The Spires Of Talos (Part One? Work-In-Progress - Unfinished)

** In honor of an amazing writer, Kelly Freas **

My name is Vo ... just that. "V" - "O" ... Vo.
I never had a last name that I know of,
(Or one that I can remember, anyway).
I'm somebody ... I matter. I was there.
There on the plateau when that son-of-a-bitch
Came crawling out of the Mudlands ...
Late in the seventh-month winter,
When the bright red mud was partially frozen
Into sharp, hard vertical shards that cut like teeth ...
Jagged and up through rivulets and furrows of
Gelatinous crimson, glinting in the light
Of the two suns, Antipholus and Dromio.
Tenacious Dromio that never set,
Pushing its brother below the horizon
And rising again, awaiting the brighter Antipholus'
Return to the violet, star-speckled sky ...
Never dark enough for night, but just
A third of the daylight back on Terra,
Like a solar eclipse that never ended,
Giving the atmosphere a magical quality.
When Antipholus roze again the purple sky
Turned to red, but not the almost glowing
Rose color of the Mudlands, more of a soft
Burgundy, or the blush of a cheek, just kissed.

Oh, I remember that day as well as any ...
I remember the condescending look on his face.
Can you believe that? Crawling and dragging
His own limp body out of the cherry mess of the
Mudlands, his shieldsuit torn to rags and ribbons,
Flesh in tatters where the suit had rent,
And blood mixing with it all, (though it was hard
To tell what was blood and what was mudfrost).
Barely strength enough to lift his head, and hardly
Looking like a human at all ... STILL, sprawled on
The rim of the Mudlands and barely alive,
He managed the precise effort to look DOWN at me ...
As condescending as any upper-crusty I'd
Ever known back on Earth's Greenside ...
(Yeah, I wasn't ALWAYS a criminal, you know),
And with as much contempt for me as anyone who
Knew of my crimes. I imagine he just assumed the
Worst, as the West Pole of this planet was
Used strictly for punishment purposes -
There were hundreds of such plateaus as mine,
All surrounded with the god-forbidden red
Mudfrost and frozen shards, and to even THINK
Of venturing forth was absurd, not that it
Would serve any purpose anyway ... there
Really was nowhere to GO, or anything to see.

Each plateau had the small heat-form domes that the
Correctional system provided, not luxurious even
By prison standards, but with everything needed
To survive and be entertained ... endless uplinks to
The Masterweb, (though they screened everything
Considered "news" for the proper content - I guess
They wanted us to feel disconnected from the vital
Parts of society ... they were damn good at that).
Food was dropped in monthly shipments, supplies
Of all kinds, medical, hygeine, etc. (one month
On Talos was equal to about two-and-a-half Earth weeks),
Though if you weren't careful and on top of things,
Your supplies would be ransacked by the PAHUN ...
Not that they meant any harm or intervention,
They just had no concept of "yours" and "mine",
And felt as worthy of the supply drops as anyone.
They were intelligent and thoughtful creatures,
But their thought processes concerned ONLY
The spiritual, and all that took place, in their minds,
Was part of the "Divine Essence", at least that's
As good a description as was ever translated to me.
Much of their language was unspoken, primarily
Conveyed with their outer eyelids and inner
Nictating membranes, not something I ever
Got used to ... in fact, just the sight of those
Multiple twitching lids irritated the hell out of me,
And often led to a violent outburst by yours truly,
Which was met with the unsettling dropping of
Their double jaws, and the most ungodly scream
Imaginable, which, received by the very delicate
Human ear bones, resulted in unconsciousness
And severe migraines upon awakening, (and an
Even less enjoyable loss of bladder control).

The Pahun were half the height of a human,
But they carried themselves with a sort of pride
That spoke of royalty, though the way they were always
Engaging in their form of reproduction, shed that
Air of royalty quite effectively. There was only one sex,
And all were capable of carrying their young to term ...
They would "join" with each other with seemingly random
Regard, though I was to learn later that THEY knew the
Difference ... they also "joined" oft-times in groups,
Not just the customary pairings that humans are used to,
But when it WAS more than two, a sort of song would arise,
And the larger the "joining", the louder and more frenetic
The song would get ... after being there a while I learned
That these larger group "joinings" corresponded with the
Anticipation of the release of balloon spores from the
Nearby mountains. The two events were clearly connected,
But I could never figure out exactly HOW. A sort of
Pollen, maybe, that excited their mating instinct?
Another spiritual exercise of some kind, honoring
The mountain spore spires and their life-giving powers?
There was no rain there - EVER- but there WAS a type
Of condensation that took place high in the atmosphere,
Which formed as large ice structures in the mountains.
With the warmer cycles of the rising of Antipholus each
Day, the lower layers of ice were slowly softened and
Absorbed as water in the spore spires - sharp peaks
Of biological growth, (very similar to sponge), that grew
Below the ice line, and were covered with tiny sacs ...
These sacs, or "balloon spores", (similar to the alvioli
In human lungs), would swell with moisture until they
Were fat and heavy enough to break off and float
Like umbrellas into the Mudlands ... there they'd
Settle onto the sharp shards of frozen, red mud,
And release their moisture, making a crimson muck
That flowed like slow, cold lava between the jagged,
Ice-hard spikes of mud. This made up the misery that was
The Mudlands - vast expanses of the mostly-frozen red mud
That was all but impossible to cross, and had brought ruin
To every vehicle that had ever met with it, and all civilized
Creatures, save for the Pahun, (who had massive,
Multi-segmented, snowshoe-like limbs that could,
With difficulty, transverse that mucky red horror.

Keeping your supplies from becoming the
Common property of the Pahun meant constant
Vigilance, not that you had much else to do,
But the warden of the West Pole had felt the need
To be able to access anything at any time, so locks
And the like were not allowed. Oh, we fashioned our own
When we could, but the Pahun didn't recognize locks as
A "claim" to property, and would just go about destroying
Said device in rapid fashion, making a worse mess
Than if you had just let them at it. The ONLY way to
Insure your stuff remained yours, was to physically block
The doorway to your provisions ... the Pahun were certainly
Capable of moving you with force if they needed to,
As they were broad and much stronger than humans overall,
But for some reason they felt this refusal to move was a
Human display of some kind of temporary insanity,
And they would drop their horrid double jaws,
Stick out that disgusting triple tongue and waggle it,
Making a sound as they left as if you had just offended
The "Divine Essence" in the worst way imaginable.
I actually enjoyed pissing them off, so any chance
To do so AND keep my belongings safe was a treat,
And something I looked forward to, and often planned.
To say the Pahun were annoying is a truly colossal
Understatement, and the fact that I couldn't do
Anything to them physically was very frustrating,
Especially for a guy with major anger issues, like me,
Who, without a Safe-Wise to rob or a fight to get into,
Had few outlets to vent or feel better with. Oh, I laid hands on
Them once-or-twice early-on, in a fit of anger, but they just
Screamed that scream of theirs until I was unconscious,
Leaving me to wake up with the headache of all headaches,
(And in a warm puddle). I also bellowed at them a few times,
Thinking that might get the message across, and I
Even threw a few objects in their general direction,
But they just assumed I was gifting them in some
Loud, off-world manner, picked up whatever I had
Thrown, and commenced "joining" in one of those big,
Sing-songy orgies of theirs ... which just pissed me
Off even MORE. Then there came HIM ...

Him, TOBIAS ... Tobias Virtue. Yeah, VIRTUE! I don't
Think that was his real name, but he sure wore it in a
Serious sort of manner, along with that condescension ...
Crawling up out of the Red Mess with that look in his eye ...
The look that said "I am BETTER than you, and you know it" ...
And me standing there looking down, and KNOWing
He was right - somehow SURE he was better than
I could EVER be, and feeling like I shouldn't HAVE to feel
That way on my own friggin' plateau .. did I ASK him
To crawl up onto my patty with that disgusted, weary, self-
Righteous look on his face?!? Well, that was IT, and despite
The fact he was near-dead already, I just beat the
Living crap out of him. And it felt good. Damn good. Well,
For a little while, anyway. Then I'm just standing there
Feeling guilty, and him not making a SOUND ... dude never
Made a whimper! And he's still looking down his nose at me,
Even though HE was lying on the ground! Telling me with
That look how superior he was! THEN the Pahun spotted him,
And that was the beginning of a whole NEW phase of my
Existence there. Fast as rabbits they appeared from
Their burrows and ran to him, moving me aside to
Cradle him in those freaky damn appendages of theirs,
And carrying him up to the spare heat-form dome,
Activating the thermo-coil like they had built the thing!
(They never even showed INTEREST in one before),
Once inside they proceeded to feed him and care for his
Wounds, chanting some recitation I had NEVER heard before.
You would have thought the "Divine Essence" Himself was
Paying us all a visit, (embodied in the form of this frozen,
Red turd of a human), for as soon as they had made him
All nice and cozy, they gathered outside his dome and began
To partake in another mad, musical, eye-blinking orgy!

Well, I'm standing there taking this all in, MY jaw dropped,
When one of the Pahun, a larger-than-normal one, (the one
I took to be a leader of sorts later on), came walking
Straight over to me and looked in my EYES! Well, this just
Blows my mind, 'cuz they never even ACKNOWLEDGED me
Before, (other than being the insane human barrier to the
Supplies), let alone look into my eyes in any fashion ... and
As he's staring into me and waggling that disgusting tongue,
I get the strongest feeling I've ever had - a feeling that
Permeates my very being - and this feeling tells me with
As much certainty as I've ever experienced, that I'd better
Not TOUCH The Holy Man ... that if I don't leave The
Blessed One alone, I AND my fits of temporary insanity,
Will cease to exist. Pronto. Well, my face must have turned
Five colors, cuz no sooner had this feeling saturated me,
Than I was standing there alone, in some kind of trance,
For who knows how long ... the Pahun had disappeared,
And there was a closure on the doorway of the spare
Heat-form dome, one I couldn't even figure out, let alone
UnLOCK, (if it WAS a lock that kept it closed). And
THIS blows my irritated mind all over again, because
These creatures had never shown ANY sign of interest
In technology before, nor did they let on that they
Even CARED about it, yet here they had fashioned a
Closure on the doorway that I couldn't even comprehend,
And did so with no tools or materials of any kind, that
I could tell. All for this raggedy, beaten, condescending
Little shit that had scraped his way up out of the
Blushing toilet bowl called the Mudlands. And there
He was, (I could see through the one small window),
All snuggled up safe and warm, wounds treated, fed,
And sound asleep, as pretty as you frigging please!
But WHY?!? Why had they treated this shredded beet
Of a human with such reverence and awe and honor?

(To be continued)

Comments