Chapter 12: Monster and Man
Drifter stopped before the entrance of the abandoned building. At one time it would have been the retreat of rich folks and the chronically ill. Now pigeons roosted on its gutters and fluttered through the gaping doorway. Not so different than the rich folk, with their billing and cooing, strutting themselves for the others to see. In fact, they directly inherited the position, as there were no celebrities left in all of Civitas Apex. None that could be recognized as such.
In front of the spa, a dozen low steps radiated out in tiers, making access easy. At the top of them a doorway stood, wide and arched at the top. Its glass doors were shattered, laying across the top steps in glittering fragments. Inside was dim, struck through with shafts of light from the broken dome on top. Drifter took in the building from a few feet distant of the lowest step. He had found the spa that used to be ancient springs. Now all he had to do was turn north, to his right, and keep walking. Within the next few days, he should reach the park of science and the end of his self-imposed mission.
But he hesitated in front of the rounded steps. There might still be water inside somewhere, fresh spring water that would be untainted. If not all of it was mineral-water, that was. He did not yet need more himself, as he had filled the flask the morning before and drank little since, but Bard was still out there somewhere. And if the boy was, for some reason, trying to come in contact with Drifter again he would have known to go to the spa and wait for him. Especially as he could get clean drinking water there, something he would have a difficult time doing elsewhere.
Besides which, the mineral water might be good for the wound on Drifter’s leg. It continued to ache and weep, from the combined evils of the harsh use it had been put to (especially in fighting the griffin), the lack of care he had given the scar and more recently the river mud that had caked it. Drifter disliked putting any part of himself before his mission, but he had to be in one piece to complete it. After that, it would cease to matter.
Stalking warily up the steps, he slid into the arched door. A band of shadows enveloped him just inside, while ahead the tiled floor was lit from above. The tiles were cracked and scorched, the chairs that had once ringed this large waiting room burnt to spidery lines of black. A pair of pillars held up each corner of the room, white, with skirts of charcoal gray. A desk curved around one edge of the chamber, made of some sort of dark, impermeable stone. The few bones laying on the floor about it, cracked and gnawed, showed where some terrified citizen had attempted to hide.
To the left and right, doors led off of the main chamber. One had a metal plaque above it carrying the word, 'Massage’. The door across from it was missing its sign, but Drifter guessed it had once pointed the way to the springs.
He stuck to the shadows as much as possible, gliding around the outside of the glass-strewn room to reach the right-hand door. It led into a long, wide hall stained with amorphous yellow splotches on floor and roof. A damp and moldy odor began to permeate the air.
After trying various doors which led nowhere, to shattered rooms or ones with furnishings that did not interest him, Drifter found a set of stairs leading down into a low, wide and dimly lit chamber. The sinuous drip of water wound its way up the stairs, suggesting grottoes of cool liquid.
In the dim light of the wide room Drifter found a set of three partitioned chambers within it. He looked in the nearest one and discovered a huge, set-in pool rimmed in green tiles. He was underground now, where the Greenspark could not hit directly. The floor was damp and muddy, the tiles still in their places. The pool brimmed with lapping liquid, which came in through a piping system in the wall and ran out again through one hidden below the surface. A soft ripple spread over the pool as a drop fell from the roof. The edges of it were encrusted in a thin, whitish powder like salt.
At one time a sign had been affixed to the wall, explaining rules and perhaps the uses of the pool. Now the sign hung down, face against the wall, as if ashamed of an existence with no masters. Drifter cast a glance at the sign before walking to the edge of the pool and dipping his fingers in. It was cool, almost cold, with a slight thickness to it unlike pure water. When he drew his fingers out and touched them to the tip of his tongue it left a tingling sensation behind. With one more glance around to make sure that he was alone, Drifter rolled up the left leg of his pants and unlaced his boot. The leather was still a little damp from crossing the river, but that was no reason to get it any wetter. Underneath, his sock was stiff with dirt and mud. Drifter gazed at it dispassionately for a minute before deciding that he would leave it on. That way, it would get washed in the water at the same time. Holding his breath, he dipped first his foot and then his leg into the lapping liquid.
The mineral water was cold on instep and calf, stinging on his scorched shin. He let his breath out in a hiss and waited for the sensation to fade away. It was good that it stung. That meant it was accomplishing something.
Mud swirled away into the water, making dirt patterns before being drawn down and refreshed. After a short time, Drifter peeled his sock off and wrung it out, flopping it over the boot. It was odd to see his own foot splashing down in the water like some sort of dank fish. He counted the toes to make sure that they were still there.
After a few more moments of soaking, Drifter pulled his leg out and began to rearrange his gear. He was just drawing on the boot, when he heard a faint noise echoing towards him from the direction of the staircase. Footsteps clicked on the floor, followed by a pair of voices.
“He went this way, c’mon.”
“Hee hee, we’ll get him now!”
Coarse voices, adult but childish in their glee. Drifter finished tying his boot and slunk over to press himself against the wall. Had someone seen him come down the steps?
“He’s a tough one. Be careful.”
“Are you sure he’s still here?”
“He went in early this morning. And you know they don’t move in the day time.”
Drifter saw two men come into view, both raggedly dressed and carrying improvised spears. They gave the pool room hardly a glance, passing by with the whispered words,
“the Chardog’s probably hiding back further, where it’s darker.”
It was not Drifter they were hunting for. He stayed hidden in the shadows, unseen as they passed by. He noticed that one of the men was also carrying a lantern, as yet unlit, while the other bore a heavy club in his right hand as well as a spear. Both had lengths of rope wrapped around their middles.
As quiet as the dark Drifter began to shadow them. He did not dare come up too close, in case they lit the lantern or made a sudden turn. Instead, he followed at a distance, cautiously. He passed another partitioned-off pool, this one filled with a darker, more greenish liquid. Ahead, the two men turned into the third compartment, pausing just inside to light their lantern. Yellow light pooled out of it, gleaming off of the tiles on the floor with a sickly radiance.
Drifter paused, wary of the light. Inside the partition, he heard a shuffling noise, a growl and a startled yelp followed by the unpleasant laughter of the two men. There was another growl, a series of short shouts and laughs from the men and then the clearly-spoken words;
“He’s bound now! Hah, he’s ours.”
Mockingly, the other spoke to their victim, “poor doggy can’t move, can he? Now doggy’s at our mercy!”
“We’ll make him pay for the trouble him and his brethren cause us!”
The deep, rumbling growl of a Chardog was turned abruptly into a pained yelp. The men laughed, the dog whined and then cried out again. Drifter’s expression became hard and sharp-edged as obsidian.
Stalking forward, he looked around the edge of the partition. This one held a pool that had gone dry, the edge stained but clear of encrustation. Down at the bottom of it was a few bones and scraps of fur, as well as a torn cushion from a couch that must have been dragged there at some point. It was a Chardog’s lair, where it hid from the light and devoured its prey.
The lantern was set on the edge of the basin, just above a set of steps leading down into it. On the floor next to the steps a large Chardog lay, paws bound and huge eyes flaming. It writhed and snapped but could not get up. Blood ran from a wound in its flank, while its head had a large, lacerated bruise above one eye. The two men stood on the step above it, faces twisted in evil leers as they brandished their spears and jabbed at it mercilessly. Every time the beast cried out in pain, its tormentors laughed.
Drifter descended unseen and lay a hand on the shoulder of one tormentor. The man gave a start and turned, gripping his weapon.
“Why torture the beast?” Drifter grated, “it suffers from the destruction no less than we do. If it kills to eat, it is only acting naturally. You could try doing the same.”
The man jerked free of his grip and whirled the spear around between them, while his companion drew up his club threateningly. They were both hardened and tough, corded muscle standing out on their thin arms. Both bore light burns from the disaster, but no blackened scars. They were men of the ruins, survivors no less than Drifter.
“What business is it of yours?” the first man returned, baring his teeth. “This is a Chardog, can’t you see? They’re our enemies and we make them pay for the pain they have caused us. You got a problem with that, you can join it!”
Drifter regarded them both calmly, stepping back up onto the step above. “Nothing deserves to suffer extra in this broken world. Kill it or let it go free.”
“You gonna’ make us?”
The Chardog whined hopefully, as if recognizing a friend in Drifter.
“If need be.”
“Just you try!” The first man drew back his spear for a throw. He was not slow, used to quick decisions and the actions which followed. One had to be quick to survive in Apex as it was.
But Drifter was faster. He leaped from the higher step, kicking the spear out of his way mid-air. All his weight came down on the man’s chest, knocking him from the last shallow step to the floor with Drifter on top of him. There was a crack of breaking bones and the man’s head slammed against the stone. He moaned, but did not move. Drifter jumped from him to land on the tiles near the dog, just as the second fellow’s spear whizzed by. It clattered off of the pool’s wall, falling uselessly to the floor. The thrower did not waste a second, raising his club and coming after Drifter with set, burning eyes.
Drifter waited for him, hands empty. It seemed that he was relaxed, not even prepared for an attack. But when his adversary approached, he moved like winged fire. Stepping aside from the club’s blow he brought his hand down on the man’s wrist, shocking the weapon loose. A second strike to his adversary’s chin made him stagger to the side, losing his balance and impetus. Drifter came after him, striking to midrift and head until the second man also lay still on the cold, echoing floor.
Drifter looked down at the two unconscious men, one of which would probably never move again, before turning to the beast which lay bound nearby. A few expert slices of his knife set the dog free. It scrambled to its feet, staring at Drifter with its huge, red eyes as if trying to decide between attacking him or bowing to his will.
Drifter was on one knee on the floor, an easy target. With a quiet gentleness, he spoke to the creature, “your wounds are mine, our freedom shared. Depart, beast of the night, depart in peace.”
The Chardog tilted its head to one side, stepped forward to nuzzle the man’s shoulder with its large, damp nose, and then padded away up the stairs. Drifter followed it with his eyes, stiffening as it passed a figure standing silently at the rim of the pool. It was Bard, his eyes wide behind the glimmering glasses as he stared down at Drifter and the two pummeled men. He did not even shy from the beast as it padded by, his gaze was so intent with shock and horror.
Drifter stood up, seeing a monster reflected in Bard’s gaze. The monster that Bard saw in him.
Frustration filled Drifter. The boy beheld him with pure horror, as something insane and evil. Without a word, Drifter strode up the steps and brushed past him, stalking down the chamber through the dim light. He went up the steps at the far side. Drifter did not wait for the boy to follow and did not want him to. He knew that the boy would either shy away from him in terror or treat him like a beast to be pitied and cautiously led out of its terrible ways. The boy’s fear bit into him as a sharp pain, striking to his heart.
Blindly, he chose paths through the doors and halls of the abandoned building until he found himself coming up yet another set of steps, which led out onto a balcony at the rear of the building. It was cracked and broken on one end, stone sticking out in jagged teeth. The banister was partially wrecked, hanging down towards the ground in steel strands. What was left of it, Drifter gripped until it furrowed his skin, leaving white marks behind.
Why should he care what the boy thought?
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Bard had left him. The boy was just another denizen of the ruined city, to be avoided or dealt with cautiously, careless of his emotions. But Drifter had promised Dick to watch the boy, give him one last fling in life before it all ended. And in Bard he recognized some of the last sparks of humanity, a will to live and see life with delighted wonder. While in his native environment of garden and books, machines and relics the boy was not merely existing. He was living with an interest in life.
Drifter slid down to sit on the broken balcony, closing his eyes and calming himself with deep breaths. His whirling thoughts slowly stilled to a leaden sea. It was not a time for anger, nor for hesitation. There were other people like Bard, a few of them at least, living in Apex Haven. There was also Loran, untouched by the scorch that had come with the Greenspark fire. Those people, a handful out of all Apex perhaps, a few hundred maybe in the world, deserved a better life. But there was only one way Drifter could give it to them. Only one way he could find peace from the scorch.
He had to complete his mission.
Standing up, he gripped the railing and swung himself over the edge. Hand-over-hand he climbed down the hanging steel rail. It was a drop of perhaps six feet to the ground at the bottom. He took it easily before looking about him. His pack of goods had been left behind in the spa, set beside the first pool where he had bathed his leg.
But he did not care. The key was still in its cylinder, the scroll tucked in his uniform shirt. It would only take a few days to reach the Gate of Eternity. He did not need to eat in that time. Only drink a little, and he had his flask of water with him. In a forced march, he could make the distance quite quickly. Then everything evil would be at an end.
He turned towards the north, using the sun as a guide, and began to walk. It was not the dogged plod of earlier that day. Nor a trot or wasteful dash. It was a long, striding march that ate up the ground without expending too much energy. It was a walk that could not be stopped.
---
Bard stood aside as Drifter passed him, feeling as if he had just seen a dark phantom brush by. Down below, the two men that Drifter had either incapacitated or killed lay still, faces pale in the lantern light. As the loner’s footsteps echoed away Bard shifted his gaze from the pool to the hall and back again. He did not move for some time, rooted to the spot by the scene replaying in his mind, the scene of Drifter striking down a man mercilessly and then gently letting a Chardog go.
Chardogs, Bard knew, were beasts of the night. They raided human camps when they could, killed and ate people, devoured any bodies they found and were said to walk with phantoms like pets. Bard had never seen a phantom. He had only heard Dick’s description of seeing one. But he imagined them to be pitiless wraiths of evil, the spirits of bad people come back to life. And now he began to wonder if Drifter was one of them.
After a few minutes of standing still in the echoing, damp chamber Bard shivered and began to walk out of it. He did not want to meet Drifter on the way back out. He was scared of the man, yet somehow, his fear had turned to determination. Bard decided that he needed to stop Drifter on his quest, no matter what it took. Even if, he shivered at the thought, he had to kill the man to do it. In his mind Drifter ceased to be truly human. He was now allied with the Chardogs, a beast to be destroyed before it devoured the world.
Bard had already found a clear, cold spring of water in the abandoned place and drank from it, filling a glass bottle he had also found there and capping it with a bit of wood. After filling the bottle, he had heard voices further down in the building and followed them until he came to the spot where Drifter was fighting the other men. Now he left the spa altogether and turned north, steps speeding up until he was hurrying on his way. Now and then, he felt a twinge of hunger and unrest in his stomach, but he ignored it for the moment. His toe also was paining him at every step. Bard set his teeth and drew on a reserve of strength he had not known he possessed. It was time for action like he had never known it before.
Later that day, he began to hear footsteps ahead of him down streets, or stalking between buildings. Peering down an alley cautiously, he saw Drifter. Pausing, the boy leaned against a chunk of cracked stone to catch his breath. He had caught up. Should he try to pass Drifter and reach the Gate first, or make some attempt to slow the loner on his course?
Bard knew better than to attempt a direct attack on the loner. He decided to follow for now, and see what happened, wait for an opportunity to present itself. Carefully, with a cunning he had never used before, Bard began to stalk Drifter. He watched him from between buildings, followed him at a distance down streets and waited for him to pass between fallen heaps of masonry.
Drifter was not looking around himself. He had set his course to the north and followed it without deviating. If he knew Bard was there, he gave no sign of it. He was locked on a distant target.
By afternoon, Bard was flagging. His hunger and the pain in his foot slowed him. He could not keep up much longer and he knew it. If he wanted to slow Drifter down, now was the time.
They were traveling through what had once been tall buildings, many of them broken off now in jagged stubs not more than a story high. Piles of rubble and stones lay beside the streets or spilling out into them, making a jungle of ruin to be crossed. A few avenues were still mostly intact, though buildings leaned over them precariously. Bard and Drifter were both traversing one of these, perhaps two hundred feet apart, when the boy looked up to see an opportunity at the end of the avenue.
There, a building had been broken off above the second story, its top mostly laying in crumbles around it. But a section of wall, made up of bricks and stones, still stood on the roof of the second story, poised dangerously over the edge of the street.
Summoning all of his energy, the boy turned off the avenue and scrambled over heaped-up broken buildings, or ran behind ones that were still intact. Pushing himself, he made it to the two-story structure at the end of the street. A metal sign hung from the front of it, held out on weakened iron arms. The sign was blank, white metal bent and peeling. Bard entered a side-door and found himself in what had once been a laundromat. The tall, square machines stood in ranks up and down the room, doors hanging open as if still waiting for dirty clothes to be shoved in. The machines closest to the stairs at the back were singed, cords melted and paint chipping off.
The next story was completely burnt out, whatever sort of mini mart or restaurant it had been blotted from the room. The steps up from there, to what was now an open roof space, were rickety. Bard dashed up them recklessly, heedless of their tortured groans. He came out not far from the heap of masonry on the roof. Panting, he threw himself down beside the stacked bricks and looked off of the edge. Down below, Drifter was just approaching the building, shoulders hunched as he strode forward. He did not look up or appear to notice the boy.
Bard didn’t give himself time to consider the enormity of what he was doing. He had never taken a person’s life before, or even considered it. Now he set his thin shoulders to the wall of bricks and pushed. It took more effort than he had expected. But once it started going, the heap was poised so delicately that it all slid off at once and plummeted towards the earth. In a rain of dust and clattering stone the stack fell and struck the pavement. Bricks bounced away and cracked on the hard surface. Bard gasped at the noise, suddenly afraid to see what he had done. Timidly, he crept up and craned his neck to look over the edge.
The pile of bricks had become a dusty heap in the middle of the road. They hit so hard that some had rolled away or scattered to end up near the curb. Others were cracked, bits and corners laying at odd angles. Bard expected to see a blue cloak laying crumpled underneath the pile, a hand reaching out terribly or a leg twitching. Some sign that his plan had succeeded. But the heap did not seem to cover anything except for the road.
“Didn’t manage to kill me, did you?”
A voice rang up from the side of the street a little further on. Bard raised his horrified eyes to see Drifter standing in the shadows of the building across the way. He had his slingshot on one wrist, the hand on the sling as if about to shoot.
Instead, he shrugged and continued on his way down the street. Bard sat back, still panting from his run and the excitement. He had tried to kill Drifter. The thought sunk its fangs into him. Perhaps worse, he had failed and Drifter knew it.
Slowly, the boy made his way down from the top of the building. He couldn’t fall behind. He had too keep up. But all of a sudden he was feeling very weary and even ill.
“Maybe it was the river water.” He mumbled to himself, leaning against the building. “Or that water that had gone over the skull...”
Gradually, he sunk to the ground and rested his head on one up-drawn knee. Waves of nausea, hunger and tiredness slowly overcame him and he sunk into a restless sleep.
He was awoken by a touch, sometime in the gray of twilight. Frightened, he groaned as he straightened his back. Bard felt cold, stiff and utterly sick. Not only that, but he was terrified about what might have touched his arm. It lessened his fear not at all when he saw a hooded figure leaning over him.
“Please! I didn’t mean it!”
A woman’s voice came out of the dark, cool and calm. “I will not hurt you. Sit still.”
Bard subsided, obeying the gentle command in her voice. Tilting his head back, he could just make out a pale face and dark brows. It wasn’t Drifter, that was certain.
“Who...who are you?”
“My name is Loran.” The woman came to sit in front of him, back straight in dim profile. “Did Drifter mention me to you?”
“No. I--Do you know him?”
“We traveled together, briefly.” Loran shrugged. “I don’t know him well.”
Bard shook his head wearily. “We’ve been traveling together for a few days. I don’t know him at all.” His mind felt fuzzy and incapable. “Drifter says that’s he’s going to end the world. I’ve got to stop him...I’ve just got to...”
Darkness swirled around Bard again, making him feel sick. Loran reached out suddenly and lay a cool hand against his forehead.
“You’re ill.”
“I know...it was the mud, or maybe the skull...”
And total darkness came over the boy once again.
---
It was not long after that he awoke to the soft, comforting sound of a fire crackling. As soon as he had made a move, someone’s hand slid under his head and Loran’s voice ordered, “drink this.”
A bowl was put to Bard’s lips and he drank in a warm broth with some sort of dusty aftertaste like herbs. Looking up, he saw that a few lengths of white cloth had been put around him as a bed and a fire was burning cheerfully nearby. Loran knelt beside him, the hood of her purple robe pushed back. Deep black hair like watered silk ran over her shoulders. Her expression was one of concentration, lightened by a touch of pity.
“You’ve had a hard time recently,” she said when Bard took the bowl from her and sat up a little more, propping himself against the wall. “An infected bite on your toe, illness and starvation. Did Drifter treat you so poorly?”
Bard held the bowl close to absorb its warmth, shaking his head. “I ran away from him. I don’t understand...he wants to end the world.”
After these words he took a few more sips of the broth. The ill feeling slowly receded from his stomach and hunger replaced it.
Loran sat back on her heels, sharp features expressing interest. “So I guessed right. He does think that Eternity for All lies beyond that gate.”
“Doesn’t it?” Bard looked up in surprise.
The woman shook her head slowly from side to side. “Not necessarily. Not how he thinks of it at least. Drifter believes that we are in the apocalypse, the great battle before the end of the world. He theorizes that by opening the gate he can end our suffering and bring about endless peace. But his ideas aren’t built so much on fact or true prophecy as they are on vague rumors and hope.”
“He doesn’t seem like the sort of man to believe in hope,” Bard muttered bitterly. After a few more slurps he added, “then what is beyond the gate?”
“I’m not sure. But I wonder...perhaps a clue as to why the Greenspark fell and what it was.”
Bard sat forward a little, narrow face intent. “I always thought it must have been some sort of meteor that hit into the moon and fragmented, spewing space rock mixed with strange chemicals across the world.”
“Many people think something like that.” Loran nodded to show respect for his idea. “But there are two problems with that theory that I know, even though I am no astronomer.”
She held up a slim hand to count them off on her fingers. “First: if that were so, the Greenspark would only have affected one side of the world as strongly as it did. The other side would have been turned away and only experienced nominal effects. Second: the relics and phantoms.”
“You mean, that they didn’t appear until after the fall?”
“Yes. Even if the phantoms were 'ghosts’ or spirits of some sort caused by the intense loss of life, it doesn’t explain the relics--”
Bard held up a hand. “But wait, the relics did appear a few hundred years before the fall, right?”
Loran smiled. “Good, you know your history. But why? Isn’t it odd that 'ancient relics’ should just appear in the world? Including a gate which no one can open, no one can move and had not been seen before. Also, I don’t believe that phantoms are the spirits of dead people. And they did appear just after the fall. So what links these three things together?”
Bard stared into the almost-empty bowl. After a long pause he shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“As of yet, no one I have spoken to does,” Loran said softly, “but I wish to find out. I was in the Academy sector researching relics in the library when I came across mention of the gate. Reading the legends about it, I realized what Drifter must be intending, as I had already seen his key. I left my studies and began following his path. I thought at first I would be too late, as he had the car and I did not know how far ahead of me he was. But luckily, I ran across a friendly stranger with a truck that he had somehow kept safe and still working. A beat-up old thing, still running just enough to convey me and my things with the driver. Then, after just a day and a half of driving, we came across Drifter’s car. I decided to go by foot towards the gate so as not to be spotted as easily.”
“Then you saw me laying here and just decided to help?” Bard gave her a glance full of gratitude. “Thank you.”
Loran brushed it away with a gesture. “I would have for anyone. But, actually, I saw you trying to drop the bricks on Drifter and what followed. If you had been a cannibal looking for meat or another enemy, Drifter would have shot at you with the sling. As it was, I guessed you must know him. And a little of his intent.”
“I see.” Bard gulped down the last of the soup. “But it was still kind of you. Now what are you going to do about Drifter?”
“Follow him.” Loran nodded her head firmly. “And see what is beyond these 'Gates of Eternity’. If it is the end of the world...well, I’m ready to meet our Maker. I simply do not believe that it is true.”
“I’m-- I’m glad.” Bard’s face turned a little pink with shyness. “I don’t want the world to end yet. I still want to live and do things. Maybe even make it a better place.”
“Good.” Loran lay a hand on his shoulder, pressing down gently but firmly as she took the bowl. “But for now you must rest. We will continue together in the morning.”
“Won’t Drifter get ahead?”
“He’ll have to rest at some point. He can’t walk forever.”
“Can’t he?”
Loran’s face became surprisingly cold and hard. “We’ll just have to hope not.”