[Demonworld #6] The Love of Tyrants

by Kyle B. Stiff

  At once the Reavers froze. Then they slowly knelt in the snow and bowed before him. The vision faded, and Wodan found himself in the blue chamber where the Scry orb was housed.

  “I’m… very proud of you,” said Setsassanar.

  Wodan exhaled, overcome with emotion. He laughed with relief. “What, no riddles? No ‘yes and no’? No exhaustive theorizing?”

  Setsassanar smiled and shook his head. “You’re so hardheaded, but I… I feel as if I haven’t completely wasted my time with you. It’s quite a feeling, young Apprentice. Now, come. I need to show you something.”

  Setsassanar turned and approached the far wall, then stopped and stared at it.

  “What is it?” said Wodan.

  “The big picture. Scry, play the prepared recording.”

  The wall glimmered, then Wodan saw an image come to life on its surface. Wodan saw the entire continent captured by the Scry orbital network. Most of the land was pale brown, the arid wasteland broken by a few green shades of wild oasis and farmland. Borders were superimposed on the picture. A chronometer in the corner of the screen rewound itself; Wodan saw the massively bloated body of San Ktari shrink, saw other nations blossom around it. It looked as if the warmongering empire was creating nations rather than destroying and consuming them.

  “You see the dark cloud?” said Setsassanar. “That represents the army of the demons.”

  The chronometer moved forward and Wodan saw the dark cloud sweep over the lands of Hargis, consuming one town after another. The dark cloud paused for a moment, regrouped, then moved on to the city-state of Greeley.

  “Now watch,” said Setsassanar. “See what survived of Hargis.”

  He saw scattered images of filthy men and women crouching around campfires. A few tried to coordinate hunting parties now that the farms were gone. He saw different hunting parties encountering one another in the foothills, saw them blaming one another for the destruction of Hargis, saw them fighting one another. The people became skeletal, with the tattered remains of civilized clothing hanging off them. They gathered in the darkness of caves, seeking sanctuary and telling one another cautionary tales about what happens to those who erect walls and plow fields and fashion guns. They spoke about how it all comes crashing down, and how it was best to hide from the sun, from the world, from everything, and live like hunted animals. Finally he saw rival tribes gathering together and bartering women between them as if they were cattle, now sacrificial peace-offerings rather than human beings.

  “This is the aftermath left in the wake of the demon army,” said Setsassanar. “And it’s happening over and over again, all over the world. The survivors abandon hope. For them, there is no tomorrow.”

  Wodan saw the black cloud travel in the lands far south of the Black Valley and north of the range of mountains that held Srila. More cities disappeared. The black cloud approached a few cities within a border labeled Land of Baga-Panyar.

  “Watch this carefully,” said Setsassanar. “Now we come to the point of all this.”

  Wodan found himself looking at the crowded streets of a poor but brightly-decorated city. A black cloud suddenly swept over the city walls.

  “Wait,” said Wodan. “What’s that black cloud? It looks like the thing that represented the demons on the map.”

  “It’s them. But I didn’t want you to see the demons. I wanted you to see the people.”

  “Why not just show me the recording as it happened? I’ve seen flesh demons before. I can handle it.”

  Setsassanar exhaled loudly. “They’re a distraction, Apprentice. They shriek and wail and run about, and each one looks so different that the mind balks at their existence. But really, they are the stupidest thing imaginable. They are raging, retarded monstrosities, and I don’t want you to miss the form by looking at shadows. Now watch, will you?”

  He watched the city under attack.

  Caught off guard, the men and women fought a desperate battle, but they were overwhelmed by darkness. The eye of Scry focused on two men, brothers, laborers in simple attire. They were dark-skinned like the rest of their people, with dark hair and slanted hazel or green eyes. The brothers fought with antique-looking rifles until they ran out of bullets or the weapons fell apart, then they ran.

  With only a handful of supplies, the brothers set out across the scorching wasteland. The next city of Baga-Panyar was over sixty miles distant, a journey to be made in at least two nights, on horse or camel and with full supplies. But the brothers escaped from their doomed city in the morning; burning in the midday sun, they ran on foot through the baking hot, life-sucking sand.

  Wodan watched in horror as hours turned to days and the brothers only sipped from their canteens during short rests. Otherwise, they ran. With dogged determination they carried on, afraid but unwilling to let the rest of their people be taken off guard by the demons.

  The younger brother collapsed. The older brother knelt, gasping, and Wodan thought that he, too, would pass out. By some miracle of willpower the older brother picked up the younger, held him over his shoulders like a corpse, then continued to run. Over a day passed in this way.

  Then, a few miles from the capital city of their nation, the older brother collapsed. They did not know how close they were.

  “Come on,” Wodan whispered. “Come on... get up...”

  After a few deathly minutes, the younger brother rose, picked up the older, then continued the journey.

  Wodan saw the two brothers in the throne room of the prince of Baga-Panyar. They were surrounded by richly dressed courtiers and riflemen dressed in pastel uniforms covered in jeweled armor. The prince was dressed in silk, his fingers were full of rings, and he had a smooth, youthful face framed by an imperious goatee. He listened to the story of the two brothers. They were exhausted, but as one faltered, the other picked up the tale. The prince questioned them for a long time, his voice sharp and cruel. When the tale was finished both brothers were taken away and the prince closed his eyes in thought.

  Sadness swept over Wodan. He had seen enough of men in power to know where the tale would go. The prince would not listen, he would hate the brothers for bringing him inconvenient information, then he would have them imprisoned while he quietly made a safe haven for himself.

  But the prince stood and began barking commands at his guards. Wodan saw the city’s entire populace moving. He saw long antique rifles and swords distributed, then saw rickety trucks, horses, and camels loaded down with gear and sent in a long line into the mountains.

  “The entire population was mobilized,” said Setsassanar, “and they moved into the mountains. They had already extensively mined the mountains for jewels, so they made the network of tunnels their home. Droughts regularly plagued their land, so they already had several years’ supply of grain stored, and could survive for a long time underground. But… how the prince had the strength to declare martial law and throw away his old realm for a new one, I don’t know. Perhaps he had already heard rumors of the demons. Perhaps he had met with a demonic diplomat, like Abel whom Globulus met. Perhaps he was simply young and headstrong. I don’t know. Scry cannot record every single event that happens in the world, so the prince’s reasons will have to remain his own.

  “But when the demons came to Baga-Panyar, they found her cities emptied. And when the demons searched the mines, Baga-Panyar fought back.”

  Wodan saw scattered images of riflemen attacking from one cavern entrance, fleeing, attacking from another angle, then fleeing once more. He saw demons drawn into tunnels that were blown up. He saw the two brothers, now in fine armor, fighting alongside the prince’s royal guards, shooting and stabbing in the tunnels where the demons came at them single-file. But sometimes the perspective was strange, and Wodan could not always see what was going on.

  “Why can’t we see better?” said Wodan. “What’s wrong with Scry?”

  “It’s the stone tunnels,” Setsassanar replied. “Scry is a truly miraculous network that uses electroma
gnetic resonance to turn the very air into a lens. But, like any cheap camera, it cannot see around corners. It can correct its final image by relying on multiple cameras for purposes of perspective, and it can even see through many kinds of flimsy, man-made material, but it has limits. Seeing down into the earth is one of those limits.”

  They watched the men fight, slipping in blood, blocking up tunnels with the dead before retreating again and again.

  “The demons can be fought,” said Setsassanar. “Though vastly outnumbered, the people of Baga-Panyar mired the demons in a guerilla war for four long years.”

  The fighting slowed. Finally the dark cloud probed at the remaining tunnels until it seemed satisfied, then it regrouped, then it scattered and disappeared into several crevices in the earth.

  “The demon army was reduced,” said Setsassanar. “It took them another year to regroup. Watch as the black cloud returns and grows, forming an army ten times as large. They don’t want a repeat of what happened in Baga-Panyar. Watch as the cloud moves on... moving beneath Ktari, then swinging northwards on its southeastern border. They avoid San Ktari, of course. Both of them are crushing every civilization between them.”

  “And the other demon army?” said Wodan. “Weren’t there two?”

  “On the far side of the world. They’ve finished their work.”

  “No!” said Wodan. “So there were people there? But now they’re-”

  “Yes. The civilizations there were not as advanced as the ones here, unfortunately. The demon army did its work there, regrouped, then entered into a tunnel and disappeared from view.”

  “Where will they go?” said Wodan. “To join up with the other army, you think?”

  “Based on what the little demon in the cave told you, I think that they will head straight for the Black Valley. They are smaller than the first army. The first army is better suited for overwhelming large cities and covering open terrain with weight of numbers. The second, smaller army could easily use the Valley’s forests for cover as they attack one small town after another.”

  Before darkness could overcome Wodan, Setsassanar touched his shoulder and pulled him away from the recording. “We cannot waste the precious time that Baga-Panyar has bought us,” said Setsassanar. “We cannot let their sacrifice be in vain. Soon, Wodan… soon you will undergo your final test, and become a Master yourself. And then, perhaps...”

  “Perhaps what?”

  Setsassanar smiled with unusual shyness. “Scry,” he said, “show the Apprentice what we could do together.”

  The chamber was filled with a fabricated hologram. He saw himself and Setsassanar dressed in black uniforms, working in the hub of some kind of command center. They were surrounded by humans in similar uniforms, and Wodan even saw a few enhanced superbeings like themselves. The two Masters directed soldiers at communication terminals who directed hordes of robot warriors. He saw battlefields filled with hulking beasts of black steel armed with Gatling guns spouting death at demonic enemies. Great machine platforms hovered overhead, full of antenna arrays on top and laser cannons underneath that drilled holes into demonic caverns so that the giant robotic slayers could invade and conquer.

  “Gods above,” Wodan whispered. “Could… could such a thing really be possible? Could we really do something like that?”

  Setsassanar smiled and nodded.

  “But what about Langley?” said Wodan. “Where would she fit into something like this? Would she…”

  “You care so much?” said Setsassanar, seemingly surprised.

  “Of course, Master.”

  “Well.” Setsassanar turned and walked away. “You did well in the simulation. Take the rest of the day off. You’ve earned it.”

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chimera

  It is the Will that makes us one.

  All other qualities being mere Shadow, such as bodily form, intellect, personality and memory, Will is the brute hunger that lies at the core of our Form. All men hunger, all men dream of safety, all men want to convert the Other into Self. Meditation in practice is the will to overcome Will, to quiet the force that births war and anguish. All men struggle in the same prison as yourself. Know that you are not alone: Solitude is illusion.

  It is the Will that makes us one.

  - from On the Symptoms of Original Sin,

  a theological tract written by Nobody

  and edited by the High Priest Globulus

  ***

  Wodan woke in the middle of the night. He knew that his training was coming to an end. A terrible weight sat on his chest because he knew that he was running out of time to set things right, but the only viable solution he had come up with was utterly foolish. It required that he risk his life for a toppling line of dominoes made of assumptions and theories. If any one theory was wrong, then he would have risked his life for nothing.

  He sighed and forced himself out of bed. We live and die as best we can, he told himself as he dressed in his new all-purpose gear. There are never any guarantees, even if it seems there are. I have to try. He slipped on his new boots that his Master had made for him, then made his way through the moonlit, night-cooled hallways of the Tower.

  Wodan entered the blue Scry terminal room.

  “Robot Number Two,” said Wodan, glancing upward.

  “Slave Circuit is here, young master-in-training.”

  “Can you show me the current location of the lion Y’diamach?”

  A holographic map flashed to life over the shining orb. Wodan saw a blinking red dot in the foothills of dead Hargis, northwest of Srila.

  “Would you like a closer view?” said the feminine voice.

  “Don’t bother.” He was disturbed. It was good that the beast had moved on from Srila and would not bother his people there, but the only thing that could have brought Y’diamach to Hargis was the thirst for human flesh. It was foolish to think that the demons had killed everyone there. He had no doubt that a few survivors still lingered in the ruins, hiding in basements or caves. After facing demons and dogmen, now they had to contend with a raging god.

  What an awful, senseless thing, he thought.

  He forced himself to consider his plan.

  Just how large is Setsassanar’s conscious awareness? Is it possible for me to consult this facet of him, this Robot Number Two, without him consciously monitoring the interaction?

  Will he try to stop me from leaving?

  Wodan stared into the unblinking eye of the glowing Scry orb. There’s no guarantee that he will let me leave the Tower once I complete the final test. There’s no guarantee I’ll even survive the final test. If I’m going to do something, I have to do it now.

  “Slave Circuit, can you make a device that will allow me to track the lion?”

  “How so?” said the voice. Wodan sensed hesitation.

  “You can track the lion using the Scry network. I need a small device that links to you and displays his position for me.”

  A pause. “I can do that.”

  “And a backpack of food and water.”

  Wodan heard something hum within the walls. He paced back and forth and adjusted Capricornus at his back. The room fell silent, then a panel opened. He found a loaded backpack and, beside it, a small, round device that displayed a simple map of the ruins of Hargis. A red dot sat in the middle.

  “Thank you, Slave Circuit,” said Wodan, slinging the pack onto his back. “That will be all.”

  Nothing stirred in the Tower as Wodan descended. He found a window only a few hundred feet from the ground, scaled partway down using Capricornus, then dropped onto the field. Only a few sentries stood on lookout in the camp. Wodan glided past them, quick and silent. He found the Gul-in Kami conveniently fueled, and took off before anyone could question him.

  ***

  Late the next day Wodan landed in the deadlands of Hargis. Hot air raked against his face as he stepped from the plane. The sky was dull white with a sharp haze of orange on the horizon. A line of blue foo
thills stood in the distance, and at their feet sat a cluster of gray shadows, structures drowning in a slow tide of sand. He rubbed his eyes to wake himself, sipped from his canteen, then left the Gul-in Kami with only his sword at his back.

  Wodan drew near the ruins. He saw hollowed out remains of stone buildings, a broken wall, a dust-choked tower that might have once been part of a church. Dead fingers of wood poked from the ground. Then his senses sharpened with alarming suddenness. He did not need the tracking device to tell him that death waited nearby. He clambered up onto stone, an island in a sea of grit, and saw how far the desolation stretched. It was empty of life – but still his instinct screamed in warming.

  Like a flash of thunder the attack came, and his body moved without conscious thought. He dived and rolled across the stone, catching a glimpse of a shining golden body and a feathered mane that seemingly came from nowhere. Rising to his feet he leaped from the stone and dashed across the face of a hill, so far beyond mere terror that he felt only movement. He saw a dry, narrow, man-made ditch and leaped inside. As he ran he felt the impact of the beast’s weight landing first on one side, then the other. Stones and dust kicked up as claws blasted the narrow channel. The ditch went under an empty ruin and he slid under the dark opening. He rose and crawled backwards just as a heavy claw hooked onto the opening and jerked stones out by outrageous force. Over and again the claws lashed out at the opening, sending a shower of sparks into the darkness. He saw a slender tendril of daylight overhead and leaped dozens of feet into the air just as the narrow crawlspace erupted with intense heat. The smell of acrid, scorched stone caught in his nose as he flew through the air. He saw the massive lion down below. Their eyes locked as he hung in the sky, Y’diamach’s face a mask of unrelenting hatred.

  He fell on a stone wall, tumbled about awkwardly, then clung to a crevice and pushed himself off. He jerked his body about, landed on a rooftop, then leaped and fell in a sand-choked alley. He felt the stones of the necropolis vibrate as the giant followed him. He felt rather than heard an oncoming attack, and leaped through a window just as claws of steel blasted the opening. He leaped out on the other side of the building and found himself running nearly horizontally downhill.