Life felt still in the barracks. The monotony of the day flowing into the next with only the purgatory of sleep to give respite. He longed for the moment his head hit the bunk, the fatigue of each day allowing dream to seep into waking life. Whispers and longing nipping at his heels, visions of embrace from those he had lost, forgotten ghosts whose faces had warped into smudges of regret.
The work is important. A constant mantra he replayed in his head when the warm bunk breathed unconscious death into his ears. The Frontier was a thankless post. Desert stretching across the horizon, unbroken except for the scarred no man’s land. He had never crossed the barrier. Some had, but few returned — and those who did came back broken, something vital lost beyond the almost imperceptible shimmer.
What did cross the horizon was not of this world, creatures of myth that burned into your retina long after sight. Ungainly beasts with nothing but death in their heart and a void in their eyes.
He did not know what caused him more terror, the creatures of nightmare or the stillness between.
It had been exactly two months since the last encounter had all but decimated his regiment. Memories of fallen friends and their strangled cries locked in the subconscious recesses of his mind. He watched the horizon with half lidded attention, his mind adrift while remaining tethered to the possibility of death in the near moment.
He sat alone in his post save for a telegraph, the periodic dots and dashes reminding him he wasn’t the last human on Earth.
As he prepared to check in with command a figure could be seen crossing the boundary, with a sharp intake of breath he prepared to sound the alarm. Closer inspection revealed the figure to be no more than man, limping across the desert until they collapsed under the blistering heat of the sun.
He shrunk under the desert heat as he hiked across the sands to the figure, a large rifle slung over his shoulder. He had never ventured this close to the shimmer, its mirage like qualities playing tricks on his mind. It looked as if a puddle was made vertical, a faint warbled like reflection of himself growing larger as he approached. The effect made it seem as though the desert stretched on forever — the boundary nothing more than a window to endless arid sands, broken only by the occasional small dune — a purgatory where one could become lost if they stared for too long.
The Man was strikingly familiar, a lost brother from another life, his uniform reflected in his own. Wounds peppered his face, blood seeping into the cotton and surrounding sand. Strangely, the Man’s uniform was completely untouched, an uncomfortable feeling washed over him as the faint smell of sulphur hit his senses. He felt overwhelming anxiety, his reflection mere meters from his face as the possibility of excruciating death crept within arms reach. Staring longer he felt a strange calm wash over him, as if by walking across the boundary he could join with his reflection and become one, faint whispers of a reunion in death.
A small grunt broke him from his trance as the Man attempted to sit up. He knelt down to help and as he did the Man jumped up, grabbing his collar, the smell of death on his breath as he whispered into his ear “water”. Caught off guard he quickly pushed him down, the Man sprawled into the sand, a wounded dog ready to lash out at whomever was closest. In an act of supplication he slowly passed his canteen to the Man who quickly snatched it from his hand. Greedy gulps the only sound in that vast desert.
As the Man finished drinking, the silence that followed was deafening. He began to speak, but as he did the Man rambled “I have seen Eden and her Garden and have trampled her out of misplaced faith” he coughed, pained “you must warn them that we are not God’s promised children, but monsters of hell - harbingers of destruction and decay” he spat on his boots to punctuate his words.
“You have seen too much brother, let me take you back to camp” he replied with pity. The Man stumbled as he attempted to stand, rushing to his side he took him under his arm.
They shuffled back to command, the Man quietly muttering visions of war, of bloody battle quenching his grief.
Hobbling across the dunes, he heard a screeching sound echo from behind, like rocks skating across a frozen lake. He turned to see a hulking figure pierce through the veil, ripples reverberating across the boundary. The bipedal creature stood three meters tall, almost recognizable — a twisted amalgamation of uncanny animals, fused into one with the elegance of a single vision. The head of a spider stared blankly at the two men. For a moment, he could have sworn he saw regret in those alien eyes, a flicker of hesitation that was quickly consumed as the monster bared its fangs in rage.
The Man pushed himself away.
“Brother, the Gates of Hell rattle in the blowing wind,” he declared, stepping toward the beast. “Do unto me what befits my station, for I have eaten the forbidden fruit and wish to feel bloody retribution.”
The monster charged with a surprising speed, bovine legs carrying the beast on a collision course with the two. Diving to the side he quickly rolled away as the Man was skewered by the large scythe-like blades that protruded from the creature’s forearms.
Busy with its prey, he regained his bearings clumsily retrieving his Baker rifle. Paralysed with terror he watched as the Man was savagely impaled with a personal intent, viscera staining the hot white sand a deep red.
The scene in front of him was brutal, flecks of blood splattering his face as the beast dismantled the Man mere meters from him. The spell was broken as he found his senses. Priming the rifle with a practiced ease he pulled back the hammer and aimed at the beast of myth.
With a moment’s hesitation the creature turned to him. Obsidian eyes projecting fear, or was it his own reflection in those black pools that gave him pause.
Slowly he depressed the trigger, a small explosion rocking his body backwards as the lead ball pierced the creature’s skin. Blood the same deep red as the Man’s flowed from the wound. The beast reeled, his all too human arms thrashed in retaliation knocking him towards the barrier.
He felt his ribs crack from the impact as the beast slowly marched forward, backing him up to the veil. Terror seized him as he was caught between certain death, and ambiguous oblivion. The unnatural pull of the boundary tugged at his heart, the buzz of electricity coursing through live wires flooding his ears.
Spectres of past lives flashed through his mind as the creature slowly reached for him, a reaper preparing to harvest his fields. He felt resigned to his fate, a long exhale releasing from his short bloody life.
With that final breath he closed his eyes and passed through to Hell.