Chapter 14: The Vandals Of Icarus Ark

I was not conscious during the first three battles that took place in my journey. My life at the sanctum was preparatory, a time of alteration of mind and body, the extent of which still eludes me. My flight from the sanctum was a period of awakening, the turning of a crank to power up a newly assembled machine. My conscious mind was not capable of enduring the brutality of those early encounters, and so I have only the reports of those I travelled with to offer you now, and only the Vandals witnessed what happened to me. But I can attest to some of their actions, though I am interpreting what I saw through a half dream haze. The grotesque held me in such a cage that it took all my strength merely to bend my dreamstate towards the direction of reality, and through this fog I saw the Icarus Ark Rangers shine a little light on this darkened world.

Vandals, nomads of the wild who stay with people in need, are often seen in the same light as a tSunami. But I could see through those shallow assumptions. They were selfless and brave, and not to blame for the dangers they combatted. While I was in the grips of the grotesque's hypnosis, three of the young Vandals came out and took up positions behind and to each of its flanks. They took careful aim with their arbalests, and when silently commanded, fired upon specific weak points that caused it to whirl about wildly and scream.

The golem's siren call woke what I had thought to be a pile of stone, but was in fact a giant near the end of his life. He was startled by the call of the grotesque, and woke in a mad rage. The poor man rushed out through the arches with a mournful wail and reached for the grotesque. The golem likely would have flown away and spewed flame at the giant, but the Vandals damaged its ability to govern its own members, and so it flailed aimlessly while the giant strained against its chains and finally took hold of the grotesque by the ankle. He then slapped it against the ground like a ragdoll until it lay in a crumpled heap.

What happened next, I vividly remember, though my dream state's abrupt end obfuscated much of what happened later. The gargoyles all came to life, and one by one dropped down and harassed the giant. The Vandals then opened fire with their arbalests and kept them from overwhelming the giant or evading his reach, and in short time they were nothing more than scrap.

Several of the Vandals were severely wounded during the fight. Dolores fell from her perch and struck her head, and two others whose names escape me were grazed by the grotesques' claws. The one sad casualty was the giant, who was so hopelessly enraged by the fight he had to be put down. This is when I became lucid, by some morose fortune. They had managed to position him so that his chains kept him from moving far. They took shot after shot into his head, though puncturing the hide and skull of a giant was no easy task.

It's a far easier thing to witness a small life expunged. A person so large dies slowly, and you and they both have longer to agonize over what is happening. The first shot to do more than torment him went through his ear, and my stomach knotted instantly at the suddenness with which he stopped moving. He stood baffled, as if he were trying to determine what had caused the sudden burst of pain inside his skull. Then, ponderously, he dropped to one knee, and emitted a drawn out and rumbling moan that conjured images of a wall crumbling from a great distance.

The next shot went through his eye, and had no effect other than to quiet him. Then began the torturous barrage of killing blows that took far too long, and afflict me even now. With each shot to his brain a new level of sadness showed on the giant's face, until he sat on both knees with his head and shoulders slumped. Blood trickled out of his ears and eye sockets, and after what seemed hours he at last toppled forward, landing with a dull clap of thunder. The cloud of dust that exploded from his fall was so thick that it knocked me back. I felt my throat swell with grief as I lay there.

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