Four Althelib guardsmen moved in silence out of an alleyway in the overcity, and found refuge inside of a hollowed vehicle, blackened by fire. They crouched low, and spied what they could in their immediate surroundings of the overcity from the broken windows.
Sam spoke first, in a whisper.
“Look. There’s the cage.” Sam pointed out over the jagged glass of the window, into the square, some hundred steps before the westernmost ruins of the surrounding buildings. “I see her, barely. She’s sitting.”
“No faces by her?” Aern asked.
“None,” Sam replied. “I don’t know how they haven’t noticed.”
“The cage was made to observe,” Aern said. “It was a massive undertaking, when I was young. It rises quietly, and slowly. If you don’t make noise, and you move without flailing your arms about, you may go unnoticed. She’s just lucky there weren’t any standing near the trap doors. And so are we.”
“I don’t like the one swaying about on the rubble there, on the opposite side of the cage. It’s too close for comfort.”
“His one eye is sharper than both of mine,” March remarked, struggling with his height in the small space. “It would have been better to emerge from those buildings there…”
“Unlucky,” Aern said. “But that way wasn’t available to us. This will have to do. How many other faces do you see?”
“Let me look,” Fazel said, and made his way over to the window with Sam. “Three by the fountain, towards the south. Far enough. Two on the steps of the big important building on the far side, the one with the three double doors.”
“The courthouse,” Aern clarified.
“Oh? That place was for courting?” Fazel mused.
“No you ninny,” Aern grumbled. “Court was for holding trials. It was a place where humans had their law meted. You never did a shift in there? There’s a statue of some niru god of justice. They cover the topic in the old Sehirtu books.”
“They don’t let us read those anymore,” Sam said. “They don’t even teach the symbols.”
“Oblivion,” Aern said with disdain.
“There are a few more climbing the buildings south of the courthouse,” Fazel continued. “And I see some others far off near the eastern entrance to the square. The rest I can’t see. I’m sure there are many more.”
Suddenly, there was a deep rumble under the vehicle, and the four Althelib braced themselves as the ground shuddered. Glass fell tinkling from the frames of the windows, and rubble around the city was shaken loose. The tremor was followed by a muffled roar from underground. One of the hollowed buildings in the western perimeter of the square was filled with flashing, fiery light.
“What in the Lady’s name was that?” Aern said. “Was that fire?”
“Hmm,” March said. “We should get moving. I have a feeling they’re gonna need us down there.”
“Open the door, and you two locksmiths make way down flush-west, and come up on the cage as if from that side. Sam and I will flank you, and anything that needs its attention pulled to away, we’ll have it. Our man up in the watchtower over the eastern entrance will sound the siren if he sees any coming that we can’t, or if the cage opens.”
“What happens when we get their attention?” Sam said, with unnerving calm.
“We can fall back here. But if we do, we’d better have as many as possible following us. That will give March and Fazel time to lock the cage. We don’t want a group of faces split between us and them.”
Fazel thought for a moment, then grabbed Aern’s wrist.
“Captain, after we lock the cage, if you’re trapped here, we’ll call them back that way again. We can hide in the ruins on the west side, though we’ll be stuck there for some time. But it will give you two the chance to get back downstairs.”
“That’s a boy,” Aern said, grabbing Fazel’s chin roughly.
“And if you can call out to the girl while she’s in the cage, somewhere from inside the buildings, you can find a way back in. She knows - she sneaks around there,” Sam said. “That’s how she let the angel in.”
March smiled.
“Ever since you won that shiner, you’ve been keen as a sword.” Sam shrugged, and Fazel grinned to himself.
“Alright,” Aern said. “Let’s move. Slowly.”
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The guardsman Iyan came into the temple of the Long Lady turning his baton over and over in his hands. He walked steadily, but carefully, looking about the place in caution. He was alone, as far as he could see.
Iyan made his way over to the well, which he found with its iron gate down. He knelt before it, and peered slowly into its infinite depth. He leaned back again, and sat on his heels.
He began to speak, quietly.
“Everyone’s afraid to come in here now,” he said. “I can tell you my dream, Tomo. The bad dream. You’ll be the only one I’ve ever told it to.” Iyan put his weapon down at his side. He placed his hands one over the other on his thighs.
“This dream comes to me often, and it's always the same.
“I dream about a time when I was very young. My life at the time was about these little toys we used to have here - rather, bits and bobs of technology the humans left behind. Tiny things; the littlest parts of machinery; buttons, springs, cogs like that. I played with them as if they were toys. They were the only possessions I had. The only ones I cared for.
“My father would collect them, working his lonely posts on the outskirts of the city, back when there were still scavengers living up top, or coming in from the wastes to steal our chargers. They didn’t want to be part of the undercity. My father made sure they stayed away.
“The Casiq at the time didn’t allow anything to be taken home from the overcity, so he would sneak them back to me in our apartment after his shift. I’d wake up in the morning, and there would be a new piece waiting for me on our kitchen table, with our morning rations. My father would be fast asleep by the time I awoke. But I knew that he thought of me out there, when he was alone, guarding the city. Especially after my mother died. He brought those little pieces of ruin for me all the time. It was a secret between us.
“In the dream, I’m playing with these treasures. All of them, in the fields of ruin outside of the city, by myself. The sky is a rolling tumult of steel storm clouds, and the wind whips all around me. I hear my father call. Iyan!
“I lift my head from my play, and in the distance, see some of the bright-faces coming from far away, where the wastes vanish into the darkening mists of the world. I hear my father call again, from an entrance to the city. Iyan! Iyan! I become filled with fear. I have to get back to my father, somehow. To reach safety within the walls of the city, where he waves. There is a warm light behind him, the glow of the amber lights of the city. But all of my toys are strewn across the ground, and the wind is scattering them further across the dusty earth. I struggle to gather them up, desperate and they tumble further from me. I take as many as I can, and stuff them into my pockets. I hold more in my hands, but I always leave so many behind.
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“I get up, and begin to run. So slowly, as if I’m struggling through mud. My father hollers for me, and I know that just behind, the bright-faces are gaining ground. My father reaches out his hand, and I feel the toys falling from mine as I reach back. Only steps away, so very close. In the dream, I think: I’m losing all of my toys. All of the toys you found for me, over the long years. I’m losing them all, one by one. I’m sorry, father.
“My running slows and slows. My body becomes light, and I am off the ground. My toes only scrape the ground. I’m running in place, just short of the light of the city, and my father.
I never make it to him. I fall, just before my father, close enough to see the terror in his eyes. The bright-faces close in on me; they lay their hands on me, and their masks surround my vision. I wake up.”
Iyan took a deep breath.
“But what I think about most, when I awaken, is my father. He’s been gone for so many years. I barely remember what he looks like.. And I can’t find a single one of the toys he gave me. Not a single one. What did I do with them? Did I throw them away? Why would I do such a stupid thing? My father gave them to me!” Iyan’s voice quivered, and he looked down at his open hands.
They began to glow, faintly.
Iyan examined them further, flexing his fingers, then turning his hands over. The back of his furry knuckles were also becoming brighter.
A gleaming brilliance rose from everywhere around him.
Iyan leaned back, and fell on his rear, squinting his eyes as the light in the temple grew too bright to endure. As he did, tears streamed down his cheeks, into the soft fur of his beard.
“You’re gonna make me cry, Lovie,” a strange voice said, echoing through the temple like chimes in the wind. Iyan kept his eyes shut to the power of the light.
“Tomo?”
Iyan’s tears flowed. Through his closed eyelids, he could see a pillar of bright light rising before him, out of the well of Anagmir. It passed through him, filling him with warmth, and he raised his hands out by his sides and groaned. His chest heaved, and he unleashed his buried sorrow. He smiled through his tears, and laughed, and wept, and laughed again.
After a short time, his breathing evened, and his wits returned.
He sat for a moment in silence, with his eyes shut, then slowly got to his feet.
“Tomo?” he sniffed the moisture from the tip of his small brown nose.
“Mmm Hmm,” Tomo said from behind him.
Iyan smiled, and seemed as if he would weep once more.
“Can I open my eyes now,” he said, his voice all aquiver.
Tomo laughed.
“Yes, Lovie. You can open them.”
Just behind Iyan, a tall, limbless figure of pure brilliance floated. From its sides shone rotating fractals of glowing, shifting color, and its eyes burned with white-hot fire.
“Can I turn around too?” he asked.
“Go for it,” Tomo said.
As he turned and perceived her, Tomo stood before him somewhat changed from when he saw her for the first time. She shimmered, in a tattered pale-white dress of wide, spiraling layers that ended underneath her breasts. Her chest was covered in gilded, ivory armor. The puffs of her sleeves were translucent, speckled all around with tiny, silver silk moths whose wings flapped slowly. Her feet were bare. Her iridescent waves of lilac and pink hair floated to one side of her head, as if in water.
“Good morning, Lovie. Where did everyone go?” she asked.
Iyan grinned sheepishly, his eyes bright with the reflection of Tomo. He had no answer. He merely shrugged, bathing in his own peace. He passed his hands over his chest, and took a deep breath. “You look taller.”
“Do I? Hmm,” she looked down at the ground. “I don’t feel taller.”
“I feel taller,” he said mindlessly. “I mean… I feel better.”
Tomo nodded. “Yes Lovie. Sometimes you just need to let it out. It’s healthy,” she offered her hand. “Come. Bring me to the Casiq. I think it’s time we had a talk.”
Iyan took her hand gently, in awe of it, as if he expected it not to be real.
“But I don’t know where he is. He ran away. Everything sort of… came apart. After they pushed you into the well,” he said. “That wasn’t right.”
“Super extra,” Tomo said, raising a brow. “That was a wild trip.”
Iyan looked around, furrowing his brow. “The Casiq could be anywhere…”
“Okay, here’s what we’ll do. I’ll point to where the Casiq is in time and space, and you can lead me there.”
Iyan touched the side of his face, wondering what that meant.
“Let’s try,” Tomo said. She pointed her finger toward the face of the Long Lady, in the painting that depicted her sitting with her little humanoid companion, the both of them smoking cigarettes. “He’s over there somewhere!”
Iyan squinted his eyes.
“In that direction… is… AH! That should be near the piston chamber…”
“Well done, Lovie,” Tomo said. “To the Casiq. And hey, after everything’s finished tonight, you can look for new toys. And then one day, when you have your own child, you can leave them like little gifts. That would be kind of meaningful, wouldn’t it?”
“It would,” Iyan said. “That would be really wonderful, Tomo.”
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Luinosa sat cross legged in her domed prison. She took a deep breath, and watched as one of the bright-faces perched nearby danced its slow, swaying dance. Its masked, smiling face was upturned towards the sky.
She gripped the hanging ends of her scarf.
A tremor shook the platform underneath her, and it rattled against the edges of the vertical tunnel she emerged from. She held her breath, and turned over to place her long ear against the metal floor. Deep down inside of the undercity, she could hear raised voices.
An explosion in the distant borders of the square sent an arch of luminous liquid over the ruins, which came showering down moments later upon the surrounding debris. Some of it caught fire.
The bright-faces in the square all stood on their hind legs and stretched their necks, following the display. Some leapt forward and scuttled closer to witness a second explosion, chittering in excitement.
Luinosa slowly got to her feet.
“Tomo, you’ll be back soon. I know you will,” she said to herself. “Tonight is a special night. And I’m not afraid.”
“I believe you,” a voice said from behind her. Luinosa spun towards it with wide eyes.
Fazel crouched smiling on the outside of the cage.
Luinosa came tumbling forward towards him, and she grasped his hand in both of hers.
“It’s Fazel,” Fazel said.
“Yes I know you, dummy. Alto’s friend!” Luinosa whispered with excitement.
“Well, I mean, we know each other, I wouldn’t exactly…”
March appeared, crouched behind Fazel.
“The both of you shut up,” he said calmly. “We’re gonna lock the mouth of the cage shut, so it can’t open. With this.” March displayed the chain. “Let’s go. Quietly.”
“Right,” Fazel nodded. March gave Fazel a boost, and within moments, he was at the top of the cage. He braced himself, and leaned forward. Stepping up on one of the horizontal bars, March stretched his long arm up to Fazel, and passed him the heavy chain.
There was another explosion. Another stream of molten liquid rose high into the air, followed by several others, off to the east. Further explosions belched fire from the buildings there, and for a moment, it was as if the sun shone.
There were shouts from high above.
“Hey! YOU!” a guardsman hollered from one of the watchtowers.
The ground rumbled violently, and Fazel was shaken so hard he lost his balance, and began to tumble off of the cage.
“Fazel!” Luinosa called, as March rose up and caught him from falling off completely.
“Get back up!” March whispered. “Hurry!”
A Siren sounded.
“Fuck,” March hissed.
“OPEN THE CAGE!” one of the voices in the tower bellowed.
There was another explosion.
“HURRY!” March implored Fazel, who scrambled frantically up the cage once more.
Luinosa began to breathe shallow, panicked breaths.
“Calm down, Lu,” March said. “We’ll double back to the ruins behind us, after we lock it. You’ll be…”
Luinosa pointed behind March.
“I know. You can guide us through, I know you know the way. Just shout the directions. FAZEL!”
“I’m hurrying!” Fazel said. He shoved one side of the chain through the lip of the cage, and struggled to pull it back up again on the other.
“March,” Luinosa said. She was still pointing behind him.
March turned.
Standing directly before him, was the chattering mouth of a bright-face.