The Last Protector

by Daniel C. Starr

  He couldn't, of course. For one thing, the weather was miserable. He longed for last night's camp, up in the dry, warm breeze atop the crater rim. Down here on the island, it was cold, damp and foggy. The moon, very close to full, was little more than a diffuse white splotch in the fog, and he tried without success to make out the silhouettes of the dragons he knew were somewhere overhead. After a while it felt like the world had shrunken to little more than the pool of light around the fire, surrounded by endless gray fog. It reminded him of the dank nights in his home land, where the men would huddle around the fire, fearing what might be in the darkness.

  Sometime later—it was impossible to say just when, as time itself seemed to stop in the fog—lightning flashed in the murk, and the rumble of thunder filled the crater. A breeze blew up from nowhere, lifting the fog so that it now looked like the underside of a cloud layer spinning slowly around the island. He stared into the clouds, enchanted by the show as the lightning became more intense, with brilliant bolts and pale, flickering sheets in shades of yellow, orange and purple. The winds picked up further, roiling and churning the underside of the clouds.

  The nearly continuous rumble of thunder awakened Jape just in time for the rain to start, a few sprinkles that within seconds became a downpour. He and Nalia grabbed what gear they could and took shelter beneath the security shack's overhanging roof. Scrornuck struggled to his knees, collapsed with a grunt, and decided he didn't feel like trying to run. He lay back on his makeshift bed and let the cold rain wash over him. Perhaps it would remove a little more of the day's filth.

  The downpour lasted only a few minutes. Then the rain stopped and the clouds lifted, revealing a beautiful, star-filled sky with a gorgeous ring around the moon. Jape and Nalia returned to the fire, while Scrornuck dug the dirty towel from the day-pack and dried himself.

  "What the hell was that?" Jape said as he shook the water from his cushion.

  "You slept through most of it.” Scrornuck described the spinning-clouds-and-lightning show.

  "Back home, it rains late on Monday and Thursday nights,” Nalia said. “It helps keep the streets clean."

  "Hmm.” Jape thought for the better part of a minute before proposing an explanation: “I'll bet they're resurfacing the ice. They warm things up, create a short rain, and voilà! there's a smooth new surface for tomorrow's skaters."

  "Clever.” Scrornuck shifted on his cushion, searching for a position that hurt a little less. “Ow,” he muttered, not finding one. “This sucks."

  "Nonsense, Mister Saughblade—this is high adventure. Isn't that what you wished for when you left your little village?"

  "You know something?” Scrornuck hauled himself to a half-seated position. “Adventures suck."

  Jape nodded. “Tell me about it. When I was a kid, I thought my life was so dull, and I wished I could have great adventures and save the world. Now that I've spent years having adventures and saving worlds, I'd give anything for a quiet night at home with my family.” He sighed a long, weary sigh. “You're right. Adventures suck."

  "Hah!” Nalia stirred the fire, sending sparks spiraling upward. “You've been having adventures so long that you've forgotten just how dull everyday life is. It won't be long before you're done here, and I'll be back to my everyday life, waiting on tables in some bar and wishing I had a chance to have big adventures and save the world."

  Scrornuck found himself smiling, just a little. “Yeah, I'll heal, and then there'll just be stories of a grand battle."

  "Not for me,” Jape said flatly. “When I started in this business, that was the way I felt. But now it's just a job to be done, and the sooner it's over, the better.” He pulled the hood of his cape up over his head and rolled over.

  Scrornuck and Nalia stared at Jape, then at each other. “Well,” she said with a shrug, “I still think adventures are a good thing. We don't have enough of them here."

  "I don't think he really meant what he said."

  "I know he didn't."

  "You read his mind?"

  "I'm trying not to, but he leaks. I'm picking up thoughts all the time."

  "So you finally admit you've got the talent,” Jape mumbled, rolling back over to join the conversation.

  "Yeah,” she said, “I guess I don't have to pretend to believe any more."

  "I think you were doing more than reading minds in the security office,” he said. “You had those soldiers hypnotized."

  She nodded. “I was trying to mislead them, and keep them from looking at you."

  "I wish you'd done that on the tower,” Scrornuck said, wincing as he shifted position.

  "I tried,” she said, “but it didn't work.” She sighed. “That's the trouble with this talent—when it works, it's scary, and when it doesn't work, it's just frustrating."

  "You're still a beginner,” Jape said. “You'll get better with practice.” He rolled over, and in seconds was snoring loudly.

  Nalia leaned over Scrornuck and looked deep into his eyes. “I still can't read your mind, though."

  "If Jape's right, nobody can,” he said. “Anyway, there's nothing much there to read. I'm too tired to think."

  "Then I should give you something to think about.” She wrapped her arms around him and planted a kiss that made him forget all about his aches and pains. And he found that he could indeed think, his thoughts were about her, and they were very pleasant thoughts indeed.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Chapter Nineteen

  "What If I'm Not the Good Guy?"

  "Amen.” Kneeling on the floor of the security shack as the first rays of sun came through the door, Scrornuck finished his prayers for the soldiers he'd dispatched. The stench didn't bother him, nor did the buzzing of the flies—he'd shoveled out stables, and this wasn't much worse. What did bother him was the realization that he couldn't stand up. When he tried, something tore in his thigh and fresh blood trickled past the tape holding his wounds closed. There was nothing nearby to hold onto, and it was beginning to look like he'd have to crawl out, over and perhaps through the remains of the Captain's soldiers. With a long sigh, he slipped the prayer book into his sporran and started crawling toward the door.

  "Scrornuck?” Nalia stood in the doorway, holding her nose. “What the hell are you doing?” she demanded, sticking her head out the door for a breath of fresh air. “This place stinks to high heaven!"

  "I came in here to say a few prayers.” He again tried and failed to get to his feet. “I think I'm stuck."

  Despite the stench, she grinned. “So you need to be rescued, my major hunk?” He nodded sheepishly. She ducked out the door for one more breath of air, and then hurried inside to help him get to his feet and out of the building—far out of the building. She looked at his taped and bloody legs. “How bad are they?"

  "Not too bad,” he insisted. “I think I'll be okay as long as I don't fall again.” Moving slowly and a little unsteadily, sometimes hanging onto Nalia's arm for support, he walked with her down the stony beach.

  "You were praying?” she asked. “For what?"

  "Forgiveness for those dead guys. I don't want them to be condemned for what they tried to do to us yesterday."

  "Why not? They were trying to kill you!"

  "And I was trying to kill them.” He scratched his chin, trying to work a bit of something out of his beard. “I succeeded. I think I could use a little forgiving myself.” They reached the shore of the lake, and with her help he sat on a boulder. “Somebody once told me that when you set out to slay dragons, it's important not to become one yourself."

  She made a small show of examining his face and arms. “I don't see any horns or scales,” she said. “I think you're safe."

  He smiled, but his mood remained serious. “You know what I mean. I got so mad at the Captain yesterday that I started thinking like her. I almost got myself killed, almost got you captured, blew our chance to get to Draggott, and in the end fifty people died."

  "Well, they were the ba
d guys,” she said. “She was trying to skin you alive!” She pulled back the collar of the dragon-sex-position T-shirt, exposing the ragged wound where the Captain had tried to remove Scrornuck's tattoo. “Remember?"

  He gently removed her hand and stared across the frozen lake, where the morning sun brought the cliffs into sharp relief. “That doesn't give me the right to act like her,” he said. “I'm a Protector, not a murderer.” He closed his eyes and saw an archer he'd killed, screaming and spinning and falling to his death with an arrow sticking from his eye-socket. “Those guys didn't deserve to die like that. They were just working stiffs, making do on a Guard's pay, when the Captain offered them a few gold pieces for a bit of moonlighting. She probably made it sound like an easy job, for the good of the city, and those gold pieces could buy some better furniture, or maybe a weekend in the Guest Quarter. And then—” He pulled Ol’ Red from his belt and the blade leaped out, wickedly curved, humming hungrily. “Then they run into this.” He stared into the glassy blade, watching the subtle patterns of light dance as the energy fields shifted.

  "Jape killed a lot of them, with that dragon-thing of his,” she protested. “It didn't seem to bother him at all."

  Scrornuck let the blade disappear. “Jape sees the big picture. He's got those rings and he can understand stream crossings and big numbers. I just know that yesterday we killed a bunch of guys who were only trying to make a buck.” He turned the sword over and examined it from different angles. “You see why I need to be forgiven? What if I've become like the Captain? What if I'm not the good guy?"

  "What?” She stared in disbelief. “Of course you're the good guy!"

  "Am I?” He blinked as something made his eye water. “If I'm saving the world, why am I always killing people?” He spoke less to Nalia than to somebody he couldn't see, somebody far more important. “At least thirty since we arrived here. Three hundred and sixty since I started. I can see every single one of them, and I keep asking myself, did I really have to kill this one?" A tear rolled down his cheek, making a hard right turn at a small scar, the souvenir of an earlier battle. “How many more in this world? How many more worlds after this one? How many more do I have to kill?"

  A few more tears fell from his eyes. “I tell myself there must be a better way. I resolve with all my heart to find it—and the next thing I know I'm surrounded by bodies.” His voice fell to a whisper. “Some day, somehow, I'm going to slip, or drop my sword, and it will be over. That's how it's going to end; that's the only way it can.” He lost the battle to hold back the tears. “Forgive me, please forgive me! Oh, Lord, I am so tired of killing!” He buried his face in his hands and wept, shuddered and howled like a wounded animal, as a three-year parade of slaughter passed before his tightly closed eyes. Was any of it justified?

  In time he stopped shaking, began to breathe more slowly and steadily, wiped his eyes, and in a voice far too old and weary to be coming from that skinny young face he said, “Well, let's get going. There's a world to save.” The words seemed like a mantra, or perhaps a prayer. There's a world to save. He stood unsteadily and gazed at the frozen lake. It was still a brilliant blue-white, the cliffs of the crater still stood majestically in the distance, and the sun still shone down from a perfect blue sky. There's a world to save. A good world, a beautiful world, a world well worth saving. He blinked at the sight, as if waking from a bad dream, and smiled. There's a world to save. “Come on,” he said, taking her hand and feeling like he wanted to run. “Let's wake up Jape!” He sniffled loudly. “I hope he's got a handkerchief."

  * * * *

  "I heard you singing,” Jape said as Scrornuck and Nalia returned. “At least, I think you were singing. Or else some animal was in great pain."

  "Singing's as good a word as any, I suppose.” Scrornuck sniffed a slice of cooked wolf-meat he found on the flat-topped stone they'd used as their dinner table. It still smelled okay, so he skewered several pieces on his sword and started warming them up over the remains of the campfire.

  Jape spread out the softscroll. “Well, let's see what's new. This is good: they've begun to decode the McGinn files."

  "Anything important?” Scrornuck took a slice from his shish-kabob and handed another to Nalia.

  Jape scanned the report. “Hmm—seems the guy worked under two names. They found the employment record for a guy named ‘B.P. McGinn,’ and suspect his full name was Brian Paul. There's a whole bunch of stuff under the name ‘Brian McGinn,’ then a couple years’ worth of silence, then ‘Paul McGinn’ turns up. I wonder if he got into trouble and started going by his middle name."

  "You guys have too many names,” Nalia said.

  "Sometimes we need all the names we can get.” Jape scrolled to the next page and raised his eyebrows. “O-ho, look at that: the last thing associated with the name Brian McGinn was a ride simulator project called technolepathy."

  Scrornuck stopped chewing. “I remember that word."

  Jape nodded. “We found that record last Sunday. Looks like technolepathy cost UniFlag some big money. Well, that might explain the sudden name change.” He quickly tapped some buttons. “Crypto Team Code One with a platinum chaser; we should know in a day or two.” He pushed the final button. “Let's see, what else is there?” He methodically worked his way through screen after screen. “Wish I had some coffee. Shame we only brought the one package."

  Scrornuck spat. “You should have saved it for yourself."

  "I'll survive.” Jape's eyes suddenly brightened. “Look at this: Records indicate McGinn did not return to the Home time stream when the Grand Taupeaquaah project was abandoned, and UniFlag executives declined to launch a search for him. Wow, he must have really pissed somebody off!"

  "What do they mean, ‘the Grand Taupeaquaah project was abandoned'?” Nalia asked.

  Jape went silent, for quite a long time, and Scrornuck got a strong feeling the Ranger had said more than he intended to. Finally, with a sigh, he spoke. “I've already told you how my people brought thousands of worlds into existence.” She nodded. “Some, including this one, were themeworlds, created to provide recreation and entertainment for Guests from my world. The first was DisWarner's Safari World, where people could visit the wide-open spaces of ancient Africa. It was a huge success, and soon a dozen companies, including UniFlag, were building worlds that were even more spectacular and luxurious.

  "Then disaster struck: the streams of time crossed for the first time. Nobody saw it coming, and there were no Rangers to defuse the paradoxes. Safari World was utterly destroyed. A quarter million people died in the blink of an eye.” He shuddered ever so slightly.

  "That's awful,” Nalia said, “But what's it got to do with Taupeaquaah?"

  "When two hundred thousand Guests died in the Safari World stream crossing, it was the end of the themeworld business. Nobody wanted to take the risk of visiting or working in a world that could be destroyed overnight. Within two weeks, the operating themeworlds were evacuated and shut down. Construction crews in the unfinished worlds—including this one—simply packed up and left."

  "Spafu's Helpers,” she said thoughtfully. “The scrolls say they'll be coming back, and the Guests will come with them. A thousand at a time, in the plaza around the Horn.” A small tear formed in her eye as she made the connection. “They're not coming, are they?"

  Jape shook his head. “I'm afraid not. UniFlag's big Traveler, the one that was supposed to bring Guests from my world to yours, was dismantled many years ago. All that's left on the spot is a little park with a historic marker."

  "No Guests, ever.” The tear ran down her cheek. “And they didn't even tell us."

  Scrornuck put an arm around her and gently wiped the tear from her eye. “At least we came."

  She smiled slightly. “Yeah. At least you came.” She laughed, a bitter laugh, but a laugh nonetheless. “I guess I'm lucky—I got to meet the only real Guests we'll ever have."

  Scrornuck decided it was time to change the subject. “What else
was in the message?"

  "Something about McGinn's residences—the two we knew about, and also something called the Darklord Castle Ride Complex."

  "The Captain said the Orb was at a place called Darklord Castle,” Nalia said.

  Jape nodded and scanned the remainder of the file. “There's no reference to where it is. Nalia, do your people have any stories about castles?"

  "None that I've heard."

  Jape stabbed several buttons and sighed. “We'll put the crypto teams on this, but I hate waiting."

  "We should be able to find it,” Scrornuck said. “You can't just hide a castle."

  "No, you can't hide something that big...” Jape stopped, his bottomless blue eyes staring to the northwest as though peering right through the mountain. Suddenly he stabbed at the softscroll's buttons, calling up the map. “Unless you've got something really big to hide it behind!” He stuck his finger down with finality. “It's there. It's got to be."

  Nalia looked at the map. “The Perpetual Storm?"

  Jape nodded. “You said that storm's been there since the beginning of time. Natural storms don't last that long—it's got to be artificial. And UniFlag wouldn't build an artificial dust storm unless it was part of a big attraction.” He pointed to the hourglass shape that indicated the purple ring's measurements. “Look at this. I thought it was a phasing problem, because it points away from the light in the tower. But really, it was pointing right at the dust storm.” He smiled, the satisfied smile of one who'd just cracked a hard problem. “That's where the Orb is."

  Scrornuck's train of thought was on a different track. “Darklord Castle Ride Complex?"

  "Don't get your hopes up,” Jape warned. “The rides might not have been installed, and even if they were, they probably won't work after all this time.” His voice trailed off. “Rides?” He called up an earlier report. “Technolepathy was a ride simulator? By McGinn's time everybody knew they didn't work..."