Chapter 24: A Lone Rioter (Part 2!)

“Haha! And what would that be?”

“You.”

Skaldi stopped laughing, stunned by Vega’s serious attitude.

“Ya are like an uncared for field. Weeds and pests plague ya, but I know if I’m there-there, ya will be better. Same goes for Valiato.” Vega’s smile came back, but her voice remained authoritative. No moon or projecting came from her eyes, this was genuine. Unfeigned.

“Please, I can take care of the kid.” Skaldi tried to shut up Vega.

“I don’t believe ya do. How old is she?” Vega pressed.

“She’s thirteen.” Skaldi replied.

“Wrong. She’s fourteen.” Vega corrected, stunning Skaldi. “She turned fourteen yesterday, and she wanted to hang out with ya.” Vega grew a tad mad at him. “Have ya even seen her? How about today? What is she doing?” Skaldi lowered his head, ashamed of his absence. Guilty.

“So you’re telling me that I’m bad for her?”

“No. I’m telling ya for every hour ya take to improve yourself is an hour without her-her. It’s fine that ya have goals, but ya shouldn’t forget her while pursuing them.” Vega's anger subsided into a faint commanding tone.

“Shut up…” Skaldi muttered to himself, and Vega took care not to ask anymore questions as they roamed the halls.

Skaldi loathed this accusation, that he forgot about her. The whole reason he was learning how to read, training his body, legitimately caring about himself, was for Valiato. His head scorched hot, with him insulting Vega silently.

He organized a whole uprising just to uplift those just like Valiato. He spent hours listening and understanding Potenti, and stood side by side with her when the fight came.

Skaldi loved Valiato with all of his heart, and he hated that his love made no peace. Even in this quiet, peaceful darkness, there was chaos in Skaldi’s soul.

Delving further into the sewers, pools of nasty water surrounded them as they walked just beside them. Whirlpools spun around as droplets of slush dropped into them, making them a pinkish color. There was an adjacent pool that was long and rectangular in shape, and served as a reservoir. Vega saw her reflection, clear and calm in it.

Then, a ripple disrupted the water.

Vega noticed…

A hand was reaching towards Skaldi.

She froze solid, her face as blank as paper.

“What happened to you, scarecrow? Hello?” Skaldi tugged on her arm, but he understood her expression all too well. Fear. The Snake Skin geysered out of the pool and grabbed hold of Skaldi’s leg, pulling him under him into the swallowing dark.

Crushed in the sewage water, the elf waved his arms in shock. In his panic, he managed to grab hold of one of his daggers, and stabbed and slashed at the disgust around him. The Snake Skin couldn’t care about injury, that was against its programming. Its orders.

Strings of blood came out of the Snake Skin, but he continued to drag Skaldi deeper and deeper. Pressure welled in his skull, as he felt the back of his head scrapped against some hard metal. He watched as his bubbling breath popped or drifted above, to an escape.

The elf felt the water behind him fall and spiral, as strips of air grazed him. The Snake Skin battered the nose of him with the pommel of his cutlass as they plunged. Cogs and wheels formed this place, as will as the still burning coals powering the heating system. Spilling onto bamboo scaffolding, the two got up. The Snake Skin breathlessly continued its assault against Skaldi, as he pranced and hopped over water wheels and poles.

The weakening filled his face, as he knew bruises and cuts took shape. Crescents and barbs cursed into his skin, causing him greater insecurity.

“Why did it have to me? Damn you prick!” He yelled, still hurling and throwing daggers at the pursuing attacker. For every moment, the Snake Skin looked more and more like a pin cushion rather than a living being. Skaldi’s tenacity allowed him breathing room, giving him the time to recover from drowning.

Hooping onto a cog and landing backwards, he knew that the Snake Skin would attempt the jump. Much to his liking the Snake Skin jumped onto the cog, just as it was getting closer to another. Just as he tried to chase the elf, its shield arm began to become crunched by the two cogs.

He expected it to die quickly. He was wrong, as the whole system of heating stopped as the Snake persisted. Staring in utter horror, Skadi saw the Snake Skin’s arm bursting as its flesh was being ripped. It lifted its hand ax into the air, and chopped and chopped until its arm was pinned no longer.

Skaldi took in the image, a travesty. A revolt against any concept of self love. To call it an arm would be an insult. A weathered and gored bag of muscles and arteries would be better.

He almost threw up, but his attacker didn’t allow him that luxury. Pushing him onto the burning coals, Skaldi skipped and sizzled. The Snake Skin couldn’t care about injury, so it pressed forward. The smell of cooking meat filled the nose of Skaldi, and soon the smell of burnt tendon too.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Skaldi, still dodging the swings of the Snake Skin, recalled the booklet for the sewer. Opening it while still running away, he found a passage for the coals and steam. It read that a purple pipe when operated would create steam hot enough to melt skin and burn hair.

Waiting for an opening, Skaldi held two daggers of unequal size. The Snake Skin swung again, but Skaldi using his smaller dagger deflected to his right, with the ax slamming into a purple pipe. Speedily running away, Skaldi leapt in a doorway, hoping to avoid the steam. A screeching hiss raced all around, engulfing the room in blazing gas.

Skaldi felt the sweat and sewage on his skin, mixing together horribly. Sucking in long breaths of air, he recovered his lost calm.

“Damn that… scarecrow. Twice today she’s already messed up.” Skaldi said between breaths.

He heard a crunching snap behind him.

Skaldi took a peak behind the door. The Snake Skin still with its face melting, stared back at him. Its eyes didn’t cease. It’s orders didn’t stop.

“Son of bitch!” Skaldi stumbled back, breaking into a sprint. As he ran, the Snake Skin broke through the door. The Snake Skin followed, slashing the back of his armor, sending sparks through the hall. Running, Skaldi fumbled forward.

“Why the hell do I go?” He surveyed the halls around him, finding a barred corridor. He quickly picked himself up and ran towards them, just barely squeezing through them. As he got through, the Snake Skin reached out to grab him, but missing. Backing up to the wall, he was only ten feet away from doom. Separated by the bars, the Snake Skin raised its head to the barrier.

It started to hack the metal of the bars as easily as lumberjack would to a tree. Skaldi panicked, his eyes darting to any object to use. Taking a list of the corridor, it had barrels and bags all around. Cracking opening a few, most of them contained an odd mushroom.

He remembered this same mushroom, both from his study of herbs and him seeing it depicted in the booklet. Very delicate and sensitive, but useful. Flipping through pages, he found the image of it and how it emits sweet smelling spores when crushed. Not only this but that same mushroom is used to make coughing gas used in the Iozian military. He looked at the Snake Skin, getting closer and closer to breaking the bars and killing him. Purple fear formed on his face.

“I got to try it.” He spoke, holding one of his hands close to his mask and the other onto his dagger. Cleaving the bar in two, the Snake Skin rushed into the corridor. Slamming the pommel of his dagger into the crate full of mushrooms, a cloud of spores erupted. Blinded for a moment, the Snake Skin swung wildly at the contents in the corridor. Crawling below and bypassing the bars, Skaldi escaped for the moment.

Light came from a window and the roars of combat were just above. His exit, a way out ever so close. Running further into whatever halls he could find, he still smelt the gross stench of the Snake Skin, unrelentingly stalking him.

Time went on but Skaldi found himself in a deadend, with only a door blocking his path. Skaldi turned the knob but it was locked. The clashing of shields and spears were nearby, freedom. He jumped and drove his feet into the door. It didn’t open.

“Son of bitch!” He cursed, turning to see the distant but still approaching Snake Skin. Roughly a hundred feet away, it bolted ever closer to Skaldi. Kicking furiously, Skaldi hoped the door would break open.

“Come on!”

Eighty feet.

“Come on you son of a bitch!”

Sixity feet.

“Please!” He begged, as he felt an acidy shock in his body. Skaldi still continued, trying to ignore his pain.

Forty feet.

In his mind, he chastised himself for all the things he did wrong. For being an alcoholic. For not being a proper husband for Bolato. Not being the man he should have been.

Twenty feet.

“Someone! I’m sorry! Just please, help me!” His puny kicks were doing nothing, so he banged his fists against the door.

Zero.

Skaldi called for someone, anyone, to save him.

But no one came.

Crashing both him and the door down, the Snake Skin carrended its ax into the face of Skaldi. Knocked onto the ground, the elf was taken aback for a moment. To his past, to the time he proudly called himself a Galtian man.

The first battle he fought, against an Iozian battalion. He and his comrades flung blades and knives into the mass of Iozian soldiers, but not a single one brought down a target. That was the first moment he knew what he believed was a lie, that this war could be won. He saw the same men he knew for his entire childhood die at the hands of heartless swords and brainless arrows.

A cold flooded him, as he knelt down on the battlefield. A spear head was embedded in his stomach. An Iozian cavalryman skewered his side.

There was less blood than he expected. All the tales of blazing, glorious death became lies to him. He collapsed immediately, trying to tell himself to keep breathing. To keep living. Skaldi took himself back to that moment.

He wondered if he was still on that battlefield, together with that coldness in his stomach.

The screaming didn’t come from him however, only from his fellow fighters trying to fight on or recover the wounded. He couldn’t remember how he exactly felt with all that screaming. Peaceful was the word he thought, as he was surrounded by death.

Everything was so clear at that moment. Every sense was as accurate as can be. The grass had an earthy feeling. The sky is defined by indigo rain. And he tasted the grainy, putrid dirt in his mouth. Skaldi felt like he was blinded all of his life and finally gained sight. Like he was chained and was set free.

Skaldi believed that all of this was false, ersatz material rather than reality. He was dead and all of this was an elaborate dream. Or a nightmare.

The Snake Skin stood above the bleeding elf, half awake and half hallucinating. It raised with one hand, holding the bloodied ax, and lifted high enough so that Skaldi could realize that it was no dream. It was happening. And he knew that eventually, he would have just happened.

Doom, he thought to himself. All this struggle, just to be a failure.

CRUNCH!

The back of the head no longer existed for the Snake Skin, since Vega took to piercing its skull with her pickaxe. Its body fell against the wall and what remained of its head slid and plopped onto the floor.

“Haha. He died funny!” She spoke like a kid.

She then saw the face of Skaldi. Less pleasant looking than before, since he didn’t have a right eye anymore. Vega’s soul dropped, a bit sad that Skaldi had to go through all that. He was a good person after all, he didn’t deserve that.

“Well, at least you’re breathing! Let’s get ya up!