by Brock Law
scooped up his towel and bag and trudged to the showers.
Beneath an invigorating cascade of hot water, Will’s fears fluttered away into transient consciousness. He blanked the emotions from his head and concentrated on the scaling temperature. As he stood under the spout, one hand on the tiles for support, his body drifted from side to side. Each droplet that rained down encapsulated the odors of anxiety and seared them from his flesh. The tension began to melt. His muscles loosened, and his arms fell at his sides. He raised his face to the water and let it pour down his nose and mouth. A cloud of steam billowed around him, masking the rest of the locker room. As he unstiffened, he reached skyward, nearly touching the ceiling with outstretched fingertips. The joints in his back and shoulders cracked as he elongated. His hands came to rest on his neck and massaged the heat into his skin. When Vivienne’s soft form reentered his mind his eyes opened, immediately transfixed on the beads of water rolling down the tiles. Will remained idle as the passage of time faded beyond his comprehension.
The seedlings of heroism were beginning to grow beyond their roots. Like little vines, he felt them creep and reach around his brain. They tapped into each area of his cerebrum to exert influence. Feeling more dexterous, sharply aware, stronger in lung, harder hearted, rhetorically dominant and burgeoning with free courage, his whole body changed. Stoked by the flame of a bold spirit, an industrial furnace of smelters and cranes set to work bracing him from inside out. The iron in his blood, the calcium in his bones and the copper in his skin bonded together into the keystone that now supported the burden of two thousand years of strife. If only the product of his environment and his weathering of hardship, his body and mind were adapting. The singular goal of each was fitness, the success of which was no simple pay out, but another day treading the delicate balance of life and death.
Then there was the other option, the perilous ascension from both. This seemingly forced enlightenment refused to loosen its stranglehold on his mortality. He could turn back from the winding murkiness of the forbidding road into the unknown, but really there was no choice. Since boyhood, pop culture had bred him for adventure. However, one of the oldest romantic legends, the symbolic allegory for the pursuit of virtue and strength, was now the principal ingredient in demolishing those things. Of course, though, that was why so many fictional champions perished along the way. Whether it was by accident, unworthiness, or through loss of faith that they met destruction, they still took the chance. It was what they were supposed to do, yet it was the path that Will could not decide to journey upon willingly.
Then again, it was truly possible. Real eternity was within reach. Perhaps it was only as far away as Franklin’s mantle. Maybe it was no accident. Maybe he was special. Albeit young and unqualified for such a task, he was confident that he was a good man at least. Why then, he thought, should it be done? God forbid his motivation be greed or lust, because he knew the story well enough to realize that those blinding deceptions were fatal. All he truly knew was that someone needed his help. So despite his lack of understanding, the calling nagged. It was possible. It was attainable.
When Will finally emerged from the locker room it was dusk. The field lights had come on, under which bats had begun to feed. Besides these, the stadium was empty. Only his own shadow stretching across the end zone, and the ghostly murmur of ancient audiences kept him company. With a keen eye on the darkness, Will shuffled down the bend of the track towards the back gates.
The distant skyscrapers’ patchwork of offices and apartments glowed. The headlights of the cars on the adjacent highway scorched the underpasses beside the stadium. At the nearby university hospital, the ambulances made an alarming racket. This triggered a grim response from Will who was, until now, accustomed to their presence. He watched one go shooting over the South Street Bridge at full tilt, sirens blaring. Another returned quickly to port a few seconds after, but with only the lights flickering silently.
Among the brick arches that made up the concourse that surrounded the stadium, Will paused. Above his head was the underside of the bleachers. In front of him were the rail tresses and the river. The only other thing between him and the city was the shifting of indigo to violet and the approaching darkness in the east. He dropped his bag and leaned up against a column to admire the skyline. It must have been the odd friends he was keeping, because he was getting pretty good at looking like he was posing for a gallant portrait.
Were it not for the motion of the heavens, Will was otherwise convinced that the Earth had stopped turning. Time and space tangled together into a mess of cosmic spaghetti, tossed and sprinkled with spicy flakes of roasted supernovae. However, he was no common traveler, no historical annotator and certainly not a casual observer. It watched him back. Whatever he was fighting, and whatever he was fighting for, it was out there somewhere.
Footsteps came around the corner of the stadium and ended Will’s solitude. They stopped a few archways down from where he rested. It was strange for any maintenance crew to be working that late at the complex during the summer, but Will didn’t pay any mind. His gaze continued to search the swirling chaos in front of him for answers.
Two more sets of heavy steps emerged from behind and came to a halt at the end of the concrete path. A conversation began in a deep tone. To Will it was only a mumble of guarded voices that hummed down the tunnel. Though inconspicuous, the disturbance was just enough to break his concentration. Realizing the hour, he reached down for his bag.
Then something distinctly un-English caught his ear. He stopped mid bend, fingers just short of the strap. It was just a word, but the harsh rolled consonants were irrefutably Germanic. Apart from his pupils, Will froze.
His spine pulled him back up, creaking at every inch. Once straightened out, he went back into paralysis. The owners of the voices weren’t visible. He was still obscured by the column, glued to the bricks. He remained motionless. Hard and commanding, then with the slither of a double ‘S,’ the speech rumbled low.
The lowest vertebrae in Will’s back pivoted a hair backwards. The next followed, adding just a fraction more. Like dominoes each disc slid away in succession. Yards past the impeding structural support, the background became clearer as he shifted. At the corner pylon, four brawny men watched the campus. Every interesting scent that passed sent theirs heads jolting in different directions as they let their noses point the way. A sudden spin wheeled one around towards Will. Glossy, burgundy eyes winced until they locked on to him. A mouthful of wolven teeth unhinged.
“Schnell!”
That was all Will needed to hear. Reflexive as a jack rabbit, he shot down the walkway, flaring up a cloud of dust. A thunderous equine stampede followed him. He didn’t dally to turn and verify the circumstances of the pursuit, but assuming the worst, immediately peaked at top speed. A few seconds later he emerged from the archway, and leapt on to the grass.
With a lifetime of mandatory sprints and defensive avoidance, he expertly skirted a hedge and cut into an alley between darkened class buildings. Racing past marble entrances, he skipped over the pavement, searching for an outlet to a more pedestrian area. A hounding parade of snarling beasts clamored in his wake, puffing fervently, but otherwise chasing after the sprightly collegiate athlete without suffering.
Will bounded out of the alley with an Olympic burst, as his hunters ardently matched his pace. As he sped through a modest quad and turned on to the next sidewalk, he caught a quick glance over his shoulder. Behind him, the red-eyed ogres crowded in an aerodynamic group. As they passed beneath a streetlamp, their fangs glistened with salivating desire. Fluttering over the street like a pack of gargoyles they hissed and bit the air.
Funneled into another alley, Will gulped down his fright. Up ahead, the alley closed tightly, narrowed and was blocked by a decorative planter. He hopped up, kicked off of a short wall, and jumped out into the street. Behind him, only a gallop away, his pursuers filed up over the blockade with the same agility.
Will locked on
to a street sign and changed his baring. He banked into the next turn, and flashed between two parked cars without making contact. The pursuers bumbled and bumped into each other to squeeze through the gap. Will looked back again with heightened dedication to his survival. Upon seeing the flanking surge of the chasers who fanned out in a line behind him, he dug into the asphalt.
Now nearer the bridge at the edge of campus, the street was seasonally vacant. Careening down the far end of the stadium, he spied the Penn Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Maybe someone he knew, some friend of his dad would let him in. Another invigorating bolt of self-preservation inflamed his tensile legs, fighting off the rubbery exertion that threatened to degrade his tenacity. With a boost, he charged flat out.
Knowing the courtyard gate would be closed, he swung around the corner into the adjacent parking deck. He vaulted over the checkpoint barrier into the empty garage. Dismayed and exasperated, he saw nothing for cover. The patrons had checked out, the researchers were gone and university police had reported elsewhere. The whole place was vacant, and the status of the museum was likely the same. Now at the edge of his toes,
