The Tale of Sir Ectane

Chapter 1
Things can only get worse
Anonymous.

The house was wholly unremarkable: it comprised of dull bricks and a dilapidated slate roof, the windows had not seen attention for years the accumulated dirt gave them an odd tinge. The windows were dirty to the point where they provoked dislike but not so extreme to hold a viewer’s attention. The whole place had a cold feeling to it. Unfortunately, it suited its occupant perfectly.

The boy was of average height, average build and less than average intelligence. Even his parents had found him hard to distinguish from their other children, they told him that his isolation in the house was temporary; but the boy suspected it was forever. They had not loved him in the past and they would not love him in the future. The boy comforted himself with the prospect of food; in these long days eating was the only thing left to do. He had been left with explicit instructions not to leave the house, why this was he could not fathom but was too stupid to disobey.
“Stay here it’s for your own good” the ridiculous command reverberated within the walls of his slightly vacant head. A knock on the door awoke him from his stupor; he was in the process of eating some revolting sandwich he had concocted earlier. It was forgotten quickly. He opened the door, a storm was ragging outside. A man stood in the doorway he had a cruel pointed face, short dark hair. He looked like a man who had been handsome in his youth; his age was given away by his tattered grey suit, which looked strangely out of date. The grey man regarded the boy with a lingering distain. After what seemed like an eternity he spoke,
“Your parents will never return, they have abandoned you, in light of this I have been looking for an assistant for some time, the work does not pay well, but it is exciting. All you have to do is leave forever and follow me.”
“What is it that you do?” boy inquired.
“I am in the business of finding things, things which others want but are not sure exist do you follow?” The boy said nothing. A cold silence descended over the house eventually, the grey man began to walk away from the house, the boy followed with a tangible sense of reluctance. What else was there to do? He could only reassure himself with the thought that this was at least his own decision, he though he was in control. The grey man quickened his pace in spite of the vicious weather; he did not want to be late for his appointment. He had the boy but his work was not finished, the contract he had signed was explicit: Failure to meet any of its requirements would result a termination of payment.

As they walked the storm continued to rage, hurling debris and rain at the two travellers the whole world appeared grey. After a couple of hours the boy felt he could not carry on, he slumped to the ground refusing to move. In an instant the grey man’s eyes were on him, all became quite the sound of the storm seemed to subside. Still unable to stand the boy asked the only question he could think of
“Who are you?” An awkward silence the followed the man looked puzzled as if he did not understand. He not had been spoken to so directly in years.
“I am nothing” he replied and with that the weather deteriorated and the Journey continued. The boy sought clarification:
“What do you mean you are nothing? What kind of a joke answer is that? In the name of Jehovah and most of his witnesses!” The man formed what almost to the untrained eye would have looked like a smile and said a perfectly reasonable lie:
“You can always turn back you know, back to a life of simple drudgery and certainty, where the twin idols of knowledge and money can satisfy your every need.” He paused briefly for effect. “You have seen them I am sure the people of the developed world wondering aimless from task to task not daring to look at the sky, being almost content in there assumption that any attempt to an unintelligible is both futile and for more ‘qualified’ people to discover.”
“Surely you are not a Romantic or one of these of these optimists the teachers at school always tell me to be careful of?” The boy asked.
“No, no, no. My dear boy if you knew you would not that I am a pessimist and an anarchist, but not an optimist.” The grey man said with great conviction.

Days merged into weeks, weeks into years. All the time the grey man continued at his relentless pace. One fine day they stopped, an obstacle stood in there’re way it was the largest tree the boy had ever seen. It was a riot of competing colours which were dripping from its sinewy branches, they cast disturbing shadows onto the travellers. The boy shielded his eyes unable to bear its brilliance.
“This is a test” the man spoke in his typical monotone.
“The tree will cure you of your memories of you past life, memories that could impede our progress. All you have to do is touch it. It’s all part of the job”.
“What if I don’t?” The boy whimpered.
“If you don’t I will leave you here to die the most boring of deaths and we wouldn’t want that would we?” clearly the man’s comment was rhetorical. The boy approached with a growing confidence, at last his life had some significance he would do what he was told, and his obedience might earn him the affection he so desperately craved, he could forge a new life in this world of half truths. He was close now he could feel the warmth radiating from the tree. The second he touched it everything changed he felt pure despair course through him everything that had happened before his in fortuitous meeting with the man faded into obscurity and from obscurity into oblivion. The grey man laughed manically exultation setting his face alight, his mouth opening wide enough to show his bone white teeth. Without another word the man and the boy continued to journey into the heart of the city of destruction, at a quicker pace than before. Their pursuers were close.

What chased them could once have been called human, but now it would have to be said with a sense of irony. They were all identical, all immaculately dressed, all faceless and pale. There was no motive, no purpose behind their pursuit. All these millennia they had been chasing the grey man through shades of reality and across imagination itself but he had proved more resilient than they had expected. The chase had provided them with a thrill at first, but it had become so much more than that, it was why they existed.

The travellers were now deep into the rotten heart of the city; the buildings casting jagged shadows on the slimy pavement, this place bared no resemblance to the world the boy had known. The boy felt the need to fill the ghastly silence:
“Why are we here?” he whimpered in his typically pathetic voice. The grey man turned slowly anger coursing through him,
“Because I say so.” The boy continued to reach for as yet illusive purpose to the doomed journey:
“Why am I here?” the boy’s words seemed to be of genuine interest to him, the man stopped and leaned uncomfortably close
“No one can answer that for you, devise what ever purpose will be most comforting say we are on some kind of mission that will surely fail”. The ruined building loomed large around them their blackening walls, everything in this place looked horribly surreal. From the triangular doors on the buildings, to the flaking pink paint that was being devoured by luminous orange mould; nothing looked normal. The boy and the man were moving down the main street towards the town square.
“Isn’t decay beautiful” the grey man sighed, “all the inhabitants died years ago they woke up to the futility of it all and took matters into their own hands”. The boy new what had happened. In one great outburst of pent up rage the populous had destroyed each other. The hot weather had only aggravated things, making an already bloodthirsty community practically rabid. Minor disagreements over land, drink and women had escalated into riots and eventually a massacre which was perpetrated with an almost religious fervour. How the boy recollected this so exactly was impossible to tell. As they continued walking the boy felt a draining sense of defeat filled him as he had realised a simple truth: any sense of progress had been an illusion. They had now reached the square itself surprisingly immaculate fountain was the only thing that could distract the boy from the horror of the place. He knew in there was something fundamentally wrong with everything he was seeing. The whole place seemed to have fallen into disrepair in a surprising coherent fashion, all the cracks in the paving stones formed orderly patterns, as is the city’s ruin had been designed. The boy thoughts were interrupted by the man signalling a halt
“Now” he said in his typical monotone “we wait”.

Some time before

James Dogman hated his job, his life and his annoying wife. He lived in a grey crypt that was apparently an apartment block. Everyday he woke to the sound of the man downstairs screaming nonsense in his sleep, he was told this was due to a traumatic divorce; James didn’t believe this for a second. He hated the man downstairs (he had never bothered to learn his name) not only because of his raving but also his amazing consistency. He could set his watch by the nervous breakdown at 4am every day without fail. After James had recovered from the man’s ravings he had a bland breakfast which consisted of some nameless cereal and proceeded to work. James loathed his job more than anything, more than his wife, the man downstairs and the soulless grey block he lived in. These all seemed bearable in comparison his job. James worked in sales, in an office of sterile cubicles, with a bunch of uniquely detestable people. He spent his days selling useless modern furniture over the phone to equally useless modern suburbanites, who would happily pay anything for the latest fake leather recliner. They were a symptom for him of the disconnection that he and everyone else felt with the brokenness of all this would prove too much for the young man. By the end of the day, James would have crossed the border from sanity to the happy land of mental oblivion. It would all start with a single innocent drop of rain…

James woke from his unthinking trance with a start; he recognised the noise of rain attacking the skylight above his dark cubicle. He tried to return to what he had been doing: a thoroughly unimportant letter which he had no intention of finishing, but he could not, he would not. An intense green light bloomed in the corner of room, which bathed the room in a searing translucent shade. A wave of realisation hit him; the fragile strands of meaning that had attached him to reality were straining, the light offered him a way out, a new purpose a new life and most of all a chance for revenge. James burst out of his cubicle with a manic urgency, he knew now that he had to leave he was under the strong conviction that time was short. He did not even make it to the stairs before he was confronted in the hallway by his boss dread and despondency smothered his new found joy.
“What are you doing? Lunch isn’t for two hours” the boss intoned with all the weight of authority bestowed on him by capitalist society. An awkward silence followed, during which something in James snapped, crimson hatred coursing through him. He grabbed his boss and slammed him into the wall cubicle. The podgy man went limb. To his horror James saw the crimson trickle of blood materialise at the back of the man’s skull. James let his ex boss slide to the floor and quickly made his exit, apparently nobody had spotted him, or if they did they did not care, the boss had not been a popular one. James almost felt regret as he raced down the tower block’s stairs his feet thudding on the cheap carpet he reached the lobby in less than a minute and was soon in the office car park. His car was a nondescript green Ford, which thankfully started first time. James drove home packed his bags and left his old life forever. The part of him that should have felt remorse for abandoning his wife had clearly been jettisoned to make room for his newly found insanity. By now James was no longer alone; another person was dwelling in his head, he that had caused terror in the hearts of all who dared know his terrible name: Simon the sorcerer.

Night had fallen on the plaza which had seen much blood and would soon see much more. The boy and man did not sleep, as the stars shone an eerie green light on them.
“He is coming, he is coming” whispered the man the boy turned, looking for an explanation “Oh Simon, Simon, Simon how many times do I have to kill you? Green is his colour you see his ‘calling card’ as they say. All my life he has been chasing me and now I sense I may get to meet him one last time. Our last meeting was most productive, if I remember correctly, I pushed him into the heart of an imploding star. I digress why would that interest a boy like you hmmmm?”
“I don’t know” groaned the boy, the grey man turned on him spittle flying from his mouth.
“I’ll tell you why you should be interested you little runt, If he finds me again which I am sure he will he won’t hesitate to kill us all.” For the first time death had entered the pair’s conversation, it was to be the first of many. An awkward silence followed. Despite the fear that the boy felt he decided to sleep, he was troubled by vision of faceless men. They surrounded him in the darkness of his nightmare and sang their horrible song in the dark waters of his mind a song that sounded like oblivion itself drawing all despair to it…

The boy woke with a start, at first his vision was just a blur it took him a while to register that he was being violently shaken, by his not so friendly travelling companion who was screaming in his ear.
“Wake up, wake up dam you, they are coming all of the faceless”. In an instant the boy was up and that was when he saw them, a hundred faceless men rushing towards across the plaza many of the scrambling over the fountain with an inhuman speed him all identical of one mind, one purpose. Once more the terrible song arose till the boy could hear nothing else. The boy took refuge behind the grey man who seemed much taller now, he was standing against the tide of enemies. There was the briefest pause before the fighting began, (there was no time for a long speeches or anytime for aimless pacing either) the man smiled to himself and drew what looked like a sword from thin air.

The grey man moved at a liquid pace slicing the first assailant’s arm off. It hit the ground with a dull thud. The grey man screamed manically cutting down two more faceless with a brutal upstroke, their headless bodies staggering back into the fountain which was now bathed in moonlight. The boy stared in awe as the grey man casually dispatched the remaining faceless; it was all over in two minutes. The violence punctuated by the man’s elegant footwork.

It was only after the fight that the boy was conscious of his heart’s pounding, he had been too mesmerised by the battle to notice. The boy looked to the grey man who stood over the last of the dead his weapon shimmering in flux between different shapes, eventually settling into what resembled a sword. For a fleeting moment there was perfectly stillness. The grey man breathed heavily sweat trickling off his furrowed brow.