Desolation's Call

Letter: 5x8 in. Recipient name and address redacted with black ink.

A proposal for my esteemed donor. I have served the State and am now happy to set down that mantle and serve as your Delegate in a delicate matter.

I know your collection is nearing completion, but I suspect there are new treasures yet to be found. I’ve caught wind of a so-called “26th Regiment” deserting the army to investigate odd reports from their scouts. Without our support, they’ll be dashed upon the rocks at their destination, so I suggest we fund their mission. Let them carve a dent in the land and its unruly inhabitants, and I’ll move through their wake. If I find a new talisman, I’ll bring it back for another round of our favorite game.

Letter: 5x8 in. Recipient name and address redacted with black ink.

I’ve reached the battlefield, and what a battlefield it is. It seems the 26th Regiment, for all their training, is nothing but cannon fodder out here. They haven’t even learned to burn the fallen. I passed a one rotting soldier feasting on the comrade who’d tried to bury him, with his grave soil still freshly strewn and his friend’s shovel still rigor-mortis-tight in his hand. I burned both bodies, as the chewing noise was too indelicate. At least the 26th have been a useful distraction from my own movements.

I search under every lowly rock for the talisman you predicted would be here, but I’ve seen no sign of the “Land of the Dead.” How I even hate to write the term. I daresay no new location should be named until a man has mapped the length and breadth of it and catalogued its resources. But with your research in hand, perhaps I can make do. The area has changed since I was here last: strange nests, new fortifications. You may be interested in the altars I see behind the walls. I’m formulating a plan.

Entry from a leatherbound journal with gilt edges: 4x6 in.

I found a squadron of soldiers fleeing a conflict, some with their hands tied with rope, faces smeared with black blood. With my Mako, I put down all but one: the one who didn’t look afraid, only tired. If anyone knows how to stare straight into death’s unblinking eye, surely it’s a soldier.

I ordered him to build an altar like the ones I’ve spotted around: weapons entwined in supplication, protective prayers painted in blood. Desperate pleas for order and clean-made cots and straight lines. He didn’t need my gun at the back of his head to make another. He worked tirelessly; taking ears, bullets, and medals from his fallen comrades; vomiting the same black substance that dried on his face. But I don’t feel the same prickle at the back of my neck, not like last time. I’ll send my learned donor a sample of the vomit by balloon, disgusting though it is. Perhaps he’ll have suggestions—and can send me a new pair of gloves.

Entry from a leatherbound journal with gilt edges: 4x6 in.

Pleased to receive both new kid gloves and new information. The blood the soldier vomited had a distinctive, lightning-silver sheen seen elsewhere in my donor’s collection. The soldier has told me of a belief he’s come to hold, a way to fight even in the afterlife. Ramblings of the mad, to be sure, but I requested he tell me more, build his shrines, show me his rituals. He ate his fellows, the ones I’d shot, and didn’t ask me to share my rations. I can appreciate resourcefulness.

But after that, the vomiting wouldn’t stop. He turned on me, as if I were the voice he prayed to, for never answering, for saving none of them. I shot him through the head before he could make it two steps. His stomach muscles writhed even after his breathing stopped. I cut him open, reached into his stomach—another pair, soiled—and pulled out something made of twisted metal.

I believe it’s some kind of key.

Letter addressed to Sheriff Hardin. 5x8 in.

Hello, old compatriot. I hope you don’t mind if I kept your old title, even if the town you served is long behind you. I’m returning from another sojourn, covering my tracks with fire, as I don’t intend this matter to make it back to Washington without my permission. To you, however, I will impart that I found a most interesting new trophy in a most unexpected place. There are many I might sell or gift it to…collectors, researchers, occultists, cartographers. But I’m interested in keeping it, myself. We’ll see how the auction goes, once our friends and acquaintances are gathered.

How are your endeavors out west? I will be keen to know more details at your earliest convenience. As I told you once, a new law requires the sacrificing of the old one, and I have learned much about sacrifice these last few days.