“Your journey ends here. You have bested two of my brothers, and proven yourselves strong and resourceful, but you are no match for my might. The flames of War shall envelope you all, leaving nothing but charred ashes in their wake.”
For what could have been the first time in all of eternity, the horseman War was stunned to silence by the response he received: laughter. Jeremy howled with laughter that grew deeper and more malevolent as he willed Death’s blades to form in his hands, and the destructive instruments complied willingly. Arcs of lighting erupted along the blades, sparking and leaping between the blades threateningly. Michael held his hands out in front of his chest, palms facing up, and flames ignited in his palms, lighting his maniacal smile with flickering light that was emphasized by the blood-red shadow of the setting sun. Luna’s eyes glowed with a bright blue inner light, and spiralling whirlpools began to form in the nearby lake, matched by small spirographical patterns forming out of dancing vapour at her feet. Tanya assumed a combative stance, and the spindly tattoos that had formed on her skin after absorbing Famine’s scales began to twist and dance menacingly.
“Come!” Jeremy bellowed, his voice echoing with distant thunder. The black clouds overhead thickened and swirled as his feet lifted off the ground, leaving him hovering a foot in the air, dust swirling cyclonically at his feet. “Meet the same fate as your brothers. We are through with running and hiding.”
The horseman held his blade overhead, signalling his men to advance. The soldiers swept towards their targets, breaking their carefully composed lines and formations to tilt at Jeremy and his companions with caution thrown to the winds. They were an unstoppable tsunami, rushing forward to overwhelm the unfortunate souls who stood in their way. The tsunami broke upon an unexpected barrier; everyone fought with all their heart and soul - blades clashed against blades, fire rained down from the sky, calmed only by blasts of ice, and pulverising blows of incredible elemental strength. War’s soldiers fought with incredible tenacity that was absolutely no match for the combined powers of their opponents, turning the world into a chaotic din blurred by flowing blood and crushing bone. When the dust finally settled, only five combatants remained - War on his massive steed, impassively watching the fray, and the five elemental superhumans who dared to challenge his authority.
With a roar, War charged at them. His steed breathed gouts of flame from its flaring nostrils as it charged, and his blade seared the air with heat so intense that it scorched the very oxygen from its path. His charge lead him first to Tanya, who crouched and braced herself in the path of his mighty warhorse. They collided with incredible force, dismounting the superhuman warrior and causing the steed to vanish in a puff of flame and smoke the seemed to leave her uninjured. War rolled as he landed, leaping to his feet with ease. He screamed with untamed rage, swinging his fiery blade at Jeremy. War’s blade met those of Death, sparks leaping from both blades and shaking the very earth with their destructive potential. War fought with the skill of an experienced and powerful warrior; Jeremy did the same, his blades moving with speed and fluidity that his eyes could scarcely track. Even so, it took all of his strength to focus on parrying War’s blows, until he finally caught a glimpse of movement out of the corner of his eye and leapt high into the air, carried up on a draft of telekinetically-propelled wind, leaving War far below him to be encompassed by a pillar of flame that erupted from the ground beneath his feet. Michael cried out almost orgasmically as his flames enveloped War, burning and consuming the fearsome foe.
As Jeremy drifted slowly to the ground, the flames faded, leaving behind only War’s flaming sword surrounded by a pile of thick black ashes. Michael circled the blade slowly, checking it out from every angle.
“I understand what the two of you said before,” he said, his eyes never leaving the sword, “about hearing the horsemen’s weapons talking to you. I can hear this one. That’s so...so messed up.”
“It’s a good thing, Michael,” Jeremy said reassuringly. “Trust me when I say that sword will bring you more power than you’d ever thought possible. Not just power...more control. Pick it up.”
“It’s true,” Tanya said with a comforting smile.
Needing no further encouragement, Michael picked up the sword and lifted it over his head. The flames that still danced across the blade swirled and twisted, working their way down the blade, then the hilt, and finally to his arm. Dancing lines of flame enveloped Michael, burning complex patterns into his skin. The sword itself shrunk as the flames leapt off it, until all that remained were the dancing flames that ensconced Michael in a burning cocoon. When even that faded, his skin was permanently marred with complex runic tattoos that took the shape of rippling flames spreading across his body.
“Oh, that’s good,” he rasped. “Not painless, either - you could have mentioned that part.”
“Part of the process,” Jeremy said. “Welcome to the next step in your evolution.”
“And where does that leave me?” Luna’s voice was bitter and cold.
“It’s no coincidence that there are four horsemen of the apocalypse and four of us,” Jeremy said. “I suspect we’ll find our next challenge beyond the end of this path somewhere. We kill him, and we should all reach the height of our evolution as elemental avatars, and from there...who knows?”
“Conquest,” Tanya intoned. “Then I heard one of the four living creatures say in a voice like thunder, ‘Come and see!’ I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest.”
“I thought the other horseman was Pestilence?” Jeremy asked.
“It’s a common misconception,” Tanya said. “I’m not sure where it comes from, but it’s pretty persistent, and wrong. Of course, our encounters haven’t exactly been one hundred percent in line with what the bible tells us, so take from that what you will.”
“What do you mean by that?” Jeremy’s confusion was not abated by her partial explanation.
“Well,” she said, “in the bible, Conquest is the first horseman, followed by War, Famine, and then Death. We’ve met them in the reverse order. There are other differences, too - the bible didn’t say anything about War being a dragon, for instance.”
“Well, whatever the reason for the differences,” Jeremy said, pointing at the path, “there’s only one way we’re going to find the answers.”
“Does it feel to any of you like we’re just being strung along?” Luna asked.
“You mean do we feel like something has been pushing us in one direction over another? Absolutely,” Jeremy said. “Call it fate, or kismet, or whatever you want, but I think it’s pretty clear by now that some part of the universe has a particular destination set in store for us, and it’s not going to take no for an answer.”
“So what do you think would happen if we just avoided that road entirely?”
“I can’t say for certain, but I’m willing to bet that we’d soon find ourselves facing the same road again, whether we meant to or not. The world keeps rearranging itself wherever we go - mountains in the middle of southern Saskatchewan, earthquakes where there are no seismic fault lines, and cities shifting and changing before our eyes. We can try to outsmart the process, but I think we’d just be delaying the inevitable. Fate is a harsh bitch-mistress, and does not take defiance lightly.”
“What happens if we do decide to meet our fate, and take that road? After we meet Conquest, or Pestilence, or whatever is waiting for us at the end of the trail? End of the line? Full stop? Apocalypse averted?”
“No,” Jeremy said sadly, taking Tanya’s hand in his own and leading her towards the path. Michael and Luna followed close behind. “It’s too late for that. As soon as our society began to grow and rise, it doomed itself. There’s nothing we can do about that, but we can at least pave the way for a future for the human race.”
The journey across the bridge proceeded in silence. The weight of the last few days’ events was
starting to come crashing down upon them. The deaths of everyone they knew and loved, the collapse of society, the destruction of the social order...all suddenly felt final and real in a way that they had not when they still held out hope that there might be shelter from the storm with the military. When heavy, fat drops of rain began to fall from the sky, slowly at first, then faster and faster, it was a welcoming, cleansing change. For the first time since their journey had started, Jeremy and Tanya felt the weight of their burdens melting off of them – their grief, their despair, and their pain fell to the ground, more droplets amidst the rush from the sky. Michael danced in the rainfall, and even Luna seemed calm and peaceful. The welcome storm caressed their, uplifted them, and vibrated within them, carrying their spirits high. As they resumed their journey, their footsteps no longer fell with the same dread and worry, but moved quickly and with a renewed sense of vigour and purpose.
The rain stayed with them throughout their journey across the bridge, and their ascent up the path, but even through the rainfall they could finally see what lay ahead of them. In the distance, towering above them was a massive Gothic castle constructed of black stone. White pennants were battered by the fat raindrops, though they bore no identifying marks. As they finally completed their ascent to the pinnacle of the path, their progress ended, stopped by an impossibly deep crevice that separated them from the castle. On the castle side was a raised drawbridge, but no means of accessing from their side.
Chapter 11
Day 6 – 17:00:00 CST
Unknown Fortress, Regina
“This is it, isn’t it?” Tanya asked. “This is where it’s all going to end.”
“Yes,” Jeremy said curtly. The memories he had inherited from his mind-link with the zombie were starting to make sense to him now. This same castle occupied them all, and in the same manner - a group of four individuals bearing the gifts of the elements standing outside, demanding entry. A chill ran through his body as he realized that everyone one of those groups had ended in the same way. He briefly flirted with the idea of running away, just turning around and sprinting full-tilt back down the path to the ruins of the city below. As tempting as the idea was, he couldn’t allow himself to be swayed, and stood his ground. “I haven’t put all of the pieces together quite yet, but this is where it’s going to happen - where we’re going to make a stand that will put an end to the zombies, and allow whatever survivors may exist to flourish, and for society to eventually grow anew.”
“And then ten, twenty, thirty, fifty thousand years from now...” Michael’s voice trailed off.
“Their society will soar to new heights, and be struck down the same way. Some other poor saps will end up standing where we are, and doing what we’re doing, and the cycle will continue.”
“I’d rather break the cycle,” Michael said defiantly. “Even if it’s too late for our old lives, our civilization, at least we owe it to our descendants to make sure that the same thing doesn’t keep happening again and again and again.”
“As would I,” Jeremy assented. “Unfortunately, I don’t think there’s any way we can do that. Even with all the power at our disposal, how many zombies do you think we could kill before we finally got overwhelmed? A thousand? Ten thousand? A million? It’s a safe bet that there are literally billions of them all over the world at this point. We could spent the rest of our lives tracking and killing them, and not even make a dent in that number. No, the only way to make the world safe for humanity is to stop them at the source, and however we do that, I suspect it’s going to require that we participate in the roles fate has laid out for us.”
“You don’t strike me as the sort to believe in fate,” Michael said.
“If you’d asked me a week ago, I’d have agreed. Call me crazy, but after a few days of being hunted by zombies, abused by the people I trusted to protect me, and fighting the horsemen of the goddamned apocalypse, that’s changed a little bit. So first I started to believe in fate...I don’t know, I guess shortly after we killed Death. Then I began to accept my own fate sometime around the point where a giant dragon swooped down out of the sky at us.”
Michael laughed, a loud, ringing laugh that startled everyone. “I never thought of it quite like that. I suppose you’ve got a point, though. I guess if this has to be my fate, it’s certainly not the worst one that I could imagine. Let’s get on with it!”
As if on cue, the drawbridge began to slowly lower in complete silence, smoothly dropping into place, revealing a glimpse of an empty courtyard beyond. Throwing caution to the wind, Michael dashed across the drawbridge, beckoning everyone else to follow his lead as soon as he was safely across. They did, and were soon entering the courtyard. Surrounded on all sides by towering walls of smooth black stone, it was filled with dead grass and lifeless brown soil. At the farthest end of the courtyard, stairs lead up and into the heart of the castle. Several long-dead bodies littered the edges of the courtyard, flesh long since rotted away, leaving behind only cracked and yellowed bones. Jeremy started at this, but calmed himself as he realized that they showed no signs of movement. The group cautiously moved forward and up the stairs, alert and watching in every direction for any sign of trouble.
The interior of the castle was dark; despite lit torches hanging off the walls of the narrow corridor they entered, the flickering torchlight seemed to be sucked in to the black stone walls, throwing off only enough illumination for them to barely make out their path. The corridor continued, unbroken by intersections, doors, or markings of any sort, for at least a hundred feet, finally opening up into a vast, open throne room. Brilliantly bright red carpet lead up to a single massive black throne decorated with gold highlights. A towering figure was seated at the throne, watching the group with interest as they carefully entered the room. When he addressed them, it was with a clear, ringing voice.
“Come in, come in!”
Everyone in the group leapt to attention. Death’s blades materialized in Jeremy’s hands; Tanya assumed a combat pose; Luna’s eyes glowed with a deep blue light, and flames crackled across Michael’s skin.
“Now, now, don’t be so jumpy!” The giant sounded jovial and nonthreatening, even as they moved in closer to him. Nobody let down their guard. “I can understand that you aren’t anxious to trust me right now, my friends. Please, allow me to explain things to you.”
“We’re not your friends,” Michael growled.
“You may not think it, but you are,” the giant’s smile broadened. “Allow me to introduce myself -”
“Let me guess - Conquest?” Luna spat. “Or do you prefer Pestilence?”
The giant laughed heartily. “Yes, I’ve been known as both of those. Either appellation will suffice, as you prefer.”
“You’re not quite what I expected,” Tanya admitted. She wasn’t quite sure what she had expected, but it certainly wasn’t a ten-foot tall man with pale skin and such a jovial demeanour. He seemed more like Santa Clause than the destroyer of worlds.
“Indeed not, though conquest need not be limited to brute strength and fear-mongering, my dear girl! I expect that what you’re about to hear also won’t quite be what you expected, either,” the giant said. “It’s been a long journey that has lead you here, and there is much to understand.”
“I understand that we need to kill you,” Jeremy said, levelling his blades at the giant. “Isn’t that enough?”
“I think you of all people would understand that’s precisely what you should not do,” the giant tapped his temple, then pointed at Jeremy. Floodgates opened in his mind, filling it with a dizzying rush of emotions, images, and ideas. “Perhaps it will be best if I start from the beginning.
“A very long time ago - over eight hundred thousand years ago, to be more precise - humanity was a new species, and one that swiftly grew in understanding and power until they dominated this planet, much as you do today.
“Your current history is little different from that of the first humans. They conquered, stole, destr
oyed, and corrupted the world to suit their needs, never stopping to consider the long-term ramifications of their actions.
“Finally, they overreached. Their mastery of technology grew to the point that they created devices that could pierce the veil between dimensions, reaching out into depths and corners of reality where man was not meant to go. It was there that they found me, and I found them.
“As you may suspect, I am not entirely human. I am not even what you would consider a biological organism. I am - that which is beyond. As I encountered those bold travellers who intruded upon my domain, I felt the spark of their life-essence, the energy that animated and drove them onward. It was...delicious.”
“You...you ate them?” Tanya was aghast.
“I consumed their essence,” the giant rumbled. “Leaving behind a mere shell, an empty biological void. Nothing of value or meaning. As I consumed their spirits, they merged with me, grew to be a part of my own essence, and I learned that there were many more of them...so many more. I descended upon your world and made it my playground. I feasted upon everyone I could find, until all that was left were barren fields, decaying bodies, and a few scattered tribes of living mortals who I chose to spare. I knew that they would breed, and grow, and spread out, and once again reach for those lofty heights that their ancestors did, and on that day I would be there to claim them.
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