The Sacred Era: A Novel (Parallel Futures)

by Aramaki Yoshio

  “Yes. Would you be willing to give me the chain?”

  “The chain?”

  “Yes. Not the medal. Just the chain.”

  K hesitates for a moment. The chain can easily be replaced later. It shouldn’t be a problem to give it to him.

  “Sure, you can have it. But what use is it to you?”

  K wavers for an instant, noticing the strange gleam in the hermit’s eyes as he watches K’s hands detach the medal from its chain.

  “All right, I’ll throw this toward you, so you’ll have to catch it, okay?” K says.

  Suddenly, the horned owl stirs from its quiet observation of K and the hermit, once again speaking with alarm.

  “Don’t give it to him! Don’t give it to him, K! K! K! You can’t give it to him!”

  What the hell?

  A strange sensation—like nausea—washes over K. But he pays it no heed. He throws the chain toward the hermit.

  The hermit effortlessly grabs it from the air.

  “Why thank you,” he says.

  The hermit smiles, baring his teeth to reveal a pair of sharp fangs. So evil beyond any words is his smile that K cannot help but tremble at its sight. What has he done?

  4

  Following the hermit’s instructions, K jumps from one stone gear to another until he finally makes it to the top of the clock tower, where he finds a hatch in the ceiling. He lifts it open, then climbs up to the rooftop of the tower. Outside, a magnificent view of the black sun hanging low in the sky meets him. The dark day will soon come to an end, only to be replaced by an even darker night.

  K admires the 360-degree panorama of the city, a wider view than what’s visible from the balconies of Castle Loulan. He takes a deep breath of Loulan’s dense atmosphere, savoring the sensual and intoxicating fragrance of the air. But something is different. This is not the fragrance of Loulan’s air that K breathes. No, it is the perfume of the woman on that rooftop. She does not notice K’s entrance. Standing at the other end of the rooftop with her body leaning over the railings, she looks upon the view of the distant mountains and the city’s rooftops as their outlines glimmer in emerald.

  K casts his gaze on her slim silhouette. Her long, white dress flows to her ankles, shimmering faintly as if covered in fireflies. When she notices K’s nervous approach, she turns around with a look of surprise showing on her face.

  “Hello,” K says with a bow. “My name is K.”

  “Oh, dear me, why are you here?”

  “I came to see you. Please, tell me your name?”

  Just as these words escape K’s lips, he suddenly comes to a realization. He knows this beautiful woman. He has known her for a long, long time now.

  “Don’t you already know?”

  “Yes, I do. Your name is Barbara.”

  “Yes.”

  How do I know this?

  K fixes his gaze on the woman’s face. She looks just like that mechanical doll Amalia. His heart races, reawakening with old memories of falling in love.

  “Where did you come from?”

  “From Earth.”

  “So far away . . .”

  The woman shows him a gentle smile as she returns K’s long gaze on her.

  “Yes, it all makes sense to me now. I traveled a distance of five hundred light-years, going all the way to Loulan just so I could see you again.”

  “Oh? But how did you know to find me here?”

  “I came here to see the hermit living below to ask him about the secret of the aurora. He told me that you were up here.”

  The woman’s eyes darken.

  “Oh, no! Did you meet with him? Did he ask you for some sort of favor?”

  “Yes, he did. He asked me to give him the chain from my medallion.”

  “A chain? Please don’t tell me you gave it to him.”

  “I did. Is there something wrong?”

  “This is bad,” she says with a sigh.

  “Why?”

  “There was a large owl with that man, right?”

  “Yes. Quite a rude bird, that one. Wouldn’t stop yapping.”

  “Yes, I’m sure it was. But it’s a friend of mine. It sometimes flies over here to tell me many things.”

  “And?”

  “The man below lost his ability to fly after his wings were broken. That’s why he’s been there all this time. But now that he has your chain, he’ll find a way to repair the clasps on his wings.”

  K’s shock at hearing this is almost palpable.

  “What? Wings?”

  “That’s right. Do you not know what sort of being that man really is?”

  “All I know is what the steward of Castle Loulan told me, that he’s an old hermit studying the aurora of Loulan.”

  “Oh, dear. That’s what he told you? That mechanical steward deceived you.”

  “You mean that it’s not true?”

  “Oh, no, not at all. That man is the devil.”

  “What? The devil? What are you talking about?”

  “Why would I lie to you? His name is Lucifer.”

  “Lucifer?”

  “That name is from the Bible of the Twilight Era. They say he was a fallen angel banished from Heaven.”

  “I’ve heard those stories too, and those in the Southern Scriptures that speak of a divine being known as the Dark Wanderer.”

  “Do you remember that he’s also called Dark Wings or the Lord of the Wicked Wings?”

  She’s right. K remembers seeing such names several times in the massive volumes of the Southern Scriptures. The scriptures speak of a Dark Wanderer, a scientist from the time when divine beings walked Earth. But because he possessed evil within his heart, they exiled him from the land of the gods.

  “But I thought devils like him have long been destroyed.”

  “No. He cannot be destroyed. He is immortal.”

  K shudders.

  “There was something he said to me. Something about how he discovered the Secret of Osiris and gained immortality.”

  “Oh, that cursed magic.”

  Does she know something that she isn’t telling him? K’s curiosity gets the better of him. He presses her to tell him more.

  “Just what sort of secret is it?”

  “It is a type of necromancy, a secret technique for bringing the dead back to life.”

  With anguish written all over her face, the woman speaks to K about the existence of a revivification tank called the “Sarcophagus of Osiris.” The device transmits a tremendous electric charge through a tank filled with a strange gas. Placing a corpse inside the tank brings it back to life within a day.

  “But restoring life this way runs counter to the most fundamental laws of nature! Even if you could bring someone back, only their flesh returns. But the soul—that can never be made whole again.”

  Their time is up.

  Lucifer is coming for them. The sound of flapping wings fills the air. K looks up to the now dark skies above them. He gasps at the sight of the giant, bat-like wings swooping toward them. Attached to his back with belts wrapping around him, his wings extend out to nearly twice the size of his stout body. But even more monstrous to behold are his eyes, flickering red in the darkness, fixed right on them.

  Lucifer dives toward the top of their heads, leaving in his wake a reeking stench so foul it makes K and Barbara gasp for air.

  K tries to fight back atop the cramped rooftop of the tower, doing all he can to place himself in front of Barbara as Lucifer lunges for her. But he is no match for Lucifer’s ferocity. He circles above their heads, seizing any opening he finds, pouncing from every direction.

  K falls, then gets up. He falls again, then gets up again. But in the end, his bravery is all in vain. Tiring of K’s stubborn refusal to stay down, Lucifer lets loose a plume of flame out of his mouth. The fire singes K’s hair and back, unleashing the noxious stench of burning sulfur. Yet despite the haze and nausea increasingly overwhelming him, K still does not stop fighting.

  But Luci
fer’s attacks on K are relentless. Finally, the stench overcomes K. As soon as he falls to the floor, Lucifer grabs hold of Barbara’s body. He carries her off, flying away toward Loulan’s black sky.

  Still fighting to stay conscious, K calls out Barbara’s name. Again and again, he screams, until his voice goes hoarse. But Lucifer’s dark shadow has already flown far beyond his reach. He has already disappeared into the dark sky.

  5

  K awakens to a sky already blanketed in the deeper darkness of night. What happened? The hair and the clothes on his back should be burnt. But there is no trace of fire on them. His ears ring, and his head aches, as if it were slowly being emptied out.

  Was I dreaming? Did the devil attack me in my dreams?

  Yet all that happened remains far too vividly etched in his memory.

  K descends from the top of the tower. Nowhere else to go now but return to the city. Once again, K aimlessly wanders through town. Once again, he ends up back at the harbor where all the docked starships slumber.

  Thoroughly exhausted, K slips inside an empty waiting room in the terminal building. He plants himself down on one of the benches. His ears continue to ring.

  K hears a voice in the distance calling out to him.

  “It is you!”

  Languidly, K looks up. The young man K met at the bar some days ago stands before him. As usual, his face is dark and dismal. Nonetheless, he makes an effort to offer a weak smile.

  “Not a nice night, is it?”

  “Not really.”

  It’s the only response K manages to muster. For a moment, the thought that this young man resembles his old friend Hoffman crosses K’s mind. But it was a long time ago, back on planet Earth, when they parted.

  “You don’t look too good. How about we go get a drink to make you feel better? If you wish, I can take you to another bar.”

  K briefly hesitates, knowing that his invitation means that all the costs will be paid out of his pocket. But it doesn’t take long for him to change his mind.

  “That’s certainly a thought. Sure, let’s go.”

  The young man brings K to a dilapidated area not too far from the harbor. Hidden behind the mountains of rubbish strewn around the area is a secret entryway to a place that’s little more than a cramped hole in the wall. Not much space to go around in this place, with parts of the ceiling already collapsed and bits and pieces of the walls crumbling away around them.

  With a tone of familiarity, the young man orders something from the bartender. The bartender’s surly look and gray robes give him the appearance of a monk. With rough hands, he sets out two glasses for them, pouring their drinks from a pitcher.

  “This must be your first time,” the young man says with a proud flourish. “This is the drink that Loulan is most famous for.”

  K draws his bulbous glass close to his face, peering inside.

  Numerous tiny larvae swim within the clear liquid.

  “Am I supposed to drink this?” K asks in disbelief. “Just what is this?”

  “Those are the larvae of the famous butterfly flowers of Loulan.”

  With these words, the young man brings his glass to his lips without a moment’s hesitation.

  “So these are the larvae of the flowers that float through the air?”

  K remembers seeing such flowers in the floating gardens of Castle Loulan.

  “Give it a try. It’s delicious.”

  The young man empties his glass. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he turns to the bartender.

  “That was most excellent! Quite fresh!”

  “Yes. They hatched the day before yesterday,” the bartender curtly replies. “Another?”

  “Oh, yes, please.”

  The young man speaks as if he’s quite flush with cash, despite the fact that it’s K who will pick up the tab in the end.

  K observes the larvae swimming in his glass. Growing to a length of about a finger up to its first joint, the larvae swim about at dizzying speed, propelling themselves with a single flagellum extending out of their bodies.

  “This is what the egg looks like.”

  The bartender brings them a strip of paper, much like an egg card of a silkworm.

  “You first immerse them in alcohol. After three complete days, you warm them up to hatch the larvae.”

  K finally empties his own glass. Might as well just get it over with. The young man eagerly eyes K, watching for his reaction.

  “So? How was it?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t really say I found it to be all that great.”

  “Really? But the sensation when it goes down your throat is quite something else, isn’t it?”

  “Well, I just drank it all in one gulp.”

  “Then, you must have another.”

  At the young man’s urging, K steels himself for another try of the drink. This time, he takes his time drinking it. The young man is right. K does feel an odd slippery sensation as the drink goes down his throat.

  “You should start feeling the alcohol soon,” the young man says, placing his hand on his stomach. “Right now, they’re desperately struggling right in here, but soon enough they will burst open.”

  The young man explains that the bodies of the larvae contain some sort of alkaloid, which mixes in with the alcohol as their bodies burst open. It is indeed a strange kind of intoxication, markedly different from what you find from any Earth drug. That is not to say that it’s a pleasant sensation. For K, it feels as if his very being were splitting apart. At first, he figures that the experience differs from one individual to another. But when he asks the young man how he is feeling, he describes similar symptoms to what K feels. Whether one takes these symptoms to be pleasant or not though, that is another story altogether.

  “A magnificent feeling, isn’t it?”

  “Well . . .”

  Somehow, the drink’s effects remind K of the unpleasant sensations he experienced when he first traveled to Loulan, when his starship entered Karnak navigation.

  “Everyone feels funny at first,” the young man tells K. “Maybe the narcotics work at the level of the unconscious? Anyway, you should indulge yourself. Come with me.”

  The man leads K to the back of the bar, into another cramped room. Pulling aside the hanging curtains separating this room from the front, the young man takes K inside. There, they find a space without any tables or chairs. Instead, plush carpets rest directly atop the bare earth.

  “Why don’t you lie down for a bit?”

  No longer able to walk straight, K finds the young man’s suggestion quite attractive indeed. He drops down to the carpets so quickly he might as well have just fallen off his feet. The young man tends after K, first loosening his clothes, then bringing out a leather pillow from somewhere to place behind his head.

  “How do you feel?” he asks.

  “Not too bad,” K says, taking the time to study the young man’s face once more.

  Just as he had thought, he does look like Hoffman, almost like a twin. Could it be? Or is this just another of the effects of imbibing the butterfly-flower larvae? To K’s eyes, the young man appears to be wearing a mask of Hoffman’s face. Or is it Hoffman who’s put on this young man’s face for his mask? In the end though, does it really matter which is which?

  K’s mind is still in the midst of this confusion when he finally dozes off.

  6

  A large crowd gathers around K. He does not notice them until the sounds of their heavy breathing enter his dreams, awakening him from his inebriated slumber. He opens his heavy eyes, scanning his surroundings. Throngs of people now fill every inch of space, every single one either sprawled out on the ground or crouched down without a single care for the world. A few pass around a joint among themselves, each one taking a drag in turn, empty expressions on their faces. Among them is a young girl staring at the ceiling as she holds her knees, looking rather unbalanced.

  Young and old, men and women—there must be more than ten
people inside this cramped room. The young man who brought K here cuddles with a sullen-looking older woman in the opposite corner of the room, appearing to be deep in conversation with her.

  Another familiar face, the merchant K met in the Karnak vessel, also mingles among the people here, along with a younger woman, his daughter.

  What was her name again? Ellen or something?

  Her eyes are red, as if she has been crying for quite a while.

  Has every single woman here been crying? Why is everyone dazed or frightened all of a sudden?

  Something isn’t right here.

  Feeling somewhat rested, K rises from his rug, turning to the middle-aged man in some sort of work uniform seated next to him.

  “Did something happen here?” he asks.

  “What do you mean did something happen? Just who the hell are you?”

  The middle-aged man glares at K with a weary-looking face. Without a word, K retrieves his Sacred Service medal from a pocket of his clerical robes, flashing it to the man.

  “Oh!”

  The man’s attitude flips in a single heartbeat. As if frightened by his very presence, he shuffles away from K as fast as he can.

  Watching the man’s behavior only confuses K further. Shrugging his shoulders, he sits back down, holding his knees just like the woman sitting across the room.

  “What a depressing night! It always gets like this whenever it visits,” someone mutters.

  “Not a soul left in town now.”

  “Of course not! Nights like these call for narcotics! Only way to forget the doom and gloom!”

  The bartender walks through the curtains from the other room, bringing in his hands a five-sided tray, atop which stand numerous triangular glasses and a square blue bottle.

  “Everyone! Please, feel free to have a drink! These drinks are on him!”

  The shouts come from the far end of the room. It’s the young man who brought K here, pointing toward K. K has no recollection of agreeing to any of this.

  “Oh, that’s wonderful! Thank you! Don’t mind if I do!”

  “Come on! Pass around the glasses!”

  For a moment, some semblance of cheer returns to the people gathered here. It looks like they’ve accepted K as one of their own. The beautiful woman whose gaze was affixed to the ceiling earlier hands K the first glass, pouring a drink for him. K winces when he catches a whiff of the liquor’s strong aroma. But once it touches his lips, all that matters is its sweet flavor on his tongue.