by Dennis Fueyo
“Hold on—tie the other end to the doorknob.”
Emelia did so, and Juan waited, watching the ceiling.
“Come on, come on,” said Juan tapping his foot. A charged STEVE extended its vertical burst of particles down from the turbulent ceiling storm. As it stretched and crept along the wall, he projected his voice towards the door: “Hey! Melrose, I almost go the lock picked.”
Shuffling steps stirred behind the door.
Juan grinned and asked, projecting his voice into the door: “Pass me that hairclip, yah?” Hearing the shuffling steps approach, he lobbed the wadded silver cloth at the prison window. It slipped out between the bars leaving a silver strand hanging from window to doorknob.
The door swung open hooking the cloth around one of the window’s bars. Two Atlantians gowned in red robes holding glowing staves entered.
“You will not escape,” one scolded, wringing a tight grip on the doorknob. “Stop resisting and accept your fate.”
“While you’re here,” Juan asked with a slick smirk, “can you take an order for food?” He tracked the STEVE path through peripheral vision until it reached near the window.
The other Atlantian pointed a humming staff at Juan’s face. “You think this is a game? I’ll blast your damned head off. I could order you some fungus wraps, how about that?”
Juan snickered. “You got any cooked Atlantian?”
The STEVE hit the silver thread sending a bolt of concentrated energy through the doorknob into a grey, clammy palm. The Atlantian screamed as skin melted on the knob like a marshmallow burning over its prong.
A few cage-fighting moves executed by Juan disarmed the other. Downed, the Atlantian stared into Juan’s eyes while lying on the floor with several broken ribs and a dislocated knee.
“What will you do now?” The Atlantian floundered on a lame leg. “You have nowhere to run, and you can’t hide in the cathedral.”
“Wow,” Juan quipped and motioned to the other motionless Atlantian, “there must be waves of unimaginable pain bolting from that guy’s melted hand to the brainstem, shutting down any coherent ideas he might have.”
“Atlantians are neither male nor female, barbarian! My friend’s name is Hitu, and I am Arnu.”
“Well, Arnold”—Juan knelt down—“got medications stashed in that room over yonder?”
“My name is Arnu! And no, medicine is kept at the other end of the cathedral.”
“Gosh, Arnold, sucks to be you.” Juan swung the yellow, glowing staff over his head, landing it square on Arnu’s fontanelle.
Emelia propped Lou up from the bed, asking, “Juan, was that necessary?”
“As necessary as this is,” he said and emitted a fiery yellow blast of energy from the staff into Hitu’s skull launching reddish chips and grey chunks across the floor.
“Oh my god,” said Emelia, gagged, and barfed on Lou’s arm.
Lou barked, “Get a grip, Emelia! Either we do this to them, or they do this to us. James Laramie is no longer here to do your dirty work. Polish your ovaries and toughen up. Thank you, Juan,” he said, face sagging, “Let’s get out of here.”
Juan entered the adjoining room first, a glowing staff in each fist. It was a holding area; reclining chairs bolted to the floor, small wooden tables with tools, and several small uncomfortable-looking stools. Two stools had been placed next to a table holding a deck of cards.
Juan plucked a few cards and grimaced. “Would you look at this shit? While Lou is in the next room, dying?” He threw them on the floor and spat. “Fucking Atlantians.”
Stepping into the holding area with Lou hanging on her shoulder, Emelia said, “Sorry I puked on you, Lou. I’ll carry you out on hands and knees if I have to. I’ll toughen up, promise.”
Lou chuckled with wheezing lungs. “The vomit doesn’t bother me, don’t worry. Like what Imagine Dragons said, right? Whatever it takes, I don’t care if you throw up on my head.” She set him down on one of the reclining chairs, and he added, “Look, you are strong, Emelia, stronger than me. I believe in you. Get us home.”
“I’ll try.”
An oak door on the opposite wall of the room exploded inward on its iron hinges. Juan jerked around, aiming both glowing staves at a dust cloud drawn upward from the floor, then relaxed his stance. “Sammy!”
Sam Mason stumbled across the room and dropped onto Juan’s shoulders in a firm embrace. Tom Mason followed Sam in, stepping gingerly on feet undoubtedly riddled with blisters.
Tom held Lou’s head against his chest. “You ok?”
“Sorry, Doc,” said Lou weak-necked. “Apparently, Atlantians don’t get dysentery.”
“He’s severely dehydrated,” Emelia said wiping Lou’s brow, “and there’s nothing but saltwater around us.”
Sam cupped Emelia’s cheeks and drove in a firm kiss. “How about you, are you injured?”
“I’m fine, I’m fine,” she replied, lowering his hand. “We got to get Lou out of here. I don’t know how long he has until his body goes into shock.”
“A passageway leads west about a hundred feet back. All the halls we saw run north and east.” Sam rubbed his chin and asked, “Juan, you know how to shoot those things?” Juan gave an affirmative, and Sam then led him back into the prison cell.
Stepping on reddish goo, Sam grunted and lifted his foot. “Atlantian brains?”
“Freshly prepared, jefe.”
“Awesome. Ok, aim the staves below the window there and fire.”
Loud concussions launched yellow iridescent flame and stone chips off the wall.
“Fire again!”
Another volley filled the room with an ozone smell.
Tom hollered from the holding room, “Coming this way, Son! A bunch of them, you have about twenty seconds!”
Sam cheered, “Keep going, Juan! Blast that thing.”
The third round of shots loosened the stone window sill. Finally, the staves sent chunks of rock and concrete tumbling to the floor.
Thunderous explosions raged into the cell from the adjoining room, shaking the floor and vibrating more loose rocks off the wall. Emelia and Tom stumbled into the cell, each under one of Lou’s arms, followed by tufts of smoke.
Tom ducked back out and returned with a stool, slammed the prison door shut, and barred the door by wedging the stool against the door handle. He moved towards the bed and reflexively lifted his foot, frowning at the reddish goop dripping of the sole of his shoe. “Christ, what is this crap?”
“Atlantian brainpower,” Sam said and pointed to the fresh opening under the window. “Hit it again, Juan, please.”
Juan blasted the lower edge of the pock removing another layer of sagging stones.
A plasma discharge fired by the Atlantians splintered the top of the prison door, flinging embers wrapped in greenish flame onto the wet floor. They continued burning in the standing saltwater singeing up a smell of rotten eggs.
“Give me one of those,” Sam said, grabbing one of the staves from Juan’s hand. He raised it parallel to the door’s split wood and fired back. Screams erupted on the other side and residual yellow steam pressed underneath the threshold.
Juan repeated Sam’s action, firing into the door’s fracture. He raised a thumb to the sounds of retreating footsteps, moans, and crunching furniture. “That gives us a few minutes.”
Sam waved his arm and beckoned, “Come on, everyone! Out through the hole!”
Tom tossed Lou up and out the opening, then lifted Emelia over. He then leaped atop the loose stones and shouted, “Juan, give me your hand!” Receiving his hand, Tom launched Juan over the rubble pile, lifting him like a trebuchet. “Sammy! Let’s go!”
Sam handed Tom the staff and traversed the rubble as the door exploded inward in a firestorm of green and yellow.
Fragments of burning wood stuck to Tom’s robe filling it with holes. He aimed his staff and fired back at Atlantians storming in. The shot struck between them, ripping off the left arm of one and the right
arm of the other. He then dropped down onto a crumbling highway once labeled as the Island Expressway.
∆ ∆ ∆
Uruk stood perched on his Balcony of Sanctity overlooking downtown Savannah. The five-story 180-degree view allowed the archbishop to observe the entire western face of the cathedral, beginning at Whitemarsh Island and ending at the Isle of Hope. The old Atlantian granted surveyors permission to use the lengthy balcony for periodic assessments of the hodgepodge connected network of stone structures collectively referred to as the cathedral since the archbishop’s facility stretched two stories above the rest and utilized an extensive allure.
Fan boats circled around the cathedral bulwark and its extended baileys heading towards downtown. Uruk watched them pass the bulwark and loop about the streets while drumming knobby fingers on the battlement. “Report!”
An Atlantian dressed in a sky-blue robe stepped forward. “We have additional resources traveling here from Atlanta and Jacksonville. Our marines are checking every crevice and shelf from Wilmington Island to Skidaway Island. Strongholds are being set up at Rincon and Eden.” The young Atlantian paused, looked down, and snapped back to attention. “We will find them, your eminence.”
“Was there something else?”
“Well, some items were missing from the northeast kitchen in the Tiamat Hall. A fight occurred between two individuals in the Nanna docks. We confined them to their quarters. Ea and Utu were caught hunting grouper, and were each fined.”
Uruk clawed a handful of the Atlantian’s robe and pulled inward. “Stop wasting my time! You will find the humans before the Carver Warden finds them. Because if you do not, the Carver Warden gains the upper hand. Do you understand what that means?”
“No, no, your eminence. I’m sorry, I don’t understand, but I am a simple operations engineer, not a strategist.”
Uruk flung the smaller Atlantian against the battlement. “Chaos will reign. He will continue to keep us packaged in isolation until the last of us withers and dies. Then he will stroll onto the rampart, cross the palisade, and walk from curtain to curtain in each hall ravaging the innermost secrets of the cathedral. And when he’s finished extracting every last Atlantian soul, the cathedral will be razed into the Atlantic.”
“I’m sorry, your eminence. We will double our shifts. None will rest until the Sam Mason is found.”
“Good.” Resting a sharp chin in palm, Uruk focused beady eyes on a fan boat crossing under the ruins of I80 towards the Dead River.
Once called the Wilmington River, the Atlantians changed its name to remember a time when bodies stacked on barges clogged its banks. The Dead River represented the transition between the Stone strain-induced plague and the discovery of the radiotrophic fungus that saved them. Uruk pointed at a boat and asked, “Enlil, how many individuals are stationed to each fan boat?”
“Three, your eminence, why?”
Pulling Enlil forward, Uruk pointed at the craft. “Why does that one have five?”
“I’m not sure, Uruk…”
“Call it in, call it in, call it in!”
Enlil motioned to the other Atlantians on the allure and said, “Clear this area. Prepare the transition tables. Coordinate their capture.”
Dozens of fan boats spun around and buzzed concentric circles spiraling into their focal point. Within minutes, they surrounded the suspicious fan boat.
Speaking into a small radio woven in the collar, Enlil responded to a fluttering buzz sent to grab attention, “Go ahead, I’m listening.”
“Your grace,” a voice rang back, “the fan boat contains five Atlantians.”
Enlil’s nose flared. “Ask why do they carry five!”
“Uh, Issakum is leading four acolytes for prayers at the Dead River. Should I reroute them?”
A solid object pressed into Enlil’s head, and a voice whispered into Enlil’s webbed ear, “Not a good idea, Enlil. Leave them be.”
“No,” Enlil muttered into the radio collar, “let them through.”
“Good boy,” the familiar voice said and tapped the object on Enlil’s head. A human hand then reached over and ripped off the radio collar.
Uruk turned towards the disruption, asking, “Good boy? Who said that?”
A weapon shoved into the archbishop’s aquiline nose, held by Sam. “That’s right, you withered, power-hungry piece of sun-bleached shit. Good boy.” He swept away Uruk’s staff and asked, “Juan, can you relieve Enlil of his discharger?”
Juan disarmed Enlil of a similar weapon to what Sam held. The disk-shaped housing consisted of a handle and enclosure like the Atlantian flashlight. Unlike the flashlight, the disk launched a radiant blast twice as powerful as an Atlantian yellow glowing staff.
Uruk’s voice cracked: “How did you evade us?”
“See that beautiful girl guarding the entry?” Sam pointed to Emelia, who returned a royal hand wave and an Audrey Hepburn smile, “She is quite powerful, you know. Hid our thought patterns. Man, without your little Atlantian advantages, your people are kind of…wimpy.”
“And your people are idiots,” Uruk huffed. “Well, you have a gun pointed at my head, now what?”
Sam gauged Enlil’s eyes. “I spoke to Apsu.”
Enlil looked to Uruk confused, seeking permission to respond.
Sam gestured saying, “Don’t look at Uruk; look at me, Enlil. Hear what I say. Apsu—spoke—to me.”
Uruk struggled, and Sam’s hand on the archbishop’s boney neck jerked Uruk back in place.
“Enlil, are you not even the least bit curious what Apsu had to say?” asked Sam.
The broad-shouldered Atlantian lowered a brow, then lifted a chin and asked, “What did Apsu look like?”
Sam inhaled deeply and shared the story.
“Green tree frogs came together singing these beautiful whale songs. Then, they puffed up in little smoky clouds and the ceiling’s aurora ignited them. They became this blue mist. Eyes made of electricity peered through it, looking directly at me. The voice was deep. Wise. Mighty, Enlil. I wish you heard it, you should have been there.”
“It”— Enlil struggled to find the words—“it is true, then.”
“Don’t listen to him, Enlil,” Uruk commanded.
“Quiet!” Enlil shot back, greyish skin changing a ruddy color. The muscular Atlantian approached Sam without caution studying his face for twitching—for signs of deceit. There were none. “It is true, then.”
“You curious to hear what Apsu said?”
“Please, tell me.”
Sam said in a lowered voice, “Time mends memories. Children lift minds. Hands build bridges. Love powers all.”
“The sacred teaching,” Enlil said softly.
“Then, Apsu said only a sentinel could kill a sentinel. That I must die and be reborn. Finally, Apsu said to leave Savannah as a human. I agreed to a promise, Enlil. Apsu would let me leave so I could later return and help the Atlantians.”
Enlil paused, then asked, “You must die and be reborn?”
Sam nodded. “Not looking forward to that part.”
Enlil scowled at Uruk and demanded, “A life for a life!”
“How can you believe this human?” Uruk tried pulling Sam’s hand off the boney neck supporting the decrepit Atlantian’s head. Ancient Atlantian claws chipped trying to dig into Sam’s fleshy fingers.
Enlil snatched Uruk’s neck, knocking Sam’s hand away. Swinging Uruk around, Enlil dangled the archbishop over the allure’s edge. “A life for a life,” growled Enlil enraged, “the Sam Mason revealed more than you ever have. Traitor!”
“Please…Enlil.” Uruk wormed in the stronger Atlantian’s grip. “Consider what you’re doing!”
Enlil said to Sam, “I pledge to you, one life for one life. If you do not die as Apsu has foretold within one year, your life will be forfeit to me. Do you understand, human?”
“Fair enough. What does one life for one life mean?”
“This.” Enlil squeezed, snapping Uruk’s
neck. Opening a thick hand, the archbishop’s body tumbled down the escalade striking gargoyles and parapets as if in a pinball game until landing in a pancake of grey skin and bone on the ground.
Enlil turned and faced Sam. “If you give your life for the Atlantians, I give a life in exchange. Come, I will escort you to Eden, west of Savannah.”
“We need to grab our friends,” said Emelia stepping forward. “They’re hiding on the docks.”
“I will have them escorted to the downtown area. The stores still have medicines to help the Lou Frasier.”
“Thank you.” Emelia placed a gentle hand on Enlil’s shoulder and said, “We are grateful for what you are doing. Please hurry, though. Our friend is extremely ill.”
Enlil closed two grey eyelids and grunted a begrudging confirmation. “I will do my best.”
Part 9: Shadow of Rickettserax
“They have him!” Clark Stone flung a crystal glass containing old, fragrant wine against the wall of his quarters. Nighttime held the Coast Guard cutter in an icy grip as it chugged by Charlottesville. Its city lights dotted the glass of Clark’s portal, creating a dim reflection of his eyes. “How! How could you not slay that shit-stain when we took Wilmington.”
In the darkness, on the wall unfortunate to witness the slaughtering of Luc LeBlanc, floated two piercing red eyes. A shrill voice whipped Clark into a stupor: “Do not test me, child. You would not be the first cúntóir I destroyed for a snack.
“Fine, why can’t you go kill him in Savannah?”
“That land belongs to Apsu. I cannot broach it.”
“Why not!”
“Silence!”
Spiders summoned from every nook on the ship congregated on the wall around the luminous red eyes of Rickettserax. At his command, they migrated to the ceiling, engulfed Clark and began biting everywhere they could find open skin. He swept, smashed and mashed tickling sensations, yet the toxins built up in his bloodstream. His mind dulled from neurotoxins, and his arms swelled as necrotic poisons broke down organic tissue.
“I’m sorry, please,” whimpered Clark. “Please, call them off.”
The pin needle nips at his skin stopped, but the spiders remained to cling tightly on his clothes.