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We were in what Annah had referred to as the alley of lingering sighs, although in reality it was more a series of interconnected alleys, stretching among dilapidated buildings and piles of rubbish.
I heard hammering up ahead. When we advanced far enough to see the source, I realized it was a dabus. No one else was around; even Sybil had disappeared somewhere. I poked inside one building out of curiosity, and to my surprise found a corpse inside.
I saw the dead body of a Dabus. The stench of its decay was overpowering and, from the looks of its rigid, unnatural posture, extreme rigormortis had long since set in. Yet, somehow, I was inexplicably aroused by the scene.
I used my Stories-Bones-Tell power on the corpse. As I reached out with my power, there was a faint stirring in the air, and the dabus' body blurred for a moment. I felt a strange, wrenching pain in my skull, as if someone was hammering on it, sharply, desperately.
My vision went black for a moment, and the hammering pain faded, until it sounded like it was coming from outside my skull - the darkness cleared, and I heard the hammering coming from outside the building. The entire building seemed hazy somehow, confused, as if I were seeing it through a mist.
The hammering died, and I suddenly saw a spectral version of the dabus entering the building. As it did, the windows and the doors became like water, suddenly sealing over the entrance the dabus came through. The dabus turned, paused, and then began a slow circuit of the room, examining the walls and hammering on each one once, as if testing it.
The dabus completed its circuit of the room, then paused by the "door" it once entered. It began hammering, chipping away the stone, but with every blow, the wall repaired itself. The vision faded to black, and the hammering continued, first at a steady pace, then slower, then slower...
My vision cleared as the hammering ended, and I was once again standing beside the corpse of the dabus... it looked as if it withered away here, trapped in the building.
We exited the building, and continued following Annah to the spot where she found my body. We went down a short flight of steps, and entered a cul-de-sec. She pointed to a spot on the ground.
"This is the place. I found yeh lyin' right where we stand."
I glanced at the ground where she pointed, then looked up to stare in awe at the bizarre spectacle before me. What had appeared to be an ordinary, unremarkable bricked wall now throbbed and pulsated with movement. The wall expanded with curious elasticity, heaving outward as if some unseen force were trying to push its way through the barrier from the other side. Slowly, the undulating mass began to settle, its curves becoming more and more pronounced, and I found myself at eye-level with the stony caricature of a human face.
"What is that? " I wondered out loud.
I donnae know." Annah stared at the face in disbelief, her hands nervously fingering her daggers. "But I'm fer leavin' 'fore we find out, aye?"
I hesitated, there was something… Suddenly, a strong breeze began to blow around me and the air was filled with an eerie sighing. The rushing wind grew stronger and I could make out other sounds as well: the creaking of boards, the rustling of leaves, and the grinding of stone upon stone. After a few moments, the clamor ceased to be a cacophony of individual noises and began to blend into one articulate sound. I could make out a voice, a voice that spoke softly, yet seemed to come from all around me at once.
"YOU? IT CANNOT BE YOU."
"Do you know me? " I replied. The wind around me had stopped, but the voice was still somehow present.
"YOU ARE RESTORED AGAIN? I SAW YOU DESTROYED."
"Destroyed? Where? "
"I SAW YOU DESTROYED HERE, IN FRONT OF ME. I SEE ALL WITHIN ME."
"Do you know what happened to me? "
"THINGS THAT CAST NO SHADOW... WERE SHADOW. THEY ROSE AROUND YOU. TORE YOU DOWN. DO YOU NOT REMEMBER?" I concentrated on the strange voice composed of sounds around me. Somewhere, in the deepest recesses of my mind, there was a brief glimmer of recollection. I felt as though there was something vaguely familiar about the sounds.
I closed my eyes and tried to remember. I was able to bring back a fragment, a memory of me standing there, surrounded by humanoid-shaped shadows. They closed in, attacked. I must have died, and Annah found my corpse.
"YES... YOU REMEMBER." The voice of the Alley rang in my ears, scattering the images from my mind and returning me back to the present. "DESTROYED. AS SOON I SHALL BE. I CANNOT DELAY DIVISION MUCH LONGER. PRESSURE BUILDS. SOON STONES WILL CRUMBLE AND THE FLOATING ONES WILL REPAIR ME TO DESTRUCTION."
"You're dying? "
"PRESSURE IS TOO MUCH. TOO MANY PLACES FOLDED INSIDE. NOT ENOUGH SPACE. MUST DIVIDE."
Annah interposed, "Uh, it must be in the 'way.'"
"What are you talking about?"
"I think it's pregnant," Annah replied.
Morte joined in, "Freaky. So where are we technically standing right now? "
"I really don't want to know the answer to that, Morte." The voice continued speaking, ignoring my companions.
"HELP ME TO DIVIDE. BRANCH OUT. EXPAND. NEW APERTURES WILL OPEN. YOU MAY USE THEM TO TRAVEL TO THE LOWER WARD."
"What do you need to divide? "
"THE FLOATING ONE IS UPON ME. REPAIRING. IT PREVENTS ME FROM DIVIDING. I UNDO ITS REPAIRS. BUT IT RETURNS AGAIN AND AGAIN. REPAIRS ANEW. MUST REMOVE FLOATING ONE." I wasn't sure I liked the implication of its words.
"You want me to *kill* the dabus in the Alley?"
"REMOVE IT. ONLY THEN CAN I DIVIDE."
I knew from Iron Nalls the way to the other wards from the Hive was currently blocked. I felt I must get to other areas of the city. If helping this… thing would do it, so be it.
I found the dabus close to where I had left it. I was sure there was little chance I could convince it to just leave the area, and even if I could get it to leave, it would doubtless quickly return.
However, there was a way. I went up to it, and told it I had just discovered the body of another dabus in the alley. As I thought, it was interested in what I had to say, and soon was hurrying to enter the house where I had found the dead dabus.
For a moment, I gloried in my power. I realized I could easily bend those around me to my will, forcing them to my bidding regardless of the effect on their insignificant lives. But only for a moment.
I had sent the dabus to its death, as surely as if I had cut off its head. One could argue it was to save another's life, but it was doing nothing wrong, not by any scale of right and wrong I would wish to live by.
I thought of the incarnation that Dak'kon and Morte had known, and knew if I followed the path that had tempted me for a moment, that is where I would end up. I considered the temptation, and saw it held no real attraction for me. Time to move on.
When we returned to the being, it claimed the work the dabus had already done had weakened it enough that it could not go forward, either 'birthing' or undoing the repairs. It described what the dabus had done, and we agreed to undo its work.
Fortunately, I had a prybar which I picked up originally in the Mortuary, and with an improvised hammer the dabus' work was soon undone.
We returned to the being. It spoke again, using the ambient sounds of the alley.
"YES. ALL IS IN ORDER. I AM GRATEFUL." Again the wind began to blow around me, this time with fierce intensity. The omnipresent sounds of the Alley began to increase in volume until the soft murmur of the voice was nearly drown out by the ensuing racket. "NOW YOU MUST GO. DIVISION BEGINS. THE WAY IS NOW OPEN TO YOU."
The stone face before me began to transform once again, its mass shifting and roiling as I looked on. The entire wall seemed to melt before my eyes, exposing a narrow passageway beyond. The ground underfoot suddenly began to rock violently and the soft sighing of the wind intensified to a more urgent, almost human-like moaning. I could hear the sounds of crashing stones and snapping boards all around me as we dashed into the passageway.
We rushed forward, until we were beyond the area of buildings
rearranging themselves. Looking back, the layout of the alleys
and buildings behind us had completely changed.
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