The Umbral Gate, Part VI - FINAL

“Jesus Christ,” I stammered. Guided by fear, I inserted the key into the lock and opened the little hatch that protected the innocuous button that would detonate the five separate C4 blocks of explosives positioned inside the building at key junctures. The building itself was not the Umbral Gate, the building was just a manifestation of the gate. Torrance had explained that to me when he was in the process of buying it. If it were destroyed, something else would replace it as a gate between the two worlds. The explosives would be a temporary measure, used to slow down the cabal, hopefully slow them down long enough for the Night Coven to stop them on their end.

Torrance had spent quite a lot of time, going back and forth between this world and theirs, learning the Artes from Dame Elsbeth, performing feats of magic that scared the hell out of me. I had grown accustomed to it, though I still found it unnerving. The tattoos that were marked upon his skin gave him abilities no person could naturally have: the ability to see in the dark, increased strength and speed, and amazing endurance. My time with Torrance taught me all sorts of things about the world on the other side of the gate, though I had never seen it. He had told me about dragons and the different kinds of people that existed over there, never did he mention anything that related to this thing stalking down the halls toward him.

Torrance now held off both stickspinners with his shadowstaff. Though he was able to keep them at bay, he seemed unable to make any progress in beating them back. I couldn’t take my eyes away from the monitor. I sensed Rex moving, but I figured it was restless anxiety at being stuck in the midst of a fight that wasn’t his.

“Torrance will be destroyed shortly,” Rex said. I was shocked at his callous prediction and spun around to face him. He had rolled up the sleeves of his work shirt and I could now see a band of black tattoos inked around his biceps. Strength markings, similar to Torrance’s.

“What in the hell…,” was all I could say before Rex lunged at me.

“I cannot let you detonate those explosives,” he said, grabbing me by the shoulders and lifting me away from the control panel. With little effort he tossed me out of the tailer and stomped after me.

I was caught be surprised and the rough landing knocked the wind out of me. I struggled to my feet and pulled out my club. “Who are you, Rex?”

He stared at me, contempt written all over his face. “Rex. You called me that because you thought I followed you around like a puppy. Rex. It means king, you know, and it is suitable for what I’ll become when a permanent path is created through the gate.”

I was flabbergasted but I was now trying to circle him, to get closer to the door of the trailer. He seemed to be aware of my goal and stepped to block my path.

“We’ve known about you and Torrance for awhile, Ross. It was quite the scandal in the Night Coven when Dame Elsbeth announced she had trained one of your world to act as a warden on this side of the Gate. It was after we found out about Torrance that we decided we needed our own person on this side of the Gate as well. I slipped through two years ago, waiting for this moment. It was I who put up the beacon, the markings on the wall.” Rex was moving slowly forward, pushing me further away from the trailer as I attempted to keep a safe distance.

He continued, enjoying his moment of betrayal, “Right now, Torrance is not only engaged in combat with two of our finest warriors, but the Baron of the Cabal himself is surely now upon him. If the Baron made it through, that only means Dame Elsbeth and her group have been destroyed or disabled. Hope for your world is lost this night.”

“Hope is never lost!” I shouted back irrationally. I had no idea what I was saying. I just had that sinking feeling that I was the last defense we had against the Cabal and I wasn’t going to be able to fulfill that function with Rex standing between the detonator button and me.

He laughed at me and stepped forward to swing his fist at me. I ducked low and swung the club out, catching him in the side, right below his ribcage. I heard the grimace and then felt his magically empowered arms come crashing down against my spine. The pain was intense and I fell to the ground. My attempt to roll away was thwarted by Rex’s boot being kicked into my abdomen.

Summoning my strength, I grabbed hold of Rex’s leg like an annoying kid brother. I held on for dear life as he attempted to kick me with his other foot. That was what I was hoping for. As he lifted his other leg, I pulled hard on the one I was holding. Rex was thrown off balance and fell to the ground with me. It was my chance to make a break for the trailer. Scrambling on all fours until I could get to my feet, I dropped my club and held my stomach, running stooped over.

Rex was right behind me. As I reached the trailer, he caught me. His fist pummeled my back, throwing me forward with my momentum. My head crashed into the steps to the security trailer. All I could see was red and blood filled my mouth. My body ignored the pain and I still tried to move forward. I had to see how Torrance was doing.

I was able to get into the trailer before Rex grabbed hold of my ankle and tried to drag me back out. I kicked hard at his hands, probably doing my damage to myself than him, but one of my kicks loosened his grip enough that I was able to slip away. I had seconds to look over the monitors.

Torrance was fighting the Baron. The spinners were on the screen knocked out or dead on the floor, I wasn’t sure which. Torrance looked hellish, blood streaked across his face, his clothing torn, and his shadowstaff no where to be seen. The Baron stood easily a foot taller than Torrance and the Baron’s hand with their unearthly long gray fingers were lashing out at Torrance like whips.

Rex had come back into the trailer and I had to make a split second decision. I hit the detonator button with my hand.

The entire site shook as the C4 charges exploded. All the camera feeds to the monitors went dead. Plumes of dust and debris shot out of windows and openings in the building. Rex grabbed me and beat my head against the console until I passed out.

The Varek construction site was abandoned as the developer disappeared. The building was taken over by squatters again and rumors of ghosts and ghouls living inside the building became popular street talk in the area.

I quit my job with Varek and now sell newspapers at a newsstand across the street from the Warren. I never saw Rex again, but I know he’s out there. I hope Torrance is okay, but I haven’t heard from him since that night. I do know that the Gate was not destroyed. The Gate can’t be destroyed. It is just a labyrinth and sometimes the walls of a labyrinth move and a new path needs to be found. If that day comes, I will be here, doing what I can to stop them, because that is what Torrance would have wanted.

Umbral Gate Part V

“I noticed, from my vantage point crouched on the floor, that the stickspinners kept the sticks guarding their heads and upper body, but not their feet and ankles. Elsbeth’s goons most likely couldn’t notice this due to their proximity. I stood and sidled alongside Skirt’s foe. The sticks shifted slightly to protect the side I was on. I feigned a lunge, dropped down to my knee while delivering a brutal kick to the spinner’s foot. I was pummeled several times by the sticks: a few blows to the head and a hard blow against my ribs, shattering two of them. The sticks clattered to the ground though as the spinner stumbled from my kick. Skirt seized the opportunity and jabbed the spinner twice in the chest, pounded him in the face once and finished him with a powerful roundhouse kick that knocked him into the wall, busting the drywall and causing the spinner to collapse unconscious.

“I tried to roll out of the way to catch my breath and deal with the pain, I saw the Dame still battling the dragon. The beast had pushed its head inside the skylight and was now using its mouth to attempt to swallow Elsbeth whole. She kept it at bay with her staff, bludgeoning it in the snout and head. With deftness I’ve never seen, Elsbeth rolled backwards to avoid a lunging bite, and came to her feet. She held the staff like a spear, cocked her arm back, and hurled it at the dragon’s head as its mouth smashed into the floor. The staff hit true and penetrated the beast’s skull with a blinding flash of light. It took several frantic seconds for my vision to return to normal to see the result of the blow. Elsbeth moved away from the lifeless dragon, a black ichor oozing forth from the mortal wound. Skirt had stepped alongside Pants and together they were destroying the spinning sticks. Shard of wood flew away with each pounding blow and timed kick. The spinner, seeing he was now outnumbered backed away through the door, his protective sticks fell to the floor and he fled. The goons gave chase.

“The Dame Elsbeth walked over to me and knelt next to me as I attempted to sit up. She told me to stay down as she pulled a cloth from the inside pocket of her coat. Folded in the cloth was some sort of dried herb or something that she made me eat while she held her hands over my torso and chanted what sounded like gibberish. The pain slowly faded.”

“I must have passed out, though. The next thing I can remember was being hauled out of the Warren by two uniformed officers. I spent the night in the hospital and after I filed my report, I was given the chance to resign or being terminated for psychotic disorders. The police did a full sweep of the building and didn’t find anything that backed up my story except for the section of the floor that had caved in.”

Rex stared blankly. “And what happened between when you were with Paragon Security and now?”

Torrance smiled. “I did my own investigation which led me to understand quite a bit about the Umbral Gate and the world on the other side. The gate is a labyrinth, walk it correctly and you are transported to the other side.”

I had to interrupt. There was movement on the monitor. “We’ve got spinners!”

Torrance glanced at the monitor as he stood and stepped to the door. “Arm yourselves but stay near the trailer.”

Torrance stepped out of the trailer and it rocked as it righted itself. We watched him from the trailer door disappear into the building. Rex flipped a few switched and he appeared on a set of monitors. We followed his progress and the progress of two men who seemed to be covered in a haze on the monitor.

“What should we do?” Rex asked in anticipation.

“We sit tight. If they get through, I’ll have to take them out.”

“What do you mean? If Torrance and that Dame can’t stop them, how are you going to do it?”

On the panel that controlled the monitors, there was a small door with a lock. I reached into my shirt and pulled out a key. “The button beneath that hatch is connected to explosive charges that are set throughout the building.”

“Dear god!”

“We cannot allow them to come through.” Rex looked about nervously. “Don’t worry; the charges won’t collapse the building, only seal the exits. We are safe, relatively.”

Torrance walked carefully through the hallways. The spinners approached down a side tunnel. Torrance made a broad sweeping gesture with his arms and his hands glowed blue. As the spinners turned the corner and faced Torrance, Torrance thrust his hands forward and a stream of blue light shot out from both hands, blasting one of the spinners squarely. The spinner flew backward into the wall, but didn’t seem phased by Torrance’s attack.

The second spinner rapidly threw several knives at Torrance. Torrance reacted with extraordinary speed, dodging to the side, and then rolling forward. As he came up to his feet, a long dark staff appeared in his hands.

“There is something else coming,” Rex exclaimed pointing to one of the monitors. I took my eyes off of Torrance’s fight to look at what Rex saw. On the small thirteen inch monitor was a tall skulking man creature. He was so thin his gray skin revealed his freakish skeleton. He wore a long tattered black coat with a red poppy in the lapel. On his head, covering his long yarn like grayish black hair was a battered velvet black top hat with a satin band. Another red poppy stuck out of the black satin band. Four small metal spikes protruded from his sternum, and a chain ran from a ring in his ear to a ring to the side of his bottom lip.