Artyom Dereschuk - Hate the Sin

Up ahead, people started moving again. The wheels of the trolleys that carried the generators squealed, the lights fixed above them on long poles shook, throwing numerous shadows on the walls, and the hundred feet shuffled forward.

Corpse Eater could hear the soldiers let out gasps of surprise as they looked around, and he himself, if not for the constant fear of being attacked from behind, would have been mesmerized by the sight that opened to them.

“Keep your eyes peeled!” he heard the General shout from somewhere in the front. It was hard to pinpoint anyone’s location in the darkness, but Corpse Eater thought that he saw the man’s silhouette right near one of the trolleys—at the center of their formation.

“Keeping the safest place to himself as usual,” the boy grunted to himself.

He wasn’t the only one who was displeased with the man’s behavior; a soldier walking in front of him spat onto the ground and grunted: “Keep your lame advices to yourself. Don’t need to tell me to stay alert.” A man walking next to him nodded in silent agreement.

The crowd separated, and out of it stepped Captain Tsetse. It seemed that, out of all the boys, he was the only one who wasn’t delegated to be a torch carrier. Squinting his eyes and raising his hand to protect them from the light, he headed toward the boys.

Corpse Eater tensed up: he expected Tsetse to start barking some commands or to start telling them that they were doing a poor job, but instead, the older boy simply leaned in close to them, so that his mouth was next to their ears. Then, speaking so quietly that even Corpse Eater could barely hear him, he whispered into their ears: “When things go down, run for it. Head for the exit and don’t look back.”

Before the boy could clarify what he meant, Tsetse simply leaned back, raised a finger to his lips, and stepped back into the crowd. Before he blended in, his eyes glinted in the light of the lamps, and Corpse Eater could see that his usual look of indifference was gone; the only thing he saw there was some strange determination.

What was it that made their captain say that? Did he know something? Perhaps he had heard something in the crowd? Corpse Eater wanted to follow him, to tell him that his order—or was it advice?—was irrational and impossible to follow. That at that very moment something was lurking behind them, slowly creeping into the shadows, and probably eyeing him. But at the same time, he didn’t have it in him to object. Partly because it was still Captain Tsetse, one of the most dangerous and cunning fourteen-year-olds on the entire continent, and maybe the world. But also because something about the captain’s order felt odd. It wasn’t an order to charge into the enemy lines. It was an order to retreat when they would be needed by the brigade the most, to save their lives, and the fire in Tsetse’s eyes was a bright warning: “For your own good, you better listen to what I say.”

At the very least, Corpse Eater wanted to hope so.

The crowd slowly shuffled onward, and their steps echoed through the cave, making it seem like there were more of them—something each and every one of them wanted. Corpse Eater realized that those sounds—along with the grunts, the breathing, the revving of two generators and the rattling of trolley’s wheels under them—made it difficult to hear any other sounds outside of their crowd. At that very moment, the enemy could be creeping in, with his head in sight, and their footsteps were drowned in the noise the brigade produced as it crept forward. He wanted to ask them to be quiet, but he knew that his request would be laughed at. Even though he responsible for their safety, when it came to his own safety, he was on his own. The crowd in front of him—while so close that he could reach out and touch the back of the nearest soldier—seemed distant to him at that moment, with only a few of them visible in the spheres of lights provided by the poles, and some of them cast in the shadows when the cones from the shaking lights on the boys’ shoulders shone on them. The rest were obscured by the darkness.

Corpse Eater spun on his heels, intending to shine light on the unseen pursuers, and during that split second his heart dropped at the realization that he was actively looking for a confrontation. Don’t do it, his subconscious whispered to him. Stay ignorant of what dwells there . But to his relief, the light illuminated only footprints in the dust. Normal, human footprints, left by creatures that meant trouble nevertheless but, at the very least, not for him.

“You all right there?” he heard Homewrecker ask him. Somebody behind him smirked. The cable rubbed against his leg, reminding him to keep moving forward. The boy took a deep breath and nodded. He realized that he looked stupid in front of everyone, and although his appearance wasn’t a priority in this situation, it would be in the future.

“Don’t sweat it,” Homewrecker gently said, as if hearing his thoughts. “Better check this out.”

Corpse Eater looked in the direction where the boy was pointing, and squinted his eyes. Up ahead, one of the boys who was walking with his lamp along the wall, was illuminating something on it. He couldn’t see what it was, but it was curious enough that even a few soldiers stopped to take a look.

Upon closer inspection, the boy realized what exactly what he was looking for. It was a familiar shape, and while he initially didn’t recognize it, it was only because he hadn’t seen it in years.

Up on the wall, pressed into the jade monolithic structure, was a bas-relief of the map of the world. There was no mistake about it; even though he hadn’t seen any maps that covered more than their country in a very long time, he instantly recognized the familiar shape of his continent, the sharp teasing tongue of the continent to the west, and the massive, seemingly boundless mass of the continent to the northeast. He didn’t know their names, but never in his life had that ignorance inconvenienced him, so he didn’t see it as an issue.

This map of the world, while unexpected, was not the most surprising thing on their already bizarre and surreal trip. What had attracted everyone’s attention was that the ancient map carved in stone had their location marked on it.

There was no mistake about it; the boy had seen enough battle plans to know exactly where, in relation to the massive ocean, their country and province were located. The place on the map where the Keep of the Giants was located was marked with a seven-pronged star. Though it was not much more surprising than the presence of the map itself, the boy found it weird that demons and spirits of the Underworld were meticulous enough to mark their location on a map.

Further investigation of the map provided more details; the boy noticed other seven-pronged stars on the map, scattered around the world. One was on the massive continent far to the south of Africa, which occupied the entire bottom of the map. One was far to the northeast, on the other side of the colossal landmass the boy had noted before. He also noted that a few of them were scattered around the oceans.

“It spans the entire world,” Corpse Eater whispered, repeating the words he had heard the old man utter back in the village. “And even beyond.”

“This map is all wrong,” one of the soldiers looking at it noted, pointing to it with his finger. “There’s no landmass on top of the world like it shows here.”

“There ain’t no landmass, only ice up there,” the other one corrected him.

“Yeah, but there’s not so much as it is shown here, is what I’m saying. Whoever did this map got it all wrong. Some other continents look off, too.”

“What, you a cartographer now?” -The second soldier smirked.