The next morning, as the great ball of fire rose in the sky, Isaac began a resolute monologue on why they should move on. Malika didn’t argue. She did still wish the kind doctor was here, but he was likely dead. Isaac didn’t mention what he saw last night though. He was probably trying to spare her from something he couldn’t properly explain and likely didn’t want to.

Malika had felt the lizard first. Even with her senses muted by Isaac’s Influence, he had been farther away than usual and she was able to feel a decent amount. She had gotten up to warn him, but just as she reached the entrance she felt them. She didn’t notice they were there until it was already too late. First there was just the lizard, and then the 3 monsters were there. Even when they stood there, eating their meal, they were so disconnected from the Earth she could barely feel them. It was like they weren’t even touching the ground, separate completely. Regardless of how dull her connection to the Earth whad been, she had still felt the danger practically oozing off the trio. She had stood there unmoving behind the tarp, barely breathing until she felt them carry the last of their catch off elsewhere. When she was sure they had left she had scurried into the tent, gotten into her sleeping bag and curled up, not knowing what else to do.

It was only then that she had finally accepted Akhil’s death. For that was most surely what had happened. No food or water would be difficult enough by anyone’s standards, but with these otherworldly beings running around at night, he was dead.

How had they even made it the first night? It was only a few giant lizards at first and then slowly everything else had shown up. It was like all the gates of the underworld had been thrown open, releasing these beasts out into the world and they were just starting to move into their new territory. If that were the case, all indications they had seen thus far, pointed to the origin coming from the west. That left their only course to continue further into the rock that surrounded them and hope that they could outpace whatever new horror was spawned by this wasteland.

Packing up all the supplies as fast as possible I stuff most things into the duffel bag and the weapons into the backpack. Pausing, I take one of the 9mm and walk over to where Malika is finishing up breaking down the tent. Surprisingly, she didn’t even so much as bat an eye when I started talking about moving away and further east. This entire morning she’s just been rather subdued. Not really sure what to make of it, but if she’s willing to move out everything is fine in my book.

Standing up at my approach she looks to what I hold in my hand and raises a single eyebrow in question.

“You said you don’t know how to shoot right?”

“I can fire a pistol just fine. I’ve just never handled a rifle before.” She responds

Taken slightly aback, I unload the gun and hand it over. “Show me.”

While obviously not an expert or regular user, it doesn’t take her long to find the safety and cock the gun. Leveling it off, she points it towards the wall of the cavern, steadying the pistol with both hands in a stance that, while amateurish, shows she’s not going to shoot herself in the foot. Pulling the trigger, she dry fires it and I hand over the clip along with the other pistol.

“Nice shot, if you were going for a C-list actress on an shitacular action flick from the 70’s. Just don’t shoot me. Especially not the face, it’s one of my better features.” Her grin following my comment seems to wash away whatever was eating at her.

“Oh, don’t worry if you don’t learn how to compliment a woman soon and properly, I’ll just aim for your balls. After all, if all you know is derogatory remarks, I doubt you’ll be wooing anyone.” She jabs back, adding a saucy wink to finish it off. Coughing into my sleeve I grab the M4 and walk out with the tatters of my dignity. Malika follows not long after and we head off, away from the incoming lizards, foxes, and monsters from the Abyss.

Luckily, as we move on and the shadows dissipate with the morning, the canyon to either side becomes steeper, and vegetation shows up with more regularity. Stopping around midday to refill our canteens at a small pool we found in a crevice, I hear something that I haven’t heard in what feels like years: music. More specifically, of all things, it’s Waterfalls by TLC.

Spinning on a dime I turn to see Malika standing off to the side with her eyes closed and phone in one hand, head swaying to the music. Rushing over I startle her by snatching the phone from her hand like a toddler that wants his toy back. The screen is cracked and battered to no end, but alive.

“Hey! What the hell do you think you’re doing twat! I know it’s old but no need to be a jerk about it.” She huffs in irritation.

Turning to her I ask, “How did you turn this on and how long has it been working?”

“I don’t know it always just kind of worked alright? It survived the crash but there’s no reception out here so I didn’t think it was important. Why is this such a big deal?” She retorts.

Shoving her phone back into her hand I cackle with glee. This is it! This is our break! Tearing open the duffel bag I reach in and pull out a sealed plastic case. Opening it up reveals large bills of currency, in everything from dollars to rubles, passports from several different countries, and other necessary odds and ends if I ever needed to ghost. But they aren’t what I seek. Pulling out a small block of heavy duty plastic I flip it open and press the power button in eager anticipation. The small screen lights up and I punch in the code to ask for coordinates with regards to our current location. As the numbers flash across the screen I tear open a plastic bag filled with maps. Pulling out the world map first I narrow down our location to Algeria. Pulling out a second map I pinpoint our position to somewhere in the Tassili N’Ajjer, an Algerian National Park.

Yelling my victory to the skies I whoop in joy.

“Mind telling me what’s going on?” Malika’s voice brings me back to earth and I excitedly wave her over.

“Alright see this?” I ask holding up my device, “This just let me know where we are. We’re currently in Algeria, in some sort of nature preserve. More specifically,” Pausing for theatrics I begin illustrating with my finger, “We’re here. And not 50 kilometers to the east there’s a causeway and a village/city/town, not sure how big it is, to the North. If we move fast we can probably reach the road by tomorrow.”

“How far is that though? I’m not familiar with metric, here.”

“Oh, yeah, sorry it’s about 30 miles in a straight shot over.”

“Ok. Alright.” Nodding her head, the excitement abates ever so slightly until she looks torn between incredulity and elation. “Now, that’s awesome and all but why didn’t you do this sooner?”

“You weren’t awake when the plane went down, but essentially all electronics cut out. I lost my phone in the crash so I never had anything to test and see if it was some kind of localized EM pulse or something else. It wasn’t until I heard your phone working that I even remembered I had this beautiful piece of hardware on me.” Whatever, she can question me all she wants this news is far too pleasing.

Turning back to the apparatus in my hand I begin punching in the next set of codes, the ones that will relay a message back to home base letting them know that I’m alive but in need of assistance. Sitting there I press send and wait for the code to make its way through whatever satellites and systems it needs to. Faster than I expected, the response crawls across the screen and my mood plummets faster than the soul of a recently deceased politician. It’s an automated response with a dispatch telling all Charity personnel to prepare Doomsday procedures. The message continues and as I parse out the code I find out that restorations of damaged networks are in motion and that the Doomsday preparations are to be made and ready to go but not expected to be enacted. The fact that it’s an automated response is almost as worrying as the fact that whatever hit the plane apparently affected the rest of the world as well. This is a personal transceiver that Balaam should have replied to, but the fact that he’s not behind his desk means either he got special orders from Abraxas, or something happened to Lilith and he’s moving to bail out his sister. Either one of these is cause for major concern.

Keeping my thoughts to myself I look up and find Malika studying the map with as fine an eye as possible. Good, the more we both know about this area the better our chances. I don’t have time to be worrying about the others just yet. I need to make sure I can make it out alive first. We spend the next few minutes trying to determine our exact location among the ravines and gullies that seem to make us this entire region, until we give up and simply plan our route to a questionably vague degree. It officially involves following whatever route East we can take. We might have to do some serious climbing depending on the turns we make.

Packing everything back up except the map, which Malika hangs onto, I dip a cloth into the water and rewrap it around my head to protect me from the heat and the sun. A simple question confirms that we are both in agreement with regards to her phone. While all the predators we’ve observed have come out at night, blasting tunes as we go along, regretfully, won’t increase our chances of survival. Setting off once more, Malika strikes up a new conversation.

One that I’m not all that comfortable with.

“Is Isaac your real name?” she inquires and while her timbre says nonchalant curiosity, the loaded look she throws at the duffel on my shoulder tells me it is anything other.

“That’s… a difficult question to answer. It’s the name that I go by officially. Originally it was my middle name.”

“Oh? So your parents just up and named you Belial? Or are you just going to say it’s difficult and avoid this entirely? I’m a little pissed off I still don’t know your name. Worried I’ll give it away? Who am I going to tell out here?” Her tone had started out slow, measured and cold, but by the end had picked up, and I could feel the heat in her voice reach out and singe my hair.

“It’s not out here that concerns me. And it’s not just my safety and anonymity that I have to worry about. If-no, my bad, When we get back let’s say you drop the name Belial in some casual conversation. This is just one possibility mind you. And someone who’s in the know, which there always is, finds out you might just know all the little details that I keep close to heart, what do you suppose happens? I’ll grant you this: it’s not like the movies. It never is. There probably won’t be threats to your life, after all you’ve probably got people back home who care about you and even if you didn’t the media would notice if you went missing shortly after you got back. But 5, maybe 10 years from now you sit down have a cup of coffee and someone strikes up a conversation with you and you’ve been chatting with them for the week or so that he’s been coming around and then one day, oh yeah! He remembers something about some plane crash way back when! And he’s just so friendly you get to talking and he asks you, ‘oh yeah wasn’t there someone else that made it out with you?’ and you tell him, ‘yeah he was this odd guy'. Then you think ‘it’s been so long that it shouldn’t really matter what I say, I mean he’d never believe me right?’ So you tell him about this arms dealer that went about and had guns in boxes disguised as relief aid and killed this guy named Jethro and it just felt so good to get it off your chest finally after all these years and then he’s gone and you don’t think anything more of it, because hey he was just some guy, right?. But me? The next thing I know my life goes to hell in a hand basket. I don’t worry about people like Jethro coming after me. I worry about people who do their research.” I pause my energy spent and done with my rant, but not done driving my point home, “I don’t fear for my own life Malika. I haven’t feared death in a very long time. I’m a bad man and I do bad things. Those weapons alone would have caused more heartache and bloodshed than a drug pusher could cause throughout his entire life but I made peace with doing bad things when I was 14. But the people who would want to know the little things about me would never kill me. They’d go after my other secrets, the ones that aren’t mine to tell, or they’d go after the people I try to protect. And those things are what I fear the most.”

Silence was my only response and silence is all that was said for the rest of our travels that day.

Gracefully a well-manicured hand lifts the small wine glass to a pair of blood red lips. Moving away from a well-stocked wine rack, the woman with the hair made of gold walks over to a window.

Taking a sip of the amber-colored liquid the woman with the ice blue eyes looks over the city of Madrid. Turning to the clock that sat on the far wall of her current abode, she seems to count down the seconds.

As the clock strikes six, the woman in the emerald green dress snaps her eyes back towards the evening skyline. Just in time for five explosions to simultaneously bloom in great beautiful petals of concrete, fire, and chaos.

At this, the woman with the sinister smile on her lips sits down in an antiquated chair in the well-furnished suite on the 24th floor of the Edificio España.

There, the woman with the fiendish twinkle in her eyes, listens to the sound of heavy booted feet running down a distant hallway.

In the ornate wooden chair, the woman with the high cheekbones eases into the cushions and lets out a sigh that echoes through the expansive suite. Out the window her gaze bore as she sat there, her thoughts hers alone.

In a motion that could rival dancers in elegance, the woman with the long legs stands up and downs the rest of her glass of vintage port wine. Striding over to the kitchen, the click-clack of her heels striking the polished floor resounds louder in the room than the panicked shouting outside the entrance to her gilded cage.

Resting her glass by the sink, the woman with the hair that flowed in waves prepares a meal fit for kings. An hour later she lays out two plates with food that speaks to the soul on a table made of mahogany.

Leaving the steaming food there, the woman with the looks of cunning and sophistication melts away. In her place walks a frightened high-society girl with a hand clasped over her substantial breasts as she heads towards the foyer. With eyes that speak of innocence and belief that the men with guns were telling the truth when they said they were keeping her here for her own safety, she waits briefly in the hall until the sound of rapping knuckles upon the door thunder out from the rectangle of polished wood.

The girl with the quivering lower lip throws open the entranceway to reveal a middle-aged man with greying hair.

“Is everything alright? After I saw the explosions one of the people out here said that someone would be by to explain things to me so I made dinner. But…” Pausing and biting her lip the young maiden with the complexion of an angel hesitates before continuing, “but are you sure it’s safe here?”

Uncomfortable with the dismayed Aphrodite with the watering crystal blue eyes before him the Spaniard revolutionary assures her with meaningless nothings, “It’s alright, nothing can get you here, and as soon as it’s safe we’ll put you on a train out of the country. Trust me Liliander we have your safety at heart.”

Sniffing and dabbing at her eyes, the damsel in distress nods her head to show her unwavering faith in the uniformed Junta leader, “Please, all my friends call me Lilith.”

As night fell and the air chilled, the pair found themselves in a secure, albeit cramped, spot to spend the night. With no room to set up the tent in their newfound shelter, Malika laid out her sleeping bag on the bare rock. She hadn’t asked anymore questions after Isaac’s tirade. She refused, however, to call him Belial. It just sounded… wrong. Like a mask that he was hiding behind. She was even tempted to come up with her own name altogether instead of Isaac, if for no other reason than the principle of depending upon someone who didn’t trust you with their name.

What he said had made sense. Sort of. She couldn’t truly understand it but then again, she was working to earn her MBA and he was doing whatever it was that international smugglers did, so their world views likely didn’t line up on much.

There was one thing she could be happy about though: they had traveled a good distance today. She had had a good look at the map and if her guess was right they should reach the road by noon tomorrow.

She just hoped she could hold out that long. She had worked out regularly and was by no means a girly girl, and traveling through the canyon had proven easy enough. The rock wall that had towered over their heads didn’t always stay that high, sometimes dipping low and for hours at a time they had had to trudge through soft sand under the blazing rays before the walls climbed back. While that wasn’t entirely too bad it did tire her out considerably. This, however, only served to compound the complication that arose when they could no longer traverse at the bottom of the canyon to continue traveling east.

While the sand had been hot and walking difficult, climbing up stones that had soaked in the sun for so long they burned her hands was infinitely worse. Now, sweaty and defeated she collapsed onto the cool stone floor of the fissure they had climbed into, set high into the canyon walls. Desperately, all she could think of was how much she wanted a shower and a beer.

“We need to set a watch.”

Those were the first words he had spoken to her since their… conversation. Words she didn’t fully understand.

“What do you mean? I don’t have a watch.” She claimed, lacking any energy to say more

“No, I mean we need to set a look-out, someone to keep watch while the other sleeps. That way nothing out there can take us by surprise. We’re both pretty exhausted but the climbs look like they wore you out. I’ll take first watch and then at midnight we’ll switch. That sound alright?” He stood there looking at her as if watching for any sign of displeasure and making sure to keep his distance from her lest she assault him.

And just like that her worries evaporated. He could keep his secrets, even if she didn’t understand the need to. He was resolute in his belief and maybe he would tell her before they finally made their way out of this mess, but she wasn’t blinded by her ignorance and could see he was genuinely worried she was angry with him. He cared and for now that would be enough.

Taking a loose cloth, she grunted her confirmation, and wiped off some of the grime layered around her body. Drinking some water and eating a snack she settled down into her sleeping bag.

All too soon she was woken up. Groggy and bleary-eyed, she sat up with a start, still on edge even from the past few days.

“Anything happen?” She inquired with a whisper as she rubbed her eyes in befuddlement. She had never fancied herself a morning person. Or really a waking person.

“No. Nothing has even so much as breathed, thankfully. I’m fucking exhausted though, good luck, and try to stay awake. If I die I’d like not to have it happen while I’m still half-awake.” He murmured as he climbed into his sleeping bag, jacket still wrapped tightly around his shoulders.

“Don’t worry about me not waking you. I need someone to trip and act as a culinary distraction for whatever ends up chasing us. But if you don’t wake up fast enough I’m liable to take that tent pole and shove it up your ass. I’d like to see sleep through that cunt.” She replied, this time her whisper not so quiet. Sipping some water she moved towards the lip of their hide-out, Isaac’s quiet snoring already rumbling out behind her.

Peering out across the canyon she threw on a jacket of her own as well as the wool blanket as she sought to seize hold of the escaping leftover warmth from her slumber. The night ticked on and as the moon began to set she found her eyelids growing heavier by the minute.

A guttural hiss that she would recognize anywhere with cold terror brought her instantly out of her stupor. She cowered further into the crag, lying on her belly. She tried to feel where her possible assailants were before remembering she was too close to Isaac to utilize her connection with the world around her. Eyes wide she heard the sound draw near before one, two, three… fifteen of the giant reptiles passed below, paying no heed to the two hiding above them. They continued on, until the sound of their footfalls faded beyond her hearing.

Long after the last signs of the beasts had passed she laid there, eye-wide and unblinking. Even as the sky lightened with the coming of the sun she dared not move.

“How many again? Fifteen? Are you sure?” I ask for the second time, unwilling to believe what Malika is telling me.

Fifteen of those bastards all headed in the same direction we need to go. At least they’re nocturnal for the most part. In fact, so far, all the beasties have been coming out at night which is a blessing. If they were out at all hours of the day we’d have long ago been lubing the gears in this food chain like the fat kid at the cannibal’s birthday party.

“Yes. Yes I’m sure, but fuck did I wish I was wrong.” Malika answers. I’m tired but I swear I don’t feel half as tired as she looks. The bags under her eyes have bags. “Do you have any idea what they do during the day? We’ve only ever seen them at night.”

“I think we can assume that they do during the day the same as us at night, just find a spot and hunker down.” Considering the possibility of coming across that bank of cold-blooded creatures, I reach for the backpack and pull out the four grenades, stuffing two into my pockets I hand over the other two explaining, “I want you to take these two. If we see them this will be our best chance of stalling them.” Demonstrating for this next part I hold up one for her to see. “To throw, you’re first going to wrap a hand around the entire thing, and make sure that you’re pushing down on the lever at the top. Get a firm hold, bring it to your chest, and pull the pin with one hand. Now you’ll have five seconds, but that count down doesn’t start until you let go of that lever, so what you’re going to do is take it and give it a good throw away and then try and get some cover or just jump to the ground to make sure you don’t get hit by any stray shrapnel.” I wait for her to nod her head before handing both over. With any luck, she won’t pull the pin and accidentally drop it.

Packing up is faster this time and after checking our coordinates to confirm we’re on the right path, we set off. With the pace we set, I honestly think we could have made it to the causeway yesterday if it weren’t for all the dead ends we keep hitting. The way everything is eroded down ensures it’s not an impossible obstacle, but coming out of the valley leaves us with no shade and the rocks heat up to ungodly levels. That combined with the onerous task of actually climbing up a craggy face of a cliff, slows us down immensely. To top it all off though, is the fact that the rocks around this entire region are so variable it makes it impossible to discern anything in the distance. We could, in truth, be completely wrong about where we are and the road is just 10 minutes away, but we’d never be able to tell.

Take this one for example. We just finished climbing up a rather steady incline and now that we’ve reached the top there’s a spire that I can’t see past to my left and a cave full of giant lizards in the depression to my right! It’s absolutely ridiculous!

…

You ever get that feeling?

…

That feeling like you’ve just made a mistake?

…

Like you’ve missed something of crucial importance?

…

Right now? Right now, that feeling is alive and ringing in my ears louder a shot from a shotgun fired from the leader of your local KKK when his daughter brings home her black boyfriend.

Gulping audibly and freezing in my tracks I slowly pivot my head in the direction of the entry of a large cavern not 10 meters from where we stand. Providentially Malika has the sense to follow my line of sight and not make a peep. Looking back and into her eyes, which are wide enough to be comical if not for the circumstances, I point forward, marking a path down into the next valley that heads Southeast before bending and heading straight east as far as I can tell. Not waiting for a reply, I start to head down, barely daring to breath.

Step to the left around a pillar.

Step to the right and avoid the drop-off.

Take it back and down around the cliff.

Slide across the ledge to the tapered slope.

Home free! We made it! All that’s left is-*kkkkkrrrrrshhh*

I am a statue. A piece of the landscape. The lizards will never hear the loose rocks falling down the cliffside slowly knocking loose more debris as it goes.

Right and I’m a unicorn.

*HHSSSSSS*

High up above a scaly head pokes over the edge of the cliff. Its’ eyes don’t roam for long.

*GGGRGRRRRHHSHSSSS*

“RUN!”

Jumping and hopping down the rest of the way, we make it to the bottom and take off at a sprint, Malika matching my pace step for step as the sounds of shifting rocks reach my ears. Coming up on the bend that will take us east I chance a look back and find the whole bank of lizards almost to the desert floor. Going around the bend I come up short.

It’s another dead end. And worse it ends in a sheer cliff face that even the lizards couldn’t climb.

Wait. Maybe there’s still hope, we just have to get there before they catch up.

“Hurry!” I yell as Malika shifts from her uncertain and undetermined stance to that of an Olympic sprinter as we both tear off towards the far end of the natural enclosure.

As we come to the end of our running room, Lady Luck decides to favor us and I spot what I was looking for. Over to one side, the rock splits, forming a thin fissure in the sheer rock face that follows it to all the way up the terrain. For the first 15 meters it’s just large enough for someone to stick their arms in and grab a hold. From there it levels off and smooths out enough to simply go on all fours the rest of the way to the top. As we pause to catch our breath the pounding of padded feet reaches my ears and our reptilian foes come into sight from around the bend.

“Climb! Stick your hands in and climb like a ladder!” I shout, still out of breath. She is still winded as well but she does as I say, to the best of her ability. Sticking in a hand and grabbing a hold of something before wedging her foot into the gap and pushing off, it makes for slow progress. As she climbs I quickly follow her up the wall. We make it two thirds of the way there before our hunters make it to our position. Looking back, I panic and shove myself as far into the crag as I can, barely preventing my end from being lizard dung.

With just enough room in the crevice to turn my head, I look back to see a gaping maw and padded feet scrabbling at the fissure in an attempt to grab a hold of the duffel bag that peeks out, with nowhere to go given that it’s still attached to my back. With my feet and hands locked in there is nothing I can do as the loose rock around me is torn away. As it falls back down and prepares to make another lunge I spot a large conspicuous mound of sand come around the bend and displace everything before it, almost like a giant mole hill. A falling ball of metal catches my eye, one which the lizard, momentarily distracted snaps up.

*fwhboom*

A deep bass mixed with a wet squelching sound of freshly pulverized meat and bones echoes out and as I take another gander at my assailant, I get a lovely first-hand view of the cannibalistic nature of these omnivores. Another grenade falls and ends the same way as the first. Beholden to Malika for saving my life once again I continue scaling up the wall.

Scrabbling to the top I collapse in a heap, not too dissimilar from a wet noodle. Sitting there I watch the gore fest and make note that halfway down through the valley the large mound seems to have stopped.

*BFWOOOOM*

Like the impact of an artillery shell, sand sprays up, momentarily blinding me. As my vision clears the sight that greets me is anything but comforting. Claws, teeth, and chitin reach up into the sky as if to pierce the heavens. Towering above its surroundings, the worm-like centipede grown to impossible proportions holds one of the large reptiles in the grasp of four mandibles that reach out across its mouth contain two rows of vicious teeth. As it eats its snack it falls to the side, waving its multitude of short, stubby, spear-like legs, too small to be used to maneuver something of its girth. That notion is confirmed as the behemoth shatters a far rock wall and then slithers off in a snake-like motion, while using its legs as anchor point so that it can practically climb sideways through the canyon in its pursuit of its meal.

I think I can make an educated guess as to why nothing moves around during the day.

Deciding that staying mobile before the overgrown arthropod finishes picking apart the fleeing reptiles and decides it wants us for dessert, I turn around and move away from the cliffside. Catching sight of the road in the distance I am greeted by an even steeper precipice. A steep drop precedes the largest body of water I have yet to see out here and it stretches nearly to the roadside in the distance

*SKREEEEEEEEE*

Yep. Decision made.

Hopefully it’s not too shallow.