by T. Wyse
“Now him, he doesn’t believe anything. I’m not sure what he thinks.” Rutger nodded at Davis. “Not sure he’s sure what he thinks either.”
“Just in it for the thrills.” Davis grinned, teeth shining dully.
“Me? I think there’s something to it, but not God’s wrath. Too strange for that. That God is more of a rain of fire, plagues, and all. This is more alien to what I’ve seen walking the earth. I think this is a trick, a kick from mother nature. We’ve got our fancy machines, electricity, our stupid toys, and it’s all swept away. All of it gone now. I think we’re facing an earthquake, but one we’ve never seen before.” Rutger’s face was humorless. “What worries me is what part of the earthquake is this? Are we through the worst of it, or is the worst yet to come?” he said and looked at the sky. “Still no stars. Miss them the most. So, what about you, then?” Rutger asked without taking his eyes from the black sky above.
“It’s a bit of a story.”
“All the better. Lots of pretty women along the way?” Davis’s smile was lost in the shadows.
“Just one.” Kechua’s tone snapped the air into silence around them.
“Sorry, go on,” Davis offered after a moment.
He spoke slowly, carefully choosing what to include. “I was taking part in a . . . ritual, I guess. I slept outside the village and missed ‘the wave’ as it came.” Kechua slipped in meaningless words, ones to fill their expectations. “I was in a forest, and then just in sand, just with my dog at my side.”
Rutger shifted subtly, not quite enough to betray movement, but his ear gulped in Kechua’s words, swirling them around as if trying to test the vintage of a wine.
“I’ve seen some ruined blocks like this, but I found people in a school on a mountain. They were fighting against a monster, I think like the one you described,” he said to Davis.
“Like what?” Rutger asked, his head bowing low, eyes piercing the distance between them.
“Hard to describe. Like a giant bug, but with a shell of stone; tentacles with teeth. Very strange,” he concluded, throwing the lie to the wind for the duration of the gaze.
“Strange, but to be expected now. Swore we saw a mountain walking the first day I was with him. Kid hasn’t been the same since that day.”
“You must have been busy yourselves.” Kechua broke the story, hoping to escape it.
“Yeah, keeping alive, taking whatever we could scrounge to survive. We’ve been moving about and haven’t seen many humans other than you.” Shawn’s heart jumped at those words, and the coiling thread within him trembled with increased nervousness as he continued his mumbling prayer. “So go on,” Rutger urged.
“Not much other than that, really. I’ve seen a pack of animals and a few petrified forests since then, not much else,” Kechua lied, glad Rutger’s gaze had gone back to the sky.
“Well, how did your dog die?” Rutger asked, somewhat irate.
“Oh, he’s not dead.”
“Wait, where is he then?” The gruff man violently sat up, stumbling to rise. The night, which had fallen too slowly to be noticed during their discussion, obscured his features.
“He’s waiting down—”
“We need to get him up here, now!” Rutger charged towards the stairs.
“Wait!” Kechua managed to stop him before he fully disappeared down the stairwell. “Believe me, he can handle whatever’s out there. He’ll be our guard dog. He’s tougher than any dog you’ve known, believe me on that.” Kechua smiled.
“He’d better be one tough dog, kid,” Rutger said, moving back to his spot with a wary reluctance. “He really isn’t safe down there.”
“He’s slept down on the soil every single night since this thing started.” Kechua tried to project smiling confidence. “He has that instinct you talked about, the one where he knows what’s what.”
That calmed Rutger’s darkened silhouette, and he gave an approving nod.
“I’ll be glad to see him when it’s morning then.” A tone of sincere glee slithered into the man’s rough tones. “Be good to have a dog around after all this. Something familiar for a change.”
***
The morning came with no memory of the dreaming world, or perhaps the dull memory was shot to amnesia when he realized he sat alone in the attic. Somewhere in the quiet and nightfall, he had fallen asleep against his pack. The lid lay open, and his shirts sat scattered around him. A trail of cloth led to the stairs, the stupid CD waiting at the top.
He scrambled to assemble the clothes, scooping them into the pack and replacing the CD amongst them. They had taken all his food but had left his water, and the side pockets with his precious seeds and books remained untouched.
His heart pounded with rage as he surveyed the chaotic paths outside for any trace of them, but his own internal rhythm hid their fleeing memories from his sight. This raging heat immediately chilled, however, as he scooped the pack up, fully ready to pursue.
The staff was gone. He stumbled, his heart sluggishly forcing ice through his veins so furiously his neck ached. He stumbled down the stairs, having to steady himself on the bannister, his trembling hand rattling the unsure screws fixing it to the wall as he passed.
“You let them go,” he snarled at Wolf, who met him outside the door, almost whistling with feigned innocence.
“Who?”
“Three men, you know, men who weren’t me. They came out of here with my things, and the staff.”
“My, my. Well, what do you plan to do about it?” Wolf gave a wide grin from which Kechua could almost see the anticipatory heat gush from his slavering maw. “If only our rule wasn’t ‘no doing harm to humans,’ I believe. Oh, then I might’ve been able to stop them!” He gave a rolling laugh. “Shall this change?” The form of Wolf shuddered like crinkling paper, rising to a misshapen bear of a creature. His eyes became giddy spheres, and daggered teeth were wetted with a lapping tongue. “Shall we hunt them down?”
Nearly gagging on the hot breath brought Kechua back down to the soil. He felt the pulse of hurried steps in the mire of padded down earth. “Nothing has changed, but I think you may appreciate what happens.” His lips curled into a toothy sneer, and without knowing it, he clacked his teeth together as he carefully focused onto the freshest path among the chorus of slow wanderings.
Two of them headed into the wastes together. Their quick feet slowed as they met the sands, and their slow treading sang against utter silence.
“Whatever. They’ll tell me,” he snarled and followed their trail, winding slowly and ending in a pumping rhythm that folded the earth’s song tenfold. His arms raised at his sides, his clubs in his hands, but he came to a skidding stop.
He looked at his clubs, black teeth shining in the newborn sun.
“What is it?” Wolf panted, looping back around him. “Don’t lose the moment, boy!” He gave an almost giddily chuckling snarl.
“They left me my weapons and left me alive.” Kechua glanced at the smaller club, the figures of the three dead looking at him.
“Any wounds would not last.”
“They didn’t know that.” He let his clubs rest at his sides. “Talk first. This doesn’t need to start the wrong way.” Kechua glared against the burning eyes, his lips closed tightly.
He strode with rhythm, but even as their dots appeared on the horizon, he only jogged until their forms grew, realizing they waited for him.
Davis let a jagged knife glint in the sun, but he slipped it into his backpack before Kechua caught up to them. Shawn slumped into the soil, clutching his head, rocking forward and back.
“You aren’t running. What is it you thought you were doing?” he snarled but calmed his voice.
“Okay, hold on.” Davis raised his flat palms between them. “Look, we weren’t running from you, we—”
“Where is my staff?” Kechua growled, pronouncing the words with a pointed separation.
Wolf paced behind him grunting, his tail whipping furiously.
“Yeah, was him,” Davis cut the boy off.
“Caught him moving before dawn. He’s real quiet, but we’re all light sleepers now.” The man produced a cigarette but let it dangle in his mouth unlit.
“I thought he’d decided to roll you. Just take enough that you wouldn’t notice at first, that’s all. But he’s moving weirder than before. He seems different. He’s always been a bit high strung, you know? But not like this. He was excited.”
“Yeah, he’s a ranger, but isn’t any park ranger, that’s for sure.” Davis grinned. “Bet you didn’t see his prints, didja? It’s in his face, in the way he walks. Even when the world’s like this, seems like they’re prepared to survive. That’s what rangers are trained to do you see, to survive, to be prepared, and to deal with anything that comes their way. But he’s different from that. The way he moved in the dark, the way he looked at us following him, well . . . We both were awake, thought it was just a roll. It wasn’t though.” Davis’ voice fell to a low and almost reverent fear. “Let’s just say he made it clear we weren’t following him, even in the dark.”
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Shawn rocked back and forth even more furiously and opened his pack to offer the stolen provisions. Kechua snatched them from the boy’s hands, which withdrew as if being zapped with lightning at their touch.
“Yeah, nicked your knife too, and the first aid kit.” Davis sighed, holding them out. “Would’ve been nice to have had that kit a few days back.” He lifted his leg, demonstrating a miserable scar with a gash in his jeans to match. The wound was not deep enough to cripple but significant enough to have blackened.
“The staff.” Kechua took the knife and slipped it back into the sheath. “He has it. I need it back.”
“Special, is it?” Davis winced and traced the ground with his foot. “Figured. The way he was looking at it, like a starving hobo at a steak barbeque. Like I said, thought it was just a roll. We don’t ever strip people, just take enough that they didn’t think it was worth the hassle, you know?”
“Look kid . . . he’s weird. You’re weird too, but you’re lighter’n him somehow. I can’t quite put it into words. Can’t quite put any of this crap into words,” he ended with a mumble. “He’s weird and he’s not someone you wanna mess with, got it?”
“I didn’t eat any of it, I swear,” Shawn blurted out suddenly. “I don’t want any of this anymore. I don’t care. If we aren’t with him, then I’m happy to be hungry.”
“Yeah, have to say half the reason we were bolting was to get the hell away from him.” Davis grimaced.
“Please, please forgive us. I don’t want to steal again. I never wanted to.” Shawn’s eyes trembled, his hands digging into the straps on his shoulders.
“How many people did you hurt?” Kechua looked between the two, scowling.
“Nobody.” Davis shrugged. “Like I said, we never took enough that anyone would chase us for. His idea, but I guess he wasn’t looking for food. Was just an excuse to check for whatever he was after, and having us around meant he could bolt.”
Shawn’s words poured out in a flurry. “I don’t want any of this anymore. Before all this happened, I wished this. I wanted anything to break the monotony, to take me away from it. I wanted to be tested. I wanted to show how holy and righteous I was, how much better I was . . . ”
“But it wasn’t as convenient as you thought it’d be?” Kechua murmured.
“I don’t want it anymore. I just want to go back to it; go back to my stupid father forcing me to hunt with him, back to the expectations . . . back to everything. I still see him whenever I sleep, still see them all. I can’t . . . ”
“You don’t think that means they’re still alive?” Kechua’s tone couldn’t stay harsh against Shawn’s desperation. “Don’t you feel things when you’re dreaming, things that you can’t deny even when awake?” Kechua looked between the two of them. “Everyone you’ve known in life, it’s not gone, they’re all just waiting for their cue to return.”
Davis’s face broke into hope before transforming into angry despair. “Yeah, we’ve heard something like that from people. Don’t take stock in it though,” he snarled, looking down into his cigarette package once again. “Old lady nagged me, stupid, I . . . ” He trailed off, incoherent. “I’d give anything to see her again, not in any dumb dream, but kiss her; hug her. I’d work twelve every day from now on if I could just relax on my couch again, not have to worry about this being my last smoke. Don’t play games with my mind like that. I see enough of that nonsense in my dreams.”
“I see it . . . I see it,” whispered Shawn. “It’s there, below and above, they’re sleeping. I can feel it . . . Why couldn’t I feel it before?” There was a strange calmness, a sense of resolution in the boy’s voice.
“Let it take you, let it sweep you up. Remember the feeling of when you resisted it in the first day and revoke it.” Wolf’s voice radiated behind Kechua, the gentle voice flowing over them. A pair of rounded white cubs rubbed against his legs in passing and sat before the boy, each of them panting happily.
“I hear you, angel, I hear your beautiful words.” Shawn opened his eyes, and for a moment, Kechua thought he could see the other wolf reflecting in the boy’s eyes—a faded white, but warm and soft yet.
“Hallelujah.” With a single, joyful utterance, Shawn disappeared in a flurry of red ruby light, shuffling towards the sky. It was a lonely beam, a beam of surrender, of acceptance, and it left only the boy’s pack behind.
Davis stumbled back, locked onto the pack as it slumped into the indent. “Damn,” he whispered.
“She’s still alive. What you see in your dreams is real, true.” Kechua smiled.
“Take his pack with you and go back to the house. How much do you have including that?”
Davis blinked a moment and scratched his head. “Two months, maybe. It’ll be a stretch. Probably more in the houses, I guess. Could be longer. Going to be pretty lonely though.” He sighed. “Kid was a drag but, I don’t know, I’ll miss him.” He lit the cigarette. “I’ll miss him.”
“I need you to show me where he left, where he threw the staff. I can find him myself, but I’ve wasted too much time already. That’s my price.” Kechua glanced back at the houses.
“Fair enough.”
“Disappointing,” murmured Wolf, back to the shaggy grey the moment Kechua’s eyes glanced across him. The three of them walked in silence back to the houses.
“There.” Davis pointed out the trail of footsteps with a crater at their inception. The steps left the crater and paused, a tiny probing indent left in the sand. “I can’t imagine you’ll catch up to him though. Weird, what’s in the hole?”
“Probably fresh water, likely will be a stream within a day,” Kechua explained, heading towards the stairwell. “Be safe, and be well.” He offered a handshake to the thief and went on his way.
He didn’t turn back, but he imagined a thought that gave him pleasure. He thought of the man sitting there, utterly alone with himself and his thoughts. He imagined the man judging himself for what he had done, resolving to change himself for the better. He imagined a lonely and remorseful creature, stirring the last pieces of a craved convenience becoming extinct.
Kechua allowed the thoughts of the man to dwindle as he crossed the threshold of the skeletal town. Kechua followed the echoing footsteps of the man, and as the cluster of houses grew smaller, the footsteps grew deeper, clearer, and the pace morphed into an excited sprint. He ran in the shadow of the steps, his clubs rising to his side like wings.
***
The place bore no significance of any kind; no grand showdown within a mock street of buildings or some plateau of rock glowing with sunlight. The staff poked from the earth, leaning slightly away from Kechua. He slowed from his run, a little too close to the man and staff, the cloud of dust rushing up hi
s back as he carefully strode forth.
Rutger hunched over, his face shadowed, his body pointed directly at the boy’s approach, but gave no threat or greeting.
He stood there, equidistant as the figure clad in a blanket of yellowed sand camouflage. He expected some grand declaration from the man, some explanation, yet there was nothing but the slow rhythm of the sleeping world below him.
Wolf trotted beside the scene, cut between the two of them. He tasted at the wind, his tail giving the staff a playful bat as he crossed. The staff twirled in place, but it failed to provoke any reaction from the man as Wolf leisurely retreated away from the pair.
Kechua stared at the resting figure, feeling his breathing and heartbeat, and he could sense a line somewhere close. If crossed, he would ignite the man to life or spring an unseen trap.
“Not a dog, not a dog at all.” Rutger broke his silence with a grim chuckle, the dark and honest tones completely unveiled. “Didn’t even need to see him.”
Kechua crept forward, beyond the perceived line, gripping his clubs. He inched to the staff, shuffling carefully to react to whatever the man brought.
“Go on, take it,” Rutger declared plainly, but he didn’t look up from his shadowy facade. “Show me it’s yours.”
The boy reached, his fingers touching the tip of the staff, which spiraled clumsily away. The ground beneath the staff shifted out beneath, forcing him to stumble against it and spin around, skidding in the sand.
Yet this trivial fumble animated the man. The cloak spun, and something tore the staff from Kechua’s hands with raw force. It cracked directly into his forehead, before snapping back to the man’s side.
Kechua stumbled onto the earth, saving himself with one hand and grasping futilely against another strike of the wood. For this effort, the wood cut his hand with a jagged red gash.
“A man could go a very long time searching, scraping, for even the whisper of something like this. But here you have it, wearing it in the open for anyone to see. Shame, gotta keep a grip on your things.”
“It’s not mine. It is just with me for now. You cannot take it like an object, or even be given it.” Kechua shook his head, the shaman’s strike echoing against his skull. “It has to choose you.”