Part 2
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
—
“Ozymandias”, Percy Bysshe Shelley
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The Masked Singer
He stood at the edge of the crumbling skyscraper, his scarred face aglow in the blood-red horizon where the sky seemed to weep for the sins of the earth. Clouds roiled heavy with sorrow, painting a grim tapestry alive with a tragic wind. It swept through the remains of this monstrosity of a building, reverberating through its rusted bones — a brutal symphony of chaos laying siege to order.
It was fitting for such an occasion. A requiem played by nature itself. Had there ever been a more beautiful way to revel in the prospect of a dying society? Dead ideas and dead people gasping for an air not meant for them. Pitiful.
As night descended upon the wasteland, a grim certainty settled over him; the moment had come. Long dormant in their slumber, the Children would awaken tonight and reclaim a world stolen from them.
As for him, he was only an envoy. The herald of a lesson to those who lived like roaches under the rubble — their very ruins a host for the seeds of a new world. Mother had blessed him with the burden of tending it. An honour, really. He would see it to completion.
And for that, he needed to be perfect.
The ivory mask glimmering in his hands was itself close to perfection. If not for the reflection of his own shape. Two blood-red tears etched their way down the eye slits mirroring the weeping twilight before him, and when he held it aloft, he could see the burns. And the scars. All carved onto his face like the tracings of a map. A scorched, mutilated map — no longer of use to anyone anymore except perhaps to remind him. Again. And again. Disgusting.
He placed the mask tightly over his face, embracing his true form.
The echo of his boots on concrete announced his descent, spurring heads to lift from their tasks. To them, he was a leader, the commander of their crusade. Some called him Elarion. In their tongue, it meant “eldest”. And so he knew them all — every face and every scar scattered throughout the broken hive.
They were orphans of the old world, born into the new, and eager to reclaim their home. The eldest had barely survived a score of winters, the youngest no more than eight. Youth hardened by loss, shaped by fury. Resilient.
Elarion was not much older, but his gaze swept over them with the care of a father. A solemn purpose guided their hands and lifted their feet.
Helena, a girl young even among them, sharpened the edge of a blade. She had not been gifted a true name yet. If she lives through the night, I shall give her one. Nearby, a boy named Yor, his red cloth tied around the arm, had an expression as blank as the void they had learned to tame. With shaking hands, he rolled bundles of wires and explosives. The old world’s weaponry would serve its undoing.
Right on cue, a figure approached, head bowed low in reverence. Sylren, “the guide”, had endured seventeen cruel years. A reliable and sturdy right arm, he would serve a great purpose in the conflicts to come. Might be someday, he’d stand in Elarion‘s place.
Elarion regarded him with a rare respect. The captain’s smooth face, preserved from the harshness of their lives, lay half-buried beneath a crimson scarf. He spoke in their shared language, still primitive in a way — a combination of hand signs and soft, melodic syllables.
“The first target has been located, Elarion. Mother’s words were true.”
As expected. He raised a hand to still the captain’s song and, with a deft gesture, gave him the permission to proceed. Although their dialect matched their youth, its efficiency proved remarkable. Simple concepts were conveyed with single-handed signs, while spoken syllables layered meaning and richness. Together, the signing and syllables wove a language capable of expressing intricate ideas with an elegance that far outpaced that of the old tongue.
Elarion was, among the Children, one of the last few speakers of the old tongue. The tongue of the ancient world. Of the forsaken. He had learned it long before becoming Elarion, and it served a purpose at times. But the sonority it produced rang harsh on the ears — impure and tainted by broken ideals. Soon its voice will falter, crumbling into dust with the world that bore it.
His gloved hand brushed against the edges of his crimson cowl, the fabric whispering faintly as it slid forward. Shadows clung to his guise, transforming him further into something… other. Beneath the folds, his breath hummed softly in a rhythm that drew strength from the ritual. The fires sparkling throughout the nest cast his shape long and monstrous against the fractured walls.
Before one of them, some of the Children knelt in silent reverence. They prayed to a figure etched in prismatic hues — a masked idol weeping tears of blood. The Mourning Prophet. Elarion himself often sought guidance from him, though he was a silent adviser.
His coming had been foretold by Mother herself. He would be the one to lead them to their new paradise and show them the way to salvation. Only she could already heed his warnings; and she had done so on many occasions, sharing the insight that swayed their path.
His current path led him across a makeshift bridge — a single plank secured between two platforms. As he danced to the other side, he could see the depths of the derelict spire stretching endlessly. A buzzing agitation on the floors beneath created a twisting sensation; the metallic structure shifted and wailed under the weight of so many lives. After decades of weathering and disuse, its suffering would be brought to an end.
His attention turned to two winded boys — runners — halted at a corner, offering rations to the soon-to-be fighters. Their presence could only mean that the supply lines were in motion, the carts ferried from the sanctum. A necessary lifeline. The city had been scraped bare, and their cause demanded more than scraps to sustain them. Fortunately, this year’s harvest had been plentiful. And the reaping had only begun.
His reverie unravelled when the path beneath his boots had guided him to his destination. Drapings veiled the entrance, and he swept them aside to reveal the interior.
He had expected the chaos. In her battles against inner demons, the fixtures often bore the brunt. They lay toppled over one another, sputtering the ground in an agonising imitation of war. Only the army had but a single soldier who was laying over the rubble in an impossibly tragic position. Such potential wasted under the grip of wrath and grief.
What surprised him were the various rations scattered across the tent, still intact. Usually, her fits of anger brought an insatiable appetite — a hunger extending even beyond the taste of food. It yielded so little yet required so much. The cravings of substance, the passion of flesh. And the killings of foes. Whether he liked it or not, these were parts in which Elarion had a role to play. Feeding a soul that refused to be sated. And who was he to deny her when he, too, had spent so much of himself trying to fill a void rooted so very deep?A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
He could only try to ease her burden.
“We shall soon make our way to the enemy, Nariel.”
His voice carried the tune to her ears, and she stirred — her pale hand clutching the half-emptied bottle. Even so, she lingered, and the moment seemed to stretch and engulf her. The scarlet fabric of her tunic clung softly to her frame, its folds tracing the curves of her shape. A shape he knew so well. Often, he found himself contemplating her aspect, where all that is beauty in this world seemed to meet. Lost in the study of her as though it was an art only meant for him, and that no other eye could ever comprehend.
There was power in her, untamed and dangerous like a blade forged too quickly and left brittle. Yet even in her chaos, she held a role none others could fill. The emotions that moved her — they were more than burdens; they were fuel, burning bright enough to light the path before so many of them.
Her eyes finally fluttered open, and she struggled to get up, the hazel in her irises shifting before locking onto him.
“Have you come to hold me or scold me?”
Her gaze swirled with exhaustion and something worse — defiance, perhaps. He stepped closer, his gloved hand brushing the edge of a mask secured at his waist.
“Neither,” he said sternly, pressing the mask against her breast with quiet insistence. “The preparations are complete; get you and your group readied.”
Her lips curled into a smirk, and she grasped the white guise. The mask was a reflection of his own, as pale and terrible, but hers bore a crimson eye painted on the brow. As she fixed it in place, the woman faded, leaving behind a harbinger of death.
She became one with Elarion. No more than a shadow.
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When he ascended through the crimson tide cloaking the hill, he felt their fears and their hopes. Their anger and despair. But above all, he felt their love. A love for everything this world could yet become. For everything they fought to reclaim. They were Mother’s hope and Elarion’s pride. And soon, they would be the shepherds of a reborn world.
Elarion’s voice lifted from his chest — deep, resonant, like the murmur of distant thunder. It rippled through the rows of battle-ready children, seeping into the spaces between steel and flesh, plates and hearts. It was a song. It was a cry. It was everything words could not convey and everything they needed to hear.
One by one, voices joined his. Helena’s, with her trembling hands and sharpened knife. Sylren’s, leading the veterans in a tight formation. And Nariel‘s, too, her voice raw yet commanding. Soon, the voices swelled into dozens. Hundreds. Each carried their own battles, their own burdens, but tonight, they would converge into a single, raging storm with the might of a hundred warriors.
At the front of them all stood Yor. Dark eyes and a dark gaze, waiting for Elarion.
“I used to wear the red like you, boy. Tied around my arm.”
He stopped next to Yor and placed a hand on his shoulder. The whole procession halted behind their leader, waiting. “It guided me on many occasions. Gave me the strength to strike. And the wisdom to hold still.” He brushed the edge of a mask that was now his face.
“Until it became part of me.”
The boy lifted his gaze, looking expectantly. A white line, painted like so many Children, stretched across his quivering lips; his hands barely clutched the tiny Pandora’s box. He was only a child — shaggy brown hair and beady brown eyes filled with fear. The boy needed the courage. The will to press the button.
Elarion would give it. That, and more — so much more.
“Tonight, we are one. Unified under the red wrath and the white hope. Each crumbled wall, a seed to grow. Each fallen stone, a chain broken.” His grip on Yor’s shoulder tightened, anchoring the boy amidst the storm of voices. “Your pain is mine,” he whispered.
Around them, the song swelled, every note binding them together in the rhythm of their cause. Yor’s trembling hand hovered over the button. Such a small thing. Such an immense promise.
“Let us bury the old world and watch a new one bloom.”
Yor’s lips parted, his painted line cracking. His voice — so very low— broke into the chorus until it surged with the others and became fierce. The song reached its peak, drowning out everything else. The pleading cries. The desperate sobs.
The whimpering of doomed souls.
Capturing them had been almost laughable. A knife pressed to the throat of their youngest, and suddenly, all the fighting in them had been drained. Resistance blown away like ash in the wind. Now they hung like offerings, tied to the foundations of the building. A totem of the old world.
Dozens of them. Forsaken.
They wiggled and writhed. Like worms. But no amount of begging would give them back their freedom. This land no longer belonged to them. It belonged to the Children. And only their offspring would be given this legacy — the chance to join the white lips and the red scarves.
Perhaps someday they would find their place, much like Helena, Sylren, Nariel. And Elarion. And hundreds of others. Thousands. Perhaps one day, they, too, would be offered the chance to press a button. To chose. And precisely like Yor, they would press it.
The song ceased, leaving the world quiet. But the sound waited.
Then, a groan pulsed through the structure.
The skyscraper quivered under the impact. It gave out, letting go of the memories suffocated in its bones — so many lives, so many years. Metal supports twisted and shrieked. A banshee’s wail. Elarion stepped back, his eyes fixed on the chaos unfolding before him. Such sweet chaos.
Cracks spread across the concrete floors, walls and ceilings — a storm of dust billowing into the air, mixing with the smoke of a hundred torches. Then, with a final roar, the structure bowed before the crowd.
Stone slabs fell in chunks, steel beams bent under the weight, snapping like brittle twigs. And with each impact, shockwaves rippled through the ground. One after another, the floors caved in, booming like war drums.
The Children watched silently, their faces illuminated by the fires and the pink hue of the horizon. Then, a wind swept over them, clouding them in ashes and dust. Nariel stood at his side, eyes gleaming through the darkness of her mask. “You do have a sense of spectacle.”
Elarion let his gaze fall on Yor, who stood frozen, the button still pressed as though afraid letting go might undo what had been set in motion. He pulled him away gently, guiding the boy-now-man back to the ranks.
“You’ve done well,” he hummed quietly. “Now, watch what your resolve has wrought.”
The tower had vanished in an instant, but the sound, the sight, and the weight of it lingered still. The crowd fluttered, the red of their scarves and handkerchiefs like drops of blood on the pale landscape.
The chant returned as they moved in unison, flooding the streets towards their targets. His was decisive. An outpost of the forsaken. Filled with roaches. It was a first step towards their goal, marked with great sacrifice. And so the camp would fall before dawn. Mother had promised as much, and she had never lied before.
A low hum rose in the distance, faint at first — wind through hollow bones. Then, it deepened, resonating through the empty streets and broken alleys. Throaty and wet echoes from places unseen, joining the Children’s song. Elarion had expected it.
It came from everywhere. From nowhere. A chorus not made by human tongues, yet eerily, impossibly, it harmonised. The voices of the old world.
From the echoes of the earth and the forsaken’s blood: a lure. Deep in the darkness, something had awakened in response. It listened. It sang.
And it stirred.
***