PHANTASIA (7 page)

“There’s a saddle here,” someone screamed from the other side of the body. They walked over again and saw strapped to the dragon a strange black colored saddle, stitched from a thick and unfamiliar hide. Red wondered briefly if it was the skin of another dragon, the only thing he could imagine that could safely wrap around the bristles without being shred to pieces.
 

“This is just bizarre,” Magnus said. “Well…Emerald Thornbacks are one of the few creatures that can travel through space, a rare ability even among dragons,” he added. “I guess…something could’ve rode it… to Avalonia…but that’s impossible…dragons don’t carry people.”
 

At the thought, they all quickly looked upwards and around, as if to find someone else within their company, but saw no sign of movement besides a few Lumazoas far above them. The desert remained quiet and empty.
 

“Send out yellow flares,” Raven directed. “The Ignot Gilas will provide more than enough food for at least five teams. Maybe we can get more people here to study this. We should also send a message to the control room about it. It could have something to do with the caravan attack.”
 

They nodded while taking out their flare guns.
 

Within the hour, two other teams showed up, increasing their number to twenty, all camped around the dragon. Yellow flares went up in two other directions near them, making everyone more relaxed. If there were other teams in the vicinity, it was unlikely they would be bothered as they slept.

 
Magnus was busy at work for the next few hours, directing everyone as to which parts of Ignot Gilas were edible and which were poisonous. They had cut off all the chins of the Gilas to pack their bacteria and emptied out the meat from the inside through their underbellies. During the process, they had a laugh about eating dragon meat, which Butz suggested was a once in a lifetime experience. Magnus replied that he wouldn’t be able to manage. There was something off about the idea of eating another sentient creature, something too close to cannibalism. Either ways, they wouldn’t be able to penetrate Dragonhide.
 

Red and Raven helped set up everyone’s TPs as S and Butz scouted the area for signs of other critters. They put up their mock shelters just in time; a few hours into their setup it began to rain again. Everyone packed as much of the Ignot Gila meat as they could inside of their TPs, unsure if it would be edible if it was soaked with the rain.

A light drizzle quickly picked up into a rainstorm, an unusual hiccup in solstice’s usually calm weather. As soon as signs of the storm came about, everyone skinned the Gilas as fast as they were able to and placed them underneath where they sat. Lightning in a metallic desert could charge an indefinite amount of space; the outer skin of most creatures that adapted to this environment were already insulated against such threats. The five of them huddled inside S’s TP, listening to the storm as it continued to rage outside. Red stole a glance through the entrance whenever he could, marveling at the rivers of violet rain that cascaded brilliantly off the peaks of metallic dunes — a scene only marginally lit by the fires they had created inside their TPs and Eio’s pale luminescence.

Teams took turns keeping watch. By the time it was their turn to sleep, Red’s exhaustion from the night before had caught up to him. Laying on top of the Gila skin was an unusual feeling. It was a tough hide that resembled organic armor, but felt oddly comfortable, like a hard bed. There wasn’t enough Gila skin to cover all of their TPs, so they all decided to sleep squished together in S’s. As Red shifted around to get into a comfortable position, he noticed that the rain had gotten slightly quieter.

“Are you really going to sleep like that?” Butz asked.
 

Red turned around to see what Butz was referring to and burst out laughing when he saw Raven hunched over with a dagger in both hands.
 

“Yes, and I’d stop laughing if you’d like to wake up,” Raven replied.
 

“A lunatic, that one,” Butz remarked with a grin as he went back to trying to figure out a comfortable position to lay in like Red. They recounted the events of the day as they tried to sleep, remarking that they had covered a more than adequate amount of ground for one day. They had gotten lucky running into the Ignot Gilas, hopefully their fortune would carry over to the next few days.
 

As Red drifted to sleep, he hoped that he wouldn’t have another nightmare. Consecutive sleepless nights would be too draining at a time when he had to keep his energy up. Raven was unlikely to recover fully by tomorrow after bursting all of her energy out to save Butz; everyone would have to put in extra effort to keep them up to pace. He went to sleep counting off his good fortune, above them all he realized, was probably that they had Raven on their team.
 

When he started hearing screams in his sleep, he imagined unconsciously that his hope for a pleasant dream was broken. But then as he became slightly more aware he realized that the shouting was coming from outside. A hand shoved him hard and he finally awoke with a sudden alarm.
 

“What?!” he screamed. Magnus had shoved him awake and was now doing the same to Butz and S.
 

He heard shouting outside; several people were yelling “Red.”
 

“Are they calling me?” he asked curiously.
 

“No,” Magnus said quickly. “I don’t think so, but we need to wake up. Something’s going on.” S and Butz soon snapped awake as well.
   

Raven, who Red realized had left their TP, poked in her head through the entrance. She was spot dry, which meant the rain must’ve stopped.
 

“We need to move. Now.” She said it with such stern alertness, everyone followed suit without a word. After Red had packed as fast as he could, he stepped outside, and saw what everyone was yelling about. It wasn’t his name, it was a single red flare that shot up into the sky. Red flares were different, they didn’t fire up and explode like the other colors. They were slow to go up, extremely visible, and sparked up into a radius that covered twice as much breadth as anything else.
 

They signaled danger - extreme danger. Not the type of danger that a team might want to face to score points, which was signaled by an orange flare, but the type of danger that indicated a team might have just been wiped. Everyone who saw the flare needed to evacuate the zone immediately. Red flares were rarely seen, even during field tests, and usually indicated either a natural disaster like a moving whirlpool or an extremely advanced stage critter.
 

Everyone scrambled chaotically to disassemble their TPs. They would have left everything here, but the threat of another rainstorm still lingered. Red suddenly wished that they had made camp in a more mobile and organized way; the scene was hectic as everyone tried to gather their things among the frenzied shuffling. A second flare rocketed towards the sky, this one even closer to them. Judging by the angle between the two flares, whatever it was, it was heading straight towards their camp.
 

“Stop staring, go go go!” Raven screamed. Everyone had frozen momentarily to look at the flares, but quickly returned to packing. When he was done, Red ran over to his bike, which was parked right next to Butz’s. Linx was right behind them, howling wildly at the sky. Together, Butz and Red placed their palms down to activate their bikes, gripping tightly as if the pressure would speed the process up. Both of their bikes turned on simultaneously and lit up the space ahead of them. The next moment though, they both choked with a combination of fright and bewilderment.
 

There was someone there, standing candidly in the darkness. It was a man, but no ordinary man. He was a gaunt figure with no eyes, just skin where there should’ve been eyes, and a lifeless smile composed of sharp yellow teeth. He had a thin, sickly body with patches of bone sticking out. But his most stunning feature was his right hand, or what should’ve
been
his right hand. In its place was an enormous blade, larger than his own body, that throbbed with veins and looked like it had a life of its own. At the center of the massive weapon was a single eye, an unsettling organ that darted around with a maddening gaze. Oddly, Red felt a strange sense of familiarity, like deja vu, upon seeing the blade — as if he had known this moment was coming all along, but had forgotten about it.
 

Both Butz and Red continued to stand there in perfect stillness. Red could hear the sound of rustling behind him, and then a sudden quietness, as everyone seemed to notice the man. The gaunt figure lifted his giant arm in a heavy manner, and bought it down in a devastating blow. Red reflexively stepped back from the danger, but failed to avoid it entirely.
 

He felt only the violent sensation of being shocked, like lightning had just struck him and his body was imploding to avoid the danger. There was no pain, but he knew he had been hit somewhere. Everything around him seemed to recede to a distance, contract inwards, and then recede back to a distance, in a continuous cycle every second. Barely aware of what was going on, he noted that fighting had started, that he had been thrown on someone’s bike, and that someone else had covered his hand with a kapcha, a thick white net made out of a gooey substance that was used to stop bleeding from heavy injuries. After that, he felt only the sensation of rushing down the desert, a hysterical ringing noise in his ears, and the sound of voices screaming all over his intercom.
 

He closed his eyes to try and regain consciousness and piece together what had happened.
 

My hand, my hand is gone,
he thought to himself.
 

Fighting to open his eyes, he saw the stump of white. He heard vague expressions, someone trying to yell at him, but couldn’t make out the words. He wanted to tell the person he couldn’t understand them, but his voice came out as an inaudible scream.
 

He turned around behind him and squinted into the distance.
Focus
he thought to himself. He needed to become aware of what was going on, he was in danger. There were bikes behind them, and something like a black meteor hurtling down the desert.
 

“Red, can you hear me?”
 

He heard Raven’s calm voice, and finally understood that he was right behind her, on her bike. The voices in the intercom were Butz, Magnus, and S — but he couldn’t understand them through their simultaneous talking.
 

“Yeah,” he replied. The word came out as a faint noise, despite the fact that he intended to scream it.
 

“You need to stay conscious, Red. Don’t faint. We’re being chased.
You’re
being chased. We’re in danger, you need to think clearly. What is that thing Red? Why is it chasing you? It’s ignoring everyone else.”
 

He began to understand what was going on, and nodded. His senses crawled back to him, and he suddenly felt swept by an acute depression.
 

“My hand…he cut off my right hand…he’s chasing us,” he mumbled, looking back at the dark figure rushing towards them.
He’s moving as fast as our bike.
 
 

“Yes Red, you need to focus. Do you have the flashdust?”
 

“Flashdust” he whispered to himself. With a sudden hurried urgency, he took out the pouch of crimson dust from his pockets with his left hand and grabbed onto it.
 

“Light it Red, you can light the bag entirely. Throw it and then light it, don’t miss.”
 

He nodded.
My right hand is gone though…
he thought to himself.
 

“My right hand is gone… it’s the one I cast with,” he said to Raven. He knew he could use his left, but the thought stuck to his consciousness like an overwhelming tragedy. He couldn’t seem to get over it.
 

“Use your left, Red,” Raven replied.

“Okay,” he answered robotically. He was still dazed from a feeling of shock, his voice sounded alien through his ears.
 

“Flashdust inc, flank left,” Raven said into their intercom. Butz, Magnus, and S hushed immediately and confirmed.
   

He turned around and saw that strange and ghastly figure torpedoing down the desert right behind them. He remembered the eye, and that terrible feeling that he had somehow known it from before.
 

“Make sure you don’t miss Red, don’t use it if you’re not fully conscious.”
 

“No, I’m okay,” he lied. “Just drive straight.” His body wanted to drift into a numb paralysis of its own, and it was a struggle to stay conscious. Bits of darkness continuously ate away at the corner of his eyes, urging him to give in to the sensation of fainting. But he felt he could hang on, and knew that he had to if they were going to survive this. Paying attention to his body, he realized he was trembling with adrenaline.
 

When the bladed man was directly behind them and aligned perfectly with the direction the bike was heading, he threw the flashdust up, thrust his left hand forward, and let out a river of flames that connected with the dust. Flashdust was a highly flammable substance that amplified fire casts, but still had to be triggered properly or its effect would be marginal. Red’s initial blast covered a wide radius, but more importantly, the rush of the energy ebbing away from his hand and flowing into the air launched him back to consciousness.
This is what I live for
he thought to himself.
 

When the flashdust triggered, an explosion sounded and the flames turned green —
 
bursting out in all directions and ricocheting violently off the sands in streaks of immolation. The long lines of fire then came together and formed the signature shape of flashdust, an enormous snake shaped out of green flames. The scorching serpent continued to stretch out as they rode forward, now covering more than a Tezra’s length. It saw the bladed man first, and shot forward at him, swallowing his body whole and then exploding in a storm of green embers.