He entered a great dark room lit with a few dim purple lights. Computer terminals flickered all around.
“Didi,” he said.
A squat man with ink-black skin hobbled towards him, his dark shiny head and features swimming up slowly from the darkness. His leg brace rasped and sighed like a mechanical familiar, servant to a wizard of black science. He squinted his large, bloodshot eyes because they were sensitive to light, making his face a web of wrinkles. He was Head of the Departments of Science and Research, and perhaps the most intelligent man in all of Haven; though many of his opinions were unpopular, his creations were enjoyed by all. His leg brace groaned as he leaned against it. He said nothing.
Towering over him, Sevrik said, “Didi, Korliss says our Project is gone.”
Didi nodded slowly.
“Alive, but gone,” added Sevrik.
Didi turned away.
“Didi, that thing is the ultimate weapon. If it should fall into the hands of the enemy...” He trailed off, unable to articulate his fear.
Didi looked at the far end of the room. A large red panel and its single button twinkled in the darkness. “I am prepared,” Didi’s voice croaked. “I am prepared to sacrifice everything. Are you, Sevrik?”
“Prepared to destroy decades of work? Decades of waiting and cultivating? With the push of a button? All of it gone, Didi, just like that?”
“Yes,” said Didi, and Sevrik knew that his will was set firm. “We took a vow, the three of us. We knew the risk. Fate has dealt us a terrible card... but let us wait before doing anything rash.”
Didi hobbled over to the terrible red button and sat down beside it. “I am in no rush to push the button. We will yet find our Project.”
“Are you that confident?” said Sevrik, knowing that he would be doing much of the work.
“I am. It is only the world and all the fates who stand against us. When has that ever stopped us? When has anything ever stopped us? We are men for whom morality is merely a hindrance… not a limit.”
“Are you losing it, Didi?” Sevrik blurted out suddenly.
“I am only staying true to our plan,” said Didi. “I feel fine. Thank you.”
Chapter Two
Through the Door of the Black Valley
Wodi spent the morning trekking through dense woods. At first he tried to be as stealthy as possible, but gave that up as the woods eventually filled with horrid cries, the squealing of unseen animals killing one another, and the shrill song of insects calling out, robotic and unending. He came to a grass-covered hill and, wanting to be out of the gloom of the valley, walked to the top.
The woods were sparse near the crest. He saw great gray mountains to the west, north, and east, with treetops stretching out on all sides. Wodi consulted the ridiculous map, feeling foolish and tired from the walk. If the X on the map was any sort of indicator, then he was south of the river. If he followed the river under the mountain, or made the effort to travel south and around the forbidding mountains, then perhaps he could make his way west to the city of Pontius.
But Wodi knew that the foreign city was probably no better than the wasteland itself. He had no illusions about the hospitality of such people. Not only that, but he noticed places marked at the top of the horseshoe ring of mountains - they were tunnels of some sort, and were labeled as abandoned mines. If Wodi could avoid being eaten long enough to get some water at the river, and possibly something to eat, it was not inconceivable that he could reach the mines and even travel through them. If he could make it very far north to the wasteland city of Sunport, perhaps he could even convince someone to sail with him across the sea to Haven. Unfortunately there was a long stretch of wasteland between the wooded valley and Sunport, which was no small problem.
Still, it was the shortest possible stretch between here and home. While the plan might be unrealistic, it gave him hope. Perhaps that was plan enough.
He put the map away, looked to the mountains, oriented himself north by the sun, and thought to himself I want to go home. He set off down the hill. Tree branches soon closed overhead, swallowing the light. He hesitated before reentering the woods, thinking that he could see the glowing eyes of creatures, watching and waiting. He took a deep breath, then entered the dark.
* * *
Wodi walked the unwelcoming paths in the dark wood, picking his way through narrow trails that cut through dense grass and brush. He saw strange and twisted plants. Sticky vines crossed the ground, their orifices clogged shut with the corpses of rats. Tall towers of black flowers rose up to meet thin strands of green-filtered light. Matted wreaths of milk-blooded flowers choked at one another, thorn and stem cutting and growing as one. A garish neon plant offered a bowl of honey in its mouth; hungry insects came to lap at this prize, and were caught by a malicious tongue that hid within the sap. Another flower's blossom looked exactly like a cat's head, a defense mechanism devised to keep away the mice that would chew at its stem. Yet another plant blossomed and withered in the time that it took Wodi to walk by, obeying some inscrutable pattern in its genetic blueprint. Wodi’s hunger was not so great that he felt comfortable eating any of the strange plants, nor did he find any water to drink.
He stopped near a dark, cold stretch of woods. The canopy of leaves overhead was so dense that it completely blocked out the sun, creating a stifling world of eternal night. He peered inside. The dark was quiet and still, and eventually he could hear his own heartbeat in his ears. He could make out places where the light cut through in yellow shards, but those places were far and few between. The dark woods lay as far to his left and right as he could see; if he tried to go around so he could keep his eye on the sun and not lose his way, it could take a very long time.
He went in.
The paths were wide in the black forest; the undergrowth was stifled where the light was snuffed out. The place smelled like the dark insides of a refrigerator long dead. Phantom lights played in his eyes. Wodi kept his hands stretched out before him, continually bumping into smooth trees whose branches were so high and distant that he never felt them. The greedy trees were like wrinkled columns of marble, implacable tyrants willing to choke out all life below to guarantee a sip of sunlight far above.
Finally he came to a narrow break filled with yellow light. The little haven was no warmer than the rest of the dark wood, and Wodi was half convinced that he could see stars shining in the little opening far above. In the pale light he could see that the tree trunks were deathly white, a skeletal forest as quiet as the void. Wodi was no longer sure that being able to see the light was any better than fumbling in the dark, so he pressed on.
He picked his way from one clearing to the next. It was impossible to tell which direction he was going in; his only consolation was that the place could not go on forever. Finally he came upon a terrible sight, and he began to understand why some creatures would choose to live blind in the darkness forever.
A pale creature about the size of a cat hung suspended in the air, one of its hind legs tied to a rope that was attached to a faraway branch. Its eyes were closed, but Wodi could see it taking in shallow breaths. The poor creature turned slowly. A sharp stick of white wood lay propped up on a nearby tree. Wodi felt his eyes burning hot, for the first sign of life he encountered was a scene of torture. He knew then that it had been a very bad idea to enter the dark woods. He should have skirted around it, even if it had taken days or weeks to do so. Even if death waited in the entire valley, it would be a terrible thing to die in darkness, especially at the hands of some thing that lived in darkness.
There was only one thing to do. Wodi was not so hungry that his values had changed, so he cast about for a sharp stone. He found one, then set to work grinding it against the rope. The thing was made of thin, dry vines. Wodi tried to stifle his imagination concerning who or what could have made the rope.
The poor creature lay still the entire time, as if dead. The rope snapped apart and Wodi laid the animal on the ground. After a few lo
ng moments, the thing worked its jaw, sucked in a few great breaths, then licked its face and worked its way onto its belly. It ignored Wodi entirely and shambled off into the dark, the rope of vines dangling from its foot as a reminder that the cord of its spirit remained intact. Having grown up around bullies intent on shoring up their weak egos with minor acts of brutality, Wodi felt a disproportionate sense of accomplishment in freeing the creature. He only hoped he would be extended the same mercy if he ended up in a similar state.
Wodi examined the white stick. No doubt the thing had been used to beat the poor animal. It was smooth, a little longer than he was tall, sharp on one end with a hook near the point, and it was just heavy enough to feel dangerous. He claimed the torturer’s spear as his own, then decided that in a worst-case scenario he could always jam the point through his own eye and into his brain in order to escape an inescapable situation.
* * *
Disaster struck just when Wodi began to let his attention wander. One moment he was stumbling along, gently waving the spear of the torturer before him so as not to bump into anything, and then suddenly a harsh purple light flickered on and he found himself staring down at something like a crumpled mound of gray-white flesh. Wodi’s senses jolted in horror as the thing shifted its weight - he saw something like a large skull turn and look in his direction, then it opened its mouth and seemed to retch on its own tongue, and then Wodi’s legs carried him away from the awful thing.
Demon. The thing was a flesh demon - he did not have to see it in detail to know.
The purple light waved and bounced behind him, throwing white tree trunks in sharp detail. For the first time Wodi saw the pale trees stretching into the distance, forever and endless, marble columns holding up the black roof of the world. Wodi’s terror was so great that only a small part of his conscious mind was aware of what was going on around him; he knew only that he had to run faster than he’d ever run before, faster than any human had ever run. He heard the thing loping heavily behind him, the clatter of hooves punctuated by inhuman grunting.
A fallen tree lay ahead, black leaves shivering in the hellish light. Wodi made straight for the tangled treetop, leaped over and flew under branches, then at once the earth disappeared beneath him and he was rolling through slime, mud, decaying leaves. There was no pain, nor any emotion at all, only the hammer and anvil in his chest, the need for safety, and so when he stopped rolling he immediately crawled to his knees, saw the hollowed-out base of another fallen tree, and crawled inside. Just then he heard the beast crash through the same fallen treetop he had. He could not see it, but the thing fell down the same edge as he, though with a great deal more violence. The thing grunted and gagged like a choking pig. The light swung violently, then dimmed.
Wodi sat perfectly still, straining to hold his breath in the stifling dark. He had retained the spear of the torturer, and clutched it fiercely even though it seemed completely inadequate.
He heard the demon rise and moan, an awful sound like a human throat, only bent and changed into something perverse. The purple light swayed left and right. He heard the thing loping about the lowlands. It knew that he was hiding nearby. Time dragged on, stretched out by the horror of the thing and its hunger, and finally the fear bore into Wodi. He saw his own life, only it wasn’t the life he had lived but the life he wanted to live - the desperate fantasy of a dying man. Wodi saw himself return to Haven. He entered a mansion, he saw a faceless man and knew it was the bastard who had exiled him. Some rich sociopath who preyed on the weak. Wodi went up to him, shook his hand, let a concealed hammer drop through his sleeve and into his hand, then swung the thing into the man’s mouth.
Wodi tore himself away from the unbelievable fantasy and saw the demon loping along the hillside. As strange as it seemed, the hellish light seemed to be coming from the thing’s chest or belly. Wodi saw the thing’s black profile. It was shaped like a man, but bent over, with legs that were too long. It might have been eight or nine feet tall if standing straight. It had a grotesque bulbous head, and might have had long sharp ears. The thing was circling around, and would tighten its circle as it went. Wodi saw the misshapen beast lift its head to smell the air.
Wodi knew that he would never escape, would never be able to kill the evil person responsible for this nightmare, so he summoned up his resolve and stood from his hiding place. His legs shook terribly and he had to lean against the fallen trunk. He was plainly out in the open. He planned to shout at the thing but his mouth was completely dry. Now that he was ready for the thing to put him out of his misery, the demon seemed content to shift its head about aimlessly, with its back turned to him.
On a whim Wodi picked up a stone, cradled it in his hand, then chucked it in the distance. It landed with a dull thud and the demon’s head immediately whipped around. It tore across the lowlands, throwing up a tide of dead black leaves. Without waiting for it to get far, Wodi turned and walked away. His legs soon found their strength again and he broke into a jog. The light grew dim. When he found himself in darkness, he ran with the spear waving in front of him.
The demon moaned long and pitiful, again sounding like a perversion of a human in agony, and Wodi redoubled his speed. The idea of running into a tree was not so terrible. He thought of large knuckles on his legs, his knees breaking, he thought of teeth stabbing into his stomach, he thought of the awful moan in his ears, and he ran harder.
But his spear did smack into the trunks of white trees, and the sound of wood against wood was like a siren through the deathly calm forest. Just when Wodi began to feel his legs and lungs burning their last, the purple light returned once again. Then the moaning redoubled, a grunting, sexual sound, a monster in love with its own hunger.
There was a terrible cry. Wodi thought thunder had struck; he leaped and fell and rolled onto his back. Behind him, two beasts fought, clawing and snapping their jaws at one another, one shrieking desperately, the other hissing and spitting. In the flashing purple light, Wodi saw the demon fighting with some kind of reptilian horror. The second creature could not have been a demon, for demons did not fight one another - it was simply another of Mother Nature’s abominations, an aborted child left to fend for itself in this nightmare world.
The reptilian creature was shorter than the demon, but bulkier, and covered in black scales. The fight moved so quickly that Wodi could not tell who was causing greater pain. He forced himself up and ran. The violent cries receded into the darkness far behind. He ran and ran until his mind turned to jelly. Eventually he came upon one clearing, then another, then he no longer had to rely on the torturer’s spear to find his way.
Wodi broke through the darkest region of the forest and entered a clearing lit by violent white light. The sun was directly overhead, and was baking hot, and Wodi fell on his back and the scent of the grass was heavenly and sweet.
* * *
Wodi continued on. He stuck to the shade as much as possible, for the clearings were stifling hot in the noontime sun. The cries of insects were incessant. Eventually he found a pile of flat stones with a trickle of water running over them. The trickle descended into a shallow, green-topped, stinking pool. Wodi got near the opening and drank up the water near its source. It tasted like licking a dirty coin, but it was a great relief. It sharpened his mind more than anything that ever came out of a faucet back home.
He rarely let his attention wander, ever fearful of how he had practically walked on top of a demon earlier. The cries of insects, the slope of the land, moving shadows, the nagging thought of when he would break and eat some of the strange fruit - that was his world now.
The cries of the insects broke and shifted momentarily, and Wodi heard snapping twigs and a groan nearby. He froze perfectly still, then quickly whirled and knelt behind a tree. He gripped the torturer’s spear in both hands. The entire world was frozen and still.
A shrill voice said, “Is someone there?”
Now Wodi’s heart pounded and he took in a long, quiet breath. His
hands were shaking, and he prepared to stab something, to stab it until it was dead.
“I know someone’s there!” came the cry. “Please come out!” A long pause, then, “I’m not from here!”
Wodi felt the panic in the cry and great relief washed over him. He rose and stepped out. Every leaf stood out in sharp detail, crisp and green, because of all the adrenaline that was washing through his system.
Wodi rounded a tree and saw a young man about his age, with long red hair and clothes that were undeniably made in Haven. Wodi raised his hands and the youth relaxed. He was taller than Wodi, but seemed a little softer - no doubt from Central Haven. In fact...
“I recognize you,” said Wodi.
The youth nodded, then said, “University. We take modern lit together.” The youth showed his teeth in imitation of a smile, then said, “I’m Saul. Saul Hargis.”
“Wodi Kyner.” Wodi approached and extended his hand to shake, and immediately realized that the gesture was a very “labor class” thing to do. Saul laughed a little, then placed his limp hand in Wodi’s, no doubt thinking the greeting was absurdly old-fashioned. In fact, Wodi caught Saul’s eyes narrowing, saw his jaw tightening, and he knew that Saul did not trust him.
Neither had any idea where to begin. “Did you wake up here as well?” said Wodi.
“I never really went to sleep,” said Saul. “I -”
“How did you carve that spear?” Wodi cut him off. He had just realized that Saul was holding a spear much like his own, except the thing was freshly cut. Its tip was a series of beveled planes with the occasional deep groove from a misplaced cut.
“Oh...” said Saul. “The thing is... when they left me here, they gave me this.”
Saul reached behind his back and pulled out a large, jagged combat knife. Wodi stepped back; it was the kind of blade that a professional soldier might keep, or even a civilian if he was into morbid knick-knacks and revenge fantasies.
Saul started to put the thing behind his back once more, but Wodi said, “Can I look at the knife?”