VIII - August and July
Micah's arm hung at her side, the heavy rain crashing over her rotting buildings collapsed on their own foundations, a common scene during the Dark Age. She had since abandoned her crossbow and bolts; they were lost when she was swept up in the twister. She was still draped in a black hood and black cloak, both heavy with rainwater. Her eyes glowed a bright yellow.
"Now what, Micah?" Twister had bobbed up by her side, looking for direction.
Micah huffed, barely audible through the rain. Her piercing eyes flicked down, taking in the water pooling around her boots. "That fake wasn't a part of the plan," she said. "Neither was the Guardian, but at least for the time being they're both out of the picture."
"So… what?"
"We gotta move fast. Before Dryden does something that fucks it up even more." With that, she set off.
Quickly she strode through the grass, the weighted reeds being pushed to the side as she approached the groaning body of Cyrell. He saw her eyes through the rain.
"Hey, Cyrell."
"Mm."
"I don't care if you've turned over a new leaf or not, I still hate you, and I'm still going to treat you the same."
"Mm."
"Glad you understand. It'll always be personal with us." She smashed her heel into his skull, and his entire body convulsed from the impact, then lay still. She spun around on her other planted foot and began to walk towards Dryden. In turn, he began to walk towards Cyrell.
"Den-Mother, I applaud your mercy, but simply killing him will get us nowhere." He spoke without looking at her. "He must be granted a final death."
"Dryden, you sack of shit, fuck you."
Dryden turned to her; fists clenched in anger. "You disrespect the authority I command?"
"Yeah, I do. You're just as bad as him, Iron Lord or not." She kept moving toward him, her speed never wavering.
Dryden had stopped, and his right hand was brought to the great blade sheathed on his back. "You will not be missed."
Micah reached him, and slammed a knife into his right armpit, which lay unarmored. Muscle and nerve were severed, and his arm fell limp at his side. He pulled back his remaining arm and threw it at her, abandoning form and precision. His splayed fingers met the side of her head, sending her reeling backwards a few paces. Micah lurched forward, recovering quickly from the blow, and latched on to the length of Dryden's arm.
"Release, Den-Mother. You have initiated combat with an Iron Lord. If I willed it, you would be branded an enemy of the lords themselves." Dryden spoke through gritted teeth, his right arm hanging uselessly at his side, blood creeping down his side from the wound in his armpit.
Micah grabbed his elbow and pushed, snapping the length of his arm into two useless pieces. She leaped away, massaging her face where she was struck. Her right eye blinked out, the metal twisted and warped where the blow was delivered.
"The Iron Lords aren't all powerful. They wouldn't follow me off-world."
"But I would, you meddling bitch." His arms worthless, his head caught fire. Rain sizzled into steam when it met the leaping flames. The ram's horns glowed molten. He charged at her head-first. She leapt before the ram reached her, predicting his movement.
Dryden leapt after her, shooting like a rocket fired into space. He caught her in the chest, crushing it concave. She fell down to the ground, slamming into the mud and the tall grass, and rolling a few feet. Dryden fell into a roll, and was on his feet before Micah could force a heaving breath out of her plastic lungs.
"The iron lords are well-versed in the ways of battle. You could not hope to defeat me, Den-Mother."
Micah sat up. "Shut up, you-you… fucking… loser. You fucking loser." Her words were interrupted by grating metal gasps, crushed out of her chest by rigid steel.
"HA! Not so witty now, eh?" Dryden shouted gleefully, relishing the shift in dynamic. "You're a real nuisance, Micah. I'll kill you here, in the middle of nowhere, and you will be forgotten." He lowered himself to the ground, bending his legs like a contracting spring gathering potential energy.
He leapt forward, nearly instantly closing the distance between them, his horns poised to pierce her chest and tear through it, ripping through metal and carbon tubing. Just the moment before he struck her, she fell to the side, taking the brunt of the attack in her right arm. Metal shrapnel flew across the field, and a shower of sparks arced down into the grass, smothered by the heavy rainfall.
Dryden was behind Micah, her arm laying in front of him.
"You only extend the inevitable, Micah. A lost arm will only serve to weaken you." He turned to see her holding his belt, cut from his waist during the charge. She drew his sidearm from the holster. It was mostly ornamental, intricate designs chiseled into the metal body, and painstakingly painted onto the leather grip of the handle. Nevertheless, it would get the job done.
"Eat shit, you worthless bastard."
Micah unloaded eleven rounds into Dryden's shocked frame, riddling him with biting wounds. One found his throat, and a gush of blood darkened his fine furs and flowed through the riveted metal of his breastplate. He fell to his knees, and died.
Micah slung the belt around her wiry frame like a sash, taking inventory of its contents, before limping across the field to Dryden's ship. The rain began to let up, turning into a light drizzle. The booming sound of thunder began to move further and further away.
"Twister, Grab-bag, Pup! We're leaving!"
The Ghosts emerged from the brush, and flew to Micah, save for Junebug and Cyrell's Ghost.
"Micah, can't we wait until the Guardian is back up to say goodbye?" Grab-bag pleaded.
"Forget him, getting off-world is a much larger priority right now." Twister replied, his voice scathing.
Pup said nothing.
"It'll take me a bit to figure out the controls on this ship. You have, say, a few minutes to say goodbye." Micah climbed onto the chassis and flung open the hatch, with some effort.
Twister scoffed, "say goodbye? To what? The half-burnt corpse, or the murderer?"
Grab-bag spun around on his axis. "You know, Twister, you don't have to be such a dick all the time. The Guardian and Cyrell's Ghost saved you at the hydroplant.
Twister flexed their body indignantly. "Being grateful is a waste of time. You need to stop being such a sentimental, uh, jerk!"
Pup said nothing.
"Whatever. C'mon, Pup, let's, say, or rather, express our goodbyes."
The two flew over to the pair of corpses, Cyrell's and the Guardian's, both being revived by their respective Ghost.
Junebug looked up, "Is Micah not waiting?"
"I'm sorry, June. She's pretty agitated."
"It's…fine." Junebug went back to his work.
As Grab-bag got sentimental with Junebug, Pup had flown over to Cyrell's Ghost. Pup said nothing, but whirled around, making happy, wavy patterns in the air.
"Oh," said Cyrell's Ghost. "Thank you."
Pup excitedly nodded in agreement. She understood. Pup gave her a final nod and drifted back to Grab-bag and Junebug, awaiting the cue to leave.
"…and I'm sorry she's just leaving you here. I just don't think there's enough room in the ship for your Guardian, and-"
"I GET IT, GRAB-BAG. We'll see each other again at some point, just don't worry about it." Junebug shifted sheepishly.
"Well…yeah. You're probably right. I-I hope you make it back to the city alive."
"Thanks, I guess. Good luck finding your guardian."
Grab-bag turned to Pup, and the two flew back to the ship, where Twister was finishing up flight preparations. Micah was sprawled out inside the cockpit, the small space unaccommodating her long legs.
"Y'all ready? Good, let's get moving." Micah groaned as she sat up in the seat, flexing her fingers before beginning to type on the console.
Just then, a shrill voice rang out from the field. The group looked out over the ship, and saw a glimmering Ghost floating over Dryden's body.
"IT'S A CRIME TO KILL AN IRON LORD, MICAH-10. A CRIME!" Dryden's Ghost was yelling over the din of the thrusters. "WE WILL REPORT YOU!"
"UP YOURS, PRICK." Micah raised her remaining arm above her head and flashed a middle finger. The Ghost hurriedly began reviving Dryden.
Pale rays of sunlight fell through the clouds, reflecting in the latent dew that sat upon the tall grass. The rain had stopped. The ship rose up against the rough backdrop of Chimney Rock, and blasted upwards, breaking through the dark clouds, sunlight spilling in behind them.
"Boy oh boy, that was an adventure!" Grab-bag exclaimed as they flew further and further away from the earth below,
Twister spoke before Grab-bag could continue, "An adventure in death and peril. Pretty much everything went wrong that could. Cyrell showed up, the negotiations with Dryden fell through…"
"And there was the clone, remember?" Grab-bag added.
"Who could forget?" Twister added dryly.
Pup said nothing.
"Micah, do you know what was going on with the clone and all that?"
A moment of silence passed. Micah sat with her hands firmly pressed against the controls. "Our universe is a lot larger than us. There's a lot of weird shit out there. And when the Traveler came to us, it brought a lot of that weird shit with it."
"Profound," commented Grab-bag wistfully.
Micah flexed her jaw, still hurting from the scrap with Dryden.
"I hate Nebraska."
The beast coiled around the heart, orbiting it like a dark moon. Occasionally it would take hold of it and feel its dull beating through a thin layer of tissue. This would always send the beast into a gleeful tizzy.
It rubbed the heart across its body, it gingerly placed the heart in its mouth, feeling it and tasting it with its long, black tongue. The beast was in bliss.
But then, the heart gave its final beat.
The beast stilled, expecting another, pleading for another, but it never came. The beast reached out a long tendril, and gave the heart a sharp prod. Tissue ripped and flaked away. It was no longer a heart, just a lump of bloody flesh. The beast sat in silence for a moment, before it began to weep. Great, heaving cries that shook its whole body and churned the murk around it. The beast mourned.
The pair strode through the tall grass, both tickling and irritating at the same time. They had forsaken the road, fearful of Iron Lords and screaming Ghosts. Cyrell had left them in search of a beast, a beast which would elude him.
"Have you thought about a name at all?"
The Guardian shrugged. A full day had passed since the events at Chimney Rock. About half a day had passed since Junebug told him to think about a name.
"Uh, *sigh*, no."
"So, what have you been doing?" Junebug hissed with exasperation.
"Thinking. About a name."
"What? That's fucking what I just said."
"Oh. I wasn't listening."
Junebug whirled and bobbed. The sky was bright and blue, but the air was cool. They walked in bright light, but the wind chilled the air and whipped the grass into biting blades that cut deep and stung.
"Your name is Junebug. Like the month. I like that."
"I hate my name." Junebug squinted at him, "you know that."
"I like it. It's memorable."
"It's cutesy."
"It's summery. So, I was thinking of a name like it. Something like July or August. Or May."
"You're not cutesy either. They don't fit you, either."
"But I like feeling cutesy. Who doesn't?"
"Probably 50% of the people you've met in the last week."
"Hmmm. Whatever. I'm August now."
Junebug blinked slowly. August shivered from the cool wind.
"Well, I guess it took you long enough. Micah said she chose within a few seconds of waking up."
"Ehhhh, now that I'm thinking about it, maybe I'm not set on August," said July. "Maybe I'll change as the year goes on. Maybe next July."
"Hold on, is it July or July?"
"Who says it like Joo-lee?"
"That's how you say it, except when you're talking about the month."
"Well, I'm the month. I'm Joo-lie."
"So that's it? July?"
August rubbed his head.
"Nah, I'm back in August. Or maybe I was always August."
"You're giving me a headache,"
"I already have a headache. Every step it gets worse."
"Are we close, then?"
The two sought the dam. August felt the beast there, slithering amongst the debris, amongst the water and concrete. Living in the pipes, feeding on dead dreams and forgotten bonds.
August felt the call. The pull of the beast. Oxygen grew cold in his lungs; blood ran backwards in his veins when he felt it. When he faced the dam. The cool wind drew him there.
And that was how he knew where to go.
