He was startled, but not surprised. Milly was unpredictable and bound by no-one's will. She could
look after herself. Over the years he had come to know this. Tonight though, he feared for her.
As he watched her, now becoming strangely tense, she stood up revealing her streamlined and subtly muscled figure. She was almost boyish with small rounded breasts, strong muscular legs and small firm buttocks. When she moved her muscles rippled under her soft, pale skin and tonight this caused a tremor inside Jonathon.
Involuntarily he licked his lips as she threw back her head to send her long, raven black hair cascading across her broad shoulders. She stretched out her arms in an invitation to him.
Something awoke in Jonathon, something that Jonathon had always controlled before, now it fought with him for release. To him it was that part of him which, in the inhabitants of Dubh, had conquered their souls and now controlled them. Tonight every corrupted soul in Dubh awoke in response to a summons and turned their attention to Jonathon's desires.
They gave those primal desires a new energy as inside Jonathon Postlethwaite, his animal nature screamed for assistance and the city answered. Jonathon gasped as the energy it unleashed invaded his nervous system pushing what was Jonathon Postlethwaite, struggling, into the back seat of consciousness; it had control of his body. He could only watch and feel.
Now from the streets below flowed a moist grey, billowing fog. It was the soul of this foul city. It cascaded over the tiles and roof top ridges, began to take on burning eyed wraith-like forms, the ghosts of every deceased and corrupted being that had died in Dubh; and there where millions, melded into one sentient being.
Jonathon was being forced down inside himself, the animal that is inside us all rising with an uninhibited fury for control, it listened to no reason, no moral codes, no religion other than the church of pleasure.
He fought it as his own hands tore his clothing from his body. He resisted, but could only slow his advance to an agonized crawl towards the ridge where Milly's body, and the pleasure he could take from it, beckoned him like a beacon.
All around him the grotesque watery faces of the dead urged him on, their ice cold insubstantial hands brushing his body as they attempted to physically push him to the roof ridge and his prize. Individually they would have had little effect, but there were millions of them and the pressure of their collective touch propelled him upwards. Still he fought, contradictory signals from his brain throwing his muscles into wild spasms. From every pore of his body sweat poured in torrents. Animal and spiritual where locked in a defining combat inside the vehicle of Jonathon's flesh. Only one would win and the other would be become the other's slave, reason enslaved to animal passion or a being propelled by reason and finer feeling.
Jonathon felt as if he were drowning, he felt himself slipping slowly into a grim pit of suffocating darkness. Inch by inch he still crept towards her. He felt himself swollen and hot in his loins.
With his eyes locked upon her radiant body, he moaned and slobbered with expectation, becoming more and more a mere observer of his spiritual demise. Slowly the distance closed. He saw now that Milly too was possessed by the awesome power, the great dark horse of unbridled human passion.
Her eyes were entirely black, her pupils dilated to such and extent that no iris pigments remained. Her hair streamed in the humid rising wind, her body tensed and ready. She stretched out her arms to him again implored him to take her, beseeching him for that savage embrace.
Crowding around her, the misty forms of wraiths coalesced, attempting to paw her breasts, run their hands over her smooth skin, thrusting and rolling their hips towards hers, their devilish muzzles distorted in paroxysms of ecstasy. They looked down at the slowly advancing Jonathon and in their sneers Jonathon saw their anger at what he and Milly were. Their physical purity was an abomination to them and the cause of corruption and degradation they served.
Visions of himself and Milly enveloped in a violent, brutal, bucking embrace filled Jonathon's mind. The wraiths howled encouragingly. In a few precious seconds Jonathon and Milly would be one with one another and would be consumed, lost forever, swallowed up in the great, dark soul of Dubh. Jonathon searched for the strength to defeat it.
He focused his mind, if he touched her all was lost. He remembered Tefkin and Dale, how they had taken him in, how they had trusted him. He remembered Flax and his oaths of revenge. He remembered his own Mother, the victim of Flax and this city, his Father, his Grandfather, all its victims. If he failed now, he would fail them all. He loved, Milly but he did not want her this way.
Jonathon tried to scream, but could make no sound. Now they were face to face. Almost touching. Still Jonathon resisted. He could feel the warm moistness of her body inviting him to take them into oblivion.
Her short, sharp intakes of breath seemed to pull his lips towards hers. Yet Jonathon saw the fear in her eyes, she resisted too, she fought as he did.
“No," she moaned. “No, Dale."
Dale's name hit Jonathon like a hammer. Why had she uttered it? Did she think he was Dale? Why, now? Had he......?
Jonathon's mind tore out towards the mind of Dale. With an energy fuelled on anger, he tore down Dale’s barriers and sought the memory he thought he might find. But there was none, only a memory of a brief temptation which Dale had had, and resisted.
Dale was ashamed of it and guarded the memory earnestly. But he could not suppress his desire always and tonight it surfaced in a dream that would fulfil that wish. Through that dream the dark soul of the city had flowed to the roof tops where it could not normally reach, attempting to corrupt and defile Jonathon and Milly, and in doing so, crush Flax's guardian of the gate. Dale was the portal here Jonathon realised!
Jonathon's out of control body reached out his quivering arms about to take Milly in their first, final and terminal embrace. His mind reached out to Dale again, his message clear and simple. “DALE WAKE UP!"
Dale awoke, shocked by the voice inside his head and corruption's gateway to the roof tops slammed shut. On the roof tops a scream finally broke from Jonathon’s lips, a hollow scream which leapt into the wind and tore into the heart of the city. All the inhabitants of Dubh heard it, the clean, cutting edged scream of defiance and victory.
The army of wraiths began to melt away, flowing in black rivers back to the dark ravines and the underworld where they dwelt. Jonathon took control of himself again and the animal was caged, the wild, dark horse back on the bit. He collapsed at Milly's feet, exhausted and shivering uncontrollably, gasping for breath in the rising, gale which buffeted the roof top fortress from where corruption had been repelled.
Two arms enveloped his shoulders, yet no lust arose in him now, only the warmth of love which had arisen in their mutual struggle. He looked into the tear stained face of the girl he had treated for years as a sister, she smiled and held him closely.
“I could not hold it back Jonathon" she sniffed. “I wanted what the city demanded, but it was truly not me."
Jonathon shifted to put an arm around her waist.
“It could not have us like that, we would not truly have had one another.....It was devouring us. I never conceived of Its real power before tonight. It lives and preys on the humanity we build around us to cage the beast we have in us all. It is as I have feared. It is running out of humanity here in Dubh to consume and Flax will make way to new pastures for It to harvest, I must stop it. "
Milly kissed him gently on his sweat drenched forehead.
“I saw and felt it too. I was in Dale's dream, it tries to destroy him through his dream. It tries to destroy us all. We must destroy it Jonathon." she implored
Jonathon nodded at her simple statement and realised that Milly no longer spoke in whispers, her childish dialect was gone. The child had left her too. Nothing physical had occurred, but she was now a woman, she had fallen in love with Jonathon in the wake of their mutual crisis and that love, that real and pure emotion, untainted b
y asexual lust, had confirmed her sexual humanity.
Together they sat high on the roof ridge and watched as the Tallmen's mimicking of the dawn cast its wan light over the city. It was strangely beautiful. They felt strong, they had fought together and won, reinforced by a powerful, untainted love.
The malignant soul of the city had been defeated, it had retreated. Now it watched and waited. These two could not be tolerated, their seed could spread. It had failed once, but there were other channels to use, other means to defile them and destroy them.
Chapter Six
In the dark alleyway where Silus Flax had encountered Jonathon Postlethwaite for the first time, seven top-hatted men came across the prostrate form of their leader.
The High Hat search party had ventured into the Lower city following information on Flax's whereabouts from Bolster, now struggling to rectify a failed engine in hall nine, and the city gate guard and the two Tans who had challenged him on his exit from the city.
The High Hats had news for Flax which necessitated the normally taboo disturbance of when he was at play. They had a good idea of where and why he was here, but his prolonged absence from the Halls of Machines disturbed them a little, as was his shocking state when they found him.
After a few moments of attention, Flax began to regain consciousness. His insensible eyes opened to regard the black coated, High Hatted men, who stooped anxiously over him, with a confusion brought on by the concussion he had received. He sat stupefied for a while, mumbling incoherently, until eventually he regained his senses. Now he could recall the events immediately prior to his enforced sleep.
The disfigured body of the street woman had been removed by his minions so as not to attract the attention of the rats, at least what the their vanguard number had left of it and, to avoid the questions from any Tans who might come this way during the morning shift round up. Her remains had now joined the many other hapless victims of the nightly ritual of murder in Dubh, who floated anonymously in the stagnant mortuary of the black river. Flax felt his blood encrusted head gingerly. “Where’s the boy?" he demanded.
The surrounding High Hats shook their heads and shrugged their shoulders. Flax remembered the moments before he was struck senseless. The wild and unsatisfying woman, the smell of warm blood, the boy's sweet aroma of innocence and purity, the odours of his own growing excitement brought about by his contemplation of his forthcoming pleasures, then.... Flax growled - then the scent of two others above him.
He leapt to his feet, punching the nearest High Hat to vent his anger. Deprived! Flax took in a deep breath as the High Hats around him cowered away, expecting another outburst of violence from their master.
Instead he laughed softly. Another time, another place he thought. He would never give up a prize such as the boy. He was something special. He would find him again and those who had deprived him. He knew their scents, he knew where they had gone. He peered upwards toward the rooftops high above.
A High Hat, with one eye and a scarred cheekbone,
cleared his throat and spoke. “Your Eminence, we have news." Flax turned to the man.
“News? What now!" howled their leader. The one eyed man bowed his head, avoiding the angry glare of a fuming Silus Flax.
“Your Eminence, we have found another promising portal, it is unusual, it has a multi-ported entrance and channels which lead to more than one exit. But one of them leads to a place such as you have asked us to look for." A broad grin slashed across Flax' face, revealing his large yellow teeth. He chuckled quietly to himself, then his laughter grew into deep resonating guffaws stretched with an ironic tone.
" Haaaa!" he spat. “Every cloud has a sliver lining." he said as he hugged the High Hat whose nose he had broken. The assembled High Hats looked on confused at Flax's sudden mood change, clouds and silver linings meaning nothing to them.
Flax strode quickly towards the Upper City, his minions falling in obediently in line behind him. Not even the pouring pre-dawn rain could quench his growing excitement and happiness. It had to be the one, it had to
be! Suddenly he stopped and turned to his faithful servants, the smile dissolving from his face. The High Hat line blundering into one another as he stopped.
“Wouldn’t it be a good idea if one of you showed me the way to it you greasy, pea-brained morons! “ he shouted with amusement and a tinge of humour.
Chapter Seven
The unusual dimension door, reported to Flax by his High Hats, turned out to be as exciting as he sensed. It was located deep within the city, far below the surface streets of Dubh, in a long forgotten, rat infested street which had been walled off long ago. Flax's surveyors had found it by speculating that the cordoned off area, marked on the Tan maps they possessed, hid something worth their investigation. Such a blank, uninhabited area, usually found at the periphery of the city, had always proved in the past to be evidence of the position of a dimension door. Even though this anomaly was situated well within the boundaries of the city, his men had persevered and been well rewarded.
The High Hats had heard tales of the 'doors opening dating back several year ago. A local inhabitant had told them of its eerie light which occurred, shining through cracks in the wall which hid it, at regular intervals. He had thought it a sign from some divine spirit to go forth and procreate and told them that he would be soon venturing into the city to find a new slave to bear his seventh child since his nearing again. His knew when to the day and hour. He had watched and recorded and waited and never been wrong. Now the High hats felt confident that they had found a stable and predictable portal and Flax had been informed so that he might inspect this one for himself.
When he did inspect it he found that the dimension door was indeed unusual, not only because of its location, but because there were in fact two openings. The larger of the two was approximately the height of three men high and wide and its companion a third of its size.
By the time Flax arrived the exit points and rate of travel through the tunnels of fluctuating light had been established and reports had been compiled for his examination.
Silus Flax's elation turned to frustration when he arrived at the scene, for the twin doors collapsed shut before his very eyes before he had the opportunity to explore them. His frustration deepened when he was informed, by the local resident, that they would not open fully again for several years and that, although the door had been open for three days, his minions had been reluctant to inform him until they had been sure of this 'doors' importance.
The High Hat leader knew that this was the one, he sensed it and the scouts reports of what lay beyond the larger of the portals was highly promising. The civilisation was there and the evidence of the technology he needed too, all he had to do was wait and. Just wait. Soon Flax instructed his organisation to move its headquarters to the location of this gateway to another time and place, his own residence becoming a shrine to the ,door' and the prized portal to the fulfilment of his dark ambitions.
After much reorganisation and rebuilding of his High Hats headquarters around the door he placed a great throne like seat, in which he sat for hours daily, facing a blank wall where the door would eventually open again. Day after day he sat and stared, waiting for the moment when its re-opening was predicted. For more than six years nothing happened, six long years since his disappointing encounter with Jonathon on the streets of the Lower City.
But Flax had not forgotten Jonathon. There destinies were entwined he knew, his dreams still featured the young boy as the 'guardian of the gate' and now, as the time approached when Flax would enter it, the nightly images intensified and he resolved to find the him again and remove the threat Jonathon posed to his ambitions.
One day Flax had returned to his dwelling from a lone expedition to the Lower City and was greeted by a wall which shivered and trembled in and out of existence. As he watched the 'door' stabilised and, for a teasing moment, he could see directly into the world beyond the larger of the openings. The exit poi
nt opened into a small concreted yard strewn with beer barrels and empty bottles, a scene of secluded dereliction and neglect.
Opposite the exit there was a brick wall blocking any direct view of the world beyond or indeed the portal from the other side. On this occasion it was night and the world beyond the wall lit by a strange orange glow. Voices occasionally called out into an eerie emptiness and the sound of distant, moving engines occasionally punctuated the darkness.
A gust of cold, clean air blew from the strange world Flax observed, sending a shiver up the watcher's spine. Once again this was only a tantalising glimpse as the portal to his ambitions became quivered briefly and collapsed.
Flax ignored the smaller aperture, his explorers had informed him that it led back into the underworld of the city and was dangerously narrow with other unexplored and unstable branches. He would concentrate his attention on the larger of the two.
At the time of this opening however, Flax knew that this brief glimpse was to be the first of many, the records secured by bribing and torturing of the local witness of the door indicated such openings prior to the usual three day occurrence. The next time, when the gate stabilised again, he would be ready to move. The meticulous records of his High Hats proved to be correct.
As the months, then years, passed by and the appointed time for the door to stabilise approached, the larger of the aperture began to open as a crescent at thirty day intervals, as the smaller one did too, each time growing wider until Flax could accurately predict the width of the breach in time and space and when it would become fully open and traversable.
He began to plan, collect together provisions and equipment for his expedition, a horde of gold, drugs and jewels. He hoped that gold and jewels would have the same value in the world that he had glimpsed as it held in Dubh. There were humans in that new world, he had smelt and heard them, if he had not actually seen them and weren't all human beings the same?
The Chronicles of Jonathon Postlethwaite: The Seed of Corruption Page 6
