Thomas
When Thomas was a young boy of perhaps ten or nine years of age his mother had left the television on for him after she had finished watching the latest episode of one of her favourite soap operas. It was a boring show that chronicled the lives of a wealthy family that ran some kind of office building in the heart of the largest city on the planet, with drama that was more fake than half the processed foods he had eaten, Thomas found it to be incredibly boring and unrealistic. However, what had been shown next was a rerun of a popular science fiction show that, for the life of him, could not recall the name of it nor who the actors in it were, or even what the overall plot was about. But one thing that did stand out to him was a scene that would stay with him for as long as he lived.
In it, the lead actor, at least that is what Thomas believed him to be, was a Caucasian male with slim facial features and light brown hair gelled back to expose a sharp widow’s peak. He stood looking over an empty bay with twin mechanical doors embedded in the floor. They clanked open and bright blue light flooded in to expose the surface of a planet below; The camera switched perspective to show a long, cylindrical object with four jets being lowered below the belly of a spaceship. Almost unexpectedly four jets of violet plasma burst into life shaking the camera and propelling the cylinder down into the atmosphere of the planet. What followed next was a long, drawn-out CGI sequence that followed the missile as it entered the atmosphere of the planet before the nose cone of the warhead blew apart and four small rockets launched themselves out. The rocket continued to travel its course when the adjacent section of the rocket removed its panels and another four missiles launched themselves in different directions. Then the next section blew about and another four launched themselves, and another four until the rocket shrank to just the four jets that were already firing. Eventually, small explosions ruptured the brackets that held the rockets together and went off towards their chosen target. What had started as one large missile being deployed resulted in twenty separate nuclear explosions that blanketed an entire continent in fire.
Thomas could not quite remember if the episode in question addressed the necessity of the weapon or even who the factions in it were but it seemed to be more focused on the good guys striking their opponents first and dealing with the aftermath.
Back in those days, Thomas was, just like any other kid his age, more interested in seeing the towering columns of smoke and fire billowing high into the sky surrounded by the devastation it had wrought in lieu of seeing the devastating after-effects such a powerful weapon possessed. Many details in the cinematic depictions were always leaving things out like the effects of acute radiation poisoning or fallout and the resultant nuclear winter. As he grew older, Thomas began to wonder just how accurate their portrayals truly were.
Even halfway down the mountain, obscured by many dozens of metres of solid granite and limestone shielding him from direct contact, he could still feel the sweltering heat from the Pyrosonic explosion bite into his already irritant skin like a hundred small insects. Ominous orange light beamed over the craggy peak like rays of morning sunlight peering through the clouds, except it wasn’t early morning, it wasn’t even day… It was late at night. Thomas’ skin was sticky with sweat that dried up in the presence of the heatwave and he wondered if there were some kind of after-effect from being exposed so closely to the Pyrosonic bomb. Michael claimed the dosimeter feature embedded within his implants showed no sign of any radioactive materials present but Thomas wasn’t sure if that meant the radioactive material hadn’t reached them yet, or that there was some other by-product that the dosimeter did not detect, or that there were no harmful elements that would prove detrimental to the group’s health. If it was the first one they would really need to get a move on and get as far away as they could before any radioactive particles settled down on them. If it was the second then Thomas feared what symptoms would arise as a result of exposure and what their chances of survival would be. And if it was the third option then apart from the persistent ringing in his ears after the massive shockwave adjusted the pressure so dramatically that it had felt like someone had hit his ear drum with a mallet, he would be fine in due time.
By all accounts, it should have been pitch black and chilly with faint light bouncing off one of the moons above, but the fiery column behind the group had provided enough illumination and ambient heat to make their journey ahead as clear as a summer’s day. It was starting to mess with his perception.
Thomas glanced over the group to check up on them to see how they were holding up. Their reactions were mixed; Ghilya and Michael looked distant and sullen, they were going to be a problem if he didn’t do something to address their issues. The former had just watched her home be reduced to ash in a matter of seconds, killing off who knows how many friends and family of hers, whereas Michael on the other hand hadn’t fully recovered from his recent near-death experience. The stress of this journey was starting to get to him and it was only going to get worse if nothing was done about it. Even Thomas had to agree that the amount of stress on his young brother’s shoulders was unfair for someone like him.
Poor Michael, Thomas thought.
His young brother was not emotionally prepared for the hardships that were ahead and yet he bravely suggested the idea of going to the most powerful figure on the planet in the hopes of stopping the invasion of their nation. Just what was he thinking when he suggested this; that it was going to be like one of those old fables of a brave hero going on a quest to parts unknown and face many dangers but in the end return a legend? Even when things were normal, Michael had always been behind the average person his age in regards to his mental faculties, on top of that, there was also the issue that he never grew up to know who his father was. Neither did Thomas for that matter but he had at least developed some memories of the man.
Somebody behind him worked to clear their throat. Thomas looked back to see a mature man behind him with a silvery flattop and sagging skin on his face that gave him a double chin; Senator Clarke.
Clarke was a politician in the Lower Senate for the Federal Republic of Balko. His domain covered the sprawling megacity that made up almost two thirds the state Michael and himself resided in, in fact by many accounts the rest of the nation considered the megacity itself a state of its own. Clarke was usually a pasty white in colour but looking at the man now Thomas could see he was tanned a vibrant red that looked like a really bad sunburn. But that could have just as easily been from the effort of trying to get down this mountain. Out of the four of them, Clarke held the least energy or stamina for such a journey which occasionally made Thomas wonder if bringing him along was even worth it.
“Are you okay, Clarke?” Thomas asked. The question was less from a place of concern than it was expected for him to ask the question in the first place. Since the formation of their little coterie there had been no rigid hierarchy or structure assigning each member to any role, and yet without any discussion it had seemed like Thomas was made the de facto leader of the group; guiding them and looking out for them when the need arose.
Clarke looked up, sweat dripping down the sides of his head, breathing heavily. It made him speak with a tired, gravelly voice.
“Yeah… Yeah, I’m alright. Just need to take a break.”
Thomas nodded. He looked toward his brother and Ghilya.
“How about you two? How’re ya holding up?”
Despite the brave faces they wore, Ghilya seemed distant and with a vacant look in her eyes while Michael seemed forlorn and exhausted.
“I just watched my home and friends and family burn to-to nothing and you ask me how I am doing!?” Ghilya shrieked. “Well since you asked; I am doing fine! Really, I am. Watching your whole world be consumed in flames and leave nothing but scorched earth where there are no bodies for you to mourn aside from a cloud of ash, can put somebody in a somewhat irate mood!”
Her reply came out so loud and sudden that it took Michael by surprise causing him to flinch. He glanced between Ghilya and Thomas, uncertain if he wanted to say anything out of fear of saying the wrong thing.
Truthfully, Thomas knew not to take it personally. It was understandable and relateable to some extent, though granted his home was not vaporised to its constituent atoms, but it was under siege by all manner of creatures whose only commonality was of their shared hatred of humans led by the pyschopathic Wood Elf commander Xareith. And everyday more people were losing their lives at the hands, talons, claws of these creatures.
In fact, it was because of this that Clarke had tagged along with them in the first place. As a politician he wanted to come to some sort of agreement with the Dragon Lord as an official representative of humanity.
They found a small platuea that they could safely rest on. After a short ten minute break that honestly felt like it was less than five minutes, the group continued their trek downward and stopped at a ledge that had a view of the desert ahead of them. Thomas took a momentary glance out to the vast stretches of sand before them and noticed that the light grew dimmer as the mushroom cloud lost its energy, his eyes had just adjusted to the presence of light and now they were about to be plunged into darkness once again.
I’ll be lucky if this doesn’t fuck with my body clock and my sleep.
Another hour later and they had made their way down toward the ground. Still, nobody spoke out of fear of saying the wrong thing or they had nothing worthwhile to say. It could have been both. But Thomas looked around to see if there was any place they could hide out in the plains that didn’t leave them exposed. Silently he cursed at the limited options, then looked back at Ghilya and asked.
“Hey Missy-“
“I told you not to call me that!” She bit back venomously.
“Don’t suppose you know of a good place we can hide while we are out there? Don’t want us to get snatched up by a dragon because we are in plain sight.”
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Thomas had partly expected her to reply back immediately, perhaps with a snide comment to him or about humanity in general. When she didn’t respond immediately, Thomas thought she was ignoring him. He was about to face forward when she said something.
“Well, there is one area I can think of…” It cane out more like a disapproving mumble than an actual response.
“Sounds like a start, where do we find it?” Clarke asked.
“For starters, it's still a day’s journey from here and it is an old outpost.”
Thomas stopped in his tracks and spun around to face her. “When you say ‘outpost’ what do you mean?”
She looked puzzled for a moment, her eyes darting between Clarke and Thomas.
“It’s an old human outpost. Really old. You don’t know about it?”
Confused, Thomas turned to face Clarke who shrugged his shoulders and held up his hands in an I-have-no-idea gesture. Finally, he said. “I know we had some old military base over two hundred years ago but I never heard of one this far out from our borders. Must be really old or something.”
“Or its a super secret base where they make experiments and dangerous hush-hush, you-never-saw-us black commando type stuff. Like orbital lasers and powerful guns.” Michael said in a hushed voice. Feigning paranoia over top secret government projects. “The kind where not even high ranking officials know about it for plausible deniability.”
Clarke chuckled amusedly at the idea. “I am pretty certain its not one of those kinds of bases.”
“How would you know? Maybe its an element of the government or military you don’t belong in that is doing rogue stuff.”
“Its not... Because if it were, I would have at least liked to have known about it.”
“I don’t know, Clarke. My brother does have a point; It could have been a faction that was very secretive and you weren’t trustworthy enough or something. Might even be still classified from you to this day if you even knew were to look.” Thomas said with a smirk. He wasn’t truly taking his brother’s side so much as he was entertaining him to help him feel better.
Ghilya, with a shrug of her shoulders said. “I do believe your outpost has been abandoned for quite some time.”
Michael took a step forward with a raised finger.
“Like, that outpost we saw a few days ago? The old military one?”
“What outpost?” Clarke and Thomas said together.
“We didn’t come across any old base a few days ago.”
Michael nodded enthusiastically and recounted his findings of an old concrete bunker that had long been since abandoned while looking for Ghilya. Due to his own negligence, Michael had been leaving his rubbish lying around and by the most unfortunate of circumstances this slight had come around to bite all of them in the ass. Ghilya responded to this with what Thomas believed to be something of an overreaction and stormed off, leaving them to fend for themselves. Still, he had to teach his little brother a lesson and send him to find Ghilya and do whatever it took to apologise to her. During his chronicling of events, Thomas began to take notice of several details that seemed to be implausible for reasons he could not explain but dared not to interrupt his brother’s story telling, for now he wanted to see what the whole story was.
“-And thankfully, Ghilya came running as soon as she heard the gunfire and distracted the dragon long enough for me to impale it with my arm blade!” He said proudly as he brought out his right arm and summoned the Ithinite blade embedded within. “I still remember it telling me I was a worthy opponent just before it died in a pool of its own blood. And then I apologised to Ghilya, told her how much we needed her and we came back.”
He sounded so breathlessly excited and giddy like a child. Clarke and Thomas looked disbelievingly at each other, then to Michael who wore a proud grin on his face. Ghilya looking equally unimpressed by the events described had her arms crossed over her chest and her eyes lidded.
After a moment’s silence, Thomas looked over to Ghilya and asked. “So all that is bullshit, right?”
“Oh yeah.” She nodded.
The look of disbelief at seeing his whole display of bravado come undone quicker than it took for him to build it up was an almost worthwhile sight. For a moment it looked like Michael was about to protest but had chosen not to say anything. Thomas had to avoid making his pleasure known to prevent Michael from slipping down further his depression. Sure, he might have been okay and cracking jokes now but that was a façade he was using to hide the pain inside. For now Thomas would go easy on him until he has had time to deal with it.
Ghilya continued. “But he was telling the truth about the outpost. The one up ahead is even larger and made out of thick stone. But its been abandoned and I’ve heard stories about it.”
“What kind of stories?” Michael asked.
“Just strange ones; I heard from one traveller say they heard strange noises coming from it, didn’t even go near it to rest. Another one I heard said that they explored it on a dare and claimed that they felt like they were being watched.”
“Soooo… we aren’t going to go to this place right? I mean as if that wasn’t ominous as fuck already.” Said Michael.
Thomas shrugged his shoulders. “We may not have a choice. Besides, you already used your veto power once on the mountain tunnel, its why we are even hiking this friggin’ mountain in the first place.”
“Since when did we get voting powers? And need I remind you that my choice turned out to be the correct one? After all, we saw what happened and now we know we need to pick up the pace. Had we been in the spider infested tunnel it might’ve collapsed on us and we would never know why.”
Clarke tenderly placed a hand on Michael’s shoulder. “Your brother is right. We don’t have many options. And we can’t be picky about where we stay, especially in our situation.”
Michael sighed resignedly.
The gravelly path beneath their feet soon gave way to solid rock, then to sand. Large rocks of various sizes peppered the surface as we walked toward the volcano just over the horizon. Still a long way to go, and with plenty of night left, getting to the old building was going to be their primary priority. About an hour into it, Thomas could hear strange sounds escaping from Clarke’s mouth. When he spun around to see what was causing it he could see the Senator scratching at various parts of his face and arms.
With a raised eyebrow he said. “You alright there?”
Clarke hissed through his teeth. “No, my skin is itchy with blisters from the blast. I bet if I had those magic tattoos you guys have maybe this wouldn’t be as bad.”
Internally he rolled his eyes, but he couldn’t help but ponder the man’s words. It was true that he and Michael both had their skin reddened from the excessive heatwave but were nowhere near as red as the senator himself. The tattoos didn’t seem to come alive at all during the blast but he had to wonder if there was some kind of enhanced dermal durability that came with it.
“Maybe,” Thomas said distractedly. “But I personally find these tattoos more trouble than they’re worth.”
“They saved Michael’s life once already.” He rebutted
“Four times!” Michael swiftly corrected.
“See?” Clarke said extending an arm toward Michael.
“I agree with Thomas, these things are annoying as hell and are bloody inconsistent. “Michael added. “These tattoos are not all they are cracked up to be and hopefully we can ask the Dragon Lord to remove them.”
“How can you say that?” Ghilya sounded surprised with a small gasp escaping her throat. “Do you have any idea just how powerful someone has to be to place those on a living being? I certainly could not do that if I tried. In fact, I doubt even Xareish is powerful enough to do it. And for as strong and powerful as he claims, even he would be the first to admit he could not cast magic that powerful.”
“Its just that they seem to attract unwanted attention when they flare up and they seem to be very selective about when to activate.” Michael replied.
Michael’s voice sounded so matter-of-factly about it, though Thomas couldn’t blame his brother for his thoughts towards them. Did it save their lives? Yes; But that didn’t mean they were free of their own drawbacks that slowly proved they were becoming less useful and more problematic.
When Ghilya spoke, she almost sounded stunned. To Thomas he thought she viewed these magical tattoos as something they should feel fortunate to have.
“But even still, for someone to cast such a spell on you two, you must be very special to someone really important and really powerful. Its not every day you see that.”
Thomas turned around to face her while walking backwards. “Yeah, you see that’s the thing I have trouble with; Neither of us knows anybody that would cast this on us. I mean why would they, we’re just two guys who grew up in Sanctuary Hills, we don’t matter.”
“Is it possible this spell serves some other purpose?” Clarke asked carefully. “You said they were for protecting something important but do they have any other function or is that their only one?”
Ghilya shook her head. “Its only for protection as far as anybody knows. Only the casters themselves would know the full details.
“How is the whole spell put on a person? Like, what are the details?”
“Like most magic; you have to put your heart and soul in it. The spell and where you are sending it have to be at the front of your mind, you have to mean to cast it with all your heart, and on top of that you have to have a really, really good understanding of spells and magic.”
Thomas fought back the temptation to shake his head dismissively and instead opted for a short roll of his eyes that nobody noticed. Had he not seen the whole thing with his own eyes and experience the effects of the tattoos themselves he would have been a lot more sceptical towards Ghilya’s explanation of magic. Personally, he was not one that believed the heart had anything to do with anything that was besides its sole function.
Working as a technical assistant in Tobar’s clinic, Thomas was graphically exposed to the true inner workings of the human body and the functions each organ was assigned. The spleen functioned as an internal blood filter, sifting out impurities and storing them away in the lower bowels to be expelled along with the rest of the waste. Adjacent to that was the liver which aided in digestion and breaking down ingested substances. But the heart, that had only one job and that was to keep blood flowing throughout the body for as long as it can.
Much like his brother, Thomas was different from the rest of humanity in his belief that the heart had no bearing on his emotional state or thought processes. Even after centuries of it being proven, the common people acted based on the feeling they felt in their hearts. Or doing what the heart wants. But the heart doesn’t want anything. It does not want. It only pumps blood and that was it. The rest of it was decided by some small, emotional part of his brain that he tried to keep under a tight lid to prevent from interfering with his day-to-day life. Yet, despite his beliefs, here he was being told that magic involved the use of his heart. At the back of his mind he heard a voice gently whisper to him “Well that settles it; you are not going to be learning magic any time soon.”
He sucked in his lips and frowned as he felt something else in his mind sadden at the thought of not being able to learn magic. But the thought was quickly vanquished by the conscious part of his awareness perplexed by such a feeling. It was the kind of sadness one felt when something associated with them was taken away. Not the gut-wrenching pain of grief and mourning one felt from the loss of a loved one, but more akin to losing a toy or a piece of clothing they were fond of and now realising they won’t see it again. Thomas however, had no prior relationship to magic, at least not to his own knowledge. So it made no sense to him that he would pine for knowledge he never knew about before.
“So it isn’t possible that this spell was casted on them by accident?” Clarke asked, the inflection in his voice made him sound more uncertain than if he were asking a question. “Like, they weren’t in the wrong place at the wrong time and somehow it got casted onto them instead of something else?”
Ghilya shook her head.
“What if they were really, really born lucky and they naturally came with this thing on them?”
Thomas chuckled derisively. “Hah-hah, yeah right! We were lucky enough to be born with this shit on us but none of that luck could have gone to making us win the lottery or come from a wealthier, well-off family? Get the fuck outta here!”
Michael’s face split in half with the grin he was wearing. He lowered his submachine gun as he looked between Clarke and Thomas. “Oh yeah, real lucky we were. Hey Thomas, you remember the days when we were loaded and had Esses falling out of our pockets as we sat back and basked in the sun of our Cedar Heights summer home. Ah, what good times they were when we had too much money.”
“Hah, yeah, and anytime we needed some money our mother would always tell us to go to the vault where we keep the gold and chip off what we need!” Thomas added, laughter still present.
“You aren’t born with it, nobody is. All that is required is the caster maintaining a steady train of thought as they recite the passages and summon forth the magic to create the spell in the first place.” Ghilya explained, keeping her hands folded across her slim chest.
“So, no then?” Clarke asked.
“No. But, there may be a way we can get answers…”
“And how do we do that?” Michael asked cautiously. “I thought you said only the Dragon Lord or whoever put this on us would be able to give us answers.”
“I did and that is still our best shot,” Ghilya spun on her heels to face him. “but if I were to teach you a magically enhanced meditative technique then it is possible you might even be able to find out who did it yourself.”
“How they fuck does that even work?” Thomas asked.
“Every time someone uses magic they leave a small imprint on it. Most of the time it means nothing but it acts like a signature or some kind of identifier of who did it in the first place. If we get you two to focus really hard and meditate then perhaps you’ll be able to find out who did it in the first place.”
Though he didn’t say it out loud, Thomas glanced over toward Clarke who was staring back with a raised eyebrow in perplexion. Surely there was no way she was offering them how to use magic or at the very least give them meditation classes? Clarke took in a deep breath and sighed heavily.
“I doubt this is the best time or place to start thinking about doing some meditation. We should check out the abandoned base and if its secure, we can revisit this topic.”
Silent nods of agreement from everyone. From there on as they continued to walk, nobody spoke for what seemed to be hours, though Thomas was not really sure just how much time had passed. Back in the city where there were advertisements playing everywhere and every screen was equipped with a small clock in twenty-four time always present in the top right corner made it easy to find out what the time was by looking in any direction. For those who were rich, or really poor, or even those who fancied themselves as collectors would have a separate timepiece on their wrists.
Thomas worried that things were only going to get more difficult from here on forward, and worse, he was not certain if they were up for what might lay ahead.