Rollerskater: Penumbric
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This instalment contains scenes of bloody violence.
Not long after the first days, when all things had been given form, and men had emerged into the world to exist among the plants and animals, at the beginning of things, before all the great heroes of myth and legend had come about, before even the most ancient recorded history, there once existed a great and powerful people, who came to rule the world.
These people, beautiful as they were terrible, came to build for themselves a gilded empire, whose powers and strength surpassed any that came in its wake. From the ashes of their eventual destruction came the foundation of much human society that was to follow – from the Mesopotamians, to the Egyptians, to the Minoans, to the Greeks, to the Romans, and beyond.
But their power was not always so great. As all great people, they had started as humble and ignorant, the mysteries of the world having not yet been revealed to them. This is the story of how this forgotten people rose to power, their way of life, and how, ultimately, they were destroyed.
It begins, as these stories often do, with a humble man of simple means, a man who is known as Ur.
Ur was a mine-worker of little more than twenty years. Though the difficult and often dangerous labour of mining for copper ore had given him a body of fine muscle, he was not a scholarly man, and knew very little about the world. To him, all things were the work of the gods, from the wind that blew through the valley where his settlement lay, to the rains that watered the crops, and the sun that brought warmth. He had no need to believe anything else. He worshipped the gods and feared them, and made sure to stick to their dictates and precepts.
It happened one day that Ur was digging in the mine, as he always had since boyhood, seeking copper ore that could be smelted to fashion weapons and containers. He struck at a wall of sandstone, when he noticed something shining in the dark. Perplexed, Ur struck at the wall again, and uncovered more of the glowing material. He struck the wall several more times, until he had unearthed what looked to him to be part of a seam of a strange, white crystal, with veins of gold running through it. It emanated the sound of singing.
Now Ur became fearful – for he had never seen such a stone before, and therefore, it must belong to the gods, not men. Unsure how to proceed, Ur decided there was only one course of action: He must seek the counsel of his brother, whose name is also lost to the ages, but who came to be known, and is known, as Geb.
Geb was wiser and thinner than Ur, and worked as a philosopher and advisor to the valley’s leaders, about whom we know very little. Still, Ur knew that Geb would be able to advise him on such matters, as his brother was cautious and learned, and it was his advice on spiritual matters that Ur trusted most.
Ur arrived at Geb’s home a little after noon, and asked to speak with him. Geb had been carefully considering the flight of birds, seeking a pattern in how they flew, so that he might be able to divine information from it. When his brother arrived, he looked very flustered indeed.
‘What is the matter, brother?’ Geb asked. ‘You look terrible.’
‘I feel terrible,’ Ur said. ‘Brother, I have stumbled upon something in the mines. I believe that it belongs to the gods. I need your advice on what I should do.’
‘What do you mean?’ Geb asked.
Ur paused for a long time in thought.
‘I have found a crystal that shines like the Sun,’ Ur said. ‘And it sings. We must make haste, brother. I should not wish to anger the gods and invoke a curse upon both of us.’
Geb seemed sceptical, but he trusted his brother, and so the two brothers went together, back down the valley, and into the mine.
Ur led Geb through winding passages and walkways, until the two of them reached the chamber where Ur had been working.
To Ur’s horror, a group of his fellow workers had formed a small crowd around the unearthed crystal, and had set about digging more of it from the earth. They had unearthed a whole seam of it, which sang sweetly, and yet disturbingly all the same. He cried out in terror.
‘Stop!’ Geb shouted. ‘What in the name of the gods are you doing, you fools? Did nobody ever tell you not to meddle in the business of the gods?’
The workers stopped at once.
‘We’re sorry,’ said the foreman. ‘The singing drew us to it. We simply could not resist our curiosity. Forgive us.’
‘It is not up to me to forgive,’ Geb said. ‘You fools may have just doomed us all!’
The mine workers began to quake in fear. Ur joined them. The singing stones continued, but now their song sounded mournful, menacing.
‘We must seek counsel with the elders at once,’ Geb said. ‘Only they can help us out of this mess now.’
Geb led Ur and the others out of the mine, and they went back up the valley again, in search of an audience with the elders…
*
“Would you look at the face on it!” Chelsea Rose said, with a laugh.
“You can’t see the expression on her face,” Dolly said.
“No, but I can feel it,” Chelsea replied.
K-Os was sitting across the kitchen table from them. Socks was leaning against the kitchen counter, and Liberty was sitting on top of it. K-Os was scowling in the manner characteristic of her.
“I am going to ask you one last time,” K-Os said. “Will you change your minds about this…suicidal plan?”
“We know where Daisy is being held,” Dolly replied. “We know how to get there, and SAID-MI5 doesn’t know that we know that’s where she’s being kept. We don’t know what they’re doing to her there, or what they’re going to do to her. And every second we waste brings us closer to catastrophe. We’re going to save her, K-Os, whether you like it or not.”
“Then you’re stupid,” K-Os retorted. “The British government will kill you for this.”
“On the contrary,” Dolly said. “This is when government response will be slowest. Didn’t you see the news? They’re preoccupied at the moment. We’ll outflank them.”
“That’s a naïve attitude to take,” K-Os said. “What happened to Seymer is going to raise suspicion that one of our people is behind it. If anything, SAID-MI5 are going to be even more on their guard.”
“Then we’ll break her out or die trying,” Chelsea said. “I’m not letting her rot in that shithole any longer.”
“Nobody is talking about leaving anybody to ‘rot’,” K-Os said. “But if you get yourselves killed, then that leaves me alone against the world.”
“You’ve lived sixty-million years,” Dolly said. “You’ll be fine.”
K-Os raised, then lowered her eyebrows.
Dolly continued: “Clearly, it’s down to us to help ourselves.”
K-Os was silent for several moments, before she spoke.
“It seems there is nothing I can do to change your mind,” she said, softly, yet forcefully. “In that case, I will not be joining you. I’m going to travel to London to meet with Harri-Bec. In the unlikely event that you succeed, that is where you will find me.”
“Sounds good to me,” Dolly said. Her eyes drifted to Socks and Liberty, who had been quietly and patiently listening. “And what of them?”
K-Os turned to Socks, who gazed back at her.
“Socks will come with me,” she said. “Liberty also.”
Socks’s gaze moved from K-Os to the floor.
“Actually,” he said, “I don’t think I’ll be doing that.”
K-Os knitted her brows.
“What?” she said.
Socks cleared his throat.
“I owe it to Daisy to help get her out of there,” he said. “I’m afraid I’m not coming with you, K-Os.”
“You could die, you stupid bastard,” K-Os snapped.
“I’d rather die trying to do right by someone who has every reason not to trust me than sit around hoping. I’m sorry, K-Os, but I’m going with them. I’m your friend, not your lackey.”
K-Os turned to Liberty. “And you?” she said. “Will you be going with them as well?”
Liberty turned her gaze away, facing her back to K-Os, as if unable to withstand her gaze.
“I’m going with them, too,” she said. “My father is also a prisoner of this government. He would want me to help.”
K-Os deflated somewhat, withdrawing into herself for a few moments. She gazed down at the table, her hands balled into fists. Then she stood.
“Very well,” she said. “Then I leave you all with this: I am sixty-million years old. And after the first few million years, you stop tallying the deaths.”
She looked down at the ground, sadly.
“I wish you all the best of luck.” She swallowed. “…luck is the only thing that can save you now.”
She looked around the room at the faces looking back at her, and then turned to leave.
“K-Os,” Socks said. “Wait—”
It was to no avail.
K-Os left through the front door, and using the Chariot of Fire, sped away further than he could follow.
*
…Geb and Ur arrived at the communal dwelling of the elders, and asked to speak to them at once. At first their request was rebuffed, but when Geb warned that grave consequences may be about to fall upon the valley, they were allowed in to the sanctum where the elders acted as advisors on matters both immanent and transcendent.
There were ten of them, for ten was a holy number – ten was the number of fingers and toes the gods had given men when they were created, and so things were counted by tens. It was thought that it must therefore be a special number. The elders, therefore, never numbered more or less than ten.
‘What is the meaning of this?’ asked one of the elders, a very old man.
‘Please forgive us, O wise ones,’ Geb said. ‘While working in the mines, my dear brother has unearthed a seam of stone nobody has ever seen before – a stone that sings. We fear that we have disturbed a god’s hoard.’
‘A god’s hoard, you say?’ said an old woman. ‘And you fear the gods may be vengeful?’
‘As we are sure you are aware, it is known that the gods may bring great floods and ash from the sky if they are profaned,’ Geb said. ‘Please, you must come now!’
The elders rarely left their commune except for the most serious of occasions. It was quite significant that they all agreed to come. All, that is, but one.
She was by far the eldest and most mysterious of the elders, an old crone, short in stature, who was known for her powers of vision. She was also known for her stubbornness, and frequently went against the judgement of even the most respected of her fellows.
‘Fools!’ she said. ‘Do not disturb the seam. It will bring great destruction.’
‘How can you know that if you haven’t seen it?’ said an old man.
‘I have seen it,’ she protested. ‘Heed my warning, young men!’
At this, Geb and Ur were left frantic with worry, for they knew that the seam had already been disturbed by Ur’s fellows.
‘Pay no mind to her,’ said another old woman. ‘Her faculties of reasoning have diminished with age. We shall come with you to inspect the seam. Then we shall deliver our verdict.’
So it was that Geb and Ur led the elders, excepting the old crone, back through the settlement and to the mine. As they travelled, people stopped where they were to kneel and pay respects to the elders.
They reached the mine, and descended together, following passages and chambers once more, until they reached the seam. Ur’s fellows had erected a set of barriers around the seam, to form a cordon, presumably to avoid profaning the seam any more than they already had. The seam continued to sing its strange, wordless song.
The elders gazed up at it, some in awe, some in contemplation, but all in fascination.
‘It certainly seems divine,’ said an old woman. ‘There’s no doubt about that.’
‘Yes,’ said an old man. ‘But you might say the same of the flight of the bird, or the laughter of the infant. Yet it is not blasphemy to eat the bird’s flesh. Nor is it blasphemy to grow to manhood.’
‘Indeed,’ said another old man. ‘But those are things we encounter as part of our everyday lives. Birds and babies are easy to come by. But this is rare. Therefore we should consider that it belongs to the gods. I say we seal the mine.’
‘Nonsense,’ said another old woman. ‘Is it not true that sometimes stones are found, grey and dull on the outside, but when broken open by other stones, they shine with precious stones within? How is this any different?’
‘I disagree,’ said the first old woman. ‘Those stones are inert. But these are alive with light and sound. No other material ever encountered behaves this way. We would be fools to assume that it should be considered part of the mortal world.’
‘I concur,’ said another old man. ‘Who is to say that the world is not itself round and hollow, and that this forms part of its interior? Why, if this seam is mined, it could cause the world to split in two, just like a geode!’
The debate continued like this between the nine elders for some time, and they could not reach a consensus. Four thought that the stone was something holy, and should not be meddled with, and another four thought that it was simply another type of stone, albeit with strange properties, but they thought the stone must have been put there by the gods for humans to use. The one other, who could have broken the stalemate, could not decide one way or the other. When the argument was made that the old woman who had stayed behind had said not to meddle with the seam, her opinion was dismissed, as she had arrived at her conclusion not by reason but by simple intuition, and it was felt that a situation as potentially dire as this needed more careful thought than simple heart-feeling.
After a time, the elders fell silent, befuddled for the first time in a long time by the strange, singing seam. They could not come to an agreement.
Geb and Ur had been standing, listening carefully to the debate. It was then that Geb realised that he, with his brother’s help, could break the stalemate, but only if the elders would let him overrule them.
‘Wise ones,’ he said, dropping to his knee, ‘Forgive me, but if you cannot come to a judgement, then do you deem it appropriate that my brother and I should decide what is to be done?’
The elders were shocked, but they knew that there was little that could be done – it fell upon Geb and Ur.
‘It will have to be you,’ said the first old woman.
Geb then turned to his brother. His brother was uneducated in the spiritual, but Geb told him that he would need to be a holy witness to his communion with the gods, and that by doing so, he was forever spiritually linked to whatever Geb promised them. Ur was frightened, because he knew what this could mean for him, but he agreed, and so the ritual commenced.
Geb removed his clothing, folded it and gave it to his brother, then, before the singing seam, he repeated a holy chant, usually reserved for situations of spiritual importance; births, matrimony, cremations. He danced rhythmically and breathed shallowly, throwing himself against the walls of the mine, bloodying himself, violently throwing himself into a trance that was said to allow direct communication with the gods.
After more than an hour of this terrible ritual, Geb threw himself to his knees and shouted to the seam: ‘O Great Ones! If we disturb thy seam, punish not our valley, not our rulers, not our elders, not our friends! Punish me, Geb! Punish my brother, Ur! We give our bodies and souls to you if we have done wrong by you! If we offend by disturbing this seam, strike us down on this very spot! Spare the others!’
Now the mines fell deathly silent, but for the singing of the seam.
‘Ur,’ Geb said. ‘Get your mining tools. I want you to dig into this seam.’
‘What?’ cried one of the elders. ‘You’ll both be killed!’
‘Better we than you,’ Geb said. ‘Ur, now!’
Ur looked to the elders, then to his brother. He withdrew his mineworking tools, and in his hand lifted a crude stone pick. With a cry of terror, he ran at the wall, striking it with the pick…
*
“Central Government War Headquarters?” Socks asked aloud.
Chelsea, Liberty and himself were crowded around Dolly Mixture’s computer, a Hewlett-Packard that wheezed when asked to complete any task more complex than opening a document. She had loaded up a map on the screen. Socks noticed that Liberty seemed fascinated by the whirring machine as much as she was repelled by it.
“It was built in Wiltshire during the Cold War, under Anthony Eden,” Dolly explained. “It was built to ensure a continuation of government, had nuclear war broken out between NATO and the Soviet Union.”
“A bomb shelter?” Chelsea asked.
“Yes,” Dolly replied. “It’s an underground complex of sorts, meant to protect against fallout. It quickly became obsolete soon after it was built, as the first Soviet ICBMs came into production during its construction.”
“So why is Daisy being held there?” Socks asked.
“It’s fallen out of use in recent years, but it’s still owned by the Ministry of Defence. It seems that after the Episode, the site was handed over to SAID-MI5 for use as an internment facility. That’s where they’re holding Daisy.”
“Hippie Girl got all that from the string-things?” Chelsea asked.
Liberty cleared her throat, then paused, as if not sure how to say it gently.
“I’m standing right here, Chelsea…”
Chelsea’s face went a bit red.
“Er, yeah,” she said. “I knew that.”
“You’re right, though,” Liberty said. “While I was in there…in the strings, I mean…the shelter spoke to me.”
“It spoke to you?” Socks said, incredulously.
“Yes,” Liberty replied. “It was calling out, begging for a world-ending war. It was likening it to…”
Liberty shuddered.
“I can confirm I spoke to it,” she said.
“It sounds like we’ve got the right place, at least,” Dolly said.
“So, what’s the plan?” Socks said. “We’re just going to walk up and ask them to let Daisy out?”
“Not exactly,” Dolly said. “Myself and Chelsea will ride her motorbike. With luck, we will catch the Army unawares and distract them. As long as both of us stay on the bike, we’re invulnerable. While we create an uproar in the East, so to speak, you shall strike in the West, gaining entry to the compound from the sky. Once you have freed Daisy, we’ll make our escape.”
Socks bit the inside of his cheek.
“It doesn’t seem like a watertight plan,” he said.
“Well, it’s the best idea we’ve got.”
“Hold on,” Socks said. “You said you’re going by motorbike. So how are me and Liberty meant to get there?”
“Well…” Liberty said, quietly. “I was going to carry you.”
“If I recall correctly, the last time that happened, we almost died.”
“Only because one of my wings was shot through. I’ll be careful this time around.”
“That’s very thoughtful of you,” Socks said. “However, I don’t want you to risk your life trying to save my hide. I’ve got a better idea.”
“Really?” Dolly said, indignantly. “You have a better idea? I’d love to hear it.”
“Oh, I don’t want to spoil the surprise,” Socks said. “But believe me, I’ll be there, and you’ll know it when you see it.”
*
…There was a sound like thunder, then silence.
In his hand, Ur gripped the pick, now firmly embedded into the seam. The strange singing sound continued unabated. It was then that Ur realised that he was alive – the gods had not struck him down. Ur turned to his brother.
Geb met his brother’s gaze, then to the elders, breathing a sigh of relief.
‘That settles the matter,’ Geb said. ‘This seam must belong to us. A gift, or test perhaps, from the gods.’
‘I would not be so hasty,’ said one of the elders, who had been fervently against the idea. ‘You do not know that this meddling has not angered the gods. You assume that the revenge of the gods is always so immediate? Sometimes, the gods take their vengeance in subtler ways. You and your brother should be wary. Whatever you choose to do now will make a mark on your spirit. Whether it marks you for reward or punishment is for the gods to decide.’
Nevertheless, the decision had been made, so the elders ceased their arguments, and all agreed to leave Geb and Ur to the results of their judgement. They vacated the mine, and made their way back to the village.
‘What now, brother?’ Ur said. ‘Should we leave the hoard, as the elders said? Or should we see what use we can make for it?’
Geb thought for a very long time, pondering the great seam and its strange song. Ur knew his brother was given to long and thoughtful silences, and so waited patiently for his response.
After many hours, Geb finally spoke.
‘I think we should take a small number of crystals from the seam,’ he said. ‘We shall take them home with us and learn more about the crystals. If we find a use for them, we can begin mining the seam.’
Ur agreed with his brother’s judgement, and set to work digging out some crystals.
The crystals, as it turned out, were very hard and robust, and quite difficult to break with usual mining tools. It was only when Ur found a naturally loose piece of crystal that he was really able to mine the material. It was harder than any metal or stone Ur had ever encountered. Still, he succeeded in digging out a good amount of the crystals from the seam, and Ur and his brother placed the crystal in two woven bags, which they carried from the mine together.
Now the brothers retired to their home with the bags.
A week later, nobody had heard from the brothers. Ur had not shown up for his scheduled work in the mines, nor had Geb turned up to the administrative building where he was posted as an advisor. Concern began to grow from friends of the two brothers. News spread about the singing seam, and it was thought that perhaps the gods had struck them down as soon as they got home. No sound could be heard from inside their house.
In their culture, it was considered unfortunate to enter a home of a stranger without being invited, and so people kept well away, despite their curiosity, for fear that they too might invoke a curse upon themselves.
As the days and weeks went by, people became more concerned. What must the brothers be eating and drinking? Surely they must have run their food supplies out by now. But still, nobody, not even the town’s elders, dared to enter the home of the accursed ones. Even if their presumed corpses were rotting, fly-ridden and crawling with grubs, they could not be removed.
Then it happened one morning, almost two months later, that two strange, wild-looking men suddenly appeared outside the home of the two brothers.
At first, people passing in the street assumed them to be wild men, or perhaps thieves. It was only on closer inspection that the truth was revealed: These men, with overgrown fingernails and toenails, long unruly hair, and full shaggy beards, were indeed the two brothers, disheveled beyond all recognisability.
‘By the gods!’ said a young woman. ‘They’re alive!’
‘We had thought you dead!’ said a young man, one of Ur’s friends. ‘Where have you been?’
The brothers said nothing.
‘They should have starved to death,’ said an old woman. ‘But look, their ribcages are not visible, and their bellies are not distended. They have eaten well.’
‘Never mind starvation!’ said an old man. ‘Without water, they would have died of thirst within days! Yet their lips are not cracked and their skin is soft. They have drunk well.’
Still, the brothers said nothing.
A crowd had gathered, and nearly everyone in the community had come to see the two brothers that everyone had assumed to be dead. The brothers wore serene looks on their face, like they were privy to some truth that was now obvious.
Their next course of action was simply to raise their arms high.
‘Look!’ cried a person in the crowd.
The crowd watched with amazement as from the backs of the brothers issued wings of crystal – wings like those of a bird, but instead of feathers, wings of white-gold crystal that seemed suspended in air like motes of dust.
Now Ur and his brother leapt, and together they flew into the sky, twisting around each other, the wings flapping and carrying them to unthinkable heights. The crowd were as fascinated as they were terrified. The two men flew themselves to the tallest structure they could find – the administrative building where Geb had once worked – and stood atop the roof. The crowd followed them there, gathering around the building.
And in a loud voice, Geb and his brother brought them their new evangel.
‘Friends! We have learned a great secret. If you permit us, we will share the secret with you. It is a secret to wisdom, a secret to vitality, a secret to longevity, a secret like no other. The secret starts with the singing seam. It has opened our minds to the new beginning. Today is the first day of the new humanity. We have risen beyond, and you will join us!’
‘What do you mean?’ someone in the crowd shouted.
‘We have learned the secrets of the stones!’ Ur replied. ‘We have learned the secret of the strings…!’
*
“I really hope Socks knows what he’s doing,” Dolly said.
They’d been riding towards Wiltshire since seven o’clock that morning, and had pulled into a motorway services just outside Reading, a little way west of the M25 boundary.
“He’s stupid,” Chelsea said, her pale white hands clasped around a Costa Coffee cup filled with English breakfast tea. “In a cute way, though. Like a puppy that doesn’t know he’s an idiot.”
“When I first met him, I threw him in a river,” Dolly recalled. “Though, of course, he made it so that it never happened.”
“When I first met him, he didn’t shut the fuck up,” Chelsea said, to which Dolly laughed.
“You should have heard him, Dolly,” Chelsea continued. “He wouldn’t stop screaming in my bloody earholes. He’s a sweet enough fella, but a bit too type-A.”
Dolly smiled, then got out her phone, checking their position on the map.
“We don’t have far to go,” Dolly said. “Are you ready?”
“They won’t know what hit ‘em,” Chelsea replied. “Where’s Liberty?”
“Somewhere behind us, in the sky. She’s told me to look for dog-roses along the roadway – so that even if we can’t see her, we know she can see us.”
“It’s so strange,” Chelsea said. “We know so little about her. You don’t suppose she’s actually a…well, an angel, do you?”
“In the last few weeks we’ve learned that vampires apparently exist. Why not angels?”
“Oh, I’ve known angels exist for quite some time,” Chelsea said, smiling coyly.
Dolly wrinkled her nose half-jokingly.
“Lame-arse flirt,” she said.
They were both quiet for a few moments.
Then, suddenly, they were kissing, and Chelsea had thrown her arms around Dolly’s shoulders.
A few minutes later, they withdrew.
“For the road,” Chelsea said.
“Yes,” Dolly replied. “For the road.”
They jumped on the back of Chelsea’s motorbike.
“We’re going to have to tell Daisy about us,” Dolly said, drawing circles on Chelsea’s shoulder.
“Oh, as if she doesn’t know,” Chelsea replied, muffled by her helmet. “Her gaydar can’t be that shite.”
The bike roared to life, and Dolly put on her own helmet. They peeled out of the car park, shrieking back on to the westbound A-road for Wiltshire.
The bike was too loud, and the pithy banter had ceased. The only thing now was the mission, and their bodies, warm and close against each other, jostling together over the stony asphalt of the roadway.
Dolly looped her arms around Chelsea’s waist, and they sped onwards. Along the roadway, patches of dog-rose came into view, themselves looped around tree trunks and erupting from patches of grass. Liberty was overhead, watching them.
They travelled through the North Wessex Downs, up to Swindon, and then down towards Corsham, which lay just on the south-eastern edge of the Cotswolds. It was there that the MoD base was located.
Dolly felt for her crystal, which she was now wearing on an earring, rather than a hatpin. Such a tiny thing, and yet it was the only barrier between herself and the government.
They were heading south along the A350 when Dolly saw it.
“Chelsea!” she shouted, over engine noise.
“I know,” Chelsea replied.
It was a crisp, clear late-autumn day, and golden sun was hanging low in the sky, illuminating in golden tones the roadway ahead. About one hundred metres away, there was a roadblock, and a set of barriers had been set up across the road. Behind it was a row of soldiers, each carrying a bullpup or carbine rifle. They were aiming their weapons at the motorbike.
“Hold on,” Chelsea said. “I’m going to ram them.”
“Wait,” Dolly said. “What if—”
“Bike’s magic,” Chelsea reminded her.
“Right,” Dolly said. “Bike’s—”
There was a whipcrack of gunfire, and Dolly saw a flash of blood.
Then Chelsea screamed.
She had been shot in the shoulder.
The bike went careening off the road, ploughing through a wooden fence and into a field. They were spared that by the bike’s powers of invulnerability, but when the bike finally came to a stop, they hit the ground with a hard thud, and Chelsea went tumbling into a patch of plants.
“Jesus, Jesus fucking Christ,” Chelsea said. “I’m shot. How am I fucking shot?”
Dolly quickly placed pressure on the wound, and Chelsea screamed again.
There was so much blood from such a small hole, some small part of her was thinking, but the more rational part of her was thinking that the girl she loved was in danger of dying. Suddenly, things weren’t so funny any more. K-Os had been right. They weren’t prepared for this. This wasn’t a game or an adventure. This was real. Real as hot blood spilling over red leather.
But how could she have been shot? They were both on the bike. No bullet could penetrate the bike’s shield. Not even umbric had been able to do that.
The soldiers from the blockade emerged from the hedge, and now all of them were training their guns on Dolly and Chelsea, laying prone. Nothing in their eyes suggested an intent to arrest or show mercy. There was only one thing in their expressions that Dolly could interpret.
It was the intention to execute.
The soldiers raised their guns and fired.
But the bullets did not strike Dolly or Chelsea.
It was only then that Dolly saw the patch of plant in which Chelsea was laying.
Liberty held her hand to Chelsea’s wound, her wings encircling them as a shield.
“You took your time,” Dolly said.
Liberty said nothing.
Chelsea cried out as the bullet lodged in her shoulder worked its way out and the wound sealed itself. Liberty withdrew the projectile in her hand, then, looking down at it, she held it between her thumb and her forefinger. She scowled.
She turned to the soldiers.
“You shot my friend,” she said, holding up the bullet.
At first, Dolly thought it was merely bloodied. It was only when she squinted that she saw.
“You shot my friend with rubric,” Liberty said.
*
…After that day, the people of the valley were changed forever.
It is not known what hidden knowledge the brothers came to possess in their seclusion – that knowledge is lost. Nor is it fully understood how they were able, almost overnight, to transform their entire way of life. But transformed, it was.
The old ways were abandoned; the gods were no longer feared, and all faith in them was abandoned in favour of the crystals that were now mined from the seam by great machines. All who lived within the valley were given wings, and powers beyond imagining.
After gods were done away with, next came kings. The ruler of the valley, whose name is long-forgotten, voiced outrage and tried to assemble a force to destroy the bewingèd ones. The ruler was destroyed, along with their residence and most loyal guards.
The people of the valley decided that none should rule them; as such, they became one of the earliest republics in human history – though to call them ‘human’ by that point would be to deny their might. Their republic, however, quickly outgrew the valley, into a great and awesome empire.
It is said that once the people of the valley began to expand outwards, the unenlightened ones saw them as gods, such was their terrible power and ethereal beauty. Many bowed to them, others worshipped them. All who obeyed were assimilated.
There were some who rebelled – seeing their supposed benefactors as devils in disguise, false gods and adversaries sent to distract them from the way. They attacked their visitors with stones, spears and swords. All who opposed were destroyed.
Back at home, from a valley of simple structures rose a metropolis of sandstone domes and golden spires. Academies were built to teach the knowledge to those who cared to learn. People from far and wide came to the valley, and soon they, too, had become people of the valley.
All agriculture ceased, for no longer did anybody need to eat. The people of the valley had learned how to derive their energy from the sun itself.
Machines were created to take care of what labour that needed to be performed – the mining of penumbric, the construction of buildings, the damming of rivers. These machines, known as homunculi, worked tirelessly and obediently and never made a single mistake. Everyone came to own one.
With no need to feed themselves, and the labour of building things now nearly effortless, the people of the valley began devoting themselves to leisure, and more importantly, to art – painting, sculpture, music, theatre, literature. Their foundation myth became well-preserved. Their stories emphasised the triumph over the gods, and of man’s own ascension to godhood, borne on crystal wings.
For the same reasons, the story of their decline and fall is also well-documented…
*
The soldiers raised their guns against Liberty and fired. In a flash, Liberty’s wings leapt in front of her, but they were pierced by the rubric, which bubbled and smoked, turning her wings, at least partially, into pink powder.
In anger, Liberty held out an arm, and the soldiers were disarmed. They did not, however, seem particularly cowed by this development.
“Stand down, Miss Parish,” said a voice from behind the soldiers.
The three women turned towards the sound.
A stony-faced man was walking their way, a mauve beret atop his head. The Captain.
Dolly gritted her teeth.
“What do you want, you bastard?”
“You fell quite effortlessly into our trap,” the Captain said. “Ms. Mykhailiuk, did you really think we wouldn’t come into knowledge of your plan to break your friend out of internment? Surely you do not assume, as a foreign national, that this government is that incompetent? GCHQ and MI5 have been monitoring you for weeks. Your friend was quite eager to give up her home address upon her arrest.”
“Liar!” Chelsea barked.
“I’m afraid not, Miss Rose. She was quite clear. After that, it was a very small matter. We’ve blocked all roads into Corsham, I’m afraid. You will not be getting anywhere near that compound. Though I am sorry to say that you will be coming with us. You’ve caused enough trouble for this government for one year.”
The Captain took out his Desert Eagle and pointed it at Liberty, then gestured to the other soldiers.
“Arrest them,” he said, then gazed hard at Liberty. “If you try to disarm me again, Miss Parish, I will execute you before you can make the first move.”
Liberty begrudgingly raised her hands and retracted her wings.
“There’s just one thing I don’t understand,” she said. “Why are you using bullets tipped with rubric?”
“Rubric?” Chelsea said, trying to fight off soldiers who were forcing her into handcuffs. “Where’ve I heard that before?”
“A curious material,” the Captain said. “Provided to us by a source I am not at liberty – if you shall pardon my use of the word, Miss Parish – to divulge. I don’t quite understand it. It has many uses. For our purposes, it seems that it can penetrate invisible – some might say magical – shields, such as those which exist around that motorcycle. It has rather evened the playing field, wouldn’t you say?”
“You don’t know what you’re meddling with,” Liberty said, scowling. “That material is dangerous.”
“No more dangerous than allowing individuals like yourself to run amok,” the Captain replied. “Take them away.”
The soldiers approached Liberty. She made no attempt to fight them. The soldiers put her in cuffs, leading her and the other two away from the field.
“What’s really going on here?” Dolly said. “Who are you working for?”
“We’re working for the British government,” the Captain said. “Under the new Prime Minister.”
Chelsea tried to fight the soldiers, much as she had done during the siege at the university, but they were too strong for her, clapping her ankles in cuffs as well as her arms.
The three women were led to a large Mastiff patrol vehicle in sandy beige.
All was lost.
The heavy door swung open and they were forced in to the vehicle with barks from the soldiers.
The door slammed shut, and the engine started with a loud roar.
They were silent for a few moments.
“Shit,” Chelsea said. “We’re fucked.”
Neither Dolly, nor Liberty said anything.
It was stupid, Dolly thought, to have assumed they could have broken Daisy out.
Leaning her head against the metal wall, she listened to the engine groan, and they were steering out of the roadway.
brrrrt-clunk-a-ching
Dolly’s eyes widened. The vehicle stopped moving.
“Did you hear that?” Dolly said.
“Hear what?” Chelsea said.
Brrrrt-clunk-a-ching
“I heard it,” Liberty said.
Brrrrt-clunk-a-CHING
“Oh my God,” Dolly said.
Brrrrt-clunk-A-CHING
Dolly hurriedly shuffled her way over to the back door.
Brrrrt-CLUNK-A-CHING
A voice, over the low grumble of the Mastiff’s engine: “Sir, I’ve got visual on something. It’s…that’s impossible…radar is telling me…she must be closer than that…!”
BRRRRT-CLUNK-A-CHING
“Oh my God!” another voice shouted. “Would you look at the size of that thing—”
An enormous boot, larger than a car, crashed down upon the tarmac next to the van, and inside it was an ankle, about a metre wide. Dolly yelped and fell to the floor, looking up through the window.
Staring down upon her were two eyes like black pearls, set into the placid face of a gigantic woman with ONE etched into her forehead, and standing upon her shoulder, a familiar smiling face.
“I was wondering when they would show up,” Liberty said.
*
…The crystals of the singing seam made the people of the valley and the lands they conquered almost immortal. Though not invulnerable, their lifespans were expanded well beyond anything intended at their time of birth.
And so it was that Geb and Ur lived one hundred and fifty years beyond that first day, yet neither of them had aged even a day since then.
While the people of the valley were, by and large, leaderless, Geb nevertheless acted as a kind of consul, a scholarly, benevolent dictator charged with maintaining order in society.
Ur, on the other hand, acted as a military leader, leading squadrons of winged men and women on expeditions to new lands to explore and conquer.
By this point in time, the people of the valley ruled perhaps a third of the world, their borders only stopping where their superior power was matched by the most cunning of outsiders; those who had become accustomed to the assaults of these superhuman terrors.
It happened one day that Ur returned from one such expedition, embracing his brother. They went to the balcony of the imperial palace, which was far grander than the old ruler’s court had ever been.
‘The world we have created,’ Ur said, surveying the domes and spires which stretched as far as the eye could see. ‘Isn’t it a paradise?’
‘Yes,’ Geb replied. ‘And it is all thanks to that seam you discovered.’
‘Perhaps it was fate,’ Ur said. ‘Or perhaps, it was luck.’
‘We have no need of such superstitions any more, brother,’ Geb said. ‘There is no god but man, and none can govern us.’
‘You are right,’ Ur said. ‘But still, I do wonder what it means – a lifetime ago, I was simply a lowly worker. Now I’m more than one-hundred and fifty years old, and yet I feel no creaking in my bones. I might live a thousand years or more. I have more wealth and power than I ever desired. I simply wonder, why me? Be there gods, why entrust such things to someone such as me?’
‘There are no gods,’ Geb said. ‘We shape our own destiny. It is simple coincidence that you found the stones. I would not think too much about it. We must simply be grateful. The secrets of the strings have moved us beyond all mortal concerns. Let’s just rejoice.’
‘Of course, brother,’ Ur said. ‘I simply find it interesting to think about.’
Geb poured Ur a cup of ceremonial herbal-spiced honey-wine, which was often given to victors of battle. Though the people of the valley rarely felt a need to drink intoxicants, this occasion called for it.
Geb handed his brother the cup and poured himself one.
As they were raising the cups to toast their success, one of Geb’s homunculus guards suddenly appeared at the door.
‘This unit apologises for the disruption,’ the homunculus said. ‘A woman has just arrived at the palace, and she wishes to speak to you.’
Geb and Ur looked at each other, then to the homunculus.
‘Send her in,’ Geb said.
The homunculus disappeared and returned with the guest.
There, behind him, stood an elderly woman. Geb dismissed the homunculus, leaving the two brothers with her.
For a few moments, the two brothers could not place who the old woman was, where they had seen her before. Then she spoke.
‘I warned you not disturb the seam,’ the old woman said. ‘I told you that it will bring great destruction. My prophecy was true then. It is true now. I have come to petition you, foolish rulers, for you have failed to heed my warning. And the time of reckoning is close at hand.’
Geb and Ur were shocked.
‘That was one-hundred and fifty years ago!’ Ur cried. ‘How can you still be among us?’
‘You are both fools,’ the old woman said. ‘All that you have built will soon be dust, and almost none will remember you.’
Geb then became seized by an anger that was unusual for him.
‘How dare you enter my domicile with this insolence!’ he shouted.
He raised his hand to strike the old woman, and she caught it.
‘Young man,’ she said, quietly. ‘You know not what you are meddling with.’
Geb felt the hand cupped around his arm changing. The leathery old skin became taut, more smooth. Then the arm it was attached to changed as well.
Ur cried out in fear.
Before them, the old woman transformed into a tall, thin woman, with violet hair and sparkling blue eyes. Upon her feet, she wore curious, wheeled boots of gold.
‘You know not what you are meddling with at all,’ the tall woman said…
*
Harri-Bec was startled by a knock at the door. She was eating her lunch in the kitchen. She rose from her seat, brushing crumbs from her chest and wiping her mouth as she went to the front door and opened it.
Standing in the doorway was K-Os, soaking wet from the rain outside.
“Harri-Bec…” K-Os said, her face a mask of anxiety. “…I have a confession to make.”
Another time, another place..
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ARC THREE: NEW CULTURE
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