Fourteen

Fyndraxis had become loot. The man had gathered all of Hunner’s things that weren’t soaked in blood. Namely his bow, a small pouch that he kept on his right hip, and the Daemon Sword Fyndraxis (formerly Light Bringer). Once these things were gathered, he tied them in a bundle and balanced them over his shoulder with one hand holding them for support. He then left town without saying a word and began walking up into the western hills.
There was a sort of path that they were following. The moon had already set, but the night was clear and he could make his way by starlight. This new leg of the journey began to trouble Fyndraxis. Was this man hiking him up into the woods to abandon him? Was he about to be punished for being complicit in murder? He didn’t relish the thought of spending another undetermined amount of time stranded without a wielder.
He began to wonder why having a wielder was so important to him. Was he such terrible company that he couldn’t bear to be by himself? Being bored and lonely seemed like such a trite thing to be afraid of. He had an infinite world inside him where he could do as he pleased, that should be enough. Thinking back on his past winter and the aeons he had spent inside himself, he realized that he didn’t care for his inner world. It was a pale simulacrum of what lay before him. This was the true reality wasn’t it? What if it wasn’t though. What if this was another trick of the narrative. What if he was merely blundering his way through the tutorial phase that these distractions tended to have to orient players to the rules of the world.
What evidence did he have that this world was real and true? If it wasn’t real, the graphics were truly incredible. Technology makes these things possible though. A gentleman named Gordon Moore had made that clear in the nineteen sixties when he observed that the number of transistors that could be crammed into an integrated circuit doubled just about every two years. That was back when computers were hulking things that could only be moved around by cranes, if they could be moved at all. Fast forward a handful of decades and all of a sudden supercomputers could be carried about discreetly in a pocket.
Why did he know that? He knew nothing of his past, yet facts like Moore's law and what a cell phone was seemed to be second nature to him. This world around him didn’t seem to comport with the reality he was used to. Matters of reality aside, he knew one thing for sure. Finding himself alone in the woods again was not something that he wanted. Also, rocketing forward through time wasn’t a thing that he wanted to mess with. He had arrived in the village with no context and in the middle of a fight. If he had been present for the hours before then, he could have possibly diffused whatever situation had been happening.
He needed to talk to this man and convince him that taking him up into the woods and burying him was a terrible idea. The theatrical approach that he had tried on Hunner had yielded mixed results, so another strategy was in order. A “Please don’t bury me in the woods” strategy seemed a bit too straightforward and cowardly for a Daemon Sword, so he settled on something he called “The coolest dude in the universe.”
After they had journeyed for about half a mile and the fires from town were completely out of sight Fyndraxis piped up.
“Hey, nice night isn’t it?” he observed, nonchalantly. It was a classic piece of small talk guaranteed to be received without offense, and fully honest because it was in fact a nice evening.
“Fuck!” the man exclaimed as he threw the bundle that was over his shoulder to the ground and did a quick 360, checking the area around him for whoever had spoken.
“Down here my man, in the bag. I’m the sword,” Fyndraxis was speaking like a really calm, laid back cool dude. The man slowly approached, knelt down and untied the bundle he had made back in town.
“Could’ve sworn I heard you talkin’ in town. Thought I might’ve been losing it,” he chuckled, almost relieved.
“Nah man, I’m totally a talking sword. You’re not crazy. Nasty business back there in town huh? I tried to stop that guy. Sorry about your friend,” he was trying to channel every laid back cool dude he could think of. What came out was a mixture of Owen Wilson hanging ten on a surfboard made of rare Tom Waits vinyls and Garfield the cat smoking a joint on a set break between sax solos. Implausibly cool. It was kind of working too, this guy wasn’t running screaming into the night, which was a good sign for Fyndraxis.
“Yeah, I heard you tryin’ to talk him out of it. Hunner was always a piece of shit. He was convinced that the Twichels killed his little brother. It’s a shame ‘bout the Twitchels, but I don’t think too many tears’ll be shed for him,” the man explained while trying to repack his bundle of loot. The Sword had been a pretty important part of its structure, so he decided to just sling the bow over his shoulder and pocket the small bag.
“Bummer, anyway I’m Fyn. What should I call you man?” Fyndraxis said like he had just casually sunk a three pointer.
“I’m Teeroy,” Teeroy said.
“Right on, where we headed to Teeroy?” Asked Sub Zero from Mortal Kombat drinking a rocks glass of liquid helium.
“Well, I was going to bury you in the woods. You seem like a pretty cool dude though, so I’ll have to do something else. You see, we have a bit of a problem. With Presson dead, I’ll probably end up being Selectman. That’s like the guy in charge of town. It’s tough work and Presson did a fair job at it, but he always had his sword. Like he was always itchin’ for a fight. If anyone stepped out of line you either got the shit kicked out of you, or you ended up dead from that sword of his. It made town a shitty place to live. I don’t plan on runnin’ it like that. I want my time as Selectman to be boring. If I was to let you stay in town I think it’d become a very exciting place to live, but I’d end up ruling over a pile of bones,” he made a fair point.
“What do we do here?” Fyndraxis asked diplomatically.
Teeroy got up and began to slowly pace. He massaged his beard with one hand in the universal gesture of deep thought. He paced for almost a minute silently working things out.
“I’ll bring you to Bird. She’s not gonna like it, but she owes me one,” he said finally.
“Thanks man,” said Rick Rubin, producer for the Beastie Boys.
Fyndraxis and Teeroy walked on through the forest in silence for a time, both seeming to enjoy the evening air in their own way. The path roughly followed the course of a creek flowing out of the western hills. The valley seemed to be absolutely teeming with water. Every square inch that didn’t have a tree occupying it was employed with the seemingly endless task of removing the water they couldn’t swallow up.
“How’d you get in a sword?” Teeroy asked after a while, breaking the silence.
“Beats me, man,” Fyndraxis answered honestly. He truly had no idea how he could have ended up in this situation.
“Bird’ll probably know what to do,” Teeroy continued, “she knows all ‘bout old world stuff.”
“Old world?” The Daemon Sword queried, his curiosity piqued.
“Yeah, there used to be loads of people that lived ‘round here. Somethin’ happened, and now they’re all gone. They used to be able to do magic and stuff. You seem pretty magic to me, so I figure you’re from back then,” Teeroy reasoned, while they continued their walk.
“I don’t really remember,” Fyndraxis admitted.
“Well, that’s a bummer,” Teeroy offered in consolation, “maybe Bird can help you with that, she’s probably the smartest person I know. She’s got books.”
“That would be nice,” Fyndraxis thought that that would probably be a longshot. He had a distinct feeling that he, being a Daemon, was inherently complicated.
“Hey, what’s the deal with this Wendigo thing?” Fyndraxis had heard this term from Hunner a couple of times, and it seemed to be important.
“I’d rather not talk about that,” Teeroy replied, reluctantly. It seemed the Wendigo was important, but the topic served to torpedo their conversation, and they continued on in silence.
A journey of about three miles brought them within shouting distance of a squat cabin in a great meadow on the high western plain. The cabin itself was dark, and smoke puffed merrily out of its stone chimney.
“Bird,” Teeroy yelled when he was about fifty yards from the cabin, “It’s Teeroy. I know it’s late, but I have to talk to you.”
After a minute or so the front door of the cabin opened up and a woman appeared in its frame. She was a study in black and white under the evening starlight, her pale face a mask floating in the darkness.
“Fuck Teeroy, couldn’t wait ‘till mornin’? It’s the middle of the goddamned night,” she said, clearly annoyed at having her sleep interrupted.
“I know, sorry Bird. Shit went sideways in town and I need a favor. You mind puttin’ the kettle on?” he asked, almost sheepishly.
“All I got right now’s some booze from the boys up north,” was all she offered, and she turned back into the cabin and busied herself with the small tasks that a host is obligated to do. Teeroy and the Daemon sword made their way to her doorway to be received.
“Take your goddamn shoes off,” She said reflexively as Teeroy was about to enter the cabin. He paused at the doorway and did as he was asked. Inside the cabin, Bird had thrown a couple of logs on the fire and they were beginning to catch.
The light revealed an austere abode with a single bed, a table with a couple of chairs and a fireplace surrounded by its associated tools and utensils. The wall near the fireplace was occupied by a collection of glass bottles with various liquids and dried herbs. There were also some seemingly ancient books on a shelf whose titles had been worn off ages ago.
Teeroy had a seat at the table as Bird was grabbing one of her bottles and a couple of glasses.
“Well, what’s the fuss?” she asked as she had a seat herself.
“Hunner snuck into town and killed the Twichels and Presson,” he began.
“Fuckin’ Hunner.” She said with a distaste that spoke of years of enmity, “You kill him?”
“Yeah, he’s dead,” Teeroy said softly as he took a drink, “he had something. A magic sword. Said he found it in the eastern hills. It fuckin’ talks.” Bird froze at this mid drink.
“It what?” she said icily.
“It talks, Bird. I was chit chattin’ with it on the way up here. It’s freakin magic.” It seemed that Fyndraxis wasn’t the only one playing it cool on the journey up the hill. “You wanna say hi, Fyn?” Teeroy set the sword on the table between them.
The coolest dude in the universe strategy had worked very well on Teeroy, but Bird seemed to be a different creature entirely. Being woken up in the middle of the night aside, she didn’t seem to be the sort of person that would take bullshit lightly.
“Hi, there,” was all that came out when Fyndraxis spoke.
Bird and Teeroy looked at the sword between them, both taking a sip of the booze from the boys up north.
“What the fuck?” Bird said, after an implausibly pregnant pause.
Fyndraxis, again, didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know these people. He didn’t know anything. He was utterly lost and without anything to guide him. Earlier he had been literally lost in the woods, now that he had been rescued, he continued to be in that state, this time metaphorically.
Eventually he decided that honesty was going to be the best policy with this crowd. Teeroy seemed to be an honest and genuinely kind man. Granted, he had just witnessed him slit a man’s throat, but people contained multitudes. He knew little of Bird, but from what he could tell from her interactions with Teeroy she was a trusted confidant. He decided on an approach that he was calling “The Straight Shooter”. This involved seeming very genuine and mostly telling the truth as he understood it.
“I’m lost,” Fyndraxis began, “I awoke in this form and I have no idea how I got here. Last fall I was dug out of the ground by a young man. He cut himself on my blade and died,” a look was shared between Teeroy and Bird, “Hunner found me today and we went into town. He killed a bunch of people and now we are here. That’s pretty much my whole life as I know it until now.”
“I think the boy that dug him up was Hunner’s younger brother. He disappeared last fall and Hunner blamed the Twitchels for some reason. They never got on,” Teeroy explained to the room, “this is the kind of shit that I don’t want goin’ on in town. Can you help me out here Bird? I can’t just walk him off into the woods, I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night, and if somebody found him, I think he wouldn’t be all too happy with me. He cut through Presson and his blade like he wasn’t even there. Shit, Hunner even took the top of his own head off just taking him out of his goddam sheath.”
“I didn’t kill Presson. Er, I didn’t intend to kill Presson,” Fyndraxis began defending himself.
“I’m not blamin’ you for it, Fyn. Hunner was always a bad seed and the valley’s better off without him,” Teeroy continued, “You seem like an ok guy who is just kind of in a bad spot. If I kept you in the village there would always be a threat of violence. We’ve had to deal with that before and I don’t care for it. Sorry man, you’re just too weird for town.”
“You’ll be Selectman?” Bird asked.
“I don’t see who else would do it,” Teeroy answered through a yawn.
“Alright, “ Bird began to yawn as well, “I’ll take him for the time being, but I live alone for a reason, and I don’t care for company. I’ve had enough of it for the night, in fact. I’m going back to bed. Goodnight Teeroy.”
“Thanks Bird, I owe you one,” Teeroy said as he was putting on his shoes.
“Fuckin’ more than one,” Bird yelled after him as she was closing the door behind him.
“Thanks Bird,” said the Daemon Fyndraxis “I’ll stay out of your hair.”
“Fyn, was it?” Bird asked her new mysterious roommate, as she was clearing the glasses from the table.
“Fyndraxis, but you can call me Fyn if you’d like,” he said.
“Well Fyndraxis, I can’t say that I have much use for a talkin’ sword. Teeroy and I go way back and we trade favors out of spite for some reason,” She seemed to be winding up for some sort of tirade, “This is a huge ask for me and I’m not very happy about it. Leave me be and I’ll figure out what to do with you in the mornin’.”
“Can I ask one question?” Fyndraxis asked quietly.
“Go ahead,” Bird answered, exasperated.
“Where am I?” It was a reasonable question.
“The end of the fuckin’ world,” the tirade she had been preparing for made itself apparent, “everything west of here is picked clean by the fuckin’ Wendigo. To the south and east we have fuckin’ cannibals, the boys to the north are a bunch of fuckin’ idiots and people like Hunner and Presson can’t go ten minutes without killin’ each other. This is why I live alone up in the hills fuckin’ spittin’ distance from the Waste. Life’s hard enough out here without me havin’ to babysit a fricken magical sword,” She was breathing heavily, but all of a sudden felt silly for yelling at a sword on a table.
“What’s the Wendigo?” Fyndraxis asked.
“I’m goin’ to bed,” she announced.
She got into bed. She tossed and turned for a little bit, probably due to the nature of her guest, but eventually fell asleep. While Bird slept, the Daemon Fyndraxis busied himself with one of his favorite pastimes, dicking around with his radio.