Only smoke. Panzjrah The Killer followed his nose through the decimated factory to its fallen entrance. He coughed against the steam and struggled over the bodies, rifle ready. He let loose a round into the head of a monk that tried to get the jump on him as a second monk managed far closer, and entered a melee with The Killer.
∞
His neck was too thick and midriff stocky enough to take the punishment of quick kicks and heavy punches. The butt of his rifle broke the monk’s nose once he found an opening, and in his opponent's disoriented pause, he unravelled a cord from his wrist similar to what he had given Shay when she escaped up to the now lightning-scorched rafters above, disappearing into steam. Another or a later version of her, leathered up with swords and all, was duelling Gargarensyr nearby.
∞
Meanwhile The Killer smiled into bloodshot eyes. Bursting above a broken nose. Tightening and releasing the cord’s grip on the monk’s throat so they could reply to his only question:
“Where’s the freak?”
Alas, doorways, corridors and Corridoors as they are in this-my Tayl, what could the monk tell him? Panzjrah let the body fall, flexing his wrist to ravel back the bloody cord. Through his goggles he could see stirring no living things. Through the scope of his rifle he could find no traps lurking at the towering entrance to the factory. He left Shay and Gargarensyr to it.
∞
Outside the factory, he saw The Gathered Steps lay scattered once again, for Love and Reason had duelled there pyrrhic and unresolved. The horizon beyond them vertical and he spat. He spat again.
In a passing hallucination perhaps, all the chemical steam of the factory bleeding to its ending, he saw the coal forests that once grew here in landscapes unruled. He was in his stance a statement - to nothing and no one - knowing what had of Nature been lost to Human Nature's ways in The Age of Violence it is named, goring worlds with their walls into 'gardens'. Making 'order out of chaos' without seeing the older order already in its places, in which Humanity had no part nor right, alas. The birds of that loss, their calls never to be heard again, having elsewhere flown where Humanity cannot reach. Entire movements from the great song all missing. Stars demolished for their fuel, with Hubris crowned and decommissioning them from Nature's nameless plans and structures. Mammals unable to escape, extinct by carelessness and happenstance. His youth briefly in Falsehood spent where he learned all humanity could and could not be, his life later was with the apexes, the dragons of the skies and whales of the deep. In their ways he relearned what most have forgotten. For he had perched with the apexes and watched the last duel of Truthdom against Falsehood, seeing no salvation in either side against a damage already done. He mourned forever led on only by his love of his hatred.
The attempt on Time's life was unthinkable even to him in his butchery, and he thought in the hollow of himself how Humanity draws its lines and abides so little by them, manifesting always its ever-burgeoning destiny, an old phrase thought dead though undead, alive and unwell with masquerade.
∞
Deciding Argus was not there he unwound his rifle into pistols and holstering them at his hip he stepped through the arches exiting the factory, and as is my design, he found himself in a Courtdom-room awash with autumnal leaves rattling over the ornate carpet. Open windows yawned with the cold air of afar dead fields, lavender the softest smell he has ever known. Perhaps enough to calm even him if only for a moment. Gargarensyr stood there, robes dripping from rain over a slumped figure by a still-smoking fireplace. Through torn robes, Panzjrah saw the cyclops was bleeding or had been. Iron in the chill air.
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
“You have been robbed of your prey.” The monk sighed to The Killer. “And I of far more.”
Panzjrah did not respond, thinking perhaps to empty his pistol into Gargarensyr’s eye, in no malice other than the removal of obstacles.
“The body is still mine. Each eye inside a prize, I've heard. Don’t waste your breath trying to convert me.” He aimed and was about to squeeze.
“All such dreams have died with him, Killer. Though no irony is lost in my thoughts that you of all souls would cross paths with my master, The Watcher his name but his role was Attention. An attention in us all without which Humanity would never have discovered Time, never thought to end it, and so never led us to this. I bring you quite different targets, that will more than test you. Those whom may yet lay claim to your position at the pinnacle of all hunters. Is that not your quest in Greed's age with all your Needs quenched? The shaman Serib, the once-prince Woid, and this masked Shadow I do not know. Timelessness is to our advantage and theirs, internecine… that we are never too late, and hope shines always.”
∞
Gargarensyr revealed from his long sleeves an insignificant little thing for Panzjrah to see. Some say it was a cracked pearl, others a scrap of dragon scale or something else entirely. Whichever version is true, it is known The Killer’s mouth opened in alarm:
“Where… how did you get that?”
“From reading.” Gargarensyr smiled, having almost forgotten how to. “Serve well and the other half shall also be yours, its location known only to me. You may return home, then… as you belong not in the tale of Fate nor tayl of Payn. If the scrolls are true. What a degenerate she is, hmm? How dare she pick at History and fiction... rewriting it merged as she desires.”
Panzjrah holstered his pistol with it spun twice around his trigger finger, staring grimly as he knew no violence of his would make the monk talk. To the death Gargarensyr would keep the location secret, as to ensure The Killer's expert employ. All this he gauged with a glance remembering other Autumns.
∞
"I have read..." The Heir Scholar stepped away from his slumped master, towards the window where lavender was all. "...do you still possess your fabled way with animals? Not only a hunter, but a healer? That the other Stalkers branded you 'rabid' on the high marsh. And so 'Killer' you became."
"Why?" The Killer stared, empty of expression that human eyes may see as blankness.
Though they misunderstand as I have - his rage we interpret it as, is not that of Gargarensyr's; 'a human anger'. It is beasts that Panzjrah understands.
"Human Nature has grown wanton... will Nature rise to rebalance?" Gargarensyr proposed. "I believe it already has though from an odd source - Nature's will has taken a human vessel. Her name is Disease."
"The Viridian Smog? I welcome her." Panzjrah had heard the rumours and nothing else, of a plague that affects Humanity alone.
"Yes, I gather that she shares your sentiments; you may be able to get closer than my kin have managed so far. I need you to find her. We must convince her that not all Humanity deserves the breathlessness she brings... the horizon is Viridian, and we must act before she arrives. Desecrating everything."
"I won't convince her of that." The Killer's lip curled, disgusted.
"That will be my task. Yours is to find her... to reach the heart of her sanctum still breathing."
"And you'll give me the other half."