The Black Days of the House of Mienstrire, Part I

[Wil Mienstrire]

The End Complete IV: The Road and the Damned
by Coheed and Cambria

I believed, in the world right in front of me,
But now, along these empty streets.
Where this curse haunts these memories,
Of a man and all he's lost.

No time to think about it. No room to breathe.

If I had a way back, I'd ride through the dark and the dawn
(But please don't wait for me)
Because the man you love don't live anymore.
I can't go home again.

Tonight you'll sleep.
No fear of what might become of me, my dear.
Within these end of days,
Where this longing turns this man to prey
On a love that yearns to die.

No time to live and doubt it
Girl, I'm worth the second chance. (What have I done?)
No time to think about it, no room to breathe.

If I had a way back, I'd ride through the dark and the dawn
(But please don't wait for me)
Because the man you love don't live anymore.
I can't go home again.

I believed in the world once in front of me, well now that's gone.

If I had a way back, I'd ride through the dark and the dawn
(But please don't wait for me)
Because the man you love don't live anymore.
I can't go home again.

Bye, goodbye. Bye, goodbye
Bye, goodbye, bye. Bye goodbye, my dear.

Wil shuddered from the cold, huddling in the corner. The stone walls weren't helping to keep any of his body heat but it was the safest place. They couldn't come up from behind Wil this way. They'd just wait until he slept then. But Wil didn't sleep. Not anymore. He'd... he'd... Wil would kill any of them if they ever came close to him. Ever.

Several fires burned throughout the large room but they were surrounded by all manners of creatures, that were talking, eating, sleeping, screwing. But none of it mattered, some had been there much longer than Wil, and then a lot were new or newer, having just arrived, having just been captured, like Wil had been.

[Wil Mienstrire]

Approximately nine months ago...

Wil leaned back, his hands behind his head as he relaxed in the small cabin. Getting off and away from that planet sure would make things a less stressful. That old deputy gone bounty hunter was crazy, he was and it just kinda weirded the man of the hour, Mr. Mienstrire himself, out when someone practically stalked you like that.

It had just been a measely bank robbery. Sure Wil had used the wrong kind of explosives and blew up the building and half the block by the end of it. And it was only like, four police officers, to include the sheriff, that had died from all that. A lot more people could've died if Wil hadn't been as careful as he was. And those police had been shooting at Wil anyways. Ya know, like the holovids, don't dish it out if you can't dish it in.

But that deputy had said something about that dead sheriff being his dad. Wil had never had a father so it was a bit hard to relate. And then when that deputy had shown up later, having lost his badge and become a bounty hunter just so he could kill Wil and enjoy every second of it, Wil hadn't really felt too bad when the deputy/bounty hunter got run over with Wil's speeder. The fact that the guy showed up all bandaged up a week later at the spaceport is where wil started to get worried.

He and Dani had been split up, which didn't make this really any more comfortable than it absolutely had to be, but they would be meeting back up on Tatooine. They were taking separate shuttles there for safety precautions. Wil was just going to arrive a week earlier, no big deal. He was going to miss that babe for that week though. The flight was going to be a while, Tatooine was a little bit a ways away but it was ok. Maybe that deputy/bounty hunter just needed some time to settle things out.

Wil's eyes closed and he drifted into sleep, trying to escape the loneliness of being awake.

It's coming for you, my son. The darkness, embrace it as I once did. If you don't, the darkness will yet still embrace you.

Wil was awoken by a great shiver that seemed to run through his body and continue on to run through the whole of the ship. Glancing at his chronometer, Wil noted that he had slept, remarkably, for almost 36 hours. The dream had been much longer, much much longer, but he could only remember those few phrases. And upon second thought, Wil wasn't sure if it had been a dream or a nightmare really. Those words were a bit... dramatic, Wil would have to say. But nonetheless, it was still a dream and something seemed very wrong with the cruiser that Wil just happened to be a passenger on.

[Wil Mienstrire]

It had been the shudderings first, and then the klaxon alarms everywhere. Not a single person had known what was going on as they all stumbled into each other. The lights had gone out, all but the emergency power active. Which meant all doors were open; none of them were locked anymore. The mass mania of movement, people trying to get to the escape pods.

Wil was scared for his life and was in a bit of shock. He felt like he was just stumbling around in a river of people, trying not to get trampled. He'd already tripped once, and no one stopped; they just kept coming, and coming. He had started to head for the escape pods at first but rumors and words kept coming back that something was really wrong, like scary wrong with the whole thing.

And then Wil had witnessed first hand where the shuddering was coming from. The ship had shuddered, and Wil saw why. A small object, the size of an X-wing or something, had collided with the cruiser a bit of the ways down. And then he looked out, to see if there was anywhere they were coming from, and saw one headed right towards him.

He had screamed, tried to, until his voice went out. But he climbed, and climbed, over the river of people, just trying to get away. It was coming, Gods, it was coming. And no one listened, they just screamed, and stood there, and screamed some more. A man grabbed him and Wil kicked, and kicked until he was into the next sector, still so many people clamoring around. And then the ship shuddered, but they could all feel and hear what it really was this time. The initial noise was the rupturing of the hull. The next was the pressure as the area was depressurized. The emergency locks dropped, sealing off that sector and a majority of the noise.

There was another pop as the pressure was stabalized in the sector Wil had just managed to crawl into but they could all still hear the screams and bangings on the emergency lock. It eventually faded from the door but the delirious state everyone in the sector Wil had crawled into was only heightened now.

"What the..."

Wil kept low to stay free of any flailing limbs as he searched for an entrance deeper into the ship. He had to get away from the sides. Maybe find a map, work his way out from there...

Yeah, that's it, Mienstrire, do something. All of these people are just standing around like cattle. You're no cow. No freakin' way.

[Wil Mienstrire]

As he made his way further into the ship he noticed a few other, weathered personnel looking for ways to stay alive, and that meant away from other people. Especially given those horrendous stares they would give him and anyone who came close to them. Which was fine with Wil, if it was not the mob losing their heads as one, it would be the others like him who had it out for themselves and would accomplish what the mob might but in much more sinister ways. What they might accomplish could be anything from spilling some of their drink on his rockin' jacket to trying to kill him and make a wall of bodies to keep the whatever-it-is away from whoever might be into that kind of thing.

He did occasionally see that group of people. They were either the elderly or the young, younger he supposed given his age. And they looked lost and very alone, very, very alone. He supposed that put him with the rest of the ill intent since Wil did not feel overly composed to doing anything for them. Even more so because every babe he came across already had a guy defending them and that just meant he'd be that guy and that was not just how he rolled.

"Hey, you, kid. C'mere."

Wil turned on his heel, making his right hand into a pistol, yeah, the thumb in the air and the index finger out kinda-deal. He was banking on it looking like the real thing in the dark.

"What in deep space is that, kid? Put your hand down, you ain't scarin' no one here."

The voice came from a guy who totally fit the gruff part that came with it. In fact, he looked the part of one of those military commando figurines that Wil used to play with when he was like maybe five or six. He used to take them and make them the Rebel Alliance and pit them against his stormtroopers and then set the commandos on fire and watch them melt onto his mother's coffee table.

"Uh... yeah?"

"You look lost and lonesome, ya do, kid. Stick with us, we're gonna get us and whoever else we can out of here."

Wil went on the defensive, clenching his fist about to tell these guys off, that he was dark side master and can wrip people's spines out and twirl them in the air with his MIND! But he didn't. Deep down, he felt the lost and lonesome bit and it rattled him to the core. If these guys had a way out... They looked like they could wrench a locked door open with their bare hands.

"Uh... Alright..."

He scratched the back of his, wincing slightly, feeling like all of the sudden he was just a kid, and the grown ups were in charge. It set his free spirit off kilter to think of it like that but honestly...

"Alright, Baltsin, Gared, take point, lets move down. They hit the ship from all sides on a horizontal plane. Mash doesn't think they came from below and given what Nycum saw of 'em, they ain't normal. We were skirtin' the Unknowns and I think... I think we're up against somethin' out of there. Which is bad, really bad."

Why was Wil listening to this guy speak? Wil was actually shaking with fear. What he saw was making more sense as the big guy spoke to his small group of knuckle dragging, pipe hitters.

"I saw them too!"

The group turned as one, critical glances all around. The one that the leader had indicated as Mash tipped his chin to Wil.

"Great, cupcake. Take it easy, stay calm."

Wil needed to keep quiet after that. There was definitely some space there, socially, between him and them. Wil guessed that wasn't too bad either, given they seemed like uh... professionals at... whatever commandoish stuff they looked and sounded like they did. Not so sure a five year old could melt these guys down.

[Wil Mienstrire]

The trip down was not actually that bad. After it had been quiet for a while, Wil figured that was permission to talk. Or better yet, ask questions. Nycum had seemed quiet at first but appeared to actually be the most inclined to talk. Nycum's secret strategy to Wil's ignorance was that if he gave the kid answers, he'd eventually shut up. Little did he know...

Either way, Wil now knew everyone's name and that they were in the Construction business and knew a lot about ships and heavy industry because they needed to because it worked out the edges in their construction profiles and their boss' name was Ophelia and that they were on the ship in order to deliver some architecture files they had acquired in negotiations with another company named Empire Unlimited which Wil was pretty sure that company would probably have a huge law suit ahead of it with the Galactic Empire, but that was besides the point.

So they were heading down into the depths of the ship. To the docking bay, Wil guessed. An escape ship was in there. Is that what one would call it?

"'Ey Nycum, would you call it an escape ship?"

Nycum was walking in front of Wil so the kid did not see him roll his eyes, reconsidering his strategy.

"Escape vessel, and no, that's not what we're heading down here for."

"What then?"

"Hey, Nycum, shut that kid up will ya?"

Mash was not really the talkative type, Wil had determined.

"Wil, last thing so you don't pee your pants, but then we gotta shut it in case they are here too..."

Here too? Wil involuntarily shuttered, surprising himself at the ease at which fear flowed through him.

"We're gonna blow the core."

Blow the core? Holy... They were gonna kill everything... Everyone... Everything... The whole scheme flashed through his head at what this small group was suddenly capable of. But it made the most sense from what Wil had seen. Those things were... they meant death. If this was all there was to offer back, so be it.

"Uh..."

Realizing he was not supposed to but intended to anyways,

"Is there an escape plan?"

His question was a bit rough but the faintness in his voice was concluded with a loud swallow of worry. The rest of them glanced back at him but did not say anything. He sighed but tried to keep quiet as a sense of something ominous developed inside his chest. It kinda hurt his stomach too.

[Wil Mienstrire]

They hadn't stood a chance. Those things had been waiting for them. Well maybe not for them, but they had been there nonetheless.

How does one describe something so... unfamiliar? Wil came Coruscant, mostly human but nothing too bizarre. He'd been in mad love with a feline-ish woman who he still had amazing hot love for but was pretty sure he was going to die soon so he'd just have to hold onto the thought of it then. But still, a trip out in space here and there still did not match up to the fear of the unknown that these things struck in him.

There were three kinds. The stout ones were round, like ball round with stubby little legs that appeared to have no knees. Their face was about the whole front of their body with gigantic eyes that seemed to glow in the darkness of the engineering deck. Their mouth was as wide as they were and lined with teeth, so many teeth. It was their arms though, they had two sets, short stubby ones to match their legs/feet and then a set of spindly long arms that could possibly wrap the whole way around another one of these strange ball creatures. There were only three of them and they were attaching something to the main engine unit.

The next kind that Wil saw were the bird faced ones. large marble-looking beaks but for the three eyes on each side of their head which all moved indepedently. They had no wings but their blue-black feathers shimmered in the little light available and maybe meshed in their was some armor. There was a ton of that kind, and they held large spear like weapons that had crystal tips that emitted a strange glow but provided seemingly even less light.

The third kind, Wil only saw one of them and he got a brief look at it too because he could not take an extended glance. It was tall, like eight feet tall kind of tall and it had what looked like bats wings without any skin, which Wil thought was kind of useless. Either way, the fact that it had a slit for a mouth that went vertical instead of horizontal and was located at the neck was a bit unsettling and then its head... It was like a mannequin. A blank face, void of eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. The hair was was the same light blue of the skin and seemed to be consisted of weird looking pipes that flexed back and forth, maybe its way of breathing.

Wil saw all of this as the group he was in stealthily snuck up there by the way. And the commandos, errr, construction workers were extremely good at it. Wil kept hearing all the noises he made as he walked but could not for the life of him hear them.

They made it as close as the laser gates, an odd thing to have around here. Wil could not find much of any purpose to them except for maybe the dramatic moments upon which the oddities noticed them there and then which they had to wait while the transparent laser gates were closed before they opened, which made sense one way or another.

It was the tall thing that pointed them out. How it did that, Wil had no clue but it literally pointed straight to them. With a curse from Hathaway, that was the gruff leader fellow, they had jumped up to make a break for it and then the bloody birds had practically gone flying by, without wings mind you.

Wil was too dumbfounded to do much but watch as the birds squawked an awful shriek. Mash and Baltsin... Wil gulped again, stuck in his tracks as they both suffered from severe trauma to the neck, those sharp spears the birds had went straight through with a sickening ease and a grace that betrayed the birds' skills. A bird had moved forward to grab Nycum and he struggled only for so long until he too had a spear through him. Wil figured that must have been enough dead men as the rest of them stopped resisting. Wil must have been a relief because he put his hands in the air as soon as he saw Hathaway back down.

Wil was shaking, the metal grating below him stirring every so slightly to his vibrations. He bit his lip to keep from yelling out as black armored hands took his wrist, the tip of a spear resting at the base of his skull where it met his neck.

What fear you know, my young Mienstrire.

[Wil Mienstrire]

So many people. It seemed that all of those that Wil had meant to escape and leave to their fates had found him again. He was up a bit higher than the rest so he could see the sea of heads above him. Wil had positioned himself between the wall and a supporting pylonish kind of thing. Hathaway dozed against the wall beside him.

The commando seemed much older than he had before. Their captivity had resulted in mass confusion as they had been unceremoniously thrown into the herd of people and then the herd had been thrown into... this place. He felt like the toy maker having been swallowed by the whale. It resembled a large rib cage, they pylonish support thing even felt like bone.

They had lost track of Gared in the mass of people but Hathaway had held onto Wil's wrist with an iron grip. Why he did so was beyond Wil's knowing but Wil would not say the was ungrateful. Maybe Hathaway, even knowing Wil in such a short time, did not want to be completely alone. And after watching Nycum die, the only commando willing to talk to Wil of the group, he felt really alone.

Wil had shifted from his stoop earlier and Hathaway and blinked himself awake lazily. Young Mienstrire took that as a signal to not do anything stupid like move around so he had stayed where he was. Hathaway had explained earlier to Wil to not examine the ground for too long. Given their method of transportation and the amount of people, there were bound to be a carpet of trampled people underneath each foot. He would glance though out of boredom to see if he could catch a glimpse. He had seen a few limbs and appendages, bruised and bloodied, here and there. He'd almost thrown up. The stress of the whole ordeal was something that made him almost want to cry. The reality, his reality, had been squashed and shattered and thrown up all over again in a matter of hours. And this... crowded darkness seemed to be neverending. And Wil really needed to pee.

[Wil Mienstrire]

It was the dust that him first. Sand blowing in a strong wind that hit him in the face like steel wool scrubbing his face, namely his eyes. He was quickly brought out of his dazing sleep, Hathaway beside him, holding his wrist again.

"We're planetside somewhere, boy. Keep your face down, ain't nothin' to see anyways and save your sight from this blasted wind."

The source of the wind was accompanied by a howling that must have been some kind of engines and then a large crunching noise followed by ensuing shudders that reverberated throughout the foundation of their cattle car. Wil could not think of a better name.

The floor was opening. The realization hit Wil like an iron weight in his stomach. He was not the first though to make it over this intellectual speed bump of events. The screams rose up like a great wave that washed over them all. The sea of heads started to diminish like the maelstrom was at the center and the wind only got worse as more people disappeared.

The screams were joined by another noise that Wil had heard maybe hours ago. That awful squawking of those... bird headed things. He wildly searched for the source of their shrieks and there they were, coming from the hole in the ceiling. They were crawling like spiders along the ceiling, their heads moving in quick, jerking movements. One person had climbed up the wall, trying to keep from being pulled down to wherever people were going beneath the cattle car. But Wil could see the inevitable; the bird-head thing scuttled towards the guy and with one arm, grabbed him by the shoulder and the guy went flying into the middle. There weren't even people there anymore, just the void from which all the wind and sand was coming from.

A bird thing was scuttling toward's Wil now, he must've been high enough, too high.

"Hathaway!"