The wheels dragged on day after day. Forests, lakes, fields, ravines, small mountains all crossed their path, and in turn they were all gradually passed by. The four companions kept to a stolid pace, neither too fast nor too slow, and grinded their way across the northwestern reaches of Out-World.
None of them actively listened to the transceiver anymore; they had not deduced anything else of importance in several weeks, and it merely put them on edge to hear the scattered report here and there.
Which is why they were surprised one morning to find a scout passing through the meadow they had set camp in, not fifty feet away in the early light.
Daniel spotted the man first. Dressed in a black uniform, he seemed to ride upon a horse made of steel, an unsettling thing that hissed and clanked. The sound woke up Robby and Gwyn as well, though he motioned with a finger at his lips to remain quiet. He stood up on his blanket and prowled forth, silent as the grave.
His Touch was not as strong as it had been in Barstow all those years ago, and he knew he would need to get closer to make this work. He willed that the man would stay still long enough for him to close the distance… or that he would simply ride away. The latter might even be preferable, avoiding detection would save them much trouble.
But that option was taken away when he heard Gwyn scream. Head snapping back, he saw four more scouts, all on their own metallic steeds. He bellowed: “Robby, shoot them! Shoot them for your father’s sake!”
Not daring to watch the result, he turned to sprint at the scout in front of him. The man took out a strange device that looked much like a gun, but had no barrel. Not caring to find out the difference, Daniel flattened himself up behind a nearby tree—just in time to hear a fizzling noise emit from the machine. He smelled burning bark, but put it out of his mind: he was close enough now to feel the man and exert his influence. He bent his thoughts towards the rider, shutting off the world around him in his efforts. He dimly registered a sharp report which could only be Robby’s pistol, somewhere behind him.
He felt more than saw the scout topple off his mount, crashing to the ground in a jumbled heap even as the familiar ache started back up in his own head. A hollow voice like the woman from the transceiver immediately split the air: “OPERATOR DISENGAGED. REPEAT: OPERATOR DISENGAGED. PLEASE REENGAGE OR ENABLE THE IDLING FUNCTION WITHIN 15 SECONDS. RETURN PROTOCOL WILL BE ACTIVATED IN 15 SECONDS. OPERATOR DISENGAGED. REPEAT—“ Daniel ignored the throbbing in his head as he dashed from behind the maple tree. Two, three more shots slammed across the meadow, and then a vicious scream.
“—RETURN PROTOCOL WILL BE ACTIVATED IN 10 SECONDS—“
He climbed up into the saddle, an action which felt both nostalgic and incongruous. The smell and feel of oiled leather brought him straight back to his lessons at the apprentices’ stable, so many years ago now… but there were things that shouted at him wrongly. There was a pressure at his back like a chair, and no reins with which to control this mechanical thing.
“RIDER HAS REENGAGED, RETURN PROTOCOL HAS BEEN CANCELLED.”
Looking in front of him, there were two knobs on each side of a small control panel not unlike the transceiver they had carried with them across Out-World. There was another keypad (for what purpose he could not readily identify), a small yellow button that said “IDLE,” and two-way switch labeled “ON” at the top and “OFF” at the bottom. Daniel hammered the IDLE button with his index finger, which seemed to click as it depressed inward.
“THIS UNIT IS NOW IDLING. PRESS BUTTON AGAIN TO RESUME NORMAL OPERATIONS.”
Curse this ungainly thing, he thought dimly. He immediately climbed back off, missing the maladjusted stirrup in his hurry and falling awkwardly to the ground.
He stole a glance over at his companions… and his heart dropped into his stomach. Gwyn was sobbing openly, clutching at Fiona. The gentle animal had her head in Gwyn’s chest. It’s alright, girl. Two bodies lay akimbo in the tallgrass. Fittingly, two of the unnatural contraptions stood next to their erstwhile riders.
“RETURN PROTOCOL WILL BE ACTIVATED IN 10 SECONDS,” a voice emitted from one said. The other gave a five second warning instead.
Daniel jogged back, his lungs working like bellows, but the metal horse with the shorter warning automatically began to trot away, too regular to be mistaken for anything but a machine.
“PLEASE REENGAGE OR ENABLE THE IDLING FUNCTION WITHIN 5 SECONDS. RETURN PROTOCOL WILL—“ Daniel reached up and angrily jammed the switch into the “OFF” position, and the voice cut off, leaving them in silence but for Gwyn’s crying.
When he looked again, he saw that the two bodies belonged to the scouts. One bled openly from bullet wounds in his chest, and the other from his nose. Both of these seemed riddled with sores at every square inch of exposed skin—all along their hands and arms, lesions and ugly yellow-purple bruises mottled the skin. Their faces were swelling along the cheeks and ridges of the eyebrows, and where they were not already dripping foul-smelling pus they looked an irritable red.
By rights these men should already have been dead, he thought. With radiation poisoning this severe, it was a wonder they could even walk. Then again, they knew Roedrick’s army to be well equipped… perhaps they also had some Glammer at their disposal that kept them going like this.
It didn’t matter, either way. “Gwyn? Are you okay?” He knelt down beside her and Fiona.
“Head hurts,” she moaned. “I killed him, didn’t I?” she started sobbing again.
“Aye, and well you did. They’d have taken you too, otherwise.”
She gasped then. “They got dad!” She jumped to her feet, wincing and holding a fist to her temple. “We need to go after him!”
Daniel shook his head. “We can’t do that, Gwyn. We’re in no shape for it.”
She spit at his feet then; he was shocked by this more than anything else she could have done. “We need to do something! Who knows what they’ll do to him?”
“Indeed, who knows? Gwyn,” he held his hands up. “Listen. We were nearly overtaken by a scouting party by itself. If we try to rush into their encampment, especially like this, we’ll surely be killed. Do you want your father to suffer that?”
She bared her teeth, hating to hear these bald and uncomforting words.
“We have a greater duty we must hold ourselves to,” he reminded her. “We may rescue your father later, but we must protect the Beam first.”
This seemed to resonate with her, and she gulped air a few times. Her eyes cleared of their panic, and she nodded resolutely.
“Good,” he said with relief… though of course, thoughts of his friend lingered in the back of his mind. “Come here,” he continued regardless. “I think these will help us.”
He helped her leg up into the saddle of the metal horse he had deactivated. Turning it back on, a voice like the transceiver seemed to emit from it, though this one was identifiably male and seemed to speak with some swagger. “Welcome to the North Central—”
“Yes, yes,” Daniel muttered impatiently. “We don’t need this. Do you know how to ride a horse?”
“I’ve never seen one before,” she said nervously.
“—‘Scout’ model electric horse. Please input preferred mode of operation.”
He frowned at this. Gwyn looked down at him, shrugging.
“Is there an obvious button anywhere?”
“No, doesn’t seem to be,” she searched briefly. She tapped at a random key experimentally.
“Manual steering column selected.” A hole appeared in the control panel, and an odd column like a short stick rose out.
“I didn’t see that on other one,” Daniel said. “Try it out, I guess.”
She grasped the steering column and, preparing herself for it to throw her, she wiggled it. The metallic horse responded with surprising grace, the head swiveling back and forth to match her movements.
While she toyed with this, Daniel picked Fiona up, stroking her gently at the head. “Poor beast,” he muttered into her wool. “I wonder how the rest of the flock is doing.”
“Baa,” she said to him. Put me down, you fool.
“Probably eaten by those brutes,” he agreed. “It’s a good thing you came with us, but now I’m afraid we must leave you behind too.”
She bleated again.
“Now, no complaining. We’ll be back this way if we can. We’ll look for you, you dithering ewe.”
Kissing the top of her head, he set her back down and walked over to Gwyn, who was walking the steel creature in a small circle.
“I think I’ve got it Danny,” she said with a small measure of confidence.
“Excellent,” he said absently. “Let’s get going.”
She trotted and he walked over to the other, idling horse. Readjusting the stirrups first, he climbed back into the saddle with some effort and pressed at the yellow IDLE button.
“IDLE MODE DISENGAGED,” was all it said.
He tapped at one of the keys, unsure.
“INVALID DESTINATION.”
“Gods, what nonsense,” he muttered. By instinct from his lessons in Gilead, he squeezed his knees, and the horse began to trot steadily forward.
“That’s more like it. Works the old-fashioned way, it seems.” He placed his hands on the two knobs on either side of the control panel. “I wish it had proper reins though,” he muttered. He looked over to Gwyn, shouting. “Let’s go!”
Shakily at first, but with growing confidence, they rode their mechanical beasts northwest, following the Beam’s unerring path.
Fiona chewed at a bit of damp grass, her flat, rectangular eyes following them. Some of the chomped vegetation dribbled out of her mouth, unnoticed. After she swallowed her meal, she tilted her head briefly and began to follow after them.
As Robby regained consciousness, the first thing he realized that his head was dangling at an odd angle. With that realization also came an extreme soreness in his neck. Then he remembered a deeper soreness in the rest of his body, courtesy of that bloke that had shot him with the gun-that-was-not-a-gun. The brightly visible projectile, like a glint of light, had caused him to involuntarily cramp up everywhere, and then he had simply blacked out.
Becoming fully cognizant once more, he realized that he was dragged through what must be the camp of the army that was following them. An unimaginable number of people were gathered here, more people than he had ever seen before in his life. His heart raced like a stampeding bull in his chest as he tried to take in everything around him, though one eye had blood in it, dripping from where they had struck him in the head.
Tent after tent, fire after fire, it was an endless fielding of people, most of which he did not doubt would kill him so much as look at him. The glimpses he could get from his awkward position told him that most, if not all of them, sported the same festering sores and blisters that his captors did. In many, these had grown to open, gaping wounds that showed glistening muscle underneath, or even bone. Robby shuddered and felt like sicking up whenever he saw these things.
All around them, too, were assortments of equipment and machines, most of which he had no name for. For every third or fourth tent he also saw what looked like a wagon made of metal, but they sat upon wheels made of some unidentifiable black material and had two rows of seats at one end. He reasoned that these must be the electric carts Daniel had mentioned.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
Less commonly he saw bigger armaments with more wheels, and some actually had no wheels at all that he could see (how these things must move mystified him). He even saw one floating above the ground, supported by naught but air, though the ground underneath it still seemed compressed by some unseen force.
There could be no other force in the world like this, Robby thought, and as he did he also realized that if they were allowed to make it to the end of the Beam, they very might well succeed at the mad thing they intended to do.
That wasn’t even accounting for the bomb that they had mentioned so long ago which propelled them on this adventure. Robby saw that horrifying thing for but a second, a tangled nest of metal wires and pipes surrounding some obscured core. The air above the device shimmered strangely; as he was taken yet further into the camp, there seemed to be a regular rotation of men throwing water onto the centerpiece. The water hissed violently as it was instantly turned to steam, and vapor climbed away into the cold air.
Finally, the men hauling him around like a particularly heavy sack of potatoes set him down not too softly on the ground. Sending his one clear eye upwards, it widened with shock: a creature stood in front of him, for all appearances from the neck down a human, but its head was that of a raven. The thing was dressed in a beige uniform of some kind, and it stared down at him with eyes like large, black beads.
“Lieutenant Brinna,” one of the men carrying him started. “We believe this is one of the runaways we’ve been tracking. There were two others with him, another man and a girl.”
“Very good sergeant,” the raven’s head spoke perfectly, startling Robby even more. He dimly registered that this was a voice he had been hearing on the transceiver for the last several weeks. “Put him in the captain’s quarters, he’ll want to talk to this one.”
“Yes lieutenant,” the man said as they hauled Robby back up off the ground. Once the raven person was out of sight, the men chortled to each other. “When does the captain ever not want to talk to ‘em?”
They dragged him to another tent, larger than all the rest and colored a deep, dark red. Crimson, he supposed. On one flap, painted in a sharper tint, was a sigil. Robby couldn’t get a good look, but his brief glance gave him the impression of an eye with a spiral swirling inside it. The light disappeared
“Captain Davram, another—“
“Yes, yes, put him down over there,” a strong, bass voice rumbled. It sounded like mountains grinding together, or trees groaning in a strong wind.
Robby was dumped yet again onto a carpet that was wet with… something. He thought he could smell copper, and the urge to empty his guts grew stronger.
“Well, now, been a while since we got one of you rats,” the thundering voice said. “I thought we were done with all that, and now ka dumps another of you in my lap.”
Robby could say nothing, gagged as he was, but he glowered as best he could at this so-called captain. He wore armor instead of a uniform, thick, square sheets of haphazard metal that covered him irregularly—hardly protective, it could only be intended to intimidate rather than actually ward off attacks. On his head was a makeshift helmet: Robby could not tell for sure, but it seemed to be a bear’s skull, with one horn coming out of the forehead. Gods, he seemed as if his head was scraping along the roof of the tent. The size of him was unbelievable.
“Ah, what’s this?” He swooped down, startlingly fast for his size. He grabbed the gun from out of the holster, holding it between two fingers like sausages. “This was Jackson’s piece,” Roedrick boomed down at his captive, holding the golden pistol in his hands. Robby, being hogtied, was unable to budge an inch as the muscles in his back and arms and legs burned, screaming for release. He sucked air against the wad of cloth stuffed into his mouth, desperate for a full breath.
The towering man leaned down, a process that seemed to take forever, staring with unrestrained menace into Robby’s face. “You killed him, did you?”
Robby eyed him wildly, face sheening as sweat ran down into the folds of his clothes. Roedrick huffed in amusement, and then snatched the rag out of Robby’s mouth with that absurd speed, making him gasp.
“Didn’t kill ‘im,” was all Robby could get out, wheezing painfully.
“Didn’t think so. Soft fuck like you probably never killed a man in your shitty, meaningless life.”
Robby sucked in more air, his inflating lungs causing his muscles to cry out even more against the abuse they were suffering. “Go to Hell,” he uttered with as much strength as he could muster.
That made Roedrick laugh, short and ugly. “Got some spit in you after all, huh?”
“Ye don’t know the half—” another intake of air, “—the half of it,” he wheezed out.
“Oh? You gonna surprise me, little man?” Roedrick grinned, showcasing double rows of rock-like teeth. “Go on then, I’m waiting.”
Robby spat into the hulking man’s face, a messy glaze that caught the light of the dancing fire in it.
Roedrick merely laughed again. “Not bad! Not bad at all!” he remarked as he tossed Dodonpa’s gun onto a table in the corner of the tent. He stood up tall then, stepping over until he was situated over Robby’s prone body. Each footfall was accompanied with a little thud that actually made the ground vibrate slightly. “I like people with a little mettle in them. Most men,” he leaned over again, planting both hands along Robby’s left forearm, “don’t even know I’m gonna kill them, and yet they’ll beg me anyway. ‘Stop, please! Let me go! I don’t want to die!’” He said in a mocking, evenly high pitch that merely came out like a normal man’s tenor. “Bah. Dying’s not so bad.”
He twisted his hands, the raw strength in them apparent only for a split second. Within that second, Robby’s arm gave a thick snap as it busted cleanly in half. Before he even felt the white hot agony lancing up into his shoulder, he was screaming.
“See? That’s the part I figure more people would worry about,” Roedrick continued, as if nothing had happened. “I don’t know for sure, but I believe death is a lot less painful than that.” He spoke casually, as if unaware of the man underneath him repeatedly shrieking out all of the air in his lungs.
Roedrick shuffled awkwardly, repositioning himself so he was over Robby’s legs now; after finally bothering to wipe the spittle from his face, he laid his hands on either side of the left leg. “Looking at you, I can tell you’re not a quitter. You haven’t even asked me what I want yet. Hey, did you know? I heard once that the femur is the hardest bone to break. It’s also one of the most painful things a person can experience. Or so they say.” He twisted again, the enormous muscles in his arms and shoulders rippling with the momentary effort.
Robby’s screams renewed in intensity, and Roedrick tutted. “You know, I’m not sure I believe it. You don’t sound like it’s that much more painful than your arm was.”
Dragging in air over his dry tongue and teeth, Roedrick squeezed tears from his eyes as he started sobbing. “What do ye want, you awful bastard?!”
“Ah, come on now. I told you, everyone does that.” Roedrick took a long, serrated dagger out of the scabbard attached at his breast—it was almost a short sword—beginning to work at the rope keeping Robby’s limbs pinned together while the poor man choked on his own breath. He cried out involuntarily as he was cruelly jerked around, until the rope came away and all his limbs flopped painfully onto the earthen floor.
“There we go,” Roedrick chuckled pleasantly. “Much easier to get at you like this,” he continued cheerfully as he put the dagger back in its sheath, talking through the blubbering. “Anyway, the point I was getting at is that I don’t really want anything, most of the time. Or I guess it’s closer to say, this is what I want. The begging, the crying, the screaming.” Those large teeth flashed in a genuine, awful smile. “You see, everyone’s got a thing. Usually, that thing works based on who you are. Me, I was made for stuff like this. I mean, look at me,” he laughed. “I’m so big! And you’re all so… so…” He placed his hands on Robby’s other leg, which spasmed pitifully underneath his grip. “… tiny.”
Robby sucked in another dry, rasping breath, roaring at the top of his lungs: “I HOPE DANIEL KILLS YE, YE FUCKIN’ MONSTER!”
“Ah,” Roedrick paused, “so there are still others.” The mountain of a man stood up straight again, stretching his back and flexing the muscles in his tree trunk legs. “Don’t tell me: ‘Daniel will put a stop to you, you think you’re so tough now,’ blah blah. Am I on the mark so far?”
Robby snarled. “Yer sick, you fuckin’ animal.”
“Not what I was expecting, but I’ve heard that one too.” Roedrick yawned, then moved over the man in one step. He bent down to look Robby straight in the eyes. Radiation sores festered in his huge face just like all his troops, though his vigor seemed none the lesser for his steady poisoning. The captain’s own eyes seemed to burn him, two drops of molten gold that radiated contempt. “Unfortunately, this grows boring. You’ve already lasted longer than most of the little wretches that I take care of, but tell me about Daniel. Is he tougher than you? Is he a big man?”
Robby choked out a short, shaky laugh, willing himself to fight through the torment lacing his body. “Danny? Danny’s a tenth yer size, ye craven trash, but ten times a man ye could ever be. A hundred times.”
That tickled something in Roedrick’s brain, and he frowned. “Daniel… Daniel…” He snapped his fingers together, a sound like firecrackers. “What’s his last name?”
“Wh—“ Robby licked his lips, staring. “What’s it matter to ye?”
“Tell me, or I’ll squeeze your brains through your ears.”
Despite himself, Robby shuddered, sending fresh waves of pain up his broken limbs. “B-Bryne,” he stuttered out, licking his lips. “Daniel Bryne.”
“BRYNE!” Roedrick stood up tall again, his booming laughter filling the tent, hurting Robby’s ears. “That little shrew is still alive? How? Jackson’s lucky he’s already dead, or else I’d have some words.” The laughter fell away. “Wait, are you saying Daniel Bryne killed Dodonpa?”
Robby only coughed into the carpet. The smell of copper hit him again, and this time there was no stopping it: he retched onto the floor covering, adding his own shame to the cloying collection of already vile smells.
“Hm. Maybe the shrew has some teeth… but, that doesn’t really matter.” Roedrick fished in a pocket, pulling out a transceiver that looked absurdly tiny in his hands. It was a wonder he was able to push the TALK button. “Brinna, get over here. Now.”
Less than three minutes of agonized waiting later, the lieutenant with the raven head appeared. “Yes, captain?”
“I’m leaving camp, you’re in command for now. Where’s the detonator?”
“Right here,” the raven woman said, flashing a little black cylinder with an orange cap. “Orders still in place?”
“Continue as scheduled. I’ll find you later by the portal. If you see the Guardian, take care of it first.”
“Yes, sir,” Brinna clicked.
Roedrick and the bird woman made to exit the crimson tent. “Is Petra ready to go?” the captain asked as the flap closed behind them.
With nothing to distract him, the pain in his useless arm and leg seemed to intensify, and Robby gritted his teeth together to stop from wailing. Every breath jostled him slightly, making it worse.
Suddenly a thought occurred to him, causing his breath to hitch in his chest. Both eyes snapped open, and he looked over at the table in the corner of the room.
Steeling himself, he kicked and pulled away from the bloody mat with his good limbs, trying desperately to ignore the protests in his bad ones. Slowly, horrifically, he made his way over, half of him dragging uselessly on the dirt floor.
After what seemed an eternity, he reached his working arm up and fished around on the top. Fingers closing around his prize, he pulled the golden pistol off from the tabletop and stowed it back in the holster.
Then began the arduous journey back. He almost cried to think of it: he did not want to crawl back onto the filthy mat, not where the acrid smell of his own sick now worked to cover the metallic odor underneath.
Yet, he knew he must raise no suspicion. Another eternity later saw him approaching his original spot. The aching in his broken arm and leg was overwhelming, and he panted openly at the effort of not crying out.
He heard the lieutenant’s voice, muffled beyond the thick tent flaps. She seemed headed this way, and only with great will did Robby finally positioned himself back onto the carpet. He barely had time to take the pistol out and hide it underneath him before the flap flew back, admitting the unsettling animal-woman once more.
Brinna let the tent flap close behind her, and she sighed. It disturbed Robby to hear that noise coming out of a beak. “Still alive, are you?”
He said nothing: he hoped that he would appear unconscious.
“You know, we taheen have much sharper eyesight than you humans,” she said. “I can see the effort it’s costing you to breathe right now.” Her voice grew closer, slowly. “I can also see the dirt on your clothes, and the marks on the floor where you scuffled across it.”
Sweat beaded and rolled down his face.
“I also know that you had a pistol on you when Eiry brought you in here.”
Robby’s heart stopped in his chest. He didn’t dare open his eyes.
“I’m surprised it’s taking you this long to try and shoot me, honestly.”
His eyes popped open. Abandoning his failure of a deception, he looked at the raven woman named Brinna. She stood off to his left, near the chair where Roedrick had been sitting originally.
“Giving it up already?” she clicked at him. “You know, it usually doesn’t take him so long to finish playing with fresh meat. You must have impressed him.”
Robby huffed, getting breath going back in his lungs. “What’s that matter?”
“It doesn’t, really.” She sighed again. “I despise him, truthfully.”
“Why are ye—“ he coughed, “—even working for him?”
“It’s not him I’m working for, not really.”
“Who, then?”
“I don’t think you would like the answer to that question. It might be better to die with some peace of mind.”
Robby grimaced. “Ye talk an awful lot like him, fer someone who doesn’ like the bastard.”
“It’s complicated,” she said. “Besides, it’s not just him I don’t care for. I can’t stand any of you,” she gestured with an all-too-human hand. “You’re all disgusting to me, frankly. Your faces are pudgy, your skin waxy. You smell disgusting,” she spat, though nothing came out. “I have no idea how anyone could mate with humans. Being forced to associate with all these simpletons only makes it worse… I wish I had never been reassigned from Devar-Toi.”
“Well,” Robby coughed again, “Consider it mutual.”
“At least you’re honest,” she said sardonically, turning to face the chair. “I almost prefer that. Most of these reprobates consider it a favor to—“
And then her brains exploded out of the front of her skull. Dark feathers and bloody bits of viscera splattered all over the side of the tent, and her twitching corpse fell over next to him.
“Goodness,” he sighed, tossing the smoking gun away from him. “Jus’ love to hear ‘emselves talk, they do.”
A shout of alarm went up outside the tent, one or two people calling “Lieutenant? Lieutenant Brinna?”
He had already fished the detonator out of the raven woman’s uniform by the time the first soldier rotting alive poked his head inside the tent flap. Eiry stared as Robby pulled and twisted at the orange cap (cursing it all the while for being stubborn); he gaped at the two of them strewn on the floor. As the hapless sergeant realized what Robby intended to do, the burly man successfully pried the cap off to see a little red button.
He pressed it, and the world around him turned to stark white.