Chapter 5: Chapter 5 – IMPASSE

“So,” I said, getting to my feet, “what do we do now?”

Huang stood, also. “Normally, I fly around and look for demons to kill in a perimeter around the Sanctuary.”

I winced. “Okay, what do you suggest for those of us without wings?”

“We’ll obviously have to stick together,” Huang said. “Here’s what I’m thinking… we should try to get our bearings of the Grey City. I had a pretty good handle on the different districts before you showed up, but since things have changed, I’ll need to reorient myself.”

We went back to the front of the Sanctuary. Huang hesitated as he approached the door.

“Alright. Make sure you keep your guard up. I’d switch forms, but I don’t know if you noticed that the Gargoyle isn’t really made for stealth.”

I snorted. “Understatement.”

“Fair warning, I don’t really know the best way to avoid the demons,” Huang added, not even looking concerned. “They might hunt by motion or by smell. Their eyesight’s not bad either. I haven’t been able to figure out how it is they track me.”

“Shut up and just open the door,” I muttered.

He shrugged and eased it open. This time, we hadn’t teleported anywhere. We were facing the same dismal street we’d entered from. We stepped outside and stood there for a second, scanning the trees and cobblestones.

“This way,” Huang declared, setting off in what I suspected was an arbitrary direction. I sighed and followed anyway.

“Right now we’re in the Garden District,” Huang said under his breath as we walked. “It has these cobblestones and trees, and the Sanctuary is always here. I think it’s relatively small.”

I tried to start building a mental map, but as the Sanctuary disappeared behind us, I quickly lost track.

“We need to try mapping it on paper,” I suggested, but Huang shook his head.

“That won’t help—this place doesn’t make sense geographically. The zones always look essentially the same, but the actual layout of the streets and alleys changes.”

“I still think it might be useful,” I said, glancing down a long road lined with white-leaved trees to our right. “Maybe we can learn something about the way these ‘districts’ connect or something, or find patterns in where we’re allowed to exit.”

“I tried it,” Huang said dryly. “All it does it make your head hurt. I didn’t learn anything.”

“Well,” I snapped, “Maybe I’ll try it and see if it makes more sense to me.”

“I’m not about to stop you,” he shrugged. “Bring pen and paper next time. You’ll see I’m right.”

I took a moment to talk myself down from strangling him. He’s been here longer than you, so he knows more about the place, I reminded myself. Unfortunately, that didn’t make him any less of a pretentious asshole.

Eventually, I got over myself and realized I still had questions. “So, the Districts are these different looking zones?” I asked, keeping my voice flat. “How many are there?”

 “The one you arrived in is the biggest; I end up in it all the time. It’s just sort of an old-looking city.”

“Got a catchy name for that one?” I asked.

“Just… the main City, I guess,” he replied. “There’s the Garden District, of course, where we are now. Then there’s another one I call the Glass District.”

“What about that place we ended up last time?” I asked. “That waterfront place where I saw you transform.”

Huang looked away “I don’t know anything about it. I didn’t know it existed until we got there.”

“I wonder if there’s a way to get across the water.” I thought again of that strange bell-tone I’d sensed from it, and now allowed myself to consider what that might mean. I wasn’t sure and didn’t trust it.

“I could fly over and see what I find,” Huang suggested nonchalantly. I gave him a look. “Well, next time when it’s just me in here, I mean. Provided we don’t get called in together every time now.”

The possibility of being trapped in the Grey City without the shiny dragon to kill the monsters for me was too stressful to dwell on, so I brought us back to the matter at hand. “How do we move between them?”

Huang pointed to the end of the street. “You follow the things you see. There’s a wide glass window on that building, so if we want to go to the glass district, we go that way and keep following any big windows we see. Soon enough, you’re there.”

“That’s freaky,” I commented. “Where we off too now?”

“I don’t know. I guess I’m just waiting to see where we end up,” Huang said. “Or figure out what it is that leads us to the Waterfront.”

“I don’t think I want to go back there.”

He gave me a look. “Uh, why not? There are demons everywhere, Camilo, not just there.”

“I just don’t.” I didn’t owe him any further reasoning.

Huang just shrugged. “Fine, whatever. Let’s keep going. Try to listen for anything sneaking up on us.”

When we weren’t talking, the streets were just so quiet. It felt like every corner we passed could hide some monster just crouching in the shadows, waiting for us to come close enough.

I tried to use my sense again, but it still wasn’t back on.

“Hey. Are you able to sense the demons with your life radar thing?” I asked Huang quietly.

“Yes, when they’re close enough,” he replied, also in a whisper. The trees around us were growing smaller in number and the cobblestones had given way to rough stone panels, which suggested to me that we were leaving the gardens. “They’re good at lurking just out of my range, so it doesn’t always help that much.”

I stopped talking and concentrated on staying alert to our surroundings. We kept walking through the streets in no particular pattern, just trying to stay where it seemed quiet. Once we glimpsed a snake-monster in the distance, but it didn’t see us and we were able to avoid it.

At one point I looked down and realized we were walking on packed dirt instead of stone. I cursed under my breath.

“Sorry,” Huang said quietly. “I wasn’t trying to end up here. Didn’t even catch the trigger.”

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We were back near the Waterfront, all right. We couldn’t see the water from where we were at that moment, but the buildings and roads looked exactly like they had the previous day.

“Okay, let’s turn back then,” I said.

Huang frowned at me. “We ought to at least check it out. If we can figure out the basic layout, we’ll have an advantage.”

“Maybe I don’t want to figure out the layout,” I muttered, knowing my arguments weren’t making sense. Huang crossed his arms.

“I thought we decided to work together on this. I’m telling you, our chances of survival are better if we at least get a look around—before we end up here accidentally one day with a demon chasing us and have no idea where to go.”

“Yeah, but…” I trailed off.

“But what? What about this place has you so on edge?” Huang demanded.

“Okay, look,” I said, “The water… there’s something weird about it. I could sense something coming off of it.”

Huang raised an eyebrow. “Something weird. Did it seem dangerous?”

“Well… no,” I admitted. “It seemed pretty damn nice, actually, like a bell. But that’s why I don’t trust it. Everything in this place is twisted and awful, so there’s no way something like that isn’t some kind of trick. Right?”

“We’ve got to get you to the water,” Huang declared. My stomach dropped.

“Are you listening to me? That’s crazy.” I had to jog to catch up with him when he started walking again. “Huang! Come on.”

“That bell note? It sounds like what I felt before I got access to my other form,” Huang said, speaking quickly and earnestly. “For me it happened when I was being attacked, but for you, it has something to do with the water. If you go there again—”

“You don’t know that!” I hissed. “It could be some kind of trick. You said yourself you have no idea what this area is like.” Ahead, the buildings started to show glimpses of the grey water.

“Camilo, trust me,” he said. “At least come back to the Waterfront and try to describe it—”

“Get back in here!” I snapped in a frantic whisper, grabbing his shoulder and pulling him behind the nearest building. I gestured across my mouth to mime cutting off the noise, then pointed shakily out at the water. Huang leaned out to see and his eyes widened.

A huge mass of demons was settled along the waterfront. Over twenty of them, all with strange, grotesque shapes and gleaming, white eyes. Some patrolled back and forth while others stood on the dock, waiting motionlessly.

“The hell…” he whispered. “Maybe we didn’t see many on our way here because… they all went to the Waterfront? Why?”

I swallowed. “See that area where most of them are standing?” While they were spread pretty far around the dock, there was definitely a concentration of them partway down.

“Yeah?”

“…That’s where I sensed the thing.”

“They’re guarding it,” Huang said slowly. “They know about it. They don’t want you to be able to transform.”

I didn’t particularly want to transform either, but I realized suddenly that I was being stubborn. If I accepted that this was a real place and I was in real danger, then the only solution was to accept and use whatever weapons were offered to me. If that bell-tone really was a weapon I could use, then I’d be stupid not to take it.

Except now, there was no way to get to it.

“How many of those could you take?” I asked.

“I… I’ve never even fought two at once,” Huang admitted. “They never hunt as multiples, always alone. So… I really don’t know. There are types of demons out there I’ve never even seen.” He was starting to look pale.

“Look,” I said, “Let’s just get out of here for now. Maybe they’ll clear out?”

“I guess we don’t have a choice,” he agreed, and we slowly began to make our way back the way we’d come. Blessedly, nothing heard us leave.

“Maybe we should go back to the Sanctuary,” I suggested as the Waterfront disappeared out of sight behind us, its horrific guards along with it.

“Hiding in there isn’t going to help anything.” Huang wrung his hands. “I don’t know what we should do… maybe there’s a way to draw their attention off the dock, but short of just showing up and luring them away…”

I was trying to think of a reply when we turned a corner and were suddenly back in Toronto.

I looked around in amazement. It was right where I’d entered—a dismal alleyway, a dumpster halfway down, and a grocery store plaza just visible at the end of the street. It was still early afternoon, with the sunlight gleaming off of the piles of snow.

“Oh. Huh. Where are we?” Huang asked.

It kind of threw me for a loop to see him standing there next to me. I mean, I’d known Huang was a real person—or at least I’d been pretty sure—but after exclusively seeing him in the Grey City for so long I still hadn’t 100% believed it. It made me feel a little better about deciding to trust him.

“Er… we’re where I entered. I was walking home from my cousin’s.” I took a step back to the main road. “Not sure exactly what street I wandered onto… We’re near Dundas West?”

“Oh, wow,” Huang said once we got back to Dundas and oriented ourselves. “I’m pretty sure I can take the subway back to my place from here. But I had no idea I’d end up getting dropped off at your location. This is going to be a pain.”

 “We’ve got a lot to figure out,” I said, plunging my gloved hands into my pockets as the cold started to bite again. “We’ve got to start understanding that place. There has to be a way to break out of it for good.”

Huang nodded. “Yeah. Maybe there is. And we can assume that there are still two more people who will come in after us, right?”

“The statues,” I agreed. If two of four were current victims… “Maybe we can figure out how to end it for good before they get sucked in.”

“Listen,” Huang hedged, avoiding eye contact, “I know you see it as some kind of nightmare dimension, but I think we have to be willing to look at the bigger picture. I can’t shake the feeling that what I do in there, fighting the demons, is important. There’s some greater purpose to all of it.”

“Whatever you say.” We’d been dragged into an incredibly dangerous situation against our will—that seemed pretty cut-and-dry to me. “Uh… well… I guess I’ll see you next time?”

“Wait,” Huang sighed, pulling a phone from his coat pocket. “Give me your number, we can meet up later and try to figure some stuff out.”

We exchanged numbers and parted ways. As I made my way home, I was unable to stop myself from trying to stretch out my radar sense. It was completely dead, just like I’d imagined ever having it.

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