CoXFic: A Rogue's Monomyth (Part Two)
((Translations from babelfish; particular apologies to sovay on the 1/205012 chance she sees this))
Part Two: Wednesday/Thursday - Outside Corfu, the Hellenic Republic
There are a great many things that Jaime Synge does not particularly care for. Somewhere in that list (by his own ranking, somewhere in the teens) lies "bumbling around in the dark in the wilderness". The instructions he was given by the tavern keeper on meeting his contact were vague and poorly transcribed into English. The Greek he had been provided was too complex and also poorly transcribed. Nonetheless, he had wandered far enough to find what appeared to be the dirt road he was supposed to have found, and eventually took a seat on bumpy, lichen-crusted next to a large cedar at the edge of the road. The boy reached into his coat pocket and pulled out the large, lumpy communications artifact that he always carried with him. His gaze ran over the very meager phosphorescence playing across the shell of the artifact, weakly tracing the inlaid metals and scrollwork placed into its carapace. Synge brushed his index finger and thumb over these patterns, marring the darkness with short bursts of sparks between his fingers at the artifact's contours.
He was late. But he was also told that his contact was not expected to be punctual. It would be difficult to arrange a guide, being as the guide had publicly sworn never to make the trip again. So, Synge sat, waited, smoked, and sweated in darkness. After nearly an hour an old market truck tumbled down the dirt road, the clattering of junk in the truck bed alerting Synge almost as soon as the engine noise had. Synge stood up, igniting the air around his palm, assuming that anyone who intended to meet him would stop and anyone who wasn't intending to meet him would later tell a story about how the devil was waiting for them on this abandoned road.
The truck stopped and the cab door opened, the cab light revealing an balding old man with a short, white beard and bad teeth. He wore a light green linen shirt with mismatched buttons. "Mister Synge?" he asked, over accentuating and flattening the last syllable.
Jaime looked into the truck bed, then at the man, before getting into the cab. "Δεν θέλουμε να έχουν ενός οδηγού. Είναι το βλέπει αυτό?"
The old man shifted the truck into gear and continued down the road. "Εάν θα με συγχωρέσετε λέω, Mister Synge, μιλάτε Ελληνικά σαν καθυστερημένο παιδί. Είχα περισσότερο από αρκετό ενώ εμείς μίλησε στο τηλέφωνο. I think it would be better if we speak in the English. We will do better that way."
The warlock blew smoke out of the open window and tried hard to parse the man's quick, accented speech. After a few moment of futile guessing, he nodded. "If we don't have a guide, Saoul, where are we going?"
"We are going to meet the man at the docks. As you know, he is not eager for this trip. But your friend in España, he has paid enough to convince him to come along."
"The docks? I thought this was an overland route?"
Saoul hummed in a negative fashion and shook his finger in the air. "No, you have heard stories about η διαδρομή στον άδη. These things are not hard to learn, we know of them from many people like you. Because of people like you, it is to say. That way is known, but it is well known, it is known well and it is guarded well."
"Guarded?"
The man steered the truck around a turn with a particularly discouraging amount of loose gravel and dirt. The rear end fishtailed harshly and the motion pressed Synge against the jiggling door of the truck. The old man whipped the wheel around, more guiding the truck's direction and less controlling it. Once they recovered and Synge remembered to put on his seat belt, the man continued. "Yes, by your friends, the Arachnos army. You know their leader claims the powers of Tartarus? He would not leave such a ... famous entryway to the seat of his power without some sentries."
Synge looked around on the floor and in his seat for where his cigarette had fallen during the last, chaotic turn. Finding it nowhere, he picked another out for himself and gave a second to the driver, who nodded appreciatively. "So, we cannot go that way. But, your guide, he knows a second way, a secret way that we do not think they know about. He will take you that way."
Synge rubbed his eyes both with mild annoyance and because his vision once again refused to settle on a single wavelength of light. "How secret is secret?"
"Your guide, he was a ... eh. Forest man? Tree... he works with the national service. Looking for poachers, smugglers, a law man for the forests and islands. You understand. We had an earthquake, some years back. He and another man went to make sure that the trails and bridges were still safe. He finds a great... break in the ground. A cave, a hole where there was not one before."
"Okay..."
"He goes into the cave and finds a path, some breaks in the rock where he thinks he can hear people speaking. This man, he thinks that someone has been trapped in the cave, the cave-in, you see." Saoul wiggles his finger. "But it is not people speaking he hears."
Synge stretched himself out a little more in the cab. "It's the souls of the dead."
"Yes, but he will not tell you this," Saoul smiled. "He will say it was a fantasy. Cave gas or some other kind of nonsense. I will tell you this, but not in front of him, it is not 'cave gas' or bad air that makes a full-grown man be dragged out of a cave screaming for God and his father." Saoul paused, then touched a small crucifix and icon dangling from the rear view mirror. "So, now he drinks to make the voices silent and swears he will not enter the forest of that island again."
"Yes he will," Synge said idly as he watched the docks emerge further down this road.
"Yes, I think he will," Saoul agreed before taking a phone from the dashboard. He spoke quickly and curtly, steering the truck to a small pier on the periphery of the docks. The truck shuddered and clanked as he brought it to a halt. The two men exited the truck, Saoul embracing a man who met him at the pier while Synge strapped his backpack to himself.
The three men moved with urgency toward a small steel boat tied to the dock, where the outline of another figure could be seen sitting on the boat's seatplanks. Jaime dropped the backpack into the boat and glanced briefly at the short, nervous man waiting in the boat. His hands and legs had been tied together and a broad piece of tape wrapped across his mouth. He looked at Jaime not with terror but a sad resignation. Synge looked up at Saoul, who was still speaking with the boat's pilot. "He speak English?"
"Yes, but badly," Saoul admitted. "About as bad as your Greek. You have any Italian? Maybe some Albanian?" Synge raised his hands in passive negativity. "Ah well. You are not a very good conversational man either. You will make do." Saoul passed the pilot a small envelope and patted him on the back before unwinding the mooring from the dock. "Travel well, Mister Synge. Give the devil my regards."
Synge waved a hand through the air, less in goodbye and more in dismissal for the man's jab at his foolishness. The pilot stoked the small outboard motor into life and the three floated into the darkness.
Part Two: Wednesday/Thursday - Outside Corfu, the Hellenic Republic
There are a great many things that Jaime Synge does not particularly care for. Somewhere in that list (by his own ranking, somewhere in the teens) lies "bumbling around in the dark in the wilderness". The instructions he was given by the tavern keeper on meeting his contact were vague and poorly transcribed into English. The Greek he had been provided was too complex and also poorly transcribed. Nonetheless, he had wandered far enough to find what appeared to be the dirt road he was supposed to have found, and eventually took a seat on bumpy, lichen-crusted next to a large cedar at the edge of the road. The boy reached into his coat pocket and pulled out the large, lumpy communications artifact that he always carried with him. His gaze ran over the very meager phosphorescence playing across the shell of the artifact, weakly tracing the inlaid metals and scrollwork placed into its carapace. Synge brushed his index finger and thumb over these patterns, marring the darkness with short bursts of sparks between his fingers at the artifact's contours.
He was late. But he was also told that his contact was not expected to be punctual. It would be difficult to arrange a guide, being as the guide had publicly sworn never to make the trip again. So, Synge sat, waited, smoked, and sweated in darkness. After nearly an hour an old market truck tumbled down the dirt road, the clattering of junk in the truck bed alerting Synge almost as soon as the engine noise had. Synge stood up, igniting the air around his palm, assuming that anyone who intended to meet him would stop and anyone who wasn't intending to meet him would later tell a story about how the devil was waiting for them on this abandoned road.
The truck stopped and the cab door opened, the cab light revealing an balding old man with a short, white beard and bad teeth. He wore a light green linen shirt with mismatched buttons. "Mister Synge?" he asked, over accentuating and flattening the last syllable.
Jaime looked into the truck bed, then at the man, before getting into the cab. "Δεν θέλουμε να έχουν ενός οδηγού. Είναι το βλέπει αυτό?"
The old man shifted the truck into gear and continued down the road. "Εάν θα με συγχωρέσετε λέω, Mister Synge, μιλάτε Ελληνικά σαν καθυστερημένο παιδί. Είχα περισσότερο από αρκετό ενώ εμείς μίλησε στο τηλέφωνο. I think it would be better if we speak in the English. We will do better that way."
The warlock blew smoke out of the open window and tried hard to parse the man's quick, accented speech. After a few moment of futile guessing, he nodded. "If we don't have a guide, Saoul, where are we going?"
"We are going to meet the man at the docks. As you know, he is not eager for this trip. But your friend in España, he has paid enough to convince him to come along."
"The docks? I thought this was an overland route?"
Saoul hummed in a negative fashion and shook his finger in the air. "No, you have heard stories about η διαδρομή στον άδη. These things are not hard to learn, we know of them from many people like you. Because of people like you, it is to say. That way is known, but it is well known, it is known well and it is guarded well."
"Guarded?"
The man steered the truck around a turn with a particularly discouraging amount of loose gravel and dirt. The rear end fishtailed harshly and the motion pressed Synge against the jiggling door of the truck. The old man whipped the wheel around, more guiding the truck's direction and less controlling it. Once they recovered and Synge remembered to put on his seat belt, the man continued. "Yes, by your friends, the Arachnos army. You know their leader claims the powers of Tartarus? He would not leave such a ... famous entryway to the seat of his power without some sentries."
Synge looked around on the floor and in his seat for where his cigarette had fallen during the last, chaotic turn. Finding it nowhere, he picked another out for himself and gave a second to the driver, who nodded appreciatively. "So, we cannot go that way. But, your guide, he knows a second way, a secret way that we do not think they know about. He will take you that way."
Synge rubbed his eyes both with mild annoyance and because his vision once again refused to settle on a single wavelength of light. "How secret is secret?"
"Your guide, he was a ... eh. Forest man? Tree... he works with the national service. Looking for poachers, smugglers, a law man for the forests and islands. You understand. We had an earthquake, some years back. He and another man went to make sure that the trails and bridges were still safe. He finds a great... break in the ground. A cave, a hole where there was not one before."
"Okay..."
"He goes into the cave and finds a path, some breaks in the rock where he thinks he can hear people speaking. This man, he thinks that someone has been trapped in the cave, the cave-in, you see." Saoul wiggles his finger. "But it is not people speaking he hears."
Synge stretched himself out a little more in the cab. "It's the souls of the dead."
"Yes, but he will not tell you this," Saoul smiled. "He will say it was a fantasy. Cave gas or some other kind of nonsense. I will tell you this, but not in front of him, it is not 'cave gas' or bad air that makes a full-grown man be dragged out of a cave screaming for God and his father." Saoul paused, then touched a small crucifix and icon dangling from the rear view mirror. "So, now he drinks to make the voices silent and swears he will not enter the forest of that island again."
"Yes he will," Synge said idly as he watched the docks emerge further down this road.
"Yes, I think he will," Saoul agreed before taking a phone from the dashboard. He spoke quickly and curtly, steering the truck to a small pier on the periphery of the docks. The truck shuddered and clanked as he brought it to a halt. The two men exited the truck, Saoul embracing a man who met him at the pier while Synge strapped his backpack to himself.
The three men moved with urgency toward a small steel boat tied to the dock, where the outline of another figure could be seen sitting on the boat's seatplanks. Jaime dropped the backpack into the boat and glanced briefly at the short, nervous man waiting in the boat. His hands and legs had been tied together and a broad piece of tape wrapped across his mouth. He looked at Jaime not with terror but a sad resignation. Synge looked up at Saoul, who was still speaking with the boat's pilot. "He speak English?"
"Yes, but badly," Saoul admitted. "About as bad as your Greek. You have any Italian? Maybe some Albanian?" Synge raised his hands in passive negativity. "Ah well. You are not a very good conversational man either. You will make do." Saoul passed the pilot a small envelope and patted him on the back before unwinding the mooring from the dock. "Travel well, Mister Synge. Give the devil my regards."
Synge waved a hand through the air, less in goodbye and more in dismissal for the man's jab at his foolishness. The pilot stoked the small outboard motor into life and the three floated into the darkness.