A would-be Conqueror meets an ignominious End

Bill opened his eyes.

He was alone.

No Splock. No Duo. No comforting presence of pointy-eared logic or swashbuckling piracy. Just him, the wind, and the distinct smell of burning something that had probably been important.

He was on a roof. The top of a building—or what was left of it. The structure beneath him had seen better centuries. Cracks spider-webbed across the concrete. Rebar protruded from broken edges like the bones of some massive, long-dead creature. Smoke rose from a hundred fires below, painting the sky in shades of orange and black that would have been beautiful if they weren't announcing the end of the world.

A siren wailed in the distance. It had the exhausted quality of something that had been screaming for weeks and had long ago given up hope of anyone listening.

Bill knew this look.

He'd seen it before. Dozens of times. On dozens of worlds. After he and his fellow Space Troopers had finished "liberating" them for the Emperor.

"Post-apocalypse," he muttered. "Lovely. My favorite aesthetic."

The wind picked up. It tugged at his uniform—singed now, edges blackened, the fabric telling a story of recent unpleasantness. It also tugged at something else. Something flapping against his leg.

Bill looked down.

A magazine had been jammed under a piece of debris, and the wind was working it free. Pages fluttered. Colorful pages. Pages covered in images that—

He snatched it up.

The cover screamed at him: NIGHT OF THE LIVING CHINGERS by Stephen Thing. Below the title, a scene of unspeakable horror: seven-foot-tall Chingers—not the seven-inch kind everyone knew, but giant, shambling, zombie versions—pursuing screaming women in various states of undress. The tagline read: "They came back... for MORE!"

Bill stared.

Bill's face twisted. "Stephen Thing. I know that name. Hack. Pervert. Writes the same book every time—scary thing does scary things to people, the end. And people buy it. They line up. They call it art." He kicked the magazine. It fluttered, revealing an inside spread even worse than the cover. "Art. Sure. Art is what I'm looking at right now. They're doing what with their tail-claws? That's not even anatomically—"

He threw the magazine away from him. It fluttered in the wind, pages still turning, showing the world images that would haunt anyone unlucky enough to glance up at the right moment.

"I hate that guy," Bill announced to the empty sky. "I hate him so much. Every time I see his name on something, I know I'm going to need brain bleach. And yet he keeps writing. And people keep buying. And the universe keeps spinning, indifferent to the filth it contains."

He took a breath.

Heroic pose. That's what the moment called for. Standing on the edge of a ruined skyscraper, looking out over a burning city, the wind in his hair—he needed to look heroic. Needed to feel heroic. Needed to say something heroic.

He squared his shoulders. Lifted his chin. Parted his lips to deliver a speech that would echo through the ages—

A gust of wind caught him.

Not a gentle gust. A real gust. The kind that had been saving up aggression for just this moment. It slammed into Bill's back, lifted him off his feet, and sent him stumbling toward the edge.

He grabbed.

Rebar. Rusty, sharp, glorious rebar. His hand closed around it, and he swung, dangling forty stories above what used to be a street.

Something soft and papery slapped against his face.

The magazine. It had circled back. Of course it had. The universe wasn't done humiliating him yet.

Bill found himself staring at a centerfold. A two-page spread featuring a Chinger and a woman in a position that would have required extensive consultation with a contortionist and possibly a veterinary surgeon.

"THING!" he screamed at the uncaring sky. "I HOPE YOU ROT! I HOPE YOUR NEXT BOOK GETS USED AS EMERGENCY TOILET PAPER IN A PRISON CAMP! I HOPE—"

The wind stole the rest. He threw the magazine as hard as he could, watching its pages flutter down, down, down into the burning city, where it would probably be found by some future archaeologist and treated as a sacred text. Good riddance, Blood Ravin'!

Bill looked around. The roof. The fire. The complete absence of any safe way down.

He pulled himself back onto the roof and surveyed his options. Stairwell door? Blocked by debris. Elevator shaft? Open, but elevator cars didn't work in post-apocalypses—everyone knew that. Fire escape? He peered over the edge. The metal ladder ended twenty feet down, rusted away to nothing.

Something caught his eye. Leaning against a broken railing, attached by a heavy chain, was a skateboard.

A skateboard.

In the apocalypse.

Someone had chained it to the rail, probably assuming it would be safe up here. Idiot. Nothing was safe anywhere anymore. Bill grabbed the chain, twisted, pulled. It snapped with a satisfying crack.

He examined his prize. Wood. Wheels. Bearings that might still work. And a long, sloping concrete slab leading from the roof down to... somewhere. Somewhere lower. Somewhere hopefully less on fire.

He straddled the board. Gripped the edges. Closed his eyes.

"Here goes nothing."

He pushed off.

The ride was fast. Terrifyingly fast. The wind screamed past his ears, drowning out the sirens, drowning out his own involuntary yells. Concrete flashed beneath him, inches away, rough enough to peel skin if he fell.

He didn't fall.

For about three seconds.

Then the board hit a bolt.

A single, rusted bolt, protruding from the concrete like a middle finger from God. The front wheels caught. The board stopped. Bill didn't.

He flew.

Arced through the air in a trajectory that would have impressed a ballistician. Tumbled. Spun. And landed in a pile of garbage—the softest landing available, which wasn't saying much, since this garbage included broken glass, rusty cans, and something that might have been a dead animal or might have been a very old sandwich.