Quest SMASH

by Joseph Lallo

  Mara gave up, tired of the posturing Kole used to end all of their conversations. “Major is looking for someone or something. It’s his only hope, and I feel like it’s mine as well.”

  Kole looked at her and wondered how they were connected to the new visitor, and ultimately, to Major. He grew tired of the disappointment in Mara’s eyes. Kole could feel a connection to the new arrival and yet he could not understand why.

  He knew more about Mara’s journey than Mara. He was with Major when she came through the forest, mumbling and disoriented like all of the troubled souls that fell from the noose. They took care of her and nursed her back to health in hopes she could find whatever it was they needed to flee the dying worlds. Major never said it, but Kole knew she wasn’t the one, but she was the key to finding the one who would. Major told him she would draw that power like a magnet and that was why Kole pretended to tolerate her in Major’s presence.

  Kole and Major committed heinous, immoral acts in their lives and landed here. As far as Kole could tell, Mara had not and so he felt sympathetic towards her. He knew his own suicide brought him into the reversion, although he could not decide if he was alive or dead. Most days Kole struggled to tell the difference. When Samuel arrived, he felt the blood connection in his veins and knew this reversion would not end like the countless others that tossed him out and back into the cursed forest.

  Mara convinced Major and Kole she couldn’t remember crossing over. She kept that secret hidden away, fearful they would somehow use it against her. But she’d overheard Major and Kole talking at night about their old lives and she knew why they were here. The men were violent, greedy and selfish. But they helped her navigate the forest and so she felt a thin and cautious connection to both. The collective energy of Major, Kole and Mara could release them all from the cycle, but only with Samuel’s help.

  ***

  Samuel felt the nudge of the boot in his ribs and rolled over onto his back. A grey, gauzy haze still hung in the sky. He put a hand to his throbbing forehead and wondered how long it would take to feel normal again, if ever. Samuel detected movement across the remains of the night’s fire, and a pulse of fear raced through his chest. The tree, the wolves and the howling—especially the howling—resurfaced in his head. He gulped the air and recognized the movement of a fellow human. Samuel squinted as he sat up on his elbows.

  “What time is it?” he asked.

  “Does it matter?”

  He shrugged. “I guess not.”

  He watched the stranger from behind. The man sat on a felled trunk, wearing a tattered, black overcoat mingled with dried leaves. He wore a black cloth headband tied at the back of his head above a ponytail streaked with shooting bursts of grey.

  “Who are you?”

  The stranger turned and faced Samuel. His eyes sat deep in his skull, surrounded by dark blooms of age and fatigue. The headband crouched low over his eyebrows, and the stranger’s nose sat crooked, in between two red cheeks and lips melded together into a thin line. A bruise ran from his left ear, down across his throat, and then up underneath his right ear.

  “Call me Major,” he said.

  “Is that a name or a rank?”

  Major smiled and shook his head. “You ask too many questions.”

  Major placed his knife and sharpening stone on a rock, and the glint of the blade sparkled when it caught the dull glare of the daylight.

  “You saved my life,” Samuel said.

  Major shrugged.

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome . . . er?”

  “Samuel.”

  “You’re welcome, Samuel.”

  Major stood and walked over to Samuel, sitting on a rock facing him.

  “What do you remember?” he asked.

  “The noose.”

  Major’s eyebrows pushed the headband up slightly.

  “It didn’t work. I know it was tight on my neck. I don’t remember that, I just know it. Then it was at my feet, and the bruises on my neck turned red.”

  “Before that?” Major asked.

  Samuel shook his head. “Nothing.”

  “Family, friends, work, women?”

  Again, Samuel shook his head.

  Major whistled and stood. “Haven’t seen many that close who don’t end up with rigor mortis.”

  “Close to what?” Samuel asked.

  Major waved his hand in the air and bent down to rummage through a rucksack a few feet from the fire pit. He pulled out a plastic jewel case. The cover had four symbols on it, and the spine read “Threefold Law—Revenant.” He tossed the CD to Samuel.

  “Know what that is?”

  Samuel smiled. “I’m not an idiot. It’s a CD.”

  Major snatched it from his hands and tossed it back into the sack. “Personal, not cultural,” he said, more to himself than Samuel.

  Samuel stood and stretched his back. His stomach moaned, and he stepped toward Major. “I can’t remember the last time I ate anything.”

  That shook Major from a momentary daydream. He pulled the rucksack closed and reached into the blue, plastic shopping bag behind it, grabbing cheese on wheat crackers wrapped in cellophane. He tossed them to Samuel.

  “One of the few of those I have left. Might be one of the last ever.”

  Samuel tore into the snack crackers. The overpowering sting of salt flooded his mouth and his senses. And then, as quickly as it came, the taste disappeared. He chewed what now tasted like dried cardboard. Samuel finished the crackers and immediately recognized how thirsty he had become.

  Major walked to the nearest pine, lifted a twelve gauge shotgun, and laid the barrel over his left shoulder. He loaded a lead pumpkin ball into the chamber and clicked it shut. Major grabbed the rucksack and swung it over his head.

  “I’ve gotta go.”

  Samuel stared at him.

  “I left you a water.”

  “Hold on. Where are you going?”

  Major ignored the question and strode past Samuel toward the enveloping darkness of the forest. The filtered light retreated downward from the sky, leading Samuel to believe it was nearing dusk.

  “What if the wolves return?”

  “They will,” Major said. “But not for two or three nights. I wouldn’t linger here for too long, if I were you.”

  ***

  Samuel sat at the base of the tree that had become his refuge from the pack. He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. What he recognized as night returned, smothering what remained of the reflected light in the sky. He decided against following Major into the woods. The man must have been here much longer than he had, and it would not be difficult for Major to lose him. And then Samuel remembered the wolves and thought better of venturing into the wilderness on his own.

  He reached over to the water bottle Major left and noticed a scrap of paper underneath it. Placing the bottle to the side, he unfolded the note.

  Most of the bodies have nothing of value. Scavengers cleaned them out. The trinkets lying in piles are worthless or don’t work, neither of which will help you. I can’t tell, but I think it’s accelerating. Not at an even pace like a clock, but more like the tides. It moves faster the closer it gets. I’ve seen it before. I’m moving to higher ground. So should you.

  Samuel read the note again. It was not addressed to him, and it was not signed. He had to assume Major left it and decided another confrontation with the pack would not be in his best interest. He shoved his personal items into a pocket, drained the last of the water, and climbed the tree. When the morning glow crested over the horizon, he would follow Major’s trail as far as he could and hope it would lead to higher ground.

  ***

  Samuel awoke. He had dozed on the branch, but would not go so far as to call it sleep. He felt pain in his hips, and his muscles ached from the slight tension needed to keep him balanced and in the tree. A thin beam of light appeared on the same horizon after what felt like more t
han a single night of darkness.

  It’s accelerating.

  Samuel thought about the phrase in Major’s note, and that the night felt longer. He shook his head and turned one ear toward the unending forest. Samuel had not heard them baying, nor seen so much as a falling leaf since Major left. The silence of the forest again felt suffocating, dead. He slid off the branch and climbed backward down the trunk until his feet landed on the pine needles.

  Samuel made the decision to find higher ground before Major’s note, and he walked into the forest in the same direction Major had, following the man’s first few footsteps. Samuel laughed and remembered tracking a deer in his youth. He smelled the fresh blood and felt the crisp snap of the frigid winter air of days gone by. He stopped, frantic yet exhilarated. That memory had returned. If it did, others might as well.

  ***

  He spent the next few hours trudging through the ancient forest, unsure as to whether he was making progress or simply walking in a huge arc. Samuel had not come across his campsite again, so he considered his time as progress. He approached a narrow creek running across the path. The water moved over the low rocks and passed by without so much as a gurgle. The entire stream was silent. Samuel reached into his back pocket and removed the cap from the plastic water bottle Major left him. He dipped the bottle into the water and filled it to the top. Samuel sniffed the water, could not detect an odor, and poured a drop into his mouth. He swallowed and waited. His stomach did not cramp, and he could not detect a bitter or chemical taste. He threw the bottle back and drained it, refilling it three more times.

  Samuel continued past the creek until the forest felt as though it tipped upward toward the sky. He knew he was moving to higher ground, even though Major’s trail had disappeared. As he made the ascent, the trees thinned and the air felt colder. Samuel kept moving to keep warm, exhaling plumes of breath into the forest. He struggled to determine whether it was day or night. He trudged forward on an ever-increasing slope headed skyward. He leaned on the north side of a tree trunk, resting his legs and lungs. Samuel rubbed his eyes, certain the cabin he just spotted in the distance was a figment of his imagination.

  Moss-covered shingles clung to the pitched roof. A lonely brick chimney jutted out at an angle that threatened to pull it over. Weathered wood shakes covered the front and side, their stain long since dissolved. The lone window to the right of the door was glazed with time, the dust giving it an opaque finish. Three steps led up to a door with a single brass knob and no lock.

  Chapter 4

  Samuel came within five feet of the cabin and stopped. He looked over his shoulder, expecting the occupant to arrive and chastise him for trespassing.

  “Major?” he called out.

  No response.

  “Major, are you in there?”

  The surrounding forest swallowed the sounds like a muffling blanket of snow. Samuel strained to hear noise coming from inside the cabin. He was greeted with silence.

  He took another step closer, scanning the ground for any sign of activity. A long spider web hung diagonally across the top right corner of the door, and other webs clouded the corners of the front window.

  Samuel walked to the right, circling around the cabin. The wood shakes covered the other exterior walls, although some had fallen to the ground in clumps of rotted wood. He bent down and sniffed the crumbling shingle, expecting an earthy, organic scent. He caught the slightest hint of mold and nothing more. Coming around the other side and back to the front, he did not find a cistern, privy or any other evidence of habitation.

  He looked up at the gloomy ceiling above and felt as though night was coming again. Though he struggled to find the rhythm of the day, he could not determine whether the night was a few hours off or perhaps minutes away. He saw the leader of the pack in his mind’s eye and decided he was not ready to face the alpha male again. Major said he would be back. Had it been one night or two since the attack? Samuel could not remember. Time was stretched and thin like warm taffy.

  The front door looked back at Samuel, unmoving and uncaring. He placed a foot on the first step and heard the wood crack under his weight, the first noise registered by his ears in a long while. He felt a tingling in the bottom of his foot that climbed past his ankle, over his knee, and bolted up to his shoulders. He pulled his foot back instinctively, and the electric buzz faded. When Samuel put his foot back on the step, it returned again like a low-voltage electric current. He looked down and his eyes widened. A crisp, brilliant, blue outlined his foot and extended to the outer edge of the step. The line glowed with an intensity that made Samuel squint. It cut through the drab grey-scape of the forest and the dreary sky. The wood beneath Samuel’s foot felt solid, smooth. He became aware of a scent of fresh paint that reminded him of summers spent painting fences in the neighborhood.

  Samuel closed his eyes as the memory rushed back.

  He sat on the ground in plush, green grass. An aluminum paint tray cradling a puddle of pure white paint sat next to him, a wood-handled brush resting on the edge. He stared straight ahead at a picket, one half bare, smooth and sanded while the top half sat glistening with a fresh coat.

  “Hurry, Sammy. It’s almost time for lunch. If you finish by one, we can head to the pool for the rest of the afternoon.”

  “I’m hungry. Whatyer makin’?”

  “Grilled cheese and yogurt.”

  “I’ll be in soon, Mom.”

  Samuel opened his eyes, and the memory dissipated like a balloon carried away on the wind. He looked down and the blue outline flickered. He could see the rotted step fading through the painted one of another time and place. The tingling feeling in his body disappeared until he was left standing with one foot on the step and another on the ground.

  The patch of illumination slipped lower in the sky as the darkness pulled it down to force another night. He thought of the wolves again and placed a hand on the doorknob, willing to risk entering the unknown instead of facing the wolves again. He turned the knob and pushed, but the door did not open. The howl of the wolves rose again, as if Samuel’s touch triggered their bloodlust.

  The shudder worked its way through Samuel’s body until it triggered the Major’s words in his head.

  They will return.

  A cold sweat broke out on Samuel’s forehead, and he felt a rumbling in his bowels. The howling ceased for the moment, but he knew the next time it broke the unnatural silence, the pack would be much closer. He tried again, his hand gripping the doorknob with white knuckles. Samuel felt like the Arthur of old, trying with all his might to remove Excalibur from the stone. The knob would not move, so he pushed with one shoulder on the front of the door. The lazy spider webs dangled on his head, but the door did not give. He stepped to the side and used the palm of his hand to wipe the pane of the window. The next burst of howling made him shiver. The pack was closer. Much closer.

  Samuel backed away from the window, spinning around and conducting a quick survey of the landscape surrounding the cabin. If he used a rock to break the window, the wolves would follow unless there was something inside the cabin he could use to bar it. He shoved his hands into his pockets but found nothing to help gain him access.

  The howl that came next froze Samuel. He turned in the direction of the noise and swore he saw the yellow eyes bouncing between the scant trees of the elevated forest. Samuel placed both hands on the knob and shook as hard as he could. He leaned back, pulling with his body weight. The paws of the wolves rustled the leaves on the forest floor. Samuel looked over his shoulder without releasing his grip. The alpha male was back, and the light in his eyes spoke to Samuel without the need for words.

  “Goddammit, open up,” Samuel screamed at the door.

  The alpha male growled low, fifty yards from the cabin. The wolf downshifted from a full sprint to a light gallop, ears up and fangs bared. The rest of the pack came into the tight clearing in front of the cabin, the other hunters behind the alpha male
. The females and cubs remained safely at the edge of the tree line.

  Samuel smelled the wet fur, the odor more pungent than any others since he fell from the noose. He felt the low, moaning growl emanating from the hungry beasts. They spread out until the cabin was surrounded. He turned and placed his back on the front of the door. Samuel pushed his heels into the wooden step and drew a deep breath.

  “I’m not giving in,” he said to the alpha male. “I’m not dying without a fight.”

  The alpha male’s ears twitched. He strutted closer to Samuel. The others took tentative steps closer, careful not to infringe on the territory of their leader. The wolf snarled with saliva dangling from his fangs. Samuel bent his knees and leaned forward until his rear pressed on the front of the door. He held up his fists in front of his face as if getting ready for a schoolyard brawl. The alpha male ducked his head and lunged forward. He took two bounds and opened his jaw in midair as Samuel closed his eyes and braced for the impact. At the moment he expected to have teeth tearing at his throat, Samuel fell backward into utter and complete darkness.

  ***

  Speckles of dust hung in the air, dancing on thin strings of light that penetrated the cabin through gaps in the shakes. Samuel blinked twice, feeling his eyes burn from lack of moisture. He lifted his head and turned to face the door while his body remained on the floor, the bare planks digging into his shoulder blades. Cobwebs dangled from the corners of the ceiling and stretched from underneath the cracked plaster. A narrow strip of light framed the door, leading Samuel to believe it was day, or the closest thing to daylight in this world.

  An image of the alpha male snapped into place. Samuel closed his eyes and saw the feral, yellow eyes coming at him. He looked into the beast’s empty recesses, not believing such a creature could ever possess a soul. He remembered the teeth, bared and hungry, ready to tear at his flesh. Samuel even recalled the alpha male’s scent, which overpowered any lingering odor present.