by Frank Perez
It went without saying that no contact didn't mean that they weren't taken advantage of. Whenever one of the perfect ones decided that they wanted some fun on the wild side, one of the unnamed ones would be the beneficiary of their efforts. Efforts that more often than not turned out to be the last moments in life for the unnamed. The lucky ones would live to see another day of misery; torn, bruised and broken, yet alive. She had survived countless times.
Young and with a firm body, she'd attracted the notice of several perfect ones. For almost three days they had abused her in every way imaginable. Drinking, laughing and goading each other on to more and more depraved acts. Acts which she had borne the brunt of.
When they'd tired of their games they had tossed her aside, back to the miserable little room which she called home. None of the other unnamed came to help. That was not unusual. Misery doesn't really like company, it prefers to stay hidden in the dark, wallowing. It took a few more days for her to recover enough to get back on her feet. She fell back into her daily routine. Scrubbing things and washing others. All the while trying to avoid as much scrutiny as possible. She used tight wads of cloth to squeeze down her breasts and pile on as much mud and crap on her face and body as possible. Whatever she could do to make sure that none of the perfect ones noticed her.
After a few months, her belly had got bigger. She had heard about these things from other unnamed women. There's a child in there. She panicked.
With no other family around her, it would just be her and the child with no protection. The other unnamed would be no help. They were so starved that they would just as soon take the child and eat it - and her as well. Never. It's mine! She thought to herself and collected the little bits of nothing she owned. The one blunt knife and a little bit of food went into a folded cloth.
She looked around, nothing else.
Under the cover of darkness, she took off. None of the others sparing her a glance. She ran for what seemed like hours heading off into a nearby range of mountains. Once she was over there, she thought I'll be away from the perfect ones. It wouldn't be worth the effort for them to come and take me back. My child will be born free. It may only be a short life but it will be a free one!
The thought of freedom kept her going through the days and nights. For the first week she barely slept, an hour here and there. Constantly moving further up the mountain. The trees provided plenty of different fruit and once; she had accidentally killed a bird with her knife. She'd been asleep, and the bird had come up beside her looking for food. She was woken and become so startled at the sight that, without thinking, she'd plunged the blunt knife into it, over and over again. Once she'd realized what it was, she had paused. Reaching out, she'd ripped the feathers off the birds back and plunged her mouth into the meat. Bloody juices had dribbled down her face. She'd tasted nothing so good!
The months passed quickly once she had travelled over the initial mountain. On the other side lay a green valley with lots of places to hide. She continued on without pausing. One mountain was not far enough away for her. Another one lay in the distance. She would go over that one before even thinking of stopping.
And so she found herself in her small make-shift shack on a bed of tattered cloth, in labor and wishing it would end. When the pain subsided she smiled. Her child would be born free as she had promised herself. Nothing else mattered.
A new wave of pain washed over her. The baby was coming. Blood lay all around her on the floor. Her screams would have been heard by anyone for miles around. Another lull in the pain. She looked down. It's a boy. He's here. With the final bit of strength left to her, she grabbed the bit of cloth that she'd been harboring against this day and wrapped the boy in it. She brought him to her chest and hugged him.
She lay back her head and closed her eyes, never to open them again.
*~*
The child had been born completely aware of its surroundings. Not once uttering a single sound as his mother had taken her last breath. It would be the last thing that she would do for him. He knew who she had been and her full history but felt nothing. She was there to deliver him, nothing more. His small legs stiffened a little as he heard a noise from the front of the shack.
A lone jackal was working its way into the hovel, no doubt lured by the smell of the blood that lay all around him. He looked at it - You and your brothers, are all mine to rule. He sent out his awareness towards it; the jackal falling onto its haunches as it was assailed by the tiny creature, never standing a chance.
Within days the baby was being looked after by dozens of jackals. Each of them protecting and feeding him. His body transforming within weeks into a child. Within the space of a year, he was out hunting with the rest of the pack and holding his own. A grown man well over six feet in height with the ability to kill his prey with a simple thought.
*~*
It was into his second year of life that they had come across the hooded figure.
Out hunting one night, the pack had sent out a mental warning to the others. Danger. They had all but screamed. Not once since he had come into his full growth had the pack been even worried in any way. With a leader as powerful as him they felt invincible. Nothing could touch them. That the pack was warning about danger gave him pause for a moment. This animal would have to be very powerful to scare them like it had. He eased his way towards the place where the figure was, keen to get a better look at it before killing it.
From the cover of a large bush, he studied it.
Dressed in black with a hood covering its head. The same size as he was. Nothing remarkable about it at all, except for the dark swirling colors surrounding it. Most of his prey had only some lighter colors that would fade when he killed them. These colors, however, held power. There was no other word for it.
No options here.
His pack had been right in their assessment, this thing was dangerous. As a hunter, the child knew that hesitation never gave you the results you were after. He would strike now before his prey even knew he was there. The child sent out its most powerful blast. One that would destroy his prey.
The figure hunched closer to the fire that it had built before it as the full impact of the child’s blast hit it. He shrugged his shoulders and stretched out his hands towards the heat of the fire. "Not bad for someone with no training," the quiet voice said, "Let me show you how it should be done though." stretching one of its hands out towards where the child lay hidden and clicked its fingers.
The dark power that the child could see surrounding the figure blew outwards from the click in an ever-expanding circle. He covered his ears. Every single member of his pack had screamed out at the same time in yowls of pain. It had brought him to his knees. As quickly as it had come, it went silent. For the first time, the child could hear none of his pack. He sent out his thoughts around the surrounding area.
Nothing. A complete blank. His pack was gone. Still on his knees and reeling from the complete silence that he was not accustomed to, he had failed to notice that the figure now stood before him, reaching one of his hands down to lay upon the child’s head, “Now you truly are alone, jackal. My Jackal.” With that, the child found itself transported. Away from the only life he had ever known.
*~*
Time passed and the child now known as Jackal knew nothing but pain.
The master would appear unannounced at different times and would unleash pain upon him. In the beginning, the child had thought that the master was just having fun with him. Breaking him over and over again until he could no longer stand, at which point the master would just disappear and leave him in the darkness once more.
He had thought himself so powerful before the master had come. Now, he wished nothing else but for the misery and pain to come to an end. His mind as shattered as his body.
The Jackal’s mind went beyond the point of caring. The Master would tire of this game sooner or later and kill him. Better to go out on his own terms, however small they were. He knelt down, bowed his
head low and waited, feeling a little like the hunter that he had been before the Master had come. One way or another, the pain would end.
The Master appeared from nowhere once more, studying the inert form of Jackal. He narrowed his eyes.
Without so much as moving a muscle, the Jackal unleashed his power, identical to the first attack he had made upon the Master and hoping that this time, he was unprepared for it. The Master took half a step backwards as the Jackal’s blast hit. He caught himself and strode forward, a huge smile on his face, “Finally Jackal. The true learning can now begin!” And disappeared.
Everything fell into place in the Jackal’s mind then. The Master had been trying to teach him all this time. Pain accompanied failure. Do well and there was no pain! Next time the Master showed up, he would study how the power was weaved and throw it all back at the Master.
*~*
Years passed and his training continued. His Master’s lessons were never learned from a book or spoken aloud. Each lesson built upon a foundation of pain and struggle. The quicker each was figured out, the less the pain inflicted. The power that the Jackal now held within him was like comparing the power of a star against a candle. He laughed when he thought back to the start. He could have killed me without a second thought back then and I thought I’d been so powerful. Now he truly understood himself. I am an extension of the Master. His will is my own.
This is the reason for those lessons though, the Jackal thought to himself. Nothing can be done now that hasn't already been done. He had endured the endless days on the rocky, barren planet he was on. Digging small wells in the sand, topped off with a little bit of canvas provided enough liquids for his body to survive. The Master was thorough. His power had returned over the first few days. Survival was the point during those first hours. Regeneration came next.
And now, it's time to get back to work. This is one failure that the Master will never allow and the pain of the past would be nothing compared to what he will inflict on me if I fail.
Gathering the power back under his control again, he transported himself back to where he’d come from. The most logical place to pick up the trail of the failed one. This time, there won’t be any surprises.
*~*
Jonah’s notebook lay on the kitchen table in front of Ren. An untouched cup of tea sitting at her elbow. For the past two hours, she had sat engrossed by the short notes in the book. Snippets of a much larger story lay before her. Some of the notes actually tying up with the story that Hunter had told her in the coffee shop. Once more her thoughts wandered back to her daughter. Bonnie. What has any of this got to do with you my darling? She sighed once more, the tears no longer forthcoming. Dry, wretched sounds coming from her throat, she bent over and put her head on the table in front of her as the physical pain of her missing daughter once more washed over her.
Completely caught up in her own misery, Ren failed to realize the subtle shift in the temperature of the room.
Her eyes were still clamped shut as the mist materialized behind her in the living room. A dark red mist, that swirled around a robed figure, until the figure had become material. Her shoulders were heaving with silent tears as the Jackal strode across the living room, towards the open door of the kitchen.
She took a deep breath to steady herself, not realizing that the very act of her lifting her head had played right into the Jackal’s hands. She was lost in her mind with images of her daughter as the Jackal quickly leant forth and placed one hand under her chin and the other around the back of her head, jerking them apart.
The smile of her daughter’s memories still etched on her face, Ren fell sideways off her chair. Actions always leave a much better impression than words, his Master had taught him that. It will put the failed one off balance when he comes after me and an enemy that is off balance is easily toppled.
Deep, guttural laughter came out of his mouth as he vanished, leaving behind enough details for the failure to follow, where he would finish him off, once and for all.
*~*
Hunter looked around him at the contents of the small room that they had materialized in. Not much larger than his living room, decorated with a funny-looking rune on the floor. The infamous 5A; where he'd been caught in the trap last time.
He studied the rune closer, understanding how it worked. With nothing powering it up though it just sat there like a nice piece of art, albeit on the ground rather than hanging on a nice canvas on the wall. Easy to see how one would miss it, he thought there’s only a very subtle difference between a rune that is a portal and one that is a prison. You’d need to be looking out for it to notice.
Upon arriving, Michael had gone straight over to the writing desk. Scattered papers were strewn all over it. Even though this room is as private as you can get, you still felt the need to have an even deeper hiding hole, my old friend. What were you working on that made you that paranoid? And what was it that made you cast aside your vow of commitment to The Five and help me escape?
While Michael was busy rummaging through the notes left behind on Jonah’s desk, Hunter had been looking more at the runes on the floor, “There’s something not quite right about this Michael.”
Michael looked over at Hunter, surprised that he had seen the trap within the runes. “Yep. A subtle change in the way the runes are drawing power and they turn into a trap rather than a portal.”
“No. Not that. That was easy to see.” He paused, “there’s something... else. Something not quite right.” He looked over at Michael, “look into the middle of the rune and tell me what you see.”
Michael looked closer at the spot that Hunter had told him to. The middle rune was always made up of the sign for D’HarmaSan. This was no exception. “I don’t see what you mean, Hunter. That rune is the symbol for…”
“I know what it is Michael.” Hunter interrupted him. “Try to make your eyes unfocused while looking at it.”
Michael looked over at Hunter surprised by the interruption and even more confused about the fact that Hunter seemed to know all this stuff. He moved his eyes back towards the central rune and tried to un-focus his eyes whilst still being able to see it. Like a mirage in a desert, a smaller rune swam through his vision, circling the original. He took a step back, looking over at Hunter, confused.
“What you’re seeing there is an ancient rune Michael. Centuries old. Essentially, it’s a portal within a portal. I have no idea where your friend learned about it, regardless”, he reached out and took Michaels’ hand, “We follow the trail.”
Hunter’s voice floated into his consciousness as they floated through the nothing to get to their destination. “Your friend would not have had the power to generate that rune, Michael. I can only guess here but I think that the rune on the floor in that room was created long before he took up residence there. I can’t even imagine how he knew about it. Perhaps he came across something in one of those scrolls he was deciphering. Either way, it makes no difference. He seemed to think that there was something underneath the catacomb and I intend to find out what it is.”
Michael took it all in with no reply. He agreed with Hunter’s assessment of the ability of Jonah. Whilst without peer, his internal powers were lacking. He may have known about a hidden rune by reading about it. Nothing else fit. But if it was put there by someone else, who had done so and for what reason? They would only find out once they investigated. Nothing else for it I guess.
Michael prepared himself as they materialized in a much darker room, ready to throw up a shield around them both - unsure of what to expect. He lowered his hands realizing that Hunter had beaten him to the task. Michael looked over at Hunter with something akin to awe on his face. He was still without an aura that Michael could see and yet the control and sheer power under his command astounded him.
Yesterday he looked ready to lose his mind when he first saw me. Today, I'm actually a little bit scared of him. From what I've seen so far, he'd snuff me out like a candle if he wished.
> It was something that they would need to discuss once they had time to catch up.
*~*
The room they'd transported into was the same size as the one they had just left. That's where the similarities ended, however; with this room being covered in millions of individual runes, each one linked to the next. The power that was being put forth from the room was immense. A physical force. It felt good; it felt right.
Michael breathed deep, it felt cleansing. A cleansing that went deep into his soul. "I could easily live here forever." he murmured to himself.
Hunter looked over at Michael with a knowing smile. "That, would make sense." He ignored Michael's questioning look and moved over to place his hand on the runes on the wall. "Peaceful. Whoever created this place truly understood themselves. This," he added waving his hand around the room, "is but an extension of its creator."
"It just feels... right. There's no other words for it. Like I'm home." Michael said. One rune on the wall caught his eyes, he walked over and caressed it, tracing the outline "this is a copy of one of the runes I have tattooed on my shoulder, I just don't remember when or how..."
Michael’s eyes rolled back in his head and his body went limp.
Hunter caught him in his arms just as he was about to hit the floor and laid him down on his back. "It's time to come back to us now, Michael. No more hiding. We need you... Bonnie needs you."
Michael felt himself falling but never reached the ground. He felt like he was floating on the air itself. The room he was in was still the same with some minor differences. Hunter was no longer present with him and every rune drawn in the room was filled with power. He could feel it all. I’ve never seen this before and yet, it somehow all feels familiar. He forced himself upright and looked around him closer.