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Conclusion  

Julius 16th, First Hour of the New Day

  I darted across the grass. My back heavy and my legs so strained that each inch forward I could hear my knees pop with some ligament or bone misaligned. It felt like I was carrying plates, like some horseshoes were anchored into my boots. But I kept going, because I could see them still fighting in the distance. Killing ten, just for twenty more to appear. So’s I had to be quick about it even with my soaked shirt and this thing tied to my chest. Because it wasn’t enough that I was tired, or hopeless, that would not suffice to the city and for myself. I knew that. So I had to be quick before I failed and the before the basilisk corpse slipped off me.

  ‘Cause it wasn’t going to last long, I could already feel the make-shift rope of vines and stalks cutting away with each jerk of my movement. That’s what I’d done. I had snagged some foliage and wrapped a half-gutted Basilisk around my body. My knees were bent low, my shoulders were bumped into intestines I’d had too much difficulty removing. Everything inside of this thing was still hot and moist, which was the worst part. That or the smell.

  And I still hadn’t tested it. But how could I?

  I came across the first creature, gasping and wondering. My body adjacent to a running critter, my posture forward. I saw it move its head towards me, and it made my heart skip a beat. It took one long, yellow look.

  Then it dipped, opposite direction.

  My heart started its mad roaring again. I ran faster.

  Because you see, to them, I was just another stupid, stocky basilisk running towards the big sword swinging angry men.

  It was so good a disguise, Kal raised his blade against me and struck down. If I weren’t so wired and quick, I would have died. I jumped to my side.

  The blade rested next to my thigh, half dug into the ground, the dirt rose up past my face. My lantern, tucked underneath the corpse of the monster lit his face.

  “Virgil?” He asked.

  “Yeah.” The basilisk corpse ruffled above me as I spoke. Then I heard a monster hiss. Kal ejected his blade forward. It pierced a basilisk behind me. I felt the blood run down. Then I looked back from below his sword.

  “The barrel, quick.” I said. He looked at me for a while. “What?”

  “The barrel. Give it here.”

  He looked around, the cliff seemed so far. For him, at least. He put the blade against his rope and made two slits, the rope fell off. The barrel dropped. As if my legs weren’t killing me enough, I lifted the damn thing to my belly and chest, losing my balance and swerving left and right. Kal steadied my with his arm on my shoulder.

  “You sure you can do it?” He asked.

  “It doesn’t matter if I’m sure. I have to do it.”

  He nodded and slapped my back. “That’s for earlier.”

  I smiled. And then I ran.

  I ran forward, the cliff was so god damn close and so damn far at the same time. I could hear the waves crashing against stone and the basilisks - even closer - smelled of fresh salt. I slipped in between them, shoulders rubbing. The The way their flesh rubbed against mine, like the firmest jell-o you’d ever felt in your life. It was like I was running through silicon balloons as they dashed past me with their slick matted skin and towards the three.

  I bumped too hard into one. My body slumped and the barrel tipped over, most of it slipping out of my grip. With a big step, I tried to leverage the weight. And with a big step, the basilisk corpse over my body came undone and pushed me over.

  Ah shit.

  “Ah, shit!”

  The corpse slipped back and slid off my skin like a peel, hanging over the rope tied to my waist. My eyes went wide, but the shore was so close. I kicked the costume off and ran straight forward.

  “Cover him!” I’d heard Obrick scream. Which was a miracle I even heard it, there must have been twenty basilisks screeching behind me. A few coming up the ocean side too.

  One of them caught my leg, gripped it with one of its legs and tried to bite down, I kicked its face. It clung. The barrel slipped out. I was there, on the cliff, my head leaned down, towards the rocks below. It was like last time, I swear, when I stood on the walls and thought of jumping.

  It would have been the easier thing. For sure.

  But I took out my knife, the basilisk opened its maw. I stuck my knife straight in between the fucker’s teeth. It impaled itself, crying. My arm was stuck in its hot mouth, holding the blade. To my rear, the barrel top opened its small slit and the feint smell of petroleum filled the air. Petrol. Gas. Noxious fumes that burned my eyes and made them wet.

  There was no going back.

  I kicked the keg. It rolled down the side of the cliff, spilling the liquid off the side to the mountain, splattering it everywhere until it covered the lip. Then it went down slope, smashing onto the rocks.

  My foot ached. Some teeth were sunk in there. I had about two dozen basilisks coming after me.

  “Light it!” Sylas shouted.

  With a stone grip I lifted my lantern and with a throw that popped my shoulder out of place, I slammed it against the head of the basilisk. The one with my knife, the one with its teeth on my leg. The basilisk who writhed and shook its head in the air, the basilisk whose body ignited.

  I pried my knife out of its mouth and with a leg that could not stop hurting, that made me wince whenever the ankle turned even slightly - I kicked this creature. Shouting, half in glory and half in pain.

  The monster fell back, onto the trail of blackfyre.

  “Watch out, Virgil!” Obrick said. The trail of fire rushed on forward, towards the giant splash down on the cliffside. I looked, my head lazily standing. Turning, just barely trying to get out the way.

  The mountain exploded. My body flew a few feet back, my chest bones collapsed into themselves. I rolled onto the floor and landed face up, everything muted and censored. Breathing hurt. I gasped. Dust screened my vision and behind it, black tongues of fire faintly tinted red so as that even in this darkness, you could see their outline. I looked up. A basilisk head rolled next to me, combusted.

  Sylas came over me, looking down, screaming;

  “Virgil! Virgil! Virgil!”

  That’s all I remember.

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