The Great Beyond- the Vile Fate

by K M McGuire

  Women and children huddled together, cupping each other’s heads, trying to comfort each other, having now seemed to come to the realization that Adetia was under the rule of a new oppressive empire. As the cries for help were lost in the echoes surrounding the room, Voden saw, with great sadness, the Azuchons grunting harsh commands and occasionally jabbing the blunt end of a spear at one of the prisoners. Voden winched as a mother, whose child was pushed aside, tried to defend her family. The Azuchons beat her to the ground until she stopped moving. The child was left to cry over her limp form.

  As he looked at the cages they were in, one turned his focus towards Voden and pointed his finger. The swell of people soon threw the blame of their turmoil on him and Andar, each word filling his chest with a congestion of shame. His jaw trembled, watching the eyes of those trapped, his family and friends, though he did not know all of them by name. He could see reflections of his mother in each of their eyes, and the loneliness was cold. Voden knew this was the end of freedom, all of which he now felt was his fault. His ears caught the conversation at the doors, where Eigan’s voice rose to an impatient volume.

  “No, I think it best that you stay with our guests,” Eigan said calmly, edged with a sharpness of spite.

  “But,” Koruza gulped, “am I not your humble servant? I have researched tirelessly for this moment! Surely you mustn’t think this is only for you?”

  “Koruza,” Eigan said coolly. His tone no longer held warm emotions. “You must relax. Your part of the journey is over. The rest is for me to fulfill. You are Kintza’s messenger, true, you were listening to him through the orb, following his directions. But I am Zigralime’s. His word is far more important than the prince’s. In the end, the general follows the orders of the king.” He scanned Koruza’s grey features, as though looking for an argument, but Koruza sighed and nodded.

  “Of course,” he said, and stood next to Yael. She glared at him, which caused Koruza to mumble about how it was too hard for him to see and put himself near Voden. He looked at Voden, a bead of sweat toppled down from his massive forehead. “It could bear pleasurable to have an up-close viewing of our guests.” He chuckled quietly and looked at Voden. His crooked planks of teeth only disgusted Voden more.

  “You were a means to an end, too,” Voden whispered back.

  Koruza’s smile faded quickly at the comment. It was a small pleasure, even if it wouldn’t last. The height of the doors again took his thoughts. He glanced at the iron holding the timbers together. He almost marveled at the structures, wondering if there had ever been a time when the doors were closed before now. Eigan exchanged some words with an official looking soldier standing between him and the door. The soldier nodded obediently, cracking the door open for Eigan to walk into the square. The door closed, and he turned himself to face Voden.

  “What’s next?” Yael asked Voden. He shook his head.

  “He’s starting the ceremony,” Koruza whispered excitedly.

  “What ceremony?” Vec grumbled.

  “Kintza’s awakening,” Koruza responded softly. His beady eyes glistened. “All of my research into the metaphysical realms is finally paying off! And the science! Oh, the waves we’ve made! To think this city had secrets that pushed our limits even further!” His eyes became clouded with joy. “One would almost think that whoever built this city knew this day would come.” He smiled wickedly, chuckling soundly to himself. Queasiness rooted in Voden’s stomach, watching the sporadic glow of orange flash along the ancient whorls etched in the wood.

  “I’m sorry, Grandfather,” he whispered to himself. He felt tears collecting around the bottom of his eyes. Perhaps there was never meant to be closure in life. He stared at the grain door, wild and old, cervices that were stitched together to hold the tree tall and proud. A flashing thought entered his mind about fire, tasting the wood, unable to satiate its craving for more, until it was reduced to hardly a memory. Who cried for the memory of a tree? Who would cry for him?

  The pounding of drums turned his attention forward, fearing the monsters behind the egress. The drum pummeled the skin of some vanquished creature. The cry it made pleased its master. His mumbled pleas could not keep the door closed, and it opened to the fullness of the drums as Voden’s knees turned brittle from the chanting that raised his hair on end. He could feel the energy eagerly pulsing like shaman summoning spirits; something he wished to be far from, and they mocked him by rubbing their intangible bodies against his back. The half-men pushed them forward, fear woven between the friends. Koruza jittered with excitement, staring into the brilliant light that flooded from the square.

  “Here, Voden, we start your journey to the Beyond,” Koruza whispered eagerly to him, as they walked into the fallen city of Adetia.

  The square had erupted into a clash of sound orchestrated by a black figure standing before a massive burning pyre, his arms lifted proudly in the air. Voden was pushed through the door, and the square was an aberration of its former glory. Rows of seats were lifted high in stands that had been erected at the fringe of the square. It was packed with men and women, uttering an eerie chant that made Voden’s skin want to creep off his bones. At the top of the stands were the drums; massive and spaced around the edge, surrounded by their own pit of fire. On either side of them, the drummers beat a hypnotizing rhythm that echoed to the stars shrouded by smoke. Deep base notes of some strange instrument ebbed through the weaving smoke, flickering ambience as the crowd watched the procession walking between the stands.

  They looked as though they had been summoned from nightmares. Many had parts of themselves melded to glinting plated metal, each with one eye glowing in different colors, some of which were cloaked with masks of dilapidated and distorted features. Yet the most vile features that some of these masks had were the smiles or lack of a mouth all together. They glowered at Voden, sneering and manically laughing as they walked towards a lonely, black altar set behind the crooked remains of the Well.

  But Voden’s discomfort wasn’t formed by the black altar, or the massive monolith pulsing plum beams of light along the strange, angled lines forming an unwelcoming owl along the obsidian face of the stone. He looked at the figure pulsing in the stone, and he saw the orb he remembered from Koruza’s laboratory, socketed at the top of the owl’s head, staring fixed at the ground. He knew without being told that that was Kintza’s third eye, and it had been watching him since the beginning. It came from the churning eagerness that seeped from the crowd’s mouths, like maggots feasting on flesh. The sounds only grew as they moved closer to the altar. His attention was gripped by the sporadic flares of purple light shooting up the cracks of the odd statues and pillars, like blood flowing through veins. His eyes lingered on one of the statues: a strange looking woman with a piece of her face shattered, as if she were a broken doll. There, sparks of purple light whipped from the void left that should have been an otherwise complete head, as though they were trying to rebuild it. Each column had a blazing fire, licking amethyst tongues at the night sky as if ready to taste the depths of nothing, mocking the veil of eternity.

  Voden saw the cords attached to the bottom of the statues and columns, and they began filing together until they met at the mouth of where the fountain once stood. Melancholy took hold of Voden as he looked on the broken remains of the Well, where only a small portion of the desecrated crystal stood, curling like a bloodied dying finger. The rest was lost to the chasm. But the shadow of the black altar loomed so heavily over the fallen symbol that it was hard to not keep his eyes from turning to the block in front of the ritual fires.

  How quickly all the memories were abandoned for the new order of the world. Closer now, they could see the man hovering over the slab of obsidian. White lines glowed along the altar, and a slow noise of sliding stone arose from the top, spreading further the light, while a caliginous plate rose from inside. It settled in place with a dull rumble, and the white light became a muted purple, dowsing the cloaked man with a terrible color tha
t only shrouded him more. The crowd grew with vigor as spindly armaments curled out of the side of the altar, flickering with lines as if stretching from a long sleep. They fixed themselves above the slab like fingers ready to pluck a ripened fruit.

  They stopped a few meters away from the altar, and the cloaked figure turned to them. His smile was now visible in the light of the altar, and anticipation blossomed from the flames behind him while the odd lines of radiance decorated the shadowy table. It was Eigan, mania turning his eyes wild and black, holding a crooked gold knife in the air in victory. The crowd grew as fanatical as Eigan’s eyes, and within a few moments, Voden heard the chorus of chains jostling around as a group of Azuchons dragged a prisoner up to the table.

  They forced the prisoner’s shoulders down with a brutality that made Voden cringe, while a set of the armaments pressed down on the individual’s legs and neck. Voden heard a muffled sound puffing fearfully behind a gag of cloth.

  “This is the price we must pay!” Eigan cried, clear enough for Voden to hear over the squirming cheers and violent whooping and chanting that came from the crowd behind him. The black Azucrepyh must have made his voice project above the din. “For over forty years, we have set our eyes, focused on this journey! Mountains of hours poured into our research and planning, so that we, on this day, could tear open the prison of our fallen lords! For those who were wary of what we are about to accomplish, tonight is the night your patience is rewarded!” Another cry of pleasure caused him to pause a moment and absorb the praise. “Tonight, we will bring Zigralime’s great general back from the Collapsing Plane, so that with his guidance, we may have an army whose power is far beyond any that this world has ever seen! Their time of oppression is at end! Let the heavens hear the agony of the innocent to pave the road for a king worthy enough to deliver us to the Beyond so we can take it as our own! For only our lord has the ability to shed the lies we have been fed!”

  He gripped the knife in both hands and brought it down, burying the blade deep in the chest of the person who lay on the altar. A spout of black blood sprayed Eigan’s unwavering face. At that moment, the man on the table bellowed a harrowing cry that was barely muffled by the cloth. Voden shudder at the thought of a human being capable of making that sound. He heard the fragments of all his nightmares laced through the resonance of the cry. It caused Voden to stare at the face, yanking back with sheer pain, and as Eigan pulled the knife back, dripping with thick sludge, he knew that it was Andar. He wanted to refuse the revelation. His voice screamed out Andar’s name, hearing it as if he had been pulled from his body.

  He dropped to his knees, hoping to drown out the only sound that haunted him worse than seeing Andar contorting from the pain. He hardly noticed Vec pulling at the guards, trying to rush Eigan, or Yael almost succeeding. It didn’t register when the guards beat the end of their spear against Vec’s stomach or slapped Yael across the face. But he heard Koruza, who sounded as though he was laughing, relishing the cheers of the crowd that overpowered Voden and his friend’s anguish. Voden winced and trembled at each downward stroke and each upward pull of the knife, while Andar writhed and twitched, blood dripping all across the table in a wave of red. Finally, Eigan thrust his hand inside the cavity, squeezed Andar’s barely beating heart, and yanked it up, sliding his knife along the ventricles, separating the heart from his twitching body. Blood was squelched from the cut veins and fell defiantly onto Andar’s spasming face. Eigan held the heart high in the air for the crowd to see, and they rose with lustful glee, screaming loud enough to awaken the night.

  It was done. Andar’s blood bubbled from his chest, unable to pump, and there was nowhere for it to go. Voden beat his hands against the ground, sobbing uncontrollably. His head touched the earth, shaking worse than he could remember. The dirt became soaked with salty lamentations, as every word left unsaid became quivering repeats of I’m sorry. Though he couldn’t lift his head, he heard the clicking of the mechanical fingers digging into Andar, simultaneously pulling out segments of metal from the table, quickly stitching the pieces to his flesh. They moved relentlessly, flinging particles of blood into the air, shaking the body with their careless precision. Finally, the last arm was handed a scarlet cube by Eigan, whose glow seemed ready to sit inside him. The arm slowly lowered the Azucrepyh into the chest, finalizing the ritual.

  “YOU CAN’T DO THIS!” Vec bellowed, still striving to break from the grip of the guards. The cube disappeared inside the cavity, and a glass cover materialized in flashes of bright hexagons. A single second of motionlessness, where the whole crowd remained breathlessly silent before the body began to shiver and jerk. The Azucrepyh fumed with light, and awoke behind the viewport. “DAMN YOU, EIGAN! DAMN YOU ALL!” Vec pulled his shackles, hoping he could break the bond, determined to break Eigan’s neck.

  Eigan held Andar’s heart, smiling at him. The Azuchon yanked at the shackles, and Vec responded by throwing his elbow at the half-man’s head. He hit him surprisingly hard, causing the behemoth to stagger back, and the bond of the shackles stuttered enough for his hands to slip free. Vec was not able to savor the moment, however, as several Azuchons flanked him and began beating him vigorously.

  “Let him be,” Eigan said to the guards. “He is, after all, our guest. He cannot be converted if he has not seen.” They nodded and lifted Vec, bloodied and weak. The Azuchon he hit grunted and slapped the shackles back on his wrists. Andar’s body suddenly stopped jerking, as a burning red light flashed to life in the brazen chunk attached to his skull. The crowd cheered, greeting their new brother. Eigan unlocked the bindings, allowing for the bastardized creation to stand next to him. Eigan handed him the heart and pointed him towards the monolith, and he took a moment to whisper something to him. Eigan guided him up to the bowl carved into the surface. Andar, or the shell that was once him, placed the heart inside. The bowl burst into flames, judging every surface of the organ. The crowd now grew oddly silent. Andar stood before the structure, staring up at the image of the owl that flashed along the stone, and with a strange, slow movement, the polygons attached to his arms shifted downward as though it was unwilling, but could not disobey this being’s will.

  He turned his head back around and stared with that horrid red at Voden. “With this sword, I break the bond placed on the Collapsing Plane! Rise, great prince!” He lifted the sword high in the air and thrust the blade into the rock, until his hand hit the stone. A rumble shook the slab, and it cracked, turning the crowd to another bout of silence. It took a moment, but soon, a purple light ebbed from where the sword pierced the monolith, and it slowly lit violet. The lines carved into the stone filled with the light, making its way up to the orb set at the top. It began to drain into the globe as the filigree on the gold orb filled with the fuchsia light, finally working its way to the lens. Deep behind the glass, a spark of purple swirled a split second in the void, and then another. It burst forth a beam that looked like wine pouring up against gravity, wishing the sky to be drunk off its glory. It burned through the clouds, lighting the sky, shaking an eruption of noise that could have collapsed all of their ears. It was only Voden, Yael, and Vec looking at the beam with dismay as it scorched the heavens, while every other knee bowed to the ray.

  And it grew. The beam widened, encompassing the whole monolith. The bloody purple outline of the owl became swallowed by the brightness, until the owl flashed white in the monolith, bleeding out its lines to form a white doorway. Their eyes were now bleached by the sudden illumination of energy, and their arms involuntarily lifted to gaze at what stood in the brilliant doorway.

  The beast of gold placed a harrowing taloned foot across the threshold of the portal, pounding apprehension into the dirt with the gleaming swords attached to its feet. The beam shrunk back inside the orb, shifting nervously back and forth, as the white entryway birthed the massive head of the wicked owl from Voden’s dreams. It was difficult for Voden to wrap his head around something trapped inside his subconscious manifesting itself. T
he lid to the third eye slid back in the raptor’s head, separating the horns for the orb to set inside. The owl stepped forward to fit the sphere at the crown of his head. The metal pieces clicked and shifted, sliding back around the orb, holding it firmly in place. It rolled quickly into the socket, adjusting to its new home, and finally settled its sight on the creatures standing before him. He made his final step out of the dimension, as the blazing ivory doorway pinched shut. Kintza’s pupil-less eyes stared as if they were lost in the Collapsing Plane, holding nothing but fearful reflections as his head turned to the audience.

  “At last!” he said, exultation echoing in his chest like a ringing bell. His voice needed no amplification to be heard. “I am free!”

  “Glorious Prince Kintza!” Eigan exclaimed, bowing to the gigantic metal bird. “We welcome you home!” He sounded almost as if he was beginning to tear up.

  The mechanical third eye spun sharply, peering down at Eigan. Kintza bent low, his golden head inches from Eigan, scrutinizing the tiny priest. Silence took the breath from the congregation, transfixed by the interaction between the priest and the incarnate deity.

  “And who must you be?” Kintza said, his voice deep and metallic, rumbling coolly through the night.

  “I am the one who has freed you,” Eigan responded as calmly as Kintza asked.

  Voden was almost impressed he could hold that horrid smirk with the behemoth staring down on him. Voden felt his legs tremble at the height of Kintza. His head was large enough to swallow Eigan, and Voden suspected Kintza would think little of it. It was what Voden hoped for most.

  “Eigan,” Kintza muttered. “Fortune serves you well.” His vacant eyes sparkled glossy streams of light that danced from flames burning around the altar.

  Eigan, still smiling contently, stood defiant to the blackness of the eyes, unable to be consumed by the void. The brazen bird flicked its eye away from him and reamed it into Voden. Voden felt the consistent scrutiny, churning the contents of his stomach, feeling the bile gurgling at the abstruse beam that settled on his forehead. It urged Voden to sink deeper inside and offered him an odd seduction that nearly spoke out of the beam. Voden tore his eyes away. Vec shook his head, giving Voden a languished expression. He was drained of all color.