The Sun glared down at the whole mess with its all-seeing eye, and William felt like his skin was beginning to bubble and contort into welts beneath his cloak. Trying to make himself inconspicuous to the nearby soldiers who were buffering their rifles, he slowly turned around and took a step towards the jungle’s shade where the wolf had found a spot to lay. Before he could take another step, he heard the sergeant shout his name; sighing, he turned back around and weaved his way through the throng.
When William came to a stop in front of the sergeant, he found himself at the center of a ring of soldiers. He shuddered, unable to look at any of them as they stared daggers at him. Keeping his eyes on the sergeant, he asked, “Yes?”
“I jus’ told my men ’bout you,” the sergeant said. “’bout what you told me. Apparently, there are a lot of—how do you say—psychoactive plants that grow in this jungle. George here says you picked a shitty place for a vision quest. Don’t know what kinda degenerate he was ’for the war. But that’s the only explanation that makes sense.”
One of the soldiers in the group laughed. “Ol’ Georgie’s still a degenerate. You shoulda seen him last night.”
“Hey, Sam! Don’t go blabbing like that,” George said. “’Sides, there’s nothin’ degenerate ’bout a little shotgunnin’.”
William stammered, eliciting knowing looks from those gathered around him. After he failed to respond, the sergeant continued: “Just tell me one thing: are you hallucinating right now?”
“What? No!”
“There’s no need to deny it. The gooks prob’ly drugged you up and set you loose. God knows why them savages do anything. Look, man, yer totally bonkers.”
Anger swelled up red hot in William’s chest, but he took a few breaths and regained control of his emotions before he replied. “I suppose I told you too much.”
The sergeant barked with laughter. “Damn right you did.” He paused to stifle his laughter before continuing. “No harm done, though. Just head over to the camp hospital.” He pointed to where all the cries emanated from. “The medics’ll check you out, make you good as new.”
William nodded curtly. He glanced over his shoulder to check that the wolf was behaving itself then headed for the canopied row of cots. The soldiers he passed now grinned viciously at him. A scrawny soldier who was naked to the waste jumped in front of him and started waving his hands in front of William’s face.
“Excuse me,” William said.
The soldier smirked and lowered his hands. “I bring a message from the fairy king.”
“The fairy king?”
“Oh yes. Haven’t you heard of the fairy king? He’s got a big castle deeeeep in the jungle.”
“Is he responsible for all the destruction?”
“Oh no. The fairy king says he will end this god damn war if only…”
“If only what?”
“Uh… next time you take a shit, rub it on your face. He says only the shit-faced one can end the war.”
“How can the ‘shit-faced one’ end the war?”
The soldier howled with laughter. The sergeant walked up behind him and smacked him on the side of his head. “Get back to your duties, private,” he said.
“Ah, I was only having a little fun.” The soldier rubbed his head and stalked away through the camp.
The sergeant turned to William. “Don’t pay him any mind. My boys are jus’ growin’ bored. Carry on.”
When William reached the camp hospital, he wanted to turn around and run back the way he had come. A stench worse than the wasteland permeated the air beneath the canopy. Blood pooled on the charred ground between each of the cots, upon which men squirmed helplessly. Some of them had lost limbs, green pus oozing out of their stumps. He noticed one of the amputees looked pale as a ghost, his cot soaked through with his lifeblood. Unable to look away, William stared as the dying soldier started jerking about silently, his eyes open but unseeing. The medics had their backs turned on this man, and William stood paralyzed until the shaking faded away and the soldier lay still.
William’s blood turned to ice, his body heat pouring out of the soles of his feet. Tears welled in his eyes and started flowing down his cheeks. A sob choked out of his throat and a medic turned around to see him, hurrying over and grabbing William by the arm. The medic tried to guide him to an empty cot, but William shook him off.
“It’s all right.” The medic touched William’s arm soothingly. “Everything’s gonna be fine.”
Between sobs, William choked out: “That man just died and no one tried to help him.”
The medic looked at the dead man and sighed. “We did everything we could. That’s just the way things go out here.”
“This has to be a nightmare!”
“Sarge told us about your condition. If you just lie down, we can help bring you back to reality.”
“No! You have it all wrong. I cannot stay here!” William shook off the medic’s grip and turned to flee back through the camp. He made it five steps before he was tackled from behind. He hit the ground head-first and his skull reverberated like a bell, blackening his vision into oblivion.
***
A point midway between now and then marks the space lying beyond perception spirals spinning from the center filled with colors never imagined engulfing the mind without relent absolute silence drums upon the ears with such ferocity he begs for reprieve the mouth is sealed, no words come out unheeded by the cosmic forces thoughts flitter away through the void the last threads of his humanity cut.
With nothing but the phosphorescent spirals left, time ticks by slower and slower, then faster, then slower again. As the colors reach their peak intensity, burning the eyes beneath closed lids, a dim sound echoes across the void. The light show begins to recede, chased away by the dull rat-tat-tat. The swirling slows and the spirals compress around a point, becoming a blinding-white circle. The sounds grow in intensity, booming upon the dazed brain in volleys. A gasp of breath fills the lungs with air to resuscitate the body. The air carries the taste of sulfur and blood, shocking the mind out of its reverie to resume control of the body.
***
William’s eyes flashed open and he saw the sunlight shimmering through a layer of smoke floating above his face. He lay motionless as he pondered the meaning of his headache and the explosions ricocheting from every direction. The image of the dying soldier flashed into his mind—the last thing he could remember. He turned his head to one side and it flopped onto a hard cot, pain searing down his neck. Another pale soldier lay on the cot next to him, blood dribbling out of his mouth as he moaned.
William shut his eyes, but the cracking shots continued growing louder. As he focused his hearing, he was able to distinguish shouts and cries from the general cacophony. “We’re surrounded!” William’s eyes flared open and he sat up, all the blood rushing down from his head. Black orbs flashed across his vision and pain vibrated down his spine, shocking him to full awareness. He shook the pain from his head and focused upon the roar surrounding him. Turning around on the cot to see what was happening in the camp, he came face-to-face with the reality of war.
Soldiers were all running around, stumbling over loose equipment in a race to load their guns and defend against the enemy—a faceless, numberless mass lurking at the edge of the jungle. Gunfire rang out from all sides. The rat-tat-tat gave away the position of an enemy, but when a soldier returned fire, the attacker had already moved to another position to fire another volley.
William sat paralyzed, mesmerized by the dance of life-and-death happening across the clearing. As William watched the ballet unfold, he noticed the number of performers were dwindling. When a soldier stumbled and fell, he did not pick himself back up; he just lay in a growing pool of blood.
The bullets continued flying through the air, and some of the volleys whizzed past the camp hospital and into the jungle like angr
y hornets. William could not think to act, watching open-mouthed as the soldiers were mowed down like cattle—screaming in the face of their demise. He felt like the show lasted hours, but it only took a few minutes for the enemy to slaughter every soldier that moved in the camp. As the last man fell to his knees, his hands pressed over the red dots spreading across his uniform, and toppled face-first onto the ground, silence settled over the clearing.
Unintelligible voices drifted out of the jungle. Enemy combatants materialized around the edge of the clearing—ten dark-skinned men moving in to survey their carnage. They moved from body to body to check if any were still alive. An occasional gunshot rang out, and William jumped with each one.
As the enemy combatants drew nearer to the camp hospital, William’s nerves screamed for him to run. But his mind had been wiped blank, his body was unable to stand and he was completely defenseless. He did the only thing he could think of: he lay back down on the cot. This movement caught the attention of the enemy combatants and one of them yelled, charging to where he lay.
With his eyes jammed shut, William felt a burning rod press against his temple. He cried out with pain and jerked his head away from the barrel of an AK-47. Opening his eyes, he saw the emaciated face of the enemy, who grinned wickedly at him as he wagged the rifle in front of William’s face. The combatant was yelling gibberish at him, but William simply stared up the rifle’s barrel with morbid fascination. Time suddenly slowed to a crawl. The enemy’s voice became distorted, each syllable drawn out longer and longer. William saw as the dusty air was sucked into the gun barrel. He saw as the darkness within it lit up with a red spark. Then everything disappeared.
THIRTEEN
William started falling through a hazy subdimension filled with a mechanical-sounding whir. His stomach leapt into his throat as air rushed around him, whipping his arms and legs about like a sadistic puppeteer. A click echoed through the haze and the whirring stopped. The ground materialized under him and his body thudded into the grey earth. He gasped for breath, rolling onto his back and looking up into the chalk-blue sky, which was framed by the circle of stone pillars around his peripherals. His chest heaved as he sucked air into his lungs. He tried to steady his breathing and restore his emotional balance, but his heart beat crazy patterns on his chest as adrenaline kept pumping through his veins. What did… the monument… cannot be real… what kind of monster… Father, why… You knew…
The buzzing inside William’s head destroyed his knowledge of Good; Evil, with its lack of moral restrictions, seemed too great a foe to conquer. He kept seeing that dark-faced combatant’s grin as he pulled the rifle’s trigger. As tears streamed down his dirt-stained cheeks, he curled up into the fetal position. The well of sorrow was so deep he thought he would never be able to climb out of it, but then he felt a slimy thing brushing away his tears. His eyes flashed open to see the wolf licking his face.
The wolf! During the attack on the camp, William had forgotten about his companion. How did it evade the attackers? Had they spared its life, knowing the animal had no part in the war? But he had seen into the eyes of one of those combatants, and they had been as empty and ravenous as the panther’s. Perhaps the wolf possesses a hidden cunning and knew to hide when it heard the enemies approaching. Whatever the case, William thanked his Father that the wolf had been returned to his side.
William reached up to pat the wolf’s head, which turned to lick his hand. He ruffled its fur and pushed its head aside as he tried to sit up. Pain assaulted his body, bringing the taste of bile to his mouth. Bending forward, he vomited black ooze onto the ground. When his stomach stopped heaving, the taste of bile remained on his tongue though he spat until his mouth ran dry. Water!
William gritted his teeth as he pushed himself to his feet. He stood a moment, waiting for the pain to subside; when it did not, he tottered over to the nearest gap between pillars. He slipped through it, but when his skin brushed the stone, the chill energy no longer stung him. Outside the circle, he leaned for a moment against the pillar. Did the monument use up all its energy by teleporting me there and back? Did my reaction to what I saw atone for how the soldiers acted?
William turned and started circling around the monument, keeping a hand against the pillars to maintain his balance as he tottered along. Halfway around it, he spotted his sack lying next to his sword. He gritted his teeth as he bent to pick both up. Lights flashed before his eyes and his head started swimming as he straightened back up; he leaned against a pillar as he started to lose consciousness, and when he could see straight again, he slipped back inside the monument. The wolf was sniffing the black ooze he had vomited up, so he called it to his side.
William settled down on the ground and unraveled the empty pitcher from the sack, setting it upright beside him. He watched it fill without hesitation then took a swig of water, which he swished around in his mouth and spat into the dirt. Lifting the pitcher back to his mouth, he drank until his thirst was sated, then he put the pitcher on the ground for the wolf to lap from. His stomach rumbled for his attention, so he prayed, Father, we have not eaten in so long. Please sustain us. A steaming cut of steak materialized before him, and he snatched it up before the wolf noticed it. The wolf looked up from the pitcher as he took a bite. With his mouth full, he mumbled, “I know, boy. You will get your share.”
After William swallowed, he gripped the steak with both hands and tried to rip it in half; failing that, he set the steak down on his cape and took up his sword. He used a corner of his cape to wipe the blade clean then used it to slice the meat into two portions, its juices staining the fabric. He tossed the smaller portion to the wolf, which snatched it out of the air and lay down to gnaw through it. As William consumed his portion, his lethargy faded and his mind grew clearer. He gazed at the sky and saw orange streaks trailing through the chalk blue, a cloud drift splattered red.
How long was I in that cursed jungle, in the middle of that senseless war? It felt like I watched an eon pass before my eyes but, here, Time paused until I returned. Does Time depend upon my perception of it? William winced and massaged his temples, closing his eyes and focusing on his breathing until these thoughts dissipated. When his headache faded, he scooted backwards across the ground and leaned his back against a pillar; he found that straightening his spine dampened his pain. Staring at the pillar opposite him, he zoned out for a while, until his scalp started tingling. He scratched the itch and looked around for his hat, but it was nowhere to be seen. He sighed; another casualty of the war.
The colors started draining from the sky as dusk overtook the land, unveiling the cosmic abattoir which bathed the plain with its red glow. William ignored the night sky, his attention arrested by the pillars surrounding him which glowed even brighter, bathing the ground within the monument with their radiance. He could faintly hear the buzzing of the flies in the distance, but he knew the creatures of the Darkness would not dare approach this Light. The wolf curled up at his side, breathing softly, but when he closed his eyes, visions from the jungle clearing flashed onto the canvas of his lids. Amputees stared at him, their eyes begging for the release of death; soldiers pirouetted before him, flinging trails of blood through his mind. When he drifted into the realm of dreams, he saw nothing but corpses spread around him; they got back to their feet and continued their dance, begging him to join them.
***
When William awoke, still propped against the pillar, he was greeted by the chalk-blue sky. The glow of the monument had dimmed with the sunrise, and sunlight cut cross-patterns through the shadows around him. He stretched out his arms and legs, warm energy vibrating through his muscles, but his mind remained clouded with the fog of his nightmares. He wished he could go back to sleep, banish his awareness to the Void until the ghastly visions faded into oblivion. But when he closed his eyes, visceral memories of the slaughter stormed out of the fog, pounding on his brain. His whole body tensed like it had when he was staring dow
n the barrel of the AK-47; give me the nightmares back, at least those felt like they were happening to someone else.
William had climbed out of the well of sorrow only to fall into the pit of despair. The memories burned through his brain with a life of their own, like demons trying to consume his soul. I need to get out of here, this monument is no sanctuary. I need to run away, away from my memory. He prayed that when he reached his destination, he would be able to rest. He had become intrinsically entwined with the plain: it had produced the despair that crippled him, while it had been produced by the depravity of humankind; the way he felt was how the plain felt about Life. He would have to learn how to digest the despair and replace it with something better. He did not know how he could do that after facing the people he was trying to redeem. Do they even deserve redemption? He wished he could reject his destiny, but he knew if he wanted to restore his own peace-of-mind, if he hoped to cleanse his mind of the nightmare-memories, he had to continue his journey.
William prayed, Father, how could you let this happen? How can You be Good if this is the result of Your work?
His Father’s response floated down: “I tried to change them, but they always fought Me. That was My mistake. They must change themselves.”
Fate’s Peak Page 8