* * *
With this refusal to be allowed inside Sabohl’s anger began to get the best of him. Yet, through this fog he realized that he needed to leave before he really did something stupid and forever get banned from this place. So he stomped off not looking at all as to where he was going or the danger he was putting himself into. Because he had strong contacts with the underworld, and as far as he was concerned, was safe anywhere he wanted to go, he headed out. Although in saner moments he knew better. If he wanted to be honest the group he dealt with was only one of the many who lived in the shadows of society. But with his anger in control he really was being careless. He didn’t notice when he had turned in the wrong direction and now was heading into a part of the village that even the group he contacted would stay away. He just needed to push through and let his anger burn out and get back in control. At least he had been successful in extracting revenge earlier this evening. Suddenly he realized that his surroundings were strange to him, and he looked around and could see shadowy figures converging on him as if he was prey and they were the carnivores.
His mind flashed danger, danger, danger, but it was too late. With the fires he had set all the village would be there, and here where he presently was, would be no help. He was completely on his own. Could he talk his way out of it, or would he have to fight? In a sense the latter part of this question brought a grim smile to his face. With his mood tonight fighting might be the very thing. Again, reason pushed its way into his mind as he knew that there was no way that he by himself would be able to overcome the size of this gang. He stopped and searched his surroundings for a place that he could better defend himself and allow these to only approach from the front making it more difficult for them to attack. Yet, at the same time, he needed a direction available that would allow him to escape if the opportunity presented itself. He realized that he was still close to the river, and there was an old dock, rotting, unused, and falling apart making it an ideal place to protect himself. If it became too hard to defend then he had the river to jump into, and with the darkness of the area he would be unseen once he was in the water. Yes with this storm raging it would be dangerously cold, a raging torrent, but the danger just about ready to approach him was greater. Quickly he picked up his pace and feinted away from his planned point and then picked up his pace even more and cut to the old dock, and headed out towards the end being careful to keep his balance as it swayed under his feet making him realize that the dock was in worse shape that he first thought. Looking around in the dim reflected light he could see that there was debris and trash scattered all over the place. There seemed to be a few stacked empty shipping containers which further narrowed the approach. He hoped that because of the instability of this old dock, the stacks of trash, debris, and old containers that it would further his advantage making this gang have to approach much more carefully than they had planned.
* * *
The one who was following looked at the movements that Sabohl was making and at first it didn’t make any sense to him. It was obvious that he was now aware that there was a gang of thugs closing in on him, but it had been too late to avoid a confrontation. As he watched he saw Sabohl appear to head in one direction to suddenly dodge and head out on the old dock. Why’d he do that? It didn’t make sense, but it must to Sabohl. He saw the old dock sway a little, and knew that it was in very bad shape – but what to do, what to do? He, by himself couldn’t help, there were just too many of them. And besides his orders were clear – Sabohl could never learn that he was under constant observation, and was followed everywhere he went, and if he revealed himself, then as smart as Sabohl was it wouldn’t take him long to figure it out. So, with a helplessness of events beyond his control, he remained hidden and watched as everything slowly unfolded before his eyes.
* * *
As the villagers watched, the final shelters that were on the edge were consumed by the roaring conflagration. And slowly with nothing left to burn the flames began to slow in their rage, and now the storm with the winds and rain became, once again the dominant force, slowly overcoming the flames. Now instead of the roar of the fire, there was a replacing sound of hissing as the rains finished what the fires had begun. With most of the village turned out to attempt to suppress the fire they stood there numb and in silence at the destruction that lay before them. Too much in shock to even think, or contemplate how such a thing had started, or the results of that fire, or what the true loss had been, at this moment. Then, slowly, since there was nothing left to do, they broke up and headed back to their personal shelters, defeated by what they had just witnessed. Tomorrow they would return and see if anything, anything at all could be recovered. Although from what they had witnessed, and how they were feeling at this very moment, it was very doubtful.
At least they could be thankful that these particular shelters were not very close to where they actually lived. Had it been, then there could have been many deaths, as the fire tore through their places of work and personal shelters, leaving nothing but the ashes of the village. If that had happened would they rebuild on top of the ashes of their previous shelters, or would they have moved? That was an unknown. It would have been something that would have been a hard choice for any of them to make – something that none of them had ever contemplated. It probably would have come down to how many would have died and who had survived. By the fire starting when it did, it easily could have caught the whole village sleeping, and with no warning or no time, the deaths could have been very high. So with these thoughts they quietly returned, smelling of smoke, and covered in soot. Eventually leaving only one or two who continued to stare unbelieving at what they had witnessed.
One of these slowly withdrew and was out of sight. He had been the one who had sounded the alarm, and now needed to find the one who had continued to follow Sabohl. But with the storm still raging, and only a general idea as to direction, he really had no idea. At least he could head to one of the planned rendezvous points that had been set up for this side of the village. There were a number of these marked for the teams throughout the village and surrounding area, and since he had seen them head in the direction he was presently going, he decided to head to the closest one. It was a cold depressing night. With what had transpired, and what he had witnessed, it made it so much more so – but what to do? It was obvious that they knew who had started the fire. Well, sort of. Since they never really witnessed him setting the fire, it could have been coincidence after all. But he suspected that there was a connection between Sabohl and what had happened here. Yet, one didn’t just go and accuse one of the most important learned of such crimes. Shaking his head, he realized that there was no proof, and if they came forward, they could be accused of starting the fire also. And how could they explain it away? It angered him that Sabohl was going to get away with another one.
He finally reached one of the meeting places and began to pace. The other hadn’t arrived yet. He wondered what was transpiring, but there was no way to know. If truth be told he could be waiting at the wrong place, since it was likely that Sabohl had just circled around and headed back to his personal shelter. And with that thought he wondered if maybe he should head back there, but decided against it and wait a little longer. If he didn’t show up soon he’d head out over that way and see if that had happened. And with that decision the time continued to drag by slowly without any change. So he decided to head over to Sabohl’s shelter and see if indeed the other was there. Unfortunately it was completely on the other side of the village and would take him some time to reach there. So before leaving in the dim light he left a brief, very wet note that stated for him to wait here if he came to this meeting point. Taking a deep breath and shaking off a shiver he headed out rapidly to see if they had returned. Yet, when he arrived back at the place where they would observe Sabohl’s shelter no one was there and the shelter was dark. So they hadn’t returned. Where’d they go? And where are they? He laughed a bitter laugh, if he knew that he wouldn’
t be running around like this on this stormy, cold, very wet night.
He waited what he considered was a reasonable amount of time and when no one showed, he headed back to the other rendezvous point, taking his time to check on other locations as he headed back across the village. Soon he and his assistant would be relieved and the dawn couldn’t be far away. But with this storm he suspected that it would require the suns rising to lighten the area well enough to know that it was dawn. At each point he checked he came up empty and eventually returned to his starting point after leaving the devastation left by the fire. Again back, he was alone. With no idea of what to do or where to go, he was becoming alarmed. Normally they were to stay together, but tonight there were extraordinary circumstances that had required them to split up. Now he was here with not a clue as to what had transpired after they became separated. Shrugging inwardly, at this moment there was very little he could do but wait.
The only advantage to this location lay in the fact that it was out of the way, and there was very little chance that one of the villagers would come by and start asking questions. So he waited, hoping that his partner would show, and in what seemed much too long he could finally see someone approaching his location, and once he was close enough in the uncertain light, he recognized his partner by his walk and waited as he slowly, cautiously approached this meeting place. He wanted to shout out, “What has happened?” But held this in check, and when the one who had followed Sabohl had joined him, he found that this one had an odd look about him. So he waited, and found that he didn’t have to wait long as his assistant took a very deep breath, shuddered a little, leaned back against one of the stacks of unused lumber and shook his head.
“I think Sabohl is dead.” He whispered.
Shocked at what he had just said, the leader asked, “What? Are you sure? What happened?”
“Look, when I left you and followed Sabohl he headed for that shelter down by the river where females sell their favors. It seems that once he had accomplished what he had set out to do he was going to celebrate by taking a female. But he was denied access. From what I could gather, in a previous visit he had roughed up one of the females, and now is barred. This set him off and it was obvious that he was furious, because he took off in the wrong direction. I think if he had been in control of himself at this point he would have just headed back to his shelter and leave it at what he had already done.
“I’ve heard word that the whole storage complex was destroyed, is that right?”
In a subdued voice the leader answered, saying, “Yes, the whole thing. Once that first shelter’s roof collapsed the winds drove the fire into the rest of them. By the time anybody could get there, even though we tried, there really wasn’t much that we could do but watch as it burned.”
“Then this has become a very bad night.” He paused, as he absorbed this information, and sighed a bit. “This is going to destroy many of the businesses here. I guess we can be considered lucky that it didn’t get into the living shelters.”
Shaking his head in agreement, the leader said, “Very lucky indeed. Anyway continue on if you would.”
“Oh, yeah, I guess that would be a good idea.” He looked out over the leader’s shoulder and paused as he stared out into the distance. While this wasn’t the meeting point where they would change shifts it was the secondary location. “I think that our replacements are arriving.”
Turning around and looking in the direction that the other had been looking he saw two figures materializing out of the darkness – dawn must be close. They waited until the two arrived and the leader of the night shift then signaled him to continue.
“Okay. Anyway, like I said, he must have been angry because instead of heading back in a safe direction he went deeper into part of the village where it is very dangerous. There are a number of gangs, much theft and murder, and who knows what else, since good people just stay away – especially if they want to come out alive. And you know, the deeper you go the worse it gets, and he continued to go deeper. I became worried not only for him, but for myself. Then, I really had hoped because of the time of the night, but it was a lost hope, one of those roaming gangs found him …”
“And they killed him right there before your eyes?” The leader asked.
“If it only had been that simple, no, and that’s why I can only say I think he’s dead.”
The two that had just joined them had very questioning looks on their faces and the leader of this team asked, “Killed, who was killed?”
The one who had been following Sabohl said, “The one we have been assigned to follow and report on, you know Sabohl.”
“He’s dead?”
“I, think so, but let me finish, and I think you’ll understand. When the gang showed up I didn’t know what to do. Should I go in and help, should I stay and watch – that kind of thing. I realized that even with two of us there’d be no chance, and our orders are very clear. There must never be any contact between us and Sabohl. So I watched from a hidden place, deep in the shadows. I could see that Sabohl was still furious, but he seemed to realize his situation and began to look for a place that he could defend himself against a group this size. Personally I wouldn’t have picked where he did, but when there is no time to really look one takes what seems to be convenient, and for him it was an old rotting dock. In a way it was a good choice forcing the attackers to come at him with the maximum of two at a time giving him some advantage in the fight.
“The leader of this gang yelled at him saying, ‘Just give us your valuables and we might let you live.’ At this point the rest of the gang laughed, immediately letting anyone who happened to be around that living past the next few moments was quite unlikely. Sabohl bellowed something back at them, and while I couldn’t hear the words it incited the leader and the gang to go after him immediately. But with the restrictions only a couple could attack at a time and for a while Sabohl held his own. The problem was the dock. With all the bodies that was on it, and its poor condition it began to sway, throwing the ones fighting off balance. And during one of the shifts of the dock I saw Sabohl lose his balance and one of the attackers was able to stab him once. But at this point all this action was too much for the dock and it collapsed into the river taking half the gang with it and, of course, Sabohl.
“At this point the rest of the gang left quickly and began to head downstream to see if anybody had survived. But with this storm raging the river was a maelstrom of boiling water, tearing downstream at a terrific rate. In fact from what little I could see it wouldn’t be long before the river would go beyond its banks and begin to flood the lower areas.” He shuddered for a moment before continuing. “I just don’t know how anybody could survive that even if they were strong swimmers and were in great shape. While Sabohl is big and strong, he had been stabbed just before the dock went into the water. No, I don’t know how bad, and because of the bad light, I don’t know if he was able to grab some of the flotsam or other debris that was both from the disintegrating dock and what was already in the river or whether he was able to get back ashore. So I can only assume, at this point that he drowned. But, I have no proof, none at all. And with the speed of that water his body wouldn’t even wash up on the banks until a very long way away from here, if ever.”
The other three were silent for a while, and the leader of the relief asked, “What should we do now? I mean there’s no one to know what happened, or where Sabohl is, or even if he’s alive.”
The leader of the night team thought a moment, taking a deep tired breath since this last night had been very stressful and very eventful. “Look, if he survived then somehow he’ll return to his shelter, so I guess the best thing would be for the two of you to stake out his place and see if he does return. After we get some sleep we’ll put together a report and get it off to the history board or society leaders and after that it’s in their hands as to what happens.” Again pausing because he could feel the weariness pressing in on him now, and it was becoming har
der to concentrate let alone think, “Look, I think that this is out of our hands and all we can do is watch his old haunts and see what happens. I don’t know what else we can do.”
CHAPTER TEN
FROM SITE TO HOME
Storm after storm rolled in on the site and it was another 9-day before they finally broke, and with the morning light it was clear, calm, and very cold. Jura and Kal were thankful to finally be able to leave their portable shelter into the cold crisp air. With their breathing producing great clouds of steam, it had become obvious to all that this was a horrible place to spend the Season of Cold, and probably one of the main reasons for its abandonment once the skirmishes and fighting among the tribes and clans became a thing of the past. There were so many other places to live that could provide more comfort. Still as they stood outside in the frigid air it wasn’t long before they were shivering and retreated briefly back inside where the fire kept it warm. “I must admit”, Jura said, “that I was looking forward to getting out of this shelter and into some fresh air. But after doing just that, well, here we are back inside.” She laughed and just shook her head. I don’t know which is worse, the raging storms that we’ve just experienced, or seeing the suns shining and finding that it’s so cold that we can’t even stay out and enjoy it.”
A Taste of History Past Page 22