Light burst out from our lantern-flame, announcing our path forward as we strode into the cathedral. Dust danced and jumped to the pace of our footsteps, as if in celebration of the new arrivals. New arrivals, after decades of abandonment. I placed my hand on a mottled pillar, caressing the cold stone. It had done its job well, upholding the building faithfully for however long, in spite of its dereliction. It endured for a church without a congregation, a god without followers, and for a people who could not acknowledge it. Upholding faithfully, desperately, the vestiges of a glorious past.
I blew the dust off my fingers, watching it swirl around my frosty breath, smiling bitterly to myself.
And here we were, to destroy it.
"If we don't find anything here…" The thud of a boot kicking a pew echoed across the hall "…I am going to rip that brat's head clean off."
"Shut your trap, Gilligan. We don't have to deal with that city for the next couple of days. Surely that's a positive."
"Not sure about that," I grunted, crouching down to check under what remained of the altar. "I'd rather get down dirty with those protestors, than doing whatever the fuck this is."
"What a good little state bitch!" Gilligan grinned, touching his forefingers to his temple in mock salute. "Long live the King! Maybe if you keep your ass nice and tight for the Corporal, he might let you suck his dick next time."
"Heard little Stevie's been keeping his ass tight too." I clenched my numb fists in anticipation. "Money been scarce these past weeks?"
His face darkened, ice blue eyes staring through mine, and he stormed over to me.
I tugged uselessly at his hands grabbing my collar, forcing me back over the rubble of the altar. It brought me some kind of glee to see fury branded in the face I so despised. His wavy, greying hair whipped around his face in a furious dance. Cold, sunken eyes brought alive, bulging veins flowing with boiling blood and wrinkles so deep they might as well have been carved in.
He rammed his fist into my face. Once. Twice. I kicked him back before a third. I paid for the glory of the moment with the blood flowing from my nose, hot liquid trickling down my chin and splattering across my uniform. Dark blotches spawned across my vision, and I flailed my arms wildly, trying to retaliate. Fighting through the horrible ringing in my head, I wrestled him to the cold floor and we writhed like rabid dogs in front of the pitiless stone idol, whose lifeless eyes watched with nothing more than disdain.
A deafening roar erupted from his mouth, and I felt a snarl twist my face as we thrashed and fought and-
The room echoed with a fiery bang, freezing the two of us.
"Peter, get Gilligan off him." The fourth of us stood motionless, his smoking handgun pointed at the ceiling. "I've found the trapdoor Corporal was talking about."
Peter's boots hammered the ground as he rushed over, struggling to break Gilligan's furious grip on my bloodied uniform. After a considerable effort, his grip loosened, and I felt him roll over to my side, breathing just as heavily as I was. Peter dragged him away, muttering something about "self-control"
"I'm going to kill you one day, scum." He growled, hacking up blood furiously. "And God knows my patience is running thin."
The feeling was mutual.
Pain throbbed through my face as I lay alone on my back, and the thumping of my heart in my head drowned out the increasingly distant mutterings of my comrades. I panted like a dog, groaning as I grasped at my nose, attempting to stifle the blood flow.
What the hell was I doing here?
I could be at home, I thought. Home, sweet home.
I laughed at the thought.
I held no fondness for the place, for its narrow, winding streets, filled with prostitutes, criminals, and addicts. For the suffocating, pungent smog that choked and killed at the whims of the City, corrupting the flowery snow into a wet black mass. For the omnipresent, biting cold, making you yearn for fire, even on your own flesh, just to escape it for just a moment. The hunger, the gnawing hunger that turns you into another of the masses, tearing at your brothers and sisters for morsels, for crumbs.
For crumbs.
No, I thought, stifling my growing anger. Being here was better than being home. Bloodied, injured and bruised, laughing to myself, in an abandoned cathedral on the desolate outskirts of the country. Kneeling in front of a forgotten god, a useless statue.
This was far better than home.
I stared blankly at the god's dusty, crumbling feet for some time. I glanced up at the eroded statue, regarding its figure properly for the first time. It was ambiguous at best. Any defining features of the robed man had been eroded away by time, save for his dispassionate, pitiless face. His arm was outstretched, as if he were pointing at something. Perhaps the motion would be clearer if he had either of his hands remaining. There were traces of intricacy and detail left on the statue, perhaps the work of some master sculpture of centuries past.
My eyes found the eroded words carved into the floor before the statue.
Unwearying Beershiram, father of fire and gatherer of death. Bringer of life and despair to those held dear.
I sighed longingly, warm air fogging my vision ahead of me. Father of fire? How comfortable.
I smiled, running my fingers across the cold engravings, and clasped my hands in mock prayer.
"I…bring these thoughts to you…" I cleared my throat, looking around tentatively. "…because, well, I don't really have anything else to do. Father of fire, right? Would you mind getting me some…uh-warmth?"
I spluttered away into the silence.
Beershiram stared.
The cold bit into me, fiercer than before.
I sighed, wiping the dust off my uniform, bowing my head and staring at the statues feet.
"It's just fucking useless." I muttered. "What am I even doing here? I wanted something of my life... Something good…worth something more...try to escape the damned orphanage. But I'm just- " I couldn't stop myself laughing out. "What am I? Nothing's changed." My hand ran gently down the fabric of my uniform, the one I would spend hours admiring just a couple short years ago. "This- this doesn't mean anything. If anything, I'm just… another pawn for those pigs."
Beershiram's eyes stared into mine.
My shuddering breaths wavered as frost in the air.
I got to my feet. "Yeah, well... Sylvian's never answered anything for any of us, so worth giving you a shot, right?." I cleared my throat again, my voice gaining confidence. "Oh Death Gatherer, I'd like you to hear my prayer."
I stepped back a bit, to the patches of fresh blood on the altar. I wiped my hands across the altar and, squeezing out some fresh blood from the wounds on my face and my nose, collected enough in my hands.
Crimson blood, sustaining life.
I prostrated myself before him, painting the grey stone of his feet dark red. I clasped them with steady hands.
"I offer to you a blood sacrifice, so please, make something of me and of my life, Lord Beershiram."
My voice echoed through the cathedral, accompanied by the sound of my gentle breathing.
I laid prostrated for moments, basking in the unexpected peace of the moment, and waited for the inevitable interruption to my reverie.
Silence.
I opened my eyes, staring at the floor, my breathing picking up pace. My ears strained, listening out for footsteps, voices, anything at all.
Silence.
I sprang to my feet, bloodstained hands shooting to my handgun. Scanning the area for the trapdoor they'd supposedly found, I swept forward , cursing under my breath. I kicked open the trapdoor open with a thud, pointing the gun down the stairs, heart thundering in my ears. I swallowed, urging my hands to steady.
Movement in the periphery.
My head span to my left, to the statue of the Father Of Fire.
My heart dropped, charioted by the defiant shaking of my hands and a faint ringing in my ears.
Why was its face bloody?
A scream burst out from the womb of the basement, shattering the silence. In spite of all my military training, I froze. My ears were filled with distant bellows and cries, gunshots with the sound of an inhuman wailing. Screeching, crunching, crying, crying, crying.
Frost and fear danced in the air in front of me, framing Beershiram's bloodied face perfectly. His grey eyes burned into mine, asking me the eternal question.
"Isn't this what you wanted?"
I paused, my breathing ragged, listening to the throbbing of my heartbeat. My mind raced, trying desperately to figure out what had happened to them. Attacked? Yes, gunshots and screaming. By? What? What could possibly attack them in here of all places? Animals? Maybe animals, the crying did sound like an animal's.
Did it?
My breathing intensified. It didn't. No. It definitely didn't. Not like an animal. A human? Not a human? Then what, what did I hear, what did they fire at?
I swore, my grip tightening around my shaking gun.
I shouted. "Peter? Levi? The fuck-" I clicked the safety off. "-is going on down there?"
I couldn't make out anything looking into the basement. I didn't dare light a lantern, from fear that something might jump out at me. And I waited, breathing heavily, for that something to crawl out and find me.
So I wouldn't have to go down there myself.
Sweat dripped down my face. My hands trembled in the silence.
Nothing happened.
A low groan escaped my mouth, and I looked back at Beershiram. Hestared at something past me, through me, as if it was done with me. As if its work was done.
"Damn you…" I muttered. Gritting my teeth, I stepped down the stairs.
The darkness was impenetrable, suffocating and strangling any thought of return in my mind. . My stomach lurched with each step down the staircase and the rotting boards sagged inwards and cried out under my weight.
With every step into the darkness, my hands trembled just a little more.
With every step, the ringing in my head sounded more and more alike the wailing I'd heard before.
With every step, my mind emptied and became more alike the void I dared to cross.
Silence.
I called into the dark, and before I had finished my sentence, knew my comrades would not answer me. Whatever had happened to them, they weren't of any help to me now.
The walk down was not long enough for me to prepare. My body jolted as I reached the bottom of the steps, and my eyes strained to see in the dark. I holstered the handgun, and with baited breath, lit my lantern, my thundering heart heralding what was to come.
The encroaching darkness retreated from the light, and the abyss receded.