Chapter 39

39.

         The speculative actions of these complex men never fail to perplex me.
         To happen, it may have been this way. Or not, if it were in another fashion. To discover may require means beyond these ends.
         In the tent this takes place. In the tent on the streaming sand so soon suffused with a liquid demise. Two men are there. One you have met before. One you will never meet.
         The man you have seen looks like anger and deception when seen from the edge. The man you have not seen has no appearance. Outside a wind is rattling these invisible bones of the air. You will be here again. But not everyone will be here with you. You were never here. Not this time. Not before.
         - So he tells me you won’t leave
         This is the angry man. He is not angry now, but confused.
         The other man, also confused, rocks back and forth, makes a noise that has no words, refuses eye contact. This is not how it should be. This is how it is.
         - It’s . . . it’s not a matter of won’t.
         - Then what is it?
         - I . . . I can’t. I want to . . . I know, staying here is dangerous but . . . there’s too much to do here, I think . . . I feel that we can make something beautiful here, if we give it a chance.
         The other man blinks, rubs his face, tries not to look sick. In a way these are not his words. But he believes. Because that is how belief is.
         - It will happen. I know it. And I need to be here for it.
         The man without residual anger leans back, stretches. His eyes are stone, his gaze the absence of inertia. The words he speaks are clipped, stagnant, always tumbling forward.
         - Funny, doesn’t seem that way to me. Not at all. Looks to me that we’re on the verge of falling apart. This whole mess, it’s about to break down.
         A whistle whirls against the tent. Both men tense, expecting an assault that can’t be there. Nonexistent, the walls ripple. The man carved of anger speaks again, unhurried. It’s already happened. There’s no need to rush.
         - People say the Child is here, that she’s walking around. Nobody can agree on what she looks like. It’s said any day now all our childhood nightmares are going to come and kill us all. There’s nothing special going on here. It’s paranoia, it’s fear, it’s manufactured and it’s designed to keep us here.
         The other man makes no comment, does not meet the eyes.
         - Did you happen to notice how damn quiet it is lately? Like everyone is tied up in doing something else. I keep waking up with a headache in the morning and I can’t figure out why. If we stay here this place will murder us.
         - Then leave. I will not stop you.
         There is no defiance in this stance. No rumor in your yell.
         - If it were up to me we’d be gone. Understand? We wouldn’t be having this conversation. But it’s not. It needs all of us. And he won’t leave without you.
         - I know.
         Inaudible voices barely make an impression on the uncaring air.
         - Then tell him that. Don’t sentence the rest of us to death because you don’t have the guts to go. Let him know what you choose.
         - I can’t.
         - Why the hell not?
         - Because he won’t listen. Because it won’t matter. Because . . . because I don’t him to go.
         - Dammit!
         He could bridge the gap with a violent push and his hands tremble at the thought. That much is clear. Something without strings stops him.
         - Listen, I don’t know what the hell is going on between the two of you but I am not going to give up and die because you’re too cowardly to do anything at all. I believed in this stuff once, too, okay, I did, I’ll admit it . . . but I don’t anymore, I think it’s a load of crap and it’s the kind of crap that gets people killed. And I don’t want any part of it. Not anymore. And if you still think it has merit, fine, but don’t hold the rest of us back. Do you understand me here? Do you?
         Without a word his glance is silence. This moment could repeat for an eternal segment. Without a break it might find the tail of the end yet. Or not. Or maybe.
         Now angry, he stands, hunched in the low, tapered ceiling. Eyes flash with suppressed rage, sequestered to a place that is not here.
         - But you better decide, and soon. Because if you make us push, if you . . . just remember, you don’t have to be included, if we need to. We worked it over the other night, worked it out.
         He sits, waiting.
         - We only need five. Do you see? You’re extra. We only need five. Remember that.
         And to leave he does. The flap flips lonely, desolate. There is, of course, no other sound.
         Outside she kneels, covered and shriveled. He almost passes her. Until she speaks.
         - No luck?
         - I swear, I swear I could . . . this is nuts, we should have been gone days ago. Every day it gets even harder to contemplate. Any longer and we’ll be trapped here. Does he understand? Does he even realize? Ah . . . it’s so . . .
         Shifts, the sand whispers. If there’s a sun it won’t appear today.
         - It’s frustrating, I know. A lot easier if he were out of the way.
         - Tell me about it. You can’t even imagine how many times I’ve thought about just killing the bastard, just slitting his throat and being done with it.
         - Hm, I can’t imagine why you haven’t yet. With time running so short and everything.
         - Believe me, I’m sorely tempted. I really am. Anything to get us out of here.
         Shakes his head, steps away. Through the lens there is no angle to view.
         - But, ah, I have to go. I have to go hit something that won’t hit back, keep me from strangling someone. I have to go talk to him again, see if I can make some more progress. Maybe he can talk to this bastard, and get somewhere. I’m not getting stranded here.
         - Yes, good luck, then. Oh, and I just wanted to say, I was sorry to hear about your wife. Poor dear, it must have been the strain. At least it was in her sleep. At least it was peaceful.
         - Yeah, thanks. It was pretty rough. But I think she’s going to be okay.
         - Oh, that’s good to
         And the filter runs down the sink, leaving no trace, inverts itself, is gone.
         Is gone.
         Gone.
         Go-
         Look away.

* * * * *

         Rathas tapped Jaymes on the side of the head. “He’s supposed to blink once in a while, right?”
         The voice made Valreck stop in the doorway. Expressionless, he stared at the smaller man, who was crouched by the side of the chair, peering intently into the boy’s ear, as if trying to see his brains.
         “I didn’t hear you come in,” Valreck said, in a neutral tone.
         “Really? You should clean out those ears,” Rathas commented lightly, grasping the arm of the chair and lifting himself to his feet with a grunt. “And the kid here should clean out his.”
         “I’ll consider that advice,” was Valreck’s response. Crossing the room to where Jaymes’ sat, he wrapped one hand around the boy’s face, tilted his head so that his sightless eyes stared directly at him. Valreck’s lips moved without making any sound as he studied Jaymes, who didn’t appear to notice the scrutiny. Valreck, for his part, seemed to have forgotten that Rathas was in the room.
         The other man watched the display for a brief moment before jamming his hands into his pockets and pacing idly around the room. Occasionally his eyes would flicker back to Valreck and the boy, but he said nothing. Eventually his path took him to the window. Tapping lightly on the glass with a finger, he said outloud, “Aren’t you going to ask me why I’m here?”
         “Hm?” Valreck asked, releasing the boy and glancing over at Rathas. Jaymes’ head flopped back to where it had originally been, provoking absolutely no reaction from him. “What was that?”
         Rathas gave him a pitying smile. “Aren’t the least bit curious what brings me around?”
         Valreck looked down, appeared to consider the question, then merely shrugged. “If it were important, you would have told me by now. If it’s not, you’ll tell me eventually.” He flashed a quick and rare smile. “I know you well enough, Rathas. Your behavior, as calculated and whimsical as it may be, is predictable enough to me.”
         “And aren’t I the transparent one?” Rathas noted dryly, pressing one palm against the glass, as if trying to push through into the outside air. The fading sunlight wrapped around the outline of his hand, giving it a dark, almost skeletal appearance. “So I’m predictable, huh? I’ll have to work on that in the future, I suppose.” His eyes narrowed as he stared deeper into the empty village. The quiet seeping in from the outdoors was both pristine and eerie. “If we have a future,” he murmured, the descending light forming a diagonal band across his face, right below his eyes. He slid his hand up the window until the spiky shadow of his fingers fell across his face, a dark appendage reaching out to take him away. “They’re closing in on us, Valreck. I don’t think there’s any room for compromise anymore. It’s either us or them.”
         “Is that how it is now? I confess I haven’t been paying much attention. I was under the impression Maleth had everything under control.” Delivered in Valreck’s deadened tone, it was impossible to tell how sincere his words were. “Is that still the case?”
         “I don’t think it’s an issue of control anymore,” Rathas admitted. “It’ll end how it ends.” He snorted, curling his fingers so that only the nails touched the glass. “Destiny. I think I’ve always believed in it. The results are always decided and you just have to fumble your way along until you reach it. It takes a lot of the guesswork out of life, I suppose.” He laughed quietly, letting his hand drop back to his side. “Problem is, you always tend to assume it’s on your side. I’m not so sure now.”
         Valreck said nothing. Rathas glanced over his shoulder and saw the man crouched in front of the boy, peering into his face, one hand resting on the arm on the chair, not touching Jaymes. A barely concealed veneer of frustration was evident on Valreck’s face. It wasn’t even apparent if he had heard anything Rathas had said.
         Turning and on leaning on the wall, Rathas asked, “This the kid you were doing the dream stuff with? He looks like he’s pretty much into it. Or out of it, depending on how you want to look at it.”
         “Mm . . . yes,” Valreck muttered in a distracted tone. Rising to his feet again, he tapped the boy on top of the head and said, “I’ve been trying to induce his dreams again while keeping him somewhat conscious. He’s been less than reliable narrating his own dreams so I’m trying to maintain access to them and see for myself.” Lacing his hands together and rubbing his chin, he added, “So far the results have been . . . inconsistent. Most of the time I can only hear his dreams, I can’t see what he’s seeing and that limits me a great deal.”
         Rathas cocked his head to the side, looking curiously at the oblivious Jaymes. “And the point of all this is . . . refresh my memory here . . . you’re trying to peer into the future? Do I have that right?”
         Valreck glanced over at the other man before returning his gaze to Jaymes. “Yes,” he said slowly, with more than a trace of caution. “But there appears to be some distortion now and I’m having trouble getting him to focus. The futures that his dreams dredge up are so far ahead as to be useless for my purposes and the closer I get to the present, the more distorted they become.” He added in a murmur to himself, “And the past . . . the past is sealed away.”
         “What would you need the past for?” Rathas asked. “Unless you wanted to tell yourself what you did wrong.”
         Valreck’s eyes widened momentarily but the flicker of worry soon passed, replaced by the usual calm. The expression might have only been a trick of the shadows. “No . . . nothing like that I’m afraid. Just indulging in idle curiosity, unfortunately. I find I can’t resist the challenge.” He gave a dismissive shrug. “A character flaw I can’t rid myself of, it appears.”
         “Yeah, well that’s what got us here, so I can’t say I’m complaining all that much, even if current events aren’t exactly to my liking,” Rathas said, frowning briefly. Pushing himself off the wall, he stalked over to the doorway, taking a deep breath of the cooler air of the dimming day that was just beginning to trickle in.
         Suddenly he asked, “Do you have a plan, Valreck?”
         “A plan?” was the countering question, as Valreck lifted Jaymes’ eyelid wider. He pressed his fingers together, forming a small cone of light that pierced deep into his pupil.
         “Yeah, you know, one of those things that keeps us from getting killed. You always seem to have one, you know, just sort of lying around.” Without waiting for an answer, Rathas said quickly, “Because I don’t think Maleth has one, or, I mean, she has one but I don’t think it’s a very good one if you know what I mean. I think at its best it’s a good plan for Maleth, but not so good for the rest of us, if you know what I mean.” He took a deep breath, tucked his hands into his pockets and rocked back on his heels. “So I was just checking with you, just in case Maleth’s plan doesn’t go as well as she seems to think it will . . . you’ve got something to back us up, right?”
         “I have . . . ideas,” Valreck said slowly, moving to Jaymes’ other eye. “And if necessary, I can press them into a workable plan, I believe. It will take some time, though.”
         “That’s a relief, then,” Rathas replied, jumping back a step toward the door. “That really is a relief. I hate to think we’re working without any kind of backup. That’s good to hear.”
         “I’m glad you’re pleased,” Valreck said. “And, honestly, I would appreciate it if you informed me of the progress of Maleth’s plans, so I have some idea . . .”
         He trailed off, sensing an emptiness in the room. Getting up and turning around, he saw that he was alone again, except for the boy. Walking over to the doorway, he ran his hand along the frame, staring out into the orange and red tinted day and its deepening colors. He stared off into the distance for some time, not saying a word.
         Then, with a purposeful stride, he moved back to where Jaymes was sitting, patting the boy on the shoulder in a almost paternal fashion. Lifting his head again, he said quietly, “Do I have a plan, boy? I suppose. But is it one they expect?” He let the boy’s head drop and stared again at the empty doorway, at the vague hints of shadows that danced on the ground outside. “I think not. No, I don’t think so at all.”

* * * * *

         Evening was beginning to sink its soft claws into the waning day when they entered the edge of the village. Nobody came to greet them, of course. All the living had left the place and nothing had come in to replace the void. Not even the dead. And so a vacuum existed that no sound could pierce and where no breath could be drawn. There was no feeling remaining at all. Nothing good, nothing bad. It just was. The best you could do was awkwardly comment and move quickly along.
         “Okay, look sharp people,” Prescotte warned, stopping to drawn his sword, holding it easily before him. Behind him, Tritan and Baress paused when he did. None of them appeared to be in spectacular shape. Baress was limping slightly and was covered in scratches and bruises from his involuntary fight with Tritan. Meanwhile, the Slashtir’s wound had ceased bleeding but it had become an ugly black and red patch on his shoulder that sometimes still oozed. Tritan claimed he could still move the arm without pain but Prescotte wasn’t so sure. Neither of them would be much good in a fight. Prescotte had a feeling there would be one. He was tempted to tell Baress to go find somewhere safe to wait this out. The Slashtir would never leave him, he knew, not while the situation was still evolving. And he couldn’t find it in his heart to order the other man to go. It was his son that was missing, that might be in danger. Whatever the risk, he had earned the right to be a part of that. For better or for worse, he had earned the right to watch it go down.
         “There’s no one here,” Baress said quietly, his stoic gaze nearly fracturing under the weight of what he saw here. Even now the streets with marked and remarked with the blurred bruises of old footprints, rendered nearly unrecognizable now, smeared clear of all human traces. You could read the last night in those traces, the confused bustle of people racing to a fate that they couldn’t conceive, for reasons that still made no sense. Everyone who had made those marks was gone now, corpses creating obscene decorations for pristine fields.
         “No, that’s been taken care of already,” Prescotte said darkly, watching the hazy needle of a shadow his sword made on the ground. He wanted this over with. He wasn’t looking forward to fighting a mindbender again. They kept cheating, in ways he had no control over. “The only ones left are probably the ones we’re looking for.” Turning to the other man, he said, “Your son would have run to Valreck, right? That’s the most likely place?”
         “Yeah,” Baress replied, frowning. “I’d say he’s gone there. Don’t know why . . . the two of them seemed to get along well, he spent a lot of time here, helping Valreck out. His stare was briefly a glimpse into a too distant anguish. “And you’re saying that Valreck, that he . . . he did this . . .”
         “He did,” Tritan interjected, his deep voice a small step above the silence, surprising in its resonance nonetheless. “It was not an easy thing to do, but it was within his abilities, and feeling like a cornered animal, he went and did it. And so it was done.” The alien’s large eyes scanned the empty desolation, homes frozen in time, waiting for time and the weather to bury them and put them out of their misery. “For a man attuned to the minds of others, the quiet must be . . . staggering.” The Slashtir’s words hid a pain that he did not elaborate on.
         “I think we can fix that,” Prescotte muttered, swinging the sword in a low arc. “Baress, do you remember where this guy’s house is? That’s the first place we should look.” And of course the first thing he’ll expect us to do. But Prescotte said nothing outloud. This plan was ramshackle enough as it was. There was no room for doubts. “With luck he’ll be home and we can end this quickly.”
         “With all these empty homes, do you think he’ll be there?” Tritan asked. Prescotte backed off slightly to let Baress take the lead, a position the older man did not seem at all pleased to be attaining.
         “Well I’d hate to do a house by house search and find out he was there the whole time . . .” Prescotte said wryly. “So let’s skip to this part and hope we get lucky. If not, house to house it is.” His lips twitched downwards as he glanced up at the sky. “Though the night’s going to make it a lot more difficult.”
         “I was only at his house a few times,” Baress was saying, his back to his other two companions. “My son made me go there, because of my dreams. He said Valreck could help, he insisted that I go.” They were entering a denser area of the village, as empty as all the others, where the houses were arranged in a more grid-like pattern. Prescotte noticed they were even all about the same height. “And I thought he helped for a while . . . I didn’t have any dreams. I thought. And then, lately, I’ve been having them again. I don’t think they ever really went away.” He lifted his clenched fist, trying to squeeze the object trapped inside. It didn’t yield, of course. Nothing ever did without a fight. “You two are in my dreams, sometimes. Separately and together. Sometimes I feel like I’d know you better than I know my family, if I only understood what it all meant.”
         “So you and your son both had dreams?” Tritan asked, his shadow more gigantic than he was. “Were they of the same things?”
         “We did,” Baress admitted. “But I don’t know what his were about. He never told me. I never told him about mine. I didn’t like to talk about them. I still don’t.” They passed a house with shattered windows, the shards of glass haphazardly scattered about. Prescotte swore he saw dried blood on the fragments. This grid seemed to go on forever in its monotony. That was the point, he suspected. Sometimes you don’t need walls to keep people out.
         “I don’t think Valreck helped me,” Baress continued. It wasn’t clear if he was talking to Prescotte or Tritan anymore. “I don’t think he helped my son either. I think everyone in the village assumed he was helping them in some fashion, and he was really just using us all. Last night, I tried to remember the first time I saw him and I couldn’t. Sometimes I felt he’d been with us forever and sometimes I could only remember him being here for a few months. I can’t even clearly remember walking to his house. I know I was there and I can see it in my mind, but I could never tell you when.” Baress’ voice was numb and matter of fact, reading his thoughts off a newspaper being published in his head. He was speaking about it, but it wasn’t happening to him.
         “Friend Prescotte,” Tritan said abruptly, “is it possible that Valreck implanted false memories into Baress’ head? In everyone’s head?”
         “I think we’ve gone too far to worry about that now,” Prescotte replied grimly, moving closer to the wall of one of the house, hugging it as he made further progress into the village. He waved for Tritan to follow suit. They were getting closer now. The hairs of the back of his neck was beginning to stand up. They had to be close. “Anything could be a false memory if you start going down that route. We can drive ourselves nuts later. Let’s finish this now.”
         “We’re almost there,” Baress said suddenly, stopping short. The rigid lines of houses had now opened into a broad square, with a single simple house placed simply to the right of the center. The square was empty, just like every other section of the village. There was one window in the house and it was facing them. From what Prescotte could see, the home was empty.
         “He’s in there,” Tritan said, stepping next to Prescotte. He didn’t say how he knew it.
         “That’s the house, right there,” Baress said, pointing, his voice disbelieving. Perhaps he had never truly thought the place existed. “That’s where I used to go. I remember now . . . I remember.” But there was no revelation in his voice. The script didn’t call for it.
         “Good,” Prescotte said, sliding up next to him. Somehow he felt too exposed out here, like the house was watching him. Part of him hoped Valreck wasn’t inside. Lord, mindbenders scared him. If he let his thoughts wander for too long he could still hear his wife’s voice. Bastards. Messing with memories and minds. It wasn’t right. If they tried it again, he’d kill them. He’d make sure this time. No turning invisible and sneaking away anymore. No teleporting. He’d have it all covered. “Do you still want in on this, Baress? You can walk away at any time. Nobody will say anything.”
         “I can do it,” the man said, not looking at Prescotte. His voice held neither conviction nor doubt. The blankness was maddening. Prescotte suspected the man had been through too much, his mind too compressed by the events of the last few days. In the half-light, his scratches seemed much larger. Holding up the object clutched tightly in his hand, Baress said, “I can use this thing, right? If we have to fight, I can use this.”
         “Yeah, you can, you can,” Prescotte agreed. “Just . . . just be careful where you point it, all right? And hold it more relaxed, more like . . .” reaching out with his free hand, he adjusted Baress’ grip on the object, doing his best to keep it pointed at the house. He hoped that Baress had forgotten how to fire it. Even Prescotte only had a vague idea, having never trained with the weapons, preferring to stick to the sword. Brown had given up bugging him about it after a while, and even his snide allusions to it had stopped recently. It was too small and made him feel uncomfortable, unprotected. Give him the reassuring weight of his sword any day, however irrational the preference.
         Of course, in untrained hands, any weapons could be deadly to anyone within striking distance. Tritan would have been a better choice to handle it, but his size was a weapon in itself and Prescotte couldn’t let Baress go in there completely defenseless. Ah well, what happens, happens. That’s a soldier’s life, right?
         “Like this, got it?” Prescotte finished, once again showing the other man how to aim it. Baress nodded quickly, holding it stiffly before him. Prescotte suppressed a shiver. No, this couldn’t end well.
         “Think he’s in there, Tritan?” he asked his friend. “The place looks empty.”
         “I am fairly sure, he is,” Tritan replied. “I believe what we see is merely an illusion. The shadows are all wrong, see?”
         “Yeah . . .” Prescotte said slowly, not exactly seeing what the Slashtir meant but taking his word for it anyway. Maybe he had better eyesight. “Okay, then,” he said, to no one in particular, not even himself. He tried to think of reassuring words he used to tell the men under his command before they went into battle, but it hit him that he had never done anything like that before. No wonder why none of them had liked him very much. Oh well. There were no friends in war.
         “Okay,” he said again, letting the point of his sword touch the ground, relaxing his arms for a second. Glancing to his two companions, one tautly ready, the other placidly aware, he took another deep breath, stared straight ahead.
         “Ready, folks?” he asked.
         Without waiting for an answer, he said, “Then, let’s go.”

* * * * *

         “What makes you look only in one direction,” Valreck asked Jaymes, who gave no indication that he heard, a taut frustration evident in his voice. “Why can you only stare forward without the ability to turn your gaze backwards?” He was pacing around the boy in a crude semi-circle. Jaymes’ posture was relaxed and his eyes were open. He might have been listening, but whether it was Valreck’s words that were reaching him or not was unclear.
         Valreck’s pace took him once again in front of the boy. This time Jaymes did look up at him, his eyes semi-conscious, although he said nothing. Valreck stared back at him, his lips tight, his hands clasped behind his back. There was a strange, harsh melancholy in his eyes.
         “You might be surprised to know that I dream as well,” he said softly, bowing his head and staring at the floor. “Last night, I had a dream. I don’t sleep much these days, so it was a bit unexpected.” His eyes narrowed and he massaged his brow, remembering. “I was back at the camp, the place where all five of us came from. There was supposed to be six of us originally, but the last one, a friend of mine, he . . . he didn’t make it. Something happened to him, and he didn’t come.
         “He was in my dream last night. We were sitting in his tent, just like the days before we left. I could hear the wind rushing outside, the trickle of sand striking the cloth. My friend was there, but he didn’t look the same. He was deathly pale and there was a crimson smile scrawled across his neck. He was trying to tell me something but the only thing that came out of his mouth was sand. It fell into a pile at his feet and his skeletal fingers were trying to write words in the pile. For some reason, I kept reaching out to help him, but he was swatting my hands away.
         “But I did manage to write something before he could stop me. I wrote `Time’ in awkward letters, I kept his hands away until I could finish writing it. I was trying to make him understand something, I’m sure. I don’t know why, I’m sure he’s dead now. It doesn’t matter . . . as soon as I wrote it, he took the palm of his hand and scattered all the sand, so the word was gone. He tried to shake his head but blood started seeping from his neck and soaking into his clothes. It hurt to see it, he was always so fastidious about his appearance. And so I reached out to try to stop the blood and as soon as my fingers touched him, he fell apart, he disintegrated into particles of sand. It held his shape for only a second then it fell apart.
         “The people ran in right before I woke up. They had rakes and they trampled the tent down and they worked to spread out the sand as much as they could. Every one of them moved exactly the same. I never saw their faces. There was no time to even stop them. I woke up right after.”
         He stopped, exhaled a slow, quiet breath. His words had never risen over a murmur. Jaymes continued to stare up at him, with something resembling understanding coloring the corners of his face. It was all surface though, Valreck saw no sparks of insights flaring in his mind. It was all silent. A long time ago he noticed that when an idea was formed in the mind, it made a noise both resonant and heartbreaking at the same time. There were only so many ideas a mind could hold, he had realized. The celebration of the birth of one was the simultaneous mourning of the loss of another. Whether the lost would have been better or not was irrelevant. A loss was a loss.
         “Loss is loss,” Valreck muttered, tempted to send the boy back into his dreams again, to read the sinuous pathways of his unconscious mind and try to derive some sort of meaning from them. But he was wrestling with a beast that refused to relent and evaded his grasp no matter how tightly woven his net. The boy refused to acknowledge the past in his dreams. It was an obstacle he could not overcome.
         “It is not your fault, though,” Valreck said to him, almost apologetically. On one level, he felt guilt over his treatment of the boy. Jaymes had come running to him for aid and Valreck’s response had been to plunge him into a dream world purely for his own needs. Did one need trump the other? He didn’t know. In a way, he refused to know. “I had another dream, boy, I thought you might want to know. It wasn’t last night, it happened before all of this began, perhaps shortly after we first arrived here. I barely knew of you then, all the ideas I wished to explore were merely theories. In a way I am grateful for you, you have proven me right about a great many things. I do not believe anyone will ever know but I know and that’s enough.” His eyes looked elsewhere as he spoke the last sentence and afterwards he bit his lip and said nothing further for a while.
         Jaymes blinked, said nothing.
         “But I was telling you about my dream, correct?” Valreck continued, his voice swelling with a forced joviality. “Of course I was. It was far more pleasant than the other dream. In it, we still came here, but not because we had to flee, but because we had won, all of us who believed in destiny and we came to settle this place in our victory. With the full ascension of destiny as the Universe’s guiding force, all our shackles fell away and all our limits were removed. Men and woman could know the Universe, could know each other, without fear and without shame.” He smiled at the boy, remembering a thing that would never happen. “We were like gods, boy. I wish you could understand what we had hoped to accomplish. We wished to advance the Universe, to take it from a path of stagnation and onto a greater path of forever escalating achievement. It would have been an age of marvels, boy, with each greater than the last. It would have been glorious.”
         His voice weighted with a sudden sense of age, Valreck sighed, stepping back and smoothing his robes. “Alas, it was not to be. Our ascent to victory became a flight from certain disaster, and this place, from where we once thought we would regroup and forge onward, has become at the very least our prison and most likely our tomb.” He paused, began to sigh again but stopped himself. “We gave up a lot to arrive here but we thought by starting the journey, we could retrieve others to help us finish it. They will never come now. I did not have many friends in that camp, I’ll admit, but the few that I did I wished to keep clasped tightly to me. I wished for nothing terrible to happen to them.” His eyes closed briefly, tightly. “I abandoned them, in the end. I left them and now they are all dead.”
         “That’s . . . just what he . . . said . . .”
         Valreck’s eyes snapped open to see Jaymes struggling to speak, his face scrunched as if in deep concentration. Valreck stepped closer to him, hands lightly resting on his shoulders, doing his best not to shake the boy into unconsciousness.
         “What . . . what you mean, boy? Tell me!”
         “They’re all . . . dead . . .” Jaymes moaned, his hands tightly grasping the arms of the chair, his back stiff and face twisted. “That’s . . . that’s . . . dead, he said they’re all . . .”
         “Who said . . . who . . .” Valreck’s voice began to rise sharply in frustration but then abruptly trailed off. His eyes slowly rose to gaze at the back wall. “Oh,” was all he said, his voice somber. “I see. Very well, then.”
         “All dead is right,” said a voice from the doorway as a thick shadow stepped in to obscure the light. The glittering edge of a sword refracted what little brightness there was. “I seem to recall someone promising that to us.” There was a second, lighter shadow standing slightly behind the first man. He had one arm held rigidly out before him. “What do you think of that? Think it applied to the wrong group, Valreck? That is you, right?”
         Pivoting so that he was sideways to the intruders, Valreck looked coldly at the two men. “Ah, I was wondering how long you were going to sneak outside my home.” His eyes flashed with a quiet anger. “It would be wise for you to leave now, Prescotte. I’ve not the patience for any of this nonsense. Not anymore.”
         Taking a step indoors, Prescotte said, “I’m terribly sorry we’re inconviencing you, but this really isn’t about what you want anymore. We want our friends back and you bastards stopped.” His grin had a glint of viciousness to it. “I tend not to leave a job half-finished. You should really rethink that unhelpful attitude.”
         “Jaymes . . . son . . .” Baress whispered, still standing in the doorway. “Why are you still sitting there? Get up . . . get the hell out of there.”
         “They’re all dead,” Jaymes whispered, staring at absolutely nothing. “That’s what you said.”
         “I’ve removed myself from the conflict,” Valreck stated simply. “What you and my colleagues do to settle this is no longer any concern of mine.”
         “There’s still the small matter of the village you decided to empty out,” Prescotte said, his voice darkening. The tip of his sword flashed inches from Valreck’s clothing, nicking the air before it. “The village that used to be full of people . . . did you think we wouldn’t notice? Did you think we’d just let it stand like that?”
         A brief flicker of old pain appeared in Valreck’s eyes but his face remained impassive. “And you would make amends for that how? By killing me?”
         “Well in all honesty I’d prefer to pump you for information but killing you would be equally satisfying,” Prescotte noted calmly. His expression was infused with a grim seriousness. “I was part of the team that chased you people across the desert. You should know, you’re not dealing with amateurs here.”
         Valreck smiled thinly. “Your high opinion of yourself is indeed remarkable.” A high pitched whining began to slit the air. “But your victory, if you wish to consider it that was brought about only by the intervention of a madman. He’s not here now, and I am.”
         Baress suddenly and deliberately stepped forward, the object in his hand gently touching the back of Prescotte’s neck. His face was confused but his stance was forceful and unyielding. He didn’t say a word.
         Prescotte’s grip tightened on the sword but he didn’t move an inch. The whining began to gradually grow louder in volume.
         “Very good, Baress. Very good.” Valreck’s smile became slightly broader. “You have no special defenses, Prescotte. If I wished, I could stop your heart right here and have Baress fire the weapon anyway just to see which would kill you first. Your entire mind is a book to me, one with the binding broken and the pages jammed open.” He looked past Prescotte at the other man. “I cannot understand how you even thought this plan would ever succeed, riddled with holes as it is. The weapon might have done some good against me, but Baress has no conception on how to use it. And so that leaves you . . . and you might as well be whispering your actions to me before you enact them.”
         “Right . . . that’s what I get for tackling with someone who can read thoughts,” Prescotte replied glumly. “But why don’t you try reading this?”
         Valreck raised one eyebrow. “While . . . interesting, I don’t see it as being anatomically possible, although you might . . .” his eyes widened suddenly. “Wait . . . what do you mean duck?”
         At that moment what felt like a massive weight thudded into the side of the house, vibrating the walls and rattling the rafters. There was a grinding crunch and the entire side of the wall began to crumble and collapse in a shower of dust and debris. Valreck backed away, raising his hands to ward off the dust, a faint shield glimmering around his body as the meager light from outside filtered in through the haze. Part of a giant shape could be seen through the new hole in the wall.
         Smoothly, swiftly, Prescotte spun and shoved Baress out of the room before he could do anything else, slamming the door shut to keep him safely outside. Valreck had nearly stumbled back into the chair, his face registering shock as Tritan strode into the room, small piles of dust decorating his shoulders, motes of dirt dancing before his large eyes.
         “There’s a game the good soldiers like to play,” Prescotte said with a sharp sense of glee. “It’s called misdirection. You want to try and read my mind . . . go ahead, I hope you’re entertained. You want to read his . . . well that’s a different story entirely.”
         “And if you try, I shall break off your puny limbs and stuff them down your throat,” Tritan intoned. Jaymes started at the resonant sound of the Slashtir’s voice, but didn’t move from his chair. Valreck still had not spoken, his eyes wide at the sight of Tritan towering over his not insignificant height.
         “Aliens don’t quite scan as well, eh?” Prescotte taunted, taking another step forward, so that he and Tritan flanked the man on either side. “Care to rethink the not surrendering thing? I’d so hate to see this get any uglier than it already has. Especially with so much more available for us to wreck.”
         “And I will grind your bones to powder and use it in an ink to scrawl a thousand obscenities across your still living body as you pray for death-“
         ”He gets the point, Tritan,” Prescotte said tersely. “At least I hope he does. I’d so hate to have to reexplain it to him.” He kept his sword at his side, but his arm was poised to strike at any second. “Although I have to credit you on a forceful delivery. You sound very sincere.”
         “I wish to,” Tritan said helpfully. “Especially when I elicit screams from him that will cause the very air itself to bleed in sympathy.”
         “You’re . . . all mad,” Valreck whispered, his gaze feverishly switching from Tritan to Prescotte and back again.
         “Yeah, except we’re the kind of crazy that wins,” Prescotte responded with a quick laugh. “Now, how about you start giving me reasons not to kill you . . .” He began to raise the sword into the air. Tritan stood by, imposing and unmoving, flecks of dust still settling on him. Behind them, some debris shifted, crashing to the floor with a stony clatter.
         Valreck only shook his head violently. “No. No. Even if I must die, it will not be here, at your hand . . . no, I must . . .” suddenly he reached out, moving to throw his body across Jaymes’. The air tensed around them.
         For all his lack of experience with mindbenders, Prescotte recognized the effect almost instantly. “Oh crap, Tritan, grab him-“ even as he dove forward, desperately crossing the scant inches separating them.
         All he could achieve was a faceful of imploded air for his trouble as Valreck and Jaymes suddenly disappeared. Prescotte continued forward, slamming into the chair and knocking it over, his sword nearly falling from his hand as he tumbled head over heels, rolling neatly and regaining his feet, sword extended before him, only to greet the now upended chair, resting on its side.
         Tritan hadn’t moved during the entire incident. Swearing under his breath, Prescotte leapt to his feet, kicking the chair in a fit of rage. “Teleported. Dammit! Why does it seem like everyone we fight can do that?” He ran a hand through his hair, exhaling sharply. “Okay, what are the chances of him not going far? We might still be able to catch him.”
         “Probably very good,” Tritan said. “My suspicion is that he is still nearby.”
         Prescotte shot his friend a look. “Not that I’m complaining but who do you know these things?”
         “He teleported away with the other human,” Tritan noted. “The strain for an action such as that is much greater.”
         “Why? Ranos teleports all of us all the time. It never seems to bother him.”
         “Ranos is also considered extremely powerful . . .”
         “Ah, good point . . .” Prescotte said, tapping the chair with his sword. He really had no interest in debating this point. They were clearly losing time here. “All right, then, let’s go mindbender chasing again. If we move fast we can get him before he regains his strength and teleports again. Though I wonder why he took the boy . . .”
         “A hostage, perhaps?”
         “Yeah, that makes sense.” Prescotte strode toward the door, his footsteps tapping hollowly on the debris strewn floor. “You know, one of those threats I didn’t teach you. You must be learning finally.”
         “One was a favored method of torture among my race. It is generally done publicly, so everyone is able to witness it. It seemed to suit the general tone.”
         “Oh,” was all Prescotte said, pausing at the door. “Well I’m glad you were paying attention at . . .”
         “The person involved was a bloodkin of mine. Those in my family were allowed to begin and deliver the final torment.”
         Prescotte considered this. “And . . . including you?”
         “No, of course not. Scholars were not allowed.”
         “Ah, that’s good I guess, it wasn’t really your place . . .” letting himself trail off as he wrenched the door open. “Now let’s collect Baress and get moving, I hope he’s not too mad at me for hitting him before . . .”
         Fading daylight spilled into the room again, tumbling in from the outside, looking like tattered gauze, transparent and torn. The area around the house was eerily silent and empty. There was no one around.
         “He is gone,” Tritan pointed out.
         “Lord help me,” Prescotte muttered, holding his sword in both hands and stepping further outside. Another more thorough glance confirmed his suspicions. Gone. Damn. “This just gets better and better, doesn’t it? Now where the hell did he go?”

* * * * *

         Why’d you let them take you, boy? Didn’t I teach you better than that?
         The object in his hand was warmer now, threatening to burn his calloused skin. The other man, the crazy man with the sword, Prescotte, he had said it could hurt someone from a distance, if he knew how to use it. Baress didn’t know how to use it. The best he could do was try to bash someone’s head in. He didn’t like this weapon, any second he expected to look down and find his hand gone, burned off at the wrist. Just gone.
         and the man without hands sits in the room, not moving, not even blinking. Sometimes he does not seem to breath. A civilization could rise and fall around him before he drew another sliver of air, buildings climbing the sky and tumbling back to the ground. He’s sitting, sitting and staring and not moving and he
         Baress leaned against a nearby house, his heart thudding madly in his chest. He held the weapon close to his heart, feeling its heat through his soaked shirt. He had been running. He didn’t know for how long. Blinking sweat out of his eyes, he looked out into the village, now barely veiled for the night and didn’t recognize any of it. He had never been here. It all looked the same. He had never noticed it before. Had it always been like this? The nervous chirping of the night’s animals was the only true sound and even that was distant and hesitant, unwilling to announce itself too loudly, for fear that whatever silenced the village might also find it.
         “Jaymes, son,” he whispered, his throat raw and parched. Too much running. Too much stress today. He was a farmer, used to steady, honest labor, not this dashing around, these bursts of insane action. It wore him down. “Where are you . . . why did you go with him? Where did you go?” There was nobody to hear of course. Someone had stuffed his voice down a well. His brother had fallen down one once, long ago. He had cried for help for hours, his forlorn words echoing off the sheer, moss infested walls. Even after darkness fell, there was only the voice, ghostly and plaintive. They hadn’t rescued him. He was probably still down there, rotting bones and endlessly gaping mouth. Baress still heard the cries some nights, curled on the back of the wind.
         in the shadows of the flames of the fires they sat there and talked, until the darkness bled away into morning. They spoke of blood and destiny and its fading influence on the world. They spoke of a child, who they had never seen. And they spoke of leaving, together, of escaping onto a path that led into a different desert, attuned to a different state of mind. They spoke of all the things that could be accomplished away from this place, away from the oppressive weight of the breakneck day and its promise of a perhaps desolate end. They spoke of all the good that could be done, away from here. They spoke for hours, until weariness threatened to claim them.
         and in the end, the one laid his hand upon the other and spoke, I can’t
         Something was wrong. Terribly wrong. He was fading in and out, more and more often now, the colors of world that didn’t match this one constantly being overlaid, distorting his vision, twisting reality. Everything was real, he kept hearing a voice that wasn’t remotely his say over and over again, as if from the bottom of the world’s deepest well. He was slipping in and out of his dreams and it scared him. What was happening? He kept seeing people who he thought he knew but he had never met. Prescotte was always there, running through corridors of stone, with glimpses through narrow slotted windows of a thing so huge that its shoulder brushed the arc of the sky and voice that could flay flesh. A fight with a man whose voice was verse. Everything was violence. His brain felt soaked in it, his head swelling, with no possible way to vent it all.
         five of them try and surround him but he’s got the sword you see, the sword that cuts through it all and it’s a blur that leaves afterimages emblazoned into the air as he twists and twirls, a dancer moving to the most dangerous rhythm of all but they don’t stand a chance of course
         These people, these lives, he didn’t know them but they filled his head to bursting. Stumbling through the village, his eyes scanned blank windows and house walls saturated with now departed lives. Why didn’t he dream about those people? Of the people he grew up near, of the happy days of hiding in fields or exploring the dappled remains of the forest. Or the girls who caught his eye, when he was younger and stronger, when their smiles were more suggestive and held a promise that could be fulfilled as long as he just reached out. Or even of his father, whose hard wisdom had given him the drive to push forward with the farm, the kind of wisdom he had tried to teach to Jaymes. His father was dead now, perhaps thirty years, felled by a heart that couldn’t let him last any longer. Sometimes it was hard to remember his face, without anything to remind him. His wife would join that faceless crowd soon enough, standing silently among all the dead and the departed, their features forever obscured by a snowfall that would never desist. It hurt. It hurt too much.
         he gestures and the thing without arms bursts into crippling flames, its dying bellow a thing that could puncture eardrums, if there were anymore with ears around to
         His house was gone. His wife was dead. His son was missing and these dreams haunted even his waking moments now. Where would he go now? Where would he go to find himself again? Each moment that carried him, staggering weakly through rows of houses that he could see now were exactly the same, devoid of all human coating, clung to him like a heavy armor, dragging him down, one sticking to the other and clattering along behind him, all vying for his attention, lining up for a chance to filter into his brain. Everyone was there. A brain stuffed full of lifetimes he didn’t understand.
         little girl can’t stop crying in her sleep and every morning she wakes up to find that something has changed she can’t understand why every morning it doesn’t seem like her clothes fit her anymore
         He had to stop. This had to stop. He leaned against the house, his back to the wall, resting his head on the house and trying to force air into his lungs. Had he been running? He didn’t know. Where was he? In the village, but not at Valreck’s house. He had run away. Baress didn’t know why. His boy was with Valreck, and Valreck should be back at his house. There was metal sewn to his legs. He couldn’t move anymore.
         “Son, why are you with him?” he said to his absent child. “Your place is with your family . . . what are you doing, why are you . . .” he had to cough and it halted his speech. It hurt. Everything hurt. The pain had been growing since the night in his house, since he had buried his wife. Life was catching up to him. It was catching up and soon would trample over him.
         The object was still warm in his hand, emitting a faint keening whine, as if crying for attention. Baress raised it to his eye level, trying to remember what Prescotte had said about it. Deadly, he had said. Dangerous.
         dark when they kick the door in, their forms voids imprinted on the night, moving with liquid grace. The others race to greet them, shouting for help even as no sound permeates the room, gravity catching it without allowing it to escape. The void men point with clenched hands and light stabs with effortless brilliance from their fists, piercing through the others as if they were not there. Blood splatters the walls and floors in a gentle drizzle, as the others clutch newly burned holes punched through their bodies, moonlight smearing through fresh tunnels
         “We don’t belong here, Jaymes,” Baress said quietly, staring intently at the quietly wailing object, then closing his eyes and pressing it lightly to his face. The heat was almost a comfort. He imagined it lancing his mind, releasing the pressure, allowing all the dreams to spill out, onto the dirt, to freeze in the night to evaporate in the sun, stamped down into the dirt, to soak into the soil and decay and trouble neither him nor anyone else any longer. “It’s not our fight.” There was a spot of heat resting on his temple. It wasn’t the sun.
         before the last time I saw him he said to me, nothing goes away. Not forever. There’s no such thing. It all comes back. That’s what destiny means. That someday, it all comes back.
         “Come home, son,” he whispered, seeing only a depthless darkness.
         somehow, it all comes back
         “Dad, Dad!” a voice called out and as he opened his eyes he heard the sounds of rushing footsteps. Turning to his left he saw Jaymes racing toward him, relief evident in his eyes.
         they’re all dead
         “Jaymes . . .” he said, nearly dropping the object in surprise, stepping away from the wall to greet his son. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you, where the hell have you . . .”
         “Don’t worry about that now, Dad, it’s not important,” Jaymes told him, grabbing his shoulder with both hands, tugging him along. “You have to come with me, we have to get out of here. Things are going crazy and we can’t stay here. Okay?” His eyes radiated a feverish intensity, a drive he hadn’t seen in his son before. “It’s over our heads now. Okay? We have to go.”
         “Okay, son, okay,” Baress agreed, allowing himself to be led away. “But where are we going to go . . . the house is gone, where else is there to stay . . .”
         “We can hide in one of these houses, Dad . . . there’s nobody here anymore, we can hide until all this blows over and get our lives back, away from all this madness.” He wasn’t looking at his father as he spoke. “Together we can get through this, Dad. I know we can. We’ve been through the worst of it already, it’s all downhill from here. It really is.”
         They were at a house now, no different than any of the others. The sky was turning purple and blue, the color of constriction, of air slowly being taken away. Beyond the door there was only darkness. Jaymes was letting him go forward, talking excitedly all the while. For the first time in the last few days, Baress felt like everything was going to be all right. He had his son back, he had a plan once again. Wait it out. That was sound, rational. The kind of plan he would come up with, if his head were together. The kind of plan his father would approve of, if he were alive.
         “What about Prescotte or the other fellow,” he asked his son. He couldn’t see the boy now, he could just feel his hand, gently guiding him along the proper path. That was the fate of children, to see their elders into that lasting night. To show them the safe way to the final door. “Did you-“
         ”Don’t worry about them, Dad. They’re part of the madness. We’re away from that now. It’s better, this way.”
         Of course, he was right.
         all dead
         “In here, Dad,” Jaymes told him, as they entered the doorway. “It’s all set up, we can stay here for as long as we need to.”
         There was nothing to see. He would just have to wait for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. “I’m proud of you, son, your mother and I, we taught you well, I’m glad you . . .”
         Something shifted in the blackness, a slim void.
         “I’m sorry, Dad,” Jaymes said with tender regret.
         Too late, he realized there was someone else with them.
         dead
         “Son, what are you-“

* * * * *

         - What are trying to say, boy? What were you trying to tell me?
         - That’s what he said. He said to me. After one of his dreams, he said it to me.
         - What did he say? Out with it, already.
         - They’re all dead. He knew it. He said it to me. That’s what his dream told him. I don’t know what it was about. But he kept saying it over and over. They’re all dead. I don’t know what he meant. I don’t know what my dreams mean. I don’t know what he meant.
         - I think I do.
         Clambering his way to consciousness was trying to thrust his way through murky waters, weights tied to his ankles, fluid seeping into his lungs, soaking his skin, inflating all the spaces.
         He opened his eyes to find himself greeted by only more darkness. His head hurt. He couldn’t remember why. It took him more than a second to realize he was on the floor. There was voices shouting to him in his head but they were garbled, indistinct. It didn’t matter.
         “Ah . . . how did I . . .” he said, his voice strangely scratchy and hoarse. His brain felt too large for his head and the world kept threatening to swim away. What was happening to him? What was wrong?
         “I apologize for putting you in this situation,” a voice called somberly from the darkness. Squinting, he saw nothing. “But I’m afraid there’s no other way. The need is simply too great.”
         “What . . .” finding words was trying to relearn the language. The hoarseness in his voice was a swarm of dying insects. “What do you . . . want . . . what do you . . .”
         “Your son tells me you too have dreams.” The man shifted his position in the cushioned darkness of the room. He could feel the grim smile painting the air. “I think it’s an avenue very much worth exploring, don’t you?”
         And without touching him, the man did a terrible thing.
         oh-
         A flower with inverted petals burst in his brain and the world went heavy and light and bright and he was tasting the floor suddenly. Something solid and burning was still clutched in his hand. He couldn’t let it go. He didn’t want to. The tangled coiled knot of history unwound before him, freed from the confines of his brain. But no escape comes without price. No freedom exists that is freely given. From a place far away, he tasted the harsh flavor of blood.
         Lacking anything else to do, he moaned, cried out.
         “Ah . . . ah . . .”
         “No, no, don’t be afraid, Baress, don’t . . . it won’t hurt . . .”
         “Ah . . . you . . .”
         “Sh . . . just relax, relax, that’s right, don’t fight it, don’t try to . . . yes, that’s right . . .”
         “Ah . . .”
         “Yes . . . very good. You see now. Perfect. Yes.”
         “Ah.”
         “Yes. Yes.”
         ah-