No More Heroes [Vana]

[Obelisk]

He envied them -- the knights and soldiers that tread down Silvereye’s streets. He envied them for the way the majority of the public perceived their local heroes. There was adoration there, a sense of fond worship. Young boys ran down the streets proclaiming themselves Sir Davis, Sir John, champions of Silvereye! It was enough to make a proud man like Jericho glower with jealousy. Just to taste that level of accolade, just to know it for a moment – that was one of his most closely guarded desires. His lot in life and chosen self-serving path, meant his dream would stay a dream, but there were instances where he came close.

The Grey Wastes were home to his people and Jericho made the effort of paying them usual visits. He brought with him tales from Caedere and Sideris, carefully edited to exclude the truth of his trade and occupations. The children gathered around him and stood in silent giddiness, waiting for him to regale them with stories of pirates and knights, of large beasts that roamed an ever expanding forest. Those youthful faces were filled with wonder and their eyes shone of adoration. Even the adults treated their Leewe with quiet respect for he was one of the few lost sons that had not abandoned his roots.

His recent arrival in the Wastes saw no hero’s welcome. There was a crisis; one of their daughters had gone missing while scavenging the ruins for items of profit to pawn of onto visiting merchants. Jericho was a selfish man but if there was one thing he gave allowance to care for, it was his people. He promised the girl’s parents that he would find her and bring her home, and would not leave the Wastes until he accomplished this task.

Dust billowed beneath each footstep as he pressed through the barren land of grey. His entire body was covered in layers of drab grey cloth and beneath them he wore clothing fashioned out of the tanned hides of Grey Stalkers. It was believed the beasts’ hides were impervious to the effects of the Ash. Over his eyes sat a large pair of goggles with amber lenses. He was without identity and appeared as every other Gypsy did; camouflaged perfectly within a dreary and dead world. Around his waist was a heavy belt weighed down by pistols and ammo. He carried a rifle slung against his back. The wise did not travel far into the Wastes unprepared.

Jericho retraced the girl’s steps to what had once been a small town. The abandoned and crumbling buildings were the perfect place for a child to hide.

Or a monster.

It was with caution that Jericho entered into the ghost town, each step measured, senses open to his surroundings. Over head soundless lighting flicked behind a cloud cover that never dispersed. The heart-wrenching silence was a reminder as to why he had quit this place; no life, no vibrancy, no hope.

“Elena, come out. It’s safe.” Jericho called out in his native tongue, voice muffled against the fabric covering his face. He entered deeper into the compound, moving from one building to the next, checking inside only to find them empty. The girl’s tracks had led here. There were signs of recent activity.

He continued his search, mindful that the scavenging fiends of the Wastes could be upon him at any moment.

[vanagandr.]

The Grey Wastes were a hell.

Wrought in vines and death, agony and suffering, tremulous roots struck at nothing as Ash sucked every modicum of life from its foundation. Gradually sapping away the force and energy like some machine too great to be controlled, too intelligent to be outsmarted. Like poetry fueled by angst, massacre, tears of the mutated and silent cries that were no longer heard. It was simply allowed to run its perpetual course of unfortunate circumstance -- and in turn, sometimes granted a soul or two in the meantime. A sacrifice to the cause of nothing towards the End of the world, ought to be swallowed up by the black cough of poisonous gases and gnashing teeth. Yet no inferno swelled, lava bubbling from the obsidian sheets of glazed-over sick, demons chirping in the endless cacophony to a salvation that would never come... The Bomb had smothered it all and everyone, where all there was left was monochrome.

Such corpses wandered, their lofty ambitions tied to their ankles through chains of obligation and wasted endeavor. Effort spent on past memories that couldn't be remembered, things and places better left forgotten, faces wiped clear of name and familiarity. A twisted, forgone miasma of darker shadow, kept out of reach and always out of earshot. There had been some in its fifty-year old long existence, however, who adapted to such extremes -- reaching out and grapping the thick metal burden, manipulated and reformed into new weapons. Split. Monsters in one corner, geniuses in others. Fallen heroes, triumphant over the remnant skulls of their former comrades.

Among those, the Timekeeper was their King.

He'd regarded this particular trespasser, however, as a certain sort of odd curiosity. Not to be eliminated, but to be examined. For the time being, anyway, the loping gait of abandoned, dull-colored shadow marked the beginning of the chase. At first glance, this strange man looked like he was simply meaning to plunder any house of its nonexistent treasure, but... No. That wasn't right at all. That man walked with purpose, spoke in strange tongue, and moved deliberately. Armed, but not ready to use his weapons unwisely. It made the chapped lips of the endangered breed pull back into a snarl to match the one along the bridge of his snout, grinning its phantom grin.

If there was any child there, the king had not known about it. But children were small, children were stupid, and most vulnerable to be caught up in the gaping maw of the Wastes. It was a regular occurrence to those who did not learn quickly to keep an eye on their kin, less they be tempted from their beds and homes to a much less hospitable world. Unfortunately for Jericho, he'd known of no information, so it wasn't like he could say anything if he wanted to.

What he did want to know, on the other hand, was why this strange man was here unannounced.

Temporarily illuminated by the brief, deceptively heavenly halo of dim lighting, Abaddon crawled over rooftop. Whether the gypsy be inside or out of one such building, he would've seen the cloaked figure eventually. Scraping, growling, more creature than man as blue eyes regarded any form that moved. Metal claws scored lines in the surface, boots held traction against the slick, eroded-away halves of crumbling, rotting structure.

Although, this was his kingdom. He did not fall.

"Wha... tttt," the ethereal hiss roared from its dominant perch, comfortably set on all fours. The first half of his face was exposed while the other, deformed half glistened in the artificial means of something else. A mask, unmoving, snarling down at the unknown man, raised slightly in the indignant pride of something unnatural.

"Get... Ouuu... ttt."

[Obelisk]

He knew this dead and horrid land. He knew the creatures that roamed the vast, colorless plains. He knew what to listen for; he knew what visible signs to pay attention to. He knew this land – or so he thought.

A strange sort of noise gripped him and Jericho spun around, bewildered enough for his posture to show it. His face was hidden, his expression a mystery but his body radiated a tenseness associated with someone poised to fight. The ground beneath his feet cracked as he took a step back; the earth was dry and in desperate want of rain that would do nothing to quench its thirst. The stranger was a creature comprised of oddities. He was out of place, unexpected; Jericho’s alarm was raised to its fullest extent.

He judged the stranger by what he saw and what he heard. A monstrous mask denoted questionable mental health. His words, his inability to speak normally also spoke of insanity. The Wastes warped a man’s reality, twisting and turning it into something unrecognizable. Jericho had bore witness to those that succumbed to the madness. They lost their humanity, becoming animals and wraiths that were as much a danger to themselves as they were to others.

Though alarmed, Jericho refused to pay the demand any heed. He stood his ground, emanating his own sense of pride. Fear was not an acceptable emotion, not when he was on a mission. His posture relaxed; he became a blank slate that gave nothing away.

The Gypsy turned a defiant head upwards, staring through the amber lenses of his goggles. His hand hovered above one of his pistols, coiled like a snake, ready to strike at a moment’s notice. The masked man who spoke in an eerie, off-putting hiss became the culprit, the suspect in the girl’s disappearance. Jericho was quick to jump to conclusions, offering no allowance for questions--

Only accusations.

“Where is the girl?” He barked out in a voice that carried no discernable accent. His words were crisp, fluid, everything Abaddon’s voice lacked.