Into the Infested Side

by Shane Hegarty

  Estravon’s eyes narrowed. “That’s section 64a, and I really think it’s more a guideline than a hard-and-fast rule.”

  “I didn’t think the Council of Twelve liked to leave things too loose,” said Finn.

  “OK, it’s a rule. But it states that it can only be acted upon if there’s reasonable cause.”

  Emmie stepped forward, the crown of her hair tickling Estravon’s chin so that he had to tilt his head back. “I would’ve thought an apprentice rescuing his father would be reasonable cause,” she said. “Especially if his father is the last active Legend Hunter on Earth.”

  Estravon picked a speck of dust off his tongue. “There’ll be a tribunal about this when we get back, trust me. A big investigation.”

  “Great!” declared Emmie, genuinely delighted with events. “Then we’re heading for the mountains.”

  A tremor ran through Finn’s arm, and he wasn’t sure if it was the cold or the aftermath of the crystal or fear. He didn’t want to have to go anywhere other than home. But he was here and so was his dad.

  Finn the Defiant. Again, he seemed to hear those words his father had spoken to him before he’d been lost. Finn the Defiant.

  He trained his eyes on the depths of the dead forest ahead of them, and his mind replayed the last image on the scanner before it had stopped working. All those green dots. There were Legends all around them.

  Well, almost all around them.

  Because, in that last image, there had been a path ahead. Clear. Not yet Infested.

  “I need to find my dad,” he said. “If we move on, maybe we’ll reach clearer ground to talk to him, and we can get to the mountains and the tower he talked about.”

  Estravon shook his head.

  Emmie rubbed her hands in excitement.

  The three of them stood there. A man in a tailored Italian suit. A couple of twelve-year-olds in school uniform and half a fighting suit each.

  No Desiccator.

  A malfunctioning scanner.

  A half-working radio.

  A bag of cobbled-together weapons that might be dangerous.

  “Oh, come on,” said Emmie, skipping on ahead. “We’ve faced worse, haven’t we, Finn?”

  “I’m not sure that we have, to be honest,” he said, but he followed slowly. Anything that might bring him closer to his father was better than standing around doing nothing.

  “I expressly order you by the provisions of the 1912 Act on Misdirected Searches...” said Estravon, but Emmie and Finn had already disappeared into the forest.

  Finn moved forward. Step by step. Trying not to think about how easily the clank of his fighting suit carried across the Infested Side. And trying not to think about the stories of those who had travelled to here in the past.

  Liam the Perished. Shaun the Lost-Hunter. Lucinda the Missing.

  He managed not to dwell on their destinies. Pushed them to the back of his mind. Stayed positive.

  Unfortunately, Estravon took great pleasure in relaying each of their dreadful fates. In great detail. Then added some new ones.

  “You know about Lucas the Half-Escaped?” he asked as they walked.

  “We probably shouldn’t talk too loudly,” said Finn.

  “He was a French Legend Hunter,” Estravon continued, addressing Emmie as her armour clanked in tune with Finn’s. “It’s a great example of how you’re never safe until you’re back home, tucked up in bed, drinking cocoa. And even then only if the cocoa’s hot enough to burn the eyes of any attacker who might jump into bed with you.”

  They separated to round the fat, blasted trunk of a tree, with Estravon taking up his story again once they came together on the other side. “Anyway, Lucas chases a Cerberus right through a gateway. The gateway shuts behind him. He’s gone.”

  Finn stopped for some water, leaning against a tree stump as he did so. The bark felt slick and glassy to the touch, a couple of what might once have attempted to be buds but never grew, were now razor-sharp. He felt the frigidity of the air tickle his face, but there was no breeze at all, only a staleness. It was as if this world had been robbed of all dynamism.

  Emmie sat beside him. “This armour isn’t made for hiking in,” she said. Wiping her brow created a noise like a bin being emptied.

  As Finn took the water bottle from his bag, he accidentally pulled out the red notebook and it flopped on to the flat tree stump.

  Estravon took it almost without thinking and flicked through it absent-mindedly as he continued his story. “Anyway, as the weeks went by, it became clear that Lucas was injured, but still alive on the Infested Side, fighting his way through in the hope of finding a path back home. So, the Council of Twelve captured and bribed a sprite Legend, a Kobalos, to return to the Infested Side, find Lucas and bring him back.”

  “This story is not going to end well,” said Emmie.

  “Surprisingly, the Legend was true to its word and three days after being released back to the Infested Side it returned, pushing Lucas through a gateway ahead of it.” Estravon slowed his flick through the notebook’s pages. “It was only when the Kobalos followed Lucas through and saw the look on the humans’ faces that it realised it had underestimated the severity of the wounds Lucas had received in his battle to escape. And all it said was, ‘I did think it was strange that all of you had legs, but he had none.’”

  Finn gawped at Estravon.

  “Is it in the rules that you have to be constantly gloomy?” asked Emmie.

  “Just passing the time in a manner commensurate with our situation,” said Estravon, blowing air from his cheeks.

  “Well, maybe you should do it a bit more quietly,” she responded.

  Finn brought the bottle to his lips again, felt a spasm run through his hand, veins pulse, a tremor chase up his arm. The aftershock of the force that had thrown him across the cave still running through him. He lost his grip on the bottle and Emmie caught it before too much was spilled.

  “Are you OK?” she asked him.

  “Just cold, I think,” he lied as a bead of sweat crawled from his matted, damp fringe down his cheek. “Maybe we should keep moving.”

  He forced himself to stand, holding the radio in his hand, resisting the temptation to try it again. Its battery felt like the most important item he had.

  “This notebook isn’t yours, is it?” said Estravon, flicking through it again.

  “It is,” said Finn, a bit feebly. “Well, I found it. At home. I think it might have belonged to Niall Blacktongue.”

  “Niall Blacktongue? We’re not supposed to talk about him. But why would you think that?”

  Finn gestured at the notebook. “It says NB on the inside.”

  “Hardly persuasive.”

  “Plus, he was my grandfather and I found the notebook in my house.”

  Estravon frowned. “Well, all right. Anyway, whoever wrote it knew a lot about gateways,” he said. “These calculations, these diagrams, they’re almost like a guide to creating them. Different types of them. Stuff about different crystals too. You just found it lying around?”

  “Yeah,” said Finn, passing the water to Emmie.

  “It’s also a guide to what not to do.” Estravon held open a couple of pages with a drawing of what looked like two gateways, one with a skull and crossbones at its centre. “Like, for example, not opening one gateway on top of another. Someone put a lot of thought into this. And you just happened to find it? And then a cave full of crystals? I really can’t decide if your luck is good or bad.”

  Finn took the notebook from Estravon, put it back in his bag. “Come on,” he said. “We’d better go.”

  “Yes, wonderful,” said Estravon. “Let’s march on towards our doom, in whatever form it comes.”

  “And again that’s cheerful,” said Emmie.

  “Statistically, we shouldn’t have survived even this long. Especially you,” Estravon said to Finn. “What with the prophecy and all.”

  Finn felt a shiver at the idea of the prophecy �
�� and its prediction that he would die on the Infested Side.

  Here.

  Now?

  “The prophecy’s rubbish anyway,” he shrugged crossly.

  “You think so?”

  “I’ve been on the Infested Side before and survived. The prophecy means nothing.”

  “The Legends are rising, the boy shall fall, it says. The last child of the last Legend Hunter, and all that,” said Estravon.

  “Yes, yes, you don’t need to recite it again,” said Finn.

  “His death on the Infested Side will be greater than any other,” finished Estravon. “It’s been around for years, you know. Long before I became an Assessor. Long before you were born even.”

  “Can’t this wait until we get home?” complained Emmie. “It doesn’t matter right now.”

  “Actually, seeing as I’m currently trapped on the Infested Side with a girl in patent shoes and a boy whose very fate has been the subject of rumour since before he was even born, it matters quite a lot, don’t you think?”

  “What do you mean it’s been around since before I was born?” asked Finn.

  “It’s been around a lot longer than any of us,” said Estravon. “Decades. Since around the time that, well, you-know-what happened.”

  “We-know-what happened?” asked Emmie.

  “Since my grandfather disappeared,” guessed Finn. “Not that I’ve ever been told why.”

  “No one likes to talk about it,” Estravon repeated and pulled his suit lapels tight against the chill. “We should move on.”

  “Hold on,” said Finn, grasping Estravon’s arm.

  “Don’t grab me like that. I can’t be held responsible for my violent reflexes,” said Estravon. “Four years of Advanced Combat. Deadly.”

  “Are you saying that there’s a connection between my granddad disappearing and the prophecy starting?”

  “I am merely stating the facts as we know them,” replied Estravon. “Or, at the very least, the facts about a very strong rumour. The two events coincided. Whether that is accident or design is way above my pay grade. Which is grade 3, by the way, and not too bad for someone of my age.”

  “But it doesn’t have to be about Finn,” said Emmie.

  “Why’s that?” asked Estravon.

  “Because it doesn’t say it’s me,” Finn said. “It says it’s the last child of the last Legend Hunter, but it doesn’t actually say it’s me.”

  Estravon flicked some dirt off the lapel of his suit, straightened his cuffs, looked further into the bare, foreboding forest ahead. “I don’t know what to think frankly. I don’t know if the prophecy is real or not. I don’t know if it has anything to do with Niall Blacktongue, although we really don’t like to talk about that. But I feel increasingly sure that there is something about you that makes you very different from any other human who’s ever been here.”

  “Why?” asked Finn.

  “Because you’ve survived a visit to the Infested Side once before. Because you’re here again. And, most obviously, because we’ve got this far into this forest, with so many Legends out there, and they haven’t attacked us yet.” Estravon bent to glare at him. “Don’t you find that a bit odd?”

  Finn felt it again. That tremor through his arm, a flash in his veins. Brief but sharp. He turned away as he winced, urging it to pass.

  He took a furtive peek at the back of his hand. Veins were raised, a glowing network spreading from his fingers to his wrist. He pulled a glove on to cover it.

  For weeks, he had dwelled on this rumour about his fate, one he knew was spoken of by Legends on the Infested Side as well as Legend Hunters back home. It had begun to seem only a matter of time until the prophecy was fulfilled, meaning that every step he took brought his death closer.

  The thing was he didn’t know which way to go to stop it from happening, or if he was just locked into a destiny he couldn’t avoid.

  He decided to add that to the growing list of things he shouldn’t think about.

  Deep in the trees, there was a cry. An animal cry. Distant but clear.

  “They’re out there,” said Estravon. “So, why haven’t they come for us yet?”

  “We’re doing the right thing, aren’t we?” Finn asked Emmie as she handed him the water back.

  “You’re going to have to stop asking that, Finn,” she said. “After all, you’re the only one of us who’s been on the Infested Side before. That’s got to count for something.”

  Finn wasn’t sure that it did. Before shoving the water bottle back in his bag, he took a last swig. Liquid leaked down his chin, dropping to the ground. They moved on again, stepping carefully over sharp brambles and shattered leaves.

  Behind them, where the drops of water had fallen, the soil writhed, hungry for a purity it had not tasted in aeons.

  And, within the leafless trees, the Legends crept after them. Keeping their distance.

  Waiting.

  Thump. Thump.

  Thumpthumpthumpthumpthump.

  “OK, OK, OK, I’m coming.” Steve half fell down the stairs of the small house, two steps at a time, a sweatshirt tight round his torso, coconut-themed Bermuda shorts flapping at his knees. As soon as he unlocked the door, his nose was almost broken by Clara pushing through. She had a cuddly toy in her hands.

  “Be careful,” he complained, “we only rent this place.”

  “Where is he?” she demanded.

  “The landlord will keep our deposit if there’s damage to the house,” said Steve, examining the scrape in the paint on the wall where the door had slammed into it. “Anyway, where is who?”

  She threw the cuddly toy at his head. “What the...?” he exclaimed.

  “Finn’s gone. Start talking.”

  He picked up the toy and took a note from where it had been skewered on one of its soft fangs. It read:

  Steve looked up from the note, his exasperation clear. “He can’t be far. It’s been a dry day, so he hasn’t gone jumping into any gateways.”

  Clara blocked him as he tried to walk into the kitchen. “I’ve spent the past few weeks hoping that even you might be able to get Hugo back, but instead I’ve watched you flail around, pretending to be in charge, finding the wrong maps, going on Legend Hunts at the petting zoo—”

  “I had a map. I saw fur. It was a natural connection to make.”

  “—and I’ve been fobbed off by that Council of bloody Twelve time and time again. To what end? My twelve-year-old son has decided he needs to rescue his father all by himself. Now I want you to pick up that phone, or go to your computer, or send up a smoke signal, or do whatever the hell it is you do to contact the Twelve. We have to get Finn back.”

  Steve sighed. “But you don’t even know where he is.”

  “I know he needs our help.”

  “He’s a young boy, Clara. Young boys have adventures. He’ll be back when he gets hungry.”

  Clara picked up a phone from the table and held it out to him. “Get the Twelve on the line.”

  “I can’t do that, Clara. You know that’s not how it works.”

  “I don’t care how it works. Contact them right now.”

  “If you call them, you invariably get an assistant, a minion, someone like that Assessor. The Twelve don’t do conversations. They do rules. They do procedures. They go by the book. And it’s a book they’ve written. And they don’t send rescue parties into gateways after their only active Legend Hunter, so they’re not likely to send a whole SWAT team over just because Finn has gone walkabout for a few hours.”

  Clara stared at him with an intensity that made his eyes frazzle. “You don’t know, do you?” she said.

  “Know what?”

  “Finn didn’t go to school this morning. They called to say he never showed up.”

  “I used to do the same when it was double geography.”

  “And he left here with Emmie.”

  “Well, I just presume she’s out hanging around with...” A ripple of understanding crossed his br
ow. “...Finn.”

  As he said this, something caught Steve’s eye. The door of the microwave oven, ajar. He opened it and Clara could see a safe tucked inside. Steve turned the dial. Click. Turned it the other way. Click. And back again. Clonk.

  He pulled open its door, reached in and held out a newspaper parcel.

  “That’s a relief,” he said. “For a moment, I thought someone had taken all the dangerous stuff.”

  He unwrapped the paper.

  Inside, where there should have been a collection of highly dangerous devices taken from Mr Glad’s shop, lay a selection of fruits, pebbles and a cracked water pistol.

  Steve uttered a deep, throaty groan, then charged out of the kitchen and up the stairs three at a time. Clara followed him and watched as he threw open Emmie’s bedroom door.

  “Emmie!” he bellowed as he disappeared inside.

  A second later, he was back out again, urgently pushing past Clara and going straight to another room.

  Clara looked into Emmie’s bedroom and saw clothes on the floor, schoolbooks on the desk and a bed unmade. But no Emmie.

  She followed Steve into the other room. He was leaning over a desk beside a bank of cameras lined up at the window, turning on the computer, punching keys furiously.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  “Contacting the Twelve,” he said. “We need to get our kids back.”

  “Do you hear something?” Finn asked the others.

  They hadn’t walked much further in search of clear ground, but he couldn’t be sure if that unshakeable crawling on his skin was the strange sensation he’d been feeling or the justified paranoia that they were being watched.

  Or both.

  They stopped, and the only sounds were the creaks of Finn’s and Emmie’s armour settling. But, when they walked on again, Finn could sense it clearly now. He knew the others could too. The forest seemed to wake, as if matching their pace, tracking them. There was rustling. Shaking. Scurrying. Behind them. Alongside them. Unseen but present with every step.

  Thinking he caught movement in the sliver of sky above them, Finn twisted his head upwards. There was a sound that reminded him of bed sheets flapping on a washing line and the flat roof of cloud appeared to stir for just a moment. Then it was still again.