good place to hunt from. If he was telling the truth, then the gargoyles should come out at night to attack the town."
"He also said that everyone in town was insane."
"Yeah, well," the soldier replied with a smirk. "We'll outgun 'em for sure. They only have dark ages tech. But just in case bad shet goes down, you be ready with your focus key to get us home, alright?"
"Of course."
Jason had never actually seen wheat before, but he noted that the grass looked a lot like what he’d imagined wheat would look like. Tall, golden stalks with seeds on top waved in the wind, growing well above their knees. The ground was choppy and dipped here and there with what might be tiny creeks during some seasons.
Gliath stalked along with long, agile strides on his lean, panther-like legs, looking very out of place in this golden Earth-like field. His long, black tail swished from side to side, especially when a bird in the brush or zipping past them in the air caught his attention. The Krulax carried his big shotgun silently behind Riley and Gliath, bringing up the rear without a care.
By the time they were halfway to town—Jason still checking the map overlays on his OCS from time to time—Riley stopped them all and told Gliath to shift down.
"Yes, Ranaja."
It was probably standard practice between the two mercenaries. Jason figured that Riley didn't want the tall, deadly-looking leopardwere to freak out the natives. It was a good idea.
"Hey, would you believe that an Interstate used to run through here?" Jason asked, looking haphazardly at his map as they hiked. "Interstate 90. It should be passing through just up ahead, not far south of the village. Look at how the village is built right up against the foothills of that mountain range. Smart."
"Interstate?" Riley asked, scratching his beard.
"Oh—that's one of the biggest highway-types back home. Remember the big highway full of traffic we were on south of Ridgeview when we drove to Denver? That was Interstate 70."
"Oh yeah."
They walked on.
"I've never actually been to Montana before," Jason said.
Riley looked back suddenly with stars in his eyes. "You know what would be really fruking cool?"
"What?"
"We should take out the thirty gargoyles, then see if we can find the necromancer's home, or tower, or fortress, or whatever. It's gotta be nearby."
"Why?"
"Well, the way I see it, the Corsairs got outta here really fruking fast, right? Maybe there's some magical loot in there still. With the necromancer dead and the gargoyle job done, we'll have some time to dig around for some good shet. Magical items are the best. We hardly ever see 'em at the Market and they're hard to come by because most universes with magic are really fruking dangerous and a lot of times incompatible with normal humans. A necromancer's lair without a necromancer in it would be great! We could find some really unique gear."
Jason laughed. "Magical rings? Amulets? An enchanted Longsword +3?"
Riley smirked and scratched his beard. "Huh?" he asked, then, "Yeah. All sorts of weird shet. Like my phase belt—you actually saw it in action back on Maze World, right? Healing potions are the most common magical stuff, and they're really fruking rare too. If we can find a few more of those, that'd be fruking great. But really—we could find anything."
"It's a necromancer," Jason said. "A necromancer who apparently makes gargoyles. We might find some really dark stuff too, like wands that create undead, or things involving golem creation, or a weapon enchanted to do poison damage, or inflict negative energy or something..."
"You talk like you're familiar with magical items."
"Eh," Jason said with a shrug. All of his DnD knowledge didn't necessarily mean shit, did it? "Only from games, Riley. Fiction."
The farther they hiked and the closer they came to the village, the valley started to rise, and little copses and lines of pine trees broke up the landscape here and there. The grass started changing to a greener, non-stalky variety, and Jason could smell the forest distinctly.
It occurred to Jason that he should probably learn how to rift by estimating and inputting coordinates along the third dimension—like how Riley had tried to get him to do back on Maze World. Back then, Jason didn't even bother to try. If he had, then maybe they would have gained the advantage over Ghrag and his bug-men. Maybe they would have entirely avoided the deadly encounter with Nargog down on the canyon floor that fucked everything up. Riley would have never been mortally wounded, the minotaur would have never rampaged through town on universes 934, 1241, and 1242, and Jason 1241 never would have killed himself...
Jason once again found himself lost in the memory of finding his second self dead in the garage. He remembered hunting through the Wilderlands with Jason 1241 before they went to the Market. Back then, Jason 1241 was a lot more like him, and was just starting to play with idea of not planeswalking anymore. They’d found Jason's old Glock 26 in the underbrush—back where he’d dropped it after running out of ammo and fleeing for his life from the cannibals and the wyvern. His gun had been pulled apart by all of the weird, tiny vines that seemed to attack anything unnatural in that world.
He shook his head.
Wondering 'what if' was essentially the same as meandering along Probability Space. All along the fifth dimension were the infinite directions that every decision and twist of fate could bring Jason. He imagined following along with a different Jason—one out there somewhere—who really had taken the path that Riley had requested. There was at least one Jason out there in this multiverse that actually did figure out how to rift the three of them to the distant ridge that day, and life went on in a completely different direction.
Jason laughed. It was intellectually staggering.
Fate, he thought, smiling to himself. What fate?
At any rate, if Jason could learn how to open rifts by estimating coordinates—without teleporting them all into the dirt or a rock wall—then they could travel really fast. They could just Dim Door across the valley all the way to the town instead of walking.
This isn't DnD, Jason thought. 'Dimension Door' was a fictional spell from that game. But he could do that, couldn't he? It was the same thing. If he could estimate and open a rift to a spot that he could see a mile away, then they could all step through and save a lot of walking time.
He'd have to play with it; figure it out.
"Hold on," Riley said, and Jason realized that the soldier and Gliath had stopped.
He paused.
Riley was standing in tall grass in the shadows of some trees, crouched slightly and looking ahead. Gliath stood by, pulled in close to the pine boughs to break up his form.
"What is it?" Jason asked.
"Look there," Riley said, gesturing him to approach and pointing at the valley ahead.
Past the nearby trees, the valley continued for perhaps another half-mile while becoming more and more rolling foothills. Up ahead was the village with its tall, stone walls. Jason tried to see whatever the hell Riley was looking at. To the northwest along the tree line, where the pine forest led up Baldy Mountain, there were several big, black dots standing around in the grass. They were at least a
mile away.
"I need to bring binoculars on future missions," Jason muttered.
"See ‘em?" Riley asked.
Jason squinted at the dark figures in the grasslands to the northwest and eventually made out buffalo, grazing in the foothills far away. Those were the first animals he'd seen on this world so far other than birds.
"Buffalo."
"No, not those," Riley said. "Look near the walls. They look like cannibals from the Wilderlands."
The words gave Jason a chill. He looked back toward the village and eventually caught some movement in the trees near the western wall. There were people running around up there in the shadows of the tree line. They were nearly naked and carried clubs and other crude weapons. Two had wooden spears. Their skin was the color of mud, and there were maybe six of them in all. They did look a lot like the cannibals of the Wilderlands, but really, they were just some sort of savage humanoid race. Where they people? Or 76% Orcs?
"I see them."
The three Reality Rifters watched the distant creatures for a short while. The primitive humanoids ran around in the woods behind the village's north wall and along the tree line. Jason saw that the land there dipped down there; maybe into some sort of gulch or ravine. After a while, the savages disappeared.
"Eh," Riley said with a shrug. He scratched his beard and stepped out into the sunlight again. "Come on."
Jason and Gliath followed. In his human form, Gliath looked like an American Indian. His dark, severe face showed no emotion, and his long and straight raven-black hair tossed in the wind. The leopardwere's 'pretender form' looked right at home in Montana of u936.
They approached the village, sighting a large wooden gate in the middle of the southern wall. Eventually, the random wagon ruts they'd been seeing in the grass converged into something of a dried-up mud road leading to the gate. There was no road leading away from the village, but instead, the tracks leading away from the gate out into the wilderness veered off into multiple directions—mostly to the west into the vast valley that used to be a real city.
When they were close enough, Jason could see colors next to the gate. There was a sign to the left of the great double doors. The gate itself was made of pine trunks like a thick palisade still dark with bark and sharpened at the top into stakes. There were no people outside, and no guards on the walls. A single watchtower was built into the wall to the right of the gate above the palisade, but Jason couldn't see inside.
He read the sign aloud when they were close enough.
"Welcome ... to Bozeman," Jason quietly read as their boots crunched through the dried ruts of crumbly mud. It was an old sign—ancient, really—made of wood and painted brown that was crackled almost beyond recognition. The words were carved into the sign with a decorative font, then painted tan. Below the big word 'BOZEMAN' was a rectangle cut into the sign that might have once been a picture—perhaps a panoramic scene of the city—but now, it was just a faded, cracked-up blur. "Is that ... the original sign for Bozeman, Montana from 900 years ago?"
"It looks really fruking old," Riley said.
Just then, a scrabbling sound from above made all three of them look up at the wall. A single figure stood there looking down, silhouetted against the bright, blue sky. Jason immediately recognized the shadow of a spear-tip on the end of a long pole.
"Hold it!" the man shouted from above with a gruff voice. "Who goes there?"
Jason exchanged glances with Riley and Gliath.
"Go ahead, man," Riley said quietly. "Just remember—keep that focus key close, okay? We can shoot ‘em all down if we need to, but they might have crossbows or something."
Gliath's face was expressionless as always.
Jason looked back up at the figure. A spark of exhilaration lit deep in his belly, sending a charge all the way to his fingers and toes. Jason felt like they were in a movie. He felt like he was living in a DnD game...
"We, uh," he began then cleared his throat. "We're monster hunters. We're here to help!"
Chapter 12
When they were all done rushing out, a dozen armored soldiers stood just outside the tall, stone walls. They were dressed in thick swaths of blue and cream-colored cloth, reminding Jason of medieval Persia or something—at least in the movies, anyway. Each man stood stock-still and at attention with long, steel-headed spears in their fists, every one of them protected by a suit of armor made from dark-dyed leather and strips of bolted-on metal.
Brigandine? Jason thought, reflecting on his DnD days. Brigandine, or something like it.
The strangest and most disturbing thing about each soldier was the masks that they wore. Each man's face was completely covered by a solid and gleaming metallic mask of gold. Whether it was real gold or made to look like gold, Jason didn't know. But with their faces completely covered save for dark slits for their eyes, and the rest of their heads covered in dark, blue cowls, the soldiers instilled more than a little fear in Jason. They stood perfectly still, waiting, having all filed out of the cracked-open gate a moment after Jason had called up to the single guard up on the wall. They each stood along the huge, stone brick structure, spears held in the exact same position, waiting. They also each had some sort of short sword—like a Gladius from Roman times—strapped to their sides.
With his rifle in his hands, Jason's fingers itched. He didn't know what was happening. All of the soldiers were standing still, waiting for something; for someone to—
Jason jumped when he suddenly felt Riley's hand fall on his shoulder. He looked over at the cyborg, who met his gaze with even eyes. Jason realized that he'd been shaking. He held an AK-47 in his arms and could probably kill the dozen of the creepy guards with a single magazine, but he still felt a strange and cold aura of danger emanating from these men.
He reminded himself that they were from another world. They weren't like him.
Clearing his throat again, Jason finally pressed himself to speak up. He looked over the dozen soldiers who stood like statues, practically ignoring the three Reality Rifters.
"Are we supposed to ... uh ... is it okay if we...?"
"Who are you?" a man's voice called out from inside the gate. "Identify yourselves!"
English. Good.
Jason found himself reaching up into his shirt collar and fingering the 'home' focus key that would bring him back to his garage. He also felt the smooth, acrylic focus key to Cloudworld hanging next to it.
"My name is Jason," he called back. Was the man talking from behind the gate? Jason looked up to the wall again but there was no one there. "My colleagues are Riley and Gliath."
"What are you doing here?!" the man shouted back with a full but slightly shrill voice. Yes—he was definitely behind the gate. "Why have you come?"
"We've come to help you with your gargoyle problem," Jason replied. He looked at Riley and Gliath, but his friends were standing attentive, their weapons held in their arms and ready to rock. They weren't pointing their guns at the soldiers, of course, but Jason knew that the two of them would move like lightning and kill them all if things turned physical.
Some seconds passed.
"Where did you come from?" the man shouted finally.
Jason gave it some thought. There was no use lying about it; they were obviously different and would soon reveal that they possessed weapons of much higher technology; at least as soon as night fell and the monsters attacked.
"We come from a land very far away."
"From the stars?!"
Jason exchanged glances with Riley. The soldier smirked.
"Yes!" Jason shouted. "From the stars."
More seconds passed, tense and heavy with waiting. Jason resisted the urge to finger the trigger of his AK, but he allowed himself to quietly transition the safety lever to fire.
Click.
Finally, the gate creaked and rolled open a little farther—there were small wheels built into the bottom corners—and Jason heard the crunching and shuffling of more people walking their way. Fo
ur more armored soldiers appeared, all dressed in creamy-tan and dark blue with brigandine, spears, golden masks that gleamed in the sun, and dark blue cowls hiding their hair. In the middle of the four warriors—emerging from their cluster of protection once they were outside of the walls—was a soft, middle-aged man dressed in white and golden robes. He had a priestly-looking dark-blue sash draped around his neck (Jason vaguely thought that it was called a Stole?) running down his chest all the way to his knees. A small, gold-hilted knife was tucked into the man's belt, and he walked with a plain, hardwood staff that looked more practical than formidable. The man's face was oddly serene and formless, yet his grey eyes were stern and focused. His hair was very short and salt-and-pepper grey. He stared at the three of them for a moment, then smiled warmly.
"Warriors from the stars!" he exclaimed. His voice was like a constant satisfied sigh. "You have come to help rid our town of the Darkness, have you?"
Jason exchanged glances with Riley again. Gliath's long, raven-black hair whipped in a gust of wind.
Nearly all insane, he recalled.
"Yes," Jason replied. "Yes, indeed. We have come to kill the gargoyles that attack your village in the night."
The man smiled even wider, seeming like he wanted nothing more than to give Jason a big hug.
"You are Jason?" the man asked. "And the others are Riley and Gliath, you said?"
"Yes."
"I am Magister Josiah Estren, speaker of the Golden Lady's Communion and her Virgin Oracles. You three look similar to the other warriors from the stars that stayed here in New Bozeman recently. It is my understanding that the necromancer is dead, yes?"
"That is correct, Magister," Jason replied, feeling like he was back to roleplaying again. This was more than a little bizarre, but he tried to run with it. The leader-priest definitely gave Jason a strange vibe, but if they could all be peaceful and work together, it'd sure make hunting golem hearts easier. "I know for a fact that the necromancer is dead." If Skinner had paid Royce for it, then it was done, right?