The Forever Gate Ultimate Edition

by Isaac Hooke

  Hoodwink stiffened. "No." He initiated the entry protocol himself, and the world blinked.

  79

  Hoodwink appeared in a tight alleyway. It was cold. He'd forgotten how positively frigid the Inside could be. Each exhale brought a plume of white mist from his mouth, and he shivered.

  Snowdrifts lined either side, forming a concave path of sorts, the ground a bumpy mass of snowpack. The unshoveled drifts had piled up over the years, so much so that the tops climbed halfway up the mudbrick buildings on either side. Strictly speaking, those drifts should've reached even higher given the snowstorms that plagued this place, but some automated A.I. clean-up process prevented that from happening.

  There was a vagrant here, seated against the drift. He was swaddled in disintegrating furs, and suckled a leather bladder. The vagrant glanced up at Hoodwink.

  "The fuck did you come from?" the vagrant said, breath misting.

  Ah, the Inside. How I've missed you.

  "Want a drink?" The vagrant offered up the leather bladder and grinned stupidly. Hoodwink could have almost believed him a gol. Except there were no gol vagrants in the world.

  Hoodwink reached into his pocket and tossed the man a small purse. The vagrant started when he heard the clink of coins. Hoodwink winked at him, remembering a time when he'd avoided such men like the plague.

  Ari had taught him the folly of his ways.

  Hoodwink proceeded across the bumpy snowpack toward the front of the alley. He wondered briefly where the tracker was hidden, and when he didn't spot an obvious location, he thought he might have made some mistake.

  When he reached the front of the alley, Hoodwink's fears were confirmed. This wasn't the Black Den, though he wasn't far off. He recognized the crowded aisles and kiosks of Happy-Tot Square, a misnomer if there ever was one. Located smack-dab between Luckdown and Black Den, the square was always jammed with customers, the kind of folks who liked to buy their goods for the cheapest price possible, no questions asked. And since the public wasn't allowed into the Den itself, those Denizens with something to offload were happy to come here.

  Tanner appeared at his side.

  "So this is the right spot after all," Hoodwink said. Tanner wouldn't have appeared near Hoodwink if the tracker wasn't here somewhere.

  "It is."

  "There's no Control Room," Hoodwink said.

  "There isn't."

  Hoodwink smiled ironically. "Mind explaining why that is, then?"

  Tanner shrugged. "Apparently the Black Faction, or the New Users, moved the tracker we had on the Control Room Box. It's a problem me and Ari have had before, unfortunately. We can go back Outside if you want, and try again with the coordinates of the tracker in the Dwarf's collar."

  Hoodwink shrugged. "Probably faster just to walk to the Den. Besides, I haven't been to these parts in years, and I'd like to get a feel for the lay of the land."

  "I don't know, Hood," Tanner said. "The gate guards gave us trouble last time."

  "Come on. It'll be fun."

  And so the pair made their way across Happy-Tot square. Hoodwink felt immensely at ease here among the criminals and their customers. These were the kind of folks he'd grown up with. At least they were honest about what they did, unlike those who called themselves merchants and portal traders, thieves of a different name.

  Still, despite his ease, he realized that many of the hawkers were giving him hard looks. Too many. Though his cloak hid the numbers on his chest, and he wore a fake bronze bitch, these men could recognize the perfect face of a gol. Most of the city soldiers and guards were gols, as were the jailers and judges. The average man here had been arrested two or three times in his life, more than enough to pick out the smooth face of a gol from a mile away.

  A wiry thug with two X-shaped scars beneath his cheeks spat at Hoodwink's feet.

  Hoodwink ignored the man and kept walking. That was the best policy when dealing with these sorts. Keep to yourself, never take offense, don't look too long at any one man, and walk with purpose.

  He realized that Tanner had remained behind. Hoodwink turned around to find him scowling at the wiry man.

  The hawker scrambled to his feet of course, abandoning the stolen sheafs of cloth that were laid out on the cart behind him. Such men didn't back down from obvious challenges, gol or no gol. "Got a problem, gol?"

  "Let it go, Tanner," Hoodwink said.

  "These people need to learn manners," Tanner said. "And I mean to start teaching them."

  Hoodwink watched Tanner reach for his sword belt, except it wasn't there. Tanner and Hoodwink had elected not to bring weapons so as not to offend the Denizens. A gol with a sword in the Black Den? That'd draw trouble like a sneak to a purse.

  "I said, got a problem, gol?" The wiry man advanced until he stood nose-to-nose with Tanner. "Come to arrest me, have ya?"

  "Tanner..." Hoodwink said.

  Tanner finally backed down, to Hoodwink's relief.

  Hoodwink glanced over his shoulder as he led Tanner away. The wiry man was wearing a smug look, and he made a rude finger gesture. If Hoodwink and Tanner got this sort of treatment here, he wondered how they'd be treated in the actual Den.

  Not that he was all that worried.

  "I don't know what got into me," Tanner said suddenly. "I apologize, Hood. You know I'm never like that. I guess... I guess I'm still in a black mood, after what happened to Ari. Her death is eating away at me, and—"

  Hoodwink smiled wanly. "A different subject, if you would?"

  "Sorry Hood." Tanner walked on in silence.

  The Den lay just ahead. Hoodwink recognized the wall of mortared stone, which was around three times the height of a man. Sellblades and bowmen patrolled the upper walkways, men who were visible only when they passed between the merlons topping the wall. Sometimes the Black Faction hung the severed heads of individuals from competing factions upon those merlons. Hoodwink could still see a few blood stains under the crenelations. You couldn't clean something like that.

  The Denizens kept the drifts shoveled well away from the wall, the snow piled into ramparts that ran four paces in front of it. Took dedication, maintaining that.

  As for the wall itself, its surface had been ground down so that few fingerholds remained. If a human or gol did manage to scale that wall—via ropes and grappling hooks and whatnot—by the time they made it halfway they'd find themselves chock-full of arrows, more porcupines than men.

  A mini-Forever Gate, Hoodwink thought.

  Still, determined attackers could find a way through. Gol sappers could setup shop inside one of the many nearby houses and start undermining the wall. And while the Forever Gate was untouchable as far as bombs went, a well-placed bomb would work wonders here. And there were other ways for gols to get inside. What about the gol dogs, cats, and ravens of the world? Ravens. He glanced up. Sure enough, a murder of the black crows toured the sky.

  An archway interrupted the smoothness of that wall, and offered the only entrance into the Den. Sealed by a portcullis, Hoodwink recalled that the gate was only opened at set times during the day. He couldn't remember the precise times, but even so he wasn't about to sit around and wait.

  He was Hoodwink, after all. And he had a name to live up to.

  He crossed the embankment of snow and strode right up to the gate.

  The thick bars were closely set, with enough room for a small cat to squeeze through. Even with his gol strength, he knew he wouldn't be able to bend those bars.

  "Come on then!" Hoodwink shouted inside. "Who's running this gong show?"

  A sentry emerged from a gatehouse beyond the portcullis, and he strolled up to the gate. A leathery patchwork of a man with a bent nose and cragged scars crisscrossing his face, he'd seen his share of action. Street brawlers were the favorite inductees for the Den guard. He held a pike in one hand, and the way he moved suggested he knew how to use it.

  The sentry glanced at Hoodwink and Tanner, and he was about to turn away. But then he did a
double-take.

  "Gols!" The sentry brought the pike to bear, aiming at Hoodwink.

  Pikemen congregated behind the gate right quick. Bowmen rushed to the crenels above and knocked their arrows. Hard men, all of them.

  Hoodwink remained completely calm. He'd lived through more than a few life and death situations in his time. He'd almost bled to death when he escaped the courthouse. He'd climbed the Forever Gate. He was sucked out into space. A few men pointing bits of steel at his heart didn't do much for him these days. Still, dying would set him back all the way Topside again. And there was always the chance that death there would be permanent.

  "Whose idea was it to leave the swords behind again?" Hoodwink said to Tanner.

  "May have been mine," Tanner admitted.

  "Do you recognize any of them?"

  "Not a man."

  "Do ye notice this one's got the pike aimed at me?" Hoodwink said. "Gives me a swell of pride, it does."

  "Obviously the man has poor taste," Tanner said.

  Hoodwink chuckled. "On the contrary. He knows I'm the more valuable target."

  Tanner pointed through the bars. "Well, take a look at the other men. I think I have more pikes aimed at me in total."

  "Well, you're forgetting to include the bows." Hoodwink glanced up. Those bowmen who weren't aiming at him did so now. "See? Altogether I've got the most bows and pikes aimed at me. Count 'em."

  "Shut up, gols!" the sentry said. "And be off! Your kind isn't welcome here."

  Hoodwink paid the sentry no heed. "What do you think, Tanner? Should we teach these krubs a lesson?"

  "Since when did you start calling humans krubs?" Tanner said. "It's bad form, Hood. Bad form."

  "What? We're gols. And that's what gols do."

  The sentry jabbed the tip of the pike through the bars. "I said—"

  Hoodwink snatched the blade in the blink of an eye and tugged the sentry into the portcullis. He shoved one arm through the portcullis and around the man's head, then he squeezed the man's face between two of the bars.

  The other pikemen sprung into action, and leveled their pikes at Hoodwink.

  "I'm definitely winning now, Tanner," Hoodwink said triumphantly. "Every single pike is on me!"

  Tanner hadn't moved. He glanced upward, at the bowmen. "You're courting death here, Hood. All it takes is one lucky shot..."

  Hoodwink raised his voice. "Oh, there won't be any lucky shots, not from this sorry lot! Because they know that with just a little more pressure, their friend here will have a slight problem with his head. As in—it won't be there anymore." He'd never harm the sentry of course. But he had to sound convincing. You couldn't show weakness in front of men like these.

  One of the pikemen, a man with an angry scar above his brow, jabbed the point of his weapon into Hoodwink's upper arm. The blade didn't pierce, but it hurt. "Get you back to the gutter, scum!" Angry-Scar said. "You think we care about him?"

  The trapped sentry's face had gone bright red, pressed as it was between the two bars, and Hoodwink eased off a bit, letting the man breath. You had to be careful when you were a gol. Your strength could easily get you in trouble—all too easy to squeeze a man's windpipe shut, or burst his head against a portcullis.

  "Well," Tanner said. "It would seem we have ourselves a bit of a problem."

  "Yes," Hoodwink said. "I really have to pee."

  80

  "I'm Hoodwink Cooper, I am," he said, raising his voice. "And I'm here to meet Jacob of the New Users."

  None of the pikemen responded. Well, Angry-Scar growled, but that didn't count.

  "Hmm." Hoodwink turned to Tanner. "You think they heard me?"

  Tanner didn't seem too happy. "They heard you."

  "Why do you think they're not hopping to let us through, then? Mentioning the word User used to open so many doors in the past." Hoodwink glanced at the trapped sentry. He eased off a bit more—the man was looking a little sick—but he didn't release him. Hoodwink wasn't sure if Angry-Scar was bluffing when he said no one cared about the man. "I don't suppose the password would help?"

  Tanner shrugged. "It's worth a try." He turned to Angry-Scar. "The password is Nefarious Malarkey, and the call phrase is, Ever catch a raven in the dark?"

  "That were yesterday's!" Angry-Scar said.

  Hoodwink pursed his lips. "What's your name man?"

  "Man?" Angry-Scar said. "You're calling me man, now? What happened to krub?" He looked to his comrades-in-arms. "The gol's calling me man!"

  Some among the others chortled.

  Hoodwink decided this wasn't going to work, and that this new breed of thugs-turned-pikemen really didn't care a whit for each other. So much for honor among thieves.

  He released the trapped sentry. The man immediately fell back onto his arse, and shook his head, wheezing, unused to the sudden flow of blood in his face again.

  "Let's go, Tanner. We'll go back Outside and do what you suggested earlier."

  "Not so fast." Angry-Scar slid his pike toward Hoodwink's belly. "No one treats my friend Pratus here like that. You owe me a blood debt now, gol. And I intend to see you pay it."

  Hoodwink was about to repeat his pike-snatching and head-crushing maneuver when a voice stopped him.

  "What's going on here?"

  A newcomer appeared, standing in the street behind the pikemen. The others immediately gave him room. He looked vaguely familiar, but Hoodwink couldn't place him. He was a tall man, well into his middle years, with a bald head and a face lined by years of hard living. He wore a long-hilted sword at his waist, and two silver skulls were pinned to the high collar of his sealskin jacket. The bronze bitch seemed a little loose on his neck, as if it didn't really quite fit there. Maybe he'd recently lost a lot of weight and hadn't gotten the bitch resized.

  The newcomer seemed to recognize Hoodwink though, because his face lit up and he strode forward eagerly.

  "Well if it ain't Hoodwink Cooper," the newcomer said. "Your ugly face is the last thing I expected to see causing trouble round here. You're looking better than ever I have to say. Haven't aged a day, by my reckoning."

  "He's a gol," Angry-Scar said.

  "Why, he certainly is," the newcomer said. "Looks a bit like the Calico though, don't he?" The newcomer swatted Angry-Scar's pike away from Hoodwink's belly. "Get that out of here! And open the gate for our good guest." When none of the pikemen responded, he rounded on them. "I said—"

  The pikemen jumped into action.

  A winch turned somewhere inside the guard room, and the portcullis raised with a CLANK-A-CLANK.

  When the gate was up, the newcomer came forward, arms wide as if to embrace him.

  Hoodwink smiled knowingly at Tanner. "See my friend, my name opens a few doors now and again." He spread his own arms wide to receive the newcomer.

  At the last moment the newcomer swiveled to the side, came round behind Hoodwink, and hit him a good one in the back of the head.

  Hoodwink staggered forward a pace.

  "That's for abandoning the Users all those years ago," the newcomer said.

  Tanner made to intervene, but Hoodwink raised a warning hand.

  Another blow caught him in the ribs, and Hoodwink stumbled to his knees.

  "And that's for abandoning Ari."

  Hoodwink could hardly see for all the stars. Those blows seriously stung. It was a good thing he was a gol, able to ignore physical pain. But the mental pain was worse. Abandoning Ari.

  The newcomer came back around to the front again, and waited.

  Hoodwink staggered to his feet, rubbing his head, holding his ribs.

  "Still," the newcomer said. "You came back for Ari, eventually. That has to be worth something. And I reckon it's good to see you, in its own way. Well, get on with it then—don't just stand there, come inside. The Den awaits!"

  Hoodwink and Tanner ducked beneath the underside of the portcullis. The pikemen gave them a wide berth, not sure if they were supposed to scowl or grin, and most decided j
ust to hold up their weapons all wary-like.

  "When are you going to tell me who you really are?" Hoodwink said as the newcomer led them into the street beyond.

  "You haven't figured it out yet?" The man grinned. His mouth was as toothless as a street brawler's. Not a pretty sight. "You, the master of the hoodwink? It's me. Al. Alan Dooran? I rescued you from that courthouse ten years ago. Put the healing shard on your leg. Introduced you to the Users."

  Hoodwink stumbled a few steps, and had to stop. "Al? Al Dooran? The Al Dooran I knew was a man in his eighties!" Al Dooran had served under the previous Leader. "You should be dead!"

  "Ain't that the truth!" Al said. "But I'm alive! You see, when it became clear the gols would hunt the previous Users down to the last man, I went into hiding. Escaped the Great Purge. I came to this place and hid away from the gols, and from the world itself. I fit right in, truth be told. Not so strange, given my past."

  "But you're not old anymore!"

  "Well. I ain't exactly young. More the right age, I would say."

  Hoodwink still couldn't fathom it. "How did you do it?"

  "How do you think? I accepted the collar. Gave up vitra. It was something I was thinking about doing anyway. I didn't want to go the route of Leader and the others. Dying of old age at thirty-five years old didn't quite seem right in my books. But you know, it was the strangest thing—when I gave up vitra I never expected the ravages of age to reverse. No one did. Ain't any other User ever done it, far as I know. Give up vitra, go back to being collared, unthinkable! But I did it. In a year, I looked sixty-five. Another year, fifty-five. And on it went. Of course, my hair didn't come back. Nor my teeth. And my skin is still fairly wrinkly. But at least I'm my actual age now. My actual age! It's an amazing feeling. Course, I'd hoped to get a bit younger, but that just wasn't in the cards."

  "I actually believe you," Hoodwink said. "Mostly because you still talk like an old man," he added wryly. He glanced at Tanner. "What do you think?"

  Tanner nodded. "It makes sense, sort of. Take away the collar, and the simulation reverts the avatar to its previous state, resetting the age flag. Takes a few years to filter through, but eventually his avatar resets itself."