Quebec City in Flames

by Nelson Rusk

  I moved back again. I could now see the Messenger at the top of the stairs, approaching. The titanic inferno in which he found himself slowed him down and disrupted his concentration. The temperature on the other side seemed untenable. Even the Messenger's fire resistance had its limits. I rushed against one last tanker. The impact was tremendous, but my limited strength did not allow me to rock the tank with the same momentum. I pushed against its surface, grunting, screaming, and crying all at once. The horrible smell of burnt flesh filled the air, as did blue smoke escaping from my molten skin. Through my eyes, assaulted by toxic fumes, I could see the Messenger. He was almost there. I drew one last spasm of energy from my torn muscles. The tank tipped. Its fall was inevitable.

  Not waiting to see the result, I walked away from the portal and the Messenger who was walking at a slow pace. As the tank fell out of my sight, the Messenger straightened up. Tentacles of fire projected from his hands, which disappeared under this heap of glowing appendages. I had time to see about ten of them pass through our reality before the explosion of the tank resounded. Visible energy shockwaves reverberated all over the gate, like ripples in a pond. The threshold to the other world collapsed in an instant, making visible the part of the room previously hidden by this immaterial breach. Only a shredded opening remained suspended in the air, like an open wound in our reality, from which a series of fire projections twisted and waved in all directions.

  Horrified by these supernatural intrusions, I rushed in the same direction from where I had arrived. I hurried back. The last vision I had of this room was the burning tentacles that spread against the walls on either side, pressing so hard they dislodged foundation stones, causing an earthquake to rock the underground. These tremors repeated as I ran toward the exit.

  I arrived after a frantic race in the previous quarters of Phillips' - or the one who embodied Phillips all these years - and ran past the recessed room with the huge stained-glass window. Behind me, I heard humming and rumbling. I had every opportunity to imagine the worst about the source of these sounds. Without stopping, I climbed the stairs leading to the first-floor level. I was reaching the penultimate step when something strong grabbed me by the leg, causing me to trip heavily on the ground. Petrified with fear, I gave a muffled gurgling as I turned around to see what had interrupted my flight.

  I was both relieved and alarmed to see Beaumont's face, with an evil grin on his lips. Dried blood covered the entire upper half of his skull. When he regained consciousness, this scumbag must have prepared an ambush for me here, knowing I would come back sooner or later. As I struggled to free myself from his grip, which was not weakening, I thought of the danger approaching in the corridor beyond the stained-glass window. The roar was becoming more and more prevalent. A panicked terror seized me at the thought of facing this new peril, plunging me in a deep trance of unwholesome thoughts. Beaumont’s maniacal screams brought me back to reality.

  “What have you done to the master, sinner? Huh? You compromised the transubstantiation ceremony! We'd been preparing for the master's body change for months, and you had to come and stick your nose in! I knew we should have purged all the uninitiated in flames!”

  Beaumont screamed like a damned man and had lost all sense of reality. Foam at the mouth, his eyes rolling back and bloodshot, his wounds reopening as his body writhed in all directions, Beaumont was less human than animal, if it had been possible for an animal to reach such a state of possession. He kept on reciting litanies. My attention was only partially on him. I could not help looking into the darkness beyond the stained-glass window. Undaunted, he continued his harangue.

  “The master had chosen a new body to replace his old damaged one. A woman's body, combining creation and destruction. It was a variable he had never tried before. He would have combined these two antitheses in the same body and would have brought humanity to a state of elevation it has never known. And you had to make it all fail with your blind schemes! The master is a glowing beacon that guides the destiny of thousands of individuals, while the spark of your life is a half-extinguished firebrand that the slightest wind would subjugate. In truth, it will be a favor to you when I put it out and end its insignificance!”

  With his mind exalted by these words, Beaumont pulled a dark, oxidized metal knife out of the quiver hidden under his jacket. It was a blade with an irregular contour and a jagged edge that must leave horrible scars. The light of the lantern, of which I had lost the grip and which lay on the ground, reflected in a myriad of kaleidoscopic rays on the surface of the metal. With a roar, my attacker waved the knife over my face. I barely had time to raise my arm to counter the blow. We entered a trial of strength, the blade shaking with an apparent self-will in our hands.

  Lying on my back as I was, I was the only one who saw the tentacles of fire that penetrated through the stained-glass window, melting away what remained intact. Each tentacle was at least twenty centimeters in diameter, like the appendages of a titanic mollusk. A robe of orange and azure flames danced around each of the elongated limbs, performing a sumptuous ballet of strange beauty. A beauty coupled with an obvious and deadly menace. Enraptured by this vision, I thought of the colossal length of these tentacles, which had to extend from the rift by over a hundred meters. This realization caused my mind to crumble and capsize in the face of such an impossibility. I lost control of the dagger Beaumont was directing at my heart.

  For some unforeseeable reason, I was spared the fatal blow Beaumont had in store for me. One of the flame tentacles grabbed my attacker with a graceful and agile movement, wrapping itself around him. An expression of surprise paralyzed Beaumont's face. The burning limb lifted him into the air. The sectator's clothes caught fire where the giant appendage grabbed him. The fire quickly spread to the rest of his clothes, turning him into a living torch. In the chaos of twisting tentacles, I saw Beaumont's face one last time, ecstatic and demented. I heard him scream repeatedly "Master! Take me! Take me! "as if, by this servile declaration, he could beatify himself in the eyes of his infamous god. This nightmare picture faded as Beaumont's facial skin melted and dribbled on the ground, the heat too intense for his tissues to maintain their cohesion.

  I did not wait to observe the outcome of this act. I got up and continued my frantic run. For a long time, I heard no chasing sound. I came to believe that, for a reason known only to the Messenger, my escape had been sanctioned. Perhaps the rift had closed, trapping him in his own reality. Or perhaps he had reached the limits of his power, if such limits existed.

  From Charybdis to Scylla

  After a flight that seemed endless, I ended up near the old wing, on the ground floor. The entrance door to the underground had been left ajar, giving me access to it. I had not even thought for a second that it could have been locked, like a few days ago. I trusted providence. It had allowed me to survive too many perils to abandon me now.

  I stepped into the familiar setting of the old wing. A tremor of far greater magnitude than what I had felt before tore up through the whole building. It was a deep rumble originating from the ground. After a quick look around, I noticed that several workers assigned to the renovation of the wing seemed to be absent. This confirmed what I thought: sectators had infiltrated the construction firm to its core, perhaps even before the work began. The corruption reached Mr. Martin shortly after I arrived. If I had not intervened, they would have had complete freedom of action in this part of the underground passages, allowing them to conduct their unholy ceremony without hindrance.

  Near the stairs to the basement, the workers in service froze on the spot when the building’s foundations began trembling. I almost lost my footing as the seismic shocks increased in intensity. Running and gesturing, I shouted at the workers to leave the castle. My state of extreme agitation and haggard appearance helped to make them comply. After alarming enough people, a commotion formed in the main hall, and the urgency of the situation built up. All around me, employees warned others while running toward the exit
s.

  I was walking through the corridors of the old wing looking for anyone left behind when the roar reached its peak. Massive tremors threw me against a cupboard full of hunting equipment, which fell on the ground with a crash. As I recovered my senses, a cataclysmic detonation resounded a few meters away from me. I saw the wooden structure of the floor burst outwards and a fire tentacle sprang from it like a geyser. It had doubled or tripled in size. As soon as it squeezed out of the ground, the tentacle penetrated the ceiling, causing it to explode with disconcerting ease. I heard more repeated detonations as the appendix sank into the upper floors of the castle. The flames danced around the vertical column, throwing debris and burning materials in all directions. The corridor became a fierce inferno due to the tapestry and curtains turning into torches.

  The sight of this primordial, unbridled power unleashing itself paralyzed me. I heard more explosions from nearby corridors and rooms. I assumed that others of these tentacles of divine proportions were causing chaos and destruction in the old wing. I struggled to get up. A stabbing pain went through my right leg when I put my weight on it. Trying to ignore it, I limped as fast as possible toward the main exit. Only a few junctions separated it from where I was. The closer I got to my destination, the more I feared that a mass of molten flesh would emerge from a lateral corridor. The abyssal creature chasing me had riddled my courage with cracks just as gaping as those it had inflicted on the building’s structure. The state of primitive panic that possessed me obliterated my reason and relegated me to the position of a dazzled bystander in my own body.

  When I arrived in the lobby, I witnessed the prodigious intensity of the blaze. An appendix of fire had struck through the middle of the room and swept all around, shattering the reception desk and spreading flames from one end of the antechamber to the other. The destruction was total. I noted with horror the presence of a multitude of bodies charred and then crushed under a titanic force. The creature had taken advantage of the wave of unfortunates fleeing toward the exit to reap an abundant harvest of souls in the grip of deadly terror.

  Forcing myself to detach my gaze from this scene of insane implications, I surveyed the surroundings in search of a way out. In vain. Even at the threshold of the room where I stood, the concentrated heat was unbearable, preventing me from moving forward. Thick blue smoke made breathing difficult and punished dearly any attempt to swallow a breath of sour gas. Meanwhile, the massive tentacle occupying the entire chaotic scene squirmed in all directions, crushing and pounding the walls and furniture. I watched its senseless impulses with horrified fascination, as beams and planks the size of century-old trees broke and collapsed under the assault of its irresistible strength. Massive structural tremors, like the agonizing moans of a colossal beast, convinced me the main exit was sealed.

  I turned back, desperate to find a way out before the building's impending collapse. Burns of all severity levels covered my entire body. A hoarse and painful rasp came out of my lungs with each breath. I could only move at a fraction of my normal speed because of my sprained ankle. The spark of my life, to use Beaumont's words, gradually faded away and I could do nothing about it. I walked along the outside walls of the wing hoping to see an open window. Metal grates barricaded all issues. I knew a second way out of the wing existed, but it was on the opposite side of the castle. Crossing the entire wing was a herculean task under the present conditions. In the absence of an alternative, I had no choice but to resign myself to it.

  I limped with growing despair through the endless corridors. Around me, tentacles furrowed the old wing, moving and coordinating like a swarm of snakes animated by malicious intelligence. As I passed an intersection, I had a furtive vision of one of these abominations rushing in my direction. I walked down an adjacent corridor and entered the first room, closing the door. It was a small library at the disposal of visitors. Without delay, I rushed to the opposite wall, where a door would give me a few more seconds of desperate flight. I clung to this hope like a condemned man to his last seconds of life. Regardless of the circumstances, I would have traded all the fortunes in the world to buy the shortest reprieve. When confronted with the absurd certainty of death, every sensation, pleasant or not, was a divine pleasure, every moment contained an indivisible fragment of eternity.

  I reached the other door as the wall behind me burst under the assault of the tentacle pursuing me. My momentum and the tremor threw me into a long corridor with closed doors. I tested a few in passing, but they were all locked. The corridor ended with a barricaded window facing the outside. With no tools to break it in, it could as well have been a steel wall. My flight ended here.

  I heard a wet suction sound from behind me at the end of the corridor, like a flammable material that catches fire. A tentacle had just passed the step of an intersection and its extremity was looming toward me. I stopped. We faced each other for a few seconds. Although the thing had no eyes, a Machiavellian and calculating intelligence emanated from it. I sensed that it saw me as clearly as I saw it. This motionless canvas from the imagination of a mad painter snapped. The tentacle projected itself at me with a speed that misled the eye. I had no time to anticipate its movement. I threw myself against a wall, as far away as possible from my initial position, and prayed that this jump would suffice.

  A hissing sound like a thundering crescendo followed my dive as the limb passed me by. A blast of wood and stone fragments tore through the outer wall of the castle, a spray of sparkling blue flames surrounding the projection of debris. The shock flattened me against the wall. I thought I passed out for a moment. Pain and terror pulled me back into the world of the living. A few rags of my clothes were on fire. My skin was a vivid and gaping wound. My subcutaneous tissues were unprotected and raw, irradiating my entire body with a nameless agony. Pain-induced retching made me dizzy. My soul was screaming but my mouth no longer responded.

  The appendix got caught in the hole it had dug in the wall for a few seconds, squirming with a crash. When it came out, I seized my chance. I stood up and staggered running toward the orifice the tentacle had created. A circle of burning flames surrounded the opening. I passed the threshold, undergoing a final trial by fire, and reached the snow-covered surface of the Promenade des Gouverneurs. I do not know how I could survive this new abuse, which added to the thousands of hardships my body had endured in the last few days. When I emerged screaming in the cold air outside, flames engulfed me, haloing my form with a glowing, incandescent grace. I took about ten steps, each one a test of will, before collapsing forward in the snow. A whistle sizzled as the fire that devoured me died out and the snow went from solid to gaseous in an instant. As in response to this physical transubstantiation, my mind escaped from the tenuous ties that anchored it down to the heavy foundation of our physical reality and flew into the vastness of the night sky.

  Epilogue

  I n that position was I found by the rescuers, my shape melted into the snow, torn apart by the primordial elements of fire and frost that were fighting over the remains of my carnal envelope. Faced with these unalterable and eternal forces of nature, how can the organic matter that makes up our fragile bodies survive? But survive, I did. In another form. For how can I affirm the body that was mine before these events was the same as the one I was left with afterward? Almost nothing of these two masses of flesh and organs was similar.

  The flames had completely consumed my body hair. The little that grew back later formed random and repulsive hirsute patches. It would have been better if it had disappeared completely. It was as if a mad artist, his senses tainted by dementia, had reshaped my skin into a nightmarish sculpture. Furrows carved my fleshy tissues, forming grotesque and hideous bulges. The most horrible of these lumps of flesh remained insensitive, all organs of perception being burned to the root. This traumatic experience had perverted for me forever the concept of human beauty, both superficial and spiritual, and I could not observe it without feeling both resentment and envy. Beauty and skin-level
tenderness were forbidden to me, now and until my death. I accepted that.

  City detectives carried out an extensive investigation following the fire, which swept away the entire old wing of the castle. Despite months of exploring all possible avenues of explanation, the authorities could not explain what had caused a fire of such magnitude. Nor could the investigators explain why, after such a rapid and intense burst, the blaze then restrained itself to the old wing of the castle. They eventually attributed this to the firebreaks built between the different wings. The rudimentary nature of these protections did not change their conclusions, despite protests from fire experts.

  The police precinct assigned an investigator to my case since they considered me from the start as a major witness to the fire and, probably, a possible suspect. On multiple meetings, he interrogated me, asking a series of questions he repeated until he heard the answers he wanted. He never got them. Not from me. A question seemed to trouble the investigator. He was eager to know what had caused the huge holes in the unbroken walls and rubble piles that still exhibited structural cohesion. I was careful not to dwell on this subject and hypothesized the building firm used substandard materials for the construction of the castle, rendering parts of the walls friable. He listened to this explanation with skepticism, but it delighted me to see it appear in the final report, probably due to a lack of a credible alternative.