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Journey’s Crossroad

They walked into the vacant reception area. There was nobody to nod at on the way out.

“That’s odd, where’s the desk girl?” Bob asked.

“There was a desk girl? I didn’t see her on the way in. Or did I? I was in such a hurry to get to you that I can’t remember. Go and get Kevin.”

“He’ll be as pissed as I was when you burst in on me, Jared. Are you sure anyone else came in after us?”

“Yeah, I definitely saw another woman come in here. She was with someone.”

“They’re probably in one of these rooms…you know.”

“Yeah, anyway. Go and get Kevin.”

“This place wasn’t really worth the stop actually,” Bob said plainly. “It’s one of those experiences that you don’t have the time or the money to spend on, ‘cause you’re only here to get to somewhere more important. That’s how I see it.”

“That’s how you always see it.”

Bob frowned, and disappeared into the hallway. It swallowed him in dust rather than the darkness that would have been more fitting in a run-down place like this. Jared turned around, gazing up at the corners of the reception area, at the flies that flitted around them unchecked and unchallenged. He could feel himself getting smaller; the ceiling seemed suddenly to tower above his head. He was dragged back into the rotten drainage ditch, and he felt himself being pushed downwards to the sickle-smile scar that it had given him, until his heavy and weakened legs gave way to it. He felt himself falling to his knees. The thought of being infected and of infecting was a demon that had plagued him since his early teenage years. He remembered how his brother in Northport had accidentally got a girl pregnant through some unconventional method that was never explained. Perhaps he didn’t use a condom or pull out quick enough. The thought terrified Jared; that one single part of him could alter so many lives, and that the power to abuse this process lay within every person alive.

“I couldn’t have contracted anything, surely. Even if I did get that cut from there, its unlikely a condom’s contents could infect it. Oh God, I hope not…” he whispered to himself. He’d searched up the odds many times before on the private networks. What are the chances from getting MIV from touching another guy’s dick? Do people intentionally spread the disease around? His questions were as varied as the answers he got. Unlikely. Quite Likely. Lolz, you are infected, defo. He found himself kneeling in the middle of the reception area, staring upwards at the ceiling. Was he supplicating to banish the demon, or did this merely enflame it?

“Oh God, I am my scar…” he murmured, possessed.

“What did you say?” Bob and Kevin appeared behind him.
“Oh, nothing,” Jared said, picking himself up. His clothes threatened to reveal his thoughts; the grimy patch down the front of his shirt, and the dusty circles on his trouser knees.

“Did anyone tell you, Jared, that you are weird?” Kevin appeared sheepishly from behind Bob’s shoulder.

“It looks like you had the same problem as Bob, Kev…” Jared suggested, ignoring the remark.

“Well, it’s this place that’s weird, and no fucking wonder,” Bob interrupted, speaking for him. “I told Kev about your issues with it. We’re both alright with leaving, if you want.”

“But you’re driving, Jared,” Kevin added. “And I don’t suppose it matters if you fall asleep. You won’t crash into anything out here.”

“I’m fine with that. Let’s go.” The three of them walked outside, back into the car park. Next to Jared’s van, at the petrol pumps, the man was standing. He looked straight at them as if he were judging them silently for what they had just done. He had his gun in his hand, pointed to the ground. No black car. No bodyguards. It was odd, him standing there like that in the night. The harsh lights of the petrol forecourt shone down upon him, squaring off the desert darkness. The shade was brighter than the open, like a photograph negative.

“He looks pissed off,” Kevin said.

“No wonder, after what Jared’s just got himself into.”

“We’re all in this together, Bob. No matter what happens.”

They began to approach him slowly. Suddenly, from behind Jared’s van, jumped two lean-looking youths. The first leapt up onto the man’s back, forcing him forward.

“RUN!” Jared shouted. They ran back towards the motel like it was a school, and their lessons were about to begin. Another youth appeared in the doorway, grabbing its frame like he was a pin-up. He looked about ten years younger than the rest of them, but the group still scattered at the sight of him.

“Going somewhere?”

“Shit! Back this way, out into the desert!” Jared caught a glimpse of the man and his two assailants. One had him pinned against his van. From the darkness beyond the car park, Jared could see them fighting. The man managed to bend over and throw one of the attackers off his back, into the other. They both fell to the floor, and Jared could hear the thud they made from his position. They bounced back, as if their fall was nothing. For their young age, they showed remarkable stamina. One of them leapt back onto the man, and sank his teeth into his shoulder. The man grabbed onto him with one hand, and holding his gun, shot the other. There was a small silence. The other nearly fell off in shock. After a short struggle, he was finally thrown onto the floor, to share a similar fate as his friend. Time seemed to slow down, and yet it all happened so fast. The third at the motel entrance, seeing all this, ran straight for the man. His scream was a suicidal laugh and cry in one. He was thrown off his feet by another shot, and landed on his back in the dust.

“What the hell? Let’s get out of here!” Kevin shouted.

“No, my van!” Jared replied.

“Fuck your van!”

“We have to go back! We can’t go anywhere otherwise!” More shots rang out, each accompanied by a dire scream.

“Back to that? You’re crazy Jared! He’ll kill us too!”

“Alright, alright! We stick together guys,” Bob said. “You hear that, man?” He called out. “You hear that? We’re coming back, okay? Don’t shoot.” There was no answer. Slowly, the three of them made their way back to the petrol pumps. “Okay? Okay…” The man stood there, over two of the bodies.

“Shit man…they look like, fourteen?” Jared whispered. “Why did you do that, you sick fuck!”

“Jared…Jared. It’s not our concern. His business is not our concern, remember?”

“How can you say that Bob?” Jared replied, tearfully. Look them in they eye and say it’s none of our concern! Say we’re not involved in this!”

“We’re not. Right now, we’re not.” Bob said calmly, staring at the ground. Silence.

“They didn’t suffer, despite what you might think,” the man said carefully.

“What do you mean?” Jared asked cautiously.

“Demons.”

“Demons? You mean…vampires?”

“No. Their teeth were stunted. If they had been infected it must have been very weak, or very recently.” Bob and Kevin looked the other way, but Jared bent down over the corpses, thinking at least he owed them his interest.

“Maybe they were just pretending to be vampires? I’ve seen that happen in the Old Quarter all the time. Kids think they have the powers they read about in books and see on television. But it always ends like this.”

“You’ve seen this happen before?”

“Yeah. I was born in the Old Quarter, before I moved to the Neon Sector to start my studies. The Cascades…”

Bob turned around suddenly. “What did you say about your studies?”

“No, it’s not my studies. One of their wristbands says it. Look…The Cascades. Why, does that mean anything?” He lifted up the indignant arm of one of the corpses.

“Shit…that’s Louise’s band. How the fuck did she end up with vampire groupies?”

“They’re not vampires,” the man said sternly. “At least, not in the traditional sense.” He turned away, changing the subject. “Are you sure you want to associate yourselves with this band, Robert? With these types of people? Are you sure you all really want to go to Rogue Point? Because now is the time to admit to it if you’re having second thoughts.”

Bob thought about it. He couldn’t say he wanted to turn back, not in front of his friends. Besides, that would be what Jared would want to do. This was his trip, and he wanted to go through with it.

“No, we’re all still going. We’re all still going to meet the band.”

“Then you stand by your principles, your mission?”

“Yes.” When the man put it like that, what had been planned seemed so trivial. A speck of pleasure like a grain of sand. Amongst all this. Who knew what else lay buried out here, where no one bothered to look? “Besides, they’re just goths, right?” Bob looked down at the corpses. They still seemed shocked from being shot, their bullet wounds like mouths open with terror.

“Nevertheless, they still attacked without warning.” Jared replied. “Who says they’re not all like that around The Cascades?”

“They can’t be. Louise wouldn’t allow it. I know her, remember? These three were probably just obsessive fans, that’s all. A few sick roses, yeah? Probably high on something, or bored so they wanted to be.”

“You can’t blame it all on drugs, Bob. It’s deeper than that.”

“And you can’t blame society for people’s bad choices.”

“You two seem to know each other almost too well,” the man interrupted. “But if you want to remain uninvolved in this individual event, you’d better get in the van.”

“But we are involved. We’re witnesses to your crime,” Jared said, angrily.

“There is no crime. Not out here. Would you get in the van, please?” The three warily climbed in, unsure of whether he was giving advice or an order.

“You mean you’re just going to leave them like that?”

“Yes. It’s how things are done out here. If I follow the methods of the Contract Assassins, people will think my work is theirs.”

“So it’s like you’re framing them? Or rather, forging their own work…” Jared toyed with the thought, his foot hovering over the accelerator.

“Let’s drive. I’ve seen enough of this place,” Bob said, putting his head on the dashboard.

“Welcome to the Middle Ground”

The sky was a dark blue, and it seemed as if the van was driving across the bottom of the ocean. From Jared’s view, everyone appeared to be asleep, chewing the shadows.

“Bob, are you asleep? Bob?”

“What?” Bob mumbled.

“I was just thinking about earlier. I kind of wished that they really were vampires, you know. That would mean something from the past had survived. Something that really meant something.” Bob groaned, and turned over to face the window. Jared didn’t care. His lack of an audience gave him the comfort to continue. “I mean, what is society now if it can’t produce vampires, if it can’t create a conflict that means anything?

“Vampires make vampires, not society, Jared.” Bob replied, only for the sake of derailing his argument.

“But you’d think those kids would attack for a reason, right? They didn’t just do it for kicks? Vampirism is the only way to explain what happened back there. Without it, all we saw was senseless violence.”

“Maybe they were expressing themselves. It could be art, man. I’ve seen these things before too, you know.” Bob sighed and feigned detached disinterestedness through half-sleep, secretly preparing himself for another argument. They had always done this on long trips together, presenting each other with baseless hypothetical situations, playing verbal tit-for-tat while Kevin sat silent behind them, too stupid or asleep to join in.

“It’s a pretty grim art, if that’s the case. Or would you claim that what you photograph in the Neon Sector is art?”

“Yeah. And it’s the same stuff you write about. We’re the same, you and I. Joined like twins at our sources.” Jared gripped the steering wheel and stared at Bob’s stirring reflection in the darkened glass. It seemed like he was outside the van, standing asleep right in front of it, a phantom playing chicken.

“You think that’s what we do now?” Jared said sternly. “Does nothing matter now that we don’t see meaning in our actions anymore? The generation of the Big Impact said art was pretty much screwed because there’s now nothing left in the landscape to inspire us, and no reality to reflect. So this is what they’ve given us: a bombed-out, flat and empty fuck-land. And we’re just supposed to accept their hollow hedonism as our history?” In anger, his sour thoughts once again entertained the possibility of him being infected by the trash that he’d crawled through earlier. The idea prodded his otherwise stolid body with a sense of pleasurable danger. His imagined death, painful and protracted, was what allowed him to remember who he was. “That’s why I wanted them to really be vampires. I wanted to see a body that shambles with disease, that weeps the blood of history.”

He peered through the window, trying to see something past the reflections that were lit up by the dim car controls, something out on the road beyond the headlights. Nothing.

“This is where we live. Where everything is arguable, but nothing is answerable. Welcome to the middle ground, my friend.” Jared’s voice tapered to a whisper, answered only by the soft snoring of his ex-listeners.

Bob was doing it on purpose. Falling asleep just to annoy him.

“You’re right, you know.” The man said, a voice from the shadows. He wasn’t asleep. He was just picking his moment to speak. “We’re all disconnected, in the desert. Us, your friends, those boys I killed at the motel. I lost my only connection out here, and a part of me has never left. We are lives impervious to time, in a land without change. I know what you’re searching for. You’re not here for the same reasons as your friends.”

“Yeah. I didn’t come here to lose myself. I came for the opposite reason. Before we built our cities and wrote our books, we lived in the desert. And something must have caused us to turn our backs on it and start a civilization to unlock our humanity. Some say that force was self-consciousness or God. I don’t really know what it is, but I know there’s some secret power out here that makes us who we really are. And I want to find it.” Jared looked in his visor back at the man. His forehead was like a cliff, casting the rest of his face in shadow. He looked as if he was sleeping.

“I guess it’s so elusive because we’ve brought the city out here with us.” Jared continued. “I mean…this place is only stark because we’ve made it that way. Having Bob and Kevin here makes it difficult for me to see through all the crap they throw up. The things they say, the things they make me do. It all gets in the way of the search. Their food, their smell…I can’t stand it. But it’s me too. I’m just as bad. I see this world from this little van, this mobile prison. It marks the land with its tracks, and there’s no wind to blow them all away. We could be followed, hunted like animals in a game reserve. After all, we made this place, didn’t we? The nukes, the Big Impact. It was all us…” Jared slammed on the brakes.

“Oh my God.” The man was unfazed, while the others were startled, knocked out of their dreams. His voice filled the van as its engine growled angrily.

“So why do you search? Haven’t you already invented what you’re looking for? Do already know how your story ends?”

“No. At least I hope not. But it worries me how it seems man controls nature this much. Does he pour his soul like the sand into it? Does he make the mirage his mirror? There must be something original here, something untouched and untapped. And until I met you, I had doubts. But you’re proof…living proof. You don’t affect nature like we do. You…are nature. You don’t need a van to travel through the desert, and you don’t mark it with rubbish or disease. You’ve given me a new hope. I find you completely fascinating.” Jared put his head on the steering wheel in silence.

“What are you on about now, Jared?” Bob mumbled.

“Leave him,” the man said apologetically. “I think he’s tired.”

“No, he just wants to fuck you. Trust me, I’ve seen him like this before.”

“I think it would be good if you could all get some sleep. Leave the driving to me. I know where Rogue Point is,” the man replied calmly. He sounded like a father.

“Fine, just take us out of this goddamn place,” Jared said stroppily. He got out, and swapped seats. The van briefly illuminated the open doors and stumbling confusion, before people returned to their seats. The engine was satisfied to be running again, quiet and shadowy, with the man in control.

“They weren’t vampires. Just children with no concept of who they were.”

Judgment: The Day of the Sun’s First Coming

The van juddered to a halt; a firm shunt of Jared’s head. He woke up.

“Are we there yet?” he mumbled, as the sunlight flood under his opening eyelids. “Wherever that is…” Bob joined him in the waking world.

“Hey, this isn’t Rogue Point. Why are we stopped?” Bob peered out of the window. Sticking out of the sand, large metal frameworks towered like the ancient ruins of a lost civilization. They were arranged in a loose circle, joined together with cabling that hung intertwining like withered vines.

“Is this a graveyard…or a sacrificial site?” Jared asked.

“No,” Bob replied. This is the Rogue Point Arena. They use it for organized duels and shit. To try and keep violence out of the town. Why did you bring us here, man? This is miles away from Rogue Point.” The man switched off the engine. It was as if he was preparing himself for something.

“This is where everyone is going to be. Including your band.”

“And by everyone, who else do you mean? Portense?” Jared blurted out suddenly. There was a pause.

“Yes. I know what you were doing back at the motel car park,” the man replied calmly. “I forgive you.”

“Portense?” Bob said, stiffening. It sounded like his words were being strangled in his throat. “He’s not coming here, is he?”

“Why, do you know him?” Jared asked.

“Of course. I mean, everyone knows him. From that relationship show of his. But I know him from more than just that. I wanted to sell him some photos, and his price was too high. I said some things I shouldn’t have, really.”

“Don’t worry. It won’t come up,” the man interjected. “He’ll have bigger things on his mind. Things that he said.”

“Like what?” Jared asked.

“You’ll see. There’s no way you won’t. I need to check this place out.”

“What for?”

“Snipers.”

“You’re not going to kill anyone, are you?”

“It won’t come up.”

“You seem so sure of everything. How do you know things will go your way?” Jared leant forward, between the two front seats. He was like a child, anxious to know where he was being taken.

“They don’t need to. Nothing can stop what’s coming. Not even them.”

“The demons?”

“Yes.”

“What if they kill you like they did your friend? You know, that guy you knew?”

“If it happens, it happens. I’m sure he was thinking the same thing when he died.”

“So am I. I’m coming with you.”

“Are you sure you want to go through with that? To make it your mission?” Jared thought. He’d asked this same question to Bob, after putting him in such obvious danger. But it was Bob who chose that danger, and there were so many times he could have broken his own steps. He could have chosen differently. No, that was wrong. Nobody chose anything to happen. Choice was an afterthought to explain how people made the world. It was an excuse to wake up, to remove the blindfold, to take off the mask. Jared thought about his own choices. His sexuality, his drive to write stories, his avoidance of disease. Every thought of his had been revealed to him on this journey, every sordid little fragment of himself was unearthed in the disturbance of this stark hinterland between the city and the unreachable coast at Rogue Point. The choices of men and women counted for nothing. This place proved it. Their actions were as inevitable as nature, as the rising and setting of the sun.

“Yeah. I’ll make this my mission.”

“If you say so,” the man replied.

It could be dangerous! What, are you mad?” Kevin shouted. It was the first indication he was even awake.

“Nah, let him go,” Bob said casually, to cover his anger. “If he wants to get himself killed, that’s up to him.” Bob turned round in his seat to look at Jared. “I’m sick of looking after you, Jared. We all left the motel because you thought it was dangerous. And now you throw our consideration back in our faces by doing this?” The man got out of the car, not wishing to be the witness of another argument.

“I’m sick of the way you make me think of myself, Bob.” Jared got out as well, and slammed the door. He ran after the man across the desert floor, into the metal arena. It cast no shadows, and yet the presence it pressed upon the scene was almost as intolerable as the heat it generated.

“Stick close,” the man said. Jared hung by his shoulder, tempted to clutch it. There was something about this place that lured travelers to temptation. Instinct hung in the air silently, buffeted by a ghostly wind that could not be sensed, measured only by the swaying of the surrounding cables. Although the seats were empty, Jared could feel himself being watched.

“Is this place as dangerous as you predict?”

“It could be. The Contract Assassins may be checking up on me. They like to pay people to do work they think is below them. People like Portense and me. The whole thing is just a game to them now. They used to enforce the laws of the rich at Rogue Point. But since they were the only ones brave enough to do so, they’ve taken all the power and made these laws their own.

“Tell me what’s going on.” Jared looked back at the car, still present but made almost ethereal in the haze. “They won’t hear us.”

“Maybe you should ask him.” The man pointed over to a few shimmering black blots that filled the seats, holes in an empty display. Ambrose Portense was wearing a hooded sweat-top, its drawstrings hanging penitently. He was hunched over in the mid-morning sun, flanked by two bodyguards similar to the one Jared had seen in the black car last night.

“I don’t think I’ll bother.”

“So now you are here.” Portense seemed to wake up, and lifting his hood, revealed his pallid pate. His voice was much louder and firmer than Jared remembered. Was it the arena that made it seem this way, or was this the fervor which it generated in its inhabitants? “Earlier than predicted, and with a companion. But it doesn’t matter.” He stood up, his grey clothes statuesque, but stained with sweat. “Are you ready for the evening’s entertainment? I’m sure you’ll be interested to find out what I’ll reveal in certain members of our audience.” He outstretched his arms, as if to grasp the entire arena.

“I’ll try to make the most of it, considering I need to remain here for our business to be completed,” the man replied. “But I can’t help thinking that they’ll find what I have to say more affecting.”

“Indeed. But I hope you’ll keep that amongst yourselves. I’d hate for you to be the star of the show. I hired you because of your impressive if rather obscure history. I trust you will keep the professional confidentiality that benefits us all at the forefront of your mind when conducting yourself. I have faith in you. I have faith, and yet, throughout my time here, I’ve overlooked your many moments of misconduct. Even now I’m lenient with this continual intrusion that clings to your side. Quite a…distraction he’s provided you with.” His arms fell down by his sides, pushed there by disappointment but bearing forgiveness. Silence, and for once, Jared sensed it wasn’t held there by the man he was standing next to. “Hah! Look at this… this plentiful richness,” Portense continued. “Amongst all this scarcity. The illness of tongue carries forth the abundance of our mortality through this empty world! Oh, such simple acts which manifest complex nothings! Our town is diseased. I am a humble man with a single aim: to capture the climate of this sick filth, this moral chaos.”

“I won’t be going to Rogue Point. Once I’m done with our business I’ll be heading back out again.”

“Hang on” Jared whispered. “Bob, Kevin and I are planning to go there.”

“You can go there. But I won’t be coming with you.”

“But we can’t just leave you out here.”

“Why not? You found me here.”

Portense sensed they were sharing words. He interrupted them. “So, you won’t be staying? A pity. Don’t you feel the murmuring anticipation of an audience? The approving buzz of the cameras? The elevation all this attention endows? Having them hang on your every word, feeling like their minds are following yours, tracking your words but never finding the source…”

“I only sense judgment. And they’ll be here, at sundown,” the man replied.

“Who will be here?” Jared asked quietly.

“Everyone. And that includes that band of yours. Did you think I would stick with you without gaining something myself, drive you here for no reason that would benefit you? This is where my business meets yours.”

“We’re here for the same people, aren’t we? Maybe not for the same reasons though, which worries me.” Jared’s voice trailed off.

“Maybe you should take Portense’s advice over mine. Just sit back and enjoy the show.” The couple turned around. “We’ll speak again at sundown, Ambrose,” the man called out. He whispered to Jared. “Now, go back to the car, and not a word of this.”

Judgment: The Fall of the First Sun

Jared found himself in the car again. He woke from his sleep by a faint and distant thunder. But it wasn’t the familiar sound of the endless wind beating against every surface that defied it, nor was it the forever grinding of worn wheels against the desert road. No, it was something else, a different storm not experienced since he had began this journey: music.

“What the hell?” Bob stirred behind. “Jared, look!” He pointed up to the sky, floodlit by the arena. “Listen to that! There’s a party going on! Our man must have been right, Louise and the others are here!” Sure enough, a few heads at the arena could be seen bobbing like fish in a barrel, and standing at its gap was the man. It was as if he had summoned them all from the desert. “We have to get over there!” Bob and Kevin got out of the van quickly, followed reluctantly by Jared.
They rushed to the man. “Hey, thanks! I owe you one. A beer maybe?” Bob said, not stopping. “This place looks awesome. It’s like, everyone says the city it the center of human civilization, but this is where it’s really at!” His enthusiasm was renewed, and the struggle of the journey became the effort of an eyeblink, and like a memory, was forgotten in its speed.

“If only he knew how right he was,” the man said, holding Jared by the shoulder. “Stay with me. I want to show you something. Something which will pass by your friend, that tragic clown.”

“Ok…” Jared replied uncertainly.

…

“Bob, are you sure Louise is here?” Kevin asked as they picked their way through the rapidly thickening crowds.

“Yeah, I can smell her, man!” The arena was thronged with people, both on the makeshift stage of sand and in the surrounding seats above. Soundmen were setting up speakers and plasma screens, artists were squaring their shots, and autograph hunters snaked around the general masses. In the middle of it all, amongst the tiptoeing airkisses which passed silent words against the deafening music, was the Sister of Sarah: Louise Inkling. Bob was ecstatic, visited by euphoria.

“There she is! The girl herself!” he shouted above the calamitous preparations. She didn’t turn around. Bob ran up to her, and tapped her on the shoulder. They exchanged customary hugs.

“Robert, I didn’t expect you to turn up!” Louise said, only half surprised. “Did you come all the way out here to see little me?” She was dressed in what looked like a black school uniform, short skirt, unbuttoned shirt. Her flowing purple hair was replaced with a straight, severe, black slick of oil.

“Yep. Louise and the Cascades, who’da thought it?”

“Actually, it’s just the Cascades,” a voice from the close crowd answered. Another girl stepped out. She was younger-looking, and she appeared to show the schoolgirl image better. “I’m Arachane, and this is my band. I’m the manager…or just goddess if you prefer. These are my singers, and this is Gant Millvale, our investor,“ she said haughtily, pointing to a lean-looking man in shiny leather overalls towering behind Louise.

“Nice,” Bob and Kevin said simultaneously. “So Louise,” Bob continued. “You look a lot different with some clothes on. Emphasis on the word ‘some’! It looks like you’re finally free of your sister’s fan club!”

“Yeah. Well, I always did want to go my own way after finishing school. I guess this is my gap year, before going to uni. It’s funny really. Sarah will be leaving next year, so I won’t see her there.”

“How old are you now?”

“Seventeen. You know that, Robert.” Louise giggled.

“Do you know Louise?” Arachane asked. Her eyes flickered like film-reel under her thick black mascara. “Can we have some drinks over here?” she called out.

“Oh yeah! We go way back. I came to know her through her sister, actually.” Someone with a tray arrived with green shots. Bob took two. “You know the Eva fan club thing? I loved that!” Louise turned her head to face the man behind her. “I mean, a real artistic excuse for girls to get naked and run about town? What could be better, man?” He drained one of his shots. “I can really see what Sarah was doing with the female body. Demanding it get some respect.”

“Oh, she’s still doing all that. But she’s completely Eva now. She takes everything for herself and it’s all too familiar to me. I need my own life.” Louise said. “Besides, black is the new purple!”

“I can drink to that.” Bob downed his other shot. Gant smiled behind the tipped glass. Bob smiled back. “Say, Louise, what are you doing after the show?”

“Well, we’re all heading back to the tour bus for a party.”

“Why bother? There’s one just as good out here.” Bob grabbed another drink. “I have a friend who wouldn’t mind if we hung out in his van. Where is he? Kev, do you know where Jared got to?” Kevin shrugged. Gant leaned over and said something inaudible to Louise. She smiled at Bob. “So yeah, I was thinking we could do something tonight once your performance is done.”

“Like what?” Bob tried to focus on Louise through the haze he had imposed on himself. It was like peering through the sandstorms that he had seen on his journey: chosen, now-familiar. He tried to focus on her face, instructing the urges to flow through him. The light and the land were washed with green, a whirlpool around her glassy eyes. But something was distracting him from it, leading him back to the same image. The man looking over her shoulder was looking at him. He could imagine his presence in her eyes.

“Would you excuse us for a second?”

“Sure.” Gant turned away, not moving, as if to avert his eyes from seeing a password being typed.

“What’s he doing here?”

“Robert, this is my boyfriend.”

“Oh. Since when?”

“Since about a year ago. Not long after we last met in the Neon Sector. I know why you came here. And I can’t help you.”

“Oh. Ok. I can’t push it?”

“No.” Bob went over to Gant, and weakly shook his hand. A false smile wriggled onto his face.

“Congratulations, man. You’ll have a lot of fun with her. I should know.”

“Thanks, Robert. And that was very clever of you. Now if you’ll excuse us, we have to get ready for the show.” Bob turned around, ready to leave.

“Oh Robert?” It was Arachane. “I think I might be able to give you solace, or at least some respite.”

“Really? For what?”

“Oh, I’m sure something will come to me.”

“Great, where?”

“Out there.” Arachane pointed beyond the arena, out to the desert. “It’s nice and private.”

“Uhh, ok then.”

“Gant. I’ll catch up with you and the rest of the band just before the show starts.” Arachane took Bob by the arm, leading him away to some place of embarrassment and delight. She was his escort, but he her child.

…

“Have you ever considered that this place might become your grave? That this busy scene might return to its former desolation, once the hour has passed?” The man turned to Jared, leading him up the stairs to a seat high in the arena.

“No, he replied. Have you? Wait, what the hell? Is that Bob out there?”

“That isn’t good,” the man replied, following Jared’s gaze. “Your friend is interfering with my business. I thought he promised to stay out of it.”

“He doesn’t know what that is, I’m afraid.”

“So what’s he doing then?” the man asked, slightly snappily.

“I know Bob. So I know exactly what it’ll be.” Jared saw the two hunched figures heading out into the desert to populate it with their seed. The couple set themselves away from the crowds, and yet, from where Jared was standing, they were a scene which could not be escaped from. They embraced, casting long shadows in the floodlights, stretching to touch the horizon. Bob dropped his trousers, and the other figure bent down. This image was imprinted on Jared’s mind, transferred from his childhood computer screen. He remembered the nothings of visuality which he built up to create a scene thick with layers of luxurious bodies. He used to scan between them, flicking until they became inseparable, his eye of power truly dashed against his frozen creation. When he had attained the climax of his desire, he ardently despised it with as much passion as he had before loved it, and wished its destruction with as much fervor as he had poured into its assemblage. Clicking back the piled up windows, an inescapable sense of disgust weighed heavy upon his shoulders.

Bob and his partner must have remained there for about five minutes. They then separated, and headed back into the arena. The crowds were beginning to clear from the centre, as if in recognition of the figure. It was a woman, and she left Bob to cling to the arena’s rim like he and it were magnets. On the stage a few musicians gathered their instruments. Louise grabbed the microphone that was suddenly slid in front of her; another girl hoisted an electric guitar and cradled it there. The amps crackled and buzzed, filling the arena air with electricity. A shiver of expectant silence ran through the crowd. The floodlights burst into colours, drowning the stage in pink, then purple, and then red. They alternated, inventing new colours in the moments that they merged.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, horrors of the night!” A voice boomed from above. “Tonight, you will bear witness to the transformation that has defined our twilight times, the re-nationalization of the fractured sentiments we lost when the day broke! The sun has set again, and a new era has dawned! The stars that burn brightest burn in the darkness! Rogue Point’s Arts Alliance proudly presents, all the way from the Neon Sector in Archangel City, The Cascades!”

The crowd screamed; a thousand individuals just like the ones Jared and his friends had seen back at the motel. In amongst them were others: out of place, but barely noticeable. Louise pressed the microphone to her lips.

“It’s such a pleasure to be here tonight!” she shouted, almost devouring it. “I feel like I’m having an orgasm just looking at you all just now! Just to let you know, there’s no place we won’t be when our fans call out across the darkness! So this is for all you desert nomads out there! We love you!”

The crowd screamed again, this time louder.

Louise opened her arms, embracing. She shouted, this time without the amplification of the microphone. “The reign of Julius Caesar lasted from October 49 BC to March 15, 44 BC! Up yours! One two three four…”

She and the rest of the group exploded in a symphony of noise, launching themselves physically into their song. Jared saw Bob and Kevin climbing the stairs between the crowds of jumping youths, who in their movement caused the arena to shake violently. The whole place was alive, dancing to the waves of sound coming from the centre.

“Man, this is awesome!” Bob shouted, hunching himself against the crowds. “I really love what Louise has become. She’s like a different girl out there!”

“She’s changed, I’ll give you that,” Jared replied.

“We were looking for you, Jared. Are you coming down to the front? You get the best views there!” The man shook his head.

“Tell him it’s dangerous.”

“No, we’re fine up here,” Jared replied, mediating.

“Suit yourself. Can I at least borrow your van tonight? Or at least, the back two seats of your van? I feel lucky.”

“You were lucky, Bob.”

“He was lucky he got out alive,” the man said in a voice only Jared could hear.

“No, you can’t use my van.” The music silenced his voice, hitting the exact same notes as it.

“…can’t hear you man!” Bob smiled. Jared shook his head. “Oh, fine. Be that way. I’m just gonna go to Louise’s tour bus then.”

“Bob, don’t do that. You weren’t invited.”

“I’m sure she won’t mind. She never said no.”

“Whatever.”

Bob grinned defiantly, acting like he had won an argument. “I’m going back down to the front. Sure I can’t convince you to come?”

“Nope,” Jared shouted back. He wasn’t defiant or angry. This was just the only way he could be heard in here.

“Catch you later then.” Bob turned back, leaving Kevin to fight amongst the crowds with his conscience.

“Fuck man,” he said. “Alright then.” He approached Jared and the man, and stood beside them.

“That’s the best thing I’ve seen you do tonight, Kevin,” the man said. “Or maybe it’s the only thing I’ve seen you do tonight.” Kevin looked at him, half-gormless, half-entranced in the deafening music.

“GONNA STICK IT TO YA, TEACH. NO NAPOLEON, NO NOTHING NEEDED!!!” Louise screamed. “THAT’S NOT WHO WE ARE, NOT WHERE WE’RE SEEDED!!!”

“She’s rockin’ alright.” Kevin said. “But Bob’s wasting his time. She’s not gonna give him a look in now. No fuckin’ way.” Louise ‘s contorted face was caught on the giant plasma screen, and it seemed almost separated from her voice.

“Do you know who she is? What’s probably happened to her? That woman Bob was with. She did all this.”

“What do you mean?” Jared replied, turning his head but not taking his eyes off her.

“She’s one of my targets.”

“I thought you weren’t going to kill anyone.”

“I’m not going to. At least, I don’t want to. No…my client doesn’t want me to.”

“Hey man!” Kevin shouted in bliss. “Just enjoy yourself. This is amazing!”

“My client is due to talk to Louise after this. I just need to see how that goes.”

“Why?”

“Because some of the Contract Assassins will be watching this. Checking up on their dirty work.”

“GIVE US NO LORD KITCHENER AS FEED, WE CHOOSE WHAT HISTORY TO BLEED!!! DRINK UP OUR OWN, DRINK TO OUR OWN!!!”

Louise was transformed; she seemed to glow upon the stage, absorbing the crowd’s screams. The microphone was a conductor for the energy they generated. The lights began to flicker as the chorus began. The band moved in motion like they were in an old film.

“DRINK UP OUR OWN, DRINK TO OUR OWN. WE ARE OUR OWN. YOU ARE OUR OWN!”

The song continued, and in the strobe lighting Jared could see wiry figures posed like statues in each second: a thousand black-topped boys and girls, crosses and daggers hanging from their earlobes, glimmering in the light. A spark of neon, a flash of fishnetted pale skin.

This was another one of those images familiar to Jared. The statues were everywhere. Stuck in magazines and on flypapers all over the Neon Sector and the Old Quarter all throughout him growing up. In films and on the private networks. When one passed him by in the street, he didn’t recognise it as a real human being. And here they all were, part of this big show out here in the desert.

The song ended with a vast explosion of bright light, illuminating the entire arena and its awestruck fans.

“THANK YOU! THANK YOU EVERYONE! WE LOVE YOU ALL!” Louise said breathlessly. Her pants growled through the speakers. “Now I’m gonna hand you back to our hosts. But you can catch us in Rogue Point all this week!”

“Ladies and gentlemen! The Cascades!” The announcement seamlessly followed on from her. “And now, the Rogue Point Arts Alliance welcomes a new member into its fold. A man whose network show ‘Family Confessions’ has allowed him to bring people together, and give sanctuary to those who wish to remain apart.” There was a disquieted silence, and a few inappropriate whoops. “His skilled orations have given reason and rest to those who have lived troubled and persecuted lives. He is a true saviour. It’s his first time here at the Rogue Point arena, so please give him a warm welcome: Ambrose Portense!”

There was a raucous applause. It could have been for anyone. Portense, still in his hooded sweat-top, walked slowly out and onto the stage, his head down, shaking. The claps continued despite his firm manner, and for reasons the audience themselves did not understand. Slowly, they died away, one by one, unnervingly. There was confusion and silence, a complete contrast to what had gone before the man. Louise and her band had only just finished packing, and had not yet stepped off the stage. They were unsure of why he had not given them the time to clear away properly.

“I see a lot of strange faces here tonight,” he said plainly. “I have performed in a whole manner of obscure venues, to such a multitude of people. But this, I must say, is the most desolate I have visited. And yet, still I see life before me. Humans find a way to survive in harsh conditions. They cling to idols, promises and rituals which give them the hope and faith to go on living. I saw this done before my very eyes here tonight. But what happens when such things are pushed to their ends? When the message of faith is lost, when the act of living becomes too extreme, detrimental to the life itself? I saw it as my duty to visit these barren places to offer my guiding hand. I came here from the city centre and gave up its pleasures: the lascivious eye of the wide-screen television, the luxury of the en-suite bathroom, and the convenience of the company car. It was my humble sacrifice.” He stooped gracefully. “So if any man, woman or child here tonight is finding the pressure of life out here too much, if they feel like making that call for help: to you I offer my counselling as a testament of my charity: this in recognition of life, which I care so much about. You can make that call to me right now.”

The crowd were utterly bemused, a disorder that bordered on violence. It seemed as if at any moment they could turn nasty.

“What’s this?” he whispered, suddenly adopting an almost theatrical tone. “I hear a call…” There was a murmur of confusion in the arena stands as the audience shuffled around, looking for the individual in their midst. “It’s such a quiet voice, calling to me from the darkness which it has surrounded itself with. A little girl, who’s in deeper than she knows. So deep, she can’t even see it. She doesn’t even know she’s calling out to me. But she knows she needs help…Louise…Inkling.”

“What’s that?” Louise stopped and turned around. A chair was pushed onto the stage from behind the plasma screen by one of the arena staff.

“Sit down, young lady.”

“Ok…” Louise perched on the chair, like a child at an invisible dinner table.

“Now, it’s been said that you’ve fallen. Fallen in with a bad crowd. Would you say that’s a fair assessment?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”
“So you think what you’re doing is alright? Look me in the eye, my young lady, and tell me that it’s okay.” He leaned over to her, his hood casting a shadow upon her face. On the plasma screen, he looked like he was much closer.

“What the hell? What are you trying to say? You’re not my father!” she laughed, wide eyed.

“I’m not saying anything. I’m asking you to search your conscience, Louise. Can you bear what you’ve let be placed upon you? The things which are happening to you at Rogue Point?”

“Rogue Point?”

“Your sister has told me in confidence that she’s worried about the people you’re associating with. She cares for you, a lot.”

“No she doesn’t!” Louise exploded. “She’s just jealous of what I’ve done. She can’t accept it that I’ve moved on from her and her stupid fan club!”

“Well, you should tell her that yourself. Here she is: your sister, Sarah Inkling! Please welcome her to the stage!” The audience booed and jeered like it was natural. Sure enough, a tall woman, with purple locks cascading, came onto the stage. She was wearing nothing but a veil which glittered like it was sparkled with sand.

“What the fuck are you doing here, Sarah?”

“I’m worried about you, my dear child,” she replied smiling calmly, yet as equally theatrical as her summons.

“Don’t act like you’re pure. He’s done this to you, hasn’t he? I know who you are, you bastard! And I don’t give a fuck! I don’t even watch your show!”

“Sarah. You want to tell your sister something, don’t you?” Ambrose said, ignoring her.

“Yeah. Louise. I want you to stay away from that Arachane woman. She’s not who…no, sorry… what you think she is.”

“And do what? Come back to the Neon Sector and re-join your shitty fan club?” Louise stood up. “This isn’t about love, this is just about fame! All of it! You’re no better than me, neither of you! How dare you judge me!”

The audience whooped in delight. Sarah went over to restrain her and bring her back down onto her seat. They struggled, and Louise grabbed hold of her sister’s purple hair and pulled violently.

“YOU BITCH!!!”

“Now listen here, young lady!” Portense raised his voice, and yet his face never changed to show it. Look at me!” He crouched down. “Listen to your sister, Louise. She knows what’s best for you. This is no place for a girl like you! You’re only seventeen; too young to get caught up in it! Leave, before you get hurt!”

“No! I won’t do as she says! We’re both the same, always fighting for attention! It was like this when we were children! When mum died and there wasn’t enough of daddy’s love to go around. He used to pick us up from school and get drunk on the way to the courts…doing things on the way there. Growing up was a competition between Sarah and I: which one of us could get away from all that the quickest!”

Suddenly, Arachane marched onto the stage.

“Leave her alone. She’s past all that now,” she said calmly.

“No! She’s my sister. And you’ve changed her. I can see it.”

“I gave her choices that you never did. But she chose them. And you know what? Yes, I have changed her. I’ve shown her true companionship and given her the courage to make something of herself. And now she’s more my sister than yours.” Suddenly, Sarah leapt forwards and grabbed Arachane by the neck.

“I’ve been told what you are!” Sarah snarled.

“Somehow I doubt you could comprehend that,” Arachane replied, unaffected. Portense’s bodyguards appeared from either ends of the stage and separated the girls. He himself turned to the audience.

“Well, this obviously needs more time. If anything, ladies and gentlemen, we can take away from this the fact that sisters always fight. And our team of experts are on hand to give them the attention they need to resolve their dispute. If you have a problem just like this one, then don’t forget: you can make that call to me. Thank you so much for your time tonight, and don’t forget to watch ‘Family Confessions’, which is on all your major networks.” More wild applause. The number flashed upon the plasma screen, as Portense left the stage with the bodyguards still wrestling with their angry captives.

The evening continued, all the drama forgotten amongst the other acts.

Judgment: The Rise of the Second Sun

The first murmurs of light. A sight which weighed heavy on the souls below, which made their problems rise once again through them, stirring like memories in the heat. The day was waking the people, waking them from a night they could not remember. It throbbed at the horizon, making inroads through the sky, defining clouds.

“You never really see these times,” Jared said. Somehow the three of them had got back into the van. “It’s like what I said about him when we were on the road.” He was talking to himself. “The sky is blinded by the city. But out here, it shows its true colours. That never changes.” Bob and Kevin slept behind him again. He looked out of the dusty window. Other cars around them were being packed up, and the arena was being emptied, drained.

“So that’s it then? Stark.” Amongst the parting crowds, a familiar figure stood. It was the man, standing at the mouth of the arena, in almost exactly the same place as the last time Jared awoke. Chemtex Silk Suit. Briefcase. 5.56 Pocket Uzi, Modified Chamber, Silencer. No change. There were other people gathered around that man: The Cascades, in a phalanx. Louise and the other girls, Arachane, the one called Gant, and another who was similar looking, dressed in a shiny suit and narrow glasses that seemed to squint preparation for the sunrise. Instinctively, Jared got out of the van. He walked over to them.

“What’s going on?”

“Jared? Are you sure you want to see this?” the man called out, not turning around.

“So what if I do?”

“There’s no one else?”
“No.”

“Then you can stay.”

Gant stepped forward. “Who’s this? Someone I didn’t expect, I think.”

“The same as yours, Millvale.” The man pointed to the one who looked like Gant’s clone.

“I’m Millvale then?”

“For the duration of this conversation, yes.”

“How much do you know?”

“I know all your names. And I know enough that the Contract Assassins want you and your band out of Rogue Point. Your kind aren’t welcome there.”

Silence.

“Tell me, Millvale. How many have been bitten? How many of your band, how many of their fans?”

“Ask Arachane. It’s her band. I’m just here to clean up the mess.”

The man shook his head.

“This is all about you, Millvale. I’ll show you.”

“Do you think you can kill me? Tell me the truth.”

“No.”

“And my friends? Do you think you can kill them?”

“No.”

“Then you’re a showman, with no name. Just like everyone else out here. So, what are you going to do? Do what I came to do anyway? Let’s face it, if I hadn’t moved The Cascades out of Rogue Point, the Contract Assassins would have done it.”

You’re right. I’m not here to move you on.”

“So why are you here?”

“To judge you. Do you remember the last time you were out in the desert, walking through this valley that we made for ourselves? You met a man. You killed him. His grave is marked only by his gun, made untouchable by the burning heat of the sun. I knew that man, and he knew me. He gave me my name.”

“The son…” Jared interrupted. He could see a look of remembrance crawl across Millvale’s face: his eyes narrowed as if to bring the past’s horizon towards him.

“How can you judge me without killing me?” he asked. “After what I did to your father, you must want vengeance. You must hold anger and hatred within you.”

The man shook his head once more.

“You killed him to survive. Like him, you and I are driven fanatical by our losses, we do not do, we merely are. Look at your friends standing around you, Millvale. Would they be friends if you hadn’t walked into their lives and done what you have done? Your kind forces itself on all those around. Everything is circumstance, slain in the name of your nature. Is this woman that everyone is so fascinated with, really your girlfriend? Are you really managing this band assembled behind you? No. I will prove that you are nothing but your nature, and your self-loathing grasp upon humanity is just a lie.”

“But to do that…you yourself must prove your own inhumanity. My killing your father has made you this way.”

The sand was whipped by the wind around them; caught and falling from the folds of their squinting eyelids, each grain was a tick of time.

“Yes. And what’s to come distances us from it indefinitely.”

Silence breathed its last sigh. Gunfire. The figures standing around Millvale were thrown down around him. The man clutched his waist as a short gun seemed to appear in his opponent’s grip. He staggered, and Jared rushed forward to catch him.

Millvale was the first to awaken from the trance. His eyes widened, sensing the absence behind him. They slowly swivelled left and then right, trying to guess what scene it was. His head did not turn. “Whatever you have done to me makes me more of a man than you.”

“Do you think? I can’t kill your kind by conventional means,” the man replied, staggering forth from Jared’s grasp. “But you knew that was never my intention. Your judgement begins now. Even by their standards, you’re different. You go beyond even their endurance, left in their wake to see things they cannot. The sun will rise soon, and it’s a long way to any real shelter. You have to make that journey for each of your forced friends, and in the time you have, decide who lives and who dies. What kind of a man has that power to make that kind of judgement?”

Some of the bodies that lay around Millvale looked up to him in despair. Others buried their heads in the sand. He collapsed amongst them.

“You created that judgement!”

“And yet, you created them.”

“Oh God,” Jared wailed, catching up. “This is too familiar.”

The man approached Millvale and opened his briefcase upon the desert ground. Inside, some dusty bullets. He spread them about the sand before his kneeling sight.

“These would have marked your grave if my father had killed you. They’re all that’s left of him, after what you did. Now, you’re united with all your victims, and you must carry them upon your conscience and your shoulders across the desert.”

“Why am I seeing this? God, I wish I was blind!” Jared screamed, unable to turn away. It was as if he were speaking for the crouched figure. The man turned around. He seemed miles from Jared.

“Being blind won’t help you, Jared. My father was blind, and he never escaped them. He told me that it just pushed them onto his other senses. He heard their blood-screams more sharply, and stronger smelt their rotting flesh. His skin prickled every time he sensed the dirge of their appearances. He told me that the only way to survive your killings is to let go of your mortal sensations, physical and psychological. To become completely apart from your body and soul, and every other body that bleeds and cries. In a lifetime, sometimes we fall, and sometimes we cope.”

“But you ARE bleeding. And he is crying! You are just men! And I know you are human. I saw and felt it. The way you protected us all at the motel, and the way you listened to me when I talked about my writing. Nobody has ever done that with me before!”

“And yet, from all that, I had to walk away. Just as I will walk away from this. You said you came out here to find an origin, and a survival of the past. In this man-made wilderness, men have done just now what they have done for centuries. I’ve shown you sanctity and hypocrisy, mortification and infection. This forever fills up the empty space in us all.”

“You can’t just leave. Not this time. You’re coming back with me.”

“No. Jared, this is the end of your search, your story. Let me leave your life as I came into it: from the desert, bleeding, uncaring.”

“But what about me?”

“Go with your friends. Go to Rogue Point. Go home. Before this scene infects you. I don’t want to change you.” With that, the man turned around, leaving everything that was set before him: his tortured enemies, the remains of his father. He walked towards the light, a silhouette blurred and then blocked out by the rising sun’s magnitude.

Jared dragged himself away from the scene. It reminded him of the time he was crawling through the rubbish outside the Motel. How could he forget? He opened the door to his van, and got in. Bob woke up.

“Where were you?” he mumbled.

“Just outside for a smoke.”

“Where’s that guy?”

“Gone.”

“Oh. Oh well. At least some of us had a good time,” Bob smirked.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. It was great. I think we should meet with the Cascades more often.”

“We’re going to Rogue Point, to fill this thing up. Then we’re going home,” Jared said defiantly, grasping the steering wheel.”

“Fair enough. The funny thing about that girl last night was…well, she was wild! She even bit me!”

“Really?”

The End

Description
Journey’s Crossroad

They walked into the vacant reception area. There was nobody to nod at on the way out.

“That’s odd, where’s the desk girl?” Bob asked.

“There was a desk girl? I didn’t see her on the way in. Or did I? I was in such a hurry to get to you that I can’t remember. Go and get Kevin.”

“He’ll be as pissed as I was when you burst in on me, Jared. Are you sure anyone else came in after us?”

“Yeah, I definitely saw another woman come in here. She was with someone.”

“They’re probably in one of these rooms…you know.”

“Yeah, anyway. Go and get Kevin.”

“This place wasn’t really worth the stop actually,” Bob said plainly. “It’s one of those experiences that you don’t have the time or the money to spend on, ‘cause you’re only here to get to somewhere more important. That’s how I see it.”

“That’s how you always see it.”

Bob frowned, and disappeared into the hallway. It swallowed him in dust rather than the darkness that would have been more fitting in a run-down place like this. Jared turned around, gazing up at the corners of the reception area, at the flies that flitted around them unchecked and unchallenged. He could feel himself getting smaller; the ceiling seemed suddenly to tower above his head. He was dragged back into the rotten drainage ditch, and he felt himself being pushed downwards to the sickle-smile scar that it had given him, until his heavy and weakened legs gave way to it. He felt himself falling to his knees. The thought of being infected and of infecting was a demon that had plagued him since his early teenage years. He remembered how his brother in Northport had accidentally got a girl pregnant through some unconventional method that was never explained. Perhaps he didn’t use a condom or pull out quick enough. The thought terrified Jared; that one single part of him could alter so many lives, and that the power to abuse this process lay within every person alive.

“I couldn’t have contracted anything, surely. Even if I did get that cut from there, its unlikely a condom’s contents could infect it. Oh God, I hope not…” he whispered to himself. He’d searched up the odds many times before on the private networks. What are the chances from getting MIV from touching another guy’s dick? Do people intentionally spread the disease around? His questions were as varied as the answers he got. Unlikely. Quite Likely. Lolz, you are infected, defo. He found himself kneeling in the middle of the reception area, staring upwards at the ceiling. Was he supplicating to banish the demon, or did this merely enflame it?

“Oh God, I am my scar…” he murmured, possessed.

“What did you say?” Bob and Kevin appeared behind him.
“Oh, nothing,” Jared said, picking himself up. His clothes threatened to reveal his thoughts; the grimy patch down the front of his shirt, and the dusty circles on his trouser knees.

“Did anyone tell you, Jared, that you are weird?” Kevin appeared sheepishly from behind Bob’s shoulder.

“It looks like you had the same problem as Bob, Kev…” Jared suggested, ignoring the remark.

“Well, it’s this place that’s weird, and no fucking wonder,” Bob interrupted, speaking for him. “I told Kev about your issues with it. We’re both alright with leaving, if you want.”

“But you’re driving, Jared,” Kevin added. “And I don’t suppose it matters if you fall asleep. You won’t crash into anything out here.”

“I’m fine with that. Let’s go.” The three of them walked outside, back into the car park. Next to Jared’s van, at the petrol pumps, the man was standing. He looked straight at them as if he were judging them silently for what they had just done. He had his gun in his hand, pointed to the ground. No black car. No bodyguards. It was odd, him standing there like that in the night. The harsh lights of the petrol forecourt shone down upon him, squaring off the desert darkness. The shade was brighter than the open, like a photograph negative.

“He looks pissed off,” Kevin said.

“No wonder, after what Jared’s just got himself into.”

“We’re all in this together, Bob. No matter what happens.”

They began to approach him slowly. Suddenly, from behind Jared’s van, jumped two lean-looking youths. The first leapt up onto the man’s back, forcing him forward.

“RUN!” Jared shouted. They ran back towards the motel like it was a school, and their lessons were about to begin. Another youth appeared in the doorway, grabbing its frame like he was a pin-up. He looked about ten years younger than the rest of them, but the group still scattered at the sight of him.

“Going somewhere?”

“Shit! Back this way, out into the desert!” Jared caught a glimpse of the man and his two assailants. One had him pinned against his van. From the darkness beyond the car park, Jared could see them fighting. The man managed to bend over and throw one of the attackers off his back, into the other. They both fell to the floor, and Jared could hear the thud they made from his position. They bounced back, as if their fall was nothing. For their young age, they showed remarkable stamina. One of them leapt back onto the man, and sank his teeth into his shoulder. The man grabbed onto him with one hand, and holding his gun, shot the other. There was a small silence. The other nearly fell off in shock. After a short struggle, he was finally thrown onto the floor, to share a similar fate as his friend. Time seemed to slow down, and yet it all happened so fast. The third at the motel entrance, seeing all this, ran straight for the man. His scream was a suicidal laugh and cry in one. He was thrown off his feet by another shot, and landed on his back in the dust.

“What the hell? Let’s get out of here!” Kevin shouted.

“No, my van!” Jared replied.

“Fuck your van!”

“We have to go back! We can’t go anywhere otherwise!” More shots rang out, each accompanied by a dire scream.

“Back to that? You’re crazy Jared! He’ll kill us too!”

“Alright, alright! We stick together guys,” Bob said. “You hear that, man?” He called out. “You hear that? We’re coming back, okay? Don’t shoot.” There was no answer. Slowly, the three of them made their way back to the petrol pumps. “Okay? Okay…” The man stood there, over two of the bodies.

“Shit man…they look like, fourteen?” Jared whispered. “Why did you do that, you sick fuck!”

“Jared…Jared. It’s not our concern. His business is not our concern, remember?”

“How can you say that Bob?” Jared replied, tearfully. Look them in they eye and say it’s none of our concern! Say we’re not involved in this!”

“We’re not. Right now, we’re not.” Bob said calmly, staring at the ground. Silence.

“They didn’t suffer, despite what you might think,” the man said carefully.

“What do you mean?” Jared asked cautiously.

“Demons.”

“Demons? You mean…vampires?”

“No. Their teeth were stunted. If they had been infected it must have been very weak, or very recently.” Bob and Kevin looked the other way, but Jared bent down over the corpses, thinking at least he owed them his interest.

“Maybe they were just pretending to be vampires? I’ve seen that happen in the Old Quarter all the time. Kids think they have the powers they read about in books and see on television. But it always ends like this.”

“You’ve seen this happen before?”

“Yeah. I was born in the Old Quarter, before I moved to the Neon Sector to start my studies. The Cascades…”

Bob turned around suddenly. “What did you say about your studies?”

“No, it’s not my studies. One of their wristbands says it. Look…The Cascades. Why, does that mean anything?” He lifted up the indignant arm of one of the corpses.

“Shit…that’s Louise’s band. How the fuck did she end up with vampire groupies?”

“They’re not vampires,” the man said sternly. “At least, not in the traditional sense.” He turned away, changing the subject. “Are you sure you want to associate yourselves with this band, Robert? With these types of people? Are you sure you all really want to go to Rogue Point? Because now is the time to admit to it if you’re having second thoughts.”

Bob thought about it. He couldn’t say he wanted to turn back, not in front of his friends. Besides, that would be what Jared would want to do. This was his trip, and he wanted to go through with it.

“No, we’re all still going. We’re all still going to meet the band.”

“Then you stand by your principles, your mission?”

“Yes.” When the man put it like that, what had been planned seemed so trivial. A speck of pleasure like a grain of sand. Amongst all this. Who knew what else lay buried out here, where no one bothered to look? “Besides, they’re just goths, right?” Bob looked down at the corpses. They still seemed shocked from being shot, their bullet wounds like mouths open with terror.

“Nevertheless, they still attacked without warning.” Jared replied. “Who says they’re not all like that around The Cascades?”

“They can’t be. Louise wouldn’t allow it. I know her, remember? These three were probably just obsessive fans, that’s all. A few sick roses, yeah? Probably high on something, or bored so they wanted to be.”

“You can’t blame it all on drugs, Bob. It’s deeper than that.”

“And you can’t blame society for people’s bad choices.”

“You two seem to know each other almost too well,” the man interrupted. “But if you want to remain uninvolved in this individual event, you’d better get in the van.”

“But we are involved. We’re witnesses to your crime,” Jared said, angrily.

“There is no crime. Not out here. Would you get in the van, please?” The three warily climbed in, unsure of whether he was giving advice or an order.

“You mean you’re just going to leave them like that?”

“Yes. It’s how things are done out here. If I follow the methods of the Contract Assassins, people will think my work is theirs.”

“So it’s like you’re framing them? Or rather, forging their own work…” Jared toyed with the thought, his foot hovering over the accelerator.

“Let’s drive. I’ve seen enough of this place,” Bob said, putting his head on the dashboard.

“Welcome to the Middle Ground”

The sky was a dark blue, and it seemed as if the van was driving across the bottom of the ocean. From Jared’s view, everyone appeared to be asleep, chewing the shadows.

“Bob, are you asleep? Bob?”

“What?” Bob mumbled.

“I was just thinking about earlier. I kind of wished that they really were vampires, you know. That would mean something from the past had survived. Something that really meant something.” Bob groaned, and turned over to face the window. Jared didn’t care. His lack of an audience gave him the comfort to continue. “I mean, what is society now if it can’t produce vampires, if it can’t create a conflict that means anything?

“Vampires make vampires, not society, Jared.” Bob replied, only for the sake of derailing his argument.

“But you’d think those kids would attack for a reason, right? They didn’t just do it for kicks? Vampirism is the only way to explain what happened back there. Without it, all we saw was senseless violence.”

“Maybe they were expressing themselves. It could be art, man. I’ve seen these things before too, you know.” Bob sighed and feigned detached disinterestedness through half-sleep, secretly preparing himself for another argument. They had always done this on long trips together, presenting each other with baseless hypothetical situations, playing verbal tit-for-tat while Kevin sat silent behind them, too stupid or asleep to join in.

“It’s a pretty grim art, if that’s the case. Or would you claim that what you photograph in the Neon Sector is art?”

“Yeah. And it’s the same stuff you write about. We’re the same, you and I. Joined like twins at our sources.” Jared gripped the steering wheel and stared at Bob’s stirring reflection in the darkened glass. It seemed like he was outside the van, standing asleep right in front of it, a phantom playing chicken.

“You think that’s what we do now?” Jared said sternly. “Does nothing matter now that we don’t see meaning in our actions anymore? The generation of the Big Impact said art was pretty much screwed because there’s now nothing left in the landscape to inspire us, and no reality to reflect. So this is what they’ve given us: a bombed-out, flat and empty fuck-land. And we’re just supposed to accept their hollow hedonism as our history?” In anger, his sour thoughts once again entertained the possibility of him being infected by the trash that he’d crawled through earlier. The idea prodded his otherwise stolid body with a sense of pleasurable danger. His imagined death, painful and protracted, was what allowed him to remember who he was. “That’s why I wanted them to really be vampires. I wanted to see a body that shambles with disease, that weeps the blood of history.”

He peered through the window, trying to see something past the reflections that were lit up by the dim car controls, something out on the road beyond the headlights. Nothing.

“This is where we live. Where everything is arguable, but nothing is answerable. Welcome to the middle ground, my friend.” Jared’s voice tapered to a whisper, answered only by the soft snoring of his ex-listeners.

Bob was doing it on purpose. Falling asleep just to annoy him.

“You’re right, you know.” The man said, a voice from the shadows. He wasn’t asleep. He was just picking his moment to speak. “We’re all disconnected, in the desert. Us, your friends, those boys I killed at the motel. I lost my only connection out here, and a part of me has never left. We are lives impervious to time, in a land without change. I know what you’re searching for. You’re not here for the same reasons as your friends.”

“Yeah. I didn’t come here to lose myself. I came for the opposite reason. Before we built our cities and wrote our books, we lived in the desert. And something must have caused us to turn our backs on it and start a civilization to unlock our humanity. Some say that force was self-consciousness or God. I don’t really know what it is, but I know there’s some secret power out here that makes us who we really are. And I want to find it.” Jared looked in his visor back at the man. His forehead was like a cliff, casting the rest of his face in shadow. He looked as if he was sleeping.

“I guess it’s so elusive because we’ve brought the city out here with us.” Jared continued. “I mean…this place is only stark because we’ve made it that way. Having Bob and Kevin here makes it difficult for me to see through all the crap they throw up. The things they say, the things they make me do. It all gets in the way of the search. Their food, their smell…I can’t stand it. But it’s me too. I’m just as bad. I see this world from this little van, this mobile prison. It marks the land with its tracks, and there’s no wind to blow them all away. We could be followed, hunted like animals in a game reserve. After all, we made this place, didn’t we? The nukes, the Big Impact. It was all us…” Jared slammed on the brakes.

“Oh my God.” The man was unfazed, while the others were startled, knocked out of their dreams. His voice filled the van as its engine growled angrily.

“So why do you search? Haven’t you already invented what you’re looking for? Do already know how your story ends?”

“No. At least I hope not. But it worries me how it seems man controls nature this much. Does he pour his soul like the sand into it? Does he make the mirage his mirror? There must be something original here, something untouched and untapped. And until I met you, I had doubts. But you’re proof…living proof. You don’t affect nature like we do. You…are nature. You don’t need a van to travel through the desert, and you don’t mark it with rubbish or disease. You’ve given me a new hope. I find you completely fascinating.” Jared put his head on the steering wheel in silence.

“What are you on about now, Jared?” Bob mumbled.

“Leave him,” the man said apologetically. “I think he’s tired.”

“No, he just wants to fuck you. Trust me, I’ve seen him like this before.”

“I think it would be good if you could all get some sleep. Leave the driving to me. I know where Rogue Point is,” the man replied calmly. He sounded like a father.

“Fine, just take us out of this goddamn place,” Jared said stroppily. He got out, and swapped seats. The van briefly illuminated the open doors and stumbling confusion, before people returned to their seats. The engine was satisfied to be running again, quiet and shadowy, with the man in control.

“They weren’t vampires. Just children with no concept of who they were.”

Judgment: The Day of the Sun’s First Coming

The van juddered to a halt; a firm shunt of Jared’s head. He woke up.

“Are we there yet?” he mumbled, as the sunlight flood under his opening eyelids. “Wherever that is…” Bob joined him in the waking world.

“Hey, this isn’t Rogue Point. Why are we stopped?” Bob peered out of the window. Sticking out of the sand, large metal frameworks towered like the ancient ruins of a lost civilization. They were arranged in a loose circle, joined together with cabling that hung intertwining like withered vines.

“Is this a graveyard…or a sacrificial site?” Jared asked.

“No,” Bob replied. This is the Rogue Point Arena. They use it for organized duels and shit. To try and keep violence out of the town. Why did you bring us here, man? This is miles away from Rogue Point.” The man switched off the engine. It was as if he was preparing himself for something.

“This is where everyone is going to be. Including your band.”

“And by everyone, who else do you mean? Portense?” Jared blurted out suddenly. There was a pause.

“Yes. I know what you were doing back at the motel car park,” the man replied calmly. “I forgive you.”

“Portense?” Bob said, stiffening. It sounded like his words were being strangled in his throat. “He’s not coming here, is he?”

“Why, do you know him?” Jared asked.

“Of course. I mean, everyone knows him. From that relationship show of his. But I know him from more than just that. I wanted to sell him some photos, and his price was too high. I said some things I shouldn’t have, really.”

“Don’t worry. It won’t come up,” the man interjected. “He’ll have bigger things on his mind. Things that he said.”

“Like what?” Jared asked.

“You’ll see. There’s no way you won’t. I need to check this place out.”

“What for?”

“Snipers.”

“You’re not going to kill anyone, are you?”

“It won’t come up.”

“You seem so sure of everything. How do you know things will go your way?” Jared leant forward, between the two front seats. He was like a child, anxious to know where he was being taken.

“They don’t need to. Nothing can stop what’s coming. Not even them.”

“The demons?”

“Yes.”

“What if they kill you like they did your friend? You know, that guy you knew?”

“If it happens, it happens. I’m sure he was thinking the same thing when he died.”

“So am I. I’m coming with you.”

“Are you sure you want to go through with that? To make it your mission?” Jared thought. He’d asked this same question to Bob, after putting him in such obvious danger. But it was Bob who chose that danger, and there were so many times he could have broken his own steps. He could have chosen differently. No, that was wrong. Nobody chose anything to happen. Choice was an afterthought to explain how people made the world. It was an excuse to wake up, to remove the blindfold, to take off the mask. Jared thought about his own choices. His sexuality, his drive to write stories, his avoidance of disease. Every thought of his had been revealed to him on this journey, every sordid little fragment of himself was unearthed in the disturbance of this stark hinterland between the city and the unreachable coast at Rogue Point. The choices of men and women counted for nothing. This place proved it. Their actions were as inevitable as nature, as the rising and setting of the sun.

“Yeah. I’ll make this my mission.”

“If you say so,” the man replied.

It could be dangerous! What, are you mad?” Kevin shouted. It was the first indication he was even awake.

“Nah, let him go,” Bob said casually, to cover his anger. “If he wants to get himself killed, that’s up to him.” Bob turned round in his seat to look at Jared. “I’m sick of looking after you, Jared. We all left the motel because you thought it was dangerous. And now you throw our consideration back in our faces by doing this?” The man got out of the car, not wishing to be the witness of another argument.

“I’m sick of the way you make me think of myself, Bob.” Jared got out as well, and slammed the door. He ran after the man across the desert floor, into the metal arena. It cast no shadows, and yet the presence it pressed upon the scene was almost as intolerable as the heat it generated.

“Stick close,” the man said. Jared hung by his shoulder, tempted to clutch it. There was something about this place that lured travelers to temptation. Instinct hung in the air silently, buffeted by a ghostly wind that could not be sensed, measured only by the swaying of the surrounding cables. Although the seats were empty, Jared could feel himself being watched.

“Is this place as dangerous as you predict?”

“It could be. The Contract Assassins may be checking up on me. They like to pay people to do work they think is below them. People like Portense and me. The whole thing is just a game to them now. They used to enforce the laws of the rich at Rogue Point. But since they were the only ones brave enough to do so, they’ve taken all the power and made these laws their own.

“Tell me what’s going on.” Jared looked back at the car, still present but made almost ethereal in the haze. “They won’t hear us.”

“Maybe you should ask him.” The man pointed over to a few shimmering black blots that filled the seats, holes in an empty display. Ambrose Portense was wearing a hooded sweat-top, its drawstrings hanging penitently. He was hunched over in the mid-morning sun, flanked by two bodyguards similar to the one Jared had seen in the black car last night.

“I don’t think I’ll bother.”

“So now you are here.” Portense seemed to wake up, and lifting his hood, revealed his pallid pate. His voice was much louder and firmer than Jared remembered. Was it the arena that made it seem this way, or was this the fervor which it generated in its inhabitants? “Earlier than predicted, and with a companion. But it doesn’t matter.” He stood up, his grey clothes statuesque, but stained with sweat. “Are you ready for the evening’s entertainment? I’m sure you’ll be interested to find out what I’ll reveal in certain members of our audience.” He outstretched his arms, as if to grasp the entire arena.

“I’ll try to make the most of it, considering I need to remain here for our business to be completed,” the man replied. “But I can’t help thinking that they’ll find what I have to say more affecting.”

“Indeed. But I hope you’ll keep that amongst yourselves. I’d hate for you to be the star of the show. I hired you because of your impressive if rather obscure history. I trust you will keep the professional confidentiality that benefits us all at the forefront of your mind when conducting yourself. I have faith in you. I have faith, and yet, throughout my time here, I’ve overlooked your many moments of misconduct. Even now I’m lenient with this continual intrusion that clings to your side. Quite a…distraction he’s provided you with.” His arms fell down by his sides, pushed there by disappointment but bearing forgiveness. Silence, and for once, Jared sensed it wasn’t held there by the man he was standing next to. “Hah! Look at this… this plentiful richness,” Portense continued. “Amongst all this scarcity. The illness of tongue carries forth the abundance of our mortality through this empty world! Oh, such simple acts which manifest complex nothings! Our town is diseased. I am a humble man with a single aim: to capture the climate of this sick filth, this moral chaos.”

“I won’t be going to Rogue Point. Once I’m done with our business I’ll be heading back out again.”

“Hang on” Jared whispered. “Bob, Kevin and I are planning to go there.”

“You can go there. But I won’t be coming with you.”

“But we can’t just leave you out here.”

“Why not? You found me here.”

Portense sensed they were sharing words. He interrupted them. “So, you won’t be staying? A pity. Don’t you feel the murmuring anticipation of an audience? The approving buzz of the cameras? The elevation all this attention endows? Having them hang on your every word, feeling like their minds are following yours, tracking your words but never finding the source…”

“I only sense judgment. And they’ll be here, at sundown,” the man replied.

“Who will be here?” Jared asked quietly.

“Everyone. And that includes that band of yours. Did you think I would stick with you without gaining something myself, drive you here for no reason that would benefit you? This is where my business meets yours.”

“We’re here for the same people, aren’t we? Maybe not for the same reasons though, which worries me.” Jared’s voice trailed off.

“Maybe you should take Portense’s advice over mine. Just sit back and enjoy the show.” The couple turned around. “We’ll speak again at sundown, Ambrose,” the man called out. He whispered to Jared. “Now, go back to the car, and not a word of this.”

Judgment: The Fall of the First Sun

Jared found himself in the car again. He woke from his sleep by a faint and distant thunder. But it wasn’t the familiar sound of the endless wind beating against every surface that defied it, nor was it the forever grinding of worn wheels against the desert road. No, it was something else, a different storm not experienced since he had began this journey: music.

“What the hell?” Bob stirred behind. “Jared, look!” He pointed up to the sky, floodlit by the arena. “Listen to that! There’s a party going on! Our man must have been right, Louise and the others are here!” Sure enough, a few heads at the arena could be seen bobbing like fish in a barrel, and standing at its gap was the man. It was as if he had summoned them all from the desert. “We have to get over there!” Bob and Kevin got out of the van quickly, followed reluctantly by Jared.
They rushed to the man. “Hey, thanks! I owe you one. A beer maybe?” Bob said, not stopping. “This place looks awesome. It’s like, everyone says the city it the center of human civilization, but this is where it’s really at!” His enthusiasm was renewed, and the struggle of the journey became the effort of an eyeblink, and like a memory, was forgotten in its speed.

“If only he knew how right he was,” the man said, holding Jared by the shoulder. “Stay with me. I want to show you something. Something which will pass by your friend, that tragic clown.”

“Ok…” Jared replied uncertainly.

…

“Bob, are you sure Louise is here?” Kevin asked as they picked their way through the rapidly thickening crowds.

“Yeah, I can smell her, man!” The arena was thronged with people, both on the makeshift stage of sand and in the surrounding seats above. Soundmen were setting up speakers and plasma screens, artists were squaring their shots, and autograph hunters snaked around the general masses. In the middle of it all, amongst the tiptoeing airkisses which passed silent words against the deafening music, was the Sister of Sarah: Louise Inkling. Bob was ecstatic, visited by euphoria.

“There she is! The girl herself!” he shouted above the calamitous preparations. She didn’t turn around. Bob ran up to her, and tapped her on the shoulder. They exchanged customary hugs.

“Robert, I didn’t expect you to turn up!” Louise said, only half surprised. “Did you come all the way out here to see little me?” She was dressed in what looked like a black school uniform, short skirt, unbuttoned shirt. Her flowing purple hair was replaced with a straight, severe, black slick of oil.

“Yep. Louise and the Cascades, who’da thought it?”

“Actually, it’s just the Cascades,” a voice from the close crowd answered. Another girl stepped out. She was younger-looking, and she appeared to show the schoolgirl image better. “I’m Arachane, and this is my band. I’m the manager…or just goddess if you prefer. These are my singers, and this is Gant Millvale, our investor,“ she said haughtily, pointing to a lean-looking man in shiny leather overalls towering behind Louise.

“Nice,” Bob and Kevin said simultaneously. “So Louise,” Bob continued. “You look a lot different with some clothes on. Emphasis on the word ‘some’! It looks like you’re finally free of your sister’s fan club!”

“Yeah. Well, I always did want to go my own way after finishing school. I guess this is my gap year, before going to uni. It’s funny really. Sarah will be leaving next year, so I won’t see her there.”

“How old are you now?”

“Seventeen. You know that, Robert.” Louise giggled.

“Do you know Louise?” Arachane asked. Her eyes flickered like film-reel under her thick black mascara. “Can we have some drinks over here?” she called out.

“Oh yeah! We go way back. I came to know her through her sister, actually.” Someone with a tray arrived with green shots. Bob took two. “You know the Eva fan club thing? I loved that!” Louise turned her head to face the man behind her. “I mean, a real artistic excuse for girls to get naked and run about town? What could be better, man?” He drained one of his shots. “I can really see what Sarah was doing with the female body. Demanding it get some respect.”

“Oh, she’s still doing all that. But she’s completely Eva now. She takes everything for herself and it’s all too familiar to me. I need my own life.” Louise said. “Besides, black is the new purple!”

“I can drink to that.” Bob downed his other shot. Gant smiled behind the tipped glass. Bob smiled back. “Say, Louise, what are you doing after the show?”

“Well, we’re all heading back to the tour bus for a party.”

“Why bother? There’s one just as good out here.” Bob grabbed another drink. “I have a friend who wouldn’t mind if we hung out in his van. Where is he? Kev, do you know where Jared got to?” Kevin shrugged. Gant leaned over and said something inaudible to Louise. She smiled at Bob. “So yeah, I was thinking we could do something tonight once your performance is done.”

“Like what?” Bob tried to focus on Louise through the haze he had imposed on himself. It was like peering through the sandstorms that he had seen on his journey: chosen, now-familiar. He tried to focus on her face, instructing the urges to flow through him. The light and the land were washed with green, a whirlpool around her glassy eyes. But something was distracting him from it, leading him back to the same image. The man looking over her shoulder was looking at him. He could imagine his presence in her eyes.

“Would you excuse us for a second?”

“Sure.” Gant turned away, not moving, as if to avert his eyes from seeing a password being typed.

“What’s he doing here?”

“Robert, this is my boyfriend.”

“Oh. Since when?”

“Since about a year ago. Not long after we last met in the Neon Sector. I know why you came here. And I can’t help you.”

“Oh. Ok. I can’t push it?”

“No.” Bob went over to Gant, and weakly shook his hand. A false smile wriggled onto his face.

“Congratulations, man. You’ll have a lot of fun with her. I should know.”

“Thanks, Robert. And that was very clever of you. Now if you’ll excuse us, we have to get ready for the show.” Bob turned around, ready to leave.

“Oh Robert?” It was Arachane. “I think I might be able to give you solace, or at least some respite.”

“Really? For what?”

“Oh, I’m sure something will come to me.”

“Great, where?”

“Out there.” Arachane pointed beyond the arena, out to the desert. “It’s nice and private.”

“Uhh, ok then.”

“Gant. I’ll catch up with you and the rest of the band just before the show starts.” Arachane took Bob by the arm, leading him away to some place of embarrassment and delight. She was his escort, but he her child.

…

“Have you ever considered that this place might become your grave? That this busy scene might return to its former desolation, once the hour has passed?” The man turned to Jared, leading him up the stairs to a seat high in the arena.

“No, he replied. Have you? Wait, what the hell? Is that Bob out there?”

“That isn’t good,” the man replied, following Jared’s gaze. “Your friend is interfering with my business. I thought he promised to stay out of it.”

“He doesn’t know what that is, I’m afraid.”

“So what’s he doing then?” the man asked, slightly snappily.

“I know Bob. So I know exactly what it’ll be.” Jared saw the two hunched figures heading out into the desert to populate it with their seed. The couple set themselves away from the crowds, and yet, from where Jared was standing, they were a scene which could not be escaped from. They embraced, casting long shadows in the floodlights, stretching to touch the horizon. Bob dropped his trousers, and the other figure bent down. This image was imprinted on Jared’s mind, transferred from his childhood computer screen. He remembered the nothings of visuality which he built up to create a scene thick with layers of luxurious bodies. He used to scan between them, flicking until they became inseparable, his eye of power truly dashed against his frozen creation. When he had attained the climax of his desire, he ardently despised it with as much passion as he had before loved it, and wished its destruction with as much fervor as he had poured into its assemblage. Clicking back the piled up windows, an inescapable sense of disgust weighed heavy upon his shoulders.

Bob and his partner must have remained there for about five minutes. They then separated, and headed back into the arena. The crowds were beginning to clear from the centre, as if in recognition of the figure. It was a woman, and she left Bob to cling to the arena’s rim like he and it were magnets. On the stage a few musicians gathered their instruments. Louise grabbed the microphone that was suddenly slid in front of her; another girl hoisted an electric guitar and cradled it there. The amps crackled and buzzed, filling the arena air with electricity. A shiver of expectant silence ran through the crowd. The floodlights burst into colours, drowning the stage in pink, then purple, and then red. They alternated, inventing new colours in the moments that they merged.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, horrors of the night!” A voice boomed from above. “Tonight, you will bear witness to the transformation that has defined our twilight times, the re-nationalization of the fractured sentiments we lost when the day broke! The sun has set again, and a new era has dawned! The stars that burn brightest burn in the darkness! Rogue Point’s Arts Alliance proudly presents, all the way from the Neon Sector in Archangel City, The Cascades!”

The crowd screamed; a thousand individuals just like the ones Jared and his friends had seen back at the motel. In amongst them were others: out of place, but barely noticeable. Louise pressed the microphone to her lips.

“It’s such a pleasure to be here tonight!” she shouted, almost devouring it. “I feel like I’m having an orgasm just looking at you all just now! Just to let you know, there’s no place we won’t be when our fans call out across the darkness! So this is for all you desert nomads out there! We love you!”

The crowd screamed again, this time louder.

Louise opened her arms, embracing. She shouted, this time without the amplification of the microphone. “The reign of Julius Caesar lasted from October 49 BC to March 15, 44 BC! Up yours! One two three four…”

She and the rest of the group exploded in a symphony of noise, launching themselves physically into their song. Jared saw Bob and Kevin climbing the stairs between the crowds of jumping youths, who in their movement caused the arena to shake violently. The whole place was alive, dancing to the waves of sound coming from the centre.

“Man, this is awesome!” Bob shouted, hunching himself against the crowds. “I really love what Louise has become. She’s like a different girl out there!”

“She’s changed, I’ll give you that,” Jared replied.

“We were looking for you, Jared. Are you coming down to the front? You get the best views there!” The man shook his head.

“Tell him it’s dangerous.”

“No, we’re fine up here,” Jared replied, mediating.

“Suit yourself. Can I at least borrow your van tonight? Or at least, the back two seats of your van? I feel lucky.”

“You were lucky, Bob.”

“He was lucky he got out alive,” the man said in a voice only Jared could hear.

“No, you can’t use my van.” The music silenced his voice, hitting the exact same notes as it.

“…can’t hear you man!” Bob smiled. Jared shook his head. “Oh, fine. Be that way. I’m just gonna go to Louise’s tour bus then.”

“Bob, don’t do that. You weren’t invited.”

“I’m sure she won’t mind. She never said no.”

“Whatever.”

Bob grinned defiantly, acting like he had won an argument. “I’m going back down to the front. Sure I can’t convince you to come?”

“Nope,” Jared shouted back. He wasn’t defiant or angry. This was just the only way he could be heard in here.

“Catch you later then.” Bob turned back, leaving Kevin to fight amongst the crowds with his conscience.

“Fuck man,” he said. “Alright then.” He approached Jared and the man, and stood beside them.

“That’s the best thing I’ve seen you do tonight, Kevin,” the man said. “Or maybe it’s the only thing I’ve seen you do tonight.” Kevin looked at him, half-gormless, half-entranced in the deafening music.

“GONNA STICK IT TO YA, TEACH. NO NAPOLEON, NO NOTHING NEEDED!!!” Louise screamed. “THAT’S NOT WHO WE ARE, NOT WHERE WE’RE SEEDED!!!”

“She’s rockin’ alright.” Kevin said. “But Bob’s wasting his time. She’s not gonna give him a look in now. No fuckin’ way.” Louise ‘s contorted face was caught on the giant plasma screen, and it seemed almost separated from her voice.

“Do you know who she is? What’s probably happened to her? That woman Bob was with. She did all this.”

“What do you mean?” Jared replied, turning his head but not taking his eyes off her.

“She’s one of my targets.”

“I thought you weren’t going to kill anyone.”

“I’m not going to. At least, I don’t want to. No…my client doesn’t want me to.”

“Hey man!” Kevin shouted in bliss. “Just enjoy yourself. This is amazing!”

“My client is due to talk to Louise after this. I just need to see how that goes.”

“Why?”

“Because some of the Contract Assassins will be watching this. Checking up on their dirty work.”

“GIVE US NO LORD KITCHENER AS FEED, WE CHOOSE WHAT HISTORY TO BLEED!!! DRINK UP OUR OWN, DRINK TO OUR OWN!!!”

Louise was transformed; she seemed to glow upon the stage, absorbing the crowd’s screams. The microphone was a conductor for the energy they generated. The lights began to flicker as the chorus began. The band moved in motion like they were in an old film.

“DRINK UP OUR OWN, DRINK TO OUR OWN. WE ARE OUR OWN. YOU ARE OUR OWN!”

The song continued, and in the strobe lighting Jared could see wiry figures posed like statues in each second: a thousand black-topped boys and girls, crosses and daggers hanging from their earlobes, glimmering in the light. A spark of neon, a flash of fishnetted pale skin.

This was another one of those images familiar to Jared. The statues were everywhere. Stuck in magazines and on flypapers all over the Neon Sector and the Old Quarter all throughout him growing up. In films and on the private networks. When one passed him by in the street, he didn’t recognise it as a real human being. And here they all were, part of this big show out here in the desert.

The song ended with a vast explosion of bright light, illuminating the entire arena and its awestruck fans.

“THANK YOU! THANK YOU EVERYONE! WE LOVE YOU ALL!” Louise said breathlessly. Her pants growled through the speakers. “Now I’m gonna hand you back to our hosts. But you can catch us in Rogue Point all this week!”

“Ladies and gentlemen! The Cascades!” The announcement seamlessly followed on from her. “And now, the Rogue Point Arts Alliance welcomes a new member into its fold. A man whose network show ‘Family Confessions’ has allowed him to bring people together, and give sanctuary to those who wish to remain apart.” There was a disquieted silence, and a few inappropriate whoops. “His skilled orations have given reason and rest to those who have lived troubled and persecuted lives. He is a true saviour. It’s his first time here at the Rogue Point arena, so please give him a warm welcome: Ambrose Portense!”

There was a raucous applause. It could have been for anyone. Portense, still in his hooded sweat-top, walked slowly out and onto the stage, his head down, shaking. The claps continued despite his firm manner, and for reasons the audience themselves did not understand. Slowly, they died away, one by one, unnervingly. There was confusion and silence, a complete contrast to what had gone before the man. Louise and her band had only just finished packing, and had not yet stepped off the stage. They were unsure of why he had not given them the time to clear away properly.

“I see a lot of strange faces here tonight,” he said plainly. “I have performed in a whole manner of obscure venues, to such a multitude of people. But this, I must say, is the most desolate I have visited. And yet, still I see life before me. Humans find a way to survive in harsh conditions. They cling to idols, promises and rituals which give them the hope and faith to go on living. I saw this done before my very eyes here tonight. But what happens when such things are pushed to their ends? When the message of faith is lost, when the act of living becomes too extreme, detrimental to the life itself? I saw it as my duty to visit these barren places to offer my guiding hand. I came here from the city centre and gave up its pleasures: the lascivious eye of the wide-screen television, the luxury of the en-suite bathroom, and the convenience of the company car. It was my humble sacrifice.” He stooped gracefully. “So if any man, woman or child here tonight is finding the pressure of life out here too much, if they feel like making that call for help: to you I offer my counselling as a testament of my charity: this in recognition of life, which I care so much about. You can make that call to me right now.”

The crowd were utterly bemused, a disorder that bordered on violence. It seemed as if at any moment they could turn nasty.

“What’s this?” he whispered, suddenly adopting an almost theatrical tone. “I hear a call…” There was a murmur of confusion in the arena stands as the audience shuffled around, looking for the individual in their midst. “It’s such a quiet voice, calling to me from the darkness which it has surrounded itself with. A little girl, who’s in deeper than she knows. So deep, she can’t even see it. She doesn’t even know she’s calling out to me. But she knows she needs help…Louise…Inkling.”

“What’s that?” Louise stopped and turned around. A chair was pushed onto the stage from behind the plasma screen by one of the arena staff.

“Sit down, young lady.”

“Ok…” Louise perched on the chair, like a child at an invisible dinner table.

“Now, it’s been said that you’ve fallen. Fallen in with a bad crowd. Would you say that’s a fair assessment?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”
“So you think what you’re doing is alright? Look me in the eye, my young lady, and tell me that it’s okay.” He leaned over to her, his hood casting a shadow upon her face. On the plasma screen, he looked like he was much closer.

“What the hell? What are you trying to say? You’re not my father!” she laughed, wide eyed.

“I’m not saying anything. I’m asking you to search your conscience, Louise. Can you bear what you’ve let be placed upon you? The things which are happening to you at Rogue Point?”

“Rogue Point?”

“Your sister has told me in confidence that she’s worried about the people you’re associating with. She cares for you, a lot.”

“No she doesn’t!” Louise exploded. “She’s just jealous of what I’ve done. She can’t accept it that I’ve moved on from her and her stupid fan club!”

“Well, you should tell her that yourself. Here she is: your sister, Sarah Inkling! Please welcome her to the stage!” The audience booed and jeered like it was natural. Sure enough, a tall woman, with purple locks cascading, came onto the stage. She was wearing nothing but a veil which glittered like it was sparkled with sand.

“What the fuck are you doing here, Sarah?”

“I’m worried about you, my dear child,” she replied smiling calmly, yet as equally theatrical as her summons.

“Don’t act like you’re pure. He’s done this to you, hasn’t he? I know who you are, you bastard! And I don’t give a fuck! I don’t even watch your show!”

“Sarah. You want to tell your sister something, don’t you?” Ambrose said, ignoring her.

“Yeah. Louise. I want you to stay away from that Arachane woman. She’s not who…no, sorry… what you think she is.”

“And do what? Come back to the Neon Sector and re-join your shitty fan club?” Louise stood up. “This isn’t about love, this is just about fame! All of it! You’re no better than me, neither of you! How dare you judge me!”

The audience whooped in delight. Sarah went over to restrain her and bring her back down onto her seat. They struggled, and Louise grabbed hold of her sister’s purple hair and pulled violently.

“YOU BITCH!!!”

“Now listen here, young lady!” Portense raised his voice, and yet his face never changed to show it. Look at me!” He crouched down. “Listen to your sister, Louise. She knows what’s best for you. This is no place for a girl like you! You’re only seventeen; too young to get caught up in it! Leave, before you get hurt!”

“No! I won’t do as she says! We’re both the same, always fighting for attention! It was like this when we were children! When mum died and there wasn’t enough of daddy’s love to go around. He used to pick us up from school and get drunk on the way to the courts…doing things on the way there. Growing up was a competition between Sarah and I: which one of us could get away from all that the quickest!”

Suddenly, Arachane marched onto the stage.

“Leave her alone. She’s past all that now,” she said calmly.

“No! She’s my sister. And you’ve changed her. I can see it.”

“I gave her choices that you never did. But she chose them. And you know what? Yes, I have changed her. I’ve shown her true companionship and given her the courage to make something of herself. And now she’s more my sister than yours.” Suddenly, Sarah leapt forwards and grabbed Arachane by the neck.

“I’ve been told what you are!” Sarah snarled.

“Somehow I doubt you could comprehend that,” Arachane replied, unaffected. Portense’s bodyguards appeared from either ends of the stage and separated the girls. He himself turned to the audience.

“Well, this obviously needs more time. If anything, ladies and gentlemen, we can take away from this the fact that sisters always fight. And our team of experts are on hand to give them the attention they need to resolve their dispute. If you have a problem just like this one, then don’t forget: you can make that call to me. Thank you so much for your time tonight, and don’t forget to watch ‘Family Confessions’, which is on all your major networks.” More wild applause. The number flashed upon the plasma screen, as Portense left the stage with the bodyguards still wrestling with their angry captives.

The evening continued, all the drama forgotten amongst the other acts.

Judgment: The Rise of the Second Sun

The first murmurs of light. A sight which weighed heavy on the souls below, which made their problems rise once again through them, stirring like memories in the heat. The day was waking the people, waking them from a night they could not remember. It throbbed at the horizon, making inroads through the sky, defining clouds.

“You never really see these times,” Jared said. Somehow the three of them had got back into the van. “It’s like what I said about him when we were on the road.” He was talking to himself. “The sky is blinded by the city. But out here, it shows its true colours. That never changes.” Bob and Kevin slept behind him again. He looked out of the dusty window. Other cars around them were being packed up, and the arena was being emptied, drained.

“So that’s it then? Stark.” Amongst the parting crowds, a familiar figure stood. It was the man, standing at the mouth of the arena, in almost exactly the same place as the last time Jared awoke. Chemtex Silk Suit. Briefcase. 5.56 Pocket Uzi, Modified Chamber, Silencer. No change. There were other people gathered around that man: The Cascades, in a phalanx. Louise and the other girls, Arachane, the one called Gant, and another who was similar looking, dressed in a shiny suit and narrow glasses that seemed to squint preparation for the sunrise. Instinctively, Jared got out of the van. He walked over to them.

“What’s going on?”

“Jared? Are you sure you want to see this?” the man called out, not turning around.

“So what if I do?”

“There’s no one else?”
“No.”

“Then you can stay.”

Gant stepped forward. “Who’s this? Someone I didn’t expect, I think.”

“The same as yours, Millvale.” The man pointed to the one who looked like Gant’s clone.

“I’m Millvale then?”

“For the duration of this conversation, yes.”

“How much do you know?”

“I know all your names. And I know enough that the Contract Assassins want you and your band out of Rogue Point. Your kind aren’t welcome there.”

Silence.

“Tell me, Millvale. How many have been bitten? How many of your band, how many of their fans?”

“Ask Arachane. It’s her band. I’m just here to clean up the mess.”

The man shook his head.

“This is all about you, Millvale. I’ll show you.”

“Do you think you can kill me? Tell me the truth.”

“No.”

“And my friends? Do you think you can kill them?”

“No.”

“Then you’re a showman, with no name. Just like everyone else out here. So, what are you going to do? Do what I came to do anyway? Let’s face it, if I hadn’t moved The Cascades out of Rogue Point, the Contract Assassins would have done it.”

You’re right. I’m not here to move you on.”

“So why are you here?”

“To judge you. Do you remember the last time you were out in the desert, walking through this valley that we made for ourselves? You met a man. You killed him. His grave is marked only by his gun, made untouchable by the burning heat of the sun. I knew that man, and he knew me. He gave me my name.”

“The son…” Jared interrupted. He could see a look of remembrance crawl across Millvale’s face: his eyes narrowed as if to bring the past’s horizon towards him.

“How can you judge me without killing me?” he asked. “After what I did to your father, you must want vengeance. You must hold anger and hatred within you.”

The man shook his head once more.

“You killed him to survive. Like him, you and I are driven fanatical by our losses, we do not do, we merely are. Look at your friends standing around you, Millvale. Would they be friends if you hadn’t walked into their lives and done what you have done? Your kind forces itself on all those around. Everything is circumstance, slain in the name of your nature. Is this woman that everyone is so fascinated with, really your girlfriend? Are you really managing this band assembled behind you? No. I will prove that you are nothing but your nature, and your self-loathing grasp upon humanity is just a lie.”

“But to do that…you yourself must prove your own inhumanity. My killing your father has made you this way.”

The sand was whipped by the wind around them; caught and falling from the folds of their squinting eyelids, each grain was a tick of time.

“Yes. And what’s to come distances us from it indefinitely.”

Silence breathed its last sigh. Gunfire. The figures standing around Millvale were thrown down around him. The man clutched his waist as a short gun seemed to appear in his opponent’s grip. He staggered, and Jared rushed forward to catch him.

Millvale was the first to awaken from the trance. His eyes widened, sensing the absence behind him. They slowly swivelled left and then right, trying to guess what scene it was. His head did not turn. “Whatever you have done to me makes me more of a man than you.”

“Do you think? I can’t kill your kind by conventional means,” the man replied, staggering forth from Jared’s grasp. “But you knew that was never my intention. Your judgement begins now. Even by their standards, you’re different. You go beyond even their endurance, left in their wake to see things they cannot. The sun will rise soon, and it’s a long way to any real shelter. You have to make that journey for each of your forced friends, and in the time you have, decide who lives and who dies. What kind of a man has that power to make that kind of judgement?”

Some of the bodies that lay around Millvale looked up to him in despair. Others buried their heads in the sand. He collapsed amongst them.

“You created that judgement!”

“And yet, you created them.”

“Oh God,” Jared wailed, catching up. “This is too familiar.”

The man approached Millvale and opened his briefcase upon the desert ground. Inside, some dusty bullets. He spread them about the sand before his kneeling sight.

“These would have marked your grave if my father had killed you. They’re all that’s left of him, after what you did. Now, you’re united with all your victims, and you must carry them upon your conscience and your shoulders across the desert.”

“Why am I seeing this? God, I wish I was blind!” Jared screamed, unable to turn away. It was as if he were speaking for the crouched figure. The man turned around. He seemed miles from Jared.

“Being blind won’t help you, Jared. My father was blind, and he never escaped them. He told me that it just pushed them onto his other senses. He heard their blood-screams more sharply, and stronger smelt their rotting flesh. His skin prickled every time he sensed the dirge of their appearances. He told me that the only way to survive your killings is to let go of your mortal sensations, physical and psychological. To become completely apart from your body and soul, and every other body that bleeds and cries. In a lifetime, sometimes we fall, and sometimes we cope.”

“But you ARE bleeding. And he is crying! You are just men! And I know you are human. I saw and felt it. The way you protected us all at the motel, and the way you listened to me when I talked about my writing. Nobody has ever done that with me before!”

“And yet, from all that, I had to walk away. Just as I will walk away from this. You said you came out here to find an origin, and a survival of the past. In this man-made wilderness, men have done just now what they have done for centuries. I’ve shown you sanctity and hypocrisy, mortification and infection. This forever fills up the empty space in us all.”

“You can’t just leave. Not this time. You’re coming back with me.”

“No. Jared, this is the end of your search, your story. Let me leave your life as I came into it: from the desert, bleeding, uncaring.”

“But what about me?”

“Go with your friends. Go to Rogue Point. Go home. Before this scene infects you. I don’t want to change you.” With that, the man turned around, leaving everything that was set before him: his tortured enemies, the remains of his father. He walked towards the light, a silhouette blurred and then blocked out by the rising sun’s magnitude.

Jared dragged himself away from the scene. It reminded him of the time he was crawling through the rubbish outside the Motel. How could he forget? He opened the door to his van, and got in. Bob woke up.

“Where were you?” he mumbled.

“Just outside for a smoke.”

“Where’s that guy?”

“Gone.”

“Oh. Oh well. At least some of us had a good time,” Bob smirked.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. It was great. I think we should meet with the Cascades more often.”

“We’re going to Rogue Point, to fill this thing up. Then we’re going home,” Jared said defiantly, grasping the steering wheel.”

“Fair enough. The funny thing about that girl last night was…well, she was wild! She even bit me!”

“Really?”

The End