The Garden of Splinters - II

Back to Chapter I

Another dragon discharge lit up the darkened skies, and a stampede of people fleeing the blasts swept Xiomara and the elders.

Xiomara passed her arm around an elder to help him hobble away, shielding him from the panicked charge with her body as best she could.

“What are they firing at?” she yelled over the rumble as she took another elbow to the ribs, but Cozcatl didn’t hear her. It became so dark that she couldn't see where he or Tonatiuh were, and they kept tripping over tents and camping gear, constantly in danger of getting trampled. The wailing of young kids, women, and some men joined the cacophony.

“It’s the mictlantecutli!” shouted the elderly man, and tried to drag her forward.

“The what??” said Tonatiuh suddenly behind them, like her, shielding an elderly woman. He shoved a couple of much larger men out of the way to draw closer to Xiomara, but others pushed in and they got separated again.

The mob carried them all near a checkpoint where a group of four burdened in full-body trialsuits struggled to steer the flow away from the temple.

The guard in the heaviest set was turning purple on his megaphone. “Stay away from the temple, climbing is not safe!” he yelled repeatedly, but people keep on running around them and going up the sloped walls on hands and knees, shoving each other out of the way in the rush to reach the next platform of the step pyramid.

A younger burdened jumped in front of Xiomara and the others, arms outstretched, blocking their way.

Her trialsuit had very wide sole boots that were essentially plant-pots, from which flexible and incredibly resistant spring vines rose along her legs, interweaving around her waist, and then continued up her spine and arms.

The vines provided a huge strength multiplier and had thick pieces of gold and silver-plated steel mounted on them to protect both plant and wearer. Xiomara knew of the trialsuits but, like the dragons, she’d never seen them up close either.

“Please, respected one, don’t try to climb, I can guide you to safety!” she said to the elderly woman in Tonatiuh’s care.

Xiomara strained her eyes to look at the elder woman across the eclipse-like darkness, and for the first time noticed her beautifully embroidered white gown, the multiple layers of bead necklaces, the feathered shawl and its golden animal symbols. A doctor.

The doctor said something in Tonatiuh’s ear. He nodded and tapped Cozcatl’s shoulder.

“Let’s follow the burdened!” Tonatiuh yelled. Cozcatl and the two elders under his protection followed them, with Xiomara and her companion close behind.

The burdened guided them across the boulevard, through a chaos of trampled shelters and crates, towards a structure in the belt of buildings that surrounded the temple. The temple area was ancient and all the buildings surrounding it had the same rectangular shape with their stone walls plastered white; bad for orienting herself.

Xiomara couldn’t see where they were headed; the only lights around were the trialsuit’s lamps, pointed to the floor a metre in front of it, and the stuttering blue flashes of dragon and longarm fire.

When streetlamps finally kicked in, they’d barely reached the wide sidewalk on the other side of the boulevard. They shone on three hollow humanlike figures, visible only by their shimmering silver outline on the opposite end of the building. The figures noticed the group at the same time and charged at them.

“Mictlantecutli!” shouted Xiomara’s companion.

“Get inside, now!” ordered the burdened. She landed between the group and the silvery figures with a mighty jump. Xiomara didn’t waste time waiting to see what would happen and half-dragged the elderly man to the door. Tonatiuh waved frantically for them to hurry.

A ripple of light and wind swept the field as the old man crossed the threshold. It felt as though Xiomara had suddenly opened her eyes inside a sea wave. The distortion lasted only a second but was enough to leave Tonatiuh dazed. He stepped out of the building, looking left and right in confusion, and Quetzalcoatl flew off his shoulder to get back to shelter.

“Are you nuts!? What are you doing?” said Xiomara, grabbing him by the arm. Tonatiuh looked at her with surprise, then dawning recognition.

“Xiomara? You’re back! Where are we?”

“It’s a guardhouse, get inside!” said Xiomara. She tried to drag him. “Quickly, before those things get you!”

“Oh no”, said Tonatiuh, “we’re back at the temple.” He resisted Xiomara’s pull and turned around. “That means…”

Before Xiomara could react, Tonatiuh slipped her grip and shoved her into the building with a bash right before a mictlan smashed him against the wall.

Tonatiuh tried to get it off but all of his punches went through the hollow thing like it wasn’t there, although it clearly worked the other way. The mictlan planted an outlined hand on Tonatiuh’s face and he started shaking.

“Help!” called Xiomara, “Somebody!” She tried to pull the mitclan off Tonatiuh, but her hands, too, passed through the empty outline like the being wasn’t there. “HELP!”

“Step aside”, said the burdened and fired her longarm next to the mictlan’s head, near where his ear ought to be. The longarm's electric discharge illuminated the area around the mitclan, quadrupling his outline in intensely bright lightning. The entity let go, and Tonatiuh fell to the floor.

Xiomara rushed to help Tonatiuh while the burdened fired at the mictlan again. The outline faded.

The burdened came back to take Tonatiuh from Xiomara’s arms and carried him inside like he weighed nothing. She laid him on a cleared work desk, and the doctor leaned closer to examine his eyes and find his pulse. His face looked ashen and he shivered constantly.

“Is he alright?” said Xiomara.

“No”, said the doctor. “That mictlan sucked too much vitality. Tonatiuh’s pulse is weak; his organs will shut down soon unless we do something.” The doctor looked at the burdened and then at Xiomara. Cozcatl came to join them.

“I have to stay here and keep you all safe”, said the guard.

“Tonatiuh saved me,” said Xiomara. “Tell me what to do.”

“I need a xhocolat,” said the doctor. Xiomara, the burdened, and Cozcatl baulked.

“Is this the time for sweets, respected one?” said the burdened.

“Xhocolat has strong curative properties,” said another of the elders.

“It does,” said the doctor, “and Tonatiuh needs more than physical medicine. The mictlantecutli dissolve your will and eat away your self-worth. They’ve damaged his Sak Nik Nahal, his being essence that is one with the body universal.

“If we don’t act quickly, when the Starless Night comes he will toss Tonatiuh back into the primordial vat, and all that my grandnephew learned, all he achieved as he evolved through his past lives will be undone and lost for eternity as though it never happened.”

Cozcatl linked his fingers through his hair and whistled. Xiomara reached for the doctor’s hands and looked her in the eye. “What do you need?”

“I have cocoa seeds on me, and chillies, all we’re missing is the corn masa. We had plenty in the camp, but we had to drop the food when panic started. We’re close enough, if you’re willing to risk your life for Tonatiuh.”

“I’ll go, he’s my cousin”, said Cozcatl.

The burdened stepped in front of the door.

“You’re all crazy. You’ve seen what the mictlantecutli do, and they’re everywhere. We have to stay here and wait for reinforcements, more burdened will come any minute.”

The doctor went to the guard and reached up to touch her face. The burdened was very tall in her thick armoured golden plant-pot boots.“What’s your name, child?”

“Weavers Izel, respected one. But–”

The doctor stopped Izel with a soft finger on her lips. She turned to Xiomara.

“Fishers Xiomara,” she said and waited.

“We’re the Farmhands. I’m doctor Farmhands Xoc, and this is my grandson, Cozcatl. There we have my brother, Stonemasons Cozcatl. The tall one there is his wife, Farmhands Yolotli; they took each other's family names upon marriage, as is tradition. And finally, Hunters Meztil, a dear friend of ours.

“We are blood and we are sweat of each other. And you two sweat with us, bled with us.”

Xiomara looked down at the bloodied knuckles on her left hand; Izel had scratches on her cheek and neck.

The doctor linked her hands and swayed her multiple jewelled bracelets. Izel was about to speak again but Xiomara raised a hand to stop her. “Don’t interrupt the blessing, we’ll need it.”

“Now we all are family, in the glow of the Shining Vine, under the shelter of the Starless Night,” said the doctor. She took off two of her bracelets and handed one each to Izel and Xiomara.

“Night shelter you,” said the elders and Cozcatl, “Daylight show you the way.”

“I am honoured, respected one,” said Izel, “but I cannot let you go out into that nightmare regardless, and I can’t leave you here unprotected.”

“Izel, listen,” said Xiomara, “you should stay here and watch over them. And Cozcatl, your grandmother welcomes me as family, and I am humbled, but they’ve been your family much longer. We’re wasting time here, if we do nothing we’ll let Tonatiuh fade into nothingness and I cannot do that. I can’t.”

He had saved her and debt like that could not go unpaid, much less on the eve of a god’s Return to the world. But she also needed to get back to the temple if she was to have any chance of seeing her sister again.

“I’m going,” said Cozcatl with finality.

“No, you’re not,” said Izel, walking to a cabinet on the far side of the room, next to a large glass tank. “Xiomara is right. This is your family. It is my burden to protect the elders, but yours more so, and if the mictlantecutli come in here I might not be able to stop them on my own. If you want to help Tonatiuh, stay and help me defend him and your elders.”

She extracted a long metallic tube with braided cables attached to a squat cylinder. A quick twist popped the cylinder open, and she used it to catch a fire axolotl from the glass tank.

“Do you know how to fire a weapon?” She screwed on the top of the cylinder and handed the longarm to Xiomara.

Xiomara looked at the bare grey tube. It had a pointy tip, a grip around the middle, and another at the bottom end where the cables went into the battery. “Not one of these.” She held up the battery to peek at the tiny fire axolotl swimming circles in the liquid inside.

“It’s easy. Twist the handles in opposite directions and the tip will discharge. But you don’t point it straight at them, it’ll go through. You must fire to their side. If you can, fire at the spot where the outline is weakest, but don’t waste any time aiming or searching for it. If they grab you, you can’t repel them, so just shoot.”

Xiomara adjusted the battery strap across her shoulder and took a deep breath.

“The longarm holds ten shots,” said Izel, “don’t try to use it after that: it won’t fire, and you’ll kill the axolotl. But it isn’t easy to fire at someone charging at you, even with training. Keep low and avoid those things; try not to need it.”

“One hot xhocolat coming right up,” said Xiomara and ducked out of the guardhouse not looking back once. Goosebumps ran up her forearms when the door closed behind her.

The boulevard encircling the temple was a three-lane road in each direction. It separated the temple from the Zocalo on the opposite end, and from the ring of buildings that included the guardhouse on this side. It looked eerily desolate; only trampled-on tents and other litter covered the street. It was still dark and she couldn’t see anyone around, but the firefight appeared to have moved away from them.

The nature strip that divided the boulevard was wide and populated with ahuehuete trees of impressive girth. Most had been planted to commemorate the Return of the Starless Night one thousand years ago. They blocked Xiomara’s view of the other end and the temple, but with any luck, they would hide her from prying eyes, too.

Keeping as low to the ground as she could, Xiomara crossed the boulevard and crouched next to one of the widest ahuehuetes. Its branches hung low, creating a curtain to shield her, but still allowed a view of the temple.

There were significantly fewer people on it than had climbed during the panic. Some remained, resisting calls from the patrols to get abandon the area over the shrill whirring of a dragon in motion somewhere close. She also spotted more burdened in the glow of their longarms fire.

She put hers down to draw a handkerchief embroidered with traditional motives in vibrant reds, yellows and blues from her pocket and extracted a folded piece of old paper from it.

The first time she’d seen that writing she thought it was a prank – it looked nothing like her own large and rounded hand of those days. But over the years her script transformed until it looked as though she’d written it this morning.

I am you from years in the future I came back on the eve of the Return of the Starless Night to tell you when he comes you can visit the past again say goodbye I’ll prove it in a few weeks they’ll reject you for the scribe noviciate but don’t be sad they’ll open all calpulli apprenticeships to anyone and you’ll get ajipenu ioebgt xiphep eppptt choose whatever you want don’t throw away this letter believe me when the Starless Night returns you WILL go back again to see her but this is most important YOU HAVE TO BE AT THE SAME PLAC–

The day Xiomara found the note she went straight to Citlalli; those words, so obvious now, had seemed like another silly game her sister was trying to start with her. The two of them had always liked to invent their forms of entertainment, whether it be exploring ancient ahuehuete fortresses full of jungle spirits, or pretending to be the characters in their favourite broadcast plays.

But Citlalli denied any knowledge of it and thought it was Xiomara who was trying to start a new game. They even attempted to play ‘time travel’ for a short while, but couldn’t figure out how to make it fun and quickly gave it up.

After that, Xiomara forgot about the letter for years, until she found it again folded between some old jumpers when she was putting away Citlalli’s clothes after…

A scream close by shook her up. She couldn’t see who it was, but the silvery glimmer of a mitclan cast eerie shadows around a tree up ahead. Xiomara moved in the opposite direction, wading stomped tents and upturned chairs filling the boulevard.

The corner of the temple was fairly close; it didn’t look like they had gone far during the stampede. That was excellent news: if she went by the letter and everything she had been able to find on the Starless Night’s Return, she needed to be in the area when he came if she hoped to go back in time. She still hadn’t figured out that part, but as long as she was here, the letter gave her confidence she’d do it.

Xiomara noted a few recognisable landmarks to help her make her way back to the guardhouse once she recovered the masa, and moved forward always keeping as low as she could.

Despite the shrill whirring of the dragons, her steps felt exceedingly loud – every rustle of gravel and every crackle of leaves as booming as longarm discharges – but she forced herself to quicken the pace. She didn’t know how long did Tonatiuh have, and every moment wasted raised the stakes.

She crouched behind an abandoned vehicle to scan the way ahead. A flashlight shone her way and she ducked as fast as she could.

“Check over there,” said a woman, “the Echoing Poem is angry! We must help cleanse the city of infidels that worship the Darkness, destroyer of Animas, above Those Who Build!”

Zealots!

Xiomara bent down to look under the carriage, trying to count them. At least three, probably armed. She patted the battery cylinder to reassure herself it was still there.

A commotion broke out several meters to her right, and the zealots converged on it. One of them had caught a man trying to hide under a pile of blankets. They dragged him out, stuttering and shaking.

“Are you an infidel, worshiper of the dark?” asked the woman, clearly the leading zealot. The terrified man stuttered again and she repeated her question. Xiomara couldn’t see them well but their voices carried clearly.

“N-night shelter me,” said the poor idiot.

“CLEANSE HIM!!” shouted the woman. For a moment all went quiet, and then the man started to scream at the top of his lungs.

Xiomara risked poking her head around and caught the shimmer of a mictlan taking shape. The hollow outline leaned forward; its soft glow allowed Xiomara to glimpse the terrified face of the captive right before the mictlan jumped on him. Another joined, and another.

The man convulsed violently, then dropped to the floor with a dry thud. They were too many for her to even consider intervening. Xiomara retreated behind the vehicle and scurried away as fast and silently as she could manage. Her heart beat wildly and the longarm almost slipped off her hand.

A renewed sense of urgency gripped her. She went around the back of the vehicle, behind a stack of boxes to avoid the zealots. Thank the Luminous Vine they were consumed watching the man be ravaged by the mitclantecutli.

Xiomara got closer to the corner of the temple and headed toward the streetlamp where Tonatiuh’s tent ought to be. There was an encampment there, but much larger and squarish, very unlike Tonatiuh’s conical tent. Confused, Xiomara looked around for another streetlamp, perhaps it was the wrong one?

Then she spotted the temple stairs, which hadn’t been visible from his camp earlier. In the commotion of the stampede, Xiomara and Tonatiuh’s family must have been carried around the temple to the opposite side.

She panicked. There wouldn’t be enough time to go around, find the masa, and get back; much less with those zealots roaming the area, and the burdened opening fire left and right.

Xiomara moved closer to the big tent and started rummaging through a small mound of abandoned bundles. Maybe they would have something. There were bagged clothes, dry food, preserves. She moved faster, less concerned with the noise than finding the damned corn paste.

Finally! Half a package of fresh corn masa, wrapped in a small towel. She grabbed it and another wave rippled through the air like earlier at the guardhouse. This ripple was stronger – left Xiomara queasy. She lost her balance and fell to her knees.

Xiomara blinked a few times, trying to regain stability. Her hands brushed a large patch of shrubs that hadn’t been there a second ago. All around her, the camping ground had been replaced by overgrown marshland vegetation. The temple itself was gone, obscured by trees.

She put away the masa in her sash and gripped the longarm tube with both hands. It was bright above the trees and birds sang all around. She heard monkey calls from the canopies.

Xiomara took a step forward and smashed her nose on the streetlamp. When her eyes stopped watering she saw the camp again, the temple, and everything was the way it had been a moment ago.

A chill of fear and excitement ran up her spine. I travelled back!

She forced herself to move again and started to retrace her steps back to the guardhouse.

On the way back Xiomara saw other people walking through the encampment ruins, perhaps trying to return to their spots, but she had wasted enough time and didn’t want to risk any more delays or a run-in with zealots.

She followed the landmarks back to the guardhouse. Cozcatl peered out of the entrance as she approached, and Xiomara ran to him.

“I’ve got it!”

“Behind you!”, he shouted. Xiomara didn’t have a chance to turn around – a painful electric shock rippled through her body, and she blacked out.

* * *