Strife

by M. T. Miller

  Torres leaned in, and so did Rush, taking her feet off the table.

  “Sh—Azarian?” he asked.

  “If he wasn’t already dead from the bullet wounds, what was done to his body made damn well sure of it,” Dick said, no longer in good spirits.

  “And you’ve killed every. Single. Policeman?” Rush interceded.

  “Why’s that so hard to believe?” Dick turned to her. “Closed spaces. A lot of us. A few of them. It took a while for most to realize it, but the guards weren’t going away without us paying in blood. And boy, did we ever pay…”

  “Did none of them surrender?”

  “Surrender?” Dick’s face contorted. “Sure, there was an attempted surrender. Right after they realized their battle was lost.” He almost spat on the table, but stopped himself at the last moment. “Those who helped us before that, we spared. They’re down in the dungeon now, awaiting judgment. They may have been crucial for victory, but it doesn’t erase what they’ve done.”

  “So you control the first floor too?” Torres asked.

  “No one controls a thing,” Dick said. “We’re a free people now. No more tyrants. No more douchebag up top bleeding anyone dry. You work, you eat. You work more, you eat more. Simple as pie.”

  Rush’s nostrils twitched. If Bones hadn’t worked himself and the guards you hate half to death, like shit you’d have been able to seize power like that.

  “So why are you here?” Torres asked grimly. “Are you asking us to surrender?”

  He does that, I’m rippin’ his head off!

  “Two reasons,” Dick said as he leaned in and let his elbows rest on the table, with obvious relief. “First off, we need stuff and you need stuff. Me and the boys downstairs, we see no reason why you and us can’t work together. Of course, there’ll be no more ‘luxury here, shit there.’”

  “No more tier system? How do you suppose the city will work with no one to run it?” Torres asked as he finally let go of his crutch.

  “Not eager to stop being governor, huh?” Dick asked.

  “Are you kidding me?” Torres scoffed. “This job’s been killing me. Literally. I’d be glad to step down. Question is…” He leaned in as close as he could. “If not me, then who else would organize all this shit here? I mean, what you’re saying sounds nice… until your little communist utopia starts to actually work. Then you’ll need someone to coordinate it, and all you’ll have will be semi-competents.”

  “You’re right,” Dick said without hesitation. His eyes flashed between everyone present. “We’ll need you, and you, and you, and everyone else. If someone ends up with more responsibility, well…” He smiled. “We’ll just have to give them more rewards.”

  “Good to know,” Torres said. “First off, we’ll need water. We still have reserves, but can’t bathe in that. You can imagine how unpleasant that gets.”

  “It’ll be done as soon as possible. We’ll get someone on that. You get someone on putting that power back on. Deal?”

  Torres nodded. “Deal.” There was an electrician somewhere on the floor. He’d likely be ecstatic to have something to do.

  “Now about the other thing,” Dick said, his gaze darkening. “We’ve had some riders return from the outside. They had no idea a revolution was in progress, so were easy to detain and question. The late sheriff had them scout out west, and what they’ve seen is all sorts of bad.”

  “Lemme guess,” Rush intruded. “The fanatics are back.”

  Dick nodded. “And in number. None of our riders were injured. In fact, they were called over for talks. One says he agreed.”

  “Anything new?” Torres asked.

  “They say the Army’s coming to accept our surrender,” Dick said.

  “That’s nothing new,” Rush said. “And lemme guess, you lot want to throw in the towel? Finish what ol’ Azarian started?”

  Dick didn’t seem amused by her remark. “That isn’t an option,” he growled, his teeth bared.

  Everyone’s eyes went wide, Torres’ most of all.

  “We’ve had enough,” Dick elaborated. “Enough tyrants. Enough gangs. Enough whatchacallits. This insanity ends here, and now.”

  As a whatchacallit, I’ll have you know I take offense.

  “Whoever or whatever it was that called himself Lord Nameless had the right idea. Freedom has to be won, and this victory must come at a cost. For far too long we’ve piggybacked on the backs of the strong. This battle, it has to be won by us!” He paused for a moment. “His war on crime might have worked, or it might have not. But fact is, he’s no more, and we’re on our own. And we’re done being slaves. If this Holy Army wants to make us worship their balls, they’re going to have to work hard for it.”

  “Are you sure of this?” Torres asked. The tone of his voice wasn’t cowardly, and Rush realized that he wasn’t trying to push surrender. Rather, he was testing the man’s stability.

  “We’ve had about all we can take,” Dick said. “You try spending weeks in pitch darkness with corrupt guardsmen leering at your women and belongings while a madman preaches complete drivel.”

  Torres’ forehead wrinkled. “We have a priest here? Of the True Church?”

  “No idea what he was, but he was among the first to go. I don’t think we’ll ever find all the pieces.” Dick shook his head. “No, there will be no surrender. I don’t care how many men are coming, and I can vouch for everyone below that neither do they. This Holy Army will either break on our walls, or we’ll all die. That’s the way it’s going to be, and that’s all there is to it.”

  Torres seemed lost in thought, so Rush chose to break the tension. She rose, stepped up to the man, and extended her pallid hand. Controlling the strength of her grip was never easy, but this time she did it better than usual. Dick only winced once.

  “Mr. Revolution, you’ve got yourself a deal!” she said, scanning Torres with the corner of her eye. He agreed with their decision; that was not in question. But he wasn’t thrilled about it.

  ***

  If the time the Nameless had spent in the training camp was in some way short on fanaticism, the march on Babylon most certainly made up for it. Ever since the Holy Army set out, its accompanying choirs (three of them, no less) began chanting in Latin. Singing excerpts from the Old Testament, the New, and the Answer, they only seemed to stop when it was time to sleep. They were either amazingly well-coordinated in resting and filling in for each other, or never stopped.

  Aside from urging them onward, the chant had another, far more subtle effect: it prevented the Knights from thinking of anything but their mission, and reminded them of their place in the Church’s order.

  “We are, all of us, left behind!” a cleric shouted as he paced between rows of seated men during lunchtime. “Some for their sins, others for their role in the upcoming events! Regardless, we must all work together, or face eternal damnation!”

  Kenneth never failed to react to this. Whenever a priest would spout his nonsense, Kenneth would immediately stop whatever he was doing, fall on his knees, and join in the spouting of gibberish. By day five of the march, most of the Nameless’ squad had joined him in this. Even Greg was on the verge, but a rebuking stare was usually enough to drill some semblance of reason back into his skull. For the time being, at least.

  “I just don’t get it, man,” Greg said one night, right before they turned in. Either the lights of the pyramid of Babylon were about to become visible in the far distance, or the men were beginning to see what they wanted to see.

  The Nameless entertained his question. “What do you mean?”

  “How you deal with all of this,” Greg waved his hand. “Madness left, madness right, madness near, and madness far. Enough to make anyone go daffy. Then an old man, apparently sent by God, puts a hand on your forehead, and all of a sudden, it makes sense.”

  Is he questioning my devotion?

  “I mean, it must all be happening for a reason, right?” Greg continued. “I lost my family so I�
��d learn I couldn’t do it all on my own. I joined the Skulls so I’d eventually become part of this, and put the fear of the Lord back into this godless country. The world is no longer mad. Everything I’ve done, am doing, and will do, makes sense again.

  “But you, Lem… doesn’t take a genius to see that you’re not too thrilled with being here. Sure, you’ll do what you’re told—and if ordered to, you’ll jump under a hail of bullets—but you’re no holy warrior. You don’t even want to be one. You’re still just a soldier, and don’t seem to want to change that.”

  “And what if I am?” the Nameless asked. “Are you going to report me?”

  “Course not.” The bitterness in Greg’s voice showed that he took offense. “I have my own crises of faith from time to time, you know, and I bet everyone else here gets ‘em as well. But those pass, and I always get back on track to sanity. If I didn’t, I don’t know what I’d do. But that, Sarge, brings me to my point.

  “If you can’t reassure yourself the way the rest of us can, then what keeps you from going stark raving nuts?”

  “Maybe nothing does,” the Nameless said, unsure of how to refute the accusation. “Perhaps I went insane a long while ago. Have you ever thought of that?”

  The coldness in the Nameless’ voice gave Greg pause. It took a couple of seconds for him to decide what to say next. “You’re a strong man. Stronger than I’d ever want to be.”

  The Nameless didn’t reply. He remained silent until the camp went to sleep. He was silent throughout the night as well, despite being awake most of the time. In trying to find a way out of his predicament, he’d all but tied his brain in a pretzel. Still, no answer came, and the day of arrival was nearing.

  On the dawn of the eleventh day, the Holy Army reached the pyramid. The infighting had made it less flashy, as the glass cleaners presumably didn’t do their jobs anymore, but the structure didn’t fail to impress.

  An officer close to the Nameless pulled out a pair of binoculars and surveyed the city. Several others did the same, while Malachi crossed his arms and waited for their reports.

  “Not good, First Skull,” an officer said as he offered his set to Malachi, who promptly refused.

  “Let me guess,” he said with bitter glee. “They don’t want to surrender?”

  “Seems that way,” another officer said, lowering his own binoculars. “I doubt a welcoming note would be filled with so many insults and blasphemy.”

  Under his hood, the Nameless smiled. The city might get slaughtered, but at least it showed some spine. In a way, he was proud.

  “Should we proceed with Plan B?” the first officer asked. “Or should we give them a chance to explain themselves?”

  “They’ve had plenty of chances,” Malachi said, “and they blew them all. Siege engines; start building right this instant! I want to see this pagan eyesore stripped bare. That’ll give ‘em something to think about.”

  Over the course of the following days, the Nameless and his unit didn’t see much work. Owing to their status of the elite guard, their task was to oversee the perimeter and report their findings to Malachi. The Nameless did not enjoy speaking to him, so he had Greg do it instead.

  There wasn’t an abundance of trees around the city, but what there was were big and strong. Paired with the iron and moving parts the engineers had brought from the Underbelly, it didn’t take long for catapults and battering rams to start springing up around the siege camp. Inevitably, the time for action was getting near.

  What to do? the Nameless asked himself over and over again as the catapults were being wound up. Unable to act in any manner, he was a prisoner in all but name. Worst of all, he had to watch.

  The first barrage went about as well as it could for the city. Five rocks, all aimed without an apparent mark, hit and destroyed a solar panel or two. From afar, it didn’t look any different than pebbles falling down the side of a mountain. Inside, it had to have been a rumbling hell.

  “Attention all heathens, pagans, and devil-worshippers!” Malachi shouted through a bullhorn. “Here’s how we’re gonna do this: you either open your gates wide and surrender to our holy judgment, or we go in and judge you ourselves. You’re gonna like neither, but I recommend the former!”

  He does not want a peaceful takeover. This was apparent. In delivering such a speech, Malachi must have hoped to provoke Babylon’s people into further defiance. It would give him an excuse for the bloodshed that would follow.

  A woman’s voice came from another bullhorn high above. “How ‘bout you take that shit, dip it in some sugar, and gobble it the fuck up?”

  Already beating quickly, the Nameless’ heart reached top speed. Rush was not only alive, but spoke for the city!

  Torres’ voice came next, roughly from the same place of origin. “Whatever arrangement you had with the previous sheriff, it died with him. Babylon will not surrender, no matter how many rocks you throw our way!”

  Malachi didn’t talk back. Instead, he lowered his horn and barked orders to his officers. “Get the battering rams moving. I want that gate in pieces, and I want it done a year ago.”

  Men and women shouted as the contraptions began their crawl toward the pyramid. The operators took their positions, protected from all sides by squads of shield-bearers. They’d come halfway up to the gate when the city began to shower them with bullets.

  Reinforced with Kevlar, the shields withstood gunfire for a decent amount of time, and it almost seemed as if they would reach their destination. The wave of explosions that engulfed them proved that it was not to be. Their formation as broken as their battering rams, the survivors tried running back to the camp, only to be gunned down mercilessly. The attempted breakthrough ended with zero effectiveness, and a 100% mortality rate.

  “Thank you, come again!” Rush shouted before communication once more went silent.

  Seemingly untouched by the loss of men and resources, Malachi turned to the nearest officer. “Keep firing. I want that place naked before the Lord.”

  The barrage resumed shortly, and didn’t stop until well into the night. Unable to rest, the Nameless sat in front of his tent and stared into the freshly-opened cuts in his city. It might take a thousand, but eventually it would die.

  I have to do something, he concluded as he rose. What that would be, he didn’t know.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The Nameless looked around the camp, then back to the damaged pyramid. He would most certainly not get in through the front door. The ventilation shafts might work. Given the place’s size, the shafts were likely to be wide enough to pass through. Better yet, they likely led everywhere. If he could get high enough and break his way in, he would reach the slums before long.

  But before that, a plan. A grappling hook would be a necessity, and he already had access to it. One was stashed inside the tent, alongside the rest of their shared gear. Each small group was issued with one in case of a full-on siege. He would have to sneak it out, of course, but that was the least of his problems.

  He turned to the catapults. The number of guards there was minimal; a pair, it seemed. Those machines had to go. Luckily, they were in the engineering part of the camp. Something heavy, say a sledge, was bound to be there. But that will alert the camp, and I will already have enough trouble in reaching the city.

  He squinted, making out a lone, mounted figure at the far side of the catapult deployment zone. Several of those likely lay spread all over the camp to provide better response in case Babylon mounted a counter-offensive.

  No problem. The Nameless turned toward his tent in preparation for stealing the hook, a rope, and his weapons. The sight of Greg’s scarred mug sticking out from the entrance killed all hope of that going smoothly.

  “What’s going on?” Greg asked, well aware that something was up.

  I reckon it had to come to this. With a flick of his wrist the Nameless pulled out his utility knife, getting low to avoid being seen by any potential security. His hand flying faster tha
n the eye can see, the blade ran across Greg’s neck, seemingly producing no results. The horrendous gash that opened at that spot a moment later, however, proved that was not the case.

  His eyes jutting out in horror and the shock of betrayal, Greg pressed one hand over his profusely bleeding wound. With the other, he reached for the Nameless. The blade flashed once more, taking four of the man’s fingers. In desperation, Greg tried to scream, but what was left of his throat sounded more like the croak of a giant frog than anything resembling speech.

  In his last act before he died, he tried to rise in hope of being seen. The Nameless expected this, grabbing him from the front and tossing him face-first into the ground. The body twitched several times and then stopped, the last remnants of life flowing into a puddle around it.

  Goodbye, Greg. You were not a complete waste of a human being, but there are those I value above you. And they need me.

  The Nameless prepared for the next step. Kenneth was either asleep or in the process of waking up. Regardless, he was a huge risk. Leaving him alive was not an option.

  The Nameless snuck into the tent, knife in hand. He immediately pounced on the still-sleeping Kenneth, pressing a hand over his mouth as he slit his throat. Thankfully the tent was dark, and the Nameless was spared having to see his expression in full. Kenneth struggled, but all that achieved in the end was to help him bleed out faster.

  The Nameless closed his eyes in an attempt to savor the kill. The spoils of this sacrifice to himself were almost tangible, but still just outside of his reach. As if to mock him, this cloud of magic hovered in the air around him like food over Tantalus.

  The curse-bag. Now or never! The Nameless peeked out of the tent, checking if anyone had seen Greg’s body. Having made certain that the coast was clear, he grabbed it by the legs and dragged it in.

  He felt around his belly, rolling the bloody tabard to the side. The bag wasn’t difficult to find: it was hard, out of place, and so, so cold. Getting it out would be a horror, but it was an absolute necessity. He breathed in deep. The sooner I get it done with, the sooner the pain will pass.