Ragnarok

FIFTY-ONE

Somewhere

Hours after his meal, Bishop was back to his senses and walking along the edge of a cliff. The hallucination of killing and eating a dire wolf was hideous and nasty, but that was all it was. The fear and uncontrollable rage had left him, and then, when he came to his senses, he was walking. Bishop walked for hours until he came to the edge of a rocky waterfall without the water, a cliff that ran to both sides of the orange horizon, and dropped hundreds of feet down.

Far off to the right, the land rose along the cliff’s edge to what looked like a natural rock tower. To his left, the plain stretched out for miles. At the bottom of the cliff, the land went flat again, sweeping out as far as he could see, but the ground wasn’t featureless, it was pocked with what looked like impact craters. Thousands of them. All different sizes.

He looked behind him, searching for craters. He couldn’t see any, but the land was so flat and devoid of features that he could be within a mile of one and never know it was there.

He peered over the edge of the cliff again. A flicker of movement caught his attention-a small moving spot near the base of the cliff. Something living. It climbed up the cliff close to where Bishop stood.

Bishop considered his options. Climb down, walk forever to the left, walk forever backward, or walk forever to the right, toward the pinnacle of rock on the horizon. Maybe get a better vantage point. Maybe see another portal somewhere.

The final option was to wait for the climbing thing and see if it could reach the top of the cliff. The ground along the edge was scattered with large rocks and even a few boulders. Bishop had no doubt that he could nudge one of the rocks over, crushing and killing whatever was climbing the cliff face if it presented any danger. He was also sure it wasn’t a dire wolf. It wasn’t white, but rather was a grayish pink. Like it was coated in the salmon dust of this place.

Bishop peeked over the edge again, to look at the thing. He couldn’t see it clearly enough yet to figure out what it might be. It just looked like a speck. He walked a few yards to the right until he was directly above it, then found a good-sized boulder nearby and sat down on it. He let his gaze sweep the distant plains and the craters below the cliff.

A portal appeared, far away on the horizon. The thing looked no bigger than a marble but cast its bright light far across the orange plain. He didn’t think it was dark out there until he saw the portal appear, then, with its new brilliance added to the scene, he realized how dim things had been.

Several streaks of dust appeared from far off on the right, blazing direct paths toward the portal. Dire wolves. He considered making for the portal himself, but it was far. It would take him hours-maybe even days-to climb down the cliff and run across the plain. He leaned over the edge of the drop to check on the climbing thing. It was moving, but too far down to tell what it was or guess at its size. Bishop looked at his watch and then looked back to the portal on the pink-hued orange horizon. Suddenly the streaks in the soil from the dust clouds left in the wake of the dire wolves reappeared. This time they moved from the portal back toward the far right of his view until they disappeared. Then the portal winked out. Bishop looked at his watch. Four minutes had elapsed.

Weird. The portals were staying open for much longer back home.

Then he noticed the spot where the portal had been. A crater was left in its wake. He thought about what he had seen and what it meant. Breathing slowly, he allowed himself to fall into a meditative state. When he came out of it, he looked down the cliff again to check on the progress of the climber.

He moved back to his boulder and smiled. He knew several things now. Wherever the dire wolves were coming from, it was to his right, along the cliff’s edge up toward the pinnacle or tower of rock. He didn’t know if it was a natural formation or not. He looked at the rise again and concentrated on its shape. It didn’t matter. If it was a natural formation, he’d have a better view from the top of it and could more easily spot the enemy. High ground was rarely a bad thing. If it wasn’t a natural formation, then he would have found the enemy. Either way, the solitary tower was his next destination.

He also knew why there were craters here. They were the aftermath of portals having opened and closed. The plains were covered with craters, no two overlapping, with tracks of flat land between them wide enough for a racing horde of dire wolves. Very few free spaces remained. That’s how he would get home. Find the dire wolf source, do what he could to stop them, and then try to anticipate the next portal’s appearance by going to a spot on the plains with no craters. It wasn’t much of a plan, but it was all he had, and it felt good to have that at least.

Finally, he knew what the climbing thing was, and he settled back on his boulder to wait for it. He checked his watch. Another ten minutes passed, when he saw movement at the edge of the lip of the cliff. The thing struggled up over the ledge and rolled onto the ground at the top, just a yard away from where Bishop sat cross-legged on top of his smooth orange boulder.

The thing was humanoid, with thick boots caked in the salmon grime of this place’s ground. Dust also coated its body, and Bishop could see it didn’t wear much in the way of clothing. The hair on the head was long-well past the shoulders, tangled and matted, not too different from a jungle boy in a Tarzan film. It lay on its back, breathing hard from the exertion of its climb.

“It’s about fuckin’ time, Knight.” Bishop said with a grin.

The feral thing rolled to a crouch and looked up at Bishop through the filthy hair. “Bishop? How did you find me? How long have I been here?”

“By my watch, we’ve been here for around eleven hours, but by the looks of you, you’ve been here a lot longer. You okay?”

Knight stood slowly and Bishop took in the sight of him. The man was wearing shorts-the BDU pants he had worn under his armor, but the legs had been cut off. No shirt, and the rest of the armor was gone. Aside from being filthy and coated in grime, the thing that struck Bishop the most was that while Knight had been a wiry fellow before, he was now much better built. His muscles bulged as if he spent a lot of time pumping iron at the gym. And Knight’s hair was longer than it had been earlier that day-about two years of unchecked growth longer. Knight’s hair came down below his armpits.

The two men appraised each other.

“I’m okay. I just didn’t think I’d be seeing you. Or anyone. I think I’ve only slept two times, so I should have only been here for a couple of days.” Knight sounded clear-headed, but he wasn’t making much sense.

“Shin, your hair is down below you armpits and you look like Mowgli the Korean Jungle Man. Your clothes are rags. You must have been here longer than that. Time is funny on this side. I’ve already figured that out.”

“Huh,” Knight grunted. “My watch broke. It only felt like a few nights. Hard to tell day from night, if this place even has one, what with everything being blue.”

Bishop looked around the landscape at the pink and orange hues, then back to Knight. “Remember what Black Five said about other dimensions not following the same laws of physics? I think maybe our brains are having a hard time comprehending things here. Because I’m looking at everything around us-the sky, the ground, even you-and all I see are shades of orange.”

“Orange?” Knight looked around him, then back at Bishop. “I see midnight blue.”

Bishop was about to offer a theory on why they perceived different colors when he noticed something on Knight’s back. A backpack. A very full backpack. He hadn’t noticed it before because Knight’s long hair covered the straps over his shoulders.

He pointed to the pack. “What’s this?”

Knight grinned. “You know I hate failing missions.”