Unfiction

by Gene Doucette

  There came a terrible cry from the heavens. It was the sort of noise that made everyone—alien and human and elf, sniper and soldier and sorcerer—stop what they were doing and figure out what in the name of all that is holy could possibly make a sound such as this.

  High above, a cloud—lit only thanks to the ambient glow of the neon signs crowding Club Street—appeared to move. Then a great beast emerged, wisps of cumulus moisture clinging to its leathery wings. It was beautiful, and terrible, and magnificent.

  It was a dragon.

  “Sorcerer!” Cant shouted. “Did you call her forth?”

  “I only expected her arrival, and hoped it would precede our deaths. But the Codex said we couldn’t enter the Kingdom without facing a dragon. You know that.”

  Cant laughed. “Aye.”

  The dragon let out a second roar, and dove for the alien army. It was almost an optical illusion: the beast had nothing to compare her to when in the upper atmosphere, so it was easy to convince oneself she wasn’t as big as it had to be. But as she dove, she grew, and grew, and then the aliens started to look like actual bugs by comparison.

  Being a proper fire-breathing dragon, her first attack was fire-based, and it was directed at the only things flying high enough to make for a decent target: the drones. The flames lit up the sky and engulfed all eight of the drones, and they responded by breaking formation. The portals closed.

  This got the full attention of the alien army. If the dragon hadn’t represented a larger threat initially, she did the minute she went after the drones and closed off their only way home. Their way was clear.

  “Let’s move!” Minerva shouted, as she ran past Oliver and in the direction of Pallas.

  “Hang on,” Oliver said.

  She stopped and looked back at him, confused. “We have to reach the Kingdom before that thing is finished with the monsters, sorcerer. I don’t know if you realize this, but dragons don’t choose sides, and we neglected to invite a dragon-slayer on this excursion.”

  “Maybe you did. But we can’t abandon everyone.”

  She looked around. The street was empty, save for a couple of bug carcasses.

  Well above them, the aliens were buzzing around the dragon’s head, while the beast spun and swooped, each flap a mini-hurricane that threatened to knock Oliver off his feet. As he watched, the beast swung a mighty claw and caught a cyan-colored drone. It exploded like a rocket from a fireworks show.

  “Who do you mean?” Minerva asked.

  “In the clubs,” Oliver said. “Cant, I need you to knock down some doors.”

  Cant looked at Minerva, then shrugged. He ran to the nearest club door, which belonged to Paradise.

  “But why?” she asked again.

  “They’re hostages. Kill the aliens, free the hostages: that’s the mission, soldier.”

  Wilson laughed.

  “You’re killing the aliens with a dragon,” he said. “You planning to put that in the story?”

  “Well, I improvised.”

  Wilson said something about nobody wanting to read a story with both aliens and dragons in it, but Oliver didn’t catch his exact words, because by then Cant had taken the first door and the middle of Club Street was awash in people.

  They knew without prompting that the best place for them to be was away from the fight going on overhead, so there was a huge rush down the road, toward the crashed helicopter. He hoped Koestler didn’t start shooting people, thinking he was perhaps under attack.

  “There,” Minerva said, grabbing him by the elbow. “He’s freeing them. Now let’s get moving.”

  Oliver forgot how much he hated crowds. It didn’t seem like something someone who hated crowds would just up and forget, and yet he had. Possibly, it was because he’d spent the entire day in an abandoned city.

  He didn’t imagine the surge of people would be so omnidirectional, either, but the more doors that were opened, the fewer places the city dwellers had to go. Soon, there were as many people between him and the doors of Pallas as there were in the other direction, and he’d completely lost track of Minerva and Wilson.

  But at least Oliver knew which way he was supposed to be headed. It was very much an upstream direction, and he was often at risk of simply being carried by the flow of people, but he was able to push forward.

  After a few minutes of this, Minerva appeared at his side. She was still in her Atha form—he couldn’t think of a better way to put it—but otherwise seemed like the same girl who was trying to convince him only a few hours ago to go on this ridiculous trip to a club he didn’t even want to go to.

  “Well this was a grand idea,” she said. “I’m tempted to start killing people just to clear a path.”

  “We’d never make it to the Kingdom if we hadn’t done it,” he said.

  “We won’t make it now because we’ve done it. I think even Cant has been waylaid by all of this.”

  Oliver was trying not to look at faces as they went past, because it felt as if everyone he knew was pushing by. There was a barista he worked with a couple of times just a month ago. Behind her was the family who lived in the apartment on the second floor of Wilson’s building, next to a guy Oliver saw on the subway one time. And over there was Tandy from the Tenth Avenue Writers Underground, looking scared and apparently not recognizing Oliver.

  The whole city rushed past, a collection of half-remembered names and brief inadvertent encounters, all fleeing in terror.

  It was utterly overwhelming.

  “Why would we have not made it?” Minerva asked. “I’m not seeing your logic.”

  “We have to finish all the stories, or the way to the Kingdom isn’t going to be open.”

  “That doesn’t sound like it comes from any Codex with which I’m familiar. And I have read all of them.”

  “One of each kind,” he said. “We had to bring one of each kind to the gates of the Kingdom. I don’t see each race represented here, so I’m electing to interpret kind differently.”

  She nodded, slowly. “Very well. I suppose you would know better.”

  Overhead, the battle raged on. The dragon was more than holding her own against the combined might of the aliens and their drones.

  Oliver witnessed two drones—magenta and yellow—run parallel to the dragon, in an effort to bring her down the same way they’d brought down Koestler’s helicopter. But dragons were larger, faster, and more maneuverable than a helicopter, and also equipped with better offensive weapons. They tried, but their electrical bolts found empty air by the time they fired, and then there was a flaming counter-attack, and the drones were gone.

  “Out of my way, out of my way!” Cant was bull-rushing the people who failed to move aside fast enough. He was heading toward them from the upstream direction. His efforts cleared the way a little, and made it easier to proceed.

  “These city-dwellers would die in minutes north of the Ailings,” he declared, when they reached him. “They act as if they’ve never picked up a sword in defense in their lives, look at them!”

  “They haven’t,” Oliver said. “Has anyone spotted Wilson? Or did we lose track of him again?”

  “Your useless cohort lies ahead, at the door I cannot open.”

  “Which door was that?” Minerva asked. “Do they make doors in this world that are stronger than the mighty Cant?”

  “They do indeed. Come on, sorcerer. You’ve led us to the gates of the Kingdom itself, but they remain locked yet. Now perhaps you can prove your worth.”

  M Pallas was far too ostentatious to be mistaken for an ordinary nightclub. Vast white marble ionic columns ringed the front of a huge circular building with balconies and tresses and gables. Gargoyles hung off the roof and glared at the courtyard, which contained a garden of topiaries that had been pruned to look like Greek statues. The yard was surrounded by a high wall and gated by a wrought-iron fence. But for one detail, it looked like a cathedral, built for the worship of a nameless destroyer-god—or perhaps of all destroy
er-gods.

  That one detail was the singular expression of product branding: on the face of the building, held up by the ionic columns, was a vast letter M foregrounded by PALLAS. The letters glowed a soothing shade of lilac, as if apologizing for their garishness.

  Wilson was standing at the gate.

  “I hear they redesign the exterior every year. Can you even imagine the cost?”

  “Depends on if those are real marble columns,” Oliver said. He scanned the façade, waiting for the part where it became obvious that it wasn’t as big as it looked—that this was an unusually effective application of forced perspective—kicked in. It never did. The place was actually as large as it appeared to be.

  “This is the gate that defeated the great Cant?” Minerva asked.

  Cant checked left and right on the other side of the fence.

  “Sorcery!” he muttered.

  “The way was blocked a minute ago,” Wilson said. “Unless we’re going nuts. The two of us.”

  “I don’t understand,” Oliver said.

  Wilson stepped aside.

  “The gate’s unlocked. Go ahead and try it.”

  Oliver put his hand on the cold wrought iron of the fence, expecting to feel something more than just the metal’s current temperature. But there was no electrical charge or magical excitation, or any other transmission of pain. It just felt like a fence.

  He pulled, and the gate opened. Then there was a deafening WHOOSH as a massive boulder landed just on the inside of the gate. Oliver backpedaled so suddenly he fell over.

  “There it is,” Wilson said. “It blocks the whole entrance, see?”

  “That’s one hell of a burglar alarm,” Oliver said.

  “This is what I encountered when first I came to this point,” Cant said. “I would have attempted to overcome this by going through or around, but I feared the magical guardian would just drop another boulder, only on my head.”

  “It disappears eventually,” Wilson added. “But you have to close the gate first. I did that, and turned around. When I looked back again, it was gone.”

  Oliver got back to his feet and reached through the open gate, slowly, as if the massive rock was an unfriendly dog.

  “It feels real enough,” he said.

  “You thought it was an illusion?” Minerva asked. “Yes, that would track, wouldn’t it?”

  “If it disappears and reappears, it’s the most obvious conclusion. But this doesn’t seem like the sort of thing I’d want dropped on me. Those columns up ahead probably aren’t really marble, but this sure feels like a real rock.”

  “Maybe we can find another way around.”

  “Hang on,” Oliver said. He was concentrating on the face of the rock.

  Orsak’s words fell on the stones of the world, he thought.

  He’d seen messages all over the city already, in script that he, evidently, was the only one capable of reading.

  “So where are you?” he muttered.

  Up above, the battle was coming to an end. The aliens were never meant to face a dragon: they were prepared for an armada, and either an ending that resulted in their genocide, or in a peace accord after the misunderstandings regarding the ownership of Hockspit was worked out. Oliver never did decide which kind of ending he wanted to go with, because one was terrible and the other was improbable. He could only see three aliens still flying around, and no drones. One of the aliens looked like it was succumbing to the atmosphere more than to the dragon, which was what happened when an entire city of carbon dioxide producers manifested beneath you.

  “Sorcerer,” Cant said. “We need…”

  “Shh.”

  He put his hand on the boulder again, and concentrated. And then the word appeared. It was glowing white, right above where his fingertips rested. It was a word he’d seen before.

  “Of course,” he said. “Alavas.”

  From the perspectives of Minerva, Cant and Wilson, the boulder vanished. That wasn’t accurate, but it may as well have been. He’d used the same spell as the one placed on Atha’s bow.

  He picked up the much smaller version of the boulder, half-expecting it to be enormously heavy. It wasn’t, but if normal physics were anywhere to be found in this situation, it would have been. But this was magic; normal physics weren’t being used here.

  “Welcome to the Kingdom,” Oliver said grandly, waving them through the gate.

  “Not precisely,” Cant said. “I believe the door we require is the one up ahead.”

  “Well let’s get moving, before more rocks drop down on us.”

  What came from above—instead of large stones—was fire. A wall of flame ignited the topiaries and blocked the way, as simulacrums of Greek warriors shriveled on the vine.

  The dragon had arrived.

  She did a second pass over their heads, to make sure the initial wall of flame, however temporary, had discouraged any further progress. Then she alit on the roof, in a spot that appeared to have been designed specifically for this precise function.

  “Great warriors!” The dragon intoned. She had a voice that sounded a lot like her roar, which was to say it was deep and terrifying.

  Oliver was hung up on the part where she had a voice at all.

  “Dragons speak?” he asked, quietly, hoping she didn’t hear the question.

  “Of course they speak, sorcerer,” Cant said. “Who raised you, that you did not know this?”

  “You have done well to reach this far, but now I fear your journey has ended,” the dragon continued. “The lands beyond here do not belong to you. The Kingdom is for Orsak the great, and he alone.”

  “Orsak is long dead, great dragon,” Oliver said.

  “I have heard this said, small man. Yet this does not change the conditions by which you may enter. Only Orsak. All others must face my wrath.”

  “But if only Orsak may enter, and Orsak is no more, why do you bother to hold open the possibility of his return?”

  The dragon shrugged, which was a remarkable thing to see.

  “I’m told Orsak is no more, but I have not seen this proven. If he were to appear before me and state that he is long dead, then I will believe this is so. Since he has not done this, I will hold my sworn position until his return, and fight all others. Even valiant ones such as yourselves. Now turn about and leave this place. You may have come further than all before, but this is where your quest ends. Tell any who would listen that you found the great Kingdom, if it pleases you, but warn them as well. I will not be so kind to the next who come across this doorway.”

  “What is your name, dragon?” Oliver asked.

  “None of your concern.”

  “I would only know it so that when I, or my companions, leave this place, we would give an accurate account.”

  “My name is Promachos. You may tell them this.”

  “Very well. Mighty Promachos, how do you imagine a man many years dead might tell you himself that he is dead? This seems an unreasonable expectation from the deceased.”

  The dragon bared her teeth, which might have been a smile.

  “Indeed, it is. But the mighty Orsak is eternal. He told me so himself ‘ere besting me in combat and slaving me to this task. He is a man of many faces but one true self. And so it may be that he could enter my presence and declare he is dead. At that time I would be free, and the doors of the Kingdom unguarded to all with the perseverance you’ve already shown.”

  “Very well. Then I am the mighty Orsak himself.”

  The dragon extended her head forward, as if to get a better look at him. Her smile had only grown.

  “Really,” she said.

  “I think that might have been a mistake,” Wilson said.

  “Quiet, I might know what I’m doing,” Oliver said.

  “Well, this is splendid,” Promachos declared. “Now, simply defeat me in combat and then I’ll let you in.”

  “In combat?”

  “As I said, only Orsak can defeat me, and so if you are Orsak
, you should be able to do this. We will work out the rest after.”

  “That hardly seems fair.”

  “Do you wish to amend your declaration? It’s far too late for that. Now you’ve declared your true name is Orsak the great himself, I’m afraid my curiosity is such that I must determine it for myself.”

  “No, no, I mean it hardly seems fair for you.”

  The dragon gave a great, fiery laugh that was fortunately directed skyward.

  “Listen to me, child, I can end your journey through this world with a breath. Dare not test my patience further.”

  “What I mean is, it hardly seems fair because if I best you in combat you may be in no position to be freed from the promise to guard this door. Yes, I grant that with a puff of your infernal breath, you would incinerate all of us where we stand. But as a great and powerful sorcerer, I can destroy you before you ever got that chance. And then you would be dead. Do you imagine you are as eternal as Orsak?”

  “Very well. I am intrigued. I do not believe you are Orsak returned, but I appreciate your logic. What is it you propose?”

  “Come down here. Perhaps we can work out another way for me to prove who I am.”

  She tilted her head. You aren’t kidding? seemed to be the expression she was going for. Then with a great flap of her wings, she was airborne.

  “Oliver, are you sure you know what you’re doing?” Minerva asked. For a half-second she was just Minerva, the girl from Tenth Avenue with the fifteen different ways to smile. It was nice to see her again.

  “I am not one hundred percent positive, no,” he said. “Let’s say sixty percent.”

  “Hey, we could make for the door now,” Wilson suggested.

  “I would not try that,” Cant said. “You would just encourage her to move on to incinerating us. I expect that will be happening in a moment either way. Sorcerer, you play a foolish game.”

  “It’s the only hand I have, Cant. Besides, isn’t this why you hired me?”

  “We didn’t hire you, we kidnapped you.”

  Promachos swept across the sky, and then came in low along Club Street. When she landed, her body—from snout to tail—extended nearly the length of the entire roadway. If Koestler was still in his helicopter shooter’s nest, he would be looking at a clean shot of her tail. He would be wise not to take that shot, because while she probably wouldn’t even notice it, if she did it would be the last shot he ever took.