Cries Of The Sihalik

He knew he shouldn’t have let curiosity possess him, but he was helpless to resist, and his intrigue compelled him to see the rumored near-mythic creature that lay in the shallow-base shack. He had no knowledge of what they were doing with the legendary and feared beast, but he feared that was a question he did not want an answer to, but as for what the creature looked like? He could not stop that. No. When Zafir wanted something, and not so often did he want things, he set all matters aside, grand and trivial, to pursue the object of his focus. 

This was one of those objects. And he completely regretted meeting his wish.

The sand burnt beneath the soles of his stolen, worn-out trekking shoes. He regretted stealing these cheap things instead of the combat pair he saw adjacent — far too long ago to remember why he’d chosen these, and nonetheless, his feet escaped that hot sand before hitting the shady inlet of the shack. He had to hurry now, the sun was falling to the horizon and the darkness would take its place, and men relied on his presence in support of their defense. 

A draping tarp swung lightly in the breeze, layering the entrance to within. The interior was dark. He entered from the right side, going around a wall to find that deep purple-blue haze of dark light illuminating the room. A neon green illumination shed actual luminescence to the room. The smell was putrid. It awfully twisted his nose hairs, yet he continued. He forgot about the sweat that adhered his cloakwear to his body, the weight of the shock beam weapon in his hands, and the child he left waiting outside for him. Curiosity overtook him, nothing else. The smell was so strong now, which indicated his proximity to the object of exploration, and he knew he would regret this. 

Zafir couldn’t tell what saw. This was no such creature he imagined -- the dreaded Solifuga, in this shack he was informed would reside in. Instead, a slick, dark gray mass of matter lay in the center of the shack. The length of it spanned nearly that of the entire structure, and its width was just near the width of the shack as well, leaving barely enough room for anyone to walk around. His eyes gradually adjusted to the dark. This wasn’t just a hunk of gray matter. There was something here far more grotesque than he expected. It was larger than he anticipated, and quite terrible of stench he barely managed. 

He recognized that this slick gray form was an organism, but none he had ever seen, and certainly not the described Solifugae -- unless perhaps the stories were wrong about the creatures. Despite its foreign nature, there were features all too familiar - it had limbs, but not like the creatures in the area. They looked nearly human in shape, but the flesh was so disgustingly greasy, it looked like a skinned animal — a huge skinned-animal. The head he assumed could weigh at least similar to his entire upper body. The face was so disfigured it was difficult to tell where eyes belonged, or mouth, or if it even had any. He couldn’t see too well, either. The head itself had no neck, but appeared in a sense like some great giant stone smushed it into the body with great force; at the base of the head were huge wrinkles resembling slimy serpents roped around the base. The upper body, maybe the thorax, was an immensely solid mass of hardened flesh, like a shell, but not quite. There were two sets of arms, each muscled and vascular, with a diameter greater than Zafir’s waist. His confusion soon transformed into an inexorable fear. This thing was an abomination and he didn't want to see it anymore. It made Zafir sick to his stomach to gather all the visuals he did. This thing did not belong to the world he knew. He did not want to see anymore of the atrocity here. Zafir stepped out and remembered, I have to get my son out of here immediately, and without hesitation, he ran out of the dilapidating shack. He ran up the sand hill and grabbed his small boy. “What is itttt—” his boy said losing his words as his father snatched him up briskly. “We go. I’m taking you back to Alerita’s”

After leaving his son in a somewhat safe environment with his love-interest, he returned to the brigade to join the rest of his "companions". The Watch, which was the dull title they named their assemblage, stood in wait for opposing territory-rivals within the area. His meandering for a break wasn’t worth the journey. He couldn’t explain what he saw. How could he? Who would believe him?There were things hardly any man thought would exist on this forsaken stretch of wasteland and yet they did exist, but the transmogrification he saw was unspeakable, more false and inconceivable than the Solifuga. Was that monster a Solifuga? He thought about it. It was shaped so much like a human, but the exterior… 

“Zafir, where were you?” Galande asked in his thick Alharith accent, full of tapped r’s against his palette. Galande always had a hoarse and accusing tone, even when speaking gently. “The Watch doesn’t just quit watching whenever we choose, we have duties. You neglect those duties. Where is your boy? Do you not want your boy safe with you? What kind of useless father are you? You’re neglectful to everything, are you not?”

“He’s safe, none of which concerns you, Galande” said Zafir, with a slight hiss in his tongue. “Ah, off in the care of your whore” Galande spat. “She distracts you, Zafir”

Zafir just sat silently. It would do no good in retorting against that. He understood that a real attack would occur from the Sihalik marauders, and to disrupt and distract was erroneous. His arguments were useless anyways. Galande was correct about Zafir’s neglectfulness, and Zafir just fell into himself when he remembered the mistakes he’s made, sinking deep within shame. This was the best he’s done with his life. This brigade was his only real family, sometimes. Even if he was scorned often, it was far more tolerable than the empty life he lived before. It was dark now. 

With the darkness, a foreboding imbued. It was absolute black outside the shallow walls of this encampment. The sand was a dark tan within the circle of wall, lit from the small sconces lined across the perimeter, but externally there was nothing. He feared what the sea of nothingness fostered. There was no sun, there were disappointingly no moons as he expected, and the stars seemed all but above. The sound of darkness was silence, to that he could attest. 

There were seasons on Alharith where pitch blackness enshrouded the globe. He believed that if he tracked the chronological records correctly, that this was the middle of one of those seasons. A perfect cloak to cover The Watch’s foe. 

Zafir joined the small camp fire where five others sat. “Alamec”, said Zafir, “May I sit here?” 

Alamec hesitated a moment, but capitulated. In the presence of others, Alamec avoided Zafir, or almost always ignored him, but outside the group or in quiet secluded places, he was a good friend to Zafir. The only true friend. The group was already quiet, but Zafir’s joining made it awkward, as he did not fit into their dynamic. He placed his shock beam down on the sand beside him. 

No one respected Zafir, not while in a group. He was often shunned when he asked questions, made requests, or apologized. He apologized the most, far more than questions, and he questioned far more than he requested. He wondered if the brigade knew he had a capacity for more extensive speech than apologies. 

But some sickening feeling twisted his insides. The smell that entered his nostrils lingered still from what he experienced earlier in the afternoon in that dreadful shack. It crawled inside him. Turmoil settled in. The heat of the fire exorcised the nausea, but it was cold out, and — he didn’t want to admit to himself — he was afraid to leave the light… or anyone’s presence for that matter. He no doubt would be shamed for admitting any fears, and he could not bear it.

He was unsure if it was liquid matter he felt compelled to expunge, or blurt out what sight he witnessed in the day. Either way, it would come out displeasing others. He spoke finally. 

“I saw something today.” 

He began, but he didn’t know how to continue, before someone interrupted across the fire and began talking about the god they fought for and how angry that god must be for what the enemy was doing. This vicious holy-war was never ending, nor the apparent zealotry this brigade held. Zafir felt not vehemence whatsoever, and was impartial to the outcome among the many opposing religious entities. His only concern was for his son and his son’s survival. “I said, I saw something today” Zafir started at once, in turn interrupting his counter speaker. “I saw what the enemy was creating”. Suddenly, the zealots looked at him with deep interest — quite rare and unfamiliar to Zafir — the sudden attention actually perturbed him. He was quiet a moment.

“Well, speak it, Zafir.” Alamec urged with pseudo-rigidness (all a show for politics), but before Zafir spoke, his esophagus yanked at his stomach just enough to compel regurgitation all over the ring of the fire. “You sick bastard," said one of the men, "you could have delivered that sentiment in words instead”, then they laughed. The brigadiers nearby laughed. The concerns that vexed him seemed to be merely fiction now. He was confused and disheartened. Did he really see what he did earlier? Was that creature real? Am I stupid for believing in what I witnessed?

He turned and fell to his side, and rolled away with his back to the fire — the cacophony of their hysterical laughter amplified. He felt physically hollow after hurling his last meal, and emotionally hollow of hope or safety. He was sweating. It was freezing out in the open, but he perspired to the point of soaking his cloths.

He was laughable, he concluded. His life meant nothing. His lover was indeed a whore, though her excuse was of desperation for survival (who was not in struggle upon these wicked, sandy plains?). His son was motherless and Zafir, as a father, already failed him in safety and security. He failed himself in youth, and even now, he was certain the brigade would leave him and his boy to death for the heresy they would soon learn of Zafir’s disposition. 

How was he not already dead? This was his end. In this one moment he had mentally surrendered. I will die here if I lie here long enough. It would feel good to just lay there on the cold sand, looking away from everyone, and fall into a sleep without awakening again. He had no energy to move. He was paralyzed in vexation, placated by stillness. His sickness disappeared and was replaced by a motionless pain. 

After the laughing died down, someone threw an empty liquid sack at him for more jokes for them to laugh at. They laughed again, briefer, quieter, feeding off what sad limited life he had remaining. Then immediately, they got quiet. Not even the wind made noise. For the fire’s crackle was deafeningly loud compared to all things auditory that it currently outcompeted. The fire flickered violently. Shadows smacked across the sand-brick walls of this ruins’ structures and undulated across the sand. 

Then Zafir heard it. The cry. One scream, so small as if a rodent made it, then more screams following, building up to an orchestral waling of a horrific massacre. No one in the camp made a noise. Zafir instinctively reached slowly for his shock beam, nearly crawling to it, yet everyone else remained static. He knew exactly why there were cries of agony. He could tell that the waling of dying men weren’t more than a kilometer away, as the other men did, but they did not know the monstrosity that caused it. 

“Was that… the Sihalik?” someone asked. The Sihalik, their sister tribe, weren't far from the camp. 

They remained still. They were animals caught between the boulders of fear and death, squeezed and immobilized. Zafir stood up. He felt considerably better now, but he soon felt the sickness arising once again — and far worse now. He was dizzy, barely vertical, but he used all his power to hold his ground with his shock beam in hand. 

Once the screams stopped, Galande yelled in his thick, ugly tongue, “Pick up your weapons, fools!” With haste, brigadiers kicked up sand, ran across the camp, picked up their shock beams, spears, swords, and explosives. The fires furiously whirled as a wind spun from the sea of people. Alamec looked at Zafir, as if Zafir was the blame of this event, but Zafir only looked at Alamec with wide-eyed fear and queasiness. The men took posts all across the circling wall, uncertain where the attack could ensue. 

There was an orderly formation of defense: spearmen took the walls, shock beam men in between, grenadiers behind, and swordsmen in the innermost layer. Zafir was for a moment as useful as any man here, but it meant nothing to the wrenching anxiety he accumulated up to this point. There was nowhere for him to go — it was stiflingly dark, but he could die out there alone from the daylight sun or starvation out in the sandy doom. He had no choice but to remain — to endure. 

Everyone got quiet again. Several moments passed, and the fires burnt low as the last charred logs fell to the beds of embers. That was the only significant light left, as the sconces barely lit a square meter around them. There would be no more light for them to see. The cold loomed over more significantly. The season of darkness showed its full face now that the moons had just dipped beneath the horizon. Sudden winds threatened the last flames to sudden brightness, and death. Zafir’s ears rang during the quiet. 

A scuffling on the sand was heard. The men looked frantically but stiffly around the area. Scrapes against the sand echoed around the periphery. A disturbance on the large sand-brick walls to the left, a sand scrape to the right; Zafir heard a slithery sound of grating sand almost right in front of him. 

A bright, loud blast came from one of the shock beams and lit the night for a millisecond; the shape of a huge, disgusting and terrifying creature was illuminated. The scuffle turned into a crunch, then a terrible screech of rankled horror emitted from the immense creature. The men felt a swoosh of air as the monster hurled itself over the wall. Shock beams went off, lighting the night up like lightning strikes on a stormy evening. The darkness engulfed everything and flashes of light were the only relief, but sight only rendered the slaughter of men being torn in half, snakes of red flung across the camp, splatters of crimson across the cold sand and the hiss of blood on the embers. The smell and taste of metallic liquid hit Zafir’s face, and he shuddered. He dared not shoot, though Alamec urged him to help. Zafir only dropped his shock beam. Alamec yelled something fearfully at him, or angrily, but Zafir ran away nonetheless. The shooting, the screeching, the cries of men, the ripping and severing of limbs and bodies impelled him to escape.

The beast slashed at spearman, snapping the weapons as the beast swung its limbs across and then leaping and diving down onto men, smashing them down and swallowing them whole, stuffing their bodies inside its wide mouth. It used its small limbs protruding from beside the creatures giant stump of a head. It squashed men with its large, vascular fist-claws in one solid collision to the ground. Bone was crunched. Cloths stuck to its claw-fists as it lifted up its limbs to smash more victims. 

The screams. The chewing of bone in its teeth, the swallowing. There were no more shock beams going off. It must have known to slaughter the gunmen first.

Zafir ran to the wall and jumped over it, landing far louder than he would have liked, so he dropped down against the wall in silence. It seemed as if all the men were now dead, for his breathing was the only noise he heard. The scuffling of sand emitted from behind the wall. He clenched his cloakwear cloths. It was unbearably cold, and his sweating mitigated, but his breathing — could he not shut up? He clenched his fists as though it would help stop the sound. 

A squashing sound echoed agains the walls, followed by a frightful cry of someone’s impending doom that wailed behind him, and Zafir flinched and shuddered in response. He clenched his fists tighter. He was certain what was not delivered through his esophagus was surely delivered from his bowels now, the inner tension forcing out any organic matter remaining inside of him and making him more repulsive to his would-be predator. The crunching sound began again, now calmer and seemingly with relish. The creature paused, snorted, as if displeased, or angry, then continued chewing. Once it stopped, Zafir stopped breathing. 

He felt warmer now, a warm wind maybe, a rise in temperature, then a giant sticky drop fell onto his head. He looked up to the black nothingness, except the glimmer of what appeared to be teeth. His last thoughts were of his son, then sudden excruciation, and finally there was nothing.