by Samuel Fort
Chapter 64: Danger Close
Ben was awake now. He had died in his last dream. So had Fiela, and Sam, and many, many others. He didn’t want to dream anymore. He didn’t want to die anymore. The air in the cave was heavy and almost unbreathable, his mouth was parched, and his stomach seemed to be digesting itself. The pain in his foot was maddening, though he was grateful he could still feel the limb, knowing that not feeling pain would be a bad thing.
Vedeus, propped against the wall next to him, had been quiet for a long time, but Ben could hear the man’s labored breathing. Like Ben, he had spent most of the past day sleeping. The two had agreed to conserve their precious air and energy by not talking any more than necessary, which was a difficult task when facing death. The one thing the dying want more than anything is companionship. In this case, proximity had to suffice.
Fortunately, the trapped men were not compelled to spend their last hours in darkness. The dependable Cicada radiated a constant, if dim, luminescence. Remarkably, its power level was at 64%, despite having been on perpetually for weeks. Ben wished he had had an opportunity to upload images of Fiela or Lilian or his “Ardoon family” onto the device. Instead had made do with thousands of images of the Tiwanaku tablets.
There were worse ways to die, he decided.
But he didn’t want to die.
He looked at the damaged section of wall across from him – the section he and Vedeus had defaced in order to prevent a new creature from manifesting in the chamber. Despite their herculean efforts, the men had managed only to scar two glyphs, which differed from all the others now in that they had lost their glow. That had been enough, though. That had shut the temple down as a monster generator.
He peered at the dim glyphs, thinking. Then he stared at the corpses of the unfortunate Peth who had taken refuge in the cave, only to be chopped to pieces when a second creature appeared in their midst. A terrible way to go, he had said.
This seemed worse.
“Vedeus,” he mumbled, his swollen tongue and raspy throat making his voice that of a stranger.
“Yes, Anax,” the other man replied instantly. Apparently he had not been sleeping. His voice sounded much like Ben’s. Alien.
The king tried to lick his lips. It was sandpaper against sandpaper. “Do you think they’re still digging?”
Vedeus didn’t respond right away. “It would be a recovery mission, now. They have no equipment - no way to get to us in time. They cannot know the chamber is intact. In truth, most are probably dead.”
Ben thought about that. “I have an idea, but I don’t want to risk more lives.”
“Your death will lead to many others,” replied Vedeus. “Steepleguard will be all anarchy. The Ardoon there…killed. If you can survive, you must.”
Ben nodded weakly. “We don’t…” He coughed, or tried to. A second later, “We don’t have much time. Let’s do something crazy.”
Vedeus managed a chuckle. “Not in the mood,” he mumbled.
Ben managed a pathetic smile. “Something else then?”
“What, Anax?”
Ben used his hands to push himself further upright, and would have screamed at the pain in his foot if he’d had the ability to. “Danger close,” he said.
“Where?” said Vedeus, now alert.
“No. Incoming – ‘danger close.’”
Vedeus turned toward him. “Anax, we have no artillery.”
The other man nodded toward the damaged glyphs. “Don’t we?”
Ben put one arm around Vedeus’s shoulders and was hoisted up. The pain was immense but he was relieved to be on his feet again – or at least one of them. The two men began a grueling ramble toward the distant wall.
“There,” Ben said, nodding toward a hole in the lower portion of the block wall that had been built within the cave. It was a three feet wide. “There’s a cavity between the block wall and the cave wall. That’s where we’ll go when I’m done.”
Vedeus, practically dragging the wounded man forward, grunted. “Yes, Anax.” The Peth spoke slowly, his words slurred. “What are we doing now, though?”
“Just get me to the glyphs,” replied Ben.
It took the men five minutes to cross the chamber floor. Had they been healthy it would have taken seconds. Ben used the Cicada to light the way, helping them to avoid tripping over the dozens of corpses, fallen blocks, and abandoned weapons.
When they arrived at the opposing wall, Vedeus said, “We have no tools.”
Ben shook his head. “Wouldn’t matter. The inscriptions are too fine. We can’t replicate them.”
Vedeus leaned the other man against the wall before leaning against it himself. “Your plan has a flaw then,” he rasped. His tone was not critical. He was merely making an observation.
“Probably several.”
Gasping, Ben flipped through the images on the Cicada. Even this was a difficult task. Neither his foggy brain nor his numb fingers wanted to cooperate. His eyelids drooped and he felt his one good knee begin to buckle.
“Anax,” said Vedeus, who reached out arm to steady the man, “sooner would be better.”
Ben forced his eyes open. He slid a filthy finger over the screen of the Cicada, searching furiously for the image he needed, grunting in frustration at the number of images available and his increasingly clumsy attempts to navigate them. Locating the image he wanted in these conditions was like trying to program an unfamiliar DVR using a remote with a dying battery. While drunk.
“Got it,” he said at last. Glowing on the screen was a digital image of the segment of the inscriptions he and Vedeus had destroyed. The image actually contained a longer line of glyphs, but he zoomed in on the two that were now missing. He grunted as he pushed himself off the wall and turned. “Take this,” he said to Vedeus. “Climb the ladder. Fill the void.”
Vedeus took the digital tablet, his dry, red eyes wide. “Will that work?”
“Maybe,” said Ben, thinking how the Empyrean on the screen danced for him, just as it did in real life. “The screen zooms. Tinker with it until the size is right.”
“How will I know?”
“You’ll know.”
“As you say, Anax.” The other man seemed suddenly full of life, drawing from an untapped reserve. The Peth practically bounded to the ladder lying on the floor.
“All hell is going to break loose,” mumbled Ben.
Propping the ladder against the wall and beginning to climb, Vedeus said, “It is a better way to die.”
As he slid to the floor, the king mumbled, “Tell her I loved her.”
Vedeus was half way up the ladder. He didn’t hear the man.
