At the top of the stairs was a plateau. From there, to the left and right, roughly fifteen metres away in either direction, were doorways with two guards on each. Directly in front was a large opening.
This large opening wasn’t a doorway, at least not one you’d want to use. In front of it was a gap in the floor, about three metres across. Peeking down, it went straight down to the ground. From there, a covered passage went both directions, out to the sides of the temple, then into the open. Light seemed to be flowing about freely. The formation could be described as a pit and two tunnels, but the openness of it didn’t lend itself to such claustrophobic phrasing.
Past the gap was a second plateau and one more flight of stairs with a guarded doorway at the top. This inner doorway loomed twice as wide and tall than the two other doors.
Marcus led Cassidy to one of the side doors, and it became obvious that it led to the second plateau. It was now that Cassidy got a good look at the spears that all of the guards carried.
She had seen Aguei spears before, with the little perpendicular handle half way down, but these ones had unique spearheads. Instead of a typical narrow triangle, they were large and rounded, almost like the shape of a shovel head, but flat. It looked bulky too; at least four centimetres thick in the middle. Centered in the middle of the blade’s curve was a hole that you could drop a golf ball through.
She tried to imagine wielding it in combat, but she was forced to assume that it was a design that was only for ceremony. Despite the old design, the construction was obviously modern materials and techniques. It looked strangely modern, for a spear, with machined-smooth lines and surfaces.
“Hey boys,” Marcus greeted the two men on duty at this door. “Just about done, hm?”
“Yup.” One of them replied. “This is the new recruit?”
Yet another set of introductions were made, and Cassidy didn’t really put a lot of effort into memorizing them. She had been meeting a lot of people since she got here, and she decided to focus on those that made an impression. Marcus of course, Cipriana, Maxine, Wanda, oh, and what was cookie-man’s name? Frig. Umm… Alan! Alan; master of the cookies, and herder of the stupid greedy apes.
Once the polite talk was done, Marcus and Cassidy headed through the inner plateau. Cassidy looked up to see that this large space was covered by a very high ceiling. With the two large open doorways and the large opening behind them, it was hard to decide if this space could be considered ‘inside’, or just a big front porch.
“By the way, Cassidy. Before I forget, it doesn’t happen often, but now and then we get a bit of a sandstorm on duty. We used to have small tarps we got under, but we got rid of those. It’s just as good to curl up against a wall and ride it out. They don’t last too long, usually. Just long enough to make you want a shower.”
“I ran into a little one when I first got here.” Cassidy said.
“Yeah,” Marcus chuckled, “That helipad’s notorious. We do get bigger ones now and then, but like I said, not too often.”
They headed up the steps to the inner doorway. Marcus waved at the two men guarding the doorway, but was too busy talking to Cassidy to start another conversation. It would have been nearly identical to the one they had at the last door anyway.
“So Cassidy, ever seen the Yute demon?” Marcus asked.
“No. There aren’t pictures to be seen, due to-“
“Right right, I forget that sometimes.”
They passed through the doorway into the main hall, not much smaller than a football field.
Cassidy gasped in surprise. “I didn’t imagine…!”
They walked slowly across the floor towards the statue, as Marcus watched Cassidy take it in. “I’m guessing you were expecting a devil with wings? Or something like that?”
Cassidy smirked, staring the 'demon' in the eye, still many metres away.
The demon was a dog-like thing, with horns like a ram. It was lying down, with its head up, as if alert. Its head was at least five metres across, it’s shoulders closer to fifteen. It was carved of a much darker stone from the yellowish rock of the temple; indeed, it was almost black. Whatever this stone was, it was obviously much stronger stuff than any other stone around. The robust shaggy fur was carved with excruciating detail, which by all rights should have been worn off over the ages. Sure, it had the occasional tiny sign of damage, but no more than a statue in some modern city. Was it that well protected inside here? The walls and floor were in decent shape for their age, but not nearly as well preserved as the statue.
Cassidy thought the eyes seemed to look right at her. She smiled. “Nice puppy, Sir!” She chuckled.
Marcus chuckled back, and rocked back on his heels, looking up at the demon. “He doesn’t look scary to you?”
She couldn’t believe that no one found it necessary to share this with the world. “No Sir. I mean.. if it were real, I’m sure he’d be able to eat or crush everyone on the base, but he doesn’t look the type.”
“Heh. Well, if he fought the sphinx…. My money’s on our boy here.. but since you don’t find him scary… I’ll tell you a secret, if you stop calling me ‘Sir’.”
“Oops. Okay, Marcus, let's hear it.”
Marcus’ face grew a little more serious. Not too serious, but a bit more. He looked at Cassidy for a few moments. “His ghost is still here.” He nodded assuredly at Cassidy’s doubting expression. “Yep. He’s a good boy. He likes the company of having us around. There’s not a lot else around here without us to talk to him now and then.”
Cassidy chuckled, and walked up to the statue. She patted the nearest curl of stone fur. “Well, I bet he’s a good guard dog too. Must eat a ton.” She looked at her watch. “Dang. Battery died. How long till we’re on?”
“Oh, we may as well take post now. It’s not like a few minutes is a big impact on eight hours.”
They headed back to the door to relive the two guards there. They handed their spears to Marcus and Cassidy and left, wishing Cassidy luck. Marcus stood on one side, holding his spear with one hand, back end resting on the ground, so Cassidy followed suit on the other side. The spear was very light, and she wondered how heavy the original model was. She watched the previous shift walk away, then looked to Marcus. “Soooooooo, when’s the rush here?” she joked.
“Well, that was one right there. Next one’s in eight hours, then two other folks come by and we hand the spears to them.”
Cassidy smirked. “So… this is what it’s all about? Oh, geez, are we supposed to be silent?”
“No, no, conversation is pretty much the only way to pass the time around here.”
Cassidy looked around. The statue was still staring forward, almost expectantly. With nothing else to talk about, she finally said “I spy, with my little eye, something that weighs a couple hundred tons.”
Marcus chuckled a little. “You’re not used to silence, are ya?”
“Can’t say I’d had much use for it in general.”
“Well, there’s plenty to be had around here. Ah, I’ve kinda been wondering, what made you decide to come on board with us here?”
Cassidy leaned a bit, putting some weight on the short middle handle of the spear, and huffing a bit of a sigh. “Well… seemed like good timing for a change of scenery… It’s certainly pretty enough out here.” Marcus nodded. He didn’t ask for more, but he didn’t need to. The silence seemed to draw it out of her all on its own. She looked out the front, down the stairs, past the opening with the gap in the floor, down more stairs, to the sands.
“I was dumped.” she finally added. “Seems like Brandy and I had been together for ages, but... well... to be quite honest... I wasn’t putting much into the relationship lately. Long distance… and I guess just … “
Cassidy sighed, frustrated with herself.
“It’s alright.” Marcus said, in an almost fatherly tone.
Not really hearing him, she eventually went on after a long pause. “You hear about people taking each
other for granted, and it sounds dumb, it sounds like something you wouldn’t do. But I guess I did. But... I hadn’t even seen her in a long time, except messages. I may as well have not been going out with her for a long, long time.” She idly twisted the spear a little, and felt how the stray grains of sand ground against the stone floor. “In a way, it shouldn’t even bug me. Being dumped didn’t really change anything.”
“Except that suddenly it was official” Marcus added.
Cassidy snapped her stare over to him, her face tense with thought. “Yeah. I guess that’s it. I had someone out there. Out there somewhere, and she was mine, I was hers, and it was safe. Now I don’t have that.”
“On the other hand, you’re free.” Marcus tried to point out a silver lining, but Cassidy wasn’t too moved. She looked back out onto the sand. “Yeah, well, I hope Brandy is feeling better about her freedom than me. Freedom is overrated.”
The silence that came now bore heavier on Cassidy than before. Marcus decided to change the topic. “So, Cassidy, do you follow World Cup at all?”
Cassidy gave the hint of a chuckle. Marcus had the wisdom to know when to leave things alone. Why she opened up to her new C.O. like that for no real reason, she couldn’t put her finger on. Nonetheless, it was good to vent a little.
~~~
The man who Kirison finally met with after lots of waiting and an entirely new appointment, was significantly less terrifying than he had feared. He expected some chain smoking, overweight, middle aged man with sunken dark eyes, massive rings on every finger, an expensive yet tasteless suit, and an expression as warm as an undertaker.
The reality of “Mr. Irving” was a downright skinny old man, tall and lively. He was also dressed business casual, not too far from what Kirison had chosen for himself. That was good.
Regardless, Kirison’s paranoia found little difficulty imagining a viciously dark evil side to Mr. Irving, with a wide wicked grin and some kind of hammer dripping with the blood of someone who’d crossed him.
Let’s not think about that. Let’s sip the drink, and let the Mr. Irving think. That won’t get you killed.
Unless the drink was poisoned.
Okay, stop thinking like that. The nice skinny beanpole career criminal has no reason to kill you.
“Well Mister Kirison,“ Mr. Irving said with a light enough tone, “I really don’t think I can help you out.”
“What?! Why not?” Christ, that was less than respectful. The drink doesn’t smell like almonds, does it?
“Two reasons. For one thing, it’s not really our kind of turf. At all. By any stretch of the imagination. I’m sure you can understand.” Kirison nodded, and waited for Mr. Irving to continue. “The other thing is, with things being the way they are now, anything nanite-related is kind of a spicy area to get into in general. And besides that, there’s really zero profit in it!”
Kirison stared at the wet ring on the table where his glass had been earlier, and sighed. “Well. I certainly understand that. I wouldn’t touch this with a ten foot pole, if I could avoid it.” He sighed again.
“Look.....” Mr. Irving took a genuinely sympathetic tone. “I know of this group… they might be interested... but you might have to be… creative… they ain’t as stable as you an’ I, if you get my drift.”
Beautiful. The rabbit hole suddenly looked just that much deeper, and the fall was only gaining speed.
~~~~~
:::C /06
~~~~~
Cassidy awoke in the early afternoon. There was other activity in the barrack, but she had been sleeping through it just fine. She sat up and enjoyed the horrors of morning breath.
“Good morning.” It was Wanda. “Were you that tired that you fell asleep with your hat on? Not used to an overnight shift?”
Cassidy took a few moments for the words to sink through the haze of waking, and looked over at Wanda with a long lazy glare from under the brim of her hat. “Huh? Uhm… No. I mean yes. I mean.. overnight was fine. Things went smooth. And the hat... I always wear it. ‘Cept the shower.”
“You meant to wear it to bed?”
Cassidy nodded. “Yuh. Keeps my ponytail in line. Otherwise I wake up and my hair’s a mess.” She leaned over the edge of the bed and went into her footlocker for a shot of mouthwash.
“What’s wrong with an elastic hair band?”
Cassidy swallowed the mouthwash with a grimace, and thumbed the brim of her hat, almost affectionately. “There's one in there too. But my hat would get jealous if it was just the hair band there.”
“Nutter.”
Cassidy had her shower. No little lizard visitor today. She put herself together and wandered over to the mess hall. Cipriana was there, having some toast and OJ. It almost seemed odd to see Cipriana tending to lowly mortal necessities such as eating. Suddenly, the serene presence from the barracks seemed human after all. The toast caught Cassidy’s eye, so she fetched the same from the kitchen and went to go sit across from Cipriana.
“Hey, mind some company, Cip?”
Cipriana gave a welcoming smile and nodded towards the spot Cassidy seemed aimed at.
“Wanda said people call you ‘Cip’... was she just being silly? ‘Cipriana’ is such a pretty name, seems a shame to cut it short.”
Cipriana swallowed her mouthful. “Yes, most people call me ‘Cip’, but either way you want is fine by me.”
Cassidy leveled an analytical eye at Cipriana. “….. Cip….. Cipriana.. Cip….. I don’t think Cip does you justice… but I’m lazy, so ‘Cip’ it is. Oh, and if you want, I’ve been called ‘Cass’ off and on.”
Cipriana held a small giggle behind her calming smile. “Cass? Not Cassidy? Or Cassie?”
Cassidy almost choked on her toast. “No! Not Cassie, good lord, not Cassie.”
Cipriana couldn’t help but to smirk. “Alright then, ‘not Cassie’, which do you prefer, Cassidy or Cass?”
Cassidy thought for a moment. “If you were like me, I’d say ‘Cass’, but you’re not. You sound better saying the full name.”
“…what? Why?”
“Because you talk… slower than me. You sound like you’re taking your time talking, not in a rush, like the words are worth saying. Me? I’ll rifle off any gibberish that jumps into my head. I don’t have time to say whole four syllable names like SIP-REE-AN-AH, when there’s a billion other less important words waiting to come out. Wanda can sound okay saying ‘Cass’, just like she sounds right saying ‘Cip’. Maybe it’s a casual or formal thing. Wanda and I are pretty casual, where you come off a bit more formal, so using more formal forms of names sounds right coming out of you.”
Cassidy stopped talking, and Cipriana took a slow sip from her OJ, while staring at Cassidy with incredulous eyes. She put down the glass, swallowed, and at length, broke the vacuous silence that followed Cassidy’s spiel. “Alright then, Cassidy. I also see what you mean. You have a talent for gibberish when you put your mind to it.”
“Absolutely,” Cassidy chuckled, “I’m fluent, always have been.”
“By the way, how was your first watch?”
“Oh, fine. But you just reminded me. Speaking of watches, I wonder if I can get a new battery for...” Cassidy looked at the watch which had been dead the night before. It was now operating, and the time was even still correct. “Well, son of a... never mind then. I thought my battery was dead last night. Maybe the display is just on it’s last legs...”
“Well, you may as well leave it behind when you go on watch anyway. It’s not generally done; taking high tech stuff to the temple, that is.”
Cassidy shrugged. “Tradition? Treaty?”
Cipriana shrugged back. “I never found I really needed a watch on duty anyway.”
That was true enough, in retrospect. Eight hours went by pretty fast. Sure, she had been talking with Marcus off and on, but even still, there was a lot of silent standing and it didn’t drag on like she’d expected. Maybe the scenery helped.
Cipriana put her
glass on her empty plate, and stood to leave. “Oh, by the way, Cassidy, you made me curious. What do you think Marcus should call you?”
“Hmm… He’d been calling me Leftenent Cassidy for a while… last night it was ‘Cassidy’ .. But I think he could get away with ‘Cass’… he’s kinda folksy.” Cipriana only replied with a short thoughtful gaze off into nowhere, half a grin, and a shrug before leaving. Cassidy gobbled up the rest of her afternoon breakfast. She then wandered off to the base entrance, intending to go for a little walk to explore the area a bit. On the way, she spotted Maxine ahead of her, also headed out.
Maxine was carrying a wooden staff, with red tape around one end. It had a small side handle, just like the spears used on watch. “You got the home-made model?” Cassidy’s comment took Maxine by surprise. She turned, and held the wooden spear, much the same as the real thing was held on duty. “Eh, It’s just for practice. Some of us kinda exercise with em. Well, me mostly. The weight room can get a little tedious sometimes.”
“Crap! Weight room? Where?”
“Go to the back wall of the mess, and look left. The door is kind of hidden by a freezer unless you get close. It’s nothing fancy. The wood spears are tucked in the back of the supply closets though.”
“Geez, I’m observant. Any water slides I didn’t see? Maybe a nuclear submarine in the middle of the barrack that I may have missed?”
“Hey Cassidy, do you want to come outside and play? We can grab another spear…”
Cassidy had nothing better to do. “Sure. Oh, and you may as well call me ‘Cass’.”
“Cass?”
“Yeah, Cip and I had a big discussion about it.”
A little off the path from the base to the temple, there was an open square area tucked between somewhat taller bits of ruins. Cassidy imagined that it might have been a marketplace once upon a time. Her imagination summoned imagery of rows and rows of shop stands, and browsing, noisy crowds. Today however, it was just an empty space between deteriorating buildings. Despite its fall from grace, this place still had a certain welcoming air to it, much like the temple itself. The sun seemed to flow with the gentle, silent wind, watching the ‘children’ come to play on the ancient stones with their little sticks.
Watching Yute Page 4
