The Last Days

by Andy Dickenson

  “Bloody -”

  Neon gripped both sides of the pedal swan as her craft was tossed helplessly about in the psychic waters, the second warden’s screams now climbing high above her in another terrifying wave:

  “Aggghhhhh!”

  “No don’t, no don’t! Please! NO!”

  CRACK!

  “Agggghhhhhhhhh!”

  Panicked, Neon grabbed for her teddy bear and tumbled clumsily to the stern. The horrors lifted the swan’s prow out of the black water, her white ride tiny upon the crest of an enormous tidal wave. The bear gathered tight in her arms, she looked out upon the tempestuous sea that threatened to engulf her. Here, she saw everything. Here, she felt it all. Yet somehow she was no longer alone.

  The tide buffeted the little girl from port to starboard as she floated uncontrollably higher, when finally the swan sought the edge of the great wave and teetered on its brink.

  Neon knelt helplessly at the stern and screwed her eyes shut as the giant swell dropped, propelling her forward for an instant into the open air.

  And then she fell. Fell through where there would be stars. Fell through waters so white with rage. Fell through the tides of the Other Worlds.

  She landed with a crash on the shallow surface below, narrowly avoiding a rocky shore as another dozen colossal waves cascaded and broke above her. Neon’s mouth gaped in noiseless wonder as she tried to scream.

  Her Pirate Prince had come.

  Chapter Twelve

  SIR WILFRED Justice ambled through the frozen streets of Albion, his steps uneasy and a flask of whisky at his lips. He supped at the drink and in between swallows hummed an old song by a long dead crooner, though he could barely remember any of the words.

  “Like the zombie once said, ain’t that a pick in your head? Da-dum-da-dum. That sheep was completely black. I thumped him and she thumped back, da-dum-da-dee, you’re as deaf as a post, ain’t that a goat in your thro-oat!”

  The volume of his voice rose as he staggered into Market Place, his feet kicking snow from the cobbles. Far from empty at the late hour, there he found families and traders huddling under the crystal lamplights. Others were already banging on the front door of his office.

  “My keys are slipping, I go to work and keep gripping. If this is just your clean linen, my arse is going to be B-E-A-UTIFUL!” he yelled, as if daring them to interrupt his song.

  “Sheriff! Sheriff!” a skinny man in a hooded cloak shouted as others crowded about him. “Can’t you do something about that noise?”

  “Please, Sir Justice, our children are trying to get to sleep!”

  “Honestly, it’s dreadful!”

  “What’s that?” the sheriff bellowed from beneath his battered cowboy hat, “Do you nae like my shinging, oh joyless people of Market Place?” he burped.

  “No, no, Sir Justice,” one of the women cried in alarm, her face almost buried in a shawl to keep out the frozen night air. “It’s not you!”

  “Leave him alone, he’s drunk!” the hooded man cautioned, and the small crowd stepped back, dispersing almost as quickly as it gathered.

  “It’s the bar, you idiot,” the baker spat as he retreated into his shop. “The music from the bar, it’s too bloody loud!”

  But he was too late. “Who said I was drunk?” Sir Justice roared, unclipping the axe from the back of his leather jacket. “Come on, who shaid it!”

  The sheriff swung the heavy weapon around himself in clumsy circles, the blade glinting in the light of the full moon, until his view became a blur and he felt his knees begin to buckle. He stumbled to a stop, his vision slowly returning, to find that all his petitioners had disappeared.

  “How dare you say that I, hic, am drunk,” he chuckled as the axe landed heavily on the snow-flaked floor. With a shiver of what he hoped was dignity, he then walked to his office.

  “Sometimes being the shole representative of the law in thish town isn’t sho bad,” Sir Justice said to himself before belching again. “Who else is allowed to shwing an axe with impunity?”

  The sheriff brought his hip flask to his lips once more but nothing but a single drop of the golden liquid spilled forth.

  “Balls!” he muttered darkly, shaking the empty vessel.

  Sir Justice gazed at his reflection in the office window, the straw hat casting a shadow over his weary eyes and blotched cheeks, the orange glow from the street lamps illuminating the thick brown mole on the side of his nose. He ran a hand over his stubbled chin and stared back up the street towards the neon sign of Al’s Bar. He looked back down at the empty flask and then trudged off towards it.

  It was only then that Sir Justice became aware of the loud throb of the music. It was indeed one hell of a racket. Emboldened, a few of the city folk returned, plucking up the courage to pester him once more.

  “The noise, Sir Justice! That music! Can’t you do something about it?” they hissed from behind corners, too scared to approach him.

  “Tell them to turn that blasted cacophony off, Sheriff. Some of us have to go to work in the morning!” another yelled.

  “Yesh, yesh, fine, fine.” Sir Justice waved them away and stumbled on, his face still hidden under his hat. He had never been much of a talker, especially on days like today. As he got closer to the bar the thumping bass of the music grew louder, almost lifting his feet from the floor. Sir Justice vaguely recollected the song, as if it fanned the spark of a memory that couldn’t quite take hold of his addled brain.

  “TAKING CASH COS I’VE GOT NONE...”

  Slowly he came to the statue of his mother and father, rising victorious from the shadows of Market Square. Sir Justice stopped, admiring with contempt the little boy who stood between them. He then bent down to kiss the granite boots of his mother’s feet. This was his tradition. Like smashing the TVs and delivering his own funeral rites over his victims, it was just something he felt he had to do. Somehow not doing either would be an insult - both to their humanity, and his.

  Loved by all but lawbreakers, although even some criminals were known to have had a crush on his mother, his parents were once celebrated throughout the world. Seen as noble and wise, courageous and generous, they were The Justice Family - Albion’s great protectors - and that mantle had been passed onto him, their drunkard son. The judge, jury and executioner. Not so much loved, as tolerated.

  “NOTHING TO DO AND NO ONE! NOTHING TO DO AND NO ONE!”

  Sir Justice stared at the boy he once was and felt anger swelling in his heart like the bile rising in his parched throat. His father stood solid and proud over him. His mother, warm and beautiful at his side.

  “I killed a man today, father,” Sir Justice whispered, “in cold blood. It’s never nishe to kill one o’ God’s creatures, is it?”

  The question unanswered, Sir Justice took off his hat and bowed his head. “He’d done nothin’ wrong o’ course, ‘sides having the plague. He was just looking for Lord Truth. Like all the others, just looking for his Saviour.”

  The sheriff sighed, his head nodding. “I need to find out why Lord Truth was killed, don’t I, father? Need to find out who killed him. Then I suppose I’ll have to kill them too.”

  A couple walked by, arm in arm, a single scarf wrapped around their necks. They pulled the woollen warmer closer to their noses as they caught his smell, a mix of wood smoke, sweat and alcohol. They smiled at him nervously as they passed.

  “How many times?” he mumbled quietly. “How many lives, father, have I destroyed to keep this city safe? How much more must I sin so that others can go on complaining about noisy neighbours and kids playing in the street?”

  Replacing his hat, he glanced once again at his parents. “You don’t know how lucky you were to die the way you did. And you…” he glared at the boy.

  A frozen breeze swept through Market Place, hollow and vicious and powerful enough to coat everything before it in a fresh layer of ice. Sir Justice shivered again. “I need a drink.”

  And with that the last of the J
ustice Family turned and farted.

  He finally reached the wooden steps of Al’s Bar and climbed up them, the axe once again strapped to his back. He grabbed for a small crossbow hanging from his belt, and faced the saloon doors.

  “NOTHING TO DO AND NO ONE! NOTHING TO DO AND NO ONE...”

  “I’m coming in!” Sir Justice shouted before raising his boot, ready to kick at the swinging shutters…

  When a high-pitched cry cut through the music.

  The sound of a child screaming, away to his left.

  Sir Justice paused for a second, and then ran. He forced his mind to clear with each footfall and drank down the cold air in huge gulps. He recognised the scream. It had come from the boating lake, he was sure of it, and only yesterday he had warned some of the children not to go near it at night.

  Damn, why don’t they listen to me? he thought, as his foot caught on a cobble and he fell headlong to the floor.

  “Balls!” he roared, before picking himself up and sprinting forwards, catching up with the couple with one scarf and passing them.

  “Get help! The boating lake!” he bellowed. “Go to the bar!”

  “Sir Justice?” they shouted after him, but the sheriff ran on, his steps ever quicker.

  He entered the park from its southern end, climbing the buckled railings. His breath came fast as he swung his flabby stomach over the top and dropped to the other side. His weapons were becoming a hindrance, catching on the fence and crashing against his knees. He pulled them aside, tossing his customised belt and crossbow to the ground. He then set off running again. Snow-covered leaves, acorns and branches were crushed beneath his feet as he swept through the trees and then threw himself, tumbling, down the bank. Finally, he came to the edge of the lake itself.

  Through the darkness he could just make out the end of the jetty but, beyond that, nothing. He bounded over the jetty’s boards and pulled a crystal torch from his pocket. The air was still, there was no sound at all, and the iced surface of the lake glittered in the light of the beam. Sir Justice looked down at the water’s edge. It was frozen solid.

  No! No! he thought and ripped the axe from his back before plunging it through the surface. The ice crackled and split at the blow. The sheriff hacked and hacked until he’d made a sizable hole for the water to splash through. Then he again played the torch beam across the frozen lake, his eyes scouring frantically for a sign of life.

  Maybe it was just my drunken imagination? Maybe there was no scream at all? he wondered, when the light fell upon a ghastly, twisted shape - the splintered shell of a plastic pedal swan frozen upright in the middle of the pond.

  A golden pedal swan, his mind raced. The princess’s boat!

  The sheriff screamed as he stripped down to his breaches. “Help! Help!”

  A drink, a drink, his brain nagged. Its cold and I need some bloody whisky! But Sir Justice ignored the craving and plunged into the frozen water.

  His body streaked through the black lake, the water cutting at his skin like razor blades. Desperately he swam, his torch searching in every direction, flakes of ice streaming into his eyes like a myriad of thorns.

  Where is she? he thought. Jon, Jon, can you hear me? You’re daughter’s in danger!

  But he sensed no answer from the telepath.

  Father? Father? he begged instead. Help me!

  But locked in the blackness neither God nor his parents spoke to him. Instead, it seemed as if the lake itself responded.

  Taunting him.

  Killing him.

  “Oh, you won’t save her,” the Voice laughed. “You haven’t a chance, you great oaf. She’s mine now. You all are. This is how it begins, you see?”

  The sheriff kept swimming, the Voice thundering through the black.

  “You can only keep the darkness at bay for so long before the pain returns. The pain of lost parents, lost love. The pain of regret. Twisting, feverish, I see it lapping at your every thought. Binding its breath with yours. It’ll swallow you whole.”

  Sir Justice choked. He felt the darkness closing in on him as the light from the torch began to fail. He had never felt so alone. Maybe the Voice was right, there was no hope? Lord Truth was dead. Perhaps this was it? God had finally abandoned them.

  This is why the world ends, he thought, because we were all too drunk.

  His pace slowed and bubbles spewed from his lips as the torchlight flickered. On and off.

  On and off.

  On…

  And there, there in the distance he saw the fold of a yellow dress.

  Releasing the last of his energy, he swam ferociously towards the child. She was sinking to the bottom of the pond, curled into a ball, a teddy bear hanging by her fingers. Powerfully, Sir Justice kicked through the water, his every muscle straining to reach the little princess as she drifted deeper and deeper, her face almost serene, as if dreaming.

  The light from the torch failed entirely. His eyes locked onto the memory of her last position and he grabbed for her, catching the collar of her dress. He pulled her upwards, dropping the torch, his legs bursting every sinew as he kicked, his dying breath now ablaze and ripping through his throat.

  Yes, I could die now, he thought as the oxygen seeped from his brain. Not a drunk but a hero, like you father.

  He swam on, the girl cradled in his arms as he kicked.

  I could die.

  Finally he reached the surface and his head thumped against the glass ceiling that covered it.

  But I must save the girl first.

  His great arm came up in an effort to break through the ice.

  Must save her.

  He kicked up again, using his head this time to ram the frozen crust as his final breath trickled from his lips.

  A good death.

  His mouth gaping, the water flooding through his veins, he punched again.

  A good death.

  And then the sheriff lost consciousness.

  Chapter Thirteen

  SIX bolted out of the bar, leaving the saloon doors to thrash back and hit Tucker full in the face as he ran after her.

  “Ouch! Hey, wait for me!” he shouted, rubbing his nose and sprinting as hard as he could to catch up.

  “So, did Giles see you in the office? What did you tell him?” Tucker yelled between strides.

  “Told him I blew a hole in his safe looking for some pearls to go with my outfit,” Six yelled back. “What do you think?”

  Tucker inspected the jewels swinging from the knight’s neck as she ran. They looked good but he couldn’t believe Six would go as far as to blow up the bar for the sake of a fashion accessory. Somehow, he doubted Giles would believe it either. “And he bought it?”

  “I don’t know, would you?” Six hollered, pulling ahead of him again like it was a race and they were back in training. “He just looked shocked and said that there was something going on down at the boating lake.”

  “Yeah,” Tucker caught up with her as they approached the edge of the park. “This couple came in going mad saying they’d heard a little girl screaming and then saw Sir Justice running down here. Sounds like a load of crazy talk to me. I mean, when was the last time anyone saw Sir Justice running?”

  “Well, Grandpa just said we should check it out, and I wasn’t about to argue with him given the circumstances, was I? Here, give me a lift would you?”

  Tucker bent down to give Six a boost over the railings and then sought out a couple of bars that were bent enough for him to squeeze his skinny frame through. “Yeah, it sure was a lucky break. Did you find what you were looking for?” But when he looked up all he found was darkness and no sign of the knight.

  Tucker waited for his eyes to grow accustomed to the lack of light among the trees. He soon began jogging and was about to put on another burst of speed when his foot hit something solid in the snow. He stopped to pick up a cache of weapons, a utility belt and a crossbow.

  What the macaroni and cheese? he thought. Why would Sir Justice be downing his
weapons, unless he was going for a swim or…

  “Help! Help!” the sound of Sir Justice’s voice echoed through the park.

  Tucker plucked the binoculars from the utility belt and scanned the bank below as the faint sound of a splash followed the sheriff’s yell.

  Six’s voice followed it. “Tucker, did you hear that?” she shouted.

  “Hold on, girl,” Tucker muttered, flipping on the binoculars’ night sight. “C’mon, c’mon,” he grumbled impatiently as the view through the glasses went green.

  He quickly located Six. She had come to a halt about two hundred yards in front of him, her eyes sparkling in the emerald glow of the night scope. He then panned the binoculars across the lake until his view rested on the crushed pedal swan, glittering in the full moon, its broken head pointing at the stars like an eerie ice sculpture. Swinging the glasses back to the jetty, he found a pile of clothes at its edge.

  “Holy guacamole! He’s gone in!” the knight’s apprentice yelled. “The jetty, Six, head for the jetty!”

  The two of them scrambled down the bank, Six still yards in front. “I’m going in after him!” she called.

  “Are you serious? There’s a boat out there that looks like its been attacked by a shark or something!”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Superseriously, you’ll freeze,” Tucker called as he finally caught up with her. “Skate over the top,” he said. “The whole pond’s frozen over. Look!”

  Tucker jumped off the jetty only to slip on the ice and smash his head on one of its stilts. “Again, ouch!” he said, rubbing his afro.

  He looked up at Six. “Go on, you can make it, you’re lighter than me and you’ve got great balance. He must be heading towards that boat out there, but he’ll never be able to break back through the ice.”

  Six hesitated.

  “Quick!” Tucker screamed at her. “He’ll drown if you don’t help him. You can do this, go!”

  “Okay, okay,” Six shouted back. She hated it when Tucker ordered her around. Especially when he was right. After all, he was only an apprentice.