The protagonists get Hal to take them to the last place he took Kith – a tiny village called Perdition. The trip is pleasant, whipping along on a landspeeder, skimming the treeline, warm air racing passed. It’s only after he drops them off and they’re standing in the still air that they notice just how unpleasant Vinh actually is.
33 degrees by day, 26 degrees by night; 88% humidity. Unending clouds of buzzing, biting insects. Within five minutes Midian is miserable.
The able-bodied of the village are out in the paddies, leaving children and a few old folk in the village hub. The protagonists are dressed as nobles in comparison to the locals, who wear short, formless, threadbare robes. They are left alone by adults (who clearly expect nothing but trouble from these “rich” outsiders) and spied upon by the children.
At a watering hole, they are given free drinks by an elderly barkeep and asked to leave. When Midian’s questions provide little information – he pleads ignorance to everything – Mordecai savagely tears through his mind.
A navigator did come here, with a woman in tow. He asked about old buildings from the first surveys or the founding but, like with Midian, no one was forthcoming. So he executed someone in the street. Nobody was able to help but, desperate to appease the callous noble, they steered him in the direction of someone who may know more – a local woman who had been shunned and exiled and branded witch, called Anya Qi. The navigator returned the next day, but there was no more trouble.
The man knew only the rough direction to where Anya had gone to make her new home but, bribing some children, Midian was given a fairly decent map.
The trip is gruelling, but Midian proves himself a master of all forms of navigation as they trek through the steaming, rotting, serpent-plagued jungle.
They neared their destination around dusk. Rather than be relieved at nearing the end of the exhausting journey, Mordecai becomes suspicious. Something isn’t right. At his urging, Midian continues more cautiously. Even so, Mordecai notices them first.
Initially, it’s the smell of rotting, bloated flesh. Then the rustle of leaves. Then, through the dense foliage, they start shuffling into view – the walking dead.
Midian is quickly* surrounded. He fights a desperate fight, searching potential future-tides that will best keep him alive, but eventually falls – only moments after realising the creatures’ downfall was in his grasp all along. He lies on the ground, bleeding to death.
Mordecai fares better. Encased in a telekinetic field, he lashes out, striking the undead down, or else hacking them down with his sword. At no point does it seem he considers running. But is this loyalty to his meal-ticket, or simply him revelling in his superiority to the monsters the universe throws at him?
Battered, bleeding only a little, covered in putrescent gore, he soon stands alone. Through the trees he sees a rickety old shack. Shouldering Midian he makes towards it…
* A little too quickly. Oops.
33 degrees by day, 26 degrees by night; 88% humidity. Unending clouds of buzzing, biting insects. Within five minutes Midian is miserable.
The able-bodied of the village are out in the paddies, leaving children and a few old folk in the village hub. The protagonists are dressed as nobles in comparison to the locals, who wear short, formless, threadbare robes. They are left alone by adults (who clearly expect nothing but trouble from these “rich” outsiders) and spied upon by the children.
At a watering hole, they are given free drinks by an elderly barkeep and asked to leave. When Midian’s questions provide little information – he pleads ignorance to everything – Mordecai savagely tears through his mind.
A navigator did come here, with a woman in tow. He asked about old buildings from the first surveys or the founding but, like with Midian, no one was forthcoming. So he executed someone in the street. Nobody was able to help but, desperate to appease the callous noble, they steered him in the direction of someone who may know more – a local woman who had been shunned and exiled and branded witch, called Anya Qi. The navigator returned the next day, but there was no more trouble.
The man knew only the rough direction to where Anya had gone to make her new home but, bribing some children, Midian was given a fairly decent map.
The trip is gruelling, but Midian proves himself a master of all forms of navigation as they trek through the steaming, rotting, serpent-plagued jungle.
They neared their destination around dusk. Rather than be relieved at nearing the end of the exhausting journey, Mordecai becomes suspicious. Something isn’t right. At his urging, Midian continues more cautiously. Even so, Mordecai notices them first.
Initially, it’s the smell of rotting, bloated flesh. Then the rustle of leaves. Then, through the dense foliage, they start shuffling into view – the walking dead.
Midian is quickly* surrounded. He fights a desperate fight, searching potential future-tides that will best keep him alive, but eventually falls – only moments after realising the creatures’ downfall was in his grasp all along. He lies on the ground, bleeding to death.
Mordecai fares better. Encased in a telekinetic field, he lashes out, striking the undead down, or else hacking them down with his sword. At no point does it seem he considers running. But is this loyalty to his meal-ticket, or simply him revelling in his superiority to the monsters the universe throws at him?
Battered, bleeding only a little, covered in putrescent gore, he soon stands alone. Through the trees he sees a rickety old shack. Shouldering Midian he makes towards it…
* A little too quickly. Oops.
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