The Footsteps of Cain

by Derek Kohlhagen

  ***

  Above ground, a great screech rang out, like the cry of some sort of prehistoric monster. People outside clapped their hands to their ears to block out the sound, and then had to concentrate to keep their footing as the mammoth doors began to close, fighting the age on their gears and thundering along the ground. The wooden lattice and metal paneling of the small, makeshift pretender, puny by comparison, gave way to the unyielding progression of the closing portal, splintering and bending as if made from toothpicks and paper. The pathetic gate, constructed so proudly by the people, became a meal for the crunching teeth of its much larger relative.

  It took a full minute for the huge doors to clamp shut, and when they did, there was a resounding boom that shook the walls of the facility and buffeted the ears of its inhabitants. The echoes of the gates rode the air far and wide, announcing to the world that the last human settlement was now under its protection.

  ***

  Samuel didn’t need the confirmation on the screen to know that the gates were shut. Even deep in the ground, he could hear it. Feel it.

  The SECURITY LOCKS option, next in line, seemed to have something to do with the interior sections of the Dome. From what he could decipher, he could seal off whole blocks of it as he wished.

  He chose to skip it. If the people were being ushered into the protective shroud of the Dome, as he hoped they were, he didn’t want to end up locking them out.

  He had no idea what CANOPY SHIELD meant, but he saw no reason to ignore it; there was enough suggestion in the name to warrant its use. He nervously issued the command to activate it.

  ***

  Above, at the highest point of the Spire in the air over the main drill shaft, where an as-of-yet mysterious antenna array sat, a great spark flashed on and off a few times, and then held firm. The scent of it tickled the nostrils of those still outside. Arcs of pure electric current blazed down from the enduring spark, terminating on the top of the great wall in even intervals. In between these were smaller, perpendicular arcs that crawled up from the bottom, near the wall, to the top of the tower. Ages ago, those who’d first produced such a phenomenon had named it a “Jacob’s Ladder”, although, none of them had ever dreamed of one being used in such a fashion, at such a grand scale.

  The end effect was a broad umbrella of pure electrical energy that sealed off the top of the Spire, like a....

  Well, like a canopy.

  Between the seemingly unbreachable combination of the outer wall, its mammoth gate, and the canopy shield, there seemed very little that could penetrate inside. The old ones, the ancients who had constructed the facility and blessed it with their advanced technology, had given it a very real and very intimidating defensive blanket. And now, thanks to the extra power, it was being used to full effect.

  ***

  Back in the server room, Samuel saw a confirmation of the shield’s successful deployment on his screen.

  Now that the Spire’s defensive measures were engaged, it was time to go on the offensive. With a purposeful, firm strike of his finger, he tapped BALLISTICS.

  * * *

  Chapter 21 – Ejelano

  WELL, SHIT.

  Ejelano raced along, through the dead grass and across the rocky plain, drawing closer to his quarry. The profile of the facility ahead grew larger and larger in his vision.

  He felt the deep bite of dismay as he saw the great gates close, barring him from the easy entry that he’d expected. And then, the blinding light came to life out of thin air, and dance across the top of the entire structure like some sort of damned protective sheath. In all his long years, he didn’t remember ever encountering such a thing.

  “What is this new magic?” he wondered aloud.

  IT SEEMS THAT OUR SCARY-ASS PRESENCE HAS INSPIRED THEM TO CIRCLE THE WAGONS. I REALLY WAS HOPING THAT THIS WOULD BE EASY, BUT NOOOOOO, OF COURSE NOT. OF COURSE IT CAN’T BE EASY.

  “Will it be a problem?”

  WELL, LET’S LOOK AT YOUR TRACK RECORD. REST OF WORLD: DEAD. THE SCORE LEANS PRETTY HEAVILY IN YOUR FAVOR. I’D SAY THAT YOUR CREDENTIALS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES...DON’T BE SUCH A WORRY WART.

  The voice’s tone wasn’t as convincing as Ejelano wanted it to be. But, the White still pressed at his back. Time was short.

  YEAH, YEAH, I KNOW. I’M JUST TRYING TO KEEP YOU LOOSE, BABY.

  Yes, Ejelano was worried. Now that he understood the nature of what was chasing him, what was closing in all around him, he felt something that he hadn’t felt in a very long time. Exposed. Vulnerable.

  Mortal.

  He had to admit that, even as he sensed his apprehension starting to bubble and pop, the prospect of peril also gave him a thrill he hadn’t had since...well, since the beginning. He’d killed the world, but there hadn’t been any sport in it, no satisfaction from the hunt. There was only the churning of the clockwork, tick by tick as the eons passed by at a snail’s speed.

  The hunt. Yes. He had been a hunter. That had been his trade, in another life. He had forgotten that also, as he had so many other things, but suddenly now he remembered. Where had the memory come from? And why now?

  Ahead of him, a siren began to sound behind the walls of the settlement. It blared into the skies, full and deep, pregnant with a warning to all of those who might bear it ill will.

  He barely heard it. Something turned over in the back of his brain, barking at him. It pulled and squirmed against the leash of obscurity that held captive the memories of what he had been...before. It struggled, demanded to be acknowledged, demanded to be let out into the light.

  The great cannons, those ominous instruments of impact and fire, those symbols of humankind’s wrath upon itself, gave out a long, resistant groan atop the battlements. After a grateful slumber from their service, they once again were being called upon by the hand of their maker to carry out their terrible work. They responded to their assigned duty, as they had in centuries past.

  GOT A LITTLE PROBLEM, HERE. FOCUS.

  He tried, but whatever was tugging at him, whatever long-thought-dead piece of him that was fighting for life...would not relent. His legs kept propelling him forward, but his eyes dropped away from the metal structure ahead to the rocky ground, whizzing by.

  HEY. EJELANO.

  The rocky ground. Rocks.

  All but one of the mighty cannons began to move. Five of them turned their gaze in his direction, lazily, their actuators firing with rediscovered life and purpose, until they were staring him down with the black eyes of their barrels. Their still forms almost crackled with the potential energy stored within them.

  HEY!

  His head ached, now. There was something there, something important and huge and self-defining that was trying to rip free. He had only to find the trigger to release it.

  The rocks. Stones.

  HEY!

  He skidded to a halt.

  The stone!

  That was it. The linchpin came undone, and all the rest of it came tumbling out in vivid detail, refilling his head. He thought he’d lost it, assumed it was gone from him forever. Over time, he’d been reduced to one who could only feebly clutch at small scraps of his past, and so even as he understood the nature of the task he’d been issued, the one he undertook to secure her freedom, he’d lost the details of what he’d done to deserve it.

  Now those details, the complete circumstances of his choice and the origin of his penance, returned with a vengeance, slapping him in the face, consuming him. His eyes were open to all of its excruciating breadth.

  She, his love...his most precious gift and object of his greatest guilt. The other, his brother and betrayer, all bared teeth and deceit. The faces of his people...his family...once so often looking upon him with promise and admiration...regarding him with pained confusion. Accusation.

  He fell to his knees and pressed his forehead against the ground, as if he could push it all back out and reclaim his ignorance of the wretch that he was. But no, he was a creature forged of his crime and
tempered by his punishment, and there would be no escape for him, from himself or his past. He wept, and watered the ground with his tears, giving it back (if only a little) of what it had been robbed of through the great droughts that had sucked them dry.

  For a brief sliver of time, everything seemed to freeze. He, the devil, groveling in the dust, and the spirit screaming at him, desperate to rouse him. The cannons in the distance, poised and ready to visit upon him only a microscopic portion of what he’d visited upon an entire world.

  The cannons fired, but he barely registered the doom of their call. His thoughts drifted back, to the stone and the metal.

  BOOK TWO: THE TALE OF EJELANO, THE FORMER

  19,738 years, 4 months, 15 days, 9:56:34 hours to go

  * * *

  Chapter 22 – Ejelano

  Ejelano drew his long knife across the sharpening stone rhythmically, methodically. The sound of the metal on the rock soothed him, focused him.

  His mind was on the hunt.

  His breathing matched his strokes, in when he drew the knife toward him, and out when he pushed it against the rock. How many times had he sharpened his blade on the stone? Surely such a number could not be counted; it must be as high as the lights in the night sky, or the trees in the forest.

  Every hunter had his ritual. Some went out to the river and bathed in the early morning. Some climbed trees and let the boughs sway their bodies while they meditated. Some engaged in good-natured wrestling matches with others in the tribe, while the young women looked on with interest, whispering and laughing shyly to themselves behind cupped hands.

  For Ejelano, it was only the stone, and the metal. He had found the rock long ago, when he had first been called a man by the elders. It symbolized much to him. It was solid, like he had made his strength, and heavy, like his will. He had built his home around it, and it had never failed to keep his knife and spear deadly.

  It was the morning of the hunt. What was more...what was better...it was the morning of Ejelano’s day of Joining. By the time the sun fell, he would be forever linked, body and soul, to his beloved.

  By now she would be going through her own rituals, although how or where they took place he could not say. The women never spoke of their clandestine traditions of preparing a fellow sister for her Joining, and it always took place far in the breast of the forest, in a place the men were forbidden from entering or even knowing the location of. Truth be told, the men never tried to find it. They enjoyed the mystery that the women held so close to their hearts, and would never dare to intrude on that sacred ground.

  Lena.

  Her name crossed the surface of his mind like a caress, and it soothed him just as the knife on the rock soothed him. He could feel her hands in his hair as they rolled through the grass by the river, hear her laughter as he pulled her close. He wondered if she was thinking of him, at this moment, in her secret place in the forest...wondered if she yearned to know his thoughts just as he yearned to know hers.

  I’ve waited for you, true-heart. I’ll only have to wait a little longer.

  He examined his blade, turning it over in his hands. He reached up and pulled a single hair from his head, and held it up. In a deft motion, he brought the knife across the hair, and was satisfied to see it severed cleanly. “We are ready, you and I,” he said aloud, letting the mirror-like blade of the knife send light dancing across his vision. “Let us go and make this day a good one.”

  He stood, and dropped the knife into its sheath that he’d strapped to his powerful thigh. He took his spear and lashed it to his back, knowing full well that if it was needed, it could be in his hands in an instant. Other than his weapons, he wore no clothing, as was customary among his brothers during a hunt. There would be no distraction, no chance of becoming snagged on the thorns or producing any more noise than was absolutely necessary. Shedding his clothing meant that he would be silent and swift, efficient and lethal.

  The bounty he planned to bring back would bring the tribe the grandest feast they’d ever seen. He would make his Joining one to stick in their minds for many seasons to come.

  Emerging from his home, Ejelano sighed and stretched, letting the early sun warm him. It soaked him and loosened his muscles, infused him with energy. He set off to find the rest of the hunting party, who by now were surely assembled and waiting for him beyond the edge of the village.

  He wove himself between the homes of his people, marveling at how much the village had grown during his life. As a boy, he could only remember enough dwellings to house seven or eight hand-counts. In the years that followed, the village had prospered, and they had seen many births until there were roughly three times as many. As he made his way, he could hear the sounds of the younglings, giggling and playing games with one another. Ejelano looked forward to the day when he and Lena could add their own younglings to the tribe, and fill up their own home with the sounds that he now heard. He was finished with the brashness of his youth. Now, the only things that could make him whole was to have Lena with him, and to be blessed with fatherhood. He’d been having vivid thoughts of teaching his sons how to hunt like he, the best in the tribe, hunted. He saw his daughters following their mother around like little birds, imitating everything she did. He envisioned all of them eating together, while their happiness echoed off the walls of their home and out the door for all to hear and admire.

  He would have these things, and all would be well.

  He also saw the prestige that he was destined for. He knew that the elders were discussing who would be taking the place at the head of the village, to lead them into the next Cycle of leadership. The current Cycle had almost closed, and Banoro would be stepping down. Having borne no children for her husband, Banoro’s wife Elhadra ensured that there would be no direct line for the next Cycle. While Ejelano bowed his head in sadness for them as a Joined couple with no younglings to fill their house, he also knew the elders would consequently be looking for another to raise up to be leader. He knew they held him in high esteem, due to his many contributions. They had become the most powerful tribe in the forest through the hunters and warriors Ejelano had trained. No rival tribes could match their strength, their speed, their technique. There was little doubt in his mind that he would be the next one to lead them into the next Cycle. And after him...perhaps one of his sons. His progeny could be the ones to usher his people toward time’s horizon, and into an age of prosperity never before seen.

  All of it would begin with the day before him. This glorious day before him. His spirit buoyed by the thoughts of his future, he continued on, his steps and spirit light.

  All at once, his senses caught something. Or not his senses perhaps, as he had not seen, heard, or smelled anything. He felt something. Or someone. A hidden threat. They were close by, observing him...pursuing him. His instincts took over, and he pressed his body against the wall of the closest dwelling, reaching out with his senses to find the location of his pursuer.

  Ejelano dropped his breathing low. He waited...patient...silent.

  There.

  A tentative footstep. He knew where it was. His predator had now become his prey.

  Ejelano stretched out his toes, and noiselessly looped around the other side of the house he leaned against. He stayed low and moved like a blur, until he knew rounding the next corner would bring him within view of whoever clumsily stalked him. He heard more movement...now knew that his prey moved away from him. He could tell by the sound that he, she, or it had no knowledge of his presence, and was vulnerable. This was the perfect time to strike. He drew his knife, soundlessly, from its sheath.

  Ejelano whipped around the corner, and seized his prey by the hair. He brought his knife hand around his foe’s neck and pinned the stalker against his body. He was satisfied to hear the man yell in alarm, having been caught completely unaware. His catch began to squirm, but Ejelano held him too firmly.

  “Stop your struggling, or I will empty your throat,” Ejelano said softly, with menace.r />
  “Ejelano, no! Wait!” screamed a familiar voice. No, not just familiar; unmistakable. Ejelano immediately released his vice-like hold on the man. Once free, he turned and looked Ejelano in the face, his eyes still wide with fear and his brow covered with sweat.

  “Shaleer? What are you doing? I almost sent you to the Beyond!”

  Shaleer, his closest friend and tribe-brother, stood before him. He was massaging his throat indignantly, where Ejelano’s knife had pressed just a moment before.

  “By the forest, Ejelano!” he said. “I’m not your enemy! I was only trying to catch up to you!”

  “You fool,” Ejelano laughed with relief. “You should know better than to do such a thing when I am in my hunter’s mind. I could have skewered you and had you ready for the cooking fires before I realized who you were, had I not heard your voice. It is a good thing you spoke; I doubt you’d provide a pleasing taste.”

  Shaleer smiled sheepishly, relaxing. “I will differ with you there, brother. Surely a creature as magnificent as this,” he gestured to himself, “must taste equally magnificent. But, no, I choose today not to find a place in your dinner bowl.”

  “So be it,” Ejelano said, grinning broadly.

  It was then that he noticed that Shaleer was fully clothed in his leather skins.

  “Shaleer, why are you dressed? And where are your knife and spear? Surely, you haven’t forgotten what today is? I’m off to meet the hunting party now. You should be waiting with them.”

  Shaleer’s smile faded, and his jovial eyes became evasive. It was then, while Ejelano scrutinized his friend, that he saw a familiar flush in Shaleer’s face, and noticed his bloodshot eyes.

  He sighed.

  He didn’t have to smell the spirits on his life-brother’s breath to know what he had been doing that morning. Shaleer’s affection for strong drink was well known around the village, and it had gotten him into trouble on repeated occasions. Hunting celebrations. Seasonal festivals.