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Author's Chapter Notes:

Wow, ok so this is a bit late I know. I've been so caught up this week with others things, distractions, you al know how it is. Anyway this one has some moderate interaction but, if you haven't yet caught on, I'm not entirely sure how I want to characterize Tryn just yet. So I'm kind of going for this unpredictable type thing to suit that. Hopefully it will be good. As always I love to hear your comments, thoughts, and ideas as it does help me a good bit with how I continue to write. I haven't really worked on the superhero one in a while so don't expect that for at least another week or so. Well, that's about it, hope you enjoy!

Gravel churned against the moss coated cement. A horrible, wet scraping noise escaped the stony teeth as they wore away bits of plaster and specks of lime. Beneath it all was another bony hand still clutching a frayed canvas rucksack. The man reached down and swatted the skeletal appendage away with the back of his forearm before greedily tearing the pack open. Like the mandibles of a hungry mantis, the frail man’s hands kneaded through the stale interior. He sorted through the contents, flinging what he wanted into one pile and what he didn’t into another.

“Hmm, what’s this? Hey, I got another one!” He cheered with some meager excitement as he withdrew a dented can of cat food from the bag. “you see this? Haha, today may just be my lucky day. Now let’s see… put that there for me. Don’t want nobody taking that now…”

Whilst the hunger crazed man continued to forage, muttering hoarsely to himself, Soren lingered nearby leaning against a shattered arch with his leg propped up on a tangled piece of rebar.

“I said you seen this?” The man cried back to Soren.

“Yeah, yeah...I heard you. Just, keep it down a bit would you Tom?”

But the poor man couldn’t help himself. His joy for just a bit more of food was unfettered, and Soren believed it would be wrong to deprive him of it. Besides, he had his own little joy to focus on. Tryn had followed through on her promise, and that very morning, delivered him to the remains of a bookstore in which he found plenty of paper, pens, and the like. Now, hours later, he lingered a few blocks away, whilst the others she brought to the ruined town foraged for what supplies they could. Soren learned that this was one of their usual chores. One that they gladly would volunteer for, as it meant freedom from their musty prison.

Soren let out another sigh as he looked up at the long grey sky overhead. The encroaching clouds meant that rain was near. He could feel it in the fragile winds brushing up against him. When he had last been in the town it was cold and the air was thick with a dusty haze that made him wheeze. Now, it was clear, almost refreshing, but then again perhaps he was simply relieved to have escaped the musk of the pit. Steadily, he propped one of his new notebooks on his thigh and produced a red pen. As he put the point onto the first line the words that were clogging his mind suddenly poured forth like an oceanic wave.


Dear Erin,

I cannot begin to tell you how relieved I am to finally be writing you again. These last few days have been both torturous and exhilarating. I know it has been a while but as you might imagine my situation is rather unprecedented. The giantess (her name being Tryn, though it frightens me to say it) has treated me with unexpected kindness, though I fear it will not last. She demands to know the location of the Legion camp, no doubt for nefarious purposes. I realize that this is indeed another test of my faith. Just as Job was tempted to sin I shall endure this woman’s (if I can even call her that) coaxing. That being said I cannot ignore the little things she offers. Gifts such as this paper and this pen will not be turned away but I take them only out of my love for you. Do not fret, I shall not succumb to her bribery, no matter how hard she tries.

My fellow prisoners are a welcome break from her scrutiny. Yet even they wear on me at times. For one they are from the hills, not one of the camps, and thus I know them to be coarse and duplicitous. Though some are friendly, others make me intensely nervous, as their habits and mannerisms are quite alien to me. Many are also jealous of Tryn’s favor towards me, and even now I feel their eyes looking on with disdain. Some mock me for my position and my faith, calling me things like “uniform”, “knee”, and “sky-talker”. Nevertheless I cannot help but pity them, for in many ways they are simply misguided. Perhaps from being abused and imprisoned for so long. I hope that with time I can show them the light.

There is one though that reminds me a bit of you. Her name is Kate, and, aside from her withered appearance, is similar to you in almost every respect, right down to the way she snorts when she laughs. Oddly enough, there is a good bit of laughter amongst them. Although it is clear that they are sullen and anxious, they seem to joke with one another often. Perhaps to allay their own suffering or maybe out of some madness from being trapped for so long.

Even Tryn is not immune to this sadness. Despite the fact that she is indeed in complete control she has a strange temperament about her. When she speaks to us or barks orders she is stern or playful, but when she is left alone with her thoughts in silence, she often stares off into the distance with a solemn look on her face. I believe she knows the horridness of what she does and fears the bottomless pit that will be her fate. I hope that, next time she tries to pique my interests, I can lead her into a conversation about our savior, but I can tell now that it will be a great challenge. Sometimes, when I am alone (which is seldom these days) I close my eyes and think about all the opportunities I have been given. All the blessings and the trials are leading me to a greater purpose, I just hope that I will realize it soon. My greatest wish though, is to see you again or perhaps, at the very least, have my letters delivered to you. Unfortunately I know that is impossible now.

As always I am your brother,

Enoch

Soren finished his message with a flick of his wrist. The writing was clear and precise, worthy of a calligrapher’s praise. The red ink bled through the page and stained the one behind it, invoking visions of blood. He quickly turned away from his work and closed his eyes. Everything became loud, ringing, pounding, crying. The veins ensnaring his skull seemed to tighten and every thought he had took him back to that gruesome field that he lay upon almost a week earlier. Enormous eyes peering down at him, the feeling of hot breath permeating his skin and clothes. He doubled over as if to vomit, but there was so little in his stomach that he only gagged. When he looked back up he saw the eyes were not part of his tortured hallucination, but were very much real.

“What now?” Tryn groaned with defeat. Soren was so shaken by his visions that he did not even notice her approach. She had slid down from her perch on the mountainside and now huddled over a block of the ruin, peering down at her possessions.

“Tryn, Tryn! I have it, I found another!” Thomas cried, holding a tarnished chrome bumper above his head. His thin, shaky limbs barely kept it aloft. If it weren’t for his excitement, the piece of metal would have easily collapsed on the poor man. Tryn’s eyes darted over to Thomas diminutive form, lighting up for a passing second.

“Ahh excellent, thank you Tom, you’ll be rewarded tonight…”

Tryn’s words were soft but discomforting. They flew off her tongue like a horde of ants pouring from their earthen mound. She let her hand slip between two wrecked apartment buildings before finally stopping just over Thomas. Two fingers reached down and plucked the car component up from Tom’s grasp. She quickly stowed it away in her bag before turning her attention back to Soren, who continued to stave off the last of his waking nightmares.

“What will it be? What will it be Tryn?” Tom giddily yelled up at her, waving his arms around in an uncoordinated spiral of movement. Tryn’s face scrunched up as she shot a heinous glare in Tom’s direction.

“Run off bug! Can’t you see I’m busy?”

Tom’s face immediately sank and, before his gigantic master could say anything more, he scurried back into the dilapidated parking garage from whence he came.

“Now then…” Tryn hissed as she returned to Soren. “As I was saying, what’s wrong with you now? Did you hurt yourself?” Her final few words had some hints of sympathy buried within them. Soren knew this right away, and, feigning some blow to the temple, responded:

“I...its nothing really just, hit my head is all…”

Tryn’s eyes narrowed. With a squint, she began searching Soren’s tiny body for signs of injury, and, having found none, leaned back and let out a sigh.

“Right, right. And now I’m to hear about how you suddenly can’t remember anything over the last few days, is that it?”

“No, no I just…”

“Or is that you would further convince me that you little things are just far too fragile to be doing work?”

“No, Tryn it isn’t that but…”

She rolled her eyes and, in a sudden flash of movement, slammed her hand down sideways just behind Soren. He immediately fell onto his side, this time feeling very real physical pain shoot through him as a pair of jagged rocks caught his abdomen. Soren let out a cry composed of both fear and agony. Tryn saw this and was convinced. Again she groaned, slowly letting her hand turn until it lay on the ground with her palm up at a slight angle.

“Come now get on.”

Soren hesitated. He felt a storm brewing, and not just the literal one which already spread its darkness over them. For a time he avoided climbing up onto Tryn’s hand and kept his gaze toward the ground. Finally, after a few more awkward moments of stillness he heard Tryn grinding her teeth. When he looked up he saw that she now wore another grimace of disappointment.

“You’re gonna make this difficult aren’t you?”

“No, I’m sorry, I’ll...please don’t-”

“Oh just get on already.”

Soren finally complied. As he attempted to hoist himself up onto the surface of her palm, Tryn cocked her head to one side to address the rest of her underlings.

“Tom, you too now…” she then turned toward the South side of town. “Vic! Get your group together by the Square, same goes for you Nate, and if any of you aren’t there, well...you know what to expect…”

Soren nearly lost his grip when he heard her. Nevertheless, by the time he finally heaved himself up onto her hand his muscles gave out. For a moment he could not move, could not blink, and he could hardly breath. Tryn, upon noticing her companion’s successful ascent, shot him a quick smile which went unnoticed. Not long afterward Tom came scuttling out of the ruin, dragging two black garbage bags behind him. He tossed both onto Tryn’s palm before effortlessly climbing up next to Soren. Then, just like that, they were lifted up into the air.

Tryn dusted off her knees as she rose, humming an absent tune.

“You know I really don’t want us to be enemies Eee-nock, but for some reason that’s all you seem to want. Do you want that, to be enemies?”

“No…” Soren tentatively muttered.

“No, I didn’t think so. But if you keep defying me that’s exactly what we will be. Now when we get back I want to talk.”

Soren’s heart sank. There was so much that he wished to ask but he could not stomach the idea of uttering a single word. Next to him Thomas had already begun gleefully digging through his captured treasures, chirping as he went.

“Oooh, got to talk. Got to talk! That can’t be good lad. Nope, can’t be good at all…”

Night was falling but the world was still wide awake. Birds funneled through the lofty pines into the fern covered underbrush. Flocks of wayward deer scampered amongst the fallen branches half-buried in the moss. The once gentle rain had turned to into torrential downpour. Enormous drops of water drenched the glossy fronds and slicked cleanly off the innumerable needles on the far reaching cedars. From his position beneath the shale outcropping, Soren sat huddled against one of the fabrics left on the ground. It provided him with plenty of warmth but he couldn’t help feeling trapped by it. Tryn waited nearby, likewise hunkering beneath her makeshift roof. To any normal human, the streams of runoff bleeding through the cracks would have been powerful waterfalls, but to Tryn they were pestersome trickles cascading down onto her head. She leaned against the rocky face of the mountain, trying her best to contain her irritation. It wasn’t the rain that got her down though. No, by that point she had become fairly accustomed to the weather.

“So that’s it then huh? Not gonna tell me anything?”

Soren looked up from his position. He knew that she would never be able to hear him from this distance, especially with the storm and all. He looked away and tried his best to ignore her. It didn’t help much though, as seconds later, he felt the earth shift. When he looked back over his shoulder, her face hung directly over him.

“Have I not been fair?” She droned. Soren let out a little squeal before falling onto his back with both arms raised. “No, I’ve been more than fair. So now I’m going to have to hurt you.” Tryn’s hand began its slow approach to Soren’s body but before it even was halfway there Soren cried out:

“Wait! Wait no! Hold on just a second!”

Tryn stopped. Her left eyebrow arched up, casting her inquisitiveness in Soren’s direction. Whilst he tried to collect both his breath and his words, Soren anxiously scuttled backward until his back pressed against another rain-slicked boulder.

“Yes?” Tryn asked.

“Ok, I just...I want to know a few things first. I want know why you attacked us in that field!”

“Field?” she repeated. She turned away for a moment, her face buried in thought. “Oh riiight, you were there? Ugh, I’m still pretty mad about all that. Look all you need to know is that those little people you were hurting belonged to me! They lived in my land. Sure they were trying to escape but it doesn’t give you the right to punish them! They are...were mine.”

Soren inched back a bit. Tryn noticed his renewed ambivalence and suddenly lashed out with her hand. Two fingers clamped down on either side of him, forcing the air from his chest and the color from his skin. Though she held him for but a few seconds, the force and shock left him mute for another minute or so. She deposited him in her hand and once again leaned back up against the mountainside.

“I guess it didn’t occur to me until I saw you that I could find some replacements in your territory. Which, granted, should be mine anyways.”

“So..so..” Soren went on, still reeling from his apprehending. “So you just want...more slaves? That’s it?”

Tryn regarded him with suspicion for a second. Soren didn’t understand why, but he felt uncomfortable nonetheless.

“Slaves...I don’t know if I would call them that. Then again I don’t have much else to call them. They just...you just belong to me now.”

“Not slaves?”

“Hmph, slaves would imply they do a lot of work. What you all did today is one of the more strenuous tasks I have you perform. So, yeah I don’t think of you as slaves.”

“Oh...o-o-ok”

Tryn stifled a short laugh which quickly faded back to her usual somberness. Soren didn’t know what to make of her. She was made up of too much contradiction. Whatever she felt she would not express, especially not to him.

“You are confused aren’t you? Well, just know this: I will kill you, I don’t want to but I will. Not everyone in my possession has a purpose, you do. If that purpose isn’t fulfilled then why should I keep you?”

In that moment Soren knew. He could not explain how, or what it was that betrayed her words, but he knew that what she said wasn’t entirely true. There were certain certainties though. Soren knew, perhaps from the glint in her eyes, that she would kill him. Likewise he knew she did have something in mind for him, but he knew that true purpose was not yet clear. And maybe, just maybe, it wasn’t clear to her yet either.

“So, Enock, little bear. Tell me, can you swim?”

 

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