Saul of Sodom: The Last Prophet

by Jinn, Bo

  The door opened.

  “Good morning,” the hermit greeted from the gloom of the doorway.

  “Today is the day,” he replied

  “I know.”

  The hermit stepped aside, holding open the door.

  He entered and the door closed.

  The hermit’s countenance was as solemn and his eyes just as grave as that first night they had met. Since then, they had seen one another more than a few times, but seldom spoken.

  “How is she?” he asked.

  “See for yourself. .. She’s in her room.”

  There was a brief silence, after which the hermit sauntered past him.

  “Wait.”

  The hermit stopped in his tracks and turned again, with his usual air of omniscience.

  “You have done … a lot for her,” he faltered. “…cared for her…”

  The hermit assented with a bow of his head.

  “The last time I trusted someone with her…”

  “I know,” the hermit nodded.

  He was unable to heave his heart into his mouth, but the hermit seemed to feel his thoughts.

  “I may not come back,” he murmured, darkly.

  “You will,” the hermit answered.

  “But, if I do not … Promise me that…”

  “I will.”

  There was silence. He looked up at the hermit, wanting to say something else, but did not say it and looked away.

  “It does not change anything I had told you,” the hermit spoke as he mounted the first stair. “You should know that.”

  There was foreboding in his voice, and the two men regarded one another a solemn moment before the hermit turned and walked away.

  He ascended the stairs and stopped outside the door to the first room. The memory of the last time he walked through the door brought a swift rush of dread which held him in suspension a minute before he gently nudged the door open. A dust-speckled daylight shone in through the window across a floor littered with crumpled balls of paper. In the middle of the room, under the sunbeams, the little figure was lying semi-prostrate on her front, her legs swinging back and forth, her right cheek pressed to the floor.

  When the door clicked shut, the little golden head rose with a start.

  “Saul!”

  Naomi rose from the floor and ran toward him at once, throwing herself into an embrace. When the little arms yielded, he knelt down and cupped the little face in his hands, studying her. Her skin, though still pallid, had recovered some of its lustre, and her golden hair was streaked with thin, short threads of white.

  “Hello, little one,” he said. “You look well.”

  The girl threw her arms around him again.

  “I missed you,” she whispered, trembling with relief.

  “I told you I would come back.”

  She loosed her embrace and stepped back. Her large eyes glowed and her little cheeks were full to bursting with her smile. He picked up one of the crumpled balls of paper on the floor and stood up.

  “I asked Grandpa to come with us today,” she said. “To the place…”

  “Who?” he asked, unfolding the little ball of paper.

  “The old man,” she answered. “He doesn’t have a name.”

  “So I am told.”

  “But he’s good,” she said. “I think he’s good.”

  He drew out the crumpled ball of paper, and saw inside what looked like the beginnings of a portrait. It was far from a finished piece, but the likeness was one he easily recognised. Then he caught sight of a lone sheet in the middle of the room where she had been lying just before he came in.

  “Your latest work,” he said, picking up the more complete rendition of the same image – his own. “Is that who I think it is?”

  “It’s … not finished. I … I want this one to be perfect. It has to be.”

  He gave the picture back to her.

  “That reminds me,” he said. “I brought these for you.”

  He reached into his coat, drew the small collection of papers. Naomi took them with a beam of delight, but her smile quickly faded when she looked through the drawings and came upon the unfinished blood-blotched picture of Celyn. The forsakenness came upon her in the form of a gentle sigh which suddenly reminded him why he had come.

  “There is something I must tell you,” he said to her.

  He lifted her up off the floor and sat with her on the edge of the bed with her on his lap. Then, averting her eyes, he said: “I must go away for a while.”

  The great, gleaming eyes looked up.

  “Where?” she asked.

  “Somewhere far away.”

  “I can come with you…”

  “No,” he avowed sharply. “Where I must go, you cannot come.”

  “But, you’ll come back.,” she said.

  He was silent.

  “Saul … you’ll come back,” she said again.

  “Yes,” he said. “I will come back. I always come back.”

  “You promise?”

  “I promise.”

  I promise…

  “You think too much.”

  The memory dissolved.

  He tore his eyes away from the view beyond the small aperture and turned toward the voice that woke him from his reverie; the hawk-eyed brigadier with the snakish features.

  “I said, you think too much.” The brigadier took out a flask and unscrewed the top and raised the flask to his lips and drank. “You’ve been staring out that window since we left. What’re you thinking about?”

  “… Home,” he replied, looking away again.

  The giant metal belly of the buldroog grumbled with its heavy, bawling haul over the rugged terrain. Most of the other martials had dozed off in their seats. The stiff exoskeletons of their gear held them upright: tired heads dipping with the jounces of the trundling droog. The grips around their guns did not loosen with sleep.

  He looked out of the small aperture of ballistic glass. The front of the sidelong truck had been with them since the convoy departed, advancing and retreating over the view of the land, the high and solitary, snow-tipped mountain with the swirl of cloud over the peak and the orange blast-furnace sky. The month’s battle had been brutally bloody, even by the usual degree. To his memory, the Eastern Russians were far more tenacious than the Westerners in the face of unequalled carnage. Flashbacks returned: of bodies tearing to pieces, vaporising in a blood-cloud, and of the sounds -- the salvos, the explosions, and the hailing rounds. The long, hulking droog struck a fissure in their path and the sections of the vehicle lifted one after another. All of a sudden their path was encrusted with broken tarmac.

  “Looks like we’re coming into the city,” rasped the hawk-eyed brigadier.

  In the approaching distance there appeared the shadowy outlines of the buildings against the backdrop of the setting sun. The canyon to the northwest ebbed away and in its place surfaced a long and high protuberance of black dunes. The shape was strange. He narrowed his eyes. The sun gleamed over the black ridge, lighting up an eerie mist.

  “Got me a new prescription,” the brigadier spoke again, drawing his attention.

  In his hand, the brigadier held an open neural canister. He rolled some of the tablets straight into his mouth as if he were drinking from a flask. A swell went down his snake-like throat and he exhaled pleasurably.

  “You wouldn’t think that you could be out in the middle of a combat zone, hell all around, and feel nothing but this constant orgasm all up here (he held a finger to his temple) just going, and going, and going, and going.” He lifted his head, closed his eyes and exhaled with almost sexual relish.

  “It’s all I can feel right now,” he said with a raspy snicker.

  Saul looked away and did not speak. They were now moving through the heart of the city.

  “Not much of a talker, eh comrade?” sneered the brigadier.

  He shot a cold glare in the brigadier’s direction.

  “How far are we from Fort Gen?
” he asked.

  “…About another hour.”

  The instant the answer came, something caught his attention: something brief and barely visible, through the aperture just beside the brigadier’s head. A tiny burst of light appeared at the top of the middle tower of three red tower blocks, which one might have easily mistaken for the glare of a window, except it was too bright. Too bright. Then there appeared another flash in the next block, and a third in quick succession.

  Time stood still.

  “GET DOWN!”

  A split second later came a thunderous BASH!

  He was hurled out of his seat. Everything went white. Through the barely conscious blur he felt the ground quake again and again with successive explosions until there was nothing but a high-pitched squealing in his ear. When he came to, he realised that he was lying on the vehicle’s ceiling with blood dripping from his split scalp.

  The droog had been flipped over and the three rear sections of the vehicle were gone; a gaping hole of twisted metal cinders and a wall of smoke in their place. Bodies and members were hurled like rag dolls and lay about numb and twitching.

  “Get up!” he hollered, lifting the nearest martial to his feet. “Move, now!”

  He beat at the panels on the accesses and the pneumatic doors opened with a sharp hiss. The moment he hurdled through the access there was another bright flash and the shockwave followed, knocking them off their feet. Projectile shards of earth and shrapnel tore through his gear and another nearby vehicle detonated and keeled over. Passing trucks and droogs ground to a halt, skidded and toppled to evade the fleers and explosions, grinding up the tarmac. Hollers railed through the chaos:

  “AMBUSH!”

  “ATGs!”

  “TAKE COVER!”

  Bang! A third blast in much closer proximity caused him to stumble. Orders shot across the airwaves in a frenzy. They rushed across the street, taking cover behind the fragmented walls of a ruined building. More martials fleeing from the streets took their positions, crouched and pressed up against the wall on either side of him.

  “WHERE THE HELL ARE THEY FIRING FROM?” yelled the brigadier.

  “Three red tower blocks to the north. The upper floors.”

  “Fire on those fucking towers! NOW!”

  The brigadier howled the order over the airwaves just as another succession of explosions shook the ground and shards of debris rocketed past, splintering the edges of the walls. Storms of gunfire unleashed northward.

  He peered over the edge of the wall just in time to see the great cannons on the tank heads revolve. Blasts of fire and smoke spouted out the thick muzzles one after the other like a battleship broadside all along the thoroughfare. The sequence of shockwaves ruptured loose sections of the surrounding ruins and a shower of splintered debris fell from above. The three tower blocks burst, ruptured and split like figures before a firing squad. Then a second sequential barrage followed and ruptured the bases. The towers toppled into one another; a slow and ponderous fall like felled lumber crumbling, riven and disintegrated, vanishing in a thick, white fog. The resonance of the volleys from the tanks and the declining rumble of the falling towers endured for a whole minute. The smog rose high into the air and followed the wind to the west. They waited for some kind of follow-up -- another explosion, more gunshots…

  “Hold positions,” came the instruction over the airwaves.

  The wait carried on for about three more minutes.

  The trailing mist of powdered debris swept over the thoroughfare like a sandstorm. Soon, soldiers started emerging onto the street one by one, and the scene was one of fire, smoke and butchery. Masks came down to filter out the toxic mist. All along the half-kilometer stretch of road, the convoy had come to a halt, divided by segments of carnage.

  “All teams branch out into the streets,” Saul commanded. “Search the buildings.”

  The brigadier removed his mask and stood up, erect, cursing.

  “Five vehicles down. First Brigade, damage report?”

  “Multiple KIAs,” came the response over the transmission. “Five HGVs down. It’s a mess. We’re not going anywhere without replacements.”

  “Someone call Fort Gen,” the brigadier hollered. “We’re going to need another convoy … I knew this place was a fucking danger zone.”

  “We are nowhere near enemy lines,” said Saul. “Who were they?”

  “Freedom fighters,” replied the brigadier, “left over from the last assault.”

  “Freedom fighters…”

  “Civil soldiers – anti-militarists,” The brigadier prodded a broken corpse with his boot. “Call themselves the ‘Phoenix Brigades.’ Nobody’s friend and everyone’s enemy. Their fight is against the PMCs… Talk about a waste of blood.”

  Martials dispersed among the wreckage, inspecting the fallen for signs of life. Meanwhile, Saul peered through the mist at the silhouettes of the ruined city, the jagged edges of the broken buildings and the walls peppered with bullets. He narrowed his eyes, lowered the mask and breathed in the smog of dust, scorched air and charred flesh. Saul looked away again and gazed about in disbelief at the desolated remains. He knew this place. It was the broken carcass of Naomi’s home.

  “This … is Dolinovka,” he muttered

  “Didn’t check the itinerary?”

  “What happened here…?”

  “Have you been living under a rock?” The brigadier eyed him with a sideways glower. “The Kamchatka uprisings…? ‘Russian Winter?’”

  Russian winter…

  He remembered the media catchphrase from a long time ago.

  “This was a rebel city,” said the brigadier. “Hell,” he snorted. “This was a rebel region.”

  “What happened?”

  A troop of martials marched past and into the adjacent side streets. The brigadier sauntered casually after them. As they went to work -- breaching doors and cleaning out the buildings -- he continued to explain as he walked: “There was a mass revolt; coups all over the damn place,” he said. “Most of them were spearheaded by the Phoenix Brigades. This city right here was their capitol. NSRRS forces pulled out of the region a short while after the uprising and the U.S. moved us in a few months later – took over the whole region. We laid this place to waste a long while ago, but stragglers always get left behind. This is what happens when no one sends a clean-up crew... Rebels,” he spat. “They’re like rats…”

  He broke off from the brigadier’s company and walked off into a side alley.

  “Hey,” the brigadier called. “Where are you going?”

  “To search the area,” he replied without stopping.

  “Alone?”

  “Alone,” he asserted. “Do not follow me.”

  He disappeared down the misted path.

  Before long, he had broken off from the main contingent and was walking solitarily down the narrower streets west of the main thoroughfare. He shielded his eyes from the billowing clouds of red dust. Further on, the air became tainted with a pungency like decomposition, yet there was not a corpse to be seen anywhere. Swarms of large insects wafted through the narrow paths and gusts of wind moaned in his ears. Rolling tumbleweed caused him to stop, search around, gun raised, finger fastened around the trigger, then ease a moment later and continue. The scene was ripe for ambush.

  He slowed with each step, overcome by the surreal sense of hovering over the brim of recollection, like an enduring déjà vu, struggling to breach the boundary of memory. Suddenly, he stopped. He turned his head to the left, following the gleam in the corner of his eye.

  Something barely discernible on the holed and splintered face of a door caught his attention: a golden symbol in the form of a winged beast. In each corner of the street were the flickers of lost memories returning to him in broken, undecipherable pieces: the lines of blood-stained bullet holes in the walls, fallen masses of rubble and mud-caked seams, mounds of dirt, a few scatters of discharged round cases, and deserted homes, upturned and shattered, sti
ll containing most of the dust-laden possessions of the former city dwellers. He had seen the ruins left in the aftermath of battle, but this city looked virtually untouched, and yet there was not a soul to be seen. And all of it came together in a single, ominous question:

  Where did they all go?

  The next alleyway looked to have eluded the brunt of battle. As he passed a half-open door, the ground suddenly supple against the soles of his boots. He stopped and looked down. The ground was coated thick with dust swaying in the breeze, but through the thinner deposits he saw, quite clearly, an under-layer of bright red that stopped at the foot of the door. He holstered his weapon, got down on one knee and wiped away the dirt and gravel to reveal a fine red fabric. He grabbed the fabric in a fist, pulled it out from under the door, and when the dust showered off and blew away in the draft, he saw that he was holding what appeared to be a banner. He looked up at the door under which the banner had been wedged and noted that it was distinguished from most of other doors by the same golden winged creature etched into the red banner: A golden phoenix.

  He put his hand flat over the crest and pushed on the stiff door three times until it gave. A small horde of frightened rats scurried out, screeching. When he crossed the threshold, the wind yielded. The light switch didn’t work. The circle of torchlight lit up a small, single-room abode, cobwebs hanging from the ceiling corners like wall tapestries. All the cupboards and drawers in the room were drawn open, their contents strewn over the floor and covered in dirt, dismantled weapon parts and gear falling out of open munitions crates. The place looked to have been ransacked like everywhere else. The torchlight passed over the carpeted floor and stopped on a small desk to the left.

  He lowered the torch and lifted the fallen cabinets off the desk-top with a loud moan and bang that sent one last rat scuttling out the door. When he swept the dust and fragments off of the desk-top, something caught his eye, lodged in a narrow space between the desk and the wall. The gap was closed with what appeared to be the outer edge of a block of wood. He pocked his finger into the small gap and fiddled around until the thin block slipped out of the compartment. It was a book.