Framework of the Frontier Read online

  Her voice sent a strange shiver spidering up William’s spine. This was it. This was what he’d been missing.

  Daniel coughed, steadying his voice to confident narration, “I’ll go next. In another chair sits Narasei, a tall human woman with straight white hair and azure eyes. You might not see it at a glance, but she’s Pact Master — a binder of demons and otherworldly beings — as well as gifted with a supernatural ability to sense motives of those she speaks with. She’s from—”

  Thomas’ chortle interrupted him. “Whoa, dude what the heck, you’re playing a woman? Hah! Gayyy.”

  “Jesus Christ, Thomas, do you want to play with us or be a fucking turd for the rest of the night?” William stood. He drilled angry daggers through the little shitstain.

  The room paused in a tense silence filled by traffic and an electric background static. Thomas’ lips twitched upward with irritation, but he held it in, averting his eyes as he sank in his chair. Too quiet to hear, he muttered something under his breath.

  “What was that?” William demanded.

  Thomas raised his voice to a near yell. “Let’s continue.”

  Daniel groaned. “Can you guys behave? William, you need to chill down too. If I wanted to waste my Friday listening to little bitches arguing I’d be with the missus. I’m not here to get familiar with your insecurities.”

  “Oooh boy.” Abraham finished his beer. “It’s going to be a short game. Well, in case we ever do get to the part where combat starts — my character is… I guess you can call him Abbrams. He’s pretty much like me, but with a wizard hat. His build is, like I explained before, a modified Script Arcanist. I can give you a link to the full character sheet.”

  “Thomas?” Mitchelle asked, her chins quivering as she struggled to keep going. “Could you continue, please?”

  “Yea whatever… I’m a Weapon Master class so I can bond with weapons. I have Second Chance, so if I die I get to redo the last minute. I guess I look like myself if I was ripped and shit.”

  Daniel jumped up and dropped his tablet. “Ow! What the hell?”

  ““““What?””””

  He was sucking on his thumb, eyeing the device like it was the devil. “Static zap.”

  “What model is that? It could be a sign of the battery being faulty.” Abraham craned his neck to inspect the dark screen.

  When William leaned closer, his ears picked up that static again. It was a quiet ringing of white noise, not just the typical background noise. He’d never heard batteries make that kind of sound. Luckily, the device resurrected with cheers when Daniel swiped the fingerprint scanner, though the noise continued to grow in intensity.

  “You might want to get that checked,” William said, adjusting his voice. “Alright.” He felt a heat rise to his ears as he imagined his character: A slightly taller, more muscled, and handsomer version of himself, with white shoulder length hair and blue eyes. God he felt embarrassed imagining a version of himself that he could never be. “I’m a Radiant Paladin. I look sort of like that cool guy sword guy from the hack-and-slash video game with demons. As for the trait, let’s go with ‘A thimble of God’s Blood’.” It seemed like a decent trait to put his physical abilities on par with a warrior’s as well as giving him extra spell slots to use his abilities with.

  “Shit man, what a bummer.” Thomas tilted his head as he sipped beer. “I was expecting a cooler description from an art school dropout, like shiny stuff and armor.”

  “Wow.” Daniel leaned back, raising his hands.

  Mitchelle tried to interject with her narration, “‘Welcome’, the woman said, before gesturing her hands in a quick pattern and reciting a brief spell…” A spell the words of which William missed completely.

  He’d had enough of this loser clown. How dared he — a man who had done nothing but waste his life — point a finger at the sorest spot he knew. Was he so pathetic the only time he feels alive is reminding others their dreams failed too?

  Hot rage surged throughout his chest. Tightening his fists, William suppressed a sudden urge to punch Thomas’ teeth in. He drew a deep breath and another and another and a fourth and a fifth. Keep control of your emotions. Keep control. Lose it and you lose the situation.

  “Easy, Will, sit down. Thomas, that was uncall-” Abraham frowned, his last word drowning under the static.

  “Thomas. One more slip and I’ll throw you out myself,” William said. But he could not hear his own words.

  Mitchelle’s lips moved, but sounds were obscured by the white noise. William stood slowly, his frustration with an idiotic friend subsiding in favor of irritated confusion as he looked at Daniel’s device. Is it going to blow up?

  It was turned off again. Daniel removed the battery, but still the sound continued. They stood, exchanging puzzled looks, trying to shout over the noise.

  Abraham wrote a note with one word, ‘GAS?’ and gestured urgently towards the door.

  A soft pop broke the static.

  Right in the center of the five of them appeared a symmetric mesh of light. It formed a branching structure for an instant. It coalesced into an inky polygon continuously folding in on itself. Grooves of a wormy texture coating it shone in iridescent sheen as they moved.

  William stood still in awe. Feeling a strange tingling sensation through every nerve and muscle, popping his ears as the noise grew another notch.

  A beam of blackness shot out at Mitchelle — leaving an outline of her pained scream to evaporate in mist. Another shot out Daniel, third Abraham, and, a fourth killed Thomas, all within a span of seconds. William ducked beneath the table, narrowly avoiding death.

  Last of the misty forms disappeared.

  Old gang. Dead.

  I’ll be next.

  Dread gripped his guts deep. Flying on adrenaline, William sprinted through the kitchen, into the hallway, and for the door. A glance over his shoulder confirmed that whatever the fuck that thing was, it was following him, slowly floating after him like on a fixed leash. Another zap missed William as he leapt ten stairs at once. He managed to get into the street and slam the door shut, but the thing simply phased through it.

  A distant sound rumbled beneath the white noise. Glaring brightness blinded the corner of William’s eye. Turning his head, he found it to be the headlights of an approaching eighteen wheeler.

  Of course it’s you, truck-kun.

  Before William could feel the no doubt unforgettable full body embrace of a truck bumper, a whiteness filled his vision. Sharp pain ignited all across him, tearing William’s body into empty blackness.

  2

  An overpowering nausea threatened to choke William. He retched. Every bone, muscle, and organ ached. His body felt like it had been pulped into dough, jerked around a thousand miles per hour, slammed into the floor from orbit, and, as a final humiliation, kneaded on by a gang of angry step dancers.

  William climbed on his knees, surprised to find the pain subsiding from skull shattering throbs into barely noticeable and then nothing in a matter of moments.

  Bright amber warmth flickered through his shut eyes. Between his fingers spilled tufts of a soft verdant mattress, which crumbled under touch. It smelled of earth and spring. Moss. I’m in the woods?

  Standing up, William began to awaken. Memories of last night trickled in. He’d been on the road for hours, caught mom and her family red handed with a pick-up truck full of grandpa’s stuff, and almost started a surreal gaming session with estranged friends.

  He’d been killed by a contorted floating cuboid.

  William’s heart skipped a beat. He patted himself down in panic. No holes anywhere, no mangled limbs, and yet, something felt off.

  Looking down, he didn’t see the extra love handles he’d put on since college. Instead, beneath his neck began a sculpture of chiseled perfection. Wiry muscles twitching under veiny skin. Even the scar he’d gotten from a shop-lifting kid’s pencil was gone. It was perfect. He was perfect. William touched his face to check if he wa
s handsome too, only to realize he had absolutely no idea what his face was supposed to feel like. He pulled down his black boxers to check downstairs, only to feel deep all encompassing relief at the sight of an old friend.

  With a deep breath he looked around.

  The moss painted room and heaps, which might have once been furniture, were shrouded in cool-blue shades of dawn.

  Beyond an arched doorway spread a ruined avenue of cracked rust-red slabs, half mummified by wiry ivy and shrubbery. Stepping into the bright warm, William was struck by a nearly disorienting view of tall layered gardens and spiraling architecture that rivaled modern sky-scrapers in height. Moss painted carvings decorated the terrace parapets and age eroded statues of both slightly alien and mythical stood atop the pillars and onion-shaped domes of the towers.

  Cool. It’s like some post apocalyptic Martian version of Babylonian gardens.

  Craning his neck, William squinted at the sky and his eyes widened despite the sun’s glare. Beyond the deep ultramarine sky stretched a white dotted line from one horizon to the other and on its left side loomed two crescent moons, which marked the place as neither Mars nor Babylon.

  Dumbstruck, William stared at the world around him, slowly breathing in the flowering nature. A light warm breeze brought past him a chirp of wildlife.

  I’m in another world.

  William swallowed and licked his lips, taking a scan to see if anyone was around. It felt dumb, but he had to try it, didn’t he? He whispered, “Status.”

  Nothing happened.

  “Status window open.”

  Nothing.

  “Properties?”

  Still nothing, but he wouldn’t be discouraged so easily. William shut his eyes, clenched his fists and thought about opening a status window with every fiber of his being like he was shitting a sewer clog after three days of constipation. But, in the end, nothing happened besides colors swirling at the backs of his eyelids.

  No status screen popped up, but, as he focused, William felt something else: An odd warmth that swelled with every beat of his heart and diffused throughout his body. At first he thought it was his blood, but when focused on, it shifted like a veil of mist, swirling to his whim. It spread a funny tingle over his insides, making William blink.

  Even with eyes open he felt it now. Its presence suffused his very being. It wasn’t cold or hot or accurately describable with any sense he had ever had. But it was there. And William was sure as hell he hadn’t had it on Earth.

  So, either I’m about to have a stroke or this is my soul or mana or chi or something like that? Please don’t be a stroke.

  He had a strong gut feeling that the multi angled thingamajig that had vaporized him was to blame. So, it had to be magic. Unless…

  William squinted his eyes as he scrutinized the details of the sky above, trying to see the pixels and polygons, but could spot neither. If he was in some kind of alien simulation it had William’s monkey brain perfectly fooled, though if there were aliens, he doubted any of them would go through the trouble. Plus, if this had been a digital simulation of some sort, there sure as hell should’ve been some kind of status window popping open by now. No, it seemed like William was still stuck roughly somewhere in the neighbourhood of reality.

  Scratching his head, William pondered on what to do.

  To the left rose a crumbling thicket of towers, which shrouded the street in shadows. To the right spread a skyline of abandoned palaces, beyond which drifted into the clear sky pillars of smoke.

  Smoke means people.

  Or monsters.

  Inspecting the myriad of sculptures William noted humans among them, tastefully clothless or draped in baggy robes and keyffiyeh. People, human people, lived here, or used to live. Well, at least I can go take a look.

  Hiking up the slow incline between the ruins, William noticed when two dog sized monkeys with gold-white fur started following him. They kept yipping aggressively from above and began to get closer.

  William picked up a rock and brandished it at them as he continued walking. “Don’t get any funny ideas!”

  They did.

  The two monkeys followed, yipping louder, inching closer. William shook his rock again menacingly, but it only emboldened them. Their lips flipped backwards, revealing a row of needle teeth.

  “Oh shit.”

  Sprinting down the wall, the monkeys split off to flank him. Jaws snapped to catch his limbs, but not as fast as he would have imagined — not fast enough to catch him. William paused his sprint to swing the stone.

  It cracked something in a monkey’s shoulder, sending it skidding on the stones. William ducked under the other monkey’s retaliatory dive. A rush of excitement and confidence swelled in him. “Alright, you fuckers, you wanna eat me? You’re gonna need to finish the entrée first!”

  He shook his rock again.

  The wounded monkey flinched, hissing and yipping. Its companion hopped over to help it retreat up the vines.

  It was his victory. Tension dissolved in William’s shoulders.

  “Good job little rock, good job.” He gave it a pat. “Though, I probably should’ve killed the slow one for food…” He sighed, continuing towards the smoke.

  His idle thoughts drifted to the murdering cuboid and his old gang. Given that something obviously supernatural was afoot, it was a safe bet that they were here somewhere too.

  William paused, turning around as a hint of guilt cinched his throat. He should’ve probably started with searching for them. While he had no doubt that Abraham and Daniel would know what to do, William wasn’t so sure about Mitchelle or Thomas surviving an attack of rabid monkeys. Yes, even Thomas. Just because the guy deserved a punch in the face didn’t mean he deserved to get eaten.

  That said, there was an equally good chance they had woken up miles apart, who knows how many. Shaking his head, William dismissed the idea of a rescue operation. A man whose survival experience amounted to ‘walk towards smoke’ shouldn’t delude himself into thinking he could save others. He was already fortunate to have woken up before the monkeys or other beasts found him sleeping.

  The others might not have been so lucky.

  In somber mood, William crested a pile of rubble to reach a vantage point. From there he saw a town.

  Rope bridges zig-zagged between the spires where the ancient archeways had crumbled. Wooden shacks and buildings of mis-matching bricks clung to the sides of the massive ruined spires like blocky polypores. Platforms normally overgrown by sub-tropical plants grew tidy crops.

  “There he is. I told you it was that flash in the sky, Lidarein,” it was a man’s voice.

  A soft female voice whispered,“…not magical, but be careful.”

  Three people stood at the bottom of the rubble hill.

  The girl had floppy ears, curved ram horns, and cloven hooved unguligrade legs coated with a silky doe-dotted blonde fur that stood against her deeply tanned skin. Generous curves squeezed against a pale leather top. Her wide luscious hips spread out from below a long skirt-like loincloth of colorful patterns, which matched her scarf.

  If she was a golden ram, he was a black goat. Aside from extremely pointy chin and cheekbones, he was an average man, equipped with a vibrantly painted breastplate.

  A long sharp whistle snapped William’s attention to the third, who he had assumed was human, until she lifted off a silvery spartan helmet. She had a face of mediterranean beauty, a neatly tied bun of charcoal hair, and long pointy ears. Her black leather and silver plate armor left a lot of her olive body bare, inadvertently guiding William’s eyes from her toned abs to perfectly proportioned hips, off of which hung a blade.

  “Greetings traveler. I am Lidarein, the Chief Ranger of New Ea and the Frontier. We saw the light when you fell. Are you with the other four?” Lidarein asked.

  William sensed a cautious reservation in her voice. The two others showed their wariness more openly as they spread out slowly. William took a half step back, tightening the gri
p on his rock. Immediately, the black goat man reached to draw taut his bow, but was stopped by the elf’s raised hand.

  “Hold it,” she said to him, keeping her eyes on William as she spoke slowly. “Do you speak Nibir?”

  “No.”

  She blinked, her thin brows furrowing in confusion.

  “I do understand you just fine. I am William.” He took another half-step backward. It wasn’t a great situation to be caught in, but the cautiously diplomatic approach of the trio implied a level of civility. Besides, she had mentioned ‘the other four’ and something about light in the sky. “Did you mean four others like me? Are they here? Are they alright?”

  The male faun murmured something under his breath, making the elf glance up to the side.

  “I do not know their fate, William, but we did nothing except defend ourselves in accordance with the Frontier law,” Lidarein said. “Also, since I’m the representative of said law, I am going to kindly request you to drop your rock and come with us. The Letter King will have questions for you.”

  “Defended yourselves?”

  “They attacked unprovoked. We fought back. Now, I don’t like attacking people based on a generalization, but for the sake of the people here, I’d suggest you comply for now.”

  William looked at his rock, and at her. It was a rock yeah, but why was she so scared of it? He shook his head, trying to piece things together. It sounded like the others had come by and done something that made three fully kitted fantasy warriors wary to face a man in his boxers.

  They must’ve had superpowers. I must have superpowers. Could I throw the rock like it was a cannon ball?

  Oh shit…

  William beheld the overgrown city behind him with a mix of dread and awe. Did they do this? Idiot. They couldn’t have, the ruins were ancient. William’s gaze returned to Lidarein and he finally asked, “What happened to this place? Did they do this?”

  “Hah! No, no no. They were not that powerful, but, they were strong. What happened here? Corruption and greed is my guess. But, what’s going to happen now, William” — confidence swelled in her demeanor — “is that I’m gonna have to insist that you lower the rock and you’re hopefully going to comply, if you want to play this out peacefully. This doesn’t have to be difficult, but I’m not risking a single life for your convenience.”