by Jamie Ott
~~~
Back at camp, Julius hitched on a smile, yet sadness still emanated from his eyes.
Jacko tried to be extra kind to him. Somehow, he couldn’t help but feel partly responsible for what happened to his family. If he could, he’d end it all; the war and send the gods and demons packing, and then put everything back the way it was.
Immediately, Julius noticed the ring on Jacko’s finger. He said nothing, however, and asked not a single question. Throughout the evening, he shot Jacko and the ring glances.
He could hardly keep his own eyes of his finger. The stone bothered him. It reminded him of something; tried to drag a distant memory from somewhere.
Uncle Bally was too thrilled to notice their preoccupation. After preparing the deer, he filled a large tree bark he’d whittled into a pot, with water from the river; then he set it to boil with several large pieces of deer meat and chunks of fat. Next he hacked off the remaining bits of meat, slid them onto wood skewers and draped them across a stand he’d made.
Uncle Bally cooked the meat well into the night. He wrapped the leftovers in leaves he’d gathered, and then stowed them in his bag.
The smoke of the meat was just as good as the taste of venison.
After a while, though, it started to bother his eyes and sinuses. He laid back and shut his eyes, trying to ignore the irritation.
Heaviness weighed down on his chest as he lay there, breathing shallow so as not to pull too much smoke into his lungs.
Once, his mother told him the story of Heraclea. She was given a ruby that shined so bright that she’d use it to light her room in the evening. The ruby was said to empower its wearer, making one’s ineptitudes vanish.
Something long and yellow pecked at his ankle.
He opened his eyes and saw that it was the beak of a stork.
He breathed in, sharply, as he realized that he no longer lay in his hammock. He looked at the sky and saw that it was wine colored once again.
All around him was black soil for miles. He turned around, looking for the mountain, thinking he needed to get back to his Uncle, and back to the summit.
He stopped. A few miles out, someone in a black hooded cape rode toward him, on a horse. He heard the galloping of its hoofs on the wind.
Inwardly, he told himself to run, to get back to the summit. He couldn’t, though; he just stood there and watched the person get closer.
The horse slid to a stop, spraying up dirt at him. He climbed off the horse. As he did so, his cloak flapped, revealing a black shiny armor that looked like painted metal, only it fit his torso too perfectly, melding against his skin and emphasizing every lean and oversized muscle he had.
The man stood ten feet tall. Around his waist was a silver belt from which hung a matching sword. The man set down a bag that was similar to Jacko’s cunnan, only it held silver arrows, and a bow to match.
He drew the sword long and slow, and stood there facing him, waiting. Jacko tried to see his face, but the hood fell too low. He knew the guy wanted to fight, but Jacko didn’t have his sword.
However, the man didn’t care. He raised the sword skyward and held it there a moment. Jacko should have been scared but he wasn’t because this was all so familiar. He knew what the man planned to do, and Jacko knew just how to counteract.
The sword flung down at him.
Jacko merely side stepped.
It was an effortless strike, and he knew it. He raised the sword again, only he flung it down, faster. Jacko side stepped again, only faster, too.
Next moment, the guy was flinging the sword left and right, almost like figure eights from the left side of his body to his right, over and over.
Jacko moved just as quickly, like a weaving boxer, stepping right, and then left, repeatedly. Fluidly, they moved together, almost like a dance.
This went on and on, and Jacko knew he mustn’t tire of it, or he’d be sliced.
Finally, the man stopped, only to lunge at him, repeatedly with a full body front thrust. He poked forward at his head, neck, shoulder-to-shoulder, chest and gut.
Jacko found it especially difficult to dodge his attempts. He knew it’d be easier to thwart him, with his sword.
Suddenly, it appeared. He held it with the tip pointed skyward, and thrust it, forcefully, left to right, and up to down. Together, they made a zig zag motion up and down his body.
After a while, the motion exhausted him, so as he countered the next strike, he spun around and pushed the man in the back, making him fall to his knees.
His eyes flipped open once again. He was looking at the blue sky through brown branches.
Uncle Bally was still smoking venison.
He sat up and ran his hands through his hair, trying to make sense of the dream. It felt almost as if he’d astral projected in his sleep again, only different.
Uncle Bally was snoozing on his hammock. The metal can was steaming.
“Uncle Bally,” he said softly.
“Hmm?”
“Got enough tea for me?”
“Surely.”
He sat up and poured them.
As he stared into the flames, while sipping, it suddenly occurred to him that he hadn’t touched his sword in weeks.
He went to his bag and pulled it out. As he did this, a shock traveled up his arm. Once more, thoughts, like memories, tugged at his mind, but he couldn’t quite pull them to the fore of his brain so he could view them.
~~~
After a bit of scrambled pheasant eggs and salmon roe, Jacko decided to go foraging. A strong scent of citrus had been washing over their camp for a few days, now.
Uncle Bally and the bats were off hunting, and Julius had gone off without a word.
He knew there were, likely, hundreds of other beings there on the summit, but it felt almost like they were alone. Not once, did Jacko or the others meet another individual in the woods.
The sound of running water came from some feet ahead. He followed it to a dirt basin with a rock cliff. From the cliff water fell through a fissure, like a small waterfall. Julius was sitting on the edge, staring thoughtfully into space.
“Hey, Julius.”
He flinched.
Jacko sat next to him and watched the water tumble down.
“You know I can’t believe that this is it,” said Julius. “I mean, we just climbed a mountain to escape the fissures. Will we never be able to return to civilization? Or is this the final end? Are we the last people on Earth? And if so, are we stuck on this mountain.”
“Things could be a lot worse. We have food, water, and we’re safe. Try to look on the up side.”
“There is no upside, if this is it every day for the next fifty years. We come from a time where every day is filled with purpose, and now we have none. Doesn’t that bother you, at all?”
“Well, no.”
“How could that be? Why are you okay with that? You went to find your family, and you didn’t, I’m assuming by the lame response you gave, yesterday. Don’t you care at all?”
Jacko fell into contemplation for a moment.
“Julius, there are some things you should know. We didn’t tell you because you wouldn’t believe us. You probably still won’t, but I’m gonna try anyway. The truth is Faunus really is a god, just like in the legends.”
“Oh, Jacko…”
He turned back to the water fall.
“And this is the real Mount Olympus as you’ve probably read about. The reason the world is a disaster is because the gods – Olympians, Titans, demons, and angels – are having a war. When we happened upon you in the Garden of Hera, we were on our way here because we knew it was the only safe place.”
“Jacko, please. I’m being serious.”
“I think, in some way, you’re a part of this war. The dreams you keep having. They mean something, don’t they?”
But Julius had done. He got up and left without a goodbye.
He sighed loudly. Then he got up and continued his sea
rch for oranges.
A few minutes of walking and he approached another cliff. On the end, he could see most clearly the reddish outline of the sky outside the summit.
He got closer to the edge and looked down. Below was covered in cooling lava and ashy silt that stretch for miles until it touched the sky.
If he was to suffer, to be beaten so severely, like the first conjurer, than why was he there, safe, fed and well. How much more of this were the gods going to allow?
Then across the sky, he saw dark shadowy circles flit about, followed by light white-ish ones. They danced around each other as they fell to the ground.
More and more shadows came, like rain. Some black danced with white while some white danced with white, and occasionally, black with black.
Jacko’s heart sped, as it could only mean one thing.
The cliff rumbled violently.
Blasts sounded across the sky. White flashes of light flashed and died, repeatedly.
He backed away from the edge into a tree, rapping his head violently.
A dozen items flew down, bouncing off his head, hurting him more. He looked up and saw it was a tree loaded with oranges and orange blossoms.
He picked up as much as he could and returned to camp.
Meeting of the Two
Chapter 11
The ground didn’t stop trembling all the way back to camp. Funny how he’d pleaded to get his part over with, and now that he was close to the action, he was scared.
Uncle Bally and the bats were already back from hunting. Julius was still gone. The bats were suspended over the river, looking at the sky which had become even more blotted with dancing shadows. The war was not only in space, but had reached Earth.
Uncle Bally, who stood at the edge of the river, turned at his approach.
“Did you see the skies?”
The panic soaked his voice like water on a tissue. His eyes were bugged out and his brow furrowed into his head, creating extra lines in his forehead.
“Yes. Try to stay calm because Julius will freak out.”
He dropped the oranges next to the cherries.
“Are we safe?”
“I don’t know. I mean, I think so, as long as the gods can hold them off.”
“Well,” he said in a tone much higher than his normal voice. “I guess it makes sense. This is an important place; they want to conquer it.”
Jacko’s stomach lurched.
“What do you think?”
“I wish I had an answer but I don’t. The gods told me I’d know what to do when the time was right. But I don’t know what to do. I have no instinct. I could fight, and probably do real well, maybe even kill a lot of demons, but I don’t think that’s what the gods want of me.”
“Yeah, I’m not saying go out there and face them,” he said more calmly. “What we need is a plan of escape. They will make it into this bubble of a summit.”
“I think the only safe place for you is heaven, but I don’t have the power to send you there because of the summit.”
“You keep saying send ‘you.’ You have to come with us.”
“I can’t, Uncle. Where ever I go, danger will follow. I can’t hide from gods. They’re always watching.”
The cliff shifted so violently that, both, Uncle Bally and Jacko rolled across the ground. Jacko grabbed onto the tree trunk he’d rolled into and held on tight.
“Now, the only problem is getting you off this mountain. My powers don’t work here, so I’m going back to the temple.”
His knees threatened to buckle as he stood up on the trembling ground.
“Just hold on!” he shouted.
As he ran through the woods, all the trees and bushes shivered and trembled. He knew it wasn’t just the fighting, but the beings that lived there.
Suddenly, gods appeared everywhere.
He exited the woods and saw hundreds of white haired men standing about, watching the sky silently.
He ran up the steps, past them, and into the hall.
More gods stood idly about.
The white tunnel, from before, was open and spinning dizzyingly fast. Large sized men were walking toward the exit: one, a familiar brown haired man in a toga.
“Althenio!”
“Jacko.”
He was just as he remembered, with skin as hard and shiny as alabaster, and onyx-like eyes to contrast.
“What are you doing here?”
“Manlo begged me to come.”
“Please, you gotta help me. My powers don’t work here, and the demons are close to taking the summit. I need to get my uncle and my friends someplace safe.”
“Yes, I know. Manlo begged me to help you. Get him, and your things, and come back. But Jacko, Julius can’t come.”
“What?”
“He’s not who you think he is.”
“Yes, I know you hate us, humans, but he’s my friend. He’s coming too!”
An enormous bluish beam of light flew through the air.
Althenio picked Jacko up, by the collar, and ran out of the hall. When the light beam struck the temple, heat burst out in a shower of bright flames. He covered his eyes to avoid getting hit.
Next moment, he opened his eyes. The entire set of steps and the front of the temple was blown out. White haired gods lay everywhere, bloodied and unconscious.
“You haven’t time to waste. Now, go. I must wait here.”
Jacko ran back down the steps and back to camp.
When he got there, Uncle Bally was missing, and so were the bats.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a red jet coming toward him. He jumped out of the camp just missing getting hit by a few feet.
When the ground stopped rumbling enough so that he could push himself up, he ran through the forest, trying to find any sign of where they might have went.
“Uncle Bally?!” he shouted.
But the ground was so torn up that it was hard to use the skills, he’d taught him, about tracking.
Eventually, he found himself back at the campsite when he noticed that a cluster of leaves were crunched into halves, almost as if someone grabbed it with their fist.
“Uncle Bally!” he said to himself.
Beneath the crunched leaves, he saw drag marks.
From there, it was easy. He tracked a random trail of crushed leaves on broken branches, and drag marks, back to the basin he’d visited Julius at earlier.
There, on the edge of the rocks, was Uncle Bally, tied up. Next to him lay the grand ornamentum.
On the dirt next to the rocks, lumps bounced around inside a brown sack. Jacko knew the bats were there.
Uncle Bally looked up and slightly shook his head, telling him to go away.
Jacko didn’t listen, and ran into the clearing.
Julius was leaning on a tree, swinging Jacko’s sword.
“What are you doing, Julius?”
He flinched.
“What I’m supposed to. I have to save my family.”
“What?”
“Yeah, I’m sorry. You were right all along; I just didn’t want to admit it, but then a man came to me in my dreams. He warned me that they’d be coming down from the sky. Now, they are,” he said, rolling his eyes upward.
“Men have come to me in my dreams, too. That’s why I invited you, because I knew you were like me.”
“I’m not like you, not at all.”
He resumed to swinging the sword, side-to-side.
“Whatever, Julius. Point is the gods are doing this to us. Look, we can talk about this later. Right now, we need to get off this summit.”
“We can’t because we’re natural enemies. I like you and your Uncle, but demon blood runs in my veins.”
“The man in your dreams told you that?” Jacko asked weakly.
Months ago, Lucem told him there was a young demon – his opposite – destined to fight the final battle over Earth. Even though he knew that other forms of life had bread into humanity, like the gods and a
ngels, it still never occurred to him that the demon might be human. Now that he thought about it, it made sense.
“Unlike my demon family, I feel sympathy; they warned that it would cripple me. I want you to know that this doesn’t come easy for me. Like you, I had a rough life, a father who didn’t care, a mother who did everything to protect me and was still lost. Then I found my real family, and it was nice to be a part of something that was like love.”
“Demons don’t love the way humans do, and you’re more human than demon. You may think they care for you but they’ll betray you. Come over to our side. You’ll be rewarded, I promise.”
“Come over to your side and what? Be recycled back into the fountain of youth? While my family goes into the volcano of life, and us never to meet again? Would you make that deal?”
“You’ll meet again, if you want.”
“Yes, in hell, but I want this world. I want Earth.”
“What does it matter?” asked Jacko. “You, me, our family; once we go through the fountain or the volcano, we won’t remember each other anyway. We’ll be starting all over again.”
“That doesn’t work for me. I want what I want, and I want it, now.”
He lunged at Jacko, he darted back.
“That’s hardly fair. You’re using my weapon.”
“I believe in fair fight. You’re way stronger than me, so this is fair.”
He swiped down and left; Jacko bobbed and weaved right.
“I know someone’s been visiting your dreams, and teaching you to fight. Someone visited me, too, only I sucked at it.”
He swiped down and right, missing him by seconds.
“Sword fighting isn’t a demon’s way. We use real weapons, like tridents, but since I haven’t earned mine, as you’ve earned your sword, I figured why not take yours. See how you do without it.”
Julius stabbed forward at his shoulder. Jacko spun around, like in his dream, and pushed him to the ground.
He fell to his knees. Jacko jumped on his back and tried to wrestle the sword from his hand. Julius was much stronger than he let on, for he bucked Jacko, who flew many feet back, and stumbled to the ground.
Julius stood above him with sword raised high. Just as he was about to bring it down, a boot kicked him in the side, making him stumble.
Uncle Bally and the bats had gotten out of their bondage. He, now, stood with his rifle pointed at Julius.
“Drop it, son!” he shouted.
Jacko got up, quickly, and ran to get his bow and arrow, because if Julius was who he said he was, the war would end with his death.