Filaria - Brent Hayward [73]
Joseph grabbed Mereziah’s arms and pinned them tight while Crystal Max managed to hit him again, and again, until a wiry man in a grey uniform rushed over, crab-like, to restrain her.
“You shit,” Crystal said, panting. “You disgusting old bastard! Whydja kiss me?”
Mereziah tried to apologize but his upper lip was already swelling and he tasted blood on his tongue. One eye was beginning to shut.
“What the fuck did you think you were doing?!”
“I wanted . . . I thought . . .” He looked away, mortified. “I’ve never kissed a girl. I thought maybe you wanted . . . I’ve never kissed anyone.” Not a lie, since he and Merezath had refrained from touching lips, all those years ago. He looked down at the catwalk, through which he saw mists below, and he wished he could fall through the grille, fall down to be with the dead forever.
But then he would have to face his parents.
He did not want to weep but tears stung his eyes. My goodness, he thought, I’ve lost my mind. “Look,” he said. “I’m sorry, Crystal. I don’t have an excuse.”
He looked up.
No one was listening to him.
No one paid him any attention whatsoever.
His arms came free easily from Joseph’s loosened grip. The entire group was looking in the same direction —
There were four. Two abreast, the soldiers filled the nearby bend in the catwalk. Looming. The catwalk creaked under them. Without a doubt, these huge humanoids were the captors Crystal Max had told him about, standing silent in their dark uniforms, eyes glimmering red in their black faces. Their weapons were long, sinister, and raised.
“Hello,” one said, in a bass voice.
The four of them seemed to exude chuckling.
“You people have crashed the wrong party. We’re going to send you back through the hole you crawled out of.”
Mereziah tried to get to his feet. “Do not harm these people. As representative — ”
Flames erupted slowly, surreal, an upward curving tongue that made little noise, merely a popping sound at first. From the muzzle of a gun, the fire reached out to gently lick at the large lady — who was quiet now, of all times, as if at peace — and immediately burst from her clothing, engulfing her. Yet she remained silent, ironically, throughout this, until, with a groan, she pushed herself to her feet — showering sparks, ablaze — as if she’d just remembered a chore undone. Then, forced to reconsider, she sat back down again, in the roar of fire, to land on a pillow of sparks.
The stench of her death was horrific. Through those flames, which were already waning, Mereziah watched the woman’s skin char and crack and seep forth all the boiling liquids that had once given her life.
When her corpse toppled, the soldiers advanced, perhaps to incinerate another victim, but they were too large for this narrow place of floating paths and steam. Too substantial. They jostled and rocked, out of their element. More flames arced up before them, glowing, throwing off intense heat.
Behind Mereziah, someone scrambled to their feet and started running but Mereziah did not have a chance to turn and see who it was because from beneath him came a terrific rending sound, the sound of the world tearing apart, and the catwalk snapped, spilling its contents.
With ancient reflexes, Mereziah threw his arms out to grab hold and cling to the chain railing as the entire catwalk swung down. There was a sickening jolt, and it felt as though both his arms were torn from their sockets, but he found himself hanging painfully, swaying.
People plunged past him: the veiled woman; the burnt corpse of the silenced screamer; Joseph. As he searched in panic the chaotic and upended surroundings for Crystal, a giant fell from above, where it had somehow been holding on, making an awful racket as it passed him, clattering and flailing to be swallowed by the steam far below. It left