by Jim Spencer
‘Well, like I said Arion. We’ve got nothing to lose,’ Cordell advised him. He sighed as he extracted another piece from the jellyfish. It automatically regenerated itself and Arion opened the module and put the piece straight in. he could see a reaction happening already, as electrical pulses began to move back and forth.
‘Ok guys, I’m taking the shot,’ he aimed the gun towards the area where the pulse came from. He could feel the ground shake as the pulse went down into the earth. He had absolutely no clue if this was going to work. He constantly kept shooting down for a full five minutes until his forefinger went sore.
‘I think that’s enough, Arion,’ Cordell told him. Arion nodded and let go of the gun. They sat down and simply waited. After a few moments, once the tent moved, he fell asleep with Sana by his side.
*
He didn’t know how long it had been since they made love, but he sat there resting when he heard a rumble in the ground. He thought it might be a simple earthquake again. It seemed to happen here quite frequently he was told, but after a moment Cordell came in and awoke them.
‘I’m sorry guys, but I have to wake you.’ They went outside and saw the ground rumble for a few seconds before stopping. It seemed to be doing this in a pulsating, rhythmic kind of way.
‘How long has this been happening?’ Arion heard himself yelling.
‘For the last half an hour. I think it worked.’
‘You’re telling me we revived something.’
‘Someone, I hope,’ Cordell corrected him. The rumblings became louder as the minutes went by and more ferocious. After a few moments, they couldn’t stand on the ground safely. They had to pull back as far as they could. Arion grabbed hold of the GP-002 and Sana as fast as he could, but was unable to grab hold of the jellyfish as it fell into a black pit that had appeared.
‘No!’ He heard himself scream. After a moment of silence, the unthinkable happened. A humungous hand came out of the ground, holding the tube the jellyfish was in. It laid the fish near them and slowly came out from beneath the ground. Its hand alone was almost the size of Arion’s whole arm. His bodily proportions were huge but his face was somewhat swollen away with parts being flesh and parts being bone. It took a deep intake of breath and then slowly came out from beneath the ground. Once fully up, it balanced itself on two boulders and stood up straight, standing more than 5 feet in height.
It looked around and took in the environment. It seemed to have small garments on his midriff area. Other than that, he was mostly naked. It breathed heavily as it looked around and saw the three humans in front of it. It spoke to them. Arion had no idea what he was saying, neither did Cordell. Sana however, seemed to understand. She responded to him and the man, as Arion presumed he was, responded back.
‘You understand him?’
‘I think so. I get the gist of what he’s saying.’
‘Ask him who he is? What’s his name?’
She asked him for his name. The man answered in a deep monotone with many words between, but Arion understood what was said. He asked her to repeat the question to make sure, and got the same response,
‘I am Alexander of Macedonia’
Chapter 20
‘What does he mean Alexander?’ Arion kept asking.
‘I think it’s pretty clear,’ Cordell told him, clearly annoyed at him. Alexander spoke again, his voice surprisingly even for such a huge man. Sana translated for them,
‘He knows you don’t believe him.’
‘How can he tell?’
‘Body language,’ she responded. He tried to keep himself calm and spoke to Alexander directly,
‘Do you understand me?’
Alexander rotated his hands from one direction to the next in a half semi-circle.
‘I think that means ‘kind of’.’
‘I know what that means,’ he snapped at Sana.
‘Ok,’ she turned away for a moment before standing beside him again. He was barely keeping himself upright and could still feel his legs shaking.
‘What’s the last thing you remember?’ he finally asked him. He gestured towards the heavens and spoke some word which Arion couldn’t understand.
‘I think he means ‘light’.’
‘How the hell do you know what he’s saying and we don’t?’
‘I’ve studied old textbooks which were written in ancient languages. So I can understand part of what he’s saying.’
‘Because you’ve read it somewhere?’ he said in disbelief.
‘I didn’t say it was perfect,’ she argued.
‘I’m joking, my dear,’
‘I know,’ she smiled, smugly.
‘Alexander,’ Cordell spoke, ‘do you understand me?’
Alexander’s head shook. Cordell tried to speak the native tongue of tribe country, which Alexander was able to somewhat decipher.
‘What’s he saying now?’ Arion asked Sana.
‘Learn the language.’
‘I am trying, my dear. It’s a little harder than I can manage,’
‘Well, we’ll have to remedy that. He’s telling him we need his help.’
Alexander seemed to gesture in a shrug of some kind, which he presumed was a positive thing.
‘Does that mean he’ll help us?’ Arion asked Cordell.
‘I think so. He is curious to know how he got here though.’
‘Well here you go, Arion. Time to put your language skills to use,’ she smirked at Arion.
‘Ok I’ll try. But you’ll have to help me when I get stuck.’
‘I wouldn’t do it any differently,’ she responded.
The rest of the night, they sat down, or what was considered sitting for Alexander, as he didn’t exactly shy away with his rotting innards. He went through the explanation as best he could with occasional help from Sana. He was surprisingly more adept than he thought. It was probably just the demeanour of Alexander. Although he was alive, part of him was still decomposed. So he was partly skeletal and partly flesh. A horrific mirage to look upon. It didn’t help that he was somewhat upfront in nature so Cordell had to intercede a few times when he didn’t understand Arion’s jokes.
After many hours, he eventually came to the conflict at hand, and after some deliberation, mostly from Sana who corrected his history Alexander finally agreed to help.
‘I’m hungry after all that,’ Arion said at long last.
‘Squid?’ Cordell pointed out.
‘Anything else?’
‘Not really.’
‘Ok, squid it is. Or as I like to call it, rubbery chicken.’
*
They made a tent for themselves and Cordell agreed to sleep outside with Alexander, who didn’t need it apparently.
‘I’ve been sleeping long enough’ he said in the native tongue
Sana and Arion spent some time learning new languages. He would teach her the odd word and she would teach the odd tongue of tribe. Its root came from Arabic apparently, although it was a combination of that and Esperanto.
‘It’s really confusing,’ Arion finally confessed.
‘Well, we learn all root languages as children.’
‘I barely know my own language.’
‘And whose fault is that?’ she asked. Arion didn’t answer, but he knew what she meant. He changed the subject.
‘What do you think of me?’
‘A bit direct, don’t you think?’
‘I’m known for my honesty,’ he told her truthfully.
‘You’re a decent enough guy. You seem to treat everyone well, no matter who they are.’
‘And looks?’
‘Nothing too special. Decent enough, I guess.’
‘So, you didn’t marry me for my looks?’
‘Of course not. Those women who marry only based on looks are never happy. I married you based on character.’
‘So, what do you think of women who do marry based on looks?’
‘Idiots. Foolhardy. They’ll never be happy.’
> ‘Well, that’s one thing we definitely have in common.’
‘It’s not the only thing,’ she said, and before he knew it, they were under the covers.
*
They awoke the next morning under the sunlight. It must have been fairly windy as the cover for the tent had been blown away. It was only later on that Cordell confirmed it was not the wind, but Alexander training and swishing at the rear end. He had fashioned a sword out of the equipment close-by.
‘You didn’t hear it?’ he asked them, stunned.
‘I am a deep sleeper,’ Arion responded.
‘Fair enough. We manage to find some breakfast. Well, kind of,’ he pointed to the giant squid that they had killed previously.
‘Turns out it wasn’t completely dead. Alexander helped there though.’
Alexander nodded his head in acceptance of this.
‘He knows what you’re saying?’
‘Kind of. I spent some time teaching him basic words. Turns out he’s like a new born baby. His brain is anyway. Took everything I said. Filled like a sponge.’
‘What do you mean, baby?’
‘Well, I can’t be a hundred percent sure, but from what I could tell, he spoke of his previous life as if it was some long distant dream. It’s as if he knows he’s meant to be dead.’
‘That’s a bit different,’ Sana commented.
‘That’s the understatement of the century,’ Cordell remarked. Arion noticed a small shimmer of light to his side. He saw a vehicle coming closer.
‘Who’s that?’ he asked. No one had any equipment to check out who it was, so they simply waited for the inevitable to happen. When the trailer stopped, Patrick and the rest came out.
‘Alright mate… what the fuck?’ he said, rather dramatically, ‘I fought that were a statue,’ He stood there, staring comically at the sheer frame and size of Alexander, who clearly intimidated him. The rest seemed to be less shocked, although that wasn’t saying much.
‘I guess I have some explaining to do,’ Arion mentioned.
*
‘This is craziness,’ Patrick finally said once Arion had explained what had happened. Arion was surprised Patrick had understood his explanation as the rest were mostly puzzled, though they accepted what he said as true.
‘So how does he talk?’ Nicholas asked.
‘You mean language? He speaks something similar to what tribe country speak.’
‘Are there any more of ‘em? Patrick asked.
‘You know what Patrick, I haven’t asked him that. Why don’t you ask him?’
‘No that’s alright mate. He could literally kill me if he taps me.’
‘It’s ok Patrick. He’s harmless, unless provoked. Just think of him as a big dog.’
‘I hate dogs.’
‘Really?’
‘Yeah, got bit by one when I were younger.’
‘I did not know that. Sorry dude. I’ll ask him then,’ Alexander had sat there, looking mostly puzzled as he tried to take in this new-found language and world in. It seemed surreal to him. Arion couldn’t blame him really. He asked him the question and Alexander spoke and pointed towards the north. Arion understood most of it, but asked his wife just in case.
‘I got most of it, but correct me if I’m wrong. His family is buried close by.’
‘As far as he can remember, yes,’ she replied.
‘What would I do without you?’ He remarked.
‘Be a loner,’ she replied, a little too honestly.
‘Very funny,’ and he turned around and told the rest.
‘We’ve got some trackers in the trailer. We could use those to search for…human remains?’ Elijah asked.
‘Yes, human remains. Giant human remains,’ Arion corrected him. Of course, he knew they were going on conjecture here and the earth had changed considerably since Alexander was last alive, so knowing exactly where all the humans were would be almost impossible to determine. But they had nothing else, times were desperate and measures needed to be taken. So with that, they took some hovering trackers and used them to search within a radius of twenty miles, just to be safe.
‘I’d say we need a rest after that,’ Arion suggested.
‘Yeah, the probes will bring the results. And we can keep an eye on it using this computer. You guys hungry?’ Marcel asked.
‘Yes,’ Arion, Sana and Cordell replied.
‘Er, we have more than enough rations. Help yourself.’ Terence commented.
*
They spent the evening catching up on events that had occurred so far. The fact that civil country had such a large army to eradicate tribe country was not so surprising to Cordell.
‘He’s been wanting an excuse to get tribe country for a while. You’d think he’d have something better to do considering survival is more important right now.’
‘Apparently, he said to the young ones that tribe country had stolen civil country secrets and were creating weapons of mass destruction.’
‘That no good son of a bitch. What the fuck is wrong with him? Where the hell did he get that evidence from?’ Cordell burst out.
‘Made it up, I suppose.’ Nicholas suggested. Cordell shook his head.
‘I suppose he finally got his war. You know I read in the history books that humans were united a time ago.’
‘Yeah, that was when the earthquake took place,’ Sana told him.
‘What happened anyway?’ Arion asked her. He already knew the answer but wanted to see if civil country had messed with this part of history as well.
‘Well, the area was called USSR back then. Apparently, they were trying to dig to the upper mantle of the earth or something. For a long time, they had achieved this, but were unable to get further due to the unbearable temperature. The metal would basically melt when it got too close. They finally created a shield. That’s what they called it anyway. Something which used magnetism to retract molten away from the metal tubes they were using to dig with.’
‘They also had something called a coolant to help keep everything in place. Apparently it almost bankrupted their economy. Anyway, they got past the upper mantle and decided to go further down, to understand the mechanics of the earth so they could possibly save it, or create habitations closer to the earth or something. Not sure, that part is a bit hazy. Anyway, once they got to the lower mantle, they hit a tectonic plate and basically kept pushing, eventually forcing it to shift when it didn’t need to.’
‘This apparently caused all the tectonic plates in the earth to move at the same time, causing a major earthquake; apparently, it was a full 12.0 on the Richter scale. Although they say it was only because 12.0 was the maximum it could measure. The whole of Russia was lost, caved in on itself and parts of what was the middle east joined with Africa. Southern America is the only other part that survived. The water went under the ground, the ice caps melted, flooding the rest of the lands. To make matters worse, all nuclear weapons that had been created and stored in remote locations, all detonated at once, creating a huge amount of radiation around the world and pretty much drying up the oceans.’
‘It took about one hundred years for most of the world to be inhabitable, with the exception of south America, which is now civil country. Amazingly, it only took thirty years after that event for us to start ripping each other’s throats again.’
‘That is mostly what I know,’ Arion told her.
‘Is that what we have in common?’ she teased. Arion didn’t say anything but turned away to stop himself from getting distracted. She could push all his buttons and she knew it.
‘Hey, it found something.’
‘Really, where?’ Arion asked, excited. Alexander was sat in the side, curiously following what they were doing. He had no idea about technology but seemed to be more useful as a guard for them. Apparently, a couple of Nargus had decided to retreat seeing him earlier in the day. ‘Even they seemed to realise this was unnatural,’ Arion thought to himself.
‘About ten miles east. T
here’s a whole load of them. It’s probably better than we could have hoped for.’
‘Let’s go over there and get them. Actually, I’ve got a better idea,’ Arion turned around, ‘Alexander.’
He looked down at them.
‘Can you come with us and retrieve these warriors?’ he pointed to where the bodies were found. Alexander nodded and they decided that Arion and Cordell would go and the rest would guard the fortress until they came back.
*
What would have taken a couple of hours took only five minutes with Alexander. He practically ran as fast as he could. Arion made a mental note to tell him not to go as quick in the future. As he stopped and they located the spot, Arion extracted a piece from the jellyfish and put it into the GP-003. As the reaction happened, he did the same thing again. Shot down into the ground for a full five minutes. If this worked, then they had a good chance of at least surprising civil country.
*
‘What’s that?’ Patrick asked. They looked across the terrain and found dread creeping up in their hearts. It was the Nargus along with the Walrus. A major fight was about to break out here and they were in the middle of it all.
‘What do we do?’ Sana asked.
‘Get in the trailer.’ Nicholas said and they all followed suite. As they came in, the first screech could be heard from a distance. It was possible that they had created a tribal war.
‘Do we shoot?’ Marcel asked.
‘Not yet,’ Sana responded, ‘let them fight. Spare your bullets.’ Then, they waited, half regretting not going with Arion.
*
‘I think that’s enough,’ Cordell told him.
‘Yeah I think so too. Cordell, could you do me a favour?’
‘Sure.’
‘Take Alexander with you and protect my wife.’
‘She’s with the others.’
‘It’s not the others she needs protecting from.’
‘What did you see?’ he asked him.
‘As Alexander was running away, I could see the ground rumbling close to where they were, and I could see some Nargus coming out of their hiding places, ones that managed to survive the blast.’
‘That’s not good.’
‘I know, take him with you. I’ll wait and see if this works. Come back for me in the evening.’