Out Through the Attic

by Quincy J. Allen

  I heard screams behind me and turned to see the two tangled hyenas scrambling along the wall, keeping out of my reach, hell-bent on getting out of the alley. And then I saw something I couldn’t believe.

  The old man stood ready, the shaft of the cane in one hand and a slim blade in in the other. Orange flames flickered and danced across the bright steel. It was impossible, but there it was, an actual flame brand, just like out of some fantasy novel. One of the hyenas lay on the ground, clutching a scorched belly wound and moaning. The other ran past me in terror. His retreating steps disappeared into the night.

  The alpha lay on the ground between us, unconscious and breathing shallowly.

  The old man nodded to me, and it was almost a bow. With a quick motion, he sheathed the blade. The alley went dark once again, and I heard him walk up to me as my eyes adjusted to the dim light.

  “Thank you for your help,” he said casually as he approached. He stepped past me and, to my disbelief, helped the one with the crushed balls get to his feet. “Go on home,” the old man said. He even patted the hyena on the back.

  All I could do was stare as he calmly turned and smiled at me.

  “Are you alright?” he asked. He might as well have been asking about the weather.

  “I’m—”

  Leather scraped on pavement behind me. A hammer clicked as it was pulled back. The old man’s eyes went wide. He grabbed me by the shoulders and spun us just as a gunshot filled the alley.

  He shuddered and grimaced, squeezing my shoulders tightly. Then he opened his eyes, his jaw clenched, and slid down my body to collapse at my feet.

  I locked eyes with the alpha as he furiously jerked on the trigger of a small semi-auto pistol. He lay on the ground, blood pouring from his ruined nose and down over his mouth, chin, and neck. His eyes flicked to the weapon. Realization struck that a casing jammed breech. His fury turned to fear … and then terror as I moved toward him.

  It was his cowardice that unhinged me. Travelling in a pack, having others do his dirty work, and then to shoot someone in the back. My sense of reason and fair play shattered like glass.

  Rage.

  It filled me to bursting … consumed me until there was nothing left but a singular purpose.

  I leapt, axe handle raised high as he tried to clear the breach. The handle came whistling down on his wrist with a bone-shattering CRACK! The gun tumbled out of his grasp, his forearm bent at an impossible angle. The hyena howled in agony.

  The bear roared.

  The handle rose again, whistled, came down on a desperately raised forearm. Another bone-shattering CRACK! filled the alley. His howl turned to a shriek. I raised the handle again.

  “No! Please!” he begged.

  Bears have no mercy.

  With another whistle of wood, the handle came down into the middle of his terrified face. His skull slammed down onto concrete. Again, the axe handle rose and hammered down. Again. Again. Again … turning his features into a puddle of blood and brains, until the handle struck nothing but pavement.

  A soft plea came from behind: “Enough, son,” he said gently, but forceful enough to yank me back from a blind sea of rage.

  The axe handle froze in mid-swing. I felt blood dripping down onto my neck as I stared down into what was left of the alpha. I stood up straight, my breath coming in short gasps, and I could feel my face pulled taught in a snarl. I relaxed and my breathing slowed. The axe handle slowly swung down to dangle at my side.

  “What are you doing out here, old man?” I asked without turning. It was almost an accusation.

  “I was looking for someone,” he replied slowly. I could hear the pain in his voice. I’d heard that same tone in the war from wounded men who knew they had to move out or be overrun.

  I turned and stared at him for a few pounding heartbeats and then glanced around at the graffiti and garbage cans that lined the dead-end alley.

  “Who the hell were you gonna find in this shithole besides that?” I motioned toward the corpse behind me.

  He gazed at me, as if he were sizing me up, and then he smiled.

  “You,” he said. “Or someone like you.”

  “Me?” I couldn’t believe it. Nobody looks for nobodies. “Are you crazy? Is that your problem?”

  “Some might say so,” he replied. “But I’m far, far from crazy.”

  “Look,” I dropped the axe handle with a clatter and stepped up to him. “We gotta get you to a hospital.”

  “No,” he said quietly. “No hospital.” There was a strange resolve in his face. “Take me home, son,” he added. “I just need some sleep.”

  “You go to sleep, old man, and you’re not gonna wake up.”

  “Trust me,” he said.

  I didn’t want to. I’m generally disinclined to trust anyone. Bears are like that, but I heard myself mumble, “If you say so.”

  What the hell was I doing?

  “It’s not far. Only about twenty blocks south of here.” He held out his hand. “I’m going to need some help.”

  Something inside me wanted to walk away. I’d walked away from people before who I knew were going to die. People who froze to death or overdosed or … hell, there are a lot of ways to die quietly on the streets. But as I stared down, something inside me warmed. I felt a familiarity I couldn’t explain.

  As I pulled him up, I noticed a strange tattoo on the back of his hand, a black circle with a blue eye at its center. It had more to it, but I forgot about it as I helped him off the ground and slowly put my arm around him.

  It felt awkward at first. Aside from fights, I hadn’t physically touched another human since the day I walked out of that office what seemed a lifetime ago. We moved slowly toward the end of the alley, him gasping occasionally with his stride. Looking back, I noticed his walking stick.

  “What about your cane … sword … whatever that thing is?” I wanted to ask him about it, but even the thought of it seemed crazy to me.

  “Leave it,” he said with a chuckle. “It’ll give the locals something to wonder about.”

  Locals? I wondered.

  As we came into the light, I saw the back of his trousers soaked dark with blood.

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “If we don’t do something about that hole, you’re going to bleed out.” I leaned him against the building and moved over to where I’d left my pack. I slipped my feet into my boots and rummaged in a side pocket of the pack. I pulled out a half-roll of old duct tape and moved back to him.

  He guessed what I had in mind and pulled a handkerchief from his front pocket. He folded it several times into a makeshift compress and handed it over. Taking a deep breath, he slipped out of his coat and let it fall to the pavement. A dark swath of blood covered his shirt from just below his ribs on the right. He pulled up his shirt, revealing a dark, oozing bullet hole.

  He leaned against the wall and said, “Wrap the tape all the way round.”

  I nodded silently, pulled a length of tape off, and stuck the compress over the wound. Then I set to work. The tape screeched as I wrapped it around his body, pulling hard to keep the compress tight against his flesh.

  When I was finished, I pulled his shirt down and handed him his coat. “You gonna make it?”

  “No question,” he replied. “Ash,” he added, holding out his hand.

  I paused for a moment. I hadn’t given anyone my name in five years. Slowly, I took his hand.

  “John,” I said, and my own name sounded almost foreign to me.

  We set out, moving slowly as I supported him. I assumed he had someone at home who would be able to help him, but the truth was very different indeed.

  

  His home seemed as out of place as he did … like spotting a white tuxedo at a bowling alley. It just didn’t fit. Two stories of burgundy Victorian home, with all the dentil work along the roofline painted bright white. A white picket fence surrounded a wide yard, with two beautiful oaks stretching skyward at the front corners
of the property. Tufts of low shrubs dotted the yard, looking almost like deep green sheep grazing in silent contentment. He opened the gate, leaning heavily against me, and we walked up the sidewalk toward a raised patio where a huge mastiff lay, his head erect and ears perked forward. A low growl tumbled from the beast, like thunder rolling slowly across a distant sky, its eyes fixed upon me.

  “Easy, old boy,” Ash said. “This man is a friend.” He turned to me as we approached the dog. “Hold out your hand slowly,” he advised.

  I did, prompting a few deep huffs from the dog.

  “That’s some watch dog,” I said. Up close, the dog seemed impossibly large, a mountain of muscles, teeth, and claws that filled the middle of the porch.

  “That he is,” Ash replied. A smile played across his lips, despite the pain. And there was something else in his reply, something hinting at more than just the dog being of remarkable size. “His name is Gray.”

  As we climbed the steps, the dog rose and padded out of the way. His footfalls were almost like boots hitting the planks, and I realized that his head came almost to my chin. The thing had to weigh over two hundred pounds.

  Ash opened the screen door and, with the twist of a heavy knob, opened an oaken inner door. For a second, I was surprised that the place wasn’t locked. We weren’t all that far from a particularly bad part of the city. But then I heard the dog sniffing beside me and realized nobody in his right mind would try to rob the place.

  Gray’s nose wedged in under my elbow, and he started sniffing at Ash’s back. A quiet whimper slipped from the dog as he sniffed at the bloody streak. Ash turned, patted Gray’s head, and then we stepped inside, maneuvering together through the doorway.

  “Upstairs,” Ash said. His voice sounded weaker.

  “Is someone upstairs? Someone who can help you?”

  “There’s nobody else here, John.” His voice was resolved.

  “WHAT?” I couldn’t believe it. “Are you out of your mind? I’m taking you to a hospital!” I tried to turn him toward the door, but he held firm.

  “No. I told you, no hospitals.” He gripped my shoulder. “Just get me to the attic and I’ll explain what I can.”

  “Explain what?”

  “You won’t believe it if I tell you.” He locked eyes with me. “You have to see it. Feel it.”

  “But—”

  “After I show you, if you want to leave, you can. If you want to call an ambulance, you can. Just trust me for a few minutes. You won’t regret it. I give you my word.”

  I shook my head, thinking the old guy was crazy and had a death wish. His eyes were imploring, and after a long pause, I said, “Okay … attic and then ambulance. It’s a deal.”

  His smile was strange, more relief than anything else.

  We started moving again. Gray thumped behind. A set of dark wooden stairs stood before us, and I gawked as I glanced at the rooms on either side. The place was a museum. To the right was a sitting room and armory of sorts, with a wide assortment of edged weapons decorating the walls. Two suits of armor stood in opposite corners, one gleaming suit of plate mail and the other some variant of samurai armor, but not like anything I’d ever seen in the movies. To the left were small statues of marble, jade, and crystal. Some of the figures were human, some not, and some of them were right out of a nightmare.

  And then we were past, slowly climbing the steps, with Gray behind.

  I could see a hallway above, continuing back from the landing. Hallways also broke to the left and right around the stairwell behind us. At the top, I stopped in my tracks.

  “What the …” I started, but my voice trailed off. More weapons lined the walls, rifles and pistols this time. Some were in deep shadow boxes and some hung in pairs. I recognized a few, old revolvers and muzzle-loaders, but the rest looked like they came out of a science fiction movie. They had to be toys or models. I looked at Ash and wondered if he was a movie director or producer, someone who retained keepsakes. I tried to place his face with images from my youth, tried to match him up with the famous people I could dredge up out of unused memory.

  Nothing came.

  We circled the stairwell, moving back toward the front of the house. Upon a wide credenza set before a large, circular window, sat a model or toy spaceship roughly four feet long. The long, sleek hull was dark gray, with lines of blue and green tracing around what looked like armor plating. I recognized ports, engines, and guns. The thing had to be from some movie I’d never seen.

  We turned to a doorway facing the big window, and he leaned against the wall. His face had gone pale. He took a few breaths, summoned his strength, and faced the door. He opened it with a squeal of tight hinges. A narrow stairwell led up, with a single light bulb burning on an old cord that dangled from a high ceiling. Unlike the rest of the house, the stairwell seemed ill kept. Yellowed wallpaper covered the walls, and the boards beneath our feet were worn, squeaking as we moved up. I had to steady him from behind, for the staircase was too narrow for us to go side-by-side. Faithful Gray padded behind slowly.

  As we topped the stairs, a barren attic lay before us, a thick layer of dust covering the floor. A single set of footsteps led from a white door on the far wall. There was a small portal above the door, white crossbeams splitting a midnight sky beyond. Fixed to the door was a small metal plaque, and I recognized it as the same pattern as the tattoo on the back of his hand.

  “Almost there,” Ash whispered, and I realized he wasn’t talking to me. He moved toward the door slowly. Our footsteps thumped and scraped against worn wood. “I’m old, John,” he said. “And I’ve lived more lives … seen more impossible things than a human has a right to.” He reached the door and stood there quietly, looking at me as he panted, trying to regain his breath. “I don’t have time to explain everything, but beyond this door, your dreams can come true.” He paused then, giving it time to sink in and smiling at the stunned look on my face. “The trick is to picture what you dream of. Just stand here and imagine whatever you like, imagine that it lies beyond this door … hold it in your mind’s eye.” He closed his eyes slowly, and then a smile spread across his lips. He chuckled softly only once … and opened the door.

  I gasped, and my sense of reality swirled.

  Beyond the door were fields of golden wheat, not yellow, but gold, like fine jewelry. An ocean of it stretched away over rolling hills, all of it under an electric blue sky broken only by a massive yellow moon twice the size of the one I knew. A few hundred yards away, a single, towering tree rose high above the wheat, its branches covered in leaves of the deepest green, almost black.

  “So, do you still want to call that ambulance?” he asked. His voice was quiet, and I could tell he was fading.

  I said nothing. My words lay frozen at the bottom of a well as I stared into something that simply couldn’t exist. I suddenly wondered if I had been the one shot in that alley … that I was dreaming or dead.

  “Then let’s take a stroll across Elysium fields,” he whispered. He stepped out into the wheat, making his way across a wide expanse set between two large hillocks. I followed, turning to see Gray moving around me. The animal took a position at Ash’s side, and Ash placed his hand upon the dog’s neck, leaning slightly as the wheat swayed around us, sounding like gently rolling surf.

  As we neared the tree, I spotted long clusters of golden fruit—hidden dangles that peeked out through dark foliage like grapes on a vine. Each cluster was several feet long, and each amber fruit was the size of a tangerine. As we drew near, the tree smelled of every living blossom in creation.

  A wide circle of pale, hewn grass surrounded the tree, and off to the side, just at the edge of the circle, stood an open grave with a blank headstone and a pile of soil nearby. A spade was stuck in the freshly turned earth, its shaft pointing at the sky.

  Ash entered the circle, approached the grave, and stopped, staring down into it. Gray stepped up beside him, his large head turned up to Ash expectantly. The old man stood there in
silence for some time. I didn’t know what to say, so I watched him and listened to the breeze wash across the wheat that surrounded us.

  “It’s all yours, John,” he finally said without turning. “The house—which keeps itself, mind you—the door and …” he looked around, raising his hand at the land and sky that surrounded us, “… and all of this.” He turned, his eyes fixed on me, a mischievous look on his face. “Whatever you can imagine, which is how I found you.”

  I stared at him, blinking for a few seconds, not really believing any of it. But I couldn’t deny where I stood. Couldn’t deny the golden wheat, the incredible tree, or that impossible moon. “Why me?” I asked in a whisper. I felt as if I were in a dream that wouldn’t let go. And I didn’t want it to.

  He shrugged. “Happenstance? Destiny? I really have no idea how this all works. I’m passing it on to you as it was passed on to me over three-hundred years ago … your time.” He stepped up to the headstone and motioned for me to come nearer. “Help me sit,” he added weakly.

  “What do you mean, my time?” I asked as I helped him down.

  He sighed. It was a weary thing, full of memory. “I’ve lived two-thousand years in here, son.” He put his head back against the headstone. “You don’t age in this place … whatever it is. You’ll get tired of it sometimes … you’ll want to go home and see what’s going on back there … back with the people you couldn’t stand to be around.” His smile was a knowing one. And then he grasped my hand. Tightly. Clutching.

  Surprised, I tried to pull away, but his grip was firm. I felt a tingling, almost burning sensation. I looked down and watched the tattoo swirl across on the back of his hand like a storm-tossed cloud. It spun and coalesced into a stream of black that slithered down his fingers. Before I could pull my hand away, it slithered up onto my own. Its touch was ice, a deepening chill that ran through the veins of my fingers. The ink swirled once again, slowly reforming upon the back of my hand, resolving into the tattoo.