by Garry Ocean
Nothing happened for some time. The collarhorn, swaying with his entire body, continued his paced run. Nick, lying on his back with legs bent under him, was watching the pulsating nodules, ready to roll to the side any moment. Suddenly, the rhythm of the heavy steps of the monster slightly changed, and Nick felt he was in free fall. He managed to turn around and brace his feet at the nearest bone outgrowth. Nick realized that the giant was falling and Nick’s body was being pulled down and forward by the inertia. He managed to glance at the bone collar hovering above him like a huge umbrella. Nick felt a huge blow and everything went dark.
********
When the horns announced the beginning of the Big Hunt, Cleo was hesitating for some time if she should stay or leave. On the one hand, she didn’t want to see the forest monster do in the doomed people. And yes, they were rapists and killers. They would have been executed in any case. At least now they had a chance, albeit a very elusive one, to earn forgiveness fighting the beast. On the other hand, the girl wanted to see the raging beast in action because, perhaps, in the near future she would have to face one during her expedition to the Deep Forest. As they say, it is better to know your enemies in their face.
This time, no surprises were expected. Cleo heard the Forester bragging how his team of specially trained people had been tracking this very large beast in the Forest. Then followed a long description of all troubles and misfortunes his people had to go through to catch the collarhorn. How they had lost eight people before they managed to tranquilize the monster. Although the Forester never said a word about the hunters of near-Forest, Cleo realized perfectly well that they couldn’t have done without their help.
Details aside, the beast delivered for the today’s Celebration was indeed huge. Four dozens of the doomed criminals flouncing in fear at the further end of the Arena seemed like little bugs in comparison with the collarhorn. By the order of the guards, arbalesters shot heavy bolts into the beast from their crossbows. The bolts did not cause any visible damage to it, since they were meant to enrage the monster. And they did.
The beast turned his head spiked with long horns, and started its heavy run. It only seemed clumsy and bulky. Its every step was equal to twelve human steps, and people in the Arena, scattering around wild with fear, were trying in vain not to get under its huge clawed paws. Although the guards threw into the Arena several bundles of spears, only a score of people took them. Several brave men even managed to throw their spears right into the beast’s eyes. However, she couldn’t see what happened to them next. The dense cloud of sand dust raised by the columns of the beast’s paws covered everything for some time.
When the dust finally settled, Cleo saw broken bodies scattered on the ground. Some were still moving, but most looked dead. Cleo willfully swallowed down the lump in her throat. The spectator rows were in some wild ecstasy. Those doomed ones who were still alive were running toward the Central Pew, trying to ran away as far as possible from the huge forest beast.
The animal followed them, at first slowly and then accelerating faster and faster. The collarhorn was charging straight toward the Central Pew. Now Cleo could really feel the power and threat coming from this monster. For a second she thought that this huge beast, as high as the parapet protecting the low spectator rows, was running right at her.
The approaching collarhorn, large as it was, was getting bigger and bigger with every gigantic step. It seemed there was no force in the world that could have stopped this colossus entirely made of armor, muscles and deadly horns.
A powerful tail strike shook the Central Pew. Several spectator rows collapsed with the blow. People were shouting, yelling and moaning on all sides of the Arena. It was hard to tell if they cried in pain or fear or both. People began to fuss; universal panic was about to start.
Her alvar bodyguards quickly stepped in front of her to form a line, locking their shields and bristling with their long spears, ready to strike at any moment. Gunn-Terr jumped up to the balustrade and started to peer down, searching for the smallest threat. The bodyguards’ tall backs blocked Cleo’s view and she could not see what was going on down at the Arena. Only some long time later Gunn-Terr gave a signal to his warriors that there was no threat anymore. In one swift move the alvars returned to their initial positions.
Meanwhile the enraged collarhon, roaring and striking like a thunder, was already running away from the Central Pew. Cleo looked closely and nearly gasped in surprise. On the beast’s back, a warrior was crouching, with a spear in his arm, ready to strike. It was beyond anyone’s imagination, to understand how he ended up there. Cleo clenched her fists so tight they started to hurt. No doubt, it was he, the Nick of the Westgeyer clan, the Ritual Winner. He had no armor on him now, but Cleo could swear it was no mistake. “But what is he doing there? Just hours ago, he declined to participate in the Big Hunt for the right to marry me. Has he changed his mind?” Cleo’s thoughts were racing.
Meanwhile, the daredevil advanced to the very head of the collarhorn, where his tall bone collar started, and disappeared. Out of sight. Cleo was peering down so intensely that her eyes started to hurt, trying to discern any movement, but from such a distance she could not see anything. Nick disappeared into the darkness.
The crowds went wild. Many noticed the daredevil and were cheering him with loud shouts that turned up in volume to an unbearable roar. The collarhorn, however, continued to charge forward, increasing his speed with every step. Suddenly, the beast tripped. As if someone broke his front legs with a giant stick. The giant collapsed with its entire mass on the ground. The inertia dragged the monster for at least fifty steps more. The Arena went quiet. Everyone was mesmerized by the sight of an unmoving carcass with huge clouds of sand dust slowly settling around it.
Unaware of it, Cleo discarded conventions of proper behavior and stood up from her seat. She felt a pinch in her palm. She looked at her hand, failing to understand what happened. Where did this brown sand streaming through her fingers to the ground come from?
“Ongon!” she finally realized. “But how did it end up in my hand?” She clearly remembered her maid tying it around her neck that morning. Cleo felt the closed collar of her dress with her fingers. To take off the ongon, she would have to take off the entire dress first. Not to mention that she wouldn’t be able to do it without the maid’s help. The tight fasteners of the dress were in the back; she could feel them painfully digging into her skin even now.
********
His glider was moving smoothly, making no sound. Except for slight vibration from time to time running through its body, when it cut through the sticky clouds of vapor rising from the canyon’s bottom. However Nick, clenching the control joystick, knew that he had long surpassed the speed of Mach 27 and continued to push the accelerating pedal with all his strength.
The sunset, just like the sunrise, on the dark side of the Ghost was spectacular. It mesmerized not only the novices who just arrived but also those who lived on this planet. Nick arrived here just a week before. The team of geologists working on the Ghost needed additional batteries for their drilling equipment. It had been several months that the geoexploration team tried to break through the tough shell of the planet and get to its liquid core. The scientists believed that it could help them understand the origins and unique features of the mysterious mnemocrystals.
The rotation period of the Ghost around its local sun was equal to its own rotation period around its axis, and this is why only one half of the planet was in its mother star’s light. And had it not been for the six natural satellites, the other side of the planet would have always been dark.
Now the satellites were disappearing beyond the horizon one by one. It was getting dark quickly. Nick could not fight the feeling that the darkness is slowly enveloping him on all sides. The impression was enforced by the sharply steep vertical rocks rising several kilometers up on both sides. Below, filling up the entire deep and narrow bottom of the canyon, clouds of poisonous green steam were b
oiling. From time to time, gigantic geysers would break through from the planet’s core, throwing up thousands of cubic meters of gas a kilometer into the air.
Why the hell had he agreed to a half-joking offer from the guys working on the geo-exploration team to go through initiation into the planetary geologists? The unit’s charter strictly prohibited this, and, as Nick realized now, for a good reason. However, the tradition established by the first colonists a long time ago had taken deep roots and was still alive.
The initiation challenge was to fly through one of the longest canyons of the planet, poetically called the Canyon of the Dead, on a lightweight glider. You had to start only when one of its satellites hides below the horizon. The time was limited as the last, sixth satellite was setting exactly 52 minutes after the first one. Then the night would fall and the initiatee had to finish the flight in complete darkness. And of course, no use of autopilot was allowed.
Nick had justifiably believed himself to be a good pilot and had many hours of flying the gliders of this class. Therefore, he decided that it was an easy task. Nonetheless, he did take a testing flight, just to be on the safe side and to remember the route. He quickly developed the speed of Mach 2 and made it back on time. The only challenge was to avoid the air disturbances created by the fountaining hot geysers below. Once he was violently shaken and thrown off dangerously closely to the sharp-rocked slope of the canyon. On the whole, however, he thought the task was doable.
Now everything changed. The darkness spread from below. It seemed that the steep walls of the canyon started to move toward each other, like giant visors. Nick understood with his mind that this visual effect was achieved by the triple shadows cast on different sides by the three satellites setting down at the horizon. The darkness spreading down below was already interfering with the ability to estimate the next discharge of the geysers and to fly around them.
The glider started to shake from one side to another. It fell into air pockets several times and while in free fall flew at least a kilometer down, touching the darkness with its body. When the horizon swallowed the last but one satellite, sparkling for the last time with the reflected light of the local star, Nick realized that he was hopelessly late.
Long before that, he had to drop the speed to that of the sound. He had to fight an urge to drop it even more. The dashboard was barely lit: now only the altimeter and the speed indicator were working. Nick intentionally looked at the autopilot toggle switch, but he breathed out slowly and threw the vehicle forward by accelerating it.
The darkness was down, up, on all sides, and only at the very end of the canyon there was still a purple haze from the last setting satellite of the Ghost. What was its name? All the names of these celestial bodies slipped Nick’s memory. Calypso? Or, perhaps, Caliostro?
The glider shook violently again, Nick started to wind from one side to another. He had an impression that the vehicle was not flying but crawling on a beat-up road, constantly getting into potholes. And his ears heard a strangely familiar, but completely impossible here recurring sounds: squeak-squeak, squeak- squeak, squeak…
In a moment, he heard voices. Was it a transmitter and someone was trying to reach him with a message? Nick was listening intently but due to the strong interference failed to understand anything.
The glider jumped again so unexpectedly that Nick bit on his own tongue and came to.
“Whisperer, can he be like…”
“What ‘like’? You’d better rush the beast! We need to get to the place before dark.”
“This is exactly what I’m doing. Broke several sticks already on its back. Don’t even know how many. The beast can die on us like this. What are we going to do then?”
“What, what, you know what – we’ll carry him on our backs.”
Nick shook his head, trying to shake off the mirage. His head was shot with such a horrible pain that he went out again.
********
Nick was lying on something hard. His whole body felt weak and broken. He was also a little chilly. Nick did not want to open his eyes at all. There was still an illusive hope that all of this was just a dream. He will open his eyes now and will find himself in his bedroom at his parents’. He will jump to the window as he is and will breath in the heady air of the Altay mountains. Then he will run on a gentle slope to the Teletsk Lake, will dive into its water, cool even in the summer, and, after a long and satisfying swim will return home right by the time grandma makes everyone breakfast. Or, in a slightly worse scenario, we will be in his hard bed of the close cabin at the Tau-Kita 1 base. Nick realized that his thoughts are too logical and too organized for a dream and came to.
He remembered everything that had happened to him, but as if it were with a stranger. His brain obligingly blocked a part of his consciousness and Nick now thought that the recent bloody events at the Arena happened to someone else, not to him. He was just an observer.
He was thirsty. His head was spinning. Familiar symptoms. He had clearly overdone it with speeding-up. His body had exhausted all it reserve and now he had to pay for it by feeling exhausted. First of all, he needs to drink enough water. Then his appetite will come.
Groaning and croaking just like Whisperer, Nick dangled his feet from the cot and slowly moved into a sitting position. His head started to spin immediately, and thousands of fireflies appeared in front of his eyes. He closed his eyes tightly and then opened them again. He was still dazzled and confused, but the vision started to sharpen. “Not so bad,” he thought, “As father said: We’ll live!” Now Nick finally noticed that all his bruises, scratches and cuts were carefully processed with some thick cream. Oh, not this! He felt embarrassed imagining how while he was out they washed his entire body and put fresh clothes on him.
He heard someone’s steps approaching from outside. The door opened slilghtly with a creak and Sith’s concerned face appeared in the frame. When their eyes met, the boy’s face was lightened with a whole range of emotions from surprise to joy, and he shouted, “Nick! Alive!” Nick’s face twisted from the loud sounds in his head, but Sith cluelessly continued, “A warthog on your head! You can sleep like no one else, pregnant changeling! You’ve scared everyone, understand? Not clear if alive or like dead, you see. Everything’s different with you. What kind of a person are you, ah, Nick?”
“Water,” Nick uttered trying to stop this rapid verbal flood. His voice was trembling. Nick realized he sounded pathetic, coughed and repeated firmly, “Sith, water. Bring me some water.”
“Water? Ah, of course, water. I’ll bring it, both water and the decoction Whisperer made for you,” Sith was so excited he dance walked. “You just don’t fall asleep again, I’ll be quick, one leg here and the other – there, or is it vice versa? But you’ve got me. Wait for me, I’ll be right back.”
Sith ran outside and yelled, “Whisperer, come over here! Our lazy boy is awake!”
Nick leaned back on the wall, unaware of a stupid smile on his face.
********
“So, how are you feeling?” Whisperer asked Nick again and again. The night already fell and everything around was washed over with the Dominia’s emerald light. Because of this, even the familiar objects looked strange. The huge disc of the planet seemed to be hanging over their heads. It must have been in its perigee right now. The sky was absolutely dark, not a single cloud up there. All this created perfect conditions for observation.
“Ah, I wish I had even the simplest telescope now, I could discern whole continents and seas. Only, of course, if there are any there.” Nick thought that even with his unequipped eye he could see the elaborate surface of the planet.
“The Eye has opened,” Whisperer noticed his interest to the Dominia and must have interpreted it in his own way. “Big trouble is coming.”
“Why trouble?” Nick asked unwillingly. He was already fed up with the recent events, to discuss some ancient superstitions now was not what he wanted to do. Instead, he showed around with his arm, “Such beauty
all around us, Whisperer!”
“Beauty,” the old man either stated or mocked Nick. “Everything matches, Nick.”
Having noticed his puzzled look, Whisperer clarified, “Everything is just like in old legends. I, of course, don’t believe all those myths, too old to take all the prejudices at their face value. However, the Eye had not opened so widely from the time of the First Exodus. It gives me goosebumps when I look at the Dominia. And there are all these noises in my head, as if someone is whispering to me all the time. I hear voices even in my dreams. But I can’t understand anything. Please don’t look at me as if I am bitten by a craze-grass,” the old man smirked. “I’m telling you, the trouble is coming.”
“Whisperer, what if I tell you that this Dominia’s Eye of yours is nothing but another planet, meaning a similar world, just like here. Would you believe me? Or you’d think that I am the one who has been bitten by a craze-grass?”
“Look at me right now!” Whisperer turned to Nick with his entire body and stared at him with a long look.
“Common, Whisperer!” Nick was taken aback by his reaction. “Eye, let it be the Eye, if you say so.”
“The Orphius floats in the sky, blazing hot and lightening everything around. Junius, the youngest one, is burning in his father’s embrace. Caprius, the middle one, is empty and lifeless forever, while Santius is as cold as the marble ice. Only Terrius is the spring of life, and for life not to die, the sister is watching it over, and its name is Dominia.”
It took Nick some time to realize that the old man was citing an unknown verse to him.
“This is an excerpt from one ancient tractate. The author is thought to be Zan the Thinker, who lived long before the First Exodus,” Rich explained after a minute-long pause.