Part Thirty Nine: Beyond The Rift

	The first thing that surprised Caleb was how graceful the drop was. In light of certain past experiences he had expected to feel as if he were being sucked through a vacuum tube, but instead the portal gave way beneath his feet as if it were just thin air, depositing him on the ground in his new location with only the slightest of auditory thumps. The next thing that surprised him was that, wherever the hell he now was, the place evidently had no guard rails. He stumbled in spite of himself at the sight of the near endless void that presently surrounded him, something that caused the gunslinger to land unceremoniously hard on his now well worn and ancient rump. Caleb was once again placed on a seemingly weightless platform hanging over a just as apparent nothingness, enclosed by nothing more than a vast array of starry night.

	Well, that was not entirely true. On either side of him were placed two great stone obelisks, and extending out in front of him was what looked to be akin to some kind of stone vessel designed to ferry him across to his next destination. On this contraption a panel with the palm of someone's hand carved into it could also be plainly seen, and the old gunfighter slowly found himself to be increasingly drawn to it. Placing his own hand into the sculpted grooves, Caleb soon discovered that the panel itself gave way easily to his touch, and before he knew what was happening the stone structure beneath his still unsteady feet suddenly took off with an alarming amount of speed. Caleb then noticed that he was heading towards an even larger floating structure, the architecture of which reminded him greatly of the Hall of Epiphany.

	Wherever this outpost was, it must have been a creation of the Cabal and Tchernobog. Caleb thought back once more to the book entry that had brought him to this place. All it had said was that the castle contained some kind of gateway to the otherworld, which was presumably the same place he found himself in now. The scroll he was searching for was also said to be able to upset the balance of power in this otherworld. It was then that a thought struck the old gunfighter. If his scroll was supposed to be capable of overcoming life and death itself, how exactly was it supposed to be able to accomplish that by changing things here? Caleb suddenly felt a cold feeling rise up from inside him. The Cabal had been trespassing on sacred ground. This place was not meant for mere mortal's to tread, or at the very least, it was not meant to be accessed by mortals on this side of the grave.

	Then again, it could be argued that given that caveat Caleb could still qualify. He was now certain that the otherworld he was now in could actually be better described as the world beyond. After having been hounded by his spectral agents and having even seen the man himself in passing, Caleb had now gone and knocked directly on death's door itself. With that in mind, could he not now find his fallen comrades and take them back with him? The thought, though enticing, presented with it a not inconsiderable list of associated difficulties. So far at least Caleb's access to the place seemed limited just to this lone settlement created by the soldiers of Tchenobog, and even if he was somehow able to find his fellow Chosen ones here, Caleb's own means of returning back to the land of the living for the moment remained very much undetermined.

	The scroll was the key to this place, the old gunfighter knew, and finding it remained very much his top priority. Yet another cold shiver then ran up Caleb's spine. Somehow even the thought of breaking the rules of this world left a bad taste in his mouth, even as he openly contemplated the idea to himself. His own disgust at the undead creature he had become was surely a part of it, but even with that thought being accepted, his own revulsion at the idea of breaking the bindings of this reality welled up inside of him so strongly as to make it seem to be one of the gunslinger's newly discovered passions. If it were not for his own just as strong personal desire to see the faces of those he had lost again he would never have managed to come this far. Through the scroll he hoped to satisfy both of his compulsions, returning Ophelia to him without defiling the place he was now in.

	The vessel he was riding on then docked with the approaching temple, and Caleb made his way up a series of winding steps made in dedication to the dreaming god once more. Tchernobog must have had big plans for this place. The old gunfighter thought back to some of the being's last words to him right before he had shot the god down, a fresh anger rising inside of him. "With the power you bring, I shall throw open the door between the worlds and inherit the earth." It was a perversion, and even though Caleb still did not fully understand the reason for his present choler, he was now extra glad that he had put an end to Him when he had. Even though his heart now felt burdened by this new strange sense, the old gunslinger was still glad that he had made it this far. It was a journey that he had to make in order to see that his business here was finished, once and for all.

Hamish Paul Wilson
November 30, 2014