Dustfall, Book Five - What Lies Beneath

by J. Thorn

  “But they won’t. Don't you see that? And regardless, it’s already happened and you are just not seeing it.”

  She shook her head. “How has it already happened?”

  “Both the people outside as well as the ones we've imprisoned, none of them grew up in the world before the catastrophe. Hell, we didn't grow up in the world before the catastrophe! Now we are the only ones, far as we know, who have working technology. We don't need to slaughter them to reset the world. Centuries have passed since the disaster, and the world has reset itself already. All we need to do is step up and be willing to educate the ones that have survived.”

  Katrina's frown deepened and Abernathy could sense an internal struggle. He knew the woman to be highly intelligent but also stubborn. Abernathy had seen those qualities combined in her many times but he’d rarely been on the opposing side.

  “You know I’m right.” He pushed harder. “You know that allowing this slaughter outside to continue is the worst thing we can do. Those we have trapped inside know that we are the ones trying to teach them a better way. And they know that we have committed an atrocity of the same kind that was committed centuries ago. Not only will they not cooperate, they will make it worse.”

  Katrina looked down at the desk, seeming to contemplate his words until her eyes went wide.

  “You're right.” Katrina shook her head and fought back silent tears. “Oh god. I never saw it that way. I’m doing exactly what they did. I’m the monster. I’ve ruined everything.”

  “It's not too late, my friend. We may be old, but we’ve got the weapons to stop this. We can end this now if we move quickly.”

  Abernathy watched her wipe away a tear with the back of her hand.

  “I hope you know what you're doing, you old fool,” said Katrina.

  Chapter 32

  The night had brought with it a chill, clouds moving across the sky and allowing the moon to occasionally cast its glow upon the ruins below. A stiff wind blew through the trees and rattled the leaves like old bones, pushing the grass back and forth with an invisible hand.

  Morlan crested the hill and stopped, standing there for a moment in the tall grass, gazing out over the place called Galax. He frowned and then nodded. Galax looked like all of the other ruins, but then again, it didn’t.

  If you took away the glow of fires and the cries currently drifting toward him from the chaos that seemed to descend on the place, the ruined city was a massive sprawl across the hillside and into the valley beyond. He could see most of the buildings, and some of them were very tall, almost like the monoliths in the ancient cities, the ones ruined in the catastrophe. But these looked almost intact as if they’d been tended to for centuries. There seemed to be very little sign that the taint of the catastrophe had even touched this place.

  All of the buildings were obviously old, and some looked to be crumbling, but when compared to what lay elsewhere in the world, these could be repaired with enough hands to do the labor.

  “They will know we’re coming,” said a voice from nearby.

  Morlan turned and then turned back to the view once more. It was his scout. The man would prattle, but he was good at his job, even if he had the cheek to speak out of turn sometimes. Morlan knew that impulse had been born of familiarity, and he trusted the man enough to let him speak whenever he wished. Few had the courage to do so.

  “I did suggest we stick to the forest, you know,” continued the scout. “We could have made it almost up to the city if we had headed a bit further east before trudging up the hill. This place is wide open. They will already have seen us.”

  “Of course they will.” Morlan gave him rein to speak but that didn’t mean he had to engage the scout in conversation.

  “I see,” said the scout. “Ok.”

  “Enough now.” He brushed the air with his right hand. “My goal has been achieved if they have seen us. They will know we're coming, though I believe they are more than occupied. Enough that we will not be their main concern for the next few hours.”

  “The Valk will also have seen us.”

  “If they’ve seen us, they’ve seen us.”

  The two men stood in silence, watching the battle in the city unfold. A few minutes passed before another figure appeared beside them, a face Morlan knew well, and a leader of one of the Cygoa clans that were his most loyal allies.

  The clan leader grinned, breathing heavily.

  “Impressive, isn't it?” asked Morlan.

  “Yeah,” said the clan leader. “Much more impressive than that hole in Wytheville.” The man nodded.

  “After we are done here we may need to reconsider the center of our civilization,” said Morlan.

  “That's a big word,” said the clan leader, grinning wider. “What do you mean?”

  Morlan laughed. “I mean, maybe we will leave Wytheville behind and claim this as the home of the Cygoa.”

  “If you want this city, it will be yours,” said the clan leader. “We’ll make sure of it.”

  Morlan nodded. Some of the other clan leaders were difficult to control and motivate, but this one he had known many years and Morlan had always backed him when he needed help. When this was all over, Morlan was determined to reward the man.

  “So it will be,” said the clan leader, nodding. “But what now? Do we wait this out?” He nodded toward the battle ahead. “Let them fight it out between the two of them?”

  “And clean up afterwards?” asked Morlan. He stopped gazing over the sprawl of buildings and turned to the clan leader, smiling. “Not really the warrior’s way, though. To let others fight our battles for us.”

  “No, it isn’t noble,” said the clan leader.

  “The Cygoa will not back down,” said Morlan. “We did not march all this way to watch a battle.”

  “What’s the word then?”

  Morlan was silent for a minute as he scanned the city ahead, noting how some of the barricades had already fallen and how others had been left intact and had been left unmanned. “Spread the word. We move swiftly. We will strike at the rear of the Valk, clearing the ones hiding in these woods first. Then we will follow their path through the barricades and hit them from behind while they chase down the T’Yun. We will take a large number of them out before they can turn their attentions from the T’Yun. We will use this battle to our advantage.”

  “Sounds good to me,” said the clan leader.

  “It may mean more effort on our part.” Morlan hissed another word. “Sacrifice. But I'm sure our men are ready to avenge their fallen comrades taken by both the Valk and the T’Yun.”

  “I’ve been waiting for this for a long time,” said the clan leader.

  “So have I, my friend. Come let us take the battle to them.”

  With that Morlan held his head high and walked through the grass toward Galax.

  Chapter 33

  Rav swung the ax down hard, taking the fallen Valk warrior between the shoulder blades. He staggered back, still gripping the ax tightly and feeling it rip from the man's body as he backed away from the other Valk now swarming out of the alleyway.

  It had taken less than thirty seconds for the barricade to be overrun, and the two clan warriors standing guard had been slaughtered quickly, even though the metal sheet barrier stood at least fifteen feet high, placing the guards almost adjacent to the first floor of the buildings on either side of the alley.

  This hadn't slowed the Valk. Now, as Rav watched, the barricade began to collapse and he could see why. A tree trunk at least a dozen feet long had been slammed up against the makeshift barrier, and it must have taken a dozen of them to run the trunk over the open ground. The thing was nearly a foot thick, and he was surprised they even managed to move it in the first place. But, it was heavy enough to collapse the barricade and had been sturdy enough for the Valk to run up and leap over the top, taking the two defenders much quicker than Rav had expected.

  The cries of war only made the night worse. Fires raged but left many of
the ruins still in darkness — the place the foul creatures inhabited. Rav wanted to believe that daylight would bring some semblance of relief but part of him hoped he’d be around to see the sunrise.

  The alleyway was no more than ten feet wide, just a gap between two buildings, and he'd been passing by when he heard the crunch and the first cry of the defenders. One of the clan warriors with an empty quiver had slung his bow and grabbed for an ax, which meant that he'd already used up whatever supply of arrows he’d had, trying to stop them from reaching the barricade in the first place.

  Just how many of them were there? Rav thought about that as he backed away to the end of the alley. There were a dozen that he could see that had already climbed over the collapsing barricade, and there was a lot of movement beyond that, easily twice as many, and with the alleyway being ten feet wide, he would have to face two of them at once.

  It could be done, but against three dozen or more? They pressed forward, pointing long spears at him, which made it more difficult to fend them off. They had the reach that he didn't. He quickly glanced behind him and saw clan warriors running along the street, past him. None seemed to be willing to stop, each fighting their own battles with the Valk.

  They are all hurrying somewhere, he thought, somewhere away from the barricades they were supposed to be defending. As he stepped out of the alleyway, forced back by the thrusting spears of the angry Valk in front of him, Rav saw the reason for the exodus.

  A few hundred yards away, down near the end of the street where a large, wide barricade had once stood guarded by a dozen or more warriors, there was now just a pile of rubble and twisted metal. Several bodies lay on the ground, already killed by the Valk that now poured over the remains of the barricade in far greater numbers than he had faced in the alleyway.

  He had no choice, dodging as a spear was thrust toward him. He would have to run, even though he still suffered badly from the injury he’d taken falling into the breach. He would have pressed through the pain as he’d done so many times before in war. He would leave, and try to keep up with the other warriors heading to wherever they were going.

  Jonah must have some other defense plan if the outer barricades didn’t hold. They would need to gather somewhere, maybe in the center of the city where the inner barricades were. From there they could defend themselves in numbers. Holding the outskirts of the city had been too much, clearly an overestimation of what the clans could accomplish. They just didn't have the numbers. All the Valk had to do was pick some of the barricades and charge them in mass, leaving other defenses untouched.

  Rav felt a rage boiling in his stomach. They ruled the world of the underground and had prowled the surface in search of the flesh of fallen warriors. The clans didn’t like it, but the dead were dead and if that kept the beasts below the surface, then so be it. But these damn things hadn't had enough. Why couldn’t they just leave them be.

  He leapt forward, swinging his weapon, feigning a ferocious attack on the two Valk at the front of the alleyway. The two spear wielders backed up, frantically trying to avoid his flailing ax but not being entirely successful. His ax bit into the shaft of the nearest warrior’s spear, smashing the weapon. The Valk stumbled, his eyes wide and left holding only half of the spear. This was the moment the Rav took to make his escape.

  As he turned to run, Rav noticed a large trash can leaning next to the corner of the building, right at the end of the alleyway. He passed it, turned back, and gave it a hard kick, sending it flying into the alleyway entrance. The metal container made a loud clang as it hit the wall and bounced, then rolled into the alleyway toward the oncoming Valk, spewing it’s rotting and rusted contents across the ground. He knew it wouldn't hold them up for long, but it might give him a second or two.

  He turned back to the road and began to run, getting no more than twenty yards away when the pain from his leg began to throb and scream. He found himself limping more than running. He glanced back and saw the Valk already exiting the alleyway, most of them spreading out, waiting for the others to join them from down the road. At least half a dozen took up the chase and followed him.

  Rav could see that they were closing the distance and he realized he couldn't run any faster. There seemed to be too many to fight and too many to run from. He looked ahead. A dozen other warriors were sprinting along the street away from the oncoming horde, but he was at the back and none of them had seen him, so they wouldn't turn back to help. He stumbled on another ten yards and glanced back a second time. The gap between him and the warriors ahead of him had widened, and the footfalls and cries behind him had closed to a matter of feet.

  Rav slowed, stopped, and then turned, feeling a sinking in his stomach. This is it, he thought. This is where I finally leave this life. He cursed, but he couldn't think of a better way to go out. Rav wanted to die in the warrior’s way, not fleeing from an enemy like a beaten dog. He was glad he had lived beyond his fall into the great breach so that he could die with true honor.

  Maybe this is why I didn’t die then. I was meant to die here, defending the last of the clans. He lifted his ax and bellowed, then took up a stance, waiting for the Valk to catch up. Six of them approached, slowing from a run to a walk, spreading out. They clearly planned to surround him.

  So be it, he thought, backing away slowly. He would take more than one of them down before this fight was over. He would make them pay in his own small way, and vowed to take at least half of the six with him into the next life.

  “Bring it on, motherfuckers! I’ll not go first.”

  He’d seen it himself. The look of acceptance and insanity in a man’s eyes when he faced the eternal darkness. Now, the Valk were probably seeing that in his eyes. One old, injured man turned to all six Valks. For a moment he’d hoped that alone would be intimidating and make them reconsider. But it hadn’t.

  The first stepped forward, hefting a spear, and lunging to strike. Rav smashed the spear away and then swung his ax back in an arc as another moved in. As the second warrior stepped forward also carrying a spear, the man froze and staggered. Rav didn't have time to wonder why, as another Valk came toward him, but then this one also stopped a few feet before Rav could attack. And now he saw why. The flight of an arrow and half of the shaft jutted out from the center of the man's chest. It had struck the gap in the armor.

  Rav took a step back and glanced at the spear wielder, who had also failed to attack, and saw the man was now down on one knee, grasping at an arrow that stuck out from his groin. Blood poured down onto the road from the wound, pooling between the man's knee and his foot. Then Rav heard a whistle, and he glanced up to see another arrow take a third warrior in the neck. The man staggered and fell back far more dramatically than the first two, hitting the road with a loud bang, his metal armor clanging against the blacktop.

  The remaining three Valk warriors backed away, then one of them turned and started to run, heading back along the road to the main gathering that now surged along the street a hundred yards away.

  “Run, you old idiot,” shouted a familiar voice.

  Rav turned, looking up to see a figure upon the roof of the building opposite. He recognized the man immediately. Ghafir. He stood on the flat roof of a three—story, red brick building, protected up to his waist by a wall. Ghafir released another arrow and this one struck one of the two warriors that had backed away. Then as he was reloading again, the remaining Valk turned and ran.

  “Rav!” Ghafir shouted, cupping his hands in hopes his words would carry. “I don't have an endless supply of arrows. Get to the stairwell at the back of the building. I‘ll meet you there.”

  Rav saw the alleyway opposite and hurried toward it, leaving the street and the bodies of the Valk behind. He staggered between trash cans and piles of rubble until he reached an intersection. The alleyway that he stepped from led along the backs of many of the buildings that faced onto the main street. It was wide, maybe two dozen feet across, with tall brick walls on either side and few windows
facing outward. Metal stairways and ladders led up many buildings.

  He made a quick left, judging the building that Ghafir had been on to be the next one along, and he was relieved when he saw the man scramble over the wall onto a metal stairway that wound down the side of the building. There was a section halfway down that was broken, but Ghafir deftly dropped down onto the section below, and by the time Rav reached the bottom of the stairs, Ghafir was already out in the alleyway, waiting for him.

  “Everybody's heading back toward the plaza defenses.”

  Rav winced, the pain in his leg now surging back to replace the adrenaline that had prepared him to die. “Everyone?”

  “Yeah, the barriers are falling all over. Now everybody seems to be heading to the plaza in the middle of the city. We need to go.”

  “I can't run.” Rav pointed down with his ax. “My leg.”

  “Then I'll help you, my friend. If we stick to the back alleyways, hopefully we can avoid any more encounters with that scum. At least they are behind us, and everyone seems to be heading in the same direction.”

  Ghafir stepped forward and grabbed Rav under the arm, helping to support his weight, and the two began to move more swiftly through the alleyway.

  “I hope that Jonah’s got something in mind,” said Rav.

  “The plaza I would say.” Ghafir used his head to nod at the streets in front of them. “There the roads aren't too wide, defenses are up. If we can hold that plaza, we may stand a chance.”

  “Have you seen how many there are?” asked Rav, staggering onwards.

  “Yes. We’re heavily outnumbered, and that's without what I saw coming up the slope.”

  “What did you see?” Rav stopped for a moment, and put his hands on his knees. “What the hell did you see coming up the slope?”

  “The Cygoa. They are here as well.”

  Rav shook his head. “Like we need them here to help put the boot in.”

  “Yeah.” Ghafir’s chuckle didn’t make Rav laugh. “Not the best of luck, but they are no friends of the Valk either, from what I've heard. So even though we may have to face them later, if we survive, they may even prove to be a boon fighting the Valk. Come on, we can't wait any longer. We gotta get to the plaza.”