(Previous)
I had
never pictured myself as Moses.
Walking
at the head of this group made me nervous.
I was much happier when Maggie or Davis took the lead for a bit, but then I had to worry about what they were
going to run into. Lady -- the head of
the locals, none of whom gave names -- sometimes went out there as well, as did
their overgrown talking monster. It made
me nervous to see even them out ahead of us for fear that something would
happen --
Of
course something was going to happen.
Edmond
was walking with me and being uncharacteristically quiet, which I also didn't
trust. Oh yes, paranoia in full bloom
here.
"What's
bothering you, Edmond?" I finally asked, rather than leave it all in my
head.
"Everything."
"That's
no help."
"Then
you shouldn't have asked." He gave
a sigh. "Okay. First is that odd creature up there. I've never seen anything like it. It didn't come from Elsewhere and it isn't
from around here, I'm sure of that much.
So that means it came from yet another place."
"Yes,
probably," I agreed. What did I
know?
"We're
heading for a door to another place. It
might be his place. I don't think I want to walk into a world
filled with them."
"If
the door lead to his home, why hasn't he gone there?"
"Maybe
because he's crazy and is protecting humans rather than eating them."
"You
have a dark, dark mind, Edmond."
Edmond
stopped and looked up at me. "Look,
I put myself in his position. I imagined
myself with these weak little things all around me, and here I was, alone. Maybe kicked out of home because I wasn't
sane. I didn't want to be alone. So there I am, and I make friends with the mice.
I protect them. What would you think?"
I
didn't say anything, but I found myself looking at the creature again.
"Yeah,
that's what I thought," Edmond said.
Well,
that certainly helped my state of mind.
We
were making remarkably good time, though.
These people were used to traveling through this maze of ruins. They were also good at finding unexpected
food, mostly in the form of mushrooms and other fungus. They picked everything along the way and
clearly shared with each other. I still
couldn't see how they managed to survive, though.
"I
wonder how long ago this happened," I said to no one in particular.
"My
guess would be about fifteen years," Davis said. "Too much is still standing and I heard
a couple of the others say they hoped to find a store that hadn't been
plundered yet. This is something that
happened in the memory of this generation.
You can see it in their faces."
"But
why?"
"Don't
think this group will tell us."
Davis looked up at the city hanging over them. "You had some contact. What did you
learn?"
I
hadn't thought about that since I woke up.
I had purposely shoved it out of my head and I tried not to shiver as it
came back now. I looked around the area,
at all the ruins, the dust, the feel of death.
"Mark?"
Davis said.
"They
want magic. That's about all I can say
about it," I replied softly.
"They know we're not from around here. They know we have magic, but they don't seem
to think that we're any threat." I
stopped and considered it for a few steps.
"And you know, that might just have been pure luck. I don't know much about magic at all. If she'd caught hold of you or Maggie
--"
"She?"
"Yes. She had a voice, there in my head. Calm.
Cultured, if you know what I mean.
A sense of self-worth and no sense of worth for anything else."
"Not
my favorite type of person," Davis replied. He glanced up and away quickly. "They don't look up. I think it is a way not to draw notice. If you notice it, the city will notice
you."
I
thought about it for a moment.
"Attracted by the magic, maybe.
And you know, that makes me think that city is like a big mouse
trap."
Davis
glanced at me, at Edmond, at the sky and away.
He walked on for several steps.
"Illusion," he said.
"Or more than that because there is something solid up there. But not what it seems. Do you think the rest of these people know
what it is?"
"I
think if they do, they know enough not to look at it and not to talk about
it."
Davis
gave a nod. We said no more. Not right now.
The
day was going from light gray to dark gray and would soon be black again. I could tell that Lady was looking for a
campsite. Edmond had come back to be
carried. I thought about how easy it
would be for him to disappear in the darkness and we'd never know what
happened. I was glad to carry him.
A
cold wind blew past us --
"Cover!
Cover!" Lady yelled, waving towards us.
Her own people had already dived down into whatever covering of debris
they could find. Children cried and were
silenced.
The
wind roared and growled as I scrambled to find some cover. I held tight to Edmond because the wind was
so strong I could barely keep from being swept away and he wouldn't have a
chance. He burrowed into my jacket and I
thought I could hear him cursing and hissing in turn. I wasn't near to a wall. I had climbed clear of them, looking for a
place to camp.
And
it cost me. I could see something in the
darkness that spread across us; something huge in a cloud of dust that rose
around it so that I couldn't see the shape, even when it swept down at me and
caught me up in the cloud as well.
To Be Continued. . . .
995 Words
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