by Heath Pfaff
I frowned at him, not pleased to hear him using his class position as a reason to protect me. “You’re stronger than me, Zark, ahead of me in the class pecking order, but I’m not fragile or weak. You can’t protect me from everything. We’ll both end up fighting before the night is out.”
“Yes, but not alone on top of a wall. In a fight between us I would win. That means, alone, I am better suited to a fight. It makes more sense for me to go up first. If something happens, I’m better capable of taking care of it.” He insisted.
I had a strong desire to punch him in the face. Hard. “I know what you’re doing, but you’re forgetting that we’re close enough in skill that I might take you in a fight. In fact, I did take you in a fight last time we squared off. You want to protect me, and that’s sweet, but I don’t want to be protected.” With that I didn’t give him any further time to argue. I pushed his hand off of me and started up the wall. I moved quickly and easily up the ragged surface. It hadn’t been designed to stop people from getting over it. The wall was there to separate one area from another, which was good for us. I reached the top lip and cautiously pulled myself over until I could see what was beyond.
There was a courtyard beyond with buildings in various places, but along one wall, one leading into the tower, was a doorway that the metal monstrosities were clearly guarding. There were at least a half dozen of them standing outside the door, and as I was watching one of them went inside before another came out.
There were all different kinds of things here, some on two legs, some crawling across the ground like spiders, the organic bits a mix of animal and human, terrible glass eyes glowing in their decaying skulls. There was an arrow painted on the wall, pointing at the door, though it looked almost enough like a random spatter that if I wasn’t looking for a sign I might have missed it entirely. It was clear where our instructors wanted us to go next.
The top of the wall was narrow, and I’d only pulled up far enough to just get over the edge. I looked back down and waved for my annoying companion to join me. Zark climbed up quickly and was soon at my side. He scanned the area below as I had.
“That door?” He asked, pointing to the same location I’d determined was our destination.
I nodded. “Yes, we need to get in there. There is an arrow on the wall.” I gestured in the direction.
“By the Blackened, there are so many of the damn things in here. How are we going to get in that room. We don't even know what it looks like inside. There might not be room for us to fight or run.” He whispered.
“We’ll have to draw them out, create a distraction of some sort, something that will bring as many of them as we can get away from here.” I suggested.
“That’s a fine idea, but what do we do that doesn’t split us up and leave us vulnerable to attack?” His ability to point out the obvious fault in my plans didn’t really make me any happier with him.
“What if we find one of the creatures near the edge of the clearing and lure it away from the others a bit, and then attack it. We can pin it down to a spot and when it screams to get the attention of the others we make a break from it and come back to the door? I imagine it won’t give us much time, but maybe enough to do what we need to do.” I suggested.
Zark was shaking his head. “I don’t know if that will work. We’d have to work really fast, and if anything went wrong it would be the two of us against this entire horde. We can’t fight all of these.”
I sighed in frustration. “We can grab one of the ones with two legs. We break both of its legs and cripple its arms. Each of us will take a side, and then we can jam it into one of the supply sheds on the opposite side of the wall and sneak through the shadows back to the wall here. We climb atop it, and while the others are looking for the injured one, we jump down and grab the item we need from the room.”
“That’s the same idea.” Zark pointed out.
“It is, but I took it further, gave us more time to work with. Look, we can catch that one when it makes its next circle.” I pointed to a two legged monster walking beneath us that had rounded the courtyard twice since we’d been up there. “We pull it through the door and shove it in that building there.” I pointed to a small building off to one side. I wasn’t sure what it was, or even if it was unlocked. “We can get back into the shadows and up onto the wall fast enough. When we snag it we’ll make sure to silence it until we’re ready for it to call for help. I can drop in behind it after you get its attention. I’ll wrap my arm over its face and use my dagger to dislodge it’s arm. You’ll have to take out both legs and the other arm, but that way it won’t make noise.”
My dagger was more of a tool than a weapon, but it would work for this well enough.
Zark still looked uncertain. “I should be the one to take it from behind.” He said.
I opened my mouth to protest, but he spoke quickly.
“No, it’s not about protecting you. I’m stronger. We don’t know how much that thing will be able to thrash around. My hold will be better, and my primary weapon has a blade. I can use that to disable at least one of its arms. This isn’t about me being marginally better at fighting this time, it’s just logic. Besides, being in front of it and being the one to lure it in isn’t exactly a safe place to be either.” He made his case quickly, and he was right. This time it did make more sense.
“Alright. Then that’s what we’ll do, but as soon as that thing is stashed away, we run for it.” I insisted. “I don’t want to be here when those things come back, and I don’t want you stuck with it either. No dying.”
He gave a small chuckle. “Alright, no dying. Let’s go then.” With that we both dropped back down the wall and made our way toward the door. We kept low and moved with our attention fully on the area around us. Being spotted now would put us in a very bad place.
We reached the door through the wall quickly enough, and then Zarkov took a place next to it, ducked low and into the depths of the shadow cast by the wall. I waited a little further out, watching through the door until I saw the shape of the two legged creature approaching the entrance. It had a peculiar gait, something unnatural and unsettling about the way it shifted its weight around on legs made of a mix of flesh and metal that were poorly met together. It reminded me a bit of the golems, and that was an unwelcome comparison.
I steeled my nerves, and as it drew near I whistled loud enough for it to hear, but not so loud that the sound would carry much further. It stopped, it’s head swinging in my direction, and as soon as I saw the flash of color in its glass eyes I dove off to the side and out its line of vision. I wanted it to suspect I was out here, but not to see me fully.
I could hear it switching paths, following what it had seen, and then I heard the sound of its metallic feet on the stone in front of the doorway and knew it was close. It stopped. I was off to the side now. I could see the door and it hadn’t come through yet, but I wasn’t straight on the door so I couldn’t see anything of what was beyond. Had I not let it see enough of me? I looked to the shadow by the door. Had it spotted Zark? I couldn’t see him from where I was, but the thing was closer to him now than it was to me.
I held my position. It’d had plenty of time to see me. Jumping out there again would just give it a straight line of attack on me, make it easier for the thing to charge my position, and possibly alarm it enough that it would call out to the others. I wasn’t going to allow for that. Why was it holding back? I wished I could see what was happening on the other side of the wall.
The seconds seemed to stretch out as I grew increasingly agitated. Every muscle in my body was tensed. I reached back and drew out the two halves of my staff. Something was wrong. The plan had gone awry and . . .
At that moment the creature stepped through the door. It’s eyes scanned the area and fell on me quickly. It sprang forward, mouth opening to let out a scream, but Zark was on it instantly. He tackled it from behind, his arm going over its face.
They hit the ground hard as Zarkov’s w
eapon tore into one of its shoulders. He attacked mercilessly, ripping into what was left of its arm. The appendage had been mostly stripped away, the end replaced with a long, sharp blade that it was trying to bend around so as to strike at Zark. I dove forward myself and began to hammer blow after blow into its other arm. The assault was particularly brutal.
Even on this thing, this monster, it felt wrong to hold it down and rip its limbs from its body. It made some noise as it struggled, but without being able to open its mouth it couldn’t really let much out. Finally we had it mostly broken and dismembered. We dragged it across the field and tried to throw it into the nearest room, but the room was locked.
“This will have to do.” I told Zarkov, and he gave me a shrug and we let it go, making a break for the wall. It began to make a horrible, inhuman screaming sound as soon as its mouth was free. The sound was metallica and terrible, rattling up from inside of it as though it was made not by vocal chords but my some grinding and twining of metal. Again I was reminded of the golems, and again a chill passed up my spine. It thrashed in our direction, but there wasn’t enough of it left to chase us. We fled from the screeching, gurgling roar of its distress. Nothing alive should have made a sound like that.
By the time we were a third of the way back to the wall more of the creatures in all manner of different configurations were pouring out of the door, headed in the direction of their fallen companion. They didn’t see us, which was good since we weren’t trying to hide very well. We were running. We scaled the wall without stopping, though we paused when we got to the top. Most of the creatures were headed for the doorway out, so we dropped down on the other side and made directly for the entrance to the tower, the one with the arrow over it.
We didn't move as cautiously as we should have, but our time was limited now. How long did we have before they realized this was all a distraction? I knew it couldn’t be long. We reached the entrance to the tower and Zark peeked around it and then shot back quickly.
“Four of them.” He whispered the words, barely audible. “They’re not moving. The watcher sphere is on a shelf in the left back corner of the room. The creatures are watching some box in the middle of the room. It is all very strange, makes me feel ill at ease. The whole room feels strange.”
“Stranger than what we’ve seen so far?” I asked incredulously.
He nodded. “There is something wrong with that room, that box. We need to do this quickly.”
“I wasn’t planning on wasting time.” I told him. I took a deep breath. “We go in together, grab the sphere, and fight off the creatures until the door opens. Is there any other way to do this?”
He shook his head. “This is the only way in. The room is of fair size. We should be able to fight inside, but if we move all the way to the back down one of the rows we should also be able to keep more than one or two of the creatures from coming at us at once. No matter how we do this it’s going to be dangerous. We’re going to have to fight.”
“Then we’ll fight as hard as we can. Lead the way. I’ll be right behind you. We’ll try to get as far as we can without being seen, but once they spot us, we run for it.” I told him, patting him on the shoulder. This could very well be the end for one of us, I knew. Or both of us. I couldn’t find my fear just then. It was lost in the cool certainty of my training.
Zark started forward and I stayed close at his back. He’d drawn his weapon, and I still had mine ready as well. We slipped through the door and I got my first good look at the room. It was sizeable, and in the center was a large table that looked like it had once been used for eating, though now it held just a single box that was made of old and worn driftwood, gray-blue in color The four creatures in the room were staring at it intently, imobile, almost like statues. They were so intent that they didn’t even seem to notice us as we slipped into the room and flattened ourselves against the wall. We started back for the left corner. I could see our objective now. The back of the room had rows of shelves, the shelves covered in books and documents, which made me reevaluate the use of the table. This wasn’t a place to eat. This was a planning room of some type.
Now that we were inside the room, I could tell what Zark had meant about the area. It felt wrong. It felt dangerous and alive, like the entire place was crawling with bugs, but there was nothing visually off putting other than the four monsters around the table. We slid back between the shelves cautiously.
I was amazed that we’d gone so far and not been noticed. We reached the back corner of the room and Zark grabbed the stone, a grin spreading across his face. “We made it.” He mouthed the words, but didn’t speak them.
We just had to wait now. The door out would open soon for us. The seconds crawled by, and then one of the four creatures in the room moved, and the other three followed suit. Two of them rounded on us as though they’d seen us, through where we were huddled it would be impossible for them to have actually seen us. There was no direct line of sight. I knew they turned towards us only by the sound of the motion, and a quick peek from behind our cover. They let out a horrible metallic screeching sound and charged in our direction. We hadn’t done anything to alert them at all, but it wasn’t time to focus on the impossibility of our situation. We had to act.
I pushed Zarkov down the nearest aisle and followed after him quickly. In the corner we were more open, but down the row they could only attack us through one of the narrow channels, or that had been the plan we’d discussed outside, and when I’d initiated the motion, but the first metallic hybrid slammed through the line of shelves, nearly crushing us with the heavy piece of furniture as it tore through the suddenly feeble seeming obstruction to get to us. I dove one direction and Zark rolled the other. We had to split up to avoid being hit.
The creature was on me in a second, bladed metallic limbs thrashing around, cutting through the air inches away from my head as I tried my hardest to get back and away. This one looked as though it had been a dog or a wolf at some point, though the organic parts were hard to identify now. It walked on four bladed limbs, and had two more hinged, sword-like limbs that it used to slash at me. I backed away, turning the blows aside with my weapon as I could. The attacks were powerful and I couldn’t directly block one because I knew it would have sent my arms numb almost immediately.
I heard a loud scream from the other side of the room and knew that it was Zarkov. My heart hammered in my chest as I tried to steal a glance, but I couldn’t take my eyes off of my current engagement. The danger was too imminent. A single slip in attention could kill me. We were fortunate that only two of the creatures had attacked. The other two had clambered onto the table and were apparently guarding the box, or that was the impression I got. I couldn’t exactly look, and wasn’t that interested anyway.
The thing attacking me roared and came on even stronger, limbs flailing faster so that I was forced to fall back. I couldn’t even turn the blades away fast enough. It was forcing me back into the small nook we’d first hidden in after getting the sphere. Out of the corner of my eye I saw movement outside the door. Reinforcements were coming. Suddenly a line of light appeared opening up on a nearby wall, and I felt a surge of hope and relief. The new magical doorway swung open.
“Zark, the exit!” I called out, hoping he’d seen it too. Hoping he was still alive. I hadn’t heard him since the scream.
My back hit the wall and a clawed limb sliced into the meat of my leg as I failed to back out of the way in time. The next three blows came fast, and I reacted on instinct alone, blocking each with my weapons, the blows so hard that my arms vibrated and shook, becoming difficult to feel. I realized that I was on the cusp of a death I couldn’t escape. The door was just a few feet away, but I couldn’t make it through.
I looked up into the green glowing eyes of my death as it approached, and something inside of me rejected this end. I would not fall here. Not like this. This wasn’t even real anymore. This was an echo of something gone. I wouldn’t be killed by something that wasn’
t real. I screamed in rage and swung my weapon with my numb left arm.
For some reason the creature attacking me had stopped moving. The whole room seemed still. When my weapon hit the beast, it shattered, bursting into dust as though it wasn’t solid at all. I was confused, scared a little, but I didn’t hesitate. I ran across the room, limping heavily on my leg that was now torn wide open. I found Zarkov laying on the ground, the creature above him frozen in place, claws raised as though it was about to strike. He had his weapon up, terror on his face.
He gave me a confused look as I approached. He had several bad wounds, a few of them fatal if we didn’t get him back. I ducked down and grabbed him. He still had the stone. “Come on, while they’re . . . well, let’s just go.” I said, and I started to drag him towards the door.
“I don’t understand what happened. I was about to die.” Zark said, voice shaky.
“Yeah, me too. The door opened though, maybe it stopped things.” It never had before, but I couldn’t be certain. This whole thing was different. I dragged Zarkov through the door and we collapsed on the other side.
Shaw was there, looking at the both of us as we fell across the threshold. There was a strange expression on his face. I’d never seen it there before. It might have been surprise, or possibly distress, but it was fleeting and I couldn’t quite figure it out before it was gone entirely. The rest of the hall was full of people in various states of injury, blood spattering the walls and floor. I looked over and saw a woman die. Her eyes becoming blank as I looked into them. She was mostly gone below the waist. Zark and I really didn’t look bad all things considered.