Killers, Traitors, & Runaways

by Lucas Paynter

  Flynn and Jean were halfway down the tunnel with water up to their knees by the time the rift opened—he would get Jean through, then fall back for the others. He had worked it out. There was still time.

  Two sets of footsteps thrashed behind them. Hopeful, Flynn turned, keeping Jean supported as he did. Mack and Leria were still holding the line, but two Reahv’li had slipped through. Just as the claws inched through his fingers, he realized he had made one fatal miscalculation.

  Ya know what I’m gonna do.

  Jean didn’t need to say it. Two Reahv’li were running for them, and all she needed to do was reach out, touch the wall. Cracks burst through the tunnel like veins, sprouting and wrapping around large chunks of stone that fell to create a barrier between them and their pursuers. Air and water alike were choked with dust, and through the dirt that clung to her face, Jean wore a self-satisfied smile. She hadn’t yet realized what she had done.

  The flooding would grow worse on the other side. All Flynn could do now was finish what he’d started. He walked Jean the rest of the way—there was no longer any reason to hurry. After helping her through, he followed. There was no point in looking back.

  CHAPTER FIVE: Innocent Things

  Salt water poured through the rift like a stout waterfall, washing away the moss and mixing with the fetid water of a sunlit swamp. Flynn had nearly drowned on arrival and, upon forcing himself above the water line, gasped for air as he tried to take in his surroundings. Jean surfaced nearby, rising up and whipping her head back, the moss clinging to her hair, her face. Flynn suddenly, violently choked, coughing up some of the rank water he’d swallowed.

  “Ha ha! What a fuckin’ landing! Like to see ’em follow us now!”

  The conduit to Breth remained open behind Flynn, and he glanced slowly back at it. Part of him hoped that, despite all odds, their missing comrades would yet emerge. He swiftly abandoned that hope, and instead looked ahead. Old blocks of concrete, Brethian in origin, littered the swamp. It was as though something had blasted them through centuries prior, moss and fungus overwhelming their every side, hanging off the rusted rebar that jutted menacingly outward. Seawater continued to flow through the rift until Flynn gained enough distance that it closed.

  The others were waiting, perched across the old stones and the trunk of an ancient tree that had long since fallen. All eyes were on them.

  “You both made it.” Chari spoke reluctantly. “It … it had been a spell, and we began to fear the worst.”

  “I see Jean caught up,” Poe commented. “I welcome your return.”

  “Yeah, nick of time.” Jean grinned. “Where’s Mack?”

  It hurt to swallow, and Flynn choked when he tried to speak. Zaja got her words out first. “Last we saw … they were with you.”

  “They…?” Jean looked at Flynn, turning pale as she realized that something had gone very wrong. “Flynn…?”

  “Mack … and Leria, they were—” Flynn coughed. “They were holding the Reahv’li at bay while I got you to safety. Two of the enemy got through, and you—”

  “No.” He had never heard her sound so scared.

  It was an awful sentence to finish. “You buried their way out.”

  However Flynn felt for saying it, Jean was hit worse. It came to him innately, all the things she felt but couldn’t say. A schizophrenic wash of emotion, of anger and screaming and crying. But the real Jean, the one in front of him, could only desperately shake her head. “No. No.” She grabbed Flynn’s collar, wrenching him back toward the gate, and he had to twist around to avoid falling backward. She lurched hard and urgently with every step on her bad leg, the connection to Breth opened, and they fell through together.

  In an instant, they were back in the tunnel. The dust in the air hadn’t settled, and the light coming through from the other world bounced off it, making it harder to see. He stepped forward, and the rift closed behind him. The water level hadn’t noticeably risen, but Flynn could hear the sound of it trickling just ahead.

  Jean waded urgently to the wall of rubble that plugged the end of the tunnel. “Mack! Mack!” No sooner had she reached it than she began clawing at chunks of stone and tearing them aside. “Wait there! If ya hear me, buddy, just wait!”

  “Jean…” Flynn was hoarse. He coughed, clearing his throat, and yelled sharply, “Jean!”

  She stopped just long enough to glare at him in disgust. “Haul yer ass over here and get helpin’!”

  “The chamber on the other side is flooding. Most likely by now, it’s completely filled. If Mack is still down there, he’s drowned. He’d … he’d be dead.”

  A fragment Jean held tumbled from her hand. As quickly as she began to process it, she fought to shut it down, digging her fingers into her own scalp. “Then he’s waitin’, just above! Wherever the water’s stopped, that’s where he’s gonna be! He’s gonna need me to come back for him—!”

  “Damn it, Jean!” Flynn marched at her, grabbing her by the shoulders. “Several hundred Reahv’li drove us down here! We were cornered, and they’d have gone after Mack and Leria with the rest of us gone.”

  “Then he needs me to get him back—”

  “You’re not listening!” Flynn roared. “He’s gone! This is done! We cannot save him.”

  Jean ground her teeth, and he sensed every fiber in her tightening with the urge to kill him where he stood. “Fuck you,” she seethed. “You may have ditched everyone ya ever knew, left ’em to rot, but I don’t do that. I don’t ditch—”

  “You did. You didn’t mean to, but you did.”

  Jean punched the wall next to his head and her knuckles tore and bled, leaving Flynn with little doubt she’d broken something in the process. The tunnel shook with her scream. She heaved like she’d just run a marathon, and the corridor pulsed with every gasp. Rubble and dust fell from above, and instinct told Flynn to save himself and let Jean do what she wished.

  But Jean wasn’t ready to give up and Flynn wasn’t prepared to lose her as well, so he said what he had to, to break her in this delicate moment.

  “It’s your fault.”

  Like everything she touched, Jean collapsed. She said nothing more, only sobbed into his shirt, her tears lost in all the swamp filth that had soaked in. He was silent, and gave her the space she needed to let it out. This wasn’t the sort of outburst she wanted to share with the others, and he knew she would hate herself for sharing it with him.

  * * *

  It had been hours.

  Chari slid into the fetid water, felt the sensation of something slimy and cold crawling up her bare thighs, stopping at the arc-shaped scar on the back of her right leg. She had removed the wrappings on her legs ahead of time, but had to tuck the skirt of her garb in to avoid trailing filth. A long dredge through the swamp awaited them.

  Jean emerged first, hobbling in her direction, and Chari met her halfway. “Here,” she beckoned, helping Jean lean against a tree. As Chari wrenched the sodden boot from Jean’s foot, she noted that her friend was uncharacteristically quiet. Her eyes were bloodshot, and she looked away as Chari wrapped her hands around the ankle, twitching from the pain but not uttering a sound. As Chari did her work, the swelling diminished and the pain passed into her before dissipating entirely.

  Jean accepted her boot and muttered a vague “thanks” before trudging off into the swamp. During this time, Flynn had joined them, the passage to Breth having closed for the last time.

  “So we’re carrying on?” Zella climbed down from the felled trunk while asking and Flynn simply nodded. She said nothing else, merely waded off in pursuit of Jean. Poe followed, leaving Chari, Zaja, and Flynn behind.

  “Is he—?” Chari choked. Mack was among her first real friends, something she’d taken for granted as long as she’d known him.

  “We don’t know,” Flynn said, shaking his head. He touched briefly on everything
Chari and the others had missed. But there was no resolution to the tale.

  It felt rude to break the moment, but Chari felt she had to. “They’ll be getting ahead of us the longer we linger.” She tightened her hold on her rifle’s strap, lest the muzzle dip into the water.

  Flynn agreed, adding, “Give Jean her space.”

  When Chari started walking, she expected the others to follow promptly. She looked back to see Zaja climbing from her perch onto Flynn’s back, so she could avoid wading through the brisk waters. The afternoon was fading, but it was at least warmer than the labyrinth from which they’d escaped.

  Flynn must have thought the sound wouldn’t carry as he whispered to Zaja, “You’ve lost weight,” upon securing her.

  Zaja gave a faint “Yeah,” of affirmation.

  Chari pretended to hear nothing and put on a smile. “Let us carry on.”

  It didn’t take long to catch up with the others, but a stagnant silence hung between them like the very air they now breathed.

  Mack would have stirred the conversation, she eventually realized, freeing us from this pallor. Whatever his fate, in leaving this swamp, they had consigned him to it.

  Chari could think of nothing to break the tension. As High Priestess, she could have led an empty prayer to the Goddess for Mack’s well-being, and though she loathed the pretenses, she found right now that she missed the safety of such routine. All she could do was suffer in silence like her companions—save for Poe, she noticed, who carried on as though nothing had changed.

  Night had fallen long before they escaped the swamp. They had brought supplies scavenged from Breth, at least, and this included several flashlights. Having never handled one before, it was a momentary marvel, and Chari found amusement cupping her hands over the beam and playing with the shadows. The fun quickly died, as a single glance from Flynn’s tired, irritated eyes implored her to stop.

  While the flashlights helped light their way, they also made the six a beacon for insects and other hostile creatures, and Chari felt no relief from the things that bit at her arms and pricked at her skin. When they reached the high ground of a lonely island, she was covered in welts and rashes. She looked up for some comfort from the sky, but found only a canopy so thick she couldn’t see a single star.

  “We break here, ’kay?” Jean asked. “I’m fuckin’ bushed.”

  No one spoke, but there was agreement among them. As Zaja climbed down from Flynn’s back, he ordered no one in particular to, “See about making a fire. I’ll hunt down something to eat.”

  Chari wanted to follow, wanted the distraction of putting herself to use, but had no strength remaining. She sank down on her crossed legs, resting on the butt of her rifle to stay upright, but fell asleep anyway.

  * * *

  The swamp had been unpleasant in every imaginable way, but Zella had long kept a private rule to savor each new world she visited. In the course of her long life, she’d seen many. The darkness surrounding them made it easier to focus on the chirp of insects kept at bay by the campfire’s smoke, the smell of their dinner being seasoned by the bog’s musk as it cooked on the open flame.

  “Ya gotta leave it in longer.”

  “You usually burn it,” Flynn rebutted.

  “I can’t eat raw food, fucker.” Jean tried to smile.

  “It’s not raw, just rare.”

  While they cooked, Zella was busy rewrapping her arms, covering the sacred scars carved into them. She had never learned the old tongue and only loosely knew the meaning of these runes—they spoke of a willing sacrifice and a gift of power. She was considered a blessed scion in some circles, but this did not deter the mosquitoes from biting her, and she did not want welts forming in the engravings of her skin. She’d lived with these markings for almost a year now, and had learned to constantly think ahead for what problems they might cause.

  “You don’t know this place, Zella?” Flynn handed her a stick of charred meat and shriveled swamp vegetables. It was bitter at first bite, but beneath the blackened skin, the flavor improved.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever been here,” she replied as she looked past him. The remains of an orange-striped amphibian rested on the shore, its legs as long as her arm, a third eye embedded in the back of its head. It was thoroughly alien to her.

  “Don’t matter.” Jean pulled a skewer from the flame and tossed it to Poe. She shot him a derisive look, then returned to fish out her own share. “We’re here, ain’t we? Carry on and all that crap.”

  Poe studied his share of the meal, but declined to start eating. He lowered his head and breathed out, “Jean. I have suffered the loss you now endure.”

  “Shut it,” she snapped.

  “I have,” he assured her. “As with Mack, she, too, is forever lost. And, as with your friend, her severance from my life was my own fault.” Despite Poe’s melancholy, Jean remained unmoved.

  “So … what? We got one fuckin’ thing in common and ya think that makes us buds or somethin’?” She tore off a bite of meat, char and all, and stared at Poe through the fire. Her eyes were bloodshot, her face stained with mud and smoke. She looked to Flynn. “The nerve of this fucker!”

  If Poe felt any shame, he showed none.

  “You tried to kill my best friend, first time we met,” Jean went on. “Ya ever even think about that, fuck-head? Thing that pisses me off most? You’d have gotten ‘im too, if this chick—” she pointed at the sleeping Chari, “—weren’t so good at patchin’ up holes in people!”

  Poe snorted in irritation, plunged his untouched skewer into the soil, and stood up. “There was nothing personal in my actions that night. But if you wish to revenge your friend against me now—”

  “Would if I fuckin’ could!” Jean yelled, standing to meet him.

  Zella watched, but said nothing; it was not her place to interfere.

  “Ya think I wouldn’t love to smash you into the ground, fucker?! It ain’t right that you’re still here and Mack’s—he’s—”

  She seemed about to break, so Zella finished for her, softly. “He’s gone.”

  Jean found her lost nerve, and continued. “Been on my own for a long time and since that started, it was one easy fuckin’ rule: only keep friends around. Met too many creeps and pervs as a kid to chance that again.”

  “I am neither of those things!” Poe protested.

  “No,” Jean agreed, her voice turning cold. “Yer a monster. Until you, I never kept no one around I couldn’t learn to forgive.” She glared contemptuously at Flynn, but added nothing. “And the icing on the shit cake? I’ve gotta keep you alive, keep you safe, ’cause someone thinks you can save the world.”

  “You’re not obligated—”

  “I’m fuckin’ doin’ it!” she bellowed. “It needs doin’. But I don’t have to like it and I don’t have to suffer yer goddamn sob-stories about how we got some hurt in common. ’Cause we don’t.”

  Jean sat back down and noisily devoured her dinner. Neither she nor Poe nor anyone else said another word. As soon as Jean was done, she rolled over to sleep, her back to the fire. After a time, Poe fidgeted, leaning forward to get a better look at her. It was only when he was certain that she was at rest that he looked to Flynn.

  “I should have simply kept quiet.”

  “Yes,” Flynn agreed. “You should have.”

  * * *

  Night faded, but the six slept on until midday. They were physically and mentally exhausted, and the toll of the previous day had been worse for some than others. The noon sun emerged through the thick canopy in narrow streams, waking Flynn up. As he rubbed his weary eyes, he found Zaja tending the fire. She sat very close to it, trying to absorb whatever warmth it could provide; the swamp was colder today.

  “Kinda wish we went for that desert,” she commented.

  “We’d still have Mack,” Flynn glumly ag
reed. Jean rolled over nearby, startling him, but she gave no sign of waking.

  “And there were two suns,” Zaja cheerfully reminded him. “Think of what I could do with two suns! You’d all be counting on me for a change!”

  Flynn recalled the glaring heat and the waves of sweat and the blinding light of those twin stars, and for one moment, he longed for it. To have dodged the entire previous day, to be returning from scouting ahead for water or safe passage to find some shaded canopy where Mack waited with the rest of them. He cast aside such thoughts and woke the others, one by one, saving Jean for last. They couldn’t stay forever; it was time to move on.

  The sunlight that beckoned them out of the fetid swamp was dimmer than expected, for gray clouds had blown in. They emerged atop a small hill that overlooked rolling fields; plumes of smoke wafted to the sky and mingled with the clouds above. The air smelled faintly of sulfur, and faint crashes sounded in the distance.

  “What’s that sound?” Jean asked, vexed.

  “Cannon fire,” Chari answered uneasily. “I only ever heard it in celebratory use, but for others, I’ve imagined it as a tool of dread. I share that dread now.”

  “We’ll find nothing going back,” Zella said as she looked to Flynn. “We tried to be picky and control where we landed, and look where we’ve come.”

  There was no condescension in her tone, but something approaching disappointment, and Chari understood why. Zella had only stumbled between worlds, so every passage she’d found was a boon. Through Flynn, they had the means to pick and choose, and still they had been dealt a losing hand.

  “The only passage here is the one we came from,” Flynn told them. “It might be a while before I sense another.”

  The swamp soon became a distant memory as they descended into the windswept valley and met the farmsteads, often reduced to tinder. There were no signs of life, and any surviving storehouses had been looted. Whatever remained was withered or rotting. The fields had often been harvested, but what few still flourished—along with any stray livestock—kept the six nourished for the time being.